Childhood Friend of the Zenith

"Huff… huff!"

Beneath the moonlit sky, the Black Moon Empress ran, her movements frantic.

"Hah…!"

Sweat drenched her body, fear carved deep into her face. Though she had long surpassed forty, she had maintained her youth through the Absorption Art, a sinister technique that allowed her to steal vitality from others.

The number of women she had drained and the men she had used had long exceeded hundreds.

Yet despite her youthful appearance, inside she was a villainess rotten to the core—one now consumed by terror.

‘I have to run… I have to get away.’

Faster. Faster. She had to escape.

‘Who the hell was that man?!’

She had seen his face. The moment she recalled him, a chill ran through her spine.

He looked like the Fire Artisan Demon.

That disgusting, depraved man who had clung to her, his eyes filled with filth, his abilities beneath contempt. She had always found him repulsive and avoided him whenever possible.

But—

‘…He was different.’

The man she had encountered wasn’t the Fire Artisan Demon. She was certain of it.

Who was he?

‘The face was the same, but everything else was different.’

His energy, his presence, his very being. He wasn’t an orthodox sect member, but she had no idea what he truly was.

How could someone perfectly replicate another’s appearance without using a disguise technique?

‘And The Sky-Changing Emperor… that old man was killed instantly.’

A martial artist who had mastered external cultivation to the extreme, known for his nearly impenetrable defenses. He had once boasted that even the Three Lords would struggle to break through his guard.

‘What a joke.’

He had died without resistance.

His chest had been torn open, his heart ripped out as if it were nothing.

‘Damn it.’

Was she mourning his death? Not in the slightest. The Black Moon Empress had no interest in what happened to The Sky-Changing Emperor or the Fire Artisan Demon.

‘But now what?’

Right now, her only concern was her own survival.

‘If I had known a monster like that was involved, I would have never taken this mission.’

Grit.

She clenched her teeth. No one had told her about this. She had simply been instructed to gather at the front lines, handle the Vigo, and eliminate the orthodox sect members inside.

‘Was I set up?’

Had she been deceived?