DEMON KING AZRAEL: REBIRTH OF THE ECLIPSE

The first thing I tasted was my own blood, metallic and bitter, like a copper coin left to rot in the rain. It pooled in the back of my throat, thick and choking, forcing a ragged cough that felt as though someone had driven a rusted nail through my lungs. "Still breathing, are you? You persistent little cockroach," a voice sneered, muffled as if heard through a thick layer of peat. A heavy boot slammed into my ribs. The crack was audible, a sharp, sickening snap that sent a fresh wave of white-hot agony screaming through my nervous system. I didn't cry out. The boy whose body I now inhabited had no breath left for screaming, and the King who had just woken up within him refused to give these peasants the satisfaction. Where am I? my soul demanded, a flickering flame of abyssal darkness struggling to ignite within a vessel made of glass and wet clay. The silver blade... Selene's eyes... the cold of the Void... it should have been the end. "Look at him, Senior Li! He's actually staring at you. The worm still has a bit of spirit left," another voice jeered, followed by the wet sound of a spit hitting the stone floor near my ear. I forced my eyes open. My vision was a blurred mess of grey shadows and flickering torchlight. I was lying on a frigid stone floor in what smelled like a warehouse for rotting herbs and damp grain. My fingers, thin and calloused, clawed at the dirt. This wasn't my body. My hands had been broad, scarred by a thousand battles, wreathed in the purple flames of the Eclipse. These were the hands of a child, skeletal and trembling with a weakness that made my stomach turn. Han Xiao... a fragment of a memory surfaced, a dying echo of the soul that had just vacated this wreck. Outer disciple... Azure Cloud Sect... orphan... the 'Trash of the North Peak'. "I’m talking to you, you deaf mute!" The one they called Senior Li—a youth with a face like a slapped ham and robes that smelled of cheap incense—grabbed a handful of my hair and yanked my head back. The world spun. "The debt, Han Xiao. Where is the Spirit Stone you stole from the dispensary? My patience is thinner than your chances of reaching the next moon," Li growled, his breath smelling of stale ale. "I... didn't... steal it," the voice that came out of my mouth was a pathetic rasp, a ghost of a sound. Li laughed, a harsh, grating noise that echoed off the damp walls. "Still lying? You were seen. Now, either you hand it over, or I’ll see how many of your fingers I can snap before you lose consciousness again. Boys, hold him down." As two other lackeys moved to pin my shaking shoulders, a surge of cold, ancient fury began to stir in the depths of my shattered soul. It was a familiar heat, the rage of Azrael, the King of the Sunder, the Sovereign of the Nine Hells. Selene... I thought, the name a poisoned dart in my mind. Did you do this? Did you cast me into this pathetic cycle of reincarnation to watch me crawl in the mud? I closed my eyes for a second, ignoring the dull thud of a fist hitting my stomach. I turned my gaze inward, searching for the vast ocean of darkness that had once been my power. Instead, I found a desert. My core was shattered into nine jagged shards, each one glowing with a faint, mocking light far beyond my reach. My meridians were clogged with filth, my blood was thin, and my dantian was nothing more than a dried-up well. A thousand years, a whisper resonated from the very fabric of the world around me. The Empress of Heaven rules the stars. The Demon King is but a myth used to frighten children. A thousand years? My heart—Han Xiao’s heart—stuttered. I had been gone for a millennium. The woman who had pressed her lips to mine before sliding a dagger of concentrated starlight into my spine was now the sole ruler of the heavens? "He's drifted off again! Wake the bastard up!" Li shouted. I felt a bucket of icy, stagnant water splash over my head. The shock sent a jolt through my system, and for a brief moment, the connection between my soul and this broken body tightened. The pain didn't vanish, but it became objective. It was data. A map of where I was broken. Left radius fractured. Third and fourth ribs cracked. Internal haemorrhaging in the abdominal cavity. Severe malnutrition. "You want... the stone?" I wheezed, my eyes locking onto Li’s. Li grinned, leaning closer. "That’s more like it. Tell me where it is, and I might let you sleep in the infirmary tonight instead of this pigsty." "Come... closer," I beckoned with a trembling finger. Li sneered, his arrogance blinding him to the sudden stillness in my gaze. He bent down, his ear inches from my lips. "Speak up, trash. I haven't got all night." I may have no energy, I whispered to the darkness inside me, but I still remember how to kill. I didn't use strength. I had none. I used leverage and the memory of a thousand executions. My hand, which had been limp on the floor, suddenly shot up like a striking viper. I didn't punch him. I drove my thumb deep into the soft tissue beneath his jaw while my other hand gripped the back of his neck, pulling him down into the momentum of my rising head. Our skulls collided with a sickening thud. Li screamed, stumbling back as blood sprayed from his broken nose. But I wasn't finished. Using the surge of adrenaline, I rolled onto my knees, my breath coming in ragged, burning gulps. The world tilted dangerously, but I forced my centre of gravity low. "You... you bloody animal!" Li shrieked, clutching his face. "Kill him! Break his legs! I want him crippled for life!" The two lackeys, stunned by the sudden outburst from a boy they had considered a walking corpse, hesitated for a fraction of a second. That was their first mistake. Focus, Azrael, I hissed at myself. Redirect the pain. Use the residue of their own fear. As the first lackey lunged, a tall, spindly boy with a reach far greater than mine, I didn't retreat. I stepped into his guard. I felt my own rib groan under the pressure, but I ignored it, sliding my foot behind his heel and driving my elbow into the hinge of his jaw. The boy’s head snapped back, his teeth clacking together with a sound like breaking porcelain, and he crashed to the floor, unconscious before he hit the stones. The second one stopped dead. He looked at his friend, then at me. I was a mess of blood and wet rags, shaking uncontrollably from physical exhaustion, but my eyes... I knew what he saw in my eyes. He saw the abyss looking back. "W-what are you?" the boy stammered, backing away. "I am the consequence of your poor choices," I rasped, the voice sounding less like Han Xiao and more like a tomb opening. "Get him, you coward!" Li roared from the floor, his face a mask of crimson. "He's just a fluke! He's still the same trash!" I turned my head slowly toward Li.