“What in the thousand hells?!” Xin Fu exclaimed as he fell onto his ass.

He quickly scrambled behind one of the rather large trees that populated Fallen Valley and cursed his luck.

‘What in the thousand hells?!’ Fu repeated mentally as he watched the swirling vortex of pure demonic qi manifesting itself from a horrific crack in reality in a matter that defied explanation.

Every part of Fu’s instinct told him to bolt, he’d gathered herbs and other resources in these enchanted woods for over two decades and had never encountered something like this.

He needed to tell someone, give the town a fighting chance! But no matter how much he willed it, his traitorous legs wouldn’t budge.

Fu would have sworn that he would never feel anything as terrifying as the presence before him, but he would have made a liar out of himself instantly, as he suddenly didn’t feel it.

---

While Fu was busy being scared shitless, Dan was experiencing something new.

Existence.

‘Ah.’ Dan muttered into the void, not the void that he had just left, but the void of silence that met his presence.

For a timeless second, Dan just ‘sat’ there, experiencing his new normal. It was as if his brain was connected directly into a google server, and all the information in the world sat at his fingertips.

But he didn’t have a brain, and the information didn’t sit there, it was him moving as naturally as breathing.

‘Dammit.’ Which was not at all naturally now that he thought about it.

But now that the moment was over, he did what came naturally to him, he pulled his qi, which he now knew the energy he was sensing and controlling was, into himself, stopping the world from knowing of his presence for free.

It was the basics of the basics, according to all the information he had, which was again, him.

‘What do I want?’ Dan idly wondered, but he found his answer quickly.

He smirked to himself, and began naturally wielding his qi in a way that would allow himself to.

A pair of lips burnt itself into the realm of Murim, followed by a mouth to fit itself upon, and a pair of lungs that allowed the first breath of Dan’s new life to occur.

It occurred bit by bit as Dan willed his qi to create what he knew was possible. Thousands of lifetimes worth of knowledge aided his machinations. Cells, organs, meridians, nerves, chemicals, DNA, his qi allowed himself to meticulously pull atom after atom, molecule after molecule into existence, with bits and pieces that even he did not know aided by the natural chaos that occurred in his wake.

It was an extremely intensive process that required the utmost attention to detail, yet the essence that was Dan didn’t bother to overview the operation. That was the being that was Dan, knowledge given form, if he knew how to do something, he could do it, within limits.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

Dan paused as that part of him came under view, he knew he had limits, but the knowledge about what his limits actually were… well, limited.

Dan smiled as a small bit of information added itself into his form, that was part of what his limits were answered.

Dan finally took at his appearance, and begun laughing hysterically.

He just couldn’t help himself, his instincts had betrayed him.

---

Fu was about to faint. The poor guy had just witnessed the most grotesque sight he had ever seen. And once the thing had completed the macabre process of creating a flurry of organs and blood and pulling themselves together, the stunning beauty of a man started laughing manically.

The man before him had fine, arched eyebrows, a rounded jawline, a dainty nose, and slim facial proportions. His hair was nothing like Fu had ever seen before, the long black strands held a luster and delicacy that made him imagine flowing obsidian held together by a blood-red ribbon.

Combined with the delicate figure, flowing traditional black robes and jade like skin, the only reason Fu was sure this was a man, was because he had seen the ‘organs’ themselves form before the robe had.

But this man was obviously inhuman, even without the strongest spiritual presence Fu had ever felt, along with the feat of hiding it, the iris of the man was blood-red and when Fu managed to peer closer with his qi enhanced sight, the pupil of the man swirled with barely contained inky chaos.

And that was all before the man ‘talked’.

‘Ah fuck, I never thought my preferences would be put on blast like this.’ The demon, for that was all this creature could be in Fu’s eyes, intoned without even bothering to move it’s mouth.

Fu didn’t hear it, it wasn’t in any language that Fu knew, and he obviously was missing the context of an entirely alien culture…

...but Fu understood. Knowledge radiated from the demon when it spoke, and all that was present would understand.

Fu was about to fall to his knees not from the other-worldly experience, but from the confusion and stress.

‘On blast?! Who is hearing this? And who in their right mind would judge a demon on something as simple as their preferences?! …Does he know I’m here?!’ But no matter how much Fu contemplated the meaning of the knowledge in his head, the intent of the ‘speaker’ just wasn’t transmitted.

Dan would have to be considerate to a person he did not know was there to do that.

’Should I change?’ Fu inwardly gasped at the revelation that the demon could change his appearance at will. ‘Nah. I should keep honest with myself.’ Dan was absolutely conversational in his ‘tone’ and demeanor, leading Fu to continue to sweat needlessly.

‘I do wonder though, did the fetish develop the interest, or did the interest develop the fetish? Ah, a true chicken and egg situation.’ Fu understood the statement in it’s entirety, but that only lead to more questions than answers. The chicken/egg paradox he was introduced to did leave a lasting impression, though.

The demon paused in his inane speculations in apparent shock.

‘Am I asian?!’ An entirely alien race of people?! In his shock, Fu was shocked yet again as he felt a shift in something Fu couldn’t quite fathom.

‘Oh, it’s just every race seems kind of like that in this world, and this northern race of people are the ones that are the closest analog for caucasian? Cool, cool.’

Fu’s everything was spinning.

The demon continued to ramble on. ‘No wait, it’s not that being asian is a bad thing, it’s that changing something like that just to fit in reviles- oh, why are you defending yourself Dan? It’s not like anyone is here?’

Fu should have been relieved at that statement, but all he could do was wearily note that the demon’s name is Dan.

‘I wish there was something like…’ The demon named Dan trailed off as some kind of illusory plane appeared in front of it. The demon looked at it curiously, then with bewilderment, until the spell broke and the demon just snorted. ‘Fuck, that’s just me.’ The demon laughed while waving away the illusion.

‘Xianxia is close enough to litrpg anyway for it to not matter.’

‘Why is the demon referring to genres of fiction?!’ Fu felt like he was about to spit blood.

Fu wished that anything would happen to distract the demon, anything at all.

And Fu learned a very important lesson about making wishes while under duress when the 12 chi tall hulking behemoth came crashing into the clearing that the demon was in.