Vael Moraine

Vael couldn’t believe he had to do this again.

Coming back to this stupid, pitiful world. Invading it. Getting his hands dirty for a place they had already conquered once. It made no sense. The cultivators here could no more stop the demon invasion than they could lasso the moon. So why was he here, yet again, ushering in the apocalypse?

It was boring. Utterly boring. Yet here he was, doing the same thing once again.

He wanted to incinerate something.

The last time he’d been here, the end had come at night. He remembered it clearly—lounging in the Imperial Palace of the Empire of a recently deceased royal family, one hand idly swirling wine while the other toyed with the blonde hair of a certain “pet” princess. A bright-eyed little thing, dressed in nothing but humiliation, made to serve as his court jester, concubine, and punching bag when he was bored.

He had been just about to force himself on her again when, in a blink, he’d been somewhere else entirely.

The snow-bound peaks of the Pagana Mountains bit into his lungs, the stink of demon blood gone from the air, his fingers gripping cold stone instead of silk. And in his head—memories. A whole other life. The invasion. The conquest. And the knowledge that he would have to start over.

It was infuriating.

The first time, everything had gone well—well, mostly. His direct superior—the Condor Magamaga—hadn’t even known what Vael was really doing, much less the demon nobles who commanded the war. The Ten, they called themselves. Vael never knew their true names, only their titles: Wrath, Greed, Pain, Fear, and the rest. He wasn’t even sure if the titles matched their natures, or if they were just for show. Demons were like that—equal parts misdirection, backbiting, theater, and savagery.

None of them seemed aware of the reset. At least, none of the ones Vael had spoken to. Which made sense. He was, after all, the architect of the last downfall.

Now he was preparing to do it again; and as he thought back to his exploits and the conquest, he realized it had not been perfect. They had lost a lot of resources and the over all conquest had taken much longer than it should have as he looked to find crack against the seals tht seperated this world from others.

It had given the rifraft of this world time.

The iMurai, with their unyielding honor codes and absurdly refined swordcraft, hadn’t fallen into line as quickly the first time around. They had been weakened by the Orcs, but still fought with everything, their whole being when they were finally called upon. Where the cultivators flinched and compromised, the Murai cut weakness out of their ranks like a tumor. The Serrans of the southern warrior-cities were the same—an unbreakable military culture that held strong even as the demons poured across the land. Neither had been easy to crush.

The Iron Tide of the Orcs were a problem too.

Brutal, unrefined, and extremetly difficult to control. They weren’t like human armies, where you could break a few nobles and watch the rest crumble. Orcs fought until nothing remained—of the enemy or of themselves. Even when the demons offered them blood and strength, they turned it back with snarls, preferring to die on their feet than kneel. They had eventually found a few to deceive and that help their downfall, but orcs...they were stubborn.

But then there had been the prince.

An anomaly among his kind—more refined where others were savage, sharp where others were blunt. He spoke with the cadence of a courtier but fought with the fury of his bloodline. For a time he united the fractured clans bringing unity and purpose to the orcs who had been a scattered and beaten down people. Under his banner, the horde stopped being a rabble of warring tribes and became an army with discipline a direction if not control. He rallied them not only to resist but to strike back, and his counterattacks carved swathes of demon flesh from the land.

For months, Vael’s demons forces bled against him. He pressured the demons to fight like prey instead of predators—ambushes in the high passes, night raids on supply caravans, brutal running battles where the prince’s forces vanished into the fog as quickly as they appeared.

It had been… irritating. More than irritating. The prince gave them a war worth remembering, and if not for his eventual death on the field—cut down after holding an impossible line against three demon nobles at once—Vael wondered how far he might have gone.

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A shame, really. The orcs were never so dangerous again after his fall.

This time, Vael would be methodical and much more aggressive. It had taken YEARS last time. He should be able to accerate the timeline by ten this time around if they preformed correctly. He had to contend with the Murai, the Serrans, the Empire, and the orcs in proper succession—with more intrigue and aggression this time. No flashy conquest for conquest’s sake; no letting the lesser demons run amok for the sake of the beautiful destruction it caused. He had to control the demons and their legions build strenght quickly and crush the resistance.

Only then could he get off this godsforsaken world.

He could not be complacent; he would need to be even more strategic, as there was clearly some force here he didn’t understand—something that had triggered this… do-over.

The do over didn't matter. He had destroyed this world once. He could do it again. The mortals of this world didn't have the tools, the people, the power or culviation to stop him.

Step one: break the Empire again.

He was already in the process of releasing the blood sickness into the Tier 1 families. It would be do eariler and more aggressive leaving out subtly. This version would do even more damage quicker as he had refined it with knowledge he gain from human alchemists. He would cut down Claire Wang before she had the chance to develop and fight back.

Vael thought about Clarie Wang.

That woman had been a problem—an anomaly. A human cultivator who had reached peak human in less than thirty-five years. Unthinkable. At first, she had run from her own power, weighed down by fear, secrets, and some deep, unresolved hesitation.

He had always wondered what had caused her to run, to live like a rat in fear.

Then, five years later—right when the different fighting factions had been defeated—without warning, Claire Wang came back into the world like a storm unleashed—cutting through battlefields and demon elites alike. It was too little too late. She was strong, but she couldn’t rally the resources; there simply weren’t enough people to fight the Legion.

That was until she did the impossible and ascended to the Transcendence Stage.

From that point, Claire Wang became like a death goddess. She crushed the resistance—all of his forces. There was even discussion of the Demon Gods and the Demon Lords coming to deal with her.

That didn’t end up happening. Fortunately, she died after killing most of the Ten that were acting as generals of the Vanguard. The demons would have been in trouble if that had not happened, as the woman fought with a fire—an anger—that bordered on self-hatred. If it had not been directed at him and the others, it would have been almost beautiful.

This was the reason why Claire Wang was the priority. No one rose that far, that fast, without help. Not in this world. The humans of this world didn’t understand true cultivation—the levels and power--the power beyond Human. The levels and being beyond were truly terrifying. But Claire had stepped into that upper world—too late, but she did make it. That isn’t something one does in this backwater transient world, not without something—or someone—opening doors that should have stayed sealed.

Vael had destroyed her once. This time, he intended to know exactly how she climbed so quickly… and to burn that ladder to ash before she could take the first step.

Which was why he traveled to the Second Ring and stood in the eastern pavilions of the Wang estate, the lacquered scroll case cool under his arm, flanked by two of his best-dressed operatives.

They came as merchants—travelers bringing items of power and potential influence.

He had half expected her to attack him on the spot. What he found was… impossible.

Claire Wang walking toward him with polite interest and zero regard for her own defense or safety. She had no guards and no real cultivation presence to speak of—her mana was so thin it was barely detectable. In the first run, she’d been a blade hidden in silk, her aura cutting the air itself. Now she was… nothing.

And when she looked up at him, there was no recognition. Only the polite curiosity one might give a passing stranger.

“You must be Mr. Vael Moraine,” she said, tilting her head, eyes narrowing as if to focus on a memory that kept sliding away. “Your reputation precedes you; your skills and wit come highly recommended.”

Vael smiled faintly, masking the calculations spinning in his mind.

If this really was Claire Wang, then her meteoric rise had not even begun. Which meant the trigger for her growth was still ahead—and possibly changeable. Then he might simply have to wait and watch a bit longer.

That was when he felt it—someone watching.

Across the lotus pond, a tall man stood half in shadow, studying them. Vael met his gaze and offered a polite, empty nod. The man didn’t move, but his presence was weighted, suspicious. Protective.

Claire noticed nothing. She was still speaking, asking about trade goods and artifact provenance in a tone too casual to be real. Vael answered as any merchant might, keeping the words harmless while letting his eyes map the shape of her aura, the rhythm of her breathing.

It was weak. Untrained. Not yet dangerous.

But he had seen this before. In another life, she’d been like a dormant ember—until something turned her into a wildfire.

This time, he would find that spark before it lit.

And snuff it out.

Vael smiled. This time there would be no mistakes.

“Master Vael.” A voice interrupted his musing. The communications spell spoke directly to his mind.

“Skylin,” he thought sharply. “You know how unstable and dangerous this form of communication is. Why would you interrupt me in this way?”

“It’s urgent, sir. It’s the Southern Passage Gate—the one you had opened before you left.”

Vael paused. The Southern Passage Gate was part of his master strategy for this second conquest; in the first timeline, two armies of the Ten had gotten only partway through that location before some sort of convergence overload blew the gate up. He had opened it early this time, and it was already accumulating strength there. He had opened three others like it.

“Why are you bringing up the Southern Gate?”

“It’s under attack, sir. The Iron Tide has set upon it.”