Raising the Villain in Wrong Way

A slow, rumbling sound began in Yan Lie’s chest. It was deep, rough, and vibrating.

It took the terrified audience a full five seconds to realize that the Mini Demon Lord wasn’t growling.

He was laughing.

It started as a chuckle and erupted into a full-blown, booming roar of genuine, psychotic amusement that shook the rotting roof tiles of the nearby huts.

"Spiritual dysentery!" Yan Lie laughed, throwing his head back. He looked back down at Ji’an, his red eyes blazing with a sudden, terrifyingly intense fascination.

He ripped his halberd from the ground and took a step up the stairs, ignoring the garlic ward completely, stopping until his broad chest was inches from Ji’an’s spatula.

He leaned down, his face entirely too close, his hot breath smelling of ozone and fire.

"You have spine, little cook," Yan Lie whispered, his voice a dark, thrilling promise. "I like spines. They make such a satisfying sound when they snap."

Ji’an didn’t step back. She met his glowing red eyes with deadpan, absolute exhaustion.

"If you snap my spine," Ji’an stated flatly, "you’re making your own dinner. And I highly doubt you know how to properly season a rhino."

Yan Lie stared at her. The smile on his face turned sharp, feral, and utterly captivated.

The Myriad Illusions Lower Realm was supposed to be a survival test against beasts.

But as Lin Ji’an looked at the Demon Lord invading her personal space, the Assassin watching from the shadows, and the memory of the Ice Genius waiting furiously on the outside...

She realized the true test had nothing to do with monsters.

It was a test to see how long she could survive being the accidental center of a reverse-harem of absolute psychopaths.

And judging by the way Yan Lie was currently looking at her, her time was running out very, very fast.

***

The air in the deserted village was thick enough to choke on. The thick, creeping fog swirling around the cobblestones seemed to hold its breath, waiting for the inevitable slaughter.

Yan Lie, the Blood Sovereign, the undercover Mini Demon Lord whose mere name made entire continents tremble in the original novel, leaned forward.

His massive, muscular frame completely blocked out the pale moonlight filtering through the mist. His burning crimson eyes locked onto Lin Ji’an, a feral, domineering smirk playing on his lips.

He was radiating the kind of oppressive, alpha-male, "trashy CEO" energy that was designed to make weaker characters swoon, tremble, and ultimately submit to his overwhelming authority.

He was expecting fear and submission. 𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

However, what he received was 1.5 pounds of seasoned, blackened iron directly to the forehead.

CLANG!

The sound rang out across the silent village like a temple bell.

"Ow! What the—?!" Yan Lie stumbled backward, his hands flying up to his face. The sheer absurdity of the impact short-circuited his demonic reflexes.

It didn’t pierce his skin since his demonic aura was far too dense for a mortal weapon to draw blood, but it stung like a nest of furious hornets.

"Trash!" Lin Ji’an barked, her voice lacking any trace of fear.

Instead, it was filled with the specific, volcanic rage of a head chef whose kitchen had just been insulted by a rude customer. "Absolute, insufferable trash!"

She didn’t retreat into the hut. She stepped forward, closing the distance between them.

THWACK!

She swung the Black Iron Spatula again, bringing the flat edge down hard on Yan Lie’s armored shoulder.

"You think you can just barge in here?!" Ji’an yelled, stepping into his personal space and swinging the spatula in a relentless, rhythmic flurry.

Whack! Whack! Whack!

"You think because you’re tall, wear too much black silk, and have a voice like you gargle gravel that you can just order people around?!"

"Stop that!" Yan Lie roared, raising his massive arms to shield his face. He was completely disoriented.

He was a tyrant who fought with heaven-shattering halberds and blood-magic.

But he did not know how to defend against an angry youth aggressively swatting him with a cooking utensil, as if he were a misbehaving stray dog. "Do you know who I am?!"

"I don’t care if you’re the Jade Emperor himself!" Ji’an shrieked, driving him backward down the rotting wooden stairs.

Smack!

The spatula hit his shin. "I don’t care if you are a demon, a god, or the Lord of the Underworld! You do not dare to walk into my camp, track blood onto my porch, and demand I cook your parasite-ridden meat medium-rare!"

Yan Lie stumbled off the bottom step, his boots hitting the dusty cobblestones.

He tried to raise his massive halberd to intimidate her, but Ji’an didn’t even flinch. She just swatted the wooden shaft of his weapon with the spatula.

"Put that oversized stick down before you poke someone’s eye out!" Ji’an reprimanded fiercely, her dark eyes blazing with an authority that somehow entirely eclipsed his demonic aura. "Listen to me very carefully, you overgrown edgelord. I hate your tone. I hate your attitude. And I absolutely loathe this overbearing, ’I-own-the-world’ routine. It’s cliché, it’s toxic, and it does not work in my kitchen!"

The entire courtyard was paralyzed.

The Class 7 disciples, who had just watched this man cave in a Rank 4 Rhino’s skull with a single blow, were staring at Lin Ji’an with their jaws unhinged.

Tang Bo had stopped breathing altogether, while Princess Ling’er was peeking through the cracks in the door, her eyes wide with starry, absolute awe.

Even Mo Wuchen, the sociopathic Assassin who had been meticulously plotting his own manipulations from the corner of the hut, had dropped his teacup.

The delicate porcelain shattered on the floorboards, but Wuchen didn’t notice. His amber eyes were fixed on Ji’an, his perfectly crafted mask slipping to reveal pure, unadulterated shock.

’He is hitting him,’ Wuchen’s brain scrambled to process the data. ’That man’s Qi is an abyss of slaughter... and the cook is hitting him with a spatula. And that man is retreating, completely defenseless? Does it even make sense?’