Demons Beside You

The mudman led Chen Zhao to his Cave of Ruins. He lived there alone.

The Cave of Ruins was in the middle of a swamp. Some lower level demons and creatures lived here.

Chen Zhao had seen records of Hellbugs in the demonic medical book. They were basically a type of parasite.

The previous Grim Reaper had experimented on humans and demons. Hellbugs could live on them. Hellbugs weren’t fatal to demons, but they definitely were to humans.

Thankfully, there were no Hellbugs in the human world. The human world wasn’t suitable for them either. Unless a Hellbug could find a host in the human world extremely quickly, they wouldn’t be able to survive.

Because of the environment, even if one or two Hellbugs appeared in the human world, only one or two people would die. It wouldn’t become a widespread disaster.

In Hell, having Hellbugs was a common illness, just like roundworms in humans back then.

Some lower or smaller demons suffered greatly though. Hellbugs couldn’t kill them, but they were still painful.

The previous Grim Reaper mentioned two treatments in his notes. The first was a biological extraction, or surgery.

The second was driving them out with medicine, similar to how humans drove out roundworms. The previous Grim Reaper also discovered poison ivy, a type of plant in Hell.

Poison ivy was a common toxic plant in Hell. It contained poison that was fatal to both demons and humans, so you couldn’t use it directly. It had to be refined first.

After extracting the poison, the ivy could be made into an antidote that would quickly drive the hellbug out of the host.

“Bloody Hunter, go find some poison ivy.”

“Yes, Living Lord.”

A while later, the Bloody Hunter found a clump of poison ivy.

Chen Zhao began extracting the medical elements of the poison ivy. He put it inside a cup filled with demon’s blood. The blood would absorb the poison of the ivy. When he took out the ivy later, the poison was mostly gone.

After that, Chen Zhao had the mudman eat the refined medicine.

The mudman was clearly unwilling. After all, in his eyes, poison ivy was a huge toxin and he would die. However, the Bloody Hunter was obviously fatal too, so he grudgingly ingested the poison ivy.

A while later, he threw up and there was a Hellbug in the vomit.

The dark red creature was as thick as three fingers together and around three feet long. There were suction cups on each end. It was still very lively and tried getting close to Chen Zhao.

He took two steps back and the Bloody Hunter squashed the hellbug.

After expelling the Hellbug, the mudman became much more spirited.

This was Chen Zhao’s first demon patient. However, the Hellbug wasn’t that troublesome of a condition. The treatment process and theory was clear too. It wasn’t difficult at all.

“Most respected living being, these are souls I fished out of the River of Death yesterday. Please accept it.”

The mudman held up two souls locked inside a fist-sized crystal ball. They’d shrunk a lot, but Chen Zhao still saw the terror on their faces.

“Uh…I said I don’t need to get paid.”

“No, this isn’t payment. This is my respect for you.”

“I really don’t need it. I have no use for it.”

Chen Zhao truly didn’t need it. What would he use it for? It wasn’t like he ate souls.

“These two souls look very complete. You’re so lucky. Where did you find them?” The Bloody Hunter looked at the two souls in the crystal ball.

Most souls floated down the River of Death after falling into Hell. The demons would capture these fallen souls like fishermen.

Some souls were more complete and remembered most of their lives. They were more valuable. They could be divided into dozens of soul fragments. Others were more broken. Their memories were already shattered, so they were naturally less valuable. It was a feat if a demon could get one or two soul fragments.

As a resident of a territory, the demons had to pay tax to their lords, which was in the form of soul fragments.

For example, a small lord like Beelzebub could get more than 1,000 soul fragments per year. He wasn’t very strong, but his territory was in a good place. The River of Death would flow through it, so he was pretty well off.

The Bloody Hunter found a few more sick demons for Chen Zhao. These all had common diseases. It was easy for Chen Zhao to treat them too.

After these cases, Chen Zhao became much more familiar with demonic medical knowledge.

Studying for ten years couldn’t be compared to actually doing it once.

After half a day, Chen Zhao returned to the human world.

Knock, knock.

As soon as he exited the basement, he heard the knocking outside.

Opening the door, he saw an overweight 50-year-old woman holding a piece of pizza.

“Hi, I’m your neighbor. I live across the street in the third house to the left. I heard that there’s a new neighbor, so I came over to say hi. This is freshly made.”

“Thanks. I’m Chen Zhao, but you can call me Chen.”

Chen Zhao didn’t reject her. After all, this was his first interaction with neighbors. The pizza wasn’t the main point. It was the thought that counted. If Chen Zhao wanted to keep living here, he had to have good relationships with his neighbors.

He didn’t plan on acting like a cold city guy or an unfriendly stranger.

“I’m Mary. My husband is Bant. I think you two will become friends. I won’t disturb you anymore. Goodbye.”

“Goodbye.”

Chen Zhao and the demons crowded around to eat the pizza when someone knocked on the door again.

It was a man around 50 years old. He seemed to be close to Ethan’s age, but he was completely different from Ethan. While Ethan was the decadent middle-aged type, this man was tall and burly like a bear. He had a strong presence.

“Hello, I’m Mary’s husband. She just said that there’s a cute boy here.”

“Uh…I don’t think I count as a cute boy…” Chen Zhao wondered how Mary described him at home. He was nowhere close to cute.

“Okay, whatever. Mary said that you don’t look back, so you want to come to our town’s bonfire party tonight?”

“Sure. Thanks for your invitation. Oh, can I bring my kids?”

“Of course… You’re married?”

Chen Zhao moved to the side. There were some small furry heads eavesdropping in the corner. “These are my kids.”

“Of course. I’ll come pick you up tonight.”