Chapter 574 - 40: Well Said! Me Too

"You’re really something else, kid. A natural-born Demon Lord, able to be so self-righteous even while admitting you’re evil."

Yara, carrying Su Zhou’s phone, rolled down from his head and onto the table, trying to avoid the Karmic Fire. It shook its head. "It’s unlikely to burn yourself to death, but I’m warning you—when that Karmic Fire ignites, it’s incredibly painful."

But at this, it couldn’t help but laugh. After all the battles he’d been through, had Su Zhou ever been a stranger to pain?

It was just as he himself had once said: if you can’t endure pain, how can you bear being undying? Su Zhou, possessor of the Undying Blood, was perhaps the person in this world most capable of enduring pain.

So, it fell silent. It quietly watched Su Zhou and touched the cold flame with the tip of its finger.

In the next instant, the Karmic Fire, which had barely covered the young man’s arms, suddenly erupted into a roaring blaze that engulfed Su Zhou’s entire body.

The moment the Karmic Fire touched him, Su Zhou searched his conscience.

’Am I an evil person?’

He questioned himself, judged his own actions, and easily arrived at an answer.

’Of course I am.’

’I kill as I please. My battles have inevitably harmed innocents. I’ve broken numerous local laws and frequently cause trouble for others without a shred of remorse. I often act on a whim, relying on my own strength, and do extreme things without considering the consequences.’

’I’m certainly not some arch-villain, but by my own standards, if I ever ran into someone like me, I’d definitely beat them up.’

"Double standards really are instinctual, aren’t they? I’m no exception."

Letting out a long sigh, Su Zhou then chuckled. "But at least I can recognize that. It means I’m not all that bad. Deep down, I’m still a good, kind, and upright boy."

But he quickly realized something was wrong.

’That’s weird. Why doesn’t it hurt?’

Black flames burned all over Su Zhou’s body. He had expected to be in immense pain—at least more pained and exhausted than when he and the National Master Demon Emperor had torn out each other’s organs and devoured each other’s flesh, or when he had battled the Water God for a full day and night. But not only did he feel no pain at all...

In fact, his conscience... no, his *body* felt a bit hot.

’This fire is actually pretty warm. I didn’t think this cold flame would have any heat to it once it was lit.’

Su Zhou tried to control the black Karmic Fire on his body, but he failed. After all, what he could control was the source of the Fire of Sin. What was burning on him was the sin itself, ignited by the Karmic Fire—they weren’t fundamentally the same thing.

The young man was completely baffled. "Theoretically, I should be able to burn myself—does this thing even have any power?!"

"Yara, what’s going on?"

Su ’Nobita’ Zhou cried out for help.

"Weird. Once the Karmic Fire ignites, you should feel like you’re being roasted at the center of the sun. Why do you just feel a bit hot... Oh, I get it!"

And Yara A Dream, after examining Su Zhou closely, came to a rather peculiar conclusion. "You have too much Desire Power. It’s blocking the Karmic Fire."

"Jeez, I almost forgot you saved two worlds—oh, and you recently added that contract with the Beast God Realm... Let me put it this way: your Soul is basically wrapped in several ridiculously thick layers of Desire Power and Merit. Forget the Karmic Fire. Even if one of the Immortal Gods used the Nail-Head Seven Arrows Book on you, they’d be the one to die, not you."

"Until every living being in those two worlds who remembers and praises you is gone, you’re basically immune to all Curses."

By the time Yara finished speaking, the Karmic Fire on Su Zhou’s body was already starting to die down. Theoretically, Karmic Fire cannot be extinguished until all sin has been burned away. But Su Zhou’s Desire Power was as vast and endless as the ocean. The only reason the Fire of Sin had managed to burn for even a few minutes was that Su Zhou had instinctively reined in his Desire Power and actively allowed the fire to burn him.

"Why can’t I see the Desire Power and Merit on myself?" Su Zhou asked in confusion.

"If you had a mirror that could reflect Merit, you’d be able to see it," was Yara’s reply. "A Diviner never divines their own fate. The same principle applies to Desire Power. You can’t see your own."

After all that, Su Zhou still hadn’t successfully managed to test the power of his new Divine Technique. His aggrieved expression made him look like a big kid who couldn’t find a place to play with his new toy.

In the end, he had no choice but to take Yara’s advice and wander around, looking for some depraved, wicked person who fit the bill so he could test his new ability. From a certain point of view, this too was an evil thought, but Su Zhou, long accustomed to his identity as a Demon Lord, paid it no mind.

’Now I need to find a "little cutie" to test the power of the Fire of Sin on. Who’s going to be the lucky one?’

Unfortunately, after a full six hours—from afternoon until late at night—of flying over half of Zhengguo, Su Zhou still hadn’t found a suitable target. After all, he was looking for a truly wicked person, the kind whose death would be no loss. It wasn’t that Zhengguo had no such people; it was just that Su Zhou had already rounded them all up a few months ago. There were none left for him to find now.

But eventually, after flying out of the country, Su Zhou found a suitable candidate in Southeast Asia.

He was a middle-aged man in a clinic, beating an elderly man.

He was a patient, and he was beating his doctor.