Divine Martial World, Stone Town.
"Have you noticed? Recently, there seem to be a lot fewer Martial Cultivators."
"Uh... now that you mention it, that does seem to be the case. It's been almost half a month since we've seen Constable Huang. I wonder where the Martial Cultivators have gone?"
"I heard that yesterday, someone in Little Stone Village went mad, killed their entire family, and even injured several constables who went to assist."
"A while ago, that butcher on the east side of town also seemed to lose his mind, treating his wife like a pig and slaughtering her. It's said he even mixed the meat with pork to sell to the townspeople."
"Ugh, stop it! I'm never buying pork from the east side again, it's disgusting..."
"Why have there been so many strange occurrences lately? Why are so many people going insane?"
"Help! Someone's gone mad, help!"
From afar came heart-wrenching cries for help. Upon hearing the noise, most people's first reaction was to find a place to hide, then search for a weapon, and finally to peek and watch.
Very quickly, the constables of Stone Town rushed to capture the mad person.
Surprisingly, the mad person was just an ordinary person, yet they managed to hold the upper hand against several Body Refinement Realm stage seven or eight constables.
If not for the timely arrival of the Qi Cultivation level Captain, it might have been challenging to apprehend the mad person quickly.
Having witnessed the madness firsthand, the people chatting on the street didn't dare to stay long and quickly said their farewells and hurried home.
"This is the eighth case of insanity this month." The Record Officer noted down the details of the case before rushing back to the yamen to report to the County Magistrate.
Upon returning to the yamen, he found it unusually quiet inside, devoid of any sound.
The Record Officer didn't pay much attention to this odd silence, assuming that everyone at the yamen was out handling business.
After entering the yamen, the Record Officer was never seen again.
Beifeng City, City Lord's Mansion.
Lu Jingfeng evaluated the reports from various towns and villages, noticing many cases from one or two months ago, yet there had been no updates for a long time.
"Someone, call Master Lin over..."
After inquiring, Lu Jingfeng discovered that it wasn't that these towns hadn't had any incidents, but that they had lost contact.
The officials sent to the towns had also vanished, with no word from them, disappearing entirely.
Bang! As Lu Jingfeng was speaking with Master Lin, a loud noise suddenly erupted from outside.
Soon after, the cry of a servant could be heard.
"Master, something's wrong, Third Young Master has gone mad!"
Lu Jingfeng's expression changed, and in the next moment, he appeared in Third Young Master's courtyard, where the contorted face and bloodshot eyes of Lu Third Young Master were mercilessly killing the surrounding servants and guards.
Upon seeing Lu Jingfeng, he let out a beast-like roar, hurling the two bloody halves of a corpse towards Lu Jingfeng.
Lu Jingfeng's face turned serious, releasing the power of the Core Formation Realm, suppressing the mad Third Young Master.
"My son, wake up..." Lu Jingfeng landed and tried to awaken Third Young Master's mind.
Unfortunately, his response was only a beast-like roar.
Lu Jingfeng, full of disappointment but not much surprise, imprisoned the Third Young Master and instructed the servants to lock him up, intending to release him once a cure was found.
Such sudden cases of madness have occurred repeatedly in Beifeng City, each time resulting in considerable casualties and commotion, typically harming family members first.
The physicians have so far been unable to restore sanity to these mad individuals.
Lu Jingfeng never expected that his third son would also become one of the mad.
"Find a way to cure this illness, by any means possible, and have the people below identify the cause of this affliction," Lu Jingfeng ordered with a somber expression.
In fact, he secretly suspected that although the times and places of these mad individuals were different, they all shared a characteristic after going mad.
This characteristic closely resembled demonic traits.
Or rather, they were exactly like demons.
Lu Jingfeng suspected that these people inadvertently came into contact with Demonic Qi, leading to abnormal changes in their minds.
But Third Young Master hadn't gone anywhere; he hadn't even left Beifeng City recently, so how could he have encountered Demonic Qi?
Even if Demonic Qi had eroded their minds, the signs of demonization should have first appeared in ordinary people, not become so unpredictable and patternless as it is now.
From ordinary people who have never cultivated to Martial Cultivators with not insignificant Qi Sea Realm cultivation, all showed signs of mutation, yet no connection between the mutants has been discovered so far.
Gazing at his ineffective subordinates, who had yet to unearth a single clue, Lu Jingfeng felt a surge of inexplicable anger and wished to kill these useless fools.
As rage surged to his head, Lu Jingfeng's mind went blank, and moments later, he regained his composure with no memory of the recent incident, continuing to arrange the search for a solution.
The demons had yet to invade the Divine Martial World, but their influence had already begun to quietly alter everyone.
The Royal Family, Tianji Pavilion, and Demon Tribe have all been searching for the source of the demons.
Like shadows, the demons appeared suddenly in the Divine Martial World, with no warning or origin, and their causes remain unknown.
At first, Tianji Pavilion believed the demons were produced by the Demon Caves, but often facts proved that demons appeared before Demon Caves.
If demons were created by the Demon Caves, then the Demon Caves should precede the demons.
It's like the chicken and the egg dilemma, with no final conclusion.
