~Whoosh~
The wind howled through the Yang Sect on a certain day, where a young boy of around fourteen stood in the middle of a wide, disordered courtyard, surrounded by hundreds of dark red and yellow eastern-style buildings.
"Just another day of sweeping," the boy muttered with a self-deprecating smile as his hands skillfully maneuvered a broken broom around the courtyard.
This boy's name was Azmodeus; he had no last name, and for as long as he could remember throughout his life, he had been working tirelessly in the Yang Sect.
When he was an infant, likely no older than a few days old, he was left at the gates of the Yang Sect with nothing but a bamboo basket to keep him in, accompanied by a simple note that said, 'His name is Azmodeus…'
Fourteen years had passed since that day, and he was admitted as a Trial Disciple of the Yang Sect the day he turned twelve.
Although he wasn't allotted any resources by his sect, and despite his lack of cultivation talent and high-rank Spiritual Roots, Azmodeus tried his best to make the most of his life.
He had no friends, no family, and no companions.
There were no secret lovers, no girl next door; he had no one.
Even his fellow elder sect brothers and sisters, along with the elders of the sect, despised him.
The reason for their disdain? Well, it was because of nothing more than the 'Spiritual Root' and subsequent cultivation talent that he was born with.
In the world of Prometheus, power was everything.
And to gain that power, one needed the talent to seize it!
Unfortunately, in the case of Azmodeus, he was born with the lowest-ranked and most useless Spiritual Root of all time, the 'Crystallized Embryo.'
Even the most basic of Spiritual Roots granted the owner the lowest quality of cultivation talent, along with a corresponding innate ability.
But for Azmodeus, all he got was the 'lowest quality cultivation talent' part…
Which was to say that he was more useless than even the worst of the cultivators out there.
And it was because of this inadequate talent that he was essentially abandoned by the Yang Sect in everything but name.
He wasn't allotted any resources, was treated as invisible and was despised by everyone for his weakness and perceived uselessness.
This was his life as one who possessed the weakest of Rank 1 Spiritual Roots…
Nevertheless, just like any other day, Azmodeus made his way through the vast courtyards of the Outer Sect, striving to make everything spotless.
He did this even though he knew for a fact that no one would thank him or even appreciate him for what he was doing…
"I wonder where Elder Chong is…" he wondered while taking a glance at the Sect Library.
Elder Chong was the one who assigned him his daily menial sect quests, and he was expected to complete at least three of them each day.
If he didn't complete the very minimum, he would be publicly whipped in front of all the Outer Sect Disciples and Entry-Level Disciples.
"It looks like he's not here today," Azmodeus sighed, his dull gaze drifting away from the empty Sect Library.
"Well, they are having that Sect Gathering Celebration today, so it's no surprise that the Sect Library, just like the rest of the sect, is deserted."
After realizing this, he recalled that he was the only one who wasn't invited to the celebration of the sect's victory against the Beast Wave that had attacked one of its affiliate towns.
"Oh well… Just another day in paradise."
His dejected words echoed out as he continued the last of his daily tasks for the day.
_____
A few minutes later, Azmodeus was finishing up the sweeping of the Sect courtyards, which spanned tens of thousands of meters altogether.
Just as he was about to pack up and head back to his 'home' outside of the sect, a few drunken figures in gray robes walked into view.
Their robes bore small red badges stitched in the front, and on those badges, there were exactly three green bamboo stalks, indicating that these few people were Inner Disciples of the Yang Sect.
Furthermore, it also went to signify that all of them had reached at least the Early Pulse Condensation Stage of the Body Refinement Realm.
And when their cultivation bases were pitted up against Azmodeus's, they were five minor realms higher than his measly Flesh Refining Realm!
But despite the vast difference in their strengths, Azmodeus simply stared at these familiar faces with a darkened expression.
"Eh? Is that Azmodeus??" the leader of the group, with his hair tied into a bun, sneered, his face twisted into a smug, drunken grin.
"Ahh, brother Yang Cheng, it turns out it really is that piece of trash!" a hunch-backed young man with a kiss-ass disposition fervently agreed with his Young Master.
"I really can't stand how that one always keeps staring at me, Brother Yang Cheng. Could you pretty pwease do something about him for me~?"
A girl with a makeup-covered face and a well-endowed body made of 95% plastic snuggled up to the leading drunken figure, her sultry gaze focused on the inexpressive Azmodeus.
She seemed to hold some personal grievances against him.
Her name was Yang Yun, and she was regarded as one of the untouchable flowers of the Yang Sect.
"!!!"
Yang Cheng looked down at the cleavage that was pressed up against his chest. A lecherous smile formed on his face as he turned his head toward Azmodeus and slurred, "D-Do you know *hick!* wh-who I am…? Y-You stupid useless trash! *hick!*
He burped a few times during his speech, clearly intoxicated to the extreme.
"..."
Azmodeus watched this ridiculous scene with a blank expression. He could tell that Yang Cheng was barely managing to stay on his feet.
He expected this to end with him having to 'sincerely apologize' for his 'rude behavior' like usual; however, contrary to his expectations, Yang Cheng stepped forward with staggering, wobbly steps.
After struggling to reach a spot around five meters away from him with great effort, he stammered, "*hick!* I-I am the son of the Grand Elder! That makes me far better than you! W-What was that!? You wish to fight me, you say!?"
Yang Cheng's expression twisted in rage as he conjured the inner strength within his body and channeled it into his fists before shouting, "How dare you claim to be superior to someone such as I!? M-My woman says you have been staring at her with your poor man's eyes, wh-which is unacceptable! S-So just die for this d-daddy!"
"???"
Azmodeus had no clue what this lunatic was spouting out of his disgusting mouth. But before he could even grasp what was happening, a fist beyond anything he could withstand, charged with mysterious blue energy, came barreling in towards him.
'What the hell-!?'
His astonished thoughts were cut off as Yang Cheng's fist hit him directly in the stomach!
'How is he so accurate even while black-out drunk!?'
Azmodeus's bewildered thoughts were drowned out by a great amount of blood pouring from his mouth as he was sent flying into a nearby red brick-layered wall!
BOOM!
The wall crumbled in less than a second, leaving the bloodied figure of a young boy slumped up against a few loose bricks with a gaping hole in his stomach.
"W-What the hell…" he muttered through his bloodied teeth.
The light in his eyes began to flicker as Yang Cheng, Yang Yun, and the hunchback approached his broken body.
"!!!" Yang Yun, upon seeing Azmodeus's mangled form, immediately threw up, clearly unaccustomed to such a gory sight.
Yang Cheng and the hunchback would have likely reacted the same way, but they were far too drunk to even notice the ribs poking through his organs.
Instead, Yang Cheng stumbled up to his bloodied body, his eyes glazed over as he stammered, "T-This is what happens when someone goes against me!"
After spouting this narcissistic statement, his eyes closed up and he collapsed onto the dying figure below him.
Azmodeus turned his pained expression down at the seventeen-year-old young man snoring on his mangled torso, unable to believe what was happening right now.
However, it didn't take long before the pain kicked in and he accepted the reality of his situation.
"Urrghh…!" he grunted with a look that said he wasn't willing to show any sign of pain.
But on the inside...
'F*cking sh*t, this really hurts!!!'
He screamed in his mind while writhing against the brick wall, the man who did this soundly sleeping on top of him.
After a few seconds of futile struggle, under the drunken eyes of Yang Yun and the hunchback, Azmodeus ultimately resigned to his destined fate.
'Th-This is really happening… I'm going to die, aren't I…?'
As this realization struck him, the light from his eyes started to fade, and he felt like he was close to slipping away into the afterlife.
But before he passed away for good, he shouted, "...I-I refuse! I'm unwilling! I can't die!"
Azmodeus was not ready to die! He didn't care how miserable his life had been! He didn't care that there was no one but himself in his life!
Every day since the moment he came to learn about cultivation and acquired the most basic Qi circulation technique there was, Azmodeus devoted himself to it with relentless determination!
He cultivated tens of times harder than any of the geniuses in his Sect! He cultivated by pushing himself to the brink while juggling his sect duties, all for the sole purpose of becoming stronger!
He didn't have any grand dreams about becoming the strongest, but what he did know was that he had to give it his all!
And that's exactly what he did, he spent 12–14 hours cultivating every single day!
Even though, after tens of thousands of hours of cultivating, he had only advanced from the first stage of the Body Refinement Realm, the Strength Training Stage, to the second realm, the Flesh Refining Stage, he didn't care!
He wasn't cultivating in hopes of gaining instant success like all the Young Masters of the Yang Sect.
No! His urge to cultivate was driven by the need to get stronger! To make everyone, including his parents, regret ever looking down on him!
He did everything he was told to do; he was willing to be humiliated by whatever means those stronger than him deemed fitting for him, all because he merely existed.
There was nothing he wasn't willing to do in order to become stronger!
Endure humiliation, obey every command, everything!
All so he could prove to everyone else, and more importantly, to himself, that he was worth something!
And yet…
"L-Life truly is so unfair…" Azmodeus despondently muttered, a self-deprecating smile playing on his cracked lips.
He clutched the hole in his stomach while inflicting more pain on himself in an attempt to keep his eyes open and stay conscious.
'I can't die here…'
'I refuse to die here!'
'I want power! I want to get stronger! I want to prove them all wrong!'
A fire ignited in his black eyes as he attempted to shove the drunken bastard off of him, wanting to find someone who could heal him.
However, no matter what he did, none of his muscles seemed to be obeying his commands…
But regardless of the unresponsiveness of his body, he tried to get himself up again.
He failed.
He tried again.
He failed again.
He tried again…
Ater more than a dozen attempts at trying to move, nothing worked, and his body remained as unresponsive as before.
Azmodeus desperately tried something else. He called out to the two wide-eyed people watching his struggle with shocked expressions.
"H… Hel…" He tried to call out to the two idiots, but his body just didn't have anything left to even make a sound.
After a dozen or so attempts to get out his voice, he realized something that he should have understood the very moment Yang Cheng hit him.
'I'm going to die…'
'I'm really going to die…'
'Before I could even leave my mark on this world…'
'Before I could prove that I was worth something…'
He used the last of his strength to turn his face up to the starry night sky, and whispered in his mind, 'This is the end for me… But for some reason, the night looks a whole lot prettier today…'
As he marveled at the sparkling stars, the light from his eyes faded away forever.
And just as he slipped into the world of the unconscious, a particularly distinct star shot through the black blanket that covered the world of Prometheus.
It was a star that held untold significance for the untimely death of the Yang Sect's only Trial Disciple…