While I was asleep, I felt somebody watch me.

I wouldn’t normally care, mortals posed me no threat and I would not bother waking up to deal with them, but the gaze I felt on me was… how should I even put it? Very very very ...x50 times very scary? Yeah, something like that.

It was so scary it would kill a lesser being with the fear it induced alone. Admittedly, as I was still barely above mortals, it should have also been harmful to me, but I didn’t feel any harm done. It was very odd.

What came into my view as I opened my eyes was gold. Fine golden hair cascading beautifully on a robe embroidered with elegant golden flowers and a pair of very beautiful eyes with golden pupils. They weren’t just yellow, the pupils actually seemed to be made of gold. They looked like finely-crafted jewelry but the depth in them could suck one’s soul in.

It was the most beautiful pair of eyes I have ever seen in my life.

A thin arm stretched above my head and I could feel a warm touch that made me feel at peace on my face. The smooth fabric of the robe’s sleeve invoked familiar feelings of warmth in my heart. It was an interesting sensation, feeling a step away from death but also in so much comfort you would want to stay in place forever.

The person in front of me smiled peacefully as she gazed on me and she continued to direct her mesmerizing golden eyes into mine. I didn’t know how, I frankly didn’t want to know how, but she was here, in front of me.

I was overjoyed to meet her again to the point where I wanted to cry tears of happiness, but I also felt conflicted to have had her out, in this foreign for her Universe.

Yes, it was Hilda. Hilda the Omnipotent. Hilda the Golden Phoenix. Hilda, the greatest alchemist to ever be born in the Galaxy. Hilda, my love, my soul, my everything and the only person I would be willing to spend an eternity with. My most cherished person, my only love… my wife from the previous timeline, who died to a heavenly tribulation.

Tears wouldn’t stop hindering me from looking at her.

How did she find me? How is she still alive? Is she real, am I dreaming? All these questions… I didn’t even bother to want to answer them. She was the most incredible person I have ever known and if somebody like me could live again, why couldn’t she? I honestly just wanted my brain to just shut up and bask in the moment’s atmosphere.

She smiled. It was a charming smile, a beautiful smile, a very cruel and very vicious smile…

“I am back”, I heard her voice. It was dripping into my ears like honey and flowing into my brain. It hurt my heart.

“You are not real”, I said… whispered… muttered through my labored breaths as tears interrupted my speech.

Her beautiful… her cruel smile deepened, just like the crack on my heart. Her warm touch on my head weighed heavily on my mind. I wish it would crash my brain into paste so that I won’t have to experience this.

“I am back”

“Get out of my head”

“Did you miss me?”

“Get. Out.”

“We’ll always be together from now on”

“GET OUT!”

“Are you happy to see me”

“Out of my head”

…

…

Cultivators also have mental illnesses. Human cultivators especially, are vulnerable to sicknesses of the mind. It’s because a human’s lifespan biologically is pathetically short. Their social nature is also deeply rooted in them, making the constant periods of solitude very much unbearable.

It’s because of this that they have a problem that other races don’t get to face very often – they are weak to Heart Demons.

Heart Demons… How shall I put it. They are a collective name for certain things created from parts of a cultivator’s psyche that contain a cultivator’s grievances and weaknesses and generally anything considered negative and harmful.

Cultivators grow stronger through cultivation of the spirit. The thing is, nobody truly knows how a spirit works. It’s so mysterious in fact, that it’s believed impossible to truly understand it.

We know quite a few things about it however. First of all, it’s responsible for a cultivator’s ego and personality. It houses a cultivator’s memory. A cultivator uses their spirit to execute both conscious and unconscious mental process, like, for example, thinking.

But because the spirit is so important and mysterious, developing it can lead to all kinds of consequences. For humans, though not only for them, one of them is that every now and again the parts of their psyche would develop on its own.

It’s not a bad thing per say… If you know the right methods, you could create things like multiple minds that keep their unity and be able to think much faster and achieve greater results.

For the rest though, most of the time, Heart Demons would emerge instead. These can lead to all kinds of consequences. Death, insanity at worst and distractions and inconveniences at best.

In the previous timeline, I never suffered from a Heart Demon.

Was it because my spirit was severely affected from moving over to this timeline that I now showed an opening for one to get in? A weak spirit and experiences way beyond what it should’ve been able to endure does make a good recipe for such a situation.

And how do I deal with a Heart Demon? I can’t really use any of the techniques known to me for dealing with one, as those are meant for higher cultivation stages and can’t be adapted for my situation.

Do I just tough it out?

Hm… It will be hard. I know I should be acting rationally and not care about the Heart Demon but… It’s kind of very hard. Impossible even.

Maybe I should contact Master?

Hm… No, thank you. I don’t want to. He is close to me and I respect and care for him, alright. He’s not this close to me though. It’s not something I would be willing to share with anybody.

I’ll just do my best, I guess.