“Phew, finally back to normal.”

In a quiet field located far away from any civilization, Damien let out a sigh of relief. After many days of continuous effort, he had readapted to his body.

Truthfully, it wasn’t as hard as he originally expected, though he shouldn’t have been surprised considering how he had bolted to the mirror right after he woke up without any trouble.

In terms of readjustment, it only took a few hours for him to complete it. The rest of the past few days were used to familiarize him with the improvements he’d made during his coma.

“When it comes to my physical body, it doesn’t seem like there have been many changes besides the fact that I gained a bit more vitality than I had previously. Instead of losing years, I actually seem to have made a net gain in lifespan through this experience.”

Although there were some minor benefits to his physical body, it wasn’t anything special. It was only the natural strengthening that was gained when his body was broken down and reconstructed.

But since it wasn’t a targeted reconstruction for growth and was instead entirely focused on healing, unlike the magma bath he took when he first entered the secret realm, there wasn’t much benefit.

The true benefit was to his spiritual cultivation, something he didn’t even know existed until recently.

The work he put into repairing his broken spiritual world, as well as the refinement of the twenty-three-petaled flower, had greatly boosted his mental power.

“It’s a shame that I can only do some basic stuff with all this power. Especially with the fine control I gained through my years of effort, it’d be a great trump card if I could use it properly. Looks like I’ll need to consult some people and learn some mental skills after I get out of this place.”

Currently, the only mental skill he had was his Mind Prison. This skill was meant to be used to put him into an emotionless state so he could perfectly practice the Void Heart Sword Law, but Damien had found that such a usage was a waste of the construct’s potential.

From helping him regain his mind when he was up against the Demon Queen’s seduction to helping him preserve his ego when his mind was on the verge of breakdown, the Mind Prison was such a versatile skill that Damien felt the need to punch its creator for using it so inefficiently.

“As a matter of fact, I should probably start looking into the actual Sword Law part of Void Heart Sword Law. Even if I don’t agree with the whole emotionless thing, it’ll probably still be helpful. I might be able to integrate it into my Void Sword Art to enhance it.”

Damien thought back to when he first obtained the Void Heart Sword Law and couldn’t stop himself from chuckling.

“Man, I was really on something back then. I’ll have to give Ruyue some love when we reunite as thanks for helping me come out of that self-destructing state. If it wasn’t for her, who knows what kind of terrible mistakes I would’ve committed.”

Damien smiled as his hand went to his chest. There, he felt the faint rhythmic thumping of a heartbeat that wasn’t his.

“I wonder how you’re doing right now? I truly hope your Trial World doesn’t have the same demon troubles I’m having right now. Still, at least I know you’re safe…no, since your heartbeat is so calm, you’re probably thriving. As expected of my woman.”

Before his mind was shattered, he could only vaguely feel Ruyue’s physical condition through the piece of her soul that she had given him, but during the process of collapse, a strange mutation took place in the imprint she had placed on him.

As if acting to preserve itself, that portion of Ruyue’s soul had escaped his mind space and taken root in his heart instead.

At that time, his body was being reconstructed inside the greenish white cocoon, and that portion of soul had ended up fused with his heart.

Through such a strange set of coincidences, Damien and Ruyue’s hearts had become interconnected. He didn’t know what kind of effects such a mutation would have, but he could only slowly find out once he reunited with the woman herself.

“Damn, it’s tough being a sentimental guy like me. What a shame…” As he spoke, Damien started feeling like he was forgetting something. Going through his memory of what happened before his coma, he suddenly remembered.

“Ah! I put a whole bunch of people inside of the Sanctuary and then basically died! I should probably go check on them…”

Luckily, he had remembered before it became too late. Those guys were probably incredibly confused about what had happened in Acier and during the months afterwards, since he had been broadcasting the situation.

Thinking about how he had bragged to Demon King Lucius before everything went downhill, Damien suddenly felt a bit embarrassed.

“Forget it. Thick skin is something every man needs to have. Nearly dying? Hmph, look at how I’ve improved over this period of time. Of course everything was according to plan. How could I predict a Demigod descending? Naturally, I’m just built different.”

Damien puffed out his chest and entered the Sanctuary with confidence. Before he went to visit the ones residing within, he stood in the air and observed the layout of the place.

“Now that I look at it from a bird’s eye view, this place is seriously cluttered. I just keep sectioning off space every time I need something new, so it’s become a hassle now. Let me fix this before I go meet them.”

Damien focused his mental power and began restructuring the space in the Sanctuary. Currently, there were many clumps of random space that he had used for various one-time purposes, but he didn’t need that.

Instead, he merged all those spaces together and turned them into something new. At the same time, he restructured the existing spaces to make them more organized and fluid.

The Sanctuary soon experienced tremendous changes. Now, there was simply one massive continent that looked like its own plane, with little Xue’s space being merged with all the rest.

The only separated spaces now were one for prisoners and one for him personally.

The prison was straightforward, especially since he didn’t have the talent to erect constructs within it. It was a barren plain where not even grass could grow. But that was just for the sake of atmosphere. After all, psychological warfare was its own game.

The main thing that differed was what Damien termed as World Principles. The World Principles were the laws that governed the space. Many things could be regulated by tweaking them.

For instance, within the Prison Realm, he mainly utilized Principles of suppression. Those within would find their strength taken from them while a constant aura suppression would weigh on their minds and bodies.

Other than that, Damien added a few more things that could be used for both psychological and physical torture, but those Principles weren’t active at all times, they were like settings he could turn on and off as he desired.

As for little Xue’s realm, or rather, the Main Realm, the World Principles didn’t differ much from that of an existing normal world. It would be hard to differentiate purely based on the aura and feel of the realm itself.

The third realm was the same, with no major differences in World Principles from the outside world. It was Damien’s personal realm for training and relaxing, and there was also a portion sectioned off for the sake of storage.

“Main Realm, Prison Realm, Personal Realm…I really need to change these names. Well, the latter two are fine but the main realm is basically a world of its own, so it needs a good name. Maybe I’ll consult some people about it later.”

Damien nodded in satisfaction. Now, all the people within the Sanctuary were in the Main Realm together. But Damien wasn’t worried about the demons harming little Xue. Even if the World Principles were naturally untouched, he could still manipulate them to suppress those he didn’t trust.

As an example of this, all the demons were basically no different from mortals at the moment, even the Demon King Lucius.

Damien clapped his hands in satisfaction. “Everyone must be confused at the sudden change, so this benevolent Young Master should go explain it to them!”

With a carefree smile on his face, Damien flashed away and appeared in the Main Realm, not far away from where the demons were situated.