As everyone knows, a Netherworld portal opened by the Pan'ku Box will only close after a demon passes through it. Otherwise, it will remain open indefinitely.
Tso Lan stared at his portal, momentarily at a loss for what to do.
Shendu was completely unreachable. The only ones who knew anything about the outside world were Xiao Fung and Tchang Zu, who had already gone through. Xiao Fung was basically a broken mess now, and Tchang Zu wasn't faring much better.
These were immensely powerful, inherently evil demons—yet one had been beaten into severe depression, and the other had been tortured into developing crippling social anxiety. This left Tso Lan completely unsure of how to proceed.
Just as he hesitated, a jet of water shot over from a distance and smacked him right in the face. "Tso Lan, if you don't go out, the portals for me, Hsi Wu, and Dai Gui will never open."
The speaker was the Water Demon, Bai Tza. Following her words, Dai Gui and Hsi Wu landed on either side of the open Netherworld portal.
"Besides, Tso Lan, your portal is on the moon. Even the most exceptional wizard would be rendered utterly powerless up there. What exactly are you afraid of?"
"Afraid? Are you trying to tell me what to do?"
Tso Lan refused to act impulsively. "If all the demons end up like those two, then all hope is truly lost. We need to pool our strength and unite."
Tchang Zu had dug a hole in the ground and buried himself inside it, unable to handle the stares of the others. "They set up the perfect countermeasures right outside the portals. This proves the pattern of the Pan'ku Box has been cracked, and the one who cracked it wasn't Shendu."
"Speaking of Shendu," the Sky Demon, Hsi Wu, said as he flapped his wings and hovered in the air. "He hasn't contacted us in days. I wonder if his side managed to snatch the box back."
Barring any unforeseen miracles, Shendu was going to be stuck in Stone Ocean until the end of time. His role in the story was practically over for now, but the other demons had no idea.
Bai Tza immediately jumped to conclusions. "Could Shendu have betrayed us yet again?"
This was actually highly probable. After all, Shendu had a silver tongue, and betraying his brothers and sisters was hardly a first for him.
"When I find Shendu in the human world, I'm going to thoroughly torture his soul."
Expecting the demons to genuinely unite was a tall order. These guys were two-faced by nature. In the past, they might have possessed some intellect and cunning, but those traits had long since been eroded away by the endless eons spent in the Netherworld.
Just as everyone was arguing endlessly, and Tso Lan was still hesitating over whether to step through, Zenith's head suddenly poked in through the Netherworld portal.
While all the demons stared in stunned silence, Zenith spoke up. "What are you guys dawdling for? We've been waiting outside for two days and haven't seen hide nor hair of you. What's the matter, is Earth not appealing anymore?"
Putting aside whether Earth was appealing or not, how the hell did he get in?!
Before Tso Lan could even react, Zenith whipped out a Minecraft Lead, swinging it around like a cowboy's lasso. Finding the perfect opening, he hurled it straight at Tso Lan's body.
Tso Lan's physique was relatively slender compared to the other eight demons, and his attire was by far the most refined. In other words, he looked much more human than the rest of them.
Dressed in a traditional Hanfu of deep red accented with purple, his hair was meticulously tied up. Every movement he made carried a uniquely elegant and dignified charm.
Sure, he had four arms, blue skin, an insectoid mouth, and a long tongue like an anteater, but none of that detracted from his distinguished aura among the demons.
After all, the rest of the guys basically just wore enough to cover their modesty, with Tchang Zu being the only exception in his half-suit of armor. The Water Demon, Bai Tza, didn't wear a single scrap of clothing—though, to be fair, she was essentially a flat-chested snake-woman, so there wasn't exactly anything to look at anyway.
The moment the Lead looped around him, Tso Lan instinctively tried to counterattack. Purple gravitational energy gathered in his hands, but before he could even fire it off, Zenith violently yanked him forward.
Zenith grabbed him by the collar and rapidly dragged him in and out of the Netherworld portal, as if exploiting a video game bug. The portal's logic registered that Tso Lan had exited and then immediately re-entered. This completed the sequence of unsealing and resealing, permanently closing Tso Lan's portal right then and there.
Don't question it. After all, that's just how the game logic was coded.
Tso Lan: "?"
*'Wait, did I just hallucinate seeing the moon and the Earth for less than a second?'*
Tchang Zu and Xiao Fung, the two brothers in misery, had somehow huddled together. Squatting on the ground, Tchang Zu looked at Tso Lan with sheer envy. "That guy is so lucky. He only had to stay on Earth for a single second before coming back."
Hearing this, tears streamed down Xiao Fung's face. Once again, he lamented that the absolute immortality of demons wasn't a gift from fate, but a cruel punishment.
As the Moon Demon and the eldest of the eight, Tso Lan refused to let his brethren wallow in such despair. How could they let a mere human walk all over them? "Demons of the world, unite! We must join forces to defeat the Great Demon King Zenith!"
"That sounds nice and all, big brother, but we can only go out one by one. Shendu is off dead somewhere for all we know, and the Pan'ku Box has clearly fallen into the hands of the forces of good. We're at a massive disadvantage."
The Sky Demon, Hsi Wu, pinched his chin in thought. Zenith's existence was simply too far beyond the realm of common sense for them to comprehend.
Generally speaking, when it came to the Pan'ku Box, the righteous wizards of humanity would do everything in their power to seal it away and prevent the demons from ever being released.
But not Zenith. This guy actively wanted to drag the demons out one by one just to beat the crap out of them.
Suddenly, the void of the Netherworld trembled, and Shendu's green, reptilian face abruptly materialized in mid-air. "My brothers and sisters, I actually have an idea... Perhaps we can seek outside help. The Dark Chi Master of this era is our natural ally."
"Shendu?"
Tso Lan immediately fired a blast of gravitational energy, but it merely caused Shendu's floating head to flicker. It was just a projection, so naturally, it didn't take any damage.
"I am currently trapped in an Earth prison and cannot leave, but the Dark Chi has guided me to an ally in this era—Daolon Wong. Humans are far better at dealing with other humans than we are. He will find a way to free us all."
The demons reluctantly bought his story. In truth, aside from seeking out a Dark Chi Master, there was one other method: tampering with the Book of Ages.
This artifact was essentially the physical manifestation of the Heavenly Dao in the *Jackie Chan Adventures* universe, recording all of history from the dawn of creation to the present day. Anything written on its pages with its matching brush would instantly become reality.
It was roughly equivalent to wielding a six-stone Infinity Gauntlet with zero side effects, though its area of effect was strictly limited to Earth.
However, unless it was an absolute last resort, Shendu would never use this method. He had discovered the existence of the Book of Ages in ancient texts back during the era of the immortal warriors. In the past, other Dark Chi Masters had attempted to use the Book of Ages to establish their own rule, but every single one of them had met with catastrophic failure.
Fate always had a way of choosing someone to save the world. Shendu had a sinking feeling that if he altered the Book of Ages, the universe would just correct itself by having either Zenith or Jackie Chan save the day.
"Anyway, Daolon Wong will find a way to contact you. I have to go fight in a tournament now."
Tournament? What tournament?
The demons were left completely baffled.