“That was one of the weirder scenes I have seen in my long life” I commented to the kitten who was frozen in shock when she realised she had an observer.
For a few minutes we just stared at each other. She was completely frozen that I saw that and I couldn’t think of anything to say after seeing that. So, we just stayed like that, two frozen beings staring at each other in shock and confusion.
Eventually she had a very late reaction and jumped almost two metres in the air with a hiss of surprise and her all her fur straightening out to make her two times bigger before she fell down directly on to her face on the syrup laden floors. For a few minutes she was just suspended with her but hanging in the air and her face planted on the floor before she slid down onto her stomach and transformed into her humanoid form.
“Owwww” She said in a slow groan.
“How do you react as if you where just caught five minutes after being caught, Sapphire? That’s one of the latest reactions I’ve seen. And did that really hurt? Considering your cultivation you should be fine” I asked her in bewilderment.
“Pride, it was my pride that hurt, not my face… though that hurts too… I’m weaker in my kitten form. Wait no, why are you even in here!?” She yelled at me once she regained herself.
“Ironically it was because I was looking for you which led me to this scene. I’m still not sure exactly what I just saw.” I told her dismissingly.
“Why? Why now of all the times you could have come in? This is the most embarrassing moment of my life” She groaned as she started banging her head on the floor.
“This will probably be the most embarrassing moment of the next few years of your life as well. On the bright side at least it was me who saw you and not your sister” I told her brightly. She just glared at me in response before resuming the head banging.
“Sorry. I felt awkward so teasing you was the only solution I could come up with” I told her as I pet her ears.
“That doesn’t help at all” She told me with a dead voice.
“I wouldn’t be a very good friend if I helped” I snorted.
“Something seems very wrong with that statement Scarlet.” She told me blankly after staring at me for a while.
“Why? I saw you embarrass the hell out of yourself, of course I have to tease you rather than comfort you. It would be an offense to our friendship if I did something so distant” I told her seriously.
“God’s are weird. Why did I befriend gods? I’m such an idiot” She told herself as she ignored me.
“Hey I’m pretty sure a lot of mortals have the same opinion as me. Besides aren’t mortals weirder? You are obsessed with rolling around in syrup in your kitten form but yet you hate getting dirty. How am I the one who doesn’t make sense in this situation after what I just saw, Sapphire?” I asked her with a snort.
“Do you remember how I told you that I refused to tell anyone why I like to roll in syrup? I changed my mind. I’ll tell you but in return you can never, ever tell anyoe about what you just saw. Deal?” She asked me dead seriously.
“No” I told her straight up making her falter.
“Why!?” She yelled at me desperately.
“I will not deny telling your kids this story once you have some. They deserve to know all the embarrassing things you’ve done. Don’t you see, I’m doing this for you” I told her like it was obvious.
“You’re evil, you know that? That’s like telling me that if I ever start a family all my secrets are going to be announced to the world. Where do you even get such evil and twisted ideas?” She asked me desperately.
“Huh? But my parents are like this and we’re really close because of it so naturally I will help my friend get close to their family. See, I’m helping you. To think that I’m just trying to make my friends life happier and you called me evil, how mean” I told her dramatically while wiping fake tears.
“Arghh fine! Be that way then! I’m not telling you anymore!” She yelled at me childishly with watery eyes.
“Fine. Suit yourself. Since you committed the ultimate sin however of telling me you’d reveal your secret but then changing your mind I’m telling them immediately in retribution.” I told her spitefully as I turned around to leave.
“No wait! Fine! Come back!” She yelled after me desperately as she clung to my ankle.
“Fine. You have one more chance. I’m still telling your kids though” I told her sternly.
“When I was taken by the shadow they hadn’t cleaned the blood off of me yet so the only sensation I had ever felt before my body was destroyed was the sticky blood. I used it to stop myself from going crazy in there and now it calms me down to be sticky. Are you happy!?” She asked me while crying.
“Yes.” I said softly as I hugged her, ignoring the syrup on her body.
A few minutes later she had stopped crying and continued her story.
“I-when I came out and had a body I wanted to feel sticky again since it was annoying me and ever since then it’s been like an obsession to me to roll in syrup so I can feel that feeling again. I didn’t want to tell anyone because I thought they’d try and ‘cure’ my obsession but it means so much to me that I’m scared of losing it” She told me as she started crying again and dug her face into my chest, muffling her voice.
“Sapphire, we all love you. Do you really think that if we knew that we’d try to hurt you by taking that away from you? Jeez, you’re such an idiot sometimes. I may have fun teasing you but that doesn’t mean I ever want to hurt you, that’s just because of how cute your reactions are. I never want to hurt the people I care about.” I told her softly as I stroked her hair.
“B-but everyone’s always talking about how weird it is?” She cried to me.
“It is weird. Being obsessed with rolling in syrup is weird and we all know that. But sapphire, you big idiot, do you really think we’d change something that is a part of who you are and that makes you so happy? It’s weird but we all love that about you. We all have weird things we like doing. As long as your not hurting yourself or others why would I try and change you? Seriously, you’re such an idiot. Would you try and change us? Your sister is obsessed with sleeping with you because she’s scared of losing you again but will you try you change that? Azure is obsessed with cute things even though she tries to hide it and has secret collections of teddy bears. Will you try to change that? I’m terrified of losing the people I care about so I cling to everyone I have and interrupt you all randomly to hug or hang off of you all. Are you going to try and change that? There’s so many weird big and little things about us that make up who we are. To change even one of them about each other… if it doesn’t hurt ourselves or others, would you ever try to do that to us? Why should we do it to you then?” I scolded her as her eyes widened.
She looked down in shame as she cried before whispering ‘”thankyou…” to me.
“I love you. To me, you are part of my family. Even if you are a friend and aren’t related by blood everyone I care about is part of my family to me. I love you all so much more than most people could grasp and I would do anything to protect you. I’m clingy, selfish, jealous, defensive and stupid most of the time when it comes to them but more than anything, I don’t want to hurt or let any of you get hurt. I know how annoying I can be when I act like I do and I’m so terrified of losing you but yet, neither you or the rest of my family try to change me because you know that it is part of what makes me me. Thankyou, sapphire.” I told her warmly as I hugged her tightly.
She let me stay like that for the next hour and probably would have let me stay like that for longer if nothing had happened. But it did. My mind felt fuzzy and my thoughts went out of control, I felt nauseous and I couldn’t think straight.
“You’re yummy” I said sillily after I licked syrup off of her cheek. She looked at me stunned.
“A-are you okay?” She asked worriedly.
“Of course I’m okay, silly! I’m the great me after all! Wait no, that doesn’t seem right… my minds fuzzy and I feel sick… w-what’s wrong with me?” I asked her desperately.
Before she could answer I fell to the side and started vomiting as my head felt like it was trying to split in two. But why did it hurt more than the times my head actually splits in two!?
“W-what’s happening to me? I’m me, I can’t get sick but yet I vomited… am I pregnant? No, stupid! I’m six and a virgin… there’s no way I’m pregnant… maybe i died and became a mortal without realising it? Or this is a dream? Or maybe-“ I would have kept rambling but then it started. My body was in pain, so much pain. My thoughts totally blanked and all I felt was raw, primal agony.
“Fuuuucarggghhhhhhh!!!!” What was at first a curse degraded into screams. I have no idea how long it lasted before it stopped temporarily and when I tried to talk it just started again, ten times worse than before. Everything felt like it was being shredded, burned, twisted, stretched and destroyed all at once and it just kept getting worse, and worse, and worse and I could do nothing but scream.
----
[POV Change]
As I groggily opened my eyes and tried to work out what was happening, a scream shocked me back into my senses. It was horrible, the worse I had ever heard and the longer it went the worse it got. I saw Scarlet’s form on the ground wriggling, convulsing and screaming in more pain than I had ever seen before. Freezing for a few seconds, I bolted to the door to wake up azure. She’ll know what to do right? I mean, she’s a god as well so of course she will.
As soon as I opened it the sound enchantments stopping the sound entering the bedroom from the bathroom cut off and they where woken up by the screaming before I had the chance. I felt myself getting pushed and my shoulder cracking painfully on the wall before I once again regained myself and saw my sister standing at the door crying with a horrified look on her face and Azure desperately trying to work out what was wrong with her master.
“What happened to her!?” My sister asked me desperately as I came up beside her.
“I don’t know! We where talking but then she got weird and fell over vomiting before she started screaming! I tried to help her but I got knocked out and I don’t know how long but when I woke up it was even worse than before and I opened the door to wake azure up but this… why…?” I told her as I realised I had started crying as well without realising it.
I watched as she thrashed around for minutes before I saw an accidental blow rip Azure’s entire shoulder out and shred it. She didn’t even flinch and just used her mana to heal it as she desperately tried to work out what was happening. It hit me like a brick. Azure’s a god and scarlet is so, so much stronger than her. Just how am I even alive after being flung into that wall!? I should be a bloodstain right now but instead I was only knocked unconscious by the glancing blow. Meanwhile I’m watching a god being shredded with ease by accident when I, a mortal not even half way to the god realm, somehow managed to not get annihilated from just being within a few metres of her when it started.
For hours I watched her screaming in pain and it just kept getting worse and worse. Every time I thought it was impossible for it to hurt her more it was surpassed by the screaming and her body. Azure’s was being shredded so much that she had to leave her masters side to regenerate her mana within half an hour and even then, we had to scream at her to leave telling her that if her master got better and found that she killed her she would be devastated. She looked to be in almost as much pain as her master by not being able to help her and she was crying so much. Every time she got mana back she went directly to her masters side and created a cycle of being shredded, regenerating mana and being shredded again.
It got to a stage where Scarlet was clenching her muscles so tightly in pain that her skin and veins where bursting and healing in her constantly growing agony and the pain… her screams… they had already reached such a primal level that I could barely comprehend it anymore. Crystal tried to make me look away from the sick cycle that just went on and on in front of me but I refused.
After what felt like a year and was really only a day something finally changed. Two hundred gods appeared around us with their hands and eyes glowing. At first I thought it was them doing it but then they spoke simultaneously, a really fucking creepy feeling.
“Failsafe activated: Ruler’s mana has fallen to critical levels and death is imminent: Activating healing and mana restoration.”
“Ruler has been healed but mana continues to drop from unknown attack: Activating diagnostic mode”
“Error: Diagnostic failed! Using secondary &#%*& Diagnostic” They all said different words for the diagnostic names to the point where it became unrecognisable.
“Secondary Diagnostic Failed: Switching to &#%*% diagnostic”
“Third Diagnostic Failed: Switching to &#%*% diagnostic”
“Fourth Diagnostic Failed: Switching to &#%*% diagnostic”
“Fifth Diagnostic Failed: Switching to &#%*% diagnostic”
And it went on and on for hours as she continued to scream as they kept her mana up.
“6439th diagnostic has successfully diagnosed the problem: Foreign soul shard is using ruler’s mana to torture and limit host’s mental state: Activating purge”
They all simultaneously started growing brighter and Scarlet’s screaming lessened slightly before it came back even louder than before.
“Purge has failed: Activating last resort: Sealing foreign soul shard”
“Foreign soul shard has been successfully sealed: Strengthening seal”
“Seal has been strengthened to approximately two years of duration: Awaiting further orders”
She finally stopped screaming and passed out immediately and the gods just stayed stationary, watching and waiting. What was that, 31 hours? Fuck… that… she was in so much pain for so long… fuck.
----
[Normal POV]
“-ster!” I heard a vague voice.
“Master! Master, can you hear me? Please wake up master” Azure. I heard her call out to me in a desperate voice before she eventually broke down into crying.
“Ow. Everything hurts” I said groggily as I opened my eyes.
“Master!!” She pounced me, making the nerves in my body feel like they where burning. I couldn’t help but wince at the sudden spike of pain but it was really nothing compared to that… thing earlier. Ah right, now it’s coming back to me *shiver*
“Master it’s okay now, it doesn’t hurt anymore right?” Azure practically begged me. She was clearly trying to reassure herself just as much as me.
“Somehow I don’t think when someone says everything hurts to tell them nothing hurts is the correct response, Azure. But yes… ‘that’ is over atleast.” I smiled weakly.
“I was so scared” She broke down completely as she clung to me and cried loudly.
“I’m sorry.” I told her simply as I started stroking her hair. The small pain is fading now that I’ve woken up.
After ten minutes of her clearly not showing any signs of stopping, I decided to interrupt.
“What happened?” She looked at me with teary eyes as she struggled to compose herself.
“I’ll answer for her, let her cry for a while. I’m assuming you remember meeting me in the bathroom but you started to act a bit strange before you fell over and vomited and started screaming in pain. I’m not sure when or for how long but you hit me into a wall and knocked me out but when I woke up, your screaming was louder and I opened the door immediately. You woke the others up before I got the chance to and then for the next
31 hours in total you where just getting worse and worse with your pain increasing by the second.
I’m not sure exactly when in that time but your gods came saying something about a failsafe and ran 700+ failed diagnostics before they identified a foreign soul shard inside of you that was using your own mana to torture you. They tried to purge it but failed and instead sealed it with a seal that will last two years by their estimate and ever since you’ve been unconscious and your gods have been on standby. That was two days ago. We haven’t left since then” Sapphire told me as she came to pat Azures head who burst into tears again.
I frowned at that. A foreign soul shard? What the hell?
“I’m such an idiot. I should have checked every inch of my soul after I got the power to manipulate it without limits… but instead I didn’t and let this bullshit happen.” I scolded myself angrily.
Ignoring the others, I closed my eyes and decided to do that now instead.
The soul has an ‘inner’ and ‘outer’ section. By nature the soul is hard to manipulate even if it is possible to shatter them and even with the ritual only the ‘outer’ soul can be manipulated at all while the ‘inner’ is impossible to even see. When I got the soul manipulation skill from the box as a gift, I only thought about the direct applications to it like being able to see all my outer soul and directly improve that without death. I completely forgot about my inner soul because I always saw it as impossible to even see, let alone manipulate.
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
But that is wrong. This skill let’s me manipulate souls, the entirety of the souls. Naturally that means I have access to the entire soul but since I was caught up in my old views I didn’t even consider exploring it. But that was stupid. Once I got the ability to manipulate my soul I should have immediately explored my entire soul completely and because I didn’t this happened.
When a body is enhanced with mana, it is just enhancing it’s base strength. Souls themselves are the same. The inner is the body and the outer is the mana that enhances the body, even if it is different once you explore the technical. But the inner soul is only able to be improved with time while the outer soul could be improved with the ritual and the gains you achieve throughout all your lives. Of course this skill will let me improve it directly which means it is even better than I gave it credit for but once I explored my inner soul in a quick but detailed search I found three threats.
The first threat was a shard of Williams soul. Actually this one isn’t really a threat at all since it had no power, consciousness or malicious intentions but just being part of William makes it a threat. The second one was a physical manifestation inside my soul of my connection with hell. That is a threat in case I accidently activate it again but overall it’s not anything to worry about. In the future I’ll play around with it to try and work out how to create a link with the heavens or absorb hell’s mana without side-effects but that will only be after a lot of careful studying and tests on other souls so I don’t screw anything up.
The third threat is what did that to me. Another soul shard that has a consciousness, malicious intentions and a hell of a lot of power that it stole from me while I couldn’t stop it since I was in hell. With the connection open the majority of it was put directly into it since I wasn’t able to manipulate my body nor was I in any state to defend against it. The soul shard itself is at around the strength of two hundred full-souled gods right now which is ridiculous considering it is only the ‘love’ and ‘hate’ sections of the soul.
The other soul shard was what really surprised me though. The one that wasn’t a threat to me hit me harder than any brick ever could and it made a lot of the hate (even if I won’t forgive) I had for William disappear. It was his ‘innocence’ and ‘kindness’. He had given it to me somehow when we where still kids and without kindness holding him back, his love warped him into a monster. Since it was never destroyed and as such couldn’t grow back and was instead given to me, he never could have gotten it back.
It really makes me pissed off that he managed to give this to me and made my life hell because of it but if he didn’t, none of that would have happened. He lost the qualities that made him him and turned into a monster. And what’s worse is that this monster was still alive. The soul shard that attacked me, ‘love’ and ‘hate’ was his. I know for a fact that I ground his soul into less than dust so how the fuck did that asshole end up in my inner soul!?
Forming a mental link with him I decided to ask. He’s a cocky bastard so I’m sure he will answer.
“William. How the hell are you alive. I destroyed your soul to such a thorough extent that even if someone spent eternity finding the particles it would be impossible to reform you.” I said coldly to him.
“Ara ara? Is that how you greet a friend, angel? Where’s the ‘Omg I thought you where dead, I’m so happy your alive~’ I was expecting? Sigh, I even sent you a gift and everything and this is how you treat me? Such a shame. I’m hurt, y’know? What was that, ten times all the pain you made me feel compressed into a small time? I thought you’d love it~” He sung in reply.
“Unlike you though, I didn’t deserve all that pain dickhead. Sorry if I seem a little pissed off at the person who single handily ruined my entire life and then decides to torture me for such a shitty reason. How are you alive?”
“Ah, you really don’t know anything angel. Your always remarking at how emotions have the power to break reality but yet you forget about them so easily? Although this is all that’s left emotions brought me back from dust almost immediately, y’know? I’ve been in here for so long now, it’s boring~ Atleast you where cute when you where obsessed over me but then you came and got this stupid family, I’m jealous y’know? When I saw you spouting all that crap about love I just had to use some of this new power to make you regret it a bit.” Bitch.
“Pfft, you know what. Screw you. You will die now that I know you’re here. But guess what, William? I’ve got a present for you! I bet you don’t even know, right? But I have your kindness and innocence… don’t you think that I’ll just love all the guilt your forced to feel with them back?” I sung to him excitedly.
“Pfft, those things? They where destroyed long ago, baka” He scorned me.
“Hmm… oh I bet you’ll wish they really where. But while I was confused as well when I saw it, I understand now you know? Emotion. You gave me your kindness and innocence all that time ago with the power of emotions. And now… I’ll give them back to you, fucktard.” I told him menacingly as I combined the ‘hatred’ ‘love’ ‘kindness’ and ‘innocence’ back together.
For a few minutes, he said nothing. But then I felt it. His hatred was shattered and devoured by the other three aspects of his soul and he began talking again.
“Oh hoh? While I am certainly surprised and you are right, I do feel guilty, I hope your not expecting me to come back like your prince charming, right angel? Sorry but my innocence was destroyed long ago as well” He told me as his innocence shattered and got absorbed into love and kindness.
“Pfft, baka. I’m still destroying your soul for good even if you where back to the exact state you where originally. Finding that shit inside my soul may have made me atleast stop hating you but I will still never forgive you. But I suppose this is a good thing, right? For the first time in more than a hundred thousand years you are whole again, back with the trait that made you who you where. Atleast you get to experience that before you die. But more than anything, I’m rather thankful. I hated my last life quite a bit because of how much I hated you and I never liked living with hate. This will make my new life-without you- a lot better, so thanks.” I told him in amusement.
“Ah, my little scarlet angel is all grown up. You know, that was quite mean of you. I know I deserved it but the amount of guilt you just forced me to feel is massive, y’know? But your right. It is nice to have this back since just like how you always say your ‘base’ is to gain power, my ‘base’ was love and kindness towards the one person I lived for so losing kindness warped me quite a lot, y’know? Anyway, mind if I talk to you a bit before I go?” He asked with a sad voice.
“I wouldn’t be a very good person if I didn’t let you talk right? I can’t forgive you William. I will always hate you for what you did to me and the people I cared about but finding this part of you again today has helped me massively. Maybe now I can let myself be truly happy again like I was when I was a kid. I also realised a lot about myself after that hate was gone as well. So letting you talk can only be of benefit to me, right? Who knows, maybe it will help me be happier. So make it up to me by talking, William.” I told him.
“Yeah yeah, demanding as always princess. Jeez, you really do fit that title. When we where kids you where the biggest princess I ever met. But I really am sorry, angel. Even if you won’t forgive me and nor do I want you to, I’m sorry for everything. An I tell you my story? You never knew how I had all those gods right? I want to explain some stuff to you about how things became the way they did. Also… I didn’t shatter your fathers soul. I killed him but I let his soul go. Even if you’ll never find him again since you don’t recognise it telling you that should help you a bit.” He told me, stunning me.
“Why didn’t you? That makes no sense considering your personality.” I asked.
“It’s part of my story princess. So will you listen?” He asked me with an amused tinge to his voice.
“Idiot I already said I would. Don’t keep this princess waiting, hmph!”
“You’re father is the reason I met you. Even without kindness the dept I owed to him made me spare him. Unfortunately since he had the closest personality to yours the rest of your family didn’t get spared since I didn’t think they had much influence on your creation so I didn’t owe them a dept. Anyway I’ll tell you the story from the start.
My father was a tenth realm god who bound a few hundred lower realm gods with soul contracts in order to protect his family. My mother had terrible cultivation talent and strength so even after keeping her alive for hundreds of years with life-span extending tablets and giving her the best resources she was only in the sixth mortal realm. Our world was fathers domain so we often went down there for sight-seeing without any fear since he was always watching over us.
On that day while we where on the world a group of fifty gods came too close for comfort and father went out to warn them. He never expected anyone to hurt us or even be able to since we always went to remote locations so he never considered the possibility of something terrible happening to us. While we where down on the world bandits came across us and overpowered, raped and tortured my mother and older sister in front of me while forcing me to watch. They let me go afterwards for their own sick amusement.
Without them, I didn’t want to live anymore and that’s when I met your father. I was trying to kill myself from jumping off a cliff and he made a deal with me. Come live with him for a while and if I still wanted to kill myself after that then he wouldn’t stop me. At first I agreed since it was just a few more days to me anyway and it meant nothing. I never thought he’d convince me to live. I knew my father was watching but since it was my only chance at living he didn’t interrupt.
After a few days though I realised why your dad was so confident. You where the happiest, brightest, smartest and friendliest child I had ever seen and I couldn’t help basing my entire life around your existence. For the next two years I lived with you under the excuse of losing my memories like your father and I agreed upon and it was the happiest I had ever been even when my family was alive. You became my sole reason for existence.
But then my father sent me a message. He told me to come back so I could cultivate properly and protect you with my own power rather than risk losing you as well like I did with my mother and sister. Naturally I accepted but I was also heart broken so I wanted to give the entirety of myself to you so you would never forget me. That’s when I lost my kindness and innocence.
Afterwards father realised immediately that they where destroyed and although he was confused he thought they would regrow and I would be fine so he just focused on teaching me. They showed no signs of fixing themselves however and by the day the extreme amount of love I had for you was twisting me without kindness as a restraint and my father realised I had become ‘evil’.
He couldn’t kill me so instead he bound all his servants to me instead and preformed a ritual that sacrificed his life to massively increase my cultivation. After that I lost the last restraint holding me away from my evil thoughts and I took everything from you. I’m not sure why I didn’t just bring you to my home and instead watched you for so long but I think it was because I didn’t want you to hate me which you would if you knew it was me.
At one point, when you tried to kill yourself, I brought you to me for a year. At first you where extremely happy because I found you again and you still had someone left but when I was with you I could still feel my kindness and innocence and it made me feel guilty. After a while, you got suspicious with your too smart mind and you worked it out and grew to hate me. I couldn’t stand it and I erased your memories and sent you back down to the world.
The rest from there you already know and now we are here.” He told me in a resigned voice.
“Heh it seems just like him to do something like that. I was his pride and joy so he was probably laughing inside when he made that deal. You know, it pisses me off that my life was ruined for such a stupid reason. You wanted me to never forget you so you gave away the thing that makes you you. Couldn’t you just make me promise to marry you or something instead? Your so stupid. We could have both lived happily ever after back then if you didn’t lose them.
But it dosen’t matter now. I have a family again and I am happy, even if I have a lot of tragedy in the past. I wouldn’t change things if I could. But William, you really are an idiot. A massive idiot. Now you don’t have my love or even my friendship and instead I hate you and are going to erase the entirety of your soul. Emotions really screwed you over didn’t they? The power to break reality but not always to your favour. They really are mysterious.” I scolded him. Overall though I was sad.
“Well I had to do something dramatic to make you remember me, right? With your mind I’m sure you would have ended up with the same goals anyway. If I’m the villain atleast you have someone to blame other than yourself. If we fell in love and got married before I eventually got killed I know you would have blamed your own weakness and even this happiness would be impossible. I can’t say I really regret the outcome, even if I regret the situation.” … … … what?
“And why would you have died? Why would I have failed at protecting you no matter what. That makes no sense.” I told him blankly.
“The only reason you got so strong is because you had a will to get strong. While your mind gives you potential outmatching any other, without tragedy you wouldn’t have become what you are today. I was never a strong person even after my father died. If we where together we would have both been weak with only my father for protection and he still might have killed himself once he was sure I was happy. Eventually, no matter what, we would have faced tragedy anyway and with your luck and brains you would have survived while I would have died. I prefer that you are happy now with unrivalled strength as compared to the other possibilities like being unrivalled but never happy. You might have even been raped and enslaved if things went differently. Tell me, don’t you agree that as far as end results go this one is better?” He asked.
“That’s still a speculation but I do admit that it is a very well founded one after everything I have seen. Anyway is there anything else you want to say before we part ways, William?” I asked him seriously.
“Fall in love. Not the false love like you’ve been tricking yourself with until now when you tried to make yourself a family in your last life, truly fall in love. You already have made yourself a family, you don’t have to keep lying to yourself about it anymore. I’ve watched you for so long now… but you never truly fell in love with any of those girls you thought you did back then. After all, you even kept yourself a virgin because of it. We both know angel that you have been lying to yourself so next time, find someone who you aren’t tricking yourself for. I already have a vague idea of who you truly love and I feel that you do as well but until you work it out don’t trick yourself.” He told me sincerely.
“I know who I love William. I knew from the moment I met them. But I didn’t consciously know, right? Thanks. This time you really helped me a lot more than I could have expected by forcing me to think about it. Goodbye William.” I told him sincerely.
“Goodbye. My last wish… tell her. If you know, tell her immediately. Please don’t tell me though. That would just be plain cruel considering I still love you. Just destroy me now please.” He said with a laugh.
“Fine fine. That was three last wishes though idiot.” I told him as I erased his existence forever.
I channelled the power across my inner soul as a whole to strengthen it. Considering how big it is and that I don’t know anything about what each individual thing does yet I obviously wouldn’t put two hundred gods worth of power into any one thing but if I spread it out evenly it still has a massive effect for me.
In a human body there are things like heart, brain, muscles, organs and blood. If I strengthened one individual core component of the body without knowing how far I could push it I might accidently destroy it. If the lungs where so powerful that it ripped up the chest as I breathed naturally that would suck. So instead, if I strengthen the whole body as a whole then I don’t have to worry even if I don’t know what it all does yet. Well, that’s the theory I was operating on anyway.
I felt myself get a lot stronger at once since the base improved so the multiplier that is the outer layer is more effective but it wasn’t quite describable. My mana pool got bigger but I feel like that was a side-effect of the process and not something that was supposed to be improved. It was more like my souls maximum capacity was massively increased and with it I got some more mana to access. Now when I siphon mana from the heavens I should be able to get even more than I could originally.
If I where to give a comparison I would say that right now my soul is like a human wearing armour so strong that it makes me invincible with my inner being much weaker than my outer. But right now, I’m at the level of super human. Once I improve them both a lot more it would be like a god wearing armour stronger than reality. And I have an idea for how I will do it but that’ll come later. For now, I’ve wasted too much time in here and I need to go comfort the others. I must of scared them a lot. What, four days I’ve missed by now?
Opening my eyes I found Azure asleep while hugging my waist while I was still sitting up as I had been when I came to explore my soul. Postponing my plans I spent the next few hours stroking her hair while she slept. I made the mistake of starting and then when I saw her smile in her sleep I couldn’t stop myself. It was calming and it gave me a lot of time to think as well so there’s not really a problem.
She started to get up and look around groggily before she saw I was awake and froze mid yawn.
“Master… you’ve changed.” She said softly.
“My soul got a lot stronger” I replied easily.
“No, that’s not what I meant. I mean, I can feel that you got more powerful but what I meant was that you feel happy. Like something that was burdening you disappeared and… well, I’ve never seen master like this before. I couldn’t tell while it was there but now that it’s gone I can tell instantly” She denied surely. I was a little surprised that she could recognise that but when I think about it more it’s not so surprising.
“I met William again and I found out a lot of things that let me stop hating my last life. I haven’t forgiven him and now I have erased him permanently but he did atleast help me realise a lot of things about myself in the process. I’m sorry for scaring you so much earlier Azure. Are you okay?” I told her honestly before asking with genuine concern. I know it affected her a lot more than it did the other two. Even if I had no control over myself at the time, I remember what happened in that time and I saw how she acted.
“As long as master is happy and fine then I am happy. Just… just don’t scare me so much again…” She told me confidently before letting her fear show through.
“I’ll try not to, I promise. What happened earlier will never be able to happen again but whether I worry you again… I can’t guarantee that.” I reassured her as she laid her head in my lap. She obviously wanted to be doted on.
“I made him a promise” I told her after patting her head for a few minutes.
“Master what did you promise him? He doesn’t deserve master’s promises” She asked me concernedly.
“I won’t forgive him Azure but I don’t hate him anymore. As long as it’s not unreasonable making him a promise is fine. Besides, he helped me realise something so he deserved a last request.” I told her softly.
“Do you have to go away?” She asked me in worry. She obviously didn’t want me to leave and I guess the way I worded that sounded like I was doing something for him.
“No, I don’t have to leave so don’t worry, it’s nothing like that. He made me realise that I’ve never truly been in love before. In the past I fell in love with girls only because I wanted a family and I was lying to myself because of that. He wanted me to be happy after everything he’s done to me so he made me realise that so the person I fall in love with isn’t a lie to myself but is instead someone I really care about” I reassured her warmly.
“So what was the promise then?” She asked me curiously but had calmed down.
“I promised him that I’d tell the person I loved that I loved them as soon as I knew who it was. I always knew who I loved since I met them but it was something that I buried without realising. Because of the promise, I was forced to think about it so now I have to tell them” I explained to her.
“S-so you know who it is?” She asked me with a dejected look that she failed miserably at hiding.
“Of course. But Azure, how can I feel confident about this love of mine when I made the one I love? I feel selfish for making you yet daring to fall in love with you, Azure. It feels like I am trying to take advantage of you.” I told her bitterly but sincerely.
“M-master, you l-love me?” She asked stutteringly.
“More than anything.” I answered her confidently.
“Really? Really truly?” She asked cutely.
“Do you think I would joke about this?” I asked with a smile.
“No! I mean, I just can’t believe that master loves me as well…” She said dazedly.
“You know, I really like that as well part. Can you say it again?” I asked her happily.
“T-that’s…” She stuttered as her face went bright red.
“Answer me properly Azure. I may look calm right now on the surface but I can guarantee I am very nervous right now and it’s making me uneasy.” I scolded her gently.
“A-ah! I’m sorry, master!” She said as she got shocked from her daze.
“Are you apologising because you made me uneasy or are you apologising because you are rejecting me?” I asked her as my face faltered momentarily.
“I-I love master” She said as she buried her head in my chest. My previous worry turned into an overwhelmingly warm and fuzzy feeling instead and I couldn’t resist squeezing her in a really tight hug with a goofy smile.
“Are you embarrassed?” I asked coaxingly.
“Mmh” She agreed.
“Why?” I asked as she still had her head hidden.
“B-because master doesn’t have grown up feelings yet with her body but I still have them because of my race” She answered as her voice wavered and was muffled by my jumper.
“Your body can feel that?” I asked her in surprise.
“I-I was embarrassed to tell master about it once I understood what they where and I didn’t want master to create a distance with me” She said in a really small and cute voice.
“I’m sorry for not noticing Azure. I must have made you feel a lot of guilt, right? I’m sorry. But you know, I’m kind of jealous now. I have to wait years until my body loves you just as much as my mind does but you get to have that from the beginning. But I’ll be able to pull through somehow. It’ll just make my body love you even more once it grows up, right?” I told her honestly. I mean, if I kissed her, I won’t get to feel what she feels, right? My body is six so I don’t get to feel the full effects of love even if I can feel the warm fuzzy feeling but she get’s to feel it anyway.
“M-master, that’s even more embarrassing!” She shrieked to me as I laughed.
“Is it? Haha I’m sorry. But right now, even though this hug feels really nice, it must feel ten times better for you, right? I really am jealous. Sigh, I don’t have any magic that can remake the effects puberty brings to love but maybe that’s a good thing. I’d feel weird if I was getting turned on from kissing a child after all even if I do love you” I told her happily.
“Master if you keep talking like this I’ll never stop blushing” She complained to me cutely while still hiding her face.
“I guess that’s a good thing then considering how cute you are when you blush” I told her as I made her show me her face. Holy **** it really is really cute to see her so flustered.
“Nooo!” She cried as she dove back into my chest and I laughed.
“Aww but it’s so cute” I pouted.
“A-anyway, what do we do now master?” She changed the topic with a voice that clearly betrayed how flustered she was.
“Well I could easily sit here flirting with you for the rest of the day but I guess we have to make up an excuse for why we missed school and tell everyone we’re engaged. So maybe I’ll just flirt with you for a few hours instead so I can see that cute blush of yours? I still haven’t decided, maybe I’ll just skip out on school for the rest of the week as well to flirt with you before we go and do anything else. What do you think?” I teasingly asked her.
“I think master’s trying to bully me” She said with an obvious pout showing through her voice.
“Hmph, of course!” I said proudly. “My future wife looks so cute, of course I just want to bully her a little” I told her as she stuttered but couldn’t form any words.
“I love you, Azure. From the moment I brought you into this world I loved you even if I didn’t know it. I can’t explain this with logic and I know for a fact that there’s no reason within my soul that caused me to feel like this but I do and I don’t need any explanation for the fact that I love you. But over these two years, my love has only gown as I’ve watched you develop and learnt more about you. You are the most important person to me and I would sacrifice the rest of existence to be with you, even if I would be sad at losing my family. But to me, you just became everything and more and I can’t lose you no matter the cost. This feeling is so much bigger than everything else and so much more important and it is all dedicated to you and you alone. We may both take a while to grow up physically and I won’t be able to feel with my body what I feel with my soul until then but no matter I won’t stop loving you. I’m sorry if I embarrass you or seem clingy and selfish but I can’t help it. I just want to smother you in this love forever and be smothered by yours as well. To me, it seems like everything. I love you” I promised her sincerely and told her exactly how I feel.
“I l-love master too. I-I don’t mind if master is clingy or selfish… I am as well so I want master to cling to me and to be selfish with me. I feel the same as master, even if I am embarrassed to say it and unconfident but I want master to love me and I want to love master as much as possible. Master is mine from now on so master has to dote on me and I have to dote on master and no one can take master from me anymore. I was so scared someone would take master from me…” She told me with resolve, even if her voice was muffled and embarrassed.
“Thankyou for loving me.” I told her sincerely as I snuggled up as close to her as I could get.
For a few hours we just stayed like that, basking in the feeling. There was no need to say anything as we only wanted to enjoy the feeling and talking would just hinder that. Eventually though, I sighed and got up reluctantly. There’s only so long I can put this off before things get annoying. Being a princess who is missing for the better part of four days… even if I don’t believe my parents will look for me because they can’t do anything but trust me considering how strong I am, there will still be trouble if I keep putting things off. As much as I’d like to stay here with Azure all day I’m not going to keep worrying my family and friends anymore. It’s time to leave.
Opening the door with Azure following me I saw crystal look up with surprise before putting her finger to her lips in a gesture to be quite. Sapphire was sleeping on her shoulder and judging by her face, it’s probably the first time she’s slept since this started so none of us wanted to wake her up. I was surprised that she was in her humanoid form still when she likes her kitten form more but she probably has her own line of reasoning that is making her do that so I won’t comment.
Erecting a small barrier around her, I sat down opposite crystal while making sure that even when we started talking the barrier would stop us from disturbing Sapphire.
“Are you okay now, Scarlet?” She asked softly once she felt the barrier.
“Ironically I’m feeling better than I ever have right now. Is Sapphire okay? Looking back I knocked her unconscious and Azure cracked her shoulder, not to mention how traumatised she is with anything pain related in the first place… I imagine this must have been pretty rough on her.” I said with a weak smile.
“Her physical injuries are fine but considering how fearful she is of pain after spending her entire life in an abyss of it I think it will take her a while to recover mentally. Other than being a little clingy though I don’t think there’ll be any problems. She only fell asleep a few minutes ago so I want to give her some time” She told me as she rubbed her sisters hair comfortingly.
“I’ve got to go sort things out with school and the castle anyway so she can sleep a little. I just wanted to check how you two where going before heading out so I’ll come back once I get things sorted out and explain what happened to you both. Has anything else happened while I was out of it?”
“Someone came to nock on our door once but after that no one else has come nor has anyone tried to send us a message. I’m not sure who it was since I figured it would be better not to say anything before you woke up but it was probably either your sisters or your teacher. So far no one out of this apartment knows what happened so it should be easy to clear things over.” She told me lightly.
“No, it won’t go over so clearly this time. I intend to announce publically that I’m engaged to Azure so things will be rather troublesome for a while” I told her casually as I got up.
“Wait, what? You two got engaged? Huh?” She asked me with a stupid expression.
“I did say I felt the best I ever had before, right? Of course something good must of happened” I told her simply.
“Later, okay? Master likes teasing people anyway so she won’t tell you anything until everything else is already sorted out” Azure told her before she could ask the torrent of questions on the tip of her tongue. I was rather looking forward to the little play I had planned out in my head… how disappointing.
I pouted at Azure briefly as she tried to avoid eye contact before turning my attention back to Crystal.
“We’ll be heading over to the castle for a while. Sorry but knowing my family it will probably be atleast several hours before we can get back here but until then you should get some sleep as well. I know you wouldn’t have slept until your sister had so take this chance to rest a bit” I told her with a smile. I could visibly see the tiredness catch up to her as I reminded her about it and her eyes started to droop as she fought to keep them open. Not only would it have been emotionally exhausting for her, she’s still only a nineteenth realm cultivator. Not sleeping for four days in a high stress condition will of course take a toll.
Teleporting with azure, I went to do the thing I was dreading. Tell my extremely dramatic family that I’m getting engaged to Azure. Just these four days and what happened during them would be enough to keep them active for hours, let alone this. Combined? It’s like igniting the mana channels of a world. The last time I experimented with it I accidently made a new sun. Basically, it’s just a really, really big bomb waiting to detonate and I’m willingly walking into the centre of the explosion radius.
“Master will we really be okay?” Azure asked apprehensively as we stood in front of the door.
“No, no we will not.” I told her with a gulp as I pushed the doors open. Their eyes… it’s started already.