CHAPTER 71 -LYCORIS RADIATA-
LAYLA EVERDILL
With no sense of day or night, my mind couldn’t comprehend the exact time or motion the City Of Eternity had.
However, one thing was for sure, and that was that whatever Hannah had in mind or thought, Juliette Riley was in the plans. I took some time to eye the human girl, recognizing her features for the first time in a long time. The black short hair which length only reached her shoulders. Pale peach skin color which didn’t match her eye color or her attitude.
Hannah turned to me, seeing me closely with a tint of unamused emotion over her eyes. She then said, “You don’t seem any bit surprised by seeing Juliette Riley unconscious. Much less, in the Eternal City.”
I matched her eyes, “Brat, if you are going to speak to me like that, I would’ve just stayed at Afreon and waited for the battle that Luna is waiting for so eagerly for.”
The yellow haired witch dragon spoke quickly after my words. Saying, “An inconvenience for you and me if you were to do that.”
“What…?”
Hannah, who had been looking to the other side—to where the horizon was—turned to me with a sad expression on her face. I was puzzled by her sudden reaction and words, she probably knew something that I or anyone else knew about.
She’s always been like this, ever since she had obtained her mana core at a very young age. Not sleeping for months left her drained to her core, as nightmare after nightmare she only had when she tried to sleep.
That is why I had become a sort of scientist and engineer, for Hannah’s sake. Like Hannah, I’d spent most of my time hurled at my job and career. Losing important events or important people.
However, Hannah isn’t the only reason why I choose this path.
The Ancient Walker—or the King of War of the most recently known—proposed a new kind of imaginable world, a place where things are not built by hierarchy or gods.
Yet it is too good to be true. Though he has power to back up his plan and this imaginable world, he is missing a standing in this hierarchy. The Ancient’s rank hasn’t been applicable in this world, since his power before his mana ring rivals those in the highest position in the highest dimensions.
Being the hope of many, also means being the center of hatred by many.
That is just what it means to have power that is strong enough to engulf entire nations or even kingdoms. Nevertheless, something isn’t right though I have said that he is strong enough to not lose a fight against a general rank or marshal, but the sudden death feeling I got in Afreon wasn’t human at all.
The death ill feeling wasn’t even directed towards me but to someone else, yet, it felt like it was to me. The Espions and the Vassals came running to the lab when it all went away, searching for a way to help those who were unconscious because of the aura that was from another dimension.
Is there someone else that could hold power like Alter Violet? Who else could reign over the Ancient Walker’s power?
A series of questions rumbled my mind as I tried to process the sudden power and strong deadly aura.
Wait… If this has happened then.
With Hannah still looking at me, she raised a hand before I could even speak. The dead eyes that the witch wielded towards me brought me to distrust the path that we were taking.
I had second thoughts along with doubts when it came to Hannah’s loyalty and servitude towards Alter Violet. She is meant to only serve in absolute mastery to Onyx Millguard, but her sudden change in sight is unexpected.
“You have a lot of questions which I cannot answer right now, however, you must know that the path we are taking–ever since we were little–is still the same and I won’t back down from it now. Not after getting this far, but sure, doubts are welcome into this path and so is trust.”
The dragon witch then turned to the waking up human, and with the dead eyes she showed me changed to her normal everyday mood that she would use in Ezar, to the monarchs of the dimension of dragons and to everyone in there.
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She was being a two-faced woman, whose sole objective was just to follow the already carved up path in front of her without hesitation. A slave to this fate and destiny that she sees, pathetic.
As Juliette Riley comforted her head, she slowly opened her eyes to us. Slowly recognizing us and making a fuss about it, screaming both our names with hazy memory.
“Hannah… and you, how are you here you bitc–” Juliette’s sentence was cut in a matter of time by the one and only witch.
“Now is not the time for insults or to say what’s in your mind,” Hannah’s words were directed to not only Juliette Riley but to me as well for some reason. “We are running out of time, he must be around dead valley right now. If we do not hurry, we might miss him…and forever.”
ALTER VIOLET
Walking down the center of what seemed like a grand canyon, but instead of being called that, it was dead valley. A place where a deadly war, one that the gods and many other high-ranked being fought for what things are now.
Though, as interesting as it may sound, it was not living up to the name it was given. The rocks that form the canyon were discolored, gray and black, surrounded by many weapons–which I assume that were used during this war–and somehow are still intact till’ this day.
This was a route that I didn't know. Passing through the countless routes that even some beings didn’t know, in camparising, this wasn't undervalued. It exceeded my expectations more than any routes mentioned just by mouths filled with doubts.
It had been many hours–or many days–since we left for Deboa. The device that Sol’gonol brought with him appeared to be unstable to bring three people with him, its limit was two but since Susan decided to come with us, I had no place to reject her will.
She hasn’t seen her father in more than a month if I’m correct or possibly even more. If I hadn’t gone with Chuzeoth, Eugene, or even Pearl to the small village. I might have just not seen her or even bumped into her during the dungeon’s event, her search for me would’ve not ended but possibly extended more than whatever time she has been searching for me.
“StarBoy, did you know about this place, the dead valley?” Sol’gonol asked, facing front while sending his words to me.
I eased my mind through my vision, taking in everything that was in my sight and some predictions that might or might not be true. I already had my answer but it wasn’t quite firm. It had holes, gaps in saying that I was confident in it.
I wasn’t though, but that I can’t say, not in front of him or Susan just because of some distinct doubt. Keeping that in mind, I answered the demonic marshal’s question. “No.”
“That is surprising coming from you StarBoy, I for sure thought you parti–”
“However, it feels like I have fought in this place. It feels so distant that maybe it probably happened, or maybe when I…” My mouth got heavy thinking that maybe, in some time, I was reincarnated into this world before and somehow forgot or didn’t remember at all.
I let silence veil on us as we kept on walking towards what seemed to be the end of the canyon. At the end of the massive rocked walls, at the bottom resided red flowers–half my height–waving along with the wind.
It looked like a facade, a trap that was not for one but for two of us.
Or…
I continued to walk forward without mismatching my step, like I hadn’t realized what was in front of us. My gaze jumped from the red flowers to Sol’gonol in a matter of seconds before I noticed that Susan was acting strange too.
The mana—her aura—was being too jolted to whatever she was thinking about. Her transparent red aura would turn into static energy and the aura would turn into a dimmer color.
Susan had noticed these red flowers and was debating whether or not to tell us about it. Keeping her eyes in the front, her energy began to erupt into submission. Though my phase hadn’t activated or even my sense of it, Susan’s emotions started to flow into the air.
Subsequently, I absorbed them as well without hesitation, realizing that not only was I concerned about these flowers but so was she. Yet, it was her first time seeing these red flowers–is what these emotions told me as they grew into more concern and an unknown worry.
“Death Flowers…?”
My attention turned to Sol’gonol, who suddenly decided to speak of the current situation. “You know what these are?” I unknowingly asked, ready to activate Halo King before anything goes wrong.
The pale demon walked up to the flowers first, in a hurry to confirm whether they were the real deal or not. A spark of mana came to his hand and was left to the flower, igniting the flower to a blue fire. The other flowers followed the burning one and soon the whole field of red flowers was nothing but burning blue flowers.
Sol’gonol stepped back, retreating his mana-filled rich hand with a jolt. I couldn’t help but to absorb his emotions as well. I was expecting some half-assed emotions like demons have always been but Sol’gonol’s were different, hitting me like a truck on my left and a moving train on my right, all at the same time to just squish me from their own strength.
The emotion of a strong certainty that something was going on and he wasn’t going to tell us… me. This demon was convinced of some sort of thing when the red flowers turned into blue fiery flowers, but it only grew stronger when they all stopped bruning. Changing its color from red to blue. The bulbous perennial with snowy, bright-blue flowers. Full blooming into spindly stamens mirroring that of a spider’s legs extended slightly upwards and outwards from the flower’s center.
Yes… I remember clearly what these flowers were. Representing the meaning of death, a symbol of the non living guided by reincarnation: Lycoris radiata.
To think this world would have this flower, though its change of colors really surprised me. Red to blue, simply igniting mana into it.
There was a feeling, an ominous feeling that they don’t only do–that flashy display of random people injecting mana just for it to burn–while changing colors. Another meaning perhaps? My mind pushed around some thoughts that entered my mind as I continued to observe Sol’gonol’s actions.
Not only that, but for someone to feel this way towards something like this.
The dark red haired demon spoke, not noticing that his true emotions had betrayed him by his tone. “StarBoy. Offspring of the Black Slayer. We must hurry to my lord's chambers.”
Immediately after, Sol’gonol pulled out an orb. Materialized in a sort of black and gold metal, around it was the mana of different kinds. All four elements along with Divine and Mundane.
What is that? I questioned it in my mind, unable to take my eyes off it.
Speaking in a low but orderly tone, the demon marshal said, “Take us to Deboa.”
Forming a vertical oval in front of the Lycoris radiata. Radiating and glowing it’s outside in a ring of red and orange combine, all while the inside was pitch black with some sparkles on it.
His hand briefly turned to the portal —or gate—signaling to us that this was our only chance to get there in time. Honestly I was dumbfounded that why wouldn’t he use it earlier instead of having us walk all this way to a giant canyon and then to end up in some Lycoris field in the middle of the old battlefield.
With not being able to wrap my head around it or the reason as to why he didn’t, this was really one of the best ways to get there fast. There was no denying it.
Before I took action, I let out a deep breath. Both of the demons stayed silent and only gazed at me while I walked through the portal—or gate—leading into the chamber of the Demon King ConderHell.