Reaper of the Martial World

historical

Book 7: Chapter 152: Hidden Events (1)

As Madeleine, Dyon and Little Rain sought to strip the Golden Flame Mystical Realm clean of minerals it had slowly built up over trillions of years, a different scene was occurring at Soul Rending Peak.

Eli, Meiying and various Demon Generals like Thadius and Ronica looked on nervously as Delia fought a battle for her life. They had seen cruel tribulations before, especially Meiying who had seen Dyon’s, but was this really what a celestial should be facing?

Still, Delia faced it all valiantly. Dressed in a black gown and holding an ice-cold sword in her delicate palm, she faced the onslaught of devils… Bearing down on the image of hell that stood before her.  

Thousands of skeletons creeped toward forward, each covered in bones of a dense black. Cracked and without emotion, they came in waves, assaulting Delia’s mind and body. While those watching in the distance had never seen such a tribulation, Delia knew exactly what it was…

The heavens were enraged, enraged that a woman carrying the child of one its heavenly children had actually ignored a chance at protection to face this tribulation alone. In its anger, it wanted to punish Delia for putting something its child cared about in harms way.

But, this wasn’t the end of it. Not only was this trial difficult, it was wholly cruel.

Each of these skeletons, they all represented the dead of the Patia-Neva Clan. They each limped and crawled toward Delia, rage and grievances clear in their socketed eyes.

Your father is the reason we all died, so why do you get to live? You should die as well…

These words reverberated in Delia’s mind. So much pain and horror had been caused by her father. In fact, her own mother was among those who suffered the most… Being forced to be with a man she hated to core and even almost losing her own child.

This sort of two-pronged attack was too vile…

Should the daughter pay for the sins of the father? Should she feel guilty that her own father felt it okay to ignore the pain and loss of billions of others, but actually couldn’t ignore her own pain? Why had her father saved her, but sentenced so many others to death? How was this fair?

Not too far from where Eli and Meiying stood, Giralda suddenly touched her cheek, only now noticing that tears had been flowing. She couldn’t hear what Delia was hearing, but somehow, she felt that their stories were connected by a faint line of similarity.

Looking toward her own daughter, she felt a deep pain in her heart. It had already been several years since the events of Soul Rending Peak, yet Violet had hardly changed at all. Although she had become quiet and reserved, especially after the humiliation given to her by Dyon, it didn’t take much for Giralda to see that those same venomous thoughts swam around in that head of hers.

Truth be told, Giralda had wanted to take Violet back to the Crystal Dragon Clan. Maybe by seeing and living what it meant to be a true dragon, she’d change for the better. However, her better judgement stopped her.

What was it that Violet clung to before? Wasn’t it the idea that one could only survive with the greatest of backers? Who cared about nonsense like true love and feelings? It meant nothing in the face of the larger fist…

The experience of losing her mother was engrained in her so fiercely that she became a shallow person beyond compare. Wouldn’t going back to a powerful Clan like her mother’s have the exact opposite effect? In fact, the reality that Dyon was the one to save her and not Violet’s own father had already served to confirm her deeply rooted beliefs.

Wasn’t Dyon a True God? He literally represented the peak of what it meant to be an expert in this martial world. Even those outer fringe clans that existed outside the tower quadrants would treat him with respect once he was fully matured.

It seemed like wherever Violet turned, her own inner thoughts were only confirmed again and again… Clearly, she had no idea that Dyon came from absolutely nothing to build himself up to where he was now.

Still, the recluse Violet had come out for this event… It wasn’t everyday one got to see a saint advance to the celestial realm, especially not one of the 9^th order. It was a grand event for the whole universe. But, what she hadn’t expected was for her cold, still heart to be unexpectedly stirred by the scene she saw.

It was an odd dichotomy….

On one side of the field, there were those who worried for Meiying. They all knew that she was pregnant with Eli’s child and had been for a long time. In fact, she was only supressing the birth because her body wouldn’t have survived the labor process unless she became stronger.

But, on the other side, there was a family of four feeling their emotions stir for reasons completely irrelevant to this…

And then there was Delia, who despite facing this onslaught had a cold smile on her otherworldly features.

“My husband allowed me to see the light of the absolute path a long time ago… You aren’t worthy of making me step off of it…”

Delia would never forget that day Eli called out to her during the World Tournament. Back then, her mother’s life had been threatened, but the coldness of her constitution made her ignore all things… It told her that she was a cruel queen who stood above the world, who cared about feelings? Who cared about a mother who couldn’t fight for her own freedom? The only thing that mattered was power!

It wasn’t until Delia heard Eli’s call, one that awoke her from her stupor, that she shattered the absolute path that her constitution had laid out for her.

On that day, Delia chose a different path from her father’s cruelty. She chose to take a sword strike and die for the sake of her ‘weak’ mother, and thus, the selfless absolute path was born…

These voices speaking in her head right now? She had long since transcended them.