Grand Ancestral Bloodlines

1364 All Good Things End

Ryu chuckled. The couple had already put their clothes back on, but this girl was still clinging to him. It was as though even a breath of space was too much. Even so, the bright smile on his face made him happy. This was a sort of feeling that he would never get tired of.

He could remember exactly when the last time he had felt so good was. He was still six years old, a few days from his seventh birthday. That day he felt like the world was in the palm of his small hands, as though nothing would be able to stop his steps.

Back then, he already had aspirations of reaching the peak of the world, he couldn't wait for his awakening so that he could finally start cultivation. He had already had his eyes on various records, wanting to break them all. He thought he could reach the Sky God Realm in one bound, he had never taken the ages of those so-called "geniuses" seriously.

Of course, that sort of high flying feeling had vanished not long after, casting him into an abyssal hell. But all these years later, he felt that he had finally broken free.

When his Dao Heart had shattered, he had already felt a great deal better. But that was just relatively speaking, it had to be remembered that that foul karmic energy was still being produced, dampening the true highest state that he could reach. But now that his Dao Heart was complete and newly reconstructed, he almost wanted to smile to the skies above, his heart as light as a feather.

Ryu realized in that moment that the situation with his Dao Heart was even more complicated than he had initially thought.

Originally, the failure of his Awakening had cast him into an abyss, but what exactly did it mean for his Dao Heart to be so close and yet so very far away from him?

Ryu's original theory was that his body had learned to compensate for the lack of his Dao Heart, and once he began to cultivate, he was stuck in a rut he couldn't pull himself out of. Because his Dao Heart's function was taken over by his other souls, it wasn't perfect and the flexibility he might have had in the beginning was no longer there.

This stuck Ryu in a certain mindset that he couldn't extricate himself out of, only amplifying his victim complex even after he gained himself the strength, power and talent that he had so long wanted.

Ryu still felt that this theory was correct, but there was another matter to consider as well... and those were the very chains that had wrapped around his Spiritual Foundation. How could that not affect his Dao Heart if his Spiritual Foundation was the representation of it?

Ryu had neglected this point because the first time he touched the chains, he had had such a fierce reaction. He never drew the connection because of that. If he had had the chains on a part of his soul for so long, then why hadn't he acclimated to them already?

But he had been looking at things the wrong way.

His connection with his Spiritual Foundation had been weak back then. And even if it wasn't, there was a difference between attacking just one soul and multiple.

But there was an even more important matter. The knowledge of the Seven Spirits and Three Souls didn't seem to be widely known. In that case, when the Martial Gods created these chains, wasn't it likely that they only knew how to attack the superficial soul? In that case, the chains would be less effective on other parts of the soul, and most effective on the parts it was used to.

When Ryu thought to this point, everything slid into place.

The most surprising part was that it had only taken a fraction of a split second to reach this conclusion.

Ryu knew why this was immediately. His Origin Flame... it was finished now.

This wasn't the so-called complete of Sacrum, but rather the truest form of the highest echelons of existence.

The world itself seemed to have changed before his eyes. Even with his eyes still sealed, it felt like [Ephemeral Tapestry] had returned and he could see all the bright colors of existence once again. The world felt far simpler and far more complex at the same time, like the complex was becoming simple, then complex, and then simple again in his eyes.

It all unraveled before him and it was far too beautiful to put into words. The smile on his face became brighter.

But the good things could only last so long.

The inheritance ceremony had long since come to an end, there was only so long that Ryu and Mae could remain here. It wasn't long after this that they were teleported out, and as one might imagine, the situation was far from good, but it was also much odder than anything Ryu had expected as well.

The first thing he saw was lanjor and Empana in a sorry state, most of the others completely dead with the exception of Jorlumin and one another.

His first thought was that this was due to him, but then he recalled that they weren't this injured after they caught up with him. His second thought was that this was connected to the bridge, but he felt that this didn't make sense either, after all it attacked the psyche more than the physical body, and even the injuries to the body should be more internal than anything else, but it looked like they had been attacked from the outside.

The third thought he had was that the higher Planes were taking out their rage on them. After all, in the past they might have been satisfied with reaching the violet road, or even the indigo and lower. But after seeing Ryu and Mae reach the golden road, how could they be satisfied?

But this didn't seem to be the case either because they weren't encircled by them despite the fact these people were observing from a distance, seemingly waiting for something.

Suddenly, Ryu smiled, he knew who it was.

He looked at the inconspicuous figure by Jorlumin's side.

That should be the mistress of the Lizard Demon Race, it seemed that she really had appeared. Even though he acknowledged this, Ryu didn't quite say anything just yet.

And as expected, countless gazes landed on him and Mae all at once.