Reaper of the Martial World

historical

Book 4: Chapter 16: Watch

Seeing Dyon’s figure nonchalantly turn his back on the Head of God Clan – and not only that, but also the Head of the Guild Headquarters – sent the Sapientia elders into a fit of rage. Unfortunately, it wasn’t only them that were angry. The Heads of notable Guilds around the universe that had been meeting to discuss the demon sage also couldn’t understand the actions of this young man.

“Unfortunately, child. Leaving here isn’t so simple a task.” Connery Sapientia spoke faintly, maintaining his superior air. He felt that he had an obligation to maintain his demeanor as Dyon’s elder, or else he would come off like a joke.

Dyon had already turned away and couldn’t be bothered with these people anymore. He had things to do, namely helping Ri finish her training and also saving the Viridi family. Although he could use force to settle the second matter, Dyon was still apprehensive about being the aggressor in this situation. He had too many enemies and he didn’t want to give the more troublesome characters a reason to begin to act against him.

God Clans? He believed he could handle. But, he wasn’t willing to deal with Royal God Clans just yet…

Looking toward Thadius and the other nine demon generals, Dyon smiled – choosing to silently thank them this time. No matter how they felt, the truth was that they had known Dyon for less than a year. For them to be so loyal was something that Dyon was grateful for.

What Dyon didn’t know was that to them, he wasn’t just the successor to their old master. Dyon had saved them from millennia of and suffering and had given them the opportunity to take hold of their own minds again instead of remaining brainless zombies. They followed him so whole-heartedly because they could see the good in Dyon.

When Dyon had saved them, he hadn’t known that the demon generals would ever be of benefit to him, or that they were even demon generals to begin with. He had just seen people who needed his help, so he saved them. They would always remember that.

Seeing the guild head being ignored, Livy, who was still pressed firmly against a building’s roof, struggled to transmit a message to Voron.

After an initial surprise, Voron turned to Ace to confirm something. Slowly, but surely, their smiles widened as their gazes once again focused on Dyon’s figure.

Clearing his throat, Voron began to speak. “Head Sapientia, I have to say that it is an honor to meet you.”

Connery turned his calm gaze toward Voron who was immediately taken aback and struggled to regain his composure. ‘Were these the same eyes he used to look at Dyon? Why wasn’t Dyon effected?’

Despite the tranquility of Connery’s features, it was clear that a rage was being stoked. If Voron didn’t have a very good reason for calling to him, it was likely that the Cavositas God Clan would have to suffer the loss of one of its geniuses.

Struggling to piece together his next words, Voron turned his focus to Dyon, “I remember that you just recently put in a order for pill servants, no? It just so happens that we have a family of former alchemists who would meet your requirements to perfection.”

Connery’s brows subtly twitched. Just what was this boy getting at? Why was he bringing up such a thing now? The use of pill servants wasn’t exactly a topic to be spoken about in the open. In fact, it was very close to a taboo. So, why?

But, when Connery’s senses caught a flaring of rage from a very familiar figure, he suddenly put two and two together. Did this family of former alchemists have something to do with this Dyon child? It certain seemed so…

The crowd, seeing this interaction, suddenly became very interested – especially toward Dyon’s reaction.

The conversation itself seemed complete out of place, and yet for those intelligent enough, it was also pointed and deliberate. There was a purpose to this and it just might be what they need to catch Dyon unawares.

However, pill servants… That was something even those who liked to watch people suffer wouldn’t wish upon their worst enemy.

The term seemed innocent. Maybe it was simply the act of being an assistant to an alchemist? Tending to gardens, securing materials and fetching items?

But, no. The job of a pill servant was nothing short of hell.

With the low level of alchemy available in this universe, usually research had to be done to move forward. In the human world, when research was conducted, there were codes of ethics to follow as guidelines. Animals were placed on an evolutionary scale for how closely related they were to humans, and the closer you were, the more justification a scientist had to provide for their usage in an experiment. In fact, in the human world, before potentially dangerous products were brought anywhere near a human, it would often go through extensive animal testing…

However, the martial world had no such morality. Weak humans and slaves were seen as no different from animals. What was the need for the extra safety steps and codes of ethics, if human lives meant nothing to these people?

Pill servants were nothing more than lab rats. They were endlessly force-fed pills and monitored for their reactions. Their meals consisted of little more than appetite supressing pills. They lived in cages, barred from light for ridiculous lengths of time – with no option to bath themselves, no option to relieve themselves, and no option to live a normal life.

Whenever they consumed too many pills for the researchers to distinguish between results, they were cut open and purged.

Their veins were flooded with a substance akin to rubbing alcohol. Their stomachs were pumped and emptied. And then they were sown back up before the process was repeated all over again until their deaths.

And maybe the worst part? Those that died from pill consumption may have been among the lucky ones… If the pill was quick, that is…

“Oh?” Connery lightly smiled, “Do tell me more.”

Seeing that Connery had picked up on his cues, Voron breathed a sigh of relief as the faint veil of pressure was lifted off of him. Then, he turned to Vidar, signaling for him to take over. After all, the slave trade was a Ragnor family business, not a Cavositas one.

“It’s quite simple, Guild Head.” Vidar continued while ignoring his sneering younger brother, Elof, “About two years ago there was a family who had the audacity to sacrifice the lives of young experts in their charge all for the sake of a depraved power. When their allies found out about this, they were both shocked and appalled. So, they completely renounced them and their actions.

Luckily, at the time, my brother and his friend, Ace, were there. As you know, our family has been punishing those who should be punished for hundreds of years. In fact, you can think of us as the criminal justice system of the martial world.” Vidar’s words only seemed to grate on Dyon more and more. It was as though he was right next to him, whispering into his ear.

“As such, we took it upon ourselves to punish this despicable family. They’ve already been working as pill servants for a good long while, as a matter of fact. Only a single one of them seemed to be too useless to even do that properly, so, he was sent to fight in the Chaos Arena. At least this way, they can be of proper use to society instead of the bottom feeding leeches they once were.”

Connery nodded in agreement, almost a bit too enthusiastically. “I’ll gladly take these pill servants off your hands, then. In fact, I don’t mind signing a contract for them here and now.”

Vidar shook his head, “Don’t be ridiculous, Head Sapientia. With the work your family does, how could we make you pay for such a thing? Won’t your research benefit us all in the end?” Vidar’s ring flashed as a few sets of ten plates appeared in his hand.

Each slave was assigned one of these. They were essentially a brand to not only track their existence, but to also kill on a whim. The scars that ran across their face was only a guise of their marks. The true marks were embedded within the scars. The scars themselves were more of a psychological chain and ball. The slaves would wake up everyday knowing that they had a scar that would never heal. They were slaves for life… They’d never escape.

When Voron had told him earlier today that these might come in handy, he almost hadn’t believed him. But, it seemed like it really would. Whether Dyon truly cared about this family or not was already on full display, and having the opportunity to play with a such an arrogant boy, in Vidar’s eyes, was the greatest of pleasures.

Connery happily accepted these plates into his ring.

“The guild headquarters thanks you.”

The truth was that the Viridi family had been being used as pill servants in Arena City for months. Although the Cavositas weren’t array alchemy specialists, that didn’t mean that members of their and other families nearby, weren’t interested in the craft. As such, many cities had guilds of their own.

Arena city’s alchemy guild had needed pill servants, so the Viridi family had become at the perfect time.

As for Eli, he had been a truly odd case. Pills seemed to not be effective on him, no matter how many he took. In fact, most of his deterioration in health had been due to watching helplessly as his family was ruthlessly used and abused.

Seeing how pathetic Eli was, the guild elders had tossed him away to the streets. But, he kept coming back, refusing to leave his family. In the end, Eli had been dragged down to the chaos arena to die.

No one understood how he had survived so long. His cultivation couldn’t even be considered to be at the middle of the foundation stages. There was no reason why he should have survived so long without proper food and water. And yet… He had.

Connery watched Dyon’s back silently, his face maintaining a calm and ever so slightly mocking smile. He wanted to see how this Dyon would react to this situation.

Ri and the demon generals had immediately picked up on Dyon’s anger. Although the demon generals didn’t know as much about the situation as Ri did, it was clear to them that this family was important to Dyon and that Dyon was struggling to reign in his temper.

The irony of demonic will was that while it strengthened your body and allowed you to manipulate the emotions of others, it also slowly took away your ability to control your own. And in cases where the anger hit so close to home, Dyon had to try his best to not crush Ri’s small hand even as he held onto it tightly.

But, something seemed to have changed since the last time he experienced such a whirlwind of emotions.

Even as flames of dense black danced in his eyes under the disdaining gazes of those who watched around him, and gentler and forgiving flame of white began gently trickle across Dyon’s bronzed skin – skin so perfect it looked as though it had been cut out of crystal.

Ri and the demon generals were the first to feel this white flame, in fact, they recognized it from Dyon’s humanoid manifestation. It had been the ability housed in one of the six black-gold flaming circles. And yet, they couldn’t place just what it was… Much like they couldn’t understand the black flames.

But, what they did know is that Dyon’s once unstable emotions, seemed to reset themselves. Dyon’s anger all but vanished, replaced with a calm and calculating gaze as he loosened his grip on Ri’s small hand.

“I’m sorry.” He looked down at her apologetically.

Ri flicked Dyon’s forehead, “Don’t apologize about something so stupid. I barely felt anything.”

Dyon could only smile at Ri’s white lie. His body’s strength was at a completely new level, and Ri had reset her cultivation. How could she not have felt anything? But, Dyon appreciated her all the more in that instance.

Seeing Dyon suddenly look back at him, Connery was startled to find a calm and arrogant smile.

“Since you all like to play games, how about we play some games then? How about it?”

“What do you mean, exactly?” Connery asked in puzzlement.

“I’m not really a fan of your politically correct talk. Manipulating the facts, and fabricating tales is hardly something to care about. Those who are intelligent enough know that the Ragnor have no moral ground to stand on, in fact, they’re actually quite disgusting. And those who are intelligent enough know that the only reason you’re so willing to freely admit you do something so immoral is because you can’t get over the fact a child, as you call me, isn’t afraid of you.”

Dyon’s words seemed to sound like they were said in jest. In fact, despite his words about political correctness, it seemed like he himself was maintaining the boundaries of cordiality. And yet, if you focused on the actual words being said, it was clear that he was making no such attempt.

Not waiting for Connery to pick up on the fact he was being disrespected, Dyon continued.

“So, under the guise of those things. I asked in you if you would like to play a game. Let’s find out who really is the most intelligent. Ah, I think I’ll start actually.” Dyon said with a smile, still not allowing Connery to speak. He had his demon generals around him, even if Connery decided to forget all thoughts of face and attack Dyon, he would definitely be stalled for long enough for Dyon to pull out at least one of his puppets.

“When I came here, you already knew who the demon sage was. Interesting. Even more interesting is the fact that you seemed intent on exposing me as him. That’s fine, in all honesty, but you’ve made quite a few mistakes in that assessment.

The first is the assumption that with me exposed, you could use the guise of providing protection to reel me in.

The second assumption is that I’m somehow so gullible and pliable that I’d be perfectly alright with allowing myself to be manipulated so easily.

And the third assumption you made is in thinking you actually had something to provide to me.

Your Sapientia family can’t protect me. Your family’s research is outdated in this universe and nothing compared to my master. And quite frankly, I hate the thought of being used. In fact, I may very well rather die than do such a thing.”

Connery’s brows furrowed. He had long since picked up on Dyon’s disrespect, but why was he doing such a thing? What was the purpose?

“It seems the crowd is quite good at forgetting things, so how about I put things in perspective for you all?” Dyon smiled.

Ri couldn’t help but feel her heart tingle at Dyon’s command of the situation. It always seemed like when Dyon had his back against the wall, he would come out stronger.

Just before, when he had felt that overwhelming amount of anger, it wasn’t that he hadn’t already thought of a solution to the problem – it was that he was struggling with not choosing the path of destruction and just ending them all. Dyon had to be more careful with his actions, and he knew that.

Killing members of the Sapientia family might be fine for now, but what were the ripple effects? How many in this universe would be affected by such a thing? The Sapientia family were the back bones of progression, how could Dyon feel okay with cutting that off unless the circumstances were extreme?

And what about the Ragnor family? Dyon now knew very clearly that they were a member of the three most powerful clans in the quadrant. And he also knew that they came to this universe for a purpose, a purpose they had yet to fulfill. If Dyon wiped them from this universe before they could fulfill the mission their main clan had set for them, wouldn’t that bring the ire of clan much too powerful for Dyon to handle down upon him?

He had to be cautious and reel in his anger. But, that didn’t mean he couldn’t make them pay. Those who had to die would die, but it would be in moderation. Those who didn’t die? They’d be humiliated until they wished they would.

“As the demon sage, I’m without a doubt the most qualified to be head of the guild headquarters of this universe. Don’t you think?”

Dyon’s words brought a stunned silence.

A fifteen-year-old guild head? What kind of ridiculous concept was that?

No one knew whether to laugh, or if they should take such a statement seriously. Connery Sapientia was a man known for having had the best soul talent among humans in the past at least ten thousand years. He had snatched the head position at a young age himself, but even then, he was already hundreds of years old. Then, he had reigned nearly unmatched for millennia. Who was this boy who thought it was so easy to challenge him?

Hearing laughter begin to spread through the crowd, Dyon couldn’t help but start laughing himself. In fact, he laughed so hard that his own outburst stopped that of others.

Wiping tears from his eyes, Dyon settled himself down. “Sorry. I just find it funny that people who have no idea about what it means to be an array alchemist are making judgements about who should and shouldn’t win.

These are the same experts that pissed their pants and formed a meeting over a pill I created on a whim. In fact, just a few days ago, an entire planet was willing to use underhanded schemes just to pull me to their side. And yet you’re laughing about my ability to beat this guy? Don’t you think that makes you all look ridiculous?

Maybe the funniest part is that the man you’re so sure will win has the most serious face on out of all of you.”

Suddenly, Dyon’s demeanor completely changed from his carefree attitude. “It’s best you all shut your mouths and watch. That’s all you’re good for.”