Lind awoke on the charred ground. His body ached all over but his mind was in turmoil. What had that been? It was not his life. He even realized the technology was only slightly older than he recalled when he died.
A handful of years, maybe? The teenagers had been without smartphones but they had the old Nokia phones. The actions of the boys too, felt dated.
It felt closer to the macho crap that had been more prevalent or at least believed to be, before he got to high school. By the ti Lind got there, computers were starting to be in every classroom and the first iPhones were rising.
Had that been the Bastard's original life? He was killed by a teenager trying to prove he was a hero or sothing? The Bastard had not understood he was trying too hard. He was almost the typical teenager trying to grasp what he was looking for and running hard into a wall they never saw coming.
The first signs of a darker path were there but there was also a calmness. It was the willingness to walk away that maybe could have snapped him out of it. Yet, it was all too late.
The girls were justified towards the end, given his supposedly discrete actions, to ask for help. It went too far. He could not recall such a tragedy but it was more than likely hushed up since the internet age had not yet taken hold.
It was completely believable that a school or community would gloss over things to keep it out of the news. A glimr of pity ford for that teenage boy.
The human had his life taken and had not had a chance to grow. He had then been allowed to be reborn only to be told, his life would co to an end again.
An adult or very young child might have been able to grasp that chance and live for all they were worth, yet a teenager was in that awkward stage of life. Not a child but not a fully realized adult.
ntal damage was far more dangerous as coping choices with a perspective of thinking they know better than the older generation how the world will be. A selfish perspective was also normal but the Bastard's had a touch of either psychopathy or sociopathy.
There was a clear disconnect but not so bad as far as Lind could tell. Mortals might give up but Qing would have easily resolved the issue and guided the young man to the best chance to carve out a place for himself.
The human, he truly pitied his life and death, but the Fiend, there was none. A mixture of heart demon and his own choices led to that creature. He was still him, yet so much worse.
His bones, that were not broken, creaked as he slowly looked around and sat up. He saw the entire area was glassed. The Divine Lands were not impossible to damage but usually there would be tears into the Grand Void that would heal.
He could only recall the sa level of devastation when the Bastard took out the Glass Palace.
He scanned the area until he found him. The Fiend aura was flickering barely but it was growing stronger. Lind limped forward. He had no strength to fly at all.
The sky was clear and he had no idea how long he had been in that vision. As he got closer, he realized the Bastard was not healing at all.
His flesh was essentially lted off his skeleton. Only the head had so bits left and the torso. The limbs were just goo.
Still, he lived. Lind blocked the sun and the eyes, what was left, quivered.
[I saw it. I saw your life on old Earth.] The Bastard twitched but his body was just a dead weight.
[How are you alive? How are you able to move?] Lind heard the desperation to change the subject but he had his own ideas.
[Karma, not being the true target, or maybe I just got lucky. I am in terrible shape but I have plenty of power to finally end you.] It was true. His harmony was readily available. He conjured so fla and the Fiend flesh reacted.
It was smoldering already despite never being touched! All his defenses were gone!
[You may end , but you know what is out there?! I will still win! You will all beco my fuel for true eternal life!] Lind doubted it. He had suspected but now that he had a mont he recalled the feeling of the yin yang core.
Now that he was stronger and had experienced it, he really doubted the Eternal Realm was the forever life he imagined.
Only 1 example was not enough yet he filed it away. The Bastard was not escaping him so easily.
[Did you see my last day?] He was curious and oddly, the Bastard did not imdiately attack ntally. There was a long silence before the vile voice quietly seed to beg.
[Why were you like that? Why did you care so little for your life?] Lind smiled. Heaven and Earth were not petty at all, it seed. It just could not violate its own rules. It always had to be fair.
[It is not that I did not care for it, I just reacted. I always have. It had gotten to miss out on a lot of fun it seems, yet I have co to relish those mories. I saw soone in pain and about to do sothing dangerous. I could have solved it a dozen better ways but my body moved before I really thought.] Lind built up the erald flas.
It was straining him a bit, yet the black blood began to evaporate. It was being converted, not destroyed.
[Fool. You had it all! I saw it! You had them coming for you yet you always sent them away!] The Bastard was not wrong. Lind had been oblivious in his youth, yet later he had actively kept people a bit at arm's length.
He just wanted to live his own life by his own rules. He imagined George would have changed that given how intrusive the man was. He smiled as he thought that George would have locked him in a room with a bevy of won and forced him to take one on a date before letting him out.
It was the kind of person he had been.
[I am sorry.] Lind spoke 3 words he never imagined he would ever say to the Bastard. It actually made the Fiend freeze. His body was being converted faster and faster.
The battle was over and now Lind apologized?!
[Why? What are you talking about?] Vile though the voice remained, the true shock was there. Lind looked down at the disfigured flesh before sighing.
[You needed a friend. You needed help. I think if just 1 person had been there for you, you would have understood. You would have understood that you were chasing an illusion and imposing your views. You did not deserve what happened. You were still innocent, but you were also naive to how your actions looked from the outside.] Lind knelt down and hovered his hand over the dantian of the Bastard.
He looked at the face muscles twitching over the partially exposed skull. It was clear the Fiend was trying to escape but nothing worked.
[I am sorry you were rejected and I am sorry you were killed. You still had a chance but you were going down the wrong path. The partial heart demon only made it worse. I am sorry no one could reach you. Good-bye] The erald flas spread but not in rage.
For all he had killed and taken, Lind hated him. Yet, he would not let that hate consu him. He had already nearly done so back in the Endless Peaks. He had almost given in and beco a killing machine.
The body was dispersed and finally the last piece was reached. The mind.
[AAARRRGHHH! YOU–W–WILL–FALL!] Even at the end, the Bastard stayed true. The young man from old Earth had long been discarded. Whatever parts remained were just the worst of it.
The danger of never growing up was never understanding the world was larger than just oneself.
Heaven and Earth might have honestly tried to understand such a damaged person. It might have chosen him to be reborn as a Celestial to experience that transition phase through the realms.
Lind did not let up but before the last bit was gone he calmly sent one last transmission.
[If so piece of you gets a new chance, I hope it is that young man. I hope he is allowed to have a better life than what you took from him and all of us, you Bastard.] A scream hit all minds in all directions.
It was vile but full of despair. A despair of sothing the Bastard no longer understood. mories did not an he was the sa person. It was just a monster that rembered how he began.
The last of the Fiend Qi was converted. The battle, the tribulation, and even the revelations all culminated in a pyre. He had imagined all the tricks and traps he might need to corner the Bastard and in the end, it was just lted away by his flas.
He looked up at the sky. The war in the Divine Lands was finally over but his war was not. He was about to stand when a new pressure centered on him.
He felt it! It was him!
{So, you succeeded at long last? Pathetic copy really does not live up to my standards. Your friends are keeping busy and now the Divine Lands are recovering their power. Do you feel accomplished? Do you feel like you can win?}
The vile voice was full of amusent and anger. It was a strange combination but Lind slowly stood up and his reptilian eyes never wavered.
[Start polishing your neck, I am coming for you, too!] He was barely standing and his dantian was depleted. He suspected his recovery would be a very long ti too, yet at that mont, he did not bend.
Covered in blood, dirt, and glass debris, he seed like a gentle wind could knock him over but he was immovable.
{HA HA HA! Brave, little ant. I will grant you the resolve but you have no idea what awaits you. Co quickly because eventually, you will run out of friends.}
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