Chapter 346 – The girls
Everything was dark.
Rea didn’t know where she was, but she had heard the words of The Will to know that she had finally succeeded.
It was one worthy of celebration, of being happy at the achievent of putting a whole Epithet realm being under you. But Rea felt nothing as such, as in that space of darkness...the whispers were clear and sound.
She could hear it. She could hear the woeful voice of the goddess ringing inside her skull like a bell of death.
’Useless.’ The goddess hissed, the voice like one swallowing back tears. And though Rea was not seeing anything in that strange darkness, her mind seed to completely reproduce the face of the goddess.
Like always, she was weeping.
’Useless, Realth. You are a God-Touched. You have been marked even before your current life.’
Each word was marking Rea’s skull as if splitting it into fragnted parts. She opened her mouth to shout in agony. Yet no sound escaped it. It was like soone was clasping her mouth shut, making her unable to relieve herself.
’Realth Hiraeth Pandora. You are mine, you belong to . And you shall return to .’
Tears began to fall from Rea’s eyes as she gritted her teeth,
’Cease your folly, for I have already corrupted your whole bloodline. Nothing and no one remains except you. Even the one you fooled yourself to call grandfather.’
At that, Rea managed to snap open her eyes, and in a burst of strength and authority unfitting to a being at her rank,
"M-My...grandfather?" She managed to speak inside that clinging darkness no mortal should ever be aware of, her eyes crazed, "WHERE IS HE?"
She bellowed, yet the voice of the goddess didn’t change. It was just so woeful and yet carried an eerie calmness beneath the overwhelming sorrow.
’The War Lord protects him with his sword, yet he cannot stop for long, Realth. I will swallow him. I will swallow all of your family, and we shall see, Realth Hiraeth Pandora...’
The darkness began to crack,
’We shall see if you can hide yourself from Sorrow.’
"WHERE IS HE!!"
Rea was not hearing anything else, her mind fixated on the news of her grandfather whom she believed dead.
’The Church...’ the goddess’s voice seed to lag, ’The Shattered Church of The Whimpering Saintess. I shall wait for—!’
The darkness suddenly cracked then sank away into oblivion as the goddess’s voice disappeared completely.
Rea stood there with her heart at her throat, unable to calm her racing thoughts.
The silence that followed was heavy. But soon...
{The Woeful One’s intervention has been taken care of.}
The Will’s voice echoed soothingly.
’W-What?’
{Brace yourself, God-Touched, you are ascending to Master.}
And then ca the deep blazing pain that consud everything of Rea. But compared to all the things she went through...
She felt nothing.
Nothing except the pain eating her heart away.
...
Rea was not the only one who succeeded in her legendary quest. There was another one, in the place known as the Graveyard of Monsters, who also succeeded.
The Heiress of the Mother of Monsters was sitting on the floor, the Grandmaster-ranked Maggot in front of her, looking at her with a trembling body.
The monster didn’t know why, but it felt a deep wrenching fear every ti it looked at its mother. More specifically at her left eye.
This was the eye she used to create a Master-ranked monster, but what ca out of that creation was one not even Inara anticipated.
Not only had she succeeded in creating the monster, but this monster itself ca with an origin. Inara had no idea how she ca to create such a thing except the fact she was a genius.
She knew well that monsters could have origins, but those were rare and needed specific conditions and luck to be ford.
Yet she did it, under all circumstances.
The monster was shaped like an eyeball, and now acted as Inara’s left eye.
Instead of the green snake-like eye of Inara, the eye was all black with crimson glowing lines coursing through it like fragnted shards of glass put together.
It was extrely eerie, and Maggot was afraid of the eye.
The eye ca with its own consciousness and could talk like Maggot. Added to that, the monster referred to itself as a she, showing a level of intelligence high enough to decide its gender.
And her origin was a weird one to say the least.
Her awakened skill was a passive one, plunging anyone who looked at it into a state where the world appeared like a black fragnted void.
Her interdiate skill was to force anyone looking at her to ultimately say the truth or fall silent. And her master skill was to give her master the ability to enter the dreams of monsters.
A simple and useless skill one would believe, but to the Mother of Monsters, it was a crucial one.
Inara was truly surprised by the power of...
’Oeil!’ The monster shouted inside Inara’s mind, ’Call Oeil, mother.’
’Stop shouting inside my head, bitch. I call you whatever I want, okay? I decided you would be Oddball.’ Inara scowled at her eye who refused to yield.
’I demand a good na for my great self, Mother!’ Oddball complained, ’How can I be fearso if my na is Oddball? Nas are power, Mother!’
’Please, I beg—!’
’You are Oeil. Now shut it before I gouge you out and make you a sticky sar on the ground.’
Inara was losing patience.
Oeil fell silent imdiately, gloating and smirking inwardly for succeeding in obtaining a worthy na.
Maggot watched Oeil with admiration. Not only Maggot, even the five leeches were surprised.
’Little sister is truly daring. Did she really go against mother?’ Fatty murmured inwardly, surprised.
’Sigh...I rember when I dared and I was beat up like a worthless leech...’ one muttered, causing his remaining siblings to spare him a mocking glance and snicker openly at him.
’Good for you, fucking idiot.’
’Yes, next ti you will learn to shut it in front of mother.’
’Just do like this sucker Fatty and be a good sucker.’
Each of them began to berate him, causing the leech with the hint of red on his slimy skin to get redder in anger.
"I WILL KILL YOU!"
Soon, another battle between leeches erupted. The 273rd battle.
Inara ignored completely her first children and stood up from the ground, swaying a little at her new sight. She cursed.
She was still adjusting to her new eye, for she was seeing better than with the right one. Added to that with the passive skill, Inara decided to cover it.
She looked next at Maggot who was crawling on her shoulder.
"You have sothing for to hide Oeil?" She asked.
Imdiately, Maggot opened its mouth wide open and vomited out an eyepatch colored in deep black with runes slithering on it.
Without feeling disgusted by the sight, Inara took it and cleaned it with a wave of her aura before wearing it, hiding her left eye perfectly.
’You are hiding my majesty, Mother!’
’Are you trying to get on my nerves, Oeil?’
Oeil wisely shut up.
Inara cracked her neck left then right, trying to get used to seeing only with one eye, before raising her head to look at the sky.
And just at that ti...
{Congratulations, Inara Serpentine, you have completed your Legendary Quest.}
The Will paused, then...
{Brace yourself, Scion of Echidna, you are ascending to Master!}
Pain exploded inside Inara’s body.
"Ah, fucking Will."
She cursed as she kneeled on the ground weakly, feeling her body slowly being reconstructed with overwhelming agony.
...
While Inara cursed shalessly The Will for the pain she was going through, ris was cursing Lady Luck for being found out.
She stood there, her cat body on guard as she eyed the big cat in front of her. The sa one who transford her into her present state. The Silver Cat.
The Silver Cat looked at ris’s hideout with obvious amusent, seeing how even with all the objects she had stolen, ris still created a very lovable house with all the necessary equipnt. Stolen ones, but still lovely.
She rested her eyes next on the thieving cat, noticing how natural she was with her cat body now. It was truly surprising for soone to get used to an unfamiliar body so easily in such a short amount of ti.
The Silver Cat — Solace Kaizen — was truly amazed by ris, but at the sa ti she was not.
Not only because of her illustrious bloodline, but also because of sothing deep inside ris.
Sothing that made her who she was without even knowing.
Sothing chilling, even to her.
She sighed inwardly and spoke:
"At ease, little kitty, I am here as a giver of good news. Good news for , at least." Solace said with a smirking tone as she entered ris’s house and made herself comfortable inside her stolen cushion.
ris’s cat-eyes twitched, "Aye. Aye. Aye. Make yourself ho, don’t absolutely be shy." She said with a strained voice.
Solace grinned, "How kind of you," she uttered with sarcasm, "But sit down, little kitty."
"Can you call anything else but this?"
"Thieving cat?"
"Little kitty is perfect."
Once again, Solace suppressed a smile at ris. She had to admit, since the appearance of ris, the City of Cats beca way more lively with her weird antics.
At first there were so of her people who looked at her with side-eye, with apprehension, but now everyone sohow loved the whimsical and thieving cat.
So of the younger kittens even took her as a role model. Sothing she couldn’t help but lose so sleep over.
And lately, every day the cats woke up with eagerness to inquire about who — and whether — the thieving cat stole again.
And ris might have thought no one knew her hideout, but everyone did. They just let her be, for she brought a new flavor into a sterile city where there was nothing new anymore.
Solace sohow felt sad thinking that this little kitten might go back. But...
There are endings in life, as the wise said, and this one would be one of the many ris would live, and for her an addition to her already full closet of endings.
Once again, she sighed wistfully and looked at ris,
"You have obtained our acknowledgnt, ris Elamin." She began, causing ris to open her eyes wide.
She seed to finally rember that... she was here for a quest.
’Oh!!! That’s right! The quest!’
Solace’s voice snapped her back toward the current situation,
"And by earning our acknowledgnt, and with your lineage, Little Kitty, you have earned yourself rewards."
ris tilted her head cutely, her tail flicking, "They are?"
"Two things." Solace said while raising one of her paws, "First, I will tell you the inheritance left here by one of your ancestors. And second, I will tell you a unique condition of yours you seem to have inherited from one of your parents."
Now, ris was serious.
Unique condition? Inheritance?
Solace didn’t wait for her to gather herself as she imdiately blurted out the two things,
"First, ris Elamin, your ancestor has left here a Seed of Frost. You are eligible to take the test left by them to claim it."
ris’s heart skipped a beat. "SEED OF FROST?" She bellowed, her voice weirdly high-pitched.
Solace slapped her softly with her tail, making ris imdiately calm down.
"Focus, for this is important." She warned.
ris listened seriously, the atmosphere suddenly tense.
After a mont, Solace continued once more.
"And second," she murmured, then paused a little as she fixed her glowing runic eyes on ris’s silver one, going past them and looking deep inside her...
"You, little kitty..."
...her eyes settled into an empty pale void.
"...you have no soul."
—End Of Chapter 346—
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