The sound of Sara's crying was the only thing that existed in the absolute dark of the cell. To her, the silence was a vacuum, a terrifying void that had swallowed her brother's soul. But to Edward Vistro, the silence was crowded. Within the theater of his mind, a thousand versions of this exact moment played out in a haunting, simultaneous overlay.
He watched her through the haze of his past lives. He saw her as she was now, young, scared, wearing the blue cloak of a house that was going to fall apart. He also saw her as a queen in his four-hundredth life, a corpse in his six-hundredth, and a weary refugee in the lives where he had been too weak to reach her in time.
Sara looked up at him, gasping. She looked for anger, resentment, or even the fear she used to know. But there was nothing. Edward's face was expressionless.
She started talking fast, her words mixed with sobs. She blamed herself. She admitted to years of ignoring things, of staying in her nice room while Damian laughed in the annex. She thought his cold eyes showed the isolation she had allowed. She thought she had broken him.
Edward listened, but she couldn't have known that her neglect was nothing compared to the things he saw, or that he had died many times.
In his earliest regressions—the second, the fifth, the tenth—Edward had been a man of emotions. He had wept until his eyes turned red. He had thrown himself into the arms of lovers and friends, desperately trying to forge bonds that could withstand the reset. But he had learned the cruelest lesson of the heavens: relationships are ephemeral when time is a circle. Why bother memorizing the scent of a woman's hair or the sound of a friend's laugh when a single sword-thrust can send you back to a morning where they look at you as a stranger?
Life had lost its value. It was just something to spend. He stayed sane by turning his pride into a weapon and his arrogance into armor. He had one goal: to kill the Demon Lord. Every land he had conquered, every king he had enslaved, every forbidden art he had mastered—it was all for the sake of that final, elusive kill. He had become a machine made of mana.
And yet, every time he regressed—every time he told himself that this time, he will finally developed a heart of cold. But there remain some people who always find a way to melt them, one of them being his sister.
Despite himself, Edward felt a familiar, unwanted heat behind his eyes. It was a traitorous sensation, a crack in the cold he had spent years making.
A tear fell, leaving a path on his dirty cheek. Then another.
'Many times,' Edward thought. 'I have sat in this dark, and I have watched her weep, and every single time, I think I am strong enough to watch her walk away without crying.'
He was wrong. He was always wrong about this one thing.
Edward then stood up. He moved like a brother, and reached out, his fingers shaking, and touched Sara's face. He gently wiped away her tears.
Even though he had done this countless times, her skin felt fresh. It felt like the first time he had touched something alive after being in nothingness.
"Don't," Edward said, his voice rough. "Don't cry in a place like this, Sara. Your tears are too precious for this place."
Sara stopped, gasping. "Edward? Are you... still in there?"
"I am more here than ever," he said, looking at her. He pulled his hand back, his cold mask returning. He couldn't stay in this moment as it was too risky while his father watched over the house.
"You have to go," Edward said, his voice sharp. "Now."
"Go?" Edward, "I just found you! I can get you out, I can talk to Father—"
"No," Edward interrupted, his eyes flashing. Father would act quickly against you if he found you here against his command. Listen for the first time and just leave.
"But the food—" Sara said, reaching out to offer the little food she had brought with her.
"I am okay," he said again.
His reasoning was simple, he was at Initial Adept stage. In a direct confrontation of raw power, his father would crush him like an insect. While Edward's sword insight was unrivaled across the entire Western Continent—a skill that allowed him to kill mages two ranks above him in his past lives—this body was currently too weak to execute the higher-tier forms. A battle with the Marquis now would be a gamble he wasn't ready to take. He needed the thirty days to reach the High Mage stage, and everything began with him Refining his body using the marrow extract.
Sara looked at him, looking for the boy she knew, but only saw a stranger. Yet, she saw the strength in him.
She reached into her cloak and pulled out a small bundle. "I brought you some bread and meat from the kitchens, and some water. Please, Edward, eat."
Edward looked at the bundle. He didn't need the food, his body was okay for not eating, But he took it.
"Thank you, Sara," he said softly. "I will eat it."
Sara stood up, her legs shaking. She looked at him, her heart a mess. She didn't understand the change in him, but she felt that Edward didn't need her protection anymore.
"I'll come back,"she said.
"I would appreciate it if you don't, but it seems there's no changing your mind about it," Edward said.
Sara chuckled and her hand moved to the latch. She closed the door, locking it. The light went away, and the cell was dark again.
Edward listened to her footsteps fade. He looked at the food, then put it aside. He didn't eat. Instead, he closed his eyes and felt his power grow.
He recalled the steps he needed to take. Within three days, he had to reach the mid level of the Adept rank to use the Epic ranked extraction spell and draw the marrow essence from the goblins in the lower pits. That marrow would temper his body, accelerating his cultivation and allowing him to reach the High Mage stage within thirty days. With such a foundation, he would be unmatched throughout Luminaris.