Pov: Ryuk
Blood dripped from my finger, soaking deep into the blackened parchment. The moment my blood touched those cryptic runes, the paper didn't just absorb it—it drank it.
A chilling hum echoed through the silent forest clearing.
The parchment dissolved into wisps of dark gray ash, turning into a spiral of black mist that shot straight into my open wound.
"AGHHH!"
A sound torn straight from the depths of hell ripped out of my throat. It felt as though liquid ice had been injected directly into my veins, rushing toward my heart. The cold was unbearable, freezing my blood, making my skin turn a sickly grayish-white.
Along with the excruciating pain, thousands of twisted, incoherent whispers battered my consciousness. It was like standing in a storm of weeping souls and demonic laughter, clawing at my sanity, trying to drag my mind into a bottomless abyss.
Kill... devour... return to dust...
Is this the mental pollution? The taboo of borrowing power from the outer death world? My vision flickered between bloody red and pitch black as my knees gave out, slamming hard against the freshly dug dirt of Roby's grave.
Just as my consciousness was on the verge of collapsing into madness, a sudden warmth erupted in the center of my chest.
Ding—!
A golden chime, pure and majestic, rang directly inside my soul.
"HOST HAS ABSORBED FORBIDDEN DEATH MANA."
"BEACON OF TRUTH HAS BEEN TRIGGERED PASSIVELY."
"THE LIGHT PURIFIES THE ILLUSION OF CORRUPTION, ANCHORING HOST'S WILL TO ABSOLUTE ORDER."
"SIGIL OF EVOLUTION HAS BEEN TRIGGERED PASSIVELY."
"DEATH RUNES ARE BEING RECONFIGURED TO PREVENT CORPOREAL COLLAPSE."
"CONGRATULATIONS, HOST HAS COMPLETED SYSTEM MAIN QUEST: GAIN INFORMATION OF SECRET YOUR BODY HOLDS (1/1)."
System's Notification sounded in my ear, I got another reward. I think this reward may come handy in helping me running, but I have no time to look into it as first I need to get away from this.
The black mist violently churning inside my chest met the radiant golden light of the Beacon of Truth. Like water poured on boiling grease, a furious sizzling erupted within my meridians. But instead of tearing me apart, the Sigil of Evolution near my heart flared like a furnace, forcefully harmonizing two forces that should never coexist: the pure, blazing light of cosmic order and the cold, parasitic energy of death!
The mental shrieks ceased instantly. My mind snapped back to crystal clarity, though my body felt hollowed out, gasping for air.
Before I could even comprehend the system upgrading, my hand, which was resting on Roby's grave, felt a violent tremor in the earth beneath it.
A ring of pale gray runes ignited around the dirt mound.
Clack... clatter...
The soil parted. Bony fingers broke through the earth, clutching the night air. Then, the complete skeleton of the dead necromancer Roby dragged itself out of the grave, covered in loose soil, standing tall under the moonlight.
Two flickering flames of pale purple fire burned inside its empty eye sockets. It didn't roar, nor did it show any savage hunger. Instead, it bent its bony spine, kneeling solemnly on one knee before me.
A faint thread of mental connection tied its skull directly to my mind.
"SPELL INVOKED: SKELETON WARRIOR (GRADE 1)."
"CURRENT MANA: 5/100."
I succeeded. In a single frantic gamble, I had opened my mana pathways and summoned an undead. But I didn't care about having a minion to fight—a Grade 1 skeleton against Reynolds Ashborn was like an egg thrown at a mountain.
"Stand up!" I ordered through the mental link, stumbling to my feet. "Carry me! Run north, deep into the Dark Mist Mountain range! As fast as you can, don't stop!"
The skeleton didn't hesitate. With terrifying speed that far outstripped an adult human, it scooped me up into its cold, bony arms and turned toward the dark expanse of the untamed forest.
The wind tore past my ears as the trees blurred into dark streaks.
Every second, the distance between the slums and me grew. If Reynolds used my bloodline or the Life Stone to track me, every meter this skeleton covered was buying Yuki and the children a higher chance of reaching Grandma Rose's bakery safely.
Yuki... Kevin... live well, I muttered, feeling the freezing night wind numbing my face as I rode the bony mount into the unknown darkness.
Meanwhile, at the outskirts of Town 16.
Dawn was just beginning to break on the horizon. The first rays of morning light painted the sky in pale shades of orange and violet.
Inside the shabby hut, Yuki had already woken up all nine children. Following Ryuk's desperate warning, she hadn't wasted a single minute. She packed their few spare clothes and held little Anya's hand tightly, while Kevin and Xiao Jake walked obediently beside her.
Her young face was pale, filled with an ominous dread she couldn't shake off. Ryuk's bloodshot eyes and trembling hands from last night kept replaying in her mind. He was hiding something terrifying, and she knew it.
"Big sister Yuki, where is big brother Ryuk?" Kevin asked innocently, rubbing his sleepy eyes. "Isn't he coming with us to eat pizza at Grandma Rose's?"
Yuki's throat tightened. She forced a gentle smile, though her hand trembled slightly. "Big brother went ahead to prepare something for us. Let's hurry to Grandma Rose, okay?"
The group of children stepped onto the slum road, heading toward the central market.
Suddenly—
RUMBLE——!!
A sound like thunder exploding right next to their ears shattered the morning silence!
The earth violently shook, making several children fall to the ground, crying in panic. Yuki instinctively dropped into a defensive stance, shielding the crying Kevin and Anya beneath her arms, her head snapping up toward the sky.
What she saw turned her blood to absolute ice.
The morning sky—the vast, endless blue vault above the town—was literally cracking open!
Massive fissures of black lightning tore across the clouds. The air turned heavy, suffocating, as if a mountain had been dropped onto the entire district. In the distance, roofs of slum houses began to collapse under the sheer weight of an invisible atmospheric pressure!
From that shattered tear in the sky, two figures descended.
One was a tall man clad in pristine white robes, carrying an aura of absolute majesty and tyranny. A long blade rested at his waist, humming with invisible slaughter intent. His eyes were cold, devoid of any human warmth, looking down upon the mortal town below like looking at an ant nest.
Former City Lord of Ashborn City—Reynolds Ashborn!
Beside him floated a woman adorned in shimmering golden silk robes. Her face was completely hidden behind an exquisite golden mask engraved with ancient, celestial patterns. Her feet didn't touch the ground; she hovered in mid-air, radiating a pressure so immense that even the air around her warped into golden ripples.
"Greetings, My Lady," Reynolds spoke, bowing slightly toward the golden-masked woman, his voice echoing across miles like rolling thunder. "According to the cycle of the stars, the medicine has reached complete maturity today. We can harvest it and return."
The masked woman raised her delicate, pale hand. A faint golden glyph spun above her palm as she closed her eyes, sensing the connection to the sealed Life Stone fragment.
A second passed.
Then, two.
The golden glyph suddenly flickered and turned pitch-black!
The woman's hand froze. The temperature of the entire sky dropped instantly to sub-zero, frosting the air.
Reynolds noticed her change and looked up, confused. "My Lady?"
When the woman spoke, her voice was not soft, nor was it merciful. It was an ancient, resonant voice that sent chills directly into the souls of every living being below:
"Reynolds... where is the boy?"
Reynolds frowned, stepping forward. "He is in the outskirts, right beneath us. I left him in this abandoned settlement, ensuring he would remain a pure, unblemished vessel without any cultivation—"
"Silence, fool!" the masked lady snapped coldly, her aura erupting like a supernova.
The shockwave blasted outward, pulverizing clouds for miles!
"The Life Stone is not in this town!" she said, her voice filled with suppressed fury and disbelief. "Its seal has been breached by death mana... and its aura is moving rapidly toward the northern forbidden forest!"
"What?!" Reynolds's expression twisted into utter shock. "Impossible! He is an 11-year-old child! He doesn't know a single martial art, much less mana—"
Down below on the road, Yuki stared at the two terrifying figures hovering in the sky. Hearing their conversation, her sharp mind connected the dots in a fraction of a second.
The danger wasn't coming for my family. It was coming for Ryuk. A medicine... they called him a medicine!
Ryuk had known this would happen. He had run away alone into the dangerous northern forest, drawing these terrifying monsters away, just so she and these children could live!
Tears instantly burst from Yuki's eyes. Her fingernails dug into her palms until blood dripped.
Up in the air, the golden-masked lady's cold gaze swept downward, scanning the slum road. Her eyes briefly passed over the crying orphans and Yuki huddled on the ground.
To her, these mortals were not even worth stepping on.
"Waste no more time," the lady commanded, her silhouette already turning into a golden beam of light shooting toward the north. "If that stone is ruined by corrupted mana, your head will roll with it, Reynolds."
Reynolds's face turned pale. "Yes, My Lady!"
With a roar that shook the earth, Reynolds turned into a streak of white light, following her toward the northern horizon, disappearing into the distant mountains within the blink of an eye.
The suffocating pressure vanished, leaving the ruined town in stunned silence.
Yuki stood up slowly in the midst of the dust and debris. Looking toward the northern sky where the two monsters had vanished, her tear-stained face was no longer filled with the helplessness of an orphan.
Instead, a terrifying, dark resolve burned in her eyes.
"Kevin, Dimitry, take the others to Grandma Rose right now," Yuki whispered, her voice deadly calm.
Kevin looked at her with trembling lips. "Big sister... where are you going?"
Yuki didn't look back. She tightened the cloth around her fists, turning her body toward the northern forest.
"I am going to get our brother back."