The elder, lost in his own arrogance, saw none of it. He flashed a smug grin, shaking his head like a parent chiding a child.
— "Sorry, it seems it doesn't work..." — he said, sarcasm oozing. — "Maybe she's busy, but I believe in you."
He thought he'd won. Thought we were pawns on a board he'd mastered. But the board splintered.
The floor trembled first, a shudder that climbed your legs and seized your chest. The air thickened, heavy as molten lead. Then she arrived.
It wasn't an entrance—it was a rupture. Tall, commanding, she didn't walk; space warped to let her through. Her form was perfection unleashed, beauty so sharp it ached. Her face mirrored Nael's, but gentler, carved in lines no mortal could match. He was ice; she was a sun that scorched the eyes. Her golden hair flowed like rivers, outshining the jade lamps until they seemed like dying embers. And her eyes—God, her eyes. Deep blue, alive with spinning stars. To meet them was to drown, to lose the earth beneath you.
She said nothing. Just lifted a finger, light and unhurried.
And the elder was gone.
No fanfare, no fight. In an instant, he was ash on the floor, a pile of nothing. His soul—that grimy essence he cherished—hung trapped in her grasp, quaking like a snared moth. Then came the fire. Golden, small, but insatiable. The soul shrieked, a sound that clawed at your mind, pleading as it unraveled. Fear flooded the hall—bitter, searing, choking.
The masters dropped to their knees, clawing the ground, muttering broken words. Even the Holy Land's master, appearing at the door like a specter, stood rigid, eyes wide. She knew. We all did. That woman was an abyss made flesh, something you couldn't defy.
— "How dare you..." — Her voice sliced the air, cold and piercing as ice. — "How dare you pray my name... while harboring filthy fantasies?"
Silence consumed everything. Even heartbeats stilled, too afraid to provoke.
And then Nael looked at her.
It was the first time he stirred, the first time his gaze found hers. Something flickered between them—a spark, a faint echo of something beyond my grasp. She smiled, a smile both tender and cruel, laced with a duality that lingered in the air.
— "This is just a thread of my presence," — she said, her voice calm, yet each word struck like a mountain crumbling into dust. Her eyes gleamed, locked on Nael with unwavering intensity. — "And you, my little Supremium… why did you teach a degenerate like that to pray?"
There was no trace of anger in her tone, only a lightness—almost playful—tinged with a subtle undercurrent of disappointment. Nael offered no reply. He stood motionless, his vacant eyes fixed on her, an abyss staring back.
Her laughter spilled out, a haunting melody, beautiful yet chilling, like bells ringing through a forsaken graveyard.
— "Well, never mind," — she said, her graceful frame tilting ever so slightly. But her eyes darkened, the blue within them swirling into a tempest. — "But listen well, my little Supremium… the next one you teach, I'll do worse than this. I'll destroy their body and let them suffer in the divine celestial fire for a thousand years. Then I'll cast them into the River of Reincarnations, where they'll taste every shade of pain until I grow weary of their torment."
She spoke as if offering a gentle promise, serene, her lips curling into a faint half-smile. No one dared doubt her. The air itself quivered under the weight of her words.
— "So…" — She tilted her head, gazing at him with a spark that seemed to pull from a distant memory. — "Aren't you happy to see your mommy?"
The hall plunged into silence—a thick, palpable stillness that pressed against your chest.
She sighed, a soft, almost mournful sound.
— "What a shame… what a shame I can't see that beautiful smile of yours, my little Supremium."
The pressure in the air thickened, crushing down like an unseen force. The masters, who moments before had stirred to rise, froze once more, their breaths snared in their throats. Nael remained a statue, his gaze unwavering, his eyes empty—devoid of anger, of yearning, holding only a void that consumed all light.
The silence within the hall pulsed, alive and dense, as though it could be sliced with a dull blade. It loomed over the peak masters—men and women of lofty titles who now appeared fragile, stripped bare. Their breaths came in shallow gasps, stolen by the moment, and the jade walls' faint glow seemed dimmed, overshadowed by a presence far greater, one that had entered with her.
The woman with golden hair, a figure sculpted from light and shadow, lifted her chin. Her eyes—deep, ravenous, like wells that swallowed the soul—fixed on Nael. Then she spoke.
— "Your older sister has been searching for you since forever." — Her voice was soft, almost tender, but it carried an edge that set the air humming. — "You two share a soul bond, you know? She can hear and feel everything you feel."
A young cultivator in the corner let out a stifled gasp, as if the air had turned to stone in his lungs. Eyes darted, quick and anxious. An older master, his gray beard cascading over his chest, raised a trembling hand to his face, wiping away sweat that glistened like a confession.
She never broke her stare from Nael. He stood as if carved from ice, his face unyielding, his clear eyes reflecting nothing—no ripple, no fracture, just an endless emptiness.
— "So I had to seal that part so she wouldn't find you." — She pressed on, her voice steady, her lips moving with deliberate grace. — "But she made me the bridge between you two. If I see you… if I feel you… she'll feel it too."
A sigh slipped from her, light and nearly human—nearly. Her fingers traced a lazy circle in the air, a casual gesture that toyed with something invisible.
— "So I sealed all my senses."
Silence fell again. She paused, and then a smile unfurled across her face—small, sweet, yet sharp enough to cut.
— "But… what mother doesn't know her own child?"
Nael gave no answer. Nothing in him bent or softened; her words slid off him like rain on polished stone. The masters, though, shifted faintly—a timid, shared breath broke free. Someone cleared their throat, the sound reverberating like a clap of thunder in the stillness.
She laughed, a chime of shattered bells, and crossed her arms with an ease that masked a quiet menace.
— "And one more thing, my little Supremium… stop teaching others to call or summon us."
The warning landed like a stone in still water, sending unseen ripples through the room. The cultivators shrank back instinctively, caught in its wake.
— "If, by chance, they summon your sister…" — She sighed, her shoulders rising and falling with a weariness that felt ancient. — "She'll burn everything here."
The silence returned, heavier now, laced with a cruel edge. A wide-eyed youth swallowed audibly, the sound jarring in the taut atmosphere.
— "She doesn't like jokes." — She frowned, her lips pursing as she searched for the right word. — "She's very… vengeful."
A shiver rippled through the air. Even the masters, draped in their ornate robes and cloaked in imposing auras, felt the cold creep up their spines. She watched them, her gaze flickering with something not quite amusement, not quite wrath.
— "Speaking of her…" — A glint sparked in her eyes, as if she'd recalled an old, private jest. — "She's been quite troublesome lately."
Her fingers resumed their slow, hypnotic dance in the air.
— "Recently, she ripped the masculinity from the Drakarys Heir."
A ragged whisper burst through the hall—a collective gasp of raw shock, as if the ground had split beneath them.
— "All because he said he was in love with her."
She turned her face to Nael, waiting, searching. But he remained unchanged—a wall of silence, a void that offered no echo.
— "If it weren't for a hair's breadth, she would've killed the poor wretch." — She continued, her tone even, almost detached. — "And then, as if that weren't enough, she declared to the world that any man who wanted to marry her must first defeat you."
The silence snapped shut like a heavy door, suffocating the room. The masters exchanged fleeting glances—some with clenched fists, others with downcast eyes, as if afraid to be noticed.
— "And so, the trouble began."
Her voice stayed light, almost teasing, but what followed stripped away any hint of levity.
— "Now, men are hunting you to defeat you."
She sighed, the sound of an exasperated mother, her eyes narrowing slightly.
— "And the Seraphim…"
For the first time, a shadow crossed her face—a solemn, almost sorrowful gleam.
— "The Seraphim are hunting you to exterminate you."
Her words crashed like thunder, and the hall seemed to shudder—or perhaps it was the hearts within it.
— "After all… there is no male Seraphim." — "And there never should be."
The truth settled, massive and undeniable. Eyes widened in disbelief. A master's cup slipped from his grasp, the jade striking the floor with a lone, hollow clatter.
— "Not even a half-Seraphim like you."
She tilted her head, her expression unreadable, as if seeing him anew.
— "Many said I cast you into the mortal realm because you were useless."
A soft laugh escaped her, wistful, like a breeze rustling through withered leaves.
— "Others spun different tales."
She took a single step forward. Just one. But the air shifted—grew dense, charged, like the calm before a storm. Every cultivator felt it: she was more than a woman, something vast and uncontainable, a force that tightened your chest.
And Nael? He simply watched, as always—a mountain standing firm against the wind.
The silence that followed pressed down on every shoulder. No one spoke. Ascended. No one breathed too loudly. Eyes turned to him—some with uncertainty, others with awe, many with unmasked fear.
Yet he remained untouched, as if the world could collapse around him and he'd still stand, unyielding.
She smiled—a smile devoid of warmth, of light.
— "I didn't have time to tell you before, in that recording…" — Her voice rumbled, deep and resonant, like thunder trapped within her throat. — "But now you know."
She tilted her head, her eyes shimmering with something no one could name. A promise? A threat? A goodbye?
The hall was no longer just a room—it was a living weight, pressing hard against your ribs. Jade lamps hung silent, casting trembling green shadows across the walls, as if even the light sensed the wrongness of it all. The air clung thickly to your skin, and the cultivators, in their grand robes, held their breath as though exhaling might break some unspoken law.
She stood at the heart of it, a figure out of place in that space. Her golden hair flowed like molten fire, and her eyes—blue, fathomless, brimming with a radiance too vast to hold—locked onto Nael. She tilted her head just enough to make the silence roar.
— "You carry the Giver's Physique."
A chill cut through the hall, sharp as an icy blade against the spine. Someone stifled a gasp, the sound echoing like a muted clap of thunder.
— "Perhaps in the mortal realm, you'd be safe…"
Her laughter rang out then, cold and hollow, bouncing off the walls and prickling the back of your neck.
— "But here, Nael…"
The floor seemed to quake—or maybe it was the fear trembling in the bones of those who listened.
— "No."
Jaws slackened among the masters, teetering on the edge of falling. An old man in the corner gripped his chest, his knuckles white with tension.
— "There was once someone with the same physique before."
Her eyes glinted, heavy with a secret too old for that world, steeped in dust and blood.
— "He was useless to himself… but useful to all women."
Her voice dropped like a stone, and some cultivators swallowed hard, the sound piercing the quiet. A younger master, eyes wide, shifted as if to flee but remained rooted, bound to the spot.