Chapter 221 – My Last Born!
"Fucking bitch!"
Love cursed with all her strength, veins crawling all over her forehead and neck as she looked at her reflection in the mirror.
Her beautiful uniform was now completely stained by that bitch’s drink.
The first day! The first day of school, and her uniform was already in such a deplorable state!
"And that bitch had the nerve to yell at me? Me? Love de Bayard??" She hissed under her breath, her eyes bloodshot, scrubbing at the stain with more force than necessary, only making it worse.
That woman was so lucky she wasn’t alone and had a twin sister.
Oh, so damn bloody lucky.
However...
"If you think this is the end, then just wait for my damn bloody news." Love continued, remembering the faces and figures of those two women. "Second year or not, no one treats me like this without consequence. Damned bloody whores with their slutty bodies."
Yet the most infuriating thing in this situation wasn’t even those cow-breasted twins.
It was Emrys himself, acting like a hero to save a useless commoner. A maid. Someone not even worthy of licking her feet after a sweaty training session.
There was a reason Love de Bayard had no maid, no butler, no servant of any kind.
They always died after a couple of months. All of them by suicide.
Love never cared or asked herself why they killed themselves. She couldn’t care less about the lives of commoners.
They could die for all she cared, and her life would continue uninterrupted.
Those commoners would never run out anyway. One died, another took their place.
That was her view.
Love de Bayard was the youngest daughter of the Runic Tower. Her very Aspect — Runic Body — was the pinnacle of what the Tower wished to achieve in their lifetime.
Setting aside the fact that her talent in rune inscription was greater than anything people had ever known, Love possessed one of the most versatile powers in the Golden Generation.
She, alongside Nafissatou, the Magician.
Where Love needed to know the runic inscriptions of something in order to use its power, meaning she was not limited by affinity.
Nafissatou only needed to know the "Spell" of what she wanted. But realistically, she was limited by the number of affinities her Magic Core could hold. And that depended on each person’s talent.
So because of such talent and background, added to her honestly breathtaking appearance, Love became who she was today, through her father’s indulgence.
And through another incident: the death of her mother.
Love’s mother died when she was five years old.
Killed. Assassinated. Beheaded after being thoroughly abused.
By whom?
Her own fucking butler, who was a spy from a rival faction.
No one could understand the innate disdain and hatred she held for commoners, and more precisely, those damned bloody servants.
She loathed them.
And she would have killed them all if she didn’t have a reputation to uphold.
"Emrys, you damn bloody idiot with a hero complex." Love scowled. "You left me alone to save that maid? A damn bloody maid?"
To say she was disappointed would be a lack of proper word usage.
She was disgusted and offended by his act. But she must not show it to him.
She must, at all costs, remain the perfect girlfriend for him. She would give him whatever he wanted, whatever would make him believe she was his own. Even her body.
And that, as long as being with him boosted her popularity and made her an undying legend in the Model industry.
That was the last thing she had left.
The last thing her mother left for her.
So after spitting out everything in her chest, Love was now much calmer, able to go back and act all lovey-dovey with Emrys.
"I love him." She whispered, looking at her reflection. "I love him with all my heart, and I always sacrifice myself for him. Yes. I love him. I love Emrys Stormblessed. I do."
Repeating that over and over, Love smiled beautifully and lovingly, her face the very standard of the perfect girlfriend.
Taking a breath, she pivoted and strode toward the exit.
"You can do it, Love."
She smiled beautifully.
"You can."
She finally exited the room, her mood all rainbows and pink.
The moment she was gone, however, Windy appeared out of thin air, holding a huge phone that had been recording.
She smiled happily, watching the video of Love acting like her real self in a place where she thought no one would see.
"Klaus will be so happy!" She laughed, and disappeared again, heading toward her lovely master, bearing good news.
"Hehehehe!"
...
At the same time, in the Realm of Mountains and Rivers, Cassius finally arrived at his destination.
He looked in front of him, seeing nothing but a strange mountain made of melted glass, perfectly reflecting the sun overhead.
There was no entrance, but Cassius knew there was one somewhere here.
"Now how do I find the entrance?" He asked himself, and his Innate immediately hissed in answer.
Cassius tilted his head. "You mean..." he began, his lips twitching heavily, "...I need to pay respect to my ancestor first?"
His Innate hissed in acknowledgement, confirming his thoughts.
He rolled his eyes, finding it completely absurd.
However, this answered one of his unspoken questions.
"This doesn’t seem to have been created by Amate Desdemona." He thought, stroking his chin. "That 333rd ancestor of mine doesn’t strike me as someone who’d care about this kind of thing to such a degree. Then... another ancestor?"
If he was right, then there was a great chance he would meet another of his ancestors.
Cassius felt thrilled by that thought. The more ancestors he met, the better his understanding of the overall situation.
’I just hope he can speak? Or at least leave something behind to inform me.’
He truly hoped so. But for now, he needed to pay his respects.
[You don’t have to do much. Just say some prayers.]
"It’s not that simple." Cassius’s lips twitched, remembering what his Innate had hissed to him. "I have to do a damned dance. A dance called Coiling Snake, then at the end cut my finger and let my blood fall onto the surface of the mountain."
Ananke’s lips twitched as she tried to hide her laughter. [This looks like one of those rituals from past Ages. It’s rare to still see them nowadays. Only tribes still hold a wisp of these forgotten traditions.]
"Yeah, in any case, this is weird."
But finding no other way, Cassius steeled himself and began to dance, following his Innate’s guidance.
Ananke burst into laughter at the sight of Cassius’s awkward movements. His face flushed crimson.
But he pushed on.
The more he danced, however, the more he seemed to slip into a sort of trance. The world around him blurred into a hazy landscape, his eyes growing glassy.
His mind became nothing but a realm filled with the hissing of snakes, yet he could understand all of them.
They were greeting him. They were joyful. They were... happy.
Cassius went further, his movements now swift and fluid like a striking snake, and he found himself suddenly standing in an entirely different world.
His body was still dancing, unable to stop.
Faster, swifter... perfect, even.
He cast his eyes around as he danced, and saw a world of white and crimson.
Cassius continued to look around, dazed and confused, and suddenly saw a sight that made him shiver.
He saw a snake that seemed infinite — with no beginning and no end — looking at him with eyes that seemed to have seen everything between heaven and earth, and understood it all.
The snake’s appearance could not be perceived. Or rather, his mind couldn’t hold the memory of how it looked.
Yet that was not the end.
Atop the snake’s head sat a woman.
Cassius felt the instinctive need to kneel and bow to her, feeling as though she were his beginning... and his ultimate end.
The woman’s features were hidden. But Cassius could feel that she smiled at the sight of his dance.
Then her voice graced his ears:
"My Last Born."
BOOOMM!!
Cassius’s body convulsed heavily. His knees buckled and met the ground. His face began to bleed white, black and crimson, droplets falling onto the surface of the mountain.
’Queen above...!’
The world grew blurry, his breathing shallow.
Then a voice echoed again, this time not hurting his very existence.
"Ohoho?" It exclaimed. "Hahah! It’s you, right? Last Born? No doubt! This door only opens for you! Hahahah! Come on, then! Come on, my boy!"
Cassius gingerly lifted his head, still disoriented, looking at the door that had suddenly appeared, with the Sigil of his Family neatly inscribed upon it.
"Enter my abode, my dear boy!"
—End of Chapter 221—