--- Elena ---

As Liz stood back up straight, I suddenly felt a subtle presence appear a bit further away which stopped after getting close enough. I hid every emotion disappear from my face and continued to walk as if I passed her by chance. But thinking a bit further ahead, why would anyone normally come to this alleyway?

“Liz, don’t react to what I’m going to say. You’re being followed. The person should be from the Greywing family, so you should be alright. I’ll pretend to rob you, so you should play along. We’ll meet later. Your follower must be taken care of in the future,” I used my soul realm to contact her.

As I walked past her, I reached into her pocket and pulled out the pouch of world crystals she was given. In these past few days, Skeiron and Liz turned most of the servants of the Greywing family into Pawns to make their lives easier in the mansion. Even if Skerion was our Pawn, we couldn’t make him go through an outrageous change and make him ask weird things. It was better to influence everyone from the inside.

Turning people into blood servants wasn’t that hard as long as they willingly drank their Master’s blood and accepted the transformation. The people inheriting the Descendants’ blood wouldn’t change their race or their looks, but their natural talent would rise by a notch. If mixed with drinks, people could be turned into blood servants quite easily if the one putting them to sleep was someone they revered or trusted. The most important part was that they wouldn’t fight the sleepiness else they’d find out the truth and would break free, but if they fell asleep and accepted it, by the time they woke up, they’d be my servants.

The blood of the devourer was that kind of vile material, but it turned out to be really handy. I could have made more pawns back on Dink and Dunk, but they would have been too weak to do anything noteworthy. I needed capable servants, not just cannon fodder for large-scale wars since I never planned to do something like that. I wasn’t an idiot who thought that she could change the world alone or with a tiny team of five.

As I left Liz alone, I felt a crushing presence descend upon me which belonged to the person tracking Liz. I paid it no heed as if I never noticed it and left the scene without any trouble. I didn’t plan to keep that woman alive for long, so I didn’t mind her seeing my face and my ‘robbery’.

By the time of the Trigon Festival arrives, she should be dead. I can’t have her follow Liz and Skeiron all the time, though it wouldn’t hurt if I knew how often she reported to her boss. Who’s she serving even? Is it Jareg or is it his grandfather?

Realising that thinking wouldn’t get me anywhere right now, I moved towards the three brothers who still had my bacteria on them, but I came to a dead end since they were inside a private area which belonged to the local academy. Thanks to Jareg teaching the common stuff to Liz and to me by doing so, I didn’t have to send anyone to attend classes or anything of the sort, but having a few people in an important place like that wouldn’t hurt either.

I was sure that they wouldn’t come out for a while, so I waited patiently for Dred to arrive and then we made our way towards the Abyss gate. Although it wasn’t in the capital city, it was quite close to the place and the Trigon Kingdom restricted access to it. If not for the fact that anyone above the seven hundredth level could go through without being stopped, surely, many people would have protested.

“So? How would it go?” I asked when we teleported out of the city.

Dred grabbed my hand, opened it, took off his ring from his finger and then put it in my palm. “There are two million and one hundred thousand world crystals combined with the ones we had and got since then. That’s all we have, so don’t lose it,” he laughed.

“How could I ever lose it?” I shook my head as I pulled it on my finger and pressed the gem on it which shot a small needle into my finger and drew enough blood to bind it to me.

“Happy now? You have your ring back,” he held my hand and took a look at it.

“Hmm, of course, I am! When was it again? Back on Dink, you left to have a talk with Hector and then he gave you one of his family heirlooms which happened to be this ring. Although it wasn’t customary on that planet, you still presented it to me as an engagement ring or should I say wedding ring? It’s not like we held something as silly as that,” I muttered, my hand on my chin. The only thing relatively close to a wedding party could be the time we spent on the beach near Novia Deros.

“Well, Audrey told me about it. She said it’d make you happy and that it was customary on Kriton,” Dred let go of my hand and said.

“It did!” I smiled.

It took about five minutes of teleporting continuously to reach the gate which was about a hundred meters tall and fifty meters wide, surrounded by giant rock pillars which had all kinds of ancient carvings on it. The ground in front of it was barren and not even a blade of grass could be seen, but only in the close vicinity of the gate.

There were two smaller houses on both sides of the gate and I could feel the presence of two people who were at the seventh realm as it turned out, after I inspected them. I couldn’t see people’s exact level at and above the seventh realm, but it really didn’t matter with my current strength since anyone at that level could kill me with a single hit, be it the seven hundred and first or seven hundred and ninety-ninth level.

The area was a foresty place and there was a large lake not far away in front of the gate where I could feel the presence of a few very powerful monsters. That lake must have been at least five kilometers deep if not more. Although I couldn’t help but wonder if there was something at the bottom, I didn’t have the strength to check it out.

The truth was that there were other types of universes other than ours. For example, there were universes where people cultivated mana in a somewhat similar manner compared to what mages did here, but still much different. They somehow built mana into their bodies and gained incredible abilities, but there were many differences.

For example, people at the same level as the rulers of Trigon could create world crystals in a cultivator universe, but they weren’t really useful for the type of training they did. Although the mighty kings here couldn’t create world crystals, their abilities were more than enough to fight people of the same level from different universes. Each universe had its cons and pros and clearly, creating materials was something simple in the world of cultivators. Opposite of that, this level-regulated world was filled with skills and spells which cultivators fell short on compared to these types of universes.

I found it rather intriguing, but the real point was that the gate connecting these multiple universes was none other than the one in front of us, the Abyss gate. Of course, it wasn’t the only one. Even a single universe had numerous Abyss gates, but people had to find them. And the Lord who ruled over the anchor, the abyss which connected everything, the one who could kill anyone with a snap of their finger was called the Abyss. It was also the creator of us, legendary creatures, hence, the reason I called it my father as a joke.

If a legendary creature died, another one would be born in its place. Every legendary creature was an eternal race that would keep reviving with only a single specimen in one universe. Theoretically, unless another Dragon God moved into this universe, I shouldn’t come across another one stronger than me now that I killed Padinyss. At most, I’d meet a newborn Dragon God whose power wouldn’t matter to me. But every universe would have one of every legendary creature and this was one of the main differences between Dred, me, and the others.

As devourers, we weren’t reborn or created as commonly as the other races. Our birth had a single condition which was that one of the creators, the ones who had the power to create universes, made it happen. I didn’t know the necessary conditions and circumstances since that wasn’t a part of my inborn memories, but the Abyss was kind enough to share one or two things about the reason of my existence, at least.

And unlike the other legendary creatures, even if I died, I wouldn’t return and be reborn with the memories of my ancestors. Sometimes I found it truly unfair how the other legendary creatures had so many perks Dred and I didn’t have, but at least, we had our own devilish ability which was hard to resist. Besides, although they could make blood servants as well, theirs were much different compared to ours.

My plans of cleansing the world weren’t restricted to just this universe, after all, I was meant to destroy everything originally. Not even planets and stars should be left, but I never felt the need to destroy everything like a crazy and mad person. I wanted to be more than what I was born to be, what I was given, and what I was meant to be. While I cleared my head and thought about the future, Dred took a quick trip around the gate and returned in a few minutes.

“There are ten people at the seventh realm guarding the gate and as the law states, only people reaching the seven hundredth level can pass through the gate, unless any of the rulers of their respective nation, states otherwise. So you surely can’t check out the Abyss for now,” he said.

Biting my lower lip, I said, “That sucks. I wanted to spread my influence to other places as well, but I guess it’s better like this. Though I really could have dealt with weaker realms and places…” I rolled my eyes.

“Indeed, and you could have made many blood servants who would have grown strong while we would clean this place, but that’ll have to wait,” he nodded his head.

“Let’s go back, it’s not like standing here will change anything,” I sighed as I turned around and teleported away. Another few minutes later, we got back to the forest of the capital city where we spent our time hunting and had some ‘fun’ together. Since nobody knew about our presence in these lands, for now, I was mostly worried about the Bear God who surely had knowledge related to my race. Thanks to their inborn memories, they would find out and spread news of my existence here quite soon which wasn’t something I wanted.

And if I didn’t want something, I’d make sure that it wouldn’t bother me. As we took a short rest, I sat down at the root of a tree and said, “You know, sometimes I wonder if we could turn legendary creatures into blood servants as well.”

“Hahaha, fat chance. Their blood has a similar effect compared to ours, so I think they’d just negate each other,” Dred squatted down in front of me.

“Why? You don’t know until you don’t try, do you?” a sly smile formed on my face.

“Although I get your point, legendary creatures are all proud and don’t trust anyone but themselves. Even if we made them drink our blood somehow, they wouldn’t accept it and go to sleep just like that, especially because they know what would happen if they did and what caused it,” he said as he picked up a dried branch and started to break it into tiny pieces.

“Maybe if we blackmailed them somehow?”

“Would you go to such length?” he raised his brows.

“Well, no,” I shook my head.

There were ten types of legendary creatures, namely the Dragon God, the Twelve Headed Hydra, the Bear God, the Phoenix, the Tiger God, the Turtle God, the Ape God, the Demon God, the Divine Angel, and the Undead God. The tiger, turtle, and ape gods usually preferred the company of beastmen. The demon god favoured the demon race, the angels favoured humans’ company. The undead god… well, it was obvious who they accompanied as well while the remaining was a rather rowdy, stuck-up, and boastful bunch with pride high enough to make them look down on everyone and handle them as nothing but tools and toys.

I had the luck to meet one of them, the dragon god, and now there seemed to be another one of those troublesome creatures with terrible personalities, a bear god. Biting my finger, I said, “I want to deal with that hairy bear as soon as possible. I don’t want to be revealed just yet. The longer we can operate secretly, the safer it is for us.”

“Hmm- Audrey, Jake, and Cor should be nearby by now. Maybe we should ask them to secretly check out this Bear God, though I’m worried about the bear’s strength since we know nothing about it,” Dred thought aloud.

After thinking about what he said for a bit, I replied, “I don’t think that a creature like the bear god wouldn’t want to be at the best place, which is next to the Abyss Gate. This makes me think that it isn’t strong enough to have a place of its own here. Considering that the Warton brothers come from the outskirts of Ketarn and that Bear Gods are said to be overbearing, it’d surely want to stay somewhere where it could play the mighty king and do whatever it wanted.”

“My point is that the bear god should be still at the sixth realm and have a territory of its own among weaker people. Boulei seemed to be proud of his ‘talent’ as well which makes me think that the people living on the outskirts are generally only at the fourth and fifth realm.”

“That’d make sense,” Dred murmured, his hand on his chin. “Yosh, should we visit it personally?”

“No, even if it was at the seventh realm, it wouldn’t be strong enough to have a place next to the Abyss gate and since I don’t know how strong it is, I’m not going to attack it just yet. Ah! I know! Let’s use Skeiron again. Although the Descendants successfully infiltrated many noble houses, other than the Greywing family, neither of those are noteworthy enough. They’re just barely above the seven hundredth level,” I grumbled, a bit sad about the fact that my dear children had to work for those shrimps.

But they couldn’t just quit their job right after going there so they were stuck there for some time and even when they could finally quit their jobs, they’d have to wait a bit before they could join other noble families and produce similar results compared to Liz’s. Well, hers was also a result of Jareg being a lustful, greedy pig who thought women were just tools made to pleasure men.

“That’s a good idea and I have just the right thing in mind to deal with Jareg and fetch us noble titles as well,” Dred stood up with a sly smile on his face. This may have been the first time I saw him show a face like that.

“Hoo? What could it be?” I mused as I retrieved the information from his mind.

My blood was like a plague once I started to share it with others and even if they were stronger unless people fought against it, they’d just fall asleep and wake up as mine. Such was the fate of Jake who lost his will, Audrey who trusted me too much, and Cor who was lacking knowledge and his own memories. Such was the fate of the children with hope for the future and the people that trusted their closest companions and family members. Would a father doubt his son’s motives, especially when he was so young?

I believed the answer was obvious.

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