Book 12: Chapter 136: No Longer (3)
Dyon opened his eyes slowly.
Saru and Lilith who had been watching on with worried expressions felt their souls tremble. There was an aged look in the current Dyon’s eyes that felt incredibly familiar, yet so distant at the same time.
If one looked toward Dyon’s Mind’s Eye, one could see that the last of the chain had been shattered into pieces. And, though the graveyard around them now was seemingly fine, the destruction around them was devastating.
“I remember…” He said softly. “… Madeleine…”
His voice was a bit hoarse as the white and black flames continued to rage around him, each taking up one half to themselves.
Abraxus’ first disciple, that was him. His first wife… She was the Holy Goddess, the only one born with Talent equal to his own. Not only were they born in the same year, they were born in the same month, on the same day, and at the very same hour.
They were two sides of the same coin. One of them was a holy maiden and the other was a harbinger of destruction, prepared to destroy everything in his path.
They were supposed to clash throughout eternity and become enemies for a lifetime. In this story, Dyon was the villain and Madeleine was the hero.
The Heavens had a perfect plan, but it could have never imagined that the lives it believed it could play with the strings of a puppet would spin so far out of its control.
Dyon didn’t become the harbinger of death and destruction it expected. He grew up with loving parents who taught him well. For the sake of not disappointing his parents, he suppressed his true nature, bringing them great pride before they too died of old age.
His character was one that Madeleine fell in love with. She felt a part of her rejecting him, but she too went against her true nature and fought to be with him.
In the end, she sacrificed herself in her first life and gave her Purity Flame to Dyon, hoping that he would rise to the top of the world. She knew that he had many enemies and he didn’t have the strength to fight them on his own, so she gave him all that she could.
It was that day the Holy Goddess so suddenly disappeared from the world, no one being aware of her whereabouts.
After transcending, Dyon lost his memory about these matters. He remembered that he had a wife whom he loved with all his being, but he couldn’t remember her face, nor the fact he was the reason for her death.
If it wasn’t for this, with Dyon’s personality, he would have never fallen for a second woman. But it was ironically these twists of fate that lead to this situation.
In the end, when he earned the title of Reaper of the Martial World and was a step away from becoming the monster the Heavens wanted him to be, it was his wife that appeared once more and saved him.
Madeleine, having died a mortal, gained the chance to reincarnate. So, she did. In fact, she reincarnated many times and it wasn’t until then that she reincarnated into a body talented enough to transcend.
However, she could have never imagined that when she finally managed to transcend that a wave of memories she had long forgotten would assault her once more.
In tears, she embraced Dyon who was just a step away from complete madness. He had lost so much and even in the end, he couldn’t gain the peace he desired.
It was something Dyon himself had been unaware of, but Madeleine knew quite well that it was the Heavens that wouldn’t allow Dyon to be a peace-loving man like his parents and she wanted him to be. It was doing all that it could turn him into a machine of slaughter and revenge. It was it that wanted him to be the Reaper…
How ironic. There was a part of Dyon that once looked down on Jasmine for her evil nature, not knowing that he himself was also born to be an even greater monster.
In a twist of fate, it was his wife that saved him again. Her appearance caused the weakened Purity Flames to regain its source, surging in power once more to balance out Chaos.
As for what happened after this? Dyon was able to act on the comprehension that had given him tranquility during the dying breaths of Saru and Lilith. He hadn’t managed to grasp all the secrets of life and death, but he had grasped all the secrets of reincarnation after so many epochs of study.
However, this wasn’t enough. Steeling his heart, Dyon watched his wife die before him for the ninth time. He stayed by her side with a smile on his face, enjoying the life together they never got to have on the mortal plane.
And like that, he witnessed the cycle of life and death intimately… nine total times…
From that day onward, the Nameless Immortal God wasn’t seen on the immortal plane again.
Dyon looked down at the raging flames on his body.
“So that’s where all this rage comes from.”
Dyon closed his eyes.
“You are you and I am me.” He suddenly said, “We are no longer the same person.”
Dyon felt his nascent soul smirk. It had a bit of an evil character to it, almost like a handsome villain without qualms for right and wrong. And then, his body began to change once more.