Chapter 69: Demonic Ki
Roygun withheld the urge to bite her nails. A few minutes had passed since her fiancé had rushed off to handle his mother's unexpected arrival, and the interaction she shared with him and Thora before he left was still weighing on her mind.
Clearly, she had completely misread the room.
Roygun felt the fear oozing out of Alduin's pores when he mentioned his mother's 'mood', from that alone, it was obvious that the ongoing conversation between the mother-son pair wasn't going to be all that pleasant—especially for the latter.
"Thora."
The maid looked up at her, lifting one brow.
"What kind of relationship does he have with her?" She decided to be blunt.
"That's a difficult question you've asked me, Lady Roygun." Thora let out a heavy sigh. "Also, you might want to keep in mind that she can probably hear everything we're saying, even from all the way over here."
Since neither of them could harness Senjutsu, they weren't able to pinpoint her location through the Ki she was expelling, but judging from how quick Alduin's dash into the distance was, it was probably pretty damn far.
Roygun huffed. "That's fine by me."
'I hope you don't come to regret those words,' Thora didn't care much for her own standing anymore. She had already turned her back on her duties as Head Maid, anything she did from this point onwards was just extra.
"I don't think it's my place to speak about it without the Young Lord's permission, but I suppose it'd do you some good to have a bit of insight if you want to support him as his fiancée."
"Just keep in mind that I can't offer you anything more than an outsider's perspective. If you really want to get involved in this, you'll have to speak to him yourself."
"An outsider's perspective will do, it seems it's too early for me to talk to him about this face-to-face anyway." Roygun nodded her understanding. "Oh, and there's no need for the 'Lady', just Roygun will do. Considering our 'situation.'"
The two ladies exchanged a knowing glance.
When the opportunity arose, they'd discuss the ground rules of their relationship with Alduin, preferably when he wasn't around.
Some matters didn't require a man's ear.
"Very well, Roygun." Thora took a moment to gather her thoughts before she began. "The way I see it, for most of his life, he was an accessory to the Lady. An object she didn't really feel much hatred or love towards, although, when the moment arose, she definitely leaned towards the former."
"She may be the one who birthed him, but she played no part in his childhood development. She only involved herself in the same way his father did—overseeing his physical training."
In the span of a few sentences, a pit had already begun to form in the Belphegor's stomach.
Though Thora did her best to remain as composed and collected as possible while she spoke, even her centuries' worth of experience couldn't hide the sorrow and pity in her voice.
A sentiment that Roygun was starting to resonate with.
"However, despite this, the relationship he has with his father isn't even remotely close to the one he has with his mother. That much I know for certain."
"How so?"
"He does not truly 'fear' his father. He is an imposing man, and he has changed a great deal from the person he once was, but the Young Lord understands the reason for this change. I won't elaborate too much, but he conquered his fear of his father a while ago. His coldness no longer haunts him."
She didn't wish to say it aloud, but Alduin's 'forgiveness', for lack of better words, towards his father always perplexed her.
The reason for Sebastian's change was clear, it was why people like Thora and Serafall, who knew the old him, pitied the man more than they resented him.
However, Alduin did not know the old him.
So how could he 'forgive' him? He had never seen the light Sebastian's presence had once emanated, it was completely illogical for him to feel even in the slightest inkling of compassion for his father.
Yet, he did.
He also felt compassion towards his mother, so much so that he'd willingly stick his neck out to keep her safe from a demise of her own doing.
To Thora, that made Alduin sometimes seem even more incomprehensible than his mother.
Sometimes, she wished that part of him would vanish.
She wished he'd act more his age and openly express his rightful outrage to his parents, who barely appeared to acknowledge him as their son.
She wished he wouldn't put himself in harm's way just because he felt responsible for making up for the mistakes of people a thousand years older than him.
And at the same time, she wished it wouldn't.
She wished his unfathomable love wouldn't wilt away, lest his fears of losing himself come to fruition.
She wished she wouldn't have to wake up one day and no longer recognize the back of the man she looked after, served, and loved more than anyone.
She wished those verdant irises of his would never truly mimic that woman's apathy and indifference.
To her, the current Alduin was someone she could always confide in, no matter how much trouble he managed to get himself in.
If that Alduin were to disappear, she wasn't sure what she'd have left.
It was like his psyche was in a constant state of war between the best parts of his father and the worst parts of his mother. An excruciating mental deadlock that he'd never win, because his blood was woven from both sides. They would clash, again, and again, and again, but never reach the negotiating table. There could be no armistice.
Alduin was still too weak, too young, and too inexperienced to mediate his own peace.
If such a thing were even possible.
She couldn't begin to comprehend how tiring it was for him, and more importantly, how long he could keep it up.
"I was the one in charge of most of the parental obligations," she took a deep breath. "Or at least the ones I was allowed to handle, the Young Lord's livelihood, his social life in particular, wasn't given as much thought as it should have been."
Naturally, Roygun knew what Thora was referring to.
His 'urban myth' status.
"If you don't mind my asking, why exactly was his social life so restrictive?"
"His father wanted it that way, the rule to remain in the manor was made by him, and since his mother showed little interest in opposing or rejecting that rule, it remained in place. As for the reason, I have no clue. It wasn't any of my business to pry as a mere attendant of the house."
She looked down, exhaling an expression of shame.
'Then again, that might just be an excuse I tell myself to alleviate my own guilt.'
Thora kept her thoughts to herself, having already shared that train of thought with Alduin some time ago.
"I know that he wanted to limit the connections Alduin made as much as possible. The less he knew about the Underworld he lived in, the less he'd yearn to explore what it had to offer, or something along those lines."
Roygun wore a triumphant smile.
"It looks like things didn't go his way."
"No, they did not." Thora returned one of her own. "However, I didn't think the Young Lord would ever find the courage to escape his father's dome of his own volition, not that I mean to disparage his character."
"He wasn't a little rebel from the get-go?"
"Far from it," she let out an exaggerated scoff. "He spent most of his life with his head hung low. He began training at four years of age, and the methods his father and mother used were rather… extreme. Far beyond anything I thought he could handle, yet… he pushed through it. Hoping that one day his efforts would earn their approval, and he'd be able to have a proper, parent-child interaction with them."
The results of those efforts were clear.
Roygun didn't dare say it aloud, but she couldn't help but wonder why exactly they even had Alduin in the first place.
They clearly didn't just want him to be strong, within his generation, he was easily the strongest. The only person who could contest that was Sairaorg Bael, the person who was publicly acknowledged as his generation's finest.
So why? Why had Sebastian Buné and Martha Sallos gotten together? What was their goal with Alduin? Assuming they shared the same objective.
"Does he still want it? Their acknowledgement?"
"I'm not sure. Recently, it seems to me that the Young Lord has started to realize that a future in which the three of them are a happy family may never come to pass."
She also wanted to comment on how poor the relationship between Sebastian and Martha was, but knew better than to address Martha's personal life when she was around, for now, it was best to keep the conversation centered around Alduin.
"However, that realization alone hasn't dulled the love he holds for them. Even if he's just supporting them from afar, without them ever knowing, he'll be content with that."
In a way, that could be seen as a more rational approach to a very irrational form of love.
"Physically, he may have distanced himself from them, but mentally, I doubt he'll ever leave their side."
Roygun pressed her lips together. It was clear that Alduin had a rather peculiar upbringing, but this was the last thing she expected to hear, and to make matters worse, she had a strong feeling that this was only scratching the surface.
This was merely an interpretation of Alduin's life after all, hearing her fiancé's perspective from his own mouth would be an entirely different experience.
"That sounds… sad."
Thora offered no response, replying with a simple, curt nod.
"So what changed? What made him decide to leave?"
"I can't say for certain. I'm not sure what happened, but a little over two months ago, something inside him changed. Something urged him to break his life's status quo, and while the reason for that eludes me, I don't care much for it. I'm just glad that he finally decided to break out of his cage."
And that he decided to take her with him.
"He was probably just fed up."
"I doubt it's that cut and dry," Thora shook her head in resignation.
Even Alduin himself didn't understand the full scope of his emotions.
Roygun fell silent, taking a moment to ponder over everything the maid had just told her.
Unsurprisingly, she found herself left with more questions than answers, but it was nice to actually know what needed to be questioned for a change.
"Thank you for telling me this."
"There's no need to thank me, I simply want the best for him. Leaving you in the dark about your fiancé's state of mind seemed counterproductive to that goal. Of course, now that I've spoken, I expect you to do everything in your power to support him to the best of your abilities."
Thora shot Roygun a heavy side-eye, making it perfectly clear that what she had just told her wasn't to be taken lightly.
"That goes without saying," the Belphegor replied without hesitation.
Minutes pass, and eventually, the two ladies spot Alduin's encroaching figure in the distance. Their faces lit up upon seeing that he was unharmed… until they got a closer look at him.
"You're hurt!" Roygun rushed towards him, gently cupping the sides of his face.
"Huh?" He blurted out in confusion, rubbing the part of his cheek she was staring at.
The wounds his mother's nails had opened were still open, blood slowly trickling down from the five horizontal slits she had drawn across his face.
'Strange… I could've sworn I healed that. The cut created by her wind blade's been fixed, but for some reason this one reopened…'
He rubbed his blood between his fingers, furrowing his brow upon noticing its strange, thick consistency. As if it had been coagulated somehow.
"What happened?! Did she do this to you?!"
"It was just a light slap, nothing major." Alduin activated his Dryadic Blessing once more, cupping his cheek and sealing the wound again.
But it made no difference, after a few seconds, the cut simply opened again. His blood remained just as disturbingly vicious as before.
'What's going on? What did she do to me?'
"Light slap my ass! You've got weird veins coursing through your skin!"
"Veins?" He tilted his head.
Alduin reached into his pocket, pulling out his phone and opening its mirrored camera to see his own reflection.
Shockingly enough, ominous, thick black veins were creeping around the five wounds, spreading outwards and slowly occupying more and more of his face.
'Oh boy…'
With immense concern written all over her face, Thora walked up to him and dabbed her fingers against his wounds, attempting to use her Blood Manipulation to identify the issue.
"Young Lord… what is this?"
"A parting gift, apparently," he chuckled dryly, attempting to mask his nervousness.
"More like a partin' curse."
In his usual, Shinobi-like fashion, Halibel popped up out of the blue, taking a drag from his kiseru.
Though he seemed like his usual, laid-back self, Alduin could tell something was awry with the wolfman's demeanour.
He was afraid, deeply so.
"It's about time you showed yourself," Roygun narrowed her eyes at her Knight. "I could've used a heads-up about our surprise visitor."
Halibel grumbled, scratching his chin.
"Believe me, warning you was my first instinct once I noticed the condition of your trees magically improve…"
"But my mother warned you to stay put," Alduin continued, his voice filled with understanding.
He knew better than anyone how terrifying her warnings could be, especially so for a creature so heavily attuned to Senjutsu like Halibel, just a sliver of malicious Ki from her could have him trembling on all fours as if he had a thousand swords pressed against his throat.
"Yeah… something like that."
He took another, much longer drag from his pipe in a desperate attempt to collect himself.
"That woman's… quite something fiancé-kun. I've heard stories about her strength like everyone else, but witnessing it… even a fraction of it first-hand is something else entirely."
Alduin smiled reassuringly.
"You don't need to explain yourself, you did the right thing by listening to her." The wolfman would've died if he hadn't. "Now then, you mentioned something about 'Demonic Ki'?"
Ki, Youki, Natural Energy. Alduin was well-educated on all three, but this was the first time he had ever heard of 'Demonic Ki'.
"Man, how do I even begin to explain it?" Halibel scratched his head. "If Youki is considered a toxic form of Ki, then Demonic Ki basically falls into the same category, except for the fact that it's a million… no, a trillion times more corruptive."
"How so?"
"Let me put it like this, manipulating Youki is like learning how to effectively wield poison. Of course, the most important thing to keep in mind when doing so is to never let yourself get afflicted by your own poison. Safety first and all."
"But Demonic Ki? That's the complete opposite. One would have to happily ingest not only their own poison, but the poison of those around them. Hatred. Resentment. Loathing. Heartbreak. Suffering. Despair. Hopelessness. Agony. The list of negative emotions goes on and on, each of them becoming a core ingredient of the poison one consumes."
"A Senjutsu practitioner will greedily devour negativity until their lifeforce is filled with it up to the very brim, and ordinarily, the contamination of their lifeforce will cause it to burn away in the most excruciating manner one could imagine, killing them in the most merciless way possible."
'I sense a but coming.'
"But those with the unfathomable talent and mental endurance to resist that contamination will obtain the right to wield that negativity as their own. An ultimate, dominating corruptive force that only a handful of powers can contend with—even those that possess a certain degree of divinity."
"However, the challenge doesn't end there. Initial control of Demonic Ki is just the beginning, the stronger one's Demonic Ki becomes, the harder it is to resist its corruptive force."
"That is the nature of Demonic Ki. An immensely high risk, in exchange for an immensely powerful reward. Although… I'm pretty sure the number of practitioners has declined drastically with the passage of time… who would've thought your mother was one of them as well?"
Alduin's eyes widened, as if he had grasped something.
'Demonic Ki, the way it functions… it isn't all that dissimilar from Dragonification. The more power you covet, the higher the chance is of you losing it all. Even the initial process of attaining Demonic Ki is similar to the risk of losing control during the awakening ceremony…'
He decided to push those thoughts aside for the time-being, there were more immediate questions he wished to have answered.
"Halibel, when I was talking with her earlier, she said that she's been able to advance to the level of a Super Devil for a while now, but wasn't doing so because that advancement wouldn't be 'stable'..."
Halibel, Roygun, and Thora all felt their breathing quicken at the mention of that realm. The realm that contained the overwhelming, incomprehensible might of the current Beelzebub and Lucifer.
Alduin's mother claimed to be capable of reaching that realm whenever she pleased, and while Roygun heavily doubted that fact, Thora and Halibel's reactions were vastly different.
"I see… I think I understand what your mother meant."
The wolfman held up one finger.
"When it comes to Senjutsu, there are two paths to ascension. One is the 'righteous' path that leads to Buddhahood, the most famous example being Sun Wukong, the Victorious Fighting Buddha."
He held up another.
"The other is the 'demonic' path, which leads to one becoming an 'Asura', or 'Shura', as those in my hometown call it. As you can probably imagine, this path involves the elevation of Demonic Ki rather than normal Ki. I'm fairly certain this is the state your mother's attempting to attain."
'Asura…' Alduin pondered. 'If that's truly what you're trying to become, then I guess I finally understand what your motivation is, at least part of it.'
It didn't take a whole lot of thinking to figure out what Sebastian wanted.
But for all this time, Alduin couldn't even hazard a guess as to what his mother wanted out of life. Why she did the things she did was a complete mystery to him.
However, if Halibel's assumption was true. Then maybe it was possible for Alduin to clear a portion of the smog clouding Martha's inner thoughts from him.
'If the gap between Ultimate-Class and Satan-Class is like Mount Everest… then the gap between Satan-Class and Super-Class might as well be the entire Andes Mountain Range.'
He chuckled inwardly.
'I guess even you lack the confidence to make that jump.'
Martha was looking for a method to either nullify or at least mitigate the risk that came with her 'ascension'. That much was clear.
Beyond that, all Alduin could do was speculate.
"Who cares about that?!" Roygun interrupted. "He's got Demonic Ki coursing through his veins! Hurry up and do something about it!"
Halibel shook his head with reluctance.
"Sorry, but this is way—way above my skillset. I might be able to do something about Ultimate-Class Demonic Ki, but what fiancé-kun's been afflicted with is much too complex for me. If I try to mess with it, I'll probably only make things worse."
He turned to Alduin.
"Honestly, I don't have a damn clue as to how you're standing right now. Having Demonic Ki directly enter your bloodstream might as well be one of the most excruciating sensations imaginable, your life force should've started experiencing contamination by now, at least the early stages of it."
'Well, I do feel a slight sting.' Alduin let out a thoughtful hum. 'But beyond that, it's honestly not too bad. Definitely nowhere near the level of intensity Halibel just described.'
"Interesting," he smirked.
"Interesting?!" Roygun grabbed her fiancé by the shoulders, violently shaking him back and forth. "There's nothing interesting about this! We need to hurry up and find a way to fix this! What kind of mother injects her son with Demonic Ki in the first place?!"
"Mine, evidently." He chuckled. "I doubt she did it to kill me, she has a plethora of easier methods to choose from if she wanted to. There's something specific she expects me to do with this Demonic Ki."
Somehow, he wasn't expressing even the slightest hint of nervousness.
"Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go meditate in order to find out what that 'something' is."
"How's meditation going to fix anything?!"
"No clue, but I won't know until I try now, will I?"
Fortunately for him, there was someone inside Alduin's mind he could consult who knew his body better than he did.
///
Hopefully, this chapter sheds some light on what I meant by Martha being ready to advance to Super-Class, as well as some of her motivations. Although if you're really observant, you can probably deduce even more than what I've divulged about her in this chapter by piecing things together.
If you want to support my work and get access to early chapters, go check me out on P@treon/Accel14!
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