Chapter 19: Jane (Part 2)
"What? Divine Sword Saint Nyler? Didn't that person completely retire from the affairs of this plane? Are you sure that he would come here, Liaison?" Number one asked in a surprised voice.
"Of course, I am 110% confident about this. Otherwise, there was no way that dog of an emperor would have allowed his daughter to come here."
"Then what should we do? We probably can't fight them right now and even if we do nothing, we are just like sitting ducks!!"
Reed sighed, and then said seriously.
"We can fight them. We just need to summon our Skull Lord. Once he is here, all these dogs shall cower and run before him."
"Number one, are the sacrifices prepared already?"
"No, my lord. I am extremely sorry as I was busy arranging the hoax library and removing all demonic traces from the temple, I was unable to prepare the sacrifices."
"Ahh, everything is happening so quickly. Damn it"
"Ah Liaison, what should we do now?"
"Looks like we need to sacrifice that girl. Initially, I just wanted to have her alive as long as possible to have some bargaining power with that empire, but now it looks like we need to use her cultivation energy in order to make up for the lack of sacrifices."
"But Lord, what about that boy?"
"Prepare the formation under the Pool of Damnation. I will force him to take a long bath in it and his Soul Shield shall slowly corrode away. Number three and four, you are responsible for this matter. Ensure that he stays in the pool as the other monks channel their energy into the formation. This will slowly corrupt his mind and weaken the soul barrier."
"Remember that you cannot beat him senseless to keep him in the bath. That would make his soul resentful and thus weaken the soul energy too much for it to be used for summoning. We only need to slightly weaken it. Once it is weakened, the Skull Lord's mark will do the rest. All right, now go."
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(Jason's side as the meeting between monks was going on.)
As soon as that hooded man named Li had left, Jason had started practicing the set of characters. They were fairly complicated and Jason took his time writing them again and again. But just after five minutes had passed, he suddenly heard a voice call out to him.
"Hello, there. My name is Jane. I wanted to talk to you for a bit."
Jason was completely startled as he heard the sweet voice once again. To be honest, he had been longing to talk to her once again ever since he had to abruptly leave when Reed arrived. After all, he just couldn't shake off the waifu fantasies that he had. So, hearing her voice suddenly left him flabbergasted.
"Hi... Hi there. My name is Ja.. Jason Tyler. It would be a pleasure to talk to you." Jason stammered.
"First, you need to come inside my room. Otherwise, it is not safe to talk." Jane did not pay much heed to his stammering and continued.
"Ah... But... But... " Jason kept on stammering as his mind started racing all around. Isn't this like way too fast?
"Stop dilly-dallying and come quickly. If that old dog Reed ever realizes that both of us are talking, it won't end well for either of us. Only by talking in my room would we be truly safe."
"Yes, Yes..."
Jason hurriedly got up and started for her room. In an instant, he was at the entrance to the door from where he had heard the voice the last time. Just as he was about to knock, he found the door slightly ajar.
"Come in"
Jason gulped as he opened the door and slowly went in. It was pitch dark inside the room and he could not see a thing.
"Miss, I can't see anything." He complained.
"I am really sorry about that. I have used up all my Universal Energy in creating a barrier around this room. This prevents that old dog from entering my room or sensing what I am doing inside. But as I have almost exhausted all my energy on this barrier, I cannot create some light for you unless I use my Soul Energy."
"Oh, alright," responded Jason, even though he was a bit disappointed. After all, who wouldn't wish to see the face of someone whom they thought was a heavenly beauty.
"Alright, now walk six steps towards your left, there would be a chair there. Take a seat."
Jason did as she said and sure enough, there was a chair at that exact location. As he sat down, he couldn't help but ask, "Miss, can you see me and your surroundings?"
"Yes, I can. Unlike you, I can emit a faint light from my eyes, which allows me to see everything around me. Just that the light is so faint that you are not able to see it."
'She can see me!!' Jason exclaimed in his mind as he blurted out a question.
"Miss, am I good looking?"
"Huh?! There is nothing wrong with your appearance. Why do you ask though?" Jane asked, puzzled.
"Nothing... Nothing at all. Anyways can you tell me more about Joseph Reed?" Jason immediately realized his folly and tried to change the topic to something else. Yet, in his mind, he couldn't help but be a little happy. At least this miss was not repulsed with his appearance. This was definitely a good start.
"Before we talk about that bastard, do you know what place you are in?" Jane asked.
"The only thing that Reed told me that this was the Skull Marked Sect and he was the Sect Master. He did not tell me anything else."
"Alright, let me tell you then. You are in the Divine Realm, the pinnacle realm for cultivators who have not reached True Godhood. "
"Also, this place is no sect. It is the demonic temple of the Skull Lord and that bastard is the Liaison of the Skull Lord. The Skull Lord is at the True God realm and resides in realms much above us. This temple is used by his followers to offer him Soul Energy and sacrifices from the powerhouses that they kidnap from other continents."
"What? This... This..."
Jason was completely stunned by what he heard. Although he had a bad feeling, he never expected the situation to be so bad. Then he asked.
"Miss, just who are you? Why are you in this place? Are you here to be used as a sacrifice as well?"
"Who I am is not important. I also do not know what this bastard aims at doing to me. But he has done nothing till now because he knows that once I die, the Empire will definitely come to know about the exact location of my death and it won't take long for this temple to fall. So, he has stayed his hand and has left me alone all this time."
"What? It seems that you are someone with a very high position within the Empire. Then how did you get caught by this fellow?"
"Che, if that fellow wouldn't have used despicable tactics by killing my mother and capturing her soul, I wouldn't have landed here. It was the foundation day at the Myosian Empire...
Jason could feel the grief and melancholy in Jane's voice as she spoke about how Reed managed to get steal her mother's soul and baited her away from the empire before capturing her. As Jason kept listening to her story, he somehow felt his own heart getting heavier and heavier.
'Why did she have to suffer so much?'
Unknown to Jason, as his feelings kept on resonating with Jane's story, his own thoughts about his sufferings at earth were slowly getting erased from his heart. Did a donkey boss and a dumb harlot even mean anything in the larger scale of things? Sure, they made his life hard when he was on earth, but was the suffering even comparable to losing someone whom you loved and that too in the cruelest manner?
The short answer - it didn't matter... at all.
And hence, his mind and heart started letting go of those insignificant characters just as some random passers-by.
"...and that is how I ended up here, in this vile man's clutches," Soon, Jane finished her story.
Jane was really feeling immense grief and anger as she recalled the happenings of that day, after all, not much time had passed since that nightmare. But she somehow managed to suppress her feelings, as now was not the time for it. She knew that Reed could arrive at any moment and they had very limited time for this conversation.
"Alright, enough about me. Tell me, why are you here? I can feel that you have come from a very low plane and do not have anything to do with cultivation. What does Reed want from you?"