Aftermath! - Grand Dao, Lost Comprehension, and Missing Items

A sharp stab of pain in his chest woke Kai up, his eyes struggling to open, heavy with an unknown burden.

The sound of a ship rolling and pitching, dying groans, and painful grunts entered his ears like an incomprehensible buzz. Every inch of his body hurt as if needles were prickling his flesh, trying to see whether he was alive.

And when he tried to move, bones rubbed against each other, forcing a groan out of him. "Ugh!"

"Don't move," an old voice guided him, not unkindly. "I fed you a Common HP Capsule. Let the natural healing take its course now."

Kai frowned at the familiar voice. Someone pulled him up and made him lean against the ship's hull. Kai felt a thin, bony hand pressing into his shoulder, propping him up. Only then he felt free enough to recognize the stifling feeling of suffocation he was in before.

Kai drew a long, sharp breath, filling his lungs with salty air, and opened his eyes.

And the moment his hazel pupils landed on a bronze helmet, they widened, ready to explode with power.

"Calm down, kid," the voice urged, laughing ruefully. "Look at yourself and then look at me. We are beyond the line of fighting now."

Kai's breathing quickened, but he did as he was told.

First, he looked at himself and his frown deepened. His chest had healed a lot, but there were still deep gashes bleeding there, a touch of white peeking out through them. Not to mention, all over his body were fine cuts, and hairline fractures were running over his ribs, making them sting with every movement.

Then he looked at the old man.

Kai had recognized the Helmet of Fate; hard to find such a powerful Item on ordinary Contestants, to begin with. Yet, this old man was in worse shape than his own.

The helmet wearer was barely alive; his left hand was missing, and so were his legs below the knees. A part of his right shoulder seemed to have vanished as if cut out by a bowl with a sharp rim.

If it weren't for the sea-like presence of Mana coming out of this Contestant, Kai couldn't have known that this was someone even more powerful, almost irresistible, than Black Wasp.

'A Contestant above 7th-floor?!' Kai's mind shook. 'He… is the Supreme-Protector, the 9th-floor Contestant. But his voice…'

The Supreme-Protector had announced his presence just after the appearance of Inheritance Land's notification. So, it wasn't hard for him to make guesses about this helmet-wearing Contestant's identity.

The 9th-floor Contestant eyed Kai's dead gaze from behind the helmet, and then slowly took off his helmet. Under the Helmet of Fate, there was an old face, full of wrinkles and dull, gray hair, but his eyes were bright vale, a touch of yellow surrounded by green; alive.

He was the same old man who had followed Kai throughout the Night of Truce, who had slapped the butt of a female Contestant, and who had felt a touch of Conqueror's Haki within Kai's bloodlust.

He was Contestant Nexus, the Supreme-Protector!

No wonder Kai couldn't sense the old man's presence. Perception was a double-edged sword, to begin with. Not to mention, for a 9th-floor Contestant, fooling the likes of Selene was just too easy, even if he hadn't truly seen the Ghost Basilisk following him.

Burying the anxiety of sitting near such a Contestant, and that too from Order, Kai craned his neck, looking around at his surroundings.

Wherever Kai could see, corpses were sprawled on the deck, dying the wood red and black. Some 50 Contestants seemed barely alive to him, missing one limb or another, incapable of even lifting heads. Ensui's user and the Contestant with Shinken Blue's power had survived as well.

But Kai could tell… these 50 Consonants hadn't survived by happenstance. Someone had saved them, along with himself, just at the right time.

However, Black Wasp was nowhere to be found.

It was then Kai's eyes landed on two figures, leaning against the broken foremast.

Moraine the Elegant and Blade Singer!

Moraine's face was pale and drenched with blood. The armor over her left arm, up to the elbow, and around her waist had been already gone. Now, the damage had worsened, fine and coarse cracks running over like hideous scars. The Wings of Grim Butterfly on her back had dimmed, too, becoming smaller than the toddler's height.

Blade Singer's right hand was still twisted at an odd angle, her face paler than Moraine's. Her chest kept puffing up and down as if she was having an intense battle with the art of breathing. Blood was dripping off her chin, falling on the sword in her left hand.

The moment Kai looked at them, both ladies also lifted their heads, their eyes matching Kai's.

Those pair of eyes were full of hate, murder… Complication? Respect?

Why was there complication and respect mixed in those beautiful, bloodshot eyes? Kai couldn't tell.

Not at all.

"I heard you saved Jack Sparrow and William Turner," Nexus drawled, licking his lips, pointing at the two Characters who were lying unconsciousness afar. "Not only that, but you also saved the two strongest Contestants who were also acting as temporary Protectors. Your contributions in bringing the Characters out of Inheritance Land surpass everyone by far, kid."

'Eh?! What's he talking about?' Kai asked himself, confused. 'When did I save anyone?'

But Kai was cursed with a brilliant mind, letting him draw theories based on the faintest hints available.

When Kai sensed Black Wasp coming, aiming to behead him, he pulled Moraine and Blade Singer toward himself, hoping to let them act as shields. The only reason he had done so was to reduce the damage of the hideously powerful blow directed at him. What had happened next had been nothing but pure acts of coincidence.

Both Moraine and Blade Singers, though grievously wounded, had survived. And the lone Contestant, Aloof, who had remained unmoved, fell under the hands of Black Wasp as a result.

But this all happened only from Kai's perspective. To others, however, it seemed as if Kai, at the cost of suffering fatal wounds, had saved Moraine and Blade Singer by pulling them toward him, leaving no targets for Black Wasp except Aloof, who was the strongest of the four.

This was nothing but an act of courage and unprecedented bravery.

A hero!

'The fuck?!' Kai's face crumpled inwardly as he concluded these facts. 'How absurd things could even get? Tch! No wonder Moraine and Blade Singer are looking at me with both murderous and complicated emotions. Moraine even more so, for she didn't have a good impression of me at all. But how they reached such a misunderstanding… Wait a minute! This?!'

Kai's head suddenly snapped toward Captain Jack Sparrow, and even his soul trembled.

'Misfortune… Supreme Luck… Luck at two extremities… Coincidences… Misunderstandings…'

Kai kept repeating these words in his head at an incredible rate. It was as if he was about to understand something great, something extremely profound. Kai even felt like if he could just grab the end of this thread of understanding, then he would never have to worry about his Bad Luck. This feeling became stronger and stronger, soaring through the sky.

This was the beginning of a Comprehension; the dawn of an Epiphany.

Some called it the Grand Dao; some named it the Principle of Universal Laws; some thought of it as the Force.

And some even felt it as a manifestation of Perception, the Omnipotent Entity present across the Multiverse; the mightiest among all.

The essence remained the same, nonetheless.

Kai's entire existence seemed to have fallen into stunned silence, his eyes losing life and his presence vanishing, falling deeper and deeper into this Comprehension.

Yet, no matter how much he let himself dive into this Epiphany, he just couldn't see the thread or its end. How to grab something that he couldn't even see?

If this went on, he would lose himself in this state eternally, just like the time when he had fallen into the gulf between black and white upon hearing the Faceless Saying for the first time.

NO!!!

A loud ethereal shout, backed by his will to survive, and Kai suddenly coughed out a mouthful of blood, taking the Supreme-Protector by surprise. Even Moraine and Blade Singer snapped their heads toward him, their pupils trembling.

"What happened?!" Nexus shouted, holding Kai from falling face-front. "I thought your injuries were healing…"

"Cough! Cough!" Kai rubbed the blood off his mouth, his gaze lost. Nevertheless, there was a glint in his eyes, hidden. The sign of him sensing the vast greatness of Perception and the lingering effect of an Epiphany.

If the day came when he could Comprehend the Epiphany he had stumbled upon just now, then…

"I am alright," Kai remarked offhandedly. "What happened? I can't recall anything."

Nexus eyed Blood Demon oddly, recalling the things he had theorized about him. For a moment, he said nothing, and then he sighed. "Sigh! I've become truly old," the old man lamented, smacking his lips. "We underestimated him. We both did."

"I don't understand…" Kai's eyes narrowed.

As Kai looked at the injured 9th-floor Contestant, for just the tiniest moment, the thought of killing him rose in his heart. He stomped over that feeling in the very next breath, however.

Kai had already found out through Chaos that he would need to kill 40 5th-floor Contestants or 5 6th-floor Contestants from Order to fulfill his Kill Count Quota of the 2nd Set. If he were to ignore the two 4th-floor Contestants he had killed before his reincarnation, then he had only killed two 5th-floor Contestants of Order.

And that too recently, during the deep sea showdown.

Killing even a 7th-floor Contestant would instantly let him do away with Kill Count. Much less needed about a 9th-floor one.

But… this was the 9th floor!

So what if the Supreme-Protector was injured, looking like a dying old man? Kai could tell that the 9th-floor Contestant had weakened significantly, his strength falling to the level of a 7th-floor Contestant. But this strength wouldn't take much time to rise, Kai knew.

Kai didn't even know why he was still alive. If he was in Nexus' place, he would have killed everyone by now to prevent others from having second thoughts about attempting something foolish.

"Who's we?" Kai added, his thoughts all over the place. "Who did you underestimate?"

Even Moraine and Blade Singer had crawled toward them by now, putting their ears against the Supreme-Contestants' words. From time to time, they kept glancing at Kai in disgust and loss, but in loss more often than not.

Contestant Nexus caressed the Helmet of Fate and turned his head to his right.

Kai, Moraine, and Blade Singer lifted their heads to look in the same direction as well.

Beyond the bobbing stern, Kai saw a faint screen of darkness, so vast that it seemed to have no end. It had a dome shape, and it was covering the entire Inheritance Land within it. Kai and others could even see flashes of light through the dark layer as if there was an intense battle going on within the dome.

It was also then Kai's eyes landed on the sky, the faint indigo and blue mixed with a touch of red and orange.

The dawn was nigh!

Kai's heart suddenly pounded. It was about time he returned, he realized.

'It's good that I…' Kai was just thinking when his pounding heart stopped. His face became white, his lips dried up, and his entire body faintly trembled in anxiety and confusion.

Kai couldn't sense her.

Kai couldn't sense his Items.

Cersei and the earring on her ear, the Book, both were lost to him, gone somewhere incredibly far, it felt.

And then Kai found another one of his Items missing.

Selene!