425-436

Chapter 425 Dead But Alive, Or Alive But Dead?

Dilan actually started to doubt if he could survive getting squashed by the ginormous meteorite. His life was on the line and the pain he was going through right now was nothing short of being sent to hell.

Getting whipped by his father to the point that he nearly died on numerous occasions, ending up punctured by an old tree in a ravine in the mountains, or nearly dying while facing the War Krendel was not even close to the pain he was feeling right now.

All the things that had happened to him had been painful. That was out of question but right now his body was melting as he was being thrust deeper and deeper into the ground.

Soil, stones, and various other things poked into his back, piercing through his threadbare clothes and flesh before they were either pushed aside, disintegrated, or molten. This made matters worse for Dilanand he ended up getting more and more injured.

His condition was bad, to the extent that he began questioning everything.

His mental stability was questionable right now and Dilan only regained his blurred senses when a bunch of notifications appeared in his mind.

[The host's Health has decreased drastically. The host's whole body is mortally damaged. [Bracing Pain] is operating in the strongest form! All stats have been augmented by 50%!]

Dilan could only read the first message at first before he perceived that the second message seemed to have been written in an unknown language; a language he couldn't decipher. At least that was what Dilan first imagined before he realized that he could actually read the message.

[The host's Special trait [???] responded to the unique situation!]

He was not sure what was going on but he hoped that it was something that could actually help him. It was good that his Health stat was currently so high but it was exactly this fact that turned Dilan's mind into mush.

His stats had been around 760 Units before but with the enhancement of his base stats, the situation changed drastically! Right now, Dilan's Health stat was around 1100 Units, [Undying] was fully unleashed all the time, while his bloodline Blood Vyrm allowed him to heal at a much faster rate as well.

Under normal circumstances, his physique would never be capable of enduring the potency of stats above 1000 Units, not while he was halfway through Tier-2, but the current situation was different.

Dilan's body was already accustomed to being different from the norm, he possessed a Constitution that strengthened his physique as well and he had accepted a bloodline that had naturally enhanced the host's physique and his healing capabilities.

Nonetheless, if another stat than his Health would be just as high, Dilan would face much bigger consequences.

But even then he would have hardly cared because his situation called for desperate measures, to the extent that he was currently trying to endure the terrific pain that swept through his entire being as he was burning, melting, and being crushed at the same time before he healed.

After he healed, he burned, melted and his bones would be crushed once again. He would heal again, end up getting burned, molten, and crushed once again and the cycle would repeat itself as if on a loop.

Dilan didn't know how often this situation repeated itself. His mind was overflowing with the information his body sent straight to his head but his brain was incapable of digesting everything.

Before all information of him being burned, molten, and crushed reached him, he was healed and the information was sent out that everything was fine. However, by the time that information would be digested by Dilan, he would be injured once again and that information would be sent straight to his head all over again.

Dilan's brain was overloading and it felt like an eternity until his mind shut off completely. His mind sent his body in a comatose state forcefully in order to prevent his brain from getting damaged because of all the massive pieces of confusing and devastating information that swept through him.

Thus, he didn't know what happened afterward, not even when the meteorite had finally reached the deepest point in the ground where it stopped, creating a huge crater that encompassed the whole city…or what it had been in the past.

He was still not pulled out of the comatose state when the meteorite finally stopped burning. A long time passed afterward, just for Dilan to awaken once again.

His body was stuck to the meteorite, there was no way for him to breathe and it was a wonder that he had yet to suffocate.

It didn't make any sense for him to still be alive, not even with the unique supernatural powers he possessed.

However, it was not as if Dilan rejected escaping the hellish nightmare of an experience alive. He was quite happy even though he couldn't show that.

His body, or what was left of it, was a mess and Dilan didn't possess even an ounce of mana to take care of the mess.

It took him an eternity to replenish bits of his mana, enough to activate the [Mantle of Elements] ability to use Earth Spirits. They made a tiny space below Dilan's feet, giving him the opportunity to move.

The gravitational force pulled him downward, yet his skin and parts of his body were stuck to the meteorite. He was forced to wait an eternity to gain the necessary strength in his body to push himself away from the meteorite, pulling off the flesh and skin that was glued to the meteorite.

It was disgusting and extremely painful but Dilan couldn't live while being stuck to the meteorite, not much longer at least. He was hanging onto his life by a thread and every breath could be his last.

After he had used all his strength to land in the tiny space below him, Dilan kept lying there. He didn't move an inch, which made the small gap look like he had buried himself into the ground.

'Is that my funeral? Well, I'm a little bit too deep underground for that. A meter or two below the surface would be much nicer than…who knows how deep underground I am right now…' Dilan thought while noticing that his body was healing and regenerating.

However, instead of regenerating normally, his whole body was being fixed. His bones that had been broken countless times were mending and realigning themselves, indicating to him that he would be totally fine once everything was over.

However, until then lots of time would have to pass and Dilan couldn't help but feel bothered by this.

'Just how much time will have to pass before I will reach the surface?' He began to wonder. Dilan thought that he heard some noises from somewhere but he told himself that he was imagining things.

Nobody should be alive in Shiron, or what was left of the city. Even his current situation made it seem as if he was dead than alive.

This could be considered 'interesting' if one wanted to put it that way, which was not exactly what Dilan planned to do.

Rather, he was trying his best to fix his body by activating [Undying] whenever he could. Due to [Bracing Pain]'s augmentation of his stats, he could heal at a much faster rate and his mana replenished quite fast as well, giving him a nice advantage when using [Undying].

Once Dilan could move a little bit, he reached out for the Cursed Dagger. He knew that the Hyel Destructo Armor Set had nearly been scrapped but it could heal all injuries it had faced.

Xealtron was not capable of doing something as magical as that. Thus, he wanted to make sure that the Cursed Dagger was not too damaged.

'I can still feel the stats I get from wielding it, but I cannot find it… Weird….' Dilan thought in confusion without realizing that the Cursed Dagger was stuck in his back…quite literally.

Chapter 426 Undying?

While Dilan was taking his time to heal, the situation outside the remnants of Shiron was a lot more hectic.

The ten thousand Ascenders, led by the middle-aged man, who had initiated the attack on Shiron after what had happened to his family, seemed to have disappeared into thin air.

They vanished and it looked like they didn't leave behind even a trace of their presence.

However, this made things even more unbelievable when a Scout of the Undying group returned after taking a look at Shiron.

Being able to use messengers, there had never been a lack of communication between Shiron and the Undying group in the Sanctum of the Old Vampire Lord.

The communication between them had decreased even more than before when the group of vile criminals had taken charge of everything all of a sudden, but even they didn't stop communicating with the Undying Group's headquarters to make sure that no one would be suspicious about the change of leaders in Shiron.

Thus, it was surprising when no one from Shiron contacted the Undying Group for several days, and the reason for all of this was shocking.

The Scout took three days to reach what was left of Shiron, investigate if there was someone left alive, and what happened in Shiron before he finally returned to the headquarters.

Everyone was shocked about the news he had shared; that Shiron had been destroyed in its entirety by something that seemed like a meteorite shower.

There wasn't a lot of information the Scouts could share, just the fact that he didn't find anyone alive, that only the city and its outskirts had been destroyed, and that he was unable to identify the few human corpses he found...or what he presumed to have once been humans.

Dilan's corpse was not found. Thus, people began to hope that he would appear in the Sanctum at any moment.

However, when a week passed without any news of Dilan, they started to doubt if their hopes were futile.

Worry overcame the women and even Sven, Williams and the others began to question if Dilan was still alive.

They didn't want him dead, but it was not normal for Dilan to disappear without saying anything.

He could do whatever he wanted to do, but he always told others when he was about to disappear for a few days.

That was just how he was...usually.

While Williams, Sven, and the others tried to prevent the news of Dilan's presumed death from spreading like wildfire and creating panic, Victoria, Kathrine and Yvonne made a quick decision.

They didn't believe that Dilan was dead and assumed that he must have been in a tricky situation that prevented him from coming back and messaging them.

Thus, they forced a few people to follow them as they made their way toward Shiron to find him.

What they found was even more shocking than the information the Scout had shared with them.

"..." For a few minutes, nobody was able to utter a single word.

They stared mindlessly at the huge crater and the now cooled-down black meteorite that protruded out of the center of the ground of the once bustling city.

"Is...Dilan really here?" Kathrine asked, horrified by the answer she was bound to receive.

"I pinned my [Soul Radar] ability to our Boss...he should be here...somewhere," A young woman in her 20s with short blond hair answered quietly while she tried to make eye contact with any of the three women, who stared daggers at her.

"Where exactly?" Victoria finally asked after half a minute of silence had passed.

Her eyes had turned crimson and bloody red miasma emerged from her body.

Fury radiated from every cell of her body and she was ready to kill the young woman if she would dare to deny her request.

However, the young woman followed the order she had received and she lifted her trembling hand to point at the humongous meteorite.

"H-his last position is there...below the meteorite..." She spoke with a trembling voice and the expression of the three women changed instantly.

"No...that cannot be...That's impossible!" Kathrine screamed in disbelief and her eyes kept widening. They turned teary and it wouldn't take her much to start crying bitterly.

"How can he just...noooo!!!" Victoria wailed bitterly while Yvonne just stared at the meteorite with an aghast face, not saying a word for quite a while.

She was deep in thoughts and her expression changed a little.

"I don't sense the death of a powerful being from that place though...My Origin ability should sense it...is he really dead?" Yvonne asked, unable to understand what was going on with her Origin ability [Angel of Death].

It shouldn't be possible for her not to notice the death aura that radiated from a powerful being such as Dilan.

The stronger a being, the higher the potency of the death aura of a being after it died.

The death aura would spread out and fill the surrounding area, and the stronger it was the wider the range in which it would fill the surrounding area.

That was also why battlefields, where countless powerful beings were slaughtered, would often give birth to Death Domains, where powerful Undeads would be resurrected.

"He is dead...in fact, he died hundreds of times, but he is still alive..." A middle-aged woman with black hair and dark circles under her eyes said as her dark eyes started to turn pitch-black, without leaving a single white spot.

"What the hell do you mean?!? Speak facts!!" Victoria howled as she clenched her fists threateningly.

"It's literally what I said. He died hundreds of times but he is still alive. That's what my ability tells me. I cannot tell you more than that," the woman stated calmly as she turned her head toward Victoria before staring deep into her eyes.

Victoria had calmed down a bit while looking at the woman but she was still glaring at her.

"So he is alive...?" She ended up asking, just for the middle-aged woman to sigh deeply.

"Of course he is. The name of our group has a reason," she said and a change of her expression appeared for the first time.

"He is Undying, after all!"

Chapter 427 Surface

'Will that really work?' Dilan began to wonder as he lifted his hands while holding a translucent bottle with red liquid inside.

It took an eternity for him to be able to move once again but now that it was possible, Dilan made use of this. He wanted to heal as quickly as possible and using the majority of his Blood Points to do so allowed him to further accelerate the speed at which he was being healed.

He bought a vial of High-grade Blood that originated from an Angel. The Blood of Angels was said to have amazing healing properties, which is why Dilan downed the contents of the bottle in one go.

Usually, it was harmful to drink large amounts of blood but Dilan's second bloodline, Blood Vyrm, changed things quite a lot.

Dilan began to regenerate at a much faster rate than before and it felt like his power would return at any time of the day.

Thus, he used the remaining Blood Points to purchase a few low-grade Blood vials from the Blood Shop.

'At least, I'll be able to heal faster now…but how will I be able to get to the surface?' Dilan was still in constant pain but he tried to arrange his thoughts to leave as soon as possible.

Anger filled his entire being whenever he thought about the middle-aged man, who had led the ten thousand human Ascenders but his emotions di little to help him heal faster.

That was why he forced himself to calm down and to avert his whole attention to replenishing enough mana to activate [Undying] as often as possible.

Dilan was pretty sure that he had used his Origin ability thousands of times, yet, it didn't look like it would advance to the 2nd Circle.

He was still not certain what the difference between the label 'Tier' and 'Circle' was but he presumed that they were not that different. At least that was what Dilan hoped because he wanted his Origin ability to be upgraded after using it very often.

Unfortunately, it didn't look like [Undying] would be upgraded anytime soon, which is why Dilan made sure that he would always replenish enough Mana to exert the stronger effects of his Origin ability.

While Dilan was healing and thinking of ways to escape from under the meteorite, the Hyel Destructo armor set was also regenerating from the devastating damage it had faced. Right now, it was only a matter of days before the Armor set would be fully healed and the biggest problem was to pull the Cursed Dagger out of his back.

Dilan was not sure how it had lodged itself in his back but he was fortunate enough for it not to be too deep inside. He struggled for a long time to reach behind his back and somehow pull the Cursed Dagger out of his back. That had been far from easy and as a precaution, Dilan ended up storing the dagger in his storage ring so as to not repeat accidentally stabbing himself again.

Dilan couldn't say what happened for sure when his mind had shut off but what he could tell was that none of his accessories had been destroyed. Some of them were damaged but it looked like only the Hyel Destructo Armor set had nearly been destroyed.

That was good news, especially since his accessories were extremely helpful to make sure that his Mana was always filled to the brim!

Once his Mana was filled despite the high consumption he had formed by using [Undying] in a constant manner, Dilan started to use [Mantle of Elements]. He changed his way of thinking and put on some gloves after undergoing a great amount of struggle to merge the Basic Elemental Spirits that he had summoned with them.

When the Spirits had merged with his gloves, Dilan had no difficulty controlling them precisely. With the use of his Ring of Infinite Elements Constitution, Dilan ended up pushing aside some more earth away from himself.

After a few hours, he was finally able to stand on his own two feet once again. It felt a bit weird standing again, especially because his feet and legs were still healing from the aftermath of the meteorite shower but he knew that there was no time to waste.

Continuing to use the Elemental Spirits, Dilan worked his way to put as much distance as possible between himself and the meteorite.

He had to make a detour around the meteorite to get back to the surface and it was not exactly safe to take the short detour directly around it. Dilan may not be a mastermind when it came to building tunnels, let alone how meteorites worked but he didn't want to take the risk of encountering the last bits of a molten meteorite when making his way.

Thus, it was best to stay away from the meteorite as long as that was possible.

Several days passed in the blink of an eye, and Dilan felt that his healing had almost succeeded. His hair which had burned to a crisp had also begun to grow back. Dilan didn't really want to see how he looked right now because he didn't want to see his disfigured and grotesque body, but he actually doubted that he would be disfigured.

His Origin ability was amazing and he trusted that it would work even better than expected. And that was exactly where the problem lay. Dilan began to wonder if the Origin ability had healed him to the extent where he had become even better-looking than before.

'I wonder if my scars are still there…' Dilan wondered all of a sudden. He didn't look down at himself even though he could see everything in the darkness. It might be a fact that he was interested in figuring out if his scars had disappeared or not but Dilan wouldn't know how to feel if they were still present or if they had disappeared after his whole body had to be healed over and over again.

Would he be happy that the scars his father had inflicted on him were gone because he would be able to forget the bitter memories of the past, or would he feel even more enraged to not have a glaring reminder of the hatred he felt for his father for everything he had done to him and his sisters whenever he looked at those scars?

The scars had always reminded Dilan that he would never be able to be content with life if he were to forgot what happened in the past, that he had something to take care of, and that he had already wasted several years of his life after fleeing from his family doing things that could potentially kill him.

Dilan had done numerous things that gave him an adrenaline kick in the past and several other activities to become better with almost everything related to sports, including martial arts.

In the past, this felt like a waste of time and just a means to finally die, but given that everything had changed three months ago, made him believe that maybe, just maybe, everything had been fate!

And with that in mind, he couldn't accept dying, let alone give up. It was not his time to give up yet and he had just started.

Dilan was actually not sure how much time passed but the moment he broke through the last layer of earth that crumbled above him, he felt a fresh breeze of air sweeping past his face.

A faint smile emerged on his ghastly pale face as he looked toward the starry sky.

"Finally, I'm out!!"

Chapter 428 'Vile' Ascenders

Dilan couldn't even exert enough strength to drag himself out of the hole. He had to use his mana to create a small earthen platform below his feet to push him upward.

Yet, even before he reached the surface, he felt a bunch of hands reaching out to him. Dilan was grasped tightly, hauled upward, and almost instantly covered with a blanket.

"Dilan…is that you?" Kathrine's voice rang in his ears all of a sudden. A moment later, a thumping sound of someone getting hit was followed by a pained scream.

"Did you suddenly turn blind? Of course, that's Dilan!" Victoria declared, without taking her eyes off Dilan even for a second.

He looked extremely weak and pale, weaker than ever before but that didn't matter because he was still alive. As long as Dilan was breathing, everything would be alright!

"You!!" Kathrine shouted at Victoria while glaring at her. She would have jumped at her if not for her sister who held her back.

"Fight somewhere else if you want to, not around Dilan. He could die if an astray attack hits him right now…" Yvonne cautioned the others when she realized just how weak Dilan was right now. It was weird to see their leader being so feeble.

She had no idea what happened in the last weeks and it made no sense for him to still be alive because the [Soul Radar] ability of the young woman who had been with them had been faulty. Victoria and the others had worked tirelessly to find Dilan but he was not at the location where the Soul Radar had led them.

Only when he broke through the surface did the Soul Radar ability accurately signal them to his position, meaning that it was only at this moment that Dilan found a way to the surface.

The Soul Radar's biggest problem was that it could only determine the position of beings above the surface or with a connection to the surface. That being said, Dilan couldn't even have gotten any oxygen from above the surface.

And upon looking at Dilan's current appearance, it was unlikely that he had been strong enough to get his hands on anything by himself either. It was already a wonder that he reached the surface all on his own, but given that he was breathing heavily and that it looked like he was on the verge of collapsing due to the overuse of his mana, he must have had a rough time.

"How much time has passed?" Dilan asked weakly while looking at the others for an answer. He knew that the others had many questions about how he had ended up here and the struggle of his survival. But, he was also pretty sure that it was more important for him to figure out what he had missed while dying over and over again.

"Around two weeks," The middle-aged skinny woman answered. She was the only one, who was not deep in thought or mindlessly staring at Dilan. She had answered him without hesitation and Dilan nodded his head at that.

"How is the situation with the Scorpio Temple, the Werewolves, and the Hordes of Chaos and Destruction?" He asked another question while looking at the middle-aged woman, who could only shrug her shoulders.

She didn't know much about the Werewolves, let alone the Temple of Scorpio or the Hordes of Chaos and Destruction. Thus, Dilan had to avert his attention and look at the three women, who seemed to have been engaged in a verbal spar with each other.

"Can't you just tell us what happened to you and everyone else in Shiron? Were you attacked, and if you got attacked, why? Was it a different race, some vile Ascenders, or what, or who?!" Kathrine bombarded him with questions and she started to point fingers at him.

Dilan looked at her weakly while trying to recall what exactly had happened.

"Human Ascenders attacked by using some sort of Mantras to paralyze everyone in Shiron before a meteorite shower destroyed everything. I have no idea how they were able to use these Mantras but they did…and here is the result…everyone's dead," He gave them a brief summary and the five women began to look at him weirdly.

"You mean vile Ascenders, right?" Yvonne asked, trying to make sure she understood everything properly but Dilan could only shake his head before he halted in his tracks.

"Vile Ascenders…can you really call this group vile? I don't know… I just know that the Undying Group in Shiron had been overthrown by a small group of five powerful Ascenders, who went around raping women left and right. They did not even spare the wife and daughter of the person who initiated the attack on Shiron. He probably turned insane after what happened to his family, but I don't know…" Dilan tried to be impartial and fair, but he couldn't really get himself to call themselves Vile Ascenders.

There was a distinct difference between someone seeking revenge and someone killing their own kind just for the sake of it.

Dilan would actually call himself a Vile Ascender because he had killed more humans than most Vile Ascenders would ever be capable of, and it didn't really bother him either.

If others regarded him as Evil he could actually accept this rather easily. It didn't matter because he would always do what he wanted to do.

Thus, he would have to accept what others did to him if they were stronger than him, even if that meant he was to die.

Dilan accepted this but that didn't mean he wouldn't take revenge on them for nearly killing him. They were the reason for him being so weak right now and all the pain he had endured during the last two weeks. How could he just leave them like that?

He couldn't care less if they came for revenge, if all of the ten thousand human Ascenders were at fault for what happened, or if they just followed their leader's commands. Neither reason for their actions would matter to Dilan. He wouldn't hesitate to shed their blood if they came for his people.

It was obvious that his hesitation to kill their leader before was a very important scenario in what happened afterward. If the leader had been killed, the follow-up attack might not have happened.

"What does it matter, what you call the people who attacked Dilan? I will tear them apart, whether they're humans, Vampires, Gods or Devils!!" Victoria shouted at Yvonne while her eyes turned crimson and her claws grew without her even realizing.

She was ready to fight the whole group of ten thousand Ascenders if necessary, but Yvonne could only sigh.

"That's obvious, but I still wanted to know what we're facing. If they killed thousands of innocent and weak humans without remorse, they shall suffer pain that is hundreds of times worse than what we went through," She stated in a calm voice, just for Dilan to intervene.

"I will take care of them. We don't know if they can use more of those Mantras. I'm not even sure how I survived and I really don't want anyone else to die," Dilan said with a heavy sigh. The memories of everything that had happened were slowly resurfacing and he didn't want anyone else to face the ghastly situation he had been in.

In fact, he only survived due to his Origin ability, which was why he would have to take care of everything. The others didn't have a survival ability like him. Thus, it was on him to fix the mess he had been pulled into.

"But whatever…I will need a few more days to heal properly and I have to search for them afterward. So, for now, let's talk about something more important," Dilan spoke before he took a deep breaths as he continued to speak,

"How bad is our situation?"

Chapter 429 We Know Nothing

"The Scorpio Temple said that the Hordes of Chaos and Destruction have also been detected on the other continents? That is not exactly surprising," Dilan said after he heard a few things Yvonne and the others shared with him.

Apparently, the Hordes of Chaos and Destruction left the Javelin Cliffs to spread out a little bit. However, they didn't start wreaking havoc all around the continents but rather inside the Gates. According to the news the Scorpio Temple had shared, the Hordes of Chaos and Destruction slaughtered all beings inside Gates before they continued to expand their range.

The Gates changed color and monsters with chaos traits were said to emerge from them every now and then, indicating that the Hordes of Chaos and Destruction were capable of altering the Gates.

"There are a few more things you should know but I think the news of the Hordes of Chaos and Destruction are the most important!" Yvonne said calmly and Dilan nodded his head.

"As long as the Werewolf packs and the Vampire Lord are not stirring trouble, I don't really care what they do," Dilan nodded his head, agreeing to Yvonne's opinion.

He was still a bit weaker but his mana replenished even faster on the surface than underground. Thus, he could easily use [Undying] in an overclocked state by using multiple times more mana than what was supposed to be possible.

"I will be ready to leave in three days. If you guys want to leave, I don't think that I will need to be protected here," He added after giving it some thought.

He doubted that a monster would even think of approaching the meteor shower field for quite a while. However, his words made Victoria and Kathrine sad and they almost pouted in unison.

"Eh..." Dilan fumbled for a moment before he thought of something, "I forgot to thank you all for looking for me. It's nice to know that someone would search for me when I go missing!"

Others might not think that Dilan's words were genuine but he was actually grateful for what the women did there. Their help might not have helped him because they couldn't find him but it was a nice thought to have someone, who would come looking for you even if you're the strongest.

Dilan smiled slightly at the women, whose expressions changed slowly as well. The tension in their body was released and they started to grin involuntarily. Even the skinny and rather gloomy middle-aged woman was unable to hide her little smile.

'I wonder if I should attack the Hordes of Chaos and Destruction after I find and kill those who eradicated Shiron?' He wondered all of a sudden, no sign of sentimentality left on his face.

He was not sure if the Hordes of Chaos and Destruction were only bad because he recalled a few words spoken by Aries Silvertale.

The woman was very helpful because she had shared lots of information with him and that was more than enough reason for Dilan to message her once again.

Their personal chat was very useful, especially because he could bombard her with questions without them getting lost in the messages that were sent by others in the group chat.

Dilan wrote a few short messages in their chat before he moved the holographic screen aside to start activating what he had planned to do while waiting for his body to heal.

He activated [Switch] to reallocate 150 Units of his Agility to Health whenever the ability's cooldown had worn off, while simultaneously activating [Thunder Step], [Second Acceleration], and [Mantle of Elements].

Dilan didn't focus on upgrading [Language comprehension] for now because he would rather focus on [Mantle of Elements]. Using the three Basic Spirits actively would allow his ability to get stronger much faster than just passively summoning and de-summoning them.

"What are you doing?" Victoria asked all of a sudden when she looked at Dilan, whose Health seemed to have increased tremendously while electricity currents shrouded his naked feet.

Simultaneously, his gloves were shrouded in fire and electricity currents. Dilan created more than ten small fire wisps that revolved around his left hand while the same scenario occurred around his right hand, just with 15 tiny thunderbolts.

"You mean me? I'm just activating my abilities to make sure that they can be upgraded in the next three days. If I'm already incapable of fighting for the next few days, I might as well use the time on improving my abilities," Dilan shrugged his shoulders as he glanced at Victoria who frowned a bit.

She looked a little bit disappointed as if she had expected to be able to do something else for the next few days, such as talking with Dilan. Victoria wouldn't even mind if Dilan didn't like speaking about his past because she could speak about her own life. All she wanted to do was to talk a little bit with Dilan and spend some time with him.

It was so hard to get close to him because whenever there was the slightest opportunity to get close to him, he would do something just like that, train like a maniac, go out on a killing spree, or do something else to avoid conversing with others.

Yvonne and Kathrine felt similar to Victoria. They didn't really know anything about Dilan, which was a bit weird after having known him for more than three months.

It was obvious that Dilan was just their leader and that everyone had a lot on their plate to make sure that everyone would live the rest of their life in a relatively comfortable way in the Undying Group while simultaneously feel a strong enough sense of responsibility to feel like becoming stronger to protect the people in the Undying Group.

Nobody would dare to say that it was easy to lead a group in apocalyptic times, especially if the apocalypse was something like the Primordial Ascension.

However, it was still quite obvious that it was important to get to know your allies to be able to trust them with your life.

"Dilan, we trust you...but won't it be possible for you to talk with us for a little? Nobody knows really anything about you while it feels like you know everything about us. We don't want to force you to talk about your family or past but it would still be great if we could get to know more about each other.

That won't only be helpful to strengthen our bonds of trust with each other more but also to know how the other person will react in certain situations," Yvonne tried to reason with Dilan, whose head flicked over to her.

He looked at her in seriousness and nodded his head after a while.

"I guess you're correct. Nonetheless, I can still activate my abilities while speaking. You guys should do the same to train your multitasking capabilities and to improve your abilities' rankings!" Dilan suggested lightly before he cleared his throat.

He took a few seconds to ask himself what he should tell the others first.

There was a lot to say but Dilan chose to break the walls between them.

"Do you guys want to know who caused all these scars?" He thus asked in a serious voice while removing a part of the blanket from his naked body.

Only then was he able to see that the scars that were faint lines were still there, but that they had healed a little bit as well. There were just numerous white stripes left on his tanned skin.

"The girls looked at his torso and the scars for a while and they all swallowed nervously before Yvonne recovered from her shock and was the first to nod her head.

"Yes, we want to know!"

Chapter 430 He Is...What?!

"Your father did all of this to you?" Kathrine exclaimed in shock and she jumped up from the ground where they had sat down to talk calmly with one another.

Her abilities turned unstable due to the anger that spread through her body, but Yvonne tugged at her sleeve and pulled her sister downward.

"We expected that someone in your family might have done that to you…what are you planning to do now that you are powerful enough to take revenge? Do you want to take revenge?" Yvonne asked, smiling gently at Dilan.

Her face was void of any pity despite witnessing his injuries and if Dilan had to be honest, he didn't like that. Most of the time, he didn't like sharing stuff about his past because people tended to look at him with pity.

That was frustrating because their pity was not helpful at all. Things had happened in the past, vile and bad things that would make any grown-up man shudder. But now it was time to accept them and go ahead, keep living and do what had to be done.

"I don't know if I will be stronger than my father. Before I think of taking revenge, I should search for my sisters. I have two half-sisters from a different mother, my father's first wife. They're one and three years older than me and they saved my life whenever they could.

There were tens of times when I was nearly beaten to within an inch of my life by my father but I never dared to run away because I knew what would happen to my sisters if I fled. I would never bring myself to be so selfish to escape hell and let them rot in it.

My mother ran away from home, and I don't know if she is still alive, and as for the third wife of my father…she is a monster just like my father. She forced my sisters to watch me getting beaten up, whipped and burned with scalding water," Dilan spoke in an unnervingly calm voice and it almost felt like the words he spoke didn't belong to his story but to the nightmare of someone else's life.

However, seeing the suppressed anger in his eyes, nobody dared to say anything. They had asked Dilan to open up a bit about his past, and that was exactly what they were receiving just now.

Kathrine's eyes watered, Victoria's eyes were filled with anger and frustration, and even Yvonne couldn't help but bite her lips nervously as Dilan continued to speak.

"When I turned seventeen, I found out what happened to my father's first wife, my sisters' mother…She was killed by my father and he recorded everything. There were numerous DVD's filmed by my father and his subordinates doing all kinds of cruel things, whether it were murder, ****, arson, extortion, torture… the list just goes on. My father even recorded when I was beaten or whipped…

I know that I would have died if I had stayed longer at our mansion but I didn't dare to leave my sisters. Yet, when they found out that I saw something I shouldn't have seen, they told me to run away, that they would be fine because they were married off by my father just a few months later.

I felt uncomfortable but I was selfish enough to run, to protect my life and to flee from my father's grasp. I went as far as I could and tried hard to forget about the fact that I abandoned my sisters to stay alive, which is why I started to do various types of things that were mostly related to life-threatening situations.

Maybe that's why I ended up here, who knows?" Dilan's voice cracked a bit. It was filled with raw emotion and the hurt, anguish, and helplessness he felt while reliving those memories was evident on his face. Upon listening to his harrowing past was no less than a hellish nightmare the girls were left speechless. Tears were streaming down Kathrine's cheeks. She jumped forward and gave Dilan a tight hug while starting to bawl.

"You had such a hard life…poor thing…" Kathrine spoke incomprehensibly while crying loudly. Dilan only let out a deep sigh and he patted Kathrine's back with one hand while making sure that she was not zapped by the tiny thunderbolts.

Meanwhile, Victoria was fuming in anger. Bloody red miasma was released from her body and it looked like she was ready to tear apart anyone who would dare to obstruct her path.

"Where the hell is this mansion?! Let's burn it to a crisp before we cut your father into tiny pieces and feed him to the dogs!!" She yelled in rage, just for Dilan to fire one of the small thunderbolts straight at her.

Victoria was zapped lightly and she averted her gaze to him before lunging forward to pull back Kathrine.

"Don't take advantage of this moment, girl!" Victoria exclaimed in anger. She halted in her tracks when she saw that Kathrine was bawling like a small child. Her bloody miasma dispersed and Victoria stared blankly at Kathrine.

"The place I had once called home is pretty far away. I'm not sure how long I would need to run over but there is also a pretty big ocean in between. I left the continent to make sure that father would never find me on his territory," Dilan explained calmly and his words caused Yvonne's ears to perk upward.

However, it was not Yvonne who said something first, but the young woman, who had been silent for the whole time.

"Wait…don't tell me your father is a high authority in the Alliance?" She asked in shock, attracting the attention of everyone around her.

Dilan was not sure why she was so shocked but he nodded his head.

"I'm not sure if it's fine to merely call him a high authority…unfortunately…" Dilan scratched the back of his head and he began to smile uncomfortably.

"Wait…you said that you're not sure if you're stronger than him by now…that means you expect him to be extremely fast in ascending the ranks… if he has enough subordinates under himself, this shouldn't be difficult…. Is your father…Arnes Cier?" Yvonne asked all of a sudden after she joined the dots by piecing bits of information together.

There were a few things that didn't really make any sense but Yvonne hit the nail on the head. Dilan was just about to nod when someone else suddenly interfered.

"But…he is only said to have three daughters…one from his first marriage, and one whom he adopted from his second marriage…" The middle-aged woman recalled and Dilan nodded his head, smiling bitterly.

"He never officially announced my existence because he wouldn't want a failure to be known as his son…and the same could be said about his second wife…my mother," He explained before he clarified it for everyone once again, "So…yes, I'm Arnes Cier's son, whether I like it or not."

"Arnes Cier…who was that again?" Kathrine asked without ever stopping to sob.

She was clueless about politics, whether it was on their beautiful continent or anywhere around Milarn.

However, even Yvonne couldn't help but smile weirdly at her sister.

"Sis…I always wonder how I can know about something more than you when I have been the one, who was forced to stay in bed due to my illness. Sometimes, I'm really curious what you've been doing all this time…" Yvonne said sarcastically and one could easily tell that she was complaining to Kathrine.

Kathrine was not sure what to reply, so she remained quiet while flicking her head to Dilan as if she hoped to receive some help from him.

"Well, Arnes Cier is the president of the Alliance on Arikan," Dilan added in the same dry tone and Kathrine nodded her head thankfully before she froze in place.

"Wait a moment…your asshole of a father…is the president of the whole fucking continent?!?"

Chapter 431 Healed

After the women came face to face with the most threatening opponent of the Undying Group, they went silent.

Dilan had no idea what they were thinking about. Thus, he let them organize their thoughts while taking a look if Ariel Silvertale had answered his earlier question on the personal chat.

'She really answered already! Sometimes it feels like she is not busy at all,' He thought with a faint smile as he began to read the message.

[The Hordes of Chaos and Destruction are considered as the Primals of the New Age in most tales because their task is to initiate the new age on the planets where they're ordered to emerge, wreak havoc and start their conquest. The Hordes of Chaos and Destruction awaken a planet faster by summoning stronger monsters, by altering Gates and by creating new Gates on their own!]

Even though Dilan thought that the Hordes of Chaos and Destruction could bring tremendous advantages for the Undying group, or potentially for all humans on Milarn, he was not sure what to think about the given information.

'Should I just annihilate the Hordes of Chaos and Destruction to slow down the awakening of the planet? That way I can make sure that I will stay the strongest and advance faster than everyone else. Furthermore, less people would die if the Primordial Ascension needs more time to be completed…' Dilan thought, just to recall something that caused him to discard this idea immediately.

'I cannot stop the Hordes of Chaos and Destruction all over Milarn. At the most, I could defeat them here, which would cause this beautiful yet rather small continent to progress the slowest in comparison to the other continent where the Hordes would continue with their conquest. It's not really worth killing the Hordes for now even if I were to be strong enough right now,' He added in his mind, feeling slightly frustrated.

The situation was far from easy to handle but Dilan tried to accept everything readily. Instead of worrying too much about the Hordes of Chaos and Destruction, he was more interested in annihilating the people, who had attacked and nearly killed him.

He didn't care about the reason for their attack because that was not something that mattered, at all. The only thing of importance was their strength and how he would fare against them! If they were stronger than him, they would be capable enough to take his life. However, they hadn't been powerful enough to achieve this, which is why it was now his turn to wreak havoc.

There was no need to show them any mercy either. They had more than two weeks to become stronger than before and it would require another three days before he would be ready to fight. His strength would be back at its peak again and the Hyel Destructo Armor Set would have regenerated by then as well.

"I think I've shared enough about myself for the time being. Someone else should talk now. I was always curious as to why the two of you never spoke about or went in search of the rest of your family, either way," Dilan said, trying to sound interested, which failed miserably.

He knew enough about most higher-ups of the Undying Group to gauge that he could trust them. Their past might be an important factor to turn them into who they were right now but that was something Dilan could see in the present.

It was not necessary for him to see their past to understand who they were right now.

Kathrine and Yvonne understood Dilan's intention behind his question. Thus, they started to share bits about their own life. Kathrine talked the most because she had the most memories about their family and so on since Yvonne had always been on bedrest most of the time.

After the sister duo was done sharing about their life, Victoria started to reveal some facts about her life as well. Her lifespan had been the longest but there had often been decades where she didn't do anything special. A long life might be interesting for most but Milarn hadn't been a place to spend over a thousand years while feeling like every single minute or hour was to be used judiciously.

There was never really the need for her to do anything special because she had nearly everything one could wish for. Now the times might have changed and time was an important factor to garner strength but that had not really been of importance to Victoria before.

In the blink of an eye, three days passed in which they talked a lot with each other. Yvonne, Kathrine and Victoria were overjoyed because Dilan had finally shared something about his past.

It might not be a pleasant past but that didn't matter to the three women, who were more relieved about the fact that he had trusted them enough to speak about his past rather than the contents and memories of his past.

Now that the three days were over the women were ready to leave Dilan alone. They were a bit worried that something might happen to him but their worries were groundless. It was not as if Dilan was not capable enough to look after himself. The earlier situation had been a terrifying incident but Dilan now knew what to do if he were to encounter something like before once again; purchase equipment that blocked effects like the paralyzation domain, or become strong enough to overpower such domains!

The women left him inside the crater caused by the humongous meteorite and Dilan's expression changed rapidly.

"I will find and kill them!" He swore to himself as he activated [Switch], which had upgraded to a Tier-1 ★★★★✭✭ ability, to reallocate a total of 150 Units of his Strength and 100 Units of his Health to his Mana.

Afterward, he released all his mana at once to shroud the district-sized meteorite in order to store it inside his storage ring.

"You gave me lots of pain, so you will become the main resource for my Undying Group's blacksmiths!" Dilan declared. He was ready to bring Old Jeff and the other blacksmiths to the meteorite to work on it whenever they could.

He used his horrifyingly high amount of Mana to use more than 100 Units on [Thunder Step], which allowed his Agility stat to reach almost 900 Units.

Afterward, he activated [Master of Gravitation] and he rushed back toward the Sanctum of the Old Vampire Lord to bring the meteorite to his people.

After he reached the base, he ignored all the people around him, looked for Old Jeff, and quickly transferred the meteorite inside his storage device.

"When you're ready to forge weapons and armors using the meteorite's metal, start mass producing them to the best of your capabilities. We need an army fully equipped with high-quality equipment!" Dilan stressed the importance of Jeff's role in their group before he gave Old Jeff a peace sign as he turned into golden particles.

He disappeared and went back to the now empty crater to take a look in the direction where he had found the ten thousand Ascenders before.

"They should be in that direction. With many Tier-1 Ascenders, their base shouldn't be too far away, otherwise, they would have required much longer to come over after the idiots violated their leader's wife and daughter…" He mumbled just to shrug his shoulders and add,

"Let's see where I'll find them!"

Chapter 432 Guilt? What Is That?

It was basically impossible for ten thousand Ascenders to hide their trails completely.

Furthermore, Dilan had to spend more than a day running all over the Shikan plains to figure out where the group he was looking for was actually located.

His anger had yet to be pacified and he didn't intend to show any mercy.

However, to make sure that he attacked the right people, Dilan entered the outskirts of the huge city where he presumed his opponents to lurk.

He approached the humongous base that had been built with the help of more than ten thousand Ascenders and the same number of ordinary humans.

"I wonder if I should feel relieved or remorseful at the thought of killing them all…I cannot feel anything when thinking about annihilating them…" Dilan mumbled, not sure what to feel.

His anger knew no bounds and it didn't even matter to him that he would kill countless innocent people. This thought caught him off-guard because he had never expected to attack someone who was innocent.

But it was his entire being that told him to never back off against anyone who attacked him. He used the same illogical reasoning as the leader of the huge base had used when eradicating his people without a second of hesitation.

Huge walls surrounded the base to protect them but that was no problem for Dilan.

Using [Short-distance traveling] once to pass by the guards, who were stationed to ensure that nobody could enter the base without going through them, Dilan appeared in the base without any of them realizing.

He walked confidently through the streets and observed the situation all around him. There were numerous malnourished humans, people that looked worse than bedraggled and homeless people before the Primordial Ascension, and humans with lifeless eyes all around the streets and the dark side alleys.

Dilan was not sure what had happened to them but he didn't really care about that, either way. It merely showed him that the base was not nice to people, who didn't contribute to society, or to people, who were unable to help in any 'useful' way due to certain conditions.

Dilan saw a few crippled Ascenders, who were looking at him hopefully as if he was some Samaritan who was kind enough to give them some food because they didn't get enough food from the government.

"That's quite funny…if there are more than ten thousand Ascenders and all of them belong to the leader of this 'bob the builder group' doesn't that mean the leader is willing to let his own loyal combatants starve the moment they're crippled? What a nice man," Dilan mumbled when he heard something from his right.

And when he glanced to his right, he saw something shimmering in the dark. His body moved back instinctively while his right hand shot out to catch the shimmering projectile that had been shot toward him.

"That's cute. You shot an arrow at me because…I was wearing good equipment, I guess?" Dilan asked as he looked straight at the human, who was hiding in the darkness.

Dilan's sky blue eyes began to glow in a glacier blue color as he looked through the darkness where he saw that the human tried to disappear.

The human ran for his life when he realized that Dilan was not an opponent to be messed with but Dilan didn't think for a single moment to spare the human Ascender's life.

Nonetheless, he didn't rush after him but followed with slow steps while tracing his mana fluctuations easily.

Dilan stepped through the darkness with an eerily calm attitude and it didn't take him even ten minutes before he reached the hideout, where quite a few Ascenders were located.

There were even a handful of Tier-2 Ascenders, along with two Guards that were blocking the entrance.

"Can I go inside?" Dilan asked calmly as he emerged from the darkness, startling the guards, who hadn't even noticed Dilan before he had appeared in front of him.

They moved quickly and went in a defensive position to make sure that Dilan wouldn't be able to attack them without going past their spears.

"Who are you?!" They asked instead of answering his question. This caused Dilan to sigh deeply and he had to look at the young men for a second before he opened his mouth once again.

"I take that as a no," Dilan said out loud as he disappeared in front of the young Guards' eyes. A moment later, Dilan passed by them and he wiped off the blood from the Cursed Dagger while entering the building where something unexpected, yet also expected awaited him.

He saw many naked women lying on the ground. Their eyes were wide open and it looked like they had been deprived of their soul. Numerous scars covered the women's bodies.

'Just how long have they been treated like this to end in such a state?' Dilan wondered as he leaned down to look at the closest woman.

"If you want, I can end your suffering right now…or you can just wait before you'll be crushed to death in a few minutes," He offered, not even thinking about offering to save them.

Dilan had seen women like the one around him a few times before the Primordial Ascension. It had always been an unpleasant experience but he knew that the women were beyond saving. The only way to save them from the terror their mind made them recall every second of their life was to end their suffering, once and for all!

The woman in front of him didn't seem to hear Dilan. Thus, he got up from the ground, just to feel a light grasp around his ankle.

"I am sorry for what happened to you, but I hope your afterlife will be better!" He said as he started using the enhanced [Mantle of Elements] to summon a total of four Basic Lightning Spirits. They fused with his Gloves of Destructo and Power, two each and Dilan manifested more than 20 tiny thunderbolts that revolved around his gloves.

One thunderbolt shot out to pierce the area between the woman's brows, killing her in an instant without making her feel any pain.

Dilan let out a sigh as he started his killing spree of the unarmed and poor women, who had been mistreated for a long time. They were already dead on the inside and Dilan was merely going to deliver the final blow to make sure that they wouldn't have to face even worse situations before they would die.

"To think that their leader is such a hypocrite. He is okay that his people are mistreated like this, and that they get violated to the point that the women look like lifeless dolls, just to blame others for doing the same. Well, there is a reason why people like him have to die," He mumbled to himself as he stepped into the light of the first big room.

A few women were currently being raped but they didn't even have the power left to defend themselves anymore. Dilan's hands curled into fists upon seeing this. He lifted one of his hands and released a few thunderbolts, killing all people before he stepped ahead. The Tier-2 Ascenders were further ahead and Dilan didn't waste any time to reach them.

They were all leaning over a beautiful woman who was still struggling to survive. Dilan would be lying if he were to say that she was not beautiful but that was not the point right now.

"She is not human?"

Chapter 433 Foreign Race

In an unexpected turn of events, Dilan saw a dark-skinned woman with pointy ears and purple eyes.

Her eyes were red and tears trickled down her cheeks as she was struggling to move around.

She was giving her all and thrashing around to prevent the men around her from taking what was the most precious to her- her chastity.

Dilan looked at the scene in the room for a moment before he lifted both of his hands to release the tiny thunderbolts that revolved around his gloves.

His eyes didn't know any emotions as the blood of several human Ascenders splattered through the entire room. The struggling woman could only feel something warm trickling onto her naked body before the gurgling noises of several men rang through her ears. Her eyes were tightly shut and she bit onto her lips, imagining the worst possible.

"Do you even know who I am?! I am the command–..." The bulky man, who had desired to take her first, shouted at the top of his lungs, just to quiet down all of a sudden.

Silence filled the room at that moment and the woman opened her eyes carefully upon realizing that something was off. Her eyes widened all of a sudden as an unexpected sight appeared in front of her.

Blood leaked out of the holes that had been pierced into the bulky man's chest, throat, and head and it took a few seconds before the man collapsed on the ground in front of the tied-down woman.

"You are dead, nothing more or less," Dilan said coldly, and his eyes turned to the woman, whom he stared at for a few seconds.

"Were you bought as a slave?" He asked her, completely out of context. She had expected him to pounce on her but his question made her stare at him with a wide open mouth.

"Huh?" That was the only thing she could blurt out after a few seconds, trying to hide her private parts.

Dilan looked straight into her purple eyes rather than her curvaceous body which caused numerous men to lust after her.

The behavior of the young man was more than a bit unfamiliar to the young woman who couldn't hide her shock.

"Well, the Queen of the Dark Elven could be bought in the Essence shop when I had access to it. She was labeled as a Slave, which is why I predicted that her whole race had been forced into submission and enslaved," Dilan explained his theory as he accessed his storage ring to retrieve a blanket.

He threw it toward the woman, whom he presumed to be a Dark Elf while continuing to stare at her.

His assumption might be wrong and both her purple eyes and long and pointy ears were some sort of special condition or created after another race's bloodline had been accepted and fused with her, but even if he was wrong, it didn't really matter all that much.

"Our Queen disappeared a long time ago…." The woman mumbled to herself, trying to make sense of the situation as she wrapped the blanket around herself.

"So why are you here, or rather, how did you come here?" Dilan asked this time after realizing that the woman was actually a Dark Elf and not human.

"Why did you help me?" the Dark Elf asked and Dilan could only frown.

"I think you're misunderstanding the situation right now. I didn't come here to save you but to see how filthy the people in this whole settlement are," Dilan answered her calmly while his eyes darted straight toward the Dark Elf, who realized something within Dilan's eyes that was far more dangerous than lust; seemingly endless anger.

The anger Dilan felt was not about the Dark Elf but the group, who had killed his people and even more importantly, had almost taken his life!

However, the Dark Elf didn't know to who his anger was targeted. Thus, she turned silent for a few seconds while Dilan's eyes felt like they were about to turn her into an icicle.

"I…was enslaved by the Drakins…and they support this group, which is why they send some of their…slaves over to this planet…" The Dark Elf stammered while speaking. She was shaking and it took her a great deal of effort to control her voice as much as possible. However, she had begun to tremble wildly and speak in a trembling voice, which was enough for Dilan to sigh deeply.

'How did the situation turn out like this?' He began to wonder.

"Drakins? Never heard of that race," Dilan said at first before he continued to speak, "Either way, tell me more about the Drakins. Are they already on Milarn with some sort of Temple by their side, or did they merely send over a bunch of Slaves?"

The Dark Elf looked at Dilan in uncertainty. She was about to say something but a purple mark above her chest began to shimmer brightly. The woman swayed a bit, she landed on the ground and stayed there.

Her blanket had loosened and fallen down but the young Dark Elf was not able to pick it up. She felt too weak to do so.

'So that's how the things with slaves work,' Dilan thought as he looked at the weak woman, who had difficulties even breathing properly right now.

He stepped forward, leaned down, and picked up the blanket to tuck her in it. Dilan didn't lift her from the ground but he stepped away once again.

"Just answer what you can without breaking the commands your master has given to you. They betrayed you first by throwing you here. You should understand that after what happened here," He said without showing too many emotions on his face.

The Dark Elf swallowed hard and she was beyond relieved that he didn't do anything to her. It was obvious that he was strong enough to do whatever he wanted to her but he didn't do so even though it was obvious that he showed no mercy or remorse when killing his opponents.

"There are not many Drakins yet, but after our newly appointed master collected enough Soul Fragments more will soon come…" She answered and her slave mark began to shine once again. However, it was more of a warning this time rather than endless pain, which would have been disastrous.

Dilan nodded his head and he thought about a few things while looking at her.

"How many Slaves did they send over, and is your master the leader of this group?" He enquired while trying to think of something.

"I don't know our exact numbers and our new human master is called Regilav Gaul. We have to follow his orders no matter what!" The Dark Elf answered and Dilan nodded his head once again.

The information the Dark Elf had provided was more than enough and he was ready to leave.

"Once your connection with him is terminated you should leave the settlement as quickly as you can," Dilan said and he stepped outside the room just to hear a silent voice reaching his ears.

"But we will die if we don't get a new master…"

It was the Dark Elf who had spoken and Dilan halted in his tracks for a moment when he heard her words.

'Slaves will always be slaves. Is that how it is?' He wondered before he stepped outside again.

There was no need for him to be concerned about the well-being of slaves, but oddly enough he could feel what they had gone through.

After all, his life hadn't been any better than a slave before he had found the chance to run away from home.

He was not different.

Chapter 434 Nightmares

What he felt about the Dark Elf Slave and the other slaves was something Dilan could hardly describe but it didn't really matter either way.

He would kill Regilav Gaul, and annihilate all his people to take revenge for what they had done to him.

His steps were silent as he walked back out of the dark alley in the settlement of the group that almost had a population of 30,000 and nobody took note of him.

Even when he returned to the brightly lit up main alley where he encountered many somewhat powerful Ascenders, Dilan was never stopped in his tracks even once. There might have been a few people, who looked at him from time to time but most of the attention he received was more for his looks and the confidence his body released subconsciously.

Dilan couldn't be bothered to merge with the crowd and not stand out as someone worth keeping an eye on but that was not necessary, to begin with because he hadn't released a single trace of mana right now.

His control over mana had skyrocketed in the last few weeks, or months if one wanted to put it like this and Dilan was not capable of concealing his mana from everyone, who was weaker than him.

As long as there was no one with more mana than himself or anyone with the special ability to detect the mana inside him, he would look like a young man with too much confidence rather than a powerful Ascender.

Dilan was not in a hurry and he spent some more time assessing the situation in the base of Regilav Gaul. However, he quickly understood that his first assumption of the base had been correct.

"Everyone who is of some use is treated well while the others are either treated shit, or decently if they're connected to those who are useful…that is disgusting," Dilan mumbled, smiling lightly instead of distorting his expression in utter disgust.

The more time he spent in the base, the less guilt he felt about wanting to destroy the base and raze it to the ground, if what he felt was guilt, to begin with.

Dilan halted in his tracks in the middle of a crowded place before he took a deep breath. Some Ascenders bumped into him due to his sudden stop and they were about to open their mouths to say something when they noticed that a tremendous amount of mana surged out of Dilan.

He used 200 Units of Mana to activate the [Demon Summoning] ability of his Blood Eclipse Necklace at once and a huge black Gate formed behind Dilan.

There was no need for Dilan to turn around to see what was going on but he smirked at the Ascenders, who had been ready to beat him into a pulp just for stopping in his tracks.

"Do you have a problem?" He asked coldly when he saw that the Ascenders had frozen in their tracks.

"N-no…Nono, we don't have a problem…have a nice day!" One of the Ascenders was quick to react and replied weakly. He figured that they had thought of messing up with the wrong person which is why he started to behave nicely all of a sudden.

But to their misery that was hardly helpful because Dilan's smirk widened before his hands shot out forward. In an instant, his hands reached the neck of two Ascenders, which he grasped tightly. He winked at them while using more force in his hands to break their neck in the middle of the crowded street.

The sound of two breaking necks reverberated through the surroundings as if a shockwave spread through it and everyone's attention was drawn to him if that had not already happened due to the sudden manifestation of the huge black Gate that began to open with a loud creak.

Dilan had yet to turn around but he was hardly bothered about the Demon he was currently summoning because his interest was more in the reaction of the Ascenders and people around him rather than the monster that would pay heed to his commands whether it wanted to or not.

"Go and kill all Ascenders within these walls. But just human Ascenders, spare the rest," Dilan ordered while throwing aside the corpses of the two Ascenders he had killed beforehand.

Upon turning around, Dilan saw something that attracted his attention. The Demon he had summoned was a Tier-3 Demon, but luckily it was probably around the Mid ranks of Tier-3 not the Peak of Tier 3.

Dilan wouldn't even need to activate any kind of ability to defeat it. That was quite interesting, especially because Dilan was pretty sure that the Demon in front of him was the strongest Demon he had encountered until now.

It might be a fact that his individual strength was not that high but what made Dilan believe that he was facing a very strong Demon was not only his gut feeling but also what he saw when the three-meter-tall Demon created a single wave of his arms.

Darkness began to ooze out of the body of the two Ascenders, whom Dilan had thrown aside, and small figures were beginning to form out of them.

Made out of remnants of their soul and the extent of their vileness, beings called Nightmares had been created by Demon, who had a human-like body with dis-proportional body parts. His arms and legs were extremely long and the same could be said about his face.

It was lengthy as if it was stretched like elastic, highlighting the razor-sharp shark teeth that were clearly visible to the naked eye.

"And here I thought you would be a very skilled close combat fighter. Looks like you are simply a Necromancer," Dilan mumbled and the Demon turned to his direction after a moment or two.

"Are you the one they call Dilan?" The Demon asked coldly, staring daggers at Dilan, who nodded his head calmly.

"Yes, I am, but why are you looking at me like that? Do you want to get beaten up by me and forced to obey me for the next hour?" Dilan asked with a cool head, not avoiding the pitch-black eyes that kept glaring at him for quite a while.

"Not today, I won't fight you today. I'm at a disadvantage here. Let's fight when we meet each other next time!" The Demon declared all of a sudden before he ordered the Nightmares to spread out and attack all Ascenders.

The death of the Ascenders welcomed the birth of new Nightmares that would spread out to kill more Ascenders.

This was one of the simplest tactics which the Demon made use of when killing existences that were weaker than him. There was no need for him to move out all by himself because his Nightmares were more than enough to achieve everything he wanted, at a rapid pace at that!

Dilan was pretty satisfied with what he saw and he nodded his head slowly before he disappeared from his location to appear on the rooftop of the largest building in the city.

The building had been right next to him and Dilan punched the ground to easily tear through the rooftop. With a calm mind, Dilan jumped through the hole he had created in the ceiling of the highest floor to land on the ground with an eerily calm expression that turned into a devilish smile.

"If I'm not mistaken, you are Regilav Gaul, right?"

Chapter 435 Torture?

"If I'm not mistaken, you are Regilav Gaul, right?" Dilan asked in utter calmness.

He stared at the familiar middle-aged man, who was currently looking at the tiny black heart shaped object that lay unmoving in his hands.

"You must have retrieved the heart from the Drakins, isn't it?" Dilan added as a second question while the devilish smile on his face widened as the screams of terror and death from outside reached them.

All the Ascenders were getting slaughtered one after another and that was something the leader of the settlement started to realize as he recalled the identity of the man in front of him.

"You…you are the man we killed with the Meteor shower domain…the leader of the Undying Group…How…How is that possible?" Regilav asked, his eyes widened in stupor as he was trying to make sense of the situation.

"Are…are you a ghost?" He concluded that the only logical explanation for Dilan's sudden appearance was that he had died and risen from the dead as a mere replica of what his mortal body had once been. He had to be a ghost because it was not possible for him to have escaped the Paralyzation Domain and the Meteor shower Domain.

"What does it matter if I'm a ghost or still alive, if you're going to die in a few minutes, either way?" Dilan asked in return and he quickly noticed that they were throwing questions at each other rather than answering them.

This caused him to frown deeply and he activated [Mantle of Elements] to fuse Basic Wind Spirits with his gloves. Afterward, he manifested a bunch of tiny wind blades which he released toward Regilav Gaul, whose arms and legs were cut and sliced through dozens of times.

The cuts were light and far from endangering Regilav's life but he was unable to calm his heart which was thudding wildly.

"You…can attack me even though you are a ghost?!? How…" Regilav screamed at the top of his lungs, which caused Dilan to frown deeply.

His sky blue eyes seemed to turn into blocks of ice as he manifested more wind blades that inflicted hundreds of cuts all over the middle-aged man's body.

"I'm the one asking questions here!" Dilan's voice thundered all of a sudden and the middle-aged man froze in his place. He was still tightly clutching the tiny black heart but he was not even able to think about that object right now.

Only when he saw that Dilan had taken the tiny black heart from him, was he able to react. Dilan had moved rapidly to shoot forward, grasp the black heart and take a few steps backward once he got his hand on the object.

"Nooo!! Don't take my Soul Collector!!" Regilav screamed hysterically and he subconsciously moved forward with the intention to retrieve the black heart that he had labeled as a Soul Collector.

"So that thing is a Soul Collector? I guess that's why she told me that more Drakins will soon emerge on Milarn," Dilan mumbled as he released a strong air current to push Regilav backward.

Despite being a Tier-2 Ascender, Regilav's stats averaged at around 100. Upon adding a few passive abilities and some inconspicuous treasures the middle aged man was wearing, his stats increased to around 150. That was Dilan's rough guess and he was pretty sure that he was not wrong.

This was not bad but it was not exactly something Dilan would consider powerful.

His stats were far more terrifying and there was no way that he would be afraid of facing Regilav. However, the questions he had were more important than his desire to tear the middle-aged man into pieces.

The Drakins could actually become a threat and that thought was something Dilan didn't like at all.

"By using this thing, you'll be able to bring more Drakins over. You got that Soul Collector, Slaves and the Mantras from them, right?" Dilan asked, trying to make it look like the Mantras were the least important information for him while it was actually the most important.

He wanted to make sure that it wouldn't be easy for everyone to be able to use the Mantras that could even kill Tier-4 existences. That was pretty important to Dilan, especially after facing the wrath of combined Mantras.

"Mantras? I have no idea what you're talking about…" Regilav said as he was trying to calm down. He knew that facing Dilan wouldn't be easy. Thus, he accessed his storage ring to retrieve a few things. He wanted to make sure that Dilan would die, which was something he would have to achieve with some external help because his own strength was not enough.

Yet, the moment Regilav moved oddly, Dilan created hundreds of wind blades that were released at once. Dilan didn't show the slightest hint of hesitation as he controlled the wind blades to cut through Regilav's arms and legs.

Regilav screamed at the top of his lungs as he felt endless pain spreading throughout his entire being, just for him to feel a searing heat where his arms and legs had been cut off.

Dilan had sent the Basic Wind Spirits back to where they belonged so as to replace them with Basic Fire Spirits that were used to burn the severe bleedings of the middle-aged man. The smell of burned and charred flesh filled the air but not even his expression changed as he continued to look at Regilav.

"You shouldn't have acted so foolishly. Why did you even try?" Dilan asked, not expecting an answer as he continued to speak, "You should have spoken to me in a calm and composed manner, knowing that you will die either way. At least you could have been spared some unnecessary pain."

Dilan couldn't really understand why Regilav acted so weird since they had encountered each other for the second time. Their first encounter had already been quite weird but it was still somewhat acceptable. However, the second meeting, right now, was even weirder than the first one.

The behavior of the middle-aged was out of the ordinary and Dilan felt as if it was related to the Drakins but he was not really sure if they had such a big influence on the people on Milarn.

It was a bit odd but Dilan tried not to think too much about it.

"Tell me about the Mantras, or I will torture you slowly until you have no option but to tell me everything!" Dilan warned in a clear voice before he added calmly,

"There is no way you can escape me!"

Regilav was already twitching uncontrollably and trying his utmost to escape Dilan's grasp. However, that was far from easy because his arms and legs had already been cut off.

"You bastard!!" Regilav shouted, just to stiffen and shut up when Dilan released a few thunderbolts. They didn't pierce holes in Regilav but electrocuted him which was what Dilan had wanted to happen, either way.

Looking down at Regilav, Dilan was satisfied with himself. The man, who had been at fault for the death of thousands of people in Shiron, was lying in front of him helplessly. He was on the verge of death, and was barely hanging onto his life only because Dilan had not chosen to kill him yet.

"Let's start over again. Tell me about the Mantras and I will kill you after, or speak rubbish and get a little bit more tortured. I don't really care what choice you'll make!"

Chapter 436 Easy Death?

"Are the Orb of Mantras and the Soul Collector the only objects you got from the Drakins?" Dilan asked in doubt while looking down at the middle-aged man, whose body looked even worse than before.

Not only were his arms and legs missing, but he was currently also riddled with hundreds of cuts and the majority of his skin was charred.

Dilan hadn't shown any mercy to Regilav Gaul after threatening him that he would torture the leader of the large settlement. Regilav didn't tell Dilan what he wanted to know so Dilan was left with no other option than to extract the information from him through force. That was why Dilan felt no remorse for torturing the middle-aged man as it was merely the result of his own actions.

If Regilav had told Dilan everything he wanted to know the situation wouldn't have gotten that bad, but that was the decision the leader made even if he was not in a completely sane state anymore.

Dilan knew that Regilav was far from sane but that was not something he could be bothered about. He felt no pity or remorse while looking at the disgustingly deformed figure of the once perfectly normal human.

"Y-yes…" Regilav could barely say and Dilan nodded his head before his eyes moved over to the tiny black heart, which was the Soul Collector. He frowned a little bit and several thoughts flashed through his mind.

'Now what am I going to do with you? Should I just break you, or can I use you somehow?' Dilan wondered as another thought flashed through his mind.

'If the Orb of Mantras is what I think it is, I'll have to find the woman who wielded it first,' He realized quite quickly.

With his gaze that was trained on Regilav Gaul and his thoughts roaming around, Dilan was in a tricky situation. He actually didn't feel like ending Regilav's life just like that. The torture of the leader of the settlement might have just begun and Dilan was not yet satisfied.

However, it was not as if he could get everything he wished for without putting in the effort to achieve his goals. Regilav's arms and legs had been cut off, his skin was scorched and charred all over and he was riddled with countless cuts that didn't stop bleeding easily.

Even if Dilan wanted to heal Regilav and start torturing him from the start, it was not as if a body in such bad condition could heal easily, let alone regenerate cut-off limbs.

"In that case…I should just end it!" Dilan mumbled to himself and came to a conclusion. He unsheathed the Cursed Dagger, and stepped forward while staring coldly at the remains of a human being in front of him before he flicked the dagger in his hand to thrust it downward with a shocking velocity.

Dilan's movement was smooth and he thrust it straight through Regilav's head, piercing his skull and brain with great power.

Regilav Gaul died in an instant, his body twitched thrice in response to the thrust and the sudden shock before it stiffened. The middle-aged man stopped moving and Dilan turned around after collecting the man's Essence crystal.

"If you guys take the Soul of my people, I will take all your Essence crystals!" Dilan announced before he wanted to disappear from Regilav's place. He had no idea where Regilav's wife and daughter were currently located but that was of no concern to him.

However, just when he was about to jump out of the building and start looking for the Orb of Mantras, Dilan realized something else he had forgotten while looking at the tiny nuisance called Regilav Gaul; the fact that Regilav had been the master of a bunch of Slaves.

Dilan had yet to meet any of the other slaves excluding the Dark Elf but he knew that there were quite a few Slaves in place. They were fighting the Nightmares with their great combat prowess, which was more than enough to defeat most Nightmares without too many difficulties.

Nightmares wouldn't be much stronger than the host they belong to. That being said, most Slaves that came from the Drakins were stronger than the Elite forces of Ascenders in the large settlement.

Nonetheless, it was not as if the Slaves were willing to put in more effort to defeat the Nightmares than what they were forced to do due to the existing clauses of the Slave Mark that had been engraved on them.

They had never been in such a situation before and had no specific orders to act upon when faced with such a scenario. This made them wonder if it may not be for the best to die today rather than suffer as Slaves for the years that would follow. With the death of their master, everything would end, and it was obvious that Regilav was currently being attacked, but nobody even considered going out to help him on their own accord.

Some Slaves were being pulled toward the direction of their new master but none of them had been given a specific list of commands on what to do in all kinds of situations.

Regilav Gaul had been new to the rules of Slave Marks and he had yet to do many things that were considered common knowledge for those, who had decades of experience which the people of Milarn could hardly get their hands on.

The Primordial Ascension had occurred only three months ago and it was only obvious that they had missed crucial pieces of information. Dilan was fine with that because he could always learn in the process, but others were bound to run into bigger problems as their strength was not comparable to his!

Thus, Regilav Gaul died while fighting all by himself and his Slaves merely noticed that the self-destruction mechanism had been activated. Some Slaves were filled with regret because they'd wished to live a better life, not as slaves but as themselves, while others were relieved that they could finally die and be free of this mayhem.

Mixed emotions coursed through the minds of all the Slaves but all of them seemed to accept the situation that was occurring right in front of them.

That was also why it was even more shocking when the Slaves realized that the self-destruction mechanism had been terminated somehow. A new Master had been linked to the Slaves, shocking them quite a bit.

Some Slaves felt uncontrollable frustration about this situation. It looked like they were finally able to regain freedom, even if this freedom came with the downside of their death, just to end up with a new master.

However, their new master was just as astonished and confused as the Slaves themselves.

"System…why did you give me the command over them!? You know…I don't really like slavery, right??" He cursed after he had gotten a bunch of system notifications that announced him as the new master of the Slaves. The management function for slaves had been unlocked for Dilan and he got to know lots of things that were quite important about slaves.

Thus, he called all of them together using some sort of function that required a tremendous amount of willpower and mana to be used; Slave Telepathy!

Regilav Gaul was not in possession of enough mana, let alone willpower to use this function but it hadn't been a problem for Dilan. Less than 15 minutes passed before a bunch of Dark Elves and a bunch of Slaves of other races finally appeared all around Dilan, who had jumped off the building.

'There are more than expected!' Dilan thought and a faint smile appeared on his face as an idea flashed through his mind.

'How about we do this?'