874. Vestiges of the Past

"Grandfather, why do people not explore the no man's land anymore?" he asked the wizened man, wearing round golden glasses and big binoculars. The old man leaned on his cane,  seemingly thinking of an answer.

"Only few people are born to be explorers with a natural fascination for the foreign. Most people like the comfort of staying at home, with little to worry," he spoke after a while in his warm, deep voice. Little Seth back then had a hard time understanding that sentiment.

"But isn't it boring always staying at home?" he asked innocently.

"Haha, maybe you would think so," he said and the memory slowly blurred.

Right, this was something Seth had repressed for a long time. It was one of his last conversations with his grandfather before he couldn't leave the hospital anymore. The old man had always loved traveling and his parents were just like that, too.

He changed in the hospital. Back then he was not old enough to understand why his grandfather lost more and more of his light every time they visited him in the hospital. It wasn't because of the wounds or the treatment, it was because the old man knew that his time of traveling was over...

Next, he stood in a room. It was the room in his dorm during college. A somewhat younger version was reading a message from his parents on his phone.

"Seth, you have to concentrate on your exams. If you do well, we can go to Beta together next time. You said you liked the beach there."

Emotions flooded him, this was the last message he had ever gotten from his parents. A deep sorrow he had thought buried filled his chest like a lump of lead. A few days after that message he got the message that his parents went missing during one of their short trips.

For weeks he had waited for news in vain. He dropped out of college and returned home and stayed there. It was only two years later that the body of his father was found by accident at the bottom of a cliff.

It seemed like their climbing gear had malfunctioned and his father fell, breaking his back. The body of his mother was never found, but she probably left to find help, only to find her own demise somewhere in the woods.

The young boy who didn't understand why people would rather stay at home, had become someone almost afraid to go outside. He had come to like the narrow streets, the smog-covered skies, the cityscape outside his window...

Things had changed since then. The circumstances forced him to change but in the end, he was still searching for a safe home, even trying to build one for himself and others,  wasn't he? There was even a tiny voice that made him leave his home for people he did not even know.

The world had always been dangerous. This was why it was important to be strong, so the world couldn't take things away. Wasn't he strong now? Why should he let others take his things away from him?

As his thoughts turned, the sorrow in his heart fueled another emotion. He was not caught up in his old scars, instead, they were the wood that fueled a burning wrath. The anger at the world he felt back then, anger at the fact that he had to relive this memory, anger at the people who were like the world, trying to take things away from him...and others. Yes, he was even angry for others.

It was that tiny voice that didn't let him stay in Ora, that would let him leave the prisoners behind in the stronghold, that whispered to him when he helped the refugees of Beta, which gave him the final push to help the people of Sigma, Delta, and even Y-City.

For Seth it was not the need to help people, he just wanted to go against the world that kept taking away their lives, their things, their precious people. He felt like throwing a ranch into the tragic plans of the world. Like a troll who did good out of spite, to bully villains and spit fate itself in the face.

Pale blue flames filled his vision, burning with the power of his anger and passion as a sneer formed on his lips.. he was going to show the scene what they had done. His vision cleared up and he saw the panic-stricken faces of the cultivators, running back and forth, screaming in hysteria.

"What is this fire!?" "He broke out of the Million Mind labyrinth?!" "I'm burning! I'm burning!" "Why can't I extinguish these flames!" "This was my favorite robe!" "get away from the fire! They even eat away at your cultivation base!"

Joining the chaos was suddenly the solemn play of a lyre and the sad voice of a broken heart.

"I bet you laughed when I dazed away slow~ I sure wasn't welcome around here at all..."

The flames around the battlefield slowly lowered in intensity, to the surprise of the cultivators around. Guardian Mo also looked on in shock, his whole body was burning but he was barely clinging to his life.

"I will wipe the shame off my face and slowly rise from my knees. I'll be back in the most unexpected way, and hell's coming with me~ He~ll's coming with me~"

The cultivators had no time to process what was happening as they squirmed in pain from the flames, unable to react when the pace of the music suddenly picked up, becoming quick and upbeat compared to the previously somber tone. A glinting rapier appeared in the blacksmith's hand.

"There's a cairn at the bottom of the funnel, where all the poor souls go when they die. And if you listen close, all  of you can be like them, a ghost~ Meaning, you're never gonna make it out alive!"

His eyes shone in a bright blue, his speed kept increasing as he sang and pranced, slashing the confused and fleeing cultivators like a lion in a herd of sheep. Harbinger of Winter Woes did not take their lives, not immediately. Wherever the bard passed, he left people frozen in despair.

"There is a palace at the bottom of that funnel.  They got a secret that they keep like a slave,

They got a black magic preacher, you'd do well to let him teach yer!"

Frozen bodies cracked accompanied by agonized screams. Bright, unholy light shone through these cracks. Like a flesh cocoon, the cultivator slashed by his sword broke apart. Emerging from their hulls, were demons of all variations, rising to the skies above the burning battlefield.

"You'll be heading down that funnel to the grave … And it is well, with my soul.

To line my pockets full of money that I steal from all of you.  And on your way down to hell, Oh please, let me tell! I'll have the devil pay twice as much to keep your soul!"

As he kept singing his song in glee, as the courtyard filled with death and fire, as demons rose to the skies. Seth was going to return, and hell was coming with him.

…

"What do you mean- " They had to flee" ?" the handsome man, sitting on the throne, asked the messenger that had suddenly arrived.

"I-It means the cultivators failed, Sir. The Tower Master of Minas Mar, he-" suddenly the man collapsed, dead. The haze of his soul was absorbed by the floor of the throne room, covered in red markings.

"You majesty, you have to calm down!"

"How am I supposed to calm down?! I'm about to rearrange the cosmos, and the one schlemiel who can louse it up is waltzing around in the woods!" he exclaimed incensed.

"Quicken the process, sacrifice more. Kill them all faster!" he added. As long as they finished their apotheosis, even the Tower Master would not be able to stop them!

"A-As you wish, your Majesty."