Ning Busan told the truth, “I don't know either.”
At the very end of Louis's memory, he had seen the God of Light.
Then, the memory had abruptly cut off there.
Had Louis struck some deal with the God of Light? Or had the God of Light taken Louis away by force?
None of this was known yet.
Ning Busan said, “By then, the xenos had already been driven out of the Landia Continent, and the Dawn Empire was growing stronger by the day.”
“Even if I really had to leave, I definitely would have told you. I wouldn't have just vanished without saying goodbye.”
The ghostly green flames in Leo's eye sockets flickered, as if he were contemplating something.
Ning Busan tapped Leo's ribs with the flat of his sword. “I'm more interested in knowing how you ended up like this.”
“Do you think I would have turned into this goddamn skeleton if I wasn't looking for you?”
Leo gave a sinister grin. The finger bones pressed against Ning Busan's Adam's apple clawed upward, leaving three deep bloody scratches on his chin.
Ning Busan hissed in pain. “What on earth happened?”
Leo said in a raspy voice, “You suddenly vanished without leaving a single word. I had a premonition that you were in danger, so I divined your location.”
“To my surprise, the divination showed that you were already dead, and your last known location was in the Undead Realm.”
“So you went to the Undead Realm?” Ning Busan sighed. “Didn't you love divining fortunes before going anywhere? Couldn't you tell that this trip would be a near-death experience?”
“So what? Alive, I wanted to see you; dead, I wanted to see your corpse,” Leo said. “Even if you were truly dead, I should have uncovered the truth and brought your bones back to bury you.”
Ning Busan asked, “What happened next?”
Leo said, “I found a way to enter the Undead Realm, but I didn't expect it to be so full of death energy. I was tainted by a curse and slowly mutated into an undead myself.”
“Oddly enough, following the guidance of my divination, I didn't find you. Instead, I accidentally trespassed into the Undead Clan's forbidden ground.”
“In the forbidden ground, I stole something from the Undead Clan, and they chased me down relentlessly.”
Ning Busan asked, “What did you steal?”
“A soul core. Or perhaps it should be called... a heart.”
Leo raised his pale hand bones. He lightly traced his chest with his fingertips, and his ribs parted slightly, revealing the empty darkness within.
He pulled out a heart from inside.
It was not made of flesh and blood, but was instead condensed from ghostly green flames, beating slowly.
Ning Busan found it strangely familiar for some reason. He couldn't help but ask, “Whose heart is that?”
Leo said, “This is the heart of the First Undead King.”
Ning Busan was speechless.
No wonder it looked familiar. It was his own heart!
Ning Busan asked, “Why... why did you steal his heart?”
Leo said, “The undead are born with soul cores; it's the source of their lives. But I only became an undead because of a curse. In essence, I'm still a human.”
“I was about to die at the time, and an ownerless soul core was right in front of me. Tell me, should I have just waited for death, or taken it for myself?”
Ning Busan immediately got a headache.
He had a card of the First Undead King, but the soul core was here with Leo?
What was going on?
Leo continued, “After I stole the First Undead King's soul core, the entire Undead Realm mobilized just to capture me.”
“They can sense where the soul core is, and I couldn't fight them all alone. So, I could only seal myself away in a deep sleep. That way, the aura of the soul core wouldn't leak out.”
Ning Busan asked, “Did you wake up once in the middle of it?”
“Yeah. After sleeping for thousands of years, the useless guards of the royal palace actually let a grave robber sneak in,” Leo said. “That grave robber almost let me out. Fortunately, I reacted quickly enough to stop him.”
Ning Busan felt like something was slightly off about those words.
Leo said, “However, the aura of the soul core still leaked out, attracting the undead army. Later, they couldn't find the soul core in the empire, and since the empire was no pushover, the matter was eventually dropped.”
“Except this time...” Leo gave the unconscious King a look of disgust and kicked him. “There are only four Grand Swordsmen in the entire empire, and three of them don't even listen to orders! Is the Dawn Empire going to collapse?”
Ning Busan chuckled twice, his tone dripping with sarcasm.
Leo snapped, “What are you laughing at? Are you happy about this?”
Ning Busan's smile instantly vanished.
If he handed over the soul core, Leo would die.
If he didn't hand it over, the skeleton army would invade the empire and go on a slaughter.
Thinking about it this way, it was indeed quite a tricky situation.
Ning Busan asked, “What's so special about this soul core? Why is the Undead Realm willing to retrieve it at all costs?”
Leo said, “I suspect the First Undead King has fallen, but his will can still influence the entire Undead Realm through the soul core.”
Ning Busan looked thoughtful. “For example?”
The soul core in Leo's hand glowed, and a massive screen of light materialized before them, displaying a miniature view of the Undead Realm that could be zoomed in at will.
On the light screen, countless awakened undead were gathering toward the Blood Red Wasteland. Skeleton warriors lined up in neat, menacing ranks. Death knights rode skeletal warhorses, radiating intense killing intent.
Leo said, “This soul core can only preserve my life. I'm not its master, so I can't unleash its true power at all. I can only use it as a map.”
Ning Busan smiled.
Leo didn't know how to use it, but Ning Busan was all too familiar with it.
It was originally a mini-map; pressing any spot would teleport him there, and it could even define boundaries for precise voice transmission.
Ning Busan placed his hand over the soul core and commanded in a cold voice, “Get back—”
The Undead Realm, the Blood Red Wasteland.
This wasteland had been silent for far too long.
Ever since the First Undead King departed, the skeleton army had fallen silent, never to wage war again.
But a thief had stolen the only thing the King had left behind, hiding for ten thousand years.
Unforgivable!
This time, no matter what, they had to find that thief and retrieve their King's soul core.
Just as they finished gathering and prepared to march toward the human world, a suffocating pressure descended from the sky.
All the undead creatures halted in their tracks, their bones trembling uncontrollably.
“Get back—”
That voice shook the entire wasteland!
That voice exploded within the soul core of every single undead!
That voice was so familiar that they couldn't help but rejoice!
The Undead King's command was like iron law, not to be disobeyed.
The entire undead army prostrated themselves on the ground. Adhering to their King's command, they obediently buried themselves back into the soil.
The Blood Red Wasteland returned to dead silence once more.
Seeing the scene on the light screen, Leo stared intently at the person beside him. “Louis, care to explain?”
Ning Busan looked utterly innocent. “I have no idea.”
No sooner had the words left his mouth than three more scratches appeared on his face.
Ning Busan said in exasperation, “Leo! Have you no shame? How can you claw people with your fingernails in a fight?”
“Are you stupid? How could an undead have fingernails?” Leo bunched his five finger bones together, making a tooth-gritting grinding sound. “These are finger bones! Do you know what finger bones are?”
Rate on N.U.
