Grand Ancestral Bloodlines

Iam stood in silence. He had almost lost his life just now, and yet it felt like just another normal day… or rather, what a normal day had been before he lost himself in the Ruin Master organization.

He felt quite free. But looking at Ryu’s back, he couldn’t help but shake his head inwardly.

This world… its waters ran deep.

Had he lost to Ryu? Of course. And he would accept his loss wholeheartedly. But that didn’t mean that there were certain truths that couldn’t be ignored.

Not only had he failed to take that step, he was also suppressed by the Title Stele. And now, he was being burned alive by Karmic Flames. Even if Ryu did nothing at all, he would die.

Maybe he should have been mad that Ryu seemed to have forgotten that in his little soliloquy, but he wasn’t. Right now, despite the pain ravaging his body, he truly felt at peace.

And then Ryu looked back to him as though he had only just now remembered his existence.

“For a loser, you sure know how to smile.”

Iam blinked, his eyes flickering down as though he was trying to see if he really was smiling or not. However, the twitch of his lip alone seemed enough to prove the fact to him.

Eventually, he shook his head.

“I’m dead. Does it matter?”

“Says who? I know a useful Summon when I see one. People die when I want them to die. They live when I want them to live. The world is really that simple.”

“You are arrogant.”

“As I’ve always been.”

“It seems to have not gotten you killed yet.”

“Yet?” Ryu let go of Silent Quibus’ head and the latter slumped over, falling in a pool of his own vomit, snot, and tears. The beautiful thing about the body of such a powerful cultivator was that most of that would just keep being produced.

Ryu raised his head to the skies and laughed as he stood. If they believed him to be arrogant before, he would only be more so. He wouldn’t rest until this world knew what the Title Ryu Tatsuya truly meant.

Iam watched Ryu laugh calmly. Even now, he wasn’t angry. Maybe after a certain point, it wasn’t arrogance at all… just confidence… just a powerful understanding of self-worth and what he could accomplish.

Yet, maybe because of his own strong Dao Heart, Iam felt the same way he had before Ryu laughed.

The world was too big.

“Do you know who that Nameless Immortal God is?” Iam asked.

Ryu grinned. “Does it matter?”

“Only insofar as it makes you realize there are people in this world that you cannot beat.”

“There’ve always been people that I cannot beat. The difference has been the same every time. The only gap between me and them is time.”

“Even if that is technically true, when you face someone truly immortal, and doesn’t know the meaning of a bottleneck or an end to their potential, and they likewise have endless time on you… how could you ever catch up?”

It was a despairing thought.

In the history of Existence, just how many geniuses had been born? There were simply bound to be some of them that could stand toe to toe with Ryu. He couldn’t possibly be the one and only, right?

Well, no… at some point, a talent was truly so broken that it could never be matched. Ryu seemed to fit that criteria to its very ends. However, if time was infinite, and yet there were existences that had experienced significant portions of it, then how could Ryu ever match up to them even if he had all the time in the world?

If the gap was significant enough, then Ryu could spend trillions of years improving at the same pace and yet still feel like he wasn’t catching up at all.

However, a question that should have stumped Ryu only made him raise an eyebrow.

“Is that difficult? I don’t need to be stronger than them to beat them. Are you under the impression that I’m as strong as you are? Was I as strong as any one of the geniuses I just killed? My body had been burned through with Karmic Flames, my talents were suppressed, my body could hardly produce as much power as a Transcended Sky God.

“Did you think I was as powerful as that ant when I slapped him? He couldn’t dodge even if he wanted to. That’s because if I want something done, even someone arrogant enough to title themselves Almighty has to lower their head.”

Iam silently listened to Ryu, his expression changing only the slightest bit.

“And if they’re more powerful than even that?”

“More powerful than someone who titles themselves Almighty? Interesting, interesting.”

“Some people don’t care to be labeled at all.”

It was clear that Iam was referring to someone specific. The Nameless Immortal God. There were truly people that didn’t care to be Titled at all, no matter how much the Title Stele wanted it, no matter how much the world begged for it.

They existed outside the scope of reality and the bounds of the laws. They were the mountain peak beyond the mountain peak, standing so tall and loftily above that even infinite time might never be enough to catch up with them.

“Does it make a difference?” Ryu looked toward the Title Stele for the first time since his name was etched into it. “He doesn’t seem all that special at all.”

Iam felt his heart tremble as though he would be smited just for hearing those words. But the punishment he was expecting to come didn’t.

“And what if it did make a difference?”

Iam kept pressing, as though he was looking for something, something other than blind confidence, something to believe in truly for the first time in his life… another path.

“We’re in the land of hypotheticals now? Are you trying to interview me for why I should save your life?

“But this isn’t the sort of game you think it is. I don’t have the same limits as the people you know, so why you keep asking as though you’re looking for a specific answer is beyond me.”

Iam was about to be disappointed until Ryu spoke again.

“But the hypothetical is interesting enough. What would I do if I came across an opponent so talented that I didn’t have enough time to catch up to them?”

Ryu grinned.

“Obviously I would just go back in time.”