Chapter 96: Walking Death (Fixed)

A few minutes earlier, Seraphina had just returned from dropping Ruby off at school.

​The house was quiet and peaceful. Exactly the way she liked it.

​She slipped off her shoes before making her way into the kitchen. It had only been a day since Cassian entered the Lord’s Domain, yet the house already felt far emptier than usual.

​A faint, tender smile appeared on her face.

​It was ridiculous, really, the boy had spent nights away before, yet somehow this felt fundamentally different.

Perhaps because this was his first true step into a world vastly larger than the Astral Dominion.

​Her smile softened further. "It still doesn’t feel real..."

​A Lord. Her son had awakened as a Lord.

​Even now, she found it surprising, especially considering her own origins.

​The thought surfaced briefly before she pushed it away. There was no point in dwelling on ancient history; the past was the past.

​A sharp ding interrupted her quiet introspection.

​The microwave finished its cycle. Seraphina walked over and opened it, retrieving a bowl of reheated seafood rice she had prepared earlier.

​Steam drifted upward, carrying a rich aroma. She picked up a spoon—

​And froze.

​Crash!

​Porcelain shattered across the kitchen floor, as the bowl slipped off her hand, scattering rice and broth. Seraphina didn’t even notice the mess.

​Every single instinct in her body screamed in alarm.

​A force was descending upon the world. An overwhelming, ancient, malicious, and monstrous force.

​Death, pure, unadulterated death.

​The energy was so completely unrestrained that if allowed to spread freely, it would engulf the entire planet within mere moments.

​The temperature inside the house plummeted into absolute zero. Shadows stretched unnaturally across the walls, and the air itself seemed to mourn.

​Seraphina’s eyes narrowed to sharp slits.

​Without hesitation—

​Snap!

​She snapped her fingers. An invisible, divine barrier instantly expanded outward, enveloping the entire house in a split second.

​The spreading death energy crashed violently against the translucent wall and ground to a sudden halt.

​Only then did Seraphina’s expression darken into pure annoyance.

​The source was blatantly obvious: Cassian’s room.

​The corner of her eye twitched. "Seriously?"

​Another violent pulse erupted from the second floor, causing her barrier to tremble slightly.

​Her eyebrow twitched again. "Which idiot arrives at someone else’s house without even attempting to restrain their mana?"

​Her voice dripped with cold irritation.

​In the next moment, she vanished.

​Space folded in on itself, leaving the kitchen completely empty.

​Seraphina reappeared instantly inside Cassian’s room, her sharp gaze locking onto the intruder.

​An old man with graying hair, a deeply wrinkled face, and simple clothes was seated casually upon her son’s bed.

He looked utterly ordinary, yet Seraphina knew better, anyone capable of leaking such horrifying death energy was anything but harmless.

​However, as her perception swept over him, her eyes narrowed.

​Something was wrong. The oppressive death energy wasn’t actually coming from him.

​The realization stunned her. ’It couldn’t be...’

​The old man seemed to notice her intense scrutiny and offered a faint, enigmatic smile.

​Before either of them could utter a word—

​Space rippled violently.

​A familiar presence materialized in the center of the room: Cassian.

​The moment he emerged from the cosmic pathway, the death energy erupted once more, far stronger and more suffocating than before.

​The room groaned under the immense weight, and reality itself strained at the seams.

​The old man’s eyes widened slightly as a spark of intense interest flashed through them. Then, without warning, his spiritual sense surged forward.

He intended to pry into Cassian, driven to uncover what could possibly produce such absurd, primordial death energy.

​Unfortunately for him, Seraphina moved first.

​Boom!

​The old man’s intrusive spiritual sense slammed headfirst into an impenetrable wall.

​A wall named Seraphina.

​The violent collision sent a localized shockwave tearing through the room. The entire house trembled violently beneath the clash of absolute titans, yet it did not collapse, two opposing, godlike forces held local reality together even as they threatened to tear it apart.

​The old man finally looked at Seraphina properly, the amusement vanishing completely from his eyes for the very first time.

​Seraphina stared back, her expression icy and unyielding, a protective mother standing between an unknown monster and her child.

​The atmosphere instantly became suffocatingly tense.

​Neither backed down. Neither yielded.

....

As the pressure within the room continued to rise, Seraphina finally turned away from the old man and looked at her son.

​Her expression remained calm, far too calm for the terrifying situation unfolding around them.

​"Honey."

​Cassian blinked. "Yes?"

​"Can you please restrain your mana?"

​"..."

​Cassian froze, the request sounding so completely ordinary that it nearly broke his brain.

​At this very moment, his supposedly mundane mother was locked in a fierce spiritual confrontation against an unknown powerhouse capable of shaking reality itself. And somehow... she was winning.

​Nothing about the situation made any sense.

​Questions exploded through his mind in rapid succession. ’Is Mom a Lord? No, that can’t be right... If she is, how did I never notice? Did she hide it? Why would she hide it? Who the hell is this old man? Why isn’t anyone dead? Why is my room still standing? Why—’

​His thoughts spiraled endlessly, but despite the chaotic confusion, years of ingrained domestic instinct prevailed. When his mother told him to do something, he listened, almost automatically.

​Cassian focused inward.

​The death mana circulating wildly throughout his body slowed. The immense pressure leaking from his form rapidly receded, like a raging ocean being violently forced back within its shores.

​The moment he restrained his energy, the physical strain upon the house lessened dramatically. The walls stopped groaning, the floor ceased cracking, and the oppressive atmosphere weakened.

​Only the invisible spiritual contest between Seraphina and the old man remained.

​Cassian stared blankly at his hands, then at his mother, then at the old man, and finally back at his hands.

​"...Was that from me?"

​His voice sounded genuinely shocked, but the realization struck him immediately afterward.

​A Death Zone. He had just returned from an actual Death Zone, and not an ordinary one, but a territory saturated with extraordinarily dense Death Elements.

A place most Lords avoided like the plague, where simply stepping into the atmosphere could kill weaker cultivators.

​Yet Cassian had never felt anything unusual. He had adapted far too quickly, his body, his soul, and his mana had all acclimated to the lethal environment of the Graveshade Expanse.

​What felt completely normal to him was an absolute nightmare for everyone else.

​Simply put, the moment Cassian descended into his bedroom, it was as though a fragment of a primordial underworld had suddenly materialized in the middle of a mortal realm.

The Death Element surrounding him had instinctively attempted to reshape the environment into something more suitable for its existence.

​And this old man...

​Cassian’s gaze shifted toward the stranger as the final piece of the puzzle clicked into place.

​The old man wasn’t here because of Seraphina, nor was he here because of the house. He was here because something resembling a walking Death Zone had suddenly appeared on the planet.

....

Seraphina turned away from Cassian and faced the old man once more.

​Despite the absurd situation, her expression remained thoroughly composed. Almost polite.

​Almost.

​"Who are you?" Her tone was deceptively calm, yet the invisible pressure behind those words made the man feel as though he were standing before a primordial beast disguised in human flesh. "And what, exactly, are you doing in my home?"

​The old man fell silent. His gaze shifted briefly toward Cassian before returning to Seraphina.

​Today had been one shock after another.

​Only a few minutes ago, he had been peacefully meditating within his personal sanctuary when he sensed something horrifying, an eruption of death mana.

It wasn’t the ordinary kind, nor was it the energy generated by standard Death-affinity cultivators.

​This had been pure, ancient, and dense beyond all reason.

....

A/N: Apologies for the mix-up! The Chapter order has been fixed. Some text got trimmed during the fix, but everything should be in place now. Sorry for the inconvenience