We talked about several topics throughout the night, but it was mostly Richard giving assurance to my doubts and telling me to get stronger. But, my eyes suddenly blackened around dawn, and my view changed.
The sky and the sun were both blood-red in color as if they were bleeding. In front of me, a duplicate of me was standing still on the sands of a vast desert. The other's hair and eyes were red, and the Divine Eye was glowing on my forehead while a crook and a flail rested in my hands.
There were many corpses scattered around us, but suddenly, they started crawling toward the other me. The view changed again when one of the corpses finally reached and touched my duplicate and I was back home.
The first thing I heard was Richard saying, "Breathe."
I realized then that I wasn't breathing and took some deep inhales and exhales. Once I calmed down, I didn't need anyone to tell me that what I saw was a vision.
"Tell me what you saw," Richard ordered. I recounted the events in the vision to him without leaving out any detail. After I finished talking, he remained silent for a long time before finally breaking his silence, "Are you sure this is everything?"
I nodded.
"The desert, coupled with the crook and flail, represent your presence in Ancient Egypt; how or why, that is unknown. The bleeding sky usually signifies a lot of death, and the corpses crawling toward you tell us that you kill them. As for the bloodied sun... I am not really sure.
"In any case, it's best to let things happen by themselves and not force events to happen."
"But I just saw them happen..." I muttered.
"Yes, but visions and prophecies are not exact futures. They can be better explained as a likely outcome. However, you should understand that it is not set in stone and many things can change, or the events prophesized can end up not happening in the first place."
I nodded slowly, then changed the topic, "Richard, I would like to make a clone."
I read about cloning before, but that was only in books, I have never seen it applied before. Richard raised an eyebrow and said, "And why would you want one?"
"I wish to spend some time with my family. I would hate to be separated from them for several years."
He shook his head and said, "It is dangerous, Orion."
"I know of the danger, but I would still like to make one," I replied. It wasn't just stubbornness on my part, I was indeed aware of the danger of making a clone. If any soul wisp escapes during the division of the soul, I will immediately die. While not exactly approving of it, Richard finally agreed.
I sat on the floor with my legs crossed while Richard taught me some hand signs and incantations and relayed some instructions on how the process is done. After he was done, I took a deep breath and started dividing my soul.
The pain was intense, causing me to scream so much that I could have awakened the entire city; that would have happened if Richard hadn't prevented sound from being transmitted from our area. The process of soul division wasn't short, and it took over an hour of excruciating pain until my sword-shaped soul was now two swords instead of one.
Suddenly, both souls started trembling, and I could tell that they were on the verge of collapsing and dispersing into nothingness. Before I could even start regretting the decision to make a clone, Richard placed his hand on the top of my head and made me drink something, and only then did both soul parts start to regain stability.
I opened my eyes and sighed in relief. I was almost on the brink of death. "This was foolish," I smiled wryly and admitted.
Richard, with a stern expression, commented, "Yes, I should not have allowed you to attempt this. You even cost me a drop of my Phoenix Tears."
Phoenix Tears were the most potent ways to heal someone, whether it was a physical or spiritual injury. And Richard, despite being a powerful phoenix, wasn't able to produce tears on a whim. Each Phoenix Tear needs a certain amount of time to be produced by the body, and this time can vary depending on the power level of the phoenix.
"Now that your souls have stabilized, the next step is to make the second body from a special mud. This body won't be as powerful as the dragon body that you have, but it will be acceptable and you can always improve its physical strength later on.
I nodded and he once again instructed me as I mixed a drop of my blood, a dragon scale from my body, ice, water, and wind elemental essence with the mud that Richard gave me. Little by little, the mud was molded into my shape, having my hair and eye color from before I became a dragon.
I extracted one of the sword-shaped soul parts and guided it to the motionless clone. He opened his eyes and nodded after the fusion was completed.
"Orion-," Richard started, but was interrupted by the both of us as we said at the same time, "Which one?"
His right eye twitched and replied with an annoyed tone, "The original one."
"What is it?" I said with a smile.
"Leave your clone here and come back to the Mansion with me."
I nodded and we teleported when he touched me, leaving my clone alone in the living room of my home. When we arrived at his office in the Mansion of Night, the troubled look on his face was too apparent for me not to notice it.
Nonetheless, I didn't ask him about it and let him initiate the conversation as he pleased. He started with a long sigh after being lost in thought for a while and finally said, "I will not lie to you, Orion... The vision you saw is greatly disturbing."
"What are your thoughts?"
"It clearly doesn't relate to the first part of your prophecy, which is to reassemble Pangu. We still don't understand what the second part really is or how to properly explain it, and now another vision has been added, I do not know how to deal with this."
Ice shall face the Prisoner's wrath... "Do you know who this Prisoner is?"
"I have some theories and guesses," he replied with a nod. Upon seeing me waiting for him to continue, he added, "I can't tell you. If the Prisoner is the person that I am thinking about, then you knowing his identity would put many things at stake, and I cannot risk it."
He had a point, of course. The mere thought of what I saw in the vision to be a possible future frightened me. So my hope was that my luck would be good and it was a mere vision and nothing more.
But... Was it?
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Updated on 13/3/2025
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