"This note is important, so I'm afraid I'll have to cut our reunion short." Minos said, making up his mind to visit the address immediately.
"But it's been so long master, please stay a little longer." Rubella begged.
"Don't worry, I'll be back soon, but this is critical." Minos said as he rubbed Rubella's head to soothe her.
After reassuring everyone that he'd return as soon as possible, Minos quickly exited the house, making his way to the address.
Minos practically ran the entire journey, making it a fast one. Before he knew it, he was standing in front of a small humble home, knocking on the door with slight anxiety.
It had already been a few months since Venix had arrived according to Beetus, so Minos was somewhat worried that he may have given up on waiting and just left.
Forutently Minos's fears didn't come to fruition, and the door soon swung upon, revealing a familiar face.
"Minos?" Venix asked with slight confusion, feeling the person he was looking at was both foreign and familiar.
"It's me, it's good to see you." Minos said, reaching his hand out.
Seeing Minos's hand, Venix couldn't help but smirk, grabbing it with a firm smack, the two shook before pulling in for a quick hug.
"What happened to you, you look completely different?" Venix couldn't help but ask as he stepped back and gave Minos an inspection from top to bottom.
"Just a growth spurt, you on the other hand, look the exact same." Minos said with a laugh.
Originally the two were around the same height, but now Minos was at least a head taller, causing Venix to feel slightly annoyed.
"You lucky bastard, where's my growth spurt?" Venix couldn't help but ask with slight envy.
"Don't worry, I'm sure it'll be your turn next." Minos said.
"I hope so, anyway let's stop talking about this before I get more annoyed. To be honest, when I came here, I never expected you'd actually have people ready for me." Venix replied.
"Haven't I always been reliable?" Minos asked with a smirk.
"You're right. So now that you're here, let's talk business, what are your plans for the future?"
"That's what I've been pondering the entire day, but I'm still not sure, how about you?" Minos asked.
"To be honest, part of the reason I came here is because I have something in mind, and I need your help." Venix said apprehensively.
"Oh, given your face, I take it this is no easy challenge?" Minos said.
"You're right, in fact if anything goes wrong, it could easily spell both of our deaths." Venix said honestly.
"Interesting, what is it?" Minos asked with no fear.
"My goal has always been to get revenge on the Thousand Split Sword Sect, and I'm sure you already know that."
"Right now my realm has reached the Twelfth Life Lock Layer, and despite trying to break through to the Inner Heaven Realm for months, the barrier hasn't budged even an inch."
"According to some books I've read it means I've reached a bottleneck, and I have two options. Either I can spend years slowly grinding away at it, or I can forcefully try to break it open with a life and death experience."
"Originally I was planning on choosing option one given its safety, but I received a piece of news that changed my mind."
"News?" Minos asked.
"That's right, every decade the Thousand Split Sword Sect will hold their Sword Son of the Thousand Sword competition, which you may have heard of."
"Isn't that the event where they choose the next young master of the sect?" Minos said.
"That's the one, and it's going to happen in a year."
"But how does that help us? The Sword Son of the Thousand Sword competition is an internal fight, I don't think there's any way we can sneak into it." Minos said.
"Who said that was the news? The real news is that the Seventh and Ninth Sons of the Swords are planning on taking a training trip outside of the sect, and I know where they are going." Venix said with a smirk.
"You plan on killing them?" Minos asked with confusion, still not sure where Venix was going with this plan.
"Of course not, killing them would serve no purpose, I just plan on borrowing their identities." Venix said as he pulled two special masks out of his spatial ring.
"These are Blood Masquerade Masks, as long as you soak them in someone's blood, they'll 'absorb' that person's appearance."
"Anyone who wears the mask will not only take on their appearance, but they'll also take on their physical characteristics, including height." Venix said as he looked up at Minos's large size.
"Besides that, I also have this." Venix said as he took out a small book with a slightly fearful look on his face.
"This is the Soul-Devouring Art, it's a forbidden move, and to be honest, I didn't plan on ever touching this book, but it's essential to the plan." Venix said.
"What's so forbidden about it?" Minos asked.
"Take a look for yourself." Venix said as he handed the book to Minos.
Minos took the book and browsed through it, however with each flip of the page, his face became more apprehensive.
The Soul-Devouring Art was exactly as the name sounded, a technique that allowed one to absorb another person's soul.
Absorbing someone's soul naturally comes with plenty of benefits, not only allowing one's own soul to strengthen according to the soul devoured, but you can also gain the devoured soul's memories.
For example, if one devours a Three-Moon Weapon Refiners soul, then they could instantly gain all the wisdom that refiner spent his entire life learning, essentially instantly jumping from a newbie to a Three-Moon Weapon Refiner in a single moment.
Of course memories are different from physical experience, and just devouring the memory won't allow you to gain all the years of muscle memory, which will still mean you'll have to train hard to master those skills.
Regardless of that slight weakness, the ability is still incredibly horrifying, but fortunately such a broken ability similarly comes with an incredibly dangerous side effect.
Compared to your own pure soul, outside souls are like ink into a glass of water, and are prone to corrupt and morph your own soul.
This means that the more souls you devour, the more likely you are to go insane and lose all sense of self.
Even before going insane, the influx of foreign memories will confuse most people, making it hard to tell which memories are yours and which aren't.
All those memories could slowly change your own personality, turning you into a completely different person, before eventually overwhelming you and turning you into a mad man.
Using this technique was practically a fast track to self destruction, so even given its powerful nature, most people would still avoid it.
But if one was only to use this technique once, the drawbacks wouldn't be too noticeable, hence Minos and Venix didn't actually have too much to worry about.
Minos could also understand why Venix said this was essential to his plan. Without memories to go with their appearance, it wouldn't take long for the two to be exposed.
"I can understand why you may not want to take the risk, all things considered, so the choice is yours." Venix said.
"I still need to know more. After we enter, then what?" Minos asked.
Seeing Minos wasn't frightened off directly, Venix couldn't help but feel slightly excited, once again reminded of Minos's true nature.
"Simple, we spend the year training, then we enter the competition. Given my strength, I'll be able to win easily, becoming the young sect master."
"The young sect master is naturally close to the patriarch, and using that closeness, I'll find the right opportunity to end things once and for all."
"So you plan on just improvising?" Minos said.
"Uhh, pretty much, but rest assured, I don't plan on doing anything stupid, I'll only strike given the perfect opportunity." Venix said, reassuring Minos.
"Besides, don't you need resources? As long as you become a Sword Son, you'll gain access to them, and I promise that if I get revenge, the sect's resources are yours, I don't want anything." Venix swore.
Minos would lie if he said the picture Venix painted for him wasn't an alluring one, he was also right that he needed resources, and the Thousand Split Sword Sect would be a great place to get them.
More importantly than all that however, was his actual sword skills. For the past year he hadn't really touched the sword, the Heaven-Sundering Sword had been collecting dust in his spatial ring.
He almost felt like he had let down the Nine Sword Divinity's expectation, making him feel like he needed to focus on his sword skills in the future.
While he still had the books he had gotten from the Nine Sword Divinities small collection, they weren't enough, and he needed more knowledge to create an unbreakable foundation.
Where would be a better place to receive an abundance of sword wisdom then the Thousand Split Sword Sect?