The acrid stench of death clung to the air, a suffocating blanket woven from the threads of burnt wood and decaying flesh.
with his memory fragment now pieced together, he could make a coherent meaning of all the fragment now and from it he found out the body of the young man he now possess is kael Asher
A fourteen-year-old kid, living a simple life in this small village of Oakhaven. His parents were farmers and he got a kid sister whose corpse also lay somewhere in this rubble
the brutal bandit raid haven't just left the village in ruins, it has ended the lives of countless people. it kind of reminds him of what he did earlier on before he was reborn.
"karma sure is a bitch" he mutter to himself shaking his head helplessly, he had killed an entire village to facilitate his rebirth and now he was reborn in a village every one was murdered.
Kael wandered the ravaged streets, his only companion the ghost of his dead family memory from both life time. he wasn't scared how to survive as that has been one of his forte
He had scavenged for food, slept under the stars, and learned to survive in the harsh realities of a world that offered him nothing but sorrow.
speaking of which, this level of massacre couldn't just be the aimless doing of bandit wanting to exploit weak people. from his level of experience, it seems there is more to this facade covered by the doing of bandit.
his mind racing as to what the end means of this massacre is, he could already deduce this has something to do with sacrificial magic.
but how come, sacrificial magic is one of the few forbidden magic frown on by the society of mage and warriors alike, it's even considered a taboo
is it that things have changed after his death and rebirth fourteen years later, though sacrificial magic exists and is practice during his time, it wasn't up to this extent of dark practice.
he could still recall how the society of mage and warriors came at him back then when he conducted the sacrificial ritual for power, he barely made it through by chance due to his discreet employment
giving him apple of time to get everything almost done before the calvery arrived but here lot of people had been killed and not a single mage or warrior had showed up.
Amidst his thoughts and the carnage, a flicker of movement caught his eye. Half-buried beneath a grotesque pile of corpses lay a young woman, her face pale and drawn, a crimson stain blooming across her torn dress.
Her breath, shallow and ragged, hitched in her chest, each gasp a desperate plea against the encroaching darkness. Her eyes, though glazed with pain, held a spark of defiance, a stubborn refusal to surrender.
Kael slowly walked over and stood beside her, stirring at her struggle to survive even against the inevitable odd stacked up against her
his emotionless eyes stirs deep into her eyes, looking deep into her soul as she stir back at him with a teary eyes pleading for any sort of help
A strange familiarity tugged at him, a resonance that echoed the echoes of his past life, a shared understanding of profound loss and unimaginable cruelty.
He knelt beside her, his fingers brushing against her cold skin, feeling the faint, erratic rhythm of her pulse. She was at death's door, bleeding slowly, but not yet gone.
the look on her face is no different from that his mother and Elena had when he watched them died before his very eyes, this same feeling of helplessness slow creeps on him that he felt too unease
A cold resolve hardened his gaze. He would not let her die. He would not let another innocent soul be consumed by the darkness.
"I don't know you much but this body seems to have a of emotion for you and I also can't stand and watch you die" his tone as cold as ice as he spoke to the young lady
but her state didn't give her that opportunity to reply, her eyes said everything she would ever want to convey and Kael understood it clearly.
"I'm not strong enough to help you properly but that doesn't mean I can't help you, it all depends if you are willing to accept the little help I can offer you right now
i must warn you though, it might end up a curse rather than a blessing, a condemned for the rest of your life if things turn out worse
but I can assure you would live and probably have the chance to exert your revenge on those who reck this havoc on you and your people"
the young lady stopped to think about the offer for a long time, disregarding the call of death behind her. she was hesitant to take such a deal, first she is a mundane human with no affinity for magic or cultivation
so how can she exert revenge even if she survived and ends up condemned for all time being
secondly, the coldness, distant emotions of this person before her is completely different from that of the young man she knew. that frail boy she had taken as her own kid brother
one who couldn't lift a finger to hurt a fly but now have such a intense amount of hatred and rage that could consume the world in whole
is it because of the experience he went through, her eyes landed on his slit throat that has for some reason healed up leaving just the trail of blood behind.
her eyes widen in an instant when she noticed this, her lips moves as if to say something but the words weren't forth coming. she could only resort to struggling using her bloody hand to write her question on the floor.
kael read It and frown as there is only a single word written but he is ever too familiar with what that word means and the weight it bears.
"demon" Kael mutter in thought, this name is not new to him even if he wasn't a mage or a cultivator. he spent a quantitative amount of his previous life researching this people
it was said long time ago the world was united as one, the realm of the supernatural and that of the natural. demons once work this world along other mystical supernatural beings
but all that was ancient history as that world has long being lost with both world forever being separated, thanks to the powerful mage council of ancient time that came together to seal away every supernatural beings from this world into a separate purgatory like world
forever creating a rift that can't be breach by both side, yes there can establish connection and link to the supernatural world but never can there be any crossing over
but from her expression, it seems what he knew isn't entirely true anymore. but how? if demons can cross over to this world now, what else is new he knew nothing about.
"I'm not a demon that I can assure you but I'm curious to know, are there demons walking amongst us now?"
the lady looked at him confused on how to answer, she painful nod her head as every actions of her now left her in immerse pain and her consciousness is slowly fading away too with the lost of blood.
kael notice this too, deciding to leave the question for later he made it his obligation to save her first. here lies his other problem.
according to the knowledge he enquired from that ancient tatom, His rebirth itself acted as the first step, cleansing his soul and making it receptive to the latent power.
The true awakening, however, required a spark. This came in the form of specific Trigger, maybe surge of magical energy from an ancient artifact or moment of overwhelming grief for a lost loved one.
This trigger resonated with the sleeping bloodline, igniting its potential. but right now he doesn't have anything with immerse amount of power he could use to ignite his bloodline
leaving him with the second option which he happens to have aboudant of it right now, and it has double due to the merge souls.
technically he could use that one but he had to prepare himself as the trigger is the least of his problem, awakening the bloodline and using it has a huge constraints tied to it.
Each use drained his physical and mental reserves, leaving him exhausted and vulnerable. leaving him susceptible to emotional extremes, his joy and sorrow amplified tenfold.
not to mention the possibility of running mad or dying by out of exhaustion and overload, he had to prepare his mind and mental fortitude
hopefully the body is able to bear the constraint of using the ability for the first time, considering the state his body is right now just resurrecting from death
he highly doubt it could take much before it crumbles, so he had to be quick and swift, leaving the rest path to fate and her luck
He closed his eyes, drawing on the forbidden power that coursed through his veins. The rage, the sorrow, the pain, the grief, the regrets, everything negative feeling he had inside himself.