Supreme Magus novel Chapter 1257

Chapter 1257 - Heroes and Masterminds (Part 1)

Lith took a deep breath, looking Phloria straight in the eyes as his inner turmoil tore him apart. He wanted to tell her everything, yet he couldn’t. Lith didn’t have the strength to handle the rejection in the case Phloria pushed him away after learning about his Abomination origin.

If she accepted him anyway, just like she had done four years back at the academy and two years later at Jirni’s birthday party, it would have been more than he could take. Dealing with Kamila and Solus was already hard, adding Phloria to the mix would have been just cruel.

Even worse, it would mean putting her before his girlfriend and prove that Phloria had been right when she had accused him to use her as a guinea pig. To observe her reaction to his ugliest secrets and use the collected data to decide whether or not to share them with Kamila as well.

That Phloria had been right when she had accused him to keep her as a replacement in the case his current relationship ended.

"I’d really like some company." Lith sent War to the Mirror Hall. The blade needed to remain outside the pocket dimension to recover its strength, but he couldn’t endanger Phloria’s life by keeping it around.

She sat beside him, pulling Lith into an embrace he offered no resistance to until his cheek rested on her shoulder. Phloria could feel that something about him had changed. His body, his aura, even the spark in Lith’s eyes was different.

Yet she just kept him tight until his heart calmed down.

"You know that you can tell me everything, right?" Phloria said.

"I know." Lith said, grateful for the long silence that followed. Her blind trust and acceptance were the first yet also the last thing he needed in that moment, causing him a bittersweet emotion.

***

The skies of Jiera, right after Lith’s tribulation had ended.

Now that Mogar had released the consciousness of the Guardians from their grip, Tyris found her mouth full of Leviathan’s neck. Fenagar had just come to his senses as well and didn’t dare to move a muscle.

Even though all of his injuries had perfectly healed, in such a precarious position all it took Tyris to rip his neck off was but a twist of her beak. The construct trapping him was still there and the pause had even allowed her to recharge her Life Maelstrom.

"You disgust me." Tyris let the Leviathan go, staring at him with spite.

"Even that jackass of Roghar is better than you. How could you stand the destruction of not one, but two civilizations and not lift a finger?"

Fenagar would have liked to reply that he didn’t care one bit of a bunch of flies that would die before he had the time to blink one of his serpentine eyes and that his love for research wasn’t limited to his own.

Kolga had taught him a great deal about how to create unliving beings and even about how to handle Decay magic. Kogaluga, instead, had taught him how to dispose of the Chaos magic in a productive way.

The Father of all Leviathans had long been interested in the secrets of life and death and the two lost cities had allowed him to study both at the same time. Yet his interest didn’t go so far that he was willing to experience firsthand what happened to a Guardian after their death so he remained silent.

"There has been too much death today to add one more corpse. Moreover, if Jiera lost one of his Guardians, the Master would surely claim your land as his own and become an even bigger threat than he already is.

’The good news is that this batch of undead will be the last. The bad news is that if I don’t clear it myself, the next time the Ranger in charge of the Kellar region comes here, he will think that Kogaluga’s cleansing is his doing.

’He would claim the glory that belongs to others and there would be no way to deny it without explaining things that are best left forgotten.’ She thought while looking at the rift in the sky that shrunk as the darkness fueling it ran dry.

’This way, I can give the credit for the cleansing to Lith and mess with Deirus’s plans without directly interfering in the Kingdom’s matters.’

’Thanks for your help today.’ War had no concept of gratitude and ignored those words. The blade had a purpose and it was happy to follow it to the bitter end of others.