Cleaver Of Sin

Chapter 505: Entropy

Asher collapsed with his back against the bed as he returned to his room after a long day, his body sinking into the mattress as though gravity itself had suddenly doubled, three days had passed and he had used that time to attend every class he possibly could, after all, all classes couldn’t be held on the same day and the Academy’s schedule scattered them deliberately.

It was already late in the afternoon, and the sun was starting to dip below the horizon, staining the sky in warm shades of orange and crimson as everyone was now left to their own personal devices and individual routines.

Those who wanted to train would naturally go train, those who still carried ambition burning within their chests pushing themselves beyond their limits, while those who had mistakenly gotten comfortable with the seemingly easy life of the Star Academy would simply return to their rooms to sleep, eat, gossip, or sleep with one another, indulging in temporary pleasures and false security as though the outside world did not exist.

’I guess I will be taking my missions tomorrow,’ Asher thought to himself. There was no need to delay his missions any longer, and he had no real resting to do since he had practically been doing nothing productive for the past three days... well, aside from attending class after class after class, where the only one he actually learned anything useful from was the assassination class, trap detection lessons, stealth principles, and the countless subtle techniques related to killing efficiently and surviving silently.

With a lazy groan, Asher rose from his bed and stretched his stiff shoulders before walking toward the balcony, the faint ache in his muscles still lingering like a dull reminder of Instructor Jude’s brutality.

There he sat down quietly as he took out a jug of juice he had bought at one of the Star Academy shops using his points, the cool surface of the container damp with condensation against his fingers. He simply stared into the drifting clouds like a jobless old man whose children were taking care of him, someone with nothing urgent left to do but watch the sky slowly change colors.

’From tomorrow, the bloodshed resumes,’ Asher thought to himself as he stared at the disappearing sun, his expression calm yet distant. From tomorrow, he would begin to fight for his life again, he would kill again, and whatever kind of opponents awaited him this time, he didn’t know, and truthfully, he didn’t care enough to speculate.

Enemies were enemies, nothing more and nothing less.

’I wonder what kind of missions Big Brother Malrik took during his time in the Star Academy, and maybe what type of missions he goes on now,’ Asher thought to himself as he leaned back slightly, because he knew Malrik was another absurdly overpowered character within Crymora, someone whose growth had always been described as monstrous and unnatural.

His eyes closed for a moment as he just sat there in silence, listening to the faint wind brushing against the balcony rails, waiting for the day to finally come to an end so that tomorrow would arrive faster and put an end to this monotonous, uneventful routine of his.

’I wonder how much Finch’s combat ability has changed or grown after he bound himself to that Emovira,’ Asher thought to himself. Although he hadn’t seen Finch or William recently, he had overheard some students discussing Finch casually, and apparently the fat idiot had flown from Rank one hundred straight to Rank sixty in a surprisingly short period of time.

Asher entertained the possibility of Finch somehow climbing into the top ten for a moment, picturing the absurd scenario in his mind, then laughed quietly to himself as he shook his head, not because it was impossible, but because of how brutally difficult it would actually be.

Although he could personally make the top ten look like light work during sparring sessions, they were far from pushovers, and each of them possessed something uniquely terrifying.

Asher’s mind shifted to another thought, imagining himself holding Rank one while William and Finch somehow occupied Rank two and Rank three, forming an absurd trio at the very top, but at the same time, he knew that was currently unrealistic, because Ryaen Silvershade alone was extremely strong, far too strong for someone like William or Finch to defeat without some ridiculous miracle.

’Wifey material,’ Asher mused to himself at the thought of Ryaen Silvershade, his lips curling upward faintly. He wouldn’t deny it, he was slowly getting more fond of her as the days passed, her personality, her strength, even her quiet stubbornness all strangely appealing to him. Whether those thoughts were blooming into something deeper was still unknown, but for now, he chose not to think too much about it.

Asher’s mind then shifted toward the strict rules of the Wargrave family. Even if he had someone he loved, he couldn’t marry them, nor could he bear a child with them, unless he became the Primarch. The restriction felt archaic and suffocating, like invisible chains wrapped around his future.

Asher didn’t think much of it though, because he wasn’t particularly interested in the Primarch position anyway, especially since he had ridiculously overpowered siblings already lined up for it far ahead of him.

’I wonder if I can bypass the rule by adopting,’ Asher’s mind immediately latched onto what seemed like a loophole, but at the same time, he felt the Wargraves wouldn’t care in the slightest because the adopted child wouldn’t carry the Wargrave bloodline, making the entire effort meaningless in their eyes.

His mind spun again, thoughts overlapping endlessly as he remembered what the Third Sun and Third Moon had once said to him; "Why become a Duke when you could be an Emperor."

Asher mused at the thought of it, Emperor Asher Wargrave didn’t sound so bad when spoken aloud in his mind, it even carried a strangely pleasant weight to it, but again, that was something ridiculously far ahead in the future, because right now he was merely a first-year student who had just finished his compulsory teamed mission and was about to embark on his first solo mission like any other ordinary Academy student.

’But on that note, I wonder what the other Empires are like,’ he thought to himself, because he knew there were three more Empires aside from the Zarethorn Empire, yet he knew almost nothing about them beyond vague rumors and scattered stories. Exploring them, or at least meeting someone from those Empires someday, had quietly made its way onto Asher’s mental bucket list.

’I wonder if I’m stronger than Thalric now,’ he thought to himself as he decided to stop thinking about the other Empires for now, although unknown to him, fate would soon bring those very people directly into his path.

Asher knew Thalric was strong, undeniably strong, because the man had once fought Doris, someone around the Firmstar Life Rank or so, and survived, which alone spoke volumes. Although Asher had grown much stronger recently, he didn’t let arrogance cloud his judgment, he remained humble... ish. He wouldn’t randomly challenge Thalric to a battle simply because he suspected he might now be stronger, as that would be childish and unnecessary.

’Decay, huh? I wonder what other things he could do with it. Can he decay Astra energy itself?’ he thought to himself, curiosity flickering through his mind, but then again another thought occurred to him, what if Thalric possessed a sub-affinity under his Decay affinity, something like Wither, after all, the Wargraves usually had sub-affinities like they were nothing special, as though the world simply handed them out freely.

’Or what if his affinity is even above Decay and Wither, something like Entropy,’ Asher thought to himself, and an affinity like Entropy sounded truly terrifying because it could theoretically collapse everything and all things, reducing matter, energy, and existence itself into meaningless disorder as though the universe had simply decided to erase something from reality.

The thought lingered in his mind as the last rays of sunlight disappeared completely, leaving the sky dark and silent, and Asher quietly took another sip of his juice while staring into the night, knowing that tomorrow, peace would end once again.