Grand Ancestral Bloodlines

Chapter 2232  A Real One

Ryu's aura bloomed, his cultivation skyrocketing into True Lordhood.

For the first time, Ryu's prowess as a Lord shook the world.

Most didn't even have the time to register that they hadn't been facing the true extent of Ryu as a Lord until this very moment. All they could feel was a towering mountain rising into the skies… both literally and figuratively.

Ryu's Shrine Mountain Natural Enlightenment soared.

"I've been waiting to use the full extent of this technique a long time… [Tatsuya Judgment]."

The full name of the technique finally manifested itself and Ryu swung down.

All the color was stripped from the world.

Iam and Silent Quibus scrambled to their feet, their own auras erupting.

Two enormous figures appeared before Silent Quibus and the rage of two Races fell toward him.

But before most could register that, Iam had also changed, large amounts of Fate wrapping around him in solid blocks of white until he seemed to have doubled in size.

Ryu ignored Iam entirely. Though objectively, what he was doing was far more impressive, what Silent Quibus had just brought out… intrigued him.

The Griffin Prince and the Qilin Prince.

At some unknown point, Silent Quibus had actually contracted them both as Summons, and they didn't seem to have the slightest bit of resistance.

Ryu thought about the actions of Little Gem and wondered if it was at all related. But then he shook his head. That little girl was just being willful.

Though, he doubted if he could really get away with calling her little anymore even after the regression. After all, she too had experienced trillions of years.

'What are trillions of years if not just a few extra thousands of years?'

"Is this your trump card?" Ryu asked, looking at Silent Quibus as though Iam didn't even exist. "He's controlling Fate on a scale most here couldn't fathom, and you brought out two geniuses of the young generation that I could kill with a snap of my fingers? Honestly, for someone daring enough to try and claim my wife as your own, you lack any redeeming qualities.

"You're a disgusting dreg, you lack strength, you lack power, you hid from a woman for millennia, while building up a false reputation of her actually caring for you.

"As a man, I have no idea how you live with yourself."

Silent Quibus didn't respond, but Ryu only smiled in return.

"I know. For a person like you to have committed so many vile acts, how could your Dao Heart be so easily shaken?"

From start to finish, Silent Quibus had never spoken a word. But Ryu continued as though he didn't realize that he was being tuned out and ignored.

"You've probably also thought that I was speaking nonsense. My wife? To you, it probably does sound ridiculous. How could a pitiful worm like yourself possibly understand how a Lord could gain the love of a Goddess without having to lie about it?

"You know, not everyone is as shameless as you are. Some of us are born with a great deal of charm and just a little bit of luck."

Ryu's aura completely changed and in that moment, he seemed to have vanished, only to be replaced by the perfectly replicated aura of a Cultus Faerie.

For the first time, there was just the slightest hint of a change in Silent Quibus' expression, his pupils shrinking by half and trembling.

"Oh, you seem to have finally registered it." Ryu nodded slowly. "I thought long and hard about why a sick bastard would use such a cheap ploy. Even for you, trying to lay claim to a person's wife just by way of rumors feels ridiculous. Killing babies is less pathetic in my opinion, at least it might serve a purpose in your own twisted ways.

"So originally, I thought that maybe you were farming Fate, trying to attach yourself to a Goddess in hopes that would help. At least that might make some logical sense.

"Of course, I ignored maybe the most obvious reason, that being that you actually wanted a chance with her and somehow you thought that this might be the best way.

"It would probably be too bold, too bold indeed. Do you have any idea how stubborn my wife is?—" Ryu's gaze shifted to Iam who had finally dissipated his earlier attack. "—You just wait there for a second, I'm still talking. Like I said, you had better decide to bring out everything you have sooner rather than later."

Ryu slashed out again, and this time an echo of Nine Revolution Sky rumbled through his body and veins popped along his arm.

But he completed the swing nonetheless before turning back to Silent Quibus.

"It just couldn't be, right?" Ryu asked, blinking. "The big bad, genocidal maniac… is actually an invalid who can't talk to women? Is that why you dismember and humiliate them? Is that the best form of communication you have?"

Silent Quibus' jaw clenched, his expression still hardly changing. It was an impossibly subtle change, and yet just how sharp were Ryu's eyes?

"Oh? Did I strike a nerve? Unfortunate, unfortunate. Why don't you come and bite me? Having a piece of me is as close as you're ever going to get to touching her anyway."

There was another ripple from Ryu's body and this time, it was the aura of a Primordial Yin that radiated outward. A very specific Primordial Yin.

Silent Quibus seemed to have turned into an entirely different man. His clenched jaw unhinged, his eyes turned into two dark orbs of abyssal light and a wild, monstrous roar sent out shockwaves as powerful as a Dragon's Breath in all directions.

His bones cracked and deformed, and then he lunged forward.

Ryu looked away from him and into the distance, then spoke as though he was speaking to the audience of the world itself.

"You see this? This is what a real Heart Demon looks like. As for this?" Ryu raised his hand, his black great swordstaff flashing. "This is what Dominance looks like."

BANG!

Ryu swung his sword down, slamming Silent Quibus into the ground.