Killed Me? Now I Have Your Power

Chapter 453: Chapter 453: Benefits

Chapter 453 - Benefits

As the events occurred in Fokay, it was nighttime in Darklore.

Medusa was in Waverith, inside her own bathroom of her splendid home. She lay there, sprawled tiredly in the bathtub filled with green slithering snakes spitting poison-colored water.

A hiss of relief escaped her lips, her body relaxing even further.

Clearly, the Queen of Snakes was enjoying her moment of respite after a long day. However, that moment was abruptly cut short as her back suddenly flared with a bright green light.

Green fire erupted with the light, soaking the whole room in a cloak of green, the snakes hissing and spitting relentlessly.

Restlessness, fear, pain and anger all knotted together like braids could be sensed from them; and those emotions came from their mother herself.

Medusa was still in the bathtub. Her head was now flung back, her wet hair sticking on her face like flickering tails of snakes. Her eyes were very much visible, and for a splitting moment, they held the same pattern as the one shining on her back — the pattern of a snake biting its own tail.

She sighed, lifting her hands from the water, causing snakes and bubbling poisonous water to drop in the process. She brought them in front of her, then buried her head within them.

Only her eyes could be seen. And they were shedding tears.

"I am sorry." She whispered, her voice cracking, her shoulders suddenly stooped.

It looked like she was burdening something heavier than herself, something that could cripple her in a way she never thought possible.

’Did I have another choice?’ Medusa wheezed, tears falling down faster. ’Did I have any other choices than to cripple my own daughter, blocking away the power she inherited from me?’

’Did I have any other choices than to guide her towards you, sister?’

She began to choke, and her tears shifted into red howling snakes. The sight was horrific.

Her breathing became ragged.

’You wanted Ascension, sister.’ She thought with spite. "Ah! All of them do! That’s all they want! The Gambit! The Gambit! Always that god-cursed Gambit!!"

The green fire blazed more furiously.

’But I do not. I do not care about Ascension. I do not want to enter the games of those gods, games that have been ongoing since the First Era.’

What she had always wanted had been one and only one thing: the revival of their destroyed Warren, and so of their Father.

’Our source of Power and Family has been taken away from us!’

Echidna had refused to act. Medusa had forced her hand.

Now her sister had given up by giving everything of her to her own niece. Medusa felt like crying in madness, yet she could only laugh at the ridiculous irony.

’You are a coward, Echidna. And I hate you. I hate you for burdening my daughter. I hate you for making her the only possible way.’

Was it her sister’s way of screwing her over?

Medusa knew it was not entirely the case. She knew that Echidna had done it knowing the likelihood of her plan succeeding required everything to be focused on only one vessel.

She knew... but she needed to fool herself in order to not face the guilt of using her own daughter for something she herself was afraid to shoulder.

Madness was not a Power meant for all to control.

Echidna failed, and chose Monsters.

She had failed, and chose Ouroboros.

What about Inara?

The young girl had inherited the Monsters of her aunt, and the Ouroboros of her mother.

Would that be enough?

Would that be enough to survive the touch of their Father? Of Madness itself?

Medusa didn’t know. And so she did the only thing she could do at that instant.

And it was to cry.

Crying for her dead sister.

Crying for her own incompetence.

Crying for her daughter bound to a path of no return.

’Monsters... ah... we are all monsters!’

And she was the greatest of them all.

Medusa wept, and the snakes wept with her.

...

"Something’s wrong." Kaden mused, lying leisurely on his back, his head resting on a soft spot, brows furrowed and eyes shut.

He didn’t know why the strange feeling, but his skill "Blood Oath" had been tingling for a while now. Someone he had used that skill on was certainly going through something.

But that was the point that made Kaden wish to curse.

What something?

He was getting mixed feelings about it: magnificent yet soul-wrenching.

Magnificent in a way that made him jealous, yet soul-wrenching in a way that almost made him cut the Blood Oath link of that person to himself.

His perception warned him, telling him to choose one path: to cut or to not cut. In either case, something would come out of it.

Kaden didn’t cut it. He wouldn’t abandon someone just because of certain uncertainty.

Now he didn’t know who that person was — most likely because of distance and the current situation — and what kind of bullshit that guy had brought him.

"Ah, blood and ashes, can I have a break?" He muttered under his breath, his eyes still shut, exhausted.

The young man did not even care about the battle happening inside his own mind.

There was no battle to begin with. At least, for Kaden. Since the beginning, he knew for a fact that he would win.

Not because this was his mental realm, but because there was no way he could be tainted by the Darkness around.

Not only was his Will unique, making him able to stop anything from cursing him or even affecting him negatively. After all, if even the Curse of The Witch couldn’t touch him... then this situation couldn’t either.

But that was not all. Even if his Will might waver sometimes, causing him to be in a state of panic and mental exhaustion... there was one thing Kaden had learned lately.

Something he didn’t quite know he could use without activating his own Domain.

Emptiness.

That discovery changed everything.

He couldn’t actively and fully use that strange power, but he had learned that he could, at least, manipulate a wisp of it.

And a wisp of emptiness was enough to devour a whole city if he manipulated that correctly.

’Too powerful. How in the hell did I awaken this power?’

There was no link with his own affinities. He was deeply puzzled, but the knowledge of that new usage made his proficiency with his Domain increase exponentially.

At least, that was something to be happy about.

So his Will coupled with Emptiness meant Kaden was never in danger of being tainted by the darkness of the dead in his mind.

So since the beginning,

’This was nothing but a trap.’ He sneered. ’I thought Woeful would have guessed, but she didn’t. Why?’

He was curious. By now, most of these gods knew of his power of Emptiness and high Will. They seemed, to add, to be especially interested in Emptiness.

So why couldn’t they guess his application of that power in this way?

It was a question Kaden had no answer to, and he abandoned the very idea of receiving one. However, there was one question he desperately wanted answered.

At that, he opened his eyes — crimson-star-lit expanse gracing the harrowing reality around — and settled them on the smiling face of Rea looming over him.

He was resting his head on her lap, having the direct view of the stitch and thread around her neck.

Kaden liked the sight, despite not daring to say it aloud.

"How did you succeed so fast?" He finally asked, curious and surprised by how fast Rea herself wafted away the darkness of his mind.

He was almost offended. Actually, he was offended.

"You don’t know?" Rea asked, still caressing his hair with bloodied hands, earning her a puzzled look from Kaden.

She chuckled, the sound hollow, as if something was wrong with her throat and very soul. "Sorrow take me, you actually don’t know. Remember Kaden. Remember our kiss."

"Huh?"

"Our bloody kiss." Rea specified, bringing her lips just an inch from Kaden. "Did you forget that moment? You drank my blood. I drank your blood. And we drank the mixed blood of us in the same way."

"What... what do you mean by that?"

His heart sped up.

"What else?" Rea shrugged. "I think I have received some benefits from it. Benefits that made me quite at ease in my fiancé’s mind."

Her lips pulled wide, eyes deader than the dead around.

"Isn’t it romantic?"

Kaden’s face was completely frozen. It took him a couple seconds to get over it, managing only to mutter,

"Well, I will be damned."

—End of Chapter 453—