Chapter 181 - A Weak Man

Races lived in tribes and were fewer in numbers. If anything, by the next twenty to twenty-five years, many more races were going to be extinct due to human greed.

There was another reason why humans started enslaving these races in huge numbers suddenly.

It was a discovery by a Transcendent. A method to use the bodies of other races to form pills which helped in increasing cultivation right away, without any time required.

For normal cultivators, this was not something that necessitated killing many vampires and elves. But for someone in desperate need to ascend, they would do anything.

In Cale’s past life, many Transcendents used to consume hundreds of thousands of pills like these to ascend by even one minor realm.

Of course, Cale didn’t actually care about who lived and died. What he wanted was the blood of these other races — so that he at least had all their pure bloodlines before they went extinct.

They wouldn’t exactly go extinct anyway. Many would still be living here and there in the margins of the world. But it was better to be prepared before the mess started.

In a few decades, the world was going to be full of spatial rifts here and there. Catastrophe was coming.

Just as Cale left the ruined sanctuary of the inheritance peak, the surrounding space did not merely distort.

It folded inward like a dying beast, swallowing the very fabric of reality itself.

The stone and ash vanished. In their place, a boundless, suffocating expanse of frost and biting snow forcefully descended upon him.

This was no ordinary spatial tear. It was an illusion of the highest caliber.

As Cale opened his eyes, he found himself standing in a place consumed by endless winter.

’Hmm?... Where is this...?’

How the hell was he caught in such an illusion? He has cleared the trial. The inheritance was his. Nothing should remain to stop him.

Before him stretched an endless, silent sea of pale white flowers, their stems and petals completely frozen in eternal snow.

They were undeniably beautiful, yet entirely lifeless — much like corpses preserved in ice. The biting wind of this northern wasteland howled, carrying a cold so strong it seemed intent on freezing the very circulation of qi and blood.

’Didn’t I clear the trial? Did one of those old fogers put me through this test?’

Yet, in this snow domain where the Dao of Life itself seemed utterly extinguished, an interesting item caught his attention.

Amidst the endless sea of lifeless white, a single, vibrant black flame rose had blossomed. Its delicate petals possessed a mesmerizing, almost demonic allure, radiating a cruel yet elegant, luminous azure light that rejected the frost of the environment.

For a simple flower to bloom in such a severe wasteland...

’Is this a treasure too?’ Cale thought, walking forward.

Suddenly, the black rose shattered.

"H-huh?"

Hundreds of petals erupted upward, defying gravity as they spiraled into a chaotic, luminous hurricane.

"So I can’t take it, huh. Sigh..."

He had thought that maybe this was also a reward of the inheritance.

The petals began to weave together, condensing phantom flesh and bone from mere illusion.

Slowly, a breathtaking figure descended from the swirling tempest of snow.

It was a woman of peerless, otherworldly elegance.

She was adorned in a seductive ensemble of deep crimson silk and golden ornaments. The form-fitting bodice accentuated her voluptuous figure while translucent scarlet veils cascaded from her waist, swaying sensuously with every movement.

Her long, platinum-white hair flowed like liquid moonlight down her curves, framing a face of exquisite beauty crowned by two magnificent crimson horns.

Beneath half-lidded eyes, her gaze carried a languid, almost playful allure.

Every movement seemed captivating.

Yet beneath her bewitching sensuality lay the imperious dignity of an ancient demoness.

She stood amid drifting crimson embers like a temptress from the depths of legend, radiating an intoxicating charm that could awaken the most forbidden desires.

She looked down at Cale.

A wry, guilty smile appeared on Cale’s face.

"Ah... it’s you..."

He closed his eyes for a few seconds, then opened them again.

"Again..."

The phantom woman did not utter a single word. She existed for merely a breath — a lingering remnant of memory given form by the illusion.

Sighing, Cale walked forward with heavy steps.

"Are you stopping me... or are you calling me...?"

As quickly as she had appeared, her form collapsed, dissolving back into a myriad of scattered petals that danced mournfully in the frigid air.

The cascading storm of petals drifted downward on the biting wind, converging seamlessly to reform into a single, vibrant flower that gently fell into Cale’s outstretched hand.

Cale’s expression remained indifferent, his cold eyes staring silently at the delicate flower resting upon his palm.

Illusions of this nature were always born from the heart, reflecting the deepest, most heavily guarded crevices of one’s memories and lingering obsessions.

The phantom born from the flowers was none other than Cheon Yuha.

"Hahaha... a heart demon? At this time?"

Was his heart so much of a mess that he attracted a demon trying to corrupt his nature?

Without thinking much, he fell on his back, lying on the flowerbed staring up at the sky above.

"System..." he called out.

[...]

"You can manipulate my own memories, right? Erase the entire existence of the person Cheon Yuha. She shouldn’t be near me, and I shouldn’t even think about her."

He took a deep breath, his voice steady...

"In the path of rapidly gaining strength, me being lonely shall be the best... heh. Although there are others, at least my obsession for them hasn’t grown to such levels to erase their existences from my mind..."

[Does host confirm to erase the existence of person ’Cheon Yuha’ from their memories? Host will lose a small chunk of their current cultivation to resolve the heart demon.]

"Do it. I said."

[Confirmed.]

And then it happened.

He didn’t feel pain. He was immune to pain at this point. What was a mere setback in cultivation for him when weighed against the freedom it would grant?

Opening his eyes, Cale looked at the moon hanging above.

"The moon really is beautiful, huh..."

He noticed he had somehow lost a bit of his cultivation, but not enough to lose an entire stage. As obvious, he understood what he had done to himself.

Again.

"The weak must bow their heads, while the strong seize whatever their hearts desire. Such is the law of this world — a law written in blood and enforced by power. But if life is nothing more than the strong preying upon the weak, then tell me... what meaning is there in such a world? And what worth is there in living, if one merely exists to submit or dominate?"

He lay there on the bed of frozen flowers, staring at the endless sky above.

’Ahhh... so lonely...’

The acknowledgment hung in the air like frost. Cale had made his choice. In the pursuit of absolute strength, he would sacrifice everything—even the parts of himself that made him human.

The memories of Cheon Yuha were gone now, erased as cleanly as snow melting in spring. Whatever connection had existed between them was severed at the root, excised from his mind like a malignant growth.