Chapter 503: 120. Why
“Zizizizi!”
A terrifying aura constantly emanated from the top of the stone tower wrapped by “Matilda.” It was either like the electric light of a charging dragon, or branches mixed with pink petals, or divine light resembling golden gazes.
The powerful forces of the Nineteen Rank were indeed earth-shattering for the Ideal Nation, and the attacks combined with other mythical beings made the flesh-and-blood monster on the stone tower howl in pain.
“Uaaah!”
The sharp scream of a woman, the deep groan of a man, and the high-pitched cries of a baby seemed to merge into one, causing unrest in the hearts of those who heard it, especially Fisher, who was surrounded at the top of the stone tower.
“No!! What are you doing? My Matilda must not be harmed!!”
Margaret, who was entangled by the Loom of Destiny, evidently sensed the assault from several strong mythical beings outside. Under the intensity of their attacks, the chaos screaming above her head notably became unstable. Relying solely on the world tree’s tear dropping into it and the power of Death continually absorbed, that terrifying infant was almost endowed with infinite vitality and destruction.
It was only her increasingly pathological maternal instincts that made Margaret unable to bear to see her “daughter getting hurt.” Panic-stricken, she raised her hand, wanting to use the Loom to accelerate the extraction of the power of Death.
Now, her daughter was almost “revived,” and the next step was to use the power to open the path to the Ultimate, enabling her and her daughter to return home smoothly.
But at that moment, a sonic boom erupted behind her. Margaret’s figure flickered, once again like a prophet, as her pupils slightly constricted. With a sudden wave of her hand, she collided with Fisher’s power from behind.
“Whoosh!”
With a loud bang, both figures simultaneously retreated backward. Fisher rushed toward the water pool below, hoping to rescue Tang Zeming Asuka first, but Margaret, having seen through his thoughts, could no longer contain herself, enraged by the dual-layered assault, and roared at Fisher.
“You primitive! If you seek death so badly, then I shall grant it to you!”
Feeling the wrath of the mother, the “Matilda” above also roared in anger. The flesh-and-blood wall that tightly enveloped the room immediately transformed into a howling assault. The intense aura of death and chaos paired with Margaret’s Loom of Destiny attack made it somewhat challenging for Fisher to cope.
Under the influence of “Destiny,” the surrounding time and space became bizarre, as if the location had transformed into a fantastical scene like Jianmu Palace or the peak of Sema Snow Mountain in the Northern Region.
With a wave of Margaret’s delicate hand, a strange wave instantly struck Fisher, who was dodging in mid-air. Suddenly, his limbs and head were separated by a space that sliced through them. Although still linked, they strangely appeared in different positions.
Under the ceiling, on the floor, and beside the water pool.
Seeing that she had successfully captured Fisher, Margaret’s expression remained tense. Because in the next moment, before her eyes, the so-called “all-seeing” ability of the Loom suddenly became unclear, as if the television was receiving interference from an unknown signal.
At the same time, the ∞ symbol on Fisher’s body began to shine again. As that unbound power illuminated, the surrounding rules gradually shattered, instantly returning his separated body back to its original space.
However, Margaret’s attention was not on him at that moment. She suddenly waved her hand, taking advantage of the moment when Fisher had just been restored to knock him away with the power of the Loom.
The Power of Destiny directly severed Fisher’s once normal right hand, and he gritted his teeth as he flew backward, crashing to the ground with layers of cracks forming.
The hand that was knocked away strangely grew flesh-and-blood tentacles in mid-air, which sent a shiver down his spine as they reached out, almost infinitely growing from the sky to the shoulder he had lost, swiftly reattaching it.
“Hiss.”
Fisher squinted, and the pain made him inhale sharply.
But like Margaret, he didn’t have time to observe the incredible changes in his body and didn’t notice that the terrifying whispered voices had started ringing in his ears again.
He and Margaret looked at the direction of the water pool in shock.
Under the observation of Margaret’s Loom, which seemed to have been interfered with and unable to operate, she found nothing. However, when she looked there with her own eyes, she suddenly realized that the deep water pool had become a bloody red, completely soaked in blood without her noticing when it happened.
For some reason, simply looking at the crimson water made Margaret’s heart involuntarily rise with a sense of dread. Even “Matilda,” at the top, being bombarded by those three Nineteen Rank mythical beings outside, became restless, frantically howling at the water pool.
And then, in the next second, a damp and pale hand suddenly reached out from the edge of the pool, fiercely gripping the floor outside the pool.
The five fingers seemed to be embedding into the floor as the owner of that hand slowly crawled out from the water pool.
“Tang Zeming.”
Fisher looked incredulously at the young girl with black hair completely soaked and scattered behind her, then kneeling on the ground, covering her face as she gasped for breath. He couldn’t see her face clearly, but he noticed that the small abdomen she had been stabbed through by Margaret was now almost scabbed over, stopping the continuous flow of blood.
But from the crimson seeping out, it seemed to be completely alive, with the bright red droplets falling continuously through the gaps in the hands that covered her face.
The calm demeanor made Margaret unable to help but freeze in place. Following her look of astonishment, she saw that the kneeling Tang Zeming Asuka finally seemed to perceive her presence. She slowly raised her head to look at her.
In her hands, the pair of eyes that wavered as if trying to burn themselves and others to ashes were continuously shedding blood-colored tears.
“Buzz, buzz, buzz!”
As the crimson within her heart formed a resonating world in the water pool, Tang Zeming Asuka finally seemed to have sensed movement.
She trembled, managing to stand up slowly with her drenched body. Then, that bloody face, from which red liquid flowed from seven orifices, transformed into pure rage, as if she were about to ignite the entire world in her fury. She began to roar hoarsely.
“Margaret!!!”
“Boom!”
The terrifying howl that came from Tang Zeming Asuka startled Margaret back a step in mid-air. As Matilda was about to take action, the water pool erupted entirely. In Fisher’s shocked gaze, the swirling crimson blood in the water transformed into the most primal and pure magic materials, rapidly forming layered magic runes at an exaggerated speed.
Margaret had just wanted to raise her hand to block it when a terrifying gale blew violently from the water, causing Matilda to roar while bending down, wanting to block for her mother. But the fierce wind ignited a scorching flame in mid-air, causing the being trying to intervene to scream in pain.
Fisher’s gaze contracted. He turned to look at the ever-combining and infinitely growing reddish rings in the water, realizing that these magic runes did not dissipate after being used, as if they possessed infinite energy, continuously echoing forth and exploding with resonance.
The level of resonance generated was far more than what a magician could engrave in a year. It was easy to imagine the furious state of Tang Zeming Asuka at that moment.
And all of this was done unconsciously by Tang Zeming Asuka.
Outside, three Nineteen Rank mythical beings were bombarding her and Matilda, and now, within the stone tower, she had to face a chaotic mythical rank and a completely mad seventeen-year-old Japanese high school girl.
However, honestly, even Fisher felt that at this moment, Tang Zeming Asuka was far more terrifying than himself.
She stared dead at Margaret in the air, her eyes seeming as if they would fly out and tear her apart. For whatever reason, whether out of guilt or fear to face the truth, Margaret gritted her teeth and prepared to go all out. She suddenly infused the Loom in her hand into Matilda’s body above.
“Ah ah ah ah ah!”
“Matilda, endure it. Fully activate the power of Death!”
As that horrendous scream echoed, Fisher’s body sank again. He suddenly felt the death chasing after him become enormously heavy in conjunction with the power left by Renee at his lower back, putting him in a life-and-death struggle against it. As this process unfolded, Fisher’s suffering was unimaginable.
He was closest to death, and it was right before the power of death affected by chaos, virtually mocking death to its face. It would be absurd if the power of death did not come for him.
As the power of death was completely activated, all the citizens in the Ideal Nation were immediately dragged into the ground by the threads of death, and even the fierce attack from outside became momentarily stalled, likely even those several Nineteen Rank mythical beings were ensnared by death.
Fisher, sealed within the stone tower, was oblivious to the circumstances outside. The only ones he worried about out there were Hela and Gouwen, but now he could hardly save himself and had to address the immediate problems first.
He barely lifted his head to look, only to see that Tang Zeming Asuka was already enshrouded in threads of death. Despite this, she continued to fixate intensely on Margaret, with the magic from behind continuing to bombard, but it proved futile.
“That foolish girl!”
Gritting his teeth, Fisher struggled to rise against death. The entire stone tower below began to shake. With the activation of the power of death, he wasn’t sure if Margaret had started the process of transferring them mother and daughter to the Ultimate, but regardless, it was certainly not a good sign since the space here and even the crevice had begun to shatter. Urgently, he needed to stop Margaret.
Without hesitation, Fisher activated all his strength, demonstrating the mechanics of his power in the face of the power of death. Amidst the pursuit of death behind him, he suddenly reached Tang Zeming Asuka’s side, firmly hugging her in his arms, using the still-empowered strength of Renee to pull them both out of the clutch of death.
Only at this moment did Tang Zeming Asuka, whose body had been stiffened, finally regain a bit of her senses. Her terrifyingly rigid gaze turned to the man beside her.
“Mr. Fisher.”
The sight of her blood-soaked eyes softened Fisher’s heart. He wanted to say something comforting but realized it was not the time for that. He had to quickly address the matter at hand.
He turned to the magic continuously manifesting in the water pool and said to Tang Zeming Asuka,
“Tang Zeming, the highest tiers of magic can only reach the Fourteenth Rank, so no matter how hard you try, you won’t be able to harm Margaret. But there’s a way to break through the upper limits of magical power: the Double Ring Magic, by exponentially increasing the resonance through layered rings.”
“Double Ring Magic?”
Tang Zeming Asuka’s hateful expression finally showed signs of easing; her gaze, which had been fixed on Margaret above, shifted to Fisher in front of her.
Seeing the crimson liquid continuously running down from her eyes, Fisher extended his hand to wipe it away. He then nodded and said,
“Ah, combining the rings; while its power can surpass myth, the difficulty will also rise exponentially. However, I believe that for you, there are no limits to magic. You possess such talent. We’re being pursued by death now, so I can only leave this important task to you. Can you do it?”
Tang Zeming Asuka glanced around herself and Fisher, looking at the threads of death that avoided her and relentlessly wrapped around her mentor instead. That almost infinite rage within her once again ignited.
Taking a deep breath, she nodded at Fisher and said, “I can do it.”
“Great, I’ll teach you.”
Before Fisher could even begin his serious teaching, he suddenly felt the deep pool of water behind him, as the crimson blood began to move toward the shore and toward Tang Zeming Asuka as if by an unseen force.
The crimson threads entwined around Tang Zeming Asuka’s body, soon forming a ring of space, as more and more crimson flowed along her body, like snakes or insects, creating countless intricate marks.
Those were the main ring, the secondary rings, the tail rings.
It was the naive magic of “I will never go hungry,” that she had written on her hand as a child.
It was the borrowed sutras she had inscribed on her own body to maintain normality.
Watching the blood wrap around her, an unending flow of crimson poured out from Tang Zeming Asuka’s seven orifices again.
“All conditioned things are like a dream, a phantom, a bubble.”
“Like dew, like lightning, should be viewed as such.”
She would no longer deceive herself.
In the wide-eyed gaze of Fisher, layers of rings piled upon each other, forming a magical entity that radiated terrifying power and surged forth swiftly.
That ever-accumulating and transforming ring was destiny.
And once again, Tang Zeming Asuka stared dead at Margaret above. Then she gently broke free from Fisher’s protection, allowing the threads of death to wrap around her.
“Margaret!!”
At the instant the dangerous aura appeared, Margaret’s soul seemed to leap out of her body as she looked down, only to see a magic spell resembling both a Vajra and a spear of Longinus appear in the angered Tang Zeming Asuka’s hands.
That thing…
No, my Matilda…
The ground of the stone tower completely froze in front of the echoing spear, recounting the process of its construction and destruction. And Matilda began to quiet down amidst the chaotic rotations. Margaret panickedly wanted to rush forward to help her “daughter” withstand this terrifying attack.
But evidently, even though the fleshly monster appeared horror-stricken and deformed, and the tears of the world tree had yet to be integrated into that monster’s body, the monster suddenly extended a tentacle, pushing Margaret aside, who wanted to step forward and shield it from the shot.
“Matilda?”
“Mom.”
The unintelligible yet universal title just left the lips of the writhing, unclear being, and the crimson magic had already reached the monster’s front.
In the next moment, all eyes turned to a pure crimson.
“Boom!!!”
The creature enveloping the stone tower was completely pierced through, taking with it all the time and space threads linked to the monster, disintegrating one by one as if it were a bottomless black hole, swallowing everything in sight.
Margaret, even while wrapped in the Loom of Destiny, was sent flying, but even as she landed, despite the sound of cracking bones and the intense pain she ignored, she lifted her head to look above.
Then, her expression brightened with joy.
She saw that Matilda, now basically rotting, still had a bit of flesh entwined with the tears of the world tree, which meant that the link with the power of death had not broken yet, and it had not yet died; the process of leading them towards the ultimate had not concluded.
She looked again at Fisher and Tang Zeming Asuka, who were tightly entwined by death below. The several mythical beings there were still struggling with death, and they seemed to be having internal conflicts, as if the Whale Folk and another transfer from Russia were entangled, not caring about this side at all.
The world tree and dragon god? By the time they arrived, we had already left.
So good, so good, Matilda.
We are going to win; no one can stop us now!
Margaret was almost in tears from joy. After counting all the resistance powers on the opponent’s side and confirming that truly no one could stop her, she stood up gleefully, almost wanting to dance.
“Matilda!”
But in the next second, as she was about to raise her head to command the entangled Matilda to transport them away, a frosty phoenix with wings suddenly flew expressionlessly above the tears of the world tree.
Below, Fisher, who was gradually becoming gaunt due to the suppression of death, quickly raised his head to look at the only phoenix that was still moving above. He smiled, glancing at the Phoenix Feather he still held tightly in his hand.
Yes, long before, when the phoenix kind had given him this thing during their time at the Tree Continent, he had not realized its significance. He had even worried whether he and Hela would be discovered by the phoenix’s family.
But just now, when Fisher taught Tang Zeming Asuka how to use the Double Ring Magic, he suddenly heard Neceria’s calm voice beside his ear asking.
“Since the Ideal Nation is so chaotic now, should I take this opportunity to obtain the tears of the world tree? After all, it seems that no one has noticed me.”
At this moment, Neceria, not forgetting their original intention, was still thinking about the tears of the world tree.
Fisher wanted to cry.
Yes, even Fisher himself had almost forgotten about Neceria, it was only when the Phoenix Feather lit up that he remembered, let alone Margaret and the others.
“Neceria, act quickly!”
“No!!”
Under the sunlight, Neceria opened her wings in the sky like a mother saint, pulling out the spear in full view, regardless of Margaret’s heart-wrenching screams, she thrust it fiercely into the already faint Matilda’s body and then expressionlessly raised the tears of the world tree high from the dissolving flesh, looking down like a victor at the chaotic Ideal Nation below.
Neceria!!
However, right after her brief moment of suavity, for some reason, under the shimmering tears of the world tree, her eyes suddenly burned painfully, as if ignited.
In that instant, a series of fragmented images appeared in front of her eyes.
She seemed to see an enormous tree, one larger than the world, appearing before her; she seemed to see a land filled with flames and devastation; she seemed to see her longed-for hometown.
In that moment, the Phoenix Feather in Fisher’s hand suddenly grew scorching, so hot that he quickly retracted his hand.
And it wasn’t only Neceria; all the phoenix kind far away on the Tree Continent suddenly covered their eyes in agony.
In that intense pain, they all saw something, to varying degrees.
Among them was an innocent child who saw a grand snow mountain and the various beings living in that wild land.
Meanwhile, feeling the pain in her eyes, Neceria’s grip slackened, causing the tears of the world tree to plummet straight down, falling into the deep water pool, and quickly disappearing within the crimson depths.
“Buzz buzz buzz!”
Margaret stared blankly at the tears of the world tree that fell into the water. Although the power of death surrounding her still appeared to be powerful due to its total activation, at least the threads of death that entangled all beings had disappeared without a trace.
Margaret remained motionless, gazing at the sky because there, Matilda had completely disappeared.
But in the next second, Tang Zeming Asuka, who had just broken free from the threads of death, charged toward Margaret frantically.
“Margaret!!”
Unimpeded, the young girl, her face splattered with blood, slammed Tang Zeming Asuka down to the ground, shrieking as she raised her hand and struck hard against Margaret’s face.
“Why!!”
“Bang!”
With that blow, Tang Zeming Asuka almost broke down, her body trembling as she delivered punch after punch to Margaret’s face, roaring,
“Why!! Tell me!! Why are you doing this to me? Why deceive me!”
“Bang!”
“Why!! Why do you make me delicious food! Why do you smile at me? Why do you braid my hair!!”
“Bang!”
“Why!! Why do you teach me to be brave!! Why do you comfort me!! Why do you teach me how to live!!”
“Bang!”
As Tang Zeming Asuka’s fists trembled, her hands already bloodied and bruised struggled to find direction in her fury. One punch landed on Margaret’s face, while another landed on the ground, causing gaping wounds.
No one could tell whether Tang Zeming Asuka was angry or crying at this moment. All Margaret could see was the blood tears dripping down the gnarled face of Tang Zeming Asuka, falling onto the ground.
Tang Zeming Asuka began to sob again, delivering a weak punch to Margaret’s face as she cried out.
“Why!! Clearly… Clearly I regarded you as my mother!! I wanted to leave with you, even though you were trying to harm us, I didn’t give up on you; I still wanted to bring you back!! Why.”
“Why, tell me why, why… I trusted you so much.”
Margaret, also full of blood after being hit, stared directly at the girl in front of her, who seemed completely hollowed out. In truth, it has always been this way for her; because she had nothing, she was desperate to give everything for that warmth, fearing it would leave and abandon her.
So even if Margaret wanted to deceive and abandon Tang Zeming Asuka, the first thing she thought of was to persuade her. Even if Fisher was already with Hela, she would still stay beside them pathetically, even if it was just to watch.
But
Why.
Even though she was so humble, even though she was so self-deceptive, you still refused to care?
Tell me, why, Margaret!
Margaret quietly watched the crazed Tang Zeming Asuka questioning herself, and the voices echoing in her mind gradually faded. Though her vision was blurry, only the silhouette of Tang Zeming Asuka appeared in her sight, but she still opened her mouth.
Toward the questioning Tang Zeming Asuka, Margaret’s throat quivered,
“Why… there really is no why.”
Tang Zeming Asuka stared blankly at the suddenly mute Margaret above her, only to witness the corner of her bloodied and mangled face curve into a faint smirk. She addressed Tang Zeming Asuka as a matter of course.
“It’s simply because… you are not my child at all.”
Upon hearing that simple phrase, Tang Zeming Asuka’s hand, which had just been raised mid-air, froze in place as though struck by lightning.
Yes, it was because Tang Zeming Asuka was not Margaret’s biological child at all.
From the start, all of the love Margaret felt should have been for her child, even if that child had already departed from her.
Yes.
So the answer was so simple.
But this simple, self-evident answer caused Tang Zeming Asuka to lose control, trembling uncontrollably from head to toe.
“Aah… how could this be… ah.”
“Aaahhh!!!”
Immediately afterward, she could no longer bear it and began to scream. The crimson covering her body could no longer obscure her sadness and despair, as if a fear-induced impulse was forcing her to retreat.
“Tang Zeming!”
Tang Zeming Asuka raised her hands viciously, and under Fisher’s astonished gaze, she struck heavily downward toward Margaret’s already closed eyes and faint body.
“Bang!”
Please vote, tip, and support! This is very important to me!
Thank you so much for your support!
(This chapter ends)
