Isaac closed his eyes.
He tried to slow his breathing, to stop the tension from crawling up his spine.
The words Catherine had just told him kept replaying in his head, and the more he thought about them, the more the pieces started to fit together.
He exhaled slowly and opened his eyes.
"This... Celia was responsible for all of this, wasn’t she?" he asked.
"Yes." Catherine nodded, a bitter smile touching her lips when she saw the seriousness in his expression.
Isaac clenched his jaw.
For a moment, Catherine thought he was about to explode.
Instead, he asked something she hadn’t expected at all.
"She didn’t get hurt, right?"
Catherine blinked. "What?"
"Is Celia injured?"
"No," she said, still processing the question. "She’s fine."
"What about you and Emily?"
"We’re fine too. None of us are injured."
Isaac sagged a little, rubbing his face with both hands before letting out a long breath. "Thank God."
A small smile spread across his face, one that was full of relief.
Catherine studied him. "You’re not angry that she did all this without talking to you first?"
"I am," Isaac said honestly. "I really am. But I was more worried about whether she got herself injured doing it. If she’s not hurt, then I can deal with the rest. I’m still going to give her an earful, though. This was too much, even for her."
He raised a hand, and the air in front of him folded in on itself. A pale, swirling spatial cloud formed.
"Come on. We’ll pick them up and talk on the way," he said.
He took Catherine’s hand and stepped into the cloud.
The world inside the spatial cloud was completely dark.
The path to the two monster tribes and the Eltari race overlapped for a while, which meant Isaac would need to teleport several times before they reached the point where the routes split.
"Where to?" he asked as he exited one spatial cloud and summoned another.
"The base of the Ashfang Tribe," Catherine replied.
"Got it."
They stepped through again, the air rippling around them as the landscape changed.
This time, a jagged range of dark stone hills rose in the distance, and the sky above carried a faint red tint, as if the light itself had been stained.
As they walked, Isaac glanced sideways at her.
"All right. Start from the beginning. Tell me what actually happened."
"Before that, I need to explain something else. About what ’monsters’ are."
Isaac raised an eyebrow.
He nodded, signaling her to go on.
"There are two kinds of monsters. The first are the ones you find in trials or dungeons. They have some intelligence, but they’re not really considered living beings. They don’t have true sentience. They’re created by the System."
"And the second?" Isaac asked.
"The ones in the wilderness. They have no real intelligence. But as they grow stronger, they start to think, to understand, to become aware. Eventually, some of them reach full sentience."
She looked at him then, making sure he was following.
"Now think about us. I’m a Celestial Kitsune. Alice is a Solar Dragon. Emily is a Netherborne Phantom Empress. Celia is a Crown Devil. You and Master are human. Althea is a Florathi."
Isaac frowned slightly. "Okay. And?"
"Why aren’t we considered monsters? What makes us different?" Catherine asked.
Isaac thought for a moment. "We don’t need to grow in rank to gain sentience. We’re born with it. We grow mentally as we age, not as we level up."
"That’s part of it. Age is another. Humans live, what, seventy or eighty years on average. Each rank adds about ten years to your lifespan, and reaching Overlord gives you a hundred more. Other races work the same way. Without ranking up, most of us don’t live that long.
"Monsters, on the other hand, live for long. It is normal for them to live upto 500 years, and even longer if they rank up."
Isaac nodded.
He still didn’t see how this connected to their current situation with the monster tribes and the Eltari.
However, he knew Catherine must’ve a reason if she was explaining all this to him.
"But," Catherine continued, "those aren’t the real reasons we’re classified differently. Some monsters are born sentient. There are unique species out there that think and feel from the moment they exist."
Isaac slowed his steps. "Wait."
She glanced at him. "What is it?"
"Dragons are not monsters. But they can live for thousands of years. Or, are you telling me they don’t live that long?"
Catherine shook her head. "They used to live upto thousands of years. But after System arrived, it changed the laws of the world. Now, even dragons only live about one hundred and fifty, maybe two hundred years if they don’t rank up."
Isaac blinked, surprised.
System.... had changed the laws of the world?
This was the moment Isaac suddenly noticed a fact.
Before the System, there were no classes, ranks, or Talents.
And yet, dragons, devils, titans, and countless other races still existed. They still grew stronger. They must have had their own methods. Their own paths.
So where did those paths go?
His mind jumped to Catherine’s Physique Refinement ability.
A chill ran through him.
’System changed the laws of the world.’
’It incorporated the training methods of different races into itself.’
The System had taken the natural methods of growth from every race and folded them into itself, made them part of a single, unified structure.
If you didn’t work with the System now, you couldn’t grow.
He remembered his trial, the way time itself had bent, pulling people from six months in the past and six months in the future into the same moment.
Back then, he’d thought he’d seen the peak of the System’s power.
Now, he wasn’t so sure.
’How powerful you have to be to change the lifespan of entire races? And affect their training methods?’
Catherine noticed the look on his face and gave him a moment before continuing.
"There’s one more factor. The one that really decides who is a monster and who isn’t."
"And that is?"
"Randomness."
He stopped walking.
"What?"
"When the System arrived thousands of years ago, it didn’t judge based on morality, intelligence, or danger. It just... chose. Some races were labeled as ’Players.’ Others were labeled as ’Monsters.’"
Isaac stared at her. "That’s it? It just picked?"
"Yes. And it set rules based on that choice. Monsters and their descendants can’t have Classes or Talents. Players and their descendants can. And there can’t be children between the two groups. It’s an absolute barrier."
Isaac felt like the ground had dropped out from under him.
"You’re telling me," he said slowly, "that entire races were condemned or elevated based on a random decision?"
"Yes."
The word hung between them, simple and heavy at the same time.
Isaac let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding.
"That’s... hard to wrap my head around."
"I know. I struggled with it too when I first learned about it."
They started walking again, the crunch of gravel under their boots filling the silence for a moment.
The Ashfang Tribe was only a few dozen minutes away.
Catherine spoke again. "After the designation of Monsters and Players, the laws of our world were twisted. Monsters became stronger. Even at the same rank, they usually have better skills and sharper combat instincts than Players, even ones with strong Talents and Classes.
"Of course, it’s not all good. Monsters can’t take over Fortified Cities. They can’t access Classes or Talents. Though, they can rank up," Catherine explained.
He nodded slowly, letting the information settle.
"What about sentience? Low-rank monsters are not capable of thinking. Was it always like that, or did the System make it that way?" he asked after a moment.
"It was like that before too. Some people believe that was the reason the System chose them as monsters in the first place. That they lacked awareness when they were weak, so they were labeled as something closer to beasts. But no one really knows for sure."
Isaac looked down at his hands.
"It still feels wrong. Like someone drew a line and decided who mattered more."
Catherine slowed her steps and turned to face him.
She knew what he was thinking.
So she decided to clarify some things to him.
"Don’t think of the System as some evil thing. I’m not saying it’s good either, but it isn’t as simple as that. There are advantages on both sides."
"Such as?" Isaac asked.
"For example, killing Players and killing Monsters gives the same amount of experience. Both sides can rank up through the System. Monsters actually have an easier time in some ways. They don’t need to complete quests. They just need to digest rare materials to rank up."
Isaac thought about that. "So they’re stronger in a fight, but more limited in where they can live and what they can become."
"More or less," Catherine said. "Different paths. Different chains."
He let out a quiet laugh that didn’t carry much humor. "That doesn’t really make it better."
Catherine shrugged.
They walked for a while in silence, the faint sound of wind moving through the rocks around them.
Isaac could feel other presences now, distant but aware. The Ashfang tribe wasn’t far.
"There’s something else I don’t get. The Red Rain. If monsters can’t own Fortified Cities, doesn’t that mean they’re always at risk?"
"Normally, that is how it would be. But Monster Tribes have another way. They pray to the [Heavenly One]."
Isaac glanced at her. "The... what?"
"[Heavenly One] is a God. Or, something like that at least. He is a god that only answers monsters. I don’t know the full details. I just know that when a tribe is under its protection, the Red Rain can’t touch them."
"I see...." Isaac muttered.
They reached a narrow path that curved around a stone ridge.
Catherine stepped ahead, then slowed again, as if she was deciding how to continue.
"Now, back to how the identity of Monsters is related to what Emily did. When the designation between Players and Monsters first happened, it caused chaos. People didn’t just accept it. They used it."
"Used it how?" Isaac asked, though he already had a bad feeling.
"A lot of races claimed that the System labeled certain beings as monsters because they were evil. They called the System the Herald of the Divine and said its word was proof of who deserved to live where. Then they started plundering and slaughtering monster tribes."
"..."
"But not everyone followed that path. One person, or rather two, did the opposite. They took monsters into their own home. Gave them shelter. Protected them. Can you guess their identity?"
Isaac thought about it.
Then, his eyes widened.
He knew of someone—parents of one of his wives—who protected a lot of races by bringing them into their home.
The Empress of the Netherworld, and the Reincarnation of the Sword God.
"Emily’s mom and dad?" Isaac said.
"Yes, they opened the Netherworld to races that were being hunted, and those falling under apocalypse. Devils, beasts, spirits, creatures that had nowhere else to go. They didn’t care about the label.
"They cared about whether someone was willing to live peacefully under their rule.
"Though, you know what happened later. The destruction of the Netherworld."
"Yeah," Isaac said, sighing.
Catherine continued, "Not everyone died back then. Some races escaped. The Ashfang tribe, the one near us now, are descendants of those survivors.
"Monsters normally live up to 500 years, and reaching Overlord rank increases their lifespan to 700-800 years. So, the elders of Ashfang were directly told about Emily’s parents by their grandparents.
"As soon as they sensed Emily’s bloodline, they bowed to her, and pledged their alliance to her."
That was.... quite surprising.
Still, one thing didn’t add up.
"Shouldn’t they be angry at Emily because of.... You know what?"
"Blood Lord that destroyed the Netherworld," Catherine knew Isaac was talking about this. "I thought the same as you. But apparently, the surviving monsters don’t blame Emily for what happened.
"They were about to die as soon as the apocalypse began. But they could live for much longer due to Emily’s parents. Not only were they given home, they were also given food and everything they needed.
"Moreover, the surviving monsters had also met young Emily, and they adored her.
"While they don’t know the exact details, they know that Emily’s body was taken over by someone else, and her parents were killed by that entity.
"The surviving Monsters pitied Emily, and knowing that the seal that forced her to sleep would break sometime in the future, they left a will to their younger generation, to help and serve the daughter of the ones who saved them and protected them," Catherine explained.
The surviving monsters had to leave the destroyed Netherworld, leaving behind Emily who was frozen in ice.
They did that for survival.
But doing so had crushed them with guilt.
They had adored Emily — the young child of their lords — who would happily bring them gifts on each visit.
Seeing Emily, whom they treated as their own daughter, broken like that had caused them immense grief.
Now, the descendants of the surviving monsters had created tribes. They were living in different areas and had different motives.
But each of them had the same will left by their ancestors—the monsters who survived the rampage of Blood Lord in the Netherworld.
[Serve the blood of the Netherworld when she rises again.]