Ryu glided down the path at a pace that dwarfed most Spiritual Severing Experts. With his sharp eyes, any protections the Ruin Master left were next to useless. It didn't take much time at all for him to make it to the edge of a small opening.
The scene could only be described as horrid. The bodies of Amarice and Delonte, not to mention their fellow adventurers, was seemingly rotting from the inside out.
The entrance Ryu stood at was elevated far above the ground floor of this opening. If one was down below, his place would appear to be just one of many hive-like openings.
From Ryu's deep understanding of Ruins, he immediately understood this oddity. The path here was relatively short, but before the Ruin was cleared, it definitely wasn't so. Hecate's Ruins were probably a maze of forceful teleportations, so although the path to this place seemed short, the reality was that it would have taken Ryu several weeks to make it here had the Ruin not already been cleared.
At this moment, the Ruin Master probably couldn't imagine that someone had made it here and was silently observing his evil actions, nor did Ryu want to allow him to know too soon. The fact that the Ruin Master was able to fake seven entries despite the shortness of the passage definitely meant that this was an inheritable Ruin. Meaning, it was entirely under his control. In such a situation, Ryu had to be careful.
As for the adventurers dying below? What did this have to do with him? Considering Ailsa's explanation of their situation, Ryu didn't have the ability to save them even if he wanted to risk his life for strangers.
"Haha! Amarice, Delonte, you never expected that there would be a day like this one, did you?" The man with the bulging stomach laughed uproariously.
The two squadron leaders who had both been writhing in pain looked toward the fat man with furious expressions, but no matter how hard they tried, they couldn't remember having any impression of him.
It was then the 'fat' man did something inexplicable. His hands grasped at his protruding belly and pulled outward. But, the grotesque image of flying blood and guts didn't occur. Instead, a toned upper body was revealed. It was clear that the so-called fat man wasn't very fat at all.
Though Ryu had found it odd that such a fat man could have such a chiseled jaw, he hadn't thought much about it, nor did he look into it. In his mind, who would be foolish enough to disguise themselves as a fat man but forget to give themselves protruding cheeks? So, he marked it down as a genetic oddity of the man and left it be. Who would have known that the man was truly in disguise?
This most definitely taught Ryu a silent lesson. He had his pupils, but he didn't use them. Trusting his own logic and applying it to that of other people could one day lead to a fatal mistake.
The formerly fat man forcefully wiped his face, slowly revealing a scarred, but relatively similarly shaped visage. The more of his true face appeared, the paler Amarice and Delonte became.
"Seventy years ago you two nearly ruined my life." The man growled. "To think I used to love such a whore. I hope you enjoy the rest of your life as a corpse puppet.
"When Ruin Master Vitae told me that I could condemn you both to eternal hell, how could I miss such a chance?"
"Morake…" Amarice weakly reached out, her once beautiful face draining of life.
All those decades ago, her and Morake truly were in a relationship. But, she had betrayed him Delonte.
Delonte, who had been jealous of Morake's handsome face, didn't let him be for fear one day Amarice would regret her decision. So, he destroyed his face before her.
The irony of it all was the Delonte's actions proved how vain of a woman Amarice was, yet he still wanted her by his side. It was truly a tale that made one shake their heads.
As time passed, Delonte and Amarice both entered the Divine Vessel Realm and were even currently on the verge of entering the Connecting Heaven Realm, while Morake lagged too far behind, his revenge growing further and further away by the day. That was… Until he met Ruin Master Vitae.
"You'll never get it back. Do you think I would come to a dangerous place with it on hand?!" Delonte cackled maniacally as though he would have the last laugh in the end. "You were always a pathetic bastard. Even in the end, you're still so foolish. Just like the two of us, you too will die here today, once again betrayed by someone you thought was an ally."
Ryu's eyes narrowed. 'Just seventy years ago Amarice and Delonte were in the Spiritual Severing Realm? Isn't that what Morake's words implied? But…'
Ryu was shaken slightly. The age required to be named a genius upon entering the Divine Vessel Realm was twenty years old. But, the threshold for entering the Connecting Heaven Realm was one hundred years!
What did that mean? It meant that somehow, two adventurers had matched the pace of geniuses of the Shrine Plane. To cross from the Spiritual Severing Realm, to the Peak Divine Vessel Realm in just seventy years… It was inconceivable!
Of course, Ryu believed he could dwarf this speed. Opening one's Qi Vessels might take a long time for others, but with his advantages, he didn't believe it would take him very long at all. But the poignant point was that this pair of adventurers should have never been able to match this pace.
Ryu racked his brain, trying to think of treasures that could explosively increase cultivation speed.
Usually, despite having many such treasures on hand, geniuses of the Shrine Plane disdained to use them. It wasn't just disdain, but also a healthy aversion. Using such treasures could ruin one's foundation. Plus, since much of later cultivation relied on comprehension, they would quickly become useless. Only individuals of this lower plane would start nearly century long feuds over such a trivial item.
However, Ryu was interested in this item for another reason: its resell value. After all, he still needed to come up with ten Medial Immortal Stones. Though such an item was useless to him, it was definitely worth at least that much. And, considering how close he already was to the Spiritual Severing Realm, he would definitely have to pay that higher amount to enter the Moon World.
In truth, Ryu actually hoped the treasure wasn't too great, or else it would be difficult to find an auction house capable of selling it.
As Ryu was lost in his thought, a familiar sound of a blade piercing flesh rang in his ears. He didn't need to look to know that Ruin Master Vitae had killed Morake. The man lived his life to be betrayed, it seemed.
"Come out. I know you're there!" This, however, startled Ryu.