But regardless of her internal fluctuations, Moon's face showed no ripple and it is with a nonchalant gaze that she met Konrad's icy hues.
"Cloud was right. You look nothing like the past you."
Moon remarked and with a step, vanished to reappear before Konrad. Ignoring personal space, she stopped only a few centimeters away from him, with her nose almost brushing his. And though with her 1.75 meters of height, she stood far below him, the silent pressure within her body prevented any underestimation.
"I take that as a compliment. Dragon Warden was a bitch. So many missed opportunities. Hell, Dragon Dark had a more fulfilling life. Of course, my most crushing regret of that life is, undoubtedly, to have kept you as my only woman.
A tragedy, really. My ancestors still curse me for it."
Konrad replied with his cool breathe brushing Moon's forehead, while hers lingered on his chin. But hearing those words emerge from his lips, although she let nothing transpire on her face, Moon felt ill. At first, she believed that loyalty to kin should always triumph over romantic sentiments. Therefore, when the Empyrean prepared to crush the Nether Realm in one last battle, she didn't flounder long before returning to her siblings' side. The rest was history.
Alas, trillions of years of suppressed emptiness brought her to the same realization as Regretless. In one step, they'd given up crucial parts of themselves. Without those parts, they lived ghost existences. Without those parts, the verb "fulfilled" would never join their hearts.
But worst, they had to maintain a façade, to cheat the world and themselves with false smiles, and masks of chimeras. And as she peered in Konrad's eyes, Moon was forced to admit that she couldn't find traces of the man that swore to live only by her.
In those eyes, her looks held no traction. She was just "another one."
Her lips curled into a smile.
"Is that so? That's not what you sang in bed."
Moon replied with no hint of bashfulness.
"I admit, your cunt was something else. A pity that it hides too many thorns. I don't dare play with it anymore."
Konrad countered with arched eyebrows and shoulders raised in a shrug. If the disparaging words provoked any reaction, Moon showed none of it.
"Don't be so sure. Who knows? You very well might. Regardless of how many lives you go through, so long as our memories remain, you can never escape me.
In the meantime, do enjoy these petty moments. True, you've forced Regretless into such a critical condition that he locked himself in secluded cultivation. Better, you vanished from our visions. Still, there are plenty of ways to track you.
The people by your side are a good enough example."
Moon retorted before walking past Konrad.
"Not going to fight?"
Konrad probed without shifting toward Moon.
"I know proper limitations. I can feel you've already perverted this World with your Devil Will. Now, no one can challenge you on this land. What point is there in fighting? Moreover, this is just a mental projection.
If we are to clash, I will do you the courtesy of appearing with my true body. Fret not, in the nearby future, we will meet again…husband."
And leaving those ambiguous words that filled Yvonne with confusion, Moon vanished in a twister of blood light. Now, only the Jade Imperial Couple remained. And though the brief exchange left her with deep confusion and overflowing questions, Yvonne set them aside, aware that what she wished to know, Konrad would reveal in due time.
"Foolish lot. Be it mortals or cultivators, all should live by their choices and the consequences they wrought. No wonders they can't cross their bottlenecks."
Konrad shook his head. Regretless, failed to become the Almighty Supreme not because of insufficient ability, but due to latent heart demons. For similar reasons, Moon failed to become Supreme.
But as far as Konrad was concerned, those past events could never produce a ripple in his immovable Dao Heart.
"Beloved, although I missed a few decades, for our forty years anniversary, I prepared an unforgettable gift."
Konrad began with a radiant smile while stretching his right hand toward Yvonne, and instantaneously, the pressure that prevented her from rising from that position vanished into nothingness. Better, as she took his hand and rose, Yvonne felt her existence flooded by tremendous Life Essence and while digesting them, her understanding of Life Laws rose at breakneck speed.
Little by little, the World Tree's Will shrunk, feeding and making way for hers as she slowly took control and overrode it. But as the overriding carried on, the life essence supply dwindled and it soon became evident that it wouldn't be enough.
Still, Konrad remained undisturbed.
…
In the outside world, Konrad's true body carried on with of the inarguably boldest moves of his life. When the Life Essence drained from the Zenith Ants reached zero, Konrad knew he only had two choices left:
A: Use the very world as the source.
B: Take the opposite force and change it into Life Essence.
The first case was both detrimental and unable to supply enough Life Essence. As for the second, that implied converting Death Essence into Life Essence. Although Konrad had robbed Nessriane's Life Wielding, and reached Death Transcendence, he knew that due to his weaker Life Law level, the change would result in massive loss.
Accounting for that, the Ancient Crystal World alone…didn't have enough Death Essence to provide. Therefore, Konrad chose the greatest source imaginable:
The Underworld!
Without hesitation, Konrad tore the veil between the realms of the living and the unliving, causing a fifty meters tall jet-black gate to appear and open in a loud grating sound that gradually revealed the echo of legions of roaming souls.
Before that gate, to say nothing of the rest, even Gulistan with her Chthonian Immortal Bloodline felt formidable pressure. The Underworld's Gate opened wide, revealing a black vortex of chthonian energies that stood as the entrance to the other side.
With a silent step, Konrad dived in and landed in the Underworld. There, a world of nothingness within which bridges of yellow rivers towered, appeared to his icy eyes. In that world, an unending stream of souls emerged from dispersed gates to dive in the yellow rivers and undergo the slow, tedious process of reincarnation.
This wasn't just the Mortal Realm's Underworld. It was the Three Realm's Underworld where all sub-divine souls found themselves, unless of course their souls failed to depart for the afterlife for one reason or another.
But even for those souls able to leave their Realms behind, reincarnation was no simple task. The yellow rivers would cleanse them of all impurities across decades, centuries, or even millennia, restoring them to an immaculate state before they could return to the living. The time they spent in the underworld depended on many criteria such as their previous form of existence and the quantity of karma weighing them down.
For that reason, animal souls spent the shortest time in the Underworld while cultivators' souls remained the longest.
Konrad raised his eyes and wasn't startled to see that within the cloudless sky of pure darkness, three towering grey thrones hovered. No figure lay within, but still, Konrad recognized them as the Guardians of the Underworld. One for each Realm Will.
