1254 Vanished
Ryu could only walk forward by dragging his feet. Breathing felt like coughing out smoke, a piercing pain filling his entire body. At this point, he looked less human and more like a walking monstrosity of flesh and blood. However, he continued to take one step after another.
It was difficult to read a person's expression when an entire layer of their skin had vanished, but the clarity in Ryu's intact eyeballs painted their own sort of picture. He placed one foot after another, trudging through the endless sea of fire.
There didn't seem to be a floor beneath him, the skies had no limit, even if he looked left, right, back and forward, there were no markers, no limiters, no sign that he was even progressing. Even what he was walking upon felt more like an illusion than anything else.
However, Ryu was unmoved. He dropped one foot in front of the other. His feet were perfectly spaced apart without the slightest deviation. His pace was perfectly even, never slowing up nor speeding up. It was as though the destination didn't matter to him and he was enjoying the journey itself.
Ryu's Dao Heart simply wasn't something that others of his generation could match with. This trial had clearly adjusted its difficulty to his current strength level, or else rather than losing just a layer of skin, he would have lost his life instead.
But after six months of tempering himself with those divine chains, it was difficult for anything to move him. He was already a person with a sturdy mind before, but now he was simply on a level of his own. Only he knew the kind of suffering he had undergone in that half year.
Those chains didn't cause any pain, nor suffering, but they severed every meaning you could possibly find in life. It erased you from existence, it cut you off from everything you held dear, it made you feel worthless, insignificant...
How could a little pain compare to that?
Ryu didn't bother to circulate his Embryonic Qi. He knew that the moment he did, the heat wave would just shatter his newly formed skin without a care in the world. Instead, he continued to walk, one step after another, perfectly even, perfectly controlled.
Although Ryu was doing this, and he was quite curious about the Taboo Powers, he wasn't to the point of feeling any sort of pity or oneness with them. In fact, the only reason he was putting in so much effort to find out about them wasn't even because of their strength, at least not in the grand scheme, anyway.
It had to be remembered that the Taboo Powers had lost. Ultimately, they were inferior to the Martial Powers.
Knowing this, why would Ryu bother to go out of his way to learn their cultivation methods if they interfered with his current methods? The only reason he continued to use the Unbalance Mantra and was continuing to learn about this Nine Pillar Flame Inheritance was because, at least on the surface, they didn't seem to be hindering him in any way.
Of course, there was the chance that there was some underlying reason the Taboo Powers had lost. But the way Ryu saw it, schemes meant nothing in the face of absolute strength. If the Taboo Powers were truly so powerful, what schemes the Martial Powers had come up wouldn't hold any weight whatsoever. The fact that they had been eradicated and almost wiped from history could only mean that they were inferior.
If the Taboo Powers had been on the come up and the Martial Powers had suppressed them before they could grasp power, Ryu would be more understanding and much more intrigued. But if the little woman's words were correct, then why should he give them this benefit? They had all been powers of the Ninth Heaven at the time, the pinnacle of what could be, and they had still fallen.
There was no pity to be had for those that had fallen to those of the same level, especially since Ryu felt that not much would have changed had they won instead of the Martial Powers.
Too few people had a mentality similar to Ryu. It was likely that if the Taboo Powers had won the war, the ultimate result would have been them proceeding to suppress everyone below them just the same.
Ryu might be inclined to help the Taboo Powers survive and carve out a piece of existence to grow, he would even overturn the current Martial Powers for them, but carrying out their legacy as though they were the ultimate good wasn't something he would ever do.
These inheritances were powerful because they were from the Ninth Heaven. If he had stumbled onto a Ruin from a Martial Power of the same level, so long as they had never directly offended him, he would just as easily take up their strength and fuse it into his own as well.
The grievances of the Taboo Powers, their hopes of revenge, their want to rise to the top once again....
What did that have to do with him?
"Fuck off," Ryu growled.
His throat was incinerated, but he continued to move.
A pillar rose into the skies and another layer of flesh was torn from Ryu's body, then another pillar, then another.
By the time six had formed, Ryu was basically nothing but ligament, tendons, bones and his pair of eyes.
When the seventh rose from the ground, his bones began to slowly turn black.
When the eighth rose, the sound of crackling echoed about his bones.
Ryu slowly raised his head, the flickering depths of his eyes calm and cool, unmoved by the skyrocketing temperatures around him.
And then the ninth rose. But the position of the ninth was right beneath his feet.
When it appeared, he was completely enveloped by fire, his body vanishing.
The nine pillars continued to rage on.
And when they finally began to dim and vanish, nothing was left but a sea of flames.
Where Ryu should have been, there was nothing. He had completely vanished.
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