1296 Frozen
Ryu's foot descended and made contact with the first step. Let alone him, there were a large number of Dream Asuras up above that were heavily invested in what would happen. In the beginning, they had been quite indifferent. With the usual culture of the Dream Asura Race, although it was a bit surprising, it wasn't unacceptable for Mae to have already laid in bed with a man. However, the more they saw her berate her own father, a man she was usually greatly respectful toward, the more curiosity they had toward this Ryu.
At the same time, there were those who were more invested in his failure as well, eager to see him struggle.
Even those who were aware of the Samsara Steps would have issues when facing them, let alone Ryu who was completely in the dark about what was happening at the moment. He might very well assume these steps to be normal and suffer greatly as a result. They had all seen the Patriarch enter, and he had clearly not explained anything to Ryu beforehand.
The Dream Asura Clan was split into four factions. The current ruling faction, or Mae's father's faction, had been in power for a long while. The other three factions, led by other branch heads, weren't weak by any stretch of the imagination, though. It was more accurate to say that the talents of Mae's faction simply went a longer way in securing the position of leadership.
The soul fire was an exceptionally rare ability and not everyone would be born with it. In fact, there were only Mae and Aantha in this generation. However, aside from the soul fire, the general fire affinity unique to Mae's branch gave them access to unique strengths of the Dream Asura Race. These four factions were divided by their usual talents. Mae's faction was known as the Soul Fire Faction, then there was the Soul Wind Faction, the Soul Earth Faction and finally the Soul Body Faction. The first, obviously, specializing in wind, the second in earth, and the last in Body Realm cultivation.
Of course, there was some crossover between these talents. There would often be inter-marrying so it wasn't too surprising for talents to shift between one faction and the next. As a result, it was probably less accurate to say that these factions were ruled by families, and more accurate to say that they were ruled by whomever happened to have the strongest affinity in said generation.
For the Soul Fire Faction, it was Mae's father, Rogryll.
For the Soul Wind Faction it was Balreak, a man with wings that spanned ten times longer than even the kilometer wings that Ryu had spotted from his father-in-law. He had hawk-like eyes and incredible pale skin that almost looked to be a sickly green.
The Soul Earth Faction was managed by a man with the face shaped like a solid cube, there were nothing but sharp edges on his face, even his hair was nowhere to be seen as he had a cleanly shaven face and a shining bald head. This man was known as Themys.
Finally, the Soul Body Faction was actually ruled by Aantha's father and Rogryll's blood brother, Iarhorn. He was a man with a mischievous glint in his eyes, much like his daughter. And what was especially off putting about this was the fact he looked exactly like the always stoic Rogryll with the exception of the latter's blood red eyes.
Currently, all four factions were present, along with even their juniors. Originally, they had been here to check on the situation in the mountain range. After all, they could all sense the commotion on the outside and they wanted to see if they would have to change their plans or not. What they hadn't expected was for Ryu to suddenly appear and for Mae to insist on her father going out to get him.
This changed a situation from an extremely serious one, to one of testing a potential son-in-law.
Regardless of Mae's words, it seemed that many hadn't simply accepted Ryu with wide open arms, and that was because too many of these factions had been eyeing Mae, there were even young geniuses present who, despite thei desires, hadn't lost their virginities yet because they were saving it for Mae in specific.
It had to be remembered that the Dream Asura Race was quite special, and that was doubly so for Soul Fire Faction women. One had to reach an exceptionally high standard in order to have more than one wife, because if you took more than on Primordial Yin and couldn't handle it, your only path forward would be death. Then you would not only waste your women's most precious thing, but you would also lose the Dream Asura Race genius.
Due to this, and to avoid any complications, many of the young men that were chasing after Mae were still virgins to this day. This was already extremely difficult for normal young men, let alone young men of the Dream Asura who had far higher sexual desires than young men of other races. There were even some that went so far as to take artificial castration pills so as not to fall victim to temptation early.
And then, all of a sudden, Aantha came back having claimed to already have a husband.
How were they supposed to take this lying down, exactly?
Behind Balreak of the Soul Wind Faction, an extremely handsome young man stood in silence, his hands clasped behind his back. He had a pale pale and almost green complexion like his father, but that faint, alien-like glow only added to his charm. However, this charm was somewhat ruined by his sunken eyes and unpleasant mood.
This was Caijor, the current highest potential Soul Wind Faction youth.
The sorrow of his gaze was intense as Ryu's foot landed on the step. He watched in silence, no other emotions present on his face aside from this all pervading gloominess.
And then, Ryu froze.
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