After A Billion-Year Torture, I Returned As A Transcendent Player

Chapter 71: Life Would Be Boring Otherwise

Aidan cut the call and turned back toward the dimension, all the noon laziness gone out of his stride.

"Jovan and Arthur, you both stay here and guard the dimension and Solenne. I’ll go make a quick trip back to Earth with Tom."

[Arthur: Got it. Nobody touches the house.]

[Jovan: Fortune says to keep your temper on a leash out there.]

’Fortune can mind its own business, but yeah. I am not planning to turn my planet into hell.’

Tom hopped onto his shoulder, and space folded around them both.

Space-Time Nexus swallowed distance the way Arthur swallowed food, whole and without ceremony. The world blinked twice, stars smearing past somewhere that wasn’t quite anywhere, and then solid ground pressed up under Aidan’s boots again, and the air tasted like home.

Earth.

He let the Garen mask dissolve entirely, white hair and his own face settling back into place.

’If this goes bad, it goes bad on my name, not Garen’s.’ He rolled his shoulders. ’Garen still has tournaments to win and a Divine-rank master to hide behind. Aidan is just some guy. Some guy can afford enemies.’

He pulled up the public news feed on his Digicard, and the story was everywhere before he even finished typing.

The Grand Wedding of Young Master Ruvel Desmeral.

’Desmeral.’ Aidan’s eyes narrowed slowly. ’Now, where have I heard that name before?’

The Desmeral Family. An off-world power of the Cloud Whirl Alliance with two Divine-rank Hunters in the house, the same family whose thigh the Wolfshadow Clan had been hugging on Hunter’s Shack Three, and apparently their young master had decided to roam the new planet that joined the alliance and collect women, as well as holding a wedding as Earth made a scenic backdrop for marriage.

The names of brides weren’t listed anywhere. The venue was. An island off the coast near City B, open invitation, all welcome to come witness the union.

’All welcome.’ Aidan pocketed the card. ’Well. Since they insist.’

...

The island announced itself long before the shore did.

A countdown burned in the sky above it, numbers of golden light a hundred meters tall, ticking down with slow ceremony. Fourteen hours until the wedding began.

And beneath the countdown, rising off the island’s heart like a grown thing rather than a built one, stood a palace of pure crystal, every wall and spire refracting the afternoon sun into a thousand lazy rainbows.

’That’s not architecture. That’s someone’s talent, shaped and left standing.’ Aidan studied it as the ferry of gawking visitors carried him closer. ’Money buys builders. This is showing off something money can’t buy.’

[Tom: Humph, quite an escort for this dick-brained brat. There are five peak Legendary-rank guards around that exotic crystal palace. I’ve tracked Beatrix’s thread. She is there.]

’Good. Then so am I.’

He walked up the crystal steps like a man with an invitation, and when the guards at the gate moved to stop him, he let his concealed pressure read as exactly Tier-10, a solid, unremarkable SSS-rank Hunter, the kind worth noting and not worth fearing.

"I’m Beatrix’s nephew," he said simply. "Family of the bride. I’d like to see my aunt."

The two gate guards exchanged a look he wasn’t supposed to catch, something quick and amused and faintly cruel, and one of them smiled with too many teeth.

"Of course," the guard said. "Family of the bride. Right this way."

’That’s the smile of a man delivering meat, not a guest.’ Aidan followed anyway, hands loose in his pockets. ’Lead on, then.’

They didn’t take him to Beatrix.

They took him deep into the palace instead, through crystal halls that grew warmer and wetter the further they went, until wide doors opened onto a bathing hall of steam and pale light, and the smell of perfumed water rolled over him.

A wide pool took up the center of the hall. Young Master Ruvel Desmeral lounged in the middle of it, dark hair slicked back, wine in one hand, four unclothed women arranged around him like furniture he’d gotten bored with.

His other hand grabbed the melons, and one woman was submerged, her head at his crotch.

Ruval Desmeral looked up at Aidan with the flat, appraising boredom of a man pricing livestock.

"So you are that feisty bitch’s nephew?" Ruvel swirled his wine once. "Well, whatever. I couldn’t find any of her relatives to threaten her with. But with you, I suppose she will obediently marry on the stage, right?"

He licked his lips, slow and deliberate.

"I can’t wait to eat her."

Something ancient and very cold turned over in Aidan’s chest, and he breathed it down with the ease of a billion years of practice.

’Easy.’ He kept his face blank, confused, a little scared, exactly what a Tier-10 nephew should look like. ’Not yet. Gotta get Beatrix first.’

Then the pressure came down.

Ruvel flexed nothing more than his intent, and the weight of it slammed into Aidan like a falling wall. A real Tier-10 Hunter would have had no answer for it at all, so Aidan gave it none, letting his knees buckle and his body crash face-first into the crystal floor with a crack that echoed through the steam.

He lay there, cheek pressed to warm crystal, and made himself tremble.

’That’s right. Look at the helpless little hostage.’ Behind his lowered eyes, something patient began to smile. ’Enjoy the show while it’s still yours.’

Ruvel laughed, short and satisfied, and waved his wine hand at the guards.

"Bring her here. Let’s see if she cares for this pretty nephew of hers or not."

The doors opened again a few minutes later, and Beatrix walked in, flanked by two guards.

She wore a bridal gown someone else had chosen for her, white and gold and heavy, and she carried herself with her chin up out of pure spite. But her eyes gave it away, worn down to something desperate, a thin ring of despair pressed flat under all that stubbornness.

Then those eyes found the young man kneeling on the crystal floor, and everything in them changed.

The despair cracked. Light flickered up through it, disbelief first, then hope, then a relief so sharp it looked like it hurt.

Aidan didn’t lift his head. He just wove a thread of Magic Whisper through the steam, sending his voice into her ears alone.

[Aidan: Seems you got yourself into a hot mess.]

Beatrix’s eyes looked as though they were about to tear, but her face bloomed into a relieved smile.

[Beatrix: Thank you for coming.]

[Aidan: You thought I wouldn’t?]

[Beatrix: I had a feeling you would.]

On his shoulder, unseen and unheard by anyone else, Tom quietly sighed.

’Master. I can’t imagine it just yet, but I can feel it in your depth how much human connections have hurt you in those over a billion years of torture you mentioned. And yet, you still seek it.’

Aidan internally chuckled.

’Of course, buddy. Life would be boring otherwise.’

"Oi, stubborn bitch." Ruvel looked at Beatrix, his eyes filled with lust as he looked only at her body. "If you care for that dumbass over there, how about doing this without any fuss? You are coming back with me to my place, whether you like it or not. Even your death is not in your hands anymore, so get it over with."

Crrackk...

The sound was sharp and resonating, and it spread from Aidan’s position.

The floor was cracking as Aidan slowly and casually stood up, air warping around him.

"Gya, gya, gya, gya, your voice is really annoying, you know?" Aidan cracked his neck, his eyes and voice equally cold, as an icy grin spread on his face.

"It’s pissing me off."