Chapter 622: It’s A Little Different
Eris laid her hands on top of Laz’s as he asked. With his eyes closed, Eris thought that he couldn’t see the blush on her cheeks, but of course he noticed and chose to ignore it. As for why she didn’t blush when she had revealed herself to him, that was something she had gotten over a long time ago thanks to her situation.
"Now... breath with me. We are going to do a part of something to see if it will work. I did this with the other’s as well and I’ve yet to encounter a case where it doesn’t work, but I don’t like to take unnecessary chances either. So relax yourself and allow my energy to flow through back and forth between the two of us," Laz said, allowing some of his energy to flow into her from his hands.
Laz had done this several times before and had never encountered any resistance before, but for the first time, there was some problems with it entering Eris’ body. Like electricity, it was rather shocking for both of them until it became painful.
Laz pulled back a little as did Eris.
"Well this is new," Laz said, looking at his hands. Eris was breathing a bit heavy as well, the pain from Laz’s energy fading slowly.
"That fucking hurt," Eris said, regaining her voice.
"I’m aware. Which is strange, all things considered," Laz responded, thinking about it.
"I’m not going to do this if it’s just going to hurt," Eris shot back, getting annoyed.
"I wouldn’t waste my time if it was just going to hurt you and not lead you anywhere. The real question is why? You’ve obviously reached this stage of the void Emperor realm and are at the threshold of having created your god seed. So how is it that your body would reject energy that is beneficial to your life force? Doesn’t exactly make sense now does it?" Laz said, looking at the girl in front of him.
Laz wanted to make absolutely sure this was the right way of going about this before they went any further for more than just the reason he gave and a very important one at that. While Laz didn’t exactly have a type he preferred over another, body wise, there were some things that Laz felt were a definite turn off. And in Eris’ case, Laz would have been hard pressed to find himself aroused by her. Sure, she had a slim body, but that was about it. Everything else, despite her age being in the hundreds, screamed ’young child." Sure, Maya in the past was the same height, but her body was well developed in other ways so that no one would even bother to question her age.
Eris, however, had pretty much nothing going for her in that department. Instead, she was flat as a board with almost no curves to speak of. Instead, she was rather stick thin with the wings being the only feature about her that stood out. Since Laz had been around many women who’s power stemmed from their bloodlines, this was the first time he had ever seen one who’s body was as unremarkable as Eris’. Even if they didn’t get massive breasts, plump butts and skinny waists, their bodies would have good definition as such was a result of nature strength.
Laz used his Heaven’s gaze skill to look deep at Eris’ body looking over every inch of her injured self to see if the issue came from that, but her body seemed fine for the most part. The path’s that a normal body would have all around them to circulate energy seemed smaller than normal for someone in her realm, but that wasn’t something that would cause this problem. Since that was the only lead Laz had, he reached out for her hand.
"Please hold my hand one more time," Laz asked, his golden gaze striking a weird feeling into Eris. She didn’t deny him even knowing it might hurt and stretched out her hand. Laz held it gently but turned it over, wanted to see the very tips of her fingers.
For Eris, the strange embarrassment she had felt before came to her again, making her want to pull back. She had to struggle with her own instincts for several minutes until she fought back that feeling and let Laz look as much as she wanted.
She had never let a man touch her ever since she was almost defiled once when she was younger.
Laz looked deep before he saw the problem. An energy channel for an infected like themselves usually was always a healthy purple color, beaming with the life force of the person. But Eris’ paths were all greenish and weak, almost to the point of collapse. In fact, in a few years, they might have just failed all together causing a massive seizure within the girl. Even if she lived she would have been crippled the rest of her life. In contrast, the energy of her wings were amazing. They seemed so healthy and full of life that it was unreal they were attached to someone so weak and brittle.
That’s when Laz’s knowledgeable eyes caught sight of the rune hidden deeply within the each wing, blanketed by the immense energy contained within them.
"Isa huh? And Jera? What an interesting way of combining them..." Laz said out loud, to a surprised Eris.
"What do you mean?" Eris asked.
"Just wondering... did you require more energy than others... just to get to the level you are at?"
"I... uh..." Eris didn’t know how to respond since this had always been her greatest embarrassment.
"I’ll take that as a yes then," Laz said, but Eris immediately lashed back.
"I know I’m stupid ok. I don’t need some fuck boy to tell me that too, OK?" Obviously she felt that Laz was picking at the wound and reacted the way she always would. She tried to pull her hand back, but found Laz’s hand like an iron vice, not letting go.
"I’m not insulting you in the slightest. I was just curious. It has nothing to do with your ability to learn. In fact, considering the circumstances, the fact that you made it to this level at all is a testament to how smart and strong you are."
"I don’t... I don’t know what you mean...."
"Your wings... they have been sucking up pretty much all of the energy that your body has been taking in over the years, but not by their own accord. They are still a part of your body and something you control. But someone did something to them with the runes that basically channeled all of your energy into your wings, as though wanting to store them there for some reason. All of these years you’ve been training and cultivating for has been you stealing the energy that was being drawn into your wings. I can’t say why they did it, but i can say that due to the difficultly that this caused your body, it seems like your energy channels are blocked to the point of almost dying out. And if that were to happen..."
"I’d become a crippled with nothing but bright, shiny black wings..."
"Pretty much yeah."
"I... I can’t.... they won’t even let me live.... not even that...." Eris started crying the years of neglect and torment catching up all at once.
"Look. You can cry all you want... but that won’t solve anything."
"THEN WHAT THE HELL SHOULD I DO?" Eris yelled, her anger directing itself at the only source available.
"Break free from these restrictions, get stronger and take your revenge? How’s that sound?" Laz replied with a bit of a smile on his face, as though this were the only answer.
"YEAH? HOW?"
"By experiencing pain. A lot of pain in fact. But that pain... that can lead you to your revenge, if you wish for it?"
Eris didn’t respond right away, looking at Laz’s face instead. Several quiet moments passed before Eris answered.
"I’m making a deal with the devil?"
"As long as the devil grants all your wishes, can he really be considered the devil?"
"Depends on the price."
"Just your soul. Nothing more, nothing less," Laz said with a smile. He was joking, not even realizing how serious Eris was at the moment.
She once again sat across from him, but Laz shook his head.
"On the table," Laz said, pointing to a coffee table sized table that was next to a couple chairs in Aphrodite’s parlor.
"I uh..."
"This is not only going to hurt, but it will hurt all over. I need to be able to access your entire body if I am to make this work," Laz responded, standing up.
Eris took a seat on the table and looked at Laz, her wings draped behind her.
"Laz down on your stomach and spread your wings as far away from the table as possible. That’s it. This is going to hurt.... real bad. You know that right?" Laz said, thinking about what’s to come. Reenforcing and strengthening energy pathways and blood vessels was something he had a lot of experience with. But that was with those whose pathways were already healthy. Eris’ were almost dead so the amount of reconstruction they would need to go through was many times harder.
"You know my sister...the one who made herself look like a young girl?"
"Yeah. She was just in here recently..." Laz said, remembering the muse he had seen.
"Her husband’s a bastard. Like a real bastard. He’s been obsessed with me for a long time now, ever since I was young. One day, when his wife was out of town doing her duties with the other muses, he somehow got me alone and tried to rape me. If it wasn’t for one of my maids being close by and calling for help, he would have succeeded. But because she was able to draw over help, he took out his revenge on her and killed her not even a day later. On top of that, he ended up blaming me for being the one to seduce him and then saying I killed my own maid to silence her accusations. Since I was still young and he was a respected member of the military, I wasn’t believed no matter how I tried to deny it. The wives of some of his brother’s found me and whipped me and beat me, again and again, yelling at me things like, "How dare you try to take advantage of our husbands," or "Why would a real man find something as ugly as you to be attractive?" Even when I was saved from their attacks, they blamed everything on me again and then kept finding me, over and over again. Once my sister came back... she called them off and forbid them from doing this ever again. As she was the one who would have been the most hurt by my actions, they listened and relented. She was always a kind soul, but even then I don’t know if she believed anything I told her. After that, I started hating everyone... but never her.... And when she came last night and told me there might be someone who could help me... that’s when I knew that she did believe me... So even before I walked in here, I planned to do whatever it took to get strong. Ever since that bastard tried to rape me, I’ve hidden myself away in my rooms and the few sister’s rooms I am on good terms with. But I’m tired of hiding. So I don’t care. Even if I die today... I don’t care. If there is the slightest chance this will work, then do whatever you want with me. I’ll sell my soul. But I promised I would kill that bastard with my own hands those many years ago. So that’s what I want. Make this wish come true.... and I’m yours," Eris said, looking up at Laz’s tall form before laying down on the table, ready for him.
"So be it. One soul... in exchange for half the world. Order coming right up," Laz laughed, way more evilly that he had desired before taking a deep breath and starting his work.
