Chapter 828: The Saint Becomes The Saviour (Patreon)

A/N

2 chaps combined into 3k chap

As this storyline is close to finishing, and I have been building up to this moment for a long time, I don't want to rush putting out chapters. Because of this, sometimes I will be posting only a single average-sized chapter, unlike this chapter which is 2 in 1. And then after we complete this arc, I'll take a week off to recover and prepare for the next one.

Chapter 828: The Saint Becomes The Saviour

A few hours later, the monastery began to empty out.

Standing on the eastern terrace with my hands on the cold stone trail, I watched all nine hundred or so monks in grey robes walk out as though they were one being.

Usually, an occasion like this, war, involved: chanting, drums, barriers, and lots of motivational speeches. But the Stone Haven Monastery wasn’t your typical institution, it had spent the past thousand years mastering how to move without being noticed, and that was a trait they needed because they were heading to the Red Sun Academy.

The good news was that they weren’t going there to participate in the war, that would have just created a bloodbath that we didn’t need right now. The monks were pacifists by nature, so they were heading there to save as many lives as they possibly could. This wasn’t even something that I had to command them as their Saint.

Head Monk Cairan had mentioned a few days ago to me that this was a decision that the monastery had come to themselves. The reasoning was simple. The Skybound weren’t the enemy. The Lightweavers weren’t the enemy. Our enemy was the madness that ran through them. The monks that were free of this madness understood this, and their nature compelled them to save their fellow people. And the truth was we did have a chance to save these people’s minds if we were able to succeed in restoring a Golden Sun in the sky that was free from all corruption.

Though I had to admit that bringing the Stone Haven Monastery into the war would complicate matters further. As powerful as the monks were, they weren’t built for war, and they certainly weren’t as bloodthirsty as the Skybound.

For them to walk into the largest battle that this world had seen in thousands of years to try to stop the combatants from killing each other without themselves being able to use lethal force, that wasn’t going to be easy.

In fact, some would call it absurd, but I couldn’t argue with them because I thought just like them that the people of this world tainted by the madness needed saving. More importantly, I knew that this was the last loop. This meant that there was no reset waiting that would wipe away any mistakes made, that would bring back those that die. No. Everyone who died would stay dead, as was the natural order of the world.

If the monks were happy to risk their own lives to save others, who was I to try to stop them, especially since I did the same in all the worlds that I visited?

The only real thing that worried me was Hiron.

Under normal circumstances, I would never send half a dozen rank 7 cultivators anywhere near the Red Sun Academy Headmaster.

That would basically be me sending him easy picking victims for his sacrifice because from the previous loops I had learned that while that man had spent centuries laying blood jade under mortal settlements to grind thousands of ordinary people into fuel, if that didn’t work, then he had no problems using a replacement fuel.

And in this case, the replacement fuel was the spiritual foundations of powerful practitioners.

But I wasn’t sending the monks as lambs waiting to be slaughtered because Cairan was there to lead them.

From the moment the old monk had revealed his Dharma Vessel in the Hall of the Turning Wheel, I had understood that he was possibly the most powerful native of this world for however long he could maintain that technique.

However, the catch was ‘for however long’, because Cairan had been totally honest and explained that around seven minutes was the best he could do and then he’d become a very tired old man with sore knees.

But that didn’t worry me too much because Cairan wasn’t alone. The Blue Sun Academy and the Stone Haven Monastery had been allies since their founding. After all, outwardly both were factions that served the Blue Sun.

Sure, Hiron could easily kill Headmaster Monroe and even the Rank 8 time looper Kal in a one-on-one battle, but that changed when two Rank 8’s allied against him, especially when one of those Rank 8’s had an overpowered eight-armed Dharma Vessel.

Yet even then I had told Head Monk Cairan repeatedly not to underestimate the Red Sun Headmaster, we would be fools to not assume that there was more to Hiron than what he had revealed thus far.

However, we had done all we could on our side to prepare. Yes, perhaps Kal could join them and make it a three versus one battle, which I believe would guarantee that Hiron wouldn’t be able to succeed in winning.

Unfortunately, that wasn’t something that we could risk. In the last loop, Kal wasn’t present and what happened? Forget about Hiron or the Skybound, the elders of the Blue Sun Academy had descended upon us, and I didn’t have the chance to awaken the Eldest Tree.

So, for this reason, Kal had to be at the Sacred Ring because there’s no point worrying about lich-like being if we can’t first stop the main antagonist of this world – the Otherworldly Being. Which brought me to what I was doing right now, which was flying towards the Vermillion Vale.

The past few times I had made my way there, I had always had an entourage, whether that be a group of 5 Lightweavers led by a Rank 6, or by Kal himself, or I was a servant clinging onto a group, the point remained, I had others to protect me.

This time I was flying alone.

Since I was a breath away from breaking through to Rank 6 in Golden Sun cultivation, and I had a Dharma Vessel, that if I was being honest, was able to stand toe to toe with Rank 7 cultivators, I couldn’t justify to myself or anyone else that I needed a Rank 7 or 8 to take me there.

Everyone already had their own roles, and I had reached the point in cultivation where I would be the one chosen to protect someone, and not someone who needed protection themselves.

I was aware of how arrogant that sounded. I couldn’t count the number of novels I had read where the protagonist announced how confident he was, and then the chapter directly after, something removed his arm.

Which was exactly why I and Azure were both on alert throughout the whole journey, looking for any sign at all that something was about to go wrong. At least I had a powerful mount for the journey, so I wasn’t completely alone if something were to happen.

The monastery had given me her.

She was a broad grey creature with six legs, a sleek body with thick plates growing along its spine and down the outside of its shoulders in overlapping rows, and a flat, unbothered face. They called them Cliffstriders, they were basically the spiritual beast versions of horses.

“Her name is Ash,” the stable monk had told me while patting the flank. “She belonged to the Head Monk since her birth, and he’s the only one with the patience to deal with her. She can be very stubborn, but at the same time, she doesn’t fall or startle. Even if a Rank 7 dropped out of the sky in front of her, she’ll just charge through them.”

“That’s good,” I had replied, glad that she wasn’t skittish because I knew that even Rank 7 beasts still retained their animalistic instincts to flee when seeing danger.

“Good for you maybe, not for the Rank 7.”

That had earned a laugh from me.

“Da took me south once,” Tomas said, pulling me away from my thoughts. “We were on the cart for four days, and I thought that was the far edge of everything.”

“How far south did you go?”

“I’m not sure. Eighty li?”

“Well, after what happens tonight, you’ll see with your own eyes that the world is much bigger than you ever thought.”

By late afternoon the pine trees gave out, and the ground bled red, but I already knew we were in the Vermilion Vale because the air changes texture and everything just feels wrong. Azure scanned my surroundings as I ate dried apricots out of a cloth bundle Cairan had given me.

When the enormous bowl of crimson-leafed forest with the ancient stones standing around the inner ring in a circle that predates every institution on this world came into view, Tomas let out a gasp, especially when he saw the Eldest Tree.

“It’s…it’s beautiful.”

I held back a smile and didn’t reply, just giving him the time to take it in.

As Ash descended inside the sacred ring, I found four people waiting for me.

At the front was Lady Laelyn wearing the traditional saint’s garments. Beric was two steps behind her left shoulder, his right hand was already on his sword hilt, and the mark under his ear flared in anticipation as it sensed my presence. And on her right side was a white-haired young man with his hands folded, an unbothered expression on his face, but the Rank 8 aura tightly coiled around me told me how serious all of this was for him.

“You made good time,” Kal said as I slid off the saddle.

“Thanks to her,” I smiled, giving Ash a scratch under her jaw and she leaned into it hard enough that I had to shift my footing. “You all look better than the last version of this.”

“I would hope so, considering that I didn’t even exist in that version.”

Even though I knew that this was Kal’s way of joking around, I could tell that he was still haunted by the lost loop.

Before I could reply, I felt someone staring at me. It wasn’t difficult for me to know who that was. It was Elder Thorn, he was standing slightly apart from everyone else, the same as always. And he had been staring at me even before I had landed and he hadn’t blinked once.

When I finally made eye contact with him, the elder took two steps forward.

“Saint,” he whispered, and his voice broke slightly as his hands shook by his sides. “You…you’re real. The old monk wasn’t lying.”

Honestly, Elder Thorn’s reaction didn’t surprise me, and it made sense considering everything he had gone through, but I wasn’t exactly comfortable with the zealous look he was giving me like I was the answer to everything.

Sure, I’d been in a lot of uncomfortable social situations. Hell, I’d even had a talking boulder insist on being my chair. But what do you say to a Rank 7 cultivator who had spent the last few centuries murdering young saints and had also murdered me in a previous loop?

“You’ve had a lot on your shoulders,” I said. “But you’re not alone now. We’re all in this together. We just need to push a little more and everything will be over.”

“I’ll do anything for you, Saint,” he whispered. “I’ll do anything for the Golden Sun.”

Fortunately for me, Lady Laelyn saved me from thinking of a response that didn’t sound dismissive.

“When you told us you were going to the monastery,” she said, looking me up and down properly, taking in the leaves along my forearms and the ridged silver-brown skin over the backs of my hands. “I thought you meant you would sit quietly in a cold room for a month and learn some breathing exercises, I didn’t think you would come back looking like a tree man, or that you would become the Saint.”

“Neither did I,” I shrugged. “But the gong made its decision.”

“Gong?” her eyebrows scrunched together in confusion. “What’s a gong got to do with anything?”

“A lot. There’s an old prophecy, a lamp, a dead man's memories, an oath sworn with a seven-year-old. I'll tell you later when nobody is trying to end the world.” I turned to Kal and sent him a message through spiritual sense because I needed to confirm something before we continued. “Has the Blue Sun noticed that she isn't its puppet anymore?

“No,” Kal shook his head. “We were able to work out a solution that used the energy in Beric’s mark to disrupt the connection, and we used our knowledge of the previous loops to make sure that Laelyn acts exactly the way the Blue Sun would expect her to.”

I let out a breath I hadn’t even realised that I was holding.

After all, that had been the main reason why the previous loop failed. The Blue Sun had figured out that its saint was compromised, so it had to act, and it did do by bestowing its ‘blessing’ on the elders.

“Thank you,” I said to Kal and Beric.

“Don’t thank me,” Beric grumbled. “All I did was hold her hand and channeled my power when I was told to.”

“That was the most important part,” Laelyn said, rubbing his arm in a reassuring way.

“So, there are no elders heading our way right now?” I asked Kal, still feeling paranoid that something was about to go wrong.

“No,” he replied. “I can’t sense anyone a few hundred li in any direction of us. And even from here, I can sense the battle that is taking place in the Red Sun Academy.”

That was impressive. Azure had already informed me that there were no enemies near us, but he hadn’t been able to sense what was going on in the battleground. With the confirmation that I needed, I didn’t waste any time after that, I acted immediately by triggering the Blink Step rune.

The sandals that I received from the monastery skidded slightly on the earth as I appeared before the Eldest Tree. The tree was as enormous as ever, it went up to the point where it encompassed your vision completely when you stood before it.

“I’m back,” I whispered, placing my right palm on the bark. “Just like I promised I would be.”

Even though the Eldest Tree didn’t retain its memories through the loops, it was able to recognise me as someone familiar because of the Golden Sun energy running through my palm right now, and also the passive buff that I received from the Genesis Seed that gave me a passive affinity with plants.

The bark began to warm below my palm as the Eldest Tree stirred from its long slumber.

Just like last time, I opened the connection and let the Genesis Seed do its thing. The root network that ran through the entire continent flared to life as the other nine trees woke up and got to work immediately.

The barrier that protected this world from extraterrestrial threats that sought to devour it stitched itself back together like an injured wound healing. And that’s when I felt it. That overwhelming presence, it reached forward and pressed against the outside of those barriers.

Unlike last time, I could sense some urgency behind it, it knew this was its only chance. I didn’t even wait to see if it failed or not, there was no way I was going to underestimate a monster like that.

I quickly channeled everything I had into the Eldest Tree. Golden Sun energy, qi from the Genesis Seed, anything that I thought could help. The pressure reached its peak, and for a moment, I was worried it wouldn’t be enough, I was worried that I would fail yet again, but then it stopped, it actually stopped.

The barrier was sealed, and the Otherworldly Being was locked outside, but before we could celebrate, the sound came from everywhere. I didn’t even know how to describe it, it wasn’t a sound that I had heard an animal or a human produce, I didn’t even think anyone could produce such a sound.

However, I knew what it was, it was rage, pure rage that we had slammed the door on its face.

Everyone around me was forced to their knees, even Kal had fallen to one knee, but his hands were covering his ear and his face distorted into an expression of pain. Fortunately for me, I was connected to the Eldest Tree, so its protection covered me and I wasn’t affected at the least.

Just when I thought that someone was going to die, the sound cut off, and we all released a sigh of relief.

We had done it. We had stopped the Otherworldly Being after who knows how many cycles. Yet as much as I’d love to say it was finally over, it wasn’t, there was still one question left to answer, and it had something to do with the being imprisoned within the Red Sun.

Had the Head Monk and Headmaster Monroe been enough to stop Hiron, or had we underestimated him after all? I didn’t have to wait long to find out the answer because the communication talisman that Cairan had given me before we parted ways grew hot.

I pulled out the flat disc of grey stone that had a spiral cut into the face of it, the spiral was glowing pale gold, which told me that someone was trying to contact me.

“Saint?” Cairan’s voice came through. “Can you hear me?”

“Yes, I’m here,” I replied. “We did it, Cairan. We actually did it. Please tell me you have Hiron. Please tell me this is all over.”

There was a pause on the other end that lasted a fraction longer than it should have.

“That’s what I reached out to talk to you about, Saint,” Cairan sighed. “We were able to capture the Skybound elders, and those we couldn’t capture, we were able to expel from the academy’s grounds, but Hiron…he’s not here, he was never here…”

The blood went out of my face, and my eyes met Kal’s, who looked just as confused as me.

If Hiron wasn't at the Red Sun Academy, then where the hell was he?

The answer came soon enough, and it came from an agonising shriek that shook my soul bond. It was a sound I had promised myself a while ago that I would do everything I could to never hear again.

A/N

Comment below what you think is going on

Previous | Next