Episode 229
The tendrils of Shub, wrapped tightly around Dale’s heart, began to stir.
Simultaneously, they reached out toward the shadow heart cast by Dale’s own. One tendril coiled around the shadow heart like a ring.
Sssshhh!
“Ugh…!”
A suffocating pressure gripped him, and blood, dark as night, spilled from his mouth.
Dale’s heart, with its six circles, cast a shadow that should also possess six circles. Together, they formed twelve circles in total.
The tendrils of Shub began to entwine the shadow heart, and the biological circles accelerated, generating a power unlike any magic Dale had ever known.
It was a power of pure darkness and shadow, not something that could be called magic. It was the primordial darkness contained within the ‘Book of the Black Goat.’
─ The world begins in darkness and ends in ice.
Shub, the ancient mother of darkness, smiled as if amused. Her words rang true.
Light was born from darkness, and as the age of fire ended, ice would mark the world’s end.
─ What do you see in the darkness, child who holds the beginning and end of the world?
Shub reached out lovingly, caressing Dale’s cheek. Despite the heart-stopping pain, Dale extended his arm.
From the shadow and darkness born of another heart, something began to emerge from his fingertips.
“This is…”
The sensation was all too familiar.
Two hearts and two thoughts coexisted within him, like light and shadow in a single vessel.
Finally, the power befitting the name ‘Shadow Lord’ began to stir within Dale.
Ignoring the pain in his heart, he reached out. The darkness swirling around the shadow heart began to take shape before him.
A Shadow Creature.
Like a child molding clay into a masterpiece, Dale began to shape the shadows into a creation of his own.
It was not a simple dark attribute creature. It was something far beyond any shadow creature Dale had ever shown before.
The darkness and shadow dancing in Dale’s hands could become anything.
The world begins in darkness and ends in ice.
At last, Dale understood the meaning of the power he possessed.
The power of creation.
The legacy of a creator.
He finally felt he had grasped the power worthy of the name ‘Shadow Lord.’
An indescribable potential and limitless possibilities filled him.
As soon as he grasped this realization, the uncontrollable power spread in all directions.
It was as if he had seized the omnipotence of a god, overwhelming his consciousness.
“Thank you, Shub.”
Yet, Dale maintained his composure and smiled quietly. Shub returned his smile in silence.
When the Shadow Lord broke free from his world and emerged, it was his mother, Elena, who greeted him.
”…Dale.”
Elena softly called his name.
“Speak, please.”
Dale replied calmly, and Elena remained silent.
“As I said, our Blue Tower will give everything we have for you.”
“As it should be.”
Dale nodded matter-of-factly at the Blue Tower Master’s words.
“But in the presence of the Lord of Truth, there’s no need for this ridiculous charade.”
”…”
“Nor is there a need to guard his side.”
Dale remained silent, and Elena smiled quietly.
“That’s why, as the Blue Tower Master, I want to give you everything I have.”
Dale momentarily held his breath at her words.
“I have no reason to refuse.”
“Good.”
Elena smiled knowingly at Dale’s response.
She reached out to him, but Dale spoke up just then.
“But it’s not worth breaking this family to gain it.”
”…”
“For Father and Lize, we need you.”
“Thank you for saying that.”
The Blue Tower Master continued.
“Don’t worry, I don’t want to break this family either. But…”
She smiled a bittersweet smile.
“The mother and wife who should be by this family’s side will be Elena, not me.”
“What do you mean…?”
“So please believe that she was a part of me too.”
Dale had no chance to respond. The Blue Tower Master reached out to touch his forehead.
“I’m grateful that my son needs me.”
Endless whispers of blue flowed into his consciousness.
Like a scene from a sci-fi movie, where a code is plugged into the neck to directly input information into the brain.
The lies and schemes woven by the Blue throughout history, and their web.
And the arcane secrets built by the one at the pinnacle of the Blue Tower.
For an ordinary person, just receiving fragments of this information would drive them mad, but it poured in relentlessly.
Yet, for the current Dale, it was not an overwhelming power.
The Blue Tower Master must have known this too.
It was finally time to pass everything on to the successor of the Blue, as a mother.
A storm of blue magic, cold enough to freeze the world, enveloped the area, and finally, the storm subsided.
“Mother…”
Dale murmured weakly.
Mother Elena smiled at him.
“What’s wrong, Dale?”
With the same loving smile as always.
Dale tried to speak but fell silent. A surge of emotion, hot and incomprehensible even to himself, welled up inside him.
He became a son who couldn’t understand his mother’s heart until the end.
He simply embraced Elena, burying his head in her chest, and began to sob quietly.
“I’m sorry, Mother.”
“Oh, what are you talking about?”
Elena tilted her head in confusion, watching Dale sob unexpectedly.
As if she truly couldn’t understand.
For she couldn’t comprehend why her usually reliable and proud son was suddenly crying like a child.
“It’s the first time I’ve seen my son cry like this.”
But there was only one thing a mother could do for her son showing vulnerability.
Elena silently embraced Dale and smiled.
Nothing had changed. Dale still had a mother he could lean on and cry to like a child.
But another mother, who loved him just as much and protected the ‘Shadow Lord’ with the Blue’s web, was no longer anywhere to be found.
Only the seventh circle etched into Dale’s heart and its shadow silently spoke of her absence.
The legacy left by the Blue Tower Master, who worried about her child until the end.
People are defined by their memories, even if those memories are synonymous with illusions.
After hearing about Elena, the Black Duke remained silent, as if he had expected it.
“It’s my fault.”
“Don’t blame yourself.”
The Black Duke shook his head at Dale’s words.
“She will still be the Elena we know.”
“But she won’t be the Blue’s shadow we knew.”
“We can’t know which side was truly her. Perhaps both were.”
The Black Duke said.
“I will simply respect her decision until the end.”
”…”
Dale nodded silently. He was right. It wasn’t something that could be changed by a few words from Dale.
“Preparations to head to the Demon Realm are complete.”
He simply had to do what needed to be done.
The Immortal Duke Frederick, founder of Saxon and leader of the Eldritch. And the one at the pinnacle of the Shadow Tower.
Facing the false king who claimed the title of another Shadow Lord.
”…I will go there with you.”
The Black Duke’s words made Dale catch his breath.
“Clearing the darkness of Saxon is not something I can ignore.”
“Understood.”
Dale nodded silently at the Black Duke’s words. One of the five great mages of the continent, standing at the pinnacle of the Black Tower. And the legacy left by the Blue’s shadow to Dale.
This was no longer an unwinnable battle. It was something Dale was meant to claim.
He was no longer the Dale who had been defeated and fallen to the Immortal Duke.
Why go to such lengths? Dale briefly asked himself. The answer was simple.
To protect what must be protected.
Even if it was filled with lies, it no longer mattered. Dale’s fight was not for ancient beliefs or dogmas of truth and falsehood, gold and shadow.
“Remember, Father.”
Dale said, his resolve firm.
“That I am your son.”
“Yes.”
The Black Duke smiled calmly at those words.
“And don’t forget that this father is by your side.”
It was a conversation like any other between father and son, yet the weight it carried was anything but ordinary.
In the shadow of the father, there was the image of a man mourning the loss of his wife, a vulnerability he never showed in front of Dale.
Without the armor of darkness to shield him, Dale could now see beyond the shadows, perceiving things he had never noticed before.
The land was a realm of swirling, icy darkness.
Amidst the barren, frozen wasteland stood a solitary, towering black spire.
The Shadow Tower.
Once defeated in the war of gold and shadows, the Shadow Lord, the Undying Frederick, had taken refuge there.
He stood at the pinnacle of the tower, surrounded by the former lords of Saxon, who knelt before him in pursuit of immortality.
“Ah, the children of Saxon are on their way.”
A boy, his eyes covered with black bandages, laughed as if delighted.
At his words, the Eldritch all knelt in unison, their shadows beginning to tremble.
“When the two children of Saxon arrive, the trial of the tower will commence,” the Undying continued.
“And whoever claims the throne of the tower in this trial will soon devour the empire of fire and light.”
No response came.
Yet, even amidst this silence, the two Saxon men were steadily drawing closer to their homeland.
The final trial was about to begin.