Chapter 40: Sealing

Chapter 40: Sealing

The black figure froze in place and released the hand holding Bernadette’s neck. It seemed to be gazing at the Queen of Mysteries with nonexistent eyes.

A dry, hoarse voice then echoed within the concealed space:

“Hometown…”

There was a trace of hesitation in that voice, a trace of confusion, and a sense of seeking confirmation, as if it had come from another world.

The corrosion Bernadette had suffered vanished. Her connection with her own Sealed Artifacts was instantly restored.

Pale Death once again began making her die little by little. This helped her resist the gradual chaos of her thoughts, keeping her basically clear-headed and rational.

Just as she opened her mouth, wanting to say more, the black figure suddenly extended its hand forward again.

But this time, it was not trying to seize Bernadette’s neck. Instead, it shoved her heavily.

Accompanying that shove was the collapse of the concealed space and a voice carrying obvious pain, as though resisting something:

“Leave!”

As the voice echoed, the black figure vanished from where it stood.

The next instant, it appeared atop the central platform and sat in the enormous iron-black high-backed chair.

Two slits immediately opened on its face, as if two asymmetrical eyes had grown there.

Yet those “eyes” had no pupils. They were entirely blood-red.

Immediately afterward, a third slit opened beneath those two “eyes.” Inside it likewise filled with pure crimson light.

This finally gave the black figure a “mouth.”

Facing Bernadette, while obvious pain and resistance filled its voice, it shouted again through the surrounding air:

“Leave this place!”

After being pushed more than ten meters back, Bernadette stood firm with ease. Yet she did not follow that voice’s command and leave the Black Emperor’s mausoleum. She remained standing there, staring blankly at the central platform, at the black figure, with sorrow she could not hide and did not wish to hide showing on her face.

She could sense it. She could already confirm it. That black figure was her father—the man who called himself Caesar, Roselle Gustav.

In the next second, even more slits opened across the black figure. They stretched from its head all the way downward, blooming into blood-red flowers at different parts of its body.

This made Roselle seem as though only a layer of shadow remained, wrapping around a mass of pure radiance and blood-red substance within.

Above the gray fog, when Klein saw this scene, he naturally thought of the red moon high in the sky.

Roselle at this moment seemed to be transforming into a shadow, trying to cover that red moon. Yet one opening after another was being torn through him, letting more and more moonlight shine into reality.

Once these openings connected, the black shadow would completely split open and give birth to an entirely new red moon.

At that time, an extremely terrifying event would inevitably occur.

Just then, Roselle’s black figure became much more illusory, as though it had turned into some kind of phantom.

This made him look as though he had been isolated in another world, with an invisible barrier between him and reality.

Then Roselle laboriously raised his shadow-like right arm and pinched his forehead.

The frequency at which blood-red slits appeared across his body instantly dropped to the lowest possible point. But the “eyes” that had already existed began blinking, again and again.

However, this did not bring any negative influence upon the surroundings. It seemed only to be a pure change in order—the tendency for blood-red slits to constantly be “newborn” had been distorted into the gradual activation of the ones that already existed.

After completing this, Roselle raised his head, looked toward Bernadette dozens of meters away, and laughed in a dry, hoarse voice.

“You really have become a major figure in the mysterious world, able to come here by yourself.

“Come over. Let me see clearly what my little…