Chapter 941: Training and Reward from thesuccubus
Chapter 941: Training and Reward from thesuccubus
Human beings, and perhaps all beings with intelligence and self-awareness in this universe, used to think with arrogance and narcissism that their lives were miserable at the slightest difficulty. However, how many of them actually sat down and thought carefully about whether their lives were as miserable as they believed?
It would only take a second of opening their eyes and looking at their surroundings to realize that their lives were luxuries that countless dreamed of having while wallowing in true despair.
Evangeline's past was by far one of the saddest and most tragic that Bai Zemin knew of if not the saddest of all.
She had lost everything, absolutely everything when she was but a five-year-old girl. At the age when she should have been enjoying laughter and playing with her elementary school friends as well as the hugs and affection of her parents, she was being trained to become a killing machine after fate took everything from her except her life.
Trying to put himself in her shoes, Bai Zemin didn't have to be in that situation for more than a few seconds in his imagination to realize that if it were him he definitely wouldn't have been able to continue on.
Bai Zemin looked at the girl in front of him with a complicated expression, but he didn't dare to look at her with pity. Giving a pitying glance to a woman like Evangeline that had fought with everything she had and gritted her teeth enduring not only physical pain but also emotional and mental pain would be disrespectful to her determination.
"If your- If this woman named Khristina is still alive then you can do whatever you want with her." Bai Zemin said as he looked into her eyes.
"Even if she is an innocent woman who has helped many people in the apocalypse?" Evangeline stared at him as she asked indifferently.
She knew the rules of the faction well, and especially the rules of Bai Zemin; Evangeline didn't believe that he would break those rules just like that. However, she clearly didn't know him well enough.
"The so-called justice is nothing but an illusion created by us humans. So-called justice is nothing but a form of revenge covered by a word more pleasing to the ears." Bai Zemin said in a cold voice.
When someone murdered, they were sent to prison as punishment; this was the revenge that society imposed on the murderer. Justice was born out of the pain of someone who suffered some kind of physical or non-physical harm from another, and it was that pain that gave birth to vengeance that could be carried out by the victim, a family member, a friend, or the laws.
He continued, "Laws exist to maintain order, and if preferable I naturally hope that the rules we set will not be broken. However, there are always exceptions."
"Am I an exception?" Evangeline asked.
"You are an important person to me." Bai Zemin nodded and said in a serious voice, "Besides, betrayal in our faction is punishable through death. Since this woman named Khristina betrayed you then she deserves death even if she was one of the most devout angels of the god of heaven."
Evangeline's mouth opened slightly and for an instant, Bai Zemin thought he saw her lips curve upward slightly in what appeared to be an amused smile. However, this seemed no more than an illusion since when he blinked and looked at her again all he saw was indifference.
"Even if back then our faction didn't exist and I wasn't a part of it?" She raised an eyebrow and looked at him doubtfully.
Bai Zemin waved his hand and said as if it was obvious, "From the moment you were born you were destined to become a soul evolver of this faction and be my Loyal Follower. Everyone who hurt you in the past must naturally pay for messing with a destined member of my faction."
Evangeline stared at him for a few seconds. Her eyes glinted peculiarly before she closed them and shook her head.
"I knew it."
"What did you know?" Bai Zemin asked startled.
She opened her eyes and said indifferently, "You're out of your mind."
"... Well, sorry for being out of my mind." Bai Zemin rolled his eyes.
...
During the approximately 5-hour flight, Bai Zemin stayed in the Collector's Pocket World after sending Evangeline back to the outside world at her request.
He walked away from the place where he had planned to build his shelter and thereafter began to train fiercely with the whip.
The explosions from each swing of his arms as the tip of the whip reached the limit and then was abruptly retracted after hitting the void formed cannons of air that flew everywhere and caused no small level of destruction causing the accumulation to worsen the scene even more.
While accompanying him in his training for more than 40 hours straight, Lilith could not help but notice the speed of his improvement increasing more and more with each swing of the golden whip in his right hand.
Of course, the training was not just about swinging and hitting the air stupidly, and it was thanks to Lilith that Bai Zemin's training progressed so smoothly at astonishing speeds.
He was very surprised when he saw her point to a spot in the distance and an instant later several finger-sized targets formed floating in the sky.
"Ice?" Bai Zemin blinked in surprise when he realized that those black objects were actually small fragments of ice.
"Lilith, you have the skill Ice Maker just like Bing Xue?"
This was the first time Bai Zemin had seen Lilith use this skill. In fact, the only time he had seen her use her powers was on the bridge after her return to Earth when she controlled several sea plants to annoy Shangguan Bing Xue.
"It's something like that." Lilith chuckled and slowly replied, "Except my skill is slightly different."
"... I see." Bai Zemin nodded with a thoughtful expression on his face.
Lilith smiled at this and after a moment of silence pointed to the targets in the distance as she calmly said, "Zemin, try to hit them all using your whip. With your current level it would be a waste of time to do it while you are motionless so move as fast as you can while trying to hit the ice pieces, I will move them through the air so it will be even harder for you."
Soon, explosions louder than before began to echo in the Collector's Pocket World, and as Bai Zemin used all of his Agility to move around while waving his whip he found that while the difficulty was undoubtedly great since Lilith was also moving the targets, it was not something impossible to do even if there were certain occasional misses.
Bai Zemin was preparing to strike again with his whip when his expression changed slightly and out of pure instinct, he leaned his body back just in time to feel a gust of cold wind passing inches above his body.
Boom!!!
His eyes widened and his movements stopped as he saw a large patch of night-black ice forming a short distance away, freezing everything around and releasing a mist that Bai Zemin felt chilling even from his position.
"You don't have time to stop and be surprised!"
Bai Zemin's expression changed slightly again when he heard Lilith's voice and he quickly turned on his heels. He stomped on the ground hard and turned into a human cannonball, dodging the second attack but with no time to feel joy as more and more were coming from everywhere.
"Hey, are you crazy?!" Bai Zemin shouted angrily and worriedly as he moved in irregular patterns with surprising maneuvers that allowed him to narrowly dodge the hundreds of black ice swords slashing at him from all directions.
Lilith remained standing in the middle of the ice objectives with a faint smile as she watched Bai Zemin move all over the area. Ice swords formed above her head and her ruby-colored eyes took on a strange light that seemed to control the swords to attack him.
"Don't worry, the Soul Record will not punish me in this world." She said calmly and with the demeanor of a goddess as her dark hair swayed gently each time a sword or more passed by her.
"What? How can you be so sure?!" Bai Zemin shouted still worried as he struggled to dodge the attacks that kept coming.
"You silly boy, did you forget that in order to enter this world people cannot have any ill will towards you? The Soul Record surely knows that so it's okay if I attack you a little." Lilith replied with a slight smile. After a brief pause, her eyes flashed and she added in a not-so-friendly voice, "While my attacks certainly won't cause you serious injury let alone kill you, they will certainly hurt... Strive to dodge them all as you break these ice shards around me."
Bai Zemin sighed a sigh of relief in his heart when he heard Lilith's reasoning. As long as she wasn't punished by the Soul Record then all was well.
Now calmer, he couldn't help but grit his teeth at her last words.
"You're fucking crazy!"
"Hahaha, thank you!"
"I wasn't praising you!"
"Stop crying and focus, more attacks are coming now!"
"You- Damn it! See if I don't leave your butt red as an apple when I catch you!"
"This big sister will give you a juicy reward later if you manage to break all these fragments before it's time to go... A reward in bed, that's it~"
Bai Zemin gritted his teeth and tried to find a pattern in the ice swords but after a minute or two he gave up when he realized that Lilith's attacks were simply irregular and without any chain linking them together.
Although he could use his Blood Manipulation skill to forge weapons and block the ice swords or use Gravity Manipulation to misdirect their course, the intention of this training was to improve his reaction, reflexes, speed, and of course, the main goal; to improve his whip control.
BOOM! BOOM!!! BOOM!!! BOOM!!!...
The explosions echoed terrifyingly for more than 40 hours.
40 hours later, the scene was a disaster, to say the least.
The beautiful green meadow had disappeared along with the trees and was replaced by a world of dark ice with craters of at least 20 meters in diameter everywhere. Although the ice was as black as night, the mist was white and now floated around making the sun's rays sparkle like diamonds every time it passed through an icy molecule.
The sound of Lilith's footsteps was accompanied by Bai Zemin's heavy breathing, and when she stopped a step away and saw him panting with sweat covering his entire body, she couldn't help but let out a chuckle.
"Not bad, little brother. Hehe... even though it took you time, you managed to break all the ice fragments even under such circumstances. Not bad, not bad at all."
Bai Zemin opened his mouth with the intention of cursing her a little but he didn't even have the strength for that.
Even with his monstrously high Stamina, it had been far from easy to dodge hundreds of attacks that moved at least two or three times faster than a bullet while attacking tiny distant objects that moved nonstop. After 40 hours of great effort, he managed to destroy the targets but his Stamina had worn out and dropped below 90%.
Lilith looked at the parts of his armor that had layers of black frost and said calmly: "Even though you were hit more than 40 times, I have to admit that it is less than I expected. Besides, the cloak on your back weakened the power of my ice swords so the pain you suffered was surely less than what you should have."
Bai Zemin rolled his eyes and in his heart vowed revenge later when he recovered.
Lilith smiled warmly and carefully helped him to his feet.
"I think someone deserves a good rest, nu?"
As Bai Zemin walked being supported by Lilith, he couldn't help but ask once he regained enough breath, "What about my reward?"
"..." Lilith looked at him a bit speechless before looking straight ahead again, putting on a mischievous smile and licking her lips, "Relax, Daddy Zemin. This little sister of yours will keep her word."
Lilith really kept her word, and thanks to the care of her body, Bai Zemin was able to sleep like a baby after releasing a different kind of burden more than 5 times without holding back at all.
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