Broken paths

Seth just laughed lightly and continued hugging Pearl. “How was it? Your time with Sun. Did he tell you the truth?”

The sudden question caught Pearl unprepared, and she nodded subtly in his arms. “I understand why you sent me to him. It only happened a few years back, but yes, he did tell me.”

“I couldn’t believe he was the one who had saved the horrors of the world from extinction… sigh.”

Seth sighed, “That’s what happens when your honor gets polluted by other feelings. That’s also why I was never happy with you starting to bear thoughts of becoming something more than a knight after you insisted on taking your vow.”

“Sun had set a precedent, and the code of honor your family lives by traces back to his; it was just that time had allowed that code to change.”

“When Sun had created the code, he had said that a true knight should know no feelings other than knighthood. A lord’s will was his command, but it always came second to the good of the knight and the people the lord had under his rule.”

“A lord who orders a knight to do something that would hurt the people or the knight himself was not worthy of that knight’s service.”

“Knights were at the start an eared position, not hereditary. With knights not allowed to form families until their retirement, most ended up not having one at all.”

“The Valdez family wouldn’t be a family now if they respected that code to the letter, so they brought alterations to it with time. They started having families and experienced love, all in the name of birthing successors to the role of Royal Knights.”

“To not make the king afraid they would one day put that family above them, they also changed their vows to ones of complete devotion. This turned the noble meaning of a knight into a servant of the king in question.”

“Your family was also not the only one; the same thing happened in most kingdoms throughout the continent. Only a single kingdom still carries the original knight vow and code, the Sun Kingdom.”

“The kingdom might have turned on Sun due to their fear of his unnatural lifespan, but his teachings were deeply engraved in their people’s hearts. They had rejected going after ascended knowledge, focusing on keeping their distance from the neighboring kingdoms.”

“Sun’s presence and ties to the Council also served as a deterrent for any other kingdom trying to invade. That’s also one reason the Sun Kingdom continued to be peaceful as the rest of the continent was plagued by war.”

“You could never be a true knight and a lover to your liege. Those were the teachings Sun had learned by paying with his conscience and the fate of the human race.”

Pearl listened to Seth’s words before lifting her eyes from his chest and asking, “And where does that leave us?”

The nervousness in her eyes made Seth chuckle as he replied, “Wherever you want us to be. I have already released you from your vow, and the decision on how you want your life from now on is up to you.”

The arms around Seth’s waist tightened as Pearl asked, “What if I don’t want to be a knight? What if I want to have what the others have?”

“Do you even have to ask? You were one of my earliest students and one of my most treasured ones. Whatever you want, I shall give it to you.”

Pearl nodded with a subtle smile spreading on her lips, burying her head in Seth’s chest. “You already know what I want.”

Despite knowing Pearl was probably expectant of their first time together, at least in that timeline, Seth still had things to do, so he softly said, “Alright, but it will have to wait until I put some other things in order. Don’t worry; I won’t keep you waiting much longer.”

After a short nod from Pearl and the two breaking their hug, Seth kissed the shy Pearl’s lips and disappeared before her eyes, teleporting away.

“He does like to do that…” muttered Pearl after some time, giggling to herself while heading through the balcony doors.

After parting with Pearl, Seth teleported to one of the few buildings that remained humble between the large numbers of skyscrapers in the city. A relatively small house right next to the imperial quarters.

Taking a deep breath, Seth pushed open the door and stepped inside, walking the surprisingly clean paved path straight to the front door. There, he pushed open the door and stepped inside.

The inside of the house was just as clean as the outside, and Seth took his time, walking from one room to another, pausing briefly in each one of them. Even after going through each room, Seth had not met a single person and eventually made his way to the garden in the backyard.

At the deepest parts of the garden, two large black gravestones were placed, with the names Hilda and Nash written in bright golden colors on them.

A shiver passed through Seth’s spine as he read the two names and came to kneel before the two, his head humbly lowered.

He regretted not being there to accompany his parents during their last years in the world, and no matter how much he wanted to get a time divinity and bring them back, he knew that would go against their wishes.

Moving his hand to touch the gravestone carrying his mother’s name, Seth muttered to himself, “I’m sorry, mother. You two were one of the reasons I came back, but in the end, I still made many mistakes despite having all that knowledge.”

“I pray the Spirit Well will treat your soul kindly, and I hope you will find it in your heart to forgive your son for once again failing to show you the love you deserved.”

He then moved his hands to his father’s gravestone and spoke again, “As for you, old man. Thanks for always taking care of mother and me. We were not the easiest to manage, but you can rest knowing you did a good job. Please continue watching over mother even in the Spirit Well.”

<Seth, there’s something I have to tell you.>

‘Hm?’ asked Seth with a frown

After a long break, a new notification appeared in his vision, <Nothing. I’m sorry to have bothered you.>

Seth’s eyebrow rose, and he asked: ‘That was strange. Are you alright?’

<Affirmative. You should hurry and check on Katy so we can ascertain her condition properly.>

Seth nodded suspiciously before saying goodbye to his parents and standing back up.

‘Remember me to have Henri teleport the entire house back to our village and create a complete replica here instead. They would have liked it if their bodies rested with the rest of our family.’

<Affirmative.>

After visiting his parents’ graves, Seth teleported again, this time arriving deep under the capital, in the same house where his seclusion had occurred.

A pink-colored energy cocoon covered Katy’s body in a simple room as she lay asleep. Without a word, Seth approached the cocoon and placed a hand atop it.

‘Do you have any idea why this happened?’

<Affirmative. Its source appears to be the lust existence inside her womb. Disturbing it would probably have adverse effects, so I would recommend against it.>

Seth nodded, already knowing what was happening when Dream showed him the state of Katy’s body. Using his lust energy to probe around the cocoon, he could feel that she and the baby inside her appeared alright, their souls fluctuating even in their unconsciousness.

“I don’t know what’s happening, but I trust you, Lust… She better be alright,” muttered Seth with a sigh, standing up and kissing the cocoon before disappearing again.

Having visited his parents’ graves and Katy, Seth had only one thing to take care of. After asking Maya a few questions, Seth teleported again, reaching his final destination.

Looking at the tall apartment building in front of him, Seth moved to the front door and pressed the button with the number 13 written on it.

After a few seconds, a pleasant voice came from the intercom: “Yes?”

“It’s me. Mind if I come in?”

The speaker on the other side of the intercom fell silent for some time, the silence being eventually broken by the sound of the entrance door opening.

Seth ignored the opened door and teleported straight to the first floor, in front of door 13.

Moments later, the door opened, and Lisa appeared in the door frame with a conflicted expression.

“You have returned,” exclaimed Lisa, moving to the side to invite Seth into her apartment.

Seth nodded, walking through the open door and looking around the simple apartment. The place was relatively modest and only had a large room with a bed, a desk, and a small library.

“I don’t usually get visitors here, so I don’t have a sofa or table for us to sit at. Mind if we sit on the bed instead?” asked Lisa after closing the door behind Seth.

With Seth’s agreement, the two sat down on the bed, a small distance between them, and Lisa asked with her head lowered: “Why did you come here?”

With time and everything that had happened, one would have expected that Lisa’s anger would have died down after all that time, but Seth could still see black traces clouding her aura even now.

Seth sighed and rested his hands on the bed, looking towards the ceiling. “I don’t even know where to start….”

“At the beginning?” asked Lisa.

“I guess that’s a good starting point, but I need to ask. What about your parents? Where are they?”

Lisa lowered her head as she replied, “Oath. After you took over Oath and the situation stabilized, it wasn’t long until they decided they wanted to return there.”

“And you agreed?”

“They already moved here because of me, and I didn’t want to impose on them any more than I already did. Also, I can easily visit them with my space source, so there wasn’t any real reason to ask them to remain here.”

“I see…” Seth remembered the promise his other self had made to Julie, which was why he was there in the first place. With his plan of gathering all the divinities to his side, Seth knew he had to break many hearts, but Lisa and Julie probably would bear the brunt of it all.

With Lisa looking at him inquisitively, Seth began telling her about the other timeline and his other self’s life there.

Since Maya kept both the ascended and the general population in the dark about the whole situation, Seth’s continued speaking for a few hours, ensuring Lisa was up to speed with everything between the different timelines.

By the end, Lisa was utterly shocked by what she was hearing, not knowing how to react.

In the other timeline, she discovered that Seth had killed her father and used his perfect body control to convince her and her mother he had left. Not only that, but he had also slept with her mother.

“Why? Why would you do all that? Why are you telling me all this?” asked Lisa, her calm facade breaking apart and appearing utterly disgusted by what she had heard.

“Because he was not exactly me… having only a destruction source and his divinity residing inside his soul, his mind was already polluted by destruction, barely allowing him to push on while focusing on his main goal.”

“I don’t ask you to forgive or understand him, but he didn’t have his other sources to try and form a balance. He has destroyed everything that stood in his way to the peak. I already hurt your father, and my situation was much more stable than his….”

“As for why I came to tell you this… I plan on keeping the promise the other me made to your mother...”

Lisa’s energy erupted when she heard Seth’s words, covering the apartment in a dark mist.

“Don’t you dare!” exploded Lisa, her eyes turning black as the fog started converging toward Seth.

“Do we have to do it like this?” asked Seth, teleporting away from the bed and standing opposite Lisa with a wry smile.