My Living Shadow System Devours To Make Me Stronger

Chapter 785: Chapter 786: A Man Who Has Mastered Lust

Many things cause agony. Once again, standing here, Damon’s body was in shambles. His legs trembled as if they might buckle at any moment, yet he forced them to remain locked beneath him. Blood dripped from his elbows to the floor in slow, stubborn taps, but still there was a fierce will in his eyes.

”What grave sin have I committed now...”

Damon whispered through the pain in his body. His fingers twitched uncontrollably, as if every nerve screamed.

”I have come to certain conclusions about the trial of sin. At first I thought what this trial punished was the crime linked to a sin, but after all I was wrong.”

He raised his mangled hand. Bone cracked audibly beneath torn flesh. His tongue had been shredded, and every word scraped his throat like shards of metal, but Damon endured. He had relived every lie he had ever told, and the agony clung to him like a second skin.

”I was wrong because I thought I had to be punished for my sins. What you are punishing is not the sin but the guilt.”

Raising his head, he laughed arrogantly.

The motion tore open half-healed wounds across his jaw. His broken body trembled, yet it carried his insane will.

What else could you call it but insanity. Insanity was doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome.

”I could not challenge your words, and my words and actions were an admission of guilt. This place is like a court. What is punished is guilt.”

Damon breathed heavily. Each inhalation scraped against ribs that felt splintered. His skin peeled in strips, scattered from his burns. His knees buckled, but he forced himself upright again.

”You said it yourself. Guilt is a cage.”

The Archivist was quiet, though his quill paused mid-air. He seemed impressed by Damon’s words. His voice echoed in a hiss, the sound brushing the air like parchment turning itself.

”Many brilliant men and women have stood here. Where are they now? Broken and turned into books that record their deeds.”

His quill moved slightly as if he were lost in memory. His eyes flickered with old exhaustion, the kind earned over centuries.

”Very few of them could remain lucid after going through four sins. I am impressed by the depth of your endurance, Damon the demon. However, it is pointless. Knowing will not change anything.”

The Archivist flipped the pages of the book in front of him. His long fingers stroked the spine like one might soothe a loyal pet.

”Hell is our guilt, and that deep darkness in our hearts creates a need for atonement, a desire to right our wrongs. It is a cage we cannot break free from.”

Damon was blind, his blood smeared over his eyes. Still, he could see with his shadow perception. He tilted his head, tracking the Archivist’s every movement through the shadows in the library.

”Spoken like someone with experience in guilt.”

The Archivist stilled, his motions freezing for a single breath.

”The truth shall set us free, and punishment is our door to salvation.”

Damon shook his head slowly. His neck scraped against the collar of chains, leaving a fresh line of torn skin.

”I do not think so. If I do not succeed by the last sin, I would become a book. Of that I am sure.”

The Archivist wrote slowly in the book, each stroke deliberate.

”Liberate yourself from the cage of your guilt and you shall be free, or sink into despair.”

”Many things are made dirty by guilt, and that defiles your heart much like your crime. You defile beautiful things.”

The crime of defilement, profaning what others hold sacred, bodies and places alike.

”This is the sin of lust. Lust in its broad sense. Violation, boundary breaking, taking without permission.”

The Archivist seemed disgusted by the very words he spoke. His lip curled slightly, his eyes narrowing to fine slits.

”A man who is a slave to lust is the lowest of slaves. Desire devours him, strips him of will. He thinks he is free but is chained by his own hands. The lustful are deluded into thinking themselves free. They laugh while they fall. They die when they pretend to live. A man who cannot master himself is unfit to master anything. A captive of his own weakness, his spirit decays. A man who has failed to conquer the flesh decays.”

”For your sin,” he said as an image appeared before Damon.

It was a beautiful image of a woman. She wore no clothes. Her body was pristine and lush like a flower in full bloom. Her curves, her pale skin, all enough to drive any man mad with lust.

Even the intensity of her red eyes pulled you in with the desire to ravage her.

They stood in a cave, or in this case a dungeon. The air was cold and damp, the stones wet beneath her bare feet. Here, no rules applied. It was just a man and a woman. No one to tell him he could not have his way with her.

Her breath was heavy. Her face reddened as she tried to resist the arousal caused by the aphrodisiac curse placed on her. Her hands trembled as she reached for him.

She threw herself on Damon, pushing her flesh against his own.

He stiffened at the memory, every muscle in his body recoiling despite the chains binding him.

Damon frowned, then smiled coldly. His eyes narrowed, sharpening like blades.

”Hehehehe. You can catch me with many sins and vices. Sadly, I am a bit weak in the lust department. I care less about a naked woman. And I could not agree with you more.”

Damon’s eyes were forced open as his flesh broke apart, blood spurting from the tear. His teeth clenched so hard his jaw clicked.

”How lowly and pathetic a man must be to lose himself to the flesh of a woman. How small must you be to be a slave to your lustful desire.”

The Archivist’s quill stopped mid-air. His expression shifted, not with anger but confusion. This was not what he had expected.

”I am lustful, but I am a master of my desire. If you had shown me kissing a lake of gold coins then maybe I would have felt something, but this is nothing. On that day I could have touched Abellona.”

Damon’s gaze cleared. His posture straightened despite the chains pulling at his limbs.

”I really wanted to. I wanted to. I intended to. But I would never defile a woman, not in her state of mind. I succeeded in saving her that day because I had a cure that did not demand her chastity. But even if I did not, I would very well make the choice to let her die than compromise on my ideal, letting myself carry the vile title of rapist. I would rather burn in a million hells than be among such ilk.”

He pulled the chains holding him. The links rattled violently, echoing through the library.

”Read my lips. I feel no guilt for what happened that day. And yes, I may have taken a few liberties with her, but it was necessary.”

His heart was clear, maybe more than ever. Damon did not feel guilt toward Abellona, because when push came to shove, Damon did what a lesser man could not and mastered his own lust.

He had the desire, and even to this day her body still lingered in his heart.

”The forbidden fruit you did not taste.”

”Those who are lustful deserve the punishment of the skin chapel, where all their skin will be peeled off.”

The Archivist paused as he spoke, then slowly sighed. His shoulders rose and fell in a subtle motion.

”You are absolved of any guilt for lust.”

As soon as he said those words, the entire library shook. Two chains fell from Damon’s body, the ones on his waist and the ones on his neck. His body sagged forward as the weight lifted, then he caught himself with a sharp inhale.

The world distorted as two figures appeared before him.

”Damon...”

A soft, chilling voice called out.