Sovereign of the Ashes

With Reina and Natalya’s return, Sein’s body-tempering experiments were officially back on schedule.

Yet, that was not the only good news.

The news of Sein’s advancement to Rank Three had reached the Divine Tower of Verdant Spring, and filled his mentor, Lorianne, with pride.

She now walked with her head held high and even traveled to the Divine Tower of Verdant Flame to visit her mentor, as well as her seniors in the Divine Tower of Whispering Flame and the Divine Tower of Floating Flame.

Sein would soon receive the knowledge of advanced pyro elemental magic as a gift from the Verdant Flame Faction.

However, with the sheer amount of magic knowledge Sein had to study and explore, he was not sure if he would have the energy to delve into the mystery of pyro elemental magic bestowed upon him by his grandmaster.

Such a busy life really brought its own kind of happy worries.

Despite his rigorous daily experiment schedule, Sein did not completely forgo moments of leisure and relaxation.

His youthful age, coupled with his strong and robust body, granted him an abundance of primal energy that most mages lacked.

By the time they were several centuries of age, many mages gradually abandoned their human desires, devoting themselves entirely to the pursuit of truth, foreign planar exploration, and magic.

However, thanks to his Verdant Flame Body Tempering Technique, Sein found his needs unusually strong. At times, his ardor rivaled that of dragons, infamous for their insatiable lust and greed.

Thankfully, Natalya’s resilience proved invaluable—no female mage partners could possibly withstand the fervor of his enhanced constitution.

With Sein’s recent promotion to Rank Three, his constitution had finally surpassed Natalya’s.

He might not match her raw muscle strength yet, but his enhanced constitution was enough to leave her utterly spent.

Sein, ever inventive, also enjoyed adding elemental flair to their moments of intimacy.

Whether it was flaming handcuffs or an elemental whip, his creativity left Natalya wavering between love and hate.

Once, during a particularly passionate session, they both inadvertently activated their Flame Demon and Baator Demon transformations.[1]

From a distance, it looked as though two demons were engaged in a fierce battle, their human forms completely unrecognizable.

At one point, Natalya was so exhausted that she suggested Reina as her replacement.

Since her return to the Divine Tower of Dark Flame, Reina had gradually begun to lose weight again under Sein’s meticulously planned body-tempering routine.

No matter how one looked at her, Reina was undeniably a beauty who could capture hearts with ease.

Sein was not sure whether Natalya was joking or testing him when she made that particular suggestion.

As Natalya stole a glance at him from the corner of her eye, Sein remained completely serious.

To be honest, he had never looked at Reina that way; he did not even consider her a woman.

In the end, he rejected Natalya’s proposal.

To Sein, Reina was not just the ideal test subject for his experiments but also a trusted friend—someone he could rely on with his life.

He dismissed Natalya’s remark as nothing more than a joke.

He would never force his friend into something she did not want to do. Of course, body tempering experiments were another matter entirely.

In the end, Reina did not end up in Sein’s bed. Instead, it was Yuri, who had been by his side for years, who finally got her wish.

Sein had met the female engineer during his first interplanar war.

After hundreds of years, Yuri’s loyalty finally culminated in an intimate connection.

Although Yuri’s constitution was far inferior to Natalya’s, she was able to satisfy Sein’s needs.

He had never expected Yuri to offer herself so readily, and she even seemed eager and genuinely delighted.

Sein had truly spent too much time in his laboratory, absorbed in the pursuit of magic truths, that he hardly understood a woman’s mind at all.

Truth be told, looking back at Sein’s relationships with the opposite gender, how many of them could truly remain “platonic”?

Only the crazy could share a common language with their own kind.

***

Aside from magic research and occasional moments of relaxation, Sein certainly had not forgotten about Leena in the Western Archipelago or Selina and the others in the Divine Tower of Verdant Spring.

He even occasionally chatted with the mermaid who had stayed behind in the divine tower.

Reaching Selina and Eileen was somewhat easier than contacting Leena.

Sometimes it was simply because Sein was too occupied, but more often, it was circumstances on Leena’s side that made communication difficult.

During the 27th year of Sein’s service at the Divine Tower of Dark Flame, he finally managed to get in touch with Leena again.

Despite the years that had passed, Leena remained as beautiful as ever.

When speaking with Sein, Leena sometimes chose to appear in her red-haired teenage form.

It was the image Sein was most familiar with, and it brought back some of his fondest memories of her.

However, Leena always made sure to stay in her adult form when she stepped outside her room at the black magic academy. With her long, straight hair and aloof demeanor, she exuded an intimidating presence.

Since the end of the Wild Gorilla World War, Leena’s influence and reputation at the black magic academy had grown significantly.

Many, including even Rank Three black mages, regarded her with fear and respect.

With an abundance of training resources at her disposal, Leena had become the very embodiment of strength within the academy.

Over the years, she had also explored several foreign planes under Blackhaven’s control.

Reflecting on her journey, Sein realized that Blackhaven’s environment had been crucial to Leena’s rapid development.

Had she been placed in an ordinary divine tower environment, she probably would not have flourished the way she had.

Recently, Leena was also nearing her advancement to Rank Three, though her progress was far less dramatic than Sein’s.

By conservative estimates, it would take her more than a hundred years to achieve the promotion.

To encourage her growth and reward her achievements during the Black Towers War, her mentor, the Black Tower Master of Cinderbones, bestowed upon her another piece of elemental mystery.

It was a special flame known as the “Cinderbone Flame”, with a hue reminiscent of Sein’s Ashen Flame.

However, the similarities ended there. The Cinderbone Flame had a different shape and distinct elemental properties.

Sein’s Ashen Flame was a composite flame of the pyro, umbra, and necromantic elemental particles.

Acquiring the Black Tower Master of Cinderbone’s signature flame marked Leena’s true initiation as an apprentice to the tower master.

During his interplanar communication with Leena, Sein had the opportunity to observe this unique flame.

The Cinderbone Flame was actually made up of necromantic energy rather than umbra elemental energy.

This unique fire possessed unparalleled corrosive and destructive power, setting it apart from Sein’s Verdant Flame, which had its own distinct strengths.

The Cinderbone Flame undoubtedly lived up to expectations as the culmination of a Rank Five black mage’s research.

While Sein lacked significant insight into necromancy, Leena had been exploring this field for the past few centuries.

For her, this special elemental mystery was a perfect gift.

After sharing their recent research findings, Leena commented with a hint of surprise, “For some reason, I feel like my Cinderbone Flame and your Dark Flame share certain similarities in their basic elemental properties.”

“Oh? Is that so?” Sein asked, raising an eyebrow.

“But my Dark Flame is an umbra elemental flame, while your Cinderbone Flame is a necromantic flame. Fundamentally, they are different,” he remarked.

“That’s true. Perhaps I’ve made an error,” Leena said, twirling a strand of hair around her finger.

1. Please take note that there is a term change for ”Demon” and ”Devil”. For more information, please visit the footnote of Chapter 910. ☜