My Living Shadow System Devours To Make Me Stronger

Damon was fuming, and how could he not be when he had just watched Xander make such a callous decision with a calm face and steady voice as if what he had done carried no true weight at all.

“I gave him a chance. I gave him a chance to back out.”

There was no more room for regrets now. The moment for hesitation had already passed, and the consequences of that choice were already moving forward like an avalanche that could not be stopped.

Damon pulled a key from his shadow storage and walked to a random door along the corridor. The metal felt cold in his fingers as he inserted it into the keyhole. When he opened the door, the space beyond was nothing like a room. The air itself felt different, heavier, older. Instead of furniture and walls, there was a vast chamber stretching far beyond what should have been possible. At the center of that chamber stood a massive stone door, shaped and carved like the entrance to a dungeon boss arena.

He took a deep breath and walked forward until he stood directly in front of it. This was the last chamber door. This was the door that sealed away the lesser gods, and this door required three keys.

One of those keys was Damon’s crown. For the past four years Lilith had studied this door, learning its structure, its ancient runes, and all its intricacies with patient obsession.

Today, they would finally enter the tomb.

A soft distortion rippled through the air beside him as space warped slightly. Lilith’s beautiful figure appeared out of thin air, as if she had simply stepped from another layer of existence into this one. She glanced at him and smiled softly, her tone teasing.

“Did someone get into a fight?”

Damon narrowed his eyes and inhaled slowly through his nose before answering.

“He’s a fool. A damn fool. Can’t he understand it’s not worth it? What good is revenge if you have to discard your own child?”

Lilith’s expression turned thoughtful, and her voice dropped into a quiet whisper.

“Victory demands sacrifice. You believed that. What changed now?”

Damon pressed one hand to his temple and began pacing around in small, agitated steps.

“Victory demands sacrifice is no excuse to sacrifice children. The term should only apply to soldiers and people who willingly step onto the battlefield. They made their choice. Not a child who hasn’t even been born yet.”

Lilith walked up to the door and slowly traced the ancient seals with her fingers, feeling the grooves and the faint power still resting within them.

“We don’t decide where or who births us. We just try our best with what we have. Perhaps, in a sense, the Unknown God is not wrong about the cruelty of birth.”

Damon scoffed mockingly, his face filled with open disdain.

“Coming from someone who was born into wealth, power, and so much more. He was born into divinity. He was loved by all his kin. Acting like his birth was some cosmic accident just makes him a hypocrite.”

Lilith was not entirely convinced.

“Maybe. But you’ve only walked a mile in your own shoes. I doubt you know what his shoes feel like.”

Damon crossed his arms and leaned back against the cold surface of the door.

“Boy would I love to know what it feels like to be an all powerful god.”

“I imagine it will not be all flowers and rainbows. Godly powers come with godly problems. Just like how a poor man believes the rich have no problems of their own, when in fact they have problems their wealth cannot solve. Our burdens are relative to our strength. The omniverse is fair in a twisted way.”

She glanced at Damon with her emerald green eyes.

“Perhaps it is the true enemy. One we didn’t even know we had.”

Damon sighed and looked away from her.

He took off his crown and placed it onto the door. The moment the metal touched the surface, a soft surge of madness and dark thoughts rose inside his mind like poison bubbling to the surface.

’What if I turn Xander’s son against him? He doesn’t deserve to be a father. I’ll kill him. I’ll kill him.’

Damon knew those thoughts were not truly his. The crown always whispered. The door reacted to it. The madness was a side effect of the key meeting its lock.

He steadied himself and held the crown firmly as the door began to move. Stone scraped against stone as it slowly swung open.

When the door opened completely, Damon stepped into a vast chamber filled with hundreds of tombstones. They stretched in every direction like a silent graveyard for forgotten divinities. At the center was a large lake that shimmered with faint, gentle light. Countless glowing vines spread outward from the lake and wrapped around the tombs like living threads of illumination.

It was silent. Deeply, unnaturally silent.

The faint glow from the lake seemed to create the illusion that there should be sound, as if water should be gently moving, but there was nothing. The silence pressed against Damon’s ears until it felt heavy.

A soft, chilling wind drifted through the chamber, carrying an ominous presence with it.

Damon stepped carefully into the tomb. The longer he remained there, the heavier the silence became. His footsteps sounded intrusive, almost disrespectful in this sacred place.

Finally, Lilith spoke, breaking the silence.

“This place feels solemn. I feel guilty just talking here.”

Damon nodded slowly and approached one of the tombs. There was a crest carved into it. He leaned closer and read the words engraved beneath.

Here lies Rafi, lesser goddess of rivers.

So there truly had been a lesser god for nearly every natural concept. Each tomb represented a domain of existence that once lived and breathed.

He moved to the next tomb.

Here lies Zephyr, lesser god of the western winds.

Damon turned slowly, looking at the others. All of them carried names and titles. Gods of forests. Gods of storms. Gods of harvest. Gods of seasons.

“How did he do it? How did he manage to capture all of these gods?” Damon asked aloud, wondering how Lazarak had accomplished something so impossible, especially since he could not kill them.

“It was no small feat, I imagine.”

The voice came from the center of the chamber, right beside the glowing lake.

Damon turned sharply. Sitting there was a blind old man wearing robes similar to the cultivator who had called himself Zhang Dafei.

Damon’s eyes narrowed immediately. That meant this person was an outsider.

He took a cautious step back and gently pulled Lilith’s hand, positioning himself slightly in front of her. Outsiders were beyond dangerous. That caution was not paranoia. It was experience.

“Junior, there is no need to be wary. This old man means you no harm. It has been over two hundred thousand years since I last met someone. Indeed, we are fated.”

His words did not ease Damon’s suspicion. They made him more alert instead.

Lilith spoke calmly.

“You are sealed here, aren’t you?”

“Indeed I am. I had the misfortune of coming here and getting sealed away.”

Damon relaxed slightly. If he was sealed, then his threat was limited.

He studied the old man’s body carefully. Several of the glowing vines had pierced into him. His face was pale like a corpse. A thin sword rested beside him while he sat in a lotus position.

“You are a cultivator, are you not?”

“I am indeed. But now I am merely an old blind man. It seems you have knowledge of cultivators. You must be a learned man.”

Damon scoffed.

“Not at all. I merely had the misfortune of meeting your friend Zhang Dafei.”

The old man paused and his blank white eyes opened slightly.

“Zhang Dafei. Yes, I am familiar with him. However, we are not friends. Unlike him who belongs to a cultivation sect, I am merely a rogue cultivator.”

Damon did not fully understand the difference, but he remained cautious. Blind and old though he appeared, there was something deeply unsettling about him.

“You’re the Blind Old Daoist, aren’t you?” Damon asked.

The old man smiled faintly.

“Ahh, I see. Then you must be the apprentice of the one who leads the Ascendants. I noticed your armor. I simply did not think you would know me.”

“How humble of you,” Lilith said calmly. “Everyone knows of you. In fact, you are very popular with the people of today.”

The old man laughed softly and shook his head.

“Junior, you should tell your dao companion to stop telling lies. It is rude to lie to the elderly.”

Lilith’s expression turned cold. So he could detect falsehoods as well. That would make him very annoying to deal with.

Damon scoffed and placed a hand on her waist in a quiet gesture.

“How did you get here, Blind Old Daoist? This tomb has not been opened since the Zero Epoch. Since the vines have pierced you, I imagine you got in here without the keys.”

The old daoist smiled and took a slow breath.

“Ahh, smart boy. Yes, I did indeed come here without the keys. I was simply unlucky. Unlike those fools seeking power, I only wished to go home. So I came to the place you call the Sky Continent and hoped to use the Abyss as a means of bypassing the goddess’s seal.”

He paused slightly, as if gauging Damon’s reaction.

“It was then that I found this place hanging between the endless Abyss and your world.”