Cleaver Of Sin

Chapter 100: Inhuman

Three black Enduron horses could be seen pulling a gold plated carriage through the dead of night at full speed. The moon hung high in the sky, casting its silver glow as the only source of light during these dark hours.

A woman dressed in a maiden white and black gown could be seen holding the reins, skillfully guiding the Enduron horses.

Within the gold plated carriage, another woman sat with composed elegance, her posture refined as she crossed one leg over the other. Her flowing green silk hair cascaded gracefully down her back with immaculate beauty. Her black eyes were serene as she gazed out the window in contemplative silence.

She was Wuthenya Wargrave; the Second Moon.

Although many would never dare to travel under the shadowed veil of night, Wuthenya was different. She welcomed the darkness as though it were a part of her, an extension of her very being.

The chances of travelers being attacked during the night were extraordinarily high, but to the truly powerful, like Wuthenya, the time of day bore no consequence.

Morning? Afternoon? Night? Bright? Dark?

It made no difference. If anyone dared to make a move against her, they would only return them to the place where new life comes from.

A faint smile touched her lips as she gazed out the window, the wind whipping against her face, her hair fluttering behind her. The three Enduron horses surged forward with power, yet the world around her did not blur.

To Wuthenya, whose perception was refined beyond measure, they were simply too slow to distort reality.

Her thoughts, in this moment, were fixed on her youngest brother, the Tenth Sun, Asher Wargrave.

She had watched him from afar since he was a child. She had witnessed his silent suffering under the unbearable weight of the Wargrave Bloodline’s immense expectations.

But Wuthenya had never intervened.

Had Asher failed his third awakening, she still would have remained silent. The Wargrave estate, with all its ruthless traditions, was ironically the safest place for someone so weak.

Yet now, that same failure of a brother had turned out to be the greatest monster among them all.

She replayed every second of her own True Awakening, comparing it meticulously to Asher’s. Though she had survived until sunrise during her ordeal, she lost both her right arm and her right eye, in addition to sustaining numerous other injuries.

But her youngest brother’s awakening had been nothing like hers. He had fought. He had strategized. He had executed. His basic rapier techniques were astounding, unreasonably so, and his ability to grasp and replicate his opponent’s techniques with just a single glance was nothing short of insane.

As she brooded over her monstrous youngest brother, her mother came to mind, Lily of the Abyss.

Unlike Azeron, who always maintained a neutral expression, Lily never hid her emotions. She smiled. She laughed. She loved. She played.

She was not born a noble. She came from common roots, a woman who rose to Azeron’s equal with nothing but her body, her hands, and her rapier. Such talent was rare even among the nobility.

The Wargrave family did not look down on commoners. Well... perhaps it was more accurate to say they hardly cared about anyone who wasn’t either family or enemy.

Their Primarch could marry anyone, whether a woman from the slums, from a noble house, or even from another empire. The Wargraves didn’t care. They believed that their bloodline overshadowed any blood it mixed with.

And they ensured that no drama from the Primarch’s wife’s lineage would ever interfere with the sacred traditions of the family.

’I wonder how Mother is doing. Is she happy now that her wish has been fulfilled? Is she watching us from beyond? Or is she merely asleep?’ Wuthenya wondered, a soft, nostalgic smile curving her lips.

As the first daughter of the Wargrave lineage, she had always shared a unique and cherished bond with Lily. When her mother died giving birth to Asher, Wuthenya couldn’t believe it. She believed, no, she was certain, that something unnatural had occurred. Some ability. Some trick. Some foul play.

Even after Azeron, her father, assured her there was no such interference, she refused to accept it. How could a woman that strong, that invincible, die from childbirth?

She had turned the Empire upside down in her search for the truth, anything that could explain, anything that could ease the void within her.

But deep down, she had known. There was no force at play.

She had simply been denying reality, for there were no enemies left upon which she could project her anguish.

The Wargrave family, in the meantime, spent that entire period grieving and cleaning up the chaos Wuthenya had caused. If a situation turned volatile and someone raised complaints, they threw gold coins at the problem to silence it.

If someone wanted more than coin, they negotiated.

And if someone tried to exploit the tragedy for personal gain, they were wiped from existence without hesitation.

Months passed, and eventually, Wuthenya calmed. She accepted the harsh truth and grounded herself once more.

Now, as she sat quietly with her melancholic expression, the memories of her time with Lily lingered like gentle shadows, wrapping around her thoughts.

’I will ascend to the heights you once stood upon, Mother,’ Wuthenya vowed silently.

Though she uttered those words with conviction, she was already nearly there. Just two Life Ranks away. But, she understood better than anyone, those two Life Ranks could be an unbridgeable chasm.

Before Lily of the Abyss died, she had attained the rare and awe inspiring rank of Dust Crownstar, a title few in history had ever held.

A commoner reaching such power was as rare as phoenix feathers. Lily of the Abyss had stood proudly among the apex of the world’s most powerful.

But Wuthenya was not far behind.

She now stood at the Spark Voidstar Life Rank, and with such power, only a select few across the Empire dared meet her gaze directly.

Sometimes, she found herself wondering just how strong her elder brother, Malrik, truly was.

They were both geniuses, equally talented in their youth. But Malrik always seemed... inhuman. As though his existence defied logic. Though he was older, and naturally should be stronger, the gap between them was simply too vast.