Lord of Mysteries:Fire of Destruction

On the outskirts of the City of Calamities...

Cracking his knuckles a little, the redhead observed the solitary flame in front of him with calm eyes.

This flame represented the Demigod of the Tamara Family, Dabrio—if that was his real name.

'It's most likely that it is.. Praying towards a hidden existence to receive help, he had already assumed that he would surrender a part of his being and decided to use his real name. That way he would show his honesty...' Sighing slightly, the redhead shrugged his shoulders without much interest.

It was now 2 a.m., and although it was pretty late, it was a perfect time to take the first step towards a new stockpile.

It had been a few days since he discovered that this guy had prayed to him for help.

Adryan had waited a few days to organize his priorities and resolve his problems, but now that he had several free days ahead of him, the time had come.

Extending his spirituality to this flame, it expanded until it formed a window of fire that began to show a scene.

Adryan immediately noticed the room's different style. From what he remembered, it was a typical cheap hotel room in Bayam.

'Change hiding places? So quickly? It can't be because he prayed to me and is trying to escape. Once he prayed, a connection was formed once I accepted it. He is a demigod, so he must know this. Running away from the Monarch is useless at this point so it must not be me who is running away…' The redhead held his chin curiously.

"He wasn't exaggerating when he said they were being hunted down one by one..." The redhead was somewhat impressed.

"It seems that the fallen branches of this family have a good support if they can afford to hunt another demigod so intensely..."

Of course, if the situation hadn't been so bad, he doubted that this Dabrio would have prayed to him in the first place.

Leaving that aside, the redhead crooked his neck and smiled mischievously.

It was time to send a message~

...

Blinking a little dazed, a man looked around him, first in confusion, which quickly turned to alertness.

He had barely gone to sleep after a busy day and now he found himself in the middle of a large, lush forest.

He knew it was a kind of dream, but not the type.

The trees were unfamiliar, and everything looked strange. His spirituality did not indicate any danger, but he would not let his guard down just because of that.

Suddenly, from among the leafy trees, a fox with orange colors resembling fire came out and walked towards him. Its fur did not look like hair but like flames, the way the flames danced in the air.

Its eyes were intelligent and it exhibited great serenity and calm.

The fox stopped more than 20 meters from him. Golden dust began to emerge from its body, and it floated in the air.

Quickly, these letters formed a message in Hermes.

September 24. Come alone.

Immediately afterwards, the scene shifted to show the outside of a forest and a village. It focused on a sign with the name Auchiied on it. Next to that sign, a few words were written: Lenburg.

After that, the dream began to collapse. Everything became blurred and fragmented.

But, amid these fragments, golden dust began to write another sentence in Hermes.

The Scarlet Monarch who burns Depravaty;

The Calamity forgotten by time;

The Stranger who comes from the unknown...

That three-line name was barely visible for three seconds before the dream collapsed and the man woke up agitated.

But that agitation quickly turned to joy and relief.

"An answer... I received an answer from the Scarlet Monarch..." With a soft sigh, the man got out of the bed where he was lying, grabbed the briefcase by his side and left the room.

He was far from Lenburg so he had to take a boat as soon as possible.

He could feel his heart beating fast, but he did not let it affect him. He continued on his way, always alert to his surroundings.

These days were a game of cat and mouse and he was running out of time to hide.

They were getting closer, and now was not the time to hesitate...

...

Adryan looked at what Dabrio Tamara was doing through the fire window with a slightly furrowed brow.

He wouldn't have minded pulling the Demigod in and bringing him here to ask better questions, but that was beyond him now.

It didn't fit his image as Scarlet Monarch, but he could also risk that this desperate family's perception of him would change for the worse.

So far, Adryan had the complete advantage in this little chat they would have in a few days, no matter how it looked. And he had to keep it that way.

For the Tamara family, who were already in short numbers and a desperate situation, once they learned what was happening, they would see it as a miracle; a messenger from God had been sent to listen to their problems, and from there it would be judged whether or not it was worth helping them.

They probably believed that the Scarlet Monarch already had a strong base and an organization or powerful members that could protect them if they proved themselves deserving.

'If they have to believe in a hidden God to live, they would have no problem doing so...' Getting an idea of what that family was thinking, Adryan couldn't help but snort in mockery and pity.

"Poor deluded souls. My dear worm is the strongest member of this Hidden God by technicality, but her sequence is suppressed. Sharron takes her place for now in Sequence level alone, but if I use my artifacts I can close that gap…" Sighing a little, the redhead moved his beach chair and began to tap his chin.

He would act based on the information he received from Dabrio Tamara about the fallen branches that were hunting this surviving righteous branch of the Family.

If until now they were only hunting them one by one through divinations, he could hide them using Mirror Divination and the Hanged Man's Card of Blasphemy. If a sizeable group was hunting them, he could devise a plan to deal with them.

Of course, as long as they didn't have something like an Angel, but Adryan doubted that whoever was hunting the Tamara would send one.

Besides, if they did send an Angel for a broken family like the Tamara, Adryan could always use a little famous trick~

Accuse them with the elders!

This was Lenburg, the base of the Church of the God of Knowledge and Wisdom. No self-respecting secret organization would send an asset as valuable as an Angel here!

Sending an Angel would not only be the stupidest thing they could do, but it would also be the easiest problem to solve that he would have to face.

By simply revealing the Angel's presence to the Church, Adryan would let them deal with it themselves and enjoy the benefits of having helped the Tamara and the contribution points he would get from the Church.

But of course, that was if this organization was stupid.

'With all that in mind, the maximum hunting force that this fallen branch in Lenburg could employ would be a Demigod with some sealed artifacts with a small team of Beyonders of Medium Sequence or just a Demigod with a grade 1 artifact...

'Depending on which path it is, this can be easier, more difficult, or even become annoying... I'm not planning on dealing with a Bizarro Sorcerer, I's already faced a Faceless once and that guy was a pain in the ass...

'The easiest to deal with would be another Imperative Mage or an Earl of the Fallen, with Dabrio, either of them would self-cancel each other and I would only have to worry about them not taking their clothes off and showing their incomplete form of Mythological Creatures...

'If they come with company, it won't be a problem, I have my own team to deal with them and I can also ask the Church for support. Of course, the profits will have to be shared but ensuring victory and our lives is no loss...'

Pausing his accelerated train of thought, Adryan laughed a little and shook his head amused with himself.

"I don't even know what I'm up against and I'm already planning how to seize my profits. I guess I've got a bit of a goblin in me."

"Well, why deny it? Like any human being, I like shiny things too~

"The next sequence after Conspirator is Reaper. Perhaps reaping the biggest harvest from a battle is one of its acting rules?" Adryan fiddled around a bit more, although he felt it could be like that, the first one had to go ahead to be able to prove it.

Of course, that didn't mean he could act in advance~

The redhead laughed some more and put the subject out of his mind.

Only once he had more information would he act, not before.

With everything ready and done, Adryan closed his eyes and, drawing the sphere of light, left the City of Calamities...

After reopening his eyes in his room, the dark-haired man settled back into his bed, covered himself with thick sheets, closed his eyes, and, with the help of cogitation, quickly fell asleep.

Blinking a little lost, Adryan looked around, confused before his eyes sharpened.

A strange fog covered everything he saw, he could barely see about three fingers in front of him.

'A dream?' With the familiar scenario, he immediately became alert.

It had been months since he had last had a dream by himself, so it was suspicious that one happened so suddenly!

In addition, he noticed how this dream seemed different from the others. Instead of appearing in a pre-formed scenario, he appeared directly in the middle of a dense fog.

'This doesn't look like the Spirit World, yet I feel familiar in this... The island of consciousness? Is someone trying to enter my mind?'

Sensing the danger he might be in, he did not try to wake up immediately as such an action could cause a reaction.

Not making any sudden movements, he looked at his body calmly.

The clothes he was wearing were the same ones he had fallen asleep in, there was nothing different about them, nothing extra.

'Hunters Hallow has not manifested itself, so until now my island has not been touched...' Adryan noticed and narrowed his eyes slightly.

After meeting Thaddeus and witnessing his attempts to read his mind, and his own use of Feynapotter Children's Stories, Adryan knew that the tunic's protection extended to his mind and his island of consciousness.

If someone tried to read it, they wouldn't be able to. And if someone tried to touch it, the tunic would react.

As the latter had not happened, the danger was low for the moment.

Looking around at this familiar but unfamiliar fog, Adryan raised an eyebrow slightly.

'Maybe it's just a Dreamwalker passing through? In a way that would explain why I 'woke up' and now I'm here...

'Why the hell won't they let me sleep? Could I still suffer from bad karma for praying to Klein in the middle of the night those days?' With a visible grimace of annoyance and a trembling eyelid, the man let out a soundless sigh.

It seemed that he still had to pay for those little big annoyances he had caused to-

Crack...

Adryan heard as much as he felt something profound within him move accompanied by a disgusting crunch. Very similar to the sound of bones breaking when crushed by a press.

Cough...

A slight cough escaped him and the taste of filthy iron filled his mouth. Everything became rough and he staggered, barely able to stand, vision blurring and his mind groggy.

Adryan felt his eyes begin to water and something dripped from his nose.

Raising his left hand, he wiped it across his face and looked at it dazedly.

His entire hand was covered in a bright crimson liquid, blood.

Crack... Thud!

The sensation from before hit him again, only much harder, and this time he fell to the floor of the dream clutching his chest.

Huff! Huff! Huff!

Agitated breaths escaped his lips, followed by gasps. His whole body began to tremble and shatter, he could 'feel' the cracks in his right arm rising up his shoulder and reaching his neck!

Cough Cough! Cough!

Bloody, gurgling coughs escaped from deep within his chest, drowning Adryan in his own blood and making it difficult to breathe.

At some point, the fog surrounding him had lost its gray color, turning soft crimson and emitting an ominous glow.

This glow seemed to grow stronger with each bloody cough and tremor that his body suffered.

Brutal ravings began to lash his mind, worsening his condition even more. The voices that assailed him were a whole multitude, screams, cries, pleas, babbling, nothing made sense.

Huff! Huff!

"Ggrrr..." Clenching his teeth and growling in pain, Adryan held his head and began to draw the sphere of light in his mind.

Any thought of waking up left his mind. If the previous attack hadn't woken him up, then waking up of his own accord, as he used to do, was also impossible.

Now he needed to go to the City of Calamities to escape whatever was attacking him!

The sphere of light began to disappear, replaced little by little by the smoke-covered city...

Just as it was about to manifest, a great darkness covered it, and Adryan found himself back where he had been.

[Forgive me, Master. But you have to endure this. Going to the temple would be harmful in your current state...]

A mysterious voice said out of nowhere, it was incredibly familiar.

Lowering his blurred gaze to his body, Adryan saw in a daze how an illusory black tunic covered him, keeping him where he was.

"Hunters Hallow..." In disbelief, the dark-haired man could only grunt that before the pain lashed him with much greater force than before.

This agonizing pain he was feeling now was too similar to the one he felt every time he was resurrected. His broken soul stretching or breaking as it was forcibly torn from the River Styx and returned to his body...

He was now feeling that in the flesh. The two sensations were completely different; if the sensation of reviving was a violent wrenching, this one was a torturous squeezing.

It was as if something wanted to get out of him but something else kept it trapped.

"Argh... Cough!" Adryan could only writhe on the floor, no longer able to scream, not unlike a snake that has fallen into a pit of boiling oil.

....

He didn't know how long passed before everything stopped, but when he came to, he found himself out of the dream and lying on the floor of his room.

It looked like he had moved around a lot in his sleep, the sheets and pillows were scattered across the floor.

With slow movements, Adryan brought his trembling left hand to his face and touched it.

Looking at his fingers, he was stunned to see how they were covered in sweat.

He could feel all his clothes sticky and clinging to his skin, and he was very cold... Incredibly weak and completely drained of energy.

Huff... huff...

'Was... was that an illusion? No... no... it felt too real... My body... I haven't felt like this since I faced the Rose School of Thought... What the hell was that...' Blinking slowly to remove the spheres of light that covered his vision, the dark-haired man looked around weakly.

Everything was still dark, and the crimson light coming through the cracks in the curtains indicated that it was still night. Thus, it couldn't have been long since he fell asleep.

Looking down at his body, he noticed he was still in his Harvey Wayne guise. After confirming this, he took a deep breath and looked to the window.

His spirituality fluctuated slightly when he saw the crimson light filtering through the curtains... The same lights that looked darker than usual...

With more effort than usual, Adryan got up from the floor and walked shakily to the window of his room.

Grabbing the curtain with his gloved right hand, he lifted it slightly to reveal the crimson outside.

His eyes were immediately drawn to the dark sky.

Unlike all the times he had seen it, tonight was different.

Hanging in the black veil and completely exposed, without its dress of black clouds hiding it, was the crimson moon.

This was a full moon, dark red like blood. Its entire surface seemed to be shining brighter than before.

Adryan recognized this phenomenon. Although the previous owner of this body had seen it several times throughout his life, this was the first time he had seen it himself.

'Blood Moon...' The dark-haired man thought dazedly, the corners of his vision rapidly darkening.

Thump!

Adryan's body hit the ground with a thud...