Way of the Knights

Chapter 370 - Seal

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'By the gods.' The old man swore, 'His Majesty told me to act like I am desperate but now that this thing's awake, I really am desperate.'

The old man was sitting on top of the Plane's Core as multiple orbs representing every elements. Red for fire, blue for water, brown for earth, green for wood, pale blue for lightning, white for yang and black for yang. Each orb formed an natural formation that served as protection for the core. The old man also weaved in some offensive attacks from time to time but due to the Bloodline Pact, he could only injure Vit'hum and not kill it. 

It had been two months since this pest woke up from its slumber. Against all expectations, the earlier estimations of the old man was wrong, he didn't account the possibility of this beast being able to force its slumber to end. 

And because of its early awakening, the struggle of the between two entities happened earlier than it's supposed to be. One desired to feast while the other desired to protect. 

If things went according to their expectations, then the old man would've still be fairly relaxed but since it didn't, things turned hectic for him. 

Ever since Vit'hum rose up from its slumber, it immediately began to siphon the plane's vitality with even more ardor. The old man could even see the excitement and impatience on the beast's eyes as it raised the maximum output of its siphoning. 

The old man could only passively defend and casually attack Vit'hum. He repeatedly cursed the Bloodline Pact and constantly blamed himself for being careless. Now he could only hope that Raven would arrive in time. 

"Give up, old man." Vit'hum's gruff and raspy voice could be heard echoing everywhere in the Center. "You can't stop me. You're just delaying the inevitable. Just let me eat this thing and I'll be on my way."

"Ridiculous!" The old man yelled in fury, "You damnable pest! All you know is to eat! If I let you do as you please, then this whole plane will be destroyed! If there's anyone that should give up here, that should be you!"

"Me? Giving up? Don't make me laugh here old man." Vit'hum replied sarcastically, "Why would I give up when I already won? Like I said earlier, you're just delaying the inevitable. I am telling you to give up out of consideration, why waste effort on defending something that's already meant to be eaten by me?"

"This thing is not meant to be eaten by you, not everything you see is yours to devour. You forced pathetic existence here and forced the Bloodline Pact on the Plane's Core!"

"What good is the world if they aren't my meals?" Vit'hum replied with a mad gleam on his eyes, "I am the hunter and they are my prey. Everything that exist here is my game, it doesn't matter how I do it, all will be consumed by me!"

And just when the old man thought that the siphoning is already at its maximum strength, Vit'hum proved him wrong once again.

The old man felt that the plane's vitality was plummeting at an alarming pace. He clicked his tongue in annoyance and pushed the formations power to the maximum degree as well. He had been regretting his choice on wasting his breath towards this pest, had he stayed silent maybe this thing won't increase its siphoning. 

With the rate of this suction, he could hold out for a week at most before the Plane's Vitality is completely sucked dry by this pest and the plane starts crumbling on its own. 

"Hmm? So the Pale Bastard's awake already? That's early."

A foreign voice reached their ears, completely taking them by surprise. Both of their eyes darted to where the voice came from and saw that it came from a young man casually walking on the empty space at the Center of the Plane, acting as if he's walking around his yard. 

Seeing him caused Vit'hum to be so confused. It wasn't expecting another being to be able to enter this place. Vit'hum himself arrived here by accident but it wasn't dumb enough to not know that this place is hidden explicitly by the plane itself. If it didn't have an unreasonable strength and durability, Vit'hum would've been completely crushed by the strange forces that are inhibiting this place. 

What's even more surprising is that, the visitor is a human. A very young one at that. Judging by his looks, he's not even a fully-fledged adult just yet. Even if he was, he's still too young compared to him and the old consciousness' age. 

Contrary to Vit'hum's confusion, the Old Man almost jumped in joy seeing Raven arrive. 

The old man was already at his wits end, any longer and he might've already give in to the pressure and cause the ultimate demise of the Plane. The old man's relief and joy was of course caught by Vit'hum, who became even more confused and curious about the identity of this youngster. 

'This old coot's guard is completely down, and it's all because of this human. Who is he? How come he's here? And what's his purpose.'

Vit'hum didn't get any answers to his questions since it didn't ask any of them. Instead, it continued to observe the young man and found out that the young man was doing the same.

This was the first time that Raven met Vit'hum in person. All those years of confrontation with the Black Curtain Guild during his past life allowed him and his father to discover about his existence. When they learned about him, they were terrified since there's no way that they could face such monstrosity but this thing never appeared even after the whole kingdom was destroyed. 

He started to doubt about its existence but when he grew stronger he found its remains, which was a definite proof that it was still alive a few years before he discovered the remains. 

Vit'hum assumed his demi-human form. He has a torso and facial features of a human, bat-like wings, wrinkled skin, has a lower body of a reptile, fangs protruding out of its mouth, a long pale horn and reptilian pupils. 

Using his ocular vision, he could see the enormous energy reserves and aura it was hiding. It was a complete monster that managed to survive throughout the years. No wonder the plane is facing headache, with its current state, it could not afford to raise a being like this even more so allowing it to continue existing. 

Under Vit'hum's bewildered gaze, the human started walking towards its location. Under normal circumstances, Vit'hum will welcome this human with arms wide open before brutally feasting on his flesh. But for some reason, with the look and demeanor of this human, he noticed that he doesn't have any desire to eat him, instead he's more interested as to why he decided to walk towards his location. 

This was his first mistake…

"Hey, don't you think that you've pestered the plane long enough by now? Why don't you just go away and find new toys to play with?" 

Vit'hum was dumbstrucked by the way Raven talked to him. 

He was completely speechless. Was this human dumb? What is he? Some sort of a middle man? It was as if he was stopping a fight between kids. Just the thought of that sounded so ironic. 

"Well, I'll be..." Vit'hum said out loud, "I thought you were some kind of a special being but it seems that I'm going senile from age. If all humans are like you, then it's perfectly justified for me to eat all of you."

"Hoh…" Raven's reply sounded amused, causing Vit'hum to become speechless even more. 

Its gaze turned towards the old man, there was a questioning look on his face. It was as if he was asking: 'Is this kid even real?' But when he got from the old man, was not an answer, but a look of pity. 

The gaze of the old man said: 'Not even a God can save you now.'

Before Vit'hum could even interpret what that means, he felt the human moved. 

Allowing Raven to move, was his second mistake.

Vit'hum felt Raven's hand on its chest At first the Pale Bastard didn't know why he did that, but his questioned was answered pretty soon. 

It didn't even had the opportunity to defend itself, it only heard Raven chanting.

"By my will, I refuse your blood. Let it be chained and restricted so that no harm shall befall to my kind. No power under highest layer heaven nor the deepest of layers hell could break this curse, for my will, is the will of all mankind."

A powerful light erupted from Raven's touch. Vit'hum felt his skin burning, the smell of its burnt flesh assaulted its nose, and for the first time in centuries, it felt pain. 

While Vit'hum still couldn't wrap around its head around what's happening. A powerful constriction enveloped its body. It felt its own blood stagnating and the Bloodline Pact it formed with the Core of the Plane was severed, causing it to suffer major backlashes. 

Feeling strength draining from it's body, Vit'hum looked at the dull eyes of the human standing in front of him. It then heard him speak.

"5th Forbidden Seal: Bloodline." Raven smirked, "How's that for an introductory present? Did you like it?"