LIGHTNOVELONLINE Chapter 136 “You shouldn’t be here.”
Chapter 136
“You shouldn’t be here.”
“...Mom?” Her voice sounded broken, even to her own ears. Her face lost all color and her eyes bathed in unshed tears at the unexpected, but emotional encounter.
Her mother looked almost the same as she did in the family photo she had in her dresser at the Tanner house, just a couple of years older. In her old plaid apron, and her favorite old shirt faded with age.
She looked so unlike herself, with that fair skin and dark eyes.
But that had never mattered to Kalysto, who had always looked more like her father, even in the soft tan tone of his skin.
Excited at the prospect of the reunion, she stepped forward, wanting to touch her. But her words stopped her.
“You shouldn’t have been the one who survived!” Her mother accused her, her voice laden with infinite resentment, and Kalysto’s heart shrank at the harshness of her words.
A lone tear rolled down her cheek as she looked with confusion at the woman who had brought her into the world.
I had forgotten how cruel mom is when Dad isn’t looking. She reminded herself sadly as the surrounding darkness dissipated without her noticing as several tendrils of black smoke climbed up her legs.
To her right, the old two-story house she had grown up in appeared, the lush forest unfolding behind the old building, enticing her to lose herself in it and seek safety among its green branches.
Away from danger.
And to her left was the town cemetery. Hundreds of headstones scattered among the cold earth as the thick fog covered most of the names.
But not all of them.
Her mother pointed toward the cemetery with her nails broken and bitten, her fingers thin from hunger. And her brown hair disheveled by the wind...perhaps as a symbol of the madness Kalysto had always suspected lurked behind her mother’s dark gaze.
“Look what you’ve done!” the older woman shouted.
But Kalysto didn’t dare to look.
She didn’t even remember well what her burial had been like. That time in her life was but a dark stain of blurred memories as she followed in absolute silence the outstretched hand of the social worker who took her to the orphanage.
“Look what you did! Look!” insisted her mother, but Kalysto, who had stopped looking like a grown woman and now had the same appearance as when she was a child with much lighter hair, continued to avoid her. “You killed my baby!”
“No, I didn’t do it!” she hastened to deny. But to insist on it was an effort in vain, just as it had been when she was little and had lost her memories.
And though she had never been able to remember what had happened that fateful night. Something inside her assured her that she was not to blame for such death.
“Stop lying!” Her mother shouted, her hand slapping Kalysto’s cheek suddenly, just as she had done countless times in the past. “You’re nothing but a jealous, good-for-nothing brat! That’s why you killed my baby!”
“No, I didn’t do it, I swear!” Kalysto cried in desperation as she fell to the ground and tried to protect her face from the countless blows her mother threw at her with her thin arms.
And for a small instant, that blank space that slept deep in her memory cracked, letting her see a small fragment that came as fast as it went.
“I only wanted to help!” She sobbed, her childish face bathed in tears and her voice breaking.
“LIES! NOTHING BUT VILE LIES!” her mother shouted, slapping her little body. Slapping and punching her wherever her adult hands could reach. “You killed my baby, just like you killed me!”
And suddenly the whole scene changed.
They were no longer near the cemetery but inside the house, in the kitchen. Where the lifeless body of her mother lay on the floor.
And something inside Kalysto broke at that moment.
As hundreds of tears descended her tender cheeks as she could feel the metallic stench of blood staining her small hands.
She didn’t even need to look down to know she was covered in blood.
[The skill Mental Defense has been deactivated.]
“You should have been the one who died," her mother’s shadow whispered behind her ear. “You shouldn’t have survived..." she continued with sadistic satisfaction as she watched her break down while she forced Kalysto to watch that horrible scene. “You should be dead," she concluded coldly, and a spectral smile lit up her face.
“No, you damned bitch," Kalysto’s head turned suddenly, and she saw with hatred the form of her mother clon behind her, at the same time that from the palm of her left hand a black crystal stake came out and pierced her mother’s stomach. “It is you who should be dead... But don’t worry," she whispered with infinite gentleness as she smiled at her with false affection. “I will take care of you and settle the score.”
At the same time, in the kingdom of Bahram.
Galatea hurried and clenched her fists as she passed by a couple of fairies, ignoring them completely as she advanced with a determined step towards her destination.
In the middle of the royal palace, at the end of a long corridor, two armed and armored guards guarded the double doors to the audience chamber where the queen-goddess of the fairies and avatar of Fieal, the wind god, awaited her report.
“Galatea requests an audience with your majesty," announced one of the guards as soon as the fairy stood before the doors.
“... Let her in," the queen’s voice was heard on the other side and immediately a gentle breeze from inside opened the heavy doors just enough for the tall warrior to pass through.
A spacious room welcomed her.
To her left, large windows gave a beautiful view of the gorgeous garden where delicate vines surrounded the thick columns and small flowers of soft tones provided a touch of color, contrasting with the pretty sky blue of the precious stones with which the walls of the palace were carved.
In the background, seated on a comfortable but majestic throne, was the queen in a long white dress whose skirt was gradually turning the same color as her piercing violet eyes, which were now fixed on the newcomer.
And at her side, a mighty warrior in golden armor and a red cloak stood just a step behind the throne.
“You are late," the queen scolded her in a solemn voice as she watched the brunette walk to a stop in front of the three steps in front of her throne.
“My sincerest apologies, Your Majesty," excused Galatea, placing one knee on the floor and her right fist clenched over her chest. “I had trouble interrogating the prisoner, hence my delay.”
“Really? How is that possible?” she questioned in disbelief.
Fairies could be very cruel when they wanted to be, so there should be no reason for such a delay.
"I have tortured and healed her for the past few hours to the point of knocking her unconscious from the pain," she reported. “It was after I ripped out her fingernails and fingers that I discovered she wears a special ring imbued with magic that helps to hide and alter parts of her stats.”
“... ¿And?” questioned the queen, arching an eyebrow gracefully.
“Even after taking it off, there wasn’t much I could read. I suspect there’s some kind of blockage in her system," the queen frowned at her words. “From the way she moved when I gave her false hope of escape, I know she is not just a shadow mage as the champion announced, or a simple knight as her system says," she added, pulling from her robes a handkerchief inside which rested an old ring, “I believe she has also been trained as an assassin. Even when she sometimes shifts into the stance a trained knight would take, her agility and tendency to strike only at vital points make it obvious. And she is too good at handling knives and daggers, which she had well hidden under her clothes, and in abundance.”
“Someone seems to have gone to a lot of trouble training her.”
“It seems so” Silence reigned for a few seconds in the room before Galatea dared to break it again. “I apologize for not being able to comply with your order, but no matter what I have done, the human continues to refuse to spill her secrets... But she seems to have some kind of mental resistance” that seemed to catch the attention not only of the queen but also of the knight standing behind her throne.
“In that case, I know just the guy to break it and make her sing," she commented, and a sadistic smile lit up her beautiful face.
“Let me help, my queen," offered the dragon king.
“We need the information in her head, not to kill her," she immediately refused. “Don’t forget that humans tend to die very easily, my dear.”
Meanwhile, to the south of the Tanish continent, the Kingdom of Desmond.
An army of demons fought against the gigantic horde of monsters that continued to emerge from the sea, doing their best not to give ground.
Although thousands of monsters fled to the bottom of the sea for safety, thousands more, much stronger than those that had escaped, took their place.
Both the shore of the beach and the sea near it were bathed with blood on both sides, but none of those still alive were willing to give up.
Aegir Donovhar, the king of the demons, led his army with the courage of someone who knew he had everything he needed to win, but even so, he strove to finish off his enemy quickly to avoid more unnecessary deaths on the part of his people.
So, after sending his horse to rest in the rear, he launched himself against the giant sea serpent that left the safety of the sea to conquer the beach, but Aegir cut its head off with a single swing of his sword.
Immediately, two notification windows appeared to his left.
One purple and the other black.
[You have leveled up!]