Chapter 3.8
When Sui Yuan felt his dagger stab Osmund’s chest and saw that it was about to slice his neck, he almost gave himself a heart-attack!
Luckily, he manages to stop on time, only resulting in a small nick. In these few minutes of self-induced immobility, Sui Yuan gathers his scattered wits about him and retrieves his soul before it can ascend. As soon as he can trust himself to function normally again, he leaps backwards, placing as much distance between them as possible. Almost killing the male lead is too terrifying an experience! Sui Yuan feels that he might have nightmares for the entire week!
Only after calming his palpitating heart with great difficulty does he wonder what should be said next. As he is afraid the other party will find fault with him and pick another fight, Sui Yuan eventually decides to throw down a final, vicious line before fleeing the scene, filled with impatience to end this arc of the story as quickly as possible.
"Nadred! I know you still remember! I know you still harbour feelings for Osmund! Am I right?!" Aurora’s despondent voice calls from behind, causing the mentally unprepared Sui Yuan to stagger and nearly fall flat on his face. Tears of blood streaming down his face, he increases his pace, escaping swiftly.
What harbouring feelings for Osmund?! Not killing him equals to liking him?! What the hell kind of logic is that! Sui Yuan really wants to fall on his knees before the female lead ah.
"For better or for worse, at least you managed to throw off that pig teammate." 5237 comforts him in a pleased tone. "As for liking whoever or whatever, wait until after you clash a few times with the male lead according to the storyline, then this rumour will definitely disappear."
"I suppose," Sui Yuan heaves a long, drawn-out sigh, praying for everything to go smoothly before pondering his next steps.
After swallowing the source of darkness - don’t say it again, the suffering he went through honestly feels worse than dying. No second time! - he is now a villain BOSS. Next up, he needs to establish his Dark Kingdom.
Like what the original character was meant to do, Sui Yuan travels through the dark lands to find a suitable place for setting up his headquarters. At the same time, he subdues more than a few beings lurking around, sending them out as his eyes and ears to monitor the main leads, ensuring they are capable of leaving the dark lands safely. If the male and female leads end up dying because he stabbed Osmund, the consequences would be unimaginable!
The first point on his to-do list progresses smoothly. With this formidable power at his disposal, Sui Yuan easily conquerors the entire dark lands. With that, his army is naturally formed, its ranks filled with violent plants, animals and other humanoid beings. Next, he also experiments in fusing his powers of darkness with self-taught necromancy.
Who knows how many skeletons and deceased beings - from small to big - have been buried beneath the moist earth of the dark lands. Hence, with so many corpses and skeletons left behind, it is the perfect place to practise necromancy. While necromancy raises the dead and permits them to move around freely, his newly-gained darkness magic imbues these resurrected beings with more power and strength than the average undead, making them a rather intimidating enemy to face. However, as Sui Yuan’s control over darkness magic is not all that great yet, he can only control around ten of this strong undead at any given time. Thus, in order to practise and train how to control his new minions, Sui Yuan comes to a decision - let these ten plus undead build houses for him.
When 5237 hears his declaration, it bangs its head against the nearest wall for a few minutes straight.
By controlling his group of undead to accomplish various tasks every day, Sui Yuan’s understanding and skill over darkness magic and necromancy inevitably increases in leaps and bounds. Presently, the total number of undead he is able to control is over a hundred. Gradually, he also begins to gather higher level creatures, making them into elite troops and commanders of his army. As for his castle, it is slowly being constructed under the joints efforts of the undead.
After all basic preparation is completed, Sui Yuan plans to sharpen his sword by attacking nearby towns and villages. As described in the original text, he will need to expand his territory first. This action will then force all races to unite against the common enemy - him - and as the war progresses, he will eventually face the main leads whom he harbours both love and hatred for - no wait, it should be only hatred.
As for whether or not he should kidnap the female lead Aurora, Sui Yuan decides to put that on hold for the time being. Firstly, his character hasn’t exactly developed any romantic feelings for her and secondly, he plans to give the main leads more time to interact. Who is to say they might have made headway in terms of romance?
All this aside, there is one more matter that is causing Sui Yuan untold amounts of trouble. Although Sui Yuan sent a few creatures out to protect them while they are in the dark lands, ensuring they return to Obsidian City to recuperate, the news that reaches his ears is rather terrible, resulting in his inability to sleep soundly for several nights straight.
This terrible news pertains to the one stab he managed to land on Osmund that day. Due to the dagger being created from pure darkness, a piece of dark magic entered the male lead’s body from when the blade was buried in his chest. While Osmund’s natural holy power is able to protect his body from succumbing to the erosive nature of dark magic, it cannot completely expel the darkness within. Now, the Holy Son is becoming weaker and weaker, already dithering on the brink of death.
During these sleepless nights, Sui Yuan experiences bouts of nightmares - the male lead dying due to the dark magic in his body, and after returning to the space between worlds, Sui Yuan is met with big, red letters showing him a negative score. Sui Yuan can even feel himself wasting away before that atrocious mark...
Wholeheartedly wanting to prevent this nightmare from becoming reality, Sui Yuan decides to secretly sneak into the city and take a look at Osmund, remove the dark magic in his body, and return a healthy male lead to this world.
Naturally, as powerful as he is right now, he cannot recklessly bring his army to the front doors of Obsidian City. That place is the largest city bordering the dark lands, and is in charge of ensuring the safety of the towns surrounding it. In order to draw the majority of troops away from Obsidian City, Sui Yuan directs his army to siege a few of the surrounding towns, forcing them to request aid from the city. Since they have a duty to uphold, troops are dispatched as reinforcements to drive the dark army back, allowing Sui Yuan to slip past the perimeter walls.
His plan works extremely smoothly. With lesser soldiers stationed in the city, Sui Yuan manages to enter undetected, heading straight for the mansion and the bedroom where Osmund is resting in.
The inhumanly beautiful Holy Son of the Heavenly race lays motionless in bed, sickly pale skin emphasising his current weak state. His breath seems to come out in feeble, intermittent exhalations. Although the wound on his chest has been wrapped under bandages with utmost care, it unceasingly bleeds black blood. Clearly, Osmund has been forced to endure intense pain over the last few days.
Mindful of the fact that his pig teammate resides in this body, Sui Yuan feels somewhat guilty. While he may dislike his colleague’s wilful impediment of his missions in each world, he doesn’t resent him to the point of hating the man. Sui Yuan cannot bear the thought of Zhao Xihe suffering due to his actions. Although he ended up fighting in order to flee from the main leads, this wound was personally inflicted by his hands, and it causes great remorse and self-blame to surface in his heart.
Walking slowly over to the bed, he perches on the edge and places a hand flat on Osmund’s chest. Closing his eyes, he reaches out with his conscience to seek the fragment of dark magic in the man’s body.
In the short period of separation, his control over the darkness residing within him has strengthened, thus allowing Sui Yuan to perform this small treatment smoothly. With a light nudge, the tiny tendrils of dark magic embedded in Osmund’s bones, blood and flesh withdraw, obediently condensing in a small sphere beneath the wound. Another mental touch has this sphere of darkness exiting Osmund’s body, coming to a stop above the hollow of his palm.
Performing another quick sweep to ensure his colleague’s body is clear of dark magic, Sui Yuan finally exhales heavily and opens his eyes. Dull red clashes with clear azure, and the elf freezes.
Snapping out of his shock, Sui Yuan withdraws his hand, only for his wrist to be caught by Osmund. Guiding his hand back to rest on that bandaged chest, he can feel the other man’s strong, constant heartbeat.
"I knew...that you would return..." Osmund says, a soft smile on his pale face. A flash of happiness flickers in his eyes as he gazes unblinkingly at Sui Yuan.
Being stared at so intensely causes Sui Yuan to feel uncomfortable. Dropping his eyes to Osmund’s chest, he tugs harshly on their joined hands, easily breaking the hold this heavily injured male lead has around his wrist.
"You know why I did it," Sui Yuan murmurs, giving a vague answer. Since his task is complete and the male lead is no longer in danger of dying, he doesn’t intend to linger any longer. Standing up to leave, his wrist is once again caught.
Glancing over his shoulder, he firmly throws off the man’s hand. The light in Osmund’s eyes dim, happiness morphing into dejection and heartache, making Sui Yuan itch to grab him by the shoulder and shake him vigorously, then beg him not to be so immersed in his acting. Besides, if he wishes to act, it should be in front of the female lead ah! It’s impossible for a male lead and a supporting male lead to have a future together! Please spare this junior actor!
Ignoring Osmund’s crestfallen look, Sui Yuan hurries out of the room. The universe clearly enjoys mocking him, for he bumps into the female lead who has been standing outside the room for who knows how long.
Although Aurora’s face appears very calm, her eyes betray the weary gloominess she is feeling inside. Evidently, her experience this time forced her to mature quickly. She doesn’t move to defend herself, merely observing him silently. When Sui Yuan meets her gaze for a full second, then brushes past her without a word, Aurora eventually opens her mouth. "Although I don’t know why you insist on walking down that path...Osmund and I will always remain your companions."
Sui Yuan pauses, wondering if he should converse with the female lead to increase her good opinion of him or not.
"I also know that you are not as unfeeling as you would like everyone to believe, am I wrong?" Aurora continues, tone uncharacteristically light but certain. "You think we don’t know, but we understand."
Turning his head to stare at Aurora, Sui Yuan’s face carries a trace of question.
"Osmund and I were seriously injured with no way of defending ourselves had we been attacked. Being able to leave the dark lands safe and sound was all because you protected us in the dark, correct?" A very faint smile pulls at the corner of her lips, seemingly afraid to shatter this moment of stilted peace. "You were always worrying, monitoring us from afar. Which is also how you came to know of Osmund’s critical condition. You don’t wish to see him suffer, and absolutely cannot bear to see him die. You care about him so much to the point of risking capture to slip into Obsidian City - I understand everything."
Sui Yuan opens his mouth to retort but closes it again as he finds himself at a loss - apparently...everything Aurora has said so far is true. But she interpreted it the wrong way ah! Please don’t deduce it any way you see fit!
"...Believe whatever you will. I only hope you understand that we are both living in very different worlds now." Ultimately, Sui Yuan can only toss out these icy sentences before dissipating into a cloud of black mist.
Shifting her gaze from the empty space to the interior of the room, Aurora sighs as she spots Osmund’s dull eyes fixed on the exact spot Nardred was moments ago.
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