Netori: Reborn as the Human Aphrodisiac

Each Blood-Smelting King inherited the throne through the Blood-Smelting Hammer. So long as the hammer kept its bright-red colors, the king still breathed. But once it took a dull-red shade, it meant the reigning king had passed away—prompting the hammer to start looking for a successor.

The Blood-Smelting Hammer now lay over Gaiseric's corpse, its dull-red shade acting like a reflection of the fallen monarch's state. With a series of slow, wobbling steps, Vel'Asha walked towards the corpse, her eyes turning empty as her trembling hands rested on the king's calcined remains.

The Inversion Skill kicked in, reversing Gaiseric's calcined corpse to its original state—now looking like a standard dead body. He couldn't return to life because while in theory the Inversion Skill could always reverse the body's state by drawing from Time itself, this only applied to the body—not the soul. Once the soul left, bringing it back was no mean feat.

But Elektra didn't just kill Gaiseric. She captured and destroyed his soul as well, making any attempt at rebirth a guaranteed failure.

'The Uriah name has no heir!

The Covenant has ended! My Lady can return home!'

'My Lady is free!' A cacophony of demonic voices boomed inside Vel'Asha's mind. The Queen Mother ignored them. Tears trickled down her face. Yet, she didn't make a sound, in silence watching the lifeless corpse her boy had become.

But as some expected the Queen Mother to meltdown any moment now, Vel'Asha waved her hand, making Gaiseric's corpse turn into particles of light that scattered into the distance.

Only the hammer stayed behind.

"There is a place for everything. Even a mother's tears become improper when the situation calls for composure," Vel'Asha said and wiped off her tears, turning sideways and staring at the burning Flameheart City. The grief in the Queen Mother's face vanished, replaced by a calm and regal look.

"Was that…your doing?" Vel'Asha asked following a moment of silence, prompting Akamana to roll her eyes with a pensive look.

"Mhm…the Zealots. I brought them, could have stopped them, but couldn't care less sooo…whoops? It is what it is," the Grand Priestess gave a helpless shrug, her words causing the wounded Mithras to restrain a chuckle.

Hateful as she might be, the woman did know how to keep a crowd entertained—making Mithras feel that if she didn't become the Grand Priestess of the Angra Theocracy, she would have made a fine jester.

"As excessive and straightforward as ever. Mana, you were always the type to take a man's family captive just because you felt jealous of his new puppy. So, I guess I shouldn't be surprised you let your mutts run amok," the Queen Mother said, and with a grasping motion, cast a veil of frigid air that swept through the capital, extinguishing the fire.

She then shifted back to Akamana, facing the Grand Priestess with a cold and indifferent look.

"But so long as I am the Queen Mother of this nation, and these people my subjects, covenant or not, I will protect them.

Akamana, your horde of degenerative mutts has harmed my citizens, so I'm sure you understand…that I must ask you to pay the dues for letting loose this sea of flames," the Queen Mother said and stepped forward, causing a miniature sun of burning gold flames to take shape at her back.

Her feline eyes went from an orange yellow to a burning gold, shining with solar rays as the locks that held her shackled collapsed one after the other.

"Oh my…is that a challenge that I hear? Careful Vel…500 years ago, you'd just landed from the Higher Planes, yet still couldn't do better than fighting me to a draw.

Yes, you're now able to use your full strength and lethal force, but back then I hadn't achieved Divine Integration or unlocked the fifth secret. So, if we try that again…" Here, all compassion vanished from Akamana's voice. Her tone turned sinister, with the bright and bubbly air she showed so far making way for complete darkness.

"I'm afraid you're going six feet under," the Grand Priestess said with a slasher smile and folded her hands below her chest, causing a burst of obsidian flames to flicker in her eyes.

The moment next, tongues of demonic flames coiled up Akamana's form, causing the ambient temperature to crash to frigid degrees. The Queen Mother wasn't impressed, and just as with Akamana beforehand, a dark-purple crest appeared above Vel'Asha's shoulder, rippling with a unique brand of nightmarish yet seductive energies.

The Dark Crest of Paradise, proof that she'd unlocked the fifth secret and established her Palace of Indulgence—becoming a Dark Preceptor.

With Vel'Asha at the center, a veil of green and gold spread across the scene, altering the fabrics of reality, and sucking all across the scene into a brand-new dimension.

A world of colorful flowers and magnificent beasts replaced the previous scenery, with golden shafts of light piercing through the sky like beacons of hope and salvation. A gigantic pair of golden phoenix wings unfolded at her back, and she strode into the sky, blinding the world with divine radiance.

"The Garden of Eden, your Palace of Indulgence is as mesmerizing as ever." Akamana marveled at the beauty of this land. From the waterfalls crashing in the distance to those fist-sized birds singing on tree branches. From the simple to the exotic, it had it all and more.

The Grand Priestess had only faced a handful of Dark Preceptors, yet was convinced that of all the Palaces of Indulgence in the Spiritual World, Vel'Asha's was no doubt the most mesmerizing.

What a shame that she now had to corrupt it.

[Dark Crest of Paradise: Palace of Indulgence]

Shutting her eyes close, the Grand Priestess threw her head back, letting her obsidian flames shoot upwards as tides of infinite darkness erupted with her at the center.

In those tides, the scenes of various duels, conflicts, wars and battlefields replayed nonstop, with a mountain of dancing corpses emerging from the currents and forming circles around Akamana.

Dark-purple wings sprouted at her back, folding over her shoulders as she became one with the darkness and vanished within.

The moment the Grand Priestess faded out, the Dancing Corpses went unhinged, waging war on the creatures of Eden as the Dark Preceptors' clash kicked off.