CHAPTER 89: CHAPTER 20: EMBRACING MADNESS

"You’ve chosen loyalty, to carry on with a task that is utterly impossible to succeed."

The Lady of the House let out a piercing scream.

"Shut up!!!"

She swung the snake-shaped dagger, its cold light shimmering, stabbing toward the twisted, writhing shadow. Clang, the dagger sank into the wall to its hilt, yet the shadow remained unharmed, even emitting a mocking chuckle.

The shadow wasn’t wrong.

They were on a path completely opposite to the Night Watcher; the Night Watchers battled against the world’s twisted laws, restrained their internal brutality, suppressed the madness of knowledge.

Meanwhile, they adapted to everything in the Bizarre Realm, followed the world’s laws, embraced the real darkness — seeking wealth by any means, indulging in lust without restraint, bloodthirsty cravings answered with wanton slaughter — filling their hearts with selfish desires, actively catering to the dark laws of the Bizarre Realm.

They merged themselves with the dark side of the Bizarre Realm, to achieve a ’true’ Path of the Extraordinary!

And the endpoint of this path was to ascend to becoming an Evil God.

But even becoming an Evil God was better than the madness of the world dominated by the Ancient Race.

In their eyes, every dark desire born of power was right, real, in line with the world’s mad essence.

They are the righteous path!

They are the true Transcendent who truly align with the Origin Laws of the Bizarre Realm.

"We are right."

"Because we digest Extraordinary Relics faster, our chances of ascension are greater!"

"We are the Transcendent who are most adapted to this crazy world."

Survival of the fittest!

We are the Transcendent advancing towards the black sun of the Bizarre Realm, while those hypocritical Night Watchers are moving against the light.

While they fight against the world’s laws, they also want to obtain the power of those laws.

They are the evil path!

"But you still failed."

"When you should have chosen betrayal, you chose loyalty. You embraced the world’s dark side, but refused to relinquish your humanity."

"So I’ve come back to life, born to replace you!"

The shadow laughed wildly, staring at the Lady of the House with a hint of pity in its gaze, whispering: "For what? Just because he gave you hope to live when you were in your darkest despair?"

"You’ve forgotten."

"We are the Transcendent who embrace the real darkness of the world!..."

"As soon as you show weakness, you’re certainly doomed!..."

The shadow’s murmurs echoed in the darkness.

Resounding heavily.

"You’ve forgotten what he said too, haven’t you... But I still remember..."

"We are the Transcendent born to replace the Ancient Days!... For this, we can sacrifice everything!..."

Replace the Ancient Days with the Evil God.

They are the ones who embrace the dark essence of the world, the true Demon Path, allowing no weakness whatsoever.

The essence of shadow is extreme selfishness, treachery and betrayal are merely manifestations; its essence is a Path to Divinity that allows for abandoning everything else for oneself, providing the slightest chance to replace the Ancient Days.

With extreme selfishness countering loss of control, serving as an anchor for self, all shining virtues are negative states, only bringing them closer to losing control.

Only Night Watchers need the light of humanity, to illuminate the darkness, to fight against the madness of the Bizarre Realm.

The Night Watcher practices the Path of the Extraordinary in reverse, but they practice it forward.

Because of actions aligning with the world’s laws, the Lady of the House’s rapid absorption of Extraordinary Essence promoted her quickly.

But if she takes a wrong step, fails to continue matching the world’s twisted mad essence, then the Extraordinary Relics will instead digest her.

This is a path of complete corruption of the Extraordinary!

Not only does it have a chance to promote the destined Legendary Level of the Evil God path, but it can also elevate one to the ’Ancient Race’ as an alternative choice, to save oneself at the critical moment.

This unique promotion method turns positive human emotions into one’s Heart Demon.

The Lady of the House remained silent for a long time.

In the end, she couldn’t completely abandon her humanity, and it became one of the roots of her loss of control.

The Night Watcher loses control to negative emotions, whereas she loses control to positive ones.

How laughable it is!

Some seek light in the darkness, while others search for darkness in the light.

The shadow throbbed, inching closer to the Lady of the House, seemingly intent on entering her body, totally replacing the will, mind, and soul of this body.

But suddenly!

The Lady of the House seized the shadow’s throat in a lightning-fast motion, this time not clutching her own throat, but actually gripping the shadow. In the shadow’s incredulous and stunned gaze, her eyes turned blood-red, and she pulled her shadow out, bit by bit, from her own body.

She no longer had a shadow.

The shadow was clutched in the Lady of the House’s hand, like a writhing blob of twisted mud, it was unknown material from the Shadow Plane.

"You find it strange, don’t you?"

The expression of the Lady of the House slowly calmed, yet her blood-red eyes bred unending madness, looking mockingly at the twisted shadow she held, speaking softly: "You probably can’t comprehend why I can catch you, can you?"

The shadow squirmed, turning into a bizarre six-eyed spider, it screamed: "That’s impossible... I’m your shadow... How can you possibly catch your own shadow..."

"You haven’t fully grasped the Shadow Law yet!"

The Lady of the House laughed.

She remembered the night filled with blood and fire, the day that was both her most painful and most joyous, she embraced death and rebirth.

Yet because of everything from that day, she ultimately failed to merge into darkness.

She couldn’t betray the President, even at the cost of madness and death.

Perhaps in the deepest part of her soul, there still gleamed the light of humanity, but this turned into a deadly poison.

"Because I’m mad."

The Lady of the House’s expression was calm, holding the shadow before her, softly saying: "A normal person cannot catch their own shadow."

"But a madman can!"

The shadow began to struggle violently, wanting to flee, feeling fear.

The Lady of the House was crazy.

But not the kind of madness the shadow had wanted.

"Isn’t this what you wanted?"

"From the moment you were born in the Shadow Plane, you desired to drive me completely insane, to lose control, so you could replace me!" The Lady of the House’s seductive face showed a smirk, and she slowly said: "Now I am truly mad! Why are you afraid instead?"

When she touched the essence of shadow, her spirituality formed a reflection in the Shadow Plane, a second self.

A corrupted Path of the Extraordinary, remaining human traits form twisted Heart Demons, split personalities.

This is the price of embracing madness.

"You are right. I indeed failed."

The Lady of the House’s voice turned into soft whispers, saying: "I didn’t expect the Night Watchers to protect Dorne so well, this place should not exist in reality."

"Just like the President said, no matter how beautiful the dream, one day it must awaken."

"No matter the cost."

"I must complete the task assigned by the President!..."

The Lady of the House opened her blood-red eyes, crushed her own shadow, the shadow turning to black mud, flowing back into her body, she then became a creature without a shadow, or perhaps she was her own shadow.

The shadow is shadowless.

"Go."

"Children."

"Go tell the people the truth!..."

A cruel, bloodthirsty smile played at the corner of the Lady of the House’s mouth as she gently raised a hand, a swarm of countless spiders poured into all corners of the sewer, she tilted her ear to listen, whispering: "They’ve all arrived..."

Embrace madness.

The Lady of the House used the last of her Monster Level to complete her Shadow Law, she now counted as half legendary-level Ancient Race, the cost was total loss of control.

At this moment she chose to let the Extraordinary Essence digest her, to gain near-legendary power, to complete the task given by the President.

The shadow writhed.

The Lady of the House’s figure seemed to assimilate with the surrounding shadows, her flesh for a moment appeared to dissolve completely hallucinatedly, then reconstituted within the shadow.

Her form underwent a very special twisted transformation.

A moment ago, the Lady of the House was still a shadowless half-human, half-spider monster, black chitin spreading from the spider’s lower body upward, slowly covering her skin, sprouting sharp bone spurs at the elbows, bearing hideous insect armor at her jaw.

The next moment, the Lady of the House’s body began to become void, her flesh dissolved wholly, seeming to not exist within reality’s space, directly forming a distorted spider-shaped reflection on the wall.

She turned into a writhing shadow.

.........