CHAPTER 284: 284

When Michelle disappeared from his sight, Alexander cast his gaze towards Kieran. If he wanted to continue with his plan, he could not let anyone see it.

He could barely stay conscious, but that did not mean he would not be able to take down someone of Kieran’s strength. Compared to him, Kieran was a mere fly.

Alexander started gathering his shadow essence when two rifts opened through the space and two bestial creatures stepped out.

A black wolf with three black eyes and a black gem on its forehead, and a two-headed black serpent with golden eyes and a black gem on each forehead.

Seeing the two, Alexander was satisfied. It took his subordinates quite a while to find him.

"My Lord!" The wolf transformed into Noctis and the snake into Unlucien. Both knelt down in respect.

Alexander gave a light nod. "I need the Mind Stone," he said lazily.

Noctis quickly took a stone out and walked over to Alexander. "Do you want to use it right away, My Lord?" he asked.

When Alexander nodded, Noctis quickly put the stone on Alexander’s forehead and retracted a few steps.

For a moment, Alexander closed his eyes and inserted his shadow essence into the stone. Then, he opened his eyes and glanced at the two. "Take it to the David!"

Noctis took the stone and stored it away. The next moment, he transformed back into a black three-eyed wolf and stepped into a rift that tore open behind him.

Unlucien stayed behind. "My Lord, how did you end up like this?" he walked over to Alexander, gathering his spirit energy on his hand.

Alexander shrugged. "It just ended up this way. First the white god came to mess with me, and then Michelle decided she didn’t want me to follow her to the Land of Exile."

Unlucien had a frown on his face. "You could have easily dodged both, couldn’t you?" He was acting a bit different than usual.

When Alexander was not weakened, Unlucien barely spoke, never really asking anything. But when Alexander was weakened, Unlucien restrained himself much less.

The reason for that was quite simple. Whenever Alexander was weakened, he rarely got angry. And one thing all shadow guards feared was seeing the Dark Lord angry. They would not be able to handle his wrath no matter how weak he got.

"I could..." Alexander sat up, feeling the effect of Lavreth’s white mist subsiding a lot. It was dispersing. The only thing left to affect him was the strike to his soul. Michelle really did not hold herself back when she did it.

Michelle did not know Alexander was getting better already. She was busy with different things.

Tenether landed in front of the barrier of Heavenly Law between the middle and lower realm.

Jumping off, Michelle placed her hand on the invisible barrier. It still did not want to let her through.

"One day..." she did not finish her sentence. Instead, she just moved her shadow essence to the palm of her hand. Alongside it, she sent out her soul energy.

Before she gained shadow essence, to pass the barrier, she needed to mix her soul and spirit energy and wrap herself in it, so the barrier could recognize she was a human. But with the shadow essence, she no longer needed to do that.

Creating void with her soul energy, she pushed it against the barrier. But it was resistant to it.

And to counter that, Michelle wrapped shadow essence around the void.

Heavenly Law was quite ignorant towards shadow essence, because it was everywhere. So if something was wrapped in shadow essence, it would be able to pass.

But it had to be a thing. Not a living being.

Just like that, Michelle pushed her void into the barrier. Then, she started stretching it out, creating a hole the size of a person in the barrier.

Before the Heavenly Law noticed, Michelle quickly walked through and retracted the void.

Tenether was already on the other side. Not having Spirit Soul blood, he had no problem passing the barrier.

Michelle hopped on his back and he flew towards the Land of Exile.

Normally, it would take about two days for Tenether to fly through the whole lower realm, but when Michelle wrapped her void around him, it took only half a day before they were once again in front of the barrier.

But Michelle did not need to get down again. The barrier in front of her was weaker, so it would let her through. Because whether it took her as a human or a monster, she was strong enough to meet the criteria to pass.

Tenether just continued flying, heading towards the capital city.

When the huge bird flew above the capital and towards the imperial palace, people were horrified. No such creatures lived in the Land of Exile.

Once above the imperial palace, Michelle patted Tenether and he started shapeshifting. That made him lose the solidness of his body and Michelle fell through.

Tenether was not that high in the first place, so Michelle was not worried about dying.

Summoning Liquid Shadow, a slimy black tentacle flew up from the ground and wrapped around her waist, stopping her fall. Then, it disappeared like it never existed.

Nearly instantly, Michelle was surrounded by knights. "State your purpose, intruder!"

Michelle coldly swept her gaze over them. She did not like being stopped.

Without a single word, she activated her Shadow Spirit Steps and disappeared from their sight. Only the captain was a cultivator, and not even at the Spirit rank, so not a single one of them could spot Michelle as she moved.

Waltzing through the imperial palace like it was her garden, Michelle headed towards the little Emperor’s office. She got there from the outside, landing on the windowsill.

There, she gently knocked on the window.

The little Emperor turned to the window, and his eyes widened when he saw Michelle, at the moment disguised as Michael Grayson. "Teacher!" He came over to open the window.

Michelle hopped into the room and swept her gaze over the Emperor. When she was leaving the Land of Exile, he was just a little child. But since then, he had grown up a fair bit. "Your Majesty, where can I find Prince Regent?" she asked.

The little Emperor was a bit disappointed that Michelle did not come to see him. "He should be at the auction house. He stays there most of the time."

Michelle smiled a bit. "Thank you, Your Majesty!" She lifted her hand and patted the little Emperor’s head.

The little Emperor nodded and watched Michelle turn back to the window. Just as she showed up, she disappeared.

A moment later, Michelle was standing in front of the illegal auction house. She wondered whether to enter through the front door or sneak straight into David’s office.

After considering it for a while, she decided.

Going through the front door would take up too much time. Sneaking in was more efficient.

David was sitting in his office, handling some documents when he heard something crash in the hallways. Standing up, he walked to the door to check what was going on.

When he opened the door, his face darkened a bit. "Was there no other way to come inside, aside from breaking the biggest window?" he glared at Michelle as she stood up from in between the glass shards all around her. She was completely unharmed because she wrapped herself in void before jumping through the glass.

Michelle retracted the void and stood up straight. "I came to ask you something." She had a cold smile on her lips as she reached into her space and took out the black pendant Alexander gave her. The engraved word Dark looked captivating in the dim light coming from the window.

David frowned a bit when he saw the pendant. "Alexander gave that to you?"

Michelle nodded. "What does the pendant mean?" her eyes narrowed in question.

David took the pendant from Michelle’s hand. "The person who carries it shall have the same authority in the Dark Palace as the Dark Lord."

"Why does it look different from Alexander’s pendant? Is yours different too?" Michelle was still suspicious. David did not tell her the whole story yet.

David took out a pendant of his own. It was not decorated the least bit. Just a black piece of jade with the word Dark engraved on it.

On the other hand, Alexander’s pendant had sharp engravings, resembling claw marks.

"Why the difference?" Michelle stared at the pendant.

"So the subordinates can recognize who is who. Also, each pendant has a special meaning."

Hearing that, Michelle frowned. Alexander did not tell her that. "What meaning?"

"It symbolizes our reign and who our subordinates are." David started explaining. "My subordinates are humans, specifically Shadow Masters. They never leave traces when they carry something out. And I am the only one who can be seen. That is why the jade does not have any markings. It is made to draw the eyes of others and prevent them from looking elsewhere."

Michelle raised a brow. That was a lot of meaning behind a single pendant.

"What about Alexander’s pendant?" she asked.

"That is similar," David nodded. "Alexander rules monsters. And he rules them invisibly. When they carry out work, they leave behind marks befitting their identity. But that hides their master. He is hidden by their claws, carrying the invisible power of the Dark Palace."

Michelle was genuinely intrigued by David’s words. What he said basically meant that half of the Dark Palace was hidden from the heavenly realm’s eyes. Out of the Dark Lord duo, only David Elether was known to the world. And from the shadow guards, it was not David’s subordinates that were visible. Alexander’s were the ones drawing attention.

The subordinates of the visible Lord were invisible, and the subordinates of the invisible Lord were visible.