CHAPTER 285: 285

In the middle realm, Noctis walked out of a rift and looked at Alexander. "My Lord, I’ve delivered the message." He bowed his head respectfully.

Alexander nodded in satisfaction. It meant David would tell Michelle what he wanted about the pendant.

In reality, the pendant Alexander gave to Michelle was made because of the elders Alexander despised so much and had killed just a while ago.

They demanded Alexander and David to always keep something representing their authority. Something like a seal to command armies. If they gave it to someone, that person would wield the same authority as them.

To get rid of the nagging, David created the pendants. And, without the elders’ knowledge, he created two more pendants, with the same aura and energy hidden inside. One was kept by Alexander and the other by him.

David made them completely on a whim, and later he and Alexander agreed that if they ever found someone to marry, they would give their second pendant to them. If the person was worth it, they would also gain authority in the Dark Palace. If not, they would just be a symbolical figure.

Back in the Land of Exile, David knew he wasn’t to tell that to Michelle. Instead, when she asked what the pendant Alexander gave her meant, he said the story Alexander sent to him through Noctis.

So, apparently, the pendant’s uneven shape and random marks all over it meant that the owner was the shadow of the palace. They would be both visible and invisible, commanding no one and everyone at the same time.

In other words, if Michelle took the pendant and acted like it symbolized, she would sometimes appear to stir chaos, but without stating who she was. She would just leave the mark of the Dark Palace. And then, she would disappear.

And all the shadow guards in the Dark Palace would obey her unconditionally.

But that was only if she gained their trust and loyalty.

After listening to David, Michelle stared at the pendant in her hand. Were Alexander’s intentions really pure when he gave her the pendant?

She didn’t believe that!

Outside the window, she summoned Tenether and jumped to his back. The black raven flapped his wings and flew up high above the city.

Michelle wrapped void around herself and Tenether. It was time to return to the middle realm.

For the pendant to recognize her as its master, she needed to drop her blood on it. She wouldn’t do it until she saw Alexander again. She still didn’t rule out the possibility that he had somehow communicated with David and told him what to tell her.

It took just a few days for Michelle to get back to the lava mountain. But she didn’t have Tenether land, because what was happening down below had captured her attention.

She wanted to observe from up above.

But that was only until an angry shout carried to her. "Damn, Michelle! Don’t stay up there and come help!" Kieran roared without taking his attention from the fight.

He, Ivona, and Anastasia were fighting a group of Elemental Giant Scorpions.

Alexander, Noctis, and Unlucien were showing no signs of planning to help them out.

Michelle patted Tenether and he swooped down towards one of the scorpions. At the same time, Michelle jumped off.

The moment Michelle landed on the ground, Tenether tackled a scorpion to the ground and transformed into a cheetah.

Opening his jaws, he bit into the scorpion, killing it swiftly.

That was one down.

But Michelle didn’t let Tenether kill any more and sent him into her space, to the rest of her contracted beasts.

"Shall we fight properly now?" Michelle smiled, summoning her sickle.

Kieran’s eyes gleamed. Since Michelle had returned from the sect, she hadn’t fought with her full strength. It was finally time she would show it.

Ivona and Anastasia were equally curious to see it.

The group leapt into the fight. Michelle went first, taking the aggro of all the scorpions. With her Shadow Spirit Steps, she evaded their attacks. And when she failed to do so, she deflected the attack with the sickle.

Seeing Michelle take the aggro but not retaliate, Ivona was the first one to understand what she was planning. And Anastasia and Kieran took just a moment longer to see it too.

Michelle wouldn’t kill the scorpions. She was letting them observe the scorpions’ movement patterns to find their weakness and strike at them.

Whenever they wanted, they could strike at a scorpion, taking its aggro away from Michelle, and fight it head on.

Michelle was holding up quite well against the scorpions. With the rank of her Shadow Mastery, they couldn’t endanger her.

But to give herself some challenge, she completely locked away her shadow essence. She had the feeling that her physical abilities alone were weak compared to her energies, and she didn’t like that. If there ever came a time when she couldn’t use any of her energies, whether soul or spirit energy, or shadow essence, she could end up in deep trouble.

So, while wielding the sickle, she used solely her physical strength.

And it was quite taxing. The sickle was heavy, meant to be infused with soul energy to be lighter. Quickly, Michelle’s arms got sore.

But she couldn’t let herself slow down. That would let the scorpions strike at her.

Of course, she could deflect that easily with her energies, but she didn’t want that.

She wasn’t even using her energies to sustain her Shadow Spirit Steps, so she was even moving slower.

In good two hours, most of the Elemental Giant Scorpions were dead and Michelle was fighting the last one. She could discard the sickle and just dodge if she wanted, but she didn’t. She wanted to push her muscles as much as possible.

Kieran and the rest stared at Michelle from a distance. "Do you want to kill that one yourself?" Anastasia shouted at Michelle.

"Sure!" Michelle blocked the scorpion’s tail flying at her.

Then she changed her grip on the sickle, twisted it and swung it upwards. Instantly, the sickle’s sharp blade pierced through the scorpion like butter. The sickle was sharper than most blades since it was made in a spirit domain. It wasn’t created by human hands, so it didn’t have human flaws.

When the last scorpion fell, Michelle summoned a shadow cushion beneath her and sat down on it. Her whole body was aching.

At first, it was just her hand, but when she reached the point when her hands started moving sluggishly, she started putting much more strain on her body to compensate for the slowness.

"What do we do with the corpses?" Kieran came over to Michelle. Because he was in an environment the most suitable for him, he was in the best condition.

Michelle shrugged. "Creatures other than those scorpions wouldn’t roam here even if they smelled the corpses."

That relieved Kieran a bit. It meant the corpses didn’t have to be taken care of right away. If other creatures came to the smell of blood, they could have been in trouble with how exhausted everyone was.

But that didn’t mean they could leave the corpses lying around. Since Kieran was still fine, he took out a knife and started going around the corpses, retrieving their Life Stones.

Seeing him put them away, Michelle frowned a bit. She was still feeling tempted to experiment with the Life Stones.

Kieran noticed Michelle’s gaze and sighed. "You will kill yourself," he said as he walked over.

Michelle shook her head. "I know I can handle it."

Kieran stored the pouch with the Life Stones into his spatial ring and sat down. "I won’t give them to you."

Michelle sighed a bit. She expected as such.

Just then, a pair of hands wrapped around her from behind. "What are you planning?" Alexander didn’t exactly know what Michelle wanted with the Life Stones, but he had a good guess.

Michelle glanced up at him. "I spoke with David Elether." She changed the subject. She didn’t feel like talking with Alexander about her experiments.

She had the feeling that he wouldn’t stop her from it. But if he did, she really wouldn’t know what to do. In the end, he was a knowledgeable person from the heavenly realm. If he told her it was too dangerous, she would take his word for it.

And she didn’t want to hear it, so she didn’t tell Alexander her plans.

Alexander knew Michelle was just blatantly changing the subject, but he let her. "And what did he tell you?" He rested his chin on Michelle’s shoulder.

Michelle frowned a bit. "The same you said." She clearly didn’t like that. It was obvious that by going to the Land of Exile, she wanted to find out that Alexander was lying.

But it seemed he didn’t.

Of course, that didn’t mean she believed him. She still didn’t like the pendant he gave her. But at the moment, she didn’t see any disadvantage of becoming the pendant’s master.

"So will you drop your blood on it?" A knife appeared in Alexander’s hand as he spoke.

"Yes, I guess..." Michelle took the knife calmly.