Chapter 246: Grand Machinator
He had a lazy, but slightly curious expression on his face as he looked down at Uhtred.
Uhtred shrugged.
"Well, nothing much, really. Only that you and Lucky are in cahoots, and you both already know of the existence of Otherworlders, and also the existence of anomalies within this world..."
He paused.
"...But, you obviously aren’t just finding out now. You’ve known about this for a long time, for years even. You spoke earlier about a ’dimension,’ which leads me to think you know there are other... dimensions beyond this one."
He looked at the Heavenly Demon pointedly.
"You already know of the existence of other dimensions. You already know of the existence of anomalies — the keys to crossing to these other dimensions, yet you are still here...?"
"Why?" Uhtred asked. "You want to know what I think? I think you locals cannot travel to the other dimensions beyond yours... at least not without the help of an Otherworlder. That is why you brought Nayu An here. That is why you brought me here... through Lucky. You want my help to give you passage to another dimension."
Uhtred finished with a raise of a brow, as if asking the Heavenly Demon whether his deduction was spot-on or not.
The Heavenly Demon said nothing for several seconds.
Then, he hummed, and suddenly, with a wave of his hand, Nayu An appeared before him.
She fell from somewhere above, screaming at the top of her lungs. And right before she hit the ground, the Heavenly Demon shifted his palm and her momentum slowed to an easy halt.
She hovered in the air in front of him, her eyes darting around the grand palace in fear and utter confusion.
Her confusion quickly morphed into a look of abject horror once she realized where she was.
It was obvious she had never been in here before, but as a local of this world — an heir of one of the main righteous clans — she had heard stories of this place.
She had heard descriptions of the evil, yet grand Demonic Cult palace — descriptions that any sane person who heard them would have thought to be blatant lies, yet now that she saw it with her own eyes, those descriptions didn’t do the evil grandness of the palace justice.
The fear in her eyes was so deep she looked nearly crazed, but then her eyes flitted over to Uhtred, and hope shone in them brightly.
"Uhtred! Uhtred, you’re here! That means my grandfather is still ali—"
She didn’t get to finish the words when a shower of blood spurted out of her mouth.
Shock was written all over her face as she struggled to process what had just happened to her.
Uhtred watched with a flat expression as she looked down to see a hand holding her heart out through her chest.
Slowly, she tried to look back and see who exactly had just ended her life, but the hand pulled back and let her body sag to the ground.
She fell like a doll with her strings cut, her body tumbling down the stairs and leaving a thick, slick trail of blood behind.
Her head was faced toward Uhtred, her eyes questioning, filled with fear, confusion, and the unwillingness to die.
Uhtred watched the whole thing. He felt compelled to. Even despite knowing she had some evil plan for him, seeing life leave someone removed all facades and reduced everyone to what they truly were...
Simple living beings afraid to die.
The life left Nayu An’s eyes, and Uhtred let out a light sigh, then looked back up, unconcerned.
The Heavenly Demon looked down at him, a glint flickering in his eyes, and a whisper of a smile on his face.
He didn’t comment on Uhtred’s lack of reaction to Nayu’s death; he simply stretched the heart he’d ripped out of her forward and spoke:
"By anomaly, you mean this thing?"
He activated some kind of technique, and suddenly, the fresh, bloody heart in his hand began to compress into itself...
No. Something within the heart began to compress, the rest of the heart dissolving around it.
By the time the process was done, a small, black, fleshy orb remained.
It thumped like a beating heart, reeking of a dark, suffocating aura so pungent that it even overwhelmed the evil emanating from the black stone floor and the throne itself.
Uhtred frowned immediately, feeling a trace of familiarity from that orb.
The same way the Demonic Maw he had passed through to enter the palace had felt similar to the Heavenly Demon, was the same way the throbbing black orb of flesh felt like an extension of the Heavenly Demon.
As Uhtred frowned in realization, the Heavenly Demon slowly placed the fleshy orb in his mouth and swallowed, the lump moving down his throat visibly.
He grimaced slightly, then stabilized himself and smiled.
"What anomaly?" He spread both his arms wide in question. "It’s all a part of me anyway."
Uhtred’s eyes widened at that revelation, a new dreadful suspicion dawning on him.
His expression of blatant shock caused the Heavenly Demon to cackle wildly.
"Have you realized it now? There are no anomalies in this world! All that there is are parts of myself dispersed far and wide, lying in wait for Otherworlders like you to be led to them whenever you come into my world!"
Uhtred’s mind shook as the Heavenly Demon confirmed his suspicion. There had never been any fortuitous encounter or anomaly in the first place!
Nayu An had been nothing more than a vessel meant to draw out champions like him.
He had told Zara to be on the lookout for anomalies and fortuitous encounters. But just like himself, even she would fall for the same trap.
Whatever anomalies any of the remaining nine champions found were simply a part of the Heavenly Demon himself, sent out to lure them.
"Also," the Heavenly Demon continued. "Lucky is not here. There is no need to keep calling this place a ’dimension.’"
He paused, his voice turning menacing.
"It is a Floor! Call it what it is directly! It is a Floor of the Illustrious Tower of Wonders! And I am nothing but a ’Floor Boss’ that you tiny ascenders are meant to defeat to cross to the next Floor!"
His voice became spiteful in addition to its menace already. He looked at Uhtred with a deep bitterness in his eyes — the first blatant expression he’d shown so far.
Suddenly he chuckled, realizing he had lost his cool. He regained his composure, his expression becoming easy.
"Unfortunately, unlike the mindless ’Floor Boss’ the Tower wants me to be, I refuse to accept the fate of becoming a stepping stone for tiny creatures like you."
He stood up abruptly and began to walk down the blood strewn stairs.
"I will ascend to the next floor... and you will open the path for me to do it."