Born in Blood

541  Inspection

Just one person was in front of Liam in some sort of… classy auditorium. The space was decorated with shelves of books, strange decorations and wall-writings.

Staring at him with a bored expression, was an aged, tired looking man with a hunched back. A pair of glasses, strangely earth-like, sat over his long nose bridge. His eyes were a dull blue, and his curly, unkempt, white hair fell over his shoulders. He took slow, long breaths in, and quick, short breaths out.

Liam furrowed his brows. He wasn't in dire straits anymore, but he still had no clue where he was, or how much time had passed.

However, Liam quickly made sense of something. 'I failed.'

Well. That wasn't anything new. Most of the time, things went wrong for him than right. Each success came with at least three failures that preceded it.

Yet… his Path!

There was finally a significant change! Immediately, he—

"Are you going to pretend I don't exist?"

Liam sighed inwardly.

Setting his eyes on the tired old man, Liam gave him a searching look, then said:

"So you're the Formation Master who set this place up." The old man gave a weak smile, then spoke with a wheezing voice:

"You're fast to catch up. Yes, indeed, I am." No sane person would ever link such wondrous, large scale Formations to such a… measly, aged individual. There wasn't even anything profound about his appearance.

In fact, he had a droll, tame aura. Sort of like a sick grandfather.

But here he was.

A Rank 5 Formation master.

The cultivation world really didn't discriminate. Cornelius Mehro was a good example of that. "Why am I here?" Liam asked. "Why else? You were half dead. I had to save you."

Liam raised a brow.

"You didn't have to."

"I suppose that's your way of giving thanks?" the old man shot back. "Not what I meant," Liam corrected with a careful, calm voice. "I don't think everyone you save, you've bothered to meet with." Silence.

The old man gave a tired grin, chuckled, then said with an impressive voice:

"Aha… haha… yes. You are correct. I brought you here out of a childish curiosity. You were the only cultivator in centuries – at least, through my eyes – who's had such a natural connection with Chaos."

"Judging by how annoyed you look right now, you're probably itching to leave. You don't even care about who I am, don't you?"

Liam was sure he had his facial expression to his usual 'dead' look… but perhaps due to his injuries, he let the mask slip. But yes.

He had no clue who the old man was.

And he didn't care, either.

Liam nodded.

The old man smirked.

With difficulty, he rose to his feet, then slowly straightened his back.

BRSH!

A sudden burst of explosive power surged around the elder, crackling across his entire frame. In seconds, a full transformation took place, revealing the old man's identity. From a tired, weak, aged frame, to a strong, broad-shouldered, chiseled figure. From blue eyes, to discolored reds and disproportioned features.

In seconds, Liam was left in utter shock.

It was none other than Asta himself.

"HAHA! SURPRISED? WAIT, WAIT. DON'T ANSWER. I KNOW YOU ARE."

Liam furrowed his brows. Did Asta quite literally split himself into two parts? Was he born with split personality disorder, and this was the result of cultivating through it?

Why were the two so different?

The possibilities that opened up to one as they climbed through the ranks was quite terrifying. Still, despite seeing Rank 6 powerhouses in action, this was easily one of the craziest abilities Liam had seen so far. Which begged a question…

"Why are you even showing me all of this? Are you trying to be friends or something?" Asta laughed loudly. A second later, his body lazily deflated, reverting back to his hunched-back, old man form. "Of course not. I'm just making sure I won't have any boredom for the next few centuries to come. Perhaps one day, we'll be fighting on opposite sides. I wouldn't want you to stagger and fall back in growth, do I?" Liam furrowed his brows again, confused and annoyed once more.

"You are literally the weirdest old coot I've ev—"

"Later now."

Asta waved his hand, and Liam's body was immediately hurled out of the auditorium, flung towards its wall in the blink of an eye. However, instead of crashing through it, Liam phased right through, continuing to fly at a stupidly fast speed, before coming to an abrupt stop.

He was right outside Pandemoniumania.

Liam let out a deep breath. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

'I'm losing my mind.'

Well. He'd already lost it.

But finally… he was alone.

Liam swam as further away as he could from Pandemoniumania, opting to stray away from the public eye. He had to meet with Bill shortly after… but he still had plenty of time before then.

A day passed.

After swimming past several small-sized colonies, Liam found an abandoned sea bed, choosing it as his test site.

First, he wanted to make sure he was utterly alone. A bit of White Matter left his Pearl, then mixed with Chaos, forming a Meathead puppet.

'Nothing's changed in my Chaos itself. The Pearl, my core, body and sea of consciousness don't feel too different, either.'

Liam sent the Meathead away with a gesture. "Go patrol or something."

Immediately, the Meathead obeyed the orders, disappearing from sight after a few minutes.

Then, Liam sat cross-legged, focusing everything on his Path.

For the first time, he had laid eyes on the Spider Lily. The vermillion petals of the dangerously beautiful flower moved on its own, as though breathing.

Liam felt a strange pang of awe and amazement. Without batting an eye, he knew this flower represented him – his Chaos – perfectly. Except, it was then that Liam realized something.

This wasn't just Chaos…

It was a mixture of several Qualities merged into one!

Immediately, Liam moved to inspect each one in close detail.

The first, and most obvious one of them, was Chaos itself. It was the Spider Lily's foundation, and what the other Qualities had built upon.

The second… and Liam had a hard time believing this… was Blood.

A Blood Quality had found its way into Liam's Chaos. The Spider Lily's slightly darker stem contained traces of blood in it, which spread to the base of the petals and veins of the flower itself.

It was as if to say, Liam's root form of Chaos stemmed from blood itself.