Epic Of The Demonic Sage

Lucius didn't know but him forgetting to close and putting the books properly had saved him from being exposed. Had it not been for Kiana thinking that it was just him being tired, they would have called in a priest or a healer.

Kiana watched Lucius for a while, making sure that he really was fine and was not sick. 

"Is he having a nightmare?" Kiana wondered.

But since Lucius was not moving or murmuring, she reckoned that the nightmare must have passed by now. 

"I'll just tell Aunt Lita he's tired and sleeping," Kiana said to herself before leaving the room.

Downstairs, Lita was sitting and sipping some tea.

"I checked up on Asher, he's just sleeping," Kiana stated.

"Still sleeping? Why? He's not sick or anything, right?" Lita asked with concern.

Kiana shook her head in response before speaking.

"No, he just spent the entire night reading some books. Probably got engrossed in them and forgot about the time." Kiana answered.

"This boy… before he barely used to open a book to read and now he can't get enough of them," Lita said.

"What should we do now?" Kiana asked.

"Leave him be. If he was reading all night, then it must have been something important. He has already helped our family a lot in these past few days and has put a lot of effort into it. He deserves to rest more." Lita stated.

"Alright. I'll ask the cooks to prepare something more nutritious for him tonight. Since he has pretty much skipped on two entire meals, he may as well compensate for it at dinner." Kiana replied.

Lita nodded her head in approval before letting Kiana leave. She went to sipping her tea while reading a few more letters that had arrived.

***

Lucius had been sleeping for over twelve hours now and would have skipped over the swordsmanship practice today had it not been for it being Sunday. By the time his eyes opened, it was past sunset.

Lucius struggled to sit up from the lying position and felt like his body was quite sore. He looked out of the window and saw the dark sky, along with the faint lingering lights of the lamps in the city.

"It's already nighttime… seems like I ended up sleeping the entire day," Lucius muttered to himself.

He managed to rise from the bed and washed his face with the water in the basin. It had already been cleaned and refilled by Kiana, as she knew that he would need it when he woke up. Having washed his face, Lucius reached for the jug of water that was kept at the corner table.

His throat was parched, having not drunk anything for the past twenty four hours or so. The last time Lucius had drunk water was during dinner last night and after that, he had just spent all his time in forming the hell imprint.

"Ahh…" Lucius said in relief as the cool water rejuvenated his tongue and throat. 

He stretched his body, making its joints crackle and pop. It was evident they had gotten tensed during the long period that he had been motionless. After he felt a bit better, Lucius decided to check upon the hell imprint. 

Lucius actually didn't know if he had fully succeeded or not. The last thing he remembered was it materializing fully before he passed out. He thus appeared in the Soul scape and saw the condition of his soul.

"What the hell is this?" Lucius said in shock.

The change in Lucius's soul was massive and it was enough to shock even him, who had seen many different things. His consciousness got closer to the soul and observed the Hell imprint that was on the left side of his chest. 

There were tens of root like tendrils arising from it that went deep into his soul and came all the way across it on the other side. Here they joined with the symbol for Nexus and created a strange cycle.

There was energy traveling between these two points and it would change between crimson red and light red.

"What did the hell imprint do to Nexus?" Lucius wondered.

Since he had never seen gifts before in this world and the energy called Aether also did not exist in the other worlds, Lucius could not come up with any hypothesis. 

'Should I try to enter my soul to see what the effect is?' Lucius wondered.

After thinking deeply for a few minutes, Lucius reckoned that he definitely needed to do it. He thus willed it and his consciousness merged with his soul.

His soul faintly glowed in a red light before its eyes opened. Lucius first tried to see if anything felt wrong in his soul-body and ensure that it had not harmed it or anything.

"Seems like a soul mutation instead…" Lucius analyzed.

He had learned about soul mutations and had seen plenty of them in his past life. It was actually something that happened a lot in the members of the Great Barrom Clan. Because they interacted with the Demonic Mana and hell energies all the time, they would inadvertence affect their bodies and eventually their souls.

Those who were True bloods of the Barrom clan had a greater connection with hell, which caused their souls to interact directly with the Hell energies. This combined with the hell imprint they had caused their souls to take on different characteristics.

Depending on the kind of True name they had, their souls may even gain some demonic aspects that belonged to the demon whose name they bore.

"A soul mutation of this kind is not something I've seen before. Though… it seems mostly benign and does not affect the actual functioning of my soul." Lucius analyzed.

Lucius checked the root like tendrils and discovered that they were actually energy channels that were made between the hell imprint and the Nexus. 

"The nexus and the Hell Imprint are now linked?" Lucius said, feeling a bit bewildered.