Chapter 42: Legacy of the Vessel

’The Celestial family...?’

The realization hit him like a physical weight. If this ruined village held the ancestral grounds of his current body’s lineage, then whatever was locked behind that iron door in the basement wasn’t just random trash—it was a direct connection to his past.

"Argh—!"

Ren gasped, his hands instantly flying to his temples as a sharp, agonizing pressure spiked inside his skull.

The pain throbbed behind his eyes, forced foreign memories surging into his consciousness with the force of a tidal wave. He staggered backward, his footing giving way against the loose gravel.

"Ren!" Elysia caught his shoulder, bracing her frame against his to keep him from collapsing into the dirt. "What’s wrong? Are you okay?"

Ren barely heard her over the sudden roaring in his ears. The vision locked over his sight, vivid and unyielding.

He saw himself as a child, dragged along a torch-lit stone cavern by the wrists. His biological parents stood beside him, their faces obscured by the flickering shadows, forcing him toward a central altar inside a hidden shrine dedicated to the dark god NYX.

They presented him directly to the high priests of the Celestial sect.

In the minds of the Celestial clan, NYX was never an inherently evil entity. The ancient records preserved by their house claimed that NYX was originally a pure, uncorrupted deity—one of the few who had partially resisted the black taint that poisoned this world’s pantheon generations ago.

The origin of that corruption was clear in the vision.

A massive, glowing meteor had descended from the deep sky, slamming into the planet’s surface with apocalyptic force. The impact released a sprawling wave of thick, purple fog that spread across the continents, blanketing every nation and reaching the higher planes.

When the ancient gods inhaled that extraplanar haze, their minds warped. Pure divine essence gave way to raw, unchecked malice, greed, and violent impulses they had never possessed.

Distorted by the taint, the fallen pantheon abandoned humanity entirely. They turned their power against the mortal realm, manufacturing nightmare beasts to wipe human civilization from the surface. NYX, resisting the full onset of the corruption longer than the others, was eventually overpowered and sealed away by the combined wrath of the other corrupted deities during an ancient celestial war.

The Celestial family clung to a singular prophecy: a savior born of the Celestial bloodline would one day serve as the vessel to contain, purify, and channel NYX’s remaining uncorrupted core to reset the world order.

Driven by this belief, Ren’s parents offered their own son as that sacrifice.

The younger Ren begged them to stop, but his cries fell on deaf ears. His parents forced him to consume a crushed herb mixture, lacing his water until his limbs turned heavy and his consciousness slipped away.

When his eyes closed, they laid his small body in the center of a carved stone dais.

Dozens of black-robed Celestial cultists lined the perimeter of the shrine. They dragged silver daggers across their palms, letting their blood drip onto the floor to trace a massive, glowing array shaped like an ’X’ crossed with an ’L’.

As they chanted in an ancient, raspy tongue, a ring of black candles flared to life around him. A dense, shadowy mass detached itself from the altar, plunging directly into the child’s chest.

The vision cut off instantly, plunging Ren back into the harsh sunlight of the ruins.

"Hah... hah... hah..."

Ren’s breath came in ragged gasps, cold sweat breaking out across his forehead and running down his jaw.

"Ren! Speak to me!" Elysia pressed, her fingers digging into his forearm to keep him steady. "What just happened?"

Ren forced his breathing to slow, shaking his head as he pulled his arm free. "I’m... fine. Just a sudden spike of vertigo."

He straightened his posture, though his eyes remained wide as he stared blankly at the stone floor.

’What the hell was that...?’

The sudden memory blast laid everything bare. He finally understood why the dark god NYX was anchored directly to his soul core. He hadn’t been chosen by chance—his own parents had offered him up as a sacrificial vessel to host an ancient, sealed deity.

More importantly, it shifted his entire understanding of this world’s threat level. The war wasn’t merely a matter of humans fighting off wild monsters or clashing with the Heretical Dark Faction. The true architects of this world’s ruin were corrupted gods—former guardians turned cosmic threats after breathing in the haze of a fallen meteor.

If those deities still lingered beyond the veil, the scope of this world’s conflict was far larger than he had mapped out.

’How did the Celestial clan actually fall then?’ Ren thought, his mind working through the details.

Ryu had mentioned back in the sub-space that the entire Celestial line was wiped out long ago for practicing forbidden dark rites. But if they were systematically executed, who delivered the final blow? The current records claimed he was dropped at an orphanage as an infant, meaning his parents survived the initial ritual only to meet a hidden end later on.

His eyes drifted back to the dark stairwell cutting into the basement foundation.

’The answers are down there.’

"Ren?" Elysia asked again, her tone laced with genuine concern as she studied his pale face. "You look like you’ve seen a ghost. Are you sure you’re fit to stand?"

"I’m fine," Ren replied, keeping his voice flat as he regained his composure. "Elysia... this symbol. You’re completely certain it belongs to the Celestial clan?"

Elysia traced her fingers along the worn edges of the wooden emblem. "There’s no doubt. My royal education included heraldry from all major historic houses. The crossed-blade insignia is unique to their main line."

Ren walked over to the edge of the collapsed floor, staring down into the pitch-black descent toward the rusted iron door.

"Then there’s definitely something preserved in that basement," Ren said, his tone turning grim.

Elysia raised an eyebrow, stepping up beside him. "It appears so."

"We’re checking it out," Ren stated, stepping onto the top stone rung of the underground staircase.

"Hey, Ren, wait," Elysia called out softly, reaching for his wrist. "Did you forget what Evelyn ordered? The primary goal is setting up the defensive boundary for the new settlement."

Ren paused on the step, looking back over his shoulder. "I haven’t forgotten. The settlement gets built. But I’m opening that door first."

His eyes remained locked on the iron threshold below.

His instinct was screaming at him to go down. In a world overrun by wild monsters, dark factions, and rogue deities, survival required leverage. Blind action was a death sentence; one wrong move made out of ignorance would kill him faster than a monster’s claws.

If the records hidden in that cellar gave him a clearer picture of what he was actually up against, it was worth every second of delay.

"Fine," Elysia sighed, taking a step onto the stairwell behind him. "Just don’t blame me if my sister comes down here to drag you out by your collar."

Ren turned back toward the dark, his hand reaching for the iron door handle below. "Let’s see what they left behind."