Chapter 554 : Murals and Destiny (上)

“That Caspian… Dead? Just like that? Did he die because of that kiss?” Iris frowned and asked as she looked at the photo in the sky. It was taken from an angle to display the untouched chessboard with a wine jar beside it. While it was not entirely clear what happened exactly, one thing was for certain. That blond guy was not only bisexual; he also really liked kissing people!

“Who knows… This Tournament is getting absolutely nuts!” Theodore chuckled. He was more than happy to see this bastard Caspian die. He was the reason his daughter began acting like some crazy bitch.

“Look, it’s big brother Bill!” a youth from the family suddenly exclaimed, making everyone quickly search the sky to find the right one.

In the photo, Bill was decapitating some other young man in what looked like an arena.

“As expected of my grandson!” Bruce, who sat beside Ann near the center of the balcony, said with a smirk. “You guys should not be dismayed for not getting a chance… As you see, this tournament is very dangerous; only elites like Bill can guarantee the best results!” he added to the youths from his factions. Many of them felt a bit dissatisfied about not getting any seeded positions, as their faction only got one key due to Ann’s solidification of power after the family coup. Now, most of them felt a bit relieved, as this tournament's level was too high. Each time one of them had any doubts, he only needed to look at poor Max and Timmy, who had talismans plastered over their crotches, waiting for this tournament to end so they could be hurried to a hospital!

“Wait… Is that Zoe?” someone exclaimed, making not only the family elders but even Falcon, who was worried sick about that girl, look at the sky and gasp in surprise as he saw the familiar Zoe in that photo standing in front of a large mural holding a torch that shone on her face, revealing not only her intricate features, but her moist eyes and the two trails of tears on her cheeks. “Why is she crying?”

“No idea, but are solo battles also available here?” one elder asked.

“You can’t presume anything here, look there are even one with four contestants! ” another replied said.

“Indeed…” Ann responded, looking at Zoe’s result photo, eyeing not Zoe herself, but the mural behind her that reflected a dragon hugging a tree. Wasn’t that mural very similar to the one in the patriarch’s chamber at the back of the family's awakening hall? What was it doing there? And why does it look so damaged?

***

Going back 30 minutes prior…

Zoe squinted as she walked through the endless corridor, her outstretched hand carefully tracing obscure lines on the stone walls that reached for the decorated ceiling 30 feet up.

She had been in this strange Maze for 15 days already, slowly making progress bit by bit. All she needed to do was solve the murals on the walls one by one to find the symbols that led to the exit.

According to her calculations, there should be only one left, and to tell the truth, she couldn’t wait to see what was on it.

At first, when she entered this place, she was completely dismayed; not being literally lost in a maze, she was also figuratively lost… She could tell that her name was Zoe and she was here on some kind of trial, but that was it. Her memories were as if they were occluded by a cloud, and she could only remember some basic things!

At first, she had no idea what to do, being lost for a few hours with nothing but a stupid system prompt.

IF YOU MANAGE TO FOLLOW THE TRUE PATH, YOU PASS.

IF YOU DIVERGE AND FOLLOW ANOTHER, YOU MAY GET FAR MORE THAN WHAT YOU ASKED FOR, BUT YOU MAY ALSO DIE.

IF YOU LOSE HOPE, YOU LOSE.

What damn path? She was in a maze, damn it!

It took her a while to finally discover the first mural… For some reason, although the story on it was not 100% clear, she could easily figure out what was happening.

It was a story of a young woman who was raised as a slave in a world where demons roamed the world. According to her interpolations, that girl’s mother came from some very strong clan that lost everything when the demons attacked their world. In the mural, this was reflected by a huge palace in the middle of an island engulfed in flame as a black hand descended from the sky.

The mother apparently managed to escape to the sea just in time, but her boat sank, and she got rescued by some guys who came to see if they could find anything to loot.

Finding her to be a beauty, the mother was sold to a brothel. There, gave birth to the girl. Fearing that her daughter would be forced to be a prostitute like her, the mother figured the little girl’s face a few days after giving birth to her.

The brothel manager seemed a little upset when he discovered that, but with the mother’s beauty and popularity, being one of his most prized possessions. He decided to forgive her for once!

Anyway, the little girl grew up in that whorehouse doing manual labor and being secretly taught many things by her mother until one day the mother died.

The brothel, no longer needing to take care of such a little monster, sold the girl to a nearby gladiator’s pit to be a servant for the slaves there, doing lowly jobs from cleaning the tools and sweeping the arena to changing the chamber pots and getting rid of the corpses.

The first mural ended with the girl, who seemed to have grown up to have a very nice body, doing manual labor around that hellhole, being cornered by some drunk gladiator, and in front of her, she had two strange symbols.

Zoe instinctively knew that they represented two choices… One was for the girl to give up and surrender to that gladiator and let him take care of her, and the other was to fight him!

Wait… was this some kind of Make Your Own Story thing, like those video games or something?

Zoe couldn’t help but inspect the gladiator. For some reason, she found him a bit charming with his bulging muscles and chiseled face, if not for that ugly scar and his bald head, who might have been able to pass as a body model!… He was also somewhat familiar, but Zoe, who had a foggy memory, couldn’t even remember her own parents, let alone this random guy.

regardless, that’s where it all ended. And Zoe quickly discovered that from the two choices at the end, two intricate lines seemed to trace out of the mural onto the walls of the maze, each heading in a different direction!

Zoe quickly followed one of them… Although she felt that submitting to the gladiator would be the safest choice, she was not the kind of girl who would just do that! So she followed the one where the girl chose to fight.

The second mural, a small one, was not far away. At the beginning, the handsome gladiator lay at the girl’s feet, dead after two strikes, as she held a training sword covered in blood. From her expression, even she was surprised that the guy died this quickly.

During those last few years, she seemed to have taught herself how to fight just by watching others do it, but she never expected to be this good at it.

There, the mural was cut again; she had two choices. To take her own life, or to face the pit owner’s punishment, something that made even the bravest of men shudder!

Zoe chose to live. Her mother taught her that no matter how hard things got, she needed to live, as there was always hope! So she would make the same choice for the girl!

It took her 2 full days to find the next mural, during which, when she slept, she dreamed that she was that girl fighting in the arena, barely holding out as monsters of all kinds crowded her to eat her flesh!

When she found the said mural, it was the same as her dream! The pit owner, who was at a loss after his star, who was supposed to be having some fun before the fight, died all of a sudden. So, instead of punishing the girl, he forced her to enter the arena to be eaten by some demons, hoping that showing the girl’s brutal demise might entertain his guests enough to forgive the absence of the hero they came to watch! One must know that the bets on that gladiator’s fight were already in place, and returning those was a big trouble!

To everyone’s surprise, the girl turned out to have a natural talent for fighting, barely managing to kill all of the demons despite her frail stature!

In the mural, the spectators, who were angry at first, seemed to have quickly forgotten that star, and began screaming in thrill, watching the purple-haired little girl raise her broken sword up in victory as the blood of the last demon covered her petite body!

This caused the said owner to see a potential profit, and he decided to raise the girl to become his newest star gladiator.

Slowly, across multiple murals, Zoe followed the little tragic girl’s journey as she slowly grew up, making many choices as she grew from a little girl to a female warrior, learning more and more things across each battle. Changing owners multiple times whilst losing many friends and gaining many enemies along the way.

Finally, one day, she was stuffed into a large cage with other warriors and dragged to fight in a big city that seemed to be the capital of some fantasy kingdom. It was the girl’s first time seeing such lavish white palaces and grand scenery all around.

That day seemed to be some kind of festival, as many people crowded the decorated streets heading to the Colosseum. She fought a few battles in front of many nobles!

It was supposed to be a great day, but something seemed very wrong as the next half of the mural that should have depicted scenes of that same glorious festival depicted a burning city. Seemingly it happened abruptly by the clear change of artistic style from a heroic painting to a tragic one!

In the second half, many people seemed to be turning into demons; some grew wings and launched into the sky, others grew spikes, and some had tentacles. All had a fantastical red glow in their eyes as they began devouring people around them, including their loved ones. It was as if all hell broke loose!

That girl, who was still in the arena when it all happened, witnessed firsthand how the old man, who seemed to be the kind with a big crown on his head, suddenly grew 8 extra hands, turning into a large shadowy boss-level monster with a gaping mouth. He ate the nobles surrounding him, then jumped to continue feasting on the spectators who hurried to escape. Sadly, this caused a stampede to happen, and the exits were all closed.

Soon, the entire Arena turned into a blood pool, with everyone escaping, including the guards who threw their useless shiny armor and began to use their swords and lances to hack at random people to make a path for themselves!

Sadly, the few who managed to walk out faced a fate even worse than death, as the city outside was already filled with monsters that crawled out of the ground!

There, the girl had a choice… She could help fight that monster or escape on her own… Now one would care for some escaped slave in the midst of the chaos!

Zoe had to pause for that one, but looking at all the children and people dying in the arena, she knew the choice she would make. Although those people came here to watch others die, she knew that this was just their world’s common scene, and they couldn’t be blamed for it. Many of them were probably good, normal people, and from their clothes, she could tell some of them might even be some poor guys who paid a great price to bring their kids here for this festival!

This choice was easy, so she quickly followed the relative symbol.

The next mural was just a turn away.

In it, the girl stood bravely in the middle of the arena, sword in hand; she eyed the demon, assessing the situation. Then, as if making up her mind, she began to attack the demons, attracting the attention of the demonized king who, for some reason, ditched the small princess he was eating and ran toward the girl as if she were some delicacy!

It was the toughest fight in the girl’s life, and in the end, by grabbing one of the ceremonial lances that one of the guards left, she managed to kill that demon king after losing an entire arm!

The next thing she knew, she was surrounded by the same soldiers she saved, all pointing their weapons at her. Clearly blaming her for killing the king! The one behind them was one of the princes who was putting that same crown his father dropped earlier on his head. He seemed to have escaped the massacre by hiding under the corpse of his mother and wetting his pants.

That guy seemed to be demanding something, probably for the girl to sacrifice herself to help him escape the arena or something like that, as in the mural he was painting on the gate. But from how all the city was filled with demons at that point, it was clear this would be futile! Even with her skill, she knew that the moment she left this place, she would be swarmed and killed!

And just when the girl thought she might have to slay the damn prince and his soldiers to survive, the mural ended, but no choice was presented, as what happened next was on a huge mural right beside it. In it, the smoke of the burning city suddenly lit up as dragons, each with a knight riding it, fell from the sky, surrounding a large chariot!!

That chariot seemed to have some sort of large crossbow that began to shoot arrows of light all around the city, and in a matter of minutes, that battle shifted as demons began to escape as if facing some great horror!

The girl, followed by the prince and his guards, hurried to the top of the colosseum stands and watched as the city got purified by the newcomer army. It was not only the ones in the sky, but also the ground. It was flooded by knights in shiny white armor, hacking all demons in seconds with amazing proficiency!

One thing stood out to Zoe in that mural, and that was that prince’s eyes. There were not those of someone happy with the help that came, but one with utter despair as he looked toward the chariot and the strange four pointed star shaped insignia at its black flag!

There, Zoe was presented with a choice: to escape using the chaos, or to wait and see… Feeling that the two choices were equally dangerous, she chose to stay!

The next mural displayed a half-destroyed palace where the prince was forced to kneel naked in front of a woman who wore a veil. That woman was putting her hand on the girl’s shoulder and praising her.

From what Zoe decrypted, it seemed that that woman was the ruler of some big empire, and when she came here, she directly took control of everything, and after forcing the survivors from the nobles to sign some papers, she exiled them.

As for the girl, that mysterious woman seemed to have taken a liking to her, giving her a strange pill that healed her arm and her face. For some reason, Zoe found the girl’s look very familiar… Very, very familiar, but she couldn’t tell when she had seen her!

What did that mean? Zoe had no idea.

Anyway, after everything settled, the woman seemed to have met the girl again, this time at a large gala where the girl was dressed in this gorgeous white dress and was being praised by many others. There, the mysterious woman, who turned out to be the empress, was dressed in a shiny golden gown that made all others around her look like poor villagers, and made an offer to the girl. She could give her a lot of money and set her free to live a normal life, or she would test her, and if she passed, she would make her a knight under her to fight demons!

Zoe had to choose, and it was clear! Without enough power, in this demon-infested world, there was no real peace!

Zoe quickly followed the path to the relevant mural. It depicted the girl first going to what looked like a knight school, where she had to struggle against many nobles and students who looked down on her.

It was the normal story of a poor girl in a noble academy where Zoe had to follow the drama through many murals and multiple choices that were presented each time some sloppy young master asked the girl to become his concubine, or some villains tried to trap her out of jealousy.

Thankfully, Zoe seemed to have made all the right choices as the girl’s journey, despite some hiccups, was smooth!

By the end of the last mural, the girl, who had clearly become an adult at that point, outshone everyone, then graduated as the strongest student in the academy's history, then applied to join the Empire’s gatekeeper’s order, the strongest and most critical knight order in the entire world!

Strange… Zoe, who studied the mural, why did she think of that name… 'Gatekeepers'? It was not mentioned anywhere on the mural… It just struck her when she saw the image of the girl standing in a square where that mysterious empress was sitting on a throne. In front of her, she presented the girl with 9 flags, of which the latter chose one that had the symbol of a huge turtle over four gates burning with fire.

Anyway, after choosing that order, the girl didn’t get to join immediately, instead the mysterious woman threw a strange glowing light orb at the girl then presented her with three trials.

The girl first had to fight a dragon on her own inside a dark valley, which she barely managed to do.

The next one was the girl going into some type of gate that seemed to look like one of those on the banner she grabbed. Inside, she entered what looked like a dark, misty world filled with strange and grotesque demons. There, she had to carve a path of blood and carnage to finally kill what looked like a huge cockroach demon.

The next mural was the final one. Zoe could tell she had reached the end of the maze when she found herself in front of a grand wall where a huge mural that was 3 times bigger than the others stood tall.

In it, the girl headed to an island filled with darkness. It was the same island in the first mural, the one where the girl’s mother came from!

It was not mentioned anywhere, but Zoe knew that the girl’s last task was to get revenge for her family! Sprite Generals had to cut all worldly concerns before fully committing themselves to serve the empire!

Wait… What is a Spirit General? Why did that world suddenly pop into her mind?

With a frown, Zoe’s eyes followed the mural.

On the island, a huge monster lived. It was a skeletal dragon that reached the sky dwelled, ruling over all kinds of demons who seemed to be busy building some large circular gate structure out of human skulls.

When the girl landed there, that monster immediately ordered its skeleton-like followers to attack her!

What happened next was expected as the girl carved her way like a hot knife through butter, killing everything in her way as she reached the strange, familiar clearing at the top of the mountain where that monster sat!

Zoe, who felt that the place looked familiar, followed the girl’s epic battle with the monster. That thing was a strange creature that had 20 heads, each with a different power; some threw fire, and others spat lightning bolts. Not only that, but it also had regenerative abilities, allowing it to grow back any lost limbs.

The girl had to use all her skills to fight it, and after one day and night, she finally managed.

To wear it down and slice it into small pieces before burning it with fire until nothing was left!

Watching this, Zoe could hear the monster’s last desperate screams in her mind as if coming from a distant memory!

Her eyes followed the girl as she walked over the burning fires into a grand gate dug into the mountain, then following a long corridor, she ended up in a grand hall where a large, half-damaged mural stood.

Watching the mural, Zoe frowned as she eyed the painting depicting a huge purple dragon surrounding a red tree.

The girl who stood in front of it cried as she touched it…

Her revenge was over!

Zoe’s eyes began to tear up.

Then the girl in the mural moved; she turned to look at Zoe.

Their eyes locked, then their shadows. For a moment it was as if the two overlapped, then…

“AH!”

Zoe gasped in shock as she took a few steps back. In front of her was no longer that mural, but all the murals she had seen spread surrounding her, allowing her to see the entire journey!

Now, she remembered.. Not only her present, but also her past… The suffering… Her mother’s stories of her clan’s past… The demons.. The coliseum… The Spirit Empress!

That girl…. It was her! No, not exactly… It was her from another Timeline….

With that last thought, it was as if something snapped in Zoe’s mind, and she gasped in shock as she looked around, inspecting the large mural again with new light in her eyes!

“I am back…” she exclaimed in shock, then, biting her lip, she began to cry again. Her master really did it and brought her back!

Not only was she able to be born again. Her entire family managed to survive… Sadly, her parents still died young! But at the very least, they lived a happy life…

“It seemed what the Master said was right… Some destinies can’t be changed!…,” she sighed, biting her lip. “Well… I am no longer alone!” she said to herself as she wiped her tears with her cuff. Now, she had not only her colleagues who also crossed into this timeline, like Liliara and Mona, but also the people she knew from this lifetime, like her Uncle Falcon and the nice people at her village. There were also the ones in the current Von Weise family whom she really liked and… She quickly shook her head, blushing a bit as she wondered why she was thinking about her cousin Victor. “Come on, Zoe… You are not a little girl anymore…” she mumbled as she turned to look at the notification screen in front of her.

YOU WIN!

“Of course I did… “ she said as her eyes looked toward the second notification.

THE CLASS [HERO] WAS ACQUIRED.

ERROR: YOU ALREADY HAVE THAT CLASS

MERGING…

YOUR CLASS HAD BEEN UPGRADED TO [LEGENDARY HERO]

“It seems like Master left me a little gift… Not bad!” she chuckled, looking at what she got. Now let’s go meet the others; there is a world to save!” she said as the world wrapped around her, and then she vanished.