A Reaper's Philosophy-Chapter 75: The Golden City

"Alright, that’s 10 moves." Grayson said out loud.

"I don’t expect you all to restart your progress when you are so close to the Inheritance opening up. So, we will have to work with what you got right now. 𝚏𝐫𝚎𝗲𝕨𝐞𝐛𝕟𝚘𝐯𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝗺

Take this as an assignment, kill at least twice the required number of kills. Six months should be enough for elites such as yourselves. Do not neglect them! Kill two times the required amount of beasts from here onwards and take note of the changes to your body. I’m sure you can manage." Grayson said then dismissed the class.

Grayson was then about to leave as well, having only the high ranked missions in his mind.

’Master.’ Death spoke to Grayson telepathically.

’What is it?’ Grayson asked.

’The girl.’ Death said appearing in a dark cloud.

"Right, shit!" Grayson exclaimed looking at the unconscious girl on the ground.

Queen lay on the ground, peacefully, looking like a sleeping beauty.

"She doesn’t look so cold and threatening when she’s asleep. Makes me want to just leave her as she is." Grayson said out loud as he watched Queen sleep.

(SNORE!)

A loud snore came out of Queen’s mouth as the image of a peaceful sleeping beauty quickly disappeared.

"Yikes!" Grayson exclaimed then picked Queen up and placed her on his shoulder.

He then walked out of the classroom and took her to the infirmary. On the way there he received numerous stares as he was carrying the queen in what some might call an undignified manner. He placed her on his shoulders like some livestock. Nobody had ever seen the queen reduced to such a state before.

After making sure the queen would be fine, Grayson quickly left her in the infirmary and headed to the second floor. A massive library could be found on this floor. Grayson had heard of this place and decided to make a quick stop there. He went through one of the doors in the second floor and saw a massive hall. Books could be seen floating in a circle going up as far as the eye could see. There were no shelves for these books, a power allowed them to hang in the air.

All one needed to do was think about the information they were looking for and books regarding that information would float in front of them. In this library, no one was allowed to leave with the books. If one were to try, the books would float right back. There were 2 other libraries on the second floor that allowed people to leave with the books, but the books in this room were special.

They contained personal insights from hosts that had been here since the beginning of the sect. The content within these books were also more complex, but most importantly, this was the only library that contained any information regarding intent.

Only teachers and a few hosts with special permissions were allowed to enter this room.

Grayson thought about information on paths, exousia, and intent. hundreds of books came flying towards him. He couldn’t leave with any of them and knew he would have to read everything there. Luckily, he had a photographic memory. He circulated Chronos’ power within him and slowed down time. He quickly browsed through the hundreds of books taking in all the information as he did.

Within 10 minutes, he was done. Grayson breathed out a heavy sigh. Although he had a photographic memory, far above normal, memorizing hundreds of such complex books so quickly was mentally draining.

As soon as he was finished, he went to Tempelis’ station next.

"I’m done with the class, show me the missions available." Grayson said impatiently.

The class took about an hour to finish and he didn’t want to waste any more time than he needed to.

Tempelis then placed 12 mission tubes on the counter in front of Grayson. "These are all S-Rank missions. You can choose to do one for every class you teach." Tempelis said whilst being completely mesmerized by the tiny cat-like creature on top of Grayson’s head.

"Can I touch him?" Tempelis said whilst pointing at Death.

"Sure, if he lets you." Grayson said as he browsed through the tubes.

Tempelis then picked up Death and began to pet him. Death had no objections to this and received the care with joy.

’They worship me.’ Death thought to himself with a smug look.

Grayson then finally picked up one of the tubes and read its contents with a satisfied smile.

"This one will do." He said then turned around to leave with the tube in hand.

Death then quickly leaped back to Grayson’s head, making Tempelis feel a little disappointed. Grayson and Death left the sect like this and headed back to The Bartender’s to prepare for the mission. He reckoned that it would take more than a few days to finish the mission so he had to pack well. As soon as everything was set, he went to check on Lilith, only to find her still passed out. She showed no signs of waking up any time soon.

He then left The Bartender’s and was ready to begin the mission. In order to start the mission, Grayson had to meet with someone first. This person was the key to accomplishing this mission and was also the person he would be travelling with.

"Grayson was it? What brings you to my shop this time? Are you finally ready to practice the path of arrays?" Elda said after noticing Grayson entering the shop. Grayson then pulled out the mission flyer with the details on it.

"You’re the one who is supposed to protect me?" Elda asked in surprise.

"That’s what the mission says. I am to protect you as you inscribe a protective array going around The Golden City, whose gate is being attacked by groups of beasts each night. The weakest of them is an Ascended Beasts. Am I wrong?" Grayson asked passively.

"No, but has the Hardon Sect fallen so much that they would send someone as new as you on such an important mission? This is the first time for The Golden City to ever ask for assistance from anyone, let alone invite people into their city. We simply cannot mess this up. Are you really up to the task? You’re only an Ascended Host." Elda answered.

"Trust Elder Mai’s judgment. I’m ready to leave immediately." Grayson said.

Feeling defeated Elda agreed to go anyways, not because she thought Grayson was capable of handling the group of beasts that would be attacking them, but because The Golden City has a powerful military that is known for their advanced weaponry. Their weapons were powerful enough to go up against even Mythical Beasts.

Elda hoped that Grayson wouldn’t even be needed for her protection. She quickly packed her belongings for the journey and met Grayson at the entrance.

"Mercy, take care of the shop till I get back." Elda said to a tall, petite, blond haired woman standing next to the entrance.

"Yes ma’am." The blond haired woman said respectfully.

Grayson and Elda then departed Madsus City, but not on foot. Elda already had a 12foot long, ascended lizard like beast for transportation and Grayson just used Death as a mount.

Elda shrieked upon seeing Death transform from the cute little cat it was into a beast. People in the streets would run away terrified upon seeing Death. Even on the road, beasts fled or hid upon sensing Death approaching.

Grayson then smacked Death at the back of his head. "Stop releasing your aura so much, I can’t kill beasts if they keep running away from you." Grayson said.

Death released a painful yowl and feigned injury.

"Hey, don’t bully him. He’s just trying to protect us." Elda suddenly shouted.

’Even in this form he managed to gain empathy...a true devil this one.’ Grayson thought to himself.

It took 7 days to get to The Golden City. On the way, Death no longer released his death aura and Grayson managed to kill a few Mythical Beasts. Most of the beasts were taken care of by Death though, which still gave Grayson the kills since Death and Grayson were counted as one entity.

Grayson was now an Ascended Host and saw he only needed to kill a few dozen more beasts in order to evolve to the next level.

He then checked his kill status window.

{Theós System

Name: Grayson

Lifespan: ∞

Objective: Kill 20 of five different kinds of Ascended Beasts each to evolve.

Kills Record:

[Ordinary Beasts]

...

[Ascended Beasts]

...

[Mythical Beasts]

Mythical Beast: Black-Smoked Red Wolf (1/40)

Mythical Beast: Scaled Caracal (83/100)

Mythical Beast: Golem (17/100)

Mythical Beast: Purple-Haired Ogre (60/100)

Mythical Beast: Armored Ant (256/100)

[Legendary Beasts]

-

[Heavenly Beasts]

-}

Grayson smiled as he looked at his kills window. He was moving unimaginably fast compared to the average host and he did not hide it. Elda was with him throughout the entire journey to The Golden City and no longer dared to underestimate Grayson.

However, seeing that Death was the one who killed most of the beasts on the way, she still didn’t think Grayson was up to the task for this mission.

Upon entering The Golden City, Grayson and Elda were escorted by a 6-foot muscular man clad in silver armor. What stood out the most about this man was the pair of nearly transparent golden wings on his back.

Looking around, they noticed most of the hosts in the city had a pair of transparent golden wings. The Golden City wasn’t called what it was just because nearly the entire city was made of gold, but because of their famous race technique, Gold Manifestation.

This race technique has 6 levels. The first 3 levels center on healing and strengthening the force of one’s exousia and the last 3 focus on speed and the laws of space. Every host of this race practices this technique. Upon reaching a certain level, the host would be able to manifest a golden pair of transparent wings made of exousia. The wings greatly improve their speed and amplifies their vitality, allowing them to heal almost any wound.

Judging by the transparency of the wings on the muscular man, he is probably on the 5th level, just one level below the final one. When one practices Gold Manifestation to the final level, their speed becomes unrivaled against anyone below the Heavenly Realm. So long as they have exousia, almost any wounds would heal nearly instantly. This race technique can go as far as even growing back a severed limb.

In the beginning, those with wings are comparable to Mythical Hosts in terms of strength. However, upon reaching the 5th level, some may even hold their own against a Legendary Host.

With such a heaven defying technique at their disposal, the people of The Golden City had grown very proud and almost completely isolated themselves from the rest of Evnoia. As great as their race technique is, The Golden City had yet to produce even a single Heavenly Host, resulting in them having no other choice but to seek for help from the Hardon Sect.

They considered this a big shame to their city, but of course, survival came first. Grayson and Elda were then led to a giant white and gold palace hovering 20-feet off the ground. This palace was twice the size of the Hardon Sect and was the only sect in the entire city.

After getting close to the golden palace they were then teleported into a dark hallway. The muscular man had a strange golden tattoo on his arm that glowed within the dark hallway.

A bright light then covered each one of them as they were finally transported into the golden palace. An incredibly futuristic scenery now came into view. There was a bright blue sky above them and golden buildings could be seen hovering off the ground all around. Complex, yet simple looking machinery, were stationed in the streets that seemed to transport people into the floating buildings.

A dozen waterfalls could be seen at the far end of the sect which all led to a river running right through the middle of the sect. People with golden wings were flying everywhere they looked, it was like paradise.

"It’s like a miniature city in here!" Elda couldn’t help but exclaim out loud. She very much wanted to study the runes from there.