Chapter 102: Drastic Developments

Seris’s body stiffened for a brief moment before she slowly melted into his embrace.

She pressed her face against his chest, and whispered softly, "I understand."

Yet, in her heart, she reminded herself to not relax if she ever wanted to be by his side.

Rhain held her for a few more seconds before gently pulling back.

He reached into his spatial ring and retrieved three luminous pills, marked with leaf-like Pill Vein.

Three of the seven Rare-Grade Essence Condensation he had refined at the Alchemy Guild earlier this day.

"Take these," Rhain said, gently placing the pills into her delicate hands. "This amount will be enough for you to cultivate for a few days. By the time you finish them, I will have refined another batch for you."

Seris obediently accepted them, knowing his capabilities, she didn’t need to ask how did he get them.

She carefully stored them away and then looked up at him, her beautiful eyelashes fluttering. "Rhain... Liana sent a message earlier. She invited me to the Silvercrest Clan for a sparring session tonight."

Rhain nodded without a second thought. "You should go. Sparring with someone of her caliber will help you solidify your foundation and adapt to your new realm faster."

He reached out, his large hands gently cupping her delicate face.

His thumb lightly brushed against her smooth cheek.

"But remember what I said," Rhain looked deeply into her eyes, his tone firm yet incredibly warm. "Do not worry so much about falling behind, and never think of yourself as a burden. I will always be by your side."

Seris felt a sudden, overwhelming surge of emotion swell in her chest.

A mist gathered in her eyes, yet a radiant smile broke through.

She nodded heavily.

"I know... and even if you want, I won’t let you go."

Looking at her stubborn yet touching expression, Rhain let out a soft chuckle.

He leaned in slowly, pressing a light, tender kiss against her cheek.

"I won’t let you go either." He promised.

Before Seris could even process the sensation of his lips against her skin, Rhain turned and walked calmly toward his bedchamber.

He left her standing completely frozen in the center of the courtyard.

Her entire face and neck flushed a fierce, burning crimson, her heart hammering so wildly it felt as if it might leap straight out of her chest.

____________

Rhain sat cross-legged on the bed and retrieved the four remaining Rare-Grade Essence Condensation Pills from his spatial ring.

Rhain placed the first pill on his tongue and swallowed.

His Abyssal Sovereign Physique activated autonomously, greedily devouring the raging flood of energy and compressing it into dense, dark essence.

As the refinement process began, Rhain’s sharp senses quickly evaluated the energy.

"Interesting...’

Rhain frowned slightly in realization.

Even though he had personally refined these pills to a flawless one-hundred-percent purity, complete with perfect Pill Veins, the raw quality of the essence was still not half as good as the Rare-Grade pills directly produced by the System.

Still, the sheer volume of energy provided by four pill-veined Rare-Grade pills was tremendous.

The Abyssal Sovereign Physique chewed through the medicinal efficacy, forcefully tearing away the bottleneck of his current cultivation.

It took three full pills to shatter the barrier completely.

Crack.

A heavy, oppressive wave of dark essence rolled off Rhain’s body, visibly distorting the air in the bedchamber.

Essence Condensation Realm, Level 6!

Rhain exhaled slowly, rolling the fourth pill between his fingers before storing it back in his spatial ring.

He would save it.

One Rare-Grade pill alone clearly wasn’t enough to fuel a full breakthrough with his monstrous physique.

He would need to refine larger batches and stockpile them for the jumps ahead.

Still, the Grandmaster Alchemist Inheritance had given him something far more valuable than any single batch of pills — it had given him self-sufficiency.

As long as he had raw ingredients and his Heavenly Flame, his cultivation speed would never again be bottlenecked by a lack of resources.

Rhain closed his eyes and sank into deep cultivation, circulating the Abyssal Sovereign Technique to consolidate his new realm.

____________

An hour later, the sound of measured footsteps approached the courtyard.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

Three deliberate raps against the heavy redwood door of the main pavilion.

Rhain opened his eyes and rose from the bed.

He crossed the central hall and pulled the door open.

Declan Rowe stood in the courtyard entrance, his usual composure was visibly strained.

"You look troubled," Rhain observed, stepping aside to let him in.

"Rhain," Declan spoke immediately, his voice completely void of pleasantries. "Many big changes have happened. The entire city has been turned upside down in a single day."

Rhain casually gestured for Declan to sit at the redwood table. "Tell me everything."

Declan sat down, leaning forward as he began to explain the sheer madness that had gripped Mirravele City over the past few hours.

First and foremost, the fragile standoff between the two great clans had utterly shattered.

Blinded by fury, Solari Clan had launched a brutal, coordinated assault on multiple Ashvele Clan pill shops across the city.

In broad daylight, the Solari enforcers had mercilessly slaughtered a few of the Ashvele Clan’s Spirit Manifestation Realm experts, turning the commercial district streets into rivers of blood.

This blatant, barbaric violation of the city’s peace forced Cassian’s hands.

He had immediately dispatched his personal army—the Silver-Armored Guards.

Thousands of elite cultivators had flooded the streets, forcefully separating the warring factions.

Cassian had issued strict, undeniable orders: any further fighting within the city limits would be met with immediate execution, regardless of the offender’s clan.

But just as the city was bracing for the fallout of the City Lord’s intervention, another, more shocking piece of news struck Mirravele City.

The Stormveil Academy was arriving.

It was a monumental occasion.

The Stormveil Academy was a towering behemoth from the Inner Province—a sacred ground for cultivators.

For them to dispatch envoys to recruit disciples from the Outer Frontier was a once-in-a-lifetime anomaly.

Immediately following this announcement, City Lord Pavallion made its ultimate move.

To ensure the Academy’s envoys wouldn’t walk into a war-torn slaughterhouse, Cassian issued a city-wide Martial Law—a draconian decree that had not been invoked since the last century.

The Ashvele Clan and the Solari Clan were strictly prohibited from entering each other’s territories for an entire month.

Their estates were effectively placed under total lockdown by the City Lord’s army.

Anyone who dared to oppose this decree, or stepped even a single foot outside their borders, would be killed on sight.

Irrespective of their status, irrespective of their strength.

And finally, as if the gods themselves were conspiring to utterly crush the Ashvele Clan, another rumor had spread like wildfire through the entire metropolis that the Alchemist Guild had unceremoniously expelled the entire Ashvele Clan from its ranks.

Over a hundred alchemists, stripped of their badges and cast out into the streets, all because one of their elders had offended an unknown, supreme expert whose identity remained a mystery.

Declan finished his report, his throat dry.

These past days in the Mirravele City had been full of upheaval.

It had changed the landscape of Mirravele City more than a long span of Century had.

Author - Many, many apologies for the repetition of last Chapter. I have updated it, please go, and take a look again.