The violet-red glow of the Inverse Hex Revival Formation pulsed with an ominous light, its intricate runes shifting like a living entity. Evelynn trembled as the cursed radiance seeped into her soul, its invasive tendrils spiraling deep within her core, reaching the depths of her very being where a slumbering Will stirred.
*Badump~*
Evelynn felt her heart pound, and her breathing nearly stopped.
A burning sensation enveloped her face, spreading like wildfire as her true soul essence resonated with a presence that wasn't there before. It was incredibly surreal, a consciousness that didn't belong to her. It rose its way to the surface of the soul.
"Empress Hexena, wake up~"
Evelynn voiced out once again as she called out to that foreign consciousness. However, it didn't sound like her own voice. It was superimposed with someone else's voice.
Evelynn clenched her fists, her fingers digging into her palms, causing blood to drip.
A chime of shattering glass resonated from her soul as pain lanced through her very existence. The memories of another life, another identity, surged forth with an all-consuming force. The hex runes woven into her soul unfurled, bringing with it another soul that woke up from slumber.
Her third eye split open.
Within that eye, one could see a vast world. Eight spectral legs stretched within, translucent and ethereal. They manifested inside the eye and began to take form. Her soul was unraveling but also being taken over, two Wills on the brink of clashing with each other. Her body cracked, black hex patterns creeping across her flesh like parasitic veins, threatening to rewrite her very existence.
"…"
Ancestor Alissara and Ancestor Lissana shuddered. This was the point at which they needed to separate their souls and put Empress Hexena's soul in a new body. They had made preparations for millions of years, but it was unknown if it would succeed.
However, they didn't make a move.
*Bzz!~*
They saw the woman called Myria summon a black-white wheel behind her.
The moment it appeared, their jaws nearly dropped as they could sense powers that they had rarely seen mixed into one. That black-white wheel was etched with undecipherable runes of life and death. They had thought only the Divine Emperor of Death was capable of something like that but this woman seemed to be also capable!
"No need to be hasty. A body is prepared~"
Myria's voice echoed out. It rippled through space and even the realm of the soul with a majestic authority.
She joined her hands and formed a circle with her palms.
The reincarnation wheel on top of Evelynn spun, drawing her and the awoken soul essence into another world.
In this world, one side was white, and the other side was black, but in the skies, there hung a moon that didn't appear like a moon but a yin-yang celestial body. It appeared to be a realm of swirling black-and-white energy where the forces of life and death coexisted in perfect harmony.
Myria appeared in the air, her form ethereal and blinding.
With a flick of her wrist, the yin moon's silver glow tethered to Evelynn's body, anchoring her existence, while the yang moon's golden radiance wove around the awakening Hex Arachnid soul.
Then Myria… tore them apart.
A soul-splitting resonance echoed through the realm as Empress Hexena's true soul essence was forcefully severed from Evelynn's true soul. A pulse of reincarnation energy descending from the world stabilized the division, ensuring that neither was lost nor destroyed.
Evelynn found herself alive in this realm.
She gasped, feeling unreal as what she experienced in the past few seconds made her feel that she passed through an eternity. She raised her head to look at a towering arachnid whose form was now withdrawn and reformed into a human shape. She couldn't help but think to herself how tragic Empress Hexena's life was as she had seen every bit of her life.
From a young age, she had been pampered but also treated with the utmost requirements a ruler would need. Everyone worshiped her but also put the burden of the clan on her, from maintaining its image to allowing it to survive. Backed into a corner out of love and loyalty to the clan, she had finally decided to sacrifice herself to gain a path in the future since things were bleak back then.
They could not just survive. There was no other path than to carve a path out of bloodshed, so she fully committed to sacrificing herself to further the World Master's purpose. However, even as an inheritance master, no one was worthy of her to pass on her mantle. In truth, the inheritance site was destroyed and sent into the distorted space where people couldn't get there easily, leaving her lonely and afraid that she may never have an inheritor, which finally made her have only one purpose for her inheritor- which was to protect the clan no matter what wrongs they may have done.
Her expectations lowered and lowered until she- Evelynn, finally arrived.
To Empress Hexena, Evelynn was her savior who gave her hope but also death. She passed away peacefully.
"…"
But now, she blinked at Evelynn, who stood opposite to her.
No explanation was needed.
She just experienced what Evelynn went through her whole life and because of that, could fathom why she stood here. Her soul was revived. It lacked a body, but she knew a body had been readied outside.
"You would go… that far… for me…?"
Empress Hexena's voice resounded out.
"It isn't that far… your uniqueness made it so… that you were only a soul's length away…"
Evelynn smiled lightly. It was as though what she had done wasn't a big thing.
"It is done~"
Myria's voice echoed from the void. Both the two souls and the Ancestors outside heard it.
The Ancestors used up their energy, causing their own bodies to receive a severe backlash from straining too hard, but they didn't care. They redirected the Inverse Hex Revival Formation to the Soul Transfer Formation, a basic formation that transferred souls to bodies. It was used in case sometimes the body could no longer recognize the soul due to being empty for a long time or other various factors. Even possessing other's bodies, a different variant of this formation is used.
Nonetheless, Empress Hexena's figure shuddered. Her soul, which was separated from Evelynn through Myria's unearthly arts, was rapidly pulled out by the Soul Transfer Formation. It headed to a chamber that was enclosed in this space and was imbued into a body forcefully but seamlessly.
'This is…'
Empress Hexena found that it wasn't even a body but a huge amount of magical beast blood essence belonging to thousands of royal family members of the Xylusc line. It was like a Blood Essence Orb. With the orb, each drop of this blood was seemingly accepting of her. She could say that thousands of them wished for her to come back to life and left these drops of pure, unadulterated blood essence, their hopes and wishes once again, making her realize how much they loved her but also burdened her.
'This burden is indeed… mine to bear."
She closed her ethereal senses, willingly accepted it again, and began molding into the blood essence.
Her arachnid body began taking shape.
In the darkness, a towering arachnid, its three luminous eyes gleaming with chromatic radiance, slowly unfurled its purple-black legs. As her body was created, the soul also began losing clarity of mind and began forgetting the foreign memories, only leaving bits and pieces.
Eventually, her body's cultivation base settled at the Immortal King Beast Stage, allowing her to take on a human shape and walk out after some time.
In the center, Evelynn sat down and Myria was using her life energy to restore her soul essence. She recalled she occupied around thirty-five percent of Evelynn's soul essence to revive. It wouldn't have mattered if she remained in the soul, but since she was separated, Evelynn faced a backlash and lost that particular amount of soul essence.
On the other side, the Ancestors appeared to have fainted, although their expressions appeared to have smiles. She felt they might have died in happiness, making her heart clench since she had known them from a young age. They were her… personal servants yet also her friends, which she played with.
In front of her, the eight pillars all went on their knees, their tears already making a puddle underneath their feet.
"Welcome back, our glorious ruler, Empress Hexena Xylusc~"
They roared and cried, their emotional figures looking never looking so pathetic but Empress Hexena Xylusc also couldn't hide her tears from forming.
"It is good to be back..." She sniffled, her nose turning red as she bit her lips.
Quickly, she moved towards Evelynn.