The flow of time resumed.
“You! What did you do!? How am I still alive! I saw you devouring me—”
“You were never dead. Your consciousness was always alive.”
Perhaps because Neo now knew a lot, Death meant the erasure or sleep of consciousness for him.
Simply losing body, soul, or seed of existence wasn’t counted as dying in his eyes anymore.
Well, he was technically blind and his eyes didn’t work but that was besides the point.
“So where do we need to go?” Neo questioned Yaleth.
The green-haired ‘man’ stared at Neo without saying anything.
“What?” Neo questioned.
“…sigh, nothing,” Yaleth said. “But before we begin, let’s make a few things clear. I hate your bitchy brother for killing me while insulting me. It’s one thing to die, but it’s another while your enemy is making fun of you.”
Neo nodded.
“Secondly, as I said, I hate him for making fun of me while killing me, not for killing me. You are different. Don’t you hate me for coming to your world and trying to destroy it?
“I want to use my research to fight against Eternals, even if that means swallowing my anger.
“I can look past my notion of revenge. But can you?
“I nearly destroyed your planet several hundred years ago,” Yaleth said.
“Then, I have good news, bad news, and bad news for you,” Neo replied.
“…go on. I’m listening.”
“Good news is my brother died. If I had to guess he probably used everything in his fight against you.”
“That can’t be possible,” Yaleth shook his head. “You didn’t see it but he was enjoying the battle too much, and curses kept flying out of his mouth. There is no one who would do that while dying.”
“It was probably just him being himself.”
Before Yaleth could say anything else, Neo continued.
“The bad news for you would be that my brother reincarnated.”
“…then what’s the point of him dying?”
Neo shrugged and said finally, “Lastly, I don’t care that you were going to destroy the world, what I care about is that you caused my brother’s death.
“I can’t forgive you for it. And that’s why instead of just taking your memories and using them to access your [Mind] on your home planet, I’m going to make you work for me, who is the brother of your mortal enemy.”
Yaleth shook his head.
“I don’t like working with you, but I don’t hate it either. If becoming a slave helps me achieve my goal, I’m okay with it.”
If Neo didn’t know Yaleth was someone who invaded planets, he might’ve cared enough to ask what Eternals did to him for him to hate them so much.
Instead, he shook his head, and raised his hand for a handshake.
“I guess we are partners now.”
Yaleth stared at his hands, and sighed. “…I guess.”
“Anyway, are we going like this?”
“What do you mean by this? We are prepared as much as we can be. I gave you a body that is as strong as a peak Stage-3, and I’ve given you several elements with their mastery reaching Supreme.
“As for myself, I’m in my best condition.”
While Neo could devour and gain elemental masteries, it didn’t increase master for his element.
From Expert rank, mastery meant master of your Element and Elemental Concept.
Right now, Neo had hundreds of Concepts of dozens of elements. A lot of them were somewhere between Expert and Supreme, but majority were only Apprentice.
As for his masteries of his own Concepts, they were still Savant (Peak).
‘This just made me recall how much mess of my body currently is. I have too many powers, and I haven’t sorted anything yet.’
Neo sighed internally. Unfortunately, he did not have time to sit and do everything slowly.
He would go towards Yaleth’s home planet, and deal with his powers’ issue on the way.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” Yaleth suddenly said. “I meant to say you should leave a guardian behind. What would you do if someone attacks your home while you were away?”
“Oh, that completely slipped my mind.”
Neo looked into his Cosmos.
After what Eternals did, Nyxtharion #2 completely forgot about the events of Tartarus, and similarly the people of Zones did not remember Nyxtharion #2.
There was no longer any connection between them.
‘Dammit, this is why I didn’t want to look into my Cosmos. It’s… twisting my heart to see them like this.’
Finding answers? Knowing if his actions were wrong? Nyxtharion #2 would never know anything.
Neo suppressed his emotions, and transferred his voice to Nyxtharion #2.
“Can you reduce the size of your body?”
“As you wish, Godfather.”
Nyxtharion #2’s body began to morph into a tiny black dragon.
Currently, Nyxtharion #2’s memories made him believe he was saved by Neo on death’s doorstep, and after it he had pledged his loyalty to Neo.
‘This… fuck.’
Neo clicked his tongue. He decided to not think about these things again until his emotions had calmed down or he would just lose his temper.
He summoned Nyxtharion #2 outside.
The tiny black dragon flapped his wings to float before him. It was smaller than Neo’s palm.
“I want you to protect this world while I’m away.”
“Understood.”
Nyxtharion #2 followed Neo’s gaze and looked at the world – continent – floating on Blood Sea.
With his strength, a single sweep of gaze was enough for him to analyze everything there.
Suddenly, Nyxtharion #2 noticed something.
His body stiffened.
“Uhm…”
“Is there anything you want to say?”
“Yes, Godfather.” Nyxtharion #2 hesitated. He looked down, and the determination in his gaze grew when he looked back at Neo. “Can I train that child?”
“Who?”
“That one.”
Neo followed his pointed claw and noticed Jack at the end of it.
“That guy?”
“Yes.”
“…okay.”
Nyxtharion #2 flew down.
Seeing him like that, Neo decided to leave gifts for all of his friends.
First, he looked for Arthur.