Life aplenty

Seth’s attack on the Council’s island affected the entire northern half of the continent, but the Kingdom of Death was hit the hardest because of its close establishment to the Council’s island.

The shockwave, tsunamis, and earthquakes ravaged the Kingdom, its cities crumbling in minutes. The ascended present in Death quickly moved to protect their home, using their energies to repel the disasters coming from the sea.

Despite all their efforts, millions still died in the first few hours.

In the Kingdom of Hope, now under Death’s influence, Endora’s attacks came as swiftly and unexpectedly as the disasters in the north. With the attack on the Council gathering all the attention, Thanatos couldn’t react in time, and Endora’s troops killed most ascended on the southern borders.

Two-fifths of Death’s armies were gone in less than a few hours, but that was not the end. While Thanatos was running damage control after losing so many troops and people, a sudden report came to his desk on the second day.

The report stated that the ascended gathered to protect their cities from the shockwaves in the north had started feeling sick, with some of their sources even imploding and killing them.

Over the next week, over 90% of the Kingdom of Death’s armies were gone, and people all over the Kingdom began dying under strange circumstances.

In their panic, people began migrating south as soon as possible, looking to abandon the Kingdom completely.

Two attacks from Endora, one not even directed straight at the kingdom, had brought it to the brink of collapse.

After an argument with Death, Thanatos ordered a lockdown, trying to salvage as much as possible, but he didn’t have enough troops to lock the borders completely. With no other option, Thanatos pulled every ascended still in Hope and used Death’s power to create a barrier along the kingdom’s borders.

The entire Kingdom of Death was sealed inside a light green fog, and every human or ascended trying to move past it died in seconds.

His move was anticipated by Endora, whose ascended continued moving north and claiming the capital of Hope the following day, declaring it as a tributary Kingdom of the Empire.

The new Kingdom of Hope also received its leader the same day, a beautiful but deadly queen named Elise, who had massacred all the people inside Hope that dared voice any complaint.

Over the following few months, the entire continent order changed once more. Endora’s influence grew again, occupying eight of the continent’s fourteen kingdoms. Even the neutral kingdoms, which never intervened in the wars of the others, like Sun or Dream, had begun to grow worried they would be next.

While tensions reached an all-time high all across the continent, Endora had made an official declaration, which with the help of Raven and many of Asteria’s air ascended, was transmitted all across the continent.

Seth used this opportunity to finally claim responsibility for the large-scale attack on the northern side of the continent, effectively warning every other kingdom that planned to stand against Endora of their fate.

Once his threat was over, he declared that Endora’s enemies were Life and Death and would not attack any other kingdom unless challenged, even making visits to Sun and Dream over the following weeks and assuring their leaders he had no plans on conquering them.

With Seth’s ability to move through their kingdoms easily, the attack on the north, and the sheer number of ascended present in Endora, the leaders of the two kingdoms had no choice but to accept his words at face value. If Endora wanted their territory, they could not stop Seth from taking it anyway.

Seth also didn’t want to earn more ire than he already did, needing positive perception just as much as he required negative one, so he proposed an alliance with Sun and Dream.

After three more months, the alliance was in place, and the entire continent fell into a strange state of cold peace. Both Soren and Thanatos wanted nothing more than to stop Seth from expanding his influence further, but they were trapped inside their lands, unable to do anything.

Thanatos was busy salvaging what was left of his kingdom, the people inside now being prisoners instead of citizens, while Soren spent every day in fear of that day being the one Seth decided to come for him.

Thanatos had Death protecting his kingdom, whose power only grew after Seth’s onslaught, but the Kingdom of Life only had its ascended, which paled in comparison to Endora’s.

When the people of the continent thought they could have some peace, a new announcement was carried out by Seth, claiming Soren had stolen a treasure of Endora and giving an ultimatum to Soren to return it.

Many people knew it was all a ruse, but no one could do anything about it, and Soren also capitulated, deciding to send the treasure of life to Endora in the hopes it would buy him more time.

The treasure of life was the central piece of the Kingdom, the symbol of its creation, so not long after Soren surrendered it, the people began turning on their leader.

With civil wars sparking in both Life and Death, the kingdom between the two, the Kingdom of Love, was completely unaffected. Seth had never mentioned it during all of his announcements, and with refugees leaving both Life and Death, its population had also grown tremendously.

While the whole continent wondered if they would end up Seth’s next target, the one in question was sitting at the borders between Life and Sorrow, looking at two ascended approaching from the Life Kingdom’s direction.

“Haha, Soren didn’t even come.” commented Maya, resting her head on Seth’s shoulder.

“Can you blame him? The poor guy is probably terrified.” Seth chuckled, wrapping his hand around Maya’s waist and stepping forward.

The two ascended immediately fell to their knees, their bodies shaking uncontrollably as one of them lifted his hands and presented a small dark red orb to Seth.

“Are you first shells?” asked Maya with an amused look while Seth took the orb away from the ascended.

“Y- yes, Your Excellencies.” replied one of the ascended.

Maya giggled playfully and turned to Seth as she asked: “How rude of Soren. This offering is not enough for even breakfast. Shall we eat them anyway?”

Seth looked at Maya with a raised eyebrow and quickly noticed that one of the ascended seemed to have lost control of their bladder functions.

With a sigh, Seth shook his head while pinching Maya’s behind and said: “You’re free to go back. The Empress is just joking.”

Despite his words, neither of the two ascended dared to stand up and turn their back on Seth.

“See what you’ve done?” asked Seth with a shake of his head, wrapping them both in space energy and teleporting to the Sorrow Kingdom’s palace, where Ava was waiting for them to return.

“Did you get it?” asked Ava excitedly, even somehow missing Maya’s flustered appearance.

Seth nodded and broke the shell covering the white orb within, allowing its bright white light to fill their room.

Ava surprisingly fell to one knee immediately, bending her head slightly forward. “I welcome your release, Queen Mother.”

Seth also smiled as threads of life energy left the small orb, forming a body around it.

After reforming her body, Isabel ignored the kneeling Ava, and her eyes landed on Seth, tears welling up inside them.

Ignoring Maya, still stuck to Seth, Isabel dove straight into his arms, resting her head on his chest. “You came for me. Thank you.”

Seth massaged her back and gave the sultry Maya an apologetic look as he said: “I promised you, didn’t I? How are you, Isabel?”

Isabel nodded and kept crying silently in Seth’s arms, enjoying the comfort of Seth’s embrace.

Meanwhile, Ava was looking at the two with a strange expression. She already knew that her queen was one of Seth’s women, but seeing it with her eyes somehow hit her differently.

Isabel was revered as a goddess in the Kingdom of Life, so Ava’s reaction was not wholly unexpected.

“Isabel, shall we leave this for later? I need to introduce you to the others.”

Isabel wiped her tears on Seth’s shirt and turned around, smiling at the pouting Maya and the still-kneeling Ava.

“I’m Isabel, the spirit of the life treasure. Pleased to make your acquaintance, Maya, Ava.” said Isabel with a slight bow toward the two.

Maya nodded back, but Ava quickly asked: “How does Queen Mother know my name?”

Isabel walked forward, extending a hand to help Ava up as she said: “How could I not know the names of Seth’s wives? I hope we can all get along as sisters in the future; no need for all these ceremonies.

While Ava was grabbing her hand and standing up with a red face, Isabel looked into Maya’s eyes and said: “I’m looking forward to learning from you the most.”

“Learning from me?” asked Maya with a raised eyebrow.

“You know. Matters of the bed. I might be older, but my experience lacks in comparison to yours.” said Isabel humbly, a somewhat thirsty look in her eyes.

Maya’s face relaxed, and a smile grew on her lips. “You’re an interesting one. We’ll see how much you can take soon enough.”

Seth cleared his throat from the back, attracting everyone’s attention, and said: “We can leave that for later. We have some things to take care of before heading for Endora.”

Seth was impressed by how quickly Isabel pacified Maya, but despite that, he knew both of them were pretty shrewd and could already imagine the headaches they would bring him in the future.

Ava and Maya nodded, but Isabel noticed Seth was staring at her and asked: “Do you need my help with anything?”

“Just your soul-revitalizing abilities.” Replied Seth with a nod.

“Alright, but I will need a steady supply of life energy for that. With no treasure to draw upon, my energies are running low.”

“No problem. Ava, are you coming?” said Seth.

“I want to have a look around Sorrow first. I’ll join you later in Endora.”

Seth wasted no more time and wrapped his hands around Maya and Isabel, teleporting with them until he reached the Kingdom of Oath.

Already expecting his arrival, Cain and Molly stood up from their seats the moment Seth teleported into the room.

Isabel only needed a look at Molly to understand what Seth wanted. After Seth had Caitlin leave his body, she went with Isabel and Molly to another room where they could return Molly to her youth undisturbed.

Cain nervously approached Seth and Maya and asked: “Are you sure it will work?”

“I’m sure. Just wait patiently.” Seth reassured him before sitting with Maya and asking Cain to join them.

As they were chatting casually about the past, the door to the room opened, and the first one to walk in was an excited young woman.

Cain froze in his seat, and Seth smiled softly when he saw that Isabel had successfully revitalized her.

Molly smiled at Seth before rushing to Cain and hugging the stunned man out of his chair.

Isabel and Caitlin also returned shortly after, chatting casually like what they had done was no big deal.

Seth grabbed Maya’s hand and walked softly to the other two. “Good job. We have a few more stops, and then we can return home.”

Just as Seth was about to teleport away, Cain noticed this and stopped kissing Molly as he asked: “Are you leaving already?”

Seth canceled his energy and looked at the two with a teasing smile: “I can smell lust for miles away. What am I supposed to do here? Watch you two go at it?”

Noticing that Cain and Molly’s faces grew red, Seth chuckled and resumed teleportation.