Chapter 10: Chapter 10 – Progress

“Maybe Hell isn’t so bad after all.” Thought Theseus.

He was nearly killed upon his arrival, and in hindsight, Theseus regretted having that thought. Hell was a place of violence and death, at the end of the day. Even though Hell was a place of hopelessness and torture, if he kept to himself with Leo, he found that the tyranny of the Suzerain Lords could be avoided. With no drama and the strength of Leo, no one would bother them. It wasn’t so bad in that respect, but the reign of the Suzerain Lords crept into Theseus’s mind from time to time.

Knowing the rumors and the stories, Theseus came to fear the Suzerain Lords. They were ruthless and relished in sin. Here in the borderlands, they weren’t as involved, but one day, Theseus knew Lord Virgo would come for him.

After another month, Theseus and Leo finished building their cabin, and their new life began. When Theseus arrived in Hell over around a year ago, Hell lived up to its name and then some. The Spirit Beasts and beasts of the Phaunus Forest would’ve long killed the weak Theseus if not for the whims of Leo. With thankfulness, Theseus cooked a fish buffet for Leo. Life couldn’t get any better than this. He was through the muck and the mire of Hell, and he was now in the peaceful countryside.

Until the Suzerain Lords came knocking, he would enjoy it while it lasts.

Leo smiled as much as he could as an underwater leopard. This was the life!

In the mornings, they worked on the house, in the afternoons, they explored the countryside forests, and in the evenings, they walked the nearby roads and meadows. Even though Theseus didn’t need to sleep as often as the normal person, he chose to sleep at night to keep a semblance of a routine.

Not having his right arm was a huge inconvenience, but Theseus grew to live with it. When he was in the soul dream with Aries, he had his arm back, which was nice, but when he entered the Virgo territory, the inconveniences of having one left arm were frustrating. Another long-lasting effect on Theseus’s body were the Shade scars on his chest. Because a Shade Core was manifesting around Theseus’s heart, the Reverse Shade Ritual left black and red scaring and residue across Theseus’s chest. It didn’t hurt much anymore, and even though he had fully recovered, it occasionally ached.

The final scaring on Theseus was from the fight with the forest beast and Leo. The shrubbery, thorns and rocks that pierced Theseus during the chase wouldn’t have left scars if they were treated properly, but because Leo saved Theseus by burning his wounds shut, burn scars littered Theseus’s body. There were even a few scars on Theseus’s face.

Regardless, Theseus didn’t want to dwell on his beaten-up body. When he left that crevice, he promised himself a new story of redemption and hope. No longer would he be brought so low, and even when the incident with Aries happened, his newly found confidence brought him through the cultivation as well as his encounter with Lord Virgo.

He was a new Theseus, and the one in Heaven was left there. He would not forget, but he would be redeemed here, in a place where redemption was supposed to be impossible. Hell, a place of suffering, would become the place for Theseus’s salvation. It wasn’t because Hell was a good place, rather, it was because Theseus had a second chance.

The slow life was good for the duo, and another couple of months passed peacefully. The cultivation Theseus did on the side was also paying off. Theseus was now at the S Rank Mortal Realm. Apart from his own personal realm, Leo also picked up on some tricks. From carefully watching Theseus for months, Leo also learned the Spirit Cultivation technique. When the two sat down together in the meadow at nighttime, they cultivated the ocean around them happily.

The terms, morning, day, and night, were all arbitrary terms. Theseus invented his own time of the day and time keeping method to keep up a routine. Perhaps the biggest improvement to their daily lives was a new skill Theseus invented for himself and Leo.

Obviously, Theseus wanted to get creative in his boredom. He desperately wanted to talk to his friend in some way, and he had three options realistically, a Spirit Skill, a Summoner Skill, or an Authority Skill. Leo didn’t think of Leo as his beast, but as his friend. For that reason alone, he struck the summoner skill idea from his mind. Alone at night, Theseus carefully crafted a worthy skill that wouldn’t be considered dangerous.

Derived from a Spirit and Summoner hybrid skill named Spirit Summon, Theseus created a new skill. Spirit Summon was the Spirit equivalent to the Shade Summon skill Theseus previously used alongside his tentative friend Aries. The newly created skill was instead a hybrid technique that was based on the friendship between him and Leo. It wasn’t a summoner skill but between a master and a servant, but a mutual skill built on friendship. He called it: Soul Link.

By linking their two souls together, it resembled a Spirit Ritual, which is the ritual equivalent for the Spirit Path of the Shade Ritual. Unlike the Shade Ritual, Spirit Rituals were consensual and resembled more of a summoner skill than a Shade skill. Theseus didn’t want this to be a summoner skill, however, which was why he modified the Spirit Summon skill in the first place.

The soul link would allow the two to fight better in combat to an extent, but more importantly, the two could finally communicate. Finally, after months of preparation, Theseus woke the purring Leo up in the middle of the night excitedly.

“Skill: Soul Link!” Theseus chanted at the confused Leo. At first, Leo was cautious. He was after all, a feral beast. He was behaved in front of the ghosts solely for Theseus’s sake in the past. Fighting the Soul Link, Leo growled. Theseus put his hand on Leo’s back to comfort him, showing Leo it was okay.

Cautiously, Leo allowed the Soul Link to take place. Uncomfortably, Leo found himself in a small cavern. This was the place where Leo had taken care of Theseus over a year ago.

“What do you think?” Theseus asked.

“Did… did you just talk to me?” Leo asked out loud.

“Yes, that’s what the skill I just did allowed us to do.”

“Yippee!” Leo jumped up and down in excitement.

“But, where are we?” Leo stopped after a minute while Theseus just smiled. Leo wasn’t talking, but rather, his thoughts could be understood by Theseus.

“This is a place in both of our minds that we share. When we’re here, we can talk.” Theseus smiled at his friend.

It worked! He could finally talk to Leo. In actuality, they weren’t in the crevice, but it was an imaginary space they shared within their minds. The two stared at each other silently for a moment. Leo understood. He was seeing Theseus in real life, and in his mind. Two places at once! This was crazy!

“How did you do this?” Leo asked excitedly. He was just a beast, and he had no concept of skills, physiques, or the seven aura paths. He fought the skill on instinct, so this was all new to him.

“I used my magic to create a soul link between the two of us. It will help us if we need to fight together, but really, I made it so we could talk somehow.” Theseus explained.

“Wow, I knew you were a smart friend to have. The moment you used magic to make the fishes taste better, I knew I had to follow you around and learn how to do it myself!” Leo jumped onto Theseus with joy in the imaginary shared space as well as in their cabin in real life.

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“Woah, you’re really too strong. You’re going to hurt me!” Theseus cried out under the weight of the leopard.

“What do you mean? I will always protect you… I mean as long as you keep teaching me cool things like the fishes and the technique for getting stronger.” Leo was referring to the Spirit Cultivation. As a beast, Leo thought this was a fair transaction. He would protect Theseus while Theseus taught him cool and new things.

Leo got off of Theseus, realizing he was hurting him.

“I call these things skills. The fish magic you’re talking about is what I call cooking. The other technique is a Spirit Skill called Spirit Cultivation I learned from the Shade man Aries.” Theseus tried to explain the situation, but there was so much to talk about.

“Shade? Was that that weird guy who kept appearing and disappearing around you? Didn’t he harm you, why were you nice to him?” Leo asked.

“It’s a bit complicated, and I don’t even know where to begin…” Theseus realized the beast was smarter than he expected, but the rules and nature of the world around them were unknown to Leo. All Leo knew was what was in front of him. It was an ignorant life, but Leo lived it happily. Like a child, Leo had to learn everything from the beginning.

“Come on! Tell me!” Leo yelled. Theseus laughed.

“Okay, okay, but I have to explain a lot of background. It could take a long time!”

“We have all night!”

Leo and Theseus didn’t need to sleep often anyways and slept for the routine’s sake.

“It all started when I decided to climb one of the Three Great Dungeons, Heaven…”

***

Leo listened intensely to Theseus’s story, and he asked a multitude of questions, which Theseus answered promptly.

“What are the Three Great Dungeons?”

“What’s Heaven?”

“Who is Alvaro?”

“What’s an Aura Realm?”

“What’s aura?”

“Are you really dead?”

“Is cooking a magical skill? Or is there a difference between skills and aura skills?”

“What’s a Shade?”

“Why did Aries attack you?”

And so on.

Leo was like a child who learned about the world for the first time. Over the period of the next weeks and months, Leo incessantly asked Theseus about his past. Leo would sometimes talk about his life, but it was so much more boring than Theseus’s life. As a beast, Leo became strong because of his physique and from eating strong beasts and Spirit Beasts. Even more than cooking, Leo loved to hear Theseus’s stories.

“What happened next?” Leo would ask as Theseus was trying to cultivate the spiritual energy around him.

“Sorry, sorry,” replied Leo seeing Theseus’s annoyance. Every day, they would still cultivate together, and it the period of time where Theseus could relax and not listen to the chatty Leo. It was nice and understandable that the beast was exceptionally curious, but it was nice to have silence sometimes.

Time kept moving on. It was the end of his second physical year in Hell, and Theseus at last broke through to the F Rank Sage Realm while the monstrous Leo also broke through to the S Rank Sage Realm. Theseus wondered if it was the right thing to do, giving a beast the knowledge of humans, but it was too late now. Leo gobbled up Theseus’s stories and magical skills nonstop, but at the end of the day, Theseus didn’t mind.

Together, their power was unmatched among the Captains. Only a Suzerain Lord could stop them now.

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