Divine Emperor of Death

Evelynn stood up and walked ahead, a little expectant of the rewards she would be bestowed for clearing the Sky Grade Trial.

As she walked, the narrow pathway slowly widened before an imperceptibly decrepit door appeared in front of view.

She neared and pushed the door open, only to see a wide and long space full of colorful specks of light shining on some objects. She garnered that those specks of light were formations.

The scenery around her was still a cave but the area this wide and long space occupied was more than a square kilometer.

And in those formations were none other than the treasures she had been looking forward to obtaining!

Suddenly, the Earth Dragon's voice echoed again, "As a reward for clearing the trial, you will be bestowed a drop of my diluted Blood Essence and a Body Tempering Cultivation Manual that is at the Peak-Level Sky Grade, Domineering Earth Dragon Arts."

"It is capable of heightening your Body Tempering Cultivation to the Peak of the Sixth Stage..."

The voice ended right there and simultaneously, a circular diagram in front her on the surface lit up and a drop of what looked like a blood essence floated above, hovering as if it waiting for something.

A manual was kept on the center of the circular diagram.

Evelynn's eyes flashed in scrutiny. After a moment of contemplation, she moved and sat on the circular diagram as she took the manual.

After she sat down in a lotus position, she started to ruminate and go through the manual with concentration.

After twenty minutes, Evelynn exclaimed, "Marvelous! Unlike the Tyrant Body Secrets, this has no preconceived nonsense of the author! It only has the driving method! Perfect! Too perfect!"

Davis had told her about the defects in the Manuals of the Grand Sea Continent, so she came to view every manual here as something contaminated and arduous to learn.

She was seemingly able to understand the Domineering Earth Dragon Arts in twenty minutes but took her days to perceive Tyrant Body Secrets right in her mind.

She closed the manual and tried to reach out to the red droplet in front of her.

The droplet of diluted Blood Essence instantly flew towards the center of her eyebrows as it touched her skin.

Evelynn instantly felt something foreign enter her but she resisted subconsciously feeling a sense of invasiveness.

"Don't resist..." The Earth Dragon echoed out again.

Evelynn inwardly berated herself for her carelessness and let her resistance end in a few seconds.

The diluted Blood Essence seeped into the pores of her skin on her forehead, making her feel dizzy, even awfully comfortable.

She felt the Blood Essence of the Earth Dragon Immortal blending into her blood before the feeling faded away into nothingness, leaving only a contemporary feeling of a surge in power.

But as moments passed by, she realized that the feeling of growing in power was slowly getting stronger.

"Revolve your preferred cultivation method, although I recommend to circulate the Domineering Earth Dragon Arts..." 

Evelynn no longer hesitated and opted for a change in cultivation methods once she remembered that her sequelae from changing cultivation methods before are no longer present with the use of Crimson Vitality Pill.

With this fact, she was emboldened enough to change her cultivation method again!

Starting to revolve Domineering Earth Dragon Arts, she instantly received a backlash causing her to spit out a mouthful of blood, but she persisted and endured the enormous pain, coursing throughout her entire body.

The battle aura that was originally revolving in a passive manner in her meridians and flesh turned chaotic before it followed suit with her active cultivation method.

This was the only method that she could use to ensure her cultivation stays in the Low-Level Iron Stage while forcefully driving out the battle aura of the Tyrant Body Secrets.

Luckily, she didn't cultivate the Tyrant Physique, or else she might've really had to cripple her Body Tempering Cultivation before she could cultivate another manual again.

The circular diagram below her lit up even more brightly, making her calm and clear despite the pain that had been clogging her head.

Pain continued to haunt her but she still clenched her teeth as persisted. The circular diagram even seemed to provide her comfort by helping her revolve Domineering Earth Dragon Arts in a trance!

An hour passed by and this moment, her Body Tempering Cultivation started to rise, touching a point that could be inferred as a bottleneck.

Evelynn gave off a greyish aura tinged with a little bit of green. Her battle aura erupted and her cultivation broke through the next level.

Mid-Level Iron Stage!

Twenty minutes passed as she kept revolving Domineering Earth Dragon Arts.

She quickly approached another breakthrough.

High-Level Iron Stage!

Even so, forty minutes later, she finally broke through to Peak-Level Iron Stage!

In an hour, realizing that her cultivation was stuck at the very peak of the Iron Stage, she stabilized her foundation for the next few minutes.

Opening her eyes, she felt rejuvenated and in terms of battle prowess, she felt that she could even fight against Low-Level Silver Stage Experts as long as they don't gang up on her.

She stood up and her attention was drawn to the multitude of formations in front of her that held the treasures inside.

"You can take away three treasures from this place..." Once the Earth Dragon finished speaking, the formations that were lit over all the objects, turned transparent, revealing the treasures.

Evelynn's eyes widened in shock. 

There was such a huge variety of treasures; weapons, pills, inscriptions, battle techniques and even herbs of different kinds.

With a glance, she was able to tell that all of them were at least Low-Level Sky Grade but about their properties, and features, she was able to perceive none.

Fortunately, in front of the treasures were a stone bed that described their properties and features.

Evelynn smiled as she stepped forward to browse, but her heart was glad that she was finally able to stand on her own feet to obtain wondrous resources.

======

Besides the tunnel of light, Davis stood there like a statue. He had already waited for over three hours.

The first two-hour time-frame was pretty normal.

After the first hour, Emperor Ruth came down and informed Davis that Evelynn had likely passed and that he should wait for about two hours to exit

Davis accepted his advice and consoled Emperor Ruth for his loss.

Emperor Ruth sighed and shook his head, no longer willing to stay in this place as he exited.

After this, Davis waited for another hour but at the end of the hour, there was still no sign of Evelynn.

Three hours had already passed! Idric had told that it caused only two hours for his Emperor Mark Ruth to clear the trial and return.

This caused him to gain a faint amount of worry again.

Another hour passed. Just when he was starting to get fidgety again, a figure walked out from the tunnel of light.

*Whoosh!~*

======

Evelynn stepped into the tunnel of light that appeared in front of her after she had finished choosing the wide variety of treasures.

When she took a step again and came out of the tunnel of light, she immediately felt someone dashing towards her.

Before she could even react, two warm hands were placed on her shoulder.

"Evelynn! Are you fine?" Davis asked as he looked at her bloodied clothes. It was horrifying to the extreme but he used his Soul Sense and could find no visible or even internal injuries in her body.

Evelynn answered stutteringly, "I... I'm fine..."

Even though Davis could find no injuries, he found visible traces of her pale skin being healed.

Davis let out a sigh of relief and hugged her tightly causing her to go awry for none other than the reason she stank right now from the subsequent breakthroughs.

"Let me go... I stink..." Evelynn's face flushed red as she was uncommonly flustered. As a woman, she didn't want her man to smell her bad odor one bit.

Even with her newfound strength, she found it difficult to push him away to no avail.

Davis moved his head back and blinked at her as if he just now noticed, "Yes, you stink..."

Evelynn turned embarrassed and angry as she thought, 'Shouldn't he be saying that I don't smell bad!? Well, I like that he is honest but he should act the opposite in this case!'

Just when she tried to retort, her mouth was sealed while her lips were savored as if it were a delicacy.

Evelynn's eyelids trembled briefly as she let out a faint moan, 'This man... I can't believe him...' 

A few seconds later, Davis stopped kissing her as he moved his head back, "Regardless, you're still delicious..."

Evelynn bit her lips as her face flushed red, but she kept silent and stared at him in embarrassment.

Davis laughed, "Well, that's what you get for worrying me to this degree..."

Evelynn suddenly realized. She had been late and the others should've arrived way before her. Her shy expression suddenly turned apologetic as she put her head down, "Sorry..."

"Haha, it's fine since you came back alive!" Davis answered as he shook her shoulders, jolting her out of her guilty expression.

A smile lit up her face but still, she pushed him away, "Don't come near me for a while!"

Davis retreated and respected her wishes once he had concluded teasing her. His heart that was clouded by anxiety ever since she left for the trial was like a blazing tiger now, afraid of nothing!

"Since you came back alive and late, I assume you managed to clear the Sky Grade Trial?"

Suddenly, Evelynn jumped on his and gave him a peck on his cheeks, "Yes, all because of your strategies!"

But then she suddenly fell back and gained distance from him, conscious of her smelly odor.

Davis became startled but then shook his head. He had only told her some simple strategies that would effectively confuse and disrupt the movements of the opponents who could not think but just move like puppets.

Seems like it worked like a charm!

"So what did you gain out of the Sky Grade Trial?" Davis had some curiosity since the youths of the Ruth Family were reluctant to reveal the matter of the treasures. From this, it could be seen that they knew which treasures were there in the Sky Grade Trial, or maybe even the King Grade Trial but that was just a guess on Davis's part.

Since they didn't want to talk about this matter, he was disinclined to ask them as well. In any case, he could just ask Evelynn, who had just passed the trial. 

Would his fiancee refute? That remains to be unseen.

And as expected, she instantly spoke, "I gained a diluted drop of Earth Dragon Blood Essence and absorbed it. Along with the new Sky Grade Cultivation Manual, I gained, the Domineering Earth Dragon Arts, I managed to reach the peak level in a few hours."

'So that's why she took so long...' Davis finally understood. He realized that it was mostly because of the cultivation method she opted to change.

"Do you know how difficult it was for me to defeat those ten Mid-Level Iron Stage opponents?" Evelynn gave off a sigh and then started to explain how she acted according to how her opponents moved.

From the first level to the final level, she explained it in detail and lamented that she was almost dead in the final moment.

If she hadn't side-stepped and swung her sword at the last opponent which made her take a stab at her shoulder while severing its head, it would've been her head which would've been pierced a hole with.

Davis shivered once he heard her explain the final part it in detail. It was like a horror story to him.

A tragic ending even before the marriage took place? With his rotten luck, he certainly believed that it could happen in his life.

"Other than that," Evelynn silently noticed his anxious reaction and inwardly turned happy. It meant that he cared about her and that made her ecstatic.

For what reason other than that did she explain her plight to him in detail? Even exaggerating it at some points...

Once she was satisfied with this reaction, she casually changed the topic, "I gained three Sky Grade Treasures."

She explained two of them but for the final one, she extended her hands and spoke with a loving smile on her face, "Here, this is for you."

A box appeared. At a glance, it looked like a pillbox.

Davis became startled, "Is this my marriage gift from you?"

Evelynn silently nodded her head.