Chapter 192: Sins of a Lifetime
The suffocating violet mana of the spatial lock hummed against Ren Sihue’s skin. He stood frozen, his right arm submerged up to the elbow inside the barrier, staring at the ancient, white-robed man leaning heavily on a gnarled wooden cane.
Wiious Frous. The current head of the elusive Frous household, and the father of Ren’s late wife, Roxana.
For decades, the relationship between the Frous Clan and the Sihue Clan had been notoriously volatile. It wasn’t born from territorial disputes or generic underworld rivalries. The bitter, rotting hostility between the two legacy families was entirely personal, and the sole reason for it was the man currently standing with his arm stuck in a barrier.
Ren Sihue.
As the icy wind of the plain howled around them, Ren’s mind violently dragged him back to a past he had spent years trying to bury.
In his youth, Ren had been the flawless, undisputed prodigy of the underworld. But behind the closed doors of the Sihue estate, his life had been a sterile nightmare. The Sihue Clan did not believe in romance, fate, or love. They believed in raw, unyielding mathematics.
Selective marriages were the absolute cornerstone of their dynasty. It was a fiercely guarded secret among the elites that genetics played a crucial, undeniable role in determining the Class Potential of an awakened child. If two S-Rank Awakeners conceived a child, there was a staggering ninety percent statistical probability that the child would inherit an S-Rank potential.
Ren’s mother had been a victim of this cruel arithmetic. She had been a fiercely independent, overwhelmingly powerful S-Rank woman with her own ambitions and dreams. That was until she was treated as a commodity, sold off by her own family to marry Hiken Sihue—a terrifying monster of a man she had never met in her entire life. She was forced to leave behind her entire life, her freedom, and her happiness just to act as an incubator for the Sihue bloodline.
It was not hard to conclude why she had hated Ren with every fiber of her being. Every time she looked into her son’s oceanic blue eyes, she didn’t see a child; she saw the physical embodiment of her enslavement.
Growing up under the crushing weight of his mother’s hatred and his father’s emotionless brutality, Ren made a silent, unbreakable vow. He would never allow the same thing to happen to his own children. He would not be a breeder for the clan.
And then, he met Roxana Frous. She was radiant, kind, and possessed a warmth that completely shattered Ren’s icy exterior. He fell deeply, irrevocably in love with her.
But their union was an impossible anomaly. When Ren declared his intention to marry her, the Sihue elders erupted in fury. Roxana did not possess an S-Rank core. The old patriarch, Hiken, outright forbade it, threatening to wipe the Frous clan off the map. Ren, driven by youthful rebellion and desperate love, fought his father.
It was a catastrophic clash that nearly leveled the estate. In the end, even the monstrous Hiken could not bring himself to kill his own heir—the perfect S-Rank weapon he had invested his entire life into forging.
However, the Frous family was equally opposed. Wiious Frous, the man standing before Ren now, had vehemently refused to hand his precious daughter over to a syndicate of murderers where women were treated as mere political tools and breeding machines. He knew the Sihue clan would consume her soul.
But Ren, consumed by his own arrogance and belief that his S-Rank power could protect her from anything, kidnapped Roxana anyway. He stole her away in the dead of night, marrying her against the wishes of both houses.
A profound wave of regret washed over Ren as he stood in the freezing plain. He had thought he was saving her, but in reality, he had dragged her into a gilded cage. Roxana only had a B-Rank potential. When they had children, the genetic dilution Hiken had furiously warned about became a stark reality. Enji was awakened with only an A-Rank potential—a severe disappointment to the elders. And Risa... Risa had failed to awaken entirely, branding her as an absolute disgrace to the bloodline.
Because of the political backlash and his father’s suffocating control over the clan’s resources, Ren could not even keep his promise to Roxana. He lacked the supreme authority needed to shield her from the elders’ constant venom. He could not keep her inside the main family branch. She was isolated, ostracized, and slowly withered away from the stress and sickness, dying alone.
He had failed her. Completely.
Ren swallowed the bitter ash in his throat, pulling his eyes away from the past and focusing back on the frail old man standing ten feet away.
"How have you been... father?" Ren asked, his voice low, raspy, and incredibly wary.
Wiious Frous leaned heavily on his gnarled wooden stick, the massive white sleeves of his robe fluttering in the wind. A dark, incredibly smug smirk slowly curled beneath his massive white beard.
"Never better," the old man replied, his voice a dry, echoing croak that carried immense weight. "And even more so after Hiken’s death. What are you doing here?"
Ren didn’t say a single word in response to the old man mocking his dead father. He couldn’t retaliate, even if he wanted to. Deep down, a part of Ren agreed with Wiious. Hiken had been a tyrant who deserved his end.
Instead, Ren kept his arm perfectly still inside the violet barrier and looked the old man directly in the eye.
"What is happening here?" Ren asked straight to the point, his oceanic blue eyes scanning the massive, pulsing watchtowers looming in the distance. "Why are you guarding a world government black site? What killed my father?"
Wiious’s smug smile instantly vanished. The playful hostility drained from his wrinkled face, replaced by a haunting, unspeakable dread. He looked down at the rocky earth, the suffocating pool of mana around his feet swirling erratically.
"Something awful," the old man whispered, his voice cracking with a fear that shouldn’t belong to a master of his caliber. "Something that should have never happened. We dug... our own graves too deep."
Ren’s pupils shrank. His mind raced, calculating the sheer gravity of a threat that could terrify a peak-tier powerhouse into such despair. He opened his mouth to ask more, to demand the specifics of the anomaly that had escaped the underwater facility.
But the old man suddenly raised his frail, wrinkled hand, cutting him off completely.
"Go on, kid," Wiious said, his tone softening into something incredibly tired and gentle. He looked up at Ren, his cloudy eyes carrying decades of unspoken grief. "If you came here thinking I hate you... that’s wrong. You made mistakes, yes. But my daughter was happy with you in the time she had. She loved you. And honestly... it does not matter anymore."
Wiious let out a long, rattling sigh, turning his gaze toward the massive, imposing watchtowers. The finality in his posture sent a chill down Ren’s spine.
"I will be ash soon," the old man murmured, a bitter, fatalistic chuckle escaping his lips. "Just like your father. Hah... maybe we will be fighting each other down there in hell, if there is one."
Ren stood in stunned silence. The absolute certainty of death in the old man’s voice wasn’t a bluff. He was standing here specifically to die. He was buying time.
Slowly, carefully, using his left hand, Ren reached up to his own neck. He unclasped a thin, pristine silver chain hidden beneath his high collar. Hanging from the chain was a small, beautifully crafted teardrop pendant—Roxana’s pendant. The only pure thing he had left in the world.
Ren gently tossed it and it landed softly on the rocky dirt near the old man’s sandals.
"After this ends," Ren said, his voice dropping into a solemn, heavy register. "And if you manage to live... Please go to the Sihue Clan’s main home in Area 17. Your grandson, Enji, is the head of the family now."
Ren paused, a faint, desperate hope flickering in his icy blue eyes. "And if the deal I made has been completed... you will also be able to see your granddaughter."
Wiious slowly bent down, his ancient bones popping in protest, and picked up the silver necklace. He brushed the dirt from the teardrop pendant, his thumb lingering over the metal for a long, silent moment. He didn’t look up, but he clutched the necklace tightly in his fist.
"Be careful where you tread," Wiious whispered into the wind, stepping aside and leaving.
Ren didn’t hesitate. He stepped fully forward. The violet energy washed over his body like freezing water, sealing shut the moment his cloak passed the threshold. He was locked in. Ren drew a deep breath, his eyes locking onto the ominous structures ahead, and broke into a sprint, knowing full well that he might never make it out alive.