Chapter 167: The Dark Home [Part-3]
"So what is your name, young man? What brought you here today?"
After hearing the exact same words again for the seventeenth time, after trying so many different talks and approaches, Alen fell into a whirlwind of chaotic thoughts. He couldn’t help but feel that his past twisted self from the ’Eclipse Spire’ was slowly returning again.
He felt like he was losing his sanity all over again, even though he hadn’t actually died.
Now, only five minutes were left before the trial ended, and things were exactly the same as before. He wasn’t able to do anything to progress. His thought process went entirely blank, as he couldn’t think of any sane method to take over this bizarre situation.
A sudden thought came into his mind, and he gave them a sweet, disarming smile, already returning to his original scheming nature.
"I am Alen, it’s nice to meet you..."
The man nodded as he tilted his head with a thoughtful gaze, waiting for his guest to continue. Alen’s smile widened as he answered.
"I came here because I wanted to meet someone who broke my heart..."
The man looked confused after seeing his guest act so unusually.
"Hmph? Who is the one who broke your heart?... Sorry, I don’t quite understand what you’re saying."
Alen leaned back on the couch and replied calmly with a deeply sad expression.
"You won’t even understand. After all, you are a clueless guy..."
The man couldn’t help but frown at those harsh words. This unknown person wearing a cloak suddenly came into their house and was now talking badly about him. How could he just be alright with that?
Just at the same time, his wife returned from the kitchen. She placed the plate of refreshments and the cups of hot tea in front of him, instantly noticing the unusual, tense atmosphere around her husband.
"Is everything okay?..."
Alen chuckled as he picked up one of the tasteless cookies and ate it.
"Of course, everything’s okay. For now, at the very least."
The man’s eyes looked at him in burning anger as he clenched his fists, trying hard not to do any reckless things in front of his family.
The children also looked at Alen, as their curiosity was piqued by the strange adult talks.
"Can you tell me, what do you want from us?..."
Alen’s smile finally vanished. He straightened his back and looked right at them with a cold, calm face.
"What I want is simple. I want the love of my life, Ara..."
The man’s expression turned pale as he wasn’t able to speak. He looked at his wife, who wore the exact same shocked expression, then turned back to Alen with an enraged face.
"How dare you come here, telling me that you desire to have my wife?! Do you want to die?!"
The man stood up, ready to punch the stranger right in the face. But suddenly, he felt he couldn’t move. An invisible, crushing pressure fell heavily onto his shoulders. He noticed the cloaked figure’s blank, azure eyes, which looked more terrifying than anything he had ever seen in his life.
Alen’s lips curved slightly from under the hood as he replied calmly, speaking as if it was a simple matter of fact.
"Chill, man. You do not have the authority to judge my decisions... Besides, our affair has been going on since long before you two were ever married, isn’t that right, Ara?..."
Ara, the man’s wife, couldn’t help but glare at the cloaked figure. She had never been in a relationship with any man besides her husband, so whatever garbage he just spat out enraged her to the very core.
"What are you saying?! I would never betray my husband! Who are you? How dare you step into our life and try to destroy it?!..."
Alen sighed heavily. He looked at her with a bittersweet, heartbroken face.
"Ara, don’t look at me like that. It breaks my heart when you look at me with such a hateful gaze. I feel my heart shattering into pieces..."
He clutched his chest dramatically to show how painful he felt by her harsh reaction.
Ara couldn’t help but glare even more intensely at his nonsense words.
Her husband beside her sat there stiffly, no longer sure what was the truth and what was false. He looked at the cloaked person with a sharp, desperate gaze.
"What do you want from her?!"
Alen looked at him and stared calmly.
"I want her back."
The man’s fists clenched so hard his knuckles turned white as he gritted his teeth. His wife’s face was incredibly pale; no color could be seen visible on her skin.
"What proof do you have to explain this?"
Alen raised one of his eyebrows as he met the man’s frantic eyes.
"Proof?... Well, I have a few pics of our intimate actions. But sorry, I can’t show you. That’s a private matter..."
The man looked stunned and thoroughly shocked. He opened his mouth and closed it again as he turned to look at his wife for answers.
Ara couldn’t help but stand up, raising her hand to slap the arrogant guy in front of her. He was shamelessly spitting whatever lies came to his mind, not even noticing that the little children were sitting just nearby listening to every word of it.
Alen easily caught her hand right before she slapped him. She started to push him away, but it was far too difficult for her little strength to push him back even an inch.
"Darling, please... Stop hiding it from your husband. We can be together once again..."
Alen gently pulled his hood back, finally revealing his handsome face to the room. His face was already handsome enough to attract massive attention before, but after gaining his Star, his body had grown more refined. Now, he had become thrice as handsome as before. With his passive ’Charm’ ability active in his arsenal, any weak-hearted person like her was guaranteed to fall for him the second he seduced her.
Ara looked at him with a stunned gaze as her mouth fell open. Her skin warmed up as a bright redness reached her face, and she looked away shyly, her previous anger melting away.
The man noticed everything. He misunderstood his wife’s blushing reaction for recognition and guilt. He felt like his entire world was shattering into pieces because of the handsome person sitting before her.
"Ara... is it true that this man and you were..."
"I—I... I don’t know..."
Ara stammered as she wasn’t able to speak clearly. Her eyes were fixed entirely on the captivating person in front of her.
The man felt confirmed that the person in front of her was definitely his wife’s secret lover. He couldn’t help but feel enraged that his years of love and devotion to his wife were destroyed in a single second when this man appeared. He felt helpless as he looked at his wife’s dazed expression. She didn’t open her mouth to defend herself a second time after seeing his face.
He thought of his innocent children. He thought of his happy married life with her. Everything was destroyed by the presence of this single man in front of him.
Alen pulled her down to sit right beside him. He placed his hand over her shoulder and leaned closer to her ear. His eyes were intense as he channeled his mana.
"Tell me, darling, that you love me..."
[Nexus Elemental Art: Sound type: Manipulation]
A strange, sound echoed inside the woman’s head. The sound was barely a whisper, but it echoed constantly in her ears again and again, manipulating her thought process.
’I love him.. I love him... I love him... I love him... I love him... I love him... I love him... I love him... I love him... I love him...’
As the hypnotic sound kept repeating inside her mind, she finally opened her mouth. Her glowing red eyes stared up at him with pure devotion.
"I love him... I love you.... I love you..."
A victorious smile tugged on Alen’s lips as he looked at the man’s helpless, broken gaze. The husband was sitting there, watching his own wife leaning affectionately onto another man’s chest.
"So what are you going to do now? ...I don’t care about her anymore... From now on, I will just take care of my own children...." The man made a firm, heartbreaking decision. He didn’t want his wife who had betrayed him to the very core. His life now thinned down only to his children, and he would only take care of them.
The children looked anxious at the sudden change in their parents’ talks. They didn’t understand what the big persons were talking about, but they felt like something was terribly wrong.
Alen’s eyes flicked toward the broken man, and a twisted, cruel smile appeared on his face.
"Whose children? For your kind information, even the children you were taking care of are also mine...."
The man’s face turned ashen. He felt his whole world completely collapse at those final words.
"No... It can’t be! You’re lying!!!"
Alen looked down at Ara, while continuing to manipulate her with sound magic according to what he wanted to get from her.
"Am I wrong, Ara?"
Ara looked up at his face, meeting his eyes. She was utterly lost in his charm and mental manipulation.
"He is right... The children are also his...."
The man’s face broke completely. He collapsed back onto the couch as tears fell freely from his glowing red eyes. All of his world collapsed; the years of care, the warm love, and every positive emotion inside him shattered into dust. His sweet home was broken.
The children looked at Alen with sheer confusion, as they didn’t know what had just happened to their parents.
After watching the whole family collapse, Alen looked at the lost man, turned toward the manipulated woman, and lastly looked at the young children who didn’t know what happened. The home was finally broken. The last few seconds ticked by before the trial was over.
Violent crimson lightning started to leak from Alen’s entire body. The deadly sparks started to cover the whole house. He cast one final glance around the room, closed his eyes, pulled away from her, and stood up.
*BOOOOM!* *BOOOOM!* *BOOOOM!*
The whole place collapsed in less than a second as the crimson lightning exploded outward. It shattered the furniture, the walls, the floors, and the ceilings. Everything, along with the people present in the room, was reduced to nothing but ash. As the dust and debris flew over the area, the whole family got wiped out completely.
This time, Alen didn’t get regressed back.
So how did he do that? It was simple, yet twisted in its own terms. A family cannot be broken by themselves unless a third person appears in their life. After regressing back again and again in this trial, Alen had learned a lesson. What is most important in the life of a family is trust, and if that trust is broken, then the family is bound to shatter.
He couldn’t help but feel like he was losing some vital part of his good character. He had just destroyed a happy family. While considering it was a trial, even if they weren’t real humans, he had done something he felt he shouldn’t have. All of his morals and his respect for life seemed to thin out further.
But as he opened his eyes, he knew he couldn’t back down anymore. Not when he had firmly made his decision to walk on this path.
[Ding! The Trial ’Kill them’ has been successfully completed!]
[Distributing rewards according to contribution rate...]
Alen dismissed the notification. He didn’t want to check it right now. He wasn’t in the right state of mind to enjoy looking at the shiny rewards he got from killing a family.
A space tore open in the air. A whirlpool of dimensional gates opened up; this time, not just one, but two.
One was of a bright green color, meant for returning back to the real world. While the other one was a red portal, allowing him to directly attempt the second trial immediately.
This option was not present in the First Stage of his trials. But now, if he wanted, he could just keep climbing the Ascension realm continuously.
But since he was not in a sane state of mind, he didn’t want to fall into another similar trial which might test his mind so brutally. He had to calm himself down before attempting to climb again.
Without casting a single gaze behind him at the destroyed house, he stepped forward and entered the green dimensional gate, returning to the Asterion as soon as possible.