Epic of Ice Dragon: Reborn As An Ice Dragon With A System-Chapter 2030: Twisted Soul

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Ruby opened her eyes, finding herself inside an endless dark, distorted and warped world.

Fragments of a broken-down manor floated everywhere, alongside floating pieces of stone and dirt.

Swirling seas of blood covered the sky, and black stars made of overflowing curses.

"…"

Her eyes looked around confused, realizing that she wasn't in the world she knew anymore.

She looked afraid, confused.

And weak.

A part of her wasn't there with her…

"Ugh… Where… Where am I?"

As she looked around confused, she saw her.

Her mother, on the floor.

She was unconscious, sleeping.

She was missing her body from her stomach down…

And there were several stabbing wounds over her body.

But there were also strange, fleshy tendrils connected to her wounds, merging with her flesh and skin.

These fleshy tendrils had countless eyes, glaring at her in silence.

"W-What is this? Mom?"

She ran towards her mother, jumping from floating pieces of concrete and wood, and even a floating, red colored couch.

"Mom!"

Until she reached her mother, in an isolated piece of concrete, surrounded by walls.

As she reached her mother, she looked at her with despair.

"W-What happened to you?! Mom? MOM!"

As she called for her mother, she started crying over her, hugging her.

"Mom…"

The tendrils that connected to her mother went down into the dark abyss beneath.

As Ruby looked around her, she noticed this dark abyss was very similar…

To that other one she once visited, that dark abyss where that monster had trapped her inside, as he tried to turn her into his new body.

"This place… Am I unconscious? Right this… we were stranded and the demons…! T-The demons almost… almost killed mom…! And Rakasha he… he couldn't protect her…! But what… Why was I so aggressive? It's not like me to… to act that way…"

"It was his fault."

"Eh?"

Ruby looked around, confused, the dark abyss surrounding her began changing, as countless red lights appeared one after another.

These weren't normal red lights, however…

They were crimson eyes.

Thousands of crimson eyes.

Glaring at her.

"Y-You…! Who…! Who are you?!"

She thought the worst, that the monster, her ancestor, the Vampire Venerable was back!

And yet…

Silence.

For a few moments, there was only silence.

And then…

The eyes started crying blood, filled with sorrow.

"Huh?"

The Ancestor would have never done such a thing, his aura too, was different.

While he was a manipulative, domineering presence…

This presence was only… very sad.

"He promised he would protect her… He failed us."

"What?"

"If we didn't intervene, mother would've died, you know?"

"…"

"Mother… I didn't want to lose her…"

"Y-You're… you're me?"

Ruby's eyes widened, as she saw a silhouette appear, a face, her face.

Made of blood, with long black hair made of void and abyssal darkness…

With six eyes across her face, all of them constantly crying miasma.

"I don't want mother to die…"

"A-Ah… Me neither…"

The gigantic Ruby looked at her with her six eyes.

"But… this isn't… the right way, right?"

Ruby's voice trembled as she faced her other self.

"Just… maybe we need to do something… differently?"

"Mother would die if we did… She would die and we would regret it forever!"

"No, wait, maybe we can… Do… something?"

"No…! There's nothing we can do now! She will die…! If we stop giving her life… she will die!"

"Really…? But… Please listen to me! You're… not the Venerable, who are you?!"

"I am you… When the Venerable died, he left behind a hollowness you filled. Do you understand what you became, Ruby? Or what WE became?"

"W-What…?"

"You absorbed the powers of a Venerable, half of them… Even if Drake took the rest… Even if Sangre took a fragment too… Still… You… hold his powers."

"I do…?"

"I am you, your Venerable Power given form. I am the true form you possess, the true power hidden within you… By drinking the blood of two hundred vampiric demons, I was able to finally awaken."

"Please… give me back my body… I-I…"

"My body, you mean?"

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"Eh?"

"You're a weaker version of me… Someone that hesitates… and cannot fight properly… someone weak that lets their mother die!"

"I-I didn't…! I didn't do that!"

"No excuses… NO EXCUSES!!! YOU WILL STAY HERE! AND YOU WILL WATCH AS I DO THE RIGHT THING!"

"No…! We can't live like this! Mother… We need to take her out of our body! T-This is wrong!"

"And let her die?!"

"She won't die; she has already regenerated! She's safe!"

"Not in the outside world… you're not safe either… nobody is safe… it's dangerous… there are so many monsters everywhere…"

"But we have to find a way, to compromise and…"

"IT'S NOT ENOUGH!"

"E-Eh?"

"THIS POWER… I WILL USE IT TO CRUSH EVERYTHING AND EVERYONE…!"

"NO, WAIT!"

"SHUT UP!"

Ruby tried to call for her, but a giant hand made of red flesh crushed her into the ground, without letting her move.

"Aaaagggh! M-Mom…! Mom…!"

As she started crying, her little hand reached her unconscious mother.

Were these her true feelings?

The feelings she had been holding back this entire time.

The darkness within her…

The inherited madness and the terrifying power that her ancestor had given to her.

Because without him holding everything together, her power might end up overwhelming her more than Ruby expected.

"Ru…"

"…"

Ruby looked around.

For a moment, she could swear she heard something.

"…by!"

"Eh?"

And there it was again.

"RUBY!"

"Ah!"

The scream echoed loudly inside of this strange, distorted landscape.

The gigantic six-eyed ruby looked around, angered.

"WHO DARES…?!"

She looked towards the origin of the voice.

"RUBY! WAKE UP!"

Crack, crack…!

As the voice echoed loudly within this world…

Ruby saw it, a small hole in the middle of this darkness, leading outside.

"RUBY!"

And the voice of Benladra echoing from outside.

"Please come back, Ruby!"

Alongside Rakasha too.

"GRAAAAHHHH!!!"

The monstrous bat roared, flying into the skies.

Its deadly attack almost managed to turn everyone into her vampiric servants.

However, Miranda tanked the hit by covering everyone in her miasmic body, and then wrapped around her leg, as she flew away.

Right now, right in the middle of the skies, Benladra and Miranda were using their Psychic Powers to enter Ruby's mind and bring her back.

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