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The Truth about the Devil
"Lying! You are lying!"
Liola yelled desperately, but the Leader glanced at him with disdain. His face was filled with impatience, while the questions Liola had suppressed in his heart had now all surfaced.
Liola reached his hand into his pocket and held tightly onto the letter Anise had left behind. Even when the Leader beat him up to the point of being severely injured, Liola didn't feel as much pain as he did now.
Could it be that Anise, the person who had always been his emotional support, only appeared before him because he was the Dragon Emperor's son? Was... it the reason why she accompanied him? And asked him to look for her?
Was everything Anise did all just to take him away from the organization, and send him back to the world he came from?
Liola sank into black world as he thought. In his mind, the imagery of Anise's smile began to crack, because Liola's faith was slowly collapsing...
Seeing Liola losing control, Kaiser acted strangely calm. He asked with conviction, "Who are you to say Anise was fake?"
As soon as he asked, the Leader immediately disappeared then appeared inches away from Kaiser's face. His suddenly enlarged blue eyes surprised Kaiser, and the Leader said with a cold tone of voice,
"Don't think for a moment you have the right to question me. In my eyes, you're absolutely nothing!"
Kaiser's heart sank, knowing the Leader was only stating the truth. The Leader was beating Liola for fun, whom could be on even footing with all the rank-X people. Kaiser wondered if the Leader even needed to pout to kill him.
"But your story was pretty good, and I never lie. Since I agreed to tell you, I won't take back my words."
The Leader blinked again, returning to his previous position. As the distance between them grew, the fear Kaiser felt lessened. His mouth had turned reckless again as a result,
"Then tell me? Even if I die, at least let me die in peace."
The Leader laughed for a while, then said as if he were peerless, "I am the legendary Gle!"
'Gle!' This word struck Kaiser like lightning.
Kaiser's usual never-ending mouth couldn't even speak a single syllable. His mouth was wide open as he stared at this stubborn pants who looked like a spoiled rich kid...
'Could he really be the terrifying and infamous devil Gle?'
And unfortunately, could he really be Kaiser's ancestor?
Seeing Kaiser's mouth hanging, the Leader... who should now be called Gle, felt quite happy. Despite having left for hundreds of years, but it looked like his fame hadn't diminished.
"Y-you are Gle?" After being stunned for a long time, Kaiser finally asked with a stutter. His facial expression was quite strange: it was neither fear nor admiration.
Gle saw his strange face, and began to feel curious. He replied, "Yes, I am Gle."
Kaiser's face turned even more strange. He thought, doesn't it mean this guy would've been something like a grandpa to him? He looked at Gle's twenty-five-ish face, and Kaiser's face looked almost like a clown. Was he suppose to call this Mr. Stubborn Pants... Grandpa?
"What? If you don't say something soon, I'm going to kill you."
Gle got angrier by the minute as he looked at Kaiser's face. He thought, no matter which world this person was from, he should either fear or revere him. But this little runt kept talking back at him, and now after hearing his name, he dared to have his mouth twitching? It made him more and more furious.
'Kill me?' Kaiser's pupils dilated. His face suddenly changed, and yelled loudly, "Grandpa! Kaiser really misses you!" He ran towards Gle and tried to hug him as he spoke.
"WHAT?!"
Gle didn't know how to react. Could there be someone so shameless that, in order to save his own skin, he'd be willing to recognize anyone as his grandfather?
Seeing Kaiser running towards him, Gle reached out his foot, which accurately landed on Kaiser's face, whose flattering noises immediately turned into a moan. Kaiser grabbed his face and rolled around on the ground.
Gle grunted coldly, "Shameless kid."
Kaiser rolled for a long while before he got up, and a shoe print was clearly visible on his face. Kaiser complained, "I truly am your descendent. My full name is Kaigleser."
"Nonsense!" Gle would never believe the lying little runt in front of him. He naturally thought Kaiser was calling him grandpa only because he was afraid of dying.
Kaiser felt really awkward. Although he had lied quite a number of times and it wasn't rare for him to suddenly call people grandpa or brother, he was actually telling the truth for a change, but it was obviously mistaken to be a lie. Kaiser rolled his eye, and began to laugh. He walked and held up the giant gun in his hands,
"Grandpa, look, isn't this yours? Look, there's your whimsical signature at the bottom of this handle."
Gle waved his hand impatiently, "So what, it's not like it's rare to find something I've left behind..."
But before he finished, he frowned, and asked suspiciously, "How did you know it was my signature?"
Gle's handwriting wasn't something normal people understood. At a glance, it was no different from random graffiti. When one examined it further, even graffiti would look better than his handwriting.
Back then, Gle had quite a number of apprentices, but very few of them were actually powerful. The reason was because, despite Gle's love of getting new apprentices, he had very little patience to teach them. He had often said a few words, threw them a book about magic, then they never heard from him again.
If Gle's handwriting was better, then it would've been fine. A Magician could probably do reasonably well if they could follow a properly written magic book.
However, Gle's handwriting was near impossible to read for normal people, and he hated anyone who would call his handwriting ugly, so no one dared to ask what he had written. Besides, Gle often came and gone without a trace, so even someone dared to ask, they couldn't have found him to do so.
Kaiser scratched his head. How should he explain? He could just understand... What's more was even Kaiser's own handwriting was terrible, so much so it could match Gle's, and it looked vaguely similar.
Under Gle's impatient and suspicious eyes, along with Ki on his left hand and magic on his right, Kaiser had to explain honestly, "I was suspicious at first too. But using this gun, I found your house, and after looking through a bunch of notes about magic, I confirmed it was your name."
"My house?" Gle looked surprised. If he remembered correctly, the supposed house of his was protected under a very powerful magic field. The only people who could enter was he himself... or someone with his bloodline.
Gle began to carefully examine Kaiser. He saw his blue eyes, and thought it looked a bit like a ruffian's. A head of green hair... it looked quite like his own eldest daughter's.
Thinking about his daughter, even the irresponsible Gle couldn't help but feel guilty. He hadn't seen her again after she turned fifteen. So ever since he had a younger daughter, Yasha, he spoiled her quite a bit, perhaps he poured his love for his eldest daughter into her as well.
So could this little gangster-looking punk really be his own descendent? Gle's expression hardened considering he thought of Kaiser as a weak-ass and a loud mouth. He didn't want to contemplate about it anymore, so grabbed Kaiser's hand.
With Kaiser's yell and complaints, he lacerated Kaiser's palm, then he took a piece of jade hanging from his waist and forced Kaiser to hold it in his palm.
"What are you doing?" Kaiser was shocked and yelled continuously.
Gle examined it briefly, then let go of Kaiser's hand. He said expressionlessly, "If you're not related to me by blood, you would be killed by the magic in this piece of jade."
Hearing Gle's explanation, Kaiser opened his mouth wide. He looked at his palm, and couldn't believe he barely missed the gates of hell. Kaiser gulped, then displayed his hooligan smile,
"Hehe, now you finally know I'm your descendent." Kaiser said as sat on a chair, completely ignoring Gle's presence.
Gle's mouth twitched. This little runt... weak, loved to brag, and talked about nonsense... could he really be his own descendent?
Gle flicked his finger, and pulverized the chair Kaiser was sitting on. Kaiser fell onto the ground, and moaned in pain, "Ahhhh, my butt is cracked open!"
"Shut up!" Gle yelled lividly after seeing Kaiser's embarrassing features.
But before Gle yelled, Kaiser glanced at Liola and had already closed his mouth. He saw Liola's face was expressionless, and he was kicking the unconscious Yandi on the ground.
Kaiser was not familiar with Liola's current expression, even though he was usually expressionless, but now he seemed... like he was an emotionless puppet. His silver eyes looked like darkened steel.
"Hmmph..."
Yandi moaned on the ground, then struggled to get up. As soon as she raised her head and looked into Liola's emotionless eyes, her body froze.
She asked timidly, "W-what's wrong with you?"
"I'm going to find Anise."
Liola's response didn't answer her question, but Yandi knew his nature too well, and she knew Liola's sudden change in attitude must have something to do with her sister.
Since Yandi's original goal was to find Anise, she didn't say anything else. After struggling to stand up, Yandi asked calmly, "Where?"
Liola's face remained completely emotionless, but night skies filled with stars and trees with circular leaves flashed in his mind. At this time, the Dragon Cross Necklace emitted a slight glow, as if it was trying to comfort its owner.
However, Liola acted as if he was burnt by a fire. He pulled the necklace off, and looked at it emotionlessly. The light on the necklace slowly faded away, and then returned to being a cold necklace.
Liola threw the necklace to Yandi without any hesitation, then turned and headed towards the door, while ignoring Baolilong who was desperately trying to grab ahold of papa's pants.
Baolilong couldn't hold back papa, and after fumbling a bit, it ran back to Kaiser, and desperately pointed towards Liola while grabbing Kaiser's shirt.
Kaiser's face turned slight, "Liola, where are you going?'
Liola answered without looking back, "To look for Anise."
He continued to walk outside, and he had already stepped outside of the gate to walk away. Yandi followed after him and anxiously tried to catch up.
* * *
Kaiser grabbed Baolilong and tried to follow, while trying to ignore a certain somebody...
"Freeze."
Unfortunate, the certain somebody wasn't used to be ignored. Gle lazily yelled, and Kaiser, despite being already at the gate, had to stop. He was... not at all confident Gle would hesitate to kill him, just because he was his descendent. To prevent himself from dying in the hands of his own grandfather, Kaiser turned around with a bitter face.
"Grandpa, aren't you planning on stopping Liola? He has gotten away."
Hearing Kaiser say so, Gle threw a complicated look at Liola's now faint figure, but in an instant he returned to his arrogant self. He said with disdain, "So what if he walked away?"
"Right, nothing, so I'll be going too."
Kaiser hurriedly turned, trying to run after Liola. Nevertheless, the suddenly closed gate told him it wasn't as simple as he thought. Kaiser held tightly onto Baolilong, who may be his only help at this point, and turned to face the tornado-like Magician.
Facing such a strong devil, Kaiser began to complain, "Why am I so unlucky? It was obviously Liola who was wrong. He's the Dragon Emperor's son. Grandpa, aren't you enemies with the Dragon Emperor? Why would you simply let him go?"
Gle raised his eyebrow, and gave a sinister yet somewhat understanding smile, "Looks like you actually care about your companion."
"Care?" Kaiser pouted, "Yeah right, I can't believe he just left me here and ran away by himself. I don't care, you go and catch him, then come back and beat him up."
Gle's blue eyes stared straight at Kaiser, whom had felt a bit uneasy from the stare. Gle began to smile.
He thought this guy's awkward personality was quite similar to his eldest daughter's. He was obviously worrying that when Liola finds Anise, he would be dealt an even heavier blow. He wants to stop Liola, but he's using such an awkward way to stop him.
"Stupid daughter. If you didn't use this way of expressing yourself, I would've came back for you no matter what."
A bit of never-before-seen loneliness appeared on Gle's previously arrogant face. As soon as he raised his head, however, he saw Kaiser was tilting his ears and listening carefully to Gle's own murmurs.
For someone like Gle, no matter what he said, it would definitely be a history-changing gossip. If he were to sell these information to magazines, he could probably make a ton of money, right? Kaiser pulled his ears wide open and drooled while dreaming about money.
"AHH! OWWW!"
Two fingers clipped tightly onto Kaiser's ears, and then they gave his ears an 180 degree turn, Kaiser yelled in pain as a result. The owner of the fingers, Gle, was looking at Kaiser with a cold face. He was beginning to be suspicious again, could this guy really be his own descendent?!
"Hmmph! How can Gle's descendent lose to Dragon Emperor's son?" Gle got angrier as he thought. Wouldn't it mean he was losing to Dragon Emperor? He seemed to forgotten the fact that the supposed Dragon Emperor's son was his own best apprentice.
Using the opportunity, Kaiser "rescued" his ears from Gle's hands. As he rubbed his ears, Kaiser didn't forget to ask, "Why do you hate the Dragon Emperor? Is it because he defeated you?"
"Nonsense!"
Fire was shooting out of Gle's eyes, and pure white flames were burning in his hands. Before Kaiser even had the chance to react, the fire on Gle's hands grew to the height of a person, and they were thrown directly at Kaiser.
Without knowing Gle would have such a huge response, Kaiser saw he had almost no chance of dodging it, so he ran from being at death's door to behind Gle.
The flames chasing Kaiser made a 180 degree turn and headed right towards Gle. However, he simply waved his hand without any expression on his face, and the white flames went out like a candle in a hurricane.
Gle's face was still expressionless. He spun around, planning to continue his attack on Kaiser.
Kaiser saw Gle's malicious face, and began yell like a child. Seeing Gle had no plans of stopping, Kaiser had to jump around evasively, trying to dodge the white flames.
Suddenly, something fell onto the ground, an emerald started rolling on the floor. Gle was stunned, and stopped attacking Kaiser. He walked over, picked up the emerald, then seem to have frozen in thought.
"What's the deal with this guy?"
Lying in the corner of a bed, Kaiser had already been close to admitting to his fate and letting the flames hit him. But he didn't expect for Gle to suddenly stop and freeze while looking at a gem.
Having survived Gle's onslaught, Kaiser murmured, "What is he doing? Whatever, as long as I'm still alive it's fine."
"Where did you get this?" Gle suddenly asked.
Kaiser was surprised, and he wouldn't dare to ignore the question, "I found it from Liola."
When Liola was unconscious, Kaiser found this emerald in Liola's clothes. Based on his theory that everything Liola owned belonged to him, Kaiser naturally took it for himself. In his mind, since Liola had already forgotten about the emerald, then it must not have been something important to Liola! It would've been better to give it to him, because he would carefully treasure the precious jewel.
Interestingly, Kaiser had no idea Maylee gave Liola the jewel and asked for it to be passed onto him. But since Liola treated the gem as unimportant, he had completely forgotten about it.
"Is that so..." Gle's face seemed to have completely lost the arrogance, leaving only loneliness and nostalgia behind.
He calmly asked himself, "Did Maylee give this to him?"
"Maylee? Do you know her?" Kaiser tilted his head and... he seemed to remember Barbalis called Auntie "Maylee"?
Tenderness could be seen in Gle's eyes while he stared at the emerald, "She was a lover of mine."
'Lovers?' Kaiser's mind went blank for a minute.
'Auntie?' Kaiser's mind went blank for another three minutes.
'Auntie and my ancestor had been together?' Kaiser's mind went blank for another ten minutes.
The 180cm, muscular Auntie whose face looked like Schwarzenegger (plus it was jagged), and her explosive hair. With her white apron far too small for her and her pink chrysanthemum skirt, was actually devil Gle's "old lover"?
The thought of Auntie standing with Gle caused an explosive curse in Kaiser's mind, which made him dizzy.
He then thought about these people doing it... Gross! It must've looked 100x more disgusting than Liola looking like a monster!
"AHH! That's impossible!" Kaiser grabbed his green hair with both of his hands, and exploded with a yell.
"What's impossible?" Gle asked with dissatisfaction. He then said with arrogance, "Only a devil like me has the right to be with a peerless beauty like Maylee."
'P-E-E-R-L-E-S-S B-E-A-U-T-Y?!?!' When he thought of Auntie's look, foam began to ooze out of Kaiser's mouth, and he looked like he was having a seizure.
The difference in a few hundreds years of age was more than a generation gap between them, their opinions were practically oceans apart! Kaiser cried as he shook his head. He would have never imagined that, a few hundred years ago, Auntie could be considered as a peerless beauty.
"What's with your face?" Gle tilted his head and glanced at Kaiser.
"N-nothing! Just that Auntie... I mean, Maylee, didn't s-seem as pretty as before." Kaiser answered carefully,he didn't want to play fire dodgeball again.
"Even if she aged, some beauty must have remained." Gle looked absolutely certain.
Kaiser forced a smile, "Re-remained." 'At least the muscles remained...'
"Since Maylee is on Li's side," Gle's expression no longer looked lonely, but instead seemed to go back to his previous arrogance, and even a hint of being sinister seemed to have been added,
"Having the Dragon Emperor killed by his own son, it seems like a pretty good idea."
Kaiser's eyes flashed, and asked timidly, "Why do you hate the Dragon Emperor? Is it because he launched a crusade against you, the devil?"
Gle's angry eyes glanced at Kaiser, then said coldly, "No, so what if he starts a crusade against the devil. I'm a devil he created."
Hearing this, Kaiser was shocked and asked without thinking, "Why would he create a devil?"
Gle glanced at Kaiser again as if he was looking at an idiot, but because of the emerald in his hands, Gle seemed to have relaxed a bit and he explained, "So he could send troops."
"What?" Kaiser frowned.
Seeing Gle was looking at him unhappily, Kaiser immediately gave him a flattering smile, then said,
"Aiya, not everyone is as smart as you, grandpa. Even though Kaiser inherited a tiny bit of your intelligence, I am not even remotely close to your intelligence, so I have a bit of trouble understanding."
The flattery seemed to work quite well, and Gle revealed an arrogant smile,
"That Dragon Emperor guy wasn't satisfied with having the Dragon Continent, so he wanted to control the entire world. In order to convince the entire race of Dragons to attack, he had to find a righteous excuse."
"A crusade against the devil... AHH! So Miluo must be the new devil!"
Kaiser wasn't an idiot after all. As soon as he heard the Dragon Emperor's wish to take over the world, everything made sense to him.
"Pretty smart, you really are my descendent." Gle's compliment carried praise for himself. After hearing Kaiser and Liola's story, Gle already had an idea.
He continued, "A few hundred years ago that bastard, the Dragon Emperor, framed me. It was obviously him who wanted to control the world, but he instead put all the blame on me."
"The Dragon race would never support the Dragon Emperor in conquering the world, and his strongest forces were his Dragon Knights. Without Dragons, what were Dragon Knights going to do? Be Infantry? So being the strongest Magician, you became the devil. He then started a crusade against you and the country you were residing, Aklan Republic. After defeating you, Aklan would be almost gone, and he would use the opportunity to take over it as well."
Kaiser hurriedly explained, and many thoughts all came out at once. So, in reality, Dragon Emperor's plan was identical to the one before, at least, the plan to create a devil was the same as before. Last time it was Gle, and this time it's Miluo!
"Hahaha! But that bastard never imagined for me to really became the devil!" Gle burst out in laughter,
"Since that bastard called me the devil, I showed him the kind of things the devil could do! I beat him back all the way to the Dragon Continent, and almost even push him off his own throne."
"Then how did you end up losing?" Kaiser asked without thinking.
Gle's face darkened, "Because the Dragon Emperor framed me again, spreading rumors that my true intentions were to destroy the world. F— destroying the world! Why would I possibly do such a thing? I haven't played enough! My bastard Magicians decided to defect to their side, and surrounded me with the Dragon Emperor. Had it not been for Mizerui and Barbalis secretly helping me, and Maylee helping me with my escape... Hmmph!"
When he was getting to the end of the sentence, Gle's expression looked rather strange. A person as proud as him still could not accept he had the help of others. Nevertheless, he had no choice back then; his whole body was practically falling apart, how could he have declined help?
Kaiser's jaws dropped, and said with a stutter, "M-Mizerui and Barbalis helped you?"
Gle grunted, "Though few knew, but Mizerui is actually my apprentice. Barbalis and Qiusi were my classmates back in Aklan Academy... Hmph! Even Dragon Emperor's wife Susanna was my classmate. The four of us were the infamous 'Crazy Four' back in the Academy. Susanna was just too stupid! Who cares if she helped her bastard husband, but she ended up getting killed. Stupid woman! Idiot!" Gle gritted his teeth while cursing, while holding the emerald tightly.
Bombs exploded one after another in Kaiser's mind, and he was so in shock that looked like a deer in headlights.
He then asked, "Dragon Emperor killed his wife? How do you know? I heard she died from childbirth."
"Nonsense! Susanna was strong as an ox. Even without magic, she could use her fists to beat me, Qiusi, AND Barbalis."
Gle suddenly rubbed his chin with his hand with a lingering fear on his face, as if he had been struck before. He continued, "Her? Dying of childbirth? Hmmph! Even if she had any trouble, she would grab her child out with her own bare hands."
'...Liola, perhaps you really were grabbed out by your mother with her bare hands.' Kaiser felt sad for his companion, for a total of 0.3 seconds.
'Would the Dragon Emperor be killed by his own son?' Gle sported a slightly sinister smile.
Although he had never believed in fate and had a disdainful attitude towards fortune tellers, this prophecy was to his liking. He didn't mind helping to push this prophecy along just like Mizerui and Barbalis.
Gle's eyes were then fixed on Kaiser, and a smile surfaced on his mouth. He thought the runt's magic wasn't bad, and he could make a good assistant to killing the Dragon Emperor.
Seeing Gle's smile, for some reason, Kaiser began to feel it would've been a good way to die if he had actually been burnt by the flames before. At least he would die quickly, and his body would even get a free cremation.
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