CHAPTER 152: | PUNISHING THE TRAITORS [WARNING: EXTREME GORE]

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  [Content Warning: This chapter contains extreme graphic violence, torture, eye mutilation, forced nudity, child abuse, sexualized brutality, graphic gore, psychological abuse, and severe psychological descent.]

  "Huhuhu... I wonder, how should I punish your little rebellion, Ishtar?" His voice was terrifyingly gentle. "It is quite conflicting to decide whether I should pluck your eyes for myself, or let you experience a pain that is worse than death."

  Solia, hearing those threatening words, shivered uncontrollably. As she recalled that day, the day of her own fear, but she steeled herself instantly. For she wouldn't allow her personal feelings to interfere with her work in detaining Ishtar. She stared down at the girl who had become an incredible powerhouse in such a short time, reading her intent as it slowly crumbled from confusion into denial.

  Ishtar’s mind was in shambles. What she had tried to plot... was it really something that warranted such extreme punishment? Her eyes being plucked out? It meant that her glorious path to become the Judge of Truth, a being so immensely powerful that her words alone would bend the laws of causality, would be forfeited due to her mistake. Because of her rebellious thoughts?

  She looked at Solia with desperation visible in her face, as she pleaded with her eyes. But Solia shook her head in refusal. She was intent that she would not help her plead for forgiveness.

  Ishtar didn’t expect that her best friend, her big sister, would abandon her like this. Despair welled in her heart, an unbearable buildup of anguish. Yet, Ishtar didn’t give up. She turned her head to look behind her, desperate to see her Master’s expression.

  But upon witnessing the look of disgust he held for her, as if she were the lowest of maggots, the absolute lowest of trash, her hopes finally crumbled.

  Her ever-loving and gentle Master, who had patiently taught her etiquette, now looked at her like she was some worm from the lowest of all. And that was when she knew, all hope was lost.

  Her will broke apart. Her trust crumbled to dust. Her beliefs were fed to the dogs, and her conscience was stamped upon like trash. Ishtar felt hollow at this series of betrayals. Her eyes lost their childlike glimmer as she looked at the same people who had been kind to her, now realizing they were nothing but strangers.

  Then, she looked at the man who brought her to this.

  She smiled, then cackled uncontrollably. Slowly, she shed her garments, stripping herself bare in a display of total submission and brokenness. Tears welled in her eyes, cascading down her cheeks to her chin, falling onto her pale, undeveloped chest in droves. Ishtar was breaking down, teetering on the edge of insanity.

  But the man merely ignored her exposed form. He sat on his throne, holding the core of Lumicor in his hand, indifferently.

  She cried and cried, until she couldn't help but ask for the final time before her future as the Judge of Truth crumbled in her hands. "Hic-hehehe... is-is it fun to watch someone suffer, Mister? Is it fun to destroy someone's future? Over these petty mistakes that I, a young child, did? Tell me!!! Is it fun?..."

  "Huhuhu, you want some answers before I extract those glimmering eyes of yours. Yes, am I right?" I let out a low chuckle, glancing at Samantha, then smiled gently as I watched Ishtar’s expression. "Huhuhu, worry not. Since I have already remembered who you are, Ishtar Von Fai. But I will stay silent about these matters, since your mother wouldn't want to see her child die in front of her, right?"

  Ishtar looked exasperated that I had somehow discovered her identity, something that shouldn't have been possible. But who was she kidding? Me, Alister Von Fai? The Harbinger of Myth? Someone so powerful that even the Heavens and the Mother had come to judge me as the biggest threat to the multiverse?

  I cackled in amusement and continued. "Huhuhu, worry not. Your eyes are just returning to the rightful owner. Don't you agree, Eyes of Truth?"

  I smiled, letting out a low chuckle as I remembered that the Eyes of Truth were still dormant, waiting for Ishtar to ascend to Emperorhood to reactivate. Oh, how silly of me.

  "Huhuhu, it seems that I had forgotten that you are still dormant. But worry not, since this young child won't be your master much sooner."

  Ishtar’s face went extremely pale at these remarks.

  This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

  SWISH!

  Panic overtook her. She used her hair like tendrils to bind Samantha and Solia's weapons, as she dashed through the door, trying to run away, aiming for the portal to escape to the next segment. But it seemed she had greatly underestimated their strength.

  THUD!

  Samantha grabbed the back of Ishtar’s head and plunged her knee into the girl’s face, sending her crashing into the ground. Ishtar’s will to survive didn't allow her the leisure to be knocked out cold. She controlled her tentacle-like hair to restrain Samantha from firing her revolvers, but Samantha had already grabbed her swords.

  SHING!

  With a fluid motion, Samantha sliced the tendrils into pieces and pointed her revolver directly at Ishtar’s head.

  Solia, watching from the sidelines with her spiritual senses, was quite shocked at how fierce Samantha was. Before she could take a step to restrain Ishtar properly this time, Samantha interrupted her, pushing her aside and whispering with disgust, oblivious to their past relationships. "I would differ not to shoot you since you're my apprentice... so stop these foolish attempts, Ishtar!"

  Solia’s opinion seemed to differ. Her murderous aura flared uncontrollably at the thought that she was going to fail her orders yet again. She was mad, mad that she who was stronger than Samantha, her mistress, had just stood there letting her mistress do the dirty work. Solia gritted her teeth in shame.

  KRA-KOOM!

  Her body crackled with white lightning. She turned into a streak of pure energy, appearing in front of Ishtar in the next moment. Solia had enough of failure. This time, she wanted to prove that she was still her God’s Secretary, her God’s First Apostle.

  Though she didn't want this, she knew it was necessary. To teach this traitorous bitch that returning her God’s kindness with hatred would only end up in suffering worse than death.

  CRACK!

  She lifted her foot, crackling with latent lightning, and lunged her bare heel into Ishtar's neck, pinning her to the ground. Ishtar coughed a bucket of blood, suffering massive internal injuries from the kick that Solia drove into her fragile body.

  She gasped for air, her vision blurring, reality shifting into a dream. All she saw was Solia’s foot, covered in blood, and then her hands moving as she drew her swords and struck them into the ground next to Ishtar’s head.

  Solia smiled like a devil incarnate and whispered into Ishtar’s mind. "Didn't I warn you that escaping is impossible, Ishtar?!! So why did you try and escape from His Grace, the rightful owner of your body and soul, you damned wretch?!!"

  Ishtar was stunned. Solia, usually so composed, was cursing like this? Her eyes, already red from crying, became redder as fresh tears dripped from her eyelids.

  Today's event had truly broken Ishtar's belief. She had thought she could separate the subordinates from his father. But today, she found out that no matter how close you were to Samantha or Solia, when it came to betraying their Master, turning them against at each other, was nothing but an impossible dream. These two had already sworn their entire existence to him. Even if she tried to coerce Tellus, she knew that one command from him and Tellus’s little rebellion would stop.

  She knew it. She was doomed. Her attempts to escape were nothing but frivolous, a failure so beautiful that her Master and big sister hated her even more. But before she could continue her spiral, Alister, the Man, the Myth, the Legend, let out a suffocating pressure.

  He stood from the throne and walked toward her. Solia bowed deeply and made way for him.

  CRUNCH.

  He stopped and stomped on her arms. Her young, undeveloped bones broke into pieces. Ishtar screamed from the pain, but no matter how she looked at those two women, they ignored her cries for help.

  Alister Von Fai sat down upon her naked stomach, smirking as he whispered into her ears. "Child, nothing good will ever happen to you when you oppose me. Didn't you remember the day your siblings died at my hand? Did you think that I killed them because I wanted to? No. I killed them because they have been a parasite since birth."

  His voice dropped lower, darker. "It was only thanks to the grace of your mother, the Goddess of Void, that I let you and those bloodsuckers live. And you have proven to be useful. That is why I gave you those eyes in the form of an unknown figure inheritance when I killed your mother for trying to oppose me."

  Ishtar felt cold shivers run down her spine. She thought she had obtained her eyes due to some fortuitous encounter. To find out it was orchestrated by her father? Ishtar’s face went pale as she remembered, this very man had mercilessly killed her mother in front of her when she merely voiced concern for her children.

  Ishtar couldn't help but want to puke at this man's cruelty. The cruelty he would do to her mother, Samantha, who hadn't even gained a fraction of her Divine Authority of Void yet.

  Ishtar feared it. The day that this man would abandon her mother in a different lifetime, watching her in anguish just to see if her suffering would lead her to discover an emotion.

  But before she could recount more of her many lifetimes following this man, killing him every time she got the opportunity.

  SQUELCH.

  Pain wracked her skull. She let out a screech worse than that of a wraith as she saw his hands reach out for her eyes. Slowly, I dug them out. "AAAAHHH!"

  Her screams reverberated across the hallways, but they didn't matter to the onlookers. They watched in silence as I, Alister Von Fai, dug out the very eyes I had gifted to my daughter, returning them to their rightful owner.

  I opened my mouth and took one last glance at the eyeballs, their pupils shaped like stars.

  GULP!

  I swallowed them whole. A notification appeared as I clicked 'Yes.'

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  [Due to you only successfully devouring Ishtar's Eyes of Truth, you have obtained it.]

  ? Eyes of Truth [Unique]

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  Eyes of Truth [Unique]

  These are the eyes of the once-great Progenitor of Strength, bestowed upon her daughter, Ishtar, who bears the fate of the Judge of Truth. These eyes possess the ability to perceive the truth of all things.

  [Initiate mutations?]

  [Yes] / [No]

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