Volume 2, Chapter 34-2 – Laxia, the Outcome Has Been Decided

Mia, the Lord of Blood, narrowed her eyes slightly.

Over the course of a thousand years, the Laxia Ritual had devoured countless descendants of Valentine blood.

Some had cried and begged for mercy. Some had resorted to any means necessary to survive. Some had torn at one another like beasts.

But never had a single one looked at her with those eyes.

And never had a descendant of the Valentine family dared point the tip of her sword toward the lofty referee’s seat.

“Are you serious, child?” Mia’s voice carried a trace of amusement, as though she were looking at a kitten that had no idea how high the heavens were or how deep the earth was. “Do you know what you just said?”

“I couldn’t be more serious.” Stella raised her head. “You’re the one I want to challenge.”

“Elder Sister…”

Cheryl knelt in the pool of blood, staring at Stella in disbelief.

She could not understand.

The one Stella had declared she would challenge was the Lord of Blood.

An ancient and brutal elder of the Valentine family.

Although the current Mia was merely a wisp of a remnant soul residing within the Sacred Blood Grail, she no longer possessed the powerful body that had once been capable of tearing apart the sky.

Over the course of these thousand years, however, the Sacred Blood Grail had collected a blood tax from every generation’s victor and devoured the resentment of every generation’s loser.

Within the Corridor of Blood, Mia was invincible.

Challenge her?

That was not bravery at all. It was suicide.

“Hahahahahaha!”

Cheryl heard a burst of laughter that rang out like pieces of metal striking against one another.

Inside the picture frame, Mia doubled over with laughter. The red wine in her hand spilled out, transforming into a rain of blood as it fell.

“Interesting, far too interesting!”

She wiped away the tears of laughter at the corners of her eyes. The teasing look in her gaze gradually turned into one of indifference, contempt, terror, and cruelty.

“This is the first time I’ve ever seen such an arrogant descendant of Valentine.”

“Since you desire it so badly…” Mia straightened her posture once more and looked down upon the tiny girl below. “The rules of Laxia are absolute. No one is permitted to refuse. The challenge you issued is no exception, even for me.”

“So, I accept.”

She agreed without hesitation.

“And the victor will receive all of the loser’s blood.” Mia licked her red lips, her gaze wandering over Stella’s neck. “I would very much like to taste it… arrogant little kitten, just what does your blood taste like?”

The moment her words fell.

Cheryl’s palm grew hot.

She lowered her eyes and saw the thorn mark symbolizing curse and fate dissolve into countless red motes of light. They scattered through the air before finally converging in Mia’s palm.

The contract had transferred.

“No… no…”

Cheryl panicked.

She struggled to stand, trying to grab at those fading motes of light.

“Elder Sister, have you gone mad? You’ll die!”

The girl’s voice was thick with sobs. She no longer cared about noble decorum, nor did she care about maintaining her dishonest facade.

“Kill me, just like Mother did back then. As long as you kill me, you’ll survive. You’ll be promoted!”

“Please… all you have to do is move your finger. I won’t resist… please…”

She did not want to see Stella die.

Especially not for the sake of saving a counterfeit like her.

If this was how it ended, then all the patience she had endured along the way, the death she had so painstakingly planned, and even her laughable, self-indulgent sense of sacrifice, wouldn’t all of it become a joke?

Yet Stella did not turn around. She did not even give Cheryl a chance to become sentimental.

In her eyes, Lord of Blood, Valentine progenitor, strip away all those flashy titles and filters, and no matter how you looked at it, Mia was nothing more than a ghost who had been dead for several thousand years.

As a Saintess of the Holy See, purifying the dead was a sacred duty written on the very first page of the employee handbook.

Whether it was some wandering ghost with nowhere to go, or a high-class earthbound spirit living in a mansion and drinking red wine, before the power of the Lord, there was no fundamental difference between them apart from the older one perhaps being slightly tougher to chew.

Since the rules allowed her to issue a challenge, why would she kill that sniveling bargain-bin younger sister instead of directly getting rid of the culprit right in front of her?

The instant Stella caught sight of the thorn mark completely disappearing from Cheryl’s hand out of the corner of her eye, she finally breathed a sigh of relief.

Now she could finally send the nuisance away. She was planning to pull out something big with Holy Light in a moment, and she definitely could not let anyone she knew see it.

“Quiet.”

Stella turned her head slightly. Her silver hair covered half of her profile, leaving only one crimson eye visible.

“You aren’t even worth killing, foolish younger sister.”

Snap.

Stella snapped her fingers.

Ripples spread across the pool of blood beneath her feet.

“Take her away, Dorothy.”

There was not the slightest fluctuation in Stella’s voice.

“Yes, Mama.”

A voice came from within the mirror.

A small hand reached out from the pool of blood and precisely caught Cheryl by the ankle.

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“Eh?”

Cheryl froze.

Before she could react, an enormous pulling force came from beneath her feet.

At that instant, Cheryl’s beautiful face twisted into an expression never seen before. Her fury toward the person who could not understand all the painstaking effort she had put in, and her fear toward a development she herself could not understand, were displayed across her face without the slightest concealment.

Cheryl did not even have time to shout again before her entire body was forcibly dragged into the Mirror Realm.

“Oh?”

Mia raised an eyebrow inside the picture frame. She looked toward the spot where Cheryl had disappeared, and a hint of surprise flashed through her eyes.

“Rather interesting.” She glanced at the now-empty ground. “Although I don’t know how you sent her out, I should remind you of something, my dear little kitten.”

She pointed toward Stella’s palm.

The thorn mark upon it was vivid red, almost dripping with blood.

“As long as the mark remains, no matter where you flee, no matter which mirror you hide inside, you can never truly leave the Corridor of Blood.”

“Since the irrelevant party has already left, then…”

Mia stood up within the picture frame. Her image gradually dimmed, and the pigments upon the canvas transformed into thick blood that flowed down the wall.

At the same time, the countless former Family Heads occupying the picture frames on both sides of the corridor also stopped speaking. Their figures collapsed one after another, transforming into streams of dark red blood that converged upon the floor. All of that blood surged toward the spot directly opposite Stella.

Drip, drip.

Countless streams of blood gathered in the center of the corridor and slowly condensed into a human shape directly opposite Stella.

Stella instinctively took one step back.

The blood receded.

Mia Valentine stood barefoot atop the pool of blood.

She wore a long dress woven entirely from fresh blood, its hem spreading behind her like a living creature.

Mia lifted the hem of her dress and gracefully performed a standard court curtsy.

“No matter the circumstances, a Valentine must always maintain her dignity.”

She straightened.

“You should bow as well. After all, as a descendant of Valentine, basic etiquette must not be abandoned.”

Stella did not move.

Pale bones appeared out of thin air, layering themselves around her and forming a defensive barrier.

“My, how rude.” Mia sighed, seemingly a little disappointed. “But that’s alright. In order to teach the most arrogant descendant in Valentine history a lesson…”

She slowly spread her arms.

At that very moment, the entire Corridor of Blood began to boil.

The walls writhed, the pools of blood churned, and scarlet blossoms of blood bloomed across the ground with an eerily enchanting beauty. Countless blood-red eyes opened in every direction.

“I will ravage you to death. Not merely your blood, but your soul as well. I will ravage that tiny shred of reason and dignity you possess, cook it with despair and terror, grind it down with pain, and only then will I savor it. That is where the exquisite beauty of the hunt lies.”

“And there is nowhere for you to run.”

Pillars of blood surged toward the heavens, obscuring Stella’s vision.

“Because…”

Mia smiled and spoke softly.

“I am the Corridor of Blood.”

—————

Mia merely gave a light wave of her hand.

At that moment, the entire Corridor of Blood seemed to hear the decree of a queen. The river of blood that had originally flowed calmly instantly began to boil, transforming into countless scarlet spears carrying a nauseating stench of rust as they stabbed toward Stella from every direction.

The Pale Sacred Remains effortlessly blocked the attacks coming from all sides.

But when Stella tried to control the Pale Sacred Remains and extend a gigantic bone claw to seize the woman in red, Mia’s figure instantly dissolved into a puddle of blood, like a droplet merging into the sea, disappearing into the pool beneath her feet.

“Not bad defense.” Mia’s voice came sometimes from the left and sometimes from the right, as though she were everywhere at once. “Unfortunately, you’re too slow. Like a turtle carrying a heavy shell. You can take a beating, but that’s all.”

With a thought from Stella, a gigantic bone spike suddenly stabbed toward the source of the voice.

Yet the bone spike only pierced through an exploding cloud of blood mist. Mia’s figure had already vanished. The next second, she stood more than ten meters away like a specter, elegantly straightening the hem of her dress.

“Too slow, little thing.” Mia chuckled, her figure melting into the blood once more. “Inside this corridor, every drop of blood is my eye, and every inch of space is an extension of my limbs. You are dueling against my world.”

Stella clenched her teeth.

The situation had taken a sharp turn for the worse.

‘What should I do?’

Use bloodflame?

Probably not. It was fine for bullying her younger sister on ordinary days, but trying that in front of a Valentine ancestor would probably just be showing off one’s paltry skills before an expert.

The Pale Sacred Remains had excellent defensive power, but their consumption of Pale Power was astronomical. And just as Mia had said, they were too cumbersome. They simply could not keep up with the speed at which Mia merged into the environment.

Holy Light Eruption?

That Holy Art was a complete gamble. If she could not kill Mia in a single strike, the backlash alone would be enough to make her pass out on the spot. At that point, she really would be at Mia’s mercy.

Dark cursecraft?

Forget that too. The only one she knew was Bone Joy, Heart Dance, which made people wish they were dead. Against Mia, it would probably amount to no more than scratching an itch.

If she had known things would turn out like this, she would have slept a little less back then and learned a few more tricks from Remedios.

Should she ask Dorothy outside the arena for help?

Stella instinctively glanced at the pool of blood beneath her feet.

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One glance was enough to make her heart jump.

The pool of blood beneath her feet now seemed to have come alive, gradually boiling and churning.

An extremely ominous possibility rose in her mind.

Mia had said that she herself was the Corridor of Blood.

Then as long as Stella stood upon this blood-soaked corridor, even inside the Pale Sacred Remains’ defenses, anywhere there was blood would still be within Mia’s attack range.

“Got you.”

Mia’s voice sounded beside Stella’s ear.

Pshk—!

Countless sharp blood-red thorns erupted without warning from the pool of blood beneath Stella’s feet, completely bypassing the Pale Sacred Remains’ defenses. They grew directly from inside the defensive barrier and viciously wrapped around Stella’s legs, forcibly dragging her entire body out from the protection of the skeletal frame.

Bang!

Stella was slammed heavily against the dark red wall.

Without magical power sustaining them, the Pale Sacred Remains dissolved into specks of embers and scattered through the air.

“Looks like your little tricks amount to nothing more than this.”

Mia slowly rose from the pool of blood and looked down at Stella from above.

She was in no hurry to take Stella’s life.

As an old monster who had lived for a thousand years, what she enjoyed most was not killing itself, but the ugly sight of prey struggling in despair.

“As long as you find a gap, even the hardest shell can be pried open with ease.” Mia shook her head, her tone filled with the arrogance of an elder lecturing a junior. “I am the ruler of the Corridor of Blood. This place gathers the resentment of every loser and the glory of every victor from the past thousand years. Did you really think your meager little tricks were enough to challenge my authority?”

Stella said nothing.

Her head hung low, silver hair covering her face. Only blood could be seen dripping from her fingertips.

Drip.

Drip.

In this damned place where everything around her was part of the enemy, conventional methods had no chance of winning.

There was only one choice left.

Stella gently placed her hand over the spot on her left hand where the Sanctity of the Heart had taken root.

The Sanctity.

That unreliable Inquisitor had said that the Sanctity would manifest in completely different forms depending on the traits of its host. Yet even now, Stella’s use of it remained stuck at the crude and straightforward stage of simply drawing upon Holy Light.

Raise the synchronization rate…

Raising the synchronization rate in the middle of battle was practically gambling with her life, but Mia was simply too unfair, and Stella had no chips left to play.

Stella closed her eyes.

The sounds of fighting around her, Mia’s mocking laughter, and the sound of flowing blood all gradually faded away at that moment.

Synchronizing with the Sanctity meant synchronizing with Holy Light, which meant synchronizing with the Lord.

And synchronizing with the Lord meant laying bare every thought and feeling in her heart before the Lord.

Amid sorrow, laughter, bitterness, and sweetness, she had to think back to why she had chosen to serve the Lord’s glory in the first place.

Stella tried hard to remember, her thoughts breaking apart beneath the pain.

Was it merely because she had been sent to a monastery and had absorbed the faith through constant exposure?

It did not seem that simple.

Was it just so she could eat until she was full?

She was not that vulgar.

Was it to obtain power beyond the mundane world?

Her instincts told her that was not it either.

Or was it simply fanaticism?

If that were the case, she would never have secretly eaten the Lord’s offerings, nor would she have dozed off during prayers.

Fragments of memory flickered in the darkness.

‘Ah…’

She remembered.

It had only been a very ordinary little incident, in a very ordinary village, during a very ordinary plague.

She had still been a child then, newly awakened to her talent for Holy Light, so clumsy that she could not even recite an incantation properly.

Inside the old church, she had merely awkwardly placed her hand upon the forehead of a dying girl and exhausted herself trying to heal her. And when the light shone, the girl’s grateful smile, along with the expression called hope returning to the faces of the despairing people around her, soothed all of Stella’s exhaustion that day.

The people had been so close to her, close enough that they could pass their grieving souls directly to her.

Just as the Lord, who bore all holy virtues and all suffering, had once stood beneath an olive tree trembling in the fierce wind, long pushing away the cup of fear, feeling the starlight scattered across its bottom and the sin and pain spilling over its rim.

The world was an endless expanse of suffering. War, plague, death, famine…

And so Stella wholeheartedly wanted to find a way to comfort people’s hearts and relieve their suffering.

To her, everything that existed in the world was an eternal source of motivation for her desire to help all beneath heaven.

She wanted people to smile.

Even if it was only a moment of peace, even if it was only the slightest trace of warmth, as long as she could make people smile, she would have received all the love she ever wanted.

She had not done it for some grand doctrine, nor had she done it to become a lofty saint.

She simply wished from the bottom of her heart…

That a land filled with kindness and fairness could descend upon the world.

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Like sunlight shining upon all.

Regardless of status, regardless of wealth, whether in the great cathedral of the Holy City or in the lightless Abyss.

Even if she stood within an Abyss that sunlight could never reach, she would still prove herself.

She would not abandon her original intentions because she was misunderstood. She would not doubt her faith because she was ignored. Nor would she slow her steps because death threatened her.

She would still be the Stella she had been back then.

Unchanged.

—————

“Still conscious?”

Seeing Stella close her eyes as though she had resigned herself to her fate, Mia did not hurry to make her move.

She walked up to Stella as though admiring the final struggles of her prey.

“I have to admit, you’re tougher than I imagined. But you’ve greatly overestimated yourself.”

Mia spread her arms, displaying the magnificent sea of blood around them.

“I am the Corridor of Blood itself. I have absorbed the residual blood of every generation of Family Heads, received the offerings from every Laxia Ritual throughout history, and collected the victors’ blood taxes. Here, I am an invincible god.”

Mia’s words made Stella open her eyes.

She glanced at the churning pool of blood beneath her feet.

Every drop of blood flowing within it was the result of a brutal slaughter.

How many souls like Cheryl, conflicted and twisted yet forced to kill their own kin, had been buried within it?

This was no sacred proving ground at all. It was merely a meat grinder that devoured familial bonds.

Because of the Lord’s everlasting and unchanging love, Stella could learn to love everyone, to love every blade of grass, every tree, every grain of sand in this world.

But if a vicious and utterly wicked ghost that treated suffering as entertainment and slaughter as glory stood right before her.

Then…

How could she allow such a demon to run rampant?

For a Saintess, endlessly praying to the Lord was not enough.

She should become the answer to her own prayers and personally chastise those who spread suffering.

Stella raised her left hand.

The cross-shaped sacred mark in her palm gradually began to shine with dazzling light. It was not flame, but pale Holy Light purer than flame and colder than moonlight.

The girl’s resolute face was gently enveloped in pure white radiance. The power of Holy Light once again overwhelmed the abyssal magical power of the Eye of the Black Mass.

“…What?”

The smile on Mia’s face froze.

She instinctively took a step backward, her pupils suddenly contracting.

‘What am I seeing?’

‘Holy Light…?’

Within the Abyss filled with filth and curses, inside the Corridor of Blood abandoned by the gods… Holy Light had actually appeared?

And…

The one wielding Holy Light was actually a demon with Valentine blood flowing through her veins?

“That’s impossible…” Mia’s voice trembled as everything she understood began to collapse. “Holy Light… Why can a demon use Holy Light?! You… what exactly are you?!”

Stella did not answer.

She gazed devoutly at her left hand, then reached out with her right hand and tightly grasped her left wrist.

A ring of pale light burst open around her wrist.

Under Mia’s horrified gaze, Stella’s left hand began to transform.

Bone restructured itself within the light, flesh and blood sublimated within the sacred radiance, and her slender arm gradually transformed beneath the enveloping light into the hilt of a sword.

Stella grasped the sword hilt formed from her left hand, lightly flicked her wrist, and slowly drew it out.

It was a snow-white lady’s sword.

From hilt to blade, there was not the slightest metallic texture. It was simply white and flawless, like snow that had remained unmelted for a thousand years.

It was neither rough nor grotesque, but elegant enough to deserve the name of a noble beauty.

The blade was slender, cleanly shaped, and sharp, with pale radiance flowing along its surface as cool as moonlight.

The blade formed from the Sanctity traced a flourish through the air, scattering a trail of brilliant stardust as it rang with a clear chime like wind bells.

“This is my domain! I am immortal!”

Mia sensed the terrifying aura capable of burning a ghost into nothingness. The instinctive fear of the dead made her unable to suppress the urge to flee.

She was a ghost pieced together from a thousand years of resentment, dried bloodstains, and the obsessions of the dead, an echo of bygone days clinging to the shadows and struggling to survive.

But the light in the hand before her was absolute noon, merciless purity.

A shadow could not argue with the blazing sun, and filth could not endure beneath purification.

Just as infants naturally feared darkness, it was only natural for the dead to fear the light.

Mia no longer had any desire to toy with her prey. She mobilized the entire corridor, attempting to completely drown Stella.

The entire Corridor of Blood answered her summons.

The towering walls of flesh and blood on both sides began to collapse, while the sea of blood beneath their feet raised waves a hundred meters high.

Countless thorns condensed from blood began to grow like a crimson tsunami. Claws sprouted from their roots and dug firmly into the ground, while their vines wrapped around anything they could cling to, mercilessly draining away every trace of nourishment. At their tips bloomed enormous crimson flowers like blossoms weeping blood, all attempting to completely drown out that single point of radiance.

Stella did not dodge.

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She merely raised high the lady’s sword that had fused with her arm.

Then she softly recited the Holy Words.

“Our Lord in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

The next second, Holy Light poured into the blade like a flood released from a dam. As though brushed by the rising sun, even the sword itself seemed to become light and ethereal. It was the power of a sworn covenant.

Then she aimed at the sea of blood crashing toward her, and at the terrified ghost beyond it, and casually swung downward.

A crescent-shaped wave of pale light left the blade, carrying unstoppable force as it instantly swept toward Mia’s tiny figure.

The boiling blood within the Corridor of Blood silently melted and was purified the instant it came into contact with that light, like accumulated snow beneath the blazing sun, transforming into clear water.

Fragments of starlight and moonlight scattered across the surface, sending their shimmering splendor down into the water below, making even the surroundings seem to glow as though submerged within a river of stars.

Mia watched helplessly as the wave of light rampaged throughout the entire Corridor of Blood.

It made no sense.

It completely violated the fundamental laws of the Abyss.

‘Why?’

‘Why could a demon possessing the Valentine bloodline wield Holy Light specifically meant to kill demons?’

‘Why could two utterly opposing powers coexist within the same body?’

Mia stared at Stella’s face and saw the crimson color at the ends of her hair gradually fade, returning to a cool silver-white like moonlight. She saw the intricate black demonic markings across Stella’s skin crack apart inch by inch and peel away, revealing flawless fair skin beneath. She saw Stella’s succubus disguise gradually stripped away completely, revealing the appearance of a human.

‘Could it be…’

The truth struck like sacred radiance piercing through darkness.

Mia suddenly understood.

“…You’re not a succubus. You’re… human? A Saintess?”

The so-called descendant of Valentine had been fake from the very beginning. The person before her was not a succubus at all!

Only a human Saintess could wield this kind of power.

‘But how was that possible?’

‘Why?’

‘Who?’

‘Who threw her in here?!’

‘Who threw a Saintess into the blood ritual belonging to Valentine?!’

Unspeakable doubts hung heavily above Mia’s head like dark clouds that refused to disperse.

But she no longer had time to think about them.

Because Mia suddenly felt the thorn mark in her palm begin to sting.

Blood, like tiny snakes, seeped through her skin and wound outward, gradually flowing toward the thorn mark.

This situation could only mean one thing…

Laxia had judged her defeated.

Only the victor could devour the loser’s bloodline. That was unquestionably an iron law of the Laxia Ritual.

Even if the opponent was a monster, even if the opponent used Holy Light…

As long as she won, as long as she was stronger, the rules would judge her to be the new master of Valentine.

And the blood taxes Mia had accumulated over a thousand years, the bloodline she had taken such pride in, were actually going to become nourishment for her?

‘No… the rules are not supposed to work like this!’

‘I am a demon. I am the creator. She is a Saintess… Laxia cannot decide that I am to be devoured by her!’

“I refuse to accept this… I refuse to accept such an absurd result!”

“Give me back my blood—!!!”

“No… no!!!”

“Vivian…! you Abyssal profanity—!”

Amid her shrill screams, the light completely swallowed her.

“Laxia.”

Stella spoke softly.

“The outcome has been decided.”

Translator Note

Yooo that’s a hella fight

One hit kill… or rather, it’s Laxia ritual itself that helped Stella kill Mia?

But in the end Stella exposes her identity… Well, not exactly?

All the witnesses of the previous Family Heads’ souls(?) were devoured by Mia for the battle. Ancestor really show no mercy towards her junior from the start TvT

So now Mia has died, no one saw Stella’s body return to being human again…

Also, also… I nearly cry again during Stella’s backstory out of nowhere TvT

It was such an ordinary awakening story, but also heartwarming TvT