Eternal Master: Path to Godlike Status-Chapter 25: Hidden Agenda Part 2

The doors barely clicked shut before Rain felt it—a twitch along his skin, the old instinct of a predator realizing the trap had already sprung.

Spikes of golden light—solid, jagged lances—erupted from the marble floor.

One pierced his thigh. Another through his shoulder. Two more crisscrossed his torso, pinning him mid-air like a butterfly in a display case.

The white silk of his new robe bloomed red.

Rain looked down at the ruined fabric, then back at Alicia with a stoic face.

"You just gave this robe to me," he remarked, the copper taste of blood filling his mouth. "And you destroyed it right away."

Alicia had already shed her pretense. The "High Priest" was gone.

She watched the blood drip from the golden spikes, her smile wide and genuinely happy.

She stepped closer, the hem of her vestments soaking in the red pool forming on the floor. She cupped her own cheek, her fingers trembling from pleasure.

"What a beautiful sight," she whispered and reached out, her thumb tracing the line of his lower lip, smearing the blood across his skin.

"I can’t get enough of this. To think... you can still talk in this state."

Her fingers moved from his lips to the golden spike protruding from his shoulder. She didn’t pull it out. She twisted it.

The sound was wet—a sickening slide of metal against muscle.

"Most men scream," she whispered, her voice trembling with a terrifyingly genuine affection. "Most men beg. They offer me their souls, their gold, their secrets—anything to make the pain stop. But you..."

She let out a soft, shuddering breath, her eyes tracing the way his wounds began to knit themselves around the gold, the flesh pulsing with a stubborn, immortal life.

"You don’t even flinch. It’s the most romantic thing I’ve ever seen."

Her touch was light, almost holy, even as her feet splashed in the deepening pool of his blood.

Rain stared at the golden lance buried in his chest. He didn’t see a weapon—he saw a twisted attempt at intimacy.

"Is this your version of showing affection?" He spat a mouthful of blood onto the pristine marble.

"No," she whispered, her face inches from his. "It wasn’t my fault. It was theirs. For being fragile. For being... paper."

She reached out, her fingers trembling as they hovered over the holes in his silk robes.

"They were nothing like you."

Out of nowhere, the golden lance vanished, sending him crashing to the ground.

Rain lay in a pool of his own rapidly cooling blood. Alicia didn’t help him up.

She knelt beside him, her vestments soaking in the red circle, looking down at him with the terrifyingly pure wonder of a child watching a bug right after its wings had been plucked.

"See?" she murmured. "You’re still here. You didn’t shatter."

Most people would have looked away from her. Most people would have vomited. Disgusted by her true nature.

But he found her very interesting. He wondered what made her this way—or if she simply been born like this.

He was likely the only man with enough patience to keep up with her.

Alicia stood up, gracefully shaking the blood from her golden-trimmed sleeves as if it were mere rainwater.

"Let’s go find you a new robe," she said, her voice returning to that polished, melodic lilt.

She looked down at his tattered state with a playful tilt of her head.

"You have a tendency to be naked when you’re damaged, and it’s a hassle to find new clothes every time."

Rain pushed himself up. His bones clicked back into place, a sound like dry branches breaking in the wind.

They descended.

The air grew thin, cooled by layers of stone and the oppressive weight of the cathedral above.

They passed through arches of weeping rock and doors that required Alicia’s blood and authority to unlock.

Finally, they reached a massive bronze door. It was green with age, etched with sigils.

It shrieked against the stone floor as it swung inward, revealing a large chamber.

Gold coins formed dunes in the corners. Relics of bone and silver sat on cushions. Swords that had ended wars hung like forgotten tools on the walls.

"This place houses the Regional Church’s most prized possessions," Alicia spoke, her voice echoing in the vast, hollow space.

She turned to him, her eyes searching his face for a flicker of greed, awe, or even simple curiosity.

She found nothing.

As expected of someone who had lived through the rise and fall of multiple empires.

"Not even a word?" she probed.

"I’ve seen better rooms buried under less stone," Rain met her gaze. "Where’s the robe, Alicia? Or is this just a display of how much the Church has stolen from its believers?"

"Follow me."

She didn’t stop at the gold. She didn’t even glance at the gems that could buy a kingdom.

At the far end, she pressed a brick that didn’t look like a lever. A seam appeared in the rock—not with the groan of metal, but with the hiss of escaping air.

This room was different. There was no gold, no glinting jewels. The walls were lined with weapons and gears that looked extraordinary.

"Artifacts," she said, gesturing loosely at the walls. "All seized from heretics who thought power excused them from punishment."

They stopped at one of the displays.

A crystal sat alone on a stone pedestal, no cushion.

Inside it, something moved — a dense black liquid that rolled against its prison in pulses, like a living thing that had long since made peace with its captivity.

Rain’s skin prickled before he fully registered what he was looking at.

"What is that?"

"The essence of a Grand Emperor Rank beast." Alicia folded her hands. "That will also become your new robe."

Rain looked at her. "How is that a set of clothes."

"It shapeshifts according to the user’s will." She tilted her head toward the pulsing black substance. "It can even take the form of a weapon."

"The drawback is that it feeds constantly. It will devour the flesh of whoever wears it—without pause, without mercy. Which makes it functionally useless to anyone who can’t regenerate faster than it eats."

Rain looked at the liquid. He didn’t need to ask why she’d chosen it. He was a man who couldn’t stay broken; it was a beast that couldn’t stop breaking.

It wasn’t a gift. It was a union of two curses.

Ironically, the hand turning the fork of fate belonged to a woman who loved both.

"Does it have a name?"

"Yes." She admired the black substance along with him. "Viel of Gluttony."