Chapter 132 A King’s Karma, The First Twilight: Ingrid ( 2 In 1)

Author note: This 2 in 1 isn't a thing! Might not repeat in the future! I forgot myself while writing is all!

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There seemed to be nothing but this word in Leonardo's mind as his hand reached out to touch this ancient obelisk. The moment he touched it, space-time within this confined pocket dimension froze, and the world seemingly lost its color.

Even the light in the young woman's eyes seemed to freeze.

Wisps of black smoke seeped through the cracks in the obelisk and crawled across Leonardo's hand, quickly yet also slowly charting his body and pouring into his eyes to paint them black.

Deep within Leonardo's sea of consciousness, an indistinct shadow that didn't seem to be a man or woman floated in front of the massive, ancient gate that kept the raging sea and the black heart at bay. This shadow then extended a hand silently, a wisp of smoke passing through the gate and into the restless sea.

In a moment, the raging sea with its waves splashing about restlessly calmed down, and the wisp of black smoke returned through the ancient gate in the form of a small black pill.

As for Leonardo, his mind was occupied by the image of a black massive throne that began to fracture and crumble away into motes of dust, eventually leaving behind six fragments that were like particles of sand when compared to the original throne.

These seven particles of sand with two words etched onto each of these little particles, these words read 'Infernal Plane.'

Leonardo didn't know how he figured out the meaning of the second word, but he just knew.

Then, the seven black fragments scattered across space-time, and the myriad planes.

The vision ended there, and Leonardo's mind returned to his sea of consciousness to see the indistinct shadow standing guard in front of the now-closed black ancient gate.

For a long while, the shadow didn't speak and neither did Leonardo, as they were communicating spiritually.

About an hour later, the shadow began growing dim as most of the information it contained was already transferred spiritually.

Noticing that it had so little time remaining, the indiscernible silhouette spoke in a clear voice, "Although you have too many martial intents, I can see that you haven't practiced them arbitrarily, which could compensate for your innate martial intent that is momentarily in a state of dormancy . Mhm, your current cultivation technique is alright, but it can only invoke the full potential of your currently awakened martial intents, while only stimulating your innate martial intent once you've take the step beyond the divine realm."

"This won't do. Although your cultivation will progress quickly, that comes at the cost of neglecting three of your martial intents to focus on one, segregating your martial intents to the four great cycles respectively. Allow me to fix the deficiency in your cultivation technique, perhaps your highly active martial intents would then stimulate and excite your thunderforce and eternal night martial intents."

The silhouette wanted to say more, but it didn't have much time to guide Leonardo through his cultivation path, especially since it wanted to personally invest in the awakening of Leonardo's third martial intent, the black thunderforce.

Thus, it sighed and muttered, "She has to make a choice," the silhouette then tossed the black pill into Leonardo's hands, dissipating into black filaments that burrowed into the black gate, rushing directly into the colorful soul pearl that flashed with the lights of four separate martial intents.

…

In the outside world, in the frozen space-time, endless wisps of black smoke poured into Leonardo from the obelisk, encasing his body in black tendrils that ultimately burrowed their way into his black cells, exciting them. Unknowingly, they began to buzz, inflate, burst, and recompress.

Millions of tiny explosions rocked Leonardo's body, followed by a muffled bang as his cultivation finally began to climb past his level 51, all the way to level 61 in seemingly no time at all.

Not only that, but Leonardo could feel that almost 70% of this black energy was devoured by the black lightning intent that emerged from the black sea within the seal, allowing the faint wisps of electricity to grow substantially, now resembling miniature serpents that streaked across the surface of his black cells.

Woosh!

A violent burst of wind kicked up the moment space-time resumed, and Leonardo's robes were shredded to pieces.

The woman came back to her senses and watched as the massive black pillar that was the ancient obelisk crumbled like brittle wood and scattered into the darkness of this pocket dimension. Then, the pocket dimension began to roil and toss about as it shrank uncontrollably, eventually fading as though it never existed, converting into a set of black robes that donned Leonardo's once-naked body.

The woman didn't see as Leonardo's back was facing her, but his eyes were as pitch-black as the obelisk used to be, only for the darkness to recede into the depths of his lifeless pupils. Feeling the power within his veins and blood, Leonardo lifted his hand to inspect a black pill now within his open palm.

In this now bleak and empty courtyard, one man dressed in plain black robes and a woman dressed in plain white robes stood silently, the former giving his back to the woman.

A moment later, Leonardo's flat voice echoed as he inspected his black garment, his brows furrowed.

"This color is making me feel uncomfortable," as he muttered, he brushed his right palm along the sleeves of the black sleeves of this trench-coat like robes. He could feel a subtle connection between himself and this black substance of darkness, albeit very faint.

Leonardo's desolate martial intent rumbled from the depths of his black cells and burst to the surface, causing the long coat to flutter chaotically, and the tight black garments underneath to writhe and wriggle. Then, a corrosive bleak dull gray that bordered silver white crept into the clothes, allowing Leonardo to visibly relax now that he was dressed in a bright white set.

The young woman was silently standing there and observing the changes, her thoughts unknown as her hazel green eyes flickered with various expressions.

She knew she had to make her stance clear as her memories were slowly fading away under the influence of some mysterious power. Obviously, the spirit in the obelisk didn't wish to give this woman too much time to think.

"What is your choice?" Leonardo turned around and looked at this young woman who was dressed in plain white, also quite impatient to move on to important business affairs after this karma is settled.

Now he was more sure than ever that he and his mother didn't belong to planet Earth, which explains many things that puzzled him, including Eternus' attitude back in the day.

"My choice, huh?" The woman smiled faintly, talking in a self-deprecating tone, "I finally have the right to make my own choice in this life?"

Leonardo looked at her silently as he could understand how she was feeling. For all these years, generation after generation, forced to carry the burden of a choice made by two of their ancestors, not even having the freedom of choosing a name other than Tesla this and Tesla that.

And at the end of the path, she could either choose to continue walking down this karma or have it all erased as though it never happened, just a bitter-sweet dream.

Even Leonardo who thought his fate was in his own hands had inevitably fallen into this game of karma, and it happened the moment he decided to leave the little blue planet.

The shadow made it clear that a powerful existence had already intercepted the lines of Leonardo's fate, witnessed his future, and made arrangements based on that future. Hence, this situation seemed so surreal.

"Can I at least choose a name of my own?"

The woman sighed after much deliberation. After tasting the feelings of everlasting youth and power to stand at the peak of this planet, the last thing she desired was dropping to a meek little girl for people to toy with as they pleased.

For better or worse, she wants the legacy of this organization, Tesla, to carry on into the distant future, even if she had to sell her soul to the devil incarnate in exchange for this power.

"Are you sure you want to be involved with this karma?"

Leonardo asked again, his tone heavy.

The woman smiled faintly.

"If I wasn't already prepared, I wouldn't have invited you over to this courtyard, to begin with." She responded with a tone that started flat but ended quite cheerful, a gentle smile plastered on her lips.

Then, she approached with a step before kneeling in front of Leonardo, her gaze cast on his white leather boots, "Please allow me to carry the burden of this karma together with you, no regrets whatsoever."

Although she didn't know much about the origins of the black obelisk, she wasn't stupid and she could tell how unfathomable of an existence the residual spirit within was. Thus, if even something as unfathomable as that would claim that Leonardo is preordained to become King, even though she couldn't understand the full picture or context, she at least had enough intelligence to know that it's something beyond this world, and beyond something as small as a Sovereign.

Leonardo sighed, having always wondered why would people want power, when the price for easy power is but a twisted reality and an end far from peaceful.

"As you wish," Leonardo reached out with his open palm, allowing the woman to directly swallow the black pill from his hand, she then held his palm close to her forehead, eyes closed.

The shadow didn't tell Leonardo much, but because the seven lifetimes of Dizmason Eternus were purified and refined, each of the six fragments would help Leonardo convert a lifetime of combat experience into an infernal seed capable of transforming the fates of the bestowed.

However, Leonardo did know that this would only work on those untainted by the karma of a stellar world, and this woman could only remain untainted through the efforts of that spirit.

The moment her memories are gone, her karma would be linked with this stellar world, which then would've put Leonardo at risk of being exposed to a situation where his karma and the karma of the current plane clashed.

This is typically the case for every planeswalker, as their presence itself defies the cycle of natural karma, and affecting this karma would draw a backlash from the entire plane.

Leonardo chanted in a low "With my mark as the successor to the Infernal Throne, I confer you the title of the First Twilight. Henceforth, in good and bad, our karma will forever intertwine."

At first, Leonardo wanted to call her something along the lines of an Infernal Guard. However, and after second thoughts, he realized that this wouldn't sound quite right as he didn't represent only the darkness of the infernals, but also the bit of light his mother invested in his upbringing.

Thus, he ultimately settled for the best of both worlds, twilight.

The seed dissolved like liquid into the woman's mouth, spreading throughout her body down to the cells, painting them black as ink. Then, her cultivation technique seemed to sense something and circulate automatically, proactively absorbing this infernal seed, but the woman had already expected something like this to happen.

After all, the cultivation technique practiced by the Chosen Tesla is something provided by the spirit of the obelisk; it would have been even weirder if it didn't resonate with the seed.

When she once again opened her eyes, she could feel a subtle shift in both her mentality and form, while the plain white clothes on her body were now a long black dress as dark as her eyes.

She blinked once, stopping her circulating cultivation technique.

Then, her eyes returned to a lively hazel green whilst her dress returned to a pure, plain white garment. The black energy was wholly contained within her cells, unlike Leonardo who had yet to consolidate his new power and hence its presence on his body.

She stood up and bowed with a brilliant smile and saluted.

"My lord! Please call me Ingrid from henceforth."

"Alright Ingrid, what is your inheritance? How can you help me in the future?" Leonardo continued to inspect his clothes which were a manifestation of his desolate martial intent clashing with the innate eternal night martial intent that was roused by the residual spirit.

This isn't the first time his four martial intents attempted to merge and manifest, as the bloodthirsty armament attempted accomplishing this endeavor in vain during its premature transformation. However, the bizarre change to his cells under the influence of the Four Dimensions Inmortal Scripture cultivation technique already charted out a path of merging the four, Leonardo having always assumed the merger lacked a catalyst, not expecting that the cultivation technique had an innate deficiency.

Leonardo had no idea that when this technique was created, it was very rate for some to have dual martial intents, let alone four. Thus, it was more of a case about Leonardo deviating from the correct path than the technique being innately deficient.

Ingrid observed this new lord curiously, noticing that he didn't particularly like the color black, or at least an excessive amount of black. However, in her eyes and after living enshrouded by darkness for this long, she came to like the color quite a bit, only wearing plain white clothes as she had long since noticed Leonardo's particular interest in the color.

Ingrid raised her palm, a black flame igniting and flickering about as though dancing, "The Esteemed Spirit passed down the Infernal Flame Arts to me, as well as boundless knowledge about alchemy arts that I have yet to digest. According to the Esteemed Spirit, after achieving the Rebirth realm, you'll need a lot of medical resources and pills to further progress in your cultivation, so what you're lacking now isn't powerful but resourceful followers."

"Alchemy?" Leonardo seems to have an impression about alchemy, but not much. However, the Rebirth realm is too far from a mere third-cycle saint like himself, so he decided to toss it to the back of his head.

"Okay, that can wait then. Now, let's get into business related matters, I want to invite your organization to invest in 49% of my claims to the energy ore mines and the energy veins underneath."

Now that business was mentioned, Ingrid's expression also focused as she said, "Why don't we discuss the details after a meal, my lord? Also, if you want the support of this organization that was in essence built to support you on days like these, I can immediately hand over the position of owner to you."

Leonardo waved her off and said, "No, that would make matters even worse for me, because even I can't predict the actions of a desperate maniac blinded by useless faith."

Ingrid was confused, she didn't know about the conspiracy brewing at this moment as House Erudite and Lexus kept the information under strict lockdown, taking the slowly boiling the frog alive attitude against the people of the Forbidden Domain.

"Pardon?" Ingrid voiced out her confusion.

"Sigh, just know that in a battle where you're confident in your inevitable victory, leaving your cornered prey with a bit of hope, even if false hope, is also a good strategy." As he spoke, Leonardo began walking out through the corridor that doesn't seem so long at this moment. "Oh yeah, can you please arrange something presentable for me to wear? Make sure there is as little black as possible, I won't be able to maintain my martial intents running for long."

Leonardo quickly found a random maid and asked her for clear directions on an empty room. Of course, the maid was under immense pressure from Leonardo's aura, her knees about to buckle down throughout the entire process.

Once inside the room, Leonardo stopped resisting the natural force that pulled all of his martial intents into his soul pearl, which also meant that his worldly energy was stripped clean as well.

However, with the current stage of his tempered flesh, an ordinary saint would be helpless against him, hence he wasn't bothered the least.

He knew that the residual spirit was currently working like some architect, analyzing and devising a new cultivation technique with the Four Dimensions Immortal Scripture and his four martial intents as a foundation, the Infernal Inheritance as a reference point, and a complete merger as an end goal.

About half an hour later, two maids in white clothes walked in while dragging a sliding wardrobe that had an assortment of clothes that clearly brought about a full set.

With the help of these maids, Leonardo was fully dressed in no time.

It was a luxurious white imperial suit and a long white coat despotic over the garments. Conspicuous gold rimmings and obsidian buttons were embroidered carefully into the white texture of the fabric, pleasing to the eye with a sense of harmony.

Leonardo's long silver hair rested calmly against his back, swaying occasionally under the tempo of the long coat following the subtlest of his actions.

"Not bad," Leonardo nodded with satisfaction before leaving the room, barely paying attention to the stunned maids in his wake.