Grand Ancestral Bloodlines

Ryu\'s gaze remained sharp. This sort of pressure, it was very familiar... Wasn\'t this the pressure of the Samsara Steps? It was like that... but far more profound. It seemed like less of an artificial pressure, and one that truly came from the turning wheels of Samsara instead.

Ryu suddenly grinned. \'Is that so?\'

These arrogant steps, he had yet to come to settle his debt with it, and yet it had actually dared to appear before him again? He had planned on absolutely crushing it. Part of the reason he hadn\'t gone all out in finding a method to heal his Dao Heart was, of course, because he his personal strength was useless right now and they were in constant danger, but more importantly than that, to Ryu at least, was the fact he wanted a perfect Dao Heart, one that would be infallible even in the face of those cheating steps.

He could already feel an overwhelming pain. It was no wonder, his Dao Heart was shattered. However, he was completely unfazed by it. Mere pain was nothing. The question was if it would dare to stop his steps this time...

And the answer was no.

Ryu grinned wildly, taking a second step, and then a third. The pressure multiplied every time. Feelings of doubt and helplessness descended, it was a far more profound sort of pressure, the kind one couldn\'t avoid by just forming a larger fist. However, it was also the kind of pressure that was the most useless before Ryu.

These past weeks without his Dao Heart, he had felt lighter on his feet than he ever had. The world felt brighter, he felt like he could smile more. The benefits of meeting Ailsa and allowing her into his life had flourished forth in full force. The shadows of his first life vanished one after another.

Ryu used to be a man who blamed the Heavens even after he had been given the chance to cultivate. He awakened his memories, and it was like the wrongs of both his first and the start of his second life had stacked atop of one another.

He could remember Ailsa reprimanding him, reminding him how lucky he was, reminding him of all the gifts he had... But he could also remember all of those words falling on deaf ears. Those logical words hadn\'t meant much to Ryu back then because all he wanted was to be mad at the world. He wanted a reason to lash out, to crush everything in his path, a reason to spill blood and spit in the face of the Heavens themselves.

All the while, he had ignored that he was one of Heaven\'s most favored children. He had been granted luck impossible for most to match, a chance to grasp at his own destiny.

Suddenly, the challenge that should have been before Ryu vanished. His steps moved forward so quickly that he even began to run, and when running didn\'t seem to be enough for him, his body flashed forward, ripping through the void.

Unexpectedly, Ryu and Mae were the only ones who had received a violet evaluation. Even the likes of the Ninth Plane only received a indigo rainbow path, but they had yet to even take advantage of it because a world shaking battle had erupted between them.

After realizing what had happened to Empana and the others after they tried to catch up, they realized that only the first group to step onto the path would gain the maximum benefits.

The Eighth Plane was comparatively luckier, they not only had a green path, but they only had one group. The beautiful demon had already taken the third chance to step onto the road speeding forward with great speed. And then, much like Ryu, he took a step forward, not willing to stop here.

No one had been paying attention to Ryu, at least not after the first shock. They felt that it was only a matter of time before they caught up and then the rest would be meaningless. By the time they realized that Ryu was practically rushing across the land with absolute ease, it was too late... not that they could have done anything to begin with. They simply never stood a single chance.

How could the pain and despair of this road match up to what Ryu had been constantly experiencing since his Dao Heart shattered?

The irony of it all was that this road was meant to push you to your breaking point, but Ryu had already passed his. He was already experiencing the worst case scenario of this road... So what could it do to him?

Ryu moved forward so quickly that he didn\'t even notice when the road beneath him turned white. By the time he looked up, coming to a grinding halt, the road beneath him was paved in shades of gold, the road ahead completely empty.

Mae was drenched in sweat. If not for the formation that Ryu had deployed, she wouldn\'t have been able to hang on until this moment. But even with the formation, the process was very hard on her. The further they went, the more her loins burned.

"Ryu... Ryu..."

A low growl left Ryu\'s lips. His heart was practically shining with a radiant light, a similar light coming from Mae that connected one another. Their connection was so deep at the moment that he could feel the full brunt of her lust.

His blood boiled and he forgot about everything else.

He pressed Mae down to the ground, sealing her lips.

The golden road seemed to explode with a blinding light that connected the Nine Planes. In the center of it all, a man entered a woman and her feverish cries echoed.