Red didn’t dream this time. When he finally came to from unconsciousness, he felt the bright light of the sun burning against his closed eyes. His head was ringing with a constant aching pain, and the youth felt a sensation of bloat in his Spiritual Veins.

Yet, he couldn’t help but have a single thought as he woke up.

‘Did I succeed?’

Red reached for his forehead and massaged the area above his glabella. The wound he opened with the knife was no longer there, and he felt nothing different in the region. A cursory examination wouldn’t tell him much, though, so he would need to meditate and examine his own body before drawing any conclusions.

‘At least I’m not dead…’

Once he recovered from his initial surprise, Red sat up and looked around with the help of his crimson sense. It was already daytime, and although he couldn’t tell for certain, the youth didn’t think he was unconscious for more than ten hours. No beasts, necromancers, or imperials attacked him during his moment of vulnerability, so at the very least, he was safe.

‘I need to-’

Red’s train of thought trailed off as his gaze caught sight of something. No, not something.

Someone.

“I thought you had died for certain.”

A woman stood a few dozen meters away, sitting on top of a tree stump with her legs and arms crossed. She was wearing a slim brown robe, like those of a cultivator, yet graceful in both style and form. Her features were sharp and elegant, fitting for a true noblewoman, with a straight, shining black hair that reached to the middle of her back. The way she seemed to carry herself befitted one’s first impressions. Yet the sheer countenance and air with which she stared at Red with her intense, black eyes, spoke of a deep-seated arrogance and coldness, that of a god regarding an ant.

The attitude of a true cultivator.

Red couldn’t help but feel a sense of recognition as he stared at the woman, yet as hard as he tried to recall, he never met someone like this before. Right now, however, he had other concerns than digging into his memories.

His hand flashed to the side of his waist, drawing his short sword out and standing up with a jump. Red couldn’t feel this woman’s fluctuation at all, which meant that she was probably far stronger than him, yet he wouldn’t stand by and let himself be killed without resisting.

The youth put some distance between himself and the woman, but she didn’t show any reaction to his movement and simply pursed her lips in annoyance.

“What is the need for this?” She frowned. “You have been unconscious for over half a day. If I wanted to kill you, you would already be dead.”

Red didn’t relax his stance. “Is that supposed to reassure me?”

“No, it is supposed to make you stop acting like a savage and to talk to me like a civilized person.”

The youth ignored the woman’s request. He kept staring at her figure, and slowly, an odd feeling started to cross his mind.

Red picked up a rock from the ground before tossing it at the woman’s figure. She didn’t move out of the way, and the rock passed through her figure like it wasn’t even there in the first place.

Red frowned. “You’re not real.”

The youth wasn’t sure how he was able to figure this out, other than the fact an instinct inside of his body seemed to warn him of this.

The woman seemed annoyed at his words. “I’m quite real, much to your dismay, I’m sure. My body is just simply intangible to normal matter.”

“Is there a difference?” Red asked.

“You don’t know the first thing about the world, do you?” The woman smirked at him. “It is truly a wonder you were able to live this long with all your secrets.”

Red continued to stare at the woman with a weary gaze. The more she spoke, the stronger this sense of faint familiarity became.

“Who are you?” Red asked.

The woman raised her eyebrows in surprise. “You truly don’t recognize me? Even after I almost killed you and your friends?”

Red frowned, and a few seconds later, recognition finally came to him. The mannerisms, the way she spoke. There was only one person that Red met that fit the bill.

Red’s eyes narrowed. “You’re the woman who possessed Narcha.”

The woman smiled. “The very same.”

They stared at each other in silence for a long few seconds. Then, Red’s gaze shifted to the ground in front of him, where the insectoid core laid. He dove and grabbed the core without hesitation, pointing it at the woman in front of him.

It was a while since Red used the exorcising chant, but he still remembered it perfectly in preparation for a day like this. The strange words came out of his mouth and the core began to glow.

However, nothing happened to the woman.

Red wondered if he needed to get closer, but he suddenly noticed the woman’s expression. She was staring at the youth with a look of ridicule.

She smiled. “Why don’t you get closer? Maybe try chanting a bit louder. I’m sure it will work that way.”

Red’s chanting slowed down until the youth fell silent. In his moment of haste, he failed to consider a single fact. If this ghost was still around, then the technique didn’t work the first time. Why would it work now?

Yet Red was still in doubt. “I managed to expel you from Narcha’s body. How can you still be around?”

The woman scoffed. “Isn’t it obvious? I allowed myself to lose.”

Red frowned. He didn’t believe her.

She frowned at seeing his skeptical expression. “What, do you think a brat like you could defeat me even in the state I was in?”

“So you lost on purpose?”

“Of course, it was all part of my plan.” she said as if it was a matter of fact.

“What plan?”

“Unfortunately, that is not for you to know yet.”

Red sighed. “What do you want? Why show yourself to me now?”

No matter how the youth thought about it, this whole encounter still seemed too strange. If this ghost really survived their encounter seven years ago, why would she wait until this peculiar moment to communicate?

She shook her head. “I have been by your side the entire time, Red. It’s not me that has shown myself, it’s you that can finally see me.”

Red frowned. “What do you mean?”

The woman shrugged. “It’s as I said. I have been watching your every move for the past seven years. How you cultivated, how you trained, how you killed, how you slept… I dare say, in this world, there is probably no one else that knows you as well as I do at this point.”

The youth couldn’t help but feel his blood run cold. The concept of someone watching him through his every living moment and probably knowing all his secrets was enough to send Red into a panic.

Still, he tried to remain calm. “Why should I believe you?”

She smiled. “Whether or not you believe me won’t change the truth. Still, if you must be convinced… Should I mention that bracelet you have? Or perhaps those scales you are trying to keep hidden?”

Red shivered. He had revealed a lot about himself to his companions over the years, but if there was one thing the youth never dared to reveal was his partial demonification. Even after all this time, his transformed eye and the crimson scales growing on his face had yet to disappear, and Red still needed the help of the bracelet the hawk had given him to keep them hidden.

This was something that not even the necromancer knew about.

The only time Red ever took off the bracelet was in his most private moments, when he was sure there was absolutely no one around, and that was only to check if his demonification had progressed. If the woman knew about it, there was only one possibility.

She was telling the truth.

The woman continued. “I must say, you are a scientific marvel. I never met anyone like you with so many strange problems and energies in your body. The mere fact you can still function normally without collapsing or transforming into some kind of horrible monster is a miracle.”

Red fought hard through the surging panic in mind and tried to rationalize the situation. She knew everything, and yet he was still here, free and alive. Either she couldn’t tell his secret to others or she had no intention to. Whatever the case, the youth needed to know more to assess the situation properly.

“Why can I see you now?” Red asked.

The woman shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine. I can only imagine it has to do with that thing you created in your head.”

Red frowned. “You mean the special acupoint?”

She raised her eyebrows in surprise. “You still think that what you did was opening a special acupoint? I thought you would know at this point there are no hidden or special acupoints in the third eye vein.”

The youth was at a loss. “But I felt a path opening.”

That sensation was always the telltale sign of an acupoint opening, which was why Red pursued it so strongly when he felt it. It was like a growing root of a tree, where at each end and intersection an acupoint would be.

The woman sighed, regarding Red with an expression of pity. “This is what happens when you don’t receive proper education. What you found was indeed a hidden vein path, but that doesn’t mean there was an acupoint at the end of it. You were basically just pumping energy into opening a path with no purpose at all.”

Red tried to digest the information. “Then… What exactly happened to me?”

“That is a good question.” The woman frowned. “I can feel a swirl of energy in your forehead but rather than an acupoint, it’s more like a pocket of flesh swelling with too much energy. I guess we could call it… A tumor? Maybe something less harmful, but I can’t imagine it is good for you, even if it somehow lets you see ghostly forms to some degree. For a definite answer, though, I would probably need to open your forehead and take a look inside.”

Red frowned, reflecting on this information in silence. Was this the result Viran expected when he passed him his technique? The youth was compelled to sit down and check the condition of this new “acupoint” right then and there, but there were more pressing matters at the moment.

Red stared at the woman. “You still didn’t tell me what you want from me.”

She smiled. “Ah, of course. But first, it is only proper to introduce myself, isn’t it?” The woman got up and extended her hand towards Red in a graceful manner, as if expecting him to kiss it. “My name is Aurelia, a core disciple of the Amber Saber Sect. A pleasure, I’m certain.”

Red didn’t know how to react.