Chaos' Heir - Chapter 1173

Chapter 1173: Tears
“Kill us,”

“Kill us,”

“Kill us.”

Those two words echoed inside Khan’s brain, even gaining different tones depending on which plant uttered them. Some were deep, ancient, and husky, while others were high-pitched, young, and almost child-like.

In reality, the woods were simply trembling, but the event was deafening inside Khan’s mind. The pleas filled his brain, carrying their profound desperation and hope. Those two words already told a long story, but Khan could learn much more by dwelling on the emotions that accompanied them.

It was the exact opposite of the Great Old One. The ancient creature had been proud until the end, striving for its rightful place in the universe even after its death. Time couldn’t diminish that sentiment. It only enhanced it, adding a fated inevitability to it.

Meanwhile, the plants had gone beyond the mere concept of desperation. They had morphed horribly, turning into beings barely considered alive. They had been forced to live for an unclear amount of time, unable to die or even put an end to their curse.

Those emotions weren’t conclusive, but Khan knew they were right. He felt it in his bones due to his biological and spiritual connection to those mutated beings. The plants had been cursed, just like he was, but their fate had been far worse than death.

Khan couldn’t even imagine how it would feel to endure the passage of years, centuries, or more stuck in that shape, forced to keep living due to instinctive behaviors he couldn’t control. Yet, the plants’ pleas resonated with his brain, giving him insights into that terrible destiny.

Khan knew he would have lost his mind or anything remotely human long ago if he had been in the plants’ shoes. He had been close to suffering from that fate with his version of the curse already. Actually, at that point, few believed Khan was sane, and he couldn’t really argue against that.

The deafening pleas and the understanding they enforced made Khan open his hand. His arm was still stretched with his palm pointed at the Tainted ground, and it would take him a single spell to obliterate those woods out of existence.

Khan wanted to destroy that vegetation out of mercy, sympathy, and kinship. He wouldn’t mind dirtying his already bloodied hands to fulfill that desperate desire. Khan knew how the plants felt, and part of him would want them to do the same if their situations were reversed.

However, Khan closed his eyes, squeezing his eyelids while his stretched hand started to tremble. He would fulfill the plants’ wish but needed something first. Mercy would come, but the vegetation had to endure a bit longer.

Khan closed his hand into a fist, squeezing it and applying real strength to his grip. His fingers threatened to pierce his skin while the muscles and veins on his arm popped out. Holding back was taking the entirety of his self-control, but he had to, especially since he felt he was close.

The tremors raged, relying on Khan’s mana to send their terrible message to his brain, but that energy source slowly waned. The pleas grew weaker and more distant until the faint earthquake finally stopped, restoring the silence in Khan’s brain.

The woods retrieved their stillness, leaving only a desperate vibe behind. The plants felt they had lost their chance to end their curse, but their twisted shapes prevented them from doing anything about it. They couldn’t even beg anymore now that they had depleted Khan’s energy.

Yet, Khan opened his glowing eyes, fixing them on the furred trunk before him. That tree was still looking at him, its organs sharing colors identical to his irises. Khan felt they had grown more disillusioned, but his perception wasn’t reliable after what he experienced. It didn’t matter, either.

“I’m looking for the Nak,” Khan said, doing his best to steady his voice and send the clearest message he could muster. “Do you know where they are?”

Without the additional energy, the three-eyed tree didn’t answer. Khan had heard its previous tremors, so he knew it could communicate. Yet, its current state made it unable to do so.

“I’ll kill you all once you answer me,” Khan insisted, bringing a hand to his exposed chest to highlight his blue scar. “I swear it on our shared curse.”

The three-eyed tree still didn’t reply, but Khan didn’t expect it to. He just wanted to convey the message before replicating his previous action. Chances were the plant had heard his message and would process it once he brought it back to life.

At that point, Khan stretched his arm again. He recalled what he had previously created, so another blue drop of mana materialized on his forefinger, containing slightly more energy than the other.

Khan threw the drop to the ground, and the woods lit up again. The tremors returned, as well as the pleas they carried. A cacophony of desperate voices invaded Khan’s brain, but he only focused on the tree before him.

The three-eyed tree joined the pleas but seemed to deplete Khan’s energy faster than before. It was doing something other than begging Khan for mercy, and he didn’t hesitate to insist on that.

“I’m looking for the Nak!” Khan shouted, trying to be louder than the voices that only existed inside his brain. “I will kill you, but I need to learn what you know about the Nak first!”

The three-eyed tree kept begging Khan, but its energy consumption intensified. It depleted his energy before the other plants, falling silent while the woods still trembled.

Peace eventually returned to the woods, but Khan had another drop of mana ready. He poured even more energy into it now, and throwing it to the ground gave birth to even louder pleas.

The voices inside Khan’s brain became even more deafening, attempting to make him dizzy and confuse his senses. Yet, a set of different words occasionally popped among that multi-voiced cacophony. The three-eyed tree was adding new meanings to its pleas, and Khan tried to cut away everything else to focus on them.

“Yes,” The tree said. “Kill us. Yes. Nak. Kill us. Show. Kill us. Take. Kill us. Kill us. Kill us.”

The tree suddenly went silent and stopped trembling, but its energy grew brighter, vanishing at high speed. The plant used everything it had to activate one of its functions until drops of an azure liquid fell from its three eyes, flowing down its short fur.