<h4>Chapter 83 Afterward</h4>


    "Cough, I’m fine..." I vomited a mouthful of blood and wiped a trace of blood from my lips while looking at Marana and Akh.


    My body waspletely covered in injuries. My current condition was truly tragic. In fact, the current me could easily be killed by someone in the tenth or eleventhyer.


    That was the price to pay for going against the universe’sws.


    The universe’sws are the rules that keep the universe working, viting the universe’sws is not something that the universe will easily allow.


    Moreover, what I did just now vites more than one rule. It vites the individuality of a soul, the concept of mortality, and the universe’s entropy. With the contract in effect, it means that Raven’s soul will be tied to my soul for a long, long time, retaining her memories after each reincarnation, and acquiring part of my concept of eternity.


    Unfortunately, that contract is notplete, it’s wed.


    With the current contract, the most a soul can apany me through the reincarnations are two or three times, after that, the soul will slowly fade away, disappearing for eternity.


    However, maybe this time will be different.


    I examined the bond between our souls excitedly. I realized it when I saw Raven’s soul. Her soul is very special. Anyone else would have died much sooner after signing a contract with a cursed weapon as powerful as her daggers.


    I realized that her soul used the bond with the daggers to slowly learn the dagger’s properties. In other words, her soul used the bond to learn the dagger’sws!


    If I can make use of her soul’s uniqueness, then maybe I can perfect the contract so anyone else can learn myws of eternity. With that, I’ll never again fear to lose my loved ones after each reincarnation.


    I can even find a way to make them immortal! Living forever blissfully with my loved ones!


    But when I examined the bond between our souls, my excitement slowly turned into disappointment.


    [It did not work, huh] I sighed inwardly and shook my head.


    [Well, at least I found a possible method to realize my goal.] I looked at the sleeping Raven on my arms and my expression softened. No matter what, at least I found a bit of hope.


    I then turned toward Marana and Akh. They were looking at Raven and me with a mix of worry and fear. Of course, the worry was mostly directed to Raven and the fear to me.


    "W-What happened?! How is Raven?!" Akh gulped nervously and summoned her courage to question me. Currently, most of her hatred had been reced by extreme fear.


    "Don’t worry, she is fine. Just a bit tired." I smiled gently and held Raven on my hands as though she was a treasure. Marana and Akh were startled when they saw my expression. They could not understand why my attitude changed so suddenly.


    But now, that was not important.


    "You... You are injured." Marana said while looking to my bloody body.


    "It’s nothing." I shrugged and moved my mana from my core to heal my injuries. In the blink of an eye, the cuts that had appeared around my body disappeared. In less than thirty seconds, my injuries werepletely gone.


    When Marana and Akh saw that, their mouths fell open. They looked at me as though I was a monster and their faces were dyed in despair.


    After witnessing the contract with Raven and seeing how easily I healed my injuries, they realized that escaping from my control was even harder than they thought.


    Before this, they harbored a bit of hope of finding a way to deal with me, but now, their hopes were dashed.


    I ignored them. Instead, I examined my body carefully.


    Although I healed my external injuries quite easily, the truth is that I’m more injured than it looks. I’ll need around five hours to heal the injuries in my soul and mana core, and even after that, my cultivation will fall from the fifteenthyer to the twelfthyer. I’ll need around one year to recover from such a drop.


    However, it was worth it. What I got was many times better.


    I moved my gaze to Marana and Akh. "Take me to a room, I need to change my clothes. Also, take Raven to a safe ce. She will wake up around twelve hourster."


    Marana and Akh were startled before nodding in the next second.


    ...


    After changing my clothes, I went to the main office of the Red Skull gang. This office belonged to Marana, but now that I took over the gang, the office became mine.


    "Exin to me the gang’s overall situation." I looked at Marana and asked.


    Marana nodded and quickly exined everything to me. She did not bother to hide anything and answered all my questions honestly.


    Of course, it was not that she became loyal to me suddenly. Instead, after getting a glimpse of my true strength, she was too intimidated to have other ideas.


    Her current fear of me suppressed any thought of resistance. In fact, she could have attacked me when I was injured after forming the contract, but her fear of me had be so huge that she did not dare to make a move, even after seeing my heavy injuries.


    Of course, if she would have tried, she would have failed.


    I frowned a bit to that. As I say before, I dislike when others fear me and treat me like a monster, but there is nothing I can do about that now.


    Thinking about the situation back then, I could have been more careful when making the contract. At least I could have found a better ce than the headquarters of a medium-size gang to realize the contract.


    Well, no use crying over spilled milk.


    After hearing Marana speak about the gang’s situation, I was slightly surprised. Marana’s management of the Red Skull gang was excellent. She managed to control perfectly each part of the gang and kept detailed records about the gang’s earnings, costs, loses, the rtionship between the members, the rtionship with other gangs, and the rtionship with other powers.


    She even told me who were spies and whose force they belonged and how she arranged the different members ording to their specialties. It was so detailed that I wondered if it was the report of a gang or the report of a secret special force.


    I heaved a sigh of admiration. "Truly impressive. Your management of the gang is practically wless. I even wonder why your gang is still a medium-sized gang."


    Marana smiled wryly. "It’s not so easy bing arge gang. There are only fourrge gangs in the imperial city, and each one of them is a powerful monster than even some noble families fear. Even if our high-levelbat strength isparable to them, there is a great disparity between our low-level strength. Moreover, all the four strongest gangs have a powerful force supporting them from behind. I don’t dare to think about recing them."


    "Oh? However, I was thinking about making this gang the strongest gang in the capital."


    Marana was startled. "... Are you joking?"


    "What do you think?"


    "... You are crazy."


    "Hahahaha... What? Are you not confident in me?"


    Marana fell silent for a moment. Remembering the terrifying power I showed not long ago, her expression turned bitter. "Yeah, thinking about it, maybe it’s possible for you."


    I smiled confidently and put my hands behind my back. Looking outside through the window of the office, I observe the capital’s night sky.


    "My goals are greater than you think, Marana. Do you want a piece of advice? Take advantage of this opportunity. It will note twice."


    Marana fell silent for a brief instant. "... I’ll think about it."


    I smiled. It was her choice if she wanted to believe me or not.


    At that moment, someone hurriedly entered the office with a panicked expression.


    "Boss, bad news!"


    Marana was so startled that she forgot she was no longer the boss. "What happened?!"


    "The Blood Night gang ambushed the third master! He is currently being attacked by two of their vice-leaders."


    "That scum!" Marana’s expression fell. "How do they dare to plot against my little brother?!"


    In an instant, her presence changedpletely. Gone was the fear she was showing, and instead, it was reced by a powerful rage.


    She then looked at me with a determined expression, as though telling me that she was going out no matter what I say. I smiled slightly and shrugged.


    "Let’s go, I want to see how strong is one of the four strongest gangs of the capital."