All Chapters of War God Returns: Lein Ashford : Chapter 221
- Chapter 230
279 chapters
Chapter 221
Dinner that night was simple but had everything it needed to. Steaming soup, bread on the side of the plate, and two people eating without needing to fill the silence with words that weren't necessary.When the plates were empty, Lein set down his spoon."What are you doing tonight?"Dorian lifted his cup of tea. "Tormenting that spoiled child again."Said in the same tone as someone mentioning they were going to water the plants or read a book before bed.Lein nodded. "I'll take a short walk."Dorian didn't ask where or why. He just nodded and picked up his cup.---Aldenmoor at night was different from during the day. Quieter in some corners, busier in others. The lights along the main road reflected off the asphalt still slightly wet from the light rain that afternoon, and the people walking on the sidewalks had a different pace from the busy hours.His Master had once said that rest wasn't the opposite of training. Rest was part of it. A body that never stopped would eventually st
Chapter 222
The paper pellet moved.Nobody could see it because its speed gave no time for eyes to follow.What was visible was the result.The young man's head snapped sideways instantly, his body lifting half out of his position before slamming back-first into the wall beside the table, then sliding to the floor in a way that gave no impression the process had been comfortable.Complete silence for two seconds.The young man lifted his head from the floor, his eyes unfocused for a moment. His hand moved to his neck by reflex, and his fingers found something stuck to his skin on the side. He took it off.A tiny paper ball. No bigger than a toy pellet, and on the skin beneath it, a small torn wound with a thin trickle of blood at its edges.The young man stared at the small object in his palm, then stood and swept his gaze across the entire room."WHO DID THIS?!"Nobody answered. Everyone was looking in different directions with the same expression, which was not knowing.His eyes moved from tabl
Chapter 223
The western forest of Aldenmoor welcomed Lein the same way it had yesterday. Light filtered through the canopy, wind without any particular destination, and a silence different from the city's silence.He returned to the same tree. The hollow between the roots that had become familiar ground in two days.Lein sat down, closed his eyes, and went in.---Yesterday he had found the fog.Today he came back to it differently.Not with an awareness pushing forward trying to break through, not with a determination searching for a gap. He sat inside himself and let the fog be the one to move toward him.Minutes passed without any visible change.But at some point, something changed.The fog didn't thin, didn't open, didn't do anything that could be described as retreating. But inside him, in the place where his awareness dwelled, Lein began to feel something he had never felt before in all his years of training.The spiritual energy he had always known moved from outside in, like someone coll
Chapter 224
The next morning, Lein returned to the hollow between the roots of the giant tree and continued from where he had left off.The underground spring he had found wasn't something that could be dug for in a hurry. He learned that on the first day when he tried approaching it too quickly and found that the closer he moved toward it, the further away it seemed.So he stopped approaching.He simply sat with it.The next day, he began to understand that the fog wasn't a barrier. All this time he had been treating it as something to be broken through, a wall that had to be torn down. But fog had no structure that could be torn down. Fog was something that had to be entered.The day after that, he learned the fog's language.Not a language in words. More like a rhythm, like the way breathing follows a heartbeat without ever being commanded to. The spiritual energy moving from the ground beneath him had its own rhythm, and all this time Lein had always been moving to a different rhythm, one he
Chapter 225
Lein looked at his hands.The spiritual energy flowing from his palms was no longer something he needed to call up or gather. It was there, always there, like a heartbeat that didn't need to be remembered to keep beating.He closed his hand into a fist.A small burst of white energy radiated from between his fingers, not because he pushed it, but because his body could no longer fully contain what was inside it."Is this the Divine Realm?"The words came out quietly, not for anyone, just confirmation of something he had already felt but hadn't yet fully believed.He compared.The power that had exploded out on the Varek battlefield when his body was at the very edge of its limit, when his eyes turned white and his hair lifted and he moved in ways he couldn't explain even to himself. The power that spent everything in a few minutes and left him nothing more than an ordinary person.That had been the fog.Forced open under pressure that had no bottom, flowing for a moment then closing a
Chapter 226
"This worries me." Victoria didn't take her gaze from the dark window. "Is it possible that bastard is still alive?"Jonathan didn't answer right away. His finger tapped the table once, quietly."With injuries that extensive and spiritual energy completely drained..." He paused. "It's nearly impossible that he survived."The room waited for the rest of the sentence that was clearly coming."But." Jonathan raised his head. "He is the Destroyer Devil. A man who should have died dozens of times based on the reports I've read. And not one of those reports proved it true." He drew a breath. "That's why, even if the most likely scenario is that he's already dead, the search continues until someone finds something concrete."Edmund shifted his gaze from Jonathan to a point in the middle of the table where there was nothing."What about the Supreme Leader? What is he doing right now?""Closed training." Jonathan answered quickly, like a question he had already prepared an answer for. "Nobody
Chapter 227
Lein sat back down in the hollow between the tree's roots.The forest had returned to its usual calm. The wind that had been swirling wildly was gone, the leaves had stopped moving without cause, and nothing remained of what had just happened here except one person sitting cross-legged in a way that was different from when he had first come to this place.He felt the change inside himself in a way that couldn't be explained in ordinary words.The spiritual energy in his dantian was no longer something he needed to gather from outside or manage carefully so it wouldn't run out. Now it flowed from within, continuously, like a spring that never ran dry no matter how much was drawn from it. No upper limit. No empty point.A thousand times stronger than when he had fought the Supreme Leader. And even that number felt too low to describe what was now inside him.But what was equally surprising wasn't only the scale of that strength.Lein tried something. He channeled spiritual energy into h
Chapter 228
That morning was different from every morning over the past week.No forest to visit. No root hollow waiting. Just the dining table Dorian had set up as usual, with scrambled eggs, toast, and black coffee still steaming.They ate in peace.After the plates were clean and the coffee was gone, Lein stood and picked up a small bag he had prepared before breakfast."I can leave on my own," he said. "No need to go to any trouble."Dorian didn't answer. He had already taken his car keys from the hook on the wall."Dorian. I already said I can leave on my own.""I know you can leave on your own." He turned around. "I still want to take you."Lein looked at him for a moment, then let out a breath."Alright."Honestly, Lein wanted to leave the Varek Continent by flying. It was faster than taking a plane. But since Dorian was insisting, there was nothing he could do except agree.---Aldenmoor Airport wasn't too large for the size of this city, but busy enough for a morning. Dorian had booked t
Chapter 229
The mechanical sound of the gate opening was the first thing that happened.The second was chaos inside the headquarters.---In the monitoring room on the second floor, an operator who had been about to take a sip of coffee suddenly sat bolt upright in his chair. His eyes couldn't leave the screen in front of him. The name that appeared in the identification system wasn't one he had expected to see this afternoon, or any afternoon in the near future.LEIN ASHFORD — OMEGA-1 — FULL ACCESS"Hey." He hit his colleague's shoulder beside him. "Hey, look at this."His colleague turned with an irritated expression that vanished the instant his eyes touched the screen.Two seconds of silence.Then both of them spoke at the same time, their voices no longer quiet."Call the Division Head now!""Activate all protocols—""Let me be the one to report first!"In under thirty seconds, the entire floor of the Corholt City branch headquarters went from the usual afternoon routine to something that ha
Chapter 230
The room was small and had nothing special to see from its window, just the quiet corridor of the headquarters outside. But tonight, with three plates on the table and the smell of cooking that Lein had never been able to find anywhere else, it felt like exactly the place he needed most.Milady had cooked herself. The head chef at headquarters had offered help twice, and twice it was declined politely but firmly. This wasn't a dinner for guests. This was a dinner for her son who had just come back from a place he should never have gone.Soft, fluffy white rice. Clear fish soup with ginger and thin spring onion on top. Chicken roasted with seasoning whose taste had never changed since Lein was small enough to sit in a chair with his feet not reaching the floor. And chili sauce with no measured amount, because Milady already knew by heart exactly how much her son liked.Lein sat in front of all of it and said nothing for a few seconds."You made too much, Mom.""You're thin." Milady sat