novelleonline Chapter 790: Just Who Is Cassius?
Chapter 790: Just Who Is Cassius?
His expression was completely devoid of emotion.
His crimson eyes blazed with an intensity that made Joy’s breath catch, but there was nothing behind them—no joy, no anger, no sorrow. He looked like a man on a mission, nothing more.
Ahead of him, a man ran desperately.
He was adorned with gold ornaments, his neck heavy with jewelry, his clothes made of the finest silk.
He looked like royalty, a king or nobleman of some kind.
But right now, he looked terrified.
"Please!" The man begged, his voice cracking with desperation. "I beg you, please stop! I can give you gold! Jewelry! Women! A thousand slaves! Anything you want! Just leave me alone!"
Cassius didn’t respond. He just kept walking.
Joy watched in mounting horror as Cassius caught up to the man, dragging him into one of the pyramids.
They descended into what appeared to be an embalming room, and Cassius forced the king-like figure onto a stone table.
The king thrashed wildly, moaning and screaming, begging for mercy.
But Cassius ignored him completely.
What happened next was so horrific that even Joy winced.
Cassius actually began to remove the man’s internal organs while he was still alive.
The king’s screams echoed through the chamber, bouncing off the stone walls.
But Cassius worked methodically, his hands steady and sure, as if he’d done this a thousand times before.
After hollowing him out, he poured honey inside the man’s body. He then closed him up, wrapped him in linen bindings, turning him into a mummy while he was still barely alive.
Finally, he threw him into a tomb that seemed to have been prepared specifically for him, sealing it shut while the man’s muffled screams still echoed from within.
Joy emerged from the memory gasping, sweat beading on her forehead. Her hands were trembling uncontrollably.
’That...That wasn’t Cassius.’ She told herself desperately. ’That couldn’t have been Cassius. The man I know could never look as hollow as that.’
But she’d seen it with her own eyes.
She took a shuddering breath, steeling herself. She needed to understand. She needed to see more.
So she looked toward another memory and let herself be pulled in.
—
This time, she found herself in a jungle. Massive pyramids rose around her, these ones made of red stone, still relatively new and unweathered.
The architecture was different from what she’d just seen—more primitive, but also more intricate in its own way.
On top of one of these pyramids, Cassius stood before another man.
This one was adorned with gold and feathers, his face painted with fierce patterns.
He looked like an Aztec warrior, a king of his people.
"Please!" The man begged in a language Joy didn’t recognize but somehow understood. "The sun god won’t forgive you! I am the chosen one, meant to rule this land! Stop this! Stop it now!"
Tears streamed down his face. But Cassius just looked at him with that same cold, crimson gaze.
And then, as the sun reached its highest point, Cassius tore open the man’s chest.
The king screamed, begging for mercy even as Cassius reached inside and pulled out his still-beating heart.
Joy watched in horror as Cassius threw the heart away and walked down the pyramid’s steps.
Bodies littered the ground around him—warriors who had tried to stop him, now lying in pools of their own blood. Cassius stepped over them without a second glance.
She was pulled back to the foggy space again, her body trembling even harder now. Each memory was worse than the last.
But she couldn’t stop.
She had to know more.
—
The next memory pulled her into a massive chamber filled with white marble pillars.
This place was beautiful, opulent, filled with the trappings of a royal palace from ancient Greece.
And it was littered with bodies.
Scholars, officials, important figures—all of them lay dead on the floor.
And in the center of it all, Cassius stood over a man wearing a green crown made of plants.
"Please." The man begged, his voice weak and broken. "Please, I’ll do anything—"
Cassius didn’t let him finish. He drove his blade into the man’s chest, ending his life without hesitation.
Joy was pulled back again, her legs threatening to give out beneath her.
This was too much. Too brutal, too violent, too utterly incomprehensible.
Was this really the same man who’d made her a scarf from woolly sheep’s wool?
The same man who’d held her while she cried?
She forced herself to keep watching, diving from memory to memory like a woman possessed.
—
She saw Cassius in a medivel royal palace, slaughtering his way through knights before cutting off the head of a king.
—
She saw him walking through plains, arrows bouncing off his body as he tore apart charging horses with his bare hands.
—
She saw him in a place she couldn’t recognize at all—a land of bright buildings and strange clothing, where people fired weapons that shot projectiles capable of killing instantly.
He just walked through it all, killing person after person until he reached his target and tore him to pieces.
—
But as she watched, something began to dawn on her.
The people around Cassius kept changing. The clothing, the architecture, the technology—none of it stayed the same.
One moment she’d seen him Ancient China, the next the industrial age of Europe, the next some era she’d never heard of, with machines she couldn’t name.
He’s moving through time, she realized with dawning horror.
He’s been alive for...centuries? Millennia?
The weight of it all pressed down on her, the darkness of these memories seeping into her heart like poison.
She felt exhausted, overwhelmed, on the verge of breaking.
But then she saw something different.
A memory that was bright instead of dark. A memory that radiated white light instead of black.
Desperate for relief, she threw herself into it.
—
This time, she found herself in a bustling market.
Vendors sold fruits and vegetables, children ran laughing through the streets, and the smell of cooking food filled the air.
And there was Cassius, walking through it all with a small smile on his face.
He wasn’t killing anyone. He wasn’t even fighting.
He was just...walking. Asking prices, talking to locals, eating street food. Laughing at something a vendor said.
Joy was baffled. After all the bloodshed, all the massacres, seeing him so peaceful was almost jarring.
But even now, she noticed something.
His eyes had that same distant look, the one she’d seen in the earlier peaceful memories. He was searching for something, some kind of purpose or answer. And whatever it was, he hadn’t found it.
She pulled back, diving into another bright memory.
—
This time, she found Cassius on a beach.
The sun was setting on the horizon, painting the sky in shades of orange and gold. Gentle waves lapped at the shore, and the sound of seagulls echoed in the distance.
Cassius was sitting on a rock, simply watching the sunset. His expression was serene, peaceful, but his eyes once again held that searching look.
He was looking for something, and he didn’t seem to know what it was.
Joy pulled back again, diving into another memory.
—
Now she was in a world she’d never seen before, bustling with activity. Factory workers and nobility walked side by side, and massive structures she couldn’t identify rose in the background.
Cassius was at a café, sipping tea and eating croissants, watching as a strange tower of metal which the locals called the ’Eiffel Tower’ was being constructed in the distance.
She’d never seen anything like it. And Cassius watched it with quiet appreciation, his eyes still holding that searching look.
Joy pulled back again.
—
Another memory.
This time, Cassius was witnessing a war.
Not the small-scale conflicts she’d seen before, but something massive—hundreds of thousands of soldiers clashing on a battlefield.
Strange war machines fired projectiles, tearing through the ranks.
The carnage was overwhelming, the death toll incalculable.
But Cassius didn’t participate. He simply watched, his expression serene, almost like a spectator.
Finally, he let out a small sigh and said,
"Light and darkness are still balanced. There’s no need to make a move."
He turned and walked away, leaving the war behind him.
—
Joy was thrown back to the fog, her mind racing.
’Light and darkness.’
’Balance.’
’No need to make a move.’
The moment she heard these words, she rremembered what Cassius had told her and Carmela that time in the underground chamber.
He’d said he used to be something called a Peacekeeper.
His job was to maintain balance between evil and good.
At the time, she’d dismissed it as nonsense.
Mystifying words that made no sense.
But now...
She looked at all the memories she’d witnessed—the brutal murders, the massacres, the genocides.
In every case, Cassius had targeted someone powerful, someone who had the potential to influence the world.
And he’d killed them, each time with cold efficiency.
What if he wasn’t killing them out of cruelty?
What if he was killing them to restore balance?
If darkness had seeped too much into the world, if evil was threatening to overtake good, then perhaps Cassius’s role was to cut it down, to ensure the balance was maintained.
That explained why the memories were so brutal.
Those kings, those rulers, those powerful figures—they were the ones who could tip the scales.
Killing them wasn’t personal. It was just...necessary.
And the peaceful memories—they made sense too.
They were periods when balance had been restored, when Cassius could simply wander and observe.
Even the war he’d witnessed—it was brutal and bloody, but because the balance was already maintained, he couldn’t intervene.
He was just a spectator.
The moment this realization crystallized in her mind, it felt like a bomb going off inside her head.
Everything clicked into place. Every cryptic word Cassius had ever spoken about balance, about his purpose, about his role—it all made sense now.
But before she could explore the thought further, she found herself being expelled from the soul.
The black-and-white soul ejected her, and she was once again floating in the abyss, staring at Cassius’s two souls.
She was disappointed.
Yes, she’d gotten answers—but she also had so many more questions.
Who was Cassius really?
How had he lived through so many ages, traveled to so many places she’d never even heard of?
He was barely nineteen years old. He’d spent his whole life in the Holyfield estate.
There was no way he could have done all those things in such a short time.
And those other worlds—they didn’t even seem to exist in her own realm.
They looked like they belonged somewhere else entirely.
Was she hallucinating? Were these all just lies meant to confuse her?
She had more questions now than when she’d started. And she desperately wanted answers.
Her gaze drifted to the second soul—the impossibly dark one, the one that seemed to absorb everything around it.
’Maybe...maybe just like the first soul gave me answers, this one will too. Maybe I can understand more if I touch it.’
She knew this was dangerous. She felt it in her bones, a deep instinct warning her to stay away.
But her curiosity was too strong. Her need to understand overpowered her caution.
Slowly, hesitantly, she reached out and touched the dark soul.