Chapter 505: We need to get out of this place and find Vergil

The silence after the explosion of the blood sphere seemed impossible. As if the world had held its breath before the spectacle of absolute power.

Ada, still on the ground, widened her eyes, unable to believe what she was seeing. The turtle, the thing that moments before had crushed her like a leaf, was now reduced to a bloody mass, groaning, broken.

And her mother…

Raphaeline looked more like a goddess than a woman. The wind stirred her long, crimson hair, which mingled with the mist of blood that swirled around her like a divine cloak. Her feet touched the sand, but the entire desert trembled as if afraid of her.

Ada shivered. Not with fear—but with reverence.

The turtle tried to move. The sound of bones cracking and flesh sliding across the ground resounded like a grotesque echo. Its front legs barely responded, one of them reduced to a bloody stump. The left eye had been pierced and was still oozing, dripping onto the sand. Still, the creature wouldn’t give up.

A roar, hoarse and desperate, cut through the night. The beast’s black mouth began to glow again, the harbinger of another demonic bolt.

Raphaeline arched an impatient eyebrow.

“You truly still dare resist?” Her voice was soft, but laced with enough venom to chill the air itself.

She flicked a finger. A single gesture.

And the blood from the turtle’s own mouth exploded, turning the attack into an internal disaster. The bolt that had been preparing to strike erupted in a chaotic eruption within the creature’s skull. The monster screamed, spewing black fire and fragments of teeth, toppling to its side like a crumbling mountain.

Ada clapped her hand over her mouth in horror.

But Raphaeline didn’t stop.

“Get up,” she ordered, as if training a dog. “I’m not finished punishing you yet.”

The creature’s body trembled, responding more to hatred than to its remaining strength. It tried to rise, but Raphaeline snapped her fingers again. Streams of blood emerged from the ground, entangling its broken legs, threading through the cracks in its armor. Each movement of the chains made bones crack, muscles tear.

The creature’s howl was the very sound of torture.

Ada wanted to scream, wanted to beg her mother to stop, but her voice wouldn’t come. There was something about the spectacle that paralyzed her. Something between terror and fascination.

Raphaeline walked slowly toward the creature’s head. Her stiletto heels sank into the blood-soaked sand, each step echoing louder than thunder. When she reached it, she climbed onto the destroyed shell as if stepping onto a throne.

Her red eyes met the monster’s desperate, yellow ones.

“You feel big, don’t you?” “Predator. Monster. A force no one should face.”

She placed her delicate hand on the turtle’s rough skin. For a moment, it even felt like a tender gesture.

“But to me…” her voice dropped to a cruel whisper. “You are nothing but flesh.”

The blood within the creature responded to her touch. Veins burst, flesh churned, and internal spines sprouted all over its body. The turtle arched its neck and screamed, the entire desert vibrating with the sound.

Ada covered her ears, but she could still feel that roar reverberating within her chest.

Raphaeline raised her hand, and the blood began to condense into increasingly complex shapes. Curved swords, axes, saws, claws. All rose above the creature, shining like fragments of crimson moon.

“You dared touch what is mine,” she said, her voice now a thunderclap. “There is no forgiveness for this.”

The weapons fell.

First one, then two, then dozens. Each blow ripped off a different chunk of shell, flesh, and bone. A spectacle of rhythmic destruction, as if she were conducting an orchestra of mutilation.

The sand turned red. Fragments of bone were thrown into the sky. The monster, which had once seemed invincible, was now nothing more than a shapeless mass of pain.

Ada watched with wide eyes, tears streaming down her face. It was too much. It was too brutal.

And yet… part of her couldn’t help but feel proud. This was her mother. That unimaginable strength, that protective fury… it was all for her.

Raphaeline raised both hands, and the blood responded in an absolute frenzy. The turtle was lifted off the ground, suspended in the air, as if it were a puppet held by invisible strings.

She clenched her right fist. The creature’s hind leg exploded.

He closed his left one. The other followed suit.

The creature, now without functional limbs, hung in the air like an empty shell.

Raphaeline tilted her head, almost curious.

“See how fragile you are,” she murmured. “See how easily you break when someone actually touches you.”

The monster tried to scream again, but blood seeped into its throat, turning the roar into a grotesque gurgle.

Ada finally found her voice.

“Mother…” her voice was weak, broken. “Enough…”

Raphaeline froze. For a moment, her red eyes lost their glow of fury and turned to her daughter.

Ada stood, even though her body was still frail. Her fists clenched, her golden eyes fixed on her.

“I… I don’t want you to get lost.”

The words fell like blades.

Silence returned, heavy. Raphaeline took a deep breath, the blood-colored weapons around her trembling, as if reflecting the conflict within her.

Then she sighed.

The turtle fell back to the ground, like a dead mountain. It still breathed, weak, almost nonexistent, but it breathed.

Raphaeline stepped lightly from its shell, walking toward her daughter. With each step, the blood evaporated into the air, disappearing like mist.

When she reached Ada, she knelt again and held the girl’s face in her hands.

Her eyes still burned, but now they were the eyes of a mother, not a goddess.

“You called me back,” he murmured, kissing her forehead. “Only you can do this.”

Ada was crying, but she smiled.

Raphaeline held her daughter’s face in her hands, watching her for a few seconds, as if she wanted to record every feature, every detail, never to forget. Ada’s golden eyes shone even through the tears, and Raphaeline saw there not only fragility, but also a developing strength, a flame that sooner or later would burn as brightly as her own.

She ran her thumb across her daughter’s cheek, wiping away the salty trail of her tears.

“My little one…” Her voice was now a delicate whisper, in stark contrast to the onslaught of minutes ago. “You will always be my priority. Never again will you hurt yourself like this just to prove something to me, or to prove something to anyone else.

Ada bit her lower lip, still flushed from the memory of her mother’s earlier words about “impressing a man.” She tried to protest, but only lowered her eyes and nodded silently.

Raphaeline smiled slightly, and then her expression changed. The maternal warmth was replaced by icy determination. She stood, her crimson hair still waving gently around her like strands of fire.

“We need to find Vergil,” she declared firmly.

Ada looked up. “Didn’t you find the husband?”

Raphaeline crossed her arms, staring at the horizon stained with blood and dust.

“No.” Her voice was serious, matter-of-fact. “This damn place keeps changing all the time. So far, I haven’t been able to find our husband.”