Chapter 78

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Chapter 78: The Queen’s Inheritance (XVII)

{tw: torture, self-harm}

A group of young women dressed as priestesses emerged from the misty streets. Each was wearing a black blindfold like Aya. This blindfold showed their identity—the Holy Flame Virgins of the Dragon Ant Queen.

“I sensed someone here. So it was you, Aya.” The leading Holy Flame Virgin stepped forward and smiled at Aya.

“Priestess Nacha.” Aya stood up straight and bowed in panic.

“It just so happens we need manpower. Come follow us underground to the Holy Flame.” Priestess Nacha nodded slightly and turned proudly, but Aya didn’t want to follow.

“I… My companions are still here, I have to tell them,” Aya said in a trembling voice.

“No need,” Priestess Nacha said coldly.

Another Holy Flame Virgin beside her whispered Priestess Nacha’s ear: “Take them with you, too. The sacrifice is not enough.”

Priestess Nacha paused, then turned around and said to Aya, “All right, then take your companions with you.”

“What do you… what do you want to do?” The word sacrifice evoked a deep fear in Aya. She swallowed saliva and asked nervously.

“It’s better to care about yourself, only care about others when you have time.” Priestess Nacha “looked” directly at Aya, as if she saw the fear on the girl’s face through the black gauze in front of her eyes. “Be obedient, or you will be sacrificed.”

Aya shrank for a moment and said, “No, a Virgin must not kill a Virgin, or my injuries will be taken on by you. You mustn’t steal my blindfold, or your blindfold will fall off.”

“I’m very familiar with the rites.” Priestess Nacha smiled and “looked” at her, stroking her left hand on the necklace hanging over her heart, which was a vivid eyeball. “I really can’t steal your blindfold, but I’ll let you take it off obediently. If the rule is broken by yourself, you’ll become the lowest honey ant. Come, hang her!”

Several Virgins swarmed around, and Aya tried to struggle, but she had only just joined the Virgins’ ranks. She had only learned the rites and couldn’t borrow even a little bit of the Dragon Ant Queen’s power. How could she be the opponent of this group of highly qualified Virgins? Soon, she was hung on a beam and screamed weakly: “Let me down, let me down! What exactly are you going to do?!”

"I’ll give you one last chance. Are you willing to give up everything as a Holy Flame Virgin, abandon the tyrannical Dragon Ant Queen, pledge loyalty to the Devil of Power, and live in the carefree Utopia from now on?” Nacha asked solemnly.

Utopia?

This name was almost the origin of tragedy in her life. When she was young, her father had abandoned his wife and child to pursue the legendary Utopia, and never came back. Utopia did not belong to the Devil of Power at that time, but it was equally as enticing. Aya thought for many years, was that illusory dream world really better than this world? In other words, was human nature so weak that even a glimmer of hope was enough for people to struggle to escape the reality of their suffering, and run to heaven or hell?

And her? Was she the same?

In the end, was she going to join this group of Virgins and become a worshipper of Utopia, or was she going to fight to the end?

“Poor child, I’m afraid you don’t know how cruel fate is, so I’ll let you experience it a little,” Priestess Nacha said softly, and took a whip from another Holy Flame Virgin. She held the whip with her right hand, held the eyeball hanging over her heart with her left hand, and pressed it to her lips in a gentle kiss. “My master, my Majesty, please give me the strength to endure.”

After saying this prayer, she raised her right hand high and lashed Aya’s thigh with the whip.

With the crisp pa, Aya screamed, and a hideous bloodstain appeared on her thigh.

Priestess Nacha shook slightly, and an identical bloodstain appeared in the same position on her own thigh. However, unlike Aya, she did not seem to feel the pain, and she grasped the whip and lashed Aya a second time.

Aya cried and struggled and twisted, but her body had been hung securely. No matter how she tried to escape, the whip still hit her body, which made her feel terrible pain.

In the dark room, the torture continued. The whip hit flesh, tearing the girl’s skin and scraping one bloody wound after another.

“Well? Have you considered it clearly?” After more than a dozen lashes, Priestess Nacha lifted her face and asked.

Aya hung her head as if she was dead, not saying a word.

This kind of resisting silence made Priestess Nacha frown crossly. She raised her arm to teach her a lesson, but a Holy Flame Virgin stopped her: “Come on, change with someone else, you’re also hurt.”

Priestess Nacha stroked the wounds on her body. Under the protection of the memento, she felt no pain, but the wounds still existed.

However, she didn’t care about these minor injuries. With the Lord of Power’s memento, it would only take a blink of an eye to heal these wounds.

She once again took the eyeball from over her heart, and dropped her lips in a kiss on the dried eyeball. The eyeball gave off a faint light, which rolled over her body and healed her after several breaths.

“Aya, what are you still hesitating about? The Flame is about to be extinguished—we all know how to extinguish it—the Dragon Ant Queen is dead, and the existence of this field is meaningless. Why don’t you stop obsessing, and turn around and walk towards the great Utopia? From then on, we can take off the blindfolds without being punished, and we don’t need to serve a fainter and fainter Flame with trepidation, for fear that one day it will go out, and we can even be free with our loved ones. Isn’t this wonderful? Isn’t it worth yearning for?” Nacha asked, with a dreamy smile on her face.

Aya hung her head, and the wounds made each fress feel like a torture. Under the constant torture, she was confused and barely conscious.

“So, you betrayed the Queen?” Aya asked weakly.

“Betrayed? It was originally loyalty under violent oppression. How is this betrayal?” Priestess Nacha giggled. “I never want to be a Virgin. I hate this boring life and I hate myself! Why should I waste my youth here in vain, and why should I guard this Flame that’s destined to go out!”

“No one forced you to do this. Take off your blindfold and be an ordinary person. Isn’t that what you want?” Aya asked.

Priestess Nacha choked. They all knew what it meant to take off the blindfold.

It means that they would become a ring breaker, not to mention the piercing pain when taking off the blindfold. After taking off the blindfold, runes would appear around their eyes, indicating their status as ring breakers. From then on, they would no longer be able to enjoy everything as Holy Flame Virgins. Instead, like those girls who had become honey ants, they would live in a dark nest, offering fresh blood to the Dragon Ant Queen, and die of exhaustion in a few years.

This fear hung over their heads day by day, so that this group of Virgins who had betrayed the Dragon Ant Queen were afraid to take off their blindfolds rashly—this was a fear they couldn’t overcome.

“Of course not. Human beings have the recklessness to betray, but they don’t have the courage to face everything. It is ridiculous.” When the little girl’s voice came, the Flame Virgins in the room were surprised. No one had noticed her arrival.

The little Queen looked at this group of people calmly, with a hint of disdain in her eyes: “Good evening, cowardly traitors.”

Priestess Nacha’s chest kept rising and falling from anger. She asked Aya with a grimace: “Is this your companion? That’s great…”

As she spoke, she appeared behind the little Queen with a flicker and strangled her neck with the whip: “She’s not a Holy Flame Virgin, so I’ll kill her first!”

“Blood is still useful, don’t cut her, choke her!” another Holy Flame Virgin warned.

“Of course.” Priestess Nacha grinned and stroked the little Queen’s face with her fingers. “Poor little thing, where did you come from? This isn’t a good place.”

“Stop it! Don’t hurt her!” Aya screamed.

“Then take off your blindfold!” Priestess Nacha shouted at her.

In the dark, Aya actually couldn’t see anything. The blindfold cut off her sight, but somehow she seemed to be able to see the figure of the little Queen, and also saw herself who had not been blindfolded yet, and knelt down and swore allegiance to the Dragon Ant Queen.

Unconscious tears had soaked the blindfold. In just a few seconds, her heart was tormented like it was being roasted. If she took off the blindfold, it would the rune symbolizing breaking the rites burn around her eyes. From then on, she could no longer enjoy all the glory of being a Holy Flame Virgin…

But she always remembers that she had vowed to be loyal to the Queen.

Was it survival or destruction?

Aya recalled that on the day when she became a Flame Virgin, the elderly Queen Dragon Ant had stood on the high platform overlooking the selected girls: “From today, you will be my Flame Virgins. You will bid farewell to your parents, live underground forever, and never see the sun again. You will serve the Flame all your life and protect it forever. I give you glory and chains, but all these are your own choices. Now, swear. Swear to be loyal to me, loyal to the Holy Flame, loyal to the rites, and loyal to the Underground Ant City.”

On that day, her heart had surged, and she had taken her vows for the good life she was about to have.

She suddenly had a choice.

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