Chapter 1970 Impossible


    Ryu raised a weak hand and caressed Hope''s cheek.


    These sorts of feelings had truly settled in for him after he saw his past lives.


    He knew he wasn''t special. Given a different set of circumstances in life, he might be at the bottom of a barrel somewhere, despairing just as much as Hope or cowering just as much as Sarriel.


    What he did know was that this version of himself... the version that could look down on the world and dauntlessly stare into the face of death was the version of himself he wanted to be.


    But that didn''t change the fact that he could have easily been different. No?v(el)B\\jnn


    And yet, even that was more complicated than it seemed.


    He had had almost three decades of secluded meditation. Most of that time seemed to have been spent calculating out his Body Realm Cultivation Method, but only he knew how much of that time had been idle, running experiments, testing how the flow of different elemental qis worked and how they vibed with his Vital qi... so on and so forth...


    It had also allowed him a lot of time to calm down and a lot of time to think. During that time, Ryu thought back to the trial of the Phoenix Sky God.


    It was the one reincarnation that he experienced that he could fully remember even without the aid of the Dream Wraiths.


    It was funny... the reason he thought of it to begin with was as a vain attempt at debunking the idea that he wasn''t unique and special. After all, in that life, born to the Tor Clan, he was in a completely different environment than he was in the Tatsuya Clan. Logically, he should have become a different man.


    But why was the little Ryu of then of the same make and build as he had been as a Scion of the Tatsuya Clan? That should prove that he was special, no?


    Even while being suppressed by his own elders, his own father and mother, he had managed to display his intelligence, and he was staunch in his arrogance. That seemed to contradict everything that he had come to learn from his reincarnations...


    But was that the case?


    "No, no, no, no..."


    She kept saying the word over and over again, faster and faster as though she was afraid Ryu would do something stupid.


    Ryu couldn''t help but burst into a fit of laughter. Little woman antics, indeed.


    "Don''t laugh at me! And don''t say something so bad again!"


    "Bad?" Ryu said with a weak smile. "I meant every word."


    "Don''t say that!" Hope hurriedly covered his mouth. "I do not want my sister wives to hate me. I still have to ingratiate myself with Sister Isemeine and Big Sister Eska properly. Don''t ruin this for me!"


    Ryu was suddenly speechless. Why did it sound like he was getting pushed to the side?


    Still, his thoughts couldn''t help but drift off as Hope continued to sputter words somewhat quickly and part incoherently.


    He had just put something together that he couldn''t put together before because he hadn''t known it at the same...


    But wasn''t the reason he was ostracized by the Tor Kingdom because he looked like a "White Devil"? And wasn''t he now suddenly an Ancestor of these "White Devils," aka the Zu Clan? And...


    Wasn''t the hatred of the Tor Kingdom the difference he needed to break through his mental constraints and earn the White Phoenix Spiritual Foundation?


    In that case... could it be his future self set all of this up?


    ''It''s impossible. I can''t be the Phoenix Sky God... can I?''


    Ryu was confused once more... because his Title was certainly not Phoenix.