I was already in front of the barrier and with Nix's help I started to walk leaning on it to the barrier, without waiting any longer I touched the barrier, it was made of energy and it was still solid, but I could feel something.

I withdraw my hand and wait, almost at the same moment, the whole barrier begins to decrease in size and gradually dissolves, from the inside a strong smell of blood explodes outside as well as blood stains in all corners.

But what caught my attention was the one in the center, he was looking directly at me and he walked calmly towards me getting on his knees.

"I live to serve your will, Zenos." (Hades)

His movement was a little stiff and when one of his knees touched the ground, cracks spread out, clearly he still doesn't have complete control over his power.

From the moment I looked into his eyes until he got down on his knees my eyes roamed all over his body, I was in disbelief.

He had a height of 1.30 being a little taller than me, his hair was red with a streak of it being black, he has no visible horns, but he has an Eclipse-shaped crystal in the middle of his forehead, and his eyes are like mine and your skin is also brown like mine.

I could see scales like mine on his arms and legs, I could also hear a voice that was a bit thicker and deeper than mine, his appearance was almost the same as mine with his face being completely same as mine with few differences.

"Get up and put this on." (I)

"How to order." (Hades)

I take one of my magic size fit clothes and give it to him to put on since he is stark naked.

He doesn't seem to be body shy, but I couldn't leave him as he came into the world with other people around, but I must say I was in disbelief as his appearance was almost the same as mine.

As soon as he finished getting dressed, Elizabeth had already set up some tables with Natasha's help for all of us to sit, I chose to have a conversation alone with Hades so that no one could interrupt.

"Why do you look like me?" (I)

"I don't know, I didn't have a choice in shaping my body, but I feel proud to share so many commonalities with you." (Hades)

I could only assume that him looking like me was a strong possibility, almost everything about him came from me, at least that's what I think, I'll have to ask Elizabeth later to confirm.

"How's your mind, is it messed up or something?" (I)

"My mind is fine, but the memories themselves are jumbled, too many people's memories to organize with yours being the easiest as they are most complete." (Hades)

"As long as I don't have to look back I should be fine." (Hades)

"Are your emotions under control?" (I)

"Yes, I could tell from your memories that it must be difficult to control your emotions, but for me, it was very easy." (Hades)

I look at his Aura, he manages to control it, but it's like someone pulling a horse's reins to control him forcing him not to advance, his control is still superficial.

"Why did you build the barrier?" (I)

"I needed to control my power and Aura, even my body was something strange, I thought it best to close myself in a more restricted space to do this, so I wouldn't have interruptions." (Hades)

"Then why didn't you try contacting other people or resolve to break the barrier now?" (I)

"My desire and will is to serve you, I could feel your desire to know me and I fulfilled your will." (Hades)

He seems to have a lot of loyalty to me, but I don't know how far that can be true, that's because I don't know how much he understands the concept of loyalty, everything he says seems more emotional dependence on me being the one who gave him life.

"If you didn't have control over your power, how did you create the barrier?" (I)

"I didn't create it, I just used the remnants of the space that was once under your command to restrict the area and then I used the sensations I felt when those 3 spoke to me." (Hades)

He must be talking about when Karina, Alice, and Eva started talking as they each took the position of the tip of a triangle, did he try to imitate that?

"You don't feel hungry, thirsty, or tired after all this time?" (I)

"..." (Hades)

He seems not to have understood my words, his eyes became more confused, it seems that he felt something and he doesn't know if he relates to my words or not.

"(I think this conversation is going to be longer than I expected.)" (I)

--------------

It was already night when I was almost carried back to the Communal Temple, Karina wanted me to continue soaking in the pool of blood and that's what I did, it was helping my recovery much more than I expected.

Hades stayed on the same floor where he was born, he for some reason didn't want to learn anything from my sisters, instead, he asked my Familiars to help with his training.

In the end, it was decided that Ragnar would teach him about Aura as he was the expert in this field, Sakura would train him in combat having been the one who trained generations of Lamias warriors and Hinata would teach him about the Soul as he is a Spectral being strongly linked to death.

My biggest concern was Hinata, but Eva offered to be a vessel for Hinata to possess, just that way she can communicate normally with others, not everyone can understand her intentions directly like I can through her few words.

As soon as I closed my eyes to float in the pool of blood, I felt someone approaching, at this time the Communal Temple would normally be closing, so I knew it was nobody among the townspeople.

When I opened my eyes it was Arash who was standing on the edge of the pool of Blood looking at me, I could feel his Aura reaching out towards me cautiously, it seemed he was checking how I was doing.

"Your condition looks better, that's good." (Arash)

"Are you worried about me?" (I)

"I'm more concerned about my daughter bonding with you, your connection is much stronger than a normal Contractor between someone and a Spirit." (Arash) "But that's not why I came here." (Arash)

I looked away and could see an Alice with a vein in her forehead so swollen it could burst at any moment, but she didn't come closer.

"Why does Alice look so pissed off?" (I)

"I put a barrier using my aura around us, I don't want anyone interrupting us and unfortunately I can't wait." (Arash)

"What do you need?" (I)

Arash shouldn't need me for anything, he is far more powerful than I am and his position as Dragon Emperor is as important as a saint as far as I can understand.

There shouldn't be many situations where I could be useful in doing something for him, especially something he would need to come to me in such a hurry without waiting for me to recover.

"I need you to go meet Orsel, you would have 3 days, but due to his precarious condition I was able to postpone it, so you have 1 week to find him." (Arash)

"Just for the record, do you want me to go see him?" (I)

"Yes, he will explain the rest when he gets there." (Arash)

"I assume he's in this Border Town thing, isn't he?" (I)

"Yes, I already have someone organized to guide you there." (Arash)

"..." (I)

"Don't make that face unfortunately it has to be you, I could explain and it wouldn't make a difference since you plan on going there anyway." (Arash)

"Why are you sure I want to go?" (I)

"Bordertown floats in this planet's orbit using the energy flow between this world and one of the Moons." (Arash)

"Fine, you convinced me, I will." (I)

Sigh

"My daughter said you love going to exotic places with beautiful scenery, I'm sure you can imagine the kind of scenery you can see from up there." (Arash)

"I already said I will, but just for a hypothetical question, could I enter that city any other time?" (I)

"If you refuse to go, don't think about approaching that place, there will be many people angry with you, people much stronger than you are currently." (Arash)

"..." (I)

"(He's not giving me chances to say no, but I also have no reason to refuse his request, he would never put his daughter at risk, so everything should be fine.)" (I)

"Can I at least send someone ahead?" (I)

"Better not, things there don't follow the same customs here, you should go with the person I'm going to send with you and follow his advice as much as possible." (Arash)

Arash spent a few more minutes talking to me about the repercussions of my Dragon Totem temporarily disappearing and told me to try to be less drastic next time as it caused a lot of problems among the Elder Dragons that he had to resolve.

After that he left and Alice stayed by my side until the moment I fell asleep still thinking about the pictures astronauts took in my old world, that was the only reference I had for what I could find in Border Town and I was excited to that.