Outworld Liberators-Chapter 205: A Young Heart Tempered by Truth

Tabulae did not delay. She walked straight toward God Eldric.

Part of her kept waiting for the dream to break.

Part of her kept insisting this was not real. That she had climbed too long.

That she had bled too much. That this was only a hunger hallucination dressed in applause.

Radeon had read her faith long ago. He had read her like a ledger.

He had not taken her away from her family. Not at first.

Radeon had let her stay where she came from and let fate do its work.

"Young lady," Eldric said. "Would it suit you if we showed a brief account of your life? To inspire those watching."

Tabulae closed her eyes. Tears slid down her cheeks, not from shame, from release.

’Goodbye, father. Goodbye, grandfather. It is time for me to move on,’ she said in her heart.

The linen screens flickered. Her life rose in pictures.

A small girl with a book held close like a treasure, eyes bright with the joy of words.

"A youth that found joy in reading," the heavenly voice said.

The image shifted.

Hands took the books from her. Harsh pulls. Yet familiar hands.

They carried the books away to be sold, and the coins they earned were spent on drink.

Tabulae stood in the doorway, too young to know how to scream in a way that mattered.

The screen flashed again.

Tabulae worked for wages, back bent, hands calloused.

She received only a tenth of what she earned, not enough to feed herself properly.

The rest was pocketed by people she called family, and she smiled as if obedience was love.

"Blind faith to family," the heavenly voice said.

The next scene came sharp and ugly.

Her father talking in low tones to a man with greedy eyes.

Words like womb, price, and strong hips spoken as if she were livestock.

Plans made to turn her into a breeding female like an animal.

Tabulae stood just out of sight, listening. Her stomach twisted. Her nails bit into her palms until she felt pain.

Her grandfather heard it too.

He did not stop it. He did not rise in anger. He cajoled his son instead, urging him to sell her, praising the profit of a smart granddaughter who had already been providing for them.

The linen showed Tabulae with a coin pouch in her hands, counting money for the very people selling her future.

"Almost sold by her own blood," the heavenly voice said. "And still counting coins for them."

Tabulae did not know. Not truly.

She had known they were greedy. She had known they wanted money.

She had even imagined, in her softer moments, that she would help them in secret, then return one day with success in her hands and forgiveness on her tongue.

Those wholesome thoughts drowned in the thickness of blood that had never been wholesome at all.

Her face went pale. Bile clawed up her abdomen.

She doubled over and vomited, right there under the linen screens, the taste of old hope turning into acid.

Most people in the stands cried.

Those who felt guilt did not cry. They froze.

Biscuit shivered where he sat. Shortbread beside him went stiff as wood.

They tried to slip out. A cultivator stuck out a foot and tripped them like dogs.

The man who did it rose at once. He stood over four meters tall, muscles bulging, the kind of strength that made air feel crowded.

A righteous man from Craftsworth of Guilds, peak Nascent Embryo stage, eyes hard with disgust.

He took a step as if he meant to stomp the father and son into paste.

Eldric appeared beside him like a shadow turning solid.

Two fingers touched the giant’s raised knees, light but absolute. Eldric shook his head once.

"Friend," Eldric said quietly. "Your heart is full of righteousness. I understand. But would you let this old man handle this."

The giant grunted, bowed, and returned to his seat, jaw clenched like he was biting down on his own anger.

Biscuit and Shortbread tried to breathe.

They could not. Eldric’s gaze found them, and his smile did not reach his eyes.

"Come down to the stage," Eldric requested.

They had no choice. If they ran, they would only die tired.

Biscuit and Shortbread started down the aisle, and fate made it worse.

Whether deliberate or not, the path they took led straight past rows of righteous cultivators.

They had seen Eldric stop a killing. That did not mean the crowd would stop at silence.

An old man who had been buying snacks at the arena bar hurled a stale cup of ale at Biscuit’s face with shaking rage.

"Trash," the old man spat. "How do you live with yourself?"

A cultivator from Blessedgrove Fortunecrest chewed a tomato like it was punishment, then flung it hard.

Two tomatoes struck, one on Biscuit, one on Shortbread.

Both stumbled back three steps, blinking in shock.

"Come. Let me make you a woman and breed you like a pig."

More voices joined. Shoes came next. Vegetables. Spicy meat still slick with sauce.

The aisle became a gauntlet of thrown disgust.

Biscuit and Shortbread kept walking because stopping would only bring worse.

By the time they reached the bottom of the stage, both men looked like they had aged a decade, and the short walk felt like the longest of their lives.

Tabulae stood off to the side and looked at her father and grandfather with a new gaze.

It held no love. No care. Only a deep disgust so complete that even disappointment could not survive in it.

Disappointment belonged to people you still hoped for.

Eldric did not let the silence linger.

"What would you like to do with them?" he asked, voice even. "Speak what your mind says. Not the shout of your heart. Not your fist that longs for blood."

Tabulae listened. The respect she felt for Eldric was enough to pull her back from the edge of her own fury.

She drew a slow breath, then another, forcing the rage to settle into something colder.

"I want to cut ties with all my blood relatives," she said, words firm and clean.

Eldric watched her a moment, then nodded once.

"Are you certain, child? Do you want me to act on this now?"

Tabulae did not answer with more words.

She dropped to her knees and held out the bamboo tube she had won from an earlier raffle, offering it like a bribe, or like payment, or like proof she was not asking for mercy.

Eldric’s expression softened.

"Child," he said, and his tone carried the faint sadness of someone who had seen too many bargains made out of desperation.

"This old man still has great finances. Keep that for yourself."

He pushed her hand gently down.

Then he produced a new sheet of paper.

Its border was black. The strongest and most lethal of the Life Bane Contracts.

Biscuit saw it and shivered. Regret hit him late and shallow, the regret of a man who only mourned consequences.

His mind spun fast anyway, trying to find a path back into advantage.

’I just need to give her nostalgia,’ he thought.

’Bring fruit for a year. Beg for support after. If I play it right, I might even cultivate.’

’Fools. I will remember every face. Then I will marry her off to someone.’

A sharp slap cracked through the air.

Biscuit’s head snapped sideways. His big body flew a few meters and hit the ground hard.

Teeth scattered from his mouth.

It was Tabulae. She had heard enough.

Eldric had made Biscuit’s thoughts loud. Loud enough for everyone to hear except Biscuit himself, and his son Shortbread.

The arena heard the ugliness in his mind laid out like entrails.

Biscuit rolled, spitting blood, and tried to think again.

’I should do it now. I will kowtow. I will admit my faults.’

He slammed his forehead into the stone.

Once. Twice. A dozen more times.

The whole arena, a million people, went silent.

Biscuit looked around, confused by the quiet, searching for pity.

Tabulae’s expression did not change.

Eldric moved before the silence could curdle into riot.

He lifted one hand and the air answered. Circles of letters spun into being above the arena, thousands of ink black characters orbiting like schools of fish.

Orbiting Calligraphy Arts. Useless for killing, priceless for making words behave.

The letters did not simply float. They turned with rhythm and intent, tightening and loosening in patterns that made the eyes follow.

Cultivators drew breath. Even the ones who pretended to be bored leaned forward.

Those who knew felt it at once, a thread of Dao of Art woven into each stroke, delicate, and beauty used like a tool.

The letters drifted over the crowd and people began to read as the characters condensed into lines.

"You will not know a person called Tabulae once you sign this," a gilded core cultivator murmured, voice strained.

"Your mind will loop back to a state before her birth," someone else read, and his face went pale as he said it.

The orbit quickened. Ink tightened. A small ball of condensed calligraphy spun on Eldric’s finger, black and glossy like a drop of oil that had learned to dance.

He flicked it.

The ink splattered onto a hanging sheet and became a portrait.

Not a simple face. A living contract.

Tabulae’s likeness formed first, gaunt and confused, eyes wide as if she was still trying to understand what betrayal tasted like.

Behind her, shadowed figures leaned in with greedy smiles, hands reaching for her book, her wages, her future.

The image shifted as the letters continued to orbit, scenes turning when you moved your head.

Tabulae fighting for a stolen book.

Biscuit’s sour face counting her salary and keeping most of it.

A man’s hand on her arm, too eager, too close.

Her nose bleeding over a workbench while she pretended it was nothing.

The crowd gasped again, not at the cruelty, at the clarity. This was how Eldric defined a contract.

Ghost attendants began to move. 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

They glided through the stands and lifted people gently, one after another, carrying them as if the arena itself had become a river.

Elderly men. Middle aged women. Young cousins. In laws. Even those who had married into the blood and thought they were safe.

Faces stiff with confusion and fear, then easing when they saw Eldric waiting and realized this was not a slaughter.

Eighteen generations pulled into the open like roots dragged from soil.

Eldric’s voice stayed soft, almost patient.

"Those invited here will be cutting ties with Tabulae," he said. "Please drip your blood into this portrait contract."

A few of them looked at Tabulae with something like shame.

A few looked angry, not at themselves, at being made to stand here.

Most looked tired. They had known her, yes. They had benefited from her, yes.

They were not close enough to defend her when it mattered, and now they were close enough to be bound by her refusal.

The portrait contract did not need explanation. The words and images did the work.

Forget Tabulae as if she was never born.

Never be fated to meet her again.

Never share her luck or misfortune.

Let your descendants carry no familial thread to her.

One by one, they stepped forward.

A prick of skin. A bead of blood. A drop falling onto ink.

The contract drank it. Letters flared.

People blinked as if waking from a long nap. Some frowned, trying to remember why their hearts felt heavy.

Some shook their heads like dogs shaking off water.

Then, guided by ghost attendants, they walked away, faces smoothing into polite emptiness.

Biscuit lingered last. His mouth hung slightly open. His eyes drifted to Tabulae.

He stared up at the linen screens, saw the winners, then looked back to Tabulae.

"What a talented young lass," he murmured. "She will definitely go far."