The Demon Queen's Royal Consort-Chapter 150 - Calm Days - V

The mountain air was pure and sharp, like a blade made of breeze. Glenn walked slowly across one of the many suspended bridges connecting the buildings of the royal castle a true marvel of demonic engineering.

From above, the world looked like a surreal painting. The bridges crossed bottomless chasms, tying halls and towers to the mountain slopes like threads spun by a divine spider. Below, an ocean of clouds moved slowly, painted with the orange light of dusk.

At the center of it all, the largest of all buildings rose with majesty: a crystalline structure of polished white jade, the most expensive and precious material on the entire planet. Its walls caught the setting sunlight as if they glowed by their own will, and its arched domes seemed to touch the sky the royal palace.

Bit by bit, Glenn felt the weight of the hospital fading away. His clothes were clean, his body stronger still sensitive, but recovering remarkably well.

At his side, Aster walked with light steps, her hands clasped behind her back, blue eyes scanning the scenery with a contemplative air.

"It’s hard to believe you live here," she said with a gentle smile, taking in the panorama without hurry. "Do you think you’ll ever get used to all this?"

Glenn took a deep breath, letting the cold wind fill his lungs before replying lightly:

"Maybe in another hundred years." Laughter followed his words.

"How are you feeling?"

"A few more days and it won’t even feel like I got run over by a chimera," Glenn replied.

Aster chuckled softly, shaking her head. The sound echoed like music on the white stone bridge.

They walked a few more steps in silence before Glenn lifted his eyes to the sky and asked a question that seemed to come from deep inside his thoughts:

"Hey, Aster... what’s it like to be a variant?"

She turned her gaze from the horizon to him, her eyes curious and calm. The question didn’t surprise her, but it seemed too sincere for a simple answer.

"Well..." she began, "...in many ways, it’s the same. I have a prana core, my energy channels work like anyone else’s. But inside... everything changes."

Glenn remained attentive. She continued:

"Most people have affinities that reflect natural elements. Water, fire, wind, earth, light, life... or in your case, gravity, electricity, space. They’re all things that exist in nature—forces the world understands."

She then spread her arms wide, as if about to reveal something grand.

"But variants don’t fit into that. Our inner world doesn’t reflect elements you can point to in a forest or a thunderstorm. Mine, for example... is chaotic, mutable. It responds more to intention than to natural law. And that’s why..."

In the blink of an eye, Aster multiplied.

Another Aster appeared beside her, identical in every detail, like a mirror reflection that had rebelled against its surface.

"...I can do this."

Glenn’s eyes widened.

Both Asters smiled at the same time.

"It’s as if my inner world were made of possibilities, not elements. As if my energy didn’t need to choose a fixed shape. Instead of having an affinity with something... I am what’s between affinities."

The comfortable silence between them continued as they walked along the bridge, the cool breeze playing with Aster’s hair and gently tugging at Glenn’s coat. But something lingered in his mind, something that hadn’t settled since she revealed her nature as a variant.

"You said your inner world doesn’t follow any logic..." he murmured, eyes fixed on the clouds below, "so how do you even cultivate? How do you absorb energy if it doesn’t even know what you are?"

Aster smiled, though this time there was a hint of frustration at the edge of her lips.

"That’s the biggest problem with being a variant," she replied. "Since our affinities aren’t natural and in most cases, are completely aberrant each of us has to figure out how to cultivate from scratch."

She sighed, crossing her arms as she walked, her eyes now fixed on the vastness ahead.

"There are no manuals. No ancient techniques. No cultivation schools. It’s trial and error... and more error. I’ve been stuck at the Lower Champion rank for over ten years." freewёbn૦νeɭ.com

Glenn glanced at her, surprised.

"Ten years?"

"Yes." She nodded. "Only recently did I have a kind of epiphany. Some insight into how I need to approach my cultivation... how I need to feel things. But now I’m facing a wall. A block I’m not even sure is real or just another limitation of my own understanding."

She didn’t sound bitter. Just realistic. Like someone who had already accepted the twisted road ahead of her.

Glenn stayed silent for a few moments. The sound of their steps echoed on the stone bridge. He looked at Aster more closely. Her blonde hair danced in the breeze, her blue eyes were alive, expressive. Her body was small, delicate... like that of a young woman around his age, maybe eighteen to twenty years old.

But now... he knew. He knew that body carried decades. Decades of trial and error, of frustration and restarts. Decades facing a reality where no one could teach her. No one could guide her.

"You look so young," he said, almost in a whisper.

Aster looked at him and laughed softly.

"I am young. Compared to what, exactly?"

Glenn didn’t answer. But in his mind, the image he had of her changed. Not as someone older or more experienced... but as someone who carried a burden he was only beginning to understand.

Maybe that’s what it meant to be a variant. A path of solitude in a world that didn’t recognize your existence as legitimate.

And as he thought about that, Glenn couldn’t help but recall his own inner world those spatial fractures, the dark abyss, the electric clouds. He too was learning alone. Also fumbling in the dark. But nothing as challenging or impossible as hers.

Then, thoughts began to flood Glenn’s mind. About the life expectancy of the inhabitants of Atlas.

’I can’t just ask her that... It’d be like someone in my old world asking how many days are in a week. Aster would probably look at me with pity. Or worse... with that sweet smile, like I’m a toddler learning to walk.’

It had been three and a half years since I was thrown into this world, and even though I’ve learned a lot... painfully, I might add, every now and then I still trip over things any kid here would’ve known since they were five.

’But if I dig deep in my memory... I think I remember something I read in the library.’

A small flashback swelled in his thoughts, tied to what the old Glenn knew about the life expectancy of the races—something fairly well established.

Naturally, I mean without accounting for cultivation, just the average lifespan for the poor souls who never manage to awaken their cores.

The elves... of course, always the elves. Those damn forest children live around 200 years even without cultivating a drop of inner energy. Right after them come the dwarves, clocking in around 150 years which makes sense, considering how much beer and ore they consume.

Beastkin, humans, and demons all fell within the same range: about 110 years, give or take depending on diet, climate, and how often they got into bar fights.

And finally, the orcs... well, orcs had a life expectancy of around 80 years. But considering their lifestyle hunting, warring, smashing things with their foreheads it was almost admirable that they made it that far.

’But that’s just the base of the pyramid. Because the moment someone awakens their core and steps onto the path of cultivation... the rules change.’

Life expectancy stretches and dramatically so. The Awakened Rank already grants a decent extension. With luck, good health, and a bit of caution, an Awakened cultivator could easily tack on another 50 years to their lifespan. Champions added 100 more.

The Master Rank granted an additional 200 years. And that was all the knowledge I could dredge up from my subconscious.

So, by that logic, a demon at the Master Rank could live somewhere around 450 years.

’And that’s when I caught myself glancing sideways at Aster. She looked so young. Small, cute, delicate... But if she’s been stuck at Lower Champion Rank for over ten years, then... how many years has she lived already?’

’Of course, I can’t just ask. No way. It’s like asking a lady her age bad manners in any world in the cosmos.’

’How old is she, really...? Forty? Eighty? A hundred and twenty? Suddenly, I felt like the new kid in class all over again.’

I smiled to myself. It was moments like these that reminded me no matter how many monsters I’d fought, corrupted dungeons I’d survived, or abominations I’d stared down... there was still so much about this world I didn’t understand. And maybe never would completely.