LGHTNOVELBOOK Chapter 211 Love was the sweetest sin of all
As the years passed, the stone man sank deeper and deeper into the darkness of sadness and madness. Everything he once had disappeared before his eyes, leaving him as a broken and desolate being. The stone king, in his mental agony, finally found death, leaving behind only a shattered stone man, an echo of what he once was.
Over time, his subjects began to worry about him, but every attempt to approach his abode was brutally repelled. In the eyes of those who once revered him as king, they now only saw a half-stone, half-flesh monster, a specter of the greatness he once possessed.
With the progression of the drawings on the walls of the pyramid, no one dared to climb ever again. The stone king, in his moments of fleeting lucidity, depicted these graphics as silent witnesses of his own tragedy. Even on one of the walls, it was seen how he himself traced the sad tales of his downfall.
In the last part of his testimony, the stone king had left written words with a mixture of despair and resignation:
"Once I was great, once I was a king. Once I had a queen, whom I loved with all my soul. Once I had a little kingdom. Now, I have nothing. I am no one, I am a broken man, a shadow of what I was. I am a shame to my kind, my legacy will be forgotten, just like me.
I did everything I could, I really did, but it wasn't enough. My heart hurts, it hurts so much. My mind sinks deeper and deeper into the abyss and I don't know what I did wrong... Oh, yes, I know what I did wrong: in loving her. Love led me to where I am, it led me to my doom, it led me to my death."
With these words, the lament of the stone man resonated into eternity, a testament of pain and regret that would be engraved on the walls of his abode, forever recalling the tragedy of the one who once was king.
Anthony felt a weight in his heart as he finished reading the heartbreaking lines engraved on the wall. Shaking his head to clear his thoughts, his gaze fell on a piece of flesh on the ground. "We have found one of the two artifacts," he announced to Persephone, but she remained absorbed in the inscriptions carved on the walls.
"A tragic king," she murmured with a sigh laden with sorrow. "Now he is only remembered as a monster," she added as she walked away and jumped back to the first floor. Anthony cast one last look at the drawings adorning the room before continuing his way downstairs.
Upon reaching the ground, he approached the stone man's body delicately, now just a heap of inert flesh. "This is all that remains of him," he murmured as he bent down and removed the crystal resting on his chest. The moment he took it, the man's body disintegrated rapidly, leaving only the artifact on the ground.
The artifact was of an intense red color, with a unique glow that seemed to emanate its own life. Its shape resembled the flesh being, a man of flesh in its purest form. Carefully, Anthony recognized the artifact, feeling the energy pulsating in his hand. It was the second artifact they needed; they now had both in their hands, but the opaque stone still lacked the crystalline brilliance.
The two of them stared at the temple before bidding farewell to the place. They descended the stairs and reached the huge doors that opened slowly, revealing the elder and all the stone people who guarded them expectantly.
"The stone," pronounced the elder reverently as Anthony handed over the opaque stone. The elder took it in his hands, examining it carefully before smiling. "A stone will always be a stone," he murmured serenely before his body disintegrated into a shower of stone particles. The people behind him repeated the same words before fading into the air.
Anthony watched even the girl he had seen before vanish before his eyes. One by one, they all disappeared, leaving only the opaque stone floating in the air. Slowly, the dark stain covering it began to dissolve, revealing a beautiful crystal stone in its place. It pulsed like a small heart, and its color gradually changed to a pure gold, shining with a golden light.
Meanwhile, all the houses that were once in ruins were rebuilt before Anthony's amazed eyes. Stone people emerged from the ground, but they no longer had physical form; they seemed like specters, spirits free from the limitations of the body. They laughed, talked, and danced, filling the air with a sense of joy and renewal.
Anthony even tried to touch them, but his hand passed through them as if they were mere shadows.
The ancient temple, once steeped in abandonment and desolation, now glowed with new life and energy. It was a rebirth, a new beginning for that place forgotten by time.
Anthony took the stone in the air, feeling its power and energy pulsating in his hands. With a smile on his face, he turned to Persephone, who was watching the stone children playing happily in the nearby courtyard.
"This is for you. Both are yours," Anthony announced as he tossed the two artifacts to her. Persephone received them somewhat clumsily, examining them with curiosity. "Didn't you say it was half and half?" she asked, frowning in puzzlement.
Anthony shrugged with a slightly enigmatic expression. "I need you to advance at least 50 levels in this test, and these two unique artifacts will be of great help," he explained as he made his way to the exit.
Persephone hesitated for a moment before storing the artifacts in her ring, acknowledging that he was right; she also wanted to get out of her class, she hated it.
With a flash, the two of them disappeared from the place, reappearing outside the huge pyramid. Now, with the artifacts in their possession, Anthony took one last look at the pyramid before disappearing again and appearing back at the house where it all began.