Grand Ancestral Bloodlines

Ryu sat there, frozen. It wasn't the first time he had seen a woman naked, but it was certainly the first time he had seen one not only so beautiful, but also one that he was so intimately familiar with.

He had been noticing it more and more in these recent weeks, but she was truly a beauty. It was easy to overlook because he had always felt so annoyed by her, and her quirky personality made him focus far more on that than how she really looked. But at the moment, he truly felt that the only two who could compare to her on the Shrine Plane were his mother and Nuri.

However, those two were women he never looked at in this way. He loved them, but only as far as one would love a mother and his sister. Elena, however...

It was like a dam had broken in his heart, and to his embarrassment, something below stood at attention before he could control it.

Ryu frowned as he felt the changes within him, not liking it in the slightest. He remembered the days when he could control his blood freely, but now he couldn't even stop this from happening.

Elena smiled like a spring breeze. Her blush was still there, filling her delicate skin with a pink hue and a subtle hint of sweat that both made her glisten and filled the room with a subtle aroma of sparkling water and roses.

She stepped forward, sitting on Ryu's lap. She huddled in his arms, happy that he didn't push her away.

Seeing the hesitation in his eyes, she giggled and felt a great deal of warmth at the same time. She had never seen this man hesitate about anything. In a lot of ways, she felt that she was lucky.

"Are you just going to sit there?" Elena breathed in his ear, making goosebumps race across Ryu's skin. It felt like he was standing on the edge of a cliff and his heart wanted to beat out of his chest.

Ryu took a breath and suppressed it. Then, he shook his head.

Elena's eyes turned a hint downcast. It was also the first time Ryu had seen such a reaction from her and he immediately felt a pang of regret, a foreign emotion and one he couldn't remember the last time he had felt.

Soon, though, her gaze became cheery again.

"From now on, you're my hubby. I'll listen to whatever you say," Elena said lightly.

She didn't make a crass joke, nor did she poke fun at him like she usually would have. Instead, she obediently lay in his arms.

Ryu was surprised about just how light she felt. The feeling of her silky smooth skin against his own made him subconsciously hold onto her tightly, worried that she would slip away.

Even without saying a word, Ryu knew that she had taken an irreplaceable place in his heart now. She was the first woman that he had ever loved. His first love, his Elena.

~

Ryu stood high on a tree branch, his eyes somewhat vacant as he lost himself in thought. The closer he got to Elena, the more those memories rolled in, and even when he actually laid eyes on her, he couldn't quite believe that he was actually seeing her.

An emotion that lasted for but a moment before rage settled in.

...

Elena was distracted. Not paying attention to her soul, she had not noticed the change. She had gotten used to ignoring it. Not sensing where Ryu was reminded her too much of the days he had disappeared, so it was easier for her to simply pretend as though he was always there instead of constantly checking to see when he'd finally come to her again.

Plus... it also didn't help that she had no choice but to focus entirely on the task at hand.

Currently, she was in the middle of a hunt, an event held by the Martial Gods for the Dregs. It was a chance to gather Contribution Points.

The Martial Gods were actually quite a progressive Clan, all things considered. This wasn't just about their views on sex, but rather how they treated their lessers.

Because Dreg Bloodlines weren't necessarily useless and were often just forgotten streams of their former glory, if there were any geniuses that climbed up within them, then it could be possible to resurrect one of these branches and allow them to climb back up to the status of one of the tiers.

There were many examples of this in the past, though "many" was just relative. Ultimately, due to how long a period of time these "many examples" occurred in, it was still an extraordinarily rare event.

Elena's life, unfortunately, hadn't been as easy as Ryu had assumed it might be.

Ryu knew that her father had high standing and doted on her quite a bit. In addition, her mother might have much lower standing, but she also at least had enough resources to separate away from her battle amongst Elena's father's other wives that she could target Sacrum.

What Ryu hadn't taken into account was that none of this mattered in the Martial God Clan. Who your parents were held little significance unless they were the highest existences, meaning powerhouses that were at least Dao Sovereigns. And even then, a Dao Sovereign would have too little weight to push around in a Clan of this magnitude.

Elena's father was an extraordinary genius in the eyes of the Martial Gods, but he wasn't even a Dao Sovereign yet. He had made it to the Omniscient Sky God Realm while following the genius stream, and had only very recently did he become a Dao Lord.

As for her mother, she was, once again, just one of many wives. Her standing was even lower.

Even if her father's name carried some weight, it was spread out so far across all his children and wives that it was hard for Elena to claim any piece of it herself.

And that led to the current situation.