Path to Transcendence

Chapter 610: First Tier 4 Rift

Julius didn’t wait and immediately went over to the rift. Cassandra was right behind him as well. She must have spotted it before he had.

As Julius inspected the rift, she spoke to him. “If you want to enter it, feel free. It should be a Tier 4 rift and might be a good opportunity for you. I know you already have some nice treasures from the tournament, but you might get something good out of this rift due to its location inside a heavily condensed life mana area.”

Julius agreed with her. He hadn’t really examined the treasures he got from Reinera so far. To be fair, he was waiting until he was settled down in Corvus before he did so, and not looking at them every day was a good way to control his impulse to shove said treasures down his throat.

But a rift inside such an environment likely had some nice things inside, and since it was a Tier 4 rift, it would be even better than the rifts he normally delved. Tier 4 rifts were known for their better rewards and higher rate of treasures. Not surprising since the risk was also higher.

Still, if he cleared it, he might get something useful to him. Even if it didn’t have anything fantastic, it would still be a good experience since he hadn’t delved into a Tier 4 rift yet.

“You don’t mind? It might take some time.”

“I mean, you can always catch up with us later. I’m not too worried about you and your survivability. Just take this,” Cassandra said to him while handing him a small metal plate. “It is enchanted so that I can find you and you can find us.”

“You sure?”

She laughed. “Yeah, you have been babysitting these two for the past couple of weeks. You deserve some time to yourself.”

“Babysitting?” Maya muttered with an offended frown.

Julius shrugged. “So what? Just meet you guys later? What if I take too long?”

“I’ll wait for you. I don’t think it will take you very long to clear the rift. Not with your current abilities. But if it does, I will come back and help you. I know that Caldrus talked with you, but are you still interested in coming back to the sect with us?”

Julius nodded. He had been thinking about it for the past week or so and came to the conclusion that it was the best decision for him. Caldrus made a good point, he didn’t really know how to navigate Corvus. He just didn’t know enough about the country to do so. Plus, the promise to access the Scorched Wastelands was too tempting to give up.

“Okay, then, in that case, we will take our time and give you time to catch up. If you can’t, then I will come and get you. In the meantime, I will make sure that these two continue training. As for you, just enjoy the rift and see if you can get anything of use,” she said to him with a knowing smile.

Julius grinned back, and before he could waste any more time, he walked over to the hidden rift and touched the swirling blue portal.

Would you like to enter the Rift?

He accepted it and felt himself get dragged into its depths.

***

When he appeared inside the rift, he couldn’t help but observe that it was very similar to the forest he had just been in. There were a few key differences, though. For one, the sun above was massive. It was at least twice, maybe even three times as large as the sun outside the rift. That also meant the heat coming from it was intense.

However, it wasn’t necessarily painful. If anything, the sun almost healed him with its contact, as if it were infusing his skin with pure life mana. He hadn’t come across anything like it before.

The other thing that he took note of was the potency of the life mana in the air. The Brightwood Forest had already been densely filled with life mana, but this life mana felt different. It felt… dangerous.

As he walked around and explored the nearby area, he allowed the sun to illuminate his skin and tried to analyse how it was affecting his body. He was fascinated by how pure and clean the life mana was. It made his own life mana feel dirty in comparison.

He wondered if that cleanliness had any impact on the effectiveness of his life-based skills.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t left alone in peace for very long. As he was walking past a particularly massive tree, he felt something ping his senses. He didn’t sense any monsters approaching him, but that was where he was wrong. Out of nowhere, a vine lashed out at him.

He sent out a pulse of kinetic energy and aura at the vine, intercepting it before it smacked him in the face. The kinetic energy was enough to halt its momentum, and his aura tore into it. The vine fell limp and hit the forest floor.

He frowned and started to understand what was going on. He quickly made some adjustments to his spatial perception and shook his head with an amused smile. Initially, he thought there weren’t any living creatures around him. But that was a hasty and incorrect assumption. Now that he shifted his senses a little, he realized that the entire forest was alive.

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He felt more movement behind him, and this time over a dozen vines came striking toward him. They were covered in small spikes along their length, and he flooded his body with kinetic energy as he attempted to try out the technique he had observed in the monkey.

His Seed of Phoenixʼs Ruin was a powerful authority, and if he was able to utilize it in his body movements, it would be a boon. Unfortunately, his authority was so powerful that it was difficult to control. It fought him every inch of the way, and despite using all his willpower, he couldn’t force the technique to work.

He sighed, and due to his experimentation, one of the vines slammed into him. The spikes tore into his flesh. He was a little surprised at how easily it was able to flay his skin from his bones, but he barely winced as his entire arm was peeled like a potato.

Then he felt the vines begin to wrap around him, restricting his movements. He did his best to fend them off with pulses of kinetic energy, but they were really persistent and were very sturdy. Even when he activated [Field of the Shattered Will] the vines didn’t rip apart, they stubbornly clung to his body with no intentions of letting go.

He soon found himself completely wrapped up like a mummy. He had no leverage, and they were trying to tear his body into pieces. Some sort of substance was pushed into his open wounds. He could feel his body feeling woozy the moment this substance entered his veins.

He was forced to send a pulse of healing mana through his body. His passive regeneration wasn’t enough to handle it. Even then, he noticed this substance was hard to break down, surprising since his body was way more resilient than before. He forced even more life mana into his channels and skill. Only then did it break down completely.

Julius frowned. He wasn’t expecting to come across such a challenge so soon, and finally began to use some fire mana. The black crown on his head glowed briefly before it surged outward with blue flames. While somewhat resistant to his kinetic energy, the vines were not as resilient to his flames. They withered from the heat, and Julius then used some kinetic energy to finish them off.

The problem was that he wasn’t able to find the source of these vines. As he mentioned before, the entire forest was alive. It made narrowing down his targets much more challenging. While he was trying to find the creature that was controlling these vines, even more came in to attack him.

He was more prepared and didn’t allow them to wrap him up again. However, he also didn’t use his fire or kinetic energy. He wanted to test his life mana capabilities a little more. Not only would he hopefully meet the requirements to learn the second chapter of Tezuko Willow’s manual, but it would be a nice way to hide his identity.

He wasn’t worried about his face or name as much as he was worried about his abilities. After all, he had fought in front of the entire Empire, and people would know that he used fire and kinetic energy.

Fire was a common affinity, so perhaps he could use his fire mana, especially when he was at the Burning Sun Sect, but kinetic definitely wasn’t something he was willing to show off in public. Even if they didn’t recognize him, he might get revealed if he showed off the same skills. He told himself this was a perfect time for his life affinity to catch up with his other skills.

Using the mana carving technique as a basis, he began to infuse his body with life mana. The empowerment wasn’t as drastic or dynamic as kinetic energy, but he could feel some slight improvements to his body.

Instead of fast and violent, he felt smooth and vibrant. If kinetic energy was like lightning in his veins, then life mana was like cool water gently invigorating his body.

Since he wasn’t as fast, he had to rely on his perception and his mastery of his body to dodge these vines. He felt several vines barely miss his face, the spikes on them brushing across his nose.

He punched out with his bare fists, knocking aside the vines. But the vines barely got damaged. In fact, he was a little embarrassed at how little damage he was doing. Without his kinetic energy, his fists didn’t carry the same amount of force.

Therefore, he allowed himself the luxury of using his aura. His ruinous aura quickly shrouded his fists, and the effect was immediate. The vines that had brushed off his previous attacks were torn apart.

Unfortunately, they grew back at incredible speeds and attacked him once again with fury.

He danced between the countless vines assaulting him, like a ballerina. A bloody ballerina, considering he was bleeding from many injuries, but he wasn’t worried. His healing skill was already taking care of his wounds. Even the weird, powerful substance wasn’t enough to stop his healing skill now that it was up and going.

He was enjoying himself. It was great practice, and these vines were a wonderful training aid. They were fast, sturdy, and dangerous. A perfect combination to test himself on.

Sadly, this couldn’t last forever; the vines were slowing down. The creature that was controlling the vines was running out of stamina. He had already found the source of the vines a little while ago. It was a creature that looked like a tree, not far away from where he was. Only about a few dozen feet, hidden behind a few larger trees. It reminded Julius of treants, but he wasn’t sure if this was the same thing.

The vines eventually came to a stop altogether. The open wounds all over his body were healing in the blink of an eye. It was really amazing to see how fast his healing had become. Even with the opposing authority trying to disrupt his skill, he was able to knit his flesh back together like it was nothing.

Julius tilted his head when he sensed something from the monster. He quickly used [Void Step] to appear in front of the monster. It was smaller than he expected, only about ten feet tall. Much smaller than the other trees around. He watched as it tried to slither beneath the ground, attempting to run away from him. Unfortunately for it, he didn’t allow it to and swiftly snatched the monster by one of its limbs.

The limb broke off, or rather the monster detached it of its own volition, but Julius was faster and was able to get a good grip on its trunk. He used his aura like claws and got enough leverage to rip the monster out of the ground, root and stem.

The creature flailed around, but Julius grunted with exertion, feeling his arms and back strain. Then, with one final rip, he tore the monster into two pieces. He glanced over at the fist-sized core that came out of the monster.

It was green, and it was the largest core he had seen from a monster he hunted. And he wasnʼt the only one who was interested in it. Before he could reach down and pick it up, Drasil appeared out of his soul space and leapt down from his shoulders, snatching up the core in the blink of an eye.

It was a little funny to see because the core was almost the same size as Drasil. However, Julius didn’t even get a chance to stop Drasil before the little spirit crammed the entire thing into his mouth. He didn’t say anything; he just stood there in silence.

Not shocked that Drasil ate the thing, but that he could fit the entire core into his small mouth. It was truly impressive.