Mystical Journey

The instant Garen sensed this symbol, it had already melted abruptly, rapidly merging into the Scarlet Snow Technique's pane.

And the Scarlet Snow Technique also changed once more.

'Eighteen Grade Cold Scarlet Snow: every move contains cold energy equivalent to the peak of Level Nine.

(Coldness Strengthening Level Four, Sharpness Strengthening Level Four. Purity Strengthening Level Four.)'

"So all the Strengthening abilities increased by one level? Not bad. After devouring so much energy, not only did it condense the Soul Seed of the Living Secret Technique, it even influenced the Scarlet Snow Technique to increase as well."

Garen had inherited many of his forefathers' memories, so he knew how strong the chill would be once he reached Grade Eighteen of the Scarlet Snow Technique.

Out of all the forefathers, the strongest was the First Generation Forefather, his Eighteen Grade Scarlet Snow Technique had increased the Coldness Strengthening to Level Three. His Purity Strengthening had also reached Level Three. He did not have Sharpness Strengthening, but even so, he had already reached an extremely terrifying level.

No one would protest if you were to call him one of the top ten users of frost among the Energy Machinists. He would certainly have a spot among the top ten strongest frost users.

Unfortunately, although he was extremely powerful in his time, and brought an era of glory to the Scarlet Snow Sect, none of his successors ever reached his level. Some of the forefathers had reached the eighteenth grade, and condensed their Soul Seed, but no one could reach Level Three in their Strengthening levels anymore. This was especially true of the Coldness Strengthening, they found countless materials, used all sorts of techniques and technology, but could only ever strengthen themselves up to Level Two. As for Purity Strengthening, they could also only reach Level Three.

As such, the Scarlet Snow Sect's position started to drop from its initial status as a middle-grade sect.

Now, Garen had once more raised his Scarlet Snow Technique to Level Three in terms of Strengthening, and had even achieved Level Four.

This power was already unprecedented in the history of the Scarlet Snow Technique.

The last thing was the most crucial, the Attribute Pane.

'Nonosiva Lin – Strength 50, Agility 50, Vitality 50 (+8), Intelligence 42, potential power 0%. Soul Limit 50.'

Other than his Intelligence, everything else had reached fifty. His Soul Limit had also reached fifty. Garen was not surprised at that, he had always planned to condense the Scarlet Snow Technique's Soul Seed, but he had not expected that he would gather the Hellfrost Peacock Technique's one instead. Evidently, out of the two frost-type techniques, the Scarlet Snow Technique could not be placed on the same pedestal as the Living Secret Technique. Therefore, his understanding of the frost-type ended up benefiting his Hellfrost Peacock Technique.

Sitting up straight, Garen pulled back his attention, and only then did he realize how much he had benefited from this. It was way beyond his expectations.

"Where is this?" Garen pulled back his gaze, and began to consider his surroundings.

"Master, this is still the Mother Planet, I carried you out of the middle of the Battlefield. We did not go far, because I was worried we would be found by the search parties," replied Turing respectfully. "You have been unconscious for three days. All our equipment and tools have been rendered ineffective by the battle's energy field, so we could not simply leap away, and had to temporarily wait here for you to awaken."

"Is that so?" Garen nodded, and put down the canteen.

He glanced at the torn-up rags on his body, and saw that his Space Equipment had also been utterly destroyed, rendered completely useless. He knew immediately that the things inside had all floated into the torrents of Space.

"This is still the Blackboard Region, right?" he asked.

"That's right, we did not go too far," replied Turing honestly.

"How would we go about returning to Planet Scarlet Snow from here?" Garen was not familiar with this aspect.

"I'm afraid we would need to borrow a jump portal, and go to the Central Academy first, then find a decent Galactic Battleship before we can leave," Turing replied according to the usual conventions.

"No, we don't need to do that. The Energy Machinists still have a base in the radiation area, we can go straight to the base and use the portal there to jump to the City of Nagadako. That was how I did it last time." Garen shook his head, and reestablished another route.

"But before we go, we should go see the situation on the Mother Planet first."

Finally, he exhaled deeply.

"I wonder how many of these people survived."

The two of them ate some barbequed meat, and then rapidly flew out from the forest, enveloping themselves in Non-Falling Light. In an instant, they had become a flash of white light, disappearing into the sky.

Fifty points of speed had already long surpassed what the average person could detect. Even some equipment would be hard-pressed to detect them.

After they flew through the air for some time, Garen quickly caught sight of a black battleship in the distance.

The battleship was shaped like a Torpedo Ship, and had the words 'Maria Region' printed on it.

He flew straight for it, approaching the battleship as fast as lightning, and reached his hand out to grab it.

Scree!

He basically tore a hole through the outer layer of the battleship.

Garen and Turing walked straight inside. They stood in the white corridors of the spaceship, the red alarms above their heads blinking brightly and wailing sharply.

"Control this ship, but don't kill all who resist, leave some alive so they can steer the ship," Garen instructed carelessly.

"Understood."

Turing nodded, and immediately wrapped himself up in Non-Falling Light, crashing hard into the walls of the corridor.

Boom.

The alloy wall caved in, twisting and bending toward the sides, revealing their sharp metallic sides.

Turing walked in quickly, and dashed toward the front of the ship.

Garen strolled through the spaceship slowly, feeling the tremors coming from it.

Soon, there were quick footsteps coming from up ahead.

"Over here! The intruders are here."

A woman's voice kept saying.

All of a sudden, Garen sensed that Turing's presence seemed to have been suppressed.

"Hm?" He was instantly interested. No matter what, Turing was still a Non-Falling-Level fighter, even though he was weaker than regular Non-Falling Levels, and had fewer skills or abilities, he was still not an opponent an Inherited Level could take. And now, he was actually being suppressed.

"But we can't afford any delays now, we need to determine where we are, and we can borrow this spaceship's data storage and topographic map for that." Once he thought of that, he stopped his leisurely stroll, and strode instead toward the footsteps coming at him.

He walked down the silver-white metallic corridor and turned the corner. At the crossroads, Garen saw a group of young women dressed in golden clothing, jogging toward him while holding High-Energy Destruction Guns.

And the person at the very front, leading the pack, was actually a familiar face – Zero-Gun Sue-Anna.

Her signature crepe-like long golden hair was extremely eye-catching, add that to her gentle but strong-willed aura, and Garen instantly recognized her with just a glance.

Of course, Garen recognized her, but she did not know Garen at all.

Ka-chak!

They all raised their guns in unison. Before the team members who were about to shoot managed to pull the trigger, Sue-Anna held her arms open and stood in front of the nozzle.

"Nobody shoot!" she yelled loudly and abruptly. Her expression was abnormally nervous, her large and pretty eyes staring at Garen intently, unblinking.

Garen also lowered his battle-ready right palm.

"I want to borrow your topographic map, and head for the Blackboard Region's Blackboard City. That's okay, right?"

"S-sure." Sue-Anna had broken out into a slight cold sweat, and replied hurriedly. "Wherever you want to go, sir, we'll happily escort you there."

She could now sense the terror of Garen's power. After all, Garen was emitting a wisp of his aura, without any attempt to hide it.

"That's best."

Garen nodded in satisfaction.

Seeing that Garen was not very violent, Sue-Anna also heaved a sigh of relief. She signaled for the members behind her to retreat quickly, and ignoring her subordinates' worried gazes, she slowly approached Garen.

"May I invite you to move to the reception room, sir? Are you heading to Blackboard City? We happen to have some people from Blackboard City on board, and we just happen to be heading there now."

Seeing that Sue-Anna was being considerate, Garen decided not to press her any longer, and called Turing to pull back.

Anyone who could suppress Turing on this ship had to be a Non-Falling-Level powerhouse, and it was impossible for Maria to have that many Non-Falling Levels, so it was very likely that this ship was their main force, holding all of their elites. He just happened to bump into it.

"Oh, yeah, how did you recognize me?" Garen knew the look in her eyes, she was clearly not unfamiliar with him.

Sue-Anna laughed awkwardly.

"When you were at the Polar Region… we all saw your image, sir."

"Oh." Only then did Garen completely understand.

Nothing much happened on the airship, and soon they had reached the Blackboard Region. Along the way, other than Sue-Anna, nobody else came to disturb Garen, she was the only one who accompanied Garen with tea and idle chatter.

Clearly, she was worried that if Garen was surrounded by too many people and angered as a result of it, things might end up badly for her. It looked like Sue-Anna harbored no ill intent toward Garen, so he just let her approach him.

When they reached Blackboard City, Garen found a set of casual clothing on the ship, and put them on. Then he led Turing out, again quick as lightning, and instantly vanished down the vast and empty streets of Blackboard City.

On the spaceship, Sue-Anna finally heaved a long sigh of relief.

"At first I had thought that once that Non-Falling Level, Diofie, died, the Blackboard Region would not be able to hang in there. It never occurred to me that… this person was related to Blackboard City…"

"Looks like our original takeover plan needs to change, inform the Royal Region immediately. The Polar Region is over, and if we anger that esteemed man, the next one might very well be us."

A white-haired old crone appeared from behind Sue-Anna, speaking solemnly with her hands behind her back.

"Try to be as friendly with Blackboard as you can," sighed the old crone, before turning around and walking into the depths of the spaceship.

****************

Garen first visited Blackboard Academy, and saw that his teacher Van Doe did not seem to be around. However, it looked like he had just left, the coffee on the table was still hot.

After he blocked that terrifying tide that covered the entire Blackboard Region, the Blackboard Region, as well as the neighboring Maria and Polar Regions, all escaped safely. However, the other academies that were further away, such as the Central Academy, all incurred heavy losses. The energy tide could be considered a short one, and had not lasted as long as stated in the original history, but even so, it had severely injured the Willpower powerhouses from the many great academies.

The practitioners of Willpower at different stages had each sustained injuries of varying degrees.

Garen left a letter on the table. After he discovered the truth, he knew that after he and Baylon left, his teacher had been caring for Nono's relatives. Although he had given up on Garen in the end, he had still fulfilled his basic duties as a teacher.

This energy tide this time was Garen's repayment to the Blackboard Region.

There was no longer any reason for him to stay here in the Blackboard Region.

Garen led Turing back to the inner parts of the Academy Battleship, and as expected, Diofie had died. Many people were mourning him, gathering together and remembering him in silence, so Garen joined the crowd and watched a while. He soon realized that it was not just Diofie, on the list of the dead persons, it stated that all the Non-Falling-Level powerhouses who had attacked him, including the principal of Central Academy, had perished, without a single survivor.

"True, even I got seriously injured back there, what's more the rest of them." As for the grievously-injured Grand Duke of Destruction, Ice Dragon, and the rest, they must surely have all died.

It was a shame, since he had implanted so many Distorted Seeds, but in the face of that catastrophic power, all resistance was futile.

Originally, Garen was confident that he could safely withstand this tide, but he had not taken the star that suddenly appeared at the very end into account.

Judging from what Jeros said, it was highly likely that the previously-unseen star was the doing of Jeros' older sister, a woman called Gersa.

The members of the Wraith Royalty were selfish, and used whatever means to achieve their ends. Their bonds to each other were extremely shallow, so it was not surprising that Jeros' sister would do something like that.

But what bothered Garen was that the name Gersa seemed to have shown up before in the original history.

She seemed to have been a main force in the last resistance within Finite borders against the conquer of the White King, and had finally died after she failed in her challenge against the White King.