Mystical Journey

At a small unnamed port somewhere in Slann.

Yuria was wearing a black windbreaker, and he leaped lightly onto a little black boat that rocked constantly on the surface of the sea. Looking at the woman in black who stood before him, his expression was heavy.

“Who on earth are you? What are you planning by calling me here?”

Several days had passed since he rescued Mind Reader, and they had been on the run ever since. After he realized that the latter had lost his mind-reading ability, he decided to see this kind deed of his to the end. He had gone to many lengths to get Mind Reader out of Slann, but just as he was about to leave, he received a mysterious message that told him to wait here for someone at this small port at this very time. They wanted to tell him something extremely important, it said.

He was not surprised to see that the one who invited him out was a woman dressed in black. She wore a veil over her face so he could not see her features properly, but Yuria found that there was something vaguely familiar about her figure and posture.

“You’ve probably noticed it, right?” The woman stood alone on a dilapidated little yacht. There were no signs of anyone else around her. A hint of faint red sunlight shone on the line between the sky and the sea, the lingering rays of a reluctant sun that had completely sunk beneath the horizon.

The sea breeze blew constantly at the duo’s hair and clothes, causing them to flap softly in the wind.

“Noticed what?” Yuria was perplexed, but he already had a gut feeling about it.

The woman laughed. “You’re no fool. A lot of things happen right next to you, and yet you pretend to see them. Or rather, you just look right past them,” said the woman calmly. “My name is Parakeet, you may address me as such.”

“Parakeet?” Yuria frowned. “What are you trying to say? You’re also the one who gave me those messages earlier, yes? Am I right?”

“Yeah… That was me.” Parakeet nodded slightly. She reached out her hand and pulled back some of her black hair. “Do you want to know the truth? If you do, come with me.”

She turned around and walked into the interior of the boat, letting down the boat’s drapes to block his view of what it was like inside.

Yuria hesitated. In truth, he already knew who she was with certainty. It was the mysterious girl who had rescued him once, the one who appeared suddenly and disappeared just as suddenly.

If she wanted to kill me, she’s already had countless chances to kill me. There’s no need for her to do it now…

He steadied his heart and strode onto the boat, ducking past the drapes and entering.

As soon as he went in, he felt a soft warm body fall into his embrace. It was Parakeet, and she wore not even one shred of clothing, her hand reaching for his crotch expertly.

The two of them tumbled into the already-made bed inside.

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

The seawater surged up and retreated, over and over again.

Garen looked at Slayer, who had sunk deep into the ocean. He was expressionless, feeling neither the joy of victory nor the pity that should be there.

He had assumed that Slayer was the ultimate boss, and Slayer was the strongest boss in the plot as well, but over here, Garen had discovered a few puzzling problems with that theory.

“If he was being controlled, then who is the true mastermind behind everything?”

Garen looked at his current Soul Rings. The third Soul Ring was complete, and the fourth was halfway done. Still, his most precious takeaway was not these Rings, it was the nearly endless rush of knowledge and experience regarding martial arts and killing that surged at Garen the moment Slayer’s Soul Seed fell apart. The reason he could use a single Soul Ring to such overwhelming effect was not only because his own Realm was high enough, more importantly, it was because his knowledge of the laws of this World and Universe far surpassed Garen’s.

Compared to an outsider like Garen, Slayer was a powerful being born and bred here, so naturally, his understanding of this World’s laws went far beyond what an outsider could emulate.

Now that he had this experience and inspiration, Garen finally noticed that his power usage rate, especially when it came to the usage of his Soul Rings, had only risen from what was about half previously to about 80% now. That meant that his power had more than doubled, right!?

“Slayer was so overpowered, and someone was still capable of controlling him… This thing behind him sure is deep…” Garen’s heart was slightly heavy.

He took out his Lighthouse communication device. At this point, there was no longer any more reason for him to continue staying here.

He activated the communication device with a smack, and as soon as he opened it, he received an influx of many messages from Nine-Tailed Fox and the others.

“Where are you? Garen! If you need help, just say it!” Nine-Tailed Fox’s message was very sincere.

“You dead yet? If not, gimme a beep!” Kong Xinxue seemed cold and distant, but there was a hint of concern.

And then there were the messages from his cell phone that had been transferred to the communication device.

“Minister, the east side is safer, and the search team probably won’t actively search for you. I’ll be waiting for you at the little green port, come here if you need any assistance or support.” Yuria sent a message.

“They’re such small fry, and still they dare to block your path, Minister? They have a death wish! Hahaha! Remember to call me if you have any new missions!” Butcher was as brash as ever.

“Sorry, Minister, we couldn’t do anything when you needed us.” Double-Tailed Scorpion’s message.

There was a long list of messages just like those.

Garen read them all, one by one, and then replied to a select few, like Nine-Tailed Fox’s and Yuria’s.

After that, he turned on the communication device’s projector.

Swoosh.

A three-dimensional transparent screen was immediately projected onto the sandy beach before him, and there were several options printed clearly on it, one of which was the option to leave this world. Others included forums, inter-World communication, item transfers, and so on.

Garen stretched out his hand to the ‘Leave World’ option and found that it required a certain number of contribution points.

Beep beep. Suddenly the communication device rang again, and this time it was Yuria.

“Minister, I might have discovered Illusionist’s whereabouts.”

Garen’s finger paused slightly.

“Illusionist…” As his disciple, Yuria had learned many of his skills directly from Garen. In a sense, their relationship was much stronger than expected. To Yuria, who respected his teachers greatly, Garen was like a teacher, but also like an older brother. If he had secrets that he would not tell anyone else, he still would not hide anything from Garen.

That was precisely why Garen vaguely saw of Yuria as something of a legacy or footprint that he was leaving in this World. Garen treated him like a descendant and never even thought of absorbing his Cornerstone ability.

“Where are you now?” he replied directly.

A reply came from the other end quickly.

“At a small port, I’m sending you the coordinates now. Master, I might really need you to do this personally this time. The situation is extremely dire and very troublesome.” Yuria’s words were particularly grave.

Garen mused over it. Yuria was a very honest guy, and he would never simply say anything he was not confident about. If he said it was bad, it must extremely bad.

Now that he had absorbed Slayer, this World no longer posed any threat to him. With his current level of Soul Energy, even if he were tossed into the center of a nuclear explosion, only his body would be destroyed at the most. His Soul Rings and Soul Will could easily find another body and be reborn once more, completely unaffected.

In that case, he might as well help his disciple once before leaving. It would be better if he could find Illusionist as well, an extra Soul Ring never hurt. And, from the depths of his heart, Garen had an inkling that the mastermind behind Slayer could very well be Illusionist. Illusionist had never appeared before, and no one knew his true identity. At the same time, he was the only one who could have controlled the terrifying Slayer, one of the Four Great Cornerstones.

After all, from what he had seen of Slayer’s combat power earlier, try as he may, Garen simply could not think of anyone else who could have mentally controlled Slayer.

“I’ll finish this last thing, and then I’ll leave.” Garen put away his communication device and walked toward the sea lightly. His legs rapidly left a long white line on the surface of the ocean, as though he was walking on dry land, and he headed into the distance, moving faster than a high-speed yacht.

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

Yuria embraced Parakeet gently, but his hand wandered all over her body slowly. It was not because he desired her, but because he wanted to feel the many scars littered all over her body. It was a dense swarm of millipede-like scars that looked unnaturally ugly.

Bu Parakeet’s superior skill in that aspect had shown Yuria an intense euphoria that rivaled drugs. That was enough to have him hooked.

“They’re real ugly, huh.”

Parakeet lay naked in Yuria’s arms.

The two of them held each other in the cabin of the boat as the boat slowly sailed into the distance, wandering further and further away on the calm ocean surface.

“No, that doesn’t matter,” replied Yuria honestly. “Is everything you just said true?”

“I’ve no reason to lie to you,” said Parakeet calmly. “The real reason I dared to come look for you here is because Slayer is dead.”

“!!!” Yuria was stunned. “That’s impossible!!” He had seen how terrifyingly strong Slayer was with his own eyes, armies from the three countries surrounded him, and most of the powerhouses joined the fray as well, but they could not even grievously injure him, much less kill him.

“There’s nothing impossible about it.” A gentle smile of release rose over Parakeet’s pretty features. “Slayer and I have Sight Sharing, so when he died, I was the first to know.”

Yuria paused.

“Sight Sharing?” He was slightly confused about the true nature of the relationship between this mysterious girl, Parakeet, and Slayer.

Parakeet did not answer immediately, but instead, she buried her head deep into Yuria’s chest. Savoring the warmth of Yuria’s body like a cat. Her own body was so cold, it barely had any warmth at all.

“You…?” As soon as Yuria spoke, she pressed her finger to his lips lightly.

“Did you know?” Parakeet opened her eyes wide, looking up and into Yuria’s eyes.

“I’m not actually as pure as you think I am…”

Yuria did not say anything and just looked at her confusedly. He liked this girl, even though she was mysterious, even though he knew far too little about her, he still liked her. And she had saved him before. That was reason enough.

“I… am the tool Slayer used for releasing himself,” Parakeet said with a smile. “Do you understand? Releasing.”

She moved her body lightly.

“Just like this.”

She instantly used her body to completely envelop a part of Yuria’s. The two of them merged deeply once more.

“Why…!” No matter how generous a man was, he would still be unable to accept that the girl he liked was actually another man’s…

Yuria was the same. He immediately felt as though the girl in front of him was unfamiliar and did not belong to him anymore. That feeling of destroyed innocence and the ecstasy coming from his lower body left him with extremely complicated and conflicting feelings.