Volume 5 – Chapter 5 (in-editing v4)

Volume 5 – Chapter 5

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On the Second Layer, Humanity joined the Orkals, the Rakkonians, and the Farians as four separate species that climbed up from their own individual First Layers.  

On the Third Layer, however…

“There’s 17.” Micheal’s words echoed in the still, windless air as he jumped off nothing, activating his Cloud Stepping Shoes in one smooth motion.

“17 different species, all climbing up the 7 Layers just like us. 18 if we count humans.” Micheal continued.

“Wow, that’s… kind of a lot.” Shin sat languidly upon a small hill-sized floating island, more of a large boulder than anything else, watching as Micheal landed on the edge of the rock. A ring of fragmented rock floated around the island, spaced around 2-3 meters apart.

“Yeah.” Micheal grunted as he flung himself upward, towards where Shin was resting.

"Technically, only 14 of them are new to us... but that's still a pretty big jump." The numbers would only grow as they climbed higher.

As he flew through the air, Micheal activated his Silk Strider Gloves and shot forward.

The familiar hiss of titanium metal strands, coated in the faintest layer of Sword Energy, burrowing into rock echoed like music to his ears.

‘I should commission my Iron Strings Gauntlet again.’

In the first timeline, Micheal had commissioned an Artifact similar to his Silk Strider Gloves called an Iron Strings Gauntlet from the Inner Sea Mage’s Association. Crafted from rare metals harvested from the corpses of older Void Predators, the Iron Strings Gauntlet was a significantly more powerful version of Silk Strider Gloves, only requiring a single hand for a far stronger effect.

‘This time, I won’t lose it.' He’d lost the Artifact on the Fifth Layer, along with most of his possessions and nearly his and Shin’s life, back in the original timeline. The Endall Tree, after Sion killed it, was an incredibly harsh world to traverse.

The metal strands dug into the rock and latched on, letting him pull himself up with ease. The strands then retracted smoothly, quickly reabsorbing into his gloves.

As Micheal reached the top, he noticed Shin had stood up, and was staring intently off into the distance.

They had been travelling for around 24 minutes at this point, moving fairly quickly. Shin’s teleportation and Micheal’s extensive travel experience made quick work for traversing through and across hundreds of islands.

“14 huh? Which one is that?” Shin pointed towards a floating island roughly 120 meters to the northeast. It was one of the larger islands, a good sized 100-meters wide chunk of barren rock.

Upon that island sat a large, emaciated blue corpse, leaning against a small ridge of stone.

Micheal’s eyes narrowed his eyes as he jumped forward, Ki enhancing his muscles as he leapt through the air twice, once off stone and once with his Cloud Stepping Shoes.

He couldn’t quite clear the distance, not until he shot out a set of titanium threads once again and pulled himself forward.

With a quiet tap, he landed smoothly on the ground, stirring up a layer of stone dust.

Shin stood a few meters in front of where Micheal landed, smirking mischievously.

Micheal resisted the urge to roll his eyes at the teleporter’s antics.

“A Fenn.” Micheal answered Shin’s question as he examined the corpse.

“This is a Fenn.” Micheal repeated, before launching into more detail.

Fenn were pallid, blue skinned humanoids that stood roughly 3 meters tall. They possessed a powerful Physique that gave them immunity to the cold, and were born with inherent Magical Abilities related to the creation, control, and manipulation of ice.

Micheal knelt down as he took a closer look at the body.

It was a weathered male Fenn, covered in scars and slightly above average in height, at 3 and a quarter meters tall. It was dressed in a set of loose, white leather seal-hide robes, and had a large, rusty hookblade tied to its belt. There were no visible wounds or injuries on the Fenn’s body, but it was visibly emaciated, with all 36 of its rib showing through its skin.

“It looks like he starved to death. Probably got lost.” Micheal slowly stood up, leaving the corpse undisturbed.

“What a way to go.” Shin muttered after a few seconds, grimacing.

Micheal nodded grimly.

One of the benefits of gaining a perfect memory was the fact that Micheal could track his progress with perfect recall. He always knew exactly what direction he was facing, and could always back-track anywhere he had gone.

He knew his spawn point was in the southwestern corner of the Outer Ringlands, which meant he knew exactly where he needed to go.

‘The other races have it rough.’  

Out of the hundreds and hundreds of different races he had encountered in his first life, he could count on a single hand those capable of creating food from nothing.

“The Outer Ringlands are a deathtrap if you don’t know your way around. And…” Micheal’s voice trailed off after a few seconds before he continued, speaking in a whisper to himself.

“We’re still early.”

They were travelling before the advent of the Rush.

‘It’s one of the advantages of climbing up so fast.’

The Rush was a time period that began during the middle of the Fifth Wave and lasted for several years. During the Rush, billions of beings began to reach the higher Layers, climbing in earnest. This mass influx of travelers brought about a period of intense chaos and warfare on the Third, Fifth, and Sixth Layers alike. It was unknown what happened on the Seventh Layer.

Micheal turned away from the dead Fenn and walked over to Shin’s side.

“How far do you think you can take us in that direction, without going below half your reserves?” He pointed towards the northwest.

“Right now? Give me a sec…” Shin pondered briefly.

“I’m still getting used to long distance jumping. Everything also feels different here, I’m not sure.” The stronger gravity and higher energy levels made the world itself feel foreign to non-natives.

Teleporting with someone else took more out of Shin than simply teleporting by himself. It wasn’t too large a difference, but it was enough to be noticed, and enough to make a difference.

“What if we aim for shorter distances, but more frequent hops. Say, 10 miles (16 km)? Can you handle that?” Micheal returned.

Shin paused for a few moments before nodding.

“I could probably make 15 miles (24 km) work, every 15 minutes? I want more practice before we go beyond that.” Shin’s success on his first ultra long jump had more to do with the Nirvana Saint’s boosting abilities than his own prowess, though that wasn’t to say he lacked control. The time he’d spent training inside Tallanoran’s Inheritance had given him a wealth of experience and skill in regards to teleportation.

“Awesome, let’s try it.” Micheal smiled. They might be able to shave off an entire month or two of travel if this worked out.

“Remember to keep us facing the exact same direction we are now, and aim high, so we don’t fall into the Void.” He reminded his best friend.

“Roger, cap’n!” Shin gave a fake salute as he dissipated and instantly reappeared right next to Micheal.

“All set?” Shin asked as he grabbed ahold of Micheal’s shoulder.

“Whenever you’re ready.” Micheal nodded back, centering himself and forcing the tension out of his body. He took one final glance at the world around him-

And then he was gone.

Micheal blinked as he began to fall down, finding himself floating in the middle of the air.

Instantly, his senses snapped outward as he scanned the world, activating his Cloud Stepping Shoes to stem his fall. He felt Shin vanish from beside him, teleporting away a split second after he dropped Micheal off.

“It worked… probably.” Micheal muttered as he looked down.

Around 15 meters beneath him was a massive floating island, covered in a huge network of cracks. It must’ve been at least a thousand meters across, the largest island they had yet seen.

It was as barren as all the previous islands, but that was to be expected. Practically no rainfall touched the Outer Ringlands, nothing natural could survive here.

“What do you mean, probably?” Shin snarked as Micheal began to fall, watching him drop 15 meters and hit the ground without blinking, Ki-enhanced muscles tanking the impact like it was nothing.

“15 miles?” Micheal asked as he raised an eyebrow.

He might have travelled the Third Layer before in his first life, but it wasn’t as if he had committed every island to memory. He had no idea how far they’d actually jumped.

“About, yeah. It’s harder to judge distance when I go really far, I was more focused on keeping us facing the same way.” Shin gave Micheal a thumb’s up.

“Exactly the same.”

“Alright.” Micheal began to smile.

“I can work with this.”

.. .. .. .. .. ..

In the blink of an eye, 4 hours passed.

Micheal and Shin settled into a rhythm as the duo made their way from island to island, making use of Shin’s long distance teleportation every 11 minutes, the length it took for Shin’s Ki reserves to recharge after each jump.

If there was one word Micheal would use to describe their journey, it would have to be…

‘Different.’

The entire 4 hour stretch was, to him, unsettlingly different from his first life’s experience.

‘It’s so empty.’

The Third Layer was huge, so large that even now, across the entire four hours since they found the Fenn corpse, they had yet to encounter any other beings.

That wasn’t to say there was no life to be found: as they moved farther and farther away from the outer edge of the Ringlands, they began to find moss and lichen clumps. During the last hour, they even began encountering small clumps of bushes and even a few small forested islands.

‘Still…’ It felt strange.

In his first life, he had his first encounter within 20 minutes of arriving on the Third Layer, coming across an angry Earo, a short, stocky gray-skinned Troll-like humanoid, that immediately tried to kill him.

‘From billions down to a few hundred thousand per species.’  The number was even smaller when it came to humanity, at least at the present moment.

Compared to the Voidwellers, from the Nobles, to the Freemen, down to the Serfs, there were tens of millions of natives to contend with.

It was a stark change that he would need to adapt to.

A few minutes passed in silence the duo continued to travel forward before Micheal called them to a halt, stopping at the edge of a lush, 300-meters wide floating island covered in a small forest of dark brown trees, dotted with pale green leaves.

Micheal took a few steps forward into a small, open clearing near the edge of the island. After finding a spot he liked, he turned round and waved Shin over.

“Shin, you still have your Miracle Gems, right?” The rare Magic Gems were one of the few ways one could upgrade their Physique.

“Yeah, still got em, chief.” Shin nodded. He hadn’t had the free time to make use of them yet.

“We’ve moved far enough for now and you never know when we might get hit again, best we prepare ahead of time. Why don't we stop and use them now?”

Shin nodded back in agreement.

"Sounds good to me."

Swiftly, the blonde teleporter found a quiet place beside one of the dark brown trees that littered this island, resting his back against it before pulling out 2 shining Miracle Gems.

As Shin settled down to meditate, preparing to activate the Gems, Micheal kept a close eye on him, and began some practice of his own.

‘I might as well start experimenting while I have the time.’

Magic brought new opportunities into his life, but that didn’t mean he’d abandon everything he’d used before.

‘How best to combine Grandmaster Sword Mastery and Magic.’ It was a thought he’d begun pondering ever since he gained his first Mana Circle.

‘Let’s see if I’ve found the answer.’

The next Spell he intended to master was a Spell that was an order of magnitude more complex than all other Spells he had attempted.

It was a Spell that required poise, skill, and control, exercising Mana in a way he had never tried before.

“Shaping Mana, binding energy, and creating form…” Micheal muttered, his eyes glowing blue as he drew upon his Mana Circles.

As Shin began absorbing his Miracle Gems…

Micheal began his first step to mastering the 2nd Circle Spell – Mana Blade, precursor to the 3rd Circle Spell – Active Mana Blades.

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