Chapter 946 - Encounter
While Jason and Jennifer had left behind the Ninad beast realm after they had completed all the tasks they had come for, a hideous being emerged out of the shadows.
Spread through a ginormous crater that devoured the surrounding energy, several parts of the same body started to fly towards one point and slowly began to fuse together.
It was the center of the explosion that had killed numerous powerhouses and even beings of the Mecynar stage!
The energy that had been deprived of the surroundings was accumulating in that place, only for years to pass by without anything happening at all. But now, bright, shining, and endlessly deep eyes revealed themselves to the Ninad beast realm once again.
"It looks like I underestimated your resolve…Yinar race!! Let me treat you the same way I was treated for centuries by your society!"
While Jason's path was clear and filled with his determination to solve everything he had in mind without eradicating entire races, the Soul Monarch pursued his goals with shocking decisiveness.
The tale of the Soul Monarch was completely different, but little did Jason, let alone the entire Yinar race, understand what kind of existence the society had created by abandoning the Soul Monarch and his family, filling him with endless rage and contempt for the Yinar race.
Never would he give up and succumb to death, not until he could take revenge for everything that had happened in the past.
And this was the case even after encountering the Grim Reaper on death's door!
**
After emerging from the Shadow walker's portal, Jason and Jennifer had returned to Manyr.
There, the first thing they encountered was that the settlements of the Agrans seemed to have enlarged.
If Jason didn't perceive wrongly, the majority of Agran from the other side of the portal must have fled just before their settlement had been destroyed.
This was quite interesting because it meant that someone had the intel that their settlement would be attacked by wandering souls or the Soul Monarch's Guards and alerted everyone to evacuate the premises as soon as possible.
Yet, instead of giving it any further thought, Jason and Jennifer shot high in the air the moment they emerged from the portal.
Afterward, they exerted their strength before flying away at the fastest speed possible.
Their stigma activated and overlapped, allowing Jennifer to reach a high speed that was comparable to Jason's when he didn't use any divine energy.
With his Celestia aura and his fluctuations retracted up to the point where he was barely noticeable, they flew through the clouds which hid their appearance too.
Jennifer had also retracted her merged energy fluctuations, but while being in the clouds, she was not even able to see something as they shot to post the white fluffy clouds at breakneck speed.
It was a weird sensation and quite cold, even after she enveloped her body with a membrane of her merged energies.
As such, she relied on Jason's Emperor Eyes which led them in a specific direction.
Simultaneously, he was using small traces of his mana in order to empower the black fire affinity.
To add a layer of protection around themselves, he enveloped himself and Jennifer in a thin film of flames, which made them feel the heat of the flames but not to an extent that would injure them.
This didn't expose them to the outside world, which was quite advantageous for the given circumstances as they were right in the middle of an enemy's territory.
Thus, flying through the air over an extremely high altitude lessened their chances of being spotted and pursued.
Rather, Jason was able to see everything below him from a bird's eye view.
It was quite interesting and something that helped him see the natural treasures that were scattered through the landscape.
There was not much to see within the core area of the Shadow walker's territory, to begin with.
Yet, it made him think about the intel he received about other types of flames that were as rare as the Origin flames.
It made Jason question whether he should search for volcanoes or natural fire attributed environments that could give birth to such flames.
Nonetheless, it was quite weird to think about Solaris' needs while his other soulbonds didn't seem to encounter their racial limit anytime soon.
Even Petri seemed to be able to grow until the Specta stage, or even higher without undergoing a second evolution.
This was quite intriguing, and something Jason could think about while flying through the clouds with Jennifer by his side.
Both were in their own world, either trying to comprehend something or thinking about other things that were quite important for their future.
While flying ahead, Jennifer also attempted to accelerate the fusion of her vessels with her soul.
However, that was easier said than done because she had three vessels, and instead of moving her soul in each direction, altering the position of her vessel was easier.
Yet, moving the vessel through her body was painful, and certainly not something one could do effortlessly.
Thus, forcing her cultivation to progress faster was not something Jennifer could afford to do at the moment.
As such, weeks went by without much happening, and they had long since left the Shadow walkers's territory behind.
In fact, through the high speed they utilized without the need to rest, they had already reached Nature's will, one of the biggest territories in Manyr that was not under the control of any race.
Intelligent races and beasts were fighting each other, trying to claim lands within Nature's will, but nobody except the most powerful existences had been able to control small portions of the land that were filled with natural treasures, lots of cultivation energy, and various different enriching environments.
Thus, Jason's Emperor Eyes were spotting all kinds of things when looking down from the high altitude at which they were flying.
Without a specific goal in mind other than finding the world bridge that led towards Tagran, they could only search for a large city in which they could procure information.
However, that was quite difficult because Nature's will didn't seem to be the best place to construct a city.
After all, all kinds of beasts would immediately surround the constructions of the city, and destroy it at once.
This was something they would do in order to prevent intelligent races from creating a shelter from which they would expand their territory and powers.
It was only logical but quite annoying for both Jason and Jennifer, who had traveled for several weeks, just to figure out that the direction they had flown in for so long was void of large settlements.
Yet, instead of getting annoyed, the two of them admired the beautiful landscape as their surrounding was extremely calm.
Even the aerial beasts around them didn't really bother about their existence owing to the Celestia aura that calmed the ferocious beasts, showing them that Jason and Jennifer were not foes that wanted to fight with them.
It had been quite some time since his Celestia aura's calming effect had worked properly.
As such, Jason and Jennifer savored the quiet time without trouble.
While cultivating passively, Jason was slowly nudging his soul and mana core to reach each other soon.
Meanwhile, it almost looked like Artemis was reaching the fused state soon.
This was quite interesting, and even more helpful because her strength would increase by leaps and bounds the moment her vessel and core had fully fused.
In fact, Jason felt like his fusion took much longer than that of his soulbonds.
Even Jennifer was of the same opinion as she realized that all of Jason's soulbonds were quite affine with fusing their soul and vessel.
However, they quickly realized that this was the case for all beasts and that only intelligent races had issues with the fusing process of their soul and vessel as it was considered unnatural.
Yet, instead of letting this dampen his spirits, Jason recalled that intelligent races had far more advantages in comparison to beasts, to begin with.
Thus they were bound to have quite a few other positive traits, which Jason and Jennifer were slowly figuring out.
Weeks had passed by, and not much had changed until now.
However, little did Jason know that this was only the calm before the storm, and that the storm was about to reach him.
Dozens of races had been sent out by the Primordial races, just to find the anomaly that had entered the Dungeon of the Primordial Descendant, a halfling named Jason!
But that was not something Jason, let alone Jennifer could know, and they had different problems to face right now.
After all, a ginormous fiery red dragon was flying around a tree that towered to the height of several thousand meters, spewing out searing hot flames that were ought to burn down the treetop.
Yet, instead of burning down, the reddish-orange leaves of the tree just shone brightly, repelling the surrounding clouds as they absorbed the heat of the flames.
The sight was shocking, but even more so was the fact that Jason perceived a few peculiar energy fluctuations from within the treetop.
'There are beasts hiding from the dragon inside the treetop??'