Novel Myriad Life [Dark, Tragedy, Fantasy]

Discussion in 'Community Fictions' started by GDLiZy, Sep 9, 2018.

  1. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Hello, this is the second novel that I wrote. It is also at royalroad and scribble hub.

    Synopsis:
    Living life as a mortal, having a stable income and family love. Everything was going great for him, his life was filled with happiness and satisfaction.

    He had a lovely wife and a cute daughter who wished to be like him. His life had purposes, his life had meanings.

    But fate was never a benevolent force, due to predestinated destiny, his ordinary life was forcefully snatched away by the supernatural force above mortals' control.

    How could he live peacefully in this chaotic world where strength reigned supreme?

    Genre: Action, Adventure, Fantasy and Tragedy.

    Table of Contents:

    Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10
    Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20
    Chapter 21 Chapter 22 Chapter 23 Chapter 24 Chapter 25 Chapter 26 Chapter 27 Chapter 28 Chapter 29 Chapter 30
    Chapter 31 Chapter 32 Chapter 33 Chapter 34 Chapter 35
     
    Last edited: Mar 19, 2019
  2. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 1
    Forus Arder was a successful businessman, he lived a simple life of a simple man, his family was one of the countless small families in the country named Aorum. A small country in the huge alliance called the Mountain Union.

    In his early life, he had always been quick-witted and smart, he studied hard to gain a scholarship to continue his study of business management. He wanted to have his own business and his own stable income, to live his life to the fullest and to compensate his parents.

    While he was studying, he also needed to work for a small job, because of his family circumstances, his family needed additional income to support all its members, including his parents and his little brother.

    Later, his little brother went out to study aboard, he said that his new school would cover all the expense of his and this was his dream. Our parents overjoyed that my little brother studied aboard, it meant that his future would be bright.

    At first, he sent his letter once a month but as time went on, he began to send them least and least, his wording also had the feeling of distant. His parents and himself assumed that his brother was under a huge load of work and they didn't want to distract him.

    After Forus graduated, he went to the outside world and started his career as a merchant, he worked his way up and built his foundation step by step, his family condition improved at a steady rate, his business was booming, his life was at the peak.

    He had always wanted to go out of his country to find his brother, to see how he progressed. But his time was all occupied by various things, the only thing that made his mind felt at ease was his brother's letter that was sent to him once a year.

    On his path to becoming a successful trader, he found his loved one, she was a daughter of a small trader. They eventually got married and settled down, his family already had a strong foundation and could support itself.

    They got a lovely daughter to complete their family. She was a pretty girl, her long light-green hair and dark-green eyes were leaked with innocence and intelligence. Her memory and calculative ability was her strong point, her future as the inheritor of her father was clear as the sky.

    "Daddy, I want to become a trader like you! I want to make you happy!" High pitched voice of their daughter, Matia Arder, was exceptionally heart-warming when Forus heard it.

    "Matia, don't annoy your father, he is working right now." Forus could feel the gaze of his wife, Meria Arder, as he momentarily stopped working and turned to hug his daughter.

    "Father will play with you after you finish your homework, promise?" He extended his pinky toward his Matia, waiting for hers.

    "Yes!" She yelled happily as she ran into her room, working on her unfinished homework.

    At this point, his Meria approached him from behind, she dropped her body on top of his back as her arms wrapped around his chest, he could feel the
    intimating warm inside of her body as it radiated to him.

    "Dear, tomorrow will be our Matia's tenth birthday, what should we buy her?" She whispered her words quietly, not letting her daughter hearing any of them.

    "No worries, dear, I have got a big surprise for her already." His smile widened even more as he thought about his gift that he had prepared for his daughter.

    "Daddy! I'm finished!" A series of footsteps could be heard as a small figure rushing toward her father, Matia had finished her homework and was ready to play.

    "Just a minute, I'm coming." Forus put his work off and kissed his wife in the cheek lightly before holding his daughter's hand while walking toward the back garden.

    ...

    The entire sky was getting dark, the sun was setting, the moon was rising. Today was Matia's birthday, it was also the full moon day as well.

    "Happy birthday to you, happy birthday, happy birthday. Happy birthday to you." The joyful sound of Meria and Forus echoed the house, they were singing for their only child.

    "Daddy, mommy, thank you!" Matia walked over to hugged her father and her mother respectively, she blew all ten candles and watched as her daddy cut the cake into three pieces.

    "Look over here, mommy got a present for you." Immediately after hearing that, Matia's eyes glittered as she darted toward her mommy.

    Meria smiled as she handed out a small wooden box warped in colourful cloth, it was a picture frame that contained her beautiful and childish photos, the biggest of them all was the family photo, her daddy on her left, her mommy on her right, smiling from ear to ear.

    "Thank you, mom!" She was even more energetic than before, turning her head toward her dad, waiting for his gift attentively.

    "This is what your uncle brought for you, he couldn't come here by himself, he is my little brother who went to study aboard since young." Forus pulled out a necklace that was designed especially for his daughter.

    The gemstone that was engraved into the silver necklace was green in colour, the light that it reflected off caused the onlooker to feel relaxed and free.

    Once the necklace was in Matia's hand, the jewel in the middle shone faintly, no mortal would be able to detect it. But, at the moment the necklace was worn by her, the gem shone brightly in both green and blue, the invisible thread of power was absorbed by her, nourishing her soul.

    "Matia!" The unseen force exploded out, instantly blasted both Forus and Meria into the walls, causing them to crumble, Both of them finally landed on the garden behind the house.

    At the instant, the sky distorted and the earth shook, countless small leaves spang out from nothing to create a dome of plants. The land around the house was sealed by a thin layer of vines, preventing everything from the inside to get out and alerted the locals.

    "Meria! Matia!" Forus shouted loudly, his entire body was riddled with injuries, he could no longer stand or walk, his legs were broken from the impact.

    The vines that surround the house quickly extended themselves and formed a humanoid figure next to the floating Matia who was covered in bright rays of colourful light. They melted with each other and became one, the figure gradually transformed from plants into a humanoid figure.

    The figure was covered in a green robe that concealed its feature, the suppressive aura that it emitted caused Forus' consciousness to shake, the physical pain he felt paled in comparison to the mental pain he was experiencing.

    The figure looked toward Meria for a moment before turning its attention to her father and mother.

    "Mortals, for your descendant to become one of us, it is your eternal blessing. You shall be granted a quick and painless death." Its voice was distorted, impossible to tell its gender, or if it ever had one.

    It lifted its hand up, the green light was produced soundlessly, the light gathered around at the tip of its finger before slowly moving toward Forus and Meria.

    Forus turned his head to view his wife for one last time. She was lying there, motionless, her mind had already descended into the state of slumbering. Despair filled his mind, he was going to die.

    He felt regret, his regret for not finding his brother, his regret for giving his daughter that necklace, his regret for indirectly killing his wife.

    But before his life was about to end, a small cracking sound echoed the sealed space, the dome of vines was trembling. A hint of coldness quickly spread itself into the house, everything that came into contact with them got frozen spontaneously, including the moving green light.

    Finally, the dome of plants couldn't hold off the invader anymore, it shattered into pieces of frozen crystal and disappeared after a short while. A person wearing a blue robe was floating on the air, slowly descending onto the ground in front of the green-robed figure.

    "Long time no see." Many massive ice spikes appeared behind the blue-robed man, threatening to shoot toward the green-robed figure.

    Responding to the threat, colourful flowers bloomed all around the house, frequently producing a pleasant fragrance and causing the invisible pressure to weight down on everything in the area.

    "I only want this girl, you could have this as a compensation." The figure covered in green gestured its hand, a white wooden box magically appeared in its hand and started floating toward the icy-cold man.

    The flowers that blossomed also began to rot away, lessening the pressure that weighted upon everything.

    The man took the box emotionlessly and watched as the figure swiftly departed. Only after a long time had passed that he cancelled his ice spikes and looked at the remain of the house.

    Forus could see him smiled as his gaze fixed at him, suddenly, his entire body was frozen instantly, leaving him in the state of paralysis. He could only feel the sensation of death before he fainted.

    ...

    In the land far away from the location of the incident, a young man sat quietly in his own mansion. He had the aura of the supernatural entities and the invisible pressure like those two entities.

    A silver ring on his right hand lit up in both green and blue colour, causing the man to open his eyes abruptly, he sat in a daze before noticing the abnormality about the light that the ring caused, it was turning weaker and weaker.

    The man stood up immediately, his face turned grim as he gestured his hands in a systematic style and chanted unknown ancient spells. His mind was in the state of anxiety, something unexpected had happened.

    After a short while, the space in front of him twisted and broke apart, leaving a path toward darkness opened. Mystical and invisible energy gusted toward the darkness, slowly revealing the scenery that the path led to.

    The man swiftly dashed into the portal and arrived at the broken down house, only the aftermath of a battle and remain of the house could be seen, he was too late.

    His mind and soul screamed soundlessly as he tried every method he could to find the location of Forus and his family, alas, the trace of any unusual energy was wiped clean by those two long before his arrival, he couldn't find anyone nor could he deduce the killer.

    "I, Intor Arder, hereby declare, that as long as I live, I will avenge my brother and his family. If they were still alive, I shall protect them with my life!" His formless soul began to emit a dark and depressing aura, many complex hexagrams manifested themselves into the physical realm of existence.

    "With my power, I shall curse the enemies of my brother. For them to be dragged into the everlasting abyss and have their soul been suppressed!

    "With my power, I shall curse the enemies of my brother. For their descendants to have their bloodline rejected them, have them perished by their own bloodline!" The sky darkened, space distorted, time slowed down, evil laughter echoed the whole world. The curse had been sent out to complete its owner's commands.

    Intor felt his body was weakening, he would need years of rehabilitation before he regained his lost power. As for his shortened longevity, although it was not much, he had no ordinary way to restore them.

    But for his brother's peace, it was worth it.

    As he gradually walked toward the portal, he saw a collapsed female who was buried under a broken wall, she was on the brink of her last breath.

    The moment he saw her, his bloodline flared up faintly, he quickly appeared before her and injected his mysterious energy into her, healing her back from her critical state.

    "Brother, I will protect her for you, I will let her have a peaceful life, waiting for you to come back." He said softly as his soul felt relieved, he carried her with him as he departed from the ruin.
     
  3. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 2
    It had been a long time that Forus had last seen a ray of light, his entire body was bounded with black chains that obstructed his movement but also supplied him with energy to stay alive.

    After he was taken to this torture room, the man did everything to take him to the edge of death and back, allowing him to experience the feeling of hopeless and despair over and over again.

    "I have already saved your insignificant life, this is time for you to pay me." The blue-robed man said, not feeling any emotion whatsoever.

    At first, he had to experience having his body torn open while staying awake, but as time go on, he adapted to the pain and the monster in blue had to raise the quality of his torture to keep him feeling pain.

    He gritted his teeth till they broke, he endured the corpse-eating maggots infested his body, he watched his body rotten away at the visible rate, only to find himself unable to die.

    "Very good, the Death Aura around you are very thick. If you could produce the Aura of Decay, I shall grant you an eternal blessing. You shall become my faithful slave when you rebirth." The man laughed happily, the result of his experiment was very successful.

    An unknown amount of time had passed, Forus spent his remaining day in pain and suffering, his body was broken and reformed, his will was shattered and mended. His body and mind were strengthened due to extreme torture and mysterious pills the man used to nourish him.

    He also learnt that the man lost one of his precious treasure due to an unknown force targetting his soul, causing him to suffer internal injuries. His power dropped from his peak and he needed time to recover.

    At some point, he noticed that he could think clearly, he could now ignore pain and exhaustion. He tried to break free from the room, he formulated plans to escape, but, all thinkings of his was crushed single-handedly by the man's absolute power.

    He then thought about the man's objective, he listed all of his theories in his mental notes, he tried to verify them. He was waiting for his chance to live on, he was waiting for the final day to decide his fate.

    ...

    The man looked at Forus with anticipant in his eyes, from his calculation, today would be the day the first trace of the Aura of Decay manifested itself in Forus' body.

    "Today is your last day as a mortal, for your despair will create the aura capable of destruction, the Aura of Decay." His voice was shaking, he was very excited that his experiment would bear fruit.

    "This is my precious crystal, called the Jewel of Death. It was created by extracting resentful souls of numerous mortals." He pulled out a pitch-black crystal that absorbed all light that touched it and processed to send it toward Forus as if it was going to become one with him.

    After the weird crystal touched and merged with him, Forus felt an unimaginable pain, not one from his physical body but one from his mental mind. The Death Aura around him amplified countless folds, a new terrifying aura revealed itself within his body. It was the Aura of Decay.

    "It has been ten years since the start of this experiment, finally, I shall destroy the limit of mine and ascend to the higher rank!" He gestured his hands in a strange manner, twisting his arms in an inhuman way.

    The red lines manifested themselves on the floor of the torture chamber, forming a bizarre shape of a goat-head three-wings monster. The dark shadow of it stepped out from the red lines, the candles that illuminated the room turned blood-red, countless spikes grew out of the walls.

    Sounds of scream and songs of madness reverberated the whole room, chilling the mind of Forus. The laughter of the blue-robed man was accompanied with a wave of his hand, sending an undetectable force to drag Forus toward him.

    "Oh, Mighty One, this humble one has a life-long wish, please accept this gift and grant this lowly one his desire." He bowed down gratefully, completely submitted himself to the evil entity.

    In response, the entity sent its tentacles toward Forus, thrusting them into his body and wrapped around his soul, caressing it as if there was something it wanted. The movement of the tentacles caused Forus to feel the sensation of pain, he also felt a familiar feeling from it which puzzled him greatly.

    "Oh, Great One, this mortal was prepared specially for your greatness, he had the Aura of Decay within himself. This lowly one is willing to gift him to your greatness." He waved his hand, causing the power that warped around Forus to pull him toward the monster.

    Feeling desperate, Forus immediately made up his mind, his eyes were full of desire to live, to reunite with his daughter and to find his brother.

    "Great One, I shall bargain with you! The Jewel of Death and the Aura of Decay inside of me, I will sell it to you for the power to survive in this world. Grant me the power to survive and I shall give you all of them, you hear me? All of them!" Forus shouted at the top of his lungs, stunning the blue-robed man and causing the evil entity to pause for a moment.

    Weird and distorted sound of laughter echoed the whole chamber, a piece of goat-skinned paper was created out of thin air, detailing the condition of the deal. Power to survive for Jewel of Death and Aura of Decay.

    "Impossible! This isn't supposed to happen!" The man collapsed onto the ground, his eyes turned crimson-red, rage and insanity filled his soul completely.

    He spent too much on this one ritual, it was supposed to be the beginning of his rise, for him to ascend and reached the new height. But, his excitement and carelessness had caused him dearly, not only he failed to break through, he even gave the chance to bargain with the evil entity away for a mortal. Even worse, the items that mortal used to exchange for his power was also his!

    "Deal!" Without any hesitation, Forus immediately completed the contact using his blood to sign his consent.

    The paper slowly turned black after having contact with his blood, it melted away and transformed into the strange floating black mist. It then shot toward Forus and seeped into his body and fused with his soul, causing an unbearable pain comparable to when the Aura of Decay invaded his mind.

    His body felt a lot lighter than before, his mind became clearer than ever, his broken and exhausted body was repairing itself at the terrifying rate, shocking even the blue-robed man.

    "You maggot! How dare you destroyed my plan and ruin my wish?!" Losing control of his anger, frozen snakes formed themselves in front of him, they dashed toward Forus as the man pointed his finger at him.

    Forus tried to shift away from the trajectory of the snakes but his feet were frozen by the blue flame that was concealed beneath the room, it was one of the traps the man prepared for an unexpected ambush.

    He was struck by the soulless snakes and flew into the walls, his body was paralysed by the freezing venom of the snakes, he couldn't even lift his finger. He could only watch as the man walked toward him slowly, his eyes were shining with anticipant, there was no trace of the previous madness.

    "Well, since I have lost my chance to ascend, there is no need to get mad anymore. Instead, having gained a new experimental material, I wonder what type of power would I be able to extract from you?" The blue-robed man chuckled lightly, feeling delighted for his new toy.

    He was all by himself, he had no love or home. He learnt to live by himself and to suppress his emotion. The sudden outburst of rage was quickly subdued by himself, losing control over one emotion might affect one's progress.

    "What are you going to do with my body?" Forus spoke with difficulty, he could faintly feel his body so he tried his best to delay for more time.

    The man frowned as he sent an ice spike and slowly cut the right leg of Forus into two pieces. After seeing that Forus showed no sight of pain, he relaxed and smiled once more.

    "Because we are going to spend time with each other, I shall tell you. I am going to experiment and identify the power that you have gotten, but I won't have you as my slave anymore, I shall kill you and obliterated your soul, you will never be able to reincarnate again." He spoke slowly and clearly, he wanted his every word to engrave in Forus' soul.

    "I will never give in! I have the power to survive! That being would never lie to me because you are willing to trade with it." Forus retorted angrily, he could do nothing except speaking, he had to provoke the man into coming closer to him. He even had to endure the pain silently to let the man lower his guard.

    The man suddenly paused and vanished, his laughter resounded on the left ear of Forus. Before he knew it, he was blown away into another wall, silent immediately occupied the chamber once more.

    "This is disappointing, you have an easy way out, not being able to feel my torture." The man was frustrated, and once again, he walked toward the broken figure that was lying on the floor.

    When he was near the lying Forus, at the speed of sound, he threw out a green dart that was covered in small pink flowers. It stabbed into Forus' body, instantly paralysed him, Forus could no longer move his mouth.

    "You think that I would fail for you petty trick? I have already take account of the possible scenarios. Your mortal mind could not contend against our great mind." The man spoke with a sense of superior, it was the sense of pride that all predators felt when they had their preys.

    "The dart would continuously send a fixed quantity of Death Aura to obstructed your movement, you would effectively become a cripple." After taunting the victim, he lifted Forus up seemingly effortlessly and carried him toward the exit.

    The ray of light that shone on Forus' face caused him to fall in dazes for a moment, this was the first sign of neutral light he had ever seen for a long time. From what he had heard from that man, he had been in that torture chamber for ten years straight.

    After a while, he was thrown into a dark room again, but this time, there was no other accessories, only a rotten wooden bed was there. He could also vaguely saw many shape knives and cutters, it was evidence, this was the experiment room the man had been talking about.

    As soon as Forus lifted his finger, he could feel the Death Aura from the dart rushing into his body, keeping it into the state of living dead again. But he was also able to feel some energy flicking within his body, it was a stain of grey light. The grey light responded to the Death Aura, more specifically, it was responding to the dart.

    But before he could explore this stain of light thoroughly, the blue-robed man opened the metal door and came in unhurriedly, his cloth was now clear-white, its surface was embodied in some kind of magical shield.

    Forus then realised, the cloth was protection against the spilt blood and skin, he was going to get torture again. But at the thought of the grey light, he forcefully calmed himself down and showed a expression of panic and dread.

    "Now, this is time for a little warm-up. Don't worry, I won't let you die easily, your body and soul will be a valuable source of my knowledge. Who knows? Maybe my hope of ascension might be inside your body, to be honest, I am very interested in that power that you acquired from the entity." The man smiled wickedly, his laughter echoed the silent room as he began to dissect Forus alive.

    Forus, who was paralysed, could silently only watch his own blood get drain, his own skinned get cut. There was no sight of ending in this torment of his.
     
  4. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 3
    After enduring for an unknown amount of time, Forus could finally gain a little bit of influence over the mysterious dart that inflicted Death Aura on him. He learnt that the dart was not under the control of that blue-robed man, because if it was, then he would not be able to exert control over it.

    Although he could suppress the pain that the man did to him, the fact that he could not move a single bit made him incredibly uncomfortable, coupled with how he had to watch the man experimented on his body, cutting them apart and healing them, over and over again just to test his idea.

    "I have to admit that the power that the entity has given to you is very strange, I couldn't find the true usage of it even after several experiments, but that was to be expected." The man stopped working to do his daily meditation, he was going to clear his mind to reconsider the new possibility of that unknown power.

    His daily meditation was the only thing that let Forus know how much time had passed, it had been a week since he made a deal with that evil being. He might also start to doubt that the power really existed if not for the fact that it was being used to slowly take control over the dart.

    Forus didn't dare to exercise any control over the dart, even a little. He was afraid of the very idea that the man could detect his plan. If he got caught before he could freely control over the dart, his last hope would truly be extinguished, he would have no real way to retaliate.

    He also couldn't go all-out trying to control it either, his understanding over the mysterious nature of the man was too little, he didn't know the depth and the resource that the blue-robed man could use. The realm that he stood on was completely above any other thing Forus could ever imagine.

    ...

    The sun was setting, the sky was painted orange by the reflection of the sunlight. The falling leaves were numerous, they fell off to accompany the woman to sit on a bench. She was looking toward the sky, waiting for someone to come.

    Her face was that of a mature and aged woman, a trace of the story could be seen in her weary eyes. She had been sitting there for hours, there was no mysterious energy inside her body, she was utterly mortal.

    Behind her was a handsome man whose eyes were sharp as a blade, his yellowish eyes could stare at those with a weak mind into submission. His body was brimming with the invisible force that separated himself and those ordinary mortals.

    "Sister, you have been sitting there for too long, it gonna cause your condition to deteriorate." The man couldn't endure seeing her getting lost in her mind, he asked her softly, knowing full well of what she was yearning.

    "I know, I also know that I couldn't live for too long, but I always unknowingly recall my past. I wish that I would live a happy life with my family, even as a mortal." She turned her head toward the man, her eyes were watery as she wiped them out and walked toward him.

    "I know that I have said it so many time. But if you want to be with him, you can always cultivate under my guidance, I could help you breakthrough and move past the limit of the mortal to completely cure you." The man couldn't help but persuade her again.

    "If one day you succeed in breakthrough past me and ascend to the new realm, you can always find him at the cycle of reincarnation and live together with him, for as long as you want." The man said in a hoarse voice, the old memory from ten years ago was starting to resurface.

    "When he tried to protect our daughter, I couldn't do anything to help him, I can't even be there to support him and could only watch him die. Now, for he is now gone, I shall live my life peacefully as he always wanted me to. He lived and died as an ordinary mortal, then I shall be a wife that he always wanted, I shall live my life as an ordinary mortal, I shall die peacefully as an ordinary mortal." Her voice was cracked due to intense sadness and grief, her husband had already left her. If not for his brother that prevented her, she would already commit suicide and rejoin with him at the next reincarnation.

    "I'm sorry, I shouldn't send that cursed gift to your daughter, it was my fault. I could have been there by myself several times, but in the end, I couldn't even be there to see his dying face nor could I accompany him in his death." The gift that he sent to their daughter was to test her talent for sorcery. If she could become like himself, then his brother's family would be prosperous for all to come.

    But how would he know that fate was wicked and twisted, that there would be a passing sorcerer who noticed her extraordinary talent and forcefully took her to their own faction. Not only the child was taken, but the parents were almost killed by the process. If not for him to quickly move to check the situation, the wife would have already been dead.

    Although he had cursed the enemies with one of his strongest spells, he could feel that they were not dead, one of them had used a mysterious treasure to forcefully break the curse, he didn't die but sustained some internal injury. The other was killed easily along with his family, but later, he also found out that it was the clone that died and not its true self.

    So his curse couldn't do any real damage to their foundation, it could only prevent them from advancing further for a wide. He could also deduce that they were both stronger than he was. Worst case, they might have giant backing with formidable depths of connections.

    "But if you never cultivate and become like me, you might not have any other chance to save your own daughter again. If you have power, then you could have both of your family members lived peacefully." The man tried his hardest to convince the maiden to cultivate, not for his own good, but for hers and his brother's.

    "I have faith in our daughter, she would soon become the influential figure, an imposing sorcerer who reach the peak. I am a bad parent who let her daughter suffer unjustly, but this is also her chance to be extraordinary." She had completed faith in her daughter, she knew her child full well. The girl would suffer a lot, but she was adaptive and smart, she would soon learn to live in the harsh environment. She was destinated to become a historical figure engraved in the eternal history of the sorcerers.

    After having said so much, the weak woman coughed softly. The man also walked toward her and supported her up, her legs were very weak that she couldn't walk if nobody helped her. Her condition was very bad, the only way to save her life was to practice the art of sorcery or having the almighty sorcerer of the higher rank personally helped her, but they were too few and far between, those beings would always be in seclusion and hardly came out.

    "I will have to trouble you again, Mister Intor. My body was too weak to walk, I could feel that my death was approaching." She calmly said so. She was happy that she could reunite with her husband even in the underworld.

    "No problem. This is naturally my compensation for causing this tragedy, I am willing to help you and be with you until you died. I could also temper with your destiny in the next life so that you will meet him again." Intor Ander, the little brother of Forus Ander. He was willing to do everything to atone his sin, if not for tending Meria, he would have risked his life to slaughter those who separated the family.

    ...

    Time flew by, on a blink of an eye, Forus had been in this new room for months, perhaps years. He would never be able to remember the exact time he was tortured. He had been through hell and back, he almost gave up his little life for many times, only to be forcefully held back by the blue-robed man.

    One of the only things that held him in place and preventing him from scattered away was the warming memory of the past. When his family was still intact and peaceful, when his daughter was still within the range of his arm and when his wife was still there for him.

    His only hope lied on the speck of grey light within his soul, it had been continuously fused with his soul, allowing him to recover and strengthen his mental ability. It could also help him control the mysterious dart that was stabbed into him by that man.

    But, all of those enduring was the foundation of today. From this moment onward, Forus had already completed all of his preparation. He only needed to endure this for one last time and use the moment of weariness of that man to escape and kill him.

    "How are you feeling today? I've got a surprise for you." The blue-robed man chuckled as he pulled out a dark-blue seedling. Its roots were twisting continuously, it was more like a parasite than a plant.

    "What will you do to my body this time?" Forus spoke with intense hatred. If he still couldn't speak after such a long time, the man might suspect him of hiding something.

    "There is no harm in telling you anyway. This is my new creation, it still doesn't have a name. But after I used it on you, depending on the result, it would be either Blossoming Soulflower or Undeath Floret." The man obviously liked his new creation very much that he thought out two names for it.

    "Judging from the name, it would have the ability to at least make me your slave. You think that you could indirectly obtain my power by controlling me?" Forus sneered as he mocked the man, provoking him into fury.

    "I really want to see your expression after you became my servant. But don't worry, you won't die easily. I will take good care of your body." Having said that, the man sent the flower floating toward Forus. If the flower successfully planted itself into his soul, that would be the end.

    But before the plant could touch him, Forus decided to risk everything and exploded with countless Death Aura that was concealed in his body for a long time.

    The Death Aura that Forus emitted was very powerful and in great quantity, if the enemy was not the blue-robed man who took precautions against it, they would be overwhelmed by it and had their lifeforce sucked dry.

    "That was unexpected, but still within the range of my preparation." The man was not tensed at all, he was relaxed and carefree. He had prepared for this moment for a while now, he would not let the same thing happened to him again.

    Forus saw the man took out many paled-white pills and processed to pinch them, the pills were dissolved into dusk and greedily absorbed the Death Aura, reducing the overall amount of it.

    Gritting his teeth, he used every bit of his force to break free from the chain and gave himself many wounds in various parts of his body. Finally, his endurance paid off, the chains couldn't withstand the flow of time and his strength and collapse.

    Forus jumped toward the man, aiming his hands at that man's neck, he only had one chance to strike him and robbed him of his life!
     
  5. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 4
    The distance between the blue-robed man and Forus were not very far yet not very near. But with Forus last bit of his strength, willpower and hope, he had only needed one jump to reach that man.

    "Die!" Forus hand moved as fast as it could to the neck of the blue-robed man. With his warcry, the hand was like a sword that was ready to behead the enemy!

    "This is disappointing." Black chains that were originally broken down magically appeared behind the blue-robed man, the aura that they emitted were far superior to the previous version that used to lock Forus up.

    Before his fist touched the black chains, Forus disregarded his safety and forcefully controlled the Death Aura to condense into revolting mist and fused into his fist, empowering it with the power of Death itself.

    The Death Aura quickly eroded the skin and flesh of Forus' fist, creating the appearance of a deformed hand. Small pieces of bones were corroded and the flesh had rotted away at the visible rate.

    The collision of the rotten fist and the black chains caused countless sparks to sprinkle into existence in many different shades of colours, the spectacular scenery could only serve as the concealment to the devastating damage hidden inside.

    Forus was sent flying at the speed of sound because of the impact, his body crashed into the wall of the chamber, producing a deafening noise that would startle the weak minds.

    The black chains were broken beyond repair, they slowly faded out of existence because the energy the man provided was no longer enough for their usage.

    "In no way could I imagine that the Death Aura could be used in this fascinating way. Too bad, the aftereffect was too much for you to bear it." The blue-robed man spoke calmly as he walked toward the collapsed wall.

    Forus was struggling to even stand up, his body and soul had suffered too much damage for the ordinary mortal. Fortunately, Forus' body and mind had been tempered by the agonizing pain from the previous experiments, allowing them to withstand the injury.

    "It was regrettable that my plan could have been perfect if I could have more time to work with, your strange flower has ruined all of my hard work." Forus spoke with difficulty. All the time they had spent together was very long, they could be said to be a friend, if not for the fact that they were trying to kill each other.

    "You are one of the more interesting fellows I have encountered in my whole life. If only you didn't have the strange power inside your soul, I could have taken you as my disciple." The man was now standing in front of the lying Forus, he was waiting for him to stand up again, it could be said to be his experiment.

    With numerous troubles, Forus had finally stood up and reignited his fighting spirit, black flame started burning his fist again as he dashed toward the man.

    This time, the man, however, didn't have his chains prepare. He could only cover his hands with the changing sphere of ices, its temperature could turn the hot boiling water into freezing ice in a matter of a second.

    Like the previous round, both fists collided with each other, creating yet another round of flashing light. But this time, Forus came prepared, he had forcefully twisted his body to let only his fist endured the impact, causing it to be blown to smithereens.

    With his pale expression, Forus used his another fist, with black flame covering it, to slam it on the unexpected man. The blue-robed man was an intelligent man, he could predict a lot of things. But the minds of living beings were mysterious and everchanging, how could he know that Forus would ignore the consequences and destroy his fist to have another chance at hitting him.

    The Forus' fist punched the man's face directly. But, it was forced to destroy the invisible barrier surrounding the man first in order to hit his real flesh. The blue-robed man was a solitary sorcerer, after all, he needed at least several tricks to survive in this chaotic world.

    Although the barrier was not that powerful, it could still hold the fist out for a second, gaining the much needed time for the man to cast his protecting spell.

    Finally, this time, the man was the one that was sent flying toward the wall. Not wanting to waste any time, Forus rushed toward the man, enduring the pain and punching the man. Every time his fist landed on the protective barrier, bits of his skin would be frozen and dissipated away. It was truly the life and death battle that decided the fate of two men.

    "The Snow of Remembrance shall cover all thing!" A strange chant rang into Forus' mind, causing his expression to darken.

    Every vague word could very well be the fearful magic that could overturn fate and kill him in an instant. That was why he continued to exhaust the mind of the man, not wanting him to speak any chant.

    The white ring on his hand shone and actualised fragments of crystals then turned them into the white snow that could cause dreamy scenery within one's mind. The Ring of Recollection was the mysterious treasure he got from a legacy ruin he once entered. Although it had been the bitter past of his, he also managed to acquire the ring from there, but, he couldn't find any usage of it other than the Snow of Remembrance.

    Forus' eyes turned unfocused the moment he inhaled a tiny part of the snow, in his mind, an unimaginable scene was playing in front of him.

    ...

    "Dear, I have been waiting for so long, is the work today too tiring?" The sweet voice of his Meria was the best medicine for his exhaustion.

    "Dad, let us play!" Matia sneaked to the back of her father and jumped on him, riding him.

    "I would like to be here, but, this is just an illusion." The hoarse voice of Forus contained the hint of grief and sadness, how could his family be together after the incident, even more so with the same appearance.

    After saying the words that broke his heart, he closed his eyes and burnt himself with the flame of the Death Aura.

    ...

    When he opened his eyes again, Forus was lying on the ground. The blue-robed man was sitting at the opposite of the room, panting and coughing out blood.

    "How is this even possible?! How did you come out of the illusion?!" The man immediately stood up despite his injury and using his blood as the offering, he gained momentary momentum to use his last bit of power to kill Forus.

    Although the man had used extraordinary chains to bound Forus, they were nothing to the burning flame of Death Aura. When Forus burnt his entire body with the power of Death Aura, the chains were broken down almost instantly.

    Forus then shot himself at the man, aiming to finish him before the spell killed him. Because his entire body was burned by the flame of Death Aura, he could disregard the extensive injury he had within his body and used his last bit of force to extinguish the life of that man.

    By the time his fist reached the range of the man, many ice spikes were already presented themselves to wage the final battle with the fist that carried the presence of Death itself.

    "Meria, wait for me, I'm going to see you soon." If there was an afterlife, he only wished to be with his wife again.

    "Matia, I hope you are doing well. I am a bad father to you, I couldn't even be with you." If there was a choice for him, he would be by his daughter's side.

    "Intor, in the end, I couldn't even see your face." The profound emotions were contained within every word that he said, his every word was for his family, for his hope.

    A teardrop was the only thing on his face. Forus closed his eyes, he knew he couldn't survive this blow, he only needed to kill the man before him. That was enough.

    "Farewell." The burning fist hit the ice spikes.

    ...

    "Why am I crying?" The lady in white dress muttered as tears dropped from her face, everything she could see was blurry except for an ordinary figure whose face was everything to her.

    She saw that man waved at her and walked into the distance, leaving farewell words that would be engraved within her soul forever.

    "Meria, wait for me, I'm going to see you soon." He said, and without any hint of regret, he disappeared into the horizon.

    That day, Meria found herself sitting alone, gazing toward the horizon while tears were flowing down from her eyes.

    ...

    Intor Ander was meditating when he suddenly snapped his eyes opened in disbelief. He could feel that something unbelievably precious to himself had been stripped away from him.

    His eyes radiated colourful light, he could freely comprehend the mystery behind the magical spells and problems he couldn't understand before. When he got out of this state, his power would rise exponentially.

    "Brother, farewell. I promise to help your wife to get reincarnated in the most suitable place." He smiled tranquilly, his brother gave him his final blessing before he passed away.

    ...

    Matia was a very intelligent and talented lady. When she first joined the Flying Green Garden at the age of ten, her talent for sorcery was that of a great genius. She could rival those legendary talents if given enough time.

    Now, almost eleven years had passed since the first day she joined the Flying Green Garden. Her mastery over sorcery was very high, she was estimated to be able to become the second rank sorcerer in the next hundred years.

    Matia had no surname, she was an orphan who was picked up by one of the higher-ups of the garden. Her memory before she joined this place was sealed, she would be able to break the seal once she advanced to the second rank.

    "What is this emotion, why did I feel it?" Her dark-bluish-green eyes flashed as she began to determine the source of this feeling. Because of her great talent in both ice and plant element, her eyes and hair were influenced by them, turning bluish green.

    Suddenly, all the world around her turned grey, she could see no colour anymore, everything around her was colourless. Although people would panic in this scenario, Matia felt, strangely, refreshing and carefree.

    Little by little, the seals created by many higher-ups of the garden began to break apart, it was being devoured by a tiny speck of colourless light, causing many fragmented memories to slowly flow into her.

    "Daddy, I want to become a trader like you! I want to make you happy!"...
    "Father will play with you after you finish your homework, promise?"...
    "I only want this girl, you could have this as a compensation."...

    Countless information about her past was forcing itself into her head, causing her head to hurt.

    In her eyes, the only colourful thing in the entire world was her family.

    ...

    Outside the main gate of the Flying Green Garden, a green-robed figure was holding a weak string of light, he examined it for a second before crushing it into bits.

    "Only the last will of a dead mortal, how dare it think about coming to see your own daughter?!" The figure said in disdain before he flew back into the flying garden.

    At the same time, the change inside Matia's body was forcefully stopped, but the damage had already been done. Although Matia was never meant to hear her father's farewell, she still managed to get his blessing before it was destroyed.

    ...

    The result of the battle created an impressive shockwave that shook the entire underground dorm, causing many spell formations to break, many tools to be destroyed. Even if the man was to survive, the cost of this action would be very devastating, enough for him to have to change his hideout and start from the scratch.

    After the shakings subsided, silence once again reigned supreme, not a single sound nor movement could be detected as if there was no life within the entire area.

    "I, as a second rank sorcerer, was pushed into the hopeless corner and even almost die. This is disgraceful! If not for that mysterious curse, I would only need to lift my finger and killed this mortal!" The blue-robed man with only half of his entire body, the upper body, crawled out of the huge hole that was the aftermath of the great standoff.

    In reality, his power had fallen continuously since the surprise attack of the demonic curse, although it could not take his life, it had inflicted great hidden injury on his soul, he would need a huge amount of time to completely heal his soul to the peak state.
     
  6. Lunnear

    Lunnear BL Readers and Writers- [My Muse is Yaoi~!]

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    Oh you have me at your summary. Looking forward to seeing where would you take this to.
     
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  7. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 5
    Losing half of their own body was very fatal to all mortals, no matter how great they were. After all, they were just mortals. They couldn't be placed on the same standing as the supernatural beings.

    But, for a sorcerer to lose more than half of their body was not fatal to the sorcerer, they could use a series of tricks to restore it to its peak state, or it could even suppress its former state if they had enough resource.

    The reason why the blue-robed man had to avoid getting his body destroyed because his resource was limit, he was a lonesome sorcerer who had no backing after all. But, he also wouldn't be stupid to not use his resource to see his precious life.

    "Unfortunately, I still couldn't find the true usage of that power in the end. But I also gained much from this fight, maybe I might be able to become a third rank sorcerer." After dozens of healing potions, the man body was already healed to the peak state.

    But, before he finished writing his experience and characteristic of the special ability that he had just fought, a distorted sound laughter echoed the whole room, triggering many weird and unexplainable phenomenon.

    The sound of laughter was completely sinister and utterly demonic. The man could see the space around him was distorting, the time had slowed down and many twisting tentacles manifested themselves from the crack between the fabric of reality.

    "How could this curse be backed!?" He was shaken to the extreme, this curse was the exact curse that almost obliterated him into nothingness. If not for the fact that he had a precious treasure to protect him.

    He clenched his hand tightly, he was not willing to die, he was supposed to become one of the powerhouses of the world of sorcerers. How could he accept this?!

    But his effort was all in vain. In the end, his Ring of Memory was shattered, as well as all his other treasures. His defensive formations were completely worthless against the face of true horror beyond the boundary of reality.

    "It came once you were dead, it came after you were kidnapped. I understand now." In the face of death, his mind was as calm as the sea. He could finally understand all of them now.

    He watched as his body was penetrated by the twisting tentacles from the void, causing both his soul and body to disintegrate into pure energy before getting sucked out to the boundless void where the origin of the curse lied, leaving only faint traces of energy.

    ...

    A white-haired old woman lay peacefully on a decorated coffin, her funeral was attended by only one person. That person was a young man who stood beside her coffin, looking down at her aged face with overflowing grief.

    The departed woman was an ordinary mortal, she passed away due to severe injury from the past tragedy. She had lived her life peacefully as she promised with her husband.

    On the man's hand, he gently held a lonely ball of white light, its movement was faint and weak, it contained the memory of the deceased woman, all her past, all her happiness and all her tragedy. It was her soul.

    "Today, I shall fulfil my last part of my promise. I shall bless you with extraordinary gifted and fate. If nothing unexpected happened, you shall be reunited with him again in your next life." The man muttered quietly, he waved his hand and channelled his power, creating the vortex of holy light.

    He carefully placed the lonely soul into the vortex and watched as it flew with the flow. The vortex was the gateway toward the Reincarnation. The blessed soul would have a new life, a life of a talented sorcerer who would reunite with her past loved.

    After the vortex faded away, the man, Intor Ander, lifted his head toward the sky, he smiled faintly at the blazing sun.

    "Brother, I have finally found the man who took away your daughter. He was an elder of the Flying Green Garden. With your final blessing, I have reached the second rank. After I became an elder of my sect, I shall lead my sect to exterminate that place!" Clenching his fist, Intor walked into his training field. He was preparing himself to get stronger as soon as possible.

    ...

    A beautiful maiden sat tranquillity in her resting quarter, her figure was unmatched by all other ladies within the same school. Her light-cyan hair danced elegantly along with the gentle wind, her dark-cyan eyes reflected the true nature of all matters.

    Her eyes fixed on the location of a wooden door, it was decorated with white flowers with many shapes. Before long, the door was pushed open smoothly as another beautiful female came in, she was a handmaid for the maiden.

    "Mistress, the elders request your presence." The maid bowed deeply in a perfect manner, her short skirt lifted up unintentionally, revealing her snow-like tender legs. She looked more like an angel than a lowly maid.

    The maiden said nothing and only nodded to her. The maid's face blushed as she sneak-peeked on her mistress. Even though she was confident in her captivating look, she still needed to admit defeat when facing her mistress.

    Along the way, the maid would always walk behind her mistress. Furthermore, everyone else who saw her would offer their sincere greeting. She had a very high status within her school, coupled with her breathtaking beauty and incredible talent, she was the highest point of the dream of many people.

    At the banquet, many talented sorcerers busily accompanied the seniors, hoping to display their talents in hope for better standing within the school. Naturally, when the maiden arrived, many sorcerers stopped their work and came out to see her gorgeous appearance.

    "Mistress, these are the most promising sorcerers of this year." The maid quickly handed a sheet of paper to her mistress, the paper contained all the possible talented sorcerers within the school for her to choose from.

    "Talent was not the only deciding factor. I will choose my disciple by myself after the competition was done." The maiden spoke calmly, many had already expected her to say this and were not surprised.

    She walked on toward the platform where all other elders sat, she was the main guest of the competition and also the one who would open it.

    ...

    Countless days had gone by, moon and sun interchanged position for innumerable times. Scenery moulded, seasons shifted. Things of the past decayed as new life sprang forth from the death.

    A battered soul had been hiding within the corpse of an unrecognizable man for a very long time, relying on the leftover energy in the surrounding to sustain itself and healed its old wound, using them to remodel the certain aspects of the soul, stabilizing its foundation, improving its talent.

    At first, the soul was very small, it only had a faint thin layer of grey web holding it together, the grey web continuously fused with the soul, becoming one and the same, it could only rely on the grey web to help it digested the energy around itself.

    Soon, a hundred years had passed, the soul had stabilized itself, the mortal wound from before was already healed. It still needed time to absorb the energy in its neighbouring to grow to its normal size. The first cycle was completed.

    During its absorption phase, another hundred years passed by, the once fading soul had now become a new salubrious soul with a strong and stable foundation for its yet-to-create physical shell. Half of the entire soul was now fused with the grey light. The second cycle was completed.

    At long last, another hundred years had also gone by. The soul had crazily devoured all elemental force around it to the maximum degree, it was much more powerful than an average mortal soul. The soul was now grey in colour, it had completely fused with the grey light. The third cycle was completed.

    Once the third cycle was completed, the soul instinctively sent out some of the energy that it had consumed to create a physical shell, the body that it created was that of a matured man. From his appearance, he appeared to be an ordinary thirty years old man, but due to the affection in ice and light element, his hair was silver and his eyes were light blue.

    After the physical shell was maintained, the soul slowly flew into contact with the soulless body and began to merge with it, the process had taken place in a span of a day and a night.

    Finally, the young man slowly opened his eyes, he felt refreshed and carefree, his entire being was without worry. He was resurrected from the dead.

    "So this was the power you had traded with me." A smile spread across his face. His gamble paid off, the evil entity didn't cheat him.

    Forus then stood up and checked his surrounding, he needed to rest his mind and rethink his plan again. After the resurrection, his mental had undergone a tremendous improvement, he had experienced the sensation of death after all.

    After finished dressing up with spared clothes he found, he also began to clear out all the damage his past battle had caused. He will be the one living in this hideout from now on.

    After all the preparation work was done, he gazed toward the boundless sky and extended his hand forward. His eyes were flashing with determination to endure all the hard work and pain to reach his goal.

    "Only with power can one survive in this chaotic world, only with power can one defy fate." He said to himself then clenched his palm into a fist and punched it toward the sky as if he was challenging the heaven itself.

    "I am back." With one remark, the sky slightly shook, the great change was coming. But, was the world prepared?

    ...

    Ten months had gone by, Forus had spent his days reading all the books he could find. He was trying to test his newfound talents and elemental affection. But he quickly ran into a major problem.

    "The techniques couldn't be used by me at all." Despite many low grade and medium grade techniques, Forus found himself to be incompatible with all of them.

    He had already guessed the root of the problem, it was the mysterious grey light that fused with his soul. Now, feeling depressed, all he could do was collecting all the information from the records and tried to create his own little method to practice sorcery.

    He learnt that the man he had killed was a rogue second rank sorcerer who specialized in ice element and alchemy. He had also obtained the map of the surrounding. As he expected, he was still within the Mountain Union, but he was not in his home country. Instead, he was in a neighbouring country named Farrum.

    "I have no idea how long I had died and how many things had changed." Although major landscape like huge cities and mountains won't easily change, the small villages and towns could be gone with the passage of time.

    The area he was in was very isolated, no other humans could be seen in the prior month. If not for the fact that Forus no longer needed to eat and drink to survive, he might die out of starvation by now.

    "I will try to complete my method of self-learning and experiment with alchemy while I'm at it." Being alive was a joyous occasion, he would not be discouraged by something as little as this, he had already reversed his fate and go against the nature of things.

    The reasons why he had not considered joining the school like others were the unpredictability and uncertainty of the sorcerers. If the news of his death-defying power were to be discovered, he would no doubt end in the same fate as before.

    Forus focused his mind on his grey soul, the power that defied death slowly spread in all direction, covering his body and revolving in his veins. He was about to confirm his self-made method of sorcery cultivation.
     
  8. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 6
    The Death Aura that existed in Forus' soul continued to invade every bit of his cells, causing his flesh to rot at the visible rate. But, because of his harmful action, his body was being tempered in the extreme condition, making them much stronger than that of a mortal.

    But, this practice was very taxing, even for him whose mind had been moulded by the countless tortures he had suffered. He could only endure it for mere minutes before he lost focus and collapsed. Luckily, his grey soul could unceasingly send out a seemingly unlimited life force to heal his physical injury.

    "As long as it was not fetal physical injuries, my mysterious soul would heal all of them." Please with what his traded power could do, Forus lay down and recollected his thought. The direction he was heading was the probable one. Although it might not be the best, he was still able to acquire power from it.

    His alchemy skill was not that good, he might be able to create simple potions and the likes, but it came with the heavy cost that is the enormous consumption of raw material. All the items that survived the aftermath of the battle had either been used or rotten away by the passage of time.

    "It seems that I still have to leave this place and roam outside." Forus had already finished preparing his necessary items, he had thought about going out for a while. Although he did not expect that it would be so soon, he still packed everything in his free time.

    Forus, cloaked under his black robe, walked into the distance and out of the hideout. Before he truly departed, he turned back to look at the place for a long time. That place had contained his tragic memory and also opened the gate that he had never hope to enter.

    ...

    During the time Forus had roamed inside the forest, he had battled with many different beasts. There were times that he won but also times that he had to flee. In this period of time, he had never ceased to practice his body tempering method.

    At night, he would find a cave to stay hidden from the true terror that traversed in the darkness. When he was sure that he was safe, he would then use this free time to practice his self-harming technique.

    Forus channel the Death Aura to invade his body again, but this time, he had completely merged the aura with his entire body. Due to this succession, his skin turned black and emitted the rotten odour, but there was no sight of rotten flesh anywhere. Instead, his body could now explode with greater strength than his previous self at ease.

    Forus blinked his eyes in amusement and laughed loudly. He already had the feeling of breaking through after a while but knew to himself that he could not rush things. But now, he was finally completed his first step and became the peak first layer sorcerer apprentice.

    Before one could become a dignified first rank sorcerer, they needed to prepare their body and soul to be able to wield the power of natural energy. That was where the stage of sorcerer apprentice came into play. There were three layers of the sorcerer apprentice stage, at first layer, one would expel the waste inside their body and strengthen their body.

    At the second layer, one would try to gather a fragment of natural energy and store them in their soul, tempering their soul and mind. At the third layer, the sorcerer apprentice would try to comprehend their innate self and embrace their elemental affection, thus finally stepping to the first rank sorcerer.

    Now, after he had become the peak of the first layer, he was eager to battle with the beasts that had once defeated him. He knew that the beasts were very good training partners, it had only raw power and nothing else. Unlike the sorcerers who had a crafty mind and tricks to backstab their opponents.

    Soon, days passed, Forus was training himself with his new-found strength, trying one fighting styles after another, wanting to find the most suitable one for himself. His raw power was still the same, but the way he could use it had drastically changed due to his continuous practices and refinings.

    ...

    After many cycles of day and night, Forus had met the first brunch of the travelling merchants. He, however, did not reveal himself and only trailed them from behind. The action of revealing oneself in the middle of a forest alone was too suspicious and unnatural. He only needed to follow them to the city, not to greet them at their face.

    Once the merchants arrived at the city, a young girl walked out of the carriage. She was surrounded by several people, presumably her servants. Her appearance was very attractive. Her short red hair gave off the feeling of hot-bloodiness, coupled with her orange two-parts dresses that covered her slender legs, her entire figure exuded the air of the noble.

    "Let us go meet my father at once." A lovely voice came out when her cherry lip moved. The servants bowed respectfully toward her before they rushed to arrange a brand new carriage for her.

    In less than a minute, the carriage had already arrived at her place, waiting for her to enter. For many people to willingly work for her, she must have a very high status in that city.

    Before she entered the carriage, she turned around and looked at the forest where she had just come from. Her gaze penetrated countless covering plants and directly landed on the concealed figure that had been trailing the carriage for a while. The figure and she made a brief eye contact before it silently retreated into the forest.

    "You have such a great pair of eyes. Just wait, I shall add you in my collection soon." The only thing she could see beside the darkness that engulfed the figure was its attractive eyes, the radiant they gave off was like a bright moon that danced on the night sky.

    With her mumble, she walked into her carriage and it set off, slowly moving toward a huge mansion. But, her mind was not on the subject of today's matter, it was already set on obtaining that pair of gorgeous eyes.

    ...

    Forus did not know how long he had been running or how far he was from that girl. Her eyes weren't that of a human, it was the eyes of a monster. She could see him even under the bush and very far away from the city border. With one glance, she sent out a mental attack on him. If he was never tempered his mental with the tortures from before, he would have been paralysed and got captured by her.

    For that reason, he had fully committed every detail of her appearance into his mind. He would avoid her and everyone related to her at all course.

    After he himself felt safe, he quickly found himself an abandoned cave. He took this opportunity to take a short rest and rethink his decision.

    "It seems that I needed to change my appearance, especially the eyes and hair." Although the girl had the eyes of the monster, she was at most the third layer sorcerer apprentice. Her eyes must be transplanted onto her with the help of her family.

    A true sorcerer would completely and utterly bound Forus in place without any chance to resist.

    From the studies and scrolls of the blue-robed man, Forus had learnt many useful spells and techniques. He could get a little creative and create his new appearance that looked as ordinary as possible.

    "I also lack many materials to perform my alchemy practice as well as studies to continue refining my method of cultivation." Forus was very poor, he only had things that could not be sold.

    Finishing all his plan, he stood up and walked out of the cave, preparing to find raw materials to perfect his disguise. He would also train himself with the wild beasts while he was at it.

    ...

    A middle-aged man was sitting alone in a cafeteria, he ate his food slowly, trying to get every bit of taste out of it. That man was Forus. After he had disguised both his eyes colour with a simple yet hidden spell, he dyed his hair with natural colour from the flowers and plants.

    This cafeteria was a special place, a trading site created for and by sorcerers. On the surface, it was like any ordinary cafeteria, people coming to eat food and have fun. But beneath the ordinary surface, many traces of magic was intentionally left behind for the sorcerers to see. The place was opened for every sorcerer to trade their items.

    Any sorcerers could come in if they showed their proof and never caused trouble. Forus decided to walk around the trading site to try to find any suitable ice or light elemental spells as well as various raw materials that were required for his alchemy training.

    He didn't hope for any precious cultivation methods. They were extremely valuable for anyone to sell them. Each of them could be considered a legacy treasure.

    Once Forus entered the underground floor of the cafeteria, he was greeted by the guards who demanded his proof of sorcery. He immediately released the frosty aura and intimidated the guards. They were frightened like rabbits and let him passed.

    "Attention! The latest wanted list from the Coruscare family had been changed!" A figure was speaking loudly on the stage for displaying the news. He threw the scroll toward the sky, the scroll then unfolded itself, revealing a silhouette of a black-robed man.

    "If anyone could capture this man alive and bring him to the mistress of the Coruscare family, the one and only Ocelia Coruscare, that person would be able to select a spell from her family's vault!"

    Everything about this man was unknown, except for his sky-like pair of blue eyes. The man in the picture was clearly the true appearance of Forus.

    Heaving a sigh of relieving, Forus thought to himself that he was lucky. If he didn't change his appearance before he came into the city, he might now become a plaything of that girl.

    While strolling around the market, Forus also kept the mental notes about the overall economy of the sorcerer world. It had become his habit since the first day he decided to work as a merchant.

    Due to his past experience with all the trading, he quickly grasped the flow of the goods after spending some time on the site. He also thought about becoming a trader inside this market to earn his income but decided against it after some thought. He had no real way to protect himself as he didn't understand the political scene of the city yet, coupled with the lack of his foundation in both cultivation base and backing, blindly trading here would be a big mistake.

    "I needed my foundation stage to reach the second-layer to have some forms of respect in this place, only then could I entered an organization and slowly building my assets over the time. I could also create business related to gamble and lottery, like in my past life." During his first life, Forus could become influential because of his new type of business. He had planned many types of business, many failed and cost him fortunes. But some also managed to achieve success such as gamble dens and lottery stores.

    His simple yet brilliance idea was not too well-known because of its scale, he could only do it in the small towns or small city. Otherwise, he might unintentionally offend those behemoths of the city and got instantly shut down.

    Forus smiled faintly, no matter which life he was, his root as a prosperous trader would always follow him everywhere. He had decided to quickly cultivate and gain as much strength as possible before he could open his business.

    While he was planning his future work, the Coruscare Family was also planning theirs.
     
  9. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 7
    Days passed slowly but steadily, nothing too special had happened yet after Forus had disguised himself and lived in a random cheap inn.

    In the past few months, Forus had made quite a profit in the form of knowledge and records. The hard currency that normal sorcerers used were Mystical Orbs. They were natural gemstones that could store the earthly energy inside of them. They could be used to absorb the energy or traded for other goods.

    Forus had tried to consume them to accelerate his cultivation progress, but, he found that the average Mystical Orbs were not effective to him at all. So he turned his attention toward the exchangeable records and goods. If he couldn't absorb them, then he would trade them for other things that benefitted him.

    When he was still an ordinary first layer sorcerer apprentice, he had to rely on the few Mystical Orbs he had from the pocket money of that poor blue-robed man to buy and sell raw materials and herbs for the big clients.

    Now that his cultivation had broken through the first layer and became a second layer sorcerer apprentice, his power had skyrocketed and could easily defeat any first layer sorcerer apprentice with his physical body alone. He finally had some standing in this lawless place now.

    His shop was at a not too crowded or remote place. He had opened a lottery shop with the grand prize as much as one thousand Mystical Orbs. The price for one ticket was only five Mystical Orbs. The possibility of getting a grand prize was around one-ten-thousandth which was not very interesting, but there were also more prizes that had a higher chance with lesser reward.

    His shop was very thriving among the poor of society. Many of the hopeless first layer sorcerer apprentices had come to try their luck with the lottery, hoping to one day get a grand prize. Their greed had clouded their rational mind with the momentary happiness of getting a smaller prize.

    "Next time, I will get the grand prize." Everyone thought the same. This was the reason for Forus' success. Greed was the downfall of those hopeless ones.

    Because of his successful marketing, he had not needed to concern himself with the fund for his alchemy practice anymore. After all, the Mystical Orbs couldn't be used to aid his cultivation, so he didn't need them for anything other than trading for goods and raw material.

    Now that he had enough stable income for his alchemy practice, his skill natural advanced by leap and bound. He could produce most of the well-known potions with low risk of failure.

    Although he couldn't use the ordinary potions he created to aid his cultivation progress, he could use them as a mean to strengthen his physical body or emergency recovery. They would be one of his lifeline in the unpredictable future.

    He had also tried to produce new types of potions to suit his need. His body was examined to be very compatible with the Death Aura. If he could create potions that purify his body with condensed Death Aura, he might be able to use them to aid his cultivation progress.

    With his hope ignited, Forus was out to buy more books to absorb more knowledge. He didn't have enough confidence in himself to join the sorcerer school. He might get caught by the higher-up and fall into the same tragic fate.

    "Just a little more time and I might reach the peak of the second layer." Because of his tempered mental mind, his progress on the second layer had been faster than other. There would be no one who could come back from the dead.

    "Mister Forus, your friends have come to meet you." The landlord had knocked on his door and spoke to him. The sound of footsteps echoed outside his house. Many unknown individuals had come for him.

    "Coming." He spoke casually before hiding a blade under his sleeve and took out a throwable potion. The potion had a decaying effect that would delay the assault for him to escape.

    He smiled brightly before opened the door. Behind the door were many robed men and women, they stood behind a young man whose bearing was that of a noble.

    A countless thought ran inside his mind, Forus still smiled as he greeted the young man with admiration on his face. From his style of clothing, he should be from the Coruscare Family. The signature of this Family was a black star with blazing orange flame.

    "Greeting young master, what could have bought your presence to this one's house?" The young man was very pleased with himself. He instinctively raised his opinion about Forus.

    "I have received the order from the family elder bring you to the eldest mistress of our family. You should feel proud to serve the eldest mistress. She is destinated to become an influential figure." The man said to Forus with kindness. If he could make a connection with this soon-to-be personal manager of the eldest mistress, his future would surely be better.

    "Guards, prepare a carriage for this man. Remember, he is going to become the sole property of the eldest mistress. Treat him well." The man issued the command to the guards. They quickly made their way out to prepare a luxurious carriage.

    "Young master, I would like to have some time to prepare myself first. If the mistress sees me in this attire, she might get angry at me." Forus needed to delay this invitation as long as possible. That girl must have already known my identity.

    "The mistress had said that I must send you to her right now." The man hardened his voice. He was very annoyed by this commoner. Even though he was going to be the personal manager of the future clan head, not anyone could look down on the Coruscare Family.

    Right after he said his stand, Forus immediately threw out a bottle of liquid toward the young man. The bottle exploded, causing its content to leak out. Everyone was panic and swiftly retreated far away from the door.

    "Retreat! It was a poison potion!" The tallest guard shouted loudly. He was their leader.

    When one unlucky guard contracted the liquid, his face turned pale and screamed miserably, but nothing had happened to his face. His legs turned weak. He dropped onto the floor. He was confused by the turn of the event.

    Once they regained their cool, they found that Forus had already fled from the scene and disappeared into the wildness. He had purposefully chosen a remote house to live in because it was easy to escape the city.

    "You go reported to the mistress. The rest of you shall organise a search team to locate that man. The will of the mistress must be carried out!" The young man spoke in an angry manner. He thought that he could curry favour for the mistress but it turned out bad, and he had to take responsibility for it.

    They must also do it secretly. If other rival families got any wind of this, it would damage their reputation and affected the clan as a whole. For so many second layer sorcerer apprentices from the big family to let a rogue sorcerer apprentice escape, it was very disgraceful.

    "This man escape from us for some unknown reasons. He likely had a secret that he didn't want others to know. Looking at many potions lying around here, although it was of low quality, it was enough for me alone." His eyes reeked of greed. If he could have these potions for himself, maybe he might break through to the third layer in no time.

    The man wasted no time to walk around the house, attempting his best to choose only the best potions. He didn't take his storage ring with him so he couldn't bring too many potions.

    Once he reached the only bedroom of the house, he was shocked to find that there were two medium quality potions hidden under the bed. Many alchemists could only create the lower and low-quality potions. Only the talented individuals could concoct the medium-quality potions. Every one of them was expensive and hard to buy.

    "Maybe the World Will had finally acknowledged my effort and grant me a fortune!" He instantly rushed toward the potions and grabbed them.

    Suddenly, the floor beneath his feet broke, causing him to lose his balance and fall down. What greeted him under the ground was many sharpened wooden spikes. The spikes penetrated his body mercilessly. His organ and blood fell down onto the ground, leaving him who was hanging on the spikes.

    His mind struggled madly as he began to regret. The last sound he ever heard was the explosion that engulfed his corpse, destroying the house, along with the trap. Not even a single hair of his would be left. Not one evidence of overwhelming amounts of potions or trap laid by Forus would be left.

    Greed was a great part of his trap. If the man could resist the temptation and cast a physical detection spell, he might have a chance to survive. After all, there was no sorcery involved in this traps.

    ...

    Not long after the death of that man, the news of Forus escaping had been sent to the eldest mistress of the Coruscare Family, Ocelia Coruscare.

    "Very interesting, you managed to escape from those weaklings. As expected from the owner of those eyes, not bad at all." She was sitting on her extravagant chair, drinking her black tea. She was carefree and not afraid of Forus escaping at all.

    "Young mistress, your father sends me to tell you the good news. The Orb of Wanderer was ready for your use." The old butler said after he elegantly poured the warm black tea for her.

    "Very well, it was about time I go and take those beautiful treasures of yours. I could feel that I would break through and become the first rank sorcerer after I had them." Ocelia said with confidence, causing the butler to overjoy. The young mistress whom he had taken care of since young was about to become the dignified sorcerer.

    With her wonderous talent, she could easily become one of the strongest first rank sorcerers. When she ascended, her status as the future family head would be set in stone. No one would be able to shake her sturdy foundation and power.

    He quickly regained his composure and led the mistress toward the room where the Orb of Wanderer was located. Inside the room were many third layer sorcerers. They were all a part of the family security. Their duty was to do every trivial thing for their mistress and protect her when danger arrived.

    She didn't even need to cast the spell. Everything would be done by those guards. She was only there to see the result. The butler promptly brought his mistress' favourite black tea to pour them for her.

    Right when her cup of tea was empty, the blurry scene manifested itself on the orb. A mature man was navigating through the forest. His appearance was mostly cloaked in the torn black robe, leaving only his black eyes unguarded.

    Ocelia Coruscare smiled at the scene and extended her hands out toward the orb. Her hands repeatedly caressed the orb where his figure was shown. Her obsession with his eyes was at the borderline between rational and madness. Her eyes fleshed with happiness. Her body faintly shook.

    The man stopped walking the moment the mistress' hands touched the orb. He slowly raised his head and looked straight into the Ocelia's eyes. He waved his hand and channelled his power into a ring in his hand. The ring shone faintly, releasing a ray of light. The light instantly travelled toward the orb and obstructed its vision.

    The Orb of Wanderer couldn't withstand the power and many cracks appeared on it. Finally, the orb exploded, causing the guards to suffer a severe backlash and cough out blood.

    Although Ocelia Coruscare had many protective treasures, she couldn't activate them in time and was blown away by the impact. Her body was injured but by not much.

    "Call the doctor and report this to the family head!" The butler's word echoed the room as many guards rushed out to follow his command.

    Although Ocelia Coruscare was only slightly injured, her mind was in chaos. This was her first unexpected lost. It made her felt many profound emotions. Her desire of obtaining his eyes was slowly advancing into something else.
     
  10. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 8
    Forus Ander felt that someone was watching him. He focused his conscious and unleashed a detection spell, only to receive nothing suspicious, but that only caused him to become even more anxious.

    "Undetectable and unseen, the treasure of the sorcerer family is very amazing." For someone was keen as him, this was very obvious to deduce who was behind this feeling of uneasiness.

    Without any hesitation, Forus immediately direct his mental energy into an ordinary ring on his left hand, causing it to shine brightly before shattered into fragments of light and flew toward the sky. The light smashed into an invisible object and destroyed the space around it. The explosion sound echoed the forest before everything returned to its state.

    Forus watched everything unfolded with his emotionless eyes, but inwardly, he felt pity that the treasured ring which he got following the struggle against blue-robed man would be employed this quick.

    After a while, Forus felt his whole body became paralysed. The sensation was very valid and genuine, causing him to frown. He promptly accelerated his speed before he blended in with the forest. He would leave this city and hide away from the Coruscare Family, more importantly, he would never appear in front of that woman again.

    "Found you." Interrupted by a voice, Forus quickly jumped away from his current location and threw a bottle of unknown liquid into his former position. The spilt liquid didn't catch its target and dissolved the plants around it.

    "As expected of someone who could escape the encirclement of the Coruscare Family, you sure have some awareness." A figure approached Forus casually. His yellowish hair was very eye-catching, coupled with his reddish eyes, it gave him the air of a hunter.

    Forus slowly retreated back while observing the man before him. He was waiting for the man to make his move first. The man smiled and stared right back at him, waiting for Forus to make his move first. The deadlock was formed after a short while. The one who moved first would lose.

    "What do you want?" Getting stuck in the midst of escaping was not an ideal situation Forus wanted. He had to break the deadlock or else the Coruscare Family would get hold of him.

    "Nothing much, really. If you could obediently go back with me and fought the Coruscare Family for my family, that would be for the best." The man was one of the opposing families that had their eyes on the asset of the Coruscare Family.

    Forus relaxed his body and nodded his head without any hesitation. The man also smiled back with a warming smile. He had the upper hand in the negotiation because he had nothing to lose while there were consequences waiting for Forus.

    Forus kneeled down and bowed his head, giving an image of a servant greeted his master, but, Forus instantly threw out three tubes of corrosion liquid at the man and jumped toward him.

    Facing the sudden turn of event, the man expression darkened. He couldn't escape the corrosion radius of the potion. Half of his face rotted away upon the contact, causing him to scream in pain and despair. The body of the sorcerer apprentices couldn't withstand the corrosion of the exotic liquid.

    "How dare you?!" His question was met with an empowered punch. Forus wouldn't let his enemy stabilized himself and used their treasures to fight him. He took the initiative and punched the man consecutively, leaving that man to helplessly defend for himself.

    Although the man was one of the young masters of the noble family, his combat ability was very high. After being on the losing side for a bit of time, he decided to weaken the force of a punch and used the remaining force to send himself flying and land on the safe distance, effectively widen the distance between Forus and himself while giving himself an ample time to balance himself.

    But how could Forus give him any time? He instantly jumped to the man, closing in rapidly without any care for the obstructing plants or rocks in the way. Along with his flight, the black flame engulfed his fist, causing the skin to turn black and released rotten smell, the smell of death.

    His fist accurately landed on the man's chest, creating a cracking sound of bone-shattering. Despite using both of his hands to block the hit, he still couldn't defend against the ruthless and destructive strike. His body was sent flying and struck into a giant boulder, causing him to cough out blood.

    Without any moment of resting, another round of flying bottles was thrown toward the location of the boulder. Although Forus himself didn't have any strong and explosive long range spells, he still had his various types of potions to compensate for his weak points.

    The sound of the explosion could be heard as the giant boulder was blown to smithereens due to the strange reaction that was created by a mixture of different potions. During the moment between life and death, the necklace that was concealed within the man's robe flashed, creating a one-time barrier to protect its owner.

    The invisible barrier spontaneously enveloped his entire body, protecting him from the large explosion. Although the treasures of the sorcerer family were great, no one would give the best treasures just for one of the descendants when he or she couldn't even become the true sorcerer.

    Even then, the barrier absorbed much of the impact before it shattered. Without any treasure to protect his severely injured body, the man was once again launched into a nearby tree, slamming into it and knocking the tree down. His broken body lied on the ground, his legs were broken during one of the explosion, incapacitating his ability to move freely.

    "Why? Why did you do this? Don't you afraid of the power of the Ninguis Family?" Ninguis Family was another clan that rooted in the city. It was an opposing force that rivalled the Coruscare Family. They had received the information about Forus getting the attention of the strongest mistress of the Coruscare Family, so, they decided to use him as a pawn to destroy the reputation of Coruscare Family before finally disposing of him.

    "Such bad luck, escaping the superpower only to find another one. Constructively offend both of them at the same time." Without wasting any precious time, Forus created a sealing dorm of ice and snapped the man's neck while concealing his appearance and disguised his aura as one of the Coruscare Family.

    He never trusted himself to be able to avoid the detection of the giant powerhouse, so, he had openly disguised himself as the Coruscare Family for Ninguis Family to get an excuse to demerit the fame and demerit the influence of the Coruscare Family. None of the families would be free enough to chase a junior like him, effectively giving himself a buffer time.

    But all those results would only matter if he could avoid this crisis first. Everything would be void if he got caught by either of the families. They would certainly involve him in their political battlefield and disposed of him off once they exhausted his usage.

    Forus turned around and started running again. This time, he skillfully hid his track and instead of running outward away from the city, he slowly navigated his way toward the city again.

    Although both families would be at war soon, it was simply impossible for their clansman to not try to search for him. They would naturally order their servants to keep watch of him, both of them would race against each other to find him.

    In order to not waste any time, they would begin to search around the forest and at the nearest city, none would have thought that Forus would dare to come back and hide in the city.

    "My new appearance needs to be much more convincing than the first one." Making up his mind, he quickly pulled out a short dagger and slash his own face, causing blood to gush out madly. Forus suppressed the pain and used his healing potion to heal his wound but he intentionally let the scar remain. He used his dagger to create holes on his own robe until they looked worn out as if they had been used for a long time.

    Satisfied with his new look, Forus began to hunt some preys to further solidify his disguise to be the real hunter.

    ...

    Since the incident that shattered her confidence, Ocelia Coruscare hadn't spoken any word that didn't relate to him, the man who had blue eyes. She had become obsessed with his sky-like eyes, no, she had become obsessed with his entire existence.

    Her sorcerer power had risen to a greater height after she experienced her first failure. It was a hidden fortune under a disaster. Her state of mind had been unchanging ever since.

    "Mistress, the respected lord had dispatched an expert to capture that man. With the help of him, you will have his eyes as soon as possible." The old butler who was pouring black tea for his mistress reported the news to Ocelia. Seeing that she stopped her train of thought and stared at him, his mind trembled as sweats ran down from his aged face.

    He was suppressed both physically and mentally by her gaze alone. After her transforming, she became like an entirely new person. Her gaze could peer into the deepest part of the observed one.

    "His eyes? They are not enough. All of them, I want all of his. His body, his mind and his soul, I want every bit of them." Her eyes flashed and slowly transformed into that of a snake. They were the eyes of a hunter.

    "This one shall inform the respected lord about your command." The butler's voice was shaky. There were hints of profound emotion such as fear and respect in his words.

    After that, the butler went to inform the family head, leaving Ocelia Coruscare sitting there alone, thinking about that man. Thinking about that beautiful eyes, she touched her own eyes. She could know that her eyes would feel the same as that man's eyes.

    "My lovely doll, I shall have you soon. Very soon, I could sense it with my eyes." Chuckling to herself, she smiled and took a sip of her favourite black tea. Although it used to be delicious, she couldn't differentiate between it or water anymore.

    She knew that she herself had lost control over her emotion when she thought about him, but why should she care? It was very beneficial for her to catch him because she might break through the third layer and become the true sorcerer.

    To embrace one's inner self, to accept one's obsession. The more obsessive you were, the harder you would achieve your goal and the stronger you would be once successfully completed their wishes.

    ...

    "Mistress, your disciple had broken through the bottleneck and become the peak of the third layer today." A beautiful lady spoke to her teacher, her voice contained various emotions and gave off the cheerful mood. Her every movement was adorable and gentle to the utmost, anyone who saw her would appreciate her beauty.

    "Little Florie, remember that the outside world is not like our flying garden. The sorcerers outside of our sect are ruthless and evil." The teacher reminded her disciple again. She had had a very tragic experience in the past.

    She waved her hand, causing the wood element energy to gather around her and condensed itself into a ball of green light. She extended her hand and gently touched the ball of light, reforming it into a wooden ring that had an emerald gem engraved in it.

    Not only that, but the kind teacher also pulled out a staff that was covered with small and delicate flowers and handed the treasure to her disciple. There were an enormous amount of sorcerer energy and various protection spells sealed inside the staff, they were made to protect the little miss when she met with danger.

    "This is all I can do to help you. The path toward sorcery was filled with sadness and grief. You must not lose to the temptation and forget your root." Little Florie bowed her head to show respect to her mentor. She bid her farewell and slowly departed out of the resident that she and her teacher always lived in.

    "Don't worry, teacher, I shall not disappoint you and breakthrough as soon as possible. With my talent and your guidance, it won't take long for me to come back." The little miss muttered excitedly, this was her first time to go out of the sect to gain experience. Although she tried to be cautious, her unrefined state of mind still thought that the outsiders were no match for herself and her teacher.
     
  11. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 9
    Forus Ander stood there, watching the henchmen of Coruscare Family destroyed his store. There was no emotion in his eyes. He felt nothing. He was indifferent.

    His lack of emotion surprised even himself. He only pondered for a moment before stopped thinking about it. He could feel that it had something to do with his return from the dead.

    He gazed at the henchmen who had very low sorcery mastery, but, he did nothing. He felt that it wasn't worth his time and the drawbacks outweighed the benefits. He also couldn't reveal his identity at the moment.

    "I must use this period of peace as efficient as possible." He muttered to himself. In this peaceful time, he had to establish his identity and solidified his status in the city. He concluded that joining an organization would benefit him greatly.

    Almost no one would want to offend the person with a great background. Even the sorcerer family would also have to rethink their decision. They wouldn't charge in and demanded the detail of their members' personal information, or worse, demanded to capture said member.

    He would no longer need to worry about material for alchemy practice after he joined the alchemy organization. He could even obtain the sorcery techniques and used them to improve his method. He also needed more variety of sorcery spells to help cope with his long-range weakness.

    After paying some gold for the bartender, Forus could easily get the general information about the independent organization within the city as well as their influence within the Mountain Union. With this piece of information, Forus began to construct his long-term plan.

    Time flew, in a blink of an eye, the sun had already set, the moon had already risen and floated majestically on the night sky. Forus left the cafeteria and went back to the inn. He had decided to join the organization named Steel Cauldron. The organization was created for the rogue alchemists to unite and defend against the suppression of the sorcerer family.

    With that thought in mind, Forus began to prepare himself and went to sleep early. Although his body didn't require eating or sleeping, it was a great way to relax his mind after days of scheming and dancing with life and death.

    ...

    "Greeting, mister. How could I help you?" The receptionist spoke her usual script as natural as possible. She had said this particular lines for countless times, so much that it became a kind of habit for her.

    "Hello, I would like to join the Steel Cauldron as an alchemist apprentice." Forus spoke and tossed a Mystical Orb toward the young receptionist. She caught it nicely and smiled before handing out a paper for him to fill his information.

    Falsus Nomen, a second layer sorcerer apprentice, joined the organization as an alchemist apprentice. He filled everything that needed to be filled but left most of the sensitive detail remained vague.

    "Mister Falsus, the recruitment and examination day would be a month from now on. We will send a letter to your place when the day is approaching." The receptionist had noticeably become more respectful toward Forus after he gave her a Mystical Orb.

    To everyone else, the orb was very precious, it could be used to buy potions or to fasten the cultivation speed, but to him, it could only be used to buy materials and some low-grade treasures.

    Falsus smiled back at her and walked away into the distance.

    Once he had gone out of the sight of the receptionist, a group of sorcerer apprentice gazed toward his direction, subtly revealing their greed. They nodded at each other and quietly walked out of the building.

    ...

    Forus continued to stoke into a remote location of the city. This was where all the pubs and motels were located. Everyone would get in and out without causing any disturbance, or else the attention would be on them.

    "Young man, instead of spending your gold and time on these useless women, you should give it to use. Consider it as a form of investment." The same group of people that followed him slowly surrounded him, threatening him to hand them the Mystical Orbs he had.

    "Why do you think that I personally walk into this remote place?" This weird and unexpected question caught them off guard. Why would Forus trap himself here instead of staying in the public area?

    Forus silently tossed a bottle of strange liquid toward the group. As they were just ordinary sorcerers, they instinctively catch it, causing the container to break off and the liquid inside to leak out.

    Followed by the scream, a series of punches were thrown out. Not long after the scream, the group was lying on the ground, trying their best to hold their cry of pain in. Getting beaten by an unknown person was bad, getting noticed by their friends was worse!

    Forus walked off as he was contemplating about the news that he got from those men. A small auction for the sorcerer apprentices was to be held in the next week, any sorcerers could join by paying a deposit of some Mystical Orbs. The deposit would be kept by the host if it wasn't used to purchase the items in the auction pavilion.

    It was a very good opportunity for him to acquire some treasures to analyse and used as another layer of protection. As for the Mystical Orbs, he had more than some of the first rank sorcerer, after all, his business had the foundation as the greed of the human which was, by nature, boundless and senseless.

    When he came back to his room in the inn, he sat down and meditated, reconsidering the actions and choices that he took earlier in the battle. He was trying to improve his fighting style and reviewed his overall performance in every aspect. Aside from cultivating his Death Aura, he didn't find any meaning in doing all the pointless actions such as going out or playing with girls.

    The loneliness in his heart was unable to be filled by an ordinary feeling of happiness. His empty heart was unmoved by the tragedy or grief of others. His heart was strangely yet fascinatedly indifferent toward the world.

    That day, Forus spent his night cultivated his Death Aura until the sun raised up to the sky. He looked up only to find the boundless sky with one bright star on it. Although the sun was big, in comparison with the sky, it was as insignificant as other things.

    "If I stopped changing, would the world also stop?" A question that needed no answer echoed in his mind. Shaking his head lightly, he stood up and prepared himself for the auction that would soon take place.

    ...

    "Old man, prepare me a carriage in the next week. I agreed to join that small auction." The beautiful yet cold female commanded her butler, in which he responded with a respectful bow.

    "Your will is my order." Although he didn't know why his mistress would want to go to such a poor and insignificant auction, he still had to carry out her request.

    The mistress lightly shook her hand, the sorcery energy that leaked out immediately formed an image of a leaning tower. The tower had six corporeal floors and one last incorporeal floor at the top. Many small balls of fire were floating inside the six floors, they were the fire spirits that she had created for many years of her cultivation.

    Although the seventh floor of the leaning tower was not formed yet, it still gave off the feeling of mightiness. None of the fire spirits dared to approach the stairway toward the incorporeal floor. They could sense the unknown entity that slumbered within the unreal floor.

    "I shall get you soon, I could sense it within my soul. Your everything will be mine." Her voice was like the decree of the empress, causing every fire spirits in the magical tower to bow their head when they received her decree.

    ...

    Walking on a lively road, little Florie tried to buy every little tasty thing and stuff them into her mouth. When she was still in the school, she could only eat the old and boring salad. She, as a little girl, had always wanted to eat the delicious food from all around the city.

    "Young miss, from you graceful aura, you must be one of the esteemed sorcerers! Please receive this invitation to an auction. Your presence would surely brighten up the whole event!" A young boy said to her while handing out an invitation, he had said these words for countless times to countless sorcerer apprentices.

    The little miss was sent into dazed for a while because of the sudden bombardment of praise before excitedly took the invitation letter. From what her teacher had told her, she needed to experience the life of ordinary sorcerer apprentices to refine her mental state. The safest place to do so was to join an auction as an observer.

    "Next week? Very well, this lady will go and brighten the mood for everyone!" She had decided to join the fun. Although she couldn't defend herself from the true sorcerers by herself, her teacher had gifted her many protective treasures. She could at least survive an attack of a second-ranked sorcerer.

    While thinking about the exciting event that she would soon be able to attend, her eyes wandered into another form of candy. They had the shape of a bloomed flower and looked extremely tasty, causing her mouth to crave for them. She wasted no time to abandon her train of thought before rushing in to buy some of them to eat.

    She was having the time of her life, extremely carefree and relaxing, without any sadness or grief.

    ...

    In a private room of an inn somewhere in the city, two men were having a conversation about the auction that was about to come. The first man had the air of arrogant and wore some kind of smooth yellow coat, judging from the material of the clothing, the coat was very expensive and wasteful.

    Another man was the exact opposite temper and air of the first man, he wore an ordinary grey coat and was very calm and passive air around him.

    "I heard that the auction this time would be a bit different, what could it be?" The arrogant man spoke while sipping his tea, obviously every relaxing. He had total confidence in himself at fighting any second layer sorcerer apprentice one in one.

    "From what this one heard, a rare middle-grade treasure would be sold at this time auction, but, the price would not be just ordinary mystical orbs." The man reported his information to the young master respectfully. He knew his limit and also knew when to back off and lay down to avoid the calamity.

    "A middle-grade treasure? Interesting. I wonder who was the owner of this treasure. Get his identity for me." He coldly ordered the poor man without any care of his feeling. They were only commoners, not enough for his attention.

    "Yes, young master." The grey-robed man responded with a bow before leaving the room. Once he closed the door, an uncontrollable smile broke out of his face, he chuckled to himself before forcing himself to remain expressionless as natural.

    "You think you could play me all you want? I will give you the same feeling of suppression like when you snatched my sister away from me." The words he uttered were filled with madness and hatred. This man had a deep and dark past. His family was torn apart by the big sorcerer family due to the beauty of his sister.

    Since then, he had been trying to avenge his parents. He had joined the big family as a servant and slowly advanced to become a henchman of this yellow-robed young master, he was the one who wanted his sister.

    Now, his life-long plan was about to hatch, just by thinking about the expression of despair when that man finally crumbled and died could make him trembled in excitement.

    "Sister, I'm going to save you. Just wait for me." He was reminiscing about his past happiness that couldn't be achieved again. A drop of tear was all he could do for those memories.
     
  12. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 10
    Feeling that the rays of light had touched his skin, Forus instinctively stopped his cultivation and opened his eyes. The sun had chased away the stars on the sky and eclipsed the moon, shining brilliantly at the summit of the world.

    As expressionless as ever, Forus began to remind himself with all the necessary information he had written down on his journal. He also remembered that today was an important day. It was the official opening of the auction.

    He thought for a moment before coming up with a series of plans. To go to the auction, he needed to forge his identity and appearance to avoid the suspicion of the influential sorcerer families in the city. The eldest mistress of the Coruscare Family was still the massive shadow that loomed over his mind. Her unpredictable personality and mysterious abilities had reminded him of the dignified sorcerers.

    Putting on a simple robe, Forus channelled his sorcery energy to change his bodily structure and facial appearance. His new body was now a slim man with a pale face. Coupled with his worn out robe, he looked like a poor random street citizen.

    Walking away into the distance, Forus strangely bent in with his surrounding, as if he was always there. The way he walked resembled all those civilians beside him. Only a ring on his hand would stand out from his unimpressive appearance. Without paying any attention, one would never be able to see Forus within the crowd of mortals.

    With a moment of thought, Forus had already stood in front of a tall pavilion. There was an enormous wooden sign hung above the entrance, radiating an aura of mystical power. The title of the building, Oak Forest, had been carved on the board with some help of a sorcerer. When the onlookers saw the board, the lingering power would ease their mind and relax their body.

    "Please show us your invitation card." The servants of the auction repeated the same words over and over again. He would ask to verify the authority of the card and sent the guests into the building, but there would be some exceptional cases why the managers needed to come out and greeted the guests personally.

    These guests were unmistakably from the influential families with a great background. They always had the arrogant bearing and superiority complex. Treating everyone as an inferior being was their mindset.

    Fortunately, Forus got into the building without any trouble. His regular appearance wouldn't get any attention from the young masters at all. They even disliked the plainness of the poor.

    Once he got inside, another servant came in and guided the guests into the chamber. Because of his low-status ordinary invitation, he could only sit at the outer layer of the room. Only the higher-class cardholder would be able to sit near the stage.

    Then there were those from famous families. They would stay in their private rooms with all sort of services. No one would be able to know who stayed in the room without his or her permission.

    The sound of chatting between friends and acquaintances gradually built up, but as soon as the manager walked in, the whole room quieted down almost immediately. Everyone's attention remained fixed on the stage.

    Only the welcoming speech of the manager echoed the hall. He spoke slowly, trying to build up the hype surrounding the event. If not for the uneasy feeling he had, Forus would have relaxed his mind and took a nap. After all, he was merely a peak second-layer sorcerer apprentice. He was nothing compared to those who had the support of their family.

    "The first item is the Wooden Liquid Bow. It is a perfect bow for the sorcerer trains in a long-range assault. It could empower the arrow with natural elements." One after another, the manager introduced the treasures tirelessly. Those who wanted the treasures bid until their pocket ran out. Most of them were the people who sat near the stage, but the one on the private rooms rarely bid. Once they did, none would dare to bide against them.

    "Next is the Decaying Dawn Ring. A ring found in the ancient ruin, but because of the passage of time, the resentment of the owner had fused with the ring, making it unusable." After hearing the introduction, Forus' mind trembled. His gaze instantly locked onto the ring, trying his best to memorise the feature of the entire ring.

    There was the familiar aura floating around the ring. It was a dark and depressing aura that could stress one's mind. Observing the dark particle, Forus smiled faintly and made up his mind to obtain it. It was the Death Aura!

    "One hundred Mystical Orbs." Forus slowly stood up and clasped his hands together and bowed his head for those around him. He was begging them to let him had the treasure.

    After seeing his manner, many others sorcerers from the influential families wouldn't compete with him unless it was necessary. After all, they had their reputation to protect. If they bullied the rogue sorcerers for something so disappointing and useless, other would have looked down upon them.

    "One hundred and fifty Mystical Orbs." A man in a yellow robe spoke arrogantly with the evil intention to toy with Forus. He sat near the stage, indicating his higher status than ordinary folks.

    "Two hundred Mystical Orbs." Gritting his teeth, Forus spoke louder than before. Fear and anxiety filled up most of his pale face. Why was he so unlucky?

    "Two hundred and fifty Mystical Orbs." The same sound echoed the whole room. At this time, no one was willing to bide now. They didn't want to be insulted like this unfortunate man.

    "Young master, please let this one have this little thing. Three hundred Mystical Orbs." Tears rolled out of his eyes. He bowed toward the man in yellow before bidding for one last time.

    Sensing that this was the young man's limit, the young master in yellow laughed out loud, feeling satisfied because of the begging. The servant in grey behind him looked at Forus silently.

    Seeing that no one would bide any further, the manager waved his hand, and a female servant walked toward him. She held the ring and put it in the box before walked toward Forus' seat.

    Forus took out a bag filled with Mystical Orbs and handed it to her before reaching out for the box. He tightly held the crate and sat down, not talking to anyone anymore.

    After there was no exciting story of revenge waiting for them, the bystanders lost their interest and stopped paying their attention to Forus. The auction then continued as if nothing had happened.

    Once no one had paid any attention to him, Forus pull the robe over his head, concealing his expression and appearance. Without anyone's knowledge, his earlier emotions were just a facade to evoke the pity in the mass, so that he wouldn't have to pay for even more amounts of Mystical Orbs.

    Forus would gladly abandon pride and do anything if the benefits were good enough. After he had died once, his lingering emotion was suppressed, making him felt detached from this unfamiliar world.

    A little while later, the hall dimmed its candles and lamps, preparing to show the main item of the auction. The sound of chatter quieted down as everyone was eager to examine the best treasure of this time.

    It was without doubt that there would be a grand bidding war between the influential families. Maybe those in private rooms would show up to suppress other with their status.

    "Ladies and gentlemen, the time is now. This last item is the Underworld Copper Coin, an undoubtedly middle-grade treasure. Any sorcerers could use its mysterious sealing power to suppress weaker treasures." A coin that was empowered by the mysterious might of the ancient appeared on the stage, radiating the sealing power that could seal the world.

    "Ten thousand Mystical Orbs and a middle-grade spiritual technique Revolving Blazing Comet." A feminine voice echoed the hall, chilling the body of the onlookers. A stunningly beautiful figure walked out of the private room. Her body radiated the freezing air of coldness and indifference.

    "She is Ocelia Coruscare of the Coruscare Family!" The crowd took only a moment to realise her extraordinary identity. She was the talent sorcerer who would become the head of the family in the future. Her elegant bearing of the leader had already earned respect from others.

    At the same moment when the voice rang out, Forus' body shivered uncontrollably, but he suppressed his chaotic state of mind before casually stood up and walked toward the exit. He needed to get out of the auction as soon as possible before she noticed him.

    Little did he know, the mistress had already noticed his behaviour and locked her glistening gaze at him, observing his appearance and committed them into her soul. When he turned his head to look at her for the last time, their gaze met, causing both of their eyes to brighten in their respective colour.

    The colourful light that was invisible to others twirled around themselves willingly, causing the two to feel the intimating sensation created from the resonance of their soul. The two rays of light fused together gently, creating an invisible string of fate that tied the two with each other.

    After a moment of confusion, Forus instantly rushed out of the auction and disappeared into the crowded area, leaving the mistress to savour the wonderful feeling of soul resonance. Little by little, the seventh floor of the leaning tower that floated inside her plane of conscious actualised itself into existence.

    The sudden change in the leaning tower caused her indifferent emotion to stir up. Only that man could cause her feeling to stir up. She could feel that they were about the same being as if she and he was once the same entity.

    "I'm leaving now, prepare me a carriage. I could feel the resonance between us as clear as ever." Ocelia smiled warmly at the thought of their union. She could feel that if she and he joined together, their future would be limitless.

    ...

    "Young master, the man had unexpectedly left early. Should we go after him? Your heritage is not to be tarnished by such a lowly commoner!" The servant in grey reported the news to his young master in yellow. His young master had taken interested in the poor man that just left.

    "Very well, I shall bring you with me to find him, that man had taken what I wanted. His punishment is only death and suffering." The young master in yellow spoke as if it was natural for him to kill someone. The arrogant in his words presented itself perfectly for everyone to hear.

    "This one shall prepare you a square of hunters to bring that man and his little treasure for you." The servant bowed his head while leaving, but the young master stopped him unexpectedly.

    "I will be the one hunting him personally. There is no need for those useless hunters. If the victim is delivered to me easily, then how would the hunt be enjoyable?" The young master in yellow laughed loudly, feeling excited from all the thought about the hunt

    ...

    "The man with a mysterious ring is unmistakably a criminal. He is trying to avoid contact with the maiden of the influential family, probably because she knew his identity." Little Florie also stood up from her seat and walked out of the auction. She was trying to tail behind the criminal, trying to help the city rid of the evil man.

    She would try to capture that man and brought him to the maiden in the private room. The maiden from the Coruscare Family would be happy to have a criminal arrested.

    "With the unique treasures that my teacher gave to me, I could see that he is only a second-layer sorcerer apprentice. I could easily arrest him, even if I couldn't, my life wouldn't be in danger." Little Florie had some confidence in herself and her teacher. She wouldn't be afraid of a random sorcerer apprentice.
     
  13. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 11
    Forus was walking along the road toward the exit. Now that the Coruscare Family knew that he was still inside their city, it would take several minutes for them to surround the town and blocked off his escape pathways.

    "Why would she be at such a monotonous and uninteresting auction?" While thinking about all the possible explanation, Forus could feel the subtle feeling of the out-of-body and weird sensation of satisfaction. The sentiment had begun to display itself after he had made a slight eyes contract with her, Ocelia Coruscare.

    Forus could sense the questionable origin of the sensation. He could feel the location of her. Such a thought filled his body with a cold and ruthless sense of insecurity, making him uncomfortable.

    Before he could ponder about the feeling, he noticed that someone had been following him. They were the young master in yellow with his servant in grey. Forus had already expected them to track him down after he begged them in the auction, but they were faster than he had expected.

    "Where are you going, young man? This young master is interested in your treasure. Mind if I had a look?" The servant in grey immediately walked toward Forus as if what the young man said must be carried out.

    Forus looked around the surrounding. After making sure that no sound would travel to the city, he slowed down his pace for the pursuers to catch up. Only by getting rid of the trackers could he escaped from the Corusarce Family.

    Acting as if he was afraid of the master in yellow, Forus clumsily took out a small chest and handed over the servant in grey. The servant then checked around before sending it toward the young master.

    Upon touching the surface of the box, the chest started to implode from the inside and shot out waves of aftershock. The powerful waves of energy slammed into the young master in yellow, causing him to stumble backwards and fell onto the ground, coughing out blood.

    Not only that, after the first wave of aftershock, a large amount of mysterious liquid also gushed out of the chest, melting everything that touched it. The acid liquid that Forus personally created touched the face of the young master, deforming it at a visible rate.

    The scream of the young master echoed the forest, but due to the dense trees and bushes, the sound couldn't travel anywhere far, eliminating the chances for reinforcement.

    The servant panicked and immediately rushed toward his young master, giving a healing potion for the young master to recover. He looked at his young master worriedly before pulling out a ring from his hand and crushed it, sending the signal toward the family of the young master.

    "You evil! The Ninguis Family will never let you go!" The servant jumped forward toward Forus, banishing his dagger and slashed it toward him.

    That was the last scene before the young master died, the healing potion didn't work as intended. The death of the young master of the big family was a very grave matter. Even if that young master was a lecherous and idiot person, the dignity of the Ninguis Family was not to be belittled. It was undeniable that Forus would become the enemy of the Ninguis Family.

    The dagger that was about to hit Forus suddenly changed its trajectory before hitting him, missing his prepared shield and landing on a rock beside him. The servant then retreated toward the corpses of the young master before setting flame on him, directly eliminated the evidence.

    After making sure that the corpse turned into the ashes, he turned his attention toward Forus and offered him a warming smile.

    Responding to the smile, Forus threw a bottle of liquid toward the servant. The potion broke down, forming a big ball of floating liquid that sped toward the servant.

    The dagger flew toward the incoming ball and crashed against each other, the floating ball caused the knife to dissolve easily before continued its way toward the servant's heart.

    The servant rolled backwards and pulled out a bracelet before chanting sorcery into it. The bracelet let out a cracking sound before transforming itself into a metal shield with the multi-colour formation extending outwards, absorbing the impact instead of his fragile body.

    At the instant that the ball struck into the shield, Forus empowered his fist with the Death Aura before punching it toward the defence. The collision directly destroyed the protection and sent the servant flying into a rock, shattering bones on his left arm.

    Forus looked at the corpse of the young master coldly, the first trap that sent shockwave toward the young master was not his. It was a plot that shifted the blame on the death of a member of Ninguis Family onto him.

    He could easily tell that the healing potion was, in fact, a poison. Even though he had already planned to kill the man in yellow to erase his track and escape the mistress of the Coruscare Family, he mustn't let any witness leave and spread rumours to ruin his life.

    However, before he could even walk toward the servant in grey to finish him off, the uncontrollable and profound emotion rushed into his soul, forcefully occupied the space within his mind. The sudden change caught him off guarded, causing him to fall onto the ground.

    His entire body fell as if it was continually changing, from solid to liquid, from male to female, from alive to death.

    His control over his body began to overlap and loosen. A new and foreign vision overlapped his old vision. His body felt the exotic sensation of pleasure and ecstasy.

    In the new Forus' vision, Forus could see the short red hair hanging down and obstructed the vision. The surrounding was very luxurious and comfortable. It was the mansion of the powerful family. In Forus' new body, he could feel the rampaging fire element and superb sensation of delight.

    The clearness of the floor reflected the appearance into his eyes. At that moment, Forus' mind shook violently, and nearly descended into the state of unstable madness.

    The reflection of his was that of a female. Even worse, he became the person he feared the most, Ocelia Coruscare. In the reflection, the face of the mistress twisted into a strange smile. She was experiencing extreme pleasure.

    The invisible string of fate slowly expanded itself as the connection between the two strengthened. As the connection between them intensified, the memory of Forus began to overlap with the memory of Ocelia Coruscare.

    The two resonant souls shared the control over the two bodies equally, but once one could advance in their sorcery, one could dominate the mind of another into submission, turning them into slave or toy.

    The string of fate slowly crept toward Forus' soul, desiring to combine it with Ocelia's and made the two became one, but once the line touched his soul, a mysterious ray of grey light manifested itself and tangled with the line, causing the line to decay and retreated back.

    Soon, the strange sensation slowly left his body. The overlapped visions also started to cease, but the fragmented memory remained in his memory.

    "I will be seeing you again, my loved." Before the connection between them ceased, the mouth of both bodies opened and uttered the same sentence with two tones of voice.

    After gaining control over his body again, Forus noticed that the servant in grey had already escaped. He immediately ran away from the scene and disappeared into the wood.

    After he felt that he was safe, he slowly sat down and contemplated over the demonic spell that connected two souls into one. Even though he had escaped the first ambush that aimed to take over his body and soul, he could feel that Ocelia was about to breakthrough and entered the first ranked sorcerer.

    When she obtained the power of the first rank sorcerer, dominating his soul and enslaved his mind would be as easy as drinking and eating for her. His body and soul would not be in his control, but it would be for Ocelia to do anything as she pleased.

    In just one event, Forus had found himself trapped inside a never-ending and endlessly complex maze with pitfalls inserted in every other step. His back was against the all-devouring wall of flesh, and the hidden blade was hovering above his head. He would die if he never moved, but moving carelessly would also be risking his life.

    "I need to advance my sorcery power as soon as possible." With this thought in his mind, Forus pulled out the Decaying Dawn Ring to inspect it. The dense Death Aura that covered the surface of the ring was an excellent external power to quickly cultivate and strengthened his soul.

    Although it would create some obstacles for his future sorcery development, the time had never waited for anyone. If he didn't grow as fast as possible, the day the next forceful control came would be his end.

    The Death Aura inside the ring invaded the body of Forus as soon as he laid down all his defence. The terrifying pain continued to rampage within his every muscle and vein, causing his body to turn pale. Due to the torments of the past, Forus could easily endure the numb feeling that would cause others to lose their mind.

    The Death Aura began to seep into his grey soul, devouring his soul little by little, but the grey soul was also tried to consume the foreign Death Aura to strengthen itself. The process of mutually absorbing each other would refine his soul and caused it to become stronger.

    During the process of consumption, the pain that originated from the loss of one's soul was a different sensation from the physical pain. Forus could feel that his mental state was slowly descending into the state of madness and absent-minded. If he lost his control over his mind for even a moment, his body would turn into a mindless shell, using only basic instinct to survive.

    After enduring for what felt like an eternity, Forus was at his wit's end. Before he could try to stop the transformation and stabilize his soul, a blurry figure revealed itself from inside the ring. The image of an old man was floating above the ring, eyeing the trembling figure of Forus.

    "Today is the day Lord Phasma will return to this world again!" The distorted voice of the old man contained a hint of excitement. He was a fragment of the soul of a sorcerer whose lifespan was at the end. In order to extend his life, he spilt his soul into different pieces and sent them to different locations, waiting for an unlucky person to obtain it and used it.

    Although Forus had already checked for many possible traps and formations within the ring, how could a lowly sorcerer apprentice detect the mysterious soul fragment of the lofty sorcerer?

    The blurry image of Lord Phasma turned into a ray of light and forcefully entered the consciousness of Forus. He hadn't known about the fierce fight between the grey soul and the Death Aura, so when he witnessed what was happening inside Forus' consciousness, his soul fragment shone faintly due to his surprise.

    "Such a powerful soul, capable of defending against the decaying power of Death Aura. It would be a waste if this soul belongs to someone other than me!" Seeing that the Death Aura was invading the soul, causing it to weaken, Lord Phasma instantly rushed toward the grey soul, trying to consume it and took its power as his own.

    The disturbance within his consciousness caused Forus' expression to worsen. He could not stop the invasion of the Death Aura because he needed it to temporary fend off the foreign soul that tried to overtake his body. He also needed to endure the pain from the forceful injection of the old man's soul.

    The longer this battle dragged on, the more he would suffer. Eventually, he would be unable to stay concentrated and fell into the mindless state.

    "I'm finally catching up to you!" Unknowingly, a young girl walked out of the bush near the location of Forus. Her eyes were full of justice and righteousness. She had been chasing the bad man that had bad intentions for a very long time, but due to Forus' high attainment in disguising and concealing track, he had delayed her for quite a while.

    "By the name of the Flying Green Garden and my mentor, I shall capture you, the criminal who slaughtered other!" Little Florie spoke confidently before rushing toward Forus, waving her hand and created many vines out of thin air.
     
  14. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 12
    Facing such an unfortunate event, Forus couldn't do anything other than to ignite his soul and used it as the emergency fuel to fight both the old man and the newcomer. His entire body visibly rotted away as the black flame burnt his body, emitting an unpleasant and disgusting smell.

    His body couldn't move like natural because of the stain on his broken soul, causing him to be unable to dodge the piecing vines and got impaled by some of them that didn't disintegrate when came into contact with his black flame.

    With one attack, Forus lost his ability to move steadily. Due to this, he had to change his offensive method. In an instant, Forus had thrown many bottles of liquid toward the young lady, aiming to obstruct her offence and to maintain himself.

    The female stomped her foot lightly, creating a giant leaf beneath her feet. The leaflet quickly enveloped the girl and floated on the sky, evading the trajectory of the flying bottles, but the bottles exploded before it landed and managed to damage the leaflet, causing it to crash into the ground.

    The female rolled backwards to avoid falling injury, but instead, a black ball of flame flew over and hit her left leg, devouring a part of her skin and caused her muscles to rot.

    Screaming in pain, she triggered one of her treasure, creating a wild dome of plants that span over ten meters, trapping everything from coming and leaving. On the wall of the dome, many white flowers blossomed and released a faint fragrance that would loosen the mind of the enemies and healed the wounds of the user.

    Before Forus could throw another series of potions, the mysterious old man inside his consciousness spread out his soul and tried to attack Forus' mind while creating pathways for the Death Aura to invade his soul, weakening both his physical body and mental mind. The action of the old man caused him to black out for a moment, losing the precious chance to stop the girl to maintain herself and heal her wounds.

    Despite the searing pain, Forus forced himself to stand up on one remaining leg and jumped forwards towards the fallen lady, punching his rotten fist towards her. He couldn't waste any time dealing with her, as the more he ignited his soul, the worse his defence against the invading soul and foreign Death Aura. If he couldn't finish her off before time was up, either he died by her spells, or the old man would take over his soul.

    Before his destructive punch could strike onto her fragile body, the vines hanging on the dome of plants shot themselves forward to restain the blow, weakening its momentum and absorbed the total damage that would otherwise seriously injured the woman.

    "Die, you criminal!" Shouting angrily, little Florie pulled out her treasure, Staff of Green Flower. Her mentor had given it to her when she advanced to the second-layer sorcerer apprentice. Such was the benefit of having prominent and caring supporters. The advantage that Forus wouldn't be able to obtain.

    The sorcery energy she channelled into her staff started to transform into wooden elemental power. If anyone used the elemental power according to its element, the power of the spell became explosively powerful, but the power would decrease if one used it on the opposing energy.

    Little Florie was a wooden elemental sorcerer. She didn't need to use any others elemental spells, so the downside of the elemental power wouldn't cause her any inconvenient.

    Countless spiked vines suddenly penetrated out of the ground, charging towards Forus. This time, the plants had a faint jelly layer that covered all of their bodies, radiating faint green light. The quality of the newly created vines far suppressed the previous set. Ordinary dagger and weak spells wouldn't do anything against the imposing wooden elemental spells.

    The spiked vines grew until they blocked the sky, causing the darkness to reign over the forest. Many white petals that fell from the white flowers on the dome of plants moved orderly under the manipulation of Florie. They formed a deadly formation that would change from offence and defence easily, creating an artificial army of flowers.

    While fighting and avoiding the fatal strikes of the floating petals, Forus needed to fortify his mind and soul to defend against the exotic soul and foreign Death Aura. The burning soul of his continued to wither away slowly, causing his concentration to drop steadily. The combined effect of everything caused his overall fighting power to drop down, making him unable to dodge some attacks, further weakening him again.

    "The Snow of Remembrance shall cover all things!" The snow-like ring manifested itself from the Storage Ring, along with the mysterious chant, the ring faintly emitted pale light, creating many crystalized rays of light before turning them into transparent snow that drifted freely across the sky.

    Little Florie tried to dodge and block the snowflakes but to her surprise, the floating snow would bypass and traverse through every defence that she could use, undeviatingly touching her white and smooth skin, upon the contact, the preserved memory of the old time started to construct itself inside her mind, causing her focus on the real world to loosen.

    She sat onto the ground, crying silently without any tears. She was immersing inside her own memory, gaining Forus some precious time to strike back at the invading soul and cleaned up the issue of destructive Death Aura.

    At the same time that Florie lost her sense and collapsed onto the ground, a wave of distorted information gushed into Forus' mind, forcing itself into his soul, causing him great pain that made the defence on the soul weaken, allowing the invading soul to slowly seep inside his soul.

    A great power would always come at a great price. The Ring of Recollection was a powerful treasure that could cause the victim to fall into the boundary between reality and illusion, losing the sense of self and truth. However, the user must also have a strong mind that could withstand the overloaded information that rushed into his or her soul when he or she used the treasure.

    The feeling of pain and depression came pushing into his mind, threatening to replace his memory and sense. Facing the thoughtless emotions were very easy for Forus to suppress, but when he had to scatter his focus to control many battlefronts at the same time, it would be very hard for him to divide more attention las everything would fall apart.

    "Young man, you even had the treasure of Thought Domain. It seems that you have a very interesting story behind your adventure." Seeing the Ring of Recollection, the eyes of the old man flashed excitedly. He started to burn his soul to maximize the offence and tried his hardest to destroy the protection around Forus' soul.

    Finally, Forus collapsed onto the ground, releasing an ever-expanding Death Aura that covered his body. The Death Aura condensed itself and became thicker as time pass. Everything that touched the strain of Death Aura would crumble into dust. His death was approaching nearer and nearer.

    His eyes became cloudly as he heard a familiar footstep echoed around him. He was laying inside a huge dark torture chamber, waiting for the next experiment.

    "Hello again, mortal. You have already successfully advanced into peak second-layer. Very interesting." Forus looked toward the source of the sound. He looked toward the source of his very first end.

    A dignified man whose blue robe would occasionally sway with the wind walked toward Forus calmly, giving off the aura of supernatural and almighty being.

    "Did you think that you could escape me?" A wicked smile spread across the blue-robed man's face, his bloody lip tore the skin off and extended further until it reached his deformed ears.

    Forus shuddered uncontrollably, turning pale from fright and madness. He watched as countless dark chains moved to tear his body apart, trying to force out all the Death Aura inside his body. The day at the torture chamber began once more.

    "Dear, are you all right?" A soft voice travelled into his ears, causing the pain to cease from his body. Meria walked toward Forus who was sitting on a table, gazing absent-mindedly toward the horizon.

    "Sorry, Meria. I was spacing out for a moment. Let go see how our lovely daughter is doing." Forus smiled as he held his wife's hand and walked toward the backyard.

    "Your hand is very cold. Meria, do you have a fever?" Forus asked his wife worriedly. Her hands were as cold as corpses.

    "Matia! Where are you?" Forus paused for a moment when he saw a beautiful figure sitting on a platform that floated above the ground.

    She wore a delicate green robe. Her beautiful face was out of the mortal's world, causing Forus to daze for a moment. Her greenish hair flew as the warm breeze passed her by.

    "It had been so long..." The female sighed and looked at the ruined building before floating away with the vines platform, acting as if Forus and Meria were not real at all.

    Feeling amiss, Forus looked at the ordinary house of his, only to find that the wooden floor had already rotten away and filled with grasses and mushrooms.

    He panicked and held his wife in his arm, only to find that he was walking with a pale-face and lifeless body of Meria.

    In his madness, he tightly held the skull of his loved one before running out of the backyard, rushing out into the direction of the city.

    "May the string of destiny between the bride and the groom forever attached to each other. For they had vowed to always exist within other's soul." Forus opened the broken door, only to find himself surrounded by many people, cheering and blessing him and her to forever achieve happiness.

    "Today, in the presence of the World Will, Forus Ander and Ocelia Coruscare had vowed to everlastingly pursue the truth for all mysteries, for all eternities!" The sound of happiness caused the hall to rumble, reaching far and wide, taking over the entire city.

    Forus looked at his wife dazedly, immersing in her otherworldly beauty. Her short orange hair shone a faint light that could rival the beauty of the moon. He handed the rotten head of his former wife, now the magnificent red flowers, toward his lovely wife. She took it and caressed it gently, creating a harmony atmosphere that engulfed the lively hall.

    "The two may announce their eternal bond by a gentle touch between their lips." Memorised by the beauty of his Ocelia, his face moved elegantly toward her, closer and closer. He could feel her breath quicken as their precious lips caressed each other.

    Suddenly, a feeling of disgusted and hatred blossomed in his body, causing him to violently push his wife away, knocking her unconscious. In his hand, a trace of rotten flesh and blood of his true wife started to devour his body, causing him to scream in pain.

    His handsome body began to break apart, causing his smooth skin to fall off on its own, revealing his true body. Looking at his rotten flesh, Forus discovered that there were many black tentacles growing out of his body, slowly turning him into a lunatic monster.

    "How could this be?!" The blurry old man inside Forus' consciousness paled from terror as he witnessed the horror that was unfolding before him. Innumerable black tendrils stretched themselves infinitely out of the grey soul, devouring everything in its way.

    The old man tried his best to get out of the consciousness, but the grey soul had already sealed the consciousness shut.

    "Why is this thing here?" The old man' last question was never meant to be answered. The tendrils devoured him completely without any resistance.

    "What are you?" Little Florie spoke while she struggled to stand up, her legs were shaking violently due to fear. The man before her suddenly twisted rapidly and there were many black tentacles growing out of him, turning him into a big mess of monster.

    The echo of suffering and pain resounded throughout the forest, covering it with the sense of ominous.
     
  15. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 13
    "Save me, teacher! Save me!" Florie screamed as she frantically shouted for help. She had lost her manners once she saw the unspeakable horror. She pulled out a scroll and opened it without any hesitation. One could see many inscribed runes on the inscription, brightly shining as if they were threatening to devour the stars.

    The runes disintegrated and turned into a single ray of greenish light, condensing itself into a giant pale ross. Her mentor had given her this scroll as the last life-saving protection. Once she used this scroll, she could bring forth a single powerful strike of her mentor who was a second-ranked sorcerer.

    The giant white ross started to rotate slowly, causing its petals to fall, drifting across the sky by the soothing wind. The pale perianths would disintegrate everything that came into contact, turning it grey and crumble into ashes.

    The dark tentacles that extended themselves from the grey soul crumbled one by one. However, there were countless amounts of tendrils originated from Forus' body. No matter how the perianths destroyed them, they would always come back.

    Silently yet frighteningly, an enormous eye manifested above Forus. The large grey eye slowly opened itself, causing the world to slow down and turn colourless. It gazed toward little Florie, causing her to become pale and coughed out her life force. Her smooth skin dried out a little after her life force came out, causing her to look older than her previous self.

    In despair, Florie cried out loudly, shouting for her teacher to come and rescue her from this nightmare.

    Her breakdown caused the mindless Forus to tense up, gradually awakening from his confused state. He felt as if she was someone he knew. Someone he loved.

    ...

    In the flying garden, a beautiful female sat on a floating platform, gazing toward the sky, watching the movement of the stars. There were many scrolls beside her, but one of them suddenly destroyed itself. The sudden change caused her to open her eyes, stopping her sorcery practice.

    She could feel a strange sensation of familiar in her soul, a sense of loss and pain. This feeling had manifested itself inside her soul as if she was about to lose something precious to herself.

    "Little Florie, I'm not gonna let you die!" She said softly before waving her hand, causing the plants around her to move orderly and brought a mirror for her.

    The mirror flashed as it revealed a scenery where her disciple was. In the vision, she could see a corrupted man, who had lost his mind, was trying to harm her precious disciple. His black tendrils slowly crept toward the helpless girl. Even her one strike couldn't beat it thoroughly.

    "I couldn't let her die. She is my only colour in this lonely life." She had watched the girl grew up. After a long period of living together, a hint of colour started to appear in her vision. Little Florie was the only colourful thing left for her to see.

    After a moment, the mirror trembled and shattered into pieces, the man inside the vision had used some unknown spells to seal and cut off space around him, disrupting the magical mirror's ability to spy on others.

    The maiden knew that her disciple was in grave threat. She had to help her at once.

    ...

    The black tentacles stopped their movement the moment Forus regained his consciousness. His mind suddenly spun rapidly, trying his best to suppress the rampaging grey light within his soul.

    He cast various spells to conceal the disturbance and stopped the interference from the outside. He could instinctively feel that someone was spying on him, or rather, someone was observing his unique body.

    He also realised that the mysterious power within his soul had already mended the wounds on both his soul and body. Although with his normal recovery speed, the injuries on the body would eventually cure themselves, the scars on his soul were ever-lasting.

    After an instant of silence, Forus turned his attention to the panting female. Her condition was getting worse as time flew by. If she didn't get any help in time, she would undoubtedly die due to massive loss of blood.

    He thought for a moment before walking toward her, causing Florie's face to turn pale. She struggled to crawl backwards, only to cough out blood and collapsed onto the ground again. In her despair, she watched as the manifestation of nightmare walked towards her.

    The black and rotting hand of Forus penetrated through her chest, leaving behind a gruesome mess that exposed her bare body and skeleton structure. A piece of her heart, as well as a fragment of her soul, flew out into his grip. He gazed at the part of her heart deeply before putting back the remnant of her heart into her body.

    He then used his icy cold elemental spell to seal the fatal injuries on her body, keeping her alive for an extended duration of time.

    Due to the pain of forcefully ripped apart one's soul, little Florie screamed until her lungs busted out and lost her consciousness while blood seeped out of her pale lip. From now on, her life was under the control of Forus. He only needed one thought to crush her fragmented soul to cripple her body and mind.

    By the time he finished bringing out a part of her soul, the black tentacles and unholy grey eye had faded out of existence and went back into slumber in his soul. He needed to keep this matter as the deepest secret of his life.

    He would kill this strange girl if not for that unknown observer. To interfere with his battle after the call for help of that girl, no matter how he looked at it, that sorcerer must have some connection with the girl. He needed to consider the outcomes of his action.

    In the end, he decided to spare her life. If that person was the enemy of the girl, they would kill her by themselves, but, if they were the ally of the girl, Forus would suffer endless pursue from that person. He had already kept a part of her soul with him. If anyone wanted to avenge her, he would use it as the hostage to keep himself safe.

    Before he could leave the crime scene, the earth around him trembled violently. The common plants started to twistedly wiggle as if they were greeting the appearance of their deity.

    The short grasses grew swiftly as they slowly transformed into the bizarre plants that leaked off relaxing fragrance, contrasted to their scent, many pointy thorns concealed themselves beneath the multicoloured leaves of the flower.

    A ripple in space-time spread across the forest, covering a big part of it. In an instant, the dimensional barrier between the real world and the void collapsed and opened a gate between the long distance.

    Inside the bottomless portal, a vast and ever-evolving Clematis slowly making its way out of the crack on the distorted space. Behind the magnificent flower were countless large and translucent vines, crawling toward both Forus and the motionless girl.

    Observing the process of the breakdown of the space around him, Forus could understand that the one behind this event was at least a first ranked sorcerer. His power, even with the grey soul fully activated, would never be able to withstand even a second in their presence.

    Swiftly, he threw many potions that deal the most damage to plant element before rushing off toward the distant. The potions dissolved themselves into the atmosphere, but they could only delay the maddening leaves for several seconds before they regained their movement control and chased after him again.

    Although the trail of blood would expose his whereabouts, the person would need to take care of that girl first.

    Even when he was rushing from the portal, the vines seemed to ignore the distance between space as they warped the space around themselves to instantly shorten the gap between Forus and the flowers. They immediately rushed towards him, catching him completely off guard.

    The thorny leaves pierced through his body, cracking his bones into fragments and injecting an unknown substance into his bloodstream. The pain rushed into his head, but Forus didn't feel any of it. He only forcefully twisted his broken arm to let it take most of the damage before cutting it off with his dagger.

    Once the broken arm fell onto the ground, the majority of the mindless thorns swiftly coiled themselves around the arm, crushing it under their enormous force before absorbing the life force within it, leaving only grey ash in their finish.

    Left with no choice, Forus pulled out his life-saving method.

    ...

    Looking at the portal, the female sorcerer concentrated most of her attention into nursing her disciple's injury. Her physical body suffered severe harm that if little Florie didn't have a strong mentor like her, she would at least lose all of her sorcery energy or she might hurt the shifted flow of the magical energy inside her body and die.

    Suddenly, senses of loneliness and longing manifested itself within her soul, causing her cold facial expression to change into a heart-breaking one. The sudden appearance of profound emotion left her in the daze. She carefully checked the condition of her disciple to find any abnormality.

    She took notice of familiar particles, they were the icy cold elemental energy that covered her disciple's body. In an instant, countless thoughts and memories rushed inside her mind and soul, forcefully made her recalled her tragic past.

    "After countless days and nights, after countless sorrow and grief, I finally found someone related to you." Her face twisted unnaturally as the unending hatred that she had suppressed within her soul released itself for the whole world to observe it.

    The killer of her family, the man who killed her father. The person who heavily injured her disciple had the same aura with that sorcerer whose crime couldn't be forgiven. They were related in some ways.

    Before she could order her plants to completely rip that man apart before torturing his soul, the man drew a small glowing orb with the size of a fingernail. The orb softly flickered as it touched the man's hand, trembling as if it was about to break.

    Once she laid her eyes on the orb, she forcefully stopped all the vines from moving before retracting them back to protect her disciple. That orb was a fragment of her disciple's soul. If she wanted to kill that man, she would indirectly cause the death of her precious student as well.

    "You forced my hand." She muttered as she extended her hand into the portal, causing it to tremble violently. The portal couldn't withstand the pressure of a second-ranked sorcerer.

    The presence of the second-ranked sorcerer's power caused the forest to shake fiercely, causing the disturbance that spread throughout the forest, arriving at the city.

    Just her presence alone made Forus strumbled and fell onto the ground. His body stiffened and the flow of sorcery energy inside his body suddenly went out of control and ran chaotically, causing his internal injuries to fare up.

    "Mistress, please stay your hand." A male voice echoed within the forest as a figure slowly materialized itself from nothingness. Together with his arrival, the temperature of the land rose up as the sky gradually turned red.

    Not just that man, but a few more consciousness of the second-ranked sorcerers also focused their wills onto the portal, waiting for the response of the foreign force.

    The arrival of an unknown second-ranked sorcerer was not something the powerhouses of the area could tolerate. The number of the second-ranked sorcerers had always been low. They also formed a peaceful situation where everyone collectively restained themselves, allowing the war to not come true.

    "I won't bother myself with your political scene, just hand me that thing, and I would gladly leave." The female concealed her resentful emotion and let them all out. This was the only clue towards that monster who killed her father. She couldn't let it slip by.

    She was willing to do anything to avenge her father.
     
  16. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 14
    The entire forest descended into the state of stillness, the wind and cloud faded out of existence as every life stopped their movement. The swaying plants froze in place, not daring to move. The blooming flowers and singing birds instantly stopped their activities and cowered in fear.

    The overwhelming power of unrestrained sorcerers could potentially suffocate every mortal within the large area. If not for the presence of other sorcerers, the female teacher of little Florie would have released all of her power and disregard everything and tried to capture Forus.

    "Miss, we won't intervene with your matter, but this is our territory, not a wasteland. Please give us some consideration." The floating figure spoke politely, but his hidden intention was as transparent as the sky.

    The female didn't show any intention to comply, but she did not cross over to the other side either. If the opposing force only had one second-ranked sorcerer, she would have already destroyed him. Her sorcery mastery was extremely powerful, barely below a handful of ancient monsters in her garden.

    "The Green Flying Garden will remember this event." The female sighed before pointing her slender finger at Forus, sending a spiritual seed flying toward him through the portal.

    The power within the seed disrupted the distortion of the space, causing the portal to shake. At the same time, the soft vines had already brought little Florie who had fainted into the gate. She was lying on her mentor's lap.

    The seed moved at an inconceivable speed, crashing into Forus' right eye and implanted itself in his eye. Not a single true sorcerers had made their move. It was utterly too much of a waste of their effort to help a nameless weakling and offended the mysterious lady.

    "Thank you for your consideration, miss. We hope to see you again." With a wave of his hand, many spell formations appeared and released multi-colour flame, destroying the portal and sealed the distortion in space.

    After the commotion ended, every consciousness of true sorcerers began to dissipate. None of them took any interest in Forus at all. In their eyes, this useless sorcerer apprentice was already dead. No matter how strong a sorcerer apprentice was, they could not compare to the might of the true sorcerer.

    Once all of them retracted all of their wills, Forus began to use his dagger to get rid of the seed that impaled his right eye, causing him to lose his vision. He could feel that the root of the magical seed was crawling inside his body, polluting his sorcery energy with the wooden element and weakening his body.

    When his dagger almost landed on his right eye, the seed immediately started acting up, causing him to lose his focus. The blade in his hand slipped and grazed his chest, creating a deep wound.

    Without any way to destroy the seed by himself, he could only use the Death Aura inside his grey soul to suppress the chaotic wooden element and delayed the process of invasion of the spiritual seed. With almost all of his Death Aura containing the seed, Forus wouldn't need to worry about the same incident.

    The roots of the spiritual seed immediately felt the incoming swamp of Death Aura, causing them to strangle each other, forming a sturdy wall that would protect the core of the bulbs while slowly advancing toward Forus' soul.

    Presently with the ongoing battle inside his consciousness, Forus needed to find another way to protect his soul and took control of the mysterious grey light. Until then, he could only use his ice and light elemental spells.

    Suddenly, the mysterious feeling of sadness and grief emerged in his heart, producing translucent tears on his face. The weary memory resurfaced from his heart as the soul-tearing scene replayed itself in his mind. Forus found that there was still happiness existed in him.

    ...

    The female sorcerer looked toward the sky at the direction of the Mountain Union, at the Ferrum Country. She knew that the evil monster who massacred her family had a disciple around there.

    She smiled lightly, thinking about the suffering that the man was undergoing made her feel relieved. The only way to get rid of the spiritual seed was to advance into a true sorcerer to achieve greater control over their flow of sorcery energy and manipulated it to inject the contaminated energy out.

    With that thought in her mind, she relaxed and began to treat her disciple's body, improving it with her wooden element and strength her soul. Little Florie had experienced enough to try to advance her sorcery cultivation.

    "Once you advance and become the true sorcerer, I would let you kill that man by yourself. When you kill him, you would be free from his shadow that would otherwise plague your soul." She said softly into Florie's ear before continued to caress her pinkish cheek. She was the only colourful thing in this colourless world.

    Suddenly, her hand stiffened, and her face twitched, causing her to frown. She could sense that something was obstructing the pathway of the spiritual seed and hindering its progress to weaken that man. Thinking that the man had a benefactor that could prevent the magical roots' advancement, her emotion fared up as she recalled about that blue-robed man.

    "Again and again, you would always destroy my happiness and separated my family from me. Father, mother, I have found the culprit who ruined our life." The female sorcerer clutched her fist tightly. Her sorrowful emotion caused her sorcery energy to go rampant and caused the atmosphere to turn solemn.

    Many elders of the Flying Green Garden had turned their attention toward the source of the power, but once they saw that it was from the lonely abode, they immediately retracted their sense and continued to do their usual business as if nothing had happened.

    The maiden gently lifted her disciple and placed her on top of a comfortable bed before kissing her cheek once, a flash of satisfaction appeared inside her greenish eyes.

    "In the name of mine, Matia Ander, I would ceaselessly hunt down that man and his disciple. I would burn their soul under my burning flame of hatred. I would skin their body alive and break every piece of their bones." With each passing word, her voice got more distorted and terrifying. In a fit of her rage, Matia made an eternal oath with her name. As long as she lived, she would try her best to avenge her family and torture the source of her misery.

    The faint laughter of an unknown entity softly echoed the whole world, seemingly amused at an unexpected turn of the event. How ironic, for a filial daughter to swore with her life to unknowingly hunt down her father and torture him for his non-existence sin.

    Once Matia finished her oath, tear of blood rushed out of her eyes, causing her colourless vision to turn red. It filled her empty soul with grief and sorrow. She collapsed onto the floor and cried out blood while knowing nothing.

    "Why am I crying? Father, I miss you." Her weak voice couldn't travel far before dissipating into the wind, thus, leaving her alone in her world.

    ...

    "Father, I miss you." Forus watched as his lovely daughter stabbed him with a bloody knife, over and over again until his vision darkened and turned black.

    The sound of stabbing turned quieter and quieter, but the mysterious sound of mocking laugh echoed within his mind, causing him to wake up from his nightmare.

    His grey soul resonance with the sound of demonic laughter as if it was his soul that laughed at the world. He could feel an indeterminable feeling of loneliness assaulted his heart, filling him with negative emotions.

    While he was checking the abnormality within his body, a delicate string of light connected itself with his soul. The line was pitch black in colour and contained endless grief and hatred. Forus immediately identified it as the string of fate as it was the same as the previous one that bound him with Ocelia Coruscare.

    Without his Death Aura, his body would take a much longer time to heal from fatal injuries. Fortunately, he had already stopped the blood loss and treat his wounds. He only needed to rest for a while before he could resume his normal movement.

    With his injured body, he dragged himself across the wildness and found himself a small cave of a giant bear. He quickly calculated the strength of the beast before killing it as it was much weaker than him.

    Forus was now a third-layer sorcerer apprentice. While his way of advancing sorcery cultivation was different from the ordinary way, the power he had was about the same with them.

    While other would need to apprehend their feeling and desire to either cut them off or embraced them to shed their mortal-self and became something above insignificant mortal, Forus would have to refine and purified his soul to use it as a supporting pillar to build his Elemental Cores. He would achieve greater control over elemental power when he successfully condensed his cores.

    Now, the problem was that his path as a sorcerer ended here. His sorcery cultivation method didn't have anything after the peak of the mortal realm. He needed to find more cultivation methods to continue developing his path. He still needed to go back to the city and tried to join the Steel Cauldron.

    "Once I advanced into the true sorcerer, I would need to find that female sorcerer." Thinking about the strange vision that followed the incident, Forus had deduced that the female sorcerer had some connection with his remaining relative, presumedly his only daughter.

    In the blink of an eye, Forus found himself completely healed and ready to head back towards the city. While he needed to treat his wounds, he also went out and collected many herbs and fruits to use them as ingredients for his potions and disguise purpose.

    With his traditional clothing on, Forus made his way towards the city. There was barely one more day for the Steel Cauldron's recruitment event. He needed to attend this event to become a member of Steel Cauldron.

    Once he got in, he would try his best to obtain merit points and used them to exchange for cultivation method and references. Even more, when he gained fame within the alchemy circle, the Steel Cauldron would become his supporter and deterred the sorcerer-bloodline families.

    ...

    The thin lines of web intertwined with each other, producing a vague image that continually altered its shape. The ghostly aura they emitted dimmed the whole room with a faint glow, creating the creepy atmosphere and cold temperature.

    The entire room was devoid of sound. Here, the stillness reigned supreme. However, one of the numerous lines abruptly twisted uncontrollably, causing it to clash with the different web, creating a ripple of sound that informed the owner of the place.

    The gate that connected the sacred room with the outside world opened itself automatically, revealing the figure of a middle-aged man. His black cloak gave off the feeling of mysteriousness, invoking the curiosity of the onlookers.

    His mouth twisted into a smile. He waved his hand and created numerous runes on the air and sent them towards various directions. The runes would travel to the residences of the influential people of the sect, informing them about the change that happened to the complex web.

    "My brother, soon, I will personally annihilate the Flying Green Garden that destroyed your precious family." His bloodline fared up for an instant when he mentioned the oath, causing terrible memories to emerge from his soul.

    Intor Ander could still taste the despair and grief of that day as if it was happening to him again. His brother's dying silhouette still haunted him whenever he lost his focus, reminding him about his decision that caused that bloodshed.

    "Everyone, the dawn of the war is right in front of us. I have used my divination skill to deduce the fate of the Flying Green Garden. The catastrophic event would threaten to consume the higher-ups of the garden. The location is at the Mountain Union!" Intor's intimidating voice echoed the whole sect, shaking the earth and raising the moral of the disciples.

    Very quickly, the whole sect decided to gather in a meeting, discussing the plan to destroy the Flying Green Garden and obtain complete domination over the entire territory.
     
  17. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 15
    With one Mystical Orb, Forus could easily pass through the inspection of the city's guards, after all, none of the guards would want to offend any sorcerers, even if they were only the first-layer sorcerer apprentice. Any mortals would fear the supernatural power that the sorcerers wielded.

    Forus took many detours and turned around at many corners to avoid those who tried to follow him and finally arrived at his rented house. He quickly wrote all the details about the incident into his daily. No matter how useless or insignificant they were, he would not neglect them as they could provide some unexpected results.

    Now that Forus couldn't use his Death Aura and decay-related spells, he needed to strengthen his power by practising his ice-element and light-element manipulation as they were the easiest for him to control because of his affection.

    After he rearranged his thought process, Forus dressed himself up and went out of his house, making his way towards the Steel Cauldron's recruitment examination.

    Along his way towards the Steel Cauldron, he had deliberately chosen to detour towards the remote and secondary roads where not many people would walk. Forus needed to avoid the crowded place and the eyes of the sorcerer-bloodline families. Although they were silent and didn't actively try to find him, the damage he had done to them was beyond their bottom line.

    Even if he didn't do anything to damage the reputation of the sorcerer-bloodline families, the mistress of the Coruscare Family would still try to find him. A moment of careless of his had created this situation, and now Forus had to live with it.

    Thinking about all his past mistakes and how to avoid them, Forus unknowingly arrived at the destination. Noticing that he had reached the Steel Cauldron's recruitment area early, he went and found himself a random seat to relax and read his daily, trying to improve his understanding of his powers and tried to formulate unique and useful methods of employing his limited skills.

    Losing in his thoughts, Forus tried to comprehend the features of his spells. He envisioned them inside of his head and practising them in his mind. Although this would increase his mastery of the spells, it also took a considerable amount of his mental concentration, causing his soul to wear down.

    Once he regained his consciousness, Forus found that the sound of the ringing bell was the one that woke him up. The ringing of the bell signified the start of the examination.

    "Greeting mister, how may I help you?" The smile of the receptionist was still the same as last time Forus saw it. Her smile was refined and elegant.

    She looked at the man in front of her, his appearance still hadn't changed one bit, except for his eyes. He had covered his right eye with an eye pad, making him looked mysterious.

    "I came here to participate the Steel Cauldron's recruitment. My name is Falsus Nomen." Throwing a Mystical Orb at her, Forus cooly announced his intention. His expressionless face caught the attention of some people, but upon seeing that he was an unknown guy, all of them quickly stopped paying their attention to him.

    "Oh. I'm sorry about your right eye, Mister Falsus. I hope you get well soon." The receptionist carefully held his hand as she voiced her worry. Her action caused jealously to appear within the heart of the onlookers, but seeing his mysterious and cold face, they all backed off.

    "Here is your pendant, please don't lose it." After handling some paperwork, she took out a pendant with Falsus craved on it and handing it to him. Her behaviour was very soothing and attractive, winking at him seductively.

    "Thanks." Forus looked at her coldly and took the pendant before walking into the examination ground, not even batting his eye at her. In his eyes, she was merely trying to get close to him to leech off his property.

    Although he could avoid this issue by not showing off how wealthy he was, he needed to establish his reputation as a foundation for his member status in the Steel Cauldron. It was the same as when he lured some thugs to beat them up. He needed to have some exploitable weaknesses for the higher-ups to take notice of him.

    Naturally, his action caused the male sorcerers to become annoyed at him, attracting a lot of envy and dissatisfaction. Other people would feel joy when a pretty girl tried to get close to them, but Forus himself wasn't a person of this generation, not to mention that he had already had a wife and a daughter.

    His personality and mental state weren't the same as ordinary people. After experiencing the state of nothingness and came out of it, Forus knew that he wasn't regular human anymore, he had struck between the border of life and death.

    The very thought of death had numbed him of almost all emotions. Nothing mundane could stir his feeling anymore, except for the memories of his first life. Forus even asked himself that if he forgot his past, would he be able to feel emotion anymore?

    "Everyone, you are very fortunate today. There is a special guest that would like to see the process of recruitment. If any of you could rise her interest, consider it your good fortune." An old man made his announcement abruptly, causing everyone to look at his direction.

    Behind that man was an orderly row of servants, standing completely still, welcoming their mistress as respectful as possible. Forus could see a figure covered in a veil of mysteriousness in both physically and mentally.

    Her manner was refined and elegant, causing a lasting impression in others' mind. Forus instantly froze when he saw the maiden covered in the orange veil. Her long reddish hair and dark orange dress danced with the gentle breeze, creating a unique scenery to the eyes.

    If not for his great self-control, Forus would have stood up and tried to get away as soon as possible. Between him and her, Forus could see an infinitesimal thread of fate connected between him and her.

    Forus slowly lifted his hand to pull down his robe, further concealing his appearance before taking out a book and read it as if he was killing time. He intentionally slowed down his actions to make them as natural as possible.

    He could feel that something was different from the usual Ocelia that he feared. Her temperament seemed to experience a comprehensive change, becoming much more delicate and refined. Her supernatural aura also became a lot more dominant that it could suffocate any weak-willed person.

    Although Forus didn't want to admit it, he had already figured out that she had already reached the stage of the true sorcerer, a genuine first ranked sorcerer. The difference between his power that got restained by the spiritual seed and her unrestrained strength was enormous.

    "Greeting everybody, the Steel Cauldron had invited me to this wonderful event. How could I refuse them? I hope every one of you would become famous and successful." Her smile was alluring, igniting the burning desire of the onlookers. Even some ladies started to blush just by witnessing her smile.

    There were only some unique people that kept their indifference altitude towards her, including Forus. Those people had tempered their mental state to a great extent, enabling them to become unfazed by that smile.

    "Thank you for your kind words, Miss." The same old man walked towards the mistress of the Coruscare Family and offered her some praise before instructed his assistants to start the tests.

    Due to the strange appearance of Ocelia Coruscare, Forus had to keep things under control. He mustn't exhibit too much potential, as it would attract her interest. His plan to grow his reputation needed to change immediately.

    "Follow me, everyone." A female assistant spoke with her lovely voice, magnified by magic, making it possible for everyone to hear her. She led everybody to the examination ground before leaving the rest of the tasks with another assistant.

    "The first test is for all of you to record down all the components that you could recognise. You could also write down the recipes of any potions you could remember. We will check for the correct version of the answers, as well as their rarity and property. The more rare and high property it has, the more point you would get." A man cloaked in a green robe that was the uniform of the Steel Cauldron walked into the testing ground and announced the content of the examination.

    The atmosphere of the examination ground was very solemn and heavy, coupled with the presence of the special guest, they would need to perform better than the rest for her to take notice of them. If they succeed in getting the interest of that guest up, their future would be limitless, but if they performed poorly, the wrong impression would develop inside everyone's mind, causing their reputation to worsen.

    With that frightening thought in their mind, virtually everyone was nervous, except for a few extraordinary and confident people. These people would be the one with great backgrounds, having the backing of a large family, or a prodigy of a great clan, excelling in the art of alchemy.

    Sitting down, Forus didn't begin the profound and rare medical ingredients yet. He wrote the basic ones while surveying his surrounding, looking for the location of Ocelia. If he did too well in this test, he would gather the attention of both the higher-ups and her, which would be disastrous.

    ...

    Ocelia Coruscare swept her vision across the testing ground, looking for any abnormality. After her breakthrough, her temperament had changed completely, becoming more refined and less hot-blooded. She could also vaguely feel that there was some connection between her and that mysterious man.

    It was as if a string had connected both of them like a knot of love. She could sense that the man she desired would meet with her again here. That was why she agreed to come to this dull place.

    She could see that some of the descendants of the big family of the city had come here to register as an alchemist. These people had lost in the internal war for the successor, so they had to come here to build their faction.

    Only a few people could make her glared twice. The man with a plain black robe who relaxingly wrote down the spiritual plants on his paper, the man cloaked in red cloth had already finished his writing and was now meditating, the woman in purple who elegantly wrote her paper at lightning-speed.

    On the closer look, she could see that the black-robed man had a complicated injury at his right eye. His right eye also occasionally emitted faint icy cold breeze, making the temperature around him dropped for an instant.

    Ocelia's interest perked up as she carefully observed his condition. Due to her talent and great comprehensive ability, she could deduce that the man had suffered a strike from a powerful actual ice sorcerer. The blow was so devastating that it bound his regenerative spell and disabled his right eye, making him blind.

    Thinking about how the man had survived an attack of a true sorcerer while he was a third-layer sorcerer apprentice, her interest in him jumped up a little before died down afterwards. After all, she was there for her target, not for watching some random alchemists.

    "Greeting, Miss Ocelia. Why is it that you, the eldest mistress of Coruscare Family, come to this unworthy place?" A male voice disrupted her thought process, causing her to glare that the incoming figure. Her indifferent personality instantly returned when she saw that figure.

    "Pleased to meet you, Mister Glacies, the eldest young master of the Ninguis Family." Ocelia bowed down elegantly, but it was without any hint of emotion or interested, completely disregarded the person before her.

    "I just came here to congratulate you on your breakthrough, and also to find a criminal that disrespected our family." Behind him, a timid servant in grey walked out. After he had escaped death and returned to the Ninguis Family, he had spread the words of the incident, painting Forus as a bloodthirsty murderer who killed their young master.

    "Sorry, Miss Ocelia, but the information we received from this servant tell us that the criminal will reveal themselves at this meeting." The words from Glacies caused the servant to tremble for an instant before regaining his composure. In his eyes, a hint of confusion quickly manifested itself.

    "Very well, let us watch the show then." Ocelia smiled lightly before returning to her seat.
     
  18. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 16
    In a short span of time that felt like an eternity, the first round quietly concluded, making many sighed in relieve. Many of the participants had already resigned themselves as they knew their limit. The test was far harder than their average alchemy test.

    The Steel Cauldron was one of the most prominent associations within the Mountain Union. It had held most of the authority regarding the arts of alchemy and crafting. Most of the greatest alchemists had the backing and support of the Steel Cauldron.

    Although there was only a small brunch in this city, it was still one of the most respected associations in the city. Even the leader of the sorcerer family wouldn't want to offend them.

    The way the descendants of those sorcerer families abused their background and caused the problem was not against the rules of the Steel Cauldron. The higher-ups also wanted to use these people to keep the arrogant prodigies in check and used their greed and jealous as the motivations to strive for success.

    "Mister Glacie, I would like to know who dares to offend your mighty bloodline?" The dull yet awe-inspiring voice of Ocelia Coruscare made Glacies Ninguis' face twitched a little. The brainless excuse he used to come and see this mistress had already backfired him. If he confessed that he deceived her with his trick to arrive to see her, his reputation would fall apart, and he would lose all his pride.

    He gazed at his newly-appointed servant, signalling him to do his work. The servant in grey trembled in fear and quickly kneeled before the eldest mistress of Coruscare Family and knocked his head on the ground loudly, breaking his forehead.

    "This servant, Avidas, would like to ask for forgiveness for deceiving both the eldest master and mistress. This lowly one doesn't know the true culprit and could only lie to you. Please, spare this one's life." His voice trembled pitifully, causing the onlookers to pity with him. He had already practised this line for countless times, hoping that it would save his miserable life in a crucial time like this.

    "Well, Miss Ocelia, let us not bother with that servant anymore. How about this? Would you like to wager that who would place first in the test of formulating pharmaceutical pills?" The young master used his hand to slap the servant in grey, causing his body to stumble backwards before spluttering out blood from the internal injury.

    Seeing the confident look on Glacies' face, Ocelia merely turned her vision towards the female receptionist and called her. The receptionist almost exclaimed joyously, but she managed to restrain herself and walked towards her.

    "You should have some basic regarding alchemy. I shall give you the chance to choose. Choose wisely, and you would receive your reward." Her request indirectly made the receptionist worried.

    If she chose the perfect one, she would obtain the blessing of the sorcerer family's mistress, but if the female receptionist didn't pick the correct one, she might face the wrath of this strong mistress.

    The receptionist girl was the daughter of an elder from the Steel Cauldron. Although this elder's status wasn't high in the association, being able to become a part of the Steel Cauldron was the sigh of a great mind. As the daughter of an elder, she had naturally learnt the arts of alchemy. She was also one of the great talented alchemists as well.

    Her father had tasked her with this receptionist job for her to make connections with the neighbouring power and with the soon-to-be-influential alchemists. If she had numerous and firm relationships with outstanding people, her future would be a lot smoother than her father.

    After a moment of deep thought, she accidentally saw a black-robed man who sat relaxingly, reading his medical book. His loose robe partly concealed his feature within, creating a sense of mysteriousness and awe.

    "That man would be able to score number one for you, mistress." The receptionist immediately pointed her pale finger at Forus, who was sitting alone and watching the scenery.

    "His body had the strange scent of medical powder and the likes. If one had practised concocting the medicinal pills for a long time, their scent would have the unique fragrance of the medicinal powder that would be exceedingly hard to wash it off." That was the reason why she chose him. At the first moment when they met, the receptionist girl had already noted him inside her mind.

    She had tried very hard to remove such fragrance when it had appeared in her bodily odour. She precisely knew how challenging and annoying such a scent could get as she had a very acute perception of smell.

    "Well done, girl. I, the mistress of the Coruscare Family, would never go against my word. You may keep this pendant as the proof of your contribution. You may request my favour once with the use of that pendant." Ocelia smiled lightly before handing out a grand-looking pendant. It had a beautiful fairy with a pair of blazing wings engraved on its surface.

    "Thank you, Mistress. I, Iracia Chlora, would never forget this moment of kindness." The receptionist girl repeatedly thanked the eldest mistress of the Coruscare Family. For her to get a favour from the future leader of the Coruscare Family, her father would cry out tears of joy.

    Strangely, her feeling of carefreeness and comfort gradually turned into the sensation of appreciation for that black-robed man. It was him that she could get this favour. Without knowing it, she had already begun to consider his capabilities and potential.

    "Hello, Mister Falsus Nomen. The lady of the Coruscare Family requires your presence. Please show us your brilliant techniques and capabilities. If the lady had taken a liking in you, your future would be limitless." Miss Iracia came running towards Forus while shouting at him, expressing her joy for his opportunity.

    Forus merely frowned upon hearing her declaration, revealing his confusion. Although he knew his disguise was not perfect, he had confidence in his experience and would not get caught on regularly.

    "Oh, sorry for suddenly saying such things, mister Falsus. I had recommended you to the mistress to let you have this opportunity to show your abilities. Congratulations!" Her goodwill had already made Forus helpless as not only would it threaten to blow his cover out, it would also trap him in the dilemma of choices.

    If he lost, he would most likely have to face the consequences for making the Coruscare Family's anger and wrath, but if Forus succeeded, he would also have to face the wrath of the Ninguis Family. Although the Coruscare would unquestionably shield him and offered him a position in their family,

    "Greeting, Mistress Ocelia, this lowly one could feel your magnanimous charisma even only seeing you for only once." Throwing in random praises and things, Forus tried his best to please this miss' unpredictable temper.

    "So you have already chosen your side? Very well, that girl over there shall destroy your confidence." Glacies pointed at the woman in purple who was looking at Forus in a disdained manner. She felt that Forus was extremely lucky and didn't deserve his place as a contender of the bet.

    Seeing that young master of the Ninguis Family had chosen her, she didn't feel much more than a little happiness and thought that it was how thing should be, recruiting a great talent for one's party was one of the most important things for the faction to survive.

    The geniuses were those who had astounding abilities. They were those whom the families and sects valued the most, supplying most of their resource to nourish them, hoping for them to rise high and mighty and brought about the time of glory to them.

    This action had caused severe cases of arrogance and massive ego prodigy. They would regard everyone else as inferior people below them. The higher-up of the Steel Cauldron also saw through this problem. That was why they had always invited the descendants of the influential families to attend the recruitment event as a special guest.

    They wanted those young masters and mistresses to stomp the ego of the prodigies and broke their delusional pride apart, helping them refined their mental state. If those geniuses developed hatred towards the sorcerer families, it would also help ensure that they would never betray the association and sided with the powerful families.

    "Such a lowly person, yet being so lucky that the beautiful mistress chose him." Another man whose cloth was as red as blood spoke out his thought without any restain. He was the first person to hand in the paper with unparalleled confidence as he was already meditating to rest when other were writing nervously.

    However, seeing that Forus ignored him and continued to fix his eye on the female in purple caused his anger to rise. If the masters and mistresses of the influential families weren't here, he would have directly challenged Forus already.

    "Pipe down. Then, let us start the next test." The next test would challenge the ability to comprehend and calculated for the best decision-making. The participants would have to read the exotic recipe that had some hidden falses and fake ingredients. They would have to fix the methods and used the limited resource the Steel Cauldron provided to create the potion.

    The score would depend on the quality and the quantity of the potion you could make and how well you could modify the recipes to enchant its effect and reduced its cost.

    The test would examine almost all of the collective abilities of the alchemists. They would have to be able to clear and steel their mind from the stress and distraction during the refining stage and used their creativity to change the combination of the recipes, enchanting the effect of the potions.

    "There would be no private room for any of you. The stage would be right here. You will be performing your refinement process in front of the observers and guests." The higher-ups from the Steel Cauldron had already arrived and would be the judges of this test. They would observe the participants' every movement and decision as well as their displayed emotions.

    These actions caused many inexperienced and naive alchemists to sweet out and lost focus, making it easier to mess up their refining process. Only the top geniuses with confidence would be able to remain calm and collected. The Steel Cauldron too only required the best of the best.

    "We hope that there would be at least someone who could impress us. Don't let us down." The voice echoed the hall, mocking the participants. The purple-dressed lady and red-robed man frowned slightly, revealing their displeasure.

    Forus began to unravel the record that the examiners had prepared for him. The paper detailed the information of a potion that existed in the ancient remains whose property was to kindle the soul and purify the polluted elemental power that remained in the consumer's body.

    The refinement process of this potion was very bizarre and wicked, using the corpse of a newborn as the base ingredient and blood of a person with your desire elemental affection as the secondary component. The alchemist would have to thoroughly dehydrate the infant corpse and submerge it with the prepared blood and circulated the blood flow throughout the body, letting the elemental power to integrate into the flesh and shell of the infant.

    Only when the skin of the infant turned blood-red could the alchemist use it to refine the pill.

    Reading the procedure, Forus lightly frowned before rearranging his idea. Although the method was cruel and demonic, Forus strangely didn't feel anything, not even a fluctuation of emotion manifested in his mind.

    The world of sorcerers regarded mortals without any power as ants and insects, having no real right or freedom. Their purpose was to help expand the pool of population to give birth to more talents. Most of the mortals didn't know about the existence of the supernatural beings as they would die by their hand if they ever encountered one.
     
  19. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 17
    After a period of thinking, Forus started to write the expected property of the evil potion. Because its main ingredient was a dead infant, there would be the Death Aura involved in the refinement process, causing the quality of the pill to diminish down. Although the amount of Death Aura wouldn't be able to cause permanent damage to the consumer, it might still cause a drop in their sorcery cultivation.

    He needed to change the way to concoct the medicine to get rid of the lingered Death Aura and substituted other rare ingredients with something more general. The methods from the early period would use the standard components from the old time, whether the modern era would use the common ingredients in the modern era.

    As for the base ingredient that was the blood and the corpse of an infant, Forus could only increase the range of the suitable age of the remains. The younger the remains, the purer the vessel for the medicine, resulting in better quality pills.

    About the consequences of refining and consuming such pills, the alchemist must deal with the resentful spirit of the parents, infants. They also needed to purify all of the blood to rid it of the trace of the previous owner before injecting it into the infant corpse. Otherwise, the mark of the former owner might clash with the current body and polluted each other, making the body withered away.

    There were many limitations to the pill. They could only heal the internal wound that didn't hurt the soul and caused by the sorcerer apprentices. The purity of the elemental power would be too high for the pill to cleanse and might even increase the power of the lingering elemental waste and further harmed the body.

    Forus casually smiled as he read through the procedure of the ancient pill. With the pill's foundation, he could potentially create the pills that stored condensed Death Aura and used it to help increase the firmness of his foundation and speeded up his cultivation process.

    Although he could try to create the new pills at that moment, he decided to not give up on the bet of the Coruscare Family. If he lost the gamble, the Ninguis Family wouldn't help him, and he would suffer the wrath of the Coruscare Family. On the other hand, if he won against the Ninguis Family, although he would face the wrath of the Coruscare Family, he would have the protection of the Coruscare Family.

    With that thought in mind, Forus decisively chose the best path for himself. Although in the end, the path contained many life-threatening crises, it was the best course of action for him. His power and intellect weren't enough for him to find the solution to this problem in a short amount of time.

    While Forus was carefully remodelling the recipe, others were also doing their job as well. The female in purple had been trying her best to recreate her pill to perfection. She hoped to use her masterpiece to thoroughly shatter the calm face of Forus and won the favour of the Ninguis Family.

    She hated the fact that an unknown person within the alchemy circle got chosen by the sorcerer family to compete with her. She felt that this man wasn't decent enough to compete with her. The red-robed man who was popular among the group would be a suitable match.

    The red-robed man, Mabilis Sagunien, was the second son of the Sagunien Family, one of the influential force outside of this city, the Flamedouse City. To gather forces to help him in his battle against the first son for the right to inherit the Sagunien Family, he had travelled to the Flamedouse City to quickly absorb the small factions to help him spread his influence before his rival did.

    With the backing of the Steel Cauldron, his path towards the successor of the Sagunien Family would become a lot easier as the support from the alchemy community was very prominent. They could bring forth numerous people who yearned to help the alchemists and gave the lasting impression to gain small favour from the skilled alchemists, hoping for them to one day accepted their requests.

    Such was the power and strength of the alchemists. It was not without reasons why the alchemists sometimes looked down on other sorcerers or those with lower skills and abilities.

    Although the lady in purple wanted to crush Forus thoroughly to reveal her talents, she couldn't do it as she wished. If she had angered the Coruscare Family by humiliating their future successor, although the Steel Cauldron would help her by deterring them on the surface, the world of the underground circle could still find their way to her.

    She would only cause Forus to lose his cool and created doubt in his abilities, causing his mental state to become unstable, making it more difficult to cultivate and practice his sorcery. His humiliating defeat must not tarnish the reputation of the Coruscare Family, but it would smash the illusion of expert that Forus had.

    Time flew fast for some yet slow for others as if time itself was not absolute and eternal, but a fragile layer of illusion originated from the limit of their senses.

    In the blink of an eye, many hours had passed, and the end of the test was near. The examinators announced the remaining time as the participants panicky checked their answers to look for the unnoticed mistakes or to hope for a sudden inspiration to improve their procedures.

    In a moment, the sound of the bell rang across the exam ground, signifying the end of the writing exam. The examinators would take the modified methods of concocting the pills and potions to examine and gave judgements about the effectiveness of the designs.

    "The following section of the examination would begin shortly. Please prepare yourself." The examinators spoke as they led the participants out of the testing ground before instructing the servants to bring the ingredients. They would provide the components according to the procedures that they got.

    Inside the honourable guest chamber, many distinguished guests were talking to each other as they enjoy the treatment of the Steel Cauldron. Most of the topics would relate to the upcoming bet between the two sorcerer families, the Ninguis Family and the Coruscare Family.

    The heated discussion to determine the victor also caused the man in red who was resting to mess up his train of thought before he quickly suppressed his emotion. For that unknown man to get a place for the Coruscare Family, it was very humiliating for him.

    However, because of this reason, the man in red, Mabilis Sagunien, felt the air of mysteriousness from Forus Ander. From his eyes, Forus must have an unusually mysterious background or a notably ancient alchemy technique.

    His mouth curled into a faint smile as he looked toward the woman in purple. She would be the first person to clash with Forus, competing with him in the art of alchemy. She was the tool that Mabilis will use to correct information about the unknown faction that was Forus.

    If he could find any lead to weakness of trail of Forus, he might be able to bring Forus under the banner of his. With a capable assistant, his path towards the successor of the Sagunien Family would be a lot smoother.

    After a moment of silence and solitude, the sound of the bell echoed the entire hall, signifying the start of the latter part of the test. The participants would have to use their modified procedures and concocted the pills or medicines that they adjusted within the time limit.

    The test was about the courage and steadiness of the participants. Within the eyes of others, they would have to remain calm and collected without losing their focus, or else the concoction would fail and created an inferior result.

    "Don't fail me, Falsus." A sudden voice that travelled into Forus' mind disrupted his thought. The speech carried a trace of spiritual power, progressing into his body unrestrained.

    Although the spiritual could potentially cripple him, Forus didn't do anything against it. He knew that Ocelia wouldn't do anything strange as many others were observing the event, including the higher-ups of the Steel Cauldron.

    When the spiritual power entered his body, it didn't linger around but instead quickly moved towards the exotic seed on his disabled eye. The string of power immediately tried to repair the unusable eye and aided the Death Aura to erase it.

    However, the mysterious seed came from the strange spell of a genuine sorcerer. It wouldn't go down quickly, especially when said sorcerer was stronger than Ocelia herself. She could only stop the ever-increasing rate of invasion of the seed, but couldn't restore his eye.

    Although Ocelia couldn't restore Forus' eye, he felt that it was better this way. If she could dispel the exotic seed and repair his eye, he would have an immense headache. It would mean that the current Ocelia would be mightier than the mysterious female sorcerer who could kill him with a thought.

    "You must defeat her, Falsus." The receptionist girl whom Forus registered with also whispered her encouragement to him. She truly wanted him to win against the female in purple, both for her benefit and his.

    Towards the encouragement and the command of others, Forus remained unmoved and wouldn't ever go all out. His objective was to draw or win by a small margin. Making too big of an event would result in many eyes being fixed on him, causing major disadvantage.

    After receiving his required ingredients, Forus quickly checked the condition of the dead infant and the freshness of the elemental blood. Marking the different of quality in his mind, Forus tried to adjust his recipe to create a more suitable pill.

    Although he could make the recipe even better, due to his unique identity, he wouldn't gather attention unless necessary. Exposing his character wouldn't just cause the Ninguis Family and the Coruscare Family to go after him, it would bring that mysterious female sorcerer to locate him as well.

    Against the unknown power that, with a single thought, could easily annihilate him, Forus had no chance to fight back yet. He needed to gain strength to combat against the enemies to achieve his goals.

    The sudden fluctuation of the temperature caught Forus in his thought, making turn his attention towards the origin of the variation.

    The woman in purple, Abicel Pingre, was using her delicate control over flaming elemental particle to enchant the quality of the fire in the cauldron. She waved her hand and caused many different exotic herbs to fly out and surround her.

    She then used her remaining fire element to envelope the impured herbs and plants, slowly yet steadily burnt away all the unneeded parts and the imperfection of the ingredients. She had produced better and more suitable ingredients from the previous inferior ones.

    Her way of controlling fire element was very taxing for the ordinary alchemists. If she lost her focus even for a moment, she could cause the flaming particle to accidentally burn the good parts of the ingredients, causing their quality to drop.

    Her spectacular performance created the attraction force that guided everyone's attention towards her figure. The cleansed herbs and plants that flew freely around her while the blazing flame erupted in beautiful patterns according to her thought. The scene illustrated the grand talent of Abicel, showing her ability that helped her built her reputation on the circle of the alchemists.

    Seeing the excellent execution of Abicel, Glacies Ninguis felt his pride exploding into the sky, filling him with delight. He secretly glared at Ocelia and found that regardless of how good Abicel was, she would never invoke any emotion from her icy face other than a faint smile.

    The thought of this possibility caused him to lose all his excitement, making him envied Forus even more. He found that when Ocelia looked at that insignificant man, she would let out a hint of emotion.

    It was as like Forus was something Ocelia couldn't get over with, as if his fate and hers connected with other.
     
  20. GDLiZy

    GDLiZy Wise Deepsea Mermaid

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    Chapter 18
    After witnessing the performance of the lady in purple, many participants felt their breathing quickened. Even Mabilis Sagunien also felt that her ability could rival his. For someone who didn't come from the sorcerer family, it would be very challenging to have enough resource to spend it on improving their alchemy skills.

    As for Forus, his case was very uncommon. In his first life, he was a successful businessman whose marketing skill was very extraordinary. He also had enough luck and resource to reuse the concept of gambling creatively and modified it into the lottery shop, exploiting the greed that presented within almost every sorcerer.

    When he witnessed the talent of Abicel, his mind suddenly thought about how confident the mistress of the Coruscare Family sounded. Mabilis turned his attention towards Forus, who was immersing himself in checking the ingredients.

    Since the start of the latter part of the competition, Forus hadn't even touched the cauldron at all. All of his attention had fixed on identifying the characteristic of the ingredients, using them to recreate a more suitable procedure.

    His action caused Mabilis to frown at first, but due to his experience, he caught up to the thought of Forus, only to make him frowned even harder. Even for himself, he knew that it would be unquestionably challenging to modify the recipe for the pills according to the provided herbs and not the other way around.

    After witnessing the subtle display of talent from Forus' work, Mabilis felt a large amount of excitement building up in his mind, the eagerness to see the battle between the two raising suns caused his face to break into a smile. The more talent Forus was, the better support he would have once he reached out to Forus and successfully recruit him.

    Silently watching, Mabilis too didn't neglect his concoction. He also intended to compete for the first place of the test. Although others would have to rethink their choice before trying to get in the way of the sorcerer families, Mabilis himself was also from another sorcerer family, so he naturally wasn't afraid of them.

    While his mind was wandering into the land of thought, Forus slowly lifted his head and reaching out towards the cauldron. His action caused Mabilis and others who paid attention to him to focus on him. They were wondering about how Forus would fare against his counterpart.

    Forus waved his hand, creating a magical force that gently lifted the corpse of the dead infant towards him. His hand moved as the small line of blue flame gradually manifested itself before him. The bluish flame moved according to his wills as it swiftly invaded the inner organs of the lifeless infant.

    The art of alchemy had diverged into many different topics, as the alchemy itself wasn't absolute. In countless ages and eras, many masters went against the common sense of their time and created multiple unique alchemy techniques. Many of which had lost their successors, and fell into oblivion due to the passing of time.

    However, even though none of the masters had achieved the true immortality, and in the end, they fell victim to the river of time, their ideas and knowledge would still live on, engraving itself into the history of alchemy.

    The art of fire was one of the most fundamental topics about the art of alchemy. It taught the alchemists about the importance of the heat source and how they could integrate them into their alchemy concoction techniques.

    The art of fire also explained the different kinds of heat. The weakest class of flame was the yellowish fire. The alchemists would use it to warm up the cauldron to get rid of their rust or used it for a minor experiment or minor refinement process. This fire was the second elementary fire that was just a little harder to produce than the average flame.

    The most common flame used by the alchemists was the orangish flame. It was the most crucial flame that all of the alchemists must learn to manipulate. It was stronger than the yellowish flame and was the most simplistic flame to produce. It was the core part of various concoctions throughout the history of the alchemy.

    The art of fire didn't end at the orange flame. Many flames existed above the ordinary flame that alchemists commonly used. That bluish flame that Forus used was one of the said flames. The bluish flame was very tough to create, as the alchemists had to focus the energy of the fire to reach the peak of regular fire before compressed them into a spark of energy to break the limit of the orangish flame.

    Only then would the colour of the fire become blue and achieved the qualitative change. The alchemists would seldom use this kind of flame as their radiation was very hot that they could potentially break out of the cauldron and injure the alchemists themselves.

    However, the advanced alchemists would still use these fire to concoct pills and potions that needed the highest degree of pureness in their ingredients, as well as the refinement that involved the better tier of treasures.

    Recalling the detail of the bluish flame, Mabilis widened his eyes as his vision carefully examined the condition of the fire as well as the expression of Forus. After seeing that Forus was still relatively relaxed after the creation of the flame, he suddenly felt that this man was not as simple as he looked.

    Ignoring the admiration of the onlookers, Forus was still concentrating almost all of his attention into controlling the bluish flame to quickly cleanse the inner organ and blood veins of the dead infant. He had to control the fire to keep it from burning the skin of the infant.

    Due to the immense power of the bluish flame, while it might destroy the skin of the infant, it would also promptly burn off the contamination in the infant at an astonishing rate, reducing the unnecessary time that it would take as well as reducing the risk of poping and hardened veins.

    Although in the beginning, he had thought that he wouldn't need to try too hard to win this competition, but now, having recognised his naive beliefs, Forus determined to use the utmost of his ability to compete with her. Even if he had offended the Ninguis Family, after witnessing the skills of Forus, the higher-ups of the Steel Cauldron would naturally try their best to protect him.

    However, most of the skill he displayed was still within the limit of his plan. He wasn't planning to reveal his secrets alchemy techniques that he learnt from the self-learning of the worst nightmare of his first life, the blue-robed true sorcerer.

    Even though Forus had always regard that monster as his worst enemy, he would still respect the abilities of his as he could self-learning alchemy and created his unique techniques and wrote down his understandings for future reference.

    Forus couldn't risk exposing his connection with that rogue sorcerer as he might invite the greedy wolfs who wanted his treasures and secret techniques. If the situation was in that stage, even the Steel Cauldron might even betray him and took all his wealth for themselves.

    After a short amount of time, the bluish flame had already dried the lifeless infant into a dried shell. Seeing the progression of his concoction, Forus, whose face was still cold as ever, continued to channel his sorcery energy to infuse with the prepared elemental blood, causing them to boil up.

    The boiling blood then extracted itself and formed a wave of blood-drops. They floated around the dried up infant and, under Forus' guidance, slowly seeped into the flesh of the dehydrated shell, invading the blood veins and inner organs.

    As the new blood inserted itself into the blood circulation system of the dead infant, it would gradually mutate the body structure of the infant to become one with the blood itself. If the blood was too diluted or the body was too firm, the new bloodline would get rejected and caused harm to the physical shell.

    This process of integrating new bloodline into the body of the infant had taken lots of mental stamina of Forus, making him sweated a little bit. He had to be very cautious not to lose his focus, or else the new bloodline would go berserk and caused an undesirable drop in the shell's quality.

    Once Forus saw the progressive change in features of the dead infant, his eye revealed a hint of vigilance. Shortly after the first visible change, the dried up infant suddenly twitched uncontrollably, making weird and disturbing sounds every time it moved.

    The new bloodline had collided with the pure body of an infant, trying to devour each other. It was Forus who constantly created an equilibrium for both the physical body and the bloodline to merge with the other. Due to his destructive action, he had attracted the vengeful spirit of both the newborn infant and the owner of the bloodline.

    This step was very crucial for the concoction process. If the alchemist couldn't suppress the vengeful spirits fast enough, it would influence the quality of the pill, causing it to experience a tremendous drop in quality, not only that, the backlash would also injure the soul of the alchemist, causing a decline in their sorcery cultivation if their sorcery foundation was not powerful enough.

    Suddenly, expansive black gas seeped out of the body of the lifeless infant, filling the nearby surrounding with a heavy aura of bitterness and sorrow. Inside the black gas, two figures were floating and hatefully staring at Forus.

    One of the figures, a middle-aged lady whose appearance was unidentifiable due to a disgusting injury she had sustained, screamed out a hoarse cry that sent out a wave of sound that disrupted the concentrating mind of other alchemists, causing them to slip up on their concoction.

    Immediately after her first attack, Forus used his hand to form a fist and directed the power of the frost to cover his fist and punched towards the faint silhouette of the maddening lady. His fist collided with the soundless and traceless wave of resentment, creating a shockwave that caused the ground to faintly quake.

    The shockwave fused the remnants of the resentment and progressed outwards from the point of collision, causing various alchemists to lose their focus and got hinder by the backlash of the disordered movement of sorcery power.

    This commotion caused many spectators to swiftly shift their attention towards Forus, using their eyes to measure his look as well as his sorcery power. They were waiting to see what would Forus do to get rid of the resentful spirit without causing the damage to the ingredients.

    After punching out at the decaying lady, Forus clasped his hands together and blew the frost that covered both of his hands towards the black mass of gas. The icy-cold ball of elemental energy flew with the magical wind and travelled towards the black smoke, clashing with it.

    Upon the moment of impact, Forus pointed his finger rapidly at the two silhouettes behind the wall of smoke. Each time he aimed at it with his finger, the tip of his nail would absorb the natural light surrounding him and condensed it into a ray of golden light before shooting itself towards the black gas, helping the ball of the icy particle to push back the aura of resentment.

    During all of this, Forus had consumed much of his sorcery energy inside of his body, making his face turned slightly pale. He also needed to focus his attention on refining the interior of the dead infant as well as supplying the sorcery energy to the bluish flame to keep it burning while balancing it not to let it get out of control and ruin the concoction.

    At the crucial moment when most of the ray of light had pushed the dark cloud into retreating inwards of itself, lady Abicel clapped her hand two consecutive times, creating two waves of heat. One would condense the refining ingredients inside of her cauldron into a pill while another would travel towards Forus, disrupting his concentration and destroyed all of his hard work.