Wyven’s shack in Mercy Forest, two weeks before Jodye’s arrival in Little Oasis.
Dessa and Wyven Chimes were standing by the lake in a warm embrace. Dessa’s crimson hair was tied into a ponytail, and she was wearing black tights and leather armor that hugged her body perfectly. Wyven was wearing his same old plain clothes and seemed to have aged by at least 5 years.
“Must you truly go, child? Now is the time we have awaited, the time where we can start over.” Wyven Chimes voice contained worry and melancholy. He was genuinely reluctant to see this child leave on her own.
“Uncle Wyven, if I don’t follow Mr. Jupiter now then I’m afraid I would regret it for the rest of my life. I have to go,” Dessa Chimes’ eyes were resolute, without a single ripple. She knew what she had to do.
“But dear niece, you do not even know where he has gone.”
“I will find him.”
“He is merely a child, he can not provide for you or take care of you. How are so certain that you can rely on such a being?”
“If it is as you say, then it is even more important that I guide him…”
“…Can you not think of it a few days more?”
“Did you not hear me earlier, uncle? About regret? Rest. Of. My. Life.” Dessa Chimes pushed her uncle away and ran off playfully, before turning around again and sticking out her tongue. “Don’t worry about me, uncle! I’m following him by choice, I like Jupiter much more than these other smelly men. He won’t let me down!”
As Wyven watched his niece runoff out of the woods, he had many complicated feelings. As an adult man and her caretaker, how could he let her go alone? Merely, she was already 16, that is considered an adult age. Plus, Dessa was not his daughter, and he could not control her. As far as being her caretaker, since when had he ever been able to actually take care of her? Wyven Chimes could barely protect himself, much less Dessa. Thus, he sat and watched as her figure grew increasingly blurry. He imagined that he would never see this niece of his again.
Sadly, Wyven was correct in this notion. He was fated to never see Dessa again.
Dessa, on the other hand, would one day soar through the divine realms disdaining the heights she used to consider tall. Of course, this was a story for another time.
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Ten days after Jodye departs from Little Oasis…
ROAR!
In the middle of a dark forest, a vicious wild cat bounces off the trees as it slashed its aggressive and sharp claws at the dodging Jodye Trill. Jodye was wearing elegant black robes and had equipped the serenity earrings and brave fang collar from his space ring. Jodye felt an affinity with these items, and after probing them with his divine sense, he knew the effects were decent. Especially the serenity earrings which could hide his aura.
Such a thing was just too good! It was a real treasure.
In such a dangerous forest, a treasure that could completely hide your aura was definitely needed. Especially since Jodye had chosen to forego the use of his Baleful Glaive, as the power increase it brought was a bit exaggerated. He couldn’t grow stronger by relying too heavily on powerful tools. A good example would be the mercenaries Jupiter often faced when on an adventure. Many of these groups employed powerful weapons that made them fearsome opponents. However, how many of these fearsome opponents had Jupiter crushed with pure strength before they had a chance to utilize their equipment?
The number was too vast to count.
Jodye aspired to possess the strength that could disdain all external measures as well. For this reason, he chose to not use his A-grade combat glaive unless his life was in real danger. Instead, he was now using a D-grade combat saber that he found in one of the magic pouches from Little Oasis town. The D-Grade combat saber only boosted his combat power by 13%. Like this, Jodye would use his own ability to clear all obstacles!
The wild cat’s paws looked as if they were dipped in gold paint and released fierce force momentum as it wildly slashed at Jodye’s legs again and again. This wild cat was 2 meters tall and 5 meters long with purple fur and glowing green eyes. It had fangs like a saber tooth tiger that appeared to be made of solid gold.
Golden-fanged Jungle Cat!
A level 3 vicious beast!
Level 3 vicious beast’s possessed the strength equivalent to 110 bp. This Golden-fanged Jungle Cat had advanced nascent metal power symbol! That was another 15 bp! Beasts were different from man, in that their bodies possess symbols and marks that represent the magic powers hidden in their lifeblood. The Golden-fanged Jungle Cat’s arms were covered in deadly and heavy metal armor. Jodye felt pressured as he dodged the attacks of this mighty beast in a helter-skelter manner. It’s raging force momentum had already pushed its strength to 140 BP.
Jodye’s astral points were building astral force momentum as his titanic rage force exploded from his muscles. Jodye waited until the opportune moment, and it came as the Golden-fanged Jungle Cat corned him against a tree and took a big swing, the metal power symbol on its arms radiating light. However, before he could get hit by this attack, Jodye was sliding under the belly of the Golden-fanged Jungle Cat as he sliced out with his blade.
Fist of Might: Mighty Slash!
The power of his nine astral points poured into Jodye’s right hand, and his saber blade sliced in a line across the center of the Golden-fanged Jungle Cat. Steaming entrails and organs spilled out in Jodye’s wake as he emerged from the other end.
“That strike just now was worth 147 BP! With my astral points active my strength is equal to 130 BP. With my base strength in addition to the combat gear’s 13% boost and my force momentum, I was able to strike this hard!” The saber in Jodye’s hand had reached the end of its life, as half of the blade remained in the Golden-fanged Jungle Cat’s rear end. “Of course, this was without using slaughter force. If I did that perhaps the blade would have broken sooner…”
Jodye Trill meticulously skinned the level 3 Golden-fanged Jungle Cat, before removing its fangs and storing them in his space ring with the beast’s heart, tail, pelt, and gallbladder. Starting a fire, Jodye roasted the corpse of the creature with some special herbs and spices he had collected and then unceremoniously devoured it. The aroma of the roasted meat was enough to water the mouths of any creature in the area.
After eating and packing up his things, Jodye jumped into a front flip, landing on a nearby tree branch. Sweat was dripping from Jodye’s brow as he took a deep breathe of relief, “Sheesh! That was a close one. I was only a tiny bit stronger than that Golden-fanged Jungle Cat when it used its metal concept. I need to advance the strength of my own concept so that I can fuse it into my battle force easier. I remember that this process is far more simple with the help of Wordly True Essence. Perhaps I should take advantage of this hero blood to learn essence cultivation?”
Jodye sat down in meditation to refine the energy in this magic beast meat. He was slowly improving his tenth spirit point. This was the hardest spirit point to refine thus far, but the current Jodye was totally unaware of that. He had assumed the pace was normal. After spending a few hours circulating the titanic rage law in his body, Jodye decided to shift focus. He took a D-grade serenity crystal out of his space ring, activated his Mind’s eye and recheck the area.
Once he was sure there were no creatures around him, he absorbed the serenity force in the crystal, drawing it into his force genesis amidst the terrifyingly chilly energy. Jodye also kept refining more divine spirit source in his right eye. Using his divine sense, he managed to fuse the yin force from the serenity crystal into the spirit source before refining them both into the spiritual paths of his right eye and deep into his source spirit. The first stage of the Cosmic Vision Scripture was called the Eye of Serenity, or the serene sight stage. Jodye was currently at the Intermediate Eye of Serenity stage, and to enter the advanced stage he had to perfectly fuse divine spirit source and yin force!
However, his contemporary fusion was still imbalanced and imperfect, he had yet to break through to the advanced level. However, his Serene Stare could affect stronger enemies now. Of course, this didn’t mean Jodye could kill them, but it would at least buy him time. Unfortunately, his law comprehensions weren’t deep enough. Otherwise, he would be able to enter the advanced level and use the soul attack, Serenity Beam! This would be his true capital when the time came. Most low-level experts didn’t practice any soul cultivation, and low-level beasts had a weak soul force, to begin with.
Jodye had that secret treasure map, but he needed the Serenity Beam if he planned on exploring a pharaoh’s pyramid! Without it, he wouldn’t be confident of his safety.
In the last few days, Jodye had been doing all he could to temper his body and abilities further. The most important thing to do for one practicing the titanic rage law was to slaughter! Only through life or death battles could one temper their flesh thoroughly with astral might, reaching the stage where astral force is fused into the battle force, allowing other powers of the earth to be incorporated! This was the secret of the Titanic Rage Force! From Jupiter’s experience, Jodye was aware that if he could utilize true essence, then he would be able to transform his astral might into astral essence. True essence had the unique ability to fuse with all matter. At higher levels of control, it could even create new matter.
This is what made high-level saints so terrifying. Astral might, on the other hand, was power in its purest and most volatile form! If true essence was the power that worlds produced, then astral strength was the power that built the world! Astral forces couldn’t easily fuse with other energies but had a natural chemistry with cosmic forces and true worldly essence.
“However, how to become a saint? Hmm…should I find a local master? If I can compare the popular cultivation methods with my records then perhaps I can create my own method,” Jodye Trill had somehow wholly fused with the memory fragment of Jupiter due to his coma. As a result, he was now thoroughly familiar with a wealth of knowledge he had only briefly skimmed through before his memory loss. After, all how easy was it to study 300 years worth of memories like it was a book?
HISSS~~
Twenty minutes later Jodye faces the belly of a 30-meter-long python with pitch-black razor shaped teeth. The python had lava shaped patterns on its sides. Level 4 Magma Serpent. The serpent was incredibly swift and agile whipping its tail around destroying trees in an attempt to subdue the bare-handed Jodye.
Wham. Wham.
Jodye Trill jumped again as the tail of the serpent came crashing down at him. He ran up the back of the snake before bringing both of his fists down on its skull. The power of his astral might exploded from his fists in and ravaged the Vicious Magma Serpent’s body from the inside out, causing to wail in pain. Jodye sneered and silenced it with a full powered heel drop.
“Level 4 Vicious Magma Serpent’s gallbladder, this should work pretty well…” Jodye Trill had some alchemical plans that he couldn’t wait to utilize. If he kept killing beasts and collecting herbs, he felt he was destined to quickly grasp this world’s alchemy methods.
Jodye continued traveling through this dark forest hunting prey. When he wasn’t fighting to temper himself, he was jumping between the branches rather than walking on the ground. This forest was his last stop before reaching the Great Gu Desert. There was about a kilometer left before he arrived at the edge of the woods when Jodye suddenly stopped. He heard a terrified scream coming from somewhere to his east. Expanding his divine sense, Jodye soon found a red-haired girl being chased by a magical beast which looked like a cross between and hippopotamus and a rhinoceros.
The girl looked to be about 15 or 16 and was incredibly cute wearing an azure skirt and leather armor, and had a body that was growing curvier. The beast had a large horn on its nose that looked super sharp and imperious, next to its enormous maw that was biting through trees as it tried to eat the red-haired girl. Its body was the size of an elephant, and it was fiercely aggressive.
“A Baku? But these sharp origin energy fluctuations… a level 5 vicious beast!” Thought Jodye out loud, as he sucked in a breathe of cool air, “Truly stubborn and unlucky. Fine, now that you have followed me, you will be my first subordinate.”
Jodye swiftly turned around and headed straight towards the location of the red-haired girl. This girl was no stranger! It was none other than Dessa Chimes!
Jodye Trill laughed boisterously as he jumped through the trees. This laugh was seeming imprinted in his blood, as he spoke with fervor, “My first task as a hero. Refining a damsel in distress into a war machine. This is bound to be fun!”
