Sovereign of the Karmic System-Chapter 689: Tackling the Void

As Wolfe and Daniel approached the wall, Der could only stare in silence. He had tried to find a reason for why the group should abandon this fooling endeavor, but while he was not a slow thinker, Daniel and Roley had not left any time for him to make his case, leaving him at a loss for words.

"You two really don’t get along.." Muttered a youthful voice that came from beside him. The owner of the voice was Ian who, at some point after the end of the conversation, had walked closer to the old warrior. "But I get it, I don’t get along with him either, even though he is my ancestor. He is kind of a tool.."

As he spoke Ian desperately tried to discern the warrior’s reactions to his words, eager to form a connection with one of the party’s core members. But, unfortunately, the plate helmet made it almost impossible. It was only when Ian called Daniel a tool that the young man was able to hear what he could only describe as the mildest chuckle in history.

"That he is." Said Der with the same neutral tone and stoic attitude as ever. "But that is not who he truly is." He then added with a spark of melancholy. His pearly white eyes were glued to the person who resembled an old friend, but now felt like a stranger. The person who had freed his daughter from slavery, protected her until he could come back and take revenge for her.. and who now he could hardly recognize.

A doubtful expression formed on Ian’s face. Many had sung Daniel’s praise, even the powerful leaders of the encampment he had lived in for all his life. And yet, of such nobility and righteousness he could see very little. All he saw in him was the depiction of narcissism – A self-centered, cold and calculative mind. But a reason to strike a conversation was as good an opportunity as any. "What kind of person is he?" Ian asked with the innocence of a curious teenager.

Der’s perpetually guarded arm seemed to relax. His hand let go the pommel of his sword, and his arm slid down the hand guard until his forearm guard was resting over it. No other part of his body moved, making it difficult for people to admit that he was truly human, and not a statue capable of simple restricted movements.

"He was a tough kid. Grew up in poverty with no parents, just like you." Der said, casually forming a connection between Daniel and his descendant.

"Have you known him since he was a kid?" Ian inquired, ignoring the spark of irritation that made his left brow twitch. In his eyes, Daniel had something of a God for the people who followed him.. and as it was normal for people who had single handedly dug their way out of the bottom of the barrel, Ian did not appreciate having his struggles compared to those of someone who had never lacked wealth, love and power.

Darkness fell on the warrior’s helmet as he closed his eyes in remembrance. "No. His father died at war under my command, back when war was fought with swords and shields, and swinging your fists did not threaten to shatter the fabric of space. I only met him years later, when he had already become a man of responsibility."

"Well, I grew up in a war zone. There is little worse than that." Ian could not help but add – A remark Der did not bother reacting to.

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It was normal for kids who had grown bearing an immense amount of suffering to want to find pride in their difficult past, wanting to be the ones who had survived the worst. It was a badge of honor. But despite the grimness of Ian’s childhood, he had seen very little of the world. He had never met the cruelty people were capable of when there was no higher cause or desperate situation to unite people, or the kind of danger hidden behind nice words.

Perhaps that was why he failed to see Conflict’s intentions.

While saying that Ian had lived a far more dangerous childhood was technically not a lie, few across the multiverse could boast to have seen and done as much as Daniel had by the time he was twenty. He had experienced the death of both of his parents, slaved to work off debts.. he had made groundbreaking discoveries and was hunted down for it. He had created societies and protected them, then saw them fall.

In comparison, Der thought, the young man in front of him had lived a more one-dimensional life. Harsh? Yes. But of kids like him he had seen tens of thousands during his decades as a general in a mortal’s army. Bet that during the army’s march back, when he would see children scour the parade of injured soldiers only to fail to find their fathers, or during recruitment, when kids barely older than Ian himself would enlist in hope to escape a life in which all they had to their name was their life.

As Der’s eyes briefly met with the proud youth’s, one thing became clear to him. Ian truly did not understand the ways of the world. Yet, he did not bother to correct him. Daniel’s story was a long one, and he had no intention of allowing a little spy to plant seeds of distrust during a mission, or worse, learn exactly where Der stood in relation to Daniel.

Noticing that the old warrior had no intention of entertaining the topic any further, Ian turned to look back at the immense wall, in front of which Daniel was standing on one knee. The fingers of his right hand were dipped into a small pool of liquid metal, while the rest of his hand was shrouded in a dense white mist brightened by the light Roley’s gaze shone on it. "What are we even doing here anyway?" He asked.

"In all likeliness, die." Der responded as the corner of his lips curved into the slightest of smiles.

—--

Wolfe’s journey across the first wall was a simple one. He had already mapped the metallic veins that spread around the general area the party was standing by, so finding his way through a second time was not a problem. He dove into the bits that marked the stone surface, then let his consciousness follow the familiar path turn after turn for roughly fifty feet, resembling a very inconsistent bolt of lightning.

Then, after about seconds, his consciousness suddenly stopped.

His consciousness was not made to understand emotions. At least not the way humans would. After all, he was a being of metal, and to him metal was a world in itself. So it was not a surprise that when his world ended an inch away from his consciousness’ location, he knew that he had reached the inner part of the first stone layer.

Fear was one of the few feelings that elementals understood. Especially when a really good reason for it had almost dissipated his existence mere minutes ago. Yet this time, things were different.

The moment Wolfe stopped his consciousness from coming in contact with the void, the faint spiritual power that followed after him through the maze of metal exploded through him, shrouding his consciousness in pure white essence. Only then did he advance, diving straight into the seemingly endless and absolute void.

His consciousness emerged like overflowing water from a crack between stones, forming a bubble of liquid metal around the exit point, then shot forward at maximum speed, stretching forward in the shape of a thin cable. The crossing only lasted a few moments which, with the protection of Daniel’s quickly eroding spiritual essence, made the whole process scary but uneventful. After all, there was literally nothing to see other than Daniel’s spiritual power being broken and disintegrated by the absolute void.

Soon enough, Wolfe’s liquid body landed onto the inner surface of the second wall, coating as much of its stone surface in order to find a new entry point, which he found no less than ten seconds layer.

—--

Back to the area where Roley and the others were waiting, the party members were left to observe the seemingly uneventful process.

The visible part of Wolfe’s body was a fist-sized glob of liquid metal, now glowing white with spiritual power. In it Daniel’s hand sank almost completely, leaving only the wrist, the back of the hand and the top of his knuckles visible.

"He reached the second wall." Daniel said through gritted teeth. Only a few seconds had passed since Wolfe’s consciousness had entered the abyss, but he had vastly underestimated the void’s corrosive ability, as well as overestimated the spiritual essence of a cultivator at the immortal stage possessed.

Every additional surface that came in contact with the void needed to be protected, so the more Wolfe’s body expanded into the void, the harder it became for him to shield him. An effort that soon became comparable to mental exhaustion, or the physical toll a twenty minutes long full-sprint race would take on a mortal’s body.

"Are you two ready?" He then asked while glancing at the figures of Roley and Aeron.

The two nodded. Aeron had already constructed a thread of mental power meant to rush through the bridge formed by the elemental’s body, while Roley was holding the sphere of primordial spatial essence between his fingers, the only treasure in his possession that had not been sealed by the inter-dimensional portal. All they had to do was wait for their moment.

And so they did, for several minutes.

During this interminable wait Aeron and Roley had noticed that Daniel was growing increasingly exhausted, and was now covered in sweat. His hand was trembling, sending ripples on the surface of the small metallic puddle, while his teeth grinded audibly.

Any attempt to ask whether there was a problem was met with a dismissive wave of Daniel’s free hand. He simply could not afford to dedicate any of his focus on anything other than fighting the void’s corrosive power, and even if he could, he would not have an answer to give. After all, his spiritual essence had not followed Wolfe into the second wall, where his consciousness was safe. His senses stopped at the portion of metal he was protecting between the two walls.

Were he to stop and retrieve his spiritual essence, that part of Wolfe’s body would dissipate, leaving the elemental’s consciousness stuck beyond the layer of void and inside the second wall, unable to cross back ever again.

After another interminable minute, Aeron turned towards Der and said, "Can you take over if he runs out of spiritual essence? At least until he recovers." His worries for the elemental’s safety were starting to show.

Before the old warrior could answer, however, Roley said, "By the time the void breaks his immortal essence apart, Dan won’t have recovered anything of significance. We just need to hope that Wolfe succeeds or retreats before it’s too-"

"NOW! DO IT NOW!" Daniel barked out.

The thread of green mental power instantly dove into the metallic puddle in a flash, zigzagged into the first metallic labyrinth and crossed the layer of collapsed space in mere moments. Then, as he entered the second layer, Aeron realized what was taking so long. The second wall was far thicker than the first. Hundreds of feet at the very least. Yet, he didn’t stop.

Moments later, Aeron’s arm snapped to the side, hand wrapped tightly around Roley’s shoulder.

Upon contact, an image appeared within the young scholar’s mind, prompting him to twist the glass bead he was holding between his fingers. In response, a portal opened a few feet away from him. It was shaky, to a degree that made what lay on the other side of it difficult to distinguish, but time was of the essence, and the portal seemed stable enough to cross.

The female paladin grabbed Ian’s arm and dove in first, followed by Der, Aeron and Roley himself. Then, as the portal started to close, Daniel retrieved his spiritual essence and dashed through, eager to once again be at reach of any semblance of usable karmic power. Though unfortunately, he was destined to be disappointed.