Mystical Journey

“If nobody has any other objections, we can leave now,” Blue Void said loudly from the front.

There were no sounds from below, indicating that everyone was pleased and satisfied with his arrangements. Blue Void then started dividing everyone into several groups and the respective tasks each group would be in charge with.

As protected ones, all the Contractors were surrounded in the middle. After all, their safety was directly linked to the existence of the summoned dragon race.

As a Wizard, even if it was a Level Nine Great Wizard, without any special physical attributes or equipment or casting a spell shield upon oneself, even a Level One Warrior could easily kill him. However, once the Wizards were well prepared, the power they could erupt would be way horrifying than an entire troop of Warriors.

Therefore, the safety of the Wizards was at the top of their list.

After everything was settled, the groups slowly walked out of the camp site. Warriors were scattered everywhere whereas Archers were at the inner layer with the Wizards and Contractors right in the middle.

Kevin was the one who stayed in the innermost, grouped together with a Contractor and a Level-Four Wizard whereas his daughter, due to special relationships, was arranged to be by his side.

The team slowly descended along a small stone ladder at the edge of the abyss, and soon disappeared into the darkness of the abyss.

*******************

The mysterious snow mountain.

The pure white snow mountain and the azure lake were calm and peaceful, yet seemed remorselessly dead without any living creatures.

There was no sun over the blue lake, only white clouds that floated slowly but there was still a white light that was shining upon the surface below.

Whoosh!

A gigantic White Dragon glided across the lake, causing large ripples and waves.

The White Dragon had a slender snake neck and strong and powerful limbs, its slightly blue-ish wings on its back fluttered gently as if it had a weird yet natural frequency. It was well coordinated and natural.

Roar…

The White Dragon growled slowly as it darted in the direction of the snow mountain.

The instant it closed in the snow mountain, the White Dragon once again rushed and entered a translucent whirlpool, vanishing into thin air.

“You’re here?”

Everything went black, Garen suddenly felt that he had fallen directly into the bottom of the abyss.

The translucent light source was right in front of him, shimmering in a faint white light as Ann’s voice could be heard from inside.

“I came to fulfill the agreement.” Garen realized that he was standing in front of the light source, his mind calmed down.

“It seems that you’re still trustworthy, and punctual,” Ann spoke lightly, “my experiments are divided into two categories. The first one is the Soul Toxic Test. Please come with me.”

“?”

Garen did not understand how he was supposed to follow her. Ann’s presence was clearly locked within the light source.

But very quickly, he soon understood what Ann meant.

Poof.

A beautiful lady wearing a black tunic skirt walked out slowly from the light source. Her hair was silky smooth and her skin even delicate than the best jade.

This was a perfect lady.

This was Garen’s first thought when he saw Ann for the very first time. She was so perfect she did not even seem humane.

This kind of perfection was not just the perfection of Heaven and Earth, but the kind of perfection that no flaws could be found. Whether it was her temperament or her body, she was completely flawless in all aspects.

“Come with me,” the clear manly voice that came out from Ann’s mouth instantly destroyed her perfect temperament.

Seeing that she just made a turn into the side of the mountain wall, Garen quickly followed.

As the both of them walked towards the mountain wall slowly, Ann explained in a hushed tone.

“Don’t be surprised by my abnormality,” she glanced at Garen’s confused face. “Every hundred years, I’ll switch genders and voices. For this coming hundred years, I’ll have the body of a woman and the voice of a man. Then the next hundred years, the body of a man and the voice of a woman.”

“Uh…” Garen was a little speechless. It was still alright if Ann had the body of a woman and the voice of a man. If he just happened to meet Ann in the body of a man with the voice of a woman… that would be extremely hard for him to adjust to…

“Also, I’m not as what you think, sealed in this place.” Ann turned back and walked towards the stone wall. She reached out her hand and pressed on it lightly.

An arch door slowly and silently appeared on the stone wall, in the middle of the black door were two scarlet red bloodshot eyes.

Click.

The door opened, and Ann walked in.

Garen quickly followed.

Inside was a pitch black hollow space without a trace of light. But with the body of a White Dragon, Garen was born with the talent of Darkvision. Coupled with the faint, white light that was coming from the outside, he could vaguely make clear of his surroundings here.

A laboratory.

This was no doubt a laboratory.

Some unknown blood-stained creatures were bound onto the white experimental platform and in the corner were some wheat-like rings with blue, electric current flashing from time to time.

There were a lot of small grooves on one side of the wall with red candles placed in it. There were probably more than hundreds of them.

Swoosh.

All the hundred over red candles suddenly lit up and a bright yellow flame instantly illuminated the entire cave.

Ann walked to a corner where a lot of garbage and utensils were placed and searched around, finding a very sophisticated looking silver-white metal machine.

“Come here.”

She waved at Garen.

Garen hurried over. Although he did not know what she was up to actually, he did agree to cooperate with her experiment and so naturally, he had to keep his promise.

“Drink it.” Ann opened the silver-white metal machine. Inside the elliptical machine was a Light Ball full of tentacles. She held it up and passed it to Garen.

“Drink?”

Garen accepted the Light Ball, how do I drink this? He was stunned.

“Try to imagine, and use your Soul to touch it,” Ann explained.

Garen composed himself and looked at it. It did not seem harmful and his Soul Ring was not sending out any warning or whatsoever, so it should be alright…

He thought so in his mind.

His Soul Energy reached out and touched the object.

Swoosh!

The white ball of light vanished instantly as it seemed to have disappeared underneath the skin of Garen’s arm.

Before Garen could even react, he felt a cold and intense aura that emerged in his soul rushing straight for his Soul Ring.

Before it could reach his Soul Ring, boom!

The white ball of light exploded and a mass of green paste splattered all over the place, even the Soul Ring.

Garen suddenly felt a strong sense of nausea stirring up in his stomach. He had a strong urge to puke.

“This is…?”

“Do you feel anything?” Ann looked at him curiously, “This is my latest Soul Explosive Potion. It’s able to separate the parts on Alien Soul that is not pure enough.”

“I…” Garen felt more and more uncomfortable. His stomach felt as if there were a thousand roundworms wriggling around and the discomfort was unimaginable.

His body tensed up and he fell onto the ground. Wriggling on the ground, he bit his mouth shut. He had a feeling that once he gave in the urge to puke, his Soul might suffer an unimaginable harm.

“This potion lasts for two days so, in these two days, I’ll give you a lesson on the basic general knowledge of this world. Oh… It’s not that kind of general knowledge, but the more high-end part,” Ann said casually. “This shall serve as my reward to you for cooperating with this experiment.”

Garen was not able to speak anymore, he could only listen. He resisted the immense urge to vomit and listened to Ann’s words quietly.

Ann led Garen to a room’s door. The room appeared abruptly on the mountain wall as if she just used a chalk to draw out a door. With a push, one could enter the room.

Garen was then placed inside the room by Ann. The room was filled with books, bookshelves, and piles of books.

In the middle of the large heap of books was a gray-yellow translucent map that was floating in the air.

“This is the Main Plane. I don’t know where did you come from but,” Ann paused as she sat down before the translucent map that was floating.

“No matter what time or space it is in the Main Substance Plane, this will always be the core.”

At this moment, Garen felt slightly better and less nauseous.

“Core? So, it is the center of everything?” He asked reluctantly.

“Almost… every year, tens of thousands of creatures from different worlds wander into the Main Substance Plane and they’re always caught by researchers to be used for various experiments. These researchers, some are Great Arcanists, some are Holy Spirits. Some are scholars of the Abyss, but most of them are Gods.”

“Human Gods, Elf Gods, Dwarf Gods etc., there are many Gods in the Main Substance Plane and just an average God’s power is able to build up a small God so there were plenty branches of Gods, small and big. For example, the Great Human God, the symbiont of Light and Fire, the Almighty Fehra.”

“So we can call for the Gods here?” Garen was somewhat surprised. It was known that Fehra was the strongest God of the Human Gods and the most powerful God. Even calling out for a God in the isolated face was very likely to be discovered so after a period of time, Fehra could pay close attention to the situation here straight away without disguise.

“Yes,” Ann nodded. “I’ve made some preventive measures so no matter which God you call out to, it won’t be a problem.”

Garen understood and did not ask anymore but in his mind, he was starting to guess Ann’s identity.

Ann pointed to the floating transparent map.

“I’ve already helped you solve your body and soul coordination, but your soul is still far stronger than your body. This is unusual itself so no matter how you coordinate, you can’t cover this up. A strong soul that is formed naturally is always recorded down by the Gods hence,” Ann cast a glance towards Garen, “you still have to pay attention to some creatures, they can still see through your essence.”

“Oh?” Garen looked as if he was listening carefully.

“First of all, all the demigods, or other higher existences.” Ann came before a bookshelf where a book flew out automatically, floating right before her. It then began flipping the pages itself.

Soon enough, another book flew out automatically and floated beside her as it started flipping through the pages itself as well.

“Second, the Holy Spirits. They have a sense of divinity and most of the powerful Holy Spirits are even stronger than demigods,” Ann’s delicate index finger pressed onto a page in the book.

“And thirdly, the scholars and thanes of the Abyss. As long as they have divinity or they’re so powerful to a certain level of existence, they can notice your problem.”

“Then… when can I settle this once and for all?” Garen asked in a low voice.

“It’s very simple. Once your body is strong enough to be worthy of your soul, by then, you’ll have a perfectly coordinated existence,” Ann smiled. “Your talent seems to be extremely powerful but in reality, your body has a limit in the plane. The soul does not affect the limits of the body, that’s the iron law, that’s why no matter how strong a warrior is, he must truly understand divinity in order to break through the limits of his strength. But Wizards are different, they can choose to understand divinity or continue to study Arcane Techniques.”

Garen did not refute. The most special aspect of the Mother Stream System was that a soul could influence as well as determine the limits of the physical body. But for Ann, perhaps she had already taken that into consideration.

In his heart, Ann had become an omnipotent know-it-all.

“Some of the stronger existences of the Main Substance Plane lived on land, the Heavens, the Chaos Sea, the stars, the great kingdoms, the bottomless abyss and the purgatory. These are all places you have to pay close attention to. Once your soul enters these places, those existences that have a strong sense of smell toward souls would instantly find you. And once you’re captured, you’ll be destroyed.”

Ann explained slowly. From time to time, she would look at Garen with a weird stare. Her eyes glimmered with gold, silver, and even a little like a crystal-like Milky Way vortex. Her gaze upon Garen was as cold as the tip of a knife, cutting Garen to the point his scales ached.

But this was obviously part of the experiment, and so he could only bear with it.

“Really strange though, there are parts of your soul that I can’t understand,” Ann fondled her chin as she muttered, “It seems that the potion’s effect is running out… continue to drink.”

Just like performing magic, she pulled out another white mass of light that was full of tentacles.