The Mother Stream was endless as it bypassed the space-time continuum. No one knew exactly where it originated and no one could see its ending point as well. Every Secret Technique practitioner could only see its ferocious current.
The moment Garen entered the Mother Stream, he looked out from within the river and what replaced the universe’s starry sky was a dimensional space filled with rainbow-colored light.
“Is this the scenery of the Mother Stream?”
It was his first time seeing himself floating in the Mother Stream this clearly.
His accumulation last time wasn’t as vast as this time. Furthermore, his current world was of a higher level than the previous two so the aura he accumulated was exhausted at a much lower rate than last time.
Garen could feel that his aura, which had transformed into the black nine-headed dragon, was being constantly corroded by the fluid. It was as if the fluid was a very acidic acid that kept melting him away as the surface of the black nine-headed dragon was bubbling ferociously, with small black debris turning into powder.
“I wonder what world I’ll be placed into this time…” Garen looked deep into his soul and saw two glowing Soul Seeds floating inside. One was icy blue while the other was a faint yet rich gold. These two seeds were like flowers as they were placed inside beautifully.
Buzz….
Suddenly an oppression as powerful as the sea passed by the river’s surface. A faint numbing anger and growl could be sensed from the oppression.
“I smell it… the Void Hunter… The scent of the Warlock’s descendant…”
“Where is it… Where is it…!”
The overwhelming oppression kept surging through the Mother Stream. Series of huge waves formed as if there was an ongoing hurricane.
The waves of pure spiritual ripples expressed the oppressor’s will clearly.
Garen’s soul looked up and saw the seven-colored barrier writhing as it cracked loudly.
“What is that…?” even before the opponent had approached any closer, he could sense an overwhelming danger when it was still outside the barrier, as it was able to induce giant waves just with its will alone.
Deep down, Garen knew that he had encountered a super creature among the Void Creatures. Hence he suppressed his aura much as possible by reducing his surface contact with the river.
He could faintly feel all sorts of overwhelming power from its will. The source of its strength was similar to his, which was the Soul’s Strength. However, his was at least ten times stronger than Garen’s in terms of Quantity.
This sort of existence was something he couldn’t hope to fight against!
“The Void Creatures… No wonder Nadia warned me to not enter the Void arbitrarily…” Garen put his thoughts away while not having a single bit of fear at all. He was purely flowing the Mother River’s current without any destination in mind.
After some time, a few powerful void creatures appeared outside the realm outside the river once more. Each and every one of them had at least ten Soul Seeds and their soul color was colorless. Each of them riled the Mother River and this made Garen understood how dangerous the Void Creatures outside the Mother Stream was. All he could do was to minimize his surface area to extend the time of his drift.
It was a journey of life and death whenever he entered the Mother River. Once his aura had been completely corroded, the soul would be next in line and this would injure it severely. He would then disappear within the Mother River, becoming one of the many imprints inside it.
The frequency of the powerful Void Creatures appearing increased as time passed.
Eventually, Garen was able to differentiate their strength based on their will and aura alone.
Only creatures of soul seed level were able to sense the movement inside the Mother River. Furthermore, the Soul Seed’s foundation was the colorless rank and the seven color ranks were the stronger ones. Each increment in level would mean an improvement in its quality.
These creatures that noticed Garen’s presence were at least colorless rank. Perhaps their training regime was different from that of the humans as they had to gather tens of soul seeds even though they were still at this rank. As a human, Garen had only obtained two soul seeds and these souls’ colors weren’t even cleansed properly. This meant that he hadn’t even entered the Soul Seed Level and was nowhere close to the colorless rank.
Fortunately, he would require only five Soul Seeds to enter the colorless rank. After all of them were purified into colorless, he would be able to step forward to the next level.
He had drifted for a long time and soon, Garen could feel that the river’s current was slowing down and was no longer as fast as before.
Most of his aura had been corroded away and he only had a fifth of it left. He felt that he had entered one of the many forks and with a jolt, he seemed to have crashed into a barrier as he was swept into a very narrow passage.
As the current slowed down, he could sense that the surrounding seven-colored barrier had become weaker and thinner through his soul seed.
After some time, Garen had exhausted all of his aurae and his own spiritual energy was being corroded.
It was fortunate that he was much more resistant as compared to before now that he had two soul seeds, hence the corrosion rate was much slower than when he had one soul seed.
He flowed along with the current. With his aura spent, he started to panic, as he’d put two lifetimes of effort to obtain this amount of soul strength. With it being corroded, every second counted and if one of his soul seed were to be destroyed, his effort of a lifetime would be wasted!
The current of the Mother River slowed down as if there were something blocking just up front.
Garen flowed along the slowing current and he soon realized that the surrounding river had changed its color into green, which was the color he saw when he first saw the Mother River.
It changed from yellow to yellow-green to finally green.
Within the river, he shrunk into a black blob of a sort. He went with the flow along with other contaminants.
Garen looked around and the edge of the river had narrowed down to a few meters apart from the horizon.
“The powerful Void Creatures from the previous days seem to have disappeared.”
Garen was unable to determine how many days had passed so he could only estimate. The powerful Void Creatures had stopped appearing and it seemed that he was headed to a rather secluded area.
He looked around and the river was filled with contaminants such as white bone debris, strange looking metal and some rotting feathers. There even were some sort of plants and leaves as well.
However, he didn’t encounter any soul’s substance like him drifting in the river.
It wasn’t just his immediate surroundings, he hadn’t encountered any existence similar to him ever since he was drifting about. It was as if the Mother River bore no life.
Time passed slowly…
Soon, The seven-colored barrier above the Mother River started to crack open.
After that, holes of various sizes appeared from the crack. Some were the size of an ant while some were as big as a fist.
Garen looked out of these holes and could see black gas rotating like a whirlpool, leading to an unknown location.
However, the situation didn’t allow him to delay things further as one of the two soul seeds started to show signs of corrosion. If he didn’t find a way to leave the river, he would lose one of his soul seeds in a few days!
“I have to do something! I need select one of the holes and leave this place!” Garen had made a decision. He started to sense the colorful barrier above the Mother River. Some of these holes were so small that his body wasn’t able to fit in at all and only holes of the size of the washbasin were big enough for him to enter.
He could sense from the black gas that these holes would lead him to an unknown universe. No one was entirely sure what sorts of dangers it had to offer but the had no choice but to choose one.
Finally, he saw a hole the size of a washbasin.
As he was about to be washed past it, Garen released all of his spiritual energy. The spiritual energy merged with the Mother River’s aura, turning it into a powerful force that pushed him out from the surface of the river.
With a splash, Garen broke free from the river and went flying towards the hole.
Thud!!
At this moment, a wave riled up and engulfed him whole, pushing him back down.
With a huge splash, Garen was sent back into Mother River once more.
He panicked and tried to jump out once more. By the time he struggled free, the hole was already far away from its original location.
“Damn it!” Garen was back into the Mother River. He could sense that his soul seed had corroded once more and he was very upset about it. These were the essence he gathered in two lifetimes and now it could be corroded at any moment.
He had already sensed that the Mother River seemed to have a mysterious power. The Mother River had already taken him, who had been living for so long drifting in the river as one of itself and would not let go of him easily.
He had completely missed the hole at this point. Although current was slow, it was determined to drive him far away from it.
“No wonder there were so many of these holes, the Mother River wouldn’t flow into it.”
Garen understood what was going on.
“I can only wait for the next opportunity…”
He waited patiently. It was fortunate that the Mother River had narrowed down even further and the seven-colored barrier was filled with holes of various sizes. All of these holes were filled with black rotating whirlpools. Some were the size of a nail while some were the size of a head but it was rare to encounter one the size of a washbasin.
Garen waited patiently. After a while, another washbasin-sized hole appeared within his vision.
“This is the one!” he released his senses as he confirmed the location of the hole with extreme precision and started to gather his strength. He knew that he needed to immediately sprint out before the Mother River reacted when he released his strength. If not, history would repeat itself and pull him down back into the river.
The hole was getting closer… and closer…