Casandra POV

In her heart, she knew this was something they needed to do, but that didn’t mean it was easy. Such an event didn’t come without a price.

Forcibly opening up this special realm wasn’t as simple as they officially stated to the rest of the sect. What she failed to explain to the members entering this special realm was that the isolated space wasn’t something they had just created.

It was a space that had existed for many years, created by the sect’s founder as a testing ground of sorts. A place to experiment with skills or train while controlling the variables inside, as well as protecting the outside world from any harm.

But the exact protocols for activating and controlling such a place were lost with the founder's disappearance. They had gone into isolated seclusion many years ago and hadn’t been seen since.

So, to operate this special realm, sacrifices were made. A lot of the issues could be solved with sheer quantity of mana, but it also required the full-time attention of several Tier 6s.

Herself, Koenn, Rhynus, Avis, and even with the enlisted help of dozens of elders, they were barely able to get it working. Elder Huan was actually a wonderful addition who made the situation much easier to control.

He’d already been very good at managing things like this, which is why he’d been placed in charge of the Mission Hall in the first place, but his recent advancements gave him the necessary power to actually contribute in a more meaningful manner.

“Do you still think this is worth it?” She asked Koenn.

Koenn didn’t respond to her question immediately; he was extremely busy making sure everything was going well and not collapsing into the voids of space. The last thing they needed was to lose these disciples in the endless abyss dividing their real world and this secret realm.

But after a few moments, he tore his glowing eyes away from monitoring the realm, rubbing his head, no doubt strained by the immense skill and focus it required to do something like this. It was thanks to Koenn’s skills that something like this was possible at all.

“We knew something like this was bound to happen. It’s why we’ve been preparing for all these years. Every advantage is going to matter. We need our disciples to be as strong as possible. And the Solstice provided a unique chance to do so.”

She nodded in agreement. The solstice was a special time of the year, making it possible to keep the realm open for extended periods. Without the solstice, she didn’t have the confidence of holding it open for long. It was important to note that opening it and keeping it open were entirely different challenges.

“Did we manage to identify the traitors?” Cassandra asked.

“A large number of them were already under surveillance, but unfortunately, there are many more that are avoiding detection.”

She sighed. “Some is better than none.”

“Agreed.”

She chewed on her lip and used her senses to delve into the realm, examining the various disciples as they made their way through it. However, after a while of this, she eventually pulled up an image of a certain somebody in the middle of their control room. This very someone, she hoped, would take full advantage of this opportunity.

***

Julius POV

He had enough experience with things like this that he wasn’t disoriented by the sudden displacement. He surveyed the area and couldn’t help but notice the familiarity of it with the Endless Forest.

Felt a barely discernible feeling at the back of his mind. It was like something was pointing him in a certain direction, and he projected his senses far outward in this direction. He mainly got trees and a few weaker monsters hiding in the brush.

It felt very real, and he wouldn't be surprised if it was to some extent. But after taking a few moments to observe the surrounding area, he started to follow that feeling at the back of his head deeper into the woods.

He did notice a sudden twitch in the air and quickly extended his kinetic field outward. The kinetic energy slammed into an incoming wolf, freezing it completely. He stared calmly at the unmoving form of the monster.

Its fur was dark black with several scars covering its body. Its teeth looked like they had recently enjoyed a meal, and its eyes were wild with bloodlust. Julius allowed his willpower to go up against these monsters. For over two months, he hadn’t fought or participated in any battles, so it felt a little bit weird.

The wolf thrashed against his grip, and only once he felt good, he finally crushed it with his kinetic energy. The strength of his authority made it easy, and to his surprise, the monster turned into motes of light.

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Unfortunately, that didn’t seem to be the end of it. He was once again beset by a number of wild wolves. All of whom were crushed by his kinetic energy. He didn’t really understand what was going on, but he continued to push forward, taking out any monsters in his path.

He also used this time to stretch his legs, incorporating some close combat while tending to these wolves. His skills had been idle for a while, and he was dusting off the rust. He was feeling good, though, just like how he felt before he got injured. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝙬𝙚𝓫𝒏𝓸𝓿𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝙤𝓶

He quickly found himself getting into a groove, taking out any monsters who attacked him and making his way toward his intended target. Before he knew it, he was already getting lost in the chaos. Completely focused on taking out any incoming enemies, destroying anything that attacked him.

But that was a mistake. One, he only realized he was making after ten minutes of this. Once again, he had gotten distracted with his new focus skill. [Calm Before Ruin] was a powerful skill, and one that he continued to underestimate. This wasn’t the first time it had taken over his mind.

The last time it occurred became the very reason why he’d been positioned wrong while fighting the Tier 5. Which ultimately, led to his death.

He took a step back, wrangling control of his focus skill with immense effort, and thinking about what he was doing and what he was going to do.

He started to get the feeling that this place wasn’t meant for him to fight and kill monsters. These wolves weren't strong enough if that was the case. He recalled Cassandra’s words to him and the rest of the disciples who entered this space.

The sect didn’t want them to keep on swinging the same sword over and over. They wanted them to explore new directions, new techniques, or ideas. Julius wouldn’t learn anything by killing more Tier 4 monsters that were weaker than him.

He needed to change how he was going about things. How was he going to handle himself in the future? He couldn’t help but notice that his fighting style and mindset were slowly slipping into a dangerous place. A place where he would constrict his vision and thoughts, allowing himself to fall into the chaos.

Not just allowing himself to fall, but to openly welcome it before thinking of any other options. A reliance on it.

He could rationalize his previous actions by saying it was because of his body’s so-called resurrection ability. But that was no longer the case. He knew he couldn’t rely on it as he once had. It wasn’t something he should ever want to use again. And so, he couldn’t be recklessly throwing himself around like that.

He needed to be smarter.

Then again, that was easier said than done.

But it was something worth a shot. And so he decided to do the exact opposite of what he’d been doing. He stopped slaughtering the wolves and instead let them come to him. He didn’t even bother to defend himself. He just let them tear into him.

It didn’t take too long for him to figure out this was an awful idea. Letting a bunch of ugly and stinky monsters eat him alive couldn’t be the purpose of it either. And so after his arm was torn off for the third time, he decided to expand his field of kinetic energy once again.

The wolves that had been ripping him to shreds were halted in place once again. He didn’t let them get any closer to him, but he also didn’t go out of his way to kill them. He simply walked past them, essentially ignoring the threat they posed. Though, to be fair, they didn’t really pose much of a threat to him since they were immobilized.

However, he could feel that it wasn’t either. His ruinous aura didn’t think so either. It surged through his body in powerful waves. It wasn’t going out of his control, but it was almost sending him feelings or encouraging him to just kill them and be done with it.

Which was odd, because he didn’t think it had been like that at all. In his mind, he’d been in control of his ruinous aura, but perhaps that wasn’t the case. Or it wasn’t exactly how it worked. It was possible that his aura was having more of an impact and influence on him than he previously believed.

After several minutes of deep thinking, he realized that it wasn’t just enough to ignore the wolves; he needed something else. He couldn’t just be content with holding back his ruinous aura from influencing him. He needed to somehow pacify it. To ensure it was okay to hold back and stay quiet.

And it took an embarrassingly long amount of self-reflection to realize another important detail. His aura wasn’t the only thing that was influencing him. It was his own desires that were driving him. He liked fighting. He liked killing monsters and getting stronger.

He loved the conflict and the chaos. But that was also the problem with his aura. He didn’t feel like it was controlling him, because it aligned with what he really desired. But that obviously posed a few difficult challenges. As exemplified by his death not too long ago.

He needed a change. He needed to somehow convince himself that he didn’t want that sort of life. Or to be that way. To not seek violence as much as he had been this past year. But he also couldn’t exactly throw it to the side. That savage side of him also played an important role, helping keep him alive when things got rough. When he was being attacked or in the middle of an unavoidable fight, he needed that darkness to defend himself and the people he cared about.

He was immediately reminded of his life mana technique and what he learned from Tezuko. And it was also at this time that he understood just how badly he was messing that up, too.

A balance must be maintained, and if he was being honest, he was doing a shit job at the moment. He was holding onto the technique and his own sanity by sheer will, and it wasn’t as impressive as some might find it.

But he was in dire need of that balance at the moment, something that he needed to rectify quickly. He thought he’d been doing a better job at this by refraining from training and taking it easy, but evidently not.

But he also had an idea of what he needed to do. Cassandra had hinted at it during her speech. This Solstice Ground, or whatever special space it was, might allow for an easier acquisition of a Concept. He hadn’t gotten a new one in a long time, but it was about time to change that.

The main issue was how to go about doing that. He sat down and began brainstorming ideas to help him accomplish something like this. And to his embarrassment, he only came up with one idea that he thought might work.

And so, without wasting any more of his precious time inside this space, he got to work. This time, hopefully figuring something out.