Path to Transcendence-Chapter 612: Foreign Entity

The concentration of mana was already high inside the rift. But upon approaching the opening ahead, he felt his throat constrict just from the sheer amount present. He almost never complained about there being too much mana, but he was feeling that at the moment.

In fact, there was so much that it was disrupting his own life mana. The techniques he worked so hard to train were fizzling around the edges. His willpower was the only thing that was keeping them all together.

The thing that alarmed him the most about this high concentration of mana was how it affected his senses and perception. The dense nature of the life mana confused his mana senses. Not just his mana senses either. His spatial perception was also affected. If he could compare it to something, he would say it was like being bombarded by a bunch of flashing lights. It could also have been from the weird energy he barely picked up on, but he wasn’t sure.

There was too much information for him to filter out. It required all of his focus to narrow his attention and keep track of his surroundings.

On the bright side, it was a beautiful sight. Large swirling tree branches wove through the entire clearing. Flowers of every color were blossoming on the trees.

He continued to walk forward, and suddenly he felt a twisting of mana from up ahead. It was a weird display of life and spatial magic. He saw three figures appear before him. They stood in front of the largest tree in the clearing, almost looking human.

It was like a human had a baby with a tree. Their skin was made of dark brown bark with distinct facial features carved into the wood. They wore dark green robes that looked woven from the surrounding plants. Each held a staff in their hands, with glowing green orbs at the tips, and they sparkled when reflected in the light.

“Child of Phoenix, you should not be here,” one of the creatures said to him. Their raspy voice sounded like two dry planks of wood rubbing against one another.

Julius was a little surprised by their demonstration of intelligence, but not overly so. He had come across several talking rift creatures before. But he didn’t sense any malice from these creatures. In fact, he barely sensed anything from them at all. Their auras were so full of life that it was the only thing he was able to sense from them.

However, he was taken aback by what they called him. They addressed him as “Child of Phoenix”.

“Why did you call me ‘Child of Phoenix’?”

“Because that’s what you are. A fledgling, but still a phoenix. Just as much as a newborn dragon is still a dragon.”

“What do you mean I shouldn’t be here?” Julius asked with a deep frown.

“This forest and rift as a whole has been infected. It is not safe for someone so young.”

“Infected? Is that what that weird energy is?”

“Yes, corruption has seeped into the roots of this rift and is spreading rapidly. One connected to life should not be here. It will only negatively affect your path, luring you from the path of the phoenix,” the raspy voice explained.

Julius held back a chuckle. He doubted it would be that easy to do that. But he still listened to these strange creatures.

“So what are you guys doing then? Trying to keep it from spreading?”

“Correct. But our abilities aren’t suited for the task. We can heal the forest and rift, but we cannot destroy the source of corruption.”

Julius looked at the edge of the clearing where he felt the ripples of this corruption a little more clearly. “What if I tried to destroy it?”

“No. That won’t be possible. You should leave this place while you can, before you are infected with the corruption. We are making sure that nothing is able to leave the rift, and if you were to be infected, then you won’t be allowed to leave the rift either.”

Julius didn’t like hearing that it would be impossible for him, smiling at the unintended challenge.

“Fine, if I am infected, then you can try and keep me from leaving. But I’m going to go and see what this corruption is. I came all the way here already, might as well see what this rift has to offer.”

“Child of Phoenix, you are playing a dangerous game. There is no need to risk one with your potential. Leave us, before it’s too late,” the creature scolded him.

Julius waved the creature away and walked over to where he felt the most powerful ripples of this weird energy. He wanted to see this corruption.

He wondered if he would get a reward for destroying the corruption. It would certainly—

He laughed when he suddenly got a notification.

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Notice: A foreign element has invaded this Rift. Standard requirements for Rift have been modified.

Notice: New Rift clearing conditions generated… Would you like to proceed?

He accepted the notification without a second thought.

Warning: This Rift has been corrupted by a dangerous foreign entity. Self-destruction of Rift will commence shortly if the corruption cannot be cleansed.

If you can cleanse or destroy the corruption damaging this Rift, you will be rewarded accordingly. Would you like to accept this request?

Julius stared at the message before rereading it several times. He hadn’t expected something like this. He had been half joking when he mentioned an additional reward for destroying the corruption. But he wasn’t about to complain.

He thought about it for a few moments. He was a little worried about the description of this corruption. The Words of the World called it dangerous, so it wasn’t something that most people could handle.

However, he felt pretty confident that he would be okay. Of all people, he should have a good chance at stomping out this corruption. Not only did he have his healing skill, but he had an aura that should be able to affect this corruption. Or rather, that was his hope.

He hadn’t come across many things that could completely resist his ruinous aura. The only things that could, were people who were really strong, such as Cain and Freya. He doubted the corruption would be at their level.

So after some thought, he accepted the request.

The moment he did this, there was a disturbance in the rift. It was like the sky was shaking and the entire forest rumbled beneath his feet. He frowned, but eventually this shaking stopped, and he suddenly felt information flood into his mind.

It was very similar to what he experienced when he gained a skill. He shook out the remnants of this sensation and perused the information he gained. There wasn’t too much information, but felt a weird little blimp in his mind. It was like he was being led somewhere.

He didn’t bother to listen to the wood creature’s warnings; he continued walking forward to where the blimp was taking him.

He went past the clearing and deeper into the forest. It was then that he truly felt the corruption. It felt sticky on his skin. Cloying to his pores and doing its best to burrow its way into his body. He understood what they had meant when they said it would infect him.

Fortunately for him, his aura was enough to destroy the corruption before it could harm him. Just to be safe, he created a thin layer of aura around his skin, which appeared to halt the corruption's progress.

As he ventured deeper, he felt the corruption getting stronger. It was becoming denser and more physical in nature. The nearby trees were turning black, and the life mana that had been so prevalent in the rest of the forest was warped and twisted by this corruption.

It was ugly and offensive to his senses. With this increase in density, so did the corruption’s attempts to infect him. The layer of aura wasn’t enough to protect him entirely. He felt some of this nasty energy entering his body. He gagged in disgust when it managed to get inside him.

It felt similar to that undead knight he had fought in that labyrinth all that time ago. But this was on a totally different level. It was far more repulsive and foul. Julius spat on the ground as he cycled aura through his body, destroying this corruption immediately.

He thought about increasing the field of aura around him, but dismissed that idea. While it was unpleasant, his aura was way more efficient at destroying the corruption internally than externally.

He had channeled some life mana when he entered this area, but he soon realized that this corruption literally fed off life mana. If he only used life mana, he would only give it substance to power itself. So despite his best efforts to only use life mana, he was forced to rely on his other affinities.

A soft, dull flame appeared around his body, and he activated [Field of the Shattered Will] just in case.

The kinetic field around him was shockingly effective at keeping most of the corruption away. Some stuff inevitably made its way through, but the field was a filter of some sort. It handled most of the corruption before it caused any issues.

Additionally, his flames did a good job at breaking down the corruption. It was even more effective when he activated his crown and sent mana into it. The ruinous flames flickered around his figure and ate away at the corruption like it was a delicious snack.

While he was walking through the forest and defending himself from the corruption, he felt an attack heading towards the back of his head. He ducked underneath this attack and slammed his hand into the vine that almost speared him in the neck.

It was similar to the treants he had beaten not long ago, but these vines were pitch-black and secreted a thick, tar-like substance from the spikes on their surfaces. He examined this substance for a brief moment before he removed his axe from his storage ring. He gave it a quick examination before he got to work.

He twirled in circles as even more vines swarmed him. Each swing took out multiple vines and smiled the entire time. It was quite a satisfying experience. He liked the axe.

He didn’t stop swinging the axe as he made his way through the army of vines. He accumulated some wounds from them, but his healing skill regenerated all of his injuries as if they had never been there. Even the corruption was wiped out in short order.

It was potent, but his aura and skills were even more so.

He continued to beat down the monster. This treant was much more powerful than the ones he faced earlier. The might behind each of its blows was enough to stagger him backwards. But he didn’t back down. He went forward and slashed all of the vines apart until all that was left was the monster’s corpse.

He removed the core and gave it a disgusted look. He crushed the cover and used his ruinous aura to destroy every last bit of it.

He didn't think Drasil would enjoy eating any of these. The core looked pretty nasty.

He came across a couple more monsters. All of them were corrupted, and all of them were dismantled by Julius. He made sure to burn their bodies just in case. They were clearly infected by this corruption. The black veins crawling all over their bodies were evidence of this.

He had some good news, though. To his surprise, he managed to get a level in some skills when he split a wild boar in half with his axe. He flicked the axe to the side, removing the blackened blood from its blade, and looked at the notification.

[Field of the Shattered Will lvl 3 -> lvl 4]

[Phoenix Renewal lvl 24 -> lvl 25]

[Inexorable Aura of Ruin lvl 24 -> lvl 25]

He grinned widely. His new epic skill wasn’t a shock to see level up, but the other two were a little surprising to see go up in level. They were hard skills to level up. But he was grateful for it. He was also excited because this meant he was one step closer to having all of his skills reach the threshold of epic rank.