Chapter 41: Travelling with the Naive Girl

After they were both done checking their newly acquired rewards, the area around them slowly began to disintegrate. The massive sand fortress started to disappear into thin air.

The fortress had been entirely useless. It was a decoy made specifically to confuse the Awakener and force them to waste their limited time.

The giant structure was just a distraction; the actual hint to solving the trial was hidden in the stars. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

Alen realized that even if he had arrived at the fortress hours earlier, he wouldn’t have been able to do anything. In the afternoon, the stars weren’t visible. Furthermore, if Serene hadn’t mentioned her dream about the symbol, he never would have made the connection. It was entirely thanks to her that they had passed the trial. He was genuinely thankful for her presence, but he certainly wasn’t going to tell her that, or she would undoubtedly mock him with that smug face of hers again.

Alen started walking toward the swirling exit portal. He looked back and saw that Serene was still standing still, deeply focused on her system interface after her Ascension. He didn’t know exactly what kind of rewards she had gotten. The World strictly allowed users to see only their own status windows to maintain absolute privacy.

"Hey, are you coming or not?" Alen called out.

Serene suddenly snapped out of her daze. She looked around at the disintegrating desert environment, and her face instantly morphed into a panic.

"Hey, hey! Wait! Where is the exit? I have to run!"

Alen sighed, shaking his head.

"I’m right here. Are you coming?"

Serene turned toward his voice. Her panicked expression instantly faded into relief as she saw him standing calmly in front of the spatial whirlpool.

"Wait! Let me come!"

She ran toward the whirlpool, her petite body moving surprisingly fast. All of her previous exhaustion had completely vanished following her rank Ascension.

She stopped right beside him in front of the gate.

"Shall we go?" she asked brightly.

Alen nodded. They both stepped forward simultaneously and vanished into the swirling portal.

As soon as they disappeared, the whirlpool spun rapidly, collapsing in on itself until it was completely absorbed by the surrounding space.

...

In the northern city of Axilir, the sky was dark.

Dense, heavy clouds covered the city, making it difficult to tell whether it was day or night. Snow fell gracefully from the sky, coating the nearby trees, the rooftops of shops, and the surrounding wilderness in a thick blanket of white.

The streets were the only things left untouched by the frost. Specific magical artifacts had been installed beneath the roads to generate heat, ensuring there was always a clear, warm path for people to walk on.

In the very center of the city, a massive whirlpool tore open in the sky, splitting the very fabric of space.

It was a Dimensional Link connected directly to the Ascension Realm. This was where awakener individuals entered the trials, and where they were spat back out.

However, entering a specific gate did not guarantee returning to it. When an Awakener finished a trial, the system would often eject them from a completely random gate somewhere in the world.

As the Ascension realm is just a Realm to climb, it doesn’t remember the coordinates of the place from which every single person who entered into the trial.

Suddenly, the whirlpool began to glow brightly, illuminating the snowy plaza as if a second sun had appeared in the cloudy sky.

Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people began to exit the giant gate all at once.

Alen and Serene walked out together, staying near the very back of the massive swarm of people.

They moved to the side, separating themselves from the exhausted, pale-faced crowds who had just survived their respective trials.

Trials were different for everyone. Sometimes, large teams would receive a common trial and work together. Other times, due to the bizarre phenomena of the Ascension Realm, established teams would be forcibly separated and thrown into completely different challenges.

That was just one of the many unpredictable ways the Ascension Realm operated. It constantly modified its own rules, meaning it was entirely useless to try and predict what it might do next. No one had ever been able to fully map out the inner mechanics of the realm.

Since Alen and Serene had been transferred to a completely random location, they now had to figure out where they were.

"Where is this place?" Serene asked, shivering slightly as the cold air hit her.

"I thought we would be transferred back to Vale City..."

"It seems we got dropped at a random location. Sigh..." Alen muttered, pulling his dark navy cloak a little tighter around himself.

’Well, whatever,’ Alen thought.

’It’s not like I actually knew my way around Vale City in the first place. I’m a completely new guy in this world, so everywhere is new to me.’

"Well... it’s not entirely bad," Alen said quietly, his breath forming a small cloud of mist in the freezing air.

"It’s actually been quite a long time since I last saw snow."

He opened his hand, letting a few gentle snowflakes land on his palm. It felt freezing, but strangely relaxing after spending half a day trapped in a boiling desert.

Alen stared at his palm continuously, lost in old memories, as more snow collected against his skin.

*Puff!*

Suddenly, something cold and heavy hit him square in the back.

He turned around, and another snowball flew through the air, landing directly on his face with a wet smack.

Wiping the cold slush from his eyes, he looked forward. Serene was crouching on the ground, eagerly scooping up more snow to form her next projectile.

"Wait, what the hell are you doing?" Alen demanded.

Another snowball was immediately thrown at him. He swiftly side-stepped, dodging it easily with his enhanced reflexes.

"Hehe!" Serene giggled, her silver eyes shining with pure joy.

"I love the snow! Let’s have a snowball fight!"