Responding to my inquiry, Mama gives me a questioning gaze, to which I reply with a smug grin.

"Miina, can you try absorbing qi right now?"

"Yeah? Oh, yeah, I can, but it won't do anything."

"Would you please try?"

Miina shrugs her shoulders and closes her eyes. Very quickly though, her relaxed expression turns into a confused one, which then turns into a serious one as she crosses her legs on the seat and starts meditating.

Kale stands up, "What's happening? What did-"

Mama interrupts him, "Be quiet, she needs to concentrate."

Kale purses his lips together and presses both of his hands against Miina's back. His face flickers through several emotions, and then he crosses his legs and closes his eyes as well.

Mama leans down and whispers, "What did you do?"

"Hehe, I used my soul to clear out her meridians! I gotta find out what other cool things my soul can do! Maybe I could levitate objects with it? Oh, maybe I could even levitate myself!"

"What is 'levitate'?"

"Ah, levitating is like flying! Wouldn't that be so cool? Oh right, you can already fly. Hahaha, maybe we'll both be able to fly!"

Suddenly, I feel a small wave of qi pass over me, which came from the direction of Kale and Miina. As I look towards them, I see Miina open her eyes, smile, and start laughing. Kale's arms drop down to his sides and, as Miina embraces him, still laughing, he slowly wraps his arms around her and starts crying.

Mama laughs, "We will go the rest of the way on foot."

Kale wipes his tears and immediately stands up, "No, we have to thank you for what you've done! Please, ride the rest of the way with us."

"No, we have somewhere to be, we must be on our way. Besides, you do not have me to thank, my daughter is the one that helped you."

With that, Mama Bloodcat smiles, grabs me, and jumps out of an open window. She starts running along the road, and we quickly pass the caravan, which soon disappears in the distance.

The sun has already set, and the sky should be dark by now, but I can't really tell. The exhaustion of my soul from earlier starts catching up to me as I gaze at the stars in the sky.

As the scenery rushes by around me, the stars above seem completely still, as if frozen in time.

'One day, I'll travel through the stars. They'll move past me as fast as these trees...'

As soon as the crazy thought appears in my head, I feel myself start to pick up speed. Everything seems to move faster and faster, and as I look around, I find that Mama Bloodcat is nowhere in sight.

Soon everything is moving by so quickly that it's hard to see clearly. Eventually the moons start moving as well, and the stars become the only stationary things in my vision.

Before I notice, the moons in the sky are already gone. I look down, but the planet has disappeared from underneath me, replaced with space, with stars. One moment everything around me seems to be moving, and the next, everything seems so still.

I watch the ever un-moving stars with a calmness I would never expect from myself. No, that's wrong; the stars have already started shifting. I fix my gaze ahead of me as a star starts expanding, soon growing large enough to fill my entire vision, and then passes by and disappears behind me just as quickly.

The stars, which were so still, start flying past me like a swarm of fireflies. It feels like I could simply reach out and touch one, like I could grab one and pluck it from space.

The stars eventually become blurs. They all seem to meld together, forming a blanket of light that surrounds me. Even the space around me seems to warp and distort, causing a nauseous feeling to well up inside of me.

I look down at my body, now the only thing in my vision that's not moving. But instead of my own body, I see the body of a human man in black robes.

"You must die!"

I suddenly wake up.

The first thing I notice is, it seems I can't scream. Rather, it seems I can't really move at all. My entire body feels sore, I feel a bit sick, and I can't move, but I don't feel like I'm dying at least. Not that that's reassuring.

'What the heck was that?!'

That was the weirdest dream I've ever had, it felt so real. And where did the idea of flying through the stars even come from? I've never particularly wanted to go to space. Then there were the robes I saw just before waking up, they somehow seem... familiar. I don't remember ever seeing them, though.

Anyway, that whole thing was weird, but there was that same voice telling me to die again! Why is that thing so rude, telling me to die? It's not like I'm going to die just because it tells me to...

'Wait, that part was a dream, right...?'

I focus all of my effort on trying to open my eyes. As my eyelids slowly part, the first thing I see is, well, nothing. Everything is just one big blur. I try looking around, but moving my eyes is hard, and the splitting pain wracking my head doesn't help either. Eventually my eyes start to focus, and I'm able to make out some trees and big rocks around me. It seems we're in a forest again.

My vision eventually clears further, and after a few scans of the area, I don't see anything dangerous looking. Of course, since I'm lying on my side, it could be behind me.

I try moving my body again, and find that I can move surprisingly well now. With considerable effort, I prop myself into a sitting position and survey my surroundings. After looking all around me, the only living creature I can see is Mama Bloodcat, who's snoring a couple feet away from me.

I only manage one look around me before I start getting lightheaded and fall down, after which everything starts getting dark.

"Wake up Lyna, I have breakfast."

I wake up to the sound of Mama Bloodcat.

"Ah, yes Mama. Man, I have such a headache..."

"Did you stay up all night studying symbols again?"

"No, I think it's from helping Miina. I probably overexerted myself."

Mama gives an 'ah' as she brings a... well, basically a dead jackalope, over and drops it in front of me. It's about as big as a deer, and it has black eyes, but it's undoubtedly a jackalope.

"I searched all over, and finally found a black eyed creature. I wanted to give you something special, because I am very proud of what you did yesterday."

I smile at her, "Thanks Mama!"

The jackalope tastes exactly like I would expect it to; mythical. I'm not sure I've ever tasted something so delicious in my life! We quickly finish off almost the whole jackalope.

"Ahhh, that was delicious. Where did you find that jackalope?"

"What is a 'jackalope'?"

"Oh, that's what I called that thing. Sorry, did you want to name it? Since you found it and all."

She laughs, "I think jackalope is a perfect name, we shall name it that."

"So did you see any more of them?"

Mama Bloodcat shakes her head.

"Anyway, that thing was delicious! Thanks for the food Mama."

Mama just smiles and mentions that we should probably start traveling again. And so we start following the road again.

We wound up quickening our pace a bit, and after two more days of traveling, we finally arrive at Mealdrou. This place seems even more impressive than Orion city. There's a drawbridge and some sort of tollbooth at the gate, and there's a line of traffic practically a mile long trying to get in. Carriages, carts, there are even many people on foot just like us trying to get in.

Luckily the line moves pretty fast, so in a few hours we find ourselves nearly at the tollbooth. Suddenly, a realization dawns on me.

"Mama, we don't happen to have any money, do we?"

"Ah."

There's a shout of 'next' in front of us, and Mama and I walk up to the tollbooth.

"Five quotes per person, ten per vehicle."

"We do not have any money with us, is there anything else that we can pay with?"

The man looks at Mama lazily from his chair, "Look lady, you're holding up the line. If you don't have any quotes, please move aside and let the next group through."

Mama waves her hand, after which a red gem appears on the man's desk. The red gem is an item that starts fires, which we found at the pyramid.

"Is this enough?"

The man stands up and looks between the red gem and Mama Bloodcat a few times.

After a moment of silence, the man calmly replies, "Yes, that's enough; you and your group can pass."

"Thank you." replies Mama, and with that, we walk through the gateway.

On the other side of the gateway is a huge plaza, tiled with something that looks like marble. The buildings at the edge of the plaza, too, seem to be made out of either marble or different types of fancy stone. There's even a translucent yellow building, which seems to be made out of a huge gem!

"Is there anywhere you want to go?"

"Nah, not really. We should just explore first!"

Mama laughs, and we chose a street and start following it. Almost immediately, I start noticing a definite difference here compared to Orion City. In Orion City, practically everyone had at least the third level of body tempering, while most people were in the Qi Awakening stage or higher. Even the merchants there were pretty strong.

Here though, there seems to be lots of normal people who don't practice cultivation at all. There are people wearing fancy clothes rushing through the streets, possibly heading to work. There are couples holding hands, sitting on benches. There are people leisurely walking through the streets, seemingly just enjoying the sights.

There are lots of cultivators too of course, and many of them seem to be pretty strong.

"Halt!"

Proceeding the shout, I stop and turn my head, as do the rest of the people on the street. A group of ten guards walk towards me and Mama until they're a few feet away, and then surround us.

A man wearing slightly fancier armor walks up to Mama, "The city lord would like to see you. Please follow us."