Red didn’t quite know how to respond. In fact, he couldn’t respond at all. In this form, he didn’t know how to form words, and other than expressing his general intentions, he wasn’t able to communicate with this other consciousness on his own.

“Did they not even teach you how to communicate in this form?” The voice seemed surprised. “Wait, don’t tell me… Did you enter this place without permission?!”

The youth, who couldn’t express himself properly, only tried to show denial.

The voice sounded vexed. “I can’t understand you, little brother. Look, this isn’t a physical realm. Everything you do will be expressed through your radiance, so try to shape it according to your will… Just watch my own radiance as these words reach you!”

Red did as much. As the other consciousness said, it wasn’t like this formless mass was producing sounds to speak to him. Instead, it was seemingly moving and vibrating as it “spoke”, these pulses reaching him and being interpreted as words in his mind. Just by observing it, though, it didn’t make it any clearer for him about how to perform such a feat.

‘I spoke with the crimson mist in my body before. This shouldn’t be any harder.’

Of course, back then he had his own body as an anchor, while now he was floating through a primordial darkness. The principle, though, should be the same.

He focused on his expanded awareness, using his own will to shape it and give meaning to the vibrations of this formless mass.

The other being’s words of encouragement urged him on. “Just focus on it. It might take a while but-”

“Can… you hear me?” Red reached out towards this other consciousness with a string of words.

“Woah!” The voice seemed taken aback. “You did it just like that?!”

The youth ignored his question. “Where am… I?”

Although he managed to speak, the sentences produced by his expanded awareness seemed slurred as they reached out to this other being. It was still something he was getting used to.

“You don’t even know where you are?” The voice continued to be shocked. “This is the Realm of Souls! How did you reach here without even knowing that?”

“It was… an accident.” Red said.

“An accident?… Wait! Are you not a part of the Order?” The voice asked in realization.

“I don’t know… what that is.”

The voice was silent for a while, its consciousness stirring around the space as if thinking hard about something.

It spoke up again. “… This is surprising. Our Radiant Current technique is not a secret to the world, but without guidance it shouldn’t be possible for someone to reach your state. Might I ask, what cultivation realm are you at?”

The voice sounded increasingly curious.

‘Radiant Current…’

That was the name of the meditation technique Eiwin taught him back then. She said it was a simple technique from her temple, yet now it was clear there was more to it than that.

“I haven’t opened my Spiritual Sea yet.” Red said, getting more comfortable speaking in this form.

“You haven’t even opened your Spiritual Sea?! And to think you still managed to reach this place without guidance!” The voice sounded shocked. “You are a true prodigy, little brother!”

The youth didn’t know how to respond to this unexpected praise.

“It’s good that I was the one that found you here, little brother. The Soul Realm can be a dangerous place for one exploring it without preparation, not to mention that you shouldn’t be coming here before opening your Spiritual Sea! The connection between your body and your soul is still too weak, so you might not be able to return to the real world if you travel too far!” The voice expressed genuine concern.

Red was quite startled when he heard this. He was just trying to find a way to escape that illusion back then, so how could he know he would end up in a different dimension upon forcing himself to sleep?

“You don’t need to worry, little brother!” The voice tried to assuage his worries. “You might not be a monk of our Order, but I will never turn away from a fellow cultivator in need of help! I will explain to you what this place is!”

Before the voice could go much further, Red cut it off. “I need to return.”

“You do?” The voice couldn’t hide its disappointment. “Although it could be dangerous for your real body if you remain here for too long, you can still stay for a good while… I can teach you what you need to know about the Soul Realm, you know? So you can be prepared the next time!”

“My real body is in danger.” The youth explained. ”I ended up in this place trying to find a way to escape from an illusion.”

“Is that so?! Then you definitely need to return! Quickly, go back to your body!”

“… How?”

The voice exclaimed in realization. “Oh, of course you don’t know! Focus on the form of your body. Imagine it is right here, and you’re still using your consciousness to inspect it. That is your anchor, and it will always draw you back as long as the two of you have a connection!”

“I don’t understand.”

“Real world logic and fancy words won’t help you understand things in this realm, little brother. Just use your instincts. You figured out how to speak so quickly, so doing this won’t be much harder. Trust me!”

Red hesitated. “I was in an illusion. Will I return there?”

“The connection you feel will be to your real body, no matter what.” The voice said. “If the illusion could trap your consciousness, then it would be a different story, but since you’re here, we know that’s not the case! Now hurry, before something bad happens!”

The being was even more worried about his safety than the youth himself.

Red didn’t seem to have much of a choice in the matter. He focused on his own floating consciousness and tried to visualize it as if it was inside his own body, like usual.

This didn’t seem to work, so instead Red tried to move around as if he was inspecting his inner body. He contorted and expanded through this primordial darkness, drawing the shape of his own frame he remembered by heart using his formless and malleable awareness.

This seemed to elicit a reaction. A pull from somewhere else. Something on the other side of the curtain.

The voice seemed jubilant. “You’re doing it! Now focus on the feeling!”

He did as much, and the pull continued to grow stronger. Soon enough, he felt himself being dragged through a barrier of sorts, and his connection to his surroundings in this place started to become fainter.

“Good luck, little brother!” the voice said as Red felt his consciousness fade. “I’m sure we will meet again in the future!”

This was the last thing the youth heard before he fell unconscious.

…

The first thing he heard when he came to was the horrible sound of shrieking. For some reason, though, the youth didn’t feel the usual state of dizziness after awakening from a deep sleep.

Instead, as soon as he came to, he was immediately in a state of high alert.

His crimson sense detected dozens of fluctuations around him, unmoving, all belonging to zombies, it seemed. Then, farther out, he felt the familiar fluctuation of Domeron, as well as one belonging to a cultivator in the Lesser Ring Realm.

Red’s eyes shot open, and he looked at his surroundings. Dozens of corpses in different states of decomposition, from skeletons to fresh corpses, were kneeling on the ground around him, their mouths moving as if to speak but producing no sounds. The scene was very familiar, and he was quick to notice that they were still inside of a cave.

This time, though, the youth maintained his dark vision and could see everything with clarity. Ahead of him, no more than a few meters away, was a skeleton slumped against a cave wall, and in its hands, it was holding a white dagger, identical to the one he saw in his illusion.

‘The bone dagger!’

Before Red could do anything else, though, he saw a duo of indistinguishable shapes flying around him. They flashed with a misty and seemingly illusory light, and were twisting around each other at extreme speeds around the room, so much so that the youth had a hard time tracking them. Yet, beneath it all, he swore he could see dozens of arms in those shapes, as well as the familiar figure of a woman.

Both of them seemed to be engaged in some kind of combat.

As if to confirm his suspicions, an angered voice reached his ears. “You stupid idiot! Stop gawking around and help me!”

It was none other than Aurelia, of course.

Red, however, had no idea how to help the woman. Even if he could keep up with the extreme speed that the two ghostly beings were flying around the room, how could he possibly hit her intangible enemy?

The woman seemed to guess his thoughts. “The zombies! It’s drawing power from their corpses! Kill them!”

The youth looked around at the praying zombies around the room. Many of them must have been the previously kidnapped peasants, but amongst them Red also saw a handful of mercenaries. Judging by their state of decomposition, they must have been the last arrivals at this cave.

Yet, no matter where he looked, he could tell that all of these people in here were dead, even those that had barely started to rot. They were all zombies.

Without a shred of hesitation, he unsheathed his sword and swung at the head of the nearest zombie to him. There was not any resistance in its flesh as the undead was decapitated in a single blow. Its corpse slumped to the ground, and its fluctuation disappeared from his crimson sense.

Red moved on to the next zombie and did the same thing, targeting its head. The still targets proved no problem to him, and in a flash, he had already cut the heads off of five zombies. None of the living corpses even flinched as he attacked them.

A shriek echoed through the cave, as the ghost fighting against Aurelia seemed to notice his intentions. However, it was unable to disengage from the woman, no matter how hard it tried.

This allowed the youth to continue his work. He dispatched zombie after zombie until eventually he came across the corpse of what looked to be a child, no older than he was back in the underground. Even Red hesitated upon this sight, his sword stopping midway for a second.

Yet, his crimson sense and his eyes told him the truth. This child was dead, and its existence in this form was a defilement to the life they once had.

With that, his sword swung down, and he didn’t look back as he moved onto the next zombie.

The entire time, he was paying attention to Domeron’s fluctuation outside of the cave, as he was engaged against a Lesser Ring Realm and the sounds of their battle reached him even here. Still, he knew he had to finish his work here first.

Each killed zombie seemed to be a blow to the many-armed ghost’s strength, and this was made evident as he saw its floating shape slow down, allowing him a better glimpse at it. It was far smaller than what he remembered seeing in the illusion, but other than that, it looked the exact same as that creature, even lacking a lower body.

As the ghost slowed down, Aurelia pressed her advantage. Her ghostly shape twisted around its form, attacking the ghost in ways Red was simply unable to catch with his vision. It was having its effects, though, as the being started to run away, to no avail.

The youth continued to kill the zombies in the room, until eventually he heard a screech. He turned around and saw Aurelia, in her “human” form, floating in the air, holding onto a small white orb in her hand. She looked at it with a disdainful expression and squeezed it with force. The orb shattered, and wisps of smoke escaped from between her fingers before dissipating into nothingness.

She looked over at the perplexed Red with an angry expression. “What are you waiting for?! Are you just going to leave your friend to die?!”