Dyne walked out and went towards the back area. He noticed the Slime walking back and forth. Like Bertugo, the Slime seemed to have changed. It now had a darker shade of Green.

“Oh. You didn’t become an Oak Slime, huh?” Dyne laughed.

The Green slime noticed Dyne and rushed towards him. He started to hug Dyne's knees with its slimy hands and slowly crawled up to Dyne as it was trying to embrace him.

Dyne knew it was an act of endearment, like a dog seeing its master.

Dyne didn’t know what to say.

“That has the soul of the citizens of Elpida. It’s only natural for it to be found to you. You should now be its owner instead of Bertugo.”

“How do monsters tame other monsters here anyway?” Dyne curiously asked as he struggled to get off the large Slime that wanted to hug it.

“Monsters of this world use a Monster Contract. It's something that monsters in my world do, and so I crafted the monsters here to have the same thing.” Strafe explained.

“So I can’t Erg... Get off me, you big Slime!” Dyne was finally frantic and used the soul energy to create a light push.

The Slime was thrown off course but ran back towards Dyne and jumped on him again.

“ARG! What’s up with this Slime?!” Dyne cursed.

“Reach out your hand to its core...” Strafe sighed.

Dyne did as instructed, and the Slime seemed to be in euphoria as it kept wiggling around and shivering.

Suddenly, a strange link occurred. Dyne felt as if a peculiar weight was added to him. But it wasn’t a physical heaviness, but something within his soul. After that, Dyne felt a connection.

Strafe was silently but inwardly complained at the

“Anyway... Can I tame monsters here?”

“Yes. But your method is different. It’s in relation to the second game you were supposed to enter.”

“Brigandine!”

“Yes. I made it the second game because you would have to be a Soul Cultivator in that world to become a Rune Knight. By being exposed to the Ra-Seru, I was hoping you’d have just enough power to learn a portion of Soul Cultivation and give you the chance of becoming a Rune Knight by the time you get to the third or fourth Genesis Tree.”

“Why?”

“You’ll find out when you get there. But the point is right now. You have to do your best when the game starts in three years.”

“Cool. I guess I have time then. How long will I be staying here? I mean, shouldn’t I also work in the other world?”

“You have three more months here. We are currently traveling from your world to mine, and the dimensional gate is wide. Unlike before, when I was running, the Imaginarium Bond is only moving according to the power I gave to it. So we should reach my world within a month in the outside world, but since the time laws here are changed, it will be three times longer.”

Dyne nodded his head and began to think. What can he do with his three months here?

“You have to do your best to survive here, though. Since you’ve decided to go here three years earlier, I set more dangers for Rim Elm. In short, it will fall unless you do something.”

“Oh? What did you do?”

“I won’t tell you. What I can tell you is that the Gomboo is not enough.”

“Got it.” Dyne nodded as he stood up and walked towards the edge of town and into the beach.

Some of the people in Rim Elm was slowly waking up. However, they didn’t leave the Genesis Tree and began to talk about what they experienced last night excitedly.

“Now, what really happened to Ginger? Why is he all weak?” Dyne finally asked Strafe.

“Are you really going to name him Ginger?”

“I already lied, so I gotta live with it. Is it a boy or a girl?”

“Serus don’t have Genders, unlike Ra-Serus.”

“Oh. Then I guess Ginger’s fine.” Dyne sighed.

“This Ginger is a Seru born in the Mist. Therefore, it never knew what it was without the Mist. This is why all Serus corrupted by the Mist stay within the Mist. They would die if left out of the Mist. That Ginger should be dead by tonight. The Mist is too thin here after all.”

“Oh. Was this also in the game?” Dyne asked suspiciously.

“Yes. Don’t you remember? On the first Genesis Tree that was awakened in Rim Elm, the Gimards around the Genesis Tree all died. That was because the Genesis Tree immediately repelled the Mist, causing those Gimards to die from the Mist's purifying power.”

“Wait. What about in Drake Castle and the other cities? Does that mean that the Serus they had were all killed? That doesn’t seem right.”

“No. In Drake Castle’s case, it isn’t. Those Seru’s were born before the Mist came into existence. In other words, their souls were pure, to begin with, and have only been influenced by the Mist. But Serus born within the Mist is born with corrupted souls. And so when a Genesis Tree is revived, these Serus die because the Mist that makes up their soul are purged.”

“I get it.” Dyne started to walk towards where Ginger was. He could see a cage being placed on the cliff located in the south-western part of Rim Elm.

The wall that surrounded Rim Elm extended out into the deeper parts of the sea. On each side of the wall that extended to the sea were two man-made stone cliffs. The two cliffs usually had hunters manning each site to ensure that no Seru or monster would sneak up through the sea. With the deep sea, the Serus and monsters were defenseless, and the Hunters could attack them.

Ginger’s cage was placed right at the edge of this cliff. A simple push and the cell would fall into the deep sea below.

He then closed his eyes. Strafe was silent. He was curious as to what Dyne would try to do.

Dyne observed the Gimard through his soul. He then could see the very core of the Gimard on its head. In it, he could sense weak flame-like energy with the head of the Gimard.

The Gimard’s chain-like body and the sharp sword-like legs were tied up to ensure that it couldn’t move. It was also placed near the beach so that a simple push could cause it to fall into the deep water.

Dyne could feel a strange heat being released by the Gimard’s soul.

Dyne decided to test it out. He slowly allowed his soul to enter the Gimard, and soon his soul felt like it was catching fire. He immediately retreated upon feeling the burn in his soul.

After his soul retreated from the area where the Gimard’s soul was, Dyne sent in the soul energy that he could harness. This was the same energy he used to do the Biron Palm Technique. The energy rushed out of his body and went into the core, which housed the Gimard’s soul.

“If you do that, he will recover.” Strafe warned.

“Why? I’m just sending him the energy. It's not like I’m giving him my soul.”

“Serus are soul creatures. As long as there is a small wisp of his soul, it can convert soul energy to create his soul.

Dyne stopped and then smirked.

He continued to pour more energy towards the Gimard. Seeing that Dyne continued, he kept silent and watched what Dyne was planning.

As the soul energy entered the core of where the Gimard’s soul was stored, it then trembled. The Gimard’s soul sensed the power and began to devour the soul energy of Dyne directly.

Dyne continued to pour out his soul energy, and this continued for about 30 minutes. As he observed the Soul of the Gimard, it was now much larger than before. But it had an extraordinary dark color.

Dyne stopped as he immediately felt the Gimard move. Dyne removed his hands from the cage and noticed that the Gimard was now conscious. Yet its body was too wounded to move.

“Wow. They really just need soul energy!” Dyne was amazed. The wounds of the Gimard were now smaller than what it was before.

“As I said, Serus are only Soul creatures. The body you see right now is a manifestation in which the Seru uses its soul to take shape. If you continue feeding, as you did, he will recover. But it will be a frenzied Seru as if the Mist is controlling it since it’s soul is corrupt.”

“Why were the Gobu Gobus after it?”

“It is a soul creature whose energy it possesses is far more potent than the lifeblood that these creatures released. The lifeblood of a Seru is also soul energy that is condensed to a physical form. As such, directly feeding on a Seru will increase their strength and their mind. And that is necessary for monsters to grow stronger and even rank up.”

“Like what happened to Bertugo.”

“Correct. The problem is that within the Mist, the monsters are also affected. They become wild and selfish. Because of this, the monsters could not mount a unified attack against Drake Castle. This is also why most of the time, the Gimards stay within the castle so that they would be protected from these monsters.”

Dyne reached out and touched the Gimard once more.

Sure enough, the soul of the Gimard had grown large. Although the sight on the soul was very distorted and strange, Dyne felt that the color of the Gimard’s soul was black. He then took in a deep breath and used his soul to enter the Gimard’s body.

As he reached near the soul, Dyne immediately dove in and began to pull out a portion of the soul of the Gimard.

The sensation was hot, and his soul trembled, but Dyne ignored it. He kept pulling and pulling, and Dyne’s hands were showing signs of being burnt.

Dyne endured it, and after much struggle, he sent a slicing soul attack that pulled off a small chunk of the Gimard’s black soul and immediately drew it back towards his soul.

Dyne stumbled back and fell to the sand. In his soul world, the small portion of the Gimard’s soul tried to break free, and Dyne tried his best to contain it.

The pain was intense, but Dyne ignored it and jumped towards the ocean.

The pain had subsided when Dyne fell on the water, and the waves were slowly pushing him to the seashore.

Dyne floated as he continued to focus on containing the Soul of the Gimard.

Strafe was silent, but he was extremely shocked. Slowly, he was starting to understand Dyne’s plan.