Chapter 14

Wil tumbled through the black void, an invisible pressure squeezing him tightly, as if he was being forced into a tube that was too small for his body.

Gravity constantly changed as he fell, sometimes in one direction, before being tugged into another. At one point he was convinced he was falling upwards, before a sharp tug to his left sent him spinning again.

The black void gradually gained hues and shades, streaks of blues and purples, hints of red and tinges of pink, until his vision was filled with all colors of the rainbow. With color, came sound, the noise of wind rushing past him, the distant singing of birds, the roar of ocean waves crashing on a beach.

With an abruptness to match his entry, he landed heavily on a sandy shore, his body rolling a few feet before he stopped in a tangle of limbs. Laying still, on his back in the sand, he took a moment to take in both himself, and his surroundings.

The Azure Lord, despite sharing some of his memories, had neglected to mention the method of travel to his ‘inner realm’. Wil shuddered at the image of that gaping maw above him, the powerlessness of waiting to be devoured.

But fortunately, he had made it here intact, with all his limbs and equipment accounted for. Sitting upright, he took in Lord Azure’s ‘inner realm’.

Looking around, he was stunned by the scenery. When he pictured an ‘inner realm’ he thought of a single island, surrounded by the void, or maybe a recreation of the Azure Lord’s lair, an ocean cave deep underwater. Whatever it was, he expected it to be small, but this was anything but.

Like the Azure Lord himself, his inner realm was massive.

Wil sat on a beach, on an entirely different continent. The white sand stretched for miles into the distance, gradually wrapping to the left, disappearing into a thick jungle. The sea in front of him was the same shade and beauty as the Azure Sea.

Unlike the Land, however, the Ocean did not stretch far before it abruptly dropped. The sea ended a mile from the shore, falling into nothing. An abyss, a black void.

Wil was shocked, as the sea continued to exist near him, waves swept the beach, white caps were visible on the water. Everything was calm, normal even, except the torrential waterfall spilling into an endless void only a mile away.

It was as if a giant knife had sliced off the remaining sea, leaving a deep scar, and cutting the rest away. The water flowed into the abyss, but the sea didn’t drain. Wil couldn’t even spot a current, threatening to pull the unwary into the void with it.

Eyes wide at what he was seeing, Wil felt the warm sun on his face. Surprised, he looked upwards, only to be stunned again by the lack of a sky.

Instead of a warm, blue sky with a sun overhead, there was nothing. The black void extended overhead as well. No stars, no blue, or red or even green sky. Just nothing at all, not even stars were visible. In this inner realm, there was not heavens above.

The sun was thankfully still there, although it was neither blue or yellow, nor was it truly a sun. Hanging above was a single flame, massive and flickering, like the fire from a candle. Orange and red, it burned brightly in the sky far above, lighting this inner world.

If anything could convince him he was no longer in the world he’d known, it was the flame floating in a void, the ocean falling in an endless waterfall.

From what he had seen, this ‘world’ was a single, flat continent, floating in the void of the Azure Lord’s Sea of Consciousness, or wherever else the Dragon Turtle kept its mana core. Surrounded on all sides by nothingness, the land and the mile of ocean were all that existed here.

Knowing that, Wil would have to be careful where he traveled. The land seemed secure, but he had no idea what to expect here. The last thing he wanted was to tumble endless downwards, screaming into the abyss.

Standing and wiping the sand from his armor, he looked past the beach, and thankfully, away from the disconcerting ocean. The beach was wide, it seemed to be nearly a mile inland before it sloped upwards, hints of shrubs and grass peeking over the top.

Wil took a moment to think as he walked inland, making a plan for his next steps. The infection was running its course through this realm.

He had thought a lot about the black blood while he was in Aachen. While it seemed like it was a disease, similar to the plague, it was more of a magical curse. It swept through a living being, changing not only its body, but rotting its mind and twisting its spirit or soul.

It seemed to him, and others he spoke to agreed, it was a combination of both, a curse carried and transmitted like a disease. A terrible thing, and not natural to their world.

It would explain the intense changes that he had seen in people at Aachen. Their bodies altered, deforming and gaining fierce physical strength, but it also destroyed their minds, turning them into maddened killers.

A disease could do both, but only a curse could affect the spirit and soul of the infected. Their mana twisted and changed, corrupted by the negative energy and corrupted mana. A simple disease would leave their mana weakened, but not changed.

If their souls had been untainted, they wouldn’t exude such negative energy. He thought of the Lich, its soul was practically made of corrupted mana. Something had created this cursed plague, and he doubted it was the undead demigod. Although the Lich was powerful, and seemed to release it upon Aachen, it felt like it was just a carrier, rather than the creator.

He suspected a similar thing was happening here, to the Dragon Turtle. From its memories, he had a vague idea of how this realm was created.

As the core progressed through ranks, growing larger, the mana became harder to control, more difficult to wield. It takes intense concentration to use high tiered spells, it was why some were restricted to specific ranks, even though someone may have the mana to cast it. Take Misty Step, for example. It required much more focus and concentration, than actual mana to cast.

The core becomes easier to control if it is anchored by something familiar, tied to something physical. It’s simpler to concentrate on a recognizable object, than something esoteric or abstruse.

Subconsciously, each person and beast form their core in a shape or manner that aids concentration and focus. The Core takes a recognizable shape, like a glass container, or a vase. In Wil’s case, he had pictured a glass vial when he was Rank 1, but it had shifted to become a diamond after his encounter with the crown up north.

He suspected as it grew bigger, it would gradually shift to something different. Like an inner palace, or a cave…and eventually a world. What better anchor than a physical place, something that belongs to you and you alone. It would be easier to progress, just adding new features or increasing the size of a place.

If the infection was here, it would manifest in physical ways, corrupting this world, since it was the representation of the Dragon Turtle’s power. And power here was formed from Mind, Body and Soul.

Wil spread his senses, feeling the energy in the air. The mana was thick here in this inner realm. Dozens, if not hundreds of times the amount of ambient mana than he felt in the real world. This was a Mage’s dreamworld, they would be able to recover form casting spells much more quickly.

Wil estimated that if it took 12 hours for him to completely recover normally when draining his core and casting all his spells, in this realm he could do the same in under an hour, faster if he actively drew in the mana from around him.

It would also allow him to progress faster, if he had the natural talent to breakthrough to the next rank on his own. Unfortunately, Wil was stuck, needing experience and combat to progress past his bottlenecks.

He was a decent mage, but a true talent wouldn’t be hindered like he was on every Rank. His core refused to budge, not willing to change in the slightest. He could only fight his way through, using combat and opportunities he found on his travels to shift it.

“I wouldn’t want to progress here anyway…I think I found the infection.” Wil said to himself, feeling the mana in the air. It was heavy, and powerful, like the ocean the Azure lord called home. But buried underneath was a feeling of foulness and filth, like an oil spill spreading thinly over water. It was there, polluting the lift of this world. It would be fine for him to use the mana here for the short term, but he didn’t want to think of the consequence of reforming or expanding his core using tainted mana.

He could feel 3 large concentrations of negative energy, all in three separate locations on this continent. Each were equally massive, but distant.

“There’s no way I can clear everything here, not by myself. There’s too much that’s already been infected. But if I clear those concentrations, it should be enough to free the Dragon Turtle’s mana, it can handle the rest.” Wil said, nodding his head as his course was clear.

Adjusting his sword belt, and fixing his satchel across his shoulders, Wil quickened his steps, leaving the beach towards the first of the large sources of corruption.