For a brief moment. Anos felt a disembodied existence. The flashes of the seals and restrictions were like the feelings of a phantom limb. But before he could focus his consciousness. He opened his eyes.
It seems such a state was just his dream.
But something about him had changed.
Anos lacked a dantian to store spiritual energy. Instead, he stored it in the meridians as if it was a river. His sea of consciousness was pure and white.
But the outline of an object seemed to appear.
A mirror without boundaries. One so sharp that it looked as if it was cutting reality. Anos didn't notice this however because he didn't have the habit of checking his sea of consciousness.
This illusory object disappeared just as easily as it appeared.
Soon his sea of consciousness was empty again.
Despite Anos's eyes being open. He couldn't see! It was as if he had become blind. But this blackness slowly became transparent until it vanished completely. He observed his surrounding environment and found that he was in a cave. He could hardly see what was in front of him.
Anos felt a headache from exhausting himself. Despite passing out. His reserves of spiritual energy were still empty. He decided to recover first before exploring. So he started to meditate.
After a few hours. He was surprised.
"The bottleneck is loosening..."
The unfortunate thing was that Anos's cultivation technique was incomplete. Why was this? In order to prevent sect secrets from being leaked. One had to perform a dao oath that was like a contract. You couldn't spread the techniques.
But in his previous world. There was all sorts of magic. One could even search anothers soul. So his sect didn't give the outer-sect disciples the entire technique.
What did this mean?
Anos's God-Eye sutra, while versatile. It could only cultivate to the late stage of foundation establishment. Once you reach this level of cultivation. You can naturally and easily get the next part of the technique.
But there was one problem.
He wasn't even in the same world! How would he even get the next part of the technique? Anos had thought of reaching nascent soul and exploring the secrets of his soul. But what if he was stuck at foundation establishment his entire life?
"There is one way..."
"I'll have to make my own technique..."
Creating ones own technique was a thousand times more difficult then using an existing one. Each technique in the sect had been passed down and optimized for generations by the brightest of minds.
One wrong change or mistake and you might explode! Or become an idiot. You'd be lucky to stop at becoming a madman. Anos shook his head. This was too far in the future. Why should a simple qi condensation cultivator worry about the tribulations of a nascent soul?
Not to mention. This world may have a lower limit. He had only seen a single martial artist and no cultivators so far.
As Anos was feeling around. He tripped over a corpse. No. This wasn't a corpse. It was Edrea! He was lying on the ground and mumbling to himself the word 'water' repeatedly.
Anos converted his spiritual energy into water and helped Edrea drink. After a few minutes. Edrea opened his eyes and was delighted to see Anos fine!
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"Solis! You're alive!"
Anos laughed.
"I won't die so easily."
Edrea then asked him various questions. Like how did he create fire from nothing? How did he make water appear from nowhere? How did he walk on the air?
"You... Have you reached the seventh level of martial arts? A warrior with Qi Control!"
Anos shook his head.
"No. I am a 'immortal'." Anos couldn't hide his feats from his friend now either way. So he figured he might as well tell the truth.
"Immortal!?" Edrea's eyes opened wide. He asked Anos if he could teach him.
"To cultivate immortals requires talent. Your soul must have spiritual roots to feel the spiritual energy in the air..."
"Do I have spiritual roots?"
Anos was a bit helpless. He didn't know how one would test for spiritual roots. But in this world, he as a foreign soul may be the only one that could cultivate.
Of course, he wouldn't tell them this.
Anos then heard the rumbling of Edrea's stomach.
"..."
"I haven't eaten in awhile. You were asleep for a long time. Aren't you hungry?"
Anos was surprised. He didn't feel hungry or thirsty at all. He hadn't eaten any savory pills or reached foundation establishment to become completely in harmony with nature.
His education taught him that he should still need to eat and drink.
"I'm not hungry."
"Where are we?" Anos needed to figure out how to get to Haven.
"I have no idea... When those wolves scattered. I heard something approaching. So I grabbed you and ran..."
"What about the others?"
"Probably dead."
There was a silence. But this was interrupted by Edrea as he asked if Anos could conjure up some food.
"It doesn't work like that."
Now that Anos had exposed his identity to Edrea. He could use his spells freely as long as outsiders weren't nearby. They left the cave and Edrea asked where they were going.
Anos pointed up and then jumped. It was weird to spectate as it looked as if he was jumping on air.
Soon. Anos was quite high in the sky. He had burned through a lot of spiritual energy. But he scanned the entire area with his eyes. In the distance, he saw a smoke.
He then walked to the ground as if he was walking down stairs.
"There is a fire nearby. Let us check it out."
Soon. Anos and Edrea moved in the direction of the smoke. After 15 minutes. They had ran into a road.
"Good."
The smoke was now visible from the ground. They soon found a caravan. But these carriages looked quite fancy, but were worn down. There was also knights in chainmail armor.
This caravan was parked around a stone campfire. It looked quite cozy. Three of the knights stopped Anos and Edrea. They didn't even speak. But they unsheathed their blades.
Edrea then spoke in a hurry.
"My father is Lester Xodia! The head of the village Evrervoth. We mean no harm! We just hope you could show us a map or point us in the direction of Haven..."
The knights didn't lower their viligence.
"What are you doing in dream valley?"
"Dream valley?" Anos was confused.
"You don't even know where you are?"
"We do not."
The knight was speechless. Just who was so careless to accidentally enter this cursed place?
"You can forget about Haven. This place is hard to enter and impossible to leave!"
Anos felt a hint of something familiar.
Edrea was incredibly curious and confused.
"We took a normal route from the village. We followed the road. My father spoke nothing of this 'valley'?"
The knight stopped talking and looked at the others.
"You are incredibly unlucky then. From what I know. This forest appears at random around the world."
Anos then heard the laughter of someone in the carriage. A women stepped out.
"You all still believe those nonsense legends?" She looked at Edrea.
"A martial artist? Still... too weak."
Edrea frowned.
She then looked at Anos.
"You... what are you?"
Anos wasn't exactly sure how to respond.
"Nevermind."
Anos then spoke:
"Tell me about this 'dream valley'?"
The women started to talk about it.
"If we believe those nonsense legends. This valley is an isolated time space. But it is also like a living organism. It is intelligent. It loves to devour the dreams of humans. But it is very picky."
"This entire forest is a closed loop."
A knight cut her off.
"Stop misleading them. Living organism? Bullshit!"
The women signaled for them to be quiet.
"My father sent me on a mission to recover a relic from this valley. It is said that the time isolation and weird behavior of this forest is simply a side effect of this relic."
Anos felt something wasn't right. He didn't think this world had supernatural power. Sure, there were martial artist. But it wasn't as crazy as the cultivation world. But now he found himself in a forbidden area-esque place.
Just like the spaces Axiom had once explored in Anos's previous world.
"Dreams?" Anos thought back to his weird dream where he was sealed. Was that dream what drew him into this forest? He shook his head. It was a well tested route.
There were no mention of such a weird place.
The women introduced herself.
"I am Zaphiela Xervist. You are the first person we have ran into in a long time..."
"How long?" Anos was curious how long they had been in this space.
"It has been over eight years..."
"So you haven't found the relic after searching for so many years?"
"We have long abandoned the mission. I just want to leave this cursed place."
"How do you leave?"
"We have tried everything. The mechanism doesn't make any sense. I might have to live out the rest of my life in this crappy forest."