Path to Transcendence

Julius felt an incredible amount of mana getting pumped into the stave via one of the guy\'s skills. Yellow flames engulfed the stave in a flickering halo. It looked pretty, but honestly, he believed that there was too much mana getting wasted in the process.

He didn\'t want to be a critic, but considering one of his main affinities was fire, he couldn\'t help himself.

His friend with the shortsword just pulled out another one, dual-wielding the two shorter blades.

"Who are you?" The shortsword guy asked demandingly.

"I think the better question is who are you and why are you following me?" Julius replied calmly.

"You shouldn\'t be sticking your nose into other people\'s business," the bald guy said angrily.

"Is that what this is about? I beat up some of your guys so you decided to tail me and…" Julius gave a dramatic look around at where they were. "... Kidnap or kill me?" He didn\'t know if this was the actual reason, but he wanted to see if they would confirm some of his own suspicions.

"You almost killed one of them," the bald guy growled out.

Suspicion confirmed. Wait, what did he say?

"Huh? No, I didn\'t. I was pretty gentle with them all things considered," Julius replied to the guy. A little offended by the accusation.

"I don\'t give a shit what you said you did. The fact of the matter is that one of them had their organs ruptured and you can\'t just get away with that."

"Wait. You said he had his organs ruptured? Which one was it?" Julius asked genuinely interested. He was pretty confident that he held back an appropriate level, but he did hit that one guy with a couple of extra shots to the chest.

"I ain\'t telling you shit!" The bald guy yelled.

"You say shit a lot," Julius said offhandedly.

"What?" The guy stopped being angry and looked more confused than anything.

"Nothing. Hey, quick question, but was this guy who almost died a burly-looking guy who had three friends?"

"So you did do it!" The bald guy was once again furious.

Julius placed his hands up in the air placatingly. "I might have done it. But to be fair, that is the only guy I did that to and he kind of deserved it," he argued.

"I don\'t care!"

"Well, you should."

Julius saw the veins on the guy\'s shiny crown pulse angrily. That was the only warning he got. The bald seemed like he was no longer interested in talking with Julius and decided that violence was his answer. His feet exploded with fire mana and blasted him toward Julius.

Julius used [Flash Step] and avoided it easily. But he didn\'t really pay too much attention to the baldy. He was more focused on the other guy. He had gone invisible the moment baldy attacked and was creeping on Julius\'s back.

However, Julius let him. The guy shouldn\'t know about his perception skill so he was just wrapping himself up for Julius in a neat little bow.

Baldy sent another barrage of flames at Julius, blinding his vision and covering him in fire. It didn\'t do any damage, but Julius didn\'t think that was what it was for. It was most likely for his friend who was dashing at Julius through the flames.

The fluidity and timing of the attack spoke volumes. These two were undoubtedly familiar with each other and had definitely done this same attack before.

Hell, it was a good plan. Julius himself used it on the trolls. It was just too bad that he knew exactly where the shortsword guy was attacking from.

Before the guy made contact with him, Julius siphoned the kinetic energy from the guy\'s leap. He used some sort of wind skill to boost himself, but Julius quite literally took the wind from his sails.

He thought that his previous usage of siphoning kinetic energy was a fluke because the guys were too weak, but now he just understood that it was his will that made such a dramatic leap in strength.

These men weren\'t scrubs; they were actually quite good fighters with solid willpowers of their own. His little test of wills to take away his kinetic energy proved it. Their wills outclassed the other thugs by a wide margin. It just sucked for them that Julius\'s was still on a different level.

He reached for Inexorable Will and clapped down on the man\'s aura, completely overriding whatever resistance the man put up. The guy froze mid-air with a baffled expression.

The best part of it was the guy left himself right in front of Julius, completely defenseless. His bald friend was too late to help, Julius absolutely rocked the shortsword guy with an arm full of kinetic energy, fire mana, and sharpened mana.

The barrier and the defensive skill that surrounded him were completely shattered and overpowered by Julius\'s strike. It tore a gaping hole into the guy\'s chest and the guy fell to his face motionless.

Julius could sense that he was still alive, his chest was still moving, but if he didn\'t get attention soon he wouldn\'t be.

The baldy wasn\'t just twiddling his thumbs while Julius was dealing with his friend either. He launched a concentrated bolt of fire mana at Julius\'s back. However, since Julius was busy punching the other one, he decided to take the attack on his back to give him enough time to break through Shortsword\'s defenses, hoping his armor dealt with the damage.

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It held up pretty well. There was barely a dent in the armor, his Concept of Sharpness took care of most of it before it impacted. Julius turned to face the fire baldy with his full attention.

He could still see the blood pouring down his hand from Julius\'s spikes. But Julius didn\'t think this guy was even aware of his injury. He was looking at Julius with bloodthirsty eyes, enraged at what Julius did to his friend.

Unlike his friend, he didn\'t attempt to engage Julius. He kept on sending blasts of fire mana at Julius while keeping his distance. Whenever Julius got too close he would set off a widespread explosion that knocked Julius away, allowing him to get distance again.

Julius tried going after a couple of times, but after the third attempt, he wasn\'t going to waste any more time chasing him. He created a bunch of spikes of mana over his shoulder. Pale violet sharpened spikes of mana pointed threateningly at the baldy in the distance.

Julius saw the look of fear and surprise on the guy\'s face when he saw Julius create so many powerful constructs. The guy knew the second he saw the first one appear that he had no chance. He immediately threw up his hands.

"Okay, okay! I surrender!" He exclaimed loud enough for Julius to hear.

Julius paused for a moment. He thought of what he was going to do and decided quickly. He relaxed his posture slightly and waved at the man to approach. The guy didn\'t move from his spot, just darting his eyes back and forth from Julius to his friend\'s prone body.

"Come here then," Julius demanded. He would give the man a chance. If he wanted to surrender Julius would allow him that privilege.

However, the guy didn\'t seem to want to listen to Julius\'s condition. He stayed put and didn\'t move a muscle. He was just blatantly ignoring Julius as he stalled for time.

Julius gave a loud sigh and sent a single spike tearing through the air at the guy. A barrier of flame appeared in front of him and stopped the spike, but only partly. The remaining energy from the spike exploded and knocked the guy off of his feet.

Julius then controlled two of the spikes to float closer to the baldy in a threatening manner. That seemed to do it though. The guy was much more cooperative with Julius. He got on his hands and knees in front of Julius, looking at Julius with resentful eyes.

Julius created shackles that immobilized the man before he did anything else. He didn\'t trust this man but he would give him a chance. Once the man was completely restrained Julius spoke to him.

"Who do you work for?" He asked politely.

"I\'m not telling you anything," the baldy grumbled out.

Julius gave him a deadpan look. "So then what\'s the reason for surrendering? If you aren\'t going to tell me anything then what\'s the use of keeping you alive? Am I supposed to just let you go and allow you to attack me another day?"

The man stubbornly stayed silent. Julius gave him a moment to think about what he was going to do and went over to the other guy\'s motionless body. A pool of blood was forming underneath his chest but he was still alive. Tier 3s were much more sturdy than Tier 2s.

Julius dragged the injured man to his friend by the ankle. He didn\'t really take care to make sure his injury wasn\'t further agitated. These men were not good men and should be grateful that he was showing this much respect to them. They should especially be happy for the little bit of life mana that Julius was sending to him. It wasn\'t enough to heal him, but it would give him some more time before he bled out.

He plopped the body next to the bald man and just gave a cold stare at him. "He\'s your friend right?"

The man just nodded at Julius reluctantly.

"So if I had a way to save him, you would tell me information in return?" He asked.

At this, the man actually hesitated and chewed on his lips. "I can\'t, even if I wanted to," he mumbled out.

"Why not? Some sort of oath or vow?" Julius asked, already expecting the answer.

The bald one just nodded his head in confirmation. Well, that\'s annoying. How else am I supposed to find out who they work for? I mean, I have a potential way, but I would rather not resort to that.

As he thought he went over the notifications he got during the fight. It felt odd especially considering he hadn\'t gotten many skill levels in the past month.

[Sage of Savagery lvl 3 -> lvl 4]

[Barrier of Severance lvl 13 -> lvl 14]

[Flash Step lvl 5 -> lvl 6]

The recent pain he felt when gaining skill levels wasn\'t present anymore. Something he was very grateful for.

As he was appreciating his rehabilitating soul, an idea popped into his head. He didn\'t know if it would work, but it was worth a shot.

He picked up the hand of the unconscious one and took the ring off of it. It was a storage ring and it might contain some answers. He tried to access it, but there was something preventing him. Declan mentioned something like this before, it was called an aura lock or something. However, Julius remembered that Declan had been able to disable it.

Julius didn\'t know if he could, but he was going to try. He took the ring in his hands and began to probe the ring with his aura. He didn\'t really know what to look for and so he just inspected it carefully.

The first thing he noticed was that there was some sort of enchantment that sucked in aura. It was like a swirling vortex of mana circuits all going down to the same point. He didn\'t understand its exact function, but he was able to sense that the man\'s aura was emitted from this part of the ring.

The one thing he remembered about Declan when he broke the enchantment for Geoffrey\'s ring was that he crushed it with a lot of force. So that was exactly what he attempted to do with this ring. He tried his best to encircle this particular part of the enchantment with his aura.

It took almost five minutes before he felt comfortable that he got a nice grip on it. However, when he did he began to compress it with his own aura, not only that but he tried to insert a thread of his aura into the ring.

He grunted from the unexpected resistance he got from the ring. It was like lifting a weight that was way too heavy for him. He strained himself, trying to overpower it. His Concept of Sharpness and Concept of Will both were used to aid his efforts.

He used Severing Will to try and disconnect the bond between the ring and the unconscious man. Then he used Inexorable Will to press and destabilize it with sheer force, supplementing Severing Will.

His ability to freeze people in mid-air wasn\'t the only benefit of his increased willpower. His aura also got a nice boost from it. If he had tried this before, he doubted he would have been able to.

Hence, he got excited when he felt something start to give. With a choking grunt, he crushed the remaining resistance and the aura enchantment like a pane of glass shattering.

He definitely wasn\'t as good as Declan because the ring didn\'t just open up to him, but it literally exploded. On the bright side, the items that were stored within it were ejected out like an exploding plane. Items flew in every direction, shredded to pieces from whatever Julius had done.

"What did you just do?" The bald man said fearfully. He looked ashen white as he saw the contents of the ring scattered about the woods.

Julius ignored him and went over to inspect the items. The first thing he looked at was the scattered and half-ruined papers. Reason being, is that you only kept papers if it was important for one purpose or another.

He eventually gathered himself a nice little stack of torn-apart parchment and started to peruse it. A lot of them were seemingly letters or orders of some sort. Some had directions on what to do and what time certain things would be arriving. However, there were words that he didn\'t understand, clearly some form of code.

He kept on looking anyway. Keeping an eye out for anything that stood out as an originator or the person who gave these orders. These papers didn\'t give him much, but they definitely showed that these men were part of a larger group. They weren\'t just acting alone, this was organized. The times and directions were painstakingly plotted out.

He was hurriedly reviewing all of the documents and he almost missed something because of it. It was a little badge on some of the pieces of scrap. It was a crest of a wolf stamped on some of the papers.

He knew exactly what this crest was. He had seen it before. It was the crest of House Greyson.