The kid stopped and glanced over his shoulder For several seconds he studied Tim but then he turned fully and bowed Well met Tim I suppose the girl is somewhat right We should have approached you earlier But it is not often that a new arrival is brought before Lucretia especially by Mr Ghosthound We were confused Ah but where are my manners I am Annon of the Willow Tree Spear Style
Chapter 1415
Randidly sat cross legged in the center of his floating island and focused on the Nether Nebula in his chest Below him Kharon was abuzz with activity as the populations of the Wandering City and the Orchard mixed but Randidly completely ignored the bustle His entire focus had narrowed to a point within his chest
In the days since his fight against Kaan Swacc the Nether Nebula had slowly been recovering At this point the density of Nether had returned to the viscous thickness that had even been able to dampen the image of the Special Investigator when he hadnÆt been suppressing Randidly with that infuriating Skill It might not be RandidlyÆs peak but it was close
Although in terms of dangerousness by far the strangest part of the battle against Kaan was that Skill that teleported him to a location without Nether
Still Randidly set aside the capabilities of the Xyrt Brigade for now he needed to focus on his current project During the climax of that fight Randidly had briefly conjured a more concentrated version of Nether in the form of a fragile seeming grey bubble It was a Nether equivalent of liquid Aether
But what fascinated Randidly was that mistakenly summoned bubble had held such immense weight that it had both shattered the suppression Skill and then shattered KaanÆs body in a follow up attack Now Randidly carefully examined his Nether Nebula to review the steps that had brought him to that power Because the grey bubble was a failed product Instead of conjuring liquid NetherÆ Randidly had meant to construct the equivalent of a Fate Randidly had been aiming to make what he had named a Penance
In retrospect it wasnÆt a surprise that he had failed to accomplish that lofty goal Randidly created no basis for this Penance to be formed in his desperate attempt as a Class provided for a Fate He had his Nether Nebula but that was a more organic mass of Nether currents than any sort of actual planned construction In fact it might be better to say that it was a miracle that he had any sort of result at all from the half baked idea
Randidly had ground the currents against themselves in the heat of battle trying to crazily power up in the moment This decision had forced the density of his Nether to increase by just enough to generate that grey bubble but it was very close to simply causing his Nether Nebula to detonate and level his entire Soulspace The pressure had been immense
Randidly suspected that he would have been able to survive the damage from a ruptured Nether Nebula but he wouldnÆt have been able to go on to beat Kaan Swacc in that condition Thinking of how close he had come to losing everything was a splash of cold water on RandidlyÆs dreams of quickly mastering Nether
Still even if he had no functional understanding of Nether that didnÆt mean he didnÆt have methods to address that RandidlyÆs memories were full of impressions of Nether Gatekeepers Nether Heralds Nether Princes and even a Nether King Of course the information he could extract from his memories regarding the Nether control methods utilized by the first Nether King was tempered by the fact that the Nether King had been controlled by Aether forces
But just recently he had sensed the powerful Nether of a Nether King during its attack on the Seventh Cohort That gave him two points of data regarding Nether Kings With that as a comparison Randidly was able to discover a few things about the way these Nether beings utilized their energy
While still sitting on the cool stone ground Randidly brought both of his hands up and pressed the palms together Due to the decreasing temperature his metallic limb was pleasantly chilly to the touch Randidly still wouldnÆt trust his metal arm in a fight but the damage had been steadily knitted together to the point that he was no longer immobilized the limb to protect it Besides it had recently been becoming a serious interference with his training
Once the connection between his hands was established Randidly released a breath and then gradually pulled his palms apart to create a small space between his hands Under RandidlyÆs careful watch two flows of Nether energy wound their way down his arms to his palms and began to circle each other
After careful study of Nether KingÆs using the Dreamcatcher of the Long Night Randidly had discovered a few patterns in the way Nether was manipulated The methods to accomplish it were rather complicated but the process was simple Randidly simply had to make his Nether currents flow in both directions at once
Which wasnÆt entirely accurate because to make the process work involved a lot of mental gymnastics to fold the flows back in on themselves in certain specific ways but it was at least something to work with Essentially an ideal Nether current would have Schroedinger’s Flow It would simultaneously flow both directions and neither
RandidlyÆs emerald eyes were locked onto the two thin flows of Nether between his hands as he began to work The process was awkward at first but Randidly didnÆt mind that If anything he was glad there wasnÆt an immediate surge in his Nether density he still wanted to head into the Dungeon soon He was slightly wary that some strange force was going to strike soon and make his training session unable to occur
Due to his wandering mind Randidly felt the flows collapse Gently chiding himself Randidly focused and tried it again
Congratulations Your Skill Nether Sensation has grown to Level 222
Time and time again Randidly lost control of the Nether flows and everything to nothing between his palms But to reach this point Randidly had gone through tens of thousands of practice hours to hone his Skills When he failed at this new task he simply reflected on what went wrong and made another attempt His Willpower surged forward and began to fold the Nether once more
His gaze never wavered
Each time he failed he proceeded a little further He was a little bit more adept with the way he could manipulate Nether Randidly began to twist while folding the flows to avoid direct conflict between the same flow as he wove it together in both directions When it became apparent that his current method was fundamentally flawed Randidly just grinned
Rather than trying to draw up a new method from scratch Randidly just began to experiment Since it seemed that his folding strategy wasnÆt the right answer he didnÆt become bitter Instead he used it as a lesson learning to utilize an entirely new energy wasnÆt easy So his intense Nether exertions became more of a thought experiment Framed in a new way a lot of tension went out of RandidlyÆs shoulders With that more relaxed approach Randidly began to play
If the Nether flows he wove together were doomed to collapse perhaps he could create a shifting flow that could only reach the omnidirectional flow for a brief instant before separating Randidly tried it
Congratulations Your Skill Nether Sensation has grown to Level 223
Congratulations Your Skill Nether Sensation has grown to Level 224
Just as quickly as he had thought of it Randidly attempted it and then tossed that idea to the side The implementation of the idea was more difficult than just accomplishing his original goal So instead Randidly tried to design a way to gather three woven Nether flows together so that they would collapse inward toward each other Perhaps they could balance each other out like his images could against Kaan Swacc
Congratulations Your Skill Nether Sensation has grown to Level 225
Congratulations Your Skill Nether Sensation has grown to Level 232
This idea was a better one than the prior attempt but again Randidly quickly realized his ability to manipulate the Nether wasnÆt quite deft enough for what he wanted to accomplish right now Nether SensationÆs Skill Level was increasing but it was rough sledding