Chapter 227: The Hidden Threat

Oathbound Lin would love to stay and observe these Runalymo more, but the Dwarves won’t wait, and he can always come back to deliver payment to Alysara. Even if he doesn’t have a good excuse, he can still say he’s here for diplomatic reasons, although, if that were the case, Commander Jordan would more likely be sent for that type of mission.

“I would like to stay and explore the wonderful community your people have,” Lin speaks his mind while adding political niceties. “but time is short. If you want, I can teleport us both closer, but it would use a lot of my power.”

Lin hasn’t rested for several days already, but he can still teleport directly back to the capital, which will shorten a multi-day journey. It will use up the last of his power to teleport so far, which means there will have to be at least one day for him to rest, but it beats having to fly back and still be running on fumes for the scrying.

“I can introduce you to my Emperor and the team that will be guarding you. I will require one day of rest, but you can use that time to see what we can offer you for your expertise.”

Lin has seen enough of Alysara’s personality to know that she will not like this. She is cautious, which is a good trait to have, especially for a scryer.

“Alright, I’m ready,” Alysara says after a minute of contemplation.

Two things strike Lin as odd. The first is that she agreed without question. Sure, Lin did swear an Oath – and he fully intends to keep his word – but she doesn’t know that, and he didn’t swear on his life. A less moral man would intentionally break the Oath, have his items teleport to her but then just steal them back. She also didn’t insist on covering that contingency which means she must have ways of getting out of such a situation, and without knowing her true power, she might actually be capable of escaping such a situation.

The second thing is that it seemingly took her a long time to think about her answer. For a mind mage who should have several skills boosting her mental capabilities, thinking at speeds that defy logic should be easy for even one mind. It could be that she’s preoccupied with her other minds, or she had to make plans for many possibilities, and of the two, the latter is much more likely.

“Very well.” Lin says, waiting for the real Alysara to show up.

“I think you misunderstand,” Alysara says with an amused smile on her face. “I can extend my abilities through my clones, so I don’t need to be there in person.”

Not a direct lie, but definitely omitting something. Lin reads Alysara’s intent, which only confuses Lin more. A mind mage should have ways of blocking such basic ways of reading people. Or perhaps she thought it’s reasonable to omit things in this situation, which is, admittedly, correct. However, the confusing part is when she says ‘extend’ which she knows isn’t an accurate description. Why not just say she has a Link with the clone that can channel her scrying abilities?

It’s not just a weird choice of words either, they don’t speak the same language, so it’s the intent of the words being communicated, which means Alysara intentionally used a strange way to describe her ability. This must mean that she does indeed have a link that can extend her ability, but she wants him to assume it is much more broad in what it can normally do. This would suggest that her scrying range comes from something else, perhaps from an item. This is the most logical thing since such an item can be stolen, so by trying to make others assume it’s her own power that gives her range, she is protecting her own valuables.

She is right to be so cautious; an item that can directly or even indirectly allow one to scry so far is one that could spark wars. However, to Lin, it doesn’t even matter. She’s not an enemy, and all that matters is that she is able to do the mission.

“Very well then, I shall teleport us promptly,” Lin says to give her time to prepare before reality bends to his whims and warps them as far as Lin can manage.

However, instead of appearing near the capital city, they appear over the Ocean. Did he misjudge how far the Nexus is, or did he overestimate how much strength he had left?

Lin instantly feels his strength vanish, and a wave of nausea hits him. It takes him every ounce of will just to keep him from plunging into the waters below.

Suddenly he feels weightless and sees the flapping of wings from his peripherals. Turning his head, he sees that he and Alysara both have a pair of beautiful wings.

“I take it this was not part of your plan?” Alysara asks, half amused and half alert.

“It was not, I must have misjudged something” Lin feels so incredibly weak, too weak for this to be a simple overdrawing of his power. “We have to get out of here!”

His instincts scream at him, realizing this is a trap! However, it was too late. A writhing shadowy mass of tentacles manifests before seeming to slide through space, grasping toward them.

Lin [Analyzes] the being but is shocked when completely foreign information fills his mind. It’s as if this being isn’t from this reality! However, the good news is that it is only Exalted tier.

“Don’t try to teleport us out!” Lin warns, “It has some sort of anchoring ability!”

Alysara summons dozens of faerin-like winged creatures that fly at the strange being and stab at it with tiny weapons which cause explosions inside the flesh of the creature.

She’s a summoner? Why are her attacks so weak?

For a legendary tier being, the summoned creatures’ attacks are way too weak, probably at around the strength of a Class level of seven hundred, or maybe even eight hundred.

The strange being heals the minor wounds almost instantly, a regenerator. However, suddenly a copy of her and Lin appears, engaging the strange being.

“Let's run away!” Alysara shouts, grabbing him and flying away. The creature seems to fall for the trick and doesn’t give chase.

“Do you know what that thing is?” Lin asks, remembering the recent world message of defeating a being of completely foreign information.

“They attacked us recently, and were defeated by the Guardian; I think they are still trying to do something, a type of siege, maybe? We didn’t teleport far away from the Nexus.”

“A siege? You don’t sound so sure. Has something like this happened before?”

“No, they didn’t attack our airships, so I’m not sure if this is just a coincidence or not.”

“If they are alien to us, then we are alien to them; they might not understand conventional travel,” Lin proposes, “If their primary method of travel is teleportation, then their sieges might reflect that, and we fell right into a trap. This might be a blessing in disguise for you since it will give them false confirmation that their siege is working if it is indeed a siege.”

“We’ll have to deal with them eventually, but we have no idea how strong they are.”

“We’ll help you get rid of them if you help us discover whatever the dwarves are planning. I think they are scared of Safyr since she defeated their last attack, so they aren’t an immediate threat.”

“I see. Well, since we didn’t go too far, we can go back to the Nexus and take an Airship; at the very least, this will confirm if the airships will be attacked or not.”

Lin doesn't argue, it’s a good idea to keep her people safe, and it will let him see how they work. He can even rest if he’s lucky, meaning he will be ready for the mission by the time he returns.

It takes about an hour to return, and Alysara takes him to what appears to be a shipyard where about a dozen airships made completely out of mana lay!

After landing, Lin touches one of the airships; he’s never even seen solid mana this… solid? Mana Forgers do exist back in the empire, but they are rare and can’t produce anything this well made.

Each one is about the size of a large-medium-sized sailing ship, each with the same design as the non-mana-made one he saw earlier.

“You know how to fly one of these?” Lin asks.

“Of course,” Alysara replies, walking onboard one of them.

“How do you power all the enchantmen—” Lin stops when he enters the airship, instantly noticing that it is larger on the inside. Such an enchantment isn’t impossible, but it would require a lot of mana, and it was just sitting here with no one to power it!

“That’s a secret.” Alysara says,  walking him to what appears to be a luxury lounge.

A pleasure ship? Lin guesses. Looking around, he can see a bar, dining tables, and soft comfortable sofas all made entirely of mana. What’s more, the ships only identify as enchanted tier, although it confirms that Alysara made them.

Runalymo Airship(Enchanted)This ship, created by the Saintess of Mana and Magic, is made entirely out of mana, self-powered, capable of incredibly fast speeds, and even has offensive measures.

Lin is curious to know what Alysara sees when she [Analyzes] it. She is the creator, and since the information mostly comes from what one understands he only sees the most basic surface-level information about it. Of course, this limitation only applies to enchanted items; with magic items, the skill reads the information from the magic in the item.

But how is it self powered? That is the key to all of this being possible. Alysara made this airship, which makes sense, she mastered [Manipulate Mana], but she has insight into how mana and magic works that defies all reason.

It is abundantly clear that the Runalymo are more technologically advanced, yet he didn’t see that in the villages he saw. It could be that they are just out of the way rural villages, or it could be that the technological developments are recent, and what more could give someone a title than to revolutionize a civilization’s technology?

All the evidence points to Alysara being the pioneer in this mana technology, maybe even the airships too. Alysara is young, even for an immortal Legendary Being, like she just reached adulthood; how can someone so young be capable of so much? Unless she is an Old Soul?

It is rare but common enough for people to be reincarnated with memories of the past life; every country has at least one every century or two, they all share the same trait of having heterochromia, two differently colored eyes. What’s much more rare and unknown are Legacy Souls like the Emperor himself who’s soul comes from an extinct realm.

Never having seen Alysara’s eyes he can't be sure, she might be hiding them to hide the fact she’s an Old Soul. Come to think of it, wasn’t there an announcement of a primordial soul being reincarnated about sixteen and a half years ago? What are the chances that was Alysara?

Of course, this depends on a lot of assumptions. One, that Alysara is indeed hiding her eyes and isn’t really blind, or potentially that those eye wraps are just a useful item for scryers. Two, that her true age is shown in her clone. Three, that Alysara isn’t an ordinary Old Soul, and four, that Alysara is even an Old Soul to begin with.

There is enough to make the case, but not anything proven. He had first assumed Alysara possessed a Mind Bond, but now he isn’t so sure as scenarios have presented themselves calling that assumption into question. He had verified he’d likely misread the situation once already, so he should most certainly exercise greater prudence before coming to any further conclusions.

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Clone POV:

“It’s so soft!” Yafel exclaims, feeling the mana silk I weaved for them.

We are at my house in one of the guest rooms.

“It’s like touching a cloud!” Yafe shares her sister’s enthusiasm and rubs the cloth on her cheek.

I don’t know what she thinks clouds feel like, but that’s certainly not it.

“How do you make it?” Yafel asks, looking at me with eyes full of aspiration.

The twins are going to be unlocking their Classes in about half a month, so I am currently teaching them how to weave mana into mana silk. They’ve already gotten the skill and have moved away from their tailoring training, now specializing in [Mana Weaving].

“It’s a bit advanced for you now, but first, you need to make a thread of strong and dense mana and surround that with loosely attached mana. But, be careful, since that loose mana will eventually be stripped away by ambient mana. You need to strengthen the MM force of the mana to prevent that,” I explain.

I watch as they start to spin spools of mana silk, trying to emulate my mana silk. It had been a long time since I last spun a spool of silk thread. That was around the time they were born; it seems like forever ago.

“Now start spinning two threads at once, then work your way up to a hundred. Once you can do that, then start weaving them together into cloth as you make the silk.”

The twins only have their Skill at level forty-four, and they need to be close to one hundred to make cloth directly. Once they are at that stage, they can make clothes directly after a bit of practice.

The hours go by as the twins practice, and I direct them as to which breakthrough levels they need to get and how. Even with my help, mastery is only achieved through rigorous practice and experimentation. It doesn’t help that I never had [Weave Mana], which makes things a little different. For instance, they get more breakthroughs that seem to be covered by my mana weaving breakthrough. In essence, [Weave Mana]’s breakthroughs are what [Manipulate Mana]’s breakthrough levels are. When their Skill upgrades, it will likely mean that their breakthroughs get absorbed into one and count for levels instead.

I should ask Kayafe to teach them how to cast spells, to give them a better chance at upgrading [Weave Mana] and getting a good Class. They will already get a good Class by being taught by me, as Kyhana and Lotis did, but if they are also taught by Kayafe, they should get an even better Class.

Plus, Kayafe did want to teach me casting anyway, might as well teach Yafel and Yafe at the same time.

“I’m tired,” Yafe complains.

“Me too,” Yafel joins in.

I pat their heads proudly. They managed to get two breakthroughs and about two dozen levels. They really wore themselves out, seeing the several dozen mana silk spools all around the place. I’ll be selling them and giving the twins the money.

“You two did really well,” I encourage them. “Want to see a secret?” I entice them with a reward while holding a finger to my lips.

“Yes!” They nod their heads enthusiastically.

I bring them to a shipyard at another village where I have about a dozen airships. These are my luxury cruise airships, although one is missing since I am borrowing it on my journey to the Human Empire.

I form a gangplank out of mana, attaching the dock to the airship, not daring to use my teleport in case of eldritch traps. The Twins run onboard playfully and into the luxury lounge where they promptly dived onto the sofa, sinking into the fluffy furniture.

I’ve been experimenting with making mana furs, inspired by the synthetic stuff from my past life. Mana is much smaller than atoms, so even if the particles are different, I can make a mana structure indistinguishable from fur by touch after a lot of experimentation.

“It’s so fluffy!” The twins say in bliss, instantly falling asleep while curled up.

They must have been more tired than I thought, but at least I know the mana fur is a success. I weave a fluffy blanket for them and let them nap. They’ll probably be up all night after this, but that’s Mom and Dad’s problem.

The airship has a bar in the main lounge, but I haven’t secured any deals with any breweries yet. There are games and sparring rooms for the athletic types. A spa for pampering, but I have yet to have any masseuses hired; and of course, there are several baths and the best bathing oils I could buy.

I don’t know if this plan will succeed in the Nexus, but I am damn sure it will in the Lunaleyan Islands.

I have several stacks of promotional posters at my home, advertising “A relaxing day in the skies!”, ready to be handed out to many villages when I am ready.

If this is successful, then I will be one step closer to completing this trial, and one step closer to another Legendary Point.