Try Your Best Chapter 1

If somebody told me that I would someday wake up in the pokemon world after death I would definitely call them either crazy or someone who had too much time on their hands daydreaming.

I was definitely not the latter as all my life, beginning from when I was an orphan I always worked hard to become someone who could make something with his life.

But maybe I should have taken a bit of time to daydream after all.

At the very least I regret not having had played the pokemon games or watched the anime beyond the Kanto region.

If I did my current situation would likely be a little bit easier for me to get accustomed to.

Alas nothing ever goes as you want it to.

At the very least I can be glad about the fact that I am still somehow miraculously alive considered what happened before I got into this situation.

Though I don’t know how long that is actually going to last as I marched through an unknown forest very carefully.

I observed my surroundings zealously to make sure nothing would sneak up on me.

The things I was looking out for that would sneak up on me being the many wild pokemon obviously as the forest was littered with them since it was a forest.

It had been an hour ago since I woke up finding myself in this unknown forest.

It was also an hour ago since I figured out that I ended up in the pokemon world as soon as I saw those pokemon roaming around everywhere scaring the heebee jeebees out of me.

And it was also an hour ago that I found out something even more shocking as I noticed how my body seemed to be a lot shorter than before.

From there it didn’t take long at all to also find that my legs and arms were smaller and shorter as well.

After a brief panic I found a river as well which is where I could finally confirm my fears as I looked into the river to see my reflection.

Alas the face that looked back at me was not the face I was used to seeing as what I saw was the face of an unknown Caucasian brat with filthy black hair and red eyes.

I looked like I was barely 16 years old as I stared into my new reflection.

Temporarily ignoring the fact that I had red irises which should not be possible or at least extremely rare.

Hundreds of questions flooded my mind as I wanted to know what was happening.

But there were no answers, other than the fact that I had died and then woke up inside an unknown forest, transported to the pokemon world, put into an unknown body of some filthy brat as his hair was not the only thing that was filthy as clearly the brat hadn’t cleaned himself for months probably with how dirty his body and clothes were plus with how damaged they were basically rags at this point.

The only saving grace here was the fact that the brat didn’t look injured or ill. He was a bit thin meaning he didn’t eat a lot which was already something very worrisome, but overall he seemed decently healthy even though he had been seemingly living in this forest for who knows how long.

My current plight was obviously important to me, but at the same time I couldn’t help but wonder what the heck this child had been doing in this forest all by himself and why it looked like he had been living in the wilds for months on end.

What were the parents of this kid doing? And did he even have parents at all?

I wondered, still not entirely cognizing the fact that I was both still alive and occupying the body of some kid I didn’t know in a world that came from a video game/tv show.

Logically, it should have been the last thing that I should have focused on.

But it was instead the kid that I worried about as I couldn’t help but think what had happened to his soul once I started inhabiting his body.

Could it be?

Did I kill him?

The thought unnerved me to no end as even though I knew that it wasn’t my intention to kill this kid, I still may have done it unintentionally.

In a way, I would have preferred it if I had just died in my previous life and not bothered anyone with my death especially this kid.

But now nothing could be changed.

I didn’t feel anything that would imply that there is another soul living in this body other than my own.

I had somehow ended up in this situation and it was now my problem to deal with.

I could not let this kid’s potential death weigh me down, instead I should be thankful for this chance and try to live my life again for not only my sake, but for the sake of the kid as well as it was because of his body that I could live again.

-Kid, I don’t know who you are. But I won’t waste this chance. I will live as best as I can. And if there will be a point where I can somehow pay you back. I will also try to do my best to help with that.

I made a promise.

And with that promise made I felt a whole lot lighter as if tons of weight was pushed off my shoulders.

With that out of the way the only thing left to do now was…

-Getting out of here alive…I certainly am not looking to become breakfast from some random pokemon. It would be different if I had my own pokemon. But I need pokeballs for that if I recall.

Something that I barely recalled as it had been over a few decades since I last played pokemon in my youth.

Luckily, I still knew a lot about it even if it was difficult to recall certain things.

But first of all I needed to find civilization.

There is no way I can continue surviving in this forest with the way I was.

Personally I did have survive skills enough to live in this forest realistically.

But that was only viable when considering that there wouldn’t be predators out there hunting for me. Predators I was sure existed here as the pokemon were not all just herbivores.

Luckily, I had found a river near the place I had woken up in.

I was sure that following the river would lead me to civilization soon enough.

But I still didn’t count on that anytime soon as I considered what I would do if it became night and I still couldn’t find civilization.

In that case, food, water and shelter would be the first thing I needed to lookout for to safely go through the night meaning I would need to prepare before I could actually make that walk following the river.

The problem here was that while I had survival skills allowing me to make a fire with just sticks and building a basic shelter with a river nearby for water.

I didn’t actually know what in this forest was and wasn’t edible namely the plants as all them while looking familiar were definitely not what I thought they were meaning that these plants could be poisonous for all I knew.

For this reason, I was hesitant about picking anything to eat from them and instead knew that the only thing I could likely eat without any repercussions was meat.

Meat that was definitely going to come from pokemon since they were the only other creatures nearby other than me.

There was a contradiction here as I had been the entire time avoiding pokemon in fear of what they may do to me if I was too close to them as I knew from the games that pokemon were ridiculous super powered monsters.

But for the sake of my survival, there was no other way but for me to hunt pokemon so I could fill my stomach.

Luckily, again, I had somewhat of a solution here as I was near a big river.

I was definitely not going to try hunting for a pokemon that walked on land as even though I was confident that I could likely kill a Rattata or a Pidgey with a makeshift wooden spear. I still didn’t want to risk it as any injury could spell doom for me as I was still very young likely not even 10 years old with no medicine to help me get better in case I got an infection.

This was simply not a gamble I wanted to put my hand in. Using traps could maybe work. But those took time to work properly and could still fail considering that these weren’t ordinary rats or birds basically meaning that there was no chance they would work to begin with.

So obviously if land creatures are a no good.

Sea creatures became my next best bet.

And wouldn’t you know it, the big river I woke up next to was actually teeming with tons of fish or rather water-type pokemon.

There were a lot of them, but there were few I could recognize with my limited memories of the first game as the only pokemon in the river I could recognize were Magikarp’s, Goldeen’s and a few Staryu’s.

The rest of these fish type or water-type pokemon were not present within my memory as they were completely unknown to me.

And what was unknown, was better left untouched as I decided to only focus on the things I did understand.

More specifically I decided to aim for the school of Goldeen’s to turn into my next meal.

In the anime I had seen I don’t recall them ever being eaten. But I do remember that Magikarp’s were said to be inedible by the female main character of the group…

What was her name?

Misty?

She was the water type specialist or something.

Anyway, from what I recall she said that Magikarps were nothing more than bone and scale which was sort of proven when James attempted to eat the Magikarp and ended up breaking his teeth showing that they were incredibly tough even if they don’t look like it.

But then again I am not sure how much I can really trust the anime or the game.

Though it was better to rely on the knowledge I had then relying on no knowledge.

Even if I had preferred hunting the Magicarps as they were notorious for being extremely weak and useless pokemon a perfect target for me to exploit and hunt for food.

Then again their looks were deceiving as their next evolution into Gyarados were immensely powerful pokemon that I never would want to meet in real life.

Though I have the suspicion that living in this world from now on I would inevitably meet a Gyarados.

I still didn’t even know what to do what with my new life.

Become a pokemon trainer?

I wasn’t so sure as I wasn’t that big on raising animals for battle or going on a journey that could be life threatening. Pokemon in all honesty did not interest me even though I arguably entered the world many in my world dreamed about entering all their life.

But I did recognize the fact that this was the pokemon world and that it wasn’t a very peaceful place.

Having a pokemon clearly would allow me to properly protect myself so thinking about it that way I believed that I didn’t necessarily have a choice whether or not I wanted to raise pokemon if I wanted to protect myself.

But that kind of thinking was for later when I could make it out of here safe and sound in a place where I could actually get a pokeball.

At the moment survival was all that mattered and for that I started to move as I gathered a lot of things from the forest and my surroundings to start making tools for what I was about to do.

A weapon to hunt for the Goldeen’s was something I needed first. It was easy to make as I simply took a long and sturdy branch before taking a sharp rock and then turning the long and sturdy branch into a wooden spear.

I made sure it was long enough for me to allow piercing a Goldeen inside the water from a decent distance away so I wouldn’t have to worry about a counter attack or at least could run away if they did counter attack. After making the spear it was then immediately time for me to hunt them.

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Outworld Chapter 74

In total we got 26 Bearded Goats.

12 of them were males while 14 of them were females.

There were 6 young ones though included in that number 4 of which were female who couldn’t produce any milk yet meaning only 10 of them were milkable, but that was of no matter as we happily got all the Bearded Goats tied them up and brought them back to our base.

Obviously the Bearded Goats weren’t going to comply easily. Since they were still wild animals they were far more ferocious compared to ordinary domesticated animals since they were wild and were used to surviving on their own.

Forcefully dragging them to our place was no issue though since I had the strength plus Primus to help us with that.

It still caused us to slow down unnecessarily. And annoyance started to build up as the Goats struggled, tried to fight and cried all at the same time.

Because I was no goat herder nor was anyone else here one for the matter. We had no idea how to discipline these goats.

We had to think about that once we got back to our base.

And when we did come back, another issue regarding placing the goats somewhere came up as we had made no pens for them.

We immediately got to work when this realization kicked in with Serena swiftly started drawing the blue print for the Goat Barn that we decided on building.

The reason we decided to make a Goat Barn which was basically an entire house for these Goats was because we considered that winter was coming and also to protect against predators if any do end up somehow getting through our palisades.

Primus and Secundus were summoned as they were absolutely needed for this project.

Because I was at Liquid Stage which meant my soul was stronger. I could summon both of them at the same time.

And with the needed man power assembled we quickly went to work as we processed material, set up the place we wanted the Goat Barn to be in which was all right in time as Serena finished drawing the blueprint.

What was left was just to follow the blue print which is where the job really started.

It was of none issue though as by the time it became noon we finished building the entire barn which looked quite good actually as Serena did a great job making the blueprint.

The insides were filled with hay like straw that we normally used to sleep on with wooden basins separately filled with both food and water for the Goats and to make sure the Goats wouldn’t dirty their food and water source Serena made sure that there was a fence that only let the head of the goats through to let them eat and drink, but not enter the area where the basins were.

The first time we had them go inside to see how they would react and how things would go.

It was obviously a bit chaotic as the Bearded Goats still weren’t all too happy with the situation obviously.

They even started ramming the walls of the barn. Hopping it would break and they could escape. But because Serena knew something like this would happen, she took extra care to make the barn solid and not easily damaged.

After 30 minutes of this. The Bearded Goats eventually became tired and realized that they couldn’t leave.

They settled down a bit and a few even discovered the food and water areas where they could feed.

Food and water with comfortable living space that was warm.

The Bearded Goats started to acclimate.

There were still issues of course. Cleaning the waste of these Bearded Goats in the future for one was going to be a regular chore and not one any of us looked forward to.

It was fortunate therefore that we had Secundus who could easily do this for us.

But that day all we wanted was to take a break as we had worked very hard from capturing the goats to building the barn.

Taking a bath was going to be number 1, but Merulia also had something else to cheer us up with as she had a wooden bucket full of white creamy substance in it that she harvested from the goats while we were working.

It was Bearded Goat Milk.

I finally got to try it.

And as soon as I did try it my eyes widened as I hadn’t expected the milk actually to be so good.

I could not finally understand why the girls spoke so highly of it.

The milk looked ordinary, but it was anything but, having an intense rich flavor, it went down very smoothly while giving you a refreshing after taste.

My mind and muscles relaxed significantly through just drinking one cup.

I immediately wanted to drink another cup.

But when I turned to the bucket to some more I found in shock that the entire bucket was already empty!

I instantly turned to the other girls knowing exactly who emptied it.

The girls too felt a bit guilty and turned away.

I felt a bit irritated and wanted to shout. But stopped myself as there was no point to it.

I should just be happy that I got to drink some of the milk at all. in the future, drinking more of it wouldn’t be an issue either.

That day we talked a bit about how great the Bearded Goat herd was that we acquired.

The milk we got from this was just too amazing and we could drink it almost every day.

In this manner we talked about what else we would like if we kept other kinds of livestock.

Eggs immediately became the topic for that as a set of sunny side fried eggs and strips of fried bacon with kifler bread and a glass of milk started to sound incredibly alluring.

Talks about catching animals that regularly laid eggs started.

Merulia herself said that she saw a flock of Cloud Ducks flying over our base at one point.

These Ducks seemed to be lay eggs regularly as long as situation allowed them to as they could continuously lay eggs as long as they had enough food and had a safe shelter.

I too was interested in this obviously after experiencing the amazing taste of the Bearded Goat milk.

But I was less enthusiastic about it as these Cloud Ducks could fly and were not comparable to how easy it was to capture the Bearded Goats.

I said as much as well. But Merulia told me that these Cloud Ducks were special in a sense that when it became winter. They would go into hibernation as food for these Ducks would become scarce in winter which is why they hibernate to skip the winter.

The place they hibernate in usually is a place that the Cloud Ducks deemed as very safe. But they are usually found buried a few meters in the ground.

When I heard that I couldn’t help but ask Merulia then why they are called Cloud Ducks and not Buried Ducks if they really do something like this.

Merulia explained with a smile that early people just started calling them Cloud Ducks because they sort of look like a big cloud when they fly in the sky in one flock. It was only later that people discovered their way of dealing with winter and how they hibernated, but by then the name already stuck so there was no way to change it anymore, not that it was required since the name wasn’t wrong.

Still though, finding these Ducks was going to be annoying just the same even if they didn’t fly because now they buried themselves which was not much better.

For this reason, I was not going to explicitly look for these Ducks randomly without having a method to track them first.

Merulia understood this and wasn’t really expecting us to go look for them since she indeed knew the difficulty of this task.

And in this manner the day ended.

The next 3 days of the week were spent hunting and going over the usual routine of research with Serena.

Both hunting and research basically stopped at this week with us getting enough food and the research were doing finally finishing as we succeeded in creating the magic air conditioner!

-Oh my god…this feels so good…I didn’t think I would miss warmth so much…

-You can say that again the fur clothes already keep us sufficiently warm, but I was really getting tired wearing them all the time.

Lemanti and Merulia praised while giving relieved looks. Having stripped down to more thin casual clothes with more skin showing as they both sat down next to the magic air conditioner Serena and I had finally finished making.

It was in the form of a rectangle box with wide slits where warm air passed through.

Inside the box there was a fan that pushed that air out while a long rod covered the back of the magic air conditioner that was creating a hot atmosphere within the box which the fan blew out.

This may all sound very simple. But it was anything but as it wouldn’t have taken a week until we made this magical household appliance.

Serena and I also thought that we could improve on it as well and decrease it size while making it more effective. But that would require more research and more tests to get the right blueprint.

Something we honestly didn’t want to bother with since the magic air conditioner we made was already all that we needed.

We instead moved to the next bit of research which was the magic stove.

We previously already worked on 2 heat related magical machines which was the magic water heater and the magic air conditioner.

In our eyes researching the stove was going to take much less time compared to that 1 week required to make the magic air conditioner.

In fact, 3 days would be enough or at least that was our humble estimate.

But before that, there was something else I wanted to do before it finally became winter and it would start snowing.

Which was to go to the river near the mountain where Serena’s original group went to and got annihilated by the raptors and retrieve the Mechanical Toolbox for Serena.

Without the Mechanical Toolbox our plan to make the aircraft to escape this place would be too difficult and could cause us all sorts of unseen problems regarding the machine if we don’t have precise tools.

The Mechanical Toolbox would solve them or at least cause those problems to be far minimal compared to us using subpar tools.

The reason I also wanted to do it now and not the previous week was because I was aiming for the time of transition between the current season and the approaching winter.

Why?

All because of what Merulia told us about the raptors, new bits of information that came about when we became aware that winter was approaching, who just like Cloud Ducks, that she told us about recently, went into hibernation as soon as winter began.

Winter hadn’t begun as of now. But since it was close the activity of those raptors was bound to be far less compared to before as they were preparing for their hibernation.

This was great for us because it meant grabbing the Mechanical Toolbox would be far easier compared to before. My own strength and the strength of the girls had also increased making my original plans of getting the Mechanical Toolbox that much more viable now that the environment was helping us as well.

As for why I we couldn’t just go take the Mechanical Toolbox when it already became winter and the raptors were completely gone into their hibernation.

It was as I mentioned because of the snow.

I still had no idea how it was going to be since I’ve never seen it myself. But the girls tell me that the snow was going to be incredibly thick once it started snowing.

They basically told me that the entire island would be covered by snow as thick as 1 or 2 meter.

Which is why, it was of utmost importance that we grabbed the Mechanical Toolbox before it started snowing since if it snowed and everything gets buried by that massive snow finding the Mechanical Toolbox even when we know its rough location would still be a total nightmare.

-And once we get the Mechanical Toolbox I guess that will be the start of our holing up until the winter is over…

-What? Not feeling great about being stuck inside most of the day Merulia?

-She is an explorer obviously she wouldn’t feel good. But this doesn’t mean none of us have any less work to do. In fact, I want to start remodeling our home a little bit. Create ventilation and such and more solid infrastructure.

-Hey! Don’t forget about the weights I asked you to make for me! I am still waiting for those!

-I swear Lemanti, don’t you ever get tired of doing muscle training all day?

-Not when I can keep my figure with Will’s potions and still gain a lot of strength! By the way should we stock up on those potion materials?

-We should, I already made lots of potions in reserved in preparation for the winter, but it’s never bad to have more.

-Yay! I love you Darling!

-If you lick me I will punch you. And stop touching me there!

-Quick! Merulia! Get him from behind!

-Okay! Serena come help us!

-Ahh…can I get at the front?

And like that the week ended.

Tomorrow we would we would go and set off to get Serena the Mechanical Toolbox.

We didn’t think this was going to be anything big.

But this island still had its surprises coming for us.

Outworld Chapter 73

With the hunting trip wrapped up.

Lemanti and I headed back to our base with all the game we hunted for the day.

Obviously we didn’t carry everything on our own. The amount of animals was just too much for us to do that.

Instead it was Primus my golem who carried everything while we rode on top of him as well.

Before going back though Lemanti wanted to take a bit of time to look for the Bearded Goats she had seen previously that she wanted to catch to turn into our livestock so we could farm them for fur and milk them for their milk.

Unfortunately, there was no trace of them which was not surprising considering that it had been close to over a week since Lemanti last saw them. They likely moved away after sensing the presence of the Tyranno as well which was a bummer, but nothing could be done about it.

As for catching other animals to turn them into livestock. This still could be done. But it would not be as ideal as catching those Bearded Goats since the female regularly produced milk while those other herbivore beasts were mostly only good for their and really nothing else.

I still thought that keeping animals for that purpose alone was good enough. But the idea of catching those Bearded Goats for their milk was something I too was interested in which is why I thought about how to catch these Bearded Goats or track them down somehow, clearly Merulia was going to be key in this meaning that next time bringing her along was going to be necessary.

When we came back to our base.

Noon was about to approach and the girls quickly came to welcome us taking the beast carcasses to start skinning and butchering them.

This was all going to be mainly done by Lemanti and Merulia.

Serena and I meanwhile would straight on start continuing our research on the magic air conditioner.

Serena had already been doing some solo research on this without me for the past week or, so she could easily do solo research without my input because she already knew how my enchantments worked for the most part since we had been working together for a good bit now.

We still had to go over her research from the start again since it was likely that she would have made a few mistakes here and there incorrectly assuming certain things.

Those were easily fixed though with our combined effort as we created quick and easy work arounds that worked fairly well.

The only thing in this project that challenged us or rather challenged me was the fact that the enchantments required very precise modifications for the kind of heat the magic air conditioner would emit.

If I didn’t care for that and just engraved an ordinary fire enchantment rune on it. Then it would turn out a bit too hot for our liking so I needed to lower the heat so it was just the right temperature though still a bit hotter just in case, this was still not too much of a problem because I already knew a lot about fire related runes when I was trying to melt the Eternium Alloy with the alchemy fire.

Another problem I had was the issue regarding the fact that only I could turn the magical household appliances on or off.

I already mentioned that for me to give other’s the ability to do this without magic. I had to be able to engrave a third rune to the enchantment to give it such function.

I was at Liquid Stage so practicing how to draw a third rune was now more then possible for me which is what I also started working on.

Learning how to engrave a third though was not easy.

The few attempts I did try ended in a predictable explosion the force of which was as expected far more powerful compared to messing up an enchantment with only 2 runes.

I was not injured though as I was wearing my protective gear that was also enchanted with defensive runes for this very purpose. My upgraded body-strengthening cantrip that now also came with a whole body magical armor was more than enough protection as well so things were fine all things considered.

After a few tries though I already knew that I would not get a proper hang of this even after practicing for a month.

I still practiced whenever I could though since this was important and so another week passed with everything that happened today going on repeat for the next week as we were preparing for Winter.

It became colder and colder while the skies started to be blanketed by more and more clouds.

By the end of the week. Every one of us had to wear some thick fur clothes if we wanted to go outside and not freeze.

These Fur clothes were also enchanted by me with a modified fire enchantment to have them become extra warm allowing us to work in general comfort outside even when it was getting colder.

After 1 week of constant hunting we already had enough meat to last us for the entire 3 months of winter and then some plus the fur and hides that came along with it.

But really this was all because of Merulia as bringing her along made hunting more successful since she could more easily track and find other creatures.

Us bringing her along though was for another reason as we hoped that she could help us find the Bearded Goats somehow.

And it worked as we were able to find the small herd of Bearded Goats on day 4.

When we found them it was the first time I laid my eyes onto these creatures known as Bearded Goats.

No one had actually told me up until the point I saw them how they looked like since I assumed they looked exactly how their name implied they looked like which was goats with beards or something.

Instead what I saw was a small herd of what looked like sheep instead of goats. I say sheep because while these goats had a pair of horns on their head and their faces were generally what I identified as goats.

Their furs were anything but that of a goat as they possessed thick wooly coats making them look like a weird mix between a sheep and a goat.

This was just an observation though and not anything of real importance.

What was of importance was how were going to capture this herd of Bearded Goats.

Preferably I wanted to capture all of them and bring them back to our base.

But I didn’t think we could do that very easily since it was only the 3 of us with none of my magic being helpful in capturing these Bearded Goats or at least not the entire herd.

Luckily though, Merulia had an idea or rather she decided to make use of her ability to solve this situation.

Telling us her intention which instantly got approval from both me and Lemanti as we thought it was a brilliant idea.

And so Merulia went to work.

With all of us standing a fair distance away hiding behind vegetation while watching the herd of Bearded Goats who were all in the middle of resting and grazing.

I could even see that there were already a lot of young within the herd not infants, but not adults either.

It helped that they generally weren’t moving around a lot and more preoccupied with eating. Our timing in encountering them couldn’t be any better.

But it really was all down to Merulia as we watched her do her things while watching the Bearded Goats.

If anything went wrong. Me and Lemanti would have no other choice but to go in ourselves and try to capture as many as we could.

But for now we just watched as Merulia channeled her ability staring at the Bearded Goats in the distance.

Unbeknownst to them. The grass beneath their feet was slowly growing. Making no sudden or threatening movements just yet. The grass just grew very so slowly while keeping low to the ground so it wasn’t obvious that they were growing.

But what was inevitably obvious was the fact that the grass color was changing as it grew. For as distracted as the Bearded Goats were they would clearly notice that the grass near them was changing color.

This would naturally make them alert. But before that could happen. Merulia intended on finishing everything in one move as Merulia was in deep concentration sweat pouring down her face as what she was doing was not easy and was neither something she ever attempted before.

But she was still confident that she could do it as her sense regarding this had gotten far better than before.

A minute passed as this was going on with the herd of Bearded Goats still staying in the same place.

And it was at that moment that one of the Bearded Goats as predicted noticed that something strange was going on.

Looking down at its feet it spotted the discolored grass that was a bit bigger compared to most other grass.

The Bearded Goat obviously didn’t know what this was. But it didn’t need to be a genius to understand that something strange was going on and that the herd needed to be alerted.

Before it could alert them though. Merulia already noticed that the jig was up.

Not holding back any longer. She unleashed the trap she was preparing as all the grass in the area that Bearded Goats were on suddenly all sprung to life!

The Bearded Goats were all immediately pushed into panic probably thinking that they were being attacked by a predator or something.

Every one of them attempted to run. With a small few succeeded as they stood at the edge of the affected area meaning they weren’t influenced as much compared to those who stood in the middle.

As for the majority who were in the middle.

They were not as lucky as the long orange yellow grass started to tie them into place stopping them from moving or running away.

It was a complete disaster for the Bearded Goats as almost every single one of their members were being tied in place by more than 5 to 8 long and thick strands of mutated grass.

Their attempts at freeing themselves by pulling away from the grass or biting it to rip it into pieces didn’t work as the mutated grass was exceptionally tough and resilient.

Eventually ¾ of the entire herd of Bearded Goats were all tired up in one fell swoop. With no ability to resist this strange event they could only be held in place and cry in fear of what was going on.

Merulia did an incredibly great job.

It was so great in fact that both me and Lemanti felt goosebumps when we saw what was happening to the herd of Bearded Goats from a distance.

It really did look like some monster had suddenly appeared underneath their feet and was trying to swallow them up.

But while this was successful neither me nor Lemanti could just continue standing there watching as I was satisfied with getting ¾ of the herd.

I obviously wanted to capture as many as I could which is why I turned to Lemanti and said.

-Let’s go!

Lemanti understood me and so with ropes in hand we run as fast as we could towards the few escaping Bearded Goats.

I really wanted to prioritize the females. But because these goats all looked the same to me and because I was no goat expert. I could only hope whichever goat I captured would turn out to be female.

In the end, I was able to capture 3 fleeing goats.

While Lemanti captured 2.

3 still managed to escape and while I could have captured one more if I put in more effort.

I would have separated from the group a little bit too much if I did that.

Ultimately I was already satisfied that we only lost 3 Bearded Goats while capturing the rest of the herd.

This was really all because of Merulia.

Coming back to the group I thought about what to tell her to express my praise for her and if I could reward her in any way.

But while coming back with the 3 Bearded Goats who couldn’t resist my strength.

I already could see Merulia taking her reward from the Bearded Goats as she didn’t waste a second while waiting for us to come back as she already was handling a Bearded Goat that couldn’t move having placed a metal cup underneath it that she got from who know where.

Right after Merulia worked vigorously on the Bearded Goat’s udders looking a bit awkward while handling them clearly not knowing exactly how milking them worked as she likely only saw it and never did it herself which is why the technique was unknown to her as she merely tried to imitate it hopping she would succeed.

But no milk was coming out. Her failure showing even more clearly as the Bearded Goat who was being milked by Merulia cried out in pain as it obviously was hurting the goat.

But soon the pain would subside as Merulia quickly started to understand the trick behind milking after accidentally succeeding in her attempts.

Quickly enough Merulia started to fill her metal cup with white Bearded Goat milk.

And when she filled it up in a decent amount.

Merulia didn’t hesitate as she took the cup to her lips and started drinking.

She drained the entire cup she had just filled.

And after draining it her smile was extremely wide looking like she had finally achieved something great or a great burden was lifted off of her.

This was the same expression she made when we finished making the bathhouse and were bathing inside of it.

Truly, nothing made one appreciate modern conveniences more like when they became unavailable to you.

Outworld Chapter 72

A few days passed as I rested inside the cave while researching the red magic core of the Tyranno.

Within those few days I was finally able to make a full recovery as my body had completely healed.

As soon as I was fully healed. I didn’t wait anymore and grabbed my Mechanical Crossbow with my backpack plus other equipment before walking out.

It was time for me to seriously start hunting, the coldness of the air outside was already starting to get noticeably thicker. Clouds were starting to get more numerous as well and from what Lemanti reported it was not going to be too long approximately 1 week or more before snow would start falling and it would really start to get cold.

Within this time, I had to work a lot. Not only hunting for creatures, but also researching the magic air conditioner and magic stove with Serena.

Enchanting the winter gear with fire enchantments to keep them warm was also necessary.

In other words, I had tons of things on my platter. The girls weren’t too different as they were working on the clock non-stop every day, making the clothes, forging the tools and anything else they could think of that would allow us to better survive this winter.

Merulia who recently got a better grasp of her ability after that 1 week of research and training with me started to use her ability to allow us to grow the necessary vitamins we would need in the winter that we wouldn’t be able to get. But because her sun elemental energy was always mutating the seeds of those plants to turn into strange plants that were dubious in regards to consumption progress was slow on that as she was attempt to make the plant grow without causing it to be influenced by her sun elemental energy.

In other words, she was trying to purely use the plant side of her sun elemental energy to grow plants. I was not sure if this was possible. But Merulia said that she was sure it was possible, but just very difficult.

I had no way to solve Merulia’s complex problem because the magic book had no knowledge regarding this unique situation. So I just had Merulia do her own research for this as that was what I wanted her to do to begin with which I was happy to see.

-You’re going out to hunt? Let me come with!

Lemanti shouted. Holding her spear while wearing a fur hide that looked like a poncho.

It was cold so it was understandable that she would wear that, as for her offer to come with. I saw no reason why not as she could help carry any creatures we would hunt so I said yes.

With that decision made Lemanti and I left our base and went out to start hunting for some creatures.

I in particular wanted to find magical creatures now that I was at liquid stage and was a lot stronger. I wanted the magic cores to study more runes and also maybe turn them into golems. But what I also wanted to do with them the most was to turn them into magical ink.

Using that magical ink, drawing the enchantments for the aircraft would be a lot safer since there would be no danger of any kind of explosion happening that could cause catastrophic damage to my body.

The Dark Forest Alloy after all was an extremely hard and durable piece of metal partially made out of Eternium. Engraving runes on it would be hard, it was already difficult to engrave runes on ordinary steel without protective enchanted gear. I could only imagine how big of an explosion the Dark Forest Alloy would cause if anything went wrong.

Unfortunately, finding magical beasts was not going to be as easy as wanting to find them.

I could only hope that we were lucky.

Not only about finding them, but also not finding a magical creature on the same level as the Tyranno.

Though I doubted we would, considering that no creatures on the same level as the Tyranno would likely come to the same area it visited last. Merulia told us that these super powerful predators kept to their own territories which I could most certainly understand.

In anyway. Lemanti and I soon started to find tracks of some creatures as we went out to hunt them.

We eventually found a few bucks, deer and boar like creatures. We also found a gigantic frog, but it looked so unappetizing to me that I didn’t even want to hunt it and instead scared it away.

Lemanti on the other hand was a bit sad though as she said that she always wanted to try eating Giant Frogs to which I made a face full of disgust though really I shouldn’t be discriminating considering the things I had already eaten which some people would likely find even more disgusting.

The things we hunted were mostly herbivores, but there were also some carnivores who intended on making us their meals.

Those Carnivores being the creatures we were already all too familiar with.

The Durgs.

Lemanti was rearing to go for a fight.

But I held her back for a moment as there was something I wanted to test on these guys.

-Test? Test what?

-I learned some new magic.

-Oh! Let’s see it!

Lemanti was excited, now looking more like a person who was rearing to watch a show. As for me I turned towards the Durgs while activating my body-strengthening cantrip.

It was nothing out of the ordinary really. But there was something different about this version of the body-strengthening cantrip as I had added additional minor runes to it changing a few things that enhanced the effect of the cantrip.

At the very least that was the intended purpose as the new runes came from the red magic core that belonged to the Tyranno who I used a similar kind of body-strengthening magic.

The few days of researching the red magic core had as I expected quickly bore fruit.

Now was the time to see what the final result was as I felt the surge of strength just like always come over my body.

But there was indeed something different about this strength. With the cantrip being different it only made sense. But what I felt was a bit odd to say the least as other than the surge of strength. I also felt a small violent surge of rage come over me.

It was not enough to overwhelm my mind though as I kept it in control at a relative ease, not too surprised about it as this was the expected effect of the modification.

Next I looked at my hand immediately spotting a blue net pattern covering my hand, but it wasn’t limited to my hand only as it actually covered my entire body.

Lemanti looked on curiously when she saw my body being covered with this magical blue net. She seemingly got lost in thought and stared at me for a few seconds before she seemed to remember where she had seen this from which was none other than the Tyranno who had a similar magical net pattern on its body, but compared to mine it was red and not blue.

The difference in color generally came from the difference of spiritual energy plus emotion which was the main thing that powered this spell which was the emotion of rage or wrath.

It was the first time I came across a spell like that which used emotion as a source of power.

I never thought using emotion as a power source was that effective either as I felt the magic power expenditure of my body-strengthening cantrip being cut down to less than a half while the power had doubled.

Suffice to say the body-strengthening cantrip had undergone a significant upgrade from before. And while yes the forced feeling of rage was annoying. It was very bearable and not too inconvenient.

Furthermore, without a side-effect like that. Such a huge increase of power would not be possible.

As they say power comes with a price.

But this was not all the upgraded body-strengthening cantrip had to offer.

Looking at the Durgs who immediately got wary when they saw the odd blue net pattern that appeared on my body the moment I used the cantrip.

One final test was needed as I just stood there waiting for them to attack me.

Lemanti had a strange expression on her face when she continued to watch me.

She probably didn’t understand why I was just standing there and not doing anything like attacking the Durgs.

But that was for a reason, a reason that was quickly shown as one of the Durgs seemed to have overcome its wariness or was a little bit too eager compared to the other’s and couldn’t wait anymore.

Pouncing forward as it tried to rip my neck into shreds.

I still didn’t move though; it was then that Lemanti started to look a little bit alarmed.

But since she trusted me she didn’t say anything which is when I acted raising my arm as soon as the Durg was close enough.

I had the Durg bite on it instead as the Durg saw no reason why not to bite.

Which was a big mistake, because as soon as it bit my arm covered by the magical blue net with all its strength.

The Durgs teeth broke and shattered into dozens of pieces and splinters.

Blood flowed out of the Durgs mouth as the bloodthirsty ferocity of the Durg immediately cooled down replaced by unimaginable amount of pain it must have been suffering from having its teeth broken like this.

Lemanti was wide eyed when she saw this. While I was pleasantly surprised as the test went extremely well.

Before the previous version of the body-strengthening cantrip while increasing the defense of my body would still not completely defend me from most attacks as I could still get injured scratched at the very least instead of getting slashed.

But now with this new version thing were different. The magical blue net pattern on my body being more than just aesthetics as it actually acted like a form of magical armor all over my body.

This was how the Tyranno was able to shatter the gigantic boulder in the first place without getting harmed too much.

It was an amazing form of protection, one I almost couldn’t believe was actually naturally made and not man made. But then again nature always took the most efficient route.

With the test pretty much over with this.

There was no point to prolong this fight anymore.

Looking at the agonizing figure of the Durg as it whimpered from the pain of having majority of its teeth broken. I decided to its suffering by grabbing its neck and breaking it in one swift squeeze.

(CRACK!)

The whimpering Durg instantly was quiet thereafter.

The 4 remaining Durgs becoming very agitated as soon as they saw one of their companions dying so easily.

They even started to recognize that we may not be opponents that they could mess with.

But it was already too late since I didn’t intend on any of these Durgs to leave.

Their Furs and meat. I definitely wanted them even if they were the best of the best.

So I picked up 4 rocks underneath me.

Seeing my action. It seemed like something broke within the mentality of these Durgs as they all started to run away into different directions.

Lemanti was intending on chasing. But she didn’t need to as I used my reinforcement cantrip on all 4 stones making them flow with a blue hue before throwing all 4 of them one for each Durg.

The 4 Durgs that were running away all immediately fell to the ground without movement as soon as I threw out the stones.

Lemanti stopped in her tracks when she saw it. Again looking very stunned by this.

And with that our hunting trip basically ended as we had gotten enough for the day.

Outworld Chapter 71

There were not many tests after this anymore.

Knowing now that Merulia could indeed soul cultivate to grow stronger our goal of finding another way for her to acquire strength faster and more efficiently was achieved.

I too gained a lot from watching Merulia’s soul, it didn’t directly give me any information that I could use to immediately make myself stronger. But knowledge regarding souls was still valuable nonetheless.

Though it was a curious thing that Merulia could grow stronger by using her ability and soul cultivation when I couldn’t do the same as me using spells over and over again didn’t make me stronger other than making me more proficient in them.

But then again. Merulia didn’t have spells and since my cantrips would grow stronger the better my spell theory and the more knowledgeable I was about magic in general it equaled out in a sense.

And I say that the tests were done, but there was still 1 thing I was curious about.

I wanted to know what Merulia’s soul does when it causes a magical phenomenon aka casts a spell.

From what I have seen so far and I repeat. I saw no runes inside of Merulia’s soul. She didn’t even seem to have any rune slots which made me even more curious how Merulia casts magic when she didn’t even have runes inside her soul.

I already knew that she was one of the rare few cases of beings who can cast magic by directly using the elemental energy and without relying on runes. But the book never explained this properly since different beings seemed to do it in different fashions.

Therefore, I wanted to see it for myself having Merulia invoke her magic while I stayed inside her soul space to observe.

I also again mentioned that staying inside someone’s soul while they weren’t meditating was a bit iffy.

Especially when they were casting magic as well.

But I didn’t think the danger was that big and it was not like I was putting my soul in danger though arguably I was putting someone’s soul in danger this namely being Merulia’s.

So I decided to ask for permission first, telling her all the dangers that could happen if something went wrong.

And it was not like Merulia was going to die if something really did go wrong, at most she would experience slight damage to her soul which could easily be healed in time and would only make Merulia feel slightly uncomfortable.

I still asked her if I could do this though since it did have a certain risk and could harm Merulia compared to what we did earlier.

Merulia after a few seconds of contemplation ended up telling me that it was okay.

She said that as long as I could see some kind of benefit for it. She was fine with it.

I was honestly a bit wide eyed when she said that. But I quickly returned back to normal trying not to think much about it.

-Are you ready?

-Yes!

Merulia said. Us communicating with one another inside her soul space as Merulia was conscious now, but could actually still talk to me when I was inside her soul space even without meditation.

It was a neat thing to discover once more, but focused back on her soul which took the form of a sapling made out of most sun elemental energy.

Outside. Merulia was holding a kifler seed. Intending on causing it to grow like many other tests we had done so far.

We agreed that Merulia would start growing the seed with her magic after a countdown which I started with…

-3.

-2.

-1.

-Now.

And as soon as I said now.

The seed inside Merulia’s hand started to grow.

And while it was growing.

I saw firsthand how Merulia’s magic worked as her soul started to shine.

I watched with bated (spiritual) breath as Merulia’s soul started to immediately concentrate sun elemental energy,

Which is where I saw something amazing as the sun elemental energy instantly started to make minor runes!

The speed of which these minor runes formed was just insanely fast and even though I only knew a few of these runes it was easy for me to decipher the entire spell just from these clues alone considering also what Merulia was currently doing which was casting a plant growth spell!

-So this is how ability users like Merulia cast spells…they don’t require to memorize runes because they automatically create these runes through their soul once they give the intent to cast a certain magic.

I reasoned, knowing for fact that Merulia had no idea about anything regarding runes meaning these runes were definitely not things Merulia actively was making through her own knowledge.

But the knowledge of these runes still has to come from somewhere which means…

-The soul, yes the power seed, this means that the power seed turned Merulia’s soul into something similar to a magic core that magical beasts use to cast magic while also keeping the etherealness of a soul. This makes sense because only magic cores innately possess the knowledge of runes. But wait…is innate knowledge required to form runes out of elemental or spiritual energy? Why do I not remember the magic book mentioning anything about a casting method like this being possible? Is this exclusive to Espers like Merulia only?

I wondered, feeling I had just stumbled upon something huge that could actually help me a ton.

But for now I let this rest and asked Merulia to do different things with her ability to see how Merulia’s soul worked.

And as expected. Merulia’s soul continued to create minor runes to fit whatever intent Merulia had.

Once a certain action or spell was not required or used anymore. The rune would immediately disappear with the sun elemental energy that created it partially returning back to the soul as If it was being recycled.

All of this was very fascinating to witness at a front row seat like this.

But after a few times I already had seen everything that was possible. Knowing that there was nothing new to see anymore I told Merulia that it was enough and exited her soul space returning back to my own consciousness.

Upon opening my eyes, I saw Merulia looking at me expectantly as if she wanted to know what kind of results I may have found by watching her do her thing.

But honestly saying, there was nothing I could tell her that would actually benefit her in a real way.

Maybe having her study the runes that her soul created would help her better at understanding her ability and maybe grow her power. But considering that Merulia was not consciously creating these herself, but her soul was, maybe that would not work.

Still though I told Merulia about it and told her to try making those runes inside her soul space to get a better feel and understanding of them as I gave her the drawings of those runes on a piece of bark.

Merulia still didn’t understand fully why. But she did as I told her to knowing that this could make her stronger.

And finally I told Merulia that she should begin to explore her ability by herself.

The reason I told her this was because we had been spending close to a week on Merulia’s new ability.

We had made lots of strides in this process and just now made an even bigger stride.

But I believed that Merulia needed her own way to grow her ability as one’s magic was only as effective as one’s own understanding of it.

Furthermore, we couldn’t just continue spending more time on this as I already had significantly healed from my injuries caused in the fight against the Tyranno.

At the very least I could walk now without much burden on myself, but running was still no go.

But that too would be possible after a few days as the minor regeneration potion had greatly cut my healing time.

For this reason, I had to now start doing things in preparation of the winter that was approaching.

Hunting for our food provisions first and foremost.

Serena and Lemanti were already doing all sorts of things in preparation while we were doing this and I could already feel that temperature were slowly getting colder and colder over the past few days.

Merulia understood this she herself would likely have not too much time working on her ability since she too would be busy making clothes from the furs and hides of animals that I would hunt so that we had winter gear.

Still though Merulia showed a complicated look on her face when I told her that she had to do these things on her own now. Not that I was completely going to be hands off as I would still help her in the future in regards to her ability if she really had some kind of problem that she had difficulties with.

But because she was making this face, I still couldn’t help but ask.

-What is it? Is there anything wrong?

Merulia shook her head at that simply smiling as she explained.

-No, it’s nothing. I just never had someone teach me so many things so personally before. In other words, I never had something like a master or a mentor even back when I was learning to become an Explorer as I always learned things on my own or by watching the instructors. Thinking that this is going to end even though we only did it for a less than a week makes me a little bit sad.

I nodded at her words somewhat understanding her, but also not at the same time as I told her.

-Well, I don’t know much about your feelings. But you don’t need to feel that way. In the future I still will help you whenever you will need it. Studying you has helped me a lot so helping you is like helping myself your magic and my magic is different so there are lots of things we can learn from each other.

Hearing this Merulia’s immediately lightened up a little bit as she seemed to have gotten an idea smiling mischievously as she asked me.

-So you mean to say…I am also like your master?

I frowned when I heard her words, it especially felt a bit irking to hear considering that Merulia had before in a sense tutored me about the world when we first met, I also already knew where this was going so I didn’t want to talk anymore as I decided to just shoo her away at this point.

Once Merulia left with a giggle I was finally felt by myself to do my own things.

Merulia’s thing with her ability was now temporarily cleared as Merulia was now mostly on her own.

My body though was again not healed enough for me to immediately start to go out hunting.

A few days needed to past before that would be possible meaning I had to occupy that time with something else like resuming work with Serena to make the magic air conditioner.

And while this was an important project that needed to be completed.

I honestly, didn’t feel like doing this right now as my mind was actually focusing on something else entirely.

This being an item I decided to pull out which was the red magic core of the Tyrannosaurus Rex.

Having kept it all this while. I had not a single chance to study it ever since I had gotten it 6 days ago.

And even though studying it now may be a bad time when I should be resuming the magic air conditioner project with Serena.

I knew that researching with Serena on that project for only a few days would not yield any significant progress or completion.

And since I would have to go hunting immediately as soon as I was completely healed.

I didn’t only want to study the magic core for personal interest, but also because I recognized that by studying the magic core I could very likely gain a good amount of power in just a few days which would help me in my hunts as I could hunt more and bigger creatures.

-Most importantly though…could this magic core finally reveal to me the power a true Arcanist possesses?

Recalling back to how the Tyranno was able to explode with a kind of might far beyond that of an apprentice. I wondered if this could finally be my chance to touch upon the powers of a true Arcanist.

Outworld Chapter 70

Beside the fact that Merulia’s soul was almost fully made out of her sun elemental energy.

Another unique point of Merulia’s soul was the fact that it was much smaller compared to my own soul.

Something I told Merulia as I was making my observations.

This seemed to tick her off for some reason as even though I couldn’t see her expression.

Inside her soul space I could somehow easily feel her emotion state as she started feeling like I was shaming or criticizing her for her small soul.

-What’s wrong with that! Excuse me for not meeting your standards!

-Why are you getting mad? I am just making an observation here and nothing more.

-You! How would you feel if I sad you are small huh!

-Okay, I get your point.

I ended up somehow soothing the ticked off Merulia for a few minutes before returning to my observation. I kept a mental note in mind to not say anything sensitive or at least keep these things to myself.

This helped for the most part as I continued doing the observation seeing other things that I found curious beside the elemental energy and size.

Those being structure and form itself as structurally Merulia’s soul didn’t look gaseous like mine did initially and actually looked more solid than anything else which was extremely surprising as that would imply Merulia was already at the Solid stage when I was still at the Liquid stage.

Of course she wasn’t a Arcanist meaning I couldn’t put her on the same measurement as a Arcanist, but the fact that her soul was indeed solid that she should in theory be stronger than me.

Theory though at the end was still just theory. In reality, Merulia wouldn’t even be able to take a single punch from my magically enhanced fist. Even if she used her Fire Plant Manipulation ability at most she would be able to slow me down a little before inevitably getting punched.

But that was solely because Merulia had not a proper grasp of her ability yet. As it currently stood she could only make things grow from a distance which was improving as she trained, we also recently discovered that she could also control movements of whatever she made grow, but that was not surprising considering that whatever the Forest Guardian could do Merulia should also be able to do.

But even when she could control the plants that she grew they weren’t very threatening. If she had a bit of time she could tie up someone as long as they weren’t moving and maybe even choke them to death.

Other than that she couldn’t do much though Merulia tried other methods I suggested like turning the plants she grew into whips.

This decently succeeded but the damage it dealt was so lackluster that it may as well have been nothing.

It would certainly hurt a child like me if I didn’t use magic and some smaller creatures like squirrels and such. Though it basically does nothing if I used magic to protect myself or when it came to larger beasts like the Durgs.

In general, the reason attacks like these didn’t work that well was again mainly because Merulia was not very skilled in this ability yet or grown enough to do more advanced things with it.

We would need to wait and have Merulia train more until we would be able to get to that point. Which was also why I was viewing Merulia’s soul as understanding more about it could maybe allow use to figure out more efficient methods of training just like how me teaching Merulia meditation exceptionally sped up her training.

Over all I didn’t have a clue as to why or how Merulia immediately started at the solid stage upon getting her ability, but even when she was at the solid stage, because of the small size of her soul it made sense that she wasn’t very strong even though she was at the Solid Stage.

Growing the size of her soul maybe was what necessary to have Merulia get a truly substantial increase in her strength.

But moving on for a moment.

Form was next as this was actually the thing that caught my attention the most when I looked at Merulia’s soul at first.

I only mentioned the other things first because I thought the most eye catching thing must be mentioned last.

But even Merulia seemed to understand that the form of her soul was a strange as like stories about souls depicted a person’s soul in similar manner to give a contrast to what Merulia’s soul looked like.

-Hey William. Don’t you think my soul looks a bit strange? Are souls supposed to look like this? It almost looks like a…

-Sapling. Yes, it looks like a sapling, and no I don’t think souls are supposed to look like that. Though admittedly I have never seen another soul other than mine and yours. Though by studying magic I do know that all souls mostly look the same which is a round sphere.

-What really?! But then why is my soul a sapling!

-I don’t know. But it definitely has to do with the power seed you used that gave you your Fire Plant Manipulation ability. The power seed itself had soul like properties. Maybe before you used the power seed your soul was normal like any other soul. But when you used it the power seed likely fused with your soul and caused the form of your soul to change.

-Hahhh…William I really don’t understand this…can you just tell me if this is bad or not?

-I don’t think it’s bad, maybe for you to get your ability your soul needed to change. Either way, I am not really interested in that. What I am wondering here right now is what your soul currently means, why is it a sapling? Will it later grow into a full-fledged plant?

-Oh! Maybe a tree!

-Yes. Maybe.

We discussed this a little bit flying around Merulia’s odd sapling like soul that was almost purely made out of sun elemental energy.

There was not much to be observed after this as I essentially made all of the notable observations that I could recognize.

Which meant this project was ready to go to the next stage, a stage that I only now thought about when it was discovered that Merulia could indeed enter her own soul space.

-Merulia can you attempt to interact with your soul? To be precise, can you try to soul cultivate?

-Soul cultivate?

And so I started explaining to Merulia the basics of soul cultivation that I didn’t mention when I told her about meditation since I at the time didn’t even know if she could meditate or not and later discovered that even though she could meditate she couldn’t enter her own soul space which I now discovered was only because she couldn’t find it and nothing else.

Merulia just like before found it hard to understand what I was trying to teach her because she didn’t feel the things I was describing the same way I did because of her lack of talent.

But she was a good student and listened to me until the end before she started asking questions to clarify certain things.

When these things were clarified and Merulia basically understood the main principle of soul cultivation.

She started the first interaction with her soul doing precisely what I taught her about soul cultivation.

I still feared that something bad might happen since this was clearly not a normal soul. So I told Merulia to immediately stop whatever she was doing if she even felt the slightest sensation of something odd happening.

But Merulia continued on and I watched as Merulia’s sapling like soul started to absorb power from its surroundings.

I immediately made a guts pose in my mind upon seeing this as this was exactly the phenomena I was looking for when it came to soul cultivating since it meant that Merulia’s soul was indeed slowly but surely becoming stronger.

How this would affect her though I had no idea.

But I waited patiently for Merulia to tell me how she felt about this herself as she continued to soul cultivate.

After 10 minutes she was done as she stopped soul cultivate and the moment she did, Merulia’s emotional state again resounded within this space as I could feel her feeling as if she gained an higher understand of something.

But she didn’t seem to be sure of what that was as she immediately asked me about it soon after.

-William…I feel like…my mind became a little bit clearer…it doesn’t feel bad, but I also don’t understand what this is…

-Don’t worry about it. This is normal, I assure you this is nothing bad, just try to calm down and digest this feeling everything is okay.

I assured Merulia, to which she significantly started to calm down more as she did as I said and ruminated on what she just experienced.

It was indeed normal to feel like this when cultivating your soul. In a sense it felt like your vision or view of the world suddenly expands and while this is a good thing for most people. It can also be a bit overwhelming for individuals who aren’t ready for it.

Merulia likely had be by her side who could tell her these things and guide her a little bit.

And after another few minutes Merulia came back to normal.

Her personality underwent no change as soul cultivation wouldn’t just suddenly change your view of the world even though it expanded it.

But still something did change as Merulia seemed to feel a lot more serene and more comprehensive of the world around her.

This change made me momentarily think that it may actually not be a good thing after all that I had her soul cultivate.

But who was I really to judge?