Whoosh!
After feeling like he'd been whizzing through the air inside the cocoon for minutes on end, Valyr eventually felt the cocoon make contact with hard ground.
Thud.
At the very mont the cocoon made contact, the young man let out an exhale to compose himself, watching the cocoon gradually disappear before his very eyes as they turned into motes of Shadow Energy.
Within seconds, what was once a vessel that allowed him to safely return to where he
intended disappeared as if it wasn't even there in the first place, finally allowing Valyr to view the Shadow Plane he was familiar with once more.
After confirming that he and Noel had appeared yet again in one of the many forests the Shadow Plane had, Valyr shifted his attention towards the old man before him, his expression frozen at the instant where he'd just passed the rift.
"Well, I definitely wasn't expecting this." Waving his hands in front of Noel to see if the man would react, Valyr eventually gave up on his attempts once a couple of minutes had passed, his actions eliciting no response from the man whatsoever.
Confident that Noel would return to the way was as long as a bit more ti passed, Valyr decided to go over the rewards he'd gotten from the Serpent Maiden, specifically the one that was more vague than the others.
'With how tangible the first three are, I already understand that she gave those rewards to both solidify and further the path I'm currently taking,' thought the young man to himself, recalling the titles and the subclass he received.
'As for the last one, I only began to understand what it was after she clarified it for ,' Valyr continued going through his thoughts. 'What was once suspicion and speculation turned into confirmation because of that.'
If the first three rewards had sothing to do with either Azure Energy, the Four Azure Paths, or the Shadow Plane, then the final reward would be considered a reward that was sorely out of place.
Why?
Because the final reward the Serpent Maiden gave him was an opportunity to improve his current species.
Thanks to Vaughn giving him information on his body's true identity, Valyr had gone from being a Human at 3rd Unsealing to a Pseudo-High Human, the level of unshackling still remaining after the transformation.
With that in mind, what the Serpent Maiden specifically did was refine Valyr's existence even further, moving him closer and closer to what was considered the next tier of species.
A High Human.
However, from what he observed and felt that ti, the reward the Serpent Maiden gave him only put him just a bit shy of ascending to the next tier, which undoubtedly brought Valyr a lot of annoyance that he did not dare voice out.
"Then again, it's not like I have no way to ascend to that next tier myself," thought Valyr out loud, thinking about the Records of Unfettering and Transcending Races he'd gotten from Vaughn.
Having already gone through the Truth Weaver Scripture in great detail, Valyr had high hopes that the Records would have similarly spectacular effects in terms of ascending his species.
'At the sa ti, thinking about the Records reminds of the information Sellifer gave on atavism,' thought the young man not long after, recalling that the thod Sellifer gave him was suitable to humans.
'Would it be possible to combine the two together and ascend to an even higher tier?' asked the young man to himself as he pondered over it for a bit more.
Unfortunately, before the young man could delve deeper into his train of thought...
"Alright. Shall we talk a look at the progress... hmm?"
Being returned to the right passage of ti, Noel was just about to ask Valyr whether or not the latter had put in effort into improving his Shadow Energy reserves, only to notice that sothing about the young man had changed after passing through the rift.
Narrowing his eyes in slight suspicion, the old man rubbed his chin for a bit before asking, "Did you actually work on improving your Shadow Energy reserves while you were away?"
Not wanting to reveal that the old man had been frozen all this ti, Valyr gave an awkward smile in response before slightly nodding. "Well, it's not a lot of progress since I had to focus on the inheritance."
"I was only able to improve my shadow Energy reserves by 10 points..." said the young man, murmuring his words near the end.
Though Valyr spoke in a murmur in a bid to sowhat confuse the old man, Noel seed as if he'd heard the young man correctly, nodding in satisfaction as a response. "10 points may not be a lot... but it's still better than not improving it at all."
"Anyways, if we consider the remaining ti we have left before sunset strikes in Veldanyr, we could stay in the Shadow Plane for around two more days before having to leave."
"Let's make most of that ti to improve your Shadow Energy even further, shall we?" At those words, Valyr nodded in response, prompting the two to start moving through the forests in search for beasts that the young man could kill.
"Considering the difficulty in killing one in proportion to the amount of Shadow Energy you'd gain from it, I suppose we should start looking for adult Shadow Serpents," said Noel whilst the two were on the move.
"After all, you were able to kill a juvenile Shadow Serpent on your own while you were still at the peak of Rank 2. I'm sure you'd be able to handle them just fine."
"Could we hunt other beasts instead, Elder Noel?" Though Valyr definitely agreed with Noel's words, the mory Sellifer shared with him was still fresh in his mind after recalling it while with the Serpent Maiden, causing him to look at Shadow Serpents differently.
"What? Are you scared or sothing, brat?" Of course, Noel did not know this, instead looking at the young man as if he were a coward. "You? Soone now at the peak of Rank 3? Soone who's gone through the Four Pillars' Inheritance, is scared of Shadow Serpents?" "That's not it." Valyr shook his head as the gears in his mind turned as fast as they could. "I was just wondering if we could hunt beasts that give more Shadow Energy than the Shadow Serpent instead."
"Is that so?" Noel raised his eyebrow at that answer, slightly dubious of the young man's claim. "And what beast would you like to hunt instead?"
Pondering over the amount of damage he could deal at his current level, the young man eventually recalled a brief encounter he and Noel had with a beast back when he entered the
Shadow Plane in the first ti.
Feeling as if he now had a shot at killing that specific beast, Valyr decided to voice his thoughts out, prompting Noel to beco silent.
"If it were possible..."
"I would like to hunt Shadow Rabbits."
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