"First off, you’re aware of how much you’ve grown in here, right?" Aesmirius began, voice smooth and unbothered, as though he were discussing sothing as trivial as the weather. "Your mystic level, your control, the overall growth—you’ve felt it."
"Yeah, I’m aware," Liam replied evenly. "What about it?"
"You won’t have any of it once you return to reality," Aesmirius said bluntly, without even a pause to soften the blow.
Liam froze. For a heartbeat, he didn’t blink, didn’t breathe. Then his voice dropped, calm but edged with sothing sharp. "What the hell do you an by that?"
Aesmirius stared at him, released a slow sigh—not one of sympathy, but the exhausted sigh of soone preparing to explain sothing he had no patience for. "Exactly what I said. All the strength you obtained here, all the growth—none of it will carry over when you step back into the real world. The principle behind it is simple. You already know you’ve been in here for three years, give or take. And in those three years, you managed to reach your current level—an eighteen-year-old with a Mid-Tier Six-star core."
Liam said nothing, holding his silence like a blade while he listened.
"But your physical body outside isn’t syncing with what you’ve achieved here," Aesmirius continued. "The flow of ti in my domain and the flow of ti in your world are nowhere near the sa. Which ans your real body has not had three years to develop. And I assu you understand what that implies?"
Liam frowned, the realization sinking in fully before he answered. "...Yeah. I get it."
Three years in Aesmirius’s domain. But in the outside world? Not even close. They still didn’t know the exact number, but Liam already felt the shape of the truth—it had barely been a year. aning his real, physical body had only experienced a year of growth or less. aning that outside, Liam was still sixteen years old, still a High-Tier Five-star core. Everything he had achieved here existed only within this realm.
He dragged a hand across his face and rubbed at his temples, trying to massage out the irritation coiling inside him. "You know... you could’ve told this from the beginning," he said, leveling Aesmirius with a detached, judgntal glare.
"Yeah, I suppose I could have," Aesmirius answered, completely unfazed. "But I didn’t. And I’m telling you now. So quit sulking."
Liam stared at him for several seconds longer, breathing slowly, steadying himself. Eventually he let out a long exhale and dropped his hand. "Fine. I won’t hold it against you. But tell this—do I at least keep my knowledge? Everything I’ve learned in these three years?"
Aesmirius’s golden eyes narrowed with a flicker of disbelief. "Of course you do. For soone born from your mother’s womb, that’s a question even you shouldn’t be asking." His tone cooled to its usual flatness. "Experience, knowledge, maturity—all of that stays with you. Those are ntal gains, not physical growth."
The tension in Liam’s chest loosened. Relief washed over him, subtle but real. "Don’t bring my mother into it. And honestly, it’s not a stupid question. I never know what’s going on in this realm. Like just now—you conveniently hid the little detail that all my physical developnt would vanish. So, yeah, I wanted to make sure I’m not walking out of here ntally empty too."
Aesmirius’s eye twitched, irritation sparking visibly. "If not for certain reasons, I’d crush you where you stand, you damn brat," he muttered with a faint smirk tugging at one corner of his mouth.
Liam ignored the threat and straightened slightly. "Now that you’ve said your piece... what is it exactly you want to do once I return to reality?"
Hearing the question, Aesmirius’s thoughts shifted sharply toward the next matter he had been intending to reveal. His expression dulled into sothing close to impatience before he spoke. "Yes, about that. There’s sothing I need you to do. You’re going to a realm called Jhuntar. You’ll retrieve a weapon of mine that’s kept there."
"It’s ant for or for you?" Liam asked, blunt and direct.
"For you, obviously," Aesmirius replied, sounding almost insulted by the idea. "What would I do with a weapon in this state? I’m stuck inside the consciousness of a child. I can barely move, let alone swing sothing around."
"Fair point," Liam said. "But why would I need that weapon? I already have the ones I rely on, and I can always get more crafted."
Aesmirius answered with a faint, knowing smirk. He flicked his fingers, and just a few feet from Liam’s face, the air shimred. Threads of ethereal radiance spiraled together, forming a golden-hilted sword whose blade glowed with a serene, divine white light. It hovered there, humming faintly.
Liam studied it for a long mont before a faint frown tugged at his brow. "Before you explain whatever that is... why am I looking at a sword? Aren’t you supposed to use sothing like a spear? A kind of javelin weapon?"
"What?" Aesmirius blinked.
"You interfered with my life and sohow pushed into unconsciously shaping my shadow magic and flas into hybrid javelins," Liam said evenly. "So I assud you wielded sothing similar."
A flicker of distant rembrance crossed Aesmirius’s face. "Ah. That. That wasn’t intentional. It just... sort of happened."
Liam gave him a slow, confused look. "So you don’t have anything to do with javelins?"
"I do," Aesmirius answered calmly. "I’ve used all kinds of weapons. There’s no particular limit."
"I see," Liam said. "Then why send after a sword? You must have other weapons stored elsewhere."
Aesmirius’s lips curled slightly. "I don’t. That sword is the only ’storage’ I’ve left anywhere. All my arsenal—the entirety of it—is in that one weapon."
Liam didn’t get the chance to respond. The sword floating in front of him pulsed, then began to shift. Its form liquefied into radiant strands, reshaping again and again. A longsword elongated into a spear, which then split into twin daggers. Those lted into an axe, then a curved blade, then unfamiliar constructs Liam had never even imagined. The transformations were fluid, ceaseless, and endless.
His eyes widened despite himself. He had never witnessed anything remotely close to that. A weapon that could be anything—everything. If he possessed it, weapon scarcity would cease to exist for him entirely.
"You said the na of the realm was Jhuntar, right?" he asked quietly, gaze never leaving the morphing weapon.
Aesmirius chuckled under his breath. "Correct. And you’re retrieving it not only because it gives you an entire arsenal, but because it contains a piece of Aetherion... and my blood. When you synchronize with it, the Aether shard becos an extension of your being."
"Aether shard?" Liam echoed.
"Yes," Aesmirius said with a slight incline of his head. "That’s the weapon’s true na."
Liam held back a sigh. The last thing he wanted was to deal with another entity—or weapon—labeled "Aether." He swallowed the question he wanted to ask and turned instead back to the ever-shifting blade.
"So," he said. "How do I get to Jhuntar?"
"I’ll encode the coordinates directly into your mind," Aesmirius said. "And when the ti cos, you’ll hand them to Mystica. She’ll open the path for you."
"When the ti cos?" Liam repeated slowly. "What exactly does that an?"
"Jhuntar is not a realm you stroll into," Aesmirius said bluntly. "It’s violently hostile. And you, unfortunately, are only a High-Tier Five-star. Entering now would be suicide."
Liam studied him for a mont, then nodded once. "So I need to get stronger first. A specific threshold."
"Yes," Aesmirius confird. "With all the experience and knowledge you’ve accumulated, you can use them to step into the level you currently stand at within this mindspace—Mid-Tier Six-star. Once you reach that in the real world, then Jhuntar becos survivable."
"So you want to spend another three years climbing to that level before I can even lay hands on the Aether shard?" Liam asked, tone even and controlled.
Aesmirius rolled his eyes. "Three years? Are you really planning to waste three years reaching Mid-Tier Six-star? With everything you’ve gained? With your advancent? Don’t insult . Are you intentionally trying to annoy ?"
"Nope, it wouldn’t be worth the ti," Liam said, his voice steady as he kept his gaze fixed ahead, refusing to spare even a glance in Aesmirius’s direction.
A faint twitch pulled at the corner of Aesmirius’s eye, irritation flickering for a heartbeat before he smothered it beneath his usual indifference. The silence that settled between them stretched long enough to feel weighted, until Liam finally cut through it with a question that carried more curiosity than annoyance.
"What exactly is in Jhuntar that makes it hostile?" he asked, tilting his head slightly. "Is the realm itself hostile, or are there things in it that make it that way?"
"The latter," Aesmirius replied in a flat tone. "The realm itself is primarily a place tied to raw nature. However, it’s the creatures roaming it that shape its danger. So are harmless enough, but others are extrely deadly. Their strength is comparable to that of an adult Nyxarion."
That final remark was enough for Liam to form a clear picture of the realm’s threat level. Anything on par with an adult Nyxarion wasn’t just dangerous—it was lethal.
"I see," Liam murmured. "Then I’ll probably run into a few along the way and hope I don’t cross paths with the ones capable of ending ."
Aesmirius watched him with a strangely asured look, his expression shifting as if he were searching for the right way to phrase sothing—or perhaps deciding whether to say it at all.
"What?" Liam asked, noticing the stare.
"There is one creature I’ll need you to kill in order for you to have a high chance of retrieving the Aether Shard," Aesmirius said, his tone level, almost emotionless.
Liam arched a brow, his mind stumbling over that statent before settling into wary confusion.
"Please," he said, voice calm but no longer casual, "explain yourself."
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