The Beginning After The End novel Chapter 277

Chapter 277

Chapter 277: One Step Forward

As my vision was flooded in a sea of purple, I could feel my aether core slowly draining. As my senses entered the stone cube, I attempted to look deeper inside. It felt like the further in I ‘traveled’, the more difficult it became. As I wafted through this space, the mud-like viscosity soon thickened and hardened until eventually it felt like I was pushing against a brick wall.

Even while I was disconnected from my body, I could feel my breath coming up short and ragged, as if I was breathing through a wet cloth. Straining to push through this wall stopping me from venturing forth, I pumped more aether out of my core until finally I was able to shift through the wall.

To describe the experience of my mind touching the surface of the cuboid relic into words would be undermining the sheer complexity of it all.

Geometric shapes in seemingly random patterns and movements floated around me. I couldn’t see an end to how far these polyhedrons went but for some reason, I knew that there was a boundary within this chaos.

As more aether flowed out from my core and into this realm within the relic, the polyhedrons began to change. I was no longer just observing but actually affecting these geometric shapes as if my aether was resonating with these things.

I found myself lost in a trance as I tried to make heads or tails out of the patterns, movements, shapes, and sizes of all of these polyhedrons that made up this realm within the relic. Using the aether within me as the metaphorical limbs, I combined, sorted, and categorized these polyhedrons in an effort to understand what this convoluted guidebook was trying to tell me.

Finally, when my aether reserves fell to around a tenth of its capacity, I was pulled out of the realm. As my consciousness returned, I found myself seated in the same position I had been on the couch. The only thing that had changed was that the room—once brightly lit by the afternoon sun—was now almost completely dark.

“You’re finally done?” Regis asked, lifting his head while curled up beside me.

I stared at the crescent sun. “How long have I been out?”

“About five or six hours. I lost count after falling asleep.”

“You need sleep?” I asked.

Regis let out a wide yawn before answering. “It’s like a battery-saver mode. I consume less aether when I’m asleep so I can accumulate more ambient aether.”

“What a peculiar dog you are.”

“Shove it,” he groused before hopping off the couch. “So did you learn anything from the cube?”

“I don’t even know what I’m supposed to be learning.” I let out a sigh. “And the worst part is that I use up aether trying to study this piece of rock.”

“Damn, and I thought learning this reality-bending ability was going to be easy,” Regis said sarcastically as he walked away.

I kicked him below the tail, getting a sharp yelp out of my companion.

“Never thought I’d miss the days when I was incorporeal,” he grumbled before turning to me. “So what’s the plan now?”

I paused, thinking for a moment. “We have a few days to kill anyway so we might as well learn a bit more about the locals. The bestowment event is something I’d want to check out along with the schools tomorrow.”

Regis looked at me silently with a slightly stunned expression.

I frowned. “What is it?”

“Nothing. It’s just that, I thought you’d be scratching off your skin trying to find some way to get to the next Relictombs or something,” he muttered.

“I have been pretty on-edge lately, haven’t I?” I scratched my cheek.

Regis shrugged, his mane of purple fire fluttering. “It’s understandable. I don’t have a family aside from you but I’d be pretty nervous if I didn’t know what was going on with the ones I cared about.”

I stood silent, taken aback by Regis’ nonchalant mention of me as his family. It never occurred to me that he didn’t have anyone else except me. Even in this canine form of his, did I still see Regis as a weapon?

Regis narrowed his eyes. “What. Why are you staring at me like that?”

“I-It’s nothing.” I got up from my seat and headed toward the door.

“Where are we going?” he asked, trotting along behind me.

“Didn’t you hear what Loreni said earlier? There are a ton of mana beasts just outside of town.” I shot my companion a smirk. “I haven’t had the chance to really practice the limits of God Step.”

“We get to stretch our legs a bit and earn some money.” Regis mirrored my smirk. “Sounds good.”

***

I breathed in the crisp night air, our feet crunching against the foliage as the two of us rushed through the woods. We wanted to get further away from the town in case someone spotted us using aether, but that didn’t mean we didn’t kill a few rocavids on the way. These massive deer-like mana beasts had antlers not only on their heads, but down their spine and thick tails that they used as deadly clubs.

Deadly for normal mages, anyway. The mana beast couldn’t even react as I sunk my dagger between their eyes, since their hides were what was what we would need to sell.

Regis had a harder time keeping his kills clean, but between the two of us, it took less than an hour to hunt down half a dozen of the rocavids roaming around the dead of night. The only reason we stopped was because we ran out of space in the extradimensional rune.

“I thought the talking crystal said you can’t put organic things into the rune on your arm,” Regis commented as we neared a small clearing that led to the base of the hill.

“It seems like I can only put it in once they’re dead,” I answered, my eyes spotting a large boulder in the center of the clearing.

Stopping in front of the boulder that stood at least a foot over me, the words, ‘Danger. High-level mana beasts ahead’ were carved with ominous splashes of dried blood on its surface.

We crossed over to the other side of the clearing, where the ground began to gradually slope up as we trekked up the hill. While my vision had been enhanced by my new physique, being unable to sense mana now made finding mana beasts a much more challenging task.

While I was able to augment my senses using this new source of magic, I’d been unable to find a way to utilize aether to sense non-aetheric beings and objects.

However, not having any sort of mana signature coming from me or Regis meant that the stronger and more predatory wildlife here saw us as an easy meal.

The first mana beast that came after us was one I hadn’t seen before in Dicathen. It reminded me of my sister’s bond, Boo, if he had four arms and a crocodile-like jaw with three rows of serrated teeth.

“Keep watch in case of any passerbys,” I ordered Regis while I faced the beast.

With a gruesome snarl, the bear got down on all six of its limbs and charged at me with surprising speed. Putting away my dagger, I faced it head on.

While my aether reserves hadn’t been fully restored, tonight’s goal was merely to test out my new godrune. I didn’t know what tier this mana beast would be classified under but it would serve as a good guinea pig.

Aether surged out of my core, clinging to my skin. As the familiar warmth of the rune spread from my lower back, I focused on the location I would try to land.

The experience of initiating the aether art this time felt completely different from when I had first used it. My perception of the world around me changed, as if everything had been stretched in all directions. Particles of ambient aether now conjoined and looked like intertwining streams of purple coursing in the air, creating fluid pathways that interconnected and branched off.