Mystical Journey

Returning to the Mother Stream again after several hundred years, Garen felt that familiar corrosive power, that assimilative power. This power was unbelievably immense, and even as he was now, it was the most he could do to protect himself, as he flowed with the current.

He turned back to look at the hole leading to the Mech Universe, the gap had shrunk until it was only as large as a fist now, and it was still shrinking.

Around him was a limitless expanse of green. He could see nothing, and hear nothing,

Only the endless rush of the stream water continued to reverberate beside his soul's ears.

Garen looked up and saw that the surface of the stream was nearby. Through the surface of the Mother Stream, he could see the colorful Spatial Barrier outside.

Roar…!

There was another fearsome roar.

To his shock, Garen saw many cracks instantly appear in the Spatial Barrier, and then an outside power seemed to punch a hole through it by force. A long, seemingly endless arm stretched out from it.

That was a golden-bronze arm, shining with a metallic glow as it extended toward him infinitely.

Bam!!

The water splashed and rose into high waves as the arm crashed into it. That arm actually reached straight for Garen. As though it could stretch forever, it descended over him with a terrifying power.

"It's a Void Creature!!" Garen knew he was in trouble, and hurriedly activated his Soul Ring, unleashing his pure Soul Energy to surround his soul, and diving rapidly into the Mother Stream.

With a whoosh, he just managed to avoid being captured by the enormous hand. It just brushed past him at the side.

But even this tiny contact caused the Soul Energy on his arm to instantly disintegrate, turning into several dozen transparent maggots that stuck onto the outer wall of Garen's Soul Energy, devouring it in large gulps.

A sense of dizziness overwhelmed Garen, and he instinctively knew that this was because he had used up too much Soul Energy. Something that could destroy the Barriers of the Mother Stream was not something he could afford to fight now.

"I need to leave right now!" He made the decision, and cut off the part of his soul that was being eaten, tossing it into the distance.

And then he swam down the Mother Stream like a fish.

Thankfully, his Soul Ring could now generate infinite Soul Energy, unlike before when he could only use the limited power stored inside his Soul Seed. If the Mother Stream finished devouring that power, he could only surrender to imminent death. Now, things were different, Garen was perfectly capable of producing new Soul Energy infinitely, so that he could last even longer and swim even further in this Mother Stream.

Boom!!

The stream water shook wildly, as the Mother Stream's powerful life force surged madly into the arm that had intruded into it.

Garen turned around, and saw that the golden-bronze arm was being rapidly corroded by that countless green current, revealing the black material underneath as large dollops of bright red blood also dripped out, merging into the Mother Stream. A large part of the green river water around it turned dark red.

Roar…!!

That unidentified creature roared out in pain, and had no choice but to pull its arm back, the palm quickly leaving the Mother Stream while all covered in blood as it retreated back into the hole in the Spatial Barrier.

The hole was also rapidly regenerating, and soon it was just as new. The waves slowly calmed down.

Inside the water, Garen heaved a huge sigh of relief. He had not felt this sensation for several hundred years, of instantly falling from the pinnacle of a world to the very bottom, turning from the hunter to the hunted. Just a moment ago, he was one of the 26 people at the very peak of the Mech World, and now he was running for his life, humiliated and ashamed.

"It's true, space is large enough to hold all sorts of wonders…" Garen sighed inwardly, and calculated his losses. The Energy Machine Imprint quickly showed its usefulness, because the Imprint was constructed around Willpower, and Willpower was a small branch of Soul Energy, he managed to retain it, and activate it using his soul. But right now, as he left the Mech World, the Energy Machine Imprint also began to operate slower.

After all, the computing laws behind its operation were mostly designed according to the laws of the Mech Universe. Once these laws changed, its auto-recovery powers should already be praised for keeping it running until now, when in fact it should have been immediately immobilized.

To put this into perspective, it was as though the speed of light was three hundred thousand meters per second in the laws of this universe, but they were nine hundred thousand meters per second in that universe. Or if one plus one equals two in this universe, but equals three in that one.

Of course, the latter was not that big a change, but it was enough to show you where the problem lay.

The reason Garen's soul could be used throughout the many universes was because its roots lay in the most basic laws, tossing aside all the other non-uniform aspects. All that remained was the general law that could be used in any universe.

This was the true power of the Warlocks. What they controlled was the general law of power that could be used across many universes.

In the Mother Stream, time was meaningless, and everything was mobile. Garen followed the bend of the stream slowly, going against the current as he swam back up the direction he came. Back then, he had been swept to the poorest branch of the Mother Stream, the Mech Universe, so now that he wanted to leave, he needed to go against the current.

After transmigrating into so many worlds, he had gone from his initial curious excitement to his current state of numb acceptance.

As for his goal, Garen had long forgotten what his original goal had been back then. Why did he choose to dive into the Mother Stream? Why did he continue to transmigrate like this? He could no longer remember the meaning and motive behind all this.

The deluge of new memories had washed away almost every trace of his initial determination from way back when.

As Garen swam upstream, he considered it slowly.

Was it for the war between Ancient Endor and the Void Creatures? Or was it simply so he could experience new lives in different worlds? Or was it so he could find the original motive for transmigrating?

Perhaps he was even looking for a way back.

As he swam, Garen's thoughts flew at high speeds. The turning of the Energy Machine Imprint gradually slowed, most of the functions lagging and stopping due to the lack of laws, until only a few of the most basic computing functions remained. The computing power was less than a ten-thousandth of what it used to be, but even then, it was stronger than the strongest super-calculator back on Earth.

Occasionally, Garen would encounter Void Creatures like the one that had tried to fish him out in the Mother Stream, but he managed to evade each of them safely.

But as Garen continued to ponder, he grew more and more lost, more and more confused. The more he searched, the harder it was for him to justify his continued existence, everything was just a repetitive cycle that would not end.

Other than to pursue even greater strength, he could not find any better reason for living.

"What is it that I want?" he asked himself.

By the time he asked this question, according to estimates, three years had already passed since he entered the Mother Stream.

He did not know where he had drifted to. There was never anything other than the endless green water around him, there were no living creatures, and only the occasional piece of flotsam floated past him. Even these items would not last much longer, dissolving rapidly in the stream water.

Throughout his entire journey, the only living things he could encounter were the occasional Void Anglers. Every one of these creatures was enormous, and each one had at least several dozen Soul Seeds. These were not the lowest grade Soul Seeds, either. Soul Seeds could be divided into the stages, namely Multicolor (TN: lit. messy colors), Colorless, and Unicolor (TN: lit. uniform color). Garen himself was at the lowest level, Multicolor, and his Soul Seed had formed only the most simple Soul Ring, so he was at the lowest end of the Demon Lord Level spectrum. If he wanted to advance further, he would need at least five Soul Seeds, forming a large Soul Ring. Then he needed to remove all the other colors, before he could advance to the Colorless Level.

And the Void Anglers that appeared outside the Mother Stream were all at least at the Colorless Level, they would not even show their faces if they did not have at least ten Soul Seeds. And the weaker ones, according to Garen's guesses, probably had fewer Soul Seeds than that, so they were smart enough to stay hidden and not look for trouble. The Barriers of the Mother Stream were also stronger in some places and weaker in some, so the weaker creatures would not gain any benefits from coming here, other than getting hurt for no reason.

These creatures were not enveloped in the power of the Mother Stream, so their movements were slower. As a result, he played them like a top, and every one of them ended up becoming Garen's only source of replenishment.

But in the end, his Soul Energy was still not infinite.

Five more years passed, and Garen felt his Soul Energy begin to weaken. The production rate of the Soul Ring was losing out to the rate of consumption, and he immediately knew that he could not continue drifting aimlessly like this.

He had a Soul Ring, and a position as a Void Pursuer. If he stayed in one place for too long, he would be the prime example of bait, luring Soul-Ring-Level Void Creatures to his doorstep.

In order to solve this threat, Garen designed a virtual model, and counted the longest duration he could stay in one world. He could not linger for longer than two hundred years, or else he would attract the Soul-Ring-Level Void Creatures nearby.

"The Void Creatures and the Ancient Endor civilization, they must have a place where the battle is mostly centered at! I can't be the only inheritor around. If I can find another inheritor, then I can truly join a group, and then we can resist the Void Creatures together."

With such an idea in mind, Garen started paying attention to the countless universes flowing outside the Mother Stream's Barriers, trying to find a universe with the same scent of a Soul Seed.

Such universes were very easy to find, because not every universe could have Soul Energy Aura. Garen was a Void Pursuer, and he remembered how useful his super-sensitive sense of smell could be now. Put together with the Energy Machine Imprint, he could differentiate the wisps of Soul Energy Aura out of the tiniest hints of each universe's aura.

Even though he knew the chances of such a search being successful were slim, Garen had finally found a new aim, so he was no longer as lost and listless as he had been.

Time passed slowly… The Soul Energy produced by Garen's Soul Ring diminished further, and the parts of his own body that he could protect reduced further and further, as the power grew thinner.

After goodness knew how long, the chance he was waiting for finally manifested itself.

*****************

Poof!

A giant black octopus tentacle stabbed hard into the Mother Stream's currents, pouncing at Garen. The tentacle was covered with countless little suction cups, and brought with it a powerful suction force that surged toward Garen.

"You're asking for it!" Garen laughed coldly, watching the tentacle unleash its suction force in the Mother Stream. "Unleashing a suction force in this thick Mother Stream water? You have a death wish."

He taunted unabashedly. After staying alone for so long, he had developed a habit of talking to himself, otherwise, he might even forget how to talk.

As though proving Garen's jeers right, that black tentacle did not manage to catch him, but instead it instantly absorbed a huge amount of Mother Stream water, until the entire tentacle expanded, growing larger and thicker as it went.