Free Web NovelChapter 64: The Eternal Garden. Part-5.
Zephyr pretended to search around while maintaining a look of vigilance on his face and muttered to himself.
"Whoever moved me from my original spot likely had the chance to attack me, but they didn’t, which means that they have no enmity towards me for now at the very least..."
"But I can’t be sure... I need to find the other party before I can make a proper assumption, and for that I would need to know who moved me and where they went afterwards..."
While muttering to himself, Zephyr used his wind affinity to make the torch float around him so that he wouldn’t need to keep holding it with his hands.
This way, both his arms would remain free, and in case of a sudden ambush, he could use both his arms to counterattack.
For a martial artist like him, his body was his greatest weapon, and keeping it free from shackles and combat-ready at all times was his primary duty as a martial artist.
Without realising it, under the influence of ’Perfect Combat Sense’ and newly learned combat skills, Zephyr started to unconsciously learn the habits of professional combatants at a very fast rate.
Just like veterans, he was now capable of maintaining his guard at all times and was capable of reacting fast before a battle could fully escalate!
"This place is so dreamy and rich in elemental powers; I wouldn’t even be surprised if I ended up seeing elves or fairies roaming around in such a place..."
The moment Zephyr said those words, the comment section exploded with activity!
[Rolling_Crocodile: That’s what we are trying to say, Sect Master!! The fairies helped you move to a comfortable spot to sleep earlier! But you just refuse to listen to us poor mortals!!]
[Blue_Dinosaur: Exactly! Those little fairies worked so hard to move you that they were all sweating, and you are doubting them! Please listen to our prayers, oh mighty Tank God!]
Seeing those comments, Zephyr barely managed to control himself from rolling his eyes at these troublemakers.
Thankfully Zephyr didn’t have to wait too long before someone finally talked about the matter that he wanted to hear about.
[Invincible_Bob: Sigh, if only those little cuties hadn’t disappeared, our anchor could have seen them too.]
[Jumping_Koala: Yeah, it’s quite surprising that those fairies could actually teleport... makes me question why they worked so hard to move the anchor physically and didn’t just use teleportation on him too...]
[Muscle_Lover: Fool! You don’t understand! Our anchor is a ’God’ of all main battle tanks! There are no such spells in the world that can work on a ’God’ like him! He’s immune to these flimsy magic skills!
If you want to move him, you must do so by showing your physical strength!]
[Rolling_Crocodile: Well said! To move the god of muscles and make him acknowledge you, you would obviously need to demonstrate your own muscle strength! How fitting!]
Ignoring the weird conversations going on in his comment channel, Zephyr focused his eyes on the information that was important to him.
’I see, so these fairies had teleportation magic... No wonder I can’t even sense a trace of them; they are likely able to use spatial magic to conceal their presence...’
’Unless they wish to reveal themselves, I won’t be able to sense them even if I am standing right besides them...’
Zephyr himself had space-related abilities, and he knew full well how overpowered this affinity was.
With enough mana, Zephyr can coat his entire body in a completely isolated folded space, which would make him completely immune to the influence of the outer world!
This was a god-tier ability and could be used to not only just negate detection and other wide-area abilities but could also be used for offensive and defensive purposes!
’Alas, the mana control needed to do something like this is insanely high; I will likely not be able to do it until Rank A at least...’
Zephyr had prior knowledge and experience from the ’Shattered Firmament Martial Art,’ and thus he knew how his own strength was supposed to grow in the future and what kind of abilities he should be able to use in the future.
He was already quite strong even at rank D, but this was just the beginning of his journey; once he reached higher realms, he would have many qualitative changes and would become many times stronger than now!
’Once I reach rank B, I will finally have some ability to threaten Xinran and make her take me seriously... but for now, I need to be low-key.’
Zephyr truly hoped that someone as strong as Xinran wouldn’t end up becoming his enemy, as being friends with her would be more beneficial to him instead.
Shaking his head in disappointment, Zephyr walked over to a fruit tree and decided to put the topic at the back of his mind for now.
’It would likely be impossible to find these fairies unless they appear in front of me willingly, so I might as well just gather food in the meantime and get going to complete my trial...’
The place was filled with food and water; Zephyr already had the ability to conjure water whenever he wanted, but he still filled the pot he was carrying with him with the highly concentrated and mana-rich water from the lake and placed it in his space ring.
Aside from that, Zephyr also picked up hundreds of various types of fruits and threw them in his space ring.
Time didn’t exist inside the space ring, and Zephyr knew it because he had used his mana to probe into the mystery of the ring before.
With his space affinity, it was easy for Zephyr to inspect space-related artifacts and realize their basic functions even without anyone telling him about it, just through pure instinct.
Having space-related affinity was a blessing that Zephyr was very happy to have obtained.
’No matter what food I store inside my space ring, it will never go bad as time won’t move inside the separate space, so I don’t need to hold back; I can store plenty of food!’
...
It didn’t take long for Zephyr to fill up his space ring with plenty of emergency rations.
The space inside the ring was pretty big, and Zephyr’s body only required minimal food intake to maintain its peak functions.
Just this stored food was enough to last him for several months!
’For now, I will only fill 3/4 of the space ring with food and will keep the rest half empty for future use.’
Maybe he might end up finding new skill books or artifacts in the future and might need to store them in the space ring, so he needed to keep some space reserved for that purpose too.
Once he was done collecting all that he needed, Zephyr took the torch and started making his way towards the giant cauldron located atop the hill far away in the distance.
’I don’t know why... but I feel quite reluctant to leave this place... is it because I have become too pessimistic after suffering so many casualties outside and want to avoid the dangers?’
Zephyr’s mental fortitude was insanely strong due to his spirit stat being very high, and although this place made him very reluctant to leave, he could still control his feelings and keep a firm eye on the bigger picture.
’If I had no powers and was just an ordinary person, I would have definitely considered staying here forever; in that scenario, this place would have been the best paradise for me in this horror world...’
’But alas, now I have power and an ambition of my own. I cannot abandon the ’Path’ I have chosen to walk on; I cannot stop here just because this place is very suitable for a long-time stay...’
Zephyr had already found out that fairies lived in this place, and this so-called ’Eternal Garden’ likely belonged to them.
If Zephyr stayed here too long, he would be imposing on them and would likely end up creating a conflict of interest with the fairies.
’And even if there were no fairies, I still couldn’t stay here forever... I have more important things to do in life now than just staying in this place and degrading into a powerless fool...’
No matter how tempting the place was, Zephyr didn’t lose sight of his goals; he came here only for water.
Now that he had accomplished that objective, it was better to leave before something unpleasant happened again.
The moment Zephyr started to think about leaving the place, a strange sense of pressure started to build up around him.
It was as if every plant, every blade of grass, and every organism around him was staring at him with hostility and was starting to see him as a target; the pressure on him increased tremendously.
With each passing step forward, and with each attempt to reach the cauldron, the pressure on Zephyr’s body increased by several times!
’I don’t have a good feeling about this...’
