Free Web NovelChapter 27: Chapter 027: The Solution To the Problem?
The Greenwood Forest never ceased to amaze Mikael as he journeyed — floated, upside down and grumbling — towards the heart of the forest, which seemed like it was worlds apart from its entrances.
"Honestly," he muttered, floating past a tree that seemed suspiciously like it had eyes, "I should probably run at sonic speed." But the drawback changed his mind and so a few seconds later, he groaned in exasperation.
"The mana in the air is too raw for me to absorb large amounts immediately and there’s that stupid rule again." He sighed
He stepped down to the ground. ’Better conserve whatever essence I’ve got.’ He looked up, straining his eyes to see past the canopies. "Must be mid-afternoon by now," he thought.
Two hours. Mikael’s pale skin gleamed with sweat. Having stripped his robe down to his waist because of the heat, his bare chest rose and fell with each steady breath. Adrian had had a sloppy posture with his body slouching always. But Mikael couldn’t help but be proud of how his body looked now. Truly befitting a Celestial, albeit a fallen one.
Smooth, taut skin over a wonderfully lean yet powerful frame. Squared and firm shoulders that supported his long, slender arms. His pecs moved subtly as he walked, every breath giving them the smallest lift. Below, his abdomen drawn tight, showing a clean six-pack; no softness, no fat. Just perfect muscles like it was shaped by a blade.
A faint sheen of sweat glistened across his chest and shoulders as a result of the exertion from pushing himself. It made his lean muscles shine starkly in the filtered sunlight. Such a shape without being the slightest bulky. He sighed and rubbed his forehead.
"I’m turning into a narcissist."
He stilled abruptly.
A clearing. With a marked stone at the center that glowed.
’Well, hello there, Heart of the Green. Lucky me, I guessed right.’ After he’d landed and given up visibility the air offered, he just chose a random direction and continued heading inwards, hoping he would get to where he wanted. And he was.
He sat on top of the rock, eyes closed, legs crossed upon the moss-covered stone. Beneath the rock, he felt the turbulence of moving essence, mana. The mana vein he’d noticed was thickest here. ’Whoever places this here must be.....oh, they could sense mana too. Silly me.’
It was finally time to get his journey started!
Minutes later, the air around him stirred, humming quietly in reaction to his essence. There was a chance Heaven might notice what he was attempting to do and they might simply decide to end him instantly. There was also a chance they’d let him amuse them, before doing away with him. The base point was that he had to hurry up whatever he was doing.
His chest rose gently, steady, his eyes now half-lidded in quiet meditation. Deep down, his essence had fully stirred and stabilized and beneath the skin of the human boy, the ancient being’s truest form awoke, reaching out.
With a slow breath, Mikael parted the veil of reality in his mind, his inner self tracing his ancient celestial pathways to his source, to the Cosmic Gate. His consciousness stirred past the ordinary.
"Release!"
The forest changed. Not physically, but in the spirit. The humming of the air increased as the markings on the rock began to glow and the sky above Mikael faded into a backdrop of stars, though still visible, more vivid than he was sure any sky of the Realm of mortals ever held.
Universes overlapped, galaxies turned and shone as bright as lanterns in a midnight sea — a glimpse into the cosmos as he floated past a billion stars and countless worlds. Or perhaps reality did while he sat in one place.
Anyhow it was a truly breathtaking sight as his breath stilled completely in wonder and contemplation. While his memories of his times in the Celestial Realm were fuzzy, the scene of worlds and stars reminded of place where he’d seen such, a lot of times.
Anyone who saw him would be staring at a boy with a smile so peaceful he’d look like an angel.
Mikael no longer felt the rock beneath him. He couldn’t even feel the weight of his own limbs, nor could he even hear his heartbeat. He had successfully unlatched, unmoored from reality. Opening his eyes, he looked down to see his body perfectly still, the physical one. The preciseness and perfection of self awareness of being needed to pull this off was something mortals could attain after spending their lifetime training for it, a mere piece of effort for the genius lad who wasn’t completely mortal.
He finally looked at his floating self. Perfect replica, like he was thousands of years ago. His wings, six of them, spread out so far it seemed they could contain worlds. Mikael smiled gently as he flapped them.
"Missed you, my friends."
Now ascending, he flew with astounding speed, cruising through the cosmos. The galaxies spiraled and glowed as he went past them. A sense of nostalgia seeped through him.
"It’s been a while."
The tether to the Gate began to pulse faintly, in recognition of a former friend, and it reached out and pulled.
Mikael turned around, eyes widened with surprise. The connection to the Gate was not permanently severed and destroyed, like he expected it to be. His surprise turned into a crooked, lopsided grin — the kind you would flash when you see a trap and walk into it anyway, resigned. There wasn’t much of a choice.
The bridge reconvened and the Gate was soon in his full view.
The Gate of the Cosmos stood suspended in the void and swirling of galaxies, anchored and tethered to neither time nor space.
Its surface pulsed like a living being, veins of divine light coursing through its frame in quiet rhythms.
Around the Gate, space rippled gently, stars bending in subtle reverence. And in its center, a tear in reality floated — a curtain of liquid starlight.
Through sheer will, Mikael stepped onto the bridge once more. The moment his feet touched it, a pulse of energy swept out toward the Gate, reached the Gate and charged up, sweeping back to him, purposeful.
The rush of energy surged through him, revitalising all his meridians, painlessly, gently.
One by one, sealed strands of his celestial essence stirred, the ones he’d buried within him before he fell from grace, like doors creaking open.
At that point, Mikael did not seek dominion or strength to destroy. Only a reconnection to his origin. A gentle homecoming. And the sensation was out of this world, literally.
Above him, a single star pulsed brighter than the others, a sign. One only few celestials, the big guys in Adrian’s terms, would recognize. And that would spell trouble for him, but...
He felt moved to tears — this enlightenment... this lightness... He hadn’t felt it in a long time. He took a step.
But the connection flickered. Mikael gritted his teeth as pain shot through his astral body.
"Guess it’s my limit for enough. Still... This was progress." His journey back to his glory days had only just begun.
The vision receded as his projected body was swept back millions of miles, back into the realm where his body rested.
He inhaled sharply and the forest returned. Birdsong resumed. He felt the wind rushing through the trees. His hands trembled faintly in his lap, body still aglow with faint residual light.
Even as the canopy of stars slipped back behind the veil, Mikael sat still, grounded on the moss-covered, marked stone, face calm, his eyes like ones that had seen the beginning and end of worlds. But something had changed.
He felt it first as warmth — like the hush of breath after a long silence. It stirred in the hollow of his chest and spread throughout his entire body, seeping through cells, sinew, muscles, flesh and bone.
Nothing dramatic. No blinding lights or cracking of the earth beneath him. Nothing of the sort.
The muscle beneath his skin tightened, ever so slightly. His form remained lean, but he could feel the power soaring through him.
A leaf fluttered from above, tumbling through the air as it fell. Not even looking up to see what it was, he raised two fingers without a single thought and caught it between them, movement perfectly timed. His motion was fluid, gentle, and fast. True he was fast before, but now his movements were refined and he, now more aware.
"Impressive reaction time. Still far from perfection though, but...." He nodded in satisfaction.
He stood slowly. And the stone beneath him bore the faintest crack — barely visible, like a spiderweb beneath his heel.
His bones didn’t ache, as human bones sometimes do after long periods of meditation. His joints now moved with fluid precision, balanced, silent. He stepped forward.
A sharp stone jutted from the forest floor, the kind that would split skin on a bare foot. Mikael stepped over it without thought. But even when the edge grazed the side of his foot, the skin did not break. The stone did
He cast a glance at the foot.
"Interesting development."
Little did the boy wonder know that he just might have doomed himself!
