His heart beat faster. As a rank one mage of the space path, within twenty metres, he could sense other small burrowing creatures.

Mist and heat rose from the ground.

A daunting rhythmic call came from the forest.

The mage's eyes widened as he took steps back.

Suddenly, the rhythmic call died down, and a loud shriek came from afar.

Being his first time out of the wall, the mage turned on his heel and ran.

Hadrian chuckled. Inspired by the elemental mages, he'd also decided to prank the mage. After all, waiting out there got boring.

The mage was quick.

Watching him, it reminded him of the chicken and little girl, but when that started to wander to Alia's mother, he shook the thoughts away.

In truth, realizing the Carry ability of the space path mages was in its rest period, an opportunity for Hadrian to take the rock sphere holding the fiend's cores had long been created.

The mages had let the small burrowing creatures in their tent feast on the meat they had cooked, and other than that, hadn't paid them much mind.

Hadrian could simply move one of these vessels to carry the rock ball.

However, when the mage brought up Bagdona, Hadrian stalled, wanting to hear what would be said.

It was little, but he wasn't disappointed.

They had been travelling together and a lot would have already been said before that moment.

He'd love to learn what Gurov and these mages were planning, or where they were headed, but he had his own goals to see to.

They might just be running away with no direction.

As he thought this, one of the small creatures approached the items that were laid down, the rock ball one of them.

It was above ground, moving slowly like such a creature would.

Actually, moving beneath the ground would be more natural.

But with Gurov there, a rank three of the elemental path who could probably sense them under ground, he was scared that would create suspicion.

So, he chose to move above ground, his fleshy body moving left and right saying, See me, I'm not hiding, I'm not doing anything.

To be even safer, he needed to scare the mage so he would come rattling to the others about what he'd experienced.

Right on time, the rock layers opened for the mage and the others could sense an air of distress about him.

As he recounted what he'd gone through, small fleshy Hadrian stood next to the rock, smaller than it in size, and flicked its small burrowing appendices.

In an instant, the rock ball vanished.

Should I wait to see their reaction?

Hadrian who was two hundred and thirty metres away from the rock tent thought.

He'd used his monkey vessel as the main vessel, placing it at the centre of his range, so that he and the Alia vessel could be on the furthest opposite end of the other monkey and small burrowing creatures' vessels.

That might be hours….

Shaking his head, Hadrian gave up on waiting.

The vessels that were in the rock tent began burrowing out as all his vessels started moving out, heading towards the direction the small party had come from, the direction of the city.

It's fortunate I ran into you.

He'd only been there for the fiend, otherwise, he would have continued following the river upwards.

The burrowing creatures emerged from the ground some distance away from the tent.

Enough climbed on the back of the monkey he'd used to scare the mage.

Channeling force path essence through them, he sent them headed towards him and Alia.

In the right setting, these are good unassuming vessels.

He thought back to that cockroach in Calos district that had exploded when he tried turning it into a vessel.

Insects would be better. I wonder why I couldn't turn that cockroach. Hm, I'm also stupid. After that moment, I registered that I couldn't, and never made any further attempts.

Creating great distance from the cohort, he also made himself a rock tent.

His two monkey vessels and ground burrowing creatures were spread out the rock tent, keeping an eye out. Of course, right then, it didn't really matter.

He sat with his legs crossed, then tugged at his centre, entering that space.

Appearing in the first layer as usual, his consciousness descended into the second and from the mist, his main vessel body formed.

Alia too, as he'd come to prefer.

Flicking his right wrist, the rock ball appeared in his hand.

The majestic hall rose around him and he sat down on a seat.

In front of him, the rock ball began dismantling as he manipulated it with his elemental essence.

Like the box, the Fiend's core unleashed their decay aura, though evidently weaker.

The time I can stay here will definitely be reduced.

He could feel its effects on him.

Of course, he could wrap the cores with the fog, but he'd come up here to accommodate the cores.

Letting out a sigh, he called at the essence.

Like the other manifestations, the essence ran to him.

Immediately he made contact, he observed as his manifested body's hand got fainter, returning to fog.

The irrational horror deep within him made him want to let go.

Using the fog, and his simultaneous existence in the first and second layer, he suppressed these effects. They didn't completely disappear.

As time passed, his brow furrowed. The suppressed fear crept back up and his intuitions flared.

In an instant, he cut his call to the essence, and scrutinized the cores.

Leaning back into his seat, his thoughts raced.

After a short while, he drummed his fingers on his blackstone seat's arm rest.

Could that be why?

The only rank two cores he currently had were the elemental path cores.

But he'd only obtained them after having a rank one core of the same path.

While I don't need pandemonium realms or other such methods to rise in rank, is the prerequisite that I have the previous ranks cores?

And for each path?

With his eyes narrowing, he slowly became convinced of the fact.

To accommodate the cores of a higher rank, he couldn't simply jump from basically a non-mage of a specific path, to a rank three of that path.

Actually, I can. The problem is what would happen if I didn't cut the call.

Thinking this, he wrapped the Fiend's cores in fog.

So, I'll need to find rank one and two cores of the death path first.

After defeating a fiend, even one that was in such a state, he was confident in his abilities to not be worried about spawns and beasts.

This means as of right now, I can ascend to rank three of the elemental path, and rank two of the space and force paths.

Of course, there is still the matter of my own personal tier.

Thinking back to how he'd won his recent fights, it's because of using abilities of multiple paths simultaneously against an opponent.

Perhaps I've really turned into a bully.

Well, I can accommodate rank one cores of the other paths, so I don't run into this problem in the future.

As far as he knew, they were the Force, space, Elemental, Death, Life, Fate, Flesh, Mind and Soul.

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