Chapter 134: Chapter 122 Waiting for You in the Void Realm (Three Updates)
Sonia asked with curiosity, “Then what is your Silver Blessing?”
Ash looked slightly startled as he glanced at the newly acquired blessing.
“Silver Blessing·Observer’s Appearance: Your appearance is misleading; unless you make an unusual move, others will subconsciously overlook your existence. In the Void Realm, this blessing is strengthened, and unless someone has an intimate bond with you, they are unable to see your face clearly.”
“Can you clearly see my face?”
Sonia was taken aback, “I can now.”
Ash blinked and briefly explained, “My blessing makes others ignore me when they see me… But I’m not a Lurker, and I don’t plan on robbing the rich to help myself to the poor, so why give me this blessing? The Void Realm really is targeting me.”
Sonia giggled, “Or maybe the Void Realm has seen through to your true nature…”
“Don’t laugh, you must feel it too, right? We now have another Secret Poison.”
When they saw the golden fish scale, a piece of hidden knowledge flowed into their minds.
“Number of people infected with Secret Poison: 14”
“Degree of Poison Strengthening: 14%”
“Current effect of the Poison: You can convert silver technique power into gold technique power, at a ratio of 64:36. (When the strengthening level drops to 10%, it gains a major boost; reaching 51% turns the effects negative).”
It was no wonder the spread of the Golden Fish Poison wasn’t wide, because even if Ash and the others deduced the truth, it wasn’t enough; one had to see the golden fish in order to be infected by the Secret Poison.
On the contrary, the fact that there were 14 infected people was quite unexpected to Ash, which meant that in addition to them, there were six other pairs who had stowed away from the Sea of Knowledge to the Time Continent in the same way—except Ash was in a cheating squad, while those people had really met by fate!
“Such a powerful Secret Poison,” Sonia exclaimed. “I’ve never heard of a miracle that could convert magic power, not to mention at a 2:1 exchange rate, even a 10:1 rate doesn’t exist!”
Generally speaking, silver magic power is just that, and gold technique power is just that; low-level magic power does not improve simply because a mage climbs to a higher level of the Void Realm, as the nature of technique power is the condensation of knowledge. Just like learning addition and subtraction in the first grade, when you go up to the second grade, it doesn’t automatically change to multiplication and division.
Though low-level technique power can activate high-level technique spirits, and high-level magic power can also activate low-level technique spirits, the former is highly inefficient, and the latter is too wasteful. Therefore, mages, in order to maximize the use of resources, often match the level of technique spirit with the corresponding magic power.
However, as mages acquire more and more high-level technique spirits, there is naturally no need to use outdated low-level technique spirits anymore, and low-level technique power is also scorned.
At the moment, Ash and Sonia didn’t have much need for this Secret Poison since they didn’t have many Two-winged Technique Spirits, and silver technique power was completely sufficient for them. But once they updated their technique spirits to the Two-winged version, they would come to appreciate the preciousness of this Secret Poison—even facing Two-winged Mages with the same progress in the Void Realm, with gold magic power converted from silver technique power, their mana bars would naturally be longer than others’!
“Drinking with my senior, sneaking into the Time Continent, obtaining a Silver Blessing, infected with Golden Fish Poison, and…” Sonia’s gaze quickly swept over Ash’s face: “What a lucky night this has been.”
“The night isn’t over yet, while we still have time, let’s go and explore the Time Continent, we might stumble upon a wild Two-winged Technique Spirit—”
“We don’t have time anymore,” Sonia said. “We’re about to die.”
Ash was taken aback, opened the “Void Realm Map,” and discovered that all 25 squares of the map carried the same message:
“Wait to die, there’s no saving you.”
“Didn’t you notice my change?” Sonia curled a lock of hair beside her ear with her finger. “My hair has turned black.”
It wasn’t just Sonia’s hair; Ash looked around and realized that the forest which still had a tinge of green had now completely turned to gray, and Sonia had lost all color, resembling a character from an old black-and-white film.
He lowered his head to look at his hands, pallid to a frightening degree, utterly devoid of any flesh tone.
“Mages chase the White Bull not only to bathe in the golden rain but also because beyond the Flowing Gold River, time does not exist,” Sonia explained. “The Flowing Gold River moves along with the White Bull; hence once a mage fails to catch up with the White Bull, they’ll fall into the ‘Static Domain,’ which lacks all color, leaving only black and white around them.”
“I woke up and saw the grass and the ground all around had turned gray, which meant the nearby Flowing Gold River had dried up. At that moment, we were as good as dead.” Sonia shrugged. “Even if we’d caught up, it would have been useless; people can’t catch up with time.”
Ash asked, “Then what about us leaving the Void Realm now?”
Sonia laughed, “The Static Domain has a significant time difference from the outside world. Though we’ve been talking for quite a while now, it might have been only a few seconds to the outside world. It takes us 20 seconds to leave the Void Realm from the outside, but in the Static Domain, it would probably take several hours.”
“Falling into the Static Domain and being frozen in time is the second most common way for a mage to die. The number one cause of death is drowning in the Sea of Knowledge.”
“How long until we freeze?”
“The textbooks say if you don’t run and just wait in place, the delay is about 10 minutes, so it’s probably not too long now.”
Ash looked up at the sky, finding the golden rain too distant to see; the whole world had turned into a silent black and white tableau.
“Will we return to this spot the next time we enter the Void Realm?”
“Yes. The Void Realm doesn’t allow turning back; mages aren’t permitted to retreat. Even if I opened the Gate of Truth with the One-winged Technique Spirit, we’d only arrive at the Time Continent.”
Ash stretched lazily on the grass, plucked a blade, and chewed on it, surprised to find it was a bit sweet.
He suddenly thought of a question, “If we die in the Void Realm, doesn’t that harm the soul somehow…?”
Sonia nodded, “Yes, but we weren’t defeated by a mage’s projection or bitten to death by a creature of knowledge, so the damage will be minor and we won’t lose our Technique Spirit. Before our spirit is fully recovered, we’ll just be a bit lethargic, unable to concentrate, sleepy, and less efficient at learning.”
“That sounds like being not quite awake… But being unable to enter the Void Realm, that’s a serious problem…”
“Since you can’t enter the Void Realm for the next few days anyway, I don’t feel like exploring the Time Continent alone. It’s a good opportunity for me to practice my cultivation, absorb the knowledge I’ve learned, and master the new Miracles. After striving for half a month, it’s time to rest.”
“Rest, huh… Reminds me, I haven’t slept in a while, and now that you mention it, I feel sleepy…”
Ash yawned and rubbed his eyes when suddenly he felt the back of his head gently cradled and placed on something soft and resilient.
A soothing lullaby, like the sound of wind chimes, began to drift gently.
It was like the tender murmurs of a lover’s whisper in one’s ear, or the refreshing clink of ice cubes in a glass during summer, innocent with a touch of bewitchment, demure yet enticing, lulling one further into drowsiness, relaxed, dizzily as if in a dream.
When the heavenly voice paused, Ash was still in a half-asleep daze.
“This is the lullaby my mother used to sing to me as a child. You are the first person to hear me sing.”
Ash opened his eyes to see the Sword Maiden looking down, her pupils filled with mirth as if to paint colors into this black and white world.
“I’ll wait for you in the Void Realm.”
The next second, time froze them into a painting.