Liam's breath hitched as he stared ahead. The void, which had remained an endless abyss for what felt like an eternity, was no longer empty.
A faint shimmer, barely noticeable at first, like the distortion of heat rising from desert sands. But as his platform drifted closer, it took form.
A tear in the space. No. More like a portal. Or maybe it was just a tear in the space.
It did not matter what it was. Liam could only hope that it was something stable because right this second, his platform was hurtling towards the swirling mess of energy without showing any signs of stopping.
Liam contemplated for a split second jumping off of the platform but if he did that he would be jumping to his death. Also, he had already tested it out and he was simply not strong enough to break the barrier of the platform even from the inside.
Jumping out of the car headed for the collision was just not an option. There was no escape.
Liam clenched his jaw, forcing down the instinctive panic rising in his chest. No point in thinking about what he couldn't do. He had only one option now—face whatever lay ahead.
The tear in space loomed larger, its swirling chaos both mesmerizing and terrifying. The deeper he looked, the more unsettling it became.
The edges of the portal didn't just shimmer—they twisted, bending reality itself in ways his mind struggled to comprehend. Light curved unnaturally, fragments of distant worlds flashing and vanishing like echoes of things that had once existed and might never exist again.
Liam clenched his fists.
The energy radiating from it was unstable, like a wound in the very fabric of existence. He could feel the sheer wrongness of it, the way it tried to reject anything near it, yet at the same time, it pulled.
His platform—his only stable ground—was seconds away from crossing into it.
Liam took a deep breath and did the only thing he could. He braced himself. The instant the platform made contact, a blinding surge of pressure and distortion wrapped around him, the force of reality itself bending and snapping like shattered glass.
Liam couldn't breathe. His body—no, his soul—felt like it was being stretched, compressed, and turned inside out all at once. This wasn't teleportation. This was something worse.
A force beyond his understanding was dissecting him, analyzing him, and deciding if he even had the right to exist in this space. His soul trembled, his newly formed constellation flaring instinctively in defense.
For an endless moment, Liam felt like he was being erased.
It ended. With a jarring boom, the platform and the barrier completely exploded and pieces of the rock blasted outward. Liam found himself freefalling. He immediately took control of the wind flow and steadied himself. It took a couple of seconds but he finally stabilized himself enough to take note of the surroundings.
He was definitely no longer in the void. Yawning under him was a stretch of trees that were suspiciously tall. They also had dense crowns that made it impossible for him to see what was underneath.
Liam narrowed his eyes as he hovered above the dense forest canopy. There was not much he could decipher from up here so he adjusted his descent, lowering himself carefully toward the treetops.
Not that it helped. Everywhere Liam looked there were only trees and trees and more trees. Not just any trees but they were gigantic trees several times bigger than the biggest tree Liam had ever seen, including the ones in the B-grade elven world and that was saying something.
Liam went closer to one of the trees and started examining it. Perhaps it was a special tree with special attributes that made it grow so strong. If he could refine something like that it would be a tremendous addition to many alchemical recipes.
Liam took his time and looked at every detail of the giant tree, using all the tools in his skill set. However, even after an hour or so, he was completely stumped. The tree was simply trash for the lack of a better word. It was utterly useless in all sense of the world. Then how the fuck had it grown so high?
He continued flying forward contemplating this strange anomaly when he suddenly stopped. There was someone else. He immediately retracted his senses, not wanting to tip the other party of. He had been searching for the other participants for a long time and this was the first one he was coming across.
Liam slowly approached the figure, stopping only when he could observe the person somewhat clearly. Immediately Liam was shocked because the person in front of him had a small pouch. He had seen this pouch before. How could he not know what it was after all this time?
It was a system shop basic storage pouch that cost an arm and a leg, a ludicrous item that he thought no one would ever buy.
Now the person in front of him was standing with one happily collecting something from the soil. While Liam had been stripped of everything, this person had been allowed a storage pouch. That was not fair. Perhaps there was something that Liam was missing. It was time to extract some information.
Seconds later Liam's face twitched as he went through the soul memories of the guy who was now lying lifeless on the ground. He did not really put up that much of a fight. Liam went all out from the beginning and the guy was dead in a matter of seconds.
The shocking part was someone like him knew an important secret tip that Liam hadn't been aware of. Apparently in events , well in some of them at least, the system sold basic items were allowed. The ones that were sold in system shops at a ridiculous price that no one had any use for after they hit level 50.
It wasn't really much as the health potions and the other potions wouldn't make even a small dent but things storage pouch were quite useful. "Well, let's see what else do you have…" Liam started looting the dead guy.