Path to Transcendence

Chapter 794: Almost Here

Rivers’s POV

After he dealt with the troublesome pest, he examined the cylinder the man had on him. It was really quite an interesting object, even by his standards. The material itself was the most fascinating aspect of it. From what he could glean, the material was quite unique. It had a structural composition similar to Null Steel, but he suspected it was a special alloy that combined various properties. All of this led him to believe that the purpose of the item was to contain something inside of it.

Perhaps if he were at his peak, he would have felt more confident in handling whatever was inside this cylinder, but he also didn’t want to risk the rift. He still needed it for his purposes.

He continued to monitor the rift, but he didn’t contact the clan about the attempt. If he was right, then someone from the clan had planned this. He didn’t know if it was purposefully done because the boy was currently inside. But alerting them to his intervention wouldn’t do anything but help the people involved.

He watched as the young teen slaughtered his way through the masses of Tier 4s. Tier 4s who were much stronger than anything Rivers had seen during his many years of observation of the rift. Something was off.

And it wasn’t the fact that a Tier 4 youth was tearing through the rift like a bona fide Tier 5. Or the fact that Julius seemed able to heal from fatal wounds like one would from getting a paper cut.

Then, not long after, his suspicions proved correct. The entire rift just seemed to shut down. Everything went dark, and his senses scanning the inside of the rift were shoved out without him being able to resist.

It felt like a bolt of lightning had slammed into his head, and he had to spend a bit of mana to remove the residue of the damage. But once he did, he immediately tried to reenter the rift or at least see what was going on. However, it was to no avail. Nothing he did managed to pierce the darkness that was now there.

He walked over to the portal of the rift and placed his hand on it. The portal itself had already undergone massive changes. The once-blue, swirling vortex of light was now a solid black pit of darkness.

He tried to put his arm through and still wasn’t able to feel anything. He immediately pulled out his emergency communication token. He sent a little surge of aura through it, and the token snapped in half. He wasn’t able to transmit a complete message. The token focused on distance and speed rather than a detailed account. But wherever Varian was, he should know that something had happened back at the estate and should return as soon as he could.

He had no idea where Varian was, or if he was off in some other rift or doing some kind of mission. But Rivers hoped that he would take it seriously and come back. Rivers wasn’t equipped to handle what looked like a huge mess.

Varian and the Patriarch might have been the only people other than his wife who knew the true purpose of this rift. So they were the only ones who could really figure it out. He didn’t want the Patriarch to be the one coming either. As powerful as the man was, he had become a bit more paranoid over the past couple of decades.

The pressure of not having a suitable heir must have been stressing the man out.

Weirdly enough, though, being unable to send his senses into the rift didn’t mean he was completely blind. If he concentrated hard enough, he could detect small fluctuations in space and reality shifting in an unusual pattern.

He pushed himself harder than he had in years. His wounded soul felt the brunt of his effort, and he could feel the fracture running through it widen ever so slightly. He didn’t particularly mind, though. Not when he was learning so much more from the rift during this brief period than he had over the past many years.

Unfortunately, that didn’t last nearly as long as he had hoped. It started as a faint trickle of mana, but in less than a minute, that trickle turned into a flood. He was forced to place a simple construct of mana in front of himself, feeling the strain on his skills as he did so.

When the flood of mana finally dissipated, he saw a figure get thrown out of the rift like a rag doll. He quickly recognized the brat from before and instantly rushed over, kneeling down right in the boy’s face, looking to see if there was anything that would explain the sudden change in the rift.

He immediately spotted the two items cradled in the boy’s arms. One was a fruit that Rivers was almost certain was the same fruit that increased one’s affinity. He had never consumed one, but he had heard enough from others to know what it should look like.

But from his understanding, you weren’t able to remove the fruit from the rift. It was something you were supposed to consume inside the rift. When taken out of the rift, the fruit wouldn’t work as intended.

Yet, if Rivers’s old eyes weren’t deceiving him, there was a fruit in the young boy’s hand that looked quite similar to the affinity fruit he had heard about. The other object wasn’t as outstanding, at least on the outside.

A book that looked like it had survived three Great Wars and a thousand years inside a swamp was gripped tightly in the other hand. He didn’t know where the book had come from, though. Was it something that the brat had the entire time? Or was it something he found inside the rift?

Readers can find the chapter on Royal Road, where the author publishes it; this copy was taken without permission.

Or even more worrying, was it something that he got from clearing the rift? He wasn’t supposed to have even touched the fifth floor, and Rivers certainly hadn’t noticed anything trespassing on that particular floor, but weirder things had happened.

It was definitely something to consider, especially since the rift hadn’t gone back to normal. It was still a black pit of darkness, but he couldn’t feel anything coming from it. The portal and rift were completely inert.

“What did you do?” Rivers asked with a sharp frown.

The boy looked a bit woozy for a few seconds, but his eyes cleared up very quickly.

“Ummm. I’m not sure,” the brat eventually said, sounding much too calm for Rivers’s liking.

“Did you clear the rift?”

The boy scrunched his nose. “I don’t think so.”

“Then what happened inside there? Why is the rift like that? And why do you have an affinity fruit outside the rift?”

It looked like the boy was going to say something, but then he clutched his neck, as if something had started to squeeze it.

Rivers had enough experience to know when something was preventing someone from saying something. It would seem that whatever had happened inside the rift wasn’t going to be so simple to find out.

Unfortunately for the boy, this wasn’t necessarily a good thing either. It wouldn’t stop the others within the clan from asking questions. There were ways around certain protections like this, and it almost never boded well for the person in question.

He had already alerted Leander about Julius exiting, though he suspected Leander was already on his way. Leander had already been watching for Julius’s return, and Rivers hoped that he had a better plan when he got there. As curious as this might have been, Rivers didn’t want to get involved in the clan’s politics.

He didn’t care, but he didn’t want his daughter to get caught up in any nasty business. There were plenty of bastards who were petty and spiteful enough to make her life miserable if they felt like Rivers did anything to interfere with their designs. He wasn’t as strong as he used to be and couldn’t protect her as well as he could have many years ago.

For the first time in ages, he actually became frustrated with his injuries and his weakness.

“Okay, can you at least tell me if you cleared the rift?”

The boy rubbed his neck. “No, I didn’t clear it.”

Rivers nodded. That was good, at least. That is, if he was telling the truth. Still, he suspected that the elders would be harder to convince.

He was about to ask another question when he felt someone approach the entrance. The doors opened up, and a heavily breathing Leander was revealed. The young man must have really pushed himself if he had gotten here this fast. It wasn’t too far away from the estate, but the distance was still considerable.

However, Rivers felt someone else approaching as well. Maybe more than one person too. They weren’t moving as fast as Leander, but they were heading in their direction.

Leander was already at Julius’s side, a healing potion in hand as he examined the young brat’s condition. Rivers had already done that and found that he was as clean as a whistle. Not a single injury could be found on him, which wasn’t too surprising considering the absurd nature of the boy’s healing skill.

Rivers’s senses weren’t exactly perfect when used from the outside looking in, but it didn’t take much to figure out that the boy’s skill was related to a very powerful concept. As for what it was, well, he had a few ideas. But he felt it would endanger the boy even more if he were to say them out loud.

As much as he found it endearing that Leander cared so much for the boy and wanted to make sure he was okay, there were a few things he wanted to talk to him about before their guests arrived.

He interrupted the conversation Leander and the brat were having. “We need to talk quickly,” he said seriously.

Leander heard the tone of his voice and immediately focused on him. “What is it?”

He handed over the cylinder before answering. “Someone tried to mess with the rift while he was inside. I’m not sure who exactly they were, but they were hired out of Dawnreach. Whoever hired them is very wealthy and knew enough about the rift to send them. Here is the token they were supposed to use when they finished it. It doesn’t have a tracking enchantment, but it will send a signal once broken.”

Leander’s face went through several emotions at once. “Slow down. You’re saying that someone hired a person to mess with the rift?”

“Yes, and that person might be coming here at this very moment. Did you tell anyone you were leaving?”

“No.”

“Then we need to be prepared for the possibility that they were the ones behind it. We also need to figure out a plausible story for why the rift is like that,” he said, pointing at the black sphere of darkness. “The clan won’t be happy, and they will try to blame it on the brat.”

Leander clearly didn’t want to believe that, but notably, he wasn’t outright saying it wouldn’t happen either.

“We tell them the truth. That an infiltrator tried to mess with the rift,” Leander finally said.

“You know better than I do that those idiots won’t believe that. They will blame the boy because they are looking for a reason to blame him. They don’t want to think that one of their own betrayed them; they’d rather blame the kid who was an outsider.”

“Yeah, and possibly piss off his master?”

“It doesn’t matter who his master is. They won’t care. Most of the people who are still around the estate haven’t seen enough of the world to even understand the vastness of it. They will make stupid decisions because they are naive and arrogant,” Rivers explained, a little sad at having to explain to Leander the brutal reality of the world.

Leander didn’t even bother to argue. The kid was slightly too willing to see the positive side of things, but he wasn’t stupid. He knew the truth of how things worked in Corvus.

“My father will make sure they won’t do anything too stupid,” Leander eventually said.

“If he returns in time. Who knows where in the nine hells he ran off to?” Rivers shot back.

“What should I do then, old man?” Leander questioned, a little bit of frustration leaking through.

“Follow your heart, and if you need help, drag Gin into your problems. The old bastard will complain, but he will help you out. At least long enough to delay the others from doing something stupid.”

Leander let out a small chuckle. “I’ll do that.”

“Good, now get ready. They are almost here.”