Chapter 260: Return Journey

Kothar bent his knees, carefully, moving as slowly as possible, and sat down, cross legged, on the bare rock beneath him.

All around him, was the dark emptiness of space, and the faded light of a dying sun off in the distance.

Kothar took slow, steady breaths through the mask of his Multiplanar Equipment, and it worked as promised, delivering sufficient oxygen to him even in this thin atmosphere.

Kothar sat, recovering as much Spatial Mana as possible, he didn't need to rest right now, but the next plane on his route was one of the more dangerous ones, so he wanted to be at his best possible condition when he passed through.

After a short while, Kothar opened a portal in front of himself, and drew his Skysteel sword, while simultaneously firing up his Plasma Blade.

Kothar stepped through the portal, and immediately leapt forward, a bright purple vine, edged with razor sharp pointed leaves, had swung through the air at him as soon as he passed through the portal.

Kothar spun around, and swung his Plasma Blade, shearing through the vine, the burnt ends sending up a thick black smoke.

But that was just the beginning of what Kothar was about to experience, the plants on this plane were completely savage, and Kothar wasn't about to get off so easily.

Even as he cut through the first vine, hanging from the grey trunk of the tree just to the right of him were many more veins, and they all shot toward him, whipping through the air.

Kothar's Plasma Blade formed a ring of light in the air, as he spun his arm over and over, slicing through the tough vines as they approached, his Skysteel sword at the reader in case anything slipped through.

Kothar felt a slight vibration in his electromagnetic sensor belt, and rolled to the left, almost losing his group in his sword.

"Booom!." A thick, twisted green trunk had slammed down where Kothar had been standing, having missed him, it reared back up into the air, ready to slam down again.

All around Kothar, the vibrant forest was coming to life, a whole being filled with precious carbon had appeared, and all the plants were eager to capture it.

Kothar ran ahead, trying to put the vines and twisted green trunk behind him, and there was another boom, as the trunk slammed down once again, missing Kothar.

Kothar almost ran into a thick wall of light blue tangled thorny branches. Kothar stopped, and looked closer, inside of the tangle of thorns were the remnants of the flying plants that he had spotted the last time he had passed through this plane.

Without even looking, Kothar felt the faint vibration as more vines swung at him, and he swung his Plasma Blade behind him, slicing the vines that were attacking him.

Kothar channeled his Spatial Mana, looking for the nearest 'thin' spot, and opened a portal in the midst of where the vines and trunk had been attacking him.

He would much rather run back to where he knew the dangers, than open a portal where there would be some unknown threats.

Kothar ran toward the portal, slicing out with both blades, the burnt and blackened ends of the vines falling to either side of him, and the booms of the enormous trunk sounding out, over and over.

Kothar switched off his Plasma Blade, and sheathed his sword, he needed to run faster, as he saw a bright blue tree, with a bulbous trunk, uproot itself from the ridge above, and began walking, on thick roots, down toward him.

Seeing that was more than enough for Kothar, and he dove forward, going headfirst through the portal ahead. 

Kothar rolled as he hit the ground, and all around him were the massive spheres that made up the dirt of Atla.

Finally, he was back in the plane that he was most familiar with.

[Silane. I hope you were able to keep our bearings after all that?] Kothar asked, as he took in the towering green pillars that were blades of grass, and an even larger column with an explosion of color at its top, a flower of Atla. 

[Given that your orientation is maintained when travelling between planes, and the distances that we travel are relatively proportional to each other. Then I think you should head in this direction.] Silane said, projecting a glowing orange arrow over Kothar's vision.

Of course, Kothar couldn't be certain that he was heading in the right direction, since it was possible that one's orientation and distances travelled weren't consistent between planes.

But he had to at least try, for it was really the only way to find out what was the case.

[Alright. Thanks, Silane. Now, let's see how the artifact does with regular old portals.] Kothar said with a grin, he was eager to see how the artifact had changed after absorbing so much energy.

Kothar opened an entry portal in front of himself, and tried opening a portal at the maximum distance that he had previously been able to, about a hundred meters away if he used all of his effort and concentration.

To his surprise, the portal opened as easily as if he had opened one only about ten meters away.

Kothar stepped through the portal, and looked back to where he had entered from, a wide grin on his face.

[This is truly impressive. It took only the slightest amount of mana, and it was far easier than in the past. Some of the improvement would be thanks to the increased size of my Spatial Core, but a lot of it is thanks to the Spatial Artifact. No wonder it was so easy to open the interplanar portal on the way here.] Kothar now focused even further, another fifty meters beyond  the first portal.

This was quite ambitious, given that it became exponentially more difficult to manipulate one's mana the further one got from themselves.

Kothar opened the entry portal, and then focused on the spot he had chosen.