Chapter 343: Ryun

Chapter 343: Ryun

The Reach of Oblivion

Unleashing his Aura felt easier than it ever had before. And immediately he noticed differences. When he used his Void Aura it had always drained Qi from his core to use. This time it did not. Instead, what he felt was a different kind of sensation. Where using Void Aura had felt like he was activating a perk, something more mechanical, this was something else. It felt as natural as breathing. And there was no drain on his core, it was deeper than that, almost as if he didnt know how to explain it.

An aura was an Aspect Manifestation perk, he couldve chosen different ways for it to manifest, but perhaps there was something more to it than he realized before. The aura spread in a sphere around him, filling his immediate surroundings with Oblivion, about a couple meters around him. He could barely see it among the other Essence, but it wasnt doing anything. Of course, he realized that it needed his intent, or rather his will as it said in the perk. His first tests were easy; he started by focusing only on air. Slowly the aura leaned on the Essence of Air, and it started to disappear from the range of his aura, leaving only vacuum. The process wasnt instantaneous, it was gradual, but effective. He almost didnt feel it, aside from having to open his mouth and let the air out of the cavity inside of him. He had nothing in his body to expand, but he could see the lack of Air Essence.

Next he started deleting more and more Essences, trying to see if there was a limit on his Aura. He didnt seem to be able to find it after deleting more and more Essences at the same time. Though the effects werent as quick as they were with his techniques. Still, he continued testing. Focus and will were required to use the aura, and he could change the intensity and range just like how he couldve done before.

The more he used it, the more adept he became with it, and a lot quicker than he anticipated. He felt that his Aspect Mastery helped a lot too. Then, he tried extending the range of the aura, wanting to see his limits. The sphere grew around him, larger and larger, enveloping the clearing he was standing in, then the forest around him, then beyond that. The more it grew the more he felt the presence of his core. It didnt drain his Qi but something was

Ah, that is where its coming from. Ryun felt the Oblivion filtering through his core, but the source was beyond it. The realm of Oblivion that he had glimpsed, that endless, bottomless, realm of nothingness that The aura stopped, and a sharp pain went through his head. He could almost see it again, Oblivion in all of its glory, the understanding that it offered. It was there, at his fingertips, and it slipped away, again.

He realized that the aura had reached the farthest it could reach, which was almost half the territory. He couldnt see the edge of the aura, of course, but he felt it as another sensation, he could tell that there was other Essence within his aura, or perhaps that his aura was in between other Essence. The range was actually about the same as his skill sense. Which he didnt think was a coincidence. Was that just the distance that his mind could handle? Perhaps there was something to that.

The sensation he gained from his core was gone again, but he could tell now that the Aura was fueled by the plane of Oblivion connected to his core. He focused his mind and tried to delete Air inside his aura. Immediately he grimaced as he felt pain shoot through him. A big no no on attempting to delete Air in half a territory at once. The range had to be an issue, or maybe the amount of Essence that he wanted to delete.

Next, he tried using his techniques, wanting to see how the auras effectiveness increase interacted with it. He charged a flicker and felt Qi surge out of his core, far more than he wanted to pull. He frowned, wondering if something was wrong, but then decided to release it. The technique shot out and he sensed it cut through the territory. He blinked in surprise at what his sense was telling him. The technique had shot to the edge of the aura, deleting everything in its way. He didnt plan for that, nor was he certain that it shouldve reached that far. From his previous tests, it shouldve taken him a lot more Qi to hit that same distance and delete as much Essence as he had just now.

He pulled his Qi back, and fired off quick shots from time to time, not really focusing on them that much. Each time they technique ended at the edge of his aura, almost as if it was a range limit for it. And they cost a lot less, almost a third less, he tested it out without the Aura and his techniques cost a lot more when trying to hit the same range.

He had tried to do this with Void, but he had never been able to. He knew that crafters used Void to somehow separate spaces that could then be made into storages through spatial powers. At least that was one way to do it. He had never managed to get Void to consume space. He didnt know why, though he had a suspicion now. Perhaps his understanding had always aligned more with Oblivion, perhaps that interfered with what he could do. Or perhaps there was some trick, it didnt matter now.

He pushed his hand through the box, his hand was made of it, so there was nothing to block. Then when he was touching that separate space he reached to his Territory perk and pulled. The space was drawn out of the Real Realm and into his territory. The result wasnt anything spectacular, he had just separated Space and what was in it, which had been only Air. Still, he felt his territory expand a tiny bit, as that Space joined the Space inside his territory.

He smiled as he saw it work, that meant that what he planned could be done, he could cheat.

The territory he was in wasnt that high tiered, the monsters were between tiers 6 and 10, and most of them were the herds of the monsters he tested his wall on, called Ishi. It was a peaceful territory, it had a large forest, a lake and several tall hills covered in stone formations. It would do.

He stood in the air above the ground and spread his Aura as far as it would go, covering the hills and half the forest, the grass plain where the herds grazed, two lakes, some of the ground, but more of the sky. And then he shaped. The Aura didnt just have an effect on his primary techniques, he had figured out that it gave his secondary ones increased range. It was far easier to send threads of Oblivion through his aura than it was through unbound Essence. His Qi spread out, his core emptying rapidly, this was going to take everything that he had. He had already drank three elixirs to strengthen his Qi and boost regeneration of it. And he still pushed for more. He tried to reach for his Aspect, for that conduit to the plain, to pull more of the Essence than his Aura was giving him. He didnt know if he succeeded, his mind was filled with his great working. His sense allowed him to monitor what he was doing, and he felt the walls of Oblivion rise all around him, at the edge of his range. Half of the entire territory.

And then with an exertion of intent, of meaning and will, he separated the Space inside from the Space outside.

The world around him trembled, he was locked inside his own space, isolated from reality outside of it. Some Essences still remained, gaining access even here in this place, laws of Time, of Gravity, of things that he didnt yet know.

It didnt matter, he spread his arms and pulled. It wasnt violent, it was almost as if he was compressing space, or no, as if his soul was spreading out to consume the space. Down below he felt the monsters panic as light winked out, what had been trapped inside hit the walls of the space and disappeared, gone in a way that Ryun didnt understand.

And then, he felt himself pulled into his territory along with his space. He remained where he was, but knew that he was now inside his own soul. He reached into his storage and pulled out a small orb. He leapt up, high near the edge of his soul and there he used it. A small ball of light came into being, sending Essence down onto his territory.

He smiled, and then felt weak, his Qi slipped and he fell all the way down to the ground. He crashed, sending debris flying everywhere, and felt the last of his Qi drain as his body regenerated. But that was distant, he was feeling exhausted, and not in any way that he had before. It didnt take him long to figure out that it had to do with his soul, he had strained it with the space that he had taken, but he had done it, and that was all that mattered.

He exited his territory in the same place he had entered it. He was high above the ground, standing in the air. The Space had repaired itself, the Air had returned, as had the Light. But the territory had a gaping hole in the middle, a box shaped crater where he had taken a piece of it for himself.

He chuckled, and then turned in the direction that the bond in his head pointed him at, heading back home. It was time to head for the gathering.