Hooking his arms over the invisible edge of the pool and looking down at the grand estate, Nolan assured himself that his romantic dealings were in proper order and simply enjoyed the afternoon sun on his skin. Thinking of such matters, he couldn’t help but wonder how Ian’s cousin was doing. After all, Hala had been the first girl that he’d ever fooled around with past the point of kissing, and he was technically engaged to her.
I hope she’s okay, he thought, recalling that at the time of his departure the Three-River Valley had just entered into a war with the Towering Eaves Clan from a neighbouring settlement. We killed a ton of their warriors in the battle for the valley, so it should be fine, right? Thinking of the beautiful hairpin that she’d given him—the engagement ring, for all intents and purposes—he found himself missing the forthright, strong-willed girl. From her perspective, he’d only been gone for a matter of months. For him, however, it had been years due to the time-dilation effects of the Millennial Ring.
Part of him didn’t want to visit Nia if it wasn’t absolutely necessary in the future, for at this point in his path as a cultivator he could create basic and intermediate meditation circle arrayments to aid in his cultivation, and he also had a vast store of heavenly dew, a large supply of divine fruit, and several medicinal pellets that Uncle Grey had created from the lingering spirit of the Falling Rain Sect’s ‘ancestor.’ On top of that, he had accumulated an incredible amount of supplies from the various powers that he’d come into conflict with during his time on Venara. Since the time constraints on his visits to Nia loosened with every visit, these days a week in this world translated to roughly twenty months on the former. After his next visit, this differential would likely extend to two years; at least if he didn’t voluntarily leave before the mysterious forces of the ring expelled him from the lifeless, frozen realm.
Pushing himself away from the invisible edge, he floated around on his back for a time while enjoying the warm embrace of the sun’s rays. After a few minutes, he created a platform of energy in front of him that he relied on to climb up out of the water. Afterwards, he leapt over the edge and landed by the tanning beds with a slight sound. Running a hand through his wet strands to remove a bit of water from them, he gave Nyla’s full, well-rounded behind a playful poke with an index finger. She was lying on her stomach, her clear, taut skin catching his eye as she turned over to raise an eyebrow at him.
He nodded to the northeast. “Let’s go work on the formation.” After speaking, he produced a large bottle of Divine Spirit Fountain water, dispelled the preservation arrayment that he’d cast on it prior to leaving Nia at the end of his previous visit and then took a few long pulls from the bottle. Afterwards, he passed it over to her.
She sat up and entertained a lazy stretch, her chest proffered out in a way that perfectly outlined it within the confines of her thin swim suit. Accepting the bottle, she downed enough to completely remove her buzz and then stood up with a flash of her long legs.
“I’ll be borrowing her for a bit,” Nolan said to Alicia and Aine with a wink.
Esteban stole Nyla’s seat the moment she stepped away. The younger boy instigated a friendly conversation with the other girls as soon as he sat down, amberwood ale in hand.
That’s my disciple right there, thought Nolan as he mentally bumped a fist to his chest in approval. He’d noticed that the youngest member of their group had been spending more and more time with these two, the three of them often going off into town on their own to enjoy local cuisines or to goof off at taverns in between stints of shopping in the many luxury stores that filled the clean streets of the fortress city.
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“We’ll be back,” he called to the others as he summoned his prized flying sword and stepped onto it in a leisurely manner. “Time to work on our little trap.”
Katerina, who was socializing with the others with a bit of discomfort on her face, turned to fix him with a curious look. “Trap?”
He gave her a thumbs up and rapidly ascended to a height of about 1,200 metres above the city, the villa located along its northern fringes.
Nyla followed after him like the protagonist of some superhero comic, matching his speed without any trouble as the two flew a fair distance from Tallgate. They eventually settled in a large clearing that they had created within the vast forests that surrounded the city, an area with a diameter of about one kilometre. Much of the wood and plant matter had been converted into timber and other construction materials that went on to make up the large tower that he and Nyla had spent countless hours erecting within this open space, a mimicry of the Desolate Spirit Tower that the Falling Rain Sect took so much pride in.
Touching down along the fringes of the clearing, Nolan brushed a hand along the length of a sagging leaf as he stared up at the malnourished foliage of the closest tree. Just as the Desolate Spirit Tower had essentially sucked a tremendous amount of life out of the Northern Wilderness’s landscape, the miniature rendition that they had created was having a similar effect on the flora in the immediate vicinity of their little project.
“I still don’t see why you insisted on making a tower,” sighed Nyla, who seemed unimpressed with the plain, nine-storey pagoda that they had erected.
“I just wanna show Tems how useless his precious treasure is. Before he dies, I plan on destroying the tower in front of him just to show him how worthless it is to us.”
As far as he was concerned, the spiteful action would be the equivalent of wiping his nose with a hundred dollar bill in front of a mortal enemy that had fallen on hard times.
Heh, fuck him.
Limiting his spiritual sense to a radius that roughly covered the limits of the artificial clearing, Nolan focused on the many focal points of the formation where specific indentations had been carved into the dirt at calculated intervals. These were slightly improvised to fit the dimensions of the power sources that they had opted to use to fuel the formation.
Summoning an oval, egg-like object that was similar to a football in size and dimension, Nolan stooped down to place the pale blue stone into one of the many slots that had been dug out well in advance. Seeing that it was a perfect fit, Nolan put on a wolfish smile.
“You’re like the queen of engineers,” he complimented Nyla after seeing that she had plotted the schematic exactly how it had been described to them by their ghostly teacher. Summoning 399 more of the peculiar stones, Nolan transferred control over them to her so that she could complete the final step in the formation’s construction.
It was important to note that each of these stones, which he’d harvested from the Desolate Spirit Tower’s top floor, contained the sealed soul of a Genesis-staged cultivator. Like this, these stones provided a huge amount of energy with which to power the formation.
Once all of the stones had been fitted into their respective slots, Nolan nodded toward Nyla and volunteered her to test out the formation. They didn’t need to activate it in full in order to determine whether or not it would function properly. So long as there were no discrepancies in the energy circuits that she had drawn out, the formation would respond to her will regardless of whether or not its main purpose was being put to use.
Eyes shining with excitement, Nyla threw out a hand and expelled some spiritual energy from the tips of her fingers, the thin tendrils striking several points of the schematic. A moment later, the entire clearing lit up with bright silver light that was vaguely reminiscent of the monochrome properties that dominated the vast majority of Nia’s surface.
“It works,” she said with a charming smile, a bit of pride in her dark, sable eyes. “We need to have Uncle Grey teach us more formations the next time we see him.”
“We can pay him a visit after we’re done in Tallgate.”
“Has he still not contacted you?”
“I don’t know what the hell he’s doing. Years have passed on his end, so I really doubt that he’s still refining the energy he harvested from the remnant soul we found at the top of that tower.” Yet again, their teacher was exhibiting shady behavior.
“He probably has his reasons.”
“Doesn’t mean he can’t tell us what they are,” he muttered, annoyance in his voice. “Maybe I should establish a connection with Jun instead? He seems a lot more reliable.”