The Arcane Emperor

Chapter 178: Rushing Forward

With no answer to his question, Rainer took a chance to look at the Seven Emperors. Apart from two of them covered in scars, the rest look like soft middle-aged men who’ve never seen a day of combat. One of them even had a considerable pot-belly to match. They’d likely found no easy way to advance further in the 3rd Tier and had been taking it easy, as the hidden rulers of the world. All were Humans, like most of this world seemed to be, Rainer thought. Some wore plate armor while others had nothing more than cloth robes and a single weapon.

Not too different from the Dragon Isles, despite being closer friends rather than the enmity and terse relationships of Alvra, the countries under their hidden rules still fought amongst each other. The only time they’d intervene was to save people they personally cared for his party had learned.

Otherwise, like the Sixth Emperor had done recently, they’d just stand by as one of their countries fell and their people were enslaved.

“At best you could hold back six of us at once,” the pot-bellied Emperor suddenly said, “I imagine you wouldn’t like what the seventh of us did in the meantime.”

“Six?” Rainer asked.

“I admit the strongest amongst you could likely handle two of us at once, but the other four, one at best, that leaves-” The Sixth Emperor’s eyes widened as he felt his Aura slow; he barely managed to lift his arm to block his neck as a violet blade cut across space and time. Despite his best attempts, the blade sliced off his arm and cut into his neck before the Mage disappeared as easily as he had come.

“I suppose it’s my mistake for assuming another planet would count the same as we do.” To Rainer’s surprise, the pot-bellied man didn’t even look offended at the missing arm, and only quickly prevented it from bleeding with a use of Aura. Most of it was burnt shut in any case.

Having spent the entirety of his Void Will and much of his Soul in that action, even though it was healing quickly with [Arcane Inviogration], Rainer was glad it was taken as the example it was meant to be. He had used [Soul Consolidation] to use [Soul Presence] on both [Void Hold] and [Arcane Blade]. On top of that, [Soul Consolidation] also improved his Soul passive skill [Spell Haste].

He still had his Tattoos though. And even if it had been a surprise attack that relied on him not even being clad or enhanced with Aura, like he’d be in a fight, it still represented his power to kill a 3rd Tier.

“That is my personal folly, I was never one for mathematics,” the newly one-armed man said, as he glanced at the others and waved one of the more antsy ones back. He took a second to look over Rainer and his group, along with the structure and people a ways behind them.

“Well, it’s not right to lose an arm over a counting error. We’d be happy to heal it,” Rainer said and then was momentarily startled as Jor suddenly appeared, stared at the arm with a longing glance, and then retreated after hearing what Rainer said.

It had disturbed more than just him.

It looked like there was something special about the flesh of a 3rd Tier, Rainer thought.

“A fine offer,” he replied.

“What are you doing here?” one of the more antsy Emperors then asked.

“We needed a more… secluded base for our operations. Other than selling enchanted items, venturing into Dungeons, and learning from and teaching this world, we care for little else.”

“And we are to believe that your desires are only such?”

Rainer dropped his [Acting], a look of malevolence gracing his face as he considered just cutting his losses and trying to kill all seven of them. It was no longer a matter of being ‘interrupted’, he remembered full well the threat of earlier.

“You think we’d bother conquering this useless place that bends the knee to Monsters and has 3rd Tiers too afraid to take a real trial? What a joke. What would we gain from it we couldn’t gain on our own.”

Rainer had mixed in a hidden [Void Presence] with his words, and Locklar was no slouch in pressuring others with Soul Magic as he had been from the start.

“Unlike you seven who have given up on life beyond its simple pleasures, and won’t even care to gain another 50 Lifespan with another 3rd Tier Trial, we don’t have time to waste playing house.”

Rainer’s insults had riled them up, but the small fact he had slipped in about 3rd Tier Trials had left them too confused and interested to really react to the insults, leaving all seven in a stunned silence.

No one seemed ready to break the silence until the Emperor he had momentarily fought went to pick up his arm and walk over cautiously. Perhaps in a show of good faith, he had even suppressed his Aura for stealth. Rainer knew full well that meant he wouldn’t be able to use Aura for a few seconds. It was in this moment Rainer covered his eyes with [Arcane Revelation] and noticed the slightest bit of Mana this self-titled Emperor had.

“I assume the sooner the better, yes?”

If he let him use the tattoo, it didn’t matter. But given that it would be Art who did the healing it did matter.

“I would be interested in learning just what’s for sale as well,” the man said, “I’m sure having me as an ambassador in this world would useful?”

His words seemed to surprise the Emperors behind him but they made no move to stop him.

Rainer had used [Mana Reading] now and didn’t detect any falsehoods. It was unlikely the man had any real control over his tiny Mana pool, but that also might inversely mean it wasn’t a good indicator of his truth.

“My name is Ren,” he said with a slight bow as he walked over.

Art appeared soon after, roots growing from his fingers as he walked over to the damaged man.

“This is your healer?” Ren asked, looking nervously at the young redhead. Nothing about this creepy man said healer.

Rainer nodded. He obviously wasn’t going to let someone more fragile like his mother heal him.

The ‘guests’ watched in awe as the seemingly living roots slowly but surely reconnected the arm and healed it fully. It took a decent amount of time, but the wound was fresh enough. Only the need to remove the cauterization caused any issues for the 2nd Tier Art.

“I’m sure you won’t mind coming back tomorrow at sunrise?” Rainer asked. Not only did he want to get back to Kara, he had many things to do in [Sleep Learning]. Not to mention his Avatar just saw the Half-Lizardkin come out of the Dungeon.

“I would be honored,” he said, heading back to his group as his Aura left stealth. A few moments later all seven erupted with Aura before heading off into the distance.

Rainer took a moment to translate what had happened to the group outside; they hadn’t managed to learn the language of this world through Art and Frederick’s Mind magic yet. Only the two old men and his mother had a mastery over the local language currently.

“Having them work their hardest to afford enchanted items for their companions is far more useful than us trying to take the world ourselves. A good stance, grandson.”

Rainer just chuckled, heading back to the Guild. He did have a thought of coming in as a conqueror but quickly abandoned it. Not only would that be a massive time sink and cost innocent lives, it wouldn’t be that beneficial. Whether it was Soul enchantment or their Aura skills, these were things the society produced on their own. They even had seven 3rd Tiers with no outside help or a powerful environment to force their progress. Not to mention the few Mages they had technically beat a rank 6 Dungeon completely on their own despite the Magic community of this planet being woefully underdeveloped. That was impressive to be sure.

He’d much rather stay in the back and use this world than try and take from it forcefully. He vanished with a Void-walk back towards the Mana-Well, a part of his focus on his Avatar in Alvra.

Rainer’s eyes opened a bit wider as he stared at the [Draconic Dog] with [Arcane Revelation]. While still having next to no Aura the Monster now had a sizeable Mana pool, likely from her Draconic heritage.

Jean too had his Mana increased but it was a reasonable amount for someone who had a level 25 Tier 1 class.

Rainer was about to head over, but the pair quickly rushed to him instead. The once invisible Familiar bond, unless he looked really closely, now seemed to flare with power. He wondered if he should prepare for battle but the young man had only rushed over to bow to him as quickly as possible.

“Savior!” the young boy said excitedly as he kneeled, “to think I would be allowed to see you again.”

His Dog, while not as excited, did come over to lick his hand. Rainer smiled as he pet the head of the horse-sized Dog, wondering if she also inherited the ability to alter her size.

Unused to this kind of attention, as the Enchanters of the Guild were not so reverent, he decided to just get on with his request.

“Would you be interested-”

“I would!” the teen said, quickly looking up at him.

Rainer just chuckled, figuring he could just explain later and send him back if needed, and wrapped the pair in a Void-walk as he headed back to his main body. It was a planet that was relatively nearby. So he hardly needed to rip open space and time.

Soon after in [Sleep Learning], with Art beside him, and a waiting Jean and his Familiar, Yami, Rainer prepared to watch the process of her Soul becoming more draconic.

He nodded towards the Half-Lizardkin before Yami went ahead and followed her instincts in consuming the strength of a greater monster. Even if said Monster had been compressed down to a vial of essence.

However a look with [Arcane Revelation] quickly discerned a problem. The [Draconic Dog] wasn’t absorbing the essence as a Dragon but as any old monster. It was strengthening what made her a Canine rather than the small portion that was a Dragon.

“What’s the matter, R-Rainer,” Jean asked, seeing the confusion on his face.

Rainer had insisted to be called by name, mostly because it was entertaining seeing the teen struggle to do so. And partly because he was doing him a big favor helping like this. There was no need for formalities. Even if there was an end benefit where Rainer would be happy to give any left Draconic resources to him afterwards. Not to mention helping with his Trial.

“She may need my help doing what I need,” Rainer said, carefully putting a hand on her and infusing his Arcane-laden Mana as he had done ages ago. If he had awoken the Draconic part of her once, perhaps it might naturally catalyze it to do what Tiamat did naturally.

Thankfully, that was all it took as the absorption shifted and more and more of the Canine became Draconic. It was a slow process, with far more wasted than with Tiamat. But the changes to the Soul were occuring visibly to Rainer, if very subtly. Evidence so far suggested that her Soul wouldn’t be changed in reality even though it may be affected. No different than Delilah doing this in the past, even though her changes were solely her own bloodline instead of Draconic.

He watched and rewatched the natural process, noting that whenever her body was refreshed, the changes to the Soul disappeared. It seemed just as the changes in the body were linked in the Soul, the opposite was likely true. Or it was releated to [Sleep Learning] alone. The only thing she likely gained from this session was an improvement in her ability to absorb essence and perhaps a greater affinity to letting her Soul be changed. Though the letter was a complete guess.

“That’s it for now,” Rainer said, letting Jean go off and do his own training in the [Sleep Learning] space as promised. It was unfortunate that the teen’s reverence for himself made his reaction to the [Sleep Learning] space incredibly lackluster. He simply nodded and accepted it as something a legendary [Archon] and his savior could do. It was by far the least entertaining of all of them he’d seen thus far.

Rainer took a moment to explain what he saw to Art so he could make his own adjustments before heading off elsewhere. It was time to level his Manipulation skills to the limit.

Violet lightning arced around him as he shot it off to the distance at stone targets or warped it through his own body with the goal of doing as little damage as possible. He found pain to be the easiest motivator to improvement. As it was, that was the only case where he quickly felt pouring his Soul in his [Arcane-Lightning Manipulation] truly started leveling it at a noticeable pace. His ability with it increasing to match.

It wouldn’t be long before it reached level 9 from 8 he felt.

[Arcane-Lightning Manipulation has reached level 9]

The vaunted message appeared just a few minutes after that thought, doing next to no damage to himself as he passed the lightning expertly from own hand through his body and to the other. Sinking his Soul into the magic through both [Soul Presence] and aided by [Soul Consolidation] truly changed how easily he could get familiar with an element.

And in this increase, Rainer felt his control over Arcane as a whole grew ever better. Ever closer to the nearly impossible 10.

A Wolf howl and subsequent Void-step in his direction interrupted his next planned element.

“Kara?” Rainer asked. She hadn’t made any recent improvement, that he was aware of, so there should be no reason she’d ask for a duel.

“Rainer,” she said, with a bit of mirth in her voice, “I think I figured out why Demons steered away from messing with their bodies like Ling Yun suggested.”

“Oh?”

“Yes,” she growled, though it came out closer to a laugh, “In my few attempts I’ve now found myself stuck in this form.”

“Completely stuck?” Rainer said, feeling for her Aura and sensing it constantly decrease, “What happens when you run out?”

“No idea. I figured you watching it and telling me what happens or what has changed with my body might help future attempts.”

Rainer nodded and watch closely. Though in honesty, he couldn’t find what exactly she did in the first place.

“How’d you manage this?”

“I started simple. I followed the process of changing a body with Golden Aura and just tried to do the same with Demonic.”

Rainer looked closer, running his hand through his fur. With his eyesight he finally found a change. Small miniscule parts of Demonic Aura had mixed with the magic portion of her anatomy. And were nowhere else. Was this why she was stuck? Changing a body with Golden Aura after all could be done by a completely normal Human. Did this mean there was an issue with her being a Wolfkin with the specific method he gathered?

Looks like he’d be paying a visit to their world sooner than planned.

Kara had already intentionally expended quit a bit of her Aura and reached empty quickly. Her muscles tensed and her fur stood on edge as her body slightly shook. Rainer stared as he watched her Life energy depleting. Had he not already done such tests in [Sleep Learning] when training [Death Manipulation], he likely would have killed her right here to prevent anything.

Grey and aging, the Werewolf body eventually collapsed, having died as if in her sleep. It disappeared a moment later, replaced by a reformed and completely healthy Kara.

“That was… unpleasant.”

“It wasn’t exactly fun to watch,” Rainer said, grabbing her into his side.

“You learn anything useful?” Kara asked, trying not to be distracted by a hand scratching her ear.

“Other than I’ll have to go and check if their Golden Aura method was ever used on anything other than Humans, no.”

The two separated after a few more moments and Rainer returned to training his manipulation. The goal was to train his Soul skills in tandem and grow the strength of his Soul ever stronger.

Back at the joint gathering place, the seven 3rd Tier Aura users convened to discuss options.

“Ren, are you sure-” before the Fourth Emperor finished his sentence he was suddenly slammed into the ground.

“Whose idea was it that we pressure them to understand their strength? Who?!” Ren said, rubbing his arm as he wasn’t entirely sure it was still there. And the slimy feeling of having his body, his Soul, and his Aura gripped in the hands of some intangible ghastly force was more than enough to haunt his future dreams.

No one spoke up against their pseudo leader, even if he had readily agreed to the idea.

“Even if we do not pressure them... to so easily bend the knee…”

“Ha. If I had known they were the real deal and not some Mages of this planet acting mysterious for benefits, let alone bending the knee, I’d make the man soup and call him my dearest mother,” Ren said, still opening and closing his hand as if needing to be reassured his flesh had returned to him.

Now that he thought about it, both the strange building and the sheer power of the 3rd Tiers should have keyed him in on their story being true. Not to mention the walking skeleton in the background and the strange long ears and eye colors on a few of them. But he hadn’t fully considered it. It was a hard switch to go from years as the strongest in the world to thinking as if his fist wasn’t the largest.

“Think about it,” Ren said, staring at the man known as the Second Emperor, “Wouldn’t they be the easiest answer to getting your wife to the 2nd Tier?”

The man’s eyes widened, and now that they were considering their story as Enchanters and world travelers to be completely true… And if their Enchanting skills matched the impossible ability to venture to different worlds...

“So I’ll take the hit, suck up to them, bend the knee, and do whatever I have to for them to finalize this place as their home,” Ren said. He had his own reasons for that.

What was the point of being rulers of the world if he had to watch his admittedly untalented daughter and son die early deaths, their mother going with them?

The 13th Princess of Zan carried a radiant smile as she welcomed the two 3rd Tier experts her Empire sent, alongside several dozen of the 2nd Tier. That hadn’t been a cheap venture by any measure of the word. Nor would they be the last sent over.

Given their region of hiding, the attack on the Demons and the source of it had been obvious. After getting this message back along with news of the capture of her Uncle, more and more resources had been put into getting here as early as possible, pushing their timeline forward.

Her Uncle, something she reported long ago, was of course not the main reason. Rather they couldn’t risk Ling or anyone else getting to the Cursed Lands before them. The mystical oddities such places often contained weren’t something they wanted to share. And a capturing of a few spies who didn’t manage to escape determined that the Ling Dynasty was hardly the only nation they needed to worry about.

For now, they needed to get a grasp on this land and its people. The Group Spells of the Mage Guilds to the North sounded like an interesting start. No doubt their unrefined techniques they deigned to call ‘Group Spells’ were nothing compared to the ones of Zan. How hard would it be to recruit that part of the native populace to their side?