Chapter 1162 Cap 1160: 1 Year Later
I was on my ship seeing a planet completely marked in purple and red colors, in the distance I can still see creatures of flesh flying around.
A little more than 1 year has passed since the first meeting with Astrid, during this time a lot has happened.
I stayed 1 month on the planet Jareh in a long siege battle with others, always being one of the first to need to retreat, which made the others also retreat, in the first week I couldn't see the difference in the number of humanoid octopus monsters, they seemed to have no end.
It was only in the following weeks that I noticed the weakening of corrupt energy in the environment, those monsters weren't coming out of nowhere, they were being created with that energy which lasted for a long time, I never saw the battle at higher levels, I just noticed that sometimes I saw one of the Demigods returning even unconscious full of wounds on the body.
In the last days of that month the fight that should have been easier due to the small number of monsters and almost absence of corrupt energy, became much more difficult with the Annual Monster Wave, we had to defend ourselves much more than before because we were dividing our forces.
After finishing the Annual Monster Wave and also having finished clearing the octopus monsters as well as the corrupt energy, the separate space created by the World Tree to seal away that corrupt energy from the world was undone.
When I got back to Border Town I came across our modified Floating Ship once again, Orsel seems to have followed the project that Nicole left behind unfinished, and in the end, it almost doesn't look like a ship anymore, it looks more like a luxury yacht mixed with a ship aircraft carrier of the navy, it was simply a complete modification of what it once was.
Of course, this came at an astronomical cost which I had to pay, luckily money is never an issue for me, I have a lot stored up in the Dungeon with the only inconvenience being Nira casting a murderous glare at me whenever I screw up her organization of things.
After that I spent time with the others learning more about the universe, I wanted to travel the universe and for that, it would be good to know what to expect.
Also, I needed to wait for Athena and Alice to return since their group would spend some time with Astrid.
Since I wouldn't have the patience to just study, I also picked up some monster combat missions from Border Town when I wanted to stretch my muscles or just have some fresh food.
I also started to make some changes to the Dungeon that I've been putting aside for a long time, now that things were calmer I thought I'd put in order everything I've been putting aside until now, I started adding 200 floors to the Dungeon, after that, I shaped several floors based on beautiful landscapes and increasing dangers, I made up to 10 floors based on horror movies that boggle people's minds.
I also left 10 floors for each of my sisters to do as they pleased, which was a mistake when Elizabeth created another city for her followers along with another Temple of Blood training headquarters.
During that time I felt like I had hit a wall for months with my strength stuck in the same place until I realized that my worries were what held me back, when I let go of worries and anxieties I finally managed to pass 90% of my transformation ability in Dragon.
During that time many things happened, this included the 4 Dragon eggs being born, there were 3 men and 1 woman, and all were Dragons of the Eclipse of Blood with the titles of Warriors of the Penumbra, only days later I found out that Hades had the Title of Guardian of the Penumbra, the 4 Dragon Games have become Hades' subordinates who have been learning from Freya.
A few weeks ago was when I finally left Border Town, to my surprise Navar decided to come along with me retiring from her duties in Border Town leaving her son or grandson in place, she asked to join me as soon as she knew I wanted to travel around Fun across the universe.
Zadiris seems to have retired a long time ago and has just been having fun most of the time when I hear about her from Alice, I seem to hear Alice's prayers when I meditate in the Communal Temple under my statue, that's how I hear about things while she is away.
After I left Border Town, I went to meet Athena and Alice's group at Astrid's base with the new Ship.
Caitlyn had already ended up with these people 6 months ago and left for other bases, before that I wondered if Caitlyn could end any kind of prejudice and how she would do that, but instead of her having manipulated people's minds as I thought she would, she just slightly influenced the minds of the people in the base through her dreams, she made them dream of acquaintances, relatives, family and even crushes with members of other races in their dreams, guiding them through a narrative created based on their individual minds.
Caitlyn is extremely manipulative when she wants to, I can't say how much this influence is her narrative manipulation can be different from directly messing with people's minds, mainly because most don't know she's doing it.
When I got there I was very well received and I talked to Miriam about what I was going to do, the first thing was to let Nicole apply her Artificial Slime to all people, this creature integrates into the bloodstream and merges with the artificial parts of people's bodies, this will help to integrate these magical items into their bodies, it was a little difficult to do Miriam's Awakening Ceremony because I had to integrate her Soul into her magical prosthesis as if it were her real arm.
But with Nicole's invention, I was able to do a simple Awakening Ceremony for everyone in the base just dividing into 6 groups, I didn't change their Races, I didn't grant any power, lineage, or ability with the exception of magic Affinity.
But even though everyone doesn't want to change races like Miriam, their races are the same, Android.
To me, it seems like a wrong term to call them, but I didn't choose the name this time.
Everyone was taken to the Dungeon before I started the process of integrating their entire base into the Dungeon on a specific floor, but for that, there couldn't be anyone inside the base.
After I did that a week ago I headed to my next destination which was on the way to Astrid's next base where Caitlyn had already left 1 month after finishing influencing their minds.
Our next stop is right where I am right now, looking at this world that fell for the same trick as the planet Jareh last year, with the sad news that they couldn't protect themselves, they weren't able to stop the contamination of this dirty energy, all planet was taken and the result I can see before my eyes.
"Don't think about them, at least there weren't people in this world." (Navar)
"That doesn't make this atrocity any better, especially when a World Tree was destroyed." (I)
"You can't save everything." (Navar)
"I know and that's not what I meant, I just think it's sad what happened here." (I)
I didn't blame myself for not doing anything for this world or feel responsible for anything, but I still found the pitiful state of an entire world being contaminated like this sad.
"Thank you for hiding us here with your power." (I)
"Don't worry about it, we needed to know the truth and investigate, this is the first confirmed planet that has fallen to contamination." (Navar)
"What did you do with the prisoner?" (I)
"Still sealed, it seems connected to something and so it's hard to unseal it for now." (Navar)
"I don't think we're going to get much information out of him that way." (I)
"Your body is clearly modified, I felt various types of bloodlines mixed badly in your body and your Aura makes me nauseous." (I)
"It would be better to leave it to your sister, the Living Nightmare can enter your mind directly to get the information." (Navar)
"It could be months before we get to her." (I)
"If you have a better plan, I'm listening." (Navar)
"I need to think, meanwhile I leave him in your hands." (I)
Navar is traveling along with some younger and older members of his people, the older ones want to get away from responsibilities and when the younger ones are traveling to gain life experience, Zadiris is doing the same.
Thanks to Navar we managed to catch one of the members of this group that distorts people's flesh, a man who has 6 tentacles instead of 2 arms, he will be a good source of information, but we need to get away from the enemies before he notices his presence.
"Let's go to the base, I'll give the signal to continue the trip to the next base, then I'll call the others and Miria to tell them about the prisoner, maybe someone else will have an idea that we couldn't think of." (I)