Chapter 292: Krysta’s New Role (Patreon)

Krysta

With the Forest Cauldron becoming a subordinate force of the United Federation of Planets during the process of Aalam saving her mother—and the five B rank elders having abandoned the force thousands of years before—Aalam managed to teleport the entirety of the Forest Cauldron to the Heavenly Soul Universe along with the other members of the United Federation of Planets in the Prime Material after the Lord of Twilight Flame’s attack, every member ending up in those silvery cages. Then, as promised, they’d been released after 28 days, and Wolfram Gan, Isaiah’s master and Krysta’s former combat instructor, helped them get situated on one of the Heavenly Soul Universe’s C rank planets.

“Wolfram, ” Krysta asked when she and the huge red-haired man finished their work and sat down to talk on the top of one of the planet’s mountains, “I don’t think I saw you at the tournament. What have you been doing since joining the United Federation of Planets?”

“Oh, not much.” The large man looked up at the sky and smiled. “My soul signature is already known and, as I was already a C rank, even more difficult to disguise than Reginald and Brom’s, so it was too risky for me to participate. And this isn’t even mentioning how I would have only gotten a few rounds into the finals anyway, if that.”

Wolfram leaned back on the large rock outcropping they were sitting on, holding himself up with his arms. “So, I’ve mostly been helping train the Federation’s youths, and it’s been fun watching people I teach continuously surpass me.”

Given his aura and expression, Krysta was pretty sure he wasn’t lying, so she felt happy for the man. From what she’d seen of the Heavenly Soul Universe so far, there was far less fighting than she was used to in the Prime Material, and a whole lot less death, so it wasn’t surprising Wolfram had been feeling far less pressure than she would have at first expected, and that lack of pressure seemed to have been good for him.

There was a quality to the man’s soul Krysta had come to recognize was a signature of those who’d met the main requirements for B rank, a sense of power and a calmness of spirit, like he knew himself and liked what he saw. So, given he’d already reached max level, mastered all his skills, and, if her senses were to be believed, maximized his stats, all he needed now was to upgrade his race and take in a large amount of primal energy and he could become the United Federation of Planet’s first B rank.

Given what she’d seen of Isaiah, and how he’d far surpassed the power of his master and already taken an apprentice of his own, Wolfram had likely been greatly rewarded by the System, gaining some unique resources and a cleansing of his soul, so it wouldn’t even be that surprising if he made it to A rank in the future.

Thinking about this, though, and what the man had just said, there were now a lot more A rank talents in the United Federation of Planets than back when their leaders had been E ranks, and quite a few of them could even fight across ranks, so where did that leave her?

“What role do you suggest I try to take now that I’ve joined the United Federation of Planets?” Krysta leaned back on her arms like the man, also looking up at the planet’s sky. “From what I’ve seen, while I’m certainly stronger than Isaiah—”

“You’re not stronger than Isaiah, at least when it comes to combat.” Wolfram sat up as he interrupted her, and Krysta moved to match him, hearing the seriousness in his voice. “Possibly in other things, but definitely not combat.

“Aalam, Mila, and then Isaiah. They’re the undisputed top three in the United Federation of Planets, and then come a dozen or so others, like Irena who you spent time with in the past. Then there are other newcomers like Vanar Tedros, who will get the chance at rebirth while guiding Aalam’s sister’s soul to be reborn through an upcoming monster tutorial, as well as hundreds of Aalam’s C rank half-siblings, all demigods themselves.”

Wolfram reached out and put one of his large hands on one of her shoulders, giving it a slight squeeze as he smiled at her. “Right now, from what I’ve seen, you’re probably number four in terms of combat power, but that’s not really all that important. Anything you can do, at least one of the top three could probably do better. So, what I would suggest is to just ask in what way you could be useful.

“Mila especially probably already has a plan for you, and, given the nature of the United Federation of Planet’s relationship with the Forest Cauldron, that plan’s probably beneficial to you anyway.”

“Oh.”

Krysta was about to respond—though she hadn’t fully figured out what to say, especially given the bombshell Diana was still alive and about to be reborn—but then she sensed someone appear right behind them and quickly turned her head to see Li Mila, or more accurately an illusory clone of the woman for some reason powered by mostly life element mana instead of the better suited light element.

“Sorry, I couldn’t help but overhear.” The clone smiled while telling an obvious lie—though it was likely, given the nature of the sensory domain the woman gained from Aalam, that she hadn’t originally been intending on listening in. “But if you want to be useful, I do have a task you could help with.”

“What is it?” Krysta stood up and looked more closely at the clone, which she wasn’t absolutely sure she’d be able to see through if Aalam’s wife was actually trying to hide its nature.

“It will probably still be a few weeks until Aalam can get back, and Isaiah’s having trouble blocking the invasion of the Primordial Humans by himself, so I was hoping you could help him.” The clone smiled and then waved its hand, a spacetime runic array appearing in the air and creating a portal to empty space somewhere else in the small universe, one well enough designed to block the planet’s air from going through. And, through the portal, Krysta could see a lot.

First, there was another open portal there, one back to the Prime Material, the aura of the universe Krysta was born in obvious through it. And it was also obvious it was being heavily influenced from the other side, something stabilizing it and forcing it open further to temporarily allow B ranks through. From what she could tell, as an essence mage and essence warrior of the space element, the portal had likely originally been temporary—a naturally occurring path between the two universes which, given the complete lack of inter-dimensional demiplane, hadn’t existed for very long—so, even with the investment on the other side, it would almost certainly eventually close. But that would take a while, on the order of years.

Second, three B ranks had just entered through the inter-dimensional portal and, in the few seconds Krysta watched, Isaiah, covered in his own blood and wielding what looked like artifacts far more powerful than those he’d used against Daevic, killed them with ease and forced their corpses back through the portal, the energy she could feel from her old friend far more powerful than what he’d used in the tournament.

Wolfram was right. Isaiah was far stronger than she was, by quite a considerable margin, at least while berserking, and he seemed to be able to access and make use of the energy of the entire Heavenly Soul Universe, something she’d only ever heard about in myth.

Stepping through Mila’s portal with the woman’s clone, Krysta watched as the inter-dimensional portal lost power, temporarily unable to allow B ranks through, and then she turned to look at the clone again as she sensed Isaiah exit from his berserking state and immediately sit down in space and start meditating. “I can’t fight at that level, unlike apparently you, so I’m guessing you want my help to interfere with the portal?”

One of Krysta’s three space element Law Dragons was literally a Law Dragon of Portals, though she’d hidden the Law’s advancement, and she’d continued to practice alchemy over the years, so she was probably better at interfering with portals then almost any C rank ever, Aalam excluded, making it a reasonable guess.

“Correct.” The clone nodded. “It seems to take them a minimum of around 1 hour and 42 minutes to strengthen the portal up to allow B ranks through again after sending a wave, and I’d like you to help make that time longer.” The clone pointed at the over one hundred B rank golems flying around the edge of what had just been the battlefield and created another spacetime portal to what felt like a B rank planet, a set of black and silver armor flying through the portal toward them which Krysta could immediately tell was exactly her size. “This armor is something Aalam created with this problem in mind, a set of dao armor designed to help you gather the power of all the golems he’s created over the years, along with that of all the space element C ranks in the United Federation of Planets other than himself, of which we have a couple dozen, and you don’t need to worry about your safety as my doppelgänger will stay here to protect you.

“But please try to make sure not to get rid of the portal’s naturally slow transition between states as the Primordial Humans are continuously sending through B rank artifacts with the power to try to find other portals between the universes if left in this universe too long. Isaiah needs the current time it takes for the portal to weaken to send those artifacts back.”

Krysta put on the armor and felt a connection to all the golems she could see, as well as to several thousand more in other parts of the small universe and 27 C rank cultivators, and this connection allowed her to realize something Mila had left unsaid.

The C ranks she was connected to were all quite weak and, due to their energies mostly being dominated by the elements of yin or yang, Krysta guessed they were younger members of the United Federation of Planets who dabbled in space element Laws, not true space element cultivators. And, more important, the golems, while all B rank, were not particularly powerful in the rank, seemingly constructed entirely from C rank materials, their ability to recharge their energy cores even worse than the C rank cultivators.

There was almost certainly a reason Mila hadn’t asked for her help immediately after letting her out of the cages, and that reason was likely limited resources. Krysta was only being asked for help because Isaiah was starting to hit his limits, not because Krysta would actually provide much of an effect when put in competition with whatever god was on the other side of the portal. And this was a bad sign.

They needed Aalam back.