Fiery world, a small island towards the north,
Shadow Union, headquarters,
Tirus and the other morning star magi casually sat on the seats especially prepared for them, they were thrones with bone like protrusions from each side.
They were led here soon after he arrived in this world, although the welcoming ceremony seemed quite underwhelming to Tirus, he still thought that their hospitality was worthy of their status as an affiliate of the Jupiter's lightning.
"So, what is the problem you're facing?" Tirus asked the lizardman who had the battle strength equivalent to hydro stage of rank 3.
Although he had been given detailed information of this mission by Zegna himself, he still wanted to see if he could get some inside perspective.
"Lord, this one is called Aven, I currently work directly under the leader of our organization, Yule. We were just tribes of different races who came together to survive, this union has the six-armed race, the lizardmen race, and even some lesser known winged races and even shadow elves as well." Aven stopped and continued after not hearing a response from Tirus.
The Shadow Union was mainly consisted of the twin-horned race, but the shadow elves held most of the higher ranks due to them having long lifespan. The Shadow elven race looked like humans, but have a black pearl on their foreheads and on the back of their arms.
The Dark flame Empire was just one of the high-ranked organizations of this world at this point in time. On the other side, the Shadow Union and the Allied Kingdoms needed to collaborate to stave off their invasions.
The Shadow Union has a precious resource called the fire source stone. Which can increase soul force to an unknown extent. They also have a meditation technique, called dark lotus Technique, which combined physique and soul in a unique way. Just the kind of technique Tirus was looking for.
Although Fiery world was mostly filled with fire energy particles, there were still some places where fire energy particles were heavily concentrated, eventually forming the fire source stones.
"Our union was contacted by the magus world's most prosperous organization known as 'Jupiter's lightning' and we have become a peak mid-scale guild a century ago. Although, our accumulation of high-grade meditation techniques as well as cultivation resources is quite deep, we still haven't been able to become a high-grade guild…"
Time passed at a faster rate in the Shadow world than in the magus world, allowing Jupiter's lightning to have a rich source of resources.
"Get to the point." Tirus said in a slightly raised voice, and Aven started feeling dizzy just by hearing his voice.
"I'll tell you the rest, esteemed magi." The voice of an unknown magus resounded as a man with black eyes and hair teleported inside the room.
This man wore a scarlet robe and emitted the aura of a rank 4 expert. Although this man was the leader of an otherworldly organization, he still looked mostly human, but had a slightly disoriented radiation.
"And you are…the leader of this place, aren't you a little too late to welcome me?" Tirus asked with a sly smile on his face.
"I am Yule, the leader of Shadow Union, and I apologize for my delay, but lord, we are always being secretly attacked by other organizations and this has been going on for a while. They have enough power to eradicate us, but they're doing this slowly, perhaps to get more information on our backers." Yule said this while gritting his teeth and looking at Tirus with inexplicable emotions in his eyes. He had recently fought someone who was also at the peak of rank 4 and had suffered severely.
"Hm...I see. You are suffering from a lot of attacks at once, is that correct?" Tirus asked while twirling his wavy black hair.
"Yes, lord." Yule said with hope in his eyes.
"Then, tell me about the territory of your organization and the place where is the situation is the most severe. I'll take care of that once I adjust my soul force according to this world." Tirus got up from his seat and walked till the door of the room, "You have ways to speed up the process, don't you?"
"Yes. Bring out the records we have on the matter of souls." Yule ordered the nearby lower rank magi as joy filled his eyes.
"Lord, please go and rest in your residence until the required materials are brought to you." Yule was a smart man, and he clearly understood that Tirus wanted some 'help' with his work, which he was happy to provide.
...
'A.I. chip, how much longer till the soul force is adjusted?' Tirus inquired as he was being led by a humanoid looking woman with wings on her back.
[Beep! This process would require 5 hours and 34 minutes to be completed]
Soul force was an energy which was incomparably higher in quality than spiritual force, it could be used in any world and could be used to kill any being that hadn't cultivated soul force.
Since Tirus had cultivated his soul force till the peak of rank 4, now allhe needed to do was make some adjustments so that he would be able to use it freely.
...
Two days passed,
Near an island,
Tirus had already made preparations and was now at the place where there was the greatest disturbance.
Since there were a lot of such 'problems' that the Shadow Union was facing, the other magi who came with him decided to go to separate places at once.
Turns out that there is actually a 'rogue' peak star rank pirate who lived in this area and attacked the ships of Shadow Union every once in a while.
Other organizations didn't do anything about this, causing the Shadow Union to suffer from great loss.
Although this situation didn't appear to be severe at first, but it was evident that this 'rogue' was probably a member from some organization or had been paid by an organization to actively seek out and attack the ships which seemed even slightly associated with Shadow Union.
There wans't much information about this pirate group aside from the fact that they had been in this area for quite a few decades now.
The reason why this was a severe problem was that this pirate group could be much, much bigger than it appears to be and could lead upto a chain a life or death fights with several leaders.
Although beings with extraordinary powers were strong, they still tried to avoid figths which could lead upto ones death. This single star rank expert had killed a few grand elders of Shadow Union and severely injured Yule, so it was only natural that the remaining members didn't want to fight as it surely meant death.
The ranking system in the Fiery world was obviously different from that of the magus world, but was similar to that of the Lava world's as both world's were similar in terms of environment.
Here, although different cultivation techniques existed, almost everyone in the shadow elven race cultivated the same high-grade meditation technique called the "Dark lotus" technique. It had 13 levels. Similar to the fire plume technique of the Lava world.
Those who had cultivated the first three levels didn't have any names for their cultivation rank, as there was nothing special about levels one to three of Dark lotus Technique. It could increase one's vitality and endurance slightly, with some tolerance towards negative energy elements.
However, once one got to the fourth level of Dark Lotus Technique, it would allow the user to have a rapid increase in strength, and they'd be called 'Officials'. Though the fundamental parts of Dark lotus Technique were the most common in the Shadow Union, the fourth and fifth levels were kept somewhat secret, and were considered the quite precious.
As for the next few levels of Dark lotus Technique, they were kept secure, and could only be passed on in a few places, like Shadow Union assassin unit. But for Tirus, they were effortless to obtain, he could peacefully cultivate this technique to the 7th or even the 8th level without consuming numerous resources.
The ancient magi had conquered countless worlds, and so it was only natural if some worlds had the exactly same cultivation realms and system.
"Lord, the rogue seems to be on this island." Yule said as he looked at Tirus with a grim expression. Although this 'rogue' was a peak star rank expert, meaning that he had peak rank 4 strength, he had managed to form a domain, thus being able to kill multiple rank 4 grand elders from Shadow Union before Tirus arrived.
"Hm..." Tirus spread out his spiritual force and felt the star rank expert, along with hundreds of his subordinates and locked onto the sky rank expert with his soul force.
"Die." Tirus mumbled as that star ranked rouge felt something completely shatter his sea of consciousness as darkness filled his vision but before his consciousness completely collapsed, he resisted and saved his truesoul from being injured.
Every subordinate of his who could feel it had suffered severe damage to their seas of consciousness as they all died on the spot.
"Go, kill the rest by yourselves." Tirus said casually as he pointed towards the island.
"Yes, lord." Yule nodded as he shot a massive fireball the size of an elephant towards the island, his subordinates following his lead.
Although Tirus could kill all of them, he didn't. Why would he expend extra energy when there wasn't much to gain? The amount of treasure Tirus had was simply too much, and also the fact that he was already at the peak of rank 4 made it so that unless he got something that had the power of rank 4 or above, he simply wouldn't really care about it.
The only one Tirus considered worth killing here was that so-called rogue rank 4 magi.
'The real fight is yet to come.' Tirus thought. He knew that this was all a small part of a grand scheme, but he had full confidence in himself and his A.I. chip.
To be continued...