While Aster was “running” through the sky, he tried to look for any signs of people in the near by areas of the forest, but after advancing more than 10 kilometers not only he didn’t see anyone else… the only thing in his line vison were trees.
“Where in the hell did that portal dropped me”, he thought.
After kept using lightning trail for almost one hour to the point where he lost count of the distance he had travelled, until something caught his interest, unlike before the forest tone changed from a beautiful intense green to a sickening yellowish one.
He stopped moving and just kept stepping on the little platforms under his feet to contemplate what was about 50 meters from his current position, Alice was sitting over a rock ignoring her surroundings, as if she was waiting for someone.
Aster descended in front of her and just like always, when she saw her brother, she threw herself at him, while she hugged his left arm, she leaned her head against his shoulder before saying.
“I knew you will soon find me”.
Aster smiled.
“What a pathetic imitation”.
…
Alice frowned her eyebrows.
“What are you talking about…”.
She couldn’t keep talking because Aster suddenly grabbed her neck and lifted her from the ground, with a death serious face he slowly spoke.
“This little trick might have worked if it wasn’t against me, unfortunately you chose the wrong target… let me tell you a little secret, the girl you are trying to imitate has cuddled with me almost every night since I have use of reason, so at this point I perfectly know the rhythm of her heart beating and how it changes when she is close to me”.
Aster walked back to the stone where “Alice” was sitting before he descended from the sky, he sat down while still keeping a firm grip around her neck before continuing.
“But that was not the only thing that gave you away, I perfectly remember the fragrance of my own sister’s body since I have tasted it so many times, you did manage to act as clingy as her but Alice will always aim for the right arm instead of the left one, it has been like that since the first time she met Aria, should I continue with the list?”.
“Alice”, was having trouble to breath due to Aster’s hand applying force on her neck, at some point she stopped trying to undo his grip and simply took out a knife and stabbed him on the neck.
*clang*
The sound of metal colliding combined with sparks produced by friction made “Alice’s” eyes widen, she looked downwards to the place where the knife should be stabbing him but… the knife simply bent itself against his neck.
Aster shook his head.
“Just because you are at the stellar constellation realm, doesn’t mean you are capable of hurting me… although I knew you were not my Alice, I was still a bit hesitant about what I’m about to do, but you helped me overcome that last piece of doubt”.
Suddenly black tree roots surrounded Aster but before they approached him, blue flames light up with him as the center.
“Ahhhrghhh”.
“Alice”, screamed due to the pain of being burned alive, her voice changed from the one of Alice to a guttural and hoarse tone, the black roots were also burned until only a thin dust remained, Aster stopped Rigel’s flame from spreading and the flames were absorbed back by his body.
He saw the thing that he was grabbing by the neck, now that it was not disguised as Alice its true form became visible, it was some kind of tree female monster, the best reference will be a treant, but unlike what Aster knew from games and movies back on earth, this one was black and it had some kind of black smoke coming from its body, which gave off an eerie disgusting feeling.
“Rigel’s flame is not hot, so that smoke is a natural trait from whatever this thing is”, he thought.
The thing asked in an exhausted voice.
“W-who the hell are you?”.
Aster smiled.
“Someone who loves his sister a bit too much I guess, but let’s not get too much into that, I will make the questions here”.
“What is this place, what is the strongest realm someone has reached here?”.
The thing remained silent for a moment but as soon as it saw Rigel’s flame appearing again it screamed.
“W-waitttt, I will answer… we are in a planet called Prasil and this is the Luonto continent, I don’t know too much about the human’s current civilization but the last time I left this forest, the human who called himself king was at the peak of the star vertex realm”.
Aster frowned his eyebrows.
“Star vertex realm? what is that”, he asked.
The creature was surprised.
“How can you not know… perhaps you are not a human also, then why are you attacking me!!! aghh”.
Aster tightened his grip to stop her tantrum.
“I have a really good smell sense and you reek of blood and death, I guess you trick people who pass by this place to eat them or something like that, normally I couldn’t care less since your victims are not my friends nor familiars but you tried to kill me… using the appearance of someone dear to me and that will be your end”.
“Besides you already know I’m not from this place, you did say “I knew you will find me soon”, after all”.
The creature didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, she couldn’t read the mind, her ability to imitate others depended completely on feelings, when she saw the young man in front of her floating, she got the image of the girl along with, preoccupation, love and longing so she decided to use that to consume that young man, who would have thought she would become the prey instead of the predator.
“What’s more this human didn’t seem to be a native of this continent since he didn’t recognize the might of a star vertex realm cultivator”, the creature resigned herself.
“I know you won’t spare me but since I answered your questions at least give me a painless end”.
Aster shook his head.
“We are still not done here, tell me the direction of the closest human city near this forest”.
The creature pointed at west.
“Just follow that direction and you will reach a city”.
Aster nodded, his hand covered in golden light for a moment and the head of the creature separated from the rest of its body which withered away soon after that.
“Unlike being refined by Rigel’s flame, annihilation is instant so there is no time to feel pain, well… if that’s how I want it to be”, he thought.
Aster walked away before using lightning trail to leave this place as fast as possible, even if he couldn’t get too much information from that creature, he was sure of one thing, there were human natives here and they were stronger than the star formation realm which meant that this place was not a secret realm with an inheritance from ancient times but… a completely different world.
Luckily Alice’s relative position was also at west so they would not need to change direction once Aster found her.
About 200 kilometers from Aster’s current position there was a scene of devastation, here the forest was green again instead of yellow or at least that’s how it was supposed to be but right now a big part of the place was burned down, little rests of black flames remained burning what looked like vines and in the middle of all this there was a beautiful young lady with red yes resting.
“I really hate this secret realm, first I got separated from him and now these stupid vines keep attacking me for no reason!!!”.
Alice was feeling exasperated, she has been moving through the forest for almost half a day and not only she hasn’t found an exit but at some point, these vines started attacking her out of nowhere and no matter how much she destroyed them, cut them or burn them with her destruction attribute they kept coming after her.
She stood up seeing another wave of vines appearing around her, she gritted her teeth before shouting.
“Once Aster is here, I would like to see these stupid vines reappearing after being reduced to nothingness humph”.
And thus, she started her 28th round of walking through the forest and fighting against the vines.