Ryu walked back into the Violet Olive mansion as though he couldn't see all the eyes stuck onto him.

After a brief exchange of words with Giveon he was assigned his own room and quickly disappeared to it, not bothering with any sort of pleasantries.

Giveon took a deep breath after gazing toward Ryu's disappearing back. After a while, he glanced back toward Grim, Dru and Amie, but all three seemed to be lost in their own worlds. Sometimes they would tremble involuntarily as though remembering some trauma before going back to being dazed.

The burly man who had been by Giveon's side frowned at such a sight. Just what happened to make them act like this?

Annette's frown was deep. She too wanted to know where such a monster had appeared from. And, worse yet, how could such a talent not have been accepted into a Faction?

As a Faerie, she was very sensitive to life force. She could tell that that Ryu was exceptionally young for his cultivation level. If not, he would appear to be so… bright.

Of course, she couldn't tell his exact age, or else she would have been maddened to the point of losing all hope in the world. A 20 year old Connecting Heaven Realm expert was completely unheard of. But, a 20 year old that could defeat Half-Step Path Extinction Realm experts was a mind boggling matter all to its own.

"That's enough idling. We need to start preparing for next month's quota. We also need to be prepared for retaliation.

"From now on, no small teams will be formed. Missions will be completed in groups of ten at worst and each team must carry a City Teleportation Token.

"

"Leader!

"

Giveon turned his attention toward the burly man, Gilbert.

"Are we really going to leave things as is? He's definitely a plant from another Team. I didn't say anything before because I felt he was too weak to accomplish anything. But, if he really dealt with Liluo, we can't allow things to continue like –

"

Gilbert couldn't even finish his words before a spark of violet lightning tore through the air, whipping against his head.

BANG!

Gilbert's head burst into a rain of charred blood and flesh.

Half of his face remained attached to his neck, leaving a gruesome sight.

"Tch. It's unfortunate that this wasn't a true death. What an annoying man.

" Annette clicked her tongue, swinging her dainty feet without a care.

By now, Annette realized she had made a mistake. If Ryu was truly a Body Cultivator, that meant that Ailsa was more powerful than she had thought.

Body Realm Cultivation was known for its slow speed along with its difficulty. However, commoner Cultus Faeries were Qi Realm cultivators. In all likelihood, Ailsa was already within the Path Extinction Realm.

The room fell into silence, a cold wind blowing through as Gilbert slowly fell over.

"I hope that makes my stance clear.

" Giveon's tone was even as though nothing had just happened. But, it was precisely because of this that the other Team members kept their mouths closed.

Giveon's stance was obvious for all to see. The next few months would be a hard stance for Violet Olive, even actions deemed to toe the line would be punished harshly.

After Liluo's betrayal, they had been on their backfoot. But now that there was a chance to recover, Giveon planned on grasping it tightly.

…

Ryu entered a spacious room, uncaring for what was happening below. Instead, his mind was completely focused on the clear spheres now in his inventory.

He took them out one by one and arranged them in the room. Soon, an oppressive aura came down. But, this time, Ryu allowed it to impact himself.

There was a reason Ryu had been so intrigued by this treasure despite the fact it was useless in the real world. The disconnect he felt while within its barrier… It was eerily similar to the disconnect he felt whenever he cultivated.

It sounded like a weird comparison to make. After all, cultivating, by definition, was communicating with the Heavens. So, what could it possibly have to do with this barrier?

But, one had to remember Ryu's Chaotic Silk Meridians.

It could be argued that the greatest source of Ryu's strength wasn't his Heavenly Pupils, nor was it his body's strength… It was his Chaos Qi.

This energy, standing on the same level as Essence, made his attacks and defense so potent that Ryu was certain that he had no opponents at the same cultivation level.

Still, Ryu always felt like something was missing.

Whenever he cultivated, he catalyzed neutral qi into Chaos Qi. Or, rather, his special meridians completed this task for him. But, the extra step caused Ryu's cultivation to slow by a measure.

Of course, with Ryu's already obscene cultivation speed, he was still far faster than most others. But, this small extra step added up to a lot over time, especially when cultivators usually evaluated their time on an order of millions of years.

A few seconds for every minute of cultivation was enough to snowball into tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of years wasted.

Beyond that, the situation might only get worse after Ryu reconnected his Spiritual Foundation. The push and pull of the conventional path of cultivation versus this clearly unconventional path would always slow Ryu down by a step or two.

However, Ryu found a bit of hope in this treasure.

Though it wouldn't be of use in the real world, Ryu felt like the illusion of being cut off from reality allowed him to focus on his Chaotic Silk Meridians with far greater detail. He could feel its subtle nuances, its needs, and he could even faintly feel a connection to that mysterious Plane Ailsa had mentioned.

According to Ryu's knowledge, there had only ever been this Plane, the Ethereal Plane, and the Abyssal Plane… However, this fourth Plane, the Plane he and Ailsa named the Chaos Plane… Well, even the Cultus Clan had never heard of it before.

It all left Ryu feeling very intrigued.

Just what was this Plane? And how were his Chaotic Silk Meridians related to it?

Ryu felt that this formation just might be able to help him find out.