At this point the woman at the second floor of the green castle didn’t know what to think.

“Spirit beasts do trust others of a similar but higher race, could that little girl descend from an amphitere race instead of a Storm Roc… no that would explain why the Black Corrosive Fang Snake acted to tame, but not the thing with the crystals at the cave”, mumbled the woman trying to find out how was that little girl accomplishing such things.

The she gazed at other of the projections, this one showed a really pale and fragile looking girl of about 19 years old, who surprisingly took what could be considered the hardest “riddle”, for her as it required the most physical demanding activity.

The girl in the projection was none other than Vivian who was climbing the mountain, at a slow but firm pace.

“But why, she smelled like poison so the swamp landscape should be a paradise for her… what is she saying?”, mumbled the woman.

A moment ago, Vivian met a really challenging decision, the swamp landscape was the easiest for her, but it would make her body definitely generate poison, the result might be not as bad as she thinks, but there was the possibility that things got bad.𝒐𝐯𝐋xt.𝗰𝑜𝕞

The cave was the same, being faced by the possibility of getting crushed by the crystal pillars would make her body create a poison strong enough to melt them, but that would mean she would lose a lot of her mobility and her sight.

And that only left her with the option of the mountain, which needed for her to use put a lot of physical effort, but her body won’t do anything unless she falls, as she has experienced a similar situation once before when she was a little kid and tried to grab something at a high placed bookshelf.

“The mountain it is then”, she mumbled as she started walking towards the path at the left.

Although Vivian isn’t the type that complains, she couldn’t help but show a bit of reluctance in her pretty face, once she saw the imposing mountain up close, but after making up her mind she started climbing.

The first dozens of meters weren’t hard at all, she could use her soul energy to make up for her lack of physical strength, but once she reached the one hundred meter mark, she was suddenly hit by a strong gust of wind.

A dull sound echoed through the mountain followed by the sound of something shattering, and Vivian nearly losing her footing due to the impact.

A pattern with the shape a snake appeared on the backside of her hands, then her usually clean transparent nails turned black, as a transparent liquid leaked out of the tip of her fingers making her fingers dive into the rock ladder, until she was able to hold onto the mountain both physically and with her soul energy.

Vivian’s vision suddenly blurred as the black pattern extended from her nails to her whole fingers, which made her bit her lips with frustration, although she didn’t covet the Emerald Whirlwind, she wanted to face the trials to prove herself, that’s why she entered the green castle

‘No, not now’, she thought as she tightened her grip on the ladder of the mountain, then the smiling image of the first person she saw after recovering her vision for the first time since she was a child, flashed in her mind.

A tall, handsome black-haired boy with a confident and gentle aura, besides the first genuinely not scared expression she has seen in someone who was near her.

“Mm?”, to Vivian’s surprise, for the first time in her 22 years of existence, her body constitution backed off a bit, the black pattern receded until it was only covering her nails, and her vision returned to normal.

It took Vivian a moment to process what just happened, but ultimately, she couldn’t pinpoint it so she just returned to climbing the mountain, whenever she needed it, she used the poison that leaked from the tip of her fingers to carve a handle into the mountain and just used her soul energy to redirect the impact of the gust of wind.

Because the wind was so strong that the barriers, she made with soul energy practically exploding upon contact, making her take the backslash.

Each time she was about to fall, her body forced the patter to expand which made her lose some of her sight, but then she just mumbled a single word and then clarity returned to her eyes.

The previous is what the woman at the second floor of the castle saw, she read Vivian’s lips every time she stopped climbing until she could understand what she was saying.

‘What an interesting group’, thought the woman to herself.

…

Back to Aster, he took his time to walk through the swamp and managed to see at least fifteen or so different poisonous spirit beasts, all of which fled as soon as he was within fifty meters of them, wherever he passed the swamp evaporated, and the vegetation regained a colorful green tone, even the thorns fell of the plants.

While it might sound beautiful, he was actually destroying a ecosystem, but he really didn’t care because all those spirit beasts and plants tried to attack him, and none of them would have shown him mercy, so he was the same, if anything he didn’t go out of his way to hunt the spirit beasts, and as long as they moved aside they were fine, some stubborn ones actually jumped from the swamp or the trees, but exploded in blue flames as soon as they were within ten meters of Aster, leaving nothing but a white dust that then joined the refreshing and floral scented mist produced by Rigel’s flames purifying the water and mud of the swamp.

It only took Aster about half an hour to go through the swamp, mostly because he didn’t have to take any detour as the vegetation changed to a non-harming one which allowed him to touch the leaves, trunks and branches of trees, which would normally cause one’s skin to itch, burn and then melt away due to a poisonous reaction.

Just like after getting out of the cave, Aster found himself at the beginning of the three paths after leaving the swamp, the sign was the same as before giving the chance to leave, or continue with the risk of failing if he couldn’t solve the third path’s riddle.

That being said, there was a difference this time too, the path at the right and middle one, in other words the ones that led to the riddles he has already solved, fused in a single one, with a bigger and more detailed door that led to the second trial.

‘Let’s see what’s the third riddle about’, thought Aster as he walked towards the path on the left.

On the way Aster couldn’t help but wonder how were his companions doing, especially a little girl who was the weakest among all the presents, but also pretty smart despite the lack of experience in the real world she has.

“Knowing her, she probably has become friends with those poisonous spirit beasts”, mumbled Aster as he chuckled.

And he wasn’t that far from the truth, right now Kana had gone through about half of the distance that the swamp covers, and there was a strange situation ongoing.

The normally territorial and aggressive poisonous spirit beasts who fight and wound each other, for the sake of the poison spirit energy that certain parts of the swamp produce, were all, swimming, sliding, crawling or moving through the tree branches, all next to each other.

And in the middle of that strange looking “pack”, there was a pitch-black serpent whose upper half was out of the water of the swam, as it advanced, with a little girl sitting on its wide back.

“Oh, so that’s how it is, you all live here and pay with your poison to the sister that owns the swamp, in exchange for the spirit energy that some of these plants produce to advance in your cultivation”.

“But then there is often a conflict when a certain wave of extra delicious spirit energy appears in some parts of the swamp?” said Kana to a swamp alligator turtle of about three meters of size that was advancing at the right-side o the pitch-black serpent.

The turtle slowly nodded with its alligator shaped head, which made Kana sigh.

“Wouldn’t it be easier, for you all to take a turn at the spots, even the winner has to spend a long time recovering from all the wounds, so why not share and use that time to train, big brother says that all the resources and talent in the world, are worthless if one lacks determination or something to protect”.

The other spirit beast that was moving at the left side of the pitch-black snake, a dark green alligator with a horn on its forehead and spikes on its back, was looked by Kana which made it lower its head with an ashamed expression.

The woman at the second floor of the castle saw such a strange and bizarre situation unfold in the projection and she was in a loss of words.

“The black-haired youth killed my Swamp Poisonous Mangroves and a lot of poisonous spirit beasts, without even a tinge of remorse and yet this little girl who is travelling with him and seem to look up to him, doesn’t seem to be able to hurt a fly… also what’s her race to be able to make those guys act so harmoniously”, mumbled the woman with a contemplative expression on her face.

While the woman was busy looking at Kana’s performance, Aster reached the foot of the mountain and after looking at his surroundings, he wasn’t able to discern what was the trick of this landscape.

“I guess I’ll have to reach the top of the mountain”, he said as he shrugged, if anything he noticed flying was forbidden, luckily, he had a way to move through the air even before he had the ability to fly thanks to his cultivation realm.

Aster took some distance from the mountain, before he focused onto the soles of his feet, lightning started to crackle on feet.

Then as if a lightning had fallen where he was standing, Aster became a flash appearing on the sky about fifteen meters above where he was standing, leaving behind a burnt mark on the ground.

With a grin on his face, he started flashing all over the place, with each step there was an explosion and a sudden lightning discharge before he appeared a dozen of meters above his previous position.

“Booom!”, but then when he reached the one-hundred-meter mark, Aster’s ascension was stopped by a sudden gust of wind that came out of nowhere.

The woman who was frankly surprised to see the incredible display of coordination and control over spirit energy, Aster casually showed by using his original technique created thanks to the combination of the paragon body and the movement technique his mother gifted him, in other words “Lightning Trail”, shook her head a bit disappointed at the fact that the black haired youth got too confident and was blown away by the random gusts of wind, set to appear after the first one hundred meters of the mountain.

“Wind is the most unpredictable element and one shouldn’t…”, the words of the woman stuck on her throat as she saw the result of the gust of wind landing a full hit on the black-haired youth.

The loud dull sound was the result of the wind breaking against a golden armor what suddenly clad the black-haired youth, giving him a majestic aura, and while the strength of the impact was enough to make him step back once, he was completely unscathed.

‘Oh, so that’s the trick of this landscape, wind resistance and impact endurance, what a shame, even when the invincible time of the armor is gone, I have yet to find something that can destroy the armor of the paragon body, though extremely heavy impacts can bypass the protection prior the invincible period, mom made sure that I can at least endure one of her “love” punches’, thought Aster as he became a flash of lightning that shot upwards, ignoring the gusts of wind that hit him with enough force to create thunder-like sound explosions.

“Seriously, what the hell is up with the younger generation nowadays”, mumbled the woman with a defeated expression on her face.