71 Ataruth

"Mother... Will I ever be chosen by the fairy.." A beautiful green haired woman who stared at the giant trunks sighed in disappointment.

With the situation slowly getting worse , she knew that without the fairy help , she wouldn't be able to fight them head on with her enemy if they formed an alliance after a agreement.

With sharp brows , clear green eyes and a curvy body , the woman could be considered a fantasy of every man and precisely because she was the ruler of the Joyful Lake , many leaders proposed to her and tried to convince her marrying into an alliance was the way to go.

Even though she was allied with the Orange Coral sect and some few others , she was still not confident with her bleak situation in the future.

"Mis..Vaneria.. You have to rest early for tomorrow." A old woman who was dressed in black opened the room and carried a plate of tea.

"Aunty Mai... Thank you so much and please go sleep first , I will rest soon." Looking at the maid who took care of her ever since she was born , Vaneria looked at her with gentle eyes as she took the plate away from her hands.

"But miss.."

"No miss , Just Vaneria , I can do it myself , aunty , please go rest."

The old woman nodded with a smile and gently pulled the door as she left the room.

After the old maid left , the beautiful Vaneria sat down on her bed and meditated.

With an soothing and gentle aura floating around the room , her hair slowly changed into a green color.

'I can't let down my grand mother hard work..'

As Nodus and Ry'ia arrived at the group of hills that was situated on the edge of the southern land , the young man slowly rotated his head around as he could barely see anything through the clouds.

*Buzzzz!*

With a bright flash of light that was followed up by a tremor , Nodus quickly made his way toward the loud explosion sound that was on the further left side of the hills.

"Black Crow! Stop it , your attacks are too bright!"

"Right! It's so visible , what if they see us!?"

A big brown bear and a fat turtle was shouting at a big black bird as they stood in front of a orange squared shape barrier.

"But.. If we don't get through then how will we survive if stronger tiny humans arrives?!"

Big Green and Big brown remained quiet as they thought about those cultivator who used strange spells.

"I can't believe I am saying this but... He is righ-" Big Green stopped his speech as he look toward the direction of two shadows.

"Fat turtle."

Seeing the young man in black appearing from the clouds , Big Green couldn't help but to be excited while Big Brown sneakily made his way behind the turtle and pretended to be his shadow.

"Young one! It been a while." The turtle ran with his short legs and stood in front of Nodus with a big smile on his wrinkled face.

"Woah! So big!" Ry'ia who arrived slightly after Nodus surrounded the big turtle as she study the new and biggest magical beast she ever seen , especially the shell.

Although he was uncomfortable with the young girl sniffing on his carapace , Torta didn't not want to say anything as she was Nodus's friend.

"Hmm? There is something on here but I can't see it.." Ry'ia was trying to reach for the shell but could only give up because of the differences in height.

"These are?.."

Black Crow slowly made his way beside the turtle with his sharp claws as he tilted his head curiosly.

"These are.. young Nodus and..?"

Ry'ia happily introduced herself as a friend of Nodus and told them the good news about the portal while the young man made his way toward the cubical barrier that came out from the middle of a hill.

"A birth place...?"

Nodus took out his phase matter and pointed at the orange cube.

"Young one.. I don't thin-"

Although Black Crow heard about the young man's prowess from the turtle , he could still tell that the object that Nodus was holding did not emit any mana.

*Zzzz*

With a laser beam , Nodus drew a small circle and went inside of the barrier.

"What the!"

"Even us three couldn't break it with brute force..."

Big Brown and Big Green were disappointed as they thought of themselves as weaklings while the Black Crow was flapping his wings with a excited expression.

"Young man! What do you see in there? Is the tree hiding anything?!"

With the barrier slightly transparent and because of the hill covering the rest of the sides , they could only see the tree with a single shiny fruit while the shadow covered everything else on the inside.

" Unknown fruit specimen , rich source of energy matters. "

After scanning with the device , Nodus could tell exactly how much calories and even what kind of vitamin it had but that didn't matter for him as he jumped up the tree.

"Wait Nodus!" Ry'ia stood in front of the man-made entrance and shouted at the young man before he could pluck the fruit from the tree.

The young man simply nodded at her and watched the beautiful , yet immature girl moving the end of her nose up and down.

"I feel like the fruit.. Is connected to a spell."

Nodus lifted one eyebrow as he chuckled quietly.

'She doesn't smell but feels it..'

After sniffing around the tree , Ry'ia went in deeper into the shadows as she picked up a new trail of feelings.

"Here!" The young girl pointed at a smooth white stone that looked like a tomb.

After jumping down from the tree , Nodus used his device to scan the stone.

"Unknown material , 88% Lazled rock related."

"Ry'ia , leave the barrier now."

Although she was confused , the young girl still ran out of the barrier and stared at the young man who went back on the tree.

With his device on one hand while the other was gripping on the fruit , Nodus positioned himself as he prepared to bolt toward the plasma hole.

With a gentle pluck , Nodus jumped down and dashed toward the hole as the white stone glowed brightly in orange with a mysterious writing on the smooth surface.

*Boom!*

The ground trembled as the dirt around the tree flew everywhere as a dozen of white stones spun around each other and formed a human shaped figure.

"Phhhhhhhhhh!"

Ry'ia and the magical beast covered their ears as the white golem emitted a high pitch static noise.

"Boooom!" Although it didn't have very much space in the barrier , the golem could still give it a good beating as it's fist flew backward before shooting toward the orange wall.

"Wah..What is that?!"

Seeing that the barrier was still instact after many hits , the beast finally calmed down as they looked at Nodus.

"I am not sure , but it's related to the Ataruth race , the living rocks."

"A living rock..?" Ry'ia remained unafraid as she approached the barrier.

"Mhmm , It has a heart." Nodus stared at the golem who was mindlessly slamming onto the barrier as he thought of the times when his legion went into a mineral planet.

The gigantic golems who were so tall that they almost left the atmosphere of their planet were almost impossible to kill , after being blasted apart by thousands of missiles , they would slowly rebuilt themselves and the only way to kill them was to find the stoneheart.

'Interesting , a hybrid here.. what kind of world is this, or more like , where is this...' Nodus thought about the three stars and noticed that the light in his hand was slowly weakening.

"Ah! Young man , the fruit!"

Nodus nodded and threw the fruit at the fat turtle.

Before he threw it , he poked a hole into the fruit with his pinky and smeared the screen of his wrist with juice before passing it onto the beast to let them decide among themselves.

"Analyzing component.. 1%" With the liquid absorbed into the watch , Nodus smiled as he made his way out of the surrounding hills.

'The core..' Standing at the edge of the cliff with Ry'ia on his side , Nodus could see a gigantic ball of flames that emitted a small heat.

Looking all the way down , he could see a huge landmass and came up with a theory in his head. 'The core is suppose to be hotter if it's this small , which mean something underneath is absorbing or reflecting the heat..-'

As his calculations went on , the three beast came up behind them as they concluded their decisions.

"Old Green will need times to absorb the fruit so we will stand and guard him.." The Black Crow told Nodus that they decided to go back to the tunnel because they feared the tiny cultivators would find them faster if they stayed close to the edges.