The White Box

After his exploration of the Vermont mine as well as the discovery of what he felt to be the secret of the mine, Asher departed straight home the next day. Compared to finding out who was the spy in the family, exposing Randel's fraudulent actions wasn't as important.

'It's not like he's going anywhere, and the longer he stays, the greater the chances he would slip up one day.' Asher thought.

Returning to the family mansion, Asher went to his room and locked the place up. He also activated a noise-cancellation spell and a formation that sealed the entire room.

'Let's see what I got.'

Asher went through the items in his storage ring and separated them into two; the ones he knew were in there and the ones that suddenly appeared. The latter was without a doubt, the items the soul fragment sent into his storage ring.

'These could come in handy in time.' Asher thought.

Among the items were some Ope and Klobat crystals, medicinal herbs and pills of varying grades, two mana cultivation techniques, a sword art manual, and a white sword with a crystal blade. Asher kept aside the Ope crystals and pills before studying the mana cultivation manuals as well as the sword art. In his past life, Asher was not a fan of weapons and mostly used his fists and palms in combat. However, that didn't mean that he had no knowledge of weapon arts, but that he only preferred using his hands. He did, however, have a preferred weapon choice, but it wasn't a sword.

With his extensive knowledge, Asher could figure out the value of a manual with just a short scan, and he could see that the sword art, as well as the two mana cultivation techniques, were pretty impressive. Sadly, Asher wasn't a man of swords, but since he had no weapon that could currently match the quality of the sword, he decided to keep it.

Weapons were classified into Human, Guardian, Legendary, Sage and Saint classes, with each class having three grades; from the lowest grade three to the highest, grade one. The same classification also applied to pills, and even herbs to an extent. The sword Asher, using this world's standards, was a grade one Legendary sword, but according to the description in a manual attached to the sword, the weapon's power was sealed and forced down one class to grade one Guardian sword. Furthermore, a special formation was set on it to prevent the power from leaking out to prevent Asher from standing out and attracting unnecessary attention to it. So at first sight, although it looked stylish, the sword would only give off the feeling of a grade three Guardian sword.

Although this was still worth a lot in the Great Dawn kingdom, a grade three Guardian was equivalent to the first 4 stages of the Guardian realm, so it wasn't so precious to the big noble families.

'I doubt anyone in this realm would be able to figure out the real value of this sword.' Asher smirked.

From the first set of treasures given to him by the soul fragment, the sword, as well as the two mana cultivation techniques were the most valuable, but to Asher, who had a deep knowledge of cultivation arts and techniques, the sword and resources were much more valuable.

'Time for the main prize'

Asher sheathed back the sword and kept it aside along with the manuals. He then lifted the sleeve on his right hand to reveal a tattoo on his arm. It was the same symbol that was on the box; 22 circles with 22 lines and a door with a hammer drawn on it at the centre of the smallest circle.

'I have to find a way to keep this hidden. I don't know what the symbol stands for, but that doesn't mean that the mysterious organization after me doesn't know about it either.'

Asher focused his attention on the mark on his arm. Asher tried passing his mana through the mark, and it reacted. With a low glow, the mark went down towards his palm before materializing the white box from before.

Just like in the underground throne room, the mana density in the room increased.

'Luckily, I made proper arrangements.' Asher sighed.

Not only had he sealed his room with a formation, but he had also sent away his personal maids and guards, and ordered that the entire mansion be empty. Apart from the Decagon who protected his mother's room and any possible other such individuals with a designated task in the building, the entire mansion was empty. Decagons were Darius' loyal death soldiers, so Asher wasn't afraid that they would be curious about any change in the building, try to question him or even spread the news.

'If the mana concentration is this exaggerated even with the box sealing it, I wonder how large the change would be once I open the box? What could even be inside?'

Asher placed the box on a table and examined it. He then noticed a button by the two sides of the box and clicked on them.

Click.

The lid went open and a surge of mana exploded from the box.

'No, this isn't just mana... Impossible!' Asher's eyes widened in shock.

Not even when the soul fragment had revealed his identity as a transmigrator was he this shocked. It was almost like someone seeing a dead person come back to life, but the intense emotions Asher felt were three times that. This was because he had seen something that he never expected to be here.

'This energy. It's the energy of a Celestial Emperor.'

A Celestial Emperor was the strongest explored realm in the universe, to Asher's knowledge. It was also the last realm of power Asher had reached in his last life; the final rank before attaining true godhood. A Celestial Emperor could easily live seven hundred thousand years and show no signs of ageing. Their life expectancy was usually between five million and ten million years and the power they wielded had gone beyond the simple definition of heaven-defying. They could even create the heavens and the earth, a brand new major heaven[1]. In his past life, there were only two other Celestial Emperors before Yi Feng for the past one trillion years of the 33 heavens' existence. That's to show the difficulty of reaching that realm of power.

Asher never expected that there would be someone capable of reaching such a level of power in this world, after all, the publicly known strongest in this 'lower land' was still a Dantian Opening cultivator or a Heroic stage mage, and they were said to only exist in the stronger kingdoms and empires. One of the reasons why the Great Dawn kingdom declined from the top five spot of the 13 kingdoms -infinitely close to even matching the top three- was because of the death of its Heroic mage. If the lower land was this weak, the Upper land wouldn't be so absurd, so Asher believed the strength cap there to be at the Perfected Cultivator realm or the Saint stage, two realms lower than the Celestial Emperor rank. For there to have existed a Celestial Emperor before in this world was big news, and Asher would have to face the Kilin continent with a different look.

'Hmm? Wait. There's another energy.' Asher was surprised.

If it weren't for his sensitive soul and psychic energy, Asher would have failed to notice it.

'The heck? This energy, isn't it…?' Asher's body froze on the spot in shock.