Chapter 379
Ra’thala had never minded fights, spars, battles, or even death feuds where only one side could walk away. They were a part of gathering power and influence. Friendly fights could also be a good way to learn about someone, and these Ascenders seemed interesting.
If he was understanding the bits and pieces of information he had picked up correctly, these people were the strongest fighters in this Realm at their cultivation level. That would have been reason enough to fight them in normal circumstances, but Ra’thala wanted to see for himself just how much his power had increased with his arrival to this Realm. It had felt like a complete fundamental reworking of himself in the moment of his Ascension, but he had nothing to base the feeling off of.
Another part of him wanted to see just how well his Celestial Guides stood up to the absurdly simple method these people used. It was undeniable these people were more advanced in many ways than his own, but it would be foolish to extrapolate that to mean everything about them was more advanced. Their way of guiding essence might work, but it was the epitome of simplicity, to the point that he couldn’t believe it was effective. Everything he knew said that such a system couldn’t be very powerful. He also suspected that they had similar thoughts, but neither side really had a frame of reference until they were able to test things.
The Librarian seemed certain that their peoples had used similar methods before, but that time seemed so long ago that it was of dubious authority. And the best way to find out was to throw themselves at each other and battle it out.
After he agreed, he felt the world warp around them, and once more he was pulled across the stars.
This being the second time he had gone through this, he felt that he could have resisted the movement with either his Sky— Domain, or even a few of his skills, which gave him a degree of security being in a foreign Realm with still unfamiliar people.
His gut told him that these people weren’t bad, but he was still firmly in the trust but verify stage he was in anytime he went to an unfamiliar location or world.
Even the strongest people could get caught off guard if they weren't careful.
Looking around, he found himself in an area not too unfamiliar from what he was used to, which both caught him off guard and made him feel a bit more at ease. There were only so many ways to safely fight in an inhabited environment, and it seemed their peoples agreed on wide open areas protected by imbuements— skills, or no, enchantments, Ra’thala was pretty sure that was the correct translation.