Chapter 1150
Having watched Liberty break free of its rocky bonds, Anton had no further obligations in Klar for the moment. It was a little bit of a waste to come out all that way for a single event, but not nearly as much as it would have been a short time in the past. As Anton continued to grow in power, his speed continued to increase. Even before reaching Unity he had been able to cover multiple light years per day, and afterwards…
He was a bit faster now. If considering neighboring systems, he could traverse perhaps one or two per day. That would still make a trip back to the core of the Lower Realms Alliance a journey of nearly a month, but Anton thought it was pretty good that it wasn’t closer to years or centuries.
Plus, there was a caveat there. He could travel that quickly between arbitrary destinations, but if he had bound stars along the path he could do much better.
It would take Anton a few days to reach his nearest bound star, at which point Chidi would have already entered the Lower Realms. The inter-realm ships were not quick, which was why they were generally intercepted by speedier replacements, leaving them free to shuttle people back and forth across the border.
If Anton left now, he could catch Chidi long before he reached Ceretos… but because they were going to a central location like that he could afford to spend a bit more time in Klar.
Much of that time was spent not with his various acquaintances- nor, sadly, with his friend Bear Hug- but instead using his significant senses to observe new parts of the system. The makeup of interplanetary species was quite interesting, and the various methods of mobility were being recorded for use by ship designers. It was unlikely that any of the various biological propulsion methods would be directly usable for ships, but they could certainly inform design. At least, that was what Anton heard they wanted the information for.
When he finished some observations, he resolved to spend a longer period in the system building up relationships and helping to spread language when he next had an opportunity. But for the moment, he had an obligation to meet.
-----
The trip to the nearest bound star was relatively boring, but nowhere near as slow and uneventful as Anton’s first interstellar journey alone. Anything measured in days was fairly trivial, as he’d been raised with more than sufficient patience for such a journey even with little stimulus. Obviously since he became a cultivator and his lifespan widened, he became even more comfortable with days slipping away.