Path to Transcendence

He was waiting outside the cave entrance for Julius to return. He had already collected the cores of the monsters as well as any valuable materials he could scavenge. They were gathered together, and he was going to try to give them to Julius when he came back out.
At least that was his plan. Almost an hour later, and the boy hadn’t come out yet. More worrisome was that he was constantly hearing little explosions deep in the cave. At first, he thought it was Julius fighting a monster or something. But then the sounds and shockwaves kept on going for way too long.
Not only that, but the blasts were way too consistent. If he didn’t know any better, it was like someone was trying to excavate.
He wondered to himself.
As he was sitting there, waiting for Julius to come back out, he suddenly stood up. His eyes hardened, and he drilled his aura to the location where he felt someone sneaking around. He demonstrated why his aura was one of his greatest strengths, and it slammed into this figure with a lot of power.
Their invisible form flickered for a moment when his aura disrupted whatever stealth skill they were using. However, to their credit, his aura was only able to stun them for a brief moment, not long enough for him to take them out.
His sword just barely missed their throat, and he was about to attack again, but they launched a half-dozen arrows at his face. He was forced to teleport out of the way and took out his other sword with his left hand.
His aura channeled along his blades. The aura was so powerful that it created small sparks, and a dense white glow radiated from the edges.
Soon, he found himself under attack from even more arrows. These arrows were made of mana and were difficult to dodge since his opponent could manipulate them however they wanted. They had various effects; some of them had a stun effect, others had a poison effect, and some of them even had effects he wasn’t able to recognize.
This didn’t deter him, though. He dashed forward, his two swords at his side as he dodged and weaved through the barrage of arrows. Some of them started to explode when they neared him, but he used his aura to create a bubble of protection. This bubble helped absorb a lot of the explosive power, and he was able to cross the distance without having to use his teleportation skill.
The person's figure became clearer as he got closer. She tried to get away, but she must not have had a teleportation skill like he did. Instead, she had a wind-based movement skill that allowed her to move very fast. Unfortunately for her, he wasn’t too much slower than her.
He used his teleportation skill to get up right in her face, his swords already swinging for her head. A shield of verdant green appeared in front of her face. His swords were halted for a brief moment, but he pushed more aura through his body and was able to overwhelm the barrier.
Unfortunately for him, that gave her just enough time to blast herself backward, and she created a platform in the air, using it as a springboard that propelled her even further upwards.
Now she was above him, her bow readied with a lot of mana being concentrated on an arrow. He clicked his tongue. He hated fighting people who could fly or mimic it, like she did.
“Who are you?” She suddenly asked loudly, her bow string not fluttering for a moment despite the immense force being strained against it.
“Who am I? Who are you? You are the one who was sneaking around like an assassin,” he said flatly, already preparing his aura. He had dealt with similar skill sets in the past and had several tricks for handling them.
“My name is Lyra, and I am looking for someone,” she said with narrowed eyes.
Jonas didn’t sense any deception in her aura, so she either had exceptional control or she was telling the truth. He decided to give her a slight chance and lowered his swords.
“Who are you looking for?” He asked.
She was silent and didn’t seem like she was about to answer. However, he already had a suspicion.
“Does he have black hair?” He asked her slowly.
He could sense her aura palpitate for a brief moment, so he continued. “Is he perhaps freakishly strong, and sometimes his eyes glow a scary red?”
She took the tension off her bow string and looked at him with a scrunch of her eyebrows. “Where is he?”
Jonah, seeing that she was calming down, placed his swords back into his storage ring. “He went in there,” he said while pointing at the entrance of the cave. “Why are you looking for him?”
She glared at him but still answered him. “We teamed up.”
“Ah! You must have been the person who came with him earlier. I thought I sensed another aura presence nearby.” He had been so focused on the gray monsters that he hadn’t seen her before. He had only taken notice of Julius when the boy smashed his fists into the swarm of monsters.
“Well… do you want to wait with me?” He offered.
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She frowned. “Wait?”
He nodded and pointed at the stack of goodies he had gathered. “Yeah, I was planning to wait for him and give him this stuff when he came back out,” he explained.
“Why?”
He scoffed. “To be his friend, of course,” he said, as if it were apparent.
He didn’t like the judgmental look on her face when she heard that part. But he ignored it. She didn’t know how terrifying Noelle Willow could be. If she did, she would likely be doing the exact same thing that he was.
However, despite her judgmental thoughts, she still decided to join him. She walked over to a nearby rock and sat down as if they hadn't been trying to kill each other moments earlier. He nodded to himself as the two of them waited for the black-haired youth to come out. Occasionally, the sounds of soft explosions echoed from the cave.
***
“Okay, forget it. If you don’t leave, I will actually kill you,” the voice growled out.
“No! Please, just a few more minutes. I am getting close, I can feel it!” Julius said in a panic. His aura control, as well as his ability to control his emblem, was rapidly improving.
In fact, he had already gained a level in his aura skill during this time. That wasn't to mention the improvements he had made outside of skill levels.
“I am not your teacher, and you are still annoying. You should be glad that Vailon has already told me about you. If not, I would have killed you and little Seraphyne, who is now dwelling inside of you.”
Julius grinned. “I knew something was weird. You were being oddly nice to me.” Vailon might not have told Julius about other locations, like the lake. Still, Julius wondered if the spirit had told anyone else, especially after this being hadn’t killed him despite being a nuisance.
“I shattered almost every bone in your body at this point. If you think that is me being nice, I genuinely feel bad for you and your upbringing,” the grumpy voice said flatly.
“It’s okay, I have a good healing skill,” he said proudly. He didn’t bother to hide it either; this being had already seen it in action.
The voice went quiet for a long time, something that worried Julius more than he cared to admit. Despite the grumpy voice being irritated, he would constantly reprimand Julius as he got smashed across the cave. But there was never silence.
“Um, hello? Are you still there?” He tried to call out and got silence in return.
“Mr. Spirit?”
“I’m not a spirit,” the voice snapped out.
“Oh, you are still here, nice! Wait, so you are not a spirit? So what are you then?” Julius asked, genuinely curious.
The voice ignored him, remaining silent for several moments.
“I have an idea,” the voice suddenly stated.
“Oh? Is it using that skill against me again? I would really love that!” He said excitedly. His progression with his emblem was always a little slow. There were just so few opportunities where he was forced to use it. That meant he had fewer chances to improve it. Freya was trying to help him, but without any practical applications, he found himself getting stuck more frequently than not.
“No, you insane masochist. I decided that I will keep you trapped in a hole until your time limit in this realm expires.”
“Wait…”
“You won’t be able to leave, get any tokens, or treasures. You will be stuck in that hole with nothing to do. And no, I will not use any of my skills against you,” the voice added.
“Okay, we don’t have to go that far,” Julius said with some worry.
“Don’t we? You won’t leave after all,” the voice pointed out, their irritation unconcealed.
Julius rubbed his head. “I’m sorry. I get carried away when I experience interesting skills. I might have pushed your patience too far.” He was embarrassed. When looking back at his behavior, it was a miracle that this voice hadn’t smeared him into a fleshy paste. Julius had been an annoying asshole to satisfy his own curiosity.
“You think?”
He bowed deeply and let his aura bloom out to demonstrate his genuine repentance. Something that the voice surprisingly accepted with a softer scoff.
“Um, what can I do to make things right? Do you need me to do something or want something in return?” He asked.
“Your dead body would be preferred, but I promised Vailon that I wouldn’t, since you are carrying Seraphyne out of here. However, you leaving here promptly would be an acceptable proposition as well.”
“That second option doesn’t sound too bad,” Julius said quickly.
“I agree, so leave now.”
Julius stood up and bowed deeply at the wall where he imagined the voice was. “Again, I apologize for my rudeness.”
“It’s fine. I punished you accordingly; it's just too bad you seem to enjoy pain and suffering. Suppose I had known that beforehand, I would have handled things differently. It would have been a lot easier for me,” the voice said with regret.
“Sorry.”
“Just get out of here.”
Julius just nodded and walked away. [Sage of Savagery] was no longer influencing him so much, and he realized that he should probably leave before their impatience reached its limit.
“Leave it,” the voice called out dryly.
Julius pulled the stone from his pocket with a disappointed frown. He gave it one last look and dropped it to the ground. The pebble from the ridiculously hard wall tumbled at his feet.
“Leave the other one too.”
Julius spun around and pointed at the wall. “How did you know?” The stone he had in his pocket was supposed to be the bait, just in case the creature noticed. While the one he had snuck inside his ring was one he planned on keeping. Yet his plan was seen through with ease.
He removed the stone and held it in his hands. It was one of the prettier ones as well—such a shame.
“Can I please keep this one? It looks like a cat.” He wasn’t lying either. The rock had two little juts that looked like cat ears and had the general face of a feline.
“No.”
“Please? I will take good care of it! I will put it inside a nice little display case and show it off,” Julius tried to convince the voice to let him keep it.
“Fine. Just hurry up,” the voice relented.
“Thank you! I will try to come back to apologize properly later!” Julius called out as he walked away.
“No! Do not do that! I will bury you ten miles below the fucking ground if you do that!” The voice called out to him. If Julius didn’t know any better, it sounded like he was a little scared.
Julius wasn’t kidding either. He would be more than willing to come back and apologize once the voice was in a better mood. It was probably well deserved. In the meantime, he had to get back, and hopefully that creepy, friendly guy wasn’t around.