Path to Transcendence

Julius was about to ask Kaelther another question, but before he could, the man suddenly vanished into thin air.
“Damn, I had some more questions,” he said disappointedly.
He sighed, but he knew that time was of the essence, and so he went over to his friends, creating a cart out of mana. He then proceeded to load his friends onto the cart, as if it were some furniture.
He didn’t spot Liam or Irene nearby, so he didn’t get to pick them up. However, he did end up picking up Riven as well. The mage seemed to be better off than his friends. There was no blood on his face, and it looked like he was sleeping peacefully.
Julius wasn’t as gentle as he was with his friends. He basically tossed Riven onto the cart like a sack of potatoes. He thought about finding Riven’s friend, but Julius still held a small grudge for her ambush on him, so he didn’t bother to. She could find her own way inside.
Once he was done, he noticed that most of the people were already beginning to stir. So before they could fully awaken, he quickly pushed the cart that held his friends inside the doors.
He was expecting something special upon entering, but nothing really happened. The only remarkable thing was the room he found himself in. The inside of the temple was breathtaking. Everything was spotless, pure white marble pillars, lined with iridescent gems.
The other thing that froze him in place was that Cadius was standing on a platform at the very center of the room. There was a big difference between what Julius had just seen several minutes beforehand.
The man’s iridescent eyes were almost entirely dull. There was color, but no sparkle. They were lifeless, and when they landed on Julius’s form, there was no sign of recognition. It was like it was a totally different person. Julius wasn’t even sure if this was the same person.
Only the similar aura signatures made him think that this was indeed Cadius. But the contrast was jarring.
It was a good thing that Cadius appeared this way as well, because Julius was half tempted to jump up there and punch the man in the face. Not because of how he treated Julius. No, because of how he hurt his friends.
He felt a surge of anger rush through him, and he reflexively shoved some fire mana into his crown, trying to form it into a spike. However, to his shock, he felt some kind of interference. It wasn’t like anything he had experienced either.
It wasn’t like the times when someone wiped out his technique. This felt very different. It was like he was utterly unable to weave together his mana, almost like he had forgotten how to use his mana.
If he could compare it to something, he would compare it to waking up one day and trying to write something down, only to find out that you weren’t able even to write your own name. You knew intuitively that you should be able to, but somehow all that knowledge disappeared.
He tried to do other things. He activated his enhancement skill, letting his mana, aura, and kinetic energy flow through his body. This only made him frown harder, since the skill worked as usual. He didn’t sense any differences and was able to enhance his body without issues.
What was the problem then? Was it just his crown?
He bit his lip and tried to create a thread of fire mana, infusing some of his mana into the sadistic crown. To his confusion, that seemed to work as well. He didn’t understand what had just happened.
He suddenly found he could use his techniques despite not being able to. The only difference he could think of was that he had been thinking about hurting Cadius. He had been toying with the idea of throwing an empowered spike at the man’s head.
The moment that thought came into his head, he felt that same interference again. Before he could sense what was happening, he felt his technique fall apart into harmless particles of mana. Even the ruinous aspect of the fire mana was taken care of with zero issues.
It had to be some kind of intent-based ward or enchantment, that was the only logical answer he could come up with. He knew that there had been a similar ward in front of the temple, but it hadn’t been like this. If you tried to hurt someone, you would be frozen in place. However, inside the temple, your entire technique and mana control would fall apart without you knowing how. It was much more uncomfortable.
He was going to keep on experimenting with the enchantment, but he noticed the cart of bodies start to shift. It would seem his friends were already waking up. Surprisingly, it was Aubrey who was the first to sit up. He had been expecting Riven to be the first one, considering his stronger willpower.
It would seem that Aubrey was full of surprises.
“Are you okay?” He asked her as she looked around with scrunched brows.
“What happened?” She asked groggily. He stifled the laugh when he saw her shove Riven off her body and to the ground. The mage’s body hit the stone floor with a dull thump and right onto his nose. Julius winced but rationalized to himself that Aubrey likely didn’t even know what she was doing.
“You don’t remember?” He asked worriedly.
“Not really, things are really fuzzy after that man showed up. I can’t remember what happened afterwards,” she said while rubbing her forehead, bumping her foot into Riven. She looked down and, none too gently, shoved the other guy away with her foot.
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He didn’t really give much attention to Riven; the mage would be fine. However, he ran his senses throughout Aubrey’s body once more. He didn’t see anything wrong with her, but he still gave her a gentle infusion of life mana just to be safe. However, even after that, her headache didn’t seem to be going away.
She pushed him away after a few moments of his smothering. “I’m fine, just a little foggy. What happened?” She asked with a serious look on her face.
Julius did his very best not to stare at Cadius and gave her a simple explanation. “Some asshole attacked all of us, and you guys passed out.”
“What?” She asked, sounding baffled.
“Yeah,” he said with a nod.
“An asshole?”
“Yeah, the biggest,” he said with a serious nod.
“Did you kick his ass?” Aubrey asked with an expectant look.
“Not yet.”
He saw a small hint of disappointment in her gaze, so he quickly added, “But he did get reprimanded by his boss.”
This didn’t seem to do anything but cause more confusion.
Still, he would have loved to kick Cadius’s ass, though. Too bad the man was much stronger than Julius. Their little clash of auras had shown as much. However, Julius liked to think that he could still get a good hit or two in before Cadius blasted him.
“Boss?” Aubrey asked, sounding more bewildered now than she had been at the beginning.
Julius waved off her concerns. “Never mind. Everything is fine now. I dragged you all inside the temple while you were out of it.”
“Wait, what happened?” A new voice spoke up. Julius looked over and saw Riven standing up, rubbing his nose with a wince.
Julius glanced at Aubrey and decided not to mention anything about how the mage got the sore nose.
“He said that we all got attacked by some asshole?” Aubrey answered for him.
“Attacked by an asshole? Is that why it feels like someone slammed me into the ground, face-first?”
Julius shrugged. “I don’t know. Everyone had bloody noses, so maybe you got hit in the face,” he lied.
Riven looked dubious but nodded slowly. “So, you were the only one who was conscious?”
“Maybe? It’s hard to tell who else was conscious. I just dragged you guys inside before everyone else woke up,” he explained.
“What else happened afterward?” Riven asked.
Julius was thinking about how he wanted to answer, but was saved from Derek and Edgar waking up.
***
Slowly but surely, more people entered the temple. It would appear that after Cadius’s little assault, the people didn’t fight when they came inside. It had deterred them.
Another weird thing was that they didn’t seem to remember what had happened. Everyone’s memory of the attack seemed similar. They only remembered passing out, but not from what. Julius suspected that Kaelther had something to do with that. Julius wondered if it was some kind of mind magic or something else.
While people weren’t outright fighting each other, some loud disagreements and insults were being tossed toward Garrett’s group in particular. It would appear that attacking people and those people surviving would lead to some grudges.
Who would have guessed?
Every time someone tried to do something, their techniques faded away before they could activate, much like Julius had experienced. Julius wanted to learn how this effect worked and wondered whether he could apply it to his own abilities.
He made sure to examine each time the techniques were taken apart, trying to find some hint. He also made sure to activate his own techniques, observing how they were affected. It was a great way to bide his time and keep him distracted.
It was also a great way to ignore people who approached him. Apparently, his fight with Riven had garnered a lot of attention. People from various noble houses and organizations had already tried to approach him, likely in the hopes of roping him into their own interests.
However, their attempts were pretty lacking compared to Jonas's. At least the other boy had been very good at weaseling his way into Julius’s good graces. He had a natural charisma and genuineness that helped him a lot.
These other people did not have this. They practically smelled like opportunistic bastards from a hundred feet away. Thankfully, Derek and Aubrey were really good deterrents. They made sure that nobody distracted him while he tried to pick apart this temple’s enchantment.
Riven did a good job at this as well. The other guy had stayed with Julius; he had seen Julius attempting to decipher the technique and sat down next to him, trying to see what he could figure out.
His friend, Eva, had shown up too. She had demanded some answers from Riven, but it had taken a surprisingly small amount of effort to satisfy her curiosity. She had even given quite a sincere apology to Julius and had even offered some nice treasures to him as recompense.
Julius didn’t bother to take them, but had appreciated the gesture nonetheless.
A couple of hours flowed by. By this point, more people had entered the temple, and there were more people with tokens than he would have thought.
Cadius was still standing on the platform doing nothing. His eyes were still blank and lifeless, but nobody attempted to approach the man. While they didn’t remember the recent attack, most people had remembered how the man had killed over a dozen people with a single blink. That deterred most people from seeking answers from the man.
Eventually, Cadius did make a move. The platform he was standing on suddenly began to glow brightly. The same iridescent light shimmered out, bouncing off the white and gem-inlaid walls. It was like a beautiful kaleidoscope of colors.
“Welcome to all of you who managed to get this far. If you are here, then that means you have gathered five tokens by various means,” Cadius started to speak. His eyes were still lifeless, and if it sounded like it, Cadius was being used as a puppet.
“That also means that you have met the requirements to begin this realm’s trial. I am required to warn you that this trial is not a simple one. The consequences of failing this trial are not just a failure to move on or death, but there could be severe consequences to your path depending on your results.”
This caused some worried mutters to echo throughout the crowd.
“You may choose to leave at this time. However, the second you enter the trial, you will not be able to leave until you have either passed or failed. You have ten minutes to make your decision. If you choose to proceed, you will enter through this archway,” Cadius said and waved his arm.
The light coalesced and formed a colorful portal between the arches.
“The choice is up to you,” Cadius said flatly, and before anyone could ask any questions, stepped through the portal, disappearing.
Everyone immediately started shouting, voices bouncing around the temple as they talked to one another.