Chapter 128: Clipped Wings

Valerian’s body disappeared from the office, leaving the ambient mana to run wild for a moment before dying down when Sylas lowered his hand.

He looked at the space Valerian previously occupied for a long second; no one knows just what he was thinking about.

"What was that last word you said?"

Ravena’s voice came from the side. She looked at him with a confused face, but Sylas just waved his hand and smiled.

"Ah, nothing, nothing. Anyway, Ravi, want to get something to eat?"

She didn’t believe him. When he said his last words before Valerian disappeared, she couldn’t make out what the elf had said; it was all just a buzzing sound. And even when she tried to remember it, she couldn’t focus on the moment for long before her attention was diverted.

But the smile and the way he acted now made it clear that he wouldn’t tell her what happened, and she couldn’t force it out of him. So with a sigh, she stood up and walked to the door.

"It’s on you."

***

His vision changed, and instead of the office with the beautiful window into the endless cosmos, now there was a strange kind of forest around him. The trees didn’t look like normal ones; instead of brown bark, it was pure white, and the leaves were a vibrant purple.

Valerian’s head still hurt from when he heard the last thing Sylas had said, and his ears rang like he wasn’t supposed to hear this, and now his soul was rebelling.

’Fuck...’

He pushed the pain away and looked around, trying to see anything in this strange forest. He felt weak, weaker than he had felt in a really long time.

After the strange chant Sylas did, he felt like he had just a fraction of his former strength.

’Did he really seal my affinities?’

Cautiously, he looked at his hand and activated [Dragon Eyes].

│─────── STATUS ─────── │

│ Name : Valerian von Astrea

│ Age : 16

│ Race : Primordial Celestial Dragon [God Seed: Ignited]

│ ─────── ORIGIN ─────── │

│ Bloodline : Primordial Celestial Dragon [Partial Awakening]

│ Physique : Infinite Cosmos Physique [Infant Stage – First Epoch]

│ Core : Cosmic Singularity

│ ────── ATTRIBUTES ────── │

│ Vitality : ???

│ Strength : B-

│ Agility : B-

│ Dexterity : B

│ Intelligence : S

│ Divine Mana : C

│ Charm : SSS+

│ ─────── AFFINITIES ─────── │

│ [Synchronized Constellation]

│ Space

│ Cosmic Fire [Sealed]

│ Void Lightning [Sealed]

│ Event Horizon [Sealed]

│ Absolute Zero [Sealed]

│ Starlight [Sealed]

│ Genesis Spark [Sealed]

│ ─────── TITLES ─────── │

│ Last Celestial

│ Child of Mana

│ Primordial Progenitor

│ Candidate for Godhood

│ Spark of True Divinity

│ ─────── SKILLS ─────── │

│ [Physique Abilities]

│ World Creation (Nascent)

│ [Racial Skills]

│ Dragon Eyes (Stage 2)

│ Dragon Tongue

│ Polymorph (Partial)

│ Dragon Fear

│ Primordial Scales (Partial)

│ Dragon Breath (Locked)

│ [Unique Skill]

│ Law Breaker

│ ─────── BOND ─────── │

│ Bound Entity: Valerie

’Fuck.’

All his stats dropped drastically, except his vitality, which strangely stayed the same. But aside from that, he was barely in B rank.

Since his body was fueled by the stars that represented his affinities, and now they were sealed away, he lost a large portion of the divine mana that was supplied to him through these stars.

Without the fuel, his body became weaker, now scraping on B rank, and even his mana output degraded to just C rank, since his weak body couldn’t handle anything more than that.

Wanting to take a look, Valerian went into his soul space. Less than a second later, he appeared in the cosmos that was his soul. And to his dismay, the constellation that was made up by his affinities was dull now, with only a single star burning.

With a deep sigh, he left the soul space and arrived back in the strange forest. Wanting to see his surroundings, Valerian tried to lift off into the sky, but that attempt only ended with him performing a small jump while looking in the air.

When he landed on the ground again, he stood there for a moment.

’I hope no one saw that...’

Since he was now basically just a B ranker, he lost the ability to fly, which someone gains at S rank.

’I guess I have to do it like this.’

He teleported as far as he could, which was severely less than what he could do before, but still enough to reach over the treetops, meeting the nightsky. During his short time in the air, Valerian looked around, trying to find anything.

And there was actually something: far off in the distance, there was what looked like multiple lights burning, and he could even see some house roofs that extended beyond the canopy.

’There are people here??’

He fell back down and landed on the ground, looking in the direction he had seen the houses.

’Just what is this place? Why are there people living here?’

He was incredibly curious why there were people in this dimension that Sylas created, and there was no way it was just a coincidence that he happened to start so close to them.

’Should I go there?’

’But I’m really weak right now. And I don’t know how strong they are or if they are hostile.’

His pondering was interrupted as a white claw bigger than his head was just centimeters away from ripping his face apart. His eyes widened at the sudden emergence of the claw, and on pure instinct, he activated his space affinity and appeared a few meters to the side.

As the shock of his nearly cut off head reached him, there was already another claw ready to cut his head apart.

’Shit!’

This time, he channeled his mana through his body and tried to dodge away from the attack, but since his body was so much weaker, he only managed to get away with a cut on his shoulder.

Rolling away, Valerian looked at his attacker, only to find the space empty.

’What is happening?’

That’s when something else hit him: his shoulder wasn’t healing. No, it was healing, just the speed was painfully slow and just a shadow of what it was before.

His guard was on high alert. Since the thing that attacked him managed to catch him off guard twice, he was careful.

’This is a space trial, right? So maybe this works...’

He let his mana spread into the surroundings as his spatial perception activated. His surroundings became clear to him as he could map out the forest in his immediate area.

But there was nothing.

Not until there was yet another claw just before his stomach. He moved as fast as he could to catch the claw, but he was too slow, and the tip of it lodged itself in his belly.

But it couldn’t penetrate him further as he gripped the white claw with as much strength as his body could bring up. He snapped his eyes to the owner of the claw and, for the first time, saw his attacker.

The monster had a lean, agile build, with pale, taut skin stretched over its muscles. Dark violet markings resembling a starry sky covered parts of its body. Its narrow, dragon like head had sharp horns sweeping backward, with several long, ribbon like appendages trailing from its neck and back.

Its hands and feet ended in long, curved white claws, while a slender tail extended behind it. Its violet eyes glowed faintly, and the space around its claws occasionally rippled and distorted.

It looked like a monster coming straight from the deepest parts of space to rip whatever its target was apart.

Valerian met its violet eyes for a moment before the beast disappeared again. It didn’t even leave a distortion in the surrounding mana or space. It just disappeared.

’I hate that elf so much.’

The wound in his stomach wasn’t too deep, but like his shoulder, it refused to heal at the pace that Valerian got so used to.

He looked around, not convinced that this was the end of the attacker and that it would soon try to kill him again. And he was right, as the long white claw came for his head from the side.

This time, Valerian was prepared and twisted his head to the side, avoiding the thrust. Fueling his body with his divine mana, he moved fast and gripped the head of the monster.

Its violet eyes widened for a moment before it tried to disappear again, but to its horror, it wasn’t able to. Using his own space affinity, Valerian locked the space around it and began to squeeze down on its head.

Normally, he would have been able to pop its head like a balloon, but with his weakened state, he only managed to get a soul curdling, high pitched scream from it.

"SKRIIIIEEEEEE!!"

Before a wave of space mana left its body, breaking the lock and disappearing again.

’It just broke free like that?’

Looking around, he wasn’t able to see the monster again, and he wasn’t sure if it would still try to kill him after he caught it or if it would run away. Either way, he had to do something.

He didn’t want to stay sitting like a piece of meat waiting to be eaten, and so he began to run in the direction he had seen the houses before.