Death... and me

Chapter 3401: Up To You

"It wasn't so bad after we escaped the giant seal..." Kentucky said, having experienced the last twelve days inside the Corridor. And he was right. It wasn't so bad since both he and Roan could enter the Dimensional Realm to recover. It's just that they spent a lot of Divine Stones and even Starlight Energy.

Since the start, only Sky Energy was truly capable of keeping them protected from the freezing energy in the Corridor during the Glacial Overflow Critical Point. Roan and Kentucky tried to save as much as possible by using only Divine Energy on everything else, but it still wasn't easy to see the amount used.

Nonetheless, it was at least worth it. Roan and Kentucky could have used a different strategy. Instead of spending Starlight Energy to make Sky Energy, they could have spent a lot of time inside the Dimensional Realm and recovered their energies slowly. But then again, that would have delayed their trip by at least a few months. Let's not forget, Kentucky does not have his own star. That means he can only rely on the normal Starlight, which isn't very good.

The Freezing Energy continued to go down rapidly, and the Deep Blue Clouds had already returned to their lighter blue color. That was a clear signal that they had left the Glacial Corridor and were now near it but outside.

After flying for a little longer, even the blue clouds were gone, and they could see the sky once more. They didn't continue on their journey, though. Instead, they found a concealed corner and entered the Dimensional Realm again.

"So you also came in to watch, uh?" Rean smiled as both he and Zangeshu worked on the final touches of the puppets. Sure enough, Zangeshu wouldn't lose the opportunity to work on a Puppet that used both Formations Runes, Blacksmithing, and Inscriptions. Above all, the core that could hold a soul was something that really opened his eyes.

Roan, however, immediately turned around to leave. "Do whatever you want, but don't come up with any funny ideas of let them with us. They will have to deal with it themselves."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah... I know, alright?" Rean already expected that. He then made a few changes on a screen in front of him, nodding in satisfaction. "Well, it's nothing that impressive, but they should be able to survive inside these puppets' cores while also being able to control them."

"Can we start then?" Zangeshu asked.

Rean nodded. Using his connection with the dimensional realm, he teleported all three souls into the cores of the puppets, giving Sister Orb the order right after. "Alright, Sister Orb. There is no need to force them to sleep anymore. Let them wake up."

[If you say so...]

The powers of the system and the dimensional realm then stopped intervening with the souls of Gram, Duleti, and Farlo. It took a few minutes, but they eventually started to regain their consciousness.

'Hum? What is this?' Gram's Soul was the first one to wake up, and he couldn't see anything. All Gram was certain of was that he was locked inside something and that he was still in his soul form, just like when he let Rean take him from his body.

Rean's Divine Sense Message arrived in the next second. 'You are awake. Good. Focus your soul power on the surroundings. There are many tiny runes that interact with the soul. It will be quite clumsy at first, but you will understand how they work with time. For now, just try to use them to open your artificial eyes.'

Gram was taken aback, but he did as Rean said. With his Soul Power, he found those runes and was surprised how his soul received a lot of information through them. He quickly felt himself connected to the entire puppet's body and eventually managed to open the puppet's eye. "Ierrr cannrt..."

"Use your Divine Sense," Rean spoke, seeing that Gram was trying to speak through the puppet. "You will need practice to speak through this puppet I made for you. The puppet has a Divine Energy core. Try to draw the Divine Energy from there into your soul to fuel your Divine Sense."

Once again, it took a while, but Gram succeeded. 'Seems like this is it?'

Rean and Zangeshu nodded. "That's exactly it. Congratulations, you survived."

Gram tried to move a little but almost tripped. He only didn't do so because Rean caught him with his Divine Energy. Gram understood his situation, though. 'You truly put my soul inside a puppet?'

Rean nodded. "Yes, and it is a pretty simple one. Its power is only equivalent to an Elemental Transformation Realm expert. Well, your soul is still in the Space Bending Realm, so you should be able to control space a little bit, which makes you a lot stronger, somewhere as strong as a common Initial or Middle Stage Void Tempering Realm expert."

"Burtt..." Gram tried to talk again.

"Yes, it is not optimal," Rean understood.

'Ah!' This time, it was Farlo's Divine Sense that reached them. 'A fucking puppet?!'

Rean shrugged and was about to continue, but Duleti also managed to do the same.

'No... I can't end like this...' She said, obviously shaken.

"Stop with your shit complaints," Zangeshu was the one to speak. "The three of you were supposed to be killed by that Divinity Realm Demon Beast. No! You were supposed to have died right after the Warm Boats were destroyed. If not for Marvin, you wouldn't even have met that Demon Beast, let alone survive it."

"Thank you," Rean couldn't agree more. "My disciple here is right. I still managed to save your souls, but it was impossible for me to save your bodies. All our bodies were destroyed that day. Now, there is only one reason I wasted my time to make you these puppets."

Rean took a deep breath. "You won't be able to cultivate with it. If you want to get stronger, you will need better puppets and things like that. Naturally, that is not my problem. That said, I need to ask. Would you rather let go and have your souls go to the underworld, or will you continue to live as you are now? That's up to you."