Mystical Journey

In the new Kovitan capital, Escalvate.

In the clear blue sky, flocks of birds in V-shaped formations soared through the air.

"Sister, have you take your medication?"

In an old but lavish looking white building.

An old lady with a head full of white hair was carrying a grocery basket as she ascended the flight of stairs. She took out her keys to unlock the door and walked into a wide living hall.

"Madam Dani." a maid in white skirts stood by the door as she greeted the old lady.

"Thank you for the hard work, Little Jenny " Dani greeted the maid warmly.

"Another quiet day..." a coarse elderly voice was heard from the study room near the living room.

Dani laughed after hearing the voice and handed the basket to the maid before walking towards the study room located at the deepest corner of the living hall.

An old lady full of white hair with a graceful figure was sitting in a red rocking chair by the full-length curtains near the study room.

Her face was wrinkled but her eyes were calm and serene, with no traces of the pessimism and low-spiritedness of an elderly.

"Sister, I bought your favorite goby fish. I saw someone foraging it from the wilds, so I bought all of it since it’s fresh." Dani said as she exerted large amounts of force to push open the curtains.

"Aren’t you supposed to go to the palace festive? Why are you free to come over here?" the lady who sat on the rocking chair asked softly.

"Isn’t it because of my worry?" Dani laughed. "Once I saw that you left your medication at my place, I immediately sent them over."

She took a chair and sat next to her sister, Hathaway. The sisters gazed at the bright blue sky beyond the window, enjoying the serenity.

"Speaking of which, it has already been more than 50 years, time really does fly in the blink of an eye." Hathaway sighed. " I wonder how is he now, there hasn’t been any news from the palace."

"It was said that due to the aftermath of the battle, he is still recovering." Dani nodded, her eyes solemn. What kind of injuries would take 50 years to recover? They were afraid they were injuries that would be deemed terminal... She dared not speak of such words though, as she was worried that her sister’s last hopes would be extinguished.

After fifty years, what used to be the powerful and influential Black Swamp Palace was now the world’s second largest hybrid university in the new capital.

After the world’s totem power was weakened to the brink of extinction, the Black Swamp Palace had invited former totem users and swiftly converted into a government-run university. Using their core martial techniques’ powerful reputation, they have established their reputation.

In these years, numerous talented disciples have been admitted into the university, among them were the top-tiered prodigy Ansapello who became one of the few martial arts masters of the world. After continuous effort, he was hired as the leader of the Kovitan Empire’s Military Headquarters. He even opened up a separate martial arts school, which was widely available worldwide, called the Pure Hearted Fist and had many disciples under him.

Aside from that, that girl called Pefalia had established the Blackbird Double-Handed Weapons Combat school after she left the school, and it too spread everywhere.

There were actually many more talents that graduated from Black Swamp Palace that had established their own careers and had expanded into different industries, obtaining decent achievements of their own. Even the least of them were at least industry experts.

Hence, there will be a moderate sized festive held in the entire new capital.

"Has Ansapello dropped by recently?" Dani suddenly asked

"Why? That brat visited me a few days back." Hathaway had a very good impression towards that genius who respected her. Ever since Garen had disappeared, he remained respectful towards her even through the darkest of times in the Black Swamp Palace. Even though he had already graduated, he still tried his best to help his fellow students and seniors. Though he looked arrogant, he was actually a responsible person.

"That brat has recently proposed a resolution in the Senate, it’s slightly controversial... as the nation grows stronger in recent years, it seems that the boy is becoming ambitious again." Dani frown as she spoke.

"What did Ivy and Skyharp think about it?"

"It’s neutral I suppose. They didn’t overtly reject nor support." Dani shook her head.

"Then it’s best that I don’t express my opinions. The matters of the country are not something we can judge with our personal eyes. As our position differs, our perspective may differ too." Hathaway said as she shook her head. "Right, how’s that brat at your place doing?"

"Same old, same old, he brought his family for a vacation at West Continent, leaving behind this lonely old woman alone." Dani started complaining. She lifted her head and saw her sister’s face that was no longer comparable to her youth, and her heart shivered.

"What about you, sister? Was it worth it, waiting for that person for so many years?"

"There’s nothing unworthy about it, I’ve grown used to waiting all these years. Plus, I don’t feel lonely at all, Lala, Ivy, Angel, Sylvia and the rest have always been visiting me. With so many friends around me, what else is there to feel unworthy about?" Hathaway had remained single even though she had been wildly popular among men when she was young. They had all been turned down politely, whereas her sister Dani had found a decent man to marry, and her family was now one of the top-tiered nobles in Kovitan. She had two sons and 5-6 grandchildren, which made every gathering a rowdy and warm one.

In these years, the Grand Princess has inherited the title of Queen and become the honorary symbol of spirit in the Royal Family. The actual administration of the country still fell upon the Senate that was composed by the four giant influences. Among that, Black Swamp Palace took two seats, which one would consider to be the biggest influence in the entire Kovitan. Aside from that was the Grand Duke Benoc, who represented the Grand Princess, now the current Queen, as well as an organization representing the civilians. Grand Duke Cody had long been eliminated, hence his whereabouts were unknown.

Even after the fall of totem users, the radio that had been developed all those years ago still had very holistic functions; its core still used resonance technique and not totem’s power, hence its usability was not affected.

This had expedited the spread of messages within this world, in the midst of the high speed, high volume message transmission, technology had also abruptly improved at an exponential rate. Countless forgers from the totem world had migrated to scientific research and used their previous knowledge as a basis for many breakthrough theories and research results that took the world by storm.

In merely fifty years, the technology evolved from the original firearms and steam engine locomotives up to the biplane, a wide variety of cannons, tanks and civilian-friendly technology, born as the results of multiple conflicts.

With giant ferries traversing between two continents, countless water bodies have been explored.

In the fifty years worth of recovery, the global population had dramatically increased under each country’s strong push for policies encouraging population growth.

At the same time each technology continued its growth, the medical standards have improved tremendously. What used to be specially used by totem users, such as microscopes, incubators, training equipment and the like have all been converted for medical purposes. Mankind’s birth mortality rate had decreased drastically and everything was developing at an unprecedented rate.

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In a deep sea trench of North Pole.

An immense blue ice mountain stood upon the entrance to an abyssal trench.

In the deepest part of the ice mountain were some tiny spaces, and there was actually a man-made underwater tunnel and plaza. What used to be a place that isolated water had been ruptured and flooded with water and shards of ice.

The plaza was dark with a hue of blue, minus a swarm of illuminating jellyfish floating through slowly, their bodies expanding and shrinking. The pale blue glow emitted by the swarm was calming and serene.

Oddly enough, these jellyfishes were different from jellyfishes from the outer world; the ends of their tentacles emitted a faint purplish-blue light.

Soon, a school of anchovies swam through the plaza in circling motions, they also have the similar purplish-blue hue on their sharp teeth, which seemed unusually ferocious.

This was the world-renowned Deadly Poison Sea Territory. It didn’t mean that the seawater itself was poisonous, but rather the species inhabiting it, as for unknown reasons, all the species here carried some lethal form of poison.

The Deadly Poison Sea Territory was considered famous in the North Pole, and there would be a certain amount of tourists expected to visit here even though the sea creatures here could not be consumed. Instead, their unique appearances left the tourists mesmerized.

Under the ice mountain deep within the trench.

It had been many years since anyone had entered this realm.

Ever since the totem’s power had been destroyed, there hasn’t been any human capable of traversing such depth.

This was the deepest trench in the entire North Pole, tens of thousand meters deep. After repeated measurements done in the recent years, this trench was rated one of the deepest existing trenches, and second place in terms of depth.

At the deepest parts of the trench, a faint crackling sound could be heard from the inside of the odd ice mountain’s serene pitch darkness.

"How long has it been...."

Garen slowly woke up from his deep slumber.

As he opened his eyes, his surrounding was still the same blue ice layer. This ice was from his body, forming a cryogenic hibernation area.

Outside the icy layer, the migrating poisonous jellyfish floated by once again, Garen suddenly had a flash of realization.

"Has it already been another ten years?" He mumbled. When that swarm of jellyfish passed through this area once every decade, up to this point, he had already witnessed it 5 times.

"Fifty years already?" Garen’s head had some delayed memory recalling. Not being awake for exactly ten years, always being in the state of recovery, it was normal for him to be unable to recall something immediately after waking up suddenly.

After the last time where Ivy, Skyharp and the rest of the elders came to visit thirty years ago, there hasn’t been anyone who’d come to this underwater trench.

The water isolation plaza that was supported by totem’s power had also been ruptured, and it had turned into a wonderland for the underwater creatures.

There were already signs of the weakening of totem’s power thirty years ago, and Ivy, who used to rely on his own power to come in, had to combine powers with the rest of the elders to forcefully come down.

That was the last time Garen had had any contact with humans outside..

In the later years, he relied on the special radio to contact the outside world, but then even the radio had run out of power and had broken. Since then, he’d always been alone...

The totem’s powers’ had been weakened, but Garen’s body already had no totem’s power, what replaced it was the brand new Living Secret Technique. This power was not affected by the destruction of Heaven’s Door and had retained its immense power.

This was already beyond the realm of a totem user; to be breaking through into form 6.

Garen made a detailed scan of his own body’s condition.

The Secret Techniques of his body had completely integrated, Northern Trident Frost-Fire True Water Evil Technique was a technique that would have been no different from a normal Living Secret Technique, but due to the interruption by Hellgate’s subordinates during the final advancement, it’d caused an anomaly on the technique’s formation, which became an evil technique. Piling onto the side effects and heavy injuries sustained in the war, the Secret Technique put him into a deep slumber recovery status, each sleep lasting more than ten years.

Taking advantage of the immense pressure and extreme coldness as food and resource of the North Pole Deep Trench, it slowly recovered his body’s injuries.

Alone in the vast deep sea, he stayed there for tens of years.

Even a totem user with a mind as calm as Garen, he couldn’t help but fall into a state of mental disarray.

He checked his body’s condition. In the final war where he killed Hellgate, the deed hadn’t earned him any potential points. But instead, his attributes and talent underwent their first changes in history.

The real change was in the Attribute Pane.

"Strength 18. Agility 14. Vitality 14. Intelligence 12. Potential 0%. Soul limit 20."

Garen turned his gaze on his attribute pane and disregarded the large pile of complicated things at skill pane.

The Attribute Pane has undergone a huge change.