Birth of the Demonic Sword

"I think you should remain here for the time being," Noah said once Harold and him were alone.

The tour of the floating lake was over. The four leaders had even offered their support when it came to inscribed items and drugs. Their inventory wasn't the best, but Noah and Harold appreciated that gesture nonetheless.

"You want me to leave already?" Harold asked. "I thought your recruitment methods would be more convincing. Do you even want me in your organization?"

"I have a dangerous project at hand," Noah explained. "Things might get quite bad for me and those in my reach. This is for your own good."

"How dangerous are we talking about?" Harold snorted. "Your battle prowess is incredible, but I'm quite strong too. I can help."

Noah couldn't help but glance at Harold. The expert had already changed his opinion about Noah's organization. He seemed inclined to join him and see more of his adventures.

'Maybe I'm not too bad as a leader,' Noah laughed in his mind, but his face remained stern.

"I have another job for you," Noah revealed, and a faint light began to shine in Harold's eyes.

"Finally, some action!" Harold shouted.

"Moira and the others don't want to leave this place," Noah explained. "They have been honest with us, but I can sense their hesitation. They would only force us to gather more troops before even considering abandoning these defenses."

"That's only normal," Harold commented. "This is their home. They have lost many battles during the crisis. Their hesitation isn't surprising."

"I agree, but that's a big problem," Noah sighed. "I can't focus on gathering troops while also developing countermeasures to Heaven and Earth. It might not look like it, but we don't have much time. The others in our team have probably created a decent army already. We must speed things up on our side."

Harold fell silent. He could understand Noah's point, but his approach had evident issues. The expert wouldn't mind continuing the exploration on his own, but he lacked the power to deal with threats like Otto.

It would even be impossible for Harold to perform as well as Noah. He couldn't deal with an entire floating lake on his own. He lacked his explosive power and incredible battle prowess.

"What if we find another Otto?" Harold gave voice to his hesitation.

"That's why you need to convince the others," Noah explained. "Having this entire force at your disposal would improve the task significantly. Experts like Otto would still be a problem, but you could rely on a proper army at least."

"It won't be easy," Harold commented.

"It never is," Noah sighed. "We are against the very world that provides us with "Breath". I would be disappointed if the fight turned out to be easy."

Harold fell silent again. He knew that Noah wasn't trying to leave the battlefield. He must have important reasons to decide to leave the recruitment to others.

"Are you trying to get your hands on a game-changing power?" Harold eventually asked.

"That's the plan," Noah revealed.

"I think I can handle this mission," Harold announced. "The others pretend to like it here, but they are secretly sick of this environment. Their power will stagnate if they keep living here. I think they will decide to go out if I insist."

"Let's meet back in the first lake then," Noah ordered. "I will remain in the wilderness for a while, and I'll even try to gather more troops if everything goes well. Yet, the final battle will probably happen there, so we can use it as our final destination."

"How will I know when the time is right?" Harold asked.

"I have the faint sensation that Heaven and Earth will warn us about that," Noah said. "They must be watching this environment closely. They'll probably trigger the battle themselves once their side gets enough troops."

Harold could only nod. Heaven and Earth were quite reliable when it came to those things. After all, they had made the whole mission possible. Noah and the others would have never managed to reach the other side of the Immortal Lands on their own otherwise.

Moreover, Harold's task had a few positive aspects. He wouldn't be alone, and Moira's force knew most of the experts in that world. They could warn him and prepare a few descriptions of every new organization that they met.

"Make them leave," Noah reminded Harold before leaving the buildings and entering the azure water. "Gather many troops. Kill as many Heaven and Earth's followers as you can. I'll try to return once everything is about to start."

Noah left without warning the leaders about his decision. His departure didn't go unnoticed, but Harold took care of explaining the reasons behind his actions.

Needless to say, Moira and the others felt disappointed about that turn of events. They wanted to improve their relationship with Noah before deciding on his plan. He was the leader of his force in the end. Harold was only another underling.

Yet, they could understand that the situation was about to become tense. Heaven and Earth would soon make their move. Their followers were also gathering and creating an army. It wouldn't take much before everything was ready for the final battle against the Devils.

Noah flew on his own through the peculiar environments. He didn't follow the path toward the next floating lake, but he didn't even try to return to the first structure.

He didn't have a proper destination. Noah only wanted to be as far as possible from areas that could contain cultivators or magical beasts. His project was too dangerous. He couldn't take unnecessary risks.

A broken plain that floated among the sky appeared in his vision. The landmass was upside down and featured vegetation on the wrong side, but Noah found it perfect for his plans.

A few training sessions alternated the many experiments with the Devils' chaotic laws. Noah even depleted his stash at some point, and he had to leave the plain to hunt those creatures.

The experiments continued to lead to failures. In theory, everything had to work. Noah's law was perfect for that power, but the mutations continued to overwhelm his existence.

It wasn't a matter of safety or approaches anymore. Noah performed those experiments on pieces of his aura that he separated whenever the mutations went out of control. He was using the quickest method to obtain results, but he still failed to gain valuable insight into the matter.

'Why is my ambition unable to control this power?' Noah sighed in his mind after another failure. 'I'm doing everything correctly, but the mutations keep going out of control. What am I missing?'

Noah continued to experiment for a while, but it eventually became clear that his approach wouldn't work. He had to come up with something different, and he had to do it quickly.

'I need to connect to the other world's will, don't I?' Noah sighed in his mind before filling the insides of his mental sphere with layers of dark matter.

His dark matter also covered his figure and applied many protective layers. Noah was preparing his centers of power for the risky approach. His higher energy was the only substance that could buy him some time if the mutation went out of control.