Bro, I'm not an Undead!

What could this be?

Was it a human?

Moving through the rough, de-grassed lands away from Inhone City was a lone carriage pulled along by two horses which had a dash of grayish back to them.

It was strange.

While the carriage itself seemed to be a hazy grey in colour, the figure within was so dark that its colour stood out.

The second most eye catching thing within the carriage was the two bundles wrapped in cloth tightly. They were in a storage space in the back part of the carriage.

With normal vision, one wouldn't be able to tell what was wrapped up within them, but Skullius saw it clearly in a hazy grey colour as well which made him squint.

Corpses.

They were dead bodies wrapped up in the pieces of cloth.

'Now that's fishy...' Skullius thought. He knew suspicious activity when he saw it. And this was it.

Naturally, he had all the reason to believe that whoever this was, was not a goody two-shoes.

The incredibly shady setup didn't look like something that should be let slide.

However, Skullius decided not to pursue this matter.

For one reason, he didn't want to waste time with different agendas and this wasn't his problem.

The other was, well...

There was a cruel and raging energy that leaked from this figure!

It was different from Terian's controlled raw energy that stemmed from both his class and stage or from a powerful core.

No, it was outright malicious as didn't seem to simply be from power accumulated through a core.

The Discount Human let this go as he rushed up ahead after taking one last glance at the dark figure.

He flashed at an insane speed over the stretch of distance covering two additional miles in a few short minutes!

This was going well.

Below, Skullius saw the thousands of people in different settlements all with a variety of colour, mixes of the dark and white colour staining almost every individual he could see.

It was... beautiful to see from up here.

This was one of the few times that Skullius considered something to be beautiful since he came here.

He was used to calling the dreadful designs of Somanda's tower beautiful and attractive and not this mash of dull colour with the small existences walking with it in them.

How quickly he had strayed from the path of undeath.

While enjoying the view, the Projected Discount Human felt a tug at his body.

He suddenly started to decelerate as a slight pull drew him back, forcing his speed to dip despite his efforts.

'I knew it wouldn't be so simple. I'm guessing I can't be too far away from my body even after these enhancements?' Skullius thought.

But he would power through anyway.

How else would he surpass his limits?

How else had he been able to break through the seemingly insurmountable challenges that had brought themselves before him time and time again other than through going beyond his limits... plus the obscure favour that Serenity had talked about which supposedly battled his atrocious luck.

Had he truly been unlucky since the Tremur Forest though?

Well... one could argue, yes.

From being accused of being a Green Neolist member to almost dying while fighting Jackpot who could literally control luck, to the library incident and how it was coming back to bite him in his fake ass, to the near death experience with Guddhar and all.

All these might seem like a casual hero's journey features but even the most protagonist amongst protagonists didn't get into all these within a mere six days!

Skullius wasn't constantly in trouble.

The Discount Human struggled on, pushing against the resistance that sought to pull him back!

He crossed another miles worth of distance which brought him up to five miles covered, the Discount Human continuing on even as the tug at his Projected figure grew!

Sadly, he couldn't use any of his skills in this state or interact with physical matter as he had left his core and body behind!

He could only manipulate the elements that had already been conjured by his skills beforehand.

'HNGH!' Skullius' Projected form showed vague outlines of his face scrunching up as he put in more effort!

With each bout of flight over a vast distance, his speed reduced by half and now, he was barely able to finish a mile in an hour!

The Discount Human sincerely hoped nothing bad was happening back where he had left his body as that would truly be atrocious.

He hadn't shared many of his abilities with Oliviana and Silrat and didn't intend to tell them about [Crude World Projection] because that would entail telling them about the Fruit of World Myths.

Fortunately, the ToE he was engaged in didn't mentioned anything about him disclosing more information about himself.

FSHH!

8 miles!

At this point, Skullius felt himself come to a complete halt as the pull on him grew stronger than the strength of his flight!

'Not when I'm just two away from the goal!' Skullius groaned while exerting more of his force.

The strength he gained from this boost only earned him a dismal level of speed which he soldiered through with still.

Fortunately, what Skullius had wasn't a physical body and fatigue wasn't exactly what he would feel.

Instead it was a heavy sensation that tried to pull him back to his body.

After a prolonged struggle, Skullius finally reached the ninth mile, and the moment he passed, a dark, distorted chain shot through from the direction of Inhone City and clutched onto his back with a metal clink!

...!

'Crap!' Skullius exclaimed right before he was pulled back at a shocking speed over the distance he had crossed straight into his cosmetic body!

The sensation of his flesh returned and perhaps from shock, Skullius spun and knocked against the walls animatedly!

The Discount Human took a few moments to relax his mind before sitting up straight.

'I really failed, huh? What a troublesome Task,' he thought with a slight tone of frustration.

He was quite dejected, but not by much.

With a little more Enriching gems, he didn't see why he couldn't break through this barrier. It was just one more mile.

Another thing that he had found to be interesting was that while purple gems had the 1000+ limit, the limit for purple-red gems was above 2,500+.

He didn't know the limit for red gems, but it was bound to be higher than this.

'Well... on to refining other promising aspects of my strength then.'