The Oracle Paths

The good news was that here he didn't need his Aether Sun Core to digest the magic metals in his Space Storage. Getting close to the star was enough.

The thing was, its size, mass and density was a tad higher than expected. This sun was almost ten times larger in diameter than the one warming the Earth, and the swirling plasma inside was so turbulent that if he wasn't careful, he might end up being ground to a pulp inside.

Replace the water with plasma at tens of thousands or millions of degrees, and imagine how the oceans would behave after Aurae shook the Earth like a protein shaker. That was the level of plasma stirring on the surface of this sun.

Put another way, if he fell into the water, or rather into the plasma, he would be sucked into rollers of such magnitude that he would be crushed under thousands of kilometers of plasma before he knew what hit him.

'Still, I need to get closer.' Jake's eyes narrowed as he peered down at the gigantic ball of plasma below him.

Driven by determination, he shot toward the star noiselessly into the void of space, feeling the temperature and radiation hitting his body's surface skyrocket at a breath-taking rate.

'This sun is hotter than I thought, but I can still handle it.' He estimated calmly.

Suddenly, a solar flare erupted out of nowhere, a geyser of thousands of kilometers of plasma gushing from the star's surface. Plasma projectiles several kilometers long flew towards him like meteors and Jake had no choice but to perform many spins, loops and twists to avoid being crushed by several thousand tons of plasma propelled at tens of thousands of kilometers per hour.

After having dodged the first salvo, the flaming projectiles having lost their momentum were recaptured by the sun's enormous gravity and Jake found himself once again forced to intensify his evasive maneuvers.

'Exploring a star is trickier than I thought it would be.'

[You're underestimating yourself, Jake.] Xi cheered him gently. [Your Constitution is more than 21,000 times that of a normal human, and your resistance to heat and radiation is terrific for your level. Adding your Agility and Vitality, your body is also extremely ductile, which is why you can use the Compression spell to reduce your size. Have faith in yourself, Jake. Even if this solar flare hits you, the worst you'll get is a few broken bones, but you won't break. Without Aetheric Augmentation and some of the special powers the Players use to strengthen their spells and weapons, it's almost impossible to hurt you significantly.]

Jake had to admit she was right. It was like hitting a tennis ball with a racket with all his might. Even if the ball was catapulted hundreds of meters, it wouldn't pop. When an object exceeded a certain threshold of hardness and elasticity, it became much more difficult to damage.

In the real world, what was elastic was rarely hard. A sharp diamond could scratch any piece of rubber without difficulty, but it would break at the slightest twist exceeding its resistance.

And Jake was considerably more elastic and flexible than any chewing gum and hundreds of times stronger than the hardest diamond. Even if he were hit by a planet-sized asteroid, as long as its speed did not exceed ten or a hundred times his own maximum movement speed, he would survive, even if it meant being flung to the other side of the cosmos.

This was the danger of high-level Evolvers. The pure Aether defining a world''s Aether density was not enough to create such anomalies. Even if an individual's Aether density increased, it would not greatly affect their regeneration speed, intelligence or flexibility.

But it was different for bloodlines and Aether encodings.

The seven main Aether stats were the Oracle's welcome gift to the Mirror Universe. This gift seemed ordinary at first, especially compared to the potential of a bloodline, but that was because all Evolvers had never known a life without these Aether Encodings. In reality, they were far more valuable than one might think.

Jake had not yet attempted to create his own Aether Encodings, but now that he had been promoted to the rank of Aetherist apprentice, he had every intention of looking into it. He was sure that this field had immense promise, not to mention the fortune he could make by reselling his products.

'In that case, let's get closer, since I have nothing to fear.' Jake shrugged in response to Xi's encouragement.

He sounded confident, but in truth he was extremely cautious. The previous solar flare had been impressive, but it was nothing compared to a large-scale flare. These could form plasma columns of several hundred thousand kilometers and the ionized matter could reach 800km/s and be as hot as 10 to 100 million degrees.

If Jake was hit by such an eruption, 21,000 of Constitution or not, it would be a miracle if he wasn't instantly vaporized.

Growing more and more focused, his body cautiously drew closer to the star and soon he had to close his eyes to avoid burning his retina. With his eyes closed, he activated his Myrtharian Vision, and began to navigate in the sidereal void, observing the energy and radiation flows around him.

A few dozen minutes later, he stopped a few hundred meters above the star. No new solar flare matching the intensity of the previous one hindered his progress, but random plasma geysers stretching several kilometers were not uncommon.

Nevertheless, he was pleasantly surprised to find that with his Myrtharian vision he could to some extent predict the timing and location of these flares. Nearby plasma currents held no secrets for him. Even when he wasn't completely sure of his predictions, he was usually right, proof that his Luck stat was doing its job.

"Well, now that we're here it's time to start doing what we came here for."

He summoned his dim red Aether Sun Core, but did not immediately dunk it into the star's plasma. Before he began, he studied its Aether Symbol first. After several minutes of intense scrutiny, he exhaled with a long sigh.

"As expected from Cekt. I can't see the Runes. However, I'm an Aetherist now, so it's not like I have no solution for this."

He obviously couldn't match his master's performance easily, but he could build on it. But to do so, he had to be willing to make some sacrifices.

With a regretful expression, he siphoned off all the remaining energy within his Aether Sun Core, then disposed of the plasma coating the Aether Core at the center, releasing it to become part of the ionized matter of the star beneath him.

The Aether Sun Core in its raw form was just like any other Aether Core except that it was combined with one or more Aether Symbols. After absorbing so much Aether, the Aether Symbol had become extremely dense, collapsing under its own weight.

If it was the original Aether Symbol that Jake had created in the first place, it wouldn't have happened, but since it was his master's handiwork it wouldn't be surprising if he had incorporated other Aether Symbols of his own into the equation to explain this occurrence.

Luckily, for this problem too he had a solution.

[Aether Compression/Expansion: With effort and patience you can change the size of your Aether Runes and Symbols.]

This was one of the new skills included in his second Soul Class welcome pack. Eager to quench his thirst for knowledge, he immediately set to work.

This Soul Class Spell he didn't really understand, but he knew how to use it instinctively like walking or breathing. It was basic privilege after having let an unknown stele rewrite his Soul's Aether Code.

He focused on the Aether singularity at the heart of the Aether Sun Core and after a moment he got a sense of what he had to do. It was like pulling on a shoelace to untie a knot. Simple, but the result was immediate.

The ultra-compressed Aether Runes slowly began to swell and Jake suddenly became aware of the astronomical amount of Aether this Aether Sun Core had stored after all this time.

"T-This..."

At that very moment, he learned the hard way why it took so much Aether and energy to improve a bloodline. Every bloodline, especially those of high rank, had Symbols in their Aether Code specifically dedicated to Aether compression. This was the only way to guarantee the continuous levels up of the bloodline.

Of course, these Aether Symbols had their limits. Whether a bloodline was of natural or artificial origin, the Aether Runes were not always correctly drawn. There were often minor defects, but combined in the billions, they formed a fundamental elevation threshold that the bloodline could never transcend.

By slightly modifying these Aether Symbols responsible for compression, the Aether Code could only regress, but due to the high density of Aether acting as Aetheric gravity, this could take some time, or even be nigh impossible for an Aether Core.

Jake focused all his mental power on the tiny Aether Symbol, and after a few minutes he was able to enlarge the runes enough to see a little more clearly.

It's exactly as I imagined.

In addition to the light and heat spells that Jake had planned, Cekt had also added a Compression Spell, an Anchor Spell, but also two more advanced Aether Spells: Energy and Matter Conversion.

Properly set, these Aether Spells could convert Aether into matter, energy and vice versa, allowing the Aether Sun Core to grow exponentially by absorbing heat and radiation from the environment.

With the reverse analysis complete, Jake now knew how to make an Aether Sun Core just like Cekt.

Since Jake was right next to a star, he intended to make the most of his stay...

'A few thousand Aether Sun Cores, hehe... I hope Lost Divinities will appreciate my gift when we meet again...' Jake laughed sinisterly as he began to weave the Runes of the first Aether Core of a long series.