Seeing the red slash sent by Lilia towards the bedridden Nina, and though surprised at the realization that Aster’s grip on her hand was like a vice which she wasn’t going to be able to shake off in time, unlike Iris’s eyes which were of a smooth red color, Layla’s eyes shone in a light green color.

Sparks flew from the area of her wrist which Aster was holding onto, as she released a tiny bit of her sword intent, which was actually at the third level, in other words, realm-wise, this red-haired girl was at a similar level as Agnes!

Which made Aster inwardly frown, in terms of age the girl whose third level sword intent was now slowly but surely cutting through the golden light protection of the Paragon Body, shouldn’t be far from Agnes, so there is no way she is a native of a middle ranked Stellar System.

‘I guess Iris’s background is more complicated than what I thought, not that it’s not understandable considering she is at the top echelon in a sect stablished by those godmothers of mine’, thought Aster as he let go of her hand.

Not because he was at risk of getting harmed, with her sword intent alone she was easily able to pierce through the golden light protection yes, it’s third level intent after all, even if she is restraining it, it’s not something that can be blocked by the Genesis Manifestation level defense power that the golden light projected by the armor, had.

However, the golden armor itself was way tougher than that, just as Layla realized after seeing that Aster’s hand was completely fine even after being exposed to her sword intent.

‘What the hell is that armor… unless I go pass Genesis Manifestation level, there is no way to cut through that, even those damn golems weren’t so tough’, she thought as she moved her hand to unsheathe her sword, finally getting serious.

Just for her to see Aster smile as he pointed at Lilia’s direction, making Layla’s pretty green pupils, contract at the realization that she got so immersed in the black-haired youth who she didn’t realize was strong enough to block her way, that she lost her original focus, saving Nina from that aggressive woman!

The previous took long to explain but happened in a fraction of a second, needless to say but Aster was impressed by how Layla managed to keep up with his parallel thinking, meaning that unlike Iris she is an energy/soul cultivator.

Unfortunately, not even Aster can completely keep up with Lilia, regardless of whether she is restraining herself or not, so Layla could only turn around in time to see that red slash from earlier, fully land on Nina.

“No…”, what originally was going to be an angered scream, followed by her using everything she had to fight with Aster, for getting in her way, became a confused expression on Layla’s face as she saw Nina’s feverish face relaxing on the spot.

“Phew”, to Layla’s surprise, Nina who has been unable to properly rest for quite a while, let out a comfortable sound and fell asleep on the spot, which prevented her from witnessing the incredible scene of the red glow from which Lilia’s slash from earlier was made, coming out of her body “dragging” a hand sized sphere of grey fog, along with it.

Lilia curiously gazed at the thing and casually gestured her hand, which made that red glow return at her, while she grabbed the sphere of grey fog with her hand, to cutely play with it.

‘I guess that makes sense, that clingy dragon girl wouldn’t randomly help others, unless I asked her to, that girl had something in which she was interested’, amusingly thought Aster, it was understandable Lilia was currently being dominated by her instincts, so what she wanted was what ruled her actions, in other words she moved and acted based on her desires.

Despite the weird scene from earlier, Layla immediately recovered from the shock, she rushed to Nina’s side and checked up her vital signs and was unable to control her awe.

“She is completely fine now…”, she mumbled, only for her to hear Aster saying.

“Well, that is not completely right, the origin of her problem has been dealt with, yes, however her body is exhausted, so you do need a high ranked resource with fire and earth properties but a soft effect, to nurture her back to full health, otherwise a couple of years of not being able use her full strength, are to be expected”.

Before Layla’s heart dropped again, Aster added. Sёarch* The nôvelFire.net website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

“Luckily, there is something like that right here”, with those words, a giant hundred-meter sized golden armored arm appeared next to Aster, casually picking up the magma golem which Layla had shot down earlier, by its neck.

Now, the golem had a pretty respectable, size of around fifty meters in total, but looked like a toy compared to that sole arm, also no matter how much the golem fought, punching the giant golden armored hand with its blazing fists, the grip around its head didn’t budge.

“Every “threat” in these territories, had a reward if you are skilled enough to obtain it, there is a palm sized core floating in the stomach of the golem, blast a hole through it and take it out”, said Aster to Layla.

He could have done it himself, but Lilia was barely being distracted by that grey fog, if he paid more attention to other “females”, she will for sure notice it and her reaction was rather unpredictable just like earlier, also he needed as much of his energy reserves to deal with Lilia’s courting rituals, so he limited to restrain the golem.

Layla didn’t waste time, earlier when she fought the golems she was using as little energy as possible, since her aim was the deepest parts of this volcanic territory, where real spirit beasts would for sure live, but since based on what Aster said, she’ll be able to get what she needed from the golem, then there was no need to limit herself.

In a flash, she placed her hand on her sword and unsheathed it and an insanely high speed, others only saw a red flash and heard a “click”, when Layla sheathed her sword again, marking the end of her attack.

‘Oh, I guess that explains why she uses a single edged sword’, thought Aster, unlike Iris who used a long sword with two edges, which was more commonly seen, Layla wielded a single edged one, which specialized in fast and precise slashes, as the thousands of cuts that practically turned the whole middle body of the magma golem into molten rock strips with the exact same length, suggested.

The eyes of the golem immediately lost their light, not because of that previous attack, the magma itself wasn’t important for the golem, it could always replenish what it lost, making it really hard to deal with, but since Layla was now holding its palm sized red core in her right hand, the golem crumbled apart the next second.

Also, Layla moved so fast that she created the illusion that she never left her current position, this is also why she was so wary of Lilia, she was really confident in her speed and reaction time and yet she was easily overwhelmed by a “plain” and “average” looking person, it didn’t make sense for her.

“This certainly has fire and earth attributes, but it’s too volatile…”, mumbled Layla as she saw the magma core of the golem on her hand, still she has received enough surprises from Aster in such a short period of time to believe the stories that her cousin has told her, so she handed Aster the core and waited to see what he was planning to do.

Aster dispelled the manifestation of the armor and instead showered the core with Rigel’s flames.

“Crack!”, a loud crack echoed through the whole area as the core crumbled apart, turning into dust the next second, leaving behind a nail sized bright dark orange crystal which looked specially eye catching.

“Mm?”, Lilia who was previously immersed in playing with that gray fog sphere, turned her head towards Aster and her eyes sparkled when she saw the “candy” on his hand, but this time Aster was faster than her, he appeared next to Nina and made her swallow the crystal, very much to Lilia’s displease.

“Grrr!”, with a soft growl, Lilia pounced on Aster and started poking him and checking his pockets, looking like a cute little animal which wants a treat, but with the plus that the red glow which was imprisoning that grey fog sphere was starting to look specially menacing for others.

“Ahem, that should be enough to completely cure her, tell Iris that she can come with those two to visit my valley tomorrow at noon, I have my hands quite occupied right now, so I’ll take my leave”, said Aster as he prepared to fly away with that ticking bomb dragon girl.

“Wait, is it okay if I go as well!”, shouted Layla in a hurry as she saw Aster jumping out of the red boat.

“Sure”, limited to say Aster, not wanting Lilia to be near other girls for more time, also it is true that he was interested in Layla, after all, someone that could match up to Agnes, realm-wise even if he wasn’t sure if she had a strong enough battle prowess to be on the same level as that exercise maniac friend of his, was for sure not easy to come by.

And with that, Aster flashed past the golems that were trying to keep him out of the outer zone of the volcanic territory, disappearing from sight in a couple of seconds.

“M-Miss Layla, who were those people?”, asked one of the young red-haired girls who only now that Lilia was gone, were able to move again.

“I would like to know it myself… also what is all that “miss” stuff, we aren’t in those stuck-up bastard’s presence, so stop it you little girl”, said Layla as she flicked the girl’s forehead.

“Ouch, that hurts sister Layla!”, exclaimed the girl, Layla smiled in response, she stole a gaze on Aster’s direction before she supplied energy to the red flying boat, since she had a lot to talk about with Iris.

…

Leaving that little episode aside, Aster flew who was flying at high speed, relaxed when he felt those girls leaving, which also made Lilia who was pouting since earlier, as she didn’t find a treat like the one Aster gave to Nina, in his pockets or clothes no matter how much she looked into them, softly snort.

“Humph”, her displease was clear, Aster on the other hand was amused by the fact that the first sound similar to a word, that came out of Lilia’s dragon mode was a snort, at least she didn’t go on a rampage, perhaps because she got something interesting from Nina, so she decided to be “magnanimous” even if other females approached her mate.

Speaking of which, Aster curiously gazed at that red glow which floated around Lilia, imprisoning that grey fog sphere, which even at this point was trying to get away.

“Just what is that thing, I’m sure it drained quite a bit of that girl’s health, perhaps that Merkel guy’s attribute has a parasite-like property or something”, mumbled Aster, just to feel Lilia’s intense gaze on him.

“Ahem, I’ll give you a candy later so….”, before Aster could finish bribing Lilia, thinking she was about to start destroying everything in sight, despite them not having arrived at their final destination, he saw her shaking her head.

“Mm”, Lilia grabbed that grey fog sphere with her hand and then showed it to Aster while she made some weird gestures, trying to convey her demands to “forgive” him.

“Pfft”, Aster couldn’t help but softly laugh at her trying her best to make sure her desires were understood and fulfilled by him.

“Grrr!”, Lilia of course noticed Aster making fun of her, which earned him a soft growl accompanied by she showing him, her teeth before she bit his neck, of course she didn’t do it seriously, but Aster did feel her teeth sinking into his flesh, before she licked the wound.

“My bad, my bad, I’ll of course comply and refine another candy for her majesty”, jokingly said Aster, that’s right, those gestures imitated how Aster refined the core of the magma golem, changing its original explosive nature with Rigel’s smooth purifying property, turning it into a soft fire and earth resource which is hard to come by in the wild.

But Lilia didn’t think about any of that, she just wanted Aster to make a candy for her instead of for other girls and she happened to have gotten a good raw material earlier.

“Fufu~”, Lilia giggled and then rubbed her face against Aster’s chest a couple of times, before she handed him that grey fog sphere to him.

The moment Aster touched the thing, it tried to escape but he restrained it with the golden light protection of the Paragon body, sealing its fate.

‘It does resemble that red glow with which she stole control over my arm, a bit… but its purpose is not the same, not to mention that this grey fog is way less refined and easier to deal with’, thought Aster before his hand exploded in blue flames.

Sizzling sounds came from the sphere which melt like butter under the sun, until only a small black crystal which radiated a strong aura of vitality, was left.

Aster inspected the thing for a couple of seconds, before he turned to see that dragon girl of his which was cutely drooling while following his hand’s trajectory, making it clear that she wanted to eat that crystal.

“Don’t look at me like that, here it’s all yours”, said Aster as he offered Lilia the crystal, only to see her eyes sparkling, she opened her mouth and pointed at it with her hand, her meaning was clear “feed it to me”.

Aster bitterly smiled in response, he technically fed Nina the refined core earlier, so of course this needly dragon girl wanted him to do the same for her.

“Come here you, needy dragon girl”, said Aster as he dragged Lilia into his embrace, sitting her on his lap to then shove the candy into her mouth.

“Mmm~”, Lilia triumphantly smiled before she closed her mouth, also trapping Aster’s fingers with her lips, she casually swallowed the candy and instead focused on his fingers, thoroughly licking and playing with them with her tongue, before she let go of them while giving Aster an “innocent” bright gaze.

“Sure, sure, if you want to be spoiled, so be it”, said Aster as he patted her head, making Lilia happily lick his face in response.

While Aster was enjoying Lilia’s reaction, his eyes glowed and a surprised expression flashed through his face as he saw that red glow flowing towards Lilia’s middle back, gathering there and ultimately returning to her body through it, resulting in a small red ruby shaped seal to appear there.

It was similar in shape to the cute black scale from which her main pair of wings originated, but it was a tattoo-like thing, similar to the one from which Sarina or Kana’s wings originated.

Not to mention it was at the exact height at which her secondary pair of wings, spread out.

‘Don’t tell me she had a “crave” for vitality-rich things, because of this… she is separating her secondary wings from the main ones, does this count as evolution?’, wondered Aster.

Aster didn’t relate she wanting that ruby, the candies and even his blood, to those wings, because vitality is not the same as physical energy.

Vitality is the “health” of the body, physical energy on the other hand it’s basically stamina, it’s a representation of how much a cultivator’s body can handle, it diminishes the more strain is put on a cultivator and increases with rest and meditation.

That being said, it’s not a power that’s used by cultivators actively, not even body path ones, they circulate spirit energy through their bodies to attack, this involves meridians which are not physical existing channels.

Lilia’s secondary wings, seemed to somehow make use of it as an offensive mean and now Aster realized that she could transform vitality into physical energy as well, which was amazing.

You might believe that healthy equals having a high resistance, but that’s not the case at all, Aster is the perfect example of that, his yang which represents his vitality is virtually endless and yet it’s not like he doesn’t get tired, he isn’t a perpetual moving machine after all, otherwise he would be able to subjugate that monstrous mother of his in bed winning the “war”, instead of satisfy her until he passes out, which is just winning a “battle” instead.

But Lilia apparently learned how to overcome that, which was honestly terrifying, for her enemies at least, this meant that if she continued evolving in the future, there might be a day where she can fight endlessly without getting tired at all.

‘Was this the change in her lineage, caused by she reaching the Gate Transcending realm, while also having entered the Heavenly realms in the energy path before’, thought Aster before he put the subject at the back of his head and instead focused on caressing the needy dragon girl in his embrace.

Amidst Lilia’s happy giggles and comfortable sounds, they reached their final destination, the center of this volcanic territory and also the most dangerous part of it, where the flag was positioned.

Unlike the outer zone where there was solid ground with magma flowing below of it, the center was basically an open sea of lava, with nothing on which one could step on and that wasn’t all, there were no golems here, instead Aster could feel the presence of spirit beasts coming from the sea of molten rock.

“Grrr!”, completely different to the cute growls that Lilia uses to express her disapproval or displease with Aster, what escaped from her lips this time was a threatening and fierce sound, followed by her red ruby eyes glowing in an ominous red blood light as she jumped out of Aster’s embrace.

Aster saw Lilia’s nails black nails enlarging a bit, to resemble claws, her muscles also tensed up and even the ends of her hair seemed to stand, she took an aggressive stance as she glared at the sea of lava.

Despite all the previous, there wasn’t an ounce of wariness on her expression, instead she had a wild smile on her pretty face, making it clear that she was excited over the incoming fight.

The calmness of the sea of molten rock was disturbed by giant waves that raised all over the place, as a dozen of thirty-meter figures emerged from within the lava, they were a kind of spirit beast called volcanic armored bears.

A race with not only innately high defenses as they grow black obsidian on top of their natural tough hides, hence why they live in volcanic zones, but also a really high battle prowess since their attribute is a composition of earth and fire, in other words magma which they actually stored in their stomachs, not to mention they aren’t limited to the Transcending realms.

But what probably made this race outstand the most, is the fact that they are extremely territorial and will fight head on against enemies that set foot in their nest, to the point of disregarding their own lives, also they are pretty much instinct driven, incapable of communication until they enter the Heavenly realm, acting as mindless beasts, so they are an extremely dangerous race that has to be regularly controlled.

“Roaaaar!”, the bears saw the “invaders” floating above their territory and without any second thought, charged at them while roaring and exhibiting their large claws and menacing teeth.

Bears are normally loners, but these guys swarm their enemies, a tactic that would normally be used by individually weak spirit beasts, but pulled it off by strong ones, it’s a nightmare for a cultivator.

Seeing the strong enemies charging at them, Lilia’s smile widened, she became a black flash that appeared in front of the bears, her little fist swung backwards before she punched one on the stomach.

“Crack!”

“Booom!”.

The bear in question, had the armor on its whole body, explode on the spot and was then sent flying like a meteor, clashing against the lava, opening a temporary path due to the impact, before disappearing in the sea of lava that closed a moment later.

Lilia happily smiled at Aster before she jumped towards another bear, which this time took the initiative to attack, just for its paw to be met head on by Lilia’s little fist, resulting in a thunderous explosion as the whole arm of the bear was blasted away, before Lilia kicked the bear sending it flying out of their sight.

“So, the ritual this time isn’t simple destruction, but… a beatdown”, said Aster as he raised his left arm, blocking the claws of a bear with the golden armor that cladded his body.

He grabbed the arm of the bear and spined the beast to then smash it against another one, defeating two enemies with a single movement, despite how easy Aster made it look, these bears were all early-stage Void Manipulation realm spirit beasts, which luckily lacked the wisdom to move through space, but made up with the incredible ability to spit lava, just like the torrent of molten rock that was shot at Aster in all directions suggested.

The bears saw their enemy being swallowed by lava and they roared in excitement, just to see the black-haired human come out of the thick lava, completely unscathed.

Aster craned his neck, unfortunately for these bears… volcanic zones were a playground for him.

Aster saw Lilia having fun, beating the hell out of the bears that kept coming from the lava sea using only her fists and he corrected his statement from earlier.

“So, we are asserting dominance by competing on who gets rid of most of the “pests” in our love nest, this time around, huh?”, he said before he dove into the swarm of enraged bears.

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