The Burning Fiend

A winged serpent shaped metallic life form moved at high speed making its way toward the end of the prefecture and the continent, the last city in that direction would be the Crystal Cave City which was more famous, due to the incredible scenery, than important for being the connection point to another continent.

A hundred years had passed since Reynolds fought against the there famous 7-star Fiends and consolidated his fame creating deterrence. He had obtained enough inkstones to live in luxury for thousands of years, so they could travel without need to stop in the cities they come across to perform missions.

They had been avoided by the bandits as his metallic life form had become easily recognizable allowing them to travel with leisure, only stopping in places they found interesting. They had also used another metallic life form along with the 'stealth' bracelets only allowing Koral and Talia to not hide their aura in order to attract bandits that the girls could use for training and a few test subjects for Jenne's experiments.

During this time, the one who had the most improvement turned out to be Koral who was greatly inspired by the music notes and compositions that Reynolds had taken from Aruko's interspatial ring. She had not trained consciously, but she enjoyed playing music as a hobby and her understanding in the mystery of 'Music' was increasing slowly.

Reynolds thought that this sort of training seemed slightly more effective that the comparison of mysteries between different elemental systems that Talia was performing, and wondered who will be the one to gain a new elemental avatar first.

They were approaching a barren mountain that seemed surrounded by an extensive swamp, Reynolds thought that the place seemed strange and decided to stop on the mountain for a while. The metallic life form coiled on what seemed a platform at the middle of the mountain.

The place was strange to say the least, the swamp seemed full of life while the mountain, made out of rocks, seemed devoid of life, but they could not find anything wrong with it or the reason behind this phenomenon. Windsor liked the place, and she started looking for suitable boulders that could be used for sculpting while Catherine and Reynolds looked more interested on the swamp as the life energy seemed like a beacon to them.

They decided to stay there for a few months thinking that Talia and Windsor could benefit from exploring the strange mountain, while the rest returned to their pondering of the Laws and Edicts or to their studies of runes and poisons while listening to Koral's gentle and relaxing music.

Reynolds's three divine avatar were completely occupied trying to fuse the four laws, but his saint body would spend time with his family and alternate between studying runes, pondering the mystery of 'Explosion' and contemplating the swamp trying to gain new insights using the life energy emitted on this strange place.

---

A young man with short black hair and a mischievous smile was walking with a beautiful blond woman as they made their way to a store where one could buy or rent recording orbs with battles of powerful combatants. They heard that the store had recently acquired a couple of recordings of a powerful Fiend from the Jadefloat Continent and Sasha had dragged Bebe to the store to see if they could find news of Reynolds and his family.

"Sasha, do you think we will find news of him? Are you really that interested in him?" Bebe asked with curiosity, he had jested about this so many times that neither of them found it funny anymore and it had just become a normal conversation between them.

"You said that he became a 7-star Fiend more than a hundred years ago, that would made him stronger than your Boss, isn't it? I'm just curious, if I'm forced to roam the Infernal Realm agaisnt my will... then, I will rater be away from my parents. They seem a good choice." She was frowning and then muttered to herself.

"It should be enough time for the recordings of his battles to arrive to the Redbud Continent. The only question is... if his battles are at the level where his recordings could cause interest in other continents." Sasha answered without much care, she was taking a break from her training and not really looking for the recordings.

But Bebe smirked and said. "Well, we are in luck... look at that". He pointed to two recording orbs with tags that read 'The Burning Fiend 7-star trial' and 'The Burning Fiend victory over three 7-star Fiends'. Bebe soon paid for the two orbs, and they left the store thinking of returning to the courtyard to watch the two battles.

"I think Boss will feel depressed after knowing that Reynolds has already become a 7-star Fiend, perhaps he will finally take a 5-star mission this time. That could be fun". Bebe muttered to himself with hope. Sasha looked at him with mirth and said. "Yes... because Bebe is a little boy that could not go anywhere without his big brother. Poor Bebe who cannot take a 5-star mission alone". Her tone was similar to the one, a.d.u.l.ts would use to talk to little kids making Bebe blush and growl.

In the last decades Bebe was growing bored with the short missions he took along with Linley, and he thought that staying in the city to eat delicacies and sleep was more to his liking that performing the low level missions that would not take them far from the city. They could not get an exciting mission as that would require for them to leave the city and Sasha was not a Fiend yet. She had refused to take the examination with her mother who was already a Highgod, she insisted that she would go to the Fiend trials when she managed to fuse the three laws she had mastered, and that might take her between 50 and 100 years.

Linley was sitting next to Delia on the courtyard's garden, he felt a little frustrated as well for taking only 4-star missions, and he was growing restless. He had managed to fuse the mysteries of 'Earth Essence', 'The Throbbing Pulse of the World' and 'Gravitational Space'. But he had not managed to find a way to start fusing "World Walking" with any of the three other laws. The power of his 'dragonblood warrior' form allowed him to fight 5-star Fiends without problem, but he could not reach the rank as the 5-star missions were too lengthy and usually far away.

He looked curiously as Sasha and Bebe, that just came back, seemed excited and hurriedly started looking at the recording orbs they had just bought. His curiosity winning the inner battle, he stood and moved closer to Bebe hoping to find something to distract himself. Bebe just smiled at him before throwing an orb to him.

Linley poured his spiritual sense into it and the image of Reynolds fighting another Deity startled him, he understood immediately that the realm of both combatants was above his and the battle ended with a clear victory for Reynolds. He then looked at the tag, and he seemed to lost his soul when he read 'The Burning Fiend, 7-star trial'.

"A 7-star Fiend already... but how? I need to train more!" Linley's voice seemed to gain unyielding determination while Delia frowned from the other room and released a sigh in frustration.

---

Beirut was sitting behind an expensive wood desk, he was a little disappointed as Linley's and Bebe's improvement was not up to his expectations. He had not mentioned anything when he learned that the girl Sasha was going to travel with them, but he regretted it now... their progress, well... Linley's progress was limited due to her presence, but he could not say much for Bebe. He doubted his grandson would make any progress considering how lazy he was.

Still, a smile appeared on his face as he looked at the recording orb placed on his desk, the other kid had improved beyond his expectations... it was just a shame that he trained the Elemental Laws of Fire and there was not much he could do to propel his growth. He would need to keep focusing on Linley hoping that he would reach the realm of Asura within the next 100,000 years.

He shook his head and wondered how much longer his wind avatar would be forced to remain exiled on the Yulan Plane.

---

On a luxurious hall, Mosi was sitting on his comfortable chair and seemed content yet a little unwillingness could be found on his face. He sighed looking at the recording orb that his one of the servants had brought him a few hour ago. He was sure now that Reynolds was a soul mutate, a 3-way soul mutate! But he could do nothing about it since Reynolds's power was not much different that his and it will not be long for him to reach the Asura level.

He was happy to have make a good decision and allowing the kid Tarosse to leave, he was too fond of his comfortable life and creating enemies without sufficient reason could only make things more complicated. "Perhaps I could still become friends with him... he might be interested in learn from my research in soul mutates and his own experience could be useful to further my research". He muttered to himself while the light on his eyes seemed to shine brighter.

---

Reynolds was drinking wine while enjoying the music Koral had being playing not far from him. He found it curious, Koral used her fire avatar to play the flute but her saint body was coiled on her l.a.p completely immersed in the music.

It seemed that she only needed to hear the music to help her to ponder the mystery itself and playing the flute was not really necessary. Suddenly he smiled and looked at Koral as the Elemental Laws descended and her music stopped.

Reynolds chuckled thinking that he had expected Windsor and Talia to be the ones making the most progress on this place, but Koral was about to create her wind avatar surpassing Talia again. The girls were soon standing next to Reynolds while looking with happiness at Koral, Talia's smile was specially bright and pure.