Chapter 255 - 255. Running
A shadow ran near the western side of the continent.
It was fast, it shot through the plains without hesitation, only looking at was in front of it.
That shadow was, of course, Noah.
He was clad in a tight black robe with a hood that covered his face and he was speeding in a straight line along the coastline, he was using it as his landmark.
'Two months have passed by now, I bet that the information about my element has become public already.'
Noah knew that the noble families would retort in some way to his absence to the meeting, he had already considered the worst possible outcome and he couldn't care less.
'Even if they label me as a criminal and start a man-hunt, I am already outside their reach.'
In the two months after the events of in the Bare Dungeon, Noah did everything he could to cover his tracks and escape the Utra nation.
He had destroyed his hunter and academy's tokens for fear of being tracked down by the Royals, he really didn't want to bet on Ivor's words.
Then, he had inspected Phoebe and Manuel's space-rings, gaining a large number of resources and potions before destroying the rings too.
Lastly, he had cut his hair short, he didn't think that a simple haircut would hide his identity in front of other cultivators but he believed that it could slow down the investigations.
As for his escape plan, it was quite simple.
The Bare Dungeon was already near the border of the nation, it was at only one week of travel from the Royal city after all, reaching the border took him no time.
Noah had chosen to move to the westernmost part of the country though before abandoning the nation and he had his reasons for that.
The first one was that he had no idea about the actual layout of the other countries, he could only use the coastline to be sure of his path.
The second one was that the western side of the country was the one with fewer cultivators!
At the center of the border, there was the Royal city and, on the eastern side, there was the academy.
Those two structures gathered the majority of cultivators of that part of the country, the others would just reside in their mansions and would generally avoid the areas populated by commoners.
However, Noah preferred to hide his presence even in front of those commoners.
During his travel, he had encountered many small or large villages that had only a few weak cultivators in them.
Those were the moments when he would use the Warp spell.
Noah had always held back in using that spell during his battles.
The main reason was that he wanted to hide his actual proficiency with it but there was more to it.
The Warp spell was hard to perform, it required a great deal of concentration and mental energy and required for the user to see or to sense the place where he would teleport.
Also, it needed some time to cast it, its efficiency in battle completely depended on the situation.
Yet, one big advantage was that it left no traces of the user.
Noah had used that spell as soon as he came out of the Bare Dungeon to make any possible spy of the Royals lose track of him.
Then, he had proceeded in using it every time he found some human's settlement, that was the best approach to prevent anyone from noticing him.
The distance crossed by one teleportation could only cover a few kilometers at best but it was enough to surpass those villages.
Another time when his spell had been required was when he had reached the border of the nation.
Noah was sure that there was a formation in place there so he had used the Warp spell repeatedly to cross it.
That formation mostly prevented outsiders from entering the country, it hadn't been created for the opposite situation but Noah still had chosen to use his spell, he really didn't want to notify the Royals of his escape after all.
The rest of his escape was spent running.
Two months spent running had allowed him to cross thousands of kilometers and, thanks to his rank 4 body, he had only needed to rest a few times to recover.
'Another village.'
Noah saw another human's settlement in the distance.
It didn't seem the kind of place that could be inhabited by cultivators but he still decided to resort to the Warp spell.
Noah focused his mental energy on the other side of the village and activated the spell, being immediately enveloped by a black fire only to reappear at a few kilometers in the distance.
Yet, as soon as he reappeared, he found two fishermen staring at him with wide eyes.
'Fuck, my mental sphere still can't give me a perfect perception when it comes to long distances.'
Noah uncovered his hood and smiled at the two commoners, all while performing a bow.
"Do you know which country is this?"
The two fishermen had seen that man coming out of the black smoke and were even more surprised when they saw how young it was.
"Th-this is Athor country, My Lord"
Noah nodded and continued to smile.
"Do you happen to know which countries are their allies?"
The fishermen thought for a while before shaking their heads.
"We are simple commoners, My Lord, we don't really understand the stuff about cultivation."
'It seems that I still can't stop.'
Noah released two strands of black smoke that enveloped the fishermen and performed another Warp further in the distance.
The partial Demonic form devoured those commoners in an instant, leaving no trace of them.
'I still don't know if I left the area of influence of the Utra nation!'
However, Noah didn't care at all about those two, he had decided to kill them as soon as they saw the black flames.
That world was a dangerous one.
One day you could meet a dragon and die under its might, in another one you could meet a man escaping from his country that was ready to do anything to cover his tracks.
'Luck can determine life and death, only personal power can cut the strings that control your fate.'
It was with that thought that Noah continued to speed in the distance, uncaring the beauty of the crystalline sea on his left.