Chapter 79: Cloud in a bottle? Who needs it when you have magic

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*Booom!!*

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*Booom!!*

"He's doing it again?"

In the middle of the backyard of Aspen's house, the sounds of small and compressed explosions could be heard from time to time, but strangely enough, there wasn't any sound from battle nor shouts of rage coming from there. Claire, who was right now watering the plants of her garden, walked over there to check on Aspen, who by the last week has been doing a certain type of training that she had yet to understand.

*Booom!!*

"Hey, mind mentioning me what were you doing again?" Claire bent over the fence in Aspen's backyard, and yelled at him as he seemed to be a bit too concentrated to notice her.

"I'm surpassing game-boundaries, HAHAHAHAHA!!" Aspen, who saw her curious gaze over his training, laughed like a madman as he remembered in anticipation of what he has been looking to master this entire week.

Suddenly, he kicked the ground and gave an enormous jump high into the air, probably reaching more than 4 meters high in just one jump. However, just when he was about to start falling to the ground once again due to gravity, mana started gathering rapidly on the plant of his left foot, and created a small explosion after kicking the air that suddenly launched him high into the air once again.

"Are you trying to fly?" Claire, who saw Aspen rise even higher into the air, raised an eyebrow and placed her hands on her hips.

"Something like that"

*Booom!!*

Aspen continued jumping mid-air while also maintaining his own balance, he also started performing different types of actions while creating small explosions below his feet. Be it using his sword in midair as if attacking an invisible enemy, drinking potions mid-air (Actually water, he didn't want to waste precious potions on training). Or controlling the nearby trees perfectly while in midair.

"In this way I can jump infinitely, or at least until my mana depletes. But considering that I won't use it to fly around, and only to dodge attacks which should have been impossible for me to dodge before, then I think It will be okay... Though I should probably craft two or three additional stacks of Mana potions just in case..." After finally landing, Aspen started murmuring to himself while smiling widely at his new technique.

Suddenly, a translucent screen appeared in front of him, informing him about his new mastery over the technique.

"So I only needed to fix my balance then? Neat"

Aspen then lifted his head and started looking at the beautiful clouds passing through the skies. His somewhat calm look soon turned over into one of playfulness, as he started muttering some words in a low voice with a grin spreading on his face.

"Should I go to space?"

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An hour later...

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"Hey Aspen, I went to the city you told me. They kinda looked at me with fear, but I managed to get quite a lot of money! I even bought some beers for us to drink!" Jack, who until now was in Balroc city living the rich life and doing business with treasures he has managed to get through the years, entered the place and started calling at the door of Aspen with a smile on his skull.

*Knock*

*Knock*

*Knock*

"Aspen, you there my friend?"

...

*Knock*

*Knock*

*Knock*

"... I guess not...... Hey miss Dryad, do you know where did Aspen go? I thought he could be training his strange techniques for the time being?" Seeing that Aspen was not at home, he called out to the Dryad he had met a few weeks ago, since in his times Dryads weren't that rare unlike now, he wasn't particularly surprised for seeing one, and thus his reaction to seeing a Dryad was close to non-existent. Though when he discovered that Dryads have actually gone almost-extinct his jaw fell to the floor in astonishment (literally).

"Oh, you were here mister Jack? Aspen... went on a small trip... but don't worry, he should be here pretty soon... unless he is dead..."

"Dead?!"

"Oh, he is here..."

"Huh, Where?!"

"Up"

"Huh?!"

As Jack lifted his head, he saw a small dot in the sky approaching them slowly.

"What is Aspen doing in the sky?!"

Soon, the strange figure landed horribly in front of them, creating a small dust cloud, and leaving some spiderweb-like cracks on the ground.

"Ugh..." A small groan came from the center of the explosion, and soon after the dust dispersed, Jack and Evvie saw the heavily wounded body of Aspen lying on the ground with a pensive expression on his face.

"What the heck happened to you up there?!" Jack, who saw his heavily injured body, approached him and tried to help him stand up, but was stopped when he saw Aspen raise his hand and gesture him to stop.

"I found some angry birds that weren't happy seeing a human actually flying, and I soon started getting stabbed by dozens of flying feathers that were as sharp as daggers. Not to mention, but the prolonged use of explosions to jump into the air might actually be a little damaging to my bones... which is why I can't move my legs for the time being..."

*Smack*

Jack smacked his bony forehead and looked at Aspen with a raised eyebrow.

"Why did you even go so high in the first place?" 

Aspen, who heard Jack's question, looked away and muttered some words with an embarrassed expression.

"I thought that maybe I could find some kind of Sky city, you know, I've heard that angels actually exists since childhood, and I thought that maybe if I went high enough I could manage to find a sky city... Though I only met some horrible bird-women that tried to kill me as soon as I met them..." 

"Hmm... are Angels also extinct miss Dryad?"

"No, they shouldn't be, but their sky cities have moved far away from this monster infested lands a long time ago, probably to the south, but I'm not completely sure..."

*Gulp*

As Aspen drank a small healing potion, his legs, which were pretty bloody and bent on different ways, returned to normal, and he started getting up with a rather relaxed expression on his face.

"I think I will depart in two days, I still want to enjoy sleeping on my bed for a bit more after all..."

"Really? What about your investigation on the red crystal from that giant Slime we fought some time ago? You finished it?" Jack turned to look at Aspen and massaged his jaw in wonder, after all such a magic item must have incredible powers, and he was curious on what did Aspen manage to discover after studying it himself.

"Don't even talk about it... Although it really had some magical-teleporting properties, unfortunately it only works on slimes, as it separates the body in small pieces that it transports through the space in an instant. Thus, the slimes, that are made out of gel, will not die after having their bodies separated for one second. However, when I made a test on a cute bunny that I found on the forest... Well, let's say that it didn't end well for the bunny... or for my clothes."

"Huh... now I know why you were covered in blood that day..."

"Hahaha... it was certainly not a good image... But don't worry, I will find it a use someday... for the time being, I should be preparing my luggage for traveling through the sea. After all, I will have the elves bring me in one of their excursions to the jungle. Mostly because I don't have a ship on my own, and they are the only ones that can bring me with them... That aside, I still need to craft some important potions that I might need later... And I think that they won't be easy to make"

"You're traveling though the sea? Haaah... I remember those days when I could travel through the coasts of the Human territory exchanging goods and increasing my wealth. Even kings could bow down to my wealth, now look at me, skinny to the bones (literally) and with not even a speck of my old fortune... be careful though, I remember that storms were actually quite common while traveling on the sea... and sharks too... and giant squids as well... and there also those merfolks, quite the troublesome bunch... hmm, just try to be careful"

Aspen, who heard Jack's worried tone, turned to look at him with a grin on his face as he started patting Jack's shoulder while laughing a little.

"Hahaha... Don't worry, what's the worst thing that can happen while traveling through the seemingly infinite vastness of the sea?"

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