Odyssey of the Blind God

"Just travel around Jundra, conquer dungeons, get to know other races and their traditions, and find yourself," Meryl answered after a while.

She knew that she shouldn't influence Nial in his decisions but the young Original was not able to follow his desires because he was afraid that something might happen to his father if he left him on his own.

It was not as if that fear was bad but restricting himself to the new human shelter would only result in stagnating his strength which would inevitably mean that he would be weaker than the beings who would attack the human shelter in the future.

That being said, he wouldn't be powerful enough to defeat his future opponents, which meant that it wouldn't be possible for him to protect what was left of his family.

"Who knows…maybe you might encounter other humans all over Jundra as well?" Master Crevian joined Meryl's attempts to convince Nial. He could tell what his disciple was struggling with so he wanted to extend a helping hand as well.

Meanwhile, Nial was thinking a lot. He didn't doubt that it was better to leave the human shelter, whether it was to adventure through Jundra or to leave the planet altogether to explore the vast Universe and become stronger in the process. Nonetheless, it was obvious that he couldn't leave his father alone, at least not in this state even if his father himself was of a different opinion.

"Do you mean other humans from Jundra?" Nial asked Master Crevian, feeling slightly confused. It was not impossible for more human shelters other than their nine to exist but Nial was not sure how high the chances for something like this were.

Even for the human race of Jundra, the planet was still a mystery. They hadn't explored more than 20% of it before the first dungeons had appeared.

"I thought more about human races from…other planets, but humans from Jundra might be somewhere as well, who knows?" Master Crevian asked with a faint smile on his lips. He felt that Nial's questions were a good sign of his willingness to travel around and explore places.

"Just find out who you are and what you want on your adventure, and come back when you think you have all the answers," Master Crevian suggested before he added nicely, "We can make you a radar that is locked to the Forest of Life's coordinates, and a device, which which you can teleport short distances. It will have infinite uses if you can provide enough mana to utilize it!"

Nial could tell that both Master Crevian and Meryl were trying their best to make sure that Nial wouldn't feel bad in any way when leaving. He was grateful for this but he could also tell that the situation might as well end up as it had been with his mother.

He hadn't even been far from his mother when she had been attacked, yet, he had been unable to save her before he had been a bit too late.

"We will also make sure that we create a communication device for you that can be used with mana all over Jundra, okay?" Master Crevian asked and Nial felt as if his teacher was reading his mind.

Nial was unable to hide a tiny smile that crept up his face as he nodded his head after he was pulled into a 'discussion' with his father. Miles' condition seemed to have improved a bit and he was basically ordering Nial to leave the human shelter and to become strong enough to make sure that Sabrina wouldn't get into trouble.

It felt like Miles was not bothered about his own safety or life but he wanted his children to take care of each other. He was too weak to do anything, which was his biggest regret in life.

If he had been a little bit stronger, or just a little bit faster, his wife might not have died. If he could, he would have gone back in time and sacrificed his own life to protect his wife, but his body had been paralyzed, and he had been unable to move when the incident happened.

He had helplessly witnessed the murder of his wife, and if not for Nial's quick actions, Sabrina would have died as well. Miles knew that his son had done his best and that he would always give his utmost to protect his family.

That being said, it had been a necessity for Miles to make his son leave, otherwise, Nial would never be able to get his act together, let alone find out who he truly was and what he wanted to do in the future.

When Nial finally accepted to leave, a small fire of determination and ambition had been ignited within the young Original once again. He started to prepare lots of things for his journey.

Nial didn't think that he would need so many things but he started to use his Heart of Darkness while engraving runic constellations on various pieces of equipment.

This was something he did to experiment with a few things and the results were marvelous. The Heart of Darkness increased the potency of the runic constellations he engraved by more than 30%. This allowed him to attain exceptional results but it brought forth great difficulties as well.

The more potent runic constellations that had been engraved while Nial had used his Heart of Darkness in various ways, whether it was to release dark energy or his Essence of Darkness, were more likely to cause his runic armaments to break.

Nial accepted this rather easily, especially since they didn't possess many materials that could endure the highly potent power of augmented Advanced Runic constellations.

Almost three weeks passed before Nial finally decided to leave. He received an improved Originals bracelet, a teleportation device that could teleport up to three beings to a place several hundred kilometers ahead as long as he had visited that place once in his life before.

The teleportation device was a bracelet that would map his surrounding area to ensure that he would never be teleported in unknown terrain, say inside a mountain or in the sky, which was also why he could only teleport to places he had been before. It was a safety measure and Nial was more than fine with that.

He wouldn't want to jump hundreds of kilometers through unknown lands because he would never know where he would land. Furthermore, the reason for him to travel around was to find himself and become stronger. That would be a lot more difficult if he were to teleport himself through Jundra like a madman.

That being said, Nial finished his preparations before he hugged his father tightly. Miles looked much better than before, which was even more reason for Nial to feel more confident to leave his father's side.

It was time for him to find out more about himself instead of acting like others wanted him to.

"Leave now…and don't forget that we will have to talk when you are back for good!" Miles said, forcing himself to smile at his beloved son.

Nial smiled back at his father before he hugged him again.

"You can always message me…and don't do something stupid while I'm away. Take care of everyone and scold the slackers of the Onyx association and the Orion Artisan Guild. You are in charge of them!" Nial exclaimed before he laughed lightly as he took his leave.

He walked slowly away from his home before his steps accelerated the moment his father was not able to see him anymore.

Nial turned into a flash and he left the shelter in the blink of an eye.

As for his first destination, it was the destroyed settlement of the Heligav race! Nial wanted to figure out a few things, and the Heligav's destroyed shelter should be a great target!

It took Nial quite a while to reach the destroyed settlement of the Heligav, where he met a bunch of Elves. They had been stationed at the destroyed settlement to allow researchers to look through the tomes and goods of the Heligav race.

At the same time, it was not impossible for the man-made world bridge to get altered on the side of the Heligav race. Alterations would be quickly noticed if someone was near them to witness them when they were in process.

Thus, it was mandatory for Guards to be present at the destroyed settlement all the time. Nial was not obstructed by the Elven Guards. They greeted him in a rather neutral manner before they avoided his existence altogether.

Nial was thankful for that because he wouldn't want anyone to bother him right now. His heart and mind were still in turmoil even though he had been certain that it wouldn't affect him much to leave the shelter.

'I wonder if I will really be able to find out what I want to do, and who I am. The purpose of my life…' Nial mumbled before he shook his head with a deep sigh.

There were so many things Nial had yet to get used to, and one of them was the fact that not all races would be like the Elves, who had accepted him for possessing the powers of the late God of Darkness.

Other races would either start worshiping him, while the vast majority would attempt to kill him at once.

"I need to learn how to fight without using my dark energy… Even if I could use bits of the Essence of Darkness without anyone being suspicious about the origin of my power, it would be better if I avoid using both the dark energy and the Essence of Darkness…" Nial mumbled while he was deep in thought.

He was at the Prometheus rank and had yet to bind a total of five abilities. In the end, Nial had only occupied two out of five vacancies on his mana core, and he would have to bind the remaining three abilities to him before advancing to the Deux rank.

After he attained the Deux rank, he wouldn't be able to bind any ability to himself anymore. Thus, Nial had to use the following months, or maybe even years to figure out what kind of abilities he was lacking, how to hide dark energy perfectly if necessary, and a lot more.

Nial had a lot more to do than he initially thought but it was definitely good that he had a lot on his plate.

Working hard allowed him to forget the things that concerned him, whether that was his father's well-being, what his sister was doing if Mathias was doing fine, finding out more about himself, and so on.

And with that thought in mind, Nial started to expand his range of perception and [Mana Sense] to find out more about the Heligav race's settlement.

Not many researchers had come to Jundra yet because the Elves had focused on sending a horde of numerous combat Elves to the planet first, rather than a high number of Runiciers or other intellectual Elves.

Their highest priority was to make sure that the Elves would retain control of their territory and defend themselves against all possible opponents rather than getting to know some of the world's secrets.

This made it much easier for Nial to size up everything in his surrounding area and to digest the ginormous batches of information that flooded his mind.

Within a day or two, Nial finished his analysis of everything the Heligav had brought to Jundra and his finds were quite surprising.

"Looks like the Elves underestimated the Heligav. They've already managed to secure an alliance with quite a few races," Nial mumbled, intrigued as he visualized a map that had manifested in his mind.

It was somewhat old and not up to date anymore but it was definitely a map of Jundra, or rather the region where all human shelters, the Forest of Life, and a few red dots were marked on.

Interestingly enough, Nial was able to read a bunch of the signs that had been drawn on the map, which was why he began to smile so foolishly.

"I guess it's time for me to enter a city of foreign races once again!"