Ethan stood at the edge of the ancient forest.
The air was still thick with the scent of ozone and ionized blood from the battle that had just occurred. Behind him, twenty shadow soldiers once proud Origin Paragons and Eternal Sovereigns stood like silent monuments to his power. They were ready to hunt, to grow his army, and to serve as his eyes in this vast world.
But Ethan's mind was already elsewhere.
His primary goal remained the same. He needed to find powerful Inverse beings. These entities, born from the negative plane of existence, held the keys to a level of power that the positive world could not provide.
However, searching for them by luck in the infinite expanse of the Origin World was a fool's errand. It was inefficient, and Ethan valued efficiency above all else.
He needed a way to cross the border.
Ethan sat beneath the shade of a massive tree, his mind racing through the laws of physics and metaphysics.
