98 8th Layer (1/2)

There was muffled silence and stillness, Hartley's quiet breaths were akin to thunder in these tranquil settings, in an open grass plane surrounded by large thick trees, Hartley with his hair now golden-blonde in color sat cross legged.

Ever since gaining control of his inner world on Kang's estate, he was able to enter it as himself and not a mini blue version of himself, the only difference between this Harley and the Hartley in the real world was his hair color.

From a bird's eye view, one could see jungles, mountains and rivers stretching for more than 3000 kilometers, this world, wild untamed, untouched and untainted by any other living being, had a bright blue star floating above it like a constant eye watching over everything.

The bright blue glow radiated by the star, covered every inch of the land and reflected in Hartley's piercing blue eyes which were unfocused in concentration. There was a deep rumbling from the ground beneath his feet, then came a whitish-blue glow around his body, its light sparkling and glittering making him look phantom-like in the blue-tinted world .

In the real world Hartley's body seem to be covered in ice-blue mist, it swirled and writhed around him as his hair danced up and down in the windless room. Hartley was within a room of the run-down manor, half of the manor had been knocked down and was in the process of being rebuilt, while the other shabby half was whereHartley, Zhi Ruo and Qin Li lived with some of the serving staff.

The floor rumbled and the ceiling creaked, murmurs of panic and concern slowly spread through the manor but before matters could get out of hand, a calm returned to the room and the ice-blue mist dived back into Hartley's body. He sat there unperturbed as peace and serenity returned to the manor, making those who were about to panic question if they had been hearing things in the night..

Back in his inner world Hartley stood with a sparkling radiance surrounding him, he had finally stepped into the 8th layer of the xanthian realm, his physique had also been upgraded to the 5th layer of the xanthian realm.

He could now be considered a genuine power-house in Aidonia and had transitioned from the 7th layer to the 8th layer in months, this was a feat only attained by others through decades of hard work and a commitment to long periods of closed door cultivation, it was no coincidence that those at the higher echelons of the xanthian realm on the Aldora continent were all elders sporting a head of white hair.

Looking around at his inner world which felt more and more apart of his body, Hartley willed it to behave in the parameters of the outside world, this would serve him like a simulated training ground.

He took a deep breath, raised his right hand and ice-blue lights swirled around it, it then stretched out like a light-saber taking the form of a sparkling straight bladed sword about 90 cm long, it looked no different from a blade produced on the anvil of a blacksmith.

Hartley had been thinking about this since battling the young man from Sasko at the banquet, the man had used his flames to form a rough sword, it was a crude implementation but it gave Hartley an idea.

Hartley then raised his left hand , ice-blue lights swirled once more then extended out to take the for form of a curved short blade about 40cm in length, once again this looked like a perfect blade and not an unstable interpretation of a blade, the blue blades made by his blue star essence looked like solid extension his hands.

One of Hartley's biggest advantage was the fact that he had infinite elemental powers, meaning the two swords could be used like normal swords with no fear of running out of power, he practiced a few slashes which produced whirring sounds then smiled.

After an hour Hartley discovered that he could still change the characteristics of his elemental swords with gravity, by applying negative gravity he could make the blade as swift as the wind or by applying more gravity he could make the strike as heavy as a mountain falling from the sky, and the best part was that these elemental blades were strong enough to strike with 100x gravity applied without shattering to shards like a normal sword.

Hartley struck out at a giant tree, with 100x gravity applied to the blade it shattered to dust with a boom, Hartley then willed the tree to reform and the wooden dust acted as if someone had pressed the rewind button on a dvd player and returned to its original form as if nothing had happened,

he stopped then the blue blades disappeared with a flash.

After further experiments he discovered his time domain, monochrome, could last 30 seconds and spread to cover 150 meters, his gravity field could extend 3 kilometers and could exert 125x normal gravity....