Dyne ran back and was using his Soul arts to locate Meta. The effects of the Chicken King had disappeared, and the monsters couldn’t find where Dyne was.

Vahn and Gala had been hiding just near the forest’s entrance, and Dyne sensed them.

The group met, and Dyne immediately motioned for them to move.

“Quick! Move inside. The monsters outside are still confused!” Dyne exclaimed and moved deeper inside the forest.

The East Voz Forest was a dark and damp forest full of all sorts of vegetation. It was home to several Serus who has become king of the woods.

Dyne could feel powerful earth energy as they went deeper and deeper.

The first thing they did was find a secure spot to hide as they began to observe the forest's strange occurrences.

“Master Dyne… What was that attack?” Vahn excitedly ask.

“Dragon King Slice, or simply, Dragon Cut. I use Brimstone from fire and earth to create a massive explosion on the ground. But that attack was very weak compared to a certain Master who could create an amazing explosion.” Dyne recalled Gadwin from Grandia, which Justin would later learn.

“Dragon King Slice. Amazing!” Vahn was amazed.

Gala was also amazed at what Dyne did.

“Anyway, this forest is very different than expected…” Dyne frowned. The strange energy in the forest had Earth, but Dyne could also detect Ice and Dark.

“This place is weird. It’s so out of place. The surrounding element doesn’t make sense.” Dyne wondered.

“What seems out of place, Lord Dyne?” Meta asked.

“It’s like this… There is strong Earth energy here. Possibly the strongest among the elements. But I could sense Ice and Dark as well. So either this place is home to two elemental creatures or a power source, or that it somehow was able to create a mutual combination. But I can’t understand it. Earth is closest to Light, yet the Earth here feels closer to Dark…” Dyne was confused. He couldn’t make any sense of it from here.

“Oh. It must be the Elemental Chain effect!” Meta answered.

“Elemental Chain effect? That’s new. Tieg didn’t tell me that.”

“It’s helpful for us Ra-Serus to get stronger. You see, for example, I am a Fire Ra-Serus. But it would be very, very difficult if I were to try to assimilate with a Gizam or a Nighto. I couldn’t understand why before, but I finally grasped the reason when you explained the Elemental Affinity wheel. I need to assimilate the powers of a Seru of a different Element which is closer to their element.”

“Let’s say a Gizam… What would you need to have an easier way in absorbing it?”

“It will depend on which route I take on that Elemental wheel. I could go with absorbing Light Serus, then Earth, and then Water. But since you said that this place has elements leading to Earth and didn't have the elements of wind and entropy, I think I would need to go the other route. Which means I need to absorb Lightning first, and then Wind and then Dark before I can get to Water.” Meta explained.

“Oh! Of course! Light and Dark. So this place has established an Elemental Chain effect that you mentioned, but it can't breach the Light and Dark category..”

“Lord Dyne, that term is something that I made up. But it is something that I feel I’ve heard somewhere.”

Dyne smiled and ignored Meta’s words. He knew this was because Meta’s memories are slowly awakening.

“This makes this forest doubly dangerous. I have a feeling that three things could be causing the Elemental chain. The Dark should be Jedo. He seems to have made a home on this place. The Earth's energy should be related to the Basilisk. It seems it has a home here. We’ll have to be careful in case more Basilisk appears here. But the intriguing part is the Ice. What’s making it?” Dyne frowned.

It was then that Dyne noticed Gala was in a strange state and kept frowning.

“Erm… What are you doing, Gala?” Dyne asked.

“I am trying to listen to your conversation,” Gala answered as he opened his eyes.

“Train harder…” Dyne sighed.

“Man. For Monks, these guys sure are slow. I mean, how hard is it to communicate like this?” Dyne shook his head and sent a mental message to Vahn and Meta.

Strafe and the Soul Poison coughed up blood even though they don’t have a body. Strafe had noticed that Dyne was naturally able to communicate with others. Vahn and Tetsu can hear the mental messages through different means. Vahn had Meta, so it was natural that he could hear it. Tetsu had long studied Kin’s teaching and could hear. But the two of them couldn’t send it.

It took Strafe eight months to be able to communicate, and the owner of the Soul Poison nearly a year to do that. But Dyne was naturally doing it after months of Soul training.

“Our main concern should be the Genesis Tree. Let’s look for it. Looking at the terrain and how Gala explained that we need something to break the stone weeds, we’ll need to look for that Crystal Flower Gavel.”

“The Weed Hammer… Right.” Gala nodded. He had already explained that this was something that they would use when journeying in this forest.

“Gala, you said that prior to the Mist, many of Chorak would go to this forest to mine, right? What were they mining?”

“This place had always had a thick Earth energy, and this forest is constantly undergoing petrification. The plants here become petrified after about five or ten years. And so, the Miners would often do business here and smash the plants to gather precious gemstones. Jade stones are often mined from the different Jade flowers and weeds here.”

“So those Jade stones which encased all your medicines and preserved it are from here? Dyne asked.

“Yes. But of course, when the Mist came, they are unable to gather more.”

“What an interesting forest. I wonder… Did Jedo choose this place? Meta, You said that Jedo didn’t join the war. But was he wounded? Why did he need to be encased in a Genesis Tree?”

“He combined with a fallen Ra-Seru. Jedo was the Ra-Seru of Dimensions. You could say he had Rem's powers, which was time. Through him, Rogue found how to get to Legaia as the Evil God sought Jedo's help. Of course, Jedo didn’t know that that was Rogue's plan to rule Legaia. He aided the Evil God not knowing what the Evil God intended and even regretted it when the War God and the Evil God's war began. But when Rogue revealed his intentions to go to Legaia, Jedo did not join. However, Jedo’s beloved friend, Yami, had sided with Rogue. Horn fought Yami, and Yami died. I believe Jedo took Yami's remains and used his powers to combine his form with Yami. This must be why you sensed the Darkness, Lord Dyne.”

“Oh… So such an event happened. What an intriguing back story! Alright. Let’s find this bad boy. But seriously though…” Dyne glanced around and began to lead Vahn and Gala deeper into the forest.

Dyne didn’t say the last part of his sentence.

“This place really looks like the Evil Forest of Final Fantasy IX! I better brush up with my fire skills in case I’ll kill meet that strange petrifying plant.” Dyne frowned.

The team stealthily explored the areas of the forest. The forest was wild, and while there were plenty of plants, there was large petrified jade-green grass everywhere.

Using the Golden Compass, the group was able to evade the monsters easily. But what was surprising was that Dyne moved so smoothly that it looked like he could easily bypass these monsters even without the Golden Compass.

Dyne’s skill in covert movements was now on full display. As a result, the group was easily able to avoid many monsters as they moved deeper and deeper.

The group soon found an abandoned minefield where there were plenty of tools and even a small hut.

Dyne explored the small rooms used for resting miners, and there, Dyne found a large hammer made of heavy iron.

“Is this it?” Dyne observed the hammer and tried to carry it.

“This is heavy…” Dyne was amazed at the weight. He had to use Spirit in order to be able to carry the hammer.

“Well… Gala, you carry this.” Dyne gave the hammer to Gala, who easily carried it.

“Gala, how far off in Bodily cultivation are you?” Dyne asked.

“I’m at eighth level of Martial Advent.” Gala answered.

“So basically, level eight. Same as Vahn. But your strength should be stronger than Vahn… Seems about right.” Dyne knew that Gala was slow but could deliver the most powerful attacks in their team.

“Are you trained on how to use a hammer?” Dyne asked as he recalled a certain enemy that Gala had, which used hammers.

“No, Lord Dyne.”

“Hmm… Well, if you have time, you should try to practice carrying heavy weapons.”

“Biron Arts specializes on one-handed equipment’s so they properly execute attacks,” Gala answered.

“Yes. But that’s because your Spirit art's limitations require you to move the Spirit as you attack. Once you reach full mastery, you can easily release the same Spirit energy when executing an art almost instantly. Like this.” Dyne held out Grim and Channeled the Spirit energy, which surfaced on the tip of the Scythe.

Dyne then suddenly threw Grim, and it flew like a boomerang and stabbed through a Twin Tomb that had wandered alone.

Grim immediately burned the Twin Tomb from the inside, causing the Twin Tomb to squeal and then die.

“See? Easy.”

Gala was amazed and began to nod.

“I will do my best!” Gala cheered as he held the hammer with brimming determination.

Vahn shook his head. He knew how hard that was. Even Strafe rolled his eyes when Dyne said easy.

“For now, use that hammer as you normally would. The weed hammer is quite strong. If you exert Spirit in your hands, adding to your strength would result in an explosive attack. The drawback is that you could only make one of such attacks. I leave it to you to experiment with the effective ways to attack.” Dyne explained.

“I understand.”

“Oh. Right. Since you have a lightning attribute, we should change the name of this hammer. Once we get you a Lightning Ra-Seru, I think you’ll be able to amplify the power of that hammer.”

“Change the name? What would you suggest?”

“Weed Hammer sounds like a pitiful weapon to be used by you. Since you'll soon be a god of lightning, let’s change the name… to Mjolnir.”