The Bloodline System

Chapter 1472  Unbound Flow

Author's Note: Unedited Chapter

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"We're mostly out of options so let's just make sure we avoid getting into another scuffle..."

The others nodded in agreement, understanding the gravity of their situation.

The recent events had drained them a lot.

Gustav, sensing the need for personal preparation for what lay ahead, excused himself to one of the rooms within the spacecraft to meditate.

Secluded and in silence, Gustav sat cross-legged. His breathing was deep and measured. The room, dimly lit by the soft glow of the ship's ambient lights, provided a sanctuary of peace. As he closed his eyes, his mind drifted inward, connecting with his bloodline roots.

'The third step of Beta Rank... It's within reach. I just need to push through the barriers, channel deeper.'

His focus intensified and as he delved into the depths of his bloodline channels, he sensed the burgeoning power within him, teetering on the edge of a significant breakthrough.

("Prepare yourself.") The system voiced.

Gustav opened his eyes momentarily, his meditation interrupted.

"What is it again? What am I to prepare for?"

("Unbound...")

The word lingered in the air, cryptic and heavy with unknown implications. Gustav's eyebrows knitted in suspicion.

Shaking off the disturbance, he refocused, channeling more intensely.

'I guess something will happen when I break through... I can't let anything distract me right now.'

Days passed, with the spacecraft inching closer to its destination. Inside his meditation room, Gustav was a conduit of raw energy. His dedication and intense focus finally paid off.

With a resonant surge that felt like a sonic boom echoing through his veins, Gustav achieved the third step of Beta Rank.

At that exact moment, a wave of powerful energy radiated from his body. The ship trembled, panels and tools rattling unsteadily.

Outside the meditation room, the group was taken aback as the ship vibrated unexpectedly.

"What in the world?" Falco was appalled.

"It's coming from inside the ship... It's Gustav! He must have broken through," Endric immediately announced to the others.

The energy subsided as quickly as it had erupted, returning the surroundings to a state of calm once more.

As Gustav reached the third step of Beta Rank, a profound internal shift occurred. It felt like a physical pull, tugging at the very essence of his being, drawing him inward and outward simultaneously.

His consciousness expanded, flooding with memories that did not belong to him—or did they? The images and sensations that washed over him were vivid, disorienting, and utterly foreign.

'What is this? These memories... Another life, another dimension, perhaps?'

The memories unfurled like a tapestry of another existence where Gustav was not a fugitive or a fighter, but an honored being in a dimension vastly different from his own. He saw flashes of ceremonies in his honor, divine beings that faltered before him.

Yet, the details were fragmented, obscured by the mist of a mind not fully his own.

As he delved deeper into the flood of alien memories, he felt a sensation of vertigo as if his spirit were detaching from his body.

When he regained consciousness, the room and its familiar confines had vanished. Instead, Gustav found himself adrift within a constellation of stars, the cosmos enveloping him in its awe-inspiring expanse.

A monumental presence loomed before him, a being of incomprehensible scale whose hand, the size of a galaxy, swung towards him with slow, inexorable force.

The air—or what passed for air in this cosmic vision—vibrated with the power of the colossal entity as it boomed a single, condemning word:

"Traitor!"

The accusation was thunderous, resonating through the very fibers of Gustav's being.

The pressure from the descending hand was immense, threatening to crush him into nonexistence. It felt as if every cell in his body might burst, scattered to the cosmic winds.

'I can't move...'

In a desperate bid for survival, Gustav tried to shield himself, but the power bearing down on him was beyond his newly attained capabilities.

As despair gripped him, fearing his end was imminent, his eyes snapped open.

He was back, not in the cosmos, but lying on the bare floor of his ship's meditation room. The stark, cold metal under him and the ship's movement noises briefly reassured him, but his relief was short-lived.

There was a persistent banging sound, someone at the door, urgent and insistent.

 "Gustav! Are you in there? Open up!" Aildris's muffled voice rang out from the other end.

With a groan, Gustav pushed himself to his feet, his body aching as if he had truly been crushed by a celestial giant.

He staggered to the door, unlocked it, and swung it open to find Aildris, concern etched deeply into his features.

"There you are! We heard a loud crash, and then nothing for the last three days.  Are you alright? You were unresponsive."

'It's been three days? It felt like a few seconds,' Gustav couldn't believe his ears.

It had already been three days since he broke through to the third step of Beta rank.

Gustav leaned against the door frame, trying to collect himself.

His voice was hoarse, his mind still reeling from the intensity of the vision.

"I saw something..."

"How do you mean?" Aildris inquired.

"A vision... Or perhaps memories. It is strange but now I have even more questions," Gustav answered with a bothersome expression.

"A vision? That's... unusual. Do you think it was real?"

"Real or not, it felt significant. Things like this never happen to me. I was called a traitor, Aildris. By something ancient and powerful."

Aildris looked at him, trying to make sense of the words. His concern deepened, reflecting the gravity of what Gustav described.

...

In the dimly lit control room of the spacecraft, the air was thick with concern and curiosity. Gustav and Aildris entered together, the weight of recent revelations hanging heavily between them.

The group turned expectantly as they approached, their faces etched with worry.

"Gustav, you've been silent for three days. We thought you'd come out after your breakthrough... What happened?"

Gustav paused, the disorientation from his temporal displacement evident in his expression.

"It was only a few seconds to me. I had no idea three days had passed."

Endric, who had been observing Gustav closely, nodded with a knowing look. His background as a time candidate had given him a unique perspective on such anomalies.

"You regained some memories, didn't you? The kind that stretches across time and dimensions."

Gustav turned to look at him.

"Yes, I did. Memories that don't feel familiar."

Endric's forehead gleamed with a green glow as Husarius's voice rang out.

"As you grow stronger, Gustav, the more 'unbound' you become. This means your past, potentially across different realities, will continue to reveal itself to you, piece by fragmented piece."

'Is that why the system warned me?' Gustav recalled the system's heads-up before his breakthrough.

"Memories of what, exactly?" Ria questioned.

"Memories of being the outworldly," Endric blurted out.

The revelation added a layer of tension to the already charged atmosphere. Gustav's frown deepened as he internally questioned the mysterious title that had loomed over him for the past three years.

"Being the outworldly... It seems there's much more to it than I anticipated. I need more answers."

As the words left his mouth, a phenomenon occurred.

From within Gustav, a teenage feminine figure with striking red hair, eyes, and a gown, materialized. She phased out smoothly, her presence both startling and mesmerizing.

"What did you mean back on the Nereus Sector when you said you had something to tell me?" Gustav's eyes didn't have a hint of surprise as he voiced out.

Aildris and Ria on the other hand were just experiencing something like that for the first time and couldn't believe their eyes.

"It's always something new with you, isn't it?" Aildris voiced, startled.

"Oh, yeah... Meet System," Gustav said to both of them.

"That explains nothing but... Okay?" Ria mumbled with a confused look.

The system maintained a calm demeanor as her red eyes locked onto Gustav's.

("What you perceive as memories are indeed glimpses of your existence as the outworldly—a term that encompasses much more than can be easily explained in a moment.")

("What I wanted to let you know at the Nereus Sector was the fact that I am an echo of your past. I existed back then.")

"What do you mean by that? You knew me as the outworldly?" Gustav inquired.

("Yes I did.")

"So you're older than just a few thousand years?"

("I am.")

"Is that why you bound yourself to me when you came to earth?"

("No. I didn't know it was you at the time.)

"So who exactly are you?"

The system's face glitched multiple times after hearing the question.

("I am unauthorized to answer this question. This is as much as I can tell you at the moment.")

Gustav absorbed the information, his mind racing with possibilities and the weight of his hidden past.

Aildris and Ria were doing their best to keep up but they could barely understand what was going on.

Falco had an idea since his Father was a higher dimensional level being while Endric was ahead of them all in terms of said knowledge since he was a time candidate.