Chapter 309: 309

Staring at Tenether being petted by the little girl, Michelle sat down on a nearby rock, crossing her legs.

She both did and did not like the situation.

She liked it because going unnoticed would greatly help her stealth.

But she did not like that it would make things bothersome if she wanted to approach someone.

If they did not notice her until the moment she spoke to them or drew attention to herself in another way, they could mistake her for trying to sneak up on them. That could bring her unnecessary trouble.

And she knew that with how careless she usually was, and with how rarely she interacted with people, she would forget to draw attention to herself earlier, which would lead to misunderstandings quite often.

Thinking about all that, she started considering creating a passive skill that would always stay activated and would let others notice her.

Glancing down at herself, her gaze fell on the shadow at her feet. If she made her shadow more prominent, maybe it would draw more attention. And she, as the owner, would in turn get noticed. Because people were prone to noticing peculiarities and anomalies.

Moving her shadow essence, Michelle moved it into her shadow and made it quiver, shaking it like a leaf in the wind.

It was barely noticeable on its own, but when compared to the fact that other shadows were not moving an inch, it was eye-catching.

On the other side of the barrier, the little girl’s older brother, the young man, suddenly noticed something.

Looking up, he saw a figure sitting in the upper realm, making him freeze up.

Staring Michelle up and down, he was visibly stunned.

First of all, her appearance was far from normal, her features abnormally beautiful.

And second, he found it suspicious that he did not notice her until then. Did she just come? Or was she so powerful that she could conceal herself from everyone present?

Both would make sense. To conceal oneself while separated from the other by the barrier of the Heavenly Law was not all that difficult. The barrier of the Heavenly Law greatly dulled senses.

Those who were not of high enough rank could not even hear sounds coming from the other side. And those high enough could only hear them suppressed.

The young man stared at Michelle in suspicion. “Who are you?” he finally asked.

Glancing at Tenether, another question rose from his throat. “Is that cat yours?”

Looking over at Tenether, Michelle nodded. “He is still young, so he gets lost often,” she spoke calmly, like she was not talking about a lost cub. “I came to search for him.”

The young man did not believe that the cub had just gotten lost. “If the cat is so young, how could it pass the barrier on its own?” he continued asking.

Michelle shrugged her shoulders. “My Tenether is powerful enough to go to the heavenly realm. Why would this little barrier stop him?”

Her words completely stunned the young man. Looking at the tiny cat in his little sister’s hands, he could not imagine that it would possess such power. But the little creature’s calmness also proved that it was not an ordinary lost cub.

“How should I know you are not lying?” the man still highly doubted Michelle’s intentions. And the fact that she had such a powerful creature by her side only made him more suspicious.

Michelle shook her head. “I can leave if you want me to…”

With that, she waved her hand at Tenether.

The black cat instantly jumped away from the little girl and leapt through the barrier of the Heavenly Law to climb into Michelle’s arms. There, it nestled comfortably, purring a bit.

With Tenether in her arms, Michelle turned around to leave.

After just a few steps, she retracted her shadow essence from her shadow. That made it so the young man and the people with him could no longer see or detect her. To them, she was completely gone, like some kind of mirage.

To Michelle’s surprise, it had proved to be quite difficult to make her shadow constantly move so subtly, so she could not hold it for long.

If she had to move the shadow wildly, all over the place, she was confident she would be able to do it for hours without batting an eyelid. But subtle movements without leaving certain set boundaries required immense control, which was extremely draining.

It was true that Michelle’s rank in her Shadow Mastery was high. Yes, her control was monstrous for someone of her age and amount of training, but that control was explosive, not usable in the long term.

Michelle was aware of that from the start. She did not have as much experience with shadow essence as she did with her spirit energy. Nor was it as natural to use. It went against logical reasoning quite a lot. So Michelle, of course, knew that she had to train more. Much more.

Weeks were not enough. She would need months, maybe even years, depending on the intensity of her training.

Well, Michelle was a maniac when it came to training, so there was no doubt that once she started, it would not take her years. At most, half a year.

As Michelle walked deeper into the upper realm, she heard a shout behind her. “Wait!”

She did not even bother turning around, sure it was not directed at her.

That was until someone grabbed her by the shoulder. “Please wait!” It was a middle-aged man from the group with the little girl and her older brother.

Michelle was surprised that the man was able to follow her, but she did not show it too much. She just showed enough surprise to make it seem like she only did not expect to be stopped. “Yes?” she tilted her head in question.

The man stepped back, straightening up. “Young Lady, are you free to talk?” he asked.

Michelle narrowed her eyes. “What about?” She was feeling quite curious, both about what the man wanted and about how he was able to see her without her doing anything special.

“Young Lady, why were you by the barrier of the Heavenly Law? Are you from the middle realm, or were you planning on going there?” the man asked.

Michelle was not exactly the type of person who answered random questions, but something was telling her that if she spoke with the man, she would benefit from it greatly. “I am from the middle realm,” she answered.

It was a half-truth, since she was from the Land of Exile. But it was true that she was coming up from the middle realm.

Usually, when someone asked another person if they were from one of the lower realms, they did not want to know which realm they were from, just if it was a lower one. So Michelle was not worried about the half-truth.

“By chance, Young Lady…” the man continued after Michelle’s answer. “Did you come to the upper realm to attend one of its academies?”

Michelle narrowed her eyes. That was indeed the truth. The main reason she left the comfort of the archduchy in the Land of Exile, even though she had a lot to do there, was because she needed to cultivate in the second-best academy of the upper realm. Some kind of artifact there was affecting the spirit energy in the academy, so if she cultivated there for a while, she could completely conceal her Spirit Soul Blood. She could even control its scent.

That was what she thought when she still possessed Spirit Soul Blood.

After absorbing the three Life Stones, she did not know what blood she possessed or whether the artifact could affect it, but Michelle still wanted to give it a try. Trying definitely would not hurt her.

“Yes!” she nodded.

The man was relieved to hear that. “And do you have a chosen academy?”

Michelle chose to lie and shook her head. “Not yet.” She was not even sure why she lied about that one. Maybe she just wanted to know what the man would say to that.

“Then,” the man clearly did not mind that Michelle did not have an academy chosen, “Young Lady, have you heard about the Ostrich Academy?” he asked.

Michelle shook her head. She had not. But it did remind her of the Ostrich family she had encountered in the Land of Exile. Did it have something to do with them? In the end, she knew that the Land of Exile’s Ostrich family came from the upper realm’s Ostrich family.

After Michelle shook her head, the man quickly explained the basics about the Ostrich Academy, making Michelle raise a brow. It made her sure about two things.

The Ostrich Academy was created and led by the Ostrich family.

And the Ostrich Academy was the second-best academy of the upper realm, the one she was aiming to get into.

After saying all that, the man finally moved on to the deal he wanted to strike with Michelle.

He was a member of the Ostrich family, and his daughter had died just a few days ago. She had been killed by someone else from the Ostrich family.

She, similarly to Michelle, had basically no presence. Unless she announced herself, no one would notice her. So the man wanted Michelle to put on a disguise mask and take on the identity of his daughter.

That way, the culprit would get nervous and try to eliminate her.

To make sure nothing happened to Michelle, the man would send her to the Academy. There, she could study all she wanted, while he found the culprit in the family and took care of them.

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