Return of the last survivor

Merlin was spending the time of his life in the void.

It felt like he was swimming in slightly cold water, with the physique of a Tier 4 being. It gave him a sense of freedom he hadn't felt in a long time. Suddenly, Merlin remembered the when he had felt a similar feeling, the memory giving him shivers.

It was the memory of his having just dies, and being completely free of a body, in the white space along with Arcania.

However, what he felt now was not as extreme as that, just a feeling of having become free from something. As time passed, Merlin understood what that 'thing' he became free of. IT was the suppression of a lower ranked plane had on creatures that were of a higher Tier than the rank of the plane. Although he had the protection of 'The Master', the pressure still existed around him, wanting to suck up all his mana and bring him down to Tier 3.

'It's gone now, so it doesn't matter much anyway. What I need to do now is to reach Tier 5 as soon as possible and absorb that Origin Force from the Tsundere plane. Well… I need to leave a lot for it to grow. It is like mana for planes. I want to see what it does to me, must be pretty good since Arcania was talking about it as though it was some sort of treasure.'

'But I cannot take too much, or else Tsundere will die. And to for that, it needs to grow. Mut for that, I need more population there. I just hope those 20 I sent there can do something about the population. Cortana's children keep telling me that the population at the base I constructed has already exceeded double of what it was before I left, but that is still not enough. Especially considering I had like 40 people living there when I left. The biggest problem was that most of the people in my base were women and children, and the men are still busy killing each other like bloody fools!'

'Sigh. Things will sort out. For now, let's concentrate on the new plane.'

"Cortana…"

"Yes! 4 days, 34 minutes more. I just confirmed it with Arcania."

"Good."

Since Arcania could be rather 'moody' with its answers, Merlin though to just put Cortana on Arcania pestering duty until it decides to answer. And surprisingly, it was actually working.

"Keke, consider it revenge for the putting me through two lives of hell"

At this moment, a notification popped up.

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Although the last life was 'hell' according to Earth Human standards. Is this one truly 'hell'?

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This statement got Merlin thinking.

'Was it hell? What happened that could be considered hell? Compared to my last life, this one is like heaven? I saved almost everyone I wanted to, and My strength is growing incredibly fast. At this rate, I should be able to reach Tier 9 before Zero comes along.'

'But will that be enough? I mean, he was a 'monarch' of a plane. And I can assume that he was at least at the Tier 9 mark, maybe tier 10 even. And if he has reached Tier 10, I need to reach that tier as well, and the only way of doing that is to become part of a faction and get their Supreme being t allow me to ascend into a higher being at Tier 10.'

Merlin's thoughts wandered from topic to topic as Cortana and Arcania occasionally interjected over the course of the next few days, until he finally arrived outside the plane his soul fragment had found. This time, his soul fragment was not being corroded by the corruption of the void, not the plane itself. In fact, it was surviving perfectly fine.

'Here goes nothing…' Merlin thought to himself as he flung himself into the plane whose size was so large that it could be compared with the endless universe within Earth's dimension. And he could only return if he conquered the plane, or at least made a significant enough change within the plane for the planer will to recognise the change as an anchor for Merlin.