Reilo's meeting with the Ancient Ones was almost completely unknown outside their ranks, save to a few of their number.
And the meeting itself went much as Reilo had expected. After getting past Vali and Ford, everything went smoothly.
It was a mysterious flower.
Its petals were purplish black and, when spread open, measured more than ten meters across. It looked rather unremarkable.
But at its heart was a mysterious vortex. After advancing to the sixth level, Reilo had become quite sensitive to Space Power. Though he still couldn't match the Mandala Flower or the Ancient Ones in their breathtaking mastery—not to mention their ability to destroy parts of shallow Curvature Space—his ability to travel through Curvature Spacetime with his physical body alone was already beyond the imagination of low-level beings.
"Please, come in. The great Ancient One is inside."
At the old turtle's gesture, Reilo nodded.
He stepped into the vortex at the flower's heart and found himself in a subspace where both the sky and the ground were gray and hazy.
This space was much like the Mandala Flower's seed space.
But the resemblance was only superficial.
There was no sign of life or vegetation, and the space was extremely small. Every second here left Reilo feeling more oppressed, like an elephant shut inside a cramped room.
Reilo sensed the Law Power within the space, then flew in a certain direction. Soon, he arrived at a vast plaza.
An ordinary-looking, withered branch stood upright on the floor. An old turtle sat balanced on top of it. The scene was so harmonious that it seemed to blend into the space itself. In Reilo's eyes, the turtle was like a spring, endlessly welling up with streams of Law Power that kept the subspace from collapsing.
The old turtle slowly opened