"I am Halios, but you knew that already, didn't you, Ning?" the man asked.
Ning frowned a little. "You know about me? How do you know about me?" he asked.
"I do not know why I know about you. I only know that I do," Halios said. "I have known about you for the past month and have wanted to meet you to ask you why I know about you, your thoughts, and your feelings."
"You know what I'm thinking?" Ning asked with a shocked expression. "Doesn't that mean that you are… holy shit!"
"What… is a Will?" the man asked.
"You're a will of this world, born from the minds of the living, manifested from the energy of the planet," Ning said. "Of course. A planet with this dense of a Qi should absolutely have a will. I did not expect to meet you here at all."
"Can you tell me more about who I am?" Halios asked.
"Sure, why don't we talk inside?" Ning asked.
"I…" Halios looked back. "I cannot let you enter. You must get permission from my mistress if you wish to enter this place."
"Your… mistress?" Ning gave Halios a confused look. "Are you talking about the Empress?"
"Yes, the Empress is my mistress," he said.
'How is that possible?' Ning thought to himself.
"What do you mean?" Halios asked. "Should it not be possible? Why should it not?"
"That's because you are a will. No one should be able to control you," Ning said. "Anyway, we can talk inside."
"As I said before, you are not allowed to go in without the Empress's permission," the Will said.
"I don't need anyone's permission to go anywhere," Ning said and continued walking forward.
Halios acted to stop him. Space twisted around Ning, forcing him away from the location where one could enter the secret realm. However, Ning was simply too strong for the Celestial Will to be able to stop him.
No power amounted to anything in his presence and he walked into the secret realm.
Inside was a city-sized piece of grassland with different houses and training grounds. There was no one here at the moment, but just a few minutes ago, the Blackspire family members along with members of their court were in this place.
Ning looked around and quickly found a small pond at the center of the land. "So I was right," he thought to himself. "This is the Origin."
Ning felt the energy in this place and took a deep breath in. At the same time, Halios entered quickly to follow him.
"Please come outside. You are not allowed to come in here. Only my Mistress and her people can come in," he said urgently.
"God, what the hell is wrong with you?" Ning asked as he turned around. "Are all planetary wills too dumb to do things on their own, or what?"
He remembered Alexis being a similar kind of being, that did what the lord of the Aether tower told her to do.
Now, this Halios was the same.
Suddenly, Halios fell to the floor and grunted in pain. "Please… get… out… of… this… place!" he shouted through what seemed like pain.
Ning was surprised and turned serious. 'It's not an act,' he thought when he saw the will on the floor. 'Something is wrong with him.'
Ning grabbed Halios and walked out of the secret realm again. Only then did Halios breathe in relief and was fine.
"What's wrong? What happened to you?" Ning asked.
"I… I broke my oath… and I was punished," he said.
"You broke your oath? What oath?" Ning asked.
"To always follow my master's commands and do what they say," Halios said.
Ning frowned. 'An oath can hurt a Will?' he thought. "Why did you make an oath?"
"I… I was young… and naive, and I didn't know any better," Halios said.
Ning's senses notified him of someone's arrival. "Come visit me when you can, or I will come to visit you tonight," he said and disappeared.
Halios looked up after Ning left and saw the Empress slowly float down to the ground. "What happened?" she asked. "Your oath stone showed signs of breaking."
Halios was unable to lie, so he told the Empress everything. "Someone came and tried to enter the secret realm. I tried to stop them, but they managed to enter anyhow," he said.
"What? Someone entered?" the Empress got angry. "How could you let that happen?"
"I'm sorry, mistress. I was unable to stop him," he said.
"How are you unable to stop him with your strength? Are you saying there's an Immortal God roaming around in my city?" she asked.
"No, he was not an Immortal God," Halios said.
"Of course not. Who would think that?" she snarled. "Next time he comes back, let me know immediately."
"Yes, mistress," Halios said.
The Empress left back with anger on her face. "Goddammit, I hope whoever it was didn't realize how good the secret realm was," she said softly as she flew away.
Halios was a little dejected and stood by the secret realm. That was all there was to his job after all. Unless his mistress explicitly asked him to do something else, he was supposed to stay here all day long.
"Brother Halios, was stepmother here just now?" the young boy from before, the one that could not cultivate at all came from the garden area.
"Yes, the mistress was here," Halios said.
"I heard her shouting. Is everything alright?" he asked.
"It's okay," Halios said. "It has resolved now."
"I see," the young man said. "By the way, do you think you can help me find this fruit called the Bewitching Vine's spirit apple? I can't seem to find any in the treasury and I'm not sure where one could find it."
"Bewitching Vine's Spirit apple? It's a rare fruit," Halios said as he views the entire planet that was basically his body.
"There are a few in the next continent. I can get them for you once I get the mistress' approval."
