Jason's first reaction on hearing Linus' short introduction that was quickly followed by multiple questions, was to look at him in dumbfoundment.
Yet, when he felt Jennifer's grasp around his hand tighten, he regained his senses as he used the human language to speak for a moment.
"My name is Jason. Nice meeting you. About the camp I come from…to be honest, we do not belong to any camp. In fact, I was brought to Manyr when I was very young, and I wasn't raised in any camp or so, but in the Julandra region.
However, when I heard that there are humans from Argos in this camp that can teach me more about soulbonds and help me figure out more about my origin, I quickly left my home."
Taking a deep breath, Jason hastily cooked up a story as he added while pointing at Jennifer.
"This is my fiance, and she left with me. I hope that is no problem, she is also a human after all…"
Linus was astonished by what he heard, and looked at them for a moment.
But considering that Jason was talking in the human language that was only used on Argos, there was no reason to doubt him.
On the contrary, Jason's small introduction told Linus a lot about him.
The fact that he didn't come from one of the few camps the Shadow walker race had built, but from Julandra, the region the Shadow walkers had recently invaded corroborated his theory.
Hence, the possibility that Jason got to know about the existence of other humans from Argos when some of their people attacked the Julandra region was feasible.
It had happened quite often in the last two years.
As such, Linus believed Jason quite easily. It was even more so because the woman next to him looked confused when Jason spoke in the human language.
This meant that she had never heard him speak this language, indicating that he was not lying about what he said earlier.
The only aspect that made him slightly suspicious of Jason were his mana fluctuations that were far more powerful than his cultivation base indicated.
Because of that, he looked at Jason for a few moments before he asked,
"How high is your soul amplification, and how many soulbonds do you have?"
It was rude to ask these questions, but Linus knew that he had to be careful of outsiders.
A single mistake, and the Shadow walkers might kill him without a second thought.
And that was certainly not something he wanted to happen.
There might be more than enough powerful humans, but every single one of them was under a soul contract. Thus, their life and survival depended on the graciousness of the Shadow walkers.
Until now, this hadn't caused any problems, and most soul contracts were not exactly restrictive in nature.
But all of the contracts had one exact clause in each of them.
[Betray the Shadow walkers or the races that are affiliated with them, and you will die the most painful possible death!]
This clause prevented the humans from betraying the entire Shadow walker alliance, and Jason was already aware of the existence of such a clause.
It had become a norm for stronger races to add clauses like these in a soul contract if one nurtured weaker races.
Because of that, and their unique situation, Jason attempted to speak mostly the truth while leaving out specific things as well as lying a little if needed.
A good lie always had a little bit of truth in it. Knowing this, he dished out the best possible lies by skillfully hiding that he was an extremely powerful individual.
His story made him look like a human who simply wanted to learn more about the soul world.
"I don't know what you mean by soul amplification…but if that's the bond I share with my soulbonds and the increase in strength they provide me, it should be quite high…as for soulbonds, I have a total of three…"
After he said this, Jason looked at Linus as if he was confused.
His expressions made him explain the entire situation of soulbonds, their bond with humans, and what exactly the soul amplification was to Jason.
Acting as if he didn't know how high the soul amplification of his soul world truly was, Jason caused Linus to have a great headache.
It was even more problematic because their last soul awakening orb that could also be used to test one's soul world had broken apart.
'This fucking idiot…if he hadn't broken the last soul awakening orb, we could have tested Jason's soul world now…'
With that thought in mind, Linus could only scratch the back of his head, not sure what to do with the pair in front of him.
However, rather than sending Jason away, which might be on the safer side, Linus thought of the difference between Jason's cultivation base and the strength of his mana fluctuations.
It was simply too big to be ignored.
As such, his soul amplification had to be extremely high, or his soulbonds extremely powerful.
That was more than enough reasoning to try his best in order to make Jason stay inside the camp.
At least until the Shadow walkers would return to take a look at their progress.
Other than that, some Shadow walkers might arrive at any time, giving them commands to join the alliance's army in order to fight against their foes.
In the end, the Ultimate Soldiers, a name given to the well-trained humans of Argos, were considered as the secret weapon of many races mostly because of two reasons.
The first reason was the superiority of soul worlds.
It was simply much more powerful than any kind of existing soul awakening common, or even higher races could ever achieve. The second reason that made the humans of Argos so powerful was the fact that they could enter the secret realm inside the Shiman camp, and bind Ninad beasts to their souls!
Jason had no idea what Linus had meant by 'Ninad beasts', and even after asking, the answer he received was confusing, at best.
That was because Ninad beasts were simply the beasts residing in a place which only humans hailing from Argos could enter…or so the Shadow walkers, their affiliated races and many other races that had connections to such places thought.
However, Jason felt that this was quite confusing because it was odd that many common races had found places they couldn't enter, only to coincidentally figure out that humans of Argos could walk through such places quite easily.
Furthermore, it looked like one couldn't speak about the secret realm and Ninad beasts in any language except the universal language.
Jason felt that this was even weirder, but instead of commenting or questioning this, he listened intently to the information he received.
According to Linus' intel, Ninad beasts increased the soul amplification it transferred to the binder of its soul.
That meant a single Ninad beast at the Initial phase of the Ascendion stage might amplify the binder's strength three times more than an ordinary beast could do.
This clearly showed how powerful the secret realm Linus had been talking about truly was.
In Jason's case, a single Ninad beast might amplify its entire strength and transfer it to his soul world without the necessity of it having to enter his mana core. It was normally the only way he could receive a 100% soul amplification from one of his soulbonds.
However, all of this didn't really bother Jason because he was trying to find the familiar mana fluctuations of Lux.
Even if they might have been altered with time, their origin was still the same as before.
But that was not really helpful.
Jason's first reaction on hearing Linus' short introduction that was quickly followed by multiple questions, was to look at him in dumbfoundment.
Yet, when he felt Jennifer's grasp around his hand tighten, he regained his senses as he used the human language to speak for a moment.
"My name is Jason. Nice meeting you. About the camp I come from…to be honest, we do not belong to any camp. In fact, I was brought to Manyr when I was very young, and I wasn't raised in any camp or so, but in the Julandra region.
However, when I heard that there are humans from Argos in this camp that can teach me more about soulbonds and help me figure out more about my origin, I quickly left my home."
Taking a deep breath, Jason hastily cooked up a story as he added while pointing at Jennifer.
"This is my fiance, and she left with me. I hope that is no problem, she is also a human after all…"
Linus was astonished by what he heard, and looked at them for a moment.
But considering that Jason was talking in the human language that was only used on Argos, there was no reason to doubt him.
On the contrary, Jason's small introduction told Linus a lot about him.
The fact that he didn't come from one of the few camps the Shadow walker race had built, but from Julandra, the region the Shadow walkers had recently invaded corroborated his theory.
Hence, the possibility that Jason got to know about the existence of other humans from Argos when some of their people attacked the Julandra region was feasible.
It had happened quite often in the last two years.
As such, Linus believed Jason quite easily. It was even more so because the woman next to him looked confused when Jason spoke in the human language.
This meant that she had never heard him speak this language, indicating that he was not lying about what he said earlier.
The only aspect that made him slightly suspicious of Jason were his mana fluctuations that were far more powerful than his cultivation base indicated.
Because of that, he looked at Jason for a few moments before he asked,
"How high is your soul amplification, and how many soulbonds do you have?"
It was rude to ask these questions, but Linus knew that he had to be careful of outsiders.
A single mistake, and the Shadow walkers might kill him without a second thought.
And that was certainly not something he wanted to happen.
There might be more than enough powerful humans, but every single one of them was under a soul contract. Thus, their life and survival depended on the graciousness of the Shadow walkers.
Until now, this hadn't caused any problems, and most soul contracts were not exactly restrictive in nature.
But all of the contracts had one exact clause in each of them.
[Betray the Shadow walkers or the races that are affiliated with them, and you will die the most painful possible death!]
This clause prevented the humans from betraying the entire Shadow walker alliance, and Jason was already aware of the existence of such a clause.
It had become a norm for stronger races to add clauses like these in a soul contract if one nurtured weaker races.
Because of that, and their unique situation, Jason attempted to speak mostly the truth while leaving out specific things as well as lying a little if needed.
A good lie always had a little bit of truth in it. Knowing this, he dished out the best possible lies by skillfully hiding that he was an extremely powerful individual.
His story made him look like a human who simply wanted to learn more about the soul world.
"I don't know what you mean by soul amplification…but if that's the bond I share with my soulbonds and the increase in strength they provide me, it should be quite high…as for soulbonds, I have a total of three…"
After he said this, Jason looked at Linus as if he was confused.
His expressions made him explain the entire situation of soulbonds, their bond with humans, and what exactly the soul amplification was to Jason.
Acting as if he didn't know how high the soul amplification of his soul world truly was, Jason caused Linus to have a great headache.
It was even more problematic because their last soul awakening orb that could also be used to test one's soul world had broken apart.
'This fucking idiot…if he hadn't broken the last soul awakening orb, we could have tested Jason's soul world now…'
With that thought in mind, Linus could only scratch the back of his head, not sure what to do with the pair in front of him.
However, rather than sending Jason away, which might be on the safer side, Linus thought of the difference between Jason's cultivation base and the strength of his mana fluctuations.
It was simply too big to be ignored.
As such, his soul amplification had to be extremely high, or his soulbonds extremely powerful.
That was more than enough reasoning to try his best in order to make Jason stay inside the camp.
At least until the Shadow walkers would return to take a look at their progress.
Other than that, some Shadow walkers might arrive at any time, giving them commands to join the alliance's army in order to fight against their foes.
In the end, the Ultimate Soldiers, a name given to the well-trained humans of Argos, were considered as the secret weapon of many races mostly because of two reasons.
The first reason was the superiority of soul worlds.
It was simply much more powerful than any kind of existing soul awakening common, or even higher races could ever achieve. The second reason that made the humans of Argos so powerful was the fact that they could enter the secret realm inside the Shiman camp, and bind Ninad beasts to their souls!
Jason had no idea what Linus had meant by 'Ninad beasts', and even after asking, the answer he received was confusing, at best.
That was because Ninad beasts were simply the beasts residing in a place which only humans hailing from Argos could enter…or so the Shadow walkers, their affiliated races and many other races that had connections to such places thought.
However, Jason felt that this was quite confusing because it was odd that many common races had found places they couldn't enter, only to coincidentally figure out that humans of Argos could walk through such places quite easily.
Furthermore, it looked like one couldn't speak about the secret realm and Ninad beasts in any language except the universal language.
Jason felt that this was even weirder, but instead of commenting or questioning this, he listened intently to the information he received.
According to Linus' intel, Ninad beasts increased the soul amplification it transferred to the binder of its soul.
That meant a single Ninad beast at the Initial phase of the Ascendion stage might amplify the binder's strength three times more than an ordinary beast could do.
This clearly showed how powerful the secret realm Linus had been talking about truly was.
In Jason's case, a single Ninad beast might amplify its entire strength and transfer it to his soul world without the necessity of it having to enter his mana core. It was normally the only way he could receive a 100% soul amplification from one of his soulbonds.
However, all of this didn't really bother Jason because he was trying to find the familiar mana fluctuations of Lux.
Even if they might have been altered with time, their origin was still the same as before.
But that was not really helpful.
