The next building seemed quite large; it was the second-largest building in this fortress. I stepped inside and got met with cool air. The inside looked... Strange. I’ve never seen anything like this before. It was white and tidy; the air was cool and everything was orderly in contrast to the other building. The insides surely didn''t match the outside. It gave the feeling of a hospital but there were no patients. I arrived at an enormous door made out of metal. The text read ‘Seed vault’ in 3 ancient languages. I guess no room to misinterpret it. I tried opening the door but it was heavy as fuck. I saw no structures that needed to get hit by magic to open it. Maybe it works like those newer buildings that are based on ancient technology. Aaand I found it a panel with buttons.


    This stuff was old but I didn''t see dust anywhere. I looked around and the air was kept super clean. What kind of crazy stuff did these ancients come up with? I probably have to press these buttons in a certain order. I inspected the buttons and noticed that some buttons were worn down more than others. I tested various combinations of these buttons and got in after 3 tries. Too easy! I arrived in an enormous room that was quite cold and shelves full of cooled boxes reaching further than the eyes could see. I looked around and opened some of these boxes. They all had various stages of the plant''s life preserved and a large number of their seeds. I spotted plants I’d never heard of and also some that have gone extinct quite a while ago. I started to realize something. This fortress is a time capsule. Preserving languages, preserving plants.


    They knew something might go wrong so they put in action to preserve what they could. I swiped some seeds of interesting-looking plants and those that had great culinary value. I just walked around in awe of the place and the massive undertaking it must have been to get this all going. Greg would have loved this place. I would like to bring him here sometime but getting here is a pain and this place is constantly moving… moreover it’s above the ocean…


    I spent 2 hours exploring this place. I was about to leave when I got an idea. Blue ghost truffles! I ran around trying to find the area where they stored fungi. There was a chance they called it something different but it’s properties are quite unique! I spent 2 more hours searching and found them. Their name hadn''t changed. I opened the box and was disappointed. There were only 4 spores. Not a bag or anything. 4 individual spores and 1 whole ghost truffle in the box. Were these things almost extinct even back then? The chance of growing anything out of 4 spores is… extremely low. This whole truffle might as well be the last one left on the planet. It also didn''t seem in a great state. What do I do? I know nothing about these things, they didn''t include its habitat and growing conditions as they do with most things. I might make this worse if I just take this, now their population is in limbo, if I take it, I might finish them off due to ignorance…


    I put them back carefully. I tried looking for red sky mangoes but nothing of that name exists here so they might have had a different name but finding out might take forever. I did find dynamo beans under the lightning bean name. I stored some hoped that Raishin doesn''t kick the bucket before I can get them to him. I looked for the liquid shadow potatoes but according to the ancients, those went extinct… I’m glad they were wrong on at least that. I didn''t have any liquid shadow potatoes on me but I placed 2 bottles of liquid shadow vodka inside. It’s not the same but if a shadowcat ever comes here in need, at least he has something.


    I left the seed vault with mixed feelings when I saw another door. Cultivation room? This can’t be good… I did the same trick and entered this room. It had a lot of shelves with cooled boxes too but also a part with some large containers with fluid and weird things in them. What is all this technology? It beats out the most modern technology I''ve ever seen on Kaledon by a long shot. There was a lot of white and metallic in this space.


    I looked in the boxes and these seemed to be samples of different races and procedures to take to... Huh, revive the species? What does that mean? Only certain species can revive. Humans had a lot of samples while most other races didn''t have that many. I looked at the strange ancient technology. There weren''t many moving parts but some things were moving but they were using the ambient mana as fuel. It was extremely efficient.


    I tried to figure out what it was doing but it was moving so few and infrequent that I couldn''t figure it out. I guess I didn''t pick up movement in this place because this barely registers as movement. Everything was so white and clean even after so many years of nobody attending to this place. I assumed this place had the same function as the seed vault if certain species go extinct this is the place to revive them. It made me uncomfortable though… I located the box for the nine-tailed spirit foxes. I opened it and It had 3 samples, 1 male and 2 female. I opened the boxes of other tailed beasts and other legendary and mythological creatures. The highest number of samples was 6. Some were incomplete because they were only from 1 gender. A certain machine caught my interest. It even had instructions on how to add samples.


    Insert bodily fluid here? What the hell? I read the instructions and it even ranked the types of bodily fluids in order of effectiveness. ''Blood'' ranked as second effective so I bit my finger and dropped some blood in the opening to the instructions. Suddenly the machine began to move. I healed my finger with nature energy and watched the machine do its thing. A screen popped up asking for details. What race. gender. age and name of specimen, etc. I filled it out in curiosity and a vial popped out labelled with the stuff I put in. It looked identical to the vials I saw in the boxes. Does this mean I just contributed to reviving the 9t? I went to the 9t box and placed it inside. Was this a good idea? But in case I die I have at least done something to prevent us from going extinct. It feels uncomfortable to have someone revive our species from my blood but it beats extinction, I guess.


    I placed the vial on the side of the males and closed the box. I wanted to check out what they would do for phoenixes when I realized something. I’m not a pure 9t. I’m also half phoenix, but in what box would my vial need to go then? There was no phoenix box but it had directions to a certain machine. I arrived and I couldn''t believe my eyes. This machine was holding a phoenix egg! I sat down on the floor and thought deeply.


    There are no phoenixes on the main floor currently because they were all in Hourai. So technically this is the only phoenix here. One thing isn''t clear though. Phoenixes and dragons have 2 subcategories. Those that look humanlike and can turn into their real form like my mother and sisters and those that are only in their real form. There is a big difference between them. In the end, it doesn''t matter regarding their role. But a true phoenix, like my mom and sisters, is less likely to kick the bucket in their early years.


    My mom was born from an egg, my sisters were too but I wasn''t. That''s how they knew I would be different, so looking at this egg won''t tell me anything. It only needs a lot of heat to eventually hatch. Do I take this egg with me? This machine has the right idea but it''s nowhere hot enough to keep this egg viable for long. It’s already quite weak. If I leave it here the egg might die and rot.


    I sighed. I’m too young to become a dad and even if it''s not a true phoenix, I seem to be terrible with pets, Bunai, Ignis, and all the spirits sacrificed themselves for me. A phoenix is sturdier than this but… I concluded that I had no choice, at least the phoenix would have lived if I take it, it would never get born if I leave it here. I carefully took the egg out of the machine. It warned me that the egg needs at least 200 ℃ to keep it viable. I guess this is why the egg is so weak because a phoenix egg needs at least 650 ℃.


    I made a separate part in my pocket dimension and made the temperature about 1127 ℃. This is the temperature my mother said she hatched Xelia at. Yuna had a colder temperature and it might have come with some... problematic traits.


    Then again Xelia had some too. I don’t know at what temperature my mother got hatched. I raised the temperature to 1500℃ and checked on the egg. It seemed to recover quite fast. I slowed down time because I’m still too young and busy to look after another living being. I put this in my archive because it would suck if I forgot this.


    I left the room. This was so mentally and emotionally draining. Even the ancients were struggling to keep our numbers high. Phoenixes are way more common than tailed beasts. Their numbers should be similar to dragons in numbers but this place had only 1 phoenix egg.


    I had caught a glimpse of 5 dragon eggs but I don''t know about the conditions needed to hatch them and I’m not an orphanage. Running around with a bunch of brats behind me isn''t anything I want to deal with for a long time. I located a suitable spot to rest, curled up in my tails and went to recover from all the stuff I learned today. Tomorrow might be just as bad.


    This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    Day 339 came and I was ready for the next building on this time capsule fortress. I barged in ready for anything yet still got surprised. This place looked like an enormous workshop. I looked around and various weapons and armor pieces were displayed. Jackpot! This place is the best. It had weapons and armor from different ancient civilizations. I inspected many of them but they weren''t super interesting.


    I did swipe manuals on how to make relic magic weapons. I had a blast. I tried out some weapons but they were either too heavy, not to my taste, or had vague methods of activating the magic within. Also, some were just old and didn''t work. I didn''t pay much attention to the armor but one thing caught my attention. It was a small piece of fabric but its properties were insane. And it was super soft. I read what it was about and understood why there was only a small piece of cloth and not a whole armor set. It was made out of 9t fur. Some 9t donated some fur to the maker to create this. There was an enormous manual on it. I thought about the mountain of fur I had stored up and decided that maybe this will come in useful. I know some weaving techniques but I’m rusty on that. Maybe I should have paid more attention to when Hera tried to teach me. There was also dragon scale armor and all kinds of things using exotic materials.


    I spotted a phoenix dress. It looked very pretty but I’m not into dresses. It reminded me a bit of the dresses my mother and Xelia used to wear. They were sexy and elegant yet provided a lot of crazy strong effects. I got hit by nostalgia and decided to swipe the manual of this too. I might have to pick up skills to make this or find someone who could. There was something made out of 6t fur that when spun in threads could be used to conduct lightning better. Seems quite pointless.


    Nothing about shadowcat fur because it turns into a shadow when it separates from them so nothing could be made out of it. These things all looked cool but this was not my expertise. I could make some of these armor sets made out of chainmail or metal but none of us would wear these. I left this building quite happily. What would the next building have in store?


    It smelled quite stuffy. It looked like an old study room and there was a large round table in this building that seemed to consist of just 1 room. It had a map of the continent. A quite old one. It marked major cities of which most are gone by now. I saw an icon indicating the location of Event Horizon. And one that indicates the location of the fortress. It seemed to be moving on the map. It also indicated where the primal runes were found. It marked other stuff too but I wasn''t interested in these. I remembered the locations by putting it in my archive. I couldn''t find any more interesting things so I left.


    So, a room where they tracked where they found everything. Not everything was marked but the important things were marked. For example, they marked where they found one of the dragon eggs but the location where they found the phoenix egg was missing. They indicated the areas certain groups of civilizations lived, where the primal runes were found, where important plants or seeds were found etc. So far everything just points to this place being a time capsule. Maybe that''s part of the reason it''s flying. One nasty earthquake could mess things up. Or nosy archaeologists might dig it up and mess with it. The problem is that it might be a bit too inaccessible. Especially if the location is unknown. There is no point in all this when nobody can find it to revive whatever went extinct. I went back inside because I didn''t check if this fortress had a set route or if it was random. I also didn''t get any answers about those cyclops.


    I found another map that pathed out the fortress trajectory. It would arrive 78 km from the port town I was about once every 310 years. The rest would be over the open ocean. Passing nearby some islands but that''s it. The whole trajectory is called the Hurricane Path but I still don''t know what the cyclops have to do with it. I kept flipping pages but no answers. How vexing.


    I gave up and went to the largest building. I got met with a gust that almost blew me away. I used [Pressure] to stand my ground. This was some sort of deck. I walked forward and gasped. There was a miniature version of the Hurricane path over the ocean. It was miniature but the hurricanes were still 50 meters tall. They even had the cyclops in it. The whole room was quite windy. I guess this is a simulation room? But for what? I found a panel that allowed me to change the path.


    You can''t be serious right? I started to track the direction of the floating fortress, the real one not the model one. I drastically changed the Hurricane Path in the model. It took 10 seconds but the model started to change to match how I tinkered with it. Some moments later I noticed that this whole fortress changed direction. This is crazy… Are these cyclops artificial? If that''s the case then that''s insane, the ancients were so far ahead of us in engineering and whatever, that there''s no way we can catch up in a reasonable timeframe.


    Because of this model, I could see the effect it had on its surroundings. I might have drowned some islands by messing with this. I changed the path to how I remember how it looked like. I think I got it but it looks a bit different. But as it looks like the current path, I mean the path before I messed with it, was the most optimal route where no islands get screwed over and the landmasses were relatively unaffected. I had a slight temptation to send it over Event Horizon but it might set the black hole loose and that would be a very bad idea. I noticed a button that read ''test mode''. Apparently, I can test changes that don''t affect the current path but just to see what would happen… Why isn''t this the default setting?! I hit the button and the simulation was in test mode. I dialled up the hurricane strength and jumped in. I would use this place for training. I could freely alter the size and strength of these hurricanes.


    Day 345. My body was covered in bruises. I kept getting flung into the walls by the strong winds. This only happened when I lost focus but it still hurt. It was the same problem as when I went to train underwater. Except, I would drown in the ocean when I lost focus and here, I will get launched into a wall. I spent a day circulating nature energy to make my body hurt less and practiced the pronunciation of that primal language.


    I couldn''t continue cheating with [Waterfall] so I made a wind equivalent that I named [Hurricane Path]. Not very original I know. But instead of a path followed by hurricanes, it was a path made through hurricanes. I also developed [Counter Swirl], it could destroy weaker hurricanes by turning the wind in the opposite direction, it was very intensive and stamina draining and I couldn''t do this on the stronger ones yet. I also got better at using [Pressure]. I also created a wind version of [Ocean’s Wrath] and just named it [Hurricane''s Fury], its only weakness was that I couldn''t get [Frozen Skin] stacks from it. Mastering wind wasn''t as hard as mastering water, wind had a lot of things in common with water.


    Only 5 more days were needed. This might be because I''ve learned a lot from fighting underwater. My experiences with previous elements were speeding up the ones to come. I spent another day just processing and organizing the new techniques I had created, added some filler movements into most of my new and existing techniques to make it easier to sneak in movements of other techniques. It would make me more flexible.


    In my sparring matches against Shidar, it became clear that leyline energy has an easy time punching through mana. Probably because these don’t like to interact. His turtle defense was the only attack that stood a chance. But even so, I could carry mana-based attacks with my [Oceans Wrath]. The mana didn''t mix with the leyline energy but got carried and then shot out as something that was both. It was a very strange interaction. Maybe it was possible to mix them but it was quite hard and the default state is that they don''t mix. Leyline energy is Isi’s will, does that mean she doesn''t agree with mana but tolerates it? I stepped out of the hurricane simulator. It was strange to feel hardly any wind. I looked at every building in this fortress, each was important in its own way.


    I wonder if I should report this to the Adventurers Association but I don''t know how trustworthy they are. I trust the president and Vice Daddy but I don''t know if there are other important figures that might abuse this. I would trust Vinny and Sylvana more in this. Maybe I should tell them about this. Sylvana is going to be tough to locate but Vinny is probably fooling around with his new girlfriend where I last left him.


    Just lightning was left, however... I looked up. I was quite close to the celestial currents. I reached out and managed to connect to the celestial currents. A bit of information came in. To use light or dark elemental Dragonvein was easy; it used the movements of teh base elements. This was easier than I thought, however... I tried other moves. I seem to be unable to use the base elements when attuned to the celestial currents, its light and dark strictly. I guess it needs a tradeoff for being this easy.


    So, all that was left was just lightning, eh? Where to go? I guess I should return to port, relax a bit, maybe visit Vinny… Vinny lives so far from here…


    Or I could locate some spots that had primal runes and find a spot to practice lightning. Let''s see it''s day 351 so I have 129 days left before my first year is over. I have more than enough time. Maybe I should take 29 days off.


    Most of my breaks were mandatory to make sure I wouldn''t collapse during rough moments. I wanted to drop a [Dimensional Anchor] here but my 9th tail reminded me that this only works on locations fixed in space, so any place that’s not constantly moving… wonderful. I tugged on the [Dimensional Anchor] and got to Gavin with a [Dimensional Teleport]. I tried to locate the fishermen but it was quite late so it was hard to find them. I would try the next morning so I returned to the Adventurers Association and got a room. The plan was to wake up early the next morning but I ended up sleeping till the morning after.