The Master of Cards Chapter 29: Making A Choice

"Card Dimension? Aliens?" Alex was shocked. He suddenly realized that this parallel world was much more crazier than he had imagined.

"What exactly is the Card dimension?" He asked.

"It is a world. You can encounter various phenomenon there that provide card fragments of cards that would otherwise be unobtainable on earth. Your growth in there would also depend on how much risk you are willing to take." Old Ren said.

"Old man, were you a member of the adventure guild? Did you explore this card dimension?" Alex asked.

Old Ren nodded. "Everyone ends up visiting the Card Dimensions at some point. I was quite a successful explorer there. Cards like this, are impossible to create." Old Ren summoned a card that was green in color and had a red rose on it. He activated the card and a thorny red armor covered his body, giving him a heroic edge, before dissipating and absorbing the rose card back into his body.

Alex looked at that card and was shocked. The power the card and the armor emitted was terrifying. However there was something else that pricked his mind about what Ren said.

"Dimensions? Multiple?" Alex asked.

Old Ren nodded. "You can enter the First Card Dimension, but then you can ascend to higher dimensions. On earth, we compete against each other, but in the card dimensions we compete with Aliens and other terrifying things within the dimension."

Alex was put into thought. "My biggest issue, is that I know too little about the World of Cards. Things like the Card dimension you told me about are something I would never learn about on my own.

This is why I was considering the Special Department, but if the department would lock me in, I do not know if I want to join them."

Old Ren smiled. "There is a universal institution called the Earth Knowledge Tower. You can learn any and every information there that even families may not know. You can exchange Adventurer Guild Credits as we as Exchange Information with the Knowledge Tower itself to get their credits and exchange for any information.

The Card Dimension is vast and hasn't been explored all that much, because it is too dangerous. If you have initiative, you can learn everything we know about the card world."

Alex nodded. "Do I need any permit to enter the Card Dimension?"

Old Ren shook his head. "No, you do not. But before you enter, you should become stronger. Inside the Card Dimension you will be too weak."

Alex didn't reply for a bit. "How do I get stronger?"

Old Man Ren smiled. "There are many ways, but the best way is to fight. Card Frontier is a good place for that. But there are other ways as well. Like focusing on your fighting abilities. The stronger card users are always strong fighters even without cards. I can help you with that."

Alex nodded. "Old man, you are good to me. One day I will repay your kindness." He paused. "I need to learn more about the Card dimension first before I make a decision. How do I learn about it?"

Old Ren threw a chip to him. "This has some basic information. Even if you do not join the Academic Influences, the Military or even the Adventurer's House there are many other smaller guilds and influences both affiliated as Adventurers or to private parties. Powerful families also have their own influences." He said.

Alex nodded. He went back and carefully read the information he received. The Card Dimension was truly a mysterious place. Alex decided to choose his own path. He would explore the Card Dimension himself first and then see which influence he should join if any.

But first, he had to become stronger. He decided to enter the VR capsule and enter the Card Frontier. He went for his 10th PvP battle. By now he had a good collection of one time use cards. The 10th battle began in the arena with the alert of a 10th consecutive win battle between two opponents.

Alex had been studying the water attribute for the pas two weeks and in this battle he arrived with a black stick. The battle had attracted a small audience, mainly friends of Alex's opponent, 'Storm Desire'.

Storm Desire was a student at Warrior's University, an elite university on Earth of the same level as Star University and was a card initiate with some battle experience. Which could be seen from the fact that he too was an undefeated 9 win streak out of 9 matches total.

When his friends in the audience saw his opponent's name, they booed. "Your Dad is a Noob? Stormy bro, take this troll down!" They screamed.

Alex took out his stick and a card appeared in front of him. It was a Wind Attribute Rank 1 Haste Card that improved the speed. Alex calmly activated it, while Storm Desire, looked at his card and refused to use it. Instead, he took out a Rank 1 Wind Wave Card.

The battle began, and immediately Storm Desire began floating above the ground and flew towards Alex at a low height. Alex calmly stretched his legs. He was so in tune with the water element that every movement created an illusion of water even without the water fortification card.

Alex didn't looked stressed at all, just moved in a very fluid way and his stick smashed at Storm Desire's flying leg which was about to hit him. When Alex saw his opponent try to fly higher he took out a stun card he hadn't used in ages and quickly activated it.

Over the many battles he had noticed something that was unusual and he attributed it to reaching the fourth level of the inner world. Alex could activate cards almost instantaneously and even pause the activation to delay the release. His opponents always had a delay of at least four seconds when activating cards during battle.

Thus, Storm Desire looked in horror as he was instantaneously stunned and paralyzed by the card activation, falling to the down. Alex calmly kicked him with force and finished his health to a comfortable victory.

Chapter end