After Dennis and Aaron return, I give everyone an explanation of everything that happened while I was gone. Lily listens with a singular degree of focus as soone who will soon enter Beyond.
It’s impossible to tell her about the trial itself, given the way the system censors any attempt, but general information regarding Beyond seems ok, so I tell her what I can.
“So you still don’t know how to clear the 1st floor of the dungeon and enter the second?” she asks as I finish my tale.
“Yup, no idea at all. The current plan is to reach the safe zone and try to gather information and continue from there. We should be able to do it in three days when you and Tess get your stay tokens.”
“Won’t we need a bigger group?”
“Possibly, but Tess said Gareth promised to join. If it doesn’t work out, we can just reschedule it for six months from now—when I’m due to et up with Leticia and the others. Or I could just go back for a day or two and leave another ssage so that we can try sooner.”
Tapping on the armrest of the manabloc chair I made for her and the twins, she smiles. “I’m so happy I don’t have to think about these things! Just point at the monsters.”
“Is she cosplaying Nat?” Dennis quips, poking Aaron.
“Rember we read that article that said that one of the easiest ways to pick up girls was to imitate them a bit? Like mimicking their movents and behaviors would help make you more endearing. Maybe she read the sa article,” Aaron nods seriously.
“I’m going to fuck you up! Both of you!”
“Totally like Nat.”
“Yes. At this point, it has to be intentional.”
“And now Nat’s going to increase the difficulty on that cursed orb of his.”
“Well, we were expecting that. Bring it on!”
I listen as they babble for a mont, then do just that, and for a while at least, they don’t have the focus to spare on idle chatter.
I turn to Lily. “What do you think of Specter’s arm and the pieces of Whitey’s heart?”
“They’re in terrible shape and weakening fast. They’ll probably crumble to dust soon.”
“Either it’s the system ssing with us or that’s just how lurkers work, maybe they just crumble to dust so they can be recreated in a year. Though I’d think it’d make more sense to just fix the body over the following year and reuse it.”
“Maybe that is how it works; perhaps in this case the arm has been marked as destroyed?”
“Could be.” After weakening the orbs so the twins can focus, I address the entire group, “In three days we’ll be heading deeper into the central region. With any luck It might finally complete our side quest, and we can start working on our information gathering in the process.”
As I return to thinking about our plans, I spin the newly shaped thermal pyramid floating in the middle of our group, having moved on from the cube, each face shines a different color, ranging from pale yellow to dark gold, and each one emits a different amount of heat.
The way it spins has an almost hypnotizing quality to it, as I continue, “We’ll take over one of the smaller groups, so we have a good place to sleep. Preferably sowhere with a good view. Before you ask, yes, you can call it Angry Kittens, I don’t even care anymore. The training will continue for you two and Lily too. We don’t need to sleep much anymore, and we’re going to find out how far I can push you guys before you start hallucinating.”
“What?”
“[Mana Manipulation] will be our main focus, and we’ll work on improving [Connection] after. Lily’s going to focus on body modification and [Disintegration].” I say, and begin to put my plans into words, in an attempt to make everything easier to schedule, “I’ll work on improving [Resonance], and practice the stances for kinetic energy, and I’ve got a great idea for a new mana technique, with Lily’s help, I think I could get a new skill in the process.”
Eventually, I start to feel like a single thermal pyramid isn’t enough of a challenge and create multiple evil orbs, making them spin around while I deal with their effects, “I will disassemble most of the damaged arcane items and sell a few. My end goal is to build a facility to create arcane items with the materials at our disposal.”
Biscuit approaches, and I watch as he lays on the ground next to Lily, putting his small head on his front paws.
“I will try to co up with ways to modify and recreate the Restrictive Training Emblem and Burden Enhancent Inscriptions so that you can make use of them as well. I just need to find a way to keep them from stopping your brain from functioning, or your heart from beating, or preventing your chest from moving and suffocating you.”
“WHAT?”
I'm really going to be busy I realize, saying as much as I do, “You know that feeling when you think you have a lot of free ti and then you start going over everything you need to do and find you don’t have near enough ti to fit it all in. Anyway, over the next few weeks, I think my priority will be mana and kinetic energy, in that order. I’ll just have to find a way to fit the rest in sohow.”
“What about things like the Floor quests? I an, we’ve already been here for quite a while and we still haven’t figured out how to leave,” Dennis says, reminding .
“It’ll probably end up being sothing as simple as helping one of the beings from the five, now four, containnt cells escape and then letting them deal with the rest,” I say, yawning as I increase the speed of the spinning pyramid.
“You an beings on the level of Champions?”
“Yup,” I nod. “You rember the 4th floor, right? Our quest was to kill one of the Calamities, and the biggest part of the solution was to pick the one you could face with your group and abilities. This floor might be the sa, we might just need to choose the right prisoner to release. Though that dickhead Champion from before clearly wasn’t it.”
“Do you really think that alone would be enough?”
I shrug, “If it’s not, we release them all and let them break this prison apart and sneak out when they do.”
“Yeah, I hope Tess’s or Sophie’s group finds out more,” Aaron says, not seeming to like my idea for so reason. Well, I don’t mind the lack of trust, but in my experience, the simplest thods often work the best.
I lean back in my chair and open up a pouch of deer jerky, and taking out a piece, before taking a bite and chewing on it.
Sowhere from my right, next to Lily, I hear a quick, surprised movent.
I take another bite.
(Bitch!) Biscuit shouts, using a word I haven’t heard from him in a long while. I think he must have learned it from Lily.
I take two more bites, and Biscuit quickly appears right in my face, floating and clearly angry but finally giving his attention.
“I’m sorry,” I say sincerely, apologizing for cheating on our future Overlord, as I put my hands on my lap and return his gaze. “But, Biscuit, haven’t you been letting other people pet you as well?”
That seems to shock the corgi as if the thought hadn’t occurred to him, and he avoids my gaze.
Reaching into the air, I grab him and pull him into my lap. He lets it happen, his nose constantly twitching as he sniffs at the pouch of deer jerky.
I take out another before closing the pouch and offering the piece to him.
He hesitates for a bit, but after glancing at , he starts carefully chewing away, trying not to touch my hand.
The next day, we get so more detailed ssages from the others.
Tess, Min-Jae, and Maya are heading deeper towards the center of the region. They can’t share more with the system’s censorship, but I think they learned a bit more about the remaining containnt cells and decided to head over to one of them.
Izzy sends a ssage of her own as well, confirming that she and Sophie are safe and heading west. She ntions people with abilities like Sophie, bringing to mind an image of the closed-off city of mind mages.
It’s an area even people outside the central region seed to scorn. And as we’ve asked around we’ve learned that most people with such abilities tend to gather in a single place. Either for protection or to accomplish a shared goal. For so reason, Sophie and Izzy have decided to head in that direction.
Though I have sothing I would just love to ask Sophie.
The others might have forgotten, but I haven’t. The Champion Caius’s bond didn’t die back in the containnt cell in the Mana Desert. And I’ve really been thinking about it too. The thylarin brothers died, so they were unable to carry the parts of the bond Izzy sensed, but what if that asshole Champion tricked ? What if he expected those pieces to be discovered, or prepared another, just in case, a much smaller and weaker fragnt he kept well hidden?
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There is even a chance Sophie already knows about it. When it cos to these things, she could almost be considered my equal, and in so situations, she even does better.
But the biggest confirmation of all is a feeling I get in a flash of shared mory I had with Biscuit. The corgi refuses to share more, but it’s clear that he’s made so sort of deal with Sophie to stay quiet about it.
Our newest Beyonder and her little sister, heading for a city of mind mages, carrying a piece of the Champion’s bond with them.
Sophie sure is working on so interesting stuff.
A day passes, and I appear in front of Whitey again. The area around us this ti is the 1st floor; more accurately, it is the clearing with the bus we arrived in.
Whitey stands in front of it, tapping with the tip of his finger on the side of it, each tap sending audible vibrations through the air.
Curious, I observe him as he does. He seems to be concentrating on sothing, examining it deeply. All while his heart beats in slow, powerful, bursts.
“Got it.” He says, nodding, apparently satisfied, before tapping on the side of the bus one last ti.
In an instant, a surge of concentrated kinetic energy explodes outward. In an incredibly focused burst of force, sending a perfectly round shockwave through the tal, as the point of impact collapses inward as if it had been struck by a teor, sending a series of ripples outward in a visible wave.
Each part of the bus caught in the wave is thrown back violently, but the energy dissipates just past the bus itself, leaving everything beyond it completely untouched. The roof compresses, the windows shatter inwards, and the entire vehicle collapses into itself, forming a deep, circular indent exactly where Whitey’s finger made contact.
In the next heartbeat, the bus releases all the built-up energy in a single blast. The side panels explode outward, flaring out like petals. The energy transfer is so precise that even the ground beneath the bus is untouched.
Whitey steps back and turns to , “That thing is made of so interesting materials.”
He stomps, sending a single wave of kinetic energy blasting outwards from his body, bending the grass, and for a mont, the wind stops blowing, encompassing us in deep silence before it returns. His eyes glow dangerously, the look more reminiscent of the lurker that tore people apart rather than the man I t a day ago.
“I’ve been thinking, human. I even respected you for a bit given the way you defeated , but the thing you killed was nothing more than an empty puppet. A fucking disgrace to all the effort I put into developing my abilities.”
Another gentle stomp sends everything around us floating into the air. Pieces of the bus, the bus itself, stones, pieces of wood. He levitates all of it, holding the mass of debris frozen in the air with his ability.
“You want my kinetic energy? The result of my blood, sweat, and tears, the culmination of my heart’s purpose? The very thing I threw everything away to pursue. Fine! That was our wager, and I’m soone who always kept his word.”
More and more energy radiates from him, his eyes growing a deeper and deeper shade of red. Whitey begins to feel taller, and slimr. His white hair whips about in the ai as if it were caught in a hurricane, and his black horns start feeling like they’re absorbing the light. Just the beating of his heart generates enough energy to slowly push away.
More than any ti before, he feels like a demon.
“You don’t have a proper heart, you’re only human, and your talent is the worst,” he says, a dangerous smile crossing his face, almost like he's recalling an old mory. “But maybe, just maybe, there's sothing here I can work with. You’ve got guts, I’ll give you that. If you’re ready to get broken down and put back together, I’ll teach you.”
Whitey steps closer, his eyes glowing with a fierce intensity. “I’ll show you what it takes. You’ll understand what it ans to let every heartbeat beco a weapon, every pulse of blood a force that could crush mountains.”
He pauses, letting his words sink in.
“You already said sothing similar,” I say in response.
Even though he is smiling, it feels very dangerous, almost like I'm poking a sleeping bear while being locked in a cave with him. A bear with a mini nuclear reactor in place of its heart.
“I don’t expect you to understand or think the best of right away.” I say, rolling up my sleeves and shaking off the tension in my arms and legs, “Words are cheap, and your actions tell the greatest of truths, wouldn’t you agree?”
“Yes,” he answers simply.
I nod, “Not long ago, I had the benefit of learning from soone not so different from you. And she’s the most powerful person I’ve ever t. Certainly far more powerful than you.”
Closing and opening my fist, I think back on everything that’s happened since I found myself here. There are things I still need to improve, but if there’s one thing I can say about myself.
It’s that I take pride in my efforts and progress.
I look back at Whitey, and speak as a sharp smile climbs its way onto my face, “She didn’t know as well as she thought she did and pushed too much. I will take what I want from you, along with what I’ve won. I don’t care if you beat the shit out of ; I don’t care if I have to bleed and crawl through the dirt, as long as I can get it.”
“You would make a decent demon.”
“My disciple said the sa.”
“Let us begin then.”
“Yes.”
POV Earth
“It’s exactly as we feared, director. The animals are getting bigger. That polar bear in South Hudson Bay is three tis the size of any polar bear ever recorded. An impossibly large moose was discovered in Newfoundland, and a giant lynx is hunting grizzlies in the Yukon.”
“Sotis I just wish I didn’t have to deal with it, damn it. Prepare a report, and I’ll go over it before passing it on to the higher-ups.”
“Should we pass it on to the Departnt of Public Safety and the Ard Forces?”
“Yes. They can deal with it just like everything else.”
“Got it, director!”
POV Earth
“Sir, the situation in the Pacific just got a lot worse. There’s a shark out there—it’s the size of a cruise ship. They spotted it near the Mariana Trench.”
“A shark? That big? Are we sure?”
“Yes, sir. It’s already disrupted several shipping routes, and a couple of research vessels have gone missing. Satellite images show it circling, almost like it’s guarding sothing down there.”
“Great. That’s just what we needed after that damned spider showed up. Send out an alert to the naval forces and tell them to keep all civilian ships out of the area.”
“Understood. And should we inform the public?”
“Not yet. Let’s just keep this between us and monitor its movents.”
POV Earth
“So, we’re just all gonna pretend there isn’t a giant spider hanging out on the moon?”
“Oh, yeah, it’s totally normal. It’s just a massive spider, chilling up there like it owns the place.”
“Honestly, at this point, I kind of have to respect it. It’s been up there for over a year and hasn’t moved an inch. Probably just waiting for us to get comfy.”
“Yeah, it’s like a horror movie villain on a coffee break. Just taking its ti, and plotting its next big move.”
“Right? anwhile, we’re all down here hoping that just maybe if we ignore it, it’ll go away.”
“Hey, maybe it’s just shy!”
“Or maybe it’s sizing up the planet like, ‘Alright, if I ever need a snack, I’ll just reach over. Not today, but soday.’”
“Yeah… let’s just hope it stays on break.”
“Just look at it. We all know it’s just a matter of ti.”
POV Earth
"Ever since its appearance over a year ago, the 'Moon Spider,' as it’s been dubbed, hasn’t shown any signs of movent or aggression. It's just… there. Clinging to the surface of the moon, The size of the entire state of Colorado, with its many legs spread across the lunar surface, all visible from Earth. For the ti being, it’s remaining completely motionless. There’s no observable activity, no indication of feeding activity, or even the most basic of life functions. We've been monitoring it around the clock, trying to understand what it is, how it got there, and why it’s been so eerily still. Initial scans show an incredibly dense biological structure, unlike anything we've ever encountered. It doesn't fit into any known category of life as we understand it. The spider is silent, and despite all efforts, there’s been no response to any signal or attempt at communication. But the question remains: why hasn’t it moved? It’s been over a year, and it hasn't so much as twitched. Speculations range from theories regarding a deep hibernation state to the idea that it’s so sort of cosmic warning. The public at large, after an early outbreak of panic, has finally gotten used to the spider's presence. Even though it still remains a threat, no one knows if it’s content to simply watch… or if it’s just waiting for sothing. That was until about two weeks ago."
“What happened?”
“A group of a few dozen people appeared near a collapsed tunnel in Osaka, Japan, and the Moon Spider showed signs of movent, just a slight turn in the direction of Japan. The individuals that appeared in Japan were later identified as mbers of a group of people who were presud dead in a tunnel collapse a few weeks before the Moon Spider appeared.”
“Continue.”
“Yes, thank you, sir. Reports indicate that these people possessed… unnatural abilities. Physical and ntal capabilities that defy our understanding. The Japanese governnt and military have done their utmost to keep this under wraps, and most of these people have been cooperative, freely sharing information after their return. Japan has recently decided to provide us with so of this information. They’ve suggested that more individuals like them may appear and they’ve noted that those who’ve returned so far are what they refer to as ‘Easy Difficulty’ participants.”
“You said most cooperated. What happened to the rest?”
“Two refused and attempted to flee. One was subdued with the assistance of the other returnees. That’s what the Japanese have taken to calling them, sir, and we’ve decided to adopt the term as well.”
“Understood. What happened to the last one?”
“Kazuki Sato, twenty-three years old, was neutralized using an anti-materiel rifle. Prior to that, he survived an anti-tank missile strike and eliminated a twelve-mber team from Japan’s Special Forces Group. We’re awaiting further reports, including photo and video docuntation.”
“Please continue with the briefing.”
“Thank you, sir. Since the arrival of the first returnees in Japan, a range of animals in the area where the returnees appeared have exhibited remarkable growth in both physical capabilities and intelligence. Holographic windows have begun appearing before people who co into contact with the returnees. The returnees refer to this phenonon as a ‘system ssage.’ It’s incredibly infectious—proximity alone is sufficient to spread it. Those affected have shown signs of what the returnees call ‘awakening,’ allowing them to access a ‘status window’ displaying a nurical representation of their abilities and granting them two so-called ‘skills’.”
“What does the ssage say?”
“It reads: ‘Congratulations! The earliest participants of the tutorial have completed their induction, and Earth will begin its awakening. More information will follow once the tutorial concludes! Welco!’”
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