The Path of Ascension

Chapter 174

Matt felt nothing.

They had been miles and miles above the surface of Minkalla, with the wind rushing through their hair, when everything went black as the planet moved them to the first floor.

He couldn't even hear his own breathing or taste the air around him. It was disconcerting for a long heartbeat; he couldn't even feel his armor, the clothes on his body, or the weapon in his hand.

It was like he was in the worst dream imaginable.

That only lasted a second before Lunas training and preparatory work came to the fore of his mind, and he spread his spiritual perception out in a wave around himself, allowing Matt to see what was near them.

The first and most obvious thing was that his friends were still standing around him, and each had readied their weapons.

Matt spread his spiritual perception around his friends, but found that the area he could sense was less than a tenth of its usual distance. He should have been able to see everything within a few miles of himself, but he could barely sense anything past a thousand feet before his spiritual perception went blind.

Linking his AI with his friends, he found the connection was also restricted in the same way his spiritual perception had been. It was incredibly muted, allowing for basic communication but little more.

Liz was the first to speak through their AI. Everyone ok?

They all responded in the positive, and she continued, So we got Eternal Darkness as our first floor. Not great as a first-floor reward, but it's not a super valuable one to get later, so it could have been worse. Definitely annoying to try and speed through, but at least we dont have to worry about getting the theme reward, so we dont need to be thorough. If we have enough Genesis Energy, great. But if not, its nothing to cry about. Matt, start the recon.

Matt immediately cast [Air Manipulation], spent 1,000 MPS to boost its range, and set his control of the air to searching everywhere around them. Unfortunately, it didnt end up being one of the rare times where Eternal Darkness allowed spell feedback, so he might have been putting mana into literally nothing, as far as he knew.

Minkalla had locked down that version of a sense just as much as it had his sense of touch. Cycling through all of his other elemental manipulations, he found the same was true for each of them, even the more esoteric ones.

Changing back to [Earth Manipulation], Matt threw all 2,560 MPS into the skill and tried to manipulate Minkalla itself, but he found that he could only interact with a foot or so of the surroundings before he hit a wall of material that completely ignored any of his control.

Sadly. this was exactly as Luna said it would be, so he just reported, Nothing unexpected.

He saw Liz nod through his spiritual perception and chew her lip for a second before she made her decision. Matt takes the lead with full armor up. These monsters should be well hidden here, but their offense should be dead average for Tier 14s.

That meant it would still tear through him if he wasn't careful, but with [Cracked Phantom Armor] taking 2,000 MPS between both layers, he should be able to take a hit or two before being injured.

Queen, take up the spot behind Matt and kill anything that attacks him. Aster, backpack time. Ill keep up a film of blood behind us to help prevent ambushes.

Without saying anything else, they all started moving, and Matt fell into their formation as they had practiced. With both her Talent and Concept connecting her to her blood, Liz had substantially more feedback from her spells, making her something of the de facto scout. Now, substantially more feedback amounted to literally any feedback, but she was still the least-blind of them all.

Using his spiritual sense, Matt narrowed it down from a sphere spanning as far as it could all around him, to just the hall they were in. He was able to discern more about their current surroundings with less background noise to filter through. The natural-looking cave was fairly straight, but had a few twists and turns that seemed to lead them nowhere.

Every dozen or so steps, Matt used [Earth Manipulation] and [Air Manipulation], but found nothing out of the usual.

The worst part of Eternal Darkness, he came to find, was walking. Without the feedback that his body usually gave him, each step had to be deliberate, and a portion of his spiritual perception needed to be allocated to his feet, as he could accidentally step farther than he meant to without feeling his foot hitting the ground.

They were just about to start climbing up a slight incline when something flickered in Matt's spiritual perception for a heartbeat. It was distinctly not human, and as soon as it stopped moving, it vanished from his senses once again.

Something with camouflage ahead. Right side of the tunnel. Marking in our AI map.

Their AI had been making a map from what they sensed with their spiritual senses, but it was still crude, as they only had a single tunnel to base it off of.

As they crept up to within striking distance of the hostile entity, Matt slashed out with his sword after charging a [Mana Slash]. He couldn't feel the weight of his sword or the heft of his swing, but he had used his blade for close to three decades, and was intimately familiar with it. He didnt need the proprioceptive feedback at this point.

The crescent of mana forced the monster to move, and it became visible to their spiritual perception as a six-limbed humanoid. Two of the arms slashed out at Matt, who sidestepped before bringing his blade down on one of the monsters spindly arms

He felt none of the feedback he should have, but he could sense that the first arm he hit snapped like a twig under his attack.

Susanne wasn't any slower, and a second [Mana Slash] struck out where the monster was, and cut off one of its legs directly.

Aster was ready with the finishing blow, and an [Ice Spear] slammed into the monster's chest.

As it died, there was a rush of what almost seemed like golden essence pouring into them. Genesis Energy. It swirled around in Matts core, and even without an essence distribution bracelet for the energy, it evenly split itself between the four of them.

Genesis Energy felt like water when compared to the mist that was essence, and slowly spun itself into a ball in his spirit where unallocated essence usually sat.

After a second of inspection, Matt also noticed that he could feel the Genesis Energy that the others had gathered. They were like small pricks of light that called to his own reserve of the stuff.

Aster, test please. Liz asked as soon as they had all settled themselves.

Instantly, Aster responded, Already done! It swirls like essence does but is a bit easier to manage, and will rotate on its own for a second or five after you stop, so it takes very little attention to manipulate.

Matt kept his blade at the ready as Liz and Susanne started their own test, and once Susanne moved up to replace him as the vanguard, he focused inward and started cycling the drops of Genesis Energy in his spirit.

It responded to his lightest touch, and just like Aster had said, kept swirling for a few seconds each time, seemingly pulled along by his rotating cores. All that was required was a bit of a spiritual kick every so often, which was easy enough to maintain during all but the most strenuous of combat.

His fingers were clumsy, given he was only able to guide them by looking at them through his spiritual senses, but they found their way to his mana stone belt and traced over the first crystal therein. A few weeks back, hed been given the last portion of his Tournament rewards, a rush job because Luna had decided to send them into Minkalla a cycle early. A single rechargeable mana stone that minutely concentrated the mana stored within it, while keeping it attuned to him. From what hed gathered, it had been the result of a fair amount of research, and Talented crafters working on ways to concentrate mana outside of cultivation, which he suspected may have started because of him.

With the knowledge of how Minkalla worked, it was apparent that it was intended to potentially bond to him as a growth item, and hopefully solve his mana concentration issues. Technically, the stone was already concentrating his mana, and he could use it for a minute increase to his concentration, but it didnt change what his spirit actually made. If it were a growth item, the hope was that once it was a part of his spirit, the result would be a permanent increase.

At least, that was the idea.

Accordingly, he was cycling the full 2,000 mana it could hold in and out of it as fast as it could manage, trying to use it as much as possible. He wouldnt be able to do so much in combat or while exploring, but an hour or so a day dedicated to using it, and the passive usage that his armor got whenever they were fighting, would hopefully put those two items as prime candidates for bonding.

Once they were all done with their prep work, they started their trek through the halls while watching out for more of the six-limbed monsters, which they encountered every few hundred feet. They were just settling into a rhythm when the tunnel ended, and there was a wide-open expanse that felt endless to their restricted senses.

After carefully exploring the tunnel, they found themselves on a ledge near the top of a massive pit with sheer walls that sunk out of their view.

Testing, Matt found that flying in all forms was restricted in this area.

No flying, so do we go up or down? Matt asked the question while trying to send his perception down into the pit.

Aster immediately voted, We explore the ceiling! Going the wrong way is how you find the best loot, after all.

Liz waited for Susanne and Matt's agreement before the four of them started climbing the craggy walls.

Because this was Minkalla, and it seemed to actively restrict them where and however it wanted, they couldn't even use [Earth Manipulation] to create better handholds in the wall as they climbed.

Still, they were all Tier 11s, and even having to hold their body weight with one finger was more than doable for them, so climbing was easy enough.

Or it would have been, if they weren't immediately attacked by a swarm of very hard-to-notice bat creatures.

Matt cast [Hail] a few feet behind them and focused on climbing as Aster, who was still situated in the backpack, yipped as she used his created ice to slaughter the weaker flying monsters.

She had gotten very, very good at using Matts ice to deadly effect in their training, and these monsters, while being low Tier 14s, only seemed to have the body strength of a low Tier 12.

Minkalla clearly meant for them to be more an annoyance than a danger for anyone with a few spells that they could cast behind them.

Sadly the Genesis Energy they received confirmed that supposition, as even after Aster killed dozens of the bats, they got less Genesis Energy than a single hall monster.

When they climbed the few hundred feet to the top of the tunnel they found nothing of importance, so they started to climb around in a circle before they all felt something moving at them.

Its presence was generally hidden, but it was so big, it shattered Matts [Hail] spell just by flying through it. Wings and fangs were the only general perception that he was able to feel before it landed with a crash on the wall.

Hanging onto a wall as it shook without the feedback from their senses was incredibly disconcerting, but they all managed, even as the monster tried to eat Susanne.

A massive maw snapped forward at her, but she summoned her second manifestation and cut the monster in the mouth without even turning her real body away.

She had to have used her [Hypersonic Edge], as the Tier 14 monster's tongue and teeth were cleanly sliced through, which let Liz make her first move in Minkalla.

The Tier 14 blood, instead of just falling, froze and started to climb up the monster's jaws and face.

As the blood started to cover its face, Matts spiritual perception was finally able to see that it was some mix of wyvern and bat, possessing a bat's head but with scales covering its hide.

As it tried to lunge again, Lizs control over the blood stopped it in its tracks as she summoned more blood out of her glove, creating sanguine spires to halt its advance.

Normally, Liz would then use her blood to strangle or cut the monster's throat, but this monster was smarter than most, and shook its head back and forth, breaking Lizs control over the blood and throwing itself away from them.

Through their AI, Liz said, It has a spell for breaking active spells. I lost control over all the blood that was touching it. Careful. Matt, another [Hail] please.

He did so and made it as wide as possible to create a net that the monster would have to break through again. As he had that thought, he also cast [Air Manipulation] to lock down the area around them.

If the beast broke spells it passed through, hed know. Even if he couldn't get feedback from the spell, he could still sense when it broke.

They started climbing once again but found nothing along the top of the pit where it met the roof.

Aster was disappointed that they didnt discover any good loot but her mood perked up as they started climbing back down.

They were around halfway back to the ground on the other side of the pit when Liz called out. Hold up. My blood found something strange.

Liz had been keeping a ring of blood near them, ready to fend off attackers after the bat monster's attack, but even as Matt checked, he couldnt see what she had felt.

He was about to cycle all of his manipulation spells out of habit and hope, when a hole opened up next to her.

Aster cheered, and he joined her mentally even as he climbed over and sent a blast of fire into the hole.

When no Genesis Energy rushed into their spirits, they passed through the new hole in the wall to find a small room that had been hidden. Inside, they could sense everything in the hole, which was just a single chest sitting alone along the back room.

Liz used a tendril of blood to feel out the chest and open it, but nothing came out or attacked them, so they inspected the item her blood pulled out.

It was a ribbon of cloth nearly two feet long and about six inches wide along its entire length. None of them were eager to touch it, as even normal rifts could have dangerous items, let alone ruins in Minkalla.

Matt, as the enchanter, started to inspect it for any binding runes or dangerous effects, but found nothing on his first inspection. Not willing to risk it, he pulled out his enchanting set and started to do a more thorough check of the cloth.

In the end, he only found a few runes he believed increased perception, but as they weren't the Empire standard runes, he wasnt able to be entirely sure.

I think it's an item that boosts perception, but I can't be sure how exactly it does that. Still, it should be safe enough to wear.

Aster sent a shrugging fox picture as she said, Well, that's boring on a floor that we cant see on.

Liz was following his own thought process and said, Perception, not sight, though. This might help us see better through our spiritual perception.

That caused them all to consider it, but just as Matt was thinking to offer to test it, Susanne reached down and picked it up.

When nothing bad happened to her, she asked, Anyone mind if I try it on?

None of them minded, and she tied the ribbon around her ring finger on her off-hand.

Oh, yeah. My spiritual perception is a bit clearer after putting this on.

She untied it, which Matt was grateful was possible. Items that bound to you and refused to let go werent unheard of, even if they were rare even in Minkalla.

Susanne offered the ribbon up, and they each tried it on, and as she said, there was a small but noticeable increase in their spiritual perception.

In the end, Liz kept the item as it also boosted her sensitivity with her blood, and her Talent seemed to get around a little of the restriction Minkalla imposed on all of them.

With their new item wrapped around Lizs bicep, they started their climb down the shaft of the tunnel.

They had climbed down the tunnel another few hundred feet when the bat monster once again attacked them, but this time, they were ready. Liz had aerosolized a bit of her blood and spread it out around them as a countermeasure to the monsters sneak attacks.

It was an incredibly taxing method on both her mana and mental strain, but while it slowed them, it made sure that they were safe, and was the only reason they knew the bat-wyvern was coming back at them.

Matt had a barrage of [Fireball]s ready to intercept it while he cast [Jolt] on cooldown.

He now had three different versions of [Fireball] in his spirit. The first was his oldest, and was made to be as cheap as possible, but it was one he never used anymore. The second one, and the one he most often cast, was a version of the skill that he had increased the mana cost for in exchange for a lower cooldown. His third was a version of the spell meant to be as destructive as possible, and had quite a large cost in exchange.

All versions of a skill that hadn't been radically changed generally shared the same cooldown, which meant he could only use one at a time instead of just casting [Fireball] A then [Fireball] B to bypass the cooldown. Most of his spells were different enough that they didnt share much of a cooldown, but at times like these, he fell back on his [Fireball] that had been modified to have a cooldown of less than a second for double the original 10 mana cost.

For anyone else, it would be a dumb move, but Matt didnt mind. His mana pool nearly never dipped below 25.6 mana unless he had his generation all sent into channeled spells.

If he didnt, he could cast that 20 MPS [Fireball] forever.

And he did.

Over and over, he sent mana into the skill as he tracked its location through the information Lizs AI picked up from her connection with her blood and sent to them.

Even a Tier 14 monster couldn't easily take the rapid and accurate barrage of [Fireball]s that Matt sent at it, and the bat-wyvern twisted and rolled in the air, trying to dodge the onslaught. But fast as it was, the four of them were used to fighting Tier 15 monsters that were faster, stronger, and more durable than this beast, so Matt had no trouble anticipating its flight path and landing most of his shots.

Still, he was unable to actually kill it, and ended up just scaring it away, but that was fine for the time being.

They climbed for another two hours in the seemingly endless pit, fending off attacks by both the large and small bat monsters that kept trying to kill them.

When they sensed the bottom of the pit, Matt whistled even though it made no sound.

The pit was carpeted with Void Obsidian stalagmites.

They were incredibly rare and expensive in the outside world, and at Tier 14, Void Obsidian would have sold for its weight in Tier 16 or 17 mana stones.

It wasnt great for melee attacking, as any shearing pressure would shatter the Void Obsidian, but it was fantastic to make arrowheads out of. Its void properties meant that it would punch through magical and physical armor as if they weren't there, and would be more than effective for a few Tiers up, even without enchantments.

With enchantments Matt wanted to find out.

He wondered what would happen if he made Liz a spearhead out of the stuff. It could make for some incredibly potent attacks.

But first, they needed a way to get past the razor-sharp Void Obsidian and reach the exit in the middle of the hole.

Just as they were discussing how to do it, the bat creature came back at them with a flock of the smaller bats.

Matt cast [Flamethrower] and then [Fire Manipulation], taking his stream of fire and sending it out in a larger wave to kill as many of the little monsters as he could before the large one reached them.

It helped, but the monsters seemed unaware or unbothered by their brethren dying in droves and kept flying forward.

With Liz, Aster, and Susanne taking the large bat's attention, Matt focused on keeping the smaller ones off of them as they unleashed some of their strongest spells to kill the large bat without pushing into their actual trump cards.

Susanne jumped to the side and slashed out with her Concept blade as she was mid-air, slicing off the monster's wing before she landed a few feet lower.

Liz and Aster didnt let her attack go unanswered, and Liz sent a tendril of blood at the monster's leg, trying to pull it down to the Void Obsidian below. The monster responded by gripping the wall with its talons, physically resisting long enough to use its spell breaking technique.

It lunged at Liz, but Aster was ready and cast one of her new spells, [Snowbank]. It was the ice equivalent of [Flamethrower], and sent out a slurry of snow at a rapid rate. Aster used her [Ice Manipulation] to compact and harden the ice until it was a pillar traveling at incredible speeds.

The pillar of snow and ice hit the bat in the face hard enough to send it tumbling into the Void Obsidian, impaling it.

Even that didn't kill it, and it opened its mouth in a silent scream of agony, but Susanne's [Mana Slash] silenced the beast after just a moment.

The rush of Genesis Energy was like a flowing river as it split four ways and rushed into them.

It was more than ten times the amount they had earned so far in the entire delve.

Liz was the first to ask, Sub-boss?

Matt would have agreed if this was a normal rift or ruin, but this was Minkalla, so it was only a guess at best, albeit an educated one.

Still, it was the only answer they had, so they worked under that assumption.

It took another few minutes of Matt frying the small bats before the stream stopped, and they were able to proceed.

Matt had Liz hold him with a tendril of blood, and he very carefully cut the Void Obsidian near them off at the bottom, handing the stalagmites to Susanne, who put them in his spatial backpack.

That backpack was the largest one they could buy that was made only of Tier 14 materials, and was especially created to store valuables they found in Minkalla.

It was massive enough to easily hold a five-story building. If they wanted it bigger, they could have done so, but they reduced the size a bit to add on enchantments for preserving materials they gathered.

Everything they gathered would go in there, or one of the five exact replicas sitting in their house where they were stored away.

Liz had a special orb for storing alchemy ingredients that they had made for the same purpose, but so far, they hadnt found anything fitting the description.

After cutting away several of the Void Obsidians, they had a place to stand, but no path to the hole, as the monster's impaled corpse was in their way. They paused when they noticed that the bat wyvern was starting to rapidly dissolve, and just watched as Minkalla reclaimed its monster.

That made it easier on them, as they no longer had to cut a way through its hide, but before it completely vanished, Liz managed to grab a tooth and a flap of its skin, which they quickly put away. Curiously, looting the corpse halted the dissolution of the monster until they were done. Sadly they only earned a Tier 8 skill from the dissipated corpse.

With their path clear, they neared the hole in the center of the pit and inspected it.

Through their spiritual perception, they could feel something moving underneath them rapidly, and one test later with [Water Manipulation], confirmed that there was moving water beneath them that was flowing rapidly.

All of them had underwater breathing amulets crafted by Matt in the last few weeks, so they had no issue with throwing themselves into the raging waters after tying together their armor with Tier 14 spider silk.

The water was unsurprisingly neither warm nor cold, which could be a problem. It was Tier 14 water, and if it was cold and they couldnt feel it, hypothermia could creep up on them quickly.

Thankfully, Matts enchanted amulets worked as intended, and created a little bubble of air around their mouths and noses, feeding them fresh air while rejecting carbon dioxide in its sphere of influence.

Ironically, Matt had the hardest time making the amulet work with [Cracked Phantom Armor], which kept trying to treat it as a foreign enchantment, and forced him to iterate the design a dozen times before he got one that worked. Eventually, he was able to find a configuration that worked with his spell.

Thankfully, nothing attacked them as they were carried along in the watery tunnel, and with a little [Water Manipulation] from Matt, they stopped themselves from bouncing around against the rock walls.

Less than ten minutes later, they found their exit in the form of a whirlpool that swirled them around a drain.

Matt and Susanne pulled everyone together, and they huddled together as they were sucked out of the hole.

When they exited the hole, their spiritual perceptions were able to see that they were in the middle of the air, falling rapidly from the faux-waterfall-drain-thing.

This time, they were able to fly, and they caught themselves in the air before spreading their perception out getting a low detail scan of the area within a few miles of them.

Above them, they found an un-manipulatable ceiling of stone, but below them spread a jungle of towering trees that had massive foliage draped across their limbs with equally large vines climbing and linking them.

The four of them were settling down into the forest when an ant the size of a horse climbed out of a hole in the ground and lumbered around before clicking its pincers together.

As if it wasn't affected by the floor theme, it headed right in their direction.

All of them took to the air and watched the ant walk along an unseen path in the forest.

They followed it to find that a beast corpse the size of a large hill was getting picked apart by a swarm of ants.

Susanne turned slightly and asked Liz, Do we attack? That could be a lot of Genesis Energy.

Matt interjected before Liz could speak. The real question is why the monster hasn't dissolved yet. The bat thing dissolved in only a few minutes. I don't expect that Minkalla will even allow monsters to harvest other monsters. This feels off.

That caused all of them to look at the monster again, and they found that it was a monkey of some variety, judging by its tail and what was left of its flesh.

They spent another five minutes watching the ants devour the monkey and bring its meat away, before deciding that they should try to pick off a straggler ant and see how much Genesis Energy came from killing it.

If they got a lot, and decided that it might be worth fighting their way through to the nest.

When a lone ant trundled its way under them, Matt and Susanne both struck out with [Mana Slash]s, cutting the ant into three at the thorax.

The rush of Genesis Energy was larger than the small bats, but not as large as the ones from the monsters they had fought in the tunnels.

It was, after all, a single ant out of what had to be hundreds, if not thousands of ants.

Returning to the corpse, they started slaughtering all the ants which seemed scattered and tried to flee.

Even with their senses restricted, they were able to finish off all the ants in short order, but they weren't able to stop the ants from calling out for reinforcements, and what they dubbed soldier ants arrived.

This ant type had thick armor plating as their chitin, and seemed more built for defense. Their exoskeletons resisted their initial attacks without effort.

They were all surprised when, as if given a signal, the ants raised their heads and spat out a stream of liquid at them.

Matt cast [Bulwark] to block the spray, but he could feel that something was wrong.

Before he could identify what was off Liz said, The liquid is trying to eat away at his spell. Assume their spit is corrosive. Dont let it land on you.

After that, they stayed behind Matt, who focused on defense, while the other three peppered the soldier ants with attack after attack.

It took them a few minutes, but they eventually managed to kill the ants without getting hit.

The Genesis Energy they received was more than enough to put any question of avoiding the hive to rest. Each soldier gave nearly a quarter the Genesis Energy that the large bat had.

Seeing that, they were forced to reconsider the designation of sub-boss that they had given it earlier.

Genesis Energy was a new energy type, and they didnt know what was considered normal for a monster to give, but these ants gave enough that they didnt even consider leaving.

Finding one of the tunnel's entrances, Matt cast [Flamethrower] into it and kept the spell going until the ground shifted and the flames started to wash back on them.

Liz tisked over their AI. So they arent stupid. They closed the tunnel when we tried to burn them out.

Matt shrugged, Well, worth a shot to try and drown them.

That also didnt work, and after a minute of Matt using [Create Water], the ground shifted, and the water started to back up.

The four of them were forced to scout around looking for a third entrance, but this time, they went inside instead of trying to flush the ants out.

Sadly, the ground around them was like most of Minkalla, and only an inch or two of the surface layer earth was usable by [Earth Manipulation], which meant that they couldn't dig their own way through the ground.

They encountered their first soldier ant in the large tunnel and it rushed them, taking their attacks on its armored head without flinching. It tried to chomp on Matt, who used his Concept's repulsion effect as it tried to bite down, keeping the jaws at bay.

It felt like he was trying to force back the pincers by hand, and after only a heartbeat, he knew it was a losing battle. But Matt still did his job long enough for Liz, Aster, and Susanne to attack the more vulnerable mouth of the monster.

Susanne's attack arrived first and cracked the chitin of the ant, which tried to reel back, but Matt flexed his Concept further, forcing the pincers open and past their normal breaking point.

It was then that it tried to spit at him, but he had [Bulwark] ready, and it caught the corrosive liquid before it could touch him. Lizs and Asters attacks landed immediately afterwards, hitting the monster in its eyes. Aster's icicle penetrated to its brain and ended the monsters struggle right then and there.

Matt stepped back as Liz went to collect the monster's spit in a special vial that was nonreactive to most corrosive liquids. After taking a sample, they proceeded down the tunnel, fighting when they had to, but thankfully, the tunnels were small enough that they didnt have to fight more than one of the ants at a time. As long as they took their time, they were easily able to kill them.

There was only one mistake when an ant came out of a tunnel that was hidden from their spiritual perception.

Seeing that, they inspected the wall around it and found another hidden tunnel. With their spiritual senses so restricted, and without any other senses to rely on, they missed what would have normally been blindingly obvious.

Inside, a massive crystal jutted out of the ground and pulsed with Genesis Energy. As they approached, information flooded their minds.

The idea of a fight was like a sirens call and warning mixed.

A challenge room.