When everything was cleared up, Shara and Sideark went ahead to the forward group. Ryan and Zedart stood together in the tunnels, a corpse in between them. Zedart was staring intensely at Ryan and it was getting a little uncomfortable.

“What? You looking for a fight?”

The [Swordsman] shook his head. “No. It just feels like every time I make progress you seem further ahead.”

“Are you jealous of me?” For some reason, Zedart being jealous of him felt wrong. Though it was fair. “I guess with the apex title it’s not even close anymore.”

Zedart shook his head, “I wasn’t talking about that.” Then he looked behind him, towards where Sideark had gone. “I was talking about that.”

“What? Tricking Sideark?” Ryan waved it off, “That’s just basic negotiating, rule one.”

Zedart frowned and tilted his head, a little confused by the words of Barry’s very basic wisdom.

Ryan elaborated. “Figure out what they want most of all. Honestly, figure out what they’re afraid of too. Then use it to get what you want.”

“What about the rest of your plan with the Unwanted?”

“It’s the same thing. People want to feel good about themselves. There’ll still be idiots that don’t like them because of how they look, but you just need a good first image and most people will be on board. For the smart ones you just need to remind them about history and they’ll jump on board to be on the right side of it. After all, everyone wants to sound smart and right.”

Ryan paused, thinking a little.

“Probably only works because it’s peaceful though. I don’t know how I’d have done it if there was a war going on. It probably needed to happen before the next Realm expansion though.”

Zedart just shook his head in exasperation but didn’t comment further.

Ryan was still in his head thinking about the what-ifs of it all.

In a couple days the Tyrants would be challenging the highest Trial. When they completed it, a realm expansion would happen, and along with it there would be chaos and strife. If everyone was busy trying to solve that mess then the Unwanted might have had to wait for another couple of years.

If they had been causing chaos in the middle of a realm expansion?

Ryan kicked another rock at Rax’s corpse. He didn’t want to think about the what-ifs anymore.

“I’m surprised this bastard didn’t qualify for a system exchange. Don’t most portal enhanced monsters always come with an exchange?”

Zedart raised his eyebrow. “I do have the screen up. I just wasn’t sure if exchanging it was the right thing to do in front of Shara.”

Ryan scoffed. “I do most of the work and you get the kill credit? Stupid broken Trial System.”

“I do believe it’s because you didn’t actually do any damage to him.”

The body disappeared a moment later, and left behind on the ground was a white glove. Ryan snatched it first.

“Typical, this would have been really useful before I entered the Cataclysm Abyss.”

Ryan put it on, then gave Zedart the side-eye. The [Swordsman] just shrugged.

“It’s. You did most of the work after all.”

Ryan had been expecting more of a fight. He narrowed his eyes. “You got a healing potion with you?”

Zedart picked up a glass vial from his belt and tossed it at him. Ryan caught it, uncorked it, then smelled how potent it was and pocketed it. He took out a weaker potion from his own belt pouch and started pouring it over his face. Shara’s claw marks from when he picked her up had already started to heal but it was still slightly raw. At least with the potion there’d be no scarring left.

He eyed Zedart but the [Swordsman] seemed unflappable, not caring that he pocketed the much more expensive potion at all.

“Man, you’re no fun.” Ryan winced as he felt the much weaker potion take its toll on his face. “Still, carrying around mid potions. Not worried about achievements?”

“I was told peoples’ lives were at stake. Given your exhaustion, I believe I came underprepared instead.”

“Not your fault. I’m still mostly blaming Sideark.”

The awkward silences were getting longer. Honestly, Zedart was far too intense for Ryan’s liking and making fun of the [Swordsman] wasn’t easy without someone else to bounce insults off of.

“Man, I wish Gamielle was here.”

Ryan was trying to bait a Gamielle entrance. There was no way that if she was listening, that she wouldn’t have been tempted to jump out to try to scare them both. But no, apparently her ban on Sector Four still held strong.

Zedart just nodded along, not knowing what Ryan was really trying to do. “It would have been nice to have a proper reunion.”

Another awkward silence passed. It seemed the thick-headed [Swordsman] finally picked up on how awkward the moment was between just the two of them.

Zedart tried to make smalltalk. “It feels like a different time. We’ve both come a long way since then.”

Ryan sighed. “Not far enough.”

The more he progressed, the more that was revealed about the monster that was the Witch Tyrant. Anti-healing, a Legend of illusion, a Legend that could call upon the Fallen and more speed than what a [Rogue] classed lightning dragon could handle.

Zedart knocked Ryan out of his thoughts. “I guess you won’t be stopping. But Mahjit, Valee and I will be staying at the fourth realm for a bit. A month at minimum.”

Ryan was surprised by that. “Really? I thought you wanted to keep pace with me.”

“We do, but all of us have filled out our Trial skill slots and we’ll need to slow down and consolidate. We talked it out and we wouldn’t be stronger unless we can secure an S+ ourselves.”

“Damn.”

While the Trial System did reward going blazingly fast with levels, learning the skill to free up the Trial slots had to be done on your own. Only by maintaining S+ grades could one hope to maintain his pace. Everyone else had to slow down at one point or another. Actually, Ryan had issues of his own that he needed to fix. His mana structure was completely messed up and needed fixing too.

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Further, he hadn’t even touched alternative paths to power like melded skills. Though, that was for later. When he had time to slow down.

“Ah well. One step at a time then. I’ll be moving on ahead, don’t fall too far behind Zedart.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t.” The [Swordsman] promised.

And for some reason Ryan believed him.

–

He went back down the winding tunnels alone. Ryan had Rax’s white glove, holding the walls of the tunnels as he went. The shaking from the fighting had caused far too much instability and Ryan really didn’t want the ceiling to collapse around him.

But it was costing mana. A hell of a lot of it too. Or maybe it was just that he didn’t really have that much mana to begin with. He adjusted the output to just capture the ceiling above him as he walked and it reduced the drain by a huge amount.

Then Ryan had a thought.

[Activate Enchantment]

It was like a skill activation, but focused solely on the glove. It processed his mana and touched the walls as they lit up with Rax’s enchantments. All of a sudden Ryan could see. Every single tunnel around him. All at once.

“Oh fuck.”

The sensory overload scrambled his brain, making him stagger and forcing him to break the connection.

That move had been monumentally stupid. Ryan wasn’t a [Mage] at the eighth realm. He could activate enchantments but it didn’t mean Rax had made them well enough so that anyone could just use it by activating it.

Now he wasn’t just physically and mentally exhausted, but he was dizzy too.

Ryan kept marching forward. His fingers touching achingly at the potions in his belt. But he held off on using them. All of this would pass. He had something left to do.

He came to the scene where Rax had slaughtered his kin.

–

Twenty minutes later…

Ryan ripped off a metal sheet off the walls and stabbed it into the mound of dirt that he had shifted with Rax’s glove. Perhaps it was a little disrespectful to use the glove of the person that had slaughtered them to bury them but he also didn’t really want to spend too long digging with his bare hands.

He etched out some words with a blade of red aura.

Here lies the Unwanted. They died so that the others of their kind could live. Never forget that they were people seeking a better life.

The words burned with red. For a time, the bodies would not be touched by the monsters in the Cataclysm Abyss.

Ryan picked up Rax’s personal golem and its stupidly tough spear and kept walking forward.

–

One step at a time. A little dizzy, a little exhausted, and more than a little drained of aura. Even if Rax came back from the dead and killed him, Ryan wouldn’t regret his action. Well, Ryan would blow both of them up but that was besides the point.

The point was that Rax’s personal golem was stupidly heavy. Even with his right arm and the apex title bonuses it was starting to become a drag.

And then he came across another golem.

This one had the vague shape of a snowman. Just that the three spheres were made up of knitted flesh and it had two massive monstrous arms instead of sticks. Ryan had figured out earlier that this was the tool that Rax had used to dig his own tunnels.

He then stared at his gloved hand.

It was a monumentally stupid idea. Unfortunately, Ryan was also monumentally greedy. Both of these golems were probably worth at least thousands of realmcoin. Possibly even more to a collector or an enchanter. As much as Ryan had told Clara that he didn’t feel anything from staring at his bank balance, the idea of throwing away millions of dollars worth of stuff would hurt his soul.

So Ryan reached out and touched the golem, half expecting a severe backlash from activating its enchantments.

To his surprise, it activated without much of a fuss. In fact, it just took a sliver of mana to turn on and then looked towards him for direction.

Ryan shifted his attention forwards and the golem did the same. He pointed forward with his gloved hand and then it started to move. Its lower spherical base rotating to move it forward. When it hit a wall, its massive arms started to dig through rapidly, even faster than he’d seen Shara move the earth.

Neat.

With his new digging golem by his side Ryan started his trek back Rax’s personal tunnel.

–

Thirty minutes later, in the basement of Rax’s workshop.

Ryan was having a bit of a personal crisis. He had thought the greatest challenge would have been outmaneuvering Rax. Then he found out that the greatest challenge had been fighting two stupidly powerful constructs.

Now he came to what had to be the greatest challenge of them all. It challenged Ryan more than anything he’d done so far as an adventurer.

Return Binding Spear of Brilliance. Faded O’gurke Blade. Repaired Fiella’s Mana Cannon. Kraxxsken’s spare golem heart. Thunderous Gunboots. Enchanted Chitinleather. Polymerized Weavebasket. Ragardinous Glaive

Ryan had opened up Rax’s personal underground vault with his glove and in it he found repaired treasures of old and some of Rax’s spare creations. Some of them were even artifacts, items that ordinary people could use.

Hundreds of millions of dollars. Maybe billions of dollars to the right people.

The vast majority of them didn’t fit his size, most of the items were too big to carry around.

Ryan was on his knees. Facing his greatest challenge yet.

“What have I done?! Why didn’t I accept Gamielle’s offer for her spatial bag?!”

He was regretting all of his choices because of this one moment. Even if he was blacklisted, he could have done something like force Zedart to sell these for him. Ryan could have been rich beyond comparison.

Then the hollowness came back. He didn’t really need the money. It was just numbers on the screen.

Then he remembered looking up how much Seffara’s private jet cost.

Ryan’s eyes blazed as he stared at the polymerized weavebasket. He started shoving everything that could fit on top of it. Piling it sky high.

“I don’t care how dangerous it is, I’m carrying as much of this stuff into the Trial as I can.”

–

Five minutes later…

It was when he started trying to shove an overfilled basket of treasures through the narrowish door that Ryan had a realization. A thought. A most treacherous thought that wormed into his head and made him drop the basket.

“Ah fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck. What is wrong with me?”

If it was months ago he would have taken as much as he could without hesitation. Even if it risked his life he would have done everything to drag as much of it away as he could.

He kicked the basket over, tipping the priceless items into the room and locked the vault. Then covered it with dirt.

For a good ten minutes Ryan just stared at the blank wall. The most treacherous idea that wormed into his head was that the Unwanted could really use this money. If not immediately, then in the future. It would help set up their society once they settled in and the sympathy from the rest of the world ran dry.

Then Ryan couldn’t get the idea that he was robbing from starving children out of his head.

And that was that.

The [Bard’s] stupid words hung in his head.

“Fuck you Ozyell, I’m still an adventurer.”

He redug out the entrance and opened the vault. Then picked up the incredibly oversized and intricate mana cannon. It came with a shoulder strap to fit on his back.

Was it the most practical or useful weapon in the vault?

Of course not.

But it would be the best tool that would help vent his stress. He was an American adventurer after all.

Ryan walked out of the vault and hid the entrance back up with dirt.

–

Two hours later…

Now Ryan didn’t know how many layers of exhaustion he had piled up. Physically, mentally, emotionally and now spiritually. At least his aura was starting to recover to normal levels.

Ryan was also starting to regret taking one of the bigger objects in the vault. Apex fourth realm strength or not… the mana cannon and Rax’s personal golem were both still really heavy.

There was nothing to shoot at either. At least, he wasn’t really willing to shoot the mana cannon in the tunnels.

–

One hour later…

One step at a time Ryan marched forward. Going further down into the Cataclysm Abyss, deeper than anyone had ever reported reaching. The digging golem had broken into the tunnel that both Sideark and Shara had told him was there. Apparently Rax had closed off the various entrances leading to the Fifth Trial because it would occasionally spew out shadowy humanoids and monsters.

Trial entrances could do that when an attempt was royally botched or Trial hadn’t been challenged in a long time.

Though, Rax couldn’t collapse tunnels near to the entrance itself. The Trial System didn’t let any living creature purposefully create obstructions in the vicinity of its entrances. It did mean that monsters often could and did escape underground and into the rest of the Cataclysm Abyss.

Ryan approached one of the many openings leading up to a massive dome around the Fifth Trial entrance itself. It was a huge chamber with a large hill leading up to the Fifth Trial entrance.

His initial plan had been to relieve some of his stress by blasting whatever monsters that had made their nest around the system portal. The underground chamber would be physically enforced by the Trial System itself, so he could go really go nuts here.

Instead, what Ryan saw was a huge pile of monster corpses on the side. Neatly placed with an enchantment that stopped the smell from wafting out.

“You’ve made me wait for a long time you little fourther brat.”

A familiar voice called out from on top of the hill. His eyes moved from the pile of monster corpses and up towards the Trial entrance.

In front of it sat an elf, one of his eyes missing from its socket. He was hunched over, leaning his chin on his hand with a grin on his face.

Ryan hadn’t forgotten the Witch’s promise that there would be something to help him with his mana core development. It was part of the reason why he was carrying so much potentially useful enchanted equipment.

He just hadn’t expected that the something would be One-Eyed Rick himself.

“What? Cat got your tongue? Hurry up, boy! The Witch Tyrant offered to let me free as long as I helped develop your magical abilities in good faith.”

That fucking bitch. Ryan didn’t say.

Instead, he lifted a finger. “Sorry I think I left the stove on.”

“What?”

Ryan used [Return to Earth]. The skill raising a familiar hum that called all monsters to his location. The effect naturally being negated by his aura.

Though it did have the effect of making the mad old elf’s chin slip from his hand in disbelief.

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