Chapter 30 Discoveries

This new lifestyle change will be the first steps in creating a society that is based off of monster cores and loot items instead of materials harvested from monster corpses. The mages guild research team led by Gilbert slowly begin to piece together the runic formula of the ring as both Paul and Golaium manage their respective cities. In the meantime, I travel a crossed the second floor of the dungeon in search of the door leading to the third floor.

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As everyone in the kingdom continues to grow stronger or expand their businesses, I make my way across the second floor in search of the entrance to the third floor. Going off of the information I received from Paul, the entrance is near Murcrilium, I begin my journey heading in that direction. Now that I have made the second floor a part of my kingdom, I can casually stroll through the floor without having to worry about any unexpected surprises.

After walking for several days I make my way past the entrance to the mountain range leading to Murcrilium's city gate. Moving deeper into the mountain range past Murcrilium, I discover an expansive valley leading further into the mountain range to the west of Murcrilium. The valley is roughly three miles wide and the top of the valley can't even be seen as it reaches into the clouds.

In the entrance of the valley there is a small lake that has crystal clear blue water that reflects the clouds on its surface. Inside of the lake there appears to be many different types of fish that have made their homes at the bottom of the lake. I make my way to the edge of the lake and decide to set up camp and rest for the day enjoying the beautiful serenity of the lake.

As I am relaxing next to the waters-edge I review my system to get more familiar with all the features that I've unlocked over the past couple weeks. Having Neph as the admin for the animus system has made interacting with the system functions a lot simpler and easier than it was originally. It also allows Neph to make sure all the features are the highest level currently available, so I don't have to worry about manually taking care of all the features.

The day passes by as I relax next to the lake, the next morning I awaken and clear up my campsite before making my way deeper into the valley to explore and see what all the valley has hidden within it. Following the river deeper into the valley I journey further within, passing several different types of monsters that are native to the valley.

While walking along the river there are many herbivore type monsters grazing among the tall grass on the riverbanks as well as drinking from the river itself. They seem to be non-hostile monsters due to them not attacking as I walk past them, which as a surprise to me because from my experience so far, all the monsters I have come across attacked have attacked me on sight.

I take my time observing the different types of monsters since they have decided to ignore my presence, I also observe how they interact within their own species as well as the other herbivore monster races. Among the many monsters along the river, my system has identified, Vermilion Deer, Shadow Hippos, Millennial Cranes and Phantom Rabbits.

All of these different races seem to be able to coexist in the same ecosystem without fighting over territory. After spending several hours observing, the inhabitants of the valley while walking in the depths of the valley I begin to hear a steady roaring sound coming from further in the valley.

As the day starts to end I have walked several miles into this hidden valley and have yet to come across the end of it. It appears that it might take me a couple days to finally reach the valleys end, which won't be so bad since I have discovered several new types of monsters and have learned that not all monsters will attack on sight like I had come to believe.

After spending another night inside the valley along its central river I continue my journey of discovery the next day. Still following the river deeper into the valley I notice that the valley appears to be getting slightly narrower as I go deeper, the roaring sound I've been hearing for the past day and a half is gradually getting louder and louder.

Half a day had come and gone as I finally reach the end of the valley and discovers that the roaring sound, I has been hearing this whole time, is in fact an enormous waterfall. The end of the valley is an enormous waterfall that fills a smaller lake than at the valleys entrance but this one is three times as deep due to the powerful waterfall.

I make my way around the lake towards the waterfall to get a closer look and notice that there appears to be a cave located behind the falling water curtain. Making my way behind the waterfall carefully, I step into the cave and discovers that there are fire crystal lanterns lining the walls of the cave leading into its depths.

"That's odd, I wonder why this cave is lined with lanterns, could this be a secret dwelling or something?" I mutter to myself as I look around the cave entrance for any clues as to what this place is.

After looking around for a few minutes and not finding anything to give any clues as to what this cave is used for, I make my way further into the cave to see what lies within it. Making sure to keep my guard up and my awareness active so I don't get taken by surprise by any potential monsters hiding within the caves depths.

Several minutes later after having walked a few hundred feet into the cave, I enter an expanded cavern that looks to have been carved out of the cave wall. The cavern is roughly fifty feet in diameter and about twenty-five feet high, and all along the circumference of the cavern there are fire crystal lanterns evenly spaced out to illuminate the entire cavern.

At the opposite side of the cavern from the cave entrance sits a set of massive double doors that appears to be carved right out of the wall. The doors stand, twelve feet wide and spans from the floor all the way up to the ceiling of the cavern with two large lanterns adorning either side of the double doors.

After entering the cavern I make my way towards the double doors, as I rest my hand on one of the doors, I immediately get a notification from my system.

(Would you like to enter the third floor of Nephelium's Crypt?)

"So, this is the door to the third floor, it's definitely well hidden, there's no way someone will just accidentally come across it," I say out loud to no one in particular.

Now that I have found the entrance, I relay the information to Paul and Golaium before I proceed to go to the next floor, since I don't know if I'll be able to talk to them when I'm on the third floor since it isn't under my control yet. After the pair of them tell me to be careful and wished me good luck, I answer my systems prompt question.

"Yes," I say answering the question prompted by my system.

The two doors slowly start to open inward, after I confirm my desire to enter the next floor of the crypt. As the doors open, I can see a room past the doors with lanterns illuminating the entire area as the doors open.

Once the doors have fully opened I walk into the now accessible room and see a giant magic circle on the raised center platform just like when I left the first floor to travel here to the second floor.

As I walk up the stairs and step into the center of the magic circle, the circle begins to glow starting from the outer circle of magic runes making its way inward to the center rune right under my feet. After the center rune illuminates and shines as brightly as the sun I feel myself being teleported from the second floor and involuntarily close my eyes as the circle sends me to the next floor.

Feeling myself arrive onto the receiving magic circle, I open my eyes in order to see where I have arrived at. As my eyes adjust to the environment around me, I see that I am in what appears to be a long abandoned old shrine. Looking around I see that the walls surrounding the magic circle have long since collapsed and they are covered in massive tree roots.

Taking a closer look past the walls, I discover that I am in the middle of what appears to be a massive forest as there is nothing but trees surrounding me within this old shrine and these trees each appear to be over one hundred feet tall. Their trunks are roughly twenty feet in diameter and James can't even see the tops of the trees through the canopy of branches and leaves above me.

Making my way out of the ruins of the shrine, I approach the nearest tree and slowly start to climb up it so that I can get a better vantage point so I can see exactly where I am. After about twenty minutes of climbing I finally make it to the tallest branch and is able to look out above the treetops and what I see is truly remarkable.

Before me are trees as far as my eyes can see, spreading out in all directions. As I look around, I notice a massive golden colored tree that appears to be several miles away from me. The tree is so massive all the trees around it look like blades of grass.