Beginnings (pt.5)

Eldan was aimlessly wandering the pathways and sometimes large corridors filled with unidentified bones. His eyes weary from the exhaustion of not having much sleep for countless hours, days maybe. His sleepless ventures made it harder to fight, but what can he do than deal with it?

Sometimes, he would feel the need to lean to the left, only to fall over without being able to support himself in time.

The former proud elf was no longer there as he traverses the pitch black pathways like a rat. He fends off waves and ambushes from the skeletal creatures that spawn in the first floor with one sword and arm. His entire right arm was beaten and swollen, it looked like it was painted purple even.

'...'

Eldan Furthif, one with a noble lineage amongst the elf society, was a cast-away, made to be an expendable soldier in battle rather than being an esteemed scholar and learn the history and knowledge of his Race. The reason for it, being framed as a murderer.

Eldan was once bright, not arrogant, selfish, and foolish. He was just playing, spending his youth until one day. A mystery occured that puts him in the spotlight, and it was dyed red.

''Father, what do you mean I killed mothe-"

"Shut up! Dammit, Eldan… Why did you do it, why?!"

"Father, what are you even-"

"She died with a knife, one with your fingerprints and even Mana scent! Do you know how much trouble you're in?!"

"Father, please, hear me out! Why are you-"

"No, son. Your criminal deeds are too heavy. Killing one of your own, even if you hate them, is an irredeemable act."

"Father…"

In the mind of a young child, he couldn't comprehend most of what's spoken. But that was all he remembered, the crucial ones, the most haunting words, the helplessness, and the loneliness afterward.

'...'

He seeks forgiveness, but finds none, he seeks warmth, yet feels none. For over 60 years, he worked as a soldier and felt no worth. Sure, he was a commander once. But that was just a title. Something that's given because he's proven himself, his worth. One would be proud, but not Eldan, who wished for something more.

To be recognized by someone, not because he's strong. To belong once more.

It might seem like he's vague and rambling on with nonsense, so in simpler terms he wants to be in a family and not feel like an outsider anymore. Not condemned as a murderer, not treated as a monster.

'...'

And with that, Eldan collapses onto the pathway's floor. His purple arm was pulsating and in pain, yet it was too shallow to overpower the sleep that overwhelms him like a tsunami. Blank, black, and darkness fills his consciousness and leaves him utterly and absolutely vulnerable.

''........''

And it was here, that a head came out from underneath all the bones behind Eldan's collapsed body.

"Oh, he finally collapsed…"

A female's voice, hoarse and crooked in a sense. The entity came out from the ground, crouching and walking forward on all fours. Its face was still surprisingly covered with flesh, though wrinkled and old.

"He's an elf… fine skin, youthful… good replacement. No, no. He's too beautiful to be skinned, no. He's capable fighter, maybe, could he? No, no, that's too much of a stretch. He's too inexperienced, not powerful yet. But, if he's able, then it's a shot. If not, I can take whatever's remain.''

The little old granny gremlin touches Eldan everywhere, even his bums and crotch. She feels up the poor unconscious 'young' man, as a grin appears on her face.

''First and foremost, he must be in optimal shape. One arm is too disadvantageous, and the other is almost useless… he's such a bad and broken toy, but, I'll have to make due."

She then drags him with her to wherever she's going.

...…..

Several splashing noises and the product was complete. All that's left is for the one that's been gifted with it to wake up and experience what it's like to be whole again.

''Phew, not my best work, but it'll improve overtime. Now, when he's gonna wake up.''

The little old granny gremlin looks at Eldan's face, waiting for his eyes to twitch open. Peculiarly, her face was extremely close, uncomfortably so to be honest.

And after a few uncountable minutes, the eyes of the Sage opens up to be greeted with the awkward sight.

"...Ummn."

"Oh, awake enough?"

"You're… who…''

He moves his left arm due to the phantom sense that he still had one, only to be greeted with a pure white arm as it grasps his face and he winces in slight pain.

"...What?"

"Notice it yet, handsome?"

"..."

He stared dumbfoundedly at the object that's now replaced his left arm. A white prosthetic arm that he could feel, it wasn't just a sculptor even.

"How… wha-"

"Firstly, name?"

"Wh– huh?"

Extreme confusion. His face twisted in both disgust and confusion as he backs away, falling off the table he's resting on.

"Wh-Wh-What are you?!"

"What, don't recognize the face of your savior? Tsk, tsk, that's rude."

"W-What?"

"I am Ghe, Bone Maker. I work on that arm of yours, and also heal the other one so that I don't have to make a second one."

"..."

Eldan looks at the pale white left arm. He moves his fingers, able to feel every movement very fluidly without delay. Then, he checks his right hand, which he remembers was beaten and badly injured. But, it too was healed and now returned to normal, no, it might even be better than before.

'What the…'

He repeats and repeats like a broken record player. Questions piled, but he knows that being confused like this isn't going to do much. So, with deep breaths to stabilize himself, he stands up using his new left arm.

''Ghe, I am Eldan Furthif. Pleased to meet you, and thank you for rescuing me to this place."

"There we go! Good good, now, off you can go now."

"...Eh?"

"What? You think I'm gonna let you stay? I have other things to do, now leave, shoo shoo."

"..."

It turned his face from a pleased one to yet again a confused one. Ghe even makes the waving hand gesture with a carefree smile on her face.

"But…"

"But what? I've done my service already and I'm on the losing end of it. Wasting my precious rare bone fragments willy nilly on someone without payment is already a waste. A huge waste, yes."

"Rare bone fragments… What is this payment that you want? Maybe I can pay it back?"

"Oh? You think you're up for the task? Hmm… Well, sure, whatever you want. Here, for your payment you must give me back the rare bone frags that I've wasted to make your arm and heal the other. That's it."

"Great, so where can I find these? I'll gladly repay you if that's all it takes."

"Ohoho, alright, alright. But bewarned, the rare bone fragments I'm speaking of can only be obtained from dangers."

"It's no problem, I can do it."

"Suit yourself, pretty face."

The little Ghe shrugs and pulls out a piece of yellow rough paper from the backpack that's almost twice as big as Ghe's body.

"This is the map, use it to repay your payment to me. Two should be enough."

"Alright, thank you.''

Eldan receives the piece of paper and looks through it. But after a few minutes, he was still looking at it without moving an inch.

'...What kind of map is this?!'

The map that Ghe handed to him was, well, too detailed to say the least. It was filled to the brim with small black lines with a white one in between two of them. The map wasn't quite large, just enough to wrap around one's hips to make a skirt.

'Where do I even begin.'

He was looking at the map very intently for some time now, and he still couldn't find the location he's currently at.

But eventually, he found where he was. At the corner of the map, there's a small star shaped piece of sticker stuck to a square room.

He looks around, and indeed, the place is square.

'So, this place is here?'

Upper left corner was where he was on the map. And a few notes of interest, bone stickers at round and rectangle rooms. He thinks those are the places where he can get the rare bone fragments.

With that, he rolls the piece of paper and puts it away somewhere.

"Alright, how do I get out of here?"

"Over there, that slightly shining skull. That'll take you out here."

Eldan nodded and turned to where Ghe pointed to.

'???'

It was a burning skull. One that Eldan had seen many times with different shades, green, and black. But this one, it was burning a small blue flame in its left socket, instead of the entire skull being torched ablaze.

He walks to it and reaches out a hand. His index finger inserts into the blue left eye socket, and the flame covers him from start to finish.

"Woah!"

But, even though it is fire, it does not hurt him. Warmth, soft, safe. The moment lasts only for a moment, a brief moment, but that was all enough for his mind to calm to a still. A new view, and then comes a new experience.

'...where am I now?'

He takes out the map and gazes at its complicacy once more. Many paths, lined and drawn, yet now he could not find where he currently is.

'...Is this it?'

Then, he notices a light of some sort that wasn't there before. A faint blue light amongst the numerous pathways.

'...'

He moves from his spot to somewhere, observing the blue dot closely.

'...It's also moving.'

So, he pinpointed the location, his location, on the map. All that's left now, is to traverse this horrid place again.

'The nearest one isn't far, let's hurry.'

He eagerly runs to where the nearest rare bone fragment is located. While on the way, he examines his prosthetic with a curious gaze.

The thing was interesting in how it could even function. There was nothing that he could feel that's connected directly to his missing arm, but he could move it with just a whim. He tries punching, and the movement was smooth and fluid.

'This contraption…'

He puts the arm away for now.

...…

He arrived at his destination after a somewhat peaceful trip, and the scenery was very familiar.

'Isn't this…'

He remembers back to before the worst pain he ever felt. Cawojin, before entering his Boss room, it looked exactly like this, and the one in front of him also looked almost identical.

'...'

He checks the map again, but sure enough, the place that the bone sticker is placed is in front of him.

'Fuck, this isn't good.'

He began to grimace, but didn't say anything bad towards Ghe, as this was of his own volition. He puts the map away for now and enters, a resolute expression was on his face for whatever reason.

A few steps in, he could spot that same silhouette, but one that's different entirely from Cawojin as it took more steps to be able to see it. Closer and closer, the Boss was surprisingly smaller, about Eldan's height to be exact. It still had clothing, but the quality of it is dirty and dusty, some places even torn and ripped.

It wore a long, very large scholar robe that Eldan was quite familiar with, as he had seen it for a few rare times in his youth.

''...''

A strange feeling starts to dwell in his chest. An off-putting one that builds up overtime, being higher and higher steadily.

'Wha–?!'

Then, it suddenly dawns on him. He saw a staff in the skeleton's right hand, and with the scholar robes, he realized what the off-putting feeling was.

He immediately runs away towards the entryway that he went through, only to be stopped like before by bones.

'Shit!'

He turned around, and the skeleton figure was almost face-to-face with him, staring at his eyes with its own empty sockets that had one singular red orb in each of them.

"A new one, huh? An elf too, no less. Haven't seen much of you anymore, it's a pleasant surprise!"

"..."

"I am Sevanio Fernan, once an elf with the title of Archmage, nice to finally meet one of my kin again.''

"An… elf?''

Eldan was taken aback.

'Did someone get taken here in the past? Did one of the High Scholar get taken here?'

But, with such a disappearance, there would be some sort of report issued and being recorded in elven history as the most bold act ever. A High Scholar was a little over twice the power of a regular Human Archmage, able to learn and cast tier-7 Magic which is the highest a mortal can cast.

"Are you… from the city?"

"City? No, I was in secluded studies when I was rescued and shown a different path. One so glorious, so prestigious, and that is under the guise and cloak of my God, Saurosh Koravek Solomon!"

The elven Archmage turns around, waving his staff in the air as he says those fanatical words. With a slam, the atmosphere turns silent, dead silent.

"So, my kin, what have you here? I can sense from your Mana capacity that you're different from previous ones, weaker, significantly so."

"I'm here to… collect rare bone fragments. But, it seems like this place was wrong. Excuse my rudeness, elder."

"..."

The dead silence continued to stretch even after the short exchange. This makes Eldan sweat nervously.

''Rare bone fragments, you say? Ahhhh, now I know why you're here. Why you're so much weaker."

"And what, might that be, elder?"

"I once knew a small skeleton, ambitious, rebellious, and tenacious. She's smart, smarter than me which came as a surprise considering she's of Dwarven blood. She has this, fascination towards the bones that litter and make up this place, my refuge and so many more."

"..."

"Then, she did the unspeakable, impossible, and blasphemous. She defied one of my God's childrens, and hid away like a boney rat. She searches, and we sometimes cross paths often for some reason. I tried to convince her, that this dream of hers can maybe be deemed possible if she would just say it to one of my God's children's permission. But nooo, she decided that this was hers and hers alone. Seems like Dwarven blood is truly flowing through her veins."

"...Was her name Ghe?"

"Ahhh, yes, yes… little bone, Ghe. The Bone Crafter, she calls herself as."

"..."

"..."

Then, no more words were exchanged further between the two. It was like a rollercoaster, fast but then ended far too quick.

"So, without further ado. Let our confrontation begin."

"Wait! Elder, this shouldn't-"

"I am not your elder, boy. I betrayed our kin, and became the opposite of Nature herself. Reduced to this, undead cursed form. And the most horrid thing, to you at least, is that I don't feel an ounce of remorse or regret. I relish in this new, corrupt form. And I serve Death, the claimer of Life."

With that speech, he teleported away into the middle of the room again. Different from Cawojin's battle, the room they're in is lit up as several Magic Eyes were created and circling at the edges of the ceiling. Then, fire burned ablaze at the center of those Magic Eyes.

"Flame Swarm!"

The fires then moved, fired off at a medium speed and started to create an arc, moving like they had a mind of their own. The flames circle the room from a left to right direction, and in just a few seconds the entire place is lit up completely.

'Oh fuck!'

And they weren't just lights, but projectiles, dangerous ones.

''Elder, can't we talk this through?!"

"You talk too much, more action, or do you intend on being a pile of black bones? Won't that be interesting for later generations?"

"Kuh!"

One of the flames hit him on the prosthetic, searing it slightly black.

'No choice then, it's now or never again!'

With a sufficient threat, and with a very clear reason to disregard the skeleton as an ally even if he was once an elf, he rushes on the offensive.

Being a Mage, one would think that they're not good on the melee offense, but not so for the higher leveled ones. Two paths are laid for them when they reach about the Level 200 mark, or not really because they can do whatever they want, and it's to either decide they want to be powerful, or safe.

They speck into the defensive values, unlock some Classes that boost said values as much as possible to a safe margin, and then go back to being the aggressive passive damage dealer they are. Or, on the other hand, disregard what the above text just suggests and speck into more damage to become a paper, very dangerous but also very dead when caught.

And Sevanio was the former, making this fight a lot more difficult.

"Aegis Barrier, Magic Strengthening, Solidify."

A basic defense Spell combo. Numerous rotating, orbiting hexagon plates surround and protect Sevanio from the incoming sword. Eldan saw this, yet still swung his sword at it. And as expected, the sword bounces off without even leaving a crack or slight smudge.

'...'

"Haha, impressed?"

Eldan redirects the sword to block the incoming flames, even going so far as to use his newly made prosthetic to block his vital exposed parts.

'Hope Ghe can give me a fix…'

He really didn't want to be one arm short after knowing that this was possible, no way. But, this situation was posing some difficulty, and using it as a shield is unavoidable.

This unfavorable situation spans out for more than 5 minutes, which isn't long but in combat, it's like an hour with how much concentration Eldan is using. Dodging the flames, blocking them, and sometimes having to sacrifice more of his prosthetic to be unharmed in dangerous situations.

'Fuck, I can't continue this momentum. I'm fighting on a losing front, I'll need to balance it out!'

From a new angle in mind, Eldan searches for a solution from that point on. He's vigilant, watching every move Sevanio makes, but they were all trivial hand movements and the occasional taunts.

"This is getting boring, why don't you just give up? Better yet, join us. We're like a family down here, though not as big as the others."

"..."

Eldan ignores Sevanio's useless dialogue. But then, a fire almost manages to reach his face. Several beads of sweat went down his forehead, and that's when the heat of the situation brought him his solution.

'Why aren't the number of flames dwindling out?'

The entire room, although with about ten minutes has elapsed after the fight has begun, the number of flames hasn't shown any signs of decreasing. No, it looked like there was more flames inside than before.

'Those Magic Eyes, I need to take them out!'

But how, of course with his bow.

'Thank goodness I didn't throw away my precious bow.'

The bow that he has strapped around his body, unable to be used because he was one arm short before, was now usable with the new prosthetic.

'I need to look for an opening, and then snipe them.'

With that plan in mind, he began to boost his vigor, slashing and dismissing the flames that came his way in an effort to dwindle the amount for an opening. But, yet again, that wasn't the correct solution to this problem. The number of flames weren't decreasing, and even if it were, not noticeably.

'Shit, what should I…'

Then, with a sudden eurika in his mind, he bet on it with his life.

'If it fails, I'll have to risk my prosthetic… man, such a waste. Hope I won't get scolded later.'

He spins and spins, and then on the right window, lets go of the sword along with the force that he built up with the spin. It travels to one of the 23 Magic Eyes and this made Sevanio have a reaction.

"Hey hey! That's not allowed!''

"Oh yeah it is!"

The sword breaks the Magic Eye upon impact, reducing it from a red circle to blue scattering particles in the air.

"Really, c'mon now.''

'22 more to go…'

A disruption was put between the scattering flame pattern. A gap opens up, and Eldan notices an empty spot devoid of most of the traveling flames.

'There!'

He burnt more of his prosthetic arm, now being a charcoal color with some white spots. But, that was a necessary sacrifice. The regretful thing is that he didn't come up with the solution sooner.

'Whatever, at least I'll have a chance.'

He gets to the spot, with some of the flames slowly filling it back up already.

'Steady… steady…'

His hands were slightly shaky, but his concentration straightened that out immediately. An arrow made from yellow energy forms, and he releases it through the air as fast as possible.

The mark was easily hit once more, but the arrow collided with some of the flames, luckily it didn't get wasted.

'21…'

Another gap opened at a different location. This pattern continues, with Sevanio making comments with every Magic Eye broken.

"Hey, cut it out!"

"Uggh, so annoying!"

"That was so not respectful of your elderly!"

"C'mon, why are you still continuing?!''

"Stop, please!"

"Junior, how about considering being my apprentice? Elves are naturally gifted at–!!!"

"Not another one!"

"..."

The flames dwindled out, extinguished. Sevanio was now silent, not a word came from his very talkative mouth just moments ago. The atmosphere was taking a new turn, a more fiery serious one.

"So… you chose to deny my gift? The glory you could've had, yet you're too blinded by whatever Ghe told you, or whatever you believed in. Or is it because I'm Undead? Is that it?"

"Elder…"

"Well well, even if you lament, even if you decide to convert, I will show you no shred of kindness. Your life is now numbered in the minutes, boy. Be ready for your consequences!"

The staff Sevanio holds get raises up, a Magic Eye forming at the top.

"Ice Tracers!"

The Magic Eye launches several sharp pieces of ice into the air. It seemed like it would hit the ceiling, but no. It had the same function as the flames from before, moving on its own whim.

'!!!!'

This makes Eldan more surprised. Spells with that kind of function are very rare, and the only Spell he ever heard that can move like the flames and ice Sevanio casted was one called Air Sphere, and that Spell has a slow movement and wide turning rate too.

'How powerful is he?!'

Compared to Cawojin, his only comparison really when up against these kinds of special Undeads, Sevanio was a lot harder in that his damage source is numerous and could be very unpredictable at times, like right now for instance.

Eldan dodges the incoming ice as much as possible, but could not completely. After safely overcoming the ice, another Spell was casted in that short span of about 3 seconds.

"Maximized Magic, Concentrated Mana, Fireball!"

A Buffed Fireball Spell gets aimed at Eldan. The projectile was the size of a football, and the moment it was casted the thing traveled at a speed little under the time one would need to close and open their eyes.

'Crap!'

Eldan moves his upper body, twisting his shoulder and chest to the left especially to further increase his chances of dodging. The Buffed Fireball, although not hitting directly, was able to melt off and burn away a piece of his ragged clothing and chain link armor.

'Kuuhhh…'

His flesh was slightly burned, sizzling a little which made Eldan shudder.

"Maximized Magic, Enlarged, Icicle Barrage."

This time, a different Spell with a new Buff was added. Enlarged and Concentrated Mana, two simple Mana Control principles. One enlarges the size of the casted Spell but at the cost of its effects being weakened, while one shrinks and focuses its effects to achieve a greater reward.

Anyway, a bigger Magic Eye, one that could be compared to Eldan's height of 1m84, shot out a shotgun of sharp icicles at his direction with a spread that makes evading impossible.

'Damn…'

Eldan thought that this was it, the end. The icicles are sharp enough to penetrate through the thin chain-link and through his flesh. He'll be a porcupine with blue spikes, and maybe he'll become another one of the mobs wandering this place.

'Sorry, everyone…'

He couldn't do it, he failed. This is as far as he could go.

"Arghhh…"

Several icicles pierce his abdomen and prosthetic. He tried to minimize the damage, and this is as far as he could minimize it to.

"...Puah…"

He coughed out a bucket of blood, as the icicles spread frost through his body. A shivering, deathly cold envelopes his mind.

"Maximized Magic… Mind Deconstruction."

A purple Magic Eye appears in front of the staff. Eldan's thoughts shut down, his eyes lost their colors and he slumped down to his knees.

"..."

"..."

"You are too weak, my boy… I shouldn't, but I'm still an elf in origin. You're lucky, my boy, come back when you become stronger."

A bunch of boney hands pluck out the icicles from his side, and then drag him down with them.

"Ghe… your collector is lucky. But next time, my kindness won't be so sparing."

Sevanio Fernan, a fanatic that worships Saurosh Koravek Solomon as a God, but also a weak-hearted man who can't bring himself to kill his kin, the Elves. He's one of the 5 other Mini Bosses who will spare you when you're of a certain Race.

Ricar, the Feral Dog, Cretarus, the Mad Bull, Alira Evumba, Spider Lady in White, Eruta Croeta, the White Fang, and Sevanio Fernan, the Elf Lich.

'I'll be expecting your presence once again, my boy. Be strong, your trial isn't going to be ended by my hands.'

...

Back in the third floor, Kokio was making more of her fleshy experiments with a blank, unidentifiable face. It had a faint scar line on it, from her left cheek to her mouth.

'That damn… bastard. Just a lucky strike, a lucky, damned, fucking strike.'

Her memories began reliving a certain moment from days before. It has been almost a week or something now.

'Fufufufu… you lost, doggy. Now, bow before your master, or die.'

'...'

A burst of red, powerful aura.

'Huh?! What is…?!!!!'

She could feel that 'dog' having his power increased, or maybe released, through the roof. Her body shuddered, like she was in the same presence as Saurosh Koravek Solomon, in front of the Father.

'H-How is this…?!!'

After that was a royal beat down. Kokio wasn't able to adjust and adapt properly and ended up getting the scar line across her beautiful face from getting a sword slash across it.

'W-Wait! I-I yield! Spare me, please!'

Humiliation, disgust, she shuddered as those words left her mouth to the one person she didn't want to say it to. The one person whom she will forever acknowledge as a 'dog', nothing more, nothing less.

''That little fuck… that piece of shit… that damn dog!"

Her eyes turned pitch black as she bared her teeth, grinding them and making sparks fly out with her speed and force.

''...''

She focuses back on the experiment she's currently doing. With a purple gemstone in hand, and the completed body of a fairly normal elf, she shoved the gemstone in and gave it life.

'Although it's no Soul, this'll be good enough.'

The elf, eyes twitching slightly, body shuddering periodically, was woken up with a single snap of a finger. Black eyes like the void, he sat upright.

''Hmph, that's finished. Now, to transport him to the fourth floor.''

After the match, the winner gets to order the loser. So, she was tasked by Saurosh who was asked by Guesha to restore the dead body of a single elf and to keep it functioning, enough to not let it rot at least.

'Tch, just you wait.'

She was incomplete. She didn't have her main body, the lower centipede body, with her there. If she did have it, she thinks she would've beaten Saurosh.

'Yeah, I was just not in my best shape.'

An ignorance that becomes bliss to sooth the mind.

...

'Is it today?'

On the sixth floor, the Challengers are still going. The whole group was female, and they made a base of operation at the center of the Four Zones, the Neutral Plains.

The Neutral Plains held the weakest Race of monsters, Slimes. Various colors, but all the same except for a few noticeable ones.

'...'

One elf named Senna, a beauty sitting under the shade of a tree. The sun shined down, gleaming through the leaves to grace her face. She was away from the other two, who are currently out adventuring nearby. Their current powers aren't enough to venture into any of the Four Zones yet, and even now almost a week later, they still feel unready.

'Those monsters are ridiculously dangerous. There's not even a small monster here, nothing in this place is small.'

Monsters from World Saga Online. The monsters that dwell in the fourth floor are all Apex Monsters, big and enormous, with the strongest being the Leader or Alpha. Orcs, Goblins, and Lizardmen of the Swamp and Marshlands, Snow Barbearians, Winter Sprites, and Aerosapiens of the Snow Lands, Lycans, Felinians, and Cavemen of the Great Forest, finally the Great and Elder Drakes, Wyrms and Wyverns of the Mountain Range, the copycats and despised by Dragonkins.

And to make everything worse, every monster within the fourth floor all have at least above 2m height. This is the product of when you force multiple Apex Monsters into one place and let them stay there for thousands of years. With competitors the same size as you, a new height must be established.

Monsters in the fourth floor range from Level 400-700 being the norm, with Level 1200-ish and above being where the Monster receives its Apex category. Of course, there are a few that have reached 3000 in Level, and those Monsters are the targets of Guesha's periodic Hunts.

The ones that survive, they get to stay alive and be her Pet. Those who die, they become her meal.

So, for a couple of Level 30s at best right now, they can only hunt Slime for probably the rest of their stay here, until they grow old even.

'That woman said she won't kill us immediately. Get stronger…'

Before they were tossed here in the Neutral Plains, Guesha had said to them her Promise of Honor. She doesn't hunt those that can't protect themselves or cowards that hide indefinitely.

'The amount of power that a Goblin has…'

The first time she, and her teammates, encountered one of the many Monster residences, it was from the Swamp and Marshlands area. A single Goblin, on equal size with them as well no less, was able to single-handedly nearly defeat all three of them combined without taking a single scratch to its green lean yet muscular body.

Given that then, Senna, the one that has Awakened and was able to fight almost on equal footing with Saurosh, was weakened severely. But, her powers then were almost crippled now.

Back then, her Levels reached a staggeringly high value, almost breaking through the 7000s. It was to the point that Legends in this New World would be dropping their jaws down at the sight, groveling on their knees even. But, such a value can't be obtained anymore.

Her limit did rise, but only to Level 100, the highest a Mortal could attain before they try the difficult Transcendence to rid themselves of their Mortality.

Back in WSO, Transcendents are numerous when their World gets to be released in the Rankings. Some are bad, less are even good, while most are secluded masters. They are the supporting pillars for your World when other much stronger Players come to invade, and they usually have a higher Level than the World's Ruler. This is to make bullying lower Worlds be more difficult and not so easy.

'This place, it's so weird… but powerful.'

That's an understatement for someone like her who's barely the average Level. But, everyone has their starting points, it's just that theirs are more prominent given that they don't die young.

.....

'...'

Black, dark, and drowsiness. The room of the Bride of Death is a sanctuary for the Stage Guardians, her children in her eyes, and the tomb of so many others that are foolishly enough to approach and release.

''Yayyy… he managed to survive. I don't have to get out of bed.''

To her children, she looks like a Goddess, the only one worthy to stand next to their Father, Saurosh Koravek Solomon, who goes by the name Sora Kuroka in courtesy of himself.

But to the latter, Charlotte Von Arshal Sanguise, the Vampire Queen and his Bride, he sees her as a cute adorable little squish ball that does nothing more than laze and sleep in her eternally dark chamber. Some would be furious, seeing such a thing from someone who's supposed to be your partner in life and help relieve some of your stress, to just laze around and do nothing.

"Awww, and hubby didn't even notice. Looks like I won't be scolded. Yayyy!"

But how can you get angry when your wife can turn into any appearance whenever?

"Ummm."

Her mature figure, right now, was nowhere to be seen. A child with long black hair that blends in seamlessly with the room, such a thing is the Bride of Death when in her free time. The remark of 'adorable squish ball' from Sora wasn't an exaggeration. She was literally one right now, all tucked up and wrapped in her hair.

"Hehehe, can't wait for him to get back so that we can have something to eat. Wonder what the outside has to offer?"

Bright, doll-like eyes make you want to die of a heart attack. She's just too cute for words, really.

"Hum, hm, hah, hmm, hah ha hah um ta!''

'...'

And of course, nowhere is safe from Sora's prying, slightly creepy in this situation, eyes.

'She really is irresponsible.'