212. Grand Entrance

This process was playing out on other planets too.

The Thousand Seas tribe was another one of the Nine Great Factions. Most of its planets were, appropriately, dominated by seas, with little islands peppered here and there. Some of their planets were little more than big globes of water. Massive cities floated atop them, built over on massive rafts. Some sat on ships the size of continents. Moving cities that could lift off of one planet, sail across the vast expanse of space to another, and plunk down if need be.

That was how Outer Faction disciples joined the Inner Faction. They would sail their bases right over.

Even their Observatory was floating: a buoy sat on a blob of slowly spinning water.

Inside, lightly dressed scouts debated vigorously with one another.

Their Big Board—lots of inked papers nailed to a giant straw bulletin—sat before them.

#1 was a catkin Thain warrior, Rafira. He had startling purple eyes and two black cat-ears. He was wrapped mostly in mummy bandages. You could see bad burns around the little chunks of exposed temple.

#3 was a certain Avery Lively. She looked rather surprised, flailing wildly as she was being shucked off the back of the Superbara.

***

ᴅᴇᴇᴘ ᴇᴀʀᴛʜ ʜᴀʟʟ

The Deep Earth Hall was the quietest of the Nine Great Factions' galaxies. Probably because most of the action happened underground—though they were not a very talkative folk regardless.

The planets looked like great hunks of rock floating around. Some as big as stars. The only things that broke the surface were antenna-like steel beams, or steam vents, or sinkhole-like entrances that fed into tunnels running deep and wide.

Their Observatory was mostly underground too. Their big board, chiseled into the wall, featured the same Catkin man at #1, the one with the purple eyes. This time his hands were spread out, five mummified fingers reaching like he was summoning something.

#2 was a certain Emeka Eze, reading a skill tome by candlelight, sat on an old leather seat in his study.

***

ᴄᴜʟᴛ ᴏꜰ ᴇᴛᴇʀɴᴀʟ ᴡɪɴᴛᴇʀ

The Cult of Eternal Winter's home star was frozen over. It streamed out a blistering cold light. The planets were caked in snow and frost. Some were vast glaciers unto themselves. Others full of wintry forests and soft drizzling snow.

Their Observatory was a yurt perched on a small distant chunk of ice. On their Big Board, Vanessa Volkova was #1.

***

ᴛᴇᴍᴘʟᴇ ᴏꜰ ᴛʜᴇ ᴡᴏʀʟᴅ ᴛʀᴇᴇ

Unlike the other Factions, the Temple of the World Tree was not centered on a star. Instead it was built around their signature World Tree.

They had two stars in their system, stuffed with plenty of essence—but those stars orbited the World Tree too. The Tree was what gave them life, gave them Law. Its enormous roots went deep into the fabric of the Universe itself, vanishing into the void. Its trunk spanned continents.

A little cloud of activity—staircases and vine-bridges and airships—floated alongside it, running up the entirety of the trunk. Civilization. Billions called this place their home, made houses on the fringes of single leaves. Kingdoms controlled their own little strata. The higher and higher you went, the more powerful and prestigious they got.

Though the top, past the uppermost canopies and boughs, was reserved for the disciples of the World Tree faction. And at its very peak, the head of the World Tree Faction made his home.

High Priest Lan Arandor led morning prayers from his perch atop the Everlasting Temple. On the very highest bough of them all. There he led thousands of World Tree faction disciples—and hundreds of billions of followers across the galaxy—in prayer every morning.

It was their sacred duty to care for the World Tree. They gained great powers in return.

Lately though, the Faction had fallen on stressful times. Their fated leader—by dint of her Title—had been missing for some millennia. Now she was presumed dead. And until her reincarnation was found, her role in the interim would be assumed by the head of the most powerful house—that was the High Priest Lan Arandor. He began every morning service by lamenting how aggrieved he was at this state of affairs.

The World Tree Faction's Observatory was a treehouse sat on a tiny planet of lush loamy soil. And their Big Board, among all, was unique. They had their picks all worked out—from Lysa Mawa, #1000, to Reina Torres, #3. But their #1 was left blank. A question mark.

It was reserved for the reincarnation of the Mistress Maker. The sacred maiden fated to lead their Faction in Chaos Cycles past, and in Chaos Cycles to come.

***

The Mistress Maker in question was not aware of any of this, of course. At the moment she was rather preoccupied. It was a good thing there was no surveillance before the Superdungeon—the Temple monks would have been quite horrified to see what their sacred maiden was up to.

It was their last chance to level before the dungeon—and though she and Zane had racked up quite a few, they were hard at work this last week.

𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝕦𝕡!

𝔼𝕤𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕖 𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝟚𝟚𝟡 -> 𝟚𝟛𝟘

With a satisfied sigh, she rested her head on Zane's chest. She looked up at him. "Ready?" she murmured. Zane nodded.

She smiled and closed her eyes. She was asleep in seconds.

Zane looked at her fondly. She was at the World Rank #5 too. The preparations had all been made. He stared at the ceiling, chest rising and falling slowly. Feeling deeply peaceful.

Tomorrow.

It was time.

***

Tomorrow, bright and early, they were off.

Zane, Reina, Evan, and Avery all met at the town square at the crack of dawn. They were all pretty eager to get going, but Evan was the most excited of them all, as usual. He was ambling around in happy little circles. He was going to go save the world. This was the purpose of Evan.

He was also quite nervous. But he didn't hyperventilate anymore. He'd gotten a lot better at managing that kind of stuff—Zane remembered the first time he saw Evan, he was curled up in a tree. Sometimes Evan still patted his pockets for his inhaler—before the change, Evan used to get bad asthma attacks when he got scared. It was an old habit. Now he wasn't even doing that anymore.

Something about being around Zane seemed to be rubbing off on him. Every time he started going under he looked to Zane, and got a model of what it looked like to be unbothered. It helped a lot. Zane wasn't normally up for this kind of thing—he did not consider himself a good role model. Certainly most people should not try what he did. That would end quite badly. But if Evan found it useful, then Zane was happy. He ruffled the boy's hair. Evan beamed.

Avery wasn't even that cranky even though she was woken up early, which was highly unusual.

"Alright gang!" she cried. "Let's kick some Monster ass."

She hated bullies as much as Evan didn't like bad guys. Especially when they went after her friend. "Don't you worry big fella," she told Zane, patting him on the back. "I've got you!"

She cracked her knuckles. "Those Monsters better hope they don't come across me…" She scrunched up her face. She was doing her best to look like she meant business. It was rather hard when you were under five feet tall.

A big crowd had come to see them off. Luminous Faction guards had had to fence off the whole square but they were spilling into every side street, yelling and cheering. Zane had been wished good luck a lot these past few days. Overhead Zane saw little blimps with reporters with dark rings under their eyes floating, announcing just as excitedly.

They all exploded when they saw him and his friends coming through. Raining cheers and well wishes—Evan pressed close to Zane, clutching Zane's arm. There were lots of World Rankers there too at the very front. Even top World Rankers. He saw some familiar faces. He noticed Cain Hastings waving a handkerchief, eyes a little watery, blowing his nose.

Zane noticed, with a little surprise, that Eze had come to send him off too. He stood aloof from the crowd, arms crossed—he gave Zane a little nod. Zane nodded right back.

They went on through the portals. Going out to Base Camp. It was not so much a mountain range anymore—more a mess of terrain. Some flat, some desert. In the distance Zane saw great basins, water slowly gathering. It would be some months before they filled.

He had done all that, he realized.

Huh.

Heaven's Peak, though loomed large as ever in the distance. Smoking slightly at the top.

Not another half hour of trekking later they were there. The first gate of the Superdungeon.

The stone runed staircase thick as a highway leading deep into the bowels of the earth. A hellish red light gushed from deep within…

Strange auras wafted out of that entrance. Foreign auras. Auras of other worlds, Zane knew. Past a certain point they would be descending into the unknown—not on Earth anymore. Past a certain point there was no going back. And they would be in the Super dungeon proper.

Reina squeezed his hand, bit her lip. Zane looked around. Everyone was a little apprehensive.

"Let's do this," he said. He knew he had to be the one to lead the way and show a strong face. He went on ahead first, so it would be easy for his friends to follow. They did.

Everyone seemed to feel a lot more confident when it was him leading the way.

***

This tunnel was not natural. It was too perfectly cut—the stone an enormous rectangle winding deeper and deeper… at some point the stone started to change. Normal earth stone got streaked with pulsing blue veins. And then that earth stone started changing to something else, too, chunk by chunk. Something colored deeper, a kind of obsidian streaked with gray. An alien texture.

A new aura issued from deep within the tunnels. Washing out like a wall of heat, flowing over them and beyond—he felt it in the pit of his stomach, a kind of denseness like nothing he'd ever felt, an essence humidity. Just the ambient essence here was like an A-rank treasure floating in the air. If a Foundation cultivator stayed here a few months, they could get up to Core probably.

The deeper they went, the hotter, the denser things got—the walls turned darker, craggier, opening up from that perfect rectangle mold. Becoming something natural. Natural to some other world. It smelled of rusted metals and sulfur and ash. Ash-drifts floated on the air—clumps of black drifting before them…

Crystals started studding the walls. Peeking out of cracks in stone here and there. Big fat translucent white crystals, crystals that gave off a good deal of wispy light, and a great deal of thick essence—Zane examined them.

ℂ𝕣𝕪𝕤𝕥𝕒𝕝 𝕠𝕗 𝔾𝕚𝕝𝕕𝕣𝕦𝕟𝕕𝕒𝕣 [ℂ𝕠𝕞𝕞𝕠𝕟 (𝔼)]

𝔸 ℂ𝕣𝕪𝕤𝕥𝕒𝕝 𝕠𝕗 𝔾𝕚𝕝𝕕𝕣𝕦𝕟𝕕𝕒𝕣 𝕥𝕒𝕜𝕖𝕤 𝟙𝟘 𝕞𝕚𝕝𝕝𝕖𝕟𝕟𝕚𝕒 𝕥𝕠 𝕘𝕣𝕠𝕨, 𝕟𝕠𝕦𝕣𝕚𝕤𝕙𝕖𝕕 𝕓𝕪 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕖𝕤𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕖-𝕕𝕖𝕟𝕤𝕖 𝕒𝕥𝕞𝕠𝕤𝕡𝕙𝕖𝕣𝕖 𝕠𝕗 𝔾𝕚𝕝𝕕𝕣𝕦𝕟𝕕𝕒𝕣. 𝕀𝕥 𝕚𝕤 𝕨𝕠𝕣𝕥𝕙 𝟙𝟘 𝔼𝕒𝕣𝕥𝕙-ℂ𝕠𝕞𝕞𝕠𝕟 𝔾𝕣𝕒𝕕𝕖 𝔼𝕤𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕖 𝕊𝕥𝕠𝕟𝕖𝕤.

Reina harvested them. She was surprised how such good treasures were just lying around here—each Crystal was akin to 100 of their Max-grade Essence Stones back on Earth.

The mini-map opened up, showing the winding tunnel ahead. It was the only thing in sight.

𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕙𝕒𝕧𝕖 𝕖𝕟𝕥𝕖𝕣𝕖𝕕: 𝔽𝕝𝕠𝕠𝕣 𝟞𝟚: 𝔻𝕨𝕒𝕣𝕧𝕖𝕟 𝕂𝕚𝕟𝕘𝕕𝕠𝕞 𝕠𝕗 𝔾𝕚𝕝𝕕𝕣𝕦𝕟𝕕𝕒𝕣.

𝕋𝕠 𝕒𝕕𝕧𝕒𝕟𝕔𝕖, 𝕖𝕟𝕥𝕖𝕣 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕤𝕥𝕒𝕚𝕣𝕔𝕒𝕤𝕖 𝕝𝕠𝕔𝕒𝕥𝕖𝕕 𝕚𝕟:

𝕊𝕖𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟 𝟛: 𝕋𝕙𝕣𝕠𝕟𝕖 ℝ𝕠𝕠𝕞

𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕒𝕣𝕖 𝕚𝕟:

𝕊𝕖𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟 𝟙: 𝔾𝕣𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝔼𝕟𝕥𝕣𝕒𝕟𝕔𝕖 ℍ𝕒𝕝𝕝

Reina and Evan and Avery all flinched a bit at the notification. It told them what they were all suspecting—no going back now. They were in. Zane frowned at it.

So far it didn't look like much of a hall to Zane.

There were no Bosses to kill here either. You just needed to go down.

He saw the tunnels opening up on the mini-map into some big cavern. That looked engineered again. A perfect rectangle. The stuff inside—blotches of terrain—were laid at regular intervals too.

Reina thought that must be whatever the true entrance to the realm was. They were still coming up to it. They were all a little tense so far—except for Zane, who was mostly just cautious. But once they got in there… they would all need to be on their a-game.

In the tunnel-bends before they got there though, Zane caught sight of a few big yellow clumps on the mini-map set deep into the walls. Only there was no paths to get there—it was like they hovered in the middle of the terrain.

Reina frowned at them too. "I wonder if they're buried," she murmured. "Like veins of ore."

But they had no tools to get then. And these walls, with those weird otherworldly dense rocks, looked pretty thick. They did look like they would succumb to pretty good hammer, though.

Zane looked at his hands. Looked up at the walls. Looked back to Reina.

She instantly got his drift.

"Stand back," he said.

"Why?" squeaked Evan. "What's going—Ohhh!"

And they went a good fifty feet back. Zane frowned. "Farther."

Hundred.

This… should be good enough?

Zane pricked a finger at the wall.

He hardly made a dent in it. Got a few loose stones out, maybe.

This was quite surprising to him—even pricking a finger with some force back on Earth opened up some scars. But it seemed whatever reality this place lived in could handle a whole lot more.

He frowned. Hmm.

He balled his hands into a fist. And threw a cautious punch.

BOOM!

The wall cracked—just a little. Ruptures ran out where he struck. But that was all.

The tunnel did not look anywhere near caving in.

This stone… it was of a caliber you would never find on Earth. Even in the S-rank dungeons.

It would need a more forceful approach.

Zane blinked at his hand. Then at the tunnel.

He was starting to smile. Just a little.

Back on Earth he always had to be at least a little ginger. It was too easy to break things. It had been so long since he could let loose. And actually punch something. Hard. Give it all he had.

He wasn't even sure how much he had.

Now was a good time to find out.

"Go back a mile," he told his friends. Just in case.

Then, when he saw them scramble back far enough—

He took a deep breath. Clenched his fist, wound back. And burned his blood.