‘The ticket?’

  Percy had swiped the amethyst emblem from Kassorith at the last second mostly to spite him for stabbing him in the back, not expecting to use it anytime soon. How was he supposed to infiltrate an event hosted by one of the most powerful factions in the universe?

  With what he hoped would be a permanent source of royal jelly at hand, he technically no longer even needed a first-generation leaf to become a god. At the same time, he wouldn’t say no to another lifespan extension if he could get it, let alone whatever else might be on offer.

  ‘Let’s not get ahead of myself. Maybe he just wants to sell the ticket to an acquaintance from the Void Hand or something. He hasn’t said anything about sneaking into the tournament…’

  Regardless, Percy’s main goal during this trip was the knowledge of how to turn his runes into seals, plus whatever other secondary enchantments he might need for his artificial advancement.

  All of his calculations to attack divinity hinged on this, as it would not only triple his remaining lifespan, but lower the number of natural promotions necessary by one, thus cutting the lifespan requirement by an additional factor of ten. This was the massive gulf that separated Red-borns from Orange-borns.

  ‘Let’s focus on that then. Everything else I get is just a bonus.’

  He hadn’t requested the information from Metatron earlier, as he didn’t want to clue him in to his intentions. If he purchased the seal-crafting knowledge from the system, it would look less important to him, though he’d have to ask the titan for it otherwise.

  ‘I’ll wait until after I watch him craft my seals,’ he decided.

  That was the perfect excuse to spark Percy’s ‘curiosity’ on the topic. Afterwards, he would try buying the knowledge himself and only bring it up to Metatron during their final meeting if he failed. That way, it would appear as a mere afterthought, rather than Percy’s main goal.

  The issue was that Metatron knew about Circulation and spectral traits already, and pre-casting wasn’t so difficult to figure out even if he hadn’t considered it before. Other than the Dance, he practically met all the requirements to copy Percy’s idea, and he would be able to complete the project much faster than him.

  Thankfully, figuring out the external flow of the boosting art involved a great leap of logic, hopefully preventing Metatron from realizing the spell’s potential. Percy felt tremendous pride in his ancestor – well, Micky’s ancestor – the Second Hero, for coming up with the Dance all by himself, without even being a titan. Geniuses of such calibre were probably rare.

  Metatron didn’t personally have the Scribing trait either, though he might not even need such a crutch. As one of the universe’s leading runecrafting experts, he could probably do everything without it.

  ‘Maybe I’m reading too much into this,’ Percy thought with a frown. ‘Would the artificial advancement even do anything for a god?’

  Deities had turned their cores into internal worlds. Percy didn’t even know whether they had mana channels anymore, or if there was a grade of mana higher than Clear.

  Obviously, they could still use some version of the regular Dance, as that was precisely what Micky’s ancestors had relied on to fend off the invaders. This was how the spell had gained its name. However, what Percy was currently trying to do with his boosting art might not even be applicable to gods.

  ‘It doesn’t matter. Even if he merely spreads it to his people, that’s bad enough…’

  In any case, none of that was important right now. He had to complete the challenges to earn the rewards, and he needed his host to grow much stronger before he even attempted them.

  First, he took a detour to the residential area, placing his hand on the wall outside his friends’ place. “Cube, I want to see Gabe. Can you let him know I’m here? User ID: WANDERER.”

  Silver runes lit up beneath his palm, this time flashing green like they were supposed to.

  “Authorization granted. Evaluating request…”

  Listening to the system’s cold, monotonous voice, Percy exhaled in relief. ‘I’ve got to hand it to Metatron. Asshole or not, he works fast. It hasn’t even been five minutes.’

  Percy wouldn’t be surprised if the titan had entered the spectral fiend test into the system too, like he’d promised.

  “Evaluation complete. User ‘Gabe’ is currently unavailable. Would you like to leave a message?”

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  He frowned. Was his friend in the middle of a challenge or something?

  “No, it’s fine. I’ll visit some other time. What about Noland, Leo and Tlaloc?”

  “Evaluating request…”

  “Evaluation complete. Users ‘Noland’, ‘Leo’ and ‘Tlaloc’ are currently unavailable. Would you like to leave a message?”

  Weird. Was it a coincidence that everyone was absent at the same time? Scanning his surroundings, Percy had to admit that the Vault looked a little less busy than usual. They couldn’t all be in the challenges, right? There weren’t nearly enough cubes for everyone to enter at once.

  ‘Maybe most of them are locked in their rooms. Is it because I’ve taught them Circulation?’

  That would certainly explain most of the Vault’s residents being busy. It had only been a few years since the spell had spread, it took a long time to master, and it would open new doors for everyone. Whoever learned it would instantly be able to clear more waves in the challenges, improving their quality of life as a result.

  ‘But if most people are practicing at home, how come the four of them are all missing?’

  Thinking about it some more, Percy quickly identified the most likely culprit: their promotions. Gabe’s second core should have advanced a couple of years back, catching up to his first one. It would have also made affinity fusion easier and opened the door for Synchronization.

  To master the spell, he had two Circulation patterns to master, and he had just regained his eyesight the last time Percy visited. Obviously, the jellyfish-person had experienced many gains in a relatively short period of time, so it made sense that he was constantly in the challenges trying to push himself further.

  The others’ situations were similar. Both of Noland’s cores should have advanced, and he’d had to master just as many patterns. Unlike Gabe, the man had never practiced runecrafting to Percy’s knowledge, nor had he had to recover from any debilitating injuries, but he’d still had less time to get on top of everything.

  Leo’s second core should have advanced even more recently, and Tlaloc should have also reached Blue after receiving cleansing resources for the first time in his life.

  ‘I guess it wasn’t that urgent.’ Percy shrugged.

  He was a little bummed out that his friends were busy as he hadn’t seen them in decades. He wanted to chat with Tlaloc about Huehue now that he had regained his memories of that place, but it would have to wait.

  “Cube, is it possible to leave a message to myself?”

  “Evaluating request…”

  “Evaluation complete. It is possible to leave a message for anyone in the Vault, including user ‘Percy’. However, whether they will notice or receive it may depend on their personal settings.”

  “Can I put a condition on it? For example, to only be delivered once the recipient logs into the system with a Red core?”

  Percy hadn’t merely wanted to visit his friends to catch up, but also to leave a message to the other clones. Then again, reaching out to them through their shared access to the system might be faster and more convenient.

  “Evaluating request…”

  “Evaluation complete. It is possible to place any arbitrary conditions you want.”

  “Great! I want to leave a message to myself. Send me two copies – one as soon as I log in with a Red core, and another when I do so with an Orange one.”

  “Evaluating request…”

  “Evaluation complete. WARNING: Invalid condition detected. User ‘Percy’ is already at Yellow. It is impossible to meet condition ‘log in with a Red core’. WARNING: Invalid condition detected. User ‘Percy’ is already at Yellow. It is impossible to meet condition ‘log in with an Orange core’.”

  Percy felt the urge to chuckle. What happened to “any arbitrary conditions you want”? Either way, he’d be the judge of what was or wasn’t possible.

  “Don’t worry about that. Just send the messages. I want them to say: ‘I’ve talked to Metatron. He already knows about the blessing and the spectral traits. I’ve bargained with him for a few benefits – leave that to me and focus on your own challenges. We haven’t talked to the others yet. Kassorith is alive.’”

  “Evaluating request…”

  Communicating like this was less convenient than the cords, but it couldn’t be helped. They might have been able to relay their messages to each other via their main body had they empowered their connections, but they were all supposed to have focused on concealing the blessing instead.

  “Evaluation complete. Message sent.”

  Leaving the residential cubes behind, Percy returned to the area with the challenge cubes. Paying closer attention, he noticed a queue at each one, all of them longer than usual. People could stay inside as long as they wanted, so he had no idea when he’d get his turn.

  Fortunately, he and Cassiel still had a lot of channels to clear and temper, and much physical conditioning to go through before they could use Circulation. Even better, they could focus on all that while waiting outside the cube.

  One of the nicest things about the Vault was that it was self-cleaning, so one could relieve themselves wherever they wanted. This was something that Gabe had taught Percy during his first visit, and something that he had greatly appreciated every time since.

  Of course, it was one thing to do that in the privacy of the training cube, and another thing entirely to do so while being surrounded by people. Thankfully, it was also possible to request a private stall around oneself pretty much anywhere. He’d never had to do that before, because he’d never spent too long waiting in the queues, but it would certainly prove handy over the coming days.

  Shrugging, he picked the shortest queue in sight – one only five people strong – walking to the back. He stopped a few metres behind one of the hulking humanoids with the horns – the tallest people in the artificial world.

  His host was on the opposite end of the spectrum as one of the short, green-skinned folks, and he was a young child to boot. Since Cassiel barely reached about halfway to the man’s knee, Percy wanted to keep his distance to avoid getting the boy stepped on by accident.

  ‘Start exercising. Push-ups, sit-ups, whatever… I’ll give you food and healing potions whenever you get tired,’ he said, getting a nod back from the child.

  Percy doubted that any other eight- or nine-year-old would have agreed as obediently, but the residents of the Vault were probably all used to hardship. Letting the boy do his job, he resumed clearing their channels.

  A surge of anticipation rose in his chest as he thought about the massive credit windfall on the horizon, making him salivate at all the runecrafting knowledge he’d be able to purchase.

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