If Ryan was being completely honest, Tar’el was a really crappy aura generator. The elf was actively dampening his emotions and using some trick to keep his own aura placid and contained. From a purely risk vs reward perspective, playing the music wasn’t worth the aura generation.

  Of course, that assumed the music was just for Tar’el alone.

  Phase three of the Artigan theme song continued to play, blasting down irreverent music down the solemn depths of a dead world. It wasn’t half as loud without the speakers but his aura did help spread through the ground. At first, whatever lurked down the tunnels would hear it, then start to creep closer.

  Then the overwhelming stench of blood and war would hit them. Artigan’s aura promising them their deaths.

  Then the creatures would run.

  That was what was truly regenerating his aura reserves. Teasing the stupid elf was just a bonus. Tar’el had his eyes scrunched closed and was trying very hard to tune out both the music and his whistling.

  Everything fled from the surroundings. All the creatures but one.

  Ryan had been working on that skill for awhile now. Only in these depths, consistently noticing whatever the hell was stalking him did the Trial System acknowledge that he’d truly learned the standalone skill.

  Taking out the phone and angling the screen behind him, Ryan turned off the music, then a second later, he turned the device off. A flicker of his stalker appeared on the dark reflection of the screen.

  A too-large white head dashed popped back into a too-small hole.

  One he had dismissed.

  Tar’el must have missed it, the elf was smug. “Hah! I knew you were getting nothing from me. We’ve had special training to stop demonic aura skills like yours.”

  Ryan turned on phase one of his theme song on repeat. The music was an attempt to muddy his voice. “We’re being followed.”

  “What?!”

  Naturally the stupid squirming elf gave it away. Ryan sighed, . Not that it really mattered. The monster had definitely understood what he’d done. If it didn’t, it was too dumb to be a threat.

  Ryan tried to make conversation while he thought. “I was hoping it was your boss. Guess he was too much of a coward to come down here to save you.”

  That upset the elf. “The First Leaf leads the entirety of the Leafstalkers. Risking his own life to save me would be the peak of foolishness.”

  The peak of foolishness bumped up his shoulder, making the elf grunt. “, so you’re not a complete moron. You sort of understand what your leader meant.”

  Challenging Tar’el’s intelligence seemed to do the trick. “That you were being raised by the Witch Tyrant? That you are not as evil as people say? Of course I understood.”

  Now that dumbfounded Ryan. “Then why the hell are you trying so hard to kill me?”

  “Did I not say? You are a Trialist. One who seeks power and–”

  “Yeah, yeah skip to the end please. I wasn’t paying attention the first time and I’m not listening to the indoctrination bullshit that Leafstalkers keep posting online.”

  The elf went quiet at that.

  “A phrase from Earth. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. You who compromise and endanger everyone else for your strength have already been corrupted. When you are stronger that small corruption will magnify by countless times. You must be stopped. You will not–”

  It turned out that Tar’el wasn’t completely stupid. It was just that he was an absolute fanatic. The lines he was spouting were stuff that armchair Realmers liked to discuss. About morality, goodness and the place of the Trial System in all of that. About how both the good and evil sides of a person would be magnified. A normal society could not bear such rapid progress from regular people.

  They all admitted that they had been lucky with the Tyrants. That any other time and any other world, Trialists would have started carving out kingdoms and would leave both worlds a bloody mess.

  It was a philosophy based on fear and the worst of humanity.

  And Ryan kind of understood their point of view.

  Imagine growing up knowing that adventurers could grow strong enough to wipe out your entire city. That the only chance you had to stop them was to nip the problem in the bud. Find the ones compromising decency for power before they hit the fifth realm.

  It was an apt name. The worst part was that Ryan couldn’t wholeheartedly disagree about Tar’el’s assessment of him either. Whether the elf realized it or not. His assessment about what Ryan would do if he gained the power equivalent to the Tyrants were somewhat accurate.

  Tar’el seemed to take the silence as a victory.

  “Now why should I keep quiet and keep us safe?”

  Ryan could accept that Tar’el was worth talking to properly. “Because it’s stalking us despite being afraid of me. That means higher order of thinking. It means curiosity or it believes it can kill me. Despite that, I can’t get either of my [Dangersense] skills to latch onto it.”

  “Then all the more reason for me to give it some warning.”

  “You aren’t listening, it’s intelligent. It might have been manning the turrets, it sent that rolling flesh golem after us. You’ve heard of the real horror stories down here right?”

  That made Tar’el go quiet. “I’m not afraid of torture.”

  “.”

  Ryan walked past a tunnel going up with an adventurer’s marking on it. Signifying safety. He rolled his eyes and kept walking.

  This whole setup was a trap, anyone could see that.

  With every step further it rattled his [Lesser Dangersense]. Making the lesser alert tilt louder in his head. There should have been more traps. At least another turret. Even if it was a post-cataclysm tunnel, civilizations should have come by here and tried to make this convenient tunnel their own.

  That was, unless this tunnel was new. Ryan’s eyes glanced at the adventurer’s mark, denoting a safe route out.

  It was an old style marking. Safety. But there being no other markings on any other tunnel? At least not a single modern ‘hey I’m going here.’ or a ‘Artigan was here’ graffiti?

  Tar’el the silly elf seemed to have finally made up his mind. He began to call out to their stalker. “You! Artigan knows you’re here! Make sure you prepare thoroughly. Lots of monsters and turrets, his reserves aren’t endless!”

  Ryan sighed. He turned around, staring at each of the holes, his voice carrying out.

  If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  “We both know that I know you’re stalking me. You might as well come out. I promise not to attack you as long as you don’t attack me.”

  They waited for a few seconds. As expected, there wasn’t a response. Not at first, anyway.

  A thud reverberated around the tunnels from up above. Then the rumbling started. It was coming from behind him. Where he had walked from.

  Ryan waited, then saw the outline of what it was. Then Ryan started running the other way.

  Tar’el started screaming in his ear.

  Ryan, who’s ear was next to the screaming started screaming back. “What!? IS this not what you expected?!”

  It had the rough shape of the flesh golem he’d fought earlier… only this time it was significantly larger, taking most of the space in the tunnel. Instead of a bunch of limbs, it had two massive arms sticking out from the sides. Pulling itself down to generate more and more momentum.

  Oh, and it was also covered in massive metal plates.

  Apparently their stalker had taken heed and upped their game.

  Ryan ran downwards, not nearly at top speed, but fast enough to outpace the armored ball of flesh. The rest of his mind was watching the crevices and his front for any traps or turrets. It only took three minutes of running before he saw it.

  A dead end.

  There were side crevices before him and the dead end. One with an adventurer’s marking for safety, the other with a marking for danger. The first of its kind.

  Ryan upped their level of intelligence a several notches in his mind as he stood still. He pretended to deliberate over the options. He turned to one tunnel, then to the other, then turned back to that steep uphill, where the ball of metallic flesh was angrily rolling down. Shaking the entire tunnel.

  Tar’el looked at the ball in fear, then he turned to the safety marking. “Hurry up, why aren’t you running over there?!”

  Maybe the trap wasn’t as obvious for others as Ryan thought it was. He just shrugged casually.

  “And here I thought you wanted to die together. What, is getting crushed not good enough for you?”

  “Are you serious?! Is this how you want us to die?!”

  The massive ball was seconds away from crushing them. Every time it started losing momentum, its two massive arms would dig into the ground, then throw itself forwards. Even Ryan would have to sprint to make it to the crevice now.

  He took out the hilt of his sword instead. “Eh, last time I walked into an obvious trap I almost got soul hexed. I think I’m done with that for now.”

  The blade of aura formed from the hilt up. The blade fragments had been destroyed but the deformed kintsugi style hilt had stayed strong. Ryan could have just made a long sword and cut down on it, but he also had no idea how strong those metal plates were. If he misjudged and they ended up being as durable as ninth realm armor then he’d be screwed.

  He lined up the attack.

  [Aura Slash]

  The blade of red cut vertically and shot forth. Ripping up both the floor and ceiling of the tunnel, it continued forwards. The golem raising its arms in defense at the last minute. It cut cleanly through the arms, both flesh and bone providing no defense. It smashed into the enchanted metal, and… cleanly cut through them too. Slicing forward, through the core and out the other end.

  Ryan took a couple steps back, as the two huge arms on the sides pulled the clean halves apart. Making the flesh monster roll past him.

  Ryan gave the open mouthed Tar’el a wink.

  “You’re going to have to work overtime to refill that aura.”

  The elf spluttered, shaking his head and closing his eyes, trying to find his own center so that he wasn’t feeding Artigan’s aura.

  Ryan just chuckled. He eyed the metallic armor and wondered.

  Ryan checked his notifications

  Ryan had seen them before, but found that his luck was so bad that it felt almost wasteful to System Exchange massive creatures for something like a rusty sword. In this place where only horrors dwelled?

  He pressed yes.

  The entirety of the corpse disappeared in front of his eyes, vanished without any fanfare. In front was a bastardized mix of a beating heart and what looked like metallic pipes instead of the main arteries that a normal heart had.

  It was also the size of both of his fists put together.

  “Yup, my luck is shit as always… Actually…”

  Ryan looked around. He waved the bloody golem heart at the crevices he could see.

  “Hey! Do you want this? I’m willing to trade! Be my guide and this is yours!”

  No answer.

  “Typical.” Ryan waved the heart in front of Tar’el’s face. “Hey, do you want this? Technically, you did contribute to the fight. Adventurer’s rules.”

  The elf, who was peeking through mostly closed eyes, flinched back from the bloody heart that was throbbing in his face.

  “Guess that’s a no. Fine with me.”

  Ryan put down the hogtied elf and detached the hood from the robes that were wrapped around the elf. It was a function he should have used more often. The hood was detachable could be used as a makeshift satchel. Ryan just never used it that way because he valued the aesthetics more.

  He put the heart in the hood-pouch and put it between the convenient space between hogtied elf’s torso and limbs. Ryan then placed Tar’el back at his rightful place. On top of his left shoulder.

  Tar’el groaned. “Please, I give up. I’ll co-operate.”

  Ryan started whistling. “What was that? You gotta speak louder. I had an elf screaming in my ear.”

  “I said I’ll co-operate!” The elf screamed again in his ears. “This is too humiliating. I don’t want to die like this.”

  “Hmm.”

  Ryan pretended to give it some thought, then shook his head.

  “Nah, adventuring rules 101. When escorting an annoying hostile prince that you’re not allowed to kill: You never let them run around freely. The easiest way is always to tie them up and keep them in a cart.”

  Ryan whistled his tune, slowly making his way back up the tunnel. There hadn’t been a hole that could fit that massive golem before. It had definitely dropped in the only area he hadn’t really had time to take a good look around.

  The very chamber with all the turrets in it.

  After a few minutes his tied elven prince began to squirm.

  “I have to go to the toilet.”

  “Hah! That’s a good one.”

  –

  Earth:

  Sideark turned off his stream, citing a ‘personal emergency’. He had promised to do a marathon 100 hour stream when Artigan had showed up. Something no other non-adventurer streamers could do. It was another reason why his streams were superior. You just couldn’t compete against someone that had so much energy hours into a livestream.

  That hundred hour stream would have been an insanely popular one too. The time spent doing reactions to other reactions of big streamers and adventurers would have been excellent. The analysis would have been excellent too. Even the Eighth realm adventurers had lined up asking to do collabs in his chat.

  However, something had alerted him that required Sideark to shut it all down. His heart beating quickly at the news.

  One of his paid moderators, had scouted out big news. The chance of a lifetime.

  Apparently Artigan had breached the three mile mark of the Cataclysm Abyss. People were saying that he had been routed by the First Leaf and was forced to go down into the depths.

  Now, now was Sideark’s chance.

  He booted up a chatroom. A private open sourced message board that was technically under Realmnet’s purview. It had always maintained top the line encryption methods. You could even insult the Witch Tyrant in these and as long as the messages didn’t get leaked to the public, you’d be safe.

  The chatroom was called the “Eternal Delvers”.

  These were the Destined that had gotten unlucky. Those that had gotten stuck into the depths of the Cataclysm Abyss. Either pushed down deep by a monster or a trap. Leaving their teams behind as they had the one option that regular Trialists didn’t get.

  The [Return To Earth] skill.

  There was a reason why Sideark only ever streamed. His story was a tragically famous one. Another reason why it was so exciting to tune into his stream. The tragically lost Destined that delved too far in. His return point in The Realm a place that nobody else could reach.

  Sideark:

  Ratty:

  Sideark:

  Illigos:

  Sideark:

  Ratty:

  Sideark:

  It was the little secret that nobody else knew. An adventurer in their group chat had lost their safety life and had come out with one fact: There was more than one Trial entrance in Sector Four.

  It had just been buried deep, deep in the Cataclysm Abyss.

  Illigos:

  Sideark:

  Worang:

  Sideark:

  Sideark grinned at the screen.

  Most of them were strong. All of them had wanted to delve with their teams to prove themselves as outstanding Fourthers. They had just gotten unlucky in one way or another.

  With so many years of practice on Earth, they had learned and maxed out most of their skills. Some of them had gone deep into melded skills that could match most Epics in strength.

  Sideark would put half of the guys in the “Eternal Delvers” group at the top five of realm four strength.

  Him? He would put himself on the level of Juniper the Fair Hearted, if not higher.

  If he was placed in the tournament with his analysis and scouting network? He’d win the whole damn thing.

  Sideark grinned at the screen. The day to climb up the realms had finally arrived.

   is

  24 chapters ahead!