Dungeon Diver: Stealing A Monster’s Power

I look out the massive one-way glass window, overlooking the entire Ellipsia Citadel. The view stretches far into the endless green clouds beyond the edges of this floating city in the sky.

A familiar warm tingling sensation pulls at the back of my consciousness, connected to the strongest link of loyalty I have back on my home world.

Instead of waiting any longer, I open the half-created telepathy channel and speak directly into Maria's inner ear.

"Getting to a safe place to call took longer than expected, but I made it. How are you? And what's the general status update of things back on our world...?"

Her voice returns immediately.

"I'm fine... better than fine. We're all okay. We won our battles. But—Jay! You went dark for days... Where'd the throne take you?"

A warm feeling rushes through me hearing this, and it certainly isn't any new system upgrade or extra power.

I let out a long breath I didn't even know I was holding in. A weight of worry is lifted off my shoulders as I deactivate my conceal skill, making the horns and facial features of Drako Vermillion fade away.

My pristine ethereal Noble Human form lights up the room now, still representative of my true face. I activate a two-way [Spectate] feed while I reply.

The same mind-blowing visual of thousands of towers, endless clouds, and an in-depth perception through my Noble eyes for over 100 thousand kilometers in every direction is projected into Maria's mind.Nôv(el)B\\jnn

In return, I receive a visual feed of everything within her senses too and see a strange sight of the other generals and massive piles of wealth filling rooms all throughout the Apex Regions base.

While this is intriguing, my vision stays fixed on Maria's core. It looks even darker blue, and a large amount of her active strength and stats right now is working on full power to contain this Soul Energy within the confines of her body.

There is a massive amount of Mana and Qi acting as if it has an insatiable hunger. Even with my eyes as they are now, the true depths of this core are a strange mystery to me. It's like it simultaneously wants to devour all of the energy around her, while also wishes to release an overwhelming amount of power from within.

It feels like the deeper I look, the harder it is to sense, as if the royal blue light is turning black. It makes me wonder if it's because I'm trying to look through a simulated hologram, and if I were there with her on the human world, I could make sense of things better.

I continue talking, as all I get back from sharing my view is silence.

"You've grown much stronger..."

–

Her eyes widen, and she reflexively gasps at the enormity of the sight before her.

She replies to me through our link.

"You have grown too... much stronger..."

Heads turn in the room within the Apex Region headquarters, and Maria whispers her next words aloud for all of them to hear.

"Jay has made contact. He's safe...."

Arie, Abby, and Raven all stop sifting through their system messages and message boards to request access to the telepathy channel we're on.

New faces pop up one by one, and everyone linked to my senses is able to see the same mind-blowing sight of a city many times larger than the entire world they stand on.

Beside me, Ember shrinks in size, halting his hybrid Dragon form to stand at a similar height of 20 meters next to me.

He enters the telepathy channel and is the first to speak again, breaking the silence.

"What a surprise. You can really contact the Lower Realm."

Within a pseudo-holographic chamber within the system, the six of us on this call can all feel each other's presence and see the full imagery of our bodies floating in a void.

Ember's eyes sweep over everyone on the call, but his gaze stops on Abby.

"You managed to awaken that ability already...?"

Ember grins while Abby's eyebrows raise.

"What ability? What do you mean already?" she responds after shaking herself out of the overwhelming display of the Citadel I just showed her.

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His eyes move up and down the others, but he doesn't care much for what he sees. The hybrid dragon with sharp claws, red and black scales, and a long pointed tail rests his gaze back on the sparkling green healer.

"It's what I was trying to beat out of you before the throne awakened. Looks like the Immortal Healer really has returned. I'd warn against trying to awaken that power any further... at least, on a world you'd like to keep in one piece."

As Ember refuses to tell any more until she sees him in person, Abby stares at him with a partially frustrated glare.

I, however, look my other teammates up and down.

Arie stands out to me next.

There is hardly any divine energy in his body. Only some leftover threads he absorbed after cleaning up the corpses of the demons' forces after the war days ago.

However, his body is strong.

The Qi that reinforces his demonic Soul Energy feels even stronger. A familiar warm sensation glows within his being. It's like I'm feeling a watered-down version of Ether flowing through him. It's far less potent than the low-quality Ether I've absorbed over the last few days, but it certainly has the same properties.

It's seamlessly infused with Qi as its base, bonding his Soul Energy together as one. I make a comment on it out of curiosity.

"That energy you wield, there is something similar to it here, in the Upper Realm."

Arie shakes himself out of the magnificent display of shimmering green towers, endless rolling clouds, and billions of dead worlds in the exile zones.

"Really? There is Concentrated Essence up there??"

I tighten my gaze and nod.

"Yes, I believe so... but it goes by a different name, and it's far more refined. I have quite a bit of it up here. Maybe I can send you some..."

The memories of many Demons and other Lords sending and receiving pure ether through their systems are clear in my mind, but I don't have an avatar to mimic that transaction.

However, there may be something different that will work the same way.

I pause for a moment, as the scene of the whole Apex Region continues to play out in my mind, and I figure there's only one thing that could keep Bri so fixated rather than joining the conversation: money.

It's clear it has to do with this [World Wide Connectivity System] that keeps showing up in my notifications during milestone updates, so I decide to open it up.

Instantly, hundreds of trillions of messages flood into my mind. As the System operator, I have even more control over this interface than the generals.

Although, unlike them, my name doesn't show up in any of the databases. I'm like a ghost, with god-like power. I feel the ability to manipulate the leaderboards as I wish, shut down or view any and all private or public message boards.

Even the items and money within the system—if I wanted to—I could pull it all out into my own system storage right now with a single thought.

My eyes widen, and I sift through the data of every single transaction that has passed within the last few days, gaining a complete understanding of what Bri has achieved while I was away.

I just grin and close the interface. The small, harmless manipulation they're doing now to keep order among worlds is more than enough to maintain peace and profit in the meantime. I will remain a ghost and not interfere in the World Wide Connectivity Marketplace. It should remain a tool for the planets of the Lower Realm to compete, trade, communicate, and thrive.

"Yes, I do believe it will be possible to transfer materials between realms. I will look into it further later, but it looks like Bri has already secured you a means to grow stronger. Focusing on compressing your True Cores should be the priority."

As our perception is linked, Ember and these four generals all witnessed my peek into the system, but none of them comment on it. Ember is not surprised, while the others are still taking in the awe-inspiring Upper Realm. A look into a deeper level of the system interface they are already accustomed to isn't that surprising either.

Raven speaks up next.

"Yes, many of the Order's rules and rituals make far more sense to me now. My duty is to help them compress their True Cores. Then, we will fully saturate them. However, all of the texts I've read only allow a single entity per world to ascend via normal means. I—"

I open up a panel in my system labeled [Fast Travel] for all of the generals to see, and Raven stops talking mid-sentence as she reads one of the lines below the information on this perk.

[Any one of the Rising Emperor's 5 Generals may use this Fast Travel Perk 1 time every 24 hours. This ability allows the users to take the fastest route of travel from their current position to a mutually agreed upon position within 100 meters of the Rising Emperor.]

[Choose Travel Type:]

[1][Deposit Mana][Default Pre-Activated]

[2][Create Demonic Energy[i] Travel Type][Admin Activation Necessary for General Use]

[3][Create Ether[i] Travel Type][Admin Activation Necessary for General Use]

When my gaze hovers over the mana deposit button, an astronomical amount of energy is necessary to travel. It constantly shifts up and down, hundreds of quintillions of MP every second that passes, visualizing that the planet they're on is moving in a strange direction compared to the position I'm standing in here in the Upper Realm.

It seems a single fast travel will cost a high single digit percent of all of the mana on a 3rd Class world like this.

With Bri's business ability, acquiring more mana won't be an issue. However, it's an extremely high amount. This much MP could easily bring a Labyrinth from 1 to 100 floors in an instant.

This deposit button is greyed out in my system, as the generals are the ones that must pay the fee. However, hundreds of plots of land all around me within a 100-meter radius light up in my mind where I'm able to select a travel point.

I allow these panels to fade from my vision and look back up at Raven.

"Getting you up here won't be as tough as it seems."

I open up my storage and allow a slab of leftover S-Grade mana shielding to fall out. In the Lower Realm, it can easily contain the full-powered blows of true yellow core hunters.

Here, I allow this slab, one of the strongest substances on the human realm, to be crushed into dust from the gravity and pressure of the air before it even touches the floor of this suite.

"Surviving the pressure up here is a far greater challenge. You saw how hard I fought to keep my body within the throne, right? That doesn't even compare to the normal conditions, walking about in the open air. Your goals are to compress, then fully saturate your cores. Afterward, we'll work on a travel plan."

I smirk as their faces light up with awe again. At the same time, Ember's presence fades from the call slightly as he privately checks a system message sent to him from Torvak, on the other side of the Citadel.

He looks at me within the private suite and speaks out loud.

"They made it to the High Orc's base without any problems. The Warlords wish to open a secure line and speak to you, the new Leader of their Citadel."

I look out the window in their direction, and even with my advanced perception, I can't see through the tower I watched them enter. I reply with a slow nod, activating my mana manipulation's true core ability to form shimmering green replicas of Abby, Maria, Arie, and Raven within this room.

"Very well, connect us. We'll take the call together."