I stare at the spot where a mana crystal wide as a bus and tall as a skyscraper used to stand and turn to my duplicate. “So it disappeared.”

“Yup,” he answers.

“It just disappeared while leaving behind traces as if someone had used the skill called [Tether].”

“Yup,” he repeats.

Well, it looks like someone is cooking. Be it for our confrontation or something else. But it's not like I haven’t been doing the same, so I can’t really complain. On the contrary, I'm curious. Our thought process is very nearly the same, but as our environment affects us, we come up with different methods and think of different skills. Him being on a tight time limit has changed him in ways that are hard for me to imagine.

“Well, anyway, I want to resume our attempts to power [Focus] with black mana with our trait active. It could help you too.” I say.

“We can do that for today. Tomorrow we should go to the bunker under the Sleeping Noodle. My anchor is already weakening.”

“Yes. I need to deal with some stuff but in one hour?”

“Okay.” He teleports, and I'm left alone looking at the empty spot.

With a snort, I teleport as well, appearing in one of the rooms that seems to have housed someone in a high position. The furniture is gone, and there is nothing of real interest, but I like the colors and the way ornaments light the room when I run mana through them.

“I want to pick my reward for the side quest,” I say.

Congratulations on completing the side quest! You can now pick one mid-epic item from the offered options.

Silentstep Tunic (Epic):

Crafted from the silk of a mythical spider, the tunic is as durable as it is light. It can easily be concealed under everyday clothing and offers protection against both physical and magical attacks. The tunic's unique fabric absorbs sound, making the wearer's movements silent and hard to detect.

Amulet of Whispering Winds (Epic):

This amulet holds a fragment of the eternal wind within its core. It allows the wearer to communicate with others across vast distances. By whispering into the amulet, the message is carried on the wind, reaching its intended recipient with a whisper only they can hear.

Mirage Bead (Epic):

This bead can be activated to cast an intricate illusion around the user, making them appear as someone else for a few hours. The illusion is complete with visual, auditory, and even tactile elements, making it incredibly difficult to see through, though it is possible with enough skill. After use, the bead turns to sand.

Starfall Pebble (Epic):

A small, unassuming stone that holds a fragment of a fallen star's core. When thrown against a hard surface, it unleashes a devastating explosion of kinetic energy. The pebble is consumed in the process, making it a powerful single-use weapon.

Heart of the Phoenix Emblem (Epic):

Worn directly over the heart, this emblem can be used to bring the wearer back from the brink of death, engulfing them in flames that heal but do not burn. This power can be called upon three times, after which the emblem fades.

Titan's Backbone (Epic):

Inscribed along the spine, this tattoo grants the wearer the indomitable endurance of a titan, enabling them to withstand any attack without faltering. This titanic resilience is available three times.

There are some really nice options. I like the tunic, and it could increase my defenses, but who needs more defenses when I can kill my opponent quicker?

Amulet of Whispering Winds? Why would I want to talk to people?

Mirage Bead is single-use, so the effect is probably capable of deceiving people of an even higher level than me. The twins will probably be capable of that in the future.

Pebble? I can make my own. Probably not as strong, but that’s ok.

Then we get to the emblem and tattoo, and I like them both. Having the failsafe of the emblem to bring me back from the brink of death would be reassuring. It could probably restore even my worst wounds and restore limbs.

But!

I like Titan's Backbone a bit more. It's simple. When activated, it should allow me to do whatever I want with black mana. Well, probably up to a limit. I still remember how the black mana orb cracked a high tier epic weapon on the 4th floor. But even that might be fine, even though the tattoo is mid-epic, its uses are limited, so these uses might be stronger than the performance of an upper epic item.This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Its tier could be due to the limited number of uses. Logically, right?

“I pick Titan's Backbone.”

Then I wait while I feel the burning sensation on my back. As always, when the system does something, I try to observe, but as usual, I'm not capable of doing so. I can't feel any presence doing it. I can't sense where the mana doing it is coming from. It just happens. It's disturbing as always.

The timer says I have four days left until Vega comes back, and so far, she seems to be alive. There have been no notifications saying otherwise.

Stretching a bit and trying to examine the tattoo on my back, I stand up and head towards my duplicate. Mana compressed by [Focus] won't master itself and training with the Duplicate helps me to save weeks, if not months.

There are lines painted on mine and Clonthaniel's foreheads. A few more on our arms. We even made something we call a Focus crown.

It's more akin to wreaths, and one of each sits on our heads. The lovingly named Focus Crown is made of thin, wire-like threads of conductive metals we melted and covered in mana stones.

Being as ugly as it is, we don't mention it too often, but we’ve put a lot of effort into the inscriptions, each one designed to lessen the aftereffects of using black mana to power our [Focus]. Unfortunately, the "crowns" are upper rare at most, we are still unable to create epic items from scratch.

Our mana is topped up, our Vortex Cores are full. The thermokinetic heart is strong and ready. I have a voidsteel slicer on my waist as well as the voidsteel rapier the Housekeeper gifted to me. Meanwhile, Clonthaniel only has a voidsteel slicer, such a loser.

Neither of us is wearing any armor. I still haven’t gotten used to wearing armor even after I’ve had opportunities to try good armor. I just don't like the feeling of restriction it gives me, and it doesn't feel as versatile as my skills. That might be the reason I get hurt so often, but that's something to think about another day.

No words are needed, and once my duplicate puts his hand on my shoulder, I let his [Tether] take us to the anchor while leaving multiple anchors behind.

We appear in darkness, but neither of us creates light. Instead defensive skills activate, and [Perception] scans the area.

There is no imminent danger, so both of us form a thermal orb that starts letting out gentle golden light and floats higher, illuminating the cave we find ourselves in.

Drawing our weapons, we follow the only available path, a tunnel leading downward. As things tend to be in these places, it is extremely quiet, and the only thing we hear is the sound of our own steps. The air is stale, and the walls are wet, with drops of water falling to the floor.

We do not rush, maintaining a normal walking speed, while enjoying the tension in the air.

As we go deeper, we pass through an iron door. Of the same type as the one leading to the bunker, we are currently staying in. The door that was impossible for me to move or open. Yet there they are, mangled, crumpled, and torn apart in places. Thermal orbs light them, creating shadows that make them look even more ominous.

The tunnels we pass through slowly become wider, the rock replaced by walls made of smooth stone and iron. But even these are damaged. Craters cover the walls, melted debris is scattered about, and there are gaping holes in places with extremely smooth edges. There’s all sorts of damage all over the place.

I change the setting on my Regulator and devote more of my mana to strengthening my body through Reinforcement.

Soon, the mana density starts increasing. The Valley is already full of extremely dense mana that we’re constantly having to defend against. Less powerful individuals even die there just from that. Even so, it increases even more and forces me to strengthen my Mantle and give more of my attention to the [Resonance] I'm using to deal with it.

The further we go, the more damaged the tunnels are. Fallen pieces of ceiling, torn off in uneven chunks. An entire side of the wall melted into a heap of cooled slag.

And the pressure increases even further.

Then we find the first corpse. It's extremely well-preserved. Either it’s fresh or more likely it was someone with a body powerful enough to look like that even after being dead for a hundred or so years.

We spend a bit of time examining it. We look at broken equipment, search pockets, and try to find a wound. But we can’t find anything. The man died just like that, without any outward or internal signs we could find as to why.

In the end, I touch it and send it back to the bunker through [Tether].

A minute later, we find more corpses grouped together. This time they all show signs of the passage of time, but their clothes seem new. Each of the men and women is wearing beautiful robes covered in dozens of mana stones. Some of the mana stones are as small as my pinkie nail, woven into clothes, creating a series of defensive fields. Others are larger, set in necklaces, bracelets, and earrings.

Each one is densely inscribed and has some function, some of which I can’t quite understand.

One of the corpses, a woman, is wearing a bracelet with a big mana stone that seems to be something like a key. After a short discussion, we cut off the arm with the bracelet just in case the key needs DNA to activate, like when the orbit base on the 4th floor would only respond to Myrra. Then we send all the corpses and items away through [Tether].

As the pressure keeps increasing, we are forced to combine our forces to create a field around us. We walk close to each other, Mana Wavelength Iris activating once in a while just for a fraction of a second. The ever-present mana makes our abuse of our eyes extremely painful even with our preparations.

The world I see with my trait is packed to the brim with mana that hangs like mist flowing in waves all around us, resonating with each other and reflecting off the walls. Tiny particles permeate the air, falling like snow and swirling in places as if they were caught in a vortex.

Finally, more rooms start appearing, each of them has a door and most of them seem to have been labeled with markings that likely describe their use. Some of them even have panels that seem to be security interfaces. We examine a few of them, and it takes us a while to figure out how to use the key bracelet with the arm we cut off. The woman seems to have been pretty high up given her level of access.

Even after a hundred years or more, the doors still move smoothly and quietly, barely making a hiss as air equalizes between the rooms.

There are facilities, but most of them seem to be in a perfectly operational state. For example, there’s an enchanting facility better than anything I’ve seen up till now. Full of tools and materials. Conductive metals like arcanadium, ingots of endurium, compressed pieces of voidsteel, and many more I can’t even identify a purpose for.

The enchanting facility is also full of half-finished items. Swords imbued with mana stones waiting to be inscribed. Spears made of endurium waiting to be sharpened through some mysterious process. Robes on tables with tens of mana stones ready to be conjoined in a working web of inscriptions. A crown made of a mysterious metal waiting for mana stones to be placed in its settings.

Dozens of items, most of them of upper rare rarity even in their unfinished state.

The system shop is willing to pay more for items we craft by ourselves. When you buy an item from the system shop and sell it back, you get 50%. If you get an item from the floor and sell it to the system, you get 10-20% of its value. But if you craft an item from materials you gathered on that floor, you get 50% of the item’s value.

Looking at the sheer amount of items and materials, some of them have the potential to be made into epic-grade items, I can only imagine how many shards I should be capable of hoarding after using all of this. And this is only the start. The first good facility we’ve found and there are probably quite a few more, judging by the sheer size of the place.

So this is one of the Enchanter’s Guild’s bunkers, one of the places they used to instate the Veil, and with a core that could only have been recharged by one of the Champions, it seems even they were willing to work for the Enchanter Guild.

We send some items and materials back to the bunker we came from and then place multiple anchors within.

Even in the short time we’ve spent here, I can feel my body's reserves dwindling, and I have already dipped into my mana reservoir. It's shocking how much I need to use to hold off the pressure and how much mana it costs even with my stats.

“We have to return as soon as possible,” my duplicate says.

And I can't help but agree as we teleport away to recharge our mana before we come back.

There is so much to explore and loot.