Dungeon Diver: Stealing A Monster’s Power

A chain reaction of layers of glyphs in front of me are shattered to dust.

I feel my body, mind, and soul weakening as over half of my entire ether pool dissolves out of my control into the atmosphere.

Even the Royal Vibrations and Primordial Aura in the air start to press in on the back side of this barrier where the weaker points are. Only the front is tough enough to withstand the impact of this spiked bolt made of pure Demonic Essence.

It’s packed with divine threads, and unlike the pools of Demonic Essence we absorbed before, these Glyphs are all completely activated, and imbued with intent to kill.

Even after the Demon’s death, all of its life energy has been sacrificed to take us out.

Despite this, our barrier holds strong.

Unlike the Ogre and Mammoths’ counterattacks that get absorbed instantly by this essence, or even the Dryad’s Glyphs left behind in the trees, they’re all helplessly melted away like it’s a strong acid.

When this Essence collides with us, it’s as though two equal forces are clashing. Only pure energy density matters. Our blue and red glyphs are just as dangerous as the purple ones colliding with them.

When the front of this spiked attack shatters from the energy overload, the back half of the arrow explodes as well. My entire vision becomes filled with purple light. However, it comes with a wave of relief. Blocking the excess essence is easy compared to defending against a blunt force attack.

Our vision of the outside zone is blocked out for a moment as a dome of dark purple energy splatters all around us, but it quickly returns as streaks of light burst through and all of the residue falls into the crater that has been created below us.

More and more of the fractured glyphs in our array dangle, dissolve, explode, and fall off into the puddle below. We have the ability to create more glyphs, but once broken we cannot remake them yet.

At least, using the current function where there is a disconnect between our medium-quality ether pool and the high-quality glyphs, the only thing we can do is create more or break down fully intact glyphs back into their original state.

Once the auras in the outside aura calm down, I watch both Ulgar and Vardon slowly float back toward us with widened eyes. We use the reversal technique to absorb what’s left of our defensive barrier, but only manage to recover about 20% of what we put in.

I don’t waste any time letting my tendrils of corruption leak out from my Demon’s Core, and drain the sea of Demonic Essence and Glyphs below me of their energy.

In a matter of seconds, the pool is gone, and my tendrils of black energy retract into my core. A pulse of hot white ether stimulates all of our glyphs again, but a majority of the raw high-quality ether only flows through us. Not all of our ether pool is recovered, but the pool we have left becomes far more refined.

We float up, and I drain the stray essence, then remaining energy in every one of the shattered Demon cores sprawled out over this battlefield. Their horns and soul weapons are tucked away into my storage as well.

By the time I absorb the essence in the 14th Demon Core, I’m expecting another flashback or flicker of memories… but nothing comes.

Our Primordial Auras grow, and my corruption’s Royal Vibrations grow far stronger from increasing the pool of Royal Demon’s wills inside it. Yet, I can still feel the invisible bottleneck holding my ether pool from breaking through to holding high-quality ether.

Our soul energy cores have been restored in their energy volume, and it has even been refined further. I feel like now we could have fended off that last attack with half the effort.

Ulgar finally speaks up once I drain the last Demon’s core, “You managed to block Demonic Essence. That’s normally impossible…” He speaks in a lower tone, like he’s muttering under his breath next, “So if the Originators created the first Unbreakable Glyphs… and the Demons tried to copy them, who could have possibly killed them? The Dryads were always a peaceful race, I can’t see them ever doing such a thing…”

Vardon butts into his whispers, “Maybe they just died of old age. Or sacrificed themselves in some kind of ritual; ancient races love killing themselves for the greater good.” The Mammoth gives an unamused sarcastic grunt. “We’ll never figure it out just speculating. Many smarter than us have tried.”

Ulgar opens his mouth to argue back, but a caw from the Griffin above us makes his gaze turn serious.

“This way… Come on. More guards are approaching.”

Instead of the fear of being found when I hear these words before, I’m slightly excited. The same feeling ripples through Maria’s Vibrations too.

Not only did we see the two ancient monsters with us fight off over a dozen of these Guards without getting a single scratch, but we have the ability to protect ourselves without any external aid.

I almost want to run into another group now.

The corners of my lips turn upward, but I still follow the Black Ogre away from our current position. We leave the crater-filled battlefield quickly, and move toward the domain he’s been talking about from the start.

I speak up once the cawing from the air stops, “What is a ritual domain anyway…? And why are you so certain we’ll be able to crack the barriers? Don’t you think the Demons would have modified them?”

Ulgar shakes his head and replies without looking back.

“No, they can’t modify them. All of the domain barriers are the same, made by the Dryads. No other large-scale artifacts can be built in the Garden. The Trees would wear them down and tear them apart over time.”

I think for a moment, and Ulgar continues after making a sharp right turn around the next tree.

“The Ritual Domains are a small amount of Domains that used to be owned by the Dryads. They hold the highest potency of High-Quality Ether, and used to be gifted out to races for a limited time in order to leave racial legacies behind to their new generations.”

Maria’s eyebrows rise, “What do you mean they used to be gifted to other races?”

Ulgar turns his head back and smiles, “When the Dryads were the rulers of this zone, they did not hold all of the resources for themselves. Any race that would ascend through all of the Layers of the Upper Realm, and make it this far would get to enjoy their peaceful life in this paradise. In the outer settlements, where you found me, that is where large offerings of ether could be given to the Dryads, and Domains could be purchased from one another.”

Vardon grunts, interrupting, “Yeah right, there was always war back then too. Even if you bought a Domain, other Lords would still try to conquer one another.”

Ulgar shrugs, “I wasn’t present in the early times; I only know of war like it is now… but I’d like to believe there was a time when all races in the Primordial Garden got along.”

He sighs, then continues explaining a few seconds later, “While there were permanent residents in the outer ring, there were and still are far larger Domains near the center of the Primordial Garden. They used to have blank inheritance chambers, where one could sacrifice themselves to create imprint legacies for a new generation of their race to inherit their memories and strength. Once completed, the races would leave and return to the outer settlements.”

“Until the Demons slaughtered all the Dryads and took the Ritual Domains and Tree of Life for themselves…” Vardon snorts out.

A natural wave of rust-colored aura and flames lights up our backs that comes out of his nose and mouth, but Maria and I are quick enough to summon a few dozen simple glyphs to block it.

While we retract our glyphs and Ulgar rolls his eyes, he comments again, “That is most likely true… I’ve never seen the Central Domain with my own eyes. I don’t know if the Tree of Life is real, or if it still stands if it ever was. The Ritual Domains part at least, I’m certain they own every one of them. I’ve been out here alone to find the best ones to target when I built up the confidence, but never managed to find a method energy-efficient enough to break through their Domain Barrier. Until now, that is.”

The Black Ogre stops in his tracks, looking straight ahead at wide open forest.

The roots in this area are much thicker, and the trees thinner, but they’re much closer together. The leaves and branches above us all tangle together to block out the sky.

Ulgar points between two trees and I feel his killing intent grow.

Vardon heats up too, staring forward, and a streak of white light falls down from the thick leaves.

A light impact crater makes a few roots splinter as Axel, the White Griffin, digs his claws into the wood while staring forward with fierce yellow eyes.

“We’re clear for over two hundred Trees on every side. If we get through in the next three minutes, not a single guard team will sense a thing.”

Ulgar turns back to us, then motions us forward. As he speaks, I start to see the high quality ether patterns of the invisible wall in front of us.

“Your time to shine. This is the final barrier. Let’s break into a Ritual Domain.”