"Ugh, just a bit more!" Maria stood up with an irritated expression, rings of airwaves expanding around her as her aura fluctuated violently like a caged beast trying to set itself free.
"Haven't broken through yet?" Varian raised a brow.
In response, she threw him a vicious glare and walked out of the cave. "If you hadn't taken that pearl…"
To his surprise, other than the little grumble, she remained calm as they transversed the mountains, and slaughtered a few aerial and land beasts here and there before stopping.
"The entrance to the next floor is on top of this tree." She pointed.
"Err, what?" Varian raised his neck and stared all the way up.
The tree…didn't really look like one. Sure, it had a tall, straight, and thick trunk, but it was in a T shape. It had no branches, no leaves, and certainly no fruits.
It had something akin to a platform at its top. Because of the constant sand rain, a mountain of sand had accumulated on top of the tree.
"Is the entrance next to the—"
"It's in that sand mountain." Maria cut him off.
With no choice left, Varian scanned the tree and his casual expression slowly grew solemn.
Even though the tree looked desolate with its ash-colored trunk, there were in fact many chameleon-like creatures living on it. They're worse than chameleons in the sense these creatures could freely change their shapes at will.
Some of these creatures were pretty weak. Only rank 1s. Others, not so. Especially the rank 5s that lurked at the top of the tree.
"What's the plan?" Varian asked. "Teleport to the top, avoid fighting, and dive into the sand?"
"It's all fine until diving into the sand," Maria shrugged. "That much sand will kill us both before we could react."
"So, you have any good ideas?" Varian looked at the tree princess with expectation.
Truthfully, he could still use his matter powers to separate some of the sand and carve them a way in. But it'd expose his powers.
So, he wanted to do it her way. What's more, if this woman came here for some mission, she'd have prepared for these scenarios, right?
"I can't tell if you're still playing your character or honestly curious," She gave him a suspicious glance and took out a silver gun.
With a click, a mass of yellow-blue sphere shot into the sky and exploded, resulting in a dazzling colorful firework against the dull rain of sand.
"What was that?"
"A signal for others that the entrance to the next floor is here." Maria looked him in the eye and said with a smile that wasn't really a smile.
"You're vicious, alright."
"Thank you."
The two of them hid nearby.
Under just an hour, adventure teams ranging from five people to fifty arrived at the foot of the tree and took out their own devices to verify the message.
The entrances to the next floors always keep changing, so it's impossible for anyone to be sure. But identifying it from a small distance was still within their scope.
Soon, scouts from some powerful teams climbed up the trees while staying as far away as they can from the powerful beasts and verified the existence of the floor.
In no time, the teams joined hands and blood bathed the tree. Only the ten rank 5 beasts were left.
The coalition reached a staggering number of two hundred and had three rank 5s, a dozen rank 4s with the rest being rank 3s.
Even though they couldn't overpower all the strong beasts, they had the strength to take down at least half of them. But the teams and the beasts reached an agreement using some trade.
As the dust settled, three large groups joined hands and began gatekeeping the entrance.
By then, thousands of challengers had arrived and were waiting anxiously to enter the next floor.
At this conjecture, Maria and Varian also stood as a rare small team of two individuals at the end of the crowd.
They demanded certain precious plants and herbs for each person to pass through.
But conflicts already began breaking out and at least thirty people were murdered for whatever reasons before things calmed down.
"You're paying for me, right?" Varian asked without any hesitation.
"…" Maria looked at Varian with an incredulous expression.
"What?"
"…I don't know how someone can be so shameless."
"I'm doing you a favor," Varian said with a straight face.
"Consider meeting you my bad luck." Maria sighed begrudgingly and paid the menacing guards a small fortune.
The sand at the top was cleared already and the two smoothly entered an arcane glowing formation and the next thing they knew, they were in another world.
A world full of fog. Special, thick fog that even Varian's advanced celestial senses can't penetrate.
"Fuck."
Before he could think further, Varian clenched his head as a piercing pain assaulted his mind.
[Floor 2: Realms Of Nightmare
This place is a torture for the weak-minded.
Any plant, animal, and even inanimate objects here can evoke your fears.
That's why, this is also the best place to hone your will.
Survival Time Left: 6: 32: 11 + 20: 00: 00]
"I hate this place," Maria put on a softly glowing green pendant before her expression eased. "The rule of thumb here is that the entrance to the next floor can be accessed through one of those houses."
"Houses?" Varian shook his head to hopefully shake off the feeling of a knife twisting in his head and asked.
"Haunted Houses. It's like a cheat, whenever over a hundred natives and ten challengers die within a radius of ten miles, a haunted house is formed."
"Natives in this place?" Varian rubbed his arms as the wind grew strangely cold. "For example?"
"For example," Maria parted her lips, and a spear thrust through her heart.
Varian jumped back and drew out his sword as her body exploded into a puff of green smoke.
Another Maria Virdis stepped out of the fog with that familiar spear. She glanced at him with a bland expression and said. "These impersonating ghosts are very annoying."
"Don't move." Varian pointed a finger at her and a white light shot from his finger.
Maria wanted to dodge but after sensing the white light wasn't trying to harm her, she calmed down. The white light melted into her palm and a mark appeared on the back of her hand.
"That's a stamp to verify if it's really you," Varian said and jumped into the sky to get a better view.
It's all fog. The sky, the ground, the surroundings—everything was covered in fog. Worse, it wasn't even a real fog. Varian could feel it. It's all a mental illusion. But the illusion was so strong that it was real.
"Let's start hunting down a few natives and built a haunted house. It's the easiest way to get outta here." Maria suggested.
Varian responded by decapitating her.
"Keep the distance low," Maria Virdis walked out of the fog again and said in a hushed, reprimanding tone. "This planet is weird. You can't even come to the same place by walking in a circle. Be careful."
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