Our journey through Ring Three was a little crazy. It shouldn’t have been, considering I was once again just leading the monsters on to the destination they needed to go to

  But this wasn’t the team I was supposed to be leading. These weren’t the people who lived on Ring Four, who eked out a survival when the rest of Zairgon didn’t care for them. These weren’t the people who I cared for, and who cared for me in return.

  Still, we were all working towards the same goal—getting rid of the Blight Swarm.

  “Are you sure we’re going the right way?” one of the guards asked.

  I was spared the need to answer.

  “Don’t you see the blood on the ground?” another guard said. “It’s Pits-cursed black.”

  With the poor lighting, it would be easy to mistake the dark splotches as dried up blood dark enough to be considered black. But this wasn’t just any old blackness littering the streets of Ring Three.

  These were writhing, twisting, living Netherthreads.

  Wisps of dark energy curled off the ground wherever there were bloodstains. The droplets my wound was leaving had the same property. I was, after all, infected by the Netherthreads too. Had been, ever since my Eversight dungeon delve. They just hadn’t manifested with the same intensity as they had in Khagnio’s new tail.

  I wondered if that was because of my Illumination Aspect. Was my mana core naturally channelling it? Or was it somehow filled up with Illumination Aspected mana and was therefore keeping it under control much better than my Scalekin buddy’s wayward appendage?

  Something to investigate later. Right alongside the fact that I had manifested my first Compound Aspect. For now, we were busy leading away the monsters not far behind us.

  We were joined by other squads trying to achieve the same thing. More of the Swarm being led by groups of runaways here and there, all over Ring Three. It was a ring, after all. The invasion was occurring on multiple fronts.

  Our journey took us past the Mage Guild grounds. I was a little awed to see an enormous barrier of what looked like magical glass blanketing the entire castle-like Guildhall. The monsters were being repelled by it. Even the ones using the black lashes weren’t making much headway against the barrier. It was clearly powerful magic.

  Strangely, there weren’t many mages within the barrier keeping it up. All I saw, as I hurried along past it, was one familiar person with arms raised high. That was… Kliezeg?

  The Ogre had thick strands of glowing white and pink energy streaming from his hands, rising up to empower the barrier that he had clearly made. A barrier that could stand strong against such a huge horde of monsters was insane. Was Kliezeg that powerful? He hadn’t ever given me that impression. I had noted his badge too. It had been Silver, just like mine. So how—

  “No fucking way,” I muttered.

  “What?” one of the guards asked. “What’s wrong?”

  “Is the Mage Guild’s Guildmaster secretly posing as Kliezeg?”

  The guard, rightfully, looked like I had lost my mind.

  I didn’t have room to worry about it. We were travelling faster, going past the more populated areas of Ring Three towards the wider fields. The area just before the dungeon I had essentially destroyed.

  Right then, I was just glad that Zairgon administration had seen fit to drag the people of Ring Three out of their homes and move them somewhere else. The plan necessitated that the bugs invading everywhere would have to be led to the Nether Vein. This included the invasion from the west, from the east, from the north and south too.

  I didn’t know where the Councillors and everyone else participating in my plan had dragged the civilians and non-combat participants to. Among them were all the people of Ring Four who weren’t fighting as well. I just hoped they were alright.

  As we neared the entrance to the dungeon, the next group we met had some familiar faces.

  “Ross!” Ugnash yelled from across the field while fending off about a dozen flying ants at once. His tanking ability with those red threads drawing all aggression towards him was in full effect. “Is it true? Are you the crazy bastard who concocted this insane plan?”

  “Seriously, you have to ask?” Cerea was right alongside him, zapping the monsters in the air. “Of course it’s him.”

  “Of course.”

  I’d dearly have liked to engage in friendly banter, but I couldn’t summon the strength to yell back. Not when the dungeon was so close. Not when my anxiety was spiking in fear, wondering if the Nether Vein really would solve the Blight Swarm problem like I believed it would. So all I did was flash them my biggest grin as I rushed onwards.

  Things were getting a lot more chaotic now that we were so close. There were people fighting everywhere. Not every single warrior battling against the Blight Swarm would fit inside the dungeon.

  But they had done their part. They had led the monsters in close enough. Their presence was actively leading the rest of the invasion towards this very location.

  Especially thanks to the trail Khagnio—and to a lesser extent, I—had left.

  The wondrous thing was that everyone was trying to maintain the formation that had been set out during the planning phase. A careful corralling defence that was meant to funnel the monsters towards the yawning dungeon entrance, which had been shattered even wider thanks to people blowing it apart. I was definitely not responsible for that. Well, not directly, at least.

  “Keep going, Cultist Ross!” Lujean shouted when I met him not far from the entrance. “We’ll push them inside behind you!”

  I thought about requesting them to join me but no. Too dangerous. He and most of the rest of the Scarthralls had picked the spot they believed would be best for them. I didn’t want them getting mired in whatever the Nether Vein might hold in store.

  Of course, there were many monsters trying to stop us. Creatures swooping in from above. Giant insects leaving behind the defenders to attack me and my party.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  Some I took out on my own. Especially when they got too close. But most I let the others destroy.

  Now that I was so close, I couldn’t care what stepped in front of me. I couldn’t give a shit what sort of bug popped up, couldn’t even muster a great deal of worry about how long and how well the defenders could maintain their position or just continue funneling our enemy into the dungeon. All I could concentrate on was seeing this plan fulfilled as best as I could.

  All the more so when, as soon as me and my little ragtag party entered the dungeon, we found ourselves facing a literal horde of the creatures crawling over every available surface.

  “How in the world are we going to get through that?” a guard asked.

  He didn’t get an answer because the nearer bugs turned and faced us. They attacked, forcing us to engage. Or rather, forcing the guards to engage. I had chugged down a mana potion, so I was ready to fight too, but if my impromptu teammates could open up a pathway for me, then I’d be rushing through.

  Sadly, that didn’t look like it was happening anytime soon. So, I hefted my mace, getting ready to jump in as soon as I got an opening.

  I was saved from the effort of doing so when the Councillor decided to pop in.

  One moment, we were facing down the biggest army of insect monsters I had seen thus far, all bunched up and squeezed together with black threads running everywhere. The next, a loud impact behind us made everything shake like the earth was about to blow.

  Then a beam of compressed white flame shot in and cleared a path right through the bugs.

  I blinked hard against the brightness of the beam. It had already dissipated, but every blink had afterimages impressed on my eyelids. When I was able to see properly again, I found that the beam had melted a path through the huge army of bugs, the nearest ones burning away to widen the way forward even more.

  “What dost thou tarry for?” Councillor Lassikhio roared. “Thy path is clear! Go.”

  I didn’t need to be told twice. Yelling at the rest of the guards to follow as fast as they could, I hurried onwards. A part of me was tempted to ask the Councillor what was up with the more powerful monsters he had been dealing with in Zairgon airspace, but who cared.

  My goal was staring me in the face and I wasn’t about to be distracted from grabbing it with both hands.

  I rushed through the widening tunnel. It was too hot at first. That damn Councillor was something else. But as I got going, I channelled Flare with only Concentration, drawing in the heat to little bursts that spread it away from the centre. The guard with the icy Aspect was also helping cool things down a lot.

  “This is… crazy,” one of the guards said.

  She wasn’t just commenting on the sheer amount of the Swarm around us. There was that. But alongside that, there was the way the dungeon was opening up and revealing itself.

  It was crawling with Netherthreads. The black strands weren’t just wrapped up all over the bug monsters and whatnot. They were inscribed into the walls, wriggling all over the wall, blanketing the entire ceiling.

  The sight made my skin crawl too. I felt the Netherthreads within me respond accordingly with stinging pinches, my mana core whirring to life as well to tamp them down.

  I wondered how intense it was going to get inside the Nether Vein itself.

  There were more people all over the destroyed dungeon as well. More guards and soldiers, more defenders from Ring Four, more warriors battling against the monsters while trying not to die. The sheer presence of the black threads meant that even the bugs that fell were soon revived by the Netherthreads.

  In fact, it looked like the black energy was buffing them a great deal, making the battle even more precarious than it already was.

  The worst bit was that my ever-present shadow was growing stronger every second too. It had grown larger, more solid, keeping up with me no matter which direction I went, going through everything like it really was incorporeal. Even worse was the growing menace I felt from it. Not directed at me, necessarily, but a growing sense of malice for everything.

  Kind of like what I saw in action from the Blight Swarm.

  And no one could still see it. That was the worst part. It made me feel like I was seeing things, like whatever was going on with my Path Evolution was somehow messing with me. I hated it.

  “Where are you going?” one of the guards asked with growing alarm as we reached the massive pit in the middle of the dungeon. It was far wider now after my mana implosion. At least three times as large as I remembered.

  “To the Nether Vein,” I said.

  “But that’s crawling with the monsters. You’re seeing that, right?”

  I did not appreciate the reference to me seeing things, but I held back my annoyance. Poor guard was just concerned about me getting myself killed. “I can’t bring you guys with me though. That would be a little too difficult. But I’ll be fine.

  “No, you won’t. You’re a Pits-cursed Silver!”

  I raised an eyebrow at the Rakshasa. “You think a Silver can do what I’ve done so far?”

  To that, he didn’t have any answers.

  “Take care, Cultist,” said another guard.

  I nodded. “You too. Try not to die.”

  Then I jumped.

  I smashed through the first few bugs without a great deal of trouble. My plummet was too fast, too powerful, even without using Gravity. I slammed away several of the monsters, kicked myself off a few, all the while falling far too fast for any of them to reach me. But my plummet slowed on its own before long, without even me needing to use Gravity.

  It was difficult to tell what was going on. The lower I descended, the more everything turned bright and shining, weird prismatic feathers floating everywhere. They had somehow petrified the bugs lower down, holding them in place like they were frozen in time entirely.

  Slowly, I realized I was being frozen too, my thoughts turning sluggish as my body’s functions winded down.

  Panic clutched my chest. I couldn’t even begin to understand what was going on. Was the Nether Vein already open? Was this one of its effects? No, this looked like the opposite of the black threads. There was something faintly familiar about the prismatic leaves…

  Wait, those weren’t leaves. Those were—

  “Ah, you’ve arrived,” an ethereal but familiar voice said. Se-Vigilance’s words came from everywhere and nowhere. “I grant you permission to pass.”

  The worrying sensations disappeared as if they had never been there to begin with. I resumed plummeting, my somewhat confused mind barely remembering to channel Siphon to lower my falling speed so I wasn’t splattered when I hit the ground.

  Well, there was no ground to hit. Instead, after I passed through the strange overly lit-up zone where the Councillor’s power was active, I arrived at the bottom of the pit, right before the Nether Vein. Strange platforms hung in the air over the sea of writhing darkness, and I felt weirdly satisfied at being able to use Field Manipulation on my hand to drag myself to one of the platforms.

  Satisfied because it was heady to realize I could do that. If things couldn’t be moved, and I had suspected those prismatic discs would be stuck in place, then the movable body would be the one getting pulled via Field Manipulation.

  “Took you long enough, mageling,” Khagnio said from another platform.

  He wasn’t the only one present here. Farther off from us both, the Se-Targa Councillor was hovering in place in front of the massive gates of the Nether Vein. She had a few other Se-Targa with her, though of course, none of them gave off the same sensation of ridiculous power as she did.

  “We were going to start without you,” Khagnio went on saying.

  “Well, it’s not like I’m needed here,” I said. That probably explained why the Councillor really was going to open the Nether Vein without my presence.

  “Ahoi, Ross!” Kostis waved at me from far off, floating on a dense cloud of smoke. “Glad to see you made it.”

  I greeted him with a wave. Was my Scalekin master really going to dive into the Nether Vein right as it opened? I wouldn’t be surprised if that was indeed the case.

  My Netherthread shadow had dropped alongside me. Asshole didn’t even need a platform to remain right by my side, almost mocking me with its menacing presence. I still didn’t fully understand what was going on with my Path Evolution.

  Above me, the prismatic mist flickered with the magical feathers that the Councillor had unleashed, keeping the weaker bugs above us trapped. So much power…

  “Prepare yourselves!” the Councillor shouted. “It is time we opened the gate.”

  I wasn’t privy to the exact mechanisms needed to open the Nether Vein, but that was fine. I could rest easy knowing that it was in competent hands. Master Kostis and the Councillor would be well aware.

  Khagnio and I had a bit of a different role. We would need to act as the final lure to draw the bugs into the Nether Vein.

  With a loud groan, with all its interlocks slowly pulling away, the Nether Vein opened.