Randidly rolled his shoulder and wiped some snow off his arm. He pursed his lips; even his hair seemed covered in a light dusting of snow. After a second of piercing cold, the temperature was once more starting to rise in the surrounding area. He glanced behind him and nodded; none of his subordinates had been harmed by the attack. They were covered in snow, but the blonde Claudette’s strike had been aimed at the members of the Engraving Guild.

Randidly looked at the five frozen figures, their features still twisted into a look of horror. But the worst by far was their leader, who was only a few meters in front of Randidly and looked completely lost. Inwardly, he shook his head. Kinda a shame. Would have been worth it to capture and interrogate them for more information about the weird Nether Core that man possessed and these arrays…

But in the end, Randidly could empathize with Claudette. After his experience within the shaft with Velio Dunn, he understood how frustrating being captured was. Since the people that Claudette killed seemed to be relatively minor figures, they probably wouldn’t have known much of interest. And with his Nether Sensation, just a look was enough to give Randidly some understanding of what was occurring with those Nether Cores.

I could barely sense the connections from this guy to the distant cores, but the way power was flowing was clear. Randidly tapped his cheek. So pyramid schemes exist everywhere, even in the Nexus. I wonder how vast this one truly is.

For the moment, Randidly focused on the members of the Holy Frost Society. As the freezing radiation of the image dimmed, Randidly first took a long look at their leader Claudette Beigon. Her dark blue plate armor was obviously ornate and her eyes were dark and inscrutable. He hadn’t been the target of her image, but Randidly was still rather impressed with how quickly she had reached the peak of her image’s power. In only a split second, a frightful chill had penetrated outward.

Randidly estimated that the image that Claudette revealed was weaker than any of his individual images, but only by a small amount. And he didn’t overlook the possibility that the attack she unleashed was just a portion of her power.

Beyond her were nine subordinates that still had their weapons out. They kept their tridents and scimitars at their sides, but Randidly didn’t miss the way they were eyeing them warily. At the very least, these individuals were powerful enough to feel threatened by him. Randidly couldn’t help but scratch his ear. Don’t they know that I’m currently attempting to be very low key…?

Around the same time, Claudette looked over to Randidly’s groups. There was a certain methodical aspect to her examination, where she spent a second inspecting each individual. Then she favored Randidly with a sweet smile and bowed. “Thank you again, fellow adventurers. I thought I was a goner! But it seems my Path to the Pinnacle hasn’t yet come to its end! Ah… apologies about your subordinate…”

Suddenly, Claudette faltered. Randidly turned to the side and saw that Kerwin was using the butt of his spear to crack a layer of ice that had formed on Lay’mel’s body. Randidly turned once again to face forward and waved a hand. “Don’t worry about it. That man is the type to seem more pathetic than he actually is. It’s part of his strength. But more importantly… are you also here for the Nether King?”

“Indeed. So you are a fellow Pinnacle Seeker!” Claudette said in an excited tone. She gestured happily and her subordinates stepped forward. “We, as your frozen subordinate informed you, are members of the Holy Frost Society. I am Claudette Beigon. It is a pleasure to meet you.”

Seeing that Claudette offered her hand and bowed, Randidly shook her hand politely. “Nice to meet you Miss Beigon. I’m Randidly Ghosthound.”

His actions earned him a loud sniff from Claudette’s second in command, who bowed along with her leader but gave Randidly the stink eye and tightly gripped her trident. Helplessly, Randidly could only shrug at her reaction, which made him feel like a street urchin being thoroughly dismissed by a prospective mother in law.

“Ignore her.” Claudette rolled her eyes and then unleashed another dazzling smile. “Narthalla is convinced that the only reason a man would give me the time would be to conquer my body. And you don’t intend to conquer me, do you Mr. Ghosthound?”

Randidly’s mouth twitched at Claudette’s rather direct manner of speech. Looking at her smile, it was hard to tell whether she did it on purpose or not. “...no I do not. I already have a… person who is special to me.”

“See Nary? No reason to be such a scrooge,” Claudette said cheerily, putting her hands on her hips. Then her expression turned more serious and she looked at Randidly again. “Also, I do not give my word lightly. Since you have resolved my predicament, I set aside my own gains and assist you in seeking enlightenment within these spaces. As long as you do not fight against the Holy Frost Society or needlessly kill other Pinnacle Seekers, your Path is mine for this period.”

Randidly frowned as he considered the implications of that offer. He was somewhat uneasy both about having some other faction from the Nexus learn about him and because Lay’mel instantly recognized this woman.

Seeing that Randidly seemed to be hesitating, Claudette pouted. Then her expression abruptly brightened. “Ah! Also, I have a tool of immense value! It is a map of the area, given casually to me by the Frost Matriarch so I could rendezvous with her. Un… u-unfortunately, it appears that my own abilities were insufficient and I was unable to properly read the map…”

Randidly looked at Claudette for several seconds. She is apparently is a well-known individual, which might bring complications down the line. But in terms of usefulness… even if it’s just the map, her information about what is occurring here seem much more trustworthy than just relying on Lay’mel. Two sources of information can fact check each other...

Still, better to make sure there is no confusion before we proceed.

Randidly held up a hand as Claudette offered him the tiny, cube-shaped map in her hand. “I appreciate the assistance, but I want to make one thing clear. My affiliation is with Military High Command; I hold the position of Commander. If you aren’t willing to work with me… I’ll take the map as complete payment of your debt and we can part ways here.”

He might be able to extract more benefits from this strange woman if he didn’t say this upfront, but Randidly didn’t want to be ambushed later if this information was revealed at the wrong time. Lay’mel’s explanation of the Pinnacle Seekers’ opinions of the orthodox Nexus factions did not paint a rosy picture.

Meanwhile, Claudette frowned and her subordinate Narthalla showed an expression of shock. Behind her, the others seemed to tense. After a second of silence, Narthalla spoke. “That is why your name sounded familiar! You are that Head Drill Sergeant under Commandant Wick. Since we both know each other associations, there is no need to fake cordiality. Miss Beigon, let us part ways with this group and proceed on our own. If the Frost Matriarch found out we had joined hands Military High Command-”

“Do you seek the Pinnacle?” Claudette interrupted, still solely staring at Randidly.

Randidly blinked and frowned. But after a few seconds of thinking, he responded as honestly as he could. “I want to change the Nexus and that requires power. So I’ve always been refining myself. If I need to reach the Pinnacle to have the influence I desire, so be it. It’s not my final goal… but I sure as hell don’t lack the resolve to reach for that place if need be.”

Claudette smiled again, showing off very white teeth. “The motivations do not matter. As long as you continue following your Path…” Finally, Claudette broke off the intense eye contact. “Besides, aren’t we just moving together for a short time? I’m sure the Frost Matriarch won’t mind, Nary. She might even admire Mr. Ghosthound’s spirit.”

Influence +25!

Narthalla’s expression clearly expressed disbelief that the Frost Matriarch would think any such thing, but Randidly didn’t really mind. Besides, he was busy trying to rationalize both the absolute faith that he could sense radiating off Claudette when she looked at him after his answer and the abrupt increase in Influence. Were they related…?

Did his explanation just generate Influence for him? But Randidly couldn’t sense any sort of Nether flowing between them… Was it just a coincidence?

Meanwhile, Randidly took the cube from Claudette’s hand. For several seconds, he couldn’t manage to understand what he was looking at. Everything was messily compressed. It was certainly a map, but the sense of perspective-

But then Randidly discovered a few buttons on the side of the cube that played with the perspective. As he adjusted the map, a thought occurred to him. He looked up at Claudette to find that she was still looking at him with gleaming, puppy-dog eyes. Those were the eyes of someone who possessed almost no guile.

Randidly’s mouth twitched. “Miss Claudette… did you happen to adjust the map so its display was two-dimensional?”

“Yup!” Claudette said cheerily.

Inwardly, Randidly rolled his eyes. No wonder you fucking got lost…Well, at the very least, now that the map is restored to its normal state, I won’t have to look for minute differences in Nether density to find my way forward…

The map might be easier to look at in two dimensions, but it was precisely useless in that form. Such a warped perspective didn’t manage to convey how to travel through the complex and misleading spaces layered on top of each other. What Claudette did was a little like lining up the floorplans of a five-story building horizontally and then deciding that the first floor was extremely far from the fifth. They might seem that way in the drawing, but that was because floorplans were supposed to be informative, not representative of the finished product.

“...anyway, this is definitely helpful, thank you.” Randidly looked around and nodded. Only the frozen corpses of the Engraving Guild and the destroyed scrap of their Array was left. “Let’s head a bit deeper then.”

Claudette nodded, Narthalla looked balefully over at Randidly, and Randidly’s subordinates just had various expressions of amusement, boredom, and serious focus. Perhaps like his act of clearing a large path through the forest, they were just sorta so numb from his previous activities that picking up a few stray Pinnacle Seekers wasn’t worthy of note. Impressively, DiOrtho and Raymund had advanced to such a zen follower outlook in such a short amount of time.

But I suppose they had the benefit of five years within the Alpha Cosmos, he reflected as he walked across the clearing.

When they reached the far spatial wall, Randidly consulted the map and pressed his hand up against the tightly layered energy. His senses spread outward and he could sense the nearest few islands of isolated space within the vast emptiness. Pressing his lips together, Randidly forced his Nether Sensation further outward through the tightly pressed planes of energy. After a few seconds of intense concentration, he was just barely able to feel the vague hint of other areas that were separated from their current position by a larger ‘distance’.

Congratulations! Your Skill Nether Sensation (L) has grown to Level 405!

Even with such a high Skill Level, the layered energy makes it so difficult to sense the surroundings… I suppose that Commandant Wick was doing it on purpose to weaken the Nether King. Randidly thought in frustration. Even though I can utilize both Aether and Nether, it is still so obnoxious!

Randidly felt around just in the nearby isolated spaces for almost thirty seconds to determine the situation; both were empty. He shook his head. Heh, I’ve grown spoiled because of how powerful Grim Intuition is. This is the first time in quite a while that my capability to move outstrips my Perception. Proceeding further isn’t exactly time-consuming, but heading to these empty spaces still seems a bit of a waste-

Randidly paused. Then his eyes began to glow as he looked at the map in his hand. Very soon, he was laughing.

Claudette tilted her head to the side, causing her cascading blonde hair to sway. “Did you think of a funny joke?”

“No, just…” Randidly couldn’t help but chuckle. “Decided to take a gamble. This map is really useful; everyone gather around and hold onto each other. This might be a bit rough.”

Then Randidly turned back to the wall. As long as I know the general direction of the destination … with my ability to utilize both Aether and Nether, can’t I just burrow through the maze and cut out the wandering?

Heading directly to the core might be a bit bold… but let’s head to the inner area, shall we?