Ash fluttered down like snow around Lirael, glinting silver under the moonlight that streamed down through a gap in the colourful clouds of miasma above. She strolled through the desolation wrought by her fight with the Lich, leaving shallow footprints in the layer of warm ash that covered the ground. Her scarlet eyes flitted from side to side, searching for the remains of her enemy. Her spoils of war.

Generally speaking, hunting beasts for their shards was a thankless task. Shards turned volatile after the death of their host, and in most cases, the intense fight required to defeat the beast would result in the destruction of its shards, leaving the hunter with nothing but its corpse. But once the beast fused its shards into an Embryonic Dungeon, they would be protected by the Dungeon. So, even though fighting such a beast was exponentially tougher and more resource intensive than battling a Tier 5, there was a guarantee that shards could be retrieved from its remains. This was another reason, aside from the limited time on her hands, why Lirael had chosen to stand and fight instead of searching for easier prey elsewhere.

Lirael stopped before a mound of ash where the massive palms ensconcing the evil infant had been. Her hair elongated, wrapping around her body and freezing into her set of Frostmane Armour. Narrowing her eyes, she sliced her right palm with the fingernails of her left hand, weaving the blood that flowed out into a lance of frozen blood as long as she was tall. Readying it, she approached the mound cautiously.

She was a mere pace away from the mound when the infant burst out of it with an infernal screech, scattering ash everywhere.

The entire left half of its body, including its arm, its leg, and the left half of its ribcage was missing, revealing a jet-black heart beating within its chest. Dark blood spurted with every heartbeat from the vessels that hadn’t been cauterized by the burning ash. Most of the pale skin over the rest of its body had been scorched off, exposing the dark muscles underneath. Of its left cheek, only strings of gristle remained, connecting its jaws and giving it a lopsided grin. The silver moonlight shining behind it cast its front into deep shadow.

A single, bloodshot yellow eye gleamed within the shadows of its face – the serpentine pupil narrowing to a vertical slit as it lunged towards Lirael. Opening its mouth, displaying row after row of serrated fangs, it screamed.

The shrill sound sent a spike of pain lancing through Lirael’s mind, making her reel backwards. Clenching her teeth, she powered through the pain; stamping down on the ground with her rear foot, twisting her waist, she thrust upwards with her lance. The tip glowed with a bloody radiance as it whistled through the air, entering the infant’s gaping mouth and piercing its skull without any hindrance. It emerged from the back of the infant’s head in a shower of blood that froze midair, sprinkling down on the grey ash around them like so many glittering rubies. Its scream cut off abruptly, dowsing the region in silence.

The light disappeared from the creature’s eye as Lirael released the lance and took a step back, letting its massive form collapse lifelessly onto the ground in front of her, raising a ring of dust that expanded outwards.

Lirael wasn’t too surprised that the Lich had survived her ultimate attack. The Undead Marrow shard gave all undead a terrifying resilience, and in this case, that was compounded by its possession of a Dissociation shard. She realized now that it wasn’t the centipede that had a Dissociation shard; it was the Lich. Its ability to fragment itself was what had allowed the creature to control all the undead in the stone forest by implanting its ‘hands’ onto each of them.

Just like Lirael could use shards that would normally affect only herself upon her Thralls, the Lich too could do the same with its slaves. It had used the Dissociation shard upon the centipede to help heal its injuries and overwhelm her by transforming into a swarm of smaller insects. The centipede itself had only revealed two Tier 5 shards during their fight. The mana provided by the Lich and its ability to share shard effects was why the gigantic insect had been such a difficult opponent.

Starting from its pierced head, the infant’s corpse began to dissolve into blood and seep into the ground until all that remained was a scarlet silhouette on grey ash. There, in the middle of the silhouette, a large crystal egg the size of Lirael’s head glimmered under the moonlight. A delicate lattice of purple crystal surrounded the egg like a fishing net. It was the deceased Lich’s Control shard wrapped by its Undead Marrow shard.

As the Lich had died without a chance to assimilate all its fragments, its Dissociation shard had been destroyed despite the protection of its Embryonic Dungeon. As for any other shard it might have carried – without the protection of a Dungeon, they hadn't stood a chance. Diverging her armour and bending down, Lirael picked up the shards.

Having gathered her spoils of war, she looked inwards into her Dungeon.

Bloodskull was in a very poor state. Snow had avalanched down the mountains at the edge, the rivers of blood had overflowed their banks, giant fissures crisscrossed the earth like scars, most of the Whispering Willows had been damaged with broken trunks and snapped branches abounding, and worst of all, without the Magma Basilisk to stabilize it, the central pit had erupted, spewing molten rock and heated ash into the sky. The entire area of the Dungeon had shrunk due to the excessive withdrawal of mana and hidden behind the wispy red clouds were jagged black cracks in the sky.

The Dungeon was on the verge of collapse and all her Core Spirits had been damaged to a certain extent. The Magma Basilisk was the worst off as it had borne the brunt of the conflict. Now it was curled up in the fiery depths of the central pit, recuperating. It would take several years for it to recover, which in the outside world’s time translated to a couple of months of inactivity. In this time, she would have to avoid direct conflict with Dungeon Mages.

The Frostmane Lion, Leo, was currently utterly exhausted from using his powers to mitigate the damage to the Dungeon by the avalanches. The Void Hummingbird was nursing a broken wing in its nest hidden within the clouds – a result of her overuse of her Shrinking Space shard. A deep crack ran up the trunk of the Weeping Willow patriarch and the number of its roots and branches that had broken off during the upheaval were too many to count. The only spirit that was relatively untouched was her Blood Carp that had been protected within the blood of the rivers.

Fighting the Lich had been a gamble. A calculated risk.

A beast formed and expanded its Embryonic Dungeon by injecting its mana into the environment, converting it into its own personal space. The process was very slow and wasteful as most of the mana dissipated into the world. If the rate of mana injection was lower than the rate of dissipation, then no matter how hard it tried, the beast would never be able to advance.

This was the reason why beasts became bound to their territory after they began the process of advancement. If they left for even a short period of time, their progress would be lost as the world reclaimed their territory. Environments rich in natural Aura favoured the formation of Dungeons as the rate of mana dissipation was lower in these regions.

In sharp contrast, when the members of the sentient races formed their Dungeons, they absorbed the natural Aura surrounding them, using it to construct their personal worlds from scratch. Though this method had a much higher chance of failure than that of the beasts due to shard incompatibility, it took a much shorter period of time for the Dungeon to form and develop.

According to her ancestor’s map, a century ago, the Lich was still a Tier 5 Revenant. Thus, Lirael had surmised, the amount of mana in its Embryonic Dungeon would be less than in hers. Another point in her favour was its shard combination. Other than the obligatory Undead Marrow shard, it had a Dissociation shard and a Control shard. Its lack of a Tier 5 defensive shard meant that against her Tier 5 Pyroclastic Flow shard, it would have to spend much more mana to defend than she would have to attack.

She looked down at the glittering shards in her hand. She had bet right.

Now that she had what she had come for, she could repair and rebuild her Dungeon to be stronger than ever before. With them in hand, she could solve all the problems she had been facing with her Undead Marrow shard. The corners of her lips couldn't help but curve upwards.

Once again, it seemed that she had her newest Thrall to thank for this opportunity. If his Phlebotomy shard hadn’t restrained the centipede’s corpse toxin so well, it would have taken her a lot more time and effort to stabilize Vlad’s condition. Time that the evil infant would have used to assimilate more of its fragments and consolidate more of its power. Then the battle could have swung either way as, along with its fragments, the Lich was assimilating the mana of the victims they had been embedded in.

Her form blurred and she disappeared from the spot, reappearing beside Igor as the Naga used two of his arms to hold the centipede’s head steady while he dug out its Honed Edge shard from the base of its mandibles with his remaining arms.

Lirael had deliberately frozen the corpse with her Frostmane Armour in order to lock in as much of the mana within the corpse as possible and to delay the deterioration of the shards that had survived their fight. Unfortunately, only the Undead Marrow and the Honed Edge shards remained. If the Revenant had a third Tier 5 shard, she would never know what it was. Though, it probably wasn’t something too useful seeing that it hadn’t prevented the centipede from being enslaved by the evil infant who didn’t even have a single attack or defence shard.

Popping the crescent of crimson crystal out with a grunt, the Thrall turned to her and bowed his head. Noticing the crystalline egg in her hand, he hissed, “Congratulations, Mistresss.”

Acknowledging him with a nod, she turned her gaze to Sand. The boy had stripped off his shirt and was sitting on the ground with his eyes closed, leaning his back against centipede’s corpse with as much of his skin in contact with it as he could manage. His chest glowed scarlet from the internal light of his shards. A dense black fog transpired out of the corpse and with every breath, he inhaled it through his nose.

Through her connection to him, Lirael could feel his mana growing denser and rising through the spectrum with each passing moment. From a bright leaf green, it had already transformed into an emerald hue and was swiftly making progress towards a deep viridian. His Undead Marrow shard, as well as his Phlebotomy shard which was linked to it, were taking steady steps to the peak of Tier 3 in tandem with his mana.

Lirael could feel her connection to him getting stronger and stronger as the shards absorbed the toxin present in the Revenant’s corpse and converted it to Thrall venom in order to transform every inch of Sand’s flesh. It was an odd sensation. Like she had a second body she could gain control over whenever she wished. It felt like he was an extension of her – an extra arm. While her other Thralls were loyal to her from the bottom of their hearts, Sand, it seemed, was totally under her power physically while retaining his free mind.

Her favourability towards the boy increased as the merit he had rendered in these past few days was compounded by this sense of connection.

She estimated that there was enough mana within the Revenant to advance Sand into a middle stage Blue mage and the traces of the Revenant’s Undead Marrow shard that remained within its corpse was enough to advance both his linked shards to Tier 4.

A deep frown wrinkled Sand’s brow as his shards refused to admit the mana flowing into them and it began to accumulate within his body, making him feel painfully bloated.

Unfortunately, there was a hitch. Sand’s Undead Marrow shard was connected to his Phlebotomy shard, and that in turn had been connected to her Thrall shard during his Enthrallment. Sadly, her Thrall shard was only Tier 3. She hadn’t felt the need to upgrade it since both Vlad and Igor were restricted by their talent from advancing to a Blue Mage. It couldn't support Sand’s advancement beyond the level of a Green mage.

Walking over to him, Lirael knelt and placed a palm against his forehead. Closing her eyes and reaching out to him through their link, she pulled.

The excess mana flowed into her through her hand and she channelled it into her Dungeon, guiding it towards the ominous cracks in the sky. They were the worst of the damage and she would have had to reassign mana from other parts of her Dungeon, aggravating the damage there, to heal these cracks lest her Dungeon collapse at any moment. Now, the Dungeon drank in the incoming mana like a parched traveller in a desert and the cracks began to knit together.

As the last of the cracks sealed shut, she opened her eyes to see Sand scrutinizing her face expressionlessly, his dark eyes seemingly absorbing all light that fell on them. Behind him, the corpse of the centipede crumbled into a large pile of dust as the last of its essence was extracted from it.

A gentle breeze picked up in the area, whirling the dust away.

Rising to her feet, Lirael offered Sand her hand. “Come,” she said with a smile, “let us rebuild our home.”

For a long moment, Sand observed the proffered hand with an unreadable expression on his face. Then, silently stretching out his hand, he took it.

Lirael walked through the forest of Weeping Willows in her Dungeon, taking in the devastation wrought by her recent battle. Sand and Igor trailed behind her.

Uprooted trees and snapped trunks abounded – the blood red sap leaking out of the wounds presenting a stark contrast against the bone-white bark – and the forest floor was littered with broken vines. Seeing it up close and personal let her realize the true extent of the damage much better than the cursory scan of her Dungeon she had performed before.

The air rang with the eerie lament of the injured ents. As she passed, the mournful dirge increased in volume – the willows trying to attract her attention like children with scraped knees complaining tearfully to their mother. It was as though they were begging her to make the pain go away. She sped up her footsteps. That was exactly what she was here for.

Reaching a clearing in the shattered forest, she caught sight of her Core Spirit situated in the middle of a broad river of blood.

“Woahhh…”

Sensing her arrival, the solemn patriarch of the Weeping Willows greeted her weakly and opened its mouth wide, revealing a cavernous entrance to its interior.

Its face contorted into an agonized grimace as the effort stretched the massive crack that ran diagonally across its trunk from branch to root, passing through its right eye and cleanly bisecting its lip. The crack was dark against the pale bark. The sap leaking out of it trickled down the trunk, dyeing it a bloody red. Broken branches littered the area around it and its canopy of bony vines appeared much sparser than before. The entire tree now leaned slightly to the side, several of the roots that anchored it having snapped during the series of earthquakes that had rippled through the Dungeon.

Lirael’s boots squelched as she walked through the reddish mud that lined the river, a result of it overflowing its banks. The ground beneath her crackled with a sound like crinkling foil as it froze with each of her footsteps, a layer of rime spreading outwards from each of the frozen footprints she left in her wake. As she approached the river, the temperature around her dropped, freezing the slow-moving blood in it into a bridge of red ice that grew with her each step, linking the riverbank to the spirit’s open mouth.

Entering the hollow interior of the tree, she turned around and inspected its wound from the inside. The dim red light of the Dungeon’s night streamed in through the crack that spanned from floor to ceiling. Stepping up to the wall of the cavern, Lirael ran her hand gently over the splintered edges of the crack, wincing as she felt the corresponding fissure on the Agility shards in her eyes twinge in sympathy.

Turning, she received the shards she had harvested from the Lich from the hands of Igor who had followed her in. She wedged the egg-shaped piece of colourless crystal into the crack in the wall near the ground. Sitting down cross-legged in front of it, she placed both her hands on it and closed her eyes.

The purple crystal network of Undead Marrow surrounding the Control shard began to glow with a soft purple brilliance as Lirael’s mana poured into it, projecting a grid of purple light on her face and onto the interior walls of the cavern.

“Woahhh!”

The entire tree shivered, its bass voice ringing out once again as the Undead Marrow peeled off the Control shard and began to knit the massive crack together like so many strands of crystal thread. A purple radiance rippled outwards from the crack, spreading like water along the grain of the wood. Shattered bark and broken branches mended wherever the light visited until the entire trunk was wrapped in a coat of liquid light. The brilliance spread outwards following the vines and downwards into the ground along the roots.

Within her mind, through her connection to her Dungeon, Lirael could sense the purple light spreading through the root system of the Spirit like blood through veins. As the light contacted the roots of the surrounding trees that were entangled with the Spirit’s under the ground, it infected them; following them to their source it covered their trunks with the same purple brilliance. Light spread like wildfire centred on the Spirit, jumping from root to root and tree to tree until the entire forest began to glow a soft purple.

Broken branches grew out, uprooted trees gained a new lease of life, and trees with broken trunks grew back, bent but unbroken. Wherever the light visited, the forest recovered.

Of all the shards that composed Bloodskull, the Agility and the Undead Marrow shards were the ones most closely interlinked. This was demonstrated by the replacement of the bark of the Weeping Willows by a substance closely resembling bone and the replacement of the sap within the rattans by bone marrow.

Lirael’s goal had only been the Control shard. Obtaining another Tier 5 Undead Marrow shard had been a happy accident. While the shard couldn't be used to directly increase the degree of integration of her own Undead Marrow shard into her Dungeon, it could be used to heal the Weeping Willows. This would increase the affinity between the two closest shards in her Dungeon and indirectly promote the degree of integration.

Back within the hollow of the tree spirit, the massive crack sealed shut like two pieces of dough being pinched together, leaving a gnarled scar to remember it by. As the last of the wound knitted over, the final thread of the Lich’s Undead Marrow shard merged into the purple light, leaving the Control shard bare and embedded into the tree.

The transparent crystal ovoid vibrated as Lirael’s mana poured into it, achromatic ripples emanating from it and spreading out across the entirety of her Dungeon. For a moment it seemed like nothing had happened, then, under the gloomy mixture of red and purple lighting, the dead began to stir.

The skeletons and corpses Lirael had been painstakingly seeding her Dungeon with in preparation for just this moment, finally began to play their role, crawling out of the earth they had been buried in. They came in an eclectic variety of shapes – ranging from easily recognizable creatures to chaotically put together chimaeras of bone and rotting flesh. They varied from the size of a palm to ones that rivalled the Magma Basilisk in size.

The only order in the chaos was the distinct segregation of the undead by elemental affinity and location. The ones close to the central pit had an affinity to fire. Mostly Netherfire Serpents Lirael had picked up after vanquishing the colony she had tossed Sand into. It included the reanimated corpse of a Tier 4 Serpent – the leader of the colony.

The ones at the edge of the Dungeon, amidst the snowy mountains, had an affinity to ice. They were a lot fewer and came from more scattered sources than the ones with fire affinity as beasts with an affinity to ice were rare in a hot desert like the Tyhr. She had been lucky to find some in a system of underground caverns.

Finally, those in the between had an even mix of affinities to blood and earth. Blood to increase the integration with her Dissolving Blood shard and earth in order to prime Bloodskull to accept the next shard in line after the fusion of the Undead Marrow shard was complete: The Seismic Sense shard.

But, raising the dead wasn’t Lirael’s goal. It was only a step in the process.

“Woahhh!!”

The Control shard buzzed louder and the Willow patriarch’s deep voice joined in, the bass rumble rippling out and reverberating throughout the Dungeon. The glowing purple trees grew perfectly still, silence blanketing Bloodskull in the wake of the call.

In one corner of the forest, a Zombie that had the upper body of a mantis, the lower body of a horse and the tail of a scorpion passed too close to a Weeping Willow. No skin covered the dark red muscles and blood vessels that twined around its body, its hollow sockets revealing the lack of internal organs. Suddenly, the Willow lashed out with its vines, bringing them whipping down onto the back of the Bloody Centaur. Its knees curved under the force of the blow and with a neighing screech, it lashed out with its scythes, slicing clean through several of the vines.

Undeterred, the ent continued its onslaught, more vines taking the place of the fallen and the purple radiance that covered it repairing the broken ones. Wrapping around its legs with several other vines, the Willow pulled the Centaur closer and closer despite its desperate struggles. Finally, after a protracted confrontation, a well-placed vine whip crushed its head and it grew limp.

Dragging the body towards it, the Willow wrapped its vines around itself and its prey, obstructing the view. Only the disturbing sounds of crunching bones that emanated from it gave an idea of what was going on within.

Similar scenes played out across the Dungeon as conflicts erupted between the undead and the skeletal trees. The forest devolved into sheer pandemonium.

After a while, one of the trees near the centre of the Dungeon that had defeated and swallowed a Tier 3 Netherfire Serpent unwrapped its cover of vines. Its appearance had changed drastically. The bark the that had been colour of bleached bone was now the dark grey of freshly formed charcoal. Ghostly green Netherfire blazed all over it, spreading over its vines and giving it a canopy of phantom flames. Only its hollow eyes and mouth burnt with dark flames the colour of dried blood.

All over the Dungeon, the Weeping Willows battled undead, swallowed them and evolved, taking on their characteristics and further integrating the Undead Marrow shard into the Dungeon. And through the Control Shard, the Core Spirit controlled each of their actions, guiding them down the most optimal path with Lirael’s help.

The Bloodskull Gate opened wide and a huge metaphysical suction erupted from it, drawing in all the Aura of Death from the surroundings and funnelling it into the Dungeon. As the Undead Marrow shard integrated into the Embryonic Dungeon, magnanimous amounts of natural Aura began to pour into it and it began to expand, taking a step towards completion.

Absentmindedly, Sand scratched the back of his left hand as he stood at the entrance to the cavern, keeping an eye on Lirael’s meditating form while simultaneously watching the momentous changes taking place in the Dungeon through the Ent’s open mouth. Turning to Igor beside him, he said, “I need to take a piss.”

The Naga thrall waved him away with a hand without even taking his eyes off his mistress. He had been tasked to guard her and break her meditative state at the slightest sign of trouble – and guard her he would.

Exiting the cavern, Sand walked across the bridge of red ice that still spanned the river, coating his bare feet with Aura to combat the chill of the ice beneath. The flowing blood had already begun chipping away at the edges of the bridge, making it look like a frayed strip of cloth as chunks of ice broke away and flowed downstream.

Reaching the bank of the river, he plodded through the mud, following the course of the river upstream. His feet sank up to his calves as he traversed the soggy ground, forcing him to raise his feet high with a wet squelch every time he took a step. He kept moving, putting some distance between himself and the tree… between himself and Lirael.

He moved fast, a determined expression on his face. After about an hour, when the view of the massive ent had been concealed behind a bend in the river, his way forward was obstructed by a shallow pool of blood that had formed when the river had overflowed its banks. If he didn’t want to wade through the waist-deep pool, he would have to circle around it and pass through the forest. The forest which had currently turned into a charnel house.

Halting in front of the pool, he knelt down and leaned over it. He saw himself staring back from the still surface of the blood. The forest of glowing trees cast eerie purple highlights on the right side of his face, while the glow of the pool in front of him and the river of blood to his left dyed the rest of it red. He blinked and the soot-stained face in the pool blinked back.

The face that stared back at him was familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. Not only had he shed over two hundred years of life like a snake would its skin, even his young body was incomparable from the one in his past life. Remoulded by the magic saturating his body and the ample supply of food, he had grown a few inches and his ribs were no longer so prominent. The scrawny, undernourished slave boy was no more. In his place was a lightly muscled boy of ten that looked older than his years. The Undead Marrow shard had corrected the flaws left by years of hard labour with insufficient food, healing the hidden injuries he had accumulated from the beatings dealt upon him by the orcs.

His dark eyes carried the weight of centuries and a mission that would crush most men. A mission that was threatening to crush him now.

Sitting back on his haunches, he studied his palms. The recently darkened muscles and the black blood flowing through his vessels showed through the translucent skin, giving his palms a greyish cast. He was a peak stage Green Mage. He had two Tier 3 shards. He had access to magical information a lot more advanced than anything he’d been able to touch in his previous life. All unthinkable achievements when seen from the eyes of his younger self at the same point of time in his previous life. He had taken huge strides forward.

But at what price?

How could he bring freedom to his people when he couldn't achieve it himself? With every advancement of his shards, he could feel the Vampire Princess burrowing her roots deeper into him. It was a discomfiting feeling – knowing that your body didn’t solely belong to you. That, at any time, you could revert to a puppet to be manipulated as another willed. That at any moment, you could become a prisoner in a cage of flesh and bone.

‘The stronger I get, the deeper her control.’

In such a situation, how was he to break free of her shackles? He didn’t know… and that fact pressed down upon his heart like a mountain.

But there was still a glimmer of hope in the darkness. He turned his left palm around and studied the back of the hand. From outside, it seemed the same as his right hand, the skin catching a greyish tinge under the reddish-purple ambient light. but when he probed it with his mana sense, he caught the difference.

He had noticed this flaw before when Lirael had given him a demonstration of her authority. A gap in her control over him. A small region within the bones of the back of his left hand where the Thrall venom couldn't penetrate. He had assumed that it was a result of his previous use of Shadow toxin to transform the bones of his left forearm – the toxin resisting the invasion of the Thrall venom. But now, he was not so sure.

With the promotion of his Undead Marrow shard to Tier 3 and the resultant transformation of the entirety of his flesh, the edges of the gap in Lirael’s control over him had become much better defined. And the shape it had formed was very familiar to Sand.

It was shaped like a perfectly cut diamond; the same shape as the shard that had brought him back through time.

He had obtained the Tier 5 Time Reversal shard during his exploration of a naturally formed Time Dungeon. Even though he hadn’t known what the shard did, given how rare Tier 5 shards were, Sand had decided to make full use of it. He had kept five skill slots free and had the shard sewn into the interior of a left-hand glove with the pointed end touching the back of his hand. In case of an emergency where all his methods failed and he was on the verge of death, he could slap the back of his hand. The shard would puncture his skin, coming into contact with his blood and fusing with him.

Then he could activate it and pray that it would save his life. And that’s exactly what had ended up happening. Except, instead of saving his life, it had sent him hurtling through time and into the emaciated body of his young self.

The shape, the position, everything about the gap in Lirael’s control pointed in one direction. It wasn’t only his memories he had brought along with him into the past. The shard had come along as well.

But, to his mana senses, the shard seemed situated between the realms of illusion and reality. And it wasn’t taking up any of his skill slots – otherwise, with the current nine available to him, he wouldn't be able to fuse two Tier 3 shards and a Tier 1 Aura shard alongside this Tier 5 shard.

This could only mean one thing. His hand trembling with suppressed anticipation, he focused his mana senses the way he had learnt to in his previous life while inspecting his Dungeon and looked through the gap.

His field of view changed instantaneously and he lost all awareness of his body. He floated in a pure white void; without form or feeling. All he could do was vaguely sense his surroundings. There, in one corner of the void was a cloud of bright red mist.

And as surely as he could hold up an arm and say that it was his, he could tell – that diffuse clump of mist was his Dungeon. That deep connection was unmistakable.

He could feel his mana sense retreating from the void as it wasn’t strong enough to stand the strain yet. Back in his body, two lines of tears darkened the ash on his cheeks, the murky droplets dripping onto the back of his hand as he crouched over it.

The pressure on him had been immense and it had been building up with every mistake he made. And every action he took seemed like a mistake, increasing the power of those who held his life within their palms.

Why, he couldn't even cook a meal without it granting some huge advantage to the girl. After he had learnt that, with a mere touch, she could take back his mana at any moment and turn his body into a puppet, he had begun to despair. He could see no way out of the mess he had found himself in.

But now, everything was different. He had brought his Dungeon along with him through the river of time. All he had to do was become a peak stage Violet Mage and he would be able to reclaim his Dungeon. No matter how strong Lirael’s hold on him, once he regained access to his Dungeon, the influx of Aura into it would remould his body and any sort of restriction placed on him would be washed out by the tide. He would be free again.

His Dungeon was badly battered by the journey. All the mana within it had been extracted by the Time Reversal shard making it collapse upon itself into an amorphous mass of red mist. And after the initial boost he would get from absorbing natural Aura, he would have to build the Dungeon back up to its heyday through painstaking effort. Right after the promotion, he would be one of the weakest Dungeon Mages ever, weaker even than some mages with Embryonic Dungeons.

Yes, not everything was perfect. But in this imperfection lay opportunity. All this new information he was learning about magic, about how to build, manage, and grow Dungeons. He could put all of it to use. He could make his Dungeon much better than it had been in his previous life. His starting point might be low but going forward, there were infinite possibilities.

Raising his head, he yelled his excitement into the sky, the sound drowned out by the cacophony of the battle raging across the Dungeon.

Nothing was impossible…

For he was a Dungeon Mage.