So, in general ambient mana was sort of like a mixture of every affinity out there. Although each Affinities presence was so minute that one could actually shift it into another affinity with enough willpower. This works only because the mana is of each individual affinity is of a density that is lower than one’s own mana. Each Affinity is, generally speaking, only making up 1 out of 8646 parts of the mana in the environment. So even in a Tier 3 mana environment each individual Affinity is technically still lesser than Tier 1 in its effects. Even in a Tier 10 environment Each individual affinity is still probably lower than Tier 2 in the environment. It’s just that there’s a lot more of it. A single affinity environment is not a thing that most people ever have to deal with. Sure, there are environments where Fire Affinity is more prevalent than every other, but in most cases the environment itself still has other Affinities in it. What Leon was experiencing right now was something that can only really happen in the circumstances he currently found himself in. Trapped inside of a Dungeon that was contained in a bubble of space that was sectioned off from the surrounding space with a Breach into one of the High Tier Affinity Realms.

Leon felt it when the ambient Madness mana in the environment hit a certain point of density. All of the other affinities that were around were somehow… Corrupted. Changed on a fundamental level. They were still their own individual Affinities. But the Affinities themselves were altered by the sheer volume of Madness pressing down on them. Leon was fairly certain that the Madness affinity mana had breached Tier 4. It was a good time to observe what happened to things at that Tier level, but also it was utterly, horrendously, painful.

Leon was now in a desperate battle to keep the Madness mana outside of himself. He was pushing his own mana out and flooding his mana channels with his own reserves of mana. Leaking it slowly out of his body while simultaneously spinning the Containment Block rings as fast as he could to pull mana from his Source. Soul Shield was working overtime, and his new skill Heresy Resistance was leveling up at frightening pace. Everything that he was trying to do to stop the Tier 4 Madness mana from getting into his body was only slowing it down, not stopping it.

The reason that Leon was desperately trying to keep it at bay was actually two reasons. One: Everything around him was suddenly and randomly changing due to the Madness Affinity mana altering it. Two: Leon had gotten a tiny bit of the Tier 4 mana into his mana channels and felt like he was going to die from the pain. It was so dense that it felt like someone had injected sand into his veins, or maybe little spiky glass shards. It was so terribly painful that Leon was pretty sure he would die from the pain alone if he let any more of it get in. On top of that the Madness mana was trying to change him. He didn’t want to go insane… although he was probably just assuming that it hadn’t affected him already. He was probably Mad right now and didn’t even realize it.

The rate at which the Madness Affinity mana was increasing in density had accelerated. It was getting harder and harder to keep it out of his body. Leon was fairly certain that he was going to die here just trying to fight off the pure Madness mana. The Breach itself was going to happen far after he had already died.

That is when Leon realized something. Something that made him tremble with a combination of rage, sadness, and heartache. There was no way any of the other Tier 2’s were still alive. The only reason that he was able to put up such a defense as he was, was because of his Source. Without it he would have run out of mana within only a few minutes of trying to keep the Tier 4 Madness mana out of his body. Cynthia, Lomara, Helena, Lucy, Daisy, Lamia, Kathy, Farthallahn… There was no way that they were still alive. If they were. They probably weren’t the people that they’d been just a few hours ago. Madness will have taken them, and the Tier 4 mana will have altered them to the point that they were no longer even close to themselves anymore.

The Tier 3’s were probably still alive. But they too would be getting their bodies massively altered by the power of Madness. Hopefully at least some of them had skills that could protect them. But if Luna was any indication, most of them probably started experiencing mental issues already. He really hoped that at least Malorie was fine. But it wasn’t going to matter for long. Once the Breach actually Breached… there was no way that anyone was going to survive. Leon sat there continually pumping mana away from his Source, through his mana channels, and into the air around him almost on autopilot as he processed that.

What was even the point of fighting for his life? Leon knew he was going to die pretty damn soon. The Breach had to be almost completed. For the first time in both of his lives Leon seriously contemplated killing himself right then and there. Letting the Madness mana in was not a way that he wanted to go. He’d gotten only a tiny drop of it in his system before and it had been excruciating. He didn’t want to die with that amount of pain in his system. Honestly, Leon only considered it for a fraction of a second. He just needed to wait and when the Breach was completed, he would die so fast it probably wouldn’t even hurt. So, he kept on fighting to keep himself alive for even just a minute longer.

The Madness mana continued its climb in density. And now Leon was starting to worry. The denser it became the faster he was having to push mana out of his body. He still hadn’t hit the point where he was losing mana faster than he could get it from his Source. But he was rapidly approaching the point where he was going to start needing more than he could get.

Just when Leon hit the point where he was using everything that he was pulling from his source in a continual torrent of mana to keep the Madness mana at bay he noticed something in the room that hadn’t been there before. Now, that wasn’t all that odd considering the effect of Madness mana everywhere. Weird shit was happening all around him like some kind of trippy Alice in wonderland scene. The new thing in front of him that was different was a staircase.

Leon didn’t give himself time to think about it. It could be that he’d gone insane, or it could be that the Dungeon had just advanced to Tier 3. Meaning that there was bridge gate down those stairs. He could escape to the second layer of the heavenly spheres. He leapt to his feet and charged down the staircase as fast as he could go. The staircase seemed to never want to end though. He just kept going and going and going.

Finally, Leon hit the bottom of the staircase to find himself in a fairly small room. on the other side of the room was an honest to goodness stargate. At least that is what it looked like. A spherical portal that felt incredibly strange to his spatial senses. It was indescribable what it was doing.

Leon had paused at the bottom of the stairs when he saw the portal. In that little pause he felt something happen very far away from him. he felt it with his spatial senses. It was like space itself rippled from somewhere very far away. Suddenly the Madness mana behind him and up the stairs went from the middle of Tier 4 to something Leon had never felt before.

Leon stopped wasting time and Quantum Blinked to the edge of the portal. Hurling himself through the event horizon just as the portal was struck by a wave of Madness mana so potent that Leon was pretty sure that the density was above Tier 100. The portal itself snapped like a twig in front of the tide of Madness. Leon wasn’t hit by the high Tier mana if he had been it would have killed him instantly. But what did hit him was a collapsing wall of twisted and shattered spacetime itself. Hurling him through the other end of the portal at nearly the speed of sound.

Honestly, Leon was lucky that he didn’t lose consciousness because of the impact. If he, had he would have died. The room that he ended up in was obviously a first-floor entry room of a Dungeon. It was only about a thousand feet across, and Leon was about to slam into the wall at near Mach speeds.

What followed was Leon using a series of Quantum Blinks to bleed of enough speed that when his feet did finally hit the floor he only ended up with a serious case of broken knees and possibly a broken rib or two from hitting the wall after that. Nothing that a quick Lay On Hands wasn’t able to repair fairly quickly.

Leon lay there breathing heavily as his healing skill quickly repaired his body. He didn’t know what was going to happen from here on out. He was fairly certain that some of the mentors had probably survived just like he had. The other Tier 2’s were most likely all dead.

After a few minutes of just laying there Leon realized something very odd. He hadn’t been paying attention to the mana in his environment since he’d dove through the portal. But now that he sensed it, he was very confused. No matter the layer of the Heavenly Spheres Dungeons always started their first floor at Tier 1 mana density. Working their way up the density chart depending on the number and size of their floors. Where he was currently was the entry chamber of a presumably Layer 2 Dungeon and the mana density was sitting around the Tier 2 almost 3, mark. Which wasn’t something that was supposed to be a thing. The other weird thing was that the portal wasn’t active. It should be open and allowing him to return to the first layer in a random dungeon. But it was inert… Like it was broken or something. Also, it was freaking cold. Like cold enough that it would be dangerous without insulating clothes on for someone without resistances. The pathway deeper into the Dungeon was dark, not like the lit corridors of the Dungeon he was familiar with. At least there wasn’t a ridiculous amount of Madness Mana everywhere here.

After taking a good long minute to just breath and try to calm himself down Leon checked out his skill progress and was rather impressed by his soul skills. All of them had hit lvl.99. It was freaking ridiculous how beneficial just sitting in high density soul corrupting mana had been for his skills. But it felt hollow. He’d lost a lot more than just his house and the work he’d invested into that Dungeon. He’d lost eight lovers… friends… people he cared about. He had no clue if Nadia was even going to be alright. But now she was the only one left. Their relationship had been weird at first, but he actually really like the woman. When she wasn’t being all full psycho masochist crazy anyways.

Now without being able to get back to the first layer people would probably assume that he was dead. Malorie may not think so if she had survived. She knew most of his secrets. She would have known that he could survive for a much longer time under the influence of high Tier mana. But if she hadn’t survived… His family would likely get a letter with condolences of the Guild.

Leon didn’t want to let Luna or Nadia out of his Utility Pocket just yet. He needed some time to collect himself and just be alone. If this Dungeon was a known Dungeon, then he was fairly certain he would already have encountered Guild personnel or whoever controlled its access’s people. Dungeons were continuously farmed for resources there were always people going in and out. But there was no one here… So, he would take the alone time to mourn personally before he released the potentially still psychotic Nadia. Luna he wasn’t as worried about.

Leon sat in the middle of the room and meditated for several hours before he felt centered enough to possibly deal with crazy people. Instead of rushing to get into that endeavor though, Leon decided to just keep at it, feeling the mana around himself and his own internal mana. Mentally running over everything that had happened in the past few days over and over. Just trying to come to terms with it all. He was going to need to talk to people. Find out if everyone really had died. And if all of them really were dead he wanted to find their families and talk to them. Once Leon had himself fully ready… ok not fully, but ready enough he decided to take Luna out of the Utility Pocket.

Popping Luna out of his Utility Pocket, she was in the exact position shed been in before. Actively trying to strip her clothes off. To Leon’s great relief though her aura was already fixing itself and she seemed to be coming to her senses as her struggle to remove her clothing stopped. She stood there for looking dazed for a few moments before rounding on Leon.

“What happened!” She asked in an almost panicked voice.

“Well, you started going insane, so I put you in my storage skill.” Leon said dumbly.

That seemed to catch Luna off guard.

“I didn’t ask what you did. I asked what happened!” She spoke.

“Oh… The Dungeon reached Tier 3 and I went and hopped through the bridge portal to the next layer just before the Breach finished.” Leon explained, “I have no clue where we are though, obviously a wild Dungeon that’s not in any claimed territory though. I’ve been in here for a while and no ones come down here. Not likely if this place was known.”

Luna scrunched up her face for a few seconds while closing her eyes, “The mana is way too dense here. This feels like mid Tier 2 ambient mana. Dungeons are supposed to start off at Tier 1 no matter the layer they are on.”

“That is my understanding as well. I don’t have an explanation for it.” Leon said, “Anyway, are you feeling alright? I don’t want either of us being out of it when I let Nadia out. I’m not sure how long it will take for the Madness mana’s effects to wear off on her.”

“I could use something to eat. But aside from that I feel fine.”

“Alrighty, let me check my inventory and see what I got.” Leon said.

Leon mentally browsed through all of the food items that he had stored in his Utility Pocket skill. Verbally listing off what turned out to be massive list of already prepared foods. He hadn’t realized how many meals he’d prepared over the past several years only to leave them in storage. It was a good thing though. Not knowing where they were and without a portal back to the first layer it might be a while without decent access to cooking supplies and clean water.

“What’s Grilled Turkey Legs?” Luna asked as he listed off different food items.

“Turkeys are a medium sized bird. Darker meat pretty tasty. If I remember right, I made these ones with a BBQ glaze.” Leon responded popping two legs out and handing one over to Luna.

The two shared meal in silence neither of them really sure what to say. Drinks followed, and after both were satiated Leon stood up and rubbed his hands together.

“Are you ready? I’m not really sure how she’s going to behave. If she gets aggressive… Running won’t really help. Her Affinity is Movement. She’s ungodly fast when she wants or needs to be.” Leon spoke.

“I’m ready… Just not entirely sure what you expect of me.”

“Just… If she starts going all Psycho Murderer on us help me hold her down until she’s gotten it out of her system. I wouldn’t be able to stop her by myself, but you are almost as strong as her, so… maybe you’ll make the difference?” Leon didn’t really know what the hell he was talking about, it just felt better having another sane person there to potentially deal with an insane speed demon.

“Alright ready when you are.” Luna spoke.

Leon popped Nadia out of his Utility Pocket, she was in the same position she’d been in when he’d put her in it. and finishing off her sentence that had been cut off by her abrupt placement into storage. But she suddenly froze up midway through her sentence. Her eyes went wide as saucers, her back suddenly stiffened as if she was in pain, then she crumpled to the floor. Unconscious.

“Well, that worked out better than I expected.” Leon said mostly to himself.

“Is she alright?” Luna asked.

Leon examined Nadia with all of his improved senses. Checking her pulse, breathing, etc. Her aura was in shambles by it no longer had any traces of Madness affinity filling it.

“I think so.” Leon said, “I’m not sure… But I think she’ll recover.” He said as he hoisted the insatiate Nadia up in a princes carry, “Now what do you say to going up stairs and figuring out where we are?”

“I think you should probably stay here with her while I go up and check things out.” Luna said.

Leon thought about it for a second then nodded, “Yeah go check things out and see if there are people around. If not at least see if you can figure out what direction people might be in.”

Luna headed off while Leon busied himself with setting up a bedroll for Nadia. Her aura was rapidly recovering, and she seemed to just be sleeping. But Leon didn’t have a single clue as to how she was actually doing. Lay On Hands didn’t seem to be doing anything for her but he was using it anyway.

It was only after about a half hour that Leon realized something might be wrong. Maybe Luna had just abandoned them? There shouldn’t be any reason why it would take this long for her pop up to the surface and assess the situation. Nearly 45 minutes after Luna had left Leon was sure that she’d just up and left. But that is when he heard footsteps descending the stairwell.

Luna emerged from the stairwell looking extremely perturbed.

“It’s a long walk to get up to the surface… But, umm, I’m not sure we are getting back to civilization any time soon.” Luna spoke.

“Why is that?”

“You really need to come up and see for yourself. I don’t know how to explain it.” Luna said.

Sighing Leon bent over and hoisted up Nadia. He wasn’t going to leave her here all alone. Once he had Nadia’s senseless self snuggly held in a princess carry, he turned and followed Luna back up the stairs. And boy oh boy she was not kidding. The staircase seemed to never end. If he was only a normal human, even a fit one, he would have needed to stop for breaks multiple times on the accent. Honestly, they probably climbed about three miles of staircase before they finally emerged from the Dungeon.

The surprises that met Leon’s perception were not at all what he would have expected. First off, the moment he stepped out of the Dungeon there was a sharp rise in ambient mana density. It was borderline Tier 4 not quite there, but close enough that it felt like it was at the tipping point. Secondly, the sky was… a band. A crescent band of sky. Looking up Leon could see something that he had known about but hadn’t really comprehended before this moment. He was currently standing on what he guessed was planet for the first time in his new life. A planet situated between two layers of the Heavenly Spheres.

Everything was dark, like it was nighttime. The atmosphere felt incredibly thin and was intensely cold. Around the Dungeon entrance was a barren wasteland. There were a few shrubs dotted here and there that somehow managed to survive in the arctic temperatures. And in the distance Leon could hear the cries of the local wildlife. The sounds were not at all comforting. Everything sounded huge. Deeply pitched roars echoed in the distance, weird pulses of sound echoed through the air rhythmically in a way that made Leon think of Echolocation.

“Yeah… Let’s hope Nadia knows where we are and how we can get back.” Leon murmured.

Speaking of Nadia, she woke up just then, huddled in the bedroll she poked Leon and indicated that she wanted down. She quickly oriented herself, looking around, she seemed to take special note of Luna, and after taking few deep breaths before she turned calmly to Leon.

“Leon darling… I don’t really can’t remember anything after I made that Containment Block. Just a whole lot of being absolutely miserable and nothing making sense.” Nadia said, but there was a dangerous tone in her voice, “And also… Would you mind explaining to me how and why, in all the gods names, we are on a Dead World?” Nadia practically shouted that last bit with extreme emphasis on Dead World.