"Help... me..."

"There it is again," Lone muttered to himself as he walked down the hallway that he felt the voice was definitely coming from.

As Lone drew closer and closer to the source of the call, it grew louder and clearer. Oddly enough, not a single Darkness Monster had appeared as he was wandering around the dungeon, which confused Lone slightly, but he quickly assumed that this was the doing of the voice's owner.

"Is that... a door?" Lone said as he rounded a corner. In his vision, he could see a large wooden structure with mysterious engravings all over it.

These engravings weren't Elven in nature, so Lone found himself questioning where they came from and who made them. With careful steps, he approached and inspected it carefully. It wasn't long before he noticed a very thin separation in the middle of it.

"So it is a door? How do I open it, though? I don't see a handle or keyhole anywhere..." Lone was sure that the voice's owner was on the other side of this engraved door, but he had no idea of how to get through it.

"It's not going to just open on its own, now is it? That would be handy," Lone laughed jokingly.

"Well, it's made of world tree wood, So I guess I should just burn it down with a Mana Kindling, huh?" Just as Lone was having that dangerous idea, the two sides of the door split apart and made a crack big enough for Lone to squeeze through.

Lone smirked. "Did the tree respond to my mumbling?"

He walked through and found himself to be inside a large white room that was completely empty save for a small girl with excessively long green hair that covered her nude body. She was lying on the ground and Lone would have assumed that she was dead were it not for her eyes that were staring right at him.

"Um, hello?" Lone greeted a bit awkwardly. 'Why is a girl trapped in here? I mean, she's probably Elestia, right? The name of this dungeon is 'Elestia's Core', after all.'

"Yes... I am... Elestia... The world tree's spirit..." With several pauses as she spoke, Elestia answered Lone's thoughts.

"You can read minds?" Lone asked with some shock in his voice.

"I... am a... world tree... so I am... connected to... the planet... I know of every... existence. I... can read... the past... and the future... of the people... living on... or near me... as well... as hear... their true voices..." Elestia explained.

Lone held his chin. "So you already know everything about me?"

"No..." With what little energy she had, Elestia frowned. "I only know... what your... companions know. But you... The Tylwyth Teg and... the Human girl... I cannot see... your pasts... nor your futures... It is like... you are not from... Altros... Are you Heroes... summoned... here?"

"Something like that," Lone replied nonchalantly as he kept his mind clear to avoid being seen through. "You were the one calling for help?" he asked to change the subject.

"Yes... Ythmagobla... he is moving... his generals will attack me and... they will... be here... in two days... including... the one... you released..." Elestia announced.

"What? So soon? Why? I thought it would be several years before the Darkness Dragon would be ready to launch a second attack." Lone's voice was filled with confusion.

"I do... not know. You are right... he shouldn't... have... moved... for... at least... another... fifty... years. However... it is... not... a bad... thing..." Elestia spoke mysteriously as she looked at Lone.

"Your broken speech is a bit hard to understand. Why are you talking like that?" Lone asked, putting the important conversation on hold for a moment.

He had two whole days before Ythmagobla's generals would arrive, so he wasn't in a hurry to learn everything Elestia knew immediately.

"I am... damaged. I... was only... able to... call out... to you... because... you destroyed... so much... of Ythmagobla's... curse." There was a bitter sadness in Elestia's voice.

"Hmm... you're a spirit, right? So that means you're the world tree's soul, yeah?" Lone asked.

"Yes... that is... correct," Elestia replied.

Lone smiled. "Perfect. And If you were stronger, y'know, if your soul was more stable, would that mean that you could fight against Ythmagobla?"

"Yes..." Elestia was confused.

Naturally, since Lone had experimented with his new soul skill outside of the world tree, Elestia didn't know that he could permanently reinforce souls.

Lone went over to Elestia's side and numerous mana orbs spilt out of his spatial dimension. exactly fifty-five, to be specific. "This may hurt slightly, I'm not sure since you're so broken, but at the very least, it will feel strange."

"What-" Elestia's question was cut off by Lone's skill.

"Soul Reinforcement." Like a tidal wave, masses upon masses of mana flowed into Elestia's small body.

Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Mental Pain Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Master Level 1.

Lone could sense that Elestia's soul had been wrecked beyond belief. He wasn't sure how strong she was originally, but right now, her soul was at the lowest possible strength: I-rank.

All of Lone's mana had disappeared to bring her soul up to E-rank, and as he had done that, the girl's body had begun to spasm and a very weak cry flowed out of her mouth.

"Bear with it! I'm in pain here too! Mental Pain Resistance only makes the pain more tolerable, it doesn't actually get rid of it, so stop thrashing about and let me fix you!" Lone ordered as five of the mana orbs shattered, reinforcing Elestia's soul to D-rank.

Tears welled up in Elestia's eyes and she was biting her teeth so hard that it looked like they would explode from the pressure any second.

"One more to go!" Lone yelled as he channelled his power into the remaining fifty mana orbs and used all of that mana to reinforce Elestia's soul to C-rank.

Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Mental Pain Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Master Level 2. Congratulations! The host's soul skill [Soul Reinforcement] has levelled up! It is now Beginner Level 2. Congratulations! The host's soul skill [Soul Reinforcement] has levelled up! It is now Beginner Level 3. Congratulations! The host's soul skill [Soul Reinforcement] has levelled up! It is now Beginner Level 4.

Lone collapsed backwards and lied down on the floor as he broke out into a violent sweat. "Well, there goes almost all of my mana orbs. Now I'm down to only two," Lone laughed as he held his head and tried to endure the wild throbbing of his brain.

Even for him, who could endlessly harness mana in his body, using such a large amount of orbs and consciously redirecting that power to a skill was very taxing on Lone's mana brain and heart.

The only time that he had ever used so many orbs was when he was creating powerful items and weapons, but even then, his unique skill, Creation Magic, automatically consumed the MP stored in the mana orbs, so Lone had never personally done such a thing before.

"How...?" Elestia muttered as she slowly sat up and looked at her hands. She was amazed that she could move without any struggle or pain.

"You know about soul ranks, right?" Lone said as he stared at the ceiling.

"Of course," Elestia replied.

Lone smirked as he closed his eyes. "I recently got my hands on the Soul Reinforcement skill. I'm sure you saw that. I used it on your soul and fixed it as much as I could. Mind you, it still cost me just over eleven-million mana points."

"... Why?" Elestia knew that Lone had no strong feelings for the world tree and had no attachment to the people here aside from his companions, so she was confused as to why Lone would sacrifice so much mana to restore a mere portion of her strength.

Lone raised his upper body and leaned his hands against the ground. "You called for my help because you think I can beat Ythmagobla, right?"

Without hesitating, Elestia nodded. "Yes. In his first attack, both of the current XXX-rankers living on me and the Radiance Dragon were needed just to repel Ythmagobla in his prime, but now he is rushing. He thinks that I am recovering my strength and he is wary of you, the being who defeated one of his generals without even lifting a finger."

Elestia had a very hopeful expression on her small face as she continued, "If it's with that strange ability of yours, you can defeat him!"

"One question first. What happened to this Radiance Dragon? It won't help?" Lone asked.

A sad look emerged on Elestia's face. "She sacrificed her life to prevent my spirit, the girl who you see before you, from disappearing from this world. Ythmagobla still isn't aware of this, and his ignorance was keeping him at bay."

"I'm just gonna say this now, but I doubt I can defeat Ythmagobla as I currently am," Lone honestly spoke.

"What do you mean?" Elestia's hope-filled expression seemed to be seconds away from crumbling and that tugged at Lone's heartstrings. it was like he was looking at a child whose ice-cream had splattered all over the ground.

"My power only works on beings that are, at most, five ranks higher than me, meaning X-rank. The only reason why it worked on Scratchy was because her soul was inside of an X-ranked Homunculus," Lone explained.

"I-I can help you pass the A-rank bottleneck and rank up!" Elestia shouted in a desperate attempt to buy Lone's aid.

'Darkness, how strong do I have to be for you to have enough power to defeat Ythmagobla?' Lone asked in his mind while making sure to clutter his regular thoughts with trivia so Elesta couldn't hear their conversation.

'Considering that the child is an Ancient-level being now, hmm, at SSS-ranked for a normal avatar, though you're rather special... Maybe a late S-ranker? It's hard to tell, Master,' Darkness responded.

'You can have normal avatars as well? I thought anyone that you fully bonded with would just explode?' Lone noted.

'Silly Master... There are always exceptions. For example, Ythmagobla would make for a fantastic avatar were I not already in a far... tastier one.' Lone could imagine Darkness licking his lips and looking at him with a lustful grin, so Lone's entire body shook and goosebumps appeared on his arms.

"A-rank is as much as I can do with my limited power! B-But once I've fully recovered, I can forcefully push you to SSS-rank!" Elestia thought that Lone was ignoring her, so she tried to plead with him.

"That's fine, I can manage on my own. Anyway, I'll need something more from you if you want my help," Lone said with a firm and unwavering tone in his voice as he looked right into Elestia's eyes.

"M-My body? I can't do that. I would die if I had intercourse since it would absorb my vital energies, h-however, j-just my mouth-"

"No." Lone held his face in his palm and sighed heavily.

"I have seen you with that Human girl e-every night, so I assumed-"

"You assumed wrong." Lone wanted to strangle this cute little girl who had been peeping on himself and Sophie and making false assumptions about his desires. "Raise me to A-rank and give me enough spirit essence to reach level nine-hundred and ninety-nine, okay? Do that and I'll kill Ythmagobla for you."

"T-That's all?" Elestia was shocked.

"Yes, that's all." Lone was genuinely frustrated at this world tree spirit. He assumed that it would have been a little bit wiser considering how many millions of years old it was. "You've seen me consume the Darkness Monsters in this dungeon before, right?"

"Yes, I did. I couldn't tell how you did that though," Elestia replied.

"It's simple," Lone said with a bit of a proud grin on his lips. "I have the Primal Essence of Darkness living inside of my soul. He is my servant and I am his master, that's why I am immune to Darkness, but at the same time, I can't fight Ythmagobla unless I'm an S-ranker since the gap is too big."

"T... The Primal... Essence?" Elestia was shaken to the core. Was such a thing truly possible? Could a single mortal really harbour within him a whole Primal Essence and not be destroyed in body and soul by it?

Such a thing was possible, yes, but was it possible for a mere Foxkin? Elestia knew that it shouldn't be, but she had to believe in Lone. She had no other choice. Immediately, two-thousand bottles of glowing spirit essence appeared in front of Lone.

Clearly, these were of a higher grade than the ones that King Ele'hunda had given out as rewards during the keeper exams.

"These are enough for you to easily reach level two-thousand and five-hundred, but first, I'll grant you enlightenment and make you an A-ranker. Please stay still." Elestia was placing all of her bets on Lone.

Either Lone won, or he and everyone on the tree, Elestia included, would perish. Perhaps the innocent soul of the world tree would have collapsed from shock if Lone had told her that not only did he have the Primal Essence of Darkness inside of him, but also the Primal Essences of Sky and Void.