Family of Dé

Ancestral Castle

De Abas and the old man who was the head of the post office sat in the control room. After seeing everything that had happened between Edard and Dé Kalhari, Dé Abas had decided to directly teleport himself to Edard's location. Then something happened and Edard disappeared completely.

"What the hell is inside that cave that can disrupt our network?!" The old man shouted in shock. It must be said that the Dé had a very good satellite network that could detect almost anything as long as it had a longevity.

Dé Abas narrowed his eyes in thought. He knew there was something urgent for the queen to have personally sent him but he didn't expect to see an Outsider that could use their exclusive Curse. Not only that, Edard's Curse can kill other hunters.

The old man rubbed his forehead in distress. "How exactly did he activated that Curse? Only the queen and her maids have it."

"Skill Aberration, very unusual but still possible. The same way the Dénizens developed psychomancy skills." De Abas explained.

The old man nodded with understanding. "But how do we deal with it? We can't pick him with our satellites."

"I will go, mobilise every available hunter... no, mobilise all our hunters. I don't care what they are doing. "

"But... " The old man started but was interrupted by Abas.

"Just do it."

Déniz empire

The capital, Jékijs

Princess Nusi was the eldest daughter of emperor Déniz and the crown princess of the empire. Despite being missing for the past year the empire still hadn't renounced her position.

"Uncle Omen, I'm coming in." Prince Kyru, the immediate younger brother of the missing princess, pushed the door open.

Uncle Omen was an old man with a black halo over his head.

"Come in please." Uncle Omen pointed him to a sit.

"Uncle, you wouldn't have woken me up just because of some crap breaking their Contract vows, would you?" Prince Kyru said, annoyed.

"No, prince, it's about the princess. We have found her exact location."

"Y... you have found her exact location?" Kyru practically lost all his cool and jumped excitedly. "Where is she? Why didn't you Reverse Summon her already?"

"Er... the problem is there is a powerful aura around her, I don't know whose aura it is. My Reverse Summoning can have unpredictable effects on the people around the target. I want to hear from you before I do anything." The Sage explained hesitantly. Reverse Summoning was a soul manipulation skill used to summon a person back to a familiar place. The familiar place should have a portion of the target's soul.

"What 'unpredictable effects' are we talking about?" The prince asked with a raised voice.

"Whenever I use it, anybody around fifteen meter radius of the target would die. The strong ones tend to resist but they always suffer some soul damage." The sage explained.

"So the target will be safe?"

"Yes, prince. She will be perfectly fine, only the people around...."

"Shut up, finding sister Nusi is more important than your shitty sense of justice, just Reverse Summon her already. The empire will take care of any issue that might arise."

The sage used his blood to draw a circle at the centre of the room and he activated the skill.

"How long will it take?"

"At most, an hour."

**

Meanwhile, the increasing audience outside had seen many surprises. First of all, the red-haired boy.

If it had been one of the empires that claimed the dungeon, it would be understandable. But how could somebody, no one had ever seen, took it down. Màsar had a close system. No one could become this strong without people noticing. Over 75% of the population used elemental skills from Contracts, the remaining 20 to 25% used Acquired skills specific to their races. Only a negligible portion of the population had extra Classes.

If you used elemental skill, the House you made Contract with would know you. If you used Acquired skills, the people from your race would also have a similar skill and in most cases they would know you. And the few people that used Classes were all recognizable nobles and pure bloods everyone knew of. With a system like this, everyone would be surprised to see Edard displaying unknown skills.

The audience discussed the outcome with raised voices.

"Only Dario's team, the Lesser Demon's team and the red-haired team survived."

"Yes. Look at the video, only three teams."

"But how many skills did that red-haired boy has?! He has a dimensional skill, gravity, and even a lava Contract! Who exactly is he?! How did we miss a noble from House Báyir? What's his name again?"

"I don't know his name, let's call him Red-haired Báyir. More importantly, that dimensional skill is... awesome. I love it. I can't believe a human developing a dimensional skill, the dragons will be jealous."

As the increasing audience discussed the outcome, the leaders from the empires who had sent their representatives into the dungeon also discussed the outcome.

Commander Dáya Báyir had the most interest on Edard because of the 'Contract' issue. He looked at the representative of the lesser demons. "Tell us something about this dungeon, Sukar."

Sukar was a lionkin who had a typical lion's face and a hairy body that made him looked just like a lion walking on two limbs. Sukar clenched his jaw as he looked at Edard on the video feed. "We have just lost six teams and you are not even worried."

"Well, losing the teams is unfortunate but if we lost the teams we will be taking their place. Isn't that right, Sukar?" Daya said, a flame of battle burning in his eyes.

"Whatever." Sukar sighed and looked away.

Dáya sighed softly as he realized Sukar wouldn't say anymore. He turned around and addressed the rest of the teams.

"I think we need to address this red-haired kid before it's too late. I'll send a red-alert to my empire. I suggest you do the same. Also depending on the outcome of the next floor, we may need to get our hands dirty."

It was in the middle of this that a team arrived from the ancient family of Dé. It consisted of twenty four hunters led by Dé Abas.

Tyrant

He is dead... he should be dead. One more down! He had thought.

He had a deep insight of everything that happened in his body. He had seen Edard sustained all the fatal injuries in the third part of the Starvation Hall and he knew Edard's stamina was down.

But then something unusual happened. Tyrant carefully observed the whitish scales protruding on Edard's skin.

Is that Tempering?

He almost fainted when Edard absorbed the 47 crystals from the skeletons.

He watched helplessly as the dimensional power of Edard's flame sword coalesced in the body of the dungeon boss before it burst out violently, creating a massive hole that sucked the boss into the dimension. This was the first time Tyrant witnessed the true power of the Dragon-essence.

He watched helplessly as his giant body reduced in size. Instead of one-hundred dungeons he now had 99. So painful, he thought. He felt as if he had lost a limb. If this continued...

Tyrant didn't want to think about it anymore. The boy must die. That way he would regain his lost dungeon. To add salt to the injury, Edard wasn't a part of the major Houses. If he was, Tyrant would have been able to create a level of tension between the Houses. That would at least distract them for a while.

Between every floor and the next, Tyrant had created a resting spot called safe zone. The essence of the safe zone was to give him time to think about his next course of action.

He calculated the total strength of the next floor. With the way Edard defeated Lancel, another Tier-1 dungeon would be a free ticket for him to grow stronger. He thought about sending him directly to a Tier-2 without the qualification Quest but he suddenly changed his mind.

Not a Tier-2, I'll finish him up with my most powerful Tier-3. I can't take any chances.

The best way to minimise his losses was to rearrange the floors. Bringing the most deadly floors down. He would have time to develop the weaker floors and add more monsters.

He observed the dungeons carefully before he chose a suitable Tier -3 dungeon from the third floor.

The last four hours weren't completely a waste, six of the eight teams sent from the outside were dead. If not for the natural greediness of dungeons Tyrant should be satisfied. But the more they gained longevity the more they craved for it, like an endless vicious cycle. A dungeon would still cry for loosing an hour of longevity even if it gained a hundred years in return.

Three teams had survived Lancel but none of them would survive the Tier-3.

He smiled wickedly as he thought about a plan to make that happen.

Edard

Edard woke up feeling completely fine. He slowly opened his groggy eyes to see the corpse lying on... him. At first he didn't think much about it and just pushed it aside. But he suddenly remembered what happened. He had left the corpse in the third part of the Starvation Hall, mostly because he had left in a hurry. He lost consciousness immediately after the boss fight so he didn't retrieve it afterward. The corpse shouldn't be there unless Dylas was the one who brought it with him....

A series of messages caught his attention.

Time left in the safe zone: 00:49:55

Afterwards, you will be transported to the next dungeon.

Spiritual Sense has reached level 10 which is the maximum proficiency for a Tier-1 skill.

Spiritual Sense has upgraded to a Tier-2 skill: in addition to your ability to see distant objects you can now smell them. You can identify things (living or dead) by their scent. You can turn off your smell and sight at will.

Spiritual sense (Tier-2) has reached level 1

You have successfully formed a soul bond with Nusi Kil'zanki

Bond status: 37% (12% per day)

For having a Soul Bond with the royal bloodline Kil'zanki, you have received the following benefits:

1] Because of the alliance between the ancient House Kil'zanki and House Déniz you can use lightning element without a Contract.

2] You can burrow longevity from the bond.

3] If the soul bond is complete both you and the other party will have full access to each others memories.

NB: you are 100% prone to all the side effects of a soul bond. The immortal dais wishes you good luck.

First, Edard hadn't signed any contract and he had no idea where all these 'soul bond' stuff was coming from. Just to make sure he wasn't hallucinating he opened his classification tab and went to the class Lightning Elementalist.

Class: Lightning elementalist

This allows the user to convert life energy into a lightning element.

•Status: active

Level: 1/10 (1 hour)

Bottleneck: an obstacle that must be overcome before crossing a level. No bottleneck at this stage.

*

Choose one skill

1] Lightning Contract: create ten Contract Seals that will allow others to control lightning. Plus ten Seals per level.

You can sell a Contract Seal for a designated price and you can also burrow longevity from your followers.

If you die all the cultivators using your element will experience a significant cultivation level drop.

Cost of a Seal: 1500

*

2] Lightning Ancestor: transform your entire body into a lightning for 10 seconds. Duration of use will upgrade with leveling.

Transformed parts will be indestructible to any physical attack.

Cost: 1000

*

3] Thunderbird: the thunderbird is an ancient beast that creates its own lightning. This beast doesn't require life energy to do so as it manipulate nature energy. By activating this skill you can convert 1 unit of nature energy to a lightning bolt every second.

The more units of nature energy converted the more potent the lightning becomes. Giving appropriate time you can virtually create the most powerful lightning element ever seen.

Cost: 0

What the hell...

He hadn't seen a set of insanely powerful skills like these. The Contract that Calgon was bragging about was finally within reach. He could even transform his entire body into a lightning bolt, making him impossible to kill. There was this Thunderbird skill which enabled him to create lightning, not from his life energy but from the surrounding nature energy.

His eyes widened as he observed the skills again. Lightning Contract would make him a king, gradually an emperor. He could build his own army that would be loyal to him. But it didn't affect him directly. It didn't change his speed, attack or defence capabilities, directly. He still wanted it. Although, its cost was high he could accumulate the nature energy over time since it wasn't something to be used amid a battle.

The Lightning Ancestor was an absolute defense that could withstand any physical attack from anyone. If leveled high enough it would ensure his survival. The only problem was the cost. 1000 life energy was crazy. His life energy wasn't up to 500 yet. For the first time, he regretted not picking Open Annihilation skill. At least that would have given him the ability to accumulate life energy.

The Thunderbird was something that required zero life energy. If he chose it, he would have some control over nature energy. He could fight even when completely drained. The amount and strength of the produced lightning would be entirely different from what cultivators were capable of with their life energy. It was also the only skill that was ready to be used.

If he chose any skill, he would lose the others.

Another selection headache.

Perhaps, the Thunderbird was the most obvious choice if you excluded the future prospects. The emperors had Contract so he already had rivals there. Calgon was an elementalist but he couldn't transform his body into an elemental form, hopefully other elementalist couldn't as well. He would have to find out before he decided.

He closed the tabs and walked out of the room. Unsurprisingly, the corpse levitated and followed him behind. It would be awkward even for Dylas to see a levitating corpse so Edard tied it on his back before he walked out of the room.

They were in a large apartment with five bedrooms, a large parlour and a kitchen.

Despite not feeling hungry Edard headed directly into the kitchen, remembering the hunger effects on his longevity. Dylas was inside the kitchen trying to fry something.

Edard quickly stuffed his stomach with everything he could get. There was all kind of bizarre fruits but nothing cooked. He held one fruit with a typical apple shape, but the size was larger than the ball used in the UEFA Champions league. Edard cared less. As long as the taste was good he could manage.

Food is food! Edard thought as he threw a yellowish cashew-like fruit in his mouth.

"I thought I would have a complication of peptic ulcer disease." Edard finally said.

Dylas narrowed his eyes in thought.

"Peptic ulcer? Is that a new skill?" He asked.

"Skill? No, it's a disease that can be acquired from hunger. Just forget about it. What are you cooking?" Edard asked.

"It's a Casansbr. I'm good at this, trust me." Dylas said proudly.

Casansbr? It was his first time hearing it. "Well, I will reserve my comment until I try it. I want to thank you about the rune you drew on my stomach and also for taking care of me after I lost consciousness."

Dylas smiled. "Not a problem, although the old me would have charged you ten thousand low grade spirit stones."

"Ten-thousand?"

Dylas nodded. "Even more, depending on the customer. Don't know how the market is nowadays but it shouldn't be any cheaper."

"Thank you." Edard said with a courtesy bow.

"Don't mention, I also want to give you these." Dylas brought out the two crystals from the boss. "This one is a lot of money, it can buy a small mansion in the capital." He gave Edard the blue crystal.

High grade Stone.

Apparently, it was the same as the non-absorbable stones he'd found in the third part of the Starvation Hall.

"Whereas this one," Dylas pointed at the smaller greyish stone, "is a dungeon stone. It's the same stone I used thousand years ago to build the dungeon entrance. But it's even better; it has longevity stored in it. So you can absorb the longevity and still use it later. Since you took down the boss you should take them." Dylas said, handing the stones over.

"We are a team so you should take one." Edard said, taking the dungeon stone.

As soon as he compressed it it lost its grey color and become completely opague.

You have gained 1033 hours from a dungeon stone x1

More than one-thousand hours?! Edard exclaimed internally. It had exceeded all the longevity he had gotten before.

"I want to ask you something," Dylas said and he continued without waiting for Edard's approval. "How did you get the earth Contract? You are a demon so there is no way the Báyir empire would have handed over their Contract to you."

Edard had seen the term 'Contract' in his lightning element and apparently he wasn't supposed to use any of the elements without signing a Contract with the owner. Calgon had clearly stated that earth element was theirs.

"Is it possible to use any of these elements without a Contract?" He asked.

"It's not possible. Thousands of years ago, five heroes performed a great deed. These heroes were given a gift each. A gift that allows them to own an elemental skill for all eternity or at least until they die. The elemental skills are fire, water, lightning, wind and earth. From that day onward, whoever wants to use one of these elements must a sign Contract with the owner.

"Lord Báyir was given the earth element, and he founded House Báyir. Lord Djinn was given fire element, and he founded house Djinn. Lord Micro was given water element, and he founded House Micronomad. Lord Deniz was given the lightning element, and he founded House Deniz. Lord Fáyra received the wind element, and he founded House Fáyra.

"These Houses are all humans and only gave a Contract to their followers. With the history of bloodshed between humans and demons it is simply not possible for you to have that Contract."

Edard's heart skipped a beat. He had already made enemies without knowing. "What if you use more than one element, without a Contract?" He asked.

Dylas laughed at the sound of the question. "You are kidding, right? Using more than one element is against the rules of Màsar and the Immortal Dais. Now tell me, how did you get it?"

"....Alright. I will tell you, later."

Edard hurriedly left the apartment and headed north into the forest that surrounded the safe zone.

After he put enough distance between himself and the apartment, he stopped near a small boulder. He needed to stock up lava element and to get at least two more elements in the dimension to break the bottleneck. He had already stored earth, wind, water, undead energy, ghoul energy, Nestone, hunger energy and bio energy. Even though, his battle in the dungeon was a success but it made him realized how much stronger he needed to get.

He looked back toward the apartment to make sure he was out of range before he created a Dragon-essence sword.

He narrowed his eyes as he saw the roaring energy of the Dragon-essence in his hand. It was carved into a perfect, half a meter long sword. He swung it to slash the boulder in half. The suction force in the sword absorbed the entire boulder into the dragon dimension. He slashed again, ten times in a row, before the sword dissipated. By levelling up Dragonbreath to level 10 he could use a single sword up to ten times. Unlike initially when it dissipated after a single use. The suction power had also increased by fifty percent. There were some things he still hadn't understood about the dimension. When he opened it what he saw was a 2 by 2 window which led to a dark void. The void showed no information on its contents, which meant Edard had to remember it. Anything stored could not be taken out except for lava. He had stored igneous rocks and ended up with lava, he knew nothing about what other elements would give.

A sudden idea appeared in his mind. The Class description had mentioned he couldn't use the other elements but no mention of what would happen if he tried to take them out. He extended his left and focused on the previous elements he had stored.

You can't use wind element, it has been added to the Bang spectrum!

You can't use water element, it has been added to the Bang spectrum!

You can't use undead energy, it has been added to the Bang spectrum!

Bang? As in Big Bang?!

Edard read the screens over again. The first warning popped up when he attempted to empty the wind element in the dragon dimension. He was told he could only use lava but nobody told him what happened to the other elements he had stored. He also wanted to know what would happen if he tried to force them out of the dimension.

The things he had stored in the dimension were still inside, added to the Bang Spectrum. Big Bang was a popular theory on Earth about how the universe came into existence. Edard, as an astronomer, knew it all too well. It described how everything started from a singularity of a high-density and high-temperature core, which then burst out and developed into the different elements that formed the universe.

If the elements he stored were added to the Big Bang spectrum then there was only one explanation he could think of. The transformation in the dimension converted the elements to their very original forms. To the very thing that started everything in the universe. Just like in the Big Bang.

A sudden shock hit Edard as he realized the possibility of what he was hypothesising. He took three steps back and inhaled deeply. What would result from the elements added into the Spectrum? It was obvious he couldn't use the elements added to the spectrum now, but what of when every element was added? When the spectrum was complete?

Beads of sweat ran down his face from the mere thought. An unknown element? A never seen element? An element that represented everything in the universe? An element of mass destruction? A strong desire to see the result occupied his thoughts. On that day, Edard swore to complete the spectrum.

After taking an ample time to calm down, he turned to the only element available to him. For now he would use lava and any other additional element before he completed the Bang Spectrum.

Edard created a Dragon-essence sword and stabbed it in the ground. As it made contact, it created a giant crater. He attacked the crater again making a wider hole. He continued until he reached a rocky ground. Apparently the Safe Zone had a similar composition to Earth, with igneous rocks lining the core. Edard was happy about it, what he needed the most was the rock. He rested for a while before he started stuffing the dimension with the rock.

Lava store: 1033 units

Ejection speed: 50m/sec

Trajectory: control by willpower

Cost: 30 per unit

The sight he left behind was ugly. With a giant crater so wide and deep it could consume an entire village. Having done that he looked for any new element. Unfortunately, there was nothing, whenever he absorbed anything in the forest he would get the same notification.

Dragon-essence has stored bio energy in the dragon dimension.

Bio energy.

He even searched with his new Spiritual Sense but he only picked Dylas. The guy had finished frying the Casansbr, whatever that was, and was already training a few miles away.

What Edard lacked was the knowledge of the environment. He had thought reading things in books would clear his doubts but it made it worse. He had more questions now. It only made sense since he had never had any direct training or tutelage about the world, being the foreigner he was. Everything he knew up to this point was from his indirect questions to Dylas. Even though, that had helped but for him to have a full understanding he needed a teacher.

Edard recapped the books on geography and skills but he ultimately decided to ask Dylas directly. About the world, about immortal dais, about being a demon, about classes and skills, about soul bond, about everything. Even though, he had his suspicions about Dylas, he had no choice. He hated the fact that he knew almost nothing, the ignorance had to stop now. A risk he was willing to take.

Edard activated his new clone and appeared in front of Dylas, instantly. It was more or less a teleportation, probably faster, because Edard's afterimage was still in the forest when he appeared next to Dylas. He recognized what Dylas was doing as some kind of martial art training. Dylas's hands were clenched into a fist and he used them to punch the air in a style. Every punch sent a gale in the direction. It was as if his fists were giant mountains swung in the air. Edard watched in amazement as he waited.

Few minutes later, Dylas turned to him. "Wanna join?"

Edard shook his head. "I will tell you about the Contract."