Quake went through one of doors on the ground and brought out a completely black 7 foot long sword. Jade’s IP denoted the sword as a [Relic: Deep Vow Sword]. The sword had the image of the head of a tiny golden trident on the center of its blade.

Quake held the blade of the sword toward Jade and said “Touch the sword and swear to never swindle any citizen or member of Atlantis and to abide by our code of trade while you trade with us. Swear that you will never harm any Atlantian while you remain with us or when you are not with us unless the Atlantian has done something that truly deserves death or harm from your own point of view. Swear…”.

Jade touched the sword and said “I swear to never swindle…”. When Jade was done with his swears he saw a small golden trident form in his soul realm and on his arm. The trident represented the memory of his swear and also a foreign influence.

Quake said “You can remove the restriction by swearing the opposite of what I’ve said… don’t worry you’ll remember once you decide to. But doing that would mean that none of our city services will work for you and Ocean will know about you revoking of your vow and so will we. We will not trade with you and you will be evicted from our territory”.

Quake took the sword back to the room he took it from and went to through one of the doors on the ceiling again and brought back two emerald jars. One had swirling grey mist in it and the other was empty. He handed Jade an emerald jar and said “Hold the jar to your head and think about the information, the jar will do the rest”. Intrigued, Jade did as Quake told him to and he felt a stream of information about various human technologies flow from his head to the jar.

It took about 5 minutes for the process to complete and he dropped the jar. After he transferred the information, the jar was filled with grey mist that occasionally colorized and showed images pertaining to various subjects.

Quake passed the second jar that had grey mist in it to Jade and said “That’s what you want. Put the jar close to your head and it will do the rest”. Jade did so and the grey mist flowed toward his head. The knowledge entered his mind but it didn’t enter his soul as he hadn’t assimilated it. The process took 5 minutes also.

Quake said “If you want something else you can meet my subordinate or just ask around and you will be led to the right place”. Jade said “I’ll come back later with a friend or two. I wonder though, why did I have to fight you?”

Quake said “Because I was the only core city lord that didn’t want to trade with humans. Fighting you showed to me that even though there is a lot of danger in interacting with your kind there are some good ones like you, and the benefits are worth it… Look at you, you’re such a strong person yet you cannot be hired to kill an Atlantian because you want to trade with us. I see that as a win”.

Jade thought ‘He is quite rational. This must be why they never have wars; they are too rational for it’. He nodded and said “I’ll be leaving then, I want to go to Core 1”.

Quake had one of his subordinates, a merman, escort Jade to Core 1. Jade didn’t bother saying goodbye to Quake since merfolk didn’t understand the gesture. Jade floated behind the merman and they both swam in a certain direction. Before he knew it again he was in another city. Unlike the previous city this city was built around a chain of underwater volcanoes.

Jade reassessed his memories of getting here and came to the same conclusion he had before; the passage to the city became real for a moment before becoming unreal afterward. Unlike Core 3, Core 1 had an industrial vibe to it. There was a large amount of bubbles rising from the furnaces and heat transferring equipment in the city.

The escort led Jade to the base of a large volcano and Jade saw a large forging house with various mechanical machines used for forging. There were many rooms and the temperature was extremely high. Jade could see them making ballistae, swords, tridents, daggers, chains and various cold weapons through the open doors along the hallway he was floating through.

He thought ‘They really need an upgrade if this is the best that they have’. Jade was escorted to a room at the end of the extremely large and long hallway. This room had no forging equipment, only boards and holograms depicting various device and equipment blueprints.

A 12 meter tall humanoid with yellow skin was sitting on a chair fit for his size and had his back toward Jade. Jade was amused at finding someone of a similar size to his own and wondered if the person was also a titan.

The person turned his chair and faced Jade staring at him smugly with his singular eye. Jade’s IP denoted him as a [Rank 20 Primordial Cyclops (Arges) (Vivid)]. Jade thought ‘He’s obviously Eye’.

Eye said “So, what do you think? Amazing right?” Jade said “If you’re referring to the technology, it’s backward, very backward, a few centuries backward. But if you’re talking about how proud you are of such backward technology, yes, it is very amazing”.

Eye frowned and said “You humans aren’t that amazing! You fell to the monsters just like we did!” Jade smugly said “Indeed, but it doesn’t change the fact that your technology is very backward. It’s a good thing you did the best you possibly could to buy our technology. Now you have a future”.

To Jade’s amusement, Eye frowned even harder than he did before twisting his face as best as he could and gritting his teeth. But his one eye just made the sight that would have haunted the nightmares of most, an amusing view to Jade.

Eye said between gritted teeth “Have you made a Tier 5 Armament before?” Jade’s amusement gave way to disbelief as he said “N-No”. Eye smiled wickedly and said “I and my colleagues have made a Tier 5 weapon. You humans are nothing”.

Jade’s disbelief gave way to shock as he said “Lies!” Eye’s smile grew wider and he said “It’s very convenient that I just happened to have the Tier 5 weapon with me”. Jade said “Impossible! You wouldn’t bring such a weapon to a place where a potential threat is. I can sense the people watching us from the shadows to protect you. They wouldn’t let me close to a weapon like that if they value you so much!”

Eye laughed and said “How foolish of you. Do you think you can steal a Tier 5 weapon? A weapon you can’t make? A weapon you can’t even comprehend?” Jade was the same size as Eye but his self esteem grew smaller with every question Eye asked, making Eye seem to tower above him.

He replied “I-I-I… You’re lying! You couldn’t have made a Tier 5 weapon before me! I’m the best creator!” Jade remembered how he was 5th on the ranking that the IP showed him, further shrinking the image he had of himself.

The atmosphere became calm as Eye laughed heartily and said “No need to be so scared. I’m just joking I don’t have a Tier 5 weapon”. Jade sighed in relief and he said “You got me”. Eye laughed and said “I did, didn’t I?” Jade smiled weakly and said “You did, I didn’t even notice anything off. You’re really good at lying”.

Eye laughed, stretched his arm forward, pulled out a golden trident from the empty water before Jade and said “Am I?!” Jade’s IP denoted the trident as [Tier 5 Armament: Trident of Burden].

If Jade was still a Primordial Human he would have immediately had a stroke. His senses flickered as his mind struggled to stay conscious while he convulsed.