I went back from my mansion to the outside of the dungeon. There, I selected the third floor. When I arrived above the stairs, I was in a small room with a window and a door next to it. On the other side of the window, I could see a green field. Throughout the field, there were many gooey substances of all heights and colors. They looked like slimes, but they were of different sizes and colors than those I've encountered before.

I tried appraising the slimes through the window. The only differences were that they were called great slimes and had slightly better vitality. Such slimes could no longer hurt me! I swung open the door and ran into the field. Suddenly, the slimes started gathering into one! Yellow, green, red, purple, orange, blue, pink… so many colors!

Immediately, I cast a normal absolute frost for a second. While it was disabled by being frozen, I swung Blackmail. It cleanly cut off the amalgamating slime. Some of the remaining slimes still survived, though. As such, I used my claw and my demon eyes for hunting them down and dispose of them. After defeating about fifty great slimes, I grew tired. The area around me was safe, as I had already defeated the nearby great slimes.

Laying up, looking at the sky of this floor, I noticed it was black! Realizing my demon eyes were still on, I turned them off. It was then that I noticed, all around me, it was completely dark! If I couldn't have seen them, I may not have beat those slimes!

I quickly turned back on my demon eyes and scanned around, making sure it was safe. I consumed the five EXP shards from my battles with the slimes. I was disappointed that they only gave two points each, for a total of ten. I spent the next few hours taking in the ground-based energy. With my power of converting it to void, my affinity towards it went from zero to ten percent. Along with the six MP recovery potions I consumed, the mana I used was soon replenished.

I spent the next three days exploring the grassland. I used spirit cannon to create a large cave for my sleep and recharged it with defeated slimes. Overall, during the three days, I earned sixty EXP.

Finally, on the fourth day of my slime fest, I found the way into the next room. There was a door about three meters off the ground. Soon after I discovered it, though, it disappeared. The next day, I watched the spot the entire day, not fighting any more slimes than needed to keep the place slime-free. About an hour before the time when I saw the door yesterday, it reappeared. It was in the exact same place, except it was only about a half a meter above the ground. I was able to jump up and pull myself the rest of the way into the doorway.

On the other side, I saw four giant mountains, reaching above the clouds. This room, like the last, was completely dark without my demon eyes. Using the farsightedness feature of my new eyes, I could tell that there were many archers towards the peaks of these mountains. There was also a small stone.

"Hello, I'm from the goblin chieftain's person spear brigade. Our mage archers are surrounding you. If you want to face us, you must first ascend each mountain and activate it. Only fight if you want to."

It was a welcoming message, written in the goblin language. As these mountains were filled with trees, I did not think it too difficult to sneak up on these archers. I began climbing the closest mountain to me, weary of the goblins I saw. When I got closer to the first group, I saw their arrows were different. Appraisal showed they were mana arrows. I guess these goblins can use magic as well.

I quickly evaded them, going to what appeared to be the center. Using 450 MP, I created a large area of effect for fireball, cast it, and enveloped the entire area in flames. This, of course, drew the attention of the archers of the remaining mountain's archers, but, with Symbolize and my two-layered shield, it would take a very long time to penetrate my defenses.

Finally, the fire began to calm down. I saw a spell book! I immediately learned the spell and appraised it.

Gust forth

Rank: D-

Level: 1

Mana use: 10/meter

Requirements: air affinity 15%

Description: draws all of selected type of object towards caster

It seemed useful to clean up item drops after such a large area of effect spell was used. As I didn't have air affinity, I couldn't use it. I had to collect the drops manually. Just like with goblin mages, the void took all of the strange stones. My loot from the first mountain was forty points of experience and ten mana recovery potions. I was lucky that the numerous trees helped my attack become more spaced out and defeated at least eighty of them.

When I finished with the items, I went to the peak of the mountain. Even though there were no goblins present, the climb to the peak took many hours. > leveled up during this time. Finally, I arrived at the peak. The air here was thin, and breathing was not easy. About three hundred meters above the mountain, I saw a shimmering dome. This must be the actual ceiling. It's so high up!

While I was up here, I converted some of the air mana into my own. I stayed here for three long days. It took longer because breathing was so difficult. As such, I had to pause my attempts in order to catch my breath many times. Finally, my affinity reached fifteen percent! Satisfied, I decided to ask the two in my ring if they knew about why there were so many new element particles.

"It's an interesting phenonium, actually," Seere responded.

"Your planet doesn't have the particles. Normally, you would never be able to even unlock a zero percent affinity! It's due to the void that you can even notice the particles here." Amon continued the explanation.

"But we have a sky and ground on Earth!"

"Having it and having the particles necessary are different matters. It's interesting, since some worlds have a terrain where only a specific elemental affinity is available for its members. Take FireTeer, for example. It is so named because it's bathed in fire. All its members have fire affinity, usually at least eighty percent!" Seere picked up.

"I guess that makes sense. So, what am I missing?" I asked.

"You have it all now. I've never heard of someone with all of the affinities. More training will come soon," Amon flatly stated.

"Interestingly, I've never heard of heavenly affinity, nor have I heard of humans with void affinity. You're a human explorer, right? Of course you are, or else you wouldn't be an explorer."

I continued to the second mountain and repeated the process; however, this time, getting the loot was easier. My EXP increased by thirty points from this mountain. The top of this mountain wasn't as high, and it was actually filled with lava! I stayed away and slowly made my way towards the third mountain. Before I could get too close, I heard the voice of one of the goblins.

"Attack the magic aura!"

Arrows started raining down on me, so I had to flee.

"What's a magic aura?" I inquired.

"Everyone has their own aura. Most cannot see the aura and use machines to detect it. It is like a fingerprint from your memory. Many planets where magic is commonplace use the machines to verify identities all over. It is impossible to fake an aura." Amon answered.

"Interestingly, your aura is small, even though you have such powers. Do you have a skill to suppress it?" Seere, not one to be left out, decided to ask.

"There's none I know of, and, even if I did, you would know about it, right?"

"I guess!"

With two mountains left and a large barrage of arrows, there was nothing I was able to do to get to the next room. I was trying to plan for about two hours when, suddenly, the arrows ceased. Using this opportunity, I snuck back into the room.

On the two remaining mountains, I saw that the goblins were prepared with bows; however, they had no arrows in their quivers.

I began removing the goblin archers one-by-one, rather than as a whole group. It was much easier this way. Throughout my journey on the mountain, there were a few arrows shot towards me. They weren't a threat, though. After a few hours easily hunting the defenseless goblins, I was finally finished with this mountain. There was less EXP on this mountain but more bows to sell to the shop.

For some fun while hunting, I started combining some old bows. The first combination just produced another old bow. When I combined two of these, though, the name changed. It was now a weakened bow. I had enough, so I combined two weakened bows. The result was a lesser bow. Finally, my last combination was of two lesser bows. It produced a new bow, which I appraised.

New bow

Rank: D+

Description: string will regenerate continuously. Capable of firing three arrows at the same time

It may be useful for an archer, but it wasn't for me. I was still interested in continuing with my experiment. The next day, I set out to conquer the final mountain. I was somewhat delayed, as the arrow barrage occurred again. Finally, though, after the rest of the day, I completed this mountain. I had gotten even more bows this time, but I only got six points of experience. With the new bows, I was able to create three more new bows.

I combined the four new bows into two. They were still the same thing with the same rank. Frustrated, I combined the two new bows. I was surprised this worked!

Greater Bow

Rank: C-

Effects: damage restoration: restores partial damage to bow itself after a certain time period has passed. Far sight: increases distance of visible sight by up to three meters while preparing a shot

Description: String will regenerate continuously. Capable of firing three arrows of the time with a small increase in precision

It seemed to be a major update, compared to the previous ones that only added more arrows. I asked the system why this occurred. It didn't respond, but Amon and Seere were able to help me. C- and above equipment were considered high-end equipment, and, as such, they gained effects and became more powerful. It was also much harder to upgrade such equipment. It wasn't as simple as combining them.

It wasn't easy getting this equipment! It took so many different archers!

Satisfied I got a piece of high-end equipment, I went to the peak of the next mountain. Soon, I saw a gate appear in between the four mountains. There was also a room made of rocks surrounding it. As I approached this entrance to the next room, I could see past the gate and into the room. On the other side of the gate, there was a sandy floor. Before I could open the gate and cross over, though, I saw a spirit.

I followed the spirit to a random outcropping on one of the mountains. Inside, it looked like a cave system. I continued going downwards, following the spirit. Finally, I arrived at a large wall. On the wall, I saw many snake-like passages connected to many different places. Looking closer, I noticed the room I was in was very wide—at least one hundred meters. There was even a depiction of the black spiral staircase.

Amazed by this drawing, I lost sight of the fairy. I tried to touch it, and it shimmered in response. I couldn't sense any mana on the wall, but I tried walking through it.

On the other side of the wall, I was in a small tunnel. Crawling through the tunnel, almost being too big, I arrived on the other side.

"How did a human get here?"

I heard the voice of a beautiful female behind me. Spinning around with Blackmail in hand, I saw it was a spirit.

"Who are you? I was following someone like you, and they came here." I asked.

"I am a guard of the royal quarters. We are the fairies in charge of dungeon maintenance. The fairy you saw must have recently come from an assignment. Let me see who I should punish for this act."

"You aren't surprised I can see you?" I asked, surprised myself that she wasn't.

"Isn't it normal? Or is it that your planet doesn't have the capability to see us? System, please pull up his information."

[Request to share information has been initiated. Do you wish to comply? Please choose information to share.]

Weary of the small fairy in front of me, I only shared my name and explorer ID.

"System, please compel data on this explorer." There was a brief pause after he said this before he continued. "I forgot. I need to get the specialized ones in charge to compel more information. System, information on planet earth please."

He then went silent before exclaiming, "I see. It is rare. Your planet has no magic and no visible spirits. No wonder! You must have been very curious when you saw her. I also found out it was Isabella who you saw."

Nodding her little head, she beckoned for another fairy to come closer.

"Jasmine, please bring Isabella over."

"I'm sorry, she's new. I've told her to be secret. The only reason she still works is that she's the princess. Let's see what she has to say."

The spirit I saw earlier came flying by.

"Isabella, you were caught. Do you know what this means?" asked the guard.

"Caught? But I was careful. The only explorer was from Earth, and, since he joined a few months ago, many have been talking about how his planet doesn't have any magic! The catastrophe hasn't even occurred yet!" Isabella fought back

"You actually did your due diligence this time around? I'm surprised. But then how do you explain this man?"

"What man? All I see are the two of you talking."

At this point, Seere pointed something important out.

"Interesting. While humans from some planets can use a limited amount of spirit force, only spirits can have theirs over one hundred fifty. One hundred is usually the maximum for humans, with some monsters able to get closer to the limit. It is very rare, but a few humans can get their bodies to accept slightly more than one hundred after many years of training," she said.

"With my training, of course you'd be able to be greater. I stopped at an appropriate time as I didn't want you to become a spirit. Be careful you don't ever have a force greater than five hundred in your body, or else you really may!"

With Amon chiming in, now everyone's involved in this conversation.

"What do you mean, Isabella? This is obviously a human."

"Jackie, can't you sense spiritual force? This is obviously a spirit pretending to be a human for disguise. Nice joke! Who is it under there? Nickie? It can't be Jasmine, since she brought me here. Is it Helen? If it's Helen, she should know better than to trick me!"

"Isabella, Roberto here is definitely a human explorer. The dungeon even confirmed that." The guard, named Jackie, continued the argument.

"If he's a human, then why does his spirit force feel so strong? To put it into human numbers, it must be at least two hundred. That's impossible for non-spirits. Maybe he's a pixie! Or a sprite!"

"Over two hundred?" I questioned. Quickly, I checked my stats page, and it had increased to two hundred ten! My regeneration has even increased in level!

"Then, please let me ask you. Are you a human?" Jackie questioned.

"I am very much a human. I'm completely human."

"Then quickly! Summon the queen!"

When Jackie announced this, another fairy zoomed past.

"Jackie, why so serious? What's the issue? You can't bring someone to the queen yourself, you know." The new fairy spoke to Jackie.

"Etna, then maybe you can approve my request. You see the queen all the time, right? Look at him. He is a human."

"Jackie, is this some kind of joke? He is obviously of another spirit race."

"No, I'm human," I interjected, not wanting this to go on for too long.

"If that's the case, please rest here for the night. You can come to the queen tomorrow. " Etna stated, while flying off towards a cottage.

I followed her to a small cottage made of wood with runes on them. I could tell what the elementary runes did, such as one for increased privacy and another for concealing the door.

[Elementary rune techniques level up! Level 3!]

I appraised the new skill I learned

Runic line knowledge

Description: knowledge of how to draw all elementary runic lines

I could now figure out how to use my mana to draw simple lines as parts of runes, yet I couldn't master completed runes. There was also something missing. I knew how to do it, but I just couldn't. It was still a useless skill, no different than before.

I spent the night here. In the morning, I woke up and checked my status. I hadn't gotten such a good night's rest in a while, since I was continuously challenging the dungeon here. My status showed my SF increased to two hundred twenty, and my regeneration increased two more levels.

Soon after I awoke, Etna visited my place, and she had me follow her to the queen's residence. This was a large, golden castle in a small forest clearing. As we approached, the spirits disguised as people guarding the entrance moved aside.

"Lady Etna, who is this man?" One asked

"Relax, please. This man is another spirit who thinks he is a human. Just look at his spiritual force. We have an appointment with the queen this morning to see why he won't tell us the truth."

We continued our walk into the castle. It wasn't very far, as, once we finished walking through the first room, we approached a set of doors. Etna knocked on the doors, and a voice from inside said, "you may enter."

Entering behind her, we approached a girl in a golden dress sitting upon a silver throne. Because it seemed like the right thing to do, I bowed when I entered.

"Raise your heads," the young girl said. Suddenly, she became a small fairy.

"System, please compel data on this explorer."

[Data has been delivered to employee of the dungeon due to higher authority level.]

Suddenly, the queen gasped. "Not only are you actually a human with such high spiritual power, but you are also from a planet with no magic or spirits."

"It's interesting. System, put a lock on his data so that only those with a level of authority above mine can compel. Voluntarily, allow only those with or above my level." She paused before continuing. "Yes, I am sure. I don't need to compel him anymore."

[Data lock has been applied. Required level to compel has been upgraded from two to six.]

"I ask that you please do not reveal our existence. As we help the dungeon, there is not too much I can reward you with; however, there are two things I can gift you with. The first is a couple of our spells and skills. As the dungeon doesn't consider humans able to learn these, it's fine if I leave them to you. Second, I'll upgrade your dungeon authority. With my level five, the most I can give you is level three. Is this enough?"

Before I could respond, Isabella came running in.

"Wait, mom! Why don't I go with him?"

"Bella, you are still too inexperienced."

"But I got caught by him on my way here. He was so nice!"

"You're right about that. Roberto, I can also give you my daughter. My own flesh and blood. I hope this will allow you to keep our secret. We are immortal creatures. While you are alive, she will be your companion. She will also be bound to you at all times and able to help you throughout the dungeon. She'll stay with you, no matter what, throughout your entire life. Are you sure you are ready for this companion? Her authority will be downgraded to level three, the same as yours. She was level four. As such, she will be unable to perform any complex functions. She may be able to guide you better as well. She's inexperienced, so I don't know how much she'll be of any help."

"Are you sure?"

"Absolutely, Roberto."

"Then I'll graciously accept."

"Yeah! Then I'll finally be free to explore on my own. Please call me Bella, Master Roberto."

"Likewise, please just call me Roberto."

Her mom interjected. "Dungeon, with my level five authority, grant unto him level three authority. I approve." She paused before continuing again. "I accept my daughter as the lifelong bonded spirit companion of Roberto."

Responding to her, I said, "I accept the companionship with Isabella."

[Bonded link with fairy Isabella created. You are now bonded for life.]

"Congratulations, Roberto! Now we're together forever. Please treat me well."

"I will of course. What do you eat?"

"I survive off of spiritual force. You also seem to have a lot of it."

"You now require 1500SF in order to become a spirit," Amon responded, surprising me.

I quickly checked my status and saw my SF increased by six hundred!

Continuing, Amon said, "Congratulations on your marriage!"

"Marriage?!" I blurted out loud!

"Oh, you didn't know? A spirit's bonding is considered their marriage and you two are now husband and wife!" The queen should have told me that sooner.

"Is that okay?" Bella asked, suddenly becoming shy.

"It's fine! It's great! We can live together in my mansion! I was just surprised. That's all. I want to keep you happy, new wife."

I kissed her forehead, and she blushed. I guess she may be a little shy.

[System update completed. Authority level three granted.]

There's the notification I'd been waiting for. I tried asking about the catastrophe, how to upgrade blackmail, who these entities are I've been collecting in my ring, and many more questions about the dungeon. I didn't get anything useful back, but, unlike before, the system actually gave me a response.

[Authority level insufficient.]

"Hello there, master's wife," Amon said in my head.

"Hello," Bella stuttered in my head.

"How are you in my head?"

Blushing, Bella responded in my head, "It's the bond between husband and wife. We don't have to use words. We can always read each other's thoughts, if we want. Also, I can change my form to become more to your liking."

"Your form's fine. I love you just as you are."

"It will be helpful to you," she said as she suddenly transformed to become a young, red-headed girl in a pale blue short skirt, tight top, cute pale blue gloves, and sandals.

"I can also do this." She said, her clothes changing into a gray bustiere lingerie top with little white ribbons. Her skirt changed into gray bikini bottoms, her sandals staying the same and gloves changing color to gray.

"The new one's ok when we're alone, but the first one is probably easier for the dungeon and on Earth."

"OK, husband. I love you."

"I love you too."

"Such a cute couple. I must reward you with something for your wedding!" The queen stated, taking out a spell scroll. "I'll add this one to your reward spells."

"By the way, husband, who is that next to your soul?"

"Next to my soul?" I asked

"I'm in your soul, far away from your scary element. That's how I can always be with you. I can hide away there if I need to, and it will also help me recover. Next to your soul, there are two dark energies. They look a little broken, though."

"Amon, Seere, please introduce yourselves."

"Hello, master's wife. I am Marquis Amon. We are unable to tell him more about who we actually are, so please keep it a secret."

"Interesting. She can see us too. You have a very powerful and cute companion. I'm Prince Seere."

"Nice to meet you both," Bella shyly responded. "I hope you can meet the other seventy. You are legends to us."

Switching to talking aloud, Bella continued, "Mom, this adventurer has two of the demons from the—"

"Enough!" the queen yelled. "He must hear no more about them if they are who I think they are."

"We are, and we thank you. It's interesting you know who we are." Seere said aloud.

"We must stop this conversation, but I'd love to talk to you more if he succeeds in the trials."

"Yes, let's," Amon agreed.

"Sounds Interesting," Seere followed.

"Attention everyone! Our little Isabella has grown up and got married!" The queen's voice seemed to permeate through the air itself.

The doors to the throne room opened, and, past them, thousands of fairies could be seen.

"These are the few who aren't currently on missions," Etna explained.

"I have one question, though. What was Bella's mission?"

"I'll answer that. As it affects him, he should know. System, show the anomaly."

A projection popped up, showing the gate in the previous room. There were many different, unknown numbers showing different types of energy ratings and other data. Elsewhere, there were scales from zero percent to one hundred percent, with varying levels. The one I noticed, though, was the same odd gray color as the void's fog. This one was all of the way at the top.

The queen began explaining what this showed. "Usually, the gate here transfers explorers to a subspace prepared for the goblin chieftain's spearmen, complete with excellent spawners. It is a long, tiring fight to test endurance. The portal, this time, wasn't functioning correctly. As confirmed by Bella, the portal led to somewhere in the void. We haven't been able to close it yet, as you came here. "

"Interesting," Seere said aloud. "The void sees how close you are to it and wants to take you over before you threaten it."

"Scary," I thought.

"I'll protect you!" Bella stated, reading my thoughts.

"Thanks," I said back to her, "We'll do it together."

"We are lucky that the void is not heavily contaminating the dungeon, or else it could have been a big problem, " the queen continued. "With your authority, you can now close the portal to the void. As it appeared for you, you should be able to do it with level three authority."

"System, close the portal and connect me with the next real room," I commanded.

[Checking authority. Authority level three insufficient. Explorer connection established. Authority sufficient. Commencing action. Action complete.]

"That was fast!" I exclaimed as I watched in real time while the portal shimmered before vanishing. A door appeared in the far wall.

[Authority level three sufficient. Confirming spawn rate. Orc spawn rate satisfactory.]

I wanted to test my authority, so I commanded, "System, lower Orc spawn rate to ten percent."

[Checking authority. Authority level three insufficient. Lowering spawn rate to maximum allowable. Orc spawn rate for explorer Earth01 has been set to seventy-five percent]

While not as low as I wished, it would definitely make the next room easier.

"Now, it's time for your spells and skills." The queen began to fly from her chair. "follow me!" She said