While he was knocked out, he went over the fight repeatedly. A simulation of the fight repeated in his head. A movement out of place would have killed him in several exchanges. He was slower, his reaction time wasn’t enough. He needed more agility. But that would have to wait until he woke up.

He felt a familiar presence. It was Trixie, she was trying to make her way to him. His eyes snapped open. And his body felt wrecked. Every nerve was on fire and his head felt like a red-hot fire poker had ripped through it.

The dungeon core was rolling across the floor. Markus got up and looked in a mirror. He looked different. More like the Lucius. His jaw was a little manlier, his cheek bones were trimmed, and his forehead was more prominent. Then there was his hair. It went from a light blond to midnight black. He looked himself over and found that his muscles were a bit more compact.

Streamlined was one way to describe his body. If they saw his head, there would be a lot of questions. His face was near enough that he could claim battle wounds altered him. Taking Fay’s spear tip, he shaved his hair off. He could just tell them he wanted helmets to fit better.

“Hey, buddy over here.” Markus finished looking himself over checked for any imperfections. With none found he gave the dungeon core his attention.

“What do you want?” He asked it in as civil a tone, as his headache would allow.

“Yea, that crazy guy took over and I still have a ton of dark type monsters in here. I can get rid of the little guys on my own, but Leviathan is growing stronger by eating the other dark monsters. I don’t think I can kill it.” Markus shrugged his shoulders. He needed more power.

He reviewed power levels. A peasant max 20kans (average net stats), a knight 100kans, a chapter master 1m ans, and a hero 10m ans. With Markus’s flesh puppeteer, weight and physical strength he should be around 1,200k in average power. But he could tell his opponent was 6 to 10 times faster if that ten percent was true, he could expect stats in the hundreds of millions averaged. Chuckling, he picked the dungeon core.

“Alright what are you going to give me to kill this thing?” He asked the orb. The sphere tried to invade his mind only to crumble under his dark power. “Nice try.”

“I will give you the storm ability.” Markus raised an eyebrow.

“I haven’t herd of this storm ability. What does it do?” The orb hummed as if gathering its thoughts.

“Throughout my time as a dungeon core, I’ve developed an ability through monster breeding to conjure oceanic and aerial powers. Storm is a combination of all my research. With it you can use fluctuations of high and low-pressure systems to control large bodies of water, construct massive storms, and lightning. Its my pet project though not perfect, I think with your body it can be used.” Markus wouldn’t mind a new power by this point it was like putting a feather in his cap. But before he even touched that power, he needed to up his tier in freeze and telekinesis.

Markus snatched the dungeon core off the ground. “Are you returning me to my pedestal? That is very kind of you.” Storm said. Markus laughed at that.

“No, I’m taking you with me to ensure you uphold your end of the bargain. A smart woman once told me not to trust monsters that feed on humans.” Markus said. The core let out a feeling of depression and Markus enjoyed the feeling. He was feeling very salty after the loss.

After making his way out of the third floor he surveyed the scene. The cliff side had collapsed again after he took it down. Fun but nothing too impressive. No what he planned to do to the leviathan would be impressive. He could see himself breaking into the adept with both freeze and telekinesis.

He let himself rise from the ground and he flew to where the leviathan waged a war on the other monsters. Lightning struck it from various sky dragons to little effect. He made a mental note to acquire one before this was over. “Once you have the storm ability monsters of both sea and air will be compatible to you.” The dungeon core said helpfully. Not that he didn’t appreciate it, but Markus was about to stress his mind to the limit.

Ever since he woke up he could feel his body heal itself stronger. His vitality had increased by about 2% and his endurance by 5%. Not much in the grand scheme of things but a few bonuses helped. He tossed the dungeon core and spared a bit of focus to keep it afloat orbiting around him. Crossing his legs, he gripped the energies within himself.

Opening his meat grinder, he ground down the dark spirits of this place and collected as much dark power as he could. Eyes opened all around the Leviathan. He needed to see it from every angle just in case. Blue eyes appeared all around the small ocean. Markus let his breathing settle, this was about to get brutal.

Using the ocean as a glove he wrapped it around the leviathan and every monster that happened to be in the way. “You didn’t have to kill them, they were distracting it.” Markus shushed the dungeon core and began spinning the mass of water freezing parts of it.

“Oh, I see what you’re doing. The water by itself won’t do much to it but add a lot of sharp ice to the mix and its like adding razor blades to bath water.” He shushed the noisy dungeon core and sharpened his focus. Freeze was basically a psychic power when you got down to it. You’re willing molecules to slow down to a crawl.

This was like mixing a potion. His ingredients were an ocean, monsters and a leviathan. His tools were telekinesis, ice, and his imagination.

Water moved in cyclones going up to the ball of spinning salt water and ice. He spun it in hundreds of different directions. In a sense this ball was the epitome of dark mana, chaos. The Leviathan tried to move one way only to be thrown another way from the side. When he swam down he was forced up. Ice shards shredded its scales and solid pieces bruised it. The creature wasn’t close to death, but it was getting tired and that was what Markus wanted.

His head began to throb, as he began to expend more power. He had to hold on a little longer, if he didn’t then this would all be pointless. All the water was collected, and his focus was only on the upkeep of the construct, his chaos. A work of art devoted to the dark. He let his will back off until he was just keeping the ball together.

Taking his hand, he pointed it at the construct. Blood fell from his nose and ears like rain. He felt it, this could destroy him if he slipped up and touched the dark directly with psychic it could wreck his mind. It excited him like nothing else.

He closed his hand around the orb and it began to shrink. Water pressure increased rapidly chunks of ice exploded and the water refroze. This was the Leviathan’s chance to escape. With the area of its prison shrinking this was its chance to escape.

The water pressure increased to unprecedented levels and the ice moving through it impacted like freight trains. He felt it when the leviathan tried its last escape attempt. A chunk of ice smashed into its side and the pain made it flinch for just a second too long. It lost ground and the speed of the currents within the chaos accelerated. The smaller the chaos the faster the currents. Its armored hide was pulled off and its body was ripped apart. But he didn’t stop.

This was a trial to increase his power. Once the now crimson ball was shrunk down to the size of a basketball. He shot it away and let the pressure explode releasing water moving at insane speeds. The area where the ball hit was gone the dungeon shook to the extreme and a hole was missing. The rubble blown far away from the impact. He was only a few kilometers away and felt the explosion.

Freeze only increased to journeyman 10. But telekinesis increased adept 15. He held his head and laughed. He could feel it his mind was healing rapidly, and his mana was becoming denser. What was it like to be a master, if this was what an adept felt like? That’s right no one put much stock in telekinesis alone. It was great for getting elemental attacks from point a to b but horrible for direct attacks.

A smile ripped across his face as he hovered there. His body was so easy to maneuver now it weighed nothing to his mind. He broke off a chunk of rock divided it into a thousand stones and flung them rapid fire at a sky dragon. The monster was obliterated torn giant holes appeared in its body and it fell. Yet, this power was nothing compared to Lucius, his father, mother, Marie, or the king. Just like that the thought brought him back down to the realization he was only 13 going on 14 and the reason he was doing this was to protect his world and live happily with his partners Trixie and Lilium.

In his hand was the drop from the leviathan. A black grape that was filled with dark power. “Don’t eat it, that drop will mutate you into something like the leviathan.” Markus tossed it in his mouth and it tasted sweet like how Trixie described brains. He made sure to flood his body with light energy.

He was glad he did. Tendrils of dark flooded his body and the light barely guided them to improving his body rather than turning him into demon. He felt tendrils like steel cables wrap around his bones and merge with his own muscles. They dug into his organs and he yelled as his heart was reinforced. It beat with more force than anything he had every felt.

Markus stood up and felt like his flesh puppeteer was more of a buff than a necessity. He threw a few punches and felt how smooth they were. “You said you would give me the storm ability.” Markus said between punches.

“Here take it.” Markus held up a disk and it turned into a crawling mass of microorganisms. They entered his skin and flooded his bloodstream. They soon reached his brain and the knowledge entered him and his body adapted to it. He gained the ability to use lightning through his psychic powers. It was more of a replication by agitating ions. But it was a start. Other powers were currently out of his knowledge to use.

“I’ll be seeing you.” Markus said and planned to never return to the dungeon.

“Don’t be a stranger.” It said, as Markus dropped it. “You bastard,” he heard it shout just before it landed in water.

Markus flew up the waterfall and found came upon Trixie and Lilium under siege by lamias of all things. He landed and picked them both up. Trixie’s mind crashed into his and emotions traveled between them at the speed of thought. Lilium joined in and all was well again. He rose up created a barrier and flew towards the exit.

“When could you fly like this it’s incredible? We won’t need to ride a Windy ever again.” Trixie said and laughed at his feelings of disapproval. He enjoyed riding Windy.

He soon flew out of the dungeon entrance and Windy galloped up to greet him. “So why did you endanger yourselves to come save me?” Markus asked.

“This creepy guy who looks like you do now, said you were in danger and needed our help.” Lilium said.

“Trixie was like we have to save you now, but I had faith in you boss.” Lilium said. Markus smiled and rubbed Trixie’s tentacles.

“I was in trouble, but I got out of it. My fast recovery time came in handy.” Markus said.

“You seem so much stronger how did that happen?” Trixie asked.

“I had a break through. I’ve been focusing so much on becoming a strong warrior like Pa, I stopped paying attention to who I was. I’m damn strong and my body is a powerful weapon. But my mind was always my best weapon, neglecting it was a mistake.” Trixie gave him this conversation isn’t over look and he began brushing Windy down in preparation to saddle her.

He was just glad to finally be out of that dungeon. Markus wanted to train his telekinesis to the next tier soon. Losing like he had was disgraceful.