As the group moved past the arched opening of the behemoth tree, they saw the entire space lit up bright like some pleasure cities at night. Bright, incandescent, and seemingly active without end. Whether yellow, white, pink, or blue, the endless stream of colours melded together to cover this floor of the city in its glow.

Just this floor, that is.

The ground beneath them was actually a polished set of tree rings, quite obviously what remained from part of the behemoth tree’s innards. And about two metres above was another set of these rings, merely forming the first two levels of this gargantuan complex.

With almost 400 levels, not to mention the vast regions contained in the tree’s branches and roots, just this single floor could hold up to 30,000 individuals at any time. However, from the group walking through, they came to quickly realise that the base floor of Felethar contained very few places to live. Almost all its roads contained decorated stalls, and the buildings behind them expansive all the way to the top of this floor, but only used as storefronts or places of entertainment. All made of wood, with no clear type in use or agreement on varnish for that matter. The stalls, homes, supports, railings, and even unnecessary roofs made use of wood. Perhaps the only exceptions were glass windows and cloth used for curtains, tarps, and banners.

Regardless, the market and entertainment remained here for a simpler reason.

No one wants to keep willing spenders waiting.

None of them really fell into this category though, and they really only came here to enjoy the sights and culture. With everything possible made of some sort of wood, it became one of the most unique locations across the continents. The closest comparison would be some subterranean races that built their cities purely from stone or metal.

Aside from purchasing more food and potions, they enjoyed themselves for a few days before heading off. No one made trouble for the humans, although the rare individuals that revealed disgust remained.

No matter what, such things never stopped. Some humans hated elves, as well, and their party didn’t really care about solving societal issues.

Speaking the most common variant of elven language helped immensely, with even Raccelline growing near-fluent in speech. She even learnt how to read and write Draconic from Icy, following months of nagging and begging to do so. In theory, she just needed a throat modification to be able to use Draconic spellcasting as well…

Once out of the city, and with pockets both lighter and several times heavier, they continued on their way north.

Not even a full day passed, with the tips of the behemoth tree barely over the horizon behind them, before Jaren had something of note to say. “Seems our company is here. Block your noses too, they stink.”

The group remained within the forest beside Felethar, about 80 km away by now, and while the flat dirt road made travel easy, the thick rows of trees all around blocked vision quite well. Relying on it to see wasn’t at all viable, however, since taking the sage’s eye fruits, the group easily looked through at least half a kilometre of the forest without mana.

With Icy’s eyes, he may as well see the monster from here.

If the smell was that strong, he clearly noticed their foe from a few kilometres away, and even for a Mithril rank, that distance takes a minute to cross. A grotesque monster like a chimaera required longer unless its body was specially built to retain good speed, but most of these monster creators never cared for such things. To them, power and ‘beauty’ were above all else.

Speed so great that it became power also counted, but few species can truly make use of the concept.

Indeed, it only took 50 seconds for a bright blip of mana to rush into Icy’s mana sense, which had recently grown in size due to the evolutions he took. Originally limited to 200 metres, it increased by 50%. But more importantly, his vivid mana sight at close range doubled in range, now able to clearly see everything in a 40 metre radius around him.

While not so useful for scouting, the importance of this distance in battle is unimaginable.

“Who wants to take the first hit?” Korridan, wielding a grey metal greatshield with dozens of small curved spikes on its front, asked the group as his mana built up speed within himself. If one paid attention they’d realise that as this mana moved rapidly, an overwhelming concentration of elements moved along with the flow.

These were earth, fire, wind, water, ice, lightning, space, life, and, somehow, aura.

The literal and figurative wall’s ability to withstand pain was so ridiculous that Icy and the Auric spirit were actually able to force condensed aura into a non-acclimated body and keep it stable. Mala had fun with those experiments.

“Me! Me! ME!!!” Raccelline immediately shouted out with one arm raised and shaking, her other held a Low-rank Treasure tool usually used by Mithril rank warriors. She picked a long dagger as her small body really struggled with swords, and for once, she wanted to fight without the group’s constant worries or backup.

Darak, Icy, or Mala providing spell support, or the other warriors distracting and harming the beasts alongside her…

She just wanted to take action alone for once…

Action against an equal opponent that is.

Darak spoke up first, as even with his weaker senses, he felt the ruinous energy coming from the trees on their left. “Let her, she spent three years waiting for this. Besides, we all want to see how far she’s come.”

Indeed, it still amazed them how fast children grew up. While she remained that same badgering and energetic girl from before, the major difference had to be her intellect and shyness. Now more understanding of the world at large, she knew how to ask questions about topics instead of quietly staying out of them. And, more importantly, she no longer clung to Icy constantly as though a lost puppy.

Now she just clung to him because he became her best friend. And more so, she no longer needed his protection.

The chimaera appeared as everyone prepared for battle, its form no less disgusting than the last four which attacked.

Its torso alone was barely beyond the stitched bodies of two beasts, further experimentation fused them into one large thing. Almost as long as Icy in body alone, its spiked tail made its length exceed the dragon. The chimaera used six unrecognisable animal legs to stand, as well as having two gorilla arms at the front of its body. But worst off was its head, that being a giant mantis’ and the only part of this thing’s body which retained something resembling skin.

The mantis’ dark green carapace hardly fit the red, irritated flesh connected to it.

As it charged from the forest, both fists swung rapidly in an attempt to pound Raccelline and Korridan to a pulp, but the first attack missed as the child’s body vanished from the spot.

Meanwhile, Korridan didn’t even break a sweat as the punch collided with his shield and forced him back a step. Ice clicked his tongue though, watching and feeling as mana and space around him quivered from intense distortion.

Before the monster’s punch even pulled back from its collision with the spiked shield, the fist bleeding lightly from multiple punctures, Raccelline suddenly appeared above the chimaeras head and slashed forward as she somehow dove downwards.

In a single move, the mantis head detached and fell on the floor, meanwhile, she vanished from mid-air and once more reappeared, giddy and quite excited while standing beside Korridan.

Unfortunately, the monster remained standing even with its head on the ground, and the group watched as a pustule grew from the decapitated spot and reformed into a new head, taking just seconds to undo her damage and give out an incredibly high-pitched screech like that of a bat.

“That technique is ridiculous, it’s literally impossible for anything below gold tier to use,” Icy naturally saw how the entire thing worked best. And while everyone read through the manual, actually seeing it put into action left him more disgusted than anything.

What damn dragon thought it was fair to make this thing and class it as an evolutionary technique to become Steel ranked?

“I agree, but we should kill this thing first, no?” Mala’s question returned his focus, and the group activated their skills immediately.

Icy couldn’t help but leave a comment anyway, “I thought he’d send a proper mithril tier, to be honest. Especially if it’s meant to be intelligent.”

Their opponent wasn’t exactly fast, and its agility only beat out Icy, but in terms of power and regenerative ability, they had a tough time. Not to mention, somehow, its body resisted curse effects like Necrosis and Degeneration, two spells which ought to affect any living tissue worse than a fast-growing cancer.

“A life-essence organ was grafted into it. That bastard really wants to kill us with attrition.” Life essence is generally an unsuitable healing substance when unrefined, but did it matter for a monster like a chimaera?

Raccelline and Rebecca repeatedly cut off its limbs while dancing around it, one invisible to its senses while the other dodged and reacted faster than it attacked. Korridan maximised the pain it felt by heating the sharpened tips of his shield and jamming them into the monster, constantly enraging it more and more to the point where the pain of its cut-off limbs barely mattered.

The endless burning and hundreds of small stabbings tormented it so much more.

Already it endured endless pain from a skinned body, pain which drove it towards insanity in the first place, yet it remained sapient for some reason. To only feel more pain worsened its hell, and so drew its attention to killing Korridan as soon as possible.

Any random attacks from the spear-like tail and kicks from regenerated limbs were promptly healed by Darak, even in one frightening case where it stabbed through Rebecca’s heart with unexpected speed.

Icy focused his spells on dishing out as much damage as possible and blocking the chimaera’s attacks, but as time went on, their side began slowing down from exhaustion. Hundreds of cut-off limbs, several heads, even tails and arms, yet that thing’s giant sack of life essence only dropped to quarter full.

Poison, lava, acid, dark magic, and anything which normally ruined flesh and blood, simply didn’t work. This monster had no innate ability, just pouring all its mana into constant life essence production and raw attacks.

So damn weak, yet kept alive almost endlessly with an insane regeneration tactic.

Mala swallowed her third mana restorative, burning through the resource at the same speed as Icy, but lacking his crazy MP regen. Compressed balls of flames like miniature suns, great arcs of light and wind, shackles and cages of earth, arcs of yellow lightning bolts, and spears of frigid ice which blossomed on impact.

That described just some of the spells she used so far, and Icy’s collection was no worse.

However, it was clear that while they won against a single mithril tier of this power… One with regenerative power greater than most master tiers could not be bested so easily. Icy asked a simple question, “Should we end this?”

‘We’ referred to Mala and himself here. In truth, he did not fear any usual monster, and for good reason. Jaren gave in first, his arrows did little to no damage, at most useful as tools to pin the regrowing limbs to the ground and allow easier removal by the two girls up front. Rebecca and Darak went next as they really couldn’t keep on going, Raccelline’s frustration at the not dead monster led her to accept as well.

And Korridan just gave a quick thumbs up before refocusing.

Instantly, the surrounding temperature dropped greatly, their breaths released a heavy mist from rapid condensation. And as that occurred, the image of a snow-swept mountain appeared above Icy’s body, it was larger than before and the previously metre high image now broke past the tree tops around them.

On this large mountain, one could easily see a tiny square building which lacked a door, as well as the larger, yet small, house beside it with one. A small path connected the door with grey stone bricks.

And lastly, further from the small house, a third building, at least double in size, stood up. While not exactly a grand manor, its three floors, an attic, basement, and small garden, greatly stood out. Inside, one could see hundreds of bookshelves which filled the entirety of the first and second floors, but on the third was a large array which filled the room, and the attic remained empty for now.

Or so it seemed, but if one looked closely they would notice hundreds of small motes of light, within that place.

Furthermore, within the simple brick basement beneath this building, hidden from view, were twenty large tanks with large, cylindrical glass chambers containing a slightly blue gas. It passively flowed within the chamber, but no valves on the glass and metal tank exist, neither did any pipes for that matter. Merely a single inlet at the tank’s top.

On the mountain’s opposite side was a large furnace, akin to a bridge in shape and separated into two compartments with a small chimney on one end. The fuel always went in the opposite side, forcing hot air through the second compartment, although ‘hot’ was the wrong description for this furnace…

And as Icy’s Intermediate Mind palace descended, Mala released a string of psychic spells to their opponent. There was no further battle here, the chimaera did contain some sort of defences for its mind, how this was done greatly intrigued the two spellcasters, but none of it mattered now.

With great suppression combined with powerful attacks. The thing died soon after, and no one even had to cast a soul spell. Icy took the disjoined clump of souls stuffed into this chimaera and the group pulled out that life essence sack. With this, now saved another month or two on his third growth phase.

While just a quarter full, it was pretty much the only item of value in the thing’s body. The heart looked fine, but in reality the organ was almost worthless. This chimaera’s regeneration through life essence left the body a husk, empty of mana and merely powerful due to a mixture of bloodlines and other experiments. Only through time and rejuvenation could these parts be used for alchemy or equipment.

Although… if its only value was bloodline energy, then Icy still saw a use for it. He collected the cut off limbs and the bulk of its body, but only the parts he deemed useful after a small taste test.

Nothing that amazing overall, perhaps a few Advanced rank bloodlines at most.

“What do you think he’ll send next? Hopefully something actually strong.” Raccelline perked up first as they left the site of the battle, the only remnant a pile of ash. She obviously wanted a real opponent to test her power against, not realising she truly entered the realm of mithril tiers several months ago.

Indeed…

* * *

The chimaera creator bashed a stone desk as he saw another one of his ‘pretties’ slaughtered by these humans. They even seemed to be disappointed in all the work he put into it, and the desire to crush them and turn them into new chimaeras rose up.

“Especially that child, she’s already so powerful. Something made of her may be my best result yet… But they have that damn dragon! If only I had more Type-As!” Once more, his fist slammed against the table. While the Type-Bs possessed quite a bit of power, he did not specially reinforce their minds as much, focusing more on physical and innate abilities.

Now stuck in some basement surrounded by experimental materials, he missed the cleanliness and resources of his real lab, this makeshift place simply couldn’t compare! He was trying to rebuild those forces lost, but things were simply too hard.

“I could… It’s my only way to obtain her though, and with it, I should be able to make a new one. One which isn’t an annoying behemoth too… Yes, I have to! Prepare the Type-0!” He shouted out into the empty basement lab, and laughed a bit before realising he no longer had an assistant.

Then left to prepare the chimaera himself… What option did he have?