Dungeon Diver: Stealing A Monster’s Power

I float back to the High Orc Tower, and unlike before, once I get close enough, the intricate ether commands and structural patterns that made it impossible to see through before are easy for me to crack now.

While leagues above the rest of the Citadel, by simply touching the wall with an open palm, I'm able to take control of the entire building and send a simple message to the High Orc and Blue Ogre inside. They are resting, admiring their newly crafted Soul Weapons and Avatar shells.

As soon as I get a response back, I open up the side of the top floor, simultaneously editing the surveillance footage to seem as though the building was never manipulated at all.

My eyes track over the crafts they've been working on all this time, and I nod with respect as they are not built with the same craftsmanship interface that I'm familiar with, but instead a mechanical interface of its own that does not connect to the Citadel's systems.

The avatars have a very similar signature and complex layering structure to the building, making me piece together the fact that it must have been him or an ancestor who created this structure as well.

The Soul Weapons are very intricate too, with similarities to the avatars, but they have the Blue Ogre's craftsmanship imprinted on them, and their bases are all unique, like compressed ether, giving off whispers of intent. They are, in fact, old dormant souls.

I close the door behind me and nod.

"Your work here looks very good—and I thank you very much for the data provided on Soul Weapons. My craftsmen in the Lower Realm are making good use of it."

My gaze falls on two large containment cases in the back of the room, and then over to Asic as he sits up straight in his tall-backed throne hooked up to many wires.

"Indeed, I'm glad my research can be of use to you."

He smiles and looks over to the Blue Ogre.

"Torvak may be more in the market of buying and selling my work, but he's a talented Soulsmith in his own right. A few thousand research papers in my reports are his. I don't know if you read them all, but it was a Red Ogre's world where we managed to get the data on the throne to analyze Artifact-Class Soul Weapons."

I nod slowly and respond while opening my item storage.

"Yes, I did look through your work briefly..."

Then I pull out my sword, not bothering to use my concealment or demonic energy on it, letting the blade float in front of me in its natural state.

It is jet black, as it doesn't feel any threats nearby, but the red eye on its base opens up and looks around the room out of curiosity to see why it's been drawn.

"I'm suppressing a lot of my power right now, so you're not going to be able to witness its full capabilities. But—I read you've never seen an Amplifier in person, is that right? I don't have much time, but study it all you'd like while I'm here."

Both Torvak and Asic's eyes open wide at my words as I let the suppressed blade, which would normally be sending out its own Noble Vibrations right now, float in the center of the room.

Then, I walk forward past the Avatar Shells toward the concealment cases in the back of the room.

"These are for me to pick up, right? Seraphel said you would have some leftovers, plus an important item for him."

The two snap out of their stares at the floating blade, and Asic nods quickly.

"Yes—all of that is for you. The white box is actually all incompatible Relic- and Basic-Class Soul Weapon materials. Feel free to feed them to your blade. The blue box is for Seraphel; he says it's necessary for your last stage of training..."

Both boxes are dark black, with dense green divine threads and white ether radiating off of them.

However, one gives off a slight blue glow. It feels very dense with mana, and this blue coloration is not from any special divine threads. It actually feels like very basic water magic from my initial scan, though it is giving off additional readings that makes it clear what's inside is far more complex than anything I've looked at before. I decide not to pry into Seraphel's business until he gives me permission to do so.

The other overflows at the edges with pure white ether.

I walk over, opening up another item storage portal to drop the blue box in without hesitating, then out of curiosity open up the massive black box with an ether command.

The moment I do, even more heat with ether flows out of its top, and I see dozens more black boxes inside.

From my enhanced ether senses, I can tell these containment cases are extremely old, possibly even older than the tower we're standing in.

So, I'm far more delicate while opening them up next.

Inside some, there are dense slabs of black stone, saturated with ether. They give off the aura of being many failed or partial crafts melted down into raw material bases for easy storage.

Others, I can feel faint Noble Vibrations radiating off them, and their shapes look more like their original forms. Swords, daggers, hammers, shields, armor, and many more unrecognizable item shapes pop out at me. Each one is packed with dense divine energy tighter than anything I've ever seen before. The ether content varies, as well as the unique auras they give off.

A few of them give off killing intent, while others radiate fear, pride, anger, longing for a wielder, and a whole range of emotions. I can feel that these come from all over the galaxy, and many different eras. All of their past wielders are long dead, or are within the Soul Weapons themselves. The stories of these pieces of art are impossible to correctly guess, as some wield pure ether, and others are far more concentrated with mana or even just divine threads.

It reminds me of some of the strange originator artifacts I came across on the human world, they all reacted with different energies in their own ways. What I do know for sure is that every single item in this collection is extremely potent and powerful in its own right.

Some weapons are fractured, others are broken into pieces, and some are just fragments of an unrecognizable whole.

Each box has piles of these weapons, and I can tell each one is worth a fortune in the ether alone.

My blade on the other side of the room ripples with red energy, and the entire floor gets a few dozen degrees hotter as it notices too.

I grin.

"You're sure? All for me?"

Both of the 1st Class Lords have holographic system arrays live, studying the sword with every bit of technology they can while it's still in front of them. Torvak calls out to reply.

"All yours."

Asic nods too.

"Please, it'd be my honor to watch."

To show respect, instead of making the hungry blade float over to me, I bring the massive containment case back over to the middle of the room and grab the red sword with my outstretched hand.

In the same moment, I don't bother to keep my concealment up anymore, revealing my ethereal Noble Human form to them.

The pure white jade glow contrasts with the bright crimson sword in my grasp, but it is clear to the watchers that I am holding back. Such a beautiful sight should be giving off a domineering aura like when they watched me kill Andras Vermillion.

However, it's as though I'm a ghost.

It makes the display of power even more awe-inspiring, like I'm an illusion.

Though, the pure ether aura cannot be masked, as my blade glows red and white while I thrust it into the open container and allow it to consume all of the leftover artifacts from millennia of war and trade.

My body and sword grow extremely hot in the process, as the blade is bonded with me. When it gets stronger, I do too, and the energy it absorbs cycles through me as well.

My whole body shimmers brighter white and gives off an ethereal glow, yet nothing is released—I only take in the energy.

I don't know if the results would be different if I wasn't using this suppression technique, but I'm sure my sword successfully digested the weapons as a notification sounds in my inner ear after about half a minute.@@novelbin@@

[The Divine Emperor's Soul Sword Evolution Attribute has reached Lv. 3!]

Instead of the bright white glow dimming after the process is over, my blade and body maintain their luster, making the entire black room stay lit as bright as day.

Asic and Torvak watch in awe, as over a hundred priceless artifacts were liquefied into pure energy and devoured, along with the containment case they were resting in.

I speak up in a calm tone while letting my blade fall back into my storage and putting my concealment disguise as a demon back up.

"I thank you very much. This will certainly be helpful in the coming days... To pay you back, even though you didn't ask."

I put out my hand and create an ether transfer command, but connect my item storage to it and transfer 5.0 Medium Quality Ether to each of them.

It materializes in a crystallized form, about the size of a human palm.

To me right now, the 50.6205 Medium Quality Ether in my storage feels quite useless, but from the memories I have and the words I hear from snooping around the Citadel, it can be traded in the Fortress and Grand Citadel to demons in exchange for large quantities of mana and Low Quality Ether.

These materials can be transferred down to the Lower Realm for a price, and in turn, can raise the Class grading of Lower Class Worlds over a few decades, or centuries depending how much is injected.

By the looks on their faces when the white crystals drop into their hands, I'm certain my assumption was correct that this 10.0 Medium Quality Ether is more valuable to them than it is to me right now.

Though, it's hard to fully concentrate because of the ringing in my ears, blurred vision, and extreme heat making my body feel itchy inside and out.

In a matter of seconds, signs of my suppression technique hitting its limits have moved from the feeling I had a quarter way around the Citadel during my first stress test, to immediately surpassing the halfway mark.

Absorbing all of those artifacts has made the suppression process much harder to maintain all of a sudden.

So, not wanting to put everyone's life in danger, I float upward and immediately activate an ether command to open the ceiling.