The Path of Ascension Chapter 446

Chapter 446

Having discovered the strange realm’s true rewards, they didn’t linger once they were sure nothing else was happening, and instead rushed back to base at their best speeds.

The weird spatial expansion in the side area where they had found the pocket space still immediately pushed them out the moment they tried to retreat. Then they checked that the area hadn’t been reset or changed by the strange realm before moving on.

Matt was actually able to beat everyone except Allie back to the base through raw physical power. It would have been close, as the excitement had everyone moving at their best speeds, but simply getting a little ahead wasn’t enough for him. He further boosted his speed by throwing his mana pool at the effort, letting him pull well ahead of the others with a short but important burst of speed.

Still, no matter what he did he was never going to be faster than the teleporter, given that she was perfectly able to teleport the spell’s normal cast distances in the strange realm, which let her quickly traverse the intervening distance in rapid short hops.

Thankfully, he was only slightly slower, and she hadn’t been able to spoil the rewards before he arrived.

In fact, she had gone to Zack instead of trying to spoil the telling Liz part, which Matt appreciated.

Finding Liz was, thankfully, easy, as he could feel where each of them was through their rings. But Matt didn’t bother one of the Lizes hiding, instead swapping places with the nearest human Liz, leaving a slightly surprised phoenix Liz standing on his shoulder.

She warbled at him even as a wing expanded to form a fully formed human Liz, who gave him a bemused look.

Matt hardly minded, quickly sharing the good news. “When we killed the boss it took on the mana type of the final blow, and we think that will let us make ‘custom’ Natural Treasures. You can finally get your hands on Ichor Natural Treasures!”

Liz froze mid expression and Matt silently tallied the moment in the ‘Matt surprises Liz’ column to be brought up later.

Her grin was wide and instant.

“That is fantastic news. How many times do you estimate we need to kill the boss until it’s fully aspected? That will determine how long we need to hold on.”

Matt and Liz ran some estimates and calculations, but ultimately, they wouldn’t truly know until they were able to check after the area finished repairing itself. It was likely, but not confirmed, that the area would operate on a day-night cycle, nor was it certain that the rate of change per cycle of kill would be the same.

Despite all of those uncertainties, Matt was able to give his wife the number she wanted to hear.

“Somewhere between ten and fifteen days. My bet is closer to fifteen or twenty, but there is variance.”

Liz’s laugh warmed his heart but her kiss was worth every ounce of effort the revelation would bring in the coming days.

They had to put everything they had into this strange realm now.

Whereas defeat had been unwanted but acceptable when they entered, not knowing what they were actually getting out of the strange realm, it was no longer an option given that only the final remaining team got to keep all of their Natural Treasures. They needed to be the last remaining team.

Seeing the others arriving, Liz and he stepped out to where Zack had been working on the base perimeter defences, as everyone else seemed to be gathering around them.

Aster, still giddy, launched into a retelling of their not at all difficult fight the moment she arrived, her golem swinging its arms around wildly, nearly taking off Susanne’s head as it attempted to act out what she described.

Not that Susanne seemed to mind, with her own small but impossible to miss smile never leaving her face.

Natural Treasures were some of the most valuable rewards an exploration team could find on an expedition, and a strange realm that gave them any amount of control could let them multiply the value of their rewards dozens of times over.

Allie unsurprisingly raised the question on everyone’s mind. “What elements do we want to convert stuff into so we can maximize the value of what we pull out? Obviously we—”

Rah, however, raised a question Matt hadn’t considered on the heels of Allies. “Do we want to inform the other groups?”

Everyone looked to Rah, who looked just as confused. Eventually, he gestured around them. “In my realm, anyone exploring such a strange realm would try to share gathered information about how the realm works.”

Zack carefully spoke clearly, choosing his words so as not to offend Rah, “That is surprisingly… kind of your people.”

Instead of being offended, Rah laughed. “Kindness had nothing to do with it. It is all about favors and debt. Any team strong enough to survive and thrive would learn about such information sooner or later, so telling them early simply earns good will. As for the weaker teams who wouldn’t figure it out on their own… Well the better they do, the more we can take, should we decide to eliminate them ourselves. Logic dictates its best to fatten the sheep up before slaughter, and that is easier if you have seen everyone else.” As he realized how that sounded, Rah shrugged. “Not that we need to go after the weaker teams, but the logic seems fitting. If we all agree, I’m willing to spread the word. Being an ascender rather than an Ascender, I might be more… welcomed than any of you, given historical enmities.”

Matt considered that and thought he agreed with the logic.

This strange realm might not force fights, but it was encouraging everyone who entered to go after the weaker teams when things started getting difficult.

That meant there was a ring of logic to Rah’s suggestion, even if they only did so while warning the other teams off.

Matt had no interest in stealing the hard work of others, but his logic was equally true for the other teams.

If they thought they were going to be eliminated soon, it was not just possible, but likely they would try to take another team out before they were eliminated.

It’s what Matt would do if he didn’t think he could continue, and he stood to lose most of their collected Natural Treasures.

Sharing a look with Liz and Zack, Matt changed some of his priorities to further improving their defences.

Allie agreed. “I’m fine with that. In fact, I think we should send Matt or Liz to deliver the message. That will serve as a good reminder as to why they really shouldn’t turn their fangs towards us. People always react best to overt displays of force.”

Matt didn’t mind and volunteered immediately, knowing Liz would want to start her own ichor area sooner rather than later.

That settled, they returned to Allie’s original question: what Natural Treasures should they prioritize beyond the ones they wanted. Or to be even more blunt, what were the most valuable Natural Treasures they could make.

Their answer was both simple and incredibly complex.

Thanks to Matt’s mana aspecting ring, they had access to nearly any mana type or mana variation type they could think of. Also, while Zack had arcane mana, he had to really know the mana type if he wanted to separate it out from the mass. Or in their case, have Matt show him a sample of the mana.

Matt’s ring didn’t have that many level 5 mana types, given how rare they were, but the two he did would hopefully prove incredibly valuable. The Mind mana sample had been won in a bet with Max, and the Reality one was from a similar bet with Maya. Both had wanted aura of those types and as such had ‘lost’ bets with Matt, ensuring he had no excuse as to not work on their projects.

Matt felt it was almost poetic that Sien was being left out because she had stubbornly refused to throw a bet like that, which meant he didn’t have a sample of Dream mana, given how stupidly rare the mana type was, to make Natural Treasures for her.

That was ultimately where they decided to spend some of their extra time. Between Matt’s ring and Zack’s Arcane mana, the two of them would be in charge of making most of the extraneous deeper areas, with the understanding that they wouldn’t be put on rotation defending the base until things became more challenging.

That meant they were going to be making Natural Treasures for the team’s profit, and the richest people they knew were the other Ascenders, who would undoubtedly pay a premium for perfectly aspected Natural Treasures, regardless of Tier.

Their second highest priority for Natural Treasures were the crew of the Unsparing. Thankfully, most of them had overlapping skill types, allowing them to knock them out with correspondingly few allocated areas.

After that, they decided to go for pure profit.

Arcane and Void would get several areas each. First, Matt wanted a way to aspect his mana to Arcane, and second, they were undoubtedly the two rarest Natural Treasures to find in the wild, making their baseline prices a lot higher than a Natural Treasure made from mainly fire mana.

Ichor would also be extremely valuable, which was why he was so happy for Liz.

Historically, it took a very long time before Natural Treasures of a new element started appearing in rifts. That went doubly so for high level elements like Ichor, for which Natural Treasures would be rare to begin with. Adding in the time to mature and Tier up if the Natural Treasure went through that process, they would be lucky if more than a handful of Ichor Natural Treasures were sold post breach.

This strange realm would hopefully change that and the same thing went true for Travel mana if not more so. If the resulting treasures were in any way useful every speed based fighter in the realm would be clamoring to get their hands on such Natural Treasures.

Aster and Susanne both argued they should fully dedicate their extra efforts to those three most expensive mana types, but everyone else agreed it was better to spread the net wide in case the strange realm had some hidden restrictions.

With that in mind, they decided to allocate some time for all of the level 1 mana types as well as the more expensive level 2 mana types, like Healing and Divination, wanting to see if they could stumble on something truly rare or unique.

Plan laid out, Matt and Zack immediately set out towards where they had seen the other teams’ towers.

With only a small distance between them, they could have covered the distance in short order, but they first moved to a central location before going to the first group.

They had debated what order they should visit the teams, as they didn’t want to give away too much information, and ended up picking the northernmost tower first as the most neutral and interesting decision.

As they got close, it became clear the tower belonged to the Federation team. The team had turned the surrounding miles nearest to their tower into a flat wasteland surrounded by warning posts urging everyone away or be treated as enemies.

Instead of barging in, Matt took to the sky a dozen miles away and used [Light Manipulation] to darken the area around him in as non-threatening a gesture as he could, while Zack watched on from a hidden vantage point, ready to back him up should the Federation team ambush them.

Thankfully, Matt saw the reaction he was hoping for as five people took to the enchanted walls, while another two slowly edged forward until their spiritual perception could cover the shorter than normal intervening distance and allowed them to talk.

Marve wasn’t among the group, but Matt hadn’t expected him to be waiting in the rear, given what little they knew about the man.

Instead of complaining, Matt passed on the information they had learned, happily answering any questions they had. As he kept them occupied, Zack was busy scanning their defences in case they had to fight the Federation team.

It seemed unlikely, but they weren’t going to take any chances.

Once the Federation team ran out of questions, they visited the next team, which turned out to be the Monster collective pack, who were grateful for both the information as well as the knowledge of who their nearest neighbor was. The pack leader, Ralph, even went as far as promising to pay them back if possible.

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Matt wasn’t entirely sure the other guild leader was being sincere, but he also had no proof he wasn’t either, so left as quickly as he could.

The next team was the Empire group, and while they didn’t open their doors or let him near their base, and therefore tower, they were far more cordial. So much so, they were willing to ask more sensitive questions than the other two teams had, such as estimated kill times and potential danger levels. Such topics were usually considered rude to ask, as the answers would give away possibly crucial information about a team’s weaknesses, but Matt wasn’t worried about the team and gave detailed answers. He did strictly stick to a general power level estimate when comparing teams, but they were grateful to not have to learn the hard way.

In return, Matt learned far more about the explorations Clare had led. They hadn’t yet risked pushing too deep into any of the pocket spaces, but they had identified three spots and were looking for more. Clare even went as far as explaining the tricks they had discovered to find the pocket space beyond seeing a monster stumble out.

According to Clare, they had been considering fully clearing out one of the areas to see what would happen when Matt arrived.

Being far closer to them than the others teams had allowed him, Matt took a moment to inspect the Empire team before offering as they parted. “We can’t help much, but if you make a large enough commotion, we will try to save you guys if possible.”

He didn’t, however, tell them directly where their base was. It just wasn’t worth the risk given how their towers were their ultimate lifeline in this strange realm.

Having visited three other teams before them, Matt didn’t expect much different from the Corporation team, which was why he was surprised by the fact he was noticed before he did his well practiced light show.

Not approaching any farther, Matt watched as a deceptively plain woman flew into the air in civilian clothes, of all things.

He had expected a lot of things, but a mask he couldn’t see through combined with presumably an illusion of civilian clothes put him on edge immediately. That apprehension doubled when she got close enough for him to confirm the illusion’s existence, even if he couldn’t pierce it without directly attacking the construct.

The woman floated in front of him just a few thousand feet away, far closer than even the Empire team had dared approach.

In perfect Empire she asked, “What have we done to deserve the honor of your presence, Ascender Indomitable Titan?”

Matt didn’t immediately respond, letting his spiritual perception search their surroundings, but finding nothing out of the ordinary beyond the woman in front of himself, he shared what information he had.

Unlike the other teams who were all joyous at the thought of controllable natural treasures, the woman just watched him impassively.

When he finished, she nodded once before turning away. “Thank you for the information. As for your unspoken threat, we have no intention of fighting amongst each other, but we will not hesitate to retaliate against any who attack us first.”

Having said her piece and not seeing any reason to linger, the woman floated back down to the sanctuary they had built next to a picturesque lake and into the robust defences the Corporation team had set up.

They were, in fact, the best defences they had seen so far, with signs they had been prepared for such an eventuality, with prebuilt defensive formation plates set into the walls. That would have made their setup easier and would improve the quality of their defences. It was something Matt made a note of to work on when they flew to the next world for himself. A small but possibly useful side project.

Zack appeared next to Matt as the two of them floated and watched the team below.

Not taking his eyes off the base Matt asked, “They spotted you?”

Zack nodded. “They were so fast, I suspect they were already aware of us long before we even started our approach. Even without the fog limiting our perceptions, that isn’t easy.”

Matt mulled that over but eventually shrugged. “Maybe they can see through the fog.”

He suspected the team was a Corporation elite army team trying to keep their identities under wraps, but they could just as easily be a mercenary team with a bad reputation trying to keep their heads down during the exploration of the Rasdale breach.

Getting revenge in the Great Powers’ settled space might be impossible, but during a breach, there were endless opportunities to mete out retribution.

Having felt the woman at such close range, he wasn’t in any rush to start a fight, but he wouldn’t shy away from one if it came to that.