World Keeper

Chapter 1175: Conquering the Dungeon Worlds

Inside the elevator, Lena stared at the screen along the wall. At first, she was only in her base form, trying to see what she could understand on her own. However, her personal skills with runic magic were rather lacking to fluently read the screen. Thus, she transformed into Lifre, taking a deep breath and closing her eyes to look at it again.

“It’s… better?” Lena muttered, before shaking her head. It was clear that she wasn’t able to replicate the effects of the Keeper’s blessing that had been placed on Lifre. Thus, she went with the final plan, transforming into the Goddess of Magic herself, Ryone.

Despite her association with Olympus, Lena still felt that it was somewhat heretical to imitate a member of the Greater Pantheon. It wasn’t that she couldn’t, just that she felt that she shouldn’t do so. Especially not with one of the Keeper’s wives.

Still, this had been part of the plan proposed by the Greater Pantheon itself, so she pushed past that small discomfort and turned into the elven goddess. Once in the form of Ryone, she opened her eyes again, nodding. “Alright, I understand it now.”

With that, she manipulated the screen just as Dana had originally done, pulling up the support window to display the list of all available worlds. “According to this, the planet that we are currently on is listed as Core Seventy Eight. I’ll set our destination as floor fifty of Core One. If it’s the first core, it should have the highest level of progress, right?” She reasoned, writing the destination on the screen.

The entrance of the elevator briefly flashed, showing a barren desert. Lena and Tsubaki both looked at the World Spirit, who braced herself before walking forwards. With heavy steps, she left the elevator, her body tensed as she expected to be banished from the world.

However, as the seconds ticked by, nothing happened to her. Opening her eyes, she looked back, confirming that she had left the range of the elevator. “I’m… safe here?” She asked in shock.

“It would seem so.” Tsubaki confirmed. “Can you spread your senses to detect the rest of this planet?”

“Give me a minute, and I’ll check!” The spirit said in excitement, closing her eyes and focusing. “It’s… fuzzy. That’s the best way I can describe it. I can detect their presence, and I can get more details if I focus hard enough to fully project my consciousness there. However, I can’t detect any other planets aside from this one and the one that we came from. Okay, that’s not entirely accurate. If I spread my senses out far enough, I can detect the planets themselves, but I can’t see inside of them no matter how hard I focus.”

“Interesting.” Lena blinked, her mind racing. Perhaps because of the fact that she was imitating Ryone, but some insights seemed to present themselves to her. “Maybe it has something to do with the fact that we linked our system with this planet when we came here. So, in order for you to be able to sense every world, we would need to visit every world at least once. Assuming, of course, that the connection persists after we return. It might only be a temporary connection that lasts until all members of the foreign planet’s system have left. We can quickly confirm that much, at least.”

The World Spirit nodded her head, staying behind as Lena transported herself to Core Two, briefly leaving the elevator, and then returning once again to Core One. When they returned, the World Spirit focused, her brow tightly knit. However, she ultimately shook her head. “I couldn’t sense anything new. Still just here and our original world.”

“Really?” Lena asked in surprise. She had expected that the World Spirit would at least briefly be able to sense the other world. “So, the systems aren’t fully connected. Rather, it’s only based on the individual?”

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Thinking that, she looked at the spirit again. “Can you tell what level the civilization of this planet has reached? Given the structure of Fyor, even if they weren’t able to climb very far, there shouldn’t have ever been a case where they ran out of resources and went extinct.”

The little spirit blinked, nodding her head at that. She focused, sending her perception down through the world, one layer at a time. This was no easy task, given the layers of barriers blocking each floor. Still, she was eventually able to reach a conclusion. “I can see the same species inhabiting both the twenty-third and twenty-fourth floors. They look like some form of four-armed monkey race.”

“They’re that low?” Lena asked in surprise. “Is there something on the twenty-fourth or twenty-fifth floor that would obviously impede their progress?”

The spirit focused once again, before shaking her head. “Not as far as I can tell. They’ve covered about thirty percent of the twenty-fourth floor in various cities, but the gate on that floor.. It just seems like they haven’t found it yet. I can see it resting in a rather deep cave.”

After she said that, Aurivy’s voice spoke up in their minds. I’ve found a unique system orb that just appeared in this world after you guys arrived. However, you’ll need to go to the central region to reach it.

Tsubaki pursed her lips at that, responding a moment later. Do you have an idea of what the orb does?

Thankfully, it seemed that Aurivy did indeed have that answer. That’s right. One of the locals picked it up, so I was able to see the prompt for it. It is labeled ‘System Integration Orb 1-78’. They’re trying to fuse it with their own central spire, but it isn’t responding.

“In other words, we need to take this orb back to our own planet, and it will react with our spire. If it’s about integrating our systems… that should either allow us to fully treat this world as if it were our own, or it will forcibly synchronize all of our unlocked orbs. If it’s the former, then we will be able to tell by having Tsubaki go through a gate here. If she can’t, that means that there are some restrictions on our activities here, and we can only operate normally on levels where the elevator drops us off.” Lena said, before letting out a sigh.

“And if it’s the latter, it means that we will be unlocking everything for the natives, giving them full access to the elevator and everything that entails.”

“It is unlikely that they will have the means of deciphering the interface, however.” Tsubaki pointed out, and Lena shrugged her shoulders.

“If they can’t read the language, they will begin by simply trying to copy the symbols that they see. That will eventually lead them to the support window, and they will be able to copy runes from that list to blindly choose destinations.”

“However…” Lena continued in a more grave tone. “If it is the first option, this is a form of conquest. If we have free reign to come and go from their world, sending in forces that they cannot hope to compete against, it will be the equivalent to subjugating them, whether that is our intention or not.”

Tsubaki pursed her lips, glancing between Lena and the World Spirit. “Is there any method of confirming which option is true, before doing it practically?”

“I mean, theoretically.” Lena hesitated, before nodding her head. “It is possible to try it through an educational stream, but it won’t be easy to do. Ultimately, there is practically no downside to us retrieving the orb through either method. In the worst case scenario, we need only strengthen security around the mana spires.”

Tsubaki thought about that, before seeming to agree. Lady Aurivy, can you guide me to the gate on this floor? We have not yet tested whether I can pass through them.

As soon as she requested that, golden mist wrapped around the trio, depositing them before a gate of black stone  seemingly lodged into a cliffside. Without hesitation, Tsubaki walked up to the gate and placed her hand against it, waiting.

As Lena had theorized, the gate seemed to reject Tsubaki’s touch, as no portal appeared for them to pass through. “So, it is likely the conquest method you mentioned before?” She asked, to which Lena nodded her head.

“There’s still a chance that it is total synchronization, but it is looking more likely that it will simply allow entities from Core Seventy-Eight to act freely in Core One. Given how the World Spirit’s senses were restricted, it is likely that she is counted as a resident of Core Seventy-Eight, despite being a universal entity.”

“I see.” Tsubaki nodded her head firmly. “In that case, we will need to retrieve the integration orbs as soon as we can.”

The point of opening up the final floor in the first place was to be able to give enemies in invasions a higher chance that they would spawn in a hostile environment. However, if they now spawned in an unintegrated core, they would be hidden from even the eyes of Fate. The only solution, then, was to gather the integration orbs for every planet, ensuring that they would have the ability to see them, no matter where they were.

With that thought in mind, Tsubaki had Aurivy send them back to the spire, and then Lena sent them to the first floor. From the inside, it appeared as though the residents of the first floor didn’t even see the opening, given that they had no reaction to it appearing. Like the World Spirit had reported, they were a race of four-armed monkeys, their torsos bared and covered with short fur.

Rather than spending time to diplomatically engage with this unknown race, Tsubaki’s figure briefly flashed. Faster than anyone from this floor could see, she left the spire and grabbed the orb from one of the natives, returning in an instant.

Seeing this, Lena let out a long sigh, placing her forehead in her palm. “I’m going to have to go around and help you get all of those cores, aren’t I, senior?” She asked, to which Tsubaki nodded her head.

“I will thank you in advance. Please take us to the first floor of Core Seventy-Eight, so we can integrate this one. That will be the proper test.” She said, and Lena simply nodded her head.

Unlike the natives of the first core, those of their homeworld were perfectly capable of seeing the elevator open on the first floor. They jumped back in shock, seeing the passage suddenly appearing before them. “What happened?” A young halfling called out, before recognizing the three people in the passage, causing him to gasp once again.

“Pardon me.” Tsubaki gave a polite bow, exiting the elevator and pressing the orb against the side of the spire. “It would appear that the mana spire has become an elevator of sorts. However, I would advise strongly that nobody enters the elevator without someone fluent in third-tier runes.”

As she reported this calmly, a message flashed before the residents of both this planet and the one that they had just visited. The message informed them that the residents of Core Seventy-Eight were now capable of acting freely within Core One. Tsubaki let out a sigh, glancing into the passage and looking at both Lena and the World Spirit.

The World Spirit blinked, closing her eyes and focusing. “Y-Yeah… I can see everything there a lot more clearly now.”

Hearing that, Lena couldn’t help but groan. “In other words, I’m going to be busy for the next few days.” She said, looking out of the passage and to the halfling guard. “Issue a report to the residents of this world. Messages such as this will be appearing frequently for the time being.”

“Yes, Goddess Ryone!” The halfling responded immediately, causing Lena’s eye to twitch slightly.