This kind of a.n.a.lysis gave Arcadia a semblance of security. Maybe this wasn't marching to their certain death.

She glanced at Somnus, pulling herself away from the grim thoughts. Just seeing him walk without projecting any sort of confidence sent a s.h.i.+ver down her spine. They definitely were not marching to their death.

An inexperienced adventurer might pretend to be confident about his chances of defeating a former Heroic Summon, but that was almost always just a facade covering up their fear. To Somnus, he wasn't going to fight a former Heroic Summon. He was going to test a weapon on some poor creature. It didn't matter if they were just a goblin, orc, Heroic Summon, World Boss or even a G.o.d.

It was terrifying.

A part of Arcadia hoped that Somnus would learn a lesson here, but the other wanted to see him succeed. There was inspiration to be found in Somnus's blatant disregard for the established Order that governed the world. It held the promise of defying one's very destiny and rising to heights undreamed of; perhaps this was the soul of a Hero and the very essence of Heroism.

It may also have been nothing more than catastrophic magnitudes of hubris.

Lod led the way through the new and luxurious appearance of the Dungeon. It was quite a far cry from the damp cave tunnels. It truly looked more like a palace now—fitting to be called the birthplace of a G.o.d.

However, eventually, as they descended deeper and deeper into the Dungeon, unharried by the monsters inhabiting the Dungeon, they reached a place where luxury and wealth abruptly ended and turned into poverty and gloom.

Unlike the cave tunnels in the upper Dungeons, before the Dungeon Core upgraded, these ones were darker and held within its darkness the promise of death. These were the lowest levels of the Dungeon, which the Core no longer controlled—no doubt usurped by the former Heroic Summon, Nezaras of the Empty Chalice.

"Masters… Lod wishes to go no further than this…" the goblin suddenly spoke, stopping in his tracks.

Somnus glanced at Lod from the corner of his eyes, his always neutral expression particularly scary in this light.

Lod took a good look at the single eye he could see and was mesmerized by the universe he could see in the deep blue of Somnus's eyes.

"B-but Lod will, despite his wishes, continue to lead the masters to the evil one…" the goblin said, licking his lips.

He took a step forward and then pointed at the ground. "Be careful masters. There is a trap there."

The party navigated around the trap and continued down the Dungeon. None of them had spoken in a while. The atmosphere was quite tense when adding the doom and gloom of the lower Dungeon.

"S-Somnus, what is your plan here?" Emily suddenly asked, the nerves finally getting to her.

"Elaborate query," Somnus replied coldly.

"What are you even doing here? I get that you are trying to learn Magitech and try to create your body again… but then what?" Emily asked.

"Kill the G.o.ds. Exterminate all life," Somnus replied with the same cold tone one might use when describing what they had for breakfast.

Lod chuckled at the words. "Master is great. Master is powerful."

Emily and Arcadia did not find it funny though—they knew it wasn't a joke.

"But… why? What did we ever do to you?" Emily asked.

"Waste of resources. Inefficient lifeform. Threat to nature. Threat to my existence," Somnus listed the reasons, one after another.

"What threat can we possibly be to you? You single-handedly destroyed an entire army. You wiped out an entire city in the span of an hour. You killed a G.o.d," Emily angrily squeezed through her teeth.

"You build armies. You build cities. You have G.o.ds," Somnus said. "All threats to my existence."

Emily wanted to retort, but she couldn't find the words.

"I don't have armies. I don't have cities. I don't have G.o.ds. I am alone and a threat to your existence," Somnus said. "Your kind and I can never reach a compromise. One day you will decide to eliminate the threat that I pose."

Somnus looked at Emily coldly. "Must destroy you before that day comes."

"People will always have disagreements, Somnus. Nations are threats to each other, but still, we manage to maintain peace. There is no need for us to kill each other," Arcadia said.

This time, Somnus focused his gaze on the priestess. "Then why did your kind beg me to help them destroy an enemy army? Where is this peace you speak of? My eyes do not see it."

Arcadia frowned. Bringing up "love and understanding for all" may have been a mistake.

Once more, the party became silent, but this time, their mood was even worse than before. Perhaps they had hoped that attaining a human body, Somnus would also attain compa.s.sion. They were wrong. Dead wrong.

Finally, Lod navigated the party through the corridors until they reached what seemed like a throne room within the cave. The walls were smooth and at right angles, but they were still cave walls, made of cave stone. The floor was no better, although it was smooth it was still an eyesore.

The chamber was about twenty meters long, ten meters wide, and at least seven meters high. At the far end of the chamber was a throne, made out of unprocessed stone slabs and upon it sat a figure shrouded in darkness. Within the darkness of the hood, twin red orbs burned with a malevolent light.

"A challenger?" a raspy voice echoed through the chamber.

"Master… Lod will go… collect materials…" the goblin spoke and carefully backed away.

Somnus only casually glanced towards the goblin and then focused on the ent.i.ty that was sat upon the throne. He advanced forwards; neither in a hurry nor taking his time. It was no different than his usual pace.

"Report level. Comply," Somnus said.

"Hmm?" The ent.i.ty upon the throne tilted its head.

"Are you worth experience?" Somnus clarified.

The ent.i.ty laughed, the sound was hoa.r.s.e. It must've marshalled whatever was left of its voice to speak, "So full of hubris. My level is 125. Are you ready to beg for your life?"

Somnus glanced back to Emily who was standing ramrod straight, terrified into place.

Arcadia seemed to understand what the look meant and nodded. "Yes, you will gain experience if you kill him. But I really think we should rethi—"

"Stand by for systematic experimentation followed by termination," Somnus said and held out a hand in the empty air before him. "Beam Weapon."

There was a flash of light as the manbeam sword materialized; the purity and quant.i.ty of the mana in the beam caused it to look like liquid fire. With the sword called into existence, the throne room brightened considerably, and Somnus could finally see the person sitting on the throne.

It was a young man covered in black robes. Even after five centuries of living, he had perfect skin and tone, a stark contrast to his harsh and damaged voice. This was Nezaras of the Empty Chalice.

"Divine Protection!" Arcadia called out. A golden glow basked the throne room on top of the mute blue glow from the beam sword. A translucent bubble of golden light surrounded Somnus as Arcadia and Emily walked closer to their leader.

"A Priest and a Mystic Warrior…" Nezaras spoke and then glanced to Emily. He didn't have a comment about her, perhaps realizing that she was nothing but dead-weight.

Nezaras pointed his finger towards Somnus and casually said, "Let's begin with you then."

A magic circle appeared before Nezaras; it was ma.s.sive. It was easily three times as large as any that anyone saw Somnus create thus far. A spark of light lit up in Somnus's eyes as he studied the circle.

"Beam, Plasma, Penetration," he quietly worded out the symbols that he recognized. He focused on the one that was most critical to the spell. "Flow Adjust."

Somnus chuckled and pointed at the magic circle.

"Rewrite."

"Destruction Beam."

The two spoke simultaneously. As the mana flowed into the magic circle, it heavily relied on [Flow Adjust] to direct the mana between the Amplifiers in the right amounts. Somnus had however copied the circle and cast an exact replica over it, overwriting the [Flow Adjust] symbol with a [Mana Amplify] symbol.

The result was catastrophic.

As the mana was transformed into plasma, it bounced between amplification stages without any regulation. The generated ball of violet plasma kept growing and growing, never reaching the stage where it became a beam.

Nezaras jumped out of his throne before the out of control ball of plasma could reach him and it was just in time. Angrily, he watched the plasma devour the ground and the throne he was just sat upon.

"Greater Dispell!" Nezaras called out angrily, his voice faltering halfway through and becoming little more than just an airy hiss.

Somnus once more continued advancing, as Arcadia watched him, completely dumbfounded. Somnus could copy magic circles just by seeing them, and rewrite the symbol sequence on the fly. That was outrageous. Mortals shouldn't possess such power. Usually, the few mages who possessed [Magic Rewrite] had to learn the spells they wished to negate.

"How did you do that?" Nezaras asked, his cadence hastening as he realized that Somnus was not just a pushover.

"Do what?" Somnus asked.

"Turn my spell against me like that?!" Nezaras clarified.

His question was not ill-placed. Usually a mage would destroy a spell before it even gets started. To send it into a feedback loop was unheard of.

"Could it be that you know Destruction Beam? Who taught you?" Nezaras insisted.

"You mean this?" Somnus asked pointing a finger at Nezaras. "Destruction Beam."

The magic circle appeared before Somnus and was nearly instantly filled out. His Realize Speed was orders of magnitude higher than Nezaras's. It took Nezaras five or six full seconds to fill out his magic circle, but Somnus's only took half a second.

Nezaras had no time to do anything but to helplessly dive towards the ground.

When the magic circle operated correctly, the ball of violet plasma became a user defined size, as specified by the [Flow Adjust] symbol. Then it went through the [Beam] and [Emitters] to create a brilliant violet lance that poured from Somnus's finger.

Instantly, the temperature in the room rose by several degrees as the beam gouged into the far wall, drilling a hole five meters deep.

To Somnus, this was little more than practice and experimentation. The Destruction Beam felt like it was just at the edge of his total Realize Area for a single magic circle. As far as his total Realize Capacity, he could probably cast four Destruction Beams simultaneously.

Nezaras, however, did not know this.

"Total Area Denial!" Nezaras called out and pointed at Somnus. Six magic circles, larger than even the Destruction Beam, appeared around Somnus.

Somnus instantly knew what they were for. Two of the magic circles provided the mana, one circle was purely dedicated to compressing the mana and changing its type to Entropy, two of the circles defined the spatial coordinate, and the final one created a dome. The final effect was a bubble, like Arcadia's Divine Protection, but instead of protecting what is within, the [Total Area Denial] spell would destroy everything within the dome.

Somnus sweeped his hand through the air, using [Magic Symbol Destruction] to erase the final Magic Circle's connection to its mana supply.

As the circle went into full effect, a greyish-black dome enveloped the three, but nothing happened.

"How are you doing this?!" Nezaras shouted.

"Your Magic Circle design is too simple and it has no redundancy. Clearly, you are not experienced in combat," Somnus said.

Arcadia shook her head. She wanted to point out that Somnus was not experienced in magical combat either.

"What are you talking about?" Nezaras asked.

"I was able to easily find where the most important part of your spell connects to its mana supply and I erased it. If you were able to hide it for a few moments longer, I don't know if I would've survived," Somnus said, very straightfoward about Nezaras's flaws.

"You erased the symbol?" Nezaras asked, his anger fading and being replaced by fear. "I cannot believe this! This cannot be possible! Who are you?"

"Queries discarded," Somnus said as he continued advancing. He was now only several steps away from Nezaras.

Nezaras, cornered as he was, realized that the only way to escape Somnus's countermagic was to cast spells that were fast and simple.

"Fireball!" Nezaras called out.

Instantaneously, the magic circle appeared, filled out, and a ball of fire, the size of a person's torso, headed Somnus's way like it was a comet.

A smirk appeared on Nezaras's thin lips.

You have taken damage. -675 HP

Somnus smashed the fireball away with his bare hand, sending it flying across the room and exploding in the far corner. He didn't quite antic.i.p.ate the fireball at this range, and was slightly disappointed for resorting to such a vulgar method of defense; it was not elegant at all.

"Now," Somnus said with a tone that suggested slight annoyance. Probably because of his aching hand. "Premature termination is grounds for termination. Attempting to act in disagreement with the terms of this service is grounds for causing undue suffering not compliant with International Wartime Standards. Do you understand?"

Somnus waited for a reply from Nezaras who was still stunned to see a person just casually bat away a fireball. Did Somnus not fear pain or death?

After a brief moment, Somnus's patience ran out.

The beam sword pulsed malevolently and then pierced through Nezaras's stomach, pa.s.sing through him like a knife hot going through b.u.t.ter.

Screams filled the Throne Room.

"Do you understand?" Somnus's quiet whisper was the only sound in the deathly quiet throne room.