Chapter 481: Puppy

We reappear in another cave deep underground, which at this point, is beginning to feel routine—me finding holes and placing anchors in them. A few of my thermal cubes surround us immediately warming our surroundings as I get to work recovering my mana.

The first thing I do is check Fracture, but the sword appears to be sealed properly in its sheath. Aside from the heavily worn inscriptions and some new cracks on the blade, it almost seems fine—as fine as something this evil can be.

My right arm is still healing slowly, like most of the injuries the sword causes. Although it looks fine on the outside, I know it’s going to take days before they’re back to an optimal state—maybe even weeks for some parts of my right arm.

My mana pathways are burned and they’re slow to recover, throwing off my mana control like in the old days. On top of that, it’s left my muscles in a weakened state and damaged my natural barrier, creating a number of vulnerabilities I’ll have to deal with in the meantime.

And that’s just from the side effects of holding the sword; direct contact with the blade would have been far worse.

I check on the sleeping Biscuit, confirming what I sensed, and for a moment, I push it to the back of my mind. Next, I check on the Witch. She’s lying on the ground, still unconscious, and missing a few of her arms as well as an assortment of chunks from the rest of her body. Our little trio of hell difficulty enjoyers seems to have beaten her properly.

“I didn’t use

[Disintegration]

,” Lily says, watching me inspect the thylarin woman “but we had to be… rough before she started using the stone around us or did something to get in your way.”

She and the twins are standing in front of me, staring at Biscuit, who still lies in my arms. It would seem I’m not seeing things after all, given the way they seem to have noticed it as well.

Biscuit is much smaller now, to the point that he looks like a puppy, two-month-old at the most. His fur is all fuzzy and incredibly soft. Even his nose is shorter, his face rounder and his legs seem shorter compared to the rest of his body.

Simply put, Biscuit has become unbearably adorable, and I feel an overwhelming urge to strongly squeeze and nibble him. I know it’s perfectly normal cute aggression, but I can’t help myself as I hold that little pup in my hands.

Lily steps closer first and touches his small paw, and I sense her sending mana through him, checking his status. As she does so, I notice that unbeknownst to her, she’s begun to caress and pet his tiny paw with a stray finger, her eyes widening, as her breath quickens.

“He…” her voice cracks, and she coughs. “He’s fine as far as I can tell. His current stature aside, I think his mana pool probably increased rapidly in size, and there are some changes going on I can’t quite follow, but they don’t seem detrimental.”

As she talks, her interest grows more and more, and she moves her face closer. Then Biscuit barks in his sleep, twitching his leg as he does. Lily squeaks in response, and for a moment I almost think she might snatch him right out of my hands, but she holds herself back and masks the squeak with another cough.

“Something in my throat,” Lily complains before coughing once again.

“Sure,” I say, pulling away from her as I form a new set of manabloc chairs, one for each of us, each modified to be the peak of comfort over the past few months. They grab them, and we sit in a circle around the flickering cube which, thanks to a clever application of empty space and a touch of kinetic energy, now emits the sound of crackling firewood.

While the Witch’s unconscious body lies on the ground next to us, I start rubbing my cheek against the sleeping form of Biscuit’s small body. “Is everyone ok?”

“Yes, I healed all our wounds, but yours might need a bit more time. You know I could have used

[Disintegration]

and you wouldn’t have needed to use Fracture.”

“Yes, you could have probably broken a single chain, maybe two if you were to really lean on sacrifice. If I hadn’t used Fracture, I would have to use black mana to get rid of her crown, and that would’ve caused an explosion, without really improving our situation. This way, I got rid of her crown and used up the mana inside before it could cause any trouble; it was a perfect plan.”

“It didn’t kill the monster,” Aaron reminds me.

“I knew Biscuit was around,” I say, lifting the corgi pup as I do, leaving his tiny hind legs and fluffy short tail dangling as I move him from side to side. “I probably could have pushed myself more and dealt more damage, but I trusted him.” Ꞧ

Pulling him back onto my chest, I give him a gentle squish, feeling the urge to squeeze him even more and give him a playful nibble.

This is getting dangerous. He’s way too cute. I force myself to put him on my lap and lay my hand on his small head, which only makes things worse. That head is so small now, so soft, so fluffy.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

Good.

“Of course, there were different ways to deal with the situation, but overall it went well. My only complaint is that I was deducted who knows how many levels for the assistance he gave me in killing that beast.”

“You say ‘it went well’, but wasn’t the plan to free one of the prisoners to help us escape the Astral prison?” Aaron asks, reminding me of our mission.

“That’s true, but not this one,” I say, sure of my words. "That thing was way too unstable to even think of cooperation and we still have three containment cells left. Tess knows about two and is currently working to find the last.”

“If you think about it,” Dennis begins cautiously, “aren’t we going around killing tortured, and beaten up prisoners?”

“Well, when you put it that way, of course, it’s going to sound wrong,” I reply with a shrug. “But understand this: whether it was with Caius or this prisoner, I never went in with the intent to kill them from the start. I’m always open to freeing them through a fair deal.”

“It’s crazy how these Champion-level prisoners can still cause so much trouble, even with so much of their power stripped away,” Aaron says, gesturing to the woman on the floor. “What about her?”

“We could just leave her here and do our own thing, but I think we can probably get something out of her as a reward for saving her life.” After performing a quick check to ensure she’s not just pretending to be unconscious, I add, “I want to ask her some things about challenges and using the crown. She seems to have some experience. She might also have some nice items we could take.”

“You don’t want to ask her more about using mana? Just crown stuff?” Aaron asks as if suspecting me of something.

“Nah, I’m better than her when it comes to most mana-related stuff.”

“Imagine how good you could be if you ditched Whitey and focused on mana alone,” Dennis says, clearly trying to provoke me with a smirk.

"Imagine how completely dead I’d be if my mana got blocked, as tends to happen. Plus, this way, I can ignore my body’s stats, which will ultimately lead to a greater degree of mastery over my mana."

“Imagine how good your control would be if you focused completely on mana to prevent that from happening,” he pushes. Lately, he and his brother like to see how far they can get me before I punish them with harder training.

So I lean back in my chair and carefully pet the tiny corgi puppy in my hands. “Imagine thinking the conversations you have through

[Connection]

are private only to find out that someone was listening in.”

“Imagi… what.”

“Imagine talking about very… well, private stuff while walking through the tunnels behind a certain member of our expedition.”

“You’re bluffing. There’s no way you were able to resonate and join our private

[Connection]

. Not without us noticing.”

“Dennis, I don’t think he is. When he’s bluffing, he somehow looks more confident,” Aaron says, the more cautious of the two.

While they talk things out, I step aside, coming to a stop in front of the Witch, and say. “I know you’re awake.”

Hearing me, Melel lifts herself up, bringing herself back to her feet, and dusts herself off with the two arms she has remaining. Her wounds aren’t life-threatening, but they’re also the kind of thing Lily won’t waste mana to heal if Melel were to turn out to be an enemy.

Her yellow eyes observe me, and Biscuit cradled in my arms, before shifting her gaze to the sitting twins and Lily. Then they flicker toward the thermal orb, and her mana senses examine the cave.

She does so slowly, to avoid coming off as threatening.

Only then, without reacting to the situation or trying to say anything about the events that took place down there, she asks, “What do you want?”

Pleasantly surprised by her reaction, I nod and ask, “What do you have?”

An hour later, we find ourselves back in Hollowgate, following Melel, who’s currently leading us through the halls of her manor, which also happens to have one of the highest walls in the city. All of her arms have been restored, courtesy of Lily, who was kind enough to treat her other wounds as well.

Her manor is empty; there are no servants, no other people. Melel lives alone, secluded within a very dangerous set of defensive arrays.

The interior of the manor is simple—with no luxurious furniture or wasteful items. Everything is clean and minimalistic, with large windows to let in plenty of light. The manor itself is smaller than I expected, with thick walls enclosing most of the interior which are layered with even more defenses.

Most of the estate is dominated by a massive stone cube that towers over the actual house, taking up nearly all the available land. Its enormous bulk, easily capable of swallowing multiple mansions with room to spare, dwarfing the manor in comparison.

We pass through the cube’s wall with her skill alone, the stone seeming to melt away as it creates a path for us.

Dozens of crystals line the ceiling, mimicking daylight with remarkable accuracy, and a set of inscriptions on the walls even create the illusion of wind. A large part of the space is occupied by a lush garden, filled with trees, vibrant grass, a small pond, and a cozy-looking cottage tucked into a corner.

This is where Melel has lived for the last 10 years, storing mana in her crown.

Most of the cottage’s interior is lined with shelves upon shelves, filled with books and an even larger quantity of mana stones packed full of information. Then there are the items, most of them only seeming to have sentimental value, while others are clearly the results of an assortment of experiments.

It’s really messy inside but not in a bad way; it’s clean, lived-in, and radiates a wonderfuly cozy feeling.

Without a word, Melel takes a small tray and puts five cups on it. She doesn’t seem to have a complete set, so each cup is different, be it in material, shape, or size. Adding to it, she takes a bottle from one of the shelves and wordlessly heads to the terrace connected to one of the doors.

We take our seats in the chairs she brings us from the house, once again not a set, indicating once again, that she’s probably not used to hosting visitors like this, and so, seeing that she’s missing one, I make my own with mana, which grabs her interest as she takes a moment to examines it.

As we sit around the small table, she pours the drink into every cup, and then, in front of us, takes a sip.

Lily is the second to drink, and when she confirms it’s fine, we drink as well. It tastes very nice, fruity, and slightly fizzy, and feels warm and refreshing. I quickly find myself enjoying it and take another sip while taking full advantage of the view the terrace offers, overlooking the small pond where, under a large shade tree, sets a small stack of books. It would be easy to see Melel reading there in her free time.

During this, the Witch doesn’t speak, but I can only think of it as a silent form of thanks for saving her life. I doubt she’ll say anything more, but this gesture speaks loud enough.

“How do you take such a small amount of mana with how much you had stored in the crown?” I ask a few minutes later.

Melel turns her eyes to me from the pond, “There are a few tricks to make it easier. I had a feeling you would know about them.”

“Yes, I can do it too, but I was curious about the way you do it.”

Melel tilts her head, considering her words. “Think of it like this: the mana in the crown behaves under its own set of rules, like a layered lattice. Each layer has a different response threshold, a kind of resistance coefficient, if you will. You have to tune into each specific frequency to access one layer at a time. Otherwise, you’re effectively breaching the entire reservoir at once, which is wasteful and unstable.”

She gestures with a hand, tracing invisible lines in the air. “It's about precision extraction. With the right modulation—and by aligning your mana with the crown’s specific binding structure—you minimize the draw. It’s controlled, like a harmonic oscillation. Without that tuning, you risk releasing it all at once. Think of it like plucking a single thread from a weave, using resonance instead of force.”

“It’s like a valve, the more you…” Dennis interjects, mocking my words with a sly grin—then abruptly stops mid-sentence, mouth stuck open, frozen in place.

“Continue,” I tell Melel.

Glancing at the twins, Melel’s fingers dance subtly in the air, as if illustrating a complex formula. “The crown isn’t just a simple container; it's a resonant structure. When you tune into that structure precisely, you don’t just take mana—you prompt it to flow willingly, at your own pace. It's a form of induced resonance, not unlike coaxing stone to vibrate at its natural frequency. The crown essentially lets its defenses down.”

She pauses. “But the trick isn’t just about knowing the resonance. You have to account for environmental factors, right down to the minor shifts in ambient mana density. Most of it, the crown does on its own, but adjusting for those conditions is possible from your side, and by doing so you increase your control.”

A faint frown appears on her face. “And every time I draw from it, I also perform a recalibration of sorts, mapping the crown’s mana fluctuations to my own.”

This sounds fun, and it might take a while.

“Go play,” I say, waving Lily and the twins away, and wait for them to leave, Dennis with his mouth still wide open, then I lean closer to Melel. “Repeat what you just said and imagine you are explaining it to a 5-year-old.”