The next day was very awkward for the core group when Lola returned but Robin didn’t wait and apologized.
“I’m very sorry! I know I should have said something!” He said.
Lola slightly frowned, “It’s fine and you’re right, you should have… but Lily also knew exactly what was going to happen to herself.” She said before small life force bubbles formed and the greater demons all appeared around Lola and she side eyed every one of them with a cold glare, “Everyone who became part of the contract knew and agreed to not speak.” She said.
“We are sorry master but… everyone knows you are too kindhearted.” Yez said for all the demons.
She just snorted, “It’s fine, it’s been done so let’s not talk about it from now on or it will keep this sour taste in my mouth.” She said.
Shoji, however, did not drop it. “Lola, don’t lie, don’t think I can’t see you crying on the inside still. If you want I can hear you out or we can get a professional to help you through it. There is no shame in heroes getting therapists, many veteran military men get them to cope with great trauma and you have to cope with just as much.” Shoji said.
She glared at him for his passive view of everyone’s emotional spectrum but slumped down because she can’t hide her feelings around him.
“I… I’ll see someone.” She said.
Shoji smiled when he heard that and nodded, “Good, bottling it up will never be the right answer to something. Work through it, surpass it and come out stronger.”
She nodded but she was clearly depressed still.
That said she explained after just how much she knew.
The life force users were literally drooling at the mouth, the twins, zach and many others were exceptionally excited to be able to condense a Life Core.
“I’ve been wondering, how do fusion energies make cores or advance?” Harold asked. On his side was a metal book which he used his mana to manipulate and act as a weapon and shield. He was only in the civilian military course but he had grown since gaining mana.
Lola smiled, “You need to transform the base energies to refined energy.” Lola said.
When she said that, something struck Robin like a hammer as the timeline tree, something that had not reacted in a very long time besides just filling out the timeline constantly, went into overdrive as energy development techniques finally breached the final need that hadn’t been pointed out. The link to all the merged energy growing began to expand rapidly and complete techniques took form to effectively train.
The most important part was that it showed how to control raw energies and condense raw energies into a higher quality and not one or two but countless in countless forms.
Shoji and Lola noticed because Robin’s eyes began to rapidly go left to right like he was reading something and knew something was up. Soon he started to blink rapidly and Lola felt a shift in his divine spark and it gave off a lot of undulations.
After about five minutes he stopped and rubbed his head.
“Did you get something?” She asked.
“Very painful but yeah. I basically had the training method for every possible energy, it's how last year everyone’s training pace improved tremendously and why the list of energies expanded. Well, what Lola just said made me finally unlock the advanced condition and techniques for everything and it came like a wave so it’s still hurting.” He said, rubbed his head a bit.
Milo looked curiously, “How does that work for death mana? From what I know, neither spiritual energy or death energy have a condensed form.” he said.
Robin keeps rubbing his head, “Yes it does, it's just that it’s a closely guarded secret by the creatures of that level. Things more advance then Lich like Val’ric, Elder Lich.” Robin said.
They all looked surprised at the mention of the rank. “Isn’t Val’ric and Sir Vincent already elder lich?” One of the students asked.
“That is how we humans perceive them since they are the peak of earth’s necromancers but no.” Robin said and leaned back, “They are just ranked as Lich. Skeleton mage, death mage, Lich, Elder lich. They are the third rank.” he said.
“So what is it called in raw form?” Milo asked.
“Spiritual energy is called Spiritual Soul Power, in the future you almost exclusively called it SSP. Death energy condenses into death power. The resulting fusion will finally merge and transform death mana into Death Aether.” Rubin said.
“Is that the same for mana?” Harold asked.
“Basically, Chi into Qi and Mental energy into psychic energy to transform mana into aether.” Rubin said.
On the side one of the groups with just raw energies was in thought and asked, “Would someone with the three raw energies be able to fuse processed energies?”
Lola and Robin smiled and both of them nodded, “Now they can.” They said together because she was just as aware as Robin.
Lola looked at the demons, “I also know how to make demons into archdemons so you guys will soon be able to achieve that but only after I’ve achieved that state and only a limited number of you.” She said.
“Why only limited?” Yez asked.
Lola smiled, “I can only have 14 demon minions as an archdemon until I can fully steal the power of the 14 demon lords.” She said.
The demons were all understanding of this.
“Are you going to work to quickly make the core?” Robin asked.
Lola nodded, “I need to because I will evolve again… it will be a massive growth.”
“How massive?” Shoji asked.
“Very large.” Yez said, “From what we know, a demon would double in power but most of our power is based on our immense usage of our life force. Mania had roughly 2000 to 3000 in stats based on your human system and the rest was boosted by our demon abilities and demon biology. Hybrids aren’t as efficient. We aren't sure if Mania’s part will double, pushing Lola to the 8000s or if she will actually double and her stats rush to 12,000s.”
“That…” everyone looked at her with shock because that would clearly put her in the highest range of braveman.
Robin had to think about it and focus on Lola to try and see if there was mention but the timeline tree didn’t react and just sighed.
What it did show was how big of a change it would cause in the short term for anyone achieving a higher quality.
“I wouldn’t know about evolution but achieving a core or similar quality energy, within a month of channeling and training, is liable to push anyone who achieves no lower than 5000 in stats related to it. The high limit for level 2 refined energy can’t be more than 25,000.” Robin said.
“You guessed that?” Lola asked.
“At the end of the day, we were the ones to help Kevin set up the space so everything related to gamer space statistics. I’m using what we know up to now to base the information in the timeline tree of heroes and braveman that appear in the future since there is no system in the future.” Robin said.
It made sense that he would try to use some logic he was aware of to categorize someone’s strength and likely continued using that through experience.
“Aren’t you already close?” Milo asked.
“To?”
“Making your Life and Psychic cores.” Milo said.
“I… yes. Both me and Ruth are actually.” He said.
The others chuckled but Robin frowned, “Hey, it isn’t my fault that my mind is linked to hers. We were literally only able to get psychic energy originally after we both hit the limit at the same time.” He complained.
A lot of laughs came from the club members after that.
Zack interrupted, “I wonder how this will affect me.” He said.
“I bet it will involve your dungeon core thing but now that I think about it… were you able to properly fill life essence into the other nodes?”
Zack groaned, “No, my bosses have succeeded but I haven’t. My life essence can’t leave my blood or the dungeon and I’ve had the system check and they keep saying that it’s connected to my dungeon not achieving required conditions but the system can’t penetrate into it to tell me what is missing and it’s a pain to guess.” Zack said.
“Have you had her checked based on your DNA?” Robin asked.
“Yes, I had her scan my entire genetic code and down to the most basic traits but she can only say it is a lack of conditions. The only thing I know is that something has to happen to the dungeon core just like how originally it was the leak but now, even with so many boss monsters I still don’t get it.” Zack said.
Indeed, in under a year, with the help of the heroes to get animals and build entire ecosystems inside the dungeon, Zack had literally started feeling hunger pangs like most strength fighters. Each time he would form a boss, every five floors, they would try and get a monster egg that he would then modify to his liking and make a new boss and a new more expansion system.
He showed them the giant dungeon he had now. Every time a boss was made, the dungeon almost literally doubled and almost seemed to form forks and increase the number of ‘entrances’ with the boss room being the base instead and looking at it. Even more, the number of bosses doubled with each new branch formed meaning it isn’t just 1 monster egg he gets each time.
“Something wrong?” Zack asked.
“I just felt like the shape… the number of ‘entrances’ at the start it feels like it's starting to circle around.” Robin said.
They all looked and when he removed the newest floors and looked at all the floors spread out it made sense.
Of course their entire floors were connected by them with passages between the branches and once they saw this they realized he was right, and even more it was bending.
“Wait… you don’t mean that…”
“Your dungeon is probably the core itself and eventually you will make a circular world because the outside is massively larger than the interior.” Robin said.
“What was the last monster you made?” Tristan asked.
“I used a lizard monster and made a Frost Drake. It's still young and about as strong as a strong man though. The others are on the high end of strong man.” Zack said.
Robin looked and thought about the speed he grew. He naturally had the life essence training Robin had taught and it had done immensely to speed up the growth by making his life essence grow denser.
The 5th floor bosses all hit a limit as well, growing no stronger than level 75 with all three energies.
When he was thinking of this, something in his mind seemed to click, “Wait… you’ve said that your monster's souls are fused with yours right.” Robin asked.
“Sure.” Zack said.
“And are your bosses the only ones with Psychic energy and Qi?”
“No, after I introduced it to the bosses, the raw energies spread down after each boss had the power.”
“What happens to that energy then? Does it just evaporate?” Robin asked.
Zack froze and looked at the map and closed it before closing his eyes.
As you can expect, looking for a specific force and seeing he could control it he tried and caught something from the mental energy and chi on the surface level and they came out like the leaking life force and connected to the ground.
The energy surged down to the dungeon core which began to shine brightly within him. Instantly at the top, the lines extended from every living thing. Those without instantly activated and started to produce a faint wispy energy from those areas.
Zack instantly collapsed and Robin knew he had found the problem and started to help Zack and tell him what to do but that was when they were shocked.
He cried out and his energy went out of his control.
The locked storage spots were fully unlocked as the energy from the animals and monsters began to fuse with his body but what came out wasn’t chi and mental energy, it was world power and mental energy.
It all began to run wildly in his body but when they felt like he would burst, a wave from his dungeon crashed into the energies and it began to take a strange flow.
It was at this moment that Robin noticed that life essence was pumping into the dungeon and only life force was coming out.
They could only watch as wave after wave the chaos was hit and it soon formed a shocking flow of the three energies.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
It all kept grinding everything until a fusion of three energies actually happened causing a surging heat to enter through his body into the three centers.
As soon as that happened the refined energies came off the bosses and began to leak timidly and began to replace the raw energies and they were very clear, it was immediate as the energy started to produce very heated until it formed a stable flow.
“What happened?!” Chasm Might shouted as he entered the club to find.
Robin explained the talk they were having and the idea.
“God damn it, did you stumble across something again!” Chasm Might said and they began to check on Zack. “What is happening, world power is filling his lower dantian and the three energies are merging and filling his entire body before the fusion returns to his dungeon.” He said.
They looked at one another and even the goddess appeared and landed. She looked at him seriously and touched his body carefully. “This force…” she muttered and looked at Robin.
Her look was obvious and wanted answers.
“I know I found everything…” He muttered and turned but a bright shine came and he knew what it was. “This is World Essence!” He exclaimed.
“World… essence?” Chasm Might asked.
“It’s the essence of a world! Zack’s dungeon power is innately world essence because it is automatically generated but he previously only ran the dungeon with life force but now all three forces are combining and free through his body! It was probably the last condition to upgrade.” As he said that, it proved correct as a divine spark formed and entered his heart.
The digital goddess looked, “The title, Demigod of Monsters.” She said, reading the source.
Everyone’s jaw dropped when they heard the title.
The spark began to automatically rush through his body and fill the flow before half of it surged into the dungeon and the flame settled into the center of the dungeon core. A source did not remain within his body, only the tiny flames.
“Just like that…” Chasm Might said.
Everyone was confused but the digital goddess looked at Robin, “What of the islands?” She asked.
Robin looked at her, “That is the next step but not now. Only when there are enough pieces but their hosts can properly train that and I will try to help them after.” Robin said.
She nodded and left.
“What is going to happen to Zack?” Chasm Might asked.
“He will continue to balance out, I think. I don’t have memories of Zack but there have been others, the Living Island hosts among them, who discovered this power. It's why I had no concrete answer for Zack. At the end of it all, his power is basically set to become World Source, level 2 refined energy when World Essence is further refined.
They heard a groan after that and Zack coughed as he rolled on his side and sat up. “Ah my head… it’s pounding so hard.” He said.
Robin asked to see his stats
As you would expect, he was a summoner in the heroics course last year but he barely qualifies for the civilian military this year. Only people with braveman capacity were accepted but it was clear he would go up to the elite even.
Obviously his locked potential was also released.
“System, check if his wisdom is high enough for the explosive growth and activation of psychic energy and world essence.” Robin said.
The scan ran through quickly.
275 wisdom is not viable for the current pressure. Please elevate wisdom to 700 for safe brain development with excess for continued growth.
500 wisdom is the lowest benchmark to support his current pressure however with his current body condition, he will stabilize only once his body generates World Source. 700 wisdom is the viable starting point for training his mind.
The amount was instantly placed and his brain was forcefully elevated to the required amount with most of his potential and his brain finally stopped throbbing.
He had time to check and what they found was that the entire dungeon had grown to the next boss and was bottled up.
“I need to relieve the pressure by making more floors.” He said.
“Pick a monster in the dungeon, we don’t have time to find one.” Chasm Might said.
He had to relent and picked something and made a new monster, causing the dungeon to expand and then filled each new boss layer and by the time he was done the dungeon had already hit the next boss.
It took another boss for the pressure to stabilize. He had gone from 25 floors to 36. Two waves of boss monsters that now had to be raised.
Then he tried to fused energy and just punched the air while the system analyzed.
Warning, body is under extensive pressure and is likely to receive energy burn without proper training to support the energy.
“So another energy burn victim.” Chasm Might said.
“Sir, I’ve finally got the technique for fusion energies as well.” Robin said and told them the conversation with Lola and everything since they got there.
“This is going to be a stressful year for sure. I can just feel it.” He said but agreed that it was important. He asked Robin to properly write it all down for them to start implementing them in case there are other students.
As for Zack, he asked how to go about it.
“Do mental training Zack.” Robin said.
He was worried but followed the process using the mental energy as the center and not the world essence because he could only move it and not train it. The result was that a structure had formed within the core of his mind and there were inscriptions there. It showed how to use it in all three storage zones. Basically it was condensed of all three but the storage caused one force to be slightly stronger.
That said, the primary usage was in his ability to finally summon wild monsters that were still under his control beyond just the boss monsters. He had never been able to but he could now and the primary focus of his power was in enhancing these creature’s strength or feeding power to their innate abilities.
He was effectively a human monster wave if he wanted to be but he had to be careful to not run through his monsters.
Either way, he could now effectively summon and control common animals and monsters he bred to be his eyes and ears.
Other students wanted Robin’s help since he was so perceptive of small details but Chasm Might stopped it immediately, “Stop this right now. Robin, I know you are attentive but you’ve really got to be more careful with your friends. Zack, before you begin intensive training we will need to get you level 1 energy burn resistance like Robin got. Don’t try using World Essence yet. Robin, if you know its uses and capacities please add them to the database and after that we will see how Zack’s ability affects the energy and we will go from there. Try to avoid using it until you become proficient.” Chasm Might said but sighed.
“Mr Might, has Techno said anything about the digimetal armor he was planning to make for Hacks and Halohacks?” Oliver asked.
“He is still in the planning stage to make tools that can properly forge this material. We will have about 2 more months of training before internship begins and we will be starting operations to clean out all 50 regions of the American Union.” he said.
They exclaimed in shock that it would be falling through.
“Do you think Techno will have something ready by then?” Tristan asked.
“It is likely since what he is working with is the raw material. The most likely thing he will do is place raw melted material into the required frames to make the raw hammering tools. Solid digimetal is far from an easily molded material.” He said. “And then there is finishing up the other hero academies.”
“Speaking of those, when does it take effect?” Robin asked.
“In a week.” Chasm Might said.
“Wait, really!” everyone exclaimed.
“Yeah, in a week the European, African and Asian digital realms will be officially created with the four supercomputers connected to the same network and they will appear around here.”
“Wait… will each country train their own heroes or could this effectively be considered one academy of heroics?” Shoji asked.
“No, each union has to fund and sponsor their own academy. This means Techno isn’t supplying technology that isn’t purchased to the other nations because it, effectively, is a military resource we’ve discovered. The biggest resource we are sharing is definitely the safety of this place and the gamer space with the details explained by the gamers. Since gamers are world wide we aren’t keeping that private, especially since it will be world wide anyways.” Chasm Might explained.
“Is it okay to just leave it at that?” Robin asked.
“We’ve taken the last 3 years to figure out all the… changes that have happened. Things are going to get even more chaotic after this.” He said.
Robin frowned before he thought of something, “Wait… if the supercomputers are all connected into a single network, will that mean the gamer space will filter out of them while Kevin is inside the gamer space?”
“Yes.” he replied, “It already is because the computers are already connected but Techno is still moving them around underground and setting up the tower network with the protective world power barriers. We are using basic towers for the time being until he can switch out for digital metal.” Chasm Might explained.
Robin was shocked that it was actually expanded like that and begged another question.
“So with a super computer in each continent and, from what I remember, one to south america so that transfer speed is faster. That would mean that once the gamers achieve level 4 clearance, the gamer space will spread over most land masses.” Robin said.
“Yes but it will have to be controlled and reduced because it would put too much pressure on the power pieces who power the gamer space. We will only run for about a month at that rate so that it can scan everyone in the continents and look for the final pieces of the gamer space.” they all exclaimed but agreed that those final people were definitely the most important targets.
“Also, there will be a new kind of class for 11th and 12th graders.” He said, confusing the club’s older members.
“What kind?” Milo asked.
He grinned, “Putting them in their place before you tutor them for power development training.”
They blinked and exclaimed in shock and confusion.
“How are we going to do that?” They asked.
“It’s to show the distance 2 years can bring under the system, it will also cull the student’s egos, especially people with strong innate abilities. The process will be very simple, a group… maybe three or four, will get a group after a few month's of focused training, seeing their own explosive growth, and then beat them back to earth.” he said.
Everyone momentarily flinched at how he described it. All the students from the original academy were purposefully and painfully brought down to that level by dying day in and day out under the unrelenting fists and powers of the other heroes. This meant, to take the pressure off the teachers and be able to handle the entire school and build a junior and senior respect, they were planning to do it this way.
How each group would go about it was up to them.
“Alright, let’s get to class, it's almost going to start.” he said and got everyone moving.
Soon everyone got to their PE classes and in their regular gym clothing but as Robin walked outside he stopped and looked around in confusion because he felt like he was being looked at.
It was a strange type of look not entirely enemy but not friendly. After some thinking, it reminded him of the glares Marcus constantly gave him when they got to highschool.
He looked around but as soon as he did the looks went away and he couldn’t pinpoint so he just went on but it wasn’t even a moment to feel them again and he also noticed a strange group on the field.
Marcus, Silk and both of their groupies were warming up but around them were strangers.
As he approached he was able to hear what they were saying.
“You cowards don’t deserve the elite status you get if you’re too afraid to even fight me for the rights of an elite class spot!” the most aggressive one shouted.
The person in question had a very aggressive posture and had a sort of warped form. He had an elongated face, larger eyes and his body proportions were a bit longer and bonier but this made him taller and his muscle mass filled in the longer limbs.
When Robin got within range, one of the others around him, an entire group of strangely shaped people, noticed him. Some had animal body features, others had warped features that were significantly less humanoid.
“Hmm… these are mutant powers, at least outwardly.”
“Boss, it’s one of the hero disciples!” one of them said.
The big one turned and grinned at Robin, who was still confused.
The boy grinned and walked over before getting right up to Robin’s face, “You stupid weakling, step down from the position of hero disciple, you don’t deserve it and it should go to someone more fitting, like me!” He said.
Robin stopped and blinked before frowning slightly and pushed him away. It was a light push but he went back almost 10 meters with a light push.
“Stop kidding yourself. Also ‘Hero Disciple’ isn’t an academy title or position. I’m literally Chasm Might’s personal disciple. It’s no different from Heatwave, Moonlight and Puppeteer.” Robin said and walked past but glared as his body began to spark with electricity and rushed at Robin.
His body actually morphed really weird as the flesh, bone and muscles literally warped into a weapon that was coated with electricity.
It came at Robin with no remorse and he just raised his hand and he shouted as it came down.
A very weak pulse came from his feet safely breaking the force while the electricity didn’t even enter his body.
“Huh!” he said. “What… how…”
“Idiot, you attacked Robin of all people with the two types of attacks that he has full immunity towards.” Marcus said, in a bored tone.
“Immunity!” the guy said.
“Dumbass, Robin’s original power is Hardened Rubber body, he is literally immune to blunt force and electrical discharge.” Silk said as he stood up stretching, causing pops as he continued warm up exercises.
“I’m still cordial so get out of here.” Robin said and did a spin while gripping the arm but this time added a bit more force and as you can expect, the guy went flying away.
He shouted in anger and that was when his body shifted he literally generated limbs and skin connected to his arm and formed wings.
“Don’t think I will let this chance go!” he shouted and rushed at Robin this time forming a spiral bone covering on his fist and Robin finally lost his patience but the next second Silk appeared next to him with his hair in it’s pompadour and just a very light movement the hair smashed into his head and he smashed into the ground groaning.
Silk landed next to him and grabbed him by the face, “Don’t try to fight until your stats are at least 3000.” He said and dropped him before turning to the others, “Come on boys, keep going cause we ain’t got all the time in the world!” He shouted and all his friends went to start a warm up jog but they each wore very heavy gravity weights.
Robin looked at the group before starting a bit of light warm ups just to wait for Mr Atlas.
They both channeled their psychic energy before pushing their gravity very heavily onto themselves and started the jog which was barely more than a walk but every vein on their bodies were bulging.
“What… was with… those students?” Mr Atlas asked.
Slowly other strength type students started to gather around them and every last one of them pushed their weight to a condition no better than the duo.
“They assumed… hero disciple… was a school title!” Robin said
A labored scoff came from someone in the group.
“They are… in for… a rude… awakening.” One of the students said through his sweat.
Soon that group actually passed by and they heard scoffing laughs, “Look, they can’t even handle their own weights! Cya losers!” they laughed with their leader already healed. He looked a bit pale however and Robin likely knew why that was. No one entered the gym field without activating the save point and one of the braveman teachers must have killed him.
Class continued like this, filled with snide remarks and laughing glances while they just walked or did basic training to impact different areas.
The original hero academy kids were huffing by the end, like they usually are, while all the others looked at them with scowls.
Robin looked at the other 11th grade students.
“How are these elite braveman academy students?” He asked.
Mr Atlas looked and groaned, “They are still following their old training system, did you not give them a proper training program?”
Affirmative, however no student properly underwent testing to their limits to properly find the proper training intensity as such there was only the option to base it off their stats and level calculation only and not their abilities.
The students looked and many of them looked at the others with weird expressions. It was like looking at dumb people who didn’t want to train.
“Is it everyone?” Robin asked.
Negative.
The academy is still analyzing all student’s performance which is why every student not from the original academy is still just in normal heroic class and not elite class. Even the previous top students are under analysis to make sure and filter out the best and most dedicated from the egocentric.
Robin understood the process they were going through, after all it still took about 2 months for them to properly figure out the elites when Robin was in 9th grade.
Robin soon got up as did the others and finally removed their weights with a sigh and picked up the torture machines and everyone stretched as they regained freedom. “When will the sparring start?” one student asked.
“In about five minutes.” Mr Atlas said and looked at all the other students and smiled, “You Elite class students will be required to help the braveman run through the thousands and at the end you will get your turn with the teachers.” Mr Atlas said.
When he said that, the super strength boys and girls around him looked for a bit before their eyes shined and looked at all the others who were looking at them disdainfully.
The sudden change threw them off guard and wondered what had changed but they would soon feel it with their own bodies.