Len tapped the steel shavings clear of the enchantment block, studying it. It was a directional heat enchantment. On one side were the runes, which had an activation pin that one had to insert to allow the mana to flow through the enchantment, converting into heat and pointing out the other side.

The closer one was to the enchantment, the warmer it would be; the further away, the less warm it would be but the wider the area it covered.

It was great for keeping you warm in the cold while you slept and could also be used as a sort of stove.

Len stuck it in the ground, inserting the pin and watching the mana fill up the enchantment and activate. Snow melted on the other side in a matter of seconds as he waved his hand over the top, feeling the cold on his side and the warmth on the other.

Pushing himself up, he moved over to the packs holding the food. He took out the large cans they'd used the night before, adding in water from a canteen, some meat, dried vegetables, and lentils, making a soup in each. He then took them over to the heat enchantment. He put them down close to the other side of the enchantment, quickly pulling his hand away as the cans started to heat up.

Meanwhile, Rick snapped out a blanket on the other side of the camp, laying it down to create a bed for Len.

"These waterproof blankets sure are helpful. They'll save us from getting a wet ass tonight," Rick said.

He'd set up their general packs as a pillow, laying out the blankets down from them.

"Yeah, I'm really appreciating the temperature regulating one right now," Len said.

He periodically drew out the activation pin, checking the cans and their contents, making sure they were well on their way to a boil before inserting the pin once again and continuing the process.

Rick moved over, sitting on a nearby boulder.

"So, what do you think's going to happen when we blow up this damn obelisk thing?" Rick asked.

"I don't rightly know," Line replied, letting out a sigh. "Maybe it blows up the world," he chuckled, while Rick rolled his eyes. "Though, it should stop Dennis and his sister from being able to play with time as they did. I'm not sure if it's even there. Dungeon might not have formed yet.”

“If we destroy it, do you think that we'll forget?" Rick asked.

"I don't know," Len said, drawn to thoughts that he’d been avoiding. "If we didn't have our memories of what had happened, then is that version of me dead? Is it dead because I am here so I won’t develop into that person? Would I just remember up till the point I appeared in this body? Would I have my cultivation and understanding? Would I have my cultivation and all of my gear, be out in the middle of the forest and not know what the hell is going on?"

He nodded towards his messenger bag up against his blankets and back pack. “I think that’s part of why I’ve been writing down everything I remember. "If we do forget our memories, then the me without the memories will have a good place to start."

"Yeah, I took a safety measure as well," Rick said.

"You did?" Len asked.

"Yeah." Rick took out a piece of paper from his back pocket, unfolding it and passing it over to Len. On one side, it showed information on smithing, on cultivation, spells and important core things for Rick.

On the back, it just had five words. 'Trust Len with your life.' Rick had signed it.

Len’s heart clenched he knew they were closer than most brothers, but it was rare for them to acknowledge it. He looked up from the message to Rick.

"Stuck with me, even if I forget," Rick winked.

Len chuckled, truly moved by the trust. He folded up the piece of paper carefully and handed it back to Rick.

"Don't tell me that I'm the only one that wrote something like that," Rick said.

"I'm not as sappy as you.” Len stood, moving over to the cans, they were coming up to a good boil now He moved them away from the enchantment.

"You feel the mana density, don't you?" Rick asked as Len returned to his boulder.

"It's getting denser the closer we get to the obelisk, or the further we get away from the city.” Len reached out his hand, moving it through the air, feeling the mana gather under his will. “Remember that mana vein it was sitting on?" Len said.

Rick's eyes opened wide. "Oh. I wonder how much mana stone you could mine out of that damn thing. Heck, if we were able to mine underneath the obelisk?" His eyes found Len, a smile spreading across his face as he rubbed his hands together like a merchant before the largest sale of the year.

"First, we gotta get to the obelisk. Second, we gotta destroy the obelisk. Then we can see about mining the hell out of the mana stone,” Len sighed.

"So you're not against it?" Rick asked, surprised.

"Of course I'm not against it. It's mana stone. Do you know how much that's gonna be worth?” Len frowned at his friend.

“My man, my man." Rick made a show of wiping away a tear. “I knew you were a true capitalist.”

Len rolled his eyes. "I'm not some damn saint. Plus, with all of that mana stone, think of the enchantments we could make. Hell, it could cover an entire city and you could power it for years." Len's mind started to go in several directions at once. He quickly shook his head to try and focus again.

"Though if the mana density is stronger out here, meaning that it's faster for someone to cultivate, then that's gonna mean stronger beasts,” Rick said.

“As soon as we came over that rise the density started climbing sharply. I think the stained mountains are acting like a formation concentrating it, or at least stopping it from flowing over into Plynthia,” Len said.

“It'd be easier for someone just to be out here and passively gather mana to open their mana gates or increase their cultivation. Do you think that there's less mana in the city because they're all absorbing it? Or is it just naturally less dense?" Rick held his chin in thought.

Len stood up, the water starting to boil over the can’s side. He pulled the pin on the heat enchantment, using a cloth to pick up the cans and check them. He swirled their contents. “Dinner’s ready.” He walked the first can over to Rick and dropped it on a nearby rock.

“Ration soup,” Rick said.

“Simple and works,” Len went back to the second can, moving it next to where he was sitting. "We know that the common people definitely aren't increasing their cultivation. There's a hunter's bureau in Eskon, so there should be people in the higher noble families that have some cultivation at least. My guess would be that either mana is leaking out from that mana vein or there's a golden gate that's increasing the mana density overall," Len speculated.

Mana density referred to the amount of mana that filled the air. The higher the mana density, the more one could increase their cultivation with less work. Much like how the cultivation pad gathered mana together, making it denser and easier for one to compress through their cultivation channels, actually assisting the entire process.

If there was naturally more mana in a space, it was like doing twice the work with half the effort.

Len walked over to the heat enchantment, turned it to face where he and Rick were sitting and in the direction of their beds. He activated it.

“How’s that feel?”

“Good, warmer here, but should keep us toasty tonight,” Rick said.

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Len took a wide circle around to where he was sitting and began eating.

Even if tomorrow was to be their last day, they’d prepared for that when they led the raid on the God-Emperor’s vault. Just pushed it back a few days.

Len took in the sunset before it dipped behind the mountain to the west, bringing the bite of night. “You set up the alarm formation?”

“Yeah,” Rick pointed with his spoon out into the growing darkness. “Angled them so it will create a pyramid of coverage. Saw some birds circling around earlier. Got the mana gathering formation up as well.”

He’d done the double layered version, Len used his sight, the mana was thick and heavy.

Len held up his fist.

Rick held out his.

Len bounced his hand. “Three two one--” They went on the o of one, you had to have some rules to it all.

Scissors, crap.

“I’ll temper first and take first watch.” Len said.

Rick grinned and kept eating.

Len did the same, he wanted them to be as strong as possible for what was to come.

***

“Len!” Rick yelled.

Len’s eyes snapped open, using his sight, piercing through the darkness, awake in seconds as he drew his dagger.

“Fucking birds!”

Rick’s enchanted bow glowed as he fired a howling arrow up into the sky. Len’s head snapped upwards, a bird, one of dozens fell from the sky, its attack run interrupted.

Three more were diving, the wind sounded like a blade passing bye one’s ear.

Len threw off his blankets. I don't have enough time. He focused on the ground, snatching a stone as he reached for his new blue liquid core.

Rick released a second arrow, attempting to skewer two of the birds. The first flared their wings, drifting higher, the arrow passing underneath to hit the second bird.

Len stood up fully, drawing his arm back.

The birds were white and grey like snowy rocks. As big as a child, with a wingspan larger than Len was tall.

He crushed the rock in his hands, turning it into fragments, the wind fighting his hand as he threw the crushed rock.

It spread out as it passed through the sky, the white plumage of the remaining two birds peppered red, they spun out of control before crashing into the ground.

A screech rose from the remaining birds up in the sky. Several broke away to dive.

"What the hell did you just do?" Rick asked.

"I just killed the last one. You killed three of them. Now they're all pissed, I guess," Len replied, reaching down and crushing another rock in each hand.

"No, not the pissing off the birds. That's natural for you, with a face like that! What did you take the bird out with?”

“Crush up a rock and chuck it." Len stepped forward, pitching his second handful of rock, setting himself and taking another couple of steps to throw the third handful.

The second handful clipped a couple, causing them to screech out in pain, resuming their dives. The third handful caught three, making them lose control and drop.

Rick threw up a rock the size of his head into the sky, his hammer humming as he swung it to meet the falling boulder.

The boulder shattered into pieces, creating a blast wave of rock that tore through the beast formation, killing half of them and wounding the remainder.

Len pitched another two handfuls of stone at the creatures, taking out the remaining beasts. Seemingly having enough of the fight, the remaining birds circling above screeched and squalled, breaking apart and fleeing.

"Well, that's one fucking way to wake up," Len said.

"I think I'd take a rooster yelling at the moon instead of that," Rick replied.

"Nice work with the hammer and the boulder there. I really fucked them up," Len said. "How long have I been asleep for?"

"About two hours or so," Rik waved his hand back and forth. "There's only an hour or so til sunrise."

"Well, not worth going back to sleep then," Len said. He looked around the camp and the bird bodies.

"Grab their cores, you think?" Len asked.

"Sure thing."

They moved through the rocky landscape. Finding the few that had tried to kill Len while he slept first.

Len cut the first open with his blade, tapping against the crystalline object in is chest.

“Definitely mana mutated.” Len pulled out the core, using his clean spell to removed the gore.

“Red liquid, stronger than what was in Plynthia.”

He tossed it over to Rick, who caught it and studied it.

"Still well below our power level though," Rik said.

"I think it'll be hard for anything to reach our strength." Len stood. "And I’m aiming to keeping it that way."

“Fair enough, what’s a few punches between friends?” Rick slipped the core into his pocket. "I think I spotted another one over there." He took off over the rocks.

Jackass Len moved for another bird.

"What are you thinking of using these cores for?" He shouted back.

"Well, originally I was going to think about using it for a mana gathering cultivation or cultivation pad to increase our strength. Though at this point, we're actually able to still cultivate without needing such aids. So, I was thinking maybe use it on an enchantment," Len said.

"Well, seeing as we got a bit more time, how about some enchantments?" Rick asked. "Thinking weight reduction, and the ability to float, just like you were talking about with those train carriages you kept nattering on about.”

Len clicked his tongue and thought. "If we were to do the straight weight reduction instead of the weight adjusting enchantment that's in the sword, that would decrease the overall mana required. Then we could focus more on the floating enchantment making that plenty strong. Course there would be a weight limit. How much are you thinking of trying to float? Need to use more steel to spread the weight out evenly."

"But it would work?" Rick asked.

"Yeah, it would work. It just means that you could put say a hundred kilos on it, not a thousand, else it would be dragging on the ground. Well, if you were to make it actually large enough and displace the weight over a larger area, then you could do it even with a simple steel enchantment," Len corrected. “I came up with an enchantment to spread the weight under its footprint. Unlike wheels that had the weight distributed across four points.

"And there he is," Rick chuckled.

“So what do you want to use it for?”

“To help us do the reverse of what we did to get up here. Glide over to the obelisk.”

“That’s nuts.” Len shook his head.

“Would save us a lot of time!”

Len didn’t say anything bug he also couldn’t help himself from toying with the idea as they moved from bird to bird. By the time they returned to their camp, he had a plan in mind.

He knelt next to his messenger bag, pulling out a bundle of enchantment blanks.

Rick walked back in camp from another direction.

"Here, make yourself useful. Meld these together." He tossed over the bundle to Rick.

"Easily done!"

Len created a blueprint of the proposed enchantment in midair, studying the runes and lines, altering them as he wanted.

Adding in a special power input sequence. Instead of it drawing just ambient matter from around, or having to be powered by a person, it would focus its draw in one area, allowing him to strap a dungeon, a person's cultivated core or manastone to the designated space to be consumed by the enchantment if the ambient mana wasn’t enough.

"Done with these two," Rick said, walking over to Len. With the four blanks, fused into two larger plates.

"Alrighty." Len duplicated the blueprint, putting them over both the steel blanks before etching it into the surface.

He withdrew the blueprint and took one of the etched plates. "Start chiseling that one out. I’ll work on this one.”

"Gotcha." Rick wandered back to his pack as Len reached into the enchantment blank using heat to agitate the metal in specific locations, and then using the knowledge of the metal element to create hollows and pathways through the steel to create the hidden components of the enchantment. It took him but a few moments with barely a glimmer of mana fatigue.

The two blueprints would have been a massive use of mana before, was just a small flicker that would slowly recover over a few minutes of time.

"Damn, I love increasing cultivation," Len said.

"Really? I didn't think you were that much of a sadist," Rick said from across the camp.

"I like having a higher cultivation and tempered body. The process..." Len wasn't able to suppress the shudder that ran through him. "Fucking sucks."

"On that we are agreed, my friend," Rick said. Even though it did suck, neither of them was going to give up that sort of advantage. What was a little bit of pain for the limitless power they could gain?

Ever since he arrived in this time period, in this body, he'd been worrying about having enough power to deal with what the future would hold. They defeated fighters and beasts handily enough, though there were stronger opponents out there.

Creatures that would eat them up and spit them out. Monsters that even the people with four cores could have been defeated by with nothing more than a palm strike.

Then there were the other sentient species. Most of them more advanced and powerful than all of humanity piled together.

A part of him desired to temper his body and increase his cultivation as fast as possible, though their mission and priorities meant that wasn't possible.

So, Len took out his chisel and mana blade, activating their enchantments and using his will to bring them above his etched enchantment blank.

They shot forward, digging into the metal, the enchantments, the etched enchantments deepening before his very eyes, taking just a few seconds before they floated back up and away.

Len shook the shavings and loose material free and clear, revealing the complete enchantment.

"Based on where one placed the activation rune, it will increase or decrease the weight it reduced. Going from 20 kilos up to 200 kilos," Len explained. “Also lets you turn it off. If you have it set to two hundred kilos and you have twenty on it, you’re going to send it shooting upward.”

“Might have to have that balance out if you’re using it to transport goods like a train, have some cars super high and others lower,” Rick said.

“I’m thinking of having it focus on being a certain distance away from the majority of the ground, though then if you have something big it passes over it would jump. So you’d need to make sure its flat and graded.”

“Lot of work to do that though,” Rick said.

“Don’t I know it. There’s quite a few problems.”

Len rubbed his eyes as the world started to brighten. T

he snow that had melted the day before had a fresh coating of ice. The mountains around him started to redden as the sun kissed their heights. A deep orange growing brighter and brighter, deeper and deeper.

Len took the world in. There was an isolation to the world, a quietness as dawn broke and the day started.

Rick finished his carvings and walked over to Len. "Can you check this and add in the last parts?"

Len nodded, taking it from him.

"Thanks Len, I'll make some tea."

“That would be nice.” Len figured it was going to be a long day as he added the hidden components to the enchantment.

Rick wandered to the directional heat enchantment using the cans that they'd eaten from the night before as cups, adding tea as well as canteen water and putting them right next to the enchantment.

Len finished off Rick's enchantment, putting it down to the side as he returned back to his quiet contemplation.

The mountains had only grown deeper in their orange hue. The brightness of the sun glancing off of the snow, making him squint slightly.