The next room past the cavern held a crafting station much like the one Devon had seen Phil working at aboveground. He wondered if this was originally meant to be the real location of the dungeon's primary objective, but Irin had seen that Phil couldn't possibly survive the room with the ents and instead chosen to have the trial without the first challenge.

In the end it didn't really matter, Eve's monstrous strength allowed her to easily smash through the door blocking the way forward. After that they found a maze of tangled branches and Eve smashed through that as well. Wall after wall she destroyed, until they found the exit on the other side.

Watching the woman in action just further reminded Devon of how much he needed her for the struggle against the overseers. Even with the boosts to his stats that came from potential and all of his titles, she was still head and shoulders above him when it came to raw ability.

He was all but certain she had near double his strength, but her movements didn't feel like they had the pitfall of losing anything in any of her other physical stats. Devon imagined her arcane stat must be in the dumps, but he doubted she cared. She wasn't the sort to bother with trivial things like magic when she could smash through almost any and all obstacles by brute force.

They ran into a colossal ent in the final chamber, but between Devon's distracting fireballs and Eve's sheer power they made short work of it.

Assisted Kill - [Giant Treething - Level 35]

[Level up. Level 30 acquired.]

[Notice]

Seek conflict. When you have found a suitable challenge, the System will issue an ascension quest. Until then, all exp gained will be negated and you will not be allowed to advance to level 31.

"Oi, why do you level up so slow?" Eve asked as she jumped off the corpse of the colossal ent's hulking body.

"System just hates me, I guess," Devon said, dodging the question as he noticed Eve had also gained a level. It made sense that Eve would find his rate of progression slow, they'd been fighting against pretty much everything the dungeon had to throw at them equally, yet they had gained the same amount of levels despite Eve being 5 above him.

"Also, I just hit the level barrier."

"Mmm," Eve grumbled, seeming not entirely convinced. Devon wondered if he should clue her in on the secrets of potential, but a dark thought held him at bay.

If I give up my one and only advantage, will I even be able to keep up at all in the future?

He knew it was just his pride getting in the way of reason, but he couldn't brush aside that feeling. It was true that a stronger Eve and Trey would be a direct benefit in the upcoming battle, yet even so, he couldn't bring himself to give away his secret.

Besides, there was no way to know for sure that would make them stronger for the final battle of the tutorial. The cursed king's datalog had said the lock on free points could only be removed with the intent to use them. Which meant the system might look within their minds and determine that their real intended time to use those points would be when the final battle came, and stop them from triggering the start of the countdown until then.

It was a very real possibility that the misuse of potential would create the issue where someone would need the free points given by the system, but not be able to use them because of the time lock being tuned to the intent to use them.

Utilizing potential as someone who isn't cursed by the system isn't a decision to be made lightly. I can see why the cursed king said it was considered risky even for the elites of the Infinite Realms.

"I guess I'm getting less experience than usual too, so whatever," Eve mumbled to herself. Devon's ears perked up at that. He'd thought it seemed odd how little exp the memory dungeon had given him when he'd gone through it, even considering how his rate of progression was drastically slower than everyone else's with the first tier of Potential.

Perhaps spirit dungeons do just give less exp than the real world. I suppose it would make sense, everything in here was ultimately fabricated from nothing by the system. They lack the lifeforce of real, living creatures.

"Hey, let's go," Eve said, looking impatient.

"Oh, right," Devon looked at the clock as he followed Eve. They still had two hours left, and they both felt like that was likely the last room. Which meant that they had plenty of time to complete the dungeon objective and get Phil back.

They ascended a sloped tunnel made of bramble and roots before emerging back under the artificial daylight of the spirit dungeon. There they saw Phil still crafting away, and Irin standing next to him, looking thoroughly pissed off.

"You two… never in my life have I seen upstarts as unilaterally irritating. I suppose you've come here to engage in some kind of barbaric final fight?"

Eve started to walk forward slowly, but Devon held out a hand, stopping her. He half expected her to brush it off, but she actually waited to see what he would do.

Devon held out an open palm facing upwards and activated the mental command.

Activate magic; Fireball.

True to form, a ball of fire burst to life in his hands, and he saw Irin's enraged face turn very stiff. Devon then turned his hand toward the massive tree and let the projectile fly.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

The fireball exploded, but not against the hardwood of the tree. A massive energy shield with glyphs written all across it had burst into form, blocking the ball of fire before it could even get close to harming the tree.

"What the…" Eve muttered next to him.

"The objective prompt we got had two branching options for completion. Either we could defeat Irin, or we could destroy his spiritual foundation. It didn't take too much deduction to figure out that the tree you tried to bury us beneath was the source of your power, its size is simply too unnatural to not be something important."

"All right," Eve said, a savage grin on her face, "So I'll pummel the stupid brewmaster while you burn the tree up, yeah?"

"No, that won't work."

"Why not?"

"Because of this," Devon said as he passed her the system notification blinking in front of him.

[Ascension Quest]

Kill Irin, the Mad Brewmaster.

"What the hell? Neither of my ascension quests were anywhere near that. At most it made me kill something four levels above me…" Eve muttered, shocked at the system's disparity.

It didn't even surprise Devon that the system had done this. The last ascension quest he'd gotten had also been within a spirit dungeon, and Devon wondered if it was simply coincidence or whether a pattern was forming.

"I'll take Irin, you focus on the tree," Devon said.

"Why shouldn't we take him together? The quest doesn't say you can't have help."

"Yes, but if it does fail me because you helped then who knows how long it will be before the system decides to give me another opportunity. Besides, taking down the tree will help, even if not directly. He can hardly focus on two things at once, now can he?"

"Good luck," Eve said, hefting her axe.

Devon glanced at his mana before dashing forward. Only 105 remained, about half. His fireballs cost 30 each, and he'd used two of them against the colossal ent and one against the tree. But his amplification gem was fully charged from the killing of all the ents, so he had his ace in the hole.

Irin stared him down as one would look at a disrespectful child as Devon approached, but a little bit of intimidation wasn't nearly enough to even waver Devon by this point. His opponent was one who specialized in brewing, not fighting.

He thrust his weapon, still in the configuration of a naginata, forward. A small clash occurred as he found his attack blocked by yet another energy shield.

Devon had to leap backwards as Irin pulled a rapier out of nowhere and attacked him with it, the silvery metal phasing right through the energy shield. Then, before Devon's feet could even touch the ground Irin launched three shimmering blue projectiles at him.

He tried to move out of the way, but they followed his every move. So Devon swung his spear in an arc, managing to hit two before the third slipped past his defenses. It impacted against his stomach, but Devon didn't feel like it had left any serious damage. Third degree burns at worst, but Devon could heal those off with healing pills, so he didn't pay the wound any mind.

What he did mind, however, was that Irin had actually pursued him just behind the blue magic missiles. Devon barely shifted his head to the side as Irin's misty blade left a slice along Devon's left cheek.

But that was about all Devon was willing to let the brewmaster do.

Activate skill; Quickstab.

The tip of the naginata was pointed away from Irin after deflecting the magical projectiles, but Devon didn't care. He drove the blunt back end of the spear straight into Irin's chest.

The fiery-haired man stagged back, clearly not expecting the blow. Devon moved to follow up, but a piercing pain shot across his face from where the silvery blade had cut him. The overwhelming sensation almost made him black out, and he fell to his knees before he managed to pierce the mad brewmaster through.

"Fool. Initiates never have a clue. Of course the one who mixes concoctions endlessly would be an alchemist on the side, are you stupid? Your arcane is higher than expected, but no matter. Die."

Dammit, poison?

Irin raised his thin blade, preparing to stab Devon through the head when a massive impact rocked the clearing. Irin looked over towards his tree, a mask of fury on his face. But he turned back to Devon in the next instant, intent on finishing him off.

Shit, no time to pull out a healing pill! Activate Amplification Gem! Activate magic; Adrenaline!

Devon hadn't ever wanted to use adrenaline again after it had almost cost him his life in the encounter with the lord of the mountain, but there was no choice.

The overwhelming surge of adrenaline through his system instantly shrunk his vision to less than half of what it was normally, his peripherals completely shrouded in a haze of colors. The feeling of pain faded as he heard his heartbeat resound in his ears, his muscles compressing his blood vessels as they strained harder than he'd ever pushed them.

He kicked off to the side, shifting his body to keep Irin within his sightline. In Devon's slowed time he saw the brewmaster's expression change to one of surprise as Devon resisted the effects of whatever Irin had infected him with.

Activate skill; Quickstab. Activate skill; Sever.

He felt the last of his mana burn away as his skills queued up. He kicked off the ground behind him, shooting forward toward Irin even as he felt his left eye spasm before he lost vision on the left entirely. Evidently the poison was more dangerous than he'd assumed if it had already done enough damage that the eye closest to the infecting cut had shut down.

Irin let off a burst of his magical missiles in every direction as Devon approached, but he paid them no mind, even as he was sure they were all curving towards him from every angle.

His muscles threatened to tear themselves apart under the strain of amplified adrenaline as Devon thrust forward with Quickstab. Irin raised his energy shield again, but it shattered under the force of Devon's attack. The curved blade of the naginata blew past the shattered remnants of the shield before impaling the brewmaster just under the ribcage.

Devon almost blacked out once again as half a dozen or more of the magical projectiles collided with him from every angle. Pain that couldn't be completely negated even with amplified Adrenaline poked through the haze of his mind, threatening to completely disorient him.

But he ignored it all, planting his feet on the ground and lifting his naginata with all the remaining strength he had. The blade of the naginata tore a path upwards through the brewmaster's body as Sever activated.

The blade exited Irin's shoulder, and Devon took immense satisfaction from the look of shocked surprise on his face as his body was lifted into the air from the upwards attack before it fell back down, Irin's chest split apart with nothing to connect it down the middle.

Kill - [Irin, The Mad Brewmaster - Level 37]

Another shockwave pulsed throughout the area, but Devon didn’t even feel it as he desperately reached out to pull a healing pill from his tile. He had to guide it into his mouth by feel as his other eye spasmed, and his vision went completely dark.

He felt the soothing relief of the item go to work combating everything wrong with his body, but it was slower than usual. Most likely the poison Irin had infected him with was countering some of the effects of the healing pill.

And so he stood rooted in place, waiting for his vision and feeling to be restored