Bright light attacked their eyes, and after few seconds, once they opened their eyes, they were no longer in that dark room, but inside a garden full of semi-dead plants. Aile, Emily and Iris were stunned.

'Where are we?' They all thought.

"We got teleported somewhere," Emily said to quell their curiosity. She seemed to have experienced something similar before.

Iris was showing an uncharacteristic emotive astonishment.

Aile was surprised, but calmed down soon and asked, "How far do you think we travelled?"

"It was just three low-level energy crystals, my guess is not that far, perhaps close to the fort, I think we did not go too far. But the runes were complex, so I can not be sure especially considering that there is no place like this in the surrounding vicinity of fort bot."

Aile also tried to used his senses, connection to other people and finally said, "We are most likely inside the mountain."

Aile got some curious gazes, but their curiosity was soon pulled towards the environment around them. As the place had a beautiful light blue sunny sky and a large expanse of land with mostly vegetation and a small shack at a mountain at the side. This made them doubt Aile's conjecture.

However, Aile told them that everything around them was artificial. After asking them to deeply examine the sun, they finally understood there was something unusual about this place.

Nonetheless, the place was humongous, much larger than the mountain almost the same size as the whole town. The best feature of this place that all of them could immediately detect was a much higher concentration of energy.

This made this place perfect for cultivating. While at first sight, the grandest thing seemed to be the energy-filled air, but Aile was tempted to touch the ground, and as he guessed, the most impressive thing about this place was the soil.

The soil was rich in energy, so much so, that Aile was tempted to just eat some. But he knew that such soil has a much better use, it was for growing plants. The semi-wilted flowers plant and herbs were a great example of it, and how it had previously been used.

Growing plants here would make them grow faster and with better quality. They can be grown here, irrelevant to the requisite environmental conditions. It will also allow them to absorb energy from the environment. Apart from their expected characteristic, they would also aid in cultivation after.

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After Aile explained the benefit of this place, both Emily and Iris were overwhelmed. After looking around, they only saw grown semi wilted plants that were in the process of dying. There was only one small path that did not have any plants leading to a hill. They looked towards the end of the path and the only structure, a small shack that was on top of the only hill. They decided to visit it as the flowers, medicines and herbs in here were mostly wilted, so the only remaining place for them to explore was the cabin.

The three of them avoided touching the wilted flowers and herbs and soon arrived at the cabin.

They entered the room, and space inside was much bigger than the outside. The same principle that expanded the area inside the mountain applied to the shack. The inside of the building was a large marble floor with a few large arches. The entrances on the ground floor were followed by many staircases. There were also five beautiful stairs leading to the second floor.

The extravagance of this place was on a very high level, and everything shouted luxury.

Tremendous chandeliers that hang from the ceiling, high-grade energy stones were used as lighting, beautiful curtains made from the high beast's skins, and magnificent paintings created a unique extravagance.

Aile senses guided him to enter deeper, climbing the central stairs to the second floor. After passing rooms specialized for different trades such as alchemy, blacksmithing, concoction, runes, formation and many more Aile was hurried to the room at the end of the corridor. His senses were shouting at him to rush ahead, and if he fails to do that, it will be perilous for him. This came from the multi-coloured fate orb that had to help him understand and judge different situations. So he followed its directions which lead him deeper into the house.

Rushing to the last room, he was met with a circular ball, and he knew what that was, it was the core of an artefact. This would mean that this whole place is an artefact, and since that was the case, it meant that he would benefit greatly. He knew the next step was to connect to this artefact, so he dropped his blood on it.

Drip

Drip

Drip

...

Once 20 drops fell on it, the circular ball dimmed then brightened, and he noticed that he had connected with it. There was a connection making him feel like he hand in an extra limb when he was close to the artefact core.

A gigantic pressure descended on him, and that weight made him feel like a tiny inconsequential existence. Then the force stabilized itself. Aile realized that the artefact was far more complex than he thought, and he could access less than 1 percent of its abilities and space.

However, before he could check the other functions of the artefact, his senses flared up, and his eyes of fate were also triggered.

He was going to die, and the only path of survival was to start something. It was to activate the interior defence of the artefact. His eyes searched around and touched the circular ball, and he touched it, searching for the ruin that would trigger its defence mechanism.

Immediately after finding the rune, he guided his energy to activate it. As the barrier started to form and cover the room, there was a dark floating leaf that quickly entered the room. Dancing as if floating and gliding in a draft, it gently came towards him.

Emily and Iris both noticing something odd from Aile's gaze and seeing the leaf that was targeting him, both tried to destroy it. But it just flew around their attacks and touched his skin.