Vitmori POV

I had been watching over my sinners as they physically sparred and tumbled in the dirt while wearing the armor their bodies originally had; the idea was to make them appear more rugged and dirty to help sell the story that they have been surviving out for some time. With them looking in a generally poor state, it would hopefully boost the confidence of whoever would come out to make the buy for the people who ended up in my care. Well... That's what I had been doing. Before I knew it, there was some eruption of mana from deep below my mountain which caused my bubble to dramatically balloon out before being stretched down around the mountain as it then proceeded to go down deep into the depths below it.

When I came back into focus, my bubble had more than quadrupled in size, and my core doubled from being cantaloupe size to looking like a Texas-grade watermelon. My metaphorical back tightened as I saw my pedestal starting to crack under the weight of the now much bigger core. So, I quickly slapped on some stone supports to the top of the pedestal and all around its base until it finally looked stable again. It still seemed rather precarious, so I think I ought to do some renovations later, maybe make the pedestal lower but thicker in order to better support my core's current weight as well as future growth.

But that was for another time; for now, I've gotta figure out what the hell happened just now. My gaze turns down as I start to descend the mountain. It was interesting, to say the least, finally being able to access my entire mountain and even the outside! Just eyeballing it, I would say I have a 20ft radius away from my mountain all around. This means I can now mess with dirt, gravel, grass, and one shrub! The first actual plant that I don't need to grow or look at through the eyes of others directly. Sure, I've had trees and shrubs in my storage for a short while before, but it's an entirely different experience just getting to look at it in its natural habitat. I... I actually missed this, I hadn't properly considered it before, but I missed just looking at nature. Even now that I'm actually ground level, looking at the forest through my cloudy bubble is a much more enjoyable experience than just looking at the treeline from high up. I'm half tempted to replant this shrub somewhere closer to my core to commemorate the occasion, but I would much rather look at it from where I found it than disturb it by moving it for my own convenience.

Anyways, I'm getting distracted again... I moved back towards the mountain, soon finding the cave entrance and moving beyond the wolf den. I followed the path down into the depths of the other core's old territory, passing the skeleton storm room, the rat swarm room, the spiral corridors of traps, and the ooze room. There was just one thing that bothered me as I quickly glanced around, and that is that there were so many more rooms down here, but they were all sealed off with stone and hidden, made to look like seamless and unassuming stone walls... Again that was something for me to check on later as I crossed the ooze room and entered the bottom-most room, the scene before my eyes was not precisely what I was expecting.

'What just happened?' I asked simply, hoping for a clear answer.

Legosi is the first to speak up, holding a beautifully made, humming sword by its handle as his tail seems to wag excitedly. "I found this cool stick!" He gushed cheerfully.

Well... That was decidedly unhelpful... 'I see...'

Looking among the rest, I am interrupted by what appears to be an anthropomorphic, silver-furred golden retriever puppy-boy. "H-hi, I'm Grimm!" He calls out eagerly, his little tail starting to wag with excitement. He seemed to be clutching some kind of broken amulet close to his chest, but that wasn't something to focus on right now. "Are you Mister Green? My friend told me to listen to you from now on. A-are you okay with that?" He asked, his tail slowing to a stop as he appeared to be suddenly hesitant.

Well, I'm not about to turn away a child, even if I'm not exactly sure what a child is doing at the very deepest depths of a mountain. While this does sound like the makings of a potential horror movie, my heart is compelling me to ignore these warnings, at least for now. 'Yeah, I suppose I am Mister Green, but you can call me Vitmori if you like. Say, Grimm... How about you come up and meet me in my chamber? I think we have a few things to talk about, okay?'

Grimm's tail slowly starts to wag again as he nods. "O-okay! Yeah, sure!" He enthused cheerfully as he got off the skeleton's lap and to his own feet. Though before he could take two steps, Basti offered to give him a ride, which he accepted.

'Actually, I want to see all of you in my chamber; I want a report of what went down and some help with something else.' I explain, the rest of my beasts nodding intently as they start filing out of the room.

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I'm suddenly reminded about the giant murderous ooze sitting in the next room as I turn my perspective over to it. I'm briefly unsure of what to expect, but I go ahead and send some of my mana into it to try and make it mine. It takes a few moments, though I sense something about it shifts, and it now seems willing to follow my commands. I don't see any green markings appear on it, though I do detect some sort of concentration of mana somewhere deeper within its body. Once again, that will be something else I'll look into later as I turn my attention over to my beasts and Grimm as they enter the ooze chamber. Despite Grimm's cheerful chatter as he talks to Basti and the others, and the distinct humming sounds coming from Legosi's new sword as it sways with each of his steps, the ooze doesn't bother to react and lets them pass without issue.

Now with that concern safely off my mind, I return to the old core's chamber and poke around curiously. The room appeared to be at a level of brutal carnage that I only saw on very few occasions back home. Now while I do pride myself on being able to break down rooms with my unique study of apocalypse CSI, there were a few things that were beyond my grasp since I have, of course, never actually even seen some of these methods of killing before.

The first thing I noticed was a scorch mark in the shape of a person on the ceiling, a spear lodged deep into the stone and had apparently stayed there for quite a long time. Following the trajectory of the spear, it seemed to have been thrown up from ground level at someone who was possibly standing on the frankly giant purple core in the center of the room.

On another side of the room, I make out what appears to be some kind of archer with a strange-looking bow that happens to be in good shape; they seemed to have taken a position away from the brunt of the action, standing near the entrance and shooting at various targets around the room. That is, until they were subjected to some kind of lightning strike or blast of plasma... Now I'm not too sure about the specifics, but based on how what looks like a circlet of some kind was melted and fused to the archer's skull and how the rest of the body looks admittedly unsinged or unzapped, the equipment she... Yep, it was a she... Based on the state of the equipment she wore, it somehow protected her from the plasma or lightning; but considering there seemed to be a cloth half mask around her neck and a hood that was pulled back, she allowed herself a fatal weakness by opting to wear and show off what used to be a nice piece of jewelry instead of fully covering up with this special armor.

Moving around to the last section of the room, I came across what appeared to be a mutual kill. A beastkin of some kind, possibly either a wolf or dog wearing ornate, black robes, had been bisected cleanly in half. Yet, by the way the lower half of their body was laying forward, whereas the top half was laying on its back with its arm outstretched, the beastkin didn't die right away and launched some sort of blast at a column which fell and crushed what I can guess is a dwarf of some kind based on its stout skeletal structure. The falling column didn't kill the dwarf; however, that is if I'm correctly reading the desperate, clawing marks on the stone floor and the rubble of the column. What a rough way to go...

There are a few more bestial and frankly monstrous-looking corpses strewn about, but they look to have been cut down or shot with what seemed to have been electrically charged arrows; the burns for something like that, even on ancient bones, are something that I readily recognize.

The one thing in the room that distinctly sticks out to me as odd is perhaps the skeleton of the woman sitting on the throne. It looked like it was placed there recently, or rather it was posed too perfectly for it to have been where she died back whenever this battle took place. She looks almost... Serene... I know it's odd to say that about an ancient skeleton, but I've come across many similar types of bodies over the years... Most of them were from before the apocalypse really descended into the first couple of years of brutal chaos, but most people who came across scenes of the long dead tended not to disturb those who managed to find their end peacefully. Looking around the room, I tuck away my survivor instincts when it comes to scavenging premium-looking equipment and decide to leave the scene untouched for now.

Going back up to my core chamber, I go about shaping a nice little bench for Grimm, laying out a skin over it for some padding. I'm still not sure what to do with the kid, I've cared for more than a few stray souls in the end, so it's not a wholly unfamiliar experience to me. But in the state I'm in? I have nowhere to take him, nothing to really teach him, and no means to possibly care for him directly... My best bet is probably dropping him off with Shepherd and have his people watch over the kid for the time being. He seems bright and gentle enough, so I don't think I need to acclimate him to people, but who knows what morals and ideals he holds, if he has any at all. I'll have to check up on him often too, if his 'friend' told him to listen to me, he's bound to have certain expectations and I don't want to betray his trust by neglecting him. Maybe I'll actually make a room for him off of my chamber, I don't think he's a danger, but it is probably better to actually keep him close until I get to know him better.

I better call Zasutir over while I'm at it; I have no doubt he also felt the shift in my bubble as well as the burst of mana since he's linked to me. If I didn't know better, he was probably waiting to be called upon, wanting to hear the news.

After reaching out though, I couldn't help but notice that there was some sort of screen panel waiting to be acknowledged. 'Oh? One of these things again...'

The words soon began to scroll out after another moment. 'Aspect of Creation obtained.' The feminine voice from last time sounded out in my mind, her very being feeling very present like the last time. 'Thank you for helping my last candidate... She was a promising candidate, who was successful for quite some time before everything that happened. But there was no accounting for the choices of the world.'

'You're welcome?' I replied, not entirely sure what to make of this; I had questions, of course, but I'd rather not be rude with the being capable of making me into what I was now.

'You're making good progress, and now you have access to just about all her resources. Good luck, candidate; keep true to your heart, and I'm certain you'll prosper.' With that, the panel blinked out of existence, and I felt alone once more.

Alright... Well, that was something... Now I have to wait for everyone else to get up here...