I stood on the ground as burning ash swirled around me. I was breathing through my nose to keep the worst out. Acid Shot. Another Expanding Slime was killed, it was the level 6 monster of this zone, I was transversing. I walked over and tossed the crystal into my pack with the rest of them.

Right now, I was East of New Kochi. The entire area to the Southeast of the city was void, but my looping back up towards the connection to the East half of the Systemic Lands, there were several zones right down the middle of the Rift. The Crystal Vortex and the rest of my team were back in the level 5 zone. I was pushing forward to see the level 7 zones myself.

Acid Shot. It was nearly impossible to see, but I managed to sense the monsters when they got close enough. I was just glad my clothing and backpack were enchanted to put up with a lot of punishment. “Die!” There was the boss as its mental voice grated on my senses.

Blue glowing tentacles whipped through the swirling ash clouds, but I easily deflected them. I could sense the monster’s endowed name. The Ever Expanding Slime of Consumption. Air Burst. Acid Shot x20. It was large, but not overly large. It took a moment to felt as its tentacles whipped out. Sprays of slime shot off turning into level 6 slimes. Acid Shot x100. Now the little slimes were dead and the big one got hit again.

I went and picked up the point crystal it dropped. I poked the skill crystal. Consumption, which allowed me to eat anything to replenish my energy. It was one of the few utility skills I had found. While tempting, it probably had some drawbacks. I wasn’t about to pick this skill. I could take my time and pick the best one after clearing all the level 6 zones, or pick something else based on the skill progression.

That was why I was traveling through this hellscape. I kept advancing and tossing the crystals into my pack. It was disappointing how weak a level 7 monster was now, but it had been too easy. I just maneuvered around its attacks quite easily and overwhelmed it.

It did take a lot of Acid Shot to fully bring it down though. My skills couldn’t keep up with my stats. But they were effective enough. I finally cleared the cloud of ash and looked at another level 7 zone. Mountains, no, not just mountains. There were mountains and lots of ice, but the mountains stood out more to one side and in the background.

I wondered for a moment if the Divine Empress ever entered a level 7 zone. There was a sense of trepidation as I advanced forward, leaving the ash cloud behind. The first thing I noticed was that it was hard to breathe. There was low pressure in the air. I took a moment at the very edge of the zone, to get used to the feeling. It was unpleasant and would take time to get used to.

Looking out over the ice in front of me, and the jagged rocks soaring up to the sky, it was clear that the divisions between terrain types were becoming more incongruent. In level 6 zones, I had seen the terrains types twisting much more togeather than previous levels. But in a level 7 zone it was obvious. I noticed swirling snow in the distance. Three types of terrain in the same zone. That was new and different. That gave me a thrill of excitement.

I kept looking and scanning for any kind of monster. There had to be monsters. I took another step onto the ice. It was very cold. Where the level 6 zones were impossibly warm, the level 7 zones were impossibly cold. There was just a thin line of temperate climate between zones.

“Hello!” I shouted out. My voice was muffled. Acid Shot. Air Burst. No issues with my two main skills. I advanced while looking everywhere, for any kind of threat. The lack of monsters was setting me on edge. If there had been a horde or even a boss, I wouldn’t feel so worried.

A stealth monster perhaps in this specific zone? Acid Shot x40. I attacked all around me, and no reaction as I kept walking across the rough and jagged ice. I looked down at the ice and scanned the terrain carefully. “Oh, how clever,” I muttered. Acid Shot x20. A series of ice spikes quickly swirled out of the way of my attack near instantly.

“You will die!” Tiny ice needles shot at me. Air Burst. I quickly moved out of the way and counter attacked. I killed some of the swirling ice spikes, but the monster maintained a distance. I noted other Swirling Ice Spikes of Illusion coming towards me. They were good at hiding themselves, but once they were moving and I knew what to look for, they were obvious.

The fight quickly turned into one of attrition and I made sure to keep an eye on the Light Source in the sky and the level 6 zone at my back. I retreated once to test them, and they didn’t pursue even as they screamed at me. I then leapt right back into the fight. The only way to damage them was to get up close or a large overwhelming attack. I took the second option several times as I quickly thinned their numbers out.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

I had to deal enough damage, to their limbs before they died. No clear and obvious core that I could make out. Or perhaps it was a specific spike portion they kept safe while attacking and generating other ice spikes to skewer me.

Anyone else would have died. If it was the me before my meta-point, I would have been forced to retreat. But now I just unleashed tidal waves of acid a couple of times to thin their numbers and do enough damage to come out on top. Once the level 7 monsters were defeated I began tossing the crystals into my pack. I wouldn’t say no to the points.

Collecting point crystals also gave me time to regenerate my energy and keep an eye out for any more monsters. Level 6 zones had around 400 monsters per terrain type. I suspected there would be around 200 per terrain type in a level 7 zone at most. I moved sideways to the large rocks. I wanted to keep an eye on the level 6 zone and my path of retreat. It was late in the day, and I wasn’t afraid of fighting in a level 6 zone at night.

I could also fly over the zone if needed as well back to the Crystal Vortex. That gave me enough confidence to continue my exploration. Air Burst.

Ascending the mountainous terrain, I got a better view. Unfortunately, the obfuscation effect cut it off after a couple of miles. Occasionally a Swirling Ice Spikes of Illusion tried to ambush me, but I knew what to look out for. I just rushed them and melted them with an overwhelming attack right away. It was slow, but it was safe.

I saw the void off to the side and a blizzard. I turned back to face the interior of the level 7 zone and advanced. The level 7 monsters kept coming, but the same one. There was no change in monster type as I made my way towards the center of the zone. Thoughts of pushing on to level 8 zones rose up within me.

I didn’t think that would be possible, or was it? I reached the center of the zone, no boss, no tower, no dungeon, nothing unique except the zone itself and the occasional level 7 monster. It was going to get dark soon and I retreated back to the airship. My pack was getting fairly full of crystals as well.

Very early the next morning, I took off into the sky, flew over the level 6 zone and landed in the level 7 zone. I began killing the Swirling Ice Spikes of Illusion yet again. There was no change. At least that was consistent, but it also set me on edge.

This time I pushed right for the center of the zone. Nothing and no one would be getting in my way. Perhaps I had to kill all the monsters before the boss would reveal itself. After going through the center of the zone I kept going. In the distance I saw a change in the terrain, there was a reddish hue, that was hard to make out. A level 8 zone.

Getting closer, it was a hurricane, a hurricane of thick red liquid, with nothing else below that I could spot. Just void. I noticed chunks of flesh and tentacles in the distance. That weird patch of land by those shards was a level 8 zone most likely.

It was good to be able to put a level on it. I saw what could only be the zone monster, moving about, but I didn’t dare risk a level 8 zone. I wasn’t confident about handling the environment while fighting. Also, my clothes and pack wouldn’t last. I had collected a lot of level 7 crystals and wanted to find the skill point of this zone.

I went back and forth several times, clearing out the level 7 zone, making sure not to cross into the other level 7 zone next to this one. That one had large rock golem monsters, I was fine leaving alone for now. I wanted to find the boss or dungeon of this zone and test myself against a single level 8 monster.

The Light Source was getting close to the horizon when I killed another level 7 monster. There was a burst of golden light and a gray cube had appeared. Just a flash, and it was there. The golden light could only mean the Almighty System had acted in some way. On the front of the cube there was a set of double doors.

I took my time to walk about the cube, but there was nothing else, except the indentations indicating a door on one side. The size of the cube was about the size of a small two story house once would see in the suburbs, or around four shipping containers stacked togeather to make a cube. The doors were human sized, not overly large like the other doors I had run into in the past.

There were only two sets of doors I had found so far. Both were bad news. The first set was for bosses in enclosed dungeons. There the doors closed behind a person. The second set were the tower doors which also closed behind a person. The first set opened inward, while the second set opened out.

Whatever mechanism operated them was completely hidden from my senses as well, which indicated that it was the Almighty System managing them in some way if the flash of golden light wasn’t a clue already.

I advanced in front of the doors and they slid into the ground, revealing the interior of the gray cube, which was completely dark. “Really? Almighty System? Really?” I half moaned half asked. It was clearly a death trap of some kind. To go into the unknown. While I hadn’t thought it would actually work, clearing out all the level 7 monsters in the zone appeared to be the trigger.

Looking at the Light Source, I had about 6 hours until midnight and the monster reset. Would this cube reset like the monsters or the bosses? Or was there another reset timer? I hated the unknown. There was no one strong enough to toss in and expect to get any kind of answer back. Then there was the possibility of a meta-point and knowledge about a unique skill.

I only poked around this zone because I had confidence, I could handle the level 7 monster and had an escape route. Whatever this box with a door was, it clearly was bad news. Like the towers. I hated things with doors that would trap me. “Sorry Almighty System, not today, not for a long time,” I said out loud. There was no response, not like I expected one. Time to run some tests.