*BANG*

Zyrus stood on one knee as the ground beneath him trembled. Loud echoes reverberated nonstop from the mountains, scaring away the few birds and animals that were still living.

Only after a couple of minutes did the rumbling calm down.

‘It’s more realistic than I thought it’d be,’ Zyrus scratched his jaw while observing the map.

He imagined that a new warehouse would pop out somewhere just like in the kingdom-building games, but the reality was quite different.

‘And that’s the last place I’d expect as a warehouse,’

Zyrus clicked on the map that showed a thatched cottage in the only green area.

*Flash*

“Sweet,”

“Sweeettt..”

.

.

His voice echoed around the vast cave that was carved inside the mountain range. Zyrus slid his palm against the nearby wall which looked clean and polished.

Unlike the glowing cold walls, the floor below his feet felt warm and comforting. It was a rare sensation as he wasn't able to feel the temperature around him due to the hard scales covering his entire body.

‘It’s magic,’

Zyrus was sure that there was preservation magic casted on the walls and the floor. However, even after using his eye of annihilation, he wasn’t able to find either a magic circle or a mana stone that powered it.

‘Wait, could it be!’

Struck with a sudden enlightenment Zyrus immediately focused on the walls. Unlike before when he was looking for a surge of mana to find the formation, he was now observing the mana that encompassed the entire cavern.

And sure enough, he realized it. This cave, no, this warehouse was a natural domain. It was his first time seeing one of this type, but he was certain about his speculation.

As the name suggested, natural domains were formed by extreme environmental conditions. For example, a mountaintop that was repeatedly struck by lightning would have a lighting domain. In the same way, fire domains could be found near volcanoes and wood domains near a lush forest.

Of course, it only happened if there was sufficient mana along with the elemental powers. These places were gentler in nature compared to those created by living beings. They only enhanced their respective elements without causing any harm.

In the fourth and fifth ring of the sanctuary, all of the high-ranked species had their headquarters in such natural domains. It made their bases easy to defend due to their affinity with the elements. Not to mention it also increased progression speed for certain types of magic and martial arts.

Zyrus wasn’t exactly sure just yet, but as far as he understood, this place was just like that. Unlike the simple elements, this domain focused on a complex magic like preservation. One had to realize that preservation magic used both fire and ice magic to maintain the temperature at a suitable level. The more objects were placed in the magic, the higher its difficulty would be.

For Zyrus who was creating a void based domain, it was like a pie falling from the sky. He didn’t dilly dally any longer and summoned 100 empowered ophidian warriors.

After killing nearly 10000 Verdara beetles these past few days, he had around 2000 vials of Bone enhancement fluid and 1000 vials of Muscle enhancement fluid in his possession.

Although he was unable to collect all of the corpses, what he had was sufficient. He still had over 500 claws left, not to mention the wings that were five times the amount.

“Can you guys speak now?”

“…”

“I’ll take that as a no,”

Zyrus walked towards the foremost ophidian warrior without a trace of disappointment. He had noticed these past few days that although his summons had enough intelligence to use simple battle formation and obey his commands, they weren’t capable of acting on their own.

This wasn’t an issue for the time being, but once they numbered in tens of thousands, Zyrus knew that it would be a pain in the ass to manage them.

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Thus, he only had two options left. One was to awaken higher-ranked summons which he believed would happen after he met the Glemorax, and the other was to create an elite unit that would lead the others.

Since he didn’t know when the first one would happen, he was left with only one choice.

Zyrus placed his hand on the ophidian warrior’s chest instead of ordering him to drink the vials. Although he wasn’t able to speak, Zyrus was able to sense his summons' trust in him by looking into his eyes.

‘Tch… maybe it’s better that they don’t have emotions,’

Zyrus closed his eyes and focused on the new power he had acquired in the dungeon. His heart slowed down as a new power surged from within it. Unlike the pulsing life force it emitted before, this new power was more foul and sinister in nature.

Black blood flowed out from his seven orifices but Zyrus didn’t even flinch at the pain. The first time was the most difficult, and he knew that if he stopped the cycle midway, the summoned abyssal power would backfire on him.

Dark tendrils surged out from his heart as his dormant bloodline awakened. He felt as if bugs were crawling all over his body as the power of abyss filled each and every part of his body.

‘Phew… it’s done,’

Zyrus let out a breath of relief and looked at his outstretched hand. His blue scales were shining in a dark luster in the dim lights of the cavern.

“Now then, I’m not sure whether you get it or not, but this’ll hurt like a bitch. So, don’t faint no matter what, got it?”

The ophidian warrior nodded at Zyrus without a change in expression.

Zyrus didn’t hesitate further and pulled out two vials of enhancement fluids. He didn’t know how powerful they were, but he hoped that they had enough energy to sustain them for what was to come.

He had long since gotten used to the pain he felt when any of his summons died. It was his own way to atone for the way he was using them. He knew that it was hypocritical, but he didn’t care. They had to endure whatever came their way because they were weak.

It was the same for him.

A black whirlpool formed on his palm and it pushed against the ophidian warrior’s chest. It was the result of Zyrus’s mana circulation method. He wanted to use this as a seed for his abyssal power.

They could either absorb that power and evolve or be consumed by it. Either way, Zyrus would get new summons that had the powers of the abyss.

Just because he couldn’t use empower didn’t mean that he had no way to upgrade his summons. He was an arcanist first and foremost, and doing something like this was a piece of cake.

To his credit, the ophidian warrior didn’t even flinch when the whirlpool was pushed inside his heart. Zyrus poured the vials into his mouth and ordered him to rest. Although he was slightly tired, with his title’s effect it didn’t take him long to repeat the same process.

Leaving the 100 warriors to rest aside, he once again summoned 500 more empowered warriors and gave them the two enhancement fluids.

Unlike the previous times, their effects were immediate.

*Crack*

*pop*

“Oh, so it works like this huh,” Zyrus exclaimed in surprise as he observed the 500 warriors popping and cracking their muscles. They grew taller and their limbs were now thicker than before. Their dark green scales glittered under the caverns' glow as they knelt before Zyrus.

Although he had yet to see its effectiveness, these warriors were at least 50% stronger than before.

"Take a break and get used to your new power,"

Satisfied with the fluid's efficiency, Zyrus ordered the ophidian warriors to head back. Unlike them he didn't have the time to relax.

He studied the map while eating the rations provided by the cube. Now that his summons had become stronger, it was time to implement the second part of his plan.

‘Huu… this is going to be another tiring day,’

Zyrus looked forward to the day he would get the teleport waypoint. For the time being he had no choice but to manually summon his troops all over the continent.

Although they had barely occupied a corner of the continent, he knew that it was only a matter of time before the map would change completely.

But unfortunately for him, he wasn’t the only one who thought the same.

…

Thousands of miles away, at the edge of the forest that spanned across half of the continent, there was a castle made from white marble.

Thousands of aliens in red armor stood guard in front of its majestic gates. Their scales gleamed under the crimson sky, giving the place an eerie and ominous vibe.

Black clouds rumbled all across the horizon, but it seemed that even they were afraid of the being that sat on the castle’s throne.

“My King, A variable has appeared.”

The Glemorax King opened his thirteen eyes and looked towards the north. It was the place where Zyrus had created his temporary camp.

The king spoke via telepathy as his thirteen eyes landed on the trembling soldier. The Glemorax king had four pairs of wings with two eyes on each. Unlike the other Glemorax, he had an additional three eyes on his chest. Four gold and two crimson horns adorned his head like a crown.

“N-no your majesty. We sensed the power of earth’s spirit in that direction,” The chief of Glemorax army replied in a meek voice.

To be honest, he didn’t want to confront their ruler who stood on the towering thirty-meter tall throne. Although they were of the same species, the disparity between them was too great.

Despite being a chief, the kneeling Glemorax was only five meters tall. He was like an insect compared to the king whose four arms were twenty meters long,

“Yes, Your Majesty. He also disappears from our detection range from time to time, but he always reappears after a couple of minutes,”

“I-I think so,”

“As you command, your majesty.”

The chief scurried off without looking back. Only when he was outside of the castle did he heave a sigh of relief. He didn’t know why their king was leading the invasion on this run-down planet, not to mention two other rulers who were even stronger than him.

‘I hope we don’t come across that thing,’

Just by looking at the ocean he could feel a shiver all over his body. He wanted nothing more than to finish this mission as soon as possible.

“Move out soldiers, we head to the north,”

*Clang*

All of the soldiers banged their spear-like hands against their armor and roared at the crimson sky.

“ALL HAIL THE LORD,”

“ALL HAIL THE LORD,”

On this day, Thousands of four-armed aliens let out their war cries and marched towards the north.