Chapter 60: Property of the House of Cross

Kaelen scanned the temple, mapping the terrain out to come up with an escape strategy the moment he grabbed the weapon.

He didn’t plan to fight the statues and also fight the nightmare shadow. He was going to steal the weapon, which should tip the balance of the temple, stall long enough for the nightmare shadow to break in, then stand by and watch the two creatures fight it out, before taking out the nightmare shadow using the Primordial-Tier staff.

His plan seemed flawless, but just before Kaelen could steal the staff and make a run for it, an inscription on the weapon made him freeze on the spot, and Kaelen simply stared at it with his heart beating wildly against his chest.

The inscription was a simple text that would’ve been overlooked by any other person, but not Kaelen. The inscription read:

Property of the House of Cross.

The governors of the great nine Strongholds had a treasure vault where their most valuable items and possessions of the strongholds were safely kept. And each and every item kept in the vault was branded with the governor’s name.

Kaelen could clearly remember his father having one, and the name branded on each and every one of their items was exactly the same inscription on not just the Primordial-Tier staff, but the Divine-Tier weapon as well.

A sharp headache suddenly struck Kaelen’s head the next moment, and a fragmented memory from the past suddenly resurfaced in his mind.

***

"Mom, why are we leaving our items behind?" An 8-year-old boy asked his mother, looking behind at the dilapidated temple they were leaving behind.

"Kaelen, it’s so that if there are any survivors from our stronghold, they can take refuge in them at night." The beautiful woman turned to look up at the sky. "And if they follow the constellation, they can find us."

***

Kaelen let out a gasp as the memory was cut short, and the sharp headache was gone as soon as it started.

He stared at the statues now with a look of shock and disbelief. His speculations had been right. The safe haven had been created by someone—his own mother—as campsites, as they made it across the wasteland.

What Kaelen never expected was for these powerful items he thought came from the game to be in the possession of his family long before the game itself.

What does this mean?

Kaelen fell into deep thought. He could clearly remember escaping into the wasteland on foot with his mother, before they were both caught and boarded into a jet where his mother fought with the assassins, and on trying to help his mother, Kaelen was knocked out and that was it.

The next thing he remembered was waking up with Stronghold 5 in sight, while his mother was nowhere to be seen. But his new memory just confirmed that they’d survived and successfully escaped.

This could only mean one thing... his mother might still be alive, out there, somewhere. And the only way to find and retrace her steps was to...

"Follow the constellations...?" Kaelen mumbled to himself as he looked up at the starry night sky.

He knew nothing about stars or constellations. But he had a new goal in mind, and one thing was for certain.

He was going to investigate and find his mother.

He wasn’t foolish enough to start running across the wasteland in search of someone who disappeared ten years ago.

His first priority was strength, because he needed that to protect himself and those he loved. He needed to be at that expedition in less than 24 hours, then he could venture into the wasteland after that, knowing he had enough evolution points to make him feel safe and confident.

Kaelen immediately grabbed the staff from the hand of the statue, before slowly pulling it out of its grasp. But he didn’t run like he’d planned.

If this statue had truly been erected by his mother in his presence, they should know well enough not to bite the hand that feeds them.

As soon as he freed the staff, he struck it into the ground, sending a dense ripple of mana across the temple.

The statues didn’t move a muscle.

Kaelen went ahead to take the Divine-Tier bow and lance, and without thinking twice, he stowed them away into his inventory.

Nothing came from the statues still, but the temple suddenly shook violently as cracks began to spread across the invisible barrier.

"What do you think you’re doing?" the white-haired woman immediately called out.

Kaelen calmly turned around to face her. "I’m taking back my property."

"What?" She blurted in confusion. "You’re going to get us all killed."

"Us?" Kaelen smiled coldly. "You think I care about any of you?"

"If this staff is strong enough to repel the nightmare shadow... then I think whoever’s wielding it should be safe." Kaelen said, and at the same time, he was swiping through his evolution tree.

The moment he came across the evolution attribute he wanted, he clicked purchase and dumped half a billion evolution points into upgrading it from Level 1 to Level 6000+, to catch up with the rest of his evolution attributes.

The white-haired woman, realizing Kaelen never planned on letting any of them leave alive, quickly summoned her rifle and aimed at Kaelen. But before she could pull the trigger, one of the stampeding beasts panicking after the barrier cracked suddenly ran across Kaelen, and he mysteriously vanished from the spot.

She hurriedly ran her eyes across the temple, the stampeding beasts disorienting her as she searched for Kaelen, when a loud bang came from the barrier behind her. She spun around to see the target she was looking for, with the stolen staff half-deep into the barrier, which spread wider cracks across the barrier.

She watched in terror as the man slowly turned around with a wide grin.

She quickly raised her sniper rifle to fire again, but the man had disappeared once more, and the barrier shattered inwards as the dark shadow surged into the temple in full rage, charging straight at her. Before she could even pull the trigger, the shadow had consumed her, and her vision went blank.

[You have died.]

Kaelen stood at the top of the temple building as he watched the shadow consume everything below. It was only then he leaped from the roof to the gate of the temple, where he raised another stone ridge to seal everything inside.

The shadow, which had no form and two eerie orbs for eyes, immediately snapped its body to stare at Kaelen standing before the sealed gate.

"Only one of us gets to leave here alive." As he said that, Kaelen’s evolution attributes began climbing in levels at a terrifying speed, soon hitting Level 12000.

[You have reached the strength cap for Tier 9 Lifeforms.]

[Do you wish to spend 10,000,000,000 Evolution Points to ascend to Tier 10?]

"Ascend!"

And before the aura could even explode from his chest, Kaelen’s attribute levels were already rising once more at a terrifying speed, hitting Level 24000 in an instant.

[You have reached the strength cap for Tier 10 Lifeforms.]

[Do you wish to spend 20,000,000,000 Evolution Points to ascend to Tier 11?]

"Ascend!"

Boom—

The two evolution auras clashed in his chest, making Kaelen cough up blood. But he only gritted his teeth as he held them in and brought the staff before him. Before he smiled at the nightmare shadow.

The nightmare shadow didn’t sit around and wait for Kaelen to power up. Realizing the danger it was in the longer it waited, it immediately surged forward with full force.

But Kaelen only smiled as he stared at the beast, and his lips parted, releasing all the pent-up energy as the Primordial staff glowed in his hands.

"Infinite Mana."

Boom—!

A powerful explosion of pure energy and refined mana swept across the temple, shooting into the sky as it knocked the nightmare shadow back.

Then Kaelen immediately activated [Miasma Slime], filling the temple with an excessive white mist amidst the powerful surge of mana, before activating the most basic skill in his arsenal, but using the Primordial-Tier staff.

"Basic Fireball."

Kaelen wasn’t certain if the Divine-Tier Spark of Extinction could do the job. So he went all out, transforming the most basic fireball into a Primordial flame using the staff.

Like a black hole had been opened, the entire energy in the temple was immediately sucked inwards. Including the beam that had been shot into the sky, converging into an atom of black flame, before...

KaBooooooom—!!!