Chapter 2504 - 5,000

Alex had several problems to get past. Unfortunately, this was a lot more complicated than getting into the Demon World had been.

Last time, they had only needed to slip past the System’s notice for a brief moment before crossing into territory where its authority was much weaker. This time, they were heading straight into a Summoned World under the System’s protection. Hiding who they were for a few seconds wouldn’t come close to being enough.

If they interacted with the world without the proper authority, the System would recognize them as intruders and deal with them accordingly. Alex still remembered what had happened to the Sylphs who tried to invade Earth, and he had no desire to find out what that punishment felt like firsthand.

Then there was the world they had picked.

It was going through a Summoning, but it wasn’t some newly awakened Mortal World whose people could barely understand what Aether was. It was a God-level World, and its foundations were far more complicated than anything Alex had dealt with before.

More importantly, its World Spirit was broken. Not in a defective sort of way, but in a my world is in the fucking God Plane sort of way.

For a world of this level, that was practically a requirement for a Summoning in the first place. However, what it meant was troubling. Still, the World Spirit wasn’t mature yet without a completed Sumomong. And, without a complete World Spirit, there were gaps in the authority that should have governed the world, and while that opened up opportunities, it also made everything a lot less predictable.

And God forbid the world had a Progenitor.

Alex almost laughed at the thought. If he ran into an existence with that kind of authority while he was busy meddling with the System’s challenge, there was a good chance he’d be cooked before he even understood what happened.

The worst part was that he couldn’t just lean on Sylas to fix it.

If Sylas, Fanelei, or Xarvenya had to step in this early, then what was the point of everything Alex had been working toward? He might as well put a shotgun in his mouth and save himself the embarrassment.

That said, Alex had another plan. It was far more dangerous than anything he’d tried so far, and under normal circumstances, he would have wanted another decade of preparation before even considering it.

But, if he pulled it off...

"I don’t like that look on your face at all."

Alex glanced at Nathan. "What look?"

"The look you get before you do something crazy."

Alex grinned.

"There’s only one psycho in here, and it’s not me. But if I’m going to keep up with him, I suppose I’m going to have to go a little crazy myself."

Nathan’s face stiffened. He knew that tone. "Alex..."

"Get ready, buddy. We’re about to become the Overlords of a Summoned World."

Nathan’s lip started twitching. Before he could get a word out, Alex had already slammed his palm down on the central console.

A powerful surge of Will spread through the circuitry, and the enormous projection in front of them changed. It was only then that Nathan realized something was off about the adjustments Alex had made earlier.

The instruments had never been tuning themselves to the Demon World’s physical laws at all.

The more Nathan looked at the data, the more obvious it became that Alex had never even tried. The Demon World was collapsing, and its laws were changing far too fast for any normal system of measurement to build a reliable foundation on.

Even the Omnimous couldn’t casually solve a problem when the very rules it was trying to calculate kept shifting underneath it. But, Alex had never needed to understand the Demon World.

All he needed to understand was how Demonic Will changed the signature of a world it touched.

The difference looked small, but it changed everything. Alex hadn’t been searching for Summoned Worlds through the physical disturbances their Gates gave off. He had been searching for one particular pattern of Demonic interference, a pattern that could only show up when a world with a very specific set of traits came into contact with the Demon World.

In other words, he hadn’t picked this world because it was convenient. He had been looking for it from the very beginning.

Nathan stared at his friend as though seeing him for the first time.

"Madman... You’re playing with fire..."

Alex’s grin widened. "Yes. Yes, I am."

The instruments started changing again, their circuitry adjusting to match the fluctuations coming from the world beyond the Gate. This time, the machinery wasn’t trying to hide them at all. It was building a relationship between Alex’s Demonic Will and the incomplete authority of the Summoned World.

It was a completely different approach from the one they’d used to get into the Demon World.

Forcing the entire Hollow Ship through would only invite disaster. But, what if Alex went in alone? What if he used the same methods once used against Earth to get himself recognized as an active player. If the Sylphs could do it, why couldn’t he?

And, more importantly, what if he could establish himself as an Overlord before the System had a chance to decide what role he should play?

The immature World Spirit made that possible. On top of that, the world Alex had chosen had another advantage, one he had spent years preparing to exploit.

This world’s Summoning wasn’t going normally.

The world had already failed once, and the System was getting ready to force it through another cycle. Its damaged foundations were vulnerable during the process. That opened the door to the same kind of manipulation that had once been done to Earth.

Alex had no intention of letting that chance slip by.

"See you in five thousand years."

Nathan’s eyes went wide. "Wait, what—"

Alex disappeared.

The next instant, the instruments registered his arrival inside the Summoned World. The connection between his Demonic Will and the world’s broken foundation expanded at a frightening rate.

Nathan stared at the projection as the numbers changed faster than he could follow. He understood enough to know that Alex hadn’t betrayed them, though.

That wasn’t what this was. Nathan had known his friend long enough to tell the difference between someone abandoning a plan and someone doing something incredibly stupid to make one work.

Unfortunately, it was most definitely the second one.

Alex was trying to do what had once been done to Earth. He was forcing the world into extreme time dilation, using its incomplete World Spirit and the System’s existing Summoning cycles to create a span of time that should have been impossible to experience from the outside.

The world would keep struggling against its challenges. Every time it failed, the System would get the chance to rebuild the circumstances and start over.

Normally, that process would take an enormous amount of time. However, with the gap between how fast time flowed inside the world and outside of it, countless generations could pass while only moments went by on the Hollow Ship.

The hair on the back of Nathan’s neck stood on end.

Alex wasn’t just trying to survive the Summoning. He was planning to use those repeated cycles to build something.

If he could establish himself as an Overlord, keep himself intact through the resets, and carry what he learned from one cycle into the next, then the possibilities were practically endless.

But, the dangers were just as big. One mistake could leave him trapped inside that world, and if the System caught on to the manipulation, there was no telling what kind of punishment it would hand down.

Nathan looked over at Sylas.

The man was still sitting in meditation, as though none of this concerned him in the slightest. Nathan’s expression twisted.

How the hell could he stay so calm when Alex had just thrown himself into something like that?

Before Nathan could decide whether to say anything, the projection flashed. An enormous surge of Demonic Will erupted from the Gate, and warnings flooded the instruments as the connection Alex had built suddenly collapsed.

Nathan’s breath caught.

Then, a figure staggered out of the passage.

Alex appeared in front of the console looking like someone had dragged him through several thousand years of suffering. Considering what he’d just tried to do, that probably wasn’t far from the truth.

His clothes were torn, and his face was haggard. There were several injuries across his body that hadn’t been there when he left.

Yet, barely 2 seconds had passed.

Alex bent forward with his hands on his knees, struggling to catch his breath.

"Fuck me. Remind me never to do that again."

Nathan stared at him. For once, he had nothing to say.

After a moment, Alex straightened up. His usual grin came back, even with the exhaustion written all over his face.

"Anyway, I have the army Sylas wanted me to get now." He clapped his hands together. "Let’s cook."