Chapter 137 Lykan: Next Stage (Patreon)

Chapter 137

Lykan

Next Stage

Lykan for his part had finally found the breakthrough he had been looking for. In one night, he had managed to do one thing that had defied him for years. In one night, he had changed the course of his life forever. He had been at a bottleneck for so long in the path of his cultivation, locked in a permanent stalemate of life. Originally, he had taken on Brenna to be his successor. He realized that his path was nearly complete, that after seven years of minimal progress he had little to show in the ways of progress.

Truthfully, he had known that as things had stood, he would have died, at least that was the growing thought in the back of his mind. In his mind he knew that his life was one of advancement. That if he did not constantly advance or improve himself, he would eventually die. Then last night while in the act of love making, a breakthrough happened. His qi was able to circulate in ways that he had never imagined before. He was already on the verge of a breakthrough before, when he fought the giant serpent, but he knew it wasn’t enough.

Only when he gave in to his feelings of desire for Brenna did his mind finally relax enough to let his body act the way it needed to. For so long he had thought focus and discipline were his true key disciplines, but he was wrong. Those were but a part of his foundation. His true foundation had always been built upon movement, upon speed and power. Discipline is what always came as an after effect when he tried to maximize his gains with precision. He had been so blind to his own path of advancement that he had grown sterile in his approach to life.

That night while Brenna fished out their clothing from the ocean currents, Lykan went on a killing spree. Especially after he noticed his most recent gains. He had felt the gains personally, but then he had his gains explained to him by the Gods themselves.

Blessing Bestowed: Advanced Spherical Core.

Advanced Spherical Core. You have managed to strengthen your core to follow the path of Air circulation. With an Air circulation core many power abilities will be possible to you, at the cost of losing some higher end strength-based abilities. The energy stored here is permanently in use to improve your body. This core can be improved upon to receive greater results. Results: +6 Strength, +8 Mobility, +8 Power. Your affinity with Air and movement techniques has improved. Your affinity with Power and energy-based techniques has improved.

This was a sharp contrast from the Intermediate Spherical Core that only offered +4 to Strength, Mobility, and Power. In the previous iterations of his cores, he never received a single bonus to any techniques. Techniques he assumed were related to the attacks he used to slay the leviathan, along with other monsters over the years.

The best part was he still had the previous bonuses from his cores active, especially as it only took one of his Intermediate cores to make his new Advanced Spherical core. This meant he could still draw strength from the previous versions of his cores, while also making himself that much stronger. With newfound confidence Lykan gathered his mithril bo-staff and headed to the deep.

This time rather than hunting the leviathan, he had meeker prey to kill. He made sure to slaughter each scaled shark that was around. Fortunately, most were actively taking part in the feeding frenzy that was going on at the leviathan.

While it had only been a few hours since the beast was killed, the scaled sharks made a quick line trying to get through the tough outer hide of the beast, so they could make their way to its dense diamond shaped core. The rush for the newly available resources apparently caused a frenzy with many of the beasts, as most went to attack each other. Their days of working as a pack were seemingly over, as they all now vied for the chance to make themselves the true masters of the deep. This was only natural, as nature abhors a vacuum. The monsters of course would spare no expense to strike at others for a moment of strength and power, especially when victory here would mean that the victor would set up their lineage to be the next leviathan of these waters. That the ocean biome had already been beaten into submission by the beast. This meant that with the former apex predator now deceased, the one to take up the mantle of core devourer would surely reign supreme. There was only one problem to this plan of the monsters. That plan was Lykan, who found new strength and speed to strike.

Now even moving through water, Lykan felt the flow of air and power surround him. Even as he struck, he could feel water separating from him as he moved forward. Most of the scaled sharks had taken to the surface. This meant a quick diving lunge from the sky was more than enough to catch many of the monsters unaware. Especially as the monsters of this biome had long since forgotten the instinct to look up for predators or prey. The ocean biome had made it so no aviary creatures could survive. The few natural creatures who could fly had long since vanished, as their natural food supply was missing. With being the masters of the air, but no food to feed from, the hybrid creatures of the ocean world soon became extinct in this biome to the natural predators of the ocean. Thus, the sharks never saw death strike from above with its glowing mithril staff.

The dead and dying sharks and their qi saturated blood only served to make matters worse, as their blood called forth even more of their kind. Soon it was a virtual feeding frenzy for the scaled sharks, many of whom were too unaware of the death that stalked them overhead.

Within a few hours two things had happened; the last of the scaled sharks had been slain by Lykan’s hand and Brenna had managed to gather the last of their floating garments from the ocean waves. Then came the time when they gathered and shared the cores. The core of the leviathan was larger than any core Lykan had ever seen. Judging by its purity it looked like a large black diamond. Looking at it, Lykan wondered if the course of this core would have eventually become clearer over time, just as a diamond would have? Its size and shape seemed to denote that such a transformation was possible. Still such thoughts were beyond him at this point. In the end he had done what he had intended from the start. Better still, he had found new confidence not only in himself, but also from his nearly impossible feat.

Once the cores were collected and the pair did what they normally did at this point, gather enough edible food rations to survive their next trip. They set out to destroy the dungeon’s core room. But before they left, the couple shared one last meal together, along with one more night of intimacy. This time the pair used their heavy weapons to hold down their clothing so they wouldn’t have to search as far to find the garments. Additionally, the pair made plans to get more clothing when they next visited a town or village.

This core room, much like the last two was empty of living Titans. The few injured titans that managed to hole up in the restorative cocoons passed away long ago from their injuries.

Lykan looked at the creatures, trying to determine what had caused them to die. In the end, all Lykan could conclude was that only Titans above a certain ability level could have survived this long, even in the stasis pods. After coming to this conclusion Brenna agreed.

While nothing had truly changed between the two, everything had. Now Lykan noticed the way her eyes would wander to parts of him. Before he would have felt uncomfortable by such actions, but now he felt excited by the actions.

Once the dungeon core room was shut down, and the emergency hatches opened.

Rumble. Shatter.

This time rather than the emergency exit revealing sunlight as had almost always been the case. This time giant stone slabs fell from above. Moving on heightened reflexes, Lykan grabbed Brenna and pulled her out of the core room and into the adjacent hallway.

“It appears that a building was built directly over top of the escape hatch.” Brenna expertly noted.

Seeing the rubble, along with hearing the screams from far above Lykan nodded in agreement.

“So, what do you want to do?” Brenna asked.

Lykan who just now remembered that an angry Ghane and his legion of soldiers were likely still above the dungeon. He realized they would likely be waiting for their exit, especially as they had indirectly destroyed at least one and likely several buildings in this city. Looking around, Lykan saw the engine room that still had a faint glow of still warm qi. Then he remembered their last time escaping a dungeon that had a city built directly over top of it.

Seeing the engine room Lykan pointed. “Want to escape through the air shaft again?”

Brenna just smiled. “Well, if you insist.” She said with a faint bow as she took both her ax and Lykan’s bo-staff and held them, along with her backpack in her arms. Then with extreme grace and strength, Lykan casually lifted Brenna into his arms and began flying away.

Now that Lykan understood more about cores and their development, he realized that Brenna would likely follow an earth or fire path, which meant she would never be able to fly. At least not as easily as he could. Still, she had other strengths that would likely need to be developed. Now that he understood more about the processes, he endeavored to work with Brenna so they both could improve.

Ding. Ding. Ding.

The two broke through a side tunnel that had been overgrown with dense vegetation. It was clear that a few fires had broken out, likely as a direct result of the emergency hatches opening. Lykan almost went to go help but was ultimately pulled back by Brenna. Who with a quick shake of her head spoke volumes. She was right, he would only cause more confusion. Any lives he did save would likely be minimal compared to what people could do when they were not diverting their resources away from the rescue efforts and towards him.

Sighing, Lykan eventually nodded in agreement. With that the two began making their path south-east, towards the jungle basin. If Lykan’s guess was correct, then somewhere at the core of the great basin was a biome filled with the birthing spot of dragons. A birthing spot that had likely been left open long ago. On his way, Lykan shared what he thought of the structure.

“I am not certain that the dungeon at the heart of the Jungle Basin has been stopped. In the best-case scenario, the Jungle Basin was shut down and it contained a biome that held dragons. The emergency hatches being open would give rise to the idea that smaller dragons would get out.” Lykan spoke.

“But you don’t believe that?” Brenna asked, once again her insights into Lykan were uncanny.

“No.”

“So, what do you think is actually the case?”

Pausing Lykan looked at Brenna, then off in their direction they were traveling as they continued to make their way. Brenna didn’t rush Lykan, instead she let him formulate his theories as best he could, knowing he would need time to bind together all the different data points he had collected along his journey.

“I think there were multiple biomes with different dragons. I think each dragon had a biome that was unique to them, where they flourished and adapted. It is my belief that the psychic dragons’ biome is somewhere in the heart of the Jungle basin. This would give rise to the fact that the area is predominantly owned by the psychic dragons.”

“What if you are wrong?” Brenna posed, nothing malicious in her comment just asking for his thoughts on the matter. Fortunately, they knew each other well enough by now that such a question didn’t even bother Lykan. Instead, he appreciated the fact that she forced him to think of these contingencies.

“If I am wrong, then we can expect any form of dragon to come from the biome in the Jungle Basin.”

Hearing this Brenna nodded. Then after a few moments she asked the follow up, “so what if you are correct?”

“If I am correct, then there would be two things to note. First that the biome isn’t fully shut down, a fact that seems to be given credence by the fact that psychic dragons, while being the most recent dragon variant species to be recorded, only appearing in our records a few hundred years ago, are also the most prevalent. At least in the central kingdom. This means that the biome is fully operational.”

Brenna paused as she looked at Lykan. Seeing the tightening of his jaw line, she realized he still thought more, so she pressed. “What aren’t you telling me?”

Hearing the question, Lykan smiled as he looked to Brenna. He was happy that she understood him so deeply, he had a hard time expressing his true thoughts. Especially when they were just conjecture. “Well, if the biome isn’t fully shut down, and the biome is still producing waves of psychic dragons, then that must mean the biome itself is filled with multiple matriarchs, or maybe just a singular matriarch similar to the leviathan. One that is likely too big to leave the opening that was either found or created by the smaller children of the species.”

Hearing that Brenna paused. Then she saw the look of concern and resolve that filled Lykan’s face. Seeing that he was purposefully walking forward, despite the possible implications of fighting off against another leviathan type monster, she felt impressed. She was especially enamored by the way he seemed to gain more confidence and resolve with each stride forward. Before the breakthrough she might have stopped and asked if he felt confident enough to do this. But seeing him in action and after witnessing his actions with the leviathan, she knew for a fact that he would reign supreme, so long as he put his mind to it.

Nodding her head in satisfaction, a slight smile crested her lips as she moved in beside Lykan.

“So, I take it we aren’t getting clothes?” Brenna asked, after a few moments more of travel.

Hearing the words Lykan only smiled and groaned at the state that his clothes were in. The ocean water had been tough on their clothing, and worse his enhanced senses could now smell the ocean water stench clinging to him.

“No, we will get new clothes.” Lykan said, as he moved his head away in disgust form the putrid smell that wafted up from his clothing. Previously such things would not have concerned him, but now that he had her, he endeavored to change.