New Eden: Live to Play, Play to Live

Chapter 987: Passing Through The Veil Of Worlds



Alex's grin made Asmodeus shiver, enough so that he almost instinctively teleported ten feet back.

But, for some reason, his powers were not reacting to his will right now.

"Tell me, demon. Could your powers teleport me from and to a dungeon if I had its exact location?" Alex asked, looking into Asmodeus' eyes.

Asmodeus looked at him with a frown.

"Dungeons are separate spaces, separate from the world, whichever one you are in. They are like parallel dimensions," he started explaining.

"Shut up, Asmodeus. I know all that," Alex cut him.

"I'm asking if you could teleport from and to one if you knew of its location. Answer my question plainly."

Asmodeus shivered again, feeling Sanguis' gaze on the back of his head.

"In theory, yes. But it would require a large amount of mana. I don't know if your current body could pull off such a transfer..." Asmodeus said, his voice quivering.

Alex grinned, satisfied with the answer.

"Then I'm borrowing your power," he declared, grabbing Asmodeus' throat.

Asmodeus tried fighting back, but everything turned black in an instant, and he realized he had been taken over.

"I said I don't know if you can pull it off! If you exhaust all your mana and get locked into a dungeon while unconscious, we could all die, you madman!" Asmodeus shouted into the void, knowing Alexander could hear him.

'That's for me to figure out, and you to forget about,' Alex replied mentally, as he opened his eyes with a wide grin.

His skin had already turned black, with two long horns jutting from his forehead, as his somewhat bulky form had slimmed down a bit.

As he re-entered the cavern, Jonathan's heart almost stopped, his memory of fighting a demon flashed in his mind, but it quickly subsided as Alex's voice came from the demon's mouth.

"I found a way to bring all of this out. Are we about done with harvesting?" he asked, making some of them yelp at his appearance.

Only two people had seen him like this before, and didn't react too strongly; Kary and David. "Man, you have to warn us if you change into a demon. Some of the kids could have attacked you on sight," David grumbled, noticing Jonathan's cold sweats.

"Eh. I'm sorry. It was a spur-of-the-moment thing. But I can still carry all of this to the plane, without issue. So. Are you all done getting what we can?" he asked again, looking at the sizeable pile.

Kary shook her head with a snicker.

"You really need to think more before you act. But, to answer your question, yes. We are done harvesting what is easy to get. The rest would require dedicated mining equipment, which we neither have with us nor even brought on the plane," she declared.

Alex nodded, approaching the pile with a wide grin.

His sharp teeth made the grin look vicious, making Liu Yan and Aapo, who were closest to the pile, take a few steps back instinctively.

Alex looked at them and chuckled.

"Chickens," he mocked, before he crouched next to the pile.

He focused on every crystal in the pile with his mana senses and thought of the airplane's cargo hold.

It took a moment for his mind to lock on his target, but once it did, he felt himself sink into nothingness and pull through a viscous membrane of worlds before reappearing inside the cargo hold.

Instantly, a wave of fatigue crashed into him, his mana almost draining out completely, and he staggered to his knee.

From the side, a yelp of fear echoed as the Major walked into the cargo hold, not expecting there to be someone, or rather, something, in there.

The terrifying look Alex was currently sporting made her pull out a knife from her ankle holster and take a defensive stance immediately.

Alex huffed a bit, looking at her with a chuckle.

"Calm down, Major. It's me, Alex. I'm just using one of my forms to move things from one place to another with convenience," he said, taking deep breaths every few words.

The woman lowered her knife but did not put it away.

"Man. You really are a creepy man. And what is all this? You collecting rocks now?" she asked, pointing at the crystals.

Alex chuckled again.

"You could say that, sure. They are a valuable resource, though, so don't fuck around with them. Now, if you'll give me a second to recuperate, I'll go back and be out of your hair," Alex said, sitting next to the pile.

He plunged his hand inside, grabbed one of the largest crystals, and pulled it out. Looking at it with awe, the mana inside almost pure enough to be on the cusp of forming Aether, Alex crushed the crystal, absorbing its contents before they could dissipate.

In an instant, he felt like a bolt of thunder had energized his body, and the fatigue vanished, his eyes shooting open.

He jumped up, feeling like he had consumed fifteen energy drinks in a row, and shivered at the sense of power coursing through his veins.

He looked at the pile longingly, before shaking his head clear of the thoughts pervading his

mind.

'This is almost like a drug. Dangerous stuff,' he told himself before focusing on his task.

He glanced at the Major, who was looking at him warily, and smiled with his sharp toothy

grin.

"See you later, Major," he said, before closing his eyes and thinking about the dark tunnel again.

The trip back took much less time connecting to, as he had just gone from it and the residual mana of his path still lingered in the space between dimensions.

As he popped back through the veil separating worlds and reappeared in the tunnel, the hype feeling pulsing through him faded instantly.

He felt tired again, but to a much lesser degree. He thanked heaven for that crystal's immense mana content, but knew he had used up a precious resource.

'It was for the greater good,' he thought, imagining all they could do with the rest of the

crystals.

Some of them were the same size and a few of them were even bigger than the one he had consumed. The mana inside them could be used to power so many large spells, or devices, it was worth using one to transport them out of the dungeon.

Looking at his party, as he transformed back into a human, Alex smiled.

"There. They are on the plane, and ready to be brought back home. We can continue clearing this dungeon whenever you guys are ready."