Chương 134: All That Glitters

Cal entered [Meditation] for the last time. He sat cross-legged on the cold basement floor, breathing calmly. The cool reservoir of his Mana core refilled in steady increments, each minute of quiet restoring another portion of his capacity. He held the meditation until he was topped up, the feeling of all that contained energy bolstering his confidence. Then he opened his eyes and stood. He was ready. His spear and shortsword leaned against the wall near the stairwell where he had left them when he came down.

Crossing the basement, he moved both weapons, positioning them on top of his workbench within easy reach... just in case. Let's hope for the best... and plan for the worst. Cal turned to face the center of the room, rolled his shoulders, and cast [Portal]. It had gotten a bit easier, and as the final rune clicked into place the full construct ignited in front of him. He turned his attention to the destination and focused on the memory he needed: the bottom of the cave system in the Rootbound Depths.

Standing in front of the patch of ore, the metal's veins reflecting his magical light in prismatic glimmers. He held the memory and pushed with his Intent to the Spell. What came back was suffocating. Compressed and fractured interlocking layers of shattered rock filled every inch of what had been open space. The perception was frustratingly limited. The Spell's endpoint awareness predominantly relied on vision, and all he could see was crushed earth. Cal adjusted, using his Intent to shift the endpoint's position.

He slid it through the collapsed mass in tiny increments to find… stone. And more stone. A fractured slab angled across a hole little bigger than his leg. Slowly, he continued making adjustments until… A glitter. The ore vein. It had shifted slightly from its original location, with the collapse shearing the surrounding rock and displacing entire sections of the cave wall. But the vein itself was intact, a thick ribbon of bright metallic ore threading through the stone.

Cal locked the endpoint right in front of it and opened the aperture. The portal sliced open in the center of his basement, the rim rippling with spectral distortions. Through the opening he saw exactly what his perception had mapped: a wall of solid rock, sheared perfectly flat where the portal boundary had cleaved through it. The cut had been exacting, the stone's cross-section revealed layers of mineral strata in bands of grey, brown, and black, cleanly bisected.

[Your proficiency with Portal (E) has increased to Practiced] Cal stared at that edge. Holy mackerel! The portal's boundary was terrifying! An infinitely thin line between here and there, and anything caught in the transition simply... ceased to exist in the intervening space. He thought about his desperate dash through the rift with Jakob in his arms and shivered. One stumble. One miscalculation of the aperture's width was all it would take. Man, I could have used this to cut the manacles off Jakob's wrists.

That's wild! I could have sliced through the chains, the iron, the stone, the... Jakob… The thought trailed off into a place he didn't want to follow. Let's focus back on the ore. Yup. He pulled two E-tier Mana potions from his belt pouch and drank them in quick succession, bringing his reserves back up over half. Then he raised his hands, drawing the new runic formation of [Earth Manipulation] into the air before him. The glowing construct flashed as it ignited and shot through the portal.

It met the rock face on the other side and Cal projected his Mana through the Spell deeper into the stone, just as he had with the river rock on his workbench. He guided the Spell's oscillating frequency, tuning it, seeking the moment of alignment. The connection was abrupt. His Mana flooded the mineral structure and through the Spell's feedback he felt the stone surrender its integrity. The rock face yielded, its surface becoming pliable under his will.

Cal urged his Intent, peeling the first layer away from the ore vein. The stone moved like a thick screen of mud, sagging and folding under its own heft as he drew it back. And there it was. The ka-vae'zhar. Dark metal threaded with veins the color of rusty blood, whose streaks caught the light. The ore's aura was unmistakable: a deep, fibrous resonance that vibrated in sympathy with the Stamina coursing through his own body. So full of potential, and now finally within his grasp.

He worked methodically, clearing each layer and exposing the ore to extract what was loose and repeat the cycle. The nearest deposits came free easily, separated from their stone enclosure by the Spell's influence and pulled back through the portal by hand. Each piece was heavy and far denser than its size suggested, the weight of spiritually rich material compressed into a compact form. He stacked the pieces on the basement floor beside the portal. A growing pile of dark, glittering wealth.

The deeper sections required more effort. Cal leaned through the portal, reaching his entire arm into the softened stone. The sensation was strangely alien. Like plunging his arm into wet concrete… except it wasn't wet. The softened stone closed around his forearm and pressed against his skin from all sides, gritty and thick. He groped through the pliable mass, fingers searching for the metallic chunks of ore amid the loosened earth. Again and again. The work was slow and mentally demanding.

Maintaining both [Portal] and [Earth Manipulation] simultaneously required a sustained division of concentration that wore down his mental endurance. Each Spell demanded a different type of focus: [Portal] required a constant feed of Mana to keep the aperture stable while [Earth Manipulation] required active Intent to continuously reshape the stone. Oh, and also more Mana. Managing both felt like trying to hold a conversation while solving math problems, each task using a different part of his mind.

Minutes bled into more minutes. His Mana reserves dipped dangerously low despite the potions. But the ore mound… it grew. Cal extracted one final chunk and let his arm withdraw from the malleable stone. His sleeve was coated in mineral residue and he had grey paste drying on his skin. Stepping back from the portal, he dropped [Earth Manipulation]. The rock face beyond the aperture hardened instantly, locking back to solidity. I'm pretty sure I got everything, but let's do one last check.

He swept a deep scan of his perception through the portal and across the exposed section of rock, searching for any small pieces he might have missed. The beam penetrated the re-hardened stone, mapping the ore's distribution in his mind's eye and identifying a few small fragments. They were embedded too deeply to extract without moving the portal. The accessible portion of the vein was stripped clean. I'd say I got about ninety-eight percent of it. That's a fantastic haul, I reckon!

I think we're— Suddenly his scan caught something else deep in the stone. A spike of spiritual energy. E-tier. The aura was a bruised purple, tasting of minerals and something slimy. It was already close, far closer than anything should have been able to approach without his notice, and it was accelerating toward the portal's endpoint with the single-minded velocity of a missile locked on a target. This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

I-It's moving fast! I need to close the— Too late. The creature exploded through the rock face, its trajectory a fatal miscalculation. It struck the luminous portal boundary head-on and the rift sheared it lengthwise from head to tail. The right half shot into the basement, a gruesome display of twitching muscle and ruptured organs that sprayed gore across his basement. Cal threw himself sideways.

A loop of intestine flew through the air where his head had been, close enough for him to feel the creature's internal heat. He hit the floor in a roll, coming up in a crouch just as the mangled half-corpse slammed into the far wall. He had one heartbeat to register the impossible sight: a bisected giant worm thrashing in its death throes, and beyond the portal, the stone rumbling once more. From the darkness of the carved half-moon tunnel came a second worm that erupted through the aperture.

This one passed through cleanly, expanding the first's tunnel as its entire body threaded the portal's opening. It was massive, easily eight feet long and as thick as Cal's torso. Its body was covered in plates of mineral-encrusted armor, and its mouth was a circular maw of rotating, stone-grinding teeth that spun with a high-pitched whine. And it was currently flying through the air… until it crashed into Cal's workbench. The planks snapped.

Hardwood fractured into a hail of fragments as the two sawhorses beneath were smashed into kindling, the entire structure collapsing in an instant under the worm's immense weight. Tools scattered across the stone floor. His spear and shortsword, propped against the front of the bench, were flung in opposite directions. The spear skittered toward the stairwell while the shortsword spun into a corner beneath a shower of wooden debris.

A third worm followed immediately, launching through the portal and landing on the second in a tangle. The basement became a maelstrom of twisting armored bodies and grinding mouths that crushed everything they touched. Cal finally killed the [Portal]. The tear in reality collapsed inward and vanished without a sound. The two worms went still for a heartbeat, their chaotic flailing interrupted.

They seemed disoriented by the sudden absence of the gateway they had just stormed, but their confusion only lasted a second. It was replaced by a furious, grinding shriek that vibrated through the stone walls and rattled Cal's teeth. [Flicker Step] fired and launched him across the wreckage-strewn floor in a controlled hop. His foot found a clear patch of stone, his hand found the spear shaft, and he came up in a fighting stance with the weapon leveled at the writhing mass.

This would have been a great time for some [Immolation] if I wasn't almost completely tapped on Mana! Instead, Cal swept his perception across the creatures. The bisected front half of the first worm provided an excellent anatomical cross-section, its innards displayed like a textbook diagram. Which… he'd actually seen before! These are stonemaw worms! Mana-sensitive burrowers that ate stone and could just as easily swim through it.

They were also drawn to Mana like moths to flame, and he had been blasting Spells for the last twenty minutes, deep underground. Crumb! Their anatomy was simple and redundant. Beneath the armored segments and revolving teeth were multiple hearts distributed along the length of the body, three in total. The two worms finally untangled, and Cal reverted to his new full-spectrum spatial awareness. He prepared for battle as he took in every detail from ten yards of his current position.

The worms wheeled with horrifying speed for their bulk, their segmented bodies undulating and propelling them across the stone floor. Both oriented on Cal simultaneously, likely drawn by his use of Mana. Then they lunged. [Flicker Step] The first worm flared with Mana the instant before the creature dove headfirst into the basement wall behind where Cal had been standing. Stone parted around its body like water, the calcified chitin phasing through solid rock without resistance.

The worm disappeared into the foundation, leaving only a faint change in the surface. The second worm slammed into the wall with a concussive boom that cracked the stone and showered Cal with dust and debris. The impact stunned it for a critical second. Its armored body went rigid, teeth spinning down to a stuttering halt. He thrust through the worm's armored hide between the segments and the creature convulsed. Cal ripped the spear free and plunged it back in, targeting the heart-map burning in his perception.

He destroyed the first heart, then a second. Black ichor jetted from the wounds, coating his hands and forearms. As he braced to drive the spear home a final time, his perception blared a warning. The burrower had charged back. Its purple aura accelerated through the bedrock, rocketing directly toward his position. Cal put his weight into the final thrust, silencing the last heart of the stunned worm before quickly diving aside.

In the same instant, the burrower erupted from the floor just to his right in a volley of stone shards. He was a fraction too slow. A shrill screech filled the air as whirring teeth tore through his body like paper. A burning channel of agony ripped across his back, gouging deep into the muscle of his right shoulder as the force of the blow hurled him across the room. He slammed into the far wall. While the worm disappeared into the stone with a twist of displaced matter, Cal slid to the floor.

Pain flared all over, momentarily short-circuiting his brain. He tried to push himself up but his right arm wasn't responding correctly. Gritting his teeth against the fire in his shoulder, Cal used his left hand to shove himself into a kneeling position. Blood soaked his shirt, hot and slick down his back. He tracked the burrower's aura beneath the floor as it resumed its circling. It's coming back! The worm burst from the floor three feet to Cal's left.

Stone exploded upward in a geyser of fragments this time as the creature charged again, teeth grinding. Cal fired [Flicker Step] and hopped backward, the teeth missing his leg by inches. The worm sailed through the empty air where he'd just stood and sank back into the opposite wall, melting into the stone without damaging it. The creature surfaced again from the east wall, hurtling sideways in a spray of dust and shattered rock. Cal dodged and it bored into the floor.

Next it broke through so high on the wall it clipped the ground level flooring, raining chunks of stone and old timber that Cal batted aside with the spear shaft. Each attack lasted less than a second, the worm's body flying through foundation and air without pause, stone and earth yielding to its whim as though it had no right to stop it. And each pass it decided not to phase, the thing tore another piece of his basement apart. This little bastard is destroying my house! Cal followed the aura.

It was circling again, deeper this time, gathering momentum. He planted his feet on the most empty section of floor he could find and readied the spear, fighting past the pain in his right arm as he marshalled his Stamina in preparation. Come on you nasty little bugger... make my day. It blasted from the floor directly in front of him, angled upward, teeth swirling at full velocity. Cal immediately darted to the side for distance and followed up with a [Lancing River].

He timed the worm's trajectory, pivoting on his back foot as it shot past. The full kinetic chain of [Lancing River] drove his spear sideways into the creature's flank, the Ability firing even better at E-tier than it had at F. With a sickening crunch, the claw-iron tip punched through the armored plating at a seam and tore through the worm's body in a spray of black ichor, exiting on the far side. [Your proficiency with Lancing River (E) has resolved to Practiced] Cal released the spear.

The worm's momentum carried it across the basement and it struck the back wall as it tried to phase through. The spear shaft, now skewering the creature perpendicularly, took the full force of the impact. Ash wood groaned but held as the creature thrashed and attempted to dig forward. It was hanging halfway up the wall, a third of its body submerged in the earth. The tail whipped around, ridged plates scraping against the wall and floor. It was too disoriented to try to pull itself out. For the moment.

He was already moving. [Dash] fired, launching him across the ruined basement toward the pile of debris where his shortsword had fallen. He dug through the splintered wood, found the hilt, and wrenched it free. Another [Dash] brought him back to the pinned worm. Its thrashing had slowed and it began backing itself out of the hole. Three hearts beat with panicked energy inside it, all of them missed by the spear's lateral path. Two were in the exposed tail section and the third was still buried within the stone.

Pouring his Intent into his body, Cal channeled his Stamina and swung the shortsword in a vicious vertical arc aimed at the thick hide between two hardened plates. The steel screeched as it bit into the mineral-laced chitin but his strength forced it deep. Muscle and organ parted. With a final push, he dragged the blade through the rest of the creature's body. [New Skill Gained: Severing Slash (E) - Novice] The worm's long tail section dropped to the floor.

It convulsed wildly, a headless serpent spasming as its two secondary hearts continued to beat in his senses. Cal stepped over the twitching remains and drove his shortsword upward into the worm's exposed underside, dodging his own spear as he plunged the blade into the section still within the foundation. The final heart was pierced. The worm went rigid in a death spasm before it finally went limp.

[Your proficiency with Shortsword Thrust (E) has increased to Practiced] Casting aside his shortsword after seeing it was damaged, he withdrew his spear from the dead part of the worm to quickly dispose of the remaining hearts. He gazed over the carnage, standing in the ruins of his basement breathing hard. Splintered wood covered the floor. Pools of ichor spread outward from the bodies, merging into a dark puddle that crept toward the corner furthest from the stairs. His walls had multiple holes in them.

The floor, too. And in the center of it all, barely touched by the carnage, the ore pile glittered.