Chapter 107 – Level A Threshold

As Dream flew into the factory, he answered the call from Riddick.

"Hello?"

"Its me."

"Hi."

"Hi. So mind telling me what exactly happened? Sophia didn't want to."

"...Well, funny story. I kind of got carried away with an experiment."

"Of course you did. And the experiment this time involved putting new starts in the sky?"

"Uhh...Not intentionally."

"*sigh* So why were you unresponsive for so long?"

"I got really tired and had a little nap."

"A 4 day long nap."

"Yes."

"..."

Riddick went quiet over the phone for a bit.

"...Nevermind. Now, would you like to explain the other weird lights in the sky? Assuming of course you experiment cause it."

"Weird lights?"

"Yea. All those colorful streams of lights. We've seen them every night since I lost contact with you."

"...Hang on."

'Sophia?'

Dream went to Sophia, who already had an answer.

[Because of the blast and the radiation that was released, the magnetic field of this planet was messed with a bit and caused auroras of light to spread for tens of thousands of miles, over half the planet. And for the past four days, the lights haven't stopped. In fact, If you look over there to the dark side of the planet, you can see it.]

Dream looked to where Sophia pointed. He saw the dark horizon of the planet and sure enough, up in the atmosphere were streams of light looking just like the aurora borealis. 

'...I guess we really put on a light show.'

[Indeed. It's fortunate that this didn't happen over a planet like earth or it would've caused planet-wide electronic disturbances.]

Dream nodded. It was fine to do it here, kind of, but he probably shouldn't elsewhere. He turned his attention back to Riddick.

"Uhh...Ya. Those lights were me. The flash cause those lights, and I caused the flash."

"Figures. So what the hell were you doing up there?"

"Nothing much. Just breaking matter apart on a fundamental level and releasing radiation and heat levels equivalent to the core of the sun. Like I said, an experiment. They don't always go well."

"Well if you're fine and done with your experiment then get down here. Idona and Ciroc are wondering where you went and I'm not able to give them an answer."

"Alright, alright. I'll be down there in an hour."

"Good."

With that, they hung up. Dream sighed and continued looking around the factory.

It was mostly the same as before. All the machines to process the material were there and the storage where all the metal was placed was slowly being filled back up. Dream felt his heart ache when he saw the small pallets of ingots.

[The scanner drones are finding more deposits as we speak. We won't have issues with resources as long as we aren't making another army or causing any more nuclear reactions.]

"Alright. So out of curiosity, how was a nuclear reaction set off? We don't have uranium."

[My best guess is that the air inside the factory went and fused, causing a fusion reaction.]

"Hmm...And that's why there's no air in this one?"

[Precisely.]

The first thing dream noticed when he entered the new factory was that it wasn't pressurized with air, unlike before. Not that he cared. He didn't need air to function and could survive the vacuum of space. It was just something he picked up on. And this was apparently the reason.

"Learning from our mistakes. Nice."

[...Yea.]

"No matter. If there's nothing I need to do, then let's head down. Aegis."

"My lord."

Aegis flowed out from under his clothes and conglomerated in his humanoid form. Dream looked him over.

"You alright?"

"I am, my lord. I appreciate the concern."

"Good. Thanks for the save."

"Lady Sophia was the one with the intuition, I just carried out orders."

"To the best of your ability. So I thank you for that."

"...I appreciate the thanks, my lord."

"Sure. Now let's get back to the planet."

When he said that, Aegis turned into a liquid and enveloped Dream. He then left the factory and headed down to the location of the expedition party.

His body created a hot streak through the sky as he cut through the atmosphere. It wasn't long before the party was in sight.

*Woosh*

*Thunk*

Dream set himself down inside the carriage after taking Aegis off. Everyone inside snapped towards him.

"...You're here."

"I am."

Riddick spoke to him first with a bit of a surprised expression. Dream tilted his head.

"I see you've gotten stronger, Dream. That trip must've been fruitful for you."

Idona spoke after scanning him. Ciroc also scanned him and nodded.

"Uhh, I guess?"

Dream just took a seat next to Riddick, confused. 

[Check your status.]

'...Status.'

Dream listened and checked himself out.

|Profile|

Name: Dream

Species: Human Male

Class: [Master Artificer]

Titles: [Origin Seeker]

Level: 164

Stats: Strength- B      Agility- B+

Stamina- B       Magic- A-

Passive Skills: [Sophia] Lvl. 81, [Magic] Lvl. 68

Active Skills: [Summons From Another World], [Material Magic] Lvl. 61

'...Poggers.'

Dream just stared at the screen for a bit, excited.

Sophia went up by 12 levels, Magic went up by 17, and even material magic went up by 10. His Stamina stat went up from B- to B and his Agility stat went up to B+, which was nice. But the best part was his mana that increased from B+ to A-. It finally reached the A tier!

Dream put on a silly smile. The others nodded knowingly, figuring that he opened his status. 

"Congratulations. I can now understand your disappearance. Crossing the Grade A threshold isn't easy. You are now considered a peak combatant in this world."

"Thanks."

Dream nodded to Ciroc who praised him. 

He hadn't really noticed earlier because he had his mind on other things. But when he checked himself and his mana pool out, he indeed saw that it was much deeper and denser than before.

'There really is a big difference between B+ and A-. I didn't think it would be so big.'

[You gained mana not only from stressing your soul, but also leveling your skills. And with your mana increasing your other stats follow suit to a certain extent. Though draining your mana and stamina to its absolute bottom also helped with that.]

'Probably. That really did hurt though. Not a fan of that training method.'

Dream remembered the pain from his soul that made his eyes roll back. He had pushed himself to the limit, even though it didn't look like it on the outside. 

"Let me catch you up since you're back."

Ciroc leaned over to the table in front of them and unfurled the map.

"We've gone through several villages and killed plenty of class 3's. I'm beginning to get more uneasy about this since every village we went through had more class 3's than the previous. In this most recent battle, we fought 6. Though we still outnumber them now, I can't say the same for when we cross the land bridge and fight through their own territory. Speaking of, we're going to be arriving at the land bridge in a few days.

After we get there though, we're going to be mostly blind. The scouts can't map everything for us, and we're going to be filling in things as we go. *sigh* Mapping is gonna be a pain in the ass. Anyway, we're going to be coming up on another village within the next hour. Dream."

"I'll go."

"I figured. We'll send some others as well."

"Can I go alone?"

"Can you handle at least 6 class 3's? Mind you, these aren't the weaker ones you fought earlier. These ones are more developed. And you will die should you mess up."

"...I guess I could take one or two people."

"Wise choice. I would hate to see you die after you just crossed the threshold. Riddick, keep an eye on your student."

"Sure."

Riddick glanced over to Dream for a moment before closing his eyes in thought. Dream sat back and did a check on his inventory in preparation for the battle.

'Flux bullets, swords, flux guns, Aegis, all check. Speaking of, we should see about upgrading Aegis. We've got better materials.'

[We would have to take a day to do it, but that would be no problem. Aegis has the function of assimilating materials, which we can easily use to upgrade him. Not only that, but we could modify the liquid mana inside him. I've got ideas on how to better utilize it than we did before.]

'Sure.'

Dream nodded and sat back. 

It wasn't long before they arrived at the next village. When everyone stepped out of the carriages, they were surprised to see Dream already walking over to it. 

As he took his pretty little time, Dream scanned the demon outpost in front of him.

'11,000 demons class 2 and below. 7 class 3's, all of which have slightly higher mana levels than me.'

[Their auras too. They're strong. Maybe it's because you've reached the A mana levels, but your sensitivity to auras is greater. Or they're just that much stronger than the ones we fought before.]

'Maybe. Either way, they're stronger.'

"Dream."

Riddick flew over and landed next to him.

"We've got quite the force, Old Man."

"Indeed. What's your plan?"

"I was planning on not taking the same approach as before. From what I can see, there's 3 melee, 2 ranged, and 2 mages. They're well rounded, and I'll get caught in a sticky situation should I be too upfront."

"Smart judgment."

"So that leaves a stealthier approach. They already know about the existence of your and everyone else behind us, but not me."

"Hm? But I can see you fine. How can they not?"

"You can see me fine because I've allowed you to. But to them, all they see is a man talking to himself while walking to his doom."

"..."

"Anyway, I think I can handle this myself. Just give me a minute or so to set myself up. I haven't fought stealth in a while."

"...*sigh* Fine. Have fun."

"Mhmm."

With that, Dream suddenly disappeared from Riddick's view. Not only that, but every trace of his mana was undetectable by Riddick. The dirt on the ground didn't shift, there was no movement in the air, absolutely nothing to indicate that Dream even existed. 

"...He really has gotten stronger. It wasn't even that long ago that he couldn't hide from me."

Riddick sighed as he suddenly felt a bit older. Though that only lasted for a second before he lifted his head and rose to the air.

As he floated in the air, he looked down on the village. He could see 7 large sources of mana and thousands of demons crowded among the buildings and outside. The 7 sources of mana also sensed him and went out to observe him.

"3 melee, 2 ranged, 2 mages. He really was right. Though I wonder how he's going to assassinate them."

Riddick stayed in the air while watching the demons. The ranged demons loosed a few arrows at him to poke around a bit and he just deflected them. The melee demons almost went over to attack, but seeing the powerful force behind the man in the air, they decided not to. 

After watching each other for a minute, Riddick suddenly saw something. One of the ranged demons at the back of the group suddenly had its head lopped off. Though right as the head began to fall off the demon's shoulders, it placed itself back, like it had never been decapitated. There wasn't any blood nor sound, and even the body's movements were totally normal.

Not long after, the other ranged demon in the back also had its head sliced from its neck, but just like last time, it never fell and things looked totally normal. This happened once more for one of the mages, but right as its head was cut, there was a change in its aura. It wasn't huge, but it was enough for it to garner the attention of the other 4 demons.

"Hrm?"

One melee demon wet over to the dead mage and looked him over. Then out of nowhere, the demon punched the dead doll, blowing it away.

"...Assassi-!"

The melee demon cried out, but right as it did, it had its head lopped off. The 2 melee and 1 mage demon clearly saw this and activated their mana. The mage cast a few very powerful spells, and when they finished a hazy figure could be seen not far away from it. It rapidly closed distance and sliced at the demon.

*Shring!*

*Shatter!*

A blade went and clashed against a shield around the mage. And although it didn't go through, it still shattered the shield. The melee demons saw this and went to go slash the hazy figure, but as they approached, it suddenly disappeared.

"...My spell-!"

*Bang!*

A loud explosion rang out, and the mages head blown to bits. Even the shield that it had put back up was instantly broken through.

With the mage dead and the hazy outline gone, the melee demons panicked but stuck together. They went back to back.

In the air, Riddick was watching the whole thing, as was everyone else behind him above the carriages. Everyone was surprised.

"He's gotten stronger since he disappeared."

"I can't even see him. Is he an assassin?"

"But he's an enchanter, right?"

"But he uses those ranged weapons and swords. What kind of an assassin is that?"

"What level is he anyway? Definitely around 260 right?"

Everyone speculated off to the side while Riddick listened. He just shook his head. Only he knew what level Dream really was, though that made him seem even more terrifying than he should be. Maybe ignorance was bliss.

It didn't take long for the two melee demons to be cornered and killed under Dream's super-powered bullets. The amazing thing about the bullets was that if one didn't work, you just used more. Even if the demons could survive one shot to the chest or head, they couldn't survive a dozen. 

Dream soon appeared next to the 7 demon corpses and collected them into his inventory. Meanwhile, the 11,000 other demons around him looked on at him and the disappeared corpses in bewilderment. 

"...I guess I should clear out these guys too."

200 blades suddenly appeared around him, pointed towards the demons. Without another word, they zoomed off and began reaping the lives of all the demons in the area. 

Not more than 5 minutes later, Dream was walking back to the carriages without a speck of blood on him. Everyone descended and watched him. Riddick also followed behind.

Ciroc and Idona at the front stared at him with approving faces.

"Good job. Looks like you really didn't need help. I didn't know you had such a powerful stealth skill."

Ciroc complimented him. Dream nodded.

"Thanks. Though that mage messed me up. Maybe I should have saved him for last. Though I didn't have a decent angle to get these melee demons."

"Maybe instead of going around the back like you did, coming from above would have been good." (Idona)

"Hmm, that's true."

"Though using that building was a wise choice as well. Flying can cause mana fluctuations and give away your position. So it's not like your attention to detail is bad at all." (Ciroc)

"Thanks."

Dream smiled to them, but on the inside he was a bit disappointed.

'I still can't hide from them huh.'

By giving him that advice, they inadvertently told him that they could see him while in stealth. He of course wanted to know this information, but didn't want to ask them directly. So he took another route, which worked.

[We can't be too greedy. They're still class 4's. Their power is on another level. Not to mention the variety of skills they might have. But don't worry, we should be able to get there soon.]

Dream nodded to her. He was also confident in this, and the levels he gained during the slaughter upped this confidence even more.