During the trip back to the Poisonous Forest, I let Nix go on her own with Kira and Sophia keeping her company, so the trip would be much shorter at the speed of these three.
During this time I formally introduced Nicolas to everyone, his Golem body was like a large metal puppet a little taller than me, his appearance very reminiscent of a robot.
At the turning of the eyes he only had two magic sphere-shaped crystals attached, he used these crystals to see and use some utilitarian type magic.
The Core that is where his Soul is was placed in a space in the chest of the metallic body, the head had no hair, mouth, nose, or ears, but the functions were all working from that body from what Nicolas said.
Nicolas was still sad that this was just a test body from the past and not the body he took so long to build.
Nicolas and Rakan quickly became friends, I think they saw the passion for magical research in each other.
Nicolas also became good friends with Anton, he was very excited to have a Dwarf with an affinity for the metal element to help out, he made a point of befriending him, purely for reasons of interest.
Nicolas hasn't met Lyra yet, but I'm sure the two of them will get along, I realized they're the same kind of person, the kind that drowns in their own work.
Nicolas's metallic body had very rigid and restricted movements since it was a test body as he had said before.
I asked if he would want to build a new body, but to my surprise, he said no, it seems that around the time I left him in the room as a simple disembodied core, Lilith talked to him and told him about my awakening abilities.
He was very fascinated by my abilities and knew it could be useful to bind his soul more permanently into a body he builds, so he wants to show that he deserves such a gift.
He doesn't know that I grant awakening as it suits me and not out of merit, but I think it's okay, it would be nice to see him work before I spend my power on him.
Nicolas said that before starting his research he will transcribe all his knowledge back into books, that's why all the books and research he did in the past were destroyed when he was captured.
He said that he always had copies of his work scattered around several libraries in dozens of different Realms on another continent, he did this so that his research would not be lost even if he died in some experiment in his laboratory, it seems that he has already blown up many laboratories and his real body was scarred with many scars, he even admitted that he almost died on one occasion.
It looks like he's going to stay 1 or 2 months just writing books, it looks like this knowledge was stored inside the metallic body, he hid storage crystals there to always have his research hidden near him, it looks like he did the same thing with the perfect body that created before, but which has sadly been destroyed.
He wants to get everything into the books because he needs to empty those storage crystals that serve as extra memory for him.
I asked Leonardo to start building a laboratory in the city, and asked to be close to the square if possible, he said he would take care of everything and I told him to ask Nicolas about his designer preferences.
While the magical engineering lab is not ready, Nicolas will spend his time in the library writing his books and keeping them there.
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It took a little over two weeks to get back to the Poisonous Forest, right at the entrance Nix found an Elf who recognized Sophia, he was carrying a big monster with magic, the monster was still alive and looked like a buffalo over 2 meters tall.
Nix warned me and I asked her to keep me updated.
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A few days later Nix announces that we have arrived at the village of the Elves, she opens the Dungeon letting me and some others go out to enter the village all together, everyone in this village knows about the Dungeon and we have no reason to hide here.
When I enter the Village with Orion's puppy form and little Layla on the other shoulder, I have difficulty walking because Hinata clung to me from the front, I had to ask her to let go of me to be able to walk better, so she started to fly by my side.
When we entered the village I was surprised to see a small forest well organized inside with streets passing between one tree and another.
In almost all the trees that were quite big, there were people using magic to modify the trees by creating houses inside the trees, there were also some people building houses on top of the trees.
I look around and I don't see the destroyed remains of the houses or the holes married by the battle that I had in the past, they had put a lot of effort in rebuilding.
As we passed many waved at us, mainly children and women, there were also some men among them.
These were people who stayed hidden in the Dungeon, those who didn't wave to us still had smiles on their faces when they saw us.
We were guided to a set of five trees that combined into a complex set of interconnected houses with inside trees and houses on top of trees.
It was very beautiful but too complex to move around inside, and it was still under construction with dozens of Elves working on it.
I was taken inside, it seems that even though the construction is not finished, there were already people working there, according to our guide who guarded the gate we entered through, this was the government building where all decisions are made.
I was taken inside straight to a meeting room where only Joseph had piles of papers around him.
He sees me with a smile on his face and many thanks, it looks like his family was among the families that went to take refuge in the Dungeon during the Monster Wave.
Joseph wanted to sit down and tell me how everything has been about rebuilding the village, I sat down with him to listen as I was interested in how the rebuild was going.