Damon's Ascension-Chapter 94: Assembling The Team 3

"I’ll keep things short and succinct. We are facing a life and death crisis no less dangerous than before, and you were there with me the first time, so you know that what I mean is very serious," Damon began after greeting them, his smile fading slightly. freewёbnoνel.com

The young man’s tone shifted, becoming serious as the gathered group of elites focused on his words.

Each person here had their own style, their own strengths, and their own problems, but they were at least somewhat obedient to his authority and also wanted what was best for the human race to an extent.

"A couple hours ago, I had the change to talk to the Universe Will," Damon began, glancing around the room.

"You did what...?!" Xela asked in shock, mirroring the feeling of the other humans here.

Damon nodded to her and continued on. "It confirmed something rather unpleasant. Apparently, our race has a flaw, a genuine defect in how we process Worldly Essence."

There was a stir in the group, a few narrowed eyes, others silently frowning as they thought of what Damon was talking about and what it could be.

He did not keep them in suspense as he confirmed the suspicions of some. "It described it as a law embedded into our very form. That’s why our leveling cooldowns are so bad, why the Worldy Essense we need to ascend doubles every Level, and why we might fall behind every other race despite our potential."

There was a burst of murmurs among the group as they shared looks and confirmed that they too had noticed this doubling issue while leveling up, not to mention that Damon himself had already given an announcement about the cooldown issue earlier.

He even made a law preventing them from sharing details about it, so once people focused on that, they naturally thought about the Worldly Essence side and felt alarm at the rising costs.

Connor Baines folded his arms, leaning against a bulkhead. "Let me guess, the solution involves kneeling to the Universe Will and smiling while it pats us on the head then kiss the ring?"

"You’re actually not far off, it did offer that solution by having us invest heavily in Providence," Damon answered with a smirk.

Felicia took over. "From my own experience, each point invested in Providence reduces the Worldly Essence requirement per Level by 1%, though there are other solutions available."

Damon continued. "A more effective solution it proposed is to bathe in something called the Primordial Lake. Unfortunately, it lies deep in the Chaos Realm, an undiscovered area by the IUAS, but it can fix us permanently."

Kyle leaned forward, eyes sharp behind his mop of white hair. "So we go there, soak in magic water, and suddenly we’re cured? Sounds like a shounen plot-line, extremely adventure-based and conveniently solving a critical issue blocking the protagonist’s path."

"Hey, it kinda is, isn’t it?" Henry agreed, grinning.

The fellow paused and chuckled grimly. "Only difference is, this ’arc’ comes with permadeath."

"Not necessarily. With Xela here, at least one of us gets an extra life every 24 hours. Once she reaches a higher Stage, our chance of survival will increase even further. For this endeavor, our survival may very well hinge on her. Still, it would be in our best interest to preserve our lives as best we can." Felicia glanced at Xela askance, who was startled to be mentioned.

"Yeah, leave it to me! If you die, I will cry above your corpse for a few seconds before resurrecting you, so that you at least have one person who cares about you apart from your mother!" She snarked spiritedly with a ’peace’ sign.

"But what if Xela herself is taken down?" Bane McGregor asked in a deep voice.

Damon shook his head. "We can’t let that happen, no matter the cost. In the grand scheme of things, our lives are expendable, hers isn’t. We must invest heavily in her protection because as long as she makes it back, we can all be revived in time."

The group nodded in understanding.

"It is common sense to protect the healer, but this healer also acts as our Dragon Balls, so we cannot make a mistake." Kyle Greer agreed fully, understanding the stakes in his own unique way.

Marshal, who remained quiet for the most part, suddenly spoke. "What is the plan for the Chaos Realm? Do we have the location, the requirements, and anything else?"

"The Universe Will was gracious enough to provide me with a map of the location that leads to the place from the nearest drop point that IUAS has available, though that still requires us to cross over 5 areas. Of these 5 areas, three are F-Grade in terms of danger, one is E-Grade, and the place we are going to remains unexplored but is estimated to be at least D-Grade." Damon explained.

He then continued. "To have even a chance at surviving more than a few seconds, we need to reach at least Level 30. The Universe Will made it clear, without at least four Avatars, it’s a suicide mission. And beyond that, I’ll need the strongest humans available to go in with me."

"Us," Felicia corrected, stepping beside him.

Damon nodded. "Yes. Us. We’ll go together."

Nicholas adjusted his cufflinks. "No alternatives?"

Damon sighed. "Yes and no. It did mention a chance for us to be cleansed using Chaos Essence at each Level, but it also made one thing abundantly clear. It would rather die than share even a sliver of that precious resource."

Levi’s deep voice rumbled low. "But yet, we are supposed to risk life and limb to fetch this resource and wholeheartedly hand it over?"

"Exactly, unfair as it is, we have no choice because it makes the rules. We’re just lucky it cannot directly enslave us... yet." Damon stated gloomily.

There was a spell of cold silence after that.

"Okay, leaving aside that non-alternative, how do we reach the minimum Level necessary? Since you made us come here, I assume you have a shortcut to that end, otherwise you could have told us over the phone so we could grind hard at our local areas." Protizen Echo analyzed calmly.

Damon nodded. "That’s correct. Grinding through Essence Instances is far too inefficient in our situation. It would take us years to reach the Level 30 threshold right now. So instead, we’ll purchase it in bulk from Trust and Trades for our entire group."

"Enough to pay the penalty and to level you up right to Level 30... or slightly higher if we have money for that." Felicia added while folding her arms.

"Pay to win, sounds great, but how do we go about that?" Henry Jasek asked with interest.

"We’ll have to travel outside the solar system and use the Galactic Union’s quantum tunnels to reach the Dairma Galaxy, specifically the planet Kusibo. There is a physical entrance to the Trust and Trades special realm there which we’ll use to receive the Worldly Essence in person." Damon explained with a smile as he opened his VQD’s holographic display and showed them the map.

The Dairma galaxy was around 40 galaxies away to the northwestern side of the Milky Way, slightly above us by a bit.

"That’s dangerous, no? Aren’t there stuff like space pirates and the like?" Kyle Greer asked with a frown.

"There are, but they won’t dare to strike at us once we identify ourselves as humans. Space pirates can only bully lower-ranked species, never those in the top 50. Otherwise, the various items Damon ordered to be delivered to the Milky Way would have been pillaged halfway." Felicia answered with a chuckle of confidence.

"No other dangers?" Nicholas Spencley asked while checking his pocket watch.

"A few, but they shall be mitigated due to our transport," Damon responded placidly.

Xela raised her hand politely. "And if we all die despite the mitigations?"

Damon looked her dead in the eye. "Then humanity stays crippled... and eventually collapses, while we watch on from the afterlife."

The room went silent.

"So, any questions before we begin this endeavor?" Damon continued, voice steady.

"Yeah, what exactly are we gonna use to get there? This spaceship belonging to that vampire guy?" Henry asked while looking around.

"No. I originally wanted to wait until we’d mastered the technology ourselves before building our own, but even on the fastest timeline, that’s still over a year away. We’ll purchase a ship outright and have it delivered here, now. Sometimes, money really does solve everything." Damon stated with a smile.

"Ohhhh! Do you have a model in mind?" Xela asked with excitement, the faces of the others changing with interest.

Damon gestured for them to follow him. "Not yet, that’s why I called you all here. We’ll use the VR pods to head to the marketplace to select a spaceship together. And while we’re at it, we’ll also place the order for our Worldly Essence. This might end up being the largest single order ever placed by any one race in a single sitting, so they’ll need time to get it ready."

"This is a worthwhile endeavor, I feel uplifted being a part of the selection for a mothership." Kyle Greer stated, his dull eyes slightly wider than usual as his breathing was heavy.

"Agreed, my body is trembling with excitement at the thought!" Protizen Echo stated, passing a hand through his short dreadlocks to calm himself down.

Seeing them like this, Xela was puzzled while Felicia rolled her eyes. Even Bane McGregor, Levi Thane, and Marshal, who treated their words like gold, were visibly excited and walked briskly, as if they couldn’t wait.

"Tsk, boys and their toys." Felicia muttered under her breath, making Xela giggle.