Chapter 170: Entering The Portal
After getting the information he wanted Dhruv quickly put the core in his ring and began to walk toward the group that was beginning to regroup.
He stopped in front of the group, to attract the attention of everyone. Within a minute he got what he wanted and now everyone’s attention was placed on him.
Looking at the rows of people in front of him, Dhruv announced,
"So, we have achieved our goals for today.... I thank everyone for participating in this battle, and of course, how can we forget the members of those four groups who had defeated the boss."
As he said those lines, a round of applause rang throughout the jungle. Every single one of them had a smile on their face. The scene was almost unreal; they were smiling as if they hadn’t fought with monsters but had gone to a party instead.
Dhruv let the applause continue for half a minute before continuing...
"I hope every one of you has managed to learn something about fighting, today. If not, then you will get chances like these again and again. Until then, try to learn from them," he said as he pointed towards a particular group of people.
Everyone followed his hand direction and looked at who they were. They weren’t surprised to find that Dhruv was pointing toward the observer group.
After talking with them for a few more minutes, Dhruv told them to return to the overworld. He also mentioned that he would survey the second floor, and if it were safe enough, tomorrow, they would get a chance to fight with the monster once again.
Saying his goodbyes, he signaled Thala and his group to lead the way. Thala did as he was told, and after a minute, there was nobody in front of those barren villages, except Dhruv, Alaric, and lots of dead bodies.
Dhruv looked at Alaric and ordered, "Go and get Vexar from the sweeping team."
Alaric nodded and dived down into Dhruv’s shadow. Two minutes later, he emerged from the same shadow once again, but this time with another person with him.
"You called me, master," Vexar asked as he bowed his head in front of Dhruv.
Dhruv signaled him to lift himself as he replied,
"So, how was your day, Vexar?" While asking this question there was a cheeky smile on his face, as if he had told a very funny joke.
Dhruv was sure that if anyone beside him were to ask this question while being in front of this demon, they would be incinerated within seconds.
Vexar looked at Dhruv, with a smile on his face, and replied, "It was okay, master. All I did was cut the trees and kill any beasts that were in the perimeter. It wasn’t as exciting as killing these monsters but it wasn’t that boring either.
Hearing the last line, Dhruv remembered that after conquering the first villages, he had indeed ordered his group not to kill any beasts so Vexar could have something to play with.
’So, it wasn’t that bad,’ Dhruv thought.
"Great, I’m happy that it wasn’t boring," Dhruv mumbled as he looked in a particular direction.
He quickly opened his map and began to scroll around trying to find something on it. After a while, he stopped when an area pinned with a marker appeared within his sight. There was also a name above the pin and the name was "Portal Cave."
Dhruv looked at the cave and then scrolled back to his location. After some thinking, he found that he was quite close to the cave’s location. Without wasting any time, he signaled the duo to follow him.
After a few minutes of travel, he reached the place where the cave was. The area around the cave wasn’t all green anymore. There was almost no sign of life in front of the cave’s entrance.
Now the only sign there was of human trails and it was all around the cave. These trails had been formed when the crafter had come to mine the iron clusters.
Dhruv entered the well-lit cave. After traveling for a bit, he finally reached the place where the portal to the second floor was. Taking a deep breath, he thought of getting the core out of his ring, and within seconds, all the cores were in his hand.
When all four cores got together, there was no reaction between them, but Dhruv felt that something had happened, he just couldn’t figure out what it was.
Not wanting to waste his time, he began to walk closer to the portal. After reaching a hand’s distance from that thing, he looked at the four holes beside the portal and sighed!
Taking a deep breath, he picked one of the cores from his palm and began to take it closer to the hole. The hole he had decided on was at the top right corner.
The moment the distance between the core and the hole came down to 10 cm, something bizarre happened.
’Shit, that scared the crap out of me,’ Dhruv was awed to see that the core was sucked right into the hole the moment they got close.
Dhruv looked at the core and found out that those two had been fused almost perfectly; there wasn’t even a hair-wide gap between both of their surfaces.
’Is it getting sucked because both of them were a pair, or is it that any of them could fit in any of the holes,’ Dhruv thought as he looked at the rest of the three cores in his hand.
He picked up one of the cores once again, but this time he grabbed it with all his might so the hole couldn’t fuse with it. He was scared for a second that it might break like a mana core, but that didn’t happen.
Slowly, he moved the core closer to the hole—bottom right corner—, and when the distance between them reached 10 cm, the attraction force happened once again. The only difference was that the core didn’t fly out of his hand.
Dhruv quickly pulled his hand from that hole and began to move it toward the hole in the top left corner. When the distance between the core and the hole was only 10 cm, the attraction happened once again.
’So, any core could fit in any hole. I don’t know when it could be helpful, but I sure know it now.’ A chuckle escaped his mouth as he thought of this.
Dhruv let go of that core into the top left corner and picked up another core. After placing the other two in their respective holes, he began to wait for the magic to happen.
it didn’t take long for the magic to start happening.
A few seconds after placing all four of the cores in their respective holes, the outer part of the portal began to illuminate. Suddenly, the light was so bright that Dhruv, Alaric, and Vexar were forced to close their eyes.
Before they could even adapt to the blinding light, the sound of something breaking began to echo in the cave.
Crack! Crack! Crack!...
It sounded like the glass was breaking in front of them. Just a few moments after the sound had come, the light around the portal began to get dull.
After opening his eyes, Dhruv began to inspect the portal in front of him with great care. Even after inspecting the portal for about a minute, he was surprised to find that there wasn’t any change in it.
The cores were still in their respective holes, all the holes were in their own place, and there wasn’t any change in the portal either. Even after checking it with mana sense, Dhruv wasn’t able to find anything.
’So, nothing happened to it physically or magically,’ Dhruv thought as he walked towards it for the purpose of entering it.
The moment he was about to enter the portal, Alaric got in front of him and stopped his entry into the portal.
"I’m sorry for being in your way, Master, but there was something weird just now. Let me go through it first, and if it’s safe, then you can enter," Alaric suggested.
Dhruv looked at the Shadow Lord in front of him. He was trying to say that it wouldn’t be that bad, and even if there were any danger, he could handle it on his own.
Dhruv faced Alaric and was about to express these thoughts but stopped when he noticed Alaric’s eyes. The moment he looked into the pitch-black eyes, he knew that there was nothing that could convince Alaric now.
The thing Dhruv saw in his eyes was nothing but... Pure Determination. Determination to stop any and every danger from reaching Dhruv.
"Okay!!" Dhruv agreed and let him enter the portal first.
Alaric swiftly walked forward and entered the portal. Within a split of a second, he disappeared from the cave. Looking at the empty portal in front of him, Dhruv suddenly realized something.
’Shit, how will he transfer his message if there were to be any danger?’ Dhruv thought.
After receiving the mark and its feature of communication from a distance, Dhruv often forgot that it wouldn’t work when two people were in different realms.
He was about to panic but heaved a sigh of relief when he noticed that Alaric had emerged from the portal.
"It’s safe, master," Alaric passed the news.
Dhruv nodded and walked into the portal. His mind went blank for a second once again. After gaining control of his senses, he quickly opened his eyes.
"..." Dhruv couldn’t help but exclaim as he looked at the scene in front of him.
