Sam wondered what he should do with the Sentinel’s Watch as they walked away from the area. The first thing was that he asked if it would still work fine if it was in the Item Box, but something in his mind told him right away that it couldn’t see or react to things packed down like that. Which had Sam fish out one of the old, large-dagger scabbards he had stored away and fasten that to his chest. Taking some time to alter it to make sure it fit both him and the dagger.

  [ Conditions met. ]

  “Fuck,” Sam started panicing. “Janik, the thing is happening again.” He blurted out as he expected to be transported away the next second.

  “Oh, shit,” Janik turned towards him with a worried expression. “Err... Good luck?”

  Sam understood Janik’s hesitation and hesitant response. Based on earlier rounds, there was nothing they could do but accept it. Dia looked back and forth between Sam and Janik with a distressed expression.

  [ Ascendant System: Advanced Access granted. ]

  “.... what?” Sam accidentally let out to nobody in particular.

  “What do you mean ‘what’? What’s going on?” Janik almost demanded.

  “It seems that the Hax is ranking up... I think... It’s saying that I’m getting advanced access to it.” Sam didn’t feel good about it. It might be good, but at the same time, he didn’t properly understand it, so he had no idea what to expect.

  “The fuck does that mean?” Janik looked around like they were doing something illegal before focusing on Sam again. “Is it... Good?”

  Having relaxed a little bit, not expecting to be transported somewhere weird and fucked up, Sam took a moment to mentally probe about this.

  [ Advanced Ascendant Access:

  Class skill boost: A one-time use point to increase the value of a class skill by +1.

  Solo Dungeon influence: The ability to directly affect the triggering of a Solo Dungeon. Stopping or requesting. ]

  On top of this, there were 15 points to use.

  “.... ok... this is a bit...” Sam was surprisingly overwhelmed when he saw the seemingly small changes, but considered the power they had.

  “Well? Care to share!?” Janik annoyingly requested.

  “It seems that I can do a +1 to something in a class skill, and I can stop or request a Solo Dungeon. And it gave me 15 points for some reason.”

  “Can that access of yours explain more about what they are and why they trigger?” Janik asked after a moment of thinking.

  Mentally asking the System about the Solo Dungeons, Sam was surprised that a window opened.

  [ Solo Dungeons.

  A dungeon created specifically for the Ascendant. Its difficulty, contents and reward are tailored after the request that triggered it. ]

  “Well... yes... but it’s surprisingly interesting and boring at the same time. It’s apparently rewarding me based on the request that made it, and how hard it is and what’s inside is scaled to it... Which doesn’t feel right.” Mentally thinking back to the different Solo Dungeons, he tried to quantify the rewards. The worst one was the black room with red glowing crystals, he was in there for months, fighting fucked up abominations. But, as he considered things, he got an Invisibility skill from it, one that was tailored to his Energy use rather than normal Mana... Perhaps it was overly fucked up because it gave a surprisingly overpowered skill back.

  “Or... Perhaps it does,” he had to add after a second of consideration.

  “So... You can request these now? I... almost want to consider testing it, but...”

  “Yeah, I agree.” Sam sighed in response. He wanted to test and find out how this worked, but the Solo Dungeons had a few things that were consistent between them. Time was weird inside, he couldn’t leave and they were always a bit fucked up. So testing could end up costing him days of hard work, or perhaps only a few hours, but days in real-world time...

  “Well, the 15 points are at least easy to handle, and the +1 to a class skill...” Starting by raising his Spirit to 85, which through normal Energy math and the added 20% resource skill, added up to 50 Energy exactly, which in turn gave him 100 hands. He was a bit amused at the round numbers. Ignoring the other bonuses like Static Charge and his Health pool, assuming only Psi-weapons, his damage potential was now up to 4200, adding weapons elemental damage and other shenanigans only increased this.

  Checking which skills he could edit, his brow furrowed in annoyance. It was like the System was taunting him. He could change something by +1, yes, but it was locked to hard numbers. The Energy was listed as ‘1/2 Spt’, meaning this was not a whole number. Things like his Psyhands were listed as ‘two hands per Energy’, thus not a number to be edited. He could have sworn this was not always the case, but it was now...

  He also couldn’t change skills he had obtained outside of his Class, so things like Static Charge or Invisibility were not possible to change with this. In the end, there were only two proper candidates for change. His Area or the Psyhand carry weight could increase by 50% as he could change the 10-number in their value.

  Increasing his Area was always good, and increasing the weight would free up some hands and mess with the System-bending math when he pulses. Boosting it that much would also let him just lift heavier targets like people or monsters. But more range would let him attack and affect things at a considerably longer distance. Since his ranged attacks were based on within his area, or throwing his weapons or other objects, it felt safer to go for the range.

  “It’s kind of bullshit, all my Class skills now use fractions or words to define values, so I can’t add the +1 to anything but weight or range. And I can already lift a person even without the Boost, but my range isn’t the best...” Sam explained to Janik with an annoyed tone.

  Janik thought about this for a moment. “You can boost your weight or use weapons, but it doesn’t matter if things are out of your range, does it?”

  “No, I think I agree. More oomph is nice, but it doesn’t matter if I can’t reach a target, and throwing objects only works so far...”

  Locking in his change, his range changed from 20m/60ft to 30m/98ft. He could still increase this by putting Energy into it. And with a total of 50 Energy, assuming 1 Energy needed for Psyhand manifestation, the 49 Energy put into this would boost it to around 177m/588ft.

  “I’m tempted to request a Solo Dungeon for something stupidly simple, then something slightly more, just to test, but...” Sam commented. he was curious, but hesitant, perhaps a little afraid.

  “If it scales things according to the request, won’t something like a D-grade Aether Crystal be simple enough?” Janik asked, not seeming entirely certain.

  “It might, but... I’m still afraid of being away for 5 minutes, while being gone for months in real-time...” Sam felt this was a legit thing to worry about, as he had no idea how time worked for this.

  The very first Solo Dungeon, the flesh dungeon, he was gone for... he didn’t know how many hours, but no time had passed at all in real-time. The meeting with the Entity was closer in time. The swarm survival one was a bit worse, as was the Island. In short, he had no idea how this worked.

  Janik nodded after a few seconds of thinking. “I suppose you have a point there, but if it’s a new ability, it’s always best to understand it. Or do you intend to never use it?”

  “That’s...” Sam wanted to answer, but realised he didn’t know what to say. Janik had a point, it was a good idea to understand your abilities. This was why testing was as important as it was, but with the Solo Dungeons, he was... hesitant. He had a mix of emotions on the topic, the two main ones were overconfidence in his ability to handle things, but also fear of the things some of them put him through. His skin still crawled when he thought back to the bugs forcing themselves under it.

  Shaking his head, he snapped himself back to what was going on, he didn’t want to think about that moment more than he had to. “That’s a good point, based on what it has done before, it might give ‘the perfect reward’,” Sam made air quotes with his fingers as he stated this. “But if things are too powerful or specific... it might be a bad time.” He realised his hesitation as he ended his explanation, still not feeling entirely good or ‘out of it’ since the swarm survival Dungeon.

  “In that case, I have a suggestion,” Janik smiled to get the focus and to change the subject. “Let’s do the starter Dungeon here and see where that takes us?” He started walking before anyone could respond. “Based on the other floors, the Experience jump should be dramatic, and since we’re technically underleveled, but you’re overpowered, we should jump a few levels, no?”

  Taking note of Janik’s excited smile, Sam couldn’t argue his logic, and in a way, he was glad for the topic change. Let things mull over in the back of his mind as they focus on something else. He was also correct in the Experience jump, the first monster they met on the Third floor, the crab, gave much more than the Leviathan Boss of the Second Floor. It seemed that things were scaled according to the needed Experience for a level up based on the level ranges on the floor. This was something he had read in the guide app before as well, that the Experience was an abstract of ‘amount of kills you need on this floor’s lowest level to the next’, so to speak. So, since the levels on the Fourth Floor were from 60 to 80, and the needed Experience to hit level 61 if you freshly hit 60 is just below 6 quintillion... The Experience gained from the monsters on this level should be quite high.

  Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.

  It also seemed that the needed amount of kills wasn’t static, so hitting the first level in the first block on a Floor won’t be 100 kills for each Floor, but... As he was considering these things, he started feeling like he wanted to set up a spreadsheet and start guesstimating, even if people had already done this math before. Instead of answering Janik, he got hung up on this train of thought and took out his phone, checking the TAC guide app, the XP from the first Dungeon’s monsters was 10 quadrillion. Sam’s share of one kill would then be 5 Quadrillion.

  “Yeah,” he finally responded. “Based on the numbers here, we’re probably going to jump a lot of levels and, as in the other times, stagnate after a while.” Sam caught himself smiling in the end.

  Sam had always tried his best not to go too deep into arrogance or assuming himself powerful enough to do everything, but even without doing the math, he should gain a few levels from the first Dungeon, giving him more Spirit, which would have a domino effect and give him more of almost everything. He was getting a bit eager.

  “Yeah, let’s have a go at the first Dungeon, getting a few more levels doesn’t feel like a bad idea.”

  Janik laughed, seeming happy about his choice. He lead them on the same path they were walking down before.

  “Ah, here we go,” Janik suddenly stated, having led them across some bridges to a smaller floating island, tethered to the main island with wires and chains. They stood in front of a small cave, no larger than a one-car garage, with the familiar shimmering field in front of it.

  With his phone in hand, Janik explained. “The Dungeon is, surprise, surprise, a floating island. There are some bridges to get across, but mainly a spiral to the top of the mountain on it to get the boss. The main danger is to be killed and being knocked off.”

  Janik showed Sam his phone and speed-scrolled past the monsters. “Doesn’t seem to be many knocky-offy special skills, the Styrgers and the Boss have some, but that’s it.”

  Being glad to hear there weren’t a lot of things to consider, at least not more than normal, he stepped forward, entering at the same time as Janik.

  As the white light faded, the group found themselves in a similar cave as they had almost entered on the outside. It opened up into a nice view of a mountain on top of the floating island they stood on. They were on the ground, which was connected to the relatively small mountain. There was a surprising lack of flora on this landmass, mostly covered in moss and rock. There was a clear path to follow that led into the mountains, and between the group and the mountain pass were several creatures easy to notice.

  Janik made an elaborate ‘after you’ motion for Sam, causing Dia to smile.

  “Zar strong, more strong, Janik.” She made an accusing motion to Janik with a humorous tone.

  Janik shrugged and smiled back. “Yes, he is, why do you think I’m abusing his power like this?”

  His blatant honesty seemed to catch her off guard. She wanted to reply with something, but seemed to struggle for the words before turning to Sam.

  “Zar, Janik vor, Zar kash Janik?”

  Sam laughed at Janik’s questioning expression.

  “I suppose, it’s not entirely wrong.”

  “What... what did she say?” Janik questioned, not seeming as amused as Sam.

  Considering for a moment not to translate, Sam decided to answer instead.

  “She’s asking if you’re my servant, which is why I’m protecting you.”

  Janik’s expression turned a bit annoyed at this, causing Sam to add more info.

  “Oh, not like a slave-like servant. Know that her culture is strongly based on hierarchy. The context is that you’re the lesser combatant and are then protected, much like Dia is. Though I think she considers herself higher in the rank than you for other reasons.” Sam smiled, knowing that her status would most likely be second.

  He had spoken with her about these things earlier, and the social structure with her people is based on strength to take and strength to keep. Though there was a strong community bond besides this, the strongest was still at the top and would remain there unless challenged.

  Sam turned around, being the first to leave the cave.

  Dia nodded to Sam’s explanation, which caused Janik’s expression to change. “I suppose that’s not as bad. Guess it’s a bit hard to argue against you being the leader of the group.” Ending with a small chuckle, he remained in the cave with Dia.

  Sam walked towards the closest creature; he had no doubts he could handle it, but he felt like he should still be on guard.

  As he passed through the threshold that was the cave’s opening, a familiar window popped up.

  [ Dungeon clear conditions:

  Kill Typhoon Tyrant Aeralith: 0/1

  Optional: Kill all monsters

  Monsters: 0/20

  Rewards:

  20qa xp

  1x Random crafting material

  Chance (2%): B-tier weapon, armour or another item.

  Bonus rewards for optional step:

  20qa xp

  Random Box - X. ]

  Finding it amusing that the System didn’t list zeroes, but rather just abbreviated it to ‘qa’. Since Quadrillion had 15 zeroes, it somewhat made sense and abstracted the numbers a bit.

  Coming closer, the creature noticed him before it was within his area. It was a massive bison-like monster with legs of stone and clouds clinging to its body.

  [ Cloudhorn Bulwark

  Level: 61

  STR: 36

  DEX: 14

  VIT: 30

  SPT: 5

  HP: 2720 / 2720

  Damage: Skyhoof Slam 459 / Horn Toss 426 / Quaking Gallop 483 / Cloud Bellow 410

  Defence: 200

  Abilities: HP Boon, STR Boon, VIT Boon, Skyhoof Slam, Horn Toss, Quaking Gallop, Cloud Bellow. ]

  [ Skyhoof Slam: Leap forward and land on the target, even missing a little won’t stop you from doing damage. ]

  [ Horn Toss: Slam into a target with a powerful horn strike, lifting them off the ground, possibly stunning them. ]

  [ Quaking Gallop: Charge forwards, stomping the ground and anyone who might be in your path. ]

  [ Cloud Bellow: Let out a powerful roar, dealing damage and taunting nearby enemies to target you. ]

  This was pretty normal, he could see this being an issue for singular normal Players. Everything did damage in the 400s, and it had a defence of 200, which would soak up a lot of damage from multi-hit skills. But based on Janik’s earlier explanation, most players focused on harder-hitting single hits.

  The monster turned towards Sam, letting out an angry growl, and it started jogging towards him. Two others nearby saw it running and joined in, forming a three-monster stampede.

  Sam was patient and waited for the Cloudhorn to enter his Area before he did anything, manifesting his full swarm could ward it off and have it be smart, which was a dumb idea for Sam’s tactics. The Cloudhorn ran faster and faster as it got closer, with an angry grunt, its speed improved as its stomps became much angrier, to the point that it started tearing up the ground for each step. Even at this distance, Sam could feel the vibrations through his shoes.

  Though it was running surprisingly fast, as soon as it stepped foot inside Sam’s Area of Influence, he took action.

  In a single move, Sam manifested his full swarm, 100 Psyhands, 86 of which became Psy-weapons. Though 6 weapons missed, the total delivered damage was still over 6400. 200 of which were consumed in the Cloudhorn’s defence, but it was more than enough to take it out in a single attack.

  As the Sentinel’s Watch made contact and drew blood, Sam got a weird pre-emptive afterimage of the Cloudthorn taking the next step but failing to do so. It looked like a ghostly, almost illusionary image of it, overlaying itself over the real body.

  The premonition showed itself to be correct as the familiar explosion of blood had the life disappear from its eyes, and it failed to take the next step. The large bison crashed into the ground and rolled over twice due to momentum before stopping entirely.

  [ Experience gained: +5 Quadrillion. ]