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The large formation stretched out in front of her, lighting up with intense mana from the nine catalysts acting as batteries. In the center of it, energy gathered, and a small hole had already been pre-dug.

“Now for the seed to be planted,” Duskleaf said happily as Meira smiled and took out the tree seed from a lockbox she had left off to the side. It was a silverish seed, and she was excited to see it grow. Meira used mana to levitate it into the air and guided it into the hole. She proceeded to fill the hole with some special soil from afar, her Teacher standing encouragingly beside her. She then took out a watering can and took flight to get above the formation, and watered the entire thing. The formation responded to the magical water and pulsed with power as it fully activated and began feeding the seed energy.

“It’s done,” she smiled. She heard the sound of a notification as she gained a level, making her even more excited. One step closer to C-grade.

“Indeed it is,” Duskleaf nodded proudly. “The Silverpine Astral Tree should be able to reach at least ancient rarity with this formation, so it is something to be proud of.”

Meira smiled a bit and shook her head. “I am sure Teacher could do far better when he was my level.”

“Master used to slap me in the back of my head for failing to produce a single epic rarity plant while in D-grade,” the old god chuckled.

“That’s…” Meira said, fidgeting with her hands. She knew that her Teacher repeatedly said he wasn’t that good at lower grades, but… she had a hard time seeing it. Because today, no one would dispute he was one of the premier alchemists in the entire multiverse. How could he possibly have struggled to produce products at epic rarity?

Seeing her doubt, Teacher shook his head.

“I told you already, talent is a bonus, not a requirement, and that is only in cases where the talent does not become a handicap. The most important thing in the multiverse is work ethic. Nothing else matters if you do not have a good work ethic,” Duskleaf said. It was something Meira had heard many times before. She understood it from a logical perspective, but it was still hard to imagine. Could one really become a god just by working hard?

Everyone around her growing up had worked hard in the mines, day in and day out. They had toiled away endlessly to survive… but she did know why that didn’t count. One still had to challenge themselves. Something her Teacher could help her do.

“But you still need to know what to work on,” he continued, elaborating on her own thoughts. “If you decided to just replicate formation at or below your skill level over and over again, you will get nowhere. No, you need to constantly improve and challenge yourself. Without Master, I would have never even made it to C-grade. He was the one who guided me, gave me challenges, and whenever he felt I was stagnating, he gave me a push in the right direction. A guiding hand that made sure I would always face new challenges and be forced to improve. And I knew that he would have abandoned me without a second thought if I fell into complacency, for he did that with so many others who studied under him.”

“I understand, Teacher,” Meira said with a nod. She did not know if Grand Elder Duskleaf would also abandon her if he believed she was stagnating, and she did not intend to find out.

With Lord Thayne’s true identity as the Chosen of the Malefic One revealed to all, Teacher had finally taken her as an official disciple and even given her a Divine Blessing. He had gone so far as to allude to him not having a Chosen himself and hinted at her potentially getting her Blessing upgraded if she proved herself worthy. Meira couldn’t even think about becoming a Chosen as she was already overwhelmed by her current Blessing and elevated status.

No, no, she had something far less impactful she wanted to accomplish

Because… Meira had found her own goal. One separate from Lord Thayne and even her Teacher.

She wanted to free her clan.

Meira knew that to do this, she would have to borrow the status of her Teacher, but she also wanted to go there with her head held high. The most powerful people in the clan were C-grades, and she wanted to go there at C-grade too.

Her mother and siblings were still at the old clan based on what Izil had told her, and while some would call it an infantile dream, Meira really wanted to be the one to go and “save” them. She wanted to bring them to the Order or perhaps even claim the entire clan as her own to protect it. Something she likely could do right now… but she did not want to go before C-grade.

Meira wanted C-grade to be her “turning point,” so to say. Even if she was no longer a slave, her profession and class both bore marks of her being one. Both made it clear she was still a servant. If all went well… then none of her evolutions would even hint at it.

She wanted to show up before her family proud of who she had become and not just her status as the student of the Grand Elder.

It was a small goal in the grand scheme of things… but it was perhaps the first goal she had set entirely for herself.

Her first goal of many, hopefully.

Sandy was sleepy, so Sandy slept a lot.

Sandy was sleepy because they had eaten too much and had a stomach ache.

Sandy had not moved from within the Order of the Malefic Viper since the ceremony.

Sandy would begin to feel better after a few days, only to eat again and get another stomach ache.

Sandy was caught in a cruel loop of consumption due to all the evil people having given Sandy too much stuff to eat during the ceremony.

Sandy was totally okay with the current situation they found themselves in.

So… having a regular day job kind of sucked before the system. At least most people seemed to think so. Not Jake, though. In fact, he had very much liked having one.

It had given him some kind of structure to his life. Wake up, shower, go to work, do the work, go to the gym, drive home, and relax until he had to sleep to get up for work the next day. This constant flow of everyday life had helped keep Jake together during the nightmarish years before the system.

He still recalled those days as… bad. It was only now, after a few years had passed, that Jake could truly understand how much life had sucked for him back then. How boring and meaningless the entire world had felt. Work had, ironically enough, allowed him to have something to focus on and get through the days until, finally, the initiation arrived, and color returned to his world.

One thing had stayed, though. Jake still liked to work on stuff, which was probably part of the reason he was good at alchemy. He still needed to always try and keep himself busy, and sitting still just never really worked for him. Jake would begin to feel restless if he did nothing for too long, so even when he was on “holiday” and visited his parents and Caleb, he still did some alchemy and helped train Caleb’s shadow assassins here and there.

Minaga’s City Floor gave him some flashbacks to those calmer periods of his life, both before and after the integration. Life was incredibly simple here on the city floor, and the days blended together as the months passed. Jake just did alchemy day in and day out. Every “break” he took was going to one of the arenas and getting some points there.

Speaking of the arenas, as Minaga had said, then one could fight there once a day versus monsters. One could also fight other people, but it didn’t reward anything. If one could bet Minaga Coins in duels, that would have been a far too easy exploit.

Anyway, the daily arena challenge was quite simple. One would enter and be teleported into the middle of the arena, where a timer of one hour would begin. Monsters would then enter the arena, and as long as you killed all that were alive, more would come. This meant that someone more powerful would manage to kill far more monsters than anyone else. It also had to be mentioned that the arena was for individuals only.

After the hour was up, you would be rewarded with Minaga Coins based on the monsters you killed. Overall, Jake only saw this arena as some good exercise, and it helped him practice finishing foes faster. Sylphie and the Fallen King naturally went to this arena every day, and it had become their primary source of income. Both of them also sold stuff from within Nevermore to get more coins, as they were the slowest when it came to accumulating them.

As the Fallen King had complained, then it did seem harder for monsters to obtain coins compared to those with professions. The two of them could still do other stuff besides the arena, but it gave little compared to just crafting. There were different facilities in the city that one could work for by assisting natives with all sorts of tasks. The Fallen King had found one that asked for help with soul-related rituals that gave decent coins, while Sylphie helped craft natural treasures using her weird green wind. Jake had no idea how all that worked, but he let them do their thing to earn coins as best they could.

Dina was a bit of an odd one out in their party. She did not have a profession, only her Dryad race and Druid class, but that did not make her any less of a crafter. It was only on this floor that Jake learned Dina had an amazing technique to make what was effectively genetically modified plants. She would communicate with herbs to accomplish this, and through this, she created many different plants that Jake had never seen or heard of before.

Even if she used plants she already had before entering Nevermore, she could then sell these crossbreeds. However, Jake and she quickly discovered that if they used materials they had gathered inside Nevermore in crafting, the Brokers would buy their products for even more.

Speaking of the Brokers… Jake had no idea why they bought stuff for what they did. These Brokers were all cloak-wearing humanoid creatures that dwelled within many near-identical shops spread throughout the city. These Brokers could be spoken to and negotiated with, and Jake did see some people get away with more Minaga Coins than he would expect by virtue of good negotiation, so merchants did seem to have one advantage.

It had to be mentioned that skills did not really work that well, though. Illusion magic or any kind of mental magic was also not an option, as these Brokers had one tiny little detail about them that made it unfeasible for a C-grade to influence them:

They were all A-grades.

Why were they all A-grades? Well, it was likely to avoid people manipulating them with skills… so Jake guessed it made sense. Luckily for Jake, he never planned on manipulating them; he just sold his alchemical creations. Someone who could still kind of “manipulate” them was the final member of Jake’s party… because the old man had taken the coin lead by quite a margin through selling paintings. It turned out that creations with purely subjective values, such as works of art, were far easier to bullshit a high price for.

Jake was not jealous. Totally not. That the old man was only seven thousand coins off seemed totally fair. That Jake, who had also worked his butt off, was still thirty thousand short was not at all something to complain about.

Current Minaga Coins: 184,190/214,000

From the time they had entered Minaga’s City Floor till now, about thirteen months had passed, so they weren’t gonna break that record that was mentioned to them, that is for sure. This meant they had spent well over two years within Nevermore so far, with nearly half the time spent on this city floor. Jake would lie if he said he wouldn’t have preferred to do without… but the time was not entirely wasted.

Because it turned out that just grinding out alchemy products every day was quite good when it came to raking in levels.

*’DING!’ Profession: [Heretic-Chosen Alchemist of the Malefic Viper] has reached level 211 - Stat points allocated, +35 Free Points*

…

*’DING!’ Profession: [Heretic-Chosen Alchemist of the Malefic Viper] has reached level 224 - Stat points allocated, +35 Free Points*

*’DING!’ Race: [Human (C)] has reached level 215 - Stat points allocated, +45 Free Points*

…

*’DING!’ Race: [Human (C)] has reached level 221 - Stat points allocated, +45 Free Points*

Over this period, Jake had gained 14 Profession levels, which, if he had to say so himself, was pretty damn decent. The others had also grown over this time, and honestly, this floor did give Jake and the Sword Saint a good excuse to work on their professions while Dina leveled up her race quite a few times.

He had seen the levels slow down the more time passed, and he knew he would soon not get much more experience from just crafting, but that was honestly fine. Once he had enough Minaga Coins for his own toll, Jake had a date with a certain puzzle box he had received during his Chosen-reveal ceremony.

Overall, he would say things were going well.

However… one thing had left a sour taste in Jake’s mouth. Ell’Hakan had appeared on the Minaga City Floor four and a half months after Jake and his party made it there – so they were well ahead despite entering at nearly the same time - and the current Leaderboard had not been updated, meaning Jake was ahead of him on points too. That had been sweet, but that taste of sweetness only made what happened next leave a far sourer taste.

The record to pass the Minaga City Floor had been broken.

Ell’Hakan had appeared on the floor and did not seek out Jake. He did not seek out anyone. Based on reports, he had simply listened to the rules explained by someone on the floor allied with him, nodded, and brought his entire party to one of the Brokers.

An hour after entering the Broker’s store, he had left it, and he and his entire party had headed straight for the toll booth. They all paid their toll and moved onto the thirty-sixth floor right then and there, leaving before barely anyone knew they were there. Not even Jake heard they had arrived before after-the-fact.

Seventy-nine minutes. That was how long it had taken Ell’Hakan to pass the city floor.

Jake had cursed how the hell that was possible, only for Minaga to pop in, full of schadenfreude.

“Would you look at that, a dirty cheater complaining about another dirty cheater? So what if he found a loophole using his Bloodline? Do you think that should be banned? I could totally ban it from here on out because, you know, it’s not like there are five more floors of my labyrinth, right? Surely, you would not consider using your bullshit Bloodline on these floors, right? That would be super hypocritical, wouldn’t it?”

As much as Jake wanted to punch the four-eyed dungeon master, he could only grit his teeth and curse internally as he swore to make up for the lost time by utterly demolishing the remaining labyrinth. Ell’Hakan had taken far longer doing the prior labyrinth floors, so he hoped to catch up.

When it came to how Ell’Hakan had cheated, Minaga didn’t say, but he did drop one hint.

“The Brokers ultimately decide what they buy something for… so if they for some reason think it is a good idea to buy objects for hundreds of thousands of Minaga Coins, then what can you do? Well, I could do something, but if I stop one Bloodline-powered exploit, I would have to stop all of them.”

Jake once more did not want to argue that point, as he still felt like his Bloodline was a better cheat than Ell’Hakans. In fact, he refused to acknowledge any other Bloodlines could ever be superior overall. Sure, Dina’s was better in a plant-filled environment, and Ell’Hakans was better on a fucking city floor, but Jake would reign supreme in the vast majority of situations.

Besides, Ell’Hakan not sticking around wasn’t exactly a bad thing, as it meant Jake didn’t have to bother even thinking about the guy. Instead, he could turn his attention to all the other familiar faces who had begun to arrive on the city floor, some of which he had already made contact with.

In fact, considering how long it took on average to gather all the Minaga Coins, Jake had a feeling they had quite a reunion on their hands.