The Path of Ascension 5: A LitRPG Adventure

50

“This rift is recorded and televised to everyone watching, so do not forget her Majesty’s warning about using trump cards without reason.”

The man leaned forward and said in a dramatically lowered voice, “Do note that for this rift, the secret bosses will remain as such with AI-backed oaths. Please, read the oath over, and if you feel like you can’t comply, step out of line.”

Matt reviewed the oath and quickly accepted it, as it was the standard one used in the Tier 10 tournaments.

It boiled down to, “Don’t speak to anyone outside your team about the things you learn in the rifts. And when you do speak of them, only do so in a way as to not be overheard by anyone outside of your team.”

That final addendum meant don’t talk about the rifts anywhere but your private rooms or through your AI.

Nowhere else was secure enough to meet the requirements.

The minutes seemed to stretch as they waited out the fifteen-minute instance change before they could enter the rift.

Already, Matt could see people leaving the rifts and wandering around into the various buildings. Either they had signed up for a rift slot and had enough time to feel that they could leave the area, or they had given up on the idea altogether.

Right before their turn came up, he and Liz received a message from Luna and Kurt that they had registered them for a rift delve in a Tier 11 speedrun rift in four hours as Quill and Torch.

That should be more than enough time for them to clear this first rift.

They weren’t going for a full clear after all. They just needed to find and kill the bosses and leave the rift.

Ideally, they would only be killing four monsters before leaving.

Still, the rift was a proper Tier 12, which meant it was at least fifteen hundred square miles at the smallest and could balloon up to double that at the larger end.

Once the timer indicated it was safe to enter the rift, Matt and Liz entered with their weapons at the ready.

They found themselves looking at the edge of a densely packed forest that led up to a mountain range in the distance. Jagged peaks sprawled out in front of them as far as they could see, reaching toward the starry sky above. The moon hanging in the sky seemed almost like a second planet, providing enough light that the entirety of the rift was bathed in its soft white glow. Its pockmarked surface appeared close enough to simply reach out and touch. The whole scene would have been quite serene, if not for the menacing red glow causing their shadows to reach toward the trees.

Looking back for the secondary source of light, Matt found that they were at the edge of a cliff that dropped down to a river of lava. It looked like a glowing ribbon that seemed to be the boundary edge of the rift.

“Want to just fly around and see what we can see?” Matt asked, turning to Liz while she lifted off the ground with her now attached ankle bracelet flying devices. Neither of them wanted to waste the willpower it took to fly manually when flying devices were faster and only cost mana.

Matt withdrew his personally made flying sword, and after Liz joined him on the blade, they took off with all the speed that a Tier 12 flying device powered by 50 MPS could muster. He could have gone faster as the blade could handle around 500 MPS, but he didn’t want to show his hand. Besides, 100 MPS was in line with his Concept’s expected power growth from what he had shown in the vassal war.

Still, they were moving faster than most standard blades available for purchase.

It was fast enough that they would’ve been battered by air resistance without Matt controlling the air with his Concept. But he had gotten quite good at his control over the years.

Liz pointed down and highlighted the first monsters they saw. “Looks like elemental dogs. So far, I’ve seen decay and lightning. Nothing else seems to be Tier 12, though.”

That wasn’t surprising. While higher Tier rifts had increasingly complex ecology, there were usually a limited number of at-Tier monster types that served as the main opponents in the rift.

At Tier 12, they could expect three or four monster species.

With two identified, Matt kept his eyes and spiritual perception scanning the air around them for aerial opponents.

They flew in the direction of the exit, which was over the forest and next to the mountains, but not through them. Matt circled around the much darker part of the forest that was bathed crimson by the light, giving it an even more eerie ambience.

The rest of the forest that they passed over mostly consisted of various species of deciduous plants, but this section was a near-perfect circle of evergreens. It was painfully obvious from the air, though Matt knew that the change in trees would have been harder to notice from the ground.

They hovered in the air, keeping a bit of distance from the incongruent patch of forest.

“Should we burn it? Seems suspicious.”

Liz didn’t hesitate as she said, “Burn it.”

Matt, as Liz didn’t use fire spells in her real identity, cast a [Fireball] and launched it into the forest.

As the fire hit the trees, the entire region of evergreens rippled, and an ear rending screech slammed into them as the trees pulled together and started to form a whip.

Now that the monster was no longer hiding, the weight of its spirit was obvious, as was the mid-Tier 12 boss’ presence.

Liz jumped off Matt’s flying blade and flew off in the opposite direction, starting to summon gallons of blood from her glove growth item.

They weren’t willing to show off the true extent of their abilities, but as the monster seemed only able to attack with whips made of trees, they did not have to show much.

Matt flew close while he threw [Fireball]s as fast as the skill recovered in his spirit.

From the side, he saw Liz swinging arcs of blood at the monster’s whips. Despite the two-Tier disadvantage, she only needed a few chops to cut through each limb.

Her Blood Iron once again showed its prowess.

With most of the monster’s attention on his partner, Matt flew forward, getting closer to the center mass of the creature as its bark obstructed his sight.

[Flamethrower] took a second to burn through the outer layer of the bark, but as it hit the monster’s inner flesh, the fire took on a life of its own.

Matt was instantly attacked by every whip the monster had, but his sword was fast, and he had practice dodging attacks in the air. Still, he was only able to keep his attack up for another few seconds before he was forced away from the monster. The sheer defensive frenzy that the boss was driven into, and the remaining time limit on his skill that served to hide his Talent pressured Matt as he continued his assault.

Still, the damage was done, and as they retreated higher up into the sky, he and Liz watched as the monster burned from the inside out.

Matt shrugged and said, “That was almost disappointingly easy.”

Liz scratched her armored head and gestured with her spear. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a monster with such a glaring weakness before. I guess that fight would have been awful if we didn’t have fire spells, but who doesn’t have at least one?” She turned to him and asked, “How long did it take you to get through the outer armor?”

Matt reviewed his AI and said, “A little more than two seconds of a full 40 MPS [Flamethrower].”

Liz shook her head and joined him on his flying sword again. “That means even with just basic [Fireball]s, anyone else could have broken through the armor in about six shots if they could hit the same spot. Probably less since the explosion damage would have helped punch through.”

They waited in silence until they felt the rush of essence that flooded their spirits before moving on.

The next sub-boss they found was a boulder golem in a ravine, situated at the edge of the mountain region.

The fight was harder than the tree monster, but only because this boss didn’t have any glaring weaknesses, unlike the first monster.

Matt fought it from the ground and kept its attention on his armored form while only launching the occasional attack. It allowed Liz to build up enough blood to smash the boulders into pieces too small for the boss to reform.

It took them nearly twenty minutes to finish the monster off, but the fight hadn’t been particularly hard.