The Path of Ascension 6: A LitRPG Adventure

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As he strained to edge closer, he felt a repulsive force trying to shove him back, and he growled into the silence that Eternal Darkness put over him.

As Matt neared, he felt that there was a challenge he was supposed to overcome, and the very world around him started to warp as he broke the rules of the test.

Seeing that, Matt knew there was an answer, and used his Concept’s repulsive effect to counter the power around the gloves.

Doing that set something off with the defenses, and they grew a dozen times stronger, but with Matt’s own repulsive power, he was able to get within an inch of the gloves.

At that point, he was at an impasse. He was giving everything he had, but Minkalla was pushing back just as hard.

Minkalla wasn’t going to make it easy for him to cheat.

But he was so close.

I won’t give up.

Matt narrowed his useless eyes and flexed with everything he had, both magically and physically, trying to push past the restrictions.

While locked in an intimate struggle with the planet’s restrictions, he was able to get a better feel for the forces at work that prevented his progress. With every centimeter of ground gained, he could sense that there was a way to get the gloves.

The first and most obvious was to complete both pyramids, but there was a second, hidden condition. What that condition was, he didn’t know, but he could feel that it existed.

That knowledge was more than enough to spur him on.

Liz, Aster, and Susanne couldn’t return to the top step, but they were able to send their Concepts to help him.

That actually made the restrictions stronger, and his fingers that were only an inch away were pushed a foot away.

Through gritted teeth, he sent them a message to stop.

With their interference removed, the resistance he encountered lessened, and slowly, his fingers neared the gloves once again.

Whether it was the puzzle itself or Minkalla as a whole, Matt didn’t know. But slowly, ever so slowly, he pushed through the restriction as he refused to give up.

I am Endless. I will not give up.

As Matt embodied his Concept, his fingers neared the gloves. He could feel that he was cheating in some way, and whatever mechanism Minkalla was using to make sure its puzzles were challenging was resisting his attempt.

At first, Matt thought that he was overpowering the restriction, but that was a bit too egotistical, even for his own private thoughts.

Minkalla was a place where even Tier 50s were rebuffed. His little Tier 11 power meant nothing in the face of Intents and Aspects, but he felt that something was making way for him.

It almost felt like Minkalla wanted to test him but didn’t necessarily care how he was tested.

Digging deeper, his fingers crept forward, and the strain on his spirit and willpower started to force his consciousness to slip. Feeling himself fading, and still acutely aware that he was literally holding on to his spot in the equilibrium zone by a thread and could easily fall. He dug deeper pushing past his limits until he finally touched the gloves where they clasped hands.

Just like that, the resistance was broken, and Matt started swinging back and forth on the rope wildly. That stalemate lasted for an instant before the restriction of flight and the gravity shenanigans vanished.

It also meant the giant pyramid that was on the ceiling was now affected by normal gravity and started to fall.

On top of them.

The four of them were powerful for their Tier, with quick reactions to match. Matt’s most of all, with all his stats boosted by his channels. He cranked his speed-enhancing buffs as high as they would go and grabbed Liz, using his Concept to fly the two of them in the wake of Queen’s space bending to clear the falling debris.

They cleared the danger area easily and floated together near the ceiling, but not so close that anything could easily drop down and grab them.

Liz looked at the pair of gloves in Matt’s hand and chuckled. “Well, you got them all right. Are they worth it?”

Matt didn’t know, but he wanted to find out.Matt felt like the flight down the nearby tunnel to a safer area was excruciating, but waited until they were a safe distance away to set up the house. After three days of constant stress over the puzzles, and only being able to sleep in shifts, they all needed the break. He even cooked everyone a proper meal before he started inspecting the new gloves.

Without his sight or a dedicated skill for it, the process was annoying, but he was able to confirm after a thorough examination that there was nothing dangerous around them.

Once their safety was confirmed, everyone gathered in the living room to figure out what exactly they could do.

Matt slipped them on and then sent a stream of mana into the gloves. At first, nothing seemed to happen, but then a loose cup flew across the room at Matt. As he reached to grab it, it snapped into his hands as if it was magnetized.

“Maybe we should take this outside?” Matt offered. He really didn’t want to ruin the house if what he suspected was true.

Once they were all armored up, Matt moved away from the house and put a trickle of mana into the gloves once again. As soon as he did that, any and all loose rocks in the area started flying toward him.

Even Aster was affected; she had to use her Concept to fight against the pull of the gauntlet.

If he had his full senses, it wouldn’t have been so hard to control at first, but Matt was able to get a pretty good feel after varying the amount of mana he sent into the item.

It also helped that the pyramids had been affected by the same force.

They were gravity gauntlets.

“I think these make what seems to be a miniature gravity well. Let me get away from you guys and see what they can do with my full mana generation.” Matt couldn’t suppress the excitement he knew was in his voice at the thought.

Flying down the tunnel further, he put 100 MPS into [Cracked Phantom Armor] for protection.

At just 5 MPS into the gauntlets, the attraction was generating enough pull to draw even fist-sized rocks toward him.