Chapter 319: A Gift for My Dear Ally (GT Bonus - )

When his vision came back, Mark recognized the place instantly.

It was that dark, infinite space he already knew all too well.

There was no ground, no sky, no horizon; just an endless stretch of darkness and silence, lit only by a faint glow that seemed to radiate from them both.

This was Mary’s dream world.

That corner of her own mind she pulled him into whenever she wanted to talk to him in private, away from prying eyes.

Once they’d fully materialized, Mary finally let go of the embrace, and Mark took the chance to step back and face her.

"Alright, are you going to explain to me what’s going on already?" he said, crossing his arms. "Not to mention you basically just kidnapped me... what the hell is all this about, Mary?"

Mary looked at him with a warm smile, the one she reserved only for him.

"I already told you, sweetheart," Mary answered, looking him straight in the eyes. "I brought you here because there’s something very special I want to give you. I’ve been putting it together for a while now, just for this moment."

Mary’s smile grew even wider.

"I was waiting for you to break through your level cap. And now that you’ve finally done it, it’s time for me to hand it over."

Mark eyed her warily. After all, he knew Mary far too well to believe one of her gifts could ever be something that simple.

"...And what kind of gift are we talking about here?"

Mary just smiled.

Then she raised a hand elegantly and snapped her fingers.

And with that, the void filled.

Monsters began appearing everywhere, materializing out of thin air until, within seconds, Mark found himself surrounded by nearly a hundred creatures of every shape and size.

Winged beasts covered in gleaming scales, golems of stone and metal, shapeless beings made of shadow, and colossal serpents.

Skeletal death knights in flashy armor, multi-headed chimeras, and creatures so strange Mark couldn’t even find the words to describe them.

An absurd collection of monsters that, all together, looked less like a gift and more like an army.

But without a doubt, the most unsettling part was that none of them moved.

They all stood in silence, as if waiting for orders.

And curiously, Mark managed to recognize quite a few of them.

After all, most were mobs or mini-bosses from Eternal Conquest Online, creatures he’d seen countless times over the course of his playthroughs.

There was one thing, though, that especially caught his attention.

None of Mary’s subordinates he’d met up to that point were present among that enormous legion.

Rudolf wasn’t there. Neither were Angelica, Focalors, or Nihilux.

Mark looked back over the massive legion surrounding him before turning his gaze to Mary.

"Are all of these... your summons?" he asked, completely stunned.

"That’s right, sweetheart," Mary answered proudly. "Every single one of them is one of my precious little ones."

She swept her gaze over the legion with obvious fondness, like a proud mother admiring her children.

"Although I’ll admit they’ve got one little flaw... summoning any of them eats up a ridiculous amount of mana."

She paused briefly and smiled.

"That’s why I usually only bring out a few at a time."

"Okay, I’ll admit it. That’s pretty impressive," Mark said, shrugging. "But I still don’t get why you’re showing them to me."

Mary smiled.

"The gift, sweetheart, is that you get to kill them."

Mark stared at her, confused. And then, all at once, it clicked.

Mary didn’t need to explain anything further.

He understood immediately what she was offering him, and for a few seconds, he was left completely speechless.

He’d just unlocked the ability to level up again by defeating enemies.

Up until now, doing that the traditional way would have meant going out there, hunting down monsters one by one, and fighting them just to scrape together a decent amount of experience.

It was a slow, exhausting, and above all, tedious process.

But Mary had just handed him a shortcut.

Nearly a hundred summons, each one loaded with experience, gathered together in one enclosed space where he could take them on one after another.

It was, for all practical purposes, an experience farm served up on a silver platter.

"Wait a second," Mark said, frowning as something occurred to him. "If I kill all of them, wouldn’t that mean you’d lose them for good?"

"Not at all, sweetheart," Mary answered, shaking her head. "I can summon them again whenever I want. It’ll just take me some time to do it."

"I see..."

"And just so you know, my top ten stay with me. Don’t even think about touching those," she added, with a note of distaste. "The rest are a small price to pay to watch you grow."

He stayed quiet for a moment, watching her.

This was too much.

Mary was willing to give up a huge chunk of her own arsenal just to make him stronger.

And once again, he couldn’t help but wonder what the hell Mary saw in him to go this far.

"I don’t even know how to thank you for something like this..." he said, sincerely.

Mary stepped closer and, with a tenderness that didn’t match her reputation at all, placed a hand on his cheek.

"I already told you, you don’t need to thank me for anything," she said quietly. "I’m doing it because I want to, that’s all."

She pulled her hand back, and her playful tone returned.

"Now, quit wasting time. They’re all yours. Have fun."

Mark studied the creatures surrounding him in silence.

Each one was another step toward the top, and all of them seemed to be waiting patiently for the slaughter to begin.

But then he remembered something important.

Aria, Alice, Bayle, and the rest were still frozen at the exact instant he’d vanished.

To them, Mark had simply disappeared out of nowhere, with no explanation and no trace left behind.

And once time started flowing again, all they’d find was an empty space where he used to stand.

Mark didn’t need to imagine much to know what would come next.

His wives would panic.

They’d search for him everywhere, and the longer it took to find him, the worse their desperation would get.

’I’d better hurry this up,’ he thought, letting out a heavy sigh. ’The sooner I get through this, the sooner I can get back to them... they must be pretty scared right now as it is, without me making them wait even longer.’