Chapter 488: A Higher Spirit

Silas didn’t stop swinging though.

He kept his rhythm steady, allowing his mana to hum quietly beneath his skin, ready to detonate outward at the slightest provocation.

Within an hour of steady focused work, the center of the sunken depression was dominated by a massive shimmering mound of raw material.

Hundreds of pounds of blood-red crystal vines and brilliant milky-white diamonds lay stacked together.

The pulsing luminescence of the crimson formations bathed the girls’ faces in a warm ethereal glow, while the white gems scattered the light across the ceiling in brilliant dancing flecks.

Helen leaned on her pickaxe, wiping sweat from her brow as she looked down at the volume of the harvest.

"Well," Helen said, her chest heaving slightly against her leather harness, "that’s the lower shelf completely stripped. But... how in the world are we going to haul this up to the main cavern? The Phase One Golem is way too massive to squeeze down this narrow fissure."

Brenda nodded, looking back toward the winding, cramped tunnel that led to the outer goblin hollow.

"Yeah, even if we split it into the Phase Three scout units, those little quad-golems can only carry a couple of crates each. It would take twenty trips back and forth just to move this single pile."

The women turned their attention toward Thora.

"Master Thora," Sarah asked, tilting her head. "What’s the extraction protocol for this alcove? Did you bring auxiliary pulley lines?"

Thora paused.

The dwarven forge master slowly looked at the towering mountain of red and white crystals, then looked at the narrow three-foot-wide limestone throat of the tunnel, and then down at her own empty hands.

"Good question," Thora said plainly.

She turned slowly, locking her amber eyes onto Silas.

Silas blinked. He lowered his pickaxe, staring at the dwarven smith with deadpan incredulous disbelief.

"Thora," Silas murmured, his voice dropping into a flat monotone. "Don’t tell me. You didn’t have a plan for getting the payload out of this alcove, did you?"

Thora didn’t flinch.

Instead, she tilted her head to the side, poked the tip of her tongue out between her teeth, brought her clenched fist up to the side of her temple, and gave her head a light cartoonishly cute rap with her knuckle.

"Ehe~" Thora chirped, winking one amber eye. "Sorry, my Lord! My brain was so full of high-grade alloy formulas and diamond matrices that I forgot to measure the doorway! Logistics is an evolving science, you know!"

Silas stared at her, his left eye twitching violently.

Without moving his boots an inch, Silas raised his right hand, curled his thumb behind his index finger, and flicked the empty air directly toward the four-foot-tall dwarf.

POW!

He didn’t even make physical contact, but the compressed air-bullet generated by the physical power of his Gold Core shot across the five-foot gap.

CLACK!

"OWWWWW!" Thora shrieked, clutching both hands to her forehead as she stumbled backward with her boots kicking up crystalline dust. "What was that for?! You didn’t even touch me and it felt like an iron rivet! You’re abusing your chief of the forge!"

"I’m disciplining a logistics officer who didn’t measure the damn door," Silas retorted dryly, though the smirk on his lips betrayed his amusement.

Thor immediately vaulted down from her boulder with an earth-shattering thud, puffing out her massive chest.

"Fear not, Lord Silas! If the little smith’s mind has failed, divine strength shall prevail! Point me to the stone! I shall pick up the entire mountain shelf and march it to the surface upon my shoulders!"

"No, Thor, absolutely not," Silas sighed, holding up a hand to stop her before she collapsed the entire ceiling. "I appreciate the enthusiasm, but you’d punch a hole straight through the mountain and bury the diamonds in an avalanche."

Silas walked into the center of the depression, stopping right before the massive pile of harvested crystals.

He took a slow steady breath, closing his eyes as he tapped into the dense reservoir of his Mythic Gold Core.

VUUUUUUM!

A subtle pale golden halo hummed around his silhouette.

He didn’t channel the destructive fury of his fire but instead, he reached deep into the earth affinity anchored within his core, attuning his will to the limestone bedrock beneath his boots.

He raised his right foot and stomped down against the stone.

KRA-CRUNCH!

The bedrock beneath the perimeter of the crystal pile groaned in submission.

With terrifying fluidity, the solid limestone floor cracked, warped, and surged upward.

Four dense thick slabs of rock rose from the earth, interlocking seamlessly along their edges to form a massive perfectly squared storage crate roughly eight feet wide and four feet deep.

With a sweep of his arm, Silas manipulated the earth mana, causing the stone floor beneath the diamonds to tilt smoothly, sliding every single red crystal and white diamond directly into the newly forged stone crate without a single chip to their facets.

RATTLE-CLATTER!

"There," Silas murmured, stepping up to the heavy stone crate.

He reached down with his right hand, wrapping his fingers firmly beneath the thick limestone rim.

The entire crate, loaded to the brim with hundreds of pounds of dense, mana-saturated earth ores, had to weigh well over a ton.

Yet, as Silas flexed his arm, the corded muscles of his bicep and shoulder tightened beneath his dark leather harness, veins rising against his tanned skin with effortless terrifying power.

With a single, smooth pull, Silas hoisted the massive stone crate off the ground using only his right hand, balancing the crushing weight on his palm as if it were a common wooden tray.

"I’ll carry this batch out to the main chamber," Silas instructed, turning toward the tunnel. "Keep working the lower seams and be careful around the vine roots."

"Understood, my Lord!" the girls chorused, watching his retreating form with wide, awe-struck eyes.

As Silas stepped into the shadow of the narrow passage, Aurelia’s golden eyes suddenly flicked upward toward the cavern ceiling.

High above, nestled within the dense thicket of blood-red stalactites, a soft crimson glow flared.

FZZT!

A small fist-sized orb of pure, incandescent red light detached from the stone roof.

It floated, drifting silently through the air like a drifting soap bubble, maintaining a distance of barely ten paces behind Silas’s back as he marched down the dark corridor.

Aurelia’s brow arched delicately.

’A spirit, huh?’ she thought, her lips curving into a quiet knowing smile.

She glanced sideways, looking over at Thor.

The blonde thunder god was leaning against a stalagmite, completely oblivious to the spiritual presence, staring into empty space with a thin, glossy line of drool slowly pooling at the corner of her parted lips.

’Roasted boar... crispy skin... sweet mustard...’ Thor’s internal thoughts were practically radiating from her skull like a beacon.

Aurelia shook her head, letting out a soft amused sigh.

’Was this god ever not hungry?’ she mused, turning back to her vertical limestone slab and raising her pickaxe. ’Well, Lord Silas can handle a little curiosity on his own.’

Out in the winding corridor connecting the geode to the outer goblin hollow, the air grew noticeably colder.

Silas walked with steady measured strides, his heavy boots crunching against the limestone gravel.

The massive stone crate resting on his right palm remained perfectly level, not a single diamond spilling over the rim despite the awkward narrow turns of the rock chimney.

As he reached the midpoint of the passage... right near the sharp ninety-degree bend where the natural geode light faded, a sudden sharp tingling sensation swept across the skin behind his left ear.

The temperature in the tunnel dropped by a fraction of a degree, replaced by the distinct hum of high-power elemental mana.

SWISH!

Silas’s combat instincts flared. Without breaking his stride, he snapped his head around, his blue eyes scanning the darkness behind his left shoulder.

Nothing... The corridor was empty...

FZZT!

A second later, a warm tickling draft brushed against the right side of his jaw.

Silas whipped his head forward and to the right, his jaw clenching.

Empty.

’This thing is fucking with me,’ Silas thought, his eye twitching with suppressed irritation. ’It’s fast... It’s slipping through the spatial blind spots right at the edge of my optical vision.’

He didn’t draw a blade and he didn’t drop the crate.

Silas calmly rounded the final corner, stepping out into the colossal dome-shaped hollow where the goblin settlement had once stood.

’We already widened the path before with the help of Thor so it’s a lot easier.’

The smoldering bone-fires of the dead tribe had long since turned to cold gray ash, but the wide expanse gave him plenty of room to maneuver.

Resting in the center of the hollow was the massive Phase 1 Titan Golem, its amber optics idling in low-power standby mode.

Silas approached the open space, bent his knees slightly, and lowered the heavy stone crate to the limestone bedrock with a muffled thud.

He tilted the crate forward, using a subtle pulse of earth mana to dissolve the front panel, allowing the hundreds of pounds of red crystals and white diamonds to slide smoothly into a massive glittering heap on the floor.

"Phase One Titan," Silas commanded, his voice echoing cleanly off the high granite ceiling. "Sweep and load."

KRRRRRR-GRIND!

The construct responded immediately.

Its massive stone arm, thick as an ancient oak and reinforced with plates of Deep-Earth Alloy, reached out across the cavern floor.

The articulated bedrock fingers spread wide, scooping beneath the entire pile of crimson and white ores with mechanical elegance.

The golem lifted the massive haul overhead, dumping the minerals directly into the second reinforced transport bin bolted across its back with a rolling thunderous roar.

CLATTER-CRASH!

Right beside Silas’s left ear, a tiny high-pitched hum vibrated through the air.

Silas didn’t move his neck as he merely shifted his eyes.

Floating roughly three feet off the ground, hovering entirely out in the open, was the source of his annoyance.

It was a compact fist-sized orb of pure radiant crimson light.

The sphere pulsed with a slow hypnotic rhythm, completely entranced by the sight of the colossal stone titan effortlessly moving hundreds of pounds of earth ore.

The tiny entity seemed completely spellbound, its faint light flickering with pure child-like fascination.

Silas slowly turned his head to look directly at it.

The moment their eyes met, the crimson orb froze.

The pulsing light hitched, and the spirit violently jerked backward, attempting to dart back toward the ceiling fissures—

SWOOSH!

Silas’s hand was faster.

Honed by weeks if not months of brutal combat, his right arm blurred through the air like a striking viper.

His fingers clamped shut, catching the floating orb dead-center in his palm.

"Finally," Silas smirked, his grip tightening around the smooth, weightless ball of light. "I caught you."

He raised his hand, inspecting the trapped anomaly.

"I’ve been wondering what kind of ghost was breathing down my neck all morning... So you’re the little spectator watching us from the ceiling."

The moment Silas’s calloused flesh wrapped around its form, the spirit panicked.

SZZZZZZZZZT!

The crimson orb violently heated up.

Within a fraction of a second, the surface temperature skyrocketed from a mild hum to a blistering white-hot blaze.

An inferno of bright crimson elemental fire erupted from the sphere, wrapping around Silas’s fingers and engulfing his entire right hand in roaring flames!

"Whoa—"

Silas reflexively opened his fingers, releasing his grip.

The crimson orb shot upward like a panicked firework, soaring twenty feet into the air before hovering near the granite ceiling, its light flaring erratically as if gasping for breath.

Silas raised his right hand, casually waving it through the air twice.

WHOOSH!

The flames detached from his skin, dying out in harmless wisps of gray smoke that drifted toward the darkness.

Silas looked down at his palm.

His skin wasn’t blistered and it wasn’t charred either.

There was barely a rosy flush across his calluses, which faded within seconds under the natural self-cleansing vitality of his Mythic Gold Core.

’It’s still quite weak,’ Silas analyzed, rubbing his thumb across his palm with a thoughtful hum.

His mind quickly sifted through the academic lectures he had half-listened to during his early days at Valoria Academy before the Lord War had shattered normal life.

Spirits were not monsters.

They were not born of corrupted flesh, anomalous curses, or necrotic rot. They were spontaneous manifestations of pure concentrated elemental mana that gathered in stagnant undisturbed geological formations over centuries.

Places like Cavern KB-22 where high-power Mana Diamonds and volatile crimson crystal vines grew intertwined for hundreds of years were natural cradles for elemental life.

Most spirits born in such isolation were little more than curious, instinct-driven wisps.

They possessed consciousness, but it was simple, innocent, and reactive... much like a newborn beast or a young child.

They lacked the malice of Evil Spirits, like that parasitic entity that had lurked in the dark mines to ambush Thora during the discovery of the Sil-Graves Silver alloy.

Silas tilted his chin upward, looking at the trembling crimson orb hovering near the rafters.

"You’re not trying to hurt anyone, are you?" Silas called out, his voice softening, shedding its cold combat edge. "That fire was just a panic reflex so its self-defense."

The crimson orb bobbed slightly, its erratic pulsing slowly stabilizing into a warm steady heartbeat.

It hovered in place, watching the human lord who had brushed off its hottest flames without a single blister.

Silas turned his back on the spirit, walking calmly toward the entrance of the narrow tunnel to head back to the harvesting crew.

PING!

Right before his eyes, a crisp translucent system notification flashed into existence, floating in the center of his vision.

[Ding! A Higher Spirit would like to initiate a Spirit Contract with you. Will you accept?]

[Y / N]

Silas froze mid-step.

He blinked, staring at the glowing letters hovering in the dark air.

"A Spirit Contract?" Silas murmured aloud.