I quickly removed the spiritual cores from my Golems.
Then I threw them directly onto the ground.
As soon as they touched the earth, an enormous amount of earth-element energy exploded outward.
The ground beneath my feet trembled.
A gigantic Earth King Shark appeared before me. Upon its back was the hunting rider, motionless and prepared for the journey.
I didn’t waste any time.
I mentally ordered the Shark to open up a space inside its body and swallow Ruby and me.
Then I gave a second order.
Dive.
The enormous body of the King Shark sank directly into the ground.
The earth opened around it, and within a few seconds, we were completely swallowed by the darkness of the underground.
The Shark began advancing through the earth, carefully following the route indicated by the magical item Ruby was carrying.
The space inside the King Shark’s body wasn’t exactly spacious.
In fact, it was quite limited.
And since Ruby didn’t have a particularly large body, we didn’t have much difficulty staying there.
But that meant we had to remain extremely close.
I held her in my arms.
Ruby naturally leaned against me.
I smiled.
She was a really hot super MILF.
Her body was soft and delicate against mine, and even in that pitch-black darkness, I could feel the warmth of her presence; my male instinct kicked in, making my cock begin to harden, and I soon found myself wanting to fill Ruby’s womb with my hot semen and bring her to multiple, soaking-wet orgasms, but I was keeping King Shark in check.
If I became distracted, we could end up entering a dangerous region or, even worse, colliding directly with some group of rogue acolytes.
So I put those thoughts aside.
The magical item Lyra had given Ruby before we departed was much more useful than I had initially imagined.
That small crystal container, with a glowing sphere suspended in the center of the liquid, stored information about the route Lyra had used during her previous journey.
It wasn’t just a map.
It also recorded the underground creatures encountered along the way.
Some dangerous regions.
The approximate distribution of the demons.
And even the paths that should be avoided.
With Lyra’s clear map and the precision of my biochip, controlling the King Shark’s direction became much simpler.
Most of the time, the Shark advanced through the underground caves.
Whenever we encountered a small amount of rock blocking the way, we simply passed through the earth.
However, whenever we encountered a gigantic region of solid rock, I was forced to choose an alternative route.
Fortunately, that didn’t happen very often.
The combination of Lyra’s map and my biochip had drastically reduced the travel time.
Last time, it had taken Lyra twenty-seven hours to reach that location.
It took me only four hours.
Shortly afterward, the enormous creature emerged from the ground.
The earth split open.
The King Shark emerged inside a small cave.
I opened the internal space of the Golem and climbed out, still holding Ruby in my arms.
I jumped to the ground.
We took out the magical item and used it to check our exact location.
A representation of the region appeared in our perception.
I carefully analyzed the data.
When I finally confirmed the distance to our destination, I relaxed a little.
We were only a few kilometers from the mission location.
But my relief didn’t last long.
I quickly returned to a state of vigilance.
Ruby did the same.
Those rogue acolytes who inhabited the depths of the Subterranean World were dangerous.
They knew countless strange and bizarre spells.
Who could guarantee that they hadn’t set traps around the mission location?
If they noticed our trail, our journey back could become ten, perhaps a hundred times more dangerous, after all, our destination was the site of the old Number Seven ore mine.
Mine Number Seven was located even deeper within the Subterranean World than the mission location we had visited previously.
And there was a reason that place was so highly contested.
It was an Impiril Crystal mine.
The most abundant resource here is Impiril Crystal.
A common piece of this mineral doesn’t have much use on its own, but it is extremely valuable as a catalyst for various magical experiments.
When turned into powder, however, its value increases considerably.
Impiril Crystal powder is highly sought after on the black market because it can be used to purify and extract components from various magical items.
Even that elite camp where I had won two duels and earned many magical crystals often sent its members here.
The training camp wasn’t interested in the Impiril Crystal itself.
The true reason for that ambush was something else.
The objective was the concentrated resource that accompanies these stones.
The Impiril Heart.
A gem of this kind was completely different from ordinary ore.
After the Impiril Hearts were handed over to master jewelers, they could be transformed into countless magical accessories.
The jewelers used specialized methods to extract the mysterious energy stored inside the gems and incorporate it into the accessories.
It was precisely this energy that granted the objects extraordinary properties.
Remember that restoration piercing I found on the body of that acolyte who controlled bones?
That accessory had been produced from a gem of the Impiril Raz Heart type, which was another type of magical gem, but the principle was similar.
Even an Impiril Heart that had undergone only the first stage of extraction could reach one thousand magical crystals per kilogram on the black market.
For the elite acolytes of the training camp, transporting a truly significant amount would require hiring many clandestine merchants.
Even so, merchants from acolyte families fought over these gems like madmen.
Some were willing to pay as much as two thousand magical crystals per kilogram.
The price difference was enormous.
It was precisely after evaluating this possibility that Nople made his decision.
Mine Number Seven would be ambushed.
The objective was to plunder the stockpile of Impiril Hearts accumulated over nearly half a month.
And because of this, the battles followed a rather peculiar pattern.
Today, a team could invade a mine controlled by rogue Mages.
Tomorrow, their opponents could wait for the team on its return and launch an ambush.
Then, the roles would be reversed.
One team would be the hunter.
Then, it would become the hunted.
Everything happened within the dark tunnels of the Subterranean World.
But there was one rule.
A rule that both sides strictly respected.
No one could deliberately destroy a mine or a resource site.
No matter how fiercely they fought.
That principle could never be violated.
And it made sense.
Both the Mages from the surface and the rogue Mages depended on those resources.
If someone deliberately destroyed an enemy mine, nothing would prevent the other side from doing the same.
Before long, all resource-rich regions could be destroyed.
The result would be a disaster for both sides.
Any acolyte discovered deliberately destroying a mine or resource site would be hunted down.
And not only by the side that had been attacked.
Official Mages from both sides could intervene.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
We were already close.
According to the map, only a few meters remained.
Besides that, I intended to get Ruby accepted into the elite acolyte camp that I had been accepted into.
But that wouldn’t be simple.
She needed to stand out.
From what I had heard from Rustil, the training camp had already begun showing interest in Lyra.
She was in the process of being accepted.
As for the other members of the team, the situation was different.
They were still only on a watch list.
None of them had demonstrated enough performance to attract Nople’s interest.
And that was understandable.
After all, there were only three Pseudo-Mages on that team.
Fortunately, I didn’t even need to speak to Ruby to achieve this; once she found out the training camp had accepted me without her, her mood shifted, sometimes she’d even refuse to engage in anal or oral sex just to punish me, hehehe...
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1366 Words
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