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Chapter 434: From the Sky - Markets and Multiverses
🕑 Added 2025-08-27 05:02:20 +0000 UTCThe four of us spent a few more seconds feeling dumbfounded, before I confirmed that the scavengers were truly running away. Worse, they had a head start. We had moved far enough away from the ball room that they were barely visible at the edge of my soul sight. It would take us at least fifteen minutes to get back to the ball room, and by that time, they might have already slipped out of the academy and fled into the depths of the Market.
A moment later, true to my fears, they left the ball room through the hallway connected to a portal, causing them to vanish into thin air.
<The Scavengers just ran away! Do we chase them?> I asked.
<They just… ran through the portal?> asked Anise.
<Yes. They’re already out of my sight.>
<They attacked us first, and then fled as they willed? They aren’t even going to try to rescue the guy we knocked out?> asked Sallia, as she glanced at our unconscious prisoner.
<Apparently not.>
<They could lay a trap on the other side of the teleportation area,> said Felix. <That would be pretty dangerous. It could also somewhat explain their behavior. If we hurry to chase after them, they might spring a trap on us.>
<Or they might have really just run away,> I said, trying not to feel frustrated. <Wait, I could try sending a clone through the ball room. That would give us more information to work with. If they’re lurking on the other side of the portal, waiting to see if we follow them, they’ll either kill my clone, or my clone will find them with soul sight.>
<Good idea,> said Felix. <Let’s make our way back towards the ball room first, and then we can make new plans after Miria does her scouting.>
The four of us started sprinting towards the ball room. Previously, we had been at least somewhat worried about the noise we might make while moving - but now, we had no such fears. As we ran, I continued to think about our situation, before I asked my friends another question. <Assuming the enemy has truly left the school, should we delve deeper into the school, or keep chasing?>
<What do you mean?> asked Felix.
<Well, the group of Scavengers cleared out a huge chunk of the monsters in the school, right? If there were ever a time to seize old opportunities from the Market and grow stronger, this would be the time. We don’t really value small Achievement boosts right now, and we still have a huge amount of Achievement to spend. Risk-free exploration might allow us to seize some incredibly powerful opportunities - such as the ability to build new bodies and inhabit them. That’s nowhere near the end of what we might find in the school, if we get lucky.>
<I think we should keep chasing the splinter that the Scavengers stole,> said Sallia. <I mean, we’re in the universal tree part of the school right now. Like you already mentioned, the needs of people who came here in the flesh are already quite different from the needs of the average Transmigrator. We probably won't find much here besides rare items and materials. Those are useful… but the scavenger group has already taken the most important and valuable material of all. Furthermore, I have some other doubts. Notice that we can’t find very many other transmigrators in the Market. In my opinion, that indicates one thing - whatever is blocking transmigrators from purchasing more lives, it’s very powerful. We need something we aren’t supposed to have access to in order to survive. Felix making an item from the universal tree’s bark probably qualifies. It might be our only chance. It's much more important than whatever else we could find in the school.>
<I also think we should keep chasing after the splinter of wood,> said Anise, after some hesitation. <It seems more likely to offer a solution to our problems than the school itself, especially this wing of the school.>
<I also want the splinter,> said Felix. <I admit, part of that might just be because I’m excited at the thought of working with a rare and extraordinary material, but I do also genuinely think it’s the best way for us to survive this mess.>
<All right. If the scavengers have left the area, we’ll do our best to track them down,> I said. I felt a bit regretful about the fact that we were losing a golden opportunity to explore this building while encountering minimal resistance… but my friends were right. That wood from the universal tree might be our best chance to survive long term. Even if abandoning the building I had been so eager to explore felt bad, we had bigger priorities.
After that, we didn’t say much else as we kept running towards the ball room. Once we finally arrived, I spent another thousand Achievement splitting off a new clone, dropping me from about 275,453 Achievement to 274,452.53. I sent my clone through the hallway that teleported people in and out of the universal tree wing of the school. My clone fearlessly dashed forward, before my clone’s vision of reality lurched.
When I arrived on the other side, I immediately had my clone activate soul sight and scan the area. Then, I gritted my teeth in frustration.
They weren’t here. I couldn’t even see them in the distance. They had probably already passed through the admissions office and out of the second portal in the building. They weren’t waiting in ambush for us - they had already left the area, and quite possibly the building. They didn’t care about their friend that we were still carting around, or other treasures in the building, or getting revenge upon us. They had simply run for their lives, heedless of the fact that we were a group of four people confronting a group of twenty eight.
Then, I noticed that while the scavengers had fled, they had still left a few gifts for us. There were several strange metal cubes on the ground - and all of them had red lasers peeking out of them. I stared at one of them in curiosity, before I shared my vision with Felix.
<I have never seen these before… but I’m guessing either the lasers are meant to burn us, or they explode,> said Felix. <Try getting a rock or something and then throwing it, before having your clone dive back through the teleportation area?>
I did as Felix instructed, and a moment later, I felt a small tremor in the school. I sent my clone back through the portal a moment later, and saw several new craters in the hallway.
<Laser-activated landmines. They look like they were quite potent. Far better than the bombs we used for warfare in our third world,> said Felix.
<I’ll have my clone scout the hallway to make sure I didn’t miss any, and then we can cross,> I said. As I had my clone start scouring the area for more explosives, I tried to suppress a surge of frustration.
The landmines weren’t very good at actually hurting us - they were too obviously scattered throughout the hallway. Then again, maybe that was the point. The scavengers didn’t care whether they got any of us or not - they just wanted to waste our time while they ran further and further away.
Several minutes later, I found two more clusters of bombs - one that was actually somewhat cleverly hidden under a loose floor tile, and the other also obviously laid out in plain sight. Once I finished tripping all of the laser-activated land mines, my friends and I crept into the hallway, where I could let my trap-sensing skill do its work. Despite my frustration, I didn’t rush - that was how I might get my friends killed. No matter how much I wanted to teleport right in front of the scavengers and start harassing them and sabotaging their supplies, I needed to make sure my friends were safe first.
By the time we finished navigating through the hallway and admissions office, and then excited the building, I couldn’t find a trace of the invaders with my soul sight.
<They got away,> I said, before I sighed.
They had taken the splinter of wood with them. Our best hope. Felix’s chance to create a powerful item that could save us. It was gone.
<Wait - maybe not,> said Felix. <Look around us with your soul sight, and share the vision with us.>
I blinked in surprise, and then activated my soul-sight again. I hadn’t noticed it the first time, since I had been so dead-set on locating the scavengers, but there was something quite unusual in our surroundings.
There were several weaker and moderate-strength monsters moving towards something in the distance. It was almost as if they were all being drawn by something.
A wave of confusion assaulted my thoughts, before I laughed.
<Felix! You’re right! The monsters are all heading towards a spot south of us!> I said.
<I thought so,> said Felix, before he chuckled. <We’ve already on previous visits to the Market that monsters here are drawn to ‘unguarded’ valuable objects and facilities. The monsters don’t seem to notice objects or Achievement totals that are ‘bound’ directly to people… but the Scavengers don’t have a way to bind an object to their souls. They must have some kind of way to get around this rule… but they probably rely on a special object to mask the object they took with them. They also don’t seem to have expected to procure such a valuable object… which means that they’re basically holding a homing beacon for all the nearby monsters,> said Felix. <Let’s follow the monsters, and see if we can catch up.>
I grinned, and led my friends towards the same place the monsters were converging. There was still a chance to get the bark from the universal tree.
My cheer lasted for the next five minutes of travel, as we got closer and closer to the heart of the wave of monsters. Then, I noticed something twitch in the sky. I looked up.
It was the giant worm that had swallowed the moon-sized billboard. It was no longer wrapped into a ball as it evolved. Instead, it was looking at us.
No, it was looking at something just a bit ahead of us.
Regular monsters weren’t the only creatures that had been dragged out of their usual patrol routes to deal with the scavengers.
The giant worm in the sky had also noticed them.
I felt a surge of fear as it dropped out of the sky like a meteor hurtling towards the earth, before it crashed into the market about half a kilometer away. The giant worm had returned to the surface of the nursery to stop the scavengers.
Author’s Note:
Join my Discord! (I’m at least sometimes active there, while I admit that I don’t generally check the comments section. I’m not very active anywhere, though - writers are antisocial people, okay!)
Comments
Irakli Jishkariani
Hmmm, too greedy is too greedy. I don't call it greedy because they take something they don't need. That's not all that is to greed. Even in strict survival situation, fixating on one shiny thing will be detrimental. That's how baits work. That bark is not the only salvation, they could increase their chances of getting powerful abilities in next life by increasing their power now. They also forgot their goals for this building. Getting long lasting bodies in the market. If they get it they can technically get extra life. Stay in market and learn stuff. But that was thrown out a window for bark. And they are chasing heroic grade opponent plus 10 times their number of equal opponents. Are they out of their mind? With trapping and out of sight positioning they could do something but outside in open space against heroic grade shooter?! They are sitting ducks. Idiots.
Hoogleman
She sees it as abandoning the school because their entire party is extremely narrow-minded and singularly focused. Despite being like 800 years old each, they're very childlike. Every time one of them has an idea, the others just repeat it with different phrasing, rarely coming up with anything else. And once they get an idea, that's all they'll focus on. With the bark as an example, they heard one guy mention something they think will be useful, and then proceed to dedicate hours to attempting to kill the scavengers. And even though they plan on killing them all, Miria didn't use any of that time to kill the 4 weakened members of the group, despite the fact that they were likely actively sharing information about what had happened. Simply because they wanted a piece of bark, and even though, by her assessment, it would've barely taken any effort whatsoever. Plus, if she had tried to snuff those 4 out with extinguish, they would have found out about the laser pistol scavenger's ability to react so quickly to an attack before setting their traps and adjusted accordingly. Overall, Miria & Co. are entirely tactically inept, and overall seem to be pretty mentally stunted. They will forget the school even exists after the bone worms attack, and just be dejected that they lost their ultimate crafting material that they know nothing about. If they'd actually tracked down some tier 6 soul fragments, too, they'd have a much easier time with their efforts in relation to everything, but they instead decided to look for items they don't plan to really need for an entire other lifetime.
bcdp
Let me guess. She was frustrated, causing frustration leading to frustration over frustration. It's funny that they are surprised that the other group is not dead set on mutual elimination, like they are. After losing members to leathal means, twice, there is little reason for the scavangers to believe the two missing members have been left alive. I am also not sure why Miria sees it as abandoning the school. What prevents them from coming back afterwards? It might take too long, but just starting the chase doesn't make the school repopulate with monsters in a blink.
