Museum Core Chapter 120: Everything’s The Same, But Different

I think it's been a while since I posted the link for the discord (https://discord.gg/b6MrYKtj4T).
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Thomas was in the middle of yet another chess match against Elias, as his vision was blocked with a system window.

Earth Unified System … huh.

He quickly read the message, then clicked it away to focus on the second window.

Congratulations!

You have already earned your powers, as such. Feel free to ignore this message; however, instead, you are rewarded with information:

Based on empirical analyses, you are the strongest humans on the face of the planet.

You hold the first rank for level/progression.

You hold the first place for combat power, irrespective of environment.

That was … interesting.

And then Elias had to go ahead and dump a bucket of ice water on his head.

“Your last name wouldn’t happen to be Stettin, would it?”

Uh-oh …

“Yeah, why?” Thomas asked, with mounting dread.

“Because I think the System just sent the strongest people in the world a message that while they’re some of the strongest people around, some guy called ‘Thomas Stettin’ is the strongest human in the world.”

“Fuuuuuck …” Thomas muttered. At least he’d been using the name Daedalus from the start, which should minimize the fallout, between that and the fact that a human turning into a dungeon wasn’t supposed to be possible, hopefully, people would go chasing some hidden master, rather than bugging him.

But if they didn’t … people dealing with Thomas would likely start expecting things. Things beyond what he was already doing. By and large, people respected him as a force of nature right now.

Daedalus the dungeon wasn’t someone people wanted to fuck with.

Thomas the former human might be the same thing, but ultimately, people could be weird. Perception mattered. A lot more than it should, really.

And as though to make his emotional turmoil even worse, yet another System window popped up.

The EUS has detected that you were the victim of an accident during the merge and were forced to assume a shape that is not your own.

Should you elect to revert, you will maintain your rank and be able to choose powers for each rank up to your current one from your Dungeon’s pool.

Would you like to become human again?

For a moment, for an incredibly brief instant, Thomas considered hitting “yes.”

Yet even the thought … it terrified him. Some deep and distant part of him took one look at that option, realized what it would cost him, and began to whimper in fear.

Beyond what losing his dungeon would cost the world, beyond the fact that he would have lost any chance at stopping the second merge … he didn’t want to be human again.

Yeah, it would be years before he was able to use technology again, if ever, that was certainly annoying … but now that he had the chance to become human again, all the arguments he’d made while mulling the topic over in his head flew out of the window.

Thomas smashed the System window out of the way with an angry growl, then returned his attention to his fairy.

“Elias ...” Thomas began, seeing the fairy likewise staring at something only he could see, but he held up a hand, and Thomas shut up.

“No, I want to keep that part,” Elias announced, which made no sense, but Thomas kept his trap shut anyway.

And then, finally, the fairy grew. Not an inch, not a foot, but all the way to the size of a full human, tall, with blonde hair falling down to his shoulders, glowing red eyes … and absolutely no clothes.

Thomas dropped a bathrobe on him, summoning the article of clothing over the man without considering that he normally couldn’t do that in the presence of humans, which Elias now was …

“We’re still connected,” the former fairy mentally told him. “I wanted my body back, but …”

Elias snorted as he pulled the robe on. “I enjoyed the last year. I wouldn’t just leave. I mean, I’ll go exploring now that I’m not fragile anymore, but I won’t, you know …

Then he paused and cautiously switched topics. “Did you get the chance to …”

“I decided I wanted to stay the way I am,” Thomas declared. “Besides …”

He summoned a human dungeon monster. His newest version. D-Rank, with its avatar power having been added after its final rank-up to boost it, allowing it to be controlled at least a bit outside his dungeon while also having a built-in function that petrified the avatar when not in use to cut down on the general issues of having that avatar just … like around, when not used.

Because he’d also created a second power to avoid most of the issues involved in using humans as monsters. It effectively turned the “monster” into a robot of sorts, very simple, very limited, but still capable of fighting, and so on. It also made the human look ever so subtly “wrong,” which made them a little creepy, but also ensured that it was impossible for people to mistake his creations for actual, you know, people.

Especially as the power also ensured they didn’t bleed normally, as the blood would vanish the moment it got outside of a wound, creating a seriously strange and disjointed appearance. Sure, assuming he couldn’t do something just because he refrained from it was a pretty big logical fallacy, but it was one that a lot of people would likely fall into.

And finally, he’d given his avatar an actually useful power, just for the fun of wielding superpowers. It was called “Defensive Fulgurkinesis” and gave him lightning powers with the specialty of defense.

A lightning-cloaked superhuman. This would be fun.

“… I can have my cake and eat it too,” Thomas finished, speaking through the mouth of his avatar.

He still didn’t want to use humans and dungeon mobs in general, but now at least he had the option.

“How about we go exploring?” Elias asked.

Thomas nodded, and they began to head towards the exit.

“Wait!” he suddenly said before they were even out of the core room, causing the former fairy to freeze in place. “We’re not leaving … not without the finest armor and gear I can possibly make!”

Also, Elias should probably be wearing something other than a bathrobe …

***

Going outside felt weird. Especially in skin that was basically his own.

Yes, it was a human form specifically meant to look weird, but it was still, you know, human, and a hell of a lot closer to the re- … no, the original him than he’d been in months, aside from the brief instances he’d spent using a human avatar to try out foods and the like.

And, what felt like the thousandth time, he raised his palm in front of his eyes and watched the lightning crackling across it, arcing around as though he were some kind of sci-fi reactor or the like.

You know, the kind that looked cool while also being wildly unsafe.

“You’ve been using magic for months now,” Elias commented. “Why is that so fascinating?”

Thomas found himself shrugging. “It makes me feel like a superhero.”

It was a concept he’d mentioned once or twice, if he recalled correctly, especially going by Elias’ response.

“You know, I’m really going to have to see one of those comic books at some point … they sounded absolutely ridiculous. In what possible universe would all of the strongest people in the world decide to keep it safe, for free, without any proper support or anything? They just … let them run around like that.”

“Wasn’t that basically how Dretolara worked?” Thomas asked, recalling some of the discussions they’d had on the topic.

“The powerful had privileges, not a carte blanche,” Elias explained. “The world of comic books sounds absolutely insane.”

Thomas decided to stop arguing and let his hand drop back to his side so he could look around instead.

The jungle around them … it was both strange and painfully familiar. Like something out of every nature documentary ever, and half a dozen other movies too.

He felt small, tiny, inconsequential by comparison to the arboreal giants that surrounded the two of them, yet … yet when he sent more electricity arcing around him, sparking through the air, he felt like a giant, like a titan among men, a lightning-clad god … of a sort.

After all, it wasn’t like he was anywhere near the top of the power ladder, not in this body, at least.

“Think you can hit this?” Elias asked, yanking Thomas out of his thoughts to look at the former fairy, who was hefting what looked to be a coconut.

“Throw it,” Thomas announced and tried to catch the now-airborne nut … only to fall painfully short. The “defensive” part of “defensive fulgurkinesis” had sadly seriously cut into his range.

Without even bothering to ask, Elias grabbed another one and chucked it straight at hi- … no, past him, the fruit known for killing people it fell on moving on a trajectory that made it pass within a couple of centimeters of Thomas’ head.

… at least if it hadn’t blown apart a couple of meters from him, an arc of lightning stretching to smash clean through the coconut’s center, burning through and into the water within, which promptly flashed into steam, the pressure causing the whole thing to blow like a frag grenade.

Thomas spat out a piece of shell, then swiped his hand through his hair to get rid of the worst of it.

“Well, that happened …” he muttered.

And that was the end of their “proper” exploration of the jungle; things rapidly devolved into general horseplay after that.

“You know what?” Elias finally said. “I think I should go talk to our ‘hosts.’ They’d probably like to learn more about the System of Unified Power.”

And with that, they split up. Thomas continued to screw around with lightning, while Elias went off to offer his “services” granting system access.

***

Elias glanced at his status screen.

Name: Elias

Title: Monarch of the Crimson Sea

Species: Human (Fae-touched)

Homeworld: Dretolara

System of Unified Power (pure)

Progression: C-Rank, Stage 7 of 10 (linked to and synchronized with bound Dungeon)

Soulbound Weapon: Spear of Longinus

Other Traits: Dungeon Bound Progression; Dungeon Telepathy, Part-Fae

Powers

Fae-touched Physique (F-Rank)

Bloodforge (E-Rank)

Sanguine Overclock (D-Rank)

Crimson Link (C-Rank, prematurely complete)

Power locked

Power locked

Power locked

Stats

Vitality 300

Power 400

Magic 400

Mind 250

A few things had changed, but much stayed the same.

Nearly all of his previous powers had remained, in their complete and final form, including the one for C-Rank, even though he was not yet at the peak of that rank.

And judging by the fact that his future powers were shown as “locked,” rather than not even showing up in the first place, indicated that he’d be able to keep all of them.

However, his F-Rank power had shifted into a physique ability.

Sadly, keeping his link with Thomas had also messed with his future advancement, the only silver lining being that their advancements would feed into each other.

Elias would still be burdened with a dungeon’s high advancement thresholds even if he killed something entirely on his own, but he could improve.

And, of course, he still had his lance. Well, the one Thomas had immediately recreated after Elias had let him absorb the original to copy the “growth” property.

All in all, his powerset would have made him one of the most lethal people in the world, even if his raw power hadn’t also put him in second place, right behind Thomas.

His original first power, Bond of the Crimson Fang, had allowed him to choose a weapon and use it as if it were a soulbound weapon, then empower it based on the blood on or around it.

Good, but largely overtaken by events. Or rather, rendered largely useless by his soulbound weapon. Which made its loss a negligible price to pay.

Bloodforge, meanwhile, allowed him to manifest and control weapons out of blood, except that the blood in question was stored in a pocket dimension that could also serve to empower his other skills.

Skills like Sanguine Overclock. It allowed him to supercharge his healing and/or physical abilities by either absorbing blood on or near him, or burning his own blood for fuel.

And finally, Crimson Link built up a connection between him and a single enemy at a time, causing every strike to be stronger than the previous, building and building until he reached the point where he could shatter mountains, with the cost being able to be paid in either mana or blood, with the latter often being plentiful.

Elias’ battlefields tended to get … messy. There was a reason why “of the Crimson Sea” was his epithet beyond the fact that he’d spilled a lot of monster blood.

Although it was his B-Rank power that really turned him into an absolute monster on the battlefield.

Bloody Conversion allowed him to ignore when an enemy didn’t have blood, such as when he was fighting elementals or golems, as well as draw blood from direct strikes against an enemy’d body that were blocked by armor, and finally, he could temporarily raise a Bloody Specter from an enemy’s remains, if they still had more than eighty percent of their blood volume within their body at the time of their death.

Between those five powers, any foe that he fought would bleed when he hit it, and that would then, in turn, allow him to start burning his various powers at full blast, which would, in turn, cause more blood to stain the battlefield and empower him further, until the enemy lay dead at his feet.

And if the enemy was a giant or titan or other huge opponent, well, that just meant he’d have to keep the power-up loop going longer and scale higher.

But in the here and now, he had yet another massive advantage over everyone else, not that he needed it, seeing as he was already solidly the second-strongest being in the world, only behind Thomas.

Equipment.

For most people, there were quite a few limitations to overcome on the road to covering themselves in legendary gear.

Firstly, they needed to actually get their hands on it.

Secondly, they needed to make it so that it worked properly with their own abilities and fighting style, which wasn’t exactly a given.

And thirdly, properties like “soulbound” and “growth” did somewhat eat into the actual power of the item.

However, Thomas was helping him get around all those limitations.

Acquisition difficulty? Non-existent, once he had the pattern, it could be reproduced thrice over before it even started to become a drain on the core’s mana.

Suitability and synergy? A given, considering the two of them had worked together to create the best items possible.

Maximized power? Since the items could be replaced/upgraded very easily by the original creator, there was zero need for any limitations to be put on them beyond one that prevented them from being used against them, meaning the actual power of a given item was as high as it could possibly be.

The only thing Elias disliked about his current armor was the color. His old set had been bronze and gold, a shining bastion of light, a symbol of the power that would beat back all threats … but when he’d made that suggestion, Thomas had turned him down flat and refused to budge.

Something about how “smug pretty boy paladins” were usually “twist villains that everyone could predict being evil from their very first appearance” and that therefore, his showing up in golden armor was a terrible idea.

So Elias had gotten a silver-and-steel set with ruby inlays, which looked impressive without being pretentious… at least in Thomas’ mind. Elias wasn’t sure he agreed, but he also hadn’t considered the issue to be severe enough to truly raise hell over.

Alright, now to see if that part still worked.

Negotiating with the system, well, any system, really, was the kind of thing that could either work out wonderfully or bite you in the ass with the jaw strength of a voidshark.

In this case, it had worked; he’d kept his bond with Thomas, it just wasn’t entirely clear by how much.

Flying using his power was perfectly doable at B-Rank, never mind A-Rank, when raw power and control let just about anyone take to the skies even without a dedicated power.

Right now … time to see just how far “Fae-touched” went.

Elias manifested his wings even as the world around him suddenly went dark, followed by a loud clatter … and then his helmet fell on him, the piece of headgear large enough to cover his fairy body in its entirety and drag him down onto the ground.

Urgh …

Elias gave his forehead a perfunctory rub, then climbed out of the pile his gear had fallen in and transformed back into his human form, entirely naked.

… that could have gone better.

He put everything but the helmet back on and tried again. And again. And half a dozen more times for good measure before he finally figured things out.

Partial transformations weren’t really possible, but a combination of Bloodforge and the idea of his fairy wings could be combined to create a pair of crimson dragonfly wings that carried him aloft.

Staying beneath the canopy, he traveled through the jungle in a big loop, curving around to head towards one of the border checkpoints of the transformation zone.

He would continue to fly forward until someone, anyone, reacted … which took a truly shocking span of time.

Were they so bored at this location that they’d grown complacent, or was their eyesight just that bad?

Either way, he’d gotten within fifty meters of the walls of the checkpoint before anyone reacted, but no one seemed to mind overly.

One man waved. Another glanced up, took notice of him, then looked back down at something in his lap.

Professional, much?

Elias internally rolled his eyes as he dismissed his wings, taking a couple of rapid steps to bleed off momentum before switching to a normal walk.

Even as he came closer, no one really paid him much attention except for one individual standing at the gate itself, likely having the task of cataloging those who used the road in and out of the jungle.

Seriously?

Actually rolling his eyes, Elias tapped into the full power of his stats to close the final twenty meters in the blink of an eye, appearing in front of the gate amidst a cloud of dust and flying leaves.

“Hi,” he said, with a “friendly” grin on his face. “I do believe you’ve been looking for me?”

***

Third-strongest person in the world.

His deputy was literally in the global top-three for combat power.

That was nice.

What wasn’t nice was the fact that both of the two actual strongest people were complete unknowns.

Frye grimaced. This was going to be trouble.

Granted, the “last survivor of Dretolara” was a likely candidate for second place, and the man had, somehow, been hiding out in the jungle right under everyone’s nose the entire time, but that still left number one.

“Thomas Stettin” wasn’t exactly a common name, but it was also one borne by several people, both living and said to be deceased recently enough that, should those messages of their deaths have been false, old age wouldn’t have killed them yet.

And while there were few truly unique names, only held by a single person, that name was certainly one that wasn’t too widespread.

However, looking into people by that name was yet to reveal any useful information.

Yeah … it was probably Daedalus. He was just a bit too human, in so many ways.

For example, his idea of “cute” was literally identical to that of most humans, which was odd, considering how decidedly inhuman a dungeon core normally was.

Although … there was the way he dealt with people. Those he dealt with personally, he proved rather personable with. And he had an abstract “sense of honor” when it came to a lot of other dealings.

But as far as anyone else was concerned, they seemed to be mere “fuel.” Did that make the man a sociopath, or merely schizophrenic? Or was it the result of being turned into another species?

There were a couple more people who’d gotten transformed in the merge who’d gone through something similar, who’d changed in certain ways on a psychological level to align with their new forms.

However, they’d all gotten the chance to turn back to human when the EUS had been established, and based on the fact that the dungeon was still there …

But there was still a good chance that Daedalus had once been a human by the name of “Thomas Stettin,” albeit one who’d elected to retain his transformation.

It just … well, felt right.

Also, he used a whole lot of idioms that were decidedly not British. Each of them was theoretically one he might have heard from a delver, but the preponderance of “foreign” idioms was noteworthy.

And even the fact that Daedalus’ English was good hardly meant anything. The language was not only reasonably widespread as people’s native language, but also the most common second language in the world.

So many options … and so many chances for someone to piss off the world’s strongest man.

Because even if Daedalus and Thomas Stettin weren’t the same person, some moron would inevitably start hassling “random” Stettin families in the hopes of locating the world’s strongest, and then things would inevitably blow up. Because even if it was the wrong family that got screwed with, even the attempt might result in an explosion.

Yet was there really any chance that wouldn’t happen? That people would leave well enough alone?

Not a snowball’s chance in hell.

All that being said, however, how many people had had enough interactions with the core to be able to make that connection?

Jaclyn, himself, probably Granger … certainly no foreigners or other people he couldn’t directly order to keep their gobs shut.

Beyond that, however, all that was left to do was hope and pray that no one pissed off the dungeon core. While he didn’t exactly like being so dependent on a single point of failure, they really did need Daedalus for a lot of things.

And then his phone rang. The “last survivor of Dretolara” had appeared in the jungle; he’d just walked up to the checkpoint and introduced himself.

Elias of the Crimson Sea, who’d been in the jungle the entire time, somehow, had offered to allow a few people access to the system in exchange for a legal identity which did not impose any of the duties of citizenship, some money, a place to stay, and ready access to the dungeon. All easy enough to fulfill.

And thus, Britain had gained yet another advantage in this new world.

That was both good … and potentially the casus belli a certain foreign nation might use to attack, to “free” the man they were “keeping imprisoned for his system.”

That obviously wasn’t the truth, and certainly wasn’t how it would end up, ever, but propaganda had a way of not giving a flying toss about the truth, only how things appeared to be and the myriad ways that appearance could be twisted to suit the creator.

But there was no way on God’s green Earth that they’d be giving him up … not unless he wanted to leave, that was.

There were certain politicians who’d believe that trying to shackle a walking weapon of mass destruction was a good idea. Thankfully, every British member of that particular idiot brigade had died during the merge, and neither Frye nor the PM had ever been inclined towards that kind of moronitude.   

Even so, getting immediate access to a third System, on top of their advantage of hosting Daedalus and the Worldstrider Tribe … some might fear the British Empire was returning. And they were certainly building up a sufficient force to make that happen.

Of course, whether they’d use it was an entirely different question, but fear was just as effective a way of making people stupid as greed.

Now all there was left to do was wait and see if anyone did anything stupid …

***

All in all, the world changed a lot that day. A lot of chaos was caused, a lot of people swore at the sky, but in the end, little actually changed, save, perhaps, a whole series of brown pants situations about the mysterious powerhouse that no one had ever heard of.

But all of the previous problems were still there, still in need of dealing with, and there was a certain city guardian that was about to have a very bad day …