Underworld Passage

"Without a doubt, the change in my right eye's color happened last night..." Aster touched his cheek and picked off a bit of dried blood from his chin. "Only a few things happened last night. First, I was seriously injured for peeping at True Creator's offspring... Fuck, that asshole made me work for nothing, then had his own subordinate try to kill me. What a bastard."

Naturally, the "asshole" Aster referred to was True Creator. In fact, ever since he had received the mission to seize 1-27, Aster cursed True Creator seven or eight times a day. Of course, he still had some sense and did not use words capable of stirring natural forces to curse in the streets.

"The pollution inside my body..." Aster closed his eyes and sensed the divine pollution he had obtained from Lanevus. "It seems to have decreased, though I don't know if that's just an illusion. The change in my eye color probably has nothing to do with True Creator..."

"Then the only possibility is the contract I signed with Alidibus..." Aster opened his pet panel and searched for Alidibus's name within it. Sure enough, he found a strange contract.

Last night, Aster had signed the contract entirely out of a desire to survive. Combined with his condition at the time, he had had no opportunity to examine its contents, so even now, he had no idea what kind of contract he had signed.

"Hmm..." Aster frowned slightly as he read the contract. "Alidibus gave me a special buff, and the price was taking away my death...? That counts as a price? Hmm, there's another price... Participate in the 'Brewing' Ritual as a 'memory'?"

"What is this 'Brewing' Ritual? Why do I have to participate as a 'memory'? Why have I never heard of it?" Aster sank into deep thought. Neither the game from his previous life nor the occult books he had read in this world had ever mentioned the existence of a Brewing Ritual.

Moreover, aside from the name of the Brewing Ritual, the contract mentioned none of the crucial information, such as its location, number of participants, or time. It was exactly the kind of three-no mission Aster hated most.

What the hell is this? What am I supposed to do? Where am I supposed to go?

Should I summon Alidibus and ask him?

After thinking for several seconds, Aster decided to postpone trying the skill called Underworld Passage.

"I, in my name, summon,"

"Traveler who wanders the upper realms,"

"Singer who proclaims death,"

"Despairing one on the verge of dispersal."

At Aster's current level, only one contract could exist at a time between him and the same spirit body. After Alidibus signed a contract with him, the original messenger contract had naturally been replaced, rendering the messenger incantation ineffective as well. At this moment, Aster could only use the summoning incantation he had first used to summon Alidibus.

Azure spiritual flames ignited at Aster's fingertips, and Alidibus's grotesquely elongated body emerged from the flames.

"Your Excellency, I summoned you this time to repay the spirituality I owe you." Aster's social awareness was not so low that he would directly say he had summoned Alidibus to ask about the contract.

"There is no need. The messenger contract has perished, and you are under no obligation to pay me spirituality." Alidibus refused without the slightest emotion.

As expected, this big shot probably drained so much spirituality because he was afraid I'd summon him too often... Aster did not insist and remained respectful. "Other than that, I have a few questions about the details of the contract. What exactly is the 'Brewing' Ritual? When will it be held?"

"It is not yet time for you to know." Alidibus answered in an unfathomable tone. "You are not the only participant in the 'Brewing' Ritual. When it is held, every participant will naturally go and take part. This is fate converging."

Fate converging?

Aster instinctively extracted the main point: Don't worry. When the time comes, the ritual will come looking for me itself.

That wasn't a good thing... Aster narrowed his eyes slightly. If he had still been the person who treated everything like a game, he might have been delighted that "a hidden mission is actually flying right at me." But after reality had beaten him down so many times, Aster knew very well that an unexpected mission that could descend at any time might very well cost him his life, especially when he knew absolutely nothing about it.

It seemed he would not get any useful information from Alidibus. He could only try to find other participants in the Brewing Ritual and obtain relevant information from them.

Alidibus glanced at the thoughtful Aster and spoke. "Is there anything else?"

Though this being always seemed devoid of emotional fluctuations, he was surprisingly patient in certain matters.

"Uh, there is something else..." Aster hurriedly said, pointing to his eyes. "May I ask what is going on with my eyes?"

"One of the necessary conditions for using Underworld Passage." Alidibus's voice carried the sound of clashing metal. "They can protect you from losing yourself in the Underworld."

"I want to try it once. Could you watch over me?" Aster hesitantly made the request.

"You may use it whenever you wish. My power will activate on its own to protect you." Alidibus beat his wings. "But if you voluntarily abandon the power of that protection, then I cannot bring you back to life either."

"Alright." Aster knew that Alidibus was telling the truth. In Sequence Wars, the Underworld map was open only to players of the Death Pathway. According to the setting, any creature without divinity would die upon entering it. Only Demigods of the Death Pathway could remain there for a period of time. To stay in the Underworld for a long time, one had to at least be a max-level Death Pathway player—at the level of Sequence 2.

Aster carefully circulated his spirituality and activated Underworld Passage.

In an instant, he felt the world spin around him—

An extremely sinister atmosphere enveloped Aster's body, causing him to stiffen instinctively.

In his eyes, the world had miraculously divided into two halves. One was the original hotel room, while the other was deep and hollow, dark and boundless, with countless pale spirit bodies resting within it.

The human world was on the left, the Underworld on the right, and Aster stood precisely at the boundary between the two worlds.

He incredulously stretched out his hand to inspect his body. He found that the hand on his left, still within the hotel room, was faintly transparent. When he looked toward the dressing mirror, his reflection had vanished entirely. The mirror reflected only the empty room. The right half of his body was wrapped in a faint bronze glow, blocking the Underworld's erosion of his body.

"How am I supposed to use this ability... Ah, fuck?!"

He instinctively stepped forward, and the scene seen by Aster's left eye changed drastically—after just one step, he vanished from his hotel room and appeared on the hotel rooftop!

Seeing the crowds below, Aster instinctively wanted to step back, but then remembered that a single step had brought him to the rooftop. He forcefully stopped himself, slowly crouching down for fear that passersby might see him.

"You can only observe scenes from the real world now. Your true body has already completely entered the Underworld." Beating his wings, Alidibus appeared to Aster's left. "Therefore, ordinary humans cannot see you."

"So that's how it is..." Aster slowly stood up and asked in confusion, "Your Excellency Alidibus, what just happened?"

"Do you know where the Underworld came from?"

Phoenix did not answer directly. Instead, he posed another question.

"...I don't." Aster answered honestly.

"You've forgotten even that..." An expression resembling a sigh appeared on Alidibus's birdlike face.

"What did you say?" Aster looked utterly baffled. He could not understand the language Alidibus had just used.

"Since you don't know, there is no need to explain." Phoenix switched back to Ancient Hermes, answering in a low voice, "Do you know of Traveler's Travel ability?"

"I know that. Are you saying Underworld Passage is equivalent to Travel?" Aster immediately perked up. Traveler was an extremely popular PvP class, famed for its mobility, damage output, and versatility that surpassed every other class in the game.

The skill Travel was precisely Traveler's core skill. Its effect could be summed up in two words: blink.

And it was a blink with no cooldown and low mana cost... That single skill had placed the Door Pathway at the top of the "favorite class" rankings.

In his previous life, every professional player's equipment setup had invariably included gear from the Door Pathway.

At the thought of gaining such a powerful skill, the corners of Aster's mouth nearly curved into a grin.

"There are some differences." Alidibus spoke. "The Underworld is part of the Spirit World, and certain rules of the Spirit World also apply to the Underworld... When you enter the Underworld, you need only slightly adjust your direction and coordinates within it. Once you leave the Underworld, you can achieve an effect similar to blinking."

"Furthermore, now that you have entered the Underworld, you can effectively evade certain Beyonder Ability attacks from the outside world." Alidibus added at the end.

This is great... Doesn't that make me invincible? Aster was thrilled.

With this ability, he was even confident that he could drive back Mr. A!

"This ability is not as easy to bear as you imagine." Alidibus poured cold water over him. "When you use this ability now, you consume my spirituality. When I am absent, you can only rely on your own spirituality to pry at my power and have it protect you."

I get it, I get it. High mana cost... But even if I can only use it two or three times, that's enough to turn the tide of battle!

Aster was not disappointed in the slightest. Instead, he felt reassured. Having suddenly acquired such a powerful ability, he had felt a little uneasy.

Now that it came with the limitation of "high mana cost," he finally felt more grounded.

Aster narrowed his right eye and examined everything in the Underworld. Before long, he found the coordinates belonging to his room.