Ex-Human Morphus [A Mutant Evolution Apocalypse LitRPG]
Chapter 223

Chapter 223

The five ghosts summoned from the obelisks trailed behind him wherever he went, each glowing in a different color: blue, white, orange, purple, and green. Upon reaching an intersection, he paused momentarily to regain his bearings and give the ghosts a chance to catch up, as they couldn’t keep pace with him. When he stopped, the ghosts closed the distance to him somewhat, but they never got too close, always stopping at a certain distance from him.

Finally, he arrived at the chamber that contained the portal. He paused for a moment, allowing the ghosts to catch up. Moments later, they floated into the room and came to a halt nearby, hovering silently above the floor. Jake shifted his gaze from the ghosts to the portal and was pleasantly surprised to see that the five symbols engraved on its surface were now glowing with a soft silver light. It seemed his assumption had been accurate: for the portal to activate, all five ghosts needed to be near it. Now, he simply had to defeat the ghosts. The words they would scream in defeat should energize the symbols, and once all five were activated, the portal would materialize. At least, he thought so, but he was quite confident that his theory would prove correct.

Gripping his battleaxe in one hand, Jake attacked the ghosts, starting with the orange one because it was the closest. At that moment, a thought occurred to him that their different colors might mean something, but he couldn’t quite pinpoint what it was yet.

As soon as he struck one of the ghosts, all of them retaliated, launching waves of energy at him. The amulet he wore absorbed the damage they inflicted, but he quickly realized that under such a violent onslaught, his amulet would deplete its energy very quickly. He needed to dispatch them as swiftly as possible because once the amulet ran out of power, it would no longer shield him, leaving him vulnerable to their attacks.

He continued to fight the ghosts, killing them off one by one with his battleaxe. The ointment he had applied to the blade boosted the damage he dealt to the ghosts by 10%, which somewhat accelerated the process of killing them. However, the relentless attacks eventually drained his amulet’s energy. Thankfully, the opal he had inserted into the amulet some time ago increased his resistance to Ethereal damage by 25%, which greatly aided him in the battle. The ghosts continued to attack him, inflicting internal damage to his body, but his Enhanced Regeneration was working at full capacity, patching him up even in the middle of combat. 

Still, he acknowledged the necessity of eliminating the ghosts as quickly as possible. Even with the protective amulet and Enhanced Regeneration, he knew that he could still be killed if he sustained enough damage from the ghosts. Therefore, he focused entirely on attacking them, not bothering to dodge their strikes. Not that trying to dodge them would have mattered. After all, the ghosts’ energy waves always hit him with remarkable accuracy, making it utterly impossible to evade them. 

Finally, the fight was over. However, contrary to his expectations, nothing happened. One by one, the five ghosts vanished in a flash of light, each uttering a different arcane word, but to his surprise, these words had no effect on the symbols whatsoever. Now that the ghosts were gone, the five symbols inscribed on the arch of the portal also lost their subtle silver glow.

Jake couldn’t believe it. He had been sure that his theory was right. Was he wrong then? Or was he missing something? There was clearly a link between the arcane words spoken by the ghosts as they perished and the symbols. The way the symbols had illuminated with a faint glow when all the ghosts entered the chamber indicated that his theory had merit. So what was it that he was missing? 

Maybe he needed to kill the ghosts in a specific order? With no better ideas at the moment, he decided to test this theory. After all, there had to be a reason each ghost was a different color. To determine the first symbol in the sequence, he needed to summon the ghosts and kill them near the portal, starting with a ghost of a different color each time. Within four attempts, he would discover which of the five symbols was first in the order—provided his theory about the order of defeat was correct. With each symbol discovered, the process would become easier and faster.

So Jake then made his way to each of the obelisks to summon the ghosts one by one again. By now, he had explored most of the second floor of the dungeon, having killed most of the enemies, so the tunnels and chambers were mostly deserted. This allowed him to dash at top speed through the corridors and chambers without any interruptions. It wasn’t long before he conjured the ghosts again. Having gathered them all up, he led them back to the portal. Since the ghost he had defeated the last time first was orange, he needed this time to start with a ghost of a different hue, opting for the blue ghost.

Just a few minutes later, the battle came to an end. Just like the first time, none of the symbols had been activated during the battle. Therefore, the words uttered by neither the orange ghost nor the blue one corresponded to the first symbol in the sequence. He still had three more attempts to identify it, though. He spent some time summoning the ghosts and bringing them back to the portal once again.

Last time, he had attacked right away without waiting for his amulet to recharge fully, which left him taking heavy damage and dangerously close to death. For that reason, he decided that this time, it would be wiser to wait for the amulet to charge completely before initiating the fight. Since the amulet activated only after a full charge and the charging rate was quite slow, he found himself waiting for a considerable time, which was frustrating. However, he recognized it was necessary. There was no alternative if he wanted to avoid the risk of being killed. He simply had to suck it up and accept the wait.

As soon as the amulet was fully charged, he attacked the ghosts, starting with one of a different color than in the previous two instances. Again, nothing happened when the fight concluded. Three misses out of five attempts. He began to wonder whether his theory that the ghosts needed to be killed in a specific order was flawed. Still, with two attempts left, he knew it was too early to discard that idea and think of something else.

Once again, Jake summoned the ghosts from the five obelisks and brought them back to the portal. In the first fight, he had killed the orange ghost first, in the second, the blue one, and in the third, the white one. This time, he opted to take down the purple ghost first. Since he still wasn’t sure if there was a rationale behind the varying colors of the ghosts, he had to make a selection at random.

Since Jake was beginning to doubt his theory about the necessity of a specific order for the killings, he half-expected this attempt to yield no results, just like the previous ones. Thus, he was greatly surprised when one of the symbols suddenly glowed purple after he finally dealt the fatal blow to the ghost of the same color. This suggested that his theory was actually valid. The symbol was positioned at the left base of the portal’s arch. If the symbols were activated in a clockwise order, then the next symbol to be activated was located in the left rounded corner at the top of the arch.

Jake was so excited to finally activate the first symbol and that his theory had turned out to be correct that he momentarily let himself get distracted from the ghosts attacking him, staring at the portal instead. The remaining ghosts seized this exact moment to attack him simultaneously, completely depleting his amulet’s energy.

Since he was now vulnerable to the ghosts’ attacks, Jake decided to dart around the portal to make it harder for them to target him while his amulet recharged. He briefly considered leaving the chamber entirely but ultimately dismissed the idea. He was pretty confident that if the ghosts exited the chamber, the portal would lose its connection to them, and he would have to start from scratch. Clearly, for the symbols to activate, the ghosts had to be close to the portal when they were killed. The remaining symbols radiated a soft silver glow, affirming that they were reacting to the ghosts’ presence. If he killed the ghosts far from the portal, the words they spoke in their final moments wouldn’t trigger the activation of the symbols.

He continued to run around the chamber for a while. His quick movements made it challenging for the ghosts to target him effectively. However, an unexpected surprise awaited him. At one point, the first symbol he had activated suddenly ceased to glow. This indicated that the ghosts had to be defeated not only in a specific order but also pretty quickly—less than within a minute of one another. He realized that he wouldn’t have the luxury of waiting for his amulet to recharge during active battles with the ghosts.

Sure enough, since the first symbol no longer glowed purple, nothing happened to any of the other symbols after he defeated the remaining ghosts. Sure, it was possible that the next ghost he had defeated did not correspond to the second symbol, but even if that were the case, it was now clear that for the portal to appear, each symbol also had to be activated while the others still shone with the matching colors of their corresponding ghosts.

Once the battle ended, he took a moment to gather his thoughts. He learned that to activate the first symbol in the sequence, he had to defeat the purple ghost first. It was clear that he would be able to identify the next symbol within four attempts. Discovering the third symbol would require three attempts or fewer. Obviously, finding successive symbols would become progressively easier. Navigating the empty corridors and leading the ghosts to the portal didn’t take much time, but he really needed to allow his protective amulet to recharge after each fight with the ghosts. Unfortunately, the recharging process was quite long, as the amulet only became effective again after it was fully charged.

It made Jake think. Maybe there were some clues about the order in which the ghosts needed to be killed. Sure, he had explored most of the second floor by that point, but there were still a few unexplored areas. There might be clues hidden within those sections. The ointment applied to the blade of his battleaxe allowed him to kill ghost-like creatures. After it wore off, he would lose that ability. He checked the remaining time and learned he still had a little over two hours left, which was more than enough to finish exploring the rest of the second floor. If he found no clues about the order, he would resort to determining it manually, as he had done previously. With this plan in mind, he set off.