MMORPG: Ascension of the Strongest Spirit Master
Chapter 42: Plentiful Rewards

Chapter 42: Plentiful Rewards

"This is going to be painful," Vlad thought grimly, as darkness surged from the Eclipseborn’s ruined eye and rushed at him, clinging to him like a parasite, seeping into his flesh.

The Eclipseborn was dead, but the spirit that had possessed the bear remained, and if it could take over a beast, it could certainly try to claim him.

So while the battle was over, its struggle was not.

Vlad immediately ceased the spirit convergence. In his current state, any pain he felt was shared with Vel, and though their union granted him greater mind resistance, still, there was no reason for her to endure unnecessary agony when he could easily handle it.

As the maddened spirit rampaged within him, the boons granted by their brief union flickered out and vanished. The strength, the changes, the clarity, they left him in an instant.

Pain followed like a tidal wave. It engulfed his mind, raw and blinding, but Vlad had braced for this, at least as much as he could.

Vlad knew he had won this battle because the spirit would fail to possess him, although the failed possession would bring him a great deal of pain.

Vlad knew that if he were to fight against a spirit, he would either have to have a defensive charm that could protect him when the spirit attacked, which would cost a great sum of gold, or suffer great pain as the spirit tried to take over his body, only to fail.

The reason why a spirit couldn’t stay in the physical plane for long was because every second spent without a host was one of extreme agony, which only grew with time, either forcing them to flee or driving them mad, turning them into mindless wraiths.

The only way to stay safe was to find a host, but spirits can’t just take anyone’s body with force. To succeed, they needed to find a body that was as close in nature to them as possible, having the same affinity for mana, species, and even gender.

A rat spirit couldn’t possess a squirrel, no matter how similar they seemed.

This was why few spirits ever escaped a realm tear, and why Vlad hadn’t bothered buying a charm, because his opponent had to be a bear.

Vlad clenched his jaw and endured. The pain speared through his bones, sharp and terrible, but he had suffered worse, so to him, it was mildly annoying.

He also understood that with how much time the spirit had spent in the physical plane, the spirit would suffer extreme pain now that it had lost its perfect host.

"It must be a Noble-grade spirit," Vlad thought, teeth grinding together.

After a dozen seconds, he could barely feel his one remaining hand, nerves deadened, sensation dimming, and his mind felt hazy.

The pain was terrible. Not sharp, but deep, a deep soul ache, like something terrible and heavy, was pressing down on every fiber of his being.

His vision blurred at the edges, not from blood loss or exhaustion, but from the sheer pressure of the invading will.

The spirit’s presence loomed large behind his eyes, whispering in a voice both foreign and filled with rage and hunger. The words made no sense, yet each syllable clawed at the edges of his sanity.

Vlad stood in silent concentration, knowing all he could do was wait, and thirty seconds later, the pain began to fade away as thick smoke escaped from his being, slow at first, then rushing outward in heavy waves.

It tried to cling to his skin as it left, desperate to stay but was wrenched away by an unseen force.

The darkness gathered around him in a dense, pulsing cloud, twisting in frustration. It writhed violently as if struggling to form something solid, but every shape it tried to hold collapsed.

A snout of shadow snapped into view, a long, predatory muzzle filled with jagged, sharp teeth, but it melted away in the same breath. A pair of eyes, deep-set and glimmering with primal hate, appeared, barely staying for a full second before fading away.

The formless darkness howled in rage as it drifted away into the small rift in reality, vanishing a second later, not mad enough to prolong its suffering.

"Hah," Vlad hissed. The sound escaped as pain and fatigue settled over him like a collapsing wave.

His mind felt hollow yet brimming with agony. His eyes burned in their sockets, and every inch of his body ached from the strain of using Ghost Weave.

’I still need to do one more thing,’ Vlad muttered, voice low and ragged, as he slowly moved toward the realm tear in the distance.

Vlad reached into his cloak with his good hand and drew out a long, multi-sided crystal the size of his palm, pure and colorless. He hurled it into the pulsing tear in space.

The crystal struck the center of the tear and hovered there, suspended unnaturally in the air. Light flared along its edges, a low hum rising as it began to shine, feeding hungrily on the raw essence of two colliding worlds.

It was a vessel crystal, or more precisely, an Aether crystal, a naturally resilient gemstone, very hard to shatter, prized for its affinity with all magical energies.

On its surface were fine runes and array lines etched with precision, designed to channel either spirit essence or law essence.

Once activated within a realm tear, the vessel crystal automatically began siphoning ambient energy. It worked like a sponge in a storm, drawing in the energy and storing it inside the crystal.

The crystal would turn into a spirit crystal or law crystal, depending on the nature of the array carved onto it.

They were not the rarest of resources in the world, but they were always in demand, as every Awakened and Spiritmaster needed them for their growth.

Vlad watched as the crystal pulsed brighter, the air around it warping like heat over stone, and then took another crystal and threw it at the realm tear.

He placed six more crystals near the realm tear, knowing that since he had only brought second-rank vessel crystals and the tear was of third rank, to harvest all of its energies it would require multiple crystals of lower rank.

Vlad finally dropped to the ground and lay on his back, then pulled out a healing potion and drank it, followed by a mana potion.

Vlad felt a gentle tug on his mana, faint, but steady, like a thread being pulled from deep within his core. Thin green wisps began to gather beside him, slowly coalescing into a small, glowing figure.

Vel appeared, her wings fluttering weakly as her wide, panic-filled eyes darted around the chamber. The last thing she remembered was their union bond breaking and her master being overwhelmed by the hostile spirit.

"Master... Master, are you alright?" she asked, her voice trembling.

Vlad turned his head toward her and gave a tired smile. "My arm hurts like hell... but other than that, I am fine."

Vel let out a shaky sigh and floated closer, her eyes closely examining him, wincing every time they landed on a bleeding wound, before finally drifting past to the area just beyond, where the space anomaly shimmered in the air.

"Master, there are so many spirit and law crystals... and they seem high-grade," she said, eyes lighting up with excitement that made her seem more energized than Vlad.

He followed her gaze to the glittering white and dark crystals jutting out from the floor.

"Yeah," he said with a quiet chuckle. "Shame all the law crystals are either of darkness or shadow nature."

The bright white crystals were spirit crystals that could be used to forge a new spirit or mana core with a spirit bond. The darker, muddied ones were law crystals, potent but only useful to spirits aligned with shadow or darkness elements.

Vel’s wings drooped a little at the realization, and she let out a soft, disappointed sigh.

"But don’t worry," Vlad said with a pained grin, "we can always trade them for poison-aligned law crystals, just for you."

Vel blinked, eyes going wide with surprise. "Really? Thanks, Master." She beamed, her earlier panic forgotten as she joyfully floated closer, circling him with renewed energy.

’Let’s see what I got for clearing this instance dungeon,’ Vlad muttered under his breath, a spark of excitement flickering in his eyes.

System Notification:

{Congratulations, Player V.}

{Guardian of the Instance Dungeon ’Maw of the Eclipseborn’ [Eclipseborn] has been defeated.}

{Maw of the Eclipseborn Instance Dungeon [Nightmare Difficulty] Cleared.}

{Dungeon cleared on first attempt – All rewards doubled.}

{Experience Gained.}

{Level Up}

{Level Up ×11}

Rewards Acquired:

Equipment: Eclipseborn Aegis (Unique)

Equipment: Cloak of Eclipse (Epic)

Skill Tome: Eclipse Step – A short-range, shadow-based teleport skill.

Soul Remnant: Eclipseborn Core Shard – Can be consumed to empower a spirit companion.

Shadowbound Name Fragment ×2 – Collect three more fragments to reconstruct the true name of a King or higher-grade spirit tied to the Shadow Bear Colossus.

Gold: 18,000