“Seven of Clubs,” Rakna called out as he threw the card in his hand. The item planted itself in the ground and shone strongly. In no time at all, it expanded into a huge rectangular shape made out of red and white light. But it wasn’t blinding in the slightest.

After a moment, the shape began to twist in various manners. The very first changes occurred at the top where it took a cone-like shape, quickly forming something akin to a house roof. The rest of the figure gained details and forms until it was transmuted into a large two-story mansion.

But it was only after a few more seconds that colors began to come into play it and the material solidified into actual stone, marble, cement, concrete, glass, wood, and even paint and polyester for the outside and inside of the walls. It was quite modern; a deep contrast with the environment.

“Oh my, how lovely,” Astraea commented at the imposing building.

“Hm,” Rakna hummed and walked up the small staircase leading to the entrance. When he reached the front door, he noticed something. “Ah… it’s locked.”

“…”

“…”

“That’s awkward,” the therian muttered as he stared at the biometric scanner placed on the handle of the door that one would normally hold in such a way that the thumb would be the key. “I kind of just copied the design of my house back on Earth, albeit bigger.”

“Well then… shouldn’t that scanner have you registered in that case?” Astraea inquired.

“You would be right. And this would open,” Rakna said with a sigh. “If only it was powered…”

“…”

“So… you messed up?” Natsu ultimately voiced the situation into words and his master’s purple eyes glowered at him. “Um, I mean… you messed up, My Lord. That is a shame,” the Celestial Blaze repeated himself in a more… ‘polite’ way.

Rakna rolled his eyes and pressed against the scanner with his finger. “Eye, do your job,” he said more to himself than anything else, and his eye’s lenses rotated before a wire-like tendril emerged from his skin and pierced the door’s handle. Near instantly, a pulse of energy coursed through the wire and then forced open the lock.

“There. Open,” he commented as the nano-cable retracted into his body. He opened the door wide and stepped inside.

“Goodness, what kind of monstrosity are you?” Natsu couldn’t help but ask after the display.

“Hey,” Astraea playfully chopped down on the fire canine’s head. “That’s rude, little one.”

The Celestial Blaze twitched. “…I am not a child.”

“Nonsense, you are not even a hundred years old.”

“…”

“My body is made of self-replicating nano-machines. That’s part of the reason why it would’ve not been in your favor to fight me. For someone like you, I’m essentially unkillable,” Rakna eventually answered the question whilst inspecting the living room the entrance led to.

The place was empty; lacking any furniture to speak of. The floor was entirely carpeted, except around the front door, and the rest of the house felt very ‘fresh’. One thing interesting to note was that the electrical wiring seemed to be built already.

“I have to go check the electric relay… Hm, the quality of the materials is… well, normal for Earth’s standards. Perhaps I could have made it sturdier if I specified it to the card,” he remarked

“Would you like me to reinforce them?” Astraea offered and he looked back at her.

“You can do that?”

“Yes. The domain in which you summoned me allows for a very broad affinity. If I had to define it within a few words, you could say that my ability is ‘purity of growth’. In other words, I can change the purity of something to make it closer to what I consider ‘pure’. In the case of the plants outside, I simply raised the purity of mother nature. As for this, I could make it so that the material has a purer molecular composition and thus stronger.”

“That’s… fascinating actually,” Rakna mused. “Sure then, give it a go.”

The angel smiled happily and put a hand on the wall. “[Valuvfma,]” she intoned and her spell was cast, directly taking its mana from Rakna. A wave of enchantment spread throughout the whole house and after the faint pressure that accompanied the activation of the spell was gone, Astraea pulled her hand back.

Rakna knocked on the walls, checking the size of the focal points with Cross Sight as well, and then nodded. “I see. It did work. The number of focal points has decreased by one-fourth and they are about a third smaller. Nice going. Though… you’re seriously expensive,” he deadpanned at the Star Entity as he eyed his dwindling mana points.

The angel pouted. “Well, it’s not my fault you mortals don’t have enough mana for divine spells.”

“I think the reason for that is in the name…” Rakna retorted as he opened the door to a room and went inside, followed by the two others. It was a small room with a fenced staircase leading to the cellar. There, they found a weird apparatus wired to an electrical panel.

The therian merely gave it a look over and promptly produced a new pair of Eion stones from his storage. He manually opened a special partition of the generator-like device in front of him and placed the stones inside. After closing it, he stepped back and waited a bit until some lights started blinking.

The trio heard many things slowly boot up, such as the heater and a water pump located not far from them, but it was unfortunately not connected to any source.

“Uh, I’ll have to fix that,” Rakna uttered and returned to the living room where he swiped his finger over a small square tactile button on the wall. On cue, the lights integrated into the ceiling turned on and illuminated the room; though the effect was marginal due to the sunlight. “Good enough.”

“I see. So, you chose this design for the house because there was that generator,” Astraea said with a nod. “The uniquely powerful supply of the Eternal Stones is fully capable of powering whatever device you put here in the future.”

“Yes, well, it was a gamble. When I made the ‘request’ to the card, I basically said something along the lines of ‘build me this house’ along with the picture in my head. The limitations are as you see right now. While it built the house, the furniture inside wasn’t included.”

“However, the machines fundamental for the house’s functioning were in the cellar, as well as the electric network. I would have used more cards if they weren’t there anyway so this just happens to make things easier for me,” Rakna said and looked around.

“I guess I will have to slowly and gradually furnish the rest with the cards. Perhaps I can use one card and order it to ‘furnish the entire house’ or I could limit it to ‘furnish this room’ if it’s more effective. Regardless, I’ll have to wait a bit more to test it since the cooldown hasn’t ended yet. The option of buying everything from Black Steel is also a possibility.”

“Hm?” Natsu’s ears perked up. “Cooldown?”

“Yeah, The Trickster’s Sleeve has a thirty-minute cooldown between uses.”

The Celestial Blaze blinked as a realization struck him. “You! It was a bluff! You lied when you said you could use those to stop my spells as many times as you wanted!”

“Well, yes.”

Natsu opened his mouth wide, not knowing what to say.

“Don’t get too agitated though. Even without them, you wouldn’t have won.”

“…I hate you,” the flaming dog grumbled, folding his ears with his paws.

“I know, right? The System should have a Charm attribute. Mine would be through the roof,” Rakna jested with a flat tone and Astraea let out a chuckle over Natsu’s misery. As this was happening, a system window made its appearance in the therian’s vision.

❮ ◈ ❯

50th Plateau: Battle Trial Completed!

You have gained the right to leave the 50th Plateau.

Do you wish to exercise it now? You have 26 232 hours to make your decision.

Yes/No

---

The party’s strength has been evaluated. You have met the minimum requirements for several Plateaus. A skipping right has been granted. Party leader, Rakna Xiorra Blade, please select:

- 51st Plateau

- 52nd Plateau

- 53rd Plateau

…

…

- 60th Plateau

❮ ◈ ❯

“Oh? That’s curious…” Rakna said. ‘Looks like my clone completed the Trial but I am the one who gets to do the selecting process, huh? It also probably evaluates my strength rather than the clone’s or else, it wouldn’t even be allowed to skip five Plateaus, much less ten of them now.’

“Is something wrong?”

“Nothing much. Just my clone going on adventures,” he lightly replied to the goddess’ question and selected the 60th Plateau without much hesitation. “You can go now, by the way. I’ll call you again when I need to reinforce the furniture and the smithy I’ll be adding. For now, I’m going to join back with my clone and then look into the details of the First Ascent and my Path Quest.”

Astraea nodded with a smile. “All right. Be sure to think of me if you ever need a hand with other things as well,” she added and put Natsu on the ground. She waved at her summoner and started turning into star energy particles.

“Yeah, I’ll think about it. Although you’re expensive, you’re useful.”

The angel made a long face as she disappeared. “Don’t call a lady ‘expensive’ and then proceed to evaluate her usefulness…” She groused and sighed. “Jokes aside, it was truly an honor. Let us meet again, Lord Monarch,” she bid her goodbyes with a sincere smile and vanished.

Rakna glanced at where she was standing and snorted. “She’s a good person… I wonder if everyone in Egregore is like her though,” he muttered to himself and ate another heart. “I’m starting to feel a negative strain. Together with the hearts I conjured from the Celestial Kindles, I’m a bit too full for comfort,” he groaned and licked his fingers.

“Thank you for reminding me of the gore display you made of my kin,” Natsu uttered blankly.

The therian let out a wry chuckle at that as they exited the house. He locked the door behind him and since he had turned the generator on, next time he wouldn’t need to use his nanobots to force it open.

“Well then; [Call of Hounds,]” Rakna intoned and spent a decent amount of his mana to summon a dozen of Lv.100 Wolves and a hundred more at level 20. Fortunately, the reduction to his mana consumption was high enough to allow it and he also had a bit of mana left stored inside Andante.

Since the land they were summoned in was a simple field, most of them appeared as either Wood, Water, or Earth Wolves. But a few had emerged as Shadow Wolves because of the tree shades.

“All right. All Shadow and Water Wolves will hunt and patrol outside. Keep a safe perimeter within a three-kilometer radius. Stay as stealthy as possible in case of human intruders,” Rakna ordered his wolves and they seemed to understand as they nodded. Or rather, the only Lvl.100 Shadow Wolf appeared to fully comprehend his demand.

Now that he could leave his wolves summoned without spending extra mana and they could follow orders, it would be a waste to not use them as sentries to guard this place.

“The Wood Wolves will also be outside but they will stay around the entrance of the cave and fight off anything or anyone that tries to enter. The Earth Wolves will stay inside and will constitute the last line of defense. You can go to your posts now. The Lv.100 Wolves will be pack leaders; decide if you should engage in combat or not.”

Once he was done, the hundred or so wolves barked and a third of them directly ran to the outside of the cavern whilst the Earth Wolves scattered around the underground space.

“That is almost terrifying,” Natsu finally said as he saw the elemental wolves scramble off. “I can’t even imagine how fearsome an army of those could be…” He added, focusing especially on those level 100 wolves. He knew that even he wouldn’t be able to deal with those if too many of them ganged up on him. But that was, of course, only considering if Water Wolves could counter him.

“{I have to agree with the Blaze,}” Fray remarked. “{Being able to build this kind of force… and not even need anything to sustain them. You could just spend a few days in one spot, summoning one wolf after another and you can get yourself an army.}”

[That is why Kings and Emperors are so feared,] Ceres gave her input.

“Well, I’m not about to do that for every single Plateau,” Rakna shrugged. “If I could transport them with me though, it would be a different story. But I don’t have a workaround for that yet.”

Fray chortled. “{Yet.}”

“Anyway, let’s go. Ceres, bring us to the 60th Plateau. Where my clone is, preferably.”

[Right away.]