Chapter 667: Earned Wrath


    ?


    Ss looked around, his irises reflecting like ss as he paid closer attention to the walls around him.


    ''These walls are designed to keep Aether very restrained. The winding and twisting tunnels aren''t just here to confuse people, but it almost increases surface area for these Aether suppressing Runes. This entire undergroundwork functions simrly to the disk I risked my life to get for Lucius-it''s capable of restraining even Portals.


    ''What happens when something inherently vtile is forced to remain steady?''


    There was one main difference between the Woond Spider Queen and the ss Monkey... the Woond Spider Queen had been the helm of a Field Dungeon, but the ss Monkey had been the head of a Dynamic Field Dungeon.


    Thest Dynamic Field Dungeon Ss had cleared had also been an anomaly. It was the result of a Dungeon and a Field Dungeonbining into one, resulting in the creation of the Violet Rose Heart.


    What if, in this case, it was the sh between the ss Desert Territory and this maze that triggered all the changes?


    However, there were still too many holes in this theory.


    For one, the ss Desert had been several hours'' journey from this location. Ss and Alex had to travel quite a while to get to Cairith after capturing the monkey in the first ce.


    But Ss seemed to have thought of something for that as well...


    The Mountains of Giza.


    After Ss cleared it, there was arge change to the surroundings. A strong teleportation force warped him to a region that was likely off-Earth, which was why they faced the time dtion.


    Then there was the fact that after Ss cleared it, the pyramid reset and then allowed Lauren to follow after him, and then the monarchs after that.


    All of this was mere spection on Ss'' part. He didn''t have nearly enough understanding of spatial dynamics or time dtion to draw a concrete conclusion...


    Until that is he factored in one more thing: howte Alex and the others had been.


    It was something that he had originally dismissed as being no big deal, but with all of this context added to it, he realized that the reason they were dyed wasn''t because of an odd coincidence, but rather precisely because of this off-setting that urred between the expected teleportation locations and the actual teleportation locations.


    In fact, he was willing to bet that if he asked the four of them if they had appeared at the same time, they would say no. It was more likely that they had coincidentally met up on their way to him. Or, most likely, they had been waiting around for him to show up until themotion of the battle between himself and the ss Monkey, and then his subsequent fusion with the ss Pinecone, was too great to ignore.


    If there was this sudden shift in Earth''s spatial coordinate system, then it wasn''t impossible for an already out-of-ce Winking Portal to be transposed several kilometers away from its original location.


    But that still left the biggest question of them all...


    Why the hell was any of this actually important? Was it useful to spend so much time thinking about this seemingly worthless information?


    Ss suddenly did an about-face and ignored the portal, rushing through the underground maze. He was looking for something very particr, and Alex and the others followed him silently because they were very much used to it.


    ''No... No... Not this...''


    Ss ended up finding several more Portals. The Africor Continent had reeled in control of so many that it seemed that this wasn''t as much of a "coincidence" as it seemed. They were collecting these Portals on purpose.


    In fact, in this underground region alone, they probably had easy ess to almost all corners of the world. Even Alex found himself being taken aback by the sheer scope of it all.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    ''This is it.''


    Ss suddenly came to a stop in front of the seventh Portal they had run across. Just staring at the portal, Ss could feel it very clearly. This was a second forcefully stabilized Winking Portal to the ss Desert.


    The first one they hade across was the very same entrance to the ss Desert Territory that Alex and him had found the ss Monkey in.


    But this one... this was a new Portal, to the same Territory, but apletely different region of it.


    Ss'' mind could see exactly how things had yed out.


    The ss Monkey had left Cairith defeated by the remaining members of the Africor Continent Government, and managed to find its way back to its Winking Portal to lick its wounds.


    But then the changes to the Mountains of Giza caused the coordinates of the ss Desert to shift and change until it was ensnared by this constructed of the Africor Constitutional Monarchy.


    The ss Monkey likely then finished healing its wounds and either nned toe back for revenge or had sensed an opportunity for a breakthrough, or maybe there was a third reason that Ss hadn''t considered.


    But in truth, the reason didn''t matter now.


    Whatever it was, it caused the ss Monkey to leave through its Portal, only to find itself trapped in this maze. It likely relied on its senses and eventually stumbled onto this second ss Desert Territory Portal.


    And whatever it found inside... was the reason it had skyrocketed in power in such short order. Ss took a step forward and entered the Portal. No matter what was on the other side...


    He was willing to bet that he would have the advantage. He would be the ss Desert Warlord quite soon, after all.


    ...


    King Roderic stared at the contribution list before him. Ss sat firmly at the top, while he... was only second ce.


    This was a result that was far outside of his expectations. Everything was perfectly prepared, and things couldn''t have possibly gone more smoothly. He had even managed an unprecedented 51% Clearance and an S- rating to go along with it.


    Even Archibald''s barely 23% rating was enough for an AA- Rating. So one could imagine just how difficult all of this was, even though he had the knowledge of predecessors to rely upon.


    But now it was all for naught.


    ''The Genesis Forge is in his hands...''


    King Roderic closed his eyes and took a deep breath. For the first time, he lost hisposure. But he regained it quickly.


    ''It''s fine. Without the proper opportunity, he will never understand its value. Before then... I''ll


    crush him.''


    King Roderic and the other monarchs had not once taken Ss seriously. But now... the young man had sessfully earned his wrath.