The cave had several layers, going deeper and deeper towards the subsoil. The beasts that used elemental fons possessed a high degree of intelligence, which indicated that there were probably some more natural resources deeper down.
Khaled needed all possible resources for his journey to the far west. He couldn't travel using the nexus, as every portal in the main human settlements was directly supervised by Migdal. This left him with only the option of traveling on a legendary ship.
Upon reaching the third subterranean layer, his search was finally rewarded. In the middle of this layer, there was a cylindrical structure that went from the floor to the ceiling and took up most of the cave's space. An opening was in front of the tunnel that led to the third layer.
Khaled was left speechless when he noticed the glow emanating from the entrance, which looked like a kaleidoscope of red, green, and yellow colors. Carefully, he passed through the entrance and gained access to a circular room, lined with the hides of various animals and with a hole in the center.
In the hole, he saw several fons fruits, of the wood element, the fire element, and the earth element. Cautiously approaching, Khaled took the opportunity to check the rustic environment that surrounded him. Once he confirmed there was no danger, he leaned over the hole and evaluated each fruit. Satisfied, he placed them in his lesser dimension with a gesture of his hand, and when he was about to get up, he felt the entire cave tremble as if it were about to collapse at any moment.
In a quick reaction, Khaled took a step back and instantly found himself outside the cylindrical room. To his complete lack of surprise, standing at the entrance was a cultivator surrounded by a green aura, which indicated his elemental affinity with wood fons. It was a succession of bad news: his opponent was a cultivator of a secondary element, and looking closely, the green mantle with the drawing of the white tower on the right chest indicated that he was a master-level cultivator, in the direct service of Migdal.
Khaled stood still, facing the enemy, who, turning slowly, provoked:
— Your reaction is worthy of praise! For a moment, I thought I could catch you by surprise.
— You managed to surprise me by getting close enough to deliver a blow. I have to congratulate you, but that won't happen again.
— Hoo, how interesting, it seems that defeating those two mummies has gone to your head, but I'll show you the difference between me, a disciple of Mokurath, and those simpletons you defeated.
Hearing this, Khaled became serious. Thalendor Mokurath was one of the rulers of Migdal, one of the 5 Grand Masters of the continent. He was the terrible Grand Master of wood, known for having created the eastern forest and for having isolated the east using just one of his techniques. In his entire life, the Grand Master accepted only one disciple, Master Mokuzai of wood.
Faced with the possible identity of the ambusher, everything became a little more complicated.
The two stared at each other in silence, while a violent elemental aura formed around each of them. The power hummed to the point that the walls began to tremble. Khaled clenched his fists tightly and, in one step, instantly arrived beside the intruder. With a sword condensed from spatial fons, the blow was delivered at an absurd speed.
When success was within reach, Khaled was surprised by the appearance of a shield of vines. Its color was dark green and they had the thickness of a leg. Even though they were robust, they moved at an unbelievable speed.
The spatial blade began to sink into the shield, but, without a second thought, Khaled tilted his body back and instantly retreated, just in time to see a thick thorn project from the cut vine and pierce the ceiling.
A shiver went up his spine. If he had hesitated for a thousandth of a second, he would have been at least seriously injured and, in the worst-case scenario, would be dead.
— You're truly impressive, you managed to react to my perfect shield and get out unharmed. — As Mokuzai spoke, a dark green scroll was in his hand. Khaled noticed that, connected to the seal of this scroll, there was a greenish stone imbued with wood fons. A delicate script with a pulsating glow stood out on the stone, giving a light sensation of vitality.
A personal rune!
Mokuzai truly had a personal rune that energized a legendary master-level scroll. Personal runes were generally used at this level, being difficult to craft and requiring a great investment of resources and time.
However, regardless of the degree of difficulty, every cultivator longed to have one, and even masters would kill for such a tool. A personal rune was a natural fons repository, which in most cases doubled and, in extreme cases, tripled a cultivator's fons reserve.
This basic effect of personal runes was already worthy of fascination, but being able to combine them with legendary scrolls and matrices of these scrolls was what made them terrifying in various ways. The simplest example: the opponent could activate two scrolls, one with the rune and another with his personal fons reserve, which, at the master level, was equivalent to fighting two masters at the same time.
The battle situation became complicated. Taking advantage of Khaled's stupor, Mokuzai directed spiked vines to immobilize him. The cave floor tore as, at an incredible speed, a wave of dark green vines emerged in front of Khaled.
Even a second slower, the master of space could not be underestimated. A rune formed of spatial energy condensed in Khaled's left hand. Spinning, the rune transformed into a circular energy disk with several silvery blades with an ethereal touch.
— Temporal-Spatial Cut. — With this simple declaration, Khaled launched his technique to meet the wave of vines. Mokuzai immediately reinforced the blow with more fons, doubling the volume of vines. But, to his surprise, the spinning disk cut his attack in two! It continued unstoppable, cutting the vine shield and getting close to Mokuzai.
In a rare moment of astonishment, the master of space raised the scroll with his personal rune, using the scroll itself in a cutting gesture to combat the spatial blade head-on.
The sound of metal against metal was intense, and when it seemed that the spatial blade would cut the scroll itself and the arm holding it, a green light radiated from the personal rune. It seemed as if a green sun had descended into the cave. The intensity of the wood fons was tripled, and using the wood fons itself with the attribute of vitality and growth, Mokuzai managed to wear down the attack.
Gasping from the wear and tear of the defense he had just made, Mokuzai noticed out of the corner of his eye that, like a ghost, Khaled had materialized beside him with a triumphant expression. In his left hand, the same spinning spatial blade threatened to put an end to the fight.
At that moment, the ceiling dripped. The drop's trajectory was exactly that of Khaled's attack. What many cultivators would ignore and proceed with the attack, triggered Khaled's maximum alert!
He twisted his body at an angle that prevented a collision with the drop and, in a quick change, launched the attack against the cave's ceiling. Before the attack even arrived, a water barrier materialized and engulfed the spatial attack.
From inside the barrier, a man emerged wearing a Migdal mantle under a light blue cape. His appearance was impeccable and his smile seemed pleasant; he looked as if he didn't belong in that fighting environment.
— You were incredible! Your perception is fantastic. But even if you were a spatial beast, I was confident in my attack. Tell me, how did you manage to sense me?
— You were always in the same place, so the real question is, when did I not manage to sense you? — With an air of presumption, Khaled replied while now facing the two enemies, in a situation that should have been doubly challenging.
However, his voice, posture, and gaze were calm.
Suddenly, a wide smile broke out on the Space Master's face, as he said:
— Now that we're all here, let's stop playing games. Do you prefer to leave, or will I have to beat you until your wives don't recognize you anymore? — With each word, Khaled's aura grew and a violent spatial fons began to condense around his body. The fight was just beginning.