Zhang Dong hovered above the partially sunken castle. It was still the tallest building in this city even though a third of it was now below ground. With him were all of the hero party members and also Beatrice and Isabella. Everyone was looking down with mixed expressions after he had sent the king blasting away to the ground.

“... D-did you have to do that?”

“He was asking for it!”

He replied to Beatrice while shrugging.

“I could take him out if you want, just lend me some of that power.”

A big grin appeared on his face while the two girls waved their heads to indicate a refusal to this option. They were already powering down so Zhang Dong was running on fumes but he was sure to give the King a little scare. From what he could tell, this stunt had worked and he had successfully planted some doubt in this magical king’s heart.

“No, please don’t do that…”

Finally, the group started to descend down into a mostly undestroyed area outside of the castle. Everyone was still baffled by how far it sunk down to where the dungeon they were previously in was.

Zhang Dong started to recall what transpired down below and how this predicament came to be. It was mostly what the spies reported to the king. They all moved quite fast while he disabled the monsters for the heroes to defeat. For some reason he could function better the further down they descended and he attributed it to the cube that he had found below.

The last chamber on the 99th floor had a giant hydra monster with many heads lurking. It was supposed to be the hero's final test which they succeeded in doing even without his help.

After taking time to overlevel them to the fullest the boss monster was easy to beat. It had a rather easy-to-read fight pattern which the four youths could counteract with their skills. Due to their increased stats, the monster was unable to hit them or even deal much damage. When it did the healer of the party could just bring everyone back to full health without losing many mana points.

While the fight was underway Zhang Dong activated his map while making sure that no one would die. There he realized that there was a large black spot that he couldn’t examine and it was right past this chamber.

After the Hydra was slain it disintegrated into tiny particles of mana. These went into the heroes but some were carried down into a certain chamber. In there they found the legendary weapons that were meant for the heroes.

Sword for the sword hero, gauntlets for the fist hero, and so on. They all looked like ancient artifacts with cool designs. In Zhang Dong’s eyes, they weren’t all that great and about the level of high earth grade treasures. If he had had the materials he could fashion a half step heaven grade weapon.

This treasure room wasn’t all, he soon discovered a nearby wall that followed a similar pattern to the one he saw in his own world. He was scanned like before and allowed to enter the chamber inside.

It was a carbon copy of the cube room that he saw back then. He didn’t just snatch it like a greedy madman. He had Bob do a few scans and answer a few questions. The biggest problem he had was leaving these kids here out to dry.

When he took this item he would sentence the youths to a long life here. They already had superpowers but would not be strong enough to go against nations. He couldn’t just leave them here without being sure that they wouldn't get in trouble.

They might be like him and actually, like the new world they live in but they were a lot younger than he was when this happened. While he was an adult that had taken a bad turn in his life and the new world was a chance to start anew. These youths weren’t even in their twenties, they never even had a chance to spread their wings at home.

Luckily after some scans, Bob informed him that it would be possible to triangulate the world that the youths came from with this cube. He would need to use up some of the stored power but there would be some left for him to use.

This was an acceptable resolution to the problem. After defeating the demon king and the rest of the demons he would be able to send the kids back home by himself. He wouldn’t even need to come back here as the schematics for the teleportation formation were already in his head.

The only problem was the moment he decided to reach for this cube. Bob had forgotten to tell him that the whole dungeon would collapse when he did that. This was new to him as no such thing happened back in his own world. Here on the other hand the moment he absorbed the energy the whole place began to shake.

Everyone started panicking and he quickly returned outside. The whole place was collapsing onto itself and the whole group of people was trapped 99 levels underground. It was all up to him to save everyone, with the help of Isabella and Beatrice he powered up and protected everyone with his barrier.

The rest was history, now he was looking at a somewhat slanted sunken castle and a surprised King. He was sure to raise his chin up to look quite lofty, just like an Emperor would act. He needed to sell his superiority and that he wasn’t afraid of this man in any sense or form.

In reality, he would probably be downed by one punch if this guy decided to attack him now. His power level was still at the lower end of core formation even absorbing the cube didn’t really help him with that.

“Father!”

“Daddy!”

The members of the royal family could see their father slowly getting up from the rubble. His hair was messy and his royal robe was also dusty. This was the first time they had ever seen him taking a loss like this. They were still afraid of his might so they didn’t comment much about it.

Before they could move towards him the king moved his hand up to stop them. All of them soon parted to the side while the King looked to the white-haired spirit and the heroes behind him.

The King continued to stare for a moment, the people here gulped as they could see sparks flying between the two older men. Soon the royal guards arrived at the scene to back up the king, the moment they arrived the old man gave out a snort and turned around.

Soon he started flying away while his own kids began to chase after him. Zhang Dong turned around as well, he wanted to compliment himself on his poker face skills that were now almost perfected.

“Mr. Leigong was that really necessary?”

“Of course it was.”

Beatrice asked and slumped her shoulders forward after Zhang Dong was quick to reply. The four heroes behind them started to laugh as after the journey in the dungeon they started to open up.

It was clear to them now that Zhang Dong was a person from their own world. At least from one that was quite similar. They had the same politicians and countries as well as continents.

The date was also really close, the time in his original world seemed to be moving slower as it looked that only about a month had passed since his disappearance. For him, it was already years, if he returned he could probably just say that he went through a midlife crisis and return to his old life.

This was not something that he wanted to do. Why return to a dead-end job when he was a respectable Patriarch? The only thing that his old world had going for it was the internet and video games. Now after spending time as a powerful cultivator such things as video games lost their appeal. Though there were a few things that he missed, arguing on the internet while being anonymous was one of them.

“Are you sure you should be doing that?”

Takeshi asked while holding his large sword over his shoulder. The youth was now fitted in a shiny new armor along with a brand new sword. His companions had also found ‘legendary’ items that somehow all fit their frames perfectly. Though the caster girls were wearing robes one black and the other white.

Zhang Dong turned his head to the group of youngsters. He wasn’t sure why but Takeshi looked a lot manlier now than just two weeks ago. It could be due to the stats increase which somehow also affected his stature. Gone was a mostly skinny boy and now he was looking at a toned strapping young lad.

His tone had also changed and he sounded a lot more confident in himself. He mostly went through a week's worth of monster-killing but this was apparently enough to make his character shift. The only thing that could have done this so fast was his system, it had somehow boosted the youth’s confidence.

‘I wonder if it was affecting me as well before that…’

His mind went back in time to his own journey forward. He had used system points to buy the Tranquil Mind skill which then made him a lot calmer. Since then he had his head in the game but he could say that this was the system's effect and not him growing as a person himself.

‘As long as I wrap this up within this month they should be fine when they return home…’

Bob didn’t confirm anything as he didn’t have any data but he wasn’t sure what would happen to this system once it was through with the user. When sending the boy back would this system remain with him or would it vanish?

He knew that there was someone working in the background making these systems but for what reason he had no idea. There was a certain risk in sending the boy and the girls home with an intact system.

Would they be safe and sound, or would they explode when passing through to their original world? Bob continued to tell him that he doesn’t have enough data but after absorbing some more nuclei he could formulate an answer. Zhang Dong would need to wait until after he took out the demon king.

“Don’t worry, that King might be overbearing but he isn’t stupid. He won’t act unless he is 100% sure that he will be victorious. Why do you think he never attacked any of the demon lords?”

He answered while the group reorganized themselves. It was time to rest before asking for the construction of an attack force. If everything went well, they would be finally organizing an attack against the demonic beings. 

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