Who the heck is this guy?! Coincidentally, Ares thoughts on the man running circles around him were exactly the same as Dominus''. It was strange though, Dominus had been here before so for him to not recognise this guy must mean the original overseer was replaced. Apparently the pagoda could be updated but now the question was when did this happen? If it was recent, this guy might know a bit more about the happenings of the outside world... Although Ares was seriously wishing the guy would stop sniffing him for a Goddamn second! "Excuse me... Why are you so intent on smelling me ''good'' sir?"


    The guy, still hunched over, turned his head to Ares, giving him a good look at his sensory assailant. The man would be rather tall if he ever stopped bending his back but he seemed quite content to stay like this forever so that wasn''t going to happen any time soon. This guy was also definitely the bulkiest person Ares had ever met and he was absolutely not the kinda guy you would ever want to have a contest of strength with if you could avoid it. His muscles bulged out from his fur and displayed their scars in all their battle-worn glory. His face more closely resembled that of a lion than a human and his mane was splendorous, gloriously dangling beneath his square chin. Heterochromia added a touch of colour to his face with one blue eye and one red one on his left and right sides respectively. His blond hair was dazzling and well combed. Considering how feral his posture and personality seemingly were, he was well groomed at least. He wore leather clothes with a colossal axe, bigger than Ares even, strapped to his burly back. In spite of the size of the weapon the Panthera was darting around with his bare feet like it weighed as much as a feather. "I''mma smellin'' ya ''cos yous smells like one of them fundy-mentals! Any fundy-mental is a friend o'' mine aslong as yar takin'' good care o'' me daughter!"


    "Whoa whoa what? I''ve never met your daughter? Also how do you know I''m a... ''Fundy-mental''?"


    "Neva met my daughter?! Huh, must be one o'' dem fundy-mentals trapped inside da barrierier thingamajig."


    "The barrier? You mean the Primordial Blade''s interference?"


    "Yeah! That thingamajig. Ok ok, I see. Den allows me to into-ro-duce meself! Name''s Golgo, king o'' da Pantheras! Father o'' Havanah, Fundy-mental o'' da reality pillar! Den again, me da father o'' many panthera, couple o'' thousand. Hard to keep track o'' em all but I do good. I can re-me-member ''bout 80 per-chent o'' dem. ''Course Havanah s''special being fundy-mental ''n all."


    ... A couple thousand children?... And I thought my father was a busy man, sheesh. So what, you can tell I''m a fundy-mental because your daughter is one too?"


    "Yep. I re-me-member before she wus born some pro-phet came a-bys and told me one o'' me wives wus gunna birth a fundy-mental. Me could kinda tell he right, wife had new smell. Smell o'' fundy-mental. Like a higher be-eing. Turnsout both my nose and guy was right. Then ''gain, guy was pretty smart. Said he worked for sum kinda organic-isation? Dunno deetails but guy said ''e wanted Havanah to join with other fundy-mentals and gave us buncha culty-vashon re-sorses ''n x''change. Dat guy, and some other guys, helped raise Havanah. Havanah got a lot to show for it, can speak better than papa and will be stronger than me too. Me real proud of Havanah. So, if yous also a fundy-mental, you gonna work alongside my Havanah and be nice to her, yeah?"


    "Uh, sure, I guess so. Right now I still need to escape the ''barrierier'' so I''ll meet her, and the other fundamentals, after that I guess. Say, when did you become the overseer for this floor? It must have been somewhat recently right?"


    Yep yeah. Guy came back with some other guy from place called ''Trans-mit''? Said dey wanted to work to-gather to get info-mashon or sumthing. Dey put me in ''ere to look for fundy-mentals as well as to teech pressure stuff. I was put in ''ere about a years ago. Kinda boring in ''ere though. Wanna leave. Wus told either you or da other fundy-mental could maybe clear da pa-gooda. Speaking of fundy-mental, could yous tell the other one to come ''ere too? Gotta gather info-mashon for da guys."


    "Sure, I was going to recommend he come here anyway. What kind of info-mashon do you want, my furry friend?


    "Fleshy friend, I want to know your culty-vashon and to make sure ya kno ''bout Xhilihililix and stuffs. Make sure every one of the things is on track. Also, dat yous are working on da barierier. Can''t has it up forever."


    "Hm, ok. My culty-vashon is mental accumulation, 4th stage. I do know about Xhilihx and my duty and so on so forth. I''ll deal with the barrier when I can but I''ve got other problems to sort out first before I worry that... So yeah, everything is good... Actually, no! Wait a minute, everything is not ok! That dumb lizard Ignizz still hasn''t shown up yet! When you go back, can you ask someone to go check up on that bastard?! Make sure he hasn''t died in his sleep or something?"


    "Okey dokey. I re-me-member. Jus in case I''ll put it on a piece ''o paper too." Golgo whipped out a small notepad, which clashed heavily with his image, put on a pair of spectacles, that really didn''t suit him, and started messily writing down the info-mashon he''d been given by Ares with a pen that was barely as big as his fingers. "Ah! Almost for-gort. Wass your name fleshy friend?"


    "Ares."


    "A... Ehre... Airy..."


    "A.R.E.S. Ares."


    "Ah, me get it. Air-eese."


    "No it... You know what, fine. That''ll do champ, that''ll do."


    "Air-eese, huh? Bit o'' a weird name..."


    "Don''t you dare go there you furry phonetic fumbler."


    "F... F... F?"


    "Well, not quite but sure. Good try anyway. So, that aside, could you tell me what this trial is?" Ares looked behind Golgo, which was a task in its own right considering how much of a mountainous individual he was, and eyed up a group of moving targets in the distance. They were made of the same metal as the hills on the previous floor. As for what was stopping Ares from just walking over and aiming more precisely from a close range, there was a moat on this floor for some inexplicable reason. Ares could already kinda guess what this floor was about given the layout but he asked anyway just to make sure he wasn''t wasting time trying to complete the room in the wrong way. He was actually conversing with the overseer on this floor properly so he might as well make use of it.


    "Gotta lower da droor-brij. To du dat, ya gotta hit da targ-its with some preshor. Can''t be da normal kind tho. Gotta learn ''ow to make preshor a fizz-ical at-ack on dis floor. Den yous gotta learn to aim at da moo-ving targ-its. Speed, aim, making preshor fizz-ical, gotta do all three to pass da moat."


    "I see. I''m guessing you were chosen to be here because your good at attacking with pressure?"


    "Da best o da best! When I swing me axe, and fling preshore offa da wep-on, it cuts ever-ything ''n half no matter ''ow tuff! Ya no wut yous doing, kiddo, or ya need sum help from me?"


    "I have no idea what I''m doing, no, but that''s fine. I want to learn to do this all on my own, I think it''s better that way in the long run. This doesn''t seem like it will be much harder than the last floor because I''m at least familiar with how to access and wield pressure now. Can''t be too bad, me thinks."


    "Aighty. Den I''ll be sitting on da side and sleepy-ing. Lemme no if ya change your mind... Heh, mind. My little girly Havanah dun like mind fundy-mental at start. Got along like cat and dog. Good frends now though. Mind fundy-mental smart girly and good pers-on. Bit see-ree-oos, ''n all-ways frownin'', but good pers-on is good no matter how little dey smile. Use big words though, hard to keep up wit. Did try to speek dumber for me though. ''Gain, good pers-on." Golgo stomped over to the side and sat with his back up against the wall... Well he did at first but he conked out immediately and slumped further down until his face was kissing the floor. His tongue hung out of his mouth and it slobbered ''till there was a puddle of saliva cleaning the ground he lay on.


    Ares also took a seat but, unlike his feline friend, stayed wide awake. His goal this time was to make pressure into something that physically existed in a solid form... Isn''t this just going to wind up being almost exactly like an Echo? Learning to do this will probably be easy but maybe I should spend my time here learning to mix pressure into my Echoes after? It will take a little longer to leave this floor but that ought to be alright, I''ve still got a fair bit of time left until I need to head back and start making dinner. They''re probably gonna start eating the lunch I left behind soon... I wonder if Enyo''s calmed down yet? Well, for everyone else''s sake, here''s hoping... Anyway, time to focus on the task at hand. I can worry about Enyo later... Not that there''s really much I can do about her...


    Accessing his heart with mana, Ares let the pressure flow through him but he didn''t release it. The major difficulty in figuring out this floor''s gimmick was knowing whether or not the conversion process, of turning pressure into a solid, came before or after unleashing it outside his body. Did it happen in him? Did it happen the second he let it out? Was it even later than that? Ares hadn''t actually ever seen a physical pressure attack as it was something Dominus never used during his brief outings that Ares permitted. Dominus had skipped right over this step and gone straight to what Ares guessed would be stage four, redirecting magic with pressure. That was what he''d taught Rox. After that he jumped to stage five and coated himself in the stuff but never once did he fire pressure at anybody from range.


    Ares tried merging the pressure with his blood to no avail. It''s not even like there was a hint of success if he followed this route as absolutely nothing was happening. No response whatsoever. Ares abandoned that idea quickly after testing it, the second he realised it was getting him nowhere he moved on and tried a new approach. Mana. This had gotten him far on his learning journey and so Ares figured he would give mana another shot here. He kept a bundle of pressure trapped inside him as he tried to merge it with mana and, unsurprisingly, he made progress! It seemed like mana was an incredibly important part to pressure manipulation no matter how you wanted to use it. Now there was a different problem, it was taking forever! As Ares threw more mana into the pressure clump he could see it visibly change, and that was great and all, but the time it took made it unusable in a fight. No wonder there were multiple targets on this floor, if there was just one even an amateur at pressure control could pass this test with flying colours. This way the target would reset before you could hit them all to prevent anyone from ''cheating'' the trial, ensuring anyone who moved up had a good grasp of what was being asked of you here. Still, Ares had the answer he was looking for so now some experimentation would be all it took to correct whatever mistake he was making. His first attempt resulted in failure when the only change he made was to throw even more mana at the problem. The speed of the pressure changing to a solid did increase but A, it was barely noticeable and B, the amount of mana he used was ungodly. There was no way in hell people were doing this normally to get the desired result, that was insanity. Using upwards of 70% of your mana reserves to fire one pressure bullet?! No, that couldn''t be correct even if it was possible.


    Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.


    Although that last attempt was categorically a failure, it did still succeed in converting the pressure fully. Ares wasn''t content with this just yet but he could at least try and fire off the pressure bullet to check everything that came after this stage was functional. Unlike with simply controlling normal pressure, Ares couldn''t use mana or his eyes because it was still inside him! To that end, he pointed at one of the targets on the other side of the moat, specifically the one that was closest and not moving, and unleashed all the stored pressure via his finger. A silver swirl appeared at the tip of Ares'' finger before it coalesced into a bullet and shot forward at a blinding speed. It was so fast even Ares himself barely kept up with the projectile... The same projectile that missed its original mark entirely and slammed into the wall at the back of the room. From this Ares realised aiming was hard and not at all like firing an actual gun such as the Biome Eagle. The bullet was prone to misfiring because of the punchy recoil to Ares'' finger affecting its trajectory milliseconds after it was fired. Technically Ares had aimed properly it''s just his finger bouncing upwards affected the nearby air and jolted the pressure off course. He would have to find a method of dealing with that but, right now, he was more concerned with something else he realised...


    This attack was brutal! The pressure bullet had left a dent in the pagoda and the dull thud had even spooked Golgo awake. When Golgo saw the hole he rubbed his eyes twice as if in disbelief before staring at Ares. Golgo shook his head and smacked himself to knock himself unconscious because he didn''t believe this was real. He simply went back to sleep and pretended nothing had happened here... But something did happen! The dent was undeniable proof! Undeniable proof that Ares'' pressure was a lethal weapon in more than just one way. Normal pressure could kill, physical pressure could kill... As long as Ares could chuck his pressure at people, regardless of what form it took, he could do some real damage. What''s more, that bullet contained barely any pressure. Ares had gone light on its creation... Ares was very rapidly realising he was not going to leave this pagoda the same person he was when he came in. Even if, today, here and now, he could only complete this one floor before having to leave, the increase to his overall power level would be monstrous. With all this he might actually be stronger than Enyo again and he''d yet to even explore the other two floors. He was improving by leaps and bounds every second he spent in here and he wasn''t even halfway done yet. This pagoda was a phenomenal tool and Ares really owed the Transmit boss a great deal... Then again, they also owed him in some ways so it evened out.


    Anyway, Ares managed to eventually shut his stunned-open jaw and refocus. The end result was great but everything prior to it was dreadful and even that was putting it gently. Using pressure in this manner wasn''t feasible unless he was trying to assassinate someone in which case he could maybe charge it in advance for upwards of ten seconds. Ares was obviously not content with this, though, and went back to figuring out how to turn pressure into something physical in the proper way. What was clear to him was that mana was the answer, just not in the way he was currently using it... Which meant, logically, he needed to change the mana in some way... What could he do to fundamentally change the essence of mana?


    For Ares'' next attempt, he decided to convert the plain mana into destruction mana. Any of the aspects would do he was just curious to see if anything would change or if this wasn''t the right way to go about it. Ares ran some mana through his meridians, converted them into bog-standard annihilation mana, and made it flow back to the new pressure clump he''d created. Unfortunately the speed remained near enough the same but, interestingly, Ares did notice the pressure change colour to gold. Ares thought this was normal but, when he checked with disintegration mana and nothingness mana the pressure didn''t turn black or red... How strange... I wonder what the difference is... Let me check something.


    Ares temporarily abandoned his current task and went back to toying around with what he''d been doing on the floor previous. He ran pressure through him but, before letting it out, he mixed it with annihilation magic. Sure enough, the pressure turned a brilliant gold, sparkling away inside him. Ares was bewildered by this strange happening but he wasted no time in pushing the pressure out and creating a small golden zone ahead of him. Ares could instinctively tell there was a difference even if he didn''t know the specifics. Something about the pressure gave off a more regal feeling, similar to when Ares'' bloodline used to act up. The air he had about him when his bloodline kicked up a fuss was domineering and that same feeling could be felt coming from the golden pressure. Ares put his hand inside the golden zone and made no effort to prevent whatever came next so he could see just what kind of effect it had.


    SMACK CRACK


    "AH FUCK!" Ares'' hand was crushed under the weight of the golden pressure and sunk straight into the floor with such force his pinky finger broke on impact. It had taken the brunt of the impact and paid the price for Ares'' intrigue. Ares stared at the golden pressure with narrowed eyes trying to figure out what this was exactly when Dominus came in clutch and threw out his speculation... Ares was the start of a new bloodline! It was possible for a person to be born with a seemingly random trait that no one in their bloodline possessed but could be passed on by them when they produced offspring. Dominus'' ability to automatically adjust pressure was something no one else had ever had before him and yet he was born with such an innate ability. Ares was in a similar boat and his bloodline probably involved mixing his most proficient aspect''s mana, the one he had the highest affinity too, with pressure for various effects. If he ever had kids, not adopted ones but actual blood-related offspring, there was a chance for them to awaken this bloodline ability during bloodline awakening. In fact, anyone in Ares'' lineage from now on could potentially have it. To think he wouldn''t have known about this unique ability that he and he alone possessed if he hadn''t made a mistake during the learning process! What a waste that would have been! Especially considering how much of an improvement this made to his pressure... It was no joke how powerful the pressure had become now and he''d yet to even experiment with physical pressure too... If Ares thought he''d made leaps and strides before he''d practically just jumped over the moon in a single bound with that last discovery. In fact it was easily the most important thing he''d done since entering this pagoda bar none. Ares still needed to play around with the pressure to check if anything else had changed about it other than its effectiveness but he was immensely pleased right now. As for why he was born with this trait, it probably had something to do with the destruction pillar. Maybe destruction mana was so enticing that the pressure in him couldn''t help but fail to resist it! Ares knew he wouldn''t be able to say no if that lustrous gold mana strolled by, flaunting its pedigree!


    Ares quickly tested his golden pressure and the results were in. The golden pressure was more effective by a factor of roughly two and it caused damage to anything within it periodically via spurts of pain. It felt as though your flesh was exploding in a specific spot for a second before the sensation disappeared and reappeared again. It should also be noted that, thanks to his friendly-fire prevention mutation he got from Enyo, he could keep people safe from these effects if he wanted too. This was a small but useful thing to keep in mind. Other than that there were no differences. It seemed as though annihilation mana provided raw power and a crap ton of it at that. Honestly, there probably wasn''t a more powerful pressure out there than Ares'' golden version. This would top all the pressure charts with its eyes closed and Dominus agreed wholeheartedly. He admitted to being jealous of Ares'' bloodline because of how well it synergised with his own. Dominus swore to himself the next time he was let out he''d give it a whirl and enjoy it to the max. Ares had no qualms with that declaration because it would only ever be his opponent that suffered as a result of that decision. Anyway, Ares was getting distracted again. He''d fully mastered golden pressure, as it was basically no different from regular pressure, so now it was time to return to his struggle. He still didn''t know the optimal way to make pressure a solid substance quickly and efficiently. He had thoughts on the matter, though, as he already knew he needed to ''change'' the mana in some way and there was only one other method he could think of off the top of his head. If this next attempt also failed he would be stuck and have to give it some serious thought for a couple of hours but he had faith in his next idea.


    Mana could be changed into other types of specific mana based on aspects, yes, but the main use of mana was changing it into magic! You could swing mana around all you wanted but it wasn''t typically useful until you gave it form... Which just so happened to coincide with Ares'' goal for the pressure inside him! He put some annihilation mana inside the swirl of pressure and then came the moment of truth. Ares imagined crafting a golden bullet using the mana and began the process immediately. He didn''t need to create an art or anything, because he was just using plain old magic, so he kept imagining the shape of a standard full metal jacket bullet and pushed on. At first Ares thought nothing was happening but, when he felt a spark run through his body, his finger moved before his brain could order it to do as such. From the tip of his finger a streamlined bullet launched and broke the sound barrier... Maybe? Ares was incapable of following this particular bullet with his bare eyes because it was boosted by his anniliation mana this time and went rocketing off before he could get a good look at it. His brain was still playing catch up on everything that had just happened and processing the overload of information was not a simple task. Still he collected his thoughts and went through everything that just happened in order... As the magic formed, the previously formless formless pressure inside of him completely changed in an instant and had nowhere to go because Ares wasn''t releasing it. He could feel the pressure welling up and the last thing he wanted was to keep it inside him so Ares fired it off without any goal in mind. From there, the bullet went... THROUGH THE CEILING?!


    The recoil from the absurdly powerful shot sent the bullet spiralling upward where it pierced through the ceiling and went charging into the next floor up. Bits of dust were falling over the moat and Golgo had woken up again, gawking at the destruction while tilting his head left and right as if to discern what manner of madness had just occurred.


    Ares was also looking at hole and his reaction was no better as he was stuck blinking on repeat, occasionally pinching himself to try and wake himself up from this unusual dream. This pagoda.... Should never have been damaged! How many billions of people had been in this thing without leaving so much as a scratch?! Not only did Ares dent it earlier but he''d now also poked a hole in the damn thing! Ares had very nearly recovered from his shock when he noticed something moving about on the floor above... Fluffy? Ear? Ares rubbed his eyes and suddenly the ear vanished. He thought he was imagining things but then another body part popped up over the hole, an eye! Quite a captivating eye at that... It was a burnt orange colour with small black lines in the iris all pointed towards the pupil, making it look like a black sun surrounded by an orange horizon on a white canvas. Around the rim of the eye was a faint black colouring that reminded Ares of a fox.


    "Hel~lo cutie!" The eye in the ceiling spoke! The voice was mature but playful as it tickled Ares'' earlobe. Ares shivered from head to toe as the eyeball in ceiling looked him up and down. It was a sly gaze filled with sneaky intent and Ares finally felt like he understood what everyone else felt when he looked at them with mischief on the mind... This woman was bad news! Even as a revenant Ares felt outclassed! He almost wished he could stay on the third floor forever and his one solace was that he hadn''t finished the trial yet... But deep down he knew... This woman was an unavoidable problem that was going to give him a real headache when he ascended...