Stallus should have been able to control the flow of essence. She should be the one to decide what amounts she wanted in the crystal, but she lost control, and the crystal took all of her essence.

Stallus needed to master that. She couldn’t let her skill dictate for her.

After hours of harvesting, Azaroth stood and waited until the others were done. Then he turned to them. "We have to mine as many crystals as we can. Stallus will save some in her storage space, but we will also put small amounts in ours."

Azaroth wouldn’t let such power become inactive again because of a lack of resources.

They got to work. Catena would shake the crystals down with his metal balls, and then they would pick them up and store them in their storage rings.

Azaroth chose a particular type of crystal. It was the size of the one that caused the explosion earlier. If anything should happen, they could use it as their trump card.

"Why don’t you break them into different sizes?" Alex suggested.

Stallus frowned. "Not a bad idea. I will have to test them with different sizes anyway and find suitable sizes for different explosions."

Stallus must find one that will only take a certain amount of her essence so she would be able to calculate the amount of essence she needed for fighting.

After they collected sufficient crystals for her, they finally left the crypt. By this time, they had moved into the forest proper, and there were no more buildings for them to pass the time, so they took Alex’s suggestion.

They lived in trees now.

Azaroth picked a tree and sat at its base to start roasting one of the meats stored in his storage ring, since the last crypt was their last for that day. The others also chose trees and started the process of cooking their own food after taking fire from Azaroth.

And that was how Azaroth and the others spent their first month in the training crypt.

In their third month in, they finally met their first confrontation with a monster outside the crypt. They had since left the forest behind and were now hunting crypts in the mountains. That afternoon, after finishing their second crypt hunt, they wanted to drink water and relax before going to the next one.

It was at the stream that passed through the whole mountain that they found it. The monster was crouched beside the stream, drinking.

Azaroth stopped suddenly when he saw it. He stiffened, and the others froze as well. The monster was grey, with a bat face and the body of a child, only bigger and with three fingers that held a club.

The monster didn’t detect them in time, mostly because the team had been learning how to conceal their essence so perfectly that they could sneak up on their enemies.

But it did and flattened its ears on its skull. The monster turned, looking at them with eyes of grey and dull yellow. A brown tongue flickered out and licked its lips.

Will the creature attack them? Azaroth thought. His hands slowly went down to the hilt of his sword. He needed to be prepared if the monster meant to attack.

The monster lifted its heavy club and pointed it at them in warning. Then it turned and leaped away, its legs carrying it far with each leap.

"That was scary," Alex whispered as if the monster was still near and could hear them.

"It was a full rank above us in advancement," Stallus said.

They continued to the water. Azaroth looked around the water place to see if he would find a portal, but sadly, there was none. He sighed. "It seems we are getting to the end of this region. We’ll walk the rest of the mountain to see if we’ll find any portal."

Each region, like the forest and now the mountains, had a number of crypts attached to it. They had just cleared the closest and possibly the last one on the mountain not too long ago.

They continued to walk. The sun was high and hot in the sky, but they were used to it by now. The weather in the training crypt was ever-changing. From extreme cold to heat, it was one of the hardest things they encountered and had to adjust to.

At long last, they reached the end of the mountains.

Catena looked back sadly at the mountain that spread behind him. He totally enjoyed his time there and was sad to see it go. He liked anywhere with strong rocks.

At the very end, in the place connecting the mountains to the sprawling, rolling green hills dotted with portals in the distance, they saw their last mountain portal. 𝒻𝓇𝑒𝘦𝘸𝑒𝒷𝓃ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝒸ℴ𝘮

Stallus grunted. "I thought for sure that there would be no more portals here." She was holding a small crystal between her teeth. She would fill it with essence and draw the essence back, playing with it to know when it would cause an explosion.

That, and because she had nothing better to do anyway. The walks between hunting crypts were boring, and this was one of the ways to cure that.

"Me too," Alex said. His dark eyes frowned at the portal, and he shook his head at it.

Catena was the only one who looked forward to clearing it, and the reason was simple. It was very likely that the crypt would lead into a place with strong rocks where they’d fight monsters. Catena was beginning to like rocks more and more as the days went by.

"Well, let’s go. We still have some light left," Azaroth said. He drew his sword, and with the others following, he entered the rolling portal.

They found themselves in the same place. No, not the same because the rocks here were flat and less rocky. But it must be at the top of a mountain.

At the very top of it, at least. The wind snatched at them, but their weapons were out and ready. Monsters sometimes did sneak attacks.

Then they saw the first monster and knew this crypt was going to be different. And not in a good way.