Julius tilted his head as he felt the man's aura pulse anxiously.

"Is something wrong?" He asked.

The man returned his concern with an awkward smile. "It's nothing. I never got your name, by the way?"

Julius hesitated momentarily and considered whether or not to give out his name, but eventually decided that it wouldn't hurt to be truthful.

"It's Julius. And yours?"

"Kuro," the man said while removing the hood of his cloak. When he removed it, a pale but handsome face appeared with a head of thick brown hair. Julius was somewhat surprised at how young he looked. He knew that age was a weird thing in this world, with the extended lifespans as you advanced through tiers. But this man looked barely older than Derek and the others. Which also meant he had advanced to Tier 4 pretty early.

As Julius was busy in thought, he saw Kuro extending his hand out to him. He quickly reciprocated and they shook hands.

"What were you doing over there?" Julius asked curiously.

Kuro's eyes glimmered with excitement upon hearing that question and proceeded to explain to Julius about the interesting nature of the room. Most of the things he said went straight over Julius's head but he understood the basics.

Simply put, the room was made of a bunch of unique materials which allowed for the lich to use soul magic and control such a large number of undead with precision. Which was fascinating for the man because he was a practitioner of soul magic. An uncommon but powerful ability. Although Julius was surprised by the man's forthcomingness. He didn't know if he would have told someone about his type of magic upon meeting them.

"What about you? What are you doing here?" Kuro asked while scratching his head awkwardly, realizing that he had been going off on a tangent.

He shrugged. "I was just exploring and came across this rift," he answered honestly.

"Without anyone to back you up?" Kuro asked with an odd look.

He shrugged again. "No, but I was careful," he said, but this time he wasn't being as honest. This man didn't need to know what he had been doing outside of this room. That Julius had been practically ripping his body into pieces while learning a new way to infuse his Sharpness Concept with his kinetic energy. It would only make Julius seem like a weirdo if he knew the truth.

"Um, so are you going to take care of that lich?" Julius asked after a few moments of silence.

The man snapped his head back at Julius, looking like he had been lost in thought.

"Sorry?"

"Do you have any plans for it?" He asked while pointing at the cage of mana.

"Oh! No, I was just keeping it in there so that I could take my time examining the room. I can take care of it now, though."

Julius was about to interrupt and request that he handle it himself, but before he could say anything, the man started to compress the mana cage around the lich. A powerful pulse of mana rippled throughout the cage, and he was able to see it light up with complex lines of inscription over its surface as it got smaller and smaller.

There was a slight resistance as the lich's natural defenses protected it, but it was no use. It was trapped entirely, and like a piece of glass crushed by two boulders, the lich was crushed into little fragments.

Kuro must have sensed his disappointment because he looked over at Julius with a wince. "Sorry, did you want to do something with it?" The man sounded surprisingly nervous of offending Julius considering the fact that he was at the upper end of Tier 4 and Julius was merely a Tier 3.

Julius waved his hand. "No, it's alright. Probably for the better anyway."

While he would have liked to fight this lich, it might not have been the best idea considering he would have to do so in front of a live audience or have to ask the man to leave which might bring even more questions. It was saddening that he couldn't deal with this rift on his lonesome though.

Not long after the lich was crushed to dust, the mana pervading throughout the rift started to shake. A swirling blue portal appeared in front of them. However, before anything else, the man bent down to the broken pieces of the lich and searched through them, eventually standing back up with a glowing green pearl in his hands.

Without saying a word, the man offered the pearl to Julius with a nod.

"What's this?" Julius asked before making any moves to take it.

"It's the lich's core. It's probably the most valuable thing in the rift and I suspect many people would pay a lot of money to get something like this. While it is only at Tier 3, there is someone out there who can find a good use for it," Kuro explained.

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"What? You don't want it for yourself? I thought with your soul magic, you would find it more valuable than me," Julius pointed out with a frown.

The man shook his head firmly. "No, please, I insist. Also, I am already at Tier 4 and the uses I would have for it are pretty limited."

Julius, not seeing a reason to reject the gift, took it with a suspicious look toward the Tier 4. He didn't know why this person was taking such a respectful, borderline subservient attitude with him. It made him feel weird.

From what Julius could gather, Kuro was strong, even for a Tier 4, which made him wonder why he was acting this way toward Julius. It didn't make much sense.

Still, he made sure to show his appreciation for the gesture. He didn't know what he would do with the core, but he figured that Lily would have an idea. He could just give it to her and let her decide what to do with it.

He nodded to himself. Yes, he quite liked the sound of that.

"Well, thank you. I appreciate it."

"Of course, don't think anything of it," the brown haired man said with a smile.

Julius smiled in return and was about to head over to the portal when the man spoke up.

"Would you like for me to help you to empower that core?" He asked Julius.

Julius frowned. "What do you mean?"

Kuro gestured at the core, which was still being held in Julius's hands.

"Since the lich was controlling the undead, they must have some fragments of the lich's power still in them. With my help, using the energy remnants to empower the core is more than possible. It would make it even more valuable, and you likely won't find a better opportunity to do so."

"Won't the rift collapse soon with the lich dead?" Julius asked.

Kuro shook his head. "No, it will probably take some time until it falls apart. This rift seems pretty stable, and we would have plenty of time to handle the rest of the undead. Even if my estimate is wrong, we would simply be automatically transported out of it before it collapsed."

Honestly, it sounded like something he would be very interested in seeing. The only problem was that Kuro seemed to think that there were more undead still alive. What he didn't know was that Julius had already taken care of all of the undead he had sensed in the area. There might be more around, but if there were, it was a very small number of them.

It wasn't exactly normal for a solo Tier 3 to take care of a rift all by himself. Usually, an entire team was required to do so.

Julius eventually decided that it wasn't worth it. "No, it's okay. I have to get back pretty soon anyway, it's getting pretty late."

"Are you sure? I am going to stay for a bit, regardless, and see if there is anything else that might help me outside the cavern. You are more than welcome to join me, and it wouldn't hurt to empower the core while we are at it," Kuro said to him.

He internally grimaced. That wasn't what he was hoping to hear. In that case, the man would find out regardless. It wasn't like there was anyone else in the rift with them who could have killed the undead. If the brown haired man insisted on exploring the rift before it collapsed and found out the truth regardless, Julius might as well learn a few interesting tricks about soul magic. He suspected that it would be a useful thing to learn for the future.

***

Kuro POV

He felt a little bad, but his curiosity compelled him to do so. He knew right away that the boy was trying to hide something. He seemed too reluctant to receive something valuable and even more reluctant when Kuro offered to empower the core. Most people at Tier 3 would have happily jumped at the chance, regardless of the suspicious nature of it.

If a Tier 4 wanted to kill you, they didn't have to go through such tricks to do so. He also noticed that the boy didn't want to go back to the undead. That was odd. It wouldn't be odd if it were because of fear. That would be normal. But he didn't sense any fear or unease from Julius.

Which had him believing that his initial belief of the boy sneaking his way through was wrong. Perhaps Julius had taken care of a lot more undead than Kuro expected. He was very careful not to antagonize the boy though.

His first impression of the youth's soul was still deeply ingrained in his mind. The initial shock had been softened after some introspection, but it still remained that the boy's soul was very… menacing.

And it was the reason why Kuro was curious about the boy and he had roped the boy into hanging around with him for a little while longer. He wanted to see what kind of person Julius was if he managed to cultivate a soul like that. He had even gone so far as to give the extremely valuable lich core to the boy. Something that he had understated the value to the boy.

It was true that all lich cores were valuable, no matter the tier, but since Kuro was a soul practitioner, he had been able to properly remove the core without damage. Something most people would find impossible. It was a very expensive gift, but it was one that he hoped would cause the boy to look more favorably on him.

As they left the room, he did his best to engage the young teen in a conversation. He asked seemingly innocent questions about what he liked to do as hobbies and what kind of food he liked to enjoy. However, he couldn't help but chuckle when Julius only gave him curt responses. It would seem Kuro's actions had made the boy suspicious, and he couldn't even blame him either. It was the proper response.

However, he kept on trying to keep the boy engaged and he was going to ask Julius another question about where he was from when he noticed that the cavern was very silent.

This wasn't exactly a problem, but considering how much mana he had been dumping out trying to lure the undead to him, it wasn't normal. They should have already sensed the undead. Even without their connection to the lich, they should still be animated. Weaker, sure, but still roaming around aimlessly at the very least.

It wasn't like they were completely dependent on the lich to survive like a summoned monster would be.

It wasn't until he came across the first group of fallen undead that he began to have a sneaking suspicion of what happened. There were dozens of defeated monsters, most of whom had their heads blown off, which was actually a good thing in a way because this preserved the core that kept them running.

He looked over at the boy, who was trying to look all innocent, but Kuro could sense that this was the boy's work. The scent of his soul was all over this place and covered each monster.

It was at this moment that he realized that this young boy had likely already killed off the numerous undead that patrolled this rift. Something that even a Tier 4 like him would find exhausting because of the sheer number of them.

He looked nervously back at the boy in question. Julius's face was almost adorably innocent, but Kuro suddenly became very aware of that very first moment when he looked at Julius's soul.

Dangerous indeed. At the very least, he was just glad that the boy didn't seem to be a bad person. Perhaps his master would like to meet this young boy.