He let out a light chuckle, then shook his head, leaving his words at that.

"Well, you have heard my terms of entry if you want to use my dungeon. Tell that to anyone else who received the same quest you mentioned. If they want to gain diverse experience in fighting beasts, they can come. The first ten floors of my dungeon are open to all..."

"But the next ten floors require a fee... and for this fee," he paused thoughtfully. "Well, I’ve not particularly decided on an amount yet. When I do, you will know."

Uhtred waved his hand in a shooing motion.

"For now though, I’m done with you guys. Leave my dungeon now."

Uhtred didn’t need to say the words twice. The entire motley crew vacated his dungeon like their tails were on fire. They didn’t even look back for a second, heading out of the glowing portal and disappearing from the immediate surroundings immediately.

"Why did you bother wasting so much time? You could have just used one of them as an example, and they would all fall in line," Zara commented in her usual flat tone, as if she were talking about something very casual.

Uhtred looked back at her just as he was walking toward Diya.

"You seem to have a clear understanding of how to deal with people for someone who has lost a lot of their memories."

He paused fully and turned to face her.

"I am well aware that your memories are truly not forthcoming. Maybe something happened to you, something peculiar, during the integration..."

His words seemed to carry a deeper meaning, and the look in his eyes became slightly vacant.

He was also remembering the moment before the integration occurred: the asteroid that had crashed into the planet and the orb that had intertwined with his pendant.

The weird series of events that had followed, which very likely had to do with his current primordial grade core...

Very quickly, though, he shook those thoughts away and refocused on Zara.

"I will tell you this here and now. I can understand if you have secrets, a lot of us have secrets too. But if for a second you betray me or pose any threat, not just to me but to the rest of the crew..."

He stared at her, his eyes the coldest and deadest she had ever seen them.

"...I will kill you."

A heavy tension reigned as not just Zara, but also Minh Quan, Dennis, and Diya looked on silently.

Uhtred saw a flicker of assent cross through Zara’s eyes, the most human expression he’d ever seen in her gaze. It looked as though there was relief in her eyes, and even a bit of conviction, if Uhtred was not mistaking it.

What exactly she was relieved about, and what she was being convinced of, Uhtred didn’t know.

But so long as she had assented, he would put his doubts about her to the side for the meantime until she proved him otherwise.

He also had his secrets — secrets that were even unknown to him, who was involved in them. He could understand if a series of events occurred without her having a particular say about it.

In time, he knew he would get to know more about Zara, but for now, he would welcome her to the crew. She had helped him on Floor 20 after all. He was trusting his intuition about her, and he hoped he was not wrong.

He turned and moved forward to Diya, who was watching the whole thing with a light smile on her tired face.

Uhtred wasn’t one for wishy-washy speeches. He simply looked down at Diya and nodded.

She understood immediately what he was thanking her for: the fact that she had worked hard, pushing her body to the limit despite being fully drained, just to heal Zara so she could be of help to him on the lower floors.

That help had proven useful in the end, so there were thanks in order.

"Remind me later. I have something to give you," he said offhand, nearly as if he wasn’t too bothered. But with the way he didn’t know where to place his hands, she could tell Uhtred was not used to showing vulnerability.

She smiled as he cleared his throat and moved forward, muttering a few words to Dennis and Minh Quan as he headed for the portal leading to the outside.

"I think it’s time for us to have a base. Not just the caves we’ve been staying in, but a full-on base. A System-acknowledged territory we can call our own..."

"Oh?" Surprisingly, Dennis was the one to respond with the most enthusiasm. He strode forward immediately, briskly walking toward the portal after Uhtred, who just stepped outside.

He wanted to see the process of this "territory creation" happen before his eyes.

As they both stepped outside, Uhtred was already browsing through the multiversal store — specifically, the System section of the store, not the general multiversal store owners’ section.

He looked at the listings for system-enforced landmarkers. There was the one for 1,000 square meters, four rods that would be placed in an equal square layout spanning a thousand square meters in total, which cost 100 multiversal tokens.

Then there was the one above that for 2,000 square meters, which cost 200 multiversal tokens.

2,000 square meters was sufficient for Uhtred’s current needs. In fact, 1,000 square meters would have done the same, but just for some space and headroom, he wanted to go with 2,000. 𝙧𝙚𝙚𝔀𝒆𝓫𝓷𝙤𝓿𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝙤𝓶

To put it into perspective, 2,000 square meters was roughly half an acre of land.

It was about half the size of an American football field, more than enough room to build a sizable stronghold, a sprawling courtyard, and still have plenty of buffer space left over to prevent anyone from creeping up on them unannounced.

Uhtred just wanted something that was enough to cover the entire area of his new dungeon within his territory.

He clicked the buy button for the 2,000 square meter rods, and immediately, the tokens were deducted from his balance, leaving him with 25,105 multiversal tokens.

Four rods appeared out of nowhere, hovering in the air before him, before dropping to the ground firmly.

Each one of them was solidly built and very dense. Uhtred didn’t know what material they were made of, but he reckoned it was no weaker than his star-metal battleaxe.

He tried to push a bit of his essence into the material, but there wasn’t the slightest give whatsoever. In fact, he felt a push back that made him acutely aware he wasn’t supposed to try and control the material.

It didn’t even feel like metal after he tried controlling it, so he stopped his curious attempts.

With Dennis watching from the side, he arranged the four rods in an equal 2,000 square meter area around the face of the dungeon, which sat on the side of a small hill.

Uhtred didn’t bother to try and put the entire hill inside the area of his new territory. He only focused on the portal itself and a small portion of the hill.

The majority of the small hill was still outside his territory. It could serve as a vantage point for looking out to further distances.

The majority of the space was instead at the front areas, where he would eventually clear most of the trees and use the space for various structures.

The moment all the rods were placed firmly in the ground, a shimmering barrier seemed to form on the outside, shrouding the entire space within. The rods themselves also disappeared from view.

Uhtred saw a new panel pop up in his vision, just as the rest of the crew exited the dungeon to take in what Uhtred was doing.

The new panel was a territory panel. Just like the dungeon panel, he could see a visual interface of the entire space.

The area his territory spanned was clearly visible to him: the dungeon was listed there, the number of trees, even little medicinal herbs that littered the forest floor that fell into his territory were clearly visible.

Nothing went unnoticed within this territory.

He could even see the numbers of his allies within the territory, depicted with a green color, along with two enemies at the edge of his territory depicted with a red color...

Wait... enemies?!