Dimensional Keeper: All My Skills Are at Level 100-Chapter 605: Into the forest

Following the brutal clearing of the steel wolves, Max didn’t waste a single second. His figure moved calmly but cautiously through the crumbled remains of the ruined building. Dust floated in the air, and fragments of broken stone littered the cracked floors.

With his Three Dimensional Body fully activated, his senses extended far and wide, sweeping through every crevice of the structure. He scanned through broken pillars, collapsed beams, and even beneath the rubble, as if seeing layers beyond what normal eyes could perceive.

As he walked deeper toward the back wall of the building, something caught his attention—a faint disturbance buried beneath the floor. It wasn’t much, just a subtle flicker of energy, something easily overlooked by ordinary senses.

And it came from below him.

Max crouched and swept away the debris with a single wave of his hand. Beneath the rubble lay a slab of stone, and at its center was a jagged, almost invisible line. His eyes narrowed. That line wasn’t a crack. It was a seal.

’I feel aura of sword concept from down here.’ Max thought.

He pressed his hand over it, flooding it with his own sword concept.

A low rumble echoed. Stone ground against stone. The slab slowly retracted into the floor, revealing a compartment no bigger than a coffin.

Within it, laying atop a velvet cloth long faded to ash-gray, was a sword—broken at the hilt, its blade snapped halfway—but still radiating with a terrifyingly pure and ancient sword concept.

Even cracked and rusted, the blade hummed. Its edges shimmered with residual intent, as if it had once severed mountains, cleaved through lightning, and split space itself.

Max reached forward, his fingers brushing the cold metal, and the moment he touched it, a wave of sword intent surged into his soul.

It wasn’t just strong—it was complete.

Despite its broken form, the sword’s concept was fully refined, and terrifyingly powerful. It rejected all elements, all distractions, and spoke only one truth—sword. As Max gripped the broken weapon, his entire sword concept quivered in response.

The Severing Sword Concept inside him surged wildly just holding the broken sword.

’This…This sword might be of an expert at Divine Rank.’ Max realized, eyes wide. ’The Concept of Sword on this broken sword is so sharp that it causes even me to tremble in front of it.’

It didn’t matter that it was broken. The sword was like a master who had long stopped speaking—but left behind one final slash that echoed through time. And now, Max held it.

"Great!" Max muttered under his breath, the corner of his lips curling into a smile of excitement. His grip on the broken sword tightened slightly before he tucked it away into his spatial space.

After his intense battle with Silus, he’d come to understand something important—something fundamental about concepts.

Every concept, regardless of type or affinity, progressed through three distinct stages at each level: basic, advanced, and perfection. Right now, all four of Max’s concepts—Severing Sword, Flame, Space, and Lightning—were at basic stage of Level 1 Concept.

If he wanted to elevate any of them to Level 2, he first needed to push them to perfection stage of Level 1.

The resonance he felt with the broken sword, the way its aura complemented his own concept, gave him exactly the insight and pressure he needed to make that leap.

’With this… my sword concept will definitely reach Level 2 soon,’ Max thought with certainty as he turned his back on the ruin, the weight of the broken sword tucked away but still lingering in his mind like an unfinished poem.

Without wasting a second, Max sprinted toward his next target—an area deeply etched in Silus’ memories. Of all the locations Silus wanted to explore within the third stage of the citadel, this one had stood out. It was marked with a sense of urgency, of obsession

A large stone entrance hidden within a small forest, nestled by a flowing river. That was the only clue. Max zipped through the ancient dome’s terrain, his movements sharp and silent, his senses constantly active through his Three Dimensional Body.

It didn’t take long to find the forest.

But just as Max arrived at its edge, his body instinctively halted. He pressed himself behind a large cracked boulder, remaining perfectly still. His senses spread like a web, and what he found made his eyes narrow dangerously.

Deep within the forest, pulsating like controlled volcanoes, were powerful auras—many of them. There were four particularly overwhelming ones—four 5th-level Master Rank experts. Alongside them were numerous peak Expert Rank warriors and a few 2nd-level Master Rank elites. These weren’t just any experts.

Max’s jaw clenched.

’It’s them... The entire squad from the Four God Nation is already here.’

The same group he had narrowly avoided confrontation with earlier. And now they stood between him and the very location Silus had prioritized most.

Max’s eyes darkened as he crouched low, watching the trees sway softly under the glowing sky of the citadel dome, calculating his next move. Understanding the urge from Silus to get whatever treasure was in the forest, Max didn’t want to miss this chance.

"But they can’t stop me."

With his Green Soul fully active, Max cloaked his presence down to the very pulse of his energy—his aura sealed so tightly that not even the grass beneath his feet could sense his movement. Like a shadow that belonged to no light, he slipped into the forest with lethal precision.

The forest was vast, ancient, and twisted in ways that defied logic. Towering trees with thick moss-covered trunks stretched toward the dome’s glowing sky, while others were small but vibrant with flickering light around their leaves—clear signs of spiritual sentience.

Max felt the eerie tug of those spiritual trees almost instantly; roots slithered out like snakes and vines extended silently, trying to wrap around him like prey. But Max didn’t falter. His movements were fluid and decisive, his Three Dimensional Body letting him glide through the tangled underbrush, dodging every grasp with ease.

As he moved deeper into the forest, the light dimmed unnaturally, the air thickened with something cold and oppressive. Max’s pace slowed instinctively.

The forest here was different—he could feel it in his bones. Every breath he took seemed to stir invisible forces. His Green Soul flickered with subtle pulses of warning, a quiet scream in the back of his mind telling him that this part of the forest wasn’t just dangerous—it was deadly.

And then, he saw it.

Max froze, his eyes narrowing at the surreal and disturbing sight before him. Just ahead, in the middle of the twisted thicket, a peak Expert Rank warrior—one of the very people Silus had brought along—was suspended in mid-air.

Encased in a narrow beam of crimson light, the warrior’s body hung motionless, limbs outstretched, face locked in a silent scream. But what made Max’s heart constrict wasn’t just the frozen form—it was the unmistakable pulse of life still radiating from within. He could feel the man’s soul. It was active. Awake. Trapped.

The crimson beam had frozen not just his body, but the very flow of time around him. The warrior was still alive, still conscious—yet utterly powerless to move, to speak, to even blink. His wide, terrified eyes stared blankly into space, eternally locked in the moment he had been caught. Max’s breath slowed. A cold realization crawled up his spine.