When Jason emerged on the 20th floor, he felt a little bit weird.
The beasts' strength was much higher than that of the beast only one floor before, but even then he had no problem defeating them.
Instead, it was rather easy for him, and the amount of strength he had to use was low in comparison to before, which caused him to feel a little bit dumbfounded.
'I thought the cultivation base would increase drastically every 10th floor...did I expect too much, or did I increase my strength to a very high degree?'
The latter was not possible because one could never be too strong.
Furthermore, Jason had yet to reach the 2nd threshold of the Prismar stage. Each of his characteristics might be exceeding the 1st threshold of the Prismar stage, but, in the end, he had only solidified four prismarine crystals so far!
However, even after defeating the ferocious beasts on the 20th floor rather easily, Jason required almost an entire month just to wipe off every single beast from the floor.
It hadn't been necessary for him to do so, but in the end, even after the entire floor was cleared of beasts, Jason had yet to find the gate that led him towards the floor's Guardian and the 21st floor.
Owing to this, he launched a few more days of a detailed search without being interrupted by any kind of beasts, in which he combed through the floor, inspecting every nook and cranny.
Fortunately, it didn't take him long and the moment Jason sighted the gate, he approached it with a rapid pace. The Guardian emerged out of the opening gate, just as he crossed the required threshold.
It was a gigantic Behemoth with a height of more than 6 meters, a length of more than 20 meters, long gleaming tusks, a bulky physique, and four sturdy legs that could crush all kinds of existences under them.
However, the appearance of beasts was not something that shocked him anymore.
Rather, Jason would immediately investigate their cultivation path, cultivation base, unique traits, and other possible enhancements that were visible to his eyes.
His Emperor Eyes were constantly improving and were in sync with his advance in the cultivation ranks.
As such, he faced no issues in quickly telling what kind of advantages most beasts had.
The only issue was the concealed amplifications that the tower seemed to provide their Guardians with.
For example, the last Cyclops he fought had an extremely strong gravitation affinity that had been further enhanced through external means, while the first Cyclops had specific means to block his chaos attribute and abyssal effect to a certain extent.
Owing to these observations, he knew that the tower, or to be precise, the entire dungeon was trying to increase the difficulty to an extreme level.
However, it was exactly this scenario that caused confusion in Jason's mind because the tower's difficulty didn't seem to have increased that much from the 19th to the 20th floor.
In comparison to the difference between the 9th and 10th floor, the difference between the latter floors was not as shocking as expected. Jason could also tell that his active cultivation and that of his soulbonds must be the reason for him to feel this.
Previously, he rushed through a few floors, but that was not the case anymore.
Rather, he had cultivated for quite some time on the 11th floor, only to cultivate consistently on the following floors.
Because of that, Jason's current strength was comparable to an existence that possessed more than 20 solidified prismarine crystals!
He had yet to come across a being at the 2nd threshold of the Prismar stage, but looking deep into the Behemoth's eyes, Jason could tell that it was not as strong as he had expected it to be.
'Maybe, one of the large rotating crystals is equal to 10 solidified prismarine crystals? That's...much higher, yet lower than expected…'
Considering that one would only break through a simple threshold in the Prismar stage, a single large rotating crystal would more than double one's entire combat strength.
That was an extremely shocking boost, but Jason already possessed a combat prowess that was more than double the strength of a normal being with nine prismarine crystals.
Thus, he couldn't help but smile dryly, looking at the Behemoth that had just entered the 2nd threshold of the Prismar stage.
'Maybe I'll be able to advance a few more floors than expected?' Jason thought as he fused with Artemis, further enhancing his mana core size, and physique.
Upon receiving an amplification of 100% from Artemis' cultivation, their fusion further enhanced their strength, giving them additional enhancement as Jason's appearance began to change.
His Celestia aura was fully released before it slowly transmuted into an ice-cold aura that froze the surroundings even without supplying a single trace of mana.
Only a moment later, the two golden stigma above Jason's right eye began to glow brightly, allowing the icy cold aura to enlarge, reaching the Behemoth that did not hesitate to attack Jason.
Feeling tremendous strength radiating from Jason the moment his aura touched it, the Behemoth knew that it would die if it wouldn't do anything right now.
Thus, it charged towards Jason, causing the ground below its feet to shake violently as Byakur manifested in Jason's hand.
Making eye contact with the Behemoth, Jason's sky blue eyes seemed to rake through the Behemoth's soul. Meanwhile, Byakur was suddenly enveloped in an icy cold flame that flared up in a pale blue color with silver strands glittering on its blade.
Through the fusion with Artemis, Jason made use of the freezing flame that was forcefully transmuted from Solaris, the black origin flame, and the moonlight ability.
There was no exact degree to which the moonlight ability could enhance specific properties, but the more mana Jason inserted into it, the stronger it would become.
This was extremely beneficial, but also drained a lot of mana.
As such, Jason mostly used the moonlight ability's basic configurations because every single unique affinity, ability, and trait of his required tremendous amounts of mana.
Even after possessing four times more mana than anyone else at his cultivation base, Jason felt that he was always short of mana.
With an infinite supply of it, beasts like the Behemoth wouldn't even be able to come close to him, but unfortunately, this was not the case.
Because of that, Jason had to use Byakur to counterattack the Behemoth, whose head was lowered in an attempt to pierce its large tusks through Jason's abdomen.
Byakur had enlarged to the size of a ten-meter-long blade, and Jason didn't hesitate for a second as he thrust it at the Behemoth.
The flames followed every single movement of Byakur and the moment it collided with the Behemoth's tusks, Jason noticed that there was something he had missed out on.
"Byakur has become too weak…"
Hearing and seeing cracks sweeping over Byakur like multiple cobwebs, Jason couldn't help but sigh deeply.
He had wanted to use Byakur for a little bit longer, but that didn't seem to be possible anymore.
With that in mind, Jason realised that he would have to forge a new weapon, which was quite disappointing.
Yet, just at that moment, Byakur vibrated in reluctance as it sensed Jason's thoughts through their soul connection.
It began to glow lightly, and the cracks were forcefully halted from spreading further as if Byakur wanted to demonstrate that nothing was wrong.
Seeing this, Jason couldn't help but feel a little bit odd.
However, instead of retracting Byakur into the soul world, he exerted the Floating Sky movement technique before flapping his wings as he disappeared from his previous spot.
A moment later he emerged right below the Behemoth's head to release a tremendous amount of mana before slashing at the Guardian's head, severing it.
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