Chapter 149: [X] Chapter 149: Full Access [ Golden Ticket Bonus - ]
Alessio’s tone made it clear he already regretted the permission.
"Where is the treasury from here?" Alex asked.
Vespera looked at Alessio and answered with the calm certainty of someone who had opened these vaults before and saw no reason to dramatize the process.
"I will send him in myself, the formations recognize my authority, so they will open a temporary path and close it behind him when the window ends."
"The clerks can still record whatever leaves, you can tell them you took it."
Alessio looked at Alex one last time, voice firm enough to cut through any remaining birthday atmosphere.
"One item, Alex, only one, and only something you can actually carry out under your own power, and do it as quickly as you can, I don’t want to spending more time than it is necessary in there."
"And if you try to take more items, I will make you return everything, and this privilege will not be offered again."
"So do you understand the limit clearly, Alex?"
"I understand it clearly, dad." Alex said.
He did not argue or ask for clarification or additional time.
A moment later he simply dropped into his own shadow.
The darkness accepted him without resistance, it happened so fast that he did not even get time to react it to, and then he emerged in another room entirely.
The Royal Treasury opened around him in a single vast chamber.
Rows of open chests spilled gold coin and uncut gemstones across polished stone floors.
Diamonds, emeralds, sapphires, rubies, and rarer stones whose names he did not yet know caught the light of suspended mana crystals in every direction, throwing colored reflections across the walls and the high arched ceiling.
The scale of the wealth was immense.
’Even all my past life’s wealth combined would not come close to all of this, this is insane!’
It was meant to impress, and it succeeded even on someone like him.
Weapon racks lined the longer walls: swords of different lengths and styles, spears with formation etched shafts, axes, and more exotic implements sealed behind individual layered barriers that hummed with quiet restriction.
"Even the faint pressure releasing from these weapons... I guess they are preserved from my ancestors? The pressure gives off that ancient vibe."
The barriers felt older than the current generation of formations used in the training halls.
Shelves held skill books bound in different materials.
Some glowed faintly with residual mana that had not fully faded with time.
Others were dark and heavy with age, their covers marked with seals that had not been broken in decades.
Artifacts of every size sat on individual pedestals, each tagged with formation markers that recorded ownership, restriction level, and the last date of inspection.
The air itself tasted of concentrated wealth and old power, a dense mixture of metal, stone, and the sharp edge of active wards that had been maintained without interruption for longer than most of the people upstairs had been alive.
Alex moved through the space with wonder in his eyes.
His eyes catalogued value and usefulness, but most of all, the beauty and history these items carry with them.
Most of the gold and gemstones registered as impressive but secondary.
Liquid wealth mattered less than tools that could compound his own growth over years rather than months.
The skill books drew more attention.
"Hmm... those might be useful for me."
He walked the shelves slowly, reading residual signatures and the faint pressure each volume still carried after long storage.
Several standard techniques sat beside rarer volumes whose bindings suggested restricted circulation even inside the royal household.
Some of the darker volumes carried seals he did not recognize, older restriction marks that predated the current household formations.
One binding in particular held a circulatory method that felt rare even among the restricted texts, a technique designed to refine and cycle mana with greater efficiency than standard methods taught to ordinary disciples.
It was the kind of foundation that he thought might compound well with the Mana Heart he had already forced into existence through stubborn refusal of ordinary limits and ordinary navel placement.
"This one is the best for long term growth."
He settled on that book and lifted it cleanly from its place.
The weight was solid but manageable.
One item, it just one item and he could carry it out under his own power without strain, exactly within the limit Alessio had set and exactly the kind of things he wanted to boost his current mana technique.
The residual signature of the technique still pressed faintly against his senses even through the binding, confirming the decision felt correct.
"Let’s leave quickly, I don’t want to make dad more impatient and angry by delaying too much."
As he turned to leave, his attention caught on a pedestal set in a far corner of the chamber.
"What is that?..."
The box resting on it looked different from everything else in the vault.
The warding around it was heavier, the formations tighter, the protective presence older and more deliberate than the security applied to the open chests or the weapon racks.
It did not advertise itself with glow or size or dramatic placement near the center of the room.
It simply sat apart, as if the rest of the treasury had been arranged over the years to leave that corner undisturbed by casual inspection or by anyone who did not already know to look for it.
"Well...one more look won’t hurt anyone..."
Alex approached it quickly.
He placed one hand on the surface of the box.
Instantly something inside tried to pull at him.
"Umm..."
A searching pressure reached for affinity and identity, testing whatever stood in front of it against some internal record of permitted bloodlines or elemental signatures.
"Is this one of those affinity testing orbs? If it is then it’s a waste of my time, last time it showed no affinity, and then when I tried again it literally broke apart, all of these are just—"
But something changed, the probe was becoming more precise and old, the kind of detection that expected a clear answer and had been designed in a time when affinities were more strictly categorized.
His Aspect activated in response.
"What the fuck! Why are you activating on your own suddenly!" Even though he cursed it openly, he was already running calculations and he was thinking about what this meant.
’The reaction feels automatic, Adaptation is rising to meet the probe the same way it rises to meet any new force.’
Suddenly a text appeared across the surface of the pedestal and the box itself, sharp and formal in the same system style he had begun to recognize.
[ Detecting affinity... ]
[ Error ]
[ Error ]
[ Error ]
He felt Adaptation working against the detection, and his hand was practically glued to the surface now, he cannot even lift it.
"For the love of everything holy and unholy, PLEASE DON’T CREATE AN EXPLOSION OR DAD WILL KILL ME!"
The Aspect refused to settle into any single categorized affinity the vault’s system understood.
Shadow alone was not enough.
Pure mana was not enough.
Whatever combination of bloodline, Aspect, and forced evolution he carried did not match the expected list the formation was built to recognize.
The errors continued for a short stretch of time, the text flickering as the formation tried and failed to lock onto a known signature.
Then the text changed.
[ Full access. ]
The box opened and a sudden, dense pressure flooded outward from the interior and hit Alex directly.
"Shit—"
🌿 ─ ❦ ─ 🌿
End of Chapter 149: Full Access
🌿 ── ❦ ── 🌿