Alex looked at the 6 peaks in his vision with a massive smile on his face. 3 of those peaks were fully covered in snow, while the other 3 were only half covered from the base. One of them even had orange light glowing at the top for some reason.
The entire land in between was covered in snow and ice, that reflected the moon's light and shone everything bright at night.
When Alex saw the 6 different peaks, he understood, that he had made it. He didn't know where he was in the Icy Hell, but wherever he was, he had made it, and he had found the location on the map, finally.
That was until he took a single step forward and realized he was inside another peak too, bringing the total number up by 1.
There were 7 peaks in this secret realm, and thus, this was not the location Alex had been looking for.
"No, but it… it's snowing. It should match. What the hell?" he couldn't help but cry out. He had been so close, and yet, he failed once again.
He quickly brought out the map and checked it out. He flipped the image of the map in his head and looked at it.
He tried to superimpose the image of the peaks in front of him, to the map on the talisman, and after a few seconds managed to do it perfectly.
The one that he had been standing on was on the left side of the map length-wise.
Then came the peak that was fully covered in snow slightly to his left in the distance.
The third mountain without half the snow on its peak was on his right, further than the second mountain.
The fourth mountain was even further in the distance, seen through the 2nd and 3rd mountains. This was the mountain that was glowing orange at the top.
This was also the mountain that was marked on the map as the one that held the secrets and inheritance the Undying God left behind.
The other two mountains were behind that mountain further away than it.
"If that's the case… then what's that mountain?"
Alex turned his head in the direction of a smaller mountain that was a little to the right of the 2nd mountain, perhaps a little further away.
It was more of a hill than a mountain, but Alex supposed it was large enough to be called a mountain.
"Whatever, I need to go get that inheritance," he thought and flew over the 2nd mountain that was to his left. Since it was on the way, he wanted to check if there were anything inside here.
Alex landed on the mountain and realized that it was empty. He didn't even have to go inside to check. Simply sending his spiritual sense inside was enough to tell him it was empty.
Still, Alex wanted to be a hundred percent sure that he was right, and he was a hundred percent disappointed when he realized he was.
Alex flew over to the small hill and landed on top of it. He sent his spiritual sense onto the mountain and realized his spiritual sense couldn't enter it.
In fact, it couldn't even tell what Alex was looking at.
Alex turned around to the opening of the hallway he had just come from where the ice that blocked his spiritual sense was and wondered if this was a mound of ice similar to that.
It did make sense if both were not letting spiritual sense enter.
Alex shook his head and flew off to the 3rd mountain, which, just like his expectations of it, was empty as well.
Finally, Alex flew off to the fourth mountain, the one that glowed orange at the top.
This was where the map said it was keeping the inheritance. However, to Alex's dismay, this place too looked like it was already raided.
Still, around halfway up the mountain, Alex found an opening in the upper half of the mountain that wasn't in snow and entered.
He walked through the empty hallway and was a little surprised at how warm it was here.
'Is some script active to make the walls warm?' he wondered. He continued walking and arrived at an empty dome room with nothing in it.
Well, calling the room empty exactly wasn't right. There were things in these rooms, and Alex's eyes widened when he saw them.
"Text?" he immediately ran to the walls and started reading what was written there.
"Demon Eyes?" Alex realized that the walls were explaining techniques to improve one's eyes and how one could continue improving them.
The technique had 4 stages, each that could only be learned by continuously training the technique that was written here.
As Alex slowly read what each stage of the eyes could do, he couldn't believe it at all.
The first stage was understandable, and the second was believable too. However, the third and fourth were complete nonsense in Alex's eyes.
However, It didn't look like there was any need to call it fake at all. After all, before one could learn it all, the person needed to… cleanse their eyes with some paste.
"Cleanse my eyes with THE paste? What's THE paste?" he looked around to the rest of the wall, but none of the four walls had any description of the paste.
"How do I make the paste?" Alex looked around, trying to find any sort of writing, anywhere. As he looked around, he saw something at the center of the room.
Having seen the texts on the wall as soon as he came in, his attention had been driven towards them.
Finally, now that his attention was anywhere other than the walls, he noticed the small, circular indentations on the ground.
Small, circular, and just right to fit the medallion.
Alex quickly tore off the medallion he was wearing and pulled it off of the thread it was on. Then, he placed it on the floor in the center.
As soon as the medallion was placed, the mountain shuddered.
Alex looked around in fear, and as he did, he saw a person standing behind him.
"Ahh!" he shouted and backed away as the Saint-ranked whip appeared in his hands. However, before he attacked, he stopped and looked at the man that was in front of him.
The middle-aged man with dark robes and white hair had shining purple eyes and a pair of horns on his head.
This man was a demon. And his body was illusory.
'A soul perhaps?' Alex thought and waited for a few seconds.
"If you found the medallion and brought it here, then I can assume that I have died," the illusory demon said.
'Dead?' Alex thought for a second and finally understood who this man was. 'The undying god?'
"I suppose you know what you are here for, but in case you do not, you are here to inherit the timeless physique passed along throughout generations whose inheritors come to be known as the Undying God."
"If I, the Eighth Undying God have died, then you shall inherit this physique and carry along what has been passed down since the beginning of time itself."
"And then, you shall be the Ninth Undying God."
