Michael followed suit, finding himself on the other side of Theresa’s Pocket Dimension. It was a dungeon. One that seemed to be many meters underground, with thick walls that separated it from the soil around it.

"I smell... death," Lazarus said.

Levi nodded, but didn’t specify anything more. He led the group forwards, finding themselves towards the end of the dungeon where there was a large creature laying on the ground.

Michael immediately had his guard up. But then, he noticed that this creature wasn’t moving at all. In fact, it had no Light mana signature, meaning that it was completely dead and decaying. And judging from the amount of Dark mana around it, this corpse had been here for a long, long, time.

Theresa snapped her fingers, and suddenly, fire erupted on the torches to the side, illuminating the entire dungeon.

Michael and Levi could finally see the creature laying on the ground.

"How magnificent!" Levi remarked. He gave no care for the obvious macabre situation and approached the corpse, using his hands to prod through decaying flesh.

Meanwhile, Michael just stood there, completely shocked.

After all, the creature he was looking at was the very same monster that had attacked New Sparta!

"I assume you recognize this, Michael," said Levi.

"How did you get it?" Michael asked. "As far as I know, all the corpses back then were completely disposed of."

With the resources in a Conglomerate, Michael had no doubt that it would be easy for them to sneak a single corpse for them to study.

But it seemed that his guess had been wrong.

"You’re right. But we didn’t get this corpse from New Sparta," said Levi. "We got it from the Chasm."

"What?!"

This was a complete shock to Michael. Wasn’t this monster commanded by the Ersatz? Did that mean that they were here in the Chasm? What did that mean for the demi-humans making their homes underground? Were they a part of Ersatz?

All of those thoughts ran into his mind. But unfortunately, it seemed that even the two Conglomerate leaders had no idea.

"This is the very reason why we haven’t been able to conquer the Chasm even now," Theresa said. "These monsters can be as strong as a Nascent Spirit cultivator. And if you venture too deep into the chasm, you may run into an entire army of them. We decided to name them Magical Monsters for now."

Things were finally making sense. Those demi-humans, although crafty and scrappy in their own right, could never repel the forces of a Conglomerate. Especially two of them.

But as it turned out, they were not the only enemy these Conglomerates were facing. They fought against monsters too!

"Do they work alongside the demi-humans?" Michael asked.

Levi and Theresa both looked at each other.

"We’ve seen no signs of the demi-humans commanding or communicating with the Magical Monsters. But everytime we corner the demi-humans, the Magical Monsters seem to coincidentally appear just in time to save them," said Levi.

"But they may not be necessarily working together," Theresa countered. "My soldiers have seen demi-humans getting crushed by the Magical Monsters sometimes.

My best guess is that the demi-humans know how to manipulate these Magical Monsters to their advantage. Maybe they lure those monsters out of their lairs, and push them to our soldiers, causing us to eliminate each other."

Levi didn’t seem to agree with Theresa’s conclusion. "They’re the demi-humans’ dogs. That’s why I wanted to attack the demi-humans in the first place. Destroy them, we destroy the coordination of those magical monsters."

"But what if they’re the only ones keeping the Magical Monsters at bay? We don’t know anything about these creatures," Theresa said.

"It’s not smart."

Lazarus’ cool words immediately abated the heating conversation between the two rivaling leaders.

"What do you mean?" Levi asked.

"This creature runs purely on instinct," Lazarus answered, prodding the decaying brain on the creature’s exposed skull. "It does not have the capacity to think for itself, that’s for sure."

The undead Mystic Master looked completely elated as he continued to study the creature.

"I’ve long wanted to get a hand on this," he said. "I wanted to find out how these creatures got so strong, and how the Ersatz were able to take control of them."

"So, can you?" Theresa asked. "If we find out more about this creature, we’ll be better prepared once we conquer the chasm."

Ever since they had discovered that these creatures lived underground, conquering the chasm became not just only a business opportunity, but also a preventative measure.

No one wanted another disaster like the one in New Sparta.

"I won’t be satisfied with just one corpse," Lazarus demanded. "I’ll need more. Ten, at the very least. And I want them to be incredibly fresh. Preferably a body that hasn’t died yet, but is on the brink of succumbing to its injuries."

And if that wasn’t enough, Lazarus sweetened the deal. "Whoever can provide me with those conditions will win the ice-petals."

This was very much an alluring offer. However, it was not as easy as Lazarus was implying.

These magical monsters were the equivalent of a Nascent Spirit cultivator’s power!

If they could defeat that many magical monsters, then they wouldn’t have asked for Lazarus’ help with the ice-petals.

That was exactly the reason why they wanted it in the first place.

"If you give me the ice-petals, I can give you more corpses. It’s not going to be as many as ten bodies, but I can promise at least one or two," Theresa said.

"Deal," Lazarus immediately said.

"Wait, I haven’t made my offer yet!" Levi complained. "My soldiers will be better equipped to fight those magical monsters. Those ice-petals will be more useful to us."

"Too late," Theresa exclaimed as Lazarus handed her the Pocket Dimension ring containing the ice-petals.

Seeing this, Levi knew that the fight was over. But that didn’t mean he lost the war. If he could kill more of those magical monsters, perhaps Lazarus would change his mind.

Meanwhile, Michael remained silent. There was just one question on his mind.

"Why did you keep it a secret?"