Road to Mastery: A LitRPG Apocalypse
Chapter 124: Trial Planet

Stars flew by Jack. There were hundreds of them, thousands. He saw galaxies swirling in the distance, their spires barely discernible even with his new senses. He saw something flashing periodically in the distance, and he saw a column of light stretching up and down from the center of a far-off galaxy.

They traveled through the Milky Way galaxy. There were blue, yellow, and red stars. Some large, and some so titanic that his mind couldn’t comprehend their scale. They crossed a dust cloud so immense that it made even those astral giants seem like fish to an ocean.

Their speed was unnatural. They floated through space not at the speed of light, but the speed of thought, untouched by anything. The fabric of space itself was their vehicle.

Jack lost track of time, but it couldn’t have been more than a few hours.

When the world stabilized, Jack found himself on a moon. He stood on a large teleportation platform, like the one he’d departed from, except his surroundings were mostly empty.

Before anything else, he fell to his knees and violently emptied his stomach. Next to him, Gan Salin did the same. Brock seemed unaffected. The vomit disintegrated as it touched the platform. Only after a good minute did Jack look up.

A dome of glass surrounded them like an Inuit’s igloo, about a hundred feet in height and another hundred in diameter. Outside its walls, he could see gray dirt lined with craters. There was no sky; space was directly observable from here, like the pictures Jack had seen of Earth’s moon.

Perhaps I could go to the moon now, he thought, before realizing he was much farther than any Earth-387 human had ever been in the entire history of their planet. He was a pioneer.

In the horizon, a large sphere rose over the moon they stood on. It did not look like Earth. Jack didn’t know what he expected, but it was certainly not this. This planet looked…dead.

“Step off the teleporter,” a commanding voice reached their ears, cutting off Jack’s train of thought. He looked around, then followed the command to step away. The person who had called out to them was a human of Earth-199, dressed in a silver uniform with the Hand of God’s emblem at the front—an open palm facing the observer, with an open eye in the center.

He was at the D-Grade, as were the other two guards flanking him: one ant-like humanoid—an antfolk—and one that looked like a djinn but was even smaller in size, barely reaching Jack’s waist. This last one was also floating on a tiny cloud. Its species was apparently called vonanan.

“Are you expecting more people?” the human guard asked. Gan Salin shook his head.

“Nope. Just us.”

“Good.” He took out two pieces of paper. “Name, affiliation, and Dao, please.”

“Gan Salin, Animal Kingdom, Dao of Insanity,” Gan Salin replied. “And my friend here is Jack Rust, Bare Fist Brotherhood of the Animal Kingdom constellation, Dao of the Fist.”

Jack glared at him. Salin leaned in, whispering, “Don’t worry. The Hand of God doesn’t care about the B-Grade faction grudges.”

“You told them my Dao.” That was personal information.

“We have to tell them,” Salin replied, shrugging. “Everybody does it. And lying to the Hand of God is a terrible idea.”

Jack grumbled. “Speak for me like this again, and we go separate ways. Understood?”

Gan Salin smiled. “Perfectly so.”

“And the brorilla?” the guard asked. Gan Salin didn’t reply, shooting Jack a glance.

“He’s my spiritual companion,” Jack replied.

“Okay.” The guard scribbled down some things. “Does he have a name and Dao?”

Jack hesitated for a moment. He glanced at Brock, who frowned but nodded. “Brock,” Jack replied honestly. “Dao of Muscles.”

The guard nodded, still writing down stuff. Unless he was describing their physical appearance in text, Jack had no idea how an immortal could be this slow at transcribing.

“All done,” the guard finally said. “You may proceed.”

Another guard stepped forth—the antfolk. “Follow me, please,” it asked them in an odd voice, like it came through a series of long pipes. Jack, Brock, and Gan Salin followed it to the side, where three sleek, dark starships awaited. They were shaped as needles—as were most of them—but these were more elongated, giving Jack an impression of great speed.

Seeing the starships reminded him of Captain Dordok and the crew of the Trampling Ram. He hoped they were okay. They had saved his life.

He wouldn't forget that.

The antfolk reached the first starship, and its door slid open by itself. “After you,” it said. Jack, Brock, and Gan Salin entered a cramped space with two line of seats facing each other. It could fit ten people in total, which gave them some space to move. The antfolk walked to the front, placed its ant-like hand on a glowing blue helm, and the starship slowly rose off the ground. It passed through the entrance of the building—a tunnel-like space covered by transparent, protective film on both ends—and sped towards the dead planet.

“Is that Trial Planet?” Jack couldn’t help but ask. “It looks…”

“Destroyed?” Gan Salin said.

“Yeah.”

“It is. Well, its surface. I hear that the inside is pretty colorful.” The canine shuffled in his seat. Everybody got only one chance to visit Trial Planet, and unlike Jack, Gan Salin had been waiting for it his whole life. He was beyond excited. His explanation poured out. “Trial Planet is made up of nine rings—hence its other name, the Hollow Planet. Imagine nine hollow planets of increasing size that encapsulate each other.”

Jack raised both brows. “Are you telling me that planet has more planets inside it? Like a babushka?”

“I don’t know what that is, but yes. And they are all hollow. It’s like nine worlds nested in each other. The nine rings. As you descend into deeper rings, the danger rises exponentially, but so do the rewards. Trial Planet is filled with all sorts of opportunities, from natural treasures to Dao inheritances.”

Jack drew a sharp breath. From a physics standpoint, this nested planet thing shouldn’t be possible…but then again, after everything he had experienced, he was beginning to suspect that the physics he knew were a tad incomplete.

Even Brock leaned in, listening to the description with rapt attention. The antfolk didn’t seem to care about their discussion.

“What you see now,” Gan Salin continued, pointing at the approaching planet’s surface, “is actually the first ring. But not really. Research shows that there used to cities and civilizations there, but now, it’s just an empty, ravaged hellscape.”

“Are you saying someone destroyed that ring? Who would do such a thing? And why?”

“Nobody knows!” Salin shrugged. “Trial Planet actually precedes our galaxy. When the System arrived a million years ago, this planet came with it, and it already looked like this. There has been much research, of course. The most prevalent theory is that this planet used to belong to the Ancients, the fabled race that created the System, but that its surface was ravaged during the crusade against the Old Ones.”

Jack listened intently.

“But that doesn’t matter, at least not to us,” Salin concluded. “Nobody is allowed on the surface anymore. We will start our delve in specific entrance points that lead directly to the second ring. The first is out of order.”

“But the rest of the rings are still okay? They aren’t destroyed like this surface world?”

“Exactly. Trial Planet is protected by the System itself. Anyone above the E-Grade cannot descend below the surface. Perhaps this is why the lower rings were spared.”

“Hmm. What can you tell me about those rings? What do they look like?”

“They are all unique! The second ring, for example, is the Giant Ring—though I won’t spoil any surprises by telling you why. The point of that ring—like most of them—is just to find an exit heading to the next. They are under large, monster-infested landmarks and oddities, so if you see one, head directly there and get to searching. There are very few rewards on the upper rings, so just try to get through them as fast as possible. That’s what everyone does.

“The third ring—the Barbarian Ring—is similar, though its environment is more hostile, and the monsters stronger. At the fourth ring, the Village Ring, just try to find the village. Things get more complicated deeper down…but you don’t need to worry about that for now. Besides, we’ll meet again in the village of the fourth ring, so we can talk about it then.”

“Meet again?”

“Oh. I didn’t mention we would be separated, did I?”

“No. No, you didn’t.”

“Well, people obviously come here in teams, but the Hand of God doesn’t want weaklings to delve far just because of their connections. Everyone is scattered before they enter the second ring. The fourth ring is small enough and open enough that teams can reconvene, though. With your strength, you should be able to make it there. Me too, I hope. Unless I’m unlucky. Then, I’ll just die.” He laughed.

Jack looked at Brock with worry.

“Oh, don’t worry. Spiritual companions aren’t split,” Gan Salin hurried to add. “You and little Brock will be just fine.”

Brock punched his shoulder.

“Big Brock, I meant big Brock,” Salin corrected himself, laughing.

“So Trial Planet is only for combat classes?” Jack asked.

“Well… Partly. Non-combat classes can also delve, and they often do, but they have to go through the trouble of reconvening with their teammates at the second ring—which can take months. For us, it’s better to just go solo until the fourth ring.”

“I see…”

Jack looked outside the window. They had reached the planet by now and were sailing over its surface. The ground below was ravaged. There were razor-sharp ravines kilometers in length, like they’d been slashed open by swords. There were craters the size of cities, one of which was shaped exactly like a palm print.

Jack even saw areas covered in multicolored mist, as well as ruins where the shadows seemed to flicker wrong.

Who could have done all this? he couldn’t help but wonder.

“So, that’s the plan,” Gan Salin repeated, drawing Jack’s attention. “We meet at the fourth ring’s village. If one of us hasn’t made it there in two months…the other just keeps going. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“And by the way, if you see anything resembling a trial ground, go for it!”

“What? What do trial grounds look like?”

“You’ll know it when you see it.”

Jack rolled his eyes. The starship slowed down. Suddenly, he noticed a massive hole dug into the earth under them. It was circular, with a diameter of a few hundred feet, and seemed to stretch down endlessly. It was like a deep dark maw carved into the earth—or just a really large and deep well.

The starship touched down on the land right next to the hole. “Jack Rust and Brock, please descend,” the antfolk said. Jack and Brock stood up.

“Gan Salin,” Jack said, throwing the canine a complex gaze. “I have no idea what you’re thinking, but you saved me. I appreciate that. We are no longer enemies.”

“Of course not. We’re friends!”

“I don’t know about that yet, but not enemies. Probably.” Jack hesitated for a moment, then smiled. “Be careful down there.”

“Same to you!” Gan Salin flashed back his own smile. Jack caught the antfolk’s gaze and decided not to delay any longer. He and Brock walked away. The moment they stepped onto the ground, the door behind them slid closed, and the starship took off. Gan Salin kept waving from the little window until he disappeared in the distance.

Jack looked at the sky for a moment. It was red and hazy. The air was stingy, like he was breathing through a lemon. His eyes were watering. “So, this is Trial Planet,” he said. “What do you think, bro?”

Brock gave him a thumbs-up and a monkey grin. Jack grinned back. “That’s what I thought. Let’s go! For Earth! For us!”

The hole behind them resembled a gate to hell. They found stairs swirling its edge and climbed down, one man and one brorilla.

They didn’t even have a backpack.