Nic hauled the statue of the girl into the safety of an acacia grove, his own body so covered in stone he might as well have been a statue himself. He collapsed onto soft moss and dew-stained grass with an immense sigh of relief.

It might have been hours or even a full day before his eyes opened again.

But when he did, the girl’s body had completely shattered. It lay in pieces, her eye here, her hand there. She was simply too far gone to save. He sighed.

And then a voice spoke behind him.

“What are you?”

He turned to find a perfect copy of the dead girl floating behind him. She was made of pale, ghostly energy, floating slightly above the ground. Her face was painted with tattoos, but those faded in and out of sight. By the same strange magic, she seemed to go from young to old in the blink of an eye, as if she was unstuck in time.

But she looked afraid of him.

“You know, believe it or not…” Nic said, scratching the back of his head. “Human. I’m human, or I used to be anyway.”

“You were cursed?”

“Something like that.” He explained. “Do you know that you’re…”

“Dead?” She laughed. “Hard not to notice, with my body lying all over the place. Yes, I am dead. Soon I will pass on down the River of the Night and be gone forever to lands beyond…”

Nic didn’t tell her she was wrong. In truth, once the System started using someone as a ‘piece’ in its game…

It rarely let them go again.

“I need to know about the poison the goddess was keeping. Where did it go?”

“I took it.” She answered simply. “The master of the Hall of Night denied my people water, cursed them to die in agony. I thought he should die as well. But I was foolish; my protections were not as strong as I thought. The herb burned its way into me and destroyed me as it did my poor goddess.”

Nic sighed. It was gone…

“Do not be so glum. It is still within. Look among my remains.”

Nic turned and looked. It felt macabre, with her watching over him, but he dipped his hands into the shattered stone of the girl’s body and searched. His fingers closed around something smooth and deathly cold. Lifting it up, he saw it was her heart…

Petrified to a dark glass, in which a single thread of unearthly blue light resided.

“All the potency of the deadly medicine resides there. And I will tell you the recipe with which to make it a god-killing poison…”

She leaned in and whispered into his ear. Before she pulled away, the ghost kissed him, pressing her lips to his cheek once. “Thank you for saving me. It was a kind thing to do…”

“I only…” Nic tried to deflect.

“It was a kind thing, regardless of your reasons. Good and evil do not care about reasons, you must know by now. They only care about what is done.”

You have discovered

Lore Fragment of the Scales of Sand

200 Essence Awarded

Together, four Lore Fragments combine to seal the powers of the Guardian ‘High Priest of the Red Land’

With a faint smile, the girl faded into nothing.

Leaving Nic holding her heart in his hands.

---

Nic departed the forest shortly after, having looted the second grove for medicinal plants and made a small burial mound for the girl’s stone remains. It seemed the least he could do.

Sadly, there was less he could manage for the overall situation. Now that the acacias were being destroyed by the Aleph runes, it seemed the rot of the petrified forest would continue spread, steadily escaping its prison. Maybe if he’d been able to completely destroy the goddess rather than petrifying her, the corruption would have been stopped…

But that wasn’t in the cards.

Nic lifted up a platform of sand and sailed away, leaving the stone forest behind.

One down. Two to go.

---

Long ago, Nic had collected a stone liver from the matriarch of the sand devils. It was one of four such organs, held by the four guardians, that had been taken from the last pharaoh of this kingdom.

Thanks to the Lore Fragments he’d assembled, Nic had a good guess of where one of the Guardians was hiding. The Priest had fled through a past the wall ringing the desert’s southern reach, and the sphinx had been created to seal him from returning. On his map, there was a breach in the wall that lined up perfectly with the sphinx’s gaze…

As for the remaining two?

Nic had collected the Lore related to the Chimeric Soul Drinker while exploring the valley of the dead, but never encountered any such beast. What he had met was an old, old giant, who claimed to have eaten a god.

That sounded awfully like he’d consumed one of the organs.

That left two locations for the last Guardian to be hiding.

But the sun was coming up fast, and Nic didn’t want to be caught traveling the desert by day. He sailed towards the oasis, descending into the small valley that sheltered the clear water. Here, he could cultivate in peace. He could put down his burdens.

He could rest.

Diving into the clear and sparkling water, Nic allowed himself to float in utter relaxation as he called up his cultivation map.

Essence 24,126 / 27,046

+ 25.696 per Minute

(3.212 Base)

300% Local Modifier

+ 100% Dominion

+ Devoured an E-Class enemy (200%)

+ Consumed a F-Class treasure (100%)

+ Rested in toxic environment (300%)

Demonic Essence &%##!~

Titles -

Witness of the New Dao

---

Bloodline Progenitor

(You are the first of your kind. All costs related to innate abilities are halved. Title is lost if you lose your current form without furthering the bloodline.)

Ferocious Beast

(Rewards 18,500 First Wave Credits to your killer. Increase bounty by 500 with each Native you kill. Each dawn, gain credits equal to one tenth of your bounty.)

Sage-Artisan

(The Hand of Ash technique is recognized as your creation, and all costs related to it are halved.)

Cultivation Base (Unranked)

XII Physical Strength (Completed)

III Mental Acuity (854/8,000)*

III Spiritual Clarity (4,919/8,000)*

III Gift of Life (904/12,500)

III Mistwater Step (742/12,500)

The Old Speech (0/50,000)

Primordial Mist Shard (E)

Creates a mist that contains the weight of the ages, stealing life and weakening those who survive. An almost truly unique Shard, with few if any defenses existing to its power.

III Increase Toxicity (334/8,000)

Add Aura Efficiency (0/5,000)

I Secondary Slot (0/100,000)

Poison Devouring (Complete)

Mist Armor (0/50,000)

Petrified Warriors (0/200,000)

Jewel of Ages (0/500,000)

Mire-Caller (F)

Calls to and creates binding masses of mud, sludge, or tar. A powerful Shard for binding and controlling that requires work and imagination to master.

II Base Enhancement (414/2,000)

Add Aura Efficiency (0/1,000)

I Secondary Slot (0/50,000)

Mire-Drowned Remnants (0/50,000)

Futile Struggle (10,53/50,000)

Mire-Dweller (Complete)

Clay Idols (0/50,000)

Totemic Hieroglyphs (E)

Creates tools of bone, rock, and leather that contain nascent divinities, able to grow and rise towards the heavens as they serve you. A high-quality magical shard.

VIII Base Enhancement (114/4,500)

I Add Essence Efficiency (346/2,000)*

II Additional Secondary Slot (0/100,000)

Summoning Limit (0/50,000)

Spirits of the Earth (Complete)

Shard-Crafting (0/100,000)

Speaker of the Lost (0/10,000)

Tributes for the Divine (0/100,000)

Techniques (22% Capacity)

Eight-Eyed Mantle (1,914/12,200)

Inner Sacrifice Cauldron Technique (514/6,600)

III Hand of Ash (318/3,100)

His plan had been to push more into Futile Struggle, enhancing Mire-Caller further. Now that he was in the desert, however, that seemed unlikely to pay off in any short term way. There simply wasn’t enough water, much less mud, to manipulate in order to bind his foes.

No…

Nic had a bigger concern.

He had used Primordial Mist, and it had done nothing. Likely, it was because the miasma in the petrified forest was inherently similar to his Primordial Mist, and so the goddess had resistance…

But it had been totally shrugged off by a D-Class enemy.

Nic intended to fight more D-Classes in the future, even before rising to the rank himself. It was simply too profitable to battle foes above one’s own grade.

But he needed his main killing tool to hold up to the enemy’s growing resilience.

Without hesitation, Nic allocated all his Essence towards ranking up the ability three times. Once in Aura Efficiency, to counteract its heavy cost. Twice in Increase Toxicity, to bring it to the fifth ranking.

And because he’d completed a large milestone of five ranks, Nic knew what was coming next.

His mind began to be drawn into an illusion of cultivation, the System guiding him into a dream-state where he could witness past masters of the Shard….