Samantha voiced the only words that came to her mind, “Why did you do it?”

The Rat King spat blood at her feet and laughed bitterly, “You’re going to need to be more specific.”

Before she fully processed her actions, her hand was already wrapped around his throat. She roughly dragged him over to the place where Aiden’s body lay, only releasing him once his face started reddening from lack of air. Forcing him down to his knees once more, she harshly repeated, “Why. Did. You. Do. It?”.

The Rat King coughed and wheezed as Samantha freed him and he was able to breathe again. He rubbed his neck gingerly as he looked over the corpse with dispassion. Eventually, he shifted his gaze back up to her and shrugged, “To set an example.”

Samantha backhanded him with such force that a spray of blood splashed across the floor and nearby wall.

*Ding* Damage to right hand has activated “As One”. Minor Wounds for Samantha have been negated.

He caught himself on the ground with his unbroken arm and spluttered as he recovered from the blow. With animosity dripping from each word, he scoffed, “I don’t know what you want me to say. You want the details of how I killed him? You want me to be sorry? To regret what I’ve done?”. He grimaced as he slowly moved back into a kneeling position, then looked up at her with a snarl. When she didn’t immediately respond to his questioning, he continued, “Because if repentance is what you’re looking for, you’re going to be sorely disappointed.”

Samantha felt an ugly urge bubble to the surface, but suppressed it with a deep breath. She spoke slowly and with deliberate calmness, as if explaining something to a child, “What I want... is for you to explain why. Why were you stealing Green’s deliveries? Why did you think kidnapping the courier would get you the package? Why did you kill Aiden when he was supposed to be your hostage, and so far before the deadline? Answer.”

He stared defiantly up at her without speaking for several long moments. And, with each passing second of noncompliance, Samantha lost the fragile hold she had on her temper until it slipped her grasp completely. She ruthlessly kicked him down to the ground and stomped her foot firmly onto his shoulder, pinning him flat. She then gripped the shaft of her spear--still lodged in his back--and twisted.

He screamed in agony as the spearhead tore flesh apart and drilled even deeper into his chest, but the sound brought no relief from the cold void within her. His cries only deepened her frustration, and she didn’t stop her assault until the wretched man hoarsley shrieked, “Whisper! It was Whisper!”.

All of his previous bravado had fled him.

The Rat King lay sweating and quivering in a pool of his own blood. When he was able to compose himself enough to speak, the words came out shakily, “I was paid a lot of money to disrupt as many deliveries to Green as possible. Whisper didn’t give me any other details, I swear! He paid for discretion, so I didn’t ask questions. The boy was… he was a nuisance. He evaded my men each time he was hired, and Whisper was starting to get angry we weren’t holding up our end of the bargain. He warned that if we didn’t completely intercept this next delivery there would be grave consequences.”

I thought sending a cultivator with the usual group would be enough, but, unfortunately, you were there. The boy was caught, but he only had part of the delivery, so... my people improvised. Idiots. What good does a hostage courier do for me? No one in their right mind would make such a trade for some hired hand--some urchin with no notable ties. I thought I might as well use his life to send a message to anyone else who thought to get in our way in the future. Though, killing the boy would not stave off Whisper’s wrath...”

Samantha inadvertently tightened her grip on her spear shaft, and the small movement made the Rat King groan and shudder in fresh pain. She wondered what kind of backing the old man possessed to make a High Copper cultivator behave in such a way. She had a feeling before that Whisper wasn’t exactly as he appeared, but this seemed a little unbelievable. It was always possible that the Rat King was lying to her as well, but there wasn’t really any way to tell in this situation.

She felt that she had heard everything she needed to--or at least couldn’t stand listening to him anymore--so she pulled the spear from the man’s back with a squelch and took aim at the exposed nape of his neck.

“W-wait! You can’t kill me. You’ll be banished to the next floor!” he pleaded, and his tear-filled eyes widened in fear as he watched the point of her weapon hovering over him like an executioner’s blade.

“How would anyone even know? Your cultivator ‘minion’ said himself that things work differently here in the slums.” Samantha accused, the muscles in her arms tightening.

“Why do you think me, a High Copper, is living out his days in this disgusting place? I haven’t been aboveground in years because I was marked as ‘ready’ to be sent to the next level of the spire after killing a fellow cultivator!” he elaborated, “I’ve learned a lot in my time working with the Black Market! I know answers to questions you haven’t even thought to ask. Where do notifications come from? Why do we get quests? If you let me live I’ll tell you everything.”

Samantha barked out a rough laugh, “You think you’re the first person to ask those questions and claim to have answers? Have you learned more here in your sewers than dedicated scholars have in decades of diligent study? You’re just grasping at whatever straws you can to extend your life. No deal.”

“But have those sheltered scholars ever unlocked a hidden core quest and then failed it, resulting in being locked out from greater system functions for the rest of their lives?” he countered.

She didn’t have an appropriate response for that.

Seeing her hesitation, the Rat King breathed out a shaky sigh and the smallest of smirks made the corner of his mouth curl. He decided to press on into the silence, taking her lack of response as a sign that she was considering his offer.

“I understand that the boy was under your protection, and I have offended your honor with this entire debacle. But, as you can clearly see,” he began, gesturing to the surrounding area as best as he could from his position under her foot, “You have killed many of my mortal wards as well--”

Samantha scowled at his words, “Don’t think that the lives of these thugs were even worth a fraction of what Aiden was. Even your own vile life will not be enough to repay this debt.”

Seeing that the conversation was quickly souring, he recanted, “Ah, of course... if you feel there is still a debt between us then I am in no position to disagree. What if I throw in double the standard blood price for a mortal in addition to the information? Does 2 gold sound fair? It’s far more than he would have earned during his lifetime with his societal standing.”

Samantha’s face flushed with rage as she stared unflinchingly into his eyes. Seeing murder in her gaze, he made a new offer, “Oh! Forgive me… I misspoke. Double the blood price of course is 5 gold pieces. Is that more appropriate?”

She completely lost control of her killing intent at this point, her Mid-Copper Aura flaring and fluctuating wildly in the enclosed space. Shrill screaming filled the tunnel as her spiritual pressure did, and she thought at first that Jacob was being adversely affected by her energy. But, when she shifted her focus towards the sound, she instead saw Jacob bringing his curved blade down on the defensively raised arm of a Pack Rat gang member.

A small voice inside her shouted that she should care, that she should interrupt Jacob’s cold-blooded execution, but the voice was much, much, too quiet. She felt detached from the macabre scene as the sword caused fresh rivers of red to be spilled and the shrieks were abruptly silenced.

As Jacob moved to check another fallen foe, Samantha turned her attention back to the cultivator pinned beneath her foot.

Frustrated by her general lack of response to his newest proposal, the man protested, “I don’t understand, is 5 gold, the deaths of my men, and rare information still not enough to repay the blood price? What will it take to satisfy you? He wasn’t even a cultivat--”

With each ignorant word out of this man’s mouth Samantha’s vision became narrower and narrower, all sounds being overshadowed by the rapid pounding of her heart. Before she realized what she had done, her spear swept down in a low, vicious arc.

As she watched the former Rat King’s head roll across the waterway tunnel, an expression of shock immortalized on his face, she felt her knees go weak. Jacob had made his way over to Aiden’s body now, and he cradled the small corpse in his arms as he lifted his face to the sky and wailed. The sound of mourning cut her to the bone, her already unstable psyche threatening to implode on itself. She felt like she would go mad with anger and grief.

For all her efforts and good intentions, she had failed.

*Ding* Hidden Core Quest: Cull the Weak

Just as cream rises to the top, so too must the worthy cultivator ascend the tower. You have killed a cultivator of equal or greater rank in solo combat, unlocking access to the 2nd floor. Enter the obelisk and present your mark within one month to begin your climb.

Quest cannot be denied.

Samantha read the message with no small amount of confusion and dread, “...mark? ...obelisk?”

A sudden tingling sensation spread across her stomach and settled around her navel. She tried unsuccessfully to rub at the spot through her armor until the tickle became an irritating itch, then a burning sensation that made her feel like she was being branded by hot iron. She cried out in pain, dropping her spear as she cradled her stomach with both arms and waited for the suffering to pass. Blessedly, as rapidly as it had appeared, the feeling dissipated into nothing.

This was the last straw that pushed her past the breaking point. All she could do was kneel there on the ground--in an ever expanding pool of her enemy’s blood--and weep as every worst case scenario she could imagine flitted through her thoughts at an alarming rate.

I need to leave the floor in the next month? Was this the quest the Rat King failed too? Does this mean if I fail it I’ll lose system functionality? What does that even mean? What about my family? I don’t want to leave them behind. Am I going to die if I go to the second floor? Am I going to be killed if I stay? What should I do?

In a last ditch effort to control herself and reign in her aura, she attempted to cultivate. It wouldn’t do much for her other than give her something to focus on, but she hoped that forcing herself to have a structured qi circulation and breathing pattern would calm her frayed nerves.

Taking the lotus position, she performed the Vital Wellspring Cultivation Technique to the best of her ability. The funneling of energy from the external environment into her dantian was unstable and shaky at first, causing small gusts of wind or crackling in the air where her imperfect form caused qi streams to cross or collide. However, to her great surprise, it felt easier to draw in qi than she had ever experienced before, despite the inner turmoil and the poor qi density inside the city. Before long, the qi flows around her began to smooth themselves out, and so too did her inner emotional state begin to settle down.

She drank in the crisp, cool energy like someone dying of thirst. No amount was enough to satiate her desperate need, and she soon lost herself in the vortex of power as thoroughly as she had lost herself in despair.

Time ceased to have meaning as she drowned herself in qi, and she had no desire to surface from its depths. The energy filled her with tranquility and peace, washing away her previous anguish like footprints in sand. For a while, she relished the nothingness that she felt… but that was brought to an end as an uncomfortable pressure began to build in her center.

Samantha didn’t pay it much mind at first, becoming irritated at having her serenity broken by the feeling. She tried to get that sense of harmony back by willing the bloated feeling inside her to compress tighter and tighter as she continued to absorb the intoxicating power. Sadly, it seemed like she was reaching some sort of limit to what she could absorb. Frustrated by her comfort being stolen away, she fought harder to take in more, and more, and more… until...

Samantha fell through a vast canopy of leaves. Each branch she descended past kissed her bare skin with silken softness, more gentle and welcoming than the finest bed linens. She landed on a tree limb so high above the earth that the ground was invisible beneath her, and a shower of rainbow-colored foliage drifted down through the air like snow. Sunlight dappled her pale skin, and a summer breeze brushed past her ears while whispering ancient secrets. She strained to hear them all, but the cacophony unsettled her deeply when she focused too intently on the wind.

“This way,” Silas urged her from somewhere across the forest, “hurry.”

Samantha was confused and disoriented, so she didn’t immediately heed his words. She wondered where she was, and looked around curiously.

Another breeze moved past her, much colder and harsher than the last. The biting chill and foul odor it carried made her wrinkle her nose, and when she looked in the direction it came from she saw that the forest was rapidly wilting. Sticky strings of destiny stretched out their tendrils and grasped hold of nearby branches, corrupting the wood and causing a festering rot.

Withered leaves began to plummet to the earth in droves, and she recoiled in horror as one touched her. Countless eons of hubris. Gods and their scions striking down monstrosities. Cleansing light and contaminating darkness clashing like fireworks in the heavens. Madness.

“Hurry.” Silas repeated, his voice seeming farther away than before.

She ran.

She crossed the maze of overlapping branches with expert coordination, narrowly dodging areas where the webs touched. She closed her spirit to the falling debris, fighting back insanity as the decaying leaves surrounded her like a cage. She was too slow. The branches beneath her feet began to crumble as she leapt from them, and it was only a matter of time until she fell into the swirling inky blackness below.

A light shone dimly up ahead, and she knew instinctively that it was the spirit of her trusty companion. With a goal in sight, she redoubled her efforts to reach him, pushing through the nauseating feeling of being stretched into infinity.

A hole opened up in the path before her, a yawning abyss separating her from safety. “Jump!” Silas commanded, and the white light radiating from his form became blinding.

Trusting in her bond, she obeyed. She threw herself across the gap with every ounce of her will and his light embraced her. Her third eye snapped shut as her real eyes opened.

Samantha sat up with a gasp, sweat and filth soaking her form. The gasp was a mistake, she soon found, as it reeked of death all around her. Stifling an involuntary gag, she looked down to her lap and saw Silas curled there. He looked up at her with some concern and asked, “Are you alright now? I could feel you were hurting before… but I couldn’t talk to you for some reason.”

Emotionally, she felt raw. She mourned at the death of young Aiden, she felt disbelief that she had purposefully killed another cultivator while he was defenseless, and she felt guilt at how everything had turned out. Despite all that, she was back in control of herself. As much as she desperately wanted to indulge in some wallowing, she didn’t have the luxury of time to do so. Not with the core quest’s time limit hanging over her.

“I’m not doing well, but I’ll live. I’ll take care of a few things and then we’ll get out of here.” Samantha eventually responded, peeling herself off of the floor and taking stock of her surroundings.

The Rat King’s corpse was positively mummified, looking like a piece of dried jerky. She jumped back, fearing that she had been stuck here for months, but the other relatively-fresh corpses nearby told a different story. Jacob was nowhere to be found, and neither was Aiden’s body, but there was a small pouch with a paper tied around it near where she had been sitting. It definitely was a new addition to the area, as it was completely clean even though it sat atop a browning blood stain.

Setting Silas down, she picked up the unexpectedly hefty pouch and unwrapped the drawstring. It was filled with coppers, silvers, and gold, too many coins to accurately count at a glance.

The formal looking note read: “Esteemed Practitioner Samantha, I humbly beg your forgiveness. Though it shames me to admit it, I confess I’ve written this note to you after having abandoned you in the waterways for two days. After the battle, I spent some time burying Aiden and mourning, and could not bear to return to the site where he perished. Only after gathering my courage did I return, but I could not approach you, nor did you hear me when I called out. Your bond became most fearsome whenever I neared, and your aura was too oppressive for me to stay in your presence for long.

I have collected all the coin off the fallen Pack Rats that I could find and placed them in this bag as payment for your efforts. I know it is far below the usual hiring costs for one of your standing, but I hope you will not be offended by my offering. I will continue checking on you as the days pass, as I feel it is the least I can do. -Jacob”

Samantha placed the note into the coin purse and resealed it, tying it to her hip. Another note nearby caught her eye, this one tied around a fist-sized stone. This message was much shorter than the last.

It read: “Esteemed Practitioner Samantha, this is the second time I’ve visited to check on you, and the third day since our fight with the Pack Rats. Your bond still will not let me come closer, and you still do not react as I call your name. I will visit you again tomorrow. -Jacob”

Samantha looked down at Silas as she finished reading, “Thanks for watching over me. I’m sorry I left you alone like that.”

She reached to pat his head in gratitude... and drew her brows together in concern as soon as she did. In between Silas’s eyes and ears on both sides of his head, the normally soft fur was interrupted by two hard, flat disks. Noticing this, she realized that there were more changes her bond had gone through in her ‘absence’ as well. He was larger than she remembered, his feet were longer, his front and rear claws were sharper and more prominent, and his incisors had elongated.

Soaking in her attention and praise, Silas proudly puffed out his chest and strutted in a small circle, “Yes, I am great! You like what you see? I have gone up a rank and evolved!”

Samantha immediately checked over her notifications--many having been ignored or suppressed during her fight and subsequent withdrawal--and stared in shock.

*Ding* Congratulations, you have slain a higher ranked cultivator!

Spire qi collection has been suspended. You have been granted first access to cultivate their refined energy as a reward for your victory. Temporary purified nexus will dissipate in one week if not absorbed, if you go further than 15 feet from the source after beginning cultivation, or once all qi has been processed.

*Ding* Congratulations, your Spirit Bond has increased in rank (Rank 4 Low -> Rank 4 Mid)

Silas has received +1 to Agility and +1 to Endurance. You have received +1 Bond Ability Point.

*Ding* Congratulations, your Spirit Bond has evolved (Lunar Hare -> Lunar Jackalope)

Silas has received +1 to all stats. Silas has received new skills. You have received +1 Bond Ability Point.

You have gained access to a new Bond Ability:

Flurry – By spending 2 qi points per second, your kick speed will be doubled and kick damage will be increased by half. [Cost: 1 Bond Ability Point].

*Ding* Congratulations, you’ve broken through to High Copper!

You’ve broken through from Mid to High Copper in less than a month, a feat that distinguishes you as a true elite amongst your peers. Be warned of rising too high too quickly, however. Cultivation alone is not enough, and neglecting diligent training of your body can have adverse effects.

For being bonded to a spirit beast at the time of your advancement, +1 Bond Ability Point.