The sound of crashing water filled Dario’s ears.

It was a soothing noise that complimented the sense of cleanliness coursing throughout his body. His eyes were closed as he basked under the endless flow of rushing water. Despite the cold temperature, he was still content with the feel of dirt and grime being purged from his skin. The hard day’s work had left him covered in sweat and he was relieved to be back to his normal self.

Stepping out from under the waterfall, he walked completely naked over to a nearby flat boulder that served as a table. On top of it lay his armor components looking polished and brand new. He’d thought that there would be damages across several of its plates, but they were surprisingly all intact. It turned out that Artificers made really durable stuff.

Next to the table was a clothesline he’d fashioned out of long strips of vine. As he reached over to grab some dry clothing, he noticed in the corner of his eye a green slime trying to sneak up on him.

He raised his hand in an almost carefree manner in its direction.

His hand glowed for a split second before shooting out a beam of light that crossed the entire length of the cavern. His aim was far off, however, and the slime quickly retreated having realized its cover was blown. Dario was calm and relaxed despite the failure as he knew it would come back for another try soon enough.

He sat down and looked at his hands, watching as it shifted between glowing and being completely inert. He had been working on mastering his newfound abilities ever since he attained them, and it was a pleasure trying to figure out exactly what he was capable of.

What were his limits? How versatile was the ability? How much damage could his beams dish out? Could they be redirected through the use of mirrors?

Those were the types of questions that plagued his mind ever since he shot that first beam. Fortunately, or rather unfortunately, he now had all the time in the world to safely experiment.

Dario had been stuck in the Wildlands for the last couple of days and there seemed to be no end to his predicament in sight. He had left Tuesday afternoon and was still lost in the woods by Thursday night. It was dangerous for even a Superior — let alone a newly manifested one — to stay out for so long alone in the Wildlands, but he was thankfully able to circumvent the issue.

He didn’t have to sleep like everyone else after all.

Constant vigilance wasn’t a problem for someone who had no say in the matter. Dario didn’t have a choice of whether or not he should keep a lookout because his body simply wouldn’t allow him the alternative. He preferred to think of it as a positive thing, but he still couldn’t deny that it was quite the double-edged sword.

Insomnia was his curse, but productivity was his blessing. Dario hadn’t wasted his time lamenting over his circumstance and instead worked on surviving.

After the battle in The Grotto, he had left the cave to search for a way out of the Wildlands, anticipating that the way back would be a simple trek around the cliff. His hopes were dashed, however, as the tall rock face extended over a longer stretch of area than he’d initially thought.

He had walked for nearly half a day before deciding to head back since nightfall wasn’t the best time to be out and about in the Wildlands. Finding safe shelter was the most important goal in the long term, and he was fortunate enough that there was such a place for him to retreat to.

That was how he ended up back in The Grotto with the goal of making it his temporary dwelling. It was the territory of the slimes, but he’d had no compunction over usurping the place, especially with the big boss taken care of.

It was a surprise when Dario had walked inside the cavern to find over a dozen slimes occupying its interior. Most of them were on top of where Gronk had been, slowly devouring his corpse. He’d meant to drag the corpse out of the cave or at least make a grave for him, but it turned out to be a pointless gesture.

Dario had spent a few minutes blasting the slimes to smithereens before he’d been able to take a look at what was left of the ogre’s corpse. All that remained was his foot, completely sterile and moisture free. The slimes had thoroughly consumed him.

In memory of the strange giant, he had placed the remaining foot on top of a tall stone next to the waterfall as a sort of monument to his existence and in remembrance of Dario’s first significant kill.

He didn’t count the smaller monsters he’d slain earlier in his excursion because they didn’t seem real to him, like they were truly alive. Those had just been simple creatures enslaved to their base instincts, but Gronk had been different. He had been the first truly sentient creature he’d killed.

Dario was told that he’d change as a person fundamentally when killing a fellow sentient living being, but when Gronk died, he’d only felt a little bit of guilt and regret, with none of the soul-crushing dread he’d come to expect. He didn’t know if that meant he was a psychopath, just numb to it, or Gronk’s status as a monster made it easier for him. Either way, he now knew a little bit more about himself, and knew that he could, and would, handle anymore deaths in his future with a certain level of composure.

With the way his life was going, he really had no choice but to adapt if he wanted to survive.

On a lighter note, since he’d killed the slimes who ate Gronk and therefore taken their World Energy, it technically meant that Gronk was a part of him and within him for the rest of his days. It had been a strange yet comforting thought. There were still some oozes that escaped, but it was only a matter of time before he got them all.

The past couple of days had Dario busy in trying to explore the other end of the cliff while fending off the occasional vengeful slime. During his downtime, he would experiment and try to learn more about his new capabilities. Fortunately, he was able to figure out several important pieces of information.

Dario looked down and tapped his Status Band to check on his progress after another day’s worth of exploring and killing monsters.

The golden device lit up and showed him the glowing numbers of his stats — Assimilator at 4.6, Defender at 4.8, and Physique at 4.6. Dario grinned and felt extremely satisfied since it was a big step up from where he had started only a few days ago. All of his stats were now at 4 and he could feel the difference.

He was a bit stronger than before and it felt like he could hear slightly better, but he didn’t know if that was his imagination or not. His Defender score hadn’t changed much since he was at 4 when he had left the city, and he certainly didn’t feel any more durable than usual. Judging from what changed and what didn’t, he suspected that only jumps between integers could yield any noticeable differences.

The most significant progression during his time in the Wildlands was definitely his Assimilator stat. As soon as the Giant Slime perished, he had received its share of Assimilator World Energy, catapulting him forward and allowing him to figure out exactly what he could absorb.

What tipped him off was the fact that he could now shoot beams of light out of his hands. He recalled how The Bloody King’s assimilator aspect was emotion, where he could freely absorb it and reutilize it in different ways, like projecting it back outwards onto others. He had applied that logic to himself and came to a swift conclusion.

It wasn't heat that he could assimilate like he first thought. His aspect was actually light.

When he’d been in the burning building, it wasn’t the heat from the fire that empowered him, but rather the bright glowing flames. It explained why he always felt like he was gaining Assimilator Energy during the day, and less so during the night. Whenever the sun’s rays landed directly on his skin, he felt rejuvenated and even empowered.

After a few tests on some scattered pieces of dry wood, he had found out that any source of light added to his store of energy, whether it be from a small flame or a raging bonfire. Even the soft moonlight filling The Grotto increased his vibrancy if he paid close enough attention. Each gave various amounts to his supply of energy, but daylight gave him the most so far.

He found that whenever he was injured or low on energy, all he had to do was go out and lay directly under the sun’s rays. That helped him out a lot during his hunts and explained how he was able to recover so fast after falling off a high cliff. In fact, it explained many of the instances where he was able to stand back up feeling perfectly fine despite suffering potentially fatal injuries.

Another amazing discovery was the effect his Light Assimilation had on his need for sustenance. He found that he could actually use his inner energy to help alleviate hunger pangs. It wouldn’t make them go away completely but it still helped significantly. He would probably be starving at the moment if not for that.

He felt a lot better knowing that the sun would always cover his ass, figuratively speaking.

Interestingly enough, even being in a completely dark space gave him energy somehow, but in very small amounts compared to the gains from other sources. This told him that he was either very sensitive to light — to the point of absorbing the minute amount present in a dark room — or there was something else he was missing. He suspected it to be the former.

With his aspect, he was always gaining some amount of Assimilator Energy, and he would have to physically exhaust himself or continuously shoot light beams in order to feel drained. However, having an endlessly filling large store of energy didn’t mean he could slack off and hope that the unfair advantage would be enough for his battles. He had to get better, and to do that, he had to be more efficient with his energy usage.

He could only move and hunt safely during the day so his nighttimes were spent practising his light control. His efforts were focused on lowering and increasing the intensity of his beams, trying to figure out what utilized the least amount of energy while inflicting the most damage. In the end, it was only a matter of time and practise.

Dario raised his glowing hands and started shooting light beams towards several marked spots on the opposite wall. He smiled in satisfaction at seeing the scorched craters spreading across the stone surface.

The sounds and bright lights of Dario’s beams filled the cavern throughout the night.

A noise similar to a high-pitched shrieking warble filled the air before suddenly stopping.

Dario slowly lowered his hand and observed the smoking corpse of the arachnid still twitching on the ground a few feet away. His aim had gotten better over the hours he’d spent practising and he was putting it to good use.

His hunts continued as soon as the sun rose from the horizon. He didn’t want to waste a single moment as every second of daylight meant extra time to make his way back home. He had spent much of his efforts exploring one side of the cliff, but gave up when he realized that it seemed to go on forever.

Another big reason he’d turned around was because of what appeared to be a colony of arachnids covering a large portion of the area. He had stopped at the point where there seemed to be more spider webs than trees.

His only options were to either go deeper into the Wildlands and further out from the city, or follow along the other side of the cliff and hope that it led him back towards Voirsten. Needless to say, he chose the latter.

Dario had spent the previous day exploring the path and finding out shortcuts through the dense forest so that his next venture would cross more distance over a shorter period of time. His efforts paid off as he reached twice as far as the previous day’s travels. There was still the occasional monster that got in his way, but they were few and far in between with none of them more threatening than the average large arachnid.

He actually welcomed any encounters since it gave him an excuse to freely make use of his destructive light beams. He didn’t hold back whenever he used his abilities as he wanted to see just how fast his energy stores filled up after such heavy expenditure. With the sun high up in the sky, his recovery rate was quite phenomenal.

During his excursions, he also tested the extent of his enhanced physical senses and durability.

He was thankful for his enhanced senses as they allowed him to hear any nearby monsters trying to sneak up on him. At one point, he had almost walked right into a group of large venomous snakes. Instead, he was able to shoot at them from a safe distance due to being able to hear their nearly inaudible hissing. He did, however, allow one snake to live in order to test out its fangs against the toughness of his skin.

It was a bad idea.

In hindsight, it was probably a better idea to have a less venomous monster bite his hand. Fortunately, he found out that he could recover from deadly venoms after some time in the sun, so it wasn’t a wasted effort. It only cost him a few minutes and some nauseous pain, but the returns were worth it.

The fangs were only just barely able to pierce his skin despite its sharp features, so he now knew for sure that he had some protection against stabbing. All he had to do to become fully impervious was to increase his Defender level.

In general, all three of his Power Classes had amazing uses and it didn’t matter what leveled up as they all benefited him in some way.

In spite of his less than fortunate circumstances, he was still happy to freely go around and kill monsters. He was rarely the kind of person to dwell on the negatives of a situation and always tried to see his way through it. In fact, since he was already out in the Wildlands with a safe shelter to retreat to, he might as well go a bit deeper to see if there wasn’t more worthwhile prey.

He weighed the pros and cons of such an action and decided that no reward comes without risk, so he might as well give it a shot. He could always find his way back by using Darion Solaris, his namesake star, if he ever got lost at night.

With a pep in his step, he deviated from his path and went off into the woods, occasionally using light rays to burn holes in trees to mark the routes he’d taken.

Dario traversed through the woods for several minutes, listening closely for any unfamiliar sounds. It would be amazing if he ran into another Giant Slime, but he didn’t keep his hopes up. It was supposedly rare for slimes to get so big, so it was still a surprise for him that he had come across one in the wild.

In the corner of his eye, he spotted a single familiar green slime stalking him. It was the same size and coloration of the first slime he ever encountered.

“You again?” he asked, exasperated. “I can’t believe I still haven’t gotten you. You know I killed all of your buddies already, right? You’re by yourself now.”

The slime had no response, simply staying partially hidden behind a tree.

“First to meet, but last to go, huh?” Dario sighed and raised his arm in its direction. “Sorry little guy, but I really need your Assimilator Energy.” He chuckled when an amusing thought crossed his mind. “I want your Ass Energy, you could say. No hard feelings.”

As his hand started glowing, he was suddenly startled by the sound of a distant explosion.

“What the…?” He looked off in the distance to try and see the cause of the commotion before remembering what he was doing.

He turned back to the slime just in time to see it bouncing away.

“Damn it, stay still!” After shooting a few beams of light towards its retreating form and missing, he eventually gave up, dropping his steaming hand with a feeling of discontent. “I’ll get you next time,” he grumbled.

The sound of more explosions echoed throughout the forest.

“Okay, now I really have to check it out.”

Dario headed off in the direction of the noise, passing through several dense crops of trees and bushes, nearly getting lost a couple times before being redirected by the sound of explosions. He eventually burst out of the woods and came upon an astonishing sight.

He arrived to the scene of a battlefield.

There, in front of his eyes, was an open road with a supply caravan consisting of over a dozen carriages all spaced out with about ten meters between each other. In the back of Dario’s mind, he was happy to have discovered a way back home, but something else grabbed his attention.

Five Superiors were in a formation around one of the central carriages and engaged in combat with seven other Superiors. He was shocked to see so much firepower fighting over a simple supply caravan and was even more amazed to witness an actual fight between Superiors. Seeing it in person was hard to describe, especially with all the destructive forces being flung around like it was nothing.

Was this normal out in the Wildlands?

From a glance, it looked like the seven attacking Superiors were the bad guys and the ones defending were the good guys. He wasn’t completely sure, but the cowering civilians hiding behind some carriages tipped the scales in the defenders’ favor.

Like the foolhardy teenager he was, and drunk on his newly acquired power, he strode forward intending to help. Upon moving closer, he noticed one of the female defenders protecting the carriage being snuck up from behind by one of the rogue Superiors forming a fireball in his hands.

Dario yelled towards the unsuspecting woman, but she was unable to hear him amidst the sounds of battle and from such a far distance. He had little confidence that he’d be able to hit the rogue Superior with a beam, so he had no choice but to personally intervene if he wanted to make a difference.

With a deep pull from his inner pool of energy, he burst forth from the forest tree line and started sprinting towards her.

In the past, when he had first used his power to enhance his legs, he had tripped over a lot. He’d been very unused to the sudden increase in speed, but ever since then, he had practised diligently in order to make up for his shortcomings.

His efforts paid off.

In a handful of seconds, he crossed the nearly eighty meter distance between them and pushed the woman aside just as a blazing sphere of fire reached them. He was successful in saving her, but ended up placing himself in the crossfire.

That was when the fireball exploded.

He tried to jump away, but the blast was too close, and he was far too late. With the searing roar of an explosion deafening his ears, he felt a mind-numbing blast hit him, shaking every bone in his body. He was expelled with great force upwards into the air.

He briefly noticed a mangled foot flying away before passing out.