According to Kerra, we were going to be gone for a week or maybe a little longer, depending on how smoothly things went with the various bounties she’d selected. Even after our chat, I still had some mixed feelings about leaving. Thanks to my time down in the Sprawl, I was surer than ever that there was some serious tomfuckery afoot.

Whatever was happening in Wildespell was more than just a random-ass series of monster attacks. Akser was an information broker and my guess was that he’d stumbled onto a piece of intel important enough that someone was willing to kill him over it. I was also reasonably certain that Dogan the Shieldbreaker, Justiciar of the Seekers, had started to put the puzzle pieces together and that it had cost him his life. I wasn’t sure how any of that tied into the death of the kid over in the Baker’s district or the obvious assassination of the advisor to the Heir Apparent, but I had no doubt they were connected.

Another political faction or foreign operative taking aim at the monarchy, maybe?

Destabilizing a country during periods of transition was straight out of the CIA playbook and if the king really was about to die, there would be no better time to sow a little chaos. Or maybe there was someone else in line for the throne that wanted to thin out their competition? But if that was the case, why not just target the Heir Apparent directly?

I wasn’t sure. There were still too many clues missing and much as I hated to drop this case, I had given Kerra my word and I intended to honor it. While we were on this training op, I was going to put the happenings in Wildespell onto the backburner and focus on learning the ins and outs of being a Vigil.

And although the timing was a little frustrating, it wasn’t like we were going to be doing bullshit busywork.

The contracts Kerra had selected represented real threats to real people out in the world. As I’d learned far too well over the past weeks, Mortka were everywhere, and the fuckers were none too shy about killing whenever the hell the urge struck them. Were the people of Wildespell any more important than the countless farmers, merchants, and villagers who dotted the towns scattered around the countryside? No, no they weren’t. And those people didn’t have a fortress full of monster hunters within spitting distance.

Wildespell would just have to take care of itself for the time being and if anyone could crack it, other than me, I had confidence it would be Telent and his team. From what I’d seen, they were experienced, tough, and competent—a truly powerful combination.

Like it or hate it, I needed to focus on the mission at hand.

Thanks to Threads of Fate, I could respect my skills once every twelve hours, but the biggest catch was that I needed to use an Altar to do it. Most small cities had a temple dedicated to Raguel, but many of the smaller towns and hamlets didn’t. When I got back, I needed to ask Pascow—the Vigil who ran the Steel Griffin—how exactly I could go about setting up an altar. He had one for his own private use. He’d implied that they were expensive to set up, but whatever the cost might be worth it in the long run. But, like the Chaos Aberration, that was a worry for later.

For the time being, I needed to assume I was going to be gone for more than a week and that I wouldn’t have access to an altar until I got back. Period. Among the countless pearls of wisdom Drill Instructor Screw Y’All had screamed into my face was, plan for the worse and you’re never disappointed. It had served me well. That meant whatever armor, weapon skins, and skills I rode out with, were the ones I was gonna be stuck with until we got back. There was one other vital piece of intel I knew as well. I wasn’t going alone. Kerra would be with me and so would a couple of other, newly ascended Vigils.

She hadn’t given me a brief about what type of Vigils they were, but since the Custodians tended to operate in Fists composed of all five Wards, I was guessing we’d have a Vigil of Wrath, Truth, and Balance. Working off that assumption, I headed over to my spinning avatar and pulled up my character sheet.

>>

Boyd Knight

Race: Vigil Bound

Level: Adept, Bronze Rank

Current Essence: 3,167

Next Ascended Rank: 35,000

Attribute Points: +4

Ward Points: +3

Characteristics

Brawn: 22

Verve: 22

Finesse: 20

Arcana: 25

Insight: 19

Vigil Wards

Ward of Justice: Soul Bound Weapons (Boon), Rend, Crippling Strike, Armor Evocation

Ward of Valor: Diamond Body (Boon), Combat Sense, Matchless Endurance

Ward of Wrath: Arcane Insight (Boon), Warded Shield, Kinetic Blast, Arctic Spike

Ward of Balance: Language of the Heavens (Boon), Sidhe Pact, Fae Tether, Spectral Roots, Cunning Glamor

Ward of Truth: Threads of Fate (Boon), Master Mentalist, Honeyed Words

Expand Ward List

>>

I gave my stats a quick glance, then froze when I noticed that something was off.

Way off.

The last time I’d been in my Soul Vault had been after my trial before the Custodians. My Current Essence had been a little over a thousand, but now it was three times that amount even though I hadn’t killed any Mortka or directly absorbed any Essence over the past two days. That wasn’t the only change either; my Verve and Finesse skills had both increased by a full point apiece and I hadn’t spent any attribute points to do it. I squinted, fully confused.

The changes were all good, but I didn’t have a fucking clue how they had happened.

The only thing I’d been doing over the past couple days was combat and endurance training. Niels and Kerra were definitely putting me through my paces, but I’d been pushing myself to the point of exhaustion damn near every day since I got here and I hadn’t seen any natural gains like that…

I grunted as a thought smacked me in the side of the head.

The training wasn’t the only difference. How I was training was different.

Whenever I used the Arcane Suppression Bracelets they hit me with Crippling Alignment, which decreased my Verve, Brawn, and Finesse by 5 points apiece. Essentially, they stripped away all of my supernatural abilities—no enhanced strength, stamina, or rapid regeneration. Something clicked into place. Kerra and Niels hadn’t just been torturing me for the sake of being dicks, they’d been using the bracelets to push my natural, unenhanced abilities higher. I’d come into this world with 17 Brawn, 18 Verve, and a 15 Finesse. Ten was an average person and nineteen was an Olympic-level Athlete at the top of their game.

With the additional Attribute Points the Ascendant System had granted me, I’d already blown past what was humanly possible in most of those categories. But if those additional points were suddenly, and painfully, removed? Then I was just a regular, average joe again. Well, not regular, but even as an elite Marine, I couldn’t go toe-to-toe with a competitive strongman or a world-class sprinter. Without those enhancements, their grueling training regimen was allowing me to increase my base physical abilities—the stats I’d come into this world with in the first place.

That was the only thing that made any sense.

And the gains were so damned fast, because when I removed the bracelets after beating my body into a bloody pulp, my Rapid Regen kicked into overdrive, healing all the muscular damage I’d done while training. That increased recovery meant I was packing exponentially more growth into every single session. Three days with them was like three weeks of intensive conditioning under normal circumstances. This technique probably wouldn’t allow naturally push my stats up into the high twenties, but maybe it would grant me a couple extra points apiece in Brawn, Verve, and Finesse.

Kerra might’ve been a hard ass, but it turned out she was also a helluva trainer.

I quickly pulled up my Attribute Point Advancement Table.

With 3,167 Essence available, I had enough to bump my Insight score up to 20, which was a no brainer. The better my overall stats were, the more competitive I would be, and the greater access to skills and abilities I would have.

You must Sacrifice [3,100] Essence to increase Insight to 20. Proceed with Soul Sacrifice? Yes/No

Sacrificing Essence to advance my Stats was never fun, but worthwhile things rarely are. I gritted my teeth, ready to get metaphysically shanked in the kidney, and accepted.

A wave of frigid ice exploded inside my chest and spread through my limbs like crippling frostbite. I dropped to the deck and just lay on the floor shivering, teeth chattering, thinking I was dying for a good ten minutes. Sacrificing Essence hurt and the more I burned in a single go, the sharper and more brilliant the pain became. Eventually, the horrific feeling passed, leaving a hollow pit in the middle of my stomach as though I hadn’t had a meal in a week or two. This wasn’t my first rodeo, however, so I knew exactly what I was in for.

After the terrible sensation finally receded, I shook my head but didn’t bother picking myself up off the floor. I really needed to get a couch or something in here, since I spent so much time curled into the fetal position, praying for the sweet release of death.

Time for round two of the pain Olympics.

I focused on Threads of Fate and another notification appeared.

Action: Activate the Boon Threads of Fate to Reclaim some or all of your spent Ward Points. This action can be performed once every twelve hours. You currently have the ability Sidhe Pact marked as an exemption. Proceed reclamation with current exceptions in place? Yes/No

Since I had an official pact with Renholm, if I reclaimed those points, it would nullify our arrangement, which I didn’t want for lots of reasons. For one, loyalty was ingrained in my bones, and for another, the pixie was continually useful. Besides, if I did nullify our pact, I had no doubt the pint-sized maniac would go out of his way to make my life a living hell and I didn’t want to be constantly looking over my shoulder for the murderous fae.

If sacrificing essence felt like getting stabbed in the kidneys with a razor-sharp icicle, reclaiming my Ward Points was liking having my soul doused in Napalm.

“Yes,” I grunted, voice scratchy.

The hurt hit like a barrage of hammer blows.

I watched—body trembling, sweat rolling down my face and chest—as the avatar slowly rotating above the pool of water strobed and changed. My physical body disappeared, replaced by a human-shaped circulatory system comprised of a complex network of multi-colored threads.

A series of blazing symbols were tattooed at various points on the tangle of circulatory threads—several in my head and torso, many more dotting my arms and legs. Four gold, three green, four red, five blue, and three silver, all corresponding to the five wards, Justice, Valor, Wrath, Balance, and Truth. The tattoos themselves represented the skills, abilities, and spells I’d already unlocked. I knew, for example, that the crimson sigil overlaying my right wrist corresponded to Kinetic Blast—the hand being the primary focal point for that type of offensive magic—while the blue, circular ward positioned over my lips represented my Language of the Heavens Boon.

Those tattoos weren’t placed randomly but served to unlock specific internal Essence channels. Without those sigils in place, the channels snapped closed, cutting off my ability to access that specific source of magical energy. Without having the green Valor sigil carved into the channel at the base of my skull, my vision and hearing dulled considerably, cutting off the Combat Sense ability. Closing each of those channels—which is what Threads of Fate did—felt like having a limb amputated in a single cruel blow.

Only I wasn’t just losing one limb, I was losing an even dozen in one fell swoop.

I lay on the ground, groaning in pain, body convulsing from the trauma as I silently reminded myself that this would be worth it in the end. Pain was just weakness leaving the body.

The agony dragged on for what felt like hours but was actually minutes. Once the tsunami of soul-searing misery faded away, I sat up and leaned back on my palms. I now had a total of 85 Ward Points, a small fortune, but one which would go all too quickly. Some of the most powerful abilities, like True Resurrection, Fae Footed, or Raguel’s Divine Retribution, would eat through a third of that total without batting an eyelash. Not that I could use most of those abilities anyway—the recommended attribute requirements were through the roof.

I gained my feet, swaying and lightheaded, nabbed my Grimoire of Virtues, and scanned my Expanded Ward list, carefully selecting the skills I thought would be best suited to this assignment.

At four points apiece, Combat Sense and Master Mentalist instantly got added. Both were relatively cheap, had saved my ass more times than I could count, and were just too damned useful not to have. For two points, I added Totem Transformation into the mix as well. I didn’t use the skill often, but it was a helluva backup ability for when shit went really wrong.

Since we were going to be gone for a while, there were also a couple of utility skills that were too convenient to pass up.

With Fae Tether I could send items to my Soul Vault no matter the distance—it was the closest I could get to a bag of holding. I wasn’t gonna shlep around loot for a week, that was for damn sure. Next up was Armor Evocation, which allowed me to change out any of my prebuilt armor sets in the same fashion I could summon and dismiss my Soul Bound weapons. With it, I’d be able to effortlessly swap between my Grass Hound leathers, Stone Spider plate mail, and my medium Basilisk brigandine armor. Another added bonus was that Armor Evocation also refreshed my gear sets during swaps, mending damage and even scrubbing out bloodstains and BO.

How could I say no to that?

Those were the easy choices.

What Kerra had in store for us was some good ol’ fashion monster hunting, so I immediately dismissed Cunning Glamor, Honeyed Words, Stealth Step, and Deft Touch. The only talking we’d be doing was a little shotgun diplomacy. Since I knew Kerra was going to be around, I started eliminating skills from the Ward of Valor straight away—I didn’t want to duplicate abilities if it could be helped. I knew from firsthand experience that she had some potent healing mojo, so I dismissed all of the spells and abilities in the Bastion of Healer category. Same thing with the Bastion of Presence, which predominately offered team auras.

Matchless Endurance wasn’t flashy, but it would help numb my body against physical pain, allowing me to fight longer and harder even after sustaining otherwise debilitating injuries. That was a definite yes. I also wanted to pick up Spiked Shell, which was a personal aura spell that bitch slapped anyone who got ballsy enough to hit me with a melee attack, but at 14 points it was too rich for my blood.

Next, I turned my eyes on Ward of Justice, since I figured my primary role in the group would be as they physical damage dealer. Rend and Peerless Warrior were both go-to abilities that had served me well in the past. Crippling Strike obstructed and disrupted a target’s Arcana meridians, effectively slowing their movement rate and preventing them from spell casting for a short period of time. It was a solid skill, but I only had so many points to go with. Instead, I opted for the more expensive, but deadlier Festering Wound ability.

Festering Wound

Every combatant knows that even a small wound, left untreated, can have deadly consequences. Festering Wound is a passive ability that automatically sends a concentrated burst of necrotic energy into the victim any time an open wound is inflicted, creating an oozing sore. The necrotic energy slowly seeps and spreads through the body, reducing health, stamina, and arcana regeneration rates while simultaneously afflicting the victim with Hellflayer Rot—a disease which, in its early stages, causes intense pain, nausea, muscles spasms, and internal bleeding. Each subsequent attack causes the Hellflayer Rot to advance, making the symptoms more severe, eventually leading to asphyxiation and heart failure.

Recommended Attribute Minimums: Verve, 19; Arcana, 16

Fucking brutal and I was here for it.

I also opted for Overcharge, which let me expend Stamina to deal an additional 10% damage with ranged projectiles.

For a minute, I kicked around the idea of adding Guided Shot into my line up. It was an active ability that siphoned off a small portion of Stamina in exchange for turning any ranged projectile into a goddamned homing missile. Every shot would be in the black. I knew Marine Snipers that would’ve given their left nut for a skill like that, and here I was wondering whether to add it or not. Paired with a sniper rifle or a machine gun, that ability would be absolutely devastating, but with a shotgun?

Eh… Not so much. It was already damned hard to miss with a combat shottie, especially since the maximum effective combat range was only thirty yards. At fifteen points, I decided to pass.

Last from the Ward of Justice, I chose the Blunt Weapon Mastery.

I’d overlooked all of the various weapon masteries up until now, but after training with Niels and Kerra I knew that wasn’t an option any longer. Blunt Weapons included axes, hammers, maces, clubs, staves, and halberds—pretty much anything that used a pole or club-like handled—and added a couple of extra benefits, such as increased attack speed, decreased Stamina usage when executing special attacks, and accelerated muscle memory progression.

In short, it would make me better, stronger, and faster and would allow me to utilize Legacy Scrolls, assuming I ever found one.

With that done, I had 28 Ward Points left to play with—just enough for a couple of hard-hitting combat spells. Sure, I was a Vigil of Justice, but in my experience so far, nothing landed harder than raw, unbridled magic and with an Arcana score of 25, I’d be a world class idiot not to sling at least a few spells. I could’ve gone with a collection of lower-level spells like Kinetic Blast, Warded Shield, and Spectral Roots, but since I was going to be working with a team of noobs, those were probably the skills they would have.

After scanning my options a few more times, I settled on one powerful single-target spell, Electro Arc, and one nasty high-level AoE spell called Rain of Fire.

Rain of Fire

Fire is the great equalizer of nature, for all things burn. The more fire, the greater the blaze. Call upon vast elemental forces to conjure a Flame Cloud and rain a flurry of fiery lances on all those unfortunate souls below. The radius of the Flame Cloud and the duration of the storm is directly tied to your available Arcana Pool. Feed more Arcana into the spell to increase its overall intensity. But be warned, flame is an undiscriminating foe and will harm all those below—be they friend, enemy, or even the caster themselves.

Recommended Attribute Minimums: Arcana, 25; Finesse, 20

I glanced at my character sheet one more time.

>>

Boyd Knight

Race: Vigil Bound

Level: Adept, Bronze Rank

Current Essence: 67

Next Ascended Rank: 35,000

Attribute Points: +4

Ward Points: +2

Characteristics

Brawn: 22

Verve: 22

Finesse: 20

Arcana: 25

Insight: 19

Vigil Wards

Ward of Justice: Soul Bound Weapons (Boon), Overcharge, Rend, Peerless Warrior, Festering Wound, Weapon Mastery: Blunt, Armor Evocation

Ward of Valor: Diamond Body (Boon), Combat Sense, Matchless Endurance

Ward of Wrath: Arcane Insight (Boon), Electro Arc, Rain of Fire

Ward of Balance: Language of the Heavens (Boon), Sidhe Pact, Totem Transformation, Fae Tether

Ward of Truth: Threads of Fate (Boon), Master Mentalist

Expand Ward List

>>

Satisfied with my choices, I left my spinning avatar behind and made my way deeper into the Soul Vault.

There were six large alcoves that connected to the central entry hall, which housed my avatar: A large library that held a wide variety of books, including my Grimoire of Virtues and my weapon skin blueprints. A storage room filled with shelves, pedestals, and display cases—that’s where all the items I sent through the Fae Tether ended up. A simple barracks room, complete with slick floors, a simple metal cot, and a beat-up footlocker positioned at the end of the bed. The Soul Forge, with its glossy onyx walls and crystalline forge, was where I could break down and craft new items.

The last two rooms were the ones I needed now.

With my shiny new Raven Peak Axe skin in hand, I stopped off at the Armory, where my Soul Bound weapons waited. There were a variety of weapon racks positioned along the walls, which already housed the handful of weapon skins I’d crafted since coming to this world. A glowing, doubled-handed axe held the top position, while a gleaming Mortka-Forged bastard sword rested below it. Prominently displayed along the back wall like trophies were my Soul Bound weapons. A spectral image of a morning star currently overlaid my K-Bar, while a ghostly combat shotgun covered my Colt 1911.

I left the shottie skin in place, since I didn’t have anything better to swap it with, but changed out the mace skin for the axe Niels and Kerra had gifted me. Burning at the heart of the mace skin was a small orange and gold marble that pulsed with gentle warmth; it was the Elemental Arcanum Token I’d looted off the body of the Stone Spider Matriarch. I placed the mace skin onto the overflow racks with the rest of the meager skins I’d managed to acquire or craft so far, then unceremoniously plucked the orb from the mace and connected it to the axe skin.

>>

Elemental Spark: Fire

Token Type: Weapon Inset, Infernal

Class: Adept

The heart of a young Fire Elemental—a divine spark, born of the earth, crushed by the weight of a mountain, and baptized by churning waves of magma. In time this Spark will grow and mature into a fearsome creature—an avatar of nature itself. Or its potent power may be harnessed, granting the wielder a taste of the World Forge.

Effect 1: Equip to a Soul Forged Weapon Skin to add fire damage to all attacks.

Effect 2: When wielding a weapon equipped with Flame Elemental Spark, Fire Resistance increased by 13%.

>>

My axe burned with gentle, pulsing orange light. It was a thing of beauty, like hot brass falling or an Artillery strike.

That done, I beelined toward the Statuary Chamber to double-check all of my mission essential gear.

Inside were a quartet of marble mannequins. Three lined the back wall while one stood in the center of the room like a platoon sergeant addressing his troops. As my gaze brushed over the figures, a customary and familiar notice appeared.

>>

Armor Display Statuary

The monsters and horrors a Vigil must confront through the course of their duties varies wildly, and often the difference between victory and a painful death is the armor they wear. Some creatures hit hard—requiring the protection of heavy plate—while others are fast and nimble, requiring lighter gear to keep up. Custom Armor Sets can also be enchanted by applying Arcanum Tokens, which offer a legion of useful effects, ranging from powerful magical resistances to potent ability buffs. By unlocking the Armor Evocation Skill from the Justice Ward, a Vigil can instantly swap between up to four designated Armor Sets at will, even when away from the Soul Vault. This gives them unmatched versatility when in the field.

>>

I waved away the message, which I’d read countless times before, and focused on the mannequins themselves. The one in front was wearing my current outfit: Basilisk Scale Mail, elder bear gauntlets, reinforced pants with matching basilisk greaves for my lower legs, and heavy-duty leather boots. A leather belt covered with pouches all filled with useful items was slung around the hips while a dark, fur-lined cloak hung around the shoulders and trailed down the back.

The other three mannequins were similarly dressed. One was decked out in my Grass Hound leathers and the other sported my heavy, spiked Stone Spider armor. Each one had boots, cloaks, and pouches all filled with various odds and ends. Fae Tether allowed me to send items to the Soul Vault, but it didn’t let me take anything out, which sucked wrinkled nutsack. Armor Evocation was a hack around that. With a thought, I could toggle between gear sets, and any items stored on the various mannequins would come right along when I made the exchange.

Each gear set had a variety of build-specific Affinity Tokens, extra money, common alchemic ingredients—including ol’ timey water purification tablets—and enough dried rations to last me a few days in the field. Basically, the shit any good Marine would have in a life-or-death scenario.

The fourth and final statue was what I’d come to think as my Mule Build.

Instead of wearing spiked armor or the skulls of my enemies, that mannequin could’ve passed for any day-laborer in any city or town I’d passed through so far. Simple linen pants and tunic. A worn worker’s doublet, soft boots that went up to my calves, and a heavy cloak to block out the cold. There was a simple short sword at the hip and a huge rucksack on his back. That’s where all the real goodies were. A wool blanket, a woven grass bed roll, a leather tarp to rig a pop-up tent, pots and pans for cooking, flint and kindling to start a fire, food, water, Affinity Scales and coinage for barter.

I wouldn’t fair long in battle with the shit the Mule was packing, but I knew from experience that monsters weren’t the only danger the wilderness had to offer. Dehydration, hunger, hypothermia, and exposure could all kill just as readily as a Mortka’s claws if I wasn’t careful. Plus, sometimes it was nice to have something to wear that didn’t scream “I’m a fucking monster slayer” at the top of its lungs, especially when I was trying to grab a drink with some locals. I’ve found people have a hard time relaxing around a game of cards when the guy across from them is dressed like a goddamned death paladin.

I made a quick round, refilling pouches and tweaking my Arcanum Tokens. Once I was happy with my preparations, it was finally blessedly time to call it a night.