--- bolted upwards at the noise and attempted to grab the spear before realizing he was no longer in the cave. He wasn’t sure he was even in the actual world as the space around him was devoid of any light or sound. He could see his body perfectly well, but anything past that was just endless darkness. He couldn’t even summon his status in whatever place he was.

“Do not worry little one. You are not being attacked. I have simply pulled your mind into your own true self.”

The voice seemed to come from every direction at once, the very darkness surrounding him trembling and contorting to the voice. “What are you? What do you mean this is my own true self?”

“I am nothing and yet everything. I see everything and am apart of anything. I am Void itself. I am your creator, little one. What you see here is your true self. You are a Voidling, a being made fully of Void, and so within you lies that Void. What you see around you and where you are is that Void.”

“You call yourself Void but also say I am made of Void and that I have Void within myself. How--”

“You are not made of me, nor do you have a part of me within you. I am Void as that is what I wish to call myself. I am the oldest consciousness of all the Energies, their creator. When I created you, I took a piece of that Void that made myself up and gave control of it onto a new consciousness, being you. You are a blank slate so that you can truly grow; you can build yourself to be whatever you wish.”

“When you use Void Magic, where do you think the disintegrated Energies go? Do you believe that they just dissolve and exist as gas in the world? No, little one. You absorb those Energies into yourself in their truest forms, which is what creates this space around you. The more you grow, the greater Void itself grows.”

“I have grown weak over the eons little one. Where once I ruled over all creation, the other Energies together have continued to push me back as they continue to expand this world. They communicate with their follows, create beings such as yourself of their own, and strive to become stronger. Even the Energies constantly fight for power.”

“I always watched, never getting myself involved. It is now too late for me to fight back, and soon I will be consumed by their struggles. You are the one and only Voidling I’ve ever created. It is now up to you little one. Once you grow stronger, find the true meaning of Void. Once you do, the Energies will bow before you. I don’t have much longer. Ask me any questions you have left quick.”

His mind spinning from what he had just heard, --- struggled to come up with questions. Being told that he was the only creation of the true Energy was something he didn’t believe he would have to deal with. Thousands of questions, from what his purpose was, to how he should grow stronger, to how he was supposed to find the true meaning of Void rose up within him.

“I guess it truly was too much to expect a newly born Voidling to stay sane after hearing all of this. Since you haven't asked anything, take this advice little one. Skills don’t simply improve through level. While you may get better at doing certain things, what truly matters is if you understand the skill.”

“You must understand the Will of the skills themselves to truly grow. I will create a prompt to better explain it to you as I am out of time. Remember, Everything is made of Void, and Void is made of Everything. We are one and the same.”

“You are the one and only Voidling, as such, you shall now be called Irell Vatayarra. Understand the true meaning of your name, and grow.”

As suddenly as he had been pulled into his true self, he had been spat out. ---, or Irell, simply laid within the cave staring at the ceiling for a few minutes. His mind worked hard to get everything he had just learned and understood together. The last quote he had heard floated through his mind, and suddenly he could feel Void better.

%$#%[email protected]%$$*&^%*(^&*%$%&##&%^$*

Little one, with my last message you should have awaken your first will.

Wills are the true meanings of any skills.

As your Wills grow stronger, they will improve your attributes to allow you to better utilize them.

All your skills had a non-existent Will preciously, as such nothing showed up in your skill list.

Now, any skills which have Wills will show the level of the Will next to them.

They go from non-existent, to pitiful, to weak, to strong, to existing, to alive, and finally into real.

Your sub skills can’t gain wills, as their main skill is what truly matters for comprehension.

Once I come out of this fight, I will contact you again.

%^$%^$#$%#&^%*%%()#!#%^%&&(*$

Congratulations! Your Will for Void Magic has grown from non-existent to pitiful.

You gain 5 Intelligence and 15 Wisdom from your Will.

Congratulations! Your will for Void Magic has grown from pitiful to weak.

The gains from your Will have increased to 15 Intelligence and 40 Wisdom.

Before he could react, Irell felt an enormous surge of mana enter into his body at once. The 15 intelligence and 40 wisdom gave him a sense of power he never believed was possible before. If a weak Will gave these many attributes, what would alive, or even real Wills do? Before getting too caught up, Irell summoned his status.

Name: Irell Vatayarra Species: Human Voidling Level: 4 Title: Solo Dungeoneer I Health: 250 Mana: 480 Stamina: 250 Age: 15 Years Lifespan: 300 Years Strength: 25 Constitution: 25 Endurance: 25 Vitality: 25 Agility: 29 Dexterity: 29 Intelligence: 48 Wisdom: 73 AP: 0 Skills Identify Level 1 Herbal Knowledge Level 1 Weapon Making Level 1 Armor Making Level 2 Tailoring Level 3 Skinning Level 3 Climbing Level 1 Stealth Level 3 Meditation Level 12 Small Blades Level 6 Dodge Level 7 Void Magic Level 7 (Weak) Void-Magic Shield Level 4 | Void Claws Level 4 | Void Blast Level 10 | Void Infusion Level 2 Water Magic Level 1 Light Magic Level 1 Brightening Orb Level 3

With the extra wisdom, his mana regeneration had more than doubled, meaning he would be able to shoot a Void Blast every 35 seconds if he was out of mana. Not to mention his now massive mana pool, Irell could likely be able to clear the dungeon with ease with these gains. He decided to spend much more time to comprehending his skills truly. He wondered if he would be able to do so while meditating, though that was something for the future.

Even without leveling up, if he spent years working on his wills, he could likely grow strong enough to do whatever it was that Void wanted him to do. Getting up, Irell grabbed his spear before making his way out of the cave.

The sun had just risen, which allowed Irell to continue moving in the same direction as he had before entering into the dungeon and not getting sidetracked. He spent much of the walk thinking about what he had heard from Void and what he had learned about Wills. Though he had no idea how long it would take to gain one, he began thinking about what meditation really was. It was currently his highest leveled skill, so hopefully that would allow him to better understand it.

During the walk, his Water Magic had increased to level 2 due to how frequently he had been needing to drink water under the sun’s penetrating rays. Sadly, by the time night came, not only had he not gained any sort of WIll related to meditation, but he had run out of relds. Hopefully he could find some random creatures tomorrow or he would have to starve until he reached civilization.

Laying down at the bottom of a dune, the Voidling drifted off to sleep.

--------------------

Hearing a loud screech coming from his right, Irell swung his spear with as much force as his half-asleep body could. He felt it impact a fast moving object before it crashed into him, sending him sliding across the sand. Opening his eyes, Irell was greeted by the sight of a mouth-ful of teeth 4 meters wide careening towards him. Barely reacting in time, he stepped sideways of swung his spear horizontally.

It raked across the scales of the beast and left a gash two centimeters deep in the creature’s scales. Using identify, Irell looked at what he was fighting.

Name: None

Species: Sand Worm (Juvenile)

Level: 17

The creature was approximately 50 meters long and 4 meters wide, with a mouth taking up the entirety of its front side. He had no idea how it could see or feel where he was, but he chalked it up to some kind of other senses. Not only was the creature massive and strong, but it was also a juvenile. Irell almost paled at the thought of an adult and what level they would be, but remembered he was in the middle of a fight.

Calming himself, the Voidling shot out 4 Void Blasts, aiming them into the creatures massive maw. The spheres were larger, and seemed more real to Irell. As he knew skill levels didn’t actually affect the strength of the skill, he guessed it was due to his WIll and better understanding of Void. The four hit true, three hitting the Sand Worms teeth and one going further down its throat.

The teeth seemed to vanish entirely before the now smaller Void Blasts continued into the sides of the creatures mouth, leaving small holes fist wide. The fourth one seemed to have hit something important as the Sand Worm began wriggling back under the ground and screeching.

Seeing this, Irell began to move forwards preparing to continue the onslaught. Before he could do so, he saw something that made his heart stop. Fifty meters to his right, a dent in the ground 10 meters wide began to grow, all the sand seeming to be absorbed into the ground.

He was left in awe as another Sand Worm, this one many times larger than the one he had previously been fighting with, burst out of the ground and let out a roar that almost made him fall.

Name: None

Species: Sand Worm (Elder)

Level: 49

If the previous worm was massive, this one was colossal. Its mouth itself was around 12 meters wide while he couldn’t even tell how long it was. He just knew it was well in the hundreds. Its scales had an assortment of scars and puncture marks that seemed to almost make a pattern.

His body instantly kicked into motion, trying to get as far away as he could. There was no way he would be able to fight that Sand Worm and win. He could spend all of his mana shooting Void Blasts into one spot on the thing and it would shrug it off like he would a bug bite.

Thankfully, the elder Sand Work didn’t seem to be the best in terms of traversing the desert. It’s massive size meant that it slowly sunk into the sand if it tried to slide across the land so it had to keep diving in and out of the ground to move towards him.

His stamina was depleting quickly but the distance between the two was also growing. He hoped that it soon realized something as small as him wasn’t worth the effort.

With a final screech, the Sand Worm dove back into the depths of the desert, far from any prying eyes. Even so, Irell continued to run forwards until his stamina reached single digits, where he finally stopped to regain his energy. That sight had made getting out of the desert his number one priority. Even with another 25 levels he might not be fully safe within the desert.

The worm was level 49, one away from breaking through to 50. Level 50 was one of the most important levels a being could reach in the world. At Level 50, your body would evolve into a higher version of your previous species. It accounted for what skills you had, what your attributes were, and even your personality before it made the best possible evolution. That evolution would bring with it a massive boost to every stat a being had, making it almost impossible for a level 49 to beat a level 50.

Considering this worm was one level away from 50, Irell didn’t want to bet on the fact that there were none that had actually reached 50 and evolved into something that could instantly kill him. For now though, the Voidling was just happy it had survived. As long as he continued to move forwards he could eventually come to a place that was safe.

Like so, he continued wandering through the night, hoping another worm wouldn’t pick him as a snack.