by Aaron Oster
So, fighting through the overwhelming terror, Morgan stood his ground, raising his shaking hands and taking up a defensive stance as the beast advanced.
If he were going to go down, he would at least put up a token resistance. After all, even now, it simply wasn’t his style to just roll over and give up.
47
If Morgan had been hoping that his show of bravery would somehow get him out of this, he’d have been sorely disappointed. The beast let out a snarl, then leaped at him, moving far faster than he could keep up with. It was on him in an instant, its weight bearing him to the ground.
Pain flared in his chest as the icy cold penetrated deep into him, the wolf’s claws piercing his clothes and skin with little effort.
He kicked upward, hoping the angle would allow him access to a normally well-protected and sensitive area, but the snarl of rage showed that he’d just pissed it off.
The wolf dug its claws deeper into Morgan’s chest, and he cried out in pain as blood welled up, then froze around the claws. Worse, he could feel the cold radiating from the beast, worming its way into his body and making its way toward his heart.
Breathing was starting to become difficult, and his body began to grow numb. The pain that lanced through him when the wolf bit down on his shoulder quickly got rid of the numbness. He howled as the wolf shook its head from side to side, savaging his shoulder, ripping through flesh and muscle, and coating the ground in his blood.
Morgan had felt pain before and had been nearly killed more times than he could count. This was different. This was pain on a level he couldn’t ever remember feeling, even when he’d had his body torn to pieces by the gods’ attack. Even with his skin burned and limbs missing, the pain hadn’t been nearly this bad.
He wondered if this Well was somehow increasing the level of pain he felt, but something told him it wasn’t. This was just normal pain, the type any human would feel in this situation. It once again made Morgan wonder how he’d ever managed to survive before he’d gotten his abilities.
He thrashed in place, striking uselessly at the beast’s belly as it continued to savage his shoulder. Finally, the wolf pulled back, taking with it a chunk of flesh, and proceeded to chew and swallow it before him.
The horror that gripped him at seeing himself being eaten nearly made him sick. It redoubled his panic and terror, and he thrashed even more in the beast’s freezing grip. One of his flailing blows caught the wolf in the nose, and with a yelp of pain, it staggered back.
Morgan scrabbled back across the ground, leaving a trail of blood in his wake. The wolf shook its head a few more times, then locked its gaze onto him once more. Scrambling to his feet, Morgan tried to raise his arms once more and found that his right arm refused to move up past his waist, the ruined shoulder not allowing him the use of his dominant arm.
He flashed back again, hearing the old man with the eyepatch berating him for favoring a particular side.
“Having a preferred stance is a weakness people breed into themselves. Fight only with your right or only with your left, and you give your opponent the advantage before the battle even begins.”
Gritting his teeth, Morgan shifted his stance, moving his right foot forward and trying to balance lightly on the balls of his feet. The blood loss was messing with his balance, and the cold had sapped a lot of the strength he’d had.
He was visibly lagging, the fear and adrenaline having exhausted him as well, leaving him facing a still-undamaged rank 9 beast — one that was not going to cut him any slack or give him a break. It padded forward, sensing his weakness, and lunged at his leg.
Morgan tried to pull back but was too slow. He cried out in pain as the beast’s sharpened teeth punched through his skin, its powerful jaws cracking the bone in his leg. Even as he went down, he tried to break the beast’s grip by striking it in the nose again. But the wolf turned its head, and Morgan ended up impaling his hand on one of the beast’s many jagged spines.
He fell, striking his head hard on the ground, and his vision flashed red. He was now in so much pain that he was delirious, yet the fear still refused to flee. He felt the sheer terror of his looming death, the inevitable end that he could not stop, no matter how hard he fought.
The wolf released his leg, leaving it to lie useless, broken and crooked at an odd angle. It placed its front paws on his chest once more, pressing down hard and driving the air from his lungs. He was too weak to fight back. The pain in his limbs was too great, and the loss of blood robbed him of what little strength he had remaining.
Yet, as the beast lowered its head, the intent clear, Morgan found that he desperately wanted to keep living. Despite all the pain, suffering, and agony he felt, Morgan did not want to die. The sheer terror of nothingness, the end that would come, was just too much. He bucked his hips, trying to get away, even as the wolf’s jaws clamped around his throat.
Morgan felt the pain, the moment when it was all over. He could feel his neck giving way between the powerful jaws. The world around him turned black.
As soon as it went dark, he found himself lying on his back, at the center of the crater.
His clothes were soaked in sweat, his hair sticking to his face and neck. His heart was beating so quickly that he felt as though it were trying to tear itself free of his chest, and yet, he felt perfectly fine. Better than fine, even.
The complete lack of pain, broken bones, and torn muscles was such a relief that he began to laugh. If anyone had seen him at that moment, they’d have thought he’d gone insane and that for some strange reason, the most powerful fighter in all the Five Kingdoms had just snapped. In fact, for a few minutes, Morgan wondered if he had.
A cloaked figure appeared before him once again, and Morgan saw the burning purple eyes that peered into his very soul, judging his worthiness.
“Do you understand now?” the Gatekeeper asked, its ghostly voice echoing in his mind.
“Understand? Understand?! How the hell could I not understand, after that?” he almost shrieked. “What the hell was the point of putting me through something like that? Do you get a kick out of torture or something?!”
“No,” the Gatekeeper said. “But you already know that.”
Morgan glared at the cloaked figure, wondering if there was some way to kill it. There probably wasn’t, but taking a shot at the thing might make him feel better after what he’d just been through. Not only that, but Morgan realized that he owed the Great Shaman a visit when this was all over. He’d been told that he would just need to fight a Guardian, but this? This was something else entirely.
“Yeah, I understand the point of this test, though I still think you’re sick in the head for making people go through that,” he muttered, getting back to his feet.
“To truly rise beyond oneself and reach a level of power that you aspire to, you must first understand the plight of the common man. You have to revisit your past self and face a creature that cannot be defeated.
“You passed this test as soon as you realized that, yet you continued to fight despite that realization.
“To be truly human means to accept that there are some things out of your control. That there are powerful forces, far beyond your comprehension. Yet, despite all of that, you go on. Live, survive, thrive.
“Life holds many wonders, from the smallest organisms to titans who ascend to the very heavens. Now you can join their ranks, so long as you accept yourself for who you are and realize that what you see as two disparate halves are simply reflections of one another. Opposites in appearance, yet in essence, still the same.”
The Gatekeeper vanished then, leaving a glowing core to drop to the ground. It rolled several feet, then came to a halt at the edge of a glowing purple pool that Morgan knew had not been there before. One second there was nothing, and then, the Well was there.
Reaching back quickly, he felt a sense of relief as his fingers closed around the haft of his spear. When he’d gone into the fight against the ice-bristle wolf, who a
pparently was the Guardian, he’d been afraid he’d lost her again. Feeling the warm presence coming from the Godsteel weapon gave him a sense of security he’d been missing.
The knowledge that he was going die alone here, with no one knowing of his passing and no one to mourn him, was worse than any fear he’d felt when facing the wolf.
Letting out a shaky breath, Morgan removed the spear from his back, then slowly sank into the Well. This time, there was no voice, no presence to tell him what he needed to do or that he was incomplete. Everything he needed to know had already been said. All he did now was soak in the waters of Consciousness and feel his body grow stronger.
When he next opened his eyes, Morgan found himself sitting atop the lip of the volcano. The crater behind him was gone, sealed over by a wall of stone. But he didn’t care to look back because he already knew what he would see. In his hand was clutched the shining purple core of the Guardian, and although he had technically lost that battle, it had taught him a lesson he’d lacked up until now.
It showed him that despite all of the growth he’d been through, he had started off just like everyone else. Well, maybe not exactly like everyone else. Most humans were born into a loving family, had parents to raise and nurture them, and lived relatively normal and uneventful lives.
He, on the other hand, had been made, created to be a creature of destruction and chaos. He had been used by many and discarded when his usefulness had been deemed at its end.
To be truly human was not something he had ever experienced before. Still, after going through that, after feeling the fear, hopelessness, and pain of facing something he could not defeat, he understood what he was truly protecting.
More than that, he finally understood what true empathy was supposed to look like. He could understand the emotional turmoil of humans as they navigated everyday life with the knowledge that at any moment, something horrible could happen and they could be killed.
Sure, most of them had some small modicum of power, but the vast majority never rose above rank 2 or 3, preferring to live out their lives in as safe a way as was possible in their harsh and unforgiving world.
Morgan sighed, looking down at his hand, now perfectly calm and steady, without so much as a hint of the earlier terror he’d experienced. If all people had to deal with those levels of emotion, fear, and uncertainty on a daily basis, then he had been severely underestimating their inner strength and resolve.
Humans were far stronger than he’d realized, and here, on the cusp of evolution, he understood what it was like to be truly human for the first time in his entire life.
48
When Gold had first sent him out on this mission, Morgan had believed that he would need to go looking for him once he cleared the last Well. But now that he was sitting here, Morgan knew that Gold would be coming for him. It was a certainty. Something that he knew deep down, despite it not making any rational sense at all.
It was as though he could feel it within the very fabric of the world itself. Gold was coming. It was just a matter of time. So, to pass the time, he raised the shining core to his eyes and examined its properties.
Name: Core of the Guardian of Consciousness
Rank - ???
Total available energy - 5 Ranks
This Core was presented to you after facing the Guardian of Consciousness. Unlike other beast cores, the Guardian’s core does not have a set amount of energy, rather it will immediately boost the absorber by five ranks and maximize the gained Attribute Points in the process. The Wells are forever locked to you, and the Guardians cannot be re-challenged.
Morgan lowered the core, staring out at the boiling lake once again. It seemed that his painful loss to that wolf had come with a significant reward after all. Gaining five full ranks at this point would have taken a significant effort on his part, especially with all the intervening work in maximizing the AP he’d gain from the advancement. And while he was tempted to hold off and wait, he knew that every drop of strength he could gather now was more important than anything he could potentially gain down the line.
Plus, advancing now would push him through a threshold and save him the effort of having to pay a ludicrous amount of energy to reach the following rank.
Taking a deep breath, Morgan braced himself, reached into the core, and extracted the available energy.
Unlike with the previous times, the flood of power that entered his body was not insignificant. More than that, the push past a breakthrough rank was something that nearly robbed him of his ability to breathe. This felt so different than pulling in all the energy from the Pinnacle King cores, mainly because he still couldn’t remember doing that.
It was all he could do to remain locked in place as the energy ran rampant through him, soaking into his bones, skin, and muscles. His fingers twitched as his nerves felt like they were charged with power, and his spine locked in place as the energy wove between the separate discs, the bones hardening to be able to withstand even more punishment.
Finally, after nearly five minutes had passed, the rush of power subsided, and Morgan slumped in place, the core crumbling to dust between his fingers.
For a few long moments, he simply sat there, slowly breathing as he came down from the intense rush of power. Then, with a small effort of will, he called up his status to see what had changed.
Name: Morgan
Advanced Supermage: Rank - 80
Energy to Next Rank - 0/600,000,000
Ability Advancement - 15,000,000/15,000,000 (Max.)
Ability - Natural Disaster
RP - 9,020/9,020 (Regen - 90.2 per second)
Strength - 874
Agility - 1,230
Constitution - 1,000
Intelligence - 902
Wisdom - 902
Skills - Hypersonic Flight, Maximum Increase, Maximum Stormforge, Earthen Shift, Nature’s Wrath, Compression, Maximum Gravity Rift, Sunblast, Sand Cyclone, Frenzy
Traits - Dense Body Max., Recovery Max., Aura Sense (inherited), Aura Flare (inherited), Perfect Self, Soul Stealer, Suppression (inherited), Eternal Youth
Extra - Gravity Breaker (10th category), Collapsing Star (HyperNova), Shooting Star (Inferno), Massive Meteor (2nd category), Continental Crush, Soulstream
After looking it over, Morgan couldn’t help but feel slightly disappointed. While his Constitution had taken a clear uptick since his visit to the Well, his actual attributes had only increased by about 30 points each. He’d been expecting a new skill of some sort after clearing the third Well, but unlike with the first two, he saw nothing at all.
He let out a sigh, wondering if he was becoming spoiled with all of his recent gains. In the past couple of weeks, he’d grown by ten entire ranks, which was an absolutely staggering amount of energy at his level. He’d also gained a new skill and a new trait. He’d made some important discoveries about himself and was closer than ever to bringing Sarah back.
Speaking of which, he thought.
Morgan opened his traits tab and checked on his Perfect Self to see how far he still needed to go.
Perfect Self - The road to the Pinnacle of power is nearly at its end. Gather the required energy and find your Perfect Self.
Progress - 99%
Well, he thought, that’s a bit of a surprise.
The extra percentage didn’t really matter all that much. He already knew what needed to be done if he wanted to reach the Pinnacle, and the one thing that was stopping him right now was the beast still stuck in his head. He could feel it now, more clearly than ever. He could even see it, trapped within the cage he’d constructed in his mind to keep the beast locked away. But more than that, he could hear him, his voice a constant buzzing in the back of his mind.
“My, don’t you look positively bursting?” Gold said, stepping out of thin air before him.
“Bursting, perhaps, but still not quite there yet,” Morgan replied, still looking down to the ground below.
He’d felt Gold coming from the momen
t the god had stepped into space. Morgan still wasn’t sure what mode of transportation they used or how to make it work himself, but he suspected it had more to do with their own godly Essence than any great secret of power. For one, it didn’t trip any of the alarms the gnomes had set up, and for another, he couldn’t detect a hint of the natural power that this world generated, not even around the exit point.
“No, not quite there, I’m afraid,” Gold repeated, still grinning like an idiot. “Afraid I’ve got some more bad news on top of that,” he continued.
“I was in the Well longer than I realized, and we have about a day before the rulers of Faeland meet to declare war on the humans for supposedly killing their queen,” Morgan cut in.
“Wrong. You were in the Well longer…Wait, how did you know?” Gold asked, seemingly surprised.
“Just a lucky guess,” Morgan replied.
Truthfully, it hadn’t been hard to piece it all together after hearing about the mourning period in the gnome camp. They had practically handed him the information he’d needed to put this all together. As for him being stuck in the Well for three days, despite it feeling like a few hours — well, he’d had some experience with that before.
“Lucky guess at that,” Gold grumbled.
“Are you going to take me where I need to go to finish my evolution, or are you just going to stand there and sulk?” he asked, finally looking up. “Because, according to my calculations, we have about a day for me to advance, obtain the godly Essence I’ll need, and revive Sarah.”
“Oh, about that,” Gold said, causing Morgan’s eyes to narrow. “Calm down. We’re still bringing Sarah back.”
“Then what is it?” he asked, still glaring at the man.
“I’m afraid you’ve just made a tiny little mistake on the whole plan thing.”
