Invir parried the stab, pushing the spear into the ground. His retaliatory lunge turned into a stumble by legs betraying him from exhaustion. His arms burned, yet he managed to raise his blade, letting it sink into the chest of his enemy. Madness gleamed in the Krovath’s eyes as he grabbed the hilt and dragged Invir closer.
The masked barbarian pulled a bone dagger from his belt as his lifeblood seeped out the wound. Invir saw his doom in the sharpened edge yet was unable to mount even a perfunctory resistance. Warmth followed cold as blood seeped down his throat. It mixed with the Korvath’s blood and they fell onto the ground. The roars of war raged all around, with Lords and Heralds battling in the sky above.
How did it come to this? He’d joined the town guard for its steady pay and reputable enough status to court Dara. If he’d made sergeant, he could have afforded a house in the third district in just fifty years. Everything was in place, so why did he ignore Dara’s pleas when the recruiters passed through town?
Greed. He’d seen the Lords flying in the sky, their lifespan counted in millennia. Making captain wasn’t enough to come in contact with the mysterious truths and profound methods required to reach that step. He’d sacrificed happiness for the chance of power. Now, he’d die like a cockroach on the ground, his strength not even at the level of his old instructor back home. War was a sickness of the mind!
The fragments of Invir’s life passed through Zac’s mind in a flash, replaced with another in an unending stream. A hundred wars, a thousand lives, a million deaths. Some lives were heroic, others ignoble. The Eternal Crusade enshrined everything from F-grade cultivators who’d barely stepped onto the road of cultivation to Peak Hegemons with eons of experience.
There were as many causes as there were beings. Justice, wealth, revenge. Some experiences could become tales of valor and bravery, others tales of caution.
The memories of war and their origins stacked, forming mountains that overshadowed everything else. Each revolution tried to wash away Zac’s path and replace it with its own. Zac desperately held onto a core of self. It grew harder and harder when facing a millennium of memories, and his own life became nothing but a footnote.
Finally, there was release. The last glimmering light in the towering crystal faded, and no more memories were added to the storm raging in his mind. Separating what was his and what was outside influence would have been impossible without his Void State. Even then, he’d come awfully close to having his life scattered among the ancient cultivators.
With the self extracted, tranquility returned, allowing the mountains of a thousand lifetimes to sink into the depths of Zac’s mind. The encyclopedia of experiences added to the struggles Zac had endured to reach his current heights and the insights he’d gained into Conflict from his personal crusade.
Zac could see the path forward, and he knew that an Earthly Dao would be a huge help in overcoming the dangers he’d face in the near future. And yet, his hand didn’t move, no matter how much his body screamed at him to consume the treasure. He sighed in defeat and closed the lid, stowing the box before the enticing fluctuations could change his mind.
“You did the right thing.”
“I failed in the end,” Zac said, looking up at the enormous crystal with regret.
It had been just under a year since he advanced his Branch of the War Axe in the wake of his breakthrough into Middle Hegemony. Aiming for an Earthly Dao after such a short window could be considered greedy, but war was an incubator for the Dao of Conflict. He’d spent every day on the battlefield fighting for his life, finding the truths of Conflict at the edge of life and death.
His comprehension had gone through multiple cycles of broadening and sharpening, advancing far quicker than his Branches of Pale Seal and Kalpataru. It hadn’t been enough. Forming an Earthly Dao was a huge step, where you created a Dao uniquely yours. Dao Fragments could be considered prefabricated snacks provided by the System, and Dao Branches dinners made by following a recipe.
An Earthly Dao was a dish of your invention, designed to perfectly suit your taste based on your understanding of ingredients, palate, and cooking technique. That was the true meaning of the slightly confusing name. It didn’t have any connection with the Earthly Peak. The Earthly in Earthly Dao referred to the distinction between man and the Heavens.
An Earthly Dao was a complete, man-made Dao. It was the very first step of the journey that would end with becoming a Seal or a Throne, where your personal Dao rewrote reality. Zac hadn’t quite reached that point, feeling his comprehension lacked something to qualify as a signature dish.
The issue was his lack of time. A few more years of battle or a few decades of digesting and refining his experiences would have done the trick. Zac didn’t have that luxury, and he didn’t want to fill in the gaps by relying on treasures. He’d hoped the Eternal Crusade would provide the answer. Understanding and deconstructing the experience of others could help him better understand his path.
It had worked. His understanding of Conflict had taken another step forward. Unfortunately, he’d realized he wasn’t ready to crystallize an Earthly Dao just as he stood at the threshold. The things he remembered were not fully his yet, and the fractured memories had left a few blanks that caused imperfections.
Borrowing concepts that he didn’t fully understand to add the Void into his core had worked out well. Doing the same with his Dao would be no different than poisoning his path. Dao was the lynchpin of cultivation, and Conflict stood in the center of his path. Any weakness would ripple into every aspect of his cultivation, creating cracks in his foundations that would be extremely difficult to fix.
“It would have been nice having an Earthly Dao before setting out.”
“Which makes it all the more important you didn’t take it,” Rava said. “A moment of weakness will lead to a lifetime of regret.”
“Did you know it wouldn’t be enough?”
“You’re wrong. It was enough—you just need more time. My reservations came from your age. You’re but a child who has lived for a moment. How can you take in millennia of experience so easily? Now that you’ve survived without losing yourself, you only need to give it time to internalize.”
“Time is exactly what I don’t have,” Zac said with a shake of his head. “Those memories… they were real, weren’t they?”
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“They were.”
“Why were there so many unrelated memories? Most of them weren’t battle or training. And so many low-grade cultivators?”
“The experiences come from the collapsing souls of fallen soldiers. The memories that survived were those that had the greatest impact—good or bad. Love, camaraderie, happiness. Setbacks, betrayal, regrets. These core memories formed their paths and shaped their future. Conflict does not exist in a vacuum—there is always a causality, even if it doesn’t make sense to an outsider.”
“The order went around and reaped the souls of the departed?”
“It is more accurate to say we presented a choice, and they were volunteered,” Rava said as she looked at the crystal, where lights had begun to ignite. “For many, being forgotten is more terrifying than death. Through the Eternal Crusade, they have a chance to live on forever in the memories of others.”
Zac grunted and got to his feet. It was disappointing not to form an Earthly Dao. Even then, he didn’t regret spending his last merit on the Eternal Crusade. Rava was right in that his age was working against him. A thousand years’ worth of memories had suddenly been crammed into his head. Most templars who used the relic were already a few thousand years old, and their minds were already used to dealing with such a wealth of memories.
He almost felt like machines were whirring in the back of his mind, extracting the insights hidden in the stream of memories and adding them to his own experiences. He would not break through before they set out, but he should do so before reaching the Foreign Gods. At least, he hoped so, just like how he prayed [Void Heart] would finish its refinement sooner rather than later.
His heart had benefitted greatly in addition to the boost to his insight into the Dao of Conflict. The Eternal Crusade was one of the special training devices placed in the Hall of Heroes, which had first required passing a series of other feats. Surviving it added a last round of tempering to round out his boot camp.
“Do you regret not focusing on your other branches? Your odds of success were far greater if you chose the Altar of Revival instead.”
“I have another plan for them. Besides, it wouldn’t have made much of a difference,” Zac said. “Late or Peak—it’s still Dao Branches, even if I boost the concepts with Dao Braids and other methods. It can’t bridge the qualitative difference of possessing an Earthly Dao.”
“Are you leaving?”
“For now,” Zac nodded. “I’ll leave my elites in your care.”
“I’ll fulfill my end of the agreement,” Rava said. “On that note, I have a mission for you.”
“Is it related to the pillar?” Zac frowned. “I already—”
“Do not worry, Voidwalker. I’m not asking you to revive our order or strike down our enemies,” Rava said with some helplessness. “You and the others are planning on desecrating the remnants of our empire and pillaging our treasures.”
“Uh—”
“Any relics related to the empire and its orders can be traded in for glory. There is no upper limit.”
“Thank you. I’ll see what I can do,” Zac said.
He had no reason to decline such a win-win task. Rava got to reclaim some lost artifacts of her people, and Zac got a chance to replenish his exhausted merit pool. The things left by the Limitless Empire that had survived until today were often powerful. That didn’t mean they were useful for him or his subordinates.
Instead of letting unidentifiable and unusable relics collect dust in the Atwood Empire’s treasury, they could be directly converted into opportunities with Rava. Three weeks had given him the chance to drastically strengthen his foundations while gaining a full five levels. And yet, he and the others had only scratched the surface of what the temples had to offer.
“And thank you for all your help over the past weeks. I’ll hopefully be back in a few months.”
“Be careful. History is repeating itself, gathering momentum for the Zenith.”
Zac left the Ensolus Ruins and returned to his compound. The boot camp had officially ended a few hours ago, with the rest of the sealbearers having returned already. Three weeks in templar training had taken the years of bitter struggle and sharpened it into strength and purpose. There was so much to do and so much potential to excavate. Unfortunately, they’d run out of time.
They were three days away from the start of the mission, and everyone needed to rest and prepare. The very first step of their plan was to break through the Wall of Resolution, and the Imperial Graveyard would be filled with danger. Going in physically and mentally exhausted was suicide.
The others had all retreated to their homes and were no doubt in a deep sleep after having been deprived of rest for weeks. Zac was no different, though his rest was interrupted too soon when an alarm went off. He reluctantly roused himself and lit a small fire in his courtyard.
Twenty minutes later, the flame shuddered. An ember leaped into the air, causing space to shudder. The floating flame expanded, consuming space and distance to form a steady gate. Zac mutely looked at the spectacle, not knowing what to say as he took a step back to avoid the blazing heat. Iz never failed to impress, forming a direct tunnel instead of using a Teleportation Array.
“You made it,” Zac smiled as his Draugr half went up to greet Catheya.
“Buddy!” Kruta grinned, his face flushed red as he rushed forward. “I’ve missed that face of yours!”
“Ah?” Zac said, his exhausted mind suddenly wide awake.
A blazing flame erupted atop Kruta’s head as he unleashed a herculean punch. Zac raised his hand to block, surprised to find himself pushed back a few steps. He was even more surprised by the cascade of Conflict-imbued flames that swept over him. There was no time to ask about the transformation. An enormous blade covered in spiritual flame descended on him. Axe met blade, and the collision would have leveled his manor if not for the defensive arrays that sprung into action.
“Use your words!”
A frigid chill swept through the compound, leaving a layer of frost while extinguishing the remaining flames. Zac waved his hand to disperse the dense mist formed by the collision of opposing elements. He smiled sheepishly at Catheya before getting a proper look at his attacker.
The most attention-grabbing thing was the Ancestral Spirit standing behind Kruta. He was far larger and corporeal than before, almost looking like he was made from flesh and blood. However, the spirit had seen a drastic transformation, where it was made from extremely fierce flames instead of an unattuned spiritual energy.
Kruta’s physical transformation wasn’t nearly as obvious. The burly orc had gained a slight reddish tint, otherwise looking mostly the same as before. His transformation came from the flames that still burned atop his head. They had spread across his body, forming a semi-opaque armor that seemed to fulfill the same function as his spiritual network.
“Welcome to Earth, Little Candle.”
“Evil star!” Kruta said, his eyes wide with indignation.
“What’s wrong?” Zac asked, a helpless smile tugging at his lips. Zac obviously knew some of it. He still remembered the kind of training Ogras had been put through. How could the attention of one of the top elders of the Tayns be any less hair-raising?
“You, what kind of friend are you?! Do you know how I’ve suffered to come to your aid? Do you know how close to death I’ve come from having my fate tested on a daily basis? I’m surprised I don’t already know the ancestors on a first-name basis. Two weeks ago, I thought I was free. I could finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. I could smell the grass after years of nothing but ash and blood! And you leave me behind?! Come, let Kruta give you one good punch!”
Zac scratched his chin under the unrelenting glare of his orcish friend. “I’m sorry about that. I figured you wouldn’t mind after becoming a disciple of one of their elders.”
“Ai, it was Little Ca—Kruta’s—fault for being greedy,” Kruta exhaled. “I knew that grabbing the seal back then would send a tribulation my way. I didn’t understand how much I would have to suffer before I even got to the trial.”
“Your aura is a lot stronger,” Zac offered.
“I am!” Kruta said, his harrowed expression giving way to almost childish glee. “I never expected to surpass the ancestors. Coming close would have been enough to become a member of the tribal council, get a nice world tent and enough wives to keep Kruta busy. Now? There’s no limit! And hog duty for all who crossed me!”
“Well, I’m glad you’re here,” Zac smiled, not wanting to know what hog duty entailed.
“So, your wife updated me on your plans. When’s the skeleton coming?”
“In a couple of days.”
“Can he be trusted?”
“Not in the slightest.”
“I’ll give you this. I never have to worry about lacking excitement with you around,” Kruta said as he curiously looked around. “Now, will you please offer Kruta something to drink? Something icy-cold and refreshing!”