A Lightbearer of Two Worlds

by FallenDispair

This is He Who Fights With Monsters world taking the background lore of destiny, altered with the multiverse theme of Will Wight's Cradle Series. A much more mature Jason, older and having severed as an Australian special forces soldier. He's dealt with killing and isn't nearly as immature and naive as cannon Jason. A reworking of my Outworlder Guardian story. Better sum inside.

1. Chapter 1

A Lightbearer of Two Worlds

All rights reserved to Shirtaloon (making up the bulk/practically a rewrite), Bungie and Will Wight.

A/N: I'm taking He Who Fights With Monsters' verse adding/altering the Abidan divisions from Will Wight's Cradle Series that serve the Great Astral being, The Creator (Destiny's Traveler) and expand reality/order, pushing back against the darkness/chaos.

Important: Read for context.

The first Diamond rankers to ascend beyond their worlds into the Deep Astral and bond themselves to the Creator through its Ghosts -turning them into half transcendent entities that were both physical and spiritual capable of living in the Deep Astral- and created the Abidan. A part of the bond involved the Eledari Pact, which allows them to tap into the Astral being's paracausal powers but are forbidden from directly interacting with the physical realms of mortal entities, leaving them to their fates -even total annihilation. Only able to intervein when outside/astral powers threaten the stability and fate of a world.

The diamond rankers unable to bond with the Creator's Ghosts serve under the Lightbearers to aid in the expansion of creation.
Then from the Lightbearers came those that grew stronger by manifesting Mantles representing aspects of reality, gaining power of a full transcendent being. They became the leaders of the Abidan called Judges, forming the Court of Seven.

Each Judge created Divisions with those that exemplify their aspect of reality.

The Mantle of the Builder went to who best exemplifies Creation/Building physical reality, taking on the name of Adriel to lead the Builders of the Builder Division. The Builder division is dedicated to creating new Iterations through the management of World Seeds from the Creator through their abilities to access and maintain the underpinnings of the universe's templates, giving birth to new worlds capable of supporting life and the creation of souls. They are proficient in astral magic, but excel in building constructs and weapons.

The Mantle of the Phoenix goes to who best exemplifies Restoration takes on the name of Suriel to lead the Phoenixes of the Phoenix Division. The Phoenix division of the Abidan is dedicated to restoring and preserving dimensional integrity that protects the physical worlds of reality which produces souls, that fuel's the astral that keeps the void at bay. They also act as the healers of the Abidan, able to revert the dead to living and destroyed worlds to whole.

The Mantle of the Reaper goes to who best exemplifies the finality of Death, taking on the name of Ozriel, the Reaper to lead the Reapers of the Regulator Division. The Regulator division is dedicated to the balance of souls within the astral and physical reality by ensuring dead souls are safely migrated to the astral. More physical realities cannot be made until the Astral has a significant number of souls within it to expand the boarders of reality.

The Mantle of the Warlock goes to who best exemplifies Magical Understanding, taking on the name of Durandiel to lead the Warlocks of the Magic Division. The Magic division is dedicated to the preservation and maintenance of the astral through the understanding of magic's underlying nature that is threaded throughout existence. Magic being the substance that makes up the astral and the medium between the soul and physical reality. They also handle inter-division problems like squabbles and physical confrontations between individuals from different divisions. They tend to have enhanced magical abilities focused around knowledge, control and manipulation of magic energies.

The Mantle of the Spider goes to who most exemplifies Sight, taking on the name of Telariel the Spider to lead the Spiders of the Watcher Division. The Watcher division handles communication and detection throughout reality. The members have vision that threads throughout reality and can see fate. They detect incursions of Fiends and the Vroshir -agents of chaos/darkness/corruption- from the Void into Iterations. Coordinating responses to said threat and deploying the appropriate division to handle any problem, from dimensional instability to corruption of a world's fundamental structure by outside forces.

The Mantle of the Hunter goes to who best exemplifies Speed/Movement taking on the name of Zakariel the Hunter to lead the Hunters of the Hunter Division. Their members excel in the ability to move throughout reality and the astral with ease. The Hunter division handles exploring the edges of the Deep Astral for the Abidan using their excellent mobility and stealth, finding ideal areas for the creation of a new iteration to be secured by the Titans and built by the Builders. They are also the recon force and rescue teams of the Abidan.

The Mantle of the Titan goes to who best exemplifies Protection, taking on the name of Gadrael the Titan to lead the Titans of the Titan Division. Their members specialize in abilities of absolute defense. The Titans handle setting up barriers and defenses against the forces of the Void for the protection of reality. They are the defensive force that fights off invading forces of chaos that try devouring reality. They also build the wards around Haven that secures dangerous and powerful weapons/artifacts of significance. Haven also houses offenders; typically individuals that attempt to return to a mortal realm to either rule or steal from them, and Diamond rankers that cause issues across multiple worlds -setting loose a mutative/lethal virus, waging wars and aiding the Vroshir in raiding and destroying worlds, though most of those offenders tend to be executed. The Titans also guard Asylum: an entire Iteration dedicated to imprisoning class one fiends strong enough to endanger Judges and the Creator. Fiends of such power are too significant to be destroyed without such an effort and expense of power that the Abadan Judges would be weakened to the point that the Vroshir would be able to destroy them.

Then there is the Darkness of the Endless Void that constantly eats away at reality, the Deep Astral, as it lives outside it. It was more an aspect in antitheses of reality producing Fiends that only hunger to devour existence, including the Creator itself. The Abidan protects the Creator by hunting down and destroying Fiends, but Class-One Fiends are strong enough to threaten the existence of Judges, and enough of them could -in theory- devour the Creator.

The previous Adriel; Daruman, an unparalleled genius capable of taking on any of the Mantles, named successor to all Judge positions, turned traitor. He bound himself to the Darkness to become a Great Astral Being: the added title of the Witness signifying his new station. It was the only ever occurrence of a mortal rising to become a paracausal entity, stronger than the Judges, on par with the Creator. He had tried to steal the power of the Creator, only stopped by the intervention of the previous Ozriel and Durandiel. The Warlock managed to separate the Witness from the Creator by disrupting his working as the Reaper died delivering a heavy blow that forced Daruman to flee.

Unfortunately, the Creator was wounded during their struggle, weakening all Lightbearers in turn. Thus, the Abidan were unable to hunt down the wounded Witness as Fiends pounced on reality, drawn like wolves on the sent of raw meat. The weakened Abidan had to focus all their power on repelling the Fiends of the Void. Even so, numerous Iterations -along with trillions of lives- were lost, devoured by Fiends.

Daruman, the Witness created the Vroshir upon his defection and failed plans for the Creator, using the power of the Void to create unique Class-One Fiends called Worm Gods, using their parasitic larvae to infect humanoid souls to create humanoid-fiends he calls Hive. The exceptionally rare few who's soul ends up devouring the larvae instead of being devoured are mutated into superior Hive so strong that they are considered Gods. Such as Savathun, the Hive God of cunning and deception. Oryx, the Taken King, so mighty to have killed the Worm God Akka, becoming able to control the power of the darkness to take any and all. Xiva Arath, Hive God of War that leads most of the Vroshir forces against the Abadan.

The Witness used his knowledge to create the Vex constructs he'd acquired while being the former Builder. They snip away at reality by stealing chunks of physical reality to anchor his own creation, a reality of his own making with inhabitants -humanoid souls- stolen from numerous worlds to be used as future Hive or food for them.

The methods leave the worlds intact and are done through proxies that live on those iterations that have been implanted with Entropic Seeds -gifting them with powers such as Stasis and Strand while giving the Witness control over them. Most being willing as they gain power, even if they don't fully accept the Seed into their soul. But those that do tend to jump a rank while gaining unique powers of the Darkness. Because of this fact, mortals opening themselves to Daruman's power in the same manner as the Abidan does through Racal gifts, essences and awakening stones -indirect interaction with physical realities not forbidden by the Eledari Pact, the Abidan can't interfere directly.

Though there are instances where Daruman, the Witness directly attacks iterations, forcefully taking or devouring reality. This tends to leave the Iterations raided by the Vroshir broken and corrupted. Some decay entirely, devoured by Fiends and the Void, or, if they are salvageable, they are repaired and stabilized by the Abidan. In such instances, the Abidan directly intervenes sending forces to stop/repel the Vroshir. Even so, the Witness tends to attack sporadically and on multiple fronts, using several attacks as misdirection to succeed.

A/N: I really enjoyed Shirtaloon's work, but I can't stand Jason Asano. At first he was funny and had potential but he just ended up being an over-the-top, annoying MC that never develops past any issues. He repeatedly makes the same mistake and bringing up his issues of killing people and how he is evil. I honestly couldn't even finish book eight it got so bad, just barely making it through book seven.

So many MCs of late are stupid and over-the-top like Jason and Monkey D. Luffy. Realistically, they'd have been put down hard and fast. I prefer the more serious but full of character Ichigo Kurosaki and Wei Shi Lindon template that put effort and planning in saving people, doing what needs to be done instead of running around yelling about how great they are and acting childish with no plans, lucking out of most situations. So, this Jason Asano will be OOC being more like Ichigo mixed with Lindon's cunning and planning. Obviously he'll have his moments of anger and immaturity as no one is perfect, just nowhere as bad as cannon Jason.

This Jason dropped out of his first year of college and enlisted in the Australian Defense Force (ADF) upon finding his childhood friend turned girlfriend cheating on him with his older bother. When he was 24 he ended up knocking up a random one-night-stand; Mai Rake. It wasn't until the child was born and the young lady had committed suicide from untreated postpartum depression that he knew of the child; Tyler Rake. She'd wrote in his name on the boy's birth certificate and seeing as she had no family, he was given custody. Though, as a active serviceman, he had to get his sister to take legal guardianship of him while on deployment. His son growing up mostly as a member of Erika's family, even Emi seeing him as a little brother.

After five years of active service he applied and passed the Special Force Screen Test to join Australia Special Air Service Regiment (SASR). Once making it through all four phases of the 21-day SAS Selection Course he progressed through the 16-month reinforcement cycle. He became an official Snake eater by 26, though going back for additional courses to qualify as an officer in the regiment.
After three years of active peacekeeping missions with US Special Forces in the Middle East doing counter-insurgency, counter-terrorism, reconnaissance and hostage rescue his son was diagnosed with leukemia.

Jason was granted emergency leave to take care of his son, only for him die several months later at the tender age of six. Jason left the military upon burying his only child, guilty for not being their more, spending more time overseas than at home. Maybe 30 days a year, 8 months gone with 1 month at home before being sent off on another tour of duty.

He'll be more mature and capable with military training. Jason will have already killed and dealt with those type of horrors before arriving in Pallimustus. He won't be so naïve about death and real world implications of his actions.

I'll be replacing/fusing some of HWFWM characters with those from the Cradle Series such as Eithan, and those in the know can guess where he is.
Don't worry, I won't make Author Notes nearly as large as this one going forward.

Chapter 1: Surviving Monsters & Cannibals in a Hege Maze.

Jason woke up naked, face down in the grass. That was not how he expected to wake up, since he had gone to sleep in his own bed. From the feel of the cool grass on his groin, he had been removed from his bed and boxer shorts both. The last thing he remembered was putting away a few beers while watching a footy game with his dad and brother-in-law. They were checking up on him as they've been prone to do over the last year, after his son's death.

At first, he'd lived with his older sister Erika for a while after leaving the military and burying his barely six year old son, Tyler. It helped that her husband Ian Evans was a doctor and Emi, his niece ended up being a bright spot in his dark times. Jason had loved babysitting her over the years, when he could and the best memories he had with his son was times spent with Erika's family. Birthday parties he timed his leave around or just barbes. His older sister Erika had even set him up with a single bedroom apartment in Melbourne to be near her.

She was worried about him for obvious reasons as he'd left his career and was only semi-working for Erika's cooking show. He had cohosted several episodes before over the years with great success so her producer had no issues with hiring him on. Though he was less enthusiastic and did them rarely. Erika still had him appear on a few episodes and kept on payroll as a creative advisor.

Jason knew he was struggling on deciding what to do now that his life had fallen apart. Without Erika he could very well be some homeless bloke neck-deep in drink. He had gone to sleep wondering how he could ever pay her back for all that she has done for him. Nearly a year later and he only got a job working at an office supply store and started to try living again.

Now he woke up on weirdly comfortable dense bed of lush green softness. It wasn't like any grass he had encountered before. Which was odd as his father was a landscape architect and he'd spent a lot of time helping his father on jobs for his allowance growing up. It was also a way to avoid his mother's Japanese lessons. So, Jason was familiar with various types of grass and shrubbery.
J

ason rolled himself over and sat up. He was feeling odd, there was a lingering spoor, but also a feeling of refreshed energy. He ran a hand over his head, only to be startled when he realized his hair was missing.

"Uh..."

He felt about his head with both hands, but his head was balloon smooth. Which was odd for he had a full head of silky black hair when he went to sleep, cropped short, close to the head but enough to feel through his fingers.

"What the..." he let out dumbfoundedly before looking down. "Fucking hell, did someone shave off all my hair, even my pubes? That's sick. This better not be my old mates idea of a prank."

Jason knew his men despite being absolute professionals on missions could do some really stupid shit for kicks and to decompress, but would they actually do this? Maybe a misguided attempt at making him feel better?

He let out a sigh before he started to fully examine the rest of his body. Upon which he found all his scars and tattoos were gone. A decade of active combat had left scars from knife wounds, shrapnel, burns and bullet holes. There was one tattoo in particular he desperately tried see; the name, date of birth and death of his son over his heart. Running his hands over his chest, even clawing at it, as if it was underneath his skin. But there wasn't even a single dot of ink or a scar from laser removal. His body was pristine now, as if it'd never been touched until now. That was until he felt the scar running down over his right eye, from above the brow down to his cheek.

He wondered why just that one was still there when everything else was gone, but then he realized what was so different from that one scar: It was the symbol of his greatest failure that ran down to his very soul. His first mission where things went FUBAR and destroyed his naivety about right and wrong, and killing in general. His first real look at true evil and his failings unleashing that evil upon innocent children.

That scar was forever branded into his very being. It was the defining moment of his life that knocked him out of his moral superiority and forced him to grow up. To see the world for what it really was. But his son death was the same, so why wasn't the tattoo still there? Maybe because it came after the fact or the scar over his eye happened during the defining moment?

After shaking away the oddity of his scar and lack of other marks on his body, he started assessing his environment. All while trying to desperately not think about what happened to his body. Casting his gaze to the sky, he saw that the sun was high and the air was warm. The sky was unbroken blue, the blazing orb burning away so much as the merest hint of cloud. Sunburn, more than cold, was likely to threaten his exposed extremities. He really didn't want to relive the experience of having sunburned genitals.

The pealing alone was enough not to want it. Jason shuddered and mentally repressed the experience.
Looking around, he saw that he was boxed in between two long, tall hedges. Glancing up and down the dead-straight lane, side-junctions headed off at sharp right angles in either direction. The lane itself was wide and grassy, with plenty of room for even small groups of people to comfortably walk. The hedge walls were meticulously trimmed, professionally so in fact, at least based on his experience with his father's business.

Jason glanced down at his bald, naked body, seeing his compact muscle forged through years of military training and active combat deployments held on his broad frame -that he'd inherited from his mother's side of the gene-pool, her father and brother actually.* He was an odd mix of Asian traits with rough cocky aussie frame. Jason also had long limbs that matched his tall height, ridiculously so by Asian standards, topping out at 6'3" by time he graduated high school.

He wasn't quite as cut as he once was. Months of heavy drinking, ignoring his physical conditioning and overall lack of self care had softened him up a bit. Though he had cut back his drinking to occasional beers every now and again, started continuing his training routine and was eating healthy again. Much to his sister's pleasure. The professional chief was most irked with him when he started eating junk food and fast food.

Jason shook off his idle thoughts and set off at random to explore and hopefully find some pants. He quickly discovered he was in a hedge maze, the living walls cultivated to almost twice his height. Jason's first thought was to climb one to get a better sense of his location, but a closer examination of the hedges changed his mind. Instead of the usual boxwood, the hedges were something very prickly, and he was very naked. He'd rather put off scrapping his junk for as long as he could.

Plus that'd leave him very exposed. He looked up and down the path he was on, with neither direction looking any better than the other.
That was when all the unexplainable stuff can back in force. He could believe someone had kidnapped him, even shaved him bald for some reason and drop in a maze. Most likely full of horrible traps and armed killer and/or vicious man-eating beast wandering around to hunt him. A sick revenge/thrill from many of the powerful/vile people he has pissed off over the years doing his job. But the pristine nature of his body was impossible. Even if someone went through the expense to give him plastic surgery to remove all his scars and tattoos -which he wasn't sure was even possible- there'd still be marks from the surgery. At least patches of rough or discolored skin.

It was like magic.

"What the bloody hell is going on?"

As if in response to his question, something appeared in front of him. It looked like a touch screen, floating in the air, disembodied. He reached out to touch it with an experimental finger, the screen shimmering as his finger passed straight through.

"Hologram?"
He looked at the ground and the nearby hedges for some kind of projector, but as he started moving, the screen followed. There was text on the screen, which he read.

New Quest: [Stranger in a Strange Land]

You have awoken in a place you do not know. Explore the area to discover more.

Objectives: Explore the hedge maze 0/1. Reward: Simple pants.

"Huh?"

He looked around suspiciously. He carefully probed the pointy foliage of the hedge walls, looking for hidden cameras and projectors. Looking up at the sky, he didn't spot any camera drones. What he did notice was the moon, pale and easy to overlook in the daylight. Then he noticed another moon.

"That can't be right."

Jason looked down at the floating screen, then back up at the sky. Still two moons.

"Great. I've gone troppo."

Jason stood there, gripping the grass with his toes, relishing the sensation, unsure what to do. He kept glancing up at the sky and the extra moon. In front of him, the screen still waited patiently.

"This is crazy. I mean, a quest? I'm not a video game character."

Another screen appeared next to the first.

Jason Asano

Race: Outworlder Current rank: normal Progression to iron rank: 0% (0/4 essences)

Attributes:

[Power] (no essence): normal

[Speed] (no essence): normal

[Spirit] (no essence): normal

[Recovery] (no essence): normal

Racial Abilities (Outworlder)

[Interface]

[Quest System]

[Inventory]

[Map]

[Astral Affinity]

[Mysterious Gunslinger]

Essences (0/4)
No Essence [No Attribute] (0/4)
No Essence [No Attribute] (0/4)
No Essence [No Attribute] (0/4)
No Essence [No Attribute] (0/4)

"Is this a character sheet? Am I meant to understand any of this?"

He shook his head in bewilderment. "And my insanity chose to go with a system I'm not familiar with."

He looked over the screen again and read, "Map," latching onto something familiar. "I know what maps are. How do I see the map?"
A new screen obligingly appeared, but as it was the third screen, the space in front of him was getting crowded. He absently thought it would be convenient for the other screens to close, which they immediately did.

"What the..." Jason blew out a deep sigh at the absurdity of what was happening to him. Things were getting harder to explain away, even ignoring the extra moon and the miraculous return of his legs. Some kind of voice-command hologram was implausible, but not impossible. Mental command holograms were something else entirely.

"Yup, I've definitely gone troppo."

Hoping it wouldn't work, he started experimenting. He was able to open and close any of the windows with a simple thought.
"Maybe you're unconscious," he reassured himself. "Maybe you have a brain tumor and you're in a hospital somewhere. Or passed out on the floor. Hallucinating in an asylum. A nice one, with a big hedge maze. Or you never made it back from your last deployment..." He closed his eyes with a groan. "How is any of that comforting?"

Jason took a deep breath, letting it out slowly before opening his eyes again. The screens were still there, waiting.
"Just roll with the punches," he told himself. "Reserve judgment until more information is available. That's the rational approach."

He and his team of Snake Eaters had been put through the gauntlet numerous times. They'd endured the sadistic SASR training and all sorts of hellish combat through the years. One thing Jason had learned above all else, was keeping calm and tackling whatever challenge came his way. No time to second guess the whys or hows of a situation, just reacting and making it through.

He turned his gaze back to the map floating in front of him. It looked like a map from any videogame, complete with a location listing.

Zone: Vane Estate (Hedge Maze)

Though, it was mostly obscured. The only unveiled portion was the small section of the hedge maze he had already explored. He tried moving the map with mental commands, finding he could zoom it in and out as easily as he could open and close the disembodied screens.
Zooming all the way out he reached a world map that looked both familiar and unfamiliar. Although the details were obscured, he could decipher the outline of the continents. Disturbingly, they weren't quite the same as the ones he knew. South East Asia was a singular landmass, pushing Australia south and east where it looked to have consumed New Zealand. The Iberian and Arabian peninsulas were missing entirely, leaving Africa wholly disconnected from Europe and Asia. Sri Lanka was further south and several times larger, making for a huge land mass in the middle of the Indian Ocean. Japan looked to have absorbed north and south Korea into a single mass while being moved further south from China, forming a small ocean on par with the Indian Ocean between them. North and South America was completely separated with a small sea between them.

"Well, that's not what the world looks like. Inaccurate cartography? An older map from earlier explorations of the world?"
According to the map, Jason was in south-west Africa, somewhere around inland Namibia. He looked at the rich, green hedges boxing him in. The lush grass felt cool under his feet. He felt the hot, but not dry, air on his skin. He gave what many had referred to as his trademark scowl that made him look like he was looking for someone to punch.

"This is most definitely not the Kalahari Desert... unless this is some ridiculously expensive private estate. Maybe I was taken for some criminal lord's elaborate revenge after all." He looked around, trying to find the cameras the prick would be watching him through. Unless he was watching through a telescope from a high vantage point with good view of the maze.

He sighed, closing the map, "This is all sorts of strange." He pulled up the character sheet again.

Racial Abilities (Outworlder)
[Interface]

[Quest System]

[Inventory]

[Map]

[Astral Affinity]

[Mysterious Gunslinger]

"Shouldn't my race be human? What's an Outworlder?" Jason half expected another screen to appear, but nothing did, so he looked down the list.
"Interface seems obvious. Quest systems too, I guess. Inventory?"

A window appeared, dominated by a mostly empty grid of icon slots. There were five spaces down and eight across, for a total of forty. There was also what looked like a currency counter at the bottom, depicting six different coins. Each coin had a counter that read zero. Jason thought it held a resemblance to classic inventory systems most RPGs used.

"Can I really put stuff in here?"

There were two items in the inventory, each one occupying their own slot. One was some kind of blue icon, presumably representing an actual item, the second looked mostly the same but white.

"Alright, Jason. Time to see how far gone you really are. How do I get this thing out?"

After some quick trail and error, he discovered it was as simple as plucking the icon straight out of the screen. The icon vanished and the item appeared magically in his hand. It was a medallion the size of his palm. It looked and felt like polished sapphire marble with gold engravings on both sides. It was pleasantly warm to the touch. On one side the engraving was a picture of a fire bird, while the other had symbols reading 'Authority of the Phoenix.'

"Well, that just magically appeared out of thin air," Jason deadpanned. "That's not possible. Wait, why can I read this?" Jason had learned a multitude of languages, from English and Japanese to Arabic and Turkish, but what he was reading was most definitely was not any language he knew. "How can I read a language I've never even seen before?"

Jason tried putting the sapphire tablet back into the inventory. His first attempt was to shove it into the screen, which surprisingly worked. It vanished from his hands and reappeared as an icon.

"That defies physics," he lamented. "Bad sign for my sanity."

He repeated the process but with the white icon. It was a medallion just like the phoenix one but white with what looked like an odd techno moon on one side and 'Authority of the Creator' on the back. It also gave off a comforting feeling, like a warmth that filled his soul with life, protection, knowledge, and colder feelings like death all rolled into one.

Jason's grip on reality was feeling increasingly tenuous. The screens were odd, but could conceivably, if implausibly, be the product of hidden hologram projectors. It was when they started responding to his thoughts that he started to get worried, and now he was pulling objects out of thin air. Not to forget his hairless, fully restored body. He closed the inventory and pulled up his character sheet again. Next down the ability list was the map, which he'd already looked at, then astral affinity.

Ability: [Astral Affinity]

Increased resistance to dimension effects and astral forces. Dimension abilities have increased effect and transcendent damage is increased.

"No idea what that means. Next up is..."

Ability: [Mysterious Gunslinger]

Language adaptation. Essence, awakening stone and skill-book absorption. Immunity to identification and tracking effects.
Your soul had been marked by your reverence and skill with firearms, ensuring that the first awakened ability granted from an essence will be a conjured gun.

"Conjured guns, I could definitely use one of those, but I need an essence. Whatever those are?"

Help: Essence Abilities

Essence abilities are personal supernatural abilities. They come in a variety of forms, including passive abilities, special attacks and spells.
Compared to time-consuming and preparation-intensive ritualized magic, most essence abilities can be used spontaneously.

"Magic... sure, why not," Jason deadpanned. "And there's a help function? Can you help me get home?"

There was no response, which both disappointed him and was a relief. He'd be concerned if this weird game system stuff was sentient, possibly manipulating him. Still didn't help with the possibility that he'd gone mad.

He returned his focus to the other aspect of the mysterious gunslinger ability.

"Language adaptation? Is that how I read the weird writing on the tablet?"

He took the tablet out again. "What is this thing?"

Item: [The Phoenix Token] (transcendent rank, legendary)
? (consumable, ?)
Effect: ? Effect: ?
Uses remaining: 1/1

"Question marks. That's enlightening," he scowled at the useless information.

Jason put the blue tablet back into his inventory and pulled out the white tablet. He was surprised to find the weird screen was able to identify it.

Item: [The Creator Token] (transcendent rank, legendary)

Summons a piece of the Creator's light, that upon finding your soul to have the necessary spark, will bond with your soul, changing you on a fundamental level (consumable, summons).

Requirements: Spark of Light and Uncorrupted soul.
Effect: Summons [Ghost] that if it successfully bonds to the user's soul, will change your race to [Lightbearer] by triggering [Nirvanic Transfiguration].

Effect: Gift full essence set that can be declined.
Effect: Trigger multiple racial gift evolutions designed by the Court of Seven.

You meet the requirements to use this item.
You are able to activate [The Creator Token].
Activate Y/N?

Jason frowned at the description of the white medallion in his hands, "It'll give me a ghost that'll change my race... which is already not human. What is a nirvanic transfiguration supposed to be?"

Help: [Nirvanic Transfiguration]

Your body and soul will been combined into a gestalt entity both physical and spiritual in nature. This state will grant inherent resistance to effects that utilize the soul-body disconnect. The nature of your body will make you immune to all revival effects besides your own revival abilities and transcendent effects. Your soul will gain a significantly increased resistance to corruption.

The strength of your aura will be significantly increased.

The strength of your attributes will be significantly increased.

Your resistance to hostile dimension effects and disruptive force damage will be increased.

The effect of your dimension effects and your transcendent damage will be increased.
Physical reality around you will be more stable. You will be able to sense nearby astral space apertures and proto-astral spaces coterminous to your location.

You will be able to traverse astral space apertures, including those that are closed or have been sealed.

You will be able to directly enter proto-astral spaces coterminous with your location or directly leave a proto-astral space to a coterminous location

While within the astral, you will able to create and maintain a small zone of physical reality around you. This does not grant the ability to enter or traverse the astral.

Ghost will have access to all your racial abilities.

Your Ghost will be able to restore large amounts of your health, stamina and mana. The cooldown between each restorative effect will shorten with each advancement in rank.

When suffering lethal damage, your Ghost will be able revive you, restoring your body to a state of full integrity. This effect cannot be triggered again until you have increased in rank from the last time it was used. This ability will change on reaching diamond rank.

You will gain a permanent transcendent shield -resistant to all damage types- that ignores rank disparity. The strength and recovery of which will be congruent with your rank.

You will gain a heal-over-time effect that recovers a small amount of health, mana and stamina. This effect's strength will be congruent to your rank.
You will gain immunity to iron rank afflictions and increased resistances to higher ranked afflictions. This effect will grow in congruent with your rank.

Jason read through the effects several times, not sure how to take it. They would definitely help him but he wasn't sure about the whole soul thing. He was an atheist and didn't believe in the how soul and afterlife thing.

He just sighed in defeat, not sure what to do. The whole situation was insane. Looking closer, he noticed that the question about activating the token only appeared when he looked at the tablet while holding it. Putting it down would cause the prompt to disappear. While looking away or thinking about something else when holding the token would cause the window to shrink to the side.

He panned his head around the lush green hedge maze, thinking about his situation. He was lost, naked, hairless and lost all his tattoos. He wasn't certain if he was dead, in a coma or had lost his mind and was in a delusionary state.

Would using the summoning token push him deeper into that delusion?

Jason shook away the thoughts and decided he'd not use it. Even though the essences that'd give him guns would be much appreciated and the shields, healing and revival would be helpful, he didn't like the sound some powers being crafted by the Court of Seven. Clearly, it was an organization centered around the Creator, which he assumed was some sort of a god. He wasn't the biggest fan of religious organizations, having dealt with the horrors of zealots throughout his career.

Then there was the question of why the phoenix token was unreadable? Too many unknowns for his liking.

Jason put it away with its sapphire version and closed all the open windows except for the map. "Alright then," he said, looking up and down the pathway he was on. Neither offered anything to recommend it over the other. "Well, without a clear direction to go, any will have to do."

He picked a direction at random and set off.

---

Jason was walking through the maze, the map open in front of him. It was being unveiled as he walked. His current plan was to reveal enough that he could plot a way out. He froze when he heard a rustle in the hedges, then quickly spun towards the sound. His highly trained and experienced instincts flared out.

Something was out there.

"Who's there?" he demanded, his body shifting into his well practiced combat stance while trying not to think about how exposed his genitals were. He started panning his eyes around as he strained his ears for any sound of life, like a snapping twig or rustling of leaves.

There wasn't any response.

Jason has been ambushed countless times by either the SASR training secessions or actual assassins. From radicalized terrorists in cave systems, to ex-special forces turned mercenary in urban settings. His instincts had been sharpened to a razor's edge, though slightly dulled over the past year.

New Quest: [No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service]

Your immediate area has become infested with lesser monsters.

Objective: Discover the reason lesser monsters have infested the area 0/1.

Reward: Simple shirt.

Bonus Objective: Defeat ten lesser monsters 0/10.

Reward: Simple footwear.

Jason was continuing to hold a ready stance while focusing on panning his head around when something small came hurtling from the bottom of a hedge. His hands shot out and latched around a mass of furry, snarling buck teeth snapping at him. It looked like a rabid hamster the size of his head. After being put back from the sudden attack by an oversized hamster, Jason proceeded to jerk its head in one direction and its body in another in an attempt to break its neck. Unfortunately, that proved harder than from prior experience, though, those necks were human ones he'd been taught how to efficiently snap through internal decapitation.

The huge hamster on the other hand, writhed and struggled while snapping its teeth at him, trying to take a chunk out of his face. In frustration, Jason threw the creature to ground with all his might. The monster hit the ground hard, the soft grass offering little protection as it bounced back a bit. It twitched and shuddered, but he pounced on it before it could get up, stomping down on its head with a sickening crunch.

One of its eyes popped out its socket, screeching something terrible. Adrenaline pumping and its pained wails echoed as he repeatedly stomped down on it until it went silent. Blood, bone and grey brain matter were visible around what used to be its head and his bare foot. Unfortunately, the last killing blow caused a sharpened piece of skull to slice open his foot from the pad to the ankle.

"Crap!" Jason gritted out, seething as he hopped back, holding his wounded foot, letting a few more expletives loose as he fell onto his butt.

You have defeated [Potent Hamster].

Defeated lesser monsters 1/10.

Jason panned his head around for another attack encase something heard the hamster's death throng. After a few moments passed without a sound and no perceived movements, he returned his focus to the bleeding cut on the inside of his right foot, a firm grip above the wound. Looking back at the dead lump of the head-sized hamster, he grumbled, "What the hell is happening? How could a hamster get that big? And why attack me? Are hamsters omnivores?"

Jason looked over the creature, its head now a pulpy mass. According to the window that popped up it was a lesser monster called a Potent Hamster. Extending his index finger from his free hand, he poked at it.

Would you like to loot [Potent Hamster]?

Jason yanked back his hand, fearing it might trigger some sort of trap.

"What in the bloody hell is going on?"

Reading the screen again, and after cradling his wounded foot some more, uncertainly stated, "Yes?"

The body of the dead creature made a fizzing sound, like a rapid chemical reaction. The body started melting rapidly, first the flesh, then even the skeleton, all dissolving into rainbow-colored smoke. It seemed pretty until it hit Jason with a thick stench like burned hair and rotting flesh. He scrambled back while pinching his nose to escape the rancid smell, hacking out coughs. Which unfortunately didn't work as the bloody mess on his foot also dissolved. It was by far the worst thing he has ever smelled in his life, and he'd literally crawled through a tunnel of shit and piss.

The movement also had the unattended effect of agitating his injury, getting him to wince at the pain. Though, it was minor to the type of injures he has had to endure in the past and easily pushed it aside.

Looking back at where he'd killed the hamster, he saw the creature's body had vanished, as if it never existed at all. He ignored the window that popped up, looking over the, thankfully not too deep cut, but he also knew it'd hinder his movements. Feet were sensitive and pain would shoot up his leg every time he put his weight down on said foot.

"Bugger, this sucks," he told the spot where the hamster used to be. "Monster hamsters attacking out of nowhere, my foot is injured, that used to not be there and said monster just puffs out of existence like out of a bloody video game. I can't think of any better explanation for what's happening than I've lost my damned mind."

Jason just sat there for few more moments, his foot throbbing in pain, before he took calming breaths. He was hurt. Not badly, but he was experiencing pain. So, this wasn't some elaborate dream, it was real enough to hurt him. That meant, he had to act as if he was in an active combat zone filled with unknown dangers. No more questioning his sanity or trying to rationalize it all away. He'd been bled, meaning he could die. He'd have time to analyze the absurdity of monsters, magically removed tattoos and scars once he was safe.

He straightened up, but stayed seated on his rear as he read the screen waiting for him.

[Monster Core (Lesser)] has been added to your inventory.
[Healing Unguent (Iron)] has been added to your inventory.
10 [Lesser Spirit Coins] have been added to your inventory.

"Alright, straight into the inventory. Odd but helpful and that's all that matters right now, soldier. Focus," he told himself firmly.

Now familiar with opening and closing the screens, the inventory window appeared with a simple thought. Two more of the forty grids were now occupied with little icons, while the currency counter now had the number ten listed over the first of the six coin symbols.

Jason took out the item labelled healing unguent. It was a small, round tin reminding him of an old ointment tin his nanna would keep under the sink.
He took a closer look at the tin in his hand.

Item: [Healing Unguent (Iron)] (iron rank, common)

Topical healing ointment. Inexpensive concoction ideal for superficial injures (consumable, healing).

Effect: Apply directly to injuries to heal. Effect reduced on bronze-rank or higher individual.
Uses remaining: 5/5.

Jason pulled off the lid to discover it really did look and smell like the ointments his nanna would use when he was boy. There was a sharp, medicinal smell that cut through even the lingering stench of the dead creature. The contents were an oily substance that looked like butterscotch sauce made from dubiously sourced ingredients.

"How did I-" he cut himself off and just put the how and why aside for later. All that mattered was that he'd just got some much apricated medicine. He had languished from stab wounds and bullet holes without any aid enough to not care how, just that he had it.

Jason took a glop of the ointment and spread it on his injury. He couldn't very well walk around all that well if he didn't do something to patch up his foot. There was a tingling, burning sensation that he was familiar with, having been wounded enough times to get similar such reactions from disinfectant medical salves. Hopefully, that meant the healing unguent also disinfected the wound.

Infection was more likely to kill him from such a wound than anything else.
With relief and fascination, he watched the cut close shut, perfectly restoring his foot to normal. There wasn't even red irritated skin from the scratch left. It was like magic. Or exactly like magic.

You have used [Healing Unguent (iron)].

Uses remaining 4/5.

Jason nodded approvingly as he placed the tin back in his inventory and pulled out the other icon. What appeared in his hand was a small, red-brown gem, in shape of a teardrop.

Item: [Monster Core (Lesser)] (iron rank, common)

The magic core of a lesser monster (crafting material, magic core).

Effect: Common component for ritual magic and magic item creation.

"Oh, it's for magic rituals... which is real." Jason sighed with resignation as he put the monster core back in his inventory. It was harder and harder to not question his reality but he had to push along as if this was all real. The consequences of acting as if it weren't were worse than if they were.

Jason looked at the coin counter in his inventory, "How do I take that out?" He tried tapping on the number.

You have 10 [Lesser Spirit Coins].

How many would you like to withdraw?

"Ummm... One," he stretched out in uncertainty.

A coin appeared in Jason's hand. It was a washed-out blue color, with a metallic sheen but felt more like glass to the touch.

Item: [Lesser Spirit Coin] (iron rank, common)
An impure distillation of raw magic (currency, crafting material).
Effect: Used to fuel lesser-ranked magic items or as a ritual component.

Jason peered at the figure embossed on the coin. Looking closer, he realized it was an image of himself grinning.

He tapped his chin, "My chin isn't that pointy."

He turned the coin to look at the other side, which was engraved with text.

Product of Jason. G'day, mate.

He ran a hand over his face, groaning out in exasperation. Somehow the coin itself was more ridiculous than the fact that he had pulled it out of thin air.

---

When the slippery creature latched its teeth onto his inner thigh, Jason yelled more out of panic than pain. He still had no pants and that was much too close to his genitals. He grabbed the long, slippery eel by its head and pressed his thumbs down until he heard a crunch. His thumbs cracked through its skull and sunk into it brain, all the way past his second knuckles.

You have defeated [Flying Eel] Defeat lesser monsters 9/10.

Jason carefully unhinged the eel's jaw from his thigh and tossed it to the side. Dropping to the ground, he pulled out a tin of healing unguent and started rubbing it on the wound, ignoring the blood coming out of it.

"Why can an eel fly?" he groused.

He looked down at the wound, high up the inside of his thigh. The eel had left some rather deep teeth indentations, so the stinging lingered as the wound slowly closed. Even so, the ability to watch an injury vanish in front of his eyes was amazing.

You have used [Healing Unguent (iron)]
Uses remaining: 1/5.

After nine encounters with different creatures, Jason had only gone through one whole tin of healing unguent he'd gotten, and most of the second one. It wasn't until his fight against something called a malicious hedgehog that he even needed to use it again, going through a whole tin's worth and more. Apparently, fighting a mass of spiky barbs naked and barehanded was highly ill-advised.

He really wished he had a gun or at least a knife, a metal bat or even a well-sized stick would have done better. He was tempted to use the token simply for the fact it'd give him essences that his racial ability would ensure he got guns from them. Hell, just the magic shield would have stopped some of those barbs from piercing his flesh.

One pleasant discovery was that he didn't have to stand in the stinking smoke that came off them after they were looted. So long as he touched the creature he could back away before accepting. Even if he was far away from the dissolving creature, the loot went straight into his inventory. The only problem was that any of the creature's blood that got on him would dissolve away as well, giving Jason a full dose of the stink.

Every creature he looted gave out one lesser monster core and exactly 10 spirit coins. Most also produced additional, often nonsensical rewards. Tins of healing ointment were mercifully common, but mostly he received animal parts. That would have been understandable enough, given that he was killing creatures, but they arrived in his inventory already cut and packaged. The bundle of spines he received from the malicious hedgehog was bound with string, while the meat of the tyrannical pheasant came neatly wrapped in deli paper. The animal parts were listed as crafting materials, some of which seemed to be for cooking. While he did enjoy trying new food, Jason wasn't quite ready to put monster meat in his diet.

While he waited for the newest wound to heal, he checked the map again. He had a decent-sized chunk of the hedge maze mapped out now, but it was quite large and he'd met a lot of dead ends. He plotted out his next pathway and set out again.

---

There was a flower growing in the middle of the pathway, around a meter tall. With thick, gnarled stalk and ugly brown petals on a flower head looking like a fist full of knuckles. Everywhere else Jason had been, there was only uniform hedges and neatly cut grass. He watched it from a safe distance, but to all observation it was just a plant. He moved forwards cautiously, eyes glued to the flower. He gave it as wide a berth as he could, keeping at least two meters from it. Just when he thought he had passed without incident, the flower twitched, spraying spores all over him.

He got dizzy and fell to the ground, then felt a weight on his leg. A vine with a bulbous head had grown out of the ground near the flower stem, and was now winding its way around his leg. His head was swimming, but he clenched his teeth, fighting through the haze -this not being the first time he'd been dosed with something in a fight. He grabbed the vine as it moved up past his leg with both hands, the bulbous head opened up, clamping down onto his hand like a lamprey.

Ignoring the pain, Jason started hauling on it. The ground under the flower bulged, soil spilling away as a grotesque shape emerged from the earth. It looked like a root vegetable, but was the size and shape of a baby. The vine was attached to its stomach like an umbilical cord, while the flower grew out of its head. Getting up to his feet, he proceeded to yank on the vine and twist so the creature slammed into the hedge.

After it bounced off the hedge and hit the ground, Jason ran over and with a scream of anger, he stomped down on its head. With a sickening squelch, the plant monster's head broke apart like a melon having an unfortunate collision with a sledgehammer.

You have defeated [Carnivorous Mandrake]

Quest: [No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service]

Bonus objective complete: Defeat ten lesser monsters 10/10.

[Simple Footwear] has been added to your inventory.

Primary quest objective still available.

Jason just stood there for a few seconds, taking deep breaths to calm his anger. A baby plant monster just popped out of the ground and tried to eat him. It was an unintelligent... monster -he was still adjusting to the reality of monsters- that got the drop on him.

He was better than that!

"Come on. Get it together. I'm not becoming plant food."

Taking the footwear out of his inventory he discovered it was a pair of sandals. Although the thick grass was pleasant underfoot, Jason still put them on, remembering the damage he'd done to his foot when stomping the potent hamster to death. And a rather unpleasant run in with glass and his bare feet years ago.

Looking down at his otherwise naked self, he sighed out, "I'd still prefer some pants..." He looked at his legs and added, "Though, if the cost of getting my legs back is to go without pants for the rest of my life, it's one I'm more than happy to pay."

He looted the carnivorous mandrake, from a distance and it proved to be the most generous monster thus far with its loot, producing not only healing unguent, but also something new. Jason frowned at the object in his hand.

Item: [Trowel of the Blood Cult] (iron rank, uncommon)

A gardening implement enchanted to affect certain kinds of plants (tool).

Effect: Improves health of carnivorous plants.

The trowel looked sinister, made out of some kind of black metal with a red sheen. It carried the wear marks of having been used as a planting tool, but also had a razor edge that seemed wholly unnecessary for gardening purposes.

"Blood cult?" he read unhappily from the item description. "Great. Trapped in a cult's hedge maze, butt-ass naked, and they seem to be centered around blood. Nothing bad can come of that," he deadpanned.

"On the bright side, I at least have a weapon...sort of. But it'll do."

Jason kept the sharp trowel in a reverse grip -ideal for stabbing and slashing- while on the lookout for more monsters, and more concerningly, blood cultists. After checking his map again, he set off clutching his weapon.

Eventually he found a structure resembling an old European-styled well.

Jason looked at the well. It was a circle of bricks, the mortar aged and crumbling. There was a wooden bucket and crank, both weathered with age. It was the kind of rustically picturesque feature he could imagine someone putting at the center of their hedge maze.

Quest: [Stranger in a Strange Land]

Objective complete: Explore the hedge maze 1/1.

[Simple Pants] have been added to your inventory.
Quest complete.

100 [Iron Spirit Coins] have been added to your inventory.

Jason let out a sigh of relief and took the pants out of his inventory. They were made of plain white linen, with billowy legs and a very low crotch fit, held up by a drawstring.

"It kind of looks like the pants Majin Buu wore in DBZ..." he just shook his head at yet another oddity.

Putting aside fashion concerns, Jason slipped the pants on, walking around experimentally. They were sufficiently roomy that it didn't feel much different to walking around without them.

"I don't suppose I can get a quest for some boxers?" He waited for a few moments, but no window appeared. "Worth a try."

The wounds he suffered from the hedgehog and the flying eel left a wound on his thigh, calf, hand and arms, though they'd been healed. The pants immediately had stains of red and unguent-yellow, the one on his thigh could be misconstrued as a urine stain.

"Alright," he said to himself. "What's next?"

Sooner or later, he would need to find his way out of the maze, but the fact that his quest ended on reaching the well implied there was something special about it. He started by examining the wooden frame which had a simple crank and rope to lower a bucket, along with a little wooden roof to shield the mechanism from the weather. It only seemed to have worked to a degree, with a rope and bucket both looking worse for wear. The brickwork was likewise dilapidated, with mortar crumbling at his touch. He stuck his head over the well to look down. To his surprise, iron rungs had been affixed to the inside of the well, leading into the darkness below.

Next Quest: [Secrets of the Well]

You have discovered a ladder descending into the well. Do you have the courage to explore the depths?

Objective: Explore the well 0/1.
Reward: Awakening stone.

Bonus objective: Don't die 0/1.
Reward: Awakening stone.

"Don't die? No way that's ominous," he snarked. "And why are all the rewards awakening stones... whatever those are?"

Help: Awakening Stones.

Various forms of concentrated magic that awakens unawakened essence abilities.

"Okay... so items that'll get me more magic powers from those essences." He shook his head in resignation, "In for a penny, in for pound."
Jason was going down the rung of the well, just making it deep enough not to be seen by a passerby when he heard voices coming from somewhere close within the hedge maze.

"I tracked the aura of the mandrake that took my trowel," a gravelly male voice said. "Someone had already killed it and my trowel was nowhere to be found."

"Someone with those adventurers we caught?" another man asked.

"I don't care who they're with," the first voice said. "I'm going to kill 'em, cook 'em and eat 'em."

"I wanted to try some of that elf girl, but the mistress said we're keeping them all for the sacrifice. Bloody waste, if you ask me."

"Nah, elves ain't good eating. Not much meat on them, and what's there is all stringy. That human girl, she's the one you want. Lean and tender."

"I don't know, Dougall; she looked pretty tough to me. And we always have human. I just want a little variety, is all."

"Well, this lot is all spoken for, regardless."

Jason didn't let out a breath as he listened in a few rungs down the well until the voices faded into the distance. He ignored the fact that they were talking about elves in the face of their casual discussion on the pros and cons of eating people. Cannibals. Guess he now knows what the Blood Cult was all about. All things considered, cannibals weren't too far out the realm of what was believable. Compared to real monsters, magic, and apparently elves existing, cannibalistic cults was nothing too odd. Horrible, but realistic and historically proven. He considered it some more as he started climbing further down into the well.

"Great. This place is definitely enemy territory."

Jason wasn't exactly thrilled about his options. A quest with the explicit objective of 'don't die' wasn't great, but wandering a maze filled with cannibals seemed like the worse option. Sure, he was confident that he could take down the two men easily enough, so long as they weren't armed with something better than a knife, but they could have strange magic powers. Maybe if he took them by surprise?

The best option was to hope that he could find some sort of sewer system or underground tunnel where he could hide from this Blood Cult. He was going to need to use the token to get some more options than fighting an entire cult with a sharp trowel. He wasn't sure what the spirit of the Creator would do, but it did say something about bonding to it.

Then he'd get those essences that would give him a gun, shielding and healing. That was exactly what he needed. Though, using the token came with changing him on a fundamental level, affecting his soul by a Court of Seven -whoever they were. It sounded like a trap. He figured he could try stealth first before letting something into his soul and placing himself into someone's hands.

All he knew for certain, was that people were being held captive by cannibal cultists and were going to be sacrificed. His team had excelled at hostage rescue, though he'd prefer having some intel on the blood cult, this compound and having reconned the area first. Also, these cultists have been killing and eating humans long enough for a guy to complain about the lack of variety in their meals.

Jason wanted to save the captives and stop these monsters.

Quest: [Moved to Action]

Upon hearing cannibal cultists' plans to sacrifice adventurers you have been moved to save them and bring the blood cult to justice. Do you have what it takes?

Objective 1: Stop the sacrificial ritual and save the adventurers 0/4.
Reward: One awakening stone per rescued adventurer 0/4.

Bonus Objective: Destroy the local Blood Cult.
Reward: Awakening Stone.

That was convenient, oddly so, but he wouldn't begrudge whatever system or magic that dictated the quests he got giving him rewards for what he was going to do anyways. Though, there was something suspicious about nearly all his rewards being awakening stones. Whatever those were? Didn't help the question of his insanity any but there were people that needed help. He wasn't some superhero chasing down villains and looking for injustice, but he would do his best to save those he could when presented with the opportunity.

He was, after all, a soldier.

So, he continued down.

The well was quite deep, judging from the diminishing light coming from above. He kept a careful grip on the cold metal rungs, not only did several rungs shift as he went, the interior of the wall became dank, the sides slick and wet.

The light did not penetrate far down the narrow well, and Jason was soon moving entirely by feel. He descended cautiously, each foot carefully seeking out the next rung down. He discovered he had reached the bottom when his foot met water instead of the next rung. Some experimental probing revealed it was ankle deep, enough to submerge his sandals in the icy cold. The bottom of the well was flat but, as it turned out, just as slippery as the walls. He slipped, catching the rungs to right himself and avoid falling into what he supposed was water -going off the lack of foul smells.

Unfortunately, Jason did not find an exit tunnel and it was too narrow for his liking. Though, with some patting around and his eyes adjusting to the dark, he found a hole, large enough to crawl through. He didn't know if it was the source of the well's water or some kind of drainage tunnel.

Jason looked up at the bright circle of the sky, then the dark circle of the tunnel. "Uh. I'm going to have to go crawling down a tight, dank tunnel towards nowhere," he groaned out.

Jason slowly crawled his way into the dank tunnel, a circular pipe of wet and slimy brickwork. It was wide enough to barely push himself along, skin scrapping along the clammy sides. Someone Chad's size would never have fit. The darkness engulfed him as he moved away from the meager light that reached the bottom of the well. Edging down the tunnel, touch was the only sense with which he could navigate. The ubiquitous smell of wet rot was prevalent but nowhere near the worse thing he had ever smelled.

"This had better lead to somewhere," he grumbled to himself.

If it turned out to be a dead end, he would be forced to shimmy backwards, the tunnel far too tight to turn around. The gloom of the well had seemed stifling, but the dark of the tunnel was much deeper. The claustrophobic vibe of the tunnel didn't make the experience anymore pleasant.

He let out a breath of relief when his hand came down on slimy, wet wood instead of brick. There was no light, so he probed with his hands. He had reached the end of the tunnel, but had no idea what kind of space it opened into. He sensed open space, but in complete darkness it could well have been his imagination.
His hands felt out some kind of platform made of wooden planks. It was wet and a little slimy, although it felt reliably solid under Jason's hands. The surface of the wood was rough, like sandpaper. Some kind of long-enduring adhesive had been used to apply sand or something similar, improving friction on the wet planks. Feeling around as he crawled free of the tunnel, he felt the planks were lined up to make a walkway, a meter and half wide.

It felt like there was enough room above to stand, but even with the sand coating he didn't trust the slick wooden path in the dark. He continued forwards as he had in the tunnel, hands exploring in place of his eyes. Just a short way down the path he found a vertical metal rod sticking out of the walkway, at the edge to his left. His hands traced the shaft upwards to a hooked end, from which was hanging some kind of metal box with a loop on top. Jason tried using the glowing hologram window as a light source, but even pressed up against the lamp it failed to produce so much as a murky outline.

Item: [Crude Magic Lamp] (iron rank, common)

A simple lightened device fueled by low-level magic. (tool).

Effect: Cast light.
Current charge: 00%.

Requires a [Lesser Spirit Coin] to replenish.

Expend 1 [Lesser Spirit Coin]

Y/N?

"Yes."

When the lamp lit up, lighting up the surroundings, it temporarily blinded him from the drastic change. Once his vision adjusted, he recognized that he was in a natural cavern with stalagmites of various sizes scattered about with plenty of dark crevices and ominous shadows. Which was presumably why someone had put in the walkway, raised on thick wooden posts. The walkway was about an arm's length above the cave floor.

Jason removed the lamp from the rod holding it, getting a prompt about receiving the item. He hoped that the cavern lead to an entrance to the building or structure the Blood Cult was stationed. Then he could hopefully sneak in and free the adventurers before having to take on the cultists. He wasn't delusional enough to believe he could beat them on his own. They obviously had the numbers to deal with a single man armed with a trowel, and seeing as magic was real, they'd have powers too.

He needed backup. Hopefully the adventurers were what he thought they were and would have scouted out the Blood Cult and their area of operations. Possibly having magic powers of their own and the skills necessary to handle these types of circumstances. Unless they were green adventurers that got in over their head.

Failing that, he'd use the token, damn the consequence.

Since the beam of the lamp light lit up the cave like a lighthouse on a dark night, there was no point in being overly stealthy. He'd still stay as quiet as he could, the trowel in his left hand and the lamp in his right, prepared for a potential attack. Hopefully the monsters that might be living down in this dark cavern would have eyesight developed for it and would be dazed by the sudden light. That'd give him an opening to cut them down with his blade-like gardening tool. If it turned out to be a cannibal cultist, he'd go for the throat, cutting off any cries or sounding of an alarm while killing them.

Ideally, stabbing through the lung and straight into the heart. The quickest and quietest way to kill a person.

He started following the walkway, taking careful steps to avoid making noise and keeping an ear out for anything that might be out there. Also, the sand coating had worn away in a lot of places, leaving patches of the wood slick and frictionless from years in the bleak, damp cavern. The cave turned out to be something of a natural tunnel, roughly speaking, through which the walkway followed.

He made his way slowly and carefully until it came to an end at a brick wall, set into the side of the cave. In the middle of the wall was a hefty metal door with a big wheel set into it, like a bulkhead door on a submarine. Both door and wheel were rusty and didn't look to have been opened in some time.

"Now were getting somewhere."

Setting down the lamp and trowel, Jason grabbed the wheel with both hands and twisted counter clockwise. It didn't budge. He adjusted his angle, putting his full might into the twist, and his feet firmly planted on the ground for leverage.

"Come on you rusted piece of junk."

He felt a little give, then a little more, each accompanied by an unwilling metal groan. Finally, the wheel jerked loose and Jason was able to turn the reluctant mechanism. He proceeded to pull open the now unlocked door, but just like the wheel, it resisted. Having to put his shoulders into it, he was able to finally open the door with a shriek of rusted metal. His arms and shoulder felt a little sore, and had rust caked into his palms, but he was otherwise fine.

Quest: [Secrets of the Well]

Objective complete: Explore the well 1/1.

[Awakening Stone of the Hunter] has been added to your inventory.

Bonus quest objective (don't die) still available.

"Awakening stone of the Hunter? Will it give me hunting powers?"

He retrieved the lamp from where he had set it down, pulling the new object from his inventory. It looked like a fist-sized grey marble of swirling light, moving so fast that the shifting shadows and figures were barely noticeable. At times, for a brief moment, the marble shimmered into translucence, making Jason believe it didn't exist.

Item: [Awakening Stone of the Hunter] (unranked, legendary)

An awakening stone sharing affinity with speed and stealth (consumable, awakening stone).

Requirements: Unawakened essence ability.
Effect: Awakens an essence ability.

You have 0 unawakened essence abilities.
You do not meet the requirements to use this item.

That seemed more complicated than Jason wanted to get into when there was a door right in front of him, and he didn't have an essence so, it was a moot point. Thus, he returned the stone to his inventory and returned his focus to what laid beyond the door.

The interior on the other side of the door was dark, so he stepped inside and started panning the light beam of the lamp. It was a room, thankfully, not just more cave. It was just like a large parlor from a stately home, but after a tornado had passed through. Furniture was upended, tapestries and paintings ripped down from the walls. Bookshelves had been toppled, their contents tossed around the room. There was an ornate chandelier that had crashed down from the ceiling, scattering shattered crystal across the polished floor.

Which reassured Jason in having put on the sandals with all the broken crystal and glass.
Searching through the mess by the light of the lamp, he found an overturned couch in the middle of the room. Under it was an unconscious man, and he placed the lamp down so that its light stayed on the down figure. He stopped though, wondering if the man was another blood cultist and whether or not he should help him.

He'd just touched the man when a screen popped up.

[Vroshir Acolyte]

"What's a Vroshir Acolyte?"

He thought this place was filled with cannibal blood cultists. Maybe there were multiple cults in this...compound? Damn, he was too uninformed for his liking and really didn't want to end up as some cultist's next meal.

Seeing as the man wasn't a blood cultist -though still a cultist, but of a differing belief that he could hopefully leverage towards helping him- he placed the trowel down, but within reach if needed. Then Jason heaved the couch off of him to reveal that he was sprawled in the middle of an elaborate pentagram, set into the floor in brass or copper. The man was youngish, maybe thirty, clean shaven with an olive complexion and a handsome face. To Jason's eyes he looked Mediterranean with dark wavy hair. Oddly, he was wearing what looked like honest-to-god wizard robes.

He checked the man to find he had a strong pulse and was breathing regularly, but was showing early signs of extensive bruising and his body temperature was high. As Jason was examining the stranger, his eyes flickered open.

"Hello," Jason said. "Looks like you took quite the beating. Need any help?"

Jason offered his hand and helped the wizard-looking man to his feet. Despite having a slender frame, the wizard was surprisingly heavy for his size. Standing unsteadily on his feet, the wizard looked around at the room in disarray, then at Jason, his expression confused.

"Who are you?" the wizard asked. "How did you get here?"

"I'm Jason, and I have no idea how I got here. I went to bed only to wake up in some kind of alternate universe."

The wizard narrowed his eyes as he peered at Jason. "There's something off about your aura," the wizard analyzed. "You're not human."

"I was before getting here. Wait, auras are real?"

"You said something about an alternate universe?" the wizard asked, ignoring his question.

"That's just a guess," Jason answered. "I mean, the continents are different. Could be a crazy time travel thing. Do you know anything about continental drift?"

The wizard's gaze moved to the magic circle on the floor, then back at Jason.

"It was you," he accused angrily. "You're what went wrong with the summoning."

"Why are you mad? Do you have any idea how much your summon messed me up? I have no idea where I am, what's going on, and what was done to my body."

The wizard had a combined look of confused and angry, but as he was about to retort he went pale and stumbled in place.

"Crap, hold on," Jason said, moving to support him.

"GET OFF ME!"

The wizard staggered in the direction of a heavy writing desk. It seemed to have escaped major displacement by being the heaviest piece of furniture in the room. He almost tripped, still weak from whatever happened prior to Jason's arrival. The wizard opened a drawer, took out a small bottle and drained the contents.

"Look mate, I could go for stiff drink myself, but this isn't the right time to get drunk," Jason chided.

"It was a recovery potion, fool," the man snapped, then winced with pain. "It seems the backlash will take more than a potion to fix."

He gave Jason a smile that sent a chill up his spine.

He proceeded to pull a knife out of the drawer, "Since I can't recover mana right now, I'll have to do things the old-fashioned way. I've never tasted an outworlder before."

Jason's eyes narrowed as he subconsciously shifted his stance for what was to come, "You're one of the cannibals? Aren't you from a different cult?"

The wizard was taken aback by his questions, "How-"

Jason leaped towards the weakened wizard with a full-body kick, catching the cannibal off guard. Jason's foot made contact with the surprisingly durable man, sending him back into a cabinet. As the wizard regained his footing Jason was wincing from the pain shooting up his leg, knocking off balance. Jason had never hit anyone that had felt so dense.

It was like kicking a solid wall.

Even so, Jason quickly adjusted and moved to pick up the trowel he'd put aside when helping his would-be killer.

The wizard sneered and lunged, seeing the outworlder moving to pick up a sharp instrument, but he was also enraged that a bronze-ranker like himself was having difficulty killing a normal person all due to the backlash. If it wasn't for that he could've kill this stranger with a single ability as his essence abilities were currently inaccessible. Even his superior attributes were weakened, making him slower and weaker than a bronze rank essence user should be.

Jason grabbed the arm holding the knife and yanked, saving him from being stabbed but wasn't able to break the wizard's grip on the blade. Wrestling back and forth, they tripped on a piece of the overturned furniture and fell to the floor, still struggling. They battled in shadows as they moved out of the lamp's light, each trying to seize control of the weapon. Jason had a grip on the wizard's arm, trying to keep the knife from digging into him. In spite of his small frame and apparent weakness after being knocked out, the wizard was much stronger than him.

Jason was barely able to roll them over, putting him on top adding his weight towards pushing the knife away from his throat. Occasionally throwing a punch in with his free hand, before reinforcing his other arm in pushing the blade down. The smaller man still proved too strong so, Jason went with a desperate move and jammed a thumb into the wizard's eye.

The Vroshir acolyte screamed in pain, blood already started to stream out of the socket around his thumb. This had the added effect of the wizard's arm going out, the combined struggle of Jason's one arm and his body weight slammed it down on the owner.

The wizard suddenly went limp.

Rolling off, Jason saw the knife was sticking out of the acolyte's throat, but he was still alive, looking at him with a disbelieving eye. Jason gripped the knife and jerked it through the side of the cannibal's throat, severing the jugular, afraid the wizard could magically recover.
Blood sprayed over him, getting into his eyes and mouth. Recoiling, he spat out blood and rubbed at his eyes. By the time his spluttering came to a halt, the Vroshir's body was still.

You have defeated [Vroshir Acolyte]

Jason turned his focus to the bloody knife in his equally bloody hand.

Item: [Seal Knife] (bronze rank, common)

A dagger with the Vane family seal on the pommel (weapon, tool).

Requirements: Bronze rank [Speed, bronze rank [Spirit]
Effect: When used to imprint a wax seal on a letter, the letter will be destroyed if opened by anyone other than the addressee.

After a few moments there was an unusual tingling, slowly rising to become pain. He tightened his grip until the pain became too much and the dagger clattered to the floor.

You do not meet the requirements to use this item.

Jason cursed, having the first real weapon since arriving being unusable. So, he went back and picked up the trowel, swearing not to let it out of his grip until he had something better.

Finally, he turned to the body. Its one eye was open, face frozen in a final expression of surprise. The room was still and silent, Jason's eyes locked on the corpse.
He'd killed plenty during his years of service, avoided it when he could but also realized that some people had to die. Like a cannibal wizard that was trying to kill and eat him. He was long past the point where killing such a man would keep him up at night. That didn't make it any easier, but there was no point in letting it drag him down. Still, after his son died he'd decided that he had enough of death and left the military.

Yet, here he was, killing more...

He shook away the depressing thoughts, reaffirming the fact the man deserved it and needed to die. The only real downside was that he'd just killed his only source of intel. It was often what you didn't know and didn't see coming that killed you.

A new sound broke him out of his thoughts. The sound came from above, a metal ventilation pipe in the ceiling. There was a hollow, echoing timbre to the sound and it took Jason a moment to recognize it as a hissing noise.

It was coming from the hole.

He watched the hole cautiously while walking backwards to the magic lamp. Either poisonous gas was going to start pouring out of that pipe, which he'd need to run out back into the cave. Or, some kind of snake or wild animal was coming to the wizard's aid. His gaze sharpened when something came out of the hole in the ceiling as he gripped the trowel in his hand all the tighter. It was an enormous, pitch-black snake, head barely small enough to pass through the aperture.

"Aww crap."

Jason and the snake looked at each other, frozen for a moment. He could sense intelligence in its eyes, although he may well have been imagining it. Then the snake hissed at him and continued emerging from the vent shaft, body dangling down from the ceiling.

Jason sprinted for the door back to the cave, reversing the trowel into a downward grip in his right hand.

New Quest: [Time to Run]

The familiar of the Vroshir Acolyte sensed its master's death and has come to investigate.

Objective: Escape [Umbral Mountain Snake] 0/1.
Reward: Awakening Stone.

He almost stumbled as the window popped up, having to will it closed. He bolted through the metal door and grabbed onto the wheeled handle, pushing the door closed, the rusty hinges groaned, leaving a gap. He left just enough room that his leg could squeeze through but keep the left side of his body leaning towards the thick metal door, waiting for the snake.

He had a plan, and it had nothing to do with escaping.

Jason listened, hearing the increasing sound of hissing and scales scrapping against the ground. Just as the snakes head popped out of the gap, he full bodily slammed into the door, pinning the snake between the door and the frame. It immediately started hissing, thrashing, and snapping its jaws at him.
He could already feel the monstrous strength of the snake pushing through the gap. Not wasting anytime, Jason rammed the trowel's point down into the snake's head, aiming for its eyes as best he could in the dark. Its screeching increased as he felt the trowel dig into flesh, sometimes scrapping across scales as he continuously stabbed down with his right hand. He was desperately putting all his weight into the door as he just kept on stabbing into the black snake's head over and over again.

One overly powerful slam by the snake caused the door to ram into his left shoulder with a sickening snap. Jason screamed in pain as he forcefully pushed through what must have been a shattered clavicle and dislocated shoulder to keep the snake from escaping the doorway. Every passing second as the snake struggled against the door, worming its way out, it felt like searing pain was shooting through his entire left side, but he never stopped stabbing.

It wasn't until he was finally able to hit it right in the eye that the trowel finally felt like it did any real damage. A squelch sound and pained hiss came from the snake as the trowel punctured its brain. It slowed and weakened but still trashed. So, Jason twisted the trowel and wrenched it around the snake's eye socket.

Then, after several moments of ravaging its brain, it went still, ending Jason's struggle against the heavy metal door. With a sigh of relief, he slid down the door until he was seated on the floor. His shatter left shoulder and clavicle screamed even with the lack of the slamming pressure of holding down a snake that could have eaten a large dog.

You have defeated [Umbral Mountain Snake]

Would you like to loot [Umbral Mountain Snake]?

"Sure," he said wearily while pulling the trowel from the dead snake's eye socket, then froze. Belatedly, he remembered that monsters dissolved into stinking smoke when they were looted. To his relief and surprise, that didn't happen. All he felt was the snake shift against the door with a cracking sound. He looked over the list of items he got from the snake.

[Night-Scale Leather] has been added to your inventory.

[Umbral Mountain Snake Meat] has been added to your inventory.

2 [Night-Fangs] have been added to your inventory.

[Night-Venom Sack] has been added to your inventory.

30 [Dark Quintessence Gems (Bronze) have been added to your inventory.

10 [Bronze Spirit Coins] have been added to your inventory.

100 [Iron Spirit Coins] have been added to your inventory.

Unlike every other monster he'd killed, the snake didn't turn into a stench cloud and didn't produce a monster core.

"I need to learn the rules of this crazy-ass place."

He took a look at the next screen.

Quest: [Time to Run]

Hidden objective discovered: Kill [Umbral Mountain Snake] 0/1.

Hidden objective complete: Kill [Umbral Mountain Snake] 1/1.

Main objective reward increased from one awakening stone to two.
Objective complete: Escape [Umbral Mountain Snake] 1/1.

[Awakening Stone of the Builder] has been added to your inventory.

[Awakening Stone of the Spider] has been added to your inventory.

Quest complete.

100 [Bronze Spirit Coins] have been added to your inventory.

1000 [Iron Spirit Coins] have been added to your inventory.

"Hidden objective? I was planning on killing it the whole time. There was no way I'd outrun a giant snake through a tight tunnel in the dark. This quest system crap doesn't make much sense."

Another window popped up.

Quest: [Secrets of the Well]

Bonus objective complete: Don't die 1/1.

[Awakening Stone of the Titan] has been added to your inventory.
Quest complete.

100 [Bronze Spirit Coins] have been added to your inventory.

1000 [Iron Spirit Coins] have been added to your inventory.

"Well, if you're going to complete one bonus quest objective, 'don't die' is a definite must."

There were new items in his inventory, but his only interest was in something that could fix his broken bones. Looking over the icons in his inventory, nothing stood out that might help. The healing unguent worked best on open external wounds and probably wouldn't do much to mend broken bones.
Suddenly Jason remembered the wizard drinking what he called a recovery potion. With a grunt of pain, he forced himself up off the ground. He held his left arm to his body with his right, trowel still in his grip, seeing as every tiny movement of his arm cause pain to fire clean across his chest. Even breathing agitated his broken clavicle, making breathing difficult.

Leaning against the door's frame while standing on the dead snake's bones, Jason leveraged the door all the way open with just his right arm. That unfortunately meant releasing his left arm, causing agony to fire through him the whole time. But it was a familiar pain that he once used to motivate him to survive dire situations, like the one he currently found himself in.

Not sparing more than a moment on the skeletal remains of the snake and his pain, he made his way to the desk he had seen the wizard get the potion from. It wasn't hard to find, being one of the few pieces of furniture not overturned. Jason's eyes briefly panned over the body still on the floor as he navigated the debris of the trashed room, making sure he didn't have any more surprises. The drawer was still open, and inside was a small rack for vials like the one he had seen the wizard drink. Only two vials remained and Jason carefully picked one up.

Item: [Recovery Potion (bronze)] (bronze rank, rare)
Potent potion with strong healing and mana recovery effects (consumable, healing).
Effect: Recovers health. Effect reduced on silver-rank or higher individuals.
Uses remaining 1/1.

The vial was small, about the size of a rifle cartridge. Jason carefully put down the trowel, ready to snatch it if needed, and removed the vial from the rack. The he pulled out the stopper with his teeth and tipped it back in a gulp. It tasted remarkably like strawberry schnapps and his unruly stomach, having been churning in discomfort since his clavicle broke, settled the instant the potion arrived.

The stinging sensation Jason now associated with magical healing started seeping into him, especially his clavicle and injured shoulder. It was worse than what he had experienced before, whether because of the nature of the injures or the potency of the potion. It didn't bother him; compared to the pain he was already in, this was nothing more than a tickle.

You have used a recovery potion, restoring health, stamina, and mana.

Until the remnant magic fully dissipates, consuming further health, stamina or mana potions will result in toxic side-effects.

By using a potion above your current rank, the effect is increased, but residual magic will take longer to dissipate.

Jason traded the empty vial for the trowel and returned to the floor, leaning his back against the desk as his bones mended and his shoulder popped back into to place with an audible pop. The pain was gone and mobility was restored, but his left shoulder felt delicate and weak.

In the periphery of his vision was a trio of small icons slowly shading over. When he focused on them, they grew larger for him to examine. They were all squares with a picture of a potion on each, one red, one yellow, and one blue. They were mostly greyed-out, but the grey was slowly dropping off as a timer underneath each counted down, with just under ten minutes remaining.

"Cooldown timers. That's useful."

He pushed himself to his feet, much easier now that he wasn't in agony with every movement.

"Alright," he told himself. "Still a bit raw, but back in fighting shape. So, what's next?"
He went and picked up the magic lamp and shone the light around to better assess his surroundings. Once the dead body of Vroshir Acolyte was within the lamp's beam of light he walked over to get a closer look. There was an eerie stillness to it that only came from death. An overly familiar stillness that he'd seen many times over the years.

"You chose this, not me," he told it. "Besides, you're a cannibal that was trying to eat me. You had it coming."
He knelt down and felt that the corpse was still warm, "Too soon to close his eyes... uh, eye," he sighed out.

Would you like to loot [Vroshir Acolyte]?

He thought about the snake, its skeletal remains jammed between the heavy door.

"It won't do the same to him, will it? I don't want human meat in my inventory."

He took a step back.

"Alright," he said. "Loot the body."

[Landemere Vane's Key Ring] has been added to your inventory.

[Robes of the Astral Verdict] has been added to your inventory.

2 vails of [Crystal Wash] has been added to your inventory.

6 [Golden Spirit Coins] have been added to your inventory.

26 [Silver Spirit Coins] have been added to your inventory.

158 [Bronze Spirit Coins] have been added to your inventory.

537 [Iron Spirit Coins] have been added to your inventory.

728 [Lesser Spirit Coins] have been added to your inventory.

"Where were you carrying all that? That's over a thousand coins."

The wizard robes Landemere was wearing had vanished, although he had been wearing a full set of clothes underneath. Jason pulled the robes back out of his inventory and held them up to examine. They were dark blue, but covered in the blood of their former owner.

Item: [Robes of the Astral Verdict] (bronze rank, rare)

Robes designed for summoning (armor, cloth).

Effect: Increases the damage dealt by dimension spells.
Effect: Summoned creatures have increased damage reduction.
Effect: Damage reduction against disruptive-force damage.

Requirements: Must be bronze-rank or above to equip robes.

You do not meet the requirements to equip this item.

That was a shame as he could have passed himself as one of the cultists, making it easier to sneak around. He returned the robes still wet with blood to his inventory and started searching about for something to cover the body. There was a fallen tapestry he dug out and laid it over the corpse, it was the decent thing to do even if the man didn't necessarily deserve it.

Then Jason continued to search the room as he needed to find anything he could to aid his rescue of the adventurers and defeat the cannibalistic inhabitants.
He started by examining the magic circle in the middle of the room. It was large, around three meters across, the metal set directly into the floor. The lines were intricate and complex, like someone had started with a pentagram and gotten severely carried away. It was also damaged. Some of the metal had been pried up, other sections warped as if by great heat, although there was no indication of burning anywhere.

The circle wasn't useful to him, so he started going through the rest of the room. He started with the big desk the potions had been in. There was the remain potion and a few tins of healing unguent, which he took. Unlike the plain tins he got from monsters, these tins were branded with some kind of logo.

"Greenstone Alchemy Association," Jason read from the bottom of the tin. "I guess alchemy is real too."

The rest of the drawers contained piles of notes and diagrams that seemed related to the magic circle. Oddly, Jason could read the individual words despite never having seen the language before, but they didn't make any sense to him as a whole. From what he could gather they were on some set of magical principles, as arcane to him as high-end theoretical physics.

He moved on, searching through toppled bookshelves and overturned tables. There was a variety of what looked like curios and display pieces, mostly tossed to the floor and broken, but nothing useful. He picked up a few of the books, flipping through the pages. There were a lot of them scattered around the room, their bookcases knocked over or even smashed. They seemed to be written in a variety of languages, but Jason had no problems reading any of them. Each new and unfamiliar text came as easy as if he'd been reading it his whole life.

"That's a little disconcerting, but useful. It'd be a real pain to have to learn how to read all these new languages but intriguing as well."
Although he could read the words, that wasn't the same as understanding it. Every book he picked up seemed to be about magic theory, making them as impenetrable as any advanced textbook from a field he knew nothing about.

Moving a large, overturned table from where it had been tossed against the wall, Jason discovered a display cabinet with a glass door. Despite how hard things had apparently crashed into it, the cabinet was wholly unaffected, the glass remaining clear and without a single crack. Inside were four books, each on its own small easel stand. Compared to the other books Jason found, these looked more impressive, with intricately embossed leather covers.
Trying to open the cabinet, he found it was locked shut. After a few attempts to break the surprisingly sturdy glass, he remembered the key ring he had looted from Landemere. Pulling it out of his inventory, Jason discovered it was like a dungeon keeper's key ring from an old movie, a huge array of keys dangling from a large metal hoop.

Item: [Landemere Vane's Key Ring] (normal rank, common)

The keys for various locks throughout the Vane Manor, as well as personal keys for Landemere Vane's possessions. A mixture of ordinary keys and magical keys (tool).

Effect: Open specific locks.

"Hmm, so your name was Landemere," Jason muttered to himself while eyeing the covered corpse in the room. He shook his head, knowing the danger of knowing too much about the person he had killed and returned to the task at hand.

The keyhole on the cabinet door was quite small, so he tried the more delicate-looking keys until the lock clicked open. The cabinet wasn't very large but there were only four books in the entire case, set out for display rather than efficiency. The embossed leather didn't have titles, instead bearing patterns like the magic circle on the floor. Jason took out one of the books at random.

Item: [Astral Magic II] (bronze rank, uncommon)

A magical book that can impart the knowledge of intermediate level astral magic. (consumable, skill book).

Requirements: Bronze rank, ability to use skill books, basic ritual magic theory, intermediate ritual magic theory, basic astral magic theory.

Effect: Imparts intermediate astral magic theory.

You do not meet the requirements to use this item.

Jason was vaguely familiar with skill books from video games that instantly gave out spells or special abilities. He couldn't try this one because he didn't meet the sizeable list of requirements.

"That should greatly shorten the learning curve."

He started checking the remaining books. From the descriptions, it seemed the four books covered two different fields of magic, with one book at basic and intermediate level for each subject. Of the four books, Jason could only use one.

Item: [Ritual Magic I] (iron rank, common)

A magical book that can impart the fundamentals of performing magic rituals (consumable, skill book).

Requirements: Ability to use skill books.

Effect: Imparts basic ritual magic theory.

You are able to use skill book [Ritual Magic I].

Use Y/N?

Reading the description, he lingered on the requirement of being able to use skill books, which he met. Remembering his character sheet, he pulled it up and started looking through the listings under racial abilities.

The Mysterious Gunslinger ability seemed to give him the power to use skill books, along with essences and awakening stones. He looked at the book in his hand. According to its description it would give him knowledge. That meant it would alter his brain, but didn't his ability to read weird languages mean it was already affected? Was it already affecting his decision making processes?

For the time being, Jason stowed the books in his inventory. He could always look at them later. There didn't seem to be anything else he could make use of, so he decided to take stock. He found an undamaged chair and table, setting them up as far from the body as he could. There were a lot of tables for one room, although it was a large room.

After sitting down, he started pulling out the items he had picked up but not looked at yet, placing them all on the table. He began with the items he looted from the snake. Mercifully, the night-scale leather wasn't as drippy as the snake had been after it was skinned.

Item: [Night-Scale Leather] (bronze rank, uncommon)

The skin of an umbral mountain snake (crafting material, leather).

Effect: Crafting material for clothing, armor and accessories.

It was dark and matte, thick and cool to the touch. It was also surprisingly flexible. Like the snake, the leather was much longer than it was wide, coming out of his inventory rolled up like a traditional bolt of cloth and bound by a length of thick cord.

"Did I loot the string from the snake too? That's weird, but no weirder than everything else that's happened to me lately."
The snakeskin was listed as a crafting material, as was the night fang that turned out to be the snakes fangs. While the venom sack was also considered to be an alchemical ingredient and the meat for magical cooking -which tickled his culinary hunger. The dark quintessence turned out to be small black gems.

Item: [Dark Quintessence] (iron rank, common)

Manifested essence of darkness (crafting material, essence).

Effect: Crafting material for items with darkness attributes.

They had the look of uncut gemstones, but the shine of polished onyx. They even came with a pouch to hold them.

"Well, at least it's convenient."

The rest of the items he received as quest rewards, mostly from quests he completed by killing the umbral mountain snake and looting Landemere. There were two bottles of a clear liquid with glass stoppers called crystal wash. They would remove all foreign matter from his body, like a shower in a bottle.
Convenient but not very helpful at the moment.

The remaining items were both quest rewards for exploring the well. The awakening stone of the Titan was a smooth, rounded stone about the size of a fist. It was a solid blue that gave off the impression of solidity and protection.

Item: [Awakening Stone of the Titan] (unranked, legendary)

An awakening stone sharing the affinity of the protection (consumable, awakening stone).

Requirements: Unawakened essence ability.

Effect: Awakens an essence ability.

You have 0 unawakened essence abilities.
You do not meet the requirements to use this item.

The other awakening stones said much the same but from the Builder and Spider instead. Names that sounded like they could hold symbolism with the Creator.

"Suspicious, but I'm going to be dealing with cannibal wizards, I could use all the power I can get."

On that note, Jason reconsidered the Creator token. It would summon some ghost thing from... who knows where and give him powers. He was out of his depth considering that he was dealing with magic. So, he decided to use something that could give him some more context.

Item: [Ritual Magic I] (iron rank, common)

A magical book that can impart the fundamentals of performing magic rituals (consumable, skill book).

Requirements: Ability to use skill books.

Effect: Imparts basic ritual magic theory.
You are able to use skill book [Ritual Magic I].

Use Y/N?

After some thought, he said, "Yes."

The book floated out of his hand and into the air. The cover flung itself open and the writing on it started removing itself from the page, changing from black to gold as the disembodied text floated into the air. The pages started turning, faster and faster, gold text pouring into the air. Turning pages flicked over in a rush as the golden text formed a corona around the floating book. Then the flutter of pages started slowing, until the last page turned, and the book feel to the ground, every page blank.

The cloud of golden text swarmed over Jason like angry fireflies, disappearing into his body as it landed on his flesh with stinging bites. His mind was bombarded with information too quickly to process, leaving it lost and adrift. The pain and disorientation finally passed, leaving him in general control of his faculties, but dizzy and confused. He had no idea if seconds or hours had passed. He was weary to the bone, limbs as heavy as his eyelids.

Your stamina is low.

Two horizontal bars appeared at the periphery of his vision. One was blue while the other was orange and about empty. Next to them was a silhouette of a person that was mostly green, but the left shoulder, spreading just a bit into the chest, were yellow.
"Alright, so the orange bar is stamina, the little body is health and the blue bar is... something?"

Current mana: 100%

"Okay, I have mana. I think I'm getting a handle on this. What exactly is mana?"

Help: Mana

Mana is a resource required for many essence abilities. Low mana will lead to mental exhaustion.
Maximum mana is based on the [Spirit] attribute. Bind an essence to the [Spirit] attribute to increase maximum mana.
Mana recovery is based on the [Recovery] attribute. Bind an essence to the [Recovery] attribute to increase mana recovery rate.

Now he had a better understanding of ritual magic and some basics of magic itself. It wasn't as comprehensive as he'd had hoped, but it did help him understand that summoning things from beyond the world to serve as a familiar was common and mostly safe. Even if it came with risks, that didn't change what he needed to do.

He pulled out the Creator's token, reading over its effects again.

Jason just staired at the prompt, weighing his options. It would most definitely be a boon to use it but bonding his soul to a Ghost of the Creator or whatever, didn't sound all that appealing. He'd never believed in the concept of a soul but that still didn't mean he wanted to let something into it. Something that would change him on a fundamental level.

But he had been nearly killed twice and was no closer to escaping or finding the adventurers.

In the end, he'd have to trade tomorrow's safety for surviving today and pulled out the white tablet from his inventory. So long as he successfully bonded his soul to a piece of the Creator, he could be given the powers he needed to up his survival chances. The most important being guns from the essences it would provide.
The Creator sounded nice but touched uncomfortably along the lines of God and religion.

One he would have to let into his soul.

You are able to activate [The Creator's Summoning Token].

Activate Y/N?

"Bugger it," he relented, "go ahead and do it."

---

*A typical male Titan build from Destiny.