I can never endure the ruins for long.

  Standing there, amongst the splendor of wonders lost and cultures turned to dust, makes me weep. Far too many Pathbearers imagine the System as having given great power onto us. Perhaps this is true individually, but culturally, societally? They cannot even conceive of the sheer amount of power we've lost as a collective, how far we've fallen.

  But perhaps “we” is the wrong word here. Humanity has lost all that power. Humanity and their children, the automata. The goblins, the elves, the Umbrals, the Weaveresses, and all the other foreign races, the refugees from incursions, spawns of the gods, or visitors immigrating through gates, were not of this world.

  Earth belonged to mankind first. And their marks run deep and beautiful.

  Do you know how humiliating it is to compare my achievements, my power, to everything mankind has achieved? It's unspeakable. It wounds my pride. It mauls it like a beast would a feeble fawn. The things we do, no matter how great, we don't do naturally. Mana and skills as a whole are a distortion of natural reality. We bend existing laws to our will, and we summon fundamental forces from a spiritual philogiston that seeks to mimic its true nature. The Pre-System nations didn't have that. Everything they achieved, they achieved without magic, they achieved within the confines of the natural laws, and these achievements were great and glorious.

  The people of that beautiful age weren't even Pathless. They didn't gain any levels. They couldn't grow stronger on a whim because they struggled, because the System rewarded them with an advancement. You gained a little bit of strength with the adaptation of your muscles to load over time. But there was a limit to biology. Just like there were limits to momentum, energy, and more.

  But even with those limitations, mankind pierced the veil of the heavens. They speared out into the void and explored the broader confines of this reality. At home, their presence spanned from earth to sky, across the entire world, to even the bottom of the oceans. They weren't perfect people. They fought their foolish wars. They indulged in their petty grudges and pointless cruelties. They were lost to their hubris as well. But were they better people than us?

  Without a doubt, yes. Through their struggles alone, they cured all disease, perfected the human form, and were on the precipice of going beyond it entirely. Through their struggles, they made obsolete the miseries of labor and built a life meant for intellectual pursuits and leisure. Through their struggles, no one suffered. No one shivered and starved on the streets, abandoned. Everyone was governed and cared for. They made their own systems, ones with purpose beyond bloodshed.

  And they did all that not in exchange for skill evolutions or levels. They did it because it was who they were. Builders.

  Standing in this hollowed, decaying corpse of humanity's totality strikes at me. It makes me feel small. And I refuse to take such an insult.

  I will see their greatness inherited. I will continue their work. Someday, when the time is right, I will head to Africa and find the last remaining descendants of that great line. Perhaps rise into the void and seek their long-silent colonies and what few hidden sanctuaries may have avoided the System's notice.

  I will find them, and I will bring the fire back to them. And then humanity and its new kin can continue with their great journey across the stars once more. Enhanced by a system that is meant to preserve life instead of harvesting death.

  -Udraal Thann’s Recovered Notes

  292 (I)

  Downtime [IV]

  "Is that a poem?" Shiv asked, looking at Can Hu after the Penitent finished its recital.

  "Ozymandias," it answered quietly. "It speaks of glories lost; of the impermanence of all things. An ironic thing, considering the poet himself is still remembered after millennia. He died as a young man, drowning in the waters of Albion. It's quite remarkable that his words have outlasted the material glories of man meant to endure beyond the odds."

  Shiv stood amidst the ruins of a pre-apocalyptic world.

  The hollowed remnants of a long-lost civilization jutted out from the soil like half-buried blades. Though the desolated remnants of the old world that Shiv had spotted when he first laid eyes on the gateway weren't far from it, it was only when he and the others stood in the deep shadows of those tall, broken buildings that he realized how vast the devastated cityscape was. He immediately noticed some similarities between the wrecks here and the urban skeleton that had remained of Lost Angeles until the cataclysmic battle against Sullain and his Tarrasque had finally turned it all to dust. The architecture was similar, as were the alloys and other materials once used to construct them. They also decayed the same way, the metal somehow having tarnished at the same rate. The war against that final triumph of entropy was still going on, as bits of metal endured while their edges grew tarnished and frayed.

  The main difference, however, was function. Shiv didn't know much about the old world, but certain things were obvious after a few seconds of observation. Lost Angeles had been a place for people to live. It was a vast residential wonderland with highways connecting different megastructures and compounds. There were also colossal domes that once stood as grand bazaars, where countless merchants from various houses plied their wares. Shiv believed they were called “malls.”

  Near these malls were gardens and parks. Sometimes the gardens and parks would even be built within the communal megastructures. In summation, it was a place where people lived and thrived together. There was always an atmosphere of community there in Lost Angeles. Everyone was connected along a vast logistical transportation network. Nothing was out of reach. Not the very edges of the city, not even the Pacific Ocean, where the waves were once placid and devoid of hateful beasts.

  However, the ancient wreckages near Gate Piety’s Abyssal gateway were different. They were not connected by bridges or tunnels. The buildings here were orderly, with rusted slots lining their sides—resembling mechanical beehives. Shiv guessed they were charging stations for the ancient automata, and Can Hu confirmed his suspicions as they walked.

  Everything here was asphalt or metal, rough for humans, and without any hint of nature. That was the most uncanny thing about it. When a city died and was left abandoned, the wilderness crept back in, pushing through cracks, crawling over barriers and boundaries, consuming dense towers of concrete and metal with a creeping crawl of green from within.

  But there was none of that here. Not even a willow that swayed from atop a building, not even a flower that dared lift its head from between a crevice.

  In the world as Shiv knew it, the death of one thing offered nourishment and life to another. But this place was dead beyond death. These ruins were the final triumph of erosion.

  Shiv looked up at half-broken spires. They were snapped down the middle, and some of the damage looked too precise, too clean. Someone had cut through them, and it was likely done with a heated blade, judging from the furrowing disfigurements lining the metal of the exposed structural supports. As they ventured deeper along those asphalt roads, he looked around using his Atlas and saw no glow of life. No hint of organic architecture. Even the very bacteria in the atmosphere seemed wary of this place, unwilling to approach its epicenter.

  Through it all, Valor didn't speak. Instead, he simply kept to his pace, gliding through the devastation. Shiv, Uva, Can Hu, and Adam followed close behind, their footsteps echoing along the marred walls. As tension built inside Shiv, the poem recited by the Penitent repeated in his head over and again. It felt like a taunt delivered by the concept of artistry and memory against material reality.

  A long-dead poet who mused on the evanescence of all material things and the hubris of men to think themselves above the passing of the ages remained preserved and remembered, his words perhaps still as pristine and poignant as before.

  And here, children of the new age walked in the broken embrace of a place that once sustained their precursors. He kept expecting someone to attack him, for a shot or spell to snap out from the shadows and cut him low. The air here was ripe with nihilistic violence. Shiv's instincts screamed he was about to experience a senseless death. And he wasn't the only one who endured such strain on his psyche.

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  "There's nothing here," Adam hissed under his breath. The Gate Lord’s eyes darted about as if he was straining his senses as much as he could, trying to see what was beyond his grasp, desperate to find something—anything—to reassure his building worry. "There's nothing here," he repeated once more. Slowly, he swallowed, unwilling to accept the fact, but not able to disprove the truth.

  Between them, Uva reached out with her mind. Her psionic strands glided through the buildings, further boosted by her eldritch powers, but they drifted unhindered and unimpeded, with nothing to latch onto. She didn't voice her uncertainty, but Shiv could feel it radiate from her body language. The anxiety gnawed at her too; a blow was supposed to come, but it never landed. It was never there.

  "Feels like the System's will is being denied," Shiv breathed.

  Those exact words commanded Valor to stop. The ancient Pathbearer turned, and it was at this point that Shiv realized there were no lights around them. Everything was enwreathed in shadow, consumed by a darkness that was blacker than normal. There was no luster here, a dehydration, not of moisture, but of ambient mana itself. He'd never noticed that glow that permeated everything. It had simply always been there. Until now.

  "And why do you say that?" Valor asked, his voice interested, like a professor seeking to lead a student down a proper path of thinking.

  "It just feels like… like something's missing from the world. Like we're supposed to be filled with strife. That something's supposed to attack us right now, but it can't get to us. It's always just far enough away."

  Judging from how Uva and Adam looked at Shiv, they felt the same way as well.

  "It is not just strife," Can Hu declared softly. "Earlier, when Udraal emerged through my soul, I felt his weight. I felt his whole being. A splinter of him resides within me. But here, his presence is fainter. It is like he cannot reach me easily, and I cannot draw upon my own skills so simply either. This is a land of deprivation. A place of no honor."

  With that, the Penitent's optics turned to twin pinpricks of green before flashing once. There came a clicking sound from inside Can Hu, one that built in intensity as it looked around, taking in their surroundings with new understanding. "Radiation. Still, lingering traces of radiation in the air."

  "Doesn't that give you cancer?" Shiv asked. "Because I'm pretty sure both Adam and I had to deal with a little bit of sickness after our fight in the Rubix Well’s reactor. Valor, please don't tell me you brought us here so we can build up some kind of Radiation Resistance Skill."

  Valor smiled lightly. “Quite the contrary; you are unlikely to gain any skills while you are here. As our friend Can Hu has said, this is a place of no honor, but it is also a place the System seeks to avoid. A place of absolute death, where ruin has claimed all." The lich held up a hand, and corrosive mana crackled into existence. His Necromancy flared brighter than ever before, and Shiv clenched his fists reactively. "There is only one mana type that is unburdened by this place and even further amplified, and that is Necromancy, the lore of loss and death.”

  Everyone watched as the bright Necromantic flame flickered above Valor's hand, twitching and spasming. “Yet, despite this, it too dances unsteadily atop my palm. It glides and lashes at the world, unbalanced between my fingers. That is not supposed to be the case. It is supposed to be my power to wield, but here, mana should not be. Paradoxically, Necromancy has to be, because it is the idea of what is lost. It is the magic of echoes and remnants. And it will be through Necromancy that we shall shape a new bomb to resolve the matter of the Tarrasque, to end its undying nature. We will do so here, in utmost secrecy, where my son cannot peer through Can Hu—whose form has been compromised—and where the Culturist cannot simply emerge from Adam's infected skill."

  Valor closed his hand, and the sickly green fire went out, casting them back into near-blackness. "I brought you here to hide you, not only from the eyes of our adversaries and our more untrustworthy allies, but from the System itself. Things were missing from my memory when I was shattered. But now I remember many things. I recall how I found a few moments of peace for myself. It was within ruins like these. For whatever reason, the System either fears or reveres specific remnants of the old world. Nothing is established, and all that is destroyed will be returned to its previous state with enough time, once the destroyers have left. It is effectively a capsule, a snapshot of what was. As if the System itself does not wish to forget."

  "But why?" Adam asked.

  "I have asked myself that question many a time," Valor replied, but he shook his head, and the corrosive flames within his socket dimmed in disappointment. "I cannot give you a true answer. I do not know myself. How the ruins ended up all the way down here is another mystery. What I can say is that this place used to be a hub for automata before they gained human-like consciousness, before the System imbued them with souls and skills. I also know that this place was once struck by multiple specialized explosives. Radiation-bearing warheads, I believe the ancients called them. Devastating weapons that harness the functions of the natural world to their fullest extent. Yet comparatively feeble compared to the feats certain Pathbearers are capable of."

  "Are all ruins like this?" Shiv asked. "Because I didn't feel the same thing when I was going through Lost Angeles. A bunch of lesser vampires set up there too without any problems, and I never felt like something was fundamentally wrong with the place."

  "Quite correct. Not all ruins are the same. It seems that places that have been deliberately destroyed at the hands of the ancients themselves are more stained with this deprivation, this loss. As a result, the unique radiation lingers. If I were more certain about the nature of the System, I would dare say it is… mourning."

  Uva's expression darkened. "Mourning. What a strange thing to do for an entity that lives only for our suffering and struggle."

  "Yes, ours, but perhaps not our predecessors’, for whatever reason. Come, let us continue. The radiation is a sign, but I have not found what I came here to discover."

  They proceeded deeper into the heart of the sprawling machine city, and with every step they took, the wrongness in the atmosphere grew, settling inside them like an inflammation called to awaken. The others continued to be anxious, but Shiv felt something different. The wrongness caused him pain. Adam and Uva continued experiencing a rise in unnatural paranoia. The movements of Can Hu's body grew more machine-like, and even some repaired damage returned as its chassis rusted and cracked along its spine and torso. But when asked if they felt any physical pain, all of them answered in the negative.

  In that regard, Shiv suffered alone—but it didn’t seem that way, as his skills started whispering their own pleas to him.

  Sage of the Enkindled Heart: Please, leave now. Please. Being here makes us stop. I don't want to fizzle out of existence.

  Gardener of Doubt: You should flee. If you stay here for too long, you will become nothing more than a body, an eye, just a blurring, a lie. All magic is born as fantasy, and fantasy without common belief is but delusion. Flee…

  A Glimpse of Perspective: Whatever is being sought here cannot be found. Not by you, not by anyone.

  And though this wasn't the first time Shiv’s skills had spoken to him, they sounded different. They sounded unnatural. Like someone else was trying to communicate with him through his very soul.

  "Come on, guys, we won't be here for long," Shiv muttered under his breath.

  "What was that?" Adam asked. Uva was looking at Shiv as well, concern written upon her face.

  "I was just speaking to my skills," Shiv replied. "Pain's getting a bit worse. My skills want to leave. They're really scared. No idea why."

  Valor turned halfway, but never halted. He didn't say anything either. Shiv suspected the ancient Pathbearer had a theory, and he was testing that on Shiv directly.

  "Maybe you should go back," Adam said. "Wait outside this place, at least. It might not be good for you. Perhaps you're developing cancer of some specific sort."

  "It is not cancer," Valor said, not turning this time. "He's simply experiencing the full weight of the lack. I feel it too, the pain. I suspected something like this might happen. Do not worry, it is not fatal. It is simply extremely uncomfortable."

  Shiv trusted Valor, but it still felt wrong, being here. "Why are we feeling this way? Why do you and I feel physical pain while it's mostly psychological for the others?"

  "Because we are far more favored than they are. Some part of us has been overridden on a fundamental level. We are bound to the System now. We have survived too many of its attempts to slay us, and by this point, I think the System no longer fully believes in your destruction. It will claim your life for good if it gets the chance, but it has sunk its tendrils inside of you, and it seeks to use you. Much like my son seeks to use you. But where he wishes to have you usurp the System, that which governs all and stands as the font of magic itself yearns to have you be a foundational pillar of strife to resolve or create new problems for others."

  And Shiv flashed back to his experiences at Phoenix Academy, how he ran into so many others in peril, how he encountered so many problems in so short a time, yet how they were different from before. They weren't straight fights. They were conundrums and unexpected encounters, not necessarily for him, but more so for his enemies. From a different perspective, he guessed that he was a nightmare incarnate, especially for that Hero-Inquisitor he broke, or the bullies he brutalized. They'd had no chance against him and were given no hints he was there. And so he tore through the academy like a storm of blades upon a field of wheat.

  While they walked and Shiv's thoughts drifted, a text suddenly appeared before his eyes.

  What would you sacrifice, who would you kill, and how many worlds would you destroy to bring him back?

  These words were fully dissociated from his skills, and they flared bright in his vision, till, an instant later, they vanished as if they had never been. When Shiv tried to pull up the notification as he could with all the others, it didn't return. It was absent. Beyond his grasp. And he found himself wondering if it had been simply a trick of his mind brought on by the loss of Georges, or if something greater was at play.

  Might be fucking both when it comes to me, Shiv thought, shaking his head.