Vikram moved through the cave with a quiet intensity, dispatching the undead with sharp, practiced efficiency.
His body no longer needed to think, each strike, each sidestep, flowed from instinct, carved by repetition and honed by failure. The rhythm of combat had become something he understood on a bone-deep level.
When he finally reached the village statue, he spent his accumulated souls to raise his Vitality to two. It wasn't much. It wouldn't make him invincible. But every step forward mattered.
Especially now.
He was fast approaching the cap of his stats, and he knew the road ahead wouldn't get easier. He'd tried to avoid direct conflict, thinking he could harvest souls then retreat. But the village wasn't that kind of place.
The whole place felt like a puzzle.
Complex, cruel, and relentless.
Just like the mage's challenge from before. There had to be a solution. He was sure of it. But it wouldn't come from bypassing the challenge. It would come from enduring it.
So Vikram changed his approach.
Instead of running, he focused. He turned inward.
The Journal spoke of a technique, Ironbreaker's Axe Form, a battlefield art from another era. Not flashy, but brutal and clean. Paired with the Breath of the Crimson Pulse and his Axe Throwing Technique, these three arts would become his foundation.
He pushed them all to the Minor Accomplishment Realm, or tried to.
Axe Throwing Technique (Entry Level)Breath of the Crimson Pulse (Entry Level)Ironbreaker's Axe Form (Entry Level)
Progress was painfully slow.
Crimson Pulse advanced the fastest. It taught him how to mobilize Primal Blood in battle, how to let it surge, burn, and empower.
But every attempt came at a cost. Once, mid-fight, he lost control. Blood Deviation struck, and he died violently.
But he learned.
Again and again, he learned.
Each death chipped away at something, an invisible wall, massive and immovable, that kept him from breaking through. And with each return, something changed. The wall was still there, but thinner. Weaker. His control, sharper.
He began to sense it. A shift. He wasn't just learning Techniques, he was commanding them.
In battle, he fully mobilized the Crimson Pulse, every motion of the axe refined by Ironbreaker's Form. He only threw his axe when absolutely necessary, early experiments with it had cost him dearly. The little creatures swarmed too fast. Every miss meant death.
But still, he persisted.
Two days passed in relentless cycles of death, learning, and rebirth. Occasionally, he woke to the real world, exchanged brief words with Brunus. That quiet voice, those mundane interactions… they were the only things tethering him to normalcy.
The rest of him was buried deep in pursuit.
A breakthrough was near.
His axe strikes were becoming precise, fluid. Breath of the Crimson Pulse was revealing its true rhythm—something beneath the surface, something alive. He was on the verge of something monumental.
And then.
The car slowed to a gentle halt.
Vikram's eyes opened, adjusting to the light as he looked outside.
A tower stood before him, a monolith that pierced the sky, so tall it disappeared into the clouds. For a moment, he just stared, unable to measure its true height. It was too vast for thought.
Too impossible for the eyes.
Brunus stepped out of the car in a rush, saying something Vikram barely registered.
He remained still for a moment longer, rooted by awe, before finally pushing the door open and stepping into the shadow of the sky-piercing tower.
"Very big, huh?"
The voice came from just beside him, dragging Vikram out of his thoughts. He turned slightly, startled to see a man standing there, just a little taller than him, completely wrapped in dark clothing. A black jacket hung loose over his frame, and a pair of deep-blue glowing eyes stared out from beneath his hood, glinting like submerged stars.
Vikram felt a chill crawl up his spine.
"Heh… it's getting late," the guy said, raising a metal bottle to his lips and taking a long, lazy gulp. He sighed like someone sipping soup on a cold day, then gave the bottle a little shake. Liquid still inside.
There was something casual and untouchable about him.
His headset rested over his head, half-covered by his messy, shoulder-length hair. His beard was rough and grown-in, and for some reason, it made Vikram painfully aware of his own smooth, bald head. Not to mention his getup: floral shirt, pink jorts, and old sneakers. He looked like a background extra from a rejected 90s sitcom.
The guy next to him looked like the poster boy for cryptic, dark-side-of-the-moon energy.
"Name's Vold," the man said, extending a hand.
"Vikram." He shook it, his grip firm but not forced.
For a few moments, the two of them stood in companionable silence, staring up at the tower. It loomed above them like a divine blade plunged into the earth, stretching far beyond the clouds. The sky felt wider here, heavier too.
Then Vikram noticed a group of people approaching, dressed in black-and-blue uniforms, moving with sharp coordination. They stopped a few feet from Vold, clearly coming for him.
But before they could speak, Vold moved. He gave them a dry chuckle, raised his bottle in a half-hearted wave, and turned away without a word.
Yeah… he's definitely laughing at how I'm dressed.
Suppressing a sigh, Vikram turned toward the building and stepped through its entrance.
Inside, the air shifted.
The space was vast and quiet, its walls formed of gleaming obsidian-like material, polished to a mirror's shine. The white marble floors reflected everything with eerie clarity. Light seemed to bend here. No flickering, no shadows—just clean, silent illumination.
Near the center of the hall, Brunus stood in conversation with someone who, somehow, was even more massive than him. A literal mountain in uniform. After saluting, the giant walked off toward one of the many branching doors and vanished like mist.
"I'll just roam around for a bit," Vikram muttered.
Brunus gave him a distracted nod.
So Vikram wandered, backpack slung over his shoulder. He let his eyes drift across the walls, taking in the strange details: the faint silver etchings buried beneath the black, the symbols that didn't stay still when stared at. Everything here felt deliberate, as if the building itself was watching.