He was so damn tired.

Exhaustion had replaced excitement.

No matter how exhilarating fighting Voidlings was, doing it constantly was draining. The war drum that once thrashed wildly against his chest now beat with a dull rhythm. Not even the gains he’d acquired in the last few days—or had it been weeks? Months, maybe?—were worth mentioning anymore.

The constant assault of powerful Fragments by the dozen was wearing on him. It forced him to flee and hide while Vitae did its work, spreading its influence and power through the Fragments. Days of combat had resulted in the death of a handful of elite Voidlings, courtesy of the Obsidian Blade and its magnificent power. Vitae protected the soulbound blade even as its work concluded, but the Nihilum within them remained strong and thrashing.

He heard Vitae’s call. It was stronger than ever, sloshing against his mind, urging him to stop caring about anything else and to devour it all—to devour the Naughtrealm or to make it his. Vitae didn’t care what he wanted or which side he joined. All it desired was to consume, to grow stronger, and to be of use. And that it did. That was all he and Vitae had been doing for… David had no idea how long.

This is not how I expected this trip to be, he cursed inwardly, countless thoughts flashing through his mind. However, none of them felt like they were truly his.

Was he on the cusp of losing his sanity? Maybe he was already insane.

David couldn’t remember the last time he had slept. Nor, as a matter of fact, could he recall resting even when the opportunity arose. All he remembered was fighting, killing… devouring.

Snippets of memories resurfaced. Memories of how he had cleansed the outer area and the middle ground. Nothingness and Nihilum still lingered, but both had been drained considerably, leaving behind less than a third of their former presence. As for the Voidlings in those regions… they had been purged.

The inner region had yet to be cleansed, but David no longer wished to continue. He was done purging the Naughtrealm. Especially after the Maelstrom expanded as the accumulated Vitae crossed 100.

The urge to push into the core region and leave was stronger than ever. After all, something within him had changed. He was changing. And he had no idea whether it was for better or worse.

He couldn’t quite tell when the change had begun, but he knew one thing: he was becoming one with the Voidlings. Not directly, of course, but his persona was shifting. And he hoped the Naughtrealm was to blame. That the nothingness and raw Nihilum were the culprits rather than Vitae.

Regardless, it was not something David welcomed. He had to leave—the faster, the better.

His instincts—or perhaps the influence of the Naughtrealm—urged him to stay, but his strides were firm as he entered the core region. He had tried investigating the Naughtrealm’s center a few more times using Echoes, but they never lasted long enough to tell him anything. That didn’t mean he couldn’t tread the border to the center and observe from a relatively safe distance. Unfortunately, that was also how he’d ended up pursued by powerful Fragments—dozens of them.

Worse still, some of the Fragments possessed abilities. Fighting them was arduous and forced him to keep most of his Vitae in circulation, ensuring his body wouldn’t disobey him and freeze like before. While his plan had worked, the battles with multiple ability-wielding Voidlings hadn’t left him unscathed. His Blood reserves were low, and the natural production of Origin Essence was close to non-existent at this point.

Still, he was alive and no longer crippled.

Relying on the guidance of the Divine Compass, David crept through the core region. He could barely see without circulating pure Blood through his eyes due to the highly condensed raw Nihilum lingering in the air, emitting intense pressure. Not even Vitae could consume it entirely.

The Maelstrom stirred, exhilarated. It absorbed as much condensed Nihilum as it could and produced more Vitae. But David was far from happy. Vitae strengthened him. It empowered him not only physically, but tempered his mind and soul as well. However, the things the Naughtrealm did to him weighed more heavily as he inched closer.

He made sure to avoid the Voidlings in the central region. He crouched behind collapsed walls, waited patiently when several powerful creatures of the Void came close to locating him. David killed a Fragment, beheading it swiftly when he was certain nobody was looking, and moved onward once the lifeforce within the corpse was sealed and stored away.

It felt like eons had elapsed since he had arrived in the central region, but he was certain only a few hours could have passed. Not that it made much of a difference in this place. The denser the nothingness and raw Nihilum around him, the slower time seemed to pass. It was atrocious and feasted on his mind, yet David never slowed.

At some point, the condensed raw Nihilum transformed into fog. It blocked most of his sight and weighed heavier than ever. David didn’t slow, but he trod the central region more carefully until he saw the lights.

Beautiful, softly glowing. A magnificent mixture of golden, silver, and pristine-white lights—particles that swirled around aimlessly, as if unraveling something hidden before him.

David stared at the lights, his legs still carrying him closer to his destination, even though his mind was numb and unthinking.

It took him a while to realize that he wasn’t breathing and that he’d stopped paying attention to his surroundings. He took several ragged breaths, his eyes darting left and right, and pulled back immediately. The fog of Nihilum no longer engulfed him, freeing him from the constraints of the Naughtrealm for the first time.

It was hard to believe, and David began to doubt his sanity, but the place he’d just stepped into did not feel like the Naughtrealm. It seemed to belong to something else. Yet, the things he saw were anything but pleasant. No. It was quite the opposite and reason enough to retreat.

He might not like the fog of raw Nihilum, but it ought to conceal him from the things he saw in the place that was void of…nothingness and Nihilum.

How did I not notice that before? The fog isolates this place, doesn’t it? David’s hair stood on end, his instincts screaming to step out of the fog again. To return to the living.

All he needed was to take one step forward—a single step outside the mist.

But he couldn’t afford to do that. Not after seeing the highly potent life signals of eight creatures surrounding a structure. He saw only the glimpse of one creature, but that was enough. In fact, David didn’t have to see any of them to know what he was faced with.

Why the hell are there eight damn Voidres around that pagoda?

He activated Bloodthrone Dominion and True Sight, pushing some of his last pure Blood into his eyes. Even that was barely enough to see the eight life signals through the dense fog. But what he saw didn’t help him understand anything. Eight Voidres surrounded a massive structure—a seven-story tall pagoda—which towered high above any structure in the Naughtrealm. It stood tall, radiating power.

It was impossible to tell what the bulbs of light were, but they were full of energy. There was no trace of nothingness or Nihilum in or around the pagoda. Instead, there was life. An abundance of life. It filled the pagoda to the brim and was likely responsible for repelling Nihilum’s fog as well. But…how?

How is it possible to repel Nihilum? Zachariah cannot do it either, and he’s a god. Even the Heavens struggled to remove the Void-infected with their influence.

David grimaced, maintained the supply of pure Blood to his eyes for a while, and watched the Voidre. He was not foolish enough to believe he could kill one—let alone eight Voidres. However, his Intent had guided him to this place; to the center of the Naughtrealm. And it was full of life. Brimming with potent life strong enough to repel Nihilum even in its rawest form, condensed into fog.

That was where he had to go. David was certain of it. The pagoda was his destination.

And how am I supposed to get past them?

He could try and take the moment of surprise to rush inside, but was he going to be faster than the Voidre? And what would he do inside if he were to make it before the Voidre tore him apart?

David tried to tell what awaited him inside the pagoda, but it was difficult. Nihilum’s fog played with his senses, which made it difficult to perceive the Voidre’s life signals—signals that had remained unmoving since he set foot outside the fog. Even as he returned to the fog, the Voidre had remained unmoving.

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Maybe they hadn’t noticed him, but David doubted that. As unfortunate as it was, he hadn’t paid attention to his surroundings when he stepped out of the fog for the first time. The Voidlings should have noticed him. Even Void Saplings would have noticed him, let alone a Voidre. So why did they remain there, and why were the Voidre spaced almost perfectly apart?

The distance between the Voidre was almost the same. No—it was exactly the same…except in one instance. The distance between two Voidre was twice as long as with the others. Why?

This isn’t supposed to be an octagon. It’s a nonagon, isn’t it? Something is missing, David thought.

Or is… ‘someone’ missing?

The Void Wolf.

The Voidre he and Zachariah had fought before.

A mental image formed in his head, and he added the dead Voidre where he imagined it should be, and things started to make more sense. The life-filled swirling lights were coming from the space that should be occupied by the Voidre.

But what are these lights in the first place, and how can they survive in the Naughtrealm? In the first place… David stared at the massive pagoda that glowed like a beacon of life. How did this place survive Nihilum’s advances?

Somehow, the pagoda blocked Nihilum’s fog, and his ignorance irked him.

David nibbled on his lower lip, studying the Voidre and their movements with utmost care, and stepped out of the fog when he was certain the creatures of the Void weren’t paying any attention to him. He took a deep breath and focused intently on the changes unfolding before him. But instead of retreating back into the fog like he’d initially planned, David stayed where he was. Unmoving. Watching.

The Voidre didn’t react to him. It was almost like they didn’t notice him—but that couldn’t be, right?

David took another deep breath and smiled.

Since when was breathing so exciting? The air he inhaled was so fresh. So… full of life. It wasn’t vastly different from how he remembered the air outside the Naughtrealm, but his time beyond the Void’s domain felt distant. Like it had been eons since he had been surrounded by life, graced with the privilege of fresh air.

I understand missing the presence of life… but to think I would miss fresh air.

He grimaced, then recalled memories of the times before he had been dragged into the Naughtrealm with a nostalgic smile. It felt like a dream.

And this—David’s gaze involuntarily drifted back to the massive pagoda—this was the Naughtrealm’s heaven. The only place that felt right.

His smile widened as more memories resurfaced, but he moved on and watched the Voidre—and the empty space where the Void Wolf should have been. And now that his sight was no longer restricted by the fog of Nihilum, David could see much more. He could feel it all.

Power surged through the Voidre in tidal waves, fueling them. Their bodies bulged and rippled from the enormous amounts of energy coursing into them, and they feasted on it. But it wasn’t Nihilum they consumed—neither raw nor refined. It was something else. Something powerful enough to repel Nihilum, yet too weak to destroy the Voidre from within as it seeped into them.

David recognized the power from somewhere. He felt certain he had sensed it before. However, the memory was distant and slipped from his grasp. It resembled lifeforce, but only because of the life flowing through it. It was life—but it couldn’t be lifeforce. David sincerely doubted it. He had never witnessed lifeforce this potent. It was life, yet it also resembled Origin Essence. However, it was different.

The power was stronger, yet not. It felt brittle and seemingly incapable of harming anyone—yet it was potent and repelled Nihilum all the same.

He stepped closer to the pagoda but stopped after a single step as his heart clenched. Waves of sorrow and fury surged from the bottom of his heart, flooding him inside and out. His hair stood on end, and all movement came to a screeching halt as more memories surfaced.

His parents appeared before him, their corpses sprawled out before him, blood pooling beneath their cold, lifeless bodies. Their eyes, wide with terror, stared at him. Frightened—yet judging.

Get out of my damn head! David snapped, gnashing his teeth as the ‘memories’ faded.

Who was playing with his emotions? The pagoda filled with life had been great and all—but that? That wasn’t acceptable. In the first place, he had never seen his parents’ corpses. He didn’t doubt their deaths at this point, but for someone to fabricate memories—to plant something that never happened in his head?! That was not okay.

David steeled his mind and sealed away his emotions before he resumed his approach, eyes drawn to the Voidre even as they remained unmoving.

Should I kill them?

The Voidre felt like statues. Though clearly alive, they were growing stronger by the second. The more of the life-attuned power they consumed, the stronger they became. And if they continued to grow like this…

David shuddered. The Void Wolf had already been troublesome enough. It had grown explosively between their two encounters, and he didn’t want to imagine what would happen if the remaining Voidre were to be let loose on the Earthen Union. Could he afford to leave them alive?

Not really. However, he was also too weak to fight the Voidre head-on. Sneaking up to them could work, but he had never been a stealthy guy. David was anything but silent. He wasn’t an assassin—and was more likely to get himself killed in an assassination attempt.

I can probably kill one of them if I take advantage of the situation. They’re so focused on absorbing this power. The others would notice me though.

It wasn’t worth it. No matter how much he wanted to kill them all, David couldn’t risk it. However, he could enter the pagoda and prevent the Voidre from absorbing the object that provided them with so much power. But only after he figured out how to escape the Naughtrealm.

He turned away from the nearest Voidre as he reached the cobbled staircase leading to the pagoda’s entrance, but he never lowered his guard and remained vigilant. David stepped onto the first dark stone—polished and infused with the same power that fed the Voidre. Evidently, it was the reason the pagoda had yet to crumble—and proceeded.

The Voidre’s inaction put him on edge. It didn’t make any sense and forced him to stop after every other step to inspect the Voidlings for any changes. Yet they remained unmoving, like statues. Only their bodies bulged and rippled when new surges of power rushed through… were those chains?

He couldn’t remember seeing chains on the Void Wolf’s corpse, but now, upon closer inspection, the Voidre appeared to be chained.

The chains were filled with Nihilum that coursed through the links, heading somewhere within the pagoda. At the same time, life-attuned power surged out of the pagoda, through the same links, and flowed into the Voidlings.

What did I get myself into?! David cursed, shaking his head.

It took him a moment to process what he’d seen, but he finished the last few steps to reach the end of the staircase swiftly and stepped closer to the entrance. Whatever was hidden within the pagoda, it was bound to offer a way back to the Earthen Union. Divine Compass wouldn’t have led him here if it wasn’t his ticket home.

Right?

He reached a massive archway and stopped one last time to feel the Voidlings’ presence. Unsurprisingly, they had remained unmoving. Either they did not mind his presence, or they couldn’t feel it. Regardless, their life signals were scary, to say the least. Their lifeforce was more than ten times his own.

It was difficult to sense earlier, but now that he was about to step into the pagoda, it became painfully obvious.

Is that their power at the Platinum Rank? Or… are they already stronger than that?

He had no idea, but sensing the abundance of lifeforce and Nihilum within them made things worse for him. Passing by the resting place of two Voidre was scary, to say the least, and that shocked him greatly. It was the first time he felt truly scared for his life. At least, since he had entered the Naughtrealm.

But he was also curious. He desired to devour the Voidre. To make their power his—and to devour the life and whatever they had been feeding on. However, that was Vitae talking. He was sure of it, suppressed the desire without a second thought, and stepped through the gargantuan archway, painted in vibrant red.

As his feet carried him through the entrance, David felt a sudden shift around him. All the tension he had been carrying for however long he had been in the Naughtrealm flowed out of him, and the worries that had been plaguing his mind followed it.

His Source resumed the production of Origin Essence and pure Blood, and he felt something deep within his mind stir.

The weight of nothingness and raw Nihilum faded and made place for life.

It seeped into him and filled his cells with power until his very being was bursting with energy. Exhaustion was no more, and if David didn’t know better, he’d be certain nothing could beat him in a head-on fight. But while he knew better, David felt invincible—even if it was only a farce.

He looked around and failed to hide his smile.

The air within the pagoda was even more fragrant than outside, drifting beneath a soaring ceiling painted with intricate designs depicting dragons, phoenixes, and more mythical motifs in brilliant hues of crimson, gold, and brilliant silver that shone brighter than the stars.

Pillars—towering works of art—drenched in vibrant red and trimmed in gold leaf, were engraved with intricate lines that seemed to depict scenes of myths and legends. The details were life-like and moved around, swirling across the connected structures.

It was a mesmerizing sight. The interior was beautiful, colorful, and vibrant. It was like the tiniest specks of the pagoda were filled with life. At least, that was how it felt when compared to the rest of the Naughtrealm. The realm was bleak. It lacked color, as if it was greyed-out, and it was destroyed. Nothing was how it was supposed to be outside the pagoda.

However, no matter how enticing the pagoda’s insides were, David’s attention locked to the center. All thoughts of the beautiful interior and the Voidre’s potential threat were forgotten as his eyes fixed on something else.

Someone, to be precise.