The rest of the day was a blur. Ruler Kazriel forwarded large files to my watch and had me talk and listen to the Caldera ambassador, but I didn’t really recall anything.

My head throbbed like someone had smashed my skull with a warhammer as I stumbled back to my room. Scott was already waiting for me.

“Can we talk tomorrow?” I groaned, half-praying that he would step aside to let me sleep.

“Sure. There’s just one thing you should know,” Scott said. “We should talk to the others tomorrow. The Group Combat class is over, and the rewards have been distributed. We were noticed and granted access to the Grand Camp’s special training rooms, not that it matters for us.”

He waved dismissively. “Anyway, we don’t need to stay teamed up anymore, but…”

I interrupted. “I get it, and I do want to tell them about what happened tomorrow too.”

Scott seemed mollified and stepped inside to sleep. I followed, a myriad of thoughts filling my head. But no matter how chaotic my mind was, I fell asleep the moment my head hit the cushion.

My eyes had barely closed when someone shook me awake. Bright rays of the morning sun filled the room with light.

“How? I just fell asleep!” I groaned, trying to turn around when a splash of water washed over me.

Instincts forced me to sit upright in an instant, and I glared at Scott, who gestured for me to follow him. We went to the floor’s massive restroom and finished our business, but not without throwing a few compressed earthen spikes at Scott. He blocked them effortlessly and chided me for a good minute.

Maybe that was exactly what I needed, because I felt a lot better when we left the restroom to join the others for breakfast–although it was hard to tell through my wildly racing heart. It was almost as bad as it’d been when we fled from the Cyclop and the Treant.

***

“You met a Ruler?” Surprisingly enough, Fabienne was the first to squeal out loud after I told them what happened.

“There are Outsiders in the Grand Camp?” Daniel’s brows furrowed, which urged Scott to tell the others about the ambassadors.

Apparently, there were Outsiders in most Sanctuaries, which was news to me as well. What was also new was that nobody had been surprised about the existence of Sanctuaries. That… hurt a lot more than I expected it would.

I knew their families were influential and powerful, but… really? I was the only one who didn’t know about the Sanctuaries?

Scott and I told them about the Katrak and the challenges of the other Caldera, which seemed to hit Sophie harder than the rest.

She glared at me, which stung, to say the least, but she quickly deflated. “Should I call my parents and curse them out for making me bind Piu when I was four?” Sophie sighed heavily and glanced at me, looking for confirmation. “That would be ungrateful, wouldn’t it?”

Silence was all the answer she received from me. It was part revenge for glaring at me, part to give Sophie a moment to think. She definitely knew how spoiled she’d just sounded and grumbled under her breath after a while.

“These Calderas. I hate them. No, I don’t, but why are they only challenging Adam and Scott? I want to beat them up too!” Sophie said loudly.

Daniel nodded in full agreement. He didn’t like this at all.

“Maybe the whole team can come? If they realize how young everyone is, they might change their minds. After all, we’re not the only race with a different system. We have a World, others have a reservoir, core, or root.” Scratching the back of my head, I added, “I mean, they cannot be this narrow-minded and ignore our powerhouses just because some were ‘touched’ by the Primal Spirit when they were children.”

I was rather confident until I saw the look on Scott’s face, and I immediately realized that my words were for naught.

“You are right!” Daniel said, palms slamming into the table. It creaked but didn’t break as Daniel jumped to his feet. “We won’t fall behind. So what if you’ll be taught by a Ruler? I will make sure to reach the Expert Rank as soon as possible. The Caldera have to let me join the Katrak at that point!”

Scott didn’t seem convinced at all, but he joined the conversation. “Destiny is close to breaking through as well. I think we’ll reach the Expert Rank by the time the Katrak starts too.”

Sophie listened and grunted. “If I push Acer a little, I… should be able to keep up with you guys. I’m about to fill the last 3-Star Ether Gate. Once full, I won’t take more than a month to temper the Gate and finish tempering my body!” She nodded slowly, flames burning in her eyes. “Pushing to the Expert Rank it is then. Sounds fun.”

I couldn’t quite agree with the sentiment. It was definitely not going to be fun. They’d go through hell to push to the Expert Rank in the next few months.

Fabienne clenched her fists as well. “I will give my best too.”

The conversation with my friends turned out much better than I’d hoped. But if they gave their best, so should I.

***

Bright eyes stared at me. It was a violent – invasive – gaze that penetrated deep into my soul. My hair stood on end, and it felt like the beast was about to attack me, but I did not shy away. Our eyes met. I embraced the beast’s intrusion and let her see everything she wanted to see.

The inner World rippled and unraveled before the beast’s gaze as I stepped forward, approaching the antelope after she had injured the fourth caretaker that week.

“Do you want help?” I asked, stopping dead in my tracks when the antelope’s horns flared with golden light. “You don’t want us to bother you? I can’t do that. We have to examine your calves. A few droplets of blood and a syringe filled with your ether are all we need.”

A few more tests were in order to ensure the aging antelope hadn’t caught any viruses when she gave birth two weeks ago. The records stated that an insidious virus had affected her a few years earlier, when she gave birth for the second time. This time, she had given birth to triplets, and the caretakers were worried the calves hadn’t received enough nutrients–or ether–from their mother. Some were afraid the now-inactive virus had been triggered once more and had spread to the calves. However, she did not allow anyone to get close enough.

A bleat of anger filled the habitat, telling me all I needed to know.

While I couldn’t understand the Evolved beast, her emotions were painfully easy to read. I grumbled inwardly, cursing her defiant nature, and sat cross-legged on the ground.

“I cannot leave you like this. You know as well as I do that something is wrong with you. You’re sick, and we have to find out what’s causing your issues.”

Taken from NovelBin, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

The antelope didn’t seem to like my presence, yet she accepted it. As long as I stayed far from her young, she wouldn’t attack. That, at least, was already a win. Two caretakers had been attacked the moment they stepped into the habitat, though I was fairly sure their impatience–and the massive needles they carried–were the main problems at that time.

I discarded all thoughts of approaching the antelope’s young and focused on my work. I began World refinement using the Fifth Level of Blastor Refinery. But instead of blindly refining my World while confined in the antelope’s habitat, I circulated my ether through the surroundings. I discarded all thoughts of efficiency and replaced my well-attuned ether with ambient ether.

That postponed the refinement process until I had absorbed and annexed enough ambient ether to practice Blastor Refinery, but it also forced the antelope mother and her young to get used to me. They absorbed my ether with every breath, which ought to change their minds about me–or so Nathaniel and the other researchers said.

Since my World was unique in the sense that it reached the hearts of the beasts around me, the core of my inner World–and therefore my ether–was affected by the features of my World as well. Not caring about the antelope mother and her young was enough to make me appear like a harmless creature that didn’t mean any harm. Truthfully, I did not want to hurt them. My sole goal was to help. But that didn’t mean the beasts understood that–not until my World connected to them.

Drawn by my ether, I was greeted by a beautiful sight when my eyes fluttered open again. The World refinery had gone well, though that was the least of my concerns when I found three antelope calves and their mother sleeping beside me, their heads resting on my lap.

In the Rulers’ Names, it worked! This was insanity! I felt like screaming and squirmed. The mother antelope woke, and our eyes met again. This time, her bleat was softer as she scrambled to her feet. She glanced at her young, and I felt her hesitation wash away.

The antelope mother nudged me with her snout, releasing faint bursts of golden ether. As surprised as I was, I reacted quickly and collected the beast’s ether into several small syringes.

“Thank you,” I whispered so as not to stir the young antelopes awake. “But I do need a little bit of your blood as well–yours and your calves’. We need to make sure they will grow well and that they aren’t affected by the same virus that nearly killed you a few years ago.”

I knew the beast couldn’t understand me. Not even the average Unblemished beast could understand the human tongue. However, I could convey my intent and emotions to the mother as I reached out to gently cradle her head.

There was no incoming attack, no retreat. The antelope mother leaned into my hand and accepted all the love and care I could spare. Aureus was no fan of my tactics, which he made quite clear, whereas Nox urged me to unsheathe my sword and drive it into the antelope’s neck. But I ignored them both and focused on my World as it resonated with the feisty beast.

The storm of a beast faded into a faint gust that provided me with all the answers I needed.

I retrieved a Q-tip coated in numbing cream and applied it to a small spot near the antelope mother’s chest. Next, I took a small needle. Her heart raced, and waves of fright and old trauma flooded through me, but I managed to reassure her. Once she was calm enough, I pricked the mother and drew three small syringes of blood.

“That wasn’t too bad, was it?” I asked quietly, retrieving an Emeraldia Apple from a densely grown apple tree filled with the ether of an Unblemished plant.

The beast took a bite and nuzzled my head, gratitude replacing fear.

“Is it okay if I draw a little blood from your young as well? They won’t notice anything as long as I apply the numbing cream.”

I knew the mother wouldn’t attack even if I touched her young without consent, but asking cost me nothing. Furthermore, it gave her a sense of control, which was crucial for future examinations.

I did not force myself on them; I waited patiently for the mother’s response. That ought to create some trust.

The beast mother was reluctant at first, her motherly instincts flaring up, but she recalled the pain–or rather the void of pain–from when I drew her blood and relented.

My fingers moved the instant I was given permission. Several syringes appeared beside me, and I applied more numbing cream to the sleeping antelopes’ chests before drawing their blood. It had to be heartblood given the origin of the insidious virus, but that hardly mattered. The young antelopes barely moved as the sterilized needles pierced their soft skin.

The whole process didn’t take more than a minute, yet it was something the other caretakers hadn’t been capable of. I felt their eyes on me, burning into my back as the door to the habitat opened quietly.

“Fascinating.” Ruler Kazriel’s voice snaked through the habitat. The antelope mother jerked up and released a golden blast toward the door before lying down beside me. The tension in her body faded as a familiar aura of kindness washed through the habitat. Someone yelped in surprise, but there were no sounds of destruction. The surprise faded quickly as the Ruler emerged beside me, the golden blast fizzled out in his hands.

“I’ll take these.” He snickered, eyes drawn to the syringes filled with blood and ether. They vanished, and his eyes turned to me. “You can stay here for a bit. Come and find me in the Sanctuary once you’re done.”

Training was about to start, and I was more than happy to join Ruler Kazriel right away. The young antelopes didn’t let me. Their heads were glued to my lap, and they did not like getting moved around, so I did the only logical thing. I discarded all thoughts of training with the Ruler and surrendered to the young beasts’ cuteness.

***

Training was harsh. In the first week, Ruler Kazriel focused on my foundation. He was pleased with how well I performed with the sword and built upon that knowledge with his own experience.

Unfortunately, he liked sparring quite a lot. Kazriel’s empowerment didn’t focus on the body, yet he was stronger than Swordmaster Selene. And while the demon hiding in human skin had been a pain to train with, at least she held back. Ruler Kazriel didn’t bother. He wasn’t even trying to hide his intentions.

I was a piece of ore, and he was the blacksmith. His sword’s flat side flattened flesh and smashed bones, only for high-grade healing traits to wash over me, healing me near-instantaneously. As the wounds faded, the pain ought to disappear as well, yet it didn’t. The pain lasted through the healed wounds and overlapped with the new wounds, pushing my mind to the very edge of insanity.

Training one week with Kazriel brought me to tears, making me wish Swordmaster Selene would come to my rescue. She never came. Instead, body and mind were pushed to new heights, which only worsened when Ruler Kazriel learned that my soulshares were at the second Stage. Nox was not quite there yet, but it was only a matter of time before I would be able to fuse with the Ferronox Mantis as well. As for Aureus, our bond continued to grow firmer.

That was something Ruler Kazriel should have never found out. He disappeared the day he learned about my bonds and returned the following day with a new schedule. I was no longer beaten black and blue most of the day. Instead, the art of perfecting my way of the sword was reduced to four hours a day.

A few more hours were dedicated to the refinement of the World, but even the joy of refining my World was taken from me. Ruler Kazriel was more than satisfied with my control over ether as well as soul energy. That, however, only applied to the short period I had access to ether. If I had been anyone else, he would have cursed me… not that his bombardment of kindness felt any better.

We spent four hours together meditating cross-legged in an isolated room, practicing Blastor Refinery’s fifth level. The first days were acceptable; Ruler Kazriel supervised the process and advised me. Then things changed. He’d decided to guide me through the “true” fifth level of Blastor Refinery. At least, that was what he called it. I could only curse the true fifth level from the bottom of my heart.

His hand pressed firmly against my back, and he forcefully took over my body. The pain was incomparable, and so were the results. I did see the results and how they pushed my World further than the “false” fifth level of Blastor Refinery, but that didn’t mean I liked seeing the cracks on my core. Or losing control over my body. Or fearing the destruction of my World.

It was clear that the true fifth level was too much for my World to handle. It required a larger World, a firmer core, and a frightening control over ether and soul energy. Ruler Kazriel’s precision had been horrifying, to say the least, yet he hadn’t even performed the technique on his own body. Invading a foreign World and using someone else’s ether and soul energy should have diminished his control greatly, but it didn’t feel that way. If anything, it felt like Ruler Kazriel had decades of practice–like he’d controlled the Worlds and energy of thousands of Blessed over the years.

That… to be honest, I didn’t even doubt it. How could I, when I saw the results of his work firsthand? I felt them.

The momentary loss of control over body and World was frightening, but so was the rest of Ruler Kazriel’s training.

One thing was sure–Kazriel was a devil. He didn’t do things half-heartedly, which was as terrifying as it was terrific. After all, he did not hold back when it came to resources and serums either.

Is it worth it? I wondered one day, and I was surprised that I couldn’t tell. Every day was filled with pain, yet I could see myself progress rapidly.

Was it fast enough to defeat Zegrath in three months? I didn’t think so, but my chance increased with every hellish day that passed. And that was more than a little exciting.