Manual labor could be a cathartic experience. Sometimes, it felt like hypnosis by repetition. In this case, the job was incredibly gruesome, and to the point where he needed that hypnotic effect.

After a few hours, he barely even noticed that he was carrying bodies. He just did the work. Day after day, he made the trek from the enormous pyre he’d built and back into Honolulu to gather bodies. He’d vowed to leave no one behind.

Helpfully, most people had gathered in groups. Some only numbered in the single digits, but a few of the larger gatherings reached into the hundreds. That made his job a lot easier. Still, it was nearly two weeks after finding Nina’s and Fremont’s remains when Elijah finally finished the task at hand.

Tens of thousands of bodies had been stacked atop as much wood as he could find. It wasn’t nearly enough to represent the entire population, but it was all Elijah had been able to find. The others had either been eaten by the local wildlife or had ventured out into the desert, where they hoped to find some respite.

Elijah knew from his trek through the desert that most had perished during their journey. But there was some hope. Shane and his fellow refugees had made it through the mountains. Perhaps others had as well, even if they hadn’t found their way to the relative safety of Rubibi.

Whatever the case, Elijah had decided that the people remaining in Honolulu deserved a proper send-off. Maybe it was because he was tired of passively accepting so much death. Or perhaps the decision came from his desire to pay homage to people like Nina, Fremont, and his neighbors. The reasons weren’t important. What truly mattered was that he had decided not to rest until he’d found every corpse possible.

And he had.

The process was helped immensely by his incredible attributes, combined with the senses afforded by his body cultivation as well as Soul of the Wild. That coalescence allowed him to hunt down each and every body.

The first few days were devastating, largely because there were far too many children among the dead. Rationally, Elijah knew they were probably either the first or the last to die. Their weaker constitutions – and lack of system assistance – meant they would succumb to heat, thirst, and hunger far more quickly than the adults. However, most parents would sacrifice their own health for their children’s survival, so they were likely given the bulk of the remaining supplies.

Elijah wasn’t certain which situation was sadder. A small child who was forced to watch their parents die, then succumb to the ravages of dehydration. Or a parent who had to see their children fall.

Both sent chills up his spine.

And he was forced to contemplate those questions each time he found a child’s body.

But human beings were uniquely capable of adaptation, and as much as Elijah’s draconic features had come to the forefront, there was still enough of the human remaining that he could compartmentalize as well as anyone. He did just that, shunting those feelings aside as he worked toward his self-imposed goal.

He’d found a big-rig trailer to help with the onerous but reverential task. The fact that, using only his bare hands, he could pull something meant for a semi was incredible, but he couldn’t allow himself to enjoy it. Not when that trailer was full of corpses.

But at last, he was finished.

He stared at the stacked corpses, unsure what to feel. He’d moved past the sadness and guilt, but each time he really looked at the bodies, he felt the echoes of those emotions ripple through him.

Somewhere up there were Fremont and Nina.

Elijah had considered saving them for the top, but in the end, he’d decided against it. They’d be ash soon, so it didn’t matter where they’d been stacked.

“I don’t know what to say,” he admitted, his voice rough from lack of use. He’d spent the past couple of weeks working in silence, and it showed. “I wish you’d all found a better fate. I wish you could all have seen the things I’ve seen. The wonders of the world. The terrors. The monsters and miracles. I wish…I wish you had lived.”

He looked down at his dirty hands, continuing, “Nina, I…I’m sorry. I did what I did because I thought it was best for you. Maybe because it was the only way I could bear it. I was angry and scared, and I didn’t know how to deal with it. I didn’t want to die. I resented my diagnosis. And I took it out on you. I-I’m sorry. I’m really, really sorry.”

Elijah glanced up. “And Fremont – you were a really good boy. The best.”

Then, he stepped forward until he reached the edge of the pyre. Kneeling, he aimed his laser-pointer firestarter at the base of the pyre and set it aflame. It caught quickly. The wood he’d gathered for fuel was all bone dry, so the fire spread rapidly until the entire thing was engulfed.

The heat turned his cheeks red and dried the few tears he had left, but he didn’t step away. He endured it, almost as if he wanted himself to experience some sort of penance. Wasn’t that why he’d chosen to gather the corpses in the first place? He’d convinced himself it was because those people needed to be put to rest, and with the respect they deserved. But he knew the choice originated as much with his pathological need to punish himself for his perceived failures as it was for any other reason.

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He'd done something similar when he’d discovered his sister’s fate, when he’d trekked across hundreds of miles carrying her statue to Argos. There, he’d built a temple in her honor.

The pyre was no temple, but it was still a fitting gesture.

He watched it burn, and with every passing hour, he felt his grief and guilt latch onto a particular cluster of leaves within his garnet mind. He didn’t ignore it – not exactly – but he didn’t keep it at the forefront of his thoughts, either. Soon, he’d need to deal with that trauma, lest it build to the same fury he’d felt during his recent upgrade in his mind cultivation.

But for now, he let it fester.

Perhaps that was meant as punishment, too. For what, Elijah wasn’t entirely certain. There was nothing he could have done to save any of them. From what he understood, the continent was tens of thousands of miles from anywhere he’d been. But guilt was rarely rational.

The pyre itself was the size of a basketball arena, piled high with wood and corpses in layers. And when it lit up, it filled the sky with smoke that was likely visible from a hundred miles away. Elijah watched it all, though he wasn’t idle. Instead, he was forced to relight the fire multiple times, adding more fuel along the way.

In the end, it took two more weeks for the bodies to burn.

It poisoned the atmosphere for miles around, filling the air with foul smelling smoke and toxic fumes from the often-varnished wood he’d used as fuel. Elijah wasn’t affected, and there was no one else around to deal with the aftermath.

The steady work was an extension of his catharsis, though when it had all burned to ash, Elijah knew he was a long way from being okay with what he’d seen. So, when he finally moved on, leaving a blackened pile of ash behind, he did so in search of something more meaningful.

Steadily, he strode through the desert, his skin still black from the ash of his labor. Yet, he didn’t stop to shower. Indeed, he was barely conscious of what he was doing until he realized what drove him forward. Mingled with the guilt and sadness was something else. Something hopeful. Something magical.

He followed that thread of ethera, unsurprised when he pinpointed what he felt. It was a leyline. More important than that was the sense of vitality that had eluded him since entering the desert. The area wasn’t completely devoid of life. No desert truly was. However, that vitality was far more subtle than it would have been in a jungle.

After a few more miles, he finally saw a glimmer on the horizon. At first, he thought it nothing more than a mirage, but soon enough, that shimmer of hope resolved itself into an oasis surrounded by greenery.

He approached with mingled optimism and caution. The latter proved unnecessary because that small stretch of vegetation was entirely peaceful. Sure, nature held sway, and many of the creatures living within the oasis were predators. However, it was familiar enough to be comforting.

The pool was only a hundred yards wide and maybe half as long. However, the life-giving moisture was enough to foster so much vitality that, for a moment, Elijah felt like he’d stepped into a different world filled with ferns, palm trees, and fertile soil.

He stripped off his armor. Then his clothes. And at last, he dove into the clear water, washing away the evidence of his labor.

For a long few hours, Elijah just floated in the center of the pool. It was cool and deep, lined with rocks and likely bubbling up from the Hollow Depths. More importantly, it represented the calm cleansing he needed to experience before moving on.

He bathed, using his homemade soap to wash away even the most stubborn ash. Only then did he realize that he’d long since left the smell of burning corpses behind. Instead, the odor that had accompanied him for so long had come from him.

Realizing that, he spent even longer ensuring that he was clean. Coupled with that was a copious amount of cleansing powder, which he dumped on his clothes and armor.

That was when he sensed a creature nearby.

He swam to shore to get a closer look. According to Soul of the Wild, the creature should have been quite large. Maybe as big as a crocodile. But to his eyes, it was no larger than a gecko.

Having spent so long in Hawaii, he thought he knew what it was, too. The mo’o was a creature of Hawaiian mythology. Literally, the word meant reptile in their language, and the legend extended from that. According to myth, mo’o were amphibious, shapeshifting lizard spirits that could take the form of enormous, canoe-sized reptiles, tiny geckos, and even humans. In a lot of ways, they mirrored draconic legends from other cultures.

They were also guardian spirits who lived in fishponds and were revered by native Hawaiians as ʻaumakua, ensuring the pond’s purity. Or that was Elijah’s understanding of the mythology. As an outsider, he found it both incredibly interesting and a little daunting to fully comprehend the complexities of the spiritual relationship Hawaiians shared with their island home.

In any case, the creature Elijah thought of as the gecko-like mo’o was clearly a guardian, and not a weak one, either. It perched on the side of a palm tree, staring at Elijah with its unreadable gaze.

“Don’t worry,” Elijah said. “I’m not here to disturb you. Just a pit stop.”

The guardian didn’t move, but Elijah felt that, if it really wanted to, it could make for a very bad day. He wasn’t certain about its exact level, but he did believe that few other people in the world could have endured its gaze, much less any attack it chose to level their way.

Elijah sighed, then turned his back on the creature. He sat at the edge of the pool, his feet dangling in the water as he summoned Blessing of the Grove. The rain was almost as refreshing as the pool itself.

Belatedly, Elijah realized that there was probably a treasure down there. The magical vitality of the area was the first hint, but the presence of the guardian mo’o cemented it as fact.

Not that it mattered. Elijah had no interest in taking the creature’s treasure. And somehow, it seemed to sense that because, only a moment later, it passed him by and dove into the water. Instantly, it shimmered, revealing its true form. It still appeared much like a gecko, though much, much larger. If it was any smaller than a crocodile, he would have been incredibly surprised.

Soon enough, it dove so deep that it passed out of Soul of the Wild’s range, leaving Elijah in peace.

After everything he’d seen – and done – over the past few weeks, it was nice to just lean back and enjoy the natural world. It couldn’t last, though. He knew that. Not only did he need to continue his journey toward the Primal Realm, but he also had some more urgent ideas for the near future.

But for now, he just relaxed and let the world heal his parched soul.