The Nameless Sun rose over the Forgotten Shore, and Zachary welcomed the morning with surprisingly high spirits.
He took a deep breath, rising from the soft, comfortable bed with a long yawn and a lazy stretch. 'Man, it's strange. This feeling of liberation... of having no obligations.'
To be fair, he hadn't done much toward the end of his stay in the Outer Settlement anyway. Most likely because the atmosphere had become so toxic that no one dared give him chores, but that was a minor detail.
'This must be how a white-collar worker feels after getting fired from a black company,' Zachary lampooned, sitting on the edge of the bed. 'Wait, I wasn't fired. I quit. Or... is it a leave of absence? When I return to help them later as an outsider, does that mean I'll be rehired as a freelancer?'
He scratched his stomach lazily, a dry chuckle escaping him. He stood up, stretching his arms behind his back until his spine gave a satisfying crack. "You surely have too much free time on your hands, don't you?"
The plan for the morning was simple: find breakfast in the ruins while minimizing exposure. He needed to be back in his "quarters" soon to focus on his training.
With agile movements, Zachary slipped out of the Cathedral, landing swiftly on a broken buttress at the side of the building. He sharpened his senses, scanning the front plaza as he approached, but he froze when he spotted something bizarre.
In the distance, where the plaza merged with the charred remains of the city buildings, stood an armored wolf—the same kind of nightmare beast they had killed on their very first hunt. Zachary wasn't surprised by a mere Beast, nor that it was alone. He was surprised by its behavior.
The wolf was furiously attacking the ground at its feet. It scratched, kicked, and bit at the blackened stone with a maniacal, foaming intensity.
Zachary's right eyebrow shot up. He was no expert on the ecology of the Dark City, but he was fairly certain that "mining the pavement" wasn't a standard hobby for Nightmare Creatures.
'But oh well. Who am I to judge a monster's hobbies?'
He summoned Ender's Solace into his left hand, creeping toward the creature with silent, measured steps. Just as he reached the threshold where his Attribute would alert the beast, he exploded into motion.
The wolf reacted a second later, snapping its attention from the ground to the approaching Blasphemer, but a second was an eternity. Zachary was already upon it. His essence-coated blade lashed out in the lightning-fast thrust he had learned from Eddard, piercing the beast's throat.
[You have killed an Awakened Beast, Daruma's Hound.]
"The American way: strike first, ask questions later," Zachary lampooned quietly. He crouched to collect the Soul Shard and was preparing to butcher a few choice cuts of meat when something caught his eye.
He kicked the wolf's carcass aside to see what it had been so obsessed with. Beneath the body, the blackened stone was marred by faded, obscure spots.
It was the faint bloodstain he had left behind after the Tangled Pariah grazed his shoulder last night.
'What the—' But before he could process the implications, his enhanced senses picked up a new sound from the distance.
Footsteps. Quick. Numerous. And undoubtedly human.
Without waiting to be seen, Zachary grabbed the wolf's corpse and ducked into a blackened building bordering the plaza. Cinder Eyes and Danger Sense confirmed the interior was empty. The building was surprisingly well-maintained, looking more like an ancient boutique than a home; a dusty counter still held opaque vases filled with unidentifiable, dried contents.
He pressed himself against the wall near the window, holding his breath as the voices from outside finally became clear.
"Stop."
The male voice was steady, authoritative. Zachary recognized it instantly.
Gemma.
The footsteps grew clearer, crunching on the gravel exactly where Zachary had been standing moments before.
"Blood... Recent," a female voice added. "Do you think it's him, sir?"
Gemma didn't answer immediately. Instead, another man spoke, his tone rough and skeptical. "Do you really trust that rat's words?"
"The information he brought at least matches ours," the woman replied, a click of her tongue echoing in the silence. "We checked Changing Star's camp this morning. No sign of him. He's gone."
"So, his split from her is true, at least," Gemma concluded, his voice sounding distant.
'So Harper is already in...' Zachary thought, a wave of relief mixing with caution. 'Man, those Hunters are efficient. Harper must have entered the Castle at dawn and they're already out here looking for me.'
He pressed himself tighter against the boutique wall, heart slowing to a rhythmic throb. He couldn't afford a single mistake; he was in a very compromising position.
"And this blood... it can't be his," Gemma said, the sound of him dusting his palms together drifting through the window.
"We've heard about his Flaw. Entering the Dark City alone is basically suicide," the rough-voiced man added, his scorn palpable. "If he was going to leave that girl, he should have come to the Bright Castle. He would have been well-received..." He kicked a rock in frustration.
"Then why would he come here?" the woman asked, sounding genuinely curious.
"The bastard knows his worth," the other man spat.
Gemma sighed. Zachary could almost feel the Hunter's gaze shifting toward the looming shadow of the Cathedral. "With a Flaw like that, it would be suicide to remain in the heart of the ruins—especially this close to the Cathedral. He'll likely stick to the periphery, near the walls."
"That way he only has to worry about one direction," the woman surmised.
"Yes. He can hunt there during the day and retreat to the outer ruins when the sea rises. Only Awakened creatures populate those areas," Gemma said, turning back to his group. "We'll look for him during our regular hunts."
"Sir... is he really worth the effort?" the man asked, sounding incredulous.
Gemma remained quiet for a long moment. When he finally spoke, his voice was curt and final. "He is."
With that, the Hunters moved out with chilling efficiency, their orderly footsteps fading into the distance. Zachary remained curled against the wall, the mangled wolf carcass at his side.
'Gemma didn't mention Kido or the growing rift with Tessai,' Zachary noted, shrugging to himself. 'Makes sense. That's not information he'd share with the rank-and-file.'
Suddenly, his carefree expression shifted into a grimace of pain. 'I guess I'll have to move at night. The Host will be scouring the ruins during the day, and the chances of running into Nephis's party are too high.'
"...Fuck," he whispered into the dusty air.
Traversing the ruins at night was a death sentence for most. The truly ancient, horrific things came out to play when the Nameless Sun vanished. With his [Blasphemer] attribute, he would be like a lighthouse in a storm.
'Let's just get back for now. I'll figure out the night-shift problem later.' Zachary stood up, claimed the Soul Shard, and butchered enough meat to last the day. Before leaving the boutique, he grabbed a few sturdy pieces of wood from a broken chair—fuel for a small, contained fire—and slipped back toward the Cathedral like a ghost returning to its grave.
After stashing his new shard with the rest, Zachary turned his attention to the room's unique architecture. The Saintess's quarters had been crafted with a strange, holy precision. Small crevices were etched into the patterns of the stone walls—wide enough to allow fresh air to circulate, but angled so sharply that not a single ray of the Nameless Sun could pierce the interior. The room remained bathed in a cool, absolute shadow.
With a sigh, he started a small, controlled fire near one of the vents, ensuring the smoke could drift out. He didn't know if an Awakened could die of carbon monoxide poisoning, and he wasn't exactly eager to conduct the experiment on himself.
As the wolf meat began to sizzle, Zachary's thoughts drifted back to the plaza. To the beast's obsession with his spilled blood.
There was only one logical conclusion. 'My blood carries the [Blasphemer] aura...'
He pulled a hot piece of meat from the flame and took a tentative bite. It burned. Zachary began exhaling in short, frantic huffs, trying to cool the meat while keeping it in his mouth—a look that would have surely ruined his "mysterious lone wolf" reputation if anyone were watching.
'Is it just my blood? Or is it every part of me?' he wondered, washing the meat down with a cool draught from the Endless Spring. He shrugged a second later. 'I don't really want to find out. Let's just assume it's the blood.'
His face twisted as he looked down at the remaining, unseasoned meat. "I should really procure some spices... being a hermit is no excuse for a bland palate."
Shaking off the useless thought, he returned to the core of the problem. 'Why now? Was it always like this?'
Maybe. During the journey to the Crimson Labyrinth, he had been an evasive fighter; he rarely bled, and when he did, the group moved too fast for him to notice any lingering effects. But then, another possibility surfaced.
'Or... is it because of Blood Weave?' The thought suddenly crossed his mind.
By tampering that odd tenacity into his veins, had he made his "wrongness" more permanent? More physical? Had he inadvertently turned his very life force into a lasting mark on the world?
'I guess I'll never know,' he mused, extinguishing the small fire as he finished his meal. 'And it's not like knowing the cause changes the reality of the situation.'
He walked over to the bed and sat on the floor, resting his back against the pale wood. It was still early morning. He had an entire day to kill before the cover of night would allow him to move again.
The goal was clear.
Closing his eyes, Zachary focused inward. He felt the nutrients and essence from the meat beginning to nest in his muscles and bones. He tracked the tiny units of essence as they traveled through his circulatory system, riding the wake of his blood.
When his focus reached its peak, he began to draw it all together. He wasn't just letting it flow anymore. He began to gather every scrap of essence in his body into a single, pressurized point.
His abdomen.
Up until this point, the process hadn't been difficult. With the time he'd spent practicing, maintaining the focused formation in his core was manageable. The step after that, however... that was another thing entirely.
'Why can't there be a manual for this? A "Soul Essence for Dummies"?' Zachary cursed, clicking his tongue in the dark.
Logically, manuals had to exist in the Waking World. Controlling essence was the bedrock of an Awakened's strength, and the finesse of that control likely separated the fodder from the Legacies. He could imagine the Great Clans hoarding advanced reinforcement methods, leaving only the most basic "push-and-pull" techniques for the public.
But even if he had studied at the Academy, it wouldn't have mattered. No one taught classes on essence control to Sleepers, because for a Sleeper, controlling essence was supposed to be impossible.
Who would have thought someone would do the impossible, possible...
'And even if I had those manuals, they'd be useless,' he thought, a bead of sweat tracing a slow line from his forehead to his chin. 'Flow Control is an unorthodox mess solely fitted for my unique biology. It's not magic... I guess it's closer to internal energy or cultivation.'
Zachary gave a dry, ragged chuckle. 'If I knew I was going to transmigrate, I would've traded my philosophy degree for a deep dive into TCM and ancient anatomy. Instead, all I have are Wuxia tropes and webtoons!'
He clenched his teeth, his abdominal muscles beginning to scream under the strain of holding the essence. 'It's always the same in those stories. The protagonist finds the "Heavenly Dragon Ascending the Dao Road" cultivation method, and suddenly they're a god. No one ever explains the tutorial! How to Cultivate 101 doesn't exist!'
All he had were half-remembered lines of "poetry bullshit." As the Golden Peng ascends Mount Tai, soar with nature. As the Crouching Tiger is firm at midday, maintain the eight trigrams...
"What does any of that even mean?" he muttered, feeling a surge of genuine frustration.
He could try to channel essence through his meridians... if he had any. But he didn't have Dantians, or Qi channels, or Mana pathways. He was a creature of flesh and blood, trying to move a power that didn't belong in a mortal frame. He was walking aimlessly through a fog, hitting walls he couldn't see.
'I have no meridians, no channels, no pathways where I can channel this in an attempt to impro—'
"Wait! I do have pathways!"
Zachary yelled the words into the empty room, the sudden shock causing his gathered essence to dispel instantly, rushing back into his limbs. But he didn't care. The dissatisfaction was gone, replaced by a spark of inspiration that burned white-hot.
The vague, blurry idea he'd had when facing the Spire Messenger finally snapped into focus. It became defined, concrete, and terrifyingly plausible.
He didn't need mystical meridians. He had real, physical roads that flowed through his Body every second of every day, carrying vitality to his very cells.
His circulatory system.
His mind cleared, soaring with the raw high of evolution. Without losing a second, he dialed his concentration to its absolute limit, drawing the essence back in. But this time, he didn't aim for his abdomen.
He gathered everything into his heart.
'More...' He clenched his fists so hard his knuckles turned white. He could feel a dense cloud of essence swirling around the organ.
'Even more...' His entire body began to shake.
His temperature spiked, steam beginning to curl off his shoulders in the cool air of the Priestess's quarters. Little by little, the essence condensed. First, it was the size of his heart.
'More!' Then, the size of a child's fist.
'MORE!' Finally, the essence collapsed into a single, singular point.
A shining star, trembling with raw, pressurized energy right in the center of his beating heart. Maintaining it was like trying to hold a miniature sun in a paper bag. He couldn't move. He could barely breathe. Every fiber of his being was dedicated to preventing that "star" from detonating.
But it worked. The Core stayed lit, pulsing in sync with his heartbeat.
Zachary allowed himself a few minutes to breathe, his lungs working with heavy, ragged effort. His back was damp with sweat, the stone floor beneath him slick with the evidence of his struggle.
'Now... now what?' he thought, the strain causing his very Mind to tremble.
Maintaining the concentrated Core in his heart was becoming more bearable with every passing second, his body slowly acclimating to the pressurized heat. His temperature stabilized, and his breathing returned to a rhythmic pulse.
But the core problem remained: he was a statue. He couldn't move without risking the collapse of his focus—and with it, a potential explosion of essence inside his chest.
He needed a way to coordinate. To move the essence through his Body while the Body itself was in motion.
'Step by step, Fool. Don't rush the miracle,' he reminded himself, forcing a wave of analytical calmness over his thoughts.
He searched his memories, both from the modern world and the lore of this one, looking for an answer. He found it not in a book or a vision, but in his own scars. He remembered the Soul Devouring Tree. He remembered the harrowing mental clash when he had done the unthinkable: creating a second consciousness to house his mind and shield it from the tree's enthrallment.
Back then, it had been a desperate bunker. Now, he would use it as a co-processor.
One consciousness would hold the Core. The other would pilot the Body.
He began immediately, using his previous experience to draw the border between his thoughts. A thick vein throbbed on his temple as he branched his mind, the mental strain of holding the essence while splitting his psyche reaching a fever pitch.
But it didn't break.
Zachary took a quiet, exploratory breath. He released a small trail of essence from the Core in his heart. It shook for a fleeting moment, but he clamped down on it, guiding it into the physical highway of his blood.
Out through the aorta. Down the subclavian artery. Riding the axillary and finally arriving at the brachial artery in his arm.
He stopped it there. The strain on the Core increased with the "leak," but the effect was instantaneous. He felt an abnormal, organic surge of power flooding his arm, a density of strength that surpassed anything he had felt before.
He focused on his branched consciousness. Tentatively, he raised his arm—slowly, like an amputee testing a new prosthetic. The essence held. The flow remained.
Zachary had succeeded.
"Hahaha..." A shaky, euphoric laugh escaped his lips as he opened his eyes. He didn't know how much time had passed, and he didn't care. He moved his arm in a circle, feeling the essence shift with the muscle and bone, fueled by the pump in his heart.
With a deep breath, he used his empowered arm as a brace and stood up. The Soul Core remained. The stream continued. It was a complete, albeit rudimentary, success.
'It's wasteful,' he noted, looking down at his trembling hand. 'It's inefficient, and it's putting a hellish strain on my arteries... but it works.'
He had built a foundation. A satisfied, incredibly proud grin spread across his face, and he finally let out a hearty laugh that echoed through the hollow cathedral.
"Hahahahahaha!"
He threw his head back, placing a hand over his eyes. Finally, he dispelled the Core. The exhaustion hit him like a physical blow—his Mind was frayed from the split-tasking, his Body was sore from the pressurized reinforcement, and even his Soul felt slightly "stretched." A Dormant Soul wasn't meant to hold such concentrated power.
And yet, his Spirit felt light. Renewed.
The flaws in this method didn't demotivate him; they excited him. Flaws meant there was room for optimization. He could learn to lessen the strain, to control multiple streams at once, to power his entire body instead of just a limb... maybe even to maintain the Core while he slept.
He shook his head tiredly. That was a problem for future-Zachary.
"I guess I can call myself a cultivator now, right?" he joked to the empty room. He looked at the wall, at the single mark he had etched into the stone the previous night.
A defiant smile appeared on his face, his crimson eyes gleaming with a dangerous, newfound light. 'I'll make the most of the time I have. It will be enough.'
***
Night finally arrived, carrying a warm, salty breeze from the south. The Dark Sea had risen hours ago, and the Bright Castle in the distance was now nothing more than a silhouette shrouded in absolute darkness.
Zachary sat on the cold stone steps of the Cathedral's grand entrance. His hair was damp, a stray stream of water trickling down his temple to his chin.
'Living in isolation doesn't mean I have to let myself go,' he thought, a small chuckle escaping him as he combed his wet hair back with his fingers. Just a few minutes prior, after another grueling session of Flow Control, he had washed the sweat of his labor away with the icy, pristine water of the Endless Spring.
'I have to thank my Aspect for freeing me from basic needs. Finding a bathroom in a Cursed Cathedral would've been a nightmare,' he lampooned, standing up and dusting off his pants.
It was time to work.
With a thought, he summoned his Echo. The Carapace Scavenger materialized in a flurry of sparks, its armored bulk casting a jagged shadow over him. Zachary arched an eyebrow and patted the creature's leg.
"Bend over, mate," he said with a grin.
The Scavenger looked at him with what appeared to be a dissatisfied frown before lowering its head.
'Wait, dissatisfied? An Echo shouldn't show emotion,' Zachary mused, studying the crustacean's monstrous features. 'Right... it's just your face.'
He felt a twinge of guilt.
"I do feel a bit bad for what I've put you through... and what I'm about to put you through." He shook his head to clear the thought. "Meh, that's why I pay you—"
He stopped mid-sentence, eyes widening as he looked at the bent-over monster. "Wait. Fuck. I don't pay you, do I?"
The Echo stared at him, expressionless—though Zachary could swear a small crease appeared on its forehead.
"Internship. You're just an intern," Zachary said with a sharp click of his fingers, choosing to ignore the "disappointment" on the Echo's face. "Actually, you should be thanking me. In a modern corporation, they'd treat you way worse. I at least let you rest in my Soul Sea."
'Only when you're injured though... Let's call it occupational hazards,' he added silently as he summoned Ender's Solace.
He gripped the edge of the blade and, with a swift, practiced motion, sliced his palm. He waited, but no blood followed; Blood Weave was already sealing the breach, stubbornly keeping the ichor where it belonged. Zachary had to focus, commanding the attribute to yield. A second later, dark, thick blood began to well up, pooling in the curve of his hand.
The ichor was a deep, intense red. Through Cinder Eyes, Zachary could sense an unnatural weight emanating from it—and beneath that, the faint, golden shimmer of divinity.
He smeared the blood across the Scavenger's armored head. "Now that I think about it, Cassie never gave you a name, did she? Calling you 'Carapace Echo' is highly inefficient."
Zachary scratched his chin, then raised a finger in a mock promise. "Tell you what: if you come back alive, I'll give you an amazing name. How does that sound?"
The Echo's black eyes reflected his own. Zachary waved off its imaginary concerns. "What? Worried about the task? It's nothing serious. Just run down that wide street into the commercial district, circle that high building on the corner, and come back. Easy."
They stared at each other for a few beats of silence.
"Worried about monsters? Please! I'll be watching from the tower. Go on."
With what looked suspiciously like a resigned sigh, the Echo turned and bolted in the signaled direction. Zachary slapped its back leg with a hearty "Giddy up!" as it vanished into the shadows.
As the Echo disappeared, Zachary's smile vanished. The playful banter dropped away like a mask, leaving only the cold focus of a strategist.
'I don't have a shadow to talk to, and I refuse to talk to rocks,' he muttered to himself.
He began scaling the side of the Cathedral, moving with the fluid grace of a predator until he reached the bell tower. Because of the Fallen Devil dwelling below, flying creatures rarely approached the spire, but he didn't take chances. He stayed in the shadows of the tower, looking down at the plaza.
He kicked a piece of a broken bell, his thoughts turning somber. 'I'm not a fan of talking to myself. But I can't allow the hardships of this world to change who I am. If I have to joke with an Echo to keep my sanity and my sense of humor... then I'll do it gladly.'
Zachary shook his head as he waited for the Echo to return. 'What would be a good name for it?'
Honestly, he wasn't good with names. He vaguely remembered naming a cat and a dog when he was a child, but like every other name he once held dear, those details had slipped through his fingers. A hollow ache throbbed in his heart where those memories used to be.
He hadn't dwelled on it much, but the specificity of the amnesia was strange. He understood why his own name was gone—that was meant to dissolve his Ego to make room for the Original One. But why his loved ones?
The answer was grim: To sever his attachments.
Whatever force had brought him here wanted him anchored this world, not the old one. If he had merged with the Original One as intended, he would have been a perfect hybrid—his modern knowledge fueling a body that already belonged here. He still felt a pang of regret for the boy who had died to give him this chance, but he didn't regret refusing the merger.
He briefly looked down to Ender's Solace nesting on his hand. He rubbed the handle gently as he continued with a firm expression.
'It backfired, man. I want to return even more strongly now,' Zachary sighed. 'But I can worry about cosmic conspiracies once I'm out of this shithole. Now, about that name...'
A sudden flash of inspiration hit him. He clicked his fingers. "Pepe Silvia!"
'What a legendary name. My genius is truly frightening.'
With a lightened heart, he pivoted his focus. "Now that I will begin training, I should also try to improve the Simple Sword."
Flow Control was a breakthrough, but it was just one pillar of his strength. Thanks to Nephis teachings he has learned Broken Sword style, but that didn't mean he should ignore Eddard's teachings. At least before leaving this place, he must go beyond the mundane limits of the Old Man's technique.
He has Insight on the Heavy Sword, Nephis first sword style she teached him had traits of the Righteous and Bewitching Sword. Now, he needs to find Insight onto the rest of branches, the Swift and Gentle Sword...
Just as he was mentally tallying his ever-growing "to-do" list, he saw it.
Pepe Silvia was sprinting back from the commercial district. The Scavenger was missing a pincer, and its gait was hurried... and seemingly furious.
'Is it mad at me, or the monsters?' Zachary wondered. 'Let's go with the monsters.'
And monsters there were.
Trailing behind the Echo was a nightmare parade. Through Danger Sense, Zachary tagged three Awakened creatures and one truly hideous aberration. It was a blob of burned flesh and thorns, seeping putrid tar. Liquid tentacles lashed out from its body, hooking into buildings and dragging the mass forward with impossible, jerky speed.
A Fallen Beast.
Zachary didn't panic. He waited until Pepe Silvia crossed the plaza, aiming for the absolute darkness of the Cathedral's gate. Just as the Echo reached the threshold, Zachary dispelled it. The Scavenger vanished into sparks, returning to the safety of his Soul Sea.
The monsters, driven by the lingering scent of [Blasphemer] blood and the momentum of the hunt, didn't stop. They lunged into the pitch-black maw of the Cathedral.
...And they never came out.
There was no sound of a struggle. No tremors. No dying screams. The silence that followed was far more terrifying than a loud battle would have been. The Fallen Devil inside had likely deleted the intruders from existence in a fraction of a second.
Zachary felt a cold chill race down his spine. The power gap was humbling. But then, he looked back at the city ruins with a predator's glint in his eyes. He had just discovered a way to hunt safely on the ruins.
"Poor guy," Zachary muttered, referring to his new intern. "He's really going to be overworked."