Lucian brought Aesthra out of Helphen's Steeple, teleporting back onto the desolate plain strewn with nothing but bleached bones.
He surveyed the endless, indistinguishable wasteland and felt a trace of frustration.
The objective was clear:
Destroy the death ritual being conducted by Godwyn's followers. Shatter a portion of the Fading Sun.
But—
Which direction were they supposed to go?
Couldn't there at least be some kind of map marker?
Fortunately, Lucian was not alone. At his side stood a witch who had wandered the spirit world for a long time.
He turned to Aesthra, placing his hopes on her experience.
"Aesthra, do you know where they're conducting the death ritual?"
She blinked.
"Even if you put it that way… I don't actually know where they are."
"In this world, there are many places I've never dared to venture deep into."
"…But if we're talking about general directions, there are a few possible locations. Want me to take you there?"
Lucian nodded.
"Whether it's right or not, we'll check first."
"It's better than wandering aimlessly."
Seeing him agree, Aesthra selected one of the places she considered likely and prepared to guide him.
From a small pouch she carried, she took out a skull.
It had no lower jaw. The surface was smooth and pristine, faintly translucent like polished crystal.
Within its eye sockets burned an eerie blue flame.
Judging by its proportions, it was a pure human skull.
The sort of perfectly proportioned specimen that could pass as an idealized human cranium.
Aesthra placed it upon her palm.
Lucian looked at the unusual skull curiously.
"What is that?"
Instead of answering immediately, Aesthra raised the skull high.
The skull began to rotate slowly on its own.
It turned toward a certain direction, and the blue fire in its eye sockets flared brighter.
As though something in that direction continued to draw it.
When it finally stopped turning, she explained:
"I found this special skull some time ago."
"There's still a fragment of a soul lingering inside it. It can't communicate, but that fragment is always gazing toward one direction."
"I once kept walking, trying to find its destination… but I failed."
"After crossing several regions, I was blocked by the Sea of the Dead."
"In any case, it works as a directional guide. We can use it to determine a bearing."
Lucian regarded the skull with interest.
So it was essentially a compass.
After fixing the direction, Aesthra took out another item—a map scroll made of some unknown material.
Upon it was a crude hand-drawn map.
It was extremely rough. Only the approximate boundaries of several regions were sketched out, loosely dividing the terrain.
Within each region were various markings: circles, crosses, squares.
Lucian pointed at them.
"What do these mean?"
Aesthra glanced at where he was pointing while calculating their route.
"I'm not very good at drawing maps. These are just approximate zones."
"The circled areas are where monsters reside. We should be cautious near those."
"The ones marked with crosses are especially dangerous. Best not to approach them."
"As for the squares, those are the locations of Helphen's Steeples. I've only seen a few."
"Oh, and you might not feel it, but to souls, Helphen's Steeples carry a special guiding presence. You can vaguely sense their direction."
"So by using both this skull and the Steeples as reference points, you can roughly determine where you are in a region."
After explaining, Aesthra set off ahead to lead the way.
Lucian followed behind her, then paused.
"Should we rest for a bit?"
They had just climbed up and down Helphen's Steeple, a long and exhausting journey.
He was concerned about her stamina.
Aesthra turned back and smiled.
"Haha, I'm fine."
"I've been in the spirit world for quite a while. The thing I'm best at now is running away."
"If I couldn't even handle this distance, I wouldn't have survived."
Lucian blew the Spectral Steed Whistle, attempting to summon Torrent.
But for some reason, Torrent seemed resistant to the spirit world and refused to manifest.
With no choice, Lucian abandoned the idea.
Although Aesthra insisted she was fine, Lucian lifted her onto his back anyway, just as he had done inside the Steeple.
She flushed slightly but said nothing further.
This would allow them to move faster.
Yes… that was how she justified it to herself.
And so Lucian carried Aesthra across the bone-littered plain, sprinting toward the potential ritual site—
They checked several locations in succession.
They encountered various monsters, yet never found the true ritual ground.
Along the way, only a minority of creatures displayed strong aggression. Most reacted only if approached too closely, and Lucian and Aesthra easily avoided them.
During this time, Lucian experimented with his Soul Dash against some of the hostile monsters.
The results were decent.
When he transformed into a pure soul form and dashed, he could indeed inflict damage.
And after testing, he discovered he could fuel the energy cost directly with Humanity.
However—
Such direct collision also damaged his own soul.
For now, it could not serve as a standard combat technique.
It was more of a mutual destruction charge than a sustainable method.
After several failed searches, Aesthra finally decided to bring Lucian to the most dangerous central region.
That place was typically guarded by powerful enemies.
If possible, one should avoid confronting them.
But now, it was the only place left.
Under Aesthra's guidance, Lucian finally arrived.
This was the very center of the plain.
Amid the endless white bones, a massive slanted passage descended into the earth.
The two of them followed the tunnel downward.
Along the way, numerous giant skulls appeared; the same type Lucian had fought before.
Each massive skull wore a helm shaped like the Eclipse Sun.
If so, they had likely found the correct location this time.
The passage was packed with these skeletal guardians of Godwyn in the spirit world.
When the first skull detected them, all of them surged forth at once.
Seeing the corridor filled wall to wall with skulls, Lucian summoned the Dragonkin Soldiers—
Caelvyr and Vaelthar.
The two Dragonkin charged repeatedly, crushing skull after skull, clearing a path forward.
The group broke through head-on, advancing all the way to the deepest part underground.
The cavern ahead burned with brilliant spirit fire—
Even brighter than the lands outside under the shroud of the Fading Sun.
The skeletal guards had been completely eliminated.
Yet the followers within the cavern did not stir.
At the center of the cavern lay a massive ritual circle.
Countless skeletal beings—nothing but bone, spirit fire blazing atop their heads, knelt in worship around it.
At the very center of the great sigil sat a humanoid figure.
It held a thorned scepter and wore a crown.
Its body was emaciated to an extreme.
Its robes were extraordinarily ornate, adorned with gold, utterly different from the tattered garments of the surrounding followers.
It seemed to hold high status, perhaps a bishop or high priest.
Small in stature, with withered features and unnaturally dark skin stretched over a frame devoid of flesh—
There was no doubt.
These were the followers of Godwyn, presiding over the rite of death.
They showed no reaction to the group's sudden intrusion. The skeletal followers continued their prayers in silence, as if the failure of their guards meant nothing at all.
And on the other side—
Lucian shifted his gaze toward a suit of pitch-black armor standing motionless at the edge of the cavern.
After witnessing animated, hostile armor within Helphen's Steeple, he would never again mistake such a thing for a mere decoration.
And indeed,
The armor moved.
The instant Lucian's attention settled on it, it launched forward.
In the blink of an eye, it appeared at their flank.
The black-armored knight raised its greatsword and cleaved downward at the Dragonkin Soldiers' waists.
Asimi materialized before it and intercepted the strike with her blade, but the sheer force sent her flying.
By the time she corrected her posture midair and landed, the knight had already swung again.
A crescent-shaped blade of moonlike energy shot toward the Dragonkin Soldiers' midsections.
Before it could hit, Lucian dismissed both Dragonkin back into their Spirit Ashes, narrowly avoiding the blow.
Judging from the knight's displayed strength, that slash might well have bisected them.
Lucian frowned.
This must be the powerful regional guardian Aesthra had mentioned.
Now he understood why she had not been optimistic about their plan.
This guardian was stronger than even the most elite heroes.
Whatever it had been in life, here in the spirit world it possessed overwhelming strength, perhaps enhanced by some unique boon.
To Lucian, this was already approaching the level of a Demigod.
If every death ritual site devoted to Godwyn had a guardian of this caliber…
Then on paper, their odds truly were slim.
Asimi gripped her Sword of Night and Flame and rushed forward, engaging the black knight in combat.
Taking advantage of their clash, Lucian rang the Spirit Calling Bell, summoning Storm Knight Oleg and the Battlemage Hugues.
The moment they appeared, Lucian ordered them to charge straight into the ritual circle and destroy it.
Hugues' staff gathered a Cannon of Haima, launching it toward the densest cluster of worshippers.
The other followers did not react in the slightest, as if the attack were not directed at them at all.
The cannonball was intercepted midair by a barrier formed of spirit fire.
At the center of the ritual circle, the bishop opened his eyes.
Shriveled eyeballs fixed upon them as he raised the thorned scepter.
Black thorns of death erupted from the ground around Lucian's group.
Lucian pulled Aesthra aside, narrowly avoiding the writhing growths.
Up close, he realized—
The "thorns" were twisted masses of worms.
Just like the Deathroot-infested, worm-faced creatures of the Lands Between.
The bishop, seeing the slow thorns avoided, shook the scepter again.
From above his head poured forth countless relentless wraiths, homing in on nearby enemies.
The black knight, noticing the disturbance behind, turned to retreat, but Asimi summoned a gust of stormforce and blasted it out of the air.
After only a brief exchange, several severe wounds already marked Asimi's body.
"I didn't say you could leave."
She had been thoroughly suppressed earlier.
This enemy had nothing flashy about it.
No sorceries. No incantations. Barely any notable weapon skills.
Just raw numbers.
And that was precisely what made it infuriating.
She, who mirrored Lucian's stats, should have been the true stat monster.
She should have been able to crush it without thinking.
Unfortunately, she still could not unleash her full potential.
"I didn't want to use my brain…"
"This kind of thing is too complicated for a Mimic Tear."
If she couldn't win through brute stats...
Then she would win through technique.
So what if it was a level gap?
She bore Lucian's body and its diverse systems of power.
She was not without options.
And more importantly—
She had learned something crucial from him.
The ancient dragon seal upon her hand lit up.
One after another, she layered buffs upon herself;
Golden Vow.
Selinsax's Dragonbolt.
And more.
The black knight had just regained its footing when it saw multicolored radiance flare around her.
Sensing danger, it rushed in to interrupt.
But Asimi, now fully empowered, deflected the greatsword with precision and drove a kick into its chest, sending it flying.
She ran her palm along her blade.
The conjured Sword of Night and Flame ignited in blazing fire.
"Well? What about now?!"
She roared, colliding head-on with the charging knight in a furious melee—
Meanwhile, Lucian stood aside with Aesthra, directing the battlefield.
Oleg and Hugues faced little pressure.
The bishop had few offensive options.
He repeated the same sluggish patterns, stiff as a puppet, unable to catch them.
They had already shattered the spirit-fire barrier and were slaughtering the ritualists within the circle.
Lucian could clearly feel the satisfaction resonating from Hugues' soul.
Thus, Lucian's attention focused almost entirely on Asimi's duel.
He stood ready to intervene at any moment.
From the moment he gauged the knight's strength, he had prepared to use a burst of overwhelming damage, enhancing Soul Dash to instantly annihilate it.
Asimi's raw output was still somewhat inferior.
If she lost, he would finish it immediately.
Better to end it early and preserve her strength.
Yet—
To his surprise, Asimi fought it evenly.
Thanks to her diverse arsenal, she gradually seized advantage.
He could sense her growing sharper.
She was beginning to think like a true warrior; calculating, adapting, striving for victory.
Lucian suppressed the urge to unleash overwhelming damage.
This was an opportunity.
Let her grow.
At last,
She found her opening.
Ducking beneath a horizontal slash, she thrust upward into the empty helm.
The helmet flew off.
The armor froze, but in the next instant, the headless knight swung again.
Asimi drove her blade into the gap of its shoulder joint, dislodging the arm. The greatsword clattered to the ground.
She did not hesitate.
A vertical slash cleaved downward, shattering it completely.
Like the other hollow armors before, it crumbled into ash and vanished.
Asimi could no longer sustain herself.
She dissolved back into Lucian's body.
During the final stretch of the fight, her earlier buffs had expired.
In close quarters, the knight had given her no chance to reapply them.
Had she not truly integrated Lucian's various powers, she might have fallen instead.
Lucian felt genuine delight.
Her performance far exceeded his expectations.
This battle had changed her.
She could now wield her borrowed abilities with real mastery.
On the other side, the fight had long ended.
All the followers and the ritual circle were destroyed.
Yet the death rite itself had not been fully extinguished.
Lucian activated the bracelet's mark and teleported to the Lands Between—
Arriving at the Walking Mausoleum Compound in the Weeping Peninsula.
Beneath him stood the many headless mausoleum soldiers guarding the Wandering Mausoleum.
Lucian summoned a storm of annihilation.
Moments later, the soldiers were gone.
The Walking Mausoleum shuddered and halted.
He pushed open its massive doors.
Inside stood a heavy stone slab—
Replacing the soulless demigod corpse that should have lain there.
So this was the anchor.
Drawing the Ruins Greatsword, Lucian unleashed a Wave of Destruction.
The slab shattered instantly.
High above, beyond the obscuring boughs of the Erdtree—
The Fading Sun cracked.
A great portion of it broke apart.
Within Lucian's body, the sun's power surged stronger.
Feeling the increase, he exhaled.
He had not destroyed the Fading Sun outright, but at least he had erased a fragment.
He attempted to teleport back to the spirit world—
Only to discover he could not.
Because in shattering the mausoleum's stone slab, he had severed that region's connection to the Lands Between with his own hands.