The Heavenly Ledger's warning was not a shriek of terror, but a cold, final decree: [Karmic Source: The Scavenger. Player Tier: Sovereign.] The title itself sent a new kind of dread through him. The Archon was a hunter; a Sovereign, a Scavenger was a being that fed on the spoils of others' suffering. It was a level of detached, almost bureaucratic malice that chilled Kael to the bone.
His newfound power, the Karmic Sight, flared to life in response. He didn't just see the physical world; he saw the threads that wove it together. The ground, the ice, the distant void all of it wove together into an intricate tapestry of flowing energy. And now, he saw new threads, thin, jagged lines of corrupted energy tearing through the fabric of the Vestige Core, drawn to the lingering essence of the defeated Umbral Hounds.
He had won the battle, but the fight had left behind a meal. And the Scavenger had sent its servants to collect.
From a dozen small, chaotic portals that shimmered into existence across the icy plane, the Scavenger's hounds emerged. They were not monolithic beasts of bone and starlight, but a swarm. Thousands of them, each one the size of a fist, their bodies a repulsive fusion of insect-like limbs and writhing tentacles. Their only feature was a single, large, pulsating eye on their chitinous shells. They were a hive mind, and their sole purpose was to consume.
They were drawn not to Kael, but to the lingering karmic essence of the two Umbral Hounds he had just defeated. They moved as a single, liquid entity, their clicking, scraping sounds a terrifying chorus on the silent ice. They were not interested in the living; they were interested in the dead.
But their very presence was a death sentence. Kael's Karmic Sight showed him the truth. The swarm was a virulent plague on the realm. Its consumption of the defeated essence was not just for sustenance; it was a process of converting that raw, valuable energy into a beacon. A beacon that would call the Sovereign himself. Kael was a sitting duck. He had a few minutes at most before his presence was no longer a simple meal, but a final destination.
He couldn't run. The swarm would simply strip the realm clean, leaving him with no resources. He couldn't fight them all. They were too many, and their chaotic, corrupted energy was a poison to his purified essence. He had to be surgical.
Using his Karmic Sight, Kael focused on the swarm. He didn't see individual creatures. He saw a single, collective thread. A thick, luminous tether of corrupted karma that bound them all together. A single point of weakness he could exploit. It was a dark, pulsing core that floated within the center of the swarm, a heart of pure, vile energy.
With his last reserves of mana, Kael took a single, deliberate step, refusing to waste his energy on a futile fight. His fist, his entire being, was focused on one objective: he would shatter the heart of the swarm.
He lunged, not with a flourish of power, but with a pinpoint, precise burst of speed, his movements a blur of grim purpose. The swarm descended upon him, their tentacles lashing out, their chitinous bodies scraping against his skin. He ignored the stinging pain, the low, psychic drone of their collective mind trying to pull his thoughts apart. He pushed through them, his focus unwavering.
He reached the core of the swarm the pulsing, corrupted heart of collective karma. He didn't use a powerful punch; he used a single, pure, precise burst of the Vestige Realm's energy, the very energy that was anathema to the corrupted mana of the scavengers. He plunged his fist into the core, a scalpel of pure light against a cancer of darkness.
The core shrieked, a sound of agony and fury that was both physical and psychic. The entire swarm, the thousands of parasites, froze. Their collective eye-like cores went dark. A moment later, their bodies disintegrated into a cloud of black, shimmering dust that dissipated harmlessly into the cold air.
Kael stood alone once more, his body exhausted, his mana reserves completely depleted. The victory was cold and hollow, confirming to a Sovereign-tier player that he was not just a meal, but a problem that needed to be resolved.
He closed his eyes, his mind already racing. He couldn't stay here. He couldn't cultivate. Every second he spent in this realm was a ticking clock. He needed a true escape, not just a desperate flight. The crystal shard he had found earlier, the one that held the memories of the dead Player, felt strangely warm in his palm. He had only seen the memories, the screams of terror. What if there was more?
He activated his Karmic Sight, not on the surrounding world, but on the crystal itself. He looked past the dead player's despair, past the chaotic memories of a life lost. He saw a faint, silver thread, a single, impossibly thin line of light that was a part of the crystal, yet not of this realm. It was a path. A forgotten exit. An escape route the Scavenger's vile senses, tuned only to the living and the decaying, had completely missed. It was a path forged by a Player who had seen no hope, but still desperately carved a way out.
Kael did not hesitate. He had to follow it. His only chance was to walk into a new kind of hell, one he had to believe was better than the one he was in. He put the crystal to the Keybearer, his eyes fixed on the single thread of hope. It was a journey into the unknown, a journey to a place no living Player had ever returned from. He had no other choice.