The conduit of the gorefiends was finally in sight. Kal had been moving for another whole day since his close call with the garghound royal guard and like before it hadn’t been easy. He had been constantly harassed by roaming packs of all the demon types he had fought so far.
He hadn’t leveled again since the second day of his journey but since he was getting close to the next elite Kal thought he better distribute his free points now. Still jogging he opened up his status to see what needed more improvement.
Kalum Lesta
Status
Class:
Slayer of Fate [Epic] [Anomalous]
Level:
48
Race:
Human?
Health:
2370
Stamina:
5160
Wrath:
0
Attributes
Strength:
474
Agility:
247
Endurance:
516
Vitality:
237
Intellect:
165
Perception:
252
Will:
572
Wisdom:
244
Available:
18
Titles
Ascendant, Core Bane, Core Smith, Defier of Dhinir, Planeswalker, Planar Appetite, Slayer of the Strong, Endurance Elite, Strength Elite, Will Elite, Demon Slayer, Paragon of Man
Skills
Soul Forge [Rare], Wrathful Regeneration [Uncommon], Wrath Incarnate [Uncommon], Abyssal Consumption [Rare], Flames of Wrath[Uncommon] [Soul Forged], Slayer’s Intent [Rare] [Soul Forged], Slayer’s Apathy [Rare] [Soul Forged], Edge of Malice [Common] [Soul Forged]
Race
Birthright: Confined
Kal scanned through his attributes content with how things were looking so far until he saw his intellect level. Coming to a sudden halt Kal scanned the rest of his attributes, “What the fuck!?”
He could have sworn his intellect was over one hundred and eighty the last time he looked. Even his perception and will looked wrong. What was going on? How could his attributes be lower? He thought maybe his physical attributes might drop if his badly healed wounds were severe enough but he had never expected his mental attributes to be able to go down.
Kal looked over all of his bonuses and how he had distributed his points along the way.
Distribution
Strength:
4
Agility:
115
Endurance:
11
Vitality:
28
Intellect:
106
Perception:
0
Will:
6
Wisdom:
0
Total:
270
His distributions all made sense considering he still had eighteen to spend. Worried Kal we worked a portion of his status to display all of his bonuses from across the board to more easily see what was going on.
Attribute
Pre-ascension
Point
Item
Class
Distributed
Title %
Base
Final
Strength
22
20
30
240
4
%50
316
Stolen novel; please report.
474
Agility
15
20
40
0
115
%30
190
247
Endurance
22
20
30
240
11
%60
323
516
Vitality
20
20
0
96
28
%45
164
237
Intellect
12
20
-20
0
106
%40
118
165
Perception
16
164
0
0
0
%40
180
252
Will
19
164
-40
168
6
%70
317
538
Wisdom
14
164
10
0
0
%30
188
244
Laid out like this it was easy to spot. It must have been one of the items he had taken from the shadow, Fuck.
He hadn’t even thought about his new items since leaving the haven. Kal immediately pulled off the cloak threw it to the ground and tried to pull off the Ring of Desperate Flight but for some reason, it just wouldn’t budge.
Kal didn’t just give up though he pulled as hard as he could to the point that he felt like he should have pulled his bloody finger off with it but still, it didn’t budge. Frustrated Kal used Identify and frowned as he read the ring's description.
Soul Maw [Mythic] [Pair]
One of a pair of rings forged by the arcanists of the Soul Fields, the Soul Maw contains powerful binding enchantments designed to bind the soul of its wearer to the command of the being that wears this ring's control ring Soul Devourer.
Once worn this ring cannot be removed unless its wearer is in possession of both Soul Maw and Soul Devourer. Each day past the first Soul Maw weakens a portion of its wearer’s will until they are properly primed for domination.
Rage suddenly overwhelmed Kal, the edges of his vision turning gray. Was there nothing that he could trust, were even items able to be manipulated to trick him into equipping them? He had no idea that was even possible. Not without direct changes from a smith or craftsmen at the time of the change. How could that have happened after he had equipped it?
Kal paced back and forth, seething. His birthright raged into an inferno, unlike anything it had done since he had improved his core. He would not be dominated. Not by Dhinir, the gods, some demon, or- it moved from far beyond through carnage of all-
Kal blinked, coming back to himself. His sword was buried in the skull of a kuroxet slaughterer, his birthright still raged but his train of thought was broken, What just happened? Kal pulled his sword free. He needed to control himself and avoid thinking about-It smiling to see him return- Kal staggered again before he focused his mind once more. He looked inwards to the symbol on his next and saw that the sphere of will he had surrounded it with had weakened.
Fragments that had broken away from the symbol and were floating around it confined by his will were now able to escape through tiny cracks that had appeared around the surface of the sphere. Kal didn’t hesitate to immediately begin feeding more will into the sphere, it took a few moments but the cracks slowly began to shrink as the pearlescent light of his will filled the gaps.
The sphere now fixed Kal tried to relax himself still avoiding the thoughts but also trying to figure out what had happened. When he had fought the royal guard he had felt something get free of the will sphere but when he had checked after he hadn’t noticed any kind of change. But now he had found cracks. He had thought it was just his fatigue at first but after seeing that he knew it had to be his will being weakened.
He looked back down at the ring in frustration, first, he had to worry about getting his soul dominated but now he also had to worry about the damned thing breaking his will sphere and gods know what having a lower will would mean for his birthright.
Kal was pretty sure that his high will was the only reason he could at-will deactivate his Wrath Incarnate. What if he couldn’t do it himself? Would his birthright burn away all of his stamina in the middle of combat just to keep fighting, even if it didn’t need to?
Wrath Incarnate was a balancing act, It was savage and deadly but while in that state Kal could rarely care for his bodily health. While using it Kal felt almost like there was a tiny part of himself watching over his reckless actions but that could easily change if his will was tampered with.
He looked down at the ring and activated Edge of Malice. Kal was pretty sure he could regenerate missing limbs, he had seen the guides for it in Wrathful Regeneration so he didn’t see why he shouldn’t just cut the finger off and be done with it. Surely that would count as removing it.
Kal placed his hand on the edge of a nearby rock, spreading his fingers wide so he could safely target one finger. He raised the sword and went to bring it down just above the ring and below the knuckle of his left index finger but when the sword was less than an inch away he pulled the sword aside and it hacked down into the stone, cutting about an inch deep. Confused, he tried again but again he found his blade cutting into the stone instead of his finger.
“Damn it!” Kal yelled. Of course, it didn’t work but it was worth a shot, maybe he could get a demon to bite it off for him but something told him that that wouldn’t work either. Since the ring clearly planned on going through with what its description said Kal had to either find the owner of the second ring or figure something else out.
His will had dropped by forty points and both his intellect and perception had dropped by twenty each. It had been about four days since Kal had left the haven so did that mean he would lose ten will and five intellect and perception each day? Probably, Great…
Kal could alleviate some of that loss with the free points he gained each level but even if he leveled every day he wouldn’t be able to keep up with the loss in points. With that in mind, it was probably safer for him to just keep his free points as a backup in case his will dropped enough to risk his will sphere or Wrath Incarnate.
But would he be able to tell? His will sphere had cracked practically without him noticing, the onset of dangerous thoughts had been sudden but he had been able to repair the sphere before anything serious had happened. Kal doubted it would be that easy with Wrath Incarnate.
Frowning, Kal put ten of the eighteen free points into will and closed his status. If he was right about the ten will-a-day estimate he had just given himself one more day, one more day to either find a solution or find the owner of the Soul Devourer.
The sound of another small horde catching up reached him so Kal continued his jog towards the butcher’s territory.
The maze-like areas between each of the elite's territories parted to reveal the butcher’s territory and it was just as disgusting as Kal had figured it would be. Where the spires and rocky outcrops ended a bloody and flesh-like terrain began. The ground went from rock to a fleshy carpet the color clotted blood with bone-like growth piercing through it intermittently.
When Kal’s foot first made contact he swore it had moved, like a muscle spasm, tightening slightly under the pressure of his foot. Kal was immediately disgusted with the place and even thought about killing off another elite first before dealing with this crap. But getting rid of the gorefiends would make the rest of the wave easier. Since he wouldn’t have to worry about the random spawning of shapeless ones every time he killed something.
Since he was now in the butcher’s territory Kal had to assume he would come across far more gorefiends than before and likely different and more powerful variants. The shaped ones were more of a nuisance than a threat at this point except for the really big ones that occasionally were birthed by the death of higher leveled demons.
He just hoped the next variant of the things he saw were less disgusting. Fleshy he was ok with but intestine tentacles that plant worm eggs in your body were a huge no from him. At least he could burn them with Flames of Wrath, it was always satisfying using that skill when fighting the damned things.
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The space around Vorayx’s conduit had grown quiet since the death of the shadow since he had sent the majority of the kuroxet into the trial. Their orders were the same but he doubted they would be carried out, there was clearly something about the mortal that encouraged conflict.
It was becoming clear that the mortal was quite powerful for its level. Vorayx wasn’t sure if the mortal would survive against the other conduit holders but its speed in dispatching the shadow was quite telling.
Leaning back into his throne Vorayx grinned as he felt the telltale sensation of Soul Devourer sapping the mortal’s mind. Activating the ring’s second function he concentrated on a series of short flashes of images appearing in his mind's eye, each depicting the death of several weaker kuroxet and gorefiends.
The Soul Devourer had a few useful functions that could be used as long as its sibling ring was worn. One of those was to get a view from the eyes of the wearer of Soul Maw. While the wearer wasn’t fully under control the view was nothing more than a series of tiny glimpses but it was still very useful for the time being.
Now Vorayx would watch the mortal’s struggle. It was pointless now, its fate was sealed the moment he put on the ring but either way Vorayx would enjoy the show.