In the royal palace of the Kingdom of Takresh, one room stood apart from all the others.

It was a large one, atop the highest of the capital's towers. Very close to the king's quarters.

The localization alone was enough to distinguish it from all the others. Even more than that, however, it was its owner that set it apart. A human that lived inside a city of beasts.

Always surrounded by grandeur and luxury, the magnificent Archmage Boros was somewhat of a celebrity. Follower of one of the most powerful and prestigious Paths of all Terra, he was valued even by the king. Royal Archmage, he was called.

As an old man of profound knowledge, wisdom, and power, he inspired respect and reverence from all that met him. To most, offending him was not very different from insulting the king himself.

He was the only user of magic in Takresh, after all.

And he knew how to use this fact in his favor.

As a sage hailing from the Circle of Ludis itself, his magical prowess was unmatched in any of the surrounding kingdoms. Maybe even farther.

The fact that he had chosen to bow and serve King Baglamesh should only be met with respect, not derision. At least that was what most thought.

The few in this world who truly knew him, however, would think differently.

Just as he did.

"I can't believe I have been reduced to this..."

Currently, his famous room was shrouded in dark. His expensive furniture and beautiful fabrics were only illuminated by a mysterious blue light, as all the curtains blocked sunlight from reaching the man.

Boros himself looked like a man that hadn't slept in days. Weeks, maybe.

Currently, he was looking at the sources of the blue light. Ten glowing spheres stood atop altars around him.

If you looked closely at them, you would notice that the harder you looked, the clearer an image would form inside your head. Colors would be brought to life and then sounds would start to come from nowhere.

This phenomenon could be achieved with 6 of the 10 spheres. The others seemed deactivated.

Boros eyes shifted uncomfortably between these six functioning spheres as if he wanted to watch the happenings inside every scene at once.

A beautiful blonde woman, jumping between gigantic trees with a makeshift bow in her hands.

A wounded black man on a cave, furiously practicing a magical chant of unknown words, as if begging for the aid of a forgotten god.

A man of alien, bluish complexion, going through long practiced martial motions with a spear.

A rough brutish woman, over two meters tall and almost as wide. She feasted on the raw flesh of a goat while resisting the harshness of a blizzard atop a snowy mountain.

A noble warrior, of blue eyes and golden hair. Wielding an old blade and a rusty shield, he fought against a wave of barbarians on a desolate battlefield.

And lastly...

A ragged man. Inside deep darkness, his low cry of pain was a constant noise on those stone walls. Blood was everywhere. His mind was taken by fever... And something else. The kind of insanity that begets brilliance. And then he started laughing.

Boros shivered. He didn't like that last one. He had something on him that was... Uncanny. It gave him the creeps. Maybe it was the glint he saw in the eyes of Xerxes when he harvested the man's soul or the almost gentle touch with which the Warlock handled his Soulstone, after the deed, but Boros thought he had something special.

It was nothing he could put his fingers on. The young man had suffered through some bloody moments, sure, but so had the other subjects. Four had already died, of course, but again, most of the remaining individuals had not taken even a fraction of the toll that this one had. He was barely recognizable as a human anymore.

While Boros thought about these things, and other, more important matters, the laughter finally stopped.

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Then, like a vicious beast, the ragged man dove for the corpse of the dirty creature known as goblin and sank his teeth on its flesh.

"Urgh. Goblin flesh. That must be disgusting... Wait... Is that..? Has he gone through another Enlightenment?!"

Baffled, Boros watched with his Mana Sense as the body of the young man once again busted with overflowing mana and formed a temporary bridge with the one Universal Truth.

Even now, it was infuriating to watch those people. He just could not get used to it.

Enlightenments should not be such... Cheap occurrences. They were the closest of the divine any creature could get. They should be sacred moments, undertaken with grace and reverence. Moments to be remembered for one's whole life.

Most people worked toward them for years, sometimes decades, before achieving the desired Truth.

Seeing those people getting them on a daily basis...

Was terrifying, to say the least.

"What in the name of the Sacred Truth is Xerxes Vash planning?"

Boros hoped they all died.

But alas, it was not in his hands.

It all had started on that fateful day. Xerxes had taken him on a journey that just cemented the god-like reverence Boros had for the man's capabilities.

Across worlds, stars, moons, gaps in reality and supernova explosions, they had traveled to exotic and strangely familiar lands. From different places, they had gathered specific individuals in accordance to some hidden criteria Xerxes had.

Back then, Boros had been confused as to why go through all that trouble just to eviscerate the souls of seemingly ordinary people - even if they were from unordinary places.

But now...

Now Boros understood.

They were freaks.

Sensing the mana around them, he could feel the true nature of their souls.

Like black holes, they sucked all the mana, everywhere they walked. Burning brightly to any who could see the massive agglomerations of mana they brought with them everywhere they went, it was evident that the souls of these people were not normal.

Or healthy.

Boros was no Necromancer, to understand the inner workings of souls and their properties, but any meager Scholar would know that sucking obscene amounts of mana like those people were doing could not be healthy.

The Archmage had already witnessed the expected effect on most of the individuals, to different degrees.

Deep pain. Euphoria. Heatwaves. Irrational behavior. Heightened strength, endurance and resistance to pain. Headaches. Internal Bleeding.

Insanity.

Soul rending.

Death.

Two of the subjects had already died this way.

The others had managed to channel the overflowing mana into Enlightenments, but even that had its limits.

The comprehension and devotion needed to proceed further into a Path got deeper and deeper.

In order to continue using the mana to form bridges with the Universal Truth, they would have to experience much more than any regular individual was capable of.

Boros supposed that was why Xerxes had chosen those dangerous places to trap the subjects, but still...

He didn't think any of them would make it.

It was just not possible.

Xerxes had given Boros orders to free each individual according to a set of rules and them notify him once they achieved it. Or once all of them died. Whatever happened first.

The thing was...

The goals were too hard to accomplish for such young, inexperienced people. Even if they were little monsters.

And even then...

Boros didn't understand what was the point. Even if they freed themselves, they would inevitably die, when they their souls finally exploded from overflowing mana.

Sigh.

Nevertheless, he had his orders.

Even if King Baglamesh had not ordered him to aid Xerxes in his project, Boros was not confident enough to deny anything to a man like the Warlock.

He liked living.

Royal Archmage Boros, now reduced to a glorified watchman.

...

"Oh."

Another one died.

"Good", he thought.