“Sounds like a bunch of propaganda. I should know. I was good at making it. Anyway, you said you and this Quetulopus guy share the same master, right?” The rude soul soil glowed with thought as it finally lifted out of its depressed state.
“Yes. I was personally chosen by my great master for my fearlessness and talent.” Egosum skated past the criticism and took the chance to show off.
“Well, how long has he been teaching you?”
“He has been instructing me for nearly four months. A whole third of my life.” He puffed his throat slightly in pride.
“You are stupidly weak for training for four whole months. A better teacher would have already got you into the mortal realm by now. You're just sitting at the qi-less state despite your saturation. Truthfully, I am surprised you didn’t move up by yourself.”
“How dare you speak ill of my master! He was not able to teach me how to harness the magic for myself because I had yet to leave the water. For now he was merely expanding my knowledge base so I will not experience any bottlenecks in my understanding.” The mere thought of someone disparaging his master offended him, even if it was just a patch of dirt.
“Ah, so some type of biological limitation. I guess there are creatures with those. Well, if the story is exactly how you describe it, then your master must be somewhere within the permeation realm when he took the fight outwards and spread his Dao. This Quetulopus however must be of at least peak permeation realm if not low expansion realm given his feats.” The soul soil compromised some and offered some explanation.
“So they are supremely powerful like I said.” The smug look was immediately crushed by the ephemeral creature.
“Hardly. They weren't even close to me before my passing. They would barely qualify as foot soldiers in my armies. I was akin to those goddesses you mentioned, though our abilities are focused in completely different directions.”
“I am tired of you insulting my master and the great lord! If I wasn’t separated from them, I would ask them to smite you down like the dirt you are.” Egosum’s rage boiled over at the insults. How could the mage king himself, the leader of their civilization, and the strongest warrior he knew of be barely worthy of acting as a foot soldier in this piece of dirt army?
“Apologies, apologies. I guess everything is contextual. They would not be on your planet leading a nation if they had access to greater realms of power. So explain to me, how were you separated from them if they are so powerful. Couldn’t they take care of their charge?”
Egosum froze. He didn’t know how to respond. It was stupidly sound reasoning from a stupid patch of dirt. How had the eternal vernal pools been attacked when they were so far from the borders?
Had their forces been beaten back so far that the front lines was now the heart of their civilization?
It was impossible. There were only a few options beyond this. A surprise attack by stealth types, an insidious monster cored fallen member of society had instigated it, or some unthinkable failure.
His mind raced for an explanation only to fail.
“I am unsure. It was a normal day when everything went to shit. The morning feeding came and went as normal. There weren’t even any signs of anything wrong.” He went silent as he thought about it. No signs at all. That was ridiculous. It had to have been a sneak attack.
“The ground began to rock and tremble when it finally came to my attention. Explosions in the distance rocked the marsh violently. Fighting was visible through the clouds from where I peeked out. A strong shockwave knocked me out and I woke up later to a massive rock that eclipsed the sun falling out of the sky .”
“Sounds like a rock fall technique. An impressive one at that for how lackluster the realms of your world must be.”
It was of little consolation that the dirt thought his civilization's end was impressive. He was without his master and without any guidance. It was just him and his thoughts turning darker by the second.
“The rock proceeded to wipe out all of the vernal pools around. It was carnage. Millions of my brothers and sisters died that day.” He finally let loose the feeling he held bundled up. Though they were dulled by his cold blooded nature, it still stunk him to know the once great civilization met its end to a rock.
“Damn that is rough. I know high realm cultivators wipe out entire countries, murdering hundreds of thousands of babies at a time, but being in the presence of that must be something else.” The former wisp flexed up and down in thought, fully at home in his soul domain.
“Well, I have nothing better to do and I doubt you do either. Would you like some guidance on how to grow your qi core? You could probably come to rule this world if we combined our efforts.” he soul soil flexed upwards as if to egg him on expectantly.
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“Yeah, no thanks. I’m good.” The offer was ruthlessly rejected the second it was spoken, flooring the patch of dirt.
“What? Why? Do you even know how powerful I am? I told you, I am comparable to those goddesses you spoke of. I might even be of a higher realm than them.” The explanation fell on deaf ears as he spoke.
“Why would I want to develop a monster core? It sounds like a way to develop cheap power and lose my reason in one fell swoop.” He turned around to look at his surroundings, completely uninterested in what it had to say.
“You dimwit. A monster core and qi core are entirely different. Monster cores do not rely on a deeper understanding of any Dao unlike qi cores. One is about devouring other cores to gain their strength while the other is about understanding something deeply enough to reach new heights.” It almost scoffed at him in ridicule.
“The only real cross over is that they need a certain amount of qi to overcome the thresholds. Truthfully, I don’t know how your diminutive size is able to hold such a large quantity of qi. It would be enough to send you straight to death's door if it was housed differently. You should really thank those souls you absorbed to solidify your basal ethereal form.”
Egosum looked at the spot in front of him, uncaring about their sacrifice.
“They came to me to be eaten. Only seems fair.” His body finally began to flicker again to signal the end of their meeting.
“Yeah? Well, we shall see if you refuse my gift forever. I have all the time in the world.” It answered him smugly and glowed as he faded out of existence.
-
His waking sight did not come easy. Somehow, during his sleep, his body grew several fold. The jar that housed his form was much smaller than before as a direct result. The walls of the container touched him on all sides as he laid flat against the bottom.
Much larger and he would need to get a move on and flee from the shack.
The view had yet to change in his absence beyond some missing small creature and a few of the untouched herbs.
He could hear toiling in the back as the hag did something. The shouts and complaints were easy to understand. The actual content of the speech were much less so.
It took hours before he saw the crone. She walked out of the back room and traveled up the stairs mumbling about some useless creature and needing some device from storage.
‘What type of useless creature would she be concerned with? Maybe one of the reagents she took from the live animal supply turned out to be a dud. Serves her right.’
The musings ended abruptly as the source of the complaints made itself known. A large blue cat waltzed out from the room she had just left.
The creature stood at knee height to the woman and had white paws, mouth, and tail tip. The fur that covered it was a vibrant blue, only seen in fading daylight skies. Not quite night but also not wholly day.
It was a strange creature to take in. His body reacted defensively to it despite the lack of concern it had for the area of it. Egosum’s chest inflated and arched upwards in a bid to show off his glands, only to cause the cramp jar to be an even tighter fight.
‘Damn you instincts. Showing your fear to your enemies. How stupid can I be?’ The concern for his life died out quickly as he watched it saunter through the shelfs, paying him no mind.
‘Whatever. If it isn’t interested in me, I will not be interested in it.’
The only lady came barreling down the stair and straight for the back room quickly followed by the blue cat. She appeared in top form as loud noises poured from the area.
The sounds carried on for hours as he waited for her to finally quit. He had a whole lot of nothing but time and she was bound to fall asleep eventually.
Once again, the sun set and rose before she called it. The smell she put off was much more sweat and anger filled than the last time, but he guessed they couldn’t all be winners.
His new greatest fear of dying at the claws and teeth of a blue cat was mildly put to ease as it slinked up the stairs right behind her to keep the only witch company.
With both threats gone, he unscrewed the lid and began his daily routine.
The sheer number of plants it took to satisfy him now blew the previous days out of the water. His favorite plants to snack on only had half of them left. He had a little bit of comfortable free time now that he was done.
The dimly candle-lit room called to him. He hopped closer to the back room to see what the hag had been working so hard on that she would forgo sleeping just to complete it.
His stomach dropped as he rounded the corner. A sickening amalgamation of flesh, fur, and unknown parts sat pulsing on a metal tray. He felt queasy just looking at it from a distance. The thing moved rhythmically as the seconds passed by with him staring in fascination.
‘Why do I have to be attracted to the bizarre?’
He walked his way over to the creature and hopped up the table to get a good look. He was correct to consider it an abomination. It barely lived despite the clear surgical precision it took to graft the many parts together.
“Kill….me……please.” The weak noise stalled him to a grinding halt. Had it just spoken in Urkai? He glanced at the thing even closer than before. The weird fleshy component looked very distinct regardless of the immense alteration to it.
The thing before him contained an infant urkai of some smaller variety. It could have been a number of things but the crooked nose that hung off far too much to the side seemed to suggest one thing. Another species that was constantly discriminated against found its way to him.
It was a slave goblin. The small and fragile being sat in its horrid state before him.
Egosum looked around for something to kill it with when a stick with a short black glassy shard glued into it came into view. The strange material glinted in the candlelight.
He walked over to it and grasped it in his fingertips awkwardly.
The wooden stick sat in his hand, glued to his fingertips. The blade reflected his vision back to them, showing him the light brown skin and dark eyes that was characteristic of his people.
“You shall rest until the end times.” The strange language was surprisingly flowery despite the Barbaric origins.
“Please….” The small fetus moaned for the sweet release of death.