Drome flexed his hands, his fingers aching with the anticipation of crushing his prey. A shield-bearer, level 10, forged in the furnace of pitched battles and sworn to defend his prince with his body if needed—tonight, that body was his only weapon. He had been drinking earlier, celebrating some trivial victory, but the haze of ale was no match for the bloodlust now burning in his veins.
His enemy was no warrior, not in any way Drome understood. This creature moved like smoke, its form dissolving into shadows with every step. Drome’s sharp night vision, a gift of his kind, should have pierced any darkness, but this was different. A strange enchantment cloaked the figure, twisting light and shadow until Drome’s eyes betrayed him.
Still, Drome grinned. Shadows bled, just as all things did.
The creature darted back again as Drome lunged, his massive hands closing on nothing but air. He snarled in frustration, his impatience growing. It was fast, yes, but fast things grew predictable under pressure. Drome had learned this over years of battle. Patterns always emerged.
And there—he saw it. The shadow flickered just slightly every time it retreated. A tendril, a faint trail of movement in the dark. That was its tell.
Drome’s lips peeled back into a wolfish grin. The next time the creature dodged, Drome feinted a grasp, turning his body to draw it out. As expected, the shadow lashed forward, and Drome lunged into it with all his might. His arms wrapped around the figure, squeezing tight. Triumph roared from his throat as he felt the chill of its form pressed against him.
But the triumph turned to confusion. Then pain.
Something was wrong. Drome looked down, his vision swimming, to see the glint of steel buried deep in his chest. Blood spilled from him in a torrent, and the strength in his legs failed. His grip slackened, and the shadow slipped away, leaving him on his knees.
His breath came ragged, gurgling as he stared into the dark. He had not caught the foe after all. He had only embraced death.
----------------------------------------
Jax exhaled, his breath ragged but victorious, as a cascade of notifications illuminated his vision.
[New Skill Unlocked: Spiritual Aggressor F-rank Rare]
[+1912 Experience]
[Quest Complete: New Title Quest Added]
A grin tugged at his lips despite the weight in the air. He had done it. The oppressive power pressing down on him since they entered this place finally made sense. This was a grave. Not just of bodies, but of spirits, their presence thick and palpable, resisting any attempt to wield power that wasn’t their own. They must have been drawn here throughout the years, fleeing out of the ruins to this place of life. It explained why Nia’s spells had faltered—why she had been unable to cast.
Now, though, Jax understood. While he faced the hobgoblin, he had instinctively reached out, showing the spirits his intent. It wasn’t a pact, not yet, but something simpler, more primal. He had felt their interest, their curiosity, and their agreement. This new skill, Spiritual Aggressor, was less about commanding and more about alignment. If the spirits saw his purpose as worthwhile, they lent him their aid.
The fight had taught him one thing already. When the hobgoblin lunged a second time, its massive arms closing around what should have been Jax’s throat, it wasn’t him it had caught. Jax had infused his intent into the spirits, manifesting a shadowy duplicate of himself—a clone. The hobgoblin, thinking it had seized him, had grasped only this phantom. And while it crushed the clone, Jax had relinquished his seax to the spirit’s grasp, letting it strike the killing blow even as he threw himself back against the wall, narrowly avoiding death.
Now, as Jax sat slumped against the cold stone, he could feel the spirits swirling around him. They weren’t done. They wanted out. Their yearning was like a whisper in the back of his mind, a collective, desperate plea for freedom. And Jax also knew that he OWED them. Some power was tehre in the connection he had made, and Jax did not want to know what came of denying that power.
“Soon,” Jax thought, focusing his intent, projecting it outward. His message was simple, deliberate: First, we must deal with the prince.
The weight pressing on his shoulders seemed to lighten. A feeling of collective agreement swept through him, their presence retreating just enough to let him breathe fully for the first time since entering this cursed place. It wasn’t words, but a shared understanding.
As Jax pushed himself to his feet, his body trembling from exertion, he felt something new—a quiet blessing from the spirits. They had agreed to let him remain and function here, granting him freedom in their dominion.
He tightened his grip on the handle of his weapon, still slick with blood. This grave wasn’t a trap anymore. It was an ally.
Jax rose to his feet, his movements deliberate as he activated the Cloak of Shadows. The familiar enchantment wrapped around him, blurring his form into the darkness like smoke dissolving into night. The oppressive energy of the grave lingered, but the spirits’ blessing allowed him to move freely now, unhindered by their weight.
The chaos in the hall had subsided, the once-deafening clamor of battle reduced to sporadic sounds of combat. Casualties littered the floor—almost all of them goblinoids.
Jax’s sharp eyes scanned the battlefield. Near the far wall, Jerg and Durg stood like twin monoliths, their gray, hulking forms unmoving save for the slow rise and fall of their shoulders. At their feet lay the bodies of three hobgoblins, their crimson blood pooling dark against the stone.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
The assassins, always efficient and precise, had done their part as well. Jax noted the twisted corpses of three more hobgoblins, their deaths marked by clean, precise strikes. Scattered among the bodies were countless smaller goblins, their diminutive forms crumpled where they had fallen in their futile attempts to overwhelm.
Only one battle remained.
In the center of the room, Calis moved like a storm, his blade flashing with relentless fury. His opponent, the Princeling, stood his ground. he now had a metal shield and a spear, having lost his earlier longsword. As Jax watched the spear was shattered and the creature summoned another to his hands. The goblinoid prince’s movements were calculated, his strikes heavy and deliberate, but Calis was relentless. Each exchange sent sparks flying, the clash of steel reverberating through the hall.
Jax lingered in the shadows, watching the duel unfold. His instincts told him not to interfere—not yet. Calis had claimed this fight, and Jax knew better than to rob his companion of her due.
Still, he remained poised, ready. If the tide turned against Calis, Jax would strike from the dark like a dagger to the heart. For now, though, he observed, his presence concealed by the cloak and the silent approval of the spirits swirling unseen around him.
The goblin prince let out a guttural scream, his voice reverberating through the hall, raw with fury and desperation.
“Guardian!” he bellowed, his eyes glowing faintly as he threw a hand to the ground. A ripple of energy surged outward, tinged with the sickly green hue of his magic. Jax felt the pull immediately—a sharp, unnatural draw from the spirits around him. They recoiled, straining against the force of the prince’s will, their whispers shifting to panicked murmurs in Jax’s mind.
Jax gritted his teeth, steadying himself as the spirits rallied behind him, resisting the goblin prince’s attempt to bend them to his command.
Then Calis moved.
Her smile was sharp as a blade as she activated her skill. In an instant, her body became a whirlwind of motion, a dervish of deadly precision. She seemed to defy gravity itself, leaping into the air with impossible agility. Her feet bounced off the very air, as if the empty space around her had become an intricate web of invisible steps and walls.
The goblin prince swung his blade in a desperate arc, but Calis was everywhere and nowhere. Her strikes came in quicksilver flashes, carving lines of crimson across his enchanted armor. Sparks danced in the air as her blades found weaknesses in the magical plating, cutting deeper with every pass.
“Stop!” the prince roared, his bravado faltering. His strikes became wild, defensive. “Stop this madness! I’ll—”
Calis didn’t stop. She rebounded off an invisible point above him, spinning mid-air, her blade slicing across his shoulder and severing the straps of his armor. Another cut followed, shallow but deliberate, carving a line across his thigh.
The prince’s desperation turned to panic. His eyes darted wildly, and for the first time, they locked onto Jax.
Jax felt the weight of the prince’s gaze, the plea within it. But there was no mercy in Jax’s expression, only resolve. The spirits around him roiled, their whispers building into a low, furious hum, as if they too rejected the goblin’s silent appeal.
The prince swung again, shouting incoherent words that were more a cry for help than commands. Yet with every strike, Calis danced away, leaving another cut in her wake. The once-proud Princeling was faltering, his power unraveling under the combined assault of Calis’s skill and the spirits’ defiance.
And just as fast as it had started it was over. The Prince leapt towards Jax, having identified him as the cause of the suppression on his magic, and Calis arced her sword, and in one motion took off his head.
Calis strode toward Jax with purpose, her twin blades still slick with blood. The faint sheen of sweat on her brow did nothing to diminish the sharpness in her eyes. As she reached him, she gave a curt nod, a gesture of approval or perhaps acknowledgment of what had just transpired.
Jax barely returned the nod before the weight of the spirits pressed into his consciousness like a tide threatening to drown him. His knees wavered, and he caught himself against the wall. Their whispers turned into a chorus, loud and insistent, swirling through his mind with emotions too complex to parse—gratitude, desperation, expectancy.
“Steady,” Calis said softly, though her usual confidence wavered for just a moment, replaced by a flicker of unease. “You’ve taken their attention, Jax. That’s no small thing.”
Jax looked up, his breath hitching. “They want out.”
“They want a contract,” she agreed, her voice steadying. “If you don’t give them one, they’ll linger in your mind, pressing until they drive you mad—or until something worse claims them. You’ve stirred them, shown them purpose. Now, you need to bind them, do you know what youre doing?”
A dash of anxiety crossed her face as she placed a hand on her hip, the other gesturing toward the room. “The right contract will stabilize them and you. But can you make it? there is a lot of energy there, and you'll need to secure them."
"Yes" said Jax simply. "But My spirit is full, I need to hold them somewhere while we find a better vessel" It was true. He knew instintually that he could store parts to a spirit, but htat would requre time and attention. And afterwards what remaind would not be what had entered his soulspace. Like the spider and the hobgoblins he would have to discect parts of the spirits, which would violate the intent he had sent them. They wanted transportation plain and simple, to inhabit new forms.
"Gems are the most common method.” Her gaze shifted to the throne at the far end of the room. “And I’d wager the prince had one. Wait here.”
Calis strode to the goblin’s ornate seat, stepping carefully over the scattered remains of the slain. The throne, made of polished bone and inlaid with crude golden filigree, exuded a faint magical aura. At its base, she found a small compartment and pried it open with the tip of her blade.
“Found one,” she called, pulling out a gem. It was dark and translucent, with faint, ghostly lights swirling inside. She returned to Jax, pressing the gem into his hand.
Nia descended into the hall moments later, her robes dirtied but her expression calm. Her sharp eyes took in the scene, the fallen prince, and Jax’s pale face. “You stirred up quite the ruckus,” she remarked, floating beside him. "Sorry about that the feast hall was protected, I still cant feel them like I normally can. They are strong."
Jax nodded, and then said "Nia, can you help me. I need a contract to seal them in the gem, but id like it worded so they can come help if needed."
She waited for a moment and then said "Don't worry about all that, they understand. I cant quite talk to them, but i can hear them and feel what they intend. Its kind of strange, like taking to someone who speaks another language. Whatever these spirits are they will stay to the intent of your agreement they seem to be able to feel intent more than words."
Well, that was good wasn't it? Jax held the gem up and pressed his mind out, willing the spirits into the gem. As he did, he expressed his intent. If they helped him, he would get them to the surface. yet there was a resistance, and as if in question Jax felt the spirits form an image. A body. Jax agreed. He would get them a new body.