When Rowan came to, his world was nothing but golden radiance.

The concepts of up and down, of left and right, of space and time, simply did not exist. All that was there was himself and the Divine Void around him.

Then, footsteps.

Reality realigned itself, and the Stalwart Hero was standing once more. He was also suddenly granted a body again, as evidenced by the fact that looking around at the space of pure infinity with no angles or breaks anywhere in sight was giving him a headache.

“I do apologize. Is this better?” A voice rose up from the void, making it twist and bunch until Rowan was standing in a cozy, humble room.

It was some kind of cottage, with a beautiful view of a forest just outside, a crackling hearth, and a table set for two.

One of the chairs was taken up by a man of large stature, his hair a wild mane and beard flawlessly trimmed close to his skin. He was dressed humbly, but every shift in his stance made the tunic he was wearing strain against the muscles it was trying to cover.

No matter how disarming the man looked, as Rowan stared into a pair of pale blue orbs, he knew exactly who he was talking to. “Aristaeus.”

The god gave the hero a lopsided smile. “Rowan. You really should sit down, you’ve had a rough go of it.”

Rowan could feel his regeneration card burning in his chest, but he did feel worn out. With great reluctance, the hero collapsed into the chair, eying up the god who, what seemed like an eternity ago, had laid claim to him. “So, what is this, exactly?”

“Well, I guess some would say this is a reward for all that you have done. The defining moment of your journey, where your divine patron descends to offer you their favor. Really, though, this is just where the system-mandated process of giving a hero what he deserves is going to happen.”

Rowan sighed, already feeling even more drained by the interaction. “Okay. Fine. Then just hand whatever it is that you’ve got for me so I can go back.”

“Ah, but first, I have to ask: Would you like to go back home, hero of mine? You do have that right, now.”

Your Divine Patron, Aristaeus, offers you a way back home!

Are you going to accept?

Y/N

With a roll of his eyes, Rowan hit no. “Really?”

Aristaeus grinned merrily and shrugged his shoulders. “Sorry, but it is a requirement. You count as a Divine Summon. As your summoner, I must offer you a chance to be returned to your world of origin after you’ve fulfilled your end of the contract.”

“My end of the contract, you say. Like you ever asked for my opinion. Like you didn’t just kidnap us and tell us what we have to do.” Rowan didn’t even bother keeping the bitterness out of his voice. If the god was going to smite him, it would probably have happened a while ago.

Aristaeus just laughed. “Hold still, now.”

His hand shot out faster than Rowan could blink, plunging right into the hero’s chest.

Only shock kept Rowan from disobeying the command, but he felt his body lock in place anyway when the god gently extracted a purple-gold glowing card from his chest. Unlike the last time he’d seen his heart card, Rowan noted that the gold was by far the more predominant color. Golden cracks were all over the card, and Rowan could glimpse something underneath them.

“I really do dislike the way we cripple hero cards before we send you down. Not my choice, of course. I’m just a minor divinity. Still, it’s not right,” the god muttered quietly, reaching out with his other hand.

He grabbed for the card, but his hand closed around a glowing chain instead. The chain was chock-full of divine mana, glowing like a miniature sun. The god tightened his grip, and the thing shattered. More cracks spread over Rowan’s heart card. One by one, the god revealed and snapped eight glowing chains, and Rowan could do nothing but watch as the god worked.

When the last divine construct was crushed, the golden glow of Rowan’s card erupted, sending shards of its previous purple face flying everywhere. In the previous card’s place, a card that looked like it was cast out of solid gold remained.

Aristaeus flicked it at Rowan, and the second it slipped into the hero’s chest he drew in a ragged breath, doubling over.

“I’m apologizing a lot, but I really am sorry for how unpleasant that was. Still, considering the fact that I just tore out a core part of your soul, fiddled with it, and then replaced it, what could you expect?”

“C-Core part of my soul?” Rowan wheezed, rubbing at his chest. It wasn’t his flesh that was feeling achy, but the gesture still made him feel a tiny bit better.

“What do you think Heart Cards are? When people access their system fully for the first time, it plucks a piece of their soul’s core, does diagnostics, and then crafts a personalized card for them. Now, people can reject their own heart card in favor of another. Or even go without. That’s not deathly, since the system takes only a tiny amount of their soul.”

“Then why don’t people replace their heart cards more often once they’ve chosen? On that subject, why do people get different card tiers? Why doesn’t everyone start at common?”

Rowan knew he should be freaking out at least a little. His calmness, stirred only the slightest bit by whatever emotion the God evoked, was unnatural. At the very least, he should have been desperate to go back to Olivia. But he wasn’t, and since he was there already, a part of him demanded answers.

Aristaeus sighed and laid his arms on the table, giving the hero a pitying look. “I get it. The system really isn’t fair, is it? The sad truth is, not all souls are of equal quality. Some can handle higher tiers of power naturally, and others need to perform incredible feats for the system to recognize and decide to grant them some of its power so they could advance.”

Rowan’s mind spun at the implications, but he pushed right on. “You still haven’t told me why heart cards can’t be replaced. Also, how come nobility consistently get better grade cards? And how do heroes never get lower tiers?”

“Sheesh, so many questions. Still, I guess you deserve your answers. Let’s start from the top, shall we?

“Hero cards are never low in tier because the summoning itself imbues your souls with incredible power. Even if the summoning didn’t look for people with strong souls to begin with, which it does, heroes would still turn out epic. Incidentally, the stronger the soul of the summoned, the less power is consumed. That’s why three or even four heroes pop out on occasion. Those are clusters of people with incredibly powerful souls.

“As for the nobility… well, the basic answer is often right, and that’s the case here. Strong parents give birth to strong children. The soul of a parent imparts a piece of its power to their child at the moment of conception. When you’ve been hoarding power for generations, the advantages tend to pile up.

“Finally, heart card replacement is extremely difficult under most circumstances because the second you accept a heart card, it becomes a piece of your soul’s core. Doesn’t matter who it came from, it’s grafted right into your being. Obviously, if the card isn’t yours, that can have some… consequences.”

Rowan didn’t like the sound of that.

On second thought, he really didn’t like the sound of that, especially considering the fact that he had just handed off a legendary tier heart card to Blake. “What kind of consequences?”

The god rubbed his beard. “Well, you’re grafting a piece of someone else into the core of your being. Obviously, you’d be a tiny bit influenced by that. Some very subtle attitude shifts. Small new preferences and tastes. You might suddenly like some food you used to hate, or vice versa, that kind of thing.”

“And it’s impossible to avoid this?” Rowan was suddenly feeling sick.

“Sure it’s possible. Don’t accept heart cards from strangers and just stick to your own!” Aristaeus guffawed, then sighed when he saw the look on Rowan’s face. “Oh, fine. No, you can’t avoid it. I should also note that the higher the tier of the heart card, the bigger the impact. It’s not possession or rebirth or anything, but it’s there. It’s why, for example, all royal bloodlines are known for certain character traits.”

Rowan slumped and looked away. He was going to have to confront his best friend on the subject, but there was really little he could do. If the happy couple decided to hand off a legendary card to their kid, who was he to stop them? Really, should he be trying to stop them at all? It was a powerful card.

Power came at a price.

Looking back, wasn’t Rowan doing the exact same thing to himself? Perhaps he wasn’t permanently welding pieces of someone else to his soul, but he’d definitely shoved different cards into his deck readily enough.

Even as he sat there, the immense power of his Eidolon Body thrummed through his being, filling him with cocky pride, Scarlet Envy cried out for him to try and skewer the god sitting across from him, and Gluttonous Banquet tried to get him to devour everything in the room.

Granted, the emotional numbness made it even easier than usual to deal with those issues, but they were definitely there. In comparison, the rest of his cards must have originated from calmer individuals because they were almost inert by comparison.

“You know, you still haven’t checked out your card,” Aristaeus pointed out smugly, making Rowan squint his eyes at him.

He knew.

He was just putting it off, suddenly and inexplicably worried about taking a peek. After all, one’s heart card was apparently supposed to suit them perfectly, and while he loved his Keen Spear, Rowan wondered at the changes it would undertake now that it was restored to what it was meant to be.

He couldn’t delay forever though.

[Heart] Divine Spear Insight (Divine, Passive)

With a spear in hand, the world reveals itself before you.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Rowan took a sharp breath as the details of the card fell into place. The description was vague, a mere teaser of the card’s potential, but he knew.

The card would make him a terror with a spear in hand. His mastery over his emotions would grow. Spear combat would become a triviality, and even the slightest nick of his spear would reveal every detail of his opponents to him.

There it was, the ultimate ability to peek at the system status of anyone he fought, simply granted to him by his new shiny card.

He looked up at Aristaeus, bitterness broiling within him. “I could have really used this sooner.”

“I know.” For just a moment, the god looked genuinely more miserable than Rowan did. “Do you have a clue what it’s like to watch? To see them throw heroes into the fray, all the while hobbling their potential to survive?”

“Then why watch? Why are gods even playing these games?”

“Because they’re afraid, Rowan.” The admission floored the hero. “They don’t want new gods jostling for influence and power. They don’t want to wane and be forgotten, only to get killed by some uppity upstart. I’m the youngest of the gods, and I’m still so very, very old.”

The Stalwart Hero looked at the god across from him then, taking him in fully. This being of perfection, of ultimate power. Yet, in spite of his status, worry lines were obvious on his face, and Rowan couldn’t help but feel that he looked tired.

It was also the moment recognition finally sparked within him.

“The mural. The very first mural. You were the one who fought the demon king first,” Rowan whispered, awe bleeding into his voice.

If anything, Aristaeus looked even more tired. “Correct. I was there, at the start of the cycle. Rather, I am the beginning of the cycle. Me and that wretch of a delusional demon.”

“Explain.”

Aristaeus sighed and drove a hand through his hair roughly. “How do you think all of this started, Rowan? How do you think the first invasion happened?”

“The demons discovered this world, ripped a path to it, and invaded?” The question was tenuous, almost pleading. Something told Rowan he would really dislike whatever answer he got.

“I’m afraid not. You see, once upon a time, summoning a person, a thinking, reasoning being, from beyond our world, was considered impossible. Legendary summoners, arcanists, and magic researchers all tried to do it and they all failed. Travel between worlds is not a gentle process.

“This persisted, until one Carreen Zola stepped onto the scene. He was a man so beloved by gods they granted him the ability to wield a secondary class. At the peak of his power, he was both an [Archpriest] and an [Arcanist] of world-wide renown. And then he begged the gods for assistance with the ritual.

“With him performing a ritual and the gods powering and controlling it, they reached out, plucked a soul, and brought it to this world. In doing so, the dimensional veil protecting this world was devastated with a hole was punched right through it. What do you think came through that hole?”

Rowan’s voice was a stunned whisper. “The demon king.”

Aristaeus scoffed. “A demon whose mind was so twisted it proclaimed itself a king of its kind, sure. And the gods? Well, they weren’t exactly expecting such a thing. They’d long withdrawn their direct presence from the world as a way to stop their incessant warring from scarring their reality beyond repair. That left them with only one solution.”

“You.”

Aristaeus’ smile was bitter. “Me. They slapped them blessings on me, wished me luck, and threw me at the demons. In spite of all that followed, even though the greatest mortal civilizations were damaged almost beyond repair, I won. And when I did, I ascended. They didn’t expect that, either.”

There was still something that bothered Rowan about the story. “If that’s true, if they know why and how the demons are invading this world, why haven’t they tried to fix it? Why haven’t you?”

“Me? Because I can’t. When I ascended, I made the mistake of putting my trust in the older gods. They claimed that I needed to join them, to isolate myself in a divine kingdom, for the good of all. Then they bound me with all the agreements and accords they themselves were under already.”

“They didn’t even let you try to fix the problem first?” If there was more than a little disbelief in Rowan’s voice, he didn’t think he could be blamed for it.

“They didn’t because it’s not necessary. The dimensional veil is part of every world, and worlds are living, breathing things. It’s the same as you suffering a minor cut. It hurts, it bleeds, but it scabs and seals over.”

“If that’s true, then why is the cycle still happening?” Rowan demanded.

The god shot him a pitying look and shook his head. “Think, Rowan, and then you tell me why.”

He went to argue, but the weight of the truth slammed down on his shoulders. “Hero summoning. The demons come back because heroes are still being summoned.”

“Correct. It’s hard to tell from a mortal point of view, since the temples always send out warning and oracles ahead of time, but corruptions only ever starts to appear after the heroes are summoned.” Aristaeus’ proclamation also added to the weight that was now pressing down on the hero, threatening to drown him.

“But… how… why… They don’t want more gods! You said it yourself! Why would they…!”

“Because demons and devastation and the appearance of heroes all paint gods in a positive light. They are the protectors, the ones who summon champions who fight in their names, and this drives worship. Demons also drag otherworldly souls into our reality when they invade, and when they are slaughtered, our world is enriched. The world gods are intrinsically linked to, empowering them further.”

“It’s just a massive farming method, then? Summon heroes, let the demons in, then kick back and harvest the bounty?”

“Yes.”

For a long, long while, neither the hero nor the god spoke. Rowan’s eyes were blankly fixed on the table, without even the ability to really perceive it anymore. Aristaeus eventually sighed and stood so he could land a hand on the hero’s shoulder.

“It’s not your fault.”

“It kind of feels like it is,” Rowan said.

The god smiled wryly, and Rowan saw pure anguish in his eyes. There they were, the very first and last heroes, united in their misery. “I know. I suggest you check out your status, though.”

Having no better idea, Rowan did.

Congratulations!

Class evolution requirements met.

System evaluation in progress…

Class generated!

[Spear Saint]

You are the spear of your people, and you bear their hopes, dreams and burdens.

This class grants you the ability to tap into your spark of divine potential, enhancing every aspect of your being and setting you on the path of apotheosis.

Warning: This class will trigger a racial change from [Human] to [Demigod]

Additional beneficial effects:

* An ascendant boost to the effectiveness of all your stats

* The ability to feel the Devotion of your people, and through their belief, harvest power

* All spear-related cards gain an ascendant boost to their effectiveness

* As a demi-god, your lifespan is limitless

Class penalties:

* Your name is upon their lips

Attached card: Spear of Devotion (Legendary, Passive)

Congratulations!

You have earned a portfolio of [Spears]!

You have earned a portfolio of [Hope]!

[Class] Spear of Devotion (Legendary, Passive)

You draw on the Devotion of your people so that their faith may empower your blows.

“A demigod?” Somehow, that was all that Rowan could manage.

The god laughed, and the sound was so full of vindication Rowan shrunk in on himself. “Oh, that’s perfect. Can you imagine what those old idiots are going to think when they find out about your class?”

“That I’m better off dead?”

“That, yes. Oh, I can also picture the terror on their faces.” Aristaeus looked wistful as he spoke. “I was hoping for something like this when you picked your last class. It gave you a nice base to build up to demigod status, that and your city. It’s going to be tremendously important for you to take full advantage of it.”

“Because I can ‘harvest power’ from ‘my people?’” Rowan asked.

“Experience. You can harvest experience. Every time they feel grateful, every time they hope or pray for your well-being, you will be able to harvest experience. Emotions are powerful things, Rowan. Now, you can tap into them too.”

“I didn’t choose this,” the hero protested because the idea of cultivating devotion as a commodity he could exchange for progress did not appeal to him.

“You didn’t. No one gets to choose, not when they become a Legend or a Divine. This is no longer about picking your path. It’s about following who and what your choices forged you into.”

Rowan let himself fall until his head hit the smooth wood of the table. He might have protested the morality of treating people like cattle, but he was more than aware of the fact that the comparison wasn’t quite fair.

He just had additional incentive to treat them well now.

No, it was the other implication of his new status that worried him far more. His brand new limitless lifespan. He was immortal.

Olivia wasn’t.

As if reading his mind, Aristaeus spoke up again. “You know, you need to pay more attention to your reading comprehension. Your status told you that you can harvest experience from people. No one ever said anything about having to use that experience yourself.”

Rowan tilted his head just enough to the side that he could shoot the god a glare. “So, I can share my experience with my party? Get them up to, what, Legend before they hit the ceiling? Unless my fiancée is going to turn into a demigod too, I really don’t see how this is going to fix any of my new problems.”

Aristaeus’ smile grew. “I’m afraid not. However, I wouldn’t be worried about her if I were you. After all, your beloved is an Alchemist.” Rowan shot up in his seat, a question already on his lips. Before he could speak, however, the god beat him to it. “Well, I’m afraid that’s all the time we have. Until we meet again, Rowan.”

Rowan cursed, the cackling laughter of a god followed him as everything around him dissolved back into the void, and then it rose up to swallow him.

—

Rowan blinked his eyes, and swayed.

He was already tipping over when his body finally decided to cooperate and his stats kicked in, firming up his footing.

“Stop and answer you…!” Blake’s voice rang out, drawing Rowan’s attention to the other hero where he stood, spinning on the spot and looking around like a man possessed.

“Blake?” Kayla asked hesitatingly, hand to her head as she looked around. “Wait, am I back to the exact moment when the vision started?”

It certainly seemed that way to Rowan. Everyone else was still passed out on the floor, and the body of the so-called demon king was only starting to dissolve and flake away as black-tinged mana.

That realization finally forced Rowan into motion as he raced over to Olivia, tenderly checking her over for any signs of wounds. He let out a long breath of relief when he realized she had none. For all appearances, she’d simply decided to take a nap on the floor.

Scooping her up, he turned to the other two heroes, only to find them studying a massive gate that had materialized on the far wall at some point.

“What is that back?” Rowan asked as he walked closer cautiously, shifting his hold on Olivia so her head was cradled against his shoulder.

“Probably so the ‘demon king’ can slip its soul back to where from,” Kayla groused, glaring at the gate ineffectually. “We can’t pass through. I tried.”

“Of course you did,” Rowan sighed tiredly as he ventured a little closer himself, eying the gate.

“No, really. If you try, you’ll just get a system message.”

“She’s right.” At the look Rowan sent him, Blake flushed and looked away. “What? I… might have wanted to try and make sure that thing couldn’t come back.”

“And potentially leave everyone who cares about you behind, Blake?” Rowan chided, but his curiosity was no piqued.

Slowly, cautiously, and making doubly sure that no part of Olivia could even brush up against the gate, Rowan pushed his left hand forward. It met an invisible shield long before he could even start crossing the gate’s threshold.

ɆⱤⱤØⱤ!

₮ⱧɆ ₲₳₮Ɇ₴ Ø₣ ⱧɆⱠⱠ ₳ⱤɆ ₵ⱠØ₴ɆĐ ₮Ø ɎØɄ.

₳₱₱ⱤØ₳₵Ⱨ ₳₴ ₳ ⱧɄ₥฿ⱠɆ ₴Ʉ₱₱Ⱡł₵₳₦₮?

Ɏ/₦

Rowan never clicked the no button faster than anything he had ever done in his life. The only thing that eclipsed the sense of dread the messages inspired was the contemplative look on Kayla’s face.

“Kayla, no.”

The heroine shot him a smug smile, opened her mouth, then reconsidered. “Okay, fine. I’m not about to say ‘Kayla yes’ and then make the worst mistake of my life, but I want you to know it was close and entirely your fault!”

Rowan rolled his eyes and elected to ignore her, turning to watch Blake collect his fiancées instead. The pained expression on the man’s face sent Rowan’s stomach churning and made him pull Olivia closer against his chest.

That was apparently enough to rouse her from whatever she was experiencing, and Rowan felt a smile of his own growing when she practically blinded him with the grin she gave him. “Morning, love.” The adorable alchemist murmured, snaking her arm around his neck and pulling him down for a kiss.

Rowan didn’t exactly fight her, and when they finally parted so they could breathe, he gently pressed his forehead against hers. “Are you ready to go home?”

The question left him with all the weight of his exhaustion, the fear that had raged in him, and the anguish at all that they’d lost.

Her small smile still made it all worth it. “Yes.”