Noki shot up, gasping for air. Panicked, he touched the center of his chest. Nothing, not so much as a mark on his body. What’s more, he could see perfectly fine, maybe even a little better than before. “What the hell?” He stood up and looked around. “ I’m…still in the pit, so then all that…was real?” The knife that he used to kill the scourbeast laid at his feet and he picked up the bloodstained weapon, or at least attempted to.

The knife had disappeared as soon as he thought to pick it up, at least that is what he thought until he looked at his hand and saw it firmly in his grasp. “Whoa!” Noki dropped the knife in surprise but caught it before it hit the ground. Confused, he looked to where the scourbeast carcass was, and saw that only the molted remains of something had remained. “What the?” He edged closer and kneeled. The remnants looked like the shavings of dead skin, but not that of a scourbeast or animal.

It was human skin, his skin. Noki leapt back and hit the side of a wall ten feet from the pile of skin. “Shit. What happened? Am I dead? No, I felt that hit just now, so I’m alive. Then why…” Noki then remembered a conversation he had with Baira, about ascending for the first time. She told him that the first ascension is the most jarring because your body breaks itself down and reforms so it can process Tera more efficiently. “But that means? I did it? I did it!” Noki ran around the pit, doing ten laps in a mere matter of seconds. Joy filled his entire being as the wind rushed past him, until a different sensation overcame him.

Heat ran through his body and he started sweating profusely. The muscles in his arms and legs started to tense and he felt an immense pressure building within himself. A hint of panic set in before he remembered the rest of his conversation with Baira. After ascending, one must circulate the Tera immediately throughout the body. The body isn’t used to having large amounts of life energy and won’t know how to get rid of the excess; if it's not circulated immediately, the building can cause irreparable damage to the pathways and even death if the Tera is strong enough.

Noki immediately sat down next to a pile of carcasses. “What was it called? Right, River Circulation Meditation.” Noki closed his eyes and imagined his kulda as white orb located in his belly. River Circulation Meditation is a basic circulation method that imagines the Tera as a river slowly coursing its way through the body. As his core slowly started to fill, he imagined an empty lakebed magically being filled with water. It reminded him of the Ceaseless Waterfall of the village, and when that thought came to mind, an instinct took over. The lakebed overflowed with water and raced down an unknown, yet familiar path. The Tera flowed through his pathways from kulda to kulda, until it reached his mind.

Suddenly, everything became clear like the sun burning away the morning dew. Noki understood things on a level he never thought possible. For starters, he knew that he had ascended to Earthen Soul and that by sending his Tera to his Mind Kulda, he could see the Tera around him. “That must be due to Baira forcing her Tera earlier. Wow, I even understood that. Oh, let’s see how my kulda is looking.” Noki knew that the kulda gave insight on the strength, output and level of ascendance of a Divine Artist. An examination of his told him that something was off.

“What’s that? It looks like…a second kulda?” In the black void sat two kuldas, one a dense orb of white, the standard for any newly ascended without an aspect, but the other was a dead ball of orange. “It looks like the core of the scourbeast I killed earlier.” The second core had fused to his own and gave him the impression of a small pebble resting on a large orange stone. Having seen enough of his cores, Noki opened his eyes, a newly awakened Divine Artist.

Wind whipped past as he ran back to the village. He could see the Tera more vibrantly than before and was amazed that even at this speed, he could still make out the details of the trees and other fauna around him. Each kick from the ground propelled him dozens of feet, at this pace he’d be back in the village in no time. “I can’t wait to show Baira! She’s gonna flip out….and probably want to run a bunch of tests.” That last fact couldn’t sour Noki’s mood, nothing could. His dream of being a Delver now entered the realm of reality, all he would need to do is work his way to Diamond Souland then-

“Uncle, I think someone is nearby,” Mion said.

“The presence is unfamiliar, it’s most likely a scourbeast. Pay it no mind.” Jahn replied. Noki was hundreds of feet away but the conversation sounded as if it were happening right in front of him. Reflexively, he ducked and turned his ear towards where the sound was coming from. “See, the presence has gone away, it was just a scourbeast that sensed our Tera and fled. Now, do you remember your role.”

“Yes, Uncle. While the attack is underway, I find Baira and kill her.”

Noki couldn’t see the two talking, but he knew that Mion was smiling when he said that.

“But,” Mion continued, “ with the Kolo there, how will the plan work? I heard that you and my father erected a barrier.”

“That’s not something you need to concern yourself over,” Jahn said dismissively, “just make sure that you kill the Monsari girl. Now, take this and go, I have other matters to attend to.”

“I need to get to Baira before they do!” Noki channeled all of his newfound strength into his legs and ran. It would have taken him thirty minutes to make his way back to the threshold of the Red Forest before he had ascended, and fifteen as an Earthen Soul. Two minutes later, Noki could see the unobstructed light of the sun. He had nearly crossed the threshold when a scourbeast lionape dropped down from the tree above, blocking his progress.

Or so the beast thought.

Noki chalked it up to his new state of awareness, but he knew things about the scourbeast that he shouldn’t have. He knew it would try to overpower him with brute force augmented by its alignment to Earth Aspect; ust as he knew that it would need a moment to circulate the Tera into its powerful arms before it could attack. It was like a memory buried deep in his body was awakening, slowly giving him all the information he needed.

In an instant, the beast lunged at Noki and, in that same instant, found a fist driving straight through midsection and gripping its core. The kulda exploded in a puff of white and brown light as the scourbeast burned away into nothingness. Noki felt something travel into him, but couldn’t waste time on that, he needed to get to the village before the attack started. Without ever slowing down, Noki ran until he found himself at the entrance of the village.

“It’s still in one piece, I made it in time.” Noki thanked the heavens that he attained an Earthen Soul, otherwise he would have arrived way too late to do anything. Wasting no time, he made his way to the arena and saw a woman with silver glasses standing next to a gold pot, and who he assumed was a student.

“Who are you? I’ve never seen you before,” Gazin said.

“That’s not important! The village is about to be attacked!”

Gazin’s expression hardened. “You interrupted our Divination Ceremony, for a joke? Tell me who you are, now.”

“Noki!” Baira, her footing unsteady, ran to the stage. “Noki, what are you doing here?”

“Good, you’re here. You gotta go, Mion is going to try to kill you when the attack happens.”

“You accuse the son of the Head Chief and a member of the Okari Family, of attempted murder?” Gazin flicked her eyes to Baira, awaiting an explanation.

“Instructor Gazin, this is my friend Noki. I’ve known him for years and he isn’t the type to make outlandish accusations like that.”

Gazin raised a hand in the air to stop the guards hidden around the arena from advancing. “Ok then, Noki, do you know when or how the attack will happen? Or even who is behind it?”

“Um, excuse me, Instructor Gazin.” The three of them looked to the slender boy who stood next to the pot, “ I heard the roiling of a flame and a bit of red came out of the pot and..”

“You have a fire aspect, please go join the other students and you will get your elixir shortly.” The boy bowed repentantly and shuffled off the arena stage. Gazin looked back to Noki, “Go on, tell us who is attacking,”

Noki started to speak but was silenced by an alarm going off. It felt as if something was screaming inside his spirit. “What is that?”

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“A special alarm that only people of the Earthen Soul and above can perceive,” Baira said.

Chief Bain and Kolo Amani jumped onto the stage and took command. “Everyone, remain in your seats,” Bain said. “ Those of you Iron and above with me, the rest of you guard the entrance.” In an instant, Bain and a contingent of Divine Artists–including Instructor Gazin– vanished from the arena.

“Amani, what triggered the alarm?” Baira asked as she attempted her Moon Circulating.

Amani stared in the direction of the village entrance and scanned the horizon. “There are multiple scourbeasts emerging from what appears to be a tunnel underneath the lake and the entrance of the village.”

“The tunnels? Are you sure?” Noki asked Amani.

“The Monsari Family is full of people with great Tera sensing capacity, so yes, I’m sure.”

“Then we aren’t safe here. I’ve spent years in the mines, mapping them out for ore sites. There’s a tunnel that runs directly underneath here.”

“If there were scourbeast, I would sense them.”

“Amani,” Baira said, “ think about it. You didn’t sense the scourbeasts until the alarm sounded right? They must have a way of hiding their presence.” As if to prove her and Noki right, the walls and ground of the arena exploded with animals of all kinds; ranging from a pack of lionapes to a pride of tigerbulls.

“These are just chimeras,” Amani said.

“No, there’s something off about them.” Again, something deep inside Noki told him a truth, but he didn’t understand it. “ Wait! Look!”

One of the lionapes convulsed as a scourbeast emerged from its chest. Dozens of scourbeasts emerged from their hosts and began attacking the crowd. The guards engaged with both chimera and scourbeast alike, firing off arts that erupted in waves of color.

“The scourbeasts hid in the chimeras? That’s a level of intelligence they shouldn’t possess,” Baira said, “unless…”

“Worry about that later,” Amani said as she circulated her Tera, “ we have to get rid of them.”

“I know that,” Baira replied, “ but we need to keep an eye out for the Wildling. Noki, go with the other students and back them up.”

“What?” He shot her look, “ There’s no way that’s happening. I’m gonna get rid of the ones here, and then get the ones at the entrance.”

“Noki, you don’t have any Corporeal Arts or any basic fighting experience, now isn’t the time-” Baira’s leg lost strength and she was too late to correct herself. She fell to her knees and her white robe was sticking to her back. Corporeal Arts are martial arts that incorporate Physical Tera to grant a Divine Artist a variety of enhancements ranging from moving like water to striking like a mountain.

Noki kept one eye on the scourbeasts as he backed away to cover Baira. “What’s wrong?”

Baira didn’t answer him, prompting Amani to. “ Her ascension was interrupted, so her Tera is going out of control and her body doesn’t know which part to strengthen first.”

That had made sense to him now, Noki had felt something from Baira pressing up against him and then receding, like an invisible wave of power. “Will she be ok?”

“Once she ascends, yes.” Amani’s Tera circulated smoothly throughout her body and dedicated a small portion of it towards her Aspect. A green light washed over the surface of the arena stage and blades of translucent grass appeared. “This will help her, and keep the scourbeasts away, so don’t worry about her.”

“Thank you,” Noki said, “ for helping her.”

“Well she is my sister, it’s not like I would let her die here, and besides…” Amani looked him up and down, “ you’re the one holding the treasure. I want to see if she was right.”She said that last part in a way that unnerved Noki.She gestured for him to leave and, not wanting to upset the Kolo, Noki left the stage and leapt into the fray.

It was chaos. The people that managed to get away from the scourbeast were accosted by the chimeras and the guards were outnumbered ten to one. Noki didn’t know why, but he could tell that if the scourbeasts were gone, that the guards would be able to put an end to the attack in an instant. He encountered his first chimera, a yellow owlfox, and struck it with the full power afforded to him by his Earthen Soul. The owlfox darted to the right and countered with a slap of its tail and flew to his back, clawing at him with its sharp orange claws. Noki expected it to hurt, but the attack didn’t even break skin. “I can’t believe my body is this strong. I can take strikes from an owlfox and shrug them off now.”

Noki snapped around and grabbed the owlfox before it could fly away. He smashed it onto the ground and the chimera laid lifeless on the floor. A creature that was one of the top predators of the Red Forest, that he had heard other villagers speak of in warning tones, had died not even from a blow from him. Noki looked at the fallen chimera with a profound sense of disappointment; he thought fighting a chimera would be more exhilarating like the scourbeast in the pit. Oh well, there were more enemies abound and surely one of them could put up a good fight.

Noki felt something drifting from the chimera and flowing into him, but he ignored it since more chimeras circled around him. Another owlfox leapt at him and he smacked it down, then a lionape charged at him only for a simple kick to take it down. One after another, Noki cut through the chimeras like nothing, carving a path towards his true target; a red tigerbull scourbeast. The scourbeast saw Noki approaching and let out a deep, ground shaking roar. It had infused itself with Earth Aspect, greatly magnifying all of its physical traits. A part deep down inside of Noki was happy, it could test its strength against a worthy enemy.

The scourbeast charged towards Noki, its red horns primed to run right through him. Noki planted his feet and stood ready as the tigerbull plowed through chimeras on its way to him. Sure, the tigerbull was twice Noki’s size, but he was a Divine Artist now; physical size was no longer a limiting factor for him, he would just-

“If you don’t pull your Tera into your body and circulate it, that scourbeast will gore you,” Amani said from up on the stage. “It’s imbued with Earth Aspect, so you’ll need to actually use your Tera.”

Noki had no time to tell Amani he had no idea how to pull his Tera in and circulate it. Wasn’t it always ‘in’?

The tigerbull aimed its horn directly at Noki’s chest and dove at the boy. Noki raised his hands to intercept and found himself immediately locked in a contest of strength, and losing. Subconsciously he had circulated Tera through his hands the moment he grabbed the horns, but without covering the rest of his body he was pushed all the way back into the lower portion of the stage. “Heavens above! This thing is strong!”

The base of the arena platform was made to sustain the power of both the Divine Pot and several Iron Soul Artists, so it wouldn’t break from an attack of this caliber; which was both a blessing and a curse for Noki. The tigerbull couldn’t push Noki any further back, but he was now being crushed against the strength of the bull and the slab of stone behind him. His enhanced physicality was the only thing saving him from having a horn run right through him, and he could feel it slipping away.

A Divine Artist body is much stronger than a normal human due to the excessive flow of Tera saturating the muscles and bone, but it does so passively. To access the full strength of a Soul Body, the circulation of Tera is key. These are concepts not fully known to Noki, but his survival instincts, honed from years of being bullied and attacked by other Divine Artists, took over at the last moment. White Tera stuck to the surface of his body like a second skin and he felt fatigue burn away from his body. With inhuman strength, he took a step forward and forced the beast backwards. The tigerbull resisted and Noki could feel the full force of his strength, but managed to take a few more steps before the two were deadlocked.

“Why can’t I move him back further? I have power in my arms and legs.” Had Noki been more informed, he would have known that the moment he stopped circulating his Tera, his strength would stay the same. In this case, he gave himself enough strength not to be gored, but not enough to overpower the tigerbull fully; and if he circulated again now, he’d risk all his Tera escaping like before.

The tigerbull gathered more Earth Aspect into its body, giving it even more physical strength. Its bulk increased to the point where the ground beneath its hooves spidered under the increased weight. It took one step forward and Noki was nearly ran through; its strength had jumped to the level of an Iron Soul. Noki was fortunate that the beast lacked the intelligence to ascend or he wouldn’t have stood a chance; but as things were now, he only had to find a way to overcome its overwhelming strength.

“I’m not going to have it end here..” Noki said to himself before speaking aloud,” You hear that, you stupid beast? I’m not gonna die here!” Something akin to fire lit inside of Noki, deep in his kulda. Orange Tera rushed out of him, wrapping around his entire body. His eyes glowed like embers and he felt a surge of power unlike before. Noki slammed his foot on the ground, and with all the strength his body could produce, twisted and threw the beast over his shoulder.

Tigerbulls grow to reach a size of roughly five feet and four feet tall and can weigh up to eight-hundred pounds. As a scourbeast, it doubles its size and weight proportional to the amount of Tera it has consumed. This current tigerbull, infused with Earth Aspect, was twelve feet long and weighed twenty-five-hundred pounds and all of that came crashing into the base of the arena platform.

A deafening shockwave tore through the arena as the tigerbull’s body cracked the foundation of the platform. All of the remaining scourbeasts and chimeras halted their attacks and watched as the tigerbull, the de facto strongest creature in the area, got back to its feet. It let out a roar that Noki, somehow, understood as a taunt. ‘Is that all you got’ it seemed to say, to which Noki just replied with a primal yell of his own.

The two charged at the same time, eached poised to end the fight with their next attack. The tigerbull put all of its Tera into its horns, enhancing them with the remainder of its Earth Aspect. In a contest of speed between a scourbeast tigerbull and an Earthen Soul Artist, the beast would always have the advantage. Sure enough, the tigerbull’s horns pierced through the living orange armor around Noki and gutted him; and the beast stopped dead in its tracks.

For as grievous an injury he had sustained, Noki felt no pain. Nor did he feel the blood from his stomach leaking onto the shoes or taste the blood pooling in his own mouth; all he felt was the rush of Tera flowing into him. Noki took his right hand and thrusted it upwards towards the impaling horn. With a loud crunch, he broke off a large section of the horn and, without missing a beat, pulled the horn out of his gut and rammed it into the side of the tigerbull’s head, killing it instantly. Noki screamed a cry of victory, before collapsing face first into the ground.