The sound of construction rang out from the bottom of the canyon bluff below.

One of the many great rivers of the Eastern Basins twisted and wound, leaving a mile or so width of land on each side that stretched along the water into the distance.

Within the canyon were many bipedal forms. Some were sturdy. Some wielded tools; all were as artificial as those we'd faced on the bridge. They each worked, breaking walls and reducing the foundations of great, orange-stone buildings to rubble.

I watched an avian golem, in particular, far below, as it flapped its metallic wings with a great struggle, carrying beneath its body a net's worth of shattered stone to some unknown destination.

"What are they doing..." I trailed my voice off, one hand blocking the powerful sun from burning my green eyes.

Gwen prowled up beside me. Her large, predatory gaze narrowed. "Destroying. They're destroying whatever it all used to be."

"There's something weird going on here too," I commented. "Just like with Galadhel and her priestesses."

"Why would they be deconstructing everything?" Gwen asked. "Are they building something else, or?"

"I don't know; you'd think that'd have to be it," I replied. "Maybe anyway."

My eyes continued to scan the massive city, for that was what I figured it had to be; many of the buildings were almost completely broken apart, but it was still the best guess I had.

Much of the land had been almost cleared of a manmade presence entirely, though it still bore the mark of past construction.

As my eyes continued to drift up the layout of the half-disassembled city, they grew wide as they reached where the sun rose up behind its furthest point on the horizon.

I narrowed my vision, much like Gwen already had, just to try and confirm what I thought I was seeing.

"Oh... oh my god," I stuttered as the chill ran through my heart.

Gwen growled in response to the sudden shift in my emotions. "Clarissa?"

"Gwen. Look through my eyes, or at least look where I'm looking," I said, still transfixed in horror.

I felt the cat's eyes linger on me for a moment in hesitation, followed by her confusion and then acquiescence when I said nothing else.

The panther's consciousness entered my own. Her mind's vision melded into mine.

I watched with my friend, through my sight, as we both looked on at the huge, sun blocking mountain of white and brown that sat on the horizon at the city's zenith. The sun still burned brightly behind the mass.

We now saw where the net hoisting golem had been going.

Avians and land-based automatons alike, by the hundreds, dropped and threw the byproducts of their destructive efforts all into a massive pile. It was a pile that reached higher than any skyscraper and which had a base that spread out like that of a crumbled pyramid.

The top of this giant, dumping pile was covered mostly by rubble. The bottom too. The sides were partially obscured by the many pieces of stone that had rolled down from the top, or otherwise been flung to rest where they did by the arms of the powerful automatons.

But it was what could be seen glimpsing out from the core of that massive pile, peeking out between the rubble, that was what horrified me and now my companion as well.

"That’s--" Gwen's voice trailed, even her strong heart seeming to be brought to silence by what we saw.

"Thousands," I whispered. "Thousands, Gwen."

My hands balled. The anger burned in my bones. My mana spiraled and raged within my body, reacting to my emotions and seeking a way to lash out with them.

A line of blood dripped to the ground from in-between the right hand of my shaking fists.

"This Dungeon--" Gwen still sought for the words.

"Is pure evil," I said, my eyes never leaving the massive and never-ending pile of bones that made up the center of the rubble.

My voice shook, hatred coming into my usually carefree tone: "But we already knew that, didn't we?"

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There were too many golems for me and Gwen to ever hope to deal with in the dead city.

The minimap, leading us towards the so-called Ringed Citadel, also told us that we were far away from our destination.

And the people were already dead, their skeletons bleached white by the harsh sun.

There was no one to save in the city. No one left who knew enough about them to mourn either.

We kept moving, avoiding the sight of massacre we had come upon altogether and the many, many enemies within.

It was when we came upon the next city, if it could even be called that anymore, that the true reality of what was happening in the East finally set in.

There were no more buildings in this second ghost town. They had all been broken down, no doubt the final result of what we had seen happening in the first but already come to fruition.

This time, you could barely even see the pyramid of bones within the massive amount of rubble, to an even greater extent--barely, but you could. And I did.

There were also no Golems that I could see, though.

I don't know what possessed me. Maybe it was the fact that there appeared to be no threats, but my legs started to descend into the death-filled valley before I even knew what I was doing.

I said nothing to Gwen as I walked either; the panther didn't question me, though, perhaps somehow better understanding the emotions I felt than I did.

Once I’d reached it, I couldn't tell you how long I stood in front of the monument of bones.

They weren't human bones. They were close, but slightly misshapen. Some of the skulls even appeared somewhat like the animalistic faces of the golems we’d fought, but their existence proved, as far as I could tell, that they couldn’t be in the same position as the caliban priestesses.

It didn't matter if they weren't human though. The city around the corpses made it obvious they had been sapient and self-aware.

"This was a genocide," I said to Gwen; I didn't want to cry, I didn't want to feel anything, but I wasn't sure it was up to me. "But no one stopped it."

"This is terrible, but--" Gwen hesitated. "Clarissa, are you okay?"

I paused myself.

"No," I said. "I didn't know them. I don't even know what race they are... were. But no."

I closed my eyes and finished my sentence: "No, I am not okay."

Gwen growled. "Talk to me."

I wanted to, but I didn't have the words; the tightness grew in my throat. "You can feel it, can't you? What I'm feeling?"

The panther lowered her head. "You're angry."

"Yes," I said.

"And sad," she continued.

A tear ran down my cheek. "This could be them."

Gwen moved in and rested her large, soft head against my thigh.

My hand continued to shake, once more in a tight fist, but slowly it let itself go and hesitantly fell between my companion's ears.

"They die, Gwen," I said, realizing that I'd never really killed anyone, unless you counted Galadhel, which was more me killing the Webspinner. "Anything or anyone that caused this… They die."

To be honest, I didn't really know who I was talking about. Did I mean Cowagin? Maybe the boss monster that no doubt awaited us in The Ringed Citadel, that was probably the direct cause of the slaughter before us? Or was I most angry with whatever was behind bringing the System to my world in the first place?

Gwen pushed her head more strongly against me in comfort and solidarity. "We’ll kill them."

----------------------------------------

My legs hung over the edge of the cliff. My eyes were exhausted, bags under them.

"How many more cities, Gwen?" I asked and sighed. "I lost count."

We'd passed so many, each as lifeless and destroyed as the last.

The Eastern Basins were a walled graveyard, a hidden country of the forgotten dead.

"You need sleep," Gwen said. "You've been training too hard at night."

"How many?" I repeated.

"I don't know."

I sighed. "I'm not losing it and the stress isn't cracking me, Gwen."

The panther purred a bit, contemplatively. "I know, but you're worried."

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"Death on that scale..." I trailed my voice. "It terrified me when I saw it. Fighting monsters, dehumanizing them. Hell, they're not human, I guess. So it's fun. I like it, probably more than I should, but whatever Cowagin is... well he's a different thing. If he wanted all of this, and isn't just another victim of this dungeon--"

I paused and then finished: "Then he's more evil than anyone humanity ever produced. Even our worst, they didn't destroy entire fucking worlds. They didn't corrupt and torment the survivors, and change them until they really weren't even survivors anymore."

Gwen growled in agreement. "Killing to eat, killing to survive or to protect what you own. It's natural. And maybe even killing for what's right is too."

The panther raised her head to the stars and continued her response: "This world didn't die for any of those reasons, I can smell it in the air: the pointless death. It died for no reason at all."

I lowered my eyes to look at the beautiful vista below me. "I don't want that to happen to Earth, or here, but I think it’s too late for this place. No matter what I told Galadhel.”

Gwen and I now sat on the precipice of one small section of a massive ring of canyon walls. One that surrounded a huge and beautiful vista.

Green, fertile land. The most fertile we'd seen since entering the basins, was dotted with moon-catching flowers and vibrant grass in the depression within and below the canyon ring.

All of the lush beauty was fed by a massive lake, filled by the many rivers that ran off the rock walls all around the small section of emerald grassland.

And in the center of that lake? There rose, more grand than anything I'd seen on earth, a tower made for a giant, hewn from silver and surrounded by a dozen building sized rings that hovered, connected by massive staircases, all around it.

It was a morbid sight, in a way, for something so breathtaking and fantastical to exist in the center of a land dripping with so much past slaughter.

"Our enemy is here," Gwen said, turning her intelligent eyes to meet mine. "We rest and then we face him."

I exhaled harshly. "One more step towards answers. Towards Cowagin. If he can even give them."

Gwen growled. "You'll still enjoy the fight."

I chuckled. "Yeah, but for a lot of reasons beyond just the fighting."

"Maybe that'll just make it better," Gwen contemplated aloud. "I'd never thought about justice until recently."

"You mean until the past two weeks of traveling the canyons?" I asked.

The panther's eyes rested on the glinting, silvered tower. "Yes."

"Maybe it's not just me changing then," I added aloud, accepting her lack of explanation; I felt a lot more than she could say over our soul link anyway. "The more we fight together, the more I fight like you, Gwen. The more vicious and also calm it makes me."

Gwen didn't reply right away.

"As long--" she paused for a moment, "as long as we kill for the right reasons, I believe that will just make you stronger."

"It's not a bad thing, being more like you," I said. "I'm not as scared as I was when I first came here; I'm more comfortable in my skin too, like I’m just me."

I felt a bit of surprise and maybe bashfulness pass over our emotional connection, but it didn't come from me.

"I'm more human, I think," Gwen said, her surprise fading a bit, as she made the confession. “I feel more like that anyway. Not just whatever I am. I feel like both.”

I smiled. "Good, Gwen. If you think it’s good?”

"I do have one question," the panther began, changing the subject. "What have you been training so late into the night? You look like you've been in pain during your shifts."

I was a little shocked as I heard her ask the question; I wasn aware she’d been watching me at night, but not that closely.

"Well," I said. "I guess I could show you."

I pushed myself up off of the ground, my long hair blowing in the moonlight.

"But I can't do it out here," I said. "Let's go back to the tent."

----------------------------------------

I slipped into our hide-made shelter, Gwen padding behind me.

I made sure the flap was closed completely after us, even knowing there was likely not another living soul up on the canyon ring besides us two.

Once that was done, I walked into the center of the tent and opened my inventory screen.

My grappling hook went first, disappearing into shimmering light as I unequipped it.

Then came my armor.

Gwen didn't react to my nudity at all though; I knew it didn’t bother her. We had bathed since entering the river-filled basins after all; we were used to each other.

My pale, though somewhat more tanned skin, and muscled curves were now showing in their entirety.

Gwen narrowed her eyes. "What are those..."

It definitely wasn’t my body, in particular, that Gwen was addressing.

All across my skin there glowed, almost to a blinding degree now that my armor wasn't equipped, dozens of crisscrossing arcane sigils.

Intermixed between these shining runes, however, there were some faintly glowing white and red ones as well--though they made up the minority.

"They're runes, Gwen," I said, really feeling how weak my body truly felt now that we were nearing the time for rest. "When I saw the golems in the first city, I realized how damned outnumbered we were."

"Okay, but--" Gwen's eyes narrowed and I felt her mind probing my own. "I didn't feel it until now; you've been hiding how exhausted you are from me? I noticed a part of how tired you were, but... Clarissa, are you in pain right now?"

I was. A lot of pain. I could barely manage it, in fact.

Each glowing, arcane rune burned against my skin. Their brimming energy caused my muscles to throb, my heart to pound, and my health regeneration, even when buttressed by [Accelerate Healing], could just barely keep up with how much mystical damage they were doing on account of their mana-charged nature.

I felt like I was being torn apart. I think I probably was too.

"I can hit hard. We both can, but my mana reserves are limited. Potions can't be relied on forever and if I run out of spells before a fight is over, then we'll probably die if you can’t pick up the slack," I explained. "My fire and frostfire runes gave me the idea to do this."

I raised my forearm and traced it along the runes that I'd etched into my skin through willpower alone. "These are like batteries. Each one holds a different amount of mana; all of these probably have a little too much in them, even for practice, though honestly."

I closed my eyes and the runes began to implode, each one shattering off into the air as my body absorbed the power I’d imparted into them.

My mana bar ticked back up from its mostly depleted state, until it reached full; each exploding rune after that provided me with nothing, aside from a massive amount of relief from the pain I was feeling on their account.

"You've made a spell that acts as a potion," Gwen said, a little bit of respect mixing in with her worry. "That doesn't explain the pain or why you've been hiding it."

"Bear with me... No material can hold a limitless amount of mana, at least as far as I can tell," I explained. "The runestones I create can only be about as strong as a fireball spell, before they shatter if I try to make them any stronger, because I don't have any better material than normal rocks to enchant."

I laughed darkly and continued: "As for my body, well, turns out it has its limits too; even if I didn’t think it would at first. I used two of the soul shards we got from the gate golems to make what the System calls a [Lesser Mana Rune]. I'm pretty sure the higher level ones can go on items, but these ones apparently only work on a caster. I think it has something to do with them using residual mana coming off of the soulcore to maintain themselves--or at least that’s what it feels like they’re doing, it’s not like I have a teacher to explain this stuff.”

Gwen growled low. "You sound like you've learned a lot."

"I have," I explained as my voice grew a little serious. "Like how bad it hurts when you try to throw too many runes on yourself. At first even just one pretty weak rune made my health bar drain so fast that even healing spells couldn't keep up, and I'd have to release it before too long."

"You were just wearing a lot more than one," Gwen observed.

I held up two fingers. "Two things explain that. The first one is [Mana Resistance]. I sorta hit a wall with elemental resistances, because unless I was willing to throw [Fireballs] at myself there was a limit to what I could do every night. But my tolerance for mana runes is apparently a little easier to train, not that I didn't figure that out by accident."

I continued: "What I did was find the perfect balance between my mana regeneration, the damage dealt by as many mana runes as I could handle, and how much it cost to counter that damage with healing spells."

"Clarissa... how long have you been doing this?" Gwen asked. “You talk like you haven’t been in agony. I can feel that you have now that I’m looking for it.”

I hesitated, realizing what I was about to say might sound insane. "Every day and every hour since we left the second city, casting runes beneath my clothes and healing spells while I did. Except I can't do it when I sleep or it'd probably kill me."

"And you can keep that many runes on your body now?" Gwen asked.

I shook my head and indicated the five remaining mana runes that glowed across my neckline. "Five. With my current [Mana Resistance] I can keep five runes on my body and I won't take damage from them; each one can pretty much top me off. All the other ones you saw were just me pushing my limits to try and surpass that. If I have a lot of little, weaker runes going at once it also raises my [Spell Control] skill quicker since I have to juggle my awareness--so I was multitasking I guess."

"You have been distant these past few days," Gwen started to put together exactly what I'd been putting myself through.

The dark bags underneath my eyes began to fade as [Accelerate Healing] cleaned up some of the damage I'd done to myself now that the excess mana runes were gone. I was still exhausted though.

"Sorry about that, Gwen," I said. "I've just had a lot on my mind."

The panther growled. "I won't pry, but we shouldn't hide things from one another."

I frowned. "No, we shouldn't. I wasn't so much hiding it, I guess. Keeping the pain from crossing our soul link was more me not wanting to hurt you too. And the rest... I guess I was just stuck in my head and concentrating."

The cat shook her head.

"You have different runes on you too," Gwen said.

I lifted my hand and showed the sigil on my palm. "This is a flame rune."

I lifted my other hand and showed the matching sigil on the other hand and continued explaining: "This is a frostfire rune."

"You can control which way the explosion goes for those, right? I imagine it would hurt if you just put it against someone's head, or anywhere else really," Gwen said.

"Right," I smiled, glad to see she was following. "The fire one is designed to work kinda like a direct blow torch. It makes one big, really powerful directed blast about the size of my palm. The frostfire rune is meant to flash-freeze whatever I can grab. They're just a little extra utility and only good for one go, but it’s something. Plus they helped me to raise my fire and frost resistance a little more."

Gwen sighed. "I'm proud you're my partner, you're smart and brave, but I'm starting to think you're a little obsessive."

I cocked an eyebrow, feeling a little bit better now that my body wasn't being hyper-saturated with mana.

"I prefer inventive," I said.

"I said you were smart," Gwen indicated my self-crafted sleeping roll with her head. “We’ll forget the rest… Just sleep.”

I was tired. "I'm sorry if you feel like I kept anything from you."

"It’s fine," the panther said as she laid herself down in front of the tent flap.

Gwen closed her eyes, but I knew she was still awake. She could stand guard with her ears as well as she could with her eyes.

Not knowing if pushing the subject would just make it worse, I crawled into my sleeping bag, still nude as I'd found it comfortable to sleep that way for a while--especially when the System could equip my armor and weapons for me with a single command or two.

However, just as I was drifting off to sleep, a bit worried if Gwen was mad at me or not, I heard a gentle telepathic message enter my mind.

"I saw the flame rune you had over your heart, Clarissa," Gwen's mental message told me in a calm, but very serious tone, maybe explaining why she’d been so quick to let my dishonesty go. "You don't need it. I wouldn't ever let you become something less than human."

My eyes opened and I looked over at the panther.

She hadn't moved.

My magic wouldn't damage me unless I let it, but I could let it. The flame rune she was talking about would've been under my armor if I were wearing it; It would've been useless for damaging enemies.

I guess she wasn't trying to make a big deal out of it then... but she was smarter than I gave her credit for--and I didn't think she was dumb to begin with.

"Okay, Gwen," I whispered as I let the flame rune on my chest fade away. "I'll trust you."

"Then no more secrets," she replied telepathically.

"No more secrets," I agreed. "I'm still sorry."

"Don't be."