New Path

"I did say I didn't mind feeling some pain to get stronger, but this is just a menace," Licht said to himself, jerking his hands to remove the blood from them.

All around him were corpses of Undead Rodents, spewing out rotten smells and blood.

It was quite a gore scene that any normal person, just after seeing once would have spewed their guts out.

Yet, Licht had adapted to this new and unfamiliar environment. He was far above this bloodshed now, and for him, it was just a daily routine.

Slowly but surely the sewers were becoming his domain. He used everything it had to offer to his advantage.

Scanning around, he pondered for a moment and hand-picked some of the finest rotten corpses. He made his way toward an empty and placed down the stove, and started cooking varieties of meat.

From finely roasted meat to crispy burnt charcoal, Licht liked it all. Maybe he was going mad in this weird place, but oh well, who cared?

Humming for some moments while cutting the meat with his new trusty knife, he placed them all on it. Meanwhile, he looked at the screen that had hovered by his side for quite some time now.

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[Saint Dorax's basic spiritual energy training method: 4000 Calamity souls]

[Spiritual energy training method created by Saint Dorax. One of the best basic modules focused primarily on reaching a stage of manipulating spiritual energy. Upon mastery, the spiritual energy can strengthen the whole body as well as can be coated on weapons. Increases stats for the period of time, the spiritual energy is being used to enhance.]

[Danger: Can blow up the body if used incorrectly.]

Minor realm of mastery → Major realm of mastery → Natural realm of mastery

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'I really want this, but it is going to be hard with Undead Rodents as it is now, and the side effect…' Licht had been saving calamity souls for this training method for days.

Instead of buying any sort of lavish food, new clothes, or even another sword, after his sword had started chipping away at the brutal fights he got into.

He only used some calamity souls for water, which he couldn't get even after changing his tunnel paths.

'Can't they at least give free water?' he complained.

'There is only one reason I want this…Spiritual energy is the root of everything that fundamentally changed inside my body.'

'From awakening monsters to strengthening the body, it is a phenomenal energy' In his mind, if he could get this manual in the future, then he could become much stronger.

The only way to get stronger was to take risks and Licht wanted to risk all his calamity souls on this.

Swiping his hand in the air, another screen popped out of thin air.

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[Calamity Souls: 784]

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But the problem was how? He was literally getting minuscule amounts of calamity souls from rats, and if things went on like this then his goal of getting it would just be a dream.

Just to solve that problem Licht was venturing completely out of the safe zone he had declared in his mind.

Previously, he was slowly expanding the domain of his search for a way outside.

Mapping out the tunnels he had explored on the wall, Licht didn't stray far from his starting point.

The sewers were like a labyrinth. They connected and stretched out in every direction which made them confusing to explore.

Once he had gone too deep into its depths and reached a fork with several paths leading in all directions. It was only by luck that he had found his way back.

But in the process, he had mapped out the path to get there. Packing up all of his nonexistent stuff, while placing the stove and some of the jerky he had made from the meat of rats.

Licht had prepared everything he could for this journey. On his hip rested a small pouch made from the fur of rats he had killed. He stored some of the jerky in it.

On the left side of his hip rested the leather water bottle, hanging from his worn-down pants by a string.

In his right hand, he was holding the sword while in his left hand, a glossy karambit rested.

He made his way into the sewers, fighting off occasional rats as well as transversing weirdly made tunnels from time to time.

The deeper he transversed the weirder the foul smell got. It was changing from myriads of nasty odors to the smell of something rotten.

Ignoring it, Licht kept on moving through. With nothing to do except walk, his mind drifted along the questions he had left behind in his mind.

'I wonder how people of other regions are doing, I do think that the difficulty of them all should be similar but ugh. Fighting the undead is just weird'

'If I believe myself to be nothing special and everyone else to be around a similar level to the current me then I am too far behind.' Licht's mind spiraled on the only weakness he had right now.

The monster.

He deep down knew this issue but didn't deeply think about it. It was hard for him to come to reality with this despairing fact just because he hadn't awakened to its power.

The things his 'monster' said still resonated inside him. It got harder for him to hide the anxiety and fear of not being able to use the power he should have gotten.

A power he so dearly wanted but couldn't get.

Others would have it far easier than him in this matter, while he had to struggle through all this.

Maybe they were already done with their trials and were on a new path, treading far ahead of him.

Licht didn't want to stay behind and that was one of the reasons he had to explore more right now.

The second was the nearing of the time limit. The trial would end in just around two weeks and he hadn't made any progress regarding it.

It was a waking call for him.

If he didn't move now then he would die, and death was the last thing he wanted to have in this treacherous world.

In anxiety, his steps quickened and after some moments he finally arrived at the crossroads of his current path.