God's doing

At first, Zayn thought that he was lucky to have survived in the Undead Cave but his misconception was quickly cleared.

It was obvious that he survived because only a few Undead had been sent over to tackle him.

Zayn thought about it very hard and he came to the conclusion that someone was controlling everything in the Undead Caves. It didn't make sense that a total of six grinding spots, specifically six Goblin Caves, had been infiltrated by Undeads who could turn the living into more Undeads.

That was why Zayn thought Undead Liches had somehow appeared in the Goblin Caves where they could hide rather easily and control the Undead Skeletons while lurking in the shadows. However, that didn't really make any sense either because the Liches had to emerge from somewhere and end up in the Goblin Caves without getting caught or noticed in the first place.

Zayn was very suspicious of the Undead Caves and he grew even more vigilant when he figured that the Normie King knew about the Caves yet he didn't act.

The Normie King was likely to be a Normie with three or more Soulrings revolving around his heart. Zayn couldn't figure out why the Normie King ended up in a small town that had yet to cross the population of 10,000 to earn the right of a name, in the first place.

It made things more complicated, and dangerous. Unsure of what the near future might hold for him, Zayn told his Sparrow Spirits to do two specific things.

He gave one of the Sparrow Spirits the task to observe the nearest Undead Cave and return only when something big happened. The Sparrow Spirit was instructed to return to him the moment an Undead left the cavern entrance, or a living being emerged from the cave, unscathed.

While the first Sparrow Spirit was given the observatory task, the other Sparrow Spirit was supposed to keep an eye on Phillip Cerk and his followers.

Zayn could sense his Spirits as long as they were within a certain radius around him. This radius expanded as he grew stronger but it was still not exactly strong.

He barely sensed the two Sparrow Spirits when they were only a hundred meters away from entering the town.

They returned together, turning his worst fears true that Zayn had jokingly thought of after he recalled the ominous hue that had radiated from Phillip's Stigma during their first encounter.

'...these bastards!' He nearly cursed out loud as he made his way back to the Inn.

The Sparrow Spirits returned to him to share their respective reports but Zayn didn't even wait for them to share the memories of what they had seen with him as he inserted some of his power into one of the Spirits. The two Sparrow Spirits should have seen the same, which meant that he didn't need both Spirits to share their memories with him.

"Keep following Phillip and wait for me there," Zayn merely ordered one of them while he looked at the other one for a moment.

"Show me what you saw."

He could already guess what the Sparrow Spirit must have seen but it was reaffirmed a moment later as the other Sparrow Spirit shared its memories with him. In it, he could see Phillip Cerk, his bodyguards, and an older man who looked similar to Phillip in many ways.

There were a few more Adventurers in their group that exceeded ten members but they all had two things in common; their smile which was as disgusting as their Stigma!

"Is that really a coincidence? Obviously not!" Zayn muttered when he returned to his room in the Inn on the outskirts of the town.

By now, he knew where Phillip was located because the first Sparrow Spirit kept hovering at the same spot for a few minutes. Phillip Cerk was at the Adventurer Inn while the gray Sparrow Spirit was on top of the building, observing the entrance.

"The same God blessed them, and they nourished the Undead…Phillip's ominous aura felt similar to the Undead Cave as well…all of that is connected…" Zayn mumbled, running a hand through his hair while simultaneously trying to understand what was going on.

In fact, he was pretty sure what was currently happening but he didn't really want to accept it. There was no reason for humans to sacrifice other humans and throw them at monsters…or was there?

Since Zayn found out more about the Gods who handed out their Blessings as if they were candies, he grew a little bit more vigilant of them. He knew that Rail Landal would often lie about the missions he received from his System and boast unnecessarily but Zayn could also tell that their last meeting on the day of their graduation was directly related to the System missions.

Rail Landal didn't look like he wanted to converse more than necessary with Zayn, the Normie, when they graduated. He would have broken Zayn's arm and left afterward simply because he actually received the system mission to break a Normie's arm.

Zayn didn't know much about the Systems the Blessed received, or how well they were connected but he heard about the term Group-Missions. Group Missions were missions that were given to a group of the Blessed with the same Stigma, usually…and that was likely to be happening right now.

Zayn guessed that the Blessed around Phillip Cerk and his father were all involved in a Group Mission that may or may not have been given by their God.

The thought of the Gods actively controlling the people around him made Zayn sick, and even more so the cruelty of the Blessed that were blindly willing to surrender to their greed by following the Gods who caused the death of many just to nourish the beings in the Undead Cave.

Of course, all of this was just Zayn's theory as he didn't have even a shred of evidence to prove his point.

But that didn't really matter anymore. Zayn retrieved a Soul Shard from his backpack and he absorbed the soul particles that were stored inside it without a second thought.

The Soul Shard was the second one he obtained. He had been extremely lucky to get his hand on two Soul Shards within three days but he couldn't even sell one of them for a small fortune.

It was more important to absorb the soul particles and strengthen the Sparrow Spirit as much as possible.

After all, trouble was about to ensue and the Sparrow Spirit on his shoulder was the key to his success!