Too Stubborn to Die

Aaron was starting to feel better after so many days of rest. Not, “I’m ready to take on a mean D-grade ant queen that has been busy wiping out other powerful beasts,” better, but better nonetheless.

Importantly, he was up and walking around, even if the legs that carried him felt a little wobbly. And that was good enough to get to cooking. At least to some degree.

After all, there he still had some glaring weaknesses holding him back. For example, he couldn’t call on his spirit, or any Skills that used it. Well, he could, technically, but it was extraordinarily painful and made him dizzy and disoriented.

There was also the fact that the longer he tried to control his spirit, the more it felt like it was about to fall apart, and after a few attempts to forcibly will himself back to being better, he gave up on the idea. He was stubborn, but he also realized that if he kept going, he was likely to destroy his soul. Which was more than a little frustrating.

Still, he had a lot of ingredients to work through, and not everything he cooked needed to be spirit-touched.

There was the simple fact that everything he had was running low. And he didn’t need every dish to be powerful. He just needed some simple finger foods to stock his scabbard. So, he put aside the best ingredients to be used when he was feeling a bit better, and could do them justice, and focused on stocking up his scabbard with lesser items.

To this end, his goblin helpers provided plenty of basic ingredients, and over the next couple of days, he was able to grind out a huge number of simple dishes. By the time he was finished, he had filled up an entire section of his scabbard, which he had rather neatly piled, giving himself plenty to eat in the upcoming fights. And he even gained a Profession level from his cooking.

And while a single level over multiple days of cooking wasn’t anything to get particularly excited about, he was fine with it. After all, he didn’t necessarily want to grind out too many levels on basic ingredients. However, it was a reminder of just how much high-quality ingredients and the discovery of new recipes sped up the leveling process.

Not only would you limit your potential if you sat around grinding out very basic materials, but it would also take a ridiculous amount of grinding to get far. And it was no wonder the lesser talents in Dober weren’t flying ahead in levels, despite having plenty of mediocre materials around.

When he got done neatly tidying everything and labeling things, both in his kitchen—which was now inside his homestead—and inside his spatial storage, and he stood back and smiled. Although to any onlooker, it was somewhat concerning to see the madly determined warrior so invested in organization.

“Not bad. Not bad at all.”

At that moment, the door swung open, banging against the wall.

“Hey! Watch it! I just got done making this place look nice, you neanderthal!”

It was Sooty, standing in the doorway with a big grin.

“Hey, bossman. One of my disciples wants to show ya something.”

“Disciples? Since when do you have disciples?”

“Just come take a look!”

“Alright, fine. Lead the way.”

Sooty bounced along as he led Aaron around to the back of the homestead, where the antler roaches were being kept, and a little goblin was leading them around like some kind of goblin pied piper.

“What is going on around here?”

“Pretty impressive, huh, bossman? She can do all kinds of stuff. Oi, Iggy, make ‘em dance for the bossman!”

The goblin girl nodded, and then Aaron felt some energy in the air like a Skill had been activated, and the antler roaches started dancing.

“So this is where you are?” Treg said as he came around the corner and spotted them.

“You’re in on this, too?” Aaron asked.

“Aye. She’s good at what she does,” Treg nodded.

The little dancing roaches were only low level, between 5 and 15, but there were a lot of them, and there was no reason to turn away new allies.

“So, all one hundred eggs hatched?” Aaron asked, and the goblin girl nodded without breaking from her task.

“They can work too,” Sooty said, bouncing around. “That’s where they’ve been gettin’ all their levels. Helpin’ in the gardens and even a little building. Useful little things.”

“I’ll say. Well, keep it up,” Aaron shot a thumbs up at the goblin. “Love your work.”

He wasn’t exactly sure what to make of the strange scene, but more workers were a good thing. Especially since the farm was showing all kinds of life now, and the crops were growing incredibly quickly.

The fast growth was likely the work of the mana heart and the soil. And at the rate things were going, they were likely to need a lot of hands to help out, and it seemed like there was a new plot filled with green every other day.

With everything going on, it’s probably worth seeing if I can get some special seeds or something. Especially soul-related ones.

Aaron remembered how much soul-strengthening foods were worth in the trial, and they were relatively easy to get in there. Out here? Well, he had a feeling they would be worth a small fortune.

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“Hey, there you are!” Marko shouted and waved as he stomped over from across a field.

“Something wrong, mate?”

“No. It’s the opposite. It’s your temple thing. The timer on it is getting close to being done. Real close.”

Aaron glanced across to Sooty with raised brows. “Shall we?”

“Lead the way, bossman!”

They passed by a couple of newly built barns and cabins and came face to face with the massive temple that towered over the rest of his farm.

Marko hadn’t been exaggerating. The timer was down to just two minutes, and the temple looked more or less finished, with just a faint uncanniness to it.

The pyramid temple was huge and looked somewhat comical beside the rest of his camp. But it had been close to finished for a while, and hadn’t changed much in appearance in the last couple of days, and as such, Aaron hadn’t paid too much attention to it. He was excited to see it completed, but he also didn’t want it to fill up all the space in his mind before it was completed.

He also had his Cosmic Training Cube that had finished construction some time ago, which he wanted to test out. However, he had been busy, off fighting the entire time, and then, almost as soon as he had returned, he had gone and wounded himself.

There was no point in trying to use the training cube in his current state. If he got a chance, he figured he’d try and test it out before rushing off to deal with their ant problem. But it wasn’t exactly a priority.

“Excited?” Marko asked.

“More than you know.”

When the final countdown ended, the status of the temple changed in his status window to Completed. However, not much changed in reality, besides the uncanny gleam fading. If anything, it was a little underwhelming.

“Alright, let’s do this.” Aaron nodded to his companions and stepped inside, and they followed a step or two behind.

The place screamed grandeur, with massive pillars, huge tiles and bricks, and a nice natural breeze flowing through it.

It was not quite what he had expected. The pyramid’s externals were sleek and kind of science-fiction-like, but it was still a pyramid. And that had led him to expect narrow corridors, traps, and mazes. And that was the complete opposite of what he found.

The rooms were huge, with open doorways adjoining them together. In fact, he didn’t even see a single corridor. The tiles were massive and reflective, and gave a sensation of elegance.

“Quite something, isn’t it?” Aaron murmured as he led them through the massive rooms, while his companions were struck with awe. Except Sooty, who was bouncing around.

But despite all of that, the temple felt like it was missing something.

Hmm, what is that?

Despite the feeling he got, he kept walking. And soon, they made their way into the heart of the temple. What they found was a circular room with many doorways leading into it from all around.

It wasn’t just that it was at the dead center of the temple that made him feel like there was something special about this room. He could sense it.

“This… is…”

He didn’t have the words to describe what he felt, but he had an idea. Aaron took out the Well of Truths he had won back during the 9th stage of the Trial of the Challenger from his scabbard and placed it right in the middle of the room.

“There. That’s it.”

The effect was immediate, but not complete. The sensation that came over him felt similar to Yendal’s divine realm, but as if it were only touching on the surface of the great truths that had taken root within that place of magnificent power.

In truth, it was a monstrously long way away from being anything comparable to Yendal’s divine realm. Still, he had to start somewhere, and this was a pretty good place to do it, he felt.

“You feel that?”

Just as Aaron spoke, a rush of energy flowed through the temple, and a notification appeared before his eyes.

Herald of Yendal

ACTIVATED!

New System Store Buildings

AVAILABLE!

Aaron blinked, and he immediately realized that the notifications weren’t the only thing that had changed.

He hadn’t meant to do it, and he actually felt a little bad for it. After all, he had every intention of giving people a choice when it came to what deities they wanted to work with. Not only did he want people to decide their own destinies, but he also doubted Yendal wanted forced followers. And so when he noticed that the United Front was now labelled as “followers of Yendal the Empty-Handed,” he felt a little bad.

Curious, he opened the System to see why it had changed.

Faction: United Front

Deity: Yendal the Empty-Handed

As followers of Yendal the Empty-Handed, your faction has access to special System store buildings, minor blessings, and training paths.

To change deity, visit your temple and declare your preferred deity.

Aaron’s brow crinkled. He hadn’t made any choice. This had just happened when he placed the Well of Truths. Not that he was complaining. Their settlement wasn’t really in a position to be turning down free boons, after all.

Still, he wasn’t too sure how others would take this sudden change. And while he was technically the leader, he hadn’t intended to choose the faction’s designated deity.

“Ahh, oops? How did that happen? When did I get to choose our deity?”

“Bossman, ye her Herald, remember? Ye basically her second in command. And ye also the leader of this faction. What did ya expect to happen?”

“Mate, I dunno,” Aaron shrugged. “I didn’t think about it that much. You think the others will care?”

“Hmm. If they’ve got blessings with other gods, it could be a little funny, haha,” Sooty chuckled.

“What do you mean, Sooty?” Aaron’s brow bent seriously.

“Them divine folk don’t like sharing too much. Havin’ their followers loyal to a faction serving another divinity ain’t something they’re gonna like. Then again, most gods give out thousands, sometimes even millions of low-level blessings. They probably ain’t gonna care too much about some nobody on a new world.”

“Oh, good,” Aaron sighed. “Well, not so bad then. Hopefully, it won’t be a big deal.”

“Unless they were in the trials. That could change things. Not too many potential followers are strong enough to make them trials, ya know? If ye a weaker god, ye might have a soft spot for such a follower.”

“Great,” Aaron groaned, hoping this wasn’t going to be a problem with Talia or Julius.

But he hadn’t long to go over the thoughts as a mirror began to materialize on the only wall within the central room.

Surrounded by open archways, there was only one section of solid wall surrounding the central room, and that was where the mirror was forming.

“What’s this?” Aarom murmured as he took a step toward it.

The mirror forming before him was no ordinary mirror, either. Its borders were made of intricate decorations that curled out and formed around it, giving it quite an impressive appearance and aura.

And then, a face began to materialize within the mirror itself.

“Wait, Yendal?”