Chapter 151 (2/2)
Now, as Randidly thought about his decisions to sacrifice the lives of others in order to find power, he could do nothing but clench fists. But surely the system wasn’t here to drive individuals to moral bankruptcy. Likely that was just a side effect of another goal, the true goal. This wasn’t even close to the core of the system. There were 4 more groups of planets beyond this cohort. And perhaps it extends even further than that.
Randidly asked, “...then what is the system? Why does it comes to worlds? What is the point?”
Shal snorted. “Hmph, fool. I have had a small speck of respect for you because you did not immediately ask this. That is gone. The system is the system. It comes like weather. Perhaps someday it will pass. It gave us tools we didn’t have before, but our goal will always be the same; perfecting the spear. Even before the system came, our world chased this ideal, seeking previous Spearmen; the individual who defeated the Calamity was not the first, but likely the greatest. Do not ask question you don’t have the power to understand. Focus inward, idiot disciple.”
Randidly opened his mouth, then closed it. Shal’s answer might not have been designed to answer the question, but it did contain some information. From the way Shal was speaking, it seemed that they didn’t know. It came, and it changed their lives. But ultimately, it was secondary. Then Randidly wondered how long the system had been in this world, but decided against asking. It seemed Shal was done with interaction for now.
Perhaps after the shock of the switch passed, Earth would be like that too. Accepting the existence of the system, finding a new normal. It almost made Randidly sad in a way. But he supposed that even he couldn’t deny that the system’s arrival had done much for him. It gave people a path.
But another part of him whispered that path came at the cost of millions of lives. Sighing, Randidly looked down at the book. After a bit of hesitation, he opened it and began to read.
Time passed quickly as Randidly used Root Control to burn through his mana and studied the book. The beginning chapters laid out very generally some theories about engraving and how it worked. What Randidly was most interested in was when it described how Engraving was perhaps a simplified version of the way that Aether changed human bodies.
However, any attempts to Engrave on a living body resulted in horrible, monstrous, disastrous results. As such, the other half of the introductory chapter listed some things that you shouldn’t do with Engraving. Aside from Engraving living creatures, the rest was rather self explanatory. But what it did seem to indicate was that the reason that Engraving didn’t work was the issue of image; whereas objects couldn’t do anything but allow the image of the Engraver to be impressed upon them, living creatures could have their own images.
Because, as the text seemed to indicate, there didn’t appear to be any uniformity in what shapes and patterns created effects. What was really important was what the Engraver thought it would do.
This was complicated by a living recipient because the different images merged and changed, which was combined with the apparently agonizing pains of having your body engraved upon. This pain warped the image the recipient had even further, moving it far away from the original goal.
Randidly found it rather interesting, but he didn’t think attempting it sounded anything like a good idea. Better to focus on learning the background information in order to improve his regular engraving.
But footsteps distracted Randidly, causing him to look up. A bald man, who appeared to be the leader of the rust colored bandits, was walking up to their campfire with a sinister smile.
“Welcome, companions. Are you new to the area?” The man said, extending his hand towards Randidly. “I am Dehark. We in this business must maintain… relationships, lest any accidents happen.”
Randidly distastefully took the man’s hand, and some of his distaste must have shown on his face, because Dehark’s face tightened. After glancing at Shal, and probably realizing that even getting one of these people to acknowledge him was a feat, Dehark said. “Well I just came over to welcome you, and to give you a bit of a gift; a caravan is coming down the road, and as the newbies, you wouldn’t usually get the chance at an easy mark like this. But I like the look of you two, I think you will go far here. So want to handle this one? Stick it to those fat merchants?”
Dehark smiled manically at them, but Randidly just looked at Shal. Yawning, Shal straightened and held a hand up to his eyes. Then, strangely, he smiled. “Yes, why don’t you let us handle this one. Disciple, you will go, and you only need to make sure to do one thing.”
Randidly tilted his head to the side, and Shal continued. “You simply need to kill one of them. Do what you must to do so. Hold nothing back. Ah, take out your spear and give me your ring.”
After he handed over the ring, Randidly nodded and walked passed Dehark, who seemed to have frozen, the smile sliding off his face.
“K-k-killl one of them…?” The man muttered to himself, but Randidly ignored it. As he walked forward, he removed the large, obsidian spear from his ring, the one Shal had given for when he went into the formation. He hefted it, enjoying its weight, which was greater than even the Spine Spear that Sam had forged for him.
Just a single life.
Just a single step on his path.
But he must, because a spear that stopped advancing would be destroyed.
Breathing evenly, Randidly advanced towards the caravan.