Kaelen's eyes opened and were faced with the red-brown roof of this trial.
Groggy a moment ago, he shot up like a rocket, looking around before letting out a relieved sigh.
He was surrounded by corpses.
'Thank the Gods.'
Naturally, he was searching around for an enemy of which there was none. They were all dead; after all, he had killed them.
Standing there absentmindedly for a minute, he thought of the reason; the answer was not that hard to uncover. To his left and right, 2 walls rose from the ground.
From his back was the steep slope leading down to this ground with flaming vents, and forward was the territory of what was once 40 monsters.
Even the Ash Stalkers with their primitive hunting methods would have been torn to shreds.
The place he had chosen to lose consciousness was most likely the best place to do so.
But his mind had shifted away from the reasons he was not in the belly of some nightmare creature.
His blank face changed into a grin.
'I think I understand Sunny now.'
He raised his hands in a stretch and got onto the tips of his toes, stretching his body. With a satisfied groan he heard the cracks and pops in his body.
Then the seafarer's satchel was summoned, and his arm had already moved into it, pulling out a bone spike.
He had a hearty harvest in front of him.
A total of forty-two dormant monster corpses were lying on the ground, each with 2 shards in their bodies.
Aside from the shards themselves, he had also heard the announcement of receiving a memory.
Walking towards the closest one, Kaelen started to dissect the creature while summoning the runes of the new memory.
The dissection of Nightmare creatures had stopped being an issue by now, and he was able to do it subconsciously.
Removing the shards and crushing them, already having the awakened shard for light, the ribs of the nightmare creature were shard and pointy, and the femur had a unique structure that made it look like a hammer.
He did not take any meat from the creatures, though.
Perhaps its flesh had not been toxic on its own, but the odd black blood ooze filled him with a sense of dread, especially the smell.
He started to read out the runes of the memory.
Memories: [Hunters Mark] [Seafarers Satchel] [Swift Sea] [Burning Blood]
He smiled, having already guessed the power of this memory's enchantments.
Summoning it in his hand, he analysed its appearance.
It looked like a carving of a dog's head; this dog, however, had much flesh ripped from its face, and its teeth were a lot sharper.
Holding it like a glass of water, Kaelen took a sniff of the dog's mouth; the smell of the liquid within was the same as the blood that had seeped from the corpses and had heat-dried to the ground.
'Another tool, then.'
He had held some hope of it being a weapon, but this was good too.
Memories were often given based on the situation and the fact that it could be useful for the user.
Sunny was given the Silver Bell as his first memory. In many respects it was a very useless memory, but paired with his cunning, it had become a death sentence for a fated awakening of the nine, Auro.
This mug holding the flammable ooze had a much broader use.
By slathering it on one of his carved bone weapons and setting it aflame, it would be a lot more powerful and deadly, not to mention that many nightmare creatures would keep a distance if he had poked a flaming stick at them.
Well, the demons would, the beasts and monsters. Not so much.
Dismissing the memory, he continued his dissection of the nightmare creatures all while counting his shard count.
By the end he let out a sigh.
'170 shards absorbed now'
He couldn't help but praise his luck.
Many of the awakened had some level of education on basic combat and survival and how to deal with many situations; there were also the outskirt rats who were thrust into the first nightmare and forced to survive based on fate and luck.
Some of those awakened were given decent aspects in the nightmare, such as an aspect that could aid in endurance or combat, and some did not even get that, such as Sunny.
While he did have better survival skills than most and even some martial prowess due to his mother's teachings.
But the luck he was talking about was the one in relation to his aspect here.
The ability to assimilate had so far given him great durability and strength through the earth altering both his skin and bones.
The water had altered the blood that flowed through his body, seeming to lessen the need for both water and rest.
This, combined with his own knowledge, was a magnificent boon.
He turned around and started to walk.
'It's the sixth day.'
That was a pattern he had noticed with regard to the division of the time within this trial; 5 days were taken to adapt completely and kill weaker nightmare creatures.
The 6th day had always been when he discovered either the region of the creature or the creature itself.
He had seen the Broken Earth on the sixth day, and he had fought it on the seventh; he had reached the shattered remains of the floating city of the water trial, and he had also killed the Shattered Sea on that day.
Stepping into the narrow pathway again, he began to walk forward.
He looked down at the three corpses on the ground, trampled and smashed to meat pulps on the ground; the shards must have been smashed.
'No matter'
He would get more soon.
...
Kaelen let go of the bone spike letting it fall to the ground with the corpse.
Digging his hand into the corpse of the Ash Stalker he didn't even bother to take it out, he simply crushed it within the creatures body.
'223 shards absorbed'
The number of nightmare creatures had decreased even more significantly, he knew why though.
The Creature of this trial was close.
'Guardians... thats what I will call it from now'
The guardians of the trial
He contined to take step after step, minutes became hours and soon he found the Guardian
...
Kaelen stood atop a hill.
The hill was not very tall, but it made observations of the surrounding regions easy and very clear.
Its structure was also quite flat at the top, which allowed him to lay his assets out and take count as he looked at the creature in front.
It was the guardian of this trial.
Its size made that very clear.
'Is that what Cerberus looked like?'
No
Cerberus had three dog heads, not one human and one dog and definitely not both deformed.
The guardian of this trial was exactly that.
It looked similar to a two-headed sphinx, but instead of a lion body and human head, this thing had a dog body but beast-like human limbs with both a dog head and a human head.
And both heads were equally ugly.
The creature's flesh seemed to be much more powerful too, being able to resist the flames that licked its body.
But its appearance was not the thing that caused him to take a while to rest, eat and take inventory before moving in.
It was the look in its eyes, all four of them.
An eerie amount of intelligence in its eyes, completely different from the dormant demon's primitive yet present brain.
This thing had a curious look in its eye as if it were plotting, which it was.
When it lay down, the dog looked very much like a flaming rock mound, much like the others scattered along this region, so its presence was hidden well.
When that ash stalker jumped down from the ledge behind onto the 'rock', it continued to stay stationary, waiting for the inferior demon to step down before it woke and snapped the creature's head off.
A good hunting strategy mixed with strength was worrisome, but the worst part was that Kaelen knew that it had a larger cognitive function than it was able to display.
'Poor dog, everyone around you is an idiot, so you can't even show your smarts... Don't worry though. I'm coming soon.'
He could tell very easily that the creature held some fraction of battle prowess.
And he was going to kill it tomorrow; he already had a tactic in mind too.