The sun was moving upwards slowly and the dark sea was receding. Aether had woken up long ago, waiting for the sea to fully be gone so that he could go out and scavenge.
In the meantime he was thinking about his aspect. At first it seemed underwhelming for a divine aspect, but as he searched and experimented with it, Aether realized that his dormant ability had many uses to it. If this was his dormant ability, what would his awakened ability be?
He was dying to know, but he needed to get out of this place if he ever wanted to survive to see his awakened ability.
Nephis, Changing Star was here too. And she had murdered someone from a known clan. Aether did not particularly understand why she would do such a thing, however he did not believe that she would do it without reason either.
This part of his aspect made him feel like a seer. He could gaze into a persons last memories before their lives were taken away from them.
It was not long before the sea was finally gone. With the help of the training he had took from the wilderness class and his past classes he cautiously climbed down the tree. If he wanted to survive he would need some food and materials. So he had come down to scavenge them.
Soon, his feet finally touched the ground.
Aether summoned [Ever Winter] just in case. Immediately a saber appeared in his hand with no delay. Unlike memories [Ever Winter] could form itself almost immediately. Then he also summoned [Silk Step].
The black mud was deep enough to slow him down, but with the help of his memory he could navigate it much more quickly while making the minimum amount of sounds.
He navigated through the crimson labyrinth. He had memorized the path he was going to take, the path did not lead to anywhere particular, it was just the path with the least amount of nightmare creatures. He did not want to overestimate himself just because he had killed a weakened awakened monster as a mundane.
And finally he encountered a weird looking worm. Its size was about the half of Aether, however its length reached about 7 meters.
'Gross.'
Aether did not straight up look at it and simply kept it in his line of vision. Keeping his emotions suppressed, which was hard to do so. Aether had only encountered one nightmare creature in his life and it was severely weakened by the cold. He was nervous as he had never experienced an awakened beasts might beforehand.
The worm was moving his way absentmindedly, while Aether himself was hiding behind some corals. He clenched his hand around the saber, ready to slash down as soon as the ugly worm came into the position to strike.
When it did, Aether immediately skidded forward with the charms help and created a mind link with the creature then brought his saber up to sever its head.
But at that moment he got out a weird signal from the creatures mind, his mind screamed danger. Before he could process his own movement, he had skidded to the left which the worm had shot out dark liquid from its body.
Without wasting any seconds Aether brought his saber down. With the power added by the [Slash] enchantment he sliced the 'head' of the creature with ease, then immediately moved backwards as the carcass of the worm started leaking out that black liquid.
He had read the mind of a beast..? Not that they had a very complex thinking style.
[You have slain an awakened beast: Corrosive Worm.]
'So the liquid was corrosive.'
A certain voice echoed through his ears one again.
[You have received an Aspect Legacy! Codex of Axioms.]
Aether stilled.
He had what now? This early? How had he even gained it?
As far as he knew very few awakened had unlocked their legacies. And the ones who had unlocked it, had already created their own clans./\
Aether pondered while trying to retrieve the core of the worm. He had read the minds of humans before, and now he had read the mind of a beast. So he unlocked his legacy because he had read the minds of two distinct species?
Was it that easy?
He summoned his runes to check.
Aspect: [Heir of Reasons]
Aspect Rank: Divine
Aspect Abilities: [Whispering Paradox]
Aspect Legacy: [Codex of Axioms]
'Ugh.. math..'
As soon as Aether concentrated on the Aspect Legacy, new runes shined to describe it.
Codex of Axioms Description: [In the beginning, there was the Question. What followed was the Answer.]
The description was rather strange. What was the question? And what was the answer to it?
However, what grabbed his attention was not the description itself, but what glimmered beneath it.
The Amount of Axioms understood: [0/7]
First Relic: Unearned.
Second Relic: Unearned.
Third Relic…
There were a total of seven lines of runes, each promising him a Legacy Relic once he achieved the corresponding understanding of each axiom. Which axiom was most likely something else, not the literal axiom.
Because he already knew some types of axioms in math, if it was about that, he would have acquired most of his relics.
So how was he going to unlock the first relic? By reading more minds of more species? For now it was two. Perhaps if he read more minds he could unlock the first relic?
Soon enough, Aether absorbed the soul shard of the worm and gained ten fragments out of it.
Staying near the carcass would not be smart as its smell would attract more beasts from afar. Additionally there wasn't much he could retrieve from the worm. Its skin.. well he forced himself to carve out some parts of the creature which he considered 'edible enough.'
There were still some hours till the sea would rise. However Aether decided that it was enough for today. He needed to make himself a makeshift backpack to carry the things he scavenged. And maybe he would run into a nightmare creature once again.
Not that he wanted to.
***
'I jinxed it!'
Aether was currently busy moving around the strikes of a hulking centurion like beast. The beasts scythes tore through the air as they slashed against him from everywhere.
Aether was using his memory to slide and dodge the attacks of the scavenger while trying to get hits of his own, which was not going well because he needed to get close to the beast to attack it due to the short size of his saber.
The centurion slashed against Aether with two of his scythes at once, Aether moved forward to the beast and avoided both the attacks completely, causing the scythes of the scavenger to clash against each other.
With the help of his innate ability Aether saw the links connecting to the weak spots in its limbs. Lashing his saber against the gap between its chitin armor he severed one of its arms, causing it to scream in agony.
Thanks to the mind link and the simplicity of its thinking capacity, Aether could anticipate its attacks and dodge them beforehand, and with the help of his charm he was fast enough to do it.
After a few exchanges the beast was left with only one of its scythes, which was lost after the centurion slashed it in anger and carelessness. Aether's saber cut through it like butter. Thanks to the [Icy Wound] enchantment the wounds of the scavenger was icy. Aether was sure it hurt.
Having no other choice to attack, the scavenger was furious. It was screaming, shrieking, until it decided to just use its own torso as a weapon against Aether. It slammed its body against him, however Aether moved out of the way just in time and the scavenger slammed its own torso against the mod, sending tremors through the mud.
When it tried to get up, it suddenly lost its ability to control its body.
[You have slain an awakened beast: Carapace Scavenger.]
After moving out of the way, Aether had turned to the scavenger and stabbed his saber into the neck of the creature, a weak point. The scavenger had almost died instantly.
[You have received a memory: Azure Spear.]
And just like that Aether received his first memory from a nightmare creature. A pity that the first ones had to come from humans.
Not that he even cared. He had acquired a new memory and now had read minds of three different species.
Yellow sparks shimmered in his hand as he summoned the new memory. The handle of the spear was made out of durable wood. Its blade had a sharp point and it was azure in color as the name suggested.
Memory: [Azure Spear]
Memory Rank: Awakened.
Memory Tier: I
Memory Type: Weapon.
Memory Description: [On this forgotten shore, only steel remembers.]
Memory Enchantments: [Loose handle.]
Enchantment Description: [This spear is more powerful when thrown.]
'Could be of use when hunting.'
With that he dismissed the spear and returned to the corpse of the Scavenger. Aether absorbed the soul shard and then gathered the meat of the beast and some of its bones. Now that his hands were full he fled back to his hill.
***
Back at the hill.
Aether was making himself a makeshift backpack and was in the process of finishing it. Thanks to the tailoring lessons he had gotten in his classes, he was able make a good backpack. It was mostly made out of moss and bones as supports.
He packed his meals into the backpack and rested it near him. The dark sea had risen and the moonless sky was present. Aether was glad he could still see despite the shortcomings of this realm.
When he was about to sleep, he caught something in the corner of his eye and sat up.
Out there in the distance, half a kilometer away, a small orange light was shimmering in the darkness. Its reflections were rising and falling with the movement of waves.
It was too far away to make out any details, but Aether could guess it was Changing Star. Pretty soon, the light disappeared.
'So.. no fire in the night.'
That was the only logical reason why she had stopped the fire. And there were plenty of monsters in the sea, it was dumb to light something up as many nightmare creatures would be attracted to it.
Aether.. was having conflicted emotions about this finding. He actually wished he had not seen the light. People could not survive alone in the dream realm, but Aether did not want to travel with Changing Star. There was something off about her, and he did not really like her.
If they encountered each other, it is what it is. However Aether wanted to make sure they didn't. So he would start moving west starting tomorrow.