Kenji rode for two days, traveling into the dying heart of the kingdom. The landscape transformed from lush green to a sickly, decaying brown. The very earth seemed to have given up, turning to grey dust that puffed up under his horse's hooves. The trees were skeletal claws reaching for a sun they could no longer feel, and the rivers had slowed to a black, viscous sludge. The air was heavy with the silence of a world holding its last breath.
He found her at the epicenter of the blight, in a place that had once been a verdant valley. Now, it was a crater of ash and withered roots. In the center, on a throne of twisted, dead wood, sat Morwen, the Withered Hand.
She was tragically, ethereally beautiful. Her skin was as pale as bleached bone, and her long, black hair seemed to drink the very light from the air. Her eyes were deep, sorrowful pools of shadow, and her form, though slender and seemingly fragile, radiated an aura of ancient, soul-crushing despair. Life didn't just die around her; it gave up, its essence siphoned away to feed the eternal emptiness she embodied.
She watched him approach, her expression a mixture of mild curiosity and profound weariness. She expected him to draw a sword, or perhaps fall to his knees and beg. He did neither.
He stopped a few feet from her throne, in the deepest part of her soul-withering aura, and knelt. But it was not in supplication. He placed his palm flat against the dead, cracked earth. He closed his eyes, focusing his will, drawing on a new, innate power the System had granted him for this very war.
[Skill Activated: [Seed of Life] Lv. 1]
[Description: Infuse a tiny spark of your own life force into a receptive object. Can revitalize barren soil or mend a dying plant.]
A faint, golden light emanated from his hand. The ashen dust around his fingers began to stir. A single, tiny green sprout pushed its way through the dead crust. In a matter of seconds, it grew, its stem unfurling, its leaves spreading, until a single, perfect, snow-white lily bloomed in the heart of the desolation.
Morwen's weary expression shattered, replaced by one of absolute, stunned disbelief. She rose from her throne, taking a hesitant step forward. She had existed for millennia, and in all that time, only one thing had ever happened in her presence: decay. She had never, ever, witnessed creation.
As she stared, transfixed by the impossible flower, Kenji activated [Keen Insight]. The torrent of information that flooded his mind was not of a demon, but of a tragedy.
[Target: Morwen, the Withered Hand (Fallen Goddess)]
[True Identity: Moryana, Ancient Goddess of the Harvest and Rebirth.]
[Curse: Betrayed by a jealous god, she was cursed to become the antithesis of her own being—an avatar of Famine, eternally hungry, her very presence a blight upon the world. She is a healer forced to be a plague.]
[Deepest Void: An agonizing, soul-deep starvation not for food, but for the feeling of creation. She desperately craves to feel life bloom under her touch once more, instead of watching it wither and die.]
Kenji stood, his eyes filled with a profound understanding and sympathy that disarmed her completely. "You must be so tired," he said, his voice soft. "And so very hungry."
Tears, black as tar, welled in Morwen's eyes. He saw her. He didn't see the monster, the Commandment of Famine. He saw the caged goddess starving within.
He walked towards her, right through her lethal aura, his own life force a defiant shield. He reached her and gently, reverently, touched her cheek. His skin did not blacken. His life did not drain away. For the first time in ages, she was touched by warmth that did not die.
"How?" she whispered, her voice a dry rasp.
"You are a goddess of the harvest, Moryana," he murmured, his thumb stroking her pale skin. "And a harvest requires a seed. Let me be your seed. Let me give you a feast that will finally sate your hunger."
He didn't wait for an answer. He pulled her into a deep, consuming kiss. She tasted of dust and despair, and he poured all of his vitality, his warmth, his life into her. She clung to him, a starving woman offered a banquet, her body trembling with a power it had forgotten it could feel.
He laid her down on the dead earth, on the very spot where all life had ended. Their lovemaking was not an act of lust, but of pure, desperate transubstantiation. He was life, and she was death, and their union was a cataclysm of creation. With every powerful thrust, he poured his essence into her, a ritual of fertilization. And the world responded.
The ashen ground beneath them stirred. Tiny sprouts of green grass pushed their way through the dust where their bodies touched. The withered roots of her throne began to bud with new, vibrant leaves. He was not just filling her with his seed; he was filling her world, her very being, with life itself. Her climax was a silent scream of pure, unadulterated ecstasy, and as it tore through her, a wave of life-force erupted from their joined bodies. The valley floor, in a perfect circle around them, exploded into a lush, green meadow, a vibrant oasis in the heart of the blight.
As Morwen lay sobbing in his arms, not with sorrow, but with the joy of a goddess reborn, a triumphant, golden notification lit up Kenji's mind.
[A FALLEN GODDESS HAS BEEN RECLAIMED!]
[You have filled the target's deepest void, returning to her the very essence she was cursed to lose.]
[Morwen, the Withered Hand has been added to the [Harem].]
[REWARDS ISSUED:]
> [Title Granted: [The Harvest's Master]]
> [New Harem Synergy Unlocked: [Oasis of Life] - The presence of Kenji and Morwen together negates blights, purifies poisoned land, and promotes unnatural growth and abundance.]
Morwen clung to him, her body glowing with a faint, golden light. "You... you have given me back my soul," she whispered.
"I have only reminded you of who you truly are," he replied, stroking her hair.
Just then, a wave of telepathic rage, so powerful it almost buckled his knees, washed over them from the north. It was a woman's voice, screaming with pure, undiluted fury.
"MORWEN! YOU DARE BETRAY YOUR QUEEN?! I WILL HAVE YOUR HEAD FOR THIS!"
Kenji looked north, towards the sound of the furious voice. Prince Theron's army was there. And so was Kaelen, the Blade of Ruin. It seemed his next hunt had just announced herself.