Three days of desperate, lean travel had taken Arin through scrubland and over treacherous, boulder-strewn slopes. The Divinity Mark on his collarbone was quiet, a constant, dull throb, a silent hunger but the physical depletion from the first touch still anchored him to a slow, grinding pace.
He skirted the edge of the Bloodthorn Wastes, a region known for its vicious, mana-hungry beasts, when the jingle of brass hitches finally confirmed his fear. Three figures, clad in the plain, practical leather of professional hunters, emerged from a copse of dead trees. They carried heavy crossbows, and their leader, a squat man with a scarred cheek, was undoubtedly one of Kaelor Vynn's zealots, likely the same guard Arin had struck down.
The scar was still raw. The man's hatred was palpable even from fifty paces.
"The cursed whelp stops running!" the leader spat, drawing a short, serrated knife. "Vynn promised us gold and sanctity for returning the Vessel."
Arin had no time for confrontation. He was one strike of Lunari energy away from complete spiritual collapse. He had to rely on his mortal wit. He glanced at the crossbows, then at the Wastes behind him.
"You won't earn sanctity by hunting a boy," Arin called out, his voice thin but steady. "But you'll earn death if you trespass into the Wastes unprepared."
The leader sneered, ignoring the warning. He advanced with the two others fanning out behind him.
Arin didn't retreat. He grabbed a handful of dirt, mixed it with the brittle, thorny seed pods of the Bloodthorn trees, and threw the foul mixture high into the air as the first crossbow bolt whizzed past his ear.
The hunters shielded their eyes from the grit and pods. It was a crude, mortal trick, but it bought him the critical two seconds he needed. He dashed not toward the hunters, but sharply sideways, toward a massive pile of recently felled, dried-out Bloodthorn lumber left by local loggers.
As the hunters recovered, Arin kicked the base of the lumber pile. The logs were top-heavy and unstable. The entire stack groaned and pitched forward with a splintering roar, pinning the legs of the two trailing hunters.
The scarred leader, narrowly avoiding the collapse, paused, rage contorting his face. He lunged, knife flashing.
Arin was already running in the other direction. He didn't fight, he fled, choosing a route that led straight into the dangerous, jagged fringe of the Wastes. The hunter, burdened by a heavy leather breastplate and driven by blind vengeance, followed, unable to catch the nimble Arin.
Arin led him on a short, brutal chase, forcing the man to jump across a ravine edge. The moment the hunter's weight shifted mid-jump, Arin, hidden behind a rock, hurled a softball-sized piece of petrified wood. It was an average throw, but it struck the man's knee with a sickening thud. The hunter screamed, losing momentum and tumoring into the ravine.
The hunters were eliminated, not by divine power, but by mortal cunning. Arin waited until the sounds of struggling and curses faded. He hadn't killed them, but they wouldn't be following for days. He was safe for now, though the memory of that close encounter confirmed the urgency of his mission.
By dusk of the fourth day, the foothills of the Duskwind Mountains loomed before him. The Duskwind Sect was not hidden; it was boasted. Towers of polished grey stone rose out of the forest canopy, interconnected by sky bridges, all radiating a faint, controlled aura of spiritual energy. The air here was cleaner, richer with Qi, the life force that cultivators drew upon.
Arin approached the main gate. It wasn't a humble entryway; it was a wall of smooth obsidian, guarded by two junior disciples who looked barely older than he was, yet carried themselves with the puffed-up self-importance of emperors. Their robes were immaculate white silk, embroidered with the sect's stylised hawk sigil.
One of them, a slim youth with a disdainful mouth, didn't even look at Arin, whose clothes were now ragged and smeared with dirt and old blood.
"Off the paving stones, commoner. This path is for disciples," the youth said, flicking a speck of dust off his cuff with fastidious disgust.
"I am here seeking application as an Outer Court Candidate," Arin said, keeping his voice level. He presented his desperation with brutal honesty, omitting only the part about the execution. "I am a survivor from Ashveil Village. My parents perished. I have nowhere else to go."
The youth finally looked at him, his gaze running the gauntlet from Arin's muddy feet to the crescent-shaped mark visible on his collarbone. The youth's lip curled.
"A cursed child, trying to attach himself to the glory of Duskwind? Truly pathetic. That birthmark is the sigil of ill-fortune. Get lost."
The second disciple, slightly older and heavier, stepped forward. He didn't look kind, but he looked curious. "Wait, Jia. If he's from Ashveil, he's Flesh-Touched at most. Let the Masters reject him; that way we don't have to clean up the paperwork." He looked at Arin with an assessing glare. "What is your Qi Aperture rating, orphan?"
Arin knew that admitting his true, though meagre, Flesh-Touched level would be enough for them to dismiss him immediately. He needed to be just strong enough to be useful, but weak enough not to be seen as a threat, nor a genius.
"I have only survived on instinct," Arin murmured, maintaining a posture of exhaustion. He needed an entry point. The goddess had called this place a 'Shallow Well' it meant they prized surface-level power and were arrogant enough to overlook latent potential.
"Test him, then," Jia snapped. "A quick vitality check. If he can survive one breath of focused Qi, he lives to be a servant. If he falters, send him to the fields."
The heavier disciple placed a hand on Arin's shoulder, attempting to channel a basic thread of low-level Qi a simple assessment technique. The shock was minor, a cold penetration designed to find the centre of Arin's spiritual sea.
Arin focused entirely on the Divinity Mark. The Mark was a sponge, a cosmic black hole that constantly demanded essence. He allowed the internal, nagging hunger of Seliora's presence to actively drain the Qi that the disciple was trying to inject.
The pain, a familiar, exquisite agony, allowed him to clench his jaw and appear weak. He wasn't resisting the Qi with his own cultivation; he was simply letting the curse consume it. This made his Qi Aperture appear constricted, damaged, and pathetically low.
"Well?" Jia asked impatiently.
The heavy disciple frowned, withdrawing his hand. "Barely a flicker. His foundation is… weak, almost shattered. Maybe the curse is real. He's lower than a basic apprentice."
Perfect, Arin thought, forcing a look of weary defeat.
"He's useless. Reject him!" Jia demanded.
"No, wait. Master Tian just asked for twenty new labourers for the herb gardens," the heavy disciple mused. "He's weak, but he survived the test. He can be assigned to the Outer Court Labourers, far away from the true disciples. He'll never be an inner disciple, but we fill the quota."
He threw a cheap, coarse grey robe at Arin's feet. "You are accepted, orphan. Your name is logged. Go to the Western Labour Barracks. Your duties begin at dawn. Do not mention that cursed mark again, or it won't be Vynn who removes your head."
Arin picked up the coarse fabric, his heart pounding a slow, deliberate rhythm of triumph. He had crossed the threshold. He had the cover he needed. He had traded his immediate freedom for the chance at exponential growth.
As he walked past the obsidian gates, disciples in pristine silks cast disgusted glances at his tattered appearance and the visible mark. They laughed a sound as brittle and cold as Kaelor Vynn's shattered sword. He was an outcast, a lowest-rung labourer, a mocked figure of pity.
Arin allowed the mockery to wash over him. They had no idea that they had just invited a fragmented goddess's Divine Vessel into their shallow, arrogant well. The climb starts here.