Such a treasure trove in my hands. How many wererats would I need to kill to match this?

  How many beings were killed to make these shards? I know, as Darefei said, some aren’t from a cycle of killing but from natural growth through the absorption of essence.

  Could I be like them?

  “Darefei, could I get essence through the ambient?”

  The old geezer grinned. “That train has departed since you took the first shard! Your existence is dictated by it. I’ve heard of the opposite—beasts that gained consciousness and started consuming shards. Most of what I’ve heard wasn’t good and involved exploding into gruesome abominations. And, young boy, I’ve already seen my share of abominations. What I’ve seen from the pictures and stories is worse!”

  He scratched his white head. “Most domains get essence naturally. The process of improving oneself only with shards is wasteful—too much essence is lost to the ambient when creating a shard. Now, go on. After we finish this succession, I’ll waste all day teaching your ruler ass—maybe even give you one of my blends of beer!”

  “I’m holding you to that,” I say, already planning to gather enough info to train my own chatbot version of Darefei—with improvements, like less yelling and more trimming.

  Alright, full focus on this.

  Let’s start with bio. The sparks were consumed in a blink, enough for the 7th star. Sadly, not a spellstar.

  A smidgen of essence went to the next star. Using the core, it felt fuller.

  Not even one core shard is enough now for a new star now. If this keeps going, the number will become exorbitant.

  Another normal star for the 8th. Time for the nexus shard.

  Soon, a river of essence flowed from the shard, unbridled.

  And yes—another fucking spellstar! Oh, my fucking yes!

  The projection started, different from last time. It didn’t take a solid form, shifting like a mix of nebulous haze and oil paint in water.

  The image it formed changed, mimicking the projection of its own constellation. Slowly, I saw a sort of bloodskin forming on my hand, waiting for something more from me—like a decision, a path to take.

  With all the options—bestial claws, plants ranging from sharp to deadly—what I really wanted was mobility.

  Something like an underlayer, mobile enough to use guns and a way to send my blood for spells.

  Soon, a claw resembling a beast’s—strangely similar to a human hand—appeared. Leathery, with skin a lighter tone than the bloodskin but still red as blood.

  The concept merged with my bloodskin, expanding it. The skin took on a metallic glint, now covering my entire forearm instead of just my hands.

  The new spellstar emitted a bright line, connecting to the normal star weakly as it passed from one to the other, eventually forming a thick connection with the previous spellstar.

  The process finished, the constellation forming a weird rune-like figure. No use trying to understand it for now.

  The essence is calling.

  I decided to name this spell **Bloodclaw**. The remaining essence pumped up one more normal star.

  Strangely, as the connection to the 11th star began forming, it didn’t fail short of reaching a full bond as I expected. Something was wrong.

  I already wanted to test the spell before increasing my energy anyway with the magic shards. Time to see what this divergence was all about.

  “Hey, Darefei—”

  “Just shut up and finish those shards!” the old geezer interrupted me again.

  “My doubt is because of that. My 11th star isn’t needing double the essence. It feels the same as the 10th—like 1,000 shards’ worth.”

  “What?! 1,000 essence for your 10th node? How many spelltrees did you choose?”

  “Four.”

  “That’s above average, but it doesn’t justify this much essence! How many realms do you have? Clusters, as you call them,” the old geezer waved dismissively.

  “Also four.”

  The shortie frowned, and it was almost like I could see him turning red. “We’re doomed! Who do you think you are?! Some pampered ruler’s kid?? How are we going to get enough shards now? And don’t you dare waste my time with questions!”

  He took a few seconds to continue, almost as if fighting his anger. “The number of spelltrees you choose increases the essence needed! And that increases even more if you take each spelltree from a different realm as your starting point!”

  “Fuck, I even said I have the divine spell from the divine cluster! How didn’t you know that? A constellation with four clusters?!”

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  “For my bearded mother, I thought you were kidding! Who names a spell divine spell?? It’s like naming a dog ‘Dog’!”

  This guy! “You gave me all these shards from different clusters!”

  Darefei stomped the ground. “Because those were the ones I freaking had! You can use these damned shards in a different cluster, but there’ll be a loss!”

  Houonas interrupted, “Such wrath will bring us no closer to our destiny.”

  The old geezer pointed at the being four times his size. “You’re damn right. And so you won’t ask—after the 10th node, all nodes will require the same amount of essence as the 10th, in your case it's a thousand. The normal quantity is an average of 500 for only two different realms, even if it’s the realm of being!”

  “Alright, alright! Let me just test the new spell.” Before the old geezer could say anything, I started casting my divine spell and then bloodclaw.

  The concept was more complicated than bloodskin, but that didn’t give me pause. What was strangest of all was its effect.

  It didn’t create another layer over my skin—it changed mine. My hand increased in size by a few centimeters, my skin turning red with a weak metallic sheen. Even my nails turned a little red.

  “...Looks like just a transformed claw from any common Erythocetes,” the old geezer mumbled.

  Like I cared for his opinion.

  What I did care about were the shards I got from him.

  I felt the glassy surface of the magic core shards vanish from my hand as the essence poured into me. Normal stars formed in the 7th and 8th positions—nothing new aside from the increase in energy from them, but still nice.

  Nevertheless, as soon as I consumed the nexus shard and completed the connection to the 9th star, the same amazing thing happened.

  A new projection appeared, similar to the one in the biology cluster, but now it showed me its flaw—or maybe it wasn’t a flaw. It kept changing forms, demonstrating repeating patterns like some sort of puzzle.

  In it, I saw the spell—only two modifications, but they changed the spell tremendously.

  Finally, after focusing on it, the projection revealed itself, showing in slow motion how a couple of drops of blood transformed into a compressed flame, launching forward like a bullet but slower—like a cannonball from pirate movies.

  At the trail’s end, I felt something more—a smidgen of blood as the compressed flame vanished.

  I already had part of my mind set on naming it Blood Ray, but I’d wait to see how it really worked before.

  Sadly, I couldn’t use the essence of the nexus to upgrade my star and replenish my energy later. Maybe the energy cost wouldn’t be too high.

  Soon, the essence is consumed, forming a partial bond to the 10th star. Still not enough.

  Now, let’s finish with the tech shards. Not enough for the 9th star or to get a spell, but enough for the 6th star to see if something changes like with the others.

  Consuming the core essence, the bond formed in the 6th star. The phenomenon from the other clusters happened again—the star connected by a single light, creating a random rune-like figure.

  Soon, I felt an increased sense of awareness all over my body—my blood flow, my heartbeat, its intensity, its heat.

  The sensation diminished, but I found I could slow my heartbeat, albeit only a little at a time. The same could be done to increase it.

  The remaining essence made a frail connection to the 7th star.

  Now, for the strangest cluster—how could divinity change someone’s power? With a nexus shard and activating the 6th star, maybe I could find out.

  As the yellow shine, second only to the sun, fragmented and poured its essence into me, I bonded with one star after another.

  No change as each star bonded with me. I was starting to feel a pattern.

  The 6th star connected, and a weird sensation shocked my body as a new rune appeared. I felt something more—something beyond my physical body.

  Really strange. How would that help me?

  Let’s wrap it up for later. Time to see if there’s a new spell on the menu.

  The essence flowed like a river, connecting each new star to me. My target was the 9th star.

  As expected, a new spellstar. The projection tried to blend into a mist like the others, but soon it broke, revealing itself completely.

  Weird. Maybe I should ask Darefei why the 9th stars are spellstars. The problem is, my patience is at its limit with the fucking geezer.

  The projection showed a single drop of blood floating up from a hand, each new drop joining until they formed a small ball, the loop repeating.

  Easy to understand—some kind of blood telekinesis. I saw some promise in it, flaming promises.

  The remaining essence of the nexus shard was enough to create a partial bond to my 10th star.

  Well, that’s it. I have to say, though, this didn’t give me the same feeling of accomplishment as before. I know I’m doing this to survive, but killing beings—even as dumb as wererats—doesn’t feel sane, treating them like pi?atas or video-game chests.

  What a fucking time to grow a moral compass, though. It would be so easy to frame this as good versus evil.

  Maybe it has something to do with dopamine—triggering some brain reward system for surviving and gaining something from it. But just getting this power from Darefei feels hollow.

  No use reflecting on it right now. I’m in a death match for a succession I wasn’t even part of to begin with.

  I’ll have all the time in the world later to beat myself up after all this shit is done.