Chương 6: -6- Frost and Shadow

Calder-Sanctuary The massive, armored figure crunched across the sand again as Calder watched in anticipation. The first two skills had been utterly fantastic options; he couldn't wait to see what the next one was. Especially because even if he didn't pick it, it gave him realistic ideas for what he could potentially craft his skills into being able to do. The skill you selected was just the base, the foundation you build from.

Over the span of tens of levels and vast swaths of essence, you could slowly mold skills into things more fitting to your needs. Warriors who had changed a simple charging skill into an ability that let them dash upon the very air itself. Or of mages who have turned a basic magic missile into an unevadable dragon of force that pursues foes to the ends of the earth. They were the kind of skill-crafting stories Calder remembered hearing from his dad when he had asked about classes and levels.

The armored figure suddenly stopped, his gaze cast upon the spectral form of an owl as it swooped down to alight upon his shoulder. It picked its way across his shoulders before taking flight once more, this time sailing slowly along the coastline. The man's eyes glowed with an unearthly hue as he saw through the eyes of the owl. Scouting the beach from above with a creature that would be invisible to all but the rare few like himself who could see the creatures beyond the mortal plane.

That would be an invaluable skill, invisibly scouting enemy camps to make the perfect attack plan. Hell, if you can hear through it as well, I can't think of a much better skill for the perfect spy. Although… stealth certainly isn't my strength... hells, if I ever manage to sneak up on someone who isn't utterly preoccupied, I'll be pretty damned impressed with myself.

The beach reset to the very first scene once again and played through the intimidating armored figure crushing the ambush with the aid of the spectral knight again. Then continued on through the rest while Calder stood, chin in hand, debating his choices. Hmmm… For now I am going to choose the first; it isn't even much of a debate for me. I'm sure one of my weaknesses in a fight will be my lack of agility compared to some of the truly weasely bastards, especially ones that have skills that enhance their speed.

Having someone to literally watch my back and intercept blows is invaluable. As fantastic as teleporting would be… Someday on that one… gods, it would be amusing to see someone's face if I just dropped from the sky to land in front of them. And the scouting option is great… but not yet. Calder mentally affirmed he wished for the first skill, and the vision of the beach froze. [Skill granted] [Make Material] You may utilize your grasp of the beyond to make immaterial entities such as specters and ghosts material.

Oh well, damn, that is almost better than I imagined, but... yeah, nothing about summoning them or controlling. I would need a willing spirit. Hah, that's almost comforting, actually. I didn't accidentally take some death-dealing spirit-binding class. Well, probably, I still have another skill to pick, I think… The beach faded back into his view; this time a sprawling graveyard pierced through the heart of the pines with a stalwart blackened mausoleum that came all the way to the edge of the sand.

The armored figure respectfully stepped up the pair of steps into the mausoleum and faced a swirling specter. The specter's face was twisted in rage and pain. They kept violently gesturing towards rising smoke in the distance. The man nodded and held his palm out to the specter. The specter shrieked in soundless victory before its form crystallized into a blade that oozed vengeful purpose. Even watching, Calder understood what had happened.

A restless soul had bound itself with the figure's aid into a weapon to seek revenge and free itself that way. The figure nodded to the cruel weapon and started walking towards the smoke in the distance. Wow... that's almost certainly very powerful, but I don't know how I would feel about wielding a fucking soul that's so full of anger I'm able to turn it into a blade. That seems like it could be a slippery slope that leads towards horrors like the Kalderans' craft for their war. Let's see what the next is…

I'm going to give this skill the benefit of the doubt and assume the soul is helped pass on after its dark task is complete. The beach reset, and the hulking figure approached a panicked-looking pair of ghosts who were running around in confusion on the beach. He held out a placating hand, and their panic slowed as they realized he could see them. The husband and wife dashed to him, gesturing to themselves and then the nearby graves.

The armored man knelt and nodded in understanding, reaching out to place a comforting gauntlet on the man's shoulder. He exchanged some soundless words, and the couple nodded enthusiastically. With a gentle wave of his hand, there forms slowly dissipated into a glimmering starlike display before blowing away into a dark slit in reality.

Just as their souls disappeared, guided to a peaceful rest and the rift began closing, the hulking figure reached out, and a mote of the darkness wafted from the rift and into his palm. It roiled there for a moment before slowly seeping into him. He rolled his shoulders lightly and gave a satisfied nod as the rift finished closing. That… was beautiful; he just helped them on their way like that, as simple as waving his hand and opening the way for them...

I do wonder what he took when they passed; it probably has something to do with the power of the beyond. The scene reset again; this time around, the armored man was standing on the beach in near pitch-black darkness. Something awful and nearly intangible swirled around him like a serpent of ever-changing horrors. It sprouted and withdrew arms and eyes at random as the armored man fended it off with blasts of dark energy.

It spiraled upwards before gathering itself like a spring and crashing downward in a torrent of limbs. The armored man's arms spread wide, and the beast stopped mid-air, its form jittering as tendrils sprouted from the air around it, piercing its flesh and holding it in place. Moments later something unfathomable, something that shouldn't exist, emerged from the darkness behind the serpent. Eyes of yellow blinked open, one by one, hundreds, then thousands.

Calder blinked his own eyes hard; his vision was starting to swim as he tried to comprehend the thing before him. All he was able to catch before the vision reset was the… thing the man summoned dragging the serpent of darkness away. And the man staggering to his knees, the very air around him freezing into symbols that hurt to behold. Gods… no… that was… what was that… absolutely not that one, dear gods above, preserve me. I hope I don't see that every time I try and sleep for the rest of my life…

Calder quickly focused back on his two viable choices and immediately selected the second one, where he could help spirits along and snatch something from beyond at the same time. He breathed a sigh of relief as the beach faded away. He was terrified the system was going to show him… that thing... again... if he took too long and the scene replayed. [Skill granted] [Shepherd Of Souls] The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

Gain the power to tear the veil and send souls along their path to the godly domain they belong within. Your grasp of the beyond may be quickly restored while the veil is open. Be cautious; nothing is ever taken without notice. With his second selection done, the beach faded away, the cool spray of the water lingering for a heartbeat longer before he was suddenly back in the frosted mausoleum. Before him was his core statue, but now it had changed drastically.

His breath frosted the air before him as he gasped in shock at what the very universe now saw him as. The maiden had moved farther from the statue, no longer greeting him but watching him from the distance with a fond smile as if waiting to be freed. Dectus loomed behind him, his tattered equipment, almost tangible, silver and black cloth, seeping into reality, along with the cold shimmer of the steel in his hands. Then there was Calder, standing forward more towards the center of the mausoleum.

Now the image of him frozen in time was set upon a grainy gray coastal boulder worn smooth by time lightly misted by an unseen wave. One of his feet pushed down, pinning an armored man to the rock with such force that the metal buckled slightly. His right hand grasped his father's longsword dripping in blood that was beginning to freeze from an unnatural frost that crept up the metal from the hilt.

Calder's free hand dripped in a malevolent darkness that looked like motes of shadow twisting around his fist where the shadows touched sea spray in the statue flash froze mid-air. His, Clothes had a new addition it showed him clad in his father's tomb guard shawl, a simple mantle of dark cloth laid over his plain grey clothes. What will I become… Calder pulled himself from his musings; that creeping cold from the real world was getting worse. He needed to spend his essence, and he needed to do it now.

He walked up to the statue and hesitated, a hand hovering just above it. Alright, how the hell do I do this… Everyone does it a bit differently; some weave power into the statue with intent, others use a chisel of pure essence. I have… a fucking blizzard… I guess brute force and winging it are the plan. Calder looked around himself, feeling a bit silly, and waved one of his meaty arms in the air; nothing happened.

"Hmmm..." He shifted a bit, sending spiderwebbing cracks across the ice on the floor.

"Do I just will it?" Calder held up a hand dramatically, outstretched fingers pointed towards the ice on the floor. He expected nothing to happen as he imagined the swirling storm outside being summoned to him. Instead every highset window in the mausoleum exploded inwards as whipping winds and a flurry of snow poured into the room with him. Calder's eyes went wide, and a small smile tugged at his lips as the blizzard ripped into the room and swirled around him like he was the eye of the storm.

He closed his eyes and set a hand upon his statue; he could feel the cold around him forming into a shifting mass of ice that crept down his arm into the statue. He focused on the biting cold, the feeling of unbridled potential it carried, and pushed it into his core statue. Once he felt it rush from him, he tried to lock intent into it. Give it a purpose, and what he needed now was survival. Toughened muscles and bones, organs that would survive the wounds he had sustained.

Winds buffeted him, and he struggled to keep himself moored in place as the Essence poured past him, through him, and around him into the statue, making him more than he was before. The storm slowly ebbed around him, the winds died, and the ice began to melt away as the essence in his sanctuary lessened. He grunted and pulled his hand from the statue to end the connection. Did that work? Well, I certainly don't feel that same impending sense of doom, at least coming from my real body.

There was still some essence swirling in his sanctuary, a light slushy snowstorm instead of the blizzard it was before. Calder would certainly want to spend some on his skills as well but not until he understood them more. He put a hand back on the statue, and the storm around him whipped back up as it poured into the statue again. This time Calder had a big smile while it happened. You know I'm going to be able to lift a fucking cart pretty quick with how strong I already am.

The last dregs of his essence bound into his strength, his explosive power making the massive warrior even stronger. Calder let out a deep breath he didn't even notice he was holding; the snow was totally gone as was the ice; instead, it felt like a crisp spring morning. Alright, I want to go look at my new skill statues, but first… With a slight tremble of excitement, Calder willed his full status screen into existence.

[Calder Loamish Tier-1](lvl5) [Remnant Soul Knight](Unique) [Talents] [Tranquility Shaping] Wield the energies of the domain beyond life, beyond the warmth of the gods, and learn to shape them to your will. [Friend Of The Lost] Allows you to see beyond the material and view souls that have failed to pass on. As well as see creatures that dwell in both the materium and immaterium preying upon lost souls.

[Skills] [Make Material] You may utilize your grasp of the beyond to make immaterial entities such as specters and ghosts material. [Drain upon Grasp of the Beyond: Minor] [Shepherd Of Souls] Gain the power to tear the veil and send souls along their path to the godly domain they belong within. Your grasp of the beyond may be quickly restored while the veil is open. Be cautious; nothing is ever taken without notice. Grasp Of The Beyond: 2/100 Gaze Of Those Beyond: 0/100 Enhanced Attributes Physical Resistance: 2.

0 Strength: 1. 2 Calder let out a long slow breath and smiled; he was now twice as tough as he was before he accepted his class and had gained an entire twenty percent to his strength. And since enhanced attributes just multiplied what you already had… he was already a big, strong, tough bugger to begin with. He was willing to bet he would be a right bastard to kill now unless his opponent had a bunch of levels as well.

A scrambled brain would still kill you no matter who you were, but Calder had a thick noggin to begin with; he couldn't imagine how dense the bone was now with doubled toughness. He couldn't wait to go pick up some gravestones either. He could probably finally move the raw stone blanks his grandfather carved on without the damned trolley; that thing had a sort of fixed wheel that drove him mad. Calder turned and exited his mausoleum, stopping short as he looked around.

There were three big changes, and one of them was a terrifying doozy. Two new statues were in his sanctuary, both set right outside the mausoleum doors on either side. One depicted him hand in hand with an elderly spirit gesturing towards an indistinct golden glow that must have been an afterlife. The other showed him sword in hand, blocking a heavy axeblow from a Kalderan soldier. Dectus emerged from his frame, blade in hand, poised to stab into the Kalderan's unprotected throat.

Dectus had an almost terrifyingly gleeful expression drawn across his faded features. Yeah, it would definitely fit if he's thrilled he gets to stab people again. Calder's gaze rose up the staircase to the second change. The stone archway at the top now had a larger platform. He walked up the stairs to inspect the new objects set on top of it.

One was a shimmering glass orb set on top of a small metal stand that swirled with just a touch of sheer darkness inside it; when he focused on it harder, a system message popped up. [Grasp Of The Beyond 2/100] The other object set behind it was confusing; it was a horrible nonsensical obelisk of stone containing both sharp angles and organic curves. Eyes and limbs jutted from it in distinct carvings. A single mouth stretched around the width of it open just enough to expose rows of teeth.

Okay, what the hell is that? [Gaze Of Those Beyond 0/100] Alright. I definitely don't want to find out what happens when that meter fills up; I'm getting the distinct impression that the system warned me multiple times for damn good reason. Calder's gaze drew up and outwards to the largest change to his sanctuary. The opaque borders were gone, and he could see everything beyond. Distant shapes the size of planets languidly swam through a vast expanse of nothingness.

Twinkling lights like golden stars dotted the expanse, occasionally winking out as unfathomable beings swam past them. It was like Calder's sanctuary was now floating in the vast expanse of the cosmos, bared to all the powers of the gods and dark things beyond them. And if his guess was right, those glimmers of light were the god's domains and everything else… Everything else was a sea of darkness and hunger. On that note...

I'm going to go ahead and get the hell out of here and see if I can peel myself off the tomb floor. Calder closed his eyes and focused; his view lurched, and his stomach spun as he was suddenly assaulted by the agony his real body was experiencing.

"Fuuuuuccckkkkk…" He groaned out, slumping sideways and putting a hand on the ground. Everything hurt like he had been trampled by a stampede of horses, but he could move.

"If I can move…" Calder coughed and regretted his attempt at bravado, pain stabbing across his chest. He got both hands under himself and pushed his way to his knees, then clambered to his feet using the wall for support. When he unsteadily turned around, the room was still a frosty blood-soaked mess just like he left it. And Dectus was standing vigil next to him, blade in hand. The spirit gave him a respectful nod and something that might have been close to a look of relief.

"Yup, not dead yet. Man, the stairs are going to suck." Calder grumbled towards Dectus as he began limping from the room back towards his home. To his surprise, Dectus followed him all the way to the stairs. He only left once he had seen Calder stumble through the whipping winds to his front door. Calder paused at his door and looked down at his utterly ruined clothes and the sticky gore covering most of him from damn near bisecting the Kalderan mage.

"Oh damn, I'm going to give that old fart a stroke if I keep this up."