Graveyard of gods. From what Damon knew, it was a death zone in the demon continent with countless ancient bones, some more alive than dead, and those who were dead corrupting the world and all those around it with their lingering power.
If the evil forest was a dangerous death zone, then the graveyard of gods was the mother of death zones. It was said that even those in the seventh class advancement stood the risk of being killed there.
As a death zone, not even Lysithara came close to it.
Damon narrowed his eyes. Seras smiled, chuckling softly.
"Ahh so you donât know everything. Thatâs good. Here I thought you had all the answers."
He could tell she was teasing him, especially since the incident with the lich Amadeus.
"Hmph." He sneered, crossing his arms.
"I know only the things that I know. Life is a journey. We must strive to keep learning, for only when we acknowledge we are ignorant can we truly search for knowledge. The greatest act of ignorance is denying oneâs ignorance."
Seras didnât even know what to say. She raised an eyebrow.
"Did you just quote the Book of Athor?"
Damon blinked, closing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose.
"What are you talking about?" he responded coolly.
"Hope you didnât forget I was a student of Aether Academy too. Itâs the quote in the Book of Athor. Ahh, you are absolutely shameless... If I didnât know, Iâd think you were dropping profound wisdom.."
Damon scoffed at her words.
"Did the words impact you or not? So what if they arenât original."
Seras sighed, rolling her eyes.
"Fine. You win.."
She sat down on the white bone ground and leaned against a giant bone fragment. It must have been part of the spine of whatever creature this was.
"The temple collected some records when they first formed and as you know they survived a lot of things to make it here as a world class power. Nevertheless, our focus isnât on their history."
Seras crossed her legs, sitting in a lotus position.
"You already know of the wicked prophet, right? Legends have it he fought some unknown and terrifying enemies in an ancient war. When the war ended, what was left was a battlefield of ancient corpses whose fierce will refused to fade even in death." She paused, then whispered, "That was how the god grave came to be."
Damon glanced at the large skull they were in and the vast and deep shadows inside it. He thought for a moment and wondered if his shadow could devour this corpse. He instinctively glanced at his shadow and it slowly began to shake its head.
These things were dead, but something about them was still alive, something hungry to continue. If he devoured them he would succeed, no doubt, but he would also carry along the weight of something he shouldnât, and perhaps he would be the one who was lost.
When he got to that point, he suddenly thought of something.
The Lost. They were a race of entities in the demon continent who could steal shadows.
Were they born in the graveyard of gods?
Damon quickly opened his system panel and checked the skill category.
[Skill: Shadow Control]
[Description:]
"The lost abound, hunger in their souls as they steal shadows, replacing their stolen forms with the essence of those they take. Those whose shadows vanish become like themâlost, wandering, forever chasing what was stolen. In their absence, the shadows once lost now bend to your will, shaped by desire, lingering and intangible, as though they were never meant to be seen."
[Effect:]
The user can control intangible shadowsâthose not bound to physical formâmanipulating them with will and essence. Masterless shadows now bend to your command, a force under your control.
[Type:]
Active.
[Cooldown:]
10 seconds.
Seras didnât know what he was looking at. She merely continued.
"The ancient battle crossed the sea all the way from the demon continent, passing by the sea and permanently changing it. Finally, it stopped here on the shores of the war continent. This is how the Bone Hallows were formed."
Damon nodded. He couldnât imagine it. A battlefield stretching all the way from the demon continent, crossing the sea and even reaching here in Soltheon. How many entities died? What kind of abominations were they facing? How terrible must the outsiders be to wield such power?
He had seen firsthand how the outsiders had been able to turn Lysithara into a ruin. There was the outsider Ythar, whose corpse created a dense fog that would eventually become the Whispering Forest.
There was Ittorath, who was sealed in a spatial rift with the twin moons as catalysts, leaving only one moon in the sky of Lysithara.
This solemn, deathly air in the Bone Hallows only made Damon realize a terrible truth. The outsiders were far more terrifying than he ever gave them credit for. Far more cunning. Far more knowledgeable.
âHow am I supposed to kill entities like these?â
Seras placed a hand on his shoulder.
"You should get some rest. Weâll be moving out in a few hours.."
Damon nodded slowly, but he couldnât help asking,
"How do we even begin to fight things like this.." he muttered.
Seras stopped. She didnât say anything for a moment, then she smiled.
"I had the same thought too... when I was a little girl... except in my case it wasnât terrifying entities, though looking back now thatâs how they felt..."
Damon glanced at her slightly. Seras smiled with a distant look in her eyes.
"When I was a young girl I was faced with someone in the first class advancement.."
"Hmm, but theyâre weak.." Damon replied.
She nodded slowly. The first class was weak. It was the first step to a long path to power. Right now she could kill a first class entity with just a single gesture or even her aura alone.
"They are to you, who is in the fourth class advancement. Theyâre probably less than ants in the ground."
She placed her hand on her chest.
"To me, a child, that person seemed greater than the heavens. They could break through walls, move at impossible speeds... I stood no chance. I was just an unawakened child."
There was a faint glimmer in her eyes.
"I was certain I would die because there was no one to save me. I did the only thing I could. I fought tooth and nail, bloodied and battered, with my life hanging on a thread. I realized somewhere in my frenzy to live I had won. I had achieved something unprecedented."
Damon listened quietly. He had heard of this. This was just the beginning of her legend, the girl who slew someone in the first class when she still reeked of her motherâs milk.
"Yeah, thatâs a weakling. These are beings that are transcendent.." he replied, shooting down her logic.
Just because she beat one ant didnât really matter. That person was insignificant. He wasnât even worth mentioning in the footnotes of her legend.
"Is it? I think itâs the same." Seras smiled, her expression serene. He had never seen her smile like this. This was the gentlest expression he had ever seen on her face. Her eyes that usually carried battlefield rage were calm. He saw himself reflected in them, his expression full of doubt.
"I thought that person was unstoppable, but he wasnât. He was insignificant before strength. Now I am powerful, he is even less than an ant... maybe he seemed powerful to me because I was weak. He seemed greater than life itself, but he wasnât. These creatures are no different. They are not larger than life. To someone with more power than them, they are nothing, not even worth remembering."
Her gaze never left him.
"I am not afraid to face someone or something that seems large or more powerful. If I must, I will fight. And when I fight, I will win. Because I am Seras Blade, and I fear no giants."
Damon was moved by her words, her temperament. She was right. These outsiders seemed so vast and powerful, but who was the one laying dead here? It was them. Who was a relic of the past? They fought the wicked prophet and lost. Why should he fear defeated lovers? They seemed vast in his world, but in the grand scheme of things they were nothing, just pawns in the unknown godâs schemes. They didnât even matter. They werenât even players.
"I was wrong," Damon thought, looking at Serasâs fading figure as she walked away from him.
"I forgot something important after getting surprise attacked by Ittorath."
It was something important.
"These guys arenât invincible. They lost to someone born in my world. Theyâre even weaker than Ashcroft, who Iâve defeated.."
"Iâm not trapped in this world with them. Theyâre trapped in here with me.."
"I can still deal with this. I can still trap even the unknown god."
And he only needed to find one thing to pull this off.
Lazarakâs Lake of Tears.