The boy hadn’t simply been teleported back to the snowy plains.
He had been sent directly into his cave.
The familiar warmth immediately surrounded him, almost like a blanket gently settling over his body.
The boy sighed in relief.
For the first time in what felt like an eternity, he was home.
He had a lot to think about.
There was also one rather embarrassing detail he had only just realized.
He had gone through everything in the Dragon Realm wearing nothing but his underwear.
The boy chuckled at the thought.
But that was hardly the most important thing on his mind.
His gaze shifted toward the wooden figure pinned against the wall.
Spirit energy.
He had finally learned how to use it.
Perhaps the strange darkness residing within the wooden figure was a form of spirit energy.
Or perhaps it was spirit energy channeling some kind of concept.
Either way, the boy wanted to understand it.
He briefly considered leaving the cave and continuing his journey.
But exhaustion weighed heavily upon him.
He needed rest.
There was something else bothering him as well.
The madness.
It seemed to be lingering inside his mind, almost like something gently tickling the edges of his thoughts.
His mind wandered toward Veroth.
He had grown stronger.
Much stronger.
The boy had killed him before, yet somehow Veroth had returned.
And it seemed that the Angel of the Abyss—Yehura—had something to do with it.
Yehura…
The boy still couldn’t believe what he had witnessed.
He had actually managed to subjugate the dragons and use them as fuel for his ascension.
It was horrifying.
But, in a strange way…
It was almost amazing.
Through the dreadful events of the Dragon Realm, the boy had learned more about godhood than he ever could have imagined.
His thoughts continued wandering as he gently lowered himself onto his bed.
He relaxed against the blankets.
Then his thoughts turned toward Zuko.
Zuko was incredibly young, yet he knew so much.
To be honest, Zuko had been the first person the boy had truly spoken with in a long time.
The years without human conversation had changed him.
But Zuko was a Dragon Man.
And Dragon Men were similar enough to humans that speaking with him had felt strangely natural.
The boy’s thoughts eventually returned to spirit energy.
Zuko had said that spirit energy permeated all of existence.
It could assist with ascension.
It could strengthen the body.
It could be shaped into countless things.
But one aspect fascinated the boy more than anything else.
Concepts.
With enough imagination, spirit energy could allow someone to channel a concept.
A tiger.
A bird.
A wolf.
Essentially any creature one could imagine.
The boy shivered at the thought.
Then another question entered his mind.
“What about gods?”
His eyes slowly began to close.
“Can they channel concepts like… death?”
A pause.
“Time?”
His consciousness began fading.
“Space?”
The more he thought about it, the deeper he drifted into sleep.
The boy slept for nearly a month.
His entire being had been completely drained.
But while his body rested…
His mind wandered somewhere else.
He was dreaming.
Or perhaps—
He wasn’t.
The boy was still lying in his bed.
But his cave was gone.
His bed now rested in the middle of an endless wasteland.
A grey, lightless world stretched endlessly in every direction.
The boy couldn’t move.
He couldn’t breathe.
He couldn’t even blink.
It felt as though his heart had stopped beating.
Then, in the distance—
A massive shadow appeared.
The boy smelled something.
Rot.
A vast creature slowly emerged from the darkness.
It possessed four enormous legs, its strange form revealing dark tendons and bone.
Its face appeared horribly distorted, as though its features had been erased.
Its tail moved through the air behind it.
The creature slowly approached.
Each step shook the ground.
The boy couldn’t react.
He couldn’t even change his expression.
He was completely paralyzed.
When the beast finally reached him, it rose onto two legs.
It towered over him like a giant.
Dark liquid streamed from its distorted eyes and landed upon the boy’s bed, soaking into the leather and blankets.
The creature slowly opened its mouth.
It looked as though it were about to reveal some terrible truth.
Then it spoke.
“I can smell your madness, boy.”
The nightmare ended.
The boy immediately jolted upright.
Sweat covered his trembling face.
He grabbed his head.
“Is reality becoming a dream…?”
His breathing was unsteady.
“And the dream merging into reality?”
He had been asleep for an entire month.
Perhaps his mind had simply begun to break down from exhaustion.
Or perhaps some reality-bending horror had interfered with his dreams.
The thought immediately surfaced in his mind.
His gaze shifted toward the wooden figure pinned against the wall.
“Or maybe…”
His eyes narrowed.
“…it’s them.”
The boy stood.
He pulled on a pair of black leather pants and a long-sleeved shirt before approaching the wooden figure.
He reached out and gently grabbed the spear embedded within its body.
Then he pulled it free.
The boy smiled faintly.
“Let the experiment start.”
For the next several hours, the boy examined the broken wooden figure.
He studied it.
Tested it.
And slowly began to understand something fascinating.
The darkness inside the wooden figure was actually spirit energy.
But it wasn’t simply raw spirit energy.
It was channeling something else.
Something mysterious.
Perhaps corruption.
Perhaps the concept of darkness.
Maybe even a mixture of both.
According to the books the boy had collected, darkness had originated from the blood of the Creator.
Light, meanwhile, had supposedly originated from its saliva.
The boy wasn’t sure whether to believe it.
But he had learned enough to know that the strange darkness inside the wooden figure was far from ordinary.
The boy channeled his own spirit energy.
A sharp wooden knife suddenly appeared in his hand.
His control over spirit energy was still limited, but even his current mastery allowed him to create objects through imagination.
Food.
Materials.
Weapons.
Almost anything he could properly envision.
He stared at the wooden knife.
Then at the wooden figure.
He gripped the weapon.
And plunged it into the figure’s eye socket.
The wooden figure immediately began trembling.
The entire cave shook.
Materials fell from his crafting table and crashed onto the ground.
Then—
Time seemed to slow.
Within the eerie darkness of the wooden figure’s eye, something moved.
A red tentacle emerged.
It radiated an overwhelming sense of horror.
The boy immediately stepped backward.
“Ah, damnit.”
His expression darkened.
“It seems I attracted it again.”
The red tentacle continued growing.
It stretched higher and higher until it reached the ceiling.
Then it stopped.
As though it had sensed something.
The boy.
The tentacle suddenly lunged.
Its movement was almost impossible to follow.
It wrapped around the boy’s neck.
The boy struggled against it.
A jagged sword instantly appeared in his hand.
He gritted his teeth and swung downward with all his strength.
But before the blade could connect—
Another tentacle emerged from the wooden figure’s other eye.
It wrapped around the sword.
The tentacle tightened.
The pressure became overwhelming.
The jagged sword shattered.
Fragments of stone flew across the cave, striking the walls and ceiling.
The boy’s eyes widened.
He immediately grabbed both tentacles.
Spirit energy surged through his body.
His muscles tensed.
His strength increased.
The pressure surrounding him became suffocating.
The tentacles struggled against him.
But they couldn’t resist.
The boy’s strength overwhelmed them.
With a furious pull, he forced both tentacles backward.
They retreated into the wooden figure’s eye sockets.
The boy stumbled backward.
He coughed violently, a small trace of blood escaping his mouth.
Then he looked toward the wooden figure.
His expression hardened.
Deadly intent filled his eyes.
He charged.
Like a predator finally snapping at its prey, the boy seized the wooden figure and hurled it out of the cave.
Its body disappeared into the lightless chasm below.
The boy remained standing at the entrance.
Cold sweat ran down his forehead.
“What the hell was that?”
His breathing quickened.
Then another thought struck him.
“No…”
His eyes widened.
“They know where I’m at.”
He looked around his cave.
“I can’t stay here anymore.”
Then he noticed something.
The walls.
His expression changed.
The walls were changing.
A strange layer of flesh had begun spreading across them.
It crawled over the stone.
Across the ceiling.
Around his belongings.
The cave itself seemed to be transforming.
A blanket of flesh continued spreading through his home.
Then the voices began.
Incomprehensible ravings whispered directly into his mind.
The boy grabbed his head.
“Stop…”
The voices grew louder.
He gritted his teeth.
“STOP!”
He turned and ran.
The boy fled his cave without looking back.
Whatever had found him…
He knew one thing for certain.
He could no longer stay there.