The violet sky of the Void, shrouded in heavy clouds didn’t offer a sunrise; it simply pulsated with a deeper, bruised hue as the morning cycle began.
This was because they were still on the bordering areas of the southern continent where the Demon King’s curse corrupts everything.
Kaelen adjusted the straps of his worn gear, his eyes tracking the translucent HUD flickering in his peripheral vision.
Beside him, Lisa walked with the rhythmic grace of a seasoned soldier, her hand never straying far from the hilt of her mana-blade.
Between them, Pixel—now a fluffy, shadow-furred feline—padded silently, her tail twitching with an arrogance that only a cat who knew the secrets of the universe could possess.
“Alright, Kaelen,” Lisa said, breaking the silence.
Her voice carried the weight of a seasoned strategist.
“If we’re going to make it to Oakhaven by dusk, we need to stay off the main merchant paths.
The Demon King’s influence is spreading like a virus.
One week ago, the borders were safe; now, the very air feels heavy with his curse.”
“A virus, huh?” Kae muttered, his mind instantly translating the threat into digital terms.
“So, we’re looking at a system-wide corruption.”
“Exactly.
And it doesn’t just target the dead.
The curse actively corrupts almost anything—from living things to the atmosphere and the environment itself,” Lisa explained, her hand gesturing toward the eerie flora around them.
“Plants twist into ravenous Bramble-Stalkers, and animals go completely rogue and vicious.
Even a simple, harmless hamster can become a zombie under its weight.”
Kae swallowed hard, a sudden chill running down his spine.
His eyes slowly drifted downward, locking onto Pixel with a look of pure suspicion.
Pixel stopped walking, tilting her head up.
“What’s that look for?” the cat’s voice retorts sharply in Kae’s mind.
“It’s not like I’m going to turn on you or something.
In fact, even if I did turn, I’d never eat you.
Your smell alone is a natural predator deterrent.
Bro, when was the last time you showered?”
Kae’s face wrinkled in pure anger.
His knuckles turned white as he clenched his fist, silently wishing he could drop-kick his own familiar.
“Haha, I’m just kidding, no need to get worked up over something so trivia,” Pixel purred, completely unbothered by the death glare.
“Also, I’m a legendary mythical creature, remember?
I have the blessing of a God.
The curse can’t affect me—and by extension, it can’t affect you either.”
Kae exhaled, forcing his fist to relax, though his eye was still twitching.
Lisa didn’t notice the silent bickering.
Her gaze drifted toward the shifting mists ahead, and her tone softened, pausing in sudden sadness.
“The curse…
it manifests heavily in the souls of the lingering—the ones with unfinished business.
We call them Wraiths.
Those with blue cores, like the ones that attacked you earlier aren’t inherently evil, but they thirst for mana like a man in a desert thirsts for water.
There is this old legend that says sometimes, the poor things don’t even want to become wraiths.
The curse just attacks and takes over them without warning.
They’re in constant pain, Kaelen.
If you listen closely, you can actually hear them scream.
Shattering their core is the only way of truly setting them free.”
Kae’s expression turned grim as he absorb the weight of her words.
Suddenly, Lisa stopped in her tracks.
Her voice dropped an octave, turning chillingly dark.
“But…
be very aware of the red.”
Kae blinked, the sudden shift in her energy catching him off guard.
“Red…
Red what?”
“The Red Core Wraiths,” Lisa spoke in a dark, ominous whisper, a sudden chill settling over her posture as her eyes hardened.
“They are malice incarnate, devoid of any mercy or reason.
To them, all other life forms are just game to be hunted, tortured, and erased.
They thirst for mana, but what they desire most of all is the Void Energy.
They would do absolutely anything to devour it.
Even a tiny bit when feasted on, it can buff their strength four times than normal mana does .
The rewards of absorbing the void energy are just to die for.
She paused, her eyes narrowing as she scanned the surrounding mist, her fingers tightening on her blade’s hilt.
“Once they sense its presence, they track its aura like a pack of wolves hunting prey by scent.
Once they sniff it out, they flock and attack as a horde.
At first, it’s only a small group of ten.
When you do away with them, thirty more show up, then a hundred more, until hundreds of them all over the continent keep coming.
It doesn’t matter how powerful you are—if overwhelmed by numbers, you finally get exhausted from using up your energy to fight.
You can’t hold your own forever.”
Lisa stepped closer to Kae, her posture stiffening as her voice dropped even lower.
“And when the wielder is too exhausted to fight, then finally…
they devour every last bit of energy left.
That is how they managed to ambush and kill the old Wraith King…
yet he was one of the most powerful beings to ever exist in this world.”
A heavy, suffocating silence fell over the path.
Kae and Pixel froze.
The realization hit them both like a physical truck—they were both literally walking batteries of Void Energy.
Instinct took over logic.
Without a word, Kae dropped to his knees, scooped Pixel up, and the two of them held each other tightly, trembling in absolute terror as they stared wide-eyed into the mists.
Lisa turned around, saw the pro-gamer and the legendary cat huddled together like a pair of frightened toddlers, and burst into a melodic laugh.
“I’m so sorry!” she giggled, holding her stomach.
“I didn’t mean to startle you two like that!
I just wanted to add a little life to the story!”
She paused for a second before she continued ” plus, no one truly knows what went down that day, at the wraith kings castle.
No one knows how he died.
All that we say is nothing but faceless rumours and old legends.”
“No one was there to see it.
The battle between the demon king and the wraith king was epic and devastating—no one was foolish enough to stay and interfere.”
She kept silent for a moment ” Rumours have it, there were 500 people under the wraith king’s castle and no one got as much as a single scratch on their bodies…
The wraith king managed to protect them all, while they battled thousands of the demon King’s army with just a five man squad.”
Kae snapped his eyes open, his face flushing red as he quickly dropped Pixel back onto the grass.
He stood up, brushing the dirt off his clothes with aggressive dignity.
“Well, you almost took the life out of us!”
“I’m so sorry, I’m sorry!” Lisa chuckled, waving a hand apologetically as her laughter subsided.
She adjusted her grip on her mana-blade and continued walking.
“The old Wraith King didn’t face that horror alone,” Lisa continued, her voice dropping into a solemn, reverent tone.
“He fought alongside the Four Continental Paragons—a legendary elite squad, with each warrior hailing from one of the other four great continents.”
Kae stopped in his tracks, his gaze shifting from his translucent HUD to fix entirely on her.
“A full regional alliance?
Like a max-tier competitive roster?”
“Exactly,” Lisa said, nodding as she stepped over a twisted, blackened root.
“A Wood-Elf grandmaster from the West, a Dragon-Knight from the North, a shadow-assassin from the deep East, and a Holy Vanguard from the golden spires of the South.
They say their synergy was flawless, completely balanced to protect every front.”
Between them, Pixel halted, her fluffy, shadow-furred tail twitching as her amber eyes narrowed to sharp slits.
She let out a low, analytical purr that resonated directly in Kae’s mind.
“A balanced squad template…
intriguing.
It seems the previous generation understood basic meta-composition, Master.”
“But that’s not all,” Lisa added, her shoulders tightening as she glanced down at the cat.
“The myths claim the squad shared a singular, legendary guardian beast.
It was soul-bonded directly to the Wraith King himself, but it served as the entire team’s tactical anchor and mascot, connecting all their minds.
When the ambush happened and the King fell, that creature supposedly vanished into the Void.”
Kae glanced down at Pixel, his brow furrowing as he noted the strange, knowing intensity in the cat’s stare.
He looked back up at Lisa, his curiosity piqued.
“Names?
What kind of beast was it?” Kae asked, the questions tumbling out in rapid succession.
“What happened to them?
Who were they?”
“No one knows their true names anymore, and the archives don’t even say what kind of familiar it was,” Lisa whispered, her hand resting firmly on the hilt of her mana-blade as she looked toward the dark horizon.
“The Demon King’s curse didn’t just corrupt the land; it erased their legacies entirely.
To the Guilds today, they are just the Ghost Squad—a myth about an alliance that saved the world, only to be entirely wiped out in the dark.”
“Anyway, as I was saying…” Lisa said, breaking her own trance as she forced a small, reassuring smile.
“They held their own till the very end.
They say the battle dragged on for three days and three nights, transforming the landscape into a graveyard of shattered earth.
These brave warriors defended the fort with everything they had, refusing to yield a single inch, until they finally forced the Demon King and his remaining army into the abyss.”
She slowed her pace, her hand lifting softly to press against her chest, right over her heart.
She took a slow, grounding breath as if feeling the pulse of her own mortality.
“Anyway, as I was saying…” Lisa said, breaking her own trance as she forced a small, reassuring smile.
“They held their own till the very end.
They say the battle dragged on for three days and three nights, transforming the landscape into a graveyard of shattered earth.
These brave warriors defended the fort with everything they had, refusing to yield a single inch, until they finally forced the Demon King and his remaining army into the abyss.”
She slowed her pace, her hand lifting softly to press against her chest, right over her heart.
She took a slow, grounding breath as if feeling the pulse of her own mortality.
“Regardless,” she muttered, her fingers tightening slightly against her fabric.
“All those wraiths have one thing in common.
They are ruthless.
They’ll drain you until you’re nothing but a hollowed-out, lifeless skeleton.”
Kae scoffed softly, his eyes tracking a flickering data point on his HUD.
“Classic high-tier raid aftermath.
But pushing the final boss into an abyss doesn’t just instantly clear the map.
What happened to the remaining mobs?
A defeated faction doesn’t just delete itself.”
“No, they didn’t,” Lisa said, her green eyes darkening as she looked out over the twisted terrain.
“After the fall of their king, the remaining demon army scattered into the deep darkness.
They lived in the shadows, terrified of the light, never daring to show themselves in the open day again.”
She paused, gesturing toward the vast, empty expanses around them.
“But the damage was already done.
The Southern Continent was left with a terribly sparse population; the violence of that war claimed far too many innocent lives.
Most of the survivors abandoned their homes, migrating to the other four continents as refugees just to seek a basic, safe livelihood.”
Kae looked around at the eerie, silent flora, finally understanding the isolation of the starter zone.
“So the entire region became an abandoned server.”
“Exactly.
A lawless wasteland,” Lisa whispered, her hand resting firmly back on her mana-blade’s hilt.
“With the population gone, the demons, rogue mercenaries, and vicious goblins crawled out of hiding to inhabit the Southern Continent.
The strongest remaining demons took complete authority, seizing the old Wraith King’s castle for themselves.
They’ve spent the last thousand years slowly monopolizing the continent, building back their army, slowly but steadily.”
“There was peace,” Lisa explained, her gaze drifting toward the faint, distant outline of Oakhaven’s protective walls.
“Once they locked the Demon King into that infinite dark prison, a golden age washed over the realm.
There was peace for over a thousand years—until just recently.”
She stopped completely, turning her emerald-green eyes toward Kae, her posture growing rigid with a deep, unsettling gravity.
“The Demon King’s curse has started corrupting this world again because his power is leaking,” she whispered, the wind catching her messy ponytail.
“The ancient seal that had been holding him in eternal darkness for a millennium has weakened.
His remaining followers are actively trying to revive him, which is the true cause behind the rapidly spreading corruption.”
Kae tightened his grip on his worn shirt
Lisa’s expression darkened.
“The Red Cores are the elite—the Demon King’s favourites.
They are born of malice, capable of speech, and can possess the bodies of the dead.
They shift from one vessel to another, making them nearly impossible to track.
If you encounter one, Kaelen, word of advise …you don’t fight.
You run.”
Before Kae could respond, Aegis’s voice rang in his mind, sharp and cold as a winter morning.
[MISSION NOTIFICATION: THE WANDERING DIAMOND]
[OBJECTIVE: SECURE THE ASSET.
THREAT LEVEL: TIGER.]
“Hold up,” Kae said, his hand snapping up instantly to halt the group.
His body went rigid, his eyes locked onto the dense thicket ahead.
Lisa froze, her hand dropping to the hilt of her mana-blade.
“What is it, Kae?”
“Something really big and evil,” Kae whispered, his voice dropping into a low, focused tone.
“I can sense it.
The atmospheric pressure in my HUD is dropping.
It’s an anomaly.”
Before Lisa could even draw her sword, a rustling sound came from Kae’s shoulder.
Pixel didn’t hesitate.
With the fluid grace of a coward who valued his stock options, the black cat dove straight into the open traveler’s bag slung across Kae’s back.
She buried herself beneath a spare cloak, leaving only his amber eyes peeking out from the canvas flap.