Rise Online: Return of the Legendary Player
Chapter 166 - 166: Soul

"You... are you really a Psyker?" Ravastine asked with trembling lips.

Kaizen turned his body towards the princess and while smoothing the back of his neck with nervousness, smiling he said:

"Yes, I am. I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner. I had forgotten that small detail."

Ravastine was stunned by the revelation that Kaizen was a Psyker. This simply made her speechless, and Kaizen instantly realized this.

"Are you all right?" He asked, concerned.

She looked at him a little lost, and then looked away once more, as she did at the beginning of the trip.

"Y-yes. I just need some time to think, and I guess you need some time to talk to them privately too." She replied.

Respecting the princess' request, the Psyker nodded, and she went to the corner of the chamber near the entrance.

For his part, Kaizen turned toward the Skogsrås, they were still looking at him with true admiration. Her eyes were large and there was an unusual gleam in them. This glow was not just a glow of happiness and enthusiasm common in humans, but a golden glow that enveloped their pupils.

"His aura... she is so pure and chaotic at the same time. That's amazing..." One of them said.

"Perhaps it is evidence of his duty of balance to the world." Another commented.

"I've never seen an aura like... this one."

"That must be something only worthy of a Psyker."

However, Kaizen was neither happy nor angry at these compliments, for these compliments were not for him, but for his class, something he was just lucky to get, it was not his merit. Instead of smiling as he normally did when he received praise, he bowed his head to the Skogsrås and spoke:

"I'm sorry I couldn't come sooner. Your clearing was destroyed by these... crazy people."

The Skogsrås were surprised by the Psyker's posture, looked at each other and then bowed a little to him as well.

"You have arrived at the right time. Part of our home has been destroyed, but, thanks to you, our home, this forest, remains virtually pristine."

"Yes, Lord Psyker. We owe everything to you... Who knows what would have happened to us if they had managed to capture us..."

"Humans... why are most of them so brutish?"

"What did they want with us? We have never revealed ourselves to anyone, we have followed our ancestors' code since we were born, and we don't interfere in the human world so they don't interfere in the home we protect. Why did they attack us in such a brutal way?"

At first, Kaizen was reluctant, to tell the truth about why they were attacked by The Eye of Hermodr, but there was no reason to hide it from them, so he decided to tell.

"They wanted you." He answered the question that one of them raised.

"What do you mean?"

"They call themselves The Eye of Hermodr. Their goal is to free the god Hermodr who is imprisoned in Niflheim and to accomplish this, they are using every weapon that can be used, including terror, monsters, witches, and the dead, and now they are capturing supernatural creatures. They wanted to use you as their weapons..."

The Skogsrå listened carefully to every word Kaizen said and when he finished speaking, they remained silent for a long time, thinking about what he had said.

"Hermodr..." One of them finally said.

"That's... that's the god who guides the souls of the dead, isn't it?" Another asked.

"Yes. They are looking for a way to free him. If they succeed, I don't know what might happen, but I won't allow them to do that using supernatural creatures and innocent people." replied Kaizen.

"There is no other way they can get what they want to do other than by using that method." One of the Skogsrå commented.

"What do you mean?" the Psyker asked, confused. "Of course, there must be another way."

"Listen well, Psyker, the world follows rules, and the most fundamental rule is that death feeds life and life feeds death." She began to explain. "The more someone kills monsters, the more powerful that person becomes, and it's all worked that way since the first of Yggdrasil came into being. If they seek power, killing is the best way they can go."

It wasn't hard for Kaizen, as a player, to understand that Skogsrå was referring to the system of gaining XP in a more natural way in the world. That much was obvious, and she was right. Killing made all players stronger. But did this also work with NPCs? If the answer was yes, an NPC's evolution could be as great as a player's and so players would always have challenges, even the Evolved players.

Another Skogsrå stepped forward, denying with his head.

"You are not wrong, my sister, but you are not completely right either. All living things do acquire more power through death, and that may even be the only way to get enough power to free a god, but not all people who acquire power through death know the true way to use that ability."

"What do you mean by that, sister?"

"I learned from the ancestor Lenora that the soul of a being is the core of its true power and that it is the soul that shows us the way to use that power. Death may be what gives the power, but the soul is what converts that power into strength."

It was difficult for Kaizen to agree or disagree with this statement, even as a Psyker he was still very inexperienced.

The third Skogsrå, who until then had said nothing, stepped forward and, looking earnestly at Kaizen, said:

"Ever since we were just children, when we lived in another forest far away from this one, our ancestors have told us the story of the Psykers."

"Kesiray, now is not the time for that."

"If not now, when?" Kesiray turned and asked the Skogsrå who had almost complete green hair.

The green-haired Skogsrå didn't know what to say, so Kesiray continued.

"The story they told was about a Psyker who had a scar over his left eye, the result of a powerful attack that made him unable to fully see but still kept him alive. The Psyker did not have a name in the story, he was only called by his title: the Blue Wolf..." Kesiray began to tell.

The story of the Blue Wolf, as Kesiray called it, begins when the Psyker visits a ghost village, long abandoned by its inhabitants. This village had wooden houses that were in ruins, and the only thing that remained intact was a statue of a woman with her eyes closed.

The Blue Wolf went to the statue, and when he touched it, a woman with long golden hair and green eyes appeared. The woman introduced herself as Níðhöggr, the Serpent of the Underworld, and said that she had been trapped there for a long time, unable to return to her world.

Níðhöggr asked the Blue Wolf to release her as she just wanted to go back home, but the Blue Wolf was not sure that this was the correct choice, so he asked her to tell him what would happen upon her release.

The Serpent of the Underworld said that if he released her, she would be able to return to her world and that the Blue Wolf would get unimaginable powers, gaining also the ability to travel through the nine realms.

However, the Blue Wolf was cunning and experienced. He knew that in none of the stories did Níðhöggr have the appearance of a human, let alone a beautiful woman. Moreover, if Níðhöggr were trapped in Midgard, the nine worlds of Yggdrasil would be in chaos.

In front of this evidence, the Blue Wolf had no doubt that this fake Níðhöggr was lying, and so he denied the request without blinking for another second. The fake Níðhöggr was enraged by the Blue Wolf's refusal, and the two began to fight. The battle was long and hard, but in the end, the Blue Wolf was the victor.

Instead of releasing the evil spirit that tried to deceive him, sending it to the Lake of Souls in Alfheim or to Niflheim to be judged. The Blue Wolf punished him personally by absorbing the soul of this spirit for himself.

Legends say that when the spirit was absorbed, or is absorbed in the future, the entire ghost village disappeared and that the Skogsrå were personally guided there by the Blue Wolf to take care of that place until the end of time.

The lesson of this story not only serves to highlight that Psykers are cunning and that trying to fool one is not a great idea but also gives a hint of what Psykers may be capable of.

'Absorb someone's soul... The soul... That sounds like a fantastic power to me.' Kaizen thought.

For sure this story could just be considered some fanciful legend about the Psykers, but for Kaizen, who knew this was a class assignment, this was a reminder that the Psych Class abilities were greater than he could have imagined and that perhaps the clue to obtaining an upcoming ability was just this folklore.

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