The smoke from the fried Hydra cleared, revealing the morning sun. It was a rare sight in the Seventeenth Continent as the grey smog seemed to have pulled back, if only for a few hours, respecting the violence that had just occurred.
Red stood before the obsidian slab. The adrenaline of the battle had faded, replaced by the cool dopamine hit of rewards.
[ QUEST COMPLETE: THE MOON-CRAZED HYDRA ]
[ RATING: S (7 CASUALTIES) ]
[ REWARD 1: REGIONAL NODE ACCESS (LAKE) ]
[ REWARD 2: DIVINE FAVOR (GORR - OWED) ]
[ REWARD 3: MASSIVE BIOMASS (HYDRA CORPSE) ]
Red tapped the [ NODE ACCESS ] icon.
The swamp water shimmered. A visible pulse of blue energy rippled out from the center of the lake, washing over the muddy banks. The moss turned a deeper green.
[ NODE ACTIVATED: THE LUNAR SPRING ]
[ PASSIVE EFFECT: ACCELERATED GROWTH ]
→ Flora/Fauna within 1km grow 200% faster.
→ Mana Density increased by 50%.[ PASSIVE INCOME: +500 DP / DAY ]
Red raised an eyebrow. "Passive income. Finally."
It wasn't a fortune since he could burn 500 DP in a single whisper, but it was free money. And the growth buff was the real prize. This mud-hole could finally support a population.
He looked down at the tribe. They were gathered around the massive carcass of the Hydra. The Mud-Skippers were poking the blackened scales. Krug was standing on the beast's head, raising his broken spear in triumph.
'KRUG,' Red projected.
Krug snapped to attention. "Lord?"
'THE BEAST IS DEAD. BUT THE BELLY IS EMPTY. STRIP THE MEAT. SALVAGE THE SCALES. THEN... WE CLEAN.'
The rest of the day was an industrial operation.
The Hydra's scales were harvested. They were tough, fire-resistant, and lighter than the bronze Gorr provided.
[ MATERIAL ACQUIRED: HYDRA SCALE (RANK C) ]
→ Usage: Light Armor / Shields.
The meat was trickier. The Hydra was toxic. But Red used the [ KITCHEN ] interface to analyze it.
→ Process: Boil in acidic water (Ooze sap) to neutralize toxins.
The tribe now had enough cured meat to last a month.
But Red wasn't interested in just surviving. He wanted sustainability.
"System," Red muttered. "Shop. Ecology."
He purchased a new Blueprint.
[ BLUEPRINT: BASIC AQUACULTURE ][ COST: 2,000 DP ]
'KRUG. ORDER THE GREY-FINS. INTO THE WATER.'
Fifty Grey-Fin Lizardmen dove into the lake. Under Red's guidance, they gardened. They cleared the choking algae that had blocked the sunlight. They dragged the Hydra's massive bones to the bottom to form artificial reefs. They planted Iron-Root Kelp (scavenged from the deep swamp) that would oxygenate the water.
Red watched the ecosystem graph on his screen.
[ WATER QUALITY: TOXIC → POOR → ACCEPTABLE ]
"It needs life," Red noted.
He zoomed in on a bucket of small fry and eggs the Mud-Skippers had collected from the stagnant pools nearby. It was a pathetic amount of biomass.
Red checked his Charge. [ CAUSALITY CHARGE: 400% ]
He didn't want to use a full charge. But he needed this lake to be a farm, not a grave.
"Target the eggs. Output: 100x."
[ COST: 5,000 DP ][ CHARGE REMAINING: 300% ]
He snapped his fingers.
The bucket of eggs filled up the water around the Mud-Skippers exploded with life. Thousands of Silver-Back Trout fingerlings burst into existence, flashing like coins in the murky water. They swarmed into the lake, hiding in the new bone-reefs, feeding on the kelp.
With the [ NODE EFFECT: ACCELERATED GROWTH ], these fish would be dinner-plate size in two weeks.
"Infinite food glitch," Red whispered, satisfied. "Civilization secured."
They then got their well-deserved rest.
However, later that afternoon, an anomaly occurred.
The Grey-Fin Elder, a scarred warrior named Fin-Bar, surfaced near the center of the lake. He wasn't carrying kelp. He was thrashing, waving his arms frantically toward the shore.
"Pull!" Fin-Bar screeched. "Heavy! Heavy!"
He dived back down.
Red zoomed in. The Grey-Fins were hauling something up from the deepest trench of the lake pit where the Hydra had slept. It was wrapped in thick, black vines that seemed to resist their claws.
It took twenty Lizardmen to drag it onto the muddy bank.
It wasn't gold or a treasure chest.
It was a slab of stone.
It looked like a piece of broken masonry, perhaps a fragment of a wall or a tablet. It was made of a material that drank the sunlight. It was darker than obsidian, jagged and uneven.
Red felt a chill go through his spectral form. The System interface highlight it and glitched.
[ OBJECT DETECTED: ??? ]
[ SCANNING... ]
[ ERROR: DIVINE SIGNATURE UNRECOGNIZED ]
[ ERA: PRE-CALAMITY ]
Red frowned. "Pre-Calamity?"
Krug walked up to the object. He reached out to touch it.
'DO NOT TOUCH IT,' Red commanded instantly.
Krug froze, his hand inches from the black stone. He stepped back, bowing.
'CLEAR THE AREA,' Red ordered.
Red lowered his view, inspecting the object through the interface. The stone was carved with faint, glowing runes. But they weren't the neat, geometric runes of the System. They were chaotic, spiraling scratches that looked like they had been clawed into the rock by a madman.
Red focused on the text. The System struggled to translate.
[ TRANSLATION MATRIX: ACTIVE ]
[ ...THE HUNGER... THE VOID BETWEEN STARS... HE WHO EATS THE LIGHT... ]
[ ...LOCKED... KEY MISSING... ]
"A fragment…" Red whispered. "Of an old God?"
He checked the [ PANTHEON ] history. The Seventeenth Continent was a graveyard. Thousands of Players had died here. But this felt older than a Player. This felt like part of the map's source code.
[ ALERT: PASSIVE RADIATION DETECTED ]
→ The object emits a low-frequency psychic hum.
→ Effect: Induces paranoia/madness in weak minds over time.
"Great," Red muttered. "It's radioactive evil."
He couldn't leave it on the shore. It would drive his followers crazy. But he couldn't throw it back since it was clearly important.
He looked at the item description again.
[ ITEM: FRAGMENT OF THE FORGOTTEN (1/???) ]
→ Description: A piece of a shattered divinity. Inactive.
→ Usage: Unknown.
→ Value: Incalculable.
"Krug," Red whispered.
"Lord?"
'BUILD A BOX. LINE IT WITH LEAD... NO, WE DON'T HAVE LEAD. LINE IT WITH THE HYDRA SCALES. THEY RESIST MAGIC.BURY IT BENEATH THE TEMPLE. DEEP. NO ONE TOUCHES IT.'
Krug nodded solemnly. "Bad juju rock. We bury."
Red watched them drag the artifact away. He had solved the food crisis, secured the perimeter, and killed the boss. But now, he had a mysterious, radioactive tablet buried in his basement.
He opened his [ PROFILE ].
[ DP: 157,900 ]
He looked at the empty spot on the map where the tablet had come from. The lake wasn't just a resource node. It was a crash site.
"What else is down there?" Red asked the silence.