Path of the Berserker

My Dearest Tribute,

First, well done for making the correct decision in rejecting my false offer of ease through the Academy. It was a test…and one that you have passed. It was always my intent to send the strongest and bravest of what our fair planet has to offer, and you, my dear Tribute, have once again proven your worth to me.

Rest assured, however, that the opportunity to become a royal consort may still be in your future. Should fate destine it between us.

Especially if you return to me a Legionnaire.

I stopped reading the letter, making an ick face as my stomach churned.

What the hell was this?

I dared to read further.

It should go without saying that my planet is the only one worthy of receiving this grant.

You must ensure that it is so.

Do not disappoint me.

Until the fates reunites us again.

In my thoughts always,

Princess Lunalah

“What the actual hell…” I said, holding the letter away from me at arm’s length.

The thing was dripping with a kind of lemonade I did not want.

“What?” Blue Rose said from a rocky perch above me.

We were out in in the wild, taking a break atop a hundred-foot-high mesa in the middle of the desert, staying out of reach of the Takrids. Blue Rose and I had found a bit of rocky outcropping just below the mesa’s flat-topped surface that offered a bit of shade. The rest of our platoon didn’t seem to care. The thirty or so other White Robes lounged in desert heat directly on the sunbaked deck of the mesa along with our commander, the almighty Jei Su Long.

It’d been about a week now since Blue Rose and I had finished our elixir duty and were rotated to earn our keep on the harvesting team. I had only four days in the library, but in that time I had hammered the shit out of the books and had memorized every portion I could find pertaining to increasing the spiritual root of my Dao for ascension into the Sacred Soul Realm.

I found a brief snippet on how to ascend into the Sacred Soul Realm itself, but as Master Eiji had already warned me, the details were vague. The most it said was that it required huge quantities of Qi or Frenzy in my case. At least a hundred times more than what your Dantian could normally contain at the beginning of the core realm.

That meant I had a crap load of Frenzy to cultivate. But aside from that, the books gave tips on how my root could be strengthened through seeking some new spiritual truth or purity of my Dao. Not the most helpful, but it was guidance at least.

Normally, when Jei Su Long would lead us out on these mostly uneventful excursions into the wild, I would use the idle time to re-read the passages within my mind, seeking the key to my breakthrough for combining my inner selves. But today I received a letter. I had excitedly thought that it had come from Fia, but to my chagrin it was from the princess.

And boy was I disappointed.

“What?” Blue Rose said again, looking over my shoulder. “Is something wrong. Who is the letter from?”

“The princess.”

“Princess?” Tu’lok said, suddenly appearing from nowhere to butt into our conversation. He sat down next to Blue Rose. “Which Princess?”

“My princess,” I said with a shake of my head. “The great Lunalah.”

Blue Rose let out a gasp. “Wait! You’re engaged to a princess?”

“He is?” Tu’lok said.

I looked up at her annoyed. “Hell no! I meant that ironically. She’s the old bag who rules my planet. I kind of hate the damn bitch. On principle anyway. I don’t really know her personally. But you’d damn well think so if you read this letter.”

“Let me see,” Blue Rose said and snatched it from above me before I could react.

“Hey!”

Her blue eyes went back and forth reading the letter as Tu’lok joined her from the side. She then let out a laugh. “Are you certain you’re not engaged?”

“You see it too, right?”

“What does this last part mean?” Tu’lok said jabbing at the letter as he took it out of Blue Rose’s hand.

“Hells if I know,” I said disinterestedly.

He let out a grunt. “You’d better not be thinking about double crossing anyone, Iron Bull. Those missions to the Hell Words aren’t like these fields trips out here.”

“I damn well hope not,” I said testily.

This was our fourth day out in the wild and we hadn’t killed anything more than a few Takrids here and there. It was annoying as hell, especially after reading just how much Frenzy I required to push myself into the sacred soul realm.

“I wonder if Jei Su Long even knows how to find a monster with a damn core,” I muttered.

“Maybe he does know and he’s just scared,” Blue Rose said leaning back on her elbows. “He’s guaranteed his jade trim no matter what he does, right? Why risk his life when he doesn’t have to. Meanwhile we gain nothing. There’s no way we’ll rank high enough against the other platoons at this rate. Another week with no cultivation rewards.”

I had to agree with her. Although for a different reason. I had no need for the elixirs, but I was at least looking forward to some real cultivation by taking on some awaken spirit beasts. But Jei Su Long seemed intent on leading us around in circles for most of the day, finding us nothing.

“What is he, like sixteen or seventeen?” I said huffing out a scoff. “Trust me, in my old life as a handler, I came across plenty of his type. Spoiled young master hiding their fears and incomitance behind a façade of ‘bad luck’.”

“You two must not speak like this,” Tu’lok said with a frown. “Like it or not, he is our commander. We must respect that.”

“I respect results,” Blue Rose said.

“Same here,” I echoed her.

Tu’lok sighed frustrated. “Anyway, you are missing the point of what I was originally saying, Iron Bull.” He then shook the letter. “You must not consider something like this on the Hell Worlds. There’s enough trying to kill you there without having to worry about one of your own sticking a knife in your back.”

I looked up at him insulted.

“You think I’d do something like that?” I jerked a thumb at Blue Rose. “That’s her department, not mine.”

Blue Rose let out a gasp. “What did you say?”

“I’m loyal as they come, buddy,” I said ignoring her with [Indifference]. “And not to the princess.”

Blue Rose scowled back at me. “That was one time. And before I knew you. I’m loyal as well. To those I love.”

I raised an eyebrow at her. “Oh… so you admit you’re in love with me now?”

“I did not say that! I meant my family!”

I continued to laugh, cultivating her anger. “Damn it’s easy to push your buttons, Blue Ro—”

“What is going on here!”

The boyish shout came from Jei Su Long who was now standing above us on the top of the mesa. He glared at me and Blue Rose and then let out a harrumph.

“I might have known that it was the coward and the cripple,” he said with disdain. “You two would do well to not draw my attention. I do not suffer weakness lightly.”

I glared at the blue-haired kid but didn’t say anything, anger burning deep in my soul. The little prick hadn’t given me an opportunity to flex my muscle yet and the false first impression I had given him was starting to get old.

He waved it in my face every chance he got, however.

The same with Blue Rose and her leg.

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I glowered inwardly, Frenzy trickling from my Flame.

But satisfying as it was to loath the guy, I was going to need a heck of a lot more than a trickle of Frenzy to meet my goals. An idea suddenly popped into my head. I needed to start steering this ship in the direction I needed it to go if I wanted to advance.

And he had just given me an opening.

“Commander,” I said with a half-hearted bow. “Perhaps Blue Rose and I can prove our worthiness to you. Let us fight an awaken spirit beast. I know how to find one.”

He scoffed again. “I wouldn’t trust you two to be able to do anything. It is lucky we haven’t found anything as yet or you may as well be dead.”

I couldn’t tell if it was bravado or bullshit, but I was getting sick and tired of both. “You know, Commander, I used to be a handler from a world with a Bloodmoon like this one. I know how to find Awakened Spirit Beasts. If you’ll allow me, I’ll lead us to a creature that will put as right at the top of the rank—”

“I care not what you have to say!” Jei Su Long snapped. “Your past means nothing. Your opinion means nothing. You mean nothing.” He then widened his gaze to take in all three of us. “You are all criminals. Lower even than slaves. The fact that you are even given the privilege of being led by one such as I… is insulting.” He then looked away and mumbled. “The sooner I am done with this ridiculous chore of minding you feral dogs the better.”

Anger flared within me.

I wanted to break every bone in his arrogant little cultivator neck, but the Struggler kept me at bay.

Don’t do it, he whispered to me. Just play the game.

Jei Su Long then spat on the ground in front of us, as if to give his final verdict on our collective net worth in his eyes. I was just about to break free from my chains when Jei Su Long suddenly snatched the letter from Tu’lok’s hand.

“And what is this?”

Ah shit… I thought.

Jei Su Long studied it with narrowing eyes and frowned once he reached the end.

“Whose letter is this?” He stared at Tu’lok. “Yours?”

“No, Comman—”

“It’s mine,” I said standing, not giving a shit anymore. “And I didn’t give you permission to read it either.”

Jei Su Long’s mouth fell open in disbelief.

“You dare address This One in such a tone?!”

Maybe it was the letter putting me in a bad mood to start off with or Jei Su Long’s arrogant display of superiority just now, but the Struggler finally lost the battle. I suddenly couldn’t bring myself to give a shit about who Jei Su Long was anymore. The blue haired twerp reminded me every bit of Hein, even worse than him in his arrogance and pride.

And now here he was, standing in the way of my progression. I needed a hundred times more Frenzy than what I had now and this little asshole was stopping me from earning it. And all because he thought we were worthless pieces of shit in his eyes.

“Yeah, I dare,” I said vaulting to the top of the mesa to land before him.

A spike of fear jolted through his soul as he backed away, but then just as quickly, his arrogant cultivator nature kicked in and he screamed back at me.

“Insolence!”

His hand came swiftly and for a moment I considered letting it hit me with [Indifference] but suddenly I’d had enough. I caught his wrist like a vice, pouring on the Frenzy and his eyes widened with shock at the imposition of my strength.

“Hey,” I said coolly with [Struggler’s Resolve]. “Don’t let the color of these robes fool you. They were Black long before there were Brown or White… you get me?”

I backed up my words with [Fear the Flame] and his cultivator façade cracked before me, his young soul trembled internally as I bombarded him with eldritch powers his mind couldn’t understand. The entire platoon was on their feet and looking at us now and I could sense the fear and apprehension within their souls as well.

I sucked it all up and finally pushed Jei Su Longs hand aside.

It was time to stop playing to this asshole’s pace and set my own tempo.

I had nine months to get back to Fia and earning nothing wasn’t going to cut it.

“Who here is tired of going home empty handed each day?” I bellowed with [Struggler’s Resolve]. “Who here wants gain top rank for cultivation rewards and ascent to the next realm?”

“W-what are you doing?” Jei Su Long said, glancing about as if expecting every White Robe to suddenly turn into an assassin and run him through the back.

The transformation was startling.

From overconfident fake commander to stuttering teenage boy.

I had him on the ropes, but luckily for him, assassination wasn’t my goal today.

“I said who wants to get some damn cores?!”

Again silence and tension.

Then suddenly a shout came from behind.

“I do!” Blue Rose said as she stepped forward to join me, lemonade filling her soul. “And I’m sure the rest of you do as well! Speak up! Let the Commander hear so he knows what we want!”

Her words caused the fear in their hearts to subside and murmurs began to break throughout the ranks.

“I want to advance!”

“Yes, of course we all do!”

“Why haven’t we found anything yet?”

“I heard 8th Platoon has farmed three cores already!”

I leaned forward to Jei Su Long to whisper in his ear.

“You hear that?” I said. “That’s the sound of discontent. If you want it to get even worse, keep doing what you’re doing by jerking us around and finding us nothing. We’re not here to get a fancy Merit badge sponsored by mommy and daddy like you, understand? We’re here to work for our pay.”

I sensed it within him then.

True fear in his heart.

I was calling his bullshit and he knew it.

“Now look here,” I continued. “I meant what I said about being a handler. I can and will find us an Awakened Spirit beast to kill. But I’m going to do you the extra favor of leaving the decision to you so you can save face in front of your men. Right now, you’re looking pretty damn weak in their eyes.”

His blue eyes met my gaze, squinting as anger pushed through the fear in his soul. “Who in the hells are you?”

“Doesn’t matter,” I said. “Are you going to do it or not? Or shall I spur this into a full-blown mutiny by bringing in an awakened beast on my own accord? Show them all just how inept you are. I’m sure Chief Instructor Yora won’t be pleased about that. You might not even get your jade trim.”

He grimaced. “You’ll pay for this.”

“Maybe,” I said as I backed away from him. “But not today. Today this is all on you.”

He fumed impotently in front of me, his soul stewing in its own juices of hate. Then a streak of malevolence filled his eyes. “We’ll see about that.”

He then turned to face the rest of the platoon.

“I have made a decision!” Jei Su Long shouted. “This Cowardly One claims to know how to find an Awakened Spirit beast for us to kill. I will, for our amusement, entertain this fool to see if he utters the truth or not.” He then turned to me. “Go on then Bull Man, show us how its done. And if you fail, you can be assured that you will suffer a great punishment for this show of insolence and deceit.”

It was then his turn to lean forward and whisper.

“You need not worry about what was in that letter,” he said. “I will see to it that you will struggle to return from the battlefield this day much less to earn even a chance to do so as a legionnaire in the future. Do you get me?”

I grimaced as I accepted the challenge, my Flame filling with Frenzy.

“Sounds like a deal.”

* * *

I got to it right away.

I started by breaking the platoon down into sections.

“Who here is Low Tier Core Realm?”

About a quarter put up their hands.

“Move to the side,” I said. “Mid-tier?”

About half of them identified themselves.

Looking at who was left it was Blue Rose, myself and three others as High-Tiers.

“Alright,” I said. “We need to harvest bait first. Low Tiers, that will be your job. You won’t be much use against the Awakened Beast, so you can help by allowing the higher tier cultivators to conserve their strength for the big fight. Any fliers with ranged techniques?”

Four tributes raised their hands.

“You four will be a major source of damage,” I said. “You’ll also be needed to attract the beast’s attention to take the heat off the mid-tier cultivators if need be. High tiers will tackle the beast head on. Mid-Tiers will attack from the flank and rear. With the amount of us, it shouldn’t be too hard. Any questions?”

Everyone shook their heads and then I looked to Jei Su Long. “Commander?”

He harrumphed. “Do as he says. Commence.”

We left the mesa and I took us north towards the academy. It was still just early afternoon, but I didn’t know how long things might take to happen and I didn’t want to be caught too far from home if the operation ran into Bloodmoon time.

Plus, I had to worry about Jei Su Long himself now.

I didn’t sense he had the balls to put any action behind his words, but an opportunist was an opportunist. We kept up our speed to avoid triggering Takrid traps as we raced across the barren wilds of the desert. I kept a look out for tell-tale signs of our prey as I did so.

One of the books I had read through at the library was on the local fauna. It was somewhat akin to the handler manuals back home, save it wasn’t nearly as diverse or comprehensive. Perhaps that was as a result of most of the native species being killed off by the demons or mutated by the Bloodmoon after all this time, but there was enough information in there to give me a heads up on the food chain.

My target was something called a Pythor, which was basically a giant tortoise the size of a house with a spiked shell and the neck and head of a cobra. From what I had gathered from the book it was a mid-tier spirit beast, perhaps the local equivalent of a B class. They burrowed under the sand in the dune like areas and fed infrequently, but their favorite prey was a type of sandworm called Belek that resembled thirty-foot-long moral eels.

We killed a couple of Takrids on the way to the more sandy areas of the desert and I extracted their scent organs to use of lures for the Balek. Once we reached the edge of the dunes, the desert-proper stretched out before is like a roiling sea of sand. I had the Low-Tier team get to work spreading the scent the Takrid guts to attract the Balek.

It didn’t take long for the first one to appear, the long grey skinned creature moving like a serpent through the sand as easily as if it were water. The team of eight Low-Tiers made short work of the first one, as well as the next four that arrived.

We then moved location, closer to a large cliff face where the book said Pythor were likely to burrow against. I then went to work filleting the Balek into long strips of bloody meat.

“You actually seem to know what you’re doing,” Blue Rose said, looking over my shoulder as I cut into the last Balek. “You sure this will work though?”

I shrugged. “Hopefully.”

Blue Rose glanced back as Jei Su Long where he was studying me from afar. “Hope you’re right. He seems itching for you to fail.”

I pushed the thought aside as I seeded the sand just below the cliff face with the Balek carcasses. Once done we then retreated to a ridge midway up the cliff that was about thirty feet off the ground and then took another break as we waited.

It was mid-afternoon now and I was growing conscious of the time.

After a whole hour went by with no action, I began to grow nervous.

The bastard Jei Su Long seemed delighted.

He came to stand next to me to gloat. “So, you see now that it is not as easy as you think. And for all your silly tricks we wasted time on, they do nothing. Useless, just like you.”

I kept my poker face with [Indifference], keeping my head straight as I responded. “Every day is a fishing day but not every day is a catching day.”

“Spoken like the true native bumpkin you are.”

I looked down at the Balek corpses now baking in the desert sun.

I didn’t get it wrong, did I? I thought, beginning to doubt myself. Those eels things were what those turtle things ate, right?

No, I was sure of it.

I had gotten it right.

I was just about to call for moving spots when a Tribute at the far end of the ledge suddenly called out.

“I see something! It’s huge!”

I grinned inwardly as I stood to my feet. “About damn tim—”

I stopped short when I saw what it was.

There, making its way rapidly across the dunes towards us was a familiar creature the size of a jumbo jet.

Oh shit…

“A Jolup?!” Jei Su Long said next to me, his eye wide with fear.

I too knew the name for it now—the giant Komodo dragon looking beast that devoured Ku Ren whole. If Pythors were a B Class then this was definitely an A or S. And awakened to boot, by the size of it. Absently, I wondered if it were even the same one.

“You damn idiot!” Jei Su Long shouted. “You’ve summoned a Jolup here to kill us!”

The rest of the White Robes were on their feet in alarm.

Panic broke out as fear poured from their souls.

“Think it can reach us from up here!”

“Can we kill it?”

“Only Black Robes can kill a Jolup! We need to run!”

“It’s too late to run! We’re trapped up here!”

“Gods damn it, Bull Man!”

As the world fell into chaos around me a single thought crystalized within my mind.

If this is what the Flame has summoned for me, then so be it.

I drew my Axe and Glaive and prepared to face the creature, [Odds Against Me] for sure.

“Run if you like,” I said with [Struggler’s Resolve]. “But as for me, I’m getting done what we came for.”

Silence fell as they all looked at me like I was crazy.

And by the thoughts now running through my mind, I probably was.

I didn’t know if I was ready to take on something like this, but I didn’t care. I needed to advance and the Frenzy the thing was causing my Flame to produce was unreal.

The Jolup was nearly to us, mere seconds away as its body snaked back and forth, kicking up sand as it let loose an ear-piercing hiss from its jaws. More Tributes cried out in panic, trying to flee by scrambling further up the cliff wall.

I couldn’t care.

I cycled the Frenzy now bursting from my Flame as I prepare to jump from the cliff.

“This one’s for you, Kou Ren,” I whispered and then leapt towards the snarling jaws of the Jolup with a smile on my face.

It was finally happy hunting time.

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