> ◇ Soulcore required to use Skill Nexus Gateway.
Kael looked at the glowing text in front of him, the pale light casting shadows on the bloody snow. The words hung there, cold and unmovable, mocking him for trying to escape.
He had spent the last few minutes experinting, holding various Ravager soul cores and trying to activate the sa mysterious force that had pulled him into the Nexus.
But each attempt ended in failure.
It took a single E rank soul core to open a pathway here, so why did it demand so much more to leave?
He wasn't missing the irony—this place was a trap, one that lured in the desperate with promises of power and glory, then demanded blood and strength in return.
His fingers closed around itself as he clutched a fist.
"Fine," he muttered. "If this place thinks it can trap , it's wrong. I'll find a way out, and when I do..." Kael breathed out, the thought trailing off. He looked toward the distant settlent, its jagged walls piercing the snowy mist.
The wind slapped at his face as he walked, the only sound the crunch of his boots in the empty space.
---
The closer Kael got, the more the settlent ca into focus. The walls weren't big—they were makeshift. A patchwork of rusted tal, scavenged stone, and warped wood, held together with crude nails and fraying rope.
The gates ahead were crooked and mismatched, flanked by two guards who looked more like scavengers than sentries. Kael's eyes scanned them, noting the ill-fitting armor and chipped weapons.
These n weren't here to protect anyone—they were the gatekeepers of suffering, deciding who could enter and who would be left to die in the cold.
"New blood," one of them said, eyeing Kael with a mix of curiosity and amusent. "You look like you've been put through the wringer. First ti in the Nexus?"
Kael didn't reply. He kept walking, his face blank.
The guard stepped in front of him, his hand on the hilt of a rusty sword. "Hey, I'm talking to you."
The other guard laughed. "Let him be, Rorik. He's already been through hell."
Rorik hesitated, then shrugged and stepped aside. "Fine. Go on in. Don't say I didn't warn you—this place eats the weak alive."
Kael walked through the gates without a word. The air changed imdiately, the biting cold replaced by the stench of decay and smoke.
---
The settlent was chaos made flesh. Ramshackle buildings leaned against each other like dead bodies, their walls held together with whatever scraps they could find.
The streets were rough, littered with trash and mud. Fires burned in old barrels, their weak flas casting shadows on gaunt faces of hunger and fear.
Kael walked through the crowd, no one really noticing him. Everyone here was too busy surviving—trading scraps of food, haggling over stolen goods, or glaring at potential threats. It was a hierarchy of cruelty, where the strong preyed on the weak, and the weak prayed to be invisible.
His mind worked as he took it all in. This wasn't just any place—it was a furnace, designed to burn away everything until only the strongest were left.
---
Kael's thoughts turned inward as he walked through the settlent, piecing together what he knew of this hellhole.
The Nexus made no sense, an endless space where countless worlds overlapped. It wasn't one world, but many, stacked on top of each other like layers of a tower.
Each layer, or Reach, was a self-contained universe, getting more deadly the deeper you went.
The First Reach, where Kael was now, was the outermost layer—a Blight-tainted wasteland of low-tier Ravagers and settlents like this one. It was a testing ground, where the strong survived and the weak didn't.
Advancent required passing Reach Trials, brutal tests that were as much about ntal toughness as physical strength. Success granted access to the next Reach, and rewards like soul cores, Etherion artifacts, and forbidden knowledge.
Failure ant death—or worse.
Ravagers were the lifeblood of the Nexus, monstrous creatures that road the Reaches and bled power in the form of soul cores. These crystalline fragnts were everything here: currency, fuel, and power. But not everyone could use them.
There were many ways to use a core, but for Kael, his ability to use them was based on his Void Resonance—a asure of his bond to the Null...to sothing ancient. That asure determined how much power he could tap into those forces.
Kael's Void Resonance was still low, barely Level 2, but he could feel it growing with every core he took. The Blightborne core had been a threshold, unlocking a strength he hadn't felt since his past life.
But power wasn't enough. To leave the Nexus, to get back to his world, he needed an A Rank soul core—a rarity even here—or he'd need to clear a Reach.
The Nexus was a cage; but also a crucible. And those who let it mold them beco unstoppable.
---
Kael's thoughts were interrupted by a commotion up ahead. A group had ford a circle, shouting and jeering as two n fought in the center. One was young, skinny, and desperate. The other was older, bigger, and far more experienced.
The fight was over quickly, the older man driving a blade into the younger's chest with a grueso thud. The crowd dispersed as the winner started looting the body, stripping it of valuables before kicking it aside.
The man looked at Kael and scowled. "What's your problem?" he asked, his tone nasty. "Want to join him?"
Kael said nothing, his face blank. He kept walking into the settlent.
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