Thirty-Eight

"How is it I'm the one always covered in gore at the end of this?" Kon asked as he rooted around the chest cavity of the monster. His shoulder was wedged against a bone and the warm organs slithered under his hands, a hot pressure that he was sure he'd be scrubbing out from under his fingernails for days.

"You are best suited for it. Longer arms," Diur said from her perch on top of one of the beasts. She cut a striking figure with the hot wind blowing her robes around her muscular figure, hair snapping in the breeze as she held a bloody sword in one hand, a conqueror surveying her conquests.

"I killed more of them." Kon grimaced at the unfair thought as he finally grasped the monster core, the vibrant energy much hotter than the slowly cooling innards. It was trivial to hold back from consuming it, but the temptation was still there.

"I used an anti-material rifle while she used a sword. Some cool techniques though." Diur had showcased what her slow weeks of practice had honed into a deadly edge. She had managed to launch devastating attacks from a distance, her sword shaping the energy to send it slicing forth, shearing through muscle and meat like it was paper.

"That sword thing you did, I've seen you do it before, but it was better this time," Kon said as he got to his feet and tossed the bloody core into the pile with the rest of the cores.

"It's simply a blade lengthening technique that I have managed to adjust to allow me to cast it at a distance. I am content with my current mastery of it, but will seek to further adjust it as I find my own path to walk. Body cultivation will likely force me to change how I will manage the technique, but that is a headache for later," Diur said, hopping down from the corpse to land lightly next to him.

"Benny said he's found a few of the appropriate treasures on the moon for the two of us, but not all of them," Kon said as they looked around the battlefield. The death of the first wave of E-Grade monsters had seemed to trigger an avalanche of the monster which had poured forth from a nearby rift. Benny had said the guardian was beyond them and had disappeared for a few moments only to reappear with a core that radiated power that rivaled some of the D-Grade cores that Alice had taken on Crucible.

"I am sure he has ways to secure the rest of our needs. But I believe you have a rune to implant?" Diur said, staring at him as Kon sighed and settled down next to the pile of E-Grade stones. It didn't take a mathematician to figure out his growth required more and more energy, the last time the F-Grade stones had hardly budged the needle to gather the required energy needed to form a rune.

"To gather rift energy," Kon said, drawing the fragment on the ground in front of him from memory. It was one of the more advanced runes he'd seen so far, aside from the full-runes, but Benny had begun to teach him the secrets to reading them. There was a series of harsh cuts above the center of the rune that Benny had said represented energy rather than just absorb.

"Hey, Diur?" Kon asked as he stared at the lines, a thought popping into his head.

"Do you have a bad idea again?" Diur asked as she leaned against one of the monster's corpses, its fallen form rising up and above her.

"What's the difference between rift energy that we cultivate, and say, like light, or heat or stuff like that?" Kon asked. He couldn't take his eyes off the lines that represented rift energy.

"I don't know. I suppose it exists on a different wavelength to the others? Or maybe it is the primordial soup of the galaxy, leaking between the pores for us to absorb?" Diur said, chuckling slightly as she said it.

"Was that from one of your plays?" Kon teased her and she had at least the good graces to look abashed.

"It was an epic romance that took two years to tell fully," Diur mumbled under her breath before shrugging and continuing.

"There are many schools of thought about what it truly is and why it's different from other forms, but I am not knowledgeable enough to discuss it in a robust manner," Diur finally concluded.

"Damn." Kon stared at the lines that represented the different lines of energy and how Benny had told him they were like restrictor plates, preventing the other types of energy from entering. He gently wiped them away from the dirt drawing.

"You're doing something dumb, aren't you," Diur said, sighing as she watched him.

"My processing rune, when I built it, impressed my intent upon it, my intent was to filter energy. All energy. I should be able to do this," Kon said as he stared at the rune, thinking it over as fast as he could.

"Did you discuss it with Benny?" Diur asked. Kon wasn't listening anymore, his mind firmly locked on the idea about absorbing all types of energy and filtering them.

"What's a cultivator's greatest weakness?" Kon asked.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"A well timed sudden explosive," Diur said instantly. Kon sighed and shook his head.

"Space. There are no rifts in space. You bleed energy like you can't imagine and I can't regather anything I use. But with this, I could pull in light or heat and replenish myself," Kon said. Their recent trips had been frustrating as he slowly weakened due to not being able to replenish himself.

"No other Knight has thought of this or tried to make it happen? Surely this can not be an original thought?" Diur said, trying to slow him down as Kon started to visualize what he needed. His original plan had been to place the rune at the base of his throat, to gather energy with every breath and send it to his processing rune to filter it out. Now he was thinking about his skin, the movement of the wind, the warmth of the sun, everything that touched him could be drawn in and filtered to fuel him.

"No one has had the advantages I have. Even before the body cultivation I absorbed energy like no one else. At least that's what you and Alice say. Said.," Kon corrected himself as his hand started to inch over toward the pile of E-Grade stones.

"I think you should bring this to your mentor. He's there for a reason," Diur urged.

"She's right. I am here for a reason," Benny said, appearing next to her as if he'd always been there.

"You listen to all of that?" Kon asked.

"Yeah. Was here the entire time. Just didn't want to be bothered," Benny said as he leaned towards Kon and then with the toe of his boot added a new line.

"If you had gone your way it would have been constant absorption. As bottomless as well as you think you are, you'd get full eventually and then splatter everywhere," Benny explained. The change to the rune was discreet, but Kon had enough of an understanding to puzzle out how the placement would restrict access to the funnel like shape of the rune.

"I can do it then?" Kon asked.

"I'm technically your master, but if I stopped every dumb idea kids had, I'd have no time to figure anything else out. Worst case scenario I prevent you from blowing up," Benny said.

"Could you?" Kon asked.

"You're still weaker than me. It's harder to change things like this physical things, but not as hard as reality warping. Changing the air into cotton candy would be nearly impossible," Benny said.

"What's cotton candy?" Kon and Diur asked together. Benny ignored them as Kon looked over the rune that Benny had helped him with.

"Will the energy I absorb refill my runes?" Kon asked as he stared at it.

"Doubt it. But it could help with the other stuff. Especially if you have the appropriate runes to complement the energy type," Benny said. The old man didn't say the word mage out loud but Kon thought he understood him.

"My favorite theory on rift energy is that it is the primordial soup. It's the basis of all life, what came before this all started. Rifts are just merely doorways filled with that energy given form, molded around physical objects on this side of the veil," Benny said. He leaned down and drew a circle, and then another circle barely larger around it, and then finally the biggest circle of them all that completely dwarfed the other two circles.

"Biggest circle is the realm from which we call rift energy emerges from. My theory is that there is nothing physical here, a realm of just chaotic energy floating about. This middle circle is the veil or guard or whatever you want to call it and that is what separates up from this other realm. Smallest circle is the physical world, our galaxy."

"And rifts are the doorways between us?" Kon asked, suddenly pulled into the conversation.

"Yes and no. The outer realm is full of energy but infinite. It's all balanced out, perfectly spaced out since there are no physical impediments. Issue is our physical space has impediments and living creatures," Benny said, energetic in his sudden desire to share his theories.

"The world likes balance. So when too much of our energy builds up, specifically where there's lots of living beings emanating constant energy, then there's a buildup on the other side. A rift opens as the worlds try to balance. Matter is trapped in the rift, charged and shaped by the primordial energy and released again."

"Who believes this?" Kon asked.

"Not as many people as there should be. When I was younger I used to like entering rifts and trying to break through them, to see if there was something on the other side."

"What would happen?" Diur asked.

"The rift would pop like a balloon and I'd be left on the planet I entered," Benny said. Kon tuned him out and let his mind think, piecing together the story Benny had told him just a few weeks ago about how humanity had travelled across vast distances.

"This is how he thinks we did it. We ripped holes in the veil with rift energy and runes and crossed the distance that way."

"This would explain the density of the energy around a rift-treasure then. It is a condensed portion of the outer realm attempting to balance the scales. Then this brings us to another question, the rift beasts aren't formed in the rifts then?" Diur said, having kept the conversation going while Kon thought.

"YES! When the rifts form they're undetectable but they bring in a bunch of physical matter and that is mutated due to the energy inside of them as the treasure forms. When the treasure finishes forming is when the other side seals itself off since it's now balanced and the rift opens up," Benny explained.

"That is an interesting theory. I am sure others more learned than I would be able to offer you more enlightened commentary," Diur said.

"You're no fun. Having people fall into the rabbit hole with me is half the joy of having crazy conspiracies. Though, I do give this one slightly more credit than some of my other theories," Benny said. Kon looked up at the old man through his eyelashes as he pretended to study the altered rune.

"You're not fooling me. I know you're game. This is what you think the world really is, no measure of false humility will convince me otherwise."

"That brings me back to my point. What will all the energy I absorb be doing?" Kon asked. Benny scratched at his chin and looked back at Kon before smiling further.

"We might have to change a few plans," Benny said ominously.

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