The stench of iron and fear clung to the air, thick and cloying like a shroud of damp earth. It seeped into Thane’s clothes, coated his tongue, and permeated every breath he took. Veridia, The Shattered Realm, was no stranger to death, but this… this was an ocean of it. “This is the Grimshard Hold,” Kael muttered, his voice raspy, a low growl of frustration. He wiped a hand across his brow, leaving a streak of grime and sweat. “An ancient citadel of the Ashfall Clans, infamous for its unyielding defenses.” His gaze swept over the battle-scarred landscape beyond the city walls. “Only the Dominion, in its full, unforgiving might, could have cracked its ancient wards in just ten days.” Thane, standing a few paces away, did not reply immediately. He simply observed, his eyes tracing the jagged fissures in the formidable outer wall, the dark scorch marks that spoke of potent arcane bombardments. He heard the pride in Kael’s voice, the faint tremor of triumph, but all Thane could register was the cost. “We breached it,” he finally said, his own voice a low, even murmur, “but so many perished in the doing.” Kael scoffed, a dry, dismissive sound. “It’s all fate, Thane. The turning of the great wheel.” He gestured vaguely at the mangled forms littering the ground. “Don’t be so maudlin. Their lives mean little. As long as we shatter the Ashfall Clans, any sacrifice is worth it for the Dominion. The High Throne demands it.” A chilling, almost jovial laugh escaped him, his perspective as sharp and indifferent as a newly honed blade. Thane felt a cold knot tighten in his gut. He was burdened by this proximity to death, a constant companion that whispered promises and threats. He was, however, profoundly grateful for his assignment. The Reclamation Corps. Better here, clearing the grim detritus of war, than out there, among the fallen. A shudder, almost imperceptible, ran through him. He could have been one of them, another nameless husk bleeding out on the mud. He closed his eyes for a moment, the image of his own vitality ebbing away, a stark reminder of his purpose. He opened his eyes, scanning the sprawl of bodies. Outside the fractured gates of Grimshard Hold lay countless Dominion Vanguard, the elite soldiers of the Empire. Most had been felled by the scything hails of barbed arrows, their dark armor pin-cushioned with shafts. Others were crushed into pulpy, unrecognizable masses, victims of the Ashfall Clan’s monstrous Goliath Catapults. The scale of the brutality, the sheer, senseless waste of life, was a hundredfold worse than the skirmishes he’d witnessed on the outlying borders, where the Blight’s creatures often did the gruesome work. Even with the fragments of resilience and vigor he had painstakingly absorbed, the gifts of the recently deceased, Thane knew he would have stood no chance against such an onslaught. An endless volley of arrows, a crushing stone from a Goliath, a blast of chaotic magic – any one of them would have snuffed out his borrowed flame. The thought solidified his resolve. Survival was paramount. He had to remain hidden, blend into the shadows, and let his unique ability be his silent shield. The Reclamation Corps was the perfect sanctuary. For his two years of service, this was where he would plant his roots, gathering what he could, remaining beneath the notice of those who wielded power and spilled blood so freely. A sudden commotion at the rear of their lines drew his attention. A figure in black, obsidian-dark battle armor, rode forward, flanked by several hundred mounted warriors. The thud of hooves on the ravaged earth resonated in Thane's chest. The general’s cavalry were arrayed with a rigid discipline that spoke of a commander of significant standing. “All soldiers of the Reclamation Corps, listen up!” The voice, though amplified by some subtle arcane enhancement, was surprisingly clear, cutting through the low murmur of the weary troops. “Grimshard Hold has been pacified! Our First Iron Legion are pursuing the routed Ashfall clansmen beyond the eastern plains. Your task is now to clear Grimshard Hold and its environs!” “If there are any wounded on the battlefield,” the voice continued, unwavering, “transport them immediately to the Blight-Ward for treatment! You have five days to cleanse this ground, soldiers!” Thane instinctively looked towards the source of the command. From a distance, the black-armored warlord seemed slender, almost impossibly so for such a command. A faint, ethereal glow, perhaps a trick of the fading light, seemed to outline their fair face, and their voice, while commanding, had a peculiar timbre to it. It was subtly off, a whisper of something not quite right. A flicker of realization, cold and stark, ignited in Thane’s mind. That was a woman, plain as the bloodstains on the earth. Was everyone else truly blind? He turned to Kael, confusion warring with a morbid fascination. “Women can become generals in the Dominion?” he asked, his voice barely audible above the shuffling of feet and the distant cries of the wounded. Kael stared at him, his brow furrowed in genuine bewilderment. “What do you mean, a woman becoming a general?” Thane gave him an odd look, a weary sigh escaping him. “Kael, can you truly not tell, or are you simply pretending not to?” His gaze flicked back towards the Marshal, who was now dismounting, her movements precise and deliberate. “That general is clearly a woman.” Kael’s eyes widened, his expression utterly dumbfounded. “She’s a woman? No. Impossible.” “Forget it,” Thane murmured, dismissing the conversation. It wasn’t just blindness; it was a willful, almost cult-like ignorance. Some truths were too inconvenient for the Dominion’s rigid social order. Kael, however, leaned closer, lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Thane, watch what you say. Look at the cavalry surrounding the general. Their battle armor bears the markings of trusted aides, and every one of them holds a noble rank of the third level or higher. That proves the general’s status is anything but low. She must be a Deputy General under the Main Marshal, or perhaps even someone from the Grand Strategist’s personal retinue.” “Right, right,” Thane acknowledged, nodding absently. He no longer focused on the general. Her gender, her rank, her secrets – none of it had anything to do with him. His path was one of quiet survival, not the grand ambitions of warlords. After issuing her orders, the Marshal, Kaelen, quickly led her personal guard and galloped into the city, leaving a faint dust cloud in her wake and a lingering echo of her authority. “Kael, I’m taking some men to move the bodies,” Thane stated, turning to address his unit. “Brothers! Thirty of you, get the carts. The rest of you, come with me!” Compared to a few days ago, Thane was now a platoon leader, commanding fifty souls. The promotion, a grim reward for surviving, meant he no longer needed to waste precious time hauling carts himself. He could now focus entirely on the silent, macabre harvest of his ability. “Yes, sir!” The fifty soldiers replied in a ragged, tired unison, their voices lacking the usual martial enthusiasm, but full of grim obedience. Thane wasted no time. He moved swiftly, a shadow among shadows, and rushed onto the ravaged battlefield. The first body he approached was that of a young Dominion Vanguard, his face frozen in a rictus of shock and agony, a barbed arrow protruding from his throat. Thane knelt, his gloved hand reaching out, making deliberate, lingering contact. The familiar, cold hum began, a siphoning sensation. A whisper of something abstract and vital flowed into him. *Successfully absorbed: 1 point of Lifespan.* A sweet reward. Among all the fragments he could absorb – raw strength, nimble speed, enduring constitution, clarity of spirit – a fragment of extended years, a whisper of sustained existence, was the rarest, the most coveted. Strength and speed were abundant, readily found in the bodies of warriors, but the essence of time itself… that was a true boon. A good start, Thane thought, a rare, almost imperceptible curl of his lips. Let’s keep going. He moved the body, gently, onto an awaiting ox cart. The corpses outside the city were all Dominion Vanguard, their identities to be preserved, their bodies to be handled with a semblance of reverence, unlike the desecrated forms of the Ashfall Clansmen. He moved to another soldier, a common footman. *Touching an ordinary soldier.* The transfer was quick, a subtle surge. *Successfully absorbed: 1 point of Speed. Successfully absorbed: 1 point of Strength.* Thane moved tirelessly, a ghost among the fallen, his hands brushing cold flesh, his mind focused, his senses keen, absorbing fragments of what remained. Each touch was a quiet, morbid communion, a silent promise of his own continued existence. He did not linger in morbid curiosity, but neither did he rush. The process, the system, required a lingering contact, a quiet, morbid communion of at least five deep breaths. He found a Dominion Centurion, a man whose armor bore the marks of many battles, now riddled with a half-dozen arrows. His hand settled on the Centurion’s breastplate. *Touching a Dominion Centurion. Successfully absorbed: 5 points of Strength.* A more substantial draught of brute force, a ripple of raw might flowed into him, a silent inheritance from the dead. “Sigh, all human lives…” Thane murmured, the words barely escaping his lips, a weary exhalation. A pang, a ghost of something akin to pity, stirred in his chest. “Rest in peace,” he whispered, his voice lost in the groans of the wounded and the distant din of burial preparations. He moved the body onto the ox cart, then continued his grim work. Further on, near the shattered remnants of a siege tower, he encountered a Dominion Prefect, distinguishable by the intricate engravings on his gauntlets and the higher quality of his mail. The man lay broken, crushed beneath fallen timber, a testament to the chaos that had reigned. Thane made contact, his gaze somber. *Touching a Dominion Prefect. Successfully absorbed: 10 points of Strength, 10 points of Speed.* A bountiful collection, a significant influx of both formidable strength and blinding speed, enough to make his muscles hum with borrowed power. Rank, Thane mused, means nothing against a hail of arrows or a crushing beam. It all comes down to fate, or lack thereof. A Prefect, once commanding a thousand souls, now just another corpse. That’s why being alive, clinging to this precious, fragile existence, is what truly matters. Power was tempting, a siren’s call in this brutal realm, but life was undeniably more valuable. The Dominion's grand unification under the High Throne, its boundless ambition, was a monumental achievement, yet who truly remembered the countless, nameless soldiers who died to forge it? No wonder they said that the glory of a single warlord was etched in the blood of ten thousand. Moving the body of yet another high-ranking officer, Thane felt even more wistful. The fragments of forgotten knowledge from a life in a world utterly unlike this one granted him a perspective on this bloody battlefield that surpassed anyone else in this age. He would never sacrifice himself for a king’s ambition, never sell his life cheaply for someone else’s glory. He only wanted to live for himself, to navigate the treacherous currents of Veridia. If he hadn’t been conscripted, dragged into this meat grinder, he would never have set foot on such a battlefield. *I have to get stronger,* he vowed internally, the thought a burning ember in his weary soul. *Only by becoming so powerful that no one can kill me will I be truly safe. Once all my core attributes cross the thousand-point threshold, I should become practically unkillable. I can’t even imagine the level of power I’ll wield at that point.* He quickened his pace, the urgency of his survival driving him forward, past the rows of solemn, working soldiers. The three thousand soldiers of the Reclamation Corps worked with grim efficiency to clear the battlefield. In less than half a day, the vast, gory expanse outside the city walls was mostly cleared. The bodies of nearly ten thousand elite Dominion Vanguard had all been carefully transported away. The other seven thousand logistics soldiers were already busy, digging mass graves, constructing solemn tombs, a task that would take days. Everything proceeded in an orderly, if somber, fashion. Being a platoon leader really was a godsend. It saved him the grueling time of hauling a cart back and forth, allowing him to maximize his morbid harvest. In just half a day, he had collected well over five hundred attribute points. “Open Attribute Panel,” Thane commanded silently, a ripple of energy flowing through him as the ethereal display shimmered into existence before his mind’s eye. **Thane – Vessel of Lost Vigor** **Strength:** 458 (The higher the Strength, the greater the raw force that can be unleashed.) **Speed:** 312 (The higher the number, the greater the agility and swiftness.) **Constitution:** 265 (The stronger the Constitution, the faster injuries heal and the more endless the stamina.) **Spirit:** 268 (The stronger the Spirit, the clearer the mind and the greater the ability to sense Veridia’s subtle arcane currents.) **Lifespan:** 86 years and 108 days **Portable Space:** 2 Cubic Meters He sighed, a weary exhalation. *I’ve mostly absorbed Strength,* he noted, a detached observation. *It’s almost five hundred now. Can’t they be a little more balanced?* He mentally chided himself. Complaining about the very gifts that sustained his life was a luxury he couldn't afford.

A Harvest of Despair