Northern spent quite a while in his soul scape; even after he was done mapping out, he wanted to get a total number of souls that resided there.
Which shockingly were a lot. Northern, since he gained the soul world ability of the Void, had killed over ten thousand monsters!
It was really shocking to him.
And these were monsters that had died by his sword alone. The ones that died by the hands of his Void summons were not included. They consumed the soul of whatever they killed and rendered its core to him as talent fragments.
So, the monsters in the Limitless Void could only be put there by him alone.
Which made the realization that he had killed by his own hands over ten thousand monsters appalling.
The souls that were ushered in by Soul Taker's demise were not accounted for in that ten thousand. And the total souls that were liberated were about a thousand, with a hundred of them being Tomb Kings.
Northern was not also sure what that was yet, but he suspected that they were the kings and legends of the old era, the dispensation of time that was not recorded in history. Probably because of how far back they dated or because of someone's intentionality.
Whichever, his soul scape was larger than he usually surmised and he had more than enough hands to erect the magnificent edifice of the forge-even in the searing heat of the volcano.
The three humans definitely did not have it easy. Monsters at the very least would have built and still over time build some semblance of resistance by being exposed over time.
But humans, their skin was so fragile. Being a Drifter could have helped increase its durability, but it was still a far cry from a monster's durability.
After returning, Northern spent a few minutes sleeping. The talent fragments were still flowing in, although slowed and inconsistent with sometimes ten, twenty minutes between.
Which meant their battle in the dungeon was getting tougher. His summons were getting closer to the depth of the dungeon where they would have to defeat the twentieth floor boss.
This time, he had no interest in helping them; he was also sure that they would win. All twelve of them were more than enough.
During lunch, Northern heard something shocking. Aster came to him, sitting beside him with his plate of grilled steak and veggies.
He did not bother glancing at the food; immediately he turned to Northern and said:
"Did you hear about it? The second team to come out of the rift."
Northern's eyes twitched a little bit. He then tried to hide his interest with a straight look on his face.
"Is it the Council president...?"
At that point, hiding did not work anymore. He swung his eyes wide open.
"What do you mean no..."
"I had the same reaction."
Aster smiled interestingly. The smile was very unpleasant to Northern but what could he do, the chatterbox had got him good with this one.
"It's some kiddo from the middle east of the Central Plains, the Kejar clan."
"Yes. But usually, the J is pronounced silent, almost like h, Ke...jar..."
"Do you have a death wish?"
Aster swallowed, his voice cut off by Northern's piercing eyes. He turned away and picked his fork, sluggishly prickling the utensils on the tender slab of meat.
"So... who are these Kejar clan people?"
Northern pronounced correctly this time, the 'J' sounding with a silent hiss.
Aster beamed immediately, strange joy finding its way to his heart, his former expression disappearing completely.
"There are majorly seven clans that rule the Central Plains, either with their achievements in history or their individual strength."
He spoke with hand gestures, showing Northern his seven fingers.
"The first and foremost, strongest of them all, you have probably heard of them plenty of times."
Northern's voice came with a cold and detached tone.
"You are correct but why do you sound so hateful?"
Aster looked at him weirdly for barely a millisecond then continued.
"After the Kageyama clan, there's the Ashura clan. The Ashura clan is the greatest when it comes to hand-to-hand combat mastery; many even say that at a point in time, they could stand toe to toe with the Kageyama clan until their Patriarch, who was a Paragon at the time, died. They've had three generations of Patriarchs now and none of them had been able to become Paragons, while the Kageyama keep producing Paragons after Paragons for Patriarch."
He closed down his third finger.
"The third strongest is the Kejar clan. They are only third because of the same reasons as the Ashura clan, but I heard that they have a mysterious heart due to their Heritage abilities; it makes them a very deadly clan. The fourth is their sister clan known as the Beason clan. A clan made purely of tender and lithe girls that are very swift and shadowy... always lurking in the shadows, blending perfectly into the night with their brown skin."
The chatterbox paused for a minute looking away with a soft blush on his cheek.
"I wish to marry into that place one day..."
Northern looked at him indifferently, boringly.
He jerked back to reality and closed down another finger.
"That will be the Johnson Clan."
Northern had been expecting when Ryan's clan was going to fit into the ranking. He had in fact expected it to be the second or third.
Because judging from the brute and unfair talent that the ignorant child had, his clan had to have been very ferocious in and of themselves.
Sadly, Northern knew little to nothing about them. Even when he tried looking into them, information brokers placed too high a fee on details regarding them.
He either couldn't afford it or they wouldn't tell him except he had something of equal value
Aster leaned in closer, whispering:
"I heard they worship a chalice of cold flame. Like, literal cold flame; it's a fire that freezes instead of burning, and if the flame goes out, their flames would never be able to burn again."
Northern frowned slightly, making the chatterbox wince back a little bit.
"Of course, you can just see it as rumors. In the end, believe whatever you want to."
But that was not the case.
'Ah... that's why...'