In the dark blanket of a starry sky, a desert stretched as far as the eye could see. Dunes shifted restlessly under the bite of cold winds that ravaged the barren land.
At that moment, the space above one towering dune warped and blurred. A heartbeat later, a massive figure tore through, crashing down with such force that the dune collapsed into a flat plain of sand.
It was a draconic, wingless serpent, its body armored in scales of deep oceanic blue and midnight black. A single horn crowned its head, while its predatory face carried two abyssal eyes, eyes filled with vigilance and killing intent.
This majestic void leviathan was wounded. Scales strong enough to shrug off void decay were cracked, cut, or even dissolved in places, chunks of flesh missing.
Yet, even in this broken state, she coiled her enormous body protectively into a circle, her horned head raised high, watching for any who dared test her. Tʜe sourcᴇ of thɪs content ɪs 𝘯𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭·𝘧𝘪𝘳𝘦·𝘯𝘦𝘵
Cradled within her coils lay a man drenched in blood. His left shoulder, half his ribcage, and part of his waist were simply gone.
But even with such immeasurable damage and the silent approach of death, his expression remained calm. His eyes stayed open, cold and emotionless, betraying no sign of pain.
A potion appeared atop his remaining hand, along with a dozen dark crystals, each pulsing faintly with condensed energy.
Guided by an unseen force, the potion lifted to his lips. A nearly invisible fold of space sliced the glass vial's neck, allowing the pale red liquid to spill directly into his mouth.
While the dark crystals drifted swiftly into the leviathan's open maw, seconds later, the terrible wounds marking both man and beast began to mend, scales knitting, flesh closing.
Still far from whole, the man slowly sat upright. With his lone hand, he pushed back his long strands of black hair, revealing a handsome face, shadowy black eyes, and his unkempt beard.
"I got really lucky," He whispered under his breath. The words were questionable, considering the ruin of his body.
The man at death's door was none other than Venedikt, and for him, being at death's door was the least troubling matter at hand.
To understand his current predicament, one had to briefly trace what had happened since he first stepped into the ancestral realm.
Like all others, Venedikt entered the realm in a random biome, surrounded by the unknown. Mere hours after his descent, he had his first battle and taste of the power of another worlder.
He won that battle. Soon after, he found a safe city, where he quickly learned of the empires and great powers that ruled this place, as well as the people who called this realm their home.
Like every other participant, the next step he took was his epochal trial. His trial's first objective was clear: to save a girl.
The second objective remained unknown. Yet Venedikt realized instantly that his task was far from ordinary.
The rules stated that no more than thirty-three percent of participants could complete the same objective. Recognizing the uniqueness of his task, he recognized he might be competing against a few others, or perhaps even fewer.
Either way, he had to be the first to achieve the objective, or else he would fail and pay the penalty.
It took him two weeks, following the scattered clues he had been given, to finally locate the girl. She was a slave, one among hundreds illegally captured and being smuggled into a lawless land to be sold.
Venedikt dealt with her captors, freed the prisoners, and rescued the girl, as his trial required. As he suspected, the second part of his trial was tied to her, but not in a way he had expected.
As a partial reward, Venedikt received an unsealing scroll, and with it, the revelation of why he had been given this specific epochial trial.
The young girl's name was Xnoura Amorphous, the last true descendant and the legacy carrier of the Amorphous Sect, a power long forgotten by the world.
It was Xnoura who had used a Wish Token to summon the Realm Ruler, seeking help in finding a candidate capable of wielding the Amorphous Sect's legacy and rebuilding what had been lost.
Venedikt was that candidate.
He realized just how fortunate he was. It was unlikely to be a mere coincidence, or even luck, that he had been chosen, since his very physique bore the literal name Amorphous Void Aberration.
This physique was given to him through his legacy, one tied to an entity the system named The Outsider. From what Alex had told him, this entity had once invaded the Ancient World many centuries ago.
Venedikt was given a choice to unseal the legacy hidden within Xnoura and claim it as his reward. But doing so meant binding himself to the fate of the Amorphous Sect.
The sect's survival would become his survival, and should the sect fall again, so too would his time in the ancestral realm come to an end.
The reward promised was of galactic grade, something that could elevate a cultivator of sufficient talent to the very peak of a galaxy. That level of opportunity was far beyond what a single world, such as the Ancient World, which he called his second home, could ever provide.
It was immense in value, something nearly impossible to obtain in the ancestral realm, perhaps even outright unreachable by normal means.
Yet Venedikt was not blind. If the Amorphous Sect had been erased from history, there must have been a reason, and accepting its legacy would not only mean rebuilding it but also inheriting its enemies.
Those who had once wished the sect dead, or those who hungered for its legacy, would surely be drawn out of the shadows.
This opportunity carried with it a burden. Venedikt had long known that every gain required a price, but he also knew he could not afford to bind his entire future to a single path within this realm.
He had to consider what impact his choice would have not only on himself, but also on his brother, the one who had given him this great life and chance.
He had ten years in the ancestral realm. Ten years to uncover more opportunities , but still the question remained: if he allowed such a chance to slip away, what would that say about him?
In the end, Venedikt chose. He accepted the role of master of the Amorphous Sect, and Xnoura Amorphous became his first disciple.
He made this choice because he understood one thing clearly, that with Alex's talent, once he left the ancestral realm, he would become untouchable among the players.
As the Domain Ruler, his brother would stand shoulder to shoulder with the hegemons of the Ancient World and would truly become the ruler of one of the great powers in the world.
So if Venedikt wished to remain by his brother's side and be of use, he had to grow beyond what he ever thought possible.
His decision was not born from pride. It was because he had no other option. If the mere possibility of death could stop him from seizing an opportunity placed directly into his hands, then it would be better for him to quit now.
Because playing it safe would only make him a burden to Alex, not an asset.
The reward Venedikt received, the legacy of the Amorphous Sect, was called the Amorphous Void Codex, a collection of knowledge and skills drawn from eleven aspects of the Void.
Those aspects were: Force, Infinity, Silence, Veil, Reflection, Dream, Decay, Anomaly, Hollow, Null, and the Unknown.
The Codex was a library of immense knowledge, but written in a language that he didn't understand. Although he now had access to all of it, he could only grasp fragments, mere glimpses of what it had to offer.
And yet, even those fragments were enough to expand his horizons many times over. What little he understood multiplied his comprehension of the Void, such that he felt confident that by simply leveling up and fully digesting these gains, he could advance from the Fourth Rank to the Sixth.
Still, the Codex was more than just an instant benefit. The deeper his understanding of the Law of Void grew, the more he would be able to decipher, and the more the Codex would reveal.
It was far more valuable than Venedikt could have imagined, but with that realization came another. The troubles he would face in carrying this legacy might be greater than anything he had anticipated.
None of it mattered now.
The decision was already made, and even if he had known the dangers beforehand, he would not have chosen differently.
The first year of the ancestral realm passed swiftly. Then came the second year, and with it, the second epochal trial.
This time, the trial required Venedikt to recruit six individuals and participate in the yearly sect competition. Not only that, but he had to secure victory in one of the eleven competition categories.
The strength of participants was capped at Sixth Rank, yet even Imperial Sect star disciples would be competing, so securing a single victory under those conditions was a task that bordered on the impossible.
And for Venedikt, who had not even recruited his six disciples yet, the trial loomed all the more daunting.
But through a mix of luck and no small amount of trouble, Venedikt managed to pull it off. Not only did he secure one victory, but three, instantly making his sect stand out and drawing attention across the cultivator domain.
But that's where his troubles began.