He walked through the outer perimeter of Pearl, and the flow only increased. The courtyard still carried the echoes of battle. Hundreds of thousands had died there in the last few days, soldiers, students, beasts, strangers who had wandered into the fight and never left.
He breathed it all in.
The death energy surged into him in waves.
Each inhalation flooded his senses. His mind danced with flickers of last memories, dying oaths, desperate screams, quiet regrets. He didn't flinch. He didn't turn away.
He accepted them.
His core grew.
Visibly.
In his inner world, the orb of obsidian-black mana at his center pulsed with dark brilliance.
Cracks of violet light formed across its surface. Alive, shifting, reshaping itself into something greater.
It had been a fragment before. A cocoon.
Now it was becoming a star.
[Necromantic Core: 42% Formation Complete]
[Passive Devour Function Unlocked: Deathfield Radius—200 meters]
