God Ash: Remnants of the fallen.

{You have unlocked the special skill, Burning Spirit... }

{You have unlocked the title, Loved by The Spirits}.

***

{Burning Spirit (True Skill): The secrets of the gods and spirits are being touched by mortal hands, and the mysteries are coming undone at the seams. Mana burns and flows furiously to grant the host the strength, might, and dexterity of the gods.

Effect 1: Once activated all physical and magical stats are increased by +30%.

Cost: 20,000MP.

Effect 2: Attaching an Element to the incandescent flames of the burning spirit will grant the host a certain boosted attribute. These attributes, however, come at a steep price.

Cost: 10,000MP.

Note: As a True skill, this skill has no cooldown and can be activated as long as the host has the mana to support its consumption. The level of this skill increases as the host ascends to higher Tiers}.

{Loved by the Spirits: Your MP regeneration increases by 100%}.

***

Name: {Cain Lenosi}

Level: 60.

Strength: 1,776.

Agility: 1,877.

Stamina: 1,089/1,089.

Vitality: 1,227.

Defense: 998.

Control: 86.2..

Perception: 81.4.

HP: 10,050/33,200.

MP: 17,000/40,800.

Magic: 2,512.

Ki: 67,280.

Spirit: 1,120.

Resistance: Poison- 90%. Fire- 50%.

Skills: Golden Body, Burning Spirit, Burst Step, Divine Essense of Metallurgy, Blood Regeneration, Azure Burst, Mana Heart, Seal, Devil's eyes: Eye of Clairvoyance, Elemental Body, Abyssal Dragon Blade Mastery Tier 1: Abyssal Crimson Slash, Spirit Sense, Gravity Defying, *Charge, *Pure Energy Strike, *Evil Devouring.

Spells: Infernal Celestial Arts: {Flame Orbs, Imploding Star, Vampiric Star}, Infernal Wings, Wind Weaver, Dark Cloak, Blue Lightning, Blink, Golden Halo, 7 Golden Stars, Frozen Paths, Frost Temple, Poison Arrows, Flames of Darkness.

Titles: Champion of Ashur (locked), Sorcerer's Mind, Blessed by Mana, Pioneer, Devil Hunter, Loved by the Spirits.

Free attribute points: 58.

System points 111,009.

{Inventory}. {Shop}.

***

Cain took a few minutes to process the information that hit him head-on. It was like he had gone from free-falling through an abyss of pain, to lying on a soft, velvety bed with carnal luxuries surrounding him.

Shaking his head to remove bad thoughts, he quickly studied the words. Looking through his status screen, he realized he had lost a few skills.

{Mana Blade}, {Lightning Edge}, {Golden Severance}, and {Hollow Judgment}...

These were the skills he lost...

In exchange, he was gifted with an overbearing and powerful skill. Looking at the description of the skill, thoughts flowed like a river, especially because of the effects of the second part of the {Burning Spirit} skill,

***

Effect 2: Attaching an Element to the incandescent flames of the burning spirit will grant the host a certain boosted attribute.

Cost: 1000MP per second.

***

'Attaching an element?'

Cain took a deep breath...

Because of the nature of his true skill, he had to activate it all by himself without the help of the system. Luckily for him, he knew exactly how to do that.

Guiding his mana through the familiar channels, Cain immediately noticed the change. He no longer felt any pain, and with every circulation, he could feel his body filled with power.

A layer of transparent, nearly invincible flames suddenly ignited around his body. However, these flames weren't hot, just a physical manifestation of his mana being burnt quickly.

Cain didn't waste any more time...

He concentrated on the elemental forces and drew the element of fire from the cloud of jumbled elements.

As soon as the fiery red motes of energy touched the transparent flames, they were quickly consumed, causing the flames to take on a lightly orange hue.

{+100% Attack power, -90% Physical Defense}.

The voice of the system chimed in his ears, causing Cain to frown a bit. He suddenly felt his body exposed to the cold sea wind, causing him to break into a shiver. Never in his life had he ever been so cold.

It was as though all his defenses had evaporated...

'A steep price...' Cain immediately understood the phrase.

However, even though he could feel vulnerability wrap around him. him like a cloak, he was also filled with boundless might. He felt like if he tried, he would easily be able to tear a truck to shreds with his bare hands.

Cain quickly dismisses the enchantment, causing his body to return to its original state.

Seeing that the changes were only temporary, Cain felt the urge to try more elements out to get a feel of how vast the potential of the skill was.

As such, he quickly began to manipulate metal essence to flow toward him.

The flames of the {Burning Spirit} took on a silver luster immediately...

{+100% Physical Defense, -90% Movement Speed}.

'So fire increases attack power but reduces physical defense, metal increases physical defense, but reduces movement speed. I wonder what other elements will do.'

As this skill was unique to him, he would have to explore its boundaries, perks, limitations, and might by himself. This experience filled him with both dread and terror.

Curiosity overflowing, Cain summoned the blood element,

{+100% Stamina, -90% Attack Speed}.

Narrowing his eyes, Cain could feel that he had burned through most of his mana reservoir.

'So I can only activate this no more than three times before if run out of gas when fighting. Seems like I'll need to be careful when activating this in battle.'

Lastly, Cain activated it one last time and summoned the lightning element. He was very curious about what boon and what flaw this one would have.

Thunder seemed to rumble from the depths of the dark clouds for a moment before silence consumed the world again.

{+100% Attack Speed, -90% Control}.

Sweat poured down his face as the strain of consuming more than 90% of his mana at once took its toll on his mind and body.

'This is incredible...' This was the most profound and exciting skill Cain had ever seen. It took a special attribute associated with the element he chose to pair with the {Burning Spirit} skill and gave it to him.

While the skill wasn't without its downsides, it would be of tremendous help in battle as he would be able to switch battle styles very first in battle, confusing the enemy and giving himself the initiative.

The first part of the skill reminded him of the skill, {Golden Blood}, which has evolved to {Golden Body}.

The main difference between the two skills was that {Golden Blood} boosted only his physical attributes. This skill, on the other hand, added a fundamental increase to all his stats as long as he had the mana to burn.

This 30% increase was so devastating, it could completely change the tides of a battle. Despite losing a few of his skills, he was very happy with the new ones he learned.

Besides, with the skills attached to his weapons, the {Abyssal Dragon Blade Mastery}, and his spells, he was not short of ways to attack.

Altogether, he was slowly becoming a force to be reckoned with...

Taking a deep breath, Cain observed as his mana pool was being filled up quickly. Thanks to his {Man Heart}, as well as the vast amount of enhancements his titles granted him, especially the one he had just acquired, his mana regeneration rate was quite outstanding. He was able to absorb roughly 1000MP a minute, so he would be able to recover completely in about 50 minutes.

Until then, he decided to just sit still and continue reading...

***

Soon, the sun finally freed itself from the bondage of the night, and the yellow pen, hidden by numerous layers of God Ash began its journey to the other side of the world.

Cain watched as the relatively normal humans that were now his burden slowly rose from their slumbers. Sleeping on an ice bridge, while inconvenient, wasn't much of an issue to them thanks to the blessing of their guardian deity.

Steve was still engrossed in the pages of the [Records of Akasha], while the members of Jenny's group had already been awake for some time. Thanks to their mana levels, they didn't require a lot of sleep.

As for Susan, the indifferent beauty was staring into the horizon, facing the rising sun. Cain could feel that something about her had changed. Or rather, was slowly changing...

There seemed to be a lot of things going on in her mind. She seemed colder than her usual snarky self. Seeing this, Cian decided to approach her.

However, before he could reach her, she had already turned around to face him. With a small smile lighting up her features, she spoke in a somewhat harsh, yet playful tone,

"What are you looking at?" Embarrassed, Cain cleared his throat.

"Well, I just wanted to know how you are doing. You seem awfully quiet these days, not like how you were once..." Cain said with an awkward smile.

Blinking at Cain, a look of understanding appeared on her face,

"That? That's just a result of overusing my abilities. It isn't too big of a deal." She said light-heartedly.

After a brief pause, she continued, "To a certain degree, I can see possible future outcomes and past occurrences, but most of them are incredibly vague, and trying to understand them takes a toll on my mind." Susan said, massaging her temple.

Seeing that there were no issues with her, despite still being concerned, Cain decided to give it a rest.

"Is that so... Just make sure you don't overdo it," Cain said with a smile.

A small smirk appeared on her face as a bright light danced in her eyes.

"Don't worry about me. If anything, you should be worried about yourself."

Cain raised a brow; "How so?"

Rolling her eyes, Susan said snarkily, "Going on suicide missions to other planets, why shouldn't you be worried?"

Eyes wide, Cain turned to stare at Steve who had his head buried in paper.

'Traitor!'

Starting at Susan like a very caught in headlights, Cain was unsure of how to respond.

"Erhhh..."

However, his rescue came unexpected and in an unexpected manner...

Suddenly, two distinct voices began to ring in their ears, causing everyone to look for their origins.

With the power of his {Eye of Clairvoyance} and advanced hearing, Cain was able to pinpoint the direction the sound was coming from quickly.

He then focused on two indistinct shadows running on the ice bridge towards them. Focusing a bit more, their figures were revealed to him faintly.

'Well, look what we have here.' Feeling excitement flowing through his bones, Cain called out to the approaching people,

"Long time no see, Boys!"