Carlos pulled his three weak Skeleton Warriors back into the summoning space.
With the Purple Thornblade Skeleton Guards watching his back, he started the long trek home along the same route.
The whole thing was a total slog, but what choice did he have? This was the only way out.
At least this time he could just walk without having to fight his way through everything.
After about three days of trudging along, Carlos and his Purple Thornblade Skeleton Guards finally climbed out of the volcanic crater.
Man, the fresh air felt amazing. Sure, the sky was still gray and nasty, the ground cracked like a jigsaw puzzle, and the whole place looked like hell warmed over—but it beat the crap out of that pitch-black cave.
"How can I get these three Skeleton Warriors evolved fast?"
Carlos wasn't in any rush to hit up the other two dark mist hotspots.
Without solid intel, regular Psionics would get their asses handed to them just trying to get into those areas—nobody was going to beat him to the punch.
Besides, those other two spots were way nastier than this Infernal Beetle joint. He needed to stack up a lot more firepower before he could guarantee a sure thing.
As a smart Death Herald who didn't take stupid risks, Carlos believed in maxing out everything he could as fast as possible to avoid any nasty surprises down the road.
"Monster grinding is way too slow. One evolution needs 1,000 kills of low-level critters.
Three would need 3,000 total—that's like two weeks of non-stop slaughter."
And he'd have to go back to that easily defended boulder to perfectly bait monsters for risk-free farming.
Just thinking about it made Carlos want to bang his head against a wall.
He couldn't help but pop open his face guard to get some air, standing on top of the little volcano and staring off into the distance to chill out.
Suddenly, he spotted what looked like a camp way off in the distance, with a huge bonfire blazing like a beacon.
"A traitor camp!"
In the dark mist-covered hellscape of the Withered Lands, normal Psionics would never camp out in the open like that, let alone light up bonfires like they're having a damn barbecue.
Only those human sellouts who'd gone over to the dark side would pull crap like this.
As long as they didn't mess with the dark mist monsters, the creatures wouldn't bother them.
"Something's definitely fishy here."
That traitor camp was obviously cooking up some kind of scheme!
Human traitors usually worked solo, rarely teaming up, much less camping out in the open like this.
"Should I go check it out?"
Carlos felt that familiar itch of curiosity.
"But I shouldn't go in half-cocked!"
After thinking it over for a hot minute, he decided to shelf the investigation for now.
Sure, in the Withered Lands, whether it was normal Psionics or dark mist traitors, the highest spirituality topped out around 9 points, with most maxing at about 6 (there might be some freaks who went all-in on one stat, but that was rare as hen's teeth). They definitely couldn't match his Purple Thornblade Skeleton Guards.
But traitors weren't dumb as rocks like monsters—they used actual tactics, coordinated attacks, and could even bug out when things went south.
Looking at the size of that camp, there were definitely a bunch of them.
Carlos figured that with just 5 Purple Thornblade Skeleton Guards, he'd be rolling the dice on a disaster.
Two had to stick close to protect him at all times, leaving only 3 for the actual fighting.
"Since they're all bunched up together, they probably won't be going anywhere anytime soon.
Once I max out my combat power in this neck of the Withered Lands, then I'll see if I can wipe them off the map!"
Carlos went with the safe play.
"Short-term, I can't think of a better way for the three Skeleton Warriors to rack up enough kills.
Taking a bit longer is fine—avoiding getting my ass kicked is what matters most."
He climbed onto the Iron Palanquin and started heading back to that easily defended boulder...
...
Two days later, back on top of the boulder with the same old scenery.
Carlos spread out 4 Purple Thornblade Skeleton Guards, sending them to distant areas to hunt monsters with more juice than the Black Beetles.
This way, they could help him farm massive amounts of Spiritual Essence while building up death energy for the next evolution.
With his boosted spirituality, Carlos now only got a pathetic 0.0125 Spiritual Essence progress from killing spirituality-1 Black Beetles.
He kept just one Purple Thornblade Skeleton Guard at the stairs—the only way up the boulder—to chop off monsters' limbs and toss them up.
Compared to his old method of shooting arrows to lure monsters then hacking off limbs, this wasn't much faster, but it freed up Carlos to do other stuff.
"About two weeks should be enough for the three Skeleton Warriors to evolve successfully."
Carlos decided not to waste this downtime.
It was perfect for practicing Sun Emperor's Swordsmanship, getting ready to claim that insanely powerful piece of gear—the Sun Emperor's Sword.
He hadn't practiced before because his internal Psionic Energy wasn't strong enough to run through all the sword techniques in one shot, which made learning impossible.
But now with 70 points of Psionic Energy, he had more than enough juice.
He drew a white-quality greatsword and started moving through the techniques, each one executed with perfect precision.
This was the payoff from all that prep work—he'd been drilling these moves since he was a kid.
Everything was set up so that after becoming a Psionic, he could master badass swordsmanship on his own without having to hunt it down somewhere else.
This was one of the huge perks of getting a second shot at life.
The greatsword sliced through the air, each strike packing serious momentum, attacks coming fast and furious like a thunderstorm, yet each technique followed a different and incredibly complex path.
As the techniques flowed together, Carlos's internal Psionic Energy got pulled out automatically, the Demigod Mark on his forehead blazing bright beneath the white headband.
This time it didn't turn into the familiar Death Herald energy, but instead became pure white energy.
The greatsword got wrapped in pure white light. What had been just impressive sword work suddenly gained crazy speed with the Psionic Energy boost, creating sonic booms as it cut through the air, becoming ghostly afterimages that looked like tiny suns, gradually cranking up the temperature around him.
Feeling pumped, Carlos let out a war cry and jumped off the rock, landing right in the middle of the Black Beetle swarm below.
The mini suns created by the lightning-fast greatsword started exploding one by one, blindingly bright and absolutely gorgeous.
"Sizzle!"
"Boom!"
The dense sounds of the greatsword carving through bug flesh filled the air as Black Beetles got chopped to pieces before they could even react.
Dozens of Black Beetles got massacred in just a few seconds.
After the brief light show, Carlos felt his internal Psionic Energy almost completely drained.
He fell back behind the Purple Thornblade Skeleton Guard and climbed back up the boulder, grinning from ear to ear.
[Successfully learned Sun Emperor's Court Swordsmanship]
[Sun Emperor's Court Swordsmanship: Lost swordsmanship of the royal family from the mighty Solar Empire during the forgotten Age of Swords. Absolutely devastating power—the crown jewel of that entire era!]
[Special Bonuses: 1. Each level increases Strength, Constitution, Speed, and Mental by 0.5 each 2. Increases sword damage by 1.5% × level 3. Additional 1.5% × level damage against dark creatures Current Level 1 (Max Level 10)]
"Holy crap! At max level, it'll give a full 5 points each of Strength, Constitution, Speed, and Mental—20 total attributes."
20 attribute points—that was nuts!
That's the same boost you'd get from gaining 20 spirituality points!
As one of the world's most elite sword techniques, Sun Emperor's Court Swordsmanship's stat-boosting ability alone was enough to make every Psionic lose their minds!
Not to mention the 15% damage boost at max level!
Unfortunately, not just any schmuck could learn Sun Emperor's Court Swordsmanship. The more powerful the skill, the tougher the requirements to learn it.
Carlos could only master it because of his Demigod Mark.
Otherwise, he would've taught his sister Iris how to use it ages ago.