The village square was more crowded than usual.
Alaric leaned against the shade of a low stone wall, hands tucked into the sleeves of his cloak, watching without making himself a part of the gathering. His white hair caught the occasional glance, but most attention was elsewhere—focused on the crude wooden platform hastily assembled at the center of the square.
A cage sat atop it.
Inside, a spirit beast—barely a spirit beast at all—paced anxiously. A juvenile Ironhide Boar, judging by its dark, bristled fur and the faint sheen of spiritual energy clinging to its heavy frame. Maybe a ten-year-old beast, certainly no threat to a proper Spirit Master, but still a valuable find for a frontier village like this.
And it was about to die.
The young kid standing before the cage was a stranger. Clearly not a villager, from the whispering around him, it was the local lord's nephew—his clothes were too fine, the rings on his fingers too heavy with gold and mana glint. Next to him, one of the wandering "soul hunters" that Alaric had read about in old reports—individuals who specialized in the dirty work of spirit ring acquisition for the rich and cowardly.
The kid drew a blade. It was simple, but the ancient enchantment woven along its edge hummed even from a distance. A low class blade, but a good tool none the less.
Alaric narrowed his eyes slightly, tuning out the murmured excitement of the onlookers. He wasn't here to mourn the boar. He was here to observe.
The Vault pulsed once—a low, curious rhythm—as if sensing the importance of what was about to happen.
The man approached the cage. The boar threw itself against the bars once, twice, but the metal was reinforced with runes—sloppily applied, but effective. With a single smooth motion, the man plunged the blade through the bars and into the beast's neck.
The struggle was brief. The energy within the beast flared, spasmed, then began to unravel. A shimmering, semi-transparent ring of faint yellow light began to rise from the corpse.
Alaric's heart rate ticked up.
This was it.
In an instant his attention was locked in to the color, shape, and most importantly the feeling of it. All of it would be needed to learn how to create his own later on.
The kid sheathed his blade and dropped into a seated position directly before the cage, crossing his legs and steadying his breathing. He extended his right hand toward the floating spirit ring, palm open.
Alaric leaned forward slightly, focus sharpening.
The ring quivered in the air, resisting at first. A visible tension formed between the corpse and the man's hand—a battle of will, not strength. The ring wanted to flee. It wanted to dissipate. But the man's spirit power lanced out, invisible to most, but not to Alaric's enhanced senses.
He could see it: a spiral of force, coiling outward, grappling the ring, dragging it inward.
Absorption wasn't passive. It was dominance.
Slowly, the ring yielded. It pressed against the man's palm, then began to sink into his skin—inch by inch—the golden glow pulsing in time with his heartbeat.
Alaric scribbled a quick note on a strip of enchanted parchment tucked in his sleeve.
Spirit ring absorption sequence: Forced resonance coupling – willpower overlay – phased energy integration.
It took nearly fifteen minutes for the process to conclude. The man's body shuddered once, twice, then stabilized. The ring vanished entirely, leaving only a faint glow that sank beneath his skin—an imprint on his martial soul.
The onlookers cheered.
Alaric did not.
Instead, he watched the man's posture carefully.
The kid—rose slowly, wiping sweat from his brow. His breathing was shallow, but not strained. A low-tier spirit ring like this one wasn't much of a burden for someone who had already reached his first bottleneck.
Alaric nodded once to himself.
"So that's how it works," he murmured.
The spirit beast died. The ring rose. And unless the absorption was done skillfully, the spirit ring would reject the host and kill him. Most importantly Alaric felt a very light feeling of a lock being put on the spirit ring itself.
Not from the little kid, but from the laws of this universe itself, as if it didn't allow the dissipation of the spirit ring until at least an hour passed.
According to his observation and his memories of this world, the process demanded strength, yes.
But more importantly—it demanded control.
Control over oneself. Over the invading energy. Over the instincts buried within the beast's final echoes. Those would probably be very weak until the age of a beast turned to ten thousand years. Then there would be an accompanying shock to the soul as a trial to absorb the spirit ring.
He turned and slipped away from the gathering, vanishing into the alleyways of the village before the crowd's excitement could draw too much attention his way.
James waited for him at the edge of the village, concealed beneath a concealing traveler's cloak.
"Observation complete, sir?" the golem intoned softly.
"Yes," Alaric replied. "And the real work begins now."
He glanced once at the horizon, where the forest loomed like a living wall.
Somewhere out there, beasts older, stronger, and wiser than that caged boar roamed free.
And when the time came—when he was ready—he would not lower himself to spirit rings born of convenience.
He would forge his own.
One that would make this world—and all the worlds beyond—remember his name.
Alaric's boots crunched softly over the dry dirt as he made his way toward the treeline, heart steady but mind racing. Every detail from the ceremony replayed itself in his mind — the sequence of the spirit ring's rise, the moment of resistance, the saturation of spirit power that tethered it into submission.
It wasn't enough just to observe. Observation was the beginning. Understanding was the weapon.
He needed to replicate it — better yet, refine it.
Not mimic the rituals of fools who barely grasped the forces they commanded. He would need to learn the natural growth of a spirit beast's energy, the exact structure of a ring before it was formed, the invisible threads that linked life, death, and power together. Only by mastering that unseen architecture could he hope to build something superior.
Not a ring stolen from a dying beast.
A ring woven from intention. Forged by knowledge. Refined by mastery.
He reached a shallow ridge overlooking the forest stretching endlessly into misted twilight. Spirit beasts pulsed faintly across his magical senses — some small, skittish; others massive, slumbering titans deeper within.
James stood quietly behind him, cloak rustling faintly.
"Mark this location," Alaric said. "Tomorrow, we hunt for observation targets. Wild ones. Ones, free enough to still reflect pure soul power."
"Understood, sir," the golem replied.
Alaric let the silence stretch between them.
One step at a time.
First, he would study them. How they fought. How they lived. How their energy grew.
Then, when the time was right — when he could anchor every thread himself — he would build a spirit ring unlike any this world had ever seen.
One not born of death.
But of design.
He turned back toward the fading village lights, the decision sharp and final in his mind.
The real forging had already begun.