God Ash: Remnants of the fallen.

The moment Cain opened his eyes, he felt the familiar cool wind. Staring ahead, the sight of endless grey skies stretching beyond the horizons greeted him. He took in a deep breath. He was back...

He took another deep breath before she noticed something was off. Although the wind was cool and fresh, it also carried a hint of something else.

He had become very accustomed to this scent.

It was blood...

A frown made its way onto his face. He turned to gaze around. The other members of the group that had followed him into the Trial of the First Order stood around him, taking in the world around them as they grew accustomed to their empowered abilities and bodies.

Cain heard a whining voice,

'Master! You forgot me again!'

Cain sighed. He knew he had forgotten something. However, now was not the time to dwell on that.

He stared at the huge bear behind him. He had truly been treating her poorly these days.

"Ruby, I'll make it up to you later. For now, we need to hurry back."

"Cain..."

Cain turned around. The moment he saw who called out to him, his breath got stuck in his throat. He almost didn't recognize her. Susan was incredibly beautiful before her advance to Tier 1. Now, she had the facial features of a goddess.

Cain gulped, "Congratulations on your advance."

Vincent had a lecherous look in his eyes as he stared at the Beastwomen. They had gotten even more beautiful.

Steve smiled in satisfaction as he pulled a mage's staff out of his inventory.

"Let's hurry back. I have a bad feeling..."

Cain nodded, "Let's go."

Steve waved his staff and chanted. A second later, they were gone.

***

The Central Island was huge...

Even though there was a lot of empty space left behind after the decimation of numerous high-rises, the buildings were still abundant, more than enough to house thousands of people.

Hiding in one of these buildings with her hand over her chest, Ignis tried to regulate her breathing.

She grit her teeth as a pain raced through her body, making her shiver. A cold sweat appeared on her forehead as she fought back the exhaustion.

She had lost too much blood. Worst of all, she had iverdrafted her flame core, and now, it was covered in cracks. If she dared cast another spell, it would rupture and she would be doomed forever.

She had fought for half a day, alongside the others. However, they had been handily defeated. Many had died under her watch. All this was her fault. It was because she wasn't strong enough.

And now, using all the remaining strength she could muster, she was hidiyaway to preserve her sorry life.

She wanted to let out a sigh, but was scared she would be discovered.

Suddenly, a sound caught her attention. Footsteps closing in on her location. Helplessness overwhelmed her. It was over. She couldn't even muster up the strength to fight again.

Her mind slipped into darkness as she slumped against the wall.

Just before she could fall unconscious, a voice brought her back from the brink,

"Ignis!"

She let out a relieved sigh.

'He's back...'

With that, she fell completely unconscious.

***

Cain had a dark look on his face as he stared at Ignis. Her injuries were terrible, the worst one being a large gash across her back. Her organs were almost spilling through her ribcages. Worst of all, he could feel her life force draining away everything second.

'System, what's wrong with her?!'

{Replying to host: She is under a curse. A curse that drains away her life force. Since she is a flame creature, her life force is in the form of flames. This curse is feeding on the flames, burning through her life force at an alarming rate}.

Cain frowned, 'Well how do we fix her?'

{Replying to host: There are two ways. One is figuring out a way to break the curse. This means locating the caster. However, she might be dead before the caster can be found. Another way would be to incite her life force with an external flame source}.

Cain's mind spun as he went through his options. The moment they arrived, they had been greeted by this scene. The entire Central Island had been demolished. Bodies of Beastmen and women littered the streets. Hundreds were dead.

When he tried reaching out to Pudding, he could tell it was in a bad state. Luckily, its regeneration was incredible, so it wasn't in any immediate danger. Then when he tried reaching out for Ignis, he was frightened to see that the connection between them was weakening rather swiftly.

As such, he had rushed over as fast as possible. Looking down as her, he could only curse the bastard that had done this.

Unfortunately, trying to find the culprit would put her life in danger, so had to be smart. Luckily, he seemed to have the thing that would save her life at hand.

He reached into his inventory and pulled out a strange item. It was a physical or item. However, it didn't feel or look like that. Instead, it felt like he was holding energy itself.

The {Essence of Frost and Flame} he had gotten as a reward for the Trial of the First Order.

'Will this be enough?'

{Replying to host: Although the flame attribute in the essence is more than enough, the frost will kill her immediately}.

Cain frowned, 'How do I get rid of it?'

{Replying to host: The Host's only option is to absorb it. However, it is impossible to absorb only one part of the essence}.

Cain grit his teeth, 'Then what the hell do I do?!'

He was getting more and more irate as he felt her life slip away...

{Replying to host: The host has to absorb the essence, but transfer the flame attribute to the Cherufe Spawn}.

Cain's mind spun. How the hell was he supposed to do that?

Being idle wasn't going to solve anything, so following the system's directive, he began absorbing the essence. Grasping it firmly on his hands, he crushed it.

A flood of energy raced through the Ley Lines within his very soul, the opposing energies trying to take root.

Cain's eyes began to change as he activated {Eye of Clairvoyance} and {Eye of Uncertainty} at the same time. He was going to try everything he could.

Before the flame essence could take root, he opened the {Elemental Vault}.

An Incredible suction force came from the depths of his being, sucking the flame essence away.

The air around him became unstable as lightning crackled around him. The opposing force of frost and flame battled against each other, forcibly separating.

He began chanting, raising one hand to the air. Billows of heat coalesced around his palm. More and more flames gathered as he continued to chant.

Using the {Elemental Vault} as a conduit, he gathered more and more power until he couldn't control it anymore.

His eyes sparkled with power as he thtust his hand onto Ignis' chest.

A muffled explosion resounded as Ignis' body rose above the ground for a moment. Cain had gathered more than half of the flame essence and jammed it into Ignis' body at once in an attempt to forcibly excite her life force.

And it worked...

Ignis' eyes shot open as she felt power flood her soul. But that was not all. She energy that had entered her body continued gathering more and more surrounding power, fully saturating her body in less than a minute.

The former restrictions on her body and power were broken. Her Flame core was restored. Her strength as a Tier 1 being was restored.

She let out a gasp as power returned to her body.

Cain let out an exhausted sigh when he saw her wake up.

Ignis turned to Cain, "You..."

Cain waved his hand, "We can hug it out later. For now, I need to know everything..."

***

Ruins...

Susan looked over the destruction and let out a tired sigh. Leah's face was filled with unconcealed rage,

"Bastards... They are all bastards! I'll tear them to pieces!"

They had gone through the corpses. Women, men, children, the elderly... They spared no one they came across.

Lin Lin gave a report, "Some Beastmen were quick to react and gathered as many as they could into the buildings located closer to the Rift."

Roselle seemed unbothered, but her eyes were as cold as glaciers,

"The attackers?"

Lin Lin shook her head, "No sign of them. From what we can tell, they've been gone for the latter part of an hour. This was a hut and run mission."

Her eyes became even colder, "How many?"

Lin Lin hesitated. Sisi chimed in, her small voice heavy with sorrow and grief,

"We can't tell. But they were a very small group. Probably no more than ten. If not, we wouldn't have so many survivors."

At least, thirty percent of the people that had been here were either killed or injured. The rest managed to survive thanks to Ignis, the giant worm creature hidden beneath the island, Calio, David, and the other stronger warriors, as well as the Beastmen warriors.

However, that didn't mean there were no casualties...