Life 70, Day 581.

  The 83rd raid has been overcome. The fact I can find exactly what I will fight by reading entries from my previous life, and that my companions already know what I will face is an insane amount of help. I know I have stated as such in multiple entries in this life already, as well as in my previous lives, but this is something any future lives I live through have to know! Trust this journal! Trust our companions! They really are trying to help us!

  Princess looks at me with a smug expression as sh- And she tried to stop me from writing that. Too bad little fairy, it is now ink on the page. And now she is pouting.

  We

  Life 70, Day 582.

  I never finished yesterday entry, but there was a good reason for it. A new face has come to us. Princess almost attacked them on sight, and only kirlia was able to restrain her long enough for the newcomer to explain himself. I'll write the what I understood from kirlia's description.

  The newcomer is a zoroark, a bipedal fox with dark gray fur and a long red mane. It arrived exhausted at our camp. It comes from the distant mountain where I died in my previous life, from the enclave of his specie living here.

  This zoroark has been sent out by his peers for two reasons: one, they wish to apologize for killing me, and two, he is to act as an ambassador from his enclave. His goal is to establish a way for the enclave to communicate with the Sanctuary I have built. They wish to possibly immigrate there, as the raids from malicious humans are getting harder and harder to counter. The elders of his clan fear they may end up overwhelmed at some point.

  As mush as I am for welcoming them into the Sanctuary, half of my friends are against the idea. Princess is still angry at their actions, and little Knight still resent the fox for my death. Hound seems neutral and kirlia wish for their safety.

  As I am the one with administrative rights within the Sanctuary, I still have the final say. But I do not want to spit on Princess and Knight's emotions. So I have offered a compromise. The zoroark will be accepted into the Sanctuary, but only him, for now. If he proves himself useful. He may bring in more of his kin. If they too prove themselves well behaved and useful to the Sanctuary, we will accept the entire enclave. Food and space are no problem within the forest, so we can accept them.

  He has spent the night with us and will depart in the afternoon.

  Tomorrow, we will march toward the mountain, I should be recovered enough.

  .

  .

  .

  Life 72, Day 785.

  We have returned to the forest beneath the tallest peak of the Ice Cap range. Both Princess and kirlia are begging me to avoid it, and I am willing to listen to them. The forest radiates enough hostility to make me choke on my own breaths. Knight is cowering behind my legs, absolutely terrified, and Hound's hackles are raised.

  Something must have happened. I sadly do not think it is worth this life to discover what did. We will have to find a new way to cross the range.

  We exit the forest as the morning sun crosses Icen Sky Peak. The white zoroark has not returned during our travel through the forest. Mewtwo has confirmed multiple times that he is not even following us. Although he could hardly pinpoint his presence before, so the pokemon might still be here, but invisible to my friend's senses. Hopefully he will not pursue us once he calms down. Or maybe he will be friendly? I sadly have some doubts here, but one can always hope.

  Still, we are out now, But we still need to go up some few thousand meters to finally reach the top of Icen Sky Peak. We mentally prepare ourselves, and begin our ascension.

  Although I could go straight up and climb my way to the top, I decide to follow natural paths present in the mountain, so we can appreciate the scenery and see what pokemons live so high up.

  We walk for hours, with some intermediary climbs whenever the path we follow ends in a dead end or leads back down. We meet with multiple pokemons along the way. Mostly rock and ground types. Geodudes watch us pass by, and sometimes force me to take huge detours to avoid them. A pack of gravelers roll down close to us, forcing us to take shelter for a few minutes while they all pass. At some point, we find a large part of the mountain seemingly eaten. Dozens of cave opening dot a large portion of a flat space on the mountain. We realize what caused the formation when large snake made out of boulders exit one of the caves. That was an onix nest. The large rocky snake pokemon barely miss us and we sneakily continue our trek.

  The most threatening encounter we have to deal with happens when a rhyperior decides to attempt to bar our way further up. The large horned and rocky pokemon challenges us, and Mewtwo ends up fighting him. Although their levels are close, Mewtwo sweep the floor with him. I leave a with a few berries to the defeated pokemon, and we carry on.

  The snow covering most of the mountain has been slowly melting since the sun is out once more. Large patches of the white powder still remain but as we continue to rise further up the mountain, we see the pokemon population shift. Less and less do we find ground types. A few rock types still wander around, but more and more, we spot ice types.

  As we round a cornice, we behold a an impressive and wide view of the Ezian plane. We take a moment to appreciate the incredible vista before us. From so high, Raging Lake almost seems normal in size, and we can see all the way to the edge of the flower field. I am able to spot a distant flock of birds, as well as multiple landmarks we appear to have missed.

  One of them has us curious, almost at the edge of the birch forest we traversed a month ago, there appear to be a massive burning crater. As we try to get a closer look, we realize there appears to be a large dormant figure. Even from this far, the somewhat golden scales of the resting beast gleam under the sunlight. Mewtwo is almost certain this is not a pokemon, and I am inclined to agree. Unless we have just spotted some sort of legendary, there are no pokemons that should be that large. I'll try to look through Aster's journal to see if we can find any sort of clues.

  As we continue our observation, we realize there seems to be more than one of these beasts scattered around. On the other side of Raging lake, there appear to be a frozen forest, with a crater looking almost identical except for one massive difference. The crater is covered in ice and ice spikes. And the beast seemingly sleeping at its center appears an iridescent silvery white. Whatever these beasts are, they appear massive and dangerous.

  We remain there for an hour, looking as the sun slowly descend along the myriad of floating island above us, now closer than ever. We even take the time to consume a light meal.

  As the afternoon advances we resume our walking, continuing to get higher and higher up the mountain.

  The walk extend all the way through the nigh, although the dark does slow us, read mostly me, down. A torch is not enough to illuminate most of the surrounding, and after I almost trip all the way back down the mountain, we decide to take a break until morning.

  The night is once more troubled by monsters, as the classical roster of annoyances attacks us from all side. Zombies, spiders and skeletons appear out of thin air, I actually see some just pop into existence a dozen meters away from me. Mewtwo helps me deal with them, and our only close call happens when a creeper falls practically on top of us. It is only thanks to his hiss of pain from falling that we realize his presence, and Mewtwo is quick to throw him down the mountain, avoiding the risk of the monster exploding. The banks of snow above us would have surely come down on us should a sound as loud as an explosion had happened.

  The rest of the night passes rather quickly, and soon enough, the sky goes from dark to pinkish. Another day rises.

  Still in the shadow of Icen Sky Peak, we await another hour before we resume our climb. Once the light is strong enough to allow us clear vision of our surrounding, we continue upward.

  Once more, we meet multiple pokemons along the way, mostly ice types, but few dare approach us. A distant darumaka waves at us as we pass, but a darmaritan is quick to pick the tiny white pokemon and run. I shrug at the interaction. These pokemons must not have met many humans, and those that can get up there might just kill on sight.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  Why did the hunters choose this path? What pressure did Eziakophael put on the humans for them to decide killing pokemons is a better way to act than attempt to befriend them? This is something I still do not understand. From all I have read in the journal of Aster, having pokemons seems like an investment worth having. Yes, at the start, he kept dying quickly, yet with each death, he went further, learned more and survived longer. Do killing pokemons allows for humans to survive for longer at a faster rate? I think back to my meeting with the returned Hans Senah. How the man already had his memory back. Maybe there are benefits to use pokemon-made equipment? My mind returns to the four that attacked us. Their equipment remained, even after their bodies vanished. Maybe that is the benefit? Either train pokemons to fight for you, or acquire gear that will make your next attempt easier faster? Are those the only choices available?

  But then, what about what I can do? Did no-one attempt to experiment with the flora? Did no one attempt to extract the ores within the caves? What about this pollution that we almost unleashed upon the Sanctuary? Someone else did it, to the point that the Ezian plane is threatened to be consumed by the consequences.

  What about the nether? What other dimension are there even? Aster had some knowledge about these 'mods' and the 'game' this is all inspired from, but he can't be the only one. There must have been more. Maybe some that even knew more than him.

  And then something jumps at me. Aster lived 341 lives, I checked, number 341 is the last listed life. Each lives, he lived longer, sometimes going all the way through years of life before finally dying. If I were to add all those lives together, it should end up to cover more then a millennia or two! This makes me wonder how old Hound truly was. How old Princess actually is. How did they live this long? How did Hound, that had lived through so many lives of Aster, died of old age 60 years after Aster's passing? I absentmindedly take out one of the soul coins from my inventory.

  Aster must have collected them during his lives. Yet he never once upgraded himself. I can feel his fragments confirming this. Never once. Three hundreds and forty-one lives, and he invested all the soul coins he gathered into his pokemons. It would make sense for the coins to be the reason for the explosive growth of most partnered pokemons, but how do they work? And why can I not use them?

  But that is getting away from the actual point. Humans live lives, each one they live they gather soul coins... Wait they start with soul coins! So... humans start with soul coins... they discover they can use them to enhance themselves or enhance elemental creatures able to bend reality. They find out each weeks they will be attacked by believers of some sort of dark deity, the same that grant them the coins... Do they know that? When would they learn that?

  A sudden sound stops my thoughts.

  Dong~

  The bell. The raid!

  Dong~

  The bell echoes, and the portal opens. And once more, a cultist comes out. Head bald, the symbol of Eziakophael tattooed upon it. eyes almost turned all the way up his head. A single dagger in his right hand. He rushes us, and Mewtwo just swipes him off the path. He rolls down the mountain, his demented screams turning to cries of pain, and then only the crunches of his body impacting the mountainside reach us. We watch him go in morbid curiosity. Once he falls down a cliff some hundreds meters below us, we sigh. Another empty raid.

  I have theory on why, and Mewtwo has his own. For me, Eziakophael is either bidding his time, or trying to slow our growth. Each of the raids until the fourth week one have been out of proportions and almost always were enough to end us. The only raid we managed to clear while feeling competent in doing so was the third raid, the massive airship. After that, The solo cultist raids began, followed by the spider wave, and now we have only gotten these solo cultist raids, and they have granted us nothing. No achievement, no experience, and no special materials.

  The second day raid could have netted me some pretty neat gear, although I think I most of it would have been cursed. The first week raid could have possibly netted us some materials from the dimensional hunter, too bad I was too busy trying to save Mewtwo to check what I could loot. And for the second week raid, the airship... Well it did crash and burn. I could have tried to salvage some of the material making it up, or looted the Praetor leading it, but I did consider it not worth our time, and left it for the Sanctuary to pilfer. They do not really need much materials, seeing as they can make most of what they need themselves, even more so now that they can develop botanical technology, but they could always find some useful thing in the ship carcass. Finally, I completely forgot to loot the spiders. That was my dumbass being dumb. But the point remain. We always were rewarded by swathes of experience after these raids, as the Trio decided to reward us as much as possible so we could keep up with the dirty raids sent by Eziakophael.

  And now the Dark God sends only a singular cultist against us? He has to be trying to starve us. He must realize we can hardly complete any quests while travelling, and that his raids would be the only way for us to grow stronger at the moment.

  Mewtwo's theory is slightly more hopeful, but also a bit arrogant. The Trio mentioned multiple times that Eziakophael is as trapped by his own rules as we are. Thus, the raids must also follow rules, and him sending what the Trio qualified as either end of a year raid, or even third or fourth year raid might have cost him in some way, and now he has to recover before sending even stronger raids against us.

  As much I wish for his theory to be the one to be true, I feel like if it were the case, maybe we should be facing raids similar to the one a normal abductee should face. Still, he may be right. We have no way to know for sure... Wait yes we do! But not right now. We will take on a trial at a later date. At least once we are off this mountain.

  Speaking of, we have come to the end of another day. Night falls once more, and we spend it with a surprisingly low number of monsters to deal with.

  Once the sun rises, we continue up. Snow covers everything around us now, and the ice beneath manages to pose a threat even to my clawed feet. That is until I realize another particularity of my body: I have a far greater range of motion with these claws than I realized. As they are linked to my toes, I though they would be like nails, unable to be moved, but it turns out they are closer to another phalanges. This discovery allows me to use them as improvised ice cleats, thus negating most of the risks of sliding on ice. It still takes me some time to get used to it, but is... mostly... works.

  We are now close to the top of the mountain. Only another couple thousand meters remain, and the terrain is growing steeper as we go. This has the side and unintuitive benefit to make the climb faster. Climbing a cliff face is faster than walking up a slope.

  As I clear a one such cliff, we end up going along a long slope filled with strange ice formations. The formations almost look like sculptures, but most seem withered by the elements, or broken apart. And the higher we go, the more the quality improves.

  We end our day on a plateau next to another cliff. The space is mostly hospitable, and will offer ample sight for the monsters to come.

  None come. The entire night passes without a single attack. It gets to a point where I actually decide to place dirt, endoflames, a mana spreader and a pool, and begin to stockpile mana for later use. I have found out I can isolate mana tablets in my inventory, so they may not be consumed when my equipment repairs itself.

  When the sun finally rises, I clean up my mess, and I climb the cliff.

  When my clock indicates midday, we reach it. The top of Icen Sky Peak is a short ridge, barely large enough for me to stand upon.

  We smile at the achievement, and look around the Ezian plane. From both our left and right, the Ice Cap range extend into the distance, further than we can see. It truly is a natural frontier. Behind us, our sight now extend all the way to arrival plane, and even beyond. What we see fills us with wonderment, as well as dread. The blight mentioned by Princess as well as Aster in journal has spread almost to the edge of the forest bordering Arrival plane.

  We also spot more craters, although we have a hard time confirming the presence of the massive beasts in them. Some craters seems to have been caused by fallen rocks though. the biggest one appears as a grey disc with a black center from the distance.

  We slowly retrace our steps, from the arrival plane, to the magical forest. The forcefield covering is is actually visible from here. The shimmering barrier no bigger than my thumb, yet its shimmer seemingly visible in real time, as clear as they were from up close, as if distance is irrelevant. I hope the residents are alright. I wonder if we will unlock some sort of fast travel system in the future.

  Our sight cover the Fanged plain, then the savanna, all the way to the edge of Raging Lake. We then follow the many forests covering its shores, until we end up at the foot of Icen Sky Peak. We traveled far, and yet...

  We turn around, finally looking at what lies beyond the ridge.

  And yet we still have so much left to get through.

  I have not read too much up ahead in Aster's journal, trying to keep what awaits us beyond the peak as much of a surprise as possible. And what we find beyond the peak makes our breath catch into our throat. The other side of Icen Sky Peak is nothing but cliffs growing atop cliffs. From the foot of it, it must look like a massive wall.

  And beyond it, is black sand. A desert made of black sand spread from the foot of Icen Sky Peak. It goes and goes until it reaches a jungle in the distance, but quickly transitions to canyons made of colored terracotta. Beyond them, we cannot make out what there is.

  We remain here, transfixed by the sight. This is what we will have to travel through. Beyond the canyons must be the ocean, and upon this ocean, we will find the ruins of Marble City.

  As the sun dips behind us, we look as the shadow of Icen Sky Peak extend upon the black desert, swallowing dunes after dunes.

  We remain there, simply basking in the enormity of the world.

  We look up, at the floating islands above us, now so close we can see their colors. The blue-gray stone making them up is now visible. along with barely distinguishable ores sparsely sprinkled under the islands. We witness a cloud-like monster move around one, before it vanishes above it again.

  One day we will have to go there. I do not know when, but I know we will.

  The sun sets, and stars begin to shine, clearer than ever before.

  I think we will spend the night here.

  He watches the duo. They have taken a seat upon the ridge, and have remained since. Night is coming, and his deal with the lower lord has expired.

  If they want to come back down, they will have to face her.

  In silence, he slips closer, curious as to what could have the pokemon and not-human so transfixed.

  From the shadows of a crack, he beholds the sight, and it almost makes him slip in his hiding.