Thyr knew he was going to die. All the other miners had been crushed—Memphis too...
All because of Officer Blaze's greed. If he had just left after collecting all the mana stones, everyone would have returned alive.
But he wanted more. He sensed there was far greater wealth beneath the surface, and greed won out. That was what killed all the miners.
As he fell, countless thoughts raced through Thyr's mind. His entire life flashed before his eyes.
"That bastard Blaze probably did this on purpose so he wouldn't have to pay us... In the end, we died with nothing to show for it... I just hope he at least fixes the barrier in time."
After falling through darkness for what felt like an eternity, Thyr noticed a brilliant light surrounding him.
It came from the mana crystals embedded in the walls—the same ones he'd seen when Blaze shattered that barrier.
His body fell for nearly two minutes. Thyr couldn't believe the speed of his descent, or the depth of that hole.
Then, suddenly, his body began to slow—as if some mysterious force was affecting the gravity around him.
Thyr looked down and saw something unbelievable. A massive sphere of energy, like a small sun buried beneath the earth.
It glowed blue and appeared to be burning. It moved, rotating, sending pulses of energy through various tunnels leading to the surface.
Beside the sphere stood an enormous tree, its roots wrapped around the crystals in the walls and coiled around part of the massive orb.
"What the hell is this?" Thyr thought.
It looked like something from another world. Thyr, a slum dweller who had never even left the city of Greyrock, didn't know what to make of what was unfolding before his eyes.
He was slowly levitated toward the massive sphere of energy. As his body drew near, something bizarre happened.
The branches of that enormous tree moved and pierced straight through his body! Immense agony seized him.
"Ahhhh!" Thyr screamed in pain.
Blood poured from his wounds. The tree yanked him aside and hurled him onto the earthen ground near its base.
In that moment, the tree began channeling the energy it absorbed from the sphere directly into Thyr's body!
The heat in that place was intense, and the pain wracking his body was excruciating. He had to fight to stay conscious.
[Vessel for the World Tree found]
[Initiating fusion]
Every pore in Thyr's body began to open. These were the same pores that awakened individuals had opened before him.
Just like many before him, Thyr was finally awakening mana within his body.
The process was agonizing. It felt as though needles were being driven into every inch of his flesh, and a burning sensation consumed him.
A throbbing pain in his chest. Each heartbeat felt like it would explode.
Inside his body, unlike most common awakeners, his mana core was different.
Thyr's mana core was a tiny sapling of the World Tree. It rested there, small, planted in the ground. As if it had just been born.
Thyr passed out from the pain, collapsing onto the ground beside the energy sphere. His body was critically weakened.
Time passed down in the depths while the fusion completed. Thyr had no idea how many days he lay there.
When he finally awoke, Thyr rose slowly. To his surprise, his wounds had partially healed.
"At least I'm not bleeding anymore," he thought.
But what caught his attention most was that his body was no longer the same. He was different from before.
Thyr was no longer an ordinary human incapable of using mana. No—now he had mana within his body!
Strange information had appeared in his mind. He focused on his attributes and stats, and a scroll materialized, floating in the air before him.
On the scroll, several pieces of information were displayed:
[Name: Thyr]
[Body Rank: First Stage of the Mortal Realm]
[Core Rank: First Stage of the Mortal Realm]
[Mana: 5/5]
[Passive Skills:]
[Primordial Cycle Resonance: Every 24 hours, the amount of mana in your body doubles indefinitely.]
[Sapling Tenacity: Your body is infused with the World Tree sapling. While in contact with the ground, your wound regeneration is increased by 250%.]
Thyr's initial mana wasn't particularly high, but when he read his passive skill, he couldn't believe it.
He had to read it several times just to be certain.
"Wait, is this actually right?" he thought, blinking repeatedly.
That passive was simply absurd—and at the same time, concerning. Anyone, even a former non-awakened like him, knew the human body had a limit to how much mana it could withstand.
"Am I a ticking time bomb?"
Thyr clenched his fists.
"Even if I am, at least I'll have the power to take revenge on that bastard Blaze... He's strong, but give me time—with this passive, I'll surpass his mana!"
He looked around, noticing several tunnels that might lead back to the surface.
Beyond that, Thyr studied the tree that had pierced his body and now housed a sapling within him.
"Could this sphere be the planetary core from the legends?" Thyr wondered. "It can't be real..."
Thyr wasn't well-educated, but even as a slum dweller, he had learned to read. He'd even managed to acquire some books from the church located in the slums.
There, he'd read about mythical stories—tales he'd always dismissed as fiction.
Yet here stood an enormous sphere made of pure mana right before his eyes! Perhaps the planetary core wasn't just a story after all.
Thyr noticed something he hadn't seen before. At the base of the tree—one that held the planetary core and absorbed its energy to keep the planet from exploding—there lay a small egg.
It was completely black.
Curious, Thyr approached the egg. The moment he drew near, it began to crack.
"Shit... is this a fucking magical beast egg?"