SSS Awakening: I Can Devour Gods to Evolve My Goddesses

The wind in Galegrass Expanse was stronger than in Riftward.

The grass was taller too.

In the deepest stretches, it nearly reached a person’s waist.

Once the Warden Gate closed, the gray slopes of Forgotten Shrine disappeared completely.

Only Cassian’s Warden Authority retained the record for his personal Link, ready to be reopened.

They were outside Riftward’s formal boundary now.

No patrol network spread across four hundred and three Lords.

No road marks Tobias reported back every day.

No miners or repair carts Bram could send at any moment.

Higher risk.

And different things to find.

Aurelia had gone less than two hundred meters when a black-maned lion nearly four meters long burst from the grass.

[Ironmane Lion]

[Quality: Common]

[Level: 37]

It did not even manage to open its jaws all the way.

Aurelia turned her blade.

Lightning drove up through its lower jaw and straight through its skull.

The corpse crashed into the grass.

She looked down once.

"Even the Common ones are Level 37."

Celia swept her gaze across the distance.

"Then at least the things out here are worth a little more than the ones inside Riftward."

Cassian heard her.

"Look for Rare and above first."

"Don’t go out of your way to chase Common or Elite."

He split the force.

Aurelia took four Stormlance east.

Celia took four south.

Sigrid led the remaining four toward the high ground to the north.

The eleven Highblood split into small teams and widened their fields of fire.

The four Blackfang scattered outright.

The Rocketiers stayed near the Warden Gate coordinates.

Not because they were slow.

The grassland was simply too open.

If they found a large group of targets, twenty rockets could pivot from here toward any direction.

Cassian gave one final instruction.

"Report anything Rare or above."

"If it has a Core Trait, report that first."

"Understood."

The teams spread out.

Less than twenty minutes later, the Private Channel lit up first.

Not Aurelia.

Not Sigrid either.

Elara.

[Elara Vayne: Can your Shared Link connect to my Outer March coordinates now?]

[Cassian Vale: Yes.]

[Elara Vayne: Then send me a high-grade unit you’re willing to spare.]

Cassian paused.

[Cassian Vale: What did you find?]

Elara sent the panel directly.

[Stonehide Direbear]

[Quality: Epic]

[Level: 30]

[Core Trait: None]

A short battle image followed.

Brogan Stonecrown stood in front of a rocky slope.

Two Dwarven heavy infantry lay on the ground to his left.

The Stonehide Direbear’s chest was covered in axe marks.

Not one had truly broken through the armor.

Elara’s voice came through next.

"I just opened the Shared Link to the outer edge of the eastern mountains."

"Been here less than ten minutes."

"Brogan can hold it."

"He can’t kill it."

"Two are already dead."

"If this keeps going, I close the gate and pull out."

She did not ask whether Cassian had to save her.

She stated her retreat line first.

Cassian finished reading the Epic panel.

No Core Trait.

He did not need the final hit himself.

What Elara actually needed was a mobile force capable of punching through Epic armor across a ten-Level gap.

Aurelia and Celia could both do it.

But he had just sent both of them into the Outer March to screen for high-grade targets.

There was no reason to pull the entire exploration force back for one Level 30 Epic.

Cassian looked north.

Sigrid and four Stormlance had not gone far yet.

"Eira, come back."

A streak of lightning soon curved back over the tall grass.

Eira landed.

"Lord?"

Cassian opened her growth panel.

[Eira | Stormlance Valkyrie]

[Quality: Epic]

[Level: 10]

[Level 10 → Level 20]

[Battle Essence ×120,000]

That amount was no longer a serious hit to his current Battle Essence reserve.

More importantly, Elara was responsible for the Eastern Mountain Route and joint defense of the Royal Hall.

This would not be the last time Brogan could hold something but could not break it.

"Level her up."

Lightning-colored growth rings flashed beneath Eira one after another.

Level 12.

15.

18.

20.

No new skill notification appeared.

Storm Body was still Storm Body.

Thunder Javelin was still the same Thunder Javelin.

The changes were in the fundamentals.

A larger Aether reserve.

More stable lightning-element conduction.

And the physical strength an Epic unit should have at Level 20.

Eira flexed her right hand.

"Just me?"

"For now."

Cassian opened another storage slot.

The eight Hellcrown Guard corpses brought home yesterday had already begun to be dismantled.

Bram had sent the first list of usable parts that morning.

The arm-blade core from one Hellcrown Guard had survived intact.

The Royal Hall Forge had reforged that black-red Coresteel into a Stormlance spear shaft.

[Cinderedge Lance]

[Quality: Epic]

[Level Requirement: 20]

[Combat Profile: Piercing / Lightning Conduction]

[Source: Hellcrown Guard Coreblade Reforge]

No new skill.

No exaggerated Boss effect.

The valuable part was the material itself.

The Stormlance’s original spear was perfectly capable of carrying Thunder Javelin.

But against Level 30 Epic armor like the Stonehide Direbear’s, the question was not whether the lightning was strong enough.

The spearhead had to get in first.

A Hellcrown Guard’s Coreblade had been made for a Level 32 Epic melee unit.

Once the Royal Hall Forge reforged that section into a lance, it filled exactly that gap.

An Epic corpse he’d already hauled home was finally more than "high-quality material" sitting in storage.

Cassian handed over the lance.

Eira took it.

The moment lightning lit along the spearhead, the dark-red Coresteel looked as though a layer of color had been washed away, leaving only a deep ring of red-black at its core.

"Feel right?"

Eira spun the lance once.

"Heavier than the old one."

She pressed the tip lightly toward the ground.

The lightning did not scatter along the shaft.

It ran down the Coresteel and compressed at the very point.

"Conducts better."

"Usable?"

"Yes."

"Then go."

Elara reopened the Shared Link.

She was the one initiating this Link, so the Transit cost settled on her side.

The silver gate had barely stabilized when the Stonehide Direbear’s roar came through from the other side.

Eira stepped across.

---

The fight on Elara’s side lasted less than another three minutes.

Brogan did not step back just because help had arrived.

He stayed in front.

His great axe repeatedly caught the Direbear’s two forepaws.

Eira did not take that position from him.

Her first Thunder Javelin hit the shoulder.

BOOM!

For the first time, a real crack appeared in the gray stone armor.

The Direbear turned and lunged at her.

Storm Body surged to full power.

Eira did not contest its weight head-on.

She cut past from the side.

The Cinderedge Lance drove straight through the shoulder gap the lightning had just blown open.

Half the spearhead disappeared inside.

The Direbear roared and tried to throw her away.

Brogan’s axe haft smashed into the back of its other knee.

The massive body dipped.

Eira ripped the lance free.

The second time, she did not use Thunder Javelin again.

Lightning from Storm Body ran down the Cinderedge Lance into the spearhead, while Spear Mastery kept that single point perfectly on line.

She drove straight into the same wound.

BOOM—!

This time, the gray stone armor exploded open from shoulder to chest.

The Stonehide Direbear stumbled forward two steps.

Then collapsed.

[Eira has killed Stonehide Direbear.]

[Quality: Epic | Level: 30]

Elara looked at the corpse first.

Then at Eira.

"Level 20?"

"Just reached it."

"And that lance is new too?"

"Just got it."

Elara went quiet for a moment.

Then she turned the communication view toward Cassian.

"You leveled an Epic on the spot just to deal with this bear?"

"Not for this one."

Cassian said,

"You’re responsible for the Royal Hall route now."

"If Brogan runs into something he can hold but can’t break, report it."

"If Elara can handle it, don’t take it from her."

"If she can’t, Eira steps in."

Elara understood.

Brogan remained her front-line anchor.

Eira was not there to take his shield position or steal targets he could finish himself.

Only when something high-grade appeared that they could hold but not kill would a Stormlance provide the finishing power they were missing.

Elara gained reliable high-grade backup.

Cassian gained access to the genuinely valuable targets she ran into across the eastern mountains and the Outer March.

"So she stays with me for now?"

"Yes."

Elara looked at Eira.

"You’re willing to station core troops like Stormlance outside your own force?"

Cassian had not answered yet when a chain of thunder rolled across Galegrass Expanse.

Sigrid and the other ten Stormlance were repositioning in the distance.

Eleven streaks of lightning swept across the grassland one after another.

Elara watched for two seconds.

Then looked again at Eira beside her.

"Twelve?"

"Yes."

She looked back at the lightning crossing the grassland.

"Against Nightstripe, you only brought two."

"Later, when you entered the Dwarf mountain line, you only let me see six."

"I always knew you had a squad of Stormlance."

"I didn’t realize you’d gone this long without ever putting the full squad in front of me at once."

Cassian said,

"If fewer are enough, there’s no reason to bring all of them."

Elara was silent for a moment.

Her eyes returned to the Cinderedge Lance in Eira’s hands.

"So what you’re giving me right now is one out of twelve."

"Temporarily."

Elara let out a breath.

"Fine."

"Then I won’t hold her back just because she’s yours."

"Don’t trade her health for damage."

"That sounds like something Veyra should be saying."

"She isn’t there."

"So you’re saying it for her?"

"Yes."

Elara smiled.

"Got it."

Only then did the system reward arrive.

[Epic target kill reward]

[Battle Essence +90,000]

[Skill Book: Groundshock ×1 | Epic]

[Stonehide Plate ×1 | Epic | Level Requirement 30]

The kill belonged to Eira.

The item rewards entered Cassian’s loot inventory.

The Direbear corpse, however, was still on Elara’s side.

Cassian said,

"Keep half the materials from the corpse."

"Send me the other half."

Elara shook her head.

"Without Eira, I would already have closed the gate."

"Take it."

"I’ll keep the equipment from the two Dwarves who died and this site."

"Then I’ll send you a finished piece once the materials are processed."

Elara thought about it.

"Fine."

Neither side owed the other a favor.

An Epic that would have forced Elara to retreat had become a target both sides could profit from.

---

Cassian had barely closed the communication when Aurelia’s voice came from the southeast.

"Found a group."

"How many?"

"About a thousand."

"Wolves."

Cassian looked up.

Through Aurelia’s shared view, gray-black shapes cut through the tall grass.

The largest stood on a slab of exposed rock.

[Ironback Wolf Alpha]

[Quality: Rare]

[Level: 43]

Behind the wolf pack, a red-gold vein showed through soil they had torn open.

The system took two seconds longer to identify it than the monster panel.

Then the Domain Advancement notice that had remained gray in Cassian’s vision suddenly lit up.

[Discovered: Starcopper Vein]

[Rare Resource Point]

[Matches key material requirement for Forgotten Shrine Rank IV Advancement.]

Cassian stopped.

Aurelia was still asking,

"Check the wolves first?"

Cassian’s gaze had already moved past the pack.

Onto the red-gold vein.

"Check the mine first."

"The wolves are in the way."

"Then take both."