Wherever Tier laid his gaze upon, everything was painted in darker shades of grey. The whole contour was almost identical to Zurefgar yet devoid of any life. Instead of creatures, there was an eerie silence coming from strands and some unshaped spirits that soared to the sky.

Up above, there was a massive vortex swirling towards an unending void. Tier wondered if the vortex was made from the souls of the dead. Fortunately, his soul was kinda intact and retained his body's form in a rather ethereal shape.

Perhaps, it was still in Zurefgar and Tier was just stranded in a limbo between Zurefgar and its afterlife. The Graylands was majestic beyond words in its own way, yet still sent chills down his spine.

The only confusing thing was that just above his minimap, he saw ‘Sacrifice counter: 1’ written. He barely heard or read about it before.

“What a shame, my friend, a hunter should be feigning death, not real dead,” a relaxed-toned raspy voice greeted Tier with a chuckle. “You better listen more to da spirits.”

The one who greeted him was a character named Spirit Guide. He was a massive rakhs shaped spirit with height around 3 times of Tier’s. He wore a skull as his tribal mask, ornated with the feathers of a small bird which was probably a nightingale’s. Mischief and vigour were burning bright from his eyes. There were lines of ashes making the shape of a skeleton drawn on his arms and bare chest.

“For example, those kinds of spirits,” he pointed towards the animal silhouettes who were moving around jolly. Those silhouettes - or spirits - seemed keen to direct Tier to his body. Tier also heard faint sounds of tribal drums coming from that direction.

“Or,” the spirit guide continued, he bent forward and rested his elbows on his knees in such a way that the ivory bones didn't clash on each other, “How about a bargain? You don’t need to walk far and be revived here.”

There was a flicker of mischief appearing in his eyes when he explained, “But I be taking a bit of your power. Nothing much, you would just feel tired for a certain amount of time. As we all know, my friend, there be a price for convenience.”

Tier guessed that someone like Lyra probably would camp on Tier’s corpse and wait for him to revive just to brutally beat him again. It was a rather basic form of grieving that might still have found its way in the current era of gaming.

Taking the bargain didn’t sound that bad of a deal anyway.

Tier was about to take the offered resurrection, but then his eyes caught something else. Far on the northern horizon, around 30 degrees to the east to be more exact, he saw a huge light pillar. From his guess the light could be around the continent named Farenoth where the dwarven civilization was built.

At first, Tier wondered if the massive light pillar was just the sign of the north pole, but he dismissed that hypothesis when he failed to see something similar at the southern horizon. Then he guessed that the light pillar might be a visual glitch.

Even that was being half dismissed when Tier saw a silhouette of a massive four legged creature circling around the light pillar. Tier sighed realising that he couldn’t use [Eagle Eye] to look closer.

But somehow, the snow jaguar came to his mind considering the location of the pillar. He wondered if the light was located right at the Nefelein Valley.

Incoming whisper from Nubram.

[Pras, where are you? Don’t res on your corpse, yet. Lyra might still be there, she didn’t try to chase us to Grandar.]

Some electrons on Tier’s brain twitched at the sudden whisper. He reached his cheekbone and replied, “Command on: reply. I’m not Ega or Eggi, okay, I’m still in Graylands, gonna res here at the spirit guide?”

[Just making sure. About those two… they got murdered by Slicer.]

Tier involuntarily growled, letting some furious air blow from his mouth. He felt both chill and heat rise up from his chest at the mention of the news.

“Nothing good would ever happen if he’s around, huh….”

[Whut?]

“Nothing, I’ll res now.”

[Great, Mana said we should change location and do levelling in the southern area. She said that should be beneficial as well for Ega, but I don’t know what she meant.]

“Alright.”

Tier sighed again. Mana was clearly weird to him and highly suspicious. Was the reason she kept sticking to his side today was because she heard about Zurefgar? How long has she been playing? Why would she go the extra mile to play with them? Maybe it was all a coincidence.

Glad I found you, decent deskmate

No. her words were the clear sign that it was not the case. She did look for them.

“Is she a solo player they mentioned?”

Tier mumbled to himself. Half of this question might be true considering the previous time he saw her alone, not to mention other people he had met before also mentioned about a female guardian paladin that was still levelling.

One thing that definitely felt off for Tier was the solo player stuff. In his mind, someone like her shouldn’t have much of a problem looking for a party to level up together.

His confusion on her real background was enough to set aside his infatuation. Yet, there were other things that slowly grew more prominent in his mind.

The hunter looked up at the spirit guide who now extended a helping hand with a gleeful smile. As he reached out to accept the resurrection, Tier’s hand trembled a bit. He wondered if Slicer aiming them was part of his fault because he recently started a beef with Lyra and Slicer. While the earlier had only killed him, a person who currently wouldn't bother if he died more than five times in Zurefgar, the latter had taken down two of them. If this continues, his friends might not be able to go to Clashing Realms.

And Tier thought he was at fault since he wasn’t being careful.

“Command on: accept resurrection.”

“Be mindful of the bargain, my friend.”

The spirit guide grinned as they shook hands. He danced in trance. Silhouettes of several animals frolicked around Tier, their cries sung along the beating of tribal drums which steadily became louder.

A moment later, Tier felt like he was jolted to the living world. Nausea struck together with a sharp pain to his chest as his lungs were shocked by the increasing pressure due to breathing. His muscles spasm for a bit then quickly overridden by the cramp-like pain, yet they are so weak that Tier just fell to his knees.

Panting, Tier finally realised that wind blew to his face and the grass grew lush. His current place was filled with colours of life. On top right of his vision, he saw an icon of a skull mask basked in light. If Tier was not mistaken, that should be the mark of resurrection sickness as part of the bargain which weakened him. There’s also a countdown mark that shows it would still be around for 30 minutes in Zurefgar's time.

“Bro, you’re dead as well?” Renma greeted Pras. The priest was sitting and relaxing while Rushvatte on his side seemed pissed while staring southwards.

Tier quickly observed his surroundings. Apparently they are on top of a tall circular mound. There were also two level 30-ish orcs hanging around. Everyone seemed to be taking a leisurely break.

“Did you get trampled by minotauros? Bet because of Fat… Flick huh?” Renma asked again, he avoided using their real name due to the existence of other players around.

Tier shook his head. He sat down with them to also take a breath. “Lyra,”

“Aw, shucks, me and Rush got sliced by Slicer.”

“Damn…” Tier nodded. He already knew the info from Nubram.

“Slicer? Lyra? You guys gotta be careful,” Axxe, one of the orcs who had a braided beard, jumped into their conversation.

Hammah, the other orc, emphasised, “Especially Slicer, that guy’s a maniac.”

Tier frowned, “Who are they actually?”

Axxe rubbed his chin, “Slicer was known to be toxic from the very beginning. You know, the typical self absorbed DPS, he went on ninja looting in dungeons and raids. But that got him into trouble and then he started to aim at weaker players, even grieving on low levels without clear intent.”

“But Lyra was different,” Axxe continued, “She’s a powerhouse, the vice lead of Brotherhood guild, Rosdan’s right hand, and also a hotshot in Clashing Realms. She’s known for both her capabilities and no nonsense behaviour. But I don’t know what happened, she suddenly turned toxic and started being a disturbance. Especially if she knows you’re going for Clashing Realms. She's gonna target you.”

“From what I heard, she fought with a fellow Clashing Realms player, one of the content creator guys, I think. But, I don’t know which one,” Hammah explained. His expression grew sombre, “After that she got baited to do something then got slandered. Well, you know what happens when famous people use their fame….”

“They’ll utilise their circle and fans to gang up on you, making your life a living hell,” Tier chimed in. He took a deep breath and sighed heavily. Meanwhile Renma just patted him.

“Exactly,” Hammah nodded. “I think she got some lingering grudge left, that’s what I heard of why she started chasing those going for Clashing Realms. I bet Slicer sticks with her just for the fun of messing with lower levelled players.”

“What do you expect from Slicer? I hope he stops playing,” Axxe grunted. “That guy’s just pure bred toxic waste.”

Renma tried to joke, “Imagine if you’re a content creator or streamer and plan to join Clashing Realms.”

Hammah and Axxe laughed, “Lyra would definitely make your life a living hell.”

“So what?!” Rushvatte raged. “I don’t give a sliver of a damn to noobs like them.”

He turned to Tier and asked, “Tell me, what is the best second form for me? I need a new form that is resistant to cheap tricks or poison before I can slice and dice that shithead with my tiger claws.”

“Bear?” Tier and the others answered in unison. All of them even have the exact same tone.

“Why bear?”

“I don’t know,” Hammah shrugged. “You said tiger, then I just assume you don’t want to be boar shaped and you look fierce.”

“Yeah, bear suits you, bro.”

“Oh shut up, boar.”

Axxe frowned, “I never knew rakhs could be a mystic.”

“Come on, Axxe. I believe that’s not what he meant to Renma.”

“True,” Tier snorted.

Nevertheless, from what he had read in wikis and forums, their answers were pretty much right. Mystics could choose 2 from 5 available forms which are bjornur the bear that worked as fighter or bruiser, phantera or big cat as rogue like attacker, boar or scrofatus as tank, lycanthrope as wolf that give support utility with their howls, and svannire the spellcaster that can heal or attack.

It is up to a mystic to focus on one form only and have the other one to support the main form or get a balanced one. Whichever choice they went with, they will get different bonuses.

For Rushvatte's case, other than bears being more resilient towards disabling effect, Tier had another consideration. From what he knew, bears are very versatile on the battlefield. They can deal quite good damage and also have a plethora of ways to disable the opponents.

That might be good for Rushvatte. He wouldn’t lose much but would have a quite solid supporting form if he chooses to focus more on tiger form. However, if he ended up liking the form, then he can go on a more balanced build between the two forms.

The problem was, considering Rusahvatte tendencies, telling him directly might cause some weird responses. Tier needed to mince his words and encourage Rusahvatte to think about it on his own.

“Well, imagine not being able to do anything under the barrage of [Insularis’ Assault],” Tier said while grinning slyly. “Imagine not being able to produce shock damage on each strike or deal enough damage after getting out of a sticky situation.”

Renma chuckled, “You heard that? Our resident loremaster had spoken.”

“Fine, I’ll take the bear.”

When they were laughing at Rushvatte’s response, Tier noticed a speck of dark colour seemed to rush toward their direction from the southeast. He quickly used [Eagle Eye] to scout.

His heart sank. Slicer was coming.

“It’s Slicer,” Tier warned.

Axxe jumped on his feet. He suggested, “We better run.”

“Why?” Rushvatte groaned. “He can’t attack us in resurrection holy ground like this.”

“Yeah, but are you willing to hear him badmouth you the whole time? He’s the worst kind of untreated sewage.”

“I agree with Axxe.” Tier nodded at the others. Though his hands shook a bit, he stood up firmly. “Don’t waste your time for the likes of him,” he asserted to Rushvatte.

“Alright, alright,” Rushvatte sighed. “Where to?”

Tier jumped off the mound while summoning his rhino, landing swiftly on it’s saddle.

“Grandar!”