“After that battle at the water palace, I’m probably a big deal in the nearby Basins, right? If I put out a call for folks to join me, some’d show up, yeah?”

  Oliver starts thinking.

  “Black Wolf Lycoris, this job’s yours.”

  Black Wolf Lycoris, a leader in the soul army, used to be level 9. But tagging along with Oliver, munching on leftover chaos energy and growing steady in the gem space, he’s hit level 13.

  “Master, I’ll nail this task a thousand percent!” Black Wolf says, all respectful.

  “But, Master, I heard the giant palace sets ranks for their followers, each with perks. How do I pitch the benefits of being your servant to wild deities?” Black Wolf asks.

  “Hmm…”

  Oliver thinks for a sec, then says, “Rankings can mirror the giant palace’s—regular servants, Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Mandela Metal.”

  With a flick of his will, Oliver takes some stored metal and shapes it into tons of badges with his soul power.

  Most of these badges are Silver, handed out to the 10,000-strong soul army and most plant deities.

  Of course, some are special—like Black Wolf Lycoris, tagged as Gold, getting a Gold badge.

  Ygg and the Star Tree score badges forged from Mandela Metal.

  “Any new deities we recruit who hit level 10 or I think have big potential can become Bronze. Bronze gets to enter my gem space, pick land, and become a lord.”

  Of course, they gotta hand over their soul imprint to be Oliver’s servant.

  That’s the price for his protection.

  Truth is, Oliver’s in the middle of a creation act. Deities joining his crew now are stupidly lucky—bound to leave their mark in future myths.

  Think about it: in later religions’ murals, in sacred patterns worshipped by countless folks, you’d have your own stamp.

  Standing beside Oliver, a creator—that’s an honor in itself.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  Of course, most deities now can’t see that.

  All they care about is Oliver’s strength and the protection he can offer.

  “Oh, gotta give my faction a name…” Oliver muses.

  “Ouroboros Abyss. That’s the name,” Oliver decides.

  “Sweet! We’re the first members of Ouroboros Abyss!” Ygg and the Black Wolves cheer.

  From now on, they’re the OGs. New deities will look up to them—pretty thrilling when you think about it.

  Soon, Black Wolf takes a big crew out of the gem space, heading to various chaos Basins to hype Oliver’s new faction.

  Meanwhile, Oliver starts tallying up the haul from that battle outside the water palace!

  First up, the biggest score: the chaos energy clump from that big spider, laced with the Law of Fate!

  Oliver’s about to dig into it, start mastering Fate’s law.

  Next, the stuff in the spider’s space pouch.

  First, 800,000 pounds of Mandela Metal—kinda light for a deity of his caliber.

  Some A-tier items too—Oliver’s not super impressed, but they’re worth maybe 400,000 pounds combined.

  What really catches his eye is a consumable item called a Rune Gem. This thing can boost the power of all primal runes in the body by +1 or +2 for a short time. That’s right, all of them—Oliver possesses over a hundred different primal runes, so imagine how powerful he’d become after using this item! What a waste for such a treasure to be in the hands of that spider!

  Downside? It’s got limited uses—only three left.

  “Mastering primal runes is crazy hard for regular deities, and there’s a tool like this…”

  Oliver’s intrigued. After eyeing the gem closely, he spots familiar patterns on it.

  Thanks to those patterns, Oliver figures out its origin—it’s likely from The Well of Urd!

  Oliver once saw a glimpse of that well and got irrigated by it. The benefits from that still help him today.

  His knack for quick mastery of so many primal runes? Tied big-time to that well-water baptism.

  And the Well of Urd, aka the Well of Fate.

  Real convenient that this spider just happened to wield Fate primal runes.

  That’s no coincidence.

  Oliver suddenly realizes this spider might lead him to clues about the Well of Urd!

  Sure, he’s already killed the guy, but maybe the spider’s past or rumors about him hold some hints.

  He once tried using the Wishing Bottle to find the Well of Urd—total bust. But using it to track clues tied to the well or this spider?

  That’s not hard!

  The Wishing Bottle can probably handle it!

  Of course, Oliver’s main focus right now is digesting the spider’s chaos energy to master the Fate primal rune.

  Calming his mind, Oliver coils up in the void and starts processing the energy.

  As it flows into his body, the power of Fate starts pulsing through his flesh!