Zeyra’s jaw tightened. She stepped up to the opposite side of the table, placing her carved clay bowl down with a sharp, deliberate clack.

"Brute force and heavy meat only clog the veins if the pathways are still bruised," Zeyra countered smoothly, her voice dripping with venomous politeness. She gestured gracefully to the glowing fruits. "These are Sun-Kissed Lotus Plums. They take five years to ripen in the deepest, most essence-dense areas of the Shamanic Grove. They don’t just fill the stomach; they actively soothe the spiritual anchors and refine the raw energy in the core. They will heal the internal burns from your essence overdraft."

Zeyra leaned across the table, offering Sol a sultry, knowing smile, completely ignoring Kira’s murderous glare. "A true warrior knows that refining the spirit is far more important than just stuffing your face like a mindless beast."

"Who are you calling a mindless beast, you pampered little snake?" Kira snarled, her hand instinctively dropping toward the hilt of her hunting knife.

"If the boot fits, huntress," Zeyra shot back, her green snake spirit seemed to materialize and hissed softly, matching her master’s aggression.

Sol sat in the wooden chair, completely trapped in the crossfire.

He looked at Kira, whose hand was gripping the table so hard the petrified wood was starting to groan. He looked at Zeyra, whose eyes were burning with that intense, ambitious hunger. And then he looked down at the table.

They were both glaring at him now. The silent, heavy ultimatum was hanging right over his plate.

Choose. They were waiting to see whose food he would pick first. Whose offering held more value to him. In the brutal, tribal politics of the Great Orrath, a gesture like this wasn’t just about food; it was about acknowledging loyalty, preference, and status. If he picked the meat, Zeyra would take it as a blatant insult to her status. If he picked the fruit, Kira would see it as a rejection of her.

Sol didn’t have the patience for a tribal civil war in his bedroom.

His stomach let out a loud, aggressive growl that vibrated against his ribs. His Layer 2 Sun Core didn’t care about politics. It just demanded fuel.

Without saying a single word, Sol reached out with both hands.

His left hand grabbed a massive, dripping chunk of the roasted stone-Horn meat. His right hand snatched one of the glowing, sweet-smelling Sun-Kissed Lotus Plums.

He shoved the massive piece of meat into his mouth, tearing through the tough, essence... dense muscle with his teeth. It tasted incredible... rich, iron-heavy, and packed with raw, aggressive heat that immediately hit his stomach like a warm fire.

Before he even finished chewing the meat, he tossed the entire glowing plum into his mouth. The sweet, cool, refreshing juice exploded over his tongue, perfectly cutting through the heavy grease of the meat. The refined spiritual essence washed down his throat, acting like a soothing balm on his hyper-active meridians.

He swallowed hard, letting out a loud, highly satisfied grunt, and immediately reached for another handful of both.

He alternated rapidly. One bite of heavy meat, one bite of glowing fruit. He ate like a starving wolf, completely ignoring all basic table manners, making an absolute, glorious mess.

Kira and Zeyra just stood there, entirely stunned.

They watched him rapidly decimate both of their carefully prepared, highly valuable offerings at the exact same time, effectively neutralizing their entire political standoff by turning himself into a mindless garbage disposal.

Kira blinked, her hand slowly moving away from her knife. Zeyra’s mouth opened slightly, her elegant, sultry posture completely ruined by sheer disbelief.

Seeing him completely disregard their bitter rivalry to just stuff his face, both girls let out a simultaneous, highly annoyed "Hmph!" They didn’t say another word. They didn’t ask for permission. Kira pulled up a wooden stool on his left side, and Zeyra elegantly dropped into a chair on his right. They sat down, crossing their arms, and immediately resumed glaring at each other over the top of his head while he ate.

"You’re tracking mud onto the floorboards, Vanguard," Zeyra noted dryly, eyeing Kira’s heavy boots.

"And you’re polluting the air with that cheap scent, snake," Kira shot back without missing a beat.

Sol sat perfectly in the middle of the crossfire, chewing a thick piece of roasted root vegetable. He didn’t try to stop them. He didn’t try to mediate. He was the helpless, stationary target sitting directly between two heavily armed, incredibly dangerous women who were actively using his dinner table as a proxy warzone.

And honestly?

As Sol chewed his food, listening to the high-pitched, venomous bickering echoing off the wooden walls of his small room, a strange, unexpected thought crossed his mind.

A life like this... really isn’t too bad. He stopped chewing for a second, his silver-crimson eyes staring blankly at the far wall.

It was a profound, jarring realization. He lived in the Great Orrath. A rotting, toxic jungle filled with walking natural disasters. There was a constant, suffocating threat of death hanging over his head every single second of the day. Just an hour ago, he had been standing inches away from a Layer 4 Apex predator that could have melted his bones into slag. He had met an alien girl who could erase him from reality with a single thought.

His life was a chaotic, blood-soaked, terrifying mess.

But as he listened to Kira and Zeyra arguing over him, feeling the heavy, burning power of his Layer 2 core humming in his chest, he realized something absolutely crucial.

It was infinitely, objectively better than his last life.

Sol’s mind drifted back. He remembered the dark, cramped, depressing room back on Earth. The heavy, suffocating weight of absolute apathy. The endless, mind-numbing days staring at a screen, utterly disconnected from the world outside his window.

The crippling anxiety of failure that had kept him locked inside his own head, too terrified to take a single risk, too scared to reach out, too paralyzed to even answer the phone when his dying best friend had needed him.

He had spent his entire previous existence cowering in the shadows, trying to avoid pain, trying to avoid risk, trying to avoid failure.

And where did that get him?

He had still died. The world didn’t care that he played it safe. The universe didn’t reward his caution. He had died miserably, quietly, full of nothing but hollow, rotting regrets.

If he had just stepped out of that room. If he had just explored the world, challenged his own fears, taken a few hits to the chin, and actually lived his life... maybe things would have been different. Maybe his life would have been a bit more exciting. Maybe he would have been there for the people who mattered. 𝒻𝘳𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝘯𝘰𝑣ℯ𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝘮

Because in the absolute end, the destination is exactly the same. Everyone ends up in the dirt.

So why the hell was he so afraid of dying? Why die quietly in the dark when you can die spectacularly in the light?

He couldn’t change the past. He couldn’t go back to Earth and fix his mistakes. He couldn’t save his friend.

But he was here now. He had a second chance. He had a Sun Core burning like a star in his stomach. He had a cheat, a tribe that respected him, and the absolute power to carve his own path through this savage world.