"There’s four of us and there’s only one of her!" One of them shouted while charging in her direction. "We can overwhelm her!"

He raised his twin shortswords in her direction as he tried to cleave her in two as his face twisted into an ugly desperate snarl.

The man wasn’t a master swordsman, but he had the raw panicked strength of a cornered rat, heavily relying on the weight of his crude iron weapons to batter his opponents into submission.

Eternia didn’t retreat neither did she even blink.

The words Ren had told her mere minutes ago flashed in her mind.

’Your strength is in burst momentum and angular strikes, not raw clashing.’

As the twin shortswords came crashing down, Eternia stepped smoothly inside his guard, completely bypassing the lethal arcs of his weapons. She angled her newly purchased high-carbon steel blade upward.

Clang!

With a sharp, perfectly executed parry, she struck the flat of his right blade, using his own downward momentum to redirect the force.

The clash of power sent a shockwave up the bandit’s arms. His wrists popped with the impact shattering his grip instantly.

The twin shortswords flew out of his hands, spinning uselessly high into the night air.

The bandit’s sneer vanished, replaced by wide-eyed, primal terror as he realized he was completely unarmed and standing inches away from a predator.

He immediately dropped heavily onto his knees on the damp cobblestones, raising his bare hands to shield his face.

"Wait! Please! I yield—" he began begging for his life, his voice cracking with pathetic desperation.

Eternia didn’t hesitate. She didn’t possess a single ounce of mercy for the men who had just threatened her Master.

She pivoted on her heel, generating a massive amount of rotational force, and swung her curved blade in a devastating horizontal arc.

The high-grade steel sheared through the bandit’s leather armor, his ribs, and his spine with zero resistance. She slashed him completely in half like a Kit-Kat bar.

The top half of his torso slid backward, separating from his hips with a sickening wet tearing sound.

Blood sprayed in a massive, sweeping fan across the brick walls of the alleyway as his entrails spilled out onto the street.

Before the two halves of his body even hit the ground, another bandit charged at her.

"HAAA!" the man roared, swinging a heavy broadsword in a desperate overhead chop to avenge his fallen comrade.

Eternia spun, bringing her blade up to meet his.

Steel ground against steel as she clashed blades with that one, sparks showering over the dark cobblestones as they locked into a contest of raw strength.

Meanwhile, the last remaining bandit... a wiry, rat-faced man with a jagged dagger had hung back from the initial clash. His panicked eyes darted past the bloodbath, landing squarely on Ren.

Ren was still standing casually near the entrance of the alleyway with his hands resting easily behind his back, looking completely unbothered by the violence erupting three paces away.

The rat-faced bandit’s mind raced.

He thought if he could just bypass the monster girl, get Ren down, and put the jagged blade against his neck, he would be able to threaten this killing machine into surrendering.

Taking the arrogant, unmoving man hostage was his only ticket out of this slaughterhouse.

With a sudden burst of speed, he sprinted around the edge of the skirmish, charging directly at Ren with his dagger raised.

Eternia noticed this instantly.

A spike of panic and rage shot through her chest. Someone was aiming for her Master...

She didn’t just push back against the broadsword locked against hers; she surged forward.

Eternia parried the heavy blade aside with a brutal twist of her wrist, opening the bandit’s guard, and seamlessly drove her sword straight through his throat.

She didn’t even wait to pull the blade out cleanly. She ripped it sideways, practically decapitating the man, and immediately killed the guy that she was fighting while running at the last bandit.

She burned her mana, funneling it directly into her legs to shatter the physical limits of her human form as Eternia blurred.

The rat-faced man was only two feet away from Ren. He was already extending his arm, preparing to grab Ren by the collar.

Before the man could even think about stabbing the sword in her unmoving Master’s face, Eternia closed the distance in a fraction of a second.

She lunged with her arm shooting forward like a coiled viper striking its prey. She stabbed the bandit straight through the center of his forehead.

The force behind the thrust drove the curved blade cleanly through his skull, the bloody tip bursting out the back of his head with a shower of bone fragments and brain matter.

The man instantly lost his life with his body going completely rigid before the nervous system shut down.

The blood-soaked, crimson blade was hovering right in front of Ren’s eyes, so close he could smell the hot copper of the freshly spilled blood.

Ren didn’t flinch.

He didn’t even blink as he just stared calmly at the dark metal suspended inches from his nose.

Slowly, Eternia pulled it back. She placed her boot on the dead bandit’s chest and kicked him off her sword, letting the man collapse heavily onto his side in the dirt.

She turned to look at Ren. Her chest was heaving with heavy breaths as the adrenaline of the slaughter was still coursing through her veins.

Her golden eyes searched his face desperately for any sign of disgust or disappointment.

"Master..." she asked quietly. "How did I do?"

Ren looked at the four brutally mutilated corpses littering the alleyway, then back at her.

"You did pretty good," Ren said smoothly.

He stepped over the pooling blood, passing by her with his hands returning behind his back as he began walking deeper into the alleyway to continue their route home.

Eternia’s shoulders dropped slightly in relief. She quickly fell into step behind him, but she kept glancing back at the carnage they were leaving behind.

"Master," she asked, "what will we do with these bodies? Should we hide them?"

Ren didn’t break his stride. "What do you want to do? Swallow them?"

Eternia stopped dead in her tracks.

Ren casually looked back over his shoulder.

He knew exactly what he was saying. She really did have the ability to swallow Souls... everything was tethered to that intricate cursed skull mark branded onto the flesh of her back, currently hidden beneath the fabric of her clothes.

Eternia peeled her eyes shut as her heart began hammering violently against her ribs.

If she told him the truth... if she said that she could see glowing ethereal things hovering over the dead meat then her Master would undoubtedly call her crazy.

Or worse, he would realize she was a monster and abandon her. The slaver had beaten her severely the one time she had mentioned seeing the glowing lights.

But as she looked at Ren’s calm, expectant face, she swallowed the lump of fear in her throat. She couldn’t lie to him.

Eternia opened her eyes and told him regardless.

"Master," Eternia said with her voice trembling slightly. "I... I can see glowing orbs floating above their bodies. And I... I feel like I can swallow them. That is how the feeling is. It is an urge."

She closed her eyes tightly, bracing herself, waiting for her Master to call her crazy, to draw his own blade and strike her down for practicing forbidden demonic arts.

However, that word never came.

"If you feel like you can swallow them," Ren said casually as his voice was completely devoid of judgment or fear. "then you should swallow them."

Eternia’s eyes snapped open in absolute shock. "T-Truly?"

"I don’t repeat myself," Ren replied, turning fully to face her with a look of anticipation in his eyes. "Do it."

Eternia nodded frantically as she turned back to the four corpses.

She focused her vision, tapping into the dormant, restricted power of her lineage.

The world around her shifted slightly with the physical alleyway dimming as her spiritual perception heightened. Hovering gently above each of the dead bandits was a sphere of pure swirling white energy.

This was their residual life force or in other words...

Their souls.

As she focused on the white orbs that only she could see, the temperature of her skin spiked. The cursed skull mark on her back began to glow with a faint violet light radiating a strange, pulling heat through her spine.

She opened her mouth slightly and inhaled.

Immediately to her, the white balls of energy vibrated, breaking away from the physical corpses, and rapidly floated through the air directly into her chest.

The moment the souls breached her body, a wave of intense, euphoric pressure slammed into her. It wasn’t physical nourishment; it was metaphysical power.

The scattered fragments of the bandits’ mana pools, their minor proficiencies, and their residual magical energy violently flooded her own empty mana channels, forcefully expanding them.

Eternia gasped, her back arching slightly as the transfer completed as the glowing skull mark faded back into a dormant state.

"I feel..." Eternia whispered, looking down at her trembling hands. "I feel like I can use magic."

She focused on the foreign energy now circulating within her. She willed a flame to appear, drawing upon the residual affinity of the second bandit she had killed.

And so it did.

A bright, crackling orange flame burst to life, burning around her palm. She flinched initially, but the heat didn’t scorch her skin. It was as if these flames fundamentally belonged to her... The stolen magic recognized her as its absolute master...

She pushed more of the stolen mana into the spell and she increased the volume, making it a raging, roaring flame that illuminated the dark alleyway.

Eternia tilted her hand downward, letting the condensed fire trickle to the ground. The liquid fire landed directly on the massive pool of blood spilling from the bisected leader.

And as if the blood itself was highly flammable, the flames violently erupted.

The fire swallowed their bodies completely, racing along the blood trails and engulfing the corpses in an inferno, burning bone, flesh, and leather alike while attracting a massive amount of light to the otherwise dark street.

However, within seconds, the raging flame hovering in her own hand suddenly sputtered out as if it had lost its fuel.

"Haargh! Haah!" Eternia grunted, forcefully pushing her mana, trying to reignite the spark. She squeezed her fist with her brow furrowing in frustration but it refused to spew out.

No more flames came out... The well was completely dry...

’Wh—’ Eternia thought, deeply confused. The power had been so overwhelming just a moment ago. Why had it vanished so quickly?

However, Ren interrupted her thoughts before she could vocalize her confusion.

"Are we going now?" Ren asked smoothly, stepping out of the harsh light of the burning corpses.

Eternia blinked, snapping out of her daze. She looked at the bodies, which were already being reduced to unrecognizable, smoldering ash effectively erasing any evidence of their involvement.

"Yes, Master," she nodded quickly, pulling her curved blade back into the spatial storage ring on her finger.

They quickly resumed their walk, slipping into the deeper shadows of the commercial district just as the distant sounds of shouting echoed from the main street.

More people had noticed the sudden flash of fire and were arriving at the scene, but by the time the town guards and curious adventurers did, Ren and Eternia were far gone.

As they walked through the quiet, winding streets toward their inn, Ren turned his head slightly to look at her.

Eternia felt the heavy weight of his eyes on her body as a faint blush crept up her cheeks, assuming he was admiring how the clothes fit her frame.

However, Ren wasn’t that interested in her physical appearance. Rather, his gaze was fixed intently on the space between her shoulder blades... on the invisible scar hidden beneath the dark fabric.

’She has Soul Swallowing, huh?’ Ren thought, a deep sense of satisfaction settling in his chest.

It was a special ability of hers in the original web novel.

The reason she was such an absolute nightmare for the protagonist’s party later in the story wasn’t just her physical speed or her Snakekin transmutations. It was her horrific utility.

Alongside being able to completely restrict and depower the Awakened Caliburn... the legendary holy sword that Jace wielded, which could cut through the former Demon Lord easily... she also had the terrifying ability to swallow souls and temporarily wield their power.

With a dead soul, she could utilize whatever magic they had possessed in life.

If she killed a Pyromancer, she could cast fire. If she killed a Cleric, she could cast healing magic. She could even temporarily steal Divine Blessings or Divine Protections for a limited time, depending heavily on the overall strength and purity of the soul she consumed.

Which was exactly why Ren had sought her out so early in the timeline and bought her from the slaver before Jace ever arrived in this region.

Not only did he desperately want her on his side to restrict the sheer amount of divine, plot-armored bullshit that Jace could pull on him with Caliburn but he also absolutely didn’t want to get his own soul stolen and drained in the future if she ended up as an enemy.

Having her as a fanatically loyal subordinate was the ultimate anti-protagonist countermeasure.

"Do you want advice on your new power?" Ren asked suddenly, breaking the quiet silence of the street.

Eternia looked up at him as her golden eyes were wide with genuine surprise. "Master... how do you know about it? I have never told a single living soul about the white orbs."

Ren gave her a small smirk as his eyes glinting in the pale moonlight. "I know a lot about you, Eternia... More than you know about yourself."

’...That sounds weird.’ Ren thought with cringe bubbling.

Eternia’s breath hitched. The mysterious, all-knowing weight behind his words made her blush deepen significantly.

It was terrifying how easily he saw right through her, yet incredibly comforting to know he accepted the monster she truly was without a shred of hesitation.

"O-Okay, Master," she stammered softly, stepping closer to his side. "Please instruct me."

"The reason your fire magic sputtered out so quickly back there is because the soul you swallowed belonged to a low-tier street thug," Ren explained. "The soul dictates the mana capacity of the stolen magic so it burns out fast if the fuel is poor."

Eternia nodded, absorbing every single word as if it were the gospel.

"So," Ren continued, "the next time you swallow a soul that has an affinity for magic, don’t just burn it immediately. You can combine it with the other souls that you have stored within your mark to artificially increase the density and strength of the spell before you cast it. If you eat one weak fire mage then use the other souls to nourish it so you can cast one devastating, high-tier fire spell."

Eternia’s eyes widened to the size of saucers as she realized the sheer, horrifying potential of what he was suggesting. She hadn’t even known she could store them, let alone combine them.

She immediately stopped walking and prepared to drop into a deep reverent bow right there in the street.

"Mas—"

CRACK!

A deafening clap of thunder suddenly ripped through the sky overhead, cutting off her words completely. The pale moonlight vanished, completely blocked out by a massive dark rain cloud that had rolled over Astelvern Town with supernatural speed.

It was beginning to drizzle with heavy drops of cold water smacking against the cobblestones.

Ren turned back and looked directly into her golden eyes.

"Eternia," Ren said, wiping a drop of rain from his cheek. "Let’s run so we don’t get hit by the full brunt of the rain."

Eternia blinked, momentarily thrown off by the sudden shift in tone. "Alright, Master."

Ren smiled, dropping his hands to his sides and shifting his weight forward. "Let’s make it a race. First one back to the inn’s backyard wins. If you win, the—"

She didn’t even let him finish the sentence.

With a blur of speed, she launched herself forward, her boots kicking up water from the damp cobblestones as she ran past him, securing a massive head start down the long winding street toward the inn up front.

She wanted whatever reward he was about to offer, and she wasn’t going to play fair to get it.

Ren chuckled, shaking his head. He immediately channeled a surge of his own highly refined mana into his legs.

He exploded forward. Despite her Snakekin agility, Ren’s base stats, bolstered by years of perfect physical conditioning and training, were currently vastly superior. In three seconds, he closed the massive gap she had created.

He ran easily past her, not even breathing heavily as he looked over at her straining form.

"Better luck next time..." Ren teased smoothly, accelerating even further down the street.

Eternia whined loudly in protest, pushing her legs to move faster, but continued running with a massive smile on her face as the heavy rain truly began falling atop them, drenching their clothes in seconds.

’This is nice...’

He wasn’t running home because he was afraid of the rain hitting him, or because he actually cared about getting his clothes wet.

’The rain is the best time to practice Lightning magic.’ Ren thought.