Radeon knew he could not linger to watch it all unfold. If ghosts, Nascent Embryo, and Spirit Transfiguration could not police a small peak, then he would send them back to their graves to rest and be done with them. Order had to stand without him staring at it.

He brought two premier ghost forgers and two array premier to his side and led them down into the catacombs.

The system had to exist now, not later. He remembered the notes. Even when he only burned paper with a touch of qi, it still took fifteen minutes to make a booklet.

Five minutes to make a thousand pliers. Those minutes did not stay small. They stacked.

They became a year, a decade, a century of being trapped behind tedious work and bitter thoughts of what could have been.

That was why he needed a system. Crude, maybe. Ugly, maybe. But it would give him time.

Time to cultivate. Time to rebuild his physique. Time to cram in power before he reached Cornerstone Setting.

The ghosts and wraiths who specialized in arrays and forging studied his diagrams. They did not question. They did not ask.

Their age had taught them courtesy, and they knew Radeon would speak when he wished.

It was the same silence that hung around the huge crystal Eldritch Seed in his soul.

No one dared circle that topic. Everyone had secrets.

They moved with sharp focus. Celestial alloy was fed into ghostly flames, tens of thousands of degrees of gnawing heat concentrated until even air felt like it wanted to burn.

Radeon waited at a distance. Strong as he was, he knew staying near that place could still turn him to ash.

An hour passed. Through the stone and the warding, he saw the first glimmer soften. A bead of metal sagged free like candlewax.

The two premier blacksmith caught it on the face of their hammer and began to pound while telekinesis held the molten mass suspended.

In less than a heartbeat, the shape closed into a hollow ring.

The array masters with their carving tools embedded the embedded the dark crystal took from the bandits camp.

Crude. Barely refined. Good enough. Another drop followed, then another.

Each bead was born from an alloy that tasted of stars. Soon ten rings lay in a line.

The wraiths collapsed afterward, sprawled on the ground, tongues lolling as if thirst could touch the dead.

Radeon waited for the temperature to fall. When it sank to a couple thousand degrees, the barrier holder released his grip.

The room tried to become lava. Radeon let cool air feed in from outside, measured, controlled.

Another ghost shoved the hot air away from the surrounding structures, so the operation stayed discreet.

Nothing here could be allowed to announce itself to the wrong eyes.

Radeon lifted the rings into his hands and looked at them as if they were tools and weapons both.

Then he reached into memory for the interface he wanted, the trick that would let a human mind grasp a system without being taught like a child.

He cut a strand of hair from his Bridled Voracity Physique. He pressed a sliver of his soul into it.

The hair softened, became something else, a thin living tentacle that writhed and found a snug place inside the hollow band.

He called for Calyx, who waited outside, and tossed him one ring.

"Try it out," Radeon said.

Calyx slid it onto his finger. It did not resize, yet it clung, as if the metal had decided that flesh belonged to it.

Calyx swayed. For a blink, his eyes unfocused, then letters gathered across his sight as if the world itself had learned how to write on him.

"Say it. Status window." Radeon said.

"Stat... Status window?" Calyx halted, then turned his gaze to Radeon.

Yet even as he looked, a pale pane of script unfurled at the back of his sight, as if laid upon the inside of his eyes.

{Name: Calyx Lurienna}

{Age: 17,072 Years}

{Cultivation Stage: Peak Spirit Transfiguration} (Regressed: Immortal Essence Detected)

[Tasks] (0)

[Messaging] (0)

{EXCLUSIVES}

[Contribution Points] (0)

[Material to Contribution Exchange] (Select Items in Personal Storage)

[Item Shop] (Unavailable)

[Martial Library]

[Personal Storage]

The four premier wraith craftsmen craned in at once. Envy rolled off them in waves. The Preta, even in handsome skin, stared slack jawed, then began to drool, hands pawing at the air.

One ghost could not take it and slapped him hard enough to embed him in the wall.

"Fellow wraith, Calyx," the smith snarled, "If you mean to parade your wealth while the rest of us go hungry for it, then don't blame these itching hands when they call you out."

Calyx was not sure what the angry ghosts were on about. He edged closer, thinking he simply was not close enough. Then he pawed at the air again.

"Pray, look at this. Such a wealth of martial disciplines... I have never seen the like in all my years. You see it too, do you not?"

The rest saw nothing. Angered, they moved like they meant to hit Calyx next for holding out on them. Radeon raised a hand. The air snapped tight.

"Enough," Radeon said. "You'll get your own ring. Be ready when I need work done."

That promise hooked them like a barbed line. He fitted a strand of hair into each ring, the same small bite of soul, the same writhing tentacle settling into place.

One by one the ghosts slipped them on, and one by one their eyes went distant.

Then they started to drool as they paged through the Martial Library. Radeon had even put forging techniques and array creation in.

He watched for a moment, then felt the urge to beat sense into them for leaving him standing there like a forgotten master.

He coughed, light and sharp. The ghosts jolted as if waking from a stupor and turned back to him.

At first their reverence had looked like loyalty. Now it looked like worship.

Their gazes held the startled awe of someone meeting their maker. Radeon waved them off.

"Those martial arts aren't free," Radeon said. "Beg if you want. Contribution points don't earn themselves."

They understood at once. Aprons. White robes. Clean air. Service with a smile.

They scattered, running down toward the mountain's base to tend to customers, to earn, to trade, to grind.

For a long time, the dead had been only dead. Now, for the first time in millennia, they felt something their ghost forms had misplaced.

Motivation. Joy. Their reverence grew. Radeon's power grew with it. Their faith fed back into him.

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