Guardian Of The End

Jason debated whether to check the information on the chickens. They didn't look any different from the chickens on Earth.

Perhaps the only difference between the two was the presence of mana inside the chickens. Jason eyed the chickens for some time before raising his hands forward.

There were at least fifty of them walking together through the forest, probably in search of food or shelter.

'Hopefully, this works.' Jason silently prayed.

Dark mana gathered in the palm of his hand before launching outwards in the next second. The mana took the shape of a thin string which fell in the middle of the group of chicken.

Jason pulled on the string of dark mana. The edges sharpened out and directly passed through the body of multiple chickens, giving them a swift death.

The silver-haired boy simply moved his index and middle fingers, willing for the string of dark mana to cut through the chickens.

He felt a stinging sensation from time to time. The string cut his fingers too which was quite painful but due to his passive healing, Jason could simply focus on using the string's full potential without worrying about permanent damage.

Amber watched him with an awestruck expression. With simple movements, Jason was executing something deadly.

'Wait… maybe I can replicate this too!' Amber suddenly realized as she looked at the remaining chickens.

Barely half a dozen chicken remained and even they were terrified. They had almost given up but they were enough for Amber to test the same thing Jason was using.

"Jason, leave those six chickens to me." Amber announced.

She raised her hand forward and willed for her fire mana to appear in the form of a string. Though her control hadn't been sharpened like Jason's, Amber could still create a thread from her fire mana.

She willed the magical string forward and though she couldn't control it effortlessly, Amber found it quite effective.

Her fire string was that hard or strong like Jason's but it packed twice the amount of damage. She killed the remaining chickens in under two minutes.

"I don't think those things are edible anymore…" Jason muttered while trying hard not to gag.

The chickens had been burnt badly by the fire and looked something straight out of a gore horror film.

[ Try wrapping your fingers around your thumb and forming a tight fist. You won't gag or throw up. ] the system suggested.

Jason was skeptical at first but tried it regardless. His eyes immediately landed on a mutilated chicken corpse which was the worst out of the bunch

Even Amber had to wrap clasp her hand around her mouth to prevent herself from throwing up.

Jason found that the system's suggestion helped him and he didn't even gag. He suggested the same thing to Amber and much to her surprise, it worked.

"How did you know that?" She inquired.

'Exactly what I would've like to know.' Jason questioned silently.

[ It was in one of those body hack shorts you once watched on MeTube. ] The system casually replied.

"My grandma is a life mage and she told me some fun body hacks. They don't always work and many people might not be affected by them." Jason replied out loud.

He had never expected that something he had seen that long ago would help him in his second life.

"That's quite good." Amber sighed, her eyes staring at the ground.

Jason remembered that just like his aunt Zara, Amber's grandmother was in a comatose state as well.

"Ahem, maybe you should just burn the chickens you used the string on." Jason suggested.

"Definitely," Amber shuddered while looking at the chickens. The red-haired girl threw fireballs at the chickens, thus turning them to ash.

"Let's put them in our daggers and take them back." Amber said and walked towards some of the chickens.

She started putting the chickens inside her dagger. Jason did the same and in no time, both of them had twenty chickens placed in both of their daggers.

Forty chicken were probably more than what they needed. Jason, however, knew that they would have to separate the eatable part of the chickens first.

Upon questioning Amber, the silver-haired boy realized that neither of them had any idea on how to do that.

They hoped that one of the other three knew how to do it or they might just have to experience a bloody scene right before eating.

[ What do you want to name this skill though? ] The system questioned.

'Hmm… Let's go with Ariadne's thread.' Jason decided on a complex name.

---

< Ariadne's Thread (Tier 3) >

- Creates a thread of dark mana embedded with the curse of sharpness. Almost anything can be cut by this but the user will experience the same cut on their dominant hand.

---

Jason blinked in confusion. He rubbed his eyes once to make sure that he read everything correctly.

The skill was at tier 3, making it the first tier 3 skill he had created. Not only that but it could potentially cut anything at the price of inflicting the same wound on the user.

'I am pretty sure I didn't design this skill in that way…' Jason frowned mentally.

[ And I am pretty sure that it wasn't supposed to be that way. Its impossible for you to create something like this. ]

'I will act as if you didn't say the second statement. After all, anything is possible if I put my mind into it.' Jason argued.

[ Did you put your mind, body and soul into creating that skill right now? ]

'No…'

[ Then its better to just accept the skill. ]

***

Erebus, who was watching this while picking up lost godly items, frowned. The skill sounded eerily familiar to him.

The detailed description made it hard for him to believe that Jason had created the skill. He was with his system this time.

'I need to ask Ariadne about this…' Erebus silently thought before picking up a snowshoe.

It was dropped by the god of snowshoes. Yes, a god like that did exist alongside numerous others who will make you feel that you can become a god.

Erebus placed the snowshoe in the lost and found box, something which was full of different godly items he had collected over the centuries.

The god of shadows made his way to the real Bar of Gods and tried searching for Ariadne.

Being a bartender gave him the ability to locate almost every single god present inside the huge bar, except for a chosen few.

Erebus left a version of himself to man the counter and made his way to the other side of the bar.

Gods could do this and be present in many places at many times. However, they didn't do this because upon dispelling their conjured version, all of its living time would be transfered to them ten fold.

Though many considered gods to be immortal, it wasn't the case. Once a myth died from every single world, that god would be as good as dead.

All the time spent on worshiping them would be combined together and their current life  would be subtracted from it.

If your current life was bigger than your worshiped one, you would cease to exist. This was what happened with many gods.

But if that didn't happen, you were truly immortal. Such gods faced minor inconveniences from time to time but they were still immortal.

'I am extremely close to becoming a part of this category.' Erebus sighed, his eyes darting around the temple of gods.

In all of the worlds that existed in their universe, Erebus only had two temples in his name. Both of those temples were currently the only sources of worship that were still present and secured his immortality.

'Maybe I don't need to worry that much. The jade emperor is responsible for doing this so I should be fine as long as I bring him his favorite alcohols.' Erebus grinned silently.

He finally managed to locate Ariadne who was present in the greek section of the temple.

The temple had been divided on the basis of different mythologies. The major ones were situated closer to Castus's palace(Jade emperor's name) while the others stretched out to the edges of the place referred to humans as heaven.

"Ariadne, did you give out your divinity to anyone recently?" Erebus questioned while appearing near a waterfall.

A beautiful scenery was spread around the entire waterfall. A beautiful woman in her mid twenties was sitting at the edge of the land, her eyes staring at the waterfall.

"No, Erebus, I haven't handed out my divinity to anyone for the past decade. The last one I handed out was about twelve years ago." The beautiful woman replied calmly, her right hand tucking her glossy black hair behind her ear.

The woman was none other than Ariadne who had given a guiding thread to Theseus so that he could escape the Minotaur caught in the Labyrinth.

She was, however, abandoned by the so called hero on the island of Naxos. Many thought that she had become the wife of Dionysus, the god of wine.

But in reality, Ariadne had become the sworn sister of Dionysus. Erebus knew that gods were too messed up so he didn't bother with the myths too much.

The god of shadows was only up to date with Greek myths because he was considered a part of it too.

"Are you sure that you haven't given any mortal your divinity or a small amount of your divine energy recently, especially to mortals belonging to Clover?" Erebus questioned, his eyes glowing faintly.

As one of the ex-strongest gods to exist, Erebus still had the ability to tell when anyone was lying.

Due to the restrictions placed on his powers, this didn't work every time and many gods could evade it.

"No, I didn't do it." Ariadne replied with a sigh.

The goddess turned around and stared directly into Erebus's eyes. Her face was enough to make the hearts of most mortals tremble, both men and women.

And no, she wasn't a Chinese jade beauty. Gods and Goddesses were extremely handsome and beautiful in their realm forms.

Since they could look like anything they wanted, it was hard for mortals to exactly define them even the entirety of vocabulary sprawled out in front of them.

"Then I will take my leave," Erebus sighed. His ability confirmed that Ariadne was telling the truth but his senses didn't believe her.

The god of shadows left the beautiful scenery and went back to his counter. Ariadne finally stood up from her place and stared up at the sky.

'My lady, I hope you aren't doing anything risky. I did give the boy that skill using a tiny amount of divine energy so that no one could trace it but I know some gods who can do it. Hopefully, you can handle that part.' Ariadne thought and sighed again.

Gods sighed a lot, a habit they had developed after countless years of being alive.

Ariadne looked at the sky one last time before leaving the place. There was nothing left for her to do now.

Only 'her lady' could do anything now since she was the one who had ordered Ariadne to provide a bit of her divine energy to a mortal from the world of Clover…