The map burned in Lucien's mind.
He'd memorized it before he left the shrine. Every twist of the mountain pass, every marked danger, every black dot representing another fragment of the Codex. The next was north—hidden beneath the ruins of a forgotten city swallowed by the forest, a place the world had erased from its memory.
Greed.
That was the sin the monk had pointed to next. The Codex didn't demand a sequence. It offered no guidance. But the monk—who once bore Gluttony—claimed Greed was "closest to Wrath in spirit."
Lucien understood. Wrath burst. Greed consumed.
He moved without hesitation.
Three days passed in silence.
He avoided villages. Slept under trees. Killed only when necessary. Beasts were easy now. Their movements slow, predictable. He didn't even need Infernal Pulse anymore. His body, hardened through pain and sin-fueled regeneration, was already stronger than most mortal cultivators.
But the real change wasn't in his fists.
It was in his mind.
He thought differently now. More efficiently. He wasted no time on doubt or fear. When he moved, it was with purpose. When he fought, he killed quickly. When he felt pain, he converted it. Everything served his wrath, and in doing so, it became fuel.
Still, something lingered beneath the surface. A pressure building behind his eyes. Like his body was evolving faster than his soul could keep up.
The Codex hadn't spoken again since the awakening of Wrath.
But he felt it watching.
Waiting.
By the fourth night, Lucien reached the outskirts of the ruins.
He stood atop a rocky ridge overlooking what had once been a city. Now, only broken towers, shattered domes, and crumbling spires remained—each overgrown with moss and choked by roots. Trees grew through collapsed temples. Statues lay face down in the mud. Time had buried this place, but not completely.
And at its center stood a structure untouched by decay.
A vault.
Small, squat, square. The doors sealed in rusted bronze. Runes etched into the stone glowed faintly, reacting to his presence.
Lucien descended slowly, every step deliberate.
Something here was alive.
The wind stopped the moment he entered the ruins. The forest behind him went silent. No birds. No insects. Not even the sound of his own breathing echoed in his ears.
Inside the vault, the air was cold—unnaturally so. It clung to his skin, made the hairs on his arms rise. He approached the bronze door and pressed a hand to it.
It didn't open.
But the Codex responded.
A shimmer of heat unfurled from his core, and his palm lit up with red veins, glowing like molten cracks.
The door pulsed.
And opened.
Inside was not what he expected.
There was no treasure.
No weapon.
Only a man.
Or what remained of one.
He sat cross-legged in the center of the chamber, his body withered, wrapped in crimson robes, his skin like parchment stretched over bone. His eyes were closed. His chest didn't rise.
But he wasn't dead.
Lucien knew it instantly.
Sin recognized sin.
The moment he stepped into the room, the man opened his eyes.
Gold.
No, not gold—hollowed greed. Glowing with hunger.
Lucien didn't speak.
Neither did the man.
The silence between them was not awkward. It was sacred.
Finally, the man smiled faintly.
"You're the new Wrath."
Lucien inclined his head. "You're Greed?"
The man nodded. "I was."
Lucien stepped closer, studying the elder's form. He couldn't sense spiritual power—at least not in the traditional sense. But something else radiated from this man. Like a vault with no floor. A hunger so complete, it had eaten itself.
"What happened to you?"
The man's smile cracked wider. "I devoured too well."
Lucien sat across from him. He didn't know why.
Maybe respect.
Maybe instinct.
The man leaned forward slightly. "Greed is not desire. Not ambition. It is refusal to be full."
He tapped his chest. "I stole techniques from masters. I ate the cores of beasts. I consumed scriptures forbidden even to the demon sects. I swallowed their voices, their memories, their names."
Lucien said nothing.
The man's voice grew quieter. "Eventually, I consumed my own cultivation. My own future. I sit here now—not by choice. But because I've stolen so much of the world, it now imprisons me within it."
He looked up.
"I am your mirror. Or your warning."
Lucien met his gaze. "Then why am I here?"
The man extended a hand. From his palm, a black coin formed—etched with a serpent eating itself. Greed made solid.
"You've already passed the test. You want to grow. You refuse to stay weak. That is enough."
Lucien reached forward.
As his fingers touched the coin—
[Codex of Sin – Fragment Located][Greed Core Unlocked: Dormant State][New Trait: Devour and Inherit][Skill Gained: Memory Leech – Consume knowledge and spiritual trace from slain targets][Warning: Overuse may trigger Core Deformity]
The second pulse ignited inside his chest, this time on the opposite side from Wrath. The two cores didn't fight—but they didn't merge either. They circled each other. Balanced. Like wolves watching their twin reflections in still water.
Lucien gasped as foreign memories invaded his mind—quick flashes of techniques, movements, sword patterns, strange languages.
Everything the old man had consumed... now slithered into him.
When the vision faded, Lucien sat frozen.
The man had crumpled to dust.
No scream. No cry. No last breath.
He had simply been waiting to be absorbed.
Lucien stood.
And walked out into the ruins a different person.
Not just stronger.
More incomplete.
He could feel it now—how much more there was to gain. Seven sins. Seven cores. Each one not a power, but a transformation. A rewriting of reality.
Wrath had made him a weapon.
Greed had made him a collector.
He looked at his hands again.
One for rage. One for hunger.
He would gather them all.
And when the last sin pulsed in his chest—
The heavens would come.
And they would burn.