There was a little bit of time before the initiation ceremony for the new members, so I decided I was going to check something out with Sacrifice first. I had received my cult stipend. While extra money never hurt, I was actually more interested in finding out what I got when I Sacrificed it.

“Here goes,” I muttered, driving threads of white mana into the coin in my hand.

Nothing happened. I frowned. Then I tested with two, three, four, five… at five-hundred coins, I finally got the notification I was looking for.

[ Sacrifice

You have Sacrificed 1 [Minor] Indicator of Wealth. Windfall bonus activated.

Reward: All Aspects boosted by one Rank when used during the next wealth-attaining task ]

I couldn’t help but stare at the reward. A quick look confirmed that neither Sacrifice nor Gravity had gone up a rank. So it wasn’t lying. My Aspects would be enhanced only when I was working on another job.

Five hundred gold in exchange for a single-rank boost. If I Sacrificed five hundred more coins, would the first reward be overwritten or would the rank boosts stack? Would my Aspects get boosted by two ranks if I Sacrificed a thousand coins instead? The latter was easy to check, but did I really want to use up a thousand of my hard-earned gold?

I considered for a moment, then reminded myself I didn’t really have pressing expenses here. Free food, free home, no eight different subscriptions gnawing on my paycheck…

Since I had gold aplenty, I offered away a thousand as sacrificial tribute.

Same reward, just two ranks instead of one. Unsurprising.

I supposed I was only going to see if they stacked or not when I got working on my next job.

Not that the reward was exciting, exactly. I could perhaps get better Sacrifice rewards when taking care of the academy’s broken artifices or move things more easily with Gravity. Was that a good return on thousands of gold coins? I didn’t feel like it, especially since the countdown timer for my mana core implosion hadn’t changed noticeably.

That said, there was a potentially exciting use case. All I really needed to do was find the right job. A job where the rank of my Aspects would really come into play.

If I was being honest, my first impression of the new cult members was not generous at all. Well, apart from one. The Scalekin girl, Sreketh, had apparently also decided to join up as an official member of the Cult of the Sun. She was the only one among the trio who looked actually interested in being cultist. The other two men… not so much.

Of course, I couldn’t say that out loud. Not to them, at least. I did mention it to Escinca in a low voice after we greeted the three hopefuls and went to retrieve the things we’d need to induct them.

“A couple of them…” I wasn’t sure how to phrase it. Elder Escinca was such a positive, kindly fellow most of the time, it felt weird to even say negative things in his presence. “They don’t look particularly sure they want to be here.”

“Are you referring to the two men’s lack of exuberance when compared to young Sreketh?”

“Well… I suppose her excitement does make them look worse by comparison.”

Escinca smiled as retrieved the goblet with the red drink that reminded me of wine. “I understand your concern, Ross. We have so few members, but all of them are devoted to the cult wholeheartedly.”

“Hamsik.” I coughed into my hand.

Escinca snickered. “Yes, even Hamsik, in his own way. Diluting that devotion by taking just anyone in seems off, yes? But understand that we are not an organization that seeks to make use of its members in order to achieve some sort of goal. We are, in essence, a home.”

I chewed on that for a bit. He was right, of course. I was letting the way other members handled themselves with regards to the cult affect my assumptions about who should even be in the cult. Hamsik really was devoted to the cult in his own way too, when I could look at it without bias, even if I didn’t know much about what he got up to. Or why.

But Escinca was right. This wasn’t a profit-seeking megacorp that needed every employee to post one-hundred-and-ten percent effort every single weekday.

The Cult of the Sun was about offering people hope. Perhaps even a sense of belonging, like it had started to offer me. And that sense of belonging could present itself in many different ways.

So what if the two men were merely looking for a place to stay, or perhaps someplace where they would be safer from Thralls than outside. So long as they performed the duties the Elder set out for them, so long as they did nothing harmful, then that was enough. Not everyone had to be as ambitious as I was finding myself feeling.

“Do we need to perform Oaths for them too?” I asked, suddenly remembering one of the gripes Hamsik originally had with my induction into the cult.

Escinca frowned a little. “No, there is no need for something of the sort. Oaths are… unnecessarily binding, and I don’t think it’s needed in such a case.”

I nodded. Good enough for Escinca was good enough for me. We returned to the trio with the goblet filled with wine, ready to commence the induction ceremony.

The Elder smiled at them all, surveying them genially. “Let us begin then, shall we?”

Now that I looked at them more closely, I could see that all of them were nervous about it. They probably had no idea what exactly was even involved in the ceremony.

Curiously, I saw their eyes lingering on me as much as it did on Escinca. I was, somehow, an object of fascination to them too. Well, maybe not somehow. I could guess. There was a certain look of awe and respect, which made me feel a smidge hot under the collar, and I could almost hear them remembering that little speech I had given.

Or maybe they were remembering that I had killed one of the Thralls.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

“To begin, we shall go over the chant that we all hold dear,” Escinca said. “Some of you may be familiar with it.”

We stayed quiet as the Elder chanted.

“O Power Centred In The Beyond.”

“Flame That Crowned Sky and Light That Brought Life.”

“To You We Come On This Hallowed Dawn.”

“And Offer Unto You This Sacrifice.”

Huh. So that was the full version. I remembered hearing that exact same thing during both my original ritual sacrifice and then when Escinca inducted me into the cult too.

Next came the drinking part. The two men looked at me again, weirdly enough, and I felt compelled to nod at them in some sort of strange reassurance. They looked a little better after that and took the drink, gulping some of it down slowly.

“You’re a member of the cult now,” I said, recalling my own induction. “You’re one of us. Let that feeling… rise.”

I wasn’t sure how else to put it. Describing what I had gone through was difficult. They seemed to get it though, and I stared at their unfocused faces for a moment with a smile. That had to be the Weave telling them about their new Paths.

Sreketh was next. She swallowed the entirely of what remained in the goblet, and she didn’t need any guidance or reassurance. A few closed-eyed moments later, she was done.

“We’re actual members of the cult now,” she said, as excited as she had been at the very start, just with more wonder this time.

Escinca’s smile grew wider. “Welcome, all of you, to the Cult of the Sun.”

[ Rank Up!

Your Fervour Attributes has risen by one Rank.

Fervour: Iron VIII ]

I mentally pushed aside the blue screen of glowing words and echoed the Elder’s welcome.

Before we left for the big meeting with all the other cults, Escinca gave a little introduction about the cult itself and what the duties were to all the newbies. I ended up talking to Sreketh.

“What made you join the cult?” I asked. “You’re kind of young for something like this, aren’t you?”

Although, I supposed I didn’t know what the general track for kids were here in Ring Four. Back on Earth, children went to school and learned things as they grew older before they got jobs that could support them. Over here, I had seen schools and academies that probably had the same function. The difference was that I hadn’t seen any of them in Ring Four.

But then again, I had seen Aurier go on apprenticeships. Clearly, there were some pathways for them to advance in their lives.

I frowned. “Doesn’t the orphanage have… I don’t know, some way of finding opportunities for the children it cares for?”

“Do other orphanages do that?” Sreketh asked back. “Like in the higher Rings?”

“Uh…”

I definitely didn’t have any idea about other orphanages in the rest of Zairgon. Actually, I hardly knew how orphanages worked back on Earth. The children probably received a decent level of education, sure, but…

“I joined because it felt like the best way to gain some direction,” Sreketh said. “I saw you, and I saw the rest of the cult, and I saw how you all had this sense of purpose

. Like you all are working towards something.” She looked up at me with her eyes wide and expressive. “Something actually meaningful. And I wanted to be a part of that.”

“A sense of purpose, huh?” I said. “I can see that, yeah.” I smiled at her. “Hopefully, you’ll find it.”

Once we were done giving them a little tour, Escinca addressed them one last time.

“You are now official members of the Sun Cult,” he said. “Please keep in mind the responsibility that entails. You know your duties and all that now, but I hope you will not forget the cult when this time of dire need is past us. For it is only by continuing to work together that we can ensure our continued prosperity.”

Sreketh drank in the words, but I could see the scepticism in the eyes of the other two. They didn’t really believe in prosperity, continued or otherwise. Not that I could blame them. After all, I had seen what Ring Four was like.

And Escinca had been here for all of that. The state of Ring Four hadn’t changed in all the years that Escinca had been the Cult Elder, so these men had no reason to believe otherwise now. Still, it felt like a disservice to what the Elder was really trying to say.

So I stepped forward. “The cult will lift everyone up. The Thralls aren’t just a setback. They’re a springboard.”

Even Escinca was surprised at that declaration. He didn’t speak, but one of the men voiced the question in his stead.

“What?” he asked. “How are the Thralls supposed to be a springboard?”

I really hoped the Universal Language Approximator was translating what I meant correctly. “I killed one of them. So did other cults. And sure, so did a guard and others, but the point is, the Thralls are still a Ring Four problem. Our problem.”

“But...”

“You know, I went over to Ring Two recently.” Their eyes widened at that, even Sreketh’s. “They knew what I’d done, and that’s part of what allowed me to get up all the way to Ring Two to get a nice job that pays well.” I snorted out a short, disbelieving laugh. “I’m still Iron-ranked and it was they who offered me Silver-ranked payment. Wild, isn’t it?”

I definitely had all their attention now. It made me wonder just how rare it was for someone in Ring Four, especially someone not an important figure like Elder Escinca, to ever make it to Ring Two.

“Point is,” I said. “I’m a human from Ring Four just like you. Sure, I’ve got a Path that I’ve taken advantage of as well as I could, and getting a Unique Path like that isn’t reproducible, but the first step is obviously belief.”

I sighed out my exhale, letting my breathing and heart rate return to normal. Honestly, it was annoying how my body reacted to even little speeches like that. There weren’t even that many people here, for crying out loud. It also made me feel weirdly self-righteous, like I didn’t deserve to be the one to make speeches like that.

No idea if that was more anxiety or something even weirder.

They all looked a lot more positive, though. Probably because nothing I had said was a lie. I had gone high and fast thanks to my Path, but they had opportunities as well. People like Aurier were doing well in Ring Three. Lots of Ring Four humans had jobs up there. All it would really take to change things was making Zairgon realize just how valuable we all were.

With that done, we headed out. Escinca trusted the new members not to tear apart the temple while we were gone.

Honestly, it was kind of rich of me to act like Sreketh and the other two men—I needed to actually remember their names—were these amateurs at being cultists. I was pretty new too, compared to even someone like Aurier. Had it even been three weeks since I had been summoned to Ephemeroth? I wasn’t certain.

But yes, I wasn’t exactly a veteran member by any stretch of imagination. Then again, it was less about the time spent and more about what was done within that period.

The meeting was supposed to be held in the Earth Cult temple. On the way there, we noticed Earth Cult members patrolling through the streets like they owned the area. A clear sign we were getting close to our destination. City guard patrols weren’t an uncommon sight, but it looked like the Earth Cult’s pogrom against the Thralls had taken a different turn for now.

I was a little miffed to see that their temple appeared to be in better shape than ours. It made me wonder if envy was some big sin in any of the cults here.

On closer inspection, though, the shoddiness of the temple was just papered over to give the impression that it was fine. There was a stark difference between the regular bricks making up the Earth Cult temple that were pretty similar to the broken-down ones used to construct our temple and the rest of the stone. The latter reminded me more of pottery, like clay that was shaped by hand into the bits and pieces that filled up the holes and missing chunks.

We weren’t the first ones there, naturally. Of course, it was wholly unsurprising that the Earth Cult was waiting for us at their own temple.

Before we entered, Escinca performed a curious little ceremony. He stopped before the door and held up his hands as in prayer. “Please excuse us as we avail ourselves of your premises, while basking in your earthen aura, Nyf.”

I raised my eyebrow at him in question.

“Merely a small ritual to show my respects,” Escinca explained. “It’s not mandatory."

Since I wasn’t exactly feeling respectful towards the Earth Cult, I decided against following suit. The Elder didn’t mind.

Inside the temple, the older woman dressed in dark robes and Elder Escinca greeted each other with minimum politeness. Since they were taking care of pleasantries, I decided to ignore problem girl and the rest of them entirely.

We didn’t talk much, but the silence didn’t get time to grow awkward. The other cultists arrived soon. The Sea cult’s young leader, the Wind Cult’s old man, and then there was the Fire Cult too, dressed in hooded, flame-coloured robes.

“Welcome all,” the leader of the Earth Cult said. She spread her hands with a beatific smile. “I’m glad you all could make it. Besides the Thralls, there is something else of grave importance we must also discuss.”

“Oh?” Sea Cult asked. “What would that be, madam?”

“Ah, nothing much. Just a little something that could change all of Ring Four.”