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Wish upon the Stars (Original Superhero cultivation sci fi litrpg)

Reader mode
Malcolm Tent said:
replaced by a lang handled ballpeen hammer.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Not sure if you meant for this to be lang or long, so I figured I'd mention it.

Malcolm Tent said:
and the electricity did…something
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Missing period at the end of this sentence.

Malcolm Tent said:
There was a sort crack and the armor…shrank.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

This should either be "sort of" or "soft".

Great to see Shane getting fully back into his Solomon persona. No more creepy mask for quite some time, and now goes the Mephistopheles Armour. Onwards and upwards to the future.
 
Chapter 964
The Seal was…impressive. Slipping into it was deceptively easy, for one thing. It looked bulky and imposing, and it was, but it was also fluid and surprisingly mobile. I was able to open it up and slip inside with no trouble. More than that, my wings slid free of the metal like there was a custom made slot for them, and once they did, I was able to move and walk with almost no resistance at all.


"The articulation on this is insane," I said as I moved back and forth, bending and stretching to check my range of motion. Examining the spots, I was able to identify why that was the case too. The bronze that was the connection between individual iron pieces had sort of grafted to both sides, but in a strange way that made it seem almost like actual joints. "I really don't know if I have enough to cover this. Two hundred seventy five B-ranked chits and some change. Can't possibly be enough."


I emptied my pockets, so to speak. Honestly, I wasn't lying though. What felt like a literal fortune at the auction suddenly seemed woefully short of what was deserved.


Up to this point, I had always focused on utility for my gear. What it could do, how it did it, and how it could enhance my powers. And that was a feature of The Seal, for sure. It could channel my forms perfectly, I could already feel that.


But beyond that, it was also just…good armor. Utility was important and impressive, but I already HAD almost every kind of utility. The Seal of Solomon wasn't some amplifier that I carried around at all times. It was…art. It was pure unrestrained defensive power combined with flawless mobility.


There was value in specificity. Ascendants had been proving that for years, and this was a clear example of why. Rather than go with some super special trick ability, I just got REALLY good armor. And honestly? It was better.


He waved me off. "Fool," he said lazily. I flinched on reflex, expecting to get smacked, but nothing hit me. He just chuckled. "You're covered. I'm looking forward to leaving this place. I've spent most of my life on this planet. Not all, but most. I'm ready to move on to another adventure. Which begs the question. Are you willing to take me with you?"


"I mean, I would prefer you learn to use a measuring tape instead of slapping the shit out of people with a blue vegetable," I admitted. "But…after this? Hell yes. This is…mindblowing. It's also less weight on my soul than expected." Part of that might have been my first bound page making my Chronicle sturdier, but it was still impressive. "In any case, yes, you're in. Obviously. When we go to the A-rank zone, you can come along."


Which brought up another point. "Speaking of which," I said leadingly. "I never did find out how to actually GET there. I know the A-rank zone is small, and polar. I know there's only one A-rank city on either side of the planet. But I don't know how much of the zone it takes up."


"All of it," he said with a laugh. "The twin cities on the poles of this planet are connected through the core. An endless staircase from one to the other. But apart from those stairs, there's only four gates by which you can enter them. Arcadia and Albion, the shining jewels of the frozen heights. Not just the polar limits of the planet, but the highest point. A massive plateau of glacial ice on either end, surrounded by an impenetrable wall."


I could tell from his hushed tones that he'd seen them but never been inside. "Entry to Arcadia, the closest city is…" he shook his head. "Either be an A-ranker or be the personal retinue of one. There are less than one hundred thousand people in the whole city. Obviously, they're not ALL A-rank, but the B-ranks that make it inside are either terrifyingly wealthy or powerful. Or both."


"Well, that's not ideal," I sighed. "But it's not like we're going in blind. Our own A-rankers are in there. And my parents aren't the type to sit on their hands while the rest of us play around."


Not to mention Zeke. Anything Crell could do, Zeke could do better. I'd be shocked if my Uncle didn't already have an apparatus in place for intelligence inside Arcadia. Donovan shook his head. "That isn't the issue," he said grimly. "The issue is the intake. Those four gates are impregnable. The city is a fortress. The gates are the only weak spots, and only barely. And they only open once a week."


"Ok, so we wait a few days," I shrugged. I glanced at Fade, who had entered behind us and was waiting silently nearby. "What am I missing here?"


"Fatal funnel," he said bluntly. "The platforms to enter the gates are killboxes. Normally there are a few people heading up, and no one bothers starting anything. In this case, you're all competitors."


I grimaced. Despite my cousins realizing that this was an emergency and doing their best to deconstruct the Void influence on this planet, I had no illusions that the majority of them would pass up a chance to shoot some fish in a barrel. The faction behind Delia and Roland might be all about togetherness and family unity, but it was clear they weren't ascendant at the moment. Whoever ran the faction in opposition clearly enjoyed the bloodsport that embodied the worst of the succession war. Whoever their representatives were would almost definitely take a shot at whoever was nearby.


More importantly, Arcadia had four entrances, and there were eight cities in the B-rank zone. That meant I wouldn't just be interacting with the relatives I was familiar with, but another crop of dangerous unknown cousins who might be just as strong if not stronger then the ones on my side.


"What about the A-rankers?" I asked slowly. "Will they be aware of the incoming crop? I can't imagine entry is common, and especially not large amounts of people like will be incoming with us. Won't they step out to help?"


My parents were both monsters. Not morally (though you could make a solid case for my dad) but in terms of combat potential. My mother was intergalactically famous, and had two different abilities, one of which was inherited directly from a sitting pope. My father was a former candidate so feared that even the current Wishmaster, a man who essentially did whatever the hell he wanted by sheer force of arms even inside the WCP, considered him a peer.


Not to mention they had been married for decades and knew each other inside and out, and I had heard it implied several times that Zeke contributed to their group combat dynamic heavily. The three of them together would be the kind of threat that basically no other group of A-rankers would be able to touch.


Which, of course, meant next to nothing if they were outnumbered twenty to one. The simple truth of it was, I had no clue how many A-rankers were on this planet.


While the common axiom that there were one hundred S-rankers (an estimate I had been informed by Zeke) was well known, the actual number of A-rank Ascendants in the universe was…difficult to quantify. S-rank was a staggering leap in difficulty from A, that wasn't in doubt, and I was fairly certain the number was at least in the five digits, if not six.


It was hard to conceptualize, really, given how rare they seemed to me, but I had spent most of my time on lower tier planets and in special environments that specifically catered to lower ranked Ascendants. Beyond that, I wasn't entirely sure ANY of the numbers I'd been given for the numbers of Ascendants took into account god worlds, since they didn't seem to be common knowledge at certain levels of Ascendant society.


All this was to say that I had no idea how many enemies my parents would be up against, how many locals lived in the city at their rank, or how many of the candidates even brought A-rankers. I didn't believe that the thousands of candidates all had five A-rankers each. It wasn't feasible. There were like ten thousand candidates on this planet, and even if there were fifty thousand A-rankers in the universe, which there very well could be, I highly doubted my family had access to whatever percentage of the A-rank population that represented, regardless of how much money or influence we had.


Donovan seemed to sense my worry, and waved me off. "The A-rankers won't get involved. THe political situation inside the shining cities is complicated but mostly balanced. Even with newcomers, given the weeks you've been on world, there's no way some equilibrium hasn't been reached. No one faction will move lest they disturb the others and kick over the proverbial beehive."


Sighing, I headed out of the Hall. My new armor flexed comfortingly around me, almost propelling me it was so smooth. Crell, Carmichael, and Alanna had been waiting outside, and when they saw me, Crell let out a long whistle of awe. "Damn, boss. You look scary. And expensive. I'm kind of worried someone will try to kidnap you for your armor."


I paused, then turned to Donovan. "Is that…is that something that might happen?"


He shrugged. "Hypothetically possible, but unlikely. That suit is custom designed. It fits you like a second skin, and you're a bigger than average man. It wouldn't fit most people, and honestly, a B-rank suit of armor wouldn't be enough to piss off your collective forces here. Not to mention the suit is monogrammed. It has your symbol right on the front, and trust me, nobody is going to be melting down or reworking that armor. All in all, not worth the trouble to steal it."


Fade nodded. "He's right. They would just kill you and chop it up into scrap if they had the resources to unload it in the first place. Sure it would lose some value, but it would be much easier to sell in pieces. Most people don't have the resources to buy a full suit like that. You definitely didn't."


I glared at both of them. "You are the least comforting people I know. Now, is there a path down this damned mountain that doesn't require me to drag my aching carcass down the path? Because I don't even want to consider the possible power interaction between that trial and the weight of this armor."


"That…is a good point," admitted Donovan. "I suppose we can take the elevator."


I froze, then turned to glare at Fade. "There's…an ELEVATOR?" I asked him in a tone of barely constrained fury. "I knew there might be a non enchanted path, but you walked us past an ELEVATOR?"


"The elevator is for cargo," he explained sincerely. "Not people."


Now even Donovan was staring at him. Alanna pinched the bridge of her nose. "How are you any good with a sword? Your brain is made of rocks. Or possibly chunks of steel. The fact that you beat me in a fight is the most humiliating thing that's ever happened to me."


We all laughed, except Fade who looked mildly perturbed, which I took to be his version of pouting. We followed Donovan across the courtyard to a small fountain. He pressed a few of the rocks, and there was a low rumble as the water drained away. We all climbed in, and then the floor of the fountain began to slowly lower into the darkness.


We all chattered as we descended, but I started to tune it out. With the Void incursion temporarily taken care of and my armor acquired, not to mention my new blacksmith, I was now officially ready to head for the A-rank zone. I would be seeing my parents soon enough, provided I didn't die first. Hopefully it went better than my last family reunion.
 
Chapter 965
"That armor is badass," Benny said enthusiastically as he studied my new suit. "I mean, obviously, but like…the craftsmanship is insane. In fact, it's ALMOST as good as my new piece of gear. Well…pieces. I just finished my most recent project. Want to see it in action?" I'd called everyone together to tell them about Arcadia, but I had to admit, given how much time my best friend had spent on his newest project, I was excited to see what he could do.


Callie sighed. "Shane, I feel like you had something important to share," she tried feebly. She knew it wouldn't matter, but she always at least tried to keep me on task.


And as in most cases, she failed. "Nah, it'll keep. It's not like we have to be anywhere in the next ten minutes. Come on Benny, lets go out to the training yard. My armor is sturdy enough to take anything you can throw at it, so you can give me a live demonstration." Not to mention I was about five times as strong as him, so I wasn't worried.


Clearly he was confident in his new equipment, because he didn't even bat an eye. "Hell yes, you're going to love this."


My wife didn't look appeased, so I took out a couple pages of information I'd scribbled down about Arcadia and held it out to her. She squinted suspiciously but finally took it with a sigh, nodding for me to go off and have fun.


Everyone else filed in behind us as we left, eager to see Benny's new gear. His ability had changed in ways we didn't all understand, and he'd been working hard on the soul weapon he was creating. It had been built around the axe we had gotten from the siege back when we first arrived on the heirworld, and included infinity crystal and the gods knew what else.


When we arrived outside, Benny was practically bouncing with excitement. "This is going to be good. You ready Shane?"


Celine, who was among the close friends who had followed us, looked worried. "Ben, this might not be a good idea. I mean, his staff and armor are both B-ranked, right? I know your new item is strong but…"


"It'll be fine," I assured her. "We're sparring. I'm not saying I'm not going to throw him a beating, but I wouldn't actually hurt him." I grinned tauntingly at my friend. "As for hurting me…well, I don't see that happening. But hey, if you can surprise me maybe I'll apologize. You seem pretty confident."


As expected, the fire in his eyes blazed brighter. Benny wasn't the kind of person who wanted to be coddled or babied. His new gear needed testing, and he wouldn't have enjoyed the process if I didn't talk a little shit about it.


Amusingly, I could feel anxiety from Callie, and my sister looked uncomfortable at the taunts. The two of them were familiar with our dynamic, but they hadn't seen Benny ever get REALLY passionate about something before. It was sweet of them to worry, but unnecessary. "So, before we start, why don't you introduce your new invention?"


"Inventions. Plural," he corrected. He held up both hands. "The axe got split in two. I put one blade into each hand, and they're infused with infinity crystal dust." He straightened his hand into a flat blade and jerked it through the air. I heard a soft hiss as it split the air itself, and I could see the disturbance behind the attack. It looked surprisingly intimidating. "My phantom blades can ALSO be channeled through weapons. They're soul items, so I can use the abilities within them a lot easier than I used to. Not to mention they can grow alongside me."


I grinned at him. "Sounds like fun. How do they pair with that Dance of the Dracolich you created. You get any better at that?"


His eyes lit up with a manic energy. "Why don't you come find out." His hands flicked and a pair of swords appeared in them. He'd withdrawn them from his spatial ring, only…I blinked at him. "Wait, did you integrate your space ring?"


"Yup, left forearm," he preened. "Along with the two axe blades I'm at seventeen of my twenty slots. I've mostly been upgrading the stuff I have to my current rank the last few months as best I can. Getting my hands on the souls is proving tough, but I've gotten pretty close. I was considering swapping everything out with new gear but honestly stuff like my triple multiplier boosts is too rare to get rid of, so it didn't seem worth it when I still had a bunch of empty slots left. Now I'm down to three, but I can always remove something later if I need to."


I nodded, but wasn't too worried. Triple his stats for a few minutes was damned useful, but I was pretty much five times his total at this point. I was pretty sure triple his Might would be more than mine, but I was also aware that numbers weren't everything. Between forms like Sammael and my Path I was more than used to taking on stronger opponents.


Behind him, a figure wavered into existence. A colossal bone dragon with eyes of burning green flame. I'd seen it before, but it had changed somehow. Rather than the same white as the rest of the bone, the empty wing skeletons were darker now. They had a sort of striated metallic look at the end, black along the length and then fading to metal. Like an axe head. The metallic talond at the end glimmered with an almost unnatural coruscation of colors, rainbow metal shimmering as the light struck them.


Benny had his pair of swords up and in front of him in a strange spread stance. One blade low and at an angle away from his body and the other high and at a diagonal across him for protection.


His feet started to slide, first forward, then back. Not like walking, but more like he was trying to build up a charge of static rubbing them on carpet. His body tilted…and then he vanished.


I whirled, my staff manifesting as I spun, and the ends licked out in succession, slapping aside his blades on the flat. His eyes widened, and he stumbled back. I pressed the attack, my staff blurring as I started flicking probing strikes at the openings in his form.


Dantalion activated. I could have done more, but I wanted this to be close to even at least. It wasn't about winning. I could do that a lot of ways. I was stronger. It was about helping, showing Benny where he needed to improve. He's integrated the new tech to improve his technique, but he hadn't adapted the actual sword art yet. "Did you just teleport?" I asked him casually as Dantalion deconstructed his sword technique.


He chuckled through gritted teeth, vanishing again. My Danger Sense pinged and I reacted with a waltz, vanishing in a flash of black flames as I appeared behind him, attacking in return. "Nope," he gritted out. "I cut the space. It's one of my many new tricks. Like THIS!" There was a flash of dark metal, and the six spider legs built into his back shot out, attacking at multiple angles. They spread like wings, and the Dracolich power infused them, dyeing them the same colors as the wing tips.


Cursing, I waltzed again, avoiding the attacks, but my lips were peeled back in a grin. Then I blitzed forward, flashing through a series of waltzes to try to trip him up. His swords sang, somehow in perfect harmony with the spider legs, all operating as a whole under the influence of his Path. He wasn't engaging the manifestation to attack directly, I didn't think he could yet, but he was using it to create a sort of structure for this fight, and it was helping him operate multiple limbs at once.


More than just that, the limbs and blades were cutting into the air in a way that made it clear that I did NOT want to experience them head on. The swords flicked at my throat and leg, and my staff lashed out to deflect them, and I detected a surge of discomfort from the Ten Demons Tree when they landed. It wasn't enough to do much real damage, but it DID cut some faint grooves in the surface, even if they faded almost immediately.


It was an impressive showing…but sadly it wasn't enough. We kept up the fight for several minutes, but the stat boosters he have only worked for five minutes each. Once his Might dropped back down below mine, the coordination couldn't offset the difference in power. I took his feet out from under him with a sweep and he hit the ground with a thud.


I dismissed my staff and offered a hand to help him up. "What the hell was that last thing? How did you affect my staff?"


It was a B-rank weapon, and while he hadn't been able to do much to it, he had done SOMETHING. I wasn't sure what rank those axe blades were, since the soul of the person used to make them had probably been higher than his actual rank and I didn't know how that worked when crafting, but it couldn't be more than C. It was impossible for Benny to use a B-rank weapon without a Chronicle.


He waggled a hand. "I didn't exactly. I kind of cheated. Those slashes cut space, kind of, but it's more like…shaped portals. It teleported a layer off the outside of your staff. It took a second for it to register as an attack, and then it bounced off the Impact. But there's a bit of wiggle room with that kind of thing. It has to do with how you perceive threats. Now that you know it won't work again. But it's a good trick. I THINK I could cut into a C-ranker with that attack. It's hard to do it though. It involves…well, it's hard to describe. When I do that teleporting trick it eats space. Then I use it to form the portals. It's a Dracolich thing."


I shrugged. I was sure it made internal sense. Path bullshit was complicated and hard to track if you didn't have access to the full story. Adding and tweaking internal consistency to align the effects with your motivations, personality, AND the way people saw you (because the stats that made up the Solid Path were formed from your mythology) made the whole thing a very personal and deeply complex manifestation of a person's power and self.


Though I still didn't know the exact details of how a Domain was formed, I was pretty sure it was based on that unique combination of factors. Benny's sounded damned impressive. "Anyway," my best friend grinned. "I just thought you seeing what I could do might tweak things in my favor on the next leg of the journey. I take it from the meeting request that we're leaving soon. And based on how serious you sounded its going to be on an important mission."


I laughed at that, but he didn't join in. I stopped. "That- are you serious? You did all that to get a spot on the assault team? We're moving up to the next zone, everyone is coming with. You didn't need to-"


"Bullshit," he said bluntly. "You have a lineup. A core group of frontliners. And I'm not one of them. Not anymore. You bench me every chance you get. Which I understand, I'm not the strongest fighter here. But this is a dangerous technique. I've spent months working on all of this, doing everything I can to get stronger so I can help."


"And we're going to need it," Callie said as she emerged from the boarding house, holding up the papers. "I was going over the details in this, and I think we have a problem. There are very exacting standards to build the Void Ladder. I originally assumed they would use the fire cage somehow, but from what I can tell, this staircase would work just as well. Maybe better. Which means…"


I sighed. "Which means that the Void infiltrators will be scrambling to get in if they aren't already there. Our trip up to Arcadia is going to be about ten times more dangerous. Great." Because of course. It never rained but it poured.
 
Chapter 966
"So, I have a plan," I said as we stared up at the platforms to Arcadia. They nearest one to us was apparently the West gate. It was about a hundred miles outside of Veltheim. It had been a week since my duel with Benny (fifty six more scrolls put me at two hundred thirty two), and I had gathered most of my main combat force here, with the majority of the army inside Bethy's domain.


Ellie, Felicity, Callie, Gabe, Chelsea, Benny, Bethy, Mel, Abel, Carmichael, Crell, Alanna, and Fade were the only ones outside with me. Thirteen of my strongest and most trusted friends willing to follow me into the gates of hell. Granted, they weren't all willing to do it QUIETLY.


"Is it a good plan?" Benny asked politely. "Because based on even a rudimentary ability to recognize patterns, I'm a little worried."


I glared at him. "Can you use your pattern recognition ability to predict what I'm going to say next? Because if not, it's not that impressive after all, and if you can, then why are you not already shutting up?"


He zipped his lips (which were smirking) and mimed throwing away the key, and I huffed and turned back to the others. "Now, as for my completely reasonable and totally tactically sound plan," I continued harshly. "We're going to get on the platform. And everyone is going to group up facing out. And Abel and Bethy are going to combine forces and cover us with a blood sea infused Domain."


They all just stared at me. Like they were waiting. Then Callie sighed. "Shane…that's not a plan. It's an ACTION, but plans involve steps and predicting outcomes. You just basically said the plan is to block really hard."


"It worked last time," I shrugged. "If it ain't broke don't fix it."


My sister pinched the bridge of her nose. "The Universe is doomed. Either the Void will get us or my brother will become the Wishmaster and it will signal the end of days."


"I cordially invite you to join Benny in shutting up," I told her dryly. "Besides. That's not the WHOLE plan. We also have allies. My cousins are coming. And not just the few you met. Delia and Roland have been in touch, and they're joining up for this push. Apparently Roland knows my dad, and is terrified of him. He agreed to work with us in exchange for me putting in a good word with the old man. I guess Roland's dad and mine are enemies and he's worried dad might rip his soul out or something."


Chelsea look unhappy. "He wouldn't do that." She looked around at everyone else, who was very deliberately not looking back. "What? Dad's power is contract based. He needs permission to take someone's soul."


I was almost positive, based on my own experience, that he did NOT need that, or at least that the permission didn't need to be spoken with full faculties by an adult person. I didn't see a reason to make my sister sad though, so I kept quiet about that. The others followed suit, and I gave Benny and Callie a relieved nod.


Luckily, we didn't have too long to wait. Delia, Roland, Derrick, Nadia, Charlie, and Alys all arrived posthaste, their respective guards trailing behind. Once they joined us, our tight grouping of thirteen turned into more like a hundred, and I couldn't help but sigh.


Delia smiled at me, probably the warmest expression I'd ever seen from her, though it was so faint I might have missed it with normal senses. "Managing such a large gathering is a daunting prospect," she said with mild amusement. "Especially with us all being Wyndhams. I can say from experience, managing so much family is like herding cats."


"Drunk cats," I added. "With rabies. But it's better than the alternative."


I turned to glance at the platform in the distance.


It was…big. That was the only word for it. A huge grey stone plate hooked into an equally large metal rail set into the wall of a glacier so tall I literally couldn't see the top of it. The whole thing vanished into clouds a few miles up. However high it went, it wouldn't be a quick ride. Not on a platform that size.


Delia nodded. "I share your worry. Such a location is rife with opportunities for ambush. But it is a path we must take. You sent a message to your parents?"


"I did," I agreed. "Did you and Roland bring A-rankers along? I never asked."


She nodded. "My Aunt and her husband for me. Roland brought a cousin on his mother's side. I still can't believe you brought the full five. I thought only the branch heirs would manage to recruit so many power players."


"What can I say," I shrugged. "Ascending is the family business. And business is good. You're all just lucky they banned S-rankers. I could have managed at least three of those. And I MIGHT have been able to get The Vampire to show up." They stared at me in horror and I couldn't help but chuckle.


Bethy thought it was funny too. "I think he might have said yes just to watch all the branch leaders wet themselves."


"You're stalling," commented Abel. I glowered at him and he shrugged. "I didn't say I don't GET why you're stalling. Just figured someone should point it out. Personally I wouldn't mind a few days vacation. I love a good fight, but I didn't finish taste testing all the food stalls in Veltheim yet."


"Where the hell did you find food stalls?" I asked in confusion. "I didn't see anything like that." Then I shook my head, holding up a hand. "No. Stop. You're right. I AM stalling. Alright, we're all here. Let's get going. Keep your eyes peeled everybody." Then I narrowed my eyes as I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. "Damn it Bethy, put that AWAY, I know it's not a real eyeball." My vampire friend froze, her nail slowly skinning what I was almost sure was a white grape with a markered on pupil, and pouted.


Despite the ridiculousness of the action, it did successfully break the tension, which I appreciated. Still, we were all pretty keyed up as we walked slowly in formation towards the huge stone platform.


When we arrived, I was even more stunned by the device. It wasn't just large, it was intricate. The whole thing was carved with strange patterns and complicated reliefs. I also noticed that we weren't the first to arrive. My lips peeled back as I noticed two familiar faces. Rega and Pallax. Standing with them was sneaky cousin Wesley, and another person I didn't know. Delia caught me looking, then followed my gaze and grimaced. "Kent," she said sourly. "That is…unfortunate."


Roland sneered at the tall thin man with the greasy black hair. "Unfortunate for him maybe. If he tries anything I'll gut him without a second thought."


She shook her head. "You know it won't be that easy. Kent is a nightmare to deal with in a fight. His Stealth ability is nearly unparalleled in the family. But more importantly, he has Shelby with him." She nodded past him at a hooded form I had to really focus on to spot. I suspected Kent might have been keeping her obscured, but paying attention was enough to bypass whatever he was doing.


Shelby did not look impressive. I'd seen a lot of powerful looking warriors since I got here. Tall and imposing, muscular and hard bitten. Shelby looked…kind of like Jessie, actually. She was small and blonde, with a round face and big blue eyes. She had a wide smile and dimples, and her hair was braided at random spots in small thin braids, the whole effect of which made her look like she was going to the shops with friends or something.


She was in good shape, granted, but we all were, and the only real clue to her being anything but a normal, cheerful girl was the frankly ludicrous axe perched on her shoulder. A very sharp looking, very scary B-ranked axe that REEKED of blood and death.


Roland grimaced. "I missed her. He was covering her with stealth. I can take her, I think, but I'm not sure I'd be good for anything else. She's…dangerous."


She also had good senses, because when he mentioned her, she turned and gave him a wide, cheerful smile and a friendly wave. Unlike Alys though, Shelby looked…wrong. It took me a second to realize why. It was her eyes. Her smile was wide and genuine and her dimples made her seem sweet and likable, but her eyes looked like chips of frozen cyanide. Cold and poisonous and very deadly. Shelby was a wolf in sheep's clothing if I'd ever seen one. And I basically LIVED with Bethy, so I knew what I was talking about.


Kent, the candidate with her (they were both B-rank) ambled over with a smarmy grin on his face. "Delia, Roland, how lovely," he all but cooed, clearly thrilled by their dislike and the discomfort it caused them. I already did not care for him. "I suppose we're taking the trip together. I didn't see you back in Sparklev, so I suppose you ended up in the other spoke city that borders this place. I'm surprised so many of us arrived here. Derran is here somewhere too."


Roland actually brightened a bit at that. "Derran is always a welcome addition to any proceedings. Have you seen him since we arrived?"


"He hasn't," came a relaxed voice from behind us. "But he will now, as will you." We all turned to find a tall, tan man with Wyndham green eyes. "Roland, good to see you. You remember Kara." He nodded to the tall redhead next to him with literal hawk eyes. The two of them were, obviously, also B-rank.


Roland nodded back with a warm smile. "Derran. Glad you made it. I trust you were able to avoid most of the Void influence?"


Derran chuckled. "Oh I sidestepped all of that. You know me. I'm the cautious type. Bit low on points, but then, I don't have much need of local muscle. My father is here representing me personally, you know."


To my shock, Roland actually FLINCHED. "Davis is here? That's…good. I suppose. You know Elijah is here representing his own son, right?"


That didn't seem to sit well with Derran, whose eyes snapped to me. "No," he said slowly. "I knew his kid was in the competition but I didn't know he was here. I'm almost positive it won't come to anything. My mother doesn't HATE her half brother. She just finds him insufferable. And last I heard my father and Elijah aren't on bad terms, even if they're also not on good ones."


I blinked at that, processing the information. "Wait…half brother?" I asked. "So that would make you-"


"Your cousin," he said with a smirk. "An actual blood cousin, not the euphemistic kind we use to refer to people several generations distant. My mother is Arabella Wyndham. Malachai's oldest daughter."


I nodded along at that. My grandfather had more than a dozen kids, and only two of them shared a mother with my dad. I'd met one of my other uncles, though it hadn't been a pleasant experience. I assumed Davis was an A-ranker if he was married to Arabella and could be expected to be a match for my dad. I held out a hand. "Huh. Well, nice to meet you then. I'm Shane, as you seemed to already know."


He shook my hand with a laugh. "Knowledge is power. I do my best to stay informed of the goings on of the various branches and factions, though seem to have slipped through that net for the most part." We chatted a bit longer, but were interrupted by a lurch. I flinched and looked down, and sure enough, the ground was starting to move. "Hold tight everyone," my newest cousin commented. "Seems like the ride has begun."
 
Chapter 967
The trip up the glacier was tense. I'd expected that, with all of us stuck together in a very small area (relatively speaking) and unable to leave. Given the rank of the planet, the distance to the ground, and the makeup of the rock at the bottom, for anyone who DIDN'T have wings, falling off this platform was going to be a quick trip to the morgue, assuming there was even enough left to bother burying.


Luckily, we were in a decent position. Roland and Delia were serious heavy hitters, and with my newfound cousin being friendly with the former, that meant most of the B-rankers on this platform were pretty safely in our corner. Most. Kent and Shelby were obviously not allies, but we outnumbered them by quite a bit. Unfortunately, those weren't the only B-rankers here, just the closest ones we'd interacted with, and once we got moving, factions started to form quick.


Kent and Shelby attracted another sixteen B-rankers, most of them allied with weaker candidates. I wasn't sure if some of my less industrious distant cousins had failed to fill all ten slots, if some of their B-rankers had died, or if they were just avoiding showing their full force somehow like we were with Bethy, but whatever the case I was sure we were only scratching the surface in terms of numbers. There were about two hundred people on this platform, and probably half of them were B-rank, though naturally only a few of those were actual Wyndhams.


Which put me distinctly off balance, and made me VERY uncomfortable. It was impossible to say where our side stood in terms of alliance strength, given how independent everyone seemed to be, but the general impression I got of this place was definitely 'powder keg'.


My only consolation was that at least I had a new relative to get to know. Derran had settled nearby and was happily chatting with Chelsea and I. He'd been shocked I'd brought my twin sister with me, given her lacking candidacy, but didn't seem at all unhappy to meet her. We were getting to know a bit about his mother, and I was fielding some questions about dad.


"So is he really as terrifying as he's made out to be?" Derran said contemplatively. "Some of the rumors-"


I shrugged. "Most are probably true. He's a complicated person. I love him, but I don't like him very much most of the time. He's…cold. Distant at the best of times. I've been told that hides genuine concern for me, but he doesn't demonstrate that well. If you're asking if he's DANGEROUS, then yes, very much so. He can and will kill you if you get in his way. I suppose the best endorsement I can give is that he isn't needlessly cruel. He just also isn't needlessly kind."


Chelsea looked unhappy at the summary, which I didn't begrudge her. In some ways, Chelsea had gotten very lucky in her placement during our childhood, but in others, a bit less so. She was obviously better off with mom, but her eventual let down was a lot worse than mine.


While I had found my mom, who adored me and had been desperate to make her absence up to me, Chelsea had ended up finding dad as her long lost parent. I wasn't sure they'd even spoken more than a few words since my great grandmother's threat had been lifted. I suppose they might have been in touch through calls or something, but I knew my dad well enough to know he wasn't the daily chat type. While I envied my sister her childhood, I did not envy her the disappointment of having my father dropped on her as an adult. He was an acquired taste in the most generous terms.


Derran seemed interested. "That sounds about right. My mother isn't fond of him. She says he's a dead fish, though I suspect being grandfather's favorite has more to do with her dislike. Even after leaving the family, it's well known that Malachai adores Elijah. He considers him running off to join the devils a daring escapade rather than the betrayal that many of his siblings see it as."


"Honestly, I'm not sure how much difference that makes," I admitted. "Malachai seems to foster a fairly cutthroat political attitude among his kids. I've only met a few Aunts and Uncles, and most of them were dad's full siblings, but I got the impression from Uncle Percy that his position as Malachai's favorite is more curse than blessing, not that I think he CARES about that at all. One of the few good things I can say about dad is that he isn't the type to be swayed by popularity."


Derran nodded ruefully. "That might not be a bad read. I've met grandpa a few times, though we aren't close. My mother is actually a member of Seline's branch. Most of Malachai's kids stuck with the one of the family branches, but mom and Percival don't get along and she was motivated to go out on her own."


I could see how that decision wouldn't endear her to Percy, though it also made her dislike of my dad a bit more hypocritical. I didn't SAY that obviously, because I wasn't an idiot. But it was on my mind.


We chatted like that for a while. It was a combination of family bonding and information gathering and we both knew it. I was learning more about Davis in preparation for coming up against him in the last round (and regardless of Void interference that was what Arcadia was) and he was feeling out more info about my dad.


Of course, we weren't really giving each other anything useful. We'd been telling emotional stories with lots of personal context and very little power scaling information. It fit with the narrative of the conversation well enough and denied the other person any real useful dirt.


I DID pick up a few tidbits here and there. My ability to smell truth made it easier to slightly shift the conversation in directions where I could confirm or deny things without coming across as prying. I kept one of my parallels active at all times, keeping an eye out for the Void. I doubted MOST of the Vessels would be willing to start a fight in this cramped environment, but there would be some. More importantly, Callie was a prime target, and Fade and Alanna had strict instructions to guard her closely…which was literally the only thing that saved her.


Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a flash, then heard a scream. I whirled to find Fade standing in front of my wife, a dagger in his side, and his sword Devlos drawn and arching toward the throat of a very panicked looking B-ranker.


The assassin wasn't one of the big name B-rankers that had been pointed out. Just a mousy brown haired guy a bit younger than me. But I DID recognize him. Or rather, I'd seen him before. Sure enough, the blade lashing at his throat was deflected by an oversized axe that smashed into the ground where Fade had been seconds ago as Shelby pressed an attack to drive back my retainer.


Alanna appeared next to Fade, her eyes glowing with rage as her sword flickered for Shelby's eye, obviously going for a killing blow from the jump, and the axe wielding woman snarled and ducked behind the haft of her weapon to avoid being speared through the brain. The dagger wielder had retreated into a crowd of Kent's retainers who had shown up, and my own teammates had all gathered around us. I was at my wife's side instantly, checking her for injuries, and glaring at Kent across the crowd.


"Hey, fuckface, you better explain yourself," I snapped, my blood boiling with rage. That asshole had tried to MURDER my Callie. I was going to see his skin peeled off and nailed to a door when we got to the top of this glacier.


He sneered at me. "Watch your mouth, boy. Your betters are speaking here. If Roland or Derran has a question for me, I'll happily listen. But I won't be threatened by some-"


"Fuck off!" I snarled. "Explain or fucking die! I have five A-rankers waiting at the top of this lift, and their first mission upon reuniting with me will be mounting your fucking HEAD on a spike if you don't tell me what the hell is going on. That's my WIFE your errand boy just tried to kill you pompous simpering little prick. Not to mention a noted threat to the Void. The only reason someone like you would have to try to kill a D-ranker like that would be if you were in league with them."


He blanched, though whether because of the threat of being butchered by A-rankers or because of the accusation, I couldn't tell. I also didn't have the chance to find out, because before any of us could react, the same dagger that had been driven into Fade emerged from his chest. He blinked, staring down at his chest and then looking back at the B-ranker in confusion. The man was grinning like a maniac. Everyone froze, staring at the obvious killing blow.


I didn't know what was up with that dagger, but given that my sister, Ellie, and every other member of our group with flame or purification related powers were pouring them into the wound on Fade's side, I was guessing some kind of poison. Whatever it was would have immediately killed Callie, and had done the same to Kent, who was sliding bonelessly to the ground as the light faded from his eyes.


He never made it. With a desolate howl of "NO!" Shelby crossed the intervening distance, her axe coming across in a sweeping blow that cleaved the fucking SPACE itself, bisecting the body of her employer and beheading his killer in the same stroke.


That attack was the match that lit the powderkeg. With a roar of gleeful sadism, about a dozen different B-rankers lashed out with suicidal attacks toward their nearest neighbors, doing their best to take someone with them. They were nearly instantly cut down to a man, but several Wyndhams were killed in the ensuing attack.


None of the Wyndhams revealed themselves as Void agents, but I wasn't entirely sure that was because they were all clean. I suspected this whole assault was a cover to help some of the better hidden Vessels get into Arcadia more easily. But I hardly had time to focus on that. I dove forward, wrapping my whole body around my wife, putting as much of my armor between her and harm as possible.


"Shane, stop it!" She screamed as she tried to break free. "You're going to get yourself killed idiot!"


I heard a gurgle of stunned pain from beside me, and turned to see Kara, Darren's retainer, driving a spear into his gut. Roland let out a roar of betrayal and cleaved her head from her shoulders with a flick of his wrist. He produced a scroll, popped it open, and muttered under his breath as he removed the spear.


We all exhaled in relief as Darren's gut wound healed, all except Darren, who was staring in devastated horror at the head of his second in command lying on the ground nearby.


Luckily, the assassins had MOSTLY failed. Several of the Wyndhams had defensive wishes in place, and even their subordinates had been mostly protected. Still, some of the attacks had been vicious and quick enough to claim lives. I saw Shelby on the ground, cradling the top half of Kent in her lap and rocking it as she cried uncontrollably, Darren was nearly catatonic from shock and horror, and even the various survivors had looks of numb terror on their faces. I know I did.


So of course, that moment was when we all felt a lurch as the platform began to slow. We passed out of the cloud bank we'd been sliding through, and the stone shuddered as we came to a stop at the top in front of an absolutely massive gate, upon which stood about twenty of figures in dark robes. A-rankers, waiting for their charges. We looked up at them, they looked back…and then all hell broke loose.
 
Chapter 968
There was a brief lull before everyone lost it. Not a long one, mind. It seemed like everyone was so shocked they didn't know how to react. On our side we were staring down twenty A-rankers, and on theirs a small massacre had played out among their charges. The first person to react was a particularly large figure on the left side of the parapets of the gate.


Before any of us could move, he was standing at the base of the platform, staring in at us. "What happened to Kent?" he demanded. He was tall and blonde, with a thick beard and a heavy brow. His eyes were grey as granite, and narrowed in outrage.


I stepped in front of Callie, noticing Bethy had joined me in the motion. I smiled at my friend before remembering my face was covered by my mask, but she grinned sunnily back at me anyway, as if she knew. The man, receiving no answer, turned to the sobbing blonde holding Kent's body. "Shelby!" He barked. "Pull yourself together girl. What did you do?"


"D-daddy!" She sobbed. "They stabbed him!" She gestured to the headless B-ranker. "That one went after her!" she pointed at Callie. "And the other one stopped him." She pointed to Fade. "Then Kent tried to talk them down and he turned on us. He killed him so fast I couldn't stop it."


The man's eyes darkened as he surveyed the scene. "The blade severed the spine and struck the heart. And it was poisoned. Death would have been instant."


Shelby clutched the body tighter, crying even harder, and I felt my heart break for her a little. She'd clearly cared about Kent a lot. I tried to imagine that being Callie, or Benny, or my sister, and my blood ran cold. My hands clenched in outrage. I was so ANGRY. I had nowhere to vent it. One second I'd been snapping at Kent that I'd have him killed, and the next he'd been dead. Something Shelby seemed to remember as I did. "He threatened Kent!" She said, her eyes narrowing as she pointed at me. "Said he'd have him killed!"


The man's gaze turned to me, and I felt a crushing force from his attention. I had zero hope of offering any resistance to an A-ranker. I triggered Leviathan though, and the tide of mental pressure dissolved as it hit me. Barely. It was draining me fast, and he wasn't even actually DOING anything.


"You threatened him?" He said quietly. "D-" He seemed to be about to attack, but before he finished the word, another figure appeared in front of him, and he vanished.


My mother pushed her hood back, glaring at the person sized hole in the wall over where the others were waiting. It had shaken on impact, but not too much. "I KNOW you weren't about to threaten my son, Caius."


Another man spoke up from the wall. "Are we something you take so lightly, Star Queen? An heir of a major branch has died. Kent was one of Desmond's youngest children. His sister and nephew are both Branch Heads in their own right. Do you think your brat is going to be the side anyone picks over that?"


"I think there's no proof my Shane had anything to do with that little twit being snuffed out," my mother hissed, eyes literally alight with rage. White flames flickered on her irises and ignited on her fists. "The girl the assassin went for first is his WIFE, you lackwit. Caius is just embarrassed he didn't manage to properly vet his brat's retinue. My boy isn't his punching bag, if he wants to work out his frustration he can do it on someone else."


Between one blink and the next, another figure appeared beside her. A familiar red skinned version of my (albeit shorter) with black hair and horns. My dad stared up at the wall threateningly, fingers folded over the head of his cane. He didn't speak. He didn't need to. Everyone here knew who he was and what he could do.


There was a grinding of stone as Caius climbed out of the gate, his face murderous…right up until he saw my dad. At which case it went from enraged to terrified.


"Gods dad, what did you do to these people?" I muttered under my breath. Callie snorted out a quit laugh, quickly covering her mouth, not that I was delusional enough to assume anyone here had missed it.


Sebastian appeared next, in front of my parents rather than beside them. "This is pointless," he said forcefully. "The girl is barely coherent. We need a more stable source of information."


My mom nodded. "Ellisara," she barked. "Report."


Ellie appeared ahead of us. I actually SAW her move, albeit barely. The A-rankers were so fast they might as well be teleporting. Without a ship to watch them through or anything to slow this down, I couldn't perceive what was going on aside from the talking. Ellie dropped to a knee in front of my mother. "I'm here, master. The little lord didn't do anything wrong. He was demanding answers from the dead one when his underling literally stabbed him in the back. He was protecting her for the rest of the very short fight. Putting himself between her and harm."


"Of course he was," she said with a proud smile. "That's my boy." Her face hardened again as she turned to look up at the man on the gate, whose face I couldn't see from here. "And don't think that'll be ignored either. Someone tried to murder my daughter in law. I'm quite fond of that girl, and my MOTHER likes her even more. Or did you not realize your nobody traitor tried to assassinate Drowning Shade's personal apprentice."


The figure flinched. "I think we're getting off track," he said lamely after a slight delay. "This was clearly an attempt at infiltration by the Void. We should hurry to the other gates to survey the extent of the damage. It's doubtful this was the only attack." Then he vanished.


I was surprised. There was a strict non-interference policy on the succession war. A threat of an outside attack normally wouldn't produce much worry. This was hardly a normal competition though. The Void had broken neutrality over their knee and chucked it in a swimming pool, and no one knew what the rules were. Plus grandma was right above us, and while the S-rankers couldn't make landfall because of their Impact and the fire cage, in order to LEAVE they had to go past her. It wouldn't be out of character for her to claim Void influence and kill someone who had attacked her apprentice. Grandma was kind and compassionate with me and my friends, but she WAS her mother's daughter.


Which was another issue for them. Black Sorrow was fanatically devoted to her only child. On the off chance someone had either stopped or harmed my grandmother (unlikely with my Demigod grandfather nearby), they'd be dealing with both my great grandparents and two entire factions.


Unlike the old man, Black Sorrow and the Red Revenant didn't even pretend at neutrality. If someone picked a fight with their baby girl they'd go on a rampage.


This was, of course, why neutrality was normally enforced on this event. Because the convoluted web of relatives and support made it almost impossible to make a move if it wasn't. With the spirit of that breached by the Void, this whole thing had become a lot more complicated. For everyone else. I was actually pretty fine with the whole thing.


Grabbing Callie's hand, I gestured for Bethy and the others to follow, including Darren, Roland, and Delia. Then I approached my parents. "Mom, dad," I told them wryly. "I had a terrible time at camp."


Another familiar form snorted in laughter as it materialized beside us. Killian, the fifth member of my A-rank entourage and an old friend of my parents, grinned at me. "He really is just like his dad. I swear, it's like looking in a mirror. Well, a funhouse mirror, since he's so much taller than you were. I never realized you were so short."


"I am NOT short," my dad snapped waspishly. "I am of perfectly normal size. The universal average is five foot ten. Discounting the fairyland. But they don't count because the fae are all over the place.


"Shorter than me," Zeke said with a grin as he leaned past Killian to shoot me a lazy wave. "Took you long enough, kid. Your mom was going out of her mind with worry. When we heard about the Void attacks we had to physically restrain her from going down into the lower zones to help. But the fire cage sections off Impact. It would have caused problems for her to enter anything below Arcadia."


I hadn't realized she was that worried. I'd known she was unhappy with things, but she'd played it off as just casual concern. "We're fine," I assured them. "Assuming we're not about to get murdered over shitty family politics."


"You are not," Sebastian said in a tone like cast iron. Dark and heavy and a little brittle, it was clear that he was much angrier than he looked, and wanted an excuse to do a little violence himself. I glanced at Bethy, who was looking at him in concern, and realized why. Bethy had been through a lot since we got here. I might not be able to see the signs of her various upsets, but that didn't mean he couldn't.


My mom nodded. "He's right, sweetie. No one with any real power came besides us and Caius. I was expecting Davis, but he's been steering clear of Eli. I imagine he'll be along shortly. The rest have scattered."


Looking past her, I realized she was right. All fifteen of the other figures had vanished without a word or sign. I was DEEPLY uncomfortable with exactly how casually they were all making us look like nonentities. Fucking A-rankers. Although speaking of ranks. I was coming up on a new one myself. I wasn't sure I was there yet, but I suspected I'd hit C-rank in Arcadia, given how long this test was looking like it was taking.


We also didn't have a new trial yet. I turned to my parents. "What's the deal with the competition? We've been getting drip fed information through the announcements and don't know much. I assume you guys have been in touch with the grandparents?"


"We have," my mom assured me. "The situation is…complicated. We're all kind of flying blind. There's an implication among everyone that there's got to be a traitor, and one high up in the WCP. It has to be either an elder or someone down here in one of the cities. Possibly both. Which is making things complicated."


My dad sighed. "Everyone is questioning everyone else's motives. Which means people are backpedaling on legitimately intelligent responses because idiots are implying their treachery almost as often as the idiots are proposing terrible responses and sticking to their guns. We've managed a sort of equilibrium, but it's basically just a city wide detente for the duration of this last test as we try to ferret out the Void infiltrators."


That was disappointing but not shocking. I sighed, shaking my head. "Yeah, I assumed. There must be some way to increase points though. Right?"


My uncle grinned. "Oh there is," he said gleefully. "In fact, we think you're going to be pretty excited about it. They've put a bounty on Void infiltrators. It was one of the FEW useful moves our supporters managed to bully the council into making. Which means we can genuinely get some work done here. Hope you're all ready to get started after a short rest. We've got a big advantage given your connection to the Void, Callie. Once you're all settled in, it'll be time to start hunting." Given her excited grin, my wife was just as excited about that idea as Zeke was. And she said I was the impulsive one in our marriage.
 
Chapter 969
When we reached the house my parents had been staying at, I admit I froze. "I…was expecting something bigger." We were standing in a small grass yard between two huge buildings. Packed into the intervening space was a small cottage, thatched roof and all. It was a warm brown color, with a blue painted door sporting a shiny brass knob. The windows had matching blue shutters thrown wide to reveal gauzy yellow curtains, and the path up to the door was brown cobblestone.


My mother beamed excitedly. "Isn't it lovely! Your father wanted to stay in a big drafty castle, but I wasn't having any of that. I get quite enough of castles back home. I went looking for lodgings and found this darling little cottage for us to sleep in!" The others had already split off to stay at the two neighboring boarding houses, but Chelsea and I had been press ganged into staying with my parents for family bonding time.


I turned to look at my dad, whose face looked like it was carved from stone. I might have assumed he was unaffected, if his shoulders weren't slightly hunched. I snickered at his obvious exasperation and he glared at me. I turned to look at my mom. "Hey mom, dad doesn't seem very happy to see me, was he not as worried as you were? I mean I just assumed he would be super anxious about all the trouble, but if it didn't bother him that's fine too."


He turned to shoot me a betrayed look, his jaw dropping in horror as she pinned him with a gimlet stare. "Now honey, I'm sure that's not the case. Your father loves you, of course he was worried for your safety. Would it kill you to show your son a little affection Eli? We're not on the run anymore. Now that we're a family again I won't have you treating him like a stranger."


My lips peeled back in a sadistic grin. This was MUCH better than punching him in the throat. I knew my mom was my dad's biggest weakness, but I hadn't realized how easily she could push him around.


Granted, I was also aware that this whole dynamic was probably him expressing guilt over how my life had gone, and she was playing along because she thought I deserved a little payback. Oddly though, that made me feel even warmer. They knew me well enough to know I was still upset and were letting me work it out my own way.


Chelsea giggled at his expression. "I didn't even get a hello. Honestly, it's like you both forget you have two children."


My mother snorted. "You were twins, dear. Trust me. No one forgets giving birth to twins. Your brother has simply been deprived of affection for most of his life. I'm not asking for miracles, but I'd like to see Eli put in a bit of effort at least." Her eyes softened as they landed on me. "And it would mean a lot if you could meet him halfway, Shane. I know that isn't my right to ask, given the way things went, but…now that we have the chance, I really hope we can try to be a real family."


That took the wind out of my sails, as far as tormenting my old man went. She sounded so sincere and pleading. I felt like an asshole for reducing my own mother to begging me to be nice to my family.


"I can try," I allowed. "I can't just wave a magic wand and say everything is fine. But I get why he did the things he did, and it turned out ok for the most part. I won't swear to not to give him a hard time when I can, but I'll make an effort at least. If he'll do the same."


I looked him in the eye as I said that last part, and he sighed. "I…suppose I can do that. I can't promise to do it WELL, however." He grimaced. "I'm not a KID person. Never have been. I find children frustrating, and you were a special kind of frustration because you reminded me of myself in some ways."


"YOU raised me," I scowled. "Or helped from a distance at least. I guess Zeke did most of it. Though he led me to believe I reminded you of mom more than yourself, he said that was why you left me on Callus."


He smiled wanly. "Like I said. In some ways. I don't mean to say I'm not proud of you. The things you've accomplished are nothing short of miraculous. But I've always been a selfish man. I take care of myself first. Sasha was the exception to that rule, and I suspect you know a little something about that. You and your wife seem to be close as well. But anyone else…I just didn't have it in me."


"Don't make excuses," snapped my mother. "You were never a proper child. Ezekiel's family treated you like an honored guest, and when you finally met your father he manipulated and controlled you as best he could manage. The only positive feedback you got from Malachai was when you outsmarted him, and that's not the kind of relationship I want you to have with our son."


Putting up both hands, he just sighed. "I didn't say it would be. And I'm not making excuses, just setting expectations. I'm not going to suddenly be the dad who takes him to ball games and plays catch at the park. That isn't me. It wasn't me when I was his age and it won't be me from this side of the equation. I'm not here to parent him. He doesn't need it. But that doesn't mean I can't get to know the boy. We're both adults, and just because I'm not going to wipe his nose for him doesn't mean we can't interact."


She just rolled her eyes. "Oh for the love of the gods." She turned to me with an exasperated snort. "He's SAYING that he's afraid he won't be a good father, so he'd rather try to be your friend."


"I was NOT saying that," he said in an appalled tone. "I would never say anything like that. It's…cloying."


Her eyes hardened. "I hear you deride me for showing affection to your son again, and I might decide all the affection I show YOU is cloying. You can maintain your ominous and intimidating image sleeping on a pile of fertilizer bags in the back shed."


"That's not what I meant," he groaned. "Damn it woman, this is hard enough without you putting words in my mouth!"


"Mom," I said gently, taking off my mask. "I think maybe this is making it harder for him." She looked hurt, but I offered her a warm smile. "You said you wanted me to try, and I want to do that. But I think he needs to process things with me in his own way. I know you want to just make things ok, and you probably COULD bully him into acting like it, but I think in the long rain that'll do more harm than good."


She wilted slightly. "I just…I want us to be a FAMILY," she pleaded. "It's not that hard!"


"No," I agreed. "But it's not that easy either. We'll get there. I know we will. Just…let us go at our own pace. That was my fault, honestly. I didn't realize it would upset you so much when I teased him like that. I don't actually need you to fight my battles here. I love you, and I know you feel guilty. But like I said, I'm past the anger mostly. I get you want to fix things between us all, but some things just need time."


Biting her lip, she nodded slowly. "Alright. Fine. I'll stay out of it. But can we have dinner together? The four of us? Actually, make that five. I want to spend some more time with my daughter in law."


"I'm sure she'd love that," I beamed at her. "And even better, I'll cook for us. I've been told I'm a decent hand in the kitchen, and my skills have only grown."


Chelsea nodded eagerly. "He's got a gift," she admitted. "He's going to make Callie an amazing house husband someday." She grinned at me teasingly, sticking out her tongue at me, and I raised an eyebrow in challenge.


"I'm sorry, how is YOUR love life going?" I said with a malicious grin. "You expressed your feelings to EITHER of the people you're interested in?"


She squeaked, her face going red as she glanced anxiously at our parents. "Shane what the hell? How did you even know about that? I mean…what do you mean? I mean…shut the hell up!"


My mom actually giggled at that. "Listen to the two of you, acting like real siblings. I love how close you've gotten."


"This family is the worst," sulked my sister, actually pouting about her secret being exposed. She hadn't actually told me about it, I'd just kind of guessed, so I hadn't been under any obligation to keep it secret. It was my turn to stick my tongue out at her.


I sent a quick mental message to my wife, who appeared pretty quickly after as mom led us inside to give us a tour. She hadn't been far, and was planning to stay with me, of course, she just wanted to give me time to reconnect with my family. And I appreciated it, but honestly…I felt awkward around them.


After years with my friends and allies, being around these people that expected me to be someone that I wasn't sure I'd ever been was awkward. Like yes, there'd always been expectations from mom, but only for the short time I'd actually seen her.


Weirdly my dad seemed to have the least expectations, if only because the self absorbed bastard was too focused on what he should be feeling to even worry about me. I was a little grateful though. What I'd said to my mom was true, I did think we'd get there eventually, but I hadn't had the heart to tell her that her trying to force us to mend fences made me feel like a damned zoo animal on exhibit.


Callie appeared next to me without any hesitation, lacing her fingers in mine and shooting me that lodestar of a smile. No matter how lost I got, that always showed me which way was north. One smile from my wife would set me back on the right path, and I'd never been more grateful.


We headed inside, and I explored the kitchen, snagging some easy ingredients as the others gathered at the table in the kitchen on the other side of the counter. "So," I said as I started preparing the roux I was going to use to make the Jambalaya tonight. "Zeke said there are bounties?" This was one of my favorite recipes. Jambalaya was supposed to be tomato based, but this one cooked much faster because the roux got VERY hot (the trick was using an oil with a high smoke point, like grapeseed oil).

My dad nodded as I started chopping up the onions, celery, and bell peppers. "There's been some success identifying some of the abstract information on targets. Due to the secrets moratorium, outright FINDING them is problematic, but getting some information to use as a base for a bounty list is much more manageable."


I grimaced. I knew perfectly well how annoying that could be. But with a bounty list…I hummed to myself as I started to prepare the chicken thighs. Dantalion could help me ferret out many different things. Maybe not A-rankers, but C-rankers if I used my staff. Hell if I ranked up B-rankers would be viable if I spent some time working on it. Beyond that though, I had another advantage. I had Zeke. I was in a good mood as I returned to cooking. I had a feeling I'd do just fine in this round.
 
Does this book have smut? I noticed on amazon, it says it's rated for 13 - 18 age
 
Malcolm Tent said:
I think in the long rain that'll do more harm than good."
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

In the long run

I just realized Shane based his Legend on someone who sealed demons, and his father became a devil. I wonder if there will be any interesting interactions between their abilities in the future.
 
Chapter 970
I stared down into the very large hole with trepidation. "Look," I said slowly. "I feel like no one will take this seriously, and it might not even matter since we have to go down there. But I feel like it needs to be said. Literally NOTHING good has ever happened to any of us in a hole in the ground."


Callie rolled her eyes. "Let's be honest. Bad things have happened to us in almost every imaginable biome. I think pretty much the only ones we're missing are the ocean and the desert." Then she paused. "Except after we came out of that underwater city in the dungeon, which I guess was technically both?"


I snorted at that, looking around at all my friends. "Guess I can't argue that. We have everyone here?"


"We left some of the D-rankers to guard the houses," Callie said with a grimace. "Well, not really, there's nothing they can do if someone attacks, but they're being punished. Bethy hired a bunch of them to follow her around and serenade her with a theme song they made up on the spot. She liked it so much she decided to hire them to do it to the rest of us too. Sadly, we couldn't punish Bethy for it because it's not on the list."


I groaned, pinching the bridge of my nose. "Of course she did. It's fine, we don't need most of the D-rankers anyway. The higher ranked members of the group will have a hard enough time keeping everyone safe. Are we sure splitting into groups like this is a good choice?"


She sighed. "I mean…no. But we have to maximize our odds of finding Void infiltrators. Based on what I know about the Void ladder, they'll be setting up relays along the staircase. Considering the pressure gets heavier the deeper they go, as long as our people don't go too deep they should be fine, especially with a few C-rankers on each group to protect them."


"Fair enough," I said grimly. "My people need to get out on their own and fight, otherwise they can't build their rep and get stronger. Keeping everyone locked up in Bethy's Domain all the time isn't a viable long term solution. Groups of twenty five should do it. Obviously, we're going deepest, so my parents and Zeke should come with us. Sebastian and Killian can each head up a group of our second liners. Fade's people, some of the leftover C-rankers, what have you. Does everyone have the orbs we made?"


With Callie coming along with me, I knew at some point we'd run into problems supplying heretic fire to the rest of our group when we were separated. So last night after our family dinner I'd settled in to spend hours making more of the heretic fire spheres we'd sold. They wouldn't last forever, but if any of our people hit the Void spawn, those should be enough to handle the problem.


It was a unique advantage we had. Most people didn't have an easy way to destroy Void creatures. They were nasty and hard to kill. Most of my cousins would be concentrating their forces into large groups and trying to dive deep to maximize their point gain from the bounties of the stronger Void creatures. Spreading out like we were wasn't a viable strategy for anyone else. Which was the only reason I was agreeing to it, despite my reservations about leaving the people I was responsible for unprotected.


I glanced back down into the hole. "So…this thing leads all the way through the planet? I wonder what happens if you fall in. Do you get stuck in the middle?"


"Eventually," Zeke said as he stepped up next to me. "You kind of ping pong around in the center until you reach equilibrium between the two gravities and then stop in the middle once the momentum runs out. We've seen stuff like this before, though the heirworld's is bigger than most. It's also…unique. The staircase has floors that descend surrounding it. Every few hundred feet or so there's a new level with some other new bit of nonsense. The one in the center is kind of a mess."


That made me frown. "Why are there floors like that? It's just a hole in the ground. Why dig out levels along the staircase."


"No one knows," he shrugged. "The staircase wasn't created by the WCP. It was here when we took control of the heirworld. So were the levels. We suspect it might be a resource thing, like they were digging for ore and stuff on the way down. But no one can say for sure. The levels get pretty wide. They run under basically the whole city."


Mom grinned. "They're ALSO full of treasure. Kind of. They're unstable spatially and move around pretty much all the time. Hallways changing places every few days and things like that. So the various items lost by explorers tend to pop up. It's why this city isn't ALL A-rankers. The levels closer to the surface have pretty low pressure, and the things lost there are fairly worthless. They send D,C, and B-rankers to explore for them at various depths to dig out treasure."


"It's one of the WCPs major revenue streams," my dad added. "The heirworld has been producing artifacts for millennia. No one is sure how much is down there, or how big the floors are. Since they move around constantly they're impossible to map."


Callie looked upset. "That's bad," she said bluntly. "If they get any of the receivers down there and they get shunted away into some random part of one of the levels…not to mention the spatial instability down there will make it much easier to construct the Void ladder. What about the central level, you said it was a mess? What did you mean by that?"


"Most of the levels change places every few days," Zeke clarified. "But the central level does it every few MINUTES. It's constantly in flux. Not just sideways either. Up is down, left is right, it's a deeply unsettling place."


My mom rolled her eyes. "What Ezekiel means is that he's HEARD it's a deeply unsettling place. None of us were strong enough to get that deep when we came here last. It's impossible to reach that depth without at LEAST a Chronicle. The reasons for the slowly growing pressure closer to the core haven't been fully explored, but the Impact steadily builds as you descend. By the time you reach the center, it's much too heavy for even a normal C-ranker to bear. And we weren't nearly as powerful during the last succession war."


"Alright," I said, processing it all. "So the bounties are organized by…what? Floor? How does that work with the shifting?"


"No one sticks around for that in person," said my dad. "The spatial warping is extremely dangerous. When it starts, anyone inside flees to the staircase. The stairs themselves are made of…well, we aren't really sure. Something that anchors space." He glanced at Callie. "I assume that wouldn't completely spoil the attempts at the Void ladder?"


"If anything, the opposite," she grimaced. "Ladders need to be set on stable ground to be climbed. A cylinder of stable space through the center of the planet would be an ideal foundation to use for the construction."


I just sighed. "Fine. What's our target today then? I assume with A-rankers working on information gathering we know at least enough to pick out someone worth some real points."


"A B-rank vessel named Faustryche," my mother said cheerfully. "When the purge of the planet started, several A and B-rankers already in the city fled to the stairs. It's not a great environment for fighting, so the locals "conveniently" decided to leave them for us. As a fun obstacle in the succession war. Wasn't that nice of them?" Her tone made it clear she was being deeply sarcastic, but my dad just shrugged.


"Not their monkeys, not their circus," he said blithely. "Or at least that's what they think. It's shortsighted, but I imagine the A-rankers think they can flee when things get bad. It's easy to decide something isn't your problem when other people are around to be made to deal with it."


I chuckled. "Yeah, shocking how bad most Ascendants are at long term thinking."


"Not really," Zeke countered as we began to divide up into groups. "Stories tend to change with the telling, warping over time to become something completely different. In order to survive as an Ascendant, you need to focus on the present. I told you this years ago, kid. You'll never make it if you don't live in the now."


He had. It shocked me sometimes how casual conversations with Zeke could have so many layers. The things he said or didn't say were often important later on down the line in ways I'd never expected. It clashed with the image of the sloppy drunk I'd grown up with, but then, a lot of his Ascendant persona did. Janus was a scary, competent, devious man. I suppose it shouldn't be shocking he could put on such a good front. His entire path was based on masks and deception.


In a way though, that made him the most dependable person I could think of. Zeke could have left when I was a kid, I was convinced. Thinking about it now, he could have come up with some way to slip the contract. He was the craftiest person I knew, and I'd seen him kill A-rankers at B-rank.


The fact that he stayed was one of the reasons I knew I could trust him. And really…Zeke was the first person I'd ever trusted. He'd shown me what stability meant, gave me the sense of structure I'd needed to build the friendships I had today. Even with my parents back, Zeke was still one of the most important people in the world to me. I needed to make sure that once I became the Wishmaster, he was rewarded for everything he'd done. And I knew just how to do it. In fact, I didn't even need the WCP.


"Hey Zeke," I said as we descended the stairs in a group of twenty five. "I was thinking. What do you think about Stella apprenticing with my grandmother?"


My mom blinked. "Stacy?" It still confused the hell out of me that Stella's name was a hero name and not her actual name. I knew it meant star, but the whole thing was deeply counterintuitive. "That's a good idea. Mom does a lot with stars. I bet she could teach her plenty, and her Cosmic Witchcraft has a lot of potential. Witches can be pretty scary with the right tools."


My uncle looked a little bushwhacked. "I mean…that would be great, but Celia is an S-ranker, and the daughter of two gods. I'm sure she has better things to do."


"No way," Chelsea chirped happily. "She would love to help out a member of the family. And it would be nice having you two around. Shane got to spend his whole childhood with you, but I never got any uncle time. You owe me like…twenty years of birthday presents." She winked at him, and I saw him grin back at the audacity.


"I think I can manage something," he said with a laugh. I couldn't hold back my own grin. I hadn't really considered that Chelsea might want to have a relationship with Zeke like I had, but I definitely approved. My uncle was one of the best people I knew, and my sister deserved to have someone like him in her life. I felt like it was fitting, too, that they connect when we were all doing this family thing.


Callie smiled warmly at me, reaching over to thread her fingers in mine, giving my hand a tight squeeze. Callie loved holding hands. She had ever since we got together, and I had to admit after years of it, I felt just as warm and protected as she did when her fingers laced into my own. And so, my wife and I held hands and chatted with my parents as we all marched cheerfully down to hell.
 
Chapter 971
Reaching the tenth level wasn't too tough. I wanted to go deeper, honestly, but Faustryche had been recently seen down here and we had a day or two before the next shift. In fact, we couldn't have gone lower as a group anyway. The majority of our people didn't have a Chronicle, even among the top percentage of our combatants, and hence they couldn't stand the pressure too many levels down.


Even ten levels below the surface (and the staircase DID start at the surface, with the whole of Arcadia built in a sort of bowl set into the glacier which the stairway was at the bottom of), things were starting to get a little heavy, and I could see my friends starting to strain a bit.


Not Bethy, mind, who I was almost positive already had a Chronicle anyway, or Abel, but some of the lower end power additions like Benny and Jessie. But when we arrived, I was quickly shown that things weren't going to be that easy. Much like the other Vessels, Faustryche had supplied a large amount of what Callie called 'Void spawn'.


These particular spawn weren't mantis shaped like the ones in the forest. They looked…like devils, kind of. Short pudgy things with obsidian skin and little wings and tiny horns. Oddly enough though, most of them were D-rankers.


Ellie stepped forward, hefting her mace, but my mom held up a hand. "No," she said simply. "This isn't just bounty hunting. It's training. Shane. You and your friends'll take care of these." I shrugged, stepping up to call for my staff. It landed in my hands with a reassuring thump, but before I could activate a form, my mom continued sharply. "With no abilities."


I froze, turning to raise an eyebrow at her. The imp things were gathering at the edge of the pool of light from the staircase. The tenth level was a massive cavernous hall made of dark stone, filled with tall columns and cloaked in complete shadow. I only even knew they were Void spawn because of the eerie blue glow of the eyes. It was a very distinctive glow. "I assume you want all of us to do the same?" She nodded, and I sighed. "Any reason why?"


"You're too clever," she said bluntly. "I know you have tricks to handle any occasion, and that's good. Preparation is always a smart move. But at some point, you'll fight something tricks don't work on. You need enough strength of arms to hold your own when you're on even ground."


Despite her hard tone, I could see the worry on her face. She had clearly been more shaken by being stuck here while we dealt with the void than expected. I could understand that. I just sighed, then turned to call out for a familiar face. "Bella!" I shouted for my apprentice. "Front and center."


My apprentice's red hair had grown out since I'd seen her last. It was staggering to think she'd been essentially locked up in Bethy's Domain since we arrived on this planet. I felt a little bad, because I was supposed to be teaching her, but it was just so damned dangerous.


"Aye aye, master!" She shouted energetically as she snapped off a crisp salute. "What do you need?"


I nodded to the imps. "I need a sparring partner. Assuming my wife doesn't mind me checking on your progress?" I cocked my head at Callie, who rolled her eyes but still shook her head. Grinning, I turned back to my disciple. "Then head out. It's time for me to see the results of your training. Go on, I'll be right behind you."


She looked a bit nervous, but she moved forward. Benny, Jessie, Daysia, Dayna, and all the others spread out with him. By seeming unspoken agreement, we sent the weaker combatants out first. Well, weaker in melee. Dayna was a Heaven Murder Elf, and was dangerous in any kind of battle, but she preferred a bow.


While my mom clearly wanted us to take care of this personally to see my progress, I had my own concerns. To her credit she didn't complain about it, just raised an eyebrow and watched. After all, like I'd told Bella, I was right behind her.


It was…kind of amazing, really. To see her whirl her staff into action, striking out with different forms. Mephistopheles to destroy, Mornax to defend. Seeing the results of my training, of her obviously constant practice, brought a swell of pride to my chest. She spun and stomped and cleaved through the imps with brutal efficiency, bringing the goetia staff art to bear at what I was pretty sure was a high Expert level.


Of course, she needed some help. Once she killed a few, the imps swarmed, rushing her in a screeching wave of hate and stubby claws. My own staff spun out to meet them, flickering between her strikes and around her spinning form, slipping through minute gaps in her attacks as I threaded the needle with expert precision.


More than my enhanced stats, I was just much more experienced in the staff. Especially THIS staff. The art was my creation, and I could read it like a map. It almost felt like I was using Belial, honestly, like I was conducting a symphony of spilt blood and shattered skulls using my apprentice as my instrument.


Bella moved like a precision machine for about twenty minutes…but eventually she started to flag. I stepped past her, hooking my staff in front of her and pushing her back gently, with Callie stepping up to escort her away. "You did good, kid," I called to her as she retreated. "Now watch close. This is what you're aiming for." And then I lost myself in the flow of battle.


I wasn't a conductor anymore, I was a dancer, and my weapon was a part of my body. Imps shattered and broke against me like the tide crashing against the rocks. Some of them got through, scraping my neck or wrists or just raking my skin between gaps in my armor. But it didn't matter. Even without Mornax active, my Impact was higher than a normal D-ranker. They didn't have the power to deal real damage.


I heard myself laugh as if from far away, releasing all the pent up stress and aggression that I usually held in. No plans, no tricks, just violence. Pure, simple, uncomplicated force, brought to bear as I enacted my will on the world around me. The music was over. I wasn't dancing anymore, I was exterminating. Smashing insects in droves as I cackled my glee into the overwhelming darkness.


Until, suddenly, I wasn't. I froze, my breath was coming heavy, blood dripping through the crevices in my plate, and my muscles were burning. The heavier Impact, combined with the raw speed and ferocity of my movements had pushed my body to a level I hadn't felt recently aside from that fight with Fade's champion.


"You doin ok, love?" my wife asked in amusement from off to the side. I glanced down to find the ground torn up by my footwork, and the bodies of the imps all gone, cleansed by a rolling carpet of blue black flame.


"Thanks for the tidy," I told her with a laugh as I leaned on my staff for support. "Got a little carried away there, I think. But it was nothing too serious. I was still processing everything, just got a little tunnel vision." I knew Callie would wake me from that trance through the bond if needed, and it felt good to cut loose.


Bella appeared next to me, bouncing and clapping excitedly. "Holy SHIT master, that was AMAZING! I could barely SEE you move. Your staff was crushing them so fast it looked like one continuous motion! Do you think I'll be able to do that someday?"


"I think you could do that NOW with some work," I laughed. "I wasn't using any abilities, just the staff stances. That was pure physical combat. My stats are higher, granted, but still, no reason you couldn't do the same thing." I made sure my tone was supportive and reassuring. While tough love for the apprentice WAS good, it wasn't the only kind of reinforcement. Sometimes a positive comment could be helpful too. Bella had done well with her demo.


My comment was still ringing in the air when a blur flashed in front of my face, only to be deflected by a familiar steel sword. I nodded cheerfully to my strongest B-ranker. "Hey, thank Fade. That would have been awkward. Nothing like having your head explode to ruin a pleasant conversation."


He snorted. "Your parents wouldn't have allowed that. The only reason I was even able to deflect it was because they're treating this like a training trip. I got a tap on the shoulder from your uncle as a warning when he noticed it coming."


Despite his comments being for me, he didn't take his eyes off the enemy in front of him as Faustryche appeared before us. The man was tall. Like…unnaturally tall. Eight feet maybe. His limbs were long and spindly, and his fingers were spidery tendrils coming off too small palms. His eyes glowed that Void blue, and his mouth was full of too sharp teeth so thickly packed in that when he spoke, it was muffled. "Heretic," he slurred, eyes flicking to the still burning flame that had consumed the imps. "Surrender your life."


"Void lackey," I said in a deep voice to mimic his. "Invest in dental care." I heard a snort from behind me and turned to grin at my wife as I stepped back, letting Fade take his position opposite the vessel. Just to be safe though, I withdrew a sphere of heretic fire and tossed it to him. "Here, just in case."


He snatched it from behind him without looking, slipping it under his cloak. "Thanks, but I don't think I'm going to need it. Honestly, I don't want to risk taking the fun out of this fight." He grinned, his form flickering as he appeared in front of the vessel.


The motion was…odd. Unlike anything I'd seen him do up to now. He was moving strangely, like he had drawn himself from a scabbard and swung himself at his enemy. Every move Fade made was always in tune with his path, everything about him was reminiscent of a blade. But despite always having something of the sword about him, this was different.


While most of his movements were swordlike, this was the first time I'd seen him…DRAWN. Like he hadn't ever bared his edge before. His body twisted, aligning every muscle and hair along a razor sharp boundary as he attacked. His blade flickered, attacks sweeping in from all sides so fast they looked like they were occupying the same space.


And then…he was done. The drawn sword was sheathed, and Fade was turning away from Faustryche. Who proceeded to literally fall apart like a jigsaw puzzle.


I raised an eyebrow, staring down at the remains of the vessel with a low whistle. "Damn. Rest in pieces, I guess." I turned to my mother, and even she looked vaguely impressed. "So…you have any more bounties for us? Also, do we have to bring back a piece of him or something?"


She snorted, turning to glare at my dad. "He gets this from you, you know. Always needs to be dramatic and get the last word in."


"Of course," he said dryly. "It's all my fault dear, sorry dear."


He couldn't have sounded less sincere if he'd made air quotes, but she just rolled her eyes with a smile before turning back to me. "We have ten more bounties on this level. You're making good time, we might even be able to get to all of them. Well done with your little display earlier. I think next we'll find you a C-ranker to fight." My face went pale, but she didn't notice, turning to stroll off into the depths of the level. Maybe we should have taken our time.
 
Did you send the wrong chapter because there is no chapter 971?
 
Chapter 972
Over the next eight or nine hours, we caught three more B-rank Void infiltrators. Not all of them were Vessels, sadly. In fact, only the first one, Faustryche, had been a vessel. Personally, I didn't think it was so bad, we'd still taken down some Void worshippers, and even if they didn't happen to be big bosses, they were still powerful assets we were denying the other side. Not to mention they still had bounties, which meant we'd still get points.


My parents though, looked deeply unsettled. "Something is wrong," my mom commented as we finished off the third. "There were supposed to be a few different bounties down here, and these were the least consequential."


"It's been bothering me for a while," my dad agreed. "This isn't how the Void operates. They hate us, but they also mostly hate each other. Void Children aren't insane so much as UNsane, but they're certainly too alien to operate in a coherent formation. Even to each other. The way this whole thing has been going, it's like someone is moving pieces on a board. Which they shouldn't be capable of."


I frowned at him. "Really? It's seemed a little…haphazard, don't you think? I mean yeah, they have a shared goal, but they're not working TOGETHER. They're just kind of aimed in the same direction."


"That's more than they should be capable of," he said flatly. "This is off. Working towards a coherent goal like this is…complicated. I could maybe see enough of them agreeing to throw their people scattershot at the planet, but planning the infiltration on the lifts? The attack on Calliope? It smacks of purpose. Of overarching goal. That shouldn't be possible. There is no HEIRARCHY among the Void Children, not beyond the inherent hierarchy of power."


I froze. His voice prickled something in the back of my head. "What if there was," I said slowly. "Or at least, what if there could be." I told him about the Vessel I'd run into who had tried to recruit me. I hadn't really thought about it since it happened, but in retrospect, it seemed odd.


"That's…bad," Zeke cut in. "Like, scale of one to ten, thats fifteen points of total fucking disaster. Void Children cooperating is cataclysmic."


My mom nodded. "It is. There's no way a truce like that will hold. Once we've destroyed the ones inhabiting the nearest areas to realspace, the others will expand to fill the gaps." I cocked my head, and she explained. "The Void is complicated. But as best we can tell, the rank of a Void Child is related to the space they take up in the Void. The more Void they control, the stronger they get."


"So if we worked with them, they'd help us kill the others, and then use the space to get stronger?" I said in horror.


"Worse," Callie cut in with a grimace. "Once they expanded, they would be adjacent to realspace. So the ambivalence that allowed for the truce would no longer be viable. They'd be driven just as insane by the neighboring noise."


My dad shook his head. "That's not the worst of it. The worst is that the power blocs formed by these…what was it he called them? Deepchildren? Will influence the rest of the Void spawn. The Void is fractured because they're constantly clashing. No one force can gather enough power to centralize. But if the Deepchildren manage to form a large enough power base, they can pressure the others. Conquer or destroy them. It'll snowball into a cohesive and unified Void."


Callie looked pale. "I think…I think that's happened before. Sometime a long long time ago. There was a god. A Void god. But it died." She grimaced, clutching her head. "This isn't…ow, ow, ow, fuck!" She collapsed, and I was there next to her, panicking.


"Cal?" I said anxiously, shaking her. "Honey, what's wrong? What hurts?" I shifted to Zagan, flooding her with cleansing life giving flame, but it didn't help. I turned to my mother. "Mom, help! Use your purifying flame!"


She knelt down beside my wife, putting a hand on her head and flooding her with white flame. It didn't hurt her, of course, but it also didn't help. Maybe because Callie had some of the purifying flame in her heretic fire. I snarled, laying her down on the ground as I fumbled for a scroll. Her hand snapped up to grab my wrist. "No!" She hissed. "It's not…it's not the Void!" I frowned, not understanding what she meant. "It's my trait. The Heretic Fire is trying to commune with me."


I blinked at her dumbly. "I don't understand," I said in frustration. "But if it's that, I can help." I reached into the bond, where the trait was connected, and pulled it toward me, trying to offload some of the pain or pressure or…whatever, to myself.


It didn't work, exactly, but it did help a little. Her face eased. I pulled her up, leaning her head in my lap. "Don't scare me like that, damn it," I said tightly. "What the hell is going on?"


She grimaced. "It's not over yet. I can feel it trying. My trait wants me to know something, but the Void is rioting inside my brain. I think it has to do with how all the Void spawn seem to know what the flame is. What I am. With that ancestral hatred of Heretics. I think…I think the Heretic God is the reason the Void doesn't have a god anymore."


As soon as that came out, she threw her head back and SCREAMED, the pain echoing off the distant cavernous walls. I snarled in frustration my fingers digging uselessly into her shoulders as agony wracked her body.


This…this was fucking TORTURE. Why was this happening? Why couldn't I help her? I could handle pain, she should just give it all to me. It would be so much less horrible than holding the woman I loved and watching her suffer when I couldn't do anything. My breathing go heavier, faster, I felt like the world was narrowing to a pinpoint. I was failing. She was going to die and I- my brain came crashing to a halt. I couldn't go into her head and help or anything, but I could do something else.


Pulling my mask off, I lowered my head to hers, pressing our foreheads together and pulling and then…we were inside my library. I picked her up, carried her to the table in the center of the room, and then started grabbing books. Empty books by the armload. I triggered Beelzebub, twelve other me's joining in, and we started pressing the tomes to her body anywhere we could find.


Then we all triggered Dantalion (I upgraded it to C-rank with my staff) and PULLED. Dantalion was the demon of information. This was the Great Book Heavenly Library, but it was also my Pride pseudo Domain. This place was made for information, for its capture and preservation, for its deduction. The tree above my own Chronicle shifted, the branches reaching down to pick up books, adding them to the connection.


Callie's screams faded. Information. Forbidden or not, this was about information. Her Void Path was telling her something, her Heretic Angel trait was telling her something else. They were fighting over what she was allowed to know, but here that wasn't their choice. In the presence of my Ten Demons Tree, with Dantalion running a rank higher, INSIDE my library, no information was hidden from me. Not the kind contained in D-rank skills or traits.


The books were filling. Mostly with gibberish. Black jagged symbols that looked nothing like letters, written in strange spiral patterns that interlocked and intersected in strange and frankly uncomfortable ways.


One of the books slammed shut, and I threw it over my shoulder, grabbing another. Then a second one did the same. I snarled, calling for more. The library had no limits on knowledge. It could hold anything. I KNEW it could. Because the library wasn't just mine. It came from the old man. He'd used it to create the most powerful Skill the universe had ever known. The perfect Skill. The Void wasn't more powerful than he was. I refused to admit that.


Books began to slam shut, and I threw them away, grabbing new ones. As I did, Callie's pain started to ease. It wasn't over, but something was happening. Just not enough. Not fast enough or completely enough. My wife was dying. I could FEEL it. And it was my fault. My half assed idea to counterbalance her Path with a trait too early. She couldn't handle combining them and…I froze.


Leaving the others to work, I turned and bolted over to one of the books. I opened it, wincing at the jarring script, and tried to use Dantalion to process or parse it. I just needed to know…pushing through the pain, I bared my teeth in a vicious grin. Perfect.


It was hard to describe the sort of inspiration that I got when dealing with these kinds of things. My natural talent and instinct for Paths. But it was there, and it was real, and my own Path, with elements of the Fatewalker, was particularly attuned to those strokes of brilliance. If it hadn't been, I doubt I would have been able to do or even explain my actions following that discovery.


I threw the book on the floor. Then went and grabbed another, and another. I piled all the books that were filling with Callie's Path and stacked them all as high as I could go, grabbing more from the tree and from my other selves as they were completed. I quickly ran out. Eventually, the books stopped filling, and Callie started whimpering in pain. "It's ok love," I told her softly, pushing sweat soaked hair out of her face.


She didn't have her mask in here, it was just those beautiful blue eyes I loved so much, staring up at me clouded with pain. I had to physically tear myself away from her side as I rushed to complete my task, but I did it. Her safety was all that mattered.


Once the book stack was complete, I ran over to grab my staff from where it floated above the tome. Then I ran back over, and I reached through the bond. Finding her Heretic Angel trait was simple, given my connection to it, and pulling on her Heretic Flame was even easier. A fist sized sphere of blue black fire manifested on the end of the staff, looking for all the world like a torch, and I lowered it to the pile.


There was a whoosh and the entire stack of books went up like they'd been soaked in kerosene. The flames caught, exploding outward and literally BLOWING me off my feet, consuming my vision in darkness and sending me falling. Falling where, I had no clue, but fall I did. I could still hear Callie screaming and I tried to get to her, but I couldn't and then…


It was over. We were both fine, sitting in a chair across a familiar table. This was the executive cafeteria in Valen, back on Callus. The first place I'd ever seen my wife. Across the table from us was a man I'd never met before. A man with startling blue eyes that faded to black rather than having a defined pupil.


He was sitting at the table, eating a steak, and when we appeared (because I somehow knew we had) he smiled warmly at the two of us. "Hello little ones," he said in a voice like simmering honey. "I've been expecting you." He gestured to the table in front of us, where a pair of plates containing a sort of red rice based stew I'd never seen before sat waiting. "Please," said the Heretic God. "Have something to eat. We aren't in much of a hurry. And I imagine you have quite a few questions."
 
Chapter 973
I stared at the kindly man in shock. Or rather, I tried to. I couldn't see him, really. My eyes were inexorably drawn to his, falling into the blue black abyss. He had the same eyes as my wife, but…more. An order of magnitude more. They were magnetic, hypnotic, whatever term you wanted to use, I couldn't look away. Like they were pulling me into an endless abyss from which I'd never escape.


And then, they weren't. "Apologies," he chuckled ruefully. "I forget that happens to mortals. I haven't entertained company in quite some time."


Callie was staring too, but she didn't seem captivated or consumed, just…lost. "I...I know you. How do I know you? Not just like, who you are, I mean. I feel like you're familiar. Like you're someone important to me. But we've never met."


"Well of course," he beamed warmly. "I like to think all children know their parents."


Her eyes hardened. "You're not my father," she said firmly. "Trust me, I wish that was the case, because you almost couldn't be worse than the one I have, but he is who he is. He might not have parented me much, but I got enough physical and mental traits from him that I couldn't deny it if I wanted to."


Laughing, he just shrugged. "Is that what makes a parent? Because it seems to me you have as much of me in you as him at this point. After all, haven't you noticed you've got my eyes?"


That seemed to throw her off balance, and I could tell she wanted to argue but didn't know how. "Yeah, about that, how did you manage that?" I forced the conversation back onto me. "Because we were just kind of throwing pasta at the wall to see what stuck. I originally thought the Heretic Flame was a lucky accident, but even my luck isn't that good. You did something."


"What a wonderful man you've found for yourself, Calliope," he laughed. "Such presence of mind. Most would take credit for such an occurrence. It's a rare man who questions his gifts and not just his misfortunes."


Callie's hand found mine, gripping it tightly enough that I could tell she was overwhelmed without needing my eyes or the bond. "That's not an answer," I pointed out.


He shrugged again. "You got close enough. The presence of the Void, the purifying flame, and a few of your more esoteric tricks. It gave me enough to work with. Once you got my attention, I just…tapped your elbow, so to speak."


"You can do that?" I said warily. "Affect a working when you're, I assume, dead?"


"Gods don't die," he told me matter of factly. "They just kind of scatter. And once they do, they retain bits of what they once were. Our Domains are…inextricably linked to who we are. With a shattered soul, it takes a VERY close match to stumble into a god's sphere of influence. But it does happen. How do you think Hatescream orchestrated his resurrection? The information necessary to engineer that kind of ritual is far beyond what you could leave in written instructions. Some fool tripped over his divinity by mistake and ended up an avatar. It happens."


Callie spoke up. "So I'm your…avatar?" She chewed on the word like it was oatmeal. "What does that mean?"


He waved it off. "It's just a word for a being through which a god acts. After a deity dies, if you want to use that word, their power is diminished to near nothingness. But stories never end. And neither do the gods they become. You know that Domains can interfere with each other, it's why Morgan Lark killed all the other vampires. They can also interact, as can the forces that will one day become them."


"I see," my wife said inscrutably. "And you used this connection to make me…what I am."


His smile was kind. "I did. Gods have always acted through their children, when they have nowhere else to turn. Your friend Satala, for instance. I chose you, Calliope. You were the only option, admittedly, but I haven't regretted that choice. You've made me proud."


I felt Callie's churn of emotions through the bond. Confusion, anger, hurt, longing. Callie's relationship with her dad was BAD. Understandably, because Paul Reynolds was a fucking scumbag. But this man was kind of a relative. Kind of a new start. And kind of intrusive, which wasn't helping. He seemed to pick up on that, because he changed gears. "As I said, I'm sure you have questions for me?" he prodded.


My wife nodded, getting her head back on the matter at hand. "Yes. So many. But I think for now, we need to know what the trait was trying to tell me. About the Void god. Could he be coming back? Could this all be because of him? If gods don't die…"


He waggled a hand. "That's complicated. The Void god called itself a god, but it wasn't, not really. Void Children, and the things they become, are not capable of divinity as we attain it. They don't have souls, exactly. Though they do have SOMETHING. Ruxx was a particularly powerful being, but its return is unlikely. I destroyed it quite thoroughly, though the effort destroyed me in turn."


"Ok," I said slowly. "Probably a bit of a sidetrack but…how? How did you do all this?" I waved at him. "The Heretic God, the Heretic Flame. Like, was that just your Domain? Did you build your whole legend around destroying the Void?"


He shook his head. "Not at all. In fact, I got my powers from the Void. It's why Calliope was so compatible with me. But I suspect you already guessed as much."


"You mentioned it was an ingredient in the Heretic Flame," I acknowledged. "But I didn't expect…that. How does that work? Like you were a god and you bent the knee to serve, what was its name? Ruxx?"


His sigh was wistful. "Not at all. I gained my divinity in service to the Void. I was originally…well, I had a complicated childhood, let's say that. I was very strong as a boy. Possibly too strong. All the other children in my city looked up to me, and I gloried in the adulation. I was tall and powerful, everyone expected great things from me."


Those blue black eyes lost focus, staring off into the distance. "Except for one small thing. I wasn't an Ascendant. I didn't have a point of Impact. Several of the other boys did, and they gained power quickly. I was left behind, abandoned, and I was angry.


"We knew about the Void, in those days," he explained. "And were taught its dangers. But some were seduced by its power. There was a witch, near the city I grew up in, named Morwenna. I went to see her, and I begged her for power." His smile turned bitter. "And she gave it to me. Oh yes. I became an Ascendant, I stepped onto the path to power, and I never looked back."


I grimaced. "Favors like that aren't free. Especially not from the Void."


"No," he said with a sad laugh. "No they are not. This one certainly wasn't. I was approached years later, once I reached D-rank. I was told I would become a Vessel.


"Being the Vessel of a Void Child is…awful," he explained. "And wonderful. It burns out a part of you. A part that people need, but one that most of us would rather not have. The part that feels shame. Uncertainty. Doubt. The part that hesitates." His eyes narrowed with remembered pain. "It makes us monsters. And I was the very worst."


Callie was staring at him in horror. "So…what happened? How did you go from that to this?"


"When a Void Child grows, so does its Vessel," he said tightly. "And mine GREW. With my help and influence, Ruxx climbed the ranks quickly. I was powerful. My black flame was mighty, and it consumed all it touched. The fires of the Void are hungry things, and none could stand before them. Or me. Until Ruxx crossed that final threshold. Until he became a god, or some version of one. And so did I."


I blinked as everything clicked together. "Your soul," I said as I got it. "The damage he did was to your soul, but when you became a god it pushed your soul up with you. Mirror souls are special. It fixed whatever he did."


"It did," he nodded. "It was the most excruciating thing I have ever experienced. But when it was done, I felt…everything. And I hated. Myself. Ruxx. Morwenna. Hell, I hated the world." As he spoked, he began to weave his fingers, pulling specks of burning cinder from the air. He started to weave, and I knew without looking what he was making. A Chronicle. Callie's Chronicle.


He reached out and pulled free some of her shadow from the table, using it as thread as he started to stitch together a book. Callie watched, but didn't stop him. He was doing this, but we both knew he wasn't. She was. This place was hers, and he was acting through her to create this. We could both feel his good intentions, both feel how useful this would be, so we just sat and listened to the story as he stitched.


"I spent millennia wallowing," he said as he worked. "Hating, and breaking, and healing. Until I made a choice. I decided that I had had enough. That the Void's grip on realspace was too strong. In those days, the universe as a dark and terrible place. They kept us alive as servants. As pawns and amusements. Because Ruxx was lazy and liked what we could do for it.


"So I began to plan. The fires of the Void were powerful, but they couldn't affect the Void itself. They were a weapon that could only be turned on my own." His voice rang with shame and self loathing. "So I went out and began to search for ways to change them. I searched for centuries, eventually stumbling upon a spark of divinity from a goddess of purification. An ember that had been one of her objects of power."


He held up a hand, and the blue black flame we had come to know kindled in his palm, leaping and dancing as he stared into it. "There was more. It was a long journey. But I eventually reached the end. I kindled a spark of Heretic Fire. I burned the Void from my very BONES, and I took up a war standard against the Void Children, driving them from our space and freeing my people from the servitude I help cast them into.


"They lauded me as a hero," he said in disgust. "No one was left who remembered what I had done. What I had been. When I changed sides, realspace had been under the boot for tens of thousands of years. I was almost glad that destroying Ruxx killed me. It was a relief not to hear their undeserved cheers of gratitude anymore. They made me sick."


His hands stopped, and he set the object he'd been holding down. It had been burning cinders before, scraps of the books I'd lit aflame to bring us here. That had been why I'd done it. But he'd stitched them together into a single, solid tome, and he pushed it towards Callie. She took it reverently, feeling the power from it, just like I could. He'd combined them for us. Her Path and Trait. Combined them more perfectly than I ever could have, and I wasn't quite sure what the result would be, even if I was eager to find out.


Callie picked it up, looking lost still, but she had one more question. This place was coming unravelled. And she had one more thing she needed to know. "What was your name?" She asked him softly.


He smiled fiercely at her. "I haven't spoken it for eons now. No one has. But I suppose, oh daughter of my heart, that if anyone deserves it, you do. I know you don't think of me in such a way, and maybe you never will, but someday, I hope to earn that regard. To have family again after all this time, and leave a mark on this world that will wash away the stain of what I did. When that day comes, when you feel ready to claim me as kin, lift your head with pride, and tell any who ask that you are the child of Adam Atlas." And then, we woke up.
 
Chapter 974
We came back to reality dazed. The first thing I did was check on Callie. "Cal? Sweetie? You with me? How's your head?" I surged Zagan, flooding her body with life energy before she could answer, and she giggled and smacked at my hand.


"Wait til I respond, idiot," she said fondly. "And I'm…good." She sounded conflicted. But not in a bad way. I helped her sit up, smiling the whole time. I was just so relieved she was alright.


Everyone around us looked frantic. I glanced around to find my family and friends huddled nearby. "Hey, assholes," snapped Benny. "Maybe show some consideration? Callie just screamed and collapsed and then Shane went down after her. I don't know what happened to you idiots but I do know the rest of us were freaking out about it, so maybe take a minute to reassure us?" His voice was ragged, and I recognized the same tight helplessness I felt earlier.


"I will," I told him firmly. "AFTER I check on Callie. I need to make sure she's ok, we just went through something a little crazy, and I'll tell you all about it in a minute."


Callie stood up, spreading her wings…which had changed. Rather than a single pair of large wings, she now had three pairs of smaller wings. Oddly, these seemed much less intrusive, able to be folded up in a way the others really hadn't, but it was still shocking. Holly, one of the angels who were part of my crew and Chelsea's retinue visibly flinched when she saw them, looking terrified. "Holy shit, are you an ARCHANGEL now?"


My wife blinked in confusion, then her eyes went hazy in the way I had experience myself a thousand times when checking my stats. "Yes," she said with interest. "My Path is gone, and so is my trait, and my ability. The only remaining evidence of any of them is 'Master Trait: Heretic Archangel'. I'll be honest, that's a bit of a let down. When Shane gets a new power his stat sheet always gets way longer and more complicated. Mine was already pretty thin."


"Trust me, that's a good thing," I assured her. "Keeping track of all my bullshit is exhausting. But I am a little surprised. I mean, I figured you'd get some kind of demigod trait after…that. Though I guess it doesn't work like that."


Holly shook her head. "You don't get it." Her voice was frustrated and tight. "This is…there are no Archangels. None. Not even S-rankers. The transition from angel to Archangel isn't a matter of degree, it's a matter of type. Archangels aren't just 'angel but better'. They're…primordial entities. It's like comparing chickens to velociraptors. An Archangel is the beloved child of a god. An entity custom built to serve the will of their deity. Angels are BASED on them, but it's like someone trying to paint a masterpiece based on the description someone gave after seeing a blurry photograph one time."


Her tone had become both reverent and terrified. Callie looked conflicted. On the one hand…cool. On the other, while we'd known creating her Chronicle would let Atlas guide the way her traits blended together, hearing about it in that way made it seem intrusive and kind of stifling. It was clear from context that he's woven together the three Skills in such a way as to make the absolute most of her trait, in the same way that the old man had created the Wish power.


Honestly, we probably would have been a lot more worried, except he had ALSO blended the bond in, and left it just as strong as ever. I could still feel my wife beside me, still feel her soul touching mine, and it put both of us at ease.


My SECOND reaction after caution was awe. Binding the Chronicle like that…it was something I hadn't even imagined doing. But it was also a direct extension of my own abilities. And I knew that he'd shown me that on purpose. He's not only rewritten her story to have the effect he wanted, he'd disassembled MY OWN books to create hers, and had used that physical representation as a direct medium to alter her nature in a way I hadn't known was possible.


Atlas understood Skill and ability creation in a way I don't think anyone I had ever met did. Possibly even moreso than the old man. And speaking of the her Chronicle, I turned to my wife with an eager gleam in my eye. "So, you have your Chronicle now, right? What is it?" My Ten Demons Tome was unique. An extension of myself and my powers. Binding a Chronicle was a deeply personal thing, and given how much Callie had put into the Skills he was working with, I was sure the result within him helping guide her had been something amazing.


She held up her hands, which whooshed to life with blue black fire. "The Book of the Final Flame. It's an extension of the Heretic Fire, which is…more than I thought." As she stared at her hands, the blue black flame shifted subtle, the blue becoming muted, and I felt a sort of cold seep into the air. The same cold and despair I felt from the black mist of the Void taint. I blinked at her. "The Flame of the Void," she explained. "The Heretic Fire contains the seed of Void flame. It was Adam's old power, after all. Now that I'm better with it I can draw that out."


"Because Heretic Fire only works on the actual Void spawn," I nodded. "Now you have a weapon against other Ascendants when you need it. Though I have to wonder, if suppressing the heretic part creates that, what does suppressing the Void part create?"


She blinked, then focused on her hands. The blue undertones in the Heretix Fire strengthened, the black parts washing out, and it felt like…I stared down at my own hands. Zagan. Kind of. More purification than life force. But still a solid healing ability. That would be useful. Holly didn't seem to care though. She was more focused on something else. "What about the sword?" We turned to look at her in confusion. "Archangels aren't just angels but better, I TOLD you that. They're the sword of their god. Literally. Archangels have a soul weapon. Like Shane does."


I blinked at that. I hadn't realized the relationship I had with the Ten Demons Tree could be replicated, but I probably should have. Hell, the tree was GROWING out of my tome. I wondered what the connection was there to a god's object of power. Regardless, Callie seemed excited by the possibility.


Personally, I was more focused on something else. "If she has a soul weapon. She must have a place to keep it. My library is a pseudo Domain based on the old man's. Does that mean Callie has her own pseudo Domain like that?" My pseudo Domains were seeds of and ACTUAL Domain, and the foundation, I was pretty sure, of a god world, albeit in a VERY indirect way. If Callie had one, it could potentially give her all sorts of unique advantages, depending what the damned thing actually did.


Holly looked pretty confused, and at a general loss, which didn't shock me. Callie, however, knew from entering my library how this worked. She smiled softly at me, closed her eyes and then…


We were alone. Or rather, together. But everyone else was gone. We were standing inside of a huge black cathedral. The windows along the sides were towering murals of stained glass showing scenes of Callie's life. One was her meeting me, one was her slaying a god, one was our wedding, and the moment I proposed, and a dozen other important moments, some featuring myself and others not.


The pews of the cathedral were empty, as was the aisle, but at the end sat an altar. It was carved of gleaming black stone so dark it ate the light, and a book sat upon it, flickering with blue black flame. Above THAT, sat a sword. A huge behemoth of a weapon, easily six feet long and made of the same black rock, polished to a sheen and sharpened to a razor's edge so sharp it stung my eyes to look at it. In the pommel, held in a clawed hand, was a deep gem of startling blue, the tones deepening to black towards the center.


Callie approached, looking awestruck. I couldn't blame her. This was…a lot. Atlas was really working for that father of the year mug. I had no idea how he had DONE all this. Apparently gods were WAY more bullshit than I had been aware of. Which made sense. I hadn't had much contact with them, really, and never when they were serious about doing something and unopposed. Also Atlas was OLD. Maybe this was just a factor of him being THAT scary.


My wife approached the altar reverently, reaching up to wrap her hand around the hilt of the colossal weapon, lifting it free of whatever orbit was holding it over the book. She lifted it easily, the blade seemingly lighter than air, and whipped it back and forth a few times, her face splitting with unconcealed glee.


I sighed. Because of COURSE he would know that giving her loot was the fastest way to my wife's heart. "Shane!" she squealed in excitement. "I have a SWORD!" She spun, whipping it in a quick series of cuts that, while mildly impressive, made it clear she had no clue how to handle a weapon that size.


I winced and stepped forward to grab her wrist. "Whoah there, let's maybe not disembowel me. Not sure what it would do here, but I'd rather not find out. I'll talk to Fade about you getting swordplay lessons." I frowned. "I'm a little jealous. Why don't we have a staff master on the crew? Remind me to find one of those."


She snickered, then flicked her fingers and the sword appeared back above the book. "It's…amazing," she whispered in awe. "I think it might be one of his objects of power. Or part of one? I don't think I could hold the whole thing. But it's powerful, and it'll get stronger as I do." Her smiled was so wide it threatened to split her face. "I've always been so jealous of your weapon, Shane. Like I didn't say anything because why bother? But this…? This is all mine, and it's AMAZING!"


Flicking her fingers again, the blade caught fire, and the whole sword lit with the internal glow of the Heretic Flame. It looked imposing and majestic, but insubstantial. Like fire trapped in a black soap bubble. "Does it have a name?" I asked her with a grin. "My Ten Demons Tree didn't until I gave it one, so maybe you have to pick it?"


She blinked at that, her hyperfocus on the blade shaking as she was brought back to the present. "It doesn't. But I think I'll call it….Gossamer."


A word that meant something filmy and insubstantial. I could kind of see it. I smiled as she raced forward to snap it up again, retreating to the empty area behind the altar to swing it around. She looked so happy, all I could do was watch and smile. At least on the outside. Time in the soul space could be weird, so we weren't in a rush, but I had other concerns besides my family waiting for an explanation.


Because this was…a lot. Like yes, Atlas wanted Callie to be his legacy, to right his wrongs and redeem him to the world. I suspected he probably eventually wanted to be resurrected, but that was between them. We'd deal with it when it came. But to do all this for her. This wasn't currying favor with your new kid. This was arming his daughter for war.


We knew the Void was planning something. It was probably related to the Void god, or at least a new one, judging by what had triggered the Chronicle formation. But that was ALL we knew. What I was more worried about was all the things we DIDN'T know? Who were our real enemies? What were they planning? And how awful was it going to be that a dead god had felt the need to give Callie THIS to prepare her for it. There was no such thing as a free lunch, and I had the unsettling feeling this particular meal was going to include us eating a lot of crow.
 
Malcolm Tent said:
speaking of the her Chronicle
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Extra "the"

Malcolm Tent said:
I was sure the result within him helping guide her had been something amazing.
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The result with(from?) him

Malcolm Tent said:
As she stared at her hands, the blue black flame shifted subtle
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Shifted subtly*

Malcolm Tent said:
The blue undertones in the Heretix Fire strengthened,
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Heretic* Fire

Malcolm Tent said:
My pseudo Domains were seeds of and ACTUAL Domain
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Seeds of an* ACTUAL
 
Chapter 975
Once we emerged from Callie's soul space, I explained everything to my friends and family. Inner circle only, of course, under Murmur. Of course, everyone wanted to see Gossamer, and my wife was all too pleased to show off her new soul weapon. Even my mom was jealous. My dad, apparently, had his own ( the cane he tapped to summon his contracted souls), but they weren't common below S-rank.


I had never even realized that my relationship with my staff was something so rare until they told me. Apparently everyone just assumed I already knew soul weapons were a thing since I had one, but I'd assumed it was just a unique interaction between me and the Ten Demons Tree.


It wasn't unique, but it WAS extremely uncommon. In this case though it wasn't an example of me doing some impossible bullshit by accident, as sometimes happened. The Reincarnation Tree my staff was made from was rare and mysterious, and the power interaction was as much on its part as mine. In my case though, it had interacted with the soul space I already had to form that bond, as opposed to Callie's soul space forming in response to the weapon itself.


"I want one!" Bethy trilled happily, appearing in front of us in excitement. "Show me how! I want it to be able to summon a wardrobe! Or an umbrella! Or a paintbrush! Ooooh! What if I made Luggage my soul weapon! People would sneak up on me expecting to beat me up and then BAM! Dogalanche!"


"Ok one, 'dogalanche' isn't a word," my wife said wryly. "Two, I don't think you can have a living being as a soul weapon, and three, if dogalanche WAS a word, it would imply a large number of dogs. One of something isn't an 'alanche"."


She stomped her foot in pique. "Luggage is the best! He's worth a thousand dogs! He can be a dogalanche, just you watch!"


I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose. "Honey, what's rule number five on the Bethy list?"


"Never tell Bethy she can't do things," she groaned. "Look, that wasn't a challenge. Please don't make this a thing?"


I buried my head in my hands and screamed in frustration. "What's rule number FIVE?"


But it was futile, Bethy had vanished into the crowd, probably off to do something impossible and disturbing. My mother was giggling hysterically at our antics, and when I glared at her she held up both hands in self defense. "Sorry, it's just funny. She reminds me of an old friend of your father's." She glanced at dad. "Actually, what happened to Tim?"


He shrugged. "Last time anyone saw him he was trying to create a perfect Stealth skill by convincing himself he didn't exist. He vanished after that, so either it worked or he got bored and wandered into some kind of hidden pocket universe again. He's done that a few times. Either way, he'll probably pop up at some point where no one is expecting him and ruin someone's plans in some convenient and terrifying way."


My mom snickered. "Anyway, best not to worry about people like her. They always end up coming out on top. Some people are just loved by the universe. Bethy will be alright. And you two will as well, apparently." She stepped forward to wrap Callie in a hug. My wife stiffened, eyes widening as my mother said fiercely. "You really scared us there, sweetie. I'm so glad you're alright."


"Sadly, the good news ends at your survival," my dad added grimly. "We've been doing some thinking about the information you shared, and based on a few odds and ends you told us, we think we know what the Void has planned." Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out…something. It looked like mercury, kind of, but more shimmery, and physically painful to stare at. It was confined inside of a familiar looking crystal. "Is this the spatial anchor you mentioned for the ladder?"


Callie nodded. "Yeah, that's one of the anchors. It's good you found one. I imagine they've been scattering them pretty deep, but the more we can dig up, the better chance we can stop this. But what do you mean you figured out the plan? The Ladder drags the planet into the Void, they destroy us and snap up a generation of Wishmaster candidates. Right?"


"Doesn't fit," he said with a head shake. "Or at least not with that rogue faction Shane mentioned. But if you add in the existence of the Void god, and this thing…" I gestured to it. "What if rather than dropping the planet in wholesale, they were planning to scatter it across the Void. Would the ladder do that? Use the anchors to rip the heirworld to pieces and disperse them across the whole of the Void?"


That got a horrified wince from my wife. "I mean…theoretically. Ladders have rungs. But there's no reason to do that. It would kill most of us. That would be a huge waste of potential converts and resources."


"Except we know that there's a faction targeting the Void itself. Or at least hoping to expand," my mother explained. "And now that we know that the ladder can connect multiple points, and we know how Void gods are formed…we've figured out the endgame. They're going to use the heirworld as an invasion nexus."


Callie looked confused for a second, then she went pale. "You mean move an army through this place and into other parts of the Void to consume them and get stronger? Try to create a Void god?"


I knew the Void god thing would be involved, after Atlas made such a big deal of forcing the information through whatever block the Void had tried to establish. But this sounded pretty bad. My parents seemed to agree, but the bad news wasn't over yet. "Not an army," Zeke corrected, breaking his previous silence. "That would mean sharing the power. Maybe some Void spawn, but it'll only be the one Void Child. In fact, it might ALREADY be happening. That fake alliance they offered Shane smacks of a stall tactic. Could the ladder be partially open? Connecting a few locations to start?"


"Theoretically," Callie admitted. "If they really are trying to scatter the planet like that, it would need to be done gradually. This world is protected by quite a few safeguards. The only good news is that the Void Child won't be able to come here directly until the ladder is established. The rungs will connect two points, and it'll be able to use those to bounce around in the void, but the planet isn't connected itself yet. Think of it like the individual rungs are already constructed but they aren't actually mounted on anything yet."


"Then we need to find more of these," my dad said, holding up the anchor. "The more we find the more we slow them down. If we find enough, can we completely derail the construction? Assuming we don't get them all?"


She nodded firmly. "Like I said, gradual. We can stop it. And we need to. Whatever Void Child is doing this is going to be growing from this. Fast."


"We have another problem," I pointed out. "Atlas's story made it clear that the Vessels grow alongside their masters. And whatever means they use to do that completely circumvents the normal progression system. Atlas's soul was forcibly elevated to mirror when his master became a god. That implies there's no inherent limit to Vessel growth."


My mom sighed. "Which means the Vessel currently on this planet representing this hypothetical future Void god could be reaching A, S, or even god rank inside the confines of the heirworld and completely bypass any and all safeguards. We need to stop this, now."


"I say we contact the grandparents," I said after a moment's thought. "Try to get them to pressure the council of elders with this information. Change the point bounties to anchors instead of Void infiltrators at LEAST. Maybe even do something more proactive, as unlikely as that is. If nothing else they can spread the word of what's really at stake. The Void collapse is kind of esoteric and hard to imagine, given how long this world has been around, but a rogue S-ranker? That's the kind of shit Wyndhams pay attention to."


"We've made good progress on the bounties as is anyway," my mom assured me. "Your B-rankers, under supervision of course, hit a few more targets while you were down. We also received reports from a few of the other teams. B-rank bounties are a hundred points each, and with six of them and another twenty C-rank bounties at ten apiece, we raked in another seven hundred fifty points today."


That was good news at least. I'd had two hundred fifty already, and this put me up to a solid thousand. I was pretty sure I'd be able to redeem most of my people with that much, though I hoped the redemption cost didn't correspond to the bounties or I'd be woefully short.


Exhaling, I nodded. "Alright, let's head up and get in touch with the others. Whatever the council decides to share, I want our allies filled in on the stakes. We'll have to scatter again after that, but at the very least we can hit more anchors with them helping. I want to get as many of them as we can before the Void realizes we're onto them."


The sources of information we were working with on this weren't anything the Void could know about. Atlas was totally off their radar in his current form, at least I hoped so. I had to trust the ancient god knew how to cover his tracks. Even if word got out about the Heretic Flame, I was pretty sure the whole Chronicle formation thing was something most gods couldn't have pulled. My dad had cheated his ass off to make it happen with me, and we were blood related.


But as soon as they realized we were pushing for the anchors, they would figure out what we were doing, and this whole thing would go from cat and mouse to all out war. I suspected that the forces of the potential Void god were helping us out right now, at least based on my conversation with that Vessel. It explained a few things about how quickly we got the information on where those bases were in the B-rank zone.


Which meant that not all of the Void were currently acting against us, and that would change once they caught onto our plan. I wanted to do some damage before that happened.


More than that, I needed information. If that Vessel I talked to was the Vessel in charge of this little invasion/coup plan, then he was our target. If we could find and kill him early it would be a huge relief. I didn't want to deal with a fucking S-ranker running amok on the planet.


I mentioned this to my parents, and my dad glanced at my mother with a sigh. "There…might be someone who could help," he told me uncertainly. "A lot of the coordination across the heirworld in the fight against the Void has come from the The Empty Room. They're an organization dedicated to studying the Void. Combat, travel, they have their fingers in lots of pies. Their current leader lives on the heirworld. If anyone could get you more information on individual Vessels its him."


Based on his hesitation, and on Atlas's story, I could understand why he didn't want me to meet this guy. The Void was all about corruption, and the people who studied them would be neck deep in it. I doubted they were fully traitors, they would be under close scrutiny, but I somehow didn't think the reputation or the beings they interacted with led to stable and likable personalities. But hey, maybe I was just paranoid. Whatever the case, I'd take all the help I could get.
 
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Chapter 976
We headed back up to the surface after a bit more searching. We'd found two more anchors leaving, but since we knew the levels wouldn't shift for another two days or so, we just recorded their locations for our wide purge later. Two anchors wouldn't matter in the long run, but if we tipped our hand too early we could screw over the whole plan.


After that, my parents reached out to The Empty Room, and the rest of us turned in early. Callie and I were exhausted after everything we'd been through, and I was mulling over some important decisions of my own.


When I woke up the next day, I made sure my scrolls were stocked up, and then I sat down and started doing some math. Two hundred forty eight scrolls, seven reserves for emergencies. I could use two and leave my friends with five. That would put me at an even two hundred and fifty, and based on my estimations, I should be able to net a solid hundred stats per scroll.


Twenty five thousand points, not to mention the things I'd been accomplishing since we'd gotten here. My big fight, recruiting Fade, my new armor, the job I'd done on the trial to oust the Void infiltrator bases.


I was sure it was enough. I could do it now. After all this time, after months of working on it, hell maybe a year at this point, I could finally hit C-rank.


And I needed to. This was going to be a mess, and I was way too weak. Not to mention a rank up would allow my staff to bump my techniques all the way to B-rank. That would be a huge coup in combat against about ninety percent of our enemies. But I was on the fence for one simple reason. Scrolls.


My scrolls were a force multiplier, a counter to all manner of terrible shit. Curses, poison, dozens of traps or dead ends or possible dangers just off the top of my head. Two hundred and fifty was a LOT of them.


But they were still D-rank scrolls. My NEW scrolls would be made with C-rank Impact, a full fifty percent boost to my current total, not to mention the actual hundred thousand points extra juice from my final push over the line. Plus I'd get nine a day instead of eight. The only question was whether that calculation would break even quick enough to be useful here.


In the end though…it didn't matter. The truth was that my life was a series of cataclysmic cacophonies of cosmic coincidence constricting my control and confiscating my continued confidence. Ugh. I was thinking in alliteration again. I must have been spiraling. The point was valid though. There wouldn't ever be a magical perfect time for me to rank up. If we got out of this situation it would be on to the next one. The god war, the Void war, being Wishmaster if I won.


So I told Callie what I was planning and headed out to confer with my forces. Or rather, to offer up scrolls to as many as would take them. It wasn't a hard sell. The thing about being an Ascendant was that you were at the mercy of the whims of perception (lower case p). You were defined by your renown, and while you could ignore of redirect that, you couldn't really CHANGE it very well until A-rank, and even then it was a less literal shift than what I was offering.


Everyone wanted to course correct. To specialize a little bit more. To shave some points off a useless stat and shore up their weak spots or double down on a strength.


The hardest part was finding the specific stats that I wanted to gather. Luckily, my lowest stat was Creation, and that wasn't a popular one among anyone but crafters. Almost everyone I talked to was happy to sacrifice a hundred points of Creation for a hundred of some other more useful stat like Might or Vitality. Once I snagged all of that, I headed back to my room at my parents place to settle in and prepare for my rank up.


I relaxed my soul, allowing the stats to come pouring in. I could hold off even the stats I got from wishes if I really flexed. But it was harder. Only doable for a short period of time at these volumes, and only because my soul was strong.


Twenty five thousand points went right into Creation, which was good because I got nothing else in that stat outside of the scroll stats. What I DID get, and in surprising amounts, was Focus and Perception. Twenty and thirty thousand respectively. Apparently my feats of outing the Void had been getting more attention than I expected among the upper echelons of the WCP.


Of course, I got about forty two thousand Might, because I had consistently demonstrated it to a starling degree in my fights and actions. Add in another fifteen thousand Vitality, and I had cleared the hurdle as easily as I'd known I would.


It didn't hurt as much as I'd expected, really. It was only a hundred thousand points, which was less than ten percent of my total at this point, so I wasn't overloading myself. The soul evolution was…a lot. But the shift to D-rank had already fundamentally shifted my perception of the world. This was just more of that same overwhelming change, so it was less jarring.


Honestly, it was almost anticlimactic. The soul change was pretty subtle, though noticeable. My soul changing from Amethyst to Tanzanite. It took me a minute to realize that the reason for that was staring me right in the face. My Chronicle was handling most of the strain. And the Ten Demons Tree was helping. I should have assumed that would happen, given the use of those two items, but it was still a shock, if a welcome one.


Before I knew it, everything was done, I had changed, and at the same time I felt like I wasn't any different at all.


Wishmaster candidate status. C-rank. Ability: Grandmaster Wish- Nine times a day grant a Master wish in return for proper compensation. Wish must be feasibly achievable by the candidate's own efforts within a three day period with current statistics.


Grandmaster Path of the Doom Sovereign- A Solid Path toward a great destiny.


Wishmaster candidate points-1000


Might-281,619


Impact-155


Fantasy-124,703


Vitality-161,854


Focus-169,766


Perception-168,014


Creation-130,372


Progress to next rank:1,198,337/10,000,000


Soul strength- Tanzanite Soul Body


Chronicle: Ten Demons Tome (pages bound:1)


wish scrolls stockpiled: 0 (5 in the possession of friends to be used over time)


Bonded companion: Archimedes (Life Nova Phoenix)


Weapon: Ten Demons Tree (reincarnation tree staff that lets him simulate alternate lives to perfect his forms, and when combined with the library lets him simulate and deduce techniques in a process called the "Wisdom of Solomon")


Financial resources: 0 B-ranked, 0 C-ranked, 0 D-ranked(worth 100 E-ranked, past master rank is a watershed)


Skills: Grandmaster Path of the Doom Sovereign, Lesser Valtek Mastery, Mastery of Cooking, Lesser Inventing Mastery, Beginner Balam Mastery, Minor Fire Manipulation Mastery, Minor Piano Mastery, Minor Guitar Mastery, Minor First Aid Mastery, Master Angelic Bond, Expert Dust Construction Mastery


DS Subskills. Monk: Stone Limb, Moonlit Night, Consecration of Flame, Ripple Running, State of Grace, Steam Arrow, Afterburner, Pit of Despair, Mountain Stance, Heart over Body


Rogue: Mercy Kill, Double Trouble, Touch of Tears, Flurry of Blows, Heavy hands, Marked for Death, False Fatality, Blood Curse, Creeping Darkness, Final Strike


Diviner: Overlay, Song of the Soil, Rhythm of the Wild, Eye of Revelation, Danger Sense, Piece of Mind, Empty Spirit


It was a lot to take in. My new soul, my extra scroll, my higher level abilities. But the biggest surprise of all was the capstone skills. I'd honestly forgotten them. You got them very late in DS, and they were hard to earn. Not just leveling up, there were questlines for those three skills. They were the pinnacle of what could be accomplished with each of my three subclasses, the very peak of what each skill tree offered, and even to someone as advanced down the paths of power as I was, they were…very useful.


First was the Monk capstone. Heart over body. It allowed the conversion of energy based attacks into physical strength. The monk had a lot of useful abilities based around fire and steam and various other energy types, and in game could learn a bunch of martial arts that let you basically do punch magic on top of that. Heart over Body was the ultimate form of the Monk, the shift from magical might to overwhelming physical force.


It would be absurdly useful to me, given my access to states like Zagan, where my overwhelming power couldn't be applied in any combat related way.


Second was the Rogue capstone. Final Strike. A simple name for a terrifying ability. It was basically the finisher to end all finishers. It literally took everything out of you. Once you used Final Strike, you would lose consciousness completely for an entire day. But it unleashed the strongest attack you were capable of making at your level. Every ability, every perk, every ounce of power. Final Strike was the last resort. The assassination move that you used when your back was against the wall.


It was terrifying and I had absolutely no idea what it could or would do at my current level or with all my various forms. But it wasn't the most important or useful of the capstones.


That honor lay with the Divination capstone. Empty Spirit. The ultimate protection from insight. Perfect defense against remote viewing, prediction, or any form of Divination. Empty Spirit was exactly what I needed. My Murmur domain was powerful, but it only worked as long as I was there to erase traces. Things would stay gone, but someone could use a tracking Skill or something after the fact and find me through traces I hadn't even known to erase.


But now things like that wouldn't work on me. Granted, I was sure that given it was only a Grandmaster ranked Skill, it wouldn't protect me from people TOO much stronger than me. But a blanket immunity to similar level tracking or scrying abilities, to fucking PERCEPTION effects in general for the most part, if I understood it properly, was…a game changer.


I slumped back, staring up at the flickering purple flames rolling over my vision in shock. I couldn't believe it. That was…it. My Doom Sovereign growth had come, my final capstone abilities, and I was just…ambivalent. I mean I liked them, and they were huge for me. But they weren't the kind of ultimate power I'd have envisioned when I started down this Path. The kind of bullshit I was capable of on my own had slowly built me up to the point where these two were just more powerful tools in my already bloated toolbox.


Not that I'd complain. But I suspected I was going to have to start condensing some of my abilities a bit once I finished all thirteen of my pseudo Domains. A Domain seed, like the ones I'd need to make, was a condensed and durable thing. When it came time to make my full Domain, choices would need to be made.


I let out a low laugh and hopped to my feet, stretching and enjoying the feel of my new and improved body. That was a problem for future Shane. For now, I was stronger, better, and I had new abilities to try out. I wasn't sure how much good they would do me, but hey, that was why I had powerful subordinates to test them out against. As a new C-ranker, I had just the target in mind.


Stepping to my door and pulling it open, I called down into the house. "Hey ma? Want to see me fight your apprentice?" At the very least, I knew that ranking up hadn't spoiled my ability to come up with good ideas. This was definitely my best plan ever.
 
Malcolm Tent said:
Stepping to my door and pulling it open, I called down into the house. "Hey ma? Want to see me fight your apprentice?" At the very least, I knew that ranking up hadn't spoiled my ability to come up with good ideas. This was definitely my best plan ever.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

This is why you're not the strategist of your group.

I'm curious how his final capstone skill would be used in the real world, especially that rogue skill.
 
Chapter 977
"This is your worst plan ever," my best friend informed me cheerfully as I stood across the ring from my mother's apprentice. "You know you're going to lose, right? Like yes, you're the same rank now, but she's got ten times the stats you do, and probably has a Chronicle. Not to mention she practices the martial arts style that made your mom famous. You have no chance."


I pinched the bridge of my nose. "Has anyone ever told you that you're a TERRIBLE hype man? I'm about to get into the hardest fight I've had since my last battle with Bethy, and you're just sitting around cracking jokes."


"Oh, I'm sorry," he said in a deeply apologetic voice. "If that came across as humor, it was totally unintentional. You are absolutely going to get your entire ass kicked. In a very serious way."


"Benicio," said my wife kindly as she stepped up next to us. "If you don't stop demoralizing my husband before his big fight, I'm going to make you fight ME when he's finished. And I assure you. I would kick just as much of YOUR ass. If not more."


Benny clicked his tongue. "Married life has made you so mean. I was just messing with him."


"She can tell I'm worried," I explained with a chuckle. "And its putting her on edge. But he's not wrong, Cal. I'm about to get my ass kicked, and I'm fine with it. Ellie won't really hurt me. And I need to see how far I can push her. Won't be safe to engage any C-rankers unless I know what I'm really capable of."


She blew out a breath. "Yeah. Sorry. I just…I'm on edge. Now that Shane is C-rank, he's playing in a whole different league. We're supposed to be partners, and he pulled ahead, and I don't like it. I'm happy for you, of course," she said, turning to me. "But I feel so helpless with you jumping to the next rank, and I don't like it. Especially when I JUST got this kickass upgrade and now it feels like it suddenly means nothing."


I put a hand on her shoulder. "You're going to rank up in no time. With your new trait and your soul weapon? You're the Void's worst nightmare. Hell, once it gets out that you're a god's kid now…well lets just say I have to win this succession war or else you're going to pass me up so hard I'll never catch you again."


She gave me a wan smile, but I could tell it did help. She'd been really worried about the distance between us growing if I became Wishmaster. She never said anything, but I'd learned to read between the lines even when she hid her emotions from the bond. I'd just never confronted her about it because I didn't know how to actually HELP with that problem. If it could be helped.


But we'd seen from Satala that the children of gods (even adopted ones probably, or whatever Callie would be considered), got a considerable bump in renown. And that was regular gods, not scary Void adjacent Heretic gods that sent Void spawn into paroxysms of terror at their very mention.


Leaving her to think over our potential future, I stepped out into the ring. We'd found one in the courtyard of one of the two boarding houses surrounding my parent's cottage. Apparently they were basically standard in every Ascendant housing complex. Which made sense given how punchy we all were.


Everyone else looked excited, honestly. Bethy was taking bets and selling PEANUTS she'd gotten from…somewhere. Abel had reopened his sausage stand as a competitor and seemed to actually be beating her out on sales, though no one was placing any bets with HIM, so she was probably still ahead by the numbers. I considered betting myself, but I doubted my odds were good. Which was fair.


"This is lively," Ellie said as she strutted out to meet me in the center of the field. "As a complete newbie, it's shocking you attracted this much attention. No offense little lord, but your chances of victory here are…not high."


Clad in her usual golden armor, her giant mace swung over one shoulder, Ellisara looked like a warrior queen getting ready to slay a dragon or something. It didn't help my confidence.


Holding out my hand, I caught my staff, setting it whirling absently as my mom stepped between us, looking serious. "Alright, there WILL be rules to this bout. Shane, no using your staff's upgrade charge. A B-ranked attack is beyond the scope of this battle. Your weapon is a staff and hers is a mace, so despite both being B-rank, with your similarly ranked armors you shouldn't be in any real danger. No need to hold back either, Ellie can handle a little rumble."


The redhead grinned. "If you're REALLY impressive, you might even get to see my Sunsmasher Body technique. Though I wouldn't bet on it. There's a BIG gap between you and I. But hey, try to prove me wrong. Sounds like a party."


My mom nodded, gesturing us back and then retreating to a safe distance. She had us take up positions across from each other, and then said quietly. "Fight."


I expected a blitz. Ellie was the strongest C-ranker I knew of at the moment, and might have even been holding a Mythic Skill. I knew she probably had a Chronicle, but I ALSO knew it wouldn't be in my mother's Stellar Flame Fist, because my MOM'S Chronicle was Stellar Flame Fist, and she'd have been essentially hamstringing herself. Which meant the Stellar Flame Fist wasn't part of her ability and could be higher ranked than she was.


But despite the power I was both assured of and suspected, she didn't lunge at me or attack. She just…waited. I triggered Sammael, wings spreading behind me, and then after some consideration, I triggered Zagan.


Because of the combination of my grandfathers' purification flames, Jessie's life force abilities, and several modifier meta abilities, Zagan had the most raw energy output of any of my forms. In terms of pure power, Zagan was the peak. But it came with a tradeoff. Part of what made it so strong was how completely singular it was. It couldn't do any damage to anything. Ever. It was only good for healing and purifying. Until today.


I triggered Heart over Body alongside Glory, counting on the reinforcement of my flesh from the pseudo Domain to handle the excess power, and then I poured all that powerful life energy into the capstone skill and felt my entire body FILL with a sea of overwhelming power. My wings beat the air, and the sky tore, thunder echoing as the combination of Sammael's enhancement and the full power of Zagan and Glory flowed through my muscles.


Even my reinforced bones creaked under the strain, but I didn't care. My lips were peeled back in a bloodthirsty grin as I whirled my staff into action, spinning it into a series of sweeps and probing jabs, just trying to get a feel for her defenses.


Laughing wildly, Ellie swung her mace, and the weapon smashed into my staff in a series of blurs so fast it looked like she'd made a dozen concurrent movements. My assault broke with a crack of thunder (and not my staff, thank the gods), sending me stumbling back, guard broken. Ellie followed up, her mace hammering into my side, but between Mornax and my armor, I came away gasping with just a serious bruise instead of being folded in half.


I groaned, gritting my teeth tight against the pain. Then glared at her. I looked at my mother. "So, a question," I asked her tensely. "You said "a B-rank attack is beyond the scope of this bout. What about if I use my upgrade charge on a defensive ability?"


She raised an eyebrow at me curiously. "I mean, I won't begrudge you more durability, as long as Ellie is fine with it." She glanced at my opponent inquiringly, and the redhead nodded.


Grinning, I reached into my staff and triggered the upgrade skill, pushing Mornax to B-rank, and allowing my body to be reinforced by B-ranked defensive energy for the first time. Zagan might be most overtly powerful form, but combined with my enhanced Impact, Mornax was my most useful. I even dropped Glory. I didn't need it anymore.


Ellie raised a brow at me, looking unimpressed. "I mean, now I guess I can't beat you up until you drop that. But you can't beat me either. You're not strong enough. Not even close. Just give up. Why even bother with this?"


"Because if I didn't," I told her with a rumbling laugh. "This next part would probably kill me. Ninth circle of hell: Abbadon."


I wanted to know my limits. I could have used Final Strike, but honestly I wasn't sure that wouldn't kill her, and I didn't want to hurt her with an uncontrolled technique like that. I wanted to test my new limits. See what I could do with my capstones, and more specifically, to see what Heart over Body, the capstone of the Monk subclass, could really do for me if I pushed it to the edge.


Ellie looked confused when I said that. She looked LESS confused when I triggered Beelzebub, and even less confused than that when every one of my dozen clones triggered Zagan. Her confusion vanished completely as the clones all triggered Heart over Body and funneled every ounce of that overwhelming power into my main body, enhancing my physical strength far beyond what I should ever be capable of.


It didn't hurt. Not with Mornax at B-rank. This wasn't a B-ranked attack, no matter how impressive it might be. But it WAS enough to tear the fucking SPACE around me slightly as I blinked across the circle, my staff whirling like a hurricane, covering the sky in a torrent of attacks as I flickered around Ellie like a stop motion shadow.


I hit her. She didn't fall or really flinch at all, tanking all the attacks on her B-ranked armor, but I was able to deflect her retaliatory strikes with the overwhelming power of my current physical body, with a little bit of my Belial stance to mitigate the impacts.


Howling with laughter, Ellie shifted her stance, and something about her changed. Her form rippled, turning to living flame in a way I'd seen once before, back during the fight with her brother. Sunsmasher Body. I'd forced her to use it. Laughing, I triggered Mephistopeheles, enhancing my unnaturally strong physical blows with explosive bursts of black flame to try to offset the defensive power of her form.


A dozen blows landed on her still armored flame body in an instant, but she just ignored it, letting me land as many attacks as I wanted as she lined up a swing with her mace, both hands choking up for a massive smash.


My danger sense screamed at me to dodge, to move, and I triggered my waltz to evade as soon as it happened, knowing that blow would be too much for me.


Sadly, my waltz was based on my mom's Supernova Step, which Ellie was using at an extremely high level. She vanished in a blaze of flame, and I felt the danger sense trigger again as I turned to see her appearing next to me out of nowhere. She was still in her windup stance, and as soon as I turned, she swung full force, smashing the mace head on into my masked face at speed.


I blacked out. Instantly. Zeke's mask was designed to protect me, and I was still rocking a B-ranked Mornax form for defense. It didn't do any real damage, but it knocked me right the fuck out. Still, the last thing I remembered thinking as the spiked mace rocketed towards my head was "I made her use it". Damn it felt good to be strong.
 
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