Chapter 100: Final Merge

The washroom available in the austere bunk rooms that dotted the biome were distinctly unpleasant. A narrow cubicle tucked around the corner from the kitchen, it was a far cry from the warm rainfall he had come to appreciate in the dwarven manors. 

For one, it was freezing. Kaius had thought he would never be caught dead shying away from a cold wash. Afterall, a lifetime of using frigid mountain streams to get clean had the effect of hardening one against such base discomforts. 

Unfortunately, he had to admit that he had perhaps grown a little spoiled after so many months with comfortable amenities. He shivered at the icy water cascaded over his head, muscles locking up as they tensed against the chill.

He cleaned himself quickly under the spigot that jutted roughly out of the wall, before removing the gore that had accumulated on his armour. Thankfully, getting dry was much less fraught. Each of the twenty odd bunks in the rest stop were equipped with thick woollen quilts. It almost felt wrong to leave perfectly good bedding sodden and wadded on the floor, but it would all be reset anyway once the biome was left in peace for enough time.

Returning to the bunkroom proper, Kaius saw Porkchop had taken to lying on the brick floor near the kitchen. He was still damp, the lacking room meaning they had to wash one at a time. 

“What’re you doing there?”” Kaius asked with a raised brow.

“Waiting to dry,” he responded, flicking his ears. “Wet fur feels horrible on the blankets.”

“Fair enough,” Kaius said with a shrug, taking a seat on one of the nearest bunks. “You feeling up to chatting about your mystery skill after I’ve merged Uncanny Dodge?” 

Porkchop paused for a moment, digesting his words, before he responded a moment later. “I am. Thank you for being patient, it’s a big deal amongst my people. There will be an explanation to go along with it, I promise.”

Kaius grinned, feeling relieved. His curiosity had been all but eating away at him, but far more than that he had been a little concerned by how cagey Porkchop had been about it. With how open his friend usually was, it would have to be a great secret for him to have held these cards so close to his chest. Even if he had still let slip that something was up.

“Well, in that case, I better get on with it,” he said, pivoting to lie flat as Porkchop gave him a nod of acknowledgement.

He looked up at the slats of the bunk above him for a moment, before snapping his eyes shut and diving into his soulspace.

In the blackness of his inner sight, his soul lit up like a bonfire. He couldn’t quite believe it was already happening, merging his final legacy skill. It had required almost four years of constant training, wounds by the dozen, and boundless mountains of effort to reach this point. More, really. A culmination of his entire life to this point.

Afterall, it wasn’t like everything had been fun and games before he had matriculated into the system. No, he was a legacy scion. Everything had been bent towards ensuring that he would be able to merge all of his skills in the short five years before his class selection.

And now he was here. It was almost enough to leave him feeling a little directionless if he was honest. It was only a passing feeling though. He wouldn’t be done, not by a long shot. He still had to decide on his final skill, cap everything, and then escape the Depths. Even then he wouldn’t be done, class selection was a beast in its own right, and was a simple starting point to the endless fight to claw your way up the tiers.

It was still a firm step into the end of his childhood. With a class he would be considered a man proper by society at large. If he’d been in the forest above, still with Father, they would have been planning a celebration by now. No doubt an unplanned trip to Three Fields to down many a flagon. 

Father wasn’t here though. Yet as much as that burned, as much as he felt the yawning pit clawing at his stomach at his absence, he didn’t feel alone. Porkchop was…family. While that didn’t blunt his grief, it did give him the resolute faith that no matter what happened in the future, there would be a brother at his side to back him up. A fat one, who was far too hairy, but a brother all the same.

Kaius drank in his soul-space. The fiery light that jetted from his centre of being, illuminating the foggy clouds of his resources, glimmering on the platinum shards of his eight legacy skills that circled in a messy orbit. 

With only two skills remaining, the sheer weight of the call of his legacy skills was going to be devastating. It would also be their last battle. With his class they would be bound to him in their totality, linked to a grander, more fundamental working. 

In his mind's eye he could see them waiting, watching, as they prepared for their final confrontation. He would give them no inch, no quarter. No matter what vile whispers and painful shrieks they might call out to him with.

His will was forged iron, tempered in a crucible that would have killed all others in his position. His power, his might, his sheer bloodyminded dogged determination, was unique amongst the higher races. This, he knew for sure. This, he had confirmed to him by the system itself.

The first to be watched by the system in aeons.

The first unclassed to survive the depths, to slay Champions by the handful.

And soon, the first to tear down a Guardian from their throne and reascend to the world above.

This was a trial that every scion of his dynasty had faced. No challenge so base would stymy him. Not here, and not now.

He latched onto his soul, wrapping his intent around the wisps of meaning and actualisation that emanated from his centre. Then he began to weave, a great braided cable that glowed with inner light spun out of the fire of his soul.

As soon as he started the process, his legacy skills shrieked. In unison eight platinum shards of power thrummed, quaking with intensity as pure avarice exploded through his soul-space. Kaius grunted, gritting his teeth as the force of their call shot through him in a wave of agony. 

He pushed the pain to the side, crawling forwards finger-length by finger-length to reach towards his first skill. Every stride, every hairsbreadth, was a titanic confrontation of wills. The screaming choir of his legacy fought back every step of the way, attacking him with a symphony of discordance.

Hot blood started to drip from his nose, coating his lips with the fresh taste of iron. He pushed on.

With a howl of determination he snatched up Danger Sense, weaving a cage of soul around the shard. A moment later and his legacy skills were drowned out in a tidal wave of impressions that flooded through him from the bound shard.

There was so much more to danger than pure sensory awareness. The true essence of safety came in prediction. Sight and sound could be hidden from, twisted, tricked, and avoided. Only a complex engine, constantly assessing and processing, has any hope of warning of what might be lurking in the impenetrable darkness. Even then, organs fail. Insight was what was truly required. An impossible veil pulled back, revealing not what is, but what would be. A portent of doom so powerful that it ripples backwards through time. Imperceptible to all but the most cautious. A Danger Sense.

Kaius gasped as the visions ended as abruptly as they started, returning him to the sonic wall that was the wailing of his legacy skills. For a moment he almost lost his grip on the shard he had wrapped in his soul, caught unprepared, reeling as the wires of gold quaked in the onslaught of his legacy. 

Then he snapped back, ready and willing to fight. He pushed back, dampening the chorus of platinum as he impressed his will on his skills. This was his domain. Their power was his own. They quieted, just a touch.

Refusing to let the brief reprieve go to waste, he dove back to his soul and started to weave once more. With another cable of self in hand, his legacy redoubled their assault. Clawing at his mind, demanding their rightly owed attention. 

Teeth crunched in his mouth, Health flaring, as he pushed on. The resistance of his skills was the highest it had ever been, but he only had to contend with them for a moment longer. He could do this. Just one more.

He snatched out, wrapping soulfire around the last skill. Another wave of meaning washed over him.

Dodge was a simple thing, like most Common skills. It cared not for how danger was discovered, only in the earnest effort to avoid it. A simple lean, or the twist of a foot, was often enough. Not always, other times more drastic measures had to be taken. A dive to the ground, a turn that strained joints, or a step off a cliff. So often it wasn’t awareness that saved lives, but simple speed and control. ‘Unavoidable’ was, at its core, a relative term. Dodge sought to make it meaningless. All the insight in the world meant nothing without the capability to back it up.

Returning to himself, Kaius was beset on all sides by the mental assault of his legacy. In such a mutable space as his soul, where intent had substance, it quickly turned physical. Razor sharp shockwaves shot at him from all sides, wearing away at his willpower. Somehow, they knew that this was it. That there was one move left on the board. So they spoke, unwilling to hold their peace.

Moving as fast as he was able, Kaius withstood the storm and wove a final thread of intent. It wrapped around his wrist like a living thing, eager to abide by his wishes. Then he moved, pressing on all of his authority as the rightful ruler of his centre to shoot towards the two skills he had bound. Tethered to his soul, they orbited in carefully controlled lockstep. 

Then it was done. He forged the chain between them, and it was over.

Platinum shards fell subservient in an instant, recognising their loss and his rightful superiority. A moment stretched as simple, blessed, silence washed over him. Then the final merge commenced.

The two skills rocketed together, held fast in his shared understanding of their essence. Protectors, one ephemeral, one physical. Together they would be so much more.

Slamming into each other in a violent detonation, both shards of power atomised, dissolving into a gaseous nebula of potential. A moment later the system took notice.

*Ding! Skill Merge Detected! Would you like to proceed?*

Kaius gasped as the last vestiges of mental strain left him, the system taking over the process of reforging a skill anew. 

The glittering dust that hung in orbit around his soul began to swirl, gradually condensing as a new platinum shard started to nucleate.

Where once his other legacy skills had screamed in avarice, now they sung with joy. A cleansing, pure note that washed through his soul. A call to completion, an ancient cycle so close to ascension.

Then the process finished.

*Ding! Skill Merged! Uncanny Dodge obtained!*

He felt the overwhelming might of the system retract from his soul, his last legacy skill floating upwards to join its siblings in orbit around his centre. 

In unison, they snapped into place perfectly in line with the very centre of his fire of self. Unmoving, equidistant, and perfectly centred. All except for a single gap in the plane. A spot reserved in their vigil as they waited for the last peace of the puzzle.

As one, unified and ready to uplift his final skill.

a/n holy crap 100 chapters, it feels like we have absolutely raced to this point. We're solidly in the final stretch now, I hope you have all been enjoying!

And if you didn't catch it yesterday, go review the story on RR if you have been enjoying it! We're a hairs breadth from top 40 best all time (41 currently)!

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/94966/runeblade-a-delving-litrpg-survival-adventure