II-9 Fugitive

Attention all residents and guests:

A “Master-Tier Dispute” has occurred in the Hasbath Plaza area. All Advanced or below and non-martial residents and guests are to seek shelter immediately. 

All Adepts are warned to be mindful and avoid the combatants and debris.

Master Pathbearers and above can ignore the warnings posed in this broadcast so long as they understand the aforementioned risks.

As always, encountering an act of the system does not constitute grounds for a lawsuit, and any attempt to abuse the Compact’s generosity will result in summary and kinetic refutation.

We hope you all have a great day.

-Emergency Shelter and Curfew Broadcast in Gate Theborn (Compact Territory)

II-9

Fugitive

Momentum Core > 70

Shiv felt something inside the orc’s chest break as they smashed through another wall. A path of ruin and rubble crashed down behind them, blocking the security dimensionals from pursuit. As they emerged into what seemed to be a grand and wide lobby, Shiv saw they were quickly accelerating toward a wall made of solid gold and laughed. Holding onto 811’s throat, he spiked the big bastard headfirst against the wall, using him as a meat-shield to blunt the impact.

Not that it mattered. Shiv felt tough enough to shrug off a literal mountain falling on him by this point. Maybe he wouldn’t be able to dig himself out afterward, though, and would even end up dying of suffocation or starvation.

The orc was still stronger than him—a better brawler and a better mage. But now, with Shiv’s Adamantine Adaption Skill Evolution, 811 was now the underdog in a direct brawl. Because what worth was there in being stronger when your punches and direct magic attacks failed to achieve anything more than a nosebleed?

“Get up,” Shiv snarled. The orc blinked a few times, eyes rolling. “Aw, got a concussion?” Shiv asked sarcastically, before grabbing 811 by his head and slamming him through a nearby desk. Wood and marble blasted everywhere. An automaton dressed in a fine suit and a red cap sighed at Shiv and the orc from nearby. “Please, Master Pathbearers, take the fighting elsewhere.”

Some shrapnel was lodged in the automaton’s body, but it seemed fine overall.

Adept, Shiv guessed as he started smashing elbows into 811’s pace. He felt his arms—his entire body get harder with every blow, adapting specifically at the points of impact. The orc was bleeding badly now, face shredded and mangled like he’d been cut up by a knife. With every punch, Shiv drained more momentum, building up his core again. He dropped a heavy haymaker—811’s rolling eyes snapped to alertness, and he dodged.

The orc vanished in a gust of wind. Shiv’s fist sank through the marble-tilted floor—and got locked in place there as a column of dense crystal and stone fused around the limb. “Shit,” Shiv cursed. 811 reappeared right next to Shiv, unleashing a hurricane of hooks, straights, uppercuts, overhands. He pounded Shiv’s liver like he was trying to mine a gold vein. Blood twisted and jerked from 811’s brutalized face like lengths of liquid rope. He was giving all he had—his entire body was solidifying into crystal, his blows carrying the power of Geomancy and lightning. 

Shockwaves blasted out from Shiv as he kept trying to free his arm while the orc used him as a heavy bag. The automaton was launched off its feet—but showed only slight damage to its hull. A surreal scene took shape as sighs and boos sounded across the lobby, with people moving from where they were seating and walking out. This was how Shiv guessed that most of the people in the chamber right then were Adepts. The few nursing severe wounds or clutching their bleeding ears were, he deduced, Advanced, Pathless, or non-martials. And the one woman who continued reading her paper nearby without a care was likely another Master. At least.

How people reacted told you a lot about them, Shiv realized.

811 came to a similar reaction as he gasped and staggered back, staring at Shiv with disbelief. “Why… what… this makes little sense.”

The remains of Shiv’s pants were holding on by mere threads. The Deathless frowned at the orc as he finally ripped his arm out of the stone-vice with a final shout of effort. Shiv opened and closed his fist as he studied his arm. “Yep,” he breathed. “Definitely a bit more metallic-looking than before under the lights.” But absolutely no cuts, though. Pushing through the pain of using his Biomancy, Shiv examined the effects his new Skill Evolution had on his body.

Where Diamond Shell gave his biology a layer of collective protection from his skin to his very cells, Adamantine Adaption left his body seeming extremely fractured. But after another heartbeat of observation, he realized he wasn’t looking at fractures, but minuscule slats of dense, metallic matter infused into his very cells. Some slats were bunched tight together, forming a concentration of density for the parts of his body that were just impacted. Shiv suspect this was the reason why the first blows the orc landed on him earlier still hurt. Just a little.

Now, though 811 fists carried within them the combined power of a storm and an earthquake at once, Shiv was a godsdamned mountain, and so the hits graced him with the yield of bombs but the effect of raindrops.

Mud-thick blood splattered out from the places where 811’s crystalline hands were cracked. He heaved for air, blinking at Shiv through two swollen eyes. “How… How are you—” His eyes flashed, and he clenched his broken fangs in disbelief. “What? Master—Adamantine Adaption? That’s—that’s not a human skill! That’s not even an orc skill! That’s for monsters! That belongs to a cursed Tarrasque or Sea Leviathan!”

“Clearly not just them,” Shiv said, as he advanced on the orc. The remainder of his pants peeled off, leaving him only ripped shoes and miraculously strong undergarments. He needed clothes. He needed to get out of here and find a new Perfect Semblance to replace his burned identity. But first, he needed to finish this bloody orc. “I’m gonna hear you scream for what you did to those people, 811. I’m not done until you’re just paste in my felling hands. Now. Ball your fists and die fighting, Pathbearer!”

He charged. To 811’s credit, he did ball his fists. He did call upon rising stalagmites of stone and crystal. He did unleash a wave of wind and lightning at Shiv. The Deathless just marched through it all, shattering through stone, ignoring the lightning, using the wind to fill his core, using his building Reflexes to avoid the erupting hands that sought to hold him in place.

Parry > 42

811 roared and dashed toward Shiv. He blinked across space as he used his Master-Tier Striking again. But there was a limit to even skill. He might have been a better boxer than Shiv by far, but the Deathless wasn’t afraid of him, and the Deathless was far faster than him. 811 missed his first punch—did his pivot into a spinning elbow, only for Shiv to duck that was well. Shiv wrapped his arms around 811’s leg and yanked with a shout of effort. 811 felt his base get pulled out from under him—the orc toppled. And was promptly dragged off the ground as Shiv drew on his Might of Mass, swinging the giant around like a club.

Might of Mass > 86

811’s head was whipped back into the golden wall that stopped their initial entry into the lobby. A new dent was made near the last one. And then another. And another. Smears of orc blood splattered and painted the walls. Shiv roared as he flung the monster overhead and started bashing them against the ground. Tiles exploded. 811 tried to call on his Geomancy, but another emergency meeting between his skull and the golden wall renewed his concussion. His spell broke. And Shiv’s Momentum Core was full again.

Grappling Proficiency > 46

For a moment—just a moment—811 felt Shiv release him. 811 sailed through the air, his brain rattled, his eyes rolling. Then the monster in human flesh was on him again. Shiv seized the orc by the neck before he could hit the ground, and they made eye contact a second before the Deathless discharged his Momentum Core.

“Fight back!” Shiv bellowed. A kinetic bomb erupted off of his body. The Adept Tiers and others were gone. The only Master there froze. She turned, narrowed her eyes at Shiv, and then decided to teleport away instead of ignoring what was about to come.

The world lurched. Shiv zoomed forward—but he spiked the orc’s face into the ground before he did.

For the first time, Shiv heard 811 scream in agony. The sound was everything he hoped it would be. The orc’s shrieks drowned out even the howling winds and lasting until the sound barrier burst apart against them. A channel of blood and tissue painted their path of destruction as they exploded through room after room before erupting back out of the building. A group of unfortunately dimensionals were in their way—and were rendered into broken pieces of armor and puffs of dying embers. Shiv felt multiple mana fields brush his—but he was moving too fast for anyone to respond with a spell.

As orc and man sailed into the open air again, Shiv saw that 811’s arm right was barely clinging by a few strands of gristle and skin. The orc was also blacking out from the pain. What a disappointment. Time to wake his ass back up. He planted his feet down on 811’s chest as they made their descent. Legions of dimensionals and Pathbearers were teleporting in all around him—emerging all across the bridge in spatial pockets.

They were finally responding. A bit too late to stop any of the actual fighting. Typical felling guards, Shiv thought. He crashed down on a new bridge using 811 as a board, and at some point a jutting plank clipped the orc’s compromised arm and tore it clean off. That woke 811 back up again. The orc howled loud enough that Shiv felt a brief stab of pain in his ears. Brief because his Adamantine Adaption kicked in that way too as the corresponding cells hardened in response to the specific trauma.

Did I just become felling invincible, Shiv thought. His initial feelings were a sense of awe and excitement—followed by an immediate plunge into worry as he realized Adamantine Adaption was going to be a nightmare to level now. Hells, I might have made it extremely hard for myself to die as well. System… it’s going to be a nightmare to find someone that can hurt and kill me now…

But that was a later problem. Right now, he was going to rip this orc apart. As they came to a stop, Shiv jumped off 811 and immediately booted the orc in the head. A splatter of blood sprayed across the bridge as 811 crashed into and through a group of wolf-headed dimensionals, tearing them practically in half.

“Shit!” Shiv cursed and winced. “Didn’t mean to do that.” He didn’t mean a lot of things during this fight. As his adrenaline began to stabilize, he thought back on all that just happened over the course of the last ten minutes or so and… Shit. Shit. I really should have—how many people did we kill?

His thoughts were interrupted as two spatial pockets expanded around him.

“On the ground!” a wolf-headed dimensional barked. The creature swung a massive hammer into Shiv’s chest. He drank some hammer’s momentum and broke the weapon in half by charging through it. The wolf-headed dimensional let out a yelp as it was flung off its kicking legs into a wall of its own comrades.

Fiery, flying elementals rose along the sides of the bridge and sprayed Shiv with jets of fire. He gave an initial hiss of pain as some of his skin burned—and then his cells hardened accordingly again. Shiv couldn’t help it. He cackled with laughter. The world kept killing him. Over and over and over. And now, he was truly hard to—

Shiv’s delusions of true invincibility broke as a spell smashed against his Biomancy field. His extremely strained Biomancy field. The Deathless spasmed as he collapsed and rolled across the ground. His Biomancy allowed him to push the spell—something commanding his muscles to lock up and stop moving. In a roundabout way, it managed to achieve that.

Biomancy > 50 (Skill Evolution Imminent)

“I have him!” A feminine voice cried. Shiv groaned and pushed himself off the ground to see several teams of heavily armed Pathbearers approaching him. At their forefront was a human woman in a dense turtle-shell like carapace. She was sculpting a new Biomancy spell, and if this one hit, Shiv might just black out again.

Remember why Magical Resistance was so good now, Shiv groaned internally. I might be a physical juggernaut, but bloody magic still hurts like a bastard.

Then, salvation came from a most unlikely source. Before the female Biomancer could finish her spell, a bolt of lightning crashed into her face, forcing a cry of pain from her lips as her spell broke as well. A wall of wind washed over the other Pathbearers. A few were launched off the bridge. A massive bruiser of an automaton came pounding forward on its three legs. “Surrender!” it commanded electronically.

Shiv drank in the wind’s momentum and go off his feet, ignoring the bot. He met 811’s gaze and glared. The orc stood there at the end of the bridge, standing atop a pile of dead and dying dimensionals. He was smiling too, sobbing as if something touching was happening right before him. “Come!” he called out to Shiv. “Come Deathless monster. Let’s give 812 a most smashing dream to start his life!”

The Deathless didn’t understand any of that. He didn’t care. He was just glad he didn’t need to chase the damn orc. The automaton Pathbearer shouted another decree before punching Shiv in the back of the head. The machine gave a wail of pain as its attacking hand was reduced to wires and scrap.

Shiv barely noticed.

“Come on,” 811 breathed. He staggered toward Shiv, channeling every bit of lightning, every gust of wind, every burst of stone he had left. But the orc was flagging. His mana fields must have been beyond strained as well. He took a one-armed fighting stance. The right side of his body had been scraped off, exposing bone and inner flesh. His right arm was gone. The right side of his face was the white bone of exposed skull.

The orc was a monster. The orc enjoyed butchering the innocent and weak. But the orc was ultimately a Pathbearer warrior that wanted to die fighting.

On some level, Shiv understood and respected that. On every other, he was going to rip this damn orc apart.

811 blinked and launched a whipping hook. Shiv parried the punch into the ground and lifted the orc off his feet with a single-leg takedown. He carried the orc through another set of walls, into another building. But Shiv held back from draining any momentum this time. He saw people around him. Slaves. So many slaves. And then his thoughts from earlier hit him as his initial rage ran its course. How many people did I—

811 dropped a punch on the side of Shiv’s head. Shiv responded by spiking 811 against the ground in response.

Might of Mass > 90

Grappling Proficiency > 47

“Get out of here!” Shiv shouted. He was in the entrance of some kind of… foul-looking apartment. Slaves with unchained collars looked at him and the orc in terror. Both of them were covered in blood—mostly from 811—and as the orc tried to rise, Shiv stomped down, driving 811’s face through the floor. “Run! Now! If you don’t want to die!”

Intimidation > 24

Several slaves screamed. Some wept. All of them started stampeding out of the building. Shiv cursed as he started punching the orc, doing his best to hold 811 in place until they were out. I need to stop scaring innocent people… A flash of all the destruction and mayhem caused during this brawl against 811 rushed through Shiv’s mind. Something turned sour in his stomach. This fight started with the death of a child. A child Shiv was trying to save. Now hundreds more were dead at the very least. Dead because Shiv’s rightful fury was guided by undisciplined rage, and because 811 enjoyed the butchery.

As Shiv pounded blow after blow into the orc’s face, 811 laughed and gagged on his blood. His left eye—the only eye he had left—noticed a nearby automaton slave trying to get out. He snorted. And then sent a bolt of lightning through its body. The automaton burst apart.

“No!” Shiv snarled. “You godsdamned—” And the rage took hold again. The rage. At the cruelty. At the casual murder of the weak and innocent at the hands of a Pathbearer so powerful they got nothing out of this but pleasure. Shiv’s fists turn into crimson-soaked blurs. His Momentum Core surged to fullness. What remained of 811’s left eye burst apart under one of the blows. Ripping the orc out of the ground, Shiv planted both feet on 811’s shoulders as he locked his finger’s under the orc’s child.

Somehow, the bastard was still smiling. “It was all beautiful,” 811 whispered. “All of it. I love you. I will find you again.”

Shiv was furious beyond coherent thought. He yanked twice, feeling tendons in the orc’s neck snap. Absorbing a final hit of momentum, Shiv felt his core hit capacity, and he discharged with a primal shout of anger. His hand was locked tight around the orc’s chin. His feet pushed hard against the orc’s shoulders. Momentum Core flared. And after three final cracks of resistance, Shiv ripped 811’s head clean off as he slid across the ground, back along the bridge he came, blasting through newly arriving Pathbearers sent to apprehend him.

The world turned into a haze of twisting colors, falling limbs, and screaming voices. Shiv never let go the head in his hands. He finally slammed to a halt after smashing into a fountain, he staggered out from the debris, soaked, thick orc-blood still clinging to his mostly bare body, and surrounded by waves of dimensionals and Pathbearers.

But that wasn’t the most pressing thing for Shiv. No. As he looked down at the severed head of 811, a colossal weight crashed down on him. It was a weight he hadn’t felt in a few days.

Foreshadowing: In another realm, a newborn orc burst free from the corpse-womb that bore him. As he draws breath, a final set of memories flows into him, taken from his spiritual predecessor and bestowed upon him by his god.

812 takes a tentative step into the wasteland dimension that his people call “The Tutorial.” A sea of corpses and rusted weapons little the world as far as he can see. He also notices his brothers hatching free as well, other orcs spawned after the deaths of their predecessors, preparing for a new run on life.

He is bare. He is weak. Though he remembers much, his soul is new, and so he must regain his strength. But 812 is different than the other orcs. 812 is in love. In love with the man that killed his predecessor: An undying titan hidden under human flesh. He still feels that sweet moment when his head came free. He still sees the man’s face: wrathful, furious, feral.

And he knows there is no one more perfect for an orc to face. A reincarnating warrior against an undying one. This tale does not need to have an end. 

And just then, a quest is bestowed upon the newborn 812. Orc infants don’t usually get quests. But this one does. And this smiles, because he is going to make it back to that world called Earth, and he is going to find the man that killed him—and break him for good.

Foreshadowing > 18

“Shit!” Shiv roared. He flung 811’s head against the ground so hard it caked against the surface. He stomped it. Over and over, he stomped it. Until he was just pounding a bare foot into a puddle of gore. “Shit! Godsdammit! Godsdamn you!” He shouted at the sky, at the system in particular. All that to kill the orc, and the bastard reincarnates. Heavy breaths of billowing anger rushed free from Shiv’s nostrils. Looking around, he notices a small army of Pathbearers boxing him in from all sides, yet none of them dared to approach.

He saw it in their eyes, read it in their postures. They were terrified of him. Even the dimensionals—especially the dimensionals.

Intimidation > 28

A heavy rush of power surged through his soul, but Shiv grimaced and swallowed sour spit as he took in his surroundings. Destruction was all around him. Massive exit wounds lined all the nearby buildings. Wailings of terror and sorrow sounded all across the expanse of the gate, and Shiv noticed a small, severed hand not too far away.

The sickness returned. “Oh, Broken Moon. Oh, gods.” Shiv clenched his jaw and refused to vomit. Quickly, he reached into his cloak and pulled out his mask—slamming it back on his face. The inside of the mask still reeked of blood. His blood. The Perfect Semblance of the high vampire fused over him again, but it was pointless. Everyone could see him. But he still needed the Mind Shield. I was… I was trying to save the boy. I was… I was…

He was still furious, his blood was still coursing hot through his body, and his hands were shaking. He couldn’t stop the shaking.

This shouldn’t have… what should have happened? What could I have done? He murdered the child! I was going to—he killed so many people just to… to provoke me.

Shiv’s thoughts went quiet. An uncomfortable realization passed through him. He couldn’t have saved the boy. Not the one he bought from the automaton. A lot of other people were just doomed during the fight too. But the way he used his Momentum Core, the way he smashed into places blindly and savagely… A lot of lives could have been spared.

And that was his fault.

A faint pressure jolted Shiv out of his thoughts. His mask rattled as tendrils of Psychomancy failed to push through. Shaking his head, he whipped around and glared at the offending Psychomancer. He found him immediately in the ground, and as Shiv glared, the Psychomancer immediately stopped his spells and started to apologize while backing away. “Sorry! Shit! Sorry! It’s my job! Don’t—I’m just doing my job!”

Shiv blinked. His job… Security! He needed to go. He needed to run before—

“What is this?” A deep voice boomed from above. Then, there came a blinding flare of light, followed by a crushing, oppressive heat. All of a sudden, the coldness of this place’s sun vanished. Shiv felt his skin singe, but the temperature quickly became little more than a discomfort.

As the Deathless looked up, he clenched his jaw instinctively. A figure hovered above. A humanoid figure sprouting countless petal-like wings from his back. As the new adversary loomed closer, they did so will the ill-gray sun over their shoulder, and it curved around their skull like a halo. “What manner of degenerate do I look upon? What manner of mongrel savage are you? Have you no shame? Who told you that you may drench yourself in the blood of another within this gate—within my vaunted domain? Answer me, deceiver wearing the illusory shell of another. Speak.”

“Your domain?” Shiv said, his voice hoarse. He looked down at the mangled bits of 811 he was stepping on. “So. You’re the boss of this slave-running shithole? I’d tell you I’m sorry about the mess. But I’ll be honest and say I’m sorry about all the slaves and innocents that ended up dead just now.”

“Indeed. I am the Acting Gate Lord of this place: Lesser Marshal Confriga. And I do demand an apology. I will accept many criticisms of this place. ‘Shithole’ is not among them.” The shrouded adversary drew closer. And Shiv saw they weren’t human after all. A single, pitch-black cyclopean eye dotted the Gate Lord’s forehead. Below the eye, Shiv blinked at the creature’s mouth—it was a vertical slit with rows of small, pointed teeth. From the sides of the Gate Lord’s skull flowed octopus-like tentacles. A few held focus crystals. The rest clutched gems or skulls of various types.

A twitch of movement made Shiv look upon the Gate Lord’s armor. The Deathless tightened his fists again as he took in what he saw. A series of radiant plates shielded the Gate Lord’s body. He gave off the light of a setting sun, and Shiv thought he saw movement reflected upon the armor. Movement that didn’t correspond to anything in the real world. Yet, it was the children that sickened Shiv the most. Strapped tight around the Gate Lord’s chest piece were three impaled children. One was an Umbral. One was a human. One was a goblin. Each had a spike jutting out from their chest, binding them to the Gate Lord’s chestpiece. They shook and writhed as Gate Lord descended gracefully, floral wings closing behind as if a peacock’s feathers.

In Confriga’s hands was a curved blade that seemed to drink in the light of the world itself.

The Gate Lord stood taller than Shiv by a full head. But he was thinner, too. Far too thin.  He studied Shiv with his eye, darker than night and harder than flint. “Take off the mask,” Confriga demanded, his voice sharp, his pronunciation quick. “Show me your true guise again. Your bloodstained self. Show me your true path.”

Shiv snorted. “Maybe if you kill me politely, I’ll let you take the mask.”

The Gate Lord went still. And then, he tilted his three-meter-long blade, and the air around it grew dark. “It is not the sign of a proper guest to taunt the master of a house.”

“That’s fine. Any house with slaves in it is one I want to burn.”

“Burn,” Confriga chuckled. “Do you even know the meaning?”

“I suppose you’re about to show me with that long metal prick of yours,” Shiv taunted.

“No. I will not sully Absence’s length with your blood.” Confriga released the blade and let it hover in the air. “I will settle for tearing you apart. And dragging your broken carcass across this place. Across every chamber, every building, every surface you defaced. And then I will raise you. What remains of you. I will bind the echo of your soul to my service for the inconvenience you have caused me. And then I will forgive you. But never release you.”

Shiv snorted. And then he laughed. “You guys… All of you slaving bastards and murders just have to have these personalities, don’t you? Can’t a bastard just be an honest piece of shit anymore.”

“I will make you apologize to me for saying these words,” Confriga muttered. “Such language does not fit my presence.”

“Really. You got dead kids run through on your armor, but you don’t like cursing?” The Deathless was surprised to notice something—the Gate Lord seemed absolute devoid of any kind of mana. At least any kind of mana, Shiv was familiar with. Guess this one is a pure martial or… shit, the kids… am I fighting a Necromancer?

Confriga strode toward Shiv. “Language. It is the function that makes us who we are. That lets us express ourselves. It is the great separation of all the naturally thinking races from the mere beasts that tap into the blessed system’s gifts by instinct. Such is a matter of propriety to me. And these children… are but a message to the property to obey. And they are assuredly are not dead. For I do not allow their passing.”

Yeah. Definitely Necromancer. Fine. Let’s see what he’s got. And maybe try to think of a way out of here because that’s a lot of Pathbearers to fight at the same time…

The Gate Lord brought up a three-fingered hand and made a gesture. An eerie green set of interlocking symbols flashed. A surge of similarly colored mana erupted from the orifice’s of the children, and Confriga shaped a whip that screamed. Shiv blinked as he saw what looked like the ghostly spirits of all three children squeezed into the thinness of a whip and coiled around each other.

A burst of anger went through Shiv again. “And you call me the degenerate,” he snarled. He launched a jet from 811’s blood at Confriga using his Biomancy—ignoring the agony passing through his soul. Shiv didn’t expect the blood to hit. He just wanted to see how the Gate Lord might react, and how fast Confriga was.

The answer to the second question was faster than Shiv at baseline—but not faster than he could track with his eyes, and definitely not when his Momentum Core was filled. More importantly, he was slower than Harkness by more than a little. And that made Shiv like his odds. Especially after his literal death match with 811.

Need to watch the whip, though. Somehow, I don’t think that’s going to inflict physical harm, and i don’t want to discover what it might do to me magically.

So Shiv launched the first spell. A burst of flame spread around Confriga’s face—hopefully blinding the Gate Lord. He felt his magic splash apart against an incredibly dense layer of Magical Resistance instead. Shiv stomped forward—and then immediately launched himself aside as the dead-child Necromancy whip snaked out to spear him on its own volition. He rolled under the screaming length and closed on Confriga, and when he got a step away, he did the unexpected—he threw one of his old corpses at the Gate Lord.

Confriga let out an indignant scoff and swatted the corpse with his hand. Shiv watched as his corpse was nearly split in half. Okay. Either really High Master or Heroic. Then Confriga made a gesture, and Shiv’s corpse flashed with a green glow—and then exploded. The resulting blast didn’t so much hit Shiv physically as it crashed against him spiritually.

The Deathless released a shout of surprise as something inside him—well, it didn’t so much hurt as it made his very being feel like a rubber band. But though he stumbled—he didn’t stop. He lashed out with his fist. Confriga reeled back as if surprised—and then teleported. Shiv’s hands seized empty air. And then he felt it—the pressure. Confriga was behind him. Shiv twisted and punched, only to see that screaming whip strike his left arm.

Shiv expected some kind of pain. Some strange magical effect or another. He didn’t expect absolute agony to tear through him as his entire arm detonated in what seemed like a massive blast of chaotic, swirling mana. Light consumed Shiv. Light expanded out from Shiv. The world was a blinding cauldron of heat, sound, and force. For a second, all three felt like they were too much for Shiv to endure—his skin and flesh fried. His ears bled. His bones fractured and muscles tore. Then, he adapted. The heat lessened. The sounds were merely deafening. The pain faded entirely.

Adamantine Adaption > 105

Then, as the light faded, as Shiv cursed and clutched his smoking stump of an arm, he heard Confriga screaming in anguish. Not only Confriga, but all the other Pathbearers and dimensionals present. They were all burning too, consumed by a white-green fire as a mushroom cloud of clashing mana swelled to encompass a full kilometer of space. Shiv’s mind reeled. And suddenly, a series of unexpected level advancements passed through him.

Vitality Drain > 18

Revenant > 10

“Broken Moon,” Shiv hissed. He saw flickers of brilliant white consume the foul green Necromantic mana highlighting where his missing arm used to be. Then it was gone. But those around him were still burning. Confriga’s flesh began to melt from his body. The Pathbearers and dimensionals dispatched to capture Shiv began toppling over one after another, their melting bodies now lit as if torches bearing a greenish blaze. Most peculiar of all were the three children pinned to the Gate Lord’s armor. They burned brightest of all—but they burned with the color of glorious white, and their bodies writhed a final time as they faded into motes of nothing.

“What! What have you done!” Confriga screamed, clutching at the absent children once pinned to his chest. The Gate Lord was still burning, the green fire born of Necromancy devouring patches of his flesh. “My conduits! My effigies!”

Shiv didn’t know either. So he answered by punching the Gate Lord in the eye as hard as he could. His blow cracked the heat-glassed ground around them. It didn’t even drive Confriga back a single step. The Gate Lord snarled and seized Shiv’s neck with a crushing grip. The Deathless punched the Gate Lord’s elbow—drained as much momentum he could—but there was no breaking free. The Gate Lord casually lifted Shiv off his feet, even with Might of Mass.

811 had the strength of a small child compared to Confriga.

If there was any doubt that the Gate Lord was a Heroic Pathbearer, that doubt was dead now.

“Alright you bastard,” Shiv clenched his teeth. “Make it count.”

And so Confriga did. The burning Gate Lord released Shiv and thrust a fist into his chest. Shiv watched and timed the blow—and then noticed something: A rush of force speared out from the Gate Lord’s fist a moment before the impact and extended through Shiv like a needle. When Confriga hit Shiv, a channel of ever-growing force crashed through him. The Deathless felt his sternum shatter, and then one of his lung burst—but that was when his body started adapting to the blow.

Adamantine Adaption > 106

With a half second, Shiv was launched almost three hundred meters into the air. In that same half second, Shiv’s Momentum Core was flooded. He discharged immediately and shot back against the channel of ever-growing force. His body snapped and jerked—his stump of an arm became a nub of purest pain—but his Adamantine Adaption entered the arms race against the Gate Lord’s ever-escalating blow.

Confriga stared on in disbelief. The Gate Lord was still burning, his once opal-bright skin turning a sickly shade of mottled black. Shiv felt some of his skin rip and fray—but even that slowed as the adamantine plates lining his every cell grew tighter and tighter. Confriga might be able to split a mountain in half with a single blow, but Shiv’s was an ever-rebuilding fortress lined in layers and layers.

Adamantine Adaption > 106

Might of Mass > 93

“No—what… What are you?” Confriga whispered. And the Gate Lord jolted out from his astonishment. He drove a palm down and another channel of force speared through Shiv’s back. As the blow struck Shiv this time, he anticipated—and drank in more momentum before it could full crash through him. As a result, only a small series of fractures lined his pelvis. However, as the intersecting channels of force and Shiv’s second discharge clashed, he found himself launched off at an angle, twisting and turning through the air. Rivers of molten metal zipped by below him, and Shiv cursed as he lost track of where he was going—only to punch through the walls of another building.

Momentum Core > 73

“Really racking up the collateral damage today,” Shiv hissed to himself. Thankfully, he didn’t tear through any people this time. In fact, what he mostly crashed through was crates, cargo, and bits of machinery. He ended up pretty deep in the bowels of the building before he finally came to a stop. As he looked up, the way he entered collapsed—along with a great deal more of the building itself. But this was—Shiv blinked as he found himself in what felt like some kind of maintenance hall.

“Shit,” Shiv growled, clutching his missing arm. His other wounds didn’t feel that great either, but Adamantine Adaption made him a veritable cockroach to kill—even for a Heroic Pathbearer. He remembered 811 saying something about how the skill was only meant for monsters. Well. Considering he got Foreshadowing as well, it seemed like being Deathless gave him a wide range of options, so long as he died enough.

Might be a bit harder now. At least physically. I wonder if I can survive Marikos’s Pyromancy as I am right now… And what the hell happened with my arm? The whip—it’s like it blew up with me. Some kind of unstable mana reaction? Considering how much his Vitality Drain and Revenant Skills spiked afterward, it didn’t take much of a guess to suspect it had something to do with his unique nature.

Shiv started staggering down the hallway. He wasn’t sure where he was going, but he had no intentions of staying in place. He really wasn’t cut out for being an infiltrator. Barely a few hours here and his cover was already ruined, a bunch of people were dead, and he just went a round with this place’s Gate Lord.

“Yeah,” Shiv said to himself. “Let’s call that a draw for now.”

Intimidation > 34

A rush of levels passed through him. Shiv blinked. That was a big jump for Intimidation? He wondered what—

“THIS IS LESSER MARSHAL CONFRIGA! I AM HEREBY INVOKING A STATE OF EMERGENCY PER THE CONTRACT SIGNED BETWEEN MY LORD AND THE LORDS OF LAW! WE HAVE BEEN INFILTRATED! BY A NEW ALBION RAT, NO DOUBT! AN ATTACK HAS TAKEN PLACE! THE ENEMY HAS FLED! AS OF THIS MOMENT, THE GATEWAYS ARE TO BE SEALED! NO ONE IN! NO ONE OUT! EVERYONE IS TO REMAIN IN PLACE UNTIL HE IS FOUND AND ELIMINATED! ALL GUILD PROFESSIONALS AND KEEPERS ARE TO REPORT IN AT ONCE! HE MUST BE FOUND! HE MUST BE FOUND!”

The broadcast was so loud it shook the entire dimension. Shiv chuckled to himself, enjoying how pissed off the Gate Lord was. “Yeah. Good luck with that, asshole. Don’t worry, though. I’ll be seeing you soon. Right after, I get a new face and maybe die a few times. I need to restock on new bodies.”

And as the Gate Lord continued raving, Shiv activated his stolen Umbral Shadowalker Skill and melted into the darkness. He wasn’t sure where he was, but he did have a general plan. He needed a new Perfect Semblance, to die and resurrect to handle these wounds, and then to pay a visit to the Twilight Republic’s consulate.

There was an automaton he needed to speak with. And then kill.

If not for that bastard, shit might not have gotten this out of hand, Shiv thought.