Arthur's return to consciousness was abrupt. This time, his refinement hadn’t come with any out-of-body experience or special choices. If things had gone well, he’d been in a deep sleep for an hour or two, and now the process was drawing to a close. He was still trapped in his black egg, though thankfully, this time, there was no gooey liquid surrounding him.
Arthur suspected whatever the orb had contained had long since been absorbed by his body. There were no System messages to greet him yet, and floating within the orb with no way to touch the sides, he couldn’t exactly tell how his body had changed. Three minutes later—vastly accelerated compared to last time—the shell began to rapidly dry, becoming thinner in places and finally allowing light to flow in.
It was only then that Arthur remembered refinement tended to destroy whatever he was wearing, and he was moments away from flashing a dragon and an ancient healer. Focusing on his storage ring, Arthur withdrew some clothes, ensuring that they manifested perfectly on his limbs. Like a key clicking into place, Arthur felt the refinement complete itself; only the fading shell around him didn’t disintegrate as he’d expected.
Instead, he felt a surge of power from outside, so far beyond anything else he’d felt on the planet that it’d be like comparing the ocean to a small pond. Arthur's heart skipped a beat, or at least it should have. He wasn’t sure how much his body had changed yet, but he wasn’t certain he had a heartbeat anymore.
His refinement orb had been frozen solid, the particles of dissipating ether and nether making it up, suddenly halting in motion. It defended him against most of the magic, though, and Arthur forced his body to move through the frozen space. His fist struck the orb, breaking through it like brittle glass. Only then did the System flood him with notifications.
Arthur ignored the messages for now, instead focusing on the immediate threat outside. Now that he was exposed fully to it, he realised just how dire things were. Viktor, the remnant spirit of an ancient dragon, was frozen solid, his flames looking like water that had been frozen in motion. Vira had fared even worse, her skin pale blue as her blood literally began to freeze and expand.
Just as he began to fear the worst, the energy powering the ice magic disappeared, though its effects lingered. Still, it went from a potentially fatal problem to one that would merely have painful after effects. Arthur helped the process along, generating green flames around the basement. He wasn’t sure how frostbite worked, but any damage he caused with his assistance could easily be rectified later.
Viktor moved first. “You're dead, Arthur, dead,” he whispered in quiet defeat. “There's no way you can beat these guys.”
Arthur rolled his shoulders and looked up at the sky. That was the source of this incredible power. His enemies, who had come to Haadran to kill him. Less than an hour had passed since he’d commenced his refinement—there was quite a while to go before his deadline—which meant either Iris’ information was off, or things had seriously changed.
“Wait,” Arthur said as he came to a horrifying realisation. His probing senses had told him something he could scarcely believe to be true. “Is the ice domain covering the entire planet?”
Viktor’s silence was all the answer he needed. With power like that, Arthur should already be dead. In the seconds that had passed since he’d left his orb, someone so powerful could have easily attacked him. The fact that he remained unharmed, and the magic powering the domain had disappeared, could only mean one thing. He was being given time. Arthur grimaced as he looked around at Vira’s finished work.
They were here to see his ritual in action, weren't they. Being treated like a zoo curiosity rankled, but this was exactly what he needed. They wanted to see how dangerous he was, to see if his usefulness outweighed it. He had no secrets to hide. Arthur welcomed any fool to try to replicate his work. They would die, no two ways about it.
Still, Arthur didn’t think the danger would stop his observers. How many thousands will die in the experiments that try to replicate my success? Scratch that, how many had died in that completely unnecessary ice attack that had been launched on the planet? The soldiers of Bastion were almost certainly strong enough to survive such brief exposure, but what about the children? Had they made it?
It was a callous disregard for life that didn’t bode well for Arthur’s survival chances. Sighing, he finally pulled up the notifications that had been clamouring for his attention.
Arthur whistled. This explained why his heart hadn’t beat since he’d finished his refinement. The nether made him the antithesis of any ether-based life form, and it granted him another way to permanently harm others besides True Soul damage. Unfortunately, besides making him a better combatant, he wasn’t sure it was useful for his more immediate problems.
This trait was a little closer to what he was looking for. It granted him the ability to use nether as an energy source. Unfortunately, everything that came attached wasn’t so welcome. If his blood was truly toxic now, what did that mean for all his alchemy? Could he no longer use it in his get-rich-quick scheme? Vira had finally defrosted enough that she could move her limbs a little. It was almost time to get started. He turned his attention to his final new trait.
Arthur read through the trait's description thrice before he got his hopes up. Then he ordered three of Wovan’s bodies to teleport as far away from him as possible in three separate directions. Finally, he used Link to observe each of their bodies and the areas around them. When Vira looked at him strangely, Arthur realised he’d been laughing manically.
He’d done it.
This was it. His ticket to survival. The trait that made him far too valuable to put down. Twenty thousand square kilometres extending from where he was currently standing, Haadran was slowly, but surely, being pushed towards ether. Corruption was being purified by his mere presence. The good news didn’t stop there, though. An equivalent area around each of Wovan's bodies, too, was being stabilised. As far as the trait was concerned, it seemed every fragment of his soul splinter counted as a manifestation of his existence, which meant he could purify close to a million square kilometres of corrupted space with his presence alone.
The reverse also held true. He was just as capable of corrupting said space, but no one needed to know that. Certainly not his would-be killers.
"I'm guessing your refinement went well then," Vira interrupted his musings.
"Better than I could have hoped for," Arthur replied, unable to keep the grin off his face. "I wanted an active skill that let me cleanse corruption. I was given a passive one instead, and it costs nothing to use."
"That's... great than, I guess?"
Going by her confusion, Myriad Tongues hadn't done a good job at translating his words.
"I think it's time we get this ritual finished. Who knows how long it'll be before the temperature drops again?" Arthur said, reaching into his storage ring and pulling out his severed right hand. The limb still contained a part of his soul, and given enough time, he was sure he'd be able to reattach it. Sadly, he'd be going for the more difficult option of trying to regrow it from scratch.
Arthur placed it into one of the smaller rune circles at the edge of the ritual. In the other, he placed the fragment of Haadran's world core. The final circle contained the two corrupted dragon remnants as well as Viktor's heart and a few of his scales. Arthur then emptied his soulbound storage ring and removed it.
Iris had been the one to gift it to him, and it had served him well until now. Sadly, the time had come to say goodbye. He was making a new home now, and security had to be tight. Arthur didn't know anything more secure than his soul.
He tossed his ring into the cauldron.
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Etherious: Originator
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