As Garnet returned from the fog world, she could immediately tell something was wrong. She felt the presence of a Guide, and it was coming from the man standing next to Zedd.
"Get away from him!" Garnet shouted.
"It's okay," said Zedd. "We know who he is and what he is."
"Why is he here?!?" Garnet asked.
"He wanted to offer an exchange, but it requires your approval," said Zedd.
The man with the black robe stepped forward. He removed his hood and revealed his wrinkly face. He was very old. His moustache twitched with his nose.
Name: Arthur the Betrayer
Level: 201 (108)
Class: Wyrmfolk
Sub-Class: Guide / Dark Fire Mage
Stats: High Intelligence
"My name is Arthur," said Arthur. "I wish to seek shelter in Constantinople."
"Why should I help you?" Garnet asked.
"My daughter needs somewhere to be safe," said Arthur. "Constantinople is the best place."
Garnet was a little surprised. Arthur was doing it for his family. "How do you know that Constantinople is the best place?" Garnet asked.
"Because Constantinople is at the center of the Nexus here," Arthur answered.
"What Nexus?" Garnet asked.
"Do you not know?" said Arthur.
"I do not know what you are talking about," said Garnet.
"Listen, Constantinople is the center city here," Arthur explained. "If you have control over Peking and Anzio as well, you can activate the Nexus and turn this world into a near impenetrable fortress."
This was the first that Garnet has heard about this. "So Peking and Anzio are like Constantinople?" Garnet asked.
"Yes," Arthur answered. "Each of them has a city built under them by a past Hero. The three of them together amplify Constantinople's defensive abilities and turns it into the ultimate weapon against the attacking Guides."
"And how do you know this?" Garnet asked.
"Several hundred years, a Hero by the name of Jesse activated two of the three," said Arthur. "But no Hero since then has been able to activate more than one."
This was the first time Garnet had heard of this. Arthur was much older than he looked to know this. It looked like Zedd trusted him, so there was no reason to not trust Arthur for now. "Alright," said Garnet. "But, Anna will keep a close eye on you. One wrong move and you're out, got it?"
"Yes," Arthur answered.
"Zedd, go help Arthur's people," Garnet commanded.
"Please see to it my daughter is taken care of," said Arthur.
The little girl with scales and horns that walked out with the others gave Arthur a hug before continuing. She was his daughter. There were Merfolk, Goblins, Kobolds, and others that went with Zedd. It really was a lot of demi-humans.
"Are you not going?" Garnet asked Arthur.
"I will stay here and teach you to fight against others like me," said Arthur. "I will help you in your fight as much as I can."
Arthur was willing to expose his own weaknesses to help Garnet. "Like what?" Garnet asked.
Arthur's shadow emerged as a monster behind him. It was a black shadowy mist that began to solidify and looked exactly like Arthur. "This is what a high level Guide is capable of," said Arthur.
Garnet then realized what it looked like, Yarik. Yarik and some of the other Guides used multiple bodies and coordinated their attacks. But, this was on a completely different level Arthur had a separate body that he could control at will. It was an advanced form of just coordinating attacks with your clone. With the shadow, Arthur could perfectly coordinate two attacks at once. "This is but one of our tricks," said Arthur.
Garnet was definitely going to need additional experience. Fighting Arthur was going to be like fighting one of the stronger Guides. That is, as long as Arthur could be trusted. "So, teach me," said Garnet.
"Is that your fighting form?" Arthur asked.
"Transformation: Queen of the Night!" Garnet revealed her transformation to Arthur. "Transformation: Lightning Fire Form!" The two stacked on top of one another, causing the tips of Garnet's wings to flicker with lightning and flames to rise.
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"Is that it?" Arthur asked.
"What do you mean by that?" Garnet asked.
"Observe," said Arthur. "Demonic: Transformation: Emperor of Darkness!" The sky darkened as the black shadow that stood behind Arthur fused with his body. His entire body turned much darker as his dark aura wrapped his body. It appeared as if his entire body was wrapped in black flames. His skin turned purple in color as black scales appeared over his face. "This is a Demonic Transformation, one that Guides use to match the power of the Divine that Heroes possess."
Garnet was shocked at this. She had acquired some divine power from Silwest, but it paled in comparison to what Arthur was displaying. His power was literally warping the space around them and would completely overshadowed Garnet's transformation if his power was not being repressed by Garnet's passive skills.
"How?" Garnet asked. "How did you do that?"
"You need to fuse the divine spark you possess within you with your mana," Arthur explained. "Then, your transformations will fuse, creating a more powerful form. I heard the greatest Hero ever manage to take it one step further and specialize her Divine Transformation and regain all of her past transformations and made them even more powerful."
"So this is the next step," Garnet said to herself. "I have to learn to use the divine energy that I now possess and fuse my transformations together."
Garnet's most powerful transformations were the Queen of the Night and the Nine-Tailed Fox. If she could fuse these two, then the power would be immense. The only question was how to do it. She had no idea where to start. She had divine energy in her body, but she had no idea how to utilize it.
Arthur tossed Garnet a vial of bright red blood. "Drink it," said Arthur.
"What is it?" Garnet asked.
"A gift from Akiza," said Arthur. "The blood of the phoenix."
Garnet looked at the vial to make sure.
Name: Marrow of the Divine Phoenix Meiying
Quality: Mythical
Effect: Bestows high regeneration and the ability to use phoenix arts to the being who consumes this.
Garnet popped open the vial and drank it. Her entire body burst into flames.
New Skill: Transformation: Phoenix
A form capable of flight and overwhelming flames. These flames can be used to heal allies and hurt enemies.
MP Cost: 0
New Skill: Flame Heart
Heals a target for 1% of your maximum mana per second for ten seconds
MP Cost: 500
New Skill: Blazing Phoenix
Scorches the target area with phoenix fire, preventing healing effects while the flames burn on the target.
MP Cost: 500
New Skill: High Speed Regeneration (Level 1, Passive)
Restores 1% of your maximum HP every second.
It was another transformation. Garnet could feel something different within herself. It was as if the mana in her body began to condense into something thicker. Instead of freely flowing through her body, the mana felt like slow moving molasses that pushed against her body. Her entire body felt warm as the phoenix blood fused inside of her body.
Now came the real problem, combining the individual transformations into one. There were: Queen of the Night, Nine-Tailed Fox, Fairy, and Phoenix. Garnet focused on one thing, Partial Transformation.
Garnet did her best to only transform parts of her at a time. She activated the head part of the Queen of the Night, the tails of the Nine-Tailed Fox, the wings of the Fairy, and the burning body of the Phoenix. She looked like a hideous chimera experiment that attempted to fuse different creatures together. Yet, for a brief moment, their power could all be felt flowing through her body at the same time.
"It's not as simple as just activating each one partially," said Arthur. "You need to activate all their full transformations at the same time."
The problem for Garnet was that when she activated another transformation, it would overwrite the previous one, making it impossible. There was a limit to how much she could achieve through brute force with the Hero System. While in the past, it was able to mold some skills through sheer willpower, the transformation was a lot harder to do. She was missing something to help fuse the skills together. She was capable of using them individually, but the essence of the combined form was still foreign to her. There was a lack of understanding for some aspect of it.
Garnet tried different combinations of Partial Transformation, but it was nothing compared to Arthur's transformation. Arthur's transformation was the perfect combination of at least what appeared to be three transformations. The flow of his mana and demonic energy within his body had perfectly melded together.
When Garnet used her Partial Transformation, it was not a perfect melding. The mana within her body was still separate, it would take on properties of that specific form when her mana neared that part of her body. The result was an imperfect combination. She needed to maintain the same combination throughout her body for the Divine Transformation to work. That meant a lot of practice, something that she absolutely hated.
Garnet tried her best to balance the flow of the mana within her body. Her body would unintentionally transform and un-transform whenever her mana flow changed significantly enough. Finding the perfect balance was going to be difficult even though it was the key. The more forms you had to meld, the more difficult it was going to be. If one of the forms had a little too much mana placed into it, it would immediately overwhelm the others and Garnet would fully transform into one form. If there was not enough mana, then her body would not even transform.
Garnet began to experiment with the mana. She not only tried different combinations of each form, but she needed to sense that spark of power. That spark was the key. She had felt it for a brief second when all the forms were activated at the same time, but she had no idea how to recreate the feeling. Yet, that feeling was going to be the key. She needed to find it again and hold it. The problem was that trying to transform into all of them partially at the same time no longer recreated the feeling.
Garnet stacked the Lightning Fire Transformation on top of all her partial transformations. Again, she felt the light spark of power. The moment Garnet felt it, she held her mana output exactly at that amount, not changing it at all. Garnet could feel what felt like a fire burning near her heart in the mana reservoir. This was the key. This unique feeling of pain and discomfort began to spread throughout her body. The mana flow thickened and intensified as it forced its way through the vessels of Garnet's body. There was unbearable pain, yet the pain compressed Garnet's mana more and more. Over several days, the spark began to grow.
Parts of Garnet's transformations began to merge together, transforming into Lightning Fire as they did so. Through careful adjustments, Garnet could feel the spark grow and more parts of her transformation merge together. But, the outcome should be worth it. To combine the best aspects of each transformation would be incredible. Her power would grow several fold over.
Garnet could feel something solidify within her mana core. It was as if something was growing inside of it. The spark was growing and in it, something else was growing. The mana, chi, and divine energy within her body gathered within her mana reservoir. From there, the chains around the dragon disintegrated. The pitch blackness was being replaced by solid stone. The dragon began to shrink in size as the stone emerged from the ground. Four colored flames were arranged in a square around a young blonde woman in a green shirt dress with green eyes who now stood where the dragon was.
Garnet could feel the power flowing through her body as the blood vessels in her body were thickened and pushed to the brink. It felt as if her entire body was on fire. The vessels contracted as the power was pulled back into her mana reservoir. The four flames of black, blue, green, and orange within the temple in her mana reservoir crystallized.
Skill Upgrade: Queen of the Night -> Empress Succubus
Transforms the user into a great ruler of the night. All skills are enhanced by two levels. All stats are increased by one point for every three intelligence.
MP Cost: 0
It had taken a while, but Garnet had done it. She had fused her forms together. She appeared almost entirely human now. Her wings were shaped like a succubus's with a deep violet color, but transparent like a fairy's now. All signs of horns, scales, and a tail disappeared. Yet, it felt like her body was even stronger than before. Most importantly of all, there was no mana consumption. That was the biggest advantage of all.
Garnet could see a strange, but enormous black aura around Arthur and a strange white aura around herself. It was almost as if she could see the power her opponent had.
"Very good," said Arthur. "You've achieved a Divine Transformation."
"How do I compare?" Garnet asked. "Can you tell how strong I am?"
Arthur shook his head. "I cannot without fighting you," said Arthur. "But, you should be about twice as strong as your previous form. That's about how much changes when you move from a standard transformation to a Divine Transformation."
The skill description matched that. The ratio of intelligence to stat gains was almost cut in half. But most importantly, the dragon within Garnet changed. It had become human form as well. There was something about divine energy that made things more human. The same might even apply to Arthur and his Demonic Transformation.
"Incredible," said Garnet. "I feel like I can take on anything."
"Don't be too confident," said Arthur. "All of the high level Guides can do something similar. This will only put you on even ground."
That was where Arthur was wrong in that aspect. Garnet had suppression abilities. Abilities that essentially let her crush her opponents if they were even. With the Annual Tournament less than a month away, Garnet needed to get used to this form before the fighting started. There was something still manipulating the clans of the Eastern Empire into fighting each other and she needed to stop them before they destroyed each other. Otherwise, the defensive wall they had set up might fall to a large attack.
"Now I just need practice," said Garnet.
"And that's what I'm really here for," said Arthur. The shadow behind him split into six more. There were eight Arthurs that now circled around Garnet.
Garnet was caught off guard by this. She did not expect Arthur to be able to do this. If a Guide could split into this many, facing more than one of them could still be dangerous.
"Ready or not, here I come!" Arthur shouted.