Zeke’s mind swirled with a million symbols, each one subtly different from the last. There were pieces that were meant to fit together, but it was like trying to piece together a puzzle, if said puzzle was a three-dimensional depiction of the abstraction of an ephemeral concept. And sometimes, those pieces needed to be adjusted so that they fit into the proper place.

So maybe the puzzle analogy was erroneous.

Whatever the case, it was entirely possible for Zeke to lose himself in the process and open his eyes to weeks’ worth of elapsed time. Fortunately, he could go indefinitely without food and eschew water for only a little less time. More, he was experienced enough with runecrafting that he could drag himself out of the nigh-hypnotic state to check in with his attendants.

And if something truly required his attention, Adara, Pudge, and Talia all had access to his meditation chamber. They would drag him away if he was needed.

Thankfully, that didn’t happen. The war continued to progress, with his forces winning most engagements. However, there were a few key defeats that had necessitated a quick retreat. Thousands of kobolds and beastkin had already been slain, and he knew that if he didn’t soon complete his task, many more would follow. But he agreed with Eveline. He had a feeling that, once he’d completed the penultimate skill of his current realm, he would be hard pressed to find another opportunity to work on runecrafting.

Sure, he had plans for if that proved untrue. There were a couple of skills he needed to adjust – [Shifting Sands], [Bulwark of the Triumvirate], and [Hell Geyser] among them. He also knew he needed to adjust [Mark of Companionship] and [Avatar of the Colossus] so that they were more broadly beneficial. He often forgot to use the pair of enhancing skills on his allies, largely because they needed to be individually applied. In the heat of battle – or the lead-up to it – he usually had other things on his mind, and he usually forgot to use them.

And that was a waste, because both could be beneficial. They weren’t enough to save anyone’s life, but they could certainly function as the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back. In that way, they could be the difference between life and death. So, at some point, he intended to evolve them into something that required a little less input from him.

If he could turn them into domains, that would be ideal, but he wasn’t certain if his soul – or perhaps his spark of divinity – could support such a transformation of the skills. In any case, that was a problem for another day. For now, it took every ounce of his concentration to avoid making mistakes in his current skill’s construction. He couldn’t avoid them entirely, but each time he made an error, it meant that he would be forced to spend that much more time mending the damage he caused to the skill.

And if he somehow missed recognizing a problem, it could skew the entire skill. He thought he was past creating a corrupted skill – especially with the Framework’s subtle assistance – but if he let too many errors through, the skill might become something entirely different from what he intended. In the worst case scenario, it might be useless and impossible to fix without completely rebuilding it. And given how much time he’d already spent, that just wasn’t possible at the moment.

Those thoughts only skated along the surface of his mind, barely noticeable as he fitted one symbol after another together. With some, he had to build bridges, with others, he only had to position them properly. But none of them came together without a significant injection of his Will. Doing so required more control than he’d ever exerted; otherwise, he ran the risk of destroying everything.

It would have been so much easier if he’d simply had his old Runecrafting path with which to work. Instead, he had to be consistently cognizant of his path’s destructive side. Indeed, that was the dominant portion of his Path of Arcane Destruction, and it was a constant chore to keep it in check.

But Zeke was well accustomed to that burden, and he shouldered it without complaint. Days passed, and with each passing second, another glyph slid into place. After a week, the foundations were complete. Another week, and the frame came together. And finally, over the next month, Zeke layered the glyphs atop each other until, at last, the skill snapped together. When it did, a wave of mana swept through it, solidifying everything and cementing it in place.

He took a deep breath, smelling the stale air of his meditation chamber before letting it out in a long sigh. It was finally finished. For a few moments, he refused to inspect the notification begging for his attention. If he’d gotten it wrong…

“You didn’t.”

“You don’t know that,” Zeke countered. “You can’t know that.”

“I saw everything you did. I watched every glyph fall into place. You got it right. I’m certain of it,” she said.

Zeke opened his eyes and ran his hand through his greasy hair. Should he clean up before looking at the results? Part of him wanted to, but he knew that was just a delaying tactic. And he refused to run away from reality. So, without further ado, he shifted his focus to the notification, and when he read it, he couldn’t help but smile.

[Titan’s Smash] (C) – You are a god swatting flies. Bring your power to bear in a massive attack that will obliterate your enemies. Upgradeable.

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As opposed to [Eye of Reckoning], it was only C-Grade, which was a bit of a disappointment. However, considering that it was on the same level as [Flames of Reprisal] or a host of other skills in his repertoire, he couldn’t be too upset. Other than that, the description suggested that it was precisely what he’d intended.

“You created a C-Grade skill before reaching the peak of this realm,” Eveline said with a mental shake of her head. “Only you would complain about something that most of this realm’s elites would do anything to accomplish.”

“I wasn’t complaining,” he said.

“Sure,” was her petulant reply.

Zeke pushed the exchange out of his mind. Instead, he focused on the skill – or rather, the feeling he received when he examined it. The idea was to create a repeatable attack, so the most obvious route was to harness his extreme strength to enable just that. He still needed to test it, but Zeke felt certain that it would be exactly what he needed.

Once he’d confirmed that his skill was complete, and that it was, at least on the surface, what he intended to create, Zeke pushed himself to his feet and stretched his stiff muscles. A quick pulse of [Hand of Divinity] pushed his soreness aside, and, after weeks of inactivity, he finally left the meditation chamber. Almost as soon as he stepped out of the room, he found himself face to face with Adara.

“You’re done? Or is this just a break to keep up to date?” she asked, a slight tone of annoyance dancing in her voice. Zeke opened his mouth to respond, but she cut him off, adding, “You stink. Go get cleaned up.”

Suddenly, Zeke became very aware of his own stench. Spending more than a month locked in a single room clearly hadn’t done his hygiene any favors, and he suddenly felt absolutely grotesque. “Sorry,” he managed to mutter.

“Normally, I like the way you stink,” she said, stepping close and placing her hand on his chest. She looked up, adding, “The smell of battle is very different than whatever this is, though.”

“And what does battle smell like?”

“Blood and sweat and anger and fear,” she said with a slight quiver in her voice. “It’s all violence and destruction. This makes me think of unwashed librarians.”

She said the last with a note of disdain that made her opinion of academia quite clear. It wasn’t surprising. She was a trained warrior, and with orcish blood to boot. That race’s warlike reputation was well-earned, and though she mostly clung to her human side, Adara had plenty of orcish characteristics that made themselves clear in her personality.

“Your opinion is noted,” he said.

She rolled her eyes, then slapped his chest before saying, “Go. Shower. We’ll talk after.”

Zeke just nodded before heading to the shower, where he washed away weeks’ worth of musty stink. He even took a few moments to trim his beard before inspecting himself in the mirror. He looked much the same as always, save for a couple of key differences. First, his hair and beard – despite his efforts to corral it – were quite unruly, making him look like the world’s most muscular hobo. And then there were his scars.

Most of the time, he didn’t even notice them. However, when he took the time to truly look at his reflection, he couldn’t escape how much they’d changed his appearance. In his titanic form, they were represented by red-and-black flames, but when he took his natural cambion form, they looked little different from any normal scars. The only difference was that they covered his shoulders and most of his torso, dipping down to his navel and climbing up his neck. The thin, puckered remnants of his past decisions made his skin look like a vase that had been painstakingly put back together.

But there was an order to them, too. A pattern that made them seem almost ritualistic. On Earth, their presence might’ve been labeled as intentional body art. But Zeke knew the truth, that they were evidence that he’d ripped himself apart and been pieced back together. So, he had more in common with a broken vase than he really wanted to consider.

Even as he leaned forward, his hand on the bathroom counter, the door opened behind him, and Adara slipped insider. Before he could react, she had her hand around his waist. He turned to face her, and, as was always the case, her other fingers quickly found those scars. She was fascinated by them, and in a way that probably should have upset him.

As it was, Zeke simply accepted that she enjoyed the tangible confirmation of his power, of his past battles and the strength he’d needed to pull through. To someone like her, who revered battle and respected warriors above all, they were badges of honor unlike any others.

What followed was the best welcome back he could’ve hoped to receive, and thankfully, Eveline remained out of it. Once or twice in the past, she’d offered to advise him throughout, but that certainly hadn’t gone the way she’d hoped. In those instances, he’d locked her behind [Bulwark of the Triumvirate] until the act was finished. That had gotten the message across, and since then, she had kept her opinions and offers of advice to herself.

In the aftermath, Zeke lay in his bed – which had not survived their enthusiasm intact, having broken in half – cradling his head in his hands. Adara lay next to him, one arm draped over his chest. “Was it a success?” she asked.

“Seemed that way to me, but you’d be a better judge than me,” Zeke answered.

“Not that, idiot. The skill,” she said.

“Oh. Right.”

She smiled up at him, displaying her overly sharp incisors. “So?”

“Yeah. I think so. It’s a skill called [Titan’s Smash]. I think it’s…wait, why are you laughing?” he asked.

“Nothing. Nothing at all.”

“I don’t…oh,” he said. “That’s not…I mean…that is not what it means.”

“Sure,” Adara said, her grin widening.

Eveline finally offered, “Double entendre. Very nice.”

“I don’t think it’s actually a double entendre. It’s more of a –”

Eveline giggled as she said, “Just shut up. You’re just going to embarrass yourself.”

“This is such a weird dynamic,” he muttered inwardly. Then, aloud, he said, “Anyway – my point is that the skill turned out like I had hoped. I mean, there’s a chance that the description isn’t accurate. Or that I misunderstood it. But I think it’s a repeatable attack that I can use instead of just blowing everything up.”

“I hope so,” Adara said, pulling herself closer.

Their relationship had progressed far more quickly than Zeke might have expected, but it was still comfortable in a way he’d never shared with Abby. Was that because he’d grown more mature? Or was it because Adara was a better pairing? He didn’t know, but he wasn’t going to question things.

In that moment, he felt content. He knew it was temporary. Soon enough, his responsibilities would reassert themselves. Now that he’d completed his work on his skills, there was no reason not to contribute to the war against the Radiant Host. And once that was finished, he’d need to find Micayne and the threat he represented.

That wasn’t even considering the necessity of finding a portal to Hell, then discovering a way to descend into the Pit.

No – with all that looming in his future, Zeke was content to simply hold Adara and focus on the present.