Before long, a portal sliced through the air, and Arkanon stepped out, an approving smile on his face. He walked over to Jonathan and Hushar.

“Well done,” he declared, his smile growing wider. “This realm is in your debt.”

“The only payment we need is Slothari’s death. I assume that is still on the table?” Jonathan asked.

“Of course. If you can get that bloated monstrosity into Tartarus, that is.”

Jonathan nodded. “Don’t worry about that part.”

“What are you waiting for then? Me to prostrate myself before you? Get moving!”

Arkanon turned sharply on his heels and moved towards the Uthraki survivors, likely to congratulate them. Jonathan pulled the token from his pouch and held it out to Hushar. Luckily, their combined strength was just low enough to pass through. He could have easily farmed his way up to level 299 had he wanted to, but he knew that fighting the higher level followers of Slothari would bring him those levels in short order.

The world warped around them, and for the first time in a month, Jonathan left Tartarus. Mire extended out before him in its all too familiar arc of decay. Jonathan clenched his fists, anticipating the battle to come. The only thing left was to find Edgar. Knowing the man, he would have caused enough of an effect on the world by now to make such a task trivial.

Over the next few days, the two men made their way to the Waste Warrens, testing out their new power on the monsters of Mire. Compared to the peak Tier 3 Exults and Shards of Tartarus, the monsters of Mire were nothing. Once, while testing out the full strength of his Void Missile ability, Jonathan tapped into his powers fully, leveling a section of the Rot Trunk Copses the size of a small city. He was rapidly approaching the peak of power for this realm.

He managed to eke out a pitiful amount of essence for his efforts, but it hardly made a difference to his total. At this point, it would take thousands of level 250 monsters to make a noticeable difference in his leveling speed.

By the time they reached the Warrens, a trail of corpses had been left in their wake, scattered among piles of trees reduced to splinters. The Spillway had been less affected by their presence, but many of the strange corrupted beasts that dwelt in the malodorous swamp of oil and filth had fallen, their corpses floating to the top of the morass like whales surfacing for air.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

They reached the Waste Warrens eventually, blasting through the border like living missiles. A few soldiers were patrolling the land there, but they vanished into smears of viscera before a single punch from Jonathan. At this point, nobody save the true elites of this realm held a candle to the raging inferno of his power.

Edgar drifted in and out of consciousness as his body battled the injuries that Georgios had inflicted on him. Torrents of Death elemental energy ripped through his body, the legacy of the Master Rank archer, still present even after his death. In fact, it seemed that had only empowered the effect of the man’s final attack.

Edgar was hardly a pillar of physical strength at the best of times, and now, his body was wracked with pain unlike he had ever felt before. Gray strips of skin peeled off his body every few seconds, slowly replaced by his regeneration over time. The locus of infection was concentrated around the wound on his chest, where a piece of bone was still lodged. Attempts to remove it, both by his allies and by himself, had been exercises in futility. It had bonded with his ribcage and extended tendrils into his heart, threatening to rip apart his insides if it was ever removed.

Those around him tried to keep their voices low when they discussed his prospects, but he was a master of the Air, and could hear anything that he wished within a large radius. However, he stopped doing so after a few seconds of hearing nothing but bleak pronouncements of his future. At this point, he could only hope that Jonathan would return in time. Only the Void possessed enough potency on the elemental scale to combat the curse left by Georgios. Nobody else had anything close to the level of elemental power required.

The only good thing to have come from his victory over the invaders was a lull in battle, and a chance for his followers to cement their rule over the region. The Waste Warrens had been baptized in blood as the domain of their new ruler, and some of the unaffiliated tribes and factions had begun to flock to his banner. Though, bedridden as he was, he hardly projected an image of strength to those who came to ply him with their offers.

He meandered through a haze of confusion, only sometimes broken by moments of lucidity. At some point, he lost track of time. Eventually, he felt a familiar touch on his body, at least in terms of elemental power. He forced open his eyes with levers of wind, his muscles too weak to do so. Looming above him was the dark armor clad figure of Jonathan.

“You… finally came”

“Shh. Rest yourself.”

Edgar shut his eyes once more, and gritted his teeth as he felt talons of Void energy closing around the blockage in his chest. Fiery pain started to rip through him, but he kept quiet. Compared to the torment from the bone fragment, this was nothing.