Wyxnos' POV.
Second Age, year 143, System Administrator's Dimensional Pocket.
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Wyxnos, God of Logic, Science, and Crafts sighed. His newest domains weren't stabilized yet because he was too busy with the System and its many problems to cement his own worship. But as the cornerstone of the entire world, the System had priority many times over guiding his church and believers.
He was this close to becoming the patron deity of the gnomes. But important tasks had priority over that. He got his faith from tithes of the System. Every creature, even the Anomaly, gave him some energy every time they leveled up. It was his reward for administering the System.
But now he had a runaway soul to catch. The last thing Wyxnos wanted were reincarnators in the System. The one Loki infiltrated was already bad enough, he didn't need a second one. Fortunately, the Broodmother wasn't as skilled in System manipulation as Loki. She forgot to add safeguards to protect her ward.
"System, list all the Traits for which there was ever only one simultaneous holder. Limit the search from the date the Sun domain passed onto Galbarar to now. Add this task to the low priority queue."
> ACKNOWLEDGED... query underway...
He would wait for a month before it returned with a few hundred thousand results. The System created Perks on the fly so several similar Perks weren't quite the same or had some tweaks for species compatibility.
"System, list all the Classes for which there was ever only one simultaneous holder. Limit the search from the date the Sun domain passed onto Galbarar to now. Add this task to the low priority queue."
> ACKNOWLEDGED... query underway...
This one was way faster. The results came within minutes.
"Make backup copies of both raw result sets into the cold storage tables. Sort both results by rarity. Inner Join both by Perk the attachment to the Classes. Display results."
The list narrowed down to less than two hundred entries. Wyxnos smiled.
"I got you, Loki. I can answer you now. I know what two traits you slipped into your agent."
Wyxnos looked at two particular results.
> Weaver of Legend (unique): Grants a positive [REDACTED] correction to lore and memory retention of holders' actions. The holder is attracted to events with a threat rating above [REDACTED].
>
> [LOKI, ASGARD]'s Thrall (curse, unique): All Perks and Skills of the holder have no effect on [LOKI, ASGARD]. [LOKI, ASGARD], has full access to the holder's Status and can rearrange them by using traits and curses as the balance or paying it from his own energy. There's no limit to which traits can be added and removed so long final balance remains zero lower.
He shivered and groaned, in a non-gormandizing way. THAT was the reason why everything the Anomaly touched bent the world around her little finger. That's why she killed three Demon Lords, two Dragon Kings, and a God, Bundeus.
But the {Weaver of Legend} wasn't important. The second one was what got his hair standing up. That curse meant Loki could do anything to the Anomaly. Anything at all. He probably lied when he said he was "unlocking" the {God Slayer} Perk. He was probably just adding it on the fly.
Loki could use the massive amount of Perks and points in the Anomaly's Status to custom-tailor her to a specific purpose, or even give her Admin privileges. He could make her Wyxnos' equal when it came to controlling the System.
But it was a curse, not a Perk. Wyxnos had several observations regarding that fact. Before anything, he opened a ticket to himself. “The System’s evaluation of curse effects need better heuristics”
That could be said of everything the System did but in this specific case, the System evaluated the power of the curse by how they affected the user in the worst possible case. In this particular curse, Loki got thousands of points scot-free by just putting a control switch on his agent.
But it was a curse, not a Perk! If the Anomaly was aware of that, she could break the damn thing and free this world from the veiled threat Loki represented. Yes, the Asgardian God of Mischief and Change could still come and wreak havoc but without his foot in the System's door, he would have to waste his own energy and fight as what he truly was, an outside invader.
The best scenario would be to wipe the Anomaly. But that was impossible without resetting the System core and dumping everyone and everything linked to it. The entire world and the pocket dimension it occupied would unravel. Forget the sun going off intermittently, the whole space-time would crumble. The System core could recreate everything from scratch but it would take several dozen billion years.
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The issue had been brought up several times, but the pantheon decided to not enact the "nuclear option". Some deities, like Yznera, Queltphion, Rabhorktaar, and Zacheia were very vocal about working with the Anomaly. Yznera even claimed she'd befriended the invasive entity, although Wyxnos didn't believe it.
On the other side, Nurha-boenir, the Broodmother, and now Meheia abhorred the Anomaly. They would have her excised even if it meant cutting their own source of power and locking everyone in a black box until sentient life woke up again in the new world.
The other Gods interacted little with the Anomaly but he remembered how angry everyone was with one uncontrolled [God-Slayer] on the loose.
Galbarar sat in the middle but Wyxnos knew the God of Balance would stop pretending and take the Anomaly's side if things got too heated.
Wyxnos would very much like to work with the Anomaly but he wanted to see her gone. Gone. The number of resources and energy the System dedicated to maintaining her Status and Perks was ridiculous.
He pushed those concerns aside. There was nothing he could do right now but study the data. Or was it?
What could he do?
He could pay to lift that curse and free the Anomaly from Loki's grasp. That would anger the Asgardian but would turn the Anomaly into a quantifiable problem. Wyxnos predicted she would want to get rid of Loki's influence.
No.
The data he had was from before Bundeus died. He had no idea what Loki did or what they talked about during the last time they met. He arrived too late. He had to find out where she stood regarding Loki. There was a chance she was a willing agent and making that move would reveal Wyxnos knew what Loki was up to.
Back to the data.
"System, cross-reference this list of Perks and bring up all the unique user ID of all the holders of said Perks."
> ACKNOWLEDGED... query underway...
This query returned lightning-fast. Two entries only. Two, when there should be zero. One was familiar to him. One of the first thousand mortal users the System registered, so long ago. The Anomaly. The second one had the upper identifiers too high. A recent addition.
Wyxnos double-checked. Satisfied, he looked at the Crystal heart, a Divine Core, and smiled.
"I found you, little cheater!"
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Bundi's POV
Second Age, year 143, Calfrey Free Dungeon city, Civilized frontier of the Scorched Continent.
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Bundi killed the last monster in the pack. The cavernous Dungeon underneath Calfrey was full of dangers, only half of them of the bestial kind. The people of the Scorched Continent were a rugged bunch and killing other adventurers in the Dungeon was just an occupational hazard. That's why he delved solo. He invested the Experience Points in his Class, gaining another level. He felt a pang of envy for the Anomaly's accelerated Exp Perks. But she had a dozen lives' head start ahead of him. He would soon surpass her and have his vengeance. After all, he was only in his third life.
He selected the combat Perk, lamenting that it wouldn't carry over to his next life. He wondered if Wyxnos did that to mess with him. His growth was cut in half now because he wouldn't carry anything from the Class to the next life. His only silver lining was that the Anomaly would have the same problem.
Bundi had nobody to complain to. Of the deities, only the Broodmother knew that his soul had escaped from the duel the first time he died at the hands of the anomaly.
He walked down the tunnel only to find it closed. He took a defensive stance immediately. Someone used magic without him noticing. Closing a Dungeon tunnel was no small feat. He prepared himself to die fighting. It would stop his advancement too early but he would be reborn. Just another inconvenience. He rushed up the tunnel only to find it blocked after a bend in the tunnel. He was boxed in. He could dig out but he'd run out of air before that. Not the best way to go. He'd rather commit suicide.
"Don't do anything on the spur of the moment," A familiar voice rang. Wyxnos.
Bundi turned around. "Who are you?"
"Stop the terrible attempt at deceiving me, 'Bundi'. I can see your full status," The God of Logic and System Administrator retorted. "And change it."
"How did you find me?" Bundi asked, dropping the act.
"I have routines in place to track reincarnators. They don't work anymore on her, but you are fair game. I hadn't checked them in a while since it was useless. How careless of me," Wyxnos scoffed. "How about I swap the forbidden Perks you picked for other choices and let you go? Whoever reincarnated you forgot to protect you from outer interference."
It would be the end of Bundi. Even if he reached the surface, he would have only one life to live and it would be all over. But he was too proud to grovel. Bundi stared his former fellow deity in the eyes.
"What do you want?" If you are wasting time talking to me, it's because you decided to not erase me outright. So go straight to the point."
Wyxnos smiled. He pulled a crystal heart from his pocket. Bundi's eyes went wide. It was his Divine Core!
"How do you have it?" He asked with a dry throat.
"She gave it to me. Supposedly to help Galbarar restore the Sun faster. This would help him speed up the restoration of the Sun by five hundred years. Or..."
Bundi steeled himself and stared at the deity. Or it could restore him as a minor, domain-less god. Not this wretched existence that couldn't even be considered a true demigod.
"Here's the deal. You claimed you had a way to get rid of the Anomaly... Loki's Champion. Very well. Do so, and I'll return the core to you. Fail, and you'll die for real this time, like any mortal. Or do nothing and enjoy your life. I'm removing your reincarnation Perks. Good Luck."
Wyxnos vanished, taking the core with him.
> You lost the Perk: Hidden Divinity (unique).
>
> You lost the Perk: Human Reincarnation (unique).
>
> You lost the Perk: Blessed Rebirth (unique).
>
> You have 3 {Unique} Perk choices. Your picks are subject to approval by [Wyxnos, God of Logic, Science, and Crafts].
Bundi barely noticed that the tunnel was open. He slammed his fist on the cavern wall. "FUCK IT!"