Jason woke up strapped to a cold metal table, with a suppression collar on. Looking around the room, he noticed that the walls were rock and so was the floor. He flexed his aura, attempting to break through it before quickly realizing it was diamond rank. The restraints were also unbreakable for him. A door opened and closed behind him as footsteps rung out on the stone floor, someone approaching the table.

"You really are a genuine heretic. I can feel it rolling off your aura even through the collar. I am restraining the urge to rip and tear you apart even now. My lord warned me, and I now see his infinite wisdom."

A horrific amalgamation of flesh and cogs in human form strode over in front of him.

Jason identified him.

Robert Bumaro, clockwork human, half transcendent

"Well Rob, I don't see the point of this really. You seem pretty dull to me. I don't want to be fuckin tortured so just ask me any questions. But I guess you weren't the sharpest knife in the drawer. The Builder seems to indoctrinate a bunch of blunt idiots every time.

Jason was punched in the face. He could feel his cheekbones shattering and blood running down his face. It was already healing but it hurt like hell.

"DO NOT speak his name, you pathetically weak mortal flesh puppet. You aren't even worth the iron in your blood," he spat.

"Well, what am I here for mate? If disrespecting your god was an arrestable charge, you'd have to round up all the orangutans. Oh wait, you are a monkey. Wow, standards must be pretty low for the Builder now."

He was punched in the mouth again. With gold rank physiology removing vocal cords, mouths were optional for speaking though.

"My lord says you might remember this?"

Robert pulled out a spiny ball from a pocket and Jason analyzed it too

[Star Seed], (transcendent rank, transcendent)

"If he told you that, he told you it wasn't enough for me."

"Thaddeus was a bumbling fool with not enough time or magic to use our Broken God's greatness. But here, you will capitulate to it. You will become one of us."

He placed it on Jason and activated the ritual diagram under the table he was lying on. It hovered above him before splitting into thousands of fragments and burrowing into him through his skin, eyes and mouth. Without brains, organs or anything vital, Jason would be fine from physical damage. It was the soul trauma he was suffering that was the true purpose. The soul is inviolable and impenetrable normally unless you let the outside force in. They can scrape around the outside of it, causing massive amounts of pain, but they cannot break in. Jason knew that intimately but had a problem in that regard. His soul was still malleable due to the [Astral Throne] incorporating into him. It was vulnerable and the star seed knew how to exploit that. With his aura suppressed by Bumaro he couldn't even resist it. The force inched closer as time went on, a lonely cold death.

"Jason." a faintly feminine voice called out.

But he wasn't alone.

"Hello, mysterious voice in my head? Can you help me maybe? I don't know if you can tell but I'm about to essentially die."

"You don't remember me? You rejected my gift. Left your friends to die. You caused all the misery on Earth. Too stubborn to accept help. Now the dimensional barrier is mostly stable but at what cost? The events that brought you here were because you didn't fix it. It was patchwork at best and a single band-aid to fix a sinking ship at worst. I can help you, but it will cost you eventually."

"World Phoenix, I did fine. Maybe not to your assholish standards but fine. I am getting back to Pallimustus and seeing my friends again. You can't stop that."

Jason screamed in pain as the star seed got closer to assimilating him.

"Time's running out Jason. Choose wisely."

"Fine, what do you want from me. Join your sky wizard collective? Maybe implant me with one of your star seeds?"

"I want you to help me permanently fix the breach between your Earth and Pallimustus. The Builder plans to use the breach to send in his most powerful forces to destroy Pallimustus. They wouldn't be able to defend the planet even with diamond rankers. Destroying it would also have knock-on effects for your Earth, being connected. I govern dimensional integrity, so when I say this will be bad, you better believe me."

"Can't you do that yourself, being an all-powerful presence?"

"There are ancient pacts that prevent me from doing that. Otherwise, I wouldn't have a religion and followers to do things for me. You put the bread on the table so I can make the sandwich out of it."

"Love the sandwich metaphor, but what do I do then?" he said.

"This will hurt. Don't resist it," she warned.

All the fragments of the star seed dissolved into harmless remnants.

"That didn't huRTTTTTT!" his voice escalated. Jason's body and soul went under another fundamental change as they merged, creating something greater. Blue, gold and white light of transcendence shone out of him as he was reforged into a new form of existence. A gestalt of the physical and the ephemeral.

Racial Gift: [Nirvanic Transfiguration]

* Your body and soul will be combined into a gestalt entity both physical and spiritual in nature. This state will grant inherent resistance to effects that utilize the soul-body disconnect.

* The strength of your aura will significantly increase.

* Your resistance to hostile dimension effects and disruptive force damage will be increased. This is an enhancement of the Astral Affinity ability.

* The effect of your dimension abilities and your abilities that deal transcendent damage will be increased. This is a legacy effect of the Astral Affinity ability.

* Physical reality around you will be more stable. You will be able to sense nearby astral space apertures and proto-astral spaces coterminous to your location.

* You will be able to traverse astral space apertures, including those that are closed or have been sealed.

* You will be able to directly enter proto-astral spaces coterminous with your location or directly leave a proto-astral space to a coterminous location.

* While within the astral you will be able to create and maintain a small zone of physical reality around you. This does not grant the ability to enter or traverse the astral.

"Man, I feel like crap," exclaimed Jason.

He sat up and opened his eyes. All the straps were burned or cut off and wounds were healing on him where they were destroyed. Robert, the diamond rank that he felt in the facility he was kept, and five other gold rankers were looking at him, frozen mid-battle. A random fire burned in the background, presumably from the giant melted hole in the rock wall. He could see a larger fight out there as the clockwork cultists fought what looked like an army. Bullets, missiles, landmines, defense systems and soldiers were duking it out for control over wherever he was.

"What, haven't you seen a guy casually throw off a god's power and live? Amateurs," he said.

"That isn't possible. You shouldn't be alive," stated Bumaro in complete disbelief.

"Not dying is kind of my thing mate. See you later," Jason yelled as he dove through the portal he summoned.

"Why you little..." the mysterious diamond rank started.

"Well, shall we continue?" asked Bumaro.

All of the gold ranks jumped into the portal the diamond rank summoned before she followed.

"I guess not then."