Caeden had reached his Embodiment with Physical Enhancement during the training time his team spent in the Forge. When he’d first arrived, he’d been incapable of accessing his other shroud within the Blade Forge, the energy from the one interfering with the other. But that was more due to his lack of experience and control with his god-like powers at the time. It wasn’t some inherent limitation of the dimension.

It hadn’t taken him that long. Though he’d always been less familiar with Physical Enhancement than Sharp due to the former appearing so recently in his life, that small time difference faded in the Forge. Added to that, Physical Enhancement had such a strong alignment with infusion that it practically leapt at the chance to become an Embodiment.

At the time, he’d been ecstatic. After all, it was a big step, and massive leap in strength for him, even when accounting for Blade Forge. His new shroud drew most of its strength from Caeden’s inherent control of the space the domain was made of rather than the raw power he could display through his shroud. Time dilation and the ability to make blades specifically designed to deal with his current enemy were potent things. And that wasn’t even including the Bladeborne, who brought with them their own slew of benefits.

Physical Enhancement was an entirely different beast. It held practically nothing else except raw power. Through his training, Caeden had swiftly realized that his previous approaches to the shroud were misguided. Segregating the benefits Physical Enhancement provided to reinforcing a particular aspect like strength or speed wasn’t exactly wrong, but it was a shortsighted endeavor. Each form created distinct weaknesses that could be exploited.

Rather, it was far better for him to use Physical Enhancement as a base. In this, Caeden realized he was extremely lucky. Being dual-shrouded allowed him to simplify his usage of one of his shrouds in a way that would have caused endless problems for any normal shrouded. Such a simple approach to one's shroud usually left you with no way to overcome a power gap outside devoting oneself to martial arts.

Caeden allowed Blade Forge to take on more complex and nuanced combat approaches, while he focused Physical Enhancement down to form the best base it could be. Now, it supplied him with sheer, raw, physical potency on a level that even the strongest shrouded would find hard to match. He was stronger, faster, and tougher than he had any right to be.

Unsurprisingly, Physical Enhancement’s Embodiment was a reflection of that pure expression of force. And unfortunately, the way that expression manifested limited its situational usefulness alot. His Embodiment could not be used with even the slightest amount of subtlety or nuance. It was all explosive force and devastating impact.

For that reason, and so that he could act as a last resort, Caeden had refrained from using his Embodiment during their defense of Baserock. They’d been trying to kill as few people as possible at that point, and raw power hadn’t been where they lacked. At least, compared to their opponents at the time.

Now, he found himself in a situation almost perfectly suited for such raw power. The founder had proven himself extremely secretive and mistrustful, seemingly relying on the Ethermen he created above any humans. That fact that the dozen ships circling this artificial island nestled among the massive swells of the continental Starry Sea were all crewed by Ethermen was the final bit of evidence Caeden needed. They’d found the Ffounder’s most secret and hidden base, the place he felt most secure, and the most protective of. There was no way he’d invite another human here, someone he couldn’t control.

And that meant Caeden could smash his way through the place without an ounce of worry. It was almost poetic that the founder’s seemingly pathological lack of trust would end up becoming the cause of his demise. Or at least one of the causes. The man’s many wrongs couldn’t go unanswered, the theft of the Entrance Blade was merely the step too far into dangerous territory that made him the most pressing priority on a list too long for Caeden’s mental health.

The Starry Sea was truly a broken place that needed lots of work. Work Caeden finally felt strong enough to do. Which made this founder an annoyance in his path, a symptom and prime example of greater issues that plagued their universe. Ones that couldn’t be solved with a strong hand or a sharp sword.

But this was one situation that could be solved with a heavy hand. The only person at risk was Damon, considering the likelihood that he was in that artificial island. But he was a competent shrouded. Once he was free of whatever cage he’d been placed in, he could escape easily, according to Cat. In fact, his formshift state that placed him on the soul plane even allowed him to ignore the normal Ki-sapping effects of the Starry Sea that would have traditionally rendered him helpless and without any shroud.

The bands of shroud flowing from his chest, down his arm, and into his sigil stopped as Caeden’s whole body pulsed with power. The Hearthhome was far above the island, so far up that they couldn’t be detected easily. Higher up than most etherships dared to go. The highest heights held their own monsters, after all.

But the Hearthhome was a marvel even exceeding the founder’s efforts, and it had a cloaking function that rendered them invisible to Ki sensing, either from the island below or any monsters that might gain an interest.

When he felt his Embodiment start to activate, the intense surge of purple and gold surging from his hand and across his body, Caeden jumped from the deck, diving toward the island far below. As he did, Physical Enhancement dug into his flesh, forcing more power into his body than it had ever held before outside the Forge. And he grew.

And grew.

And grew.

And Grew.

Caeden surged in size, surpassing his former top height with Physical Enhancement so fast his vision distorted and warped as his perspective rapidly shifted in response. Then, it started to shift even more as Caeden’s physical changes entered a second phase, even as his size continued to increase.

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Suddenly, the size change was the only thing complicating his vision. Other sources of auditory and visual information joined the fray, more and more of them added on until Caeden’s original mind would have struggled to process it. But his Embodiment came with the necessary extra brain power to handle the added stimulus.

When his size reached its zenith, Caeden felt the final shift occur. His shroud washed out of his torso at a hundred different points, stabbing into the air around him. As the last of his Embodiment finished, Caeden could now see all around him, from many different angles. He could even see that the etherships below had noticed his descent. It would be hard not to, what with the outsized gold and purple giant falling toward them.

Well, not a giant.

Caeden’s Physical Enhancement Embodiment resembled a cousin species to simple giants, a much rarer, more powerful monster that was confined to only the furthest continents. Both for its power, and its sheer size.

His body, flying past the ships to slam into the surface of the island so hard the material bent and buckled, spanned over a thousand feet in height. His torso held fifty heads and a hundred hands. He was a Hecatoncheires.

Rising up from his crouched position, Caeden found many of his faces level with several ships. Quicker than lightning, massive fists that dwarfed the ships before them slammed out, shattering vessels before they could fire a shot. Those that were outside his range did fire, only to find that their weapons did absolutely nothing to his nearly-invulnerable skin. Even a shot that hit one face in the eye merely caused it to flinch closed.

His newly increased size had done nothing to diminish Caeden’s impressive speed. In fact, with so many heads holding so many brains, his thoughts flew through his minds, and his size allowed him to cover distance in a way unparalleled before.

The island beneath him was smaller than Baserock by about a fifth, but that still left plenty of room for him to move, even with his towering stature. Not worried about his landing, Caeden took a massively enhanced leap through the air, his arcing path taking him through the biggest gathering of etherships.

No doubt some members of their crews might have questioned why such a deliberate leap then took him through empty air, too far from any ship to hit, even with his massively long arms. If the Ethermen within had any real thoughts left. But they would receive their answer in devastating fashion.

Cocking back a dozen fists at once, Caeden unleashed several blows at the empty air between him and the closest ships to his leap. The sheer air force of the blurring mass each arm contained was enough to fling those ships through the air, their frames twisting under the pressure of their sudden and incredibly violent movement.

As he came back down, Caeden deliberately aimed a kick toward the island below, allowing one leg to bear the impact of his whole Hecatoncheires body. When it impacted, a jarring sensation ran up his leg as he slowed down, showing just how durable the artificial island was. But not strong enough. It caved beneath the pressure, bending like metal in one place and cracking like glass in another. Both points of failure let his gargantuan foot sink into the facility beneath the island’s surface.

Prying his foot out of the rent he’d formed, Caeden noticed through one of his fifty heads that his teammates had decided to join in, leaving the Hearthhome behind to terrorize ships as well. It was admittedly a better use of their abilities and time, rather than having Caeden do it. His air blows were strong, but they hadn’t outright destroyed the ships they hit, merely damaged them heavily.

Meanwhile, Cat was sending waves of flying undead to overwhelm ships while a dragon Asherta, fully recovered, flew through another one after her Mithril breath destroyed its energy shield. Erik peeled apart ships with black chains and Lily hurled comets the size of Caeden’s gigantified fists at her targets, followed by bursts of power energy and clouds of burning, melting gas.

So, instead of focusing upward, Caeden shifted it back below. He was going to dig through the ship with his bare hands, if he had to. And he's oh-so-conveniently created a starting point with his leap. Five hands reached down into the cracks he’d made on the surface of the island and began to pull it apart. A cracking, screeching sound rose in protest as he brute forced his way through.

Before he could shove a fist into the gap, Dave suddenly appeared next to one of his faces. At the same time, all his friends pulled off from their harried enemies to descend toward him at speed.

“Boss says she sees one of those CMS chains moving in the soul plane.”

Several of Caeden’s faces frowned.

“WHERE?” His voice boomed out a dozen mouths with enough force to toss Dave through the sky.

“Here! She thinks the founder is trying to move the whole island out from under you.”

At that, Caeden scowled. If he thought it was going to be that easy, he had another thing coming. With a tiny bit of regret, Caeden canceled Blade Forge’s Incarnation. The Entrance Blades back on Baserock or the one in the Hearthhome wouldn’t work now, but he needed his second shroud back.

As his friends reached him, Caeden began pulling Hecatoncheires-sized chains out of the Forge and wrapping them around a dozen of his wrists. “ERIK, BIND THEM.”

Without even asking, Black chains linked Caeden’s forged ones to the island below. At the same time, his teammates took the much safer route, diving into the hole he’d created in the surface. Caeden would have attempted to, but as soon as Blade Forge returned to him, he could sense the fluctuations beneath as the founder opened a CMS-assisted portal and dropped the whole island through it.

A lurch shook the entire artificial structure as they began to fall. Caeden, with the chains in some of his many hands, pulled himself down as flat to the island as possible. He needed to make sure that the founder couldn’t use the portal to cut him in half. At least, not without destroying a large portion of his facility.

As they sank, a wave washed over Caeden, and he felt that deep sucking pull from the water trying to sap his shroud away. But a moment later, the effect lessened dramatically. And Caeden could tell why. The portal connected to a landmass, not the Starry Sea. That meant the environment of the land rendered the effects of the Starry Sea’s waters useless.

Finally, a deep boom shook the island once again, as Caeden slipped through the glowing golden ring that was sucking in tons and tons of water along with the facility/island it was meant to move. Once his many eyes got a clear look at where they were, Caeden felt a little silly for worrying about the portal. It became immediately obvious that the founder had never intended to kill him by closing it when he was partially though.

Because they had landed in the heart of a continent. And they were surrounded by monsters.