How does it feel to fight the Realmbreaker?

I uh… it’s hard to describe… It's like drowning. But even that’s too gentle. It’s like being trapped in a storm, and destined for defeat before you even begin. It’s an exercise in despair, into being overwhelmed.

They keep coming. The attacks. From all angles, different forms and methods, and they all support each other, build on each other, work together like an army controlled by one person…

I don’t know how he does it. I thought I was a good warrior. Wasn’t a person I could beat up until I challenged him. But when I did… fuck, it wasn’t even a fight.

I… I drowned. He pulled me under—everything he does, the surface is just a lie, and what is below… You can… The way he fights is beyond me. Is so layered, too, too much. There was nothing I could do. No Skill. No plan. Nothing. There’s no reality that I beat him. And that’s just the thing: you can’t. You can’t. He’s too much for anyone. You can’t win.

You can’t be the best. Because he already exists….

There’s no hope.

-Jennifer Kane, Trespasser

II-20

Scion of the Celestial Flame (IV)

The world didn’t so much burn as it came asunder. A swelling tide of cascading deconstruction exploded out from the vertical slit lining the Vanguard’s visor. An instant was all it took for empyreal fire to consume kilometers worth of space, unmaking the bulk of Wei’s descending storm.

But not the young master. No. Even with the Vanguard’s impossible power, the young master remained a step ahead. Essenceshifted as a bolt of lightning, he jumped between his watery spheres, using them as conduits for travel and masking his presence. Such was also why he fought apart from his Eidolon, and created so many vectors of attack: obfuscation. A tactic he learned from facing his father and further refined through meditation.

Just as William Yu used his arrows as vehicles of disguise, so too did Wei present an active defense while he conducted his retreat. The young master surged across what remained of his storm while the Vanguard burned and burned, celestial fire cleaving gouges into Wei’s storm, but never striking the one that truly mattered.

Through it all, Wei observed his adversary as well using his Omniscience and gleaned much from his foe. The Celestial Vanguard was a warrior of simplicity. They were impossibly powerful, and unfathomably fast, but their strikes and attacks were blunt to the point of banality. There was no hidden motive in any of their blows, no flow between techniques. And why would there be? With the power they possessed, only an enemy hundred or so Essence Levels higher would be a proper threat.

But this didn’t diminish the Vanguard’s lethality. The more Wei tasted their Essence, the greater his wariness grew. The Remnant Avatar wasn’t just empowered by concepts of Destruction and Creation but was rather the marriage between the two powers. It didn’t so much incinerate as it deconstructed. There was a component of creation to its destruction as well. And the way it regenerated from harm was by using destruction as a tool to warp what was broken back into shape.

Wei’s decision to conduct an evasive offense was a wise one. Even a single hit would have shattered his Eidolon, would have obliterated his armor and flesh besides. A single mistake would see him slain without a chance of turnabout. Wei was dancing on the edge of a burning blade.

But despite the Vanguard’s strengths, Wei observed a single flaw in his adversary.

They were predictable. Reactive. Even more than he was a few fights prior. The Vanguard just attacked. Despite its overpowering offensive and defensive capabilities, it was inflexible, striking at the most obvious targets and outputting Essence at a tremendous, wasteful rate.

This was why, after leaving lingering burn marks on the face of existence itself after unleashing that massive blastwave of deconstructive fire, the Vanguard’s wings dimmed, and its Essence grew paltry. With seven whole kilometers utterly unmade, it was diminished, wings sparking with dying embers, and a shroud of ash swirling around its diminished body and fading glaive. It now resembled a dying fireplace more than an avatar of radiance.

And just in time. Wei’s active defense had paid off. He barely had eight percent of Scorn remaining. The destruction he inflicted allowed him to recoup some of his expenditures, but he was pushed hard as well, creating more spheres of water to hide himself, and more whirlwinds to stall for time.

High above, the strange creatures shaped from wheels, eyes, wings, and alien geometries sang an ethereal orchestra that reverberated with Wei’s very spirit. They were more than spectators, they were a choir, recording this moment as a song. And now, their melody was progressing toward a climax, for Wei had his window of opportunity.

Mustering what remained of his calamities, he unleashed a meteor shower of watery missiles containing sharp chunks of rock, and silvery rapier blades, and flung them forth using the winds of a collapsing tornado.

The Vanguard, now standing as a black spot upon a canvas of white, seemed to have nothing left. It projected no more blasts of fire. It unleashed no more attacks of consuming deconstruction. It only held its glaive high.

And waited.

“Finish this,” the Shell ordered.

Wei was evolving. Not only as a Class or System-host, but his technique and strategies as well. All of his attacks were transforming multitudes, each working with each, each layered upon each. The typhoon slammed into the Vanguard, and it was a testament to their Strength alone that they managed to root in place by burying their wings into the broken ivory tiles that composed the ground. But through the winds came the fluid missiles—watery spheres hammering against the Vanguard as a jolt of electricity rushed through the wetness, detonating silvery blades within and sending earth-shaped fragments into the Vanguard as shrapnel.

Overwhelm. Always pivot into offense. Always adapt—

But Wei noticed something wrong. As his onslaught continued, as the entire arena came asunder, the Vanguard suffered only scratches and dents on their armor. Worse, Wei felt a lingering touch of the avatar’s deconstruction clash against his attack, unmake his elements, and diminish his blows. In an instant, the Vanguard ignited once more, wings and glaive growing brighter, the ash swirling about its body acting as a consuming shroud, draining the very Essence that Wei expended.

The young master halted his remaining salvos and shifted his strategy. This was a mistake. The Vanguard was spent—of that he was sure. Their Essence was dry. Their fires were dim. Yet, his attacks only fueled them, and empowered them once more. He assumed they were weakened. He was wrong. This was a part of how they fought—a natural progression to their power.

As fast as they expended their flames to dissect the material world, so too would their ashen shroud become a deconstructive aegis to find fuel for their fire. The Vanguard cycled from absolute offense and physical reconstruction to absolute defense and Essence regeneration.

“Quite the design,” Wei’s Shell stated. “Many must have fallen before such a foe. Even skilled warriors.”

Yes, Wei agreed. Just as we used its reactivity, it exploited our assumptions.

“Good that you did not commit blindly and offer your neck, then,” the Shell said.

A new blossom of flame expanded out from the Vanguard. Everything in its vicinity disintegrated into tiny motes. Then, with a flap of its six wings, it exploded up into the air, leaving a fiery scar as an afterimage, accelerating so fast the surrounding air combusted and swelled in explosions of force.

Wei cursed and spread his storm out in all directions. The Vanguard just crossed a few kilometers of distance in less than a full second. There was no way to outrun them, but Wei could still trouble them. He expanded his storm in all directions—felt his Scorn drop to five percent—and created watery effigies of himself. He gave them bolts of lightning to wield as spears as well, while also coating his Eidolon in an eruption of stormstuff. Wei himself Essenceshifted into a lightning bolt, hiding himself among his “clones” and jumping between when the flames drew near.

But even these measures were barely enough.

Though his effigies attacked from every angle, though Wei’s strategy was doubtlessly cunning, the Vanguard was unstoppable, and with casual sweeps of its glaive, it channeled a beam that carved through the bulk of Wei’s mirage. The slashes were fast. Faster than Wei could reliably dodge. The first blow barely clipped him—but still took a chunk out of his lightning form. Wei tumbled out of his Essenceshifted state with most of his left rib cage missing.

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But the young master didn’t linger. He accepted the pain and setback. Adapted. Folded into an active defense. At once, he threw himself back with a gust of wind as the Vanguard spotted him. Wei splashed into one of his avatars, superimposed it over himself, and sent it forward in a sacrificial attack. He dismissed and summoned his Eidolon back to his hand and unleashed a Lance of Calamity through his pawn—then Essenceshifted into water, shaped to his own form, before mixing with his remaining clones.

The Vanguard obliterated both Wei’s clone and the Lance with contemptuous ease. However, he noticed something with his Omniscience. The presence of clashing Essences made the Vanguard’s unmaking flame fluctuate briefly. That could create an opening. But right now, he needed to focus on surviving.

As Wei directed his remaining copies to unleash lightning bolt after lightning bolt against the Vanguard, he noted it had given up on defense altogether. Chunks of fiery armor were blown off its shell, but the damage was restored with each flickering flame. Even so, it was growing dimmer. With every explosion of fire or piece of its body reconstructed, it was consuming its own Essence at an absurd rate. Between the vanishing rents left in its armor, though, Wei glimpsed a burning core—just like the Shadeshaper. The target that would bring this fight to an end.

“Do you see that?” his Shell asked.

Yes.

“Good.”

With a final burst of power, a field of deconstruction conflagration swept out, and Wei was sent fleeing as fast as he could, surging along currents of water and abandoning most of his copies—creating new ones on the periphery of his disemboweled storm.

Three percent Scorn left. He wouldn’t be able to do this for another cycle.

Once more, the Vanguard turned dim, and after carving through a kilometer-wide storm with contemptuous ease, it fell from the sky as its wings wilted to ash, as its body turned the color of dying embers.

“Your display of prowess is masterful,” the Celestial Vanguard declared. Its voice was like a bell in the morning, echoing far. “But there is a limit to skill, and you lack the power to overcome me. This is the tragedy of life, but it will guide you in the future. Take this lesson well.”

Wei ignored the Vanguard’s words and plotted his final play.

“We do not possess the capability to destroy the Vanguard while they are dimmed. That will require the use of our System—or an attack of unfathomable power.”

I must break them while they are at their most lethal, Wei deduced. They break easier when bright. But mend fast as well. So, I must land a heavy blow and then continue attacking thereafter to push through the pace of its reconstruction.

An idea came to Wei. He survived earlier by superimposing an Essence-creation over his body. Perhaps the path to victory lay in doing the opposite…

Bolts of lightning lashed out from all directions. They crashed against the Vanguard’s falling form and rather than dealing any obvious damage, simply lit them like a candle. Once more, the Remnant Avatar’s divine fire returned and they unfurled their wings—

Only to be taken by surprise as Wei charged directly at them.

The Vanguard hesitated. Tilting their head before holding their glaive high in salute. “So be it. Show me your heart, worthy challenger.”

Wei surged forward. The Vanguard counter charge. Within five hundred meters of the avatar, Wei felt the power of deconstruction touch his flesh for the first time and nearly lost focus as indescribable agony burrowed his skin. His armor peeled. His flesh dissolved. His Source dropped.

But that wasn’t the hurt Wei was expecting. For just as the Vanguard was about to reach him, Wei’s Broken Crescent, against his spine, created a Lance of Calamity using his very body as a platform. The sensation of his organs and bones churning apart as a construct of lightning, wind, water, earth, and destruction blasted out from him was indescribable. Wei’s consciousness briefly dimmed before his Shell screamed at him.

“Worthless! Stand! Fight!”

Wei returned to himself with a snarl. Saw a trail of Source leaving his mangled torso. Already, the Lance was disintegrating—and Wei guessed the Vanguard was going to blow it apart with a blast of flame. Channeling every bit of Scorn he had left into his Eidolon, he cast his spear forward with a detonation of wind and lightning as it sailed after the Lance, superimposition over superimposition, blow hiding blow.

As expected, the Vanguard retaliated, destroying the young master’s Lance with a swipe of their glaive. But the fire they channeled impacted the Eidolon, and with the Broken Crescent’s destruction came an explosion of excess Essence—an explosion that created a pocket of stability in the Vanguard’s deconstructive aura and sent the avatar reeling back.

“Now!” the Shell snarled.

Wei, kicking off a stone platform he shaped in the last moment, became the final blow himself. He shot across the path of destabilization with rapier leveled.

The Vanguard recovered. But far too late.

A shockwave preceded a resounding impact as Wei buried his blade into the Vanguard’s chest. But not deep enough. The flames rebuilt its warped chestplate. Wei could feel the flames returning, and felt the avatar reaching down from him. He didn’t wait. He acted. He pulled himself up using the hilt of the rapier as a lever. The Vanguard’s hand swiped empty air as the young master reared back—and then jerked himself forward, slamming his knee into the hilt of his blade, sending it all the way through to its core.

A thin gap opened in the Vanguard’s armor. The avatar spasmed. Wei created another blade and stabbed. And stabbed. And stabbed until the Vanguard came asunder in a rippling blast of fire.

Agony and triumph. Such were the feelings in Wei’s heart as he plummeted, cast down like a pebble from heaven by the force of the Vanguard’s destruction. But he didn’t collapse to his knees, and didn't black out from pain.

Instead, he landed hard—on his feet—even darkness crept across his vision, the fingers of death creeping around the corners of his perception.

Source: [13/600]

Wei staggered. Wei drew in wheezing breaths. Wei shook with misery. But he didn’t fall. His back didn’t touch the broken tiles.

What remained of the Vanguard did. The avatar, once a glorious warrior of light and power, smashed a meter away from Wei, with ashes weeping from its broken husk. Its form was deformed and dented, but as the dust faded, the chasm of light that composed its helmet turned to regard Wei, conveying astonishment.

And awe.

For a beat, neither spoke, the young master struggling not to kneel over. The avatar, realizing its own defeat and death.

“I see now,” the Vanguard said. “I see what you are. Yours is… greater than glory. That was… you are a seeker of mastery, of perfection incarnate. I… I no longer lament my existence as a replication… This Instance… was not my prison… it was my absolution. It was my deliverance… unto you. The Creator’s will shines still. No worthier bear of the empyreal flames have I ever seen…”

The fires within the Vanguard’s face began to dim. But still it spoke. “I beg of you, seeker of mastery, take my flame. Use it. Protect our Harmonious One, so that the Creator might grace these realms once more.”

“I… will,” Wei said. Even on the verge of death, he saluted. Decorum was not an aesthetic, it was an expression of who he was, and what he wanted to become. “You honor me… with your flame… I will… use it… and show the hells what it means to burn.”

Slowly, the Vanguard reached out for Wei, but finally, its helmet released an exhalation of ashes as well, and it finally went limp with a parting statement: “Magnificent.”

And Wei stood alone, but the silence was broken, for the angelic entities above sang an ode to his impossible victory, their voices reaching a pitched crescendo beyond what any human—or mortal—could muster.

The Instance smeared.

And Wei still refused to fall.

“Good,” his Shell said, standing beside him. It offered no further congratulations beyond that. “This is… acceptable. But we can be better. We could have overcome that without insulting ourselves with near death.”

“Yes,” Wei agreed. “Yes.”

Instance completed!

Integrating [Celestial Vanguard] with Current Class Specialization…

Scion of the Celestial Flame (Mythical) — Specialization unlocked by defeating a Celestial Vanguard and prevailing over the powers of creation itself. Grants the user the power to wield a celestial flame born of Greater Destruction and Greater Creation. All that exists can be unmade, and all that is ash can return to flame

>Aspect Advancements Per Level: +22 Strength, +18 Speed, +14 Mind, +14 Awareness, +22 Constitution, +14 Will, +10 Free Points

>Abyssal Invocation (Evolution): [Empyreal Wrath] — Become an avatar of Destruction and Creation, and let the celestial flame spill from your onslaught. You gain access to the [Greater Force,] [Greater Destruction,] [Celestial Lightning,] [Celestial Ichor,] [Heavenly Stone,] [Divine Wind], and [Greater Creation] Essences and can direct them as if strikes from your body. When your Essence is expended, it allows you to gain back Essence by deconstructing oncoming attacks. The damage you can resist in your dimmed state is determined by your Strength. The amount of force you can exert on the world is based on your Aspect of Strength. The scope of your influence is determined by your Perception. Your control over the celestial fire is determined by Will. Annihilation and rebirth are but twins of a womb.

Concept Core of (Creation) [Minor]

Concept Core of (Deconstruction) [Minor]

>Skill Shard Evolution: [Lance of Annihilation] — Expends all Scorn to create a lance of celestial flame. Damage is determined by Strength.

>Eidolon Form Evolution: [Celestial Fang]

“This…” Wei groaned. “This will do.”

Specialization Evolution Accepted.

Beginning Evolution…

***

The Trespassers stood silent. Even Bishop didn’t have words.

“Well, then,” Nils finally breathed. “We seemed to have adopted a fucking monster.”

“Yeah,” Bishop muttered. “Starting to think that William might’ve lost that fight even if he went with a higher Class-Tier.”

John Doe stood apart from the rest, his face practically pressed against the golden screen. This was… worse than he could have possibly imagined. There were still things he could teach the boy, techniques, strategies, but…

It seemed like Wei might just figure out these missing lessons on his own after a few more fights. If it would even take that long. And that was the least of his concerns. He made eye contact with Moonscar and knew them both to be two of a mind. “Our time frames are no longer accurate. The boy will be beyond our means to contend with directly within two months. Likely less. By the time the invasion begins, I will be unable to overcome him alone.”

“I know,” Moonscar replied. “I’ll make adjustments. We continue as planned for now.”

And despite her message, John Doe caught the grimace flashing across her face.

A monster. John Doe snorted. An improper word: Monsters were easy to kill. But a master… a master needed to be outmatched in all areas to overcome. And now, they were going to be eclipsed not only in terms of power, but also skill. “Fuck.”