Shaun fell back on the bed, emotionally exhausted from having to answer the questions that Gabe and Eric had for him. They hadn’t been in his apartment for that long, maybe an hour tops, but with every question they asked he had to come up with an answer that was as close to the truth as he could make it without revealing anything that could potentially expose his secret heritage. Because of that he ended up telling some lies, which ended up with him telling more lies, and in the end he really didn’t know if they believed all of his responses but they didn’t call him out on it.
The easiest questions were on the gem and gauntlet, he was honest about where he got the gem and the metal, even going into detail about meeting the Merfolk and explaining what he knew about some the factions seeding some of the dungeons with copies of themselves throughout the tutorials. That ended up into a larger conversation as to the twelve powers but he hadn’t had a chance to read the book yet so it was mostly a conversation about whether they would be looking to join clans.
It wasn’t until they started talking about Shaun and how he had completed so many dungeons alone and how he had defeated the 10th wave when even the 3rd most powerful person here couldn’t manage it in a group. That was when the lies truly started, he confessed to having an affinity, choosing to tell them that it was for fire, leading to a wider conversation about affinity and how he had gotten one, what it did and exactly how much power it gave him. He was mostly honest about it, explaining the title you could get, the increase in some attributes and how helpful it was in battle. But that was when he ended up having to skirt around the truth and lie about having more than one affinity, the increase in titles, his heritage and also how exactly that all factored into his class and profession.
When it came to his mana and how he had so much, he explained that he got Soul in both his class and profession, leading to a higher than normal amount of Soul stat but didn’t explain that it was practically doubled from all of his affinity and titles. They became sceptical at this point, as even if every single stat increase went into his soul stat from his level ups it still wouldn’t account for it being so high.
In the end they agreed to put all of their mana into the gem, Shaun doing the same to show them how it worked, before they left, not entirely happy about the information they had received, but also knowing that if he didn’t tell them the entire truth there was a reason behind doing so. As soon as they left he showered, changed into something comfortable and laid down on the bed, ready to start reading one of the books he had gotten from the store.
He had the four books in front of him, A History of the Major Faction’s, A Creatures Guide of the Multiverse, Affinity: Elements and the Multiverse, and finally, Rune’s and Crafting: Book 1. He was currently debating which one to start with, but the most pressing issue was what was going to occur in the next few weeks, many clans were sending representatives to watch them fight, and to scout them out, because of that he needed to know which ones to avoid and which ones might be the safest for him. Because of that he started with the history book.
The first few chapters were pretty straight forward, explaining that in the 1st era, they were currently in the 72nd era according to the timeline of the book, the 71st era had ended with the integration of his own universe, the twelve major factions were formed, each led by the most powerful beings in existence, the Ancients. From what the book described the 1st era was when order came to be in the multiverse and the Ancients became the ruling beings, bringing with it prosperity and what could only be described as a hierarchy across the integrated universe. Rules were put into place and everyone fell into line, although the book described this as being a peaceful time, Shaun highly doubted that, such wide scale change did not occur overnight and something had to be the trigger for it but the book didn’t go into any details around how it all occurred.
The book continued on, the next 24 chapters of the book detailing each of the twelve major factions, two chapters for each faction, one covering the major power itself and its focus, the next covering the types of clans under it. This is where it all got interesting, he only knew of one faction so learning about each of them was something that he was looking forward to.
The first power that the book explored was The Empire, a faction that’s main focus was on war and fighting, creating the best warrior’s within the multiverse. It was led by the Ancient simply known as The Empress, who’s main focus was to find and train the best creatures, regardless of race, in the art of war. The more he read about them, he found that the clans that made up The Empire would increase and decrease in rank based on the amount of power that they held, competitions would occur, mini wars really, where the winners would increase closer to the top of the faction while the loser would drop. It was a somewhat barbaric notion, but apparently it was one of the most powerful and popular powers to join into, the main reason for this being that they were provided with ample opportunities to grow in strength, and if you did manage to survive what was thrown at you, the rewards were apparently worth it.
After The Empire, he read about the faction called The Pantheon, it was a faction made up of different groups of gods, reading he found that that the Ancient who ruled was simply referred to as The King of Gods, but when he kept reading he soon realised that he had heard about this Ancient power in Earth myth, It was Zeus, taken straight from Greek mythology. But what their ancient histories got wrong was that he didn’t just rule over Greek gods, no, the most powerful clans that made up The Pantheon were so very similar to the Egyptian, Roman, Celtic, Norse and so many others that it gave him whiplash just reading about this faction. The purpose of The Pantheon, if one read between the lines, was to serve the gods, and in return you would be offered protection and chances to prove your worth and grow. It was one of the largest factions too, how? He had no idea. But they were strong, so many of the gods fell in under Zeus, and with them all the clans that made up of all the worshipers of these gods. It was mind blowing. And what was even more crazy was that many of the lesser gods aimed to be in The Pantheon, being ruled by their King.
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The next two major factions were the complete opposite of each other, Life’s Union, ruled by The All Giver, and Death’s Legion, who simply had the title of Death. Life’s Union was pretty straight forward, they focused on all aspects of life, from nature to birth, not discriminating on race and simply allowing for all of those who wished to form a clan under them to come, the only rule was that you gave yourself to life and joined in the never ending battle against Death. And for Death’s Legion, it was made up by any race or being attuned to death, Ghouls, Zombies, Vampires, not to mention beings he had never heard of. They allowed in other races, those who wished to join them in death if they proved themselves worthy. The entire thing was insane, and again joining them meant entering a war with Life.
The next two factions again seemed like they were in a constant struggle, The Holy Light Faction, who’s Ancient god was simply referred to as The Holy Mother, was in opposition to The Nine Circles Faction, led by The Morning Star. The entire thing was insane, what he read was literally two factions that resembled the fight against Heaven and Hell, down to an Ancient being named Morning Star, literally Lucifer himself, and the Holy Mother, who if he was to guess was where Earth got the God moniker from. The Holy Light Faction was made up of Angels, honest to god Angels forming the main faction, with many of the clans formed of any being who wished to unite the multiverse in the Holy Mothers embrace and bring peace to all citizens of the multiverse, joining the struggle against the demons. The Nine Circles, for their part was made up of many demonic beings and was very popular amounts those in the multiverse as the promise to be transformed into ones demonic form, which would provide a large increase in power, was an easy way to gain attributes and a Demonic Affinity.
Reading on, the next few factions were a little less intense. The Dynasty was a faction focused on trade and wealth, led by the Ancient called The Master, whose main focus was expanding across the entire multiverse, being the main faction who controlled coin, trade and the overall wealth of each faction. They worked closely with The Creator’s Guild, a faction completely dedicated to all types of crafting, from weapons to items, alchemy to complete body enhancement, it included rituals and rune smithing, all led by the god named The Creator. All those wishing to join either faction had to show some ability in their respective fields, as well as a desire to improve and grow in their respective fields.
The next faction, The Unending Void, was a little different, apparently they started out with wanting to explore the depths of the nothingness between everything, whatever that meant, but soon found that they wished to find the answers to all things that were unknown. It was a research focused faction, one that wanted to uncover things that were not known, it was all about knowledge, and at the lead was the god known as Chaos.
The Collective of Beastial Creatures was next, this one he already knew about, many unique and different beings lived within this faction, it was primarily focused on races outside of the norm, ruled by the Ancient Genisis. What he didn’t know was that they formed a close tie to the next faction, The Elementals, a faction made up of the more elemental focused beings and creatures, even monsters that had evolved. As long as you were tied to one of the elements, any of them really, there was a place for you. Even if you were willing to completely give yourself over to any of the elements, they would let you join with an oath. The Symphonium, the power that controlled the faction, was always interested in those that showed unique connections to any element in the multiverse.
The last faction in the book was different to the others, the chapters much shorter, the faction was known as The Alliance, the Ancient who ruled was just named The Betrayer. What he read sent his mind racing, it said that The Alliance was formed by the races left from the losing side of the Great War. They were the smallest faction, made up predominantly of the Fae and Dragon’s and joining the faction was done on invite only.
Shaun raced through the rest of the book, looking for any more mention of The Alliance, anything mentioning the Great War, but all that was left in the book was talk of what each of the powers, and their clans, looked for in recruits. Frustrated when he finished the book, finding no more information on The Alliance, he threw the book down and got up from his bed and started pacing. It said the races that were left after the Great War, that means that races didn’t make it, that some were completely wiped out, extinct, and that only the Fae and Dragons were left afterwards! But what were the other races!
Turning back to his bed he pulled the book on races open, opening it up he searched for the chapter on the Fae, what he found was limited, it described them as one of the most powerful races in the multiverse, but also one of the smallest, they were all part of The Alliance and were one of the first races to be integrated into the system. They were tall and great warriors, had pointed ears, larger than normal canine teeth and lived longer lives than normal. That was it.
Frustrated he turned to the chapter on Dragons, again it spoke of them being one of the most powerful races in the multiverse but also one of the smallest, they also gained the ability to shift into a humanoid form upon reaching C grade. There was many types of Dragons and they ranged in size. All Dragons were part of The Alliance. That’s it! What the actual hell!
The chapters on the other races were much larger, but these two were so short, not even filling a page in the book. He flipped to the index looking through all the names of the races to see if anything would stand out, but nothing. Frustration built within him until he couldn’t help but let out a scream, throwing the book back onto the bed and having an urge to take out his anger on something, anything, but he didn’t. He took deep breaths trying to calm himself down.
When he had brought himself back under control he decided that he would need to read the entire book on races and try and see if he could pick up anything more on this Great War, any clues as to what it was, who was involved and why it occurred. If he didn’t find anything he might risk going back to the book shop and try and get another book, it would be risky, but potentially worth it. Sitting back on his bed he got to reading the book, from the very beginning to end, and hopefully something may come of it.