That same shift in Abiodun’s image that Randidly had sensed was put on an even grander display as Lady Iellaya’s image unfurled in the sky. It’s raven wings stretched outward, rapidly drawing the attention of the Nether Gatekeepers that had been eagerly approaching Abiodun. Even without Grim Intuition, anyone watching could tell that the Nether Gatekeepers rapidly realized that they had made a mistake. Their postures oozed fear as the shadow of vast wings spread outward.

The inky-black wings of Lady Iellaya’s image stretched wider and wider until they gradually revealed an undulating, scaly body within the sea of feathers. Rather than being beautiful and glossy like the black wings, the scales were mud brown tinged with rust. It was a slender but eminently ugly body that the raven-winged serpent revealed. Its nose was square and oversized, with a squat snout and beady eyes. Its flicking tongue was tubular, like a fleshy straw.

Yet none could deny its power as the serpent raised its heads and roared.

The whole of the frontlines stirred. Compared to the other forces that had made their presence known thus far, the power of Lady Iellaya’s image stood at the peak. Randidly couldn’t even tell exactly how powerful she truly was. He didn’t have the depth or perspective to conceptualize what he was seeing.

With a beat of her wings, raven feathers were scattered around to drift slowly down over her camp like a queer sort of snow. The image was so poignant and realistic that Randidly sensed Salazar outside gleefully collecting the jet-black feathers that had fallen into their area of the camp.

Although the serpent at the core of those wings might be ugly, it certainly knew its business. As soon as it arrived its jaws chomped down on an unlucky Nether Gatekeeper that didn’t retreat quickly enough. There was a second of stillness as all present heard the distinctive sound of this winged serpent chewing up the body of a Nether Gatekeeper, but then its companions hurriedly began to attack.

Lady Iellaya’s image audibly swallowed, raised its head and screamed, and then threw its wings wide. Most of the surrounding Nether Gatekeepers were thrown backward by the blast of force and emotion, but one was acutely bisected as Lady Iellaya wielded the sharp edge of her raven wings like an enormous blade.

Within five seconds of her arrival, Lady Iellaya’s image began to run rampant, intent on devouring the surrounding Nether Gatekeepers for sport. Her influence on the surrounding battlefield was so immediately felt that two of the Nether Gatekeepers from Terith’s camp hurried over to assist. The four weaker individuals who had been struggling to survive for the past several hours finally had a chance to relax, and it also gave Vualla more room to use her increasingly precise style of fighting to suppress the surrounding Nether Gatekeepers.

Of course, the Aether forces were still teetering on routing across the frontlines on the other flank. The Commanders there couldn’t hold on for much longer against multiple Nether Gatekeepers working together. The common soldiers around said Commanders were trampled and died as their leaders could do nothing but give more ground.

Randidly sighed lightly. As much as he struggled, he couldn’t keep his heartbeat even. We all have our roles to play… Is my role really to just wait here for another two hours…? It was a bitter pill to swallow, to have Randidly’s only touch across the fight to be his aura.

Congratulations! Your Skill Ruinous Drive (Ru) has grown to Level 69!

Congratulations! Your Skill Ruinous Drive (Ru) has grown to Level 70!

As time marched by determinedly from the two-hour mark toward three hours, the rocky outcropping of the Aether Headquarters became the pivot point between two sides of the frontlines. Like a teeter-totter with a slightly chubbier child on one end, the right flank buckled while Lady Iellaya’s dominance on the left gave Aether forces renewed vigor. At the center, Lord Miln’s touches combined with Nadia and Kailm’s valiance meant that the fights were largely even.

Randidly’s focus slid between Lord Miln, Lady Iellaya, and Vualla. He watched their movements, studied the reverberations of their images. From them, Randidly could slowly feel the dispositions of these three figures that stepped up and became the focal points of the battlefield after Randidly was outmatched.

Although Lady Iellaya was the dominant force that allowed the left flank to thrive, it was actually Vualla that ended up being the one to stabilize it. At this point, she now held the attention of six Nether Gatekeepers herself, calmly throwing incisively sharp punches one after the other. Which meant that none of Nether Gatekeepers attack Commander Terith’s camp could be spared, and reinforcements had to come from deeper along the sea of Nether forces.

This eased up the strain on the camps along the left flank and allowed some second-in-commands there to be dispatched to assist with the right flank’s woes. It wasn’t much, but it was everything that could be spared.

Yet that stuff was ultimately lost in Randidly’s near-trance like state. Like clouds in a blue sky, those impressions passed as the wind of time continued to blow through. Instead, Randidly’s focus followed Vualla’s strikes and Lady Iellaya’s stubby, vicious jaws.

Because there was a thread of similarity that he discovered there; Randidly was absolutely sure that it hadn’t been present before today. His mind ticked forward. Uneasiness gradually bubbled upward. Both Lady Iellaya and Vualla now seemed more powerful than they had been yesterday. And most of that power came from a sudden increase in personal strength.

In Lady Iellaya’s case, it was clearly relating to the change in her Class and Fate that empowered her image. It was that strange darkness that was able to so suddenly blossom in the fertile ground of potential that Randidly had erected for her. Yet that image of the raven winged serpent didn’t have some grand image within it as it moved, although it pulled along behind it some sort of eternal darkness. No, it was simply strong.

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Strong in a way that spoke to depth. And for all that Lady Iellaya was Randidly’s superior and possessed the potential of hundreds of subordinates, she had only been on the frontlines for five years. Before that, she was likely at the same tier of power as Randidly. Five years was not enough to create the weight that Randidly sensed.

But what really froze Randidly’s blood was the fact that Vualla was experiencing a similar shift. No longer was she using the image of destruction as a bludgeon to empower her attacks. Instead, all the destruction came from her relatively mundane moves. The fulcrum of transferring power through her limbs became so perfectly arranged that she didn’t need to layer an image on top of what she was doing; she simply created destruction by moving. And she was growing more proficient in it with every strike.

A sliver of uneasiness stirred the juices in Randidly’s stomach. Was the focus on personal power really a coincidence? Or did that shadow of the alternate Vualla that Randidly had passed onto Lady Iellaya have some basis in reality?

And that same shadow was now cast over Vualla. Even if Randidly couldn’t sense that familiar darkness that touched Lady Iellaya and Abiodun’s new images, he wouldn’t let down his guard. So he watched, letting the fights and images blur together in one large swirl.

At about three hours and twenty minutes since his break had started, Randidly blew a powerful breath out through his nose. His trance was broken; the swirl of his thoughts was starting to disturb his actual recovery. Still, even if he wasn’t quite at his peak, most of his capacity had been restored. Remaining within the tent was a waste of time. Especially when the dim lighting would drive his mind right back to dwelling on the shift in Vualla.

Congratulations! Your Skill Ruinous Drive (Ru) has grown to Level 71!

Although he still was going to follow Abiodun’s relayed order, Randidly had some thoughts on the way that he could still affect the battlefield. Striding forward, Randidly pushed open the door to his tent. In their excitement, both the enlarged Acri and Sulfur who had encased his left arm began to hum.

Randidly could only shake his head at his plant’s enthusiasm for violence and look out over the battlefield. Yet just as quickly, he narrowed his eyes and spoke to the idle Zauna. “...where’s Salazar?”

Zauna flexed her stony hands and cracked her knuckles. “...down on the frontlines. He couldn’t… sit.”

Sure enough, Grim Intuition quickly located Salazar a short distance behind the stable form of Abiodun. Several exhausted Aether soldiers were crowded around him. Inwardly, Randidly shook his head at himself for being so distracted by the similarities in the changes between Lady Iellaya and Vualla’s shift that he had missed his subordinate moving.

Even from here, Randidly could feel Salazar talking to those soldiers. It wasn’t an offensive boost, but the visual variations around Salazar rapidly stilled as he enthusiastically orated. If Abiodun was stone and Randidly was a tree, Salazar’s influence was more akin to water. It was not exceedingly power, but it flowed through the broken cracks that Nether had created in the surrounding space and stabilized the situation. Even if it was just a morale boost to the surrounding groups, it was an effective one.

“He has a good heart,” Randidly said with a lot of difficulty. His heart trembled as he looked down at Salazar. After all, he was extremely clear on how weak Salazar was; even a three-star Nether Beast could devour the snake-man while fending off another soldier with its other hand. Yet even though he was weak, his peculiar vehemence while telling stories was enough to steady even the air.

Zauna nodded and crossed her arms. Randidly’s tongue was thick in his mouth, but some part of him was strangely comforted to look down at the back of Salazar’s head. Randidly wasn’t the only one struggling out here.

He wasn’t alone.

Tilting his head at Zauna, Randidly asked. “Do you want to fight too?”

She shook her head, but then added quietly. “...waiting for orders…”

Randidly resisted an urge to roll his eyes. What was it with these stone people and orders? Must be purposefully aggravating. “Go. I’m almost fully recovered and will rejoin the battlefield shortly. Warm them up for me.”

Without another word, Zauna hurried away, leaving Randidly alone on the high vantage point above Lady Iellaya’s camp. The roars of Nether Beasts and the sounds of Aether weapons hitting the fake flesh of the opposition drifted upward. Even with his Grim Intuition, the two forces slowly blended together; the bodies were pressed closely together in a chaotic stew of sweat and blood.

“This is war,” Randidly said softly. And as he spoke that word, he allowed all of the frustration over his own weakness to fall away. He wasn’t alone. He had allies that he needed to trust. Instead of letting his mind ferret at the strands of uneasiness that had recently manifested in his mind, Randidly reached to his belt and hefted up the Philosopher’s Key.

He didn’t attempt to activate any of the abilities, that would almost immediately negate all the gains that Randidly had made on the front of his mental energy, but Randidly carefully examined the key itself.

Its gold exterior gleamed dully. The two square teeth at the end of the key were refreshingly simple. It did not look expensive or powerful. It simply looked functional. Because ultimately a key is just a tool. What really matters is how the key relates to the world. And to find that out… the easiest place to look is at the owner.

The Philosopher’s Key, huh…

Ignition Essence stirred inside Randidly’s chest. He didn’t pursue any of those thoughts too deeply, but Randidly mused over his role. What could he accomplish? Where did his personal strength come from?

What was the Philosopher?

The assigned timelimit to the break ticked ever closer. And only a minute prior to the end of the four-hour break, several things on the battlefield changed.

Even with the assistance of individuals from the left flank, the right flank of the Aether forces finally buckled. One of the interior camps was completely eviscerated, leaving the two camps to its right completely isolated and surrounded by a season of vicious Nether Beasts looking on with hungry eyes.

Lord Miln’s familiar image stirred above the towering rocky outcropping. His personal forces began to move.

Lady Iellaya stopped toying with the thirty or so Nether Gatekeepers in front of her and surged forward, killing a half dozen in only five seconds. The black ichor of the Nether Gatekeeper dripped into her raven wings, blending in completely.

In response to these changes, the entire battlefield became aware of one thing: above the battlefield in the Great Rift, the Nether King finally opened his eyes. Its body wasn’t vast, but those two eyes burned like flares in the Great Rift. Not a sound needed to be spoken, for his hatred was sign enough that the state of the battlefield was about to change.