Lucretia and Alta lay panting in the shadowy in-between area that only the Pantheon had access to. They had developed the equivalent of the Nexus Ways, with some added comforts. Yet neither could take advantage of them now. Both of them were thoroughly exhausted after intervening in the Path that Randidly had earned in the wider Nexus.

“Does he not even notice how much Aether flows through him?” Alta groaned, rolling onto her stomach. She kept moving her arms, as though she sought out the least painful position. “God, I need a vacation.

Lucretia chuckled. “What you need is to train a bit harder before the fate of our fearless leader is on the line. And no, he probably doesn’t notice the energy. He didn’t know it at the time, but expanding to become the Alpha Cosmos would have been impossible without his Soulbond to Neveah. While he continued to gather materials, she is the one paying attention to the infrastructure of himself and apportioning out Aether. They form a potent duo.”

Alta grunted as she pushed herself onto her hands and knees. Lucretia looked at the other woman fondly, despite her grouchy expression. Currently, Alta wore a younger version of her body, before she allowed the bitterness and rage she held toward the Ghosthound to sear her physical form with such heat that she had to reinforce it with metal to prevent herself from turning to ash.

Lucretia liked this version of Alta. It reminded her of simpler, less busy times. But she could also sense how vital it was that she support Randidly for a little while longer before she granted herself a bed of oblivion on which to rest.

“The Aether he took to adjust that Path was enough for a hundred regular Paths,” Alta grumbled as she rubbed her stomach. “Ughhh… I haven’t ached like this since the worst days of being a charred cinder of a woman.”

“That’s the benefit of standing at the top,” Lucretia said lightly. “No expense spared for your improvements. But better that we alter Path result than let the System give him that trap of a reward that was there. You might not be aware of it, but the last few times the System has tried something like that, he’s punched a hole in the overlay System to rip the threat out. I don’t think he would damage us when he did that, but better safe than sorry.”

“He’s a dangerous enemy to have,” Alta said. And from the thread of awe that Lucretia could hear in her voice, she meant it as a compliment.

Both looked up at the same time. Lucretia with a wry smile and Alta with an aggrieved expression.

“How much PP is he going to spend at once?” There were deep shadows below Alta’s eyes as she forced herself to her feet. “Lucretia, I don’t want to shirk, but if we need to channel that much Aether again-”

“That won’t be necessary.” Into the between zone, two figures flashed. One was an amorphous blob of plasma, undulating slightly. The other was a charming older man. The Patron of the Void and Patron of Blades bowed to the two women. The Patron of Blades straightened and pushed back his hair. “Ladies, how can we call ourselves gentlemen if we stand by while you exhaust yourselves? Please, accept our assistance.”

*****

While his Stillborn Phoenix rolled and crackled with its growing hunger in the wake of finishing that Path, Randidly turned his attention elsewhere. He wanted to give the image some time to settle before he tried the Weakness of the Stillborn Phoenix Path. His eyes glowed emerald as he moved on to his next choice. PP flowed away and he earned free Stats in response.

Congratulations! You have completed Violence Incarnate, the Storm’s Descent Path! In the middle of the wilderness, your Path took you past a strange tunnel into the ground. You looked over the broken stone steps leading into darkness and didn’t hesitate even for a moment; you allowed shadows to lap against your feet as you descended into the ground, drawn by the intuition that what you would find waiting for you could benefit you on your Path to the Pinnacle.

In the end, what you found was an ambush.

Randidly’s awareness flickered. He sank into the Path notification, suddenly feeling his feet press against the next stair below him and the cutting attacks lashing out at him from the side. His instincts took over, his body blurring to eliminate the threat even before it arrived. Notifications continued to appear in front of him, even as he fought.

From the shadowy alcoves along this descent came bone sickles and rusted stakes, the grand armaments of a carrion race lurking beneath the surface. They are horned goblins, bulbous and swollen bellied, sour with envy toward surface dwellers. Your defensive movements shatter the bones of this weak group and send their bodies splattering across the walls. Yet your show of strength does little to slow the assault. Eyes glow in the darkness around you as you slaughter more and more of these assailants, filling the air with the scent of blood.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Continue to glide down into hell. How deep in the shadows can you sink, until you can no longer breathe?

So Randidly threw himself fully into the imagined slaughter, wanting to squeeze every last drop of benefit he could from this Path. For a while, it wasn’t even a challenge. His hands, feet, and even his tail swept back and forth, the invulnerable and irresistible judgment of a god. His descent speed quickened and their Stats seemed to rise, but compared to the heights he had reached, they were nothing. He sprinted down the cracked stone passage, simply obliterating some by crashing into them with all the force of a freight train.

However, as Randidly himself had discovered, eventually numbers began to add up.

A squat, goblinish body bounced against the floor as Randidly backhanded it out of his way. Blood sprayed from its mouth, but the bodies of the creatures were covered in a thick carapace. It cracked upon the impact, yet it crawled to its feet and groped for its weapon. Randidly’s eyes flashed.

Truly desperate to survive? I’ll show you what desperation is.

The Grey Creature raised its head and keened a mournful dirge through gritted teeth. Then the image’s razor-sharp fingers scythed through the crowd of bodies. As the Path beings died, Randidly continued to descend. He came upon larger and larger antechambers, cavernous arenas with legions of grim-eyed defenders. Their weapons grew more sophisticated, still rusted by more directly designed to slay.

The small changes in equipment proved irrelevant.

Randidly gradually escalated his capabilities as he continued to crash and crush his way forward. First the Grey Creature, then all three of his images running free, then his image physicalizations combined with Skill activations, triplicate Skill activation, then manipulation of Nether, then a storm of violence with himself at the center, still overwhelming more powerful than these beings.

The Path began to hum, resonating with the deadly force of the Nether storm.

The violence sang around him and Randidly gave himself easily over to its song. After training for eleven months, feeling the escalating tensions on Expira, watching Annie and Hank hunting for the founder of this terrorist organization, feeling the surly bubbling resentment as more and more alien refugees fled from their homeworlds, desperate to get off their previously barren worlds even as Aether began to flow around them…

He needed a release. Something pure and harmless. Something that harkened back to his early days in the Nexus, where he was so preoccupied with surviving and handling the training that he had no ability to think.

And this Path seemed perfectly tailored to do exactly that.

Randidly gave himself over to the Path dream, scraping drying blood and dirt off his arms and tail before he walked down to the next area. Again and again, his hand punched through a chest plate, the Stillborn Phoenix did its best imitation of entropy and sucked at a monster until it was a hollow puppet, Synechdochence manifested a vicious spearhead that obliterated a massive titan of these underground guardians. Faster and faster, pushing his body and Nether Core and empowered emotion to the limits. Flames of Nether Weight marched across his skin and his images burned in their physicalized forms, gleaming with more substance than the horned goblins that stood in their way.

Congratulations! Your Skill Cosmic Necessity (M) has grown to Level 671!

Congratulations! Your Skill Soulful Vigor (L) has grown to Level 218!

Plus, earning back some of the PP I spent to get here. Randidly grinned widely as he twisted around and slammed a dream version of Acri into the neck of an over-muscled titan. He yanked the serrated blade out, spraying blood sideways into the eyes of a group of tall monster spear users. Yggdrasil snorted dismissively and the monsters’ veins came alive in their bodies, wriggling up and strangling them before they could even strike at Randidly.

Congratulations! Your Skill the World Tree Suffers Only Fealty (P) has grown to Level 870!

Randidly descended. He fought. He began receiving small injuries, but his new Egg’s Illusory Plume meant that none were more than flesh wounds. Just enough sting to send a tingle through his nervous system. The churning storm of kinetic force around him grew and grew, winds howling in the enclosed space until they could suppress the defenders of this place all on their own. But Randidly continued to sink into shadow, submerging himself in ambushes and mindless responses, with the defenders gradually growing some resistance to the crashing waves of Nether.

The next cavern Randidly found was ringed in sharp blades and amorphous beings that flowed and shifted, depending on the situation. A few of these defenders began to display their own images. Potent images that gave him pause.

A brief pause. Randidly started moving shortly. And to his opponent’s dismay, that break empowered his Dreadful Alacrity.

These more powerful variations multiplied as he continued to follow the dream. Battles began to stretch. New and unusual images arrived, different flavors that felt familiar to his subconscious, but nothing that he bothered to pull himself out of the haze of violence to investigate. He was just glad to have more capable opponents.

After a fight that felt like it lasted an entire day, Randidly wiped blood from his forehead. His grin seemed glued to his face, his cheeks aching from holding the position for so long. But when he went to the far side of the cavern, no further staircase waited for him. Sitting on a pile of broken weapons was a bone dagger that caught his eye, with a large chunk of obsidian set in the hilt. Gradually, his fighting focused mind woke itself back up. The churning currents of Nether that flowed around him began to still. Following his instincts, he picked up the weapon and clicked his tongue. “Ah, too bad. I was just starting to really let loose.”

From somewhere nearby, he heard a woman’s pained groan and a tired man’s wry chuckle.

Congratulations! Like a storm, you ripped through the perilous descent and scoured it clean, finding the condensed origin of violence at the bottom. Congratulations! Stamina +1000! Grim Intuition +200! You have gained the Skill Origin of Violence (M)-

Recalculating…

Congratulations! Your Skills Origin of Violence (M) and Cosmic Necessity (M) have merged to form Wicked Waltz of Tartarus (T)! Skill Level will be maintained.