Long hours of tension left Randidly’s veins bulging in a grotesque manner across his arms and neck. His teeth were pressed tightly shut, a single twitch from painful grinding. His powerful muscles were practically wood at this point, tightening around his bones and binding him into a single, splayed position.

This… cannot continue.

Congratulations! Your Skill Yyrwood Flesh of Yggdrasil (L) has grown to Level 370!

It was, Randidly admitted to himself with quite a bit of deserve self-exasperation, impossible to forcefully overcome the electromagnetic manifestations of his Fatepiece with muscular strength. Or rather, there wasn’t really any point to resisting the energy directly; the Hierarchy of Demand needed an outlet for the universal drag, not someone who could withstand that energy while maintaining his normal life.

This wasn’t a weight he needed to lift, but more of a river that he needed to allow to flow over him.

With that in mind, Randidly gradually released an aggrieved sigh and quieted the growling Grim Chimera in his chest. A nebula of swirling negative emotions had steadily gathered around him over the past several days as he gritted his teeth and threw every muscle in his body against the electrifying serpents, but now he directed the Stillborn Phoenix to devour all of that pooling strife and struggle.

Instead of straining, Randidly just breathed. The natural and mundane movements of a body gradually asserted themselves. His thrashing body continued to twitch and twist, but the violence of the movements steadily fell as he restrained himself. Soon he floated in the misty void while being afflicted by the occasional twitch, but surrendering to the muscle spasms robbed his body of its tension and therefore the painful side effects.

Still, it does fucking feels like a surrender… Randidly thought with a sardonic smile. Then he shook his head at his own aggression. Honestly, there was no need to rush to complete this Fatepiece. There were several levels before Randidly even got to the next layer of the damn thing. Taking his time was for the best.

Besides, the current layer basically just improved Randidly’s understanding and control over his own muscles and skeleton. The annoying serpents of electricity did an annoyingly thorough job of pointing out the areas in his body that were constructed subtly different than they had been when he was wholly human. He had obviously investigated himself somewhat after being remade by the Grim Chimera, but when he noticed human-looking areas, Randidly had admittedly assumed that the functions and tendons of those areas would be the same.

As Randidly continued to breathe, his bulging veins thankfully receded to within his flesh.

In a way, the Fatepiece currently benefited Randidly most by showing him just what sort of being he now was. But this sort of understanding wasn’t something that could be rushed; Randidly decided to relax in the face of electricity and turn his focus to other things.

Still, that didn’t mean that Randidly would simply rest upon this modest success. He closed his eyes and traveled to that growing sympathy between himself and the Hierarchy of Burden. He readied himself and then increased the strength of the connection.

Influence +15!

Congratulations! Your Fatepiece the Hierarchy of Burden has grown to Level 4!

Randidly spread his arms in the shaft, moving slowly so as to minimize any spastic tremors due to the constant stream of electricity swimming through his flesh. The first few moments were always the hardest when increasing the Level of this Fatepiece. The abrupt presence of the empowered forces always ended up being more disruptive than the enduring forces themselves. The newly invigorated pythons of crimson electricity twined up and down his arms and legs, lashing out with their tongues and tails to trigger his major muscle groups.

Which meant that for a few minutes, Randidly once more twitched like a mutt being devoured by an army of fleas.

But inevitably, Randidly’s body adjusted. His powerful flesh accepted the unpredictable impulses of the Hierarchy. Gradually, he could relax. And once Randidly had enough spare attention to deal with other things, he focused elsewhere and allowed his body to adjust subconsciously. His attention could shift to the heavy lining of Nether that was now contained in his Soulspace.

Obviously using up this Nether now meant that Randidly would need to spend more time accumulating before he could attempt to weave a Nether Ritual around a whole world, but he was quite impressed by the amount of Nether he had gathered over the past several days. It was becoming increasingly clear that his Influence was at least partially responsible for the volume of Nether that he could create, just like his Weight governed how dense he could make that Nether. And with the rate that Randidly’s Influence continued to rise due to Expira and the Alpha Cosmos… he wasn’t worried about gathering enough energy for the Nether Ritual any longer.

The only problem was whether he possessed the requisite Skill to control a Nether Ritual of this magnitude.

Before he began practicing, Randidly did his best to gather up all of the information and inspiration he had gathered from watching the Nether King and condense it down into a letter. He sent this letter into the Alpha Cosmos to Wendy, who would pass it through the portal archways and give it to Neveah. Now that Expira was intimately and mysteriously connected with his body, communication was possible, despite the all-consuming mass of significance below.

Which also means that I didn’t have to waste several months refusing to back down in the face of this electricity...

Randidly was definitely the more skilled between the two of them when it came to working with Nether, but Neveah was still extremely talented when it came to understanding Aether. With how much time she spent studying the legacy of Yystrix, she would undoubtedly have some insight of her own.

Then Randidly raised his hands, not bothering with the intermittent trembling. His senses began to gather Nether at the ready. His Willpower stirred. Then, when he had the right vision for what he wanted, he began to weave a massive envelope with thick cords of Nether.

Congratulations! Your Skill Left Hand of the Nether Oracle (M) has grown to Level 310!

Influence +11!

Congratulations! Your Skill Precise Nether Ritual (L) has grown to Level 288!

Randidly’s eyes glittered in the dark shaft as Nether began to flow in intricate patterns in front of him. The working gradually expanded, taking advantage of the vast emptiness in the surrounding space. However, the size of the tight weave of Nether only made the flaws more obvious.

Right now the Grim Chimera was the architect of the Nether Ritual, once more feeling somewhat out of place as the being of necessity shaped the working. But Randidly didn’t flinch from this uncomfortable sensation; just like with the electricity running rampant through his limbs, he learned to relax and accept this awkwardness as part of the Grim Chimera. His claws tore apart the failed working, gathered up flows of Nether he could recycle, then began again.

The Grim Chimera never claimed it would be excellent at the start. But it sure as hell would quickly improve.

More than relying on the Grim Chimera’s base nature, Randidly had his own vision of how this would develop. As the phantasm of the Chimera manifested and began to work with the Nether, Randidly was throwing all the Willpower he could spare at an entirely new idea: that the Grim Chimera’s current project was to build itself a home.

Home, Randidly sighed. We know, don’t we, Grim Chimera, how it feels to have to leave a place. And we know what it is like to come back to an old place and find it unrecognizably changed. Or rather, find that we have shifted beyond our understanding, invalidating the spot which was once sufficient for us on this planet.

But now… now we have the chance to truly make ourselves a home. To start the process of protecting others with the strength we have accumulated. That, I think… is the sort of survival that we’ve been waiting for.

That is a meaningful act. To offer sanctuary to those who need it. To begin to pay back the long debt of the mistakes we’ve made...

Within Randidly’s Soulspace, those brilliant sparks in the belly of the Grim Chimera began to flicker.

*****

“So sick…”

Almost unwillingly, twelve-year-old Delilah’s hand stretched outward toward the beauty in front of her. It was the only part of her that could still move. Her shoulders remained hunched in a half-crouch, so desperate to hold onto this moment that she wouldn’t even move, in case a shift would spook time into jumping forward.

Cassandra looked around with an expression that would have made Delilah annoyed a few seconds earlier, but right now the rhapsodic beat of her heart dismissed such trivialities. “This is it? It… well it definitely looks expensive. And very nice. But can we go now? Staying here seems like SUCH a bad idea…”

All three of the teenagers (a group into which Delilah shamelessly added herself) were doing their best to remain relatively inconspicuous in a dimly lit warehouse. Around them were dozens of other objects, large and small, either covered in tarps or kept in glass cases. The roof was high overhead, making everything around them seem small and then forcing the humans into the realm of puny. All of these items were incredibly valuable, intending to be held for sale at the first even Kharon University Auction.

Mint, the oldest of the three, shrugged at pretty Cassandra’s words and raised the tarp to cover the object once more. But Delilah pinned him to the ground with a burning eyed stare before looking once more at the object with worship in her gaze. “Don’t you fucking dare. Not yet. Shit, they seriously just have this sort of beauty sitting in a warehouse…?”

Her fingers tingling, Delilah took a step forward. The DreamChaser 2000, Honey-Yellow edition, the newest skybike by famed designer, bad boy, and asylum seeker Elijah Frank, leaned almost casually against its kickstand. Its aura of badassness was palpable. Even in the half-light of the warehouse, its specialty paint popped in Delilah’s eyes. The smooth chrome lines of its pipes flanked the sleek body, screaming that this perfect vehicle needed to be liberated from this stuffy location and taken out into the sky.

Is this what falling in love feels like…? An entranced Delilah wondered. All it would take was a few short-term runes to bypass the key ignition and forcefully start the engine. Then she could-

“Commmonnnnnn,” Cassandra groaned in a half-whisper. “They might expel us from Kharon Academy if we get caught. Pleassseeeeee.”

Delilah’s eyes sharpened, but she didn’t have any easy solutions at this point. The only reason Cassandra was here at all was that Mint had an enormous crush on her. After learning that Mint’s dad was transporting the lots for Kharon Academy’s auction, Delilah was determined to enter into Mint’s social radar and reach this bike, even if just for a moment. Unfortunately, she lacked the requisite… allure to make any headway alone. To the seventeen-year-old Mint, Delilah might as well not even exist.

A practical woman, Delilah refused to let Mint’s lack of insight stop her from touch such a salacious bit of chrome. She then spent several days skipping her classes and following Mint, watching the places where he would glance when women had passed her by.

Honestly, she needn’t have bothered. The torque of teenage Mint’s neck was predictably determined by the size of the boobs that jiggled past him, despite any mundane fabrics that might stand in his way. So Delilah had dragged out her bustiest friend, the fifteen-year-old do-gooder Cassandra, hung around near Mint’s know locations, skipped even more class, spread word to Mint’s friends that Cassandra enjoyed exploring different sky-islands, and basically just waited.

The plan practically assembled itself.

Ultimately, she decided to ignore Cassandra. With a growing smile on her face, Delilah pressed her hand again the sleek exterior of the Dreamchaser. Somehow, it still felt warm. Everything she had gone through was worth-

Claannnggggg!

All three of the teenagers froze and hunched a little lower in the dimly lit warehouse.

“Was that-” Cassandra began, looking at Delilah in horror, but luckily Mint reacted quickly enough and shushed her.

CLLLLAAAAANNNGGGG!

The three exchanged glances. They were not alone in a warehouse that definitely wasn’t open to the public. Either Mint’s father was doing some last-minute shifting, or another interloper had infiltrated the warehouse.