Gabriel had been inside of The Memory for three days straight, reliving it a total of forty-seven times.

If he had survived for the full duration of it, he would have relived the battle only up to twelve times, but that meant not taking into consideration the many times the man accidentally died because he got too close, leaving the rear.

He was already sick of it, nauseated by it, and what more, he was growing visibly less focused as time passed, mental fatigue getting at him.

Gabriel knew that he would have to start adapting his powers right away because if he ever wished to leave the very outskirts of the battle, he would need constant protection.

By no means had he started wasting time, though.

Gabriel had already eyed a few interesting members of what would constitute his future team of bodyguards. What he needed to know now was, of course, getting the hang of mind and spirit bending. To do that, he started studying the Glory of Kings.

Gabriel utterly stalked his prey since the moment the closest of them descended from the sky.

It had by no means been all fun and games. The creature had been directly responsible for more than a few of his deaths. Since then, he had started seeing an entirely other meaning of the word torture.

Once the Glory of Kings decided his target, and when that target was Gabriel. All forms of resistance became futile.

He felt utterly dominated. Losing any semblance of mastery over himself.

It was like being invaded like an extraneous mind, which could simply not be ignored. Its dominance was so complete that no matter the struggle, the cries, the mental fortitude, it would not as much as waver. The young man felt like being surrounded by a fortress of steel, closing in on him until it became so close that it enveloped his skin, and once it did so, it penetrated inside of him, getting full control of his mind and spirit, that he started feeling it belonged to that monster, that it was the one right and only thing to act as it willed him to do

No matter his trained mental fortitude. The first time he felt under the gaze of the Glory of Kings, Gabriel shattered. It took him hours to recover, yet once he did indeed recover, he knew he had made advancement toward mind and spirit bending. Glory of King's rape had indeed left him with a gift, a well-received gift of knowledge, and every time he was subjected to it, Gabriel knew that he would not only gain more and more indirect experience in mind and spirit bending and in recreating the process, he even felt he was taking steps into resisting its assaults.

By the time the third day was over, not that he could notice, Gabriel felt he was ready to attempt his newfound knowledge and aptitude toward bending one of the youngest and, in his opinion, weak-minded individuals among his platoon.

He had studied many amongst them, and the weakest of them was a young girl.

She emitted pride from every inch of her body. She was among the weakest, yet her personality was so bent on only thinking about herself that not only was it clear that she was a construct, but she did barely feel human to his new developing senses.

With the help of Spirit Sight and Enhanced Senses, Gabriel was developing a new sense, one sort of vibration from the soul, which per its speech and nonverbal signs, allowed him to perceive truths about the person in front of him.

Maybe it was being surrounded by so many people who had made this new sense's fast development, or perhaps it was the fact that most of the constructs did not feel entirely like sentients, but somehow less… truer. As if they only lived in that moment.

Clearly, the mayor had tried his best in trying to give them life, and it was something which would have indeed worked if one was to experience the Memory version two just a few times, but for him, which had already experienced it more than forty times, even if not entirely, it started showing him the rough edges of the facade.

The girl was practically the incarnation of a stereotype, young-looking elf, a beauty with fair skin and long blonde hair, she a medium armored soldier, a bruiser, her will though seemed really base, optimum material for his first try.

He approached her with the intent of warning her about something related to the head of their battalion being a double agent, seeing the possible development, she took the bait right away. Gabriel was thus able to approach her and study her thoroughly. Yes, he died a few times even by standing near her in the heat of the battle and even got killed by her when he pushed too much on knowing details about her, making her suspicious. But aside from these problems, it was going rather smoothly.

Gabriel was getting to know her, her psyche, her willpower, drive, and forming experiences. For some reason, during a desperate try, she even kissed him before dying. Though, realizing that he was being kissed by something that was somehow realized by a part of the mayor made him feel rather weird.

At some point, during his last few experiences of death by the 'hands' of a Glory of Kings, something had unlocked for him.

He had successfully realized that an oblong strand of Spirit, from the Glory, latched to his Core once it managed to gain complete control over him.

The experience made him realize that there were two parts of the bending; the first and more accessible one was the mind-bending part. With an iron will, the Glory of Kings would overpower his mind while with what he couldn't but define as 'Aura.' This phenomenon would scatter from the Glory like a wave of a barely perceptible wind and envelop and enclose Gabriel's body into it. Only after that was correctly dealt with would the ability to directly control him come into play, and he now knew that the monster had to forcefully connect his own Spirit to him before it could actively govern his soul and bar any resistance it would put against his mind control. It was a complete and perfect assault made through sheer power.

Gabriel doubted he could reproduce such an effect, not only because it definitely required powers, Skills, and definitely Perks, which he did not currently possess, but because he simply did not hold that impossible strength of will and unwavering decision to act in such ways against somebody else.

Gabriel knew something needed to change, though if he wanted to get out of the place, and he knew that he would have to find that strength in him, the power to be… ruthless. There already was a sliver of it inside of him. It had developed during the previous training, and it probably needed to be consolidated, but it didn't mean he would become evil. He knew that, yet it was hard for him not to link the two adjectives together.

It's all speculation until we try.

After a fierce internal battle and much thought, Gabriel let the side of him, which felt that getting out of that place was the priority, win.

So he started his approach over the girl's psyche when he had correctly gained her trust.

Of course, his approach would be much different than the Aura bound one of the Glory of Kings. He would have to act through the means he had at his disposal.

After mulling over it, he realized that his weapons were his Enhanced Senses, Epiphany, of course, and his Spirit Sight.

With Enhanced Senses, if he really focused, given the chaos of the battle, he could understand in part how the girl's internal rhythms and responses worked. With Spirit Sight, he could see how her liquid flame looking Spirit would react to what he would do, and finally, Epiphany was his means to activate any sort of ability.

Of course, there was another problem. A problem Gabriel encountered once he started focusing on his Spirit Sight, that when not used, would fade in the background thing which he did no entirely comprehend still.

The girl had an Aura effect as well, probably a Perk, and anyway, something to use more for defense than anything else. He hadn't thought about this possibility, but now that he correctly focused on looking for Auras… not only his view of the world around him changed. But he realized too how meaningless those Perks were against the might of the Glory of Kings.

I wish I knew at what level one gets this sort of Perks. Hell, she looks among the weakest here, but I wonder at what level does one have the chance to unlock Auras.

Gabriel shrugged. He did not need to know. He needed to use his current abilities; there was no need to theorize any other way.

Once he was ready, he willed Epiphany to cast a vision.

The vision was clear, though irregular. It showed him a version of himself using corruption to abrade the girl's Aura field, which extended for roughly fifty feet around her. He could notice it intermingling with others' Aura. Where it did, there was something taking effect or exchanging something else.

Though Gabriel could manipulate Mana, he did not have a Perk to see it, like he had for Spirit, so he could only feel distortion from it.

After that, two things would happen, she would feel threatened and kill him, or she would wager her next move based on his own.

When he successfully followed the erosion of her Aura in time with a mental assault of purely metaphorical means, then based on his intentions, the girl would read them from his face, expression and react based on how well his manipulation of her had gone.

Epiphany did not explain more than that. And he knew that until his Synchronization somehow changed to include this aspect of the Dark element, he would not be able to automate the process with it.

All in all, corruption was child play when taking into consideration the new process.

Once Epiphany showed him all there was to do, he ran in hand on his face. It would be a long journey ahead of him.

Gabriel was exhausted then, so he simply left the soulscape, and with much, much more ease than he did previously, so much so that it surprised him. In fact, he found himself directly in the Challenge's chamber, in the physical world.

The Tyrant seemingly slept in front of him. He didn't care though, the monsters did not sleep.

"Would it help me if I raised my Epiphany level? Does Synchronization lose something if I do so?" He asked.

The Tyrant's fully black eyes became vivid. He knew now that it was awake.

"No, in fact, it would just facilitate the job for you. More connection to the Dark Element means more leeway in which to act. Synchronization shows just how much you can relate to a school of magic. I believe it just says that your Synchronization with the Dark has reached such and such a percentage."

Gabriel nodded.

"When you'll be able to activate even a semblance of mastery over mind and spirit-bending, your Synchronization will switch over to a Superior School which offers you access to both corruption based abilities and bending abilities. But you cannot stop there. Only the Old God will offer you complete dominion over the Dark Element, which means dominion over corruption, bending, and curses in which our final realm of interests lies. With mastery over curses, you'll have mastery over sealings as well, then we'll start the escape."

"I still don't know why you are doing this. You have mastered this type of magic too. Why can't you use it to escape?"

"Oh, I didn't explain? I'm sorry, let me clarify it to you." The Tyrant paused and got up before continuing, "You see, Gabriel. I have lost mastery of my Magic Skills once I turned into… this. It was the only means to protect my village, my citizens, and I willingly paid for it with my wife's life and my Feldurity. As a result, I was abandoned by the Old God, even though it was with one of its Complex yet forbidden rituals were the reason why I turned into this. Alas, his wishes are not mine to judge. So I only have this body's Skills to access and quite a few Perks related to my level. There is no more Magic Skill I have access to," he admitted.

Gabriel thought about it for a couple of seconds before replying.

"Alright, I believe you… or maybe it's just my mind swaying from just the thought of finally going to sleep. So don't take it personally if I treat you like a son of a bitch. You kind of deserve it." Gabriel turned around to leave before turning over him once again, "That fucking Memory? It's fucking hell. And your masters were damn sadists!" Once he finished, he turned back around to go for his business. Yet Gabriel, after a few seconds, couldn't help but hear him mutter.

"Yes, they really were."

Maybe the Tyrant and his wife had gone through much the same ordeal, if not worse.

Gabriel shook the thought away, dropped his bag on the floor, and removed his shirt. Then with the help of the Sk'rayr spear, he did once more what had become routine to support his body. Then after using Helping Hand on himself, he fell to the ground and in a coma.

He woke up feeling more tired than he had ever been. Sitting up, Gabriel realized that he had been up for more than three straight days, and this time there was no weird tea helping him retain his mental prowess toward the full of it.

Gabe sighed, rubbing his eyes.

Man, I don't want to work today… I just want to stay in bed for, like, a week.

Liz had woken up too. She rubbed her head on his hands.

Gabriel remembered when first he had met her, and he woke up in Commodo's inn, the lizard sleeping with him in its bed, on top of a comfy pillow.

"Don't you miss a pillow, Liz? And a bed?" She nodded both times.

Gabriel sighed once more, "Do you know what I miss? I miss mom's Fry Bread… and homemade red potato chips aside… Some Bannock, maybe, with Buffalo stew…"

Damn, I'm drooling. Gabriel turned toward the lizard with a wide-open mouth. Well, we are drooling, it seems.

"Alright, alright. Let's go to work."

Before heading toward the mayor and its hell training once more, Gabriel used up all his Mana and Energy, gaining a measly 2% expertise increase in Burst Attack and barely reaching Tier 7 in Epiphany.

Then, recalling his full Anchor Page, he noticed that something had changed about his Synchronization state.

Element alignment: Dark - Superior.

Current synchronization 71.65%

His Element alignment had gone from Dark to Dark - Superior. Had he finally reached some sort of connection with some 'Superior schools of Dark magic,' like the Tyrant had said?

***

Darte was still thinking about what he had listened to. Even sitting by the decision table, with that feeling of power permeating him, people's lives hang solely on his decisions. The honor that the Giant's Champion had given him by making him head-strategist, even that couldn't shake away the memories of that night.

There was little he could do. He dared not think about the consequences for his family, for The Cradle, and for the Druids of N'arr as an institution. It would segment them, shatter the thin equilibrium between his father, their Champion, and the one chosen by the Yggs as the acting guardian of Yggdrasil. The Seer of Carnage with her Legend Class.

The little man had no idea how she had not seen that coming, probably the girl's fault, Olivia. She had the means to hide from her ever-watching gaze. And yet, when he found the two, Olivia the betrayer and Crystal, her sister's Bond Spirit, he hadn't done anything.

A thing such as that would have probably been a permanent stain on his sister's reputation and hope of climbing the social ladder of Yggdrasil, or she could even have been hunted down by the Yggs themselves outright.

He did not hate his sister, yet he did not feel anything toward her, or at least, he had stopped feeling anything since his mother's death. So why didn't he get them both when he could? Why did it feel so hard to act?

There was something… unsaid hanging in the air, something mysterious left unsaid in that speech, and really, finding them, it had been too easy? If they had access to that, why would they leave such an opening for him to follow? Didn't Crystal know he would be there? Of course, he did, since even before they had managed to find him, or so his guts told him. So why hadn't the damn wolf set a layer of protection for Darte?

No. There's something more going on, and I need to be sure of it before I act.

Darte left the tent, his gaze wandering over the landscape. The war kept on raging, and he felt that no matter how long they kept killing Armored Tyrants, those monsters kept coming. Why did the Dungeon keep generating them so? Was it his wish that its balance switched, or was there something more at play? He was young and hadn't had much time to study history. But he was sure of one thing. His grandpa's library had never lied. And in the Book of Heralding, the coming of the Heralds brought change.

It might have already started. When will the next Herald descend? What if this one wasn't the first?