Arylos wheeled Baldr out of the small room with Garris and Iris in tow. They were silent as they followed Arylos, almost as though Baldr was on his way to be executed. From what Iris remembered, if a Templarian is near death, they can destroy their bodies and build a new one. Eir did it to her but she had never seen the process herself.

As they approached the foyer, Iris saw a familiar tall woman in a stunning golden dress with bright blonde hair. She saw the group approach and nearly broke down into tears as she ran up to Baldr.

“My boy, my dear sweet boy,” she cried, choking back tears and knelt down to Baldr.

“Mother,” Baldr groaned and a tear came down his face.

“We don’t have a lot of time, Frygga,” Arylos explained softly. “I’m sorry, but to cure him, we need to induce a reincarnation. What incarnation is he on right now?”

Frygga let out a cry as she held her son. “Will it make him better?” she asked between tears.

“It should, if our theory is correct,” Garris responded and Iris felt anxiety punch her in the gut, realising that Baldr’s survival relied on her plan. “The infection has been halted and it should allow him to reincarnate, cleansing him of what ails him completely.”

Frygga sighed and let go of Baldr, wiping tears from her eyes. “Second,” she whispered. “This is his second incarnation, and he’s halfway through it.”

Arylos rested a hand on her shoulder. “I promised I would help him if I could. This should help, but per our agreement, I hope you understand what must be done if his condition worsens.”

Frygga steadied herself and nodded. “Thank you,” she whispered, holding onto what hope she could have.

“This way guys,” Sentarus instructed while gesturing the group to follow him as he went through the central dining hall and walked towards the back to a large painting behind his throne and pulled it aside, revealing a pathway into a large stone hall, bare save for a small skylight at the top of a massive and daunting ceiling built into the mountain itself. It featured a large pit in the centre adorned with various foreign runes and wards and a room to the side with large windows looking towards the central pit.

The group brought the crippled Templarian to the pit, Iris feeling like this was a funeral procession as they remained silent save for Frygga crying. Arylos and Garris knelt before Baldr and Arylos tied a tourniquet around Baldr’s arm and Garris prepared a series of vials and tubes.

“So here’s what we’re going to do,” Arylos told Baldr softly, his voice resonating through the stone hall. “We’re going to expose you to a Khymr cocktail. This specific series of potions is meant to convert a mortal into a Khymr. As it’s incompatible with you, your body will begin to reject the mutation and induce a reincarnation as a result. It will cause you a lot of discomfort until the reincarnation begins. If you feel the need to back out of it, let us know and we’ll administer cleansing agents. Alright?”

Baldr thought about Arylos’s words carefully. “I understand,” he answered softly as he watched Garris prepare the three vials; a red one, a white one, and a black one. He lit a flame under the black one and Baldr watched the black fluid start to soften and boil with a deep blue colour.

Arylos waved for Frygga to come over and she slowly approached, taking Baldr’s hand in hers. “He has a couple of minutes before we administer the chemicals and begin,” Arylos told her softly. “He should retain his memories as this is a normal reincarnation for him, but if you have anything to say to him now, let it be now.”

Frygga nodded and gave her son a tight hug as Garris and Arylos stepped away to give her privacy as she spoke to him softly. Sentarus silently gestured for Iris and Bellona to follow him into the room to the side. Before Sentarus could head for the room, Iris saw Arylos come up to the king and pull him back by his arm.

“I’ll need your sword,” Arylos spoke softly.

“Why?” Sentarus asked in heavy confusion.

“If shit goes sideways, I’ll need a weapon,” Arylos spoke, keeping his voice low. Sentarus thought for a moment as he weighed the request while Iris knew exactly why he was asking.

The king let out a sigh and unstrapped his sword from his waist and handed it to Arylos before once again heading towards the side room. From there, the group watched the interactions from behind the windows and Iris couldn’t help but feel bad for Frygga. This was effectively assisted suicide for Baldr; killing him briefly so he could be healed. There was no guarantee that it would work and it all hinged on Iris’s suggestion. And if it didn’t work, Arylos would be forced to kill him permanently.

Either way, Baldr would die in a few minutes.

Iris felt a deep pain in her heart, wishing there was another way, but this may be Baldr’s only hope at this time. She still couldn’t forgive him, but condemning him to death like this reminded her of the plan to execute Arylos. She felt the same pain burn through her, but had to trust Arylos. It may have been her idea but if Arylos believes in her, she must believe in him as well.

After a few minutes, Frygga gave Baldr a kiss on the forehead and walked away, covering her face as she let Arylos and Garris return to their work. She entered the room with the others and Sentarus approached her and took the crying woman in her arms, trying to soothe her. Iris felt Frygga’s pain as each cry stabbed her heart. She felt bad for the Templarian mother, doomed to watch her child suffer and now die. Iris had no words to comfort the woman; this was a pain she could only feel but never relate to.

Garris and Arylos finished inserting various needles and tubes into Baldr and finished their preparations as Garris gave Baldr a Khymr salute and left him alone with the Titan who was leaning against the sheathed sword and watching intently. Garris entered the room and let out a shuddered sigh.

It was up to fate now. It was now a waiting game.

The group waited in a pained silence as they watched Arylos and Baldr from the pit. Nothing seemed to be happening for a while as the group watched. The silence became more painful as they could only watch, unable to stop what the two men started.

After the silence hung, they could see Baldr emit a soft gold glow as embers emanated from his body. As the light intensified, they saw the paralysed Baldr lift his hand to admire the embers as his skin burned. The light grew intense as the embers became yellow flames pouring from his wounds and cracks forming in his drying skin.

Baldr fell forward out of the chair and Frygga instinctively jumped forward but was held by Sentarus. They watched Baldr vomit a glowing gold liquid as he groaned, yelled, screamed as his body began to burn.

It had begun, and there was no stopping it now.

“Are you still with me?” Arylos questioned the reincarnating Templarian.

“So far,” Baldr coughed as more of the golden bile poured from him. And then he fell silently to the ground as the gold flames slowly faded and Arylos could only see a very cold Templarian laying on the ground.

Frygga gasped and pulled away from Sentarus as Garris made his way out of the room.

“Stay in there!” Arylos roared as he drew the king’s sword and readied himself. “I figured it wouldn’t be this easy!”

Suddenly, Baldr’s body convulsed and instead of gold flames, a purple mist poured from his skin and his scars as purple and blue flames slowly poured from his mouth and nostrils. The Templarian slowly rose to his feet as his body changed shape with metal appendages growing from his wounds like tentacles of steel that hummed with energy and shone with a noxious purple light. Baldr opened his eyes and Arylos saw that his eyes were glowing a dark violet and moved unnaturally as they focused on their enemy.

“Titan,” Baldr growled in a booming voice not of his own as he stood up straight.

Arylos, the indomitable Titan, felt fear. Anguish. Despair. Horror. Hearing this voice brought back painful memories to him that he had hoped he would never hear again. Not this soon at least. He swallowed his fear and stood ready to face his ancient foe.

“I see you remember me,” Arylos answered, trying to keep his voice from cracking.

“You fight the inevitable, Titan,” Baldr bellowed as his arm twisted and broke apart as the bone began to protrude from the flesh and sharpen into a blade. “You cannot stop what has begun; this display of yours is futile.”

“Only if I die,” Arylos growled in return, readying his stance.

The creature that was once Baldr hissed and a series of metal hands grew from his back, churning and humming with energy and machinery. “Your proposal is acceptable,” the creature laughed and lunged towards Arylos with its bone sword, Arylos barely catching it as he was pushed backwards by the sheer force. The creature made a swipe for Arylos’s face as the Titan moved out of the way and brought the sword upwards, slicing into Baldr’s arm as the creature laughed.

The creature leapt upwards and brought its metal appendages down as Arylos rolled out of the way to avoid the crushing attack. Arylos made a pushing motion with his hand as the air hummed and the creature was knocked away and into the wall with enough force to crack it. He then made a pulling motion and the creature was pulled from the wall back to Arylos and he made a deep cut through the torso as the creature fell to the side but one of the appendages struck Arylos and knocked him into one of the walls himself.

Iris couldn’t take this as she squirmed and made for the door but was caught by Garris. “Let me help him!” she called out against the Khymr.

“Enough of that,” Garris told her in a stern voice. “You’re no use to him dead.”

“But I can fight!” Iris shouted. Her thoughts were cut short by the sound of a loud boom and she turned and saw Arylos and the creature striking each other with thundering punches as Arylos tried desperately to get the beast away from him. She realised very quickly that Garris may have had a point; she didn’t know what this enemy was but she remembered how beaten up Arylos was when he fought Baldr.

She wanted to prevent that from happening again but she didn’t know if she could.

Arylos kicked the creature away and quickly picked the sword he dropped back up as the twisted mass that was Baldr screeched in an ear-piercing scream. Arylos reached out with his hand and closed his fist and the creature’s throat was crushed by an unseen fist. The creature choked and struck down as Arylos caught its boney blade, gritting his teeth as he pushed back.

“Not bad,” Arylos grunted. He then dropped the sword and ducked, causing the creature to lurch forward but before he could make an attack, the Titan was stabbed in the shoulder by a metal appendage. Arylos growled in pain as he grabbed the appendage and kicked hard into the creature’s torso and he could hear bones snap and metal creak as the creature groaned.

“Not bad at all,” Arylos commented with a sigh as he pulled the metal from his arm and twisted it off of the creature’s body, the limb’s whirring falling silent as it went limp. “You certainly watched Baldr’s fights closely. What do they call you?”

The creature slowly got up as metal formed around the creature’s broken throat to reconstruct it. “Legion 16-S, designation; ‘Enigma’,” the creature bellowed cryptically.

“Enigma,” Arylos whispered the name as a smile came to him. “To be from the 16th Legion, you must be pretty old.” Arylos reached down and picked up the sword again as his smile turned wicked. “Age brings knowledge, but it also brings weakness. So let’s see which of us made use of that time more effectively.”

The creature’s purple eyes flashed as it laughed. “Acknowledged.”