Fate looked left and right, and then leaned in to whisper. “I may have a path to get your old bodies back.”

“Oh?!”

“It won’t be easy!” stressed Fate. “But when I moved to save Gerard from the Unstuck Space I pulled him from your hidden estate. I was forced to pull some strings—in a literal sense! And though Gerard I managed to pull through… the rest were snapped in the spatial passage. Spun away. Lost.”

“But they’re not in the Unstuck Space?” breathed Dorian.

“They’re scattered across the Upper Realms,” said Fate. “Wherever Fate’s threads tied them most strongly, there they went.”

“Wait. Don’t tell me…”

“They are each of them somewhere on the plane where they became what they are now. The planes of their ascendance, that is.”

Dorian blinked. “Ah.”

To the best of his recollections most of his ascensions ended with the realm burned to a charred heap. Or drained to a dry heap. Or pulped to a mashed heap.

“So I’ll have to do a Multiversal jaunt, then, to retrieve my bodies. Revisit some old stomping grounds?” Dorian rubbed his hands. “I can do that! Oh, I can definitely do that. Hells—this is excellent news, Fate. Excellent! What else survived?! Gerard always was fond of those gardens of his.”

“Well—I doubt they survived the impact…”

“Ah.”

“Still, by my count that’s seven of your bodies! Somewhere out there, in the Upper Realms! And six of them are on planes that Jez controls.”

“Ah.”

“So your mission—and my offer—is this!” Fate had this eager gleam in his eyes. “Retrieve your bodies. Power yourself up! And, while you’re at it, work with my forces to break the Infinity Hearts on each plane you visit. Liberate their peoples from Jez’s grip!”

“You want me to play the hero?” He smirked. “Oh, Fate, you silly old coot. I’ll take my bodies back. And…sure—I’m sure we can do something about Jez’s hive bases on the way.”

“Lovely! Wonderful! Awesome!” Fate did a little jig. He looked like a happy garden gnome. “And then—after you’re done—we’ll meet up back here. Hell is where Jez has imprisoned his Godkings—in the Labyrinth! It’s also where he keeps his strongest Infinity Heart to date. We have reason to believe this is his home base. We shall assault it together!”

He clapped his hands together. “This is my contribution! A Fate Map, drawing lines to each body. And Bungee-Cords of Fate to slingshot you between realms, wherever you need to go. And all I ask is you aid us in our fight to save the Multiverse! Ah—that, and our battle tomorrow. That one is very important as well.”

Fate chewed on his lower lip. “Lose that and the rest—we needn’t even think on it. We… may be done for, I’m sorry to sya…”

“We can’t have that,” Dorian agreed. “Not when I’ve still got bodies to claw back. Tell you what—I’ll do it. On one condition?”

“Name it!”

He licked his lips. “Do you have anymore of those drums of Black Chrysanthemum elixir?”

He wasn’t ready for a confrontation with Jez’s very best yet.

But he still had a stage’s worth of Bloodline elixir churning away within him. And a lot of space to fill with new qi. And a good, what, half-day or so before the battle began?

For him it was an eternity!

The only limiting factor was the size of his bladder.

***

Fate had no more Black Chrysanthemum elixirs in store. But he did have some drums of top-tier elixir that were nearly as good. That would do the job just fine, as far as Dorian was concerned.

Qi was fuel. You didn’t even need to level up your Techniques to make them devastating—plug them with a ridiculous amount of qi and the simplest punch could cave in a mountain. Dorian was itching to see just how annoying his flashbang could get once he went through the rest of the drums Fate had just offered him. Could he flash an entire army at once? Could he blind Top Empyreans? The same went for his Fist of Falling Star, Rising Moon! He always felt his Eclipse Dao’s fullest potential could only really be seen once you went big with it. Stuffed Techniques full of Eclipse qi and let them loose.

Tomorrow would at the very least make for an interesting experiment! This cultivation system, more than any other, let him play with a mind boggling amount of qi. Just how far could he push it?

Before he went off on his cultivating bonanza, though, he had a visit to make. He popped his head into Sick Ward 46, and there Gerard was. Looking slightly grumpy on a white cot, bandages wrapping his head and mummifying his torso. Healing qi pulsed gently through him. He looked groggy—maybe from the elixirs?

“Hey there,” said Dorian with a grin.

“Good afternoon, sir,” said Gerard. Then he noticed what Gerard’s hand was doing.

It was stroking an absolutely hideous toad, which burped, narrowing its eyes at Dorian as he came in.

“I come bearing good news!”

“And I as well.” Gerard gave Gerard Jr. one more fond stroke. “Gerard Jr. has survived the Fall of Ur.” And by the look Gerard gave the thing you’d have thought it was some long-lost son or something. Gerard Jr. burped.

“He will need to be walked, sir. Would you kindly?”

He noticed there was a leash on the darned thing. “Yeah, yeah, sure,” he sighed. “But first—”

“Hi!” Sun popped her head in. “What’s up? You said to come here?”

“Yes. I have a proposal. Gerard!”

“What is it, my liege?”

“You and I will be heading to the dragonrealm! Fate has generously agreed to supply us with portals. There, we’ll meet up with our good friend Salas Godhunter! And perhaps liberate the realm along the way, if we have time.”

“Ah. Your bodies have survived, then? Congratulations.” Gerard raised a brow. Just a little. “Did Fate salvage any of my Gardens? The East Garden, perhaps, with the silver lilacs which turn to face the rising moon?”

“No, I’m afraid. Those were lost.”

“Hum.”

“Oh, don’t feel too bad! I’ll replace them for you when we rebuild our estate,” said Dorian.

“Very well. With the elixirs in my system I’ll be up to fighting shape in a day, sire. We can set off then.”

“Excellent.” Now he wheeled to Sun, who had magicked a giant rib-bone out of thin air and was struggling to fit her mouth around the end.

“Eh?”

“How about you, runt? We can find some use for you, I’m sure. Want to add a few stops to this journey?”

She really was proving improbably useful. And she was growing on him, strangely enough. He was finding some optimism and kindness was a nice counterbalance to the rank sewer of cynicism he squatted in most days.

“What’s in it for me?” said Sun, crossing her arms. She squinted at him.

“I will feed you. Whatever you like. Also, Hell’s really all eggs and meat. Don’t you want to try some other kind of cuisine?”

She considered this for about a heartbeat. “Okay. I’m in!”

“Glad to have you.” Dorian rubbed his hands. “Well, folks, we set off tomorrow! Pack whatever you need. Ransack Fate’s inventories ruthlessly. There’s just the matter of this pesky little final battle thing he’s having me make an appearance in. And then we’re off.”

“Yay!” said Sun. She still looked a little confused, like she wasn’t sure what she’d just agreed to, but she had the right spirit.

“Indeed,” said Gerard, who looked like he knew better than anyone what he’d agreed to, and knew just how hard it would be. But Gerard was Gerard, and he did what had to be done. You could wring a complaint out of him if you tried.

“I’ll meet you all here this time tomorrow, then—”

“Sir?”

Gerard raised a leash to him. Gerard Jr. burped expectantly at him, then started scratching his ear with a hindleg like a cat. “The walk, if you please?”

“…sure, sure…”

***

Finally some privacy! The toad was walked (the ungrateful little shit). The plans were arranged. And Fate had given him his own sealed tent (with blast proof interiors, he was told). He let some of the Bloodline notifications start filtering back through.

[Level-up!]

[Bloodline Quantity] 5398 -> 5581

Nine by nine by nine went the Forms. Nine to the fourth power… 6561. That was when Fourth Form would hit.

It would be a long night of power-ups. He expected it’d be the crowning one.

For now, though, the drums of unmarked black barrels stacked before him would do. Six in total. And a trusty straw, courtesy of Gerard.

Let the drinking begin!

[Level-up!]

[Star Realm: Supergiant]

[1% -> 2%]

[Level-up!]

[Star Realm: Supergiant]

[2% -> 3%]

…

…

[Level-up!]

[Star Realm: Supergiant]

[7% -> 8%]

[Level-up!]

[Star Realm: Supergiant]

[8% -> 9%]

…

…

[Level-up!]

[Star Realm: Supergiant]

[16% -> 17%]

[Level-up!]

[Star Realm: Supergiant]

[17% -> 18%]

…

…

[Level-up!]

[Star Realm: Supergiant]

[20% -> 21%]

[Level-up!]

[Star Realm: Supergiant]

[21% -> 22%]

A little more than an hour in, Dorian’s straw sucked air. That whole drum, drained dry.

For a little over a fifth of the way past Supergiant. Which, he was reasonably certain, was the highest tier his Eclipse Laws could support. Then he’d need to sit on his ass and meditate for a decade to get his Laws up to Empyrean. That, or find the equivalent of more Dao Fruit.

[Level-up!]

[Star Realm: Supergiant]

[22% -> 23%]

[Level-up!]

[Star Realm: Supergiant]

[23% -> 24%]

…

…

[Level-up!]

[Star Realm: Supergiant]

[32% -> 33%]

[Level-up!]

[Star Realm: Supergiant]

[33% -> 34%]

On and on they went…

And finally, after six hours, three trips to piss, and all but one drum of elixir fully emptied out—

[Level-up!]

[Star Realm: Supergiant]

[99% -> 100%]

His hypothesis was right. He’d hit a wall at last. He kept drinking, but the qi just leaked out of him. The star of Eclipse qi within him was so huge it struggled to hold itself together. The qi within churned slowly, dense and soupy. The supergiant was too big. It seemed to want to collapse in on itself… become something else… but it’d need a deeper integration of stronger laws, and his simply weren’t there yet. Soon, though!

He was satisfied. This amounted to a tripling of his qi reserves, give or take? With this upcoming power-up he was getting close to presuming himself unbeatable under Godking—

[Level-up!]

[Bloodline Quantity] 6403 -> 6582

[Rank-up!]

[Dragonoid] Third Form -> Fourth Form

At last!

All that effort to snatch Kinzo’s elixirs had led up to this. The Fourth Form of the Torchdragon line—the form which made their names among the most feared among all Empyreans.

First came the fierce throbbing up his shoulder blades as the last of his great batlike wings emerged from his back. They were now finally complete, and he flared them out, inspecting them. They were pretty things, alright, and when he unfurled them like two vast cloaks they seemed like the masterpiece of some great painter—a mosaic of distilled midnight, speckled with bright red stars. Could they really hold his weight? He’d become shockingly dense these last few Forms. So much so that every time he took a step nowadays he sank, even into hardened ground. But they were veined with so many qi channels. He suspected there was some kind of ambient cycling at play. He’d test it out tomorrow. All in due time…

[Level-up!]

[Bloodline Ability]

[Shield of the Blood Moon] Lv. 0 -> 1

[The torchdragon wraps itself fully in its wings which take on an impenetrable quality, nullifying all physical and qi attacks.]

[Level-up!]

[Bloodline Ability]

[Dragon’s Breath] -> [Breath of Ashen Skies]

[One dragon’s breath becomes as vast and destructive as a volcanic eruption, changing the weather and bringing its own ashen fallout.]