Erik was feeling way too good to let this moment pass him by. He was free! He didn’t have to fight the world just to breathe! Every action was without a resistance that he’d never noticed before, having lived his whole life with it. And the results were startling.

Erik couldn’t help but comparing it to weight training. He’d been running around his whole life with a hundred pounds sitting on his chest, and now it was gone. But the result was far more dramatic than that, because the resistance hadn’t just applied to his physical movements, like weights did.

His thoughts, his body’s basic functions, even his shroud. All of it had been mired in all that yucky bad luck. He’d had to fight every moment, to make every action down to the beating of his heart as perfect as possible just to limit the chances for his bad luck to strike. And that was just him dealing with what he could control. None of it accounted for all the problems that he couldn’t affect.

Now, that ingrained control and exacting standard remained without the resistance that had put it in place. And Erik was reaping the rewards. He moved his arms, marveling at how nothing went wrong. Long ago, he’d start unconsciously fixing the minor problems that constantly occurred whenever he took action. Muscles would try to move incorrectly without any obvious reason, cells would burst at random, struck just wrong by this or that.

He used to pick up diseases and injuries with such consistent regularity that a part of his shroud was constantly dedicated to keeping him alive. Back when he used Stitch, that was much harder. Once he got Healing, that process was far simpler, which had been one of the main factors in increasing his strength.

Now, those injuries didn’t happen. His body moved right without him forcing it to, and infections couldn’t find the purchase they used to, his immune system no longer inexplicably missing the invaders. And that meant his shroud was freed up to be of actual use.

Curious, Erik grabbed one of his arms with Binding, and twisted it off. He didn’t even feel the pain at this point, far too inured to the sensation for something as minor as losing an arm to phase him. Healing rushed in, and Erik had his arm back so fast that the severed limb was pushed out of the way by the new growth.

“Well, that’s dramatic.” He muttered. A sudden, familiar sensation made him raise an eyebrow. His defensive sense registered a threat. And once again, Erik had to take a moment to marvel at the difference.

Here too, his bad luck had stood in his way. The constant and relentless threat from reality itself actually dulled his defensive sense, compared to other shrouded. The only reason his defensive sense was so much better than others was the amount of practice he had with it, not some inherent superiority. That practice remained, the interference did not.

Now, Erik could tell the exact dimensions of the threat. Size, shape, power, arrival time, impact site, damage dealt if not blocked. He could even feel how much of it he could theoretically block. Unsurprisingly, that theoretical amount was all of it. His defensive sense, unhindered, could even guide Binding to act practically without Erik’s interference. What had been an ingrained ability was now a literal autonomic response.

Allowing that process to play out, Erik’s shroud acted without his conscious thought, chaining a spear from one of the shrouded Ethermen. Apparently, this one had enough smarts to realize who had chained up all its fellows, and recognized him as a threat. The spear hadn’t even left the Etherman’s hand. Erik’s shroud had bound it before the attack could even be released.

“Oh? Well that’s convenient.” Erik’s grin was more than a little malicious. He was feeling a little revengy, having just found out that there was someone to blame for his bad luck and then subsequently being freed from his life-long ‘disability’. “Thanks for offering yourself up as a test subject.”

Erik triggered one of his mnemonics, using opposing Binding chains to create tension around his legs, and then breaking one set, flinging him forward in a Break Step. Here, again, he found a difference. First, the mnemonic was flawlessly triggered, another effortless action. Secondly, the recoil damage he always suffered from using Binding or Stitch like this was less. He had bruises, not broken bones. The damage wasn’t even a tenth of what it used to be, and Healing wiped it away as soon as he noticed. The automatic response of his shroud was more powerful, and more responsive than before.

The Break Step placed him neatly and perfectly in front of his target, exactly where he’d wanted to end up, another improvement. Then, he let go of the Binding chains holding the spear in place. The Etherman instantly responded, stabbing at him.

Rather than use Binding to stop it, Erik merely flooded his body with both his shrouds, using physical enhancement only to deal with the opponent. This used to be one of his weak points. Stitch had never been very powerful at the infusion side of things, especially physical enhancement. Formshifting had been passable, but never a strong point.

Gaining Binding and Healing had helped alleviate that somewhat, both being much better than his original domain at improving his body. But it wasn’t all that impressive compared to his friends, even excluding Caeden’s absurd capacity for physical enhancement.

Now, he found that restriction gone. Before, the flows of shroud in his body were turbulent and unwieldy. It made physical enhancement inefficient and weak. That was gone, entirely gone. Erik casually slipped past a spear thrust so fast it broke the sound barrier, his arm crossed behind his back.

The following flurry of blows and manifested spears flung his way failed to leave a single scratch. Things that he would have had to use Binding to dodge, or simply heal through the damage with Healing, he avoided through sheer physical ability. He was matching a shroud-enhanced Etherman in physicality.

“Ok, looks like that’s going to be a lot easier. How’s my attack power?” Erik muttered. Rather than dodging the next thrust, he allowed it to land, the blade sliding into his chest and splitting his heart in half. A negligible issue for Healing. With the opening, Erik drew his arm back. Black chains surrounded the limb, building tension until it broke with explosive force and speed, slamming his open palm into the Etherman’s chest. The metal within bent and broke, leaving an indent in the Etherman’s chest several inches deep as it was flung back.

“Huh,” The attack had hit harder, and the recoil was similarly reduced, as Break Step’s had been. “That’s nice.”

It was funny, from a certain angle. Erik’s total shroud capacity hadn’t increased an iota, but his efficiency had spiked so hard it shattered the chart. Pulling the spear from his chest, Erik wrapped it in Binding, building tension before firing it off like a ballista bolt, carving a path through the crowd of Ethermen.

Snapping his fingers, Erik used Binding on the entire army trying to stop his friends from breaking through the founder’s protections. Just as quickly, he dropped it. All the Ethermen were freed, turning their attention toward him.

Grinning crookedly, Erik was looking forward to this far more than he probably should. Binding all the Ethermen was an inefficient use of his shroud, since all of the Ethermen could then collectively use their shrouds to push back on his. Instead, he just needed to do what he did best.

Be too annoying to ignore.

Several Ethermen almost instantly lost interest in him, the ones closest to the rest of his team. Those got another dose of Binding. The whole idea was to pound into the primitive brains of these machine-men that they wouldn’t be getting anything done until Erik was dead.

The only ones Erik left alone were those fighting Dave. The War Wight didn’t really need Erik’s help, he was handling things just fine. Rather it was the rest of the undead guarding Lily and Asherta that were struggling. Erik’s actions took most of the pressure off of them, enough that they started pushing back.

It was pretty clear the momentum wouldn’t hold, though. The shrouded Ethermen maintained their stupid vitality. Even the one with the caved in chest that Erik had hit moments ago was already moving again. That’s why Erik was committed to being a nuisance. He was sure that, as he was now, he could put down a few of the Ethermen permanently. But it would take time, and more effort than it was worth.

They weren’t here to kill the Ethermen after all. They were dealing with the founder, everything else was secondary and unnecessary. So, Erik started off by getting everyone’s attention. Mission accomplished. Now, he had to hold it. That too, was easy.

A mass of attacks were headed his way as all the attention shifted. The Ethermen didn’t think much, so their response was swift. Feeling almost bad for them, Erik activated Freewalking. The mnemonic was practically unchanged from its time as part of Stitch, only gaining more potency under the guidance of Binding.

Now freed truly, the mnemonic took on a life of its own. Erik’s defensive sense activated to its full extent, acting like another heart beating alongside his own without an ounce of effort. Merging into this beat, chains moved with a delicate touch, adjusting incoming attacks and Erik’s body simultaneously to create a gap, a path of the highest efficiency and least resistance all in one.

Just like that, with barely a whisper of shroud being used, Erik slid through the literal cloud, the storm of weapons and elements and monsters and energies flung his way without a mark to show for it. Even being at the center of the mnemonic, Erik was stunned at how effective it was. And how little it’d cost him.

But thinking about it, this result was obvious. If he thought about every move he made as an opportunity for his bad luck to act up, then the action-intensive Freewalking was a hotbed for bad luck. That meant the mnemonic had to spend more shroud correcting whatever random accidents or mishaps that popped up. Without that draining his shroud, and with his overly refined defensive sense, Freewalking was a cost so low it was hardly even worth mentioning.

And that let him do some interesting things. Freewalking was a mnemonic that he couldn’t keep running constantly due to the cost. With the cost dropped so far down, he happily did just that, constantly avoiding everything thrown his way. That alone was enough to keep the attention of the vast majority of the Ethermen. They didn’t seem to catch on to what was happening, merely noting that their attacks got very close to hitting him before missing. And that kept them attacking.

The ones that didn’t stick to him for whatever reason, got a dose of his own attention. Chains tripped them, pulled off their aim, made them run into each other, and generally made a mess of everything. It was cathartic. Erik used to fight like this, thinking of it as bestowing a measure of his bad luck on others. Now, it was like he was returning that luck to its rightful owner, the one who’d inflicted it on him in the first place. And it felt amazing.

Plus, it looked like freeing them up had let Lily and Asherta finally make some real progress. They were drilling through the energy barrier, Lily attacking with an intense beam of highly concentrated light, while Asherta bathed the entire area around the beam in Mithril to prevent it from repairing easily.

The founder was moving frantically, messing around with the suppression field generator, the ether engine, and another machine that resembled an overly complicated bed. Erik expected the girls would break through in moments, interrupting whatever he was up to. And it seemed like he knew it. Even now, his actions grew more desperate.

That was, until he flicked a lever, and a wave of something blasted out from the ether engine and into the suppression field generator, where it changed before rapidly growing to cover the whole room. Lily and Asherta dropped like stones, crumpling to the ground. Erik felt woozy. All the Ethermen fell as well, while the undead vanished, even Dave.

All that were left standing were Erik, Cat, and her grandfather. Everyone else was either gone or unconscious. And they were only unconscious, Erik used his aura to check. Everyone’s shrouds were still in place, so they were alive.

Cat and Erik both rushed over to their fallen teammates, though Erik made sure to leave a light Binding on all the Ethermen. Without them moving or resisting, it was easy for him to wrap them up. It would slow them down if they woke up suddenly, giving him time to respond.

“What was that?” he asked, standing over Cat’s shoulder as she checked their friends.

“A soul attack. Crude, and unfocused. But enough to knock out those without the proper methods to resist. The Ethermen were completely open targets, while Lily and Asherta just aren’t equipped to handle this kind of thing.” Cat explained.

“What happened to the undead? And why am I fine?” If Lily wasn’t standing, Erik felt like he shouldn’t be either.

“The undead were bound to this plane through me, by their souls. The attack disrupted the connection, and it ripped them all back to the Necroverse. They should be fine. They left before the wave could damage them. I’ll get Dave back here in a moment, I’m just making sure nothing worse happened to Lil and Ash. They were the closest to the blast.” Cat glanced at him. “As for you, there are two reasons why you’re fine. First, your Healing shroud might not protect your soul, but it can keep the consequences of the soul attack from damaging your body, so no knock out. Second, you just went through a lot of soul damage, and came back from it. Your soul is way more stable and robust than a normal person’s now. I can see it.”

“Well, what do we do now?” Erik looked at the energy barrier and the founder beyond it. “I’m not going to be getting through this thing. Don’t really have the tools.”

“Neither am I.” Cat sighed. “I’m doing my best to get these two up quicker, but we just have to wait for now.” She sighed again. “I wish Cae was here.”

“Me too. Where’d he go?” Erik asked, noting his absence once more.

“The founder blew up his soul. He’s in the Forge fixing it.”

“Oh, ok.”