The Astral soul system-Chapter 198: The king’s fragments
"Make it quick, before you join her"
Zen didn’t react. He wondered if this was one of the unforseen consequences the quest spoke of.
’Theia.’
"I’m on it"
[Ding! Detected that user can now create a codex]
[Do you wish to create a codex]
Zen quickly selected yes.
[Ritual has begun]
[Please offer tribute]
According to Theia this was the only way he could bring her to life now.
"Take off the gloves"
Zen did so without thinking much
He quickly ripped out her sword from her chest and surprisingly her blood didn’t flow out.
"Her heart’s completely frozen, and most of her insides too. Hurry"
His wings slowly wrapped around her, shielding her. They were around six feet wide each, about the size of the average person, and with the feathers/scales, about four in width.
"Beast cores, now, and I mean a lot of them. We’re going to have to multitask a bit but we’re almost out of time,so no choice"
Zen’s finger rubbed his ring and about a dozen bags dropped out.
"Not nearly enough. Usually this ritual was supposed to be done after years of preparation but we don’t have a choice. Dump everything"
He didn’t even flinch and just dropped it all,a flood of crystals he’d gotten the last night dropping onto the ground surrounding them.
[Detected sizable tribute]
[Error! Insufficient tribute]
"Damnit!"
Theia spat.
Zen’s wings started to glow
[Host is releasing Astra into the atmosphere]
[Host is releasing Aether into the atmosphere]
His newly regenerated Astra plummeted to Zero and the Aether he absorbed from Fallon all disappeared.
[Tribute level increasing]
[Insufficient]
"Damnit"
Zen remaied somewhat calm
"What exactly is required for this tribute.
"Usually it’s just energy, an form, kind or shape will do. We just need a lot. And in rare situations, something of importance. Don’t ask me what? I don’t know "
They couldn’t save Jade without the codex so they had to think of something fast
Zaine suddenly remembered something and told it to Zen.
A bit confused, he checked the ring and in the corner he could indeed see something. It was small, almost unnoticeable
[Astral sprite(crystalized)]
[???????]
He was about to take it out when Theia stopped him
"Wait!"
"..."
"We can’t use that yet. It has to be for the end, otherwise Jade might not survive."
"She won’t survive if we don’t get started"
"..."
Theia didn’t reply and before Zen could grab it, Zyro voiced an opinion.
"Maybe teach had something that could help?"
"..."
The idea was so ridiculous it almost felt like a joke. Aurora would most likely kill them the moment this was over,so the thought of her helping seemed downright stupid.
Still, Zen turned to look at her and spoke.
"I need a beast crystal. Something powerful"
He quickly raised his hand to catch something flying at him and was surprised to see a beast crystal in his hand. He didn’t bother checking it’s level or thanking her and just threw it in the pile.
[Detected substantial energy source]
[Tribute is... satisfactory]
The space in the shadow field suddenly lit up with different lights and all the crystals suddenly lit up, slowly floating into the air.
[Ritual has begun]
[You are being watched, destroyer]
With that ominous message, the system suddenly disappeared, leaving him in the dark, but luckily he still had Theia.
Beams of light suddenly erupted from the crystals, linking them all together in all the different colors as bits of stardust appeared out of nowhere, lighting up the area.
"Now put the Astral sprite over her heart"
Pulling out the crystal, Zyro had acquired, he gently placed it directly on her heart.
Now for the next bit. Zen knew what he had to do.
"From now on, your life is also on the line. If you complete the codex,you and Jade will live, but if you don’t"
Zen didn’t respond and just started. He was basically tying his life to Jade’s now. She’d been dead for a little under two minutes now.
This part would be pretty easy, albeit painful
Flexing his backpack muscles,he felt his wings shift. They were strangely malleable and tough at the same time, almost like they were held together by magnets or something. Being able to huddle together to become sturdy enough to be armor or even a weapon, and relax to become flimsy and weak.
Bending them so the edge pointed straight at him, he hardened them using the ambient energy before stabbing them both into his chest, making sure his heart was pierced.
For this to work, Zen himself was a sacrifice. His life energy was required to form the codex and his wings had to be used to stab his heart because they were the area with the most concentrated essence on his body, visible from how they shimmered.
Spitting blood, Zen shook a bit but didn’t buckle, still on his knees in front of Jade.
Before his eyes, His blood suddenly started squirming before it started flying out of the open wound, accompanied by a strange shimmering energy .
His HP suddenly started dropping rapidly, going from the original 450 to a two hundred,all the way to fifty.
He suddenly felt a force tugging on his wings. He didn’t fight it and actually helped it, pushing out as several of his feathers/scales were ripped out, leaving blood dripping which also flowed up.
One by one more and more wings were ripped and after a while, Zen internally questioned if this was actually just torture.
"Focus on the wings and blood. Just keep your focus until the rough outline is complete.
The feathers/scales and blood flowed into the center of the formation formed by the flying crystals
The lines of light connecting them all suddenly pointed to them, converging before releasing a massive pillar of light into the sky.
By now Zen’s HP had dropped to twenty. His entire body felt weak all over in a way he couldn’t explain and he felt like he was hallucinating.
He couldn’t see it but the pillar that had shot into the sky had actually "Pierced" the sky, ripping it open to reveal another world.
The moment it did, Zen felt a tug on his soul. What was it,instinct? He couldn’t tell, he couldn’t even see it, but his body knew it and it stared transforming all on its own until he was fully transformed. The transformation this time felt more painful,longer, but also more... natural?
The pillar flew into the strange realm it’d opened up like a beacon, seemingly going on forever.
A few seconds passed and nothing happened, Zen could see confusion on Theia’s face but just asked
"What next?"
"It should have... Just... focus on jade for now. You need to draw your life energy through the sprite and into her heart."
Zen looked up at the floating mass of feathers blood and stardust being shot by beast crystal energy and slowly his three left eyes flashed with power
He looked hard at the mass and tried to move it but the moment he did, he felt something like lightning strike through his mind.
"Aaaah!!!"
Zyro screamed, suddenly finding himself in the body.
He clutched his side, almost falling over.
"Why can’t we- Aaaah!!!!"
"-do this" Zaine groaned, his breathing ragged.
His HP was around Five now but he couldn’t even see it, he felt his body about to fall over.
"wHaT aRe wE dOiNg WROOOONG"
Their voice transformed into a grotesque symphony, completely disjointed from any concept of human.
He suddenly heard what sounded like the chiming followed by a voice. He couldn’t tell if it was deep or soft, and it was speaking in an unknown language he for some reason understood perfectly.
"Where is the Royal I heard call. I do not see them. I see three,i see one,i see an endless void. You can not be my king,my kin"
Zen, Zaine or whoever it was couldn’t even speak at this point. They didn’t even know who was in charge. Their brain was far too fried to figure that out.
"You are merely a husk, pieces. The king is dead, broken, and all that is left are pieces. Fragments of his soul "
In the end that’s all the three of them were. They weren’t even people they were... contingencies. After HE had died,Q in his obsession had broken him, literally and made this mess, pieces that would be easier to control than the original.
Zyro
Zaine
Zen
They were all fakes, and all equally real. Made up of an aspect of the original . Each of them were personifications of human nature that had been broken and twisted beyond recognition
Zyro - The blinding light in the human soul. Unfortunately that endless blazing light had blinded him. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝓮𝒘𝙚𝙗𝒏𝙤𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝒐𝙢
Zaine: The inevitable darkness in the corner of every soul. Pure evil which had consumed him in darkness
Zen: The dark empty husk of a soul left after the first two had been ripped out of Azrael. Featureless and completely empty
The good. The bad. And the ugly
It seemed like that was why this wouldn’t work. They were only fragments. Not even actual people.
[HP: 1]
"Nononono. Guys, listen to me, please. Don’t listen to that thing. You can do this please"
Theia’s encouragement fell on deaf ears, his eyes slowly dropped , almost closed.
The moment his HP struck Zero, he suddenly heard something.
The soft pitter-patter of little feet
Unsure how exactly, he looked up and saw the familiar pale girl, slowly walking towards him
She had pale white skin and looked to be between five and ten years old. She had delicate soft skin, like she had been pampered all her life, she was in a pure white dress that stopped below her knees and a little bit short of reaching her toes, allowing her delicate bare feet to be visible
Her messy, light brown hair seemed to flow even in the absence of any wind. Her eyes were completely pure white, seemingly without any pupils or irises.
A depressive aura emanated from her very presence,accented by her deeply disturbing inhuman smile,wide with rows of sharp teeth
They didn’t even have the energy to react and just barely asked.
"Are you finally here to kill us?"
She walked closer, stopping right in front of him. She was so small even next to Zen’s kneeling half-dead figure she was just a little bit taller.
She slowly reached up,her small hands holding his face as she pressed her forehead against his.
Even now the body still instinctively shivered. If they could move they would have run as fast as possible but right now that wasn’t possible.
She suddenly held, Zen’s necklace,her fingers running over it before she suddenly let it go, her hands going to his neck.
"Y...ooo....uu...n....d...ee..."
"What ?"
The girl took a deep breath before whispering in a small soft voice that was almost unnoticeable.
"Noooot deeeaaad. Noooot yeeeet"
They weren’t sure what she was talking about . Was this still a hallucination? A last bout of madness before death?
She suddenly pulled her hands back and showed them again, but this time, something was in them. They weren’t sure what it was put it on them around their neck.
"Is this a...collar?"
They blinked and she was gone and he was back to one HP somehow. Before they could think, whatever it was around their neck glowed brightly suddenly releasing what felt like chains wrapping their body and somehow their mind, wracking them with indescribable pain.
Their consciousness started slipping even faster as the chains tightened but this time it felt familiar.
Their last thoughts as their eyes closed were a pile of jumbled nonsense, barely discernable from jumbled screams.
...
...
...
...
