Bro, I'm not an Undead!

Aglow in the air between the three figures within the room, each stuffed within their own thoughts to the point of almost ignoring anything else – almost – was a small soul that had just escaped the body of a snow white furred creature that looked like a wolf. Its body lay sprawled on the floor, beside it a man wielding a bloody zhanmadao.

The soul floated slowly up, as if reluctant to part with the flesh it had inhabited for barely a few hours in this world. Tragically, there would be no escape, for it was gripped by a pale man with a slight smile on his face who then devoured it while.

Aurolio gave a pleased moan as the energy dissolved within his body.

A crushing force bellowed from his body, representing yet another increase in his strength.

Skullius and Idline could only watch, or rather observe, the former with more rapt levels of attention each time this phenomena occurred.

“Satisfying,” Aurolio said as he released a light breath from his nostrils. “I’m approaching something revolutionary. Something extraordinary.”

“Good for you,” Skullius said hollowly while storing back the Bashful Abomination in its sheath.

Idline took the corpse away while the pale man gestured for Skullius to sit. They were in the luxurious space of the Velanqi Family mansion after all.

Skullius obliged.

“So, do you want to know anything in particular, or should I just random fire away at my own pace ” Aurolio asked while setting one leg onto of the other casually.

Skullius took some time to think it over.

After committing to the Tie of Exchange, he and Aurolio had ironed out the finer details on how Skullius was to deliver the Null beasts and what Aurolio would share with him in exchange.

What they ended up agreeing on was that Skullius would bring ‘living packages’, as they termed them, to Aurolio twice a week. In exchange, the pale man would teach Skullius anything from what was written in his Book of Alignment, to things to do with Voided Death.

Aurolio didn’t seem to hold anything back.

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During these interactions, Skullius managed to dissect Aurolio, finding that he was very much human still. Inside at least. His hesitation to speak of some things was the main reason for this sentiment. He wouldn’t let his guard down or trust the pale man’s words easily, but most of the things he learned made sense both logically and ‘illogical.’

“I have a question of my own,” Skullius replied to him with a rather serious tone in his voice.

Aurolio gestured for Skullius to speak up.

The Hybrid Luman leaned from the back of the chair he was seating on.

“Regardless of how I feel about our relationship or about you individually, I can tell that you’re strong. Very strong…” he said before his face turned slightly depressed. “You clearly seek more strength for different reasons, but… do you feel you are… whole?”

Aurolio was a little stunned by this question.

“What do you mean ‘whole’?” he asked.

“I mean to say, with this power, do you feel that you are complete. Full of purpose, and direction. Or that having a purpose and being certain of where you’re going is what is fueling your strength and desire to get stronger?”

The pale man stared at Skullius for a while.

“That’s quite the question,” he said with a muffled chuckle. “If I had to say… maybe it would be the former. The circumstances surrounding how and why I got the Book of Alignment are, as you would expect, first and foremost, personal. But they WERE also a driving force for me in more ways than one.”

“I can’t say they helped me get stronger though. If anything, after getting these unique powers, I hardly remember what or who I used to be. My motivations changed wildly, and before I knew it, I was hunting down intangible concepts, detached from Aigas, or the past me.”

Skullius listened quietly.

Aurolio was very different from Alaris. The latter seemed to have powerful sense of self, but that same individual trait limited his desire to grow while Aurolio fuelled his desire for power almost insatiably.

“I see…” Skullius said.

Aurolio looked at him and grinned.

“Why are you so philosophical all of a sudden? You want to lose your mind before the main event? If I were you, I’d be asking more about Essences in preparation for the big fight,” he said. “Unless of course, you don’t want to show off as much as you did in your Second Preliminary Round match.”

Skullius gave a mocking laugh.

“Big fight is an understatement. And I wasn’t showing off.”

Like everyone else, Aurolio was also a bit wary of the Royale, but probably not as much.

Probably.

‘Ah, yes. I’m beginning to regret turning into a this show-off…’ Skullius thought to Aurolio’s fib.

His Second Premium Round match had left the audience cheering more than they did in his first.

To make sure he would get his ticket into the Royale, and appear as a sufficient enough threat to the other contenders, Skullius had decimated his opponent embarrassingly, leaving them on the verge of grovelling for mercy.

Of course, he didn’t spare them in the end.

He had to display that he wasn’t a push over, otherwise the remaining contenders, most of whom of were not small fries, would target him.

Even with that display though, he still refused to admit that it was much of a show-off as what Darwel, Silrat, Alaris and now even Aurolio said it was.

“Any more questions?” the pale man asked as Idline returned to the room.

Skullius paused.

“You said Veneration is kind of like an affliction that forces the user to worship a foreign Deity so that they gain the ability to use that affliction as a kind of beneficial power, right?”

“Yes.”

“So, if I wanted to reach out to another Deity who isn’t one of the three… four in Aigas… then it would have to be with Veneration, right?”

Aurolio tilted his head.

“You seem to have a keen interest in Veneration. Do you despise the Deities of Aigas?”

Thinking of the Binds of the Fukal, the marks on his chest that resisted Deity blessings and curses, Skullius cringed inwardly.

‘Kind of.’

“No. It just seems like an interesting subject. Veneration is the most out of place power I’ve ever seen someone have.”

“In that you’re right,” Aurolio said as he locked his fingers. “And to your question, yes. Veneration is the only way to reach out to outside Deities. Unless of course, you have touched upon Divinity.”

Skullius nodded.

He wasn’t lying about considering Veneration an out of place power considering what was already firmly established power-wise in the world – Blessings, Classes, Cores and Stages – but this wasn’t why he was asking about this.

To Aurolio’s reply though…

‘Reaching Divinity, huh? It makes sense how Fulgardt was able to travel to other worlds then, capturing beings like Dezrael and bringing them here,’ he thought before focusing on Aurolio.

He wondered.

At this pace, was he helping to create a monster who touched Divinity very quickly?

Maybe…