Chapter 88: The Angel of Inertia

Chapter 88: Chapter 88: The Angel of Inertia

"The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way." — Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

•••

The dead Seraph hung between the two halves of the shattered island, held in place by Vulcan’s enormous chains.

Joel stood beneath it, along the cracked ground, looking up at the largest creature he had ever defeated.

For ages, the Seraph had ruled the Shattered Heavens through fear.

Now, it was nothing more than a thousand tons of dead divine flesh, suspended by three massive chains.

Its enormous body swayed slightly whenever the air moved through the gap.

The glowing feathers on its wings had completely faded.

Its scales, once resembling collapsed stars, had turned into dull black charcoal.

The halo above its long skull had stopped rotating, hanging motionless like a coin waiting to fall.

A gust of wind passed through the gap.

The chains creaked.

The halo swayed slightly.

Across the gap, thirty-seven students stood at the entrance to the bridge, watching everything in silence.

None of them even tried to hide their curiosity.

[Ding!]

[Fate Points minted: +5.]

[Sources logged: one gravity well stood under, one fall of three hundred meters ruled absolute, one Level 65 apex kill countersigned from the sky.]

[Balance: 21.]

[Note: the mint has never issued a receipt like this one. It is keeping a copy.]

The entire night’s battle had rewarded Joel with a single entry in his system.

He read it once, memorized it, and looked up at the enormous corpse hanging above him.

There was no reason to celebrate.

He had something more important to do.

The Astral Seraph had attacked him with all the power it had gathered over countless years.

And Joel had absorbed it.

Just as he had absorbed countless attacks since his first night.

The most important rule of his Class had never changed.

Everything that hits me, I keep.

It didn’t matter whether the attack came from an ordinary fist or the overwhelming gravity of an ancient god.

The Seraph had unleashed everything against him.

And his Bastion had stored it.

Now, the creature was dead.

The lightning had disappeared, the storms had retreated, and nothing remained to challenge his claim over its body.

Joel stared at the enormous corpse.

’What should I do with a god’s body?’

If the academy discovered it, they would probably create an entire research department just to study it.

The Eclipse Syndicate would have cut it apart and sold every valuable piece.

But Joel had another option.

One that neither the academy nor the Syndicate could match.

He looked directly at the dead Seraph.

"Fate-Bound Legion," Joel said.

"Activation on the target."

[Ding!]

[Fate-Bound Legion: activation accepted on designated target.]

[Target: the Astral Seraph, Level 65. Status: deceased.]

[Advisory: taming a celestial of this grade ordinarily requires a century of tribute, three consecrated shrines, and a saint with no other appointments.]

[The house does not have a century. The house has an instrument.]

Above the broken church, pale-gold pieces unfolded out of nowhere, turning around an empty center, and the Wheel of Fate hung over the cracked ground in the dark of early morning.

[Ding!]

[The Wheel of Fate accepts the stake: 2 Fate Points. Balance: 19.]

[Application: taming, multiplied.]

TK-TK-TK-TK-TK!

The Wheel of Fate spun, and the entire strait seemed to hold its breath.

The pointer moved past x3,000, the multiplier that had saved him during the fortress battle.

Then x18,000, the multiplier that had healed his body from the Blood-Fiend’s burning blood.

Then x25,000, the multiplier that had granted him his mysterious, sealed mind.

But the pointer didn’t stop.

It continued moving toward numbers Joel had never reached before.

Numbers beyond anything he had ever experienced.

Then the wheel slowed.

TCK!

[Ding!]

[The Wheel of Fate stops. Multiplier: x30,000.]

The reward descended with overwhelming power, as though the laws of the world were being rewritten.

VMM!

•••

The golden energy didn’t simply enter the Seraph’s corpse.

It began examining and purifying it.

Thirty thousand units of binding force flowed into the enormous body, only to encounter unstable cosmic energy still trapped inside.

Even though the Seraph was dead, that energy hadn’t completely disappeared.

And it resisted the binding process.

TSSSS!

Thin streams of light escaped through the creature’s blackened scales.

They hissed against the chains before dissolving into the air above the strait.

Then more golden energy poured into the corpse.

It spread along the wings, entered the damaged chest, and traveled through the enormous spine.

Everywhere it passed, it established the same rule.

Every movement within this body would now obey Joel’s command.

Its momentum, weight, and movements were being brought under his control.

The remaining cosmic energy resisted most fiercely inside the wings, where it had gathered in the greatest amounts.

The struggle continued long enough for the thirty-seven students across the strait to witness everything.

Golden light spread through the wings.

Then the remaining cosmic energy boiled away.

TSSSS!

One glowing thread after another escaped until nothing remained.

Finally, the binding process was complete.

And the Seraph’s body began transforming.

Its enormous mass compressed.

The thousand-ton corpse became smaller and more streamlined, without losing its overwhelming power.

The dead charcoal scales cracked and fell away in large pieces.

Beneath them appeared dark-matter armor, black and smooth, absorbing the surrounding storm-light instead of reflecting it.

Then the wings changed.

Their damaged tendons and supports disappeared.

In their place, solid kinetic energy formed enormous feathers made from hardened air.

The edges bent the light around them, giving the wings a strange, almost unreal appearance.

Finally, the Seraph’s halo cracked.

Its broken pieces gathered together and formed a new ring.

This time, it was made of black glass.

And slowly, the halo began turning again.

[Ding!]

[Unit evolution complete.]

[[Astral Seraph] → [Dark-Matter Seraph]. Level: 65, retained.]

[Composition: dark matter, kinetic force. Erratic cosmic energy: purged in full, receipted.]

[Flight profile: the unit does not fly. The unit declines to fall. It is the Sovereign’s own answer, wearing wings.]

[Legion charter: amended. Lines: 3 → 4.]

[Fate-Bound Legion: 4 of 4.]

The enormous chains suddenly went slack.

In one silent movement, the Seraph’s thousand-ton body lifted free of the island’s anchors.

Vulcan straightened as the terrible weight disappeared from his shoulders.

The transformed creature floated above the ruined temple without any support.

It no longer needed wings or chains to remain in the air.

Then it slowly descended.

The Seraph landed on the cracked ground in front of Joel and folded its wings.

The movement produced two sharp sounds, like a heavy book closing.

Above its lowered head, the black-glass halo continued turning slowly.

The surrounding storm-light touched the edges of its wings, producing a faint golden glow.

"Architect."

A deep, distant voice echoed through the ruins.

It sounded formal and calm, like a great bell ringing far away.

"I fell for an entire era," the Seraph said. "And now I am told I rose again in a single night."

It paused.

"The calculations favor the house."

"They do," Joel replied.

The enormous creature remained still, waiting.

Joel studied the golden light along its wing edges.

Then he gave it a name.

"Aurelius."

[Ding!]

[Unit designation logged: Aurelius. The house notes the pun, and declines to repeat it.]

"Give me a demonstration," Joel said. "Show me what you can do."

A massive boulder, nearly the size of a chapel, was drifting past the broken island.

It had been falling through the Shattered Heavens for ages, moving at incredible speed without ever reaching the bottom.

Aurelius rose from the cracked ground.

With four slow beats of his enormous wings, he climbed high into the sky.

He circled once above the Tenth Stratum, then released a concentrated lance of solid force toward the drifting boulder.

KRAKOOM!

The enormous rock shattered instantly.

Its fragments broke into smaller pieces, scattering into the endless void.

THUMP!

The sound of the impact arrived moments later.

Then another target appeared.

A massive section of the temple’s old foundation was drifting on the far side of the strait.

This time, Aurelius attacked from a much greater distance.

The angle was difficult, with the strange curvature of the Tenth Stratum bending the space between them.

But his attack didn’t miss.

A brilliant lance crossed the distance and struck the foundation.

KRAKOOM!

The enormous slab shattered, turning into countless pieces of glass that rained into the darkness.

The demonstration had consumed no noticeable resources.

And it had proven just how powerful Aurelius had become.

"I want one," Nyx declared.

She appeared on Joel’s shoulder, her six blades extended as she stared excitedly at the sky.

"I’ve never wanted control over the weather before. But now I do."

"The Forge-Lord approves," Vulcan rumbled.

He finally withdrew his enormous anchors from the island’s foundation.

"The body has an excellent design. Those chains can now be used for towing."

Thalassa studied Aurelius’s enormous wings.

"The tide has examined his structure," she reported, her violet halos rotating slowly. "His wings can support tremendous weight. The sky is now under our control."

Aurelius descended through the darkness.

He returned to his position above the ruined temple, folding his enormous wings as he settled into formation.

Even folded, his wingspan stretched across an incredible distance.

Across the strait, the thirty-seven surviving students watched in stunned silence.

They had witnessed Joel defeat an ancient god, bind its corpse, remove the unstable energy within it, and transform it into a member of his legion.

All within the same night.

Victor Kole stood at the front of the group.

His face looked pale beneath the golden light reflecting from Aurelius’s wings.

Unlike the others, he had already started writing down everything he had witnessed.

The remaining students would remember the scene for the rest of their lives.

The enormous chains suddenly going slack.

The golden light spreading across the transformed wings.

And the moment Joel casually gave an ancient god a name, as though naming an ordinary pet.

Meanwhile, on the remaining half of the shattered island, something continued glowing.

Beyond the ruined temple walls and the broken vault, the Apex Tear remained untouched.

Its fist-sized form burned with the same strange light it had carried since the Fall.

It was the final treasure Joel had come to claim.

He now commanded four powerful members of his Fate-Bound Legion.

Vulcan ruled the land with his immense strength and forge.

Thalassa commanded the seas and healing tides.

Nyx controlled the shadows.

And Aurelius had joined them as the ruler of the sky.

With all four generals under his command, Joel had conquered the greatest threat in the Tenth Stratum.

Only one thing remained.

The vault was open.

And Joel had come to collect his final prize.