They had been working for hours, and Marcus had decided to start speaking out loud to Artemis, as the sound of his own voice seemed to comfort him.
He repeated his actions of taking his chosen materials which he had found after repeated experimentation, but after a spontaneous spur in the moment, decided to take a small slab of Somnum Exterreri.
It was an item he had found whilst he had searched through the materials on offer to him in the workshop, and after inspecting it, Marcus found that he had received it for "Being the King of the Void".
Marcus had no idea what this meant, but Artemis had told him to try to make a weapon out of it.
He started hammering, linking up the nodes using the void, and building up the item network slowly, making sure he didn't make any silly mistakes.
He meticulously carved his energy into the item, deciding to try and mix his previous work's structure and flair it with a little of his own additions.
Suddenly, a bright bronze light flashed out in front of him, glaring in his eyes and engraving into his retinas.
The bronze light turned a dull silver and then gold. It continued to change, flaring in an incredible rush of blue, followed by a shinier silver, with small red engravements floating around. It continued to largen, before turning into an even shinier, snowy white silver, with red engravements swirling around the metals Marcus had been working. It seemed to rise into the air, and the snowy white swirled around it, the runes settling themselves onto it... It seemed to glow even brighter and started to flicker.
Suddenly, Marcus felt his limbs rooted the spot, strangely protected from the extreme energies being radiated by the floating metals.
After a small while of chaos, the runes began to settle, and the weapon began to glow red. The snowy white completely vanished, and the surrounding became a black so deep Marcus couldn't even see his own hands.
The red glow began to glow even brighter, and the runes began to multiply, taking the shape of a crown.
Suddenly, chains fell from the sky, restraining the floating piece of metal, and holding against a stake that had fallen from the sky.
A shriek resounded from the weapon, followed by a headless horseman leaping out wielding a spear, and stabbing towards the chains, trying to destroy them.
It failed, not even leaving a scratch the chains. The chains retrained the horseman too, draining it away into nothing but a passing mist.
Finally, after what felt like an age of struggle, the light around the weapon died out, and Marcus felt he was able to move again. He fell to his knees in shock, then gathered his bearings and moved towards the fallen item.
He used the analyse ability on it, and received this:
The seemingly almighty system had given him nothing, so Marcus knew whatever this he was holding was far stronger than anything he had ever come across.
He swivelled it in his hands a bit, inspecting every part of it.
It was a deep purple pendant attached to a black-gold chain. It gave off an eerie vibe, and if you looked carefully enough, you'd see a flurry of small runes floating around the jewel of the pendant, before returning into the gem.
He held it by the chain, watching it swing like a pendulum, and as it rotated, a small insignia came into view, showing the engraved image of an infinity symbol in black, surrounded by a blood-red circle resembling the moon.
Using his now perfect memory, he thought back to the time he had received this book in the black market a year and a half ago. It had the same symbol engraved into it, but Marcus still knew nothing about it.
After a few minutes of thought and theories, Marcus gave up on trying to figure it out.
"Artemis… do you think you could help me out here?"
< "Well, Marcus, the thing you are holding is the insignia of th-" >
Suddenly, a monotonous voice like a robot sounded out, speaking
< "This information is restricted. Please consult a higherup about acquiring this information" >
"Artemis?! You alright there?"
< "Ugh, I forgot about my restrictions… I can't tell you about the pendant in your hands, but I can say it will be incredibly important to you! Try pouring some Vis into it."> she replied in her regular voice.
Marcus did as she said, and ran Vis through his palms and into the gem. Bringing back a wave of nostalgia, Marcus felt all of his Vis rush out of him, swarming into the pendant, just like before.
His Vis was drained even faster than before, and after a little while, Marcus felt his Vis go dangerously low, and when he tried to retract it, it was only absorbed faster. Realising he was helpless, Marcus sat down on the ground, trying to absorb some Vis into his body from the atmosphere, and absorb it for himself like he did when forging, but the effects it had were practically minuscule.
He started to panic now, absorbing as much energy as he could from wherever he could. He started to scoff down some of the remaining pills, completely ignoring the previous warnings Artemis had given him. By this point, he had decided it was do or die, and if there was any chance of him surviving, it would be by taking every risk necessary.
He decided to pop a pill whenever he started to run out of Vis, but the effects were starting to show as his stomach started to feel like it was burning inside out.
He calmed himself down as much as possible, using as little Vis as possible in his regular activities, and fell into a trance of shallow breathing and minimal activity. It reached a point where you could barely tell he was alive at this point.
He remained there, seated with his legs crossed and his arms resting on his lap, head slack and eyes open yet clouded, and time slowly passed. He would monotonously pick up a pill from the container and pop it into his mouth, and he had nearly gone through half the packet that had been about seven eighths full after his months of training.
After several hours of scarce activity and barely living, the level of Vis being absorbed seemed to decrease a little, and Marcus came back to his senses. His body felt like it had been burned inside out by now, and he was only hanging on by a slight tether to life, hovering between consciousness and possibly even death.
Running out of Vis meant certain death, however, and thus he had decided this was actually the less risky option to take.
As the rate of absorption finally died down to nothing, everything seemed to pause for a second, and Marcus felt everything calm down, and the Vis in the room had never felt so tranquil.
As if a bomb had dropped, runes burst out of the pendant and span around the gemstone, exploding out in a cyclone of fury and rotating with Marcus at the eye of the storm.
The last sight he saw was the assembling of the runes into a manifestation of light, taking the form of a fox. It was onyx black in colour and had red eyes and strange purple markings along its flesh which seemed to move along its body as the Vis around it reacted.
"Nice to see you, Master".
And with that he passed out for the umpteenth time, feeling partially dead inside, and extremely dead outside.