"I'm becoming bloody tired of constantly fainting. What kind of homunculus... what kind of protagonist keeps fainting after every encounter?" Aedhira muttered to himself, his voice bouncing around the dark, empty space. He floated there, the familiar black void wrapping around him like a heavy blanket. Another black void, more nothingness, with a side of nothing to go along with it. It was becoming a pattern.
And Aedhira didn't particularly like patterns.
This was going to leave another blemish on his already tarnished track record, and it wasn't like it was shining in the first place. He floated there for a while, arms crossed in defiance against the cosmic, dreamlike emptiness, waiting for the next bizarre occurrence to make itself known. This time, he had a plan—or at least the start of one. He was going to time it.
After a long, grumpy pause, he jabbed a finger in no particular direction, half expecting nothing.
Instead, by sheer coincidence, something flickered into view.
A spark. A quick burst of light. No, continuous sparks, skittering and bouncing around the black void like fireflies. He blinked at the sudden appearance, barely having time to process it before a voice cut through the darkness, booming and annoyingly familiar.
[You know, I saw that debacle you called a fight between you and the floor guardian.] The voice carried a tone so thick with amusement that Aedhira could practically see the grin behind it. [Nasty thing that was, wasn't it? An old, corroded soul trapped in unfeeling ice and metal. I especially remember how you got so thoroughly chased down like a rat!]
Aedhira scowled, glaring at the sparks that were now dancing in a rhythm that he swore was mocking. "You think you're funny, don't you?" he mumbled into the void, but Elysium's laughter continued, echoing in a way that suggested he wasn't planning on being interrupted anytime soon.
[Oh, it wasn't just funny. It was tragic. So bad, in fact, that I suffered from secondhand humiliation. Forget embarrassment—secondhand humiliation.]
Aedhira's scowl deepened, his indignation flaring. He could feel the heat rising in his cheeks, though he wasn't sure if that was because of Elysium's words or the embarrassment that crept in as he recalled how poorly that fight had gone. The guardian had wiped the floor with him. It had not been pretty.
But before he could even open his mouth to offer some half-baked defense, Elysium's voice rolled on, its tone taking a sudden shift—more critical, like a stern mentor scolding a wayward apprentice.
[Of course, I wasn't expecting you to take down a 400-year-old dungeon guardian, even if it was weakened. But you had so many advantages, Aedhira, and you still couldn't get it together. It was painful to watch.]
The words stung, and Aedhira's jaw clenched. "Yeah, well, it's not like you gave me an instruction manual on how to—" he began, but the voice cut through his protest, paying his complaints no mind.
[You couldn't keep your cool. You didn't even have a mild understanding of what you had to work with. Charging in like a bull-headed idiot—yeah, I saw that too. And most importantly? You don't know how to fight.]
That last line hit harder than he cared to admit. The indignation faded, replaced by a creeping sense of inadequacy that wormed its way into his thoughts. He bit back a frustrated retort, his mind reeling through the fight's failures, the way he had flailed in the darkness, grasping at tactics that hadn't worked. It was a mess, and he knew it.
Just as he was about to open his mouth again, this time with far less fire, Elysium's voice rang out once more, cutting off his thoughts before they could fully form.
[There's no point in speaking up, Aedhira. This is a recording.]
Aedhira froze, his mouth hanging open. "A recording? You sound like you're right here!"
[Yes, yes, I know. And before you even say it, I know what you're thinking. 'How is it a recording when it sounds so lifelike?' Well, that's just how predictable you are. Another fault.]
Aedhira snapped his mouth shut, irritation flashing across his face as embarrassment crawled its way up his neck. He hated that he couldn't argue with the recording, and the fact that it was a pre-recorded message somehow made the whole thing feel worse. Being critiqued was one thing, but being preemptively critiqued? That was another.
But then, Elysium's voice returned, calm but with a hint of amusement.
[Rather than a recording, this is a memory.]
Aedhira blinked, confused. "A memory?" he muttered to himself, his thoughts spiraling. He didn't recall any of this happening before. No way he'd forget an entire conversation with Elysium, of all people.
The voice, ever perceptive, seemed to hear his confusion. [I understand your bewilderment,] Elysium continued, his tone less teasing now, more instructional. [Learning how to fight—really fight—takes years, sometimes even decades of experience. No one expects you to be a master when this was only your first serious battle.]
Aedhira felt his defensive walls soften just a bit. He even managed a small, wry smile. "Yeah, well, I guess even I can understand that," he admitted with a slight shrug, though the sting of failure still clung to him.
But Elysium, always the one to turn the tides of a conversation, didn't let him bask in that small relief for long.
[That's why I didn't want you to suffer too much.] The voice grew more serious. [We're all short on time these days.]
Aedhira's brow furrowed at that, catching on the word we. He opened his mouth, about to ask who exactly "all" encompassed, but the memory—or recording, whatever this was—kept rolling.
[This is my gift to you, Aedhira. It's not much, but it's something. Knowledge—or more accurately, experience.]
Aedhira's eyes widened at that. "Experience? You can just… give me that?" He wasn't sure how that worked, but then again, none of this ever followed any normal rules.
[While souls aren't exactly my sector,] Elysium explained, [Travelers certainly are.]
Aedhira felt something shift. A deep hum vibrated in the air around him, as if the void itself was listening to the story about to unfold. Elysium's voice had changed, softened in a way that caught Aedhira's attention.
[Since the creation of the system, billions upon billions of souls were lost. The system guides these lost souls onward, pushing them forward to the next chapter of their journey on another world. Some of them grew to become great people, some even gods or transcendants. Others? They became craftsmen, blacksmiths, alchemists— some fathers, mothers.]
There was a brief silence, and Aedhira let the words sink in. The scope of what Elysium was describing was enormous, far beyond what Aedhira could wrap his head around at the moment. These were travelers, people who had lived and died—some achieving greatness, others finding peace in simpler things.
[Some lost all they knew, becoming more miserable than they had ever been. Some, though, became grateful for a second chance. A second chance back from Beyond the Horizon] Elysium's voice took on a gentler tone, almost reverent. [No traveler is the same. Each one sets out on a journey beyond what common men can imagine.]
Aedhira stayed silent, listening carefully now, his mind filing away each word. Beyond the Horizon. That phrase again. It lingered in the air like a faint echo. He didn't fully grasp its meaning, but it was important—he could feel that much.
[The ones who achieved immortality through transcendence or ascendancy still exist, even now,] Elysium continued. [Yet those who remained mortal were destined to die, as all mortals must.]
Aedhira's breath hitched. He couldn't interrupt, not now.
[What I'm giving you isn't directly from me,] Elysium admitted. [It's from the travelers who've passed on, Beyond the Horizon.]
The air grew thicker, charged with the weight of countless lives, countless experiences. Aedhira could feel it now—something was shifting inside him, something monumental.
[These are the memories of the lives 998 of the greatest travelers I've ever laid my eyes upon. Mortals, yes, but they shone brighter than the stars themselves. Their myths, their stories linger even today.]
Aedhira's mind reeled. Nine hundred and ninety-eight ?
[Some of them could nearly be as old as the system itself,] Elysium mused. [Some as recent as 200 years ago.]
Aedhira almost scoffed at that. "Recent? 200 years ago isn't recent…" But even he knew better than to interrupt now.
[These travelers weren't just warriors,] Elysium explained, his voice filled with admiration. [They were tacticians, healers, philosophers, creators, craftsmen, pioneers, and adventurers of the highest caliber. Their brilliance was not limited to battle—they shaped worlds with their hands, their thoughts, their dreams.]
The weight of it all pressed down on Aedhira. It wasn't a burden—no, it was something else. Something heavy but hopeful, like being handed a torch in the darkest night.
Elysium's voice softened even further, barely more than a whisper now. [These memories, I bequeath them unto you, Aedhira. May their dreams, their legacies, live on through you.]
Aedhira said nothing. He couldn't. By the time Elysium's voice faded, the transfer had already begun.
His body—no, his soul—shuddered, as 998 lives poured into him all at once.
Aedhira's mind reeled, but not from the typical shock or pain one might expect. It was more like he was... drinking? It was strange. There was a hollowness inside him he hadn't realized existed, and now that space was being filled. It wasn't uncomfortable, but it wasn't pleasant either. Just—odd. He blinked rapidly, trying to get a grip on what exactly was happening.
These memories that poured into him, they were so vivid, and yet they didn't overwhelm him. He didn't feel them as a shift in his core, nor did they bend his sense of self. They felt more like... pieces of a puzzle falling into place around him rather than within. He could feel the emotions tied to each memory, those bursts of triumph, the sting of losses, the warmth of camaraderie, the chill of solitude—but they sat apart from him. He was aware of them, like watching a scene from behind a glass pane.
"I just don't feel anything about it," Aedhira muttered to himself, almost puzzled by that realization. He half-expected to lose himself to these influxes of lives, to be swayed by the weight of so many stories, yet... he remained stubbornly Aedhira. Each life, each memory, drifted into the vast expanse of his mind, settling like feathers onto a lake without stirring the water.
He touched a memory of a master tactician, guiding armies through impossible odds, and yet... it didn't shape him into a commander. He recognized the thrill of the hunt from a veteran assassin's mind but felt no pull towards the shadows. He watched through the eyes of a skilled blacksmith, the heat of the forge washing over his face, but he didn't suddenly feel the itch to forge blades. It was like watching a horror movie, knowing that none of it was real enough to scare him.
"I'm not these people," he said to the empty space around him, voice ringing in the stillness. "I'm not a traveler. Not a philosopher or a blacksmith. I'm not a soldier or a knight. I'm just... Aedhira."
There was a certain defiance in the way he said it. A stubborn streak that insisted on holding his ground, no matter how much had tried to change him. But the truth went deeper than that. It wasn't just his sense of identity that kept him whole. It was his nature. The fact that at his core, he was simply not like these beings. He wasn't organic. His muscles weren't made of flesh; they were intricate lattices of metal. His hair wasn't hair but strands of uniquely tempered steel. His eyes shone like gemstones, his skin cool like marble.
The memories flowed into him, but like oil and water, they refused to truly blend. They existed within him, separated from the essence of who he was. It was a boundary he could feel, like the edge of a blade, keeping his mind from being swallowed up by the sheer weight of 998 lives lived. If a mortal, or even an Ascendant, had tried to bear these memories, they'd probably have collapsed, their minds bursting apart like an overfilled dam. But Aedhira? He just stood there, the storm passing over him without stirring the waters of his thoughts.
He couldn't tell how long he stayed like that, minutes stretching into hours, or maybe even longer. Time became slippery in that moment of processing. But when it all settled, he found himself unchanged in the ways that truly mattered. The Aedhira before and the Aedhira after—well, they were still one and the same. The only difference was that this Aedhira now carried more beneath the surface. He knew more, had seen through the eyes of heroes and villains alike, learned the failures and victories of lifetimes.
He wasn't any wiser, though. That was probably the universe's biggest regret.
Aedhira blinked, glancing around suddenly, a suspicious glint in his eye, like he'd just heard someone whispering behind his back.
"Did someone just...?" he muttered, narrowing his gaze at the shadows, a pout forming on his lips as if daring the universe to make a snarky comment about him again.
When nothing responded, Aedhira huffed, folding his arms and scowling into the shadows. "Yeah, that's what I thought."
A moment passed in silence, then the familiar, booming voice rang out, reverberating through his mind like a cosmic gong.
[Elysium again. You know, there's no point in taunting the universe, Aedhira. You're less than a fly in the grand perspective of things.]
Aedhira bristled, clenching his fists and opening his mouth to retort—only to be abruptly cut off.
[Oh, save it. This is just another memory, after all. No use trying to talk to me. I'm not really here, kid.]
Aedhira's jaw snapped shut with an audible click, frustration simmering in his eyes. But he didn't get a chance to dwell on it long as Elysium's voice rolled on, the tone shifting into something a touch more reflective, though the undercurrent of condescension never fully disappeared.
[Well, with this, I hope you'll fare well enough for what's coming. I know, I know—it's a lot. A lot to unpack. But I've got a feeling you'll manage once things calm down a bit. Or, if not... well. If the current you's gone mad, that's a shame. First time I've tried anything like this, after all. Not exactly sure what effect it'll have, but... I was betting on the 15% chance you'd still be... mildly functional.]
Aedhira felt a chill crawl up his spine at the sheer callousness in those words. He'd been aware of Elysium's detached tone before, but now, with all these new memories slotted into place, the starkness of it hit different. He could tell, on some level, that Elysium cared. But... that care was finite, limited by the immeasurable gap between them. Like a human watching over an ant—there's only so much a human can do before the ant's fragile world shatters around it.
That realization sank in, thick like honey, but with a bitter aftertaste. It wasn't a revelation he particularly liked, but... it tracked. He couldn't even deny it. Among the lives he'd glimpsed, there were travelers who had treated others much the same way Elysium treated him now—aloof, distant, burdened with power beyond measure. There was a small part of him now that understood that perspective more than he'd care to admit.
Before he could dwell too deeply on that uncomfortable thought, Elysium's voice cut through his musings, jolting him back to the present.
[Look, I don't know what quests you might've gotten once the System integrated with you. But as its... developer, so to speak, I'll give you a little hint: Quests aren't set in stone, you know. There's no one way to solve a problem. Don't get too hung up on those fulfillment conditions. It's about dealing with the whole picture. That's how the smart travelers used to play it, anyway.]
Aedhira blinked, caught off guard by the shift in tone. A practical tip, without the usual cryptic flourish?
[And, well, I'm telling you this instead of letting you figure it out because I'm such an amazing grandfather.]
The smugness dripped from Elysium's words, thick as oil, and Aedhira could almost picture the old man's spectral form preening with self-satisfaction. It made Aedhira's eye twitch, but he held his tongue.
Then, the voice softened, just a fraction—barely enough to notice. Yet there was a hint of something else there, a note that was almost... anxious.
[Be careful.]
A pause, and then the voice dropped, turning as cold and unyielding as the vacuum of space.
[Do not die.]
The words echoed, lingering like a chill that seeped into his bones. Aedhira stood there, suspended in the dark void, and there was no follow-up. No cryptic laugh or dry, wry comment. Just... silence.
"Well, damn," Aedhira muttered to himself, voice cracking slightly, a nervous laugh slipping out before he could stop it. "Way to set up a death flag, old man." He shuddered, the thought worming into his mind like a particularly stubborn parasite. Either his days were seriously numbered, or he was in for a spectacularly bad time.
He shook himself off, trying to push the uneasy thought away before it settled too deep. That was when the message, the one he'd been ignoring, flared up in front of him, cutting through the darkness with a crisp, glaring light:
[Assimilation Complete]
[Return?]
"Yeah, let's get this over with," Aedhira muttered, swiping at the prompt with a thought. Something shifted around him, a distortion that pressed against the edges of his mind, but at least he didn't black out this time.
The familiar quest window reappeared, hovering in the air, and Aedhira took a moment to survey his surroundings. The void hadn't changed—still that endless, inky blackness—but it felt... lighter? That wasn't quite right. Less heavy, maybe. He couldn't put it into words, but the difference was there, a barely perceptible shift.
His attention turned back to the quests, all neatly arranged in their respective panels. He leaned in, scrutinizing the details one more time.
---
Quest: Don't Screw with the Little Baby Man, The Baby Man
Rank: Befei
Conditions:
1. Cull at least 50% of the horde.
2. Kill the Hordemother.
Rewards:
1. Skill: Coupling.
2. To be calculated appropriately.
Quest: Run, Little Lamb
Rank: Befei
Conditions:
1. Evacuate all under your care.
2. Get them off Lokir.
3. Reach Lagrange Point 2465.
Rewards:
1. To be calculated appropriately.
---
He scanned through the details, his eyes narrowing as he took everything in. A lot of unknowns, a lot left up to fate. But he nodded, slowly, as the gears in his mind began to turn. It was clunky, like some old machine sputtering to life after years of disuse, but they were turning.
"Alright. Alright. Let's... figure this out," he whispered to himself, the words grounding him as he tried to shove aside the nerves. The new memories—disjointed, chaotic—were already proving their worth. Strategies, tactics, little bits of wisdom surfaced like flashes of light in the murk. He was, begrudgingly, a little thankful to Elysium for the so-called "gift." Sure, the gamble might've gotten him killed or driven mad, but it hadn't. So... silver linings, right?
Aedhira pulled up his status window, hoping for some clarity. But as he scanned through it, his brows furrowed.
Name: Aedhira
Rank: Unranked ???
Attributes:
- Strength: ???
- Speed: ???
- Intellect: ???
- Resilience: ???
- Magical Affinity: ???
Even his attributes were still just a bunch of question marks. And his titles... there was only one left: 'Marked Candidate'. What did that even mean? He felt a surge of frustration, clenching his fists as he resisted the urge to yell at the screen. It wouldn't do him any good.
There was something odd too—a scroll bar? Last time he'd checked, this window had been small, neat, and utterly barren. But now...
He hesitated, then dragged the scroll bar down to the section marked Skills.
And it unfurled into a mess.
[Mrygrad Lancing Arts - Lv 9] [Basic Swordsmanship - Lv 8] [Great Cooking - Lv 9]
[Therindri's Sharp Vengeance - Lv 4] [Professional Lying - Lv 10] [Night's Willowy Sneak - Lv 7]
[Xarlithian Feral Scribe - Lv 6] [Whispered Blades of Ytariak - Lv 5] [Daydreaming - Lv 10]
[Qren'tahl's Mana Harvesting Methodology - Lv 8] [Bztr'un War Dance - Lv 11] [Void Sculpting: Basics - Lv 3]
[Kynorus Scream-Singing - Lv 2] [Mending, Advanced Organic Tissue - Lv 5] [Carving the Air, Breathing the Dark - Lv 4]
[Advanced Handshaking Protocols - Lv 1] [Bladeshift: Echoes - Lv 5] [Cyril's Fluctuating Tempo - Lv 8]
[Lightweaving - Lv 7] [Thermal Retention Strategies - Lv 6] [Quantum Logic Sequences - Lv 3] [Driathal's Cruel Mercy - Lv 2] [Pellathingor Synchronized Chain Casting - Lv 6] [Social Politeness - Lv 1]...
And the list went on.
And on.
And on.
"Damn"
It seemed endless, a cascade of names that spilled out into infinity, many of which he couldn't make heads or tails of. He didn't even know what half of these meant, let alone how to use them.
He sighed, rubbing his temples as a headache began to creep in. "Oh yeah, this is gonna be a blast," he muttered dryly, staring at the chaos on the screen. His new memories had given him access to countless skills, yes—but the sheer volume of it was overwhelming.
"I'll figure you out later," he decided, swiping the skill list away with a flick of his hand. "Right now, I've got bigger problems to deal with." Like, you know, not dying horribly or failing those quests.
But as daunting as it all seemed, a small ember of determination sparked in his chest. He could do this. He had to do this. Whatever Elysium had left behind for him, it wasn't just a warning or a condescending pat on the back. It was a chance.
And Aedhira wasn't about to waste it.