"G-...gotcha...asshole..."
A deathly silence lingers over the halls of the labyrinth for several heartbeats, neither Rain nor the Curse moving. Between the waves of pain ravaging his body, Rain feels a slight tinge of fear at the thought of having just killed himself with the dagger, even though he knows logically that he was already mortally wounded. Then, he sees something change in the eyes of the Fel...right before it explodes into a cloud of golden mist.
No longer held up by the creature's grip, Rain is unceremoniously dropped several meters onto the floor. He quickly transforms the already tattered Ideal Protection into a helmet, then uses his one good leg and half functioning arm to brace his fall. His head still smacks against the ground fairly hard, but he manages to remain conscious and alive...for now.
As he lies on his side, his vision clears enough to notice that he's staring at his own entrails spilling out of the first cut made by the Curse. The sight causes his blood to turn cold...what little of it he has left in him.
Rain shifts his eyes up to the golden mist above him, which used to be the Curse, and a sense of grim satisfaction washes over him. At that moment, the mist begins to coalesce and move towards Rain, before disappearing into his chest. Without warning, a violent heat emanates from his Mark, not unlike his original Marking, and then begins to spread through his whole body.
As the heat continues to radiate through his body, Rain watches in disgust and awe and his entrails seem to pull themselves back into place. Meanwhile, he feels bones in his arms and legs being violent snapped back into place and fused, and his chest cavity expanding once again. The mangled flesh around the outside of his body also begins to writhe and burn, mending itself and closing the wounds in his skin.
It's far from pleasant, but after what he's just endured, this pain barely bothers him. After several minutes, the heat in his body subsides, and he hears the Echo whisper to him.
[You have slain a Curse...]
[You have acquired a Relic...]
*****
Close to an hour later, Rain is walking through the corridors of the Labyrinth, passing the spot where he first spotted the Curse. Before he left his would-be grave, he collected the Fate Shard and his trusty javelin, just in case. He also washed himself off. Honestly, most of that time he waited before continuing on wasn't for any practical reason...his body was fully healed, not a hair out of place, and the heat of his Mark told him that he was only minutes away from the Temple.
More than anything, he needed the time to...adjust. The amount of damage that his body was put through...the pain he endured...it feels like the experience killed something inside of him, even if he technically survived. The fact that he was willing to draw the Fate Shard is proof of that...even after the Curse's first blow broke his leg and caved in his chest, he hadn't considered gambling his life with the ominous blade. It wasn't until he was literally gutted that the last thing holding him back dissolved.
Even now, walking through the Labyrinth, he can feel the difference in himself from that fight, that decision. It's like that singleminded desire to bring the Curse to its knees at any cost, even his own life, is still with him. Whatever snapped inside his mind is broken for good. Maybe a similar experience is where Aron's advice about the most important lesson of fighting came from...the key is absolute, unwavering violence.
Rain is stirred from his somber thoughts by a change in the Labyrinth walls around him. They still appear the same shade of black, but somehow they now seem more...ominous...oppressive, even. Inspecting the changes as he continues around a corner, Rain stops dead in his tracks.
In front of him, at the end of the corridor, is a dead end.
Or rather, that's what it looks like at first glance. In reality, there's a slightly different property to the wall at the end of the corridor. It's black and opaque like the rest, but it also seems...alive. In fact, it reminds him of the swirling mist that his Relics manifest from. Any doubt that he has about this being his final destination is assuaged by the burning heat of the Mark on his chest.
Rain stops in front of the strange mist wall, inspecting it cautiously. After a moment, he shrugs and sticks his hand out to touch the strange phenomenon, and his hand passes right through it unobstructed. Blinking in surprise, he pulls his hand back and inspects it. Nothing seems to have happened. Looking back at the strange mist, Rain lets out a dry smirk.
"Well, well...how rude. Trying to conceal your secrets to the very end, huh?"
Without further hesitation, Rain walks right into the mist wall.
As he passes through it, his vision goes dark, and he feels a powerful warmth run through his entire body. Unlike the healing from the Fate Shard, this on is mild...and pleasant. For a moment, he can't see, hear, or feel anything, then he's suddenly standing in a new, dimly lit room.
Looking around, he's in a massive, circular chamber with stone walls and a domed, stone ceiling. The stone all around him seems...fragile, and cracks run rampant along the structure's surfaces. In the center of the room is a massive block of jet black, smooth rock in the shape of a tablet. It's several meters high, and a couple wide. In front of it is a small stone table, and behind it, at the back of the room, two neighboring archways are carved into the wall.
The arches look like they should be framing doorways, but there is only solid stone within them. He also notices that, contrary to what he expected, there is no door of any kind behind him either. Or, anywhere else in the room – he's effectively sealed in, it seems. However, he's not really concerned about that right now.
Instead, the thing that currently has Rain's attention is the glowing, orange handprint on the black rock in front of him. It appears to be oscillating in intensity, just like some of the runes describing his Relics at the beginning of the Trial. He lets out a curious smile.
"Now, what might you do?"
Walking forward, past the stone table, Rain confidently reaches out and places his right hand flat on the black rock, covering the glowing print. Almost immediately, another surge of heat rushes through his arm and into his Mark, before spreading out through the rest of his body. It reminds him of when he was healed earlier – the intensity of the heat, and the sensation of having his body being reconstructed is similar. However, this experience isn't painful...it's downright euphoric.
As the heat continues to wash over his body in waves, the structure around him is also undergoing changes. Everything made of stone is slowly being covered by the eerie, dark mist – the walls, the floor, the ceiling. Once he's completely surrounded, a faint hum can be heard from the structure itself, as if the mist covering it is pulsing...writhing. At the same time, the heat flooding his body experiences a spike in intensity, right near his Mark.
After a few minutes, the heat in his body fades, and the mist recedes from the surrounding structure. When they are gone completely, its as if both the structure and Rain's body have been completely remade. He feels...inhumanly strong and resilient...and the structure looks pristine, as though it was just built yesterday. As he marvels at the changes, the Echo whispers once again.
[Glory is yours, Champion...you are worthy to walk the path of Ascension. Your Ego is forged, your soul reborn. Behold its secrets...]
A beaming smile plasters itself across Rain's face.
'That's it, I officially did it!'
The Echo identified him as a Champion, not a Hopeful. This newfound power in his body must now be on par with the raw strength exhibited by the Fallen in the Labyrinth. The strongest normal humans in the world would struggle to match him.
The Echo also mentioned the path of Ascension...that's the process by which Champions can grow stronger, becoming Paragons, Demigods, and so on. Rain doesn't know much about the process, just that it involves being physically instead of spiritually transported to a different plane of existence, called Asphodel. There, Marked can undergo other challenges, kind of like new Trials, to raise their Prestige.
However, as far as he knows, undergoing those challenges, or even visiting Asphodel, is completely optional. Rain purses his lips at the thought.
'Personally, I've had enough of being tested...'
As he's considering what he'll do now that he's a Champion, the black rock in front of him begins to shimmer and blue runes slowly spread across its surface. At the same time, the left archway behind the black rock suddenly begins to fill with the black mist, in place of a doorway. A series of blue runes take shape above it. Rain vaguely understands them to mean something akin to "home".
'Nice! I'm guessing that's the way back to fresh...-ly filtered air and sunshine.'
He's pleased that he can leave the Labyrinth, or wherever this is now, but he's also curious about the runes that appeared on the black rock. Returning his attention to them, he sees what looks like a summary of...him.
Name: Rain
Prestige: Champion
Lineage: [Chaos]
Bloodline: [Primordial]
Nature: [Chaotic Will], [Unhinged], [Fated Chaos]
Talents: [Uncertain Existence], [Fickle Strength]
Relics: [Glorious Pebble], [Ideal Protection], [Fate Shard], [Ego's Brace]
Rain stares at the runes, scanning over the unfamiliar information. As time passes, his face twists into an expression of utter confusion.
"What the hell is a Chaos Lineage?"