The Oracle Paths

Ruby's heart sank upon hearing his conclusion, but contrary to what she anticipated Jake just laughed at himself with contempt and defiance,

"But in the end, it just means we're too weak. My master Cekt Mogusar told me about a legendary creature from System A0 named Wilderth, just like my last name. Its Bloodline is unofficially rated as Grade 17. What I retained was not the alleged invincibility of this creature, but that the Digestors leave it and the planets under its protection in peace. Corruption doesn't seem to have a hold on this Aether beast."

He stepped toward her and grabbed her shoulders, staring her straight in the eye,

"So don't give up. It's definitely possible to overcome the Corruption. Even if I'm wrong about everything, there's definitely a way. In the meantime, I'm going to focus on my Bloodline and Aether Spells and aim for that Grade 17 or get as close to it as I can.

"As for you, instead of focusing on how to outperform during your Ordeals, you'd be better off developing skills that promote your self-control, even if it's counterproductive in the short term and substantially changes your personality. You did the right thing with your Light Alf sub-bloodline, but I'm sure you can do much better. For starters, you'd better change that Fallen Angel Soul Class. That one will only hasten your downfall."

Ruby, who was calm and clear-headed, took his advice very seriously and teleported to the surface straight away.

"I'm going to Laudarkvik to change my Soul Class. I'll be back in an hour." She informed him succinctly via the Oracle Device.

Jake hesitated, but he accepted with one condition,

"Ask Asfrid to accompany you."

"Okay..."

Jake had the feeling that something was wrong but Ruby had already left. With a foreboding feeling, he contacted the Eltarian leader and expressed his concerns.

"Don't worry, if the Digestor manifests itself I'll send it back to sleep" She promised earnestly.

"Thank you, Asfrid. I don't know what I'll do without you."

"More unrewarding work." She grunted as she ended the discussion.

Jake then went back to forging, but several hours later he began to worry when he realized Ruby hadn't returned and he still hadn't heard from Asfrid. He first tried to contact Ruby, without success. He was puzzled when he found that he could no longer feel her presence. She was already extremely far away.

'Asfrid!'

He flew away like a blurred trail of light, splitting the rock and sky at several times the speed of sound. A few minutes later, he landed on the unrecognizable temple square where the Prophetic Stele was supposed to be. A 300 meter deep crater had scarred the area, the temple of Aurae being nothing but smoking ruins.

'What happened here?' His dumbfoundedness was matched only by his anger.

"Cough, cough!"

Jake heard the barely audible coughing of a woman at the bottom of the crater and as he approached he saw a shapeless mass of crushed flesh, blood and bone painfully regenerating. It was a miracle that the victim was still alive.

"Asfrid?"

"If you can still recognize me, I guess I'm not doing so bad..." She groaned with tremendous difficulty in articulation.

Jake smiled wrily and activated the Vitality Link Faction Skill to buy time. An uninjured Asfrid replaced the bloody lump of flesh, but his own body began to crack. The Adamantium in his bones creaked and his flesh was covered with bloody tears, but his body held together. Seconds later, his wounds healed and his bones became as hard and smooth as before.

"You, Gerulf and Rogen are truly freaks of nature." The exhausted woman sighed enviously."

"Well, from the rumors I've heard Drastan is practically unkillable with his Digitized body. It helps to have a Troll Bloodline." Jake awkwardly brushed off the compliment.

"Maybe..." She muttered thoughtfully. "After all I survived too, but only because I separated my Spirit Body in time. The Digitization could have killed me."

Getting to the heart of the matter, Jake became serious and asked,

"What happened?"

Sigh...

"An ambush by a coalition of Players and Demons. Not just any demons. All of them Spirit Mages or Players with Bloodlines delving into the mind. The Demon at their head was none other than Astraroth Thozuch. It seems that he had not said his last word when he fled from Laudarkvik. I don't know how they got this information, but they must have found out what Ruby really was.

"It only took a split second for everything to turn to shit. One-fucking-Wrath-Spell."

Jake clenched his teeth and fists in fury, an uncontrolled bloodlust threatening to overwhelm him. Who the culprits were wasn't hard to figure out.

Lost Divinities.

If one of Craig's teammates had been captured and tortured by this spiteful faction, the outcome was without question. This information could even have been inferred from the grilling of Carmin, Elduin and Bhammod.

"I underestimated them again." Jake spat coldly. "This is the last time."

This time it wasn't really his fault. Someone from Lost Divinities clearly had a higher Oracle Rank than he did. Ruby, by her Trojan Digestor nature was supposed to be immune to enemy predictions and Oracle Paths, but by suppressing the Digestor within her, the young woman had lost her immunity totem.

"And who caused your injuries? That crater?" Jake then asked.

"Ruby... She was about to switch Soul Classes when the Wrath Spell hit her. As you can see... She didn't take the expected Soul Class..."

"That's it, they made me angry." Jake said with an unfamiliar coldness "This time I'll wipe out every last one of them. Once I've fulfilled my end of the bargain with the people of Laudarkvik, I'll head to Celestial City to hunt them down with the volunteer Myrtharian Nerds."

"And I will fight by your side. I have a revenge to exact." Asfrid declared with an eerie killing intent. The moisture in the air clumped around her and a whirlwind of water condensed around her just from her ire.

Jake recalled that she was no longer just a powerful Eltarian, but also a Nereid, a lesser deity of the ocean. Asfrid felt responsible for the tragedy that had struck Laudarkvik and decided to stay behind to deal with the aftermath.

As for him, he returned somberly to his base and after reporting to Craig and Hade what had happened he shut himself up in his underground cave and began to forge furiously.

"What?! Ruby has joined the enemy! An ambush! Fuck you! SLAP!"

Jake recalled how the coated Player had slapped him in the face out of emotion. At the time, the urge to retaliate with a slap of his own had crossed his mind, but when he saw Ruby's teammate turn purplish while holding the broken hand that had just slapped him he deflated...

BANG! BANG! BANG!

Hammering furiously at an Adamantium bar while lightning and scorching rays from his Aether Sun Core rained down on him, Jake suddenly punched down on the Adamantium bar, the imprint of his fist denting the metal.

"FUCK! That's not good enough!" He fumed as he flung the useless ingot away.

The twelve Aether Sun Cores began to spin frantically around him, coming dangerously close to his body, and with the rush of heat and radiation, Jake roared with pain and anger and kicked the ground, propelling himself to the surface. The Aether Sun Cores followed his flight with a slight delay and soon he broke through the surface, the molten ground collapsing beneath him.

He kept flying up and soon he disappeared into the black storm clouds with a deafening supersonic boom.

Once inside the apocalyptic storm, Jake immediately felt the difference and split his body from his mind to let the lightning temper both his body and soul.

"RAAAAAAGGH!"

With the combination of this lightning and the radiation from his Aether Sun Cores at close range Jake's body and mind ignited and harrowing pain engulfed his whole soul. He immersed his mind in the Spirit Shell and requested for all the spiritual energy he could get.

His mental faculties expanded, and soon his Extrasensory Perception became strong enough to reach the ground more than ten kilometers below him. With his telekinesis having reached all-time highs, he began to terraform the mountain and the landscape below him, piling and merging rock upon rock to create a mountain high enough for him to stand on.

The process took only a few hours and the few Myrtharian Nerds still in the base watched with bulging eyes and mouth agape as the tallest mountain they had ever seen in their lives rose from the ground.

The process didn't stop there and Jake continued to enlarge his artificial mountain for three days in a row until it became a colossal behemoth more than 20 kilometers high. Meanwhile, the ever increasing lightning and radiation carried on destroying and reconstructing his body and mind as he refined his ingots.

Another three days later, he sensed that his companions were at their limit and he withdrew his mind from the Spirit Shell. In the palm of his hand, an Adamantium ingot as compressed as a marble glistened like a full moon.

"I did it."