City of Sin (Yanyu Jiangnan)

Fetters Of Distortion

Once he was appraised about the situation in Faust, Richard then asked about the broodmothers in Faelor and the Forest Plane. The former had now embraced her new identity and taken on the name of Mountainsea, and having gotten to level 15 she was only a step away from breaking through the limits of the plane. With Faelor’s population having bottomed out to the point that any deities outside of Richard’s trio were on the verge of falling, she made her move on the pantheon. The three goddesses had remained neutral instead of siding with her, but that hadn’t mattered as she swept through the rest with ease. That war had spanned three years, and only the three goddesses still remained in its aftermath. With that time being decades ago in Faelorian time, it was now termed the Twilight of the Gods.

The fallen deities and their divine kingdoms had become food for Mountainsea. She was still absorbing that energy to strengthen her two truenames, but it wouldn’t be long before she got to level 16 and officially became a matriarch.

Things were different in the Forest Plane. The clone was still only at level 12, but with the help of the Golden World Tree she could produce saint-level night elves and had amassed a frighteningly powerful army. Having devoted the entirety of her effort into creating combat units, she was well beyond even the original in this regard. She could specialise her drones for certain traits, like vision and elbow strength enhancements on archers that made her units much more effective than any saints. Richard’s own attention was drawn to the fact that she could add an elite’s level of intelligence into even the common drones now, which would be a huge boon to their autonomy in certain situations.

It took an entire afternoon for Richard to have a grasp on the situation. Once all of his followers had given him their reports, he dismissed them and called Nasia to his study. As they entered, he turned around and smiled, “Thank you!”

“Just a thank you isn’t enough,” a smile floated up on her mask as she said something he completely agreed with. She had been supremely impactful on his life ever since she had entered it, playing her hand at every stage to better his chances of victory. She was the one who had established the reward point system, allowing him to amass his wealth and defeat the reapers. She had personally handled things whenever he couldn’t, and despite Faelor approaching mere inches within destruction it had turned him into the premier powerhouse of Norland. In the abyss she was the only one who could follow him to the end, facing the mysterious and terrifying existences in the depths of Arbidis and somehow managing to return alive. When he was stranded in the Darkness she had taken on the role of the Archeron leader, keeping the reward point system running and beating back all enemies to amass a huge fortune for the family.

Without Nasia, neither Richard nor the Archerons would exist today. However, now that that he saw her again, now that he knew what he did, he couldn’t bring himself to say much. He eventually asked, “How did you return from the abyss?”

All of his other followers had been teleported back, but while he’d had plans to make one more and ask her to guard it he hadn’t expected to be thrown into the Darkness with a single strike. This had left her stranded in the depths of the Eternal Battlefield, but she had clearly made it back unharmed.

“I just took our original route back,” she gave him an answer that left him speechless. Even he would have found it difficult to deal with everyone he had left behind during the initial expedition. However, it was clear that she had no plans to explain as she looked him up and down and changed topics, “You seem to have gained a lot.”

Richard was a little confused, unable to understand just how she could tell that. The 32 laws of distortion were his greatest gain in his journey, but those were pretty much useless in Norland and there wasn’t a significant leap in his power otherwise.

Nasia seemed to know what he was thinking, and she quietly conjured a mirror for him to see himself in. Richard was surprised by what he saw; everything around him was distorted by wisps of black energy that constantly emanated from his body. Only now did he realise that he hadn’t completely shaken off the influence of the Darkness, and was subconsciously using the strength of the distorted laws. He had returned in a hurry and barely stopped over in his eagerness to make sure the family was safe, and as a result he hadn’t even paid notice to the fact that Norland itself was suppressing him.

Seeing himself in the mirror, he momentarily felt inclined to just leave things as they were. However, he slowly adjusted his body to fit back into the domain of order, letting go of the distortion and feeling his body relax as the invisible pressure eased off. He was once more an epic being that belonged to Norland, a child of the plane that it cherished.

Suddenly relieved of his burden, he couldn’t help but moan in comfort. However, a thunderclap suddenly resounded through the study as everything seemed to lose weight for a moment, floating up before landing once more. He immediately borrowed the laws of the plane to extend his perception outside of Faust, seeing booming thunder and patches of light in the sky as a huge vortex of lightning started spinning on top of Faust.

The people of Faust froze in their steps and looked at the sky, each of them stupefied by the strange sight. It seemed like the entire sky was spinning around the city, and the Rainbow of the Moons glowed bright as even the missing blue moon reappeared as a phantom with its kin. The city itself started shaking, throwing many people to the ground. Screams started ringing out everywhere.

In the palace, shock crawled up Julian’s face as he rushed to the window outside, a hand gripping the dagger in his sleeves. However, Apeiron’s eyes only went wide for a moment before she revealed a tranquil smile, “No need to worry, Richard is back.”

“Richard? But—”

“It seems like he couldn’t control his own strength.”

“His strength?” The fearless warrior’s voice turned hoarse, “His Grace… is this powerful?”

The Empress didn’t answer, only sighing softly. There was some joy in her eyes, but there was a sense of annoyance as well.