Akusande. Will cut in my stead, in exchange for your life?

  …Yes.

  Will you serve my will in death, as you would in life?

  …Yes.

  Will you defy time itself to ensure my fall be undone, my return be swift, my vengeance be taken?

  …Yes.

  -Zein and the Dragon-Glaive “Akusande”

  21-15

  The Glaive Unsheathed

  Time rebalanced, and Avo’s base ego snapped back in alignment with his subminds. As his cog-feed ceased its flickering, he studied the George Washingon’s central nexus with a projected Skimmer and stared.

  As did his templates.

  As did his cadre.

  There, over Thousandhand’s unmoving corpse was Quail Tavers flicking the blood off her blade. A legend stood over a legend, and surreal though the moment might have been, mortal skill triumphed against divine power.

  [Holy fucking shit!] A shrill squeal of pure excitement left Abrel as her adoration for Tavers turned manic. [Oh my gods, oh my gods, holy fuck! Quail Tavers just fucking snuffed fucking Zein Thousandhand oh my god!]

  [Jaus. Fuck me,] Corner added.

  A cheering section went up among the Incubi, surprisingly, and more than a few of the enforcers joined them.

  [I know,] Glitch breathed, releasing an awed breath. [Zein’s the literal best.]

  Kassamon and Kare peered on through Avo with open astonishment, not expecting the turn of events.

  [Well. Drinks for that squire are on me,] Kassamon said. Kare nodded as backup.

  Through everything, however, Avo felt as if he was missing part of the credit.

  Had… help… a lot of…

  A beat passed. No echoes emerged to cut anyone down. A metaphysical scab formed over Zein’s corpse. Second cycler. Of course. Tavers released a shaky breath and shot her severed armor a frown. “Thank Jaus I invested in that decoy loc–”

  The only forewarning for what came next was a single-thread of gold unspooling from Zein’s fallen umbrella.

  Time accelerated. The parasol shattered into parting threads, and then in its place was a glaive made of fractured oracle glass slicing up to cut the squire from below.

  A haemokinetic claw materialized to stop the blow, but it was Dice that arrived first.

  Sparks flashed as the jagged tip of Zein’s weapon recoiled from the waif’s alloyed sheath, a radiant rune protecting her from physical harm. The cracks within the blade deepened, and an uncontrollable pressure was hissing out from between the fissures, temporal sinews weaving the outline to a growing sinuous form.

  +Run. Now. Vent as soon as you get a chance.+ The thought left Avo as a redundant command; his cadre was already in motion, Tavers abandoned her still usable Hellgun and her split Rendskin, the armor not worth her life. The air shifted. Faint ripples formed across time and manifested probing attacks, gunfire and eldritch phenomena spewing free from the transforming glaive.

  An eruption of fire spawned a wall of bioforms to blunt the attacks. Chambers pulled Kae as the cadre began their retreat. Tavers dove first through an activated reflection, her Metamind flashing as she sent her drones a universal attack order. Metal and flesh joined the carnage while the others fled.

  Draus was the last to leave, her focus lingering on Avo for another heartbeat.

  +Go,+ he said. No sense in risking any of them. Their Rend Capacities were still high after their initial battle against Zein, but he was the only one capable of surviving without a material body. +Need to try ending this. Killing her. Get to the enclave. Remake your passages. Anything you can to burn our trail.+

  And there was something else he needed to do. A promise he made to break Zein’s glaive somehow. To whom or why he gave this oath was irrelevant. It just had to be done. And now seemed the best opportunity he would get.

  The Regular shot him a nod and clenched her fist. The unused passages cracked first, then dissolved, turning into scintillating powder as a rapidly swelling figure tore through the opposing drones and monsters. +See you soon, consang.+

  Then she crossed over as well, plunging through her Liminal Paracosmos, accelerating toward a portal opening in the near horizon within a world made from shifting shards of reflective brilliance.

  Chambers’ brief blast of flame had formed around three hundred humming wasp-sized monstrosities each half the size of a full-grown adult. They were mostly in pieces now, sticky green blood leaking from their broken carapaces vanishing behind the chomp of scales and slashing blades. The twenty-two drones in the Command Nexuses at the time were but smoking husks as well, most obliterated without ever contributing.

  It took paltry effort on the part of his Woundmother to mend his mortally wounded sheath in the George Washington, but his Metamind was screaming at him, all three of his cyclers nearly filled with Rend. With a thought, Avo set his tripartite mind upon three different tasks.

  A point of no return had been crossed with Zein’s slaying, with her open intent to enslave him once more. From this point on, his relationship with Ninth Column was adversarial, and his continued association with Aegis was questionable at best. But calamity also offered opportunity.

  With Zein struck down, with his mind functionally restored and more liberated than ever, he directed the first of his subminds to flood his essential subverts before spreading his splinters wider across the city.

  His second submind shifted over to the George Washington’s systems, where Calvino was interfacing with the SHEPHERD earlier. Back in the enclave, his sheath slumped as the breadth of his consciousness whistled out of the body, leaving but a sliver of ghosts rooted in place.

  Finally, his base mind rose, mended of flesh and clear of purpose, pushing himself up using the steps of the dais, the throne of his once masters. Turning, he faced his new foe, the thing hiding within Zein’s glaive.

  A dragon unleashed.

  It was far smaller compared to the Hungers, nowhere near their world-embracing presence. Even still, it dwarfed him by dimension, easily taking up the entire nexus, its body writhing through the air, scales resembling plates of armor shaped like teardrops.

  Searing light cleaved free from the crenulations running down its form. Each section of the dragon’s body was a map of shifting constellations, some forming sigils connected to Domains he knew. More not.between its scales. From the projected resplendence came bleary images. Almost like holograms reflected by surging rivers. Then, it seemed more like stratocumulus.

  An atmosphere was taking shape around the dragon. Avo caught glimpses of half-formed places and sensed unrealized phenomena. With each thundering heartbeat that emanated from the dragon, moments manifested and vanished, changing like dancing smoke. Through the obfuscation, he saw its face finally. An eyeless head lined with feathers and scales. It looked between a hawk and a snake, but its movements jolted from place to place.

  Avo saw battles fought, lives lost; atrocities committed, revenge sowed; hate abating, and in its place emerged love and lust, slaked at last beneath the looming heights of a cavern made from metal, artificial lights painted twin bodies etwined.

  As the scenes played, its tail coiled around Zein’s corpse, accelerating the Godslayer’s return.

  The ghoul snarled. Already, the scabs were growing thicker–he needed to push–

  A lashing cut traced an opening along his ribs as shadows erupted from the dragon. He manipulated his Echoheads, shielding himself using his biomagnetism, conserving his Rend for what was to come. The dragon reached into its mists, pulling past into present and casting calamities out to best Avo.

  But he simply dove–sinking into the shadows at his feet and tunneling fast toward Thousandhand’s yet dead form.

  COG-CAP DISTRIBUTION

  ->[BASE] - 55%

  ->[SUB-1] - 20%

  ->[SUB-2] - 15%

  ->[STANDBY] - 10%

  REND CAPACITY [WOUNDMOTHER] - 98%

  This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  REND CAPACITY [FARDRIFTER] - 97%

  REND CAPACITY [TECHPLAGUER] - 94%

  Draus’ last mirror burst apart, signaling the cadre’s exit of that particular passage. Avo barely noticed. The dragon expelled light remembered. The shine of true day. He surfaced as a rush of wind, his progression undeterred.

  “Knower.” the Dragon’s voice reverberated louder with each passing moment. It sounded sharp and vicious. The kind of voice one would imagine a predator to have. As it twisted and whipped a typhoon to counter his approach, its feathered head broke into four petals, and he saw a small face at the heart of its skull. It was a tiny, pale thing, the mien of a Sang girl greeting.

  Her eyes were closed and her hair spilled down from a half-finished bun in messy tassels. A sharp intake of breath nearly made him pause, but wasted no time still.

  There was everything to gain and nothing to lose.

  Zein made her point.

  Time for him to make his.

  “Knower! Knower of Emptiness. Burning Dreamer. Hold. Hold, please.”

  He did not. Despite something inside him desperately wanting him to. Despite Denton loudly demanding that he stop, her avatar visibly panicked in the corner of his feed. {Avo! No! We need her. She’s the only one–}

  She said more. He listened. But it didn’t matter.

  He tumbled out from a torrent of wind and splashed into the world as a stream of pulsing data. Pulsing of disruptive signals struck him. His Heaven rattled. The Techplaguer shrieked. A few more points of Rend. On the edge. Close. But they had options. And he had a plan.

  +Calvino,+ Avo called, pulling himself along the ground as a blur of force tore his left arm clean. He regrew it with a thought. Lightning coursed through him. He Boltstrode. But the dragon flicked a whip of electricity, striking him, parrying his dash off course.

  {What just–oh.} Avo’s memories synced up with Calvino–still active in his undamaged enclave-sheath. A data spike pierced out from the mind, and an uncomfortable silence grew. {Well. This is not good. This is not good at all!}

  “Knower. Dreamer. Avo. Stop. We have spoken. Unknowingly. Stop.”

  Avo fought the urge to hiss at the dragon. It was yelling for him to halt while still attacking. The smart matter mended as fast as he did, but the dragon was only using physical attacks thus far. He suspected it wasn’t trying that hard, that it was holding back either out of fear of destroying the voidship or it simply didn’t want him dead for some reason.

  Regardless, its reluctance was his advantage. A tingle in the back of his mind called for him to respond, to cast a thought in greeting to the dragon, but decided to engage with Calvino first.

  +Calvino. Need your help. Can you shut off the reactor for the ship? Isolate the current module from the other. Want you to eject all the others into the darkness. Leave only the Command Nexus by itself. Going to vent through the Hu–.+

  A gold wave scythed out from the dragon. The following temporal lag almost dislocated Avo’s base mind from the other halves of his consciousness altogether. When his senses returned, his templates, the cadre, Calvino, and the dragon were calling to him all at once. Twenty seconds were gone from his memory. He tried to move but found his limbs missing and a spiked vivianite pillar buried in his chest. His body spasmed and he hacked blood over the twelve slender arms gripping the weapon.

  “Now we speak,” the dragon said, its body curving at impossible angles to lean in close to him, bringing its human facade at level with him. Zein was still protected by its tail, and through the flicking movements of the dragon's sinuous body, her scab was almost ripe for resurrection.

  Scenes flashed over to Avo’s mind, recapping him with what he missed. He prioritized his conversations. +Calvino?+

  {The system is still too damaged to receive comprehensive inputs,} Calvino replied. {Trying to do anything to the ship’s reactor will likely result in the crew’s final death as they are deeply integrated they are with the system. But I can divert more of the ship’s mass over to the core. And move the other sections away. I must say, I do not like your current plan.}

  Avo thought it wasn’t bad. It would turn things to his Fardrifter’s advantage, anyhow.

  A ghostly wisp caught Avo’s attention, and he found the polearm thrust through him imbued with ghosts. Potent with sequences and memories. He looked up at the dragon, surprised. The Sang girl’s eyelids were open now, and a cluster of eyes–all colors, all shapes–made active rotations in her sockets. “Take it. That is all I can do for you now. They will show you the truth of things. They will show how the paths work. The shape of time. What you have become. Take it and know.”

  Finally, the question became too great to ignore. “Why?”

  The dragon went still. The Sang’s face contorted with effort as she fought to slow the passage of time around Zein, to delay the Godslayer’s resurrection if she could. “There is a promise between us. But you cannot keep it yet. You cannot break me from my cage. You cannot break me from her will. But perhaps after. Perhaps not so long.”

  Avo stared into the girl’s eyes and coughed. “Not the first time we talked.” He knew it wasn’t. Knew it from feeling. But he couldn’t remember when they last spoke–if they ever spoke.

  “An unremembered dialogue has its purpose.” It twisted the pillar to provoke his action. A splinter shot free from his halo, drowning in an ocean of ghosts.

  Too many for his splinters to erode in time.

  This demanded a shift.

  This demanded a return to fire.

  A reconstruction of the voidship flashed into his cog-feed. Ship modules were diverted. Moved far and away from the command nexuses in anticipation of what was to come.

  “The mind is right,” the Fardrifter chuffed, feeling the predatory essence in the shadowy cosmos outside the hull. “This is a poor plan. We swim within a cage that seeks to devour us.”

  The Techplaguer chimed a retort. “Take heart, STEED! The administrator will FREE-FREE-FREE us.”

  “And,” the Woundmother said, prepared to vent their Hell, “I suspect our erstwhile kin will not be doing much of the eating. Congratulations, however, are in order mule: I do believe you might be acquiring some new architectural improvements soon.”

  Sending a final command into the ship’s systems, Avo watched as the dais sank, taking the throne and the locus with it. It too was now in motion, moving fast to join the other sections of the ship.

  Maybe he wouldn’t be able to salvage any of the modules. Maybe the new engineering bay was to be lost after a single use. But at least he could set them free from the dark. Allow Voidwatch to extract the sections.

  Briefly, glimpsed through his various splinters. Kare and Maru were already en route to Naeko, the latter trying to start a session. His various splinters were spread across the Oversecs, and he melted them into hidden Auto-Seances for eventual easy access. The others were embedded in high-traffic lobbies and loci managing critical infrastructure. He spent those as backdoors as well, forming multiple bridgeheads to further his infestation of the city.

  Disjointed by time, his submind didn’t get the chance to hunt down and jack Syndis or gangers. That was fine. He’d do what he could in the moments he had left. But first, he had ghosts to burn and a final scheme to try.

  +Will be back soon,+ Avo said, casting a final thought through his cadre’s splinters before gathering every shard connected to his consciousness back in his current sheath. He didn’t need anything else to burn. Just the pillar.

  As he shifted from Delusion back to Ignorance, a fortress of fire speared up from his halo before pouring down into the pillar, searing it clean from within.

  “Yes,” the dragon sang, voice rising in a joyous song. Its scales cracked and opened, and Avo caught a glimpse of Zein’s garden–that plane she drew him into when they first met. So. That was were everything hid. Inside the umbrella; the glaive; the dragon.

  Sequences, ghosts, and memories that would have taken Avo hours to digest as steam came ablaze in an instant. Over twelve million ghosts were hiding with the pillar. Twelve million ghosts bearing centuries of information, carving epiphanies and understandings into his very mind.

  Moments from before the Godsfall detonated within him like warheads, the blasts of understanding came in sync with the howling ascent of his refueled Conflagration. He knew. He remembered. He recalled. Memories that Zein had hidden even from herself poured into him, her self-obfuscation a deliberate action–to prevent her daughter from using their shared experiences and ever achieving a mem-lock.

  And now, an entire archive was his. The truths behind the Idheim’s history–at least from Zein’s perspective–known to him. His perspective loomed, and a rising thrill battled a cold pit of dread forming in his stomach.

  Oh, how great the glory at the end. And oh, how bad things were. Worse than he could have ever realized.

  “You see?” the dragon said, releasing the pillar and shifting away from him. It was straightening now, head pointed down in an arcing loop while countless hands extended from its body, fingers spread wide in a mock embrace. “Do you understand the paths now? The shape of what is to come? What mother and daughter left broken in their past embrace.”

  “Yes,” Avo breathed. Even with the Conflagration, it was too much. All too much. He needed time to process what he learned. To go through everything and let the details settle in. Already, his templates were overwhelmed, more than a few screaming from mem-data overload.

  No other mind besides his–or an EGI’s–could have possibly managed an intake of information so great.

  Ghosts - [13,877,899]

  He called on his Woundmother’s Domains of Matter and Biology once more as it inched a single percent away from maximum capacity. Threads of blood stitched flesh and broken implants back into shape, the pillar unraveling with the caress of his Haemokinesis. Slamming back down on the ground, Avo took a step toward Zein’s body, her resurrection almost imminent.

  But the dragon shifted into his path again. “No.”

  He could try to make another attempt with his Boltstride, his Fardrifter. But he knew that to be in vain, that the dragon would just skip him across time again. Its actions were paradoxical. Contrary. It betrayed Zein’s confidence, yet protected her from him. The way it acted made him uncertain–unnerved.

  “She won’t forgive you for this,” Avo said, gesturing at Thousandhand with a floating Echohead. “You let me–”

  “You tore into my shape and stole your prize. Who is to say otherwise? Who will tell her? You?” The dragon chuckled. “She likes you. Veylis would like you. So I like you. And I am meant to serve in her stead. She is blinded by matters. But essential in this path. Look into the memories, and you will understand. You have your part in the final design. She has hers. As does my progenitor.”“Could take her Frame. Take her Heavens. Replace her."

  “No!” Force exploded from the dragon. Avo magnetized himself to the hull. The beast was coiling around him now, coiling closer and closer, but the Sang’s eyes remained locked to his. “We have a bargain. You and I. I and her. She and her daughter. You have invaded the paths of your own will and power. But the rest of us are ordained. I can choose to spare you. But I cannot let you have her.”

  Noble. Heroic. Reliable. Even commendable.

  But unacceptable.

  Avo let out a breath and prepared to disappoint his newest “consang.”

  “I understand,” he said. “But you understand why I have to try.”

  The dragon’s eyes widened. Chronological distortions flared from its every scale. But it was too late. It didn’t realize what he intended. Lacking Zein’s divine foresight and echoes, the dragon managed only a betrayed roar as Avo shed an entropic missile from his Frame.

  His Woundmother’s Rend dropped instantly to zero as it struck the inner hull of the command nexus, and a firestorm of entropy dissolved eight percent of the ship in a heartbeat. The serpent of time shivered as gnawing darkness flooded in and Avo manifested his Fardrifter in full.

  REND CAPACITY [FARDRIFTER] - 98%

  Get ready to say hi to Chief Paladin Samir Naeko real soon... Get near-daily advanced chapters on and join the .

  Ontologics

  In effect after 19-12

  Ghosts - [26,562,372]

  Liminal Frame (V) - 23,871 THAUM/c

  User: Avo

  Heaven/Hell: [Woundmother] - 10,002 THAUM/c

  Heaven

  ->Domain: (Blood)

  ->Canon: Haemokinesis (IV) - All blood in user’s area of influence can be controlled; speed and force experience exponential increases with each ton of force controlled

  ->Hubris: Central pillar of the Heaven must remain 80 tons; each ton of non-central mass controlled increases thaumic and Rend-based demands (5%)

  ->Canon: Linger - User can eject constructs shaped from their blood; each construct generated accrues Rend based on design and size

  ->Hubris: Central pillar of the Heaven must remain 80 tons; each ton of non-central mass controlled increases thaumic and Rend-based demands (5%; x2 backlash)

  ->Canon: Sanguinity’s Reign (IV) - A building haemokinetic storm continuously expands from the user, spreading their area of influence (without limitations) as far as the storm can metaphysically expand; generates more Rend the larger the area it takes up

  ->Hubris: Attempting to move and alter more than 80 tons of matter without constituting a central construct will result in thaumic backlash (20%)

  ->Canon: Exsanguinating Helix - Allows the user to instill an exsanguinating effect in a piece of matter, causing it to drain all the blood its mass can contain when in contact with a non-user designated entity; the larger the object instilled, the higher the Rend

  ->Hubris: If the object is destroyed, thaumic backlash will be inflicted (15%)

  ->Domain: (Matter)

  ->Canon: Alchemization (V) - The user can subsume and channel and combine the properties of 108 fragments of physical matter through their blood; the limit of fragments channeled can be increased at the cost of thaumic and Rend-based demands.

  ->Hubris: Any attempts to subsume gaseous or liquid matter will incur backlash. (12%)

  ->Canon: Remembrance of Matter (V) - The user can memorize the traits of all physical matter they subsume at a hundredth of the thaumic cost; the matter they memorized can be assembled and blended before a construct is formed

  ->Hubris: If matter being subsumed has their state changed mid-subsumption, thaumic backlash will be triggered (9%)

  ->Canon: Stormwreathed - The user can temporarily convert their mass into electricity

  ->Hubris: If the user is submerged by water in this state, thaumic backlash will be triggered (15%)

  ->Canon: Haemification - The user can turn all influenceable matter into blood

  ->Hubris: Any attempts to subsume gaseous or liquid matter will incur backlash (12%; x2 backlash)

  ->Domain: (Fire)

  ->Canon: Matterbomb - The user can detonate pieces of matter based on mass and inherent energy

  ->Hubris: If the matter being detonated is destroyed before ignition, moderate (EST. 35%) severe backlash will be inflicted

  ->Domain: (Luminosity)

  ->Canon: The Light Unseen - The user can blend their matter with the light of their surroundings should they stop perceiving the world visually

  ->Hubris: If the user has their perception active while this canon is in use, (EST. 51%) severe backlash will be inflicted

  ->Domain: (Protection)

  ->Canon: Fortress of Luminosity - The user emanates a luminous shroud that renders all physical matter bathed by its shine invulnerable; generates heavy Rend (1.2%) every second canon is active

  ->Hubris: There must be a persistent source of light for the user to imitate in the environment or from the user themselves or thaumic backlash will be triggered. (5%)

  ->Domain: (Biology)

  ->Canon: My Blood The Harvester, My Flesh the Symphony (III) - Allows the user to grow, blend, or extract biological organisms and structures from their blood.

  ->Hubris: Another source of biomass must be present and in the area of influence or thaumic backlash will be inflicted. (6%) ->Canon: Remembrance of Flesh (V) - Allows user to memorize traits from biological organisms at a tenth of the thaumic cost; the biomass they memorized can be spliced before they are grown.

  ->Hubris: Another source of biomass must be present and in the area of influence or thaumic backlash will be inflicted (6%; x2 backlash)

  ->Domain: (Lightning)

  ->Canon: Boltstride (III) - Allows the user to transmute and move all blood-based structures as bolts of lightning; distance limited to the reach of user’s Sanguinity

  ->Hubris: Attempting to move over 120 tons of matter as a single bolt will trigger (EST. 87%) extreme thaumic backlash

  Hell - [Fifth Circle]

  ->Domain: (Matter/Entropy/Luminosity)

  ->Canon: Breath of the Withered (V) - Allows the user to expel their total Rend as an entropic storm across their area of influence; the storm will disintegrate matter through withering bolts of lightning (This canon is absolute)

  ->Daemon: Striking the same place twice will result in the manifestation of an Anathema of Ruin, causing the user to lose control of the Heaven

  ->Canon: Barrage of the Withered (V) - Allows the user to expel their total Rend as an entropic projectile the size, shape, and speed of the Woundmother at its maximum potential; this projectile can be guided by the user and is loosed faster with higher Rend (This canon is absolute)

  ->Daemon: Should the projectile not dissolve sufficient matter, the projectile will birth as an Anathema of Ruin

  ->Canon: Shadowbreaker (III) - Allows the user to influence all shadows in their vicinity with a touch of luminosity that will continue to expand and dissolve anything physical covered by the shadows

  ->Daemon: Should an insufficient amount of physical matter in darkness be consumed in (8 seconds), an Anathema of Ruin will be manifested.

  Heaven/Hell: [Fardrifter] - 5,660 THAUM/c

  Heaven

  ->Domain: (Air)

  ->Canon: Horizon Strider (III) - The user takes on the properties of a hurricane and can influence winds for 250 kilometers

  ->Hubris: If an external force counters the motion of the user’s centrifugal force, severe (EST. 59%) thaumic backlash will be triggered

  ->Domain: (Space)

  ->Canon: Yondergales (IV) - The user’s demiplane now encompasses ten kilometers, with each ton of mass multiplying the base speed of their winds (252 kilometers per hour)

  ->Hubris: If an object over 5,000 degrees celsius is drawn into the plane, extreme (EST. 83%) thaumic backlash will be triggered.

  ->Canon: The Nine Streams of Freedom - The user can materialize from any nine points in space their winds encompass (250 kilometers)

  ->Hubris: if they emerge in a confined space and are unable to fully materialize, thaumic backlash will be triggered. (10%)

  ->Canon: Shadowrun (II) - The user can surge within shadows as if they are wind tunnels (x10 current speed); shadows must be connected to pass from one to another.

  ->Hubris: If a light shines and clears away the user’s shadow, heavy (EST. 39%) thaumic backlash will be triggered

  ->Domain: (Shadow)

  ->Canon: Midnight Hand - The user can blow, move, and shift shadows together as if they are waves in a storm.

  ->Hubris: If the user is between shadows when the wind stops blowing and the bridge breaks, moderate (22%) thaumic backlash will be triggered.

  ->Domain: (Labyrinth)

  ->Canon: Path of the Nine Storms (III) - User manifests a maze-like dungeon in the walls of their winds, allowing them to create and weave winding paths from tunnels of air; the maze is a fixed spatial anchor (may not be affected by spatial changes) that can be triggered at any time.

  ->Hubris: If the inner walls of the dungeon are forcibly breached and someone enters the eye of the storm (where resides the Yondergales), heavy (EST. 39%) thaumic backlash will be generated.

  Hell - [Fourth Circle]

  ->Domain: (Air/Entropy/Labyrinth)

  ->Canon: Halt of the Passing (IV) - The user can enchain all actors and objects moving through their area of physical influence (250 Kilometers) with stasis

  ->Daemon: An anathema of correspondence will be birthed if the total velocity drained exceeds the total Rend accrued

  ->Canon: Waybreaker (II) - The user distorts all directionality about them (10 kilometers), causing space to coil and distend, randomizing vectors of movement for all actors and objects caught in their wake.

  ->Daemon: Rend must be balanced in nine minutes or an Anathema of Correspondence will manifest.

  Heaven/Hell: [Techplaguer] - 200 Thaum/c

  Heaven

  ->Domain: (Signals)

  ->Canon: Skin of Virtuality - Layers user in mirror-reality raw data and information, allowing them to move and exist as radio signals might and shift inorganic objects in their vicinity as blocks of temporarily stored data (reloads back to their original position in reality after miracle ends)

  ->Hubris: The user cannot pass through lead without incurring heavy (EST. 41%) thaumic backlash.

  ->Domain: (Space)

  ->Canon: Techjumper - User inserts themselves into a signal or system capable of transmitting signals, moving as a packet of data and materializing at the endpoint of the transmission.

  ->Hubris: If the transfer is disrupted halfway, moderate (22%) thaumic backlash will be triggered.

  ->Domain: (Biology)

  ->Canon: TechSick.exe (II) - User mimics the properties and symptoms in a virus and transfers that over to a signal-receiving system, affecting the machine as if it were a person

  ->Hubris: If the transfer is disrupted halfway, moderate (22%) thaumic backlash will be triggered. (x2)

  Hell - [Third Circle]

  ->Domain: (Signal/Entropy)

  ->Canon: Datarot - The user decays and distorts signals and data within their ability to influence

  ->Daemon: If a signal the user is decaying is disrupted and they are unable to find another within (5 seconds) to continue expelling their Rend, an Anathema of Epistemology will be generated

  Implants

  Mime-Fog: Allows Avo to produce a spore-expelled field of active camouflage

  Celerostylus: A symbiotic reflex booster laced into Avo's spine; accelerates him a bit over sixty-five miles an hour in his baseline body

  Echoheads: A chimeric bioform adapted into an implant. Can provide echolocation for eight hundred feet. Designed from a hyper-durable silicon-chitin structure that also allows each of the eight heads to piece forward from the inside like a mantis shrimp punches.

  Bone Demon: A body-sheathe--complete overhaul of Avo's physical form. made from a nest of super-tensile, hyper-synaptic nanofibrous mycelia on the interior. Beyond the threads, thick plates of cordyceramite line the outside like jagged skeletal continents emerging from a sea of webs. Bound to his biology, Avo is able to harden and shift his structural integrity, as well as shape the growth of the fungal-ceramic matter that would encase his outer skin.

  Meldskin: A smart-fluid adaptive combat skin capable of altering its composition to suit almost any environment and slowly return to full integrity. Possess holographic disguises, advanced visual sensors, omnidirectional thrusters, and a highly advanced reactor. Can also interface with other pieces of advanced voidtech.

  Metamind

  Ghosts: [17,313,887]

  SPRITES: {4.2TB/s…}

  [QUICKSAND SYNC TRAUMA] COG-CAP: 55 SEQUENCES (VARIABLE)

  ->STRUCTURE: “A LIMPID POOL FILLED WITH BODIES DRIFTING BENEATH THE WAVES; WHATEVER TRAUMA STRIKES THE SURFACE WILL IN CAUSE IT TO IGNITE AND SIMULATE A RESEQUENCING OF SAID TRAUMA”

  ->FUNCTION: GUARDS THE MIND USING A LAYER OF TRAUMATIC MEMORIES: CAPABLE OF ADAPTING TO TRAUMAS AFTER SUSTAINING AGAINST THE FIRST IMPACT

  [THOUGHTWAVE DISRUPTOR] COG-CAP: [ERROR] SEQUENCES

  ->STRUCTURE: [NULL]

  ->FUNCTION: TAPS INTO THE ENTIRETY OF THE USER’S COGNITIVE CAPACITY AND EXPELS UNSTABLE MEM-DATA OUTWARD, DISRUPTING AN AREA OF (CONTINGENT OF GHOST CAPACITY) SPACE

  [INCOG] COG-CAP: [x] SEQUENCES (VARIABLE; MUST MATCH ALL OTHER INTERNAL MEMORIES BEYOND THE WARDS)

  ->STRUCTURE: “AN OPALESCENT SUN RAINS DOWN OVER THE LANDSCAPE; LIGHT SPILLS FROM IT MORE LIKE MERCURY DOLLOPS THAN RAYS, BASKING EVERYTHING IN A REFLECTIVE SHEEN WHILE DRINKING UP MEM-DATA INTO ITS CORE”

  ->FUNCTION: ALLOWS THE USER TO CAMOUFLAGE THEMSELVES FROM NOTICE VIA THE OBFUSCATION OF THEIR MEMORIES AND THOUGHTSTUFF. NO ACCRETION WILL LEAK DURING THIS PERIOD AND ALL OUTWARD REACTING PHANTASMICS WILL BE PLACED INTO A DORMANT STATE UNTIL DELIBERATE ACTIVATION.

  [WHISPER] COG-CAP: 19 SEQUENCES (BASELINE)

  ->STRUCTURE: FIVE/SIX LEGGED DOG CHASES A FLYING LETTER WHILE A DRONE STRIKES A VILLA.

  ->FUNCTION: ALLOWS THE EXTENSION OF CONSCIOUS AWARENESS BY 60 FEET AND THE DELIVERANCE OF COG-DATA WITHIN SAID FIELD OF AWARENESS; CAN BE EXTENDED BY MULTIPLES SHOULD MORE SEQUENCES BE USED

  [PHYS-SIM] COG-CAP: 18 SEQUENCES (FIXED)

  ->STRUCTURE: A MISSILE LOCKED TO AN AEROVEC, EVER INCHING CLOSER, DODGING INCOMING POINT DEFENSE FIRE”

  ->FUNCTION: CALCULATES THE ACCELERATION VECTORS AND IMPACT LANES OF UP TO TWELVE DYNAMIC OBJECTS

  [OSARAI MEMGUARD] COG-CAP: 20 SEQUENCES (BASELINE) [REPLACED BY QUICKSAND IN AVO'S METAMIND]

  ->STRUCTURE: “A HURRICANE TWISTING AND HURTLING SCREAMING FIGURES AND BROKEN STRUCTURES”

  ->FUNCTION: GUARDS THE MIND USING A LAYER OF TRAUMATIC MEMORIES: CAPABLE OF WITHSTANDING AND REFORMING AGAINST HEAVY-MASS PHANTASMAL INTRUSIONS; VULNERABLE TO NARROW-BUILD INVADERS.

  [AUTO-SEANCE] COG-CAP: 2 SEQUENCES (BASELINE)

  ->STRUCTURE: “A STAR BLEEDS INTO A SPIRAL OF SPLICED MEMORY SNIPPETS [ERROR: MEMORY ARTIFACTS TOO BRIEF FOR REVIEW...]"

  ->FUNCTION: ALLOWS OMNI-SYNCHRONIC COMMUNICATIONS BETWEEN TWO OR MORE MINDS ACROSS ALL AREAS ENCOMPASSED BY THE PRESENCE OF THE NETHER

  [MORALITY INJECTOR] COG-CAP: 20 SEQUENCES (BASELINE)

  ->STRUCTURE: “A RESPLENDENT CAGE WITH A CINEMA PROJECTION OF PAST HAPPENINGS PLAYING ACROSS THE SKY"

  ->FUNCTION: ALLOWS THE USER TO NULLIFY SPECIFICALLY ENCODED IMPULSES WITH COUNTER-EMOTIONAL DOSES OF MEMORY.

  GHOSTJACK (ALLOWS FOR THE MODIFICATION AND EDITING OF MEMORIES AND SEQUENCES; SHAPES TRAUMA AND COMMANDS GHOSTS)

  [SKIMMER PERCEPTION EMANATOR]

  TRAUMA PATTERNS:

  [ASELERI'S FOLLY] - HIGH PAIN INFLICTION; PHYSICAL TORTURE BASED

  [LUCILLE’S REGRET] - HIGH EMOTIONAL TORMENT; REGRET AND ANGUISH ALIGNED

  [LUCILLE’S AGONY] - HIGH PAIN INFLICTION; PHYSICAL TORTURE BASED; BODY DYSMORPHIC AFFLICTED

  [SECONDHAND FATALITY] - EXTREME PAIN INFLICTION; EGO-KILLING TRAUMA FOR HUMANS

  [BENEFACTOR’S DREAD] - HIGH EMOTIONAL TORMENT; FEAR OF COMING DEATH

  [ARATNID’S KISS] - HIGH PHYSICAL TORMENT; CASTRATION AND PRIMAL FEAR-BASED

  THE BURNING DREAMER

  MIND-TEMPLATES

  [AVO]

  The Talons

  Abrel Greatling

  The Shadows

  Benhata Veloso

  Glitch

  Lip

  Corner

  Osjack Thenndenn

  (Ashthrone/Sanctus assault force)

  Dice

  Chambers

  Paladin Kare

  Paladin Kassamon

  Enclavers

  I hope you enjoyed today's installment of Godclads!

  Anyway, I hope you're having fun, and remember: reviews, follows, favorites, and comments make the word-gods happy.