Currents of a New Path

[Crash-site]

Listening to the mage and aura user, who he was coming to learn were the leader and vice-leader of the group respectively, ramble chaotically, Irsyr's mood continuously worsened. Constantly interrupting each other and regularly misrepresenting the events despite never outright lying, he was holding back from obliterating the two men on the spot each time his reading of their thoughts misaligned with what they were saying.

Though just because he didn't do so immediately didn't mean that his opinion of them was improving or even just remotely good. But as he hid his reactions well and only met the two men's eyes with an emotionless look, they were internally elated by the time they finished their story and waited in bated silence and with much anticipation for Irsyr's answer.

For a few seconds, this silence hung in the air while Irsyr stood still in disbelief at their audacity. Whereas they presented themselves as simple traders running from a pirate group, in truth they were members of a rival organization. In spite of that, they were asking him for protection and the right to hide in this universe from an enemy they themselves provoked, with an offer for their organization's protection in the future.

And while Irsyr could look past the assumption that they could offer him any protection on the account that he was hiding his identity, the veiled attempt at extortion in their words was insulting enough to fan the flames of his rage on its own. Thus, when he broke his silence a few seconds later it came in the form of a surge of mana that shook space itself.

"Do you believe me to be an idiot or are you trying to get your soul obliterated?" Irsyr asked as he let his presence roll over the group.

"Neither of course. But you might not know, the region of the astral realm your king's territory is in belongs to three ascendants. Even amid their constant battle of influence against each other, few can stand on their own. And the group of those that are capable of that includes our leader, who is an esteemed mythic rank classified as a Planetary powerhouse by multiple outside organizations." The aura user replied, his voice strained as his body shivered in fear.

"Oh, I fully understand, few that achieve such power do not wield it. And though I respect those who do not, I'm certainly not one of them. But what differentiates us is that I do not present such shameless offers. You're asking for help and offering subjugation in return. Either offer a worthwhile deal or have the power and be in a position to enforce your will, doing neither is just insulting. Especially because the one offer your leader brings to the table is worthless to my king." Irsyr said, unleashing his presence as an ascended being along with the last sentence.

Immediately the expressions among the group of pirates dropped. While they couldn't sense the massive gap in power between Irsyr and their leader as both were simply too far beyond them, they didn't miss the unmistakable traces of an ascendant's energy, celestial mana. Unique to transcendent beings, this energy is the result of mana mutating due to contact with certain characteristic parts of an ascendant's presence while in his or her mana pool.

Not only did this identify Irsyr as an ascended being and thus unkillable to even mythic ranks under normal circumstances, but its power also meant that even if they were otherwise equal, their leader wouldn't stand a chance. Though limited in what percentage of the mana pool it could make up due to its more volatile nature, with few ascendants having the control necessary to bring that amount even the tiniest fraction over ten percent, its power means that even this fraction could outmatch the entire normal mana in an otherwise equal creatures reserves.

A moment later the dread among the group was exasperated even further when Edylia abruptly teleported to Irsyr's side. Not hiding her own status as an ascendant, her words didn't even register among all of the pirates, "It took some hard-handed telepathic persuasion but as far as they are now concerned, their targets are dead after their ship disintegrated from the damage when trying to enter this universe."

Her words caused some of the faces before her and Irsyr to light up with relief. While she and Irsyr had turned out to be the greater threat strength-wise, they hadn't any sort of grudge with them or their organization. And though their captain and vice-captain were acting as if trying to change that, their chances with them were still better.

Furthermore, Edylia's decision to actively shield them by hiding their presence was seen as goodwill and emboldened the vice-captain anew, "I'm grateful for that. And I wouldn't dare to waste that effort, so how about we all forget about the earlier misstep and work out what would be worthwhile in exchange for our return?"

Shifting his gaze toward the man in response to his words, Irsyr narrowed his eyes before suddenly unfurling his wings. With it, the illusion of their true form that dragons can display appeared behind him, causing the various humanoids before him to first freeze in place and not even react when he raised his hand with mana already gathering in his palm.

"Five hundred and eighty-two, that's how many years of life you cut short among my king's subjects. In that time, they would've contributed to his kingdom by their mere presence, binding mana into their beings and uplifting this universe with the weight their presence would exert.

As punishment for that, my lord will be returned the lifetime you took from the realm through servitude. With twenty-one individuals among you, that means each of you will spend a bit over twenty years here, balancing out the power you cost this universe through your presence and working in his name as punishment for the murders." Irsyr announced, with the green glow in his eyes fading as he stopped looking into the future of the now-dead bests toward the end of his words.

Immediately following those words he then clenched his outstretched hand into a fist, causing gasps and panicked screams below him as the curse he placed upon them physically manifested in the form of dark red chains. Phasing into the ground and reaching down a little over a meter, the chains moved around without disturbing the soil as they wrapped around their victim's torso in a single cross pattern before winding around their necks.

At first, overcome with shock, it took a moment before the first among the pirates started to resist. Reaching for the part of the chain before his chest, the aura user tries ripping it away with a strong tug, only to cry out in pain when the chain heated up in response and burned his flesh.

The moment his pained cry echoed out, four other hands that were also reaching toward the chains froze. Slowly lowering them back down, they look up at Irsyr with fearful gazes one after another.

"I advise you to get accustomed to this or it will become quite painful. Oh, and don't die, the time you owe my king is split between you, so the surviving members of your little pirate crew will then have to spend longer as captives." Irsyr said before snapping and teleporting the group away.

Following this, he turned his gaze skyward as Darganth and the others descended toward him. Letting his gaze sweep across the now-empty field of grass that surrounded the crash site, he landed next to Irsyr with a disappointed gaze still directed down at the ground.

"So it has become this bad." Darganth said, not frustrated and only sighing in resignation at this situation.

Ever since Irsyr destroyed Ikrus' will, this was only a question of time. Without a universe will there was no longer an overarching consciousness to focus the universe's energies, making it not only far more noticeable, even if it wasn't hiding before, and easier to enter as the previously solid shell that encases it becomes far more brittle and thus requires less energy to breach. And though even a Starweaver like the one Darganth was standing on could've breached into Ikrus even at its height, the drain on their stored energy would've at least given them pause back then.

But while they were largely responsible for this situation, neither Darganth nor Irsyr regretted it. In fact, this was part of their plans, so Darganth had already thought about how to react to it extensively.

"Do you think everything is ready for it?" Irsyr asked.

"It will have to be. Despite your best efforts, my growth has been falling behind my aspirations for years now." Darganth said, not elaborating on the second part any further.

Despite this, he, his wives, Irsyr, and Edylia all understood what he meant by it. Real fights were simply far better at improving one's mana parameters compared to resources and training battles. And while Darganth had extensive access to the latter two, even he had never found a method to artificially replicate the feeling and other stimuli necessary to recreate the former in training.

Though that wasn't too much of a problem before, the universe of Ikrus was only going to draw more attention in the coming years. And with it, it was only a matter of time before knowledge of Irsyr's presence spread. In turn, this would likely lead the primordials to send some of their subordinates into the region, possibly causing an open confrontation with the Locis.

So having a Starweaver crash before him was a perfect opportunity to get ahead of this and establish himself outside of Irsyr's territory. While it was common for people or even entire groups to suddenly appear in the larger population centers of the astral, doing so in their own Starweaver would still draw quite a lot of attention to them.

Even Neandra accompanying them wouldn't change much of this as small, astral-capable vessels were simply too eye-catching. And though a missing ship would still draw attention, with a good enough explanation it would bring far less trouble for them.

Taking a moment to think about the explanation they'd give, Darganth turned to Allaire as an idea formed in his mind, "Can you tell your enforcers to keep the bodies of their next few dozen targets intact? I might need the corpses of some criminals that I can pin the disappearance of the ship's crew on."

"Of course, but I doubt there will be many mythic ranks among it."

Nodding in response to Allaire's words, Darganth indicated that it won't be a problem, "Even if there are none it's easily explainable. None of the mythic ranks that were on board were particularly powerful so it wouldn't be impossible for veteran fourth ranks to win against them in the same way this can happen at lower ranks."

What Darganth didn't add was that this in fact happened more often with mythic ranks than in the lower ranks. In the latter people either manage to bridge the difference in rank through skill or by raising their mana attributes above their rank despite the inefficiency of this, often because they lack the skill to advance. But in the mythic rank, the second case is more common than before due to the high difficulty of the advancement, making that group larger.

Besides that, there are also other factors that help close the gap between two different ranks. Of those, belonging to a more powerful species is the most common, though that difference is negligible among humanoids. Species classified as monstrous humanoids like giants on the other hand are commonly stronger than their progress suggests, something that can lead to victory against seemingly insurmountable odds when paired with an especially skilled member of such a species.

As such, Darganth optimally would have one of the two fourth-rank giants that still have outstanding bounties on their head. But due to their power, they would also be difficult targets for even the mythic ranks among Allaire's enforcers, so he didn't share this with her as he didn't want to incite her subordinates to unnecessary risks.

"Alright, I'll tell them." Allaire answered him.

Nodding, Darganth then continued, "In the meantime, I'll contact the others. Neandra and Venrie especially will need some time to prepare if they join us but you three should also get ready, we'll likely be away for at least a few decades." He said.

"Then I'll organize the repair." Irsyr interjected.

Acknowledging his words with a short nod, Darganth smiled softly. Looking forward to the break from the pleasant yet monotonous past few years, he found similar expressions on his wives' faces as he glanced toward them, prompting his grin to widen as he stepped through the portal Irsyr conjured a moment later.