The System has a plan, and it is one of statistically maximized chaos. Never is this plan more evident than when someone gets an equipment reward from a successful Quest. To put things plainly, the System remembers everything that you do, but more than your successes, it remembers your failures, it remembers your limitations, and it plays with them.

I recall the first time I gained a piece of Heroic-Tier equipment. It was relatively early on in my life, not long after I murdered my mother. I had collapsed a mana core in a gate that had enslaved me. While the gate came apart, the magic that powered it filled my hand, and when I emerged on the other side, I found myself bestowed an invisible blade that shredded mana and caused bodies to combust violently with every cut.

It bestowed this upon me because my offensive capabilities were limited, and also because the threat I faced after escaping from the gate prison was beyond the reach of my skills.

But that is the thing about equipment. It makes you more of who you were, and it makes you more than who you were. We craft tools to build upon our shortcomings, and the System does the same for us. And after you're past that precipice, it will throw you at something else until you fail again. And if you somehow find a way to survive, it will remember that, and it will give you another reward to extend the time you spend at war. For if you cannot war, your death looms.

Know this: every time your hand is filled with the weight of a weapon, it is a promise from the System that it must be used.

There are no free gifts granted. Feel the weight. Swing the blade. Steal more time.

-Valor Thann

197 (I)

Morsel [II]

With pan in hand, anything Shiv fixated on for more than a few seconds turned solid. His own shadow became a paper-thin material. It was like he was using a blade to carve pieces free from seaweed. The edges of the shadow parted and were lit by glinting colors of red and gold, the same colors that edged the rim of Shiv's Last Morsel. As he plucked the pieces of shadow up, he showed them to Adam, and the thin slices shivered between his fingers.

The Gate Lord blinked. "Did you just slice a bit of your own shadow off?"

Shiv looked down and saw that the rest of his shadow was still there. Whatever he cut, it didn't seem to take from anything permanently, or at least not noticeably.

"Yup," Shiv said. The grin on his face only grew wider. He didn't fully grasp the implications of his new weapon, but so far it was proving to be something spectacular.

"How is it doing that?" Adam asked, his bafflement growing with every passing second. The orcs had grown close again, encircling Shiv as they realized a fight wasn't about to happen, but something else was transpiring.

The Deathless stuck the slices of shadow into the center of his pan, and once more, the blackness radiated with hunger. The air whistled, it drew in breaths, and Shiv knew what it was looking for this time. He summoned flames in his hand and slowly dismembered the very tip of the dancing mote. It fell free like a scoop of wasabi. The fiery substance was still crackling, but it was ultimately solidified. Shiv pinched it between his fingers and flicked it into the pan as well.

Just then, a lid slammed down. Adam and the orcs were unprepared, as was the Educator. All of them flinched back. Some of them went for their weapons, and the Educator whipped out her brush. Yet Shiv remained impassive. His eyes narrowed underneath his shredded helmet, and he watched and waited, wondering what was about to emerge from his new weapon.

Five seconds passed, and the lid dissipated in a spray of flaking color. From the inside, Shiv plucked out a new meal. The texture was black and grainy. If he had to describe it, it would be as if wrapping lentils or beans in a layer of seaweed. The grains that composed the meal were so fine that it was practically powder, not even sand. Slowly, Shiv gripped a few of the grains and retracted his helmet. He put them in his mouth and chewed.

Adam's jaw dropped open wide. "Shiv, I'm not sure if..."

Cook the Uncookable Activated

Orichalcum Resistance Obtained

Shadowshape Obtained

The Deathless gained several benefits. The first was that his body flared with the colors of orichalcum; he'd sliced a piece from the doorframe earlier, and the durability enhancement came upon him once more. Aside from that, however, his body turned black and then grew intangible. The dimensions of his form flattened. All sense of weight faded from him as he became a twin to his own shadow—a splash of darkness gliding across the world. Shiv brushed through Adam without ever coming in contact with his friend. He was like a moving shade cast by something high above.

While he was in this state, he learned various things. The first was that whatever he ate, he took on the qualities of. Even though he had consumed orichalcum, the shadow's weak qualities took precedence. It meant that his durability didn't matter so much, since he was a thing of ambulatory darkness. After about ten seconds, the effect came to an end. The shadows lifted from Shiv's shoulders, and he became himself once more.

Looking at the people around him, he began to chuckle. "Alright, so I can cut that too. I think I'll do a little bit more experimenting. But right now, I think we have a way to get out into the magma without being harmed, and a way to go unnoticed. Darkness doesn't make any sound. Yeah… this'll be good for our stealth."

Shiv's mind spun. There was practically no limit to what he could cook with this pan if he could slice bits of darkness away. It could also affect mana. So, what did that mean? I could cut Chronomancy, Shiv realized. I could cook a bunch of things together.

"I… This is bullshit," Adam whispered.

"Alright, alright, wait." Shiv erupted into a flurry of motion. No one spoke during this fey period. Adam just stared on, utterly speechless. The Educator narrowed her eyes at Shiv's new weapon, and her haughtiness was replaced by a building hint of wariness.

In that time, Shiv cut a great many things. He carved more pieces of shadow away from every patch of darkness he could find, and as he stuffed more things into his pan, it grew heavier and heavier. Then he activated his temporal shell and began peeling slices from that as well. For the first time, he felt the effects of the cuts; it reduced how much time he could sustain while in the Strider state, but that was fine. He was going to make a grand meal for everyone.

He carved away all of his Chronomantic field and filled the pan with it as well. Then, he began channeling a stream of fire into it. As he did, he looked around. "Mortar! I need your Pyromancy. Pour some heat into this."

The large orc obliged. A ball of flame erupted free from the cannon still on his back, and it splashed into Shiv's frying pan as well. After that, the lid formed, slammed shut, and this time Shiv saw a new timer start ticking down. With the sheer amount of ingredients he'd filled the frying pan with, he wasn't surprised the countdown was much longer.

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Cooking in Progress: 3 Minutes

The Chef Unwavering 63 > 64

Three minutes, Shiv thought to himself. When it took four seconds to cook something, I had about ten seconds to enjoy the effects of the meal. Maybe the conversion rate will remain the same if the time is longer as well. Only one way to find out.

As he waited, Shiv examined his frying pan. It glowed ever brighter with every piece of ingredient he placed inside of it, and ever heavier as well. He wondered if that was the Bash the Unbashable skill. He guessed that after a certain point, should he fill the pan with so much stuff, it might be as heavy as a small mountain, and he could use that to crack the head of almost any adversary.

Shiv also wondered if he could potentially cook a piece of a Hydra. If he could do that, then maybe he would gain an instantaneous regeneration capability. Or, better yet, a fragment of the Tarrasque's crystalline shell. The possibilities were… Well, they were literally limitless. Anything was an ingredient with this thing in his hand. Anything.

But right now, he was doing things in the crudest way possible. He didn't have a full cooking station. This thing was an all-in-one frying pan, but there were far more ways to prepare a meal, and so Shiv began to consider how he could rely on his The Chef Unwavering skill even more.

Just then, the lid burst apart, and Shiv's eyes widened as his pan expanded in size. Previously, it was the width of his head. Now, it swelled to the girth of his torso, with the meal fully prepared. The darkness radiating from the pan grew more intense as well, and so long as it remained filled with the food, the weight and intensity remained.

Cook the Uncookable Activated

Once more, Shiv reached inside. Instead of it being a powdery substance, it was like a mess of meatballs. Shiv shoved one in his mouth, and then another. Soon, he burst into blackened steam, and he remained in that state for a near-minute after. However, since the pan was bound to his soul, it went with him into that shadowy state, and he couldn't feed the others his newly finished meal. The currents of the present glided around Shiv and kept him rooted to the passage of time, and rippling waves of Chronology bled off him.

Orichalcum Resistance Obtained

Shadowshape Obtained

Temporal Stabilization Obtained

As the minute ended, and he re-emerged, Shiv held out the pan to everyone else.

"Alright, I got a new plan. It's called 'we cook magma and darkness and time itself and then swim out of this place without the Avatars or Ascendants ever getting close to us.'"

For a long beat, Adam continued staring at Shiv, his eyes darting between his friend and the impossible frying pan he'd gained from collapsing the mana core. A whistling sigh escaped from Adam. "There's just one problem with that, Shiv. As astonishing and utterly strange as your new pan is, how are we going to feed that to Can Hu?"

Shiv's mouth fell open. He wanted to come up with a response, but he winced as he realized that was a limitation. Bots usually didn't savor food the same way people did, but Can Hu wasn't any ordinary bot. It had a tasting apparatus, but Shiv wasn't sure if that would register in the eyes of the System as having consumed the food. Slowly, Shiv walked over to Can Hu, observing his friend's damaged body.

"Hey, you alright, Penitent?" Shiv said softly.

Can Hu lifted its head. One of its optics was cracked, but the other came alight with a vibrant green glow. "I remain half-barreled, Shiv. What is this? What are you—" And then Can Hu trailed off as well, startled by the sudden appearance of a pan in its face. "Is that a cooking utensil?"

"Dip your tasting apparatus into one of these here shadow orichalcum meatballs. I want to see if it takes effect for you."

The Penitent stiffened, but rather than interrogating Shiv about why or for what reason it had to serve as a taste tester, it did as he requested. An extending rod shot out from the underside of Can Hu's machine skull, and it pierced Shiv's meal. In an instant, Can Hu burst into flickering motes of shadow, and the Deathless pumped a fist high up into the air. "It works! Yes! If someone can taste it, it works!"

While Can Hu remained black mist, it splashed down onto the ground, unable to remain in contact with the two Pathbearers holding it up. In an instant, a stampede of orcs surrounded Shiv, and they all leaned in close, leering at the food.

"I think I want to go next," one of them mumbled.

Tequila narrowed his eyes at the pan. "Does it take alcohol as well? What might that do?"

Though these were good questions, Shiv looked between their massive bodies and saw the Educator frowning at them. A burst of intuition took hold of his mind, and the Deathless just sneered as he guessed why she was so displeased. "Hey Educator, I'm sorry that I ruined your plan."

"Plan?" she repeated, a hint of annoyance lingering on the edge of her voice.

"Yeah," Shiv continued pressing. He slipped between the orcs and came to stand face to face with his old enemy, though a significant vertical gulf separated them. "I'm pretty sure you would have planned to paint us into a book or something, and taken us out that way."

The twitch in the corner of her lip told him he was right. "Don't be absurd," she lied nakedly. "I know you would have never taken that arrangement."

"Yeah, you know a lot of things, don't you?" Shiv muttered. "A lot about the Ascendants and a lot about Udraal, but maybe not enough about me. How are your burns, by the way?"

Though she tried not to show it, Shiv could tell she really, really didn't like him. A small piece of her nose also turned to glass as Sticks and Stones did its work. "They healed. A lesser Pathbearer might find soul wounds debilitating, but a proper power has means of resolving such things."

"Oh, that's good. I'm real proud of you." He held up his pan. "If you don't have your own way out of this prison, I have a bit of charity for you."

Her lip twisted in absolute disgust, but she didn't reject his offer outright. "Udraal told me you were obstinate."

At the mention of his maker's name, the burning joy inside Shiv sputtered as if someone had poured a glass of fetid swamp water over it, and his expression came to mirror that of the Educator. "Udraal doesn't know me very well. And just to be clear, you intervening doesn't change anything. I got my eye on you, Educator. You keep your distance, and whatever you do, you state it plainly and openly. If I don't know what you're doing, Adam's got an arrow, and I've got means of ripping you apart. You keep that brush pointed away from us, and I'll keep using this pan for cooking instead of burying it inside your skull."

The Educator rolled her eyes. "Oh, don't be daft, boy. If I was going to hurt you, I would have already painted the rest of them away. No, right now, my duty is to see us all freed from this prison. And now that the annoying part is done, we begin our grand escape. And no, I do not require your cooking for myself. There is a more effective option."

"And what's that?" Shiv asked, weary.

Suddenly, she swung her tome around. Adam drew his arm back and readied a Veilpiercer. Shiv dashed forward and prepared for a fight, holding his pan high and prepared to bring it down on the Educator's face. But just then, the chains binding her tome snapped open, and ringing shrapnel filled the air. They began to orbit around the Educator rather than striking anyone nearby, and from the flipping pages, Shiv caught sight of a familiar figure: a Hydra, with many crowns adorning its many heads. It was struggling, writhing on the paper, and with a flourish of her brush, Solzimort was set free, crashing into reality with a spray of vibrant inks, taking up most of the hallway they were in.

"Oh, oh man!" Solzimort gasped. The Hydra's many heads gagged and writhed on the ground, pointing in different directions, spasming as if someone blessed with dry land after nearly drowning in the deep. "Too cramped! Too cramped! Couldn't absorb the material, too cramped…"

Shiv shot the Educator a glare. She gave him an indifferent look. "What? If you feed this to him, he will turn to darkness, and the rest of us can be fused with his body. That is far more efficient than feeding everyone."

Shiv pressed his lips together. She was right. But also, simply painting Solzimort into one of her pages was an ugly sign. Whatever he could say about the Educator, he could never trust her, not as long as she was so casual in her acts of imprisonment, and if even a Legendary Hydra that the Auroral Council itself wasn't capable of containing without sedation was helpless once captured in her book, he didn't give himself or any of his friends high chances.

"Hey," Shiv said, patting one of Solzimort's heads. "You're fine. You're fine now. Not letting her put you back in."

The Hydra slowly calmed, looking around and taking in the orcs. "We should be off soon," the Educator noted. "Gather the magma and other ingredients you need. Feed the Hydra after it absorbs you. After that, there is a place in the capital we must go to. It will lead us out of the city—and toward our shared destination."

"Our shared destination?" Adam said. "What makes you think we're going anywhere with you?"

"Because I can spare you the attention of the Ascendants." The Educator scoffed. She turned to look at Shiv, and he saw a pulsing glow, a divine incandescence radiating from her tome. "They do not recall who I am. They cannot find you so long as I am in your vicinity. Their all-seeing gazes will not be so all-seeing. But I suspect they will also be distracted by other matters."

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