The Lone Wanderer

Chapter 588 – Hollow victory

Everything turned into a blur as Percy lost any connection to the outside world. Still, he held onto his lingering traces of lucidity for as long as he could, unwilling to pass out. The only thing worse than enduring the fiend’s torturous absorption would be to mess the process up and have to start over.

He wanted to tell himself to hang on for a few more minutes, but he honestly had no idea how long it would be until his suffering was over – or even how long it had been up to that point. Alas, there was nothing he could do but wait until he saw the notification.

Percy’s soul had turned into little more than a ravaged battlefield for the four spectral creatures to wage their war on. Unlike the previous times, he struggled to even follow the changes, because his whole soul felt like it had been turned inside out.

Pain had faded into background noise. That was not to say that it had dulled or that Percy had grown used to it – it was still every bit as intense and unpleasant as it had been from the start. However, he could no longer tell which body part was hurting as the all-encompassing agony had become his default state of being.

‘Elaine must be freaking out right about now.’

This was the only stray thought that briefly crossed his mind amidst his suffering. Archibald and Orin could probably handle the gruesome spectacle just fine, but Percy’s cousin had always been repulsed by the most painful of his soul experiments. In hindsight, it had probably been a bad idea to let her watch this, but Percy had selfishly wanted people he trusted by his side.

Thankfully, the fated moment arrived about an eternity later.

[Congratulations! You have absorbed a new spectral trait: Mimicry!]

Obviously, Percy wasn’t in any condition to open his Status or study his new ability. Relieved to have finally succeeded, he gave up all resistance, allowing himself to fall asleep. Everything else could wait.

When he next opened his eyes, he was resting on something soft, crunchy, and unbearably cold. So much so, that the skin on the back of his neck felt like it would peel off if he tried to sit up too abruptly.

Darkness stretched in every direction, making it exceedingly difficult to examine his surroundings. He could still see quite far due to his mutation and higher grade, but there wasn’t much to see. Just a vast snowy plain unfolding all around him like a colossal blanket, its folds and creases forming tall hills and deep valleys.

There were other, brighter structures in the distance, though their light didn’t reach him unless he specifically focused on them – and only for as long as he did. The Symphony of a Dead Winter also echoed in the background, though it was somewhat muted.

It didn’t take Percy long to realize that he was once again on the dark side of Huehue – or at least the version of it that existed in his mind.

‘I guess I’ve passed out again,’ he thought, a wry smile forming on his lips.

Zoris had mentioned that one could teach themselves to bypass the Insomnia trait if they wanted, though Percy had never tried to do that, having grown to appreciate the extra time that it gave him every day.

Evidently, extreme mental trauma made for an excellent shortcut. His fusion with Micky had also knocked him out, though the absorption of the Amorphos had been even more brutal.

The frigid winds were quite unpleasant as they bit into his skin, as was the snow underneath his body. However, he knew that he wasn’t in any real danger of hypothermia, because all of this was happening inside his head.

Percy sighed, not in a rush to move. He figured that he’d earned himself a few moments of respite after what he’d just gone through.

‘Do I even want to absorb more traits in the future?’ he couldn’t help but ask himself.

Percy rarely questioned his willingness to suffer a little for the sake of growing stronger, but acquiring his fourth trait had been an eye-opening experience. Zoris had mentioned that many soul affinity users with the blessing of permanence opted to stop after their second fiend, unwilling to undergo the brutal operation a third time – let alone a fourth.

Percy had shattered that record by becoming the first person in history to soldier through this kind of pain. However, even if his capacity kept increasing, he was beginning to reevaluate whether it was worth it.

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‘Why am I even doing this again?’

From as far back as he could remember, Percy had always wanted to become a god. In his childish mind, the pinnacle of magic had represented the ultimate freedom – freedom from aging or disease, or from those who sought to oppress or harm him. Freedom to traverse the world, soar through the clouds, and even space, to explore the universe.

For the most part, Percy’s motivations had never changed.

If anything, awakening his bloodline had only given him the opportunity to pursue his dreams. Everything that had happened since had only reinforced his ambitions. The places he had seen had opened his eyes to more possibilities, and the powerful enemies that he had made along the way had only deepened his yearning for strength.

However, thinking back to the sheer agony that he had just experienced, he had to seriously consider whether there was any point. After all, Percy knew how dying felt, and it wasn’t nearly this bad. Perhaps, in his efforts to protect himself from the horrors of the world, he had subjected himself to something even worse…

Sighing, he pushed himself to his feet, trudging through the frozen expanse that represented his mindscape. As always, this place was a jigsaw puzzle of various locations from his past. Before returning to the real world, Percy decided to take some time to explore the area while gathering his thoughts.

Somewhere in the distance, he spotted a colossal building bathing under the dim glow of a crimson star, its colossal visage cutting through the darkness. The ancient coliseum wasn’t looking good today. It was crumbling. Whatever pieces were still standing were riddled with cracks.

Elsewhere, he saw a replica of the Whistling Woods, though the forest looked like a hurricane had just torn through it. Half the trees had been uprooted, the rest having been stripped of all their leaves.

In a third location, the Fungal Spire pierced through the dark clouds. The colossal fungi sprouting along its steep slopes had lost their usual lustre, their once-vibrant caps now shrivelled and riddled with holes.

‘Wow… this place is such a mess today…’

Worried that he had suffered serious mental damage, Percy thought back through his lives, trying to discern whether there were any important memories missing. It was only after failing to find any noticeable gaps that he exhaled in relief.

‘I guess I’m just a bit shaken from the experience. Hopefully, it’ll be back to normal in a few days.’

Turning back to the ruined coliseum, he willed himself to approach. A blink later, he was standing inside its vast arena. The stands around him were mostly destroyed, with even the sections of the building leading to the underground dungeon being inaccessible.

Ignoring all of that, he walked to a familiar spot. Granted, the whole place was familiar, since Micky had spent decades fighting here every single day, but there was a certain patch of bloodstained dirt that held a special meaning in his heart.

‘This is where we died…’

Plopping down, he picked up a handful of sand, letting it trickle through his fingers. If it hadn’t been for Percy’s bottomless ambition and his eternal quest for power, he and Micky would have never met. The latter would have died quietly in his cell, and his story would have ended right there.

Sure, the past few hours had been several times more painful than either of Micky’s deaths, but what about the last couple of decades that he had lived on Remior? What about his dreams of defeating Rhaziel and freeing Huehue from its oppressors?

Wasn’t that worth something?

There were plenty of others too. Enki, Duwa, Gabe, Leo… They would have all died if not for Percy. The Melodians would have gone extinct, and so would the Amenthei. Perhaps humanity too – if Percy hadn’t restored the royal lineage of the Starry Wasps.

‘I’m such an idiot…’ He chuckled. ‘It’s worth it. Of course it is!’

Sure, absorbing spectral traits grew increasingly painful, to the point that nothing else he had experienced over the years came close. That said, it only lasted a few hours. To a god, that was as short as the blink of an eye.

No. Not just a god. Percy had already multiplied his potential lifespan manyfold. Even if he failed to ascend in the end, he could easily live for thousands of years longer than he would have. Besides, even if he died young, it didn’t mean that his efforts had been for naught.

Percy had already helped a lot of people. Their lives mattered as much as his own ambitions and dreams, and his spectral traits had played a huge role in that. Leaving aside the Phantomwoven Cloak that he was so fond of, Percy might have failed to rescue many of his past hosts if not for Soul Stitching – a spell that was only possible due to his Weaving trait.

How many hours of extra training had his Insomnia trait provided him over the years? Hell, if not for his resistance to the Slumber, Percy might have lost a clone to the demonic infestation on Amenthes, costing Nephthys and her people their second chance at life.

And that was without even mentioning how many doors the Scribing trait had opened for him. Without it, he would have failed to obtain even half the rewards from Thess’kala or the Vault. Even worse, his artificial advancement would have never been on the table, so Percy would have had to keep searching for ways to extend his lifespan.

‘It’s worth it,’ he reiterated, a trace of his usual optimism finally worming its way into his heart.

For the first time since he began grinding that Amorphos inside his core, he even felt a sliver of anticipation to study his new trait. The others had been immeasurably valuable so far, so he was certain that Mimicry wouldn’t disappoint either.

‘I’ll do it. No matter how much it hurts, I’ll just have to grit my teeth and absorb as many fiends as my soul can endure,’ he decided.

If Percy wanted to climb higher than everyone else and carve his own will onto the very fabric of the universe, he had to be willing to sacrifice more than anyone else. A surge of newfound resolve rose in his chest as he opened his eyes – his real eyes – waking up.