A blond-haired man ran across the changing wasteland, behind him a few creatures, rushing to catch up with the man. This was none other than Arthur, desperately trying to escape the fangs of the beasts. He had become overconfident in his reacquired ability to use aether and darely to pay the price. His left hand was limply stopped to his body, an aetheric strap holding it in place. The arm itself looked entirely inhuman, blue, black, and red marks visible around it. The Djinn armor was also broken on the arm, the creature's fangs biting straight through it.
Arthur was desperate now, his breath was already ragged, thick steam clouds leaving his mouth as he raced through the land. The very Stam clouds that turned ice cold or lava hot.
All around, Arthur was in bad shape. His aether core was already left empty, the other cores not providing any value in this place.
Arthur had an assumption about what had happened. It was either that Grey wanted him to progress faster or to rush his progress. Sometimes he felt like another presence was trying to take control of this world. The world itself stopping its endless shifting, almost as if focusing on defending itself.
Arthur continued to run when suddenly, everything stopped in its tracks. The ground, the air, the monsters chasing him. Even Arthur himself stood frozen, fear grasping his entire soul. Arthur knew what this was. Static void, or at least something similar. Yet Arthur had not cast the spell, which only left one option. Sure enough, Arthur suddenly felt a presence, his body trying to shake from the overwhelming fear it could feel. Yet he couldn't, Static void made sure of that. And so Arthur stood, unmoving, unbreathing, unblinking, at Grey's mercy.
Suddenly a voice rang out, a deep monotone, with no emotion behind it.
"Why do you refuse to use them?"
A simple question, from such a being caused Arthur's blood to freeze in his veins. He instinctively understood what Grey meant. He meant destruction, the violet flames that can and would incinerate everything they touched.
The pressure upon Arthur's form eased slightly, allowing him to speak.
"I-I do not wish for them to control me!"
Arthur stuttered out, his body shaking, fear and rage clawing through his body.
There was silence for a few long moments, then the same voice told him the answer.
And with that time resumed, the beasts continuing their chase, the world starting to shift yet again.
And in the next moment, all the restraint Arthur held on, the restraint he put on himself once again, because of this opportunity to shift away from the flames, vanished. The restraints vanished without a second thought, the fear previously gripping him turning into boiling hatred.
And then the next moment, a gigantic pillar of flames engulfed all, Arthur using his own body as a medium, his skin bubbling and sizzling.
In the next moment, his flesh healed, Arthur willing the flames to obey him, no longer burning, but instead healing.
Slowly, the flames around his own body shifted, resembling more pure aether than destruction.
Yet the monsters did not fall; their furr was gone, skin was erased, the muscles charred and melted. But what beast cared for its own body? If a beast could care for their own body, it was no beast at all.
And so they lunged, fangs, claws, and tails extending towards Arthur. Their goal is singular and absolute.
The next moment, the destruction swirled in the air, being turned back to aether, forming a dome. The next second, the world inside the purple sphere froze, the beasts nothing but frozen statues.
And with that, Arthur summoned his iconic move, dozens of gigantic spears shimmering into existence, then they all flew forward. And as they were about to hit the targets, time resumed, the momentum of the creatures working against them, each being impaled on the spears.
Then several deafening explosions rang out, and whatever remained of the bodies was erased from existence itself.
Only then, Arthur dared to collapse, his aether cores empty.
***
In the waking world, it has been several months since the Paragon of Purity vanished. Yet the people did not falter in their belief in the great Paragon's survival. After all, what monster could defeat the strongest master of two worlds?
In their eyes, nothing could. And so they awaited the return of the people's champion.
Meanwhile in Antarctica, panic spread. Even if the Paragon was alive, something must have managed to defeat him, or at least heavily injured him. Everyone came to the conclusion of a high-class Terror, perhaps a lower-class Titan. This only spread more panic among the soldiers. After all, just recently, the winter beast appeared, a terrifying, powerful titan. Sky tide has deemed it a Corrupted Titan.
Everyone knew what that meant, no one on the continent could kill the beast, just Saint Tyris could hold it off.
At least for now, the Titan only wandered, with no specific destination. The soldiers could only hope that the terrifying creature would not lock onto Falcon Scott. Which was the last human bastion in Antarctica, everyone had already been transported to it or was dead.
***
In another world, people gathered in multiple chambers, war plans spread out on giant tables. Plans being shared around them, dismissed or accepted in quick succession.
Yet in all the war rooms, a nagging feeling ran through everyone's minds, the feeling of something they missed. A detail far too important to leave unattended.
Yet no one could place the feeling of something amiss, and none spoke out on their worries, fearing their leaders far too much to bring such a mere thing up.
***
Arthur woke up an unknown amount of time later, his gaze far different. Far too calm who had nearly died. He was entirely focused on his newly born goal. A goal to finally return to his home world.
And so instead of standing up, he remained sitting, crossing his legs and putting his hands together. It was time to figure out the final piece.
Arthur knew what he needed to achieve, an almost impossible task for a mere master. But he had no choice.
And so Arthur sat, unmoving. Any beasts spawned by Grey were obliterated on their arrival.
He had no time to waste running from these things.
He focused, stretched, and condensed the aether all around him, observing how it interacted with his own aether core.
Yet the once vast difference was gone, the same energy that once felt divine outside his body felt the same as the one he wielded. And Arthur, in that moment, knew he had evolved. In what way he wasn't quite sure, but that didn't matter right now. All that mattered was figuring out this newly thought of technique.
Yet Arthur didn't feel the gaze of Grey, his presence shielded. Grey gazed at the carbon copy of himself, his brows furrowed. How had this boy figured out this technique, how would he even achieve this?
Arthur's guess on what this place was was wrong, not completely, but still quite far off. Yet what Arthur had figured would in fact work, just not as intended by the young man.
Then Grey's gaze went to his own training room, trying to figure out this so-called "domain" as Arthur deemed it.
Finally Grey figured out how the boy discovered this idea, his eyes widening at the simplistic yet profoundly difficult concept of the technique.
A technique Grey couldn't achieve for a simple reason, his and Arthur's worlds shared different laws, and as such, he didn't meet one of the requirements.
Yet the technique was still extremely powerful and difficult. The best way Grey could describe the techniques' workings was that the user would use Spatium and pure aether to make a barrier, then the user would need to use Spatium on a part of his own soul, teleporting it to the real world.
Grey couldn't help himself; he let out a laugh. The pure absurdity of the technique baffled him. Yet, if the boy could manage it, it was an unbeatable technique, especially with what was inside Arthur's soul.
[A/N: At this point grammarly is just causing me more problems(lmao). Literally went thought the text for like 20 minutes, fixing it. There probably will be mistakes, but oh well. Also hope yall like the technique I came up with, kind of stole from jjk, but diffrent.]
Thanks for reading and support!
(Ps I wrote this in like an hour, leave power stones!
(Tired and broken physically as fuck)).