After picking up Perumah's magical objects, they set out again to enter the next world, Dei continuing to baby his System, studying it alongside its investigations of him in return. As it went over his memories, he found it becoming less skittish around him, understanding he was a known quantity, and getting a bead on his personality. When it stumbled upon his Rule of protecting children, it cross referenced it with his perspective of it being a child, and relaxed significantly; at least, that's how he interpreted its new behavior. His Bestial Communication did its best to give him insights into its body language, but the System itself didn't know how it felt most of the time, so he struggled to read it.

Just as he suspected as well, it grew fast. After he taught it how to grab certain things from his soul and more easily study them, it began incorporating certain ideas into its body, pulling and integrating concepts into a more stable form. He realized that, until now, its "Flesh" was purely composed of spell forms, but it was now coated in a layer of mana. No longer was its "Brain" exposed to the air, but shielded in defensive magic.

Another interesting thing they realized, which he should've guessed before, was that a System was a Sapient Race, categorized as such by the universe itself. It had access to all the emotions, and more, because its nature was one of perfect balance.

Perumah detected uncountable unfamiliar emotions in it, and they slowly realized a System's "Natural" affinities included all of them, which made sense when he thought about their purpose.

He asked her about how it saw him, because he wanted to verify it wasn't utterly heartless, and she got back two sets of emotions: Biological and Mechanical.

It held two views towards him, one as a familial bond, the other as objectively beneficial. As far as Perumah could tell, this essentially meant it did feel emotions, but it had a second set of emotions purely dedicated towards assessing its mind and ensuring it did not make compromising or erratic decisions.

In other words the System did like him, but if he started to abuse it, it would retaliate without hesitation; he was fine with that, he wouldn't give it a reason to hate him.

It was finally also starting to learn about conveying ideas through language rather than a pure exchange of knowledge and how to summarize information, so he was hopeful of asking it to potentially give him a Status screen in the near future.

Leaving it to its own devices again as they neared this planets pole, they went through the typical dance of opening a portal to the white abyss, but paused as soon as the gateway was established.

Rather than a simple endless pale void filled with black stars, Dei found there were a few creatures actually living here.

A few jellyfish shaped things bounded about, great tuna darted through the nothing, and a select few small tentacular horrors showed themselves.

The four of them stood watching the scene for a few seconds, but it was Perumah that spoke first.

"It's blue."

"What is?" Dei asked.

"Everything here. The air, water? It functions similar to water. I believe my mana and ocular senses are overlapping to create a blue tint."

"Yea, that tracks, I only see white."

"Same," Jacob threw in.

"You miss much," Perumah told them, then pointed at a particular spot in the distance. "It ebbs and flows unevenly. There is density to the mana, and where it concentrates, I sense…"

The nearby creatures cleared of the area, running for the hills due to some unknown phenomena he couldn't see- at least until small debris started to form mid-air, swirling around as it was pushed by an invisible force.

In seconds, a tornado of sparkling metals, flesh, wood, and any other material he could imagine appeared from nowhere.

It began to move away from them at an alarming pace, drawing in a few jellyfish and shredding them to pieces.

Just as quickly as it appeared, it dissipated as well, and a flood of animals returned to the area, tearing through the debris before it was all consumed.

"...Well, that," Perumah finished.

"You think we can teleport through it all?" he asked, looking in the distance towards the six planets. Clearly, he had options now, so it might take some investigation.

"...Maybe? It depends on how your teleportation spell works. If it were Spatial magic I would say absolutely not, as that tends to stay on the… surface of reality. Void jumps between things, I believe, so you tell me. Can we? Will your Void teleportation interact with the storms at all?"

"Roving Gate swaps two points of space without the in between area, so it should be impossible to interrupt it, but I remember the Cosmic Beast pulling us out of the spell last time, so I'm no longer sure."

"True… if chaos has infinite possibilities, one surely counters Void."

"My thoughts exactly. At the same time, I don't want to fly that distance considering how long that will take, and I'm not sure how well I can dodge around the storms without seeing them."

"Two non-issues. I will tell you where to go, and you can teleport to certain points. It may require multiple uses of Roving Gate, but it will be far safer and quicker than flying."

"Sure, I'm fine with that" he shrugged, "But don't forget it takes a moment for me to form a karmic resonance with a certain point. I have to use Meditation to anchor myself to other points, because that's the only way I can use magic outside my body in the first place. Just a heads up that I won't be able to move the moment I appear again, so be absolutely sure that we won't appear in one of those mana tornado things."

She nodded absently, "Certainly a piece of information to keep in mind, but one I hope will not come to be relevant. Let us set out."

Dei decided to enter his World that Walks form, just in case, because it had higher survivability, then grabbed everyone and entered partial Meditation.

The world of strings appeared, and it took significant effort to parse them, even when he knew what he was looking for and with the speeds he could think, it took a little less than half a second to find any one spot.

The main portion of his self followed Perumah's instructions and they moved through the raw fabric, but a piece of himself had its attention drawn to a construct that'd been sitting in his soul for a while- the bridge of strings created by the man with the Karma affinity back on Earth.

It involved Iora, his family, the village he was born in, Wrath, and demonic concepts. After the creation of the karmic bridge it just… went dormant, never really becoming relevant.

Still, he believed it would be. Jacob's own experience with Karma showed that it worked in very subtle ways, so Dei was sure he wouldn't know its conclusion was coming until he'd already arrived at whatever destination it had in mind.

The "Demonic" experiences within it told him it'd be back in quarantine, but other than that, he couldn't be sure. He wasn't worried about it though, as Jacob's was made with good intentions, so he didn't believe the Karma user was a bad person.

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They made it to the next planet without issue, and Dei took out his little mana reader, seeing that this universe had a high amount of Exploration, Knowledge, and Learning mana, so he believed they were some kind of pioneer world, with significant untamed land.

It was here that he wondered something else too: "Hey Perumah, how do you know which planet to go to?"

"I follow the highest density of MP. Right now, I am also sensing more chaos."

"Oh, huh, yea that'd do it."

A few seconds after they appeared, The Champion contacted him, got the story, and the events repeated themselves where he gave them some faith and said to wait a moment while he checked with the others.

This time, they sat down together because they knew it wouldn't take that long and wanted to move on soon. Perumah said she might try to get more artifacts in one of the higher-concentration mana worlds, but that was about it.

When the waves of a Leviathan trying to get their attention started to appear, Perumah looked at him curiously and he just shook his head, saying "Ignore it."

They set out again shortly after that, the chaos storms in the fabric becoming more frequent while the diversity of life raised as well.

Dei found that the aura of chaos he'd set up started reaching further as well before dissipating, while a few blessings started to appear. At one point, a school of jellyfish floated past them, and Soul reached through Dei to bless one in particular- turning it from pink to white. The moment it changed, Dei started sensing complex higher thoughts from it.

On the flip side though, a random fish got too close to Perumah and was exploded by the hand of Wrath. It hadn't even done anything, Wrath just shredded it.

True, Perumah was keeping a wary eye on it, but the poor fish seemed peaceful enough. Either way, he'd have to be careful around populations. He could be something of a wandering prophet if he let the chaos loose fully, or he could be a walking calamity.

It was on the eighth planet, around sixteen hours later, that something different happened in his interaction with The Champion.

"... So now I'm just going around collecting donations for The Champion in quarantine."

"Mmm…" he hummed, and left Dei in silence for several seconds.

"I am afraid there is no faith to spare here," The Champion finally told him, surprising Dei. He wasn't exactly entitled to something from all of them, but considering they usually had the same reaction, he figured something must be different.

When he'd arrived, the three main affinities were Earth, Refuge, and Potential- the last of which he didn't even know was an affinity, and one that would be confusing considering there was a "Potential" node in his soul completely unrelated to the affinity.

When he studied the concept, he realized the Potential affinity was of the physics variety- it involved Potential Energy.

"Oh, how come?" he asked.

"For there are dangerous times ahead. Realmwalkers of distant lands carry message for those within a certain radius to prepare, and I apologize, but I must guard my people above all others."

"Are you talking about…" he was going to say Okrin, but honestly he wasn't sure if the Titan's name was forbidden like so many other words were. "...The escape of the First Titan?"

Moderate surprise came through their bond, but The Champion quickly accepted it. "I take it you have only heard the barest hint of such an event? No, there will be no escape for him. He has too many enemies, and too many allies. His existence is one that will be the center of a storm, one which has no calm eye about it. At the moment of his escape… apocalypse shall descend upon many. Though, as selfish as I am, I will give you this hint: go no further, little one. Despite the locks upon the ball of faith within you, they will not be enough to keep out the dedicated effort of a Champion, and I… can become desperate for victory when everything is at stake. The version you speak with now? I do not know true fear. I am far from the epicenter of it all, but others? You will eventually come upon a Champion, one without options, one cornered by his situation, and he will do anything to protect his people. You walk towards the cracked coffin of the First Titan, and for this I know you have not met any version of The Champion under duress, any that faces hopelessness. Ultimately, our honor is a facade we keep in times of peace, so trust not my own honeyed words.

"If there is a version of me out there that believes you stand between him and the continued existence of his planet, even if it means damning another, even if it means releasing a demon… he will tear you to pieces."

Dei stroked his non-existent stubble as he thought about the next course of action, but he needed more information.

"Is the name of the First Titan forbidden?"

"No, but not many know it, and even fewer wish to say it. Beings of his power tend to… hear you. Even if he may not be able to respond, few wish to garner his attention."

'Understandable… I don't think I want him knowing about me if I intend to seal him away, so I'll stop saying his name for now.'

"Okay, next question, how did his 'Coffin' even get broken? Something tells me an artifact like that either lasts forever, or cracks instantly."

"It would have lasted forever, if not for that damned parasite," The Champion growled. "It starts an uncountable amount of years ago, when there used to be a balancing force that regulated this portion of the multiverse…"

Dei quickly cut him off, "Oh wait, are you talking about the System and how a partial Ascender destroyed it?"

"... Indeed."

"Okay, does that mean he also cracked open Edit? To see if the First Titan would give him advice on how to get past whatever roadblock he'd faced?"

The Champion sighed, "Yes. I sometimes forget that other Champions have the same thoughts as I, and share similar information."

Dei hadn't learned this from a Champion but he wasn't going to correct the thought, because it would be harder to explain that it was from the neighboring System.

"Okay, I get the feeling this guy was a right bastard. I don't care much about his name, but if he Ascended, I am curious as to what his affinity is and his story, if you'll tell it. As arrogant as this sounds, I intend to Ascend as well, and this is the only first-hand account I've ever heard of."

"Mm… and what shall your concept be?" The Champion asked not with skepticism, but curiosity.

"I don't know what it's called yet, but something about competing forces creating something in the middle. So far, I've used it to limit the influence of my own affinities on my mind, and to lock certain unwanted effects away. Here, take a look for yourself," he said, sending a singular piece of Null mana to The Champion.

Dei hadn't stopped creating Null Mana the entire journey. He frequently drained most types that came to him- Wrath, Kindness, Fortitude, and Soul- into his own affinity, because he wanted to use his for something big to get a fitting Achievement- and he was sure the First Titan would be his chance. Because Null mana carried his message alone, it could be used to cast his magic.

"This is why I'm seeking out the First Titan," he declared, "I heard he was escaping, and if I can find an oppositional force to go against him, I might be able to keep him trapped. From what I know… Edit is an oppositional force. I believe my type of domain was used in its creation, even if there is no affinity for it, so I might be able to repair it as well, if the… flavors are similar enough."

"This might not be the worst plan," The Champion conceded, "I sense significant definition in this, though you are mistaken about Edit; the coffin is composed not of magic, but the flesh of a long-dead Race of anti-life dwellers. In a gross oversimplification, they were utterly immune to all forms of decomposition, and offered the bodies of their people to assist in sealing away the madman. Still, it may yet be useable, as the Marditi were oppositional to the First Titan and magic in general in… other ways."

'Hmm Hm Hmmmm… opposed to magic, long-dead Race, other descendants of the Moon Primordial? Better ask discreetly…'

"Were they perhaps… created by… a particular different beginning?"

Dei felt consideration through the link, before a short and quick "Yes."

"That might work for me even better," he realized, seeing that Okrin was an almost pure representation of the Earth Primordial's power, while the Marditi were pure representations of how much the Moon Primordial hated that power.

"I would agree," He sighed, "So I must go back on my previous word and ask… will you continue your travels? I do not know if it will work, but I hope it does."

Dei smiled, "Sure. As long as you, uh, ensure I won't be smited the moment I get too close to another universe though. I want to actually make it to the First Titan."

"Not an issue, all Champions will at least start a dialog before taking what they need- and you will be given the chance to show them your brand of mana."

"Can I just not enter the universe?" he wondered, "I've only been stepping into them until this point to get the faith, what if I just move on?"

"Not a good idea. They will sense your presence on the edge of their perception, just as I have, and if they sense such a payload leaving before they get the chance to speak, they will simply attack. Enter the universe, explain yourself, then move on."

"Got it got it… thanks for the confirmation, but also, could I get that story about the guy who killed the System? I don't mean to be insensitive… but I'm already here you know? I wanna know which affinity did it."

"The story is not long, at least not in any way I can tell it, but I do not mind sharing it with you. It's a simple tale of one who later became known as Desperation…"

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