An icy sword slash, tinted with a hint of gold, crashed into a horde of skeletons at the gravesite after the rotting docks, leading to either Authoria's grave or the domed building containing Soul Lord Aren. The mists roiled at the sporadic negative ether drain. The rot effect native to the Spectral Wing, already considered deadly, went on steroids. When Luke flash froze the entire landing graveyard, the essence cost regenerated damn near instantly. He felt like a sugar high constantly invigorated him.

Balanced as it was, this also made the monster spawns go haywire. Therefore, other hunter groups stayed back in the small hallway before the Ferryman boat to cross the lake. None would risk going in further, with the foyer also overrun with blood-themed beasts, weak ghosts, and a vampire duelist.

Luke wanted to kill that one, a known rare spawn, but in sheer irony, other parties desperately said they were 'in line' for the monster already. Not here to go rare hunting, the Reaver spared himself the trouble. The foyer was mostly under control, just no longer the sanctuary of before.

Diving in and out, screeching in glee, Sooty covered herself in dead feathers, batskins, and bone fragments from aerial creatures up above. She looked to be having the time of her life, mowing down the lesser ascended unfortunates in pairs or more. Anytime the leavings of her kills stuck to her feathers for too long, shadow tendrils cleansed them away.

Diverting his attention, Xera veered herself in his grasp, pointing at the grave mound. Blue boned skeletons popped out under the ice. From the looks of it, a mutated skeleton type. Born from the excessive ice element Luke pumped into the terrain. Taking the chance to practice yet again, the Reaver shut an eye and reached into the soul. There, the faint Concept called.

Faint gold bits sprinkled onto the impossibly pure white-blue ice. Drawing black essence to Xera's edge, the Reaver slashed out again. Doing this lost power through the air, but that slight drawback didn't matter when the practice targets were fragile. Another gold-flecked sword arc flew in the air, creating a gale from the speed, turning all the skeletons into splinters.

"Done killing the dead a second time?" Wayfinder opened his clasp. "Makin' the wand sword lass go haywire from joy."

Jumbles of heh, panting, and excited shaking surrounded Xera. She was so lost in being the tool to refill massive graves that she completely missed Wayfinder calling her the wrong weapon name. Something that always worked to irk here, even if just for a second.

Closing the clasp, Wayfinder said, "I rest me needle. Might develop a mental case if you stay here too long, lad. Get to the golden ghost young lady."

Sheathing Xera, Luke managed to take the sword wand out of reverie. She yelped at the sudden blackness that contrasted the ecstasy of greed-driven ice.

The First Reaver didn't mention how much Xera would enjoy the Concept. Is it because she's designed for Reavers? Luke started walking to the mist-covered path that led to Authoria's grave site, freezing any of the swampy mud on the way.

Authoria's influence held out on this thin path. The number of Swamp Guardians and the other types Luke slew in the past hardly increased compared to before. They did all appear more vigorous than usual, their previously hollowed eyes reddened. In the distance, a faint golden radiance pierced through the thickened mists.

Up until Cerdia's recent guidance, the Reaver worked on integrating the shadow element into frost or ice, creating black ice. Since doing all three at once—Luke tried—tore a metaphysical hole in his mind and soul, he switched to dousing the ice in the Greed Concept. The properties of the ice became hungry, consuming, and persistent, far harder to melt. Frightening to even Luke upon further inspection. If he understood how to dip more of the Concept into his Ice Elementalization, the ice produced that way would outperform anything he'd created thus far.

Holding out a palm, Whispering Tome landed on it. Luke closed the tome, turning Xera into a wand. He blasted out black essence to activate Ruinous Echo, the extraneous ability unique to Xera's wand form spread out. It funneled into some victims of circumstance—swamp monsters, lowering their already insufficient magic resistance. As Luke tested, this further boosted vulnerability to any form of Elementalization. The frost stopped at the creature's knees, parting the joints from their murky bodies. They crawled toward the Reaver as he traversed the path. Nearly at Authoria's grave site, he made out the giant gravestone with an out-of-place radiant ghost sitting atop it.

Acting her part, Sooty dove in and out, finishing off what Luke started. When the Reaver switched Xera to a wand earlier, she got a better hold of herself. A tidbit Luke filed away in case Xera got a little too combat crazy. A useful trait at times, but completely giving up your presence of mind rarely worked in your favor long term. Done with her surgical strikes, Sooty circled closely overhead her Reaver.

"Hey Xera," Luke said, tossing her in a circle, catching her when gravity did its work. "Tell me how it feels different between regular ice and when I add in the Greed Concept?"

Moving her wand head slightly in a thinking pattern, Xera hemmed and hawed. She answered, "Those gold flecks feel like, coming home? They were made for me, and I for them? Sorry, I'm confused over it."

"Hmm, why would they think designing you that way is a good idea…" Luke started to internally question if Xera's divine smith was some sort of pervert.

Off in some lonely hill, a once venerated man rolled in his grave, cursing the audacity of the young.

A standing wall of mist divided Authoria's golden lands from the rest of the swamp. No stranger to this phenomenon, Luke stepped right on through. Sooty landed to his side afterwards, hopping around, picking at some golden grass. She rattled in victory when she picked apart some bugs in the deeper soil.

Reappearing in front of the Reaver, Authoria clapped happily. Her noble raiment creased in her ghostly form. She furrowed her brows for a moment. A pulse shook the Spectral Wing; the Silver Black Tower must've taken its next portion of negative ether. Authoria flickered for a second before returning to normal. The swamp outside her little radiant patch bubbled and rushed away. Some of the swamp creatures began to fight one another, each victor merging with the loser. They stayed the same strength, puzzling Luke.

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Likely reading Luke's expression, Wayfinder said, "These beasties are driven by their instinct to survive. Each taking the power that runs this place from the other in a fly-by-night attempt to withstand the Spires' takings."

Nodding, Luke released Whispering Tome, allowing it to move as it wished. He poked through Authoria, getting her attention. "Any chance you could give me a hint or two for what you need?"

Tapping a finger on her incorporeal golden cheek, Authoria tilted her head slightly. Once she started her method acting to 'show' what Luke would be dealing with soon, the Reaver stopped her mid-way. Whatever she attempted to do, he couldn't make any sense of it this time.

"Never mind, let's get this show on the road. Any objections?"

Sooty, carefree as she tended to be, pecked Luke in the ankle. Xera gave a slightly too enthusiastic "No!", and the other two artifacts remained mute. Authoria issued her request once more.

[Authoria offered you the final quest in the hidden chain. For Authoria to rest fully once more, the Four Betrayers of Radiance—waiting in the necropolis below her grave—must be slaughtered together. Warning: You cannot use a return scroll to escape possible failure]

Musing, Luke thought, That's certainly very reassuring. Already thinking I'd fail, rude Interface.

[Completion in the chain will result in upgrading Authoria's mark into the Golden Stigmata. Additional rewards are possible based on performance. The Celestial's Blood Vision Moon begins to shift]

High up above, the pulsating Red Moon, that sometimes appeared instead of its usual twin silver and golden cousins, bathed in necrotic gray light. It swirled peacefully, then paused right over Authoria's radiant burial grounds. Parts of the mist condensing near the border of Authoria's domain rose, feeding itself to the ominous moon. The swamp became increasingly visible.

The surviving monsters suffered a rude awakening.

[Called upon to temporarily loosen the Spire's Shackles, the Celestial's Blood Vision Moon demands tribute]

Scrunching up his face a little, Luke said, "Tribute? How would I give tribute to a moon?"

Wayfinder said, "Who is to say you haven't already? The poor sods got to revel in their victories for less time than a rot gnat's life cycle."

Hankering to ask what Wayfinder meant, the environment answered for the Reaver instead. The moon pulsed with red light, and the necrotic gray struck in tendril form. The mists, already thin by the Spectral Wing's standards, lightened again. The waters within the swamp drained into the ground, the mud cracked dry. Any ether or other energy resource that composed the creatures in the mists leaked out, draining too fast to be sustainable. Black rain leaked from the rapidly forming red clouds, acting as a cloak to the malpractice of the celestial body. A thin gold-lit barrier kept out the black rain around Authoria's grave grounds.

Anything else in this portion of the Spectral Wing ended up in one hazardous terrain. The black rain plopped onto the nearest swamp guardian, melting right through it, seeping into its core. It trembled once, before bursting apart into a congealed globule, bobbing in place. The new addition calmly swept up, taking additional nearby mist, moisture, and ambient ether with it, melding into the moon.

This pattern of liquid death reigned upon the entire swamp. As far as Luke could see, only those in the actual standard dungeon path were spared. The usual tyrannical denizens of the mists became an energy source to an energy-starved moon. Minutes passed, and the last bits of mists rushed away, reinforcing the edges of the official parts of the Spectral Wing, forming a mist wall to block out those not part of the event.

Overkill in this case, considering no one else but Luke's party was in this section of the dungeon. The only others would be in the initial hall, all the way on the other side of the lake, and that was entirely unaffected by the chaos. Using a whirl of black essence, Xera tried sucking in some of the black rain out of curiosity. The measure passed right through the rain, like it didn't exist in any permanent capacity. She muttered at the unsuccessful attempt, annoyed, but not enough to complain out loud, or maybe she'd matured enough to rein it in over the more minor setbacks. When the last of the cursed monsters outside Authoria's grounds died, their energy globes, representing all that they were, rose toward the Blood Moon. Each time one merged in, the necrotic gray light intensified.

Luke's sixth sense grew in anticipation. The moon high up above started to condense the gray light down toward its bottom. He thought the tribute had been satisfied, as the black rain slowed to a drizzle. Plus, not much else remained to take; the parched swamp turned into a wasteland. Visibility here was plain as day, as the mists receded to form walls far off in the distance. The Reaver found himself in a dual dome zone, the mist dome to keep others out, and Authoria's golden barrier to keep him in.

During this process of the moon taking its sweet time, the Reaver applied Infusion to Xera and Sooty. Then to Whispering Tome for good measure. Although all that seemed to do was make it float faster and add resistance, as it wasn't affected by it unless in Ghost Blade form. He thought perhaps this could be a way to double-stack Infusion. One on himself, as it permanently was, then another on the tome, empowering his spells further. Alas, it didn't work that way. He rued the loss of double Infusion Essence Lances.

Sooty glide-hopped around the barrier's edges impatiently. Luke had slotted in Nemenoth's Sovereign Crystal during the wait, taking up the last empty equipment position left. He'd have done it earlier, but it required tier 2 to equip, and he got a little lost in the fun of adding in the Greed Concept to his ice. The item might 'only' be a level 50 epic piece, but the special equipment armor types were the rarest piece for most people, and tended to be lower quality when found. Nemenoth's Sovereign Crystal, from that perspective, was something the Reaver would keep well past tier 2. Even now, when he tried to create trinkets using runic enchanting, he produced rare quality at best. Doubling checking on the situation, Luke anticipated he had time to overlook what would likely be his last item upgrade before the Tide.

[Nemenoth's Sovereign Crystal]

Quality: Epic

Active - Corrupting Aura: The Sovereign Crystal consumes 10% of your health. In return, for the next twenty seconds, your strikes deal damage in a one hundred and twenty degree cone, dealing 75% damage. Bypasses all resistances, can pierce the immaterial. 10 Minute Cooldown.

Passive - Veins of Corruption: Your attacks apply a corruption vein to enemies, dealing modest arcane damage to them over six seconds. Limit of one mark per target. For every corrupted enemy nearby, your spells and melee strikes heal you for .5% of your maximum health.

Passive - Arcane Surge: Dodging or parrying generates an arcane surge that innervates your body. Your spell power and melee attack speed increase by 10%. Lasts 30 seconds. No Cooldown.

Requirements: Tier 2, Level 50

Pulsing with crystallized desire to be a Sovereign.

The Reaver realized this the first time he got the item, but the trinket was basically a stone of amplification for both offense and defense. The Cloak of Dominion at the earlier auction couldn't match up, in his opinion. Granted, Luke absolutely was spoiled in terms of item quality. Two full artifacts and one quasi-artifact would do that to you.

Moving his feet over the golden grass, it crunched. Authoria sat at the edge of her tombstone, swinging her feet. Eyes on the new Corrupting Aura ability, Luke sharpened his mind to examine possible use cases.

Another active ability to incorporate into my toolbox. Elementalization already bypasses the immaterial property of others, but the ability to ignore resistances could come in handy. Obviously, the most crucial aspect is turning my damaging attacks into a cone effect. I'm assuming Elementalization already works with it, as it basically works with everything, just a matter of difficulty.

Obsidian rain continued to patter uselessly against Authoria's barrier. The water source mildly hydrated the arid swamp. Luke sensed the water pooling below, encompassing all the underground beneath the radiant patch he stood on and beyond. The area beneath felt hollow, unusual considering that hadn't been the case minutes ago. The earth shook, and the necrotic gray light turned teal, beaming down onto Authoria's area, then expanding well beyond it, brushing up against the mist walls in the distance.

Like a landslide, but burrowing down, the swamp formed into a caldera, widening tremendously. Only Authoria's patch stayed stable. Chancing a glance below, the Reaver found a sheer drop all alongside this golden island in the air. A brown and teal deathly miasma whispered, covering most of what seemed to be a necropolis.

[A satisfactory tribute has been acquired. The Celestial Blood Watcher Moon weakens the Spire's chains for this event. Betrayer's Necropolis revives beneath the Radiant's territory]

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