Uriel sat quietly, focused on the flow of aether within his body.
He centered his attention on the foreign streams of aether originating from the crystal, which coursed through him and funneled into the small core nestled in his solar plexus.
He observed it, fascinated.
He watched as it streamed into the core itself as strange, foreign blue aether, only to emerge moments later as thick, potent red natal aether. It cycled through his body in steady rhythms, nourishing flesh and bone alike.
Then came the remnants. the thinnest, most chaotic strands of aether. These were expelled outward, released into the surrounding air, dispersing and thinning until they transformed into white atmospheric aether.
But he could feel more.
Within his core, faint yet unmistakable, there existed a massive pool of aether. It was separate from the current cycle, independent of the flow he was observing, dormant, vast, and waiting.
'The True Core stores natal aether, but also has the ability to catalyse natal aether from any foreign aether it consumes, whether atmospheric or otherwise.'
'How strange.'
Without warning, the process accelerated.
From the crystal embedded in his stomach, a torrential surge of aether erupted. It flooded through every corner of his body, saturating muscle, nerve, and bone before rapidly converging into his true core.
Greedily, hungrily, his core absorbed it all.
It grew, if only by the slightest margin, its surface gaining a faint azure sheen atop its dark, silver, marble-like hue.
Again.
And again.
BOOOOOM!
Uriel felt it.
His core reached saturation. A click echoed through his entire being, sharp and absolute, followed immediately by a deep, booming resonance that rippled through his body.
Winds rose around him, violent, roaring, unrestrained.
A dense sea of white and crimson aether formed in the space around him, first as raw, amorphous energy, then thickening, condensing, until it became truly liquid aether, pooling and surging at his feet.
[Your Weave-System has awakened!]
[Your True Core has awakened!]
Uriel's core began to expand at furious speed.
The sea of aether surrounding him was devoured greedily, swallowed whole. His already monstrous affinity to aether surged even higher, rising beyond its previous limits and blooming in earnest.
PAH!
[Your Natal Spark has awakened!]
Uriel didn't know why, but he suddenly gasped for air. His eyes snapped wide open, bloodshot and burning, as though he had been dragged up from the deepest, most crushing depths of the ocean.
[You have entered the G Rank!]
His body shuddered violently. Sweat soaked through him, his vision swam, and his heart pounded so loudly it drowned out all other sensation.
And then—
BANG!
The aether he had absorbed imploded.
His core shattered.
The air, once bare and empty, was painted in an endless, infinite array of colors, shades beyond counting, beyond naming.
"ARGGGGGGH!"
Uriel's eyes turned white. Thick veins surfaced across his body as he began to convulse, his form lifting from the ground, suspended in the air.
His roar, of pure pain and raw agony. pierced the world itself, echoing across the entire settlement and far beyond it.
All that surrounded him became a sea of colors, an ocean of endless aether.
It coiled and danced, shifting from a world of warring knights to a gigantic void of nothingness, then to a field of imploding stars, collapsing inward upon themselves, and then—
SHAH!
—it grew strange.
Colors twisted into spectral arms and weeping eyes, screaming mouths and bleeding hearts. They shattered and reassembled endlessly, forming scenes of horror that refused to settle.
Ghosts of dragons made from burning corpses assembled in the void, only to collapse into phoenixes born from bleeding worlds. These, in turn, melted into titanic figures composed of severed heads, striding across seas of planets and trampling entire galaxies beneath their steps.
The skies became fields of mad, unblinking eyes.
The ground writhed as an expanse of twisting tentacles.
The air itself grew thick with the scent of rot, decay, and burning flesh.
It was fast. Vivid. Horrifying. Incomprehensible.
And then, pulled by a massive suction force, it all began to condense. The visions tore apart, dragged inward, compressed and crushed as they were gathered into Uriel himself.
They reformed his core.
[Your Unique True Core has awakened!]
Uriel dropped to the ground.
He gasped for air, his body shaking uncontrollably. The pain receded, retreating into a dull echo, while the memories of what had just occurred blurred and slipped away, replaced by a flood of raw sensation.
As if that weren't enough, his chest suddenly began to ache. A harsh fit of coughing seized him, blood sputtering from his lips as his stomach cramped violently.
It was brutal. But as the minutes passed, it settled.
The world around him calmed to a lull. The previously agitated atmospheric aether slowly returned to rest as he regained control of his breathing, spitting out the last sticky remnants of blood from his throat.
His natal aether simmered down as well. His core, now massive, dense, and heavy, accelerated its cycles, assisting his recovery at a frightening pace.
'…'
He pushed himself up, rolling onto his side before sitting upright.
Resting his arms on his knees, he stared at the ground, breathing slowly, his mind empty.
'…'
Uriel tried to think, but his thoughts refused to come together. His mind felt chaotic, as though caught beneath a strange spell that dulled and scattered his awareness.
"I-is it done?! Can I open my eyes?!"
Enoch's voice snapped him awake.
Uriel straightened instinctively and exhaled. A cloud of dark aether flowed from his nose as he did so.
The moment it left him, he felt calmer, noticeably so. As though the unrest clogging his thoughts had been burned away, purged entirely.
"Hello?! Are you there?!"
His gaze shifted toward Enoch.
Hearing the panic and fear in Enoch's voice, Uriel couldn't help but let out a quiet, humorless chuckle.
At the sound, Enoch finally sighed in relief. His Lie Eater armour dissolved and vanished.
He exhaled as well, as if he were the one who had just awakened, and slicked back his wet, dark brown hair. "You okay?"
"Feeling good?"
Uriel didn't answer right away.
He let the silence stretch, grounding himself, testing his balance and feeling out his body.
He almost wished he were back in the outside world, with rain and wind to steady him, but the quiet nothingness of his dimensional space worked just as well.
'It almost reminds me of the quiet stillness of the prison.'
The thought lingered briefly before fading.
He released the tension in his shoulders and looked back at Enoch.
"I don't know," he admitted. "Nothing hurts, but I'm a bit… what's the word? Dazed? Or flash-banged?"
"It's normal," Enoch replied. "Your body went into shock due to the unnatural way you awakened your abilities. I'm just glad it's nothing physically serious."
"Mm." Uriel hummed absentmindedly. "I'm really hungry though. That hurts more than anything."
Enoch shook his head. "No. That can wait. Check your status."
"No, I'm really—"
"Say 'Weave Status,'" Enoch insisted.
Uriel groaned, still disoriented, but complied.
'Weave Status.'