Augmented Aspects: Chapter 235 After Glow (Mallory) (Patreon)

Chapter 235

After Glow

(Mallory)

Struggling.

Mallory was struggling, with what felt like her body being weighed down by thick weighted blankets, Mallory felt helpless.

Her body, mind, and at times she even swore that her soul was burning.

The entire thing felt like spirit ants had found her, burrowed their way deep into her soul and began biting and tearing away parts of her.

Stinging.

The pain was relentless.

Not overbearing, not overwhelming.

Worse, it wasn’t even enough pain to make is so her mind would shut off from too much input. It was as if her mind was being pushed to the brink of mental anguish just enough, but never quite pushed over.

Then the ants began to stretch and pull folds of her body, folds that should not move. Muscles within her body began to flex, particularly in her back. Then she felt massive stinging sensations as her soul-skin, that’s a thing right? The soul-skin? Or at least there had to be, as Mallory had proof that such a thing now existed. She felt this soul-skin pull itself once causing endless pain in her back.

Then finally the pain stopped for a second.

Off in the distance Mallory could hear voices talking, but they were distant as if she was covered under water.

For her part Mallory slowly came to understand that the immense unbearable weight of power that held her in place was energy. Raw, uncontrollable and most terrifying of all the energy she felt was unresponsive.

That was the way to put it, the energy that was coursing through her body, holding her down and all but forcing her to be dormant was unresponsive.

Worse, the energy seemed to be at the beck and call of something else entirely.

Moving.

Even trying to shift her mind from the unrelenting hold of the power gripping her was insanely tough.

How something so powerful could exist here.

The fact that something could still challenge her!

This was unfathomable.

Even against the Protectorate she held back, not wanting to exert her full power, as it likely would have meant the deaths of hundreds of her own people. Let alone the Deolarian soldiers who were there to help.

Mallory had long ago learned to hold back, to focus her power and ferocity for when it was needed.

That was why she had avoided civilian casualties like Cass’s parents. People who she didn’t even realize were there. Even if she did, at that time, she wouldn’t have cared, as she had a mission to do. A task that needed to be accomplished, she had to fight and win a battle against an numerically superior force and do so overwhelmingly to end the war as quickly as possible.

This was why she went all out.

Yet, it was that action and actions like that which caused Mallory to question her beliefs. To force her to be more reserved with the usage of her power.

However, right now, her power was being pressed and restrained in ways that she didn’t quite expect.

Just as she would focus her will to grab and force her mana or aura to protect her, the ants would come back and sting.

No, not just sting, but there was something more there, something overbearing, a force that disrupted her mana and power at its source.

Then just as she thought things were getting better, she felt as if something else jabbed into her. Something akin to a vestigial tail growing from her and all but forcefully being pressed and molded to her soul.

Yet, now that she had gone this far, things were slightly easier.

The overbearing pressure seemed to relax just a bit more.

As, she felt a new organ? That all but seemed to appear from the middle of her body.

Everything was strange, however the force that had been holding her back was relinquishing its undeniable hold.

While the pain she had felt was so overwhelming that her body was unable to move, she did not suffer any damage. At least not any physical damage that would have taken away health points.

Instead, the damage was all mental, a big mistake for a survivor like Mallory. Someone who had suffered through and forced their body to endure when anyone else would have quit long ago.

These thoughts were what kept Mallory sharp. This drive to not be taken down, not now, not ever were what let her know that her moment to strike back was nearly upon her.

Slowly she could feel the unrelenting bonds of force that had been restraining her and all but blinding her with pain slowly begin to fray apart.

Everything kept moving, until finally the moment was over. The unrelenting bands of force that had been holding her down began to recede rapidly, but rather than snapping apart like they should. Like she had half expected, these bands began to break apart, before being absorbed as excess energy by her body.

Pausing Mallory almost lost her moment, her chance to strike back.

Then before she could realize where she was, what had happened, or who she was striking at, her mind, body, and soul finally reunited.

Side-sweeping Strike!

WHOOSH!

Just as she had wanted, she lashed out with her right arm.

No, not just her right arm, as there was a weapon in her right arm. A weapon that she could feel as if it was a new seventh appendage from her body. That’s right, in addition to this weapon that seemed to have manifested in her hand at will, she felt that there were two other appendages, right where her skin and soul seemed to both have been pierced the most by the stinging ants.

Yet, there was something off with her swing.

Her arm, it went too quickly. Almost like there was no resistance caused by the weight of the weapon within her grasp. That was when she began to realize that there was something extremely odd about the weapon.

A weapon that she could almost see mentally where it was at all times. She could even feel its weight and perfect width that seemed to be molded to the size of her hand.

Yet, it also seemed to be weightless when swinging it about.

Then there was the fact that her eyes were finally able to begin to take in shapes and colors in the overbearingly bright room that she now found herself in.

A room that looked simultaneously familiar, while also being something she might have expected to see at a movie made into an old cartoon fantasy setting.

The colors of the desk, chair, and everything around her were brighter and somehow more alive than they had any right to be.

Then to her surprise, the reason why they were brighter and seemingly more alive than they had any right to be, was because they were just that, alive.

“Whoa there Slashy,” a familiar voice called out but the power and form were off. That was clearly the voice of her friend, but she was small. Well not quite smaller but definitely thinner. A pixie, a colossal pixie dashed forward, glowing ephemeral wings. Seeing her Mallory cocks her head to the side and wonders why her memories over the past few hours are somehow missing from her mind.

“What?” Mallory asks.

“Calm down, just calm down, and put the weapon away.” Cass states, slowly gliding forward, but her posture and coiled muscles show that she is willing to jump away at a moment’s notice.

Seeing her like this, Mallory pauses as it is clear the girl is clearly frightened. Frightened of what, Mallory didn’t know, and worse she needed to find out, as that girl had no boundaries for what should be considered off limits. Meaning, whatever she found to be enough for her to pause should be a concern to her.

As she paused, Cass began to speak again.

“Calm down, and put the ephemeral weapon away.” Cass stated, while pointing to the weapon in Mallory’s hand.

Pausing, Mallory took a moment to stare at the weapon in her hand, only to see that it was a weapon that seemed to flicker into and out of existence. There was a huge magical sheen to it, that seemed to only glow with light particles here and there giving an overall impression of the weapon, but not what the actual weapon looked like.

Then Mallory realized that she was seeing the weapon and appendage that her body seemed to see and associate as an accepted part of her own body.

Seeing the new weapon, Mallory all but shrieked.

“What the heck is this?” Mallory asks, a note of confused anger in her voice as she angrily shook the ephemeral blade in her right hand.

“Woah there, that is a death scythe, and you need to be careful with that.” Cass shouted, but then slowly calmed herself as she was clearly trying to calm Mallory down.

Hearing Cass shout, if only for a moment was enough for Mallory to realize that there was clearly a battle of some kind that happened all over the room.

Around her the bookshelves were a mess. Parts of the carpet had been torn up, and there were even burn marks on the desk.

That’s when Mallory paused to take in the state of her friend, who was coated in drying mists of glowing trails of blood.

Seeing her beautiful face and features covered in traces of drying glowing pixie blood, Mallory’s heart all but skipped a beat.

“What did you do?” Mallory asked, taking a step forward to go try to comfort her friend who was clearly attacked, likely due to an experiment gone wrong, again.

“Whoa there, just focus and think about retracting your death scythe first.” Cass said, again pointing towards the scythe that was still in Mallory’s hand.

Seeing that, Mallory thought her friend was crazy, as she couldn’t control the weapon. Though she did drop it from her hand, which had an immediate impact on the weapon, as it began to retract immediately back into her soul.

“Oh, whoa.” Mallory said, suddenly standing upright as she felt the chain and staff of her weapon get pulled into the middle of her back, without being impaired by anything around her. Almost as if physical objects were nothing for the blade to cut through.

Scanning the room, Mallory saw that Jhonny, Cass’s bodyguard, was standing in the hallway just staring at the two of them, not ready to enter the room.

Seeing Jhonny, Mallory relaxed, as she knew he would tell her what really happened here.

“What happened here?” Mallory demanded.

“Look, she says she helped you transition to being a Mythical bloodline.” Jhonny reported.

“What? That is…” Mallory began, but then found her words trailing off as she then felt a long suppressed quest notification go off in her mind.

New Questline: Valhalla Mythical Bloodline Breakthrough (Completed): You have completed the process of transitioning from a Legendary to a Mythic level bloodline. The process was seamless and resulted in the following steps being completed: Fixing/Modifying/Altering Auras (1 / 1), Balancing Merits and Flaws (15 / -15), Balancing Attribute Distribution (6 / 6), Physical Alterations Required (3 / 3), New Bloodline Theme (1 / 1). Rewards: Experience, Aura Improvements, Title, Bloodline Theme Reward.

Just seeing the quest notification was enough to let her know that something crazy had happened. For a moment she wondered if Cass had anything to do with how much pain she was in from the changes.

Her thoughts were quickly confirmed when she read the description of her first alteration.

Avenged Seven-fold Reflexive Battle Aura granted. This aura modified by Dr. Cassiopeia Spiritlight, allows multiplicative damage to be rendered to a target who inadvertently strikes Mallory Valhalla with lethal intent and force.

A seven-fold increase in damage? That was, well it should have been impossible, but then again with Cass doing the alterations it oddly seemed acceptable. Then she saw the other changes that were in store.

Valhalla Bloodline Attributes gained per level: +4 Strength, +3 Dexterity, +3 Endurance, +1 Personality, +1 Sociability, +1 Perception, +1 Intelligence, +2 Willpower.

Those changes per level would be amazing, and were exactly what she wanted and more.

Next came the physical changes, these were things that Mallory was the most leery about. Particularly as she sow how much Cass seemed to evolve from one bloodline evolution to the next.

This was why she was relatively excited about the first change.

Angelic Wings of Purification: Wing that are imbued with the anti-corruption ability for souls. All souls bodies within range to feel the flapping of your wings will feel waves of purification washing over them. Effect: Cures Minor Status Effects that impede health, effects doubled against spirits.

Those wings were almost too perfect, even the flaws or modifications of the wings were ones that seemed to benefit her, rather than hinder her.

Yet, the changes weren’t complete there.

Ephemeral Scythe of Slaying: this soul weapon is capable of being summoned nearly instantly into the owner’s right hand. Chained to the soul, this weapon will slice through all spiritual objects that get in the wielder’s way, passing through mortal shells and objects as if they were immaterial. Effect: Uses Bladed Weapon and Polearm related skills and deals 250% soul damage. Warning: Can cause instant death.

This was the weapon that she had summoned and seeing its effects, Mallory was certain that Cass had a hand in its creation as this was the same type of material that her wings were created from. Since this only seemed to be something that Cass knew about, and something that only first appeared from her being exposed to Cass, Mallory felt that this had to be done at Cass’s request.

Also, her apprehension from just seeing the weapon seemed to stem from a deep familiarity with the weapon as a whole.

Yet, it was the last change that clearly had the hand of Cass involved in it.

Ultimate Soul Cleansing Sac: A Valkyrie unique organ that allows you to cleanse any singular spirit you come in contact with. By performing this cleansing operation, you free the spirit of all their worldly burdens, and manage to learn fifty percent of their memories and skills over the course of a twenty-four-hour cycle. Cost: 15 Merit Points. Note: Counts as a Physical Alteration.

An ephemeral sac that could let her take in a soul of a person that she killed, drain their skills at up to 50%, and then let them pass on peacefully for their knowledge. That had to be something that Cass would have orchestrated.

While Cass would prefer not to let things die, she did understand that death was an unavoidable part of the process of life. However, only Cass would use Merit points as a way to freely gain skills. Though to be honest the idea of gaining skills in such a way wasn’t half bad of a concept. And honestly she was curious to figure out how to use skills acquired in such a way. She took it that the knowledge of the skill would transfer, but the muscle memory portion would have to be worked on to gain the other fifty percent. At least that was what Mallory envisioned.

From there, other details came up about her changes.

Mythical Bloodline Perks:

Bloodline evolution Perk (Marked for Death) Identified: Ability to permanently mark a target with an unavoidable marking that always direct the user to a marked target until their death, or until user relinquishes control of the marking. Effect: All damage done to an individual marked in such a way are increased by 100%.

This was a change that she had received long ago. So long ago in fact that she could hardly remember the person that originally received that as a quest reward. Though now that she saw it, she did remember getting it, and how she had to kill likely hundreds of people just to achieve that as a reward.

Shuttering to herself, she realized just how high up she had gone in the Thieves Guild by taking on a relentless number of assassination quests.

Realizing that Cass had managed to get higher within the Thieves Guild, despite never taking on a single assassination contract just went and reconfirmed how impressive Cass’s true capabilities as a thief really were.

Then she got a warning that let her know what the exact extent of her changes were.

Warning: Valkyrie and Bloodline has been modified to be the new Mythical variant of Ephemeral Valkyrie.

Yet, that wasn’t all as she still had the badge.

New Feat Recorded: Mythical Bloodline Awakened (10,000): You have managed to awaken a Mythical Bloodline (Ephemeral Valkyrie).

Then finally she felt her body swell up with a burst of energy as she received the experience from completing such a monumental task.

Experience Gained: 1,500,000

Ding.

Level up.

Class Ephemeral Valkyrie has increased to level 1,078.

As she stood there, Mallory felt a wave of power roll over her, before she paused to look at Cass.

Suddenly the traces of blood on her face made sense, as those were the exact ways that her reflexive battle aura would strike out when she felt threatened.

Looking at her friend, Mallory felt her lip tremble, as she took in Cass’s haggard state. And then the state of her room.

Then to her surprise, both began to heal up almost instantly.

Well Cass had apparently healed from her wounds long ago. But then she saw what the Charlaine had been squawking about. As the building and even the furniture of the room seemed to be coming to life and slowly healing themselves right before her eyes.

“So, you now have self-healing carpets?” Mallory asked.

“Yeah,” Cass began, then an impish smile crested her lips as she clearly thought of something diabolical. That or maybe she just had gas? Honestly most of the time it was hard to keep up with the girl who had quite accurately been turned into a pixie.

Then before Mallory could say anything else, Cass apparently spoke her diabolical thought into reality, showing that things were going to be okay.

“I guess you could say, the room is now Mallory proofed.”

“You know that makes you sound like the old lady who covers everything in stain resistant plastic?” Mallory quipped.

“Whatever keeps the wild animals from marking everything.” Cass shot back.

“And now you are just the crazy cat lady, not helping yourself out here…” Mallory said, finally smiling as all seemed to be right with the world once more.

She was alive and whole, and her friend was still there ready to give her grief, even after clearly being attacked by her.

“Yeah well…” Cass began, but was quickly cut off.

BLUR!

Mallory used her major burst of speed to cross the room and embrace her friend in an unavoidable hug.

“Thanks,” was all Mallory could say.

For a second, Cass who had been mostly frightened and ready to shoot off randomly paused as if she expected to be attacked again. Then after a second her muscles relaxed as she gave into the hug.

“Any time,” Cass stated, then gently tried to hug Mallory, her small thin arms barely able to wrap around her shoulders.

Then after a second, Cass backs up to lock gazes with Mallory. Looking down, it is clear that she wants to say something truly profound.

“Know that I hope that pixie dust is to able to be removed, even with dry cleaning,” Cass stated.

Then just as the words began to register in Mallory’s overtaxed mind, it happened.

Poof.

The scamp disappeared, but only after coating Mallory’s clothes in a thick layer of pixie dust and blood.

“An alchemists dream, all going to waste.” Mallory sated as she looked down at the state of her attire and could only shake her head at the fact that she had been so close to getting the last word. Then pausing, she realized, this time, she would let her friend take the win, she definitely earned it, if what she thought happened truly happened.

Then turning, she saw that Jhonny was still there, never having left the area.

Seeing him, Mallory took in a deep breath, as she once again had to enter her serious mode.

“Okay, so what really happened?”