Chronicles of the True Wizard

The way the Staff worked, or the way Felix assumed it worked, was that it would only affect his Spells as much as was needed in the moment. That meant that while Felix could just fly up a few floors and wipe out droves of innocent guards, his Spells would only be minimally upgraded which meant it wouldn't be a real test of how it would work against The Dragon.

So, he needed to find an opponent that was on a similar level to The Dragon. There was only one being he was aware of that was even remotely close that he had access to, Kerix.

That also meant he could get Kerix's assessment of his readiness and The Dragon itself, in case he was missing something.

Opening an Aether Tunnel, Felix stepped through into the Ryko family facility where he had previously left Kerix.

Even though it had been nearly an Epoch, Kerix was still there, napping on the couch. Whether or not he had moved at all or had simply been napping the entire time, Felix wasn't entirely certain.

Felix used his staff to whack Kerix on the head, not nearly hard enough to even hurt.

He jumped up from the couch and rubbed at his head, "Ow." Kerix looked Felix over then nodded, "You ready to go then?"

"Gotta kill The Dragon first."

"Ugh. You still on about that?"

"I told you, I'm not moving on until I do. It's not like I can come back, right?"

"From the next realm? Nah. Acharaya controls everything there, keeps it locked down."

Felix squinted, "You mean this Acharaya, whoever they are, can let me into previous realms?"

Kerix shrugged, "Probably. Can do all kinds of things."

"I can't count on that, they won't just let me go back if I ask, right?"

"No. Acharaya does whatever's best for you, regardless of what you want."

"Okay, sounds like I can't count on it then. Which brings me back to the reason I came here…"

Kerix sighed, "You want to fight?"

"Yes. I need to make sure I'm ready and test some things. You're the only real opponent I can think of to do that against."

"One condition."

Felix's eyes widened hopefully as he had expected more resistance, "Yeah?"

"I'll give you one dekad, ten days of sparring. Then, you have 10 days to fight The Dragon. Assuming you aren't dead at that point, we're leaving."

"So I have 10 days to fight you and if I don't kill it within the next 20 days, I have to give up?"

"Yup. That or you can figure it out on your own."

So either I get to spar and test things or… I can take as long as I want.

Do you think if you had waited and been more patient, you could have been more ready before sparring with him?

Maybe but, I don't want to wait any longer. I want to fight it now.

Then do it.

What?

I mean, take Kerix up on his offer and spar him. Upgrade and practice whatever you need to but, if you want to fight The Dragon soon, you should.

I didn't expect such a complete turn around on your stance. You don't care about me killing myself with stupid decisions anymore?

I definitely do and this is definitely stupid but, I don't think you're going to outright kill yourself.

You think I have a chance?

No. Grim chuckled, I would bet against you every time.

So you're just trying to be nicer or something? If this is from some misguided notion to make up for something, I really-

No. I'm not. Your amulet.

OHHH! You're right, I should be able to get out before it can kill me as long as I'm careful.

Exactly. I think you should optimize and practice so you can get out as quickly as possible but realistically…

This isn't like I only have one shot. I can keep trying over and over again. Felix nodded as the plan began to materialize in his mind, I really wish we could test whether the amulet would work in the Acharaya's realms or not. Being able to get to Titan first would make this a lot less risky… I think.

You could try and keep probing Kerix or try to bargain with him on that but… I don't think that's going to get you anywhere.

The Residents haven't found anything have they?

No.

"So about Titan-"

"No." Kerix said in no uncertain terms, "You don't know what you're asking. Trust me, you do not want me to get you there. The Acharaya is waaaayy more qualified."

"That may be but my reaching Titan… that's the right terminiology, right? Reaching it?"

He shrugged.

Felix continued, "I'll be a lot stronger, right?"

Kerix nodded.

"Strong enough to kill The Dragon."

Kerix squinted for a moment, seemingly evaluating Felix, before shrugging again, "Likely."

"Okay, so… you don't want me to die… It wou-"

"No. You got this far so you aren't actually stupid or suicidal, you aren't going to just kill yourself."

Felix sighed, "Fine. I'll take you up on your offer then. Let's spar."

Kerix nodded, "Let's move down a few realms then."

"Huh." Felix shrugged as he followed Kerix to the door, "I didn't think you cared."

"Not… I don't care that much. Enough to spend a couple hours flying though."

"More than that."

"Yeah, sure. I've been here for like… ever. Your 2 dekads won't start until we start sparring if that's what you're worried about."

"Perfect."

In reality, it took them just a few hours to get to the 2050th realm, using rifts and Aether Tunnels, which was one of the barren realms. All the realms closer to the 2000th, were barren but kind of gross. The 2050th was relatively normal with forests of long dead trees and mountains.

"I take it you want me in my Spirit Avatar?"

Felix nodded, "I assume that's the best analog, right? You seemed pretty solid and physical last time so…"

Kerix nodded, "Yup. One of the benefits of Titan. Mind, Body and Spirit, all the same thing." He said as his body exploded, thick streams of Anima pouring out in every direction. Those streams grew and expanded rapidly into the form of a massive serpentine Dragon. It didn't take more than a second but Felix was completely focused on him and took in everything.

He didn't learn anything useful from the transformation because it happened exactly as he expected it to. Anima formed the dragon around, or from, his body. How exactly that was also physical was unclear to Felix because it didn't seem like his Anima changed, instead it was more like the Anima of his Spirit was fundamentally different from normal Anima.

Once his form had fully shifted, Kerix waited a moment then, flew right at Felix.

Felix had chosen Kerix because he was the only being even close to The Dragon that he could spar with and even then, he didn't think Kerix was as strong as The Dragon.

When Kerix's form lunged at him, Felix was at least expecting to be able to react and respond. He was wrong.

Kerix was far faster than he had been when he tore through Azura. Now, Felix realized, he wasn't holding back.

Felix moved but he literally couldn't move his body fast enough to leap out of the way. He could use an Instinct Cast Force Burst to move himself but, he just couldn't move his body in accordance and was essentially stuck treating his body as a ragdoll or a corpse.

At the same time, he cast a shield through the Staff. He didn't trust the shield to completely stop Kerix which was why he also dodged but he needed to know how effective it would be.

As Felix had expected, the shield he cast was nothing like the shield that appeared before him. It wasn't a simple barrier of Mana, naively thrown together with a Concept of Durability. Instead, it was structured and formed from interlocking hexagons of Mana while within the Spell, his Concept of Durability was gone and in its place lay a weave of Concepts Felix hadn't supplied.

Kerix's Dragon Maw was as wide as most buildings and given how fast it was moving, nearly impossible to avoid. The barrier that the Staff provided though slowed him down just enough that Felix's body managed to clear the edge of his teeth, before shattering.

His feet still clipped the scales on the side of Kerix's head though, sending his body careening through the air with an uncontrolled trajectory.

Felix caught his body as soon as he could with his Matter Control and righted himself, before beginning to heal the bruising and fracturing in his legs as Kerix stood off to the side, staring and waiting for him to be ready.

Felix had managed to avoid getting swallowed but, in a real fight, he would have died. Getting launched through the air the way he had and being completely out of control of his body was a death sentence as Kerix, had he wanted to, could have easily spun around and killed him.

Once Felix was ready, Kerix immediately shot towards him once again and Felix, without any better options, tried the exact same thing again, desperately pushing himself to move faster.

He died, theoretically, once again.

As stubborn as Felix was, he wasn't stupid so, when he failed a second time, he had Kerix wait a moment while he reassessed.

Then, he had Kerix go again.

This time, instead of trying to stop Kerix, he simply tried to shift him to the side and redirect him with a Force Burst.

Once again, the Staff interpreted and translated his Spell, producing something with the same intent but wholly different from what Felix had cast himself. Instead of a massive Force Burst, what came out of the Staff, was subtle, targeted, calculated and refined. It didn't just push Kerix's head aside with a blast, it redirected his head and twisted it slightly.

It was just barely enough for Felix to move out of the way and subsequently get slammed into the ground from Kerix flicking his neck outwards a moment later.

He tried again, pushing himself with the Staff which managed to move Felix completely clear of Kerix but also made it nearly impossible for him to control his own trajectory.

Then, Felix tried a barrier of Force, an explosion between them, a cage around himself and everything else he could think of.

What about an elastic barrier? Like something that gives a little before pushing back.

How are you going to create that as a Spell?

Actually, I might not have to. This is the perfect time to test things anyways.

As Kerix shot towards him once again, this time Felix didn't cast any Spell at all. Instead he pushed his intent into the Staff followed by Mana, in the hopes it would craft a Spell for him.

The Staff proceeded to do absolutely nothing.

He then tried specifying his intent with the most basic possible barrier Spell and also added his intent into the mix, followed by Mana. That did produce a result but the barrier it produced wasn't any better than Felix could have cast himself, had he used a more complicated Spell.

So my intent is irrelevant but the actual Spell I provide matters. It upgrades whatever Spell I give it so the better the Spell I provide, the better the Spell the Staff casts.

It's like it's trying to teach you. Improving your Spells but not doing anything for you. Showing you the next level of progression for your Spell without completely removing you from the equation.

Yeah… that's exactly what it's like. In which case…

This time, Kerix shot towards Felix and he cast the most complicated Barrier he could, a layered combination of Force and Mana. The Spell that the Staff cast took that concept, and completely reworked the Spell. Instead of just layering them, it created interlocked nodes that reminded Felix of the enchantment he had inscribed into his robes at Inscripticae.

The Staff was either too fast or not creating a Spell Form at all though so Felix was forced to try and figure out the Spell Form to create the same thing himself.

Moving his consciousness internally, he summoned the relevant Residents and began dissecting the Spell to determine how he could cast it with a form. The Perceptual Time Dilation in his Mental World made it seem like an instant when in reality, it had been anything but that. In the end, they ended up using a Three Dimensional Chaining Fractal Spell Form. It was one Spell that created one shield tile that then chained and cast itself again to create the next node.

The hardest part was specifying when it should stop instead of just chain casting forever in every direction until it ran out of Mana which would result in a misshapen barrier.

The solution, was to provide a framework for the chaining to determine when it should chain and when it should stop chaining which, was possibly the most complicated spell work Felix had ever done. The result, was a Fractal Chaining Spell contained within a Three Dimensional Spell that wrapped and modified the inner Spell. It allowed one Spell to Cast and manipulate the contained Spell in what essentially amounted to a Meta Spell Formation.

Returning his consciousness to his body, Felix indicated to Kerix he was ready then formed and cast the Spell through the Staff. It was a multiple thousand level Spell which, Felix had the focus for, but would have taken much longer had he not created and scrutinized the Form so thoroughly. It was familiar and known to him, even if he had started creating it literal seconds in the past.

So, when the resulting barrier that the Staff cast was so completely foreign to him, he knew he had been right about how the Staff worked.

The barrier that was produced took everything about the barrier he had intended to cast, and improved it. The hexagons were lost and in their place, was a three dimensional shape Felix didn't recognize that tiled perfectly, without repeating itself, throughout the barrier. It wasn't just tiles of Mana anymore either, the surface of the tiles were Spells all by themselves.

They looked like each and every one of them were constructed from a Spell Form folded onto itself into a three dimensional shape.

This time, Kerix bounced off the barrier and Felix was completely unharmed.

He recoiled in surprise then indicated Felix should step aside. When he did, Kerix shot himself multiple times faster and shattered the barrier.

He was still holding back… Fuck.

After that, Felix tried a basic Force Barrier which was transformed into a barrier consisting of no Force at all. Instead, it was a reactive barrier that consumed itself when struck to produce a counter Force. Felix dissected and replicated that Spell to the best of his ability then cast it through the Staff producing a Spell shaped like a net that morphed to encompass Kerix's head and push it aside.

That wasn't enough either though as Kerix pushed against it more intentionally and the net snapped, as if made of rope.

After that, Felix moved on as even though dissecting and replicating the Spell was possible, he knew it would be easier and he would learn more if he moved on to a different Spell. So this time, he tried to move himself out of the way with an Instinct Cast Force Burst.

Felix examined the actual output of the Spell and found it wasn't just a burst of force in a direction, it was an explosion of Force followed by a consistent push, both distributed across his body based on mass and designed to keep him mostly upright.

He replicated that fairly easily, showing just how simple his Force Burst had been, and the Staff turned that into something wholly different once again. This time it surrounded him in a Shell of Force that made it so he didn't even feel the inertia at all. Felix didn't have any idea how it did that so, he moved on once again.

Once he had gone through all the Spells that were remotely relevant to his situation, he went through them again. This time, upgrading them once more using the Staff as a guide for how he should be upgrading his Spells.

At that point, there was nothing more he could do but, he had successfully survived Kerix's opening move and, he had options for doing so.

Then, he worked towards having options against Kerix's second move. Then his third.

Felix made progress exponentially quickly as he didn't need to upgrade his Spells with every move Kerix made, he just had to upgrade each Spell once. He began to see the holes in his abilities, or rather the Staff began to point out the holes in his Spells. No matter what the Staff pointed out though, Felix realized it would never tell him what the correct solution was, just what the next step of progression was for the exact Spell he used.

Even using ever slightly different Spells, the Staff produced completely different results.

It became even more obvious though when he began to try and hit back. Using a complex barrier Spell to defend himself was one thing but significantly hurting Kerix or even The Dragon, was another. Felix was pretty sure a Spell alone wasn't going to cut it as they were both ridiculously durable so, unless Felix was going to pump his entire Mana pool into every Spell he cast, he had to find another way.

He was already convinced that that other way was to weave Concepts into his Spells. No matter how complex the Spell Form got though, the Staff refused to fill in the gaps for him. When he threw a Concept into a Spell with his admittedly awful weaving, he ended up with a weave of Concepts barely a step up from what he had put in himself.

When he cast a barrier, the Spell produced was a work of art. A series of three dimensional shapes where the surface, edges and volume within were all individual Spells interacting with each-other. That barrier had just a simple pair of basic Concepts thrown into the mix and barely integrated into the Spell. It was better than Felix had done, but paled in comparison to the Spell Form and output of the Spell that had been cast.

So, even if Felix could cast one of the most impressive looking Fire Balls ever, it didn't really do much of anything.

He continued to focus entirely on survivability for half a day of their sparring before gesturing for Kerix to take a break. Kerix, shifted back to his humanoid form and laid back on the grass, his hands interlocking behind his head.

"Okay, so. I'm starting to get a hang of surviving, so n-"

"Against me."

Felix nodded, "Right, yes. You're the best facsimile of The Dragon I've got."

"Sure but… When that thing first showed up, I tried to fight it… a few times." Kerix sighed, "It's probably about… 3 times faster than I am? Just physically. It's also more than twice as strong and way more durable than I am."

Felix gaped at him for a moment, "I mean… I fought it… kind of. I mostly just ran away but… 3 times faster? Really?"

Kerix nodded, "At least."

"When you say way more durable…"

"Like… I couldn't significantly hurt it in our fights. Nothing more than scratches and bruises."

"What did you hit it with?"

"Admittedly not that much. I don't have some super weapon like its stupid breath. I just… you know, bit and wrestled and clawed it."

"So… You're saying even if I could hurt you… I would need to be doing a lot of damage to be ready to kill that thing?"

"Yup."

"Okay. That brings me to what I was hoping to ask anyways." Felix lifted his hand before him and formed the shape of a simple Fire Ball Spell, "I've been trying to weave Concepts and Anima into my Spells for… a while now."

Kerix looked over and smirked, "Hey, you're almost as bad as I am at Spirit Weaving."

"Shit. I was hoping you could teach me."

"Yeah… I mean, I can tell you what I know, the theory mostly. I was always really bad at this shit so… I kind of just ignored it."

"Oh… Well shit."

"You know who's basically an expert at this shit?"

Felix's eyes almost brightened but, he caught himself when he realized what Kerix was going to say even before he finished.

"The Acharaya." He finished predictably.

"Doesn't really help me right now, does it?"

"Nope but, you could also just forget about that stupid thing and learn whatever you want from them."

"I can't. I need to fight it again."

"Whatever you say kid."

"So Spirit Weaving?"

"Right. Basically, you weave a Concept or Conviction into a thing."

"What about a Curse?"

"In some cases you might be able to but most of the time, it'll just fight you for control the whole time instead of doing anything you want it to."

"Okay so, how does it work? What do I do?"

Kerix sighed and sat up into a meditative stance, "Alright so, I was taught to…" He squinted for a moment as if he was looking for something then a simple looking sword appeared in his hand, "Right so, basically you just run your Soul through the sword- Spell for you I guess? I was taught with a sword."

"Same way you would affiinize Asphellum or Star Metal?"

"Yeah, kind of. You're trying to constantly cycle it in and out of the sword in a loop."

"Okay but, your Soul and a Concept are very different."

"Yeah, so the next step, once you can do that well, is to refine your Soul. All that means is you adjust what's going in to amplify a specific Concept."

"Why not just take a pure Concept and shove it into the sword?"

"Well, Concepts are not exactly stable. At least, not in a sword. You'd need not only a Sword Concept but the Concept of the specific Sword you were imbuing for it to be truly stable and remotely worth it."

"So instead we imbue our entire Souls and that's better?"

"Yes. Way better because your Soul stabilizes the Concept and empowers it."

"Okay so then what is the ideal? The ultimate goal here?"

"To put your Soul into something and empower a Concept to the point where your Soul is there to support the Concept, not direct it in any way."

"That doesn't sound that hard."

"It's harder than it seems because the nature of a living Soul is to experience and control. You basically need to go against your Soul's nature and let the Concept lead."

"Oh." I'm not even sure that would be… possible for me. "Is that the only way?"

Kerix shrugged, "No. It's the only way I know. As I said, this is a question you want to ask the Acharaya, not me."

"Shit."

Felix had Nova produce a simple sword in his Soul Space, like the one Kerix had, then began moving his Soul in and out of the sword. That part was relatively easy for Felix.

After that, he began emphasizing a Concept of Sharpness within his Soul as he pushed it through the sword but the results were pretty much what he had expected. The Sword seemed sharper and more dangerous but no more than it would have been had he simply imbued the Concept by itself, directly.

He tried to do as Kerix said, to have his Soul flowing through the weapon to take a backseat to the Concept but no matter what he did, his Soul refused to budge.

He even tried doing the same with a Spell then casting that through the Staff to see if it would provide him with some direction but that didn't get him anywhere either.

"Is there any chance you know anything about any other techniques for doing this?"

Kerix shook his head, "Nope. I don't even remember the names of other techniques. I was… not the most attentive student."

"Student?"

Kerix waved him off, "Not literally just tutors that were hired by my family."

Okay well… I need some way to at least damage Kerix, let alone The Dragon. Since it doesn't seem like this is going to work…

"Is it possible for a Spell or Weapon with no Spirit Weaving to even hurt you?"

"Of course. It's not like I could just fly through a Star."

Felix sighed, "Right… I was kind of hoping for something a little less expensive than a Star."

"I don't know where the line is but yeah. There are definitely Spiritless weapons that can do damage. I do remember they were popular amongst assassins because they're harder to sense."

Latching on to that ray of hope, Felix and Kerix began sparring again and this time, Felix kept pushing his Spells with the guidance of his Staff. He wasn't sure how far they could go because ultimately, how complicated could a Fire Ball get?

The answer was way more complex than Felix had imagined. He went from a simple Spell form disc, that he had initially designed long ago, to something closer to a Pocket Star. That required multiple layers of Spells that were nested within each-other, one on the inside to generate flame and heat and one surrounding that to maintain stability within another, on the outside to control trajectory and launch the thing.

He was ultimately pretty happy with that, considering the massive destruction they caused to the landscape and the complexity of the Spell but, disappointed as soon as he hit Kerix with one.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Then, things got far more complicated and Felix was no longer capable of designing a Spell Form to replicate the Staff's effect in a single pass. Instead, he was forced to replicate small parts of it one at a time and slowly progress, approaching his goal.

After a Pocket Star like Fire Ball, there was a fusion based Fire Ball that didn't rely on his own Mana for energy and instead, fused atoms to create energy, just like a real star. That was exponentially more complicated as he had to contain, time and control the reaction to produce energy at the right time.

Then, the Staff kept going. Instead of just containing and timing the reaction, controlling it to explode in the right place at the right time, it pushed him to directly control the fusion reaction using a Spell Fractal to manipulate things on a much smaller scale.

At that point, the Staff adjusted his Spell in ways he couldn't even comprehend for the moment so he didn't bother. Luckily, it wasn't necessary as at the very least, he was hurting Kerix.

Launching himself to the side, Felix controlled his trajectory and spun the staff around his body, casting two spells at once behind his back. Kerix's massive Dragon form careened past and a moment later, his tail, just behind his back legs, was hit by a small bead of Fire from an Aether Tunnel that instantly grew to just a few meters across as a ring of Force and Fire shot out of it in every direction.

The ring was absorbed and blocked by Kerix's body, leaving Felix completely out of reach of the effect but on the other side, the ring shot out into the landscape, scarring the mountain range behind them.

Kerix reverted to his humanoid form and gestured for Felix to stop as he regenerated the blackened scar along his butt and thigh.

"How much damage was that?"

"I don't know but it fucking hurt."

"Right. No System. How many more of those before you were dead do you think?"

"Uh…" Kerix poked at the charred flesh, picking away the blackness to reveal new flesh growing beneath, "50 maybe?"

"That is… doable."

Kerix sighed and shrugged, "If you say so."

Once he had regenerated, they began sparring once again and Felix began to upgrade each and every one of his offensive Spells one by one. He had started with Fire and upgraded Fire Ball followed by Flame Thrower then even created a few new, more exotic Spells, such as a persistent ball of Fire that spewed out Fire Bolts in every direction for nearly a minute.

After that, he went through his Cold Spells which, went from being one of the least efficient, to one of the most as the Staff guided him through extracting energy from matter and then harnessing it in the Spell. Instead of just freezing an area, the Spell persisted and grew, chaining itself and growing wider and colder over time.

Then, there were his Lightning Spells. From a Lightning Bolt, the Staff taught him to create a highly conductive path through the Aether, instead of the air. That resulted in a weird laser like Lightning Bolt that didn't deviate at all. Then, it pushed him further, to create a Spell that didn't carve a path, but found one, making it look like a normal Lightning Bolt once again. He also created variations that connected multiple targets together and persistent spheres that hit everything around them.

He never quite managed to create Chain Lightning though, no matter how much he wanted to. He didn't spend too much time on that though as he was preparing to fight a single target, not multiple.

The last offensive Spells he upgraded were his Force Spells. Force Bomb, Force Blast and Force Beam were useful but, paled in comparison to Force Blade.

Felix had previously struggled with making Force Blade efficient. Keeping it sharp and maintaining its shape throughout the flight of the Spell was complicated as the sharper it was, the more stable the Spell had to be, exponentially.

The Staff however, kept throwing out Blades that were better in every way from Felix's own Blade Spells. It took him over a day to finally figure it out but once he did, it was like a dam had broken open in his mind. The Spell wasn't perfectly stable when cast, it was infinitely chaining itself, taking a Blade and making it sharper and sharper as it traveled.

That opened up new doors to Blade Storms and other persistent Spells.

Finally, with only a couple days of sparring left, Felix began upgrading each and every one of his defensive spells again. They were less exciting than offensive spells but now that Felix was pretty sure he could actually hurt The Dragon, he needed to be able to create openings for himself.

He always had Blink to fall back on but he didn't want to ever rely on it in any situation and only use it when he absolutely had to.

Then, with just one day of sparring left, Kerix reluctantly agreed to let Felix save their last day of sparring in case he needed a refresher and so, they traveled to the 2001st realm.

Standing before the Iridescent Bubble to The Dragon's realm, Felix took Nova out of his Soul Space and handed her to Kerix, who agreed to watch over her, then commanded her to stay in that realm. Felix then quickly checked everything, just to be sure.

His Robes were equipped and bound to his Reaper's Mantle Skill.

[S - Arcane] Aether Woven Asphellum Spirit Robes

[Regenerative][Spirit][Bound]

Robes crafted from an intricate weave of Asphellum, Mana and Anima in equal quantities creating a heavy and highly flexible fabric. The Anima within is bound to The True Wizard which, along with the woven Mana, allows for the weave of the fabric, along with the color and other properties, to be changed and manipulated at will. These robes render the wearer impervious to nearly any attack within the A grade.

He had his Staff in hand and all his upgraded spells memorized.

[?] Staff of Arcane Wisdom

[?]

A Staff crafted from the branch of a tree containing vast wisdom, bound to a living Spell. Spells cast through the Staff will be upgraded. Other properties of the Staff remain unknown.

He had the Amulet equipped and slightly embedded into his chest.

[? - Mythic] Amulet of the Realms

[?]

An amulet of unknown origin bound to the universes themselves. Upon entering a universe, this amulet binds itself to the universe up to 16 times. At any point, one of the 16 bound universes may be selected transporting the physical entity that touched the amulet to the bound universe, at the last location of the amulet within the bound universe.

He even still had the hat that he often forgot about, stuck on his head and providing him no real benefit from existing.

[? - Mythic] Mysterious Hat

[Hat]

The appearance of the hat changes based on the person wearing it.

Weren't you D grade last time I checked?

Finally, his body and mind were as strong as he could reasonably make them at the moment. The Fractal Mana Form had upgraded his Mind beyond his understanding while the elixir had upgraded his body beyond what he could have done himself. All the ros his Residents had collected along with the Anima he had sucked from his bracer left his Soul as strong as he could currently make it.