Monarch of Profound Toxin

"The Blue? Profound Tox—" Andihar asked but abruptly had the air driven from his lungs.

Streaks of toxic influence seeped from Profound Toxin's hand and spread across the elf's skin before sinking into his body. Immediately, a familiar glow burned script into his arm as he struggled to regain control over his suddenly labored breathing.

Both Eik and Gul took a couple of steps closer to get a better looks at the letters.

[Received a skill granted directly by the Supreme Divinity of Toxin]

[Acquired Plate of the Toxic Colossus — Lv. 1]

"Plate of the Colossus?" Andihar muttered as he read over the notification. "You're just… giving this to me out of the blue?"

"Not… out of the blue… It is after… careful consideration… You serve us well and therefore deserve… to be rewarded."

At that demeaning remark, Andihar's eyes narrowed slightly but the valuable reward seemed to be more than enough to let him forget it.

At a thought, thick, crystalline formations snapped into place over his golden armor, growing out to cover basically all of the plate's segmented weak spots. It appeared to function in much the same manner as the Azure Aegis skill although the crystals on his armor were much less angular and smoothed down to allow for complete freedom of movement with little risk of snagging.

"Go… big," Profound Toxin instructed.

"Or go home?" Eik finished.

The crude facsimile of a human face turned to stare at him in silence before eventually speaking. "No, you can… stay regardless… Just… go big… Full stop." It returned its attention to the elf.

Andihar obeyed.

Easily hitting a hundred meters of sheer, indomitable warrior physique, the speed of Andihar's own growth seemed unable to match that of the Plate of the Toxic Colossus. Like a cocoon, it nearly completely encased him as size rapidly changed before it finally unfolded and revealed a titan of azure that sank deeply into the ground.

Without warning, robust spikes of solid Profound Toxin jabbed diagonally downward from his hips and pierced the ground with immense force, burying themselves. Eik felt a root net of crystal secure his position in much the same way he secured the foundation of his own ERBARG, aka Eik's Really Big Ass Rail Gun.

"I'm immovable…" Mega Andihar's grinding bass rumbled, easily conveying the awe he was feeling.

"As you… should be," came the nonchalant comment from Profound Toxin.

The elf's helmeted head turned to regard the ancient figure. He offered a bow from the shoulders in gratitude. "I thank y—"

"All right… try this," Profound Toxin said as a pellet of solid toxin formed in the palm of its hand. Without any other warning, it hurled the tiny projectile at Andihar's head at a speed that crackled as it generated booming vapor trails.

Courtesy of Profound Toxin's apparent but uncharacteristic mercy, Andihar had just enough time to turn and gasp but failed to raise his shield in time to block.

With a glassy clank, the projectile slammed into the crystallized, azure helmet. Head snapping back with a violent crunch, Andihar's gigantic body was thrown back and sent sliding across the ground.

"What the fuck, dude! Are you crazy?" Eik exclaimed as the earth shook beneath their feet.

"He is fine… most likely," came the calm answer.

"What the hell are you even talking about?" the X-ranker raged. "Do you have any idea how fragile an S-ranker is? One flick of the finger and it's, like… splai!"

"I know that… but…"

"Ugh," the giant groaned and pushed himself up and onto his elbows, head lulling as he tried to regain his bearings. "What just happened?" he slurred.

"Whoa, what's with your head?" Eik asked, shocked.

"What?" the large elf asked and reached up to touch his face. A massive lump of crystal had covered the entire right side of the helmet and blocked the eye hole completely. "What's this?"

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

"Reactive… protective cover," Profound Toxin clarified.

"That is so awesome!" Andihar breathed.

Eik looked from the lump on Andihar's helmet, already mending itself and returning to its original shape, to Profound Toxin watching from the garden. "I want that! Can I have that?"

"You can just… figure it out on your own…"

"Wow," Eik gasped. "And here I thought we were supposed to be a team."

[Acquired Plate of the Toxic Colossus — Lv. 2]

[Acquired Plate of the Toxic Colossus — Lv. 3]

[Acquired Plate of the Toxic Colossus — Lv. 4…]

[Acquired Plate of the Toxic Colossus — Lv. 29]

[Acquired Plate of the Toxic Colossus — Lv. 30]

"Hit me again!" Andihar shouted and got to his feet with such excitement that he accidentally carved deep grooves into the corners of Profound Toxin's new garden with his crystal-tipped boots, a sheepish expression only barely visible through the opening in his helmet. "I'm, uuh, I'm sorry," he coughed.

The ancient Worldbreaker appeared to be holding back certain emotions when it spoke, a menacing aura washing over the elf. "That is not… anything to worry about." The pellet that now manifested in its hand was at least three times larger than the first one had been.

"I'll help repair it," Andihar hurried to add, his voice trembling as he realized what was coming. Trying to keep his breath steady, he raised the enormous shield before the projectile had even been thrown. Additional sections grew from all sides of the barrier to increase the area of protection.

"Yes… you will." The sound of the air shattering alone made it clear that this was a different beast compared to the first.

Using his titanic size along with spikes of toxin branching deep into the ground for support, Andihar leaned into his shield and prepared for impact.

With a surprising lack of power, the projectile hit the center of his shield and bounced back. The beefy elf's stance relaxed visibly but before he could realize what was happening, the shard of blue went into a backspin and circled the shield tightly before hammering into the back of his head.

Again, the attack was mitigated by a reactive outgrowth of crystal. Unfortunately, the front of his helmet, which smacked into the inner side of his own shield from the sheer force of the blow, didn't receive the same consideration.

Given how large the man was, Eik cringed at the sounds of Andihar's nose breaking against the very thing that should have kept him safe. Was this prickly behavior when it came to the flower also something Profound Toxin had gotten from him? Damn…

"Another…?" the figure wondered.

"N-No. Uuh, no, I think I'm good for the foreseeable future," the elf said, trying and failing to keep the blood from his nose from spilling into a bed of yellow flowers.

With an air of disappointment, the avatar let a third shot—this one twice the size of the previous—melt back into its hand. "I see…"

"It's about time to go back, then," Gul piped up. He had been keeping his own darkness infused with Profound Toxin swirling around his hands and arms without rest. "We wouldn't want to worry the others."

"We haven't been gone that long, I reckon," Eik said. "I'm sure it's fine."

***

"Where the hell have you been?" Pölse scolded once they returned. "This is absolutely not fine at all! We thought you were dead! We need you alive for this all to work out! And where did you come from anyway?"

"I ran into some unexpected issues so I had to go home real quick."

On the way back from Toxin, the three of them had run into a problem. When Eik had tried to reverse Admittance to the Realm and send them back to the ruined world they had left in a hurry, he had found himself unable to establish any kind of connection to the destination—neither physical nor mental—and therefore unable to send them back.

Maybe Ihasu could help him figure out how to triangulate a destination and weave the information into his travel skill but for now the only place he could go seemed to be home. The intimate relationship he had with the location was apparently enough. His old family home on the outskirts of Copenhagen was also a possibility, he could feel, but that would have to wait.

Once they had emerged in the middle of the living room, they raced back, surprising the others as they burst through the front door.

"We were worried, Eik," Mn'Toakh added, her tone magnitudes more controlled than Pölse's. "When we reopened the fracture at the designated location and time, all three of you were nowhere to be found. General Pölse and I even went through to search for you, but found nothing but a flat, barren world, devoid of life. The ash-like, brittle flora you described after your first expedition also didn't seem to be there."

"And neither was the miasma," General Pölse chimed in. "What the hell happened?"

"Perhaps I should be the one to explain this one," Gul said, stepping in.

"Oh?" Mn'Toakh breathed. "Please, by all means, go ahead."

He took a deep breath. "Eik is a complete madman with too much power for someone with the wisdom of a rowdy seven-year-old like him to handle and he should be locked up on a remote world before he dommgph—" Only a brightly smiling Andihar's hand clasped over his mouth stopped the old fart from continuing his tirade.

The clan leader put up a token struggle but otherwise seemed willing to give up on his half-hearted, symbolic protest of the deadly working conditions of a Royal Guard of the Supreme Divinity of Toxin.

"To clarify," Andihar continued, Gul hanging limply in his grip. "Eik is… very powerful. He killed millions, if not billions. Regarding both the vegetation and the miasma, conditions appeared identical to the first world Eik visited. As a witness, I can report that he has found an extremely efficient way to eradicate the miasma and given the strong possibility that it is connected to the Lord of the Moon's prophesized attempt to throw the Unified Mass into a spiral of destruction, I can only recommend that we prescribe similar… treatment for all other worlds of its kind."

"I was about to say that," Gul muttered, breaking free of Andihar's hand.

"Sure you were," the elf quipped without looking at the old clan leader.

Mn'Toakh nodded gratefully while the lead analyst pulled his colleagues to the nearest table where they took notes and formulated theories in a huddles of hushed voices. This discovery of a near certain solution to the miasma set them all into frantic motion.

Eik clapped his hands for attention. "That is great! So shall we get on with it then? Send me to the last one for now, please. I ran out on a meal to come here, so I'd really like to be home for the next one. And my daughter has difficult math homework that I need to pretend to be too busy for and deflect onto her mother."