Forged By The Apocalypse - A LitRPG With Draconic Potential

After the Aspect of the Hero, Seth had been faced with a few quests which had fueled his mystique for the weaker members of Londimin. As the System seemed content to gift him powerful Aspects and items which aligned with his strengths, Seth himself was hard pressed to keep his head from getting too big. In his heart, Seth knew it was luck which had placed him in front of Titus as the System descended.

Luck was just another word for Fate, wasn’t it? Seth’s second Aspect, Fate had given him the skills to continue riding the crest of the trial waves, limiting loss of life and allowing Seth to truly feel like the hero he was pushed into being. People thanked him for saving their lives, and he had hadn’t he? More and more, he struggled to separate his own actions from those forced on him.

Seth’s third Aspect continued to fit the theme. As though the System itself were building a character, Seth received the Aspect of Regeneration. Now he was no longer able to fight for a short while, accumulate damage and stop. With his wounds closing in moments, healing fully in minutes, it was more and more expected that he stay at the forefront of their people’s dangers. This didn’t, unfortunately, repair his mental state. Each time his bones were broken, healed by the magic of the System, Seth doubted his place in things.

He was a failure when it came to being a leader, only able to stand in front of monsters and let his weapons and armour do the work. He had been forced to place the task of administration into the hands of increasingly unworthy people as the good ones got themselves killed. Unknown to himself, this festering doubt had not only held him back, it had begun to poison his Aspects and mind.

So when the confident and pristine energy of that man appeared, the knife in Seth’s soul twisted. Walking forth with a pyroclastic flow of blistering energies at his fore, Grant Kaeron had walked into Londimin and shattered every illusion which Seth had cultivated around himself. Safety? Gone. This man was easily capable of slaughtering the whole room. His level of strength was unacceptable to Seth’s worldview. Future? Questionable. Any decisions which Grant wanted would be what happened.

So when he asked for anything, especially something as ridiculous as a whole plane, Seth snapped. The attack was regrettable, only because it had all turned out so badly. Seth had been taken by surprise, and then with so many people in the room, outright killing the man was a step too far. Execution became the plan, except how could they even kill him? Seth was no fool, Grant had allowed himself to be taken captive, probably expecting the chance to manipulate Seth like everyone else did.

In the minutes before the trial wave began and the quest to save Londimin appeared, Seth was already moving. He had seen the threads of fate dancing aggressively, and the golden line from his own chest started to become thick like a rope. That only happened when there was something he had to do. Normally, there were incredible rewards for these things, so Seth gathered a group and charged towards the Elite Dungeon. When the quest arrived, telling anyone over level twenty five in Londimin to defeat that very same dungeon, Seth didn’t even slow down.

Destiny awaited him within.

—————————————————————————

Binding an Aspect is not a simple thing, Seth reckoned, looking at the slate grey Aspect in his hands. If he had known on that first day how the magical baubles would affect his personality, the core of what Seth considered his soul, would he have been so quick to say yes to the power? The answer, of course, was yes. So fervent was his desire to become the hero he imagined, that he forcibly burned the Aspect of Inevitability onto his core.

His mind had rebelled each time he tried to bind with the Aspect, a jagged, vicious sensation in his core in response. The Aspect was like a puzzle piece from a different box. It didn’t fit with Seth’s other understandings of his abilities, and so he shoved and pushed it into place regardless. There was a snapping somewhere as Seth felt himself hollow out. He didn’t care about the parts of him that were lost because at the same time, he was flooded with power. It started with a simple System prompt, before more sprang to life in response to the first, cascading to become Seth’s new strength.

Attribute Bound - Inevitability/Will

Skill Unlocked - Inevitability’s Inception

For a high mana cost, a target may be marked. That target’s attacks cannot land against the user, and the user’s attacks will strike with greater effectiveness.

Class Unlocked! (Hero, Fate, Recovery, Inevitability)

The disparate elements finally join and the Aspect wielder becomes a Fate’s Marshal

+3 Fortitude per level, +1 Speed, Will, Mental per level

+8 free attribute points per level

Achievement Unlocked - Classic (Region First)

With four pillars to hold it up, the class becomes the world. May your world outlast all others.

+3 free attribute points per level

Seth barely had time to be astounded at his new strength as the silent energy in the room began to react. Not to Seth, but to an approaching group. One which echoed with terrible power. Grant was here. He was coming… and Seth would kill him. He had become Fate’s Marshall, someone who arbitrated tests for fate. The new abilities the class had granted him were as natural to him as breathing. Grant was destined to fail his trail, Seth knew as he levelled his sword and vanished into the flow of causality. Seth would win here and continue on his path as humanity’s saviour.

It was inevitable.

———————————————————————

Unable to react verbally due to the speed at which I was forced to dodge, I realised that I was giving a running commentary in my head like Naea was listening. The realisation of her absence in the middle of battle slowed me down an inch, leaving a blade buried in my shoulder. In a way, this injury was Naea’s fault, I decided. I would tell her when I got out. “You’re being a real ass,” I quipped. My right arm injured, I swiped with my left, Retribution clawing the air and forcing Seth away.

While this marked the first real injury, the outcome of the fight was uncomfortably weighted against me. Seth was able to harm me, while I couldn’t even get a magical finger on him. Frustration was building slightly, which is what led to the slip up in the first place. In my need to vent, I had distracted myself. What was the trick here? If I didn’t work it out soon-

“Me?!” Seth’s shrieked, still unseen. Everyone in the safe room flinched, and I was glad that Seth was so fixated on me. If he chose to hurt the others for whatever reason, I wasn’t sure I could stop him. While those from Londimin were probably safe, my new best friend Hassian the cyber shark from another planet was definitely in Seth’s crosshairs. “You ruined everything.”

I almost bit back immediately but I silently conceded that I had been at the centre of this issue. I would argue that Londimin’s response to my existence was the issue, but maybe we all could have handled it better. I could have either walked away and tried something else when it was clear that Londimin was a dead-end as far as support went. Nolan could have warned me that Seth was a little unhinged. Seth could have decided not to graft a powerful piece of magic to his soul haphazardly.

We all make mistakes.

Living with them was something I very much planned to do, so I had to figure this out. With a flick of my wrist and a tap of mental energy, I removed a dense circular addition to my outfit. The Shield of Abaddon appeared, meeting Seth’s next blow. I lashed out with a transforming Alternating Armament, essentially just a sheet of thin metal, but didn’t connect. I hadn’t expected to. I was still preparing.

Item - Shield Of Abandon

From buckler to kite shield, the aim is clear. Protect yourself. However, the creator of this shield felt that offence was a better defence.

Effect: Vitality can be infused into the shield to increase the wielder’s strength for a time.

My mana was billowing out of me at a fair rate. Infusions, Air Manipulation and various, speculative uses of my other skills were draining my core. As I got stronger, the base cost of my abilities increased naturally alongside it. I wouldn’t have been able to cast one of the Mana Bolts I could now before reaching Grade One, it would empty my whole mana reserve. My stamina had also been pressed a little by the dungeon rush so far, and I had expected a break and pushed myself harder than needed in the prior few rooms to keep people safer. The wound on my arm was slowing me down, and to fully heal it wasn’t simple without Naea.

“Fuck it, take some more.” Man and stamina were being taken, why not health, too? I activated the effect of the shield, and my arm tingled with pain. The sensation reminded me of waking up from a nap having slept on the arm, and the prickling jabs of discomfort which shot past my shoulder and into my chest were unpleasant. Once the stinging got to my sternum, however, the pain exploded like a firework, filling my muscles with prodigious strength.

The armament had taken its staff form and I was done playing nice. I had hoped to get out of this fight without hobbling Londimin’s future, but Seth had me backed into a corner. I smashed the floor with my staff, the multiplicative power of multiple buffing effects making me as strong as I had ever been. The stone of the courtyard within the dungeon was hard, but all that meant was the shrapnel it became was more dangerous. I was inordinately pleased to hear a yelp of pain to my right.

Pouncing on it, I found nothing but a spot of blood on the floor. Right above it was an almost imperceptible trace of mana. That was enough for me to break out in a big smile. “Looks like we’re even,” I rolled my shoulder as I spoke, my mana able to regenerate the damage enough for mobility to return in full. It still hurt like a bitch though. “Got you now, though.”

Seth had been invisible to my senses, which meant that he wasn’t using a technique anywhere near as simple as invisibility. My theories about its complexity were confirmed as I caught that whiff of incredibly high quality mana. More than my battle instincts, my greed flared up in response. This is the power of a class? And a broken one, at that? From the specific flavour of mana in Seth’s skill, an answer began to emerge. I had faced a Dao which acted similarly within my first dungeon, as I faced the final battle.

The original wielder of the Alternating Armament, Master Thorn. Facing the Dao of Space was still as impressed as I had been in this new world. Now I was up against a facsimile, mana being used to brute force a deeper effect. My smile grew wider. “Getting tired, Seth?” No ability was without drawbacks. The cost to use this power was high. Without any specific skills to do so, I had to taunt the man in other ways and force him to attack again.

So I shot myself.

———————————————————

Seth knew his life was guided by a beautiful destiny as the attack which would have hit him right in the face was instead intercepted by Grant, who Seth had forced into a dodge. The hateful man’s intense two-coloured eyes rolled back into his head and Seth barked out a laugh. “Ha! You idiot!”

Of course, to the layman this turn of events might look like luck, but Seth knew there was no such thing as luck any more. He had been freed from that notion once he saw the threads of fate dancing. His Glimpse of Destiny skill had been eroded during his class evolution, but Seth didn’t need to see the path to follow it. The magic of Inevitability and Fate within his core pushed his sword forward in an excited stab.

With a loud, hollow crunching sound, the world turned ninety degrees and Seth found that he couldn’t move. “Huh?” He asked, His body frozen. Unbidden, his fingers slipped and the Fatecutter Blade fell from them. “What?” He tried to say, finding only slurred speech available to him. His knees buckled, and he fell, eyes facing skyward into a blistering nebula of purple and orange.

Horror rose in Seth’s throat, a gurgled wail, as Grant stood up. Unable to move, Seth saw this on the periphery of his vision. His mana was spent on those final movements, each shift into that liminal space costing him more and more for their uses in quick succession. Seth hadn’t known about the extra expense. How is that fair? He demanded silently towards the System. Wasn’t he the hero? Wasn’t he supposed to win?

No, a voice answered. This outcome, the voice said, was simply inevitable.