Second Genesis

Grey didn’t wait for an answer because, honestly, he had never expected it to be that easy.

Atlas, whoever the fuck he actually was, probably couldn’t even see what was happening here, and if his situation was anything like Prometheus’, there was a good chance he couldn’t communicate nearly as freely as the angel lady could either.

Grey had been by Prometheus’ side for long enough now to understand that there was something fundamentally strange about how Spirits like them operated, because the little red-gold flame was definitely connected to something much larger, but a lot of what it did seemed to happen on instinct and feel rather than through anything Grey would call conscious thought.

Prometheus always acted in ways that produced the greatest effect for the least possible expenditure of energy, and when it had brought Grey back to life for the first time, it probably hadn’t done so because some ancient Titan had looked down from the heavens and decided Grey deserved another chance.

Grey had simply resonated with Prometheus naturally, and that resonance had triggered an ability that already existed. It was the same reason Grey still had to awaken Prometheus one Phase at a time.

Which meant that if Atlas worked in anything close to the same way, then there was already a pretty obvious answer to Grey’s problem. If Grey was compatible with Atlas, or whatever remained of him inside The Virtueless, then the rod would have acknowledged him already. It hadn’t, which meant Atlas wasn’t sleeping because Grey hadn’t found the right words or proven himself enough, he simply wasn’t the Vessel Atlas wanted.

Normally, Grey would have taken that information, filed it away, and figured out the least suicidal way to move forward, but right now he didn’t give a single solitary fuck.

He pushed himself up from the stone with blood running from the corner of his mouth, fury boiling beneath his skin as he remembered the decision he had already made before stepping into this place.

When The Immovable had swallowed his senses and left him floating in a darkness where even his own body had stopped feeling real, Grey had decided that he wasn’t going to change who he was just because the world kept proving there were mountains taller than him.

What the fuck would that decision be worth if the first mountain he ran into afterward made him turn around and go home with his tail tucked between his legs?

Grey would rather shove a cactus up his ass than spend the rest of his life pretending he had principles only when they were convenient. If he was going to be an arrogant prick, then at the very least he was going to be a consistent one.

BOOM.

Grey’s power exploded outward, the white-gold halo above his head blazing several times brighter as his Last Paladin Frame activated and every bit of its focus poured directly into Center of Spirit.

His rage followed with it, bleeding into the world around him until it no longer felt like something trapped inside his chest, while the white gloves wrapped around his hands suddenly erupted with enough power that the air itself seemed to distort around his fingers.

"HERETIC!" the halo shrieked, its voice shaking the arena with enough force that several of the others stumbled backward.

Grey’s eyes narrowed because, surprisingly, it wasn’t reacting to The Virtueless at all. The halo’s attention had locked onto the gloves on his hands. Maybe it would only notice the angel lady if she talked, but whatever the reason, he didn’t give a damn.

He didn’t know if the floating bitch had flesh, blood, organs, or anything else he could break, but he was damn well going to find out.

"GREY!"

Elowen and Mauve shouted at nearly the same time, trying to get him to stop before he crossed whatever line the halo had decided existed, but their voices barely registered.

Grey could hear his heartbeat too clearly, feel the blood rushing through every vessel in his body, and beneath that was the furious certainty that this damned talking halo had made a mistake when it showed him those Angelic Runes.

Grey had seen something similar before in the Blood Witch’s Tome. Barkeep Ji had explained that the witches’ unique language wasn’t just a method of recording information, it was the way they passed Skills down through generations, and when those Skills were comprehended deeply enough they could eventually become Abilities.

Angelic worked differently, but the foundation felt familiar, because the glyphs weren’t governed by strict syntax or grammar, and their meaning changed depending on the thoughts, emotions, experiences, and perspective of the Angel who wrote them.

That meant the language itself wasn’t fixed, at least not completely. Once someone understood the foundation, they could begin carving their own path through it, because the meaning came from the individuality of the person using it as much as it did from the symbols themselves.

Grey’s eyes burned crimson as the realization settled into place, because he had already stumbled onto the perfect medium for something like that.

What the fuck was Center of Spirit if not exactly this?

It was the absolute center of who Grey Temolt was, his thoughts, instincts, emotions, arrogance, bullshit, and every other little thing that made him himself. If Angelic was a language shaped by individuality, then Grey didn’t need to imitate the Angel who had written the original words, he could use the foundation to force his own meaning into existence.

White-gold strands rose through Grey’s hair like living flames as he looked up at the halo.

"Fuck you, bitch, you’re nothing but a floating hole, and I swear on my life I’ll fuck you like one."

A pillar of light descended immediately, but Grey was already moving, his body blurring sideways just before the attack struck and vaporized the stone where he had been standing. He planted one foot, launched himself upward, and raised The Virtueless high above his head while every fiber of muscle in his body contracted in unison, his Frames aligning around one simple, violent purpose.

Hit the bitch.

Grey roared as the rod came down, and for the first time since the comprehension trial began, Veyrath’s eyes shimmered open. At almost the exact same moment, another line of blazing text appeared high above the arena.

[Regional Territory of White - 87%]

BOOM.

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