Chaotic Craftsman Worships The Cube

After his outburst at the gods which had at least helped with some of his building stress, Ben and Thera spent another hour with the group around them, healing their wounds and slowly siphoning off their mana to top up Thera even a little faster so they could do one of the last things they’d need to before finally going home to get some rest.

Only when he was confident they weren’t about to exhaust Thera a second time did the two fly off, asking the group to wait for their return since there was a space mage among them who could help speed up their return trip as they both rushed to the area they’d only just left, off in search of the remains of the outsider.

Ben knew it had collapsed into itself to some extent when he’d been dealing with the both of them being sucked in by the implosion it had caused but he hadn’t been in a position where he could really think about the damage. Now though he needed to see it, not just to understand the scale of it all but to also find something else that had to have been in the area.

When they got close enough, Ben once more covered Thera’s eyes, letting himself focus on guiding her in case whatever was left behind would still have any negative effect on her mind as he surveyed the devastation around them.

For miles in all directions, the land was destroyed and barren, with whatever had been there at the time left as a mystery to all who’d see it in the future, but the farther in they went, the more aware he became of something else missing. The outsider’s corpse.

I swear to fucking god if this thing came back to life I’m going to go insane. That is a level of bullshit I’m not ready to handle after a day like today.

As a minor mercy to him though, it seemed that wasn’t the case. As they went on it became easier to see a minor mountain of rubble piled up in the distance, with the occasional unnatural shimmer shining through, telling him the outsider’s body had condensed far more than he’d expected as they finally landed.

Ben led Thera forward so he could get a closer look while he felt the foreign substance pick at his brain in a similar, though lesser, way that the outsider itself had, telling him all he needed to know about the dangers it still held.

As it shimmered and warped around itself under its own power while its foreign state clashed against reality itself, it ever so gently shook loose the dirt that was encasing it, slowly dropping away all that it was buried under and speaking of a day when more would be revealed.

Clearly a situation that would need to be dealt with, but not the first one. For that, Ben pulled out something that he’d made much earlier. A compass, bound and pointing in the direction of the only soul crystal he’d made that had actually managed to seal away anything.

Given how everything else was sucked in after the monster’s death, Ben got Thera to start pulling away piles of dirt, keeping an eye on the compass to see if it would move to where it was deposited to but having no luck in that regard either, leaving the only place left to check being the now fulling exposed corpse.

Of course, none would be able to tell it was a corpse just by looking at it, not even Ben would have realized if he hadn’t been one of the ones responsible for making it. Aside from the way it interacted with the world around it, there was nothing left of its original form, with it all instead compressed down to a giant lump, ten meters across.

And the soul crystal is buried in all of that. I guess I could just leave it, but…

But he’d never get his hands on the soul of an outsider again. He didn’t even know what he would or could do with such a thing, but it was better than leaving it to rot and better to have it somewhere he could keep an eye on it, if only to be sure that the monster it sealed wouldn’t somehow break free from the enchantments that bound it and rise to the godhood it was destined for.

Which means I need to see if I can pull off some digging since I doubt Thera’s earth magic is going to be super applicable to working on foreign matter since it doesn’t even extend to manipulating something like wood. Which reminds me, even if I can’t do it myself I really should sponsor some deeper research on the topic of the extent that each affinity really covers beyond anything I’ve seen in the library records. Which doesn’t even remotely matter right now, gotta just hope my super broad, super wonderful magic will extend to this weird crap.

He didn’t really doubt it would given the other things he’d done with it, but after walking around the strange mass to try and gauge the approximate location of the soul crystal he was left to test it, expending his own power to dig through the substance before him and feeling just how much mana it took when compared against manipulating more regular substances.

But after far more work than he’d been expecting, he finally found it and used his magic to pull out the soul crystal, watching the substance close up around the hole he’d dug again the moment mana stopped being run through it.

Jackpot.

He felt a smile stretch across his face as he slipped it into his pocket and was about to turn his attention to guiding Thera into sealing away the alien matter in a way it wouldn’t escape, only to stop himself again.

Much in the same way he’d never get another chance to get his hands on an outsider’s soul, when would he again have an opportunity to get his hands on foreign matter that was somehow stable in a reality that seemed to want to reject its very nature? Sure, there’d be some danger in getting it but it was a temptation that was far too great to resist, even if he had no clue what he’d do with it, so once again exerting some of his power he compressed and shaped some of the stone around him into a strong container before using what he had left to rip away a fist’s worth of the strange material, feeling himself nearly bottom out on his mana as he did.

That didn’t matter to him though, he now had something new and fun to try and play with a bit, and with nothing else to do he helped guide Thera in her power, getting her to create something far sturdier than loose dirt to hold what remained of the thing they killed, lest they learn what long term effects its corpse might have on the world around them.

“So?”

“So?” Myriad asked back.

“Don’t play coy with me, man. You gave me a quest that you made up on the spot. What the hell gives? Getting quests is like, the main perk of having a connection to a god. One I’ve very politely haven’t been bothering you about since I’ve used up all of your pre-approved list without getting any more options. At least I’d thought, except here we are, with me only discovering at the end of the freaking world that you’ve been holding out on me! You can make up quests on the spot now! God, the betrayal hurts so much, am I the only one in the faith who hasn’t been getting the advantages of this? It cuts me deep man.”

Myriad sighed. “I’ll admit, I should have brought it up, I just knew you were going to react poorly. And for what it's worth, I haven’t offered anyone else anything beyond the standard achievement one since I’ve gained the strength to do this.”

“Okay, fine, so what give then? Afraid I’d finish too many too fast and leave you in poverty again?”

“Not exactly, though now that you mentioned it that’s a very good reason to avoid giving you more if I can avoid it. But no, the reason I haven’t been offering quests is because I can’t, and it really is largely your fault.”

“...Explain.”

Again his god sighed. “I have only just gained the ability to give quests more freely, but still not nearly as freely as other gods with more power. Someone like Anailia can grant quests she believes will challenge her believers, but as of right now, I’m different. I can only give quests I don’t believe can be succeeded by the ones I give them to.”

“Super cool to know you didn’t think I’d succeed with stopping the outsider.”

“It was a very reasonable assumption, and for that matter, you should be flattered. Ben, to be clear, I currently can’t give you quests because in general, I believe in you far too much. This current success has only reinforced that feeling.”

“Uh, explain to me a bit more?”

“Ben, I’ve known you for years now. I’ve seen you challenged many times and each time I’ve seen you come out on top. I’ve seen you change the world with your creations, improve and save the lives around you, discover secrets of the universe and escape an impossible trial. And now on top of all of that, I’ve seen you save the world. I simply have too much faith in you to possibly have quest options spring up left and right, and everything you achieve only makes it harder.”

“...Okay, if you were trying to flatter me then it worked,” Ben told him, even if the answer filled him with complicated emotions. It did feel good to hear Myriad thought so highly of him but the fact that it was keeping him from reaping some of the rewards he could otherwise get couldn’t help but leave a poor taste in his mouth. Still, it seemed there was nothing he could do about it so he instead did his best to accept it as he tried to move on. “In that case, we should have a talk later to try and figure out some appropriate quests for Sachel, Valaria, and some of the other members of your faith. There’s no reason they shouldn’t get the option to claim a few benefits no matter how impossible they seem. But moving on, now that we have that out of the way it’s okay to say it.”

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“I’m not going to say it,” Myriad groaned, knowing exactly what Ben was alluding to.

“Come on, do it, you know you want to.”

“I won’t, given what happened, your anger was justified. The fact that weapons you’ve made were turned against you is outrageous considering all you’ve done, especially after you just helped save the world, it’s just…”

“It’s just…”

“Fine, did you have to follow me to cause a scene?” His god lamented. “You know I’m on your side about this but there were definitely better ways it could have been handled.”

“Yelling at everyone did wonders for my mental health, after everything that’s happened to me today I deserved it. On that note, what’s the word? Are they going to meet my newest price or am I free to focus on my own devices?”

“Given that money’s going to be pretty meaningless if we lose, they all agreed without much of a fight. For the most part. There’s more than a few who don’t like letting you have your way so easily.”

“Welp, as we like to say in the church of Myriad, they can go fuck themselves.”

“We absolutely don’t like saying that in my church. So what are you going to do now then?”

“Hmm, well I did swear I was going to take them for all they were worth for dealing with this disaster but there’s nothing I actually immediately need,” He said, thinking to himself as he did. Ben deserved a reward for his work, he was never going to be willing to back down on that, but nothing immediately came to mind for what he wanted to take from the gods. Blessings were always nice but he was sure they’d fight tooth and nail against giving him anything nearly worthy of the success he had, but what else was there? Maybe he could get them to help him complete a couple jobs, but that was just a worse version of whatever blessings he could potentially get. Even if demanding more money for his mistreatment was his goto there wasn’t actually anything he could do with his already insane quantity of it, and while there were a couple skills he was interested in getting, they again didn’t seem to be equivalent to having saved the world as they knew it.

“We’ll put a pin on claiming my payment for now,” He ultimately decided. “Something will come up eventually, maybe if I ever find I’m really struggling with a level or two I need I’ll force them to help out then.”

“Okay, and as worrying as it is that you’ve got a debt to hold over the heads of all the gods in the world right now, that wasn’t what I was talking about. There’s a lot of worry up here about just what you’ll be doing to the church of Eneth after this.”

Ah, that.

“Hmm, I’ll tell you as long as you don’t pass it on. If anyone else asks then just pretend you don’t know.”

“Huuh, fine, but I can only promise that if you aren’t going to commit mass murder against Eneth’s priests or believers so if that’s the case then don’t tell me.”

“Jesus Myriad, what do you think of me?”

“I think you’re someone who isn’t afraid of showing a strong reaction any time someone tries to murder you and this has come from a repeat offender. I have no clue how far you're going to want to take it.”

“Okay, fair, but while I don’t like the church of Eneth I’m not going to consider everyone who gives him faith to be equally guilty. Let alone his normal believers, I’m not even going to do something as insane as exterminate his priests.”

“Fine, so what are you going to do then?”

At that, Ben smiled.

“Nothing.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“For now at least,” Ben clarified. “Think about it Myriad, they just lost their demigod, someone who had to give them some power on the international stage by virtue of his basic existence, and he died while trying to kill me. All the other assholes up here aren’t going to try and keep that a secret, are they?”

“There was some talk of it, but in the end no. Ather had a poor enough reputation to begin with and enough gods value justice that they won’t stand for pretending he died while helping to save the world when he was really just getting in the way of the one who’d actually handled that task. This is on a far bigger scale than what happened with Olensia’s oracle.”

“Okay, good to know there’s at least a few with some principles up there. Which reminds me, I saved the world. Why did I get outsider slayer and demigod slayer as titles and not something like hero or saviour or world saver or anything useful?”

“Not sure and get back to the main topic.”

“Fine. The point is, even if most don’t know who I am, plenty in that church are going to after everything I’ve done to them. So while they’re not only dealing with having their power weakened across the world’s stage at the same time as they’re dealing with their current bad press and their unfortunate lack of funds, they’re going to be justifiably panicked about how I’m going to react about their demigod trying to off me. I want them feeling that very panic for as long as possible, getting my revenge can wait after they’ve stewed a bit.”

“Fine, but then what?”

“Not super sure,” He shrugged as ideas flew across his mind. “Maybe I’ll disassemble and destroy their churches across the land, brick by brick. Maybe I’ll treat myself and murder Felth since he really has it coming anyway and it would cost Eneth his apostle. Maybe I’ll convert as many of his believers away from him as possible and let him deal with losing even more faith. Or maybe I’ll have to start really experimenting with the limits of king of sacrilege.”

Or maybe I’ll do all of the above.

While Ben was willing to say that most of Eneth’s believers were innocent of their god’s acts, he wasn’t willing to extend that same belief to the god in question. In the brief window he’d been connected to Ather before he’d taken his plunge, Ben had seen the brief conversation he’d had with his father. He had no doubt the god would deny it, but when Eneth had told him to act in a way becoming of the son of a war god, Ather’s mind had immediately flashed to murdering Ben. Gods would read minds without even trying, there was no way he didn’t know what was going to be attempted.

“Well, I guess that means I have a few months of peace before you cause some insane levels of interfaith havoc,” Myriad sighed, already envisioning a future where he’d have to defend Ben’s actions and at least having the recent events to fall back on to help justify it.

“It will be great, don’t worry. For now though, we have something else to talk about that you’re maybe going to want on the down-low, I’m not actually sure.”

“Oh empty skies, what now?”

“I got a new blessing.”

“Oh?” Myriad said, his curiosity piqued. “We all know what you did, it wouldn’t be the most shocking thing in the world if someone decided to reward your work… Who am I kidding, you wouldn’t worry about if it needed to be kept secret if it was as simple as that. Let me guess, somehow you got a blessing from the outsider, didn’t you?”

“No, and I’m not even sure if it’s really technically a blessing,” Ben explained. “It’s something I got when the outsider ripped a hole in reality and I was left staring through it. Witness of chaos. It may be in the blessing section of my status but even when I got it, the system just said I’d acquired it and didn’t say anything about it being a blessing like any of the rest I’ve gained. Ever heard of anything like that happening before?”

“Never,” Myriad said, collapsing to the ground below. “But then, no mortal has ever had the chance to stare into the chaos. Honestly Ben, you somehow keep managing to go through the most bizarre shit in the universe.”

“Ha, hey man, I’m a summoned soul from an alien reality. Every day here is some of the most bizarre shit in the universe to me.”

“Fair enough I suppose. So how are you feeling? Any side effects?”

“...Yes.”

Even as they spoke, Ben could feel the things scratching at his head. The depths of the infinite hells and the shifting form and physics of the outsider, and more than anything else, the chaos itself, all of it tainting his mind and leaving Myriad to sigh when he said as much.

“All things considered, you seem fine enough so I’m not immediately worried, but even if I was I don’t think there’s anything we could even do. All we can do is hope it fades and gets better with time.”

“Joy-oh-joy.”

The sarcasm was thick in his voice, but there really was nothing left to do but hope for the best, with Myriad at least trying to end on a positive note.

“At least that’s one emergency done with.”

“Not exactly. Naloth escape. Even if things went wrong, I’m pretty sure he walked away with a buttload of power.”

“Then that’s an emergency for a later day. For now, just try and relax the best you can. You’ve earned it.”

Out in the world, Yotu ran, feeling an alien heart pumping in his chest with each step and he hated every second of it.

He hated the running, with that same event being clear in his mind before he’d been trapped in the hells where his thoughts had been distorted for untold centuries or millennia, he couldn’t say.

More than that though, he hated the new situation he found himself in.

He’d entered the body of Naloth to get a proper grasp of the situation he’d found himself in after being freed to a new world and despite his natural wishes, he did his best to keep the body he was in alive through his properties as a death god.

It helped that the mortal he’d chosen seemed to have an unnatural life force, obviously thanks to the bizarre ritual he’d carried out, which had given him the time he’d needed to be sure that his incompatible nature wouldn’t lead to the man’s early death so he could get the information he needed, finding a world worse off than he ever could have guessed.

At first, it had thrilled him. A world at war against an impossible enemy, what could be better for a death god to enjoy? But the more he learned, the more he realized it wasn’t going to be some paradise planet for him to grow his strength on before venturing out into the vaster universe to find what had happened to his old homeworld and reclaim it for himself, after bringing an army of ghosts along for his conquest.

No, the invaders didn’t seem to only kill and conquer the local population, but whatever gods they had too. That was enough to tell him that he needed to leave the world in search of something better, to mimic a stray void god and harvest what fleeting souls he could.

It wouldn’t be too hard either. A cursory glance at his host’s memories told him that even after being tossed into hell, he’d likely held onto more of his faith and power than the numerous gods of that world who had to spend their stashes to save their people while at the same time splitting all that there was to go around amongst so many others. He wouldn't be able to take them all on, but so long as he could slip away with only a few noticing he was sure he could silence them if he needed to and escape in the end, maybe even bringing some stray souls with him.

But when he’d tried he was faced with the cruelest fate of all. He still wasn’t free.

In the ages that the body he’d been trapped in had sat in the hells, it had decayed and rotted away, releasing him from the flesh that had bound him for so long after the ascended god of his home had placed that curse on him. When he’d left the hells he’d thought that had been it too. He hadn’t given it a second thought when he slipped into the new flesh before him, only to discover that he was still just as bound. By inhabiting a new body he’d become just as trapped in it as he had in his past, with no way to escape.

While the death of his mortal body in a plan that held souls wasn’t a problem, he couldn’t simply kill the new one to escape, that would be a one-way ticket to his own demise.

No, for better or for worse he was stuck there for the time being, but that didn’t mean he always would be. He knew from the memories he was digging through that the next attack was coming. He’d happily watch from the sidelines and harvest the souls he could for power, the entire time working and planning on his escape to get the revenge he swore he’d claim.

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