The Legend of Randidly Ghosthound

Congratulations! You have earned Tier III Nexus citizenship! Adjusting parameters…

The dense workmanship of the Aether Engraving expanded into a three-dimensional shape around Randidly’s body. Small gears clicked against one another, shifting the shape to fit his body and the previous Aether infrastructure around him. Then it seemed to surge in new directions like it was being inflated or unfolded.

Each time it unfolded and stretched, it somehow seemed to become more complex; the fact that it had been condensed to such a tight form was bewildering. Randidly finally understood why the Nether King would be so interested in acquiring a citizenship coin fabricator.

If that mysterious device could churn out this sort of result, the machine itself must be a work of art.

The expansion settled. The shapes began to glow with purpose and intensity. With a whoosh, they sank into his body. Randidly’s skin tingled as the new extra layers to the Aether around him hummed to life.

He could feel them, the slivers of other worlds that suddenly lay around him. A sense of movement filled his body, as though he was riding an elevator while most of what he had experienced before remained static around him. He couldn’t see any visual differences immediately, but he sensed the expanded avenues around him.

Congratulations! You have become a Tier III Nexus citizen! Certain benefits have been applied. It will be slightly easier to earn Skill Level experience. Your Fatespieces have been enhanced by your new premium influence in the Nexus. You have been granted access to all special worlds associated with the Nexus. You may now utilize the Advanced Nexus Ways for transportation. By looking at an individual, you will be granted certain limited insights into their Class and Level.

In addition, the efficacy of your Attributes has greatly increased! A Stat point grants double as much raw attribute and regeneration! You have truly risen to become one of the elites!

Finally, you have been allotted a single idea with which to affect the growth of the Nexus! Ideas are vague things, related to your image and emotional force. Your journey to this point heavily influences the idea of you; your story becomes a rudder to guide existence. Seeds of you will be planted in all future Nexus Cohorts, shaping their development! You will receive a slight boost to utilizing your own abilities related to this idea. This boost will increase as more individuals follow the tenants of your story. Please insert your image into the provided Aether apparatus so the distribution of the idea through the Nexus can begin.

You now may peruse all previous words generated from other Tier III Nexus CItizens! However, to ensure anonymity, the identities of the original inspirations will be kept hidden.

Randidly read the notification several times. He rubbed his chin. At least this explains why so many of the monsters of the Nexus try and have massive family dynasties. It’s all to provide a broader base to boost themselves from. However… heh. Compared to having a series of worlds trapped inside of your body, having as many children as possible seems inefficient.

Still, how secret will my relationship to the word be when it’s fucking… Ghasthund?

But also, Randidly quickly wiped the small smirk from his mouth. He could feel a flower-shaped piece of Aether unfolding in front of him. It floated calmly in his Soulspace, with no enforcement apparatus to speak of. It was simply confident that he would provide his image in exchange for the boost in power he would receive for it. Or perhaps it was a show of respect, for reaching Tier III citizenship.

Because of his own rapid accomplishments and then the additional coins gathered by Edraine, earning Tier III citizenship had come to him rather quickly. But Randidly supposed that others might spend a much lengthier amount of time trying to do the same.

His attention went back to that delicate floating flower of Aether. He traced its operative framework, buzzing with tightly layered ingenuity. He needed to insert an image into it in order to create his ‘idea’. His lip curled at the thought, both of having some sort of imprint of his image that would spread and because he would be supporting the Nexus. However, the System had arranged this well. A portion of the benefits would flow back into the individual who created-

Randidly whipped his head around. His eyes widened as he suddenly realized there was a presence in the room he hadn’t noticed before. Those extra layers of existence buzzed against his skin. As Tier III Citizenship settled around him, a lot of moving Aether parts fell into place. He could feel his awareness being suddenly allowed to slide into the layered worlds.

But he hadn’t realized there would be a difference, even here. Hanging on the wall was a pixie, a small green-skinned humanoid with dragonfly wings and wide eyes. Its face was comically stretched, much oversized for its diminutive body. Its four limbs ended in fat fingerpads which allowed it to comfortably stick to the wall.

The thing appeared almost bored as it hung there and probably wouldn’t have noticed Randidly’s sudden fixation if it hadn’t began yawning and stretching. Its eyes, the size of dewdrops on a key-sized body, locked with Randidly’s. Those eyes wobbled. It realized that Randidly could now see it.

Honestly, if it had been paying attention and knew its protection relied on the fact it possessed citizenship we didn’t, it probably should have seen this was coming. Randidly wavered as he looked at this strange interloper. He wondered how long it had been here. How many secret conversations had he had in Edraine’s base that had been overheard?

Because several other details quickly became clear. First, the layered worlds of Tier III Nexus Citizenship allowed larger amounts of Nether to flow underneath the underpinnings of the System. Its suppression was much relaxed, probably relating to the attitude of the older figures in the Nexus. Second, this small bug was part of a large network of Nether; it was connected with what seemed to be millions of its kind through thin connections.

Looking at it with Nether Sensation was almost blinding; it had so many connections that it blanketed everything else in the area.

It opened its mouth. “Ah, Mr. Ghosthound-”

Before he even knew what he was doing, Randidly bolted across the room and slapped the bug against the wall with the palm of Sulfur’s hand. He worked his jaw as he pulled his hand away and looked at his gunk-covered palm. All those gossamer Nether connections snapped. Randidly licked his lips. His senses detected other movements. Suddenly, some of those distant kin of the swatted bug began to skitter and scuttle closer.

“Hum.” Randidly grimaced down at his hand. He took a deep breath to calm himself. “That might have been… hasty.”

“What happened?” Edraine frowned over at him. Raymund had settled down into a crouch at the sudden movement, preparing to strike at any foes that came. Randidly opened his mouth to explain, but felt that more weird sprites were surging closer to their position. Now wasn’t the time to explain.

Clicking his tongue and cursing himself for reacting so suddenly with wild emotions, Randidly pulled out his Alchemist’s Passport. The geometric shapes hanging from the end of the instrument jangled in a particular harmony as he dragged the key through the air. His breath caught in his chest as his mind scrambled to cope with the expanded area; he had operated his Fatepiece within the Alpha Cosmos, but this was an entirely more heady experience. He felt like distance meant nothing to him, like the whole of creation was laid out in front of him. All he needed to do was press a pin down anywhere and he would be there. The sheer size of the Nexus was intoxicating-

Randidly brought his racing mind back under control. Although he definitely had much more room to play with, he might also stumble across a powerful individual he didn’t want to encounter right now. Especially now that Tier III citizenship revealed so much was lurking just beneath the surface, hidden from view.

His Fatepiece wrapped around all of the members of the Vulpis Squad in the neighborhood, his distinctive image meaning they all acquiesced immediately and Randidly didn’t need to force the issue. The Key hummed. Then they all escaped, slipping through space to a distant location.

I think I’ll be okay without the Advanced Nexus Ways.

In the next moment, the group of a dozen individuals arrived at a very familiar space: The orange-stone asteroid that functioned as the Fifth Cohort Staging area. Most of the ground was riddled with cracks, from when Velio Dunn had attacked Randidly in the past. But at the very least, it was a place that Randidly knew would probably be desolate enough not to notice their presence for a bit of time.

Still, the shift in location hadn’t accomplished exactly what Randidly had wanted.

“Please, Mr. Ghosthound, we can handle this civilly,” An officious caterpillar with bulging doe eyes drew itself up to its full, stocky height and announced. It had taken a few minutes to arrive, but Randidly had used that time to follow those threads of Nether and realize most of the space he could sense was blanketed with these things. With a resigned expression on his face, he had waited for it to arrive.

At the same time, Edraine looked around them without the ability to see these strange bugs. “What is it, Randidly? Was there something wrong with the base?”

“You may call us Biamat.” The caterpillar gave Edraine a scathing look before continuing. “Obviously, as a freshly minted Tier III Citizenship, and one who appears to have risen on your own merits, you were unaware of some unwritten rules associated with this high honor. That is fine, we do not resent the loss of a single host.”

“Just… it looks like Tier III Citizenship is a bit more complicated than I expected,” Randidly said to no one in particular. The rushing of emotions began to calm. However, that had the added negative effect of revealing the tremor in Randidly’s Nether Core, now rocking between two Authorities. Still, clarity was better than hasty responses right now. As though he had been speaking directly to them, both the caterpillar and Edraine nodded.

But Randidly’s eyes were locked on the sky. Originally, the Fifth Cohort Rally Station had been part of a ring of asteroids that was arranged around the Nexus proper. The stars above the Rally Station were filled with blooming orange and yellow nebulas that glittered with radiation and cosmic dust. In the distance, you could just barely make out the shape of the Nexus, through the clustered teleportation arrays in formation around it.

Tier III Citizenship added a new backdrop to the already sprawling cosmic arrangement. The Nexus had become clearly visible; thick metal ropes stretched down and wrapped themselves around it, seeming to affix it aloft above the hungry maw of the Shaft. And floating above the top of what Randidly had originally been able to see of the Nexus were a series of progressively widening rings. Each layer spun in alternate directions and had slanted wings jutting off from them.

Up and up it stretched, widening and widening.

The combined display was one of a massive drill, aimed directly toward the central Nexus waiting below. Exhaust portions on those rings threw out glitter hissing plumes of silver gas. There was a glowing orb of light that Randidly could just make out within the upper rings, but with how closely they were to each other and how distant this massive construction was from him, it was difficult to make out exactly what produced that light.

“Having an ally in us would be extremely useful for you, Mr. Ghosthound,” Biamat said. Then it settled itself down and rolled over onto its back, exposing its bulging stomach. “And I must say, I am quite interested to see what you will add to the Nexus. Ghasthund is certainly an ominous-sounding expression. We await its meaning with excitement.”

Randidly’s gaze turned sharp. “You… can see my word? But I haven’t defined it yet.”

The caterpillar shrugged. “Well, for those of us who have made it to this height, we check the Tier III citizenship logs rather frequently. I think most of us will have discovered you by now. Your word is close enough to your name, and your name has been passed between a lot of mouths, after you defended the Don’s daughter, so most will know it to be you. And there might not be a definition yet, but we still see the word.”

Edraine and Raymund looked around in alarm as he spoke to air, but Randidly gestured for them to calm down. Instead, he addressed the caterpillar again. “You claim you can help? Provide information? What will you want in exchange?”

The caterpillar smiled, its glassy eyes seeming about to drip tears. “We have many wishes you could possibly fulfill. But perhaps the easiest for you… we would like you to help us form our own Nether Core. Give our collective permanence.”

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