Arthur had always wondered what Nether would look like in action once he finally had enough of the stuff to use it. Now he finally had an answer. It was like a virus spread out of Shylo, only he was infecting reality itself. Haadran was a fallen planet, but it still worked on principles of ether.

  Now, however, the Avatar of Corruption had become a blight on the world, his very presence breaking down the substance that held everything together. Arthur wasn’t sure how else to describe it. The world became less real, abstract, taking on a dream-like quality, the barriers between fiction and possibility fraying.

  Arthur’s domain rapidly weakened before spluttering and fizzling out. It operated on ether, and ether didn’t exist anymore, not in Shylo’s domain. No, that wasn’t quite right. The magic his body produced was still there, only it lacked the structured robustness ether normally possessed. So far as Arthur could tell, it seemed that Nether had broken down the code that told magic what it was supposed to do.

  With Nether, there was no such thing as affinities, no skills to speak of, only the power of ether, with none of the constraints. Nether seems like it would be more fundamental to our reality than ether, more necessary for true creation to take place, only it seems too chaotic to ever produce anything resembling life.

  The real question, however, was what came first. Ether or Nether. Arthur was slowly starting to think the opposing energies were two sides of the same coin. That was all the time he had for speculation before Shylo came after him. The formerly pale elf now had veins of purple-black marring his skin, visibly bulging with the amount of Nether he was pumping through his system.

  So Nether works better directly with biology than ether, Arthur idly noted as he jumped backwards. Yes, healing was great and all, but ether never manifested like blood when it flowed through you. Arthur’s agility was absurd, but whatever Shylo had done had allowed him to bridge the gap. Not entirely, but enough that Arthur couldn’t just run circles around him.

  Every skill Arthur attempted to use worked for the briefest of instances before warping into something beyond his control. Shadow was tainted and started to devour light, water simultaneously burned and froze, before becoming shards of obsidian that fell to the ground, inert for a moment before sprouting into flowers of glass. Arthur wasn’t stupid enough to attempt healing. Who knew what would happen? The world had truly gone crazy, where nothing made sense anymore.

  The only magic not affected by the madness was his soul gauntlet, which he chalked up to the fact that it was literally created from the same substance as his soul, only with a physical presence. It would take significantly more Nether to get past his durability. Shylo seemed determined to make this a physical contest, and Arthur would give the fool what he wanted.

  Even missing his dominant hand, Arthur was a force to be reckoned with, something the corrupted Avatar found out very quickly. Every exchange left Shylo with a fresh bruise or a broken bone. The only problem was that nothing Arthur did stuck; Shylo healing from the worst of injuries in a fraction of a second, the planet itself fuelling him. He also made sure to avoid his soul gauntlet, only getting caught by it once on the shoulder.

  Arthur, meanwhile, was collecting an assortment of injuries. All of them were only skin deep, but they hurt far more than they should have. With his soulbound cauldron, he wasn’t at risk of death by a thousand cuts, but he might just lose the fight anyway. It was time to end things, and fast. A drawn-out battle wasn't his friend, for once. Shylo appeared before him again, a lance of Nether forming around his hand. Arthur spat his dislodged tooth straight into the bastard's eye.

  The elf cursed, stumbling backwards, but Arthur understood the memo now. He grabbed Shylo’s hand, ignoring the caustic Nether that burned his palm. The corrupted Avatar teleported to safety, only Arthur was along for the ride this time. Shylo’s remaining eye widened in surprise, only to be crushed by his gauntlet. That wouldn’t be healing anytime soon. Arthur opened his mouth again, only this time it wasn’t to use his teeth as artillery. Green flames erupted from his maw, engulfing Shylo’s skull until fifty thousand points of energy had been used from his charged skeleton. All the while, Arthur was digging his spiked gauntlet as deep into Shylo’s chest as he could.

  The Avatar’s revenge came swiftly, a beam of concentrated Nether blasting into Arthur's closing mouth and piercing straight through the back of his neck. His head lolled forward; the only thing keeping it attached to his body was his reinforced spine. His mouth was a right mess, shattered teeth and a disgusting mass of pulped flesh where his tongue used to be.

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  Shylo didn’t miss the opportunity. He punched forward, a spike of Nether forming around his fist, aimed at his brain. Arthur stepped into the blow, angling his flopping head so that the punch travelled straight into his gaping mouth and through the hole at the back of his neck, right alongside his spine.

  For the first time since his initial attack, Arthur allowed the healing of his green flames to run through him. This wasn't ether, so he wasn't worried about things going awry. His body regenerated in an instant, at least it should have. The only problem was that he had an elf’s entire arm running through the lower half of his skull. If he could have grinned, Arthur would have. As things were, his muscles and teeth healed around the foreign limb, trapping it in place.

  His gauntleted fist, meanwhile, had pierced quite far into Shylo’s chest, deep enough that he managed to get a good grip on one of the monster's ribs. The corrupted Avatar wouldn’t be going anywhere any time soon.

  Now! Arthur commanded.

  Five of Wovan’s bodies, who'd been free-falling for the past twenty seconds above the battlefield, descended through the portals that had been placed perfectly in their paths, two of their exit points positioned in line with Shylo’s legs and two at his back.

  The corrupted Avatar's legs exploded off his body, leaving him a limbless torso that Arthur held aloft. That was when Wovan hit his back, propelling him at Mach five towards Arthur. Physics was beautiful, digging Arthur’s fist deeper into Shylo.

  Arthur truly loved it when a plan came together perfectly. The precise positioning of Wovan’s meteor strikes, the way he’d angled his fist upwards. Momentum, precision and magic translated to a beautifully gory result. Arthur’s fist, augmented by his soul, tore through Shylo’s lungs and a quarter of his heart. That wasn’t what he was aiming for, though. Wovan’s final meteor strike hit the top of Shylo’s head, pushing him down and Arthur’s gauntlet straight into the Avatar's brain.

  At higher levels, people could operate without hearts for extended periods. Add Nether into the mix, and the debilitating blow would have probably done nothing to Shylo. The brain, however, was a different story, and Arthur had just irrevocably destroyed Shylo’s with True soul damage.

  All of this had transpired in less time than it took a human to blink, the merest fraction of a second, but Arthur didn’t allow himself to relax. He poured ether into his gauntlet, allowing spikes to grow around his forearm and into Shylo’s chest. This time, the elf's heart was destroyed entirely, along with every organ in his body.

  Wovan, meanwhile, descended and began to feast on Shylo’s flesh, all 35 of her bodies that remained. She made short work of him, every bite of flesh she took spacially enhanced to devour more. Eleven seconds later, the spiders that had crawled into Arthur's mangled throat were done, and not a speck of the corrupted Avatar remained.

  Only then did Arthur feel the torrent of energy that told him he’d killed his foe, so much that it dwarfed the fire dragon's core he’d consumed a hundred times over.

  Arthur grinned. He’d done it. He’d done the impossible, killed the Avatar of a tier 2 corrupted world. The Etherious node that he’d long since forgotten about glowed brightly, hovering up and away from its concealed place on his inner thigh.

  When it rained, it poured. Two impossible tasks for the price of one. One of Wovan’s bodies crawled over to him and disgorged a small marble onto the floor. Shylo’s core. His Soul Splinter clearly wanted it for herself, but Arthur needed it more. The ambient Nether in the air was displaced, and for once, Arthur wasn’t surprised by Vira’s sudden appearance.

  The ancient healer stared at him in wonder, looking like a young girl all over again. “When I agreed to go after Shylo, I thought we’d all be dead within the hour. Who knew the reverse would be true?”

  Arthur smiled. “I always aim to please.”

  Vira’s expression hardened with determination. “What do you need? You said you were on a timer, right? What can we do to help? I’ll be damned if I let some short sighted bastards kill you.”

  Arthur sighed. There it was, the buzzkill. Sixteen hours hanging over his neck like the sword of Damocles. It was time to attempt the impossible once more. Good things came in threes, right?

  Arthur would take the sword of Damocles and turn it on those who wished him dead.

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  Etherious: Originator

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