The Oracle Paths

As soon as Jake stepped inside the Corrupted Temple, an austere dimness overwhelmed his senses. The sound itself seemed to have dulled, and he could barely hear his own breathing. He focused his psychic power into his Myrtharian Eyes and the light returned.

The interior of this temple reminded him of those old Gothic churches and cathedrals, except that the notion of sobriety was altogether absent. There were rows of pews for the faithful, a dais and an organ at the back, but instead of being built of basic materials like wood, everything was made of gold, platinum and precious stones.

Colorful stained glass windows depicting angels performing all sorts of divine actions served as towering wall decorations, but instead of saving people or performing miracles, these folks were their food. In one, a 12-winged angel solved a people's drought by bleeding out the entire population to irrigate their land. On another, a father praying to heal his deformed child saw his wife, himself and all the humans in his village become as deformed as his own son. On a third, the problem of famine was solved by slaughtering half a village to feed the other half.

All the pure wishes that were originally formulated ended up being distorted, corrupted. Each time, the angel who had answered their prayers took its due by devouring something. Most often the one who made the wish.

"Ugh, that's...fucking sick." Jake's face scrunched up in disgust at the depraved and unnatural theatrics. "But where are Ruby and the other Digestor Trojans?"

He attempted an Oracle Scan, but was taken aback when the emitted spirit signal ricocheted against the marble floor. There was some material or spell under the temple that could interfere with his bracelet.

"As expected from a Corrupted Species worshipping Digestors. But as a result, I know where to look."

Jake was not yet the ultimate warrior and had quite a few shortcomings, but his destructive ability was not one of those. Having to stop the ritual anyway, he summoned a Grade 6 Aether Core again and activated all of his boosting skills and kicked the ground beneath his feet with all his might.

Double Bloodline Ignition, Myrtharian Warrior Trance, Gold Stone Skin, Gravity Domain, Telekinesis, Strength Aether, Aether Conversion...

Gravity was multiplied by 110 thanks to the Gravity Domain of his armor and Jake launched himself into the air, his feet sinking deep into the ceiling and creating deep cracks in the temple's vault. He bent his legs and tightened his muscles, then hurled himself in the opposite direction back toward the ground. A jet of plasma blasted out from behind his elbow, which combined with his telekinesis accelerated his arm to inhuman heights. His fist stretched out like a spring and smashed into the ground.

The floor of the temple caved in instantly, a downward shockwave pulverizing everything underneath the temple for several hundred meters. After that first punch, Jake didn't stop there. He leapt up and did it all over again.

Hundreds of times per second.

BANG, BANG, BANG!

At first he was a bit rough, but soon he got the hang of it and started to use the ceiling with his Earth Manipulation as a trampoline to assist his movements. The might of his offensive stepped up another notch and a massive earthquake quickly rippled through Cradel, generating deep rifts that rent the earth in two as far as his eyesight could see.

After having leveled the temple to a depth of 6 or 7km, Jake's eyes flickered with anticipation as he finally detected several presences below him with his mental sense. He raised his fist one last time and...

CLANG!

His fist, which currently resembled a disproportionately large boxing glove covered in black diamonds, collided with an incredibly solid light surface. It was the rare ore from the asteroid that he had consumed in its entirety the day before.

On impact a counter force entered his body with such violence that it dislocated his shoulder. With an aggrieved frown he put his joint back in place and tried to scan the energy dome beneath him.

His Aether Sun Cores were outside the temple, which was still standing after the earthquake he had caused, but that didn't matter. Activating them remotely, he aimed the laser resulting from their convergence at the dome of light just below him.

There were kilometers of earth and rock between them, but it took less than 5 seconds for the light beam to vaporize everything in its path and strike the dome. A ripple was born on the dome's surface, which then turned into a multitude of wavelets.

Jake was optimistic at first, but soon the light from the dome grew brighter and he realized that he had been wrong about this shield. This structure was feeding on radiation and heat with an efficiency close to 100%.

He thought he had failed at first, but after a few seconds the light from the dome became so blinding that he was forced to avert his gaze. The temperature skyrocketed and he understood that unless this dome was some sort of Aether Artifact Air Conditioner of Bronze quality or higher, whatever was inside would soon cook alive like a lobster in a pot of boiling water.

That was a terrible example. It would be more like throwing a lobster directly into the core of the sun. A transition from solid state to plasma in a flash.

Alas, expectations and reality often diverge greatly. Instead of heating up indefinitely, the golden light dome abruptly darkened, turning black.

The pure white laser that had been crashing into the energy shield turned black as if liquid ink had been injected into it, and the beam of light began to decay as the destructive dark energy traveled up the laser's path to its source.

"Fuck me..." Jake curse as he threw a huge boulder of black diamond several feet in diameter that sliced the laser in half and refracted the black and white beam in different directions before vaporizing.

At the same time, he switched off his Aether Sun Cores and the destructive energy corrupting his laser was deprived of its target, having to make do with the air. Very quickly the black light of the dome regained its warm golden hue as if nothing had happened, but in the meantime several angels had managed to break out and then strike at him.

Three black lasers coming from three different directions converged on him simultaneously, aiming at his heart and brain, and Jake, unable to protect himself effectively against such energy, responded in the only appropriate way, namely by teleporting directly behind one of his enemies with a grabbing motion.

As he reappeared, the angel in front of him immediately deformed under the pressure of his grip, then when his True Will's flame flared in his pupils the Schwazen imploded, before being vacuumed into a Spatial Rift. He didn't even get a chance to count how many wings this angel had.

At the same time, the two black lasers of the two remaining attackers targeted him again, but Jake ducked behind the Spatial Rift's shade to fend off the danger. The two destructive lasers capable of shredding even air, light and Aether vanished inside without a trace.

Upon seeing this, Jake felt enlightened and realized that his True Will of Gripping could also be used to defend himself. However, after this second use of the day, he felt his mental fatigue catch up with him, a sense of emptiness and apathy pervading him unknowingly.

He was familiar with these symptoms after training his True Will hard for the past six weeks and forced himself to ignore them. Concealed by his Spatial Rift, he teleported behind another Schwazen before it closed and pulled his ultimate grip again. A second Spatial Rift tore through the air, sucking the remains of another imploded angel into it.

He tried to fool the last attacker in the same way, but the opponent realized that letting Jake grab the void in front of him was a lethal mistake, and fearlessly threw itself into the fray, slamming its falchion wrapped in black and gold light into its opponent's half-closed fist suspended in midair.

Jake had no choice but to dodge, but this time had time to observe and count the wings of his enemy clearly. A Power.

Compared to the Virtue he had killed, this angel was ridiculously fast, his swordplay so advanced that every movement was like a dance of blades slicing through the air and space around him. His body was enveloped in runes and multiple halos of light emitting distinct auras and Jake understood that this one had taken advantage of his two companions' sacrifice to receive some divine buffs.

But even with such agility and technique it didn't matter. Jake's physical advantage was overwhelming. The only danger was the True Will of Destruction coating the angel's blade, but he had found a parry.

They exchanged several thousand blows over the course of a few seconds where Jake mostly dodged, then all of a sudden he pretended to reveal a gap in his guard. The Power thrusted at his heart and instead of dodging like the last few times he deflected the blade with a heavy palm strike.

The angel's outstretched arm was flung to the side and the Schwazen lost its balance, finding itself swept away by the inertia of the counter. Jake took a step forward, teleporting a meter to grab the Power's head with his free hand. He squeezed without activating his True Will and the angel's head imploded. He then froze the corpse and its soul without giving it a chance to regenerate and with a telekinetic burst of pressure crushed the whole thing into fine ice dust before setting it on fire again with a gigantic flash of lightning.

The dome guardians had been taken out.

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