The next few hours were bad. There wasn’t any other way to put it. Noah had been through a fair bit of pain in his life. He was, unfortunately, rather used to soul damage at this point. But being able to do nothing but sit in bed, unable to even push himself over to the door, was more than just infuriating.

He’d never managed to figure out if Somnus had actually met Moxie or not. The Apostle had layered so many dreams over each other that it had been impossible to tell which one was reality.

Noah might have tried to stagger out, his head melting away or not, had he not spotted a note near his gourd. He’d barely even been able to read what it had said. The world had decided that now was a great time to start swimming around before him — but he’d just managed to catch Moxie’s name at the bottom.

She was okay.

That was all that mattered.

It was also just about all his brain would let him process at the moment. He’d flopped back into bed and buried his face in the pillow, letting the minutes tick by as he waited for his magic to return to him.

Every single second took its damned time. Noah could have sworn he’d somehow managed to get his hands on a rebellious Time Rune that was slowing the passage of the day down so he could feel every second of it.

He’d never felt eleven hours take longer in his entire life.

But as time always tended to do, it passed.

The fog drifting through his mind lifted and freed his thoughts from its sticky grasp. A part of Noah almost would have preferred it to stick around. The pain assaulting his mind nearly tripled the instant he could think clearly — if he could even claim that his current thoughts were truly clear — again.

Noah plunged into his mindspace instantly. He wasn’t going to waste a second longer to call on the Fragment of Renewal. Really, he should have done it back in the Spilling Grounds. The damage to his soul had gotten far too significant… and that had been before he’d killed himself again.

But all that was already done. All he could do now was do his best to fix the damage before it could spread any farther — and before he made it any worse by screwing around with the new runes he’d liberated from the Apostles.

Noah didn’t even wait for his mindspace to finish forming around him before he called on the Fragment of Renewal like a starved man grasping for a burger. Even as white light coming from the ragged cracks covering his soul spilled across his features, Noah sent the pearlescent river of Renewal’s magic washing across his mind.

A relieved breath caught in his throat. Relief swirled through him as the powerful Master Rune wound into the serious damage that had been carved into his very being. Noah didn’t even open his eyes. He just sat there, letting the savage pain burning through him slowly recede.

It was several seconds before Noah let his eyes finally open. The scene before him wasn’t pretty. Large cracks still riddled his soul. They arced through the sky above and ran beneath his feet, letting harsh white light spill into the darkness.

The Fragment of Renewal was still hard at work. Its power wove through his being, desperately working to pull everything back together. If things were this bad now… Noah didn’t want to think about how destroyed his soul had been just a short while ago.

It’s a miracle I wasn’t having visions already. I swear my soul damage today should have been worse than what it was back from fighting the Hellreaver. Maybe the Visions came because the Hellreaver was actively attacking my mind? Or has my overall soul just gotten more powerful so it can take more damage without fully breaking down?

It wasn’t a theory Noah wanted to test. He was more than content with the damage he’d already done to himself. Just because he enjoyed employing death as a tool didn’t mean he actually liked dying.

He blew out a slow breath and steadied himself. The damage was still bad, but it was becoming manageable. Even the Fragment of Renewal wasn’t going to be able to knit him up in one go with the amount of work it had before it. The Master Rune would need a second usage to finish the repairs.

Fortunately, he’d gotten fixed up enough to start thinking clearly again.

A slap echoed through Noah’s mindspace as he drove the palm of his hand against his forehead.

“Holy shit. I used Sunder. Right in front of all the Apostles,” Noah muttered. He pinched the bridge of his nose. “What was I thinking? Even if they didn’t see what I did, they could have felt Decras’ power. And if they did… they’ll know I’m the person they were looking for. Damn it. That was stupid. The damn headache I’ve been ignoring somehow made me completely miss that.”

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He let out a groan. The only saving grace was that Somnus hadn’t popped right back up at his door. It had been nearly half a day since his little heist. If the Apostles had figured out what he’d been up to, they hadn’t come after him for it.

Which means either Garina is covering for me or they’re even denser than they looked. Either way, I don’t think I can do much about the situation now. No point wasting time beating myself up over what can’t be changed. Might as well take a look at the goodies I stole.

A grin pulled at the corners of Noah’s lips. His displeasure evaporated as he turned to finally take a look at the results of his little heist. Four new Rank 5 runes floated within his soul, all of them completely full — and all of them perfect.

Noah quickly drew on each of them one after the other. His smile grew only wider. Even though he didn’t understand exactly what the runes were capable of, there was no doubt about it. They were more than perfect. He had 4 new Flawless Runes.

Concentrated Singularity

Astral Ruin

Bleeding Night

Creeping Death

Noah’s eyes went wide. These were no random trash runes. He didn’t have the faintest idea as to what the hell the Rank 6 he’d destroyed had once been called, but there was no doubt in his mind that it had been strong.

He let out a delighted laugh. Now that he thought about it, this made sense. The Apostles weren’t going to be messing around with weak concepts. None of their disciples would have fought very hard for just another run of the mill rune.

My bad, guys. Hope the final thing wasn’t too hard to find.

Something told him that it had been. Noah hadn’t even considered some of the concepts in the runes before him. He wasn’t sure where one would have even started comprehending them.

Astral magic? Singularities? Was this thing some kind of Collapsing Universe rune? No. That’s way too powerful, even for a Rank 6. Perhaps some fragment of that. Still… all of these are Flawless.

I suppose that completely confirms that I’ve only discovered what the rest of the world already knows. Flawless runes aren’t going to be as much of an unbelievable advantage once we leave Arbalest.

But even if that was the case… these runes were good. Really good. Their concepts weren’t exactly disasters, but they were getting pretty close to them. That was the thing with runes. Intent was more than half the battle.

If I can find a way to associate some of these with some immense manner of destruction, then I can mentally classify these things as disasters when I remake them. It’s not about if anyone else thinks they’re disasters. It’s about if I can picture it and shape it. That’s all that matters, and it’s why two runes, even of the same type, are rarely the same.

Noah rubbed his hands together. He didn’t want to just start chopping these apart mindlessly. They were far too valuable… and a few of them didn’t seem all that suited to him at the moment.

Creeping Death sounded badass. There was no denying that. But, as sound as the rune seemed, Noah didn’t have anything directly related to death within his kit. Moxie, however, was a completely different story.

This Rune suits her much better than it does me. I’m sure I could use it, but I think she could put it to considerably better use.

Bleeding Night is in a similar boat. I don’t know what the hell it’s meant for. I could probably use it, but it might be better to hand that off to someone else. Maybe Lee could put it to use? Depends what it’s capable of. But I’ll set the two of those aside for now.

Noah turned his attention fully to the other two runes he’d gotten.

Concentrated Singularity and Astral Ruin.

The names were nothing if not bold. Astral Ruin already practically sounded like a disaster. Concentrated Singularity wasn’t quite there, though. It seemed a bit more focused. Still, the name strongly implied it would have space or matter-related components within it.

So that means I can fiddle with Concentrated Singularity and try to make it fit me a bit better. As for Astral Ruin… honestly, I think I might have actually just gotten lucky. This fits me as it is. I don’t think I need to change anything. What a lucky strike. I can’t wait to see what it’s capable of…

But I’m not done here yet.

I’ve had Unstable Pandemonium sitting around for quite a while. I think I’ve gotten a pretty good understanding of how it works and where its flaws are. There’s no reason to leave it sitting around in its current state forever. I need to keep advancing.

Noah was pretty sure he didn’t actually have to swap out any of the components in Unstable Pandemonium. He just had to adjust his angle of approach now that he had a better understanding of how Chaos magic worked.

He extended his hands toward the rune. It floated over to him, the red magic twisting within its complex body crackling in anticipation. Noah laid his hand upon its angry surface. Power arced across his fingertips and stung his palm.

He drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. Then his other hand raised to the sky. Sunder descended, familiar power driving down on his shoulders with a roar. His finger brushed across the massive Master Rune’s surface; his veins turned jet black as power flooded into him.

This might hurt a bit, but my soul has taken way more soul damage than this before. I can survive living with it for a little while. I don’t want to wait another day when I’m going to be screwing with the Inquisitors soon.

And then, with a single thought, Noah shattered Unstable Pandemonium.

It was time to remake his Keystone rune.

And this time, he was going to make sure it came out Flawless.