Fate Alchemist - A Regression Academy LitRPG

"It was a safe bargain, father!" Umoch said. "It was! How was I supposed to—"

Before Umoch could finish, a blazing pain erupted across the side of his face. He'd been kneeling, but the impact twisted his head and sent him sprawling to the side. That was the second time in a matter of months that someone had mashed his face into the ground. At least this time, it was polished marble, not the rough, ancient stone of an Oronith's shoulder.

Snivelling, he pushed himself up, then wiped his hand under his nose. Blood smeared across his finger.

"You shouldn't have made the Field Pact in the first place," his father sneered. "I considered contacting Langold, but…you deserve what you've gotten."

"I—"

"There's a reason you didn't make it to the Centralis Academy, while your brother and sister did."

"You never stopped hounding me about that, father." Umoch groaned, then turned back to face him. He was a tall man, looming in front of a wall of braziers. It turned him into a silhouette. Only his rank badge glimmered, a shade of bronze-gold that made the air around it ripple. Umoch's eyes hurt when he looked at it for too long.

Orichalcum.

"I'm cutting you loose. You have failed us, disgraced my family, and made me look like a fool. The Confederacy is investigating all our warehouses, now, you know this? Because of you. Looking for signs of 'demonic tampering' and 'assisting the horde'. Because of you."

Umoch swallowed. "Father, he stole a—"

"You're lucky you're not swinging from the gallows." His father flicked his hand. "Leave. And don't show your face here again."

Umoch didn't need to be told twice. Not by his father. He scrambled to his feet, then sprinted out the hall. The guards, ceremonial non-Ascendants, stepped aside to let Umoch pass.

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

Once outside, Umoch turned and pressed his back to the wall outside. He heaved a deep breath, trying to slow his pounding heart, but he couldn't.

He'd screwed up. There was no two ways about it. And he deserved all this, he knew. He shouldn't be crying, or even begging his dad for anything. But he just didn't know where to go next.

It was over.

His mind replayed his last fight with Wulf so many times. He'd seen the potions, the scissors made of weird stone, the faint glow between the gaps in the golem's panels. It wasn't anything he'd seen before. Certainly not a Pilot.

He'd fought something far beyond his comprehension. It defeated him, after only a brief hesitation, and…after all he'd done, spared him? By all rights, it should have killed him.

It was an Alchemist. But not just any Alchemist. Most were low-tier, scrounging through the mud, desperate for any payment whatsoever. It was the worst of any crafting Class.

Or it was supposed to be. But everything changed after Umoch witnessed its power.

He'd stood before a Great Alchemist, a successor to Panne, and survived. This being could alter the world as it saw fit, it could change substances, transmute deposits of arcane resources the likes of which the world had never seen before.

In the texts Umoch had read, had been forced to read as part of his tutored youth, the first-hand accounts of Panne had seemed ridiculous. Such power, so contained within a fleshy cage, but vast and boundless nonetheless. They said he could pluck the Cords. The very Field had trembled around Panne, unable to comprehend his existence, like something else had been placed in his body. They said he was a messiah of a greater power. It was ridiculous.

But Umoch understood now.

This alter reality to its liking…it wasn't just a messiah.

Umoch shut his eyes and bowed his head. Suddenly, all his trifles felt meaningless. He'd seen unfathomable, infinite potential, and there was no recovering from that. He'd erred. His early steps, his ascension, had been meaningless. He didn't want the same things as before, so how could the Field grant him an aspect of darkness, or even the Class and Skills of a Mage? He wasn't striving toward the same things as he did when he advanced his first few tiers, when he awakened his abilities.

He'd have to remake himself. He'd been one of the few people to exist in the presence of a greater being, if only for a few seconds.

There was a new Great Alchemist.

A god-in-the-making walked among them.