Fate Weaver’s Legacy

The fusing spree had borne a lot of fruit.

First, I’d tried fusing the wallet into my backpack, which gave the backpack an extra pocket where money could go. It wasn’t anything groundbreaking, but I didn’t have anything better to fuse with the backpack, so I let it go. Some people in chat also suggested that maybe it also increased the backpack’s capacity, but I just couldn’t tell yet.

Then I’d fused a couple of war shark feathers into a thick stick and created a new weapon for myself, a spiked – or rather, a razorful? – mace. I couldn’t imagine it would be better than my key sword, but it was nice to have more options just in case. And despite my naginata being inconvenient, I still preferred heavier weapons.

Lastly, I tried combining my egg’s shell and all its shards with the frying pan I’d gotten in the dungeon. It… felt a little wrong to do – like using my own umbilical cord as a crafting ingredient – but the result was well worth it. The frying pan gained this glittery quality to it along with an [INNATE] skill: Fry & Scorch. It allowed me to channel Ether into the pan to create heat. Enough to either fry food on it, or just straight up spew fire out of it.

Which sounded useless since I had fire skills already, but the real kicker was that it was perfectly usable even when I didn’t have my fire skills equipped. That meant that I could finally just stick with my human skills and might never have to switch back to the phoenix ones unless it was some kind of emergency.

UglyRestart: give it a name

“The pan…?” I raised an eyebrow.

UglyRestart: Nana’s inferno pan
Irid123: wasn’t there a way to name your stuff officially?

“Oh, wait, yeah! There was! Where was it… Ultimate Fusion, right. So how do I…”

I prodded the skill while holding the pan and I soon got a new system window.

What would you like to name your item?
Note: This cannot be undone. Once named, an item cannot then be unfused, but gains the ability to absorb Ether, Intra, or Tempor, to empower itself.
WARNING: One or more of the fusion components is an incausal rift key, but the fused item is not.

I blinked in shock.

“Wait, what? It had that kind of function?! Nobody told me about that! And what’s up with that warning?!”

Jeofffff: oh shiiiit infinite upgrades
Irid123: oh that doesn’t sound good
Irid123: probably shouldn’t do that then

I shot Appraisal at the pan with a frown.

Demonium Frying pan + Phoenix egg (fused)
A fusion of two items.
[INNATE] skill: Fry & Scorch - Channel any amount of Ether to heat up this item or conjure fire.

“Right… So, the phoenix egg itself had this thing about being a key, but this thing doesn’t even though it’s made out of the egg…” I still didn’t know what any of that meant, but I should probably keep a rift key on hand for whenever I actually got to that point. “Yeah, I guess we’ll do without naming it… Although! What about my clothes? I should totally name them something just so they can get stronger over time!”

UglyRestart: royal garb of the mighty cuber

I scoffed. “Royal? C’mon, Restart, I’m not that pretentious.”

UglyRestart: filthy potato sack of the trash-crawling cuber

I felt my eye twitch.

“Anyway. I’ll be keeping the pan for now, and I guess I can unfuse it if I need the egg as a key…?” I shook my head. “We’ll see how it works. As for the clothes… Hmm… What should I name it?”

UglyRestart: mediocre attire of the average cuber

“All suggestions by Restart are automatically rejected from now on,” I said, deadpan.

Jeofffff: hold up you should unfuse it before you name it

“Hmm? Unfuse it? Why?”

Jeofffff: cuz you can’t unfuse then
Jeofffff: gotta only put all the good stuff in it
Jeofffff: cuz the cost of fusion gets higher

“Eh, I guess you have a point… What did I put into this again?” I looked down and tugged on the part of me that was shaped like a skirt before simply shooting Appraisal at it.

Vcuber garb + War shark hoodie + Ancient Lily bikini + Inflatable swimming sleeves (fused)
A fusion of several items. Soulbound.
[INNATE] skill: Aquaport - Use a moderate amount of Tempor to teleport a short distance. Both the starting point and the destination have to be submerged in liquid.

“Hmm… Oh yeah, I forgot about the innate skill from the hoodie… Actually, I could probably use it to cross the river in one go… when I find a spot where the current isn’t as strong.”

I mentally recounted what each of the items in the fusion did and decided, “Eh, I think it’s fine to keep it fused. Some defense, some water affinity thing, the ability to float from the sleeves…”

Jeofffff: it’s too focused on water tho
Eclipsoon: the bikini is redundant

I made a face.

“I think it’s fine. And hey, I have more Ether now and I’m gonna keep getting even more as I go! I can still stuff a few more things into this, I’m pretty sure. Once I find some more armor and whatnot, I’ll just fuse that,” I decided. “Now! Names! This needs to be good!”

UglyRestart: fate weaver’s collar

I proceeded to mute Restart for two hours without acknowledging their message.

Ugh, I already regretted inviting more people into the group chats. I should make some kind of interview process for being invited rather than inviting random people.

There were a couple more suggestions after that, but in the end, I ended up going with something simple, yet fitting.

I mentally clicked confirmation and felt a small headache before the part of me that was clothes glowed for a moment, warped around, and finally reformed into a completely new shape.

I blinked in surprise and looked over myself.

The shoes had grown into light blue leather boots that reached halfway up to my knees. They had white shark teeth patterns around the soles. The shorts/skirt combo turned into dark blue shorts framed by a cyan knee-length cloth with white and pink flame and floral patterns – were those lilies? – that was shaped like half a skirt, making it almost look like a cape that extended from my hips and covered my butt and my sides. The top was now a blue shirt – matching the shorts – with a stylized red picture of a phoenix on my chest and long sleeves that gradually turned from blue to cyan at the cuffs, where more white and pink flame patterns were. The collar of the shirt framed my neck and an odd instinctual feeling told me that I could pull it over my head to create a hood like the shark hoodie had.

I was momentarily completely stunned by all of this.

This was… wow.

Before, it was like an AI-generated mashup of all the Fusion ingredients. But this? This was as if you gave a professional artist the list of ingredients and the name of the end product and asked them to design the most kickass result possible.

Gift of the Weeping Phoenix
An outfit made by Aoto Nana through fusion, created out of various treasures she discovered on her adventures, using the gift from her phoenix mother as the base.
Provides major increase to general defense, defense against any water-based hazards and attacks, and major protection from heat and cold. Further allows the user to control water in a small radius around them using Ether, float and teleport while submerged in water by using Tempor, and automatically adjusts its size to fit its wearer using their own Ether. Also greatly enhances the user’s ability to swim, their water-based attacks, and attacks using metallic weaponry.
Smells like ancient lilies.
Soulbound.
[INNATE] skill: Minor Hydrokinesis - Use a variable amount of Ether to control water in a one meter radius around you.
[INNATE] skill: Featherfall - Use a moderate amount of Ether to make yourself fall slower. Uses less Ether underwater or in lower gravity environments.
[INNATE] skill: Aquaport - Use a moderate amount of Tempor to teleport a short distance. Both the starting point and the destination have to be submerged in liquid.

I stared at the Appraisal result in dumb shock for a good few moments while chat exploded with messages.

I slowly blinked, reading the three innate skills this thing now granted me as well as the slew of other benefits.

“Oh… Chat… I think I know why Ultimate Fusion costs fifteen skill points…”

I had been convinced it was because it lifted the cap on the rarity… and, well, that might have been part of it. But why the hell didn’t it say anywhere that naming a fused item turned it into a completely busted superitem?! The generic fused item description was gone as well! This was incredible

!

And best of all, this wasn’t an item at all! It was me! Nobody could steal it off of me or anything! This outfit was part of me!

…Which still felt really weird, but hey! If this was going to only get stronger, I could get used to it.

Oh, I could definitely get used to it.

I had a bright grin on my face as I marched my way outside of my shelter and practically skipped all the way over to the river again. I also spotted a relatively big cloud in the darkening sky and couldn’t help but yell, “Come at me, bro! I’m not afraid!”

GeorgeDoshington: vcuber yells at cloud
JamieWasTaken3: shes gone crazy
Jeofffff: how did you go from full fire build to full water build

“Shush, you two! Eh, probably because I beat a water-based dungeon, Jeoff?”

I made it all the way to the river while I talked to chat, and as soon as I walked down the riverbank and got close enough, I could feel the water in the river rushing by with my new hydrokinesis senses.

I wasted no time in scooping a bit of water out of the rushing stream with my new innate skill and made it float in the air.

Unlike what I’d been expecting, the water didn’t beautifully dance to my whims. Instead, it was like a whole bunch of droplets constantly being pushed up by nets. Some of the water floated, but I kept dropping some of the droplets and…

“Okay, this is much more difficult than I thought it would be…” I grumbled.

Eclipsoon: could you shoot it at things?

I attempted to do so, but it resulted in a weak spurt of water rather than an epic water bullet or what have you.

“Uhh… Kinda? Gah, this is difficult! Why is it so difficult?!”

Stupid water raining – no pun intended – on my parade. I had been hoping I could now easily cross the river with the combination of Hydrokinesis and Aquaport, but it would still probably be a bit difficult…

Well, whatever. I still needed to go fetch my stuff back from the dungeon anyway… and it was getting pretty late as well, so it wouldn't be the greatest of ideas to try and cross the river right now.

I still ended up playing around with the water for almost an hour as the sun set. By the time I returned back to my base, I realized that I could sort of feel water all around me as well. In the air, in the trees, in the dirt under my feet… It was just a lot subtler than a rushing river. And also way harder to do anything with since there was either so little of it, or it was blocked by dirt or tree bark.

I wasn’t particularly fussed, though. I felt strong now. So much stronger than when I’d first entered that city dungeon. Of course, I still didn’t want to get cocky and chew off more than I could bite, but I felt confident now that I would win a rematch with that poison archer without nearly dying to poison this time.

The next morning, it was time.

After a quick breakfast of my calamari pizza – I’d fused the tentacle with the pizza just for variety – and refreshing myself in the river again, I marched my way over to the city gates and glared inside it.

KaiEbikoOfficial: good luck Nana!
bloopbooper: bwoop! (•̀ᴗ•́ )و
trelipideliberitation: gogogo!
uptonMIKE: careful of traps and poisons this time

I nodded.

“Thanks guys. Yeah, yeah. I know, Mike. Don’t want to go through that whole ordeal again, either.” I briefly grimaced. “It’s going to be fine, though! It’s been almost a week! I grew a lot, I’m stronger, have new skills, new items, new strategies, new everything! And it’s not like I’m going to try and beat the whole dungeon today, I’m just getting my stuff back if I can.”

I hoped I could. The naginata could be replaced since I had plenty of other weapons, but the bucket was super convenient and the map was nice to have as well.

It wouldn’t be the end of the world, especially if I could just run the water park dungeon to get them again, but… yeah.

I checked my equipment one more time, made sure I had the right skills equipped, steeled myself, and entered the city dungeon as the familiar shiver went down my spine.

I ignored the dread and focused on the other thing – the determination, the sense of unity, and cooperation.

I could do this.

I wasn’t going to get poisoned again.