Infinite Body Prince

A static roar, like a distant waterfall, rose in Bagdona's ears.

The world around him sharpened violently, colors oversaturating until the sun seemed to burn with a blinding, white intensity.

His heart sank, a sense of profound wrongness settling in his gut.

He looked back at Gurov, his brow furrowing. They had been five metres apart a moment ago, but the distance between them was growing. The ground, and Gurov himself, seemed to stretch like pulled ribbons.

It wasn't just Gurov. Bagdona looked down at his feet; his own shadow had separated from his heels, elongating along with the warping earth.

The static assaulted his ears, rising to a scream. He watched in horror as his own torso stretched upward, though his feet remained planted firmly on the soil.

With a desperate thought, he turned toward the inner city wall, channeling essence into his muscles to sprint.

However, the wall and the land in between elongated, stretching away faster than he could move.

An invisible force pressed down on him. He was running in a dreamlike state, reality around him warping to nauseating lengths and heights.

Apparitions of himself, younger and older, flickered into existence around him, their faces etched with confusion and panic.

Blood wept from his eyes, nose, and mouth. His mind fractured, assaulted by multiple events from his past occurring all at once.

His mouth parted in a silent, unending scream.

…

On the rampart of the wall, the wind howled.

Emil felt a heat on her face so intense it was as if she had leaned directly into a fireplace.

She took three steps forward, placing a trembling hand on the stone battlement.

Her brow pinched, eyes struggling to focus far beneath them where the battle had been raging.

Now, it was silent.

A pressure built behind her eyes, a sharp, throbbing ache. To her, the participants of the battle appeared frozen in time.

"What—what is that?" Aelia muttered, stumbling up next to her.

Waves of transparent distortion rippled through the air below, creating optical illusions that bent the light, accompanied by the vibration of distant static.

Emil's heart drummed a frantic rhythm. She sensed a deep wrongness.

The other thirty mages approached the edge of the rampart, shock and fear starkly written on their faces.

…

A bolt of lightning traversed the landscape, tearing through the air before snapping to a halt and materializing into Thena.

A figure in black robes flickered into existence five metres to her right.

"What did you do?" Thena asked, her voice tight. She did not approach any further.

"Don't worry, it's simply a preliminary scratch." Jasmine said.

"Did you think that while you enjoyed all those months of advancement, we were simply sleeping?" He continued, his voice smooth.

"No matter how far behind you might seem, with appropriate assessment, preparations, and investments, you can overturn your situation."

Thena remained silent. Her short black hair whipped restlessly in the wind as she focused on the frozen battle, the suspended bloodshed of her people.

Jasmine snapped his fingers. A metal cage materialized instantly around Thena.

It exuded a dominating, suffocating aura.

"Don't be too distracted in the middle of a fight," he chastised.

Thena's body deformed into mist, but in the next moment, she reappeared violently within the center of the cage.

She repeated the attempt, shifting into lightning, then flame, but the result was the same.

Jasmine chuckled.

"It isn't simply a rank five." he said, walking closer to the bars with calm, measured steps.

Thena compressed the air all around her, trying to blast the cage open, but the force only rebounded back at her. It slammed her to one knee, leaving her heaving for breath.

"You were too confident under the sun."

Thena's head snapped up, her eyes narrowing on Jasmine.

"You're a fool," she muttered, her gums red with blood. "Whatever those witches want, you're giving them a key."

"Well, as long as we get in too." Jasmine

said.

He placed his left hand on the cage. In a blink, they vanished, reappearing instantly on the edge of the rampart alongside the thirty mages.

Emil and Aelia staggered, feeling a sudden, crushing force land on their shoulders as Jasmine and the cage materialized before them.

They looked from the trapped woman to Jasmine, who stood casually beside the bars. His lips moved, but the roaring in their ears made him inaudible.

Thena ignored them, looking down at the battle and the translucent waves of optical distortion.

"Do you want to know what the ritual is?" Jasmine asked. "Since you're about to die, I might as well tell you."

When Thena remained silent, he chuckled darkly.

"There's two methods, but I'll focus on what concerns you.

I'm going to throw you, together with this cage, at the edge of this rift leakage, observe the changes and carry you out without falling in."

He paused, offering a performative sigh.

"I was supposed to find a leakage, but as you can imagine, it was quite difficult to locate. And I couldn't wait too long with Myriel's influence spreading within the free cities."

A low vibrational hum throbbed from the valley below, vibrating in their teeth.

"The witches helped with that. But such a ritual requires a great deal of sacrifice from mages of the force, space and elemental paths. Lucky for us, the free cities are particularly known for that."

…

Hadrian felt he was approaching the limit of mage vessels he could currently control at his tier, having three rank two cores, and four rank one cores.

Luckily, he'd saved a spot for Haldon.

Looking at the witch, he called at her essence.

"You'll be wasting time," Lys said. "You know so little. After possessing a rank five artifact that long, and making it usable with sorcery, don't you think I would have made it useful in more ways than one?"

She dug into her black dress, withdrawing

a bracelet strung with moon-colored rocks.

"Once they turn black, you won't be able to use the box again," she said, tossing it to the rodent.

The creature caught it deftly.

"Why?" it asked.

Lys chuckled.

"Weren't you listening?" she asked. "I doubt you'll give me the box and come with me, but I also don't want you ending up in Jasmine's hands."

Hadrian looked down at the bracelet of six rocks and "carried" it away.

"What do the witches gain out of this?"

Lys smiled. Her skin began to grey, flaking away like dry parchment.

She crumbled into a pile of ash, the same grey ash she'd turned into the first time she sealed him.