The Runic Alchemist

———

Name : Damian Sunblade Lv. 400

Race : Demonic Human - Hellforged Tyrant

Rank : Emperor

Affinity : Chaos, Space-time

Mana : 150,000/150,000

STR : 539 + 70 (Demonic Enhancement)

DEF : 525 + 70 (Demonic Enhancement)

INT : 641

AGI : 498 + 40 (Demonic Enhancement)

DEX : 425

CHA : 24 (Demonic Enhancement)

LUC : 10

Jobs :

Emperor Rank: The Arcanometal Transmuter (Lv.200)

King Rank: The Runebound Monarch (Lv.50), The Spellwright Monarch (Lv.50)

Lord Rank: Runic Forge Master (Lv.25), Elder Runebreaker (Lv.25), The Runic Chemist Lord (Lv.25)

Blessings : Godless (50%), Goddess of Light & Nature's Blessings (50%)

Titles : [Cold Blooded Killer], [Wild Hunter], [Primordial Metal Shaper], [God Killer], [Curse Bound], [Best Runesmith(Solar System)]

Skills :

Upgradable: [Tree Climbing Saint Lv.3], [Arcane Dissection Lv.8], [Scholar Saint Lv.9], [Swordsman Saint Lv.6], [Spearman Saint Lv.5], [The Runic Monarch Lv.9], [Battle Automaton Lv.8], [Archscript Sovereign Lv.9], [Sigil Replication Lv.9], [Runic Body Engraving Lv.5], [Runebreak Ascension Lv.4], [Dust to Iron Lv.8], [Essence Sight Lv.5], [Genesis Regeneration Lv.1], [True Light Revelation Lv.1], [Ascension Rank 4.0 (Temporary)].

Racial: [Demonic Chains], [Dark Lightning], [Hellfire]

Perfected: [Eternal Scriptmaster], [Arcane Synthesis V4], [Runebreaker Monarch], [Essence Harvester], [Eldersmith's Legacy], [Worldcarver]

———

Dark hair fluttered in the wind. Damian stood still above the sanctum building crown, the highest point in the city.

Not much had changed. Just two skills from the blessing.

—

Genesis Regeneration: Regrow limbs, organs, even shattered bones mid-combat without losing consciousness.

True Light Revelation: All disguises, illusions, stealth, and false forms collapse in your presence.

—

The Godless not disappearing was a surprise.

He had never opened the status when Astraea was present in his mind. When she asked why that was, Damian replied that he would only do it in a dungeon. She merely laughed in amusement at his caution.

Dungeons would not block her influence over the stats, Damian knew that. But her influence over him was not much to begin with, he had noticed. Unlike her avatars that had her full blessings, he only had half. With his over 600 INT stats, which rivaled a fourth ranker, his mind was not easy to control. It was even less so when she wasn't actively present.

Damian only kept the stats tool active for a second and then closed it. For his eyes and mind, it was enough time to see the changes. He sensed Astraea's presence in the very next second. By then, Damian had stored the status tool back in his storage. She didn't say a word and kept observing him in silence.

———

Damian ignored Astraea and focused on the city before him. The voices, the groups of people.. the expressions..

He had taken a small tour flying across Sanctuary. All major cities and small towns. The discussion, arguments, and at times even outright anger and disappointment were clear to his ears. Even now, he could hear the whole city buzzing.

It had been a week since he got married. Vidalia had come to Sanctum. They spent some time together, but then she went back to the academy. Damian wanted her to live with him, but he was constantly called by Souldealer, Einar, and Lucian for this meeting and that matter, etc.

The air of the mainland carried an unapologetic change in it.

The Faerunians had more or less accepted their new king. A big part of which was Princess Vesperine's engagement with King Vearon. They should have been uncle and niece, but it was not uncommon in the Mainland. Nobles did that often to keep their power and make their house more powerful.

History suggested a marriage like that had more chances of producing a powerful heir. Though the arguments were shaky at best.

The princess declared she would come back for revenge before leaving Sanctuary, but Vearon had sent nobles to Sanctuary and Eldoris to make treaties. The alliance held an emergency meeting, and Landbreaker and Vearon were both invited to it.

After hours-long arguments and time-wasting, Vearon agreed to sign another peace treaty with Sanctuary and Eldoris. But instead of a hundred years, 15 year peace treaty for Sanctuary, ten for Eldoris, and only 5 for the Empire.

They could not force Vearon to honor the treaty signed by Thaddeus. And the leverage was gone. The alliance could stand together against the Faerunians, but Damian and Eldoris didn't want to mess with the Faerunians for no reason. A lot of commoners of Faerunia daily commuted to Sanctuary for work and other reasons using waygates.

A big part of Sanctuary's workforce was from outside Sanctuary. A needless war would affect too many lives. There was nothing to gain here.

Damian knew he could not remove Faerunia, no matter what. As long as the Sea God and all those mana beast legion existed. The kings or queens of Faerunia always put a quest for more land before everything, in fear of being replaced by their father. Because he defeated Thaddeus, Vearon was cautious of him. And Eldoris and Sanctuary were now partners.

The Empire was not exactly in Sanctuary's favor. The red priests were spreading hatred against Sanctuary among the common people, and the Emperor refused to act. He ignored all Sanctuary requests to stop this nonsense. It was clear that words would not work here. More than that, Damian saw something in the alliance meeting that he wished was not true.

The emperor's wife had a red mana thread connected to her head, and it was the thicker avatar version. Clearly, she was in contact with her god. And probably in time, the emperor will follow behind as well.

The empire was on its own against the Faerunians once the five-year treaty ended.

Every country on the mainland was preparing for war. They all knew peace would not last. The dream of a century without war is broken.

And not just that. The Sanctuary was affected by the wind as well. This morning, they held the event to officially partner with Eldoris. The Eldoris royalty and all sanctum heads were present. It wasn't outright hated, but the response from the common people was not the same as it used to be. Especially when they mentioned that Damian and Vidalia had been married.

The news had leaked little by little throughout the week, but most people discarded it as a rumor. Damian's spies caught many people who were riding the chaos and riling up the people even more. At times, they were the followers of the sun god, but the shadow organization people were also caught doing it. Whether God Chaos did that on purpose or the organization was not in his control, neither case helped the sanctuary. And then there were the old Dawnstar nobles' paid men.

But most of the time, they were just people. Part of no organizations.

People were afraid. The majority believed Damian had chosen a side in the war to come because the royal family of Eldoris was part of his family now. All his future decisions will now be influenced. Sanctuary and Eldoris were now one and would fight against the Empire and Faerunia in the near future.

They were angry that Lucian was not chosen. The majority of the Sanctuary were Dawnstar people. By marrying Vidalia, they believed he discarded Dawnstar once again. Amidst all that, Leon declared he would continue the fight against his father's enemies without anyone's support but his own people. That pushed people over the edge.

It did not affect the internal sanctum officials, and everything went on as it should.

But that did not matter. Too much had changed. It will never be the same.

Taking advantage of the fact that he could tell when Astraea controlled him, Damian had used the waygate to find Steelweaver and placed him inside his runic lab with Jacob. Through Jacob, the old dwarf could send him messages when needed. The appearance-changing potions worked wonders on the guy, but still, they made sure Steelweaver was never seen by anyone.

It was just a temporary thing. Another thing he didn't have enough time to see through.

"Damian,"

A voice called from behind.

"It's just as we feared. The House of Lords is about to pass an emergency bill."

He nodded and stepped forward, flying down. Souldealer joined him moments later. They entered the floor on which the large hall was through a wormhole. The hall was heated with arguments and murmuring. But Damian did not go there; instead entered a room furthest from the hall.

Sam, Evrin, Einar, Lucian, Ilvanya, and Torwin were standing inside, accompanied by their assistants and a few other sanctum officials. This room was supposed to be an office for the land and agricultural loan department. The lady in charge was Evrin's assistant.

Three out of five of his assistants were present as well. Seraphina, Celestine, and Agatha walked towards him when he entered, informing him of which lord had planned what arrangements and strategies they were going to use and how to respond against them.

Hester and Velen were representing him in the emergency gathering of the House of Lords.