Nightmare Realm Summoner

Alex's Mind Palace formed around him. A lake stretched out, white marble basin sitting alone in its center. An orb of blue mist, so thick that it wasn't even translucent anymore, swirled above it soundlessly.

Huh. I half expected Berith to be sitting around somewhere here. Not that I'm complaining. I don't need to interact with him any more than I have to. Still…

The dark expanse almost felt lonely. Ripples passed through the dark water as Alex walked across it. His footsteps echoed through his empty mind until he drew up to the edge of the basin. He sat down before it and steadied his breathing before closing his eyes for the second time, sinking even deeper into his mind.

Alex reached out to the power swirling above him. He drew in a startled gasp as he found a sea of power waiting for him. It poured down his throat, choking him, and flooded into his chest. He couldn't breathe. The power was literally suffocating.

He nearly lost his concentration then and there, but he managed to hold on by a thread. Nobody had told him what would happen if he completely fell out of meditation while connected to his power, but he didn't want to find out.

Alex repressed the budding panic and focused on the power. He sent his will forth into it. This was his mind. His power. It didn't matter if he thought he was breathing or not. His outside body was fine.

This is all in my head — and in my head, we play by my rules. I earned this power, and I won't let it just slip away.

A droplet formed from the churning mist. It fell, landing in the basin with a faint plink. Breathing grew no easier. Alex's concentration didn't falter. His focus remained ironclad. It had to.

Drop by drop, he wrung energy from the mist. Almost like rain from a cloud they fell and pattered into the basin. The sound of the falling blue energy changed as the energy landed in a growing pool instead of striking the marble walls.

Alex wasn't sure how long he spent in deep meditation. But, eventually, his eyes drifted back open. The last droplets of mist splashed down and his eyes opened to find it banished completely. And, to his delight, his basin was nearly half full of gentle, ocean-blue liquid.

He stood and rested his hands on the edge of the basin. The water within was serene and peaceful, and yet he could feel the untapped power lying in wait. The potential was just waiting for him to use it.

How many levels will this much power get me? Could I get all the way up to Novice 6?

Alex swallowed to keep his excitement under control. His hands tightened around the rim of the basin. He nearly stuck his hand straight into the water then and there, but he hesitated at the last second.

Back when he'd spoken to the fragment of Meiderly, he'd drank the water before spending it. That bond had spent a large portion of it repairing his basin rather than directly making him stronger… but if he hadn't done that, he was pretty sure the water he had now would be leaking through the cracks that had been in the basin.

There wasn't any damage to the basin left over to fix. There was nothing to repair — and yet, Alex's Mind Palace felt profoundly empty. It didn't make sense for it to be so large and contain nothing but a single white basin.

Was repairing the basin just a one-time thing?

He wasn't so sure. Alex looked down at the water rippling by his feet, his brow creased in thought. His mind churned as he let his eyes drift. Almost unconsciously, his lips curled into a frown and he blinked, glancing back to where he'd just been looking.

Something felt off about the white basin's reflection. He looked at the spot where the dark lake met the basin and drew in a small breath of surprise.

The reflection didn't match. Instead of a perfect replica of a white basin, there was something else in the water. It almost looked like the back of a throne rising up behind the basin, the exact details of it lost within the dark, murky waters.

Alex's eyes raised back to the top of the basin. Then they narrowed. He had two choices before him. Just take the power in the basin and advance as much as he could, then figure out how to get the other rewards the System owed him after that — or follow what Meiderly had shown him.

I've never been one to turn down a bet.

He lowered his head into the basin and drank. Ice spiked into his tongue and clawed at the inside of his mouth as it poured down his throat, running its fingers along his throat and reaching for his heart.

Then it slammed to a halt. For a brief instant, Alex could feel the energy. Not as a foreign body of power, but as an extension of himself. His head pulsed with the strongest brain freeze he'd ever felt.

It didn't rip free of its mouth like it had the previous time. Instead, it settled in his stomach and permeated through his body. Freezing droplets gathered at Alex's palms and ran down the sides of the basin as he gripped it tightly.

The droplets turned into a river that poured down into the murky waters below. And, from within them, a white point emerged. The point turned to a line and the line to a plane — the backing that he'd seen reflected in the water.

The white backing rose soundlessly until it rested behind the basin. A pitch-black gem the size of a fingernail sat at the very top of the mantle attached to the basin. Directly below it was a white gem with three smaller, blue ones spaced out equal distances from each other just beneath it. Channels ran from each of the blue gems, going down the mantle, and down into the basin. The brilliant blue liquid in it had reduced by a little over half.

As the freezing cold sensation started to release Alex from his grip, he looked back into the water. For an instant, he saw a flicker of a white chain far beneath. His spine prickled and the hair on his arms stood on end.

The white chain vanished and the feeling passed, leaving him alone with his newly improved basin once again. Alex swallowed.

Berith is down there, somewhere. Beneath this lake. What exactly does connecting with the energy like this even do?

He squinted into the lake in an attempt to make anything else out. The reflection of the basin still didn't seem quite right. He could just barely make out more detail on the basin's new backing that wasn't reflected in the real world.

More power likely would have revealed it, but Alex wasn't about to spend even more testing while he was in the middle of a dungeon and needed the extra strength to clear it.

As Alex studied his newly formed basin, a flicker of light danced through the black gem at its top. It swirled within its inky depths like an eye before vanishing once more. A second later, it returned.

His brow furrowed. Reaching out, Alex brushed his fingers across the gem. A thrum ran through his mind and a ripple passed through the water at his feet like someone had dropped a stone into the center of his soul-lake.

Alex nearly leapt a foot into the air as black words carved themselves across the surface of the basin's backing without warning.

[Trial: The Mirrorlands]

Objective Completed. Rewards Earned.

Accept Rewards [1/2]?

"Hell yeah I do," Alex said. He didn't see anywhere to touch or otherwise acknowledge the message. It didn't seem like he needed one. As soon as he finished speaking, the words vanished from the pale white surface.

It says ½… is the second reward for killing another Anomaly? I guess I'll have to see once I get this first one.

Golden lines burst forth in the air before Alex. They expanded, thin tendrils tracing out to form words blazing with energy.

Title Fragment Acquired.

Unbound: Granted to those who slip free of the broken lands that connect all of the Infinitum without being broken in the process.

Before Alex could even blink, the sentence vanished. Black letters appeared on the back of the basin once more.

Would you like to combine any of your Title Fragments?

Alex didn't have to think for long. His curiosity refused to let him make any choice other than the affirmative. If he'd gotten a Title Fragment for completing a trial, then they had to be useful somehow — and it wasn't doing him all that much now as far as he could tell.

As soon as he nodded, the black letters changed. Three new lines appeared on the basin.

Anomaly

Unbound

Mirrorlander

That was it. No further instruction. No hints. Just three titles. Alex's brow furrowed as he studied them. Perhaps that was another thing he'd missed from the System's tutorial while he'd been traipsing around in the Mirrorlands.

Anomaly is the title that the Mirrorlands forcibly gave me. Given the way I got it, I don't think the System likes it much. I wish I knew more about why… but it did kind of seem to break things. I'm not sure if combining it with something else would improve or ruin it.

I should probably try combining two other things first, just to see what happens. And if I'm going to do that, it only leaves me with one option.

He didn't even have to say what. As soon as his mind was set, Anomaly faded from the list and left only the other two titles behind. The back of Alex's palms tingled. Two motes of light slipped out from the remaining titles on the basin and floated in the air above the basin.

And then they just… floated there. Nothing changed. Alex scrunched his nose. He poked one of the motes. It bobbed in the air, pressing back against his finger like a pair of positive magnets.

Do I have to do the merge myself? I suppose that would make sense.

Alex reached out to each of the motes. They pressed back into his palms as he carefully pushed them toward each other. Almost instantly, the pressure started to rise. The closer he pushed the motes, the more resistant they became.

His jaw clenched and he pushed himself harder. The motes pushed back with even more effort, but inch by inch, they ground closer to each other. Alex's muscles trembled with effort — but something told him it wasn't just physical strength he was drawing on.

The water in the lake at his feet rippled. Small waves passed out from his feet and rolled across its surface. The motes drew closer still, until they were just a hair away from touching. For a brief instant, Alex found himself unable to move them any farther.

He snarled and drew on a final burst of strength. The two spots of light touched, if just barely. A brilliant burst of light went off and stars tore through his vision. Alex stumbled back with a slew of curses, blinking furiously.

Both motes of light were gone and all that remained was a single title on the back of the basin.

Unbound Mirrorlander: Slip past the limits of your Mirrorlander Class, improving its core skill while this Title is equipped.

Alex's lips parted in disbelief as he read the title. Then he read it again, and a third time for good measure.

"Holy shit," Alex breathed to himself. "I was expecting some stupid shit like five percent stronger or something. What is improving a core skill? Are we talking a whole advancement for it? Or something else entirely?"

There was only one way to find out. Alex summoned his status page with a thought.

Alex Vaya [Human]

Class: Evoker [Mirrorlands]

Stage: Novice 3

Title Fragments:

Active Titles:

Anomaly

[1/5]

Inactive Titles:

[Unbound Mirrorlander]

Soul Manifestation:

[Spatial Mirrors] (Novice 1)

Auxiliary Skills:

[Requiem to the King] (Novice 1)

[Monster Medley] (Novice 1)

[Riftwalk] (Novice 1)

With a single thought, Alex sent Unbound Mirrorlander from his inactive titles to his active ones. A spike of energy raced through his body and he stiffened, but the feeling had passed by the time he properly registered it.

Alex waited for another message, but there was nothing. It was as if nothing had changed. His brow furrowed. He still hadn't actually leveled up yet, so there was a chance that was the delay, but —

Wait.

The deck at his side felt slightly heavier. Alex's hand shot down and flipped it open. He reached inside and paused. A smile pulled across his lips. He pulled out two Spatial Mirrors. One held Glint, but the other was empty.

Holy shit. A new mirror card. Upgrades to my Core Ability are only supposed to happen every Stage according to Meiderly... but I'm still a Novice. I just got an extra card for free. That's a huge advantage. If I use this properly, I could more than double my strength.

Alex's smile grew wider.

He could get another monster.