As he stood Infront of the questions illumination, Ashton had realized what was missing from within him and what had taken it.
The notification was a reminder that regardless of its perceived limitations, the Aether System was divine.
It was in its very name... [How could I not realize sooner?]
It was a gross realization, one that split Ashton's psyche in two.
[The knot in my stomach, spreading like a cancer... It was the system.]
He fell to his knees. The fracturing of his mind had caused his body's mana to halt and return to their circles. His body had regained strength to stand, but not enough to fight the mental anguish he is suffering.
[The system had "given" me power. Insight. The flames. "Dark arts prophet". Yeah that's it...]
As he thought on the matter the pain in his head only continued to rise. The two splitting sides, were no longer running from each other.
But Ashton was neither side. He found himself as the glue struggling to keep them together.
As if he were born a bifurcation—meant to tear them apart from the start.
The darkness that the system was trying to cultivate, or the humanity of the opposite side.
[Humanity on my right, divinity on my left. Why was I given such a choice? Why was I given the system? If I choose my left, will I become a deity? Or will the system make me fertile for the climb... but at what cost?]
It was not just a personal choice, Ashton stood at the genesis of a new reality.
He became a fork in the fabric of time the moment he awoke to the systems hello.
He remained on his knees, surrounded by the shadowed trees at the foot of the pyre, yet his mind drifted far beyond the forest's reach. It felt like he was floating inside of a void as he weighed his options.
He was unaware of the world around him, so he couldn't have noticed the slight motion in the forest. Or the way the leaves unnaturally shook.
"Has he started yet?" asked a quiet voice, emanating from a circular device embedded with faintly pulsing mana stones.
"Not yet... He seems unconscious." The owner of the magic device, wearing all black and wielding a short sword with a focus in its handle.
"Is he still alone?" the voice asked, this time more cautious.
"Confirmed. Neither knights nor even a lone guard nearby."
"And… is IT present?"
The voice faltered, warping at the edges. No longer sharp or authoritative, but almost perverse and hungry in vulgar.
With clear and still voice, "I have eyes on it." the man watching Ashton from the shadows of the trees responds.
"Excellent! When the others arrive from the arena, kill everything between me and my prize." No longer hungry, the voice was starving and deprived of any humane tone.
It sounded like the lust of an addict, the lowest a human could fall.
As the forest became more concentrated in intruders, Ashton's mind became holden to the voice of a woman.
It was loud and echoed endlessly. Every time its echo died down and became swallowed by the void, it repeated...
"Master, please make your choice."
[This voice... is it the Aether System? It sounds the same as that morning... but I haven't heard it since.]
"Everybody into positions. You know whose grabbing and whose killing, everyone better fulfill their roles swiftly." It was muffled, but the voice was recognizable to the assassins, it was the depraved whispering of their master.
"On my go." The first to arrive on scene, hanging the magical commination up.
"Master, please make your choice."
[If the system wants me to make a choice, then it should be asking me to choose it. It should at least indicate what to pick, but it sounds uncaring. Its calling me master... it feels supportive of either choice]
"3..." The counting down of Ashton's reaper
-
"Master, please make your choice"
[Divinity or humanity, it is natural to only be one. They are contradictory beings, nearly complete opposite.]
-
"...2..."
-
"Master, please make your choice"
[But why am I neither side?... Of course I am not a god, but I am a human. So why is my "Humanity" Not deep within in me, I shouldn't have to hold it in my hand, and I shouldn't have the power to resist the divine]
-
"...1"
-
"Master, please make your choice"
[Am I not a human? I don't know anymore, all I do know is two identities within one body is...]
-
Ashton's consciousness, before he could even finish his thought, fell back into his body slowly.
Time stopped as he fell, everything down to the rotation of the planet froze, it was as if it was giving him time to realize. Like reality pressed pause on itself for Ashtons protection.
Like he was a ghost, he looked down on his unprotected body and the assassins, he didn't feel threatened or the human need to hurry back.
As he was finally approaching his body, the moment his sight switched from vantage to its socketed bodily norm, [Possible]
The last of his prior thought he hadn't got to finish, like it was already programmed in his mind to say even after multiple minutes have passed.
[Time manipulation is so weird] He thought as the shadows staining the ground rise up and skewer all the assassins.
All it took was a thought. Similar to his Invocation.
The only thing different is Ashton's mana created the shadow magic, not the mana in air.
[I didn't even have to calculate the spell, my mana just made it happen]
Like the Invocation was practice just for this moment, his dark arts unfolded and manifested with only his minds desire.
Ashton trimmed all but his humanities desires, he felt more than human but less divine the moment he made his choice. So, he took both. The desires of humanity and combined it with what the system offered.
He couldn't notice much of a that difference accepting the Aether System made, only that it was no longer invading and corruption his body. It was now symbiotic.
The desire of Ashton's that was greatest was greed and wrath
Not after the usual associated things these sins chase, but after power.
He was wrathful towards those who have harmed and portray harm on his protectorates and family, and greedy for the power and influence required in his world to protect anything.
By themselves they were desires that destroy most men, but together balancing each other into restraint, is what made the great.
As they balanced each other, Ashton only began to feel more desires. Like the two desires split into thousands creating a desire common among all humans.
The desire to be more than one.
The desire to accept all of what the system is, because of what it offers.
Rising to his feet, Ashton's outward appearance still the 16 year old boy, but underneath it was the focus of a military monarch. Somebody tested and ready to ensure the prosperity of its state through his strength.
As he stood before the prior, the Aether System asks him again
"Would you like to preform necromancy on the target?
Please confirm"
[Confirm] No hesitation, Ashton knew the question was coming. He felt the pull of the system, and agreed with it.
Just like he had wanted, the Demonic Incinerator rose from the pyre and into a magic circle made of bright white light.
It was hypnotizing.
Ashton felt like he had seen such a light before, and it was dreadful. It was painful in the way a memory inflicts you, but Ashton had no such memory of similar light.
The light was calling, but the Aether Systems notification and the ripping of the Nightmare Flames from his body awoke him.
The percentage representation of the flame fell to zero, and along with it the real thing.
Ashton didn't feel the loss of the flame, he only looked forward to the necromancies completion.
Then it happened, the light closed, the magic circles patterns shifted, and opened like a blackhole.
Outstretched from the hole was the paw of a beast. The white coat of fur visible, but confusing. The incinerator was blue, but should have come back as black.
It was the mark of the undead, black skin or beastly fur almost charred.
Yet, as the lion stepped out from the hole, it didn't look ragged or even undead. It stepped out with the dignity only those with a mind would have.
It wasn't missing the pieces that were too rotted or damaged to be resurrected, it was whole.
And has it bowed its head to Ashton, the demonic flames no longer embraced its tail, the flame wasn't even blue any longer. It burned a white hue and covered the front and back of its neck where its mane once was. He noticed it was drawing breath.
[This is true necromancy... Aether has truly reborn the lion through the system]