Bonded Summoner

Book 9. Chapter 33: Miracles and Scrap Metal

A deafening, metallic crashing sound echoed through the chamber as Ophelia met the Tetra-Forged Titan head-on. The towering, four-armed clockwork gladiator swung its colossal, elementally charged hammer in devastating, gravity-warping arcs, but Ophelia was a golden blur of Valkyrie perfection.

Her Hearth Sentinel–her summoned valkyrie clone–caught the massive weapon at the exact angle of leverage with its shield, redirecting the kinetic force straight into the brass-colored floor while Ophelia darted through the gladiator's guard to deliver piercing Vajrafire strikes.

The Titan gladiator was a true engine of destruction. Its blows actually hit harder than the draconid and savage plant they faced and had the elemental pulses that struck nearby allies through its domain to boot. Without Ophelia’s intense focus to guard and parry its attacks, as well as the large tanks to deflect and cause the automaton to stumble, it would turn most tanks to paste.

When a localized gravity pulse inevitably sent the Valkyrie skidding fifty feet backward, the center was ready to fill in the gap. Bloodberri brought her axe down onto the monster’s back, an explosion of light and dark blasting and shredding the monster’s metal. Her Covenant-enhanced Twilight Divide was even more devastating, drawing a significant amount of healing from the Aegis Monolith’s beam from above as it reknit the metallic structure of the ruined Titan’s body.

Before the Titan could counter with its gravity-infused maul, Avalara struck powerfully with her tree maul, knocking it to the side. Then, her chest blasted a golden ray of flame that peeled away the armor as the fixture above healed and replaced it. The two large, monstrous fighters redirected the gladiator's sweeping cleaves and bought Ophelia the crucial seconds she needed to charge back into the fray.

Because they lacked the explosive mobility of the beastkin skirmishers, Avalara and the treants stayed locked in the center, grinding the boss's internal health down to push the phase thresholds. Plus, Avalara needed to largely stay still to anchor her protective jungle and swamp.

The maelstrom of stone circled them, deadly sharp rocks impaling them as gravity weighed down on their spirits. Healing spells engulfed the tanking front line, keeping them steady within the storm.

As the Titan’s suffocating Earth Domain pressed down on the center area, Jasmina’s voice rose above the grinding gears. Empowered by her Abyssal Pearl, the Naga Siren wove a haunting, multi-layered song. The resonant frequency acted as a sonic buffer, physically fracturing the Titan's oppressive gravity and allowing the mobile strikers, who still had to wade through the storm of stone, to breathe.

Before, she had been limited to enhancing auril and the Serthunian Voiuvre’s gems. Now, her magical song protection was all-encompassing and affected all, a wonderful addition to her powers. When combined with Jake and Bloodberri’s protective auras, the defense provided was substantial.

It wasn’t quite enough, however, because the active domain of the boss was powerful and would harm those in the inner quadrant. All damage dealers had to move through it, but the mobile skirmishers likely took the most damage from this, the tanks all having tremendous vitality, defenses, and self-healing. Sanctum, Avalara and Tanda’s Jungle, and Ruby’s mountainous den, in addition to the numerous auras, all helped protect against the environmental hazards, but a lot of healing still had to go around. The arena was large, requiring many to cross unprotected areas, but it was clear the protection was helpful and significant.

The third core took just enough damage to become invulnerable, the shield flickering into place, and the Gyroscopic Ring above shifted the cores once more.

“Fire Core is active in the Apex Slot now! Keep the perimeter tight!” Jake commanded from the south of the battlefield, projecting Sanctum to shield the healers and fueling the offensive magic circles. The inner domain became a deadly firestorm for those in the center, and the gladiator’s weapon morphed into a fiery sword that spewed flame whether Ophelia blocked it or not, bathing the treants in dangerous flame. Without the numerous auras protecting them, the tree people would have dried out and burned up fast.

Through his Umbral Gaze, Jake wasn't just watching the fight; he was watching the math, aligning the appropriate damage dealers to balance the output as best as he could. The Titan and the cores within the Gyroscopic Ring shared a single systemic health pool from the Aegis Monolith.

Every time the cores took about three percent of the total health in damage, a barrier would cover them within the rings, and they would go invulnerable until the next cycle, stopping their elemental summons.

Once all three Exposed Cores were defeated, the domain in the center would stop charging, and the protective monolith would activate, causing the Astrolabe ring to rotate exactly ninety degrees clockwise. The damaging domain would partially reset, giving what was effectively a death timer a reprieve.

That meant about nine percent of damage was required to complete a cycle, and the three percent health each had to be done to all three cores to force a shift, or the danger would continue to grow. There was also damage being dealt to the gladiator, however. As the individual Exposed Cores went invulnerable, casters would move toward their destination, following the cores as they moved preemptively to maintain their damage, or they would add extra damage to the boss in the center.

In total, they were adding about three percent more damage to the boss per cycle, ending up in the ballpark of 12% of the damage done per cycle–now that they had gotten into the right flow, anyway. They were on track to finish the Titan during the ninth cycle, or eight rotations, and well ahead of the time limit each time.

It was a predictable track, and Clan Hart and Hearthtribe exploited it flawlessly with their coordination.

As the Exposed Cores used their Ambient Manifestation, raining matching magical elementals down toward them, the heavy casters didn't even flinch. The numerous beastkin, the agile Elysian Fauns, and the Asiatic Battle Maidens and Talismancers deployed into a flowing, kinetic ring through Hearthtribe’s defensive domains.

Jake even saw Avina and Davonius following. Avina’s amazing heals as a snow owl had become even more effective as she had gotten stronger. And while Davonius’s stealth had become useless here, his curses and poisons from his shaman class were strong, even if limited against the elementals.

Moving with explosive agility, the many mixed mobile warriors hurled javelins and fired rapid volleys of arrows with powerful manifestations, perfectly intercepting the falling elementals before they could ever reach the artillery lines.

To ensure they weren't overwhelmed by the constant rain of elemental adds, Jake called out for more help. With a flash of light, Zephyr, his massive Garuda, took to the air. The majestic bird humanoid's heavenly winds immediately went to work, its razor-sharp gale blades slicing through the falling earthen and wind elementals from above, locking down the airspace while protecting the healers and casters below. With Zephyr managing the skies and mobile warriors handling the adds, the specialists on the ground went to work on the Exposed Cores.

On the western flank, Bree and Ruby tag-teamed the massive Earth Core. Bree’s Fertile Flames erupted into towering, superheated vines–embodying the conceptual rule of Wood parting Earth–that burrowed deep into the elemental stone. Beside her, Ruby acted as the heavy artillery, her intense magma blades violently spalling the casing once Bree's roots cracked it open from within.

Meanwhile, Fhesiah focused her crushing draconic presence on the Wind Core. Since standard fire would only be scattered by the gales, she used her Yin-Yang Celestial Alchemy, projecting dense, hyper-compressed orbs of conceptual weight that physically crushed the cyclonic barriers, smothering the wind through sheer alchemical density. With the help of several of her fire spirits and her curses of the sun and moon, she made quick work of the wind core, while the many other flame casters easily pushed the water core.

“The Earth and Wind cores are capped! Move on to the next,” Fhesiah called out as the massive orbs went dark under their invulnerability shields. Her flame sprites immediately pivoted, pouring their remaining damage straight into the gladiator in the center. The Water Core always fell rapidly thanks to their vast fire damage, so she had moved to help on the others.

The boss staggered as the combined damage tore its body apart. The healing beam of the Aegis Monolith kept regenerating its body rapidly, but enough damage and momentum, and its stance crumbled. Until eventually, the monolith pulsed, and the Gyroscopic Ring around the Astrolabe ground clockwise, shifting the housed cores along with it.

The Titan's weapon shifted into a pair of cyclonic whips as the Wind Domain took over, and the blazing Fire Core rotated into an exposed, vulnerable slot. It was time for Nessa to shine.

Here, the raid’s composition had presented a bottleneck. Hearthtribe boasted an overwhelming abundance of fire-casters, but they lacked heavy hydro-artillery. To hit the Fire Core with the necessary thermodynamic shock, the few water and ice mages and Anuran elders had to physically relocate their casting circle across the massive arena–a lethal loss of uptime. The Overload timer ticked down, uncaring for their dilemma.

Jake was prepared this time, preloading the damage as much as he could. He knew from past testing that standard clergy templates performed terribly as summons–he couldn't artificially replicate the genuine faith required to power their miracles. But High Priestess Morwen was an anomaly; her baseline sorcerous affinity for frost was so devastating that she didn't even need the divine connection to act as an unliving siege engine.

Jake manifested her template–a silent, translucent echo of the devoted sorceress of Arawn wearing Clan Hart’s tabard–alongside a flight of Frost Mantas. The massive, floating rays of deep-sea ice glided over the battlefield, charging their pressurized freezing beams under the template-Morwen's sorcerous direction to lay down suppressing ice on the blazing core.

Elder Oram and the ice casters were channeling mana into their magic circle–which was resting on a conjured boat of ice, of all things. It was a brilliant, necessary workaround. Jake knew a complex magic circle couldn't easily be moved through the air without breaking; it required a physical or powerful enough anchor to sustain the fragile glyphs. Only a transcendent caster like Morwen, Nadessa, or Amara could float an array freely, as they were likely doing in the raid instance they were leading. Or Jake and his wives, had they spent the time mastering the skill.

That was just one more thing for them to work on before the War Trial.

“Keep casting! Do not break the circle!” Nessa’s voice echoed through the comms.

Bolstered by Jake’s Justicar State, a roaring river of righteous frostfire erupted from Nessa and swept up the boat. It wasn't only an attack; it was a high-speed magical slipstream. Nessa literally surfed the entire, unbroken casting circle on the boat across the arena safely in seconds as the casters held onto their focus. They had to pass through the Titan's domain of cyclonic, dangerous winds, and so the fiery river’s protection for the fragile casters was necessary.

Her blade and snake tail, covered in Frostfire, lashed out as they traveled, flash-freezing any stray fire elementals that slipped past the beastkin in the eastern lane.

Riding the slipstream, Elder Oram and the actual unliving Priestesses of Arawn unleashed a devastating, highly pressurized geyser of frost and water that refused to freeze completely. Striking the Fire Core, the water didn't just cool it–the priestesses' holy frost mixed with the pure water magic violently extinguished the Fire Core's conceptual animus, cracking the true core without feeding the flames.

After placing the boat down, a portion of Nessa and Jake’s frostfire river crashed into the core as well, freezing it violently. The shield quickly covered the core, and they picked up the boat with the river once more to bring it back to Sanctum. With the Fire Core appearing South next, they would be ready to blast it with a clear line of sight from within Sanctum. Jake also recalled his Templates using Call Summon, easily repositioning them with a mere thought, reinfusing them with mana from his Sanctum and preparing them for their next assault.

The Astrolabe ground through cycle after cycle. But the fight was a compounding war of attrition combined with a damage race. The Domain Attrition didn't fully reset when the elements shifted. By the sixth rotation, the brass-colored floor was a treacherous nightmare of flash-frozen magma, jagged obsidian spikes, and lingering vortexes of cutting air and crushing water. The Overload gauge was shrinking, giving them less time with every rotation before the domain became truly dangerous and a death sentence.

Jake and his wives had to keep tuning their efforts to match changes in the battlefield, and Hearthtribe moved to Jake’s strategic guidance. Despite the complications brought up, his allies answered his call.

“Eighth rotation! This is the final push!” Jake roared, his voice straining over the deafening, multi-elemental maelstrom.

The Overload timer was plunging. They had less than sixty seconds, when originally, they had over three minutes.

High above, the Aegis Monolith flickered wildly. It had spent the last seven rotations, along with the starting gambit, desperately dumping its restorative fuel to cover the Battlegroup’s rapid damage output. Now, as Bree, Ophelia, and Avalara's Treants pummeled the gladiator past the final health threshold, the ceiling fixture gave a dying, crystalline whine and shattered into a rain of useless, glowing dust.

The healing light died, the health pool gone.

From his anchor point, Jake's Umbral Gaze flared. The gamelike invulnerability shielding the Gyroscopic Ring's heavy brass-and-obsidian-colored clamps finally vanished. Through his special sight, Jake analyzed the exact phrasing of the Dungeon Script alongside the real-time mana flow of the room. The script warned that the agitated cores would continue Ambient Manifestation indefinitely until shattered.

But Jake’s Gaze saw the mechanical truth beneath the prompt: the Astrolabe was rapidly cannibalizing the cores' internal mana to fuel those endless elemental summons and the titan’s strength. If the Battlegroup played it safe and focused entirely on killing the Titan first, the Astrolabe would bleed the elemental cores dry, reducing their hard-earned loot to worthless, hollow husks. If they wanted the treasure, they didn't have a choice. They had to take it right now.

“The Monolith is dead! Execute the heist!” Jake commanded. “Sever the Astrolabe!”

The elites who were a part of the plan moved with practiced, lethal precision. Having prepared for this moment, Tanda, Dahlia, Timone, and Avalara surged forward and unleashed perfectly synchronized Cyclic Strikes. Beams and blades of golden light flashed, carrying the fury of the beastkin at four distinct points on the Astrolabe’s railings, severing the pillars that held them up and breaking any connections to the machine. Their attack’s paths actually struck more than one location, their cleaving cuts intentionally cutting through as much as they could.

With four deafening fractures of shattering magical brass, the housings of the Gyroscopic Rings broke apart, freeing the elementals, as Ophelia dragged the Boss to the true center of the arena–away from any of the cores.

Instantly, the native leaders of The Burning Steps stepped up to fulfill the second half of Jake's plan. But the moment the cores were severed from the machine, they didn't just passively drop. Stripped of their regulatory metal and seals housing them, the elemental densities violently decompressed, expanding into their true, immense forms. They lashed out with the raw, chaotic rage of ancient forces that had been chained and drained by Tartarus's terrible machine.

A miniature sun of blinding plasma, a grinding sphere of jagged tectonic plates, a churning, building-sized ocean, and a localized hurricane filled the four edges of the arena.

Sati didn't flinch at the danger they presented. Floating above the chaos, the unbroken flame flared her spirit to its absolute limit as she prayed–a dozen arms and hands clasped in various mudras. She didn't just focus on the blazing Fire anomaly; she projected an overwhelming wave of compassion, mercy, and love for all things across the entire arena. Her divine grace acted as a spiritual balm, actively soothing the violent, tortured rage of the four massive elementals, dulling their chaotic lashing just enough for the rest to actually engage them.

Across the room, Elder Morak and Garona were ready. They anchored their stances, projecting their sheer spiritual weight to lock down the crushing gravity of the Earth Elemental anomaly. Across from them, High Prelate Lethyrian and his clergy wove frantic, glowing mudras to cage the tearing gales of the living windstorm. Valora and Zephyr moved into position and helped with their bestial and heavenly control over the element to calm it.

And for the massive, churning sphere of heavy water, Nessa seamlessly flew forward to join Elder Oram and the rest of the water temple clergy. Igniting Varuna’s Spark within her soul, she projected her own divine, oceanic authority. Her resonant energy blended with the Anuran prayers, helping the exhausted mystics pacify the raging tides of the water elemental.

It was a brutal, heroic extraction. But hindsight revealed the one magical physics interaction they hadn't anticipated, and he couldn’t help but lament that they didn’t predict it and that Aisling didn’t foresee this either–that sure would have been nice. Still, he couldn’t blame the woman–she was actively knocking people out of harm's way and helping in ways it was difficult to understand. She did her best.

The Tetra-Forged Titan and its domain didn't power down. Instead, its domain stayed active and was still growing in a crescendo of danger. All four elements started to swirl around it, picking up where the end of the encounter had left off.

Stripped of its healing Monolith and disconnected from the Astrolabe, the towering gladiator was starving of energy and weakened. But the Battlegroup had spent eight full cycles as the Titan's Domain Attrition compounded. The air in the center of the arena was so saturated with heavy, multi-elemental mana that it acted like a physical tether.

By freeing the highly volatile cores before the Titan was dead, they had inadvertently handed a starving machine an exposed buffet. The Titan was violently siphoning the freed elemental storms directly through the ambient domain itself, using the thick, viscous mana of the arena as a... partially invisible umbilical cord. The cores were thankfully still calm, but their energy was being drawn toward the gladiator.

“It's drinking through the domain!” Jake called out over the chaotic battlefield. “Block it off, and protect the clergy!”

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The arena turned into a desperate, two-front war. Sati, Morak, Nessa, and the native clergy dug in with their efforts, warriors rushing in to help protect them while they tried to capture the cores. The clergy were caught in the middle–projecting their wills to suppress the chaotic storms in front of them while simultaneously physically fighting the environment to keep those same massive anomalies from being dragged away by the Titan's residual mana-siphon.

But Clan Hart didn't panic. They had won three flawless dungeon raids already this year. They hadn't just beaten this encounter; they had dominated it, and they still had plenty of gas in the tank. On the outside, Tanda’s spriggans quickly moved into action, enhancing the jungle to grow vines of protection. Fhesiah’s fire sprites created fiery barriers of compassion, and Ruby’s rolling avalanche of bloodmetal blades blocked off the central domain.

Jake, Bloodberri and Ophelia pushed out their Champion, Hearthian Auras to their maximum, covering all involved. They pushed their domains to the absolute limit now, countering the Titan’s growing aura in the center.

In the center, Ophelia, Avalara, Bree, and Bloodberri didn't retreat from the gladiator's desperate, enraged flurry. Instead, they could only grin at the challenge. The team had purposely hoarded enough burst damage between them to blast the boss down another ten percent instantly.

“Break its body!” Ophelia roared, already fully enlarged and using her Valkyrie Champion ability. Even her Sentinel enlarged, and Retribution was blasting deadly lightning from all the damage the raid had taken so far.

The Valkyrie and the tanking vanguard surged forward, completely abandoning their defensive rotation. They unleashed a catastrophic, perfectly synchronized barrage of Vajrafire and cleaving strikes, violently tearing into the gladiator's chassis and shattering its physical weapon arms while the natives fought the magical pull of the elements. Bree’s hounds tore into the titan, powerful manifestations denting its mechanical body with their fierce bites, as she unleashed a torrent of her savage, elemental flames.

Jake didn't hesitate. He deactivated Sanctum, letting the offensive lines unleash their saved ultimates. However, the domain presented a special challenge. The multi-elemental domain swirled around it, like a wall of chaotic elements. Ophelia and the rest put on a strong front as they wore the boss down, but they were being worn down as well. If they didn’t finish the boss quickly, the many elders may run out of spiritual fuel in calming the elementals.

He needed to sever the magical tether, and he was mindful of the cosmic audience watching from Tartarus. Jake deliberately kept his pure Void Furnace and the strength of their Fusion Ascension locked down. He didn't need to show them his ceiling. However, he needed to push his synchronization to its limits.

His aura flared, shifting into his Sage State. Through their Hearthian Bond, Jake reached out, matching Fhesiah’s exact emotional and magical wavelength–the precise, playful, dominant intent they had locked in during their date in Firewake. Once again, he was going to pull off a heist. This time, with larger stakes.

Fhesiah felt the shift instantly. Across the arena, her golden flames flared with blinding light.

“You clear the canvas this time,” Jake’s intent echoed through their bond, flipping their previous dynamic with a surge of shared thrill. “I'll paint the new reality.”

Fhesiah had been ready, drawing her flames into her lungs for this moment. She flew toward him with incredible speed and landed next to him. Their hearths connected in synchronization, their shared desire and thrill reaching its peak. Jake felt that all he had to do was will it, and they would become one.

Instead, she was empowered by their connection, the runes on her body lighting up with intense light. She didn't hold back. Taking a deep breath, she unleashed a massive, swirling torrent of Celestial Alchemy flames. The brilliant, golden, Yin-Yang fire didn't just burn; it forcefully transmuted the heavy, hostile domain in its path, clearing the way by melting the Titan’s remaining Aether brass chassis and defensive shielding into harmless, bubbling slag.

Simultaneously, Jake’s state shift meant his hearth core was transformed into the same dragon and kitsune flames, with a tiny fraction of Celestial Alchemy flames. He didn’t have the mithril claws of alchemy, but he always had a piece of wives’ spirits with him. Drawing the flames into his Scorching Ray, he drew up much of the remaining flames from Sanctum into his staff–Pyros’s focus–the energy still present after he had shut it down.

The energies spiraled together, compressing into a swirling, impossibly dense ball of conceptual fire as he infused his will, his Void of Family to mimic Fhesiah’s dao. Jake aimed directly at the focal point of the Titan's domain–the invisible, churning nexus of ambient mana hovering just above its chest cavity, following Fhesiah’s path she just pierced through.

He unleashed the Celestial Scorching Ray.

While Fhesiah’s breath violently cleared the physical obstacles from the board, Jake’s hyper-concentrated beam of Void and Alchemy painted their new reality. It tore across the arena, violently eradicating the ambient mana connecting the gladiator to the cores. It pierced the tether and fundamentally unmade the magical connection as it pierced through its chest and the wall behind it with a screeching roar of its own.

The residual tether snapped with a deafening, concussive blast. The shockwave of displaced air cleared the heavy domain from the center of the room instantly.

Severed from its final lifeline and physically melted to scrap by Fhesiah, Ophelia, and Bloodberri, the Tetra-Forged Titan froze mid-swing. The glowing, hostile runes along its chassis flickered rapidly, then died completely. The colossal gladiator let out a dying, mechanical groan and collapsed to its knees, completely powered down, then got converted into Loot in a flash of light.

Across the room, the sudden release of tension sent the natives stumbling backward, the chaotic magic of the four pristine, Mythic-grade elemental cores finally soothing into a quiet, dormant stasis in their magical hands.

A glowing Framework window materialized in the center of the scorched arena.

[Alliance Victory! Calculating Rewards. You have only 5 minutes before the Instance will be destroyed. A Raid Chest has been provided in lieu of more time to salvage the remains. Participants will be transferred to Primary Alliance HQ on The Burning Steps. You may enter the portal when ready to exit.]

A massive, ornate raid chest materialized on the scorched floor, overflowing with high-value gear-upgrade tokens to go along with the massive injection of Raid Points for Hearthtribe’s Ledger.

Jake walked over and swiftly claimed the chest's contents, but his eyes narrowed at the timer. It was the Framework's standard method of controlling the economy of a Dungeon Raid. By giving the raid a generous sum of Raid Points and a five-minute eviction notice, the Framework effectively prevented Adventurers from staying behind to harvest the boss's ultra-valuable corpse or the magically dense environment.

But Clan Hart had spent the last three raids perfecting their efficiency.

“We only have less than five minutes!” Jake barked over the hiss of steam, pointing to the ruined chassis of the Titan, the shattered joints of the Astrolabe, and the heavy Aether-Brass floorboards. “If you aren't actively calming a core, strip the room! Everything that isn't bolted down goes in the spatial rings and bags. And if it is bolted down, break the bolts!”

The exhaustion of the grueling attrition war vanished from the room. The primal instinct of the Adventurer took over, and they scattered instantly, weapons already drawn for demolition.

With the loot protocol initiated, Jake turned his attention strictly back to the native leaders.

Elder Morak’s heavy stone arms were trembling as he held his palms outstretched, projecting his sheer spiritual weight alongside Garona to anchor a massive, grinding sphere of hyper-dense bedrock that hovered above the floor. High Prelate Lethyrian’s breath was coming in short, strained gasps as his clergy helped weave complex wind-taming mudras around a localized, deafening hurricane.

They had successfully placated the elemental cores, but suppressing anomalies of this size was taking a massive toll. These were untamed, Mythical-rarity-and-grade forces of nature, and nearly a full tier above the weaker natives.

“They are resting and calm for now, Champion,” Elder Oram rasped. The Anuran mystic and his elders had their hands locked in continuous, glowing prayers, projecting their will to contain the churning, house-sized sphere of heavy water suspended in the air. His golden eyes were wide with awe and exhaustion. “But their spirits are vast. I do not know how long we can keep them asleep. We were lucky that their spirits were so drained to begin with.”

“You don't have to,” Jake said, striding over quickly. “You all did perfectly, but we can't take them through the portal like this. If an untamed elemental of this magnitude wakes up and lashes out in the middle of the HQ’s plaza, it will level a city block in seconds.”

Jake opened his spatial inventory and withdrew a heavy, intricate strongbox. It was forged from pure obsidian-colored magical metals and lined with deeply carved, highly complex sealing arrays that hummed with his enchantments.

He hadn't just entered this dungeon hoping to find a Water Core; he had spent days building the exact containment vessel required to transport one, or something like it, safely without bleeding its ambient magic.

Because he didn’t know what he was going to get or how he was going to get it, exactly, he was prepared for damned near anything. If the core was teeming with taint, so what? He’d take it and purge it later. He was going home with something, whether it was a water core or not. Jake would find a way to turn something into one if he had to.

With practiced care, Jake stepped up to the massive aquatic anomaly. He opened the strongbox, and the spatial arrays flared to life. The box acted like a localized vacuum, instantly suffocating the core's ambient manifestation and violently compressing the massive, room-spanning sphere of water into a concentrated, stasis-locked essence. As the last drop of the storm was sucked inside, Jake snapped the heavy latches shut.

Elder Morak grunted, eyeing the towering Earth Core as the instance timer ticked down past the four-minute mark. “And the other three? Something tells me you didn’t bring four of that thing...”

Sati glided forward, her expression serene as she looked up at the blazing, miniature sun of the Fire Core hovering above them. “This one is just like me. Perhaps not all that different from what I was before I met Faye. It is no problem for me to handle it safely for a time.” Her radiant aura flared, and she didn't pack the massive core away–she simply opened her arms. The towering inferno spiraled downward, funneling directly into her chest. The fiery elemental sank into her, safely contained within the vast, disciplined warmth of her hearth, where it could stay until they reached their home, no doubt.

That left Earth and Wind.

Jake stepped up to Morak and Lethyrian, placing a hand directly against the swirling exterior of the hurricane and the gravity-warping surface of the boulder. He couldn't build two more Mythic-grade containment boxes in three minutes, but he didn't need to. As a Champion and the Hearthian Nexus, his soul was a fortress.

Before he imposed his will, Jake took a fraction of a second to gauge their spiritual resonance. He would never force a bond on a truly sapient, thinking being against their will, unless, well, this time certainly qualified–he was saving them from dungeon dissolution, after all. But as his aura brushed against the immense Earth and Wind cores, he found no complex thoughts, no ego, and no soul to violate.

They were purely ancient, reactive manifestations of nature–more akin to a roaring hurricane or a grinding tectonic plate than a living creature. They possessed immense, chaotic drive but zero sapience.

Jake projected his overwhelming spiritual authority as he sent condensed Void-Divine Hearthflames deep into their centers, bypassing their chaotic nature and establishing a direct, domineering Summoner’s bond with the sleeping elementals. He didn't try to permanently tame them for battle right now; he just anchored their massive wills to his own spiritual weight, forcing them into a state of absolute submission.

With a pulse of his aura, the towering Earth and Wind anomalies collapsed, dissolving into streaks of light that shot into his spiritual space to rest safely alongside Zephyr for now. This was what he had to use before he had the option of being able to send them to his Sanctuary, and it was perfectly fine for these non-sapient entities.

Morak let out a massive sigh of relief, dropping his hands and rolling his aching, stone-armored shoulders. “Thank the Earth Mother. I thought the spiritual channels I worked hard on were going to shatter.” The troll chieftain exhaled heavily, finally allowing himself to look past Jake and take in the rest of the arena.

He froze. His rocky jaw went slack.

“Wait,” Morak rumbled, pointing a thick, trembling finger across the room. “Are they... peeling back the floorboards?”

In the brief three minutes Jake had spent securing the elementals, the elites of Hearthtribe had descended upon the arena like a swarm of highly coordinated, devastatingly efficient locusts.

Ophelia and Bloodberri hadn't bothered to sheathe or store their weapons. They had long since collected the slagged remains of the Tetra-Forged Titan and were now frantically hacking the most pristine Aether-Brass metal plates from what was left of the Astrolabe above and shoving the heavy slabs into their storage rings.

Nearby, Bree and her dinodogs were tearing directly into the seams of the arena and violently prying up massive sheets of the Aether-Brass floor. Avalara and Tanda were tearing away and directing the heavy treants to haul the shattered joints of the Astrolabe they had severed during the heist.

Whenever a gear was simply too massive to fit into a spatial ring, Fhesiah was right there, her Celestial Alchemy flames acting like a hyper-industrial blowtorch to melt the priceless metal down into manageable pieces.

Even Timone and Dahlia were sprinting and flying across the arena, scooping up and tearing the metal shards left behind. While the Loot skill worked against monsters, it did nothing to the dungeon environment.

High Prelate Lethyrian and Elder Oram stood frozen beside Morak. They watched in utter bewilderment as the majestic, divine warriors and champions of justice that had just saved their world with unparalleled grace and tactical supremacy reduced themselves to stealing the magical drywall.

Sati floated near the elders, gracefully adjusting her robes as her flaming hands reached into the distance and grabbed objects, tossing them into a spatial pouch as well.

She offered the stunned native leaders a serene, deeply amused smile. “My Ishvara is a man of practicality, Elders. It may seem a little greedy, a sin of the unenlightened. But in fact, it is justice instead. Every bolt and scrap metal, every precious treasure, and every Credit can be used to empower your people and reclaim what Tartarus has taken from them. How could my lord allow shame to cause us to miss such an opportunity?”

There wasn’t a whole lot of time left, but Elder Morak and the rest quickly snapped into action, understanding the truth. They, too, began to aid in tearing away the precious metals, helping them get loaded into Storage Rings or carts before they were dragged through the portal.

By the time the countdown hit ten seconds and the spatial distortion began to pull them back, the magnificent Astrolabe arena looked like it had been hit by a localized hurricane...a second and maybe even a third time. The Titan’s housing and much of any walls or pillars were gone, the Astrolabe gears and Gyroscopic Rings, despite their size, were gone, and half the floor was missing, exposing the raw, unbreakable dungeon metal below the instanced event.

Jake stood in the center of the barren crater, his spatial rings heavy with tons of priceless Aether-Brass.

As the teleportation light began to swallow them, Jake didn't look at the looted crater or the native elders. His Umbral Gaze pierced through the ceiling of the collapsing Prime Instance, looking out into the cosmic void where he knew the God of War and Justice was watching.

Jake offered a calm, deeply respectful nod to the invisible audience. “Thanks for watching over us, Father-in-Law. I hope to see you soon.”

He was thankful for Tyr’s help. Jake never would have taken such risks knowing the entity might cheat and take advantage of any weakness. That domain was truly dangerous, and in an intelligent creature’s control like Tartarus, Jake didn’t think even calling Hestia might have been enough. At the very least, he may not have been so cheeky as to go for all four elementals anyway. Three of those four cyclic strikes could have struck the boss directly, after all.

A moment later, the world dissolved into light. The spatial distortion deposited the massive Battlegroup and the native leaders directly into the center of the primary HQ plaza on the fire continent.

The adrenaline of the heist finally began to settle into a deep, victorious exhaustion. Jake looked across the wide, paved plaza toward the glowing Raid Point reclamation monolith. Usually, Valtor and the new Corvani merchants would already be standing there with their contracts and their merchant's grin, ready to separate Adventurers from their newly earned points.

Doing this saved them a lot of time trying to get things from auctions. And Valtor also helped guide Hearthtribe to make the best selections, of course.

But the space in front of the monolith was nearly completely empty, with only a few Battlegroups browsing its wares, and the Corvani merchants already starting their spiels with some of them. Clan Hart had dismantled the Prime Instance gauntlet with such overwhelming, compounding speed that their team was one of the first to finish.

The others were ones that had somewhat dejected looks–they had backed off at only one or two bosses completed, no doubt. It made sense to Jake that the highest difficulty would be the most brutal pace of all.

A burst of light from the golden hexagons of the Framework exploded from the HQ tower, rising into the sky and exciting those present.

Before High Prelate Lethyrian or Elder Morak could comment on the quiet plaza, Bloodberri slithered forward. Her posture was flawless, her eyes sharp with dynastic ambition. Blood was in full control, her mind already moving past the physical victory to the political conquest.

“The news of our victory will spread quickly, but we’ll have a few hours of rest first, as usual,” Blood declared, looking out toward the horizon. “The people of the capital cities will pour into the streets. We must march on each continent. Just as we did on Serthune, Morvalis, and Bramvalen, we will perform our victory lap and grand celebration. The Framework's words in the sky are easily forgotten by the average citizen. Seeing their heroes, Hearthtribe and its allies, march alongside their own temple clergy will help cement our alliance for generations.”

Blood omitted the words ‘empire’ and ‘dynasty.’ After all, the natives were right there. It would be moderately rude to them to point out that Jake was their emperor, even if it was effectively the case on a very loose level–they just might not like Jake to be called that.

[For now,] Blood mentally corrected Jake’s thought as she turned to Jake, her expression softening into absolute devotion. “As planned, we can lead the march and celebrations through the capitals, Milord. I understand you must secure the Pelagos merger and anchor the celestial arrays immediately. Given the core you just looted, who do you require for assistance?”

Jake nodded slowly, appreciating his wife's ruthless efficiency and her deference to his logistics. They had a plan, but many aspects of it required specifics. “I might need Nessa to calm the Water Core's ambient fluctuations while I enchant and merge it with the array housing up in space. Fhesiah, I require you to assist with the celestial array alterations to match the core’s specifications in the trench. Sati must also remain with us for a time. She can contain the Fire Core far longer than others could, but she cannot suppress such a thing indefinitely. We’ll take care of that before she can join the celebration, though I think I might require her when we establish the moon’s core as well.”

Blood nodded. “Very well, we shall make do. The rest of us will handle the shopping; don’t you worry about this at all.”

Jake gestured to the rest of the Prime Instance raid members. “The rest of you will lead Hearthtribe. Ophelia will naturally take the vanguard–she earned the glory of locking the Titan's blades. You’ve got a few hours of rest before the marching begins; go ahead and claim your rewards.”

Ophelia was immensely pleased with this, and so was Valora, her heart soaring with vindication. The noble steed loved the victory parades just as much as Ophelia herself did.

However, through their bond, Jake felt a sudden, distinct spike of wistful anticipation from the Berri half of the Echidna's soul. He had promised her a date on a moon if such an opportunity presented itself. And now was really not a great time. Again.

Jake gave her an apologetic smile. “I know I promised you the first pitch in orbit, Berri.”

Berri’s presence surfaced briefly, her eyes softening as she conceded to Blood's grand strategy. “It's fine, Jakey. Honestly, bringing a girl into zero gravity to look at a giant floating water droplet isn't exactly prime real estate for baseball anyway. You go do your cosmic architect thing. Make me a real moon with actual dirt and gravity first, then we can go there. Blood and I will go enjoy the parades. There are always plenty of kids to meet!”

Elder Morak stepped forward, looking slightly concerned. “But how will we explain your absence to the masses, Lord Hart? The people will want to see the leader and hero who helped save them.”

Blood’s smile sharpened into something brilliantly cunning. “You tell them the truth, Elder,” she instructed, expertly weaving the raw mythology of their actions into a divine narrative. “You tell them that while we walk the world to celebrate their freedom and victory over the invaders, the Champion has ascended to the heavens to perform the five-stoned miracle of Nuwa and the Divine of the Accord. That he is up there, mending the broken sky and forging the beginning of a new moon to heal the world, to give back what was once lost.”

Lethyrian and Morak's eyes widened in awe at the sheer mythological weight of the explanation. It wasn't a mere political absence.

It was a divine mandate. And most importantly, it was the truth. The elf bowed deeply. “It shall be sung in every temple.”

With the logistics flawlessly settled by Blood, the Battlegroup and the native leaders departed to begin their shopping before their rest and world-spanning victory lap. Ophelia practically glowed with anticipation of the crowds, while the beastkin were already talking about the capital feasts and duels they’ll get with the raid-seeking adventurers that were always present.

Left alone in the quiet HQ plaza with his specialized team, Jake wasted no time.

“To the secure labs,” Jake instructed Nessa, Fhesiah, and Sati, gesturing toward his Refuge portal.

They had massive celestial arrays to build, a moon to seed, and a planetary merger to execute. And once that was all settled, Jake had a very specific hearthforging to perform with Sati.