City of Sin Book 9, Chapter 1

Prelude
The next three months seemed like they would breeze past in the blink of an eye. Norland continued to remain normal on the surface, but every major noble was paying attention to the impending Archeron attack on Faust.
This was a special event. Richard had already made it clear before that he was withdrawing from the Sacred Alliance, and for the sake of pride every powerful family would bar his path back. Even those with no grudges against him would participate.
Richard himself left Norland once he informed Julian of his decision, returning to the ancient library of the primal celestials. He had managed to unseal the book on their history, but most of the language was still a mystery to him. However, he had at least managed to determine that the stonelords would greatly ease evolution, which was enough.
Right after he was done with the book, he activated a stone table in the library. Numerous magical images quickly appeared on its surface, moving according to his intentions. This didn’t look like much, but it was a laboratory desk left behind by the primal celestials that operated purely on astral energy. Richard, who had trained in the Deepblue Dream, was starting to gain a small amount of this energy to use. The little he had was enough to at least activate the mechanisms within.
This table could both control experiments and handle information, serving much better than even a grandmaster gnome’s design. Linking to it with his soul, Richard gained direct control of it and could even pump energy into it through the trees ringing the demiplane. Numerous strange shapes and images formed on the surface, giving him an interface that sped up his calculations tenfold.
His first task was to figure out the fastest way to become an epic. His mana had been pulsing ever since he absorbed the Archeron heart, but it was starting to stabilise at level 23. This was still far away from level 27, the threshold of epics. Even ignoring the mana levels, the four boosts to his various attributes were difficult to account for.
He had focused the energy of his level 23 advancement on his physique, trying to contain as much of the demonic heart’s energy as he could. His three original hearts had changed functions, now acting as energy-absorbers that drained the core whenever it pulsed. They would then slowly release it to the rest of his body, lest his organs be destroyed with every beat. His body was quite strong already, but it couldn’t even compare to when Sharon reached level 21.
Thankfully, the gap in levels could be shored up with the power of his truenames. While neither of his bloodlines were all that dense, the awakening of their abilities had made them extremely powerful. He had learnt from his reading here that few could ever awaken truenames directly from their bloodlines, and the names that were passed down weren’t necessarily constant. In reality, a truename was an instinctive grasp of a law, just like with manipulating mana or a legendary ability. His decision to start analysing laws before he was even a grand mage left him with comprehension far beyond any others at his level, and that had translated into Dizmason and Schloanruvendaer.
Next was his runes. As the best runemaster in all of Norland, every one of his runes was custom-designed to suit him perfectly. Disintegrator now worked with the grade 5 Mana Armament at its core, supported by Kingsteel and Lifesbane. While all of that gave him an effective boost of one level, Midren’s battle edition gave him another level and a half. The heart of the abyssal lord actually brought him close to Sharon in terms of carrying capacity, able to use both sets in tandem while still having room left over.
Adding on half a level from his physique and a bit more from his weapons, Richard was at a level where he could challenge level 27 beings right now. In other words, he barely crossed the threshold of the epic realm. However, he was the weakest in that realm, possessing no way to deal with even his weaker peers, forget terrifying women like Sharon and Apeiron.
Sharon… Richard recalled every single thing he could about his master. She had only just passed level 23 when he’d first met her, but her mana could already compare to that of an epic being. While her body hadn’t completely matured yet, she was a natural master of space who could flee from any engagement. The battle in Faelor had sent her into her first hibernation, her mana shooting up to a whopping level 29 in the process while her body had been strengthened as well. Even the recovered Apeiron couldn’t break through her defences anymore, making her comparable to an archlord.
On the other hand, Apeiron was someone who had a singular approach to combat, possessing speed that almost made no sense. Her techniques approached perfections, and her attacks were unpredictable and dangerous. This was a blistering offence that used all of her strength in every blow. However, this left her weaknesses apparent as well— her body just couldn’t match her skill. Keeping herself from submitting to the laws of chaos had taken a huge toll on her body, leaving lasting damage that she couldn’t easily heal. Her physique was only as good as an ordinary legendary warrior, which meant the only thing saving her was her chaos and speed. It was difficult to hit her, but any hit would leave her on the verge of death.
A million different colours flickered across the table, but in Richard’s eyes the process was slowed down greatly. At the centre of the images was Apeiron making every sort of battle movement; even the smallest wiggle was frozen, the muscle movements analysed as Richard fed in the data from his own memories.
The conclusion gradually became obvious; it was impossible for him to surpass her, be it in speed, technique, or laws. Even equalling her was impossible. For now, his optimal state was still a level lower than her, so the only way to win was exploiting her body.
Watching the figure on the table in various battle stances, Richard suddenly smiled as he realised what to do. He pulled up his sleeves and looked at his right hand, the fingertips blood red from the activation of Lifesbane. He currently had a total of five stacked on each arm; only five.
Why should he limit himself to five Lifesbanes when he still had a lot of capacity remaining? Wasn’t this a rune that was meant to be stacked endlessly?
Richard couldn’t give himself two sets of Midren, but he could definitely add more Lifesbanes to his body. If there were enough, he would come to a point where even a small brush with Apeiron would kill her.He could also modify the rest of his runes, throwing away all capacity optimisations for the sake of pure power.
Besides this, he could also grow his control of laws. His perception had grown severalfold here, and if he played his cards right he just might be able to fully grasp at least one law by the time he would have to battle.
With that, he knew just how he would get stronger.