PROLOGUE - DIANA

  [ Threats Detected! ]

  Diana froze.

  The grip on her necroscythe tightened, ever so slightly.

  She squinted into the darkness.

  Hard to see much past the rib cage.

  The only light source in the hollow underground chamber was a single lantern, crafted by Diana herself. It hung still from the top of an iron pole, driven deep into the leviathan’s fossilized ribs—unswaying in the stale, ancient air.

  The light didn’t reach far.

  “What was that, Codex?” Diana asked in a low whisper. “Say again? There’s not supposed to be anyone down here.”

  [ I’m aware, miss. And yet— ]

  “And yet, threats detected,” Diana echoed quietly.

  She had known the strange entity for years now.

  If the Codex said [ Threats Detected ]… well, threats had been detected.

  “I don’t see anything,” she whispered, eyeing the walls of the vast underground chamber that served as her excavation site.

  Maybe it was Maxwell who came to try recruiting her once again for his cause.

  She dismissed the thought.

  Harvesting bone was best done in peace.

  No sense in bringing Maxwell and his restlessness into it.

  Still… best to be prepared.

  “Skill of Arms,” she whispered. “I call you from the Aether.”

  [ Item Gained | Synthetic Class (Aetherized) ]

  [ Synthetic Class Equipped | Warrior ]

  Diana took in a breath, feeling a surge of strength, endurance, and coordination fill her.

  It’s truly amazing, she reflected—the Crafter Ability Core.

  You can even craft an entirely new class.

  Hair on her neck still raised, Diana turned to study the leviathan—the massive, ancient creature whose bones she was carefully collecting.

  At one time, this beast would have been the terror of the oceans—an unstoppable predator wielding a new adaptation for the time: jaws.

  Not only had it been powerful, but it had been magically augmented. That arcane enhancement made its already supernatural plating and bones worth harvesting.

  For the last day and a half, Diana had worked in the depths of the dark chamber, collecting materials from fossilized tails to spines to fins to jaws.

  The chamber was shaped like a clay storage jar—wide and bloated at the bottom, with smooth, steep walls leading up to a narrow neck that let in just a sliver of starlight from above, like looking up from the bottom of a very deep well.

  In thirty-six hours, all Diana had seen or sensed were spiders, a few cave reptiles, and the occasional, torturous drip of stalagmites.

  That—apart from the sound of the [ Necroscythe | Type: Tool | Quality: Heroic | Lvl 32 ] tapping at the fossil—were the only sounds she’d heard the whole time.

  [ Perhaps it is best to act as if I said nothing, while we formulate our plan. ]

  Yeah, Diana thought, responding telepathically. Yeah, you’re probably—

  She stopped.

  Something was off.

  What was it?

  The dripping water.

  The sound of the stalactite had stopped.

  Something was standing directly beneath it, catching the droplet before it could fall.

  Could she picture, without turning, where that stalactite was?

  She thought she could.

  Ready for a fight?

  [ Yes, it’s just— ]

  A rustle came from the opposite wall. Likely a distraction.

  And here she was—exposed, wearing little more than light fabric pants and a loose excavation shirt.

  She hadn’t dressed to impress.

  That wouldn’t do.

  “Tongue of Lamia,” she muttered, chipping at a fossilized rib bone with her tool to mask her words. “I call you from the Aether.”

  In one fluid motion, she hooked the necroscythe to her belt.

  She spun, hand open as if to receive a thrown weapon.

  Time and space—and the places between—warped around her palm.

  From her Aetherial Stores, that invisible dimension only she could reach, a weapon she’d crafted weeks ago formed in her grasp.

  It was a sword, slender but nearly eight feet long, made from segmented vertebrae. Diana had taken the spine from an ancient princess of a long-dead race of slaver snakes.

  They hadn’t liked it when she freed their slaves.

  Their ruler returned from the dead to give Diana a piece of her mind.

  She took her spine instead.

  [ Equipped: Tongue of Lamia ]

  Diana whipped the sword in a clean arc. As it swung, the vertebrae separated, transforming into a whip of enchanted bone.

  I’ve been on a bone-kick the last few months, she realized.

  [ Quite so, Diana, ] the Codex chirped. [ In fact, I’ve run an analysis on your last eight crafts, and— ]

  Not now, Codex, she thought.

  The Codex went sheepishly quiet.

  She struck.

  The weapon lashed out, bone tip darting like a snake beneath the stalactite. She felt it pierce flesh.

  Then, with the whip embedded, she twisted her grip—

  —and the weapon solidified.

  Then she yanked.

  Much of her power lay in her arms, armor, and synthetic classes, but Diana still had abilities far beyond the natural, even for her kind.

  Diana tugged her assailant out of the darkness and into the light of her hanging torch.

  Then her eyes went wide.

  It was a man, looking to be in his forties, though at this level of power, true age was hard to discern.

  “Maxwell,” Diana breathed, “I’m so sorry, I—” the man’s expression was dark. He looked…different. She couldn’t place exactly how. She was too distracted by the sight of her own weapon driven deep into the man’s chest.

  Yet, despite the gore, Maxwell seemed…unbothered.

  Not just unbothered—the man was casting a spell.

  Magic, Max?

  Who are you?

  Shards of amethyst light gathered at his wrists, and cloudy ink of the same color ran into the pupils of his eyes.

  Diana’s own eyes, blue and usually so calm and steady, were wide with fear.

  Diana was not what many of the scholars at the universities imagined as a typical archaeologist or paleontologist.

  Thin, with soft pale skin and naturally pouting lips, she also didn’t look like what most of the burly men imagined a master blacksmith looking like.

  Or a master leatherworker.

  Or alchemist.

  Or enchanter.

  And yet she was all these things.

  Master weaponsmith and armorsmith, deft leatherworker, exacting and calculated alchemist, and mystical, deep-arcane-delving enchanter, she was all.

  Only this was the difference between the natural and her Ability Core.

  Crafter.

  It was this combination that she relied on for survival.

  For situations like this.

  Muttering something incomprehensible, Maxwell released the amethyst shards, and they sailed into the lantern’s light, seeking her.

  “Lightstone,” she thought urgently, and pulled.

  A slab of rock, something between quartz and marble, rose from the rib of the leviathan, interposing itself between Diana and the oncoming spell.

  The shards of amber splashed against the quartz face of the stone, and Diana was already circling it, over the shock of Maxwell’s apparent betrayal and keen for revenge.

  The lightstone had absorbed the spell completely, and Maxwell’s face twisted with rage—though he still seemed unbothered by the chain of vertebrae piercing his chest.

  There’s a craft for every situation in those Aetherial Stores, Diana thought. Aether Crafter. How strange it is.

  It was a Holy Combination, some believed—the Elemental Affinity: Aether and Ability Core: Crafter combination.

  Aether Crafters were one of several combinations that only one person could have at a time on this plane of existence, and Diana had held the station for decades.

  Next to her on the rib-bone of the ancient leviathan, Maxwell prepared to launch another spell at her.

  “Armor of Euridyc—” she began, then something slammed into her neck.

  [ Ability Interrupted: Pull from Aether ]

  [ Condition Gained: Ability Locked - Pull From Aether ]

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  Whatever had been scaling the wall behind her had struck. She’d been distracted by Maxwell.

  How long had this betrayal been in the works?

  One year?

  Two?

  “Armor of,” Diana began again, ducking beneath the amethyst shards as more flew from Maxwell’s wrist. She spun, kicking him in the chest, right next to where the Tongue of Lamia still stuck through his heart.

  [ Ability Locked: Pull From Aether ]

  There was a sickening “shucking” sound as Maxwell slid off the vertebrae sword, crying out as he fell back into the depths of the cavern.

  More figures were appearing now, ringing her in the darkness outside the view of her lamp.

  Projectiles rained down on her from all sides.

  Diana shrugged her arms close to her chest and stepped off the rib bone, slipping between the spaces in the rib cage and dropping down where the creature’s stomach had long since been lost to time.

  Arrows skittered off the ribcage, and fiery streaks of light illuminated the cavern meters at a time as they sailed from the ceiling to splash against the fossilized bone.

  Diana’s hand flew up to her neck, where she’d been hit while trying to summon her armor.

  Her fingertips found cold metal, and her breath stopped in her chest.

  A collar.

  She didn’t like how delicate it felt. She tapped it, ears attuned to the sound of her fingernail, testing the density.

  Enchanted, without a doubt, but…gold. Delicate. Decorative.

  A cold pit grew in her stomach.

  That is not good.

  Spikes? Sure. Brutal irons? Sure. She’d never tried either before, but she could be convinced.

  But gold?

  Like a prize-winning pig at the fair. Like the most prized pig of all.

  Diana cursed her stupidity as the wave of projectiles hitting the ribcage intensified. An arrow, black tipped and enchanted, landed close enough to pierce the loose, sweat-stained shirt she’d been excavating in. Fortunately, it hadn’t grazed the skin.

  Any other ability—I could have done any other ability, she thought. But Pull from Aether?

  All Crafter Ability Cores, regardless of elemental affinity, were not primarily combat-focused. They could be made to excel to extraordinary lengths, compete and, sometimes even, surpass the best of them. But they all relied on prep work, crafting weapons, armors, tools, and utilities to succeed.

  The Aether Affinity put a spin on this—access to the Aether provided not only a host of complex, powerful spells, but also the ability to Aetherize items, placing them in an extra-dimensional storage that the crafter could then retrieve from thin air at a whim.

  Before coming here, Diana had stopped at a city on the edge near the coast, where the Dioscar were hoping once again to reclaim their former glory.

  She’d once brought an entire, previously-crafted castle out of her Aetherial Stores.

  Although, in fairness, that was her record.

  But without the ability to pull from the aether, everything she had was no longer within reach. Enchanted weapons and armor for all scenarios. Alchemical potions and poisons. Structures, even automated golem-like creatures capable of performing tasks—Diana had most of a city in her Aetherial Stores.

  She was powerful.

  Not as powerful as she could be—not close—but she was known as a force of nature.

  Perhaps finally too well known.

  They had timed it perfectly.

  They had interrupted her right in the middle of a crucial ability, catching her in the worst way an Aether Crafter could possibly be caught.

  It had been a long time since she was last incapable of calling whatever she needed from the Aether to suit the situation.

  This might even be good.

  A challenge.

  She smiled.

  What do you think, Codex? Should I keep the sword, or does it not count?

  [ You did pull it from the Aether… ]

  Diana stowed the sword. She’d use it in an emergency.

  And….she waited for a pause in the projectiles.

  Go.

  She dove forward, crossing the ribcage and picking up as many of the black-tipped arrows as she could.

  [ Item Gained: Inkdepth Arrow, x4 ]

  Even in the dim light from her lantern on the ribcage above her, she could see the slick poison that coated the tips.

  She ran one of the poison-tipped arrows along her tongue as she looked for Maxwell’s body in the darkness.

  [ Alchemist Ability Activated: Alchemist’s Resistance ]

  [ Resistance Gained: Inkdepth Poison ]

  She couldn’t find Maxwell himself, but a pool of his blood dripped from one of the arching rib bones.

  Diana had a plan.

  She checked the recipe and made her decisions.

  First, she tore the feathers from the black arrows, before discarding the arrows themselves.

  [ Item Gained: Falxish Feather, x4 ]

  Then she dipped the feathers in Maxwell’s blood.

  She needed a third ingredient.

  She picked at the base of one of the rib bones with the Necroscythe in three heavy strikes, sending debris and fossilized dust out in all directions.

  Recipe nearly complete.

  [ Item Gained: Bloodstained Falx Feather, x4 ]

  [ Item Gained: Bone Dust, x2 ]

  Diana shut her eyes. She pictured the grayish-brown dust within the greater scope of the world. She saw its chemical composition, its anthropological meaning, and its magical qualities. She clung to things old and things dead.

  She didn’t need bone dust—she needed grave dust.

  And ancient alchemists didn’t need lead—they needed gold.

  [ Alchemist Ability Activated: Transmute Material ]

  [ Bone Dust | Transmutation | Grave Dust ]

  That would do.

  [ Recipe: Potion of Dark-Seeing ]

  > Usable Materials:

  >> Bloodstained Falx Feather

  >> Grave Dust

  I’d hardly call this a potion, Diana thought, pinching the Bloodstained feathers, now coated in a light blue dust, into her mouth. She swallowed the clump of wet feathers harshly.

  Magical illumination filled the chamber, and Diana saw perfectly.

  Her breath held.

  There were dozens of them.

  Men and women in robes of dark amethyst, with cracked, pale skin, bent backs, uneven musculature.

  Unchosen.

  They weren’t here for her, after all.

  Diana felt fear from the Codex. A trembling, helpless fear.

  I won’t let them get you, Diana reassured the Codex, who didn’t respond.

  Unchosen brutes, hulking things eight feet tall with hunched backs and singularly large arms that pounded the ground with meaty fists as they hurled their uneven bodies descended onto the ribcage above her, and ran towards the edge to dive into the belly of the beast and smash her to bits.

  It might have been a fair fight, if she’d had all the various contingencies, armor sets, and crafts from years of work at her disposal.

  “Get out of here,” she told the Codex. “Separate. I’ll be okay…go find another host.”

  [ Negative ]

  “Do it, Codex,” Diana said grimly, as one of the Unchosen Brutes shoved his way between the rib bones, pounding one with his fist and sending it slamming sixty feet away into the cave wall just to make enough space to fit.

  [ I cannot. There is a seal preventing me from separating. And…I cannot leave you helpless. ]

  If the Codex fled, it would take her Elemental Affinity and Ability Core with it.

  There’s no time.

  She thought she could see what the Codex was talking about: A thin membrane of purple amethyst around the bowl-shaped cavern. High above, at the small neck of the cave, the stars above were tinted ever so slightly purple.

  So that’s the objective.

  Fear still trembled from the Codex.

  An image stuck in her mind, a memory—a baby deer, somehow finding itself in the middle of a city street. If that hadn’t been overwhelming enough, a lightning storm began, and the baby deer had frantically scrambled beneath an under-turned wagon, where it whined and trembled.

  I’m going to get you out of here, Codex.

  Diana’s face smoothed into resolve.

  The Unchosen Brute dropped into the ribcage.

  She was already on the move.

  I’m going to get you out of here, Codex.

  She began to sprint, crossing the belly of the beast, working her way toward the armor-plated head and jaw that had made it such a terror of the seas all those eons ago.

  Her arms pumped as she picked up speed, as brute after brute slammed into the ground, shaking the earth each time.

  She passed into the creature’s skull.

  Then her legs flex, and Diana jumped.

  She brought her fist upward, and time seemed to slow.

  She burst through the skull of the Dunkleosteus in an explosion of fossilized armor plating.

  [ Ability Activated: Fabrimancy ]

  It took all her power, but she melded with the armor plating of the skull as Diana, in a shower of plate and bone, began to craft.

  [ Crafted! Chest Armor: Fossilized Bone Chestplate ]

  [ Crafted! Leg Armor: Fossilized Bone Legplates ]

  [ Crafted! Hand Armor: Fossilized Bone Gloves ]

  [ Crafted! Foot Armor: Fossilized Bone Boots ]

  [ Crafted! Helmet: Fossilized Bone Helmet ]

  [ Crafted Set! Fossilized Bone, 5/5 ]

  [ Set Bonuses Acquired ]

  Diana slammed into the wall of the cave.

  No longer was she wearing the practical fabric of a paleontologist.

  Her body was covered head to toe in cruel-looking armor of fossilized bone, complete with a helmet with a smooth top, and piercing design around the jawline, to mimic the Dunkleosteus’ revolutionary adaptation.

  She drove her fist into the wall, and the gauntlet broke the stone.

  She perched for a moment as black-tipped arrows clattered off her armor.

  Those few that found the gaps were little issue—she had already used her alchemical abilities to form a resistance to the poison.

  The wounds themselves were little concern either—at least each individual one. At her level, self-healing was considerable.

  Diana punched the wall, driving her fist into the stone.

  Then she heaved herself upward, and drove a second fist into the stone, slightly higher.

  One punch at a time, she slowly climbed, as arrows and spells slammed into her.

  The armor held, but she felt it wearing.

  I can get us out of here, she promised the Codex as she climbed.

  Then something grabbed her leg, and pulled.

  An Unchosen Brute dragged them both off the cave wall, and Diana’s stomach lurched as she fell backwards to slam down, splintering the last unbroken bits of ribcage.

  Completely exposed, spell after spell assaulted the armor.

  It was fantastic against the arrows, but the spells.

  …if only I had my enchanting table.

  [ Diana… ] the Codex ventured nervously, [ What do we do? ]

  Diana didn’t answer right away, just grit her teeth.

  She turned over and pulled herself up, driving forward like a scrimmage player against the brute that had dragged her down. She slammed it into a splintered rib cage, yelling as she slammed it down, staking the brute on the broken rib bone like a shrike impales prey on a tree spine.

  That was just one, though, and there were dozens.

  Where had they all come from?

  Then an idea occurred.

  [ Diana, even with your resistance, you— ]

  Diana ignored the Codex.

  She dove for the nearest bone fragment, and shut her eyes.

  Pain surged at her stomach, at her arm, at the back of her head as amethyst shards slammed into her, their energies passing mostly through the unenchanted armor.

  But she ignored it.

  She focused on the fragment of bone, and imagined the skeleton as a whole.

  Aether Craft was as powerful as it was dangerous.

  Responsible use was imperative if a crafter wanted to avoid disaster.

  Now it was time to show Maxwell, the Unchosen, whoever wanted this prize-collar on her—just how disastrous it could be.

  It was time to be responsibly irresponsible.

  She imagined the whole of the skeleton—everything she had exposed, every shard on the ground, every bone still beneath the ground.

  “Aetherize.”

  For a fraction of an instant, the bones kept their exact position, except they were swapped for an eerie blueish green, ethereal light.

  [ Item Added to Aetherial Stores: Dunkleosteus Skeleton (Aetherized) ]

  Then the skeletal form collapsed.

  Motes of light dissipated in an explosion of light and color that only Diana, or any Unchosen attuned to Aether, could see.

  She shut her eyes, covered her mouth, even brought her shoulders up as far as she could and withdrew inside herself to cover her nose and ears as the chamber filled with Aether Particulate.

  To Aetherize so much without adequate preparation was…

  Well, it was an unexplainable thought that was best conveyed in the chorus of dying coughs and gasps of the Unchosen.

  Diana, fighting back pain, eyes red even through tears, began to climb the wall.

  All around her the Unchosen fell like flies as she climbed, fist after fist.

  Her lungs burned as the chemicals seared her organs.

  But she still felt the fear of the Codex, still pictured the scared fawn beneath the wagon in the lightning storm, and, plunging her gauntlets one at a time, scaled the wall to the cavern.

  The Aether Particulate wasn’t dissipating.

  It filled the cavern, the wine-jug shape providing little avenue from escape.

  Resistant as she was to her own element, Diana was beginning to feel the wear on her muscles.

  When the angle of the cave wall had her climbing against gravity, her legs dangling, it began to rise, moving toward the only outlet it could find.

  She was tired.

  So tired.

  She was grinning, though.

  She was going to make it.

  She’d taken them all out.

  The mouth to the cavern was just above. Just within reach.

  She was going to make it.

  She—

  Something tugged at her ankle, and she was pulled nearly off the wall.

  Diana screamed and slammed her fist into the wall once again by reflex.

  That single gauntlet, shoved a few inches into the stone, was all that kept her fixed to the slick walls of the cavern.

  What was that?!

  She looked down.

  There was a cord of Amethyst, reaching from deep in the cloud of Aether Particulate, extending up, and wrapping around her ankle, pulling as hard as it could.

  She slammed the second gauntlet in by instinct, and her fingers strained to keep her clinging to the ceiling as the holder of the amethyst cord pulled harder and harder on her ankle.

  Someone had survived her Aetherizing the Dunkleosteus.

  The particulate began to clear.

  The figure at the bottom looked like Maxwell, but…his features were different. Unreadable and changed.

  I wonder if I’ll ever learn what this was about, she thought, making eye contact with the being that was once pretending to be Maxwell.

  Maybe Maxwell had always been this thing.

  Maybe this thing had taken his skin.

  She wasn’t sure.

  Whatever it was, it smelled like

  Diana only knew one thing—

  Whatever their particular motivations were, they were after the Codex. And the Codex was scared, and this could not be allowed to continue.

  Gathering her strength, Diana plunged another fist into the cavern ceiling, climbing against gravity toward the mouth of the cave, and the starry night above.

  “Can you get out?”

  [ I will not leave you ]

  “Can I order you to leave me?”

  No response.

  “Can I order you to leave me?” Diana asked.

  [ …Yes. ]

  The pull was so intense. So strong. Was she stronger?

  You can be, she told herself. You can be stronger, for just a few more feet.

  She reached the mouth of the cavern. She kicked one boot into one side, another into the other side, and began to pound her fist into the amethyst membrane, which flexed and strained with each blow.

  The thing that was pretending to be Maxwell called something to her, but she couldn’t make out what.

  She ignored it.

  The amethyst membrane separating her from the night air began to flex.

  Everything still burned from the Aether Particulate—her lungs, organs, eyes, mouth, and muscles. Everything burned.

  Live by the Aether, die by the Aether, I guess.

  She slammed her fist once more into the membrane.

  It was beginning to crack, but not fast enough. Not before she would lose strength and fall to the cavern below. The Aether Particulate had risen, funneling up towards her to scour the walls of the cave.

  Tiny circles like acid burns rippled at the amethyst membrane, forming between the cracks as the Aether Particulate wore at the spell itself.

  An idea occurred.

  [ Diana, ] the Codex began.

  Diana ignored it.

  She shut her eyes, pictured the armor she had just crafted.

  She pressed her gauntlet against the membrane. Not a slamming fist, but an open palm.

  This is gonna hurt.

  “Aetherize.”

  [ Aetherized: fossilized Bone Armor ]

  The armor made from the ancient leviathan’s skull maintained its shape for a brief, flickering moment.

  Then it exploded into Aether Particulate.

  Screaming, Diana drove her fist through the membrane one last time, and the membrane shattered.

  She was covered in burns.

  She felt her scalp burn. Her arms; her legs.

  She tried to ignore the smell of burning hair.

  Everything hurt, so, so much.

  And still, the cord of violet grasped at her ankle.

  She pulled herself up, despite it all, and a fountain of Aether Particulate flew past her, escaping into the night.

  Diana threw her arms over the lip of the cave opening.

  She shut her eyes—she wanted to look up at the night sky one last time, but her eyes just hurt too much.

  Instead she hung on, arms trembling, fighting to stay out in the open air.

  Then, once the particulate had fled the cave, Diana took a deep breath of clean, night air.

  That’s nice, she thought.

  Codex—

  [ Please, let me stay with you. ]

  “Get outta here,” she said, breath rasping. “Go get somewhere safe.”

  The Codex hesitated.

  “Find someone new,” Diana said, forcing a sly grin, or at least what she hoped was a sly grin. It probably wasn’t very pretty.

  I think the aether is making my teeth disintegrate.

  “Someone worthy,” she said. “Or at least, someone we’d both like.”

  There was no response.

  Her arms were weakening.

  “And, Codex—”

  [ Yes, Diana? ]

  The little entity was overcome with grief and fear.

  “Don’t pick another Chosen Soul,” she said, almost smiling. “Not unless you have no other choice.”

  [ I can still remain with you, we can attempt to— ]

  “I command this.”

  There was a beat.

  If the Codex had one last word to her, it wasn’t around to say it. She’d purged it from her.

  And with it, her powers.

  Diana forced her eyes open, gazing one last time at the stars.

  Strength suddenly fled in an instant.

  The pain hit suddenly, the strain, the exhaustion.

  The Aether Particulate, which, because she no longer had her Elemental Affinity, she could not see.

  She gasped one last breath of fresh night air.

  Then the cord around her ankle tightened once more, and Diana was pulled back into the abyss.