The Insane Regressor: Throne of Pride

The gray threads pierced through the box’s metal layers without breaking a single seal.

[The final requirement has been detected within the host’s range.]

The status screen faded, and a larger window took its place.

[Requirements for ascension to the Ninth Rank — Walker]

[Heart of an Eighth-Rank being: complete.]

[Five extra lives held in reserve: complete — 10/5.]

[A trace of one of the Seven Sins: complete.]

[Registered trace: Mask of Loftiness.]

All three requirement lines turned dark red at the same instant.

[All requirements for ascension have been fulfilled.]

[Does the host wish to absorb the heart and begin formal ascension to the Ninth Rank — Walker?]

[Yes / No]

Ravian kept his gaze fixed on the two options.

Since the first time he’d laid eyes on these requirements, he had been forced to leave the City of Light, breach its fortress, make his way to the capital, hunt for a financier, face the Ambassador of Truth, die, and then detonate his own soul and return from something no one should ever have returned from.

All of it had brought him to this chair, before a small, sealed box.

He felt no hesitation.

But Absolute Focus swept through the room one final time, reviewing the positions of the door and windows, the number of lives he held, the stability of his soul, the condition of his body, and the nearest escape route should the ascension cause an upheaval he couldn’t conceal.

He found not a single reason to delay.

”Yes.”

[The host’s choice has been confirmed.]

[Please open the containment vessel and establish direct contact with the heart.]

Sovereign Pride made no attempt to bypass the box’s seals or tear out what lay inside by force.

Instead, Ravian extended his other hand, and in that same instant, Void Shadow spread out from beneath his feet.

It seemed that the active use of Absolute Focus, combined with Void Shadow—a passive ability—produced an effect far greater and deadlier than either could achieve alone.

The room didn’t turn dark, and nothing vanished from his sight, but Ravian’s presence rapidly contracted. The heat of his body, the pressure of his soul, and every trace of his life disappeared from the surrounding space, while the disturbances around the table were sealed within a silent layer of emptiness.

Once he’d made certain that the first pulse wouldn’t pass through the walls, he ran his finger along the central line of the Seal Box.

The silver lines responded one after another.

The interlocking seals slowly withdrew. The line that had seemed to have no beginning split into two halves, and a faint click came from within the box, like the release of a breath held for a very long time.

Ravian lifted the lid.

In the next instant, a heavy pressure descended upon the room.

The wood beneath the box creaked, the water in the pitcher near the bed trembled, and Void Shadow rippled violently throughout the room before swallowing the aura leaking from the heart.

The heart rested in the middle of a thick black lining.

It was clearly larger than a human heart and deep red in color, threaded with veins whose ends had turned a profound black. It wasn’t alive, nor did it beat in any true sense, yet the soul power preserved within it moved in steady waves that made the air above it contract every few seconds.

This was what remained of a being that had reached the Eighth Rank.

Even after its owner’s death, the heart had needed a box built specifically to keep its pressure from leaking out.

Ravian reached inside.

When his fingers touched the cold surface of the heart, a new window opened before him.

[Contact with the final requirement has been confirmed.]

[Beginning absorption will open the Walker Gate and reshape the path of both the body and the soul.]

[The process cannot be halted once begun.]

[Begin absorption?]

Ravian didn’t need to answer aloud this time.

He issued the command inside his mind.

’Begin,’ Ravian said inwardly.

The gray threads sank into the heart immediately.

Its waves stopped for a single moment.

Then came one final pulse, so violent that the table buckled beneath Ravian’s arm, and the soul power exploded out of the heart and directly into his body.

[Absorption of an Eighth-Rank being’s heart has begun.]

[Formal ascension to the Ninth Rank — Walker has begun.]

[The opening of the second gate within the Book of Sovereign Pride will now commence.]

Pain wasn’t the first thing Ravian felt.

It was the weight.

The moment the heart’s power entered through his palm, he felt as though the entire body of an Eighth-Rank being were trying to force itself into his veins all at once.

His fingers went rigid against the heart, and his feet grew so heavy against the floor that he felt as though they were sinking into a mound of fine sand, while the pressure climbed from his arm to his shoulder, then surged into his chest, his head, and the rest of his body.

After that came the pain.

His veins swelled beneath his skin, and he felt every joint in his arm being forced open from the inside, not to shatter them, but to allow something larger than they had been made to contain to pass through them.

The gray markings buried in his bones stirred.

They lit up one after another, from his fingertips to his shoulder, then spread across his ribcage and spine, as though the Sovereign Pride Physique had awakened to receive the incoming power.

[A two-rank differential has been detected between the host and the source of the heart.]

[Purification of soul power has begun.]

[The Sovereign Pride Physique has begun redistributing the pressure.]

At that moment, something resembling a crown of emptiness appeared above Ravian’s head.

Ravian couldn’t see it, but the crown shone clearly above him. Had anyone looked closely, they would have found that it held ten hollows, each shaped to hold a four-sided gem.

One of those hollows already held a crimson gem, while the hollow beside it glowed distinctly, the crimson light within it growing steadily clearer, as though it were on the verge of solidifying permanently in place.

Meanwhile, his body and soul continued absorbing the soul power from the heart.

The gray threads spread through his arm.

They coiled around the surging energy, tore away whatever traces of will and allegiance remained within it, and then pushed the purified power into his body in measured surges.

With every surge, a portion of the heart vanished beneath his palm.

It neither turned to ash nor dissolved into liquid.

It was being erased from the inside out, layer after layer, while all the power preserved by the Seal Box was transferred into Ravian in its entirety.

He didn’t scream this time.

He kept his breathing steady and his heartbeat regular through Absolute Focus, but controlling his body’s response did nothing to diminish the pain itself. It only kept him from squandering power on a shudder or a movement that served no purpose.

When half the heart had vanished, everything changed.

His awareness of the room disappeared.

He could no longer feel the chair beneath him, the table in front of him, or the air entering his lungs.

His consciousness sank into a deeper place.

He opened his eyes and found himself standing in the middle of a void that had neither ground nor sky.

Before him, an enormous gate rose.

One half was a faded white pierced with red veins, while the other was covered in dark shadows that moved slowly across its surface. It wasn’t made of metal or stone, but of layers formed from his soul, his Records, and all the power he had gathered since awakening in this world.

He knew its name without anyone needing to tell him.

The Walker Gate.