Lith Verhen/History/Volume 10

## Chapters 1099 - 1262

### Night's Ambush

Lith contacts Faluel but both are forced to return to Lutia through the Kingdom's Gate network to Derios, Faluel even more waylaid due to being in the Empire. Tista leaves for Rena's home while Solus waits for Lith at the Trawn Woods mana geyser. Lith informs Xenagrosh and proceeds to repeatedly open Warp Steps back to Lutia. He picks up Solus, who brings him up to speed on the events. They are stopped by Night, who attempts to convince him to surrender and become her host. Lith summons his Demons of the Fallen to combat the undead army, but barely hangs on against Night when the Master's Chosen arrive and attack her.

Baba Yaga arrives and stops the hybrid Eldritches from killing Night. She agrees to remove part of the Horseman's free will to prevent her from attacking Lutia ever again, and also kills her host while bonded to let her experience the pain the living suffer. After making sure his family is safe, Lith is met by the Royal Guards led by Orion and the beasts led by Feela, who apologize for not arriving in time. Lith returns to Kamila, Protector, and the Ernas sisters and explains his encounter with Night and the Abominations. Lith apologizes to Kamila for endangering Zinya but she scolds him and tells him not to blame himself for Night's attack.

Having spent the most of the past few months experimenting with the runes the Skinwalker Armor's pseudo cores are comprised of, as well as practiced Origin Flames since Lith's retirement from the army to the extent he can tap into the full potential of Zolgrish's Adamant Forge, Lith and Solus proceed to craft the Scalewalker Armor with their Twin Forge technique. With Tista, Nalrond, Friya, and Phloria stabilizing the magic circle, Lith and Solus succeed.Faluel compliments him on the work, and Lith gives her a recollection of his life.

### Test of Wisdom

Faluel sends Lith on a test of wisdom to the Jiera continent accompanied by Tista and Phloria, where he meets Aren Dolm and Gyrwin Isaar, the beast and human representatives respectively on Jiera's Awakened Council. Fenagar the Leviathan offers to "take care" of Lith, but Lith declines. Aren brings them to the beast city of Reghia explains their role in helping the humans acclimate to their situation. Meno the Tyr gives them an overview Reghia's functions and policies. The group constructs a fake exterior house while living inside Solus' tower, which she is able to manifest thanks to the city's mana geysers.

#### Reghia

Lith meets a group of Merfolk, but they quickly leave after suspecting Lith of being human. Solus regains a memory of her mother Ripha Menadion, who teaches Solus how to study an artifact's pseudo cores to learn their enchantments. The trio are assigned as teachers for the surviving humans, but are immediately rebuffed due to the Jierans’ lack of trust, animosity towards their former enemy states, and ungratefulness.

Lith meets with the mayor of Reghia Xoth the Nue and joins a monster hunting team with Olua the Roc and Bodya the Nidhogg. The three face a monster army led by a Puppeteer Abomination named Westhar, with Lith battling the Abomination while Olua and Bodya take on the monster army and the orc shaman. Put at a disadvantage, Lith is forced to strain his life force to unleash Origin Flames from his entire body. This results in his life forces going into disarray with the human side collapsing and the beast side giving way to the Abomination side, turning Lith into a liquid mass of darkness. The rampant Chaos energy inside him causes him a great amount of damage, until Lith uses the overwhelming amount of Abomination life force to spew violet Origin Flames that consume Westhar and his army. Olua and Bodya bring Lith back to Reghia.

Solus with Tista and Phloria's help manages to cure Lith's condition by cutting away at his Abomination side and strengthening the human and beast halves to restore the balance. During the night while Tista and Lith are recovering, Solus and Phloria are contacted by Friya from her trip to Nalrond's Fringe. Afterwards, Lochra Silverwing, also known to Solus' as “Aunt Loka", infiltrates the tower and recounts Solus' past as Elphyn. However, the First Magus attempts to kill Lith to "free" Solus from her captor, leading Solus to fuse with Lith. Silverwing relents to not harm Solus, and is punched dozens of kilometers away. The duo discover that fusing helped restore Lith's life forces to their peak condition.

Lith contacts Kamila, learning that her parents Kima and Crefas Retta visited Lutia and introduced themselves to the Verhens using Kamila's upcoming third anniversary as a pretext. Lith and Solus recuperate in the tower while Phloria and Tista go to work. Lith spends the time his body needs to heal by studying the Odi books he had collected in Kulah and in Dawn's lab, trying to replace the old technology with Runesmithing. He also spends time cooking for the human survivors, drawing more people to Phloria's lessons. Lith receives from Mayor Xoth a total of 11 small Adamant ingots weighing around 2 kilograms (2.2 lbs) each for the trio's contributions.

#### Kolga

Xoth recommends him for a recon mission to the merfolk Lost City of Kolga due to his cracked life force and Leegaain's translation pin. He tasks Lith with deciphering: 1) the city ruler's fine control over the mana geyser, 2) the details of the Forbidden Magic ritual, and 3) where the darkness energy from the ritual goes. Lith realizes this is the reason Faluel sent him to Jiera and that Leegaain was aware as well. They make ample preparations before meeting their guides, the same group of merfolk Lith met on his first day. They bring them deep underwater to the merfolk city of Zhen to prepare their Kolgan disguises and debrief them on the mission.

The trio enter Kolga, discovering that the cracks in Lith's life force are absorbing the Forbidden Sun's energy. While inside, Death Vision's effects disappear and Solus' core is temporarily boosted to bright cyan. Lith's Abomination Touch allows him to temporarily alleviate Phloria and Tista from Kolga's infection. They learn of Asfell Kolga, one of Ripha Menadion's apprentices who used the Hands of Menadion to found the city. Aren Dolm devises an infiltration plan using Khalia the merfolk as a sacrifice, and the merfolk hold a memorial ceremony for her. The trio familiarize themselves with their Kolgan disguises before they stage Khalia's capture. Lith slips Solus' ring inside the pocket of the Kolgan captain who brings Khalia away for the ritual.

Without Solus draining the foreign mana, Lith experiences Death Vision to a greater degree than before. He sees countless dead souls swarming Kolga. A constant stream of shades pass through him and feed on his mana, also imparting their thoughts and feelings. As Lith, Phloria, and Tista approach the Light Torch department, Lith regains his connection to Solus. He discovers her in her regained human form attempting to kill two Kolgans who had captured her. His darkness spell inadvertently reverts the pair from unliving back to the living, and he grants form to the dead souls haunting the Kolgans by turning them into Demons of Darkness. The souls retake their stolen life force, and the Kolgans wither and die.

Lith opens his fifth eye as a result, the orange one on his right cheek. He feels Mogar's pull at his conscience, but manages to stifle it. They regroup and Lith shares Solus' memories of what happened to Khalia. Lith suggests reporting the mission as a failure to hide the existence of the Hands from the Awakened Council, and brings up the option of leaving Solus in Kolga alone to let her experience a regular life. From Solus' memories of Kolga's arrays, Lith realizes Kolga's workings are the missing link to updating the Odi's Body-Swapping machine and mixing the Madness with it.

Solus resolves to destroy Kolga and retrieve the Hands to prevent anyone from abusing her mother's legacy again. Lith approaches the Council with an assault plan, and after they hesitate to take immediate action, he recounts the ritual and also reveals Kolga's nature as the source of the Lost City of Kogaluga's energy in the Kingdom. Tyris becomes enraged, and Fenagar's dismissive attitude causes the Great Mother to race to Jiera in a furious rage, prompting the Council to hastily proceed with Lith's plan. Solus assaults the city's tower alone to confront King Ykrah while the others attack the Light Torch.

Lith intervenes when Ykrah summons the city's soldiers to his defense. His touch releases his victims' energies instead of allowing them to return to the Forbidden Sun, weakening the Kolgans' collective strength. However, he is severely outnumbered and without Solus' tactical mind nor presence to protect his mana core from the Forbidden Sun, Lith is nearly overwhelmed. With the world energy inside Kolga already thin compared to the outside world to start with, his close proximity to the tower and the Hands leaves him just enough to fuel spells.

As Lith's consciousness begins to fade from his many wounds he is brought to Mogar's Mindscape, who takes the form of Elina, and meets Carl's soul. Mogar reveals Lith had been reincarnated as a Puppeteer Abomination and that it had granted him the beast life force as a second chance as it had all the other reincarnators, though he is the first to make a life with it. Carl offers Lith to pass on with him to the afterlife, distraught at the amount of suffering he'd sustained in his short 19 years on Mogar. Seeing that Carl doesn't resent him for what he has done, Lith ultimately refuses and breaks the chain connecting them, putting Carl to rest. Lith ceases his resistance and allows his **fifth tribulation** to happen.

Lith's Demons absorb Kolgans, granting them mass and a mana core. Instead of releasing them to the outside, he makes them part of his own body to add to his mass and power, though he becomes forced to relive their burden. The added mana cores shield him from the Forbidden Sun and empower his spells. The sudden surge in world energy and mana from Lith allows War to speak its first words, and it mimics Lith's bloodline ability to cast Soul Weaver. Lith and Solus continue damaging the Forbidden Sun, while Lith and War continue growing in size, Lith reaching over 30 meters (100 ft) in height. He breathes white Origin Flames to finally destroy the Forbidden Sun, ending the tribulation and causing the city barrier to crack, the sea wiping out the Kolgans. Solus and Lith return to their former conditions, their cracked life forces unable to sustain any of their gains.

The group returns to Reghia, where Solus stores the Eye of Kolga white crystal inside the mines. She declines to imprint the Hands as her tower should be able to function the same, if not better. After receiving 6 more Adamant ingots from Xoth, the group returns to the Griffon Kingdom where they meet Faluel, Tyris, and Leegaain. Tyris informs them of her intent to credit Lith with the destruction of Kogaluga which she had cleared earlier after its dimensional rift closed, as well as push the humans to bridge with the beasts in order to face the undead.

Lith and Solus question Faluel about her involvement in sending them to Kolga, which she confirms but denies having done so to cause them suffering. Lith expresses his feeling that the next tribulation will be his last. Faluel shows Lith that his two life forces have mixed further and that he is a half step away from the violet core. Lith reunites with his family and reveals to Kamila first his Abomination origin and conversation with Mogar, though she initially mistakes it as a confession for cheating on her. She reaffirms her love for him and the two spend the night performing recreational activities.

## References

1. ↑ Chapter 1110: Yurial’s Legacy (Part 2)
2. ↑ Chapter 1112: Blood for Blood (Part 2)
3. ↑ Chapter 1122: Scalewalker Armor (Part 2)
4. ↑ Chapter 1130: Thinking Ahead (Part 2)
5. ↑ Chapter 1137: Secrets and Plots (Part 1)
6. ↑ Chapter 1142: Merfolk (Part 2)
7. ↑ Chapter 1157: Double-Edged Power (Part 1)
8. ↑ Chapter 1167: Chaos Force (Part 3)
9. ↑ Chapter 1194: Split Up (Part 2)
10. ↑ Chapter 1209: Faluel’s Ploy (Part 1)
11. ↑ Chapter 1214: Under the Sea (Part 4)
12. ↑ Chapter 1223: Light and Decay (Part 1)
13. ↑ Chapter 1235: The Eye and the Hands (Part 1)
14. ↑ Chapter 1237: Dollhouse (Part 1)
15. ↑ Chapter 1244: Legacies (Part 2)
16. ↑ Chapter 1247: Against the Odds (Part 1)
17. ↑ Chapter 1251: Demons’ Horde (Part 1)
18. ↑ Chapter 1252: Demons’ Horde (Part 2)
19. ↑ Chapter 1255: Spoils of War (Part 1)
20. ↑ Chapter 1259: Faluel’s Plan (Part 1)
21. ↑ Chapter 1262: Undead Tell Tales (Part 2)