Outworld Liberators-Chapter 154: Letting the Young Gauge Taste Power

Then a click sounded, soft but final. The ninety-nine Soul Anchors connected on their own.

Each hair became a small tendon that strengthened with each strand of energy it absorbed.

The soul recognized the change and made the Soul Anchors its own. The sand-like soul hardened into clay.

The clay shifted into something akin to gold, soft and malleable, able to be shaped without breaking.

This was what made the artificial constitution special. It did not only hold the soul. It gave the soul a new framework it could grow around.

The ghost attendants rotated, each infusing their soul energy for another hour. When the trembling eased to a steady pulse, he deemed it stable enough.

"Let go of the soul, Calyx," Radeon said.

The soul descended into the machine body. The arrays inside the steel shell revved to life.

Hundreds of them woke in sequence, lines of power crawling through the frame like veins filling with blood.

A high grade spirit stone sat at the core, powering the body, because Gauge Point had not yet established soul cultivation of his own.

For now, the body moved on borrowed fire.

Later, if he survived, he would be the one to feed it.

Skin began to appear in patches. Hair followed. The face that emerged mimicked Gauge Point’s old features, but the build was different.

More robust. Steadier. The fragile slimness was gone, replaced by a frame that looked like it could carry weight without flinching.

Gauge Point woke. He sat up, eyes widening as sensation flooded him.

He felt lighter and stronger at the same time, like the world had lost its grip but his hands had gained theirs.

A mirror had been prepared. He stumbled toward it, naked, and stared.

His body was chiseled, the lines of it too clean, too deliberate, as if a sculptor had cut away every weakness.

His dark gray pupils were still there. His face looked more refined. His eyebrows were sharp as daggers.

Then he looked down.

Despite the constitution being called a machine, his skin suddenly turned deathly white, almost corpse pale.

He swallowed hard.

"Why, Master. Where. Where is my manhood?"

Behind him, the Tiyanak stood with hands tucked behind his back, wearing a cheeky expression like a child hiding stolen sweets.

Calyx’s staff cracked across the ghost’s head.

Not hard enough to kill, but hard enough to make the lesson sting.

Calyx snatched what the Tiyanak had hidden and shoved it into Gauge Point’s hands.

"Young Gauge," Calyx said, awkward, for once, "it may sound a strange thing for me to say, but I hope you do not lose it."

Gauge Point clutched the part that made him man. He fitted fast where it belonged, then tested it with a few frantic flicks.

Relief hit him so hard his shoulders sagged. It worked.

He had plans for the future. Children. A lineage. Proof that the path he walked would not strip him of everything human.

He looked back at Radeon, cheeks hot, pride bruised, fear still clinging like sweat that would not dry.

Radeon did not mind the small charade. He had seen worse jokes played in bloodier rooms.

He placed a jade slip in Gauge Point’s hand.

"The Soul Machina Scriptures," Radeon said.

Gauge Point stared at it, confused. A jade slip was a common thing, his fingers did not know what to do with it.

He looked up, then down again, as if the answer might be written on his palm.

Calyx stepped in and guided his hand.

"Hold it like this," Calyx said.

Gauge Point did. The jade turned warm, then hot, and knowledge poured into him.

At first he did not see words. He saw memory.

A creature of steel descended from above. It had half-formed wings made of energy.

It hovered over a small planet and stretched its wings outward.

The land dried. The air thinned. Life withered.

Souls of the inhabitants were harvested, from the smallest insects to the largest beings that defined life.

The images of these beings were pulled into its being.

The creature of steel grew its half-formed wings into a set of majestic wings of light, radiating holiness.

Then it moved on. Another civilization. More advanced. Towers that gleamed. Lights in the dark.

It stood far away, too far for screams to reach, and drew out soul power again. A whole world died as if it were only a tool being emptied.

Then the creature took hold of spirit stones.

Simple stones, humble in the hand, and yet it absorbed their energy near instantly.

The energy gathered within its wings, stacking and stacking. The creature of steel changed.

After that, it no longer sought life. Only stones. Only containers of power.

Then the memories cut off like a blade severing a thread.

Gauge Point blinked, breath shallow, heart racing.

Radeon put a middle grade spirit stone into his hand.

"Use it," Radeon said.

Gauge Point held the stone and the method rose inside him like something he had always known.

He drew in breath and drew in energy at the same time, following the path the jade had carved into his mind.

At first it felt like drowning. The energy pressed in too fast, too heavy, as if the stone were turning into water and flooding his chest.

His hands started to shake.

"Slowly," Radeon said. "No need to rush."

Gauge Point forced himself to obey. He took it in like sips instead of gulps.

He let the energy settle rather than slam. His new body hummed with the strain. The arrays in his frame pulsed faintly, adjusting, accepting.

Two hours passed. The spirit stone turned to dust in his palm.

Gauge Point opened his hand and felt the residue fall away.

He raised both palms, focused, and gathered the energy into a small ball of qi that hovered above his skin like a captive star.

His voice came out rough.

"So this is power."

Calyx watched the boy’s eyes and saw the spark there, ambitious and hungry.

"Young Gauge," Calyx said, "ambition is great. But I hope you remember us when you reach a peak we have not reached."

Gauge Point held the qi sphere steady and let the words sink in. He let the qi disperse, then he nodded once, slow, as if marking it into himself.

Then he dropped to his knees.

He bowed forward and gave Radeon a kowtow. His forehead slammed the ground with a dull thud that carried through the pavilion, a sound too heavy to be mere performance.

"I am eternally grateful for this opportunity, Master," Gauge Point said. "I am an orphan. I hope treating you as both teacher and father will not be a burden to your heart."

He meant it. Not as strategy. Not as flattery. He felt Radeon walking a path that was more arduous than anyone he had met, and perhaps anyone he would ever meet.

A path paved with choices that left blood on the hands no matter which way you stepped.

Gauge Point wanted to be grateful. He also wanted to be free. 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

Radeon looked down at him, expression unreadable.

"It doesn’t weigh on me," Radeon said. "But listen close. Follow your own mind before you follow anyone’s words. Even mine."