The Glitched Mage-Chapter 114: Abyss Fused Warrior

A thick, shadowy aura began to pulse around Ember's collapsed form, tendrils of darkness coiling and sinking into her skin. Her limbs twitched—once, twice—then jerked violently before her movements began to stabilize. Slowly, unnaturally, she rose to her feet.

[[ Subjugation successful ]]

[[ Adding Ember as an Undead Warrior ]]

[[ Total Undead Warriors: 23 ]]

[[ Spaces Available Until Next Upgrade: 2 ]]

Unlike Sana, who had fallen to one knee and called him master after her reanimation, Ember said nothing. She stood in silence.

Almost… mournful.

Her ruby-red eyes, now dulled by death, met Riven's with an expression that made him pause. Even in death, there was betrayal in her gaze. Hurt. Grief that hadn't fully faded.

Riven exhaled and stepped closer, placing a hand gently atop her cold head.

"You're no good to me like this," he muttered. "I'll give you a little power. But I want you to prove you deserve it."

[[ Activating Undead Advancement System ]]

[[ Available Promotion: Undead Warrior → A//by…/ss Fused Warrior ]]

[[ Begin channeling mana and /A…:::bys/s? ]]

Riven's brow furrowed as flickering error codes danced across the notification window. The system trembled around anything involving the Abyss—as though it wasn't meant to process it. Broken characters, corrupted instructions.

He remembered Nyx's words.

"Even Velmorian never channeled the Abyss the way you do."

Maybe the system wasn't rejecting the commands. Maybe it simply didn't understand them.

He shook the thought away. That problem could wait until he returned to the Shadow Kingdom. Until then… he'd make do.

"Do it," he said flatly.

Abyssal mana surged through him once more, dark and scorching, as he braced his already-drained body for the strain to come.

The shadows responded instantly.

A pulse—deep, low, ancient—shivered through the room as the temperature dropped. The torches dimmed as y he air itself seemed to hold its breath.

It wasn't like casting a spell or channeling a technique. No—this was descent.

His mind plunged inward, past his mana circuits and through the reservoir of darkness nested in his core. He reached beyond his body, letting his consciousness bleed into the void.

The Abyss greeted him.

It always did.

Endless, formless, consuming. Yet now, Riven searched within it—not for power, but for her.

A single thread of soul, fragile and torn, drifting somewhere in the current of oblivion. He focused, cutting through the storm of wailing spirits and forgotten thoughts that brushed against his senses. The deeper he pushed, the harder it became to hold on to himself—until he felt it:

A flicker—familiar, fleeting.

It shimmered like dying light beneath a storm, fragile and scattered. Her soul wasn't whole. It drifted in pieces—fractured memories, half-formed thoughts, remnants of who she'd once been. A thousand threads unraveling in the Abyss.

But it was there.

Dim, distant… but alive.

And that was enough.

Riven reached into the dark and seized it—pulled it back from the edge of nothing.

Pain lanced through his skull as the Abyss resisted, coiling around the fragment like a beast refusing to give up its prize. But Riven did not flinch. He commanded. The Abyss obeyed—not willingly, but inevitably. Tendrils of black fire licked across his skin as he siphoned a portion of Ember's fractured soul from the void and forced it back into her shell.

The system screamed.

[[ WARNING: Abyssal Interference Detected ]]

[[ Unstable fusion in progress… ]]

[[ Success chance: …??? ]]

[[ Proceeding… ]]

Ember's body seized.

Not the awkward spasms of the undead—but a violent rejection. As though her body knew something unnatural had been forced into it and was trying to burn it out. Shadows rose around her, not from Riven—but from her. They flared like wings, burning black and crimson.

She screamed.

Not a cry of pain, but something deeper—raw and visceral, as if her very soul was being torn apart and reforged in the dark. The sound echoed through the room, sharp enough to rattle the walls, broken enough to make the air feel heavier.

It wasn't human.

It was grief, fury, memory, and rebirth all colliding in a single, breathless moment.

And then—

Silence.

Heavy. Absolute. As if the world itself was holding its breath.

Riven dropped to one knee, breathing heavily. Sweat slicked his skin. His vision pulsed with static, the Abyss still curling at the edges of his mind. He pushed it down. Controlled it.

Before him, Ember stood perfectly still. Her hair, once vibrant red, was now streaked with veins of obsidian black. Her eyes—still crimson—glowed faintly, not with life, but with something deeper. Older.

She blinked slowly, then tilted her head.

"…Brother."

The word was soft. Hollow. But sure.

Riven straightened slightly, cautious but alert.

"You remember?"

She touched her chest, her fingers trailing faint flickers of black flame. "…Some things. Not all. Faces. Voices. A room. Loneliness. Then you." Her gaze lifted to meet his again. "I remember that I… follow you."

Riven studied her carefully. Her stance, her tone—everything about her was off from the Ember he remembered. She was no longer Ember Drakar, eldest daughter of the family that scorned him. What stood before him was something reborn. Fused. Loyal.

But still not whole.

"You can follow me for now, prove yourself worthy." he said simply.

She nodded once, eyes set with determination. "I will."

The system chimed again, its voice quieter, hesitant.

[[ Promotion Complete ]]

[[ Ember has evolved into: Abyss-Fused Undead Warrior ]]

[[ Loyalty: Absolute ]]

[[ Memory Retention: Fragmented ]]

[[ Status: Stable ]]

Riven exhaled slowly, only now realizing he'd been holding his breath.

The shadows near the door stirred, subtle but sharp—Nyx had felt it.

"Nyx," he called.

She came in at once, as if she'd been waiting eagerly, her expression immediately alert. Her gaze swept the room, settling on Ember and the bloodied floor with sharp calculation.

"What did you do?" she asked, her voice edged with alarm. Then, after a beat, her mouth twisted into something amused. "Gods, you really do like stabbing people. First Sana, now this poor girl."

"I'm his sister," Ember said coolly, folding her arms as her ruby eyes narrowed. "Who are you?"

Nyx froze mid-step. Her gaze flicked to Riven, then back to the girl now glaring at her. "She's… she's dead, right?" she asked slowly. "One of yours?"

"She is," Riven confirmed. "Undead. Bound."

Nyx tilted her head, circling Ember slowly. "But she's aware and… sassy. That's not normal." She narrowed her eyes. "They're usually hollow. Blank."

"You're kind of rude, has anyone ever told you that?" Ember said, hands on her hips. "Now, seriously—who are you?"

Nyx blinked, then burst into a wicked grin. "Oh, I like her."

Then she turned back to Riven, eyes glittering. "But really—what did you do?"

Riven shrugged, running a hand through his hair. "Honestly? Not entirely sure."

With a snap of his fingers, the blood vanished from the floor in a hiss of flame.

"I'll let you know when I figure it out."

Riven glanced toward the sealed window, the last strands of twilight fading behind the glass.

"We leave for the Shadow Kingdom tomorrow," he said, voice low. "But there's something I need to tie up before then."

Nyx's grin faded, curiosity sharpening in her gaze. "The Drakar Estate?"

Riven nodded once. "I won't leave this kingdom with unfinished business. Not with them."

Ember's posture straightened slightly. Though her face held no memory of her former life, something in her stirred at the name. A flicker of tension in her shoulders. The ghost of a feeling she didn't yet understand.

Nyx moved toward the wall and retrieved her cloak, fastening it around her shoulders. "Then we go tonight."

—x—

They waited until the halls were silent—until the last lanterns in the Academy dorms flickered low and the shadows thickened outside the windows.

No goodbyes. No farewells.

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Just three silhouettes slipping through the darkness, unseen and unheard.

Riven led them through the outer courtyard, his presence cloaked in stillness. They moved along the crumbling back wall of the Academy grounds until they found the gap they used before.

Riven crouched low, slipping into the torn opening and brushing aside a curtain of ivy. Nyx followed silently and Ember ducked in after them, her eyes scanning the dark trees ahead.

Beyond the wall stretched a narrow strip of forest—dense, overgrown, forgotten. The kind of place no one ventured unless they had something to hide. The path that followed was little more than a trail of beaten grass and stone, leading away from the Academy and into the hills that watched over the city.

They moved without speaking and by the time the silhouette of the Drakar estate rose through the trees—its towering spires lit in cold moonlight—Riven's jaw had set in quiet steel.

The estate hadn't changed.

Arched windows. Golden-trimmed gates. White-stone walls meant to impress noble guests. But beneath the glamour, Riven saw it for what it was: a gilded prison.

Ember stood beside him, staring up at it with blank recognition. Something flickered in her gaze—confusion, disquiet—but no words followed.

Nyx folded her arms. "How do you want to do this?"

Riven stared at the gates for a long moment. Then his voice, calm and cold, broke the silence.

"Quietly."

He stepped forward, his fingers curling once—just enough to stir the shadows around them.

And the wind, once still, began to shift.