John had hoped, despite knowing better, that the Eternal Fortress would become less confusing to navigate with Arkeidos gone. Truth of the matter was that it only got worse. Enchantments of this magnitude did not break apart instantly even when the central power distribution and the operator were both taken out. Instead, the dimensional warping inside the city-sized fortification turned into an unmappable mess.


    After a few short hours of investigation, the remaining members of the coalition decided to forego that particular task. The sole exception to this was the Horned Rat. Flaunting John’s direct request, the god was exploring the fortress on his own. Obviously, John wasn’t worried about the Horned Rat but what that schemer may gather in terms of knowledge better left uncovered.


    The good news was that whatever he did find, he would not be able to take back.


    Only John would be able to take things out of the Kingdom and, besides Claire’s core, he had not been able to remove anything from it yet. One of the first things he had tried to do was to give her a new body. By the rules of the system, that apparently had to wait until the Kingdom was closed and the transferral was absolute. John kept her on his person. The inventory would have been safer, but he didn’t want to place her in three days of sensory deprivation. Not that he was even certain she could feel anything in her current state.


    The one Sylkarion, the soul-refining device, he was guaranteed to get had not yet spawned in, as he was only supposed to get it upon truly leaving. That left him with only 3 Inventory Slots worth of items to take with him. What they were to be filled with was obvious: as many Sylkarions as they could find.


    A whole ten of them were hidden in the same temple that Arkeidos’ remains were inside of, which made that a quick affair. Each of them took up one of the slots, meaning that John would exit with a total of four. One of them would go to the Horned Rat, as per their agreement, and one would be used for Delicia. What to do with the remaining two remained to be seen.


    As for all of those that they found and couldn’t take with them, John elected to turn them into scrap metal. A waste of an extremely powerful resource, without a doubt. A resource he did not want to leave in the hands of the people that populated this cave.


    It turned out that Arkeidos had been engaged in some selective breeding projects in this cave. Each time an Ironborn was worthy of ascension, they were given one year to spread their seed down here. The people there were allowed to live relatively simple lives, although they also had to pledge their labour to keeping the enchantments all over the world running.


    It was immediately obvious that they would inherit the world.


    Unlike those misery-addled people on the surface, those who lived down here were well-fed, educated, and of sound mind. Whether the selective breeding had led to any notable increase in power or ability was basically irrelevant, considering the surface-dwellers had been drug-addicts in a practically post-apocalyptic hellscape for a thousand years.


    With Arkeidos and the Ironborn gone (some potential individual stragglers notwithstanding), these people who could farm fungus and perpetuate their society would be the civilization to take over. There was no competition. John hated that this was the case. These were the closest to the Ironborn when it came to benefitting from Arkeidos’ regime. It was a distant second, yet John did not enjoy that those that had thrived under the previous paradigm would be the ones to create the new one.


    He could have killed them all. All he’d need to do was to let Nathalia loose on the cave, fill it with fire and molten rock, and watch the entire populace vanish under an ocean of volcanic glass. Two wrongs did not make a right, however, and so all he could do was give these people some rudimentary education in modern political theory and strip them of as many tools of tyranny as possible.


    John was admittedly doing little of that work himself. With his mana regeneration so heavily diminished, all work that remained and had even the slightest chance of being dangerous was delegated to everyone else. Every last Mettle plant they knew about was torn down, every Sylkarion they found destroyed, every enchantment they spotted made non-functional. Other factions started to create spots of greenery in the desolation above.


    They did as much as they could with their three days. Not as much as John wanted. As the Quest text had pointed out, though: for John to reshape this world as he desired, he would have needed years, if not decades. He was having trouble adjusting his own continent of birth according to his preferences. To change the culture of the entire Iron Domain to something else would have taken a generation of re-education.


    One of the easier matters to resolve, which they did early on, was to murder the kraken horror spawn that was sealed under the glass. Whatever it was, even the baby was able to block Observe, it was a parasite on a continental scale. Executing it on the spot was an easy decision.


    Harder was the question of what to do with the mace.


    To say it was a powerful weapon would have been an understatement. John would have loved to get it out of the hands of this world and into his own, killing two birds with one stone. Even if he had been fine with leaving the Sylkarions behind to facilitate this, it wouldn’t have been an option. The mace was way too large to conceivably fit into three Inventory Slots and John couldn’t even lift the damn thing. Even if he could have taken it along, it wasn’t going to replace Purgatory.


    Since destroying it was incredibly difficult, involving too much strain on Nia, they opted to instead bury it deep under the cave. They threw it into a massive hole together with what of Arkeidos’ destroyed bodies they could locate.


    That still left the entirety of the Eternal Iron pillar and the vast resources of the Eternal Fortress untouched. Nathalia could have torn most of the building to shreds. Realistically, anything that John was worried about would have survived such indiscriminate thrashing and everything he wanted to remain, all of the history and scientific texts hoarded in the building, would not.


    So, after three days of consistently improving the world as best they could, they just had to accept that this was all they could do and leave.


    It turned out to be an unnecessary precaution. The object came to an immediate, unnatural halt upon reaching the ground. Six blades buried into the floor, Inkaryl rested at the centre of the party.


    The electronic music that boomed from the boxes was all that filled the deep silence. John was a bit amused at the general sense of uncertainty that suddenly settled in. There were very few that knew what had just happened. It could be forgiven if people thought the weapon’s appearance was a bad omen.


    What was unnerving was that the item managed to break the layer between dimensions, but these Fusional armaments had some kind of minds of their own. Standing up, the Gamer walked to the weapon. “No need to panic,” he addressed everyone loudly, as he placed his hand on the grip. “Seems like Arkeidos’ weapon decided I’m its next worthy wielder.”


    As if to underline his words, the weapon shrunk to be more in line with the Gamer’s frame. The weapon was by no means small after that process had concluded. The shaft of lead and cast iron greys reached all the way up to John’s midriff. With the familiar sound of a beating, metallic heart, the jagged blades dislodged from their sockets in the prismatic ring of Fusionals around the Astrotium core, then slotted back into place, each of them assuming the multi-coloured appearance themselves.


    ‘I suppose my soul is too mixed to give any definitive element the advantage?’ John wondered. Just by looking at it, he felt there was more gold and silver present than anything else, the colours of the light element. That would have mapped onto the story others had presented. Not that it ultimately mattered. John lifted the mace.


    Well, he tried to lift the mace.


    With one hand, then with both, he desperately tried to get the weapon off the ground. He could feel the strain of effort create visible veins on his forehead. Eventually, he gave up. The people were already laughing. Best way to keep his pride here was to crack a joke and move on. “Looks like it may have made the wrong choice,” he said out loud and took a step back. Just to prove everyone that it was a joke, he willed the weapon to his hand.


    It did obey the call. Because he was smart enough to hold his hand at an angle, the weight also didn’t make him keel over. It just rested one step removed from its original resting place. The Gamer grinned. He had no use for the weapon in his personal arsenal, none of his Hand Slots were available. At worst it would make for a wonderful trophy.


    “Now that all of your attention has already been gathered, I’d like to say a few words.” John blinked and looked up, seeing Maximillian on top of the stage. The gravity mage looked better than ever, his new mastery over his element manifesting in a swirl of particles around him that was no doubt difficult to maintain and had no use besides appearances. “Unless you’re going to protest, buddy.”


    “You’d hold the speech anyway,” John shouted back, causing the crowd to chuckle again.


    “Right on I would,” Maximillian responded straightforwardly. Then he cleared his throat. “All of the speeches have been held already. We mourned those that have fallen and toasted to our victory. Rather than rehash all of that, I’d like to speak a few words on myself.


    “I joined this coalition to help my friend. Many of you will likely have heard what happened with Alexej, back when the Blood of the Proletariat invaded Rome. On that day, I was hurt deeply and I struggled for a while, wondering how, exactly, to go from there. It was that sense of loss that mixed with a wonder if I was, perhaps, just an inferior version of my friend John here, when Reetha influenced my mind. After all, I do not open portals to other worlds or have legendary weapons fall from the sky for me.


    “I know many of you that were there dealt with similar, reinforced sensations of inadequacy. After all, that was how she wanted to make us passive. Amidst it all, however, I realized that this sense of irrelevance was horridly misplaced. I found my determination, not just to stand up in that moment. No, I finally found the determination to take control of my life in its entirety again, and it starts right here. Irielz, could you come up here?”


    The question seemed to come out of nowhere and the succubus was visibly dumbstruck. Few in the party actually knew who she was, but eventually all eyes were on her. Such was the nature of herd thinking.


    After the initial surprise had settled, the black-haired succubus pulled her shoulders back. Making herself as tall as she could despite her below average height, she walked forwards. It was late in the day, the red-tint of dusk giving her light grey skin a peculiar colour. She wore a fine, black and white dress of satin, covering her hourglass curves tightly. With one beat of her (mostly) decorative bat wings, she landed on the stage. Her tail waved curiously as she walked up to her boyfriend.


    The two exchanged a few short words, which the microphone did not pick up. Deliberately, the king then raised it back to his mouth. “I realized, at my lowest, that I needed to stand for who I am. Perhaps, and I can’t believe I’ll say this, I won’t be the greatest of kings or the legend of this generation. Perhaps I will just be a king and a notable person. Whatever I end up being, I’ll be the greatest at it. I want to face the future. I realized I need to stand. I realized I need to kneel before one woman.”


    Maximillian let go of the microphone. It slowly sank down alongside him, while he dropped to one knee and retrieved a small box from the inside of his jacket. The small object inside sparkled in the sunlight.


    Irielz covered her mouth with both hands. It was as stereotypical a reaction as it was wholesome. The succubus jumped from one foot to the other, while waiting for the question to leave Maximillian’s mouth. “I will not even try to justify whether or not this is appropriate after only a few months. There are some things that should just be. This is one of them. Irielz, will you marry me?”


    “Yes!” she shouted immediately.


    End of Season 3 Arc 8.