Creating my own staff art had been on my mind for a while, but I'd never been sure how to go about it. I needed a way to connect my path with my combat style. After watching Zeke fight though, I realized there was other connections I could make. Zeke's dual mask thing was a way to invoke the legend of Janus. I'd done some research on the two faced god, and I could see why he'd be aiming for that, it was a source of power and fear added onto his already massive reputation.

It also gave me ideas for what I should do with my own combat style. Being a fatewalker and connecting that to my fighting style was fine, but if I could connect that to the actual legends of Solomon, that would give me that extra little bit of buzz. So I'd sat down and dug into every story about Solomon the Demon Binder. I'd scoured every possible source, looked through every obscure book.

No one was sure where those stories came from, they were just part of the public consciousness, the massive trove of legends and myths from who knew where that floated around space. But my research had clarified some of what the stories were about, how they worked, and how I could use them.

"Goetia staff art." I said levelly. "First form: Belial." I'd built the staff art around DS Mastery, so my Path would be inextricably linked, but using my path, and especially the strength of my soul, I'd been able to do things that I never could have before.

My body changed. Blackened stone covered every inch of me, crackling with toxic fire as I became a demonic avatar of poisonous flame. Rather than depend entirely on skills like Touch of Tears or Stone Limb, the first form of my staff art made me and my weapon both creatures of pure destruction, sharpening and refining multiple skills that I'd usually have to use in succession into a stable whole I could use for much longer than five or ten minutes.

My enemy whistled. "Well...that's new." He said in appreciation. "Never seen anyone do...whatever the hell that is. Don't think it'll save you though."

He blurred forward, sword cutting the air like a thousand arrows as he lashed out with dozens of stabs to try to poke me full of holes. His blade pierced me, but I felt no pain. Belial wasn't coated in poison magma. He WAS poison magma. This was the first step on my Path, and it was strong. I triggered my overlay, letting fate guide me. A wall of arrows showed me where I was being attacked.

I turned my body slightly, not enough to dodge, but enough to avoid getting hit in any vital areas. I had no idea if I'd heal completely when I resumed my human form, and I'd rather not bleed out. My staff came up, made of the same material as I was, and spun, knocking aside countless blows so that only a few of them actually landed. As soon as I saw an opening I drove my staff forward like a striking snake, my Path and my staff art combining to create a vicious piercing attack.

The man in the mask, shoved off with a foot, sending himself backwards with the force of my blow, but was forced to strip off the jacket over his armor with a curse as my ability infected it. "Shit." He said, waving his sword to clear off the corrosive liquid magma that should have been blood. "That's unpleasant. I don-" His eyes widened and he hurled himself to the side as Callie emerged from the shadows again, daggers aimed at his throat.

My staff came down hard on the spot he was heading for, and he barely managed to block with his rapier in time to avoid taking a direct hit. Callie and I were perfectly in sync, and he was in danger from either of us. Looking around, he cursed, and without a second of hesitation hurled himself over the side of the island, plummeting down into the mist below.

I blinked. "I...didn't know he could do that." I looked at Callie. "Did you know he could do that?"

She snickered. "Never change, honey. And speaking of change, can you turn off...that." She pointed at me. I let Belial retreat, wincing at the pain of a few almost closed stab wounds. I also exhaled in relief as the soul damage from using my new ability was repaired. Belial was powerful, but it put a lot of stress on my soul. Not enough to be unusable or distracting, but it let me milk a bit of extra energy out of the island.

We rested up for a minute while I filled her in on my new staff art. She was intrigued, but I told her I'd only managed one form so far, and I didn't want to talk about any of my other ideas in case I jinxed it. After our break, we got back to it, not wanting to get intercepted again. Finding out there was more than one entrance to each island made it much less safe to lounge around.

Mounting the rainbow bridge, we continued on our way, slowly scaling towards the heights of the shaft. I hadn't seen what was at the top very clearly, since we'd started falling partway down, but I was pretty curious.

More than that though...I was having fun. No risk of death for me or the others, no excessively political nonsense, no dead gods trying to murder us. Just a game that I was having a blast with, and one that I thought I had a real shot to win. Callie seemed to be enjoying things too. We took our time walking, looking down at the scores of people making their way up.

We'd headed into a more central portion of the ascent, so we could see the multitude of other islands better now. It let us keep an eye on our competition and make sure no one was sneaking up on us. I spotted Benny and Celine fairly low down, making their way slowly but surely. Abel was several islands up, and despite being under much more pressure than we were because of how strong his soul was, he was absolutely crushing it.

"Should have known that monster would breeze through this." I muttered. "You see Gabriel and Bethy anywhere? I can't pick them out."

We were still walking across the most recent rainbow, but talking helped take my mind off how grueling this was. People are not designed to be tortured and then healed ad infinitum. Callie grunted, shaking her head as she wobbled, and I grabbed her elbow to steady her. "Nope. They're probably behind us or something. The layout here is nuts. We'll see the- what the hell is that?"

I turned my head where she was looking and spotted what she was talking about. A jellyfish. Just floating through the air. It was orange, and it flopped harmlessly through the air, coming slowly toward us.

"So...what are the odds the mysterious floating sea creature approaching us is a good thing?" She didn't respond and I sighed. "Yeah, that's what I was afraid of. Can you hit it from here with shadows?" I didn't want that thing getting close to me. I was sure whatever it was going to do would hurt.

Callie scoffed. "How? We're standing on a rainbow. Even if I could find a shadow here there isn't one out there, and my constructs will be under the same strain as me. I'd basically be increasing the surface area of my soul and artificially inflating the resistance. Can you reach it with your staff?"

I flicked my hand out, my staff shooting to full extension before I caught the end in a firm grip. It extended out over the abyss, but didn't even come close to the jellyfish yet. As I did that though, it started to drift sideways, like it was circling around. I blinked. "Well that's convenient. Apparently it's scared of...Callie walk faster."

Able to sense my distress, her head snapped around to where my gaze had followed the jellyfish. A swarm of orange gelatinous creatures swarmed toward us, and as they drifted over the island, their tentacles dragged over the grass. Energy sparked and played as they began to very slowly pale, going from orange towards yellow.

"Shit." I snarled as we sped up. "Soul eating jellyfish? This is bullshit!" If I had to guess it was some kind of balancing mechanic for the people pulling ahead. Whoever had designed this fucking trial was a grade A asshole. We made it to the next island, stumbling forward to collapse to our knees, and looked back at the last island. The jellyfish were still there, soaking up the soul energy as they became more and more yellow.

"Once they're done there they'll come here." I said anxiously. "I don't suspect that them touching us would be beneficial, since we're fucking MADE of soul right now. Death by soul eating jellyfish isn't a death I've considered before, but it's low on my list even so."

I let the power flow into me, breathing deeply as I tried to suck up as much as I could. Sadly, I could only take in as much as I needed, and I quickly hit capacity. Pulling Callie up by her hand I yanked her with me across the island to the next bridge. We immediately mounted the next rainbow.

"Which way should we go?" She asked worriedly as she looked back at them. "I think we're in the lead, but that's not exactly a good thing right now. We need to get up to the top, right?"

I nodded. "Unless this is a giant fuck you to everyone the test has to be passable. Maybe the jellyfish are a reaction to me using my Path to bull ahead, or maybe they're there for another reason. That masked guy was up here too, so it's not just us. Chances are good some of the ringers have run into them, or will. But yeah, the top is probably a safe zone. I don't want to fight those things, especially not after they hit yellow."

Speaking of soul strength, mine was slowing down as we went. The higher it got the more energy was needed, and the less the damage I was receiving meant in terms of percentage. It was the same difficulty, but progressing was getting harder and harder. Nonlinear improvement, swell.

When we hit the next island, we stopped again, turning back to watch the jellyfish swarm the one we'd just left. The one before it, the one we'd last seen them on, was dead and blackened, every single plant a desiccated husk. Further reinforcing my idea that I didn't want to get caught by those things. Before we could move on another person stepped onto the island.

It wasn't anyone I recognized, just a short, green haired guy, but I didn't wait for him to react to our presence. I hit him while he was recovering and I wasn't, smashing his head with my staff as Callie tied him up. Then I carried him to the other side of the island and threw him bodily off toward where the jellyfish were just leaving the last island, hoping he'd keep them occupied.

When he hit the cloud of jellyfish, his body went rigid, and he started screaming as they consumed all the power in his spirit. We didn't stay to watch, heading for the other bridge, but we saw enough. I was just glad no one actually died in here. He'd be ok on the outside, if a little pissed off. Callie grabbed my hand and squeezed it, letting me know she understood and was on my side, and we resumed the climb. I didn't know how much time we'd bought, but we needed to make the most of it.