Chapter 1405: Dreadreaver
The metal scraps from Jeci’s armor began to merge together in Northern’s hand. They softened under the white heat radiating from his palm, turning moist and malleable, losing every quality that made them recognizable as metal. Northern squeezed them into themselves, twisted them out, squeezed again. The material yielded like wet clay.
While he worked, he sent a mental command to a clone. Maw’Thoraxis’s corpse was dragged towards him. Two of his clones bent down with scavenger’s knives and shredded the skin plates of the dead monster away from its body, peeling them off one by one and passing them to Northern, who folded each piece into the ball of melted substance in his hand.
He allowed his autonomous shadow to seep out and bleed into the mixture as well, a dark thread winding through the molten mass. Then Northern began to draw out a shape.
Before any of this, before he’d even started the process, Northern had taken a good look at the metal that formed Jeci’s armor. It was crafted from something called the Dread Warden, albeit an inferior version of the original. This meant that the Dread Warden carcass-to-impurity ratio was quite low, and still it had been able to release the kind of power it did for Jeci.
Northern did not know what rank the Dread Warden was, but it had to be at least Belial rank. He vanquished those impurities and mixed the little he had of the carcass itself with Maw’Thoraxis’s carcass, letting his Supreme Shadow be the binding agent that held the two together.
Then he worked them under the white heat of his hands, turning the mass in and against itself until the two materials lost their individual character and became something new. He began pulling the melted metal outward, stretching it like moulding material while it was still soft enough to accept a shape.
Northern separated the melted metal into six parts. The first he used to form the chest plate and shoulder pauldrons together with the lower leg pieces. The second became the vambraces. The third, the boots. He fashioned a helmet with the fifth portion, pressing the metal into something angular and predatory, and the sixth he drew out long and thin, extending it into a tenebrous black steel spear.
The hammering process was easy. There was no hammering process. Northern simply let the heat cool, and as it did, the shapes formed rigidity around his design. Metal that had been formless moments ago locked into edges sharp enough to cut light.
It took less than thirty minutes, and this was especially because Northern was keen about the details.
Using the [Soul String], he tied the armor to his soul first. He would change the binding to Jeci’s later.
[Item Successfully Bound]
[Analyzing...]
[Item Classification: Ancient]
[Item] Name: [Dreadreaver]
Type: [Armor(Heavy — Full Set: Helm, Chest, Pauldrons, Gauntlets, Tassets, Greaves)]
Rank: [Ancient]
Order: [IV]
Order Abilities: [Reaver’s Rebuke], [Mantle of Dread], [Dread Field], [Passive Effects]
Description: [This armor was created using the purest form of metal salvaged from a leviathan that guarded the Void Gate for a thousand years, and a Bell that defied its fate and ruled the depths of the Black Canyon for hundreds of years.
[The armor itself is a full suit of heavy plate rendered in absolute matte black — not the dark gray of iron or the shine of obsidian, but a lightless, almost hungry black, as though the metal was forged from solidified shadow. Every plate edge is jagged and angular, rising into cruel points at the pauldrons, gauntlets, and the crown of the helm. The helm itself is a faceless wedge, its visor a narrow slit framed by serrated ridges that sweep back like the crest of some predatory beast.
[Crimson runes scar the surface — not painted or engraved, but grown into the metal, glowing faintly with their own heat. A central sigil blazes on the chestplate: a branching, thorn-like glyph that pulses in time with the wearer’s heartbeat. Smaller runes mark the left pauldron, the forearms, and the tasset skirt — each one a fragment of the Dread Warden’s dying curse. In darkness, the runes are the only visible feature, making the wearer appear as a silhouette of malice with veins of bleeding light.
[The armor’s waist is cinched by a wide belt of the same black material, and below it, segmented tassets hang like the skirt of a war priest — rigid enough to deflect a blade, but articulated enough to allow movement.]
Northern read the description and felt something close to pride. The Order abilities weren’t something he had put conscious effort into formulating, but they were one of the main reasons he’d selected these materials. And this armor was different from all the others he had seen. It even had Passive abilities.
The first, [Reaver’s Rebuke], gave a 30% chance to reflect damage back as void-aspect energy. The harder the armor is hit, the harder it hits back.
The second, [Mantle of Dread], was a transformation ability. The runes fully ignite and the armor becomes semi-living for 120 seconds. In this state, the plates shift to intercept blows autonomously, wounds seal on contact, and a void barrier generates around the wearer, absorbing up to 10,000 points of damage. Visually, the wearer appears wreathed in dark-crimson fog, and the helm’s visor burns like two molten eyes.
The third, [Dread Field], created a zone of darkness that drained the enemy’s power and funneled it to the wearer and their allies. Enemies caught inside lose speed and accuracy from a primal fear, while the wearer and allies gain both. Weaker enemies could faint or flee outright.
And the Passive effects: +185% physical defense, +70% Dark Resistance, +40% Essence Recovery rate, Intimidation Aura, and Self Repair.
Northern was very satisfied. This would most likely turn out to be his masterpiece.
For now.
’Ha.. I can’t wait to see her face when I deliver this to her.’
He turned to the tenebrous spear and smiled.
’Now, let’s see what you’re made of.’
