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Carver and Herald were both spot-on Long ago, they told me that certain artifacts needed to be near their chosen wielders in order to continue to function Herald, orked with artifacts at the Lorica’s Gallery all da, also hinted that continued contact could deepen that attunement, that bond between the relic and the user

Granted, I couldn’t quite use Vanitas to attack souided cruise thened to the point that he could speak to me from inside my enchanted backpack, from an entire other dimension

“Well, if you truly don’t want to hurt your father, then we should do everything in our power to co you Safe, like”

“That, we can agree on,” I said Without even thinking it, er on the weird and incredibly difficult list of reagents that Hecate had set out for me Because the task, she said, should be commensurate to the reward

“So now she wants you to find five runted “When you could barely handle the one”

“Hey That’s not fair Besides, you’re just jealous that I paid Nightmare h

ted it “I jealous over an inanimate object”

“Iainst an inanimate object”

“I didn’t lose nothing,” I growled “There’s no basis for any of this Hecate only said that I needed the swords for the ritual, not that I had to actually wield them”

Five swords reatest mystical forces that walked the earth, each syht The task, Hecate said, was to gather a sword that represented the essence of the celestials, the infernals, the old gods of earth, huh ironically, that was the easiest of the tasks to accoer for that one

“So I’m the Eldest blade,” Vanitas said “That h up one of their sacred, powerful relics, and somehow trust us not to end the planet when the Dark Roo deal”

I groaned, shoving a pair of headphones over my ears so I wouldn’t look too weird to any passersby I didn’t needatto myself

“You don’t have to be so negative, you know Hecate says that this will give us e need to stop the Eldest forever Isn’t that worth the risk, whatever that risk is? It can’t be so bad”

“Can’t it?” Vanitas said “But who are we to stop you? If you’d successfully worn the Crown of Stars, your soul would be forfeit You’ve given enough of your blood and your life to call on the Dark” The next thing Vanitas said see off into soe of sadness “We could cut your legs off at the knees and you would – gods, Dustin, you would still crawl to your own doom, all to save a race of people that doesn’t even know the danger it’s in”

I cleared et all sentiet the Eldest out of ers andmy hand out into the distance “From here to infinity”