Chapter 285: Azrem Curse

"Gods, laws... what have we gotten ourselves into?" Rex mumbled. He thought this was going to be a simple exploration mission: go in, get what they need, and head out. But it had been anything but that.

"What even are laws?" Nataly asked. Of the squad, only Sol and Duncan were in the loop about law techniques, the rest were in the dark.

Torben tilted its metallic head in confusion. "Has this been lost to time too? The path to godhood? Comprehend a law technique, complete it, turn it into a full law, and become the embodiment of that law. Never heard of it? Hell, he just comprehended a law technique."

The squad followed Torben's mechanical arm, which pointed at Sol, raising even more questions.

"You're an A-Ranker now?" Duncan asked, knowing what it meant to have a law technique.

Though Sol hadn't intended to hide it, it was awkward that he wasn't the one to reveal it to his squad. Since the cat was already out of the bag, he didn't deny it. "Yeah, it happened during the fight against that spider monster."

Torben scoffed. "And you were extremely foolish for doing so. If not for Orna's intervention, it would have killed you before you could finish. It's insane to try such a thing right in front of your enemy."

"At the time, I didn't even consider what it would do if it noticed me doing that. But if I had known, I probably would've done it regardless. It was the only way I had to escape. It was either comprehend a law technique or stay stuck in the hallucination it put me in."

He hadn't known that others could detect the process, as it felt like a mostly internal experience. And though it was, there were many ways of noticing he was going through his ascension. In the Bliss Spider's case, it would have realized simply by sensing the rising power and threat coming from him.

"So, wait, you're actually A-Rank?!" Aron struggled to keep up with the conversation, but understood at least that much.

"How?" Lapis asked directly, her meaning clear.

The other squad members echoed the same question, all eager to know, with the exception of Rex, who seemed only somewhat interested.

Sol looked to Duncan for help as the only one who also knew of the situation, but Duncan gave him a helpless smile in return.

Sighing, Sol explained how he had been expressly warned by Zaman not to share the method of becoming A-Rank and how there would be serious repercussions for both him and the kingdom if he did.

Lapis still didn't understand. "So each nation and independent organization can have up to fifty A-Rankers at any given time. What's to stop them from sharing the method anyway?"

"I'm not sure... He just said there are ways."

"Maybe he's lying! To stop you from sharing it around! How could they possibly know if you told us and none of us spoke a word of this?" Lapis wondered aloud.

"There are actually a lot of ways to enforce this." Torben stated. "Back in my time, a common method would be to use a curse."

"A curse?" Nataly frowned. Curses were not to be taken lightly, as they were one of the more insidious ways to harm others.

Torben nodded, unconcerned about the negative connotations. In his time, it was never a moral dilemma to use one. "It's a sure way to make sure information doesn't fall into the wrong hands. For example, the recipe for Azrem Alloy was a closely guarded secret of the royal family. First, you begin with pure iron, cleanse it of impurities by bathing it in baby slime mucus..."

As Torben listed the steps for creating Azrem Alloy, his left mechanical hand began to glow, and a black sigil of a hammer covered in flames appeared.

"And voilà. Now I'm marked for divulging the secret to its creation. It can also be tracked, so it's very hard to hide from the royal family once marked by this."

Worried, Nataly moved closer to inspect his hand.

"Are you okay? Can the curse be removed?"

"Of course I'm fine. I wouldn't have shown you this otherwise. I planned on replacing this arm soon anyway. Normally, even if someone chops off their arm, the mark would reappear on another part of their body. But it's a little different for me. In my case, the curse stays on where it appeared even if I swap to a new arm. It's because the curse is unable to identify that it's no longer connected to my body."

He removed his arm and tossed it onto the middle of the table.

Lazuli looked at the mark and asked, "How is it possible for the curse to still be in effect after so long? Is it some kind of ritual formation that's still working somehow?"

Torben laughed, full of pride for his people's ability to make such a thing still work centuries after their demise. "If done properly, like my people did, they can last a long time. There's no formation or physical object maintaining the curse—it's been permeated into the very essence of our kingdom. The range of this curse is also very wide because the effects aren't too strong. If someone wanted to share the method of making the alloy without the royal family's permission, they'd have to travel to another continent or be marked by the curse. If the caster is strong enough and has sufficient support, it's even possible to cast a curse wide enough to cover an entire world. It's been done before."

"So we could be marked by a curse if we share how to become A-Rank…" Duncan said. Though he hid it behind a serious expression, there was a slight fear of who or what would come for them if they were marked.

Torben shook his metallic head. "Not saying it IS a curse. It COULD be a curse. I was only giving an example. There's more than one way to skin a cat. It could be a divination spell or a divine object like the Vow of Silence, for all I know."

Sol held back the urge to facepalm and said, "...Regardless of whether it's a bluff or some scary curse, I don't think we should go around spreading this information."

The rest of the squad nodded, some more reluctantly than others, but they understood the risk.

"Well, let's push that aside. If you hadn't known about it, I would've told you. But knowing there may some force suppressing this information, I'm not gonna go antagonize them now." Torben wasn't stupid enough to spread knowledge that was being purposefully hidden. Though he had lived a long life, most of it was spent imprisoned in the ancient city alongside the creature that had killed everyone he knew and loved. Now that the way out was finally available, there were many things he wanted to do before passing on to his next life and having to deal with pursuers for spreading information was too much of a hassle.

"What I called you all here for is to give you what you came for."