The chamber was built in silence.
Stone by stone, rune by rune, the Hall of Mutation had risen not from necessity, but from curiosity. From something deeper. A pull in my core that whispered of evolution not as a goal—but as an obsession.
This hall was not like the rest of Netherhold. It breathed differently. The air was heavy, filled with particles I couldn't name, drawn from the warped mana that surrounded the Fragment of Broken Evolution. The containment crystal floated above the central dais, spinning slowly, flickering between consistency and collapse.
I stared at it.
The fragment was beautiful in the way a dying star was beautiful. A collapsing miracle. It did not just glow; it writhed, pulsed with something that wanted to live, even if it no longer remembered how.
It reminded me of myself.
What am I now?
A dead king returned. A lich with no god. A sovereign without worship. And yet... I had returned stronger than before, born from betrayal and pain.
Perhaps that was why I was drawn to this shard of failed ascension.
Because I had failed once, too.
And unlike the Hollowborn, I survived.
---
I stood on the edge of the fusion platform, watching the soulsteel restraints hum around the floating shard. Runes flared to life—containment, amplification, deviation filters. Every inch of this place was designed not to control mutation, but to survive it.
The moment the shard bonded with something living, reality would bend.
The only question was: Would it break?
I extended my will across the lower levels. Creatures stirred. Thousands of them now lived under my reign—some newly born, others forged from old magic and broken bones. But I needed something specific. Something imperfect. Resilient. Unpredictable.
Something already… wrong.
I didn't call his name.
He felt me anyway.
Within minutes, I heard the sound.
Squish. Slap. Squish. Giggle.
And then: "HELLLOOOOOO~!"
He burst into the chamber like a wet balloon of joy.
Glep.
Formless, boneless, and always grinning. A being born from mimic flesh and discarded energy. He had no proper lineage, no evolution path, no species classification. He was a mistake the world had overlooked.
But I had never overlooked him.
Glep had survived things that should've destroyed him. He'd been stepped on by a Titan-borne. Boiled in acid. Crushed under a collapsing ceiling. And yet here he was, giggling, drooling, and vibrating with excitement.
"Master!" he squeaked. "The fancy room! Is this where the explodey things happen?!"
I said nothing for a moment.
He wobbled closer, one eye rotating clockwise while the other spun in reverse. "Am I dying today?"
I met his gaze.
"You might."
He paused. "Oh. That's cool."
"You are the first."
He blinked. Then shivered. "I feel honored. And gassy."
He hopped onto the platform and lay down like a sacrificial goat made of joy and mucus.
---
> [Fusion Sequence Initialized: Subject – Glep | Catalyst – Fragment of Broken Evolution]
[Status: Containment Locked | Mutation Route: Unstable | Possibility of Catastrophic Failure: 72%]
The chamber sealed. Energy flared. Glyphs carved into the walls activated in layers—one after another like dominoes of divine engineering.
The shard descended slowly, spinning faster, vibrating as it neared the mimic's body.
Glep looked up.
"I hope I turn into a dragon made of pudding," he whispered.
And then it touched him.
Reality cracked.
---
The sound wasn't like thunder.
It was like bone being scraped inside your soul. The lights didn't dim—they bled. The rune circle under Glep twisted, forming new symbols even I didn't recognize. His body jerked violently. Liquefied. Solidified. Began to bloom.
Flesh split open, and from inside it came—a chrysalis of mutating ooze and crystallized bone. His laughter echoed louder, deeper, folding in on itself.
It didn't sound like Glep anymore.
It sounded… beautiful.
I watched from behind three barriers of soulsteel and a wall of reinforced shadowflame. My eyes adjusted, my core pulsing in sync with the chamber's heartbeat.
This wasn't mutation.
This was rebirth.
I saw wings forming and dissolving, mouths closing over other mouths, eyes blinking out of existence before blinking back in higher, sharper. There were screams—not from pain, but from power. They weren't Glep's.
They were memories. From the fragment. From the Hollowborn.
They knew this process. They had felt it. They had feared it.
And now it was beginning again—under my control.
---
After what felt like an eternity, the light stabilized.
Steam rose.
The cocoon cracked.
And from within it stepped a figure. No longer a blob. No longer laughing.
He stood tall—thin, agile, and terrifying. Bone plates covered his spine. His limbs elongated but flexible, his core pulsing with glowing veins of mimic mana. His grin remained.
But this grin watched.
He bowed slightly.
"I was chaos," he said, voice like a warped harp string. "Now I'm... performance."
"Name?" I asked.
"Glepharion," he said. "The Adaptive Jester."
He twirled, summoned a clone of Luma's light, warped it into Boneflare's flame, and juggled both.
Then ate them.
> [Mutation Successful]
[New Classification: Hybrid Aberration (Tier B)]
[Traits Gained: Chaotic Morphing | Adaptive Resistance | Elastic Soul Core | Memory Ingestion (Minor)]
His energy signature fluctuated, impossible to pin down.
No form was permanent. No damage lasting.
He was chaos with a spine.
Madness with a plan.
I approached carefully.
"Do you remember what you were?"
He chuckled. "Yes. I loved him. He was free."
"And now?"
"I'm focused. But still funny."
He clicked his fingers. A shadow puppet danced across the wall, then exploded into song.
I turned away.
Success.
---
I spent the next several hours cataloging data.
The Mutation Codex was now active, its core made from broken laws.
The shard had stabilized—but barely.
Its energy wasn't depleted.
It had simply... slept.
And it would awaken again when called.
The next test was already in motion.
This time, I had chosen them carefully.
Three creatures entered the hall—escorted by Grave Stalker.
None of them were normal.
The first: a harpy whose wings had been mangled in a battle defending her nest. She limped, but her eyes blazed with vengeance.
The second: a lizardkin half-melted by volcanic acid. He no longer blinked, but his scales shimmered with unnatural resilience.
The third: a silent crawler born from shadow. It had no mouth. But it had followed every command I gave without fail—and never asked for reward.
They stood before the dais.
Glepharion watched from the shadows, clapping slowly.
I looked at each of them.
"I won't promise survival," I said.
They didn't flinch.
"But I promise this: if you die, your remains will become something glorious."
None of them moved.
Then the harpy stepped forward.
"I want to fly again," she whispered.
The lizardkin followed.
"I want to burn without pain."
And the crawler simply stared.
Permission. Consent. Desire.
That was all the shard needed.
The runes lit again.
The light returned.
And the screams began.
---
END OF CHAPTER 8