Chapter 112 - Paths the Lies Ahead (Patreon)

As far as Valkorion understood it, the Compendiums of the Pathways were very rare things, and not many people had them. Mostly because the methods to create them were lost in the ancient past, and the few copies that remained fell into the hands of various Beyonder Organizations or powerful Beyonders.

With the Compendium, one could lay down the foundation of the Mid-Level Beyonder Organizations in time.

The Compendium wasn't just an ordinary booklet, but it was a proper Artifact that contained wisdom and Supernatural Powers, and according to the information that he knew, only True Gods could make a Compendium.

Overall, one could consider the Compendium as the Divine Artifact, yet not that much, as the literal amount of the Divine Power within the Compendium was zero, and it was absolutely useless aside from the information that it contained.

So, one could say that the Compendium was a rather problematic treasure in this respect.

For many, it's value would be tremendous, and for some, it would be just a bit pricey book.

Valkorion didn't know who the man named Mephistopheles was, but if he was able to hand over such an amount of treasures for the information on the Doom of the Valyrian Freehold, it must be someone with an extraordinary backround.

No less extraordinary than Adam, perhaps.

This could be good and bad at the same time... certainly it would be problematic, but for the time being, he would rather enjoy the benefits of the Kadath Congregation. Valkorion knew that if the Kadath Congregation could truly work as a Secret Organization, then their ability to influence the world would be tremendous.

When he looked at Adam, he knew that the man was certainly a puppet master behind the scenes in some region of the world. And if he were given a free choice to say where he would tell Westeros.

The religion of the Seven closely aligned with that of Adam's attire, and Southern Westeros was an ideal place for Adam to do his machinations. He just shrugged as that was away from him, and as far as he knew, the Apprentice Pathway, which was the Pathway used by the followers of the Seven-Who-Are-One, didn't have anything to do with his own.

Meaning they were not adjacent Pathways.

Now that he had his hands on the Warrior Pathway, he could finally see what was so interesting about it, and he could fill the gaps. The maximum that he managed to find out was that it was later divided into two directions...

Orthodox and Unorthodox, and soon enough, as he was reading the Warrior Pathway Compendium, he found out why.

Once someone reached the Sequence 6 Beast Knight, then the Beyonder was at a crossroads on how to continue because, at this moment, what seemed to be one Pathway became another one.

Both of these Pathways that were stemming from the common origin were interconnected and contradictory at the same time. Yet, one couldn't exist without another as they represented some of the fundamental aspects of the Cosmos.

From Sequence 6, one would have the choice as to which advance. 

Either to walk through the Orthodox Pathway of the Dawn or the Unorthodox of the Moon.

The Orthodox Pathway followed the concept of the Twilight Dawn.

Sequence 5: Twilight Knight

Sequence 4: Dawn Paladin

Sequence 3: Twilight Scion

Sequence 2: Dawn Lord

Sequence 1: Hand of God

Sequence 0: Twilight Dawn

This was the standard Pathway, and for Sequence 5 to Sequence 3, he had every necessary information that was needed to advance through these Sequences. Including Beyonder Potion Ingredients, Acting Methods, Advancement Rituals, and some additional information about Pathway and Abilities.

Then he turned his sight to the Unorthodox Pathway, which was more appealing to him despite the dangers and stigma that it presented. 

Sequence 5: Vampire

Sequence 4: Bloodknight

Sequence 3: Bloodscion

Sequence 2: Vampire Lord

Sequence 1: True Ancestor

Sequence 0: Crimson Moon

The "Orthodox Path" represented the concepts of Twilight and Dawn, while the "Unorthodox Path" represented the Concept of the Moon, which was apparently later on mutated into the Crimson Moon with the creation of the Vampires.

According to the information in the Compendium, the very first being that became the God of the Moon and Dawn in the 1st Epoch, was the Ancient God. In the Second Epoch, two of his closest subordinates betrayed the Ancient God, split his Godhood in half, and took one aspect for each.

With the deal with the Great Old Ones, they created new God Positions, and thus, the Crimson Moon and Twilight Dawn came into existence. As much as simplified was the information and most probably tons of additional information was 

Now both of the Paths had their pros and cons. 

The Twilight Dawn Pathway was higher on the offensive specter right from the start; it was easier to master, and most importantly, apparently, the chances of losing control were very low even when compared to other Pathways.

According to the Warrior Pathway Compendium, the Twilight Dawn Pathway was probably the most stable Pathway, and the possibility of succumbing to the Madness was extremely low due to the Light of Dawn that was purifying everything negative.

That was incredibly appealing to Valkorion because it was pretty safe, and even all things considered, the Twilight Dawn Pathway was very powerful Pathway, even though it was more leaning towards the area of concept of Tank and not pure DPS.

On the contrary, the Crimson Moon Pathway was more challenging as it required far higher innate talent to advance through the Sequences while at the same time, the possibility of succumbing to the Madness was...

One of the highest.

Of the all known Pathways.

At the same time, they had rather slow growth and required a lot of resources to even advance. Most obviously, one needed to drink blood; the more powerful Blood, the better for the Beyonder, as they would be able to increase their power even more.

However, embarking on this Pathway also had its own benefits.

The first thing was the versatility because it was both Magically oriented as it was oriented on physical combat. At the same time, the Beyonders, who were effectively Vampires, had much longer lifespans, which was very important for Valkorion.

Anything could happen, and he could be stuck at some random Sequence for a long time and die before reaching the High Sequences. Most of the Pathways, even at the High Sequences, have a maximum Lifespan of a few centuries, with the average being five hundred years.

Not to mention, at the higher Sequences, the combat prowess of these Beyonders was really high, and their survivability was top-notch. And being a Vampire sounded rather cool, especially when there was no one looming about him.

At the same time, he was rather suspicious that there was the presence of the Deadric Princes... 

He didn't know if the certain Deadric Prince was a thing here who was rumored to be the origin of all Vampire in the lore. Valkorion knew that there wasn't really a need to decide right now, even though he was already leaning toward the Unorthodox Path.

While the idea of playing on Paladin wasn't that bad, it wasn't his style.

The Twilight Dawn Pathway, while powerful, was more oriented towards the defense, and the offensive abilities were not really their strongest side.