“Hm?”
As Zach’s voice fell, Aatrox’s eyes turned toward him.
“Mortal, you have been to the northern tundra?”
The Freljord was located in the far north of Runeterra and was covered in ice and snow all year round, which was why Aatrox called it the northern tundra.
Faced with Aatrox’s question, Zach almost did not hesitate at all and nodded directly.
“I’ve been there before!”
There was no helping it.
He had to say that.
If he did not, how could Aatrox possibly believe anything he said?
Besides, in his previous life, Zach had played on the Freljord server.
That should count as having been to the Freljord, right?
When Aatrox heard that Zach had actually been to the Freljord, a very obvious look of surprise flashed through his eyes.
He found it hard to believe that this powerless mortal before him had actually been to the northern tundra.
And had not died?
Zach looked at Aatrox’s reaction and felt just as surprised.
Based on what Zach had known in his previous life, Aatrox had been to the Freljord before.
And on the way, he had even slaughtered Tryndamere’s entire tribe!
Could it be that the current timeline had not reached that point yet?
Zach asked tentatively, “Aatrox, have you never been to the Freljord?”
Aatrox shook his head.
“Neither in the past nor now have I or my brethren ever set foot on the northern tundra!”
Zach’s eyes filled with confusion.
“Why?”
“There are many ancient gods in the far northern tundra!”
Aatrox said directly, “Whether for the Shurima of old or for the current me, conquering that land would come at an extremely heavy cost!”
“Moreover, Queen Setaka once said that unless there were special circumstances, we should avoid reaching into that land as much as possible!”
Queen Setaka.
When Zach heard Aatrox mention that name, he could not help looking at Aatrox with a strange gaze.
Setaka, the Ascended warrior queen, the founding ruler of the ancient Shuriman Empire, and Shurima’s first Ascended.
It seemed that Aatrox still retained memories from when he had been an Ascended.
“However, if I truly cannot find a suitable body anywhere else in Runeterra, I will still set foot on that land!” Aatrox added.
At this point, Zach understood.
If he had not appeared, Aatrox probably would have gone to the Freljord in the near future.
It was just that Zach had intercepted him first.
Hearing what Zach said, Aatrox asked again, “Mortal, this body you speak of exists in the far northern tundra?”
Zach nodded without hesitation.
“Exactly!”
“Aatrox, you may need to set foot in the Freljord and search for a qualified body yourself!”
“Oh?” Aatrox narrowed his blood-colored eyes and looked at Zach suspiciously.
He suspected that Zach might be deceiving him.
After all, in order to survive, Zach might very well invent things that did not exist at all.
Naturally, Zach also knew Aatrox’s concerns, so he understood that he still needed to drop something big.
“Aatrox, if you want to kill the Aspect of Twilight, if you want to defeat Pantheon, sometimes you have to use necessary measures!”
“And going to the Freljord to obtain that body is one part of those necessary measures!”
At this point, Zach did not continue.
He simply looked at Aatrox quietly.
And after Aatrox finished listening to Zach’s words, several violent tremors flashed through his blood-colored eyes.
“Boom!”
Blood-red force erupted in an instant, blasting Zach, who was sitting on the ground, more than ten meters away.
“Insect, why do you know these things!”
Zach slowly stood up from the yellow sand and shook the sand off his body.
He looked at Aatrox.
“I heard the story of Aatrox, the Ascended general of ancient Shurima, in old books, so I know a little about it!”
Aatrox looked deeply suspicious.
How could the grudge between him, the Aspect of Twilight, and Pantheon possibly be recorded in old books?
And yet, somehow, Zach still knew a little about it?
Even so, Aatrox’s eyes, which had originally been full of suspicion, also flickered with a hint of wavering.
The first reason was that Zach had actually been able to name the Aspect of Twilight and Pantheon out of nowhere.
The second was that Aatrox had wandered Runeterra for so long and still had not found a suitable body.
Now, he had suddenly heard all this from a strange, mysterious mortal.
This caused Aatrox, who had already been planning to go to the Freljord, to waver even more.
His blood-colored eyes fixed on Zach for a long time, and Zach felt somewhat unable to breathe beneath Aatrox’s violent power.
At this moment, the two of them simply stared at each other.
Neither spoke.
In the desert, only the howling of the storm seemed to remain.
After an unknown amount of time, the pressure on Zach slowly faded, and Aatrox once again carried his greatsword behind him.
“Mortal, if you have deceived me, no matter where you flee, I will find you and make you taste every pain in this world!”
Aatrox’s voice reached Zach’s ears along with the raging wind in the desert.
Immediately afterward, the wings on Aatrox’s back spread to their widest, and blood-colored streams of air erupted from his body.
Under Zach’s gaze, Aatrox flapped his wings and shot straight into the sky, quickly disappearing from Zach’s sight.
Only then did Zach finally survive an almost certain-death situation with nothing but his silver tongue.
It was also at this moment that the familiar blue interface appeared in front of Zach’s eyes again.
[The host has successfully helped Aatrox fulfill his dream!
Dream fulfillment rating: B!]
[Host, please choose one of the following four rewards!]
Seeing those two lines of faint blue text, Zach could not help growing excited.
It seemed that Aatrox finding a suitable body had already become a foregone conclusion.
Zach knew it.
With a hellish start like this, how could he not have some kind of cheat?
Moreover, this cheat, helping others fulfill their dreams, then obtaining one of the dreamer’s abilities or traits, also greatly surprised Zach.
He shook his head, tossed all those messy thoughts to the back of his mind, and looked at his rewards with great excitement.
In front of him were four faint blue square frames.
Inside those frames were the four rewards provided by the system.
Zach only needed to choose one from among them.
[Infernal Chains!
Special chains condensed from hellfire, capable of assisting in battle!]
[Partial Ascended Power!
The power Aatrox possessed before he fell and became a Darkin.
Due to insufficient dream fulfillment rating, only a portion can be obtained!]
[World Ender!
Squeeze out your own Darkin power and instantly erupt with strength several times greater than your own!
After activation, your power will rapidly decline.
Duration depends on your own strength!]
[Blood Magic!
Not top-tier blood magic, but it can still be used to construct a physical body!
It can also absorb the blood of others to rapidly recover from injuries!]
“This…”
Looking at the four options before him, Zach froze.
He really had not expected the rewards given by the system to be this absurd.
Among these four options, if Zach remembered correctly, Infernal Chains and World Ender seemed to be Aatrox’s abilities.
As for Ascended Power and Blood Magic, they seemed to be traits belonging to Aatrox himself.
There was no doubt that no matter which of these four rewards he picked, each one was extremely terrifying.
And now, Zach was facing an incredibly difficult choice.
Out of four, which one should he choose?
He becomes connected to Silco’s side, gains a Skin Master System, and uses League skin-based weapons, tech, armor, and abilities to change the fate of Zaun.
Instead of letting Arcane’s tragedies play out exactly the same way, Felix tries to protect the people around him, especially Powder/Jinx, and push Zaun toward open rebellion against Piltover.
The story starts with the Piltover-Zaun conflict, then expands into the wider Runeterra setting: Noxus’s invasion of Ionia, Demacia’s internal conflict, the Freljord, Shurima, the Void, and eventually the Ruination/Shadow Isles plotline.