Baiyi was finally back to that familiar patch of the gobi he had left not too long ago. The yellow sand, desert shrubs, and the battle-scarred environment were all still exactly as the Fifth Walker had left them. There was a white skeleton laying on the ground in front of Baiyi. Its arms were crossed in front of its chest as it laid there quietly.
“You’re not gonna bounce back up, right?” Baiyi said as he approached the skeleton. He stopped right in front of it and kicked it lightly.
Suddenly, something happened!
This time, nothing dead was coming back to life. Instead, Baiyi noticed the whiteness of the skeleton gradually begin to fade, making the bones become more translucent. The translucent skeleton suddenly began to morph into something else. In a few moments, only a strange set of clothes laid in front of Baiyi.
It was an elastic leather suit of some kind that was meant to cover every part of a human’s body. It resembled a frogman’s diving suit, but it was partially transparent. Looking downwards, one could spot the desert sand that was underneath the leather suit.
The leather suit looked like it would only fit an adult, albeit tightly. Baiyi could not identify the material that the leather suit was made out of; to him, it did not seem to be artificial linen. This made the leather suit even more mysterious.
Seeing as the leather suit was form-fitting and partially transparent, one might consider it a great outfit for a kinky night.
“This is…” Baiyi crouched down, picked the leather suit up, and began to examine it thoroughly. He scanned it with his psychic energy and said, “If I’m not mistaken, this is the monster doppelganger I just fought…”
“You’re saying the great Fifth Walker was shamelessly floored and completely overpowered by a kinky BDSM suit? To the point that he had to use his top-secret ultimate mo — mmmmm! Mmmff!” The speaker was quickly muted before they could complete their sentence; Baiyi did not even bother to check who it was.
After resolving the nuisance that was the annoying speaker, Baiyi turned back to the leather suit. “This isn’t just any leather suit; it is more unique than any outfit.”
Immediately after he spoke, the hand holding the leather suit burst into black flames, and the fabric was burnt to a crisp.
However, in as short as two breaths, the leather suit was restored back to its original form; it looked brand new, just as it had done before.
That was the same ability used by the doppelganger!
“Huh. Interesting…” The Archmage remarked, feeling riveted.
“This thing must be another one of those unique Law Fragments. In fact, only a Law could ever rule over matter and all beings in the universe — including the corrosive property of Void Energy. No wonder the Void Energy I used during the fight had almost no effect on the doppelganger.” Baiyi added as he retracted his psychic energy. He carefully and gradually extended his consciousness towards the leather suit, determined to read the Law behind it.
When his consciousness made contact with the leather suit, a torrent of information surged into his mind. Fortunately, this time, not only was the information complete, but the amount of information permeating Baiyi’s mind was also a lot more than the amount of information he had gotten from the Law fragment in Gouve. Baiyi appreciated the fact that the information entering his mind was coherent and properly ordered, revealing the history of the leather suit and its purpose in proper clarity.
After a while, the influx of information stopped, and only then did Baiyi begin to digest what had been revealed to him. He announced to the Void, “This leather suit is a ‘Law-ful Creation’— an item imbued with the world-changing power of Laws, so I guess it is technically an incomplete Law? You know, like the Fairy Walker’s Caudillo Butterfly bow. About this leather suit, as long as it remains within the unique territory it can construct — yes, the ‘Holy Ground’ I was just battling in — then it will be able to transform and restore itself without end.”
“To be clear, a god once used this leather suit, but for some reason, it was left here. It even contains the remnants of an essence belonging to the Higher Power who once used it. The essence is just as powerful as Void Energy. I’ll go out on a limb and say that during the battle, this leather suit had used that essence to rival my abilities… That must have been ‘Holy power’, right?”
With this new information, Baiyi was finally able to understand everything that had happened to him since he came to this realm. It all started with Baiyi innocently planning an outdoor trip with his beloved students so that he could enjoy the bliss and happiness a father did. However, a band of assassins from Godsfall showed and engaged Baiyi in a gruesome battle. In order to end the battle as quickly as possible, Baiyi had to draw power from the Void, and by doing so, he unwittingly set off the defense mechanism of an ancient and powerful leather suit. In order to protect itself, the leather suit exhausted the remaining holy power it had left to construct an isolated space. It lured Baiyi into this space and engaged him in a fierce battle!
As the belonging of an unknown god, not only was there a possibility that the leather suit had been crafted personally by the hands of the god who once owned it, but the leather suit itself was actually a priceless Divine Regalia; as such, its abilities and attacks were devastating, enough to place someone like the Fifth Voidwalker on edge!
However, it was unfortunate for the Divine leather suit that its master, the unknown god, was long gone, so the minuscule holy power left inside it limited the damage and endurance that the divine clothing could dole out. In the end, Baiyi was able to obliterate the leather suit’s special, isolated space, which, in turn, destroyed its self-defense mechanism. Only after that was Baiyi was able to claim the leather suit as his prize.
Unfortunately for Baiyi, the remaining holy power in the suit was so little, it was not enough to create the large isolated space that the suit had created on its own, neither was it enough for Baiyi to deal attacks as devastating as the suit did. The leather suit only had enough holy power to perform small-scale self-restoration and form-transformation; it was now a defanged divine regalia.
One could only imagine how much power the leather suit originally had. Back then, as long as the person who wore the suit remained within the suit’s special isolated space, they would be able to revive themselves completely, no matter how devastating their opponent’s attack was. Furthermore, they would be able to transform at will and perform their opponent’s moves and abilities perfectly. The leather suit was still capable of restoring itself from any form of damage; however, that effect would no longer extend to whoever wore it.
Even its transformation ability had been watered down greatly. The leather suit could now only take on the appearance of someone, but that was it.
This was akin to the rank of the item dropping from “Cell from Dragonball” rank to “Baiyi’s Potter the Owl” rank.
Of course, Baiyi had arrived at this conclusion based on the information from the leather suit and his own conjectures, which stemmed from his experience. In summary, A super rare divine regalia, which had been capable of turning any battle to its owner’s advantage, had now become a common, kinky leather suit. Despite that, Baiyi was still pleased with the suit’s high intrinsic value; it was now the best loot he had gained from all his adventures and raids. To him, It was even better than the War God’s Sword! The only reward he considered more fortuitous than this leather suit was his Kitty-Cat Maid, Attie.
Baiyi believed that the leather suit would suit a soul armature just fine. Even though its abilities were worn out, an immortal’s thrash was still worth more than a mortal’s finest armor. Furthermore, the leather suit still contained the secrets of a Law within it, making it a valuable research item. Such was the prestige of being a divine regalia!
The battle had been worth it 1 .
The Archmage suggested that Baiyi swap his armor for the leather suit, but after a short while of thinking, Baiyi declined.
“It’s a form-fitting leather suit! It already looks really weird, and now you want me to wear it and cosplay as that Forest Fairy from Shin Nippori 2 ?” Baiyi asked in disbelief. “There’s has got to be another purpose which we could use it for, but all that will have to wait until we have conducted some research. Oh, I almost forgot; it has a name. It is called ‘The Divine Burial’.”
“Gah! Such a ‘discomposing’ name. Uttering it in an audible decibel is akin to inviting a hex!” Feeling befuddled, the Scholar slowly said, “Enlighten me; how does one manage to attend a burial while dressed in a semi-transparent, body-fitting attire?”
‘That was a really unnecessary question right there,’ Baiyi thought helplessly to himself. On the outside, however, he tried offering his own interpretation of the name. “I think, it means that if someone comes across a foe wearing this leather suit, they should begin to plan a burial for themselves. But—”
Baiyi stopped suddenly because he recalled how he had found the leather suit. When he first saw the leather suit after his battle with the doppelganger, it was in the form of a human skeleton. The skeleton had been laying down with its arms crossed across its chest. This was similar to the position human corpses have after they had been placed into a coffin. Therefore, could the “burial” in its name indicate the burial of the Higher Power who once owned it? Could this go further to mean that the leather suit was just a funeral garment for the unknown god who once owned it?
It was a preposterous conjecture, so Baiyi shook his head sideways, dismissing it. He had decided not to bode on this, seeing as there were more pressing matters that demanded his attention.
To Baiyi, if one was to ponder deeply, they would realize that the chain of events that had led to this point seemed a little… off. He had found this tiny realm by coincidence, and the tiny realm coincidentally contained this fascinating leather suit, which Baiyi coincidentally awakened, and coincidentally defeated and claimed for himself.
The bit of his consciousness which was powered by his smuggled power had found this realm by coincidence, and Baiyi was only able to smuggle that power from the Void because he had coincidentally been in the right place at the right time to battle the revived-Abyss Lord, Thaas.
His actions had been marred by too many coincidences; every piece just seemed to feed a bigger picture. At this point, he definitely could not chalk it all up to “Fate. I guess…”. After all, this was not a comedic novel 3 .
Just as Baiyi was mulling over all this, the Fourth Walker, the Oracle Walker, who was the “Leading Expert in Faking Death”, suddenly “came to life” and shared a bit of his consciousness. When Baiyi hurriedly pried that bit of consciousness open, all he saw was…
“Coincidence is fate.”
‘You’re not saying anything! Why you sonuva —’
Baiyi was about to fly into a rage, but he stopped himself. What could one possibly say to a fraud? It would be a fruitless attempt as the fraud could not be won. Moreover, this fraud, the Oracle Walker, did not include a comeback message in that bit of consciousness he sent out; had he foreseen that Baiyi would choose not to bother refuting his only comment?
“After all I did, it still turned out that I don’t belong here, either. And here I thought that we all could be here until Grace Day — or Graciously-Giving-Me-More-Trouble Day — is over, but look at how well that turned out?” Baiyi lamented. “Maybe I should just check on the kids.”
Baiyi sent out his psychic power to encompass the area, and he detected his students still at the hill he had left them. They were still there. It seemed they had been having too much fun to notice the chaotic magical vibrations.
“Poor Little Mia. I must have worn her out with that move, right? When I get back, I’m gonna have to do a lot more to compensate,” Baiyi said to no one in particular as his body slowly rose into the air.
He turned to give the scarred battlefield one last look.
Suddenly, he froze. Something was not quite right!