Well, it was quite strange. Basically as far as Darius could tell, the story of the game that Vena based Gravitas' laws on was a land called Phantasmagoria.
The mana in that world was usable by anyone but humans. No mages and no special powers, but they did live in a magical world since plants could make use of mana and special beings like dragons existed as well as using the energy for themselves.
However, these dragons were guardians and did not raid human lands.
Naturally, in the pursuit of technology, ether was discovered and refined from mana. However, the caveat was that every time ether was refined and consumed for various stuff, it would be converted back to mana at a loss, which was then reabsorbed from the atmosphere and so on.
So after years of this, a crisis came to the land, but the humans didn't much care.
However, there was a special species that were born in this world through a unique endgame plot called spirits. They were a female-only race of supreme beauties who were violent and basically killing machines, split into the three elements of Fire, Earth, and Ice.
Follow on NovᴇlEnglish.nᴇtThere was the occasional Black Spirit with curse abilities who were sadistic and one unique White Spirit who could perform unique support.
The Fire Spirits were usually attackers who could use mana to add flame to their blades or daggers, very weak in defense, and super strong with fire magic that could one-shot other teams.
The Earth Spirits were purely defenders and healers, who could use mana to create shields and take damage for the whole team, as well as cast healing, defensive and revival magic for other spirits.
The Ice Spirits were a mix of attack and support. They had the highest physical attack able to cut down all but Earth Spirits in one blow, even more than fire spirits, and their defense was super weak. However, they were the only ones who could counter and seal magic cast by Fire or Earth Spirits.
The Black Spirits had weak attacks but were super fast, able to strike multiple times in one round compared to others. They had a shit-tier defense, but their barriers had slight damage reflection. Their support was deadly, able to curse others by reducing attack, reducing defense, or forcing them to 'skip their turn'.
Also, Black Spirit magic could not be sealed or banished by Ice Spirits.
The source of the spirits was revealed later in the game to be an Eternity Sword that was of great power.
And with that came the whole picture of the world of Phantasmagoria and beyond. In this world, there were two factions, the Chaos Eternals and the Law Eternals.
They were timeless beings that could live forever and displayed great power through their bound swords. These two factions had obvious motives, Law Eternals who wanted to rule the weak and destroy order, and the Chaos Eternals who advocated freedom and natural development.
They spent eternity fighting and across multiple worlds across the universe, which was - funnily enough - shaped like the Tree of Yggdrasil.
And now comes Earth. One Eternal, a female beauty, with the Sword of Time, stays and watches over the story's protagonist while being in hiding. She recognized the protagonist had the chance to become Eternal and so protects him.
However, he is forcibly isekaied one day after feeling sick and placed in the world of Phantasmagoria, just one plane out of many in the universe, barely adjacent to earth.
He is then forced to use a Rank 4 sword called Desire to fight against his worst enemy who wanted to 'marry' his 13-year-old sister with a sword called Oath which was also the enemy of Desire.
Naturally, the protagonist, his enemy, his younger sister, and his two best friends - of which one secretly likes him - are all isekaied at the same time.
Follow on Novᴇl-Onlinᴇ.cᴏmThey are called 'Etrangers', the local language for 'Otherworldly Strangers'.
Skipping the initial story, the characters, and the dramatic, tear-jerker plot, Etrangers were basically four tools summoned by the four swords of Phantasmagoria to fight to the death, and the winner combines the Rank 4 Desire and three Rank 5 Swords including Oath to form a Rank 2 Eternal sword called World of which the 4 were split from during a previous battle.
All such swords had a specific Rank that they belong to, with those Ranks going from Rank 0 to Rank 9, from Rank 0 being the strongest to Rank 9 being the weakest.
The stronger the sword, the greater its will, leading most swords from Rank 4 and above to have their own established personality, whereas swords of Ranks 5 and below tend to be more comparable to blades that run off instinct, beastly in nature.
Spirits possessed Swords from Rank 6 to Rank 9, with Rank 6 Spirits being the strongest among them and Rank 9 Spirits being the weakest. Etrangers possessed Rank 4 and 5 swords and all swords at Rank 3 and above were Eternal swords.
Interestingly, all spirits were born from a Rank 2 sword called Rebirth and when they came into being, they had their sword with them. They were used like disposable war robots by the weak humans of Phantasmagoria.
However, what interested Darius from all of this was not just the fact that this story was full of interesting ideas for him to take, as well as being the reason for Vena's work.
No, what interested him was this Eternal race, or more specifically, the Eternity Swords that granted them their powers.
That was also one part of it, and the other was that he got a notification from the True Supreme System that he now had the ability to travel to Phantasmagoria in the 'World's' Sub-menu as long as he bought the Travel Key from the System Shop.
This was interesting and Darius began to wonder if he wasn't limited to real-world in the universe, but also fictional ones created in games, movies, and literature.
If he could do so, it would change everything and revolutionize his plan for what he did during the Master stage and above!