Chief Evelyn presented the King with the new attire: The Void Anchor Garb. It was a high-tech combat suit built not to attract external Flow, but to retain the King's massive internal DF reserves.
The outfit featured highly reflective, dark violet plating interwoven with threads of pure, crystallized Meta-Flow. Crucially, the armor incorporated numerous internal stabilizers and regulators, ensuring that even under extreme stress, the King's hair, makeup, and posture would remain at a perfect, unwavering 100% Aesthetic Integrity.
"Your Majesty, the Void Anchor will ensure zero external FPM drain," Evelyn explained, adjusting a crystallized pauldron. "It maximizes the efficiency of your internal DF for the duration of the mission. The aesthetic is purely internal power."
Felix donned the armor. The weight felt reassuring. He clipped the gilded microphone—the Prism of Unfettered Desire—onto his belt, the artifact humming softly with its ancient, cultivated energy.
"Let's go," Felix commanded. "It's time to meet my shadow."
The Void of Lost Focus was a desolate, mist-shrouded valley, magically shielded from the rest of the world. The moment the Royal Airship crossed the threshold, Felix felt the crushing emptiness.
The warm hum of the national Flow vanished instantly. The air was thick with a psychic dampener, designed to extinguish all forms of mental focus. Felix's internal system registered the change immediately.
[SYSTEM ALERT: EXTERNAL FLOW RATE: 0 FPM. GLOBAL FLOW NET: OFFLINE. INTERNAL DF RESERVES: MAXED. AI RATING: 100% (STABLE).]
Felix stood alone in the oppressive silence. Knight-Captain Rhea was suspended mid-air in the center of the clearing, wrapped in chains of dull, gray energy. She was unconscious, her usual vibrant aesthetic utterly suppressed by the psychic field.
Standing opposite Felix was a figure cloaked entirely in rough, featureless gray material. This was the Shadow.
"You came," the figure rasped, the voice completely devoid of aesthetic quality—just flat, dull sound. "You brought the relic."
"I came for my Knight-Captain," Felix said, his voice ringing with the clarity of pure, focused rage. "And I came to end your ugly crusade, Shadow."
"My name is not Shadow," the figure hissed. "I am the vessel of pure, absolute Contempt."
The figure raised a hand, and the atmosphere intensified, pressing in on Felix. This wasn't a physical attack; it was a pure, mental assault using the magical signature Felix had previously detected.
"Your Flow is a lie, King! It is fleeting, consumerist desire! It is the weak corruption that the Doctrine of Undivided Light sought to purge!" the figure shouted. "You use your people's base desires to empower yourself! You are the ultimate insult to True Focus!"
The gray energy surged from the figure, coalescing around Felix into a physical barrier: The Contempt Cage. It was a shimmering prism of pure, weaponized disgust, designed to shatter Felix's internal focus.
[SYSTEM WARNING: CONTEMPT CAGE DEPLOYED. ENEMY ATTACK: PURE PSYCHIC DEGRADATION. RESISTANCE: DF RESERVES ONLY.]
The Cage pressed in, attempting to revert Felix's aesthetic integrity by force. He felt his perfect hair attempting to flop, his posture wanting to slump, his memories of past Rituals of Gooning turning sour and embarrassing. The Cage was trying to make him feel the shame of his former life.
"You cannot make me ashamed of my focus!" Felix fought back, planting his feet firmly in the Void Anchor Garb. He channeled his internal DF to execute the first strategic counter.
He targeted the most ugly, vulnerable part of the enemy's aesthetic: the dull, featureless gray cloak.
Kingly Skill Activated: The Ironic Inversion (Targeted Self-Defense)
Felix poured 5,000 DF into the inversion. The Contempt Cage shook violently. The gray cloak, the very symbol of the Shadow's dull, featureless existence, instantly transmuted.
It became a Hyper-Shimmer, Flow-Weave Poncho, complete with embroidered Clout Crystals. The garment was overwhelmingly, painfully aesthetic.
The Shadow screamed in agony, clutching the shimmering material. "NO! My Contempt! You corrupted my Contempt!"
The Contempt Cage weakened, the psychic pressure easing momentarily. Felix had proven his internal power was sufficient, even without the national Flow. The enemy was vulnerable, defeated by their own aesthetic. But the identity of the Shadow remained hidden under the glittering poncho.