+7 Agony Infusion

The +7 Agony Infusion sits in my hand like a shard of quiet thunder, a slender oblong of obsidian pressed into a tempered copper frame, its surface etched with sinuous violet runes that glow just enough to betray a pulse beneath the metal. The edges catch on the light, catching a shimmer of heat that travels up the knuckles when you cradle it, as if the infusion itself breathes. A tiny, black gem at the center hums with a rasping, almost human note, a sound you can feel in your bones more than hear with your ears. Lore drifts around it, too, a whisper that it was forged not in a smithy’s forge but in the shadow of a ruined library, where memory and pain were distilled into a power that could be worn rather than endured. Some say it carries the echo of a veteran instructor who learned to turn the sting of a hit into a sharper strike, so each upgrade bears a memory that sharpens the user as much as the gear. Holding it, you sense the weight not just of metal and magic but of a hidden bargain between risk and reward. The infusion is not merely a stat stick; it is a pact with the world that the more you take on, the more you give back, in forms of experience and consequence. In the stories that drift through tavern whispers and workshop benches, it is said to be a rare rite of passage for those who venture into the most unforgiving corners of the map, where every corridor asks for more than brute force and every boss leaves a memory behind with your gear. The glow from the runes shifts when you speak to— or about—a foe who has learned to resist ordinary strength, as if the shard is testing your resolve to see if you’ve earned this kind of a burden. In practical terms, the +7 Agony Infusion raises the wearer’s capacity to endure and apply agony—the slow, creeping pressure bands of damage that echo through so many battles. It makes certain builds sing, especially those that want to push beyond sustainable limits for a short window, turning pain into a more precise, concentrated output. It isn’t a universal tool, but in the right hands it changes tempo: you can thread harder hits through a fight, puncturing moments of vulnerability in a sequence that would have otherwise worn you down. The world doesn’t reward loud bravado alone; it rewards the patient, measured ascent, and this infusion is a quiet ladder rung for those who know where to plant their feet. Market days have a way of bending memory to coin, and old stories of scarcity bloom into new prices. I found myself angling for a fair number at Saddlebag Exchange, the open-air stall where traders trade stories as freely as they trade goods. The clerk laid out a small ledger and a chain of copper coins, noting that the +7 Agony Infusion sits at a premium when the demand for higher agony stacks in the latest fractal runs is high, and looser when the crowd returns to older routes. It’s a strange balance, a ritual of negotiation that makes the item feel less like a purchase and more like an agreement with the world’s darker, humming undertones. The coin clinked, and the infusion found a new home—ready to turn instinct into strategy, and pain into a sharper edge for the road ahead.