As it turned out, Iggwilv had been trapped by three of her adoptive sisters, turned into stone and her powers used to further their own gains.
Eden had to give it him, Graz'zt was quite good at selling his wish, painting the rescue of Iggwilv as something that would benefit Eden more than anyone. After all, Iggwilv truly was one of the greatest wizards in existence, and as an Archfey, commanded considerable forces.
But even without any of that, Eden would have been easily convinced to save her. After all, she was the creator of the spell Eden had used as a basis to create his most powerful spell. Avatar of Wrath could not have existed without Tasha's Otherworldly Guise. He would love to converse with her.
So, Eden and the two Demon Lords came to an agreement, becoming allies. Yeenoghu, as well as the other Demon Lords he had subdued, were put in the loop as well. Eden also extended the invitation to Eshebala and Kali, the two Goddesses Eden could be said to be in good terms with, or rather that he had met and not killed, but they remained cryptic in their responses.
After making this arrangement, Eden continued going up the Abyss, only avoiding the 88th Layer, which was the Gaping Maw, and sure enough, many of the Layers were left without their lords. Eden strongly suspected that some of the Demon Lords he had recruited had betrayed him and told Demogorgon they knew about his trap, so they were hardly covering it anymore.
Without anyone standing in his path anymore, Eden took only about two days to finally reach the 1st Layer of the Abyss, the Plain of Infinite Portals. This layer was lorded over by Pazuzu, another Demon Lord who had disappeared to join Demogorgon.
All in all, it had taken Eden about a week to go from the 664th to the 1st Layer of the Abyss, which had to be some kind of record, though it was hardly something Eden was proud of considering he had been trapped on the 666th Layer for 500 years.
On a more positive note, Eden's Simulacrum managed to crack the key between fusing Holy Fire and Abyssal Fire, thus creating a whole new kind of flame.
[Angelic Flame: All of your fire, poison and radiant spells now use Angelic Fire. For any damage calculation involving Angelic Fire, the lowest Resistance, Immunity or Weakness between the damage types is used.]
With this, Eden doubted there was much in existence that could resist his spells. While fire and poison were a rather common Resistance and Immunity, radiant was far rarer, with only angels and similar figures having resistance to it in general.
For something to have Resistance, much less Immunity, to all three would be quite rare. At least, there were none that Eden knew of.
In any case, he had also felt that three elements was the limit for these types of flames. Merging them had been hard enough already, and Eden was not sure that he would be able to merge a fourth element even with hundreds of years.
With that said, Eden was only left with conquering the Gaping Maw in the Abyss, which he had preparations to make for, so it was finally time for him to leave the Abyss.
Before leaving though, he finally got some clothes to wear that were actually useful to him.
Graz'zt offered Eden one of his sets of robes. He did not hide that this was an instance of boot-licking, but Eden accepted the robes nonetheless.
[Robes of the Archmagi]
[Rank: Unique]
[Defence: +120]
[Wisdom: +6]
[Intelligence: +6]
[Magic Resistance: Gain resistance to all negative magical effects, making it harder for them to affect the wearer.]
[War Mage: All spells find their target more easily, while the wearer is harder to hit.]
[Damage Resistance: Any damage under 50 fails to affect the wearer.]
The robes were gold and white, matching well with Eden's pale angelic skin, and making his black eyes and black hair more striking.
Happily putting them on, Eden's first order of business ought to be freeing Iggwilv, both to thank Graz'zt and for himself.
Eden knew Iggwilv to be held prisoner in her personal palace, which itself was situation in a region known as Prismeer. Eden knew hardly anything about Feywild though, and although Eden could breach through protected regions with his spatial magic, he needed to know where he was headed to use it, meaning he could not instantly teleport there.
This meant Eden would have to travel himself through the Feywild, and although the Boon of Speed would surely come in handy for that, it would still take some time.
So, before heading to the Feywild, Eden decided to do something that was long overdue: visit the party.
Although Eden was not much more familiar with Baldur's Gate than any other place, since he had only seen a depiction of it in a video-game, he was deeply familiar with the members of the party, meaning he could locate them with his Foresight.
"I cast Plane Shift."
A silver, four layered spell circle appeared in front of Eden, and he was instantly teleported across the planes.
All of a sudden, he found himself inside a tavern. The atmosphere was festive, though the air seemed to freeze over the moment he appeared. He felt several killing intents settle on him, from multiple sources.
No one said anything for a time, before Mizora, the female devil, patron of Wyll, who was present for some reason, bowed, greeting, "I extend my greetings to the honored Demon King."
She did not recognize him. None of them did, which was understandable. Although he had kept similar facial features, everything else about him had changed.
Actually, as far as Eden knew, nobody in existence knew that the human Ozymandias was the same person as the Solar claiming the title of Demon King. The only one who had witnessed his human form after he claimed the title was Aurnozci, whom he had killed.
His eyes going through the room, Eden noticed that not only was the whole party present, but they had gotten a new member, Jaheira, and all evolved to Tier II. They were quite weak in Tier II, with a single attribute at 50 or barely over, but they were still Tier II. This meant they were near the end of their adventure, and the Absolute should not have much longer to live.
There were also several figures which did not belong to the party. Mizora was one of them, but there was also another winged figure, a strongly built female.
She was Dame Aylin, and although she shared some features with a Solar, she was considerably closer to a mortal, and looked more humanoid. She had a normal height, and her wings were about half the size of Eden's.
She looked conflicted seeing him, but when his gaze turned to her, she knelt down, the gesture more mechanic than genuine, greeting, "An honor, esteemed Solar."
Her reaction was understandable. Solars were at the top of the angelic hierarchy of this world, and were beings second only to gods in Mount Celestia, often acting as their general and right hands. They were more or less the angelic equivalent of Archfiends.
Eden's eyes lingered on her kneeling form for a moment, before he said, "Arise. I came here to meet old friends."
He looked back at the rest of the party, and his eyes settled on Wyll as he chanted, "I wish for you to regain your human form."
The six-layered spell circle appeared, and a wave of power erupted from it, rippling over the fabric of reality, reaching Wyll in an instant.
Under their very eyes, his horns retracted back into his skin, his blackened sclera turning back white and his red eye black.
Even several seconds after the transformation took place, Wyll kept patting his body, standing in disbelief. He had long resigned to being stuck as a devil for the rest of his life.
Meanwhile, Mizora did not even dare to look displeased. Whatever she felt, she did not dare to show it, which was understandable considering she was facing Eden.
Her boss, the fallen angel Zariel, was a Solar before her fall, so from a strictly biological standpoint, Eden was already her equal. Although he did not share the same attributes fault of his Binding Vow, she did not know that.
But Eden was not just a Solar, he was the one who claimed the title of Demon King, who had been slaying Demon Lords equal to Zariel in droves, and even some deities. His feats had spread quite far and wide already, the powerful beings in the realms knowing about him.
Turning away from Wyll, Eden looked at Karlach, his Superior Truesight peering at her mechanical heart. It was not far from exploding.
"I wish for you to regain your biological heart."
Karlach's transformation was much less fancier than Wyll's, and essentially invisible, but her mechanical heart disappeared, being replaced by one made of flesh and blood. Karlach was left clutching her chest, not out of pain, but sheer shock.
Eden never used Wish much since specialized spells were always better, and for most situations, Wish was either not potent enough to do what he wanted, or it was unnecessary.
While the two reeled in their shock, Sylfine approached cautiously, bowing in a martial greeting, "Thank you for your help…"
Eden looked down at her, squinting his eyes at her, and asked, "Have the urges disappeared with Sceleritas?"
Sylfine froze, before looking up sharply. Her eyes were widened in shock, and she took a second to find her words, "O-Ozymandias?!"
Eden grinned, his wings unfurling slightly, "Some angelic transformation and you guys can't recognize me anymore?"
They all looked at him with owlish eyes, before Sylfine suddenly threw herself at him, crushing him into a hug. Behind, Gale said disbelievingly, "How is this possible? Mystra herself told us it was impossible to free you from where you were sent. She said… oh, by the gods."
Astarion looked at him with narrowed eyes, not bothering with pretense as he said, "We were told time passed differently. By a lot. Got a taste of the 'joys' of immortality?"
Patting Sylfine's head, which only reached his midsection, making him feel like he was being hugged by a child, Eden replied, "500 years. And not impossible to escape, just very difficult."
Mizora, who had also caught on to his identity by now, said, "500 years of time for the ability to kill gods is a deal I'd take any day."
Smiling, Eden separated Sylfine from him, and said, "I still have things to do, but I'm happy to see you're all still here."
Gathering mana in his hand, Eden formed a small matrix of a spell, a variant of an Alarm spell. He threw it over to Gale, saying, "Take this. If you crush it, I will be warned, and teleport over to you. Use it only if you are in grave danger."
Gale carefully pocketed the spell given physical form, and asked, "So, this thing about killing gods… Could you take care of the Absolute? Or is there some divine rule about not touching it?"
Eden shook his head, "You don't need me to intervene. Besides, if I acted, other actors would be drawn in, and it would create more chaos than anything. I've drawn out things far worse than the Absolute. Besides, now is not the time."
Glancing at Lae'zel, he asked, "Considering you are still here, I suppose you have learned the truth about Vlaakith and Orpheus."
Lae'zel nodded, suddenly looking guilty, "Yes. I apologize for my past transgressions."
Eden held up a hand, reassuring her, "No need to worry. I'll be killing Vlaakith and the Dead Three soon enough. Speaking of which, you wouldn't happen to know where she is?"
"She should be in Castle Susurrus, in Tu'narath. It was built upon the corpse of a six-armed deity, floating in the Astral Sea."
Gale butted in, "I think I have sigil of the teleportation circle leading there somewhere, actually."
He opened his bag of holding, looking through it while Astarion revealed, "We made a stop by Waterdeep. Got some of his old stuff."
Gale took out a parchment, tossing it over to Eden with a grin.
"Say, you wouldn't happen to have developed spells in your time in the Abyss?"
Eden smiled, amused at how the roles had reversed, "Hand over your spellbook."
Gale eagerly did so, showing unbelievable trust in Eden doing so, or unbelievable greed, since a wizard without their spellbook would lose nearly all their spells.
Gale's spellbook was filled with spells, and once, such a spellbook would have been a dream come true for Eden. When he had chosen this mission world, one of his ultimate goals had been to learn from Gale's fully furbished spellbook.
Now though, it hardly looked attractive to him.
Eden Inscribed several of his spells inside, and after a moment, decided to also add three of his 6th Circle Spells: Starburst, Shattering Darkness and Superior Truesight.
Handing it back, he said, "I added Epic Spells in there. You probably won't be able to use them, and definitely shouldn't if you don't want Mystra to sever all ties."
Gale appeared too excited to listen to his warnings, but Eden was not too worried, since he should not be able to use them without Mystra's permission.