Mage Tank recap

After dying on Earth, Arlo respawns in a system-governed world and survives a sabotaged creation Delve with Varrin and Xim. He bonds its displaced core, Grotto, joins a Third Layer tribe as Arlo Xor'Drel, and builds a pocket Delve inside his inventory. An attempted abduction leads him, Xim, Varrin, Nuralie, and their allies to Calvani Caverns, where divine forces coerce them into the failing containment Delve called Cage. The construct Etja is freed from possession and joins them. Fortune reveals that he brought Arlo from an Earth now millennia beyond recovery, then removes Anesis to Hiward and leaves the party to fight Orexis's soul fragment. Varrin destroys the fragment after Arlo shares its vulnerability. The group removes a destabilizing Void Sphere, uses its mana to repair their damaged mana veins, and escapes. Anesis remains at large, the sphere remains in Arlo's inventory, and the system names Arlo's party Fortune's Folly despite their choice of Soulsbane.

Arlo dies when a car strikes his bicycle, then accepts an interface offer to respawn in a new zone. Character creation restores him to a younger body and grants unusual options linked to an unidentified divine patron. He selects the Traveler birth sign, a healing ring, dimensional magic, a short-range teleport called Shortcut, a touch attack, and an aura that shares his strong health regeneration with allies. He conceals his outsider origin after joining Varrin, Xim, Chilla Stormreiss, and Sayil Starion in a creation party. Varrin asserts leadership through noble rank and selects Platinum difficulty without group approval. The party enters Toxic Grotto, where poisonous fog and venomous creatures make Arlo's regeneration central to survival. His lack of combat experience is clear, but he learns to use his magic under pressure and protects Xim during an ambush. After the group crosses a crumbling bridge, an atrocodile drags Varrin into the river. The party kills it, but the creature's fear effect has scattered them. They then find Chilla dead in a side passage, leaving the survivors trapped in a lethal Delve with an unknown additional threat.

The survivors discover that Toxic Grotto contains an automated poison-essence farm far beyond what they expected from a creation Delve. During another ambush, Sayil vanishes and dies without an evident struggle. Arlo, Varrin, and Xim find his mutilated body and evidence that someone has been stripping essence from the facility. In the lower tunnels, a mental command draws Arlo toward Hognay, an infiltrator carrying the displaced Delve Core. Arlo resists, wounds him, and takes the orb. The core, named Grotto by the party, admits that Hognay coerced it into arranging Chilla's and Sayil's deaths. Hognay has damaged the obelisk and summoned a C'thun to drain the Delve. The survivors attempt to restore Grotto while fighting both enemies. Arlo apparently kills Hognay, but the C'thun breaks the obelisk and nearly overwhelms everyone. Arlo bonds Grotto as his familiar, allowing the core to absorb his mana overload and guide a final attack. Arlo reshapes his dimensional spell into a beam and kills the C'thun. He confirms Hognay's death, and Arlo, Xim, Varrin, and Grotto leave the ruined Delve alive.

At the post-Delve facility, healers treat Xim and Varrin while officials question why Arlo was absent from the participant records. Guardian Lito escorts him under suspicion. Grotto now shares sensation and thought with Arlo, and their bond greatly increases his mana recovery. Arlo also discovers that his dimensional magic can evolve into an expandable pocket space, which Grotto believes could house a new Delve. Myria retrieves a valid record showing that Arlo entered as a last-minute replacement, though his nationality is redacted. Once the immediate dispute is cleared, Arlo tells Xim and Varrin about his death, character creation, and origin in a world without magic. They recognize that his ability to train attributes beyond normal limits makes him both powerful and vulnerable to exploitation. Varrin offers a path to Hiwardian protection through his family, while Xim offers membership in her Third Layer tribe. Arlo chooses the tribal route. Drel'Gethed accepts both him and Grotto, and Xim sponsors the adoption. The rite gives him the permanent name Arlo Xor'Drel, a recognized Third Layer identity, new resistances, and additional magic.

Arlo settles in Foundation while Xim completes required devotions. He opens his expanded pocket space and authorizes Grotto to establish a Delve within it, retaining authority over its limits. Study and training rapidly raise Arlo's attributes, and Grotto completes an obelisk that makes the pocket Delve operational. Soon afterward, a hired Delver party invades Arlo's home to abduct him. The pocket defenses help him kill three attackers and capture two. Lito and Myria investigate. The prisoners connect the job to an information broker and to the Ring of Calvani, which grants entry to Calvani Caverns and offers an illicit route to becoming a Delver. Tracking the ring leads to a low-lord crime boss, but the confrontation becomes a battle when Arlo senses Xim imprisoned beneath the warehouse. He finds Xim and Nuralie held by a Littan controller, who departs rather than fight. Nuralie revives Xim and helps defeat the crime boss upstairs.

Central authorizes an expedition to Calvani Caverns. Arlo enlarges the pocket dimension to support the travelers, obtains armor and weapons, gains physical magic, and trains with a warhammer. During the river journey, a wounded winged resident warns that a hostile flock has attacked a colony and targeted ships bound for Arsenal. The expedition defeats the attackers and rescues surviving children and captives, but their sponsor and connection to the wider trade disruption remain uncertain. Lito continues Arlo's hammer instruction, while Grotto studies the unusual mana structure that permits Arlo's training gains and considers whether it could eventually help his companions. Arlo reaches key physical milestones, learns to carry his dimensional attack through a weapon, and becomes co-administrator of the pocket Delve. The expedition reaches the mountain rendezvous and prepares for the approach to Calvani Caverns, still uncertain about the force behind the abductions and attacks.

Varrin joins Arlo, Xim, and Nuralie in a formal party, with Arlo chosen as leader. The larger expedition approaches Calvani Caverns through the dangerous Third Layer after Drel'Gethed detects scouts and a divine mana event. A vast eye notices Arlo during the crossing, and he senses an overwhelming void-like presence at their destination. Back in ordinary reality, the group defeats hostile Delvers, but Orexis emerges, absorbs the dead, and claims that its desires drove the rebellion. The divine confrontation overwhelms the expedition. The survivors are forced into Calvani Caverns, where their captor opens Cage, a failing containment Delve destabilized by a Void Sphere. Ealdric is killed to power a primordial creation obelisk, and a clay construct is made as a fifth team member and intended soul vessel. Grotto sabotages the procedure, but the construct carries Arlo, Xim, Varrin, and Nuralie through the portal. Cage's runes expel the possessing fragment, and the construct names herself Etja. Arlo spares her as an autonomous being. Cage then charges the five-person party with preventing collapse and stopping a divine specter from breaching central confinement.

Cage explains that the Void Sphere is destabilizing a Hiward reality anchor and waking imprisoned divine beings. Unable to release prisoners directly, Cage asks the party to open two locks and awaken Fortune as a defense against the specter. Arlo summons Shog Tuatha during the first lock battle, and Etja proves herself as a powerful combat caster. At the second lock, the group defeats a coordinated hive of eyes, hands, and a corrosive plant, then enters central confinement. The party awakens Fortune, who confirms that he transported the same continuous Arlo from Earth. Earth is now thousands of years beyond Arlo's former life, leaving no path back to his family. Fortune admits that Arlo's arrival was meant to facilitate his release. He agrees to confront Anesis but refuses to protect the party from Orexis. Nuralie, Xim, and Arlo use a piece of Fortune's soul to craft arrows capable of poisoning Orexis's incorporeal fragment.

Orexis's soul fragment attacks after Fortune removes Anesis to Hiward. It identifies Etja as its created daughter, wounds Arlo, suppresses his casting, and nearly consumes Shog Tuatha. Arlo discovers Reveal, an ability that shares his soul perception with his companions. Through it, the party sees that the fragment is unstable and vulnerable. Nuralie's divine arrows weaken it, Xim returns in an Ascended form, and Grotto forces it to confront its incomplete nature. Varrin's Soul Strike splits and destroys the fragment. The wounded party still must prevent Cage from collapsing. Etja removes the Void Sphere from Hiward's Reality Anchor but suffers severe mana-vein damage. Grotto channels the sphere's output into the pocket Delve, expanding it and using knowledge from Calvani Caverns to give Xim, Varrin, Nuralie, and Etja Rebirth mana veins. Their urgent damage is repaired, and Xim can cleanse her remaining lethal afflictions. Arlo then stores the still-dangerous sphere in inventory stasis. Everyone exits alive, and Etja becomes a full member. Anesis has escaped after fighting Myria and the Ravvenblaq matriarch. The group chooses Soulsbane, but the system names Arlo's party Fortune's Folly instead.

Arlo, Grotto, Xim, Varrin, Nuralie, and Etja escape Cage alive after destroying Orexis's remaining specter and preventing the Delve's immediate collapse. Ealdric is dead, while Lito and Drel'Gethed survived their initial injuries outside Cage. The Void Sphere is removed from Hiward's Reality Anchor and now rests in stasis within Arlo's quick-access inventory, but no permanent disposal method is known. Grotto channels the sphere's mana through the pocket Delve, expands it, and gives Xim, Varrin, Nuralie, and Etja Rebirth mana veins, repairing their urgent damage. Etja is accepted as a full party member. The group chooses Soulsbane as its name, but the system registers Arlo as leader of Fortune's Folly instead. Fortune has taken Anesis to Hiward, where she escapes after fighting Myria and the Ravvenblaq matriarch. The surviving party therefore faces an at-large divine enemy, uncertainty over Fortune's aims, possible Crown claims against the pocket Delve, and the continuing danger of the stored sphere.