Jon dropped the coin, and it burst into flame. Everyone around him was engulfed, screams instantly echoing through the wreckage of the battlefield. The Melee-Types dove back, but many of them were already set aflame, including Entismo and Boy.
Is he too low on Mana to use Day of Judgment? I asked Index.
“Yeah, he used up the last of it on that final Spell.”
I sprinted forward, calling back to Erani and telling her it was safe. Ainash also followed from her spot on the sidelines, though she looked much less worried about the burning people.
Ainash tore forth and slashed her whip right across Jon, who was completely consumed by flame, much too distracted to do anything to avoid her attack. In the meantime, I knelt down by Entismo and Boy, both of whom were still on fire. Boy’s entire chest had been set alight, and I could do nothing but watch as he scrunched his face up in clear agony, rolling back and forth on the ground. But he could do nothing to extinguish the magical flames.
Entismo was screaming. He’d caught a larger brunt of the fiery explosion, and his entire body was being consumed before my eyes as he writhed in the dirt.
“Put it out!” he screamed. “Put it out! Please, for the love of everything!”
“Fucking Jon…” I muttered, frantically looking around for anything to help. Even if I knew I had no capability to help, maybe someone nearby had something to put it out. There were plenty of Spells that created magic water or otherwise ended magical effects, but…
Looking at my surroundings, I mainly saw people on fire. And out of the surviving ones, nobody was moving to take action—not even the defectors from Jon’s own side. Unlucky. Or, maybe Jon purposely populated his team with people who couldn’t put out magical flames, as contingency for…what, this exact scenario? I wouldn’t have been surprised, honestly.
Entismo let out a shuddering breath. “I can’t. I can’t! Don’t let me die, please! By the gods, I’m going to die!”You have offered moderate contribution toward the slaying of Level 28 Cleric.
Due to killing a member of your own species, you have earned 0 XP.
I glanced over and saw Ainash drawing her whip away from Jon’s corpse. He’d already been burning to death by his own Spell, so it evidently hadn’t been difficult to finish him off.
“Ainash, come over here so I can sync up memories with you and Erani? I need to go back and do this once more.”
“Why? Bad guy is dead!”
“Yeah, but a lot of good guys are, too. C’mon.”
She frowned at me. “Would be waste to use limited ability to save Human lives.”
“It’s not a waste.”
“What if more bad guys come, and you need ability? Have needed to use a lot of ability this time, what if there is another bad guy just as strong?”
“You can’t keep me from going back. You can only keep yourself from remembering it.”
After a moment’s pause, Ainash huffed out a breath and marched over to me. I beckoned Erani over, too, trying to ignore the still-ongoing screams of the dying. Though, trying to ignore the screams almost made me feel worse, despite the fact that I was going back to make sure they never happened.
Erani got to me first, and before I could even say anything, she spoke.
“We’re going back,” she said definitively, sweeping her hand around the battlefield. “This cannot be final.”
“I know, I know,” I said, nodding. “I’ve already arrived at the same conclusion. Did you think I wouldn’t have?”
“I didn’t think you’d decide it was best to stay in this timeline, but I do think that Index would. And it seems to be good at convincing.”
“It would be optimal,” Index said in response to Erani’s words. “Though, not without downside, considering the reputation cost. Still, by my estimations you’d get more from the safety provided by saving the use of Time Loop, plus the extra Stat if it went unused. We don’t know when you’ll Level up next, so we want to ensure you get the Recycled Loop triggers in when possible.”
I’m not—
“Don’t bother arguing. I didn’t try fighting you on this because I knew I wouldn’t be able to persuade you.”
I sighed, turning my focus back on Erani. “Well, you don’t have to worry about Index on this one, I guess.”
Ainash walked up to us, avoiding my gaze. On her way over, she stepped on the arm of one of the men we’d hired, who was lying catatonic on the ground. His body’s injuries from the fires were…indescribable. But suffice to say, some of his insides stuck to the bottom of her foot when she stepped off. She avoided my gaze the whole way over.
“What’s with her?” Erani asked, clearly concerned.
“Rebellious phase? I dunno,” I said with a frown. “Didn't want to go back. She was the one who tried to argue, actually. Not Index.”
“What? No way. She wouldn’t.”
“I think you’re being a little too kind in your estimations of her moral code.”
“She’s been doing so well with the Goblins, though.”
“I’m not saying she’s not learning to be kinder, but it’s clearly a process. One that’s still ongoing.”
“I’ll talk to her.”
“Might be best to save that for after we transfer memories and go back. We still have some work to do, even if it’s in a different timeline.”
And then I was back, only having gone a few minutes. Before transferring memories, Erani and I had a discussion on what our strategy would be, and we came up with something that’d keep everyone safe. Only, redoing the entire fight would put the whole plan in jeopardy if we made any mistakes along the way. We needed the timing to be the exact same—not a second off—and any tiny difference in action would likely influence things enough to change that.
So, with just a little bit of time before Jon set himself and everyone around him on fire, I arrived back, instantly called Erani and Ainash over to me, and transferred their memories back to them.
After that, we got back into our previous positions, trying to reenact everything that’d happened before to the best of our ability.
Then, right on time, I watched as Jon looked around at the people surrounding him, desperation filling his wild eyes. He said his line, “The world would be better off without you people in it, anyway.”
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The coin dropped. But before it could even leave his hand, Erani had already shot an Explosive Firebolt, one aimed for the exact spot the coin would’ve hit. They both flew toward their destinations, and just before the coin clanked against the ground and burst into flame, the Firebolt collided at Jon’s feet first.
The explosion blasted everything in the area away—the coin most of all. It flew high into the air just as it set itself alight, the massive explosion of flame bursting into nothingness harmlessly in the sky. Though, of course, the fighters weren’t all left without harm; Erani’s Firebolt Spell packed a hefty punch at its current Rank.
But the damage dealt to them was much, much less than the flames of Jon’s superpowered Spell. Everyone seemed more or less safe, untouched by the inferno that’d quickly fizzled out in the air above them all.
Before anyone could recover from the quick series of events, Erani, Ainash, and I were all dashing forward, coming in to finish the job.
Index, just to make sure, Jon doesn’t have the Mana left to use Day of Judgment, right?
“Still no. Though, he won’t be as much of a pushover this time around. Before, the damage he’d taken from his own attack had brought him down pretty low. This time, he still has a good amount of Health left.”
I nodded. As long as he can’t one-shot us.
I’d boosted my Dexterity with Expedite, so I got to Jon first. And I introduced myself to him with a punch to the face.
You have struck Level 28 Cleric for 51 damage using fist.
In his dazed state, he obviously hadn’t been expecting it, and took my knuckles straight to the cheek, stumbling back. I’d been keeping Crippling Chill active on him this whole time, which, with Light Plate’s discount, actually cost less to do than my natural Mana/Minute restored, so my Mana reserves were still quite high.
So, naturally, during the moments my fist was connected with his face, I cast Noxious Grasp, Sanguine Bond, and Curse of Echoes all targeting him. And the moment he’d backed a couple paces away from me, I aimed my palm at him, shot a Ray of Frost, then surged forth to hit him again.
You have struck Level 28 Cleric for 147 damage using Ray of Frost.
You have cursed Level 28 Cleric with Ray of Frost. For the next 5 seconds, his Dexterity score is lowered by 19.22.
12.8 Mana Cost. Your Mana is 1.51k.
I coughed when I saw the effects of my Spells—not just Ray of Frost’s insane damage and debuff, but also Noxious Grasp dealing 15 damage in a fraction of a second, and Sanguine Bond draining 17 Health per second. That was all the work of Cumulative Catastrophe, which had been silently growing more and more powerful from Crippling Chill’s stacking buff on any of my Spells cast on Jon.
But I didn’t hesitate, stepping in for another swing, this time aiming to grab him by the throat so I could hold him for a longer time with Noxious Grasp active. It’d deal over 50 damage per second currently, if I could keep on him for long it’d be enough to end the fight here and now.
He was anticipating me now, though, and despite my debuffs, was able to parry my strikes, redirecting my hands with his arms. But I still got in a short pulse of Noxious Grasp during the time we were in contact, meaning more damage, and one more percent of Spell power from Cumulative Catastrophe.
He struck back, pushing me away and lifting his leg up to try and kick me in the gut. But I pulsed on Gravity Well as he lifted his leg, and the sudden sluggishness made it trivial to keep out of the way as he tried to strike me.
I was about to move back in when I got a message from Ainash. “Father, back away for second!”
I did, taking a few steps away from Jon without looking behind me to see what Ainash was doing, and soon got my answer to that question. An answer in the form of a series of Firebolts flying into his face. Six of them, to be precise, all shooting through the air in the span of just a couple seconds, and each one exploding against Jon and pushing him back. With his lower Health, he barely had the shield necessary to resist those blasts, and it was showing.
The final Firebolt was larger and brighter, obviously having been powered up by Elemental Embrace, and upon hitting Jon square in the chest, it blasted him clean off his feet and to the ground, where he was set aflame.
Before he could even attempt to stand, Ainash flew over my head in a massive leap, landing with a spin, her whip out and cutting into Jon’s stomach. I saw blood finally begin to be drawn from him as the laceration drew a line of red across his belly. Ainash didn’t let up, throwing her arm back and forth like she was trying to slice him to pieces, and Jon’s weak attempts to raise his arms and block the strikes did nothing to stop the onslaught.
I saw the faint glow of light around his hands as he used what was presumably the last Mana in his pool to try and heal himself, but it was clearly a pitiful amount, likely undone entirely by a single of Ainash’s attacks, of which there were plenty.
In the end, Jon was the victim of an absolute slaughter; less a fight and more an execution. He didn’t die all that quickly, and maybe not even effortlessly, but it was completely one-sided. Or, it was one-sided in this timeline. And, considering the amount of grief he’d given us in the many, many timelines before it, I felt like an easy fight was well-earned.
Ainash ended up giving me the final blow, which she seemed to view as quite the honor. Even if I wasn’t as pleased to kill the guy as she seemed to think I was, I was still happy to know she wasn’t too upset with me about going back to save everyone.
I did it with Noxious Grasp, pressing my hand against Jon’s chest and keeping it active until he died. My palm instantly became sticky with blood the moment it pressed up against his chest, which had been all but cut to ribbons by Ainash’s whip. His face looked no better, entire chunks of his nose having gone missing during the conflict.
Despite his injuries, his eyes still somehow looked as bright as ever, looking up at me as I finished him off.
“...I’m going to die,” he croaked, just barely loud enough that I could hear.
“No shit,” I said.
“I didn’t…I knew it would happen, eventually. I just hoped…it would be different. I had hoped I would die protecting people.”
“Then you should’ve protected more people.”
There was a flicker of anger in his eyes, like he was about to argue, before he took a shaky breath and the anger seemed to disappear. “I did…the best I could do, with the situation given to me.”
A few seconds passed in silence.
“You believed in what you said,” Jon said, eventually. “You truly think you can win. I don’t agree.”
“I was able to beat you, wasn’t I?”
He chuckled weakly. “I don’t agree that you can beat the Demons. But…I respect it. You’re fighting for what you believe in. I once thought I could help every person on the planet. You remind me of…if that version of me had lived longer than he had.”
“Well, maybe I can live just a bit longer, then.”
He chuckled once again, the rising and falling of his chest only barely able to be felt beneath my fingers. “I…doubt it.”
You have offered moderate contribution toward the slaying of Level 28 Cleric.
Due to killing a member of your own species, you have earned 0 XP.
His eyes closed, and I stared at his corpse. “Well fuck you, too.”
I took a breath and stood, looking at the destruction around us. For the most part, everyone looked okay.
“Well?” I called out. “Nobody’s dead, right? Seriously injured?”
There was a beat of silence, and then everyone—who would have all also received the kill notification if they’d done any damage to Jon over the course of the fight—erupted into a cheer. I heard a few mentions of “So we’re still getting paid, right?” in there, but for the most part, it seemed to be the genuine celebration of a fight well won. And I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t broken out into a smile, as well.
It was around that point, surveying the absolute calamity of a battlefield, that I spotted a massive contingent of guards surging in from the streets. They stared at the destruction—the collapsed buildings, the holes blown into roads, and the burning piles of rubble scattered throughout—in obvious shock and horror. But there was no obvious fighting going on anymore, which clearly led them to pause.
Eventually, one of them just shouted out, “What in Hell’s flames happened here?!”