To Serve and Protect (5)

Watanabe Daisuke stared down the batch of fleshbeasts he’d just vanquished. He understood that, in a matter of minutes, they would surely be reborn again.

These were no longer the shambling, unintelligent types he and Annabelle had been facing at the start of the corridor—these ones were armed, sentient, and ferocious. It was the difference between starving cats and a legion of tigers. Yet, despite their increased deadliness, he’d felled them with the same level of speed and efficiency he‘d cleared the horde with earlier—in no small part to the sudden influx of Lumens that allowed him a second wind, and of course, his allies.

Despite this “effortless” victory—his inner workings were far from serene.

Far from that.

Every angle of attack he chose, every card he used as a reference, every technique he visualised—he had bet every single drop of his resolve on them as he pushed forward. No one would be able to tell, but Watanabe was exerting himself far more strenuously for this than for anything else he’d ever tried for in his life.

In his mind, nothing he’d done was impressive. All he wanted to do was to make as much progress as possible with the deus ex machina that’d been graciously extended by the Saint—to carve out a universe where Annabelle could live, something he’d decided on after spending an undefined amount of time in his inner world begging Alicia to help him change. All he was doing was making good on a promise.

Everything else, in his mind, was secondary.

He hadn’t noticed how much stronger he’d become after a week of infinite battles. How calloused his hand had become under the gauntlet, how much his expression had seemed to mature.

To the three people behind him, however, he was an entirely different person—the first of which was currently walking up to him.

Soren placed a gauntlet on Watanabe’s shoulder. Had he not been wearing his visor, perhaps the group would have caught the look that flashed on his face when he saw his Initiation cape being worn by someone so worthy.

“Quantum,” he said, his voice distorted. “I’m proud of you.”

Watanabe’s voice was laser-focused. “Thanks, Sensei.” He still hadn’t kicked his habit of using words nobody else could understand, though. “Let’s chat later. I need to tell you something. So, if you look down further, there’s a heart, and—”

The second person started stomping up towards him, sending splashes of ink everywhere.

“You!”

Watanabe pointed to himself.

“Uh, me?”

“Who are you, and what have you done with Mister Primot?!”

He found the question to be in bad taste. Mainly due to the way she was pronouncing his gamertag. It was meant to be Japanese, like Purimotto—and therefore accidentally Italian—but Piquet was a markedly French house, and so this redhead was yelling out Primoh like he was Winnie the Pooh’s long lost cousin.

Still, he considered the question carefully. With much more care than a rhetorical question should ever receive—because he believed Maelle Piquet was “this version of Alicia” that the Saint had alluded to in the field of carnations.

He had no real reason to believe this, but he would be proven right eventually. Maelle just didn’t know it yet.

Probably.

“That name means nothing to me now.”

Maelle was flabbergasted. She refused to let this show, however.

She wanted to ask him so many questions. Like if he was okay, how he’d learned those spells, if the gauntlet she’d made was to his liking, what happened to his eyes, if she could learn to become cool as well—but she suppressed all of those impulses. She wasn’t about to forgive somebody who, to her most recent memories, was supposed to be a babbling idiot.

“You… stop wasting your quanta! It’s dark, you know? Your circuits won’t naturally clear themselves without a light source!”

“I know. I only channeled that much because of the hole you two made. I’ll be more conservative from now on.”

“...Don’t be such a know-it-all! You’re so reckless!”

“I’m sorry. You know, I’m grateful that you came for us, Maelle.”

“...”

”And I’m happy that you’re being yourself around me.”

“Stop this nonsense right—”

Annabelle interjected, her voice haggard. “Hello, Your Grace. Um… I know you’re mad at him. I think. But he apologised to me, so it’s okay…”

“You too?!”

“Ahaha… Don’t stand so close to me, princess… I’m filthy.”

“Caw.”

“Enough of this.”

The heart pulsed again.

“Who’s that?” Maelle asked.

Soren instinctively held an arm up between his retainer and the invisible threat.

Annabelle frowned.

The rest of the group had already heard this beat before. It led them to assume that this was just a rote resummoning, even if for the pair, it was being accompanied by a new voice.

But the tremor that followed was wrong. There was a subtle flaw in its rhythm. And Watanabe, who had stood in this cycle a hundred times by his count—but more importantly, had a personal connection with its creator—understood this immediately. It was a visceral, reflexive thought, much like his body used to react to the smell of meat. His soul realised something was off.

He gripped Sumirezaku tighter.

“Get ready!” he commanded.

Everyone flew into position. Soren stood side by side with Watanabe in the vanguard, holding up Galebrand against the dark. In the backline, Maelle ripped off her cloak, revealing a vast array of royal jewelry that flashed red and yellow—then channeled Fire in her dominant left hand and Time in her right. Annabelle would’ve been able to complete the traffic light formation had her staff’s modulator not been chipped into oblivion, but instead of panicking, she focused her efforts on redirecting Cockie into the center—a bastion between the melee and the artillery linking the two, then flipped open her Codex to a page of healing spells.

They worked as if they could read each other’s minds.

In any other situation, Watanabe might have wondered how far they could go like this. Maelle could be the strategist and political lead. Soren was the tactician and emergency muscle. Annabelle covered the support and logistics, and Watanabe… he didn’t mind being the joker, filling in for whatever they would ask of him. After all these three had done to reveal to him the meaning behind his life… he wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.

Right now, though, only one thought echoed in his mind. He set his gaze on a specific spot on the ground, ready to etch his mark on destiny.

Come, Kenshi.

The group watched as the lake of shadows coalesced, giving birth to a silhouette that rose with unnerving grace—like a brush rising from ink.

A man with an Oni mask, cast permanently in a smile.

He was applauding.

The sound of dull, metallic claps—the sound of a gauntlet hitting flesh—echoed throughout his domain.

“Well done, Daisuke. The power of love and friendship. How inspiring. Now, you’ve well and truly pushed me over the brink—I am in ruin.”

Soren regarded Watanabe momentarily. “You know this demon, Quantum?”

“Long story.”

“Th-that mask… it’s from my vision.”

“...Daisuke,” Annabelle simply repeated, her voice sad.

“Enough! All of you, shut up.”

With a brutal wrench of his gauntlet, and a flash of pink, Kenshi shredded his lamellar chestplate into atoms.

A gust of air howled through the corridor.

Ink flew up in shredded droplets, creating a momentary galaxy of dark stars against the wind.

“I… tire of this.”

What greeted them in the aftermath was the sight of pure, white flesh, like the belly of a fish. His ribs were exposed, stretching his malnourished, parchment-thin skin, each bone seemingly curved not to protect his insides—but to contain him. Golden markings ran the entirety of his exposed torso, like circuits, barely contrasting at all with his pallid flesh, and protruding out of his chest in neat rows were the sights of countless amethysts grafted directly onto him.

In the middle of his being—where his stomach should have been—the slow, dreadful pulse of a heart kept beating. A black, grotesque thing visible in the hollow of his body, where all the circuits led to, where all his veins started and ended.

The source behind this domain.

Watanabe recognised those markings. They were the same ones that existed under his gauntlet. But while he focused on that fact, the rest of his party stared at Kenshi’s beating heart, arriving at the same unspoken conclusion.

That has got to be Asmodeus!

……Wait. He’s not dead?

Asmodeus. I’ll need to work with Quantum.

It can’t be… Primot and Asmodeus are…?

“You’ve won, Daisuke. You have friends, and people who love you. You are you, and I am me. Well done. The distinction could not be any clearer.”

Pointing his left hand into the ground, blood began to drip out of his pores.

“Alas—”

A burst of air interrupted his speech.

The room filled with flashes of sky blue and grey.

Maelle was blinded. Annabelle looked on in awe.

Watanabe and Soren both had the same idea—now’s not the time for honour. They both burst out of the formation, the Paladin taking the left flank, the Samurai blazing down the right. They arrived at Kenshi’s beating heart at the same time, Watanabe with a deadly slash from the air, Soren a powerful stroke from below. Their blades both drew ink from the lake as they met in the center, creating an image laced with meaning, yin and yang coming together to extinguish a demon.

One drew meaning from his duty. The other carved it out of adversity. They had both arrived at the same purpose—to protect their loved ones, they would defy all odds, break any law.

It should have been poetic.

The prophesied Templar of the past, and the strongest Templar in the present—they should have come together in harmony, ushering a blazing new future for the world, one where Kenshi had no place in.

But.

Instead, in a singular frenzied pivot, in an impossible motion to draw out his katana, Kenshi miraculously managed to absorb the might of both blades with a block.

A block—powered by flesh and blood.

The corridor screamed.

Ink flew everywhere. The lake beneath him rippled out in violent circles.

The ground beneath him exploded.

Black liquid gushed out of his heart as it strained under the combined strength of two heroes. And then, it pulsed.

“ARE YOU TWO FUCKING KIDDING ME?!”

From the lake of ink, without warning, shadows erupted. They climbed the walls, swarmed the ceiling, and descended upon Annabelle and Maelle.

“Soren!”

“Princess!”

“Give me a break! Give me a break already!”

With their pre-emptive strikes amounting to nothing, and himself in a vulnerable aerial position, Watanabe decided he had no choice but to regroup for a second attempt. Soren followed, instinctively understanding the ebb and flow of battle, knowing better than to struggle against the current. But occupied by the idea that their loved ones were now drowning somewhere in the lake, their minds began to spiral off in different directions.

Watanabe paused for a moment—to think, to try and understand what he just saw, to recover the energy that he’d spent in his opening gambit that was supposed to have felled his opponent. He had no other choice. All of his energy had been put into that salvo, so there was nothing else to do but that.

Calm down.

Anna is strong. Maelle’s not foolish.

They can handle themselves.

At the very least, he had the privilege of seeing Annabelle die before—and recently. He had it in him to suppress his emotions, to cling onto hope. After all, the outcome of what would happen if he gave into his despair now was smiling at him.

You’re exhausted—you need to recover now.

Unbeknownst to him, Kenshi was thinking the exact same thing.

Blood poured out of his gauntlet.

His blade’s form was unsteady.

Like mirrors, the two faced off against each other, unknowingly cycling through the exact same thoughts.

This doesn’t look good.

What should I—

“Sky Blitz.”

But Soren was not like them.

His form shimmered in the void.

And in the aftermath—a blaze of blue.

A menacing shine remained in his wake, enough to paint this domain in a shade of azure Watanabe could only assume it’d never seen before. Kenshi could barely bring up his blade in time to meet Galebrand and the wrath of a brewing storm.

Sound exploded.

Wind rushed everywhere.

The heart beat faster.

“Where is she? Talk,” Soren said.

“You fucking buffoon. Where is she? WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU ARE, YOU IMBECILE? Do you never stop to think maybe—”

“I don’t have time for this.”

Soren was ready.

Compared to his opener that Watanabe had matched by pouring in all of his effort, this was twice—no, three times as fast, and a hundred times more blinding.

The world’s strongest Templar had controlled his strength as a precaution against taking down his teammates through collateral damage. Seeing his true strength now, it was obvious.

Watanabe could barely remain standing. And neither could Kenshi.

Shit.

But Watanabe’s reaction to this was anything but impressed. He got angry at himself instead.

In the time he was forced to settle down, he realised a few things. How there was a surprising lack of a splash when he landed, how the edge of the universe no longer looked like pulsing shadows, how the smell of the room had changed—he noticed all these things thanks to his forced reprieve. Having spent an eternity in hell, these scant few seconds were enough to realise things had changed, and irreversibly.

We’re not in that domain anymore.

Kenshi was trying to retreat.

Those shadows didn’t swallow Anna—they’d swallowed us.

He’d wanted to tell Soren all of these things—to tell him Maelle was safe, that there was a small chance that killing Kenshi would backfire, that they had to think twice about recklessly engaging the man and stranding themselves in this limbo. But Watanabe was still no match for the world’s strongest Templar, and the few seconds he took to gather his thoughts was enough for Soren to decide he needed to vanquish Kenshi.

So be it, then.

Watanabe had full faith that the man would control his strength and not accidentally kill him.

In that case, he decided to settle for the second best thing—telling Soren that Kenshi possessed an arsenal of tricky spells, and that in a previous lifetime, he’d been able to miraculously defeat the world’s strongest Templar. So long as Soren didn’t attempt to—

Blue.

Soren held up his off-hand, seamlessly re-focusing his quanta from his blade to the conjuration of a magical circle mid-flurry. He traced out the symbol of Air in his mind’s eye, and then an amethyst glow and the smile of an Oni enveloped him.

***

I should’ve realised this sooner.

There’s no chance Kenshi would have saved a technique like that for now. I know this for a fact. If he could’ve killed Anna just like that, he would’ve done it from the start, then trapped me here forever while refusing to let me die. I know this… because that’s what I wanted to do to him when he broke my fragile ego in a previous lifetime. A big show of power, followed by some showboating.

Cheap shots are best used as openers.

We’re in his pocket dimension, aren’t we?

The ability he used to appear in front of Anna and I at the tree?

…Fuck. I should’ve just yelled that to Soren right away.

“I don’t have time for your games.”

Soren transitions from a two-hand grip to a single-hander, then points his gauntlet at Kenshi. It glows with a sky blue.

No.

Don’t do that. Anything but—

Before I can interrupt, a competing flash of amethyst overwhelms my senses. Every implement on Kenshi’s body starts flaring up, spitting blood in all directions, and now his own off-hand is pointing at Soren too.

Null Error
2 Entropy Quanta
Spell
Burst Speed

Counter target non-Entropy spell.

Soren’s glow abruptly shuts off. The domain is just foggy again now, with the absence of his quanta.

The Oni smiles.

“YOU BLIND, TEMPLAR?!”

Soren’s grip shifts defensively, his blade angling inwards to cover his body—it’s a desperate move, an attempt to cover as much area as possible before Kenshi’s spell inevitably connects.

Flash Fission
2 Entropy Quanta
Spell
Burst Speed

Destroy target non-Artifact Creature with Quanta cost of 3 or less, or Transform it.

No.

There’s no way Soren can absorb that from this range.

He’s dead.

I’m about to watch history repeat itself.

This is how Kenshi defeated Soren in that previous lifetime, isn’t it? Played with his emotions using some sort of taunt, then tricked him into casting?

Fuck. This isn’t what I meant when I said—

Alright, that’s enough.

No more thoughts.

I need to interrupt Kenshi, or die trying.

I can’t counterspell.

My instincts don’t understand it yet.

In that case, all I can do now is try to go faster.

Intent: Cut down Kenshi before he casts.

Element: All of them.

I grip Sumirezaku with both hands.

Move.

[Fleet Footwork.]

[Moment of Glory.]

More.

[Trailblaze.]

[Approach Velocity.]

[Momentum.]

Even more.

[Sky Blitz.]

[Tailwind.]

Everything.

[Perfect Timing.]

My desire resonates: I will save Soren.

0.0003 Second Flash Step
1 Gravity, 1 Air, 1 Time Quanta
Legendary Technique — Quantum Mage
Burst Speed

Destroy target creature.

The moment I see any hint of Kenshi’s spell about to resolve, I move.

One moment, him and Soren are images to me. The next, they’re nothing but smears of paint.

I blink, and space itself flinches. Sound doesn’t have time to react to my movement, and neither does air rush to greet me as I will my way over to Kenshi’s beating heart.

It’s sort of anticlimactic—the way nothing registers as changing to my senses, not wind nor noise—nothing except that Kenshi is wide open to me now, and that I’m right in front of him.

Then suddenly—an explosion. Air rushes in to fill the vacuum of the void I’ve left. So does a blinding explosion of colour.

It’s a fitting backdrop to the end of a struggle.

Electricity rushes through my entire body.

Goodbye, old me.

I’m faster than your spell.

This is the end.

…

…

I’m… in front of him?

That can’t be right.

“You’re wide open.”

I see an Oni, smiling.

I’m not supposed to see his face. I’m supposed to be coming in from an angle, slicing his arm.

He… turned?

How is that—oh.

Right.

He’s me.

If I can read his thoughts, then—

“Quantum!”

An unbelievably strong force pushes me to the side.

My blade connects with thin air, slicing through with zero resistance.

Pink.

The sound that greets my ears next is simultaneously morbid and surreal.

It sounds like steel being melted, and flesh exploding. Like a 787 Dreamliner crashing into the earth with passengers, the unmistakable noise of a fuselage crumpling apart and breaking off into pieces.

I jam Sumirezaku into the ground as I fly, trying to regain any semblance of traction that I can.

The slowdown helps me notice something else. The heat. It radiates from somewhere beyond me in waves, enough for my body cutting through air to notice the difference in temperature. Not once in any of my fighting with the ghouls or in this void did I think about heat. Now, it was hot.

And then the smell.

Barbequed pork.

No.

No.

By the time I’ve regained control, Soren is nothing more than a small blip in the distance, a fraction of his massive frame.

A neat semi-circle is carved into the side of his armor. It looks like someone placed a dough cutter right onto his body.

Please.

I point my off-hand at my feet.

I need to close the distance.

…But there’s nothing there. I used everything up.

My entire body is numb.

Stop that.

I ignore it and start sprinting.

…It occurs to me that Soren is still standing, holding Galebrand. He’s holding something else in his off-hand… the head of the man with the Oni mask. The rest of his body hangs weakly, but I can still hear his heart beating.

“Well fought, stranger.”

I can barely make out Soren’s distorted voice.

“Go fuck yours—”

Then there’s the sound of a heart getting stabbed through.