Two Times Ten

Right before my eyes, Two kicked away a woman’s corpse and cackled. She was dressed in her usual gothic getup, and held two knives, one in each hand.

What… but how was this possible?

As the crowd rushed away, Saga moved to intercept her, white sword gleaming under the sunlight. A burst of flames erupted from the woman’s back, sending her to the sky before that happened.

Saga did not give up so easily, however. Using the momentum of her run, she leapt hard and further slashed her sword for a greater reach.

She actually almost made it; her sword sliced off a part of Two’s shoe.

“Nice try, girl!” the woman shrieked back at her. “But our game won’t end so easily!”

An arrow streaked from somewhere, missing her by mere inches. Another followed, but Two flew even higher.

“See if you can catch me, haha!” she screeched, using her jetpack to fly away as quickly as possible.

Screams around us continued as I realized I was completely frozen. I looked down to the corpse on the ground. Make that several corpses, actually.

We’d killed our share of animals, but… since One was a robot, I now realized that this was actually the first dead human I ever saw.

That fact caused nausea to well inside me. As well as self-hatred for the fact my two companions managed to act while I didn’t.

“What are you standing there for!” Kai barked at me, making me twitch. “We’re going after her!” Saga already rushed away, as expected.

“I… but…” I mumbled. “Dammit!” I broke into a run after them, making my way between the panicking crowd.

Where did she even go to, anyway? I couldn’t see her past the not so-tall but still tall enough buildings of this town.

How did this happen?

How had she found us literally minutes after we entered town? Or was it just a coincidence and we had the rottenest luck? For some reason I doubted that.

I ended up seeing her again much earlier than I expected. Turning around a corner somewhere—I already lost sight of both Kai and Saga—I just so happened to find her.

A weapon-wielding woman who was probably some sort of city guard seemed to have been fighting her, but I entered the scene just as Two slashed her throat open. The woman gurgled and fell to the ground, blood pooling under her. Some other corpses littered the ground here and there.

Seeing me, Two laughed. But this time I couldn’t let her get away. I shot a lightning bolt right at her without any prelude.

Unfortunately, she moved her knives to intercept me and the purple energy was absorbed into the blades.

Mogage was so annoying… how could I overcome that? Maybe attack from an unexpected angle?

But before that a new figure appeared from a side alley, rushing at her.

She ran like the wind. Her yellow-streaked black hair streamed behind her and she wielded a sword that almost looked like it was made from pure light.

Two turned, but she wasn’t quick enough.

Saga’s sword—apparently called Tarisha—went through her neck with absolute precision.

I gasped.

Two’s head flew off from her body, which then crumpled to the ground.

However, there was no splash of blood. In fact, the head even kept laughing for a few more moments as it rolled on the ground. Instead of blood there was a black liquid, and a few sparks scattered from the stump.

I gasped again.

She was a freaking robot!

“No way,” I called. “She was also a robot all along?”

However, I quickly realized this couldn’t be right. For one, I heard more shouts from nearby… and I also recalled our very first time meeting Two. When she got grazed by Kai’s arrow, she actually shed real blood.

Which meant…

“This was a body double!” I called a moment after Saga already rushed away. Dammit. Thinking back, I did end up finding her too easily despite the fact she seemingly flew to the other side of town.

I cast a quick spell to boost my running speed and kept searching for Two among the scenes of chaos.

I arrived at yet another scene as it happened, witnessing Kai’s arrow piercing Two’s neck. The woman fell to the floor, twitching.

“Hey, what the hell?” he exclaimed upon seeing sparks and smoke rise from the area of her wound. He then turned to me. “C! Glad to see you’re safe. What about Saga?”

“Ran ahead somewhere,” I told him. “Also… it looks like Two sent robots after us!”

“Yeah, no shit,” he spat.

“I almost forgot she was the one who created One… does she have an entire army or something?”

“Hey, at least these are way easier to beat,” noted Kai. “C’mon, let’s go find the real one!”

He was right. One easily shrugged off all of our attacks, be they magical or physical. Was that some difference between the mass-produced and her so-called masterpiece? Meaning, quantity over quality.

We soon ran into yet another Two. Kai prepared for an attack when a figure leapt at him from above—yet another Two. Had they ambushed us?

However, I made a surprising move there. Using both hands to make a double spell attack at the same time, I chose not to go for anything destructive like electricity or flames—but something she would find much more difficult to absorb.

Two dropped Kai to the ground and was about to pounce on him when both were drenched in water.

Yet another spell that Jarred taught me. It had no direct combat usefulness, but it could serve as these things’ weakness…

Immediately sparks covered Two and she convulsed. “RAAARGH!” Unfortunately, Kai was too close to her so he also got electrocuted.

“Shit,” I cussed, immediately shooting a light cantrip to push her away from him. Twitching, Kai rose to his legs while the assaulting robot-Two was out of commission.

—I forgot about the second Two.

Cackling madly, she slashed at Kai, scoring a hit, and then lunged at me too.

The next moment her hand holding the knife detached and hurtled through the air. Another moment later, her head also went spinning, and she fell.

Saga appeared there, breathing heavily. Sweat glistened on her face and she was covered in many scratches and even scorch marks.

“Hah… they’re everywhere,” she huffed and puffed. I hurried to cast both a minor healing spell—one less effective than my usual one, but also more mana-efficient—and the fatigue-mitigating spell at her and Kai.

“Do you have any way of locating the real one?” asked Kai, looking at me.

Unfortunately, I lacked such a spell. “She might not even be here,” I said, but then shook my head. “No… someone like her would definitely be watching this from somewhere nearby.”

Watching us from somewhere…

That brought two realizations to my mind, though only one was immediately relevant.

“The clock tower!” I cried.