Chapter Thirty-Three - Iuty, Part 1

“How can you make re-live that?”

The darkness in human shape did not reply. Instead it extended its hand and the web of mold charged at me.

I punched the upcoming attack. The mold invaded my mind once again, but I strangled the rot away. I saw my memories of my human life as I tried to choose to cling to them. But I am in a battle of life and death. My Ocean Slug tail washed away whatever remnants were left of that attack.

“Iuty! Stop this!” Seiko shouted.

She was the loudest I’ve ever heard her. Her more reserved nature impeded her from being loud at all, but knowing this is her brother in a corrupted state would leave her desperate to find any solution. I understand, but at the same time, I am feeling vengeful.

I remember my time in Japan. I remember feeling hope and enthusiasm towards my future. It didn’t feel like I was on borrowed time and my guess is that I erased my own memories of the earthquake to keep the dream alive.

I spin and hop to avoid more attacks. Seiko finds higher ground and Olive deflects attacks waiting for commands. We are all at different wavelengths right now trying to deal with the situation, but I decide to calm down and focus on not trying to kill what may be potentially Seiko’s last living relative.

What exactly happened though, Seiko told me that she climbed the first four floors alone, did her brother follow her or did she think he died along the way. Whatever the case, this being in front of us is corrupted. Iuty does not talk back or even acknowledge words. It uses an invisible extension of its body to attack us like if he had an extra limb like me.

Anytime an attack manages to hit me, I wash it away with my Ocean Slug tail. The salt water properties wash over me quickly and remove any negative mental effects that are applied with that debilitating attack. Since I don’t have a weapon or proficiency with a sword or battleaxe, I’m forced to rely on elemental attributes.

“Iuty, please! What happened when we reached the fourth floor?!” Seiko said while surprisingly leaping towards the entity.

Even though I have my super physical capabilities, it is too far for me to be able to save her without putting myself in harm’s way. But heck, this is my teammate, so I jump towards her ready to be reabsorbed by the darkness.

We begin our ascent as a community again to the fourth floor. Well, as a family. It is more of a forced project for me, but also a test. A graduation. I want to find more to destiny than meeting the Blight God.

My cloak and Iuty’s cloaks will be fully completed following this climb. Although they start taking shape and form now, there are still steps to complete to be a full extension of our bodies.

As we enter the waterfall into the third floor, I immediately sprint and break my promise. Iuty sees this as a game probably and follows me.

“I’m going alone, idiot.”

“Hey, I’m not an idiot!”

He keeps up with me and I have no idea how to keep him from sticking with me. At the very least, his magic, [Hand of the Blight God], could serve as a good distraction for him when monsters appear. While he is distracted showing off his power from the extent of our god, I can make my effortless leave.

It doesn’t take long to find some dire wolves. And just like planned I am able to leave undetected. As my community travels in a group, they don’t send anyone after us. There are no scouts and no strategy at all. It will all be handled as soon as they arrive at the dangerous situation.

It doesn’t take long for me to hit a roadblock, so I wait for Iuty to catch up. He gleefully takes the opportunity to use his magic again to take down the giant orcs while I rinse and repeat the previous situation.

Along the way, the evolution of our cloaks begins to take form. My cloak is like a living being. Like an extension, much like Iuty’s magic. I can feel it breathing as if it was just born. Iuty’s cloak manifests into something darker. It does not carry any of the attributes and colors of our tribe, but it loses all that gives it its qualifying attributes.

Either way, this strategy seems to be working out for me where Iuty takes care of the monsters and I take care of physical roadblocks caused by barriers. We are able to work as a team even though we both lack abilities to go at it alone.

We unintentionally bond again and talk. Even though it’s fun to be able to talk with him, I still want to leave.

“Let’s make it a race then!”

“A race?”

“Yeah, first to the Surface wins.” He said.

“Wins what?”

“The race?”

“Just that, that simple?”

“Do you have any ideas for a prize?”

“Not really.”

We somehow took the long way up as we found our family at the last stage waiting for us. They climbed together and knew we hadn’t finished the waterfall climb. As soon as my mother saw us, she ran towards us and hugged us tight.

“Are you two ready to journey alone? You look ready. You seem to understand more.”

“Yeah, yeah. We’re both ready.”

We all exited into the fourth floor of the world and arrived at a forest. It was daytime and silent. Normally, you’d see and hear a variety of fauna. This fourth floor entrance was empty except for the looming tower floating above. The celestial themed tower hummed dimly as my family spread out to examine it.

“That’s the Tower of Stars! We can start climbing towards the fifth floor now!”

“But how do we get up there?”

“That’s a good question, we’ll start with air technology and work from there. We’ll need a Library to find methods of aerial transportation.”

Without warning an intense beam of energy fired at us. Those of us that were still mesmerized by the structure were able to dodge, but our words of warning were not loud enough to reach the rest.

The beam of energy was restless as it kept tracking and consuming each of us one by one.

“Iuty! Mother! Father!” I screamed. I screamed the loudest I could.

Luckily or unluckily for me, the attack never reached me. Instead I was knocked unconscious by the shockwave produced in its final blast. When I awoke to the hellish landscape, I could only find scraps of cloth and cloak.

Then I saw Iuty in the air. Something had consumed him, but he was alive. He was floating in the air, perhaps with his magic. But even though I could physically recognize him, I knew that was not him. He floated away and entered the Tower of Stars.