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The Gamer Chapter 1235 – The Fate of Another Kingdom Finale – Tyrant’s Death
🕑 Added 2022-06-09 18:11:27 +0000 UTCThey landed on the mostly flat remains of one of the pillars. The members of their group that could fly carried those who couldn’t and everyone took a moment to breathe. “Were you aware there was an obstacle to block that?” the Horned Rat asked, looking out at what remained of the black orb. His body language was perfectly still, but John could feel that he was annoyed with the destruction of whatever the hell that had been.
“Yes,” the Gamer responded. Nia had written him periodic updates of her position, including where Eliana and Nathalia had fought. Her dutiful reporting had allowed him to use that final ability without risking hitting wherever in these depths Arkeidos stored Claire – and his phylactery. “We’re not done here.”
“I really wish we were tho,” Rave groaned, shifting her weight left to right and back. A gesture Moira mimicked repeatedly.
“Can you hold it in until we find Arkeidos or do you two want to take care of that now?” John asked, knowing exactly what those motions, not to mention the exchanged glances, were about. When it came to those two banging when this was over, he had taken it as a foregone conclusion the moment he set them against the same enemy.
“There’s no way I’ll miss the end of this!” Rave declared.
John nodded and glanced at how everyone else was doing. In general, everyone appeared either stable or stable enough. Fascinatingly, all four of the Artificial Spirits seemed completely fine. Their power was still part-sponsored by Gaia, their cost based on a percentage of his mana regeneration.
That this was an unintended part of the system seemed obvious. Right now, John’s mana regeneration was a pitiful 3,12 per second. To sustain the three Artificial Spirits, he paid 0,47 per second. Obviously that was not a price fitting for the effect.
Bothersome was that there was absolutely no way that he could have summoned any of his elementals with that mana available. She had assured him she was willing to make the sacrifice, but John would have been a lot happier if he hadn’t needed to leave Undine in her home plane for a full week. There was nothing he could do to work that miracle, sadly.
“Show me your back,” Aclysia demanded.
“What’s with his back?” Rave asked, immediately alarmed by Aclysia’s tone. John pressed his lips together. He had wanted to keep this until they were somewhere else. So far, his torn clothing had hid things well enough.
The cat was out of the proverbial bag and so he pushed the button to remove his top completely. Through Aclysia’s eyes, he saw the injuries Arkeidos had left on him. Each tip of the mace had left a triangular scar, healed already through Gamer’s Body, and made permanent thanks to the Hellfire.
Although John would have much rather not gotten hit at all, he had to applaud Arkeidos’ aim. The strike was symmetrical, or at least so minorly off that the human eye couldn’t notice it on skin. The upper pair of the triangular marks was on his shoulders, the middle pair below his armpits and the lower pair at the middle of his back. “In terms of scars, it’s the least bothersome.”
“I like it,” Metra remarked.
“I fucking hate it!” Eliana growled.
“I can’t believe ya tried to hide that!” Rave complained.
“Just until we were done down here.” John sighed.
While they had that talk, two more people arrived at their congregation. One was expected. Nathalia, now in her human form, made her way over. She joined the ‘not happy’ camp when it came to the scar. The second arrival was Maximillian.
John could see what had changed about him and was honestly too tired to be surprised by it. Regardless, he let Maximillian have his gloating moment. “And now, I, too, am a quarter elemental.”
“Ya stole my thing!”
“It was never yours to keep, just because you stumbled upon it first, by chance.”
“It was still my… ya know what, I’m too horny and mildly annoyed for this discussion,” Rave rolled her shoulders. “Can we… where do we go anyway?”
“Down,” John told them. “He’s calling us.”
Down below the half of the sphere that remained in place, in the darkness of the endless caves, between the spires and strands, shone a single light. Bright, it guided, in seven colours. Brown, green, red, blue, gold, purple, and necrotic poison. Seven lights, to call them to where the tyrant hid his phylactery.
________________________________________________________________________
John was uncertain what to make of the bottom of the cavern. The scattered remains of what the explosion had loosened created a ring between them and the sprawling city he had seen on his way down. Fundamentally, the presence of life was a good omen, yet he had to wonder what kind of civilization had existed here with the Emperor’s approval.
‘One issue at a time,’ the Gamer thought, as he landed in a true necropolis. Time forsaken towers and withered buildings were located around a temple that was humble compared to everything else the tyrant had built. About as large as a particularly wealthy rural church, the temple was surrounded by seven pillars. One to each element and one to undeath.
John moved ahead of the group. In his current state, he was vulnerable, but not vulnerable enough that he was afraid that any final trickery could take him out. Besides, he did not take Arkeidos for the kind to engage in such trickery in his final moments.
The room was large enough for their moderate sized group to fit in comfortably. With its own six obelisks and the throne at the back, John recognized the room immediately. This was what he had seen through the communication crystal, only now there were no damned souls floating around anymore. The mechanism that had facilitated that had been utterly destroyed.
John first looked to Arkeidos, who sat on his throne. The previous nondescript appearance of the Emperor was now solidified into that of a muscular man, his form ethereal and formed from green energy. Little swirls of mist sometimes rose from his translucent skin. Within the body was the true final body the Emperor possessed: a skeleton covered in patches of iron and jaggedly carved runes. It was a completely improvised work and one that appeared like it had been made under great duress with a myriad of mistakes all over bones too frail to match the muscular body around them.
The scars on Arkeidos’ face were reminders of his life in one way or another. Either they were remembrances of injuries so strong that they stayed with him even in undeath or aftereffects of the lines he had carved into his body when it was still flesh and blood that covered those bones. The procedure the tyrant had used to overcome his Mettle affliction could have been nothing short of torturous and he had done it all to himself.
Between the last body of the tyrant on his throne and the Gamer was the stone container of the phylactery. It was right there, in front of John, the glowing heart of the kraken horror, serving as the safe haven for the lich’s soul.
Something caught John’s eye and he looked underneath the floor. Swiftly, he realized that it was dark tinted glass, under which a creature prowled. One with a humanoid torso and a lower body made of tentacles. A young and alive version of the creature that Nathalia had left as a peculiarly shaped piece of coal.
“It grew slowly, the past two-hundred years,” Arkeidos raised his voice, causing John to look back at him. “I have never been able to unravel its origin in its entirety. The shaft through which you descended existed well before my time, as did this cave. This very place,” he gestured around with his left hand, “it was where I faced the great one that you saw above. It was sealed by my ancestors here, kept suppressed and docile by feeding it the souls of all those that perished in this world. Its presence sapped the topsoil of the lifeforce required to sustain larger plants. I theorize that it fell from the sky, a great beast that devours planets. Embedded in its forehead was the metal I used as the core of my weapon, Inkaryl.”
The mace appeared in his hand, sized much smaller now that it had to fit the Emperor’s human form. With the head pointed downwards, he placed it in front of him. “That’s quite the unnerving tale,” John admitted. Were there more of these things down there? Did they parasitize entire planets and then go into stasis while travelling between them? How quickly did they travel? Did they only exist in this Kingdom or were they capable of jumping between? Were there other lifeforms out there based on Astrotium? “The universe is quite vast.”
“Indeed,” Arkeidos agreed.
“Gamer,” Moira barked, her aggressive tone somewhat diminished by the clear problems she had with standing straight. “Why are you conversing with this monstrosity?”
“Because it’s rude to deny someone their last words,” John responded dismissively.
The tyrant chuckled and raised his left hand. Between two fingers he held the red and black core of Claire. Before John could doubt Arkeidos’ honour, the revenant softly tossed the core to John, who caught it effortlessly. A relieved breath left those who had not trusted in the Emperor’s word.
“It was a brilliant life I led,” Arkeidos stated and rose to his feet. He grabbed the mace and wandered down the flight of stairs separating the throne from the rest of the hall. “I rose through the challenges, I took what I wanted, and in the end even you are not able to deny me what I had wished for the most for millennia: a proper challenge.” Arkeidos’ ghostly steps still reverberated with authority.
“You will live on as a scar on this world and on me,” John told the tyrant.
“A hollow accomplishment,” Arkeidos waved off. “I do not care to be remembered for what I was. All that ever mattered is who I am. I will cease now. An eternity lived, a millennia dominated. There is only one regret to have, fellow conqueror, and that was to have not investigated the possibility of worlds like yours sooner.”
The two of them looked at each other, through the open pillar that contained the phylactery. “I would have defeated you one way or another,” John declared.
Arkeidos laughed. “Oh, how arrogant you are. It could be stimulating to discuss this. Alas, as we both have admitted before – the time for dialogue has never been.”
With a two-handed swing, Arkeidos hammered down on the display in front of him. The roof shattered, then the mace slammed down on the beating heart. Black ichor splattered out, so thick that it only flew half a metre before coming to a stop. Even with the head of the mace in the middle of its flattened shape, the heart desperately kept beating.
The crystals, pieces of Arkeidos’ expanded souls, around it were gradually sapped of their magical glow, turning into mundane gemstones. “My life was always mine to claim,” Arkeidos bellowed. He let go of his weapon and sprawled out his arms, as the ghostly energy began to drift off his ghostly fingers. “Rummage through my ruins. Bask in the glory I have gathered. All that I have accomplished, fellow conqueror, admire it. You have earned your keep.”
“I can only wonder what a force of good you could have been under other circumstances.” John shook his head. He blinked once, then the smile on the tyrant’s lips was gone, leaving behind a disfigured skull that dropped lifelessly to the floor a moment later.
“Well, that’s the end of that,” John said and turned to his followers. He opened his mouth to address the Horned Rat. The god was already gone. ‘Great, now I got a loose schemer running around… should I just… yeah.’
The Gamer raised his hand and exited the Iron Domain, pulling everyone who was still around with him. The fact that it was possible at all meant that their victory was indeed universal and that no one was still in a threatened position.
“Allies!” John shouted, staring specifically at the back of the Horned Rat. The schemer turned around, a minorly annoyed glint in his red, flickering eyes. Ignoring it, the Gamer continued immediately, “We have won this day!”
Cheers broke out all around. No matter how injured or exhausted, everyone added to the volume that filled the dark space of the I.D. Gate. John tried to continue, but the accomplishment the members of the coalition felt, for good reason, continued to echo. Vikings screamed at the top of their lungs, the knights of the Golden Rose beat their shields, members of tribes from around the world stomped their feet in a fascinating display of multicultural unity, and the Hobomice unloaded a full magazine of bullets into the air. It was a wild display.
“Allies… ALLIES!” John finally managed to overpower them for long enough that he could grab their attention again. “We have three days to sort out what remains. It will not be enough to set that world into order, but we can put it on the right path. More importantly, it means we can do so after we have rested… and counted our losses.” Looking over the crowd, John had no idea if there even had been any. A list they kept would reveal this soon enough. “Those who wish to rest, please leave this space. All who remain will re-enter with me in ten minutes.”
The vast majority of people streamed towards the door that stood in the middle of this void. There were wounds to treat and naps to take. John did not begrudge any of them if they took it easy for the entirety of the next three days. What had needed to be done had been done. He could not help but smirk though.
Foremost of those leaving were Rave and Moira.
Comments
Hansuwepeter
he would get even more op even faster
Kinda sad how John can't keep the kingdom(s) he conquers
Rave and Moira lewd pls
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