Go ahead you infuriating fool. Play your game. Toy with Anon and let’s see where that gets you. The second you let your guard down I’ll whisk them away and consume them before you can even make it out of the empire.
Gregorious frowned, and started to slowly stalk forward–as if nothing could harm him. “What? Got nothing to say? I thought for sure that after all I’ve put you through you’d at least want to chew me out.” Anon didn’t reply, didn’t even acknowledge that Gregorious was talking, so he roared. “Say Something!”
Josephine barely refrained from clicking her tongue as she drowned out the absurd noise by briefly closing off her ears. You did this? You? The absurdly obese tantrum throwing infant? I’m the one who summoned Matweirden! I’m the one who brought us here! You might have crafted the pieces, but I placed them on the board! She turned her gaze to the limp form of the transformed and formerly corrupted deity to distract herself from her boiling rage. But this is fascinating. To undo the demon’s possession and physiological changes would be incredible enough on its own, but she’s become something else entirely! Suffused with divinity but not the source of it! I must have her for study! Perhaps dissecting her will reveal the secret to Anon’s peculiar powers? Perhaps she’ll even provide a new way to ascend?
Anon weakly righted their hunched posture and snorted derisively. “I’m disappointed.”
Both Josephine and Gregorious froze.
She smirked. What? In this hopeless situation you dare to condemn us? Pathetic blubbering would suit you better, but I never expected to be judged by such a–
Her amusement faded as she looked on.
Anon’s visage gradually changed from one victim to the next. Silently cycling through every apostle and terrestrial deity that they’d ever preyed upon before changing to remind them of the countless more ordinary people that they’d harmed, wronged, and killed–directly or otherwise.
She arched an eyebrow. Who even are those people? I recognize a few other apostles that I’ve consumed, but there are too many faces. They can’t all be apostles, can they? Our order has claimed many, but this is too much. And what is this feeling? Why is this pathetic attempt at a guilt trip unsettling me? Why are my defenses not reacting to or stopping it? Or is this mild annoyance all you’re capable of?
Gregorious ground the teeth of several of his auxiliary mouths creating a harsh nails-on-a-chalkboard-esque sound. “What. Did. You. Say?”
<“I’m disappointed.”>
The calm, clear, voice resonated through the chamber as if the very air itself issued the words, sending them to reverberate and strike the pair repeatedly–like a chorus of all their victims.
<“You’ve lived such long lives but not a hint of wisdom is within you. How did you become so senseless?”>
Josephine stared at Anon, caught off guard by the effect mere words were having on her body. It’s getting worse! How does every syllable strike my mind like a hammer? Why do the words burn my flesh like hot iron? Why does my spirit quake? I am strong! I have stared into the abyss, curse you! I know the truth of the world! This should be nothing! So how is Anon doing this? There is no mana being exerted! No divinity! They’re only talking! System! Tell me what that creature is doing! Now!
The system crackled to life in her ear like an old record.
Her eyes widened. What did you say?! You answer to me! We harness divinity! We claim authority! We–
The system replied.
The echo grew in her ears until it unified with the disturbance Anon started amplifying the effects of both tenfold. She winced, shut her eyes, and channeled her mana, divinity, and blight to suppress the now intolerable interference.
Once free, she wiped the single drop of sweat from her brow. It’s not the first time the system has defied orders. I should have expected it since the nearest corrupted terrestrial deity has been purified and can no longer serve as a relay… But it’s never been so aggressive before. It’s never even resisted after I rebuke it–and certainly never repeated or reacted to another’s words.
She muttered. “It must be because one handcrafted by God is so close at hand.”
She opened her eyes, and for a split second she saw Anon towering over them like the sky above mere ants. She blinked the wildly inaccurate vision away, ever more furious that such paltry tricks could affect her, and watched Gregorious’ reaction.
He still writhed under the influence of the sound, evidently he had also asked for the system’s analysis of the situation, but he fared far worse than she did–likely due to the difference in their magical proficiency and his perpetually childish mind.
He bellowed “Shut up! Shut Up! SHUT UP!” And the cavern quaked under the assault of his overpowered vocal chords.
Anon looked weak enough to be blown over at any time, however, they barely moved under the shockwaves created by the supersonic sound. Matweirden, though, was hurled away and crashed against the walls, escaping an impromptu entombment from falling rock by a hair’s breadth.
Interesting. Anon’s not protecting her. So I can’t use her as a hostage. Annoying, but fine. She’s too valuable to– Josephine forced her racing heart to slow, and all but forgot her prior anger as her associate’s howling grew more and more intense–until even her plugged ears could no longer shield her. Wretched fool! I better wake him up before he brings the cavern down on our heads.
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Using her own surplus of mouths, she near instantly incanted the ‘gravity hammer' and 'warped wall’ spells and flattened the half-insane Gregorious into a palm shaped crater, while cutting off the collapsed Matweirden from further harm.
She sighed. This is getting ridiculous. Had he just kept his mouth shut, that would have been a perfect opportunity to flee with Anon and Matweirden! But noooo! That hopeless buffoon just has to get his way! He just has to be obsessed with playing the scheming mastermind! But the second something goes wrong, or his expectations are denied, he throws everything away in a fit of rage! And I have to play along lest he kill them or me!
“Haaaaaa…” Gregorious roused himself from where she planted him a second later, oozing up and reassembling his humanoid structure beneath his robes. “Thanks Jose! I’ll have to treat you to another feast for sparing me the remainder of that backlash.” He drug a claw-like hand over his veiled face as he returned his focus to Anon. “Now. You. Suffer!”
Before the cloud of dust had even left the ground, Gregorious was behind Anon, and he drove his fist into the back of the apostle’s hooded head at blistering speed.
Josephine frowned. I messed up. I should have used only enough force to silence him, not shock him free of the full effect. Now he’ll subdue Anon and I’ll have to risk fight– Oh!
There was a sound like glass splintering as three scintillating barriers simply appeared and stopped the hit–albeit barely.
“What? So you’re good at magic?” Gregorious hissed as he circled the still unmoving Anon like a cat would a cornered mouse, quickly casting a plethora of empowering spells as he launched more strikes at unseeable speed. “Tough luck. I might not be the best at it, but I know plenty of spells across many disciplines and elements so you’re–”
More and more dense layers of barriers appeared to stop or deflect the onslaught, and in the midst of the chaos that no mortal could even perceive Anon held up a finger to Gregorious’ veiled lips and the Ascendant’s magic shattered.
Josephine’s eyes bulged out of their sockets and pressed against her veil to get a better look. That… that’s not… how?
The movement wasn’t fast. In fact, it was so slow that they both registered it coming, yet it came so naturally that neither actually perceived its purpose until it was in place–making contact with his rapidly moving face when there was no way to tell where it would be until it arrived. <“Senseless. The blind leading the blind. Hungering for what you lack, yet unable to see that you desire the things you gave up. How long will you let yourselves fall? You can’t go much farther.”>
Anon’s voice was quiet now. As small as a ladybug crawling on a blade of grass. But they felt it as intensely as a frozen needle through the heart.
Josephine winced, Ugk. More of this obnoxious sensation. You know you can’t beat us, Anon, so you’ve what? Decided to irritate us to the bitter end?
Gregorious, too taken aback by the sudden disappearance of his magic, failed to resist the pulse of black colored magic that Anon’s finger released.
It washed over him like a silent tide, and he staggered a few steps away, stumbling on the splintered stone his steps had shattered as his head throbbed beneath the weight of Anon’s words and spells.
Josephine grinned and strode forward as her associate clutched at his head. “You never cease to amaze me Anon. I didn’t know time essence magic could be used to assail the mind like that. But you’re underestimating us.”
Gregorious’ body exploded out from under his robes. More flesh than he had any right to possess welled out and shaped itself into a towering and horrible mess of eyes, mouths, and appendages. The ceiling pinned his white robe to the top of his bulbous head like a tiny and useless wig; its continued presence a mockery of the horror it once concealed.
The monstrous Ascendant huffed and puffed violently as he adjusted to his increased size, mass, and power. “Y–you! I’ll make you pay! For this humiliation! For making me break the first seal outside my domain!”
But Anon’s only response was to collapse.
Gregorious shifted his bloated body but the partly collapsed cavern wasn’t large enough to accommodate his preposterous size. “Jose! Jose! It’s over! Get us out of here! Back to the altar! Feeding on Anon is the only thing that will recover my mood! Jose!”
Josephine had to resist skipping as she waltzed over to pat his pustulant paunch while drawing her two unconscious prizes over to her with a quick cast of ‘gravitational grip.’
Now’s my chance! Finally! The Transcendent won’t tolerate you causing chaos throughout the countryside, and it’ll be about a week before you piece the seal back together on your own, so enjoy trying to figure out how to get home looking like that you pig! Anon’s mine!
She completed a ‘world walk’ spell and stepped into the familiar white spatial tunnel that would take her to the sacrificial altar with Anon and Matweirden.
Gregorious’ muted cries of “Hey!” and “Traitor!” were an all too sweet bonus as the magic severed her connection to her former location, and she looked forward to savoring Anon’s shockingly vast array of powers once the ritual was complete.
#
So I might be screwed…
My sharp senses were a blur of darkness and fatigue as I flopped to the floor. They’d faded fast after Gregorious grew and released a boatload of blight into the air. That wouldn’t have been too bad, I have my ring and all, but the blight resist power was almost instantly overwhelmed. At that point, with so little mana left I kinda had no choice but to collapse and play dead–hoping they’d remove me from that environment asap since reusing the trait would be pointless.
That, at least, is working out.
I felt magic lift me, and watched the world bleed to white as Josephine pulled me and Cass into a master level teleport spell that Uriel identified as ‘world walk’. I could only just make out Gregorious’ shouting with my faded awareness and my unsteady consciousness, but I heard enough to confirm that they weren’t on friendly terms.
I’ve honestly been flying by the seat of my pants based on that fleeting hope. I got even luckier too, since I only added authority to my voice to intimidate them, and never expected that people who are fully corrupt are weak to that particular trick. I never even imagined that the system would or even could help me out too!
Gregorious’ blindingly fast movements flashed through my mind. If I hadn’t used the ‘focus’ ability on full blast, I never would have been able to track him enough to block–let alone chance making contact when I did with ‘way of the one’.
I mean, I did my best to stay calm and sound as intimidating as possible the whole time, but I burned through my mana reserves so fast just blocking those strikes that I’ve basically got nothing left! Any one of those hits likely would have been enough to either knock me out or put me down, so I didn’t really have a choice, but now I’m in a really tough spot in deciding how to escape.
I tried to focus, but the blurry bubble of my awareness had receded such that it barely showed me Cassandra’s limp hand and my own figure. No idea where Josephine was positioned, or if she was even watching, but assuming she’s as arrogant as I think she is she’s probably just let down her guard.
Which means that now would likely be the best timing to try to escape, but since we’re mid teleport there’s no telling what the consequences of messing with her magic would be. If I wait a little I’ll recover more mana, but I expect to be restrained again somehow, and there’s no telling if the restraint will ever be lifted. I suppose doing nothing and hoping her plans will unravel on their own is an option too, but from the sound of it, Gregorious, the most likely one to intervene, is kinda stuck, so unless another Ascendant get’s wind of this–I don’t think it’s a good choice. Heck! None of them are good choices! But of these options, I have to choose.