Art returned to the same time and place, but infinitely eerier for some reason he could not put his finger on. It was like there was a hush over the world. The combat between the many Reubens and his crew was ongoing, the pew pews of laser guns and the clang of swinging pirate sword muted.
Something beckoned his attention, some primal instinct. For a short moment, Art realized why - it was because someone observed them, and some ancient part of Art remembered his ancestral prey instincts. The hairs rose on his neck.
What. Art thought and shook it off. I’m not prey. I’m the coolest guy that ever coolled damnit.
Easily self-assured of his own superior peak existence, Art stood up straighter and dismissed this vital self-preservation instinct just as a greatsword flew out of the mountains from a great distance, impaled him in the head, and pinned what remained of his course to the mountainside with a BOOM of sonic energy. Art died instantly.
“Art! No!!!” Sam shouted.
But a bunch of other multiverse Arts appeared too so the story isn’t over yet.
“HA HA!” one of the Arts exclaimed. He was identical to the Art that just died. “I am the Art of an exact clone of the one who just died, and I cloned myself for this very eventuality! The story will not be hampered!”
“””“Damnit, Art!””””” the Reubens exclaimed in unison. “”””But you are too late! The McGuffin is almost in my hands!! MU HA HA HA-”””
Suddenly a small portal opened a few meters above the ground and the Prime Reuben who had escaped to look for the McMuffin fell to the ground. He was badly injured, and drew ragged breaths.
“... run! Run away!” he wheezed.
“What? RUN???” said a Ruben with anime hair and a tattered martial arts outfit. “Why would we RUN?”
“There’s no time!” Prime Ruben screeched desperately.
“Wait.. do you all feel that… that ominous presence?” Sam said. The battle had come to a lull. She looked around as if trying to spot something.
“Our Ninja instincts are finely honed by the fires of battle and we feel nothing. It’s probably just the stress piling up. It’s kind of been a day.” said Baka.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
“... arrr. No, the lass is right. Arr.” said whatever-his-name-Beard, suddenly wary. “T’is be the feeling of a storm approaching. I can feel it, right in the bone that never quite healed correctly back when I fractured my little toe in a toe-stubbing pain tolerance competition.”
“Meh.” said Art, for he knew without a shadow of a doubt that he was the peak of all of existence and that the immediate OHKO of his identical clone was but mere coincidence.
Then the music began. And even Art looked to the mountains.
A lullaby played. It was soft at first, that music of death. Faint and distant and promising of eternity. It was the embrace of dusty battlefields that had found dreary peace. The music of a promise.
From somewhere within the mountains, ash - actual ash, not the character Ash - drifted on a dramatic, ominous wind. The wind howled into a small tornado, and then into a physical shape, the ash materializing into a tall person holding a greatsword.
“Oh, accursed relatives of Herbert. Oh, ill-omened rust of the blade of existence.” said Briallen, Champion of the Strix King, the strongest boss in the area from back in chapter… something. The winds howled dramatically around her, whipping her long dark hair, as she slowly, edgily, opened her eyes. They were pink. Prime Ruben shivered in fear. “Long have we awaited this moment. The moment where all the Rubens and Arts are gathered in one place.”
She raised her greatsword with the ease that most people raise tooth picks, and holy lightning and unholy fire both swirled around it. “Ye, who art doomed to destroy all. Ye, whom I have hunted for a thousand multiverses, and a thousand years of frankly utterly ridiculous time traveling bullshit, each timeline doomed by your existence.”
Briallen swung the sword downwards, and a stream of energy flowed out of it. Thousands of portals opened, and out of them, stepped a thousand Briallens. Around fifty of these Briallens formed a choir, an orchestra, and a metal band, and started ramping up the boss music with orchestral choir metal. The lyrics went something like “Death death, death, DOOOM, DOOM DOOM” on repeat.
“Wait,” said Art. This is unfair! Why are you trying to kill us all!?”
“Oh, not all of you, necessarily. Just Herbert and everybody related to Herbert. I’d say it’s not personal but after a thousand years of this bullshit that’d be a lie, but it’s because you fools invented Multiverse and Time travel just for your stupid brother rivalry and turning random people wizards of Really Illegal Explosives, and thus doomed the existence of the Weave of the Universe. I’m sorry, not sorry, but I have traveled across all the timelines, and there is none that survives you two. NONE. How anybody can embody such sheer amounts of utter bullshit is-” she paused and took a deep breath.
Sam, Ash, the Ninjas, and the Pirate all shared glanced.
“Aaaaaaaah……!” the Prime Briallen spoke. “Finally… peace… and I must do is kill you all…. The McGuffin will never be yours. FOR I, BRALLEN, CHAMPION OF THE STRIX KING, SHALL SEE TO IT MYSELF!!!!”
She opened her eyes. Again. She hadn’t closed them, which made this very fucked up. They were silver this time.
“Oh no!” one of the 14 year old ninjas exclaimed. “It’s an anime technique! She’s powerful!”
The boss music screeched up to a high pitch as a thousand most-powerful-bosses fell upon them at once.