18:02
“Wow,” Wu Ming said, spying the fireworks from his perch atop the skyscraper. “Things are getting pretty crazy down there, huh?”
Mereloco didn’t mince words.
“I’m going,” he said -- and fired himself towards the shopping centre using Unchained. Wu Ming whistled as he watched him go. The purple bullet slammed into one of the building’s outer walls, but he doubted that would slow the caveman down any. He was made of sterner stuff than that.
“As for me,” Wu Ming chuckled, turning his back on the battlefield. “I’m on babysitting duty.”
Whistling idly, he hopped off the top of the skyscraper and dropped down to the balcony where the others were positioned. Aclima was still lingering in a corner, while Nael stood guard over her. Gregori, for his part, seemed to have skedaddled at some point. Wu Ming didn’t expect anyone would miss him.
“How we looking?” Wu Ming grinned, planting his hands on his hips.
“Haven’t spotted anyone yet,” Nael muttered, dull red eyes scanning the horizon. “How are we getting inside that place?”
“Well, grandpa has just gone for it,” Wu Ming said. “But I’m thinking we wanna go for a more subtle approach. Once ol’ Muzazi finds out we’ve got Aclima with us, he won’t be able to just sit there -- so that’s when we --”
Aclima interrupted.
“I don’t want to see Muzazi.”
Wu Ming blinked. “Okay.”
“I don’t want to see Muzazi,” Aclima repeated.
“Yeah, cool,” he replied. “The stairs are right there, though?”
Aclima narrowed her eyes. “You’re not seriously letting me go,” she said suspiciously.
Nael looked at him too, his mouth a flat line of disapproval. It seemed he didn’t agree with Wu Ming’s generosity -- giving up a potential advantage was probably anathema to a pragmatic gentleman like him. But hey, sometimes that was how life went.
“Let you go?” Wu Ming frowned at Aclima, ignoring Nael. “I didn’t have you in the first place. I’m being serious, you can just leave if you feel like it. Go ahead.”
For a second, Aclima didn’t move. Clearly, she still had her doubts -- but Wu Ming was fully serious, one-hundred percent, ten-outta-ten, two thumbs up, five stars. Plans were like plates, in a way. It was fun to juggle them, but if they ended up breaking on the floor it was no biggie. Finally, she seemed to realize that Wu Ming was being genuine… and she took a step towards the stairs.
That was when it happened.
That was when Wu Ming was surprised for the first time in a very long while.
A black dog was sitting next to Aclima.
It grinned in all directions with a face that had been stretched into humanity and crushed into a beast. Finger-claws tapped languidly against the rooftop. Eyes shining with deadlight narrowed maliciously.
One moment it was not there, and the next it was, oozing out of the rooftop’s corner like it was printed into existence. It met Wu Ming’s gaze as if mocking him -- and if that was the case, it was right to. It wasn’t like Wu Ming hadn’t been expecting something to appear. Since he’d noticed the ability tracking Aclima, he’d been ready for it to activate -- but still, when it had finally appeared, it had somehow caught him off-guard.
Wu Ming blinked.
The beast reached for Aclima.
And…
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Guardian Entity: Hachiman!
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… its head exploded into shadows.
In an instant, Nael Manron had manifested his Guardian Entity and lanced right through the skull of the creature. It dispersed into black smoke, flying off in all directions. Aclima yelped, jumping back from the spot where the creature had appeared. Hachiman flipped its wooden spear in its hands as Nael glanced back at Wu Ming.
“Whatever that thing was,” he said seriously. “I doubt that killed it. We need to move from this --”
Blood sprayed.
Again, it had been the work of an instant, and again it had caught everyone there off-guard. The head of the creature had suddenly emerged from a single point on Nael’s boot and tore his heel out, sending him down towards the ground. Before he could even finish falling, the head was emerging once more -- this time from his hand, from one of his fingernails -- and lunging for his throat.
Well, Wu Ming had seen enough.
Lengthwise Guillotine.
Before the shadow-jaws could make contact, Wu Ming cut them in half with a swing of his string -- and once again, they dissipated into shadow. It seemed this wasn’t the sort of thing that could be killed just by cutting it. Interesting, interesting. Great, fantastic. He was into it. As Nael finally dropped to the ground, roaring in pain and clutching his ravaged foot, Wu Ming smirked.
Sorry, friend, but that’s the last time you catch me off guard.
Rainbow Web.
“Your ability,” Wu Ming said, crossing his arms. “... is to travel and manifest through sharp angles -- I’d guess corners, specifically. First, the corner of this balcony, then the corner of this guy’s bootstrap, then the corner of his fingernail. So long as I know that and I know who your next target is, I can make a pretty good guess where you’re coming from.”
He looked over his shoulder, smiling.
“Ah, there we go,” he said. “I’ve never liked gambling, you know. I just can’t seem to lose.”
The beast hung in the air, inches away from Wu Ming, suspended by a web of shining kaleidoscopic strings. As Wu Ming had expected, it had leapt out from the opposite corner of the balcony, seeking to attack him from his blind spot -- and so it had fallen into his trap. It struggled and snarled in its bindings, but the strings were tight and strong… it wouldn’t be getting free any time soon.
It glared at Wu Ming with wide eyes of primal hatred.
“Now, then,” he purred. “Let’s get a better look at you.”
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“Your Majesty,” said Praetorian One, floating over the kingdom of war. “My Principality, if you would. This is a late-night Appointment I’m up against.”
DOWNLOADING ABILITY… “Principality (Blue)”
A blue halo appeared floating over Praetorian One’s head, and with it came knowledge. Sword techniques refined over hundreds of years, dissipating into his body as muscle memory so potent it was as if he’d done the training himself. Without the Principality, he was a formidable warrior. With it, he was a veritable sword saint.
White-feathered wings flapped in the air as Praetorian One inspected the area below.
Appointment continued to live up to his reputation. Even after being run through with Dignity, he’d managed to tear himself free and retreat into the construction fields. Still, the blow had done its work. Dignity’s thorns would manifest inside Appointment’s body from the point of injury outwards. Even if Praetorian One didn’t do anything, Appointment would drop dead all on his own.
But he wasn’t one to pass victory into the hands of time. That was why he’d dispatched Two and Three to pursue Appointment… and that was why he would act now.
Each time Praetorian One’s wings flapped, they scattered glowing white feathers that hung in the air. Indeed, the sky above the shopping centre was filled with them now, like the stars had been pulled in from space. Needless to say, they weren’t for decoration.
Praetorian One raised a hand, and the feathers moved to obey him -- flitting through the air to gather just above his palm. Deployed alone, they were strong enough to melt through stone and flesh, but that wouldn’t be enough to deal with Appointment. He deserved better -- he was so special, after all. The feathers gathered and gathered, consolidating until they formed a shining javelin of starlight, taller than Praetorian One himself. He took hold of it in a clawed hand and aimed down to the complex Appointment had retreated into.
Schedule Breaker, Praetorian One scoffed. Let me show you what real light looks like.
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
He hurled the javelin, carving a line of white across the sky…
…and watched in satisfaction as the building below erupted into heaven’s wrath.
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Wu Ming strode forward, ignoring the pillar of white light suddenly stretching into the sky behind him. Shadows danced across his face as a thin smile spread across his lips. For the briefest of instants, he was the image of a reaper.
“Wow, you’re a creepy little guy, huh?” he said, inspecting his bound quarry. “Ten outta ten on the sleep paralysis aesthetic, I’ll give you that. What’s your deal?”
For its part, the beast had stopped thrashing in its restraints. Instead, it was just staring at Aclima with those empty white eyes, unblinking. Wu Ming frowned as he squatted down next to it, following its gaze to the girl. He rubbed his chin and clicked his tongue.
“As I thought, looks like it’s pretty pissed off at you, kiddo,” he said.
“What the hell is it?!” Aclima said, her face pale, her back pressed against the furthest wall.
“You said you took out the Kennelmaster, right?” Wu Ming asked. “Well, looks to me like this faithful pooch has come for revenge. A post-death ability, if I had to wager, triggered after you released Curse Hand. You might wanna keep it running on corpses in the future.”
“Bastard…”
Wu Ming blinked as he recalled: right, right, Nael’s heel had been torn out. He was on the ground, clutching his foot, face red from pain and anger. Slowly, he got up -- Hachiman supporting him on one shoulder. His red eyes narrowed as he glared at Wu Ming.
“Next time,” he growled. “Don’t use me as your guinea pig. That hurt. I’ll kill you.”
“Sorry, sorry,” Wu Ming chuckled. “Dr. Stitches.”
With that simple command, a sequence of strings leapt out of Wu Ming’s index finger, wrapping around Nael’s injured foot and binding the wound shut. The young man nodded in begrudging gratitude.
“Now,” the moody Scurrant said, looking over at the trapped beast. “How about we finish this thing?”
Twang.
Wu Ming blinked. “Huh?”
Twang.
Wu Ming looked. “Eh?”
Twang.
Wu Ming grinned. “For real?!”
Snap.
The creature broke free.
Shadows exploded across the rooftop like smog as the beast launched attacks in every direction, claws and jaws slashing and biting at everything in sight. For their part, Wu Ming’s companions responded quickly: Aclima just fled down the stairs, while Nael had his Guardian Entity hurl his body out of the attack zone. Wu Ming alone remained standing where he was, deflecting the incoming blows with split-second string barriers.
Even when I counterattack, Wu Ming observed in the midst of his maddened dance. It doesn’t actually do any damage to this thing. It’s the same as when Hachiman stabbed it before. Since its made of shadows, all a physical attack can do is disperse it, huh?
In that case…
Starlight Swing.
Like he was throwing out a yo-yo, Wu Ming flicked his finger -- and a string of pure white light whipped forward, slashing at the creature’s claw as it attacked. This time, the shadows did not disperse. This time, they bled.
The monster screeched in pain and leapt backwards -- once, twice, thrice -- until it was perched right on the edge of the building. Wu Ming’s strike had cut it right between two fingers -- and now it held that bleeding wound up to its face, inspecting it. The pain had been momentary… now, it seemed more curious than anything else. It cocked its head so far that it turned a full three-hundred and sixty degrees, returning to its original position, before looking back up at Wu Ming.
“Hurts…” it said, in a soft but malicious voice. “Bast… ard…”
“Oh?” Wu Ming replied, hands on his hips. “You can talk?”
Well, it was learning to talk, anyway. The words came out haltingly, right on the edge of stuttering, like it was a malfunctioning machine. Wu Ming guessed that made sense: if this was a post-mortem ability of the Kennelmaster’s, that meant this entity had only existed for about half a day now. Hell, Wu Ming supposed that made it an extremely quick learner, if anything.
The creature didn’t respond to Wu Ming’s question. Instead, it just continued to turn its hand, inspecting its wound from various angles -- before flicking its wrist and snapping the cut shut.
“Come on, come on, it’s no fun without some dirty talk,” Wu Ming chuckled. “I’m Wu Ming, what’s your name?”
The creature just stared at him.
“Come on.”
It grumbled for a second, then: “Black… Dog…”
“Oh? Black Dog? That’s a pretty generic name, but I guess I’ve got no right to --”
Oops, it’s killing me.
Black Dog took advantage of Wu Ming’s momentary distraction. In an instant, its head had swelled to enormous proportions, covering the distance between it and Wu Ming and snapping -- taking half the rooftop with it. Wu Ming whistled as he leapt back, hopping between chunks of rubble as they flew through the air.
“Nice, nice!” he laughed into the crisp night air. “You tried to get me talking there, didn’t you?! I like it! Ten outta ten! A little clumsy, but you’ve got the spirit!”
“Finish,” Black Dog growled, its arms lashing through the air like tentacles as it tried to bat Wu Ming out of existence. “Finish this thing…”
Maybe this thing wasn’t as smart as Wu Ming had hoped. Everything it was saying was just it repeating something it had heard -- ‘bastard’, ‘that hurts’, ‘finish this thing’. Even if it was using those words in new contexts, the fact that it couldn’t think of things to say on its own didn’t bode well for its imagination.
It looked like he’d bet poorly again. If this was an enemy that would just attack without strategy, he’d be better off going after whichever bounty hunter had created that geyser of light. Best to wrap things up here quickly.
Starlight Shot!
The same shining string from before, bundled together into tiny balls, fired as bullets. They zipped through the air, popping perfect holes in the shifting shadows before him, sending blood spraying down the side of the building. Black Dog screeched with force enough to vibrate the air, lashing out with its arms even faster -- but these frenzied blows were even easier to dodge.
It raised one fist high up into the air, arm stretching out absurdly further -- and then that fist inflated to the size of a car. Just from looking at it, Wu Ming could tell a direct hit would turn a human body to pulp. Unfortunately for Black Dog, it wouldn’t be getting so much as an indirect hit.
Wu Ming pulled himself backwards by twin strings just as the fist came down, utterly decimating what was left of the rooftop. Hopefully Nael and Aclima had managed to fully get away before that, but if they hadn’t, Wu Ming guessed that was just how their lives ended. His attention was elsewhere.
The strings pulled him all the way to the next building along -- his feet landing on the window as he stood up horizontally, secured to the glass by fibers in his feet. Looking up -- across to his original location, where Black Dog was -- he raised both hands and cried:
“Starlight Cannon!”
A bundle of bright string that dwarfed Wu Ming’s own body fired forth and slammed into Black Dog, obliterating its form and painting the skyscraper in vivid red blood. Wu Ming slapped his hands together, licking his lips. That had been perhaps a bit more gruesome than he’d intended…
“...but I had to make it look convincing, right?” he said, pointing his finger at the incoming attack.
As expected, Black Dog had retreated part of its body into a corner before the attack struck -- and now its head was lunging forth from the corner of the window pane, aiming to bite down on Wu Ming’s throat. A Starlight Shot easily popped its skull --
-- but then another set of jaws sank into Wu Ming’s leg.
He blinked. “Eh?”
Off-guard? Three times in one night? Is this really okay?
A second head had emerged from another corner of the window pane, launching another attack while Wu Ming had been smugly responding to the first. It tore greedily at his leg, severing the thread-woven limb and sending it flying off.
Starlight Shower!
A web of shining strings detonated all around Wu Ming like a set of radiant firecrackers, banishing the shadowy head of the Black Dog for a moment. He used that opportunity to escape -- flipping end over end up the surface of the building. As he moved, however… he was pursued.
Heads. Heads without end.
This building was lined with windows, and each window had four corners -- and from each of those corners emerged another head of the Black Dog, lunging and snapping at Wu Ming as he tried to escape them. He was good… but he had to admit that this thing was good too. Escaping unscathed was not possible. Chunks of Wu Ming’s body were torn away while he moved, wounds inflicted that would have surely been fatal for a man of flesh and blood.
Even with the constant attacks, though, he was able to reach the roof -- weaving new limbs and flesh into existence as he landed. He caught his breath in what he knew was a precious moment of peace. This enemy… he’d taken it too lightly.
It wasn’t able to do all this a second ago. Back then, this was definitely a movement power, not one that produced new body parts from corners. It modified its ability according to the demands of the situation. Which means… it's like me.
A Black Dog with a thousand powers.
The four corners of the rooftop erupted into dancing shadows -- and four gargantuan heads emerged from them, each much larger than the one that had ravaged the other building. A maintained Starlight Shower formed a barrier to defend against their attacks, but that still meant Wu Ming was trapped between the four of them. He held his hands out to maintain the ability as he considered his next move.
How did this ability work now? Clearly, destroying these heads wasn’t actually harming Black Dog anymore, since more attacks just kept coming. That suggested there was a main body somewhere, launching these attacks remotely. If he could just locate that, he could win.
Wu Ming took a step backwards…
…and bumped right into that main body.
“So… slow.”
Black Dog had risen up to its feet, standing like a human, and just like that it was twice Wu Ming’s height. Through impromptu senses, Wu Ming saw it look down at him, and saw it pull its hand back to strike him. In the second it took Wu Ming to whirl around, in the second it took for that backhand to connect, he considered one thing.
Not once since the battle started had anyone said the words ‘so slow’.
Oh.
Oh, this is bad, actually.