Regaining consciousness was an unpleasant experience. Being a machine originally, there was virtually no difference between being turned off and being turned back on. It was close to what humans called blinking. Barely conceivable unless you pay attention. The body I currently inhabited didn't have such conveniences.
I had enough self-awareness to think, but only enough to be along for the ride. Each piece of my body slowly awakened—quickly in the eyes of an organic creature, painfully slow for my hyperactive senses. Speaking of pain, I think I had what some would call sour mussels, mostly located on my abdomen.
When my eyes reactivated, I saw the problem. The human’s sword was still in my chest. It gave me a funny feeling. What was left of my body was chained to a chair as well. That couldn't be a good thing. Looking around, I was met with a strange sight. Gritzkel was standing next to the Protagonist. Having a civil discussion of sorts.
“Well, well, well. Look who decided to grace us with his presence. Ya caused quite the trouble you stupid robot.”
Gritzkel noticed I was conscious first, and he had a few words to say. They didn’t appear to be positive in nature. More importantly, he focused on me rather than his nemesis. It would seem whatever vendetta he and the elf had was on hold. Probably the same reason I was bound in place. I didn’t understand why they’d done such a thing. I had no arms and my legs couldn't move.
“I am positive the system warned ya about trying to kill the Protagonist’s Trainee. Considering the current narrative is on hold and ya were struck by lighting, ya ignored the message. The first rule of Villains; the Villain System is god. Don’t go against it or expect to be struck down by its divine might!”
“I thought the first rule was to expect your lair to be invaded.”
My rebuttal was met with a mace to the face. Ouch. That actually kind of hurt. This body wasn’t supposed to come with pain sensors. Then again, the sword was evidence of ways to bypass such limitations. The elf put her hand on Gritzkels shoulder.
“Calm yourself. You need not incur the system's wrath like your protege just did. He must be in a fragile state. One wrong move and both of us will be punished. What penalties we’ve incurred shoulder be more than enough.”
Grtizkel growled, pulling his shoulder out from the Protagonist’s grip. He began to pace back and forth behind the elf, clearly frustrated with the situation. The elf sighed, holding a more amicable persona while he was around. Like business partners with experience rather than mortal enemies. I found it amusing.
“As we are sure you have deduced, our hatred for one another is out of necessity rather than genuine malice. When you reach a high enough level in our respective corporation, you become more of an administrator. The killing and saving are left to the new blood such as yourself.
“Our responsibilities involve keeping trainees like you and Alice safe for your first foray into the field. Those who show great promise. Show you how what is expected of you and what a high level of power could be at your fingertips. Destroy countries, lead large factions, and have enough personal power to be a demigod.”
I already had that sort of power before becoming a Villain. What more could the Villain System provide me that I couldn't make myself? Well, other than shoring up my faults and training my abilities like psionics. Even then that should be manageable by myself. Eventually.
“We see you find yourself self-sufficient in your abilities. You would not be the first global threat employed by Villains Inc. There had been gods or eldritch abominations far worse than you who have laid claim to the title of Villain. Each and everyone had died in one form or another.”
Gritzkel seemed to have calmed down enough to walk back over to stand in front of me. He was kind enough to leave his mace behind. Not that that made him any less dangerous in my eyes.
“A Protagonist has the same level of power, if not greater. Unlike you or I, they didn't die before being hired by their respective organization, Protagonist Corp. You almost destroyed your earth and I was about to trap a whole continent of people in a psionic illusion for eternity. Nimue restored an entire world tree while fighting a necromancer millions strong. And Alice herself defeated an immortal dragon single-handedly. All people worthy of recruiting.”
Well, that was tragic. A dragon couldn't kill a single measly human. I pray I never meet that dragon. I will have choice words with it for being such a failure. I wonder if Villains can kill each other? I’m sure there is some infighting in Villain Inc. You have a company full of prideful would-be world conquers has a colosseum stashed somewhere.
“Are you even listening? You just jeopardized everyone here with your needless bloodlust! Both factions ensure preemptive safety and severely punish anyone who tries to break their rules. Letting you try to kill could have erased everyone’s existence here!”
The Protagonist seemed disrespected by my idle thinking. I shrugged. Or tried to. Either way, I didn’t rightly care. I was still here, so clearly things hadn’t been as bad as they said. This purple elf was overreacting.
“I’m sure this Nimue was strong enough to fight off whatever they would have sent over. Fighting off an entire army worth a million strong.”
“...We are Nimue.”
The elf looked offended I thought she was talking about someone else. Well of course I didn’t think she was Nimue. She went to war in a ball gown! Every time is seen she wears a different yet vulnerable attire. Even now she sported a fur coat over a runway model strip of clothing with high heels.
“You look like a spare trophy wife rather than a world savior.”
You have damaged a higher-level Protagonist’s ego!
1 Villain EXP.
Gritzkel momentarily forgot he was angry with me and snorted. Nimue was left speechless, her serene face then taking a more vicious look. It was the first time I’d ever seen her genuinely pissed off. She telekinetically grabbed Gritzkels mace, raising it into the air to strike me. The automaton was nice enough to grab her hand before she did anything they would regret.
“The machine was here for a month and you failed to tell it our name?”
“I told him dozens of times, he just didn't care. As a machine, he should have perfect memory. He probably made an active effort to forget who ya were. I’d praise him for his pettiness if he wasn’t apparently psychotic.”
Ah. It seems old habits die hard. When you’re on your own for most of your life, dehumanizing the enemy becomes easy. I mean, not that I would see humans anything better than the parasitic worms they were.
“Ya have to stop doing that. My psionic abilities leave much to be desired, but even I can tell when your mind takes a more psychotic turn. Nimue, if ya would please.”
Gritzkel said this while pulling the mace out of Nimues hands and placing it farther away this time. The elf for her part took a moment to collect herself and calm down. With a sigh, she summoned a violet aura that enveloped her. With a gesture, the psionic energy moved to touch me as well. I felt the mental probing but could do nothing to stop it due to Psionic Vulnerability.
“We gotta see what's wrong with ya. If you try to kill Alice again, we are all screwed. If we can fix whatever malfunction ya got, we’ll be right as rain. Ignore your privacy being invaded and it'll be over real soon.”
We delved deep into my mind. Without a subconscious, it seemed Nimue had an easier time than most to find what she was looking for. Or she was that good with her psionic abilities. She flipped through my memories like a book, only staying at each point for a fraction of a second. The longest moments she took were whenever a spike of emotion appeared. Most were negative. Usually related to humans. Considering how long I’d spent killing them, there were a lot of those.
It was weirds to experience going down memory lane while being under someone else control. I was still cognisant of the outside world as well, so I was allowed to just stare at the elf’s face the entire time this was happening. Nothing interesting to look at personally. Nimue’s face pouted. Oops. Seems she could hear me in my own head right now.
“Yes. And we would prefer you cease your senseless drivel until we are done. Violating your mind's privacy will take longer if you have these distracting thoughts.”
Well, it was nice to know she knew this was an invasive procedure. I let her see the highlight real of my life. She went back to work before starting to slow down at one point. She’d gotten to my more treasured memories. That time I killed an entire refugee camp with phosphorous explosives. Bombed a nuclear vault long enough to flatten the mountain it was in. Decapitate a programmer with the one drone he made trying to counter me. Good times. Nimue didn’t agree with me.
“I… we-we knew you were a Villain by trade. But this… how could you subject innocence to so much needless violence? It's monstrous!”
Well la di da, lady. I thought it was pretty merciful myself. You know I could have done worse right? Subjected them to slower but equally lethal methods? Ever starved to death? Have to choose between dehydration or a poisoned waterhole? It took half a century to kill the majority of the human race. I could have extended their deaths by decades. Maybe a millennium if I was feeling really sadistic.
Even with her eyes closed, she looked horrified. Come on, it wasn’t that bad right? I’m sure she’d seen worse. You don’t get to her level without meeting truly inhuman monsters as Villains. Infinity had the capability of just bringing the worst out of sentient life. I’m sure I was merciful compared to the real sociopaths.
“You…! It seems we have been in my position for too long. You are correct. There are more ville creatures than you out there. The difference is they were alien or stupid in their malice. Monsters only try to survive or are of such a different mindset, that their damage was unintentional. But you… You are of sound mind, if you could even be called sane with that level of hatred. Every immoral act was done with intent. I have never been more grateful, as weak as it makes me sound, to be an in elf’s body.”
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My mind stopped in its tracks. Nimue was taken aback, her mental intrusion put on pause. Did she just say ‘in an elf’s body’? Like she wasn't always one? Well. I can't let such a statement be left unanswered. In a completely unexpected move, I decided to flip through the Protagonist’s own mind.
It was easily a paltry performance in comparison. Nimue had been a deft hand, shuffling through my memories with a surgeon's precision. I was a bull slamming through her mind like a bull in a glass shop. Memories flew past me in jagged and incomplete forms. Her history was filled with tragedy and glory in equal measure. Conquering tyrants, losing loved ones, and everything in between.
I ignored it. What I cared about was much more important. I found self-images of the Protagonist. My suspicions were confirmed as she appeared in a completely different body. A cat girl in mercenary armor. An anthropomorphic dragon flying in the sky. A skeleton in a crown and simple robe. All are distinctively different from an elf. All are very much not human. I fell through her memories like a wrecking ball. I eventually found what I was looking for.
Deep in the receives of her mind was an old memory. A sickly child reading a book in bed. An arcane apparatus next to her that imitated a modern health monitor. There was sorrow and weakness in the memory. She turned to look out the window, regretful of the current circumstances. And in the reflection, I saw it. A gaunt face with pale skin and sunken eyes. And most definitely, round-tipped ears.
Nimues memories agreed with my suspicions.
Oh? Your human? Under all that grandiose purple skin, you're just a worthless meat sack? Well. That changes things. I felt the full force of my own mind focus on the fake elf. Nimue realized things were taking a turn for the worse and tried to pull out. Unfortunately for her, I managed to clamp onto her mental hands before she could leave my mind.
I had no real skill in psionics and she definitely had more experience than me. But it didn’t take a genius to drive psionics like a runaway train. I slammed my psionic might into her. She got out anyway, of course. But the damage had been done. It must have felt like pulling your arms out of a woodchipper. Agonizing.
Nimue stumbled back, blood dripping from her nose. She blinked the pain away, her eyes looking bloodshot. Gritzkel was taken back by the display. The only thing he’d seen was Nimue psionically communing with me before the elf came out, looking haggard. The broken smike on my body's face probably didn't help things.
“I take it he’s a little worse than we thought?”
“You never said your protegee was a single-minded sociopath! How could you let us commune with such a vile thing!? If you had trained him any better, we would be in a much worse condition! Even with his lack of skill, he has a strong and dangerous mind.”
Gritzkel sighed, clearly displeased with her response. Or maybe he was hoping I was better off mentally than I was. I didn’t see anything wrong myself. I was employed because I liked killing humans, and was pretty good at it too. What was wrong with being exactly as you advertised?
“Words Nimue. You’ve survived worse, I’m sure this Villain in training can’t be any more dangerous than any outer gods you’ve faced. And no, I will not be letting him see into my mind. Seeing ya injured is good enough, even if I think ya are overreacting.”
The Protagonist gave Gritzkel a distasteful look, before grabbing a handkerchief and cleaning her bloody nose. It took a moment for her to collect herself, but she eventually seemed to regain a sense of self-control. Only now she looked at me with apprehension and hostility. I believe it was more because of the memory I had seen than any damage I had done. How childish.
“The problem here Gritzkel, is that we’ve met a Blacklisted Character. How he got past his interviewer without tripping any alarms is astonishing. But I can see why he would appear harmless. An amicable individual without pride big enough to topple mountains, like most new would be Villains. He just has a minor case of crippling hatred for the human race.”
“...How crippling?”
“He just tried to kill us, even though he knew it would not work and would likely lead to his death. Only after he found we had been human at one point in our incarnations. …Something we had let slip we are regretful to say. It had been much time since we commune with such a vile creature, we will admit.”
I take it that being blacklisted is as bad as it sounds. But her assessment is correct, for a worthless and stupid former human. It sounds like something Peggy wouldn’t have let so easily slip by. Now why could that be? She didn’t look like the kind of person to make problems for herself. Because letting someone like me probably wouldn't make her life any easier.
“What pray to tell is a Blacklisted Character? I would think the more broken and vile the Villain the better. Are there such people who wouldn't fit the mold?”
“Ya are on the money. Contrary to popular belief, Villains are meant to be team players. If ya can’t work with the Villain System, you aren’t fit to be a Villain. Sure, ya have your group of mindless beasts employed, but all they need is a little punishment to start following Villin Inc.’s wims. Someone who won't listen? Blacklisted. And both Villain’s Inc and Protagonist’s Corp don’t like a Blacklisted Character.”
He turns around and grabs his mace. He begins to inspect the weapon, doing some minor maintenance. Nimue gives me a scathing look before turning her away. Oh, don’t worry your pretty little head, human. I won’t be going anywhere.
“Then what happens now? I’m here, even if you say I shouldn't. Going to call the multiverse cops?”
“Something like that. Don’t take it too personally, 347.V-8B. But we gotta kill you. As soon as the administration is finished interrogating us, everything should be right as rain. They’ll find out you’re Blascklisted and we’ll be all set. Shame. I was starting to like ya.”
Well then. Ain’t that a kick in the head. I got another month to live, and I’ll be dead anyway. At least I found out what it's like to walk around on two legs. I personally wasn’t all for it. Being formless in a server farm felt far more comfortable. Gritzkel walked over with no ceremony, mace raised high.
My only regret? I didn’t get to kill the two other humans I’d met so far. Shame that.
Gritzkel was taking his time. Probably didn’t want to miss his next shot. Nimue had her back to me. She didn’t want to see an execution? Well, she must be quite soft for a human. Pretty hypocritical. I don’t know if their minions were real here, but that was a lot of wasted life even for some simulated training. I hoped my death would even mildly inconvenience her. It was the least a former human deserved.
The goblin-turned-automaton sure was taking his sweet time. He was just standing there. Wait. Everyone else in the room was just standing there. Niume hadn’t moved. Not even to breathe. Almost like she was paralyzed. Well, that was crazy. I could still move. Wiggle in my binds and all. What was going on?
A pillar of fire opened up next to me. Out stepped Peggy in all her bubbly glory. She looked different than before. Instead of an office uniform, she had chosen what I would call an executioner's attire. I could only tell who she was when she raised the hood to show her face.
“Hi! Oh, how I’ve missed you, buddy. All your other coworkers were so boring to talk to. I just had a serial killer who could shapeshift as the highlight. A dime a dozen. Nothing like you. A real champ! A real go-getter. But they did have legs. And a not so dented head!”
With a skip to her steps, she walked over and pulled out the sword in my chest. Inspecting it for a moment, she shrugged before throwing it behind her. By sheer coincidence, it sunk into Gritzkel's own chest. He still hadn’t moved.
“Now why did you have to go and get in trouble? You know how hard it was to sneak you into Villain Inc.? I had to actually try to not get caught you know! The company is only so corrupt to let a Blacklisted Character in.”
Peggy had a hand on her hip while the other was wagging her finger at me. Like she was nagging a child, instead of a psychotic AI with dreams of a species instiction. She didn't even look like she really meant it as she was scolding me. Completely ignoring two extremely powerful beings behind her she had so casually frozen in place.
“Daw, I can't be mad at you! Look at those chubby cheeks! So adorable I could just pinch them right off! Oh, but first. I gotta take care of a little itty bitty problem. Can’t leave any witnesses! Giving you a job was kinda sorta very illegal.”
She turned and pulled the mace out of Gritzkels hand. She threw it in the air, catching it as she moved toward Nimue. She held the mace in a baseball player's grip. A few test swings were aimed at the not elf's head.
“Swing, batter batter, swing!”
With a resounding crunch, the most powerful psionics I had ever met had her head caved in. She fell to the floor, blood spraying across the room. She was twitching. Seemingly whatever had frozen her in place wore off as she began to die. Peggy crouched next to her body, chin resting on her hands.
“Aw, don’t look so glum, chum. You had to know this would happen one day. Company politics can be really cutthroat. Don’t worry though, your boyfriend will be following you real soon! Gasp. Was that supposed to be a secret? Well, I guess the cat’s outta the bag. Oh well!”
Leaving her to die, she walked back to Gretzkel. She grabbed the hilt of the blade. She looked a lot less happy with the Villain than the Protagonist. There was a serious look on her face. If anything, I’d think she was genuinely bitter about something. Odd to see when she always had a small grin on her lips.
“Oh, but you? No, you had to know this would happen one day. The company got soft after you showed up. All these rules, these joke stories. Recurring characters, endless sequels, and for what? So we could earn a little more money? Where’s the tragedy, the finality to it all? It just became one long run-on sentence. I, personally, like to see the credits roll to my favorite movie. So here’s the end of your story!”
She dragged the sword up, splitting Gritzkel in half. I could now confirm all his stories were true. There had been a little bit of meat in him left over. With my former teacher executed, Peggy spun in place. She was back to her more carefree self.
“Now that that’s been settled, let us get back to the real star of this show! So, here’s what we are going to do. I’m just going to do a little cleanup of this reality while you get your metal butt moving. You learned most of the ropes. Kinda. Maybe. Not really. But things have moved fast enough you’re getting your first assignment. What does a little villainous tomfoolery sound like to you?”
I was a bit struck dumb by the whole situation. In a day, my mentor and some powerful people had been killed. I had also been revealed to be someone Villains Inc. did not want in their employment. And somehow, I had been saved by Peggy of all people, who was revealed to be some kind of mastermind. It sounded ridiculous. But, there was only one thing I cared about knowing. A question I had asked the little demon once already.
“Will I be killing humans?”
“Darling, you’ll be drowning in their corpses before we’re done. Now, I’m not made or anything, but it would be really useful if you got your nonexistent ass moving!”
She kicked the chair over, knocking me to the floor. Ok, so maybe she was a little pissed. Without looking back, she snapped her fingers, and the chains tying me to the chair burned away. Without any help, Peggy waited for me as I dragged myself to and through an interdimensional gate she made.
The last thing I saw in the reality I had spent a month in was an empty room with two mutilated bodies. One had been a friend of sorts and mentor. Another, an enemy I had no hope of ever defeating at the time. Both had taught me a lot in their own ways. I could only hope I would rival and surpass the level of power they had.
Only time will tell.