FENG SAI

I scraped my sword against the shining surface of the formation anchor, unable to so much as scratch its surface. With a grunt, I sheathed the weapon. This wasn’t working. It wouldn’t work. The system had told me what had to be done, what I needed to do.

It even offered rewards for it. The system had given me a quest.

The system also implied that I would lose my freedom — my freedom to pursue its revenge, at minimum — if the formation activated. That told me that the System believed, or knew, that the formation would work.

A memory of the formation was enough to rip me away from here and to another world.

I took a steadying breath. My Willpower was once again controllable, but only barely, thanks to [Danger Sense] and [Identify] both leveling.

I needed to stop and think.

The System said to use [Carve.] I hadn’t even tried out every type of [Zone] I had — it was a mistake. I needed to use them all. Experimenting with them inside the dungeon when they nearly destroyed the first dungeon chamber felt like a mistake, though.

[Carve] most of all. Its text was always green in the System, a sign of the strange meddling that surrounded the Anti-Light order.

I hesitated to use it. Stacking the normal, untampered [Zones] like [Slow] had shattered a chamber. But the System wanted me to use it.

And I was out of other options.

With an extended hand, I pulled on my Willpower and activated [Zone: Carve.]

A ticking count down appeared first, followed by a transparent bubble that spun outward from the point of my focus. It warped the air like a heat-haze, exactly the same as the other types of [Zones] I could use at first. Then it hissed, the outside of it taking on an iridescent green sheen and releasing the smell of burning ozone as it ablated the dungeon itself.

The rune inside of the bubble of alien power glowed brighter and brighter, struggling to absorb enough qi to power it. The air shifted as the rune heaved to swallow enough power to sustain itself.

Above me, the dome of black warped and twisted, struggling to operate with one of its anchors destabilized.

But it wasn’t enough to shut it down.

I reached out and threw up a second [Zone: Carve] on a second anchor. It was on the other side of the black dome I was beneath; I counted four in total, including the two I was already disrupting. The qi in the air became erratic as the anchors fought for power.

The first [Carve] zone disappeared with a pop and a puff of green smoke. The second disappeared a moment later. The barrier dome of the teleportation formation stabilized. Static electricity made my hair stand on end. I felt charged, like lightning would arc between myself and the next thing I touched.

Littlebird pecked at the teleportation anchor with increasing frenzy.

It felt like the night sky was closing in above me, pressing me down to the stone floor of the floating city’s teleportation chamber.

Something shifted above me. I looked up to see a hole in reality being torn open, making eye contact with a man in scholars robes on the other side. He stared at me, mouth agape.

He was upside down. From where I sat, his desk was on the ceiling. He moved his hands free of his desk. Papers poured out of the portal and down onto the ground in front of me. Then his desk started floating upward as the hole stretched wider and wider. It moved toward me, closer and closer to making contact with the ground.

It was about to pull me through. I had to act now. I had to disrupt all four anchors at the same time.

With grim determination, I flexed my Willpower again.

This would work. It had to.

[Zone: Carve] activated in four places at once. Littlebird threw itself backwards. The dungeon spirit was becoming increasingly translucent and panicked. It looked like a ghost now.

The portal above me slammed shut, shaving the man’s desk in half. A broken piece of wood hit the ground next to me, bouncing on the stone tile. It still wasn’t enough.

I was just slowing the formation down. It was still activating.

[Carve] wasn’t breaking the formation, and I didn’t want to risk stacking it and bringing the entire chamber down around me. I’d rather teleport and live than escape and die.

Instead, I used [Carve] on the obsidian dome around me. It answered with the sound of rending metal; the wall all but screamed as the force of its own rotation ripped it to pieces. It dissolved into dust. The wall continued spinning, carving a line in itself that became my own window into the floating city.

Distantly, I saw smoke rising from the forest. The clash in the sky came closer. My own face stared back at me from beyond the metal grate that separated the town from the teleportation chamber.

I paused and stared. It stared back.

Littlebird chirped at the copy of me as the window widened. For just an instant, I thought I was staring into another kind of portal — maybe one turned inward on the teleportation formation itself. Then the copy of me turned in alarm as arrows embedded themselves in its chest and side, piercing through armor that I would never wear. My copy staggered back.

As the teleportation barrier was shredded open, my view expanded. I saw Poppy charging Dale. Eros strung another arrow.

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It had only been thirty days since I had seen them. [Identify] didn’t lie about who they were. But they looked like completely different people. For them, it had been two years. My breath hitched.

[Zone: Carve] timed out, the barrier warping to seal itself shut. Above me, the portal crept open, a crack in reality. The rest of the man’s desk fell through.

I cursed and used [Carve] again, but with all of the anchors fully powered, it failed to push another hole through the barrier.

So I activated it four more times.

I wasn’t even counting how many spheres I had left; I just prayed it would be enough.

The barrier weakened, then, with the noise of rending metal, it once more opened. The portal above me slammed shut again.

Poppy shoved Dale’s head into the barrier. The metal grate that had been between us was gone. I wouldn’t miss my chance this time.

I grabbed Littlebird with both hands, earning an indignant squawk, and threw myself bodily through the hole. I sailed over Dale and slammed into the ground, rolling and sliding.

I looked up in time to see Dale slip out of Poppy’s grasp. Her hands closed on a wave of black shadow that pushed her away. Dale clutched his own throat as a wave of darkness under him carried him away. He slid closer to the copy of me, who was glancing around in abject horror and panic.

The center of the metal gate that had blocked off the city from the teleportation chamber looked like it had been ripped off; the remnants of it stabbed out like broken ribs on either side of the obsidian dome.

[Danger Sense] activated and I threw myself forward right before Eros shouted, “Sai, move!”

A dozen black spike passed through the space my head had just occupied, released from Dale’s hand. His other hand still clutched his neck. I threw Littlebird up into the air.

Dale barred his teeth, his face covered in tears and beat red. Fresh burn marks covered his chest and stomach.

Shadows gathered around his hand, his arm pitch black, a sword forming and stretching out from it. Poppy leaned forward between us, ready to fight. Arrows pierced the armor of the man wearing my face. The copy of me stared down at Dale with abject horror, ignoring the arrows slamming into it.

Then Dale’s neck split open. I saw the cut before the knife. Red poured from the wound. Anna materialized behind him like she was simply standing in my blindspot. Dale gagged, then coughed, spitting up blood. The shadows he gathered popped, disappearing, but he lived, propped up by his stats.

I drew my sword and charged the copy of me.

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MEAT, Minutes Earlier

Meat was happy to be here. Once they killed the monsters flying in the sky above, Meat would have a buffet. Even if he couldn’t eat the humans they were traveling with, it was still a good day. He would be able to eat his fill.

He ignored their conversations, instead staring at the rounded dome in before him. It looked like an egg.

He hoped it was an egg. It felt like a very, very powerful egg. He licked his lips. If Dale hadn’t told him not to eat anything, he would have tried to eat it right in front of everyone. He just had to tear apart the cage between him and the egg. He put a hand on the metal and pulled.

It screeched as it bent.

Then the egg opened! The monster inside must have been hatching.

But instead, Meat looked at his own face. The face he had stolen. He frowned. This was his face, now, and stealing it wasn’t fair.

Meat turned to look at Dale, who turned pale. Humans did that when they were afraid. Meat didn’t know why Dale would have been afraid.

Then Poppy punched Dale in the stomach. Black fire crept along Dale’s skin before erupting in destruction that burned his stomach. Meat didn’t know why the humans had betrayed them!

“I knew it!” Eros shouted.

Three arrows hit Meat’s stomach before he knew what was happening. He stumbled backward. But he wasn’t dead.

He needed to get to Dale. He had to help Dale. Dale wasn’t good at fighting up close. That was Meat’s job.

Meat took a step forward before a hand grabbed his own, pulling him back. A knife sunk into Meat’s throat.

He rearranged the muscles in his throat, stretching out to grab both the knife and the hand holding it as he spun. He stared into a black shilouette — the girls. She was missing.

Where was Annabelle?

Meat didn’t have time to find out. His head deformed, stretched, and clamped down on the shade-copy of Annabelle. He bit through her shadowy form with ease, his human face reforming a second later. He stumbled forward, sealing his own bleeding, before turning back.

Poppy had Dale’s head inside of the egg.

Then the man with Meat’s current face jumped out of the portal. Meat frowned. Everything was happening so quickly. He took another step forward. He felt sleepy. More arrows slammed into him. They weren’t lowering his health.

[Status: Poisoned]

[Status: Dazed]

Annabelle slit Dale’s throat.

Dale was on his hands on the ground. Meat watched Dale’s health drain away. His [Endless Hunger] told him that Dale was going to die. The seconds shot by. His eyes widened.

Dale had raised Meat. He had taught Meat to hunt, fed Meat. Disciplined Meat.

Meat felt anger boil up. Dale said that anger was bad. It made Meat hard to control. But it was wrong. They couldn’t take Dale from Meat.

Meat didn’t have any way to heal him. Once they reached level 50, together, they were going to be able to find much, much better food. Dale had promised him.

The man with Meat’s face stabbed him in the stomach.

“You can’t die.” Meat said.

Everyone stared. There was a pause. Another arrow thunked into Meat, landing in his head this time, but the damage was minimal.

“You can’t take him from me!” Meat shouted. His voice warbled as his entire mouth spoke instead of just the fake human one he wore. His head split.

He couldn’t heal Dale. But he wouldn’t let them take him.

Meat threw himself onto Dale, exploding outward into a mass of tentacled flesh and gore, and wrapped Dale inside of himself. Arrows pierced into Meat. Knives and blades and burning punches tore him apart. He couldn’t see them. His eyes were inside right now.

Meat was focused on keeping Dale with him. He did the only thing he knew how to do.

He ate.

[You have reached level 50!]

[Species Upgrade Options Available. Choose.]

Meat didn’t look at the options. He never did. He always knew which one felt right.

[Evolution in progress]

Meat felt himself change. Shift. Become something different. Something more.

[Race: Gore Mimic has been upgraded]

[New Race: Echo Wraith]

[Echo Wraith Passive, Level 1: Gain (Echo Wraith Passive Level) Random Skills from [Mimic] Target.]

Meat felt his flesh lock into place. The fake metal, chitin armor, that covered his body was gone. Instead, his flesh was stronger than armor. He pushed himself back together. His eyes spun into place in his head, pointing outward, and he saw.

The ground around him was covered in flesh carved away from him. That was fine; he had plenty of compressed flesh left. Feng Sai was stabbing and carving at him. It was starting to hurt.

Meat flung his hand out to smack Feng Sai away. He dodged.

Arrows landed in Meat’s side, flashing with lightning, and shadows danced as they stabbed him. Then they retreated. Poppy slammed a fist into him, knocking him backward. When she followed up, Meat caught her next fist in his hand. He flesh wrapped around her. She stared up at him. Horror filled her eyes.

But none of it was enough.

Meat wasn’t weak like humans.

Meat was a monster. And a monster of the first tier required an entire party of the first tier to kill.

Meat smiled. He knew just what to do.

He pulled on the skill he had copied from the target he mimicked. He targeted Poppy. Granted, he didn’t know what it would do. But it felt right.

[Xylem, The twenty-second Anti-Light form. This technique rips open the way between worlds.]

[Warning: Technique Incomplete.]

[Activating this Skill will most likely kill the user.]

Meat waved the warnings away. He activated the skill.’

Then he exploded in a shower of gore.

[Teleportation Complete!]

[Partial Teleportation: 40% of target left behind]

[System Error: Connection to Ludus Arbor lost]

[Attempting to establish connection with local World Tree]

[World Tree Identified: Heavenly Pillar]

[Location: Bloodstone Continent]

[Connection Successful]