Chapter 36—Retribution

God was disappointed with the whole of humanity. He had only slumbered for a moment—what could only be seen as minutes—and yet in that short amount of time, they had already strayed so far. Had he not told them honestly what they need to do? Had he not made the rules clear, and warned them of the devil's workings? Time and time again he had given them guidance, and yet he stood here still, surrounded by the products of their actions.

First, there was the girl who gave her faith to a false god. Had he not warned his children that he was jealous?

Second was the two pretenders, one crimson, yes, but the other daring to bear false imitation of his light. Had he not taught his children to know His grace?

Third was the trio standing a few measures back. He could see the workings of their minds, the drive of their hubris. Had he not told them he would not blind himself to such an affront?

Last was far from least. Last was the sum of all of their sins, standing so defiantly she was garbed in black. Last was this thing that could only be a devil, this thing that could only exist because his children turned from his splendor. Had he not stressed to them the evil of the darkness?

God was infuriated with the whole of humanity but there would come a time when he would love them again. He would lead them, and make sure the world prospered. He would show them that he was truly omnipresent, and remain vigilant by their side. He would forgive them for thinking that they could ever be above him. But first, they had to face retribution. Pulling stardust together he made a thousand flaming swords, about brought them down to sunder with his wrath.

His foes guarded, all but one, running past them as if to run between drops of rain. This one called Ace leaped into the air, swinging his arm blade for the fury in God's eyes. With another flaming sword, he stopped this insult, and the boy rolled over it as blades met. A black-edged arm blade slashed for God’s neck, slicing through another sword instead as it swept around. As if the pieces were steps, Ace rose higher. Fury flaring as he came down, God ended this performance with a heavy lightning strike.

Corrosion intercepted it, launching in, ramming Ace out of the way. Steam rose from it and God called a whirlwind, yanking the pretender off the ground. Barbs erupted from its body, burning up in the air between them. A sword dropped into a slash and then spun across its body. Suddenly, it swung for God as well, blade tainted with crimson veins! He returned it to dust and lined the incision, building an explosion inside the red body. An arrow flew through and stopped as he saw it. As God peeled it apart, the air around him ignited. From that blast he swooped around, carrying the flames as he came for King. Fang raised her star and shadows moved, pushing God upward with millions of reaching hands. He blew them apart with the flames but lingered above. Some of the hands survived, carrying embers back to the girl.

She scooped them up with the star, and the liquid skirt flowed like a tide around her. The star sprouted a stem, and she held it like a scepter as she spoke.

“Who lurks in the dark?” She waved it over the tide.

“The Terrible Talidrew.” Answered her shadow, as a gray man rose with a hole in his bare chest. Therein sat a bird, perched upon a small tree growing from the bottom. Talidrew reeled back and the bird let out a soundless cry. He opened his mouth. When it reached god he heard it—millions crying out for mercy, demanding he free them from their torment. This was not a cry, but a vacuum, making his body waver as it tried to pull him in.

“Mr. Dolz, the toymaker.” Her shadow spoke again and a dapper man rose, thick glasses over the eyes of a pointed face. He held up small a cloth, hiding God from his sight. With a wring he found something inside it, unfurling to reveal a wooden doll. He painted the small thing with a wipe, giving it a familiar visage. Mr. Dolz twisted its arm, and a fracture stretched across God’s. He snapped the legs upward and turned it violently at the waist. As cracks ran across God’s body Mr. Dolz twisted the head.

“The Vile Pegg…” It rose, one part toad and man and ham and ram. From its swelling sac, a swamp poured over. Three thick tongues licked its lips. Red eyes fell on the doll in Dolz’s hands. He chucked it back, and as the tongues caught it, the swamp rose around God’s body. Pegg closed its mouth, and he was swallowed.

Dropped into a stewing pool of misery and hatred, false innocence and blame. The swamp within Pegg was a nauseous, thick, slosh, made thicker with the tears of the eternally damned. Each malevolent memory forsook him for their dealings, making his glowing body ill with their desperate touch. Ill! As if human disease could ever reach God. He pulled a sword from his nebula robe and split the darkness with a mighty swing. Pegg split too and God found himself beside the cursed girl. In her eyes, he could see understanding. There was insult in thinking a shadow could stop what the devil himself couldn’t, and he would respond to insult a thousandfold.

His nebula sword made static sparks as it fell and her scepter caught it. It flowed back like the wind and the next slash flew, almost catching her as she swung again. With a second sword, he doubled the pressure, blades swinging in an eternal cosmic dance. A third arm stabbed a spear down, and a fourth and fifth flung lightning back. Ace dodged but had to go wide. Corrosion caught his but stuck fast in place. As Fang caught the spear God slashed her body, tearing darkness away enough to see flesh beneath. She clenched her jaw, and he stabbed for her chest.

Arrows crashed through swords and spear.

The girl escaped, snatching shards from the air.

God’s eyes moved to Micaela and King.

“I think this might work. We can’t match his power currently but I can see the math. If I do this and we match crest, we can use Khalaf as a mediator to convert his math to ours.” The woman wove an emblem with silver dust, letting it come to rest on her chest. “Adale never thought she’d be as strong as him, she just had a better way to go about it.” She said confidently.

God let himself forget the devil girl.

A sixth hand joined the others as they stretched in front of him, crushing dust into a star. With a push, he fired a beam, bright like molten metal. King spun his bow into a glaive, splitting it into two streams. They came back together as they snaked around Micaela, bringing God with them with six swords in hand. One of her shadow protectors was the first to notice, pushing her away as the swords came around. Another tossed her further as God spun after, slicing through the ones that turned to face him. He crushed his swords into another star, firing another beam before she had the chance to land.

“Break.” King called and God shattered; blowing away most of his upper body.

“The math all adds up.” Khalaf smiled, and God’s fury deepened as King spoke again.

“Break.” A chunk exploded from his face. He reached with his remaining arms and the Number repeated. “Break!”

Each one shattered and the glaive spun into a bow.

Arrow nocked, King fired. “Condense.”

It felt like chains moving under his flesh, each one a snake hungrily chasing a mouse. They came together with a snap on his back and tightened, squeezing as if to make him smaller than a coin. But he was still God! His might could not be contained like this! He detonated, sending the trio hurtling back.

His particles smashed together and a star dropped from his newly formed hand. He lifted it and snapped a meteor barrage at the three. Until Corrosion got in the way, stretching its mouth as it took a deep breath. It inhaled the meteors and bled a nebula from its hand, racing in. God drew a line in the air, swinging down as Corrosion swung up.

Like flames they twisted into and around each other, tearing violently as wielders pulled back and swung again. Blades did not meet flesh but each new clash dyed them, shifting colors from one to the other until both gods held a different sword. With a thought God burned the crimson away, not allowing this pest to take control of his power again. Across from him, Corrosion took a bite, tearing at its sword as if it were a kebab. Seizing the power inside it, God made spears jut out. Pulling them back in, he churned a star, birthing a sun in Corrosion's chest. The crimson foe let out a guttural roar as its light burned into fuel. God saw a flash of black and felt the ground beneath his feet, losing the power to Corrosion. He found Ace behind him as he looked over his shoulder, black-edge pulling back as the shining one stabbed forward.

Stabbed! And the wound felt alive as the boy's light moved like a virus in his veins. As God tried to push it back and heal, the black edge soared, stabbing him again—somehow breaking his control. The boy slashed and he could swear the wound burned. He tried to heal that too and again the black edge curved. Light and darkness danced together, birds in flight swooping and swiping. Ace carved into the God Eternal and he felt the full intention of every cut. The light tore through parts of him, letting this boy destroy something fundamental. And the darkness was a scalpel, severing the electricity from neurons. He was God and he was Eternal, yet he could almost feel the end. The world was growing dark around him, and in that darkness, he heard voices.

“God who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. I pray to you my soul to keep and guide through my darkest hour. I am a good man God, but my boss tries my patience. Please lead me through my rage so that I may work tomorrow.”

“God, can you hear me? I know this is kinda stupid and you have better things to do, but I really want to get into this school. I know there are others out there but this one feels right.”

“God, I know this is selfish but please save my momma. She’s always been a good woman, please guide her through this illness.”

“Hi God! My name is Tom. My mommy says I should pray to you and let you know that I’ll always be a good boy. I don’t really know what I’m s’posed to say, but I’ll try.”

“God,”

“God,”

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“God,”

“God,”

Millions of prayers raced through the darkness to his ears, reminding him that he could not sleep yet. Beyond the dark veil that had long been his prison, people were awaiting his great return. His people needed him to banish evil from their lives. They needed him to shine above them, offering a promising tomorrow. They needed him to rule and there was no throne waiting in death. In the darkness that tried to swallow him now, he saw a light and reached up to it. Something hit his neck, tearing through, but he grasped that light even as his body fell.

A beam crashed down, the force so strong it tossed Ace back. It folded and stretched into a double helix, pulling god’s body apart and back together. A new form emerged in its wake, overall similar but more man than being of light. It had form. It had flesh scarred where cracks and torn neck used to be. It was more itself, made more so by the longing in their prayers.

Ace shot in with black-edge forward and God stopped it with an outstretched palm. With a tap, Ace stabbed the ground and his head was buried as God pushed it down. A crackling arm picked him up, forcing out a scream as electricity wracked his body. God held his free hand out the other way, catching a beam spewed from Corrosion’s mouth. He dropped Ace and whirled together marbles on his newly freed fingers. With a gentle push, they whizzed through the crimson falsehood, leaving wounds billowing with smoke. Its mouth beam broke and God whirled again, conducting a meteor shower with swinging hands. Corrosion couldn't get away; couldn't even take a step. God simply gestured, again and again, leaving naught but an ember in the air. Distantly, he heard a conversation.

Celine Klein stood close to King’s group, talking to herself so loudly their deliberation stopped. It wasn’t that she had anything of note to say, but that what she witnessed was too much for silent thought.

“Corrosion can’t eat his light anymore.” Was this consideration, or fear? “What changed…? What is he doing differently.” She watched the marbles almost snuff the flame. “Could it be…?” She looked closely at them. “He’s using people’s worship to turn aspects into ammunition! Corrosion can’t eat them because he can’t identify them! That thing isn’t just orange and blue.” Was that recognition on her face? “Could it be that rather than eating color, the Crimson Prophet is sinking its fangs into something else?” Her brow tightened. “Oh! That might just do. I was planning to save this for when the castle was restored, but I suppose it’s worth it now. The castle won’t even remain standing if this thing escapes.”

She brought her hands together, and King’s group turned to watch.

“O’ God who waits in the Arbiter’s Absence, bestow on to me thy power and grace. I stand not only as thy ally, but as a vessel of thy word. My hands art thine. Thy eyes art mine. Let our two souls be one.” She swung her sword and two weighing scales hung from its hilt. Lifting it to a poised stance seemed to act as a trigger, fog cascading down her back like a hooded cape. A frozen fractal spread out under her feet.

God stopped his assault on Corrosion, leaving only a red flicker behind.

Celine glided toward him, stabbing into an outstretched palm. God tilted his head in disappointment, and ice froze and split his veins. A pulse sent her flying, but the damage was already done. He could heal it, but minds were already on the move.

“She said it isn’t just orange and blue… Could that mean she’s talking about the next level of calculations?” King started.

Micaela came next. “She has to be, right? If we think of each particle of light as a number, then he started as their total sum. One billion orange particles plus, maybe, two-hundred million blue. But then he asks what the sum means…”

King again. “It’s the power of worship right in front of us. Except he doesn’t need something like Castle Cerulean!”

Khalaf followed. “No, he absolutely does not. He’s God after all. I wonder how many people worship him.”

King. “Even here on the border of the Twilight Grove... He doesn’t need a lot of living people, he just needs what he has now.”

Micaela. “And what he has is the Luminance of nearly ten million people. All the prayers are inside him. Adale didn’t have anything like this. Cerulean didn’t have anything like this. This guy is terrifying!”

Khalaf. “But she wounded him, right?”

“She did. Which means we can wound him too. Corrosion can’t absorb his light because he’s more than just light, or the light is something more. Celine matched the math. Light equals the power of Gods.”

“The Arbiter freezing those who sin! So we just need to match that. But how are we going to do it?”

“Use me as an energy source for King.”

“What?”

“Think about it? I’ve been used as demon bait for years now. I know how to bring them around.”

“You’re going to target the Luminance inside him.”

“Call it, Luminance: Haunt.”

Celine stabbed and froze the veins in God's cheek. He tried to push her back with another pulse, but she spun aside and stabbed again. He did not simply wait for her blade. Dodging swiftly with nimble steps he slid and danced away, tossing marbles to draw blood where he could. Something blue flashed in the corner of his eye and he leaped the other way, widely dodging the swing of King's glaive. At least, he thought until he felt something squirming on his leg. There he saw small jaws biting and swiped that piece of flesh away. Celine came up behind, writing a line before he fully noticed. A Seraphim filled this space to his right and became a six-eyed sword as he grabbed hold of it.

Six eyes, with six sights.

As Celine stabbed again one eye moved and he bounced her back. Painting the air with light he knocked her to the ground, swinging down next as another eye twitched. He blocked King's strike and saw the foulness on his blade. There was writing, like a message of welcome, and he put fire to it as the Number drew back. Two eyes in the center looked opposite ways and God dropped. One saw Corrosion driving claws at his head and the other saw Ace slashing for his body. Two more paint strokes sent them flying. King’s blade fell and God knocked him back hard enough to bounce off the wall. Three of the eyes moved in random ways, and he let his mind follow their vision. Celine first; with a fury of thrusts. He easily blocked those and almost the swipe of Corrosion’s claws. The wound was little more than a scratch, but the beam he fired opened a hole. Ace swung, furious but slow; energy wasted as blades rolled off God’s skin. Lightning struck the boy again, and God grabbed Corrosion by the leg. As if it was a club he swung at Ace, batting them both to the ground. Six eyes turned one way and he caught Celine’s sword on his hand guard. He could feel the horror rising out of her but it was far too late. A choir-like hymn rang out from the blade, igniting her body as she shot back.

“Researcher, what was that?” She hissed through gritted teeth.

“A Hymn for God. He used the belief in him to overpower the belief in the Arbiter, or whoever you’re praying too. For just one moment, he seized the doubt people might have and ignited it.” Micaela quivered. “Even Adale wasn’t prepared for something like that. Anything short of a utopia is a weapon for him.”

God dropped to the ground. This girl was sharp. She would have served him well but she had already chosen her lot in life. Retribution was preordained, but perhaps she may find redemption as well. Nevertheless, she had to suffer first.

His sword’s eyes moved wildly, suddenly!

“Who lurks in the dark?” They found the source of their panic, standing with an orange light like a gem in her scepter. Had she been working his shards into something she could use? Had he so foolishly been distracted?

“The Graceful Rorodora.” Her tide answered and a woman rose from it. On her face sat a bird-like mask. Wearing a billowing dress, with a sash around her shoulders, she spun and the wind spun with her. The Seraphim sword still looked around wildly, and God understood as ink drops stained his skin. The more she spun the thicker they got—globule missiles that blotted his light. She was not a dancer, but a pen, writing over his glory with the depths of the abyss. He blasted toward her, determined to take her head before his color was fully gone.

"The Scornful Sandashakal." Chains rattled as something split the tide, shark-like at first until its full bulk rose. It was a slab of black iron, shaped like a giant fang. Strong arms guided it down as shackles failed to hold them back. Sandashakal was burly with chains stabbed through his arms and a mask bolted onto his face. God didn't try to block his slash, he dodged! And another sword swung for his ink-stained side. It found purchase, tearing in with weight and the might of an arm that could swing it. God blasted himself back with a beam, noting how little it affected Sandashakal. More ink-stained him and his fury swelled.

“The Joyful Waas.” A rotund man rose with a toothy smile. Like a candle blown out, he disappeared, then reappeared by King’s side. He steadied the boy and dusted him off. He patted his shoulders, then puffed into existence beside Corrosion and Ace. He helped the two stand up and patted their back. Ace looked to Fang for a moment, something dawning, before Waas tapped his shoulder and drew his eyes to Corrosion. Another puff and he stood by Micaela and Celine's side. Though no words came out he spoke, captivating them with his silent musings. One last puff and he was by God's side. His large hand fell onto God's shoulder and wide round eyes met his. Waas's smile beamed as much as a shadow's could, and God drove the Seraphim sword into his stomach. Lightning shredded him from the inside, and orange glowing eyes glared at Fang. The wound on his side told him of the error of his actions. Before he slew those who thought men could match God, he had to end the devil they turned to first.

Sandashakal leaped through the air. As his iron fangs fell God dodged them, stepping cleanly away from their bulk. He lifted his hand, sending lightning through the brute, doing nothing to slow him down. Sandashakal tore at him and God leaped wide as the fury became too much. Landing far enough that shadow had to run in again, God noted the static running down his skin and turned it into swords slashing through his ankles. The crashed to the floor and was zapped again, this time the swords plunging a line down his spine.

With Sandashakal down God stomped his foot, sending a surge toward the whirling Rorodora. It tore her legs apart, but he didn’t let her body fall, launching a slash instead that split her down the middle. These shadows faded and he dotted the air behind him with stars. They followed fast as he shot toward Fang, promising an impact that’d cleanse the world. The tide beneath her moved and something leaped from it. As God came too fast to stop, it threw a punch, knocking all the light from his face. He tumbled gracelessly away and his head swam with confusion, light filling it anew.

He hadn’t heard a voice that time, did he?

There was no answer to the question this time, right?

Wrong, he supposed, as he distantly heard Corrosion speak.

“The Forest-Green Slasher." It said as the new foe pulled two axes from the ground…

[Chapter 36 ends...]