There Prota was, standing off against two of the people she thought she could call friends. They stood against her, hands stretched out, tears in their eyes. It wasn’t them she held a vendetta against.
It was Draco.
“Well? What are you waiting for? Give me a show.”
Rage began to fill Prota’s heart. She was getting sick of this. She was sick of getting stepped on, watching other be abused, played with like toys, unable to lift a finger against someone who was clearly beatable.
Destiny? The [Protagonist]. Kit? A Mystic. The headmaster? A dragon. John? Diaboli? Gods, potentially even stronger than Celeste herself.
But this was just a stupid, bratty kid.
“I’m sorry,” Prota whispered, but she wasn’t holding back anymore.
Her eyes began to glow as she pulled mana out of her staff, the air around her freezing as her Blossom of Ice began to form.
“What the- Ryan, she’s doing it! Hurry!”
“I know!”
The red haired boy quickly began to chant his own spell, and while it was a little faster than Prota’s signature move, they still hadn’t practiced chanting high circle spells while moving. Frozen by fear and panic, the twins forgot some of their training.
The giant spear of fire shot right toward Prota, but the small girl was already moving, the grass underneath freezing as she moved, shattering as her legs ran through the fields, crumbling under her feet. Tears streaming down her eyes, she threw the crystal flower, the petals shattering as soon as it reached the twins.
This time, though, they were more prepared. They knew what it was, having dealt with it once. Shields were quickly put up, blocking the shards of ice that would’ve done some serious damage had they ignored them once more.
Prota, however, wasn’t done.
There were no holds barred. There would be no hiding, no secrets, nothing. Reaching out, she began pulling mana from the twins, whose spells staggered at the sudden loss of mana.
“What the- what was that?!”
A giant fireball formed above Prota’s head without a word escaping her lips, blazing like the sun. The heat slowly compressed, turning the flame blue, then splitting into a ring of smaller spheres hovering around her head. One by one, they shot out, homing onto their targets as if they had a mind of their own.
“Wh- how are you doing that?!”
With a wave of her hand, a wave of cold shot out, freezing the ground, and another squeeze of the hand caused icicles to shoot up, messing up the twins’ movement. They tripped, got stuck on the spikes, and in no time, they were done.
Her staff was nearly depleted of mana, her mind fuzzy from recasting mana recovery so many times, but the rage, the adrenaline, it carried her, pushed her through. There was only one target left.
“You- you did the same thing back in the cave! You’re a demon! A devil!” Draco yelled, his eyes bulging as he scrambled backward. Unlike the twins, he had lost all control. He’d practically forgotten that he could use magic in his moment of fear.
“You can’t do this to me! I’m a noble! You hear me? A noble! You can’t touch me, I’m-”
An icicle planted itself in the ground right next to his head with a thud, forcing him to shut his mouth. Prota’s blank, empty face stared deep into his eyes. Somehow, that was the scariest part of it all. She didn’t look like she was seething with rage, but somehow, you could just tell.
“No more.”
Those were the only two words she uttered before raising her hand, a blue fireball incinerating his head, leaving nothing but an empty stump. The body faded into light, and only then did Prota fall down, exhausted. She could feel the tension and adrenaline leaving her body as her goal had been completed. Rest. She could re-
[Prota! You need to get out!]
Prota’s eyes shot wide open. A message? From John? No, it was Zero. Zero? What was going on?
[Get out, now! Use Soul Steal on the air! There’s no time to ask, just do it! Something went terribly, terribly wrong with the [Plot]! You need to hurry!]
Something went wrong with the [Plot]? Her heartrate began to shoot through the roof. Neither John nor Zero had ever said something like that. It was always using the [Plot] to their advantage. Something was strange, something didn’t fit right, those were all things they’d said, but never had she seen Zero panic like this.
The fear was so strong that her tendrils reacted on their own, reaching out into the air, sucking mana from the environment all on their own.
[I’ll help you out]
That voice. Those messages. That strange person from before, the one who’d helped her in the village. Even it was back?
[Just this once, don’t get it twisted. It’s just, you need the help right now]
Suddenly, the world around her shattered.
~~~
Prota shot up, her heart pounding as she could feel the mana overflowing in her veins. The tendrils were working without her command, pouring it into the staff, which was nearly empty. A quick scan of the area told Prota everything and nothing at once.
John was gritting his teeth, holding a red blade against… hold on, wasn’t that Hikari Dormier? The cat Mystic, and the professor of the Magic Circle class?
“You were hiding your strength!” they giggled, a harsh scraping sound ringing out through the air as their claws clashed against John’s sword. “And that blade… is it made of the same material as your bat? It’s rather strong?”
John’s left eye was glowing strong, shining brightly. Prota felt a chill run down her spine. That wasn’t a good sign. Students were yelling, running around and trying to get out of the exam hall. Most of them were succeeding. However, four bodies laid on the floor.
Destiny. Danjo. Celeste. Briar. Just what was going on here?
“Hikari! What do you think you’re doing?” Leora yelled, somehow blocked by some kind of interference. Strong magic was being shot at the cat, but it was somehow being blocked, as if a giant barrier had been put up.
“Taking this demon girl with me, of course! What do you think?”
“Then that was-”
“Soul Steal, of course! It seems they managed to get it right for once!”
The cat’s grin stretched into a wide smile, revealing a row of sharp, pointed teeth.
“And I’m here to pick it up!”
“Boy! Just hang on!” Leora yelled. “I’ll get in there to help you! Just hold him off!”
“That would be hard,” Hikari chuckled. “Cause I’m gonna step it up now.”
The cat’s body blurred, disappearing from sight, leaving only a small cloud of dust where it’d once been. There was a loud clash of metal as John raised his blade, deflecting Hikari’s claws once more.
Just how strong was [Infinity] running?
“Prota! Get up! He’s after you! Again,” John muttered, as if an afterthought. “Seriously, I’ve been itching to kill a god for a while.”
“Kill a god! Are you joking? You might’ve gotten lucky, but you still have no mana! Don’t get cocky, boy! Just because you can resist Draconic Speech doesn’t mean-”
“Shut it! Nobody talks this much in a fight!” John yelled, driving his fist forward at the speed of sound.
A sonic boom cracked out through the air as John’s fist collided with the Mystic’s face, sending them flying into the ceiling. Only, they didn’t hit the ceiling. They just bounced off an invisible barrier, falling back to the ground on their feet.
“Hmph… what was that? Some kinda trick?”
“No trick. Come on, let’s keep going.”
A bead of sweat dripped down John’s cheek. He wasn’t sure how long [Determination] could keep up. According to Zero, something had gone terribly wrong, but he wasn’t being told what. To compensate, [Determination] had been given quite the hefty buff, but John didn’t know how long that was going to last. He had to make it count.
[Power: x100000000]
He winced as pain shot through his head, like a needle digging into his brain. Gritting his teeth, he pushed on, speeding up until he, too, was nothing but a blur, clashing with the Mystic over and over.
“Boy! Hikari’s specialty is not hand to hand combat! Remember that!”
Leora’s warning came just in time. John barely dodged as a beam of pure energy shot out from a piece of paper lying inconspicuously on the ground, a strange pattern glowing drawn on top.
“Bah, you’re no fun.”
“Seriously, piss off!” John yelled, firing off his own beam of energy. The attack missed, but hit the invisible barrier, sending out cracks like shockwaves from an earthquake.
“...I would’ve been in trouble if that had hit me,” Hikari muttered. “Nya, you were hiding something really interesting, weren’t you?”
“Shut the fuck up!”
John practically vanished, his speed stepping up yet another notch as he bashed Hakari’s skull in over and over, but the cat was prepared. Circle after circle glowed on their body, taking any damage John was dealing and likely negating it. Just how many tricks did the Mystic have?
“You… are getting really troublesome, nya,” Hikari growled, the smile no longer present on their face. “Just what are you?”
“I’m John. Seriously, why do people keep asking me that?”
“I sense nyo mana from you! You shouldn’t exist!”
“Yeah, I know! Guess what, dipshit! I’m still here!”
The two continued to clash, dozens of spells thrown out in the few seconds before the barrier crashed, letting Leora in. The phoenix began to rain white hot flames on the battlegrounds, forcing the cat to stay on their toes, now dealing with two opponents just as strong if not stronger than them.
“Gah! How long did you know for?”
“Our organization reaches further than you might’ve thought,” Leora said, dashing forward and grabbing Hikari by the throat. Her hand turned white hot, and while John couldn’t tell what it was, it seemed to be doing something because Hikari wasn’t getting out of her grasp.
“Your… organization?”
“I believe you are familiar with our current head. Jinae Rumba.”
“Jin- no fucking shot. Here? You guys are showing up again here? Are you kidding me?”
“She told us much about you. It is part of the reason you are in this academy in the first place.”
“You damn Vertitatis bastards,” Hikari grumbled. “Always getting in the way.”
“Not always. But right now, yes. Because this boy and his sister are precious to us.”
“The sister, huh?”
John felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up. No, goddammit-
“I’m at least taking her with me!”
The cat was fast. Way faster than he’d let on. John, for the sake of his comfort, had only used a level of [Infinity] that felt right, but he should’ve just gone all out from the start and obliterated this so called god from the face of the planet. In a moment where he’d been distracted, the cat had sped up past his point of vision, maybe using some kind of magic circle, and put one on Prota.
“It may be my loss, but it’s your loss as well!”
John couldn’t do anything. He reached Prota in a blink, but it couldn’t stop the girl from exploding from the inside out, her body immediately turning to dust.
“You bastard!” John yelled, but at that moment, true fear entered his heart.
They couldn’t die. No, no, they couldn’t die, because if they did-
“What have you done?!” Leora yelled, tears streaming down her eyes. Her hands lit up until they looked like they were made of plasma, burning through all of the cat Mystic’s circles and melting their head off.
John stood, stunned. Now that the fight was over, he could feel himself trembling. Destiny. Danjo. Celeste and Briar, even though they weren’t that close yet.
But worst of all, Prota.
He could bring them back. He hadn’t even lost that much progress, and now that he knew Hakari was an enemy, he could warn Prota not to lose self control, and everything would be perfectly fine.
But they didn’t have that comfort of [Resets] anymore. They couldn’t [Reset]. John had forced himself to understand that fact until it was practically ingrained into his body. So the fear he was feeling at the moment was very, very real.
“Dammit!” John yelled, pulling out a gun.
Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.
“Hold on, what are you-” Leora started, pausing as John raised the weapon to his head. “No! You can’t! I know you’re upset, but you can’t end it here!”
“What, because I’m useful to you?”
“No, you have to live for them! Your friends! They may be gone, but you’re here, and you’re-”
Without a shred of hesitation, John raised his hand and obliterated the Casting professor. He needed silence at the moment.
Should he just keep going? Learn as much as he could? That was possible, but in the end, he would inevitably have to [Reset]. He wouldn’t go on without Prota. Not now. Maybe a year ago he would have, with the penalties in place, but not anymore.
“Dammit!” John yelled as he heard sounds of yelling coming from outside.
He only had one chance left. Pray and hope.
Raising his gun to his head, the world went dark.
~~~
“John-”
“Not now, Prota!”
Prota shrunk back as she saw John biting his thumb, pacing back and forth over and over, muttering to himself like a madman.
“Is this it, Zero? Is this what’s happening?”
“I can’t tell you, John,” Zero said, his voice also desperate. “I wish I could. I really do.”
“You-”
“Don’t ask anything, John. Don’t make assumptions on your own.”
His heart was racing, and no matter how much he tried to calm himself down, he found he couldn’t. The stress was getting to him. Would the demon king be there? Would she be there to force his hand again? He didn’t even know if he could beat her this time. If only he hadn’t brought everyone back. If only he hadn’t-
No. He couldn’t change that now. All he could do was press the button and pray.
“Prota. I’m not going to lie to you. I’m really scared right now.”
That didn’t reassure the small girl at all. The one who was always in control was losing his mind. To be fair, she understood his fear. The threat of the demon king was very, very real.
All they could do was hope.
[Reset]
~~~
Their prayers went unanswered.
“You messed up!” Diaboli cackled, crashing through the roof. In just two shots, she obliterated both Hikari and Leora, immediately waking up all the students in the exam. They were disoriented, but the sight that greeted them wasn’t helping. It was fine, though. They all disappeared. Dead, probably. Only John and Prota were left.
“Dammit. Prota. Run. Now!”
The girl didn’t waste any time, using all her mana and magic to run as far as possible. Interestingly enough, Diaboli didn’t make chase. She just stared at John, grinning sadistically.
“She’ll be easy enough to catch. You, on the other hand… you gave me trouble. And I’m willing to bet you don’t have enough energy to pull that trick you did last time.”
“You really came here betting on that?”
“Well, it’s a gamble in my favour. Even if I’m wrong, we make another deal, and I find you the next time you slip up. I’m always the one at an advantage here.”
John grit his teeth. She was right on both accounts. He didn’t have the energy to pull that trick again. He only had one hail mary up his sleeve. This was all he could do.
“[Deus Ex Machina]: [Setting change: Realism]!”
There was a bright flash of light, but when it died down, it didn’t look like anything had changed. Diaboli, however, fell from the sky, and when she fell, she yelped in audible pain.
“What did you do, you whelp?!”
“Setting change. This [Story] no longer has magical powers. Of any kind,” John said, panting. “It’s just me, you, and our fists. And my gun.”
John raised the pistol, but as luck would have it, he was out of bullets, and with no powerups, his pocket dimension was disabled.
“Fuck,” John cursed, running in.
The two began exchanging blows, but one party was arguably better at fighting than the other. John wasn’t sure where Diaboli had learned to fight, but she wasn’t very good at it. He didn’t care. All that mattered was that he got out of this alive.
“You- bastard-” Diaboli gasped between blows. She was really taking a pummelling. Her armour got in the way of any punches John had to offer, but her face was wide open, and John was happy to target that specific area.
“That’s- enough!”
With a yell, she threw John off of her. He grunted as he hit the floor, but that was fine, he could-
“Enough. I am done playing games with you.”
A beam of energy formed in her hand, pulsing with energy as she aimed it at John.
“Wh- how?”
“Just because you are out of your stupid little energy does not mean I am as well. Did you think I was one of your [Characters]? Someone to control, someone forced to dance under your little strings? Fool.”
John’s eyes went wide. Shit. He hadn’t even thought of that. He’d been so panicked that he’d forgotten that [Setting change] worked only on [Characters]. Well, this was his first time using it. He vaguely remembered using it in his memories, but they were so rare that they were basically of no help at all.
Regardless, it seemed that Diaboli did not count entirely as a [Character].
“This is your end, boy. Your memories are mine. Your mimic of a sister is mine. You do not belong in this world. Not now, not ever. You are a plague. A stain. And you will be gone.”
During her monologue, John saw something shining in the distance. A stray bullet. Seriously? Well, now that he thought about it, the gun wouldn’t have worked anyway. Not on Diaboli.
But it still had a use.
Without her noticing, he reached out, sliding the copper object into his barrel, silently pushing it back into place. As she was laughing, he pulled the hammer and prayed Prota knew what to do.
“I’ll see you again.”
Diaboli’s eyes widened. “No! You can’t-”
~~~
John sat up, and to his relief, Prota was next to him. If he’d been any calmer, he would’ve noticed how rushed the whole thing felt, but he didn’t have the privilege of thinking things like that.
“...Prota.”
She didn’t say anything. She was still shaking.
“I- what are we going to do?”
“I- I’m sorry,” Prota mumbled, rocking back and forth.
“That doesn’t matter anymore. I- I don’t know what to do.”
John sat down next to her, hugging his knees.
“I don’t have any [Deus Ex Machina] energy left. I don’t know what to do. I can’t win, Prota. Not against her.”
“John can-”
“That’s not how it works, Prota!” John said, tears beginning to form in his eyes.
Was it really going to end here? Was it really going to finish, just like that? No memories. No adventures. All of this had been an elaborate bait, a joke, an unfinished [Story] built to prank him.
“I- we gotta try again. That’s all we can do, right?”
Prota nodded.
“...we fight together.”
Prota’s eyes widened.
“You’re my protector. If we go out… at least we’ll go out together. Ok?”
Despite everything, Prota smiled. Right. If she went out, she’d go out with John.
[Reset]
~~~
They died. Again. And then they died again. And again. And again. And again. And again. And again.
They just kept trying over and over, but each fight was shorter and short. Soon, they would reach the point where Diaboli would have magic ready for them upon waking up, and if that happened, it was game over. John would lose everything, and they’d never [Reset] again.
So there they were. Sitting in the void, delaying the inevitable.
“...Prota. I’m sorry.”
She looked up at him, her eyes dark. She was tired of all the [Resets]. All the deaths. The feeling of hopelessness, the feeling of losing.
“I should have never gotten you involved in this. I should’ve just left you-”
“No.”
Prota sat up, grabbing John and putting her head to his.
“If we die… then Prota is ok with that. Because without John, Prota would’ve died anyway. And without John… I’m ok with dying with John. Because it’s better than living alone.”
Her eyes were filled with tears, staring deep into John’s soul. All the memories. Their meeting on the street. The first few weeks, her story of her village, her recovery, the food they’d had, the times they’d shared. Her training with those adventurers, her first birthday with John.
[Destiny Bond.]
Jinae. The Town of Beginnings. Destiny, Kit, the Cave of Trials, discovering magic, fighting monsters, meeting Danjo, fighting Doctor, entering the school, all of it. Even if she were to die here, it was enough. She could say she’d lived. And without John, there would’ve been none of that. None of it at all.
“Because John helped me live. And so if John makes me die, then… Prota will die with John.”
John choked on his words. Right. A companion. Someone who stuck with you till the end. His eyes widened.
He was a [Writer], yes. A [Reader]. The world was fake. But ultimately, he was still a [Character]. Someone who could interact with the people of this world. Someone who could make an impact, someone who could form bonds, relationships. And just because they were “fake,” just because they wouldn’t always be there, that didn’t mean anything. The real world was like that, too. People came. People went. But one isn’t meant to cry because it’s goodbye. You’re meant to smile because it happened. Memories, too, were a kind of [Story]. And they wouldn’t exist without others.
How had he forgotten that?
And how ironic was it that, in the face of true death, in the face of an unavoidable situation, he was realizing that?
“...Prota. There’s one thing left that I can do.”
Her eyes widened. Why hadn’t he done it yet? Why had he held onto it for so long?
“I can only do it once. [True Reset]. Prota. This is basically death.”
She didn’t understand.
“[Reset] allows us to keep our memories while everyone else forgets everything. But [True Reset]... we forget, too. It’s literally a [True Reset]. Everything goes back to how it was. None of us will remember any of this, even me. Zero will remember it, but he isn’t allowed to tell me if I’ve ever done a [True Reset] or not, so I basically remember nothing.”
Prota’s eyes closed. She understood. He would save them, but… did it even matter? They wouldn’t remember anything. It would be as if nothing had ever happened.
No. It would make it so that nothing had ever happened.
“We don’t have any other choice, Prota. What else are we going to do?”
“We can- we can-” she stammered, but nothing came to mind.
John choked as he tried to breathe. He didn’t want to forget this. He didn’t want to forget what he’d just learned. His time with Prota, his time with everyone. What if they didn’t meet? What if the next version of him decided to get rid of her?
He could only hope. Hope that the [Author] wasn’t as evil as he’d always made them out to be. Hope that the [Author] meant for the two of them to get together.
And if they made it to the end, well, [True Resets] weren’t entirely true. These memories would be sealed into a book and stored in a library. He’d be able to read this [Story] someday.
He just had to hope that he’d be reading it with Prota.
“Prota. I’m sorry.”
“...it’s ok. Thank you, John.”
“No. Thank you, Prota.”
He wrapped her in a big hug, burying her head in his chest. The two of them shed tears, embracing each other as if by holding onto each other, they would hold onto themselves.
But that wasn’t possible.
“You were real.”
Prota’s eyes shot open. Those words, from so long ago.
You were real.
She understood them now. She hadn’t understood before. They hadn’t meant much to her. But they made sense now. The world was fake. Everyone was fake. The world was a [Story]. To John, not a single thing was real.
But to her, and her alone, he’d confessed that she was “real” in this world of “fakes.”
“John! No, don’t go!” she cried out, her heartstrings being pulled every which way. “No, we can do something, we can-”
“There’s nothing, Prota. She’s playing the role of god. The role I thought I used to play. But I guess not.”
Prota held on tight, restricting his arms, as if trying to stop him from doing anything.
“Then we can stay here. Forever.”
“And do what? Your brain will freeze, Prota. You’ll stop thinking. Is that what you want? We might meet again. And if we do, we’ll read our lives as a [Story]. And we’ll see everything that happened.”
“But what if I don’t? What if I don’t meet John again?”
John pushed Prota back, holding her by the shoulders and looking her in the eyes.
“No. We will meet again. I promise.”
“How?”
“If we don’t, then I’ll become a [Writer] and force us to meet. I’ll write a [Story] all about us. I’ll find that idiot [Author] in real life and beat the shit out of them and write the [Story] myself. Ok? So don’t worry. Because we will meet again.”
Prota’s breathing began to stabilize.
“...John can’t break his promise.”
“No.”
“...ok.”
With that, she let go of him. John closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
Thank you. For the memories. For the good times. For everything.
“Initiate [True Reset].”
A bright flash of light blinded everyone, and when it was gone, a single button remained.
[True Reset]
We’ll see each other again. Because what exists is not fate, but [Plot]. And should the [Plot] remain the same, then we are destined to meet each other once more.
“Prota. Are you ready?”
“...nn.”
“Someday, we’ll read about this and laugh. And we’ll remember everything, someday. I promise you.”
“I’ll wait for John.”
With a forced smile, John walked toward the button, Prota walking alongside him. Somehow, despite their forced emotions, it was the realest they’d felt in forever.
“Thank you. For being real.”
[Thank you. All the best luck.]
[True Reset: Start]
[Thank you for reading.]