Glenn clenched his sword tightly, his teeth gritted.
"...What happened to you, Josh?"
The Corrupted looked at him confusedly. Somehow, he still had eyes, even though they rolled and jerked in random directions occasionally.
"What happened to me? You're asking..." An arrow of ash and darkness appeared in his right hand, "...what happened to ME?"
Josh laughed madly, unable to stop himself. He hid his face behind his monstrous hand, the ten-bone fingers failing at covering the bare skull.
"Well, to ME, nothing happened, Glenn," he cackled, before pointing a finger at him, "...My whole team, though? Those I shared joys, pains, everything with?"
He suddenly stopped laughing and slowly placed the arrow on his bow, looking at it pensively.
"All dead. They all died, Glenn. Every one of them. And, to speak truthfully..." He glanced up at Glenn and grinned ominously, "...I think some part of me died that day too."
Glenn, tense, prepared himself. He didn't doubt that the mad Corrupted was going to attack him. Josh had entirely lost his mind. He wasn't Josh, anymore, he was...
Someone, no, something else.
Josh coughed as his chest bulged, but he didn't seem to care about it. He slowly stepped toward Glenn, whose Mana was firing up like crazy.
"But, you know, Glenn. This would have never happened, had this horrible Mother never existed!" He spat hatefully, his eyes rolling back in their sockets. Glenn held his sword straight, not leaving him out of sight. Josh's twenty fingers were busy clasping the dark arrow and the stringless bow.
"Even now, She's here..." he whispered as he glanced above him fearfully. Glenn frowned and was almost tempted to look above, but the main threat was Josh, not an illusion only the latter could see. He didn't exactly know what happened to Corrupted Ones, and this experience convinced him that he needed to research the subject deeper.
"She's been watching ever since, you know?" Josh shouted desperately, pointing at the sky with his arrow. Glenn pressed his lips together while preparing to cast a Nitrogen Lance. He wasn't enjoying this experience at all. Should he stop listening to this monster, or... keep trying to find some hint of Josh's humanity?
Glenn knew what the answer was, but he couldn't resolve himself to act upon it.
"Ever since they died, Glenn, She's been here. Every time I slept She'd live in my dreams, suffocating me with fake hopes and tainted choices!" Josh roared, his chest bulging with increasing violence. The Corrupted's head snapped in his direction, before shaking it.
"And I know..." Josh pulled the nonexistent bowstring on his weapon, readying an arrow, "...I know you've been seeing her too, Glenn. After all..." The Corrupted suddenly aimed for Glenn and let go of the arrow. The projectile flew through the air before getting caught in Glenn's Gravitational Shield, which was dismissed after blocking the attack, the Mana maintaining it consumed in one shot. Glenn's eyes widened and he hurriedly cast another Gravitational Shield, considering the need for other defensive options.
Josh grinned and pulled another arrow of ash and shadows out of nowhere, readying it for another shot.
"After all, don't they call you the Devil's Hand? The Insane Hero? The man who slaughters madness with madness? You've taken the whole meaning of fighting fire with fire to another level!" Josh cackled and let the invisible bowstring go. The arrow flew with more this time, and Glenn was forced to step to the side, let the arrow enter his Gravitational Shield, and then hurriedly let it go in another direction. The arrow went and pierced one of the nearby fire-lizard monsters, killing it directly.
'...You do need to train this if you want to use it to counter. Deflective Gravitational Shield might be a better name, but it's too long...D.G.S? I love acronyms,' Diamanes suddenly commented, trying to lift the weight on his host's shoulder. In other situations, Glenn might have appreciated the effort, but not this time. This wasn't some unknown, nameless bastard he was fighting. This was a comrade, almost a friend, but also not.
Glenn chose to stop listening to Josh's nonsense and start fighting back. He steadied himself and clenched his teeth before shooting the Nitrogen Lance at Josh. The Corrupted's eyes would have probably widened, had he any eyelids left. Too bad, he only had a skull and misshaped bones, now.
"...I knew it. I KNEW I WAS RIGHT!" A voice shouted from another side of the battlefield, startling Glenn. He hurriedly turned away to see Josh bent in two, laughing his ass off. As if following the rhythms of his laughs, the sources of the bulge in Josh's chest started to get excited and moved even more frantically. The young man gritted his teeth and pushed forward toward his opponent, his legs charged with Mana to try and go faster.
Using Mana as a body enhancement was, to say the least, inefficient. Aura had always been much more suited for body strengthening, either to make it harder to cut, stronger to punch, or simply faster. And yet, Glenn still enhanced his legs with Mana, losing in efficiency for the sole advantage of a standard boost of his speed. As he ran, he sliced in Josh's direction a few times, Cutting & Pulling with as much precision as he could.
"Oh, a new weapon also? Where is your...flamboyant axe, Glenn? Did you lose your toy, like I lost my friends?!?" Josh spat, shooting arrow after arrow, all while jumping and dodging Glenn's attacks. The young man didn't reply and suddenly pressed his left hand on the ground, conjuring a Nitrogen Wave to cover it whole in white ice. Josh roared in anger and kept on shooting, only his hands were moving so fast even Glenn couldn't detect every shot.
He deflected two with his Gravitational Shield, or whatever Diamanes had named the spell until the third arrow broke the shield. Lacking in time to cast a new one, Glenn blocked the fourth arrow with his bastard sword, and in a lack of other solutions, dodged to the side the last one. The arrow was faster than expected and grazed him on the shoulder, carving an ashy line in his Soulbound suit. It barely scratched him, and yet, Glenn felt immensely uncomfortable. He wasn't in pain, but it was as if something had latched on his shoulder and wouldn't let go, slowing his movements and disturbing his concentration.
Josh didn't waste another second and shot another salvo, before landing on the ground next to one of the lava rifts, the only spots where his Nitrogen Wave had next to no effects. There probably was some Mana in those Rifts that stopped the spell, in addition to the heat.
"Let me just kill you, Glenn...So you can also join my dead friends in their peaceful rests, in Onnea's embrace!" The Corrupted laughed loudly, shooting arrows one after the other. Glenn continued to clench his teeth and deflect or dodge the attacks to the best of his ability, but he had grown used to fighting with other people, and having the opponent's entire focus on him made the task harder, even more for long-range opponents like Josh.
"Having Sahro to run around as a distraction would have been greatly appreciated," Nelg suddenly said. Glenn could only agree with his sword as he took out Pebble and began preparing a Shooting Star.
Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.
"Pebble..." Glenn muttered, speaking to the stone with baseless hopes,"...I count on you this time."
If the stone had sentience, it was time to prove that it was better than just an indestructible projectile. Which was already great as a first attribute, when he thought back to it. Maybe it wasn't unbreakable, but very, very touch? He couldn't tell without doing tests, which would have to wait for after this hellish fight.
'Focus.'
The pebble floated above his open hand, flaming up with Sun's Touch and spinning under Gravity Manipulation's influence. The pebble soon became searing red, then white, before flying off in a streak of light. A bright line was drawn in the air as the projectile shot in Josh's direction. The Corrupted barely had the time to try and dodge when the Shooting Star obliterated his right shoulder, transforming it into ash. Flames covered Josh entirely, burning off what remained of his clothes and skin. The whole melted away, revealing a skeleton screaming in pain with non-existing vocal cords, alongside a bulging shadow encroaching on its chest.
The shadow writhed in the flames as the pebble fell and rolled away, having completed his purpose. But Glenn still wasn't done. He lunged forward, using Nelg once more to attack Josh. This time, the Corrupted was too busy fighting off the flames to dodge the attacks and was promptly pulled in Glenn's direction, his bones crackling as the attacks tried to slice through it and failed. Glenn didn't let that get to him and discarded Nelg, putting both of his hands in front of him as the flaming Josh flew toward him.
"I hope you'll be luckier in your next life..." Glenn muttered, before straining his Mana Heart to produce two Black Holes at the same time. His Mana reserve suddenly bottomed out in a matter of seconds, but it was just enough to power the spell. The two black holes gravitated around each other before colliding with Josh. The Corrupted's scream of pain was muffled by the distortion created by the black holes, and his body was suddenly stretched due to the differential gravitational forces. His limbs were torn away before being smashed into the skeleton, the shadow growing on what was once a chest swallowed by the black holes.
Josh somehow managed to hold his hand toward Glenn through the strength of the two black holes and muttered something. The sound of his words was cut off, but Glenn had somehow managed to understand what the Corrupted had just said.
"Monster."
That was Josh's last word until the last bit of his body was swallowed by the blackhole combination. Lacking the Mana to sustain themselves, the blackholes fused and disappeared, leaving nothing behind but nightmarish memories for their caster. Glenn fell back, drained, his butt hitting the ground.
"...Should I have gone all in like I just did?" He muttered questioningly, doubting his decision. The fight had taken what, a minute? The only reason it was so short was mainly due to his luck. It seemed like, for some reason, Josh was particularly weak to fire, probably due to the influence of that shadow that grew on his chest like a parasite. Using Shooting Star had been especially effective. Then, using Nelg to Cut & Pull and control Josh's trajectory had been a risky bet as well, for if he failed his next spells, he would have the Corrupted right in close combat, and there was no way to tell if the transformation had made Josh stronger than he was.
Glenn rubbed his shoulder where the arrow grazed him. It was itching him badly and felt quite uncomfortable; for now, he wouldn't be able to heal it due to his Mana deficiency, but priests were waiting for the outcome outside of the Magi Brotherhood's safety perimeter. That was the classic methodology the various organizations took for these kinds of accidents: isolation of the space thanks to the mages, civilian evacuations and first aid provided by the Church of Onnea, and eradication of the threat first by the Cleaner's Workshop.
The young man sighed and weakly pushed himself up, before glancing at his surroundings. He summoned Nelg back, in his basic, normal sword form. After all, he had no Mana to feed the sword to awaken it. The Fire-attribute monsters nearby had watched the fight from nearby, some falling to the stray spells, frozen or pierced by the cursed arrows. Glenn was sure they were cursed; no way it would feel so disturbing otherwise.
Or did he feel disturbed just because he killed an old work colleague? He wasn't even friends with the guy, why would he feel bad?
Yeah, why should he feel bad?
...
"...Shit. Fucking shitty vacations..." Glenn rubbed his eyes, grunting as he held his sword straight. He was getting used to sparing just enough Mana to leave him capable of fighting; the days of suffering from Mana's exhaustion were far behind him. His swordsmanship, Nelg's sharpness, and his superior body should be enough to get rid of these trash fire mobs.
As soon as he thought that, one of the rifts spitting out lava suddenly chose to erupt completely, spraying its contents in a searing projection. Glenn's eyes widened and he hurriedly jumped back, before changing his mind.
"I'll just get out of here..." He hissed as he pushed away a dog-sized lizard with six legs and two tails, and pierced its head, killing it instantly. The young man pulled his sword back and avoided the next creatures, running to the ward's edge. Without a second of hesitation, he jumped through it and exited the space's isolation. His shoulder kept on burning unpleasantly, he had to find a priest quickly.
'Glenn, I think there's something wrong with that wound...' Diamanes muttered, confused.
"Yeah, no shit Sherlock!" Nelg spat with contempt, worried. Glenn stumbled forward and sheathed Nelg, before looking at his shoulder. Even though it had only grazed him, it was bleeding profusely with black blood. The same shadow that grew on Josh's chest was nested in the wound, swirling viciously as it worsened it. Glenn paled and pressed his hand against the wound, wincing as the pain rang in his shoulder, and ran toward the nearest warder, a man with a blue and green robe. The mage turned his head just in time to see Glenn stumbling toward him, his right arm covered in blood and his eyes bloodshot.
"You..." Glenn rasped, struggling to talk, "...I need a...priest..." He collapsed face-first, his sight fading to black. The wound shouldn't have been so dangerous, and yet...yet he couldn't help but feel as if something was deeply wrong. It didn't feel like his life was in danger, no, it felt...different.
----------------------------------------
"Monster."
The voice rang like a thousand bells, echoing loudly and suffocating him.
"A creature of mediocrity. That's what you are."
This...this voice shouldn't be here. It...no, it couldn't exist anymore!
"You must become more than that, #####."
It chilled him to the bone to hear it again, after so many years. This was a bad dream, a nightmare, just like last time, right?
"Your name is W#####, #l#enn. You have to uphold that name over everything, over everyone. Nothing should step on you, for it should be stepping on MY name!"
It was impossible. He dug the grave to bury this voice, burned the corpse, and gathered the putrid ashes to bury them in that same grave.
Glenn couldn't see anything, nor feel anything. He could only hear it; the dreaded voice, the one who made his life a hell worse than this world he fell in.
Wait, he fell into another world...
An illusion. Again. Playing on his deepest fears, on his nightmares. Was that why he couldn't think like usual? Was that the reason?
But he wanted to hide. Hide away from the voice, from him. Push the problem away and act as if it didn't exist. This method worked so well, so why not use it again?
...
"No," Glenn muttered somehow, his voice ringing against the voice, pushing back against it.
"You think you can fight back? You, trying to rebel against ME? Who do you think you are, worm? Should I just teach you another lesson?" The strength of the voice suddenly rose, destroying the little resistance Glenn somehow mustered. It, no, he was too strong. What could he do?
...Magic! Glenn tried to channel a spell with the little Mana he had left, conjuring a small light in this world of darkness. His arm lit up with a weak Sun's Touch, the light swallowed by the shadows twirling around Glenn. Finally, the young man could see again, but perhaps it would have been better for him to keep his eyes closed.
For the shadows had the shape of his nightmare, of the buried past that should have never reappeared.
Something that should have been left behind on Earth. The shadow cackled cruelly and looked down on Glenn as if he were an ant.
"Hmm...You've become too strong-willed, hmm? This doesn't do anything to you, anymore. Well, let's see if Lina is the same, shall we?"
Glenn's blood ran cold and he froze, Sun's Touch light smothered away. The voice laughed like a whisper in the wind.
"...That's what I thought. Trash."
The shadows engulfed him, wrapping around his body like chains of fear and terror. Glenn wanted to resist, but he couldn't, for it would put his sister in danger. He could prioritize his well-being in front of many things, but there was one thing that was more important than his life. One person, for the other one, was dead.
The shadows grinned, looking down at him in a circle, mocking and belittling him.
"Failure."
"Just a failure."
"He's nothing."
Glenn crouched down, grimacing as he covered his ears. This part of his life was behind him, it was over.
This was an illusion. All an illusion.
His sister couldn't be hurt. She was on Earth. He was here.
In Limbo.
Glenn slowly stood up in the darkness, the chains of fear breaking like the weak things that they were. The voice stopped talking, the past buried once and for all.
The young man opened his eyes.