Rye was a knight and this body of sin was her armor. Fifteen hundred kilos moved with the grace of a dancer. She flexed her fingers. She was fairly certain that she could lift a grug one-handed, or crush a human skull.
Valti snorts in laughter.
And the comments of Aurana were nowhere to be heard. Someone must have been very mad.
“Vessel,” Zippo tittered at the back of her mind. “Mighty. Comfy.”
It was a power that made the world feel like it was made of glass. It made her feel invincible. And yet, when she stepped out of the hidden treasury, past a de-liquifying Elia, to see Rhuna punch through Brod the giant’s chest, she felt like something inside her was missing. Everyone else was either dead or in retreat, and Rhuna was still standing fine, ignoring her missing head.
But Rye’s fear was gone, her heart no longer distracting her from what needed to be done. There was nothing distracting her in fact, just the vast, deep calm of a cold, dark ocean.
Rhuna turned just as she crushed Brod’s heart, blood and gore caking her hands.
“You’re finally showing up on my [Danger sense]. Lookin’ good, other Elia. My backup body fits you like a glove.”
“I guess now I know how you can be so arrogant all the time,” Rye said.
“Can you blame me? Look at these scrubs: they barely gave me a scratch.” Her head was almost fully regrown, the features of her face swimming around like fish in a pond. “And look at you, walking out to challenge me without even a weapon.”
Rye opened a hand. With a flex of [Dream-haze projection], a long iron cylinder snapped into her hand. The club thrummed with a heavy energy.
“Woah, now that was sick and intimidating. I know why I picked you as my successor now.”
“You picked Elia. And for what, to keep your riches, your vain legacy?” She gestured at the piles of loot. “You have all this power and all you do is make piles like a deranged squirrel.”
“I prefer the term ‘like a dragon’,” Rhuna said, her face morphing into reptilian angles. “Have you ever killed a dragon before? They’re great sport.”
Rye scowled. “You are a cancer that has festered in the remains of my people. You are an insult to me and our empire on every level.”
Rhuna cackled, her body twisting and swelled “Bitch, it’s my empire now, everyone who came before is either dead or listens to me.”
She grew a tail, long and jagged, and claws as many and sharp as her teeth. It was an amalgam of human and dragon. She looked the monster she was now, wings made of small fingers on her back questing like worms in a rotten apple. It was alright then, to slay her. Knights killed monsters all the time, even tax knights.
“Oh wait,” Rhuna said, slitted eye widening, “‘our’ empire? You’re not from earth. Hah-hah, everyone you love is dead.”
With a scream of fury, Rye charged, swinging her mace. Rhuna caught it with a hand that shifted into a long, wicked blade.
“Oho, someone really can’t take a joke.” Rye ducked under her bladed tail, only to get punched across the face by a finger-wing, trailing chipped stone. “Sumwald’s great mace. A good choice, won’t break quickly. Now, what do I counterpick? Ah, yes. [Yoink]!” A serrated whip appeared in Rhuna’s hands. “Archibalds spirit render. Now that man knew how to make people scream before I squashed him. Wanna see how I did?”
“SCREW YOU!”
Her whip came fast, snaking around Rye’s defense and wrapping an arm. The serrated barbs dug into her stone-skin and it did not hurt.
Rye charged Rhuna, smashing her with an impact that could shatter bones. But the lioness swerved to the side, her body a cloud of tentacles in one moment, then a solid monstrosity in the next. As Rye kept up the assault, she suddenly found her fist bouncing off a shield, only to punch herself in the face.
“The justice shield. One of the first things I got for ransoming Karla.”
The next swing of her tail sent Rye careening through a pile of worthless gold, coins spraying everywhere.
A direct attack was impossible. She’d need to be clever.
She landed next to one of the many piles of loot, picking whatever staff looked most powerful. With a twist of conjuration, dozens of icy balls appeared all across the room, then exploded, releasing a blinding storm of powdery snow. She charged around the side, when a couple of conches came flying at her, exploding with the boom of thunder all around.
“Bottled lightning. A bitch to gather, but so worth the trouble.” Rhuna just shook her head, now little more than a dark figure in the fog. “Did you really think because you’re surrounded by magical weapons that you would have the advantage? Bitch, I killed most of the people who wielded these with my own two stone hands.”
Rye grunted as chips of stone peeled off her arm. Blanketing the room in dense snow was probably not a good idea. The lack of clear vision went both ways. No doubt Rhuna was just standing there with that taunting smile of hers, waiting to counter whatever Rye threw at her. Rye knew that she was not a good fighter, and only a passable conjurer without her greater souls as a crutch.
But she had had plenty of time to theory craft inside her dream. And through her staff she found a connection to the snow all around.
With a wave of her hand, all the tiny particles rushed towards Rhuna’s face, encasing it in a quickly growing ball of dew.
“Hah, try to shape-shift out of that, you heartless tyrant! You’re a menace and a murderer and all you know to do is hurt!” Rye yelled and immediately felt like it was an inappropriate time to gloat, as Rhuna’s head retracted into her body, and a face grew out of her shoulder.
“Oh please, like half of these people mean anything to you.” She leveled a crossbow at Lim, who hid back around the corner. Then she switched to Elia, and Rye immediately jumped in front of it. “Hah, see? What did I–“
Rhuna staggered, pulling an arrow from her eye. “Fucking furries.”
She chased after Lim, disappearing into an adjacent room. Rye rushed to her other half. Elia looked terrible, half drooping bruise, half mangled limbs. Her arm was trapped under a pile of rubble. The lioness knew how to disable undead without killing them. Watching her struggle to breathe was perhaps the most painful thing Rye had done in the past few minutes.
“Rye,” Elia asked, only three-quarters puddle at the moment. “That you?”
“I am. Yes. I mean, you need some water.” She lifted up a perforated bottle, empty of all but a few sips. Elia drank them up greedily, wincing as another bone straightened out.
“Fuck. I… we’ll be right there with you. Just gimme a sec to improvise something. Then we can take her together.”
“You can’t.“ Somewhere in the back, Lim yowled in surprise. “You won’t. You don’t have to fight anymore. I will take her, alone.”
“Rye. Rye dammit. Rye!”
Rye turned and readied for her own bout of improvisation.
Rhuna was right, at the moment she did not care about all these people buzzing around. But she would make an effort. Because Rye was a knight and no matter how big or small, knights helped people. And if that was not true, then she would make it.
Rye gathered all the ice and influence she could, emptying her reservoir. A thick, bulbous mess of an ice brick soon encased the head of her metal club, making her finally feel its weight.
Lim ran past on all fours, followed by heavy, thudding footsteps.
Rhuna only turned when Rye had already taken the initiative and planted the mace in her side. She caught it, of course, with a dozen quickly shapeshifted hands. Her blow was cushioned, the heavy ice cracking under a dozen hands.
The look of triumph on Rhuna’s face turned to shock as the ice sloughed off, revealing the end of Partlight’s handgonne.
Rye knew how guns worked now in principle, but she had no idea how to fire this boomstick. What she did know was that it was a shell strong enough to withstand great explosive forces, be they chemical, or a mix of astral influences.
Rye cast her spell and the cocktail of influences hidden inside exploded into violence, and action, and a dozen little miscast tears. The end pointing towards Rhuna exploded. The sound was like the wrath of an angry god, shattering all the windows as Rhuna was flung straight out of the building.
A her-shaped hole dripped with stone right below the old one.
Finally, Rye exhaled. Her handgonne was cracked, her reservoir spent, and she could only hope that reconstituting into a shape with movable limbs would take Rhuna enough time for Elia to come up with… something. Preferably a plan that involved running away. If that didn’t kill the lioness, Rye had nothing that could.
A whip snaked around Rye’s neck. She coughed, realizing that she didn’t need to breathe just as she felt her feet leave the ground. She tumbled out of the hole in the wall, falling two stories down. The ground shattered under her impact.
The whip was wrapped around a pillar, reeling her in all on its own. Rye struggled past the tarry knights, who were still stuck in their moment of time. Suddenly, she felt a hand grip her right forearm. Out of reflex, she punched the ground, but it turned from water-like to solid within seconds, trapping her other arm.
A few meters away, Rye saw Rhuna emerge from the ground as it parted before her. Half her face was missing and the left side of her body was crumbling to the floor.
“That actually hu-urt,” Rhuna said. “Man, you are haaard to turn.”
Rye looked to her right arm. The outer layers of stone were sloughing off like molten glass. Rye jerked away in shock, but realized that for the moment it was only superficial damage .
Rhuna could change the shape of everything so easily. But not her. Why was that? Why? This could be the answer, the one weakness Rhuna had besides her arrogance. She needed to play for time.
“Is it fun, living life balanced on the back of the downtrodden?” Rye spat. “How can you live with yourself?”
Rhuna shrugged. “I’m very acrobatic.”
“I hope you trip and hurt yourself.”
“With a body like this? Girl, I could fall off a mountain and be fine. You on the other hand–” Rye swung her free hand, which Rhuna stomped into the liquid-then-solid ground, “you haven’t even hit the bottom yet.”
Rhuna crouched beside her. “I see it in your eyes. No hardship. No suffering. No struggle. Between you and Elia, you’re the squishy one. All I have to do is squeeze a little, and she’ll fall in line perfectly.”
“She’s not your tool,” Rye spat. “She deserves a life. More than anyone, she deserves what she can’t have.”
“More than anyone, you say?” Rhuna stomped on her head. “More than any of the other people your fucking gods abducted and threw into this mess of a world?”
Rye felt something crack, then shatter. With an odd sense of detachment, she saw her head roll off her shoulders. She tucked her exposed spirit into her chest, where it was safe.
“Do you know how fucking annoying it is, to suffer and fight and die, just to do it over, and over, and over again? And then I find out that it’s not random, it’s her. She has the shard of time, or some other bullshit, she chooses the timelines. She chooses what is real and what is simply a hallucination. Isn’t that just cruel?”
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“Don’t you dare talk about her like you know her,” Rye snarled.
“Wow, and here I thought decapitation would finally shut you up. Right, ghost shenanigans.” She licked her lips, dry as death. “You know, it’s kinda silly, us undead beating each other up all day while the gods watch and laugh. A bit like our gladiator game, it’s endless, safe entertainment, until the point the figures crack.”
“So what, are you implying that you’re just perpetuating a cycle? That you’re like a god?”
“Sure am.”
“I bet you’d make an ugly dreg.”
Another kick made Rye eat dirt. She felt a tinge of phantom pain. But there was no pain here, and nothing else to fear but failure. And failure was not an option.
Could she possess Rhuna and kill her that way? Could she force her into a dream, then take her apart? What would the cost be?
“One million dreams,” Zippo tittered in the recesses of her mind. “Great imbalance. Great calamity. Pay upfront.”
Balance. That was the theme of every shard. Rye had unlimited power with her shard of dreaming, but only inside her own self-made dream. Every use of her shard outside of this was either tallied for or against her. If the need for balance extended to things made out of them too, which was why Rhuna was not using her fake grail of ages all willy-nilly either. The cost was not worth it.
But if Rhuna really could control the shape of everything she touched, why did she not reintegrate her severed head? It was material that was lost and compensating for it throughout her body surely was less effective.
Unless…
Unless she couldn’t.
Rhuna couldn’t add more material to her body. She had the shard of shapes, not of mass. Rye just needed to find a way to chip Rhuna down, then she’d be on the path to victory.
She clenched her teeth as she sunk into the white dream, drafting plan after plan in what were only seconds in real life. Her reservoir was almost entirely empty, but she could still cast a single snowball, enough to make a surface slippery or blind someone. Once Rhuna was on her back, then Rye would fly up, and… possess a boulder and fall on her chest or something.
Suddenly, a lance of pain shot down her shoulder, yanking her back into the waking world. Rye screamed. It was time to leave. But as she tried to jump out of her body, the leash around her neck pulled her back inside.
The spirit render. It was keeping her contained.
“Wh-what!?” she croaked.
“As I was saying, there is really no end to being an undead. Except, well, the gods don’t like true immortals. They have a way to kill an undead for good.” She pulled a knife from between Rye’s shoulders, a jagged one with a brown, chipped edge. Rye stared at what seemed to be red blood dripping from it. It looked like a grail shard fused to a hilt. “When they sent their passing knight assassins after me, I slaughtered them all and looted their corpses. And would you look at that? To kill an undead, all you have to do is strike at the spirit.”
She raised it again, wild glee running across her face which was done mending itself. “Now you’re gonna be a good little hostage. But I never said I needed you whole.”
Fear struck Rye in her cold stone heart. She wanted out, wanted to go, wanted to be anywhere but here.
The dagger plunged into her right arm. Rye screamed, her body convulsing as she felt something foreign worm its way in between parts of herself, sawing, tearing. And then it was gone. And so was every feeling below her shoulder.
She looked right, and her arm was still there. But it didn’t move. It just felt dead.
“Alright. Next up, a leg.”
Rye cast her snowball, which whiffed as Rhuna dodged easily. She was all out of options.
Rye tried to brace for the pain, the loss, but every inch of her body wanted her to beg and bargain to make it stop. But the pain never came. Instead, the whip around her neck loosened and something fell down next to her severed head. It was a hand. Rhuna’s hand.
“Hey stone-cold, mind if I give you another haircut?” Rye watched as an Elia-colored blur bounced off of the statues and frozen goop knights. She was missing an arm, but appeared even more jolly than usual. With every blue streak, she carved a piece out of Rhuna, but she was not hitting the joints.
She was unbalanced, unable to compensate for a lost limb on the fly. Rye flung herself out of her broken body and into Elia’s own and was enveloped with its familiarity. Safety. Home.
“You ok there, Rye?” Elia said flippantly as she carved another furrow.
What are you doing, run away!
Rhuna had caught on to Elia’s tricks. She pretended to be looking left when she suddenly swiveled, and whacked Elia across the face.
Dong went Elia as she bounced off the floor, crashing through a Rhuna statue.
“Dong?”
Rye’s other half looked frazzled as her limbs unstiffened and she got back up, black metallic sheen disappearing beneath it. “Finally got a hang of that essence of iron. And thanks for holding her off, Rye. Couldn’t have come up with a plan without you.”
You don’t have a plan. You’re just here because you’re worried about me.
“Touché.”
Which is stupid, by the way. If you die, it’s a ‘game over’. I had it handled.
“Handled? Girl, she handled you like a couple of handbags on black Friday. If you think watching you become a martyr will make me happy, you’re wrong.”
That… that goes both ways! But watch, she has her grail as a trump card. And you are in no shape to handle her.
“I’ve managed. Against dregs. Rhuna is anything but.” Elia wiggled her arm stump. “And you?”
I can’t feel my right arm. It’s gone, even in my haze form. I think I lost more than just my arm. I can’t remember anything before we fought Hall on Glenrock.
Elia winced, as if she felt the pain herself. “I… shit, sorry. This was my idea. I dragged you into it.”
And I followed. Willingly. I’m here for you, Elia, as you were there for me.
“Ahem. Still here by the way.” Rhuna snorted stone dust as material from her back flowed to fill in the missing parts. But cracks were starting to show, and she didn’t even bother with the half of her face that was crumbling away again. “You think a little itty bitty boony twist is enough to stop me? One measly little upgrade? My build has been optimized over decades, I have only the best boons.”
“And yet, look at you, a monument to every woodchipper victim. Didn’t kill me when you had the chance. Ooh, what’s this?” Elia feigned surprise as she fished the shard-knife from her pockets. “I think this is a skill-issue.”
Of all the things anybody had said or done today, none made Rhuna’s face twist in fury quite like that. Rye almost didn’t notice the swarm of mini bats offering her an almost empty water bottle. She drank greedily from it. With her reservoir half full, she conjured first a humerus, then a scapula and ulna, and then a hand, with five, triple segmented fingers. It was all made of ice, rough blocks in favor of density and strength.
Elia noticeably relaxed as the weight settled onto her shoulder.
I know how you move. I’ll be your left.
“And I’ll be the rest.”
“Don’t think I can’t [Yoink!] that knife back like I can’t [Yoink!] you back into the afterlife.” she said. But instead of the dagger, two rocks appeared in her hand.
Elia flashed the handful of pebbles she was holding with the dagger. “Figured out how your boon works. You just take loose objects inside an area, chosen randomly. It’s a small, optimized area, but you couldn’t get rid of the randomness. Shame.”
Then she began juggling them, mixing in chunks of debris and parts of Rhuna’s own face. Rye found herself keeping up, only fumbling the odd rock or two.
“Where is it? Is it here – whoops, my bad – or here?”
Rhuna pointed a finger at her as Rye led her in a circle with backward hops. “[Yoink!], [Yoink!], [Yoink!]!”
All of Elia’s props appeared in her hand, as did the dagger. “That’s what you get for being an arrogant little troll.”
Elia blinked. “Yup, I can be a bit of a troll at times. But you’re an Idiotpancakesayswhat?”
“Wh- oh, haha, very funny.” A pebble broke off Rhuna’s nose, trickling down her face. “What next, you gonna start asking me if I’ve ever heard of updog–”
A second, metal impact smashed straight through Rhuna’s upper torso. Karla bounced off the ground with a lot less grace than Elia, but caught herself, continuing in a stumble.
“Here – ow – she dropped this.” Karla gave her the knife back, then interposed herself between them.
“Thanks.” Elia pocketed it in her backpack. “I am also frequently a distraction. By the by, my backpack is full of over a hundred spoons, so have fun running the odds on that.”
Rhuna slammed the ground, her voice hoarse with fury. “YoU BiTcH!”
Her lower jaw fell to the floor, which was when they realized that her voice was coming from somewhere deeper within the stone. The smallest hint of fleshy skin showed right where her heart would have been. An eye looked out at them through wispy hair. It was a head, embedded in the deepest part of the stone. Then a couple layers of white granite covered it up, and Rhuna was all teeth and spikes again.
The Lioness looked downright frenzied, the remaining mass not enough to keep her on two legs. She lowered herself on all fours, and with a single tug, tore against the stone towards Karla –who stood her ground. With a single, great whack of her shield, Rhuna was smashed into the ground.
She looks scarier, but she’s somehow easier to follow.
“Yup, it’s called the monster-phase effect,” Elia said, casually hopping over a swipe and dealing one in return. “Whenever a boss turns more bestial, it’s a coin-toss whether they're about to fuck your shit up, or if they become too predictable.”
“I Am NoT PrEdIcTaBlE!” Rhuna rasped.
Elia landed, just to stumble over a small nub of ground. A fist of too many spikes raced for her face. She made the tiniest [Frog leap] in existence, her body turning a black sheen as the impact sent her careening over a brainworm pool.
“Of course, we’re all running on fumes here. Even with all we’ve done, she’s just not slowing down.”
It’s the mass. She has less, but whatever force she uses to move stays the same.
“Here’s to hoping she makes a mistake.” Elia waited until she caught Zane off-balance before throwing a spoon at her wrist, making the attack go wide. The bestial statue twisted towards her in an unnatural way. “What’s the matter Rhuna? Where are those big boons you were boasting about a minute ago? What, they’re all passive? Or is pickpocketing and making people stub their toes all you can do?”
Rhuna screamed.
“Not exactly good banter ol’ Rhuna. I honestly was expecting more from a double centenarian granny driving her mobility statue.”
“DoN’t cAlL Me ThAt! YoU’rE aS OlD aS ME!”
“Wrong, you’re as old as me.”
“GrAaAh!” Rhuna’s shape grew more wicked; superfluous inches migrating up along her limbs. Elia readied for her next attack when a thing fell right out of her chest. It was a cracked and slapdash cup, and by the way Rhuna’s claws scrabbled for it, it was as precious as her own heart.
Elia, don’t let her use the grail!
And Elia did not. She jumped forward, sending a solid kick into Rhuna’s side, which was enough to make her dig furrows into the ground. But Rhuna did not let go.
“Shit.”
“Heavy!” Rhuna yelled and Rye felt her arm shatter as they were tugged to the ground.
Karla charged from behind, but Rhuna’s spine did a 180 degree twist and pointed at her.
“Float!”
With the next step, Karla was propelled into the air. Rhuna lazily batted her away, which was when Zane finally took his time to strike, the shard knife in his hand. Elia must have palmed it, and left it where he could pick up.
He got a stab in, one, singular one. It cut along Rhuna’s chest. But it was not deep enough. In the same moment as he realized that, her claws closed around his head.
“Bind!”
He was already half bat-swarm when the words sent them all swirling back into his human form. Rhuna grinned, smug face replaced with that of a hungry, broken dragon.
“I was not DONE talking,” Rhuna screeched, eyes bloodshot. “Undead can be killed by attacking their spirit.” She turned to the brainworm pool that had been taken over by living tar. “But there are worse fates than death.”
“NO!” Elia yelled and Rhuna tossed him in.
Zane hit the surface with a splash and for a moment, it looked like it was just ankle deep. Then, little sticky worm-tendrils surged up his thin armor, and tore into his body like ravenous leeches.
He screamed. By the gods, Rye watched him, and he screamed. Those sounds were not something a human ought to make. Wherever the black tar touched, his skin discolored into a bruised purple. Bones snapped and first scales grew up to his eyes, then feathers, and fur, and features of every creature that life had ever birthed.
Rhuna chuckled, her satisfaction grim.
“Now that that pest is dealt with, onto you…” A trickle of stone dripped down her face like saliva.
Elia, move!
“Can’t. Heavy.” Rye tried to lift her arm, but it was as if it weighed ten times more.
Rhuna batted them aside with a lazy paw, until they were right on the tarry pond’s edge. There was lucidity behind those eyes, and an all too human taste for cruelty.
“As I said, she who controls you controls the fate of the world. One small prick, and Elia here turns right back to when you first stepped into my realm. We’ll get there soon enough. I’ve decided that instead of making you my successors, I think I’d rather have two pets, to vent all this… strain you’ve built up.” Her smile turned predatory as she placed a wicked paw on Elia’s chest. “You’ve crossed the Rhuna. You really shouldn’t have. Here’s something for the both of you to remember me by.”
Rye reconjured her arm, digging her hand into the wet mud as Rhuna pushed them, claws digging deep into her. Rye dug her hand in further as Elia subtly grabbed for the knife. Even if the tar would tear her hand apart, Rye swore she would stay perfectly quiet.
“Inch by inch,” Rhuna cackled. “Until you don’t know where one person ends and the other begins.”
A drop of tar touched her icy hand and every part of her mind wanted nothing but to run, to flee, and to escape. Tongues of black goo raced up her arm and Rye clamped her eyes shut, everything growing blurry through the pulses of pain. Sunlight hurt. Thinking hurt. But for once, Rhuna was within arm’s reach, and Rye was a very good distraction.
Do it. Please.
Elia swung at the part where Zane had cut her, where the stone couldn’t cover her insides, and stabbed Rhuna in the heart-head. Rhuna stiffened and Elia wrenched it out and stabbed again and again, screaming, as Rye screamed in turn.
“Y-you. You!” Rhuna said, coughing. “You little shits. You don’t deserve this. You don’t fucking deserve anything, you–”
Her face suddenly made a very odd motion and a ghost the shape of an angry woman seeped out of it.
It poured into Elia, and into Rye.
“Hah. HAHA! I AM IMMORTAL! You thought punching was all I could do, but you left yourselves WIDE OPEN. I’ll possess you, and drive you mad, and slowly, I’ll take over your entire life until… why is this place so white?”
“Die,” Rye whispered, through teeth and gritted tears. “Die. Go to hell. Disappear. DIE!”
And with a whispered scream and a sigh, the music stopped, and there was nothing but the silent agony running up her arm.