A vein bulged out of her forehead as she gritted her teeth in anger.

“You… you fool! You just threw away your entire life! You could have spent it with a tall goddess for the rest of eternity, yet you care so much about winning this wave that you cast it all aside! Even if you could win against me, you would never find another woman as beautiful as I, and less so one that finds your pathetic existence lovely!”

Tanuki did not respond but kept on trying to hurt himself awake.

The army of bugs grew. They climbed all over the bride, mainly focusing on concealing her face.

“You don’t want to look at me, because you know you’d fall for me!” She wiped the roaches out of her face and shouted in frustration. “That’s it, right? Right?”

He finally spoke. “I’m not doing this for any complicated reasons. It’s strange, even I can’t really explain why, but I need to get away from you.”

“Because I’m too pretty, right?”

“Because your face disturbs me!”

Without speaking another word, he returned to bashing his head into the invisible barrier blocking him from self-harm. It was unclear whether he was achieving anything, but it was too early to give up.

The bride stood frozen. Never before had she experienced one look at her perfect features with a feeling other than lust.

She laughed nervously. Not the cute kind of giggle, but the one that conceals anger and pain. There was only one explanation for his refusal. He must have realized her plan.

“I see how it is,” she laughed harder to grab his attention, “So, you’ve discovered my plan? I wasn’t lying about the marriage part. No, had you said yes to my proposal, I would have spared you and made you another husk of my collection. But you must have realized what happens when you say no. Ah, I had no chance to avoid your smarts, but such mistakes cannot be held against me! Am I right or am I not? Truly, such a clever boy. Such a shame I’ll have to kill you.”

Tanuki turned around with a confused expression.

“Hachiro Tanuki… you knew I was a trickster, but to figure out I would abuse such a simple, yet for you, new mechanic to my advantage is truly commendable. Indeed, I have commanded one of my venomous centipedes to crawl to you. Had you refused my marriage proposal, I would have ordered it to poison you. But I don’t get it… how, just how did you figure out I was going to do that?”

Tanuki stood up and in that moment, the bride saw him for what he truly was.

Another god. No longer did she view him as some lowly vermin, but rather as a tall monument to human cleverness. After all, how could anyone else outsmart her but a divine being?

“You…You did what?!” Tanuki panicked.

“What do you mean,” she responded.

“You ordered a centipede to kill me?”

“Wait… if you didn’t know, why are you trying to wake up so vehemently?”

“Don’t you get it? I’ve been trying to tell you, but you are too stupid to understand. Your face makes me want to throw up!” He yelled before rushing off to throw himself off the stairs. She watched on as Tanuki tried to break his neck and, of course, failed again.

But she could not believe it. Did he just openly admit to insulting her beauty? No, that was impossible. But then why did he say that? Was it his problem that she was a woman? Or was he just trying to be hurtful?

It did not make any sense. She was beautiful! Absolutely stunning! The most perfect creature! The apex of femininity!

To think someone would refuse such a picturesque face, she could not allow that without consequence. She had to take revenge for this abuse of words. No person, no, not even any god had the right to refuse her!

She ran after Tanuki.

“You little shit!” She sent her foot bolting into his side. She kicked him so hard, he flew between the benches. “Do you know how much you have hurt my feelings? You have no right to talk to me like that! Take it back! Take back what you’ve just said!”

The onlookers turned their empty heads to stare at the boy. Despite having been hit with such a powerful attack, he smirked. He experienced no pain in this world, so the bride’s rage served merely as amusement to him.

Furthermore, she fell right into his trap.

“Idiot… you just played yourself.”

She jumped after him, standing on his chest.

“What are you babbling about? Did you hit your head? Serves you right!” She spat on him.

He wiped it away and looked up at her with a mocking grin.

“Yeah, your words hit my head with the information I so needed, but that’s about all the effect your tantrum had on me.”

“What?!” She bellowed.

“You made me realize something. I’m still part of the real world, even when I’m in this dreamscape. That means my voice can be heard, and I can make commands, much like how you commanded your centipede to get to me. I did not jump off the stairs to try and wake myself, I believed you when you said I’m too weak for that. Instead, I did it to get a safe distance away where you couldn’t hear my command.”

“What do you mean?!”

“Axe her head.”

A large cut shot through her face. Her arms fell to her side and her gaze fell to the ground. Then, as the killing weapon was removed from her head, her corpse fell onto Tanuki.

Thus, she was dead. The invisible force ended the dream.

Tanuki found himself lying in the grass. His pain was back, but so was his freedom. A centipede clattered by his left ear, he turned and squashed the thing with his fist.

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While in the dream world, his mana recharged. It gave him the power to stand up while balancing with the staff. He hopped to the bride’s corpse. It lay on the juggernaut from the chest up, while everything under was still on the other side of the portal. His minion stood next to it, balancing against the deadweight juggernaut. Its axe was bloody with black tar.

Tanuki grew curious. With the top of his staff, he poked under the bride’s veil to lift it.

His body froze.

The bride’s head was made of dried twigs, much like that of the soulless husks’, and there was a ritual carved into her face.

Another deathrattle.

It activated and a portal opened in its place.

“Ready your axe!” Tanuki shouted the order, then jumped back just in time to fall under the cold claws that swiped out of the bright hole.

Following the hand, a head emerged. That of the enraged bride, screaming furiously.

“How dare you?!” She gargled like a crazed beast.

Her deathrattle summoned not another creature, but herself yet again. Judging by the lack of wounds on her head, she also came back with a new body. Tanuki realized this when he saw the same ritual carved into the new body’s face.

And though the odds seemingly turned against him with this revelation, he still had a trick up his sleeve. There was one thing, one singular idea that he had while summoning the husks.

Perhaps a theory would have been a better word for it, but ultimately, it was a sacrifice. And though he hated the thought of it, he knew that by going through with it, he could immediately kill the boss.

The duel entered its final moments as Tanuki ordered his husk. “Cut off your arm.”

The bride clawed against the ground, trying to pull herself through the narrow hole. Her other arm was still stuck on the other side.

The husk stood over the portal and with a strong slash cut off its own arm. It fell onto the bride’s face, but she was too preoccupied with screeching and wriggling around like a worm to notice.

“I’m going to fucking kill you!” Her raspy voice boomed. Tanuki knew if her other arm got through, she would jump out of the portal and tear him into pieces, yet he was not scared. After all, she was already dead.

He looked up at his last remaining minion, then sighed.

“Thank you for your services. I request you return to your original form.”

He had this question about rituals while creating minions. What happens if he does everything perfectly, draws the summoning circle, gets the right materials, does everything accordingly, but adds another material in the middle of the ritual's activation?

Had he, for example, cut himself and let his blood pour onto the summoning circle while the minion was already being built by the magical wind, would it have introduced a new effect to the minion or cancel out the ritual entirely, stopping the magical wind and wasting a valuable potion? He wondered. Could it have instead disturbed the magical wind with enough chaos that it would not just stop the ritual but cause an explosion to take place?

He hated that he had to lose this minion. He knew he would get more in the future, but this one was special. Even if it was not a living creature, he assigned a special kind of worth to it, because it saved him from the brink of death. It made uttering those final words all the more painful.

“Goodbye.”

With that, the minion’s movement slowly ceased to be. Its head lowered forward and the balance in its legs ceased. The corpse fell to its knees where it slumped forward.

From the wound of its lost arm, the remains of the health potion trickled down. Like a small crack on the side of an aquarium, its flow was small but continuous. The red liquid hit the original bride’s scalp and slid down the corpse’s forehead into the portal.

Tanuki ignored the violent bride and her screaming, instead focusing on the trickle. It traveled into the portal and… nothing. But he did not lose hope so easily. Waiting for just a little longer revealed small crackles escaped the portal as the amount of stale health potion grew within. The small sparkles of lightning grew louder, until eventually…

The corpse blew up.

Tanuki covered his face at the last second. His body could barely stand against the force of the explosion. For a second, he was rendered deaf, but his hearing came back with a ringing sensation, and with it, he heard the bride’s animalistic screaming.

He looked up and the deadweight husk was lit up in purple flames, bringing color into the ghastly blue night. The bride’s original body was gone, its new one consisting of a head and an arm. Where it hung out of the portal was a clean cut, burning with the magical fire.

Tanuki felt no sympathy for her. Hell, her finally having a good reason to be so loud made him all the angrier.

“My body! My-My beautiful body! Gaah! Why did you do this to me? Why did you do this to my pretty body?!”

Tanuki stepped forward and she immediately clawed in his direction. This was to his benefit, however, as it made him remember the ritual carved into the new body’s head. If he wanted to put an end to this nightmare, he needed to get through the bride’s defenses.

He had no more minions. Spells were out of the question, there was no telling she might successfully dodge or block his attack and resummon herself. There was only one way to finish her.

He feared her no more.

And with the fear gone, anger fuelling his heart and clouding his judgment, he knew what he had to do.

No longer did his sprained ankle hurt so much. He put his weight on it, walking towards the god.

His arm hurt when he clenched his fists, but it gave him confidence. He felt the power residing in his hands.

The god clawed at him, but he walked through her attacks with unstoppable force. She laughed, and cried, manically screaming insults, prayers, and threats. She mocked the boy as he bled from her attacks, only stopping as he raised his fist and pummeled it into her face.

Tanuki shouted a battle cry as pain bolted through his body. He raised his other fist and bashed it into the god’s skull. His first hand hurt more after the punch, yet he charged another.

The god opened her mouth to berate the boy, but before she could say a word, another fist burst through her face. She screamed as Tanuki’s blows turned into a barrage, growing not only in speed but destructive power.

He did not speak a word, but howled like a crazed beast, putting all his strength into destroying the god’s head. She finally realized his plan––should he destroy her before she could be reborn, she would be gone, forever.

She panicked and put the last of her strength to claw at her own throat. Doing so would kill her faster, and she could be reborn through the new hole.

But Tanuki did not allow her to do that. The moment she left the wound and her soul left this husk, and the moment a portal, and with that, a resemblance of her appeared through the wound, Tanuki howled with wrath and destroyed the hole.

This has caused a new wound to appear, a passage for her to be reborn through. Tanuki stomped on the new hole. Another wound appeared from that. He destroyed that too.

The god floated in a dark void, small circles of lights appearing as new wounds opened. She swam towards them, but before she could have gone through, Tanuki destroyed the wounds.

“Damn it,” she panicked, “If this keeps up, I’m really going to die!”

Her perception of death changed drastically. No longer did it seem so romantic once she was on the receiving end.

More wounds opened as her body was further destroyed. She rushed towards the portals, but no matter how fast she swam, Tanuki was even faster. Those glimpses she saw of the boy no longer resembled the child she met at the church.

He was gone. An unhinged killer took his place. A beast that saw no fear, no pain, only destruction.

Her tears grew in volume as she trashed around to no avail. She would not be allowed entrance into Tanuki’s realm. No, not just there, but back to reality itself.

One last great portal opened and she dashed towards it. It was so far, but she was so fast, her entire being powering her speed forward.

“Forget death, I want to live! I want to live! I don’t care about love or death, I don’t care for any kiss of death, I just want to live! Live!”

And before the portal closed, she saw one last picture of Tanuki’s rage, his bloodshot eyes, and bloody fists that cast judgment, and sealed her last source of light.

– – –

Darkness surrounded her. Her senses were still active, but she could not feel anything, just a sea of emptiness ahead, stretching into infinity.

She fell asleep. And then she awakened back into the dark. She tried to scream, but she had no mouth. She tried to cry, but no tears came. She tried to kill her soul, but the void would not let her die. She tried to stop thinking, but her chance was denied.

Time ceased to exist as a concept, it was an infinity in there, an endlessly stretching line of nothingness. Forever she would walk a dead world alone. Should she fall, the world would force her to continue that march down an endless spiral.