THE CRIMSON BITCH : LEVEL 12

DAY 217 : A-DAY, FOURTHWEEK, GAIA, YEAR 1

ARENA 7 : ROUND 9 : FINAL FOUR

[ NEW ACHIEVEMENT MILESTONE: 3 ]

That’s right. I changed my name again.

Piss was living up to her own name by herselfing me off so much, that I decided to take it back.

So, until further notice, this is what I’m going by. That much, at least, is according to plan.

What I never planned on was going out in public while my name was like this. I wasn’t going to watch any of the tournament matches. I was purposefully avoiding the whole thing until I could compete myself.

But Darreck convinced me easily enough. “They’re great tickets. Not as great as the view from the arena floor I’m sure. But it’ll do you some good to see a match for yourself.”

So here we are.

Not that I was paying attention one way or the other, but I realize I’ve never actually been to Central’s quintessential Central District as soon as I notice the walls and ceiling of the main Free Zone Tunnel. The entire expansive underground hallway is plastered with animated promos of the four remaining Tournament guilds. Both matches will be happening today, one after another, in the main arena itself. Which makes sense. Everyone knows that any real tournament doesn’t truly begin until the quarterfinals. So it would be silly of them to relegate either of the semifinal matches to a mere sideshow.

I get that. I do. But that doesn’t make me any less unreasonably impatient about the whole thing.

It takes long enough to walk to The Arena’s main plaza, with The Tower dwarfing it all in the background. My frustration mounts as we move past the local spawnpoint, and I suddenly remember the days and weeks and months of new towns and things. And underpinning it all was the constant effort of getting to know a bunch of jerks who I naively thought were my friends… It’s a bad memory. I have real friends now, so I can tell the difference.

Still, it’s in a distinct funk that I follow Darreck on autopilot past the line of NPCs and Heroes and whatnot, through the VIP entrance, and into our admittedly amazing seats. We’ve got a full view of both team’s starting positions, not to mention perfect sightlines to the point in the middle where most of the action is bound to happen.

Almost as soon as we sit down, shorter Skyscrapers than average for Central, but dwarfing almost any from precollapse Earth, shoot up from the ground.

Which itself changes from the glass-like grid of the default arena, to an urban mix of cement and metal.

Paint that didn’t exist a moment before, precisely splashes across the entire street, resolving into liberally painted directions for driving, stopping, and parking vehicles that themselves neither have, nor ever will, exist.

That’s apparently the cue for the loudest man that’s ever lived, to scream into my ear. “IT’S THAT TIME OF YEAR AGAIN!!! ROUND NINE!!! SEMIFINALS!!! LAST CHANCE FOR AN UPSET!!! SO WHO’S IT GONNA BE??? THE REIGNING CHAMPIONS… OR THIS YEAR’S DARK HORSE???”

“THE ADVEEENTURER’S GUIIILD???”

Over half the crowd applauds. Except they don’t. It’s far too synchronized for that.

“OR THE GOOOOD BOOOYS???”

What the remaining fraction of the audience lacks in numbers, it more than makes up for in enthusiasm as they BURST into, I’m pretty sure, every kind of encouragement that exists. Applauding and cheers, obviously. And plenty of culturally significant variations on those besides. They’re even throwing things into the arena. Including all kinds of ratty underpants. Also a disproportionate amount of what look to be pre-chewed tennis balls.

But tawdry or not, all approval-based projectiles get zapped like bugs by the arena itself just as they would otherwise cross the invisible barrier separating seats from battlefield.

I snort. “The Good Boys? What kind of dumbass name…” I trail off as I notice the barely-concealed glares from a few nearby audience members whose day I seem to have instantly ruined.

Darreck pats me on the shoulder. “They’re the underdogs. They’re also actual dogs. Or at least they were before they came here and transitioned to human bodies. It’s a guild made entirely of puppies who died saving their owners. What they lack in strategy and tactics, they more than make up for in persistence. And their likability factor is through the roof.” Darreck actually tears up a little. “They just want their masters back.”

Blue shrinks into her seat.

Unlike Green and Yellow, who say the same thing, at the same time, in the same way. “Aaawe…”

I point around to the crowd in general. “So what was with all that? If they’re all so popular, how come so few of the audience is on their side?”

Darreck shrugs. “You know as well as I do. The Adventurer’s Guild is widely regarded as the best for a reason.”

“Because they say so?”

“Rude.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” I lower my voice to sound more secretive. “WHY..?”

“Two reasons. The first is the sheer size of the organization you’re dismissing. Nearly all of the audience who didn’t cheer for The Good Boys will be Adventurer’s Guild members, here to get contribution points for supporting them in an official match. The second reason is the sheer trial-by-fire nature of the guild’s Ascension Tournament Team. Nobody’s gone through more than those eight to get where they’re standing. They’ve all been working at it for centuries, if not millennia. Only a few of them for that long, mind you. But what they are, one and all, is hungry. Starving, even.”

“I’m sorry… For real this time. That actually wasn’t at all what I was assuming.” But they’re all so surly standing over there like that. “Then what’s got their panties in a twist? They should be on top of the world right now. I definitely would be if I was two matches away from ascending.”

“Not at all. They’re up against the top talent of all the independant guilds. Over the last few months, all sixteen of them have won eight times in a row, against eight teams of eight Heroes in their exact same shoes, just to get this far. The Adventurer’s Guild may be favored to win the match. But the other side is no less desperate for victory. And no less qualified to achieve it. Well, maybe a little less… There aren’t enough Good Boys to make their Tournament Team anywhere near as competitive. At least not compared to the top of The Big Four. Regardless, For both sides, I imagine this will prove to be their most stressful match of the year.”

“So then what about the finals?”

“They don’t count.”

“What? Why don’t they count? Wait, Aren’t we watching that too?”

“Why would we… Oh.” But he doesn’t get any further with whatever excuse he has not to bother scoring Finals tickets.

Instead, the match starts.

[ 3 ]

“THREE!!!”

[ 2 ]

“TWO!!!”

[ 1 ]

“ONE!!!”

[ 0 ]

What seems like every single person, including the ones I came here with, even Blue, joins with the announcer to yell one final word. “FFFIIIGHT!!!”

Immediately, one of The Good Boys shoots down the main boulevard, past the construction zone bordering each starting location, towards their opponents in a burst of blue wind while the rest of them fork off adjoining streets to spread out in every other direction.

“AND THERE GOES CAR CATCHER!!!”

The Adventurer’s Guild team starts walking as one, if lackadaisically, around their own adjoining construction site and straight down that same boulevard.

“-ONCE MORE FLAUNTING A TOTAL LACK OF ANY AND ALL COMPETITIVE-”

Before the announcer can finish his sentence, one of the alleged uncompetitives takes out a sniper rifle and shoots it straight downwards. Besides making a full-on crater in the concrete right next to where her teammates are walking, this launches her above even the tallest nearby building, leaving a similar, yet completely alien trail of rapidly cooling plasma in her wake.

“-AND ZEPHYR MAKES THE FIRST MOVE!!!”

Once she establishes sightlines with the speeding former dog, Zephyr shoots upwards and away from the obvious target. Then left. Then down, right, and left again to repeat the whole thing, only faster. With each shot, a little bit of leftover plasma from the recoil coalesces around both the sniper, and her sniper.

A few rotations later, she’s spinning like a bullet herself to careen down the main street, straight for Car Catcher.

Before the latter can get anywhere near her teammates, the former shoots straight down, leaving another crater right in front of where Car Catcher is running.

He trips. The fall proves even worse than I thought as one leg goes all the way down, through the crater itself, and into the sewer that not only did the arena apparently bother to render, but that Zephyr then shot straight through.

Did she mean to do that?

From just above Car Catcher, all the energy around Zephyr discharges. Not downwards. But instead, to the right.

Almost a full mile down the adjoining street, another former dog explodes as though run over by a train.

“FIRST BLOOD IS TAKEN, AND COLLIE, IS, OUTA HERE!!!”

As soon as Car Catcher tripped, one of the group of seven jumped toward them, ahead of the rest, and started winding up a punch.

Now, still nowhere near where Car Catcher is stumbling to rise, the man nonetheless unleashes a clearly well-practiced jab straight towards the far-off stumbling figure.

Reality warps as a literal locamotive barrels out of his extended arm. In what I have to assume is a deeply customizable Skill, the old-timey, wooden, coal-powered, bullet train speeds down the street, gradually burying itself in the road to run down the man not quite yet risen up to ground level.

All that’s left is a roughly train-shaped groove scooped out of the intervening concrete like so much ice cream.

“-AND THE TRAIN FIST CHUGGA GHUGGAS RIGHT OVER CAR CATCHER!!! THIS DOESN’T LOOK TOO GOOD FOR THE BOYS!!!”

That’s when a tennis ball plunks against the head of one of the six remaining… No, the slowly walking Adventurer’s Guild group is down to four. Why-

The tennis ball explodes.

“WHATS THIS???”

Three of them jump away in time.

The middle one isn’t quite so fast. The blast doesn’t kill her. But she’s not looking too great.

Before I can do more than fruitlessly pause time for a few minutes to come out even more confused than the previous instant, I spot out where one of the others just went.

A sword erupts in prismatic fire a few blocks over. The fact that it immediately grabs everyone’s attention says something about the sheer spectacle of the thing.

The red-armored man holding it brings his sword down in a single perfect swing. Through nothing.

Elsewhere, a dog dies.

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

“THAT’S IT FOR FETCH!!!”

The swordsman lifts his weapon still gushing with prismatic flame. He pivots. He shifts his posture. Nothing actually happens to him. Nonetheless, his entire presence seems to somehow flatten.

I’ve never seen anything like it outside of stylized animation.

His sword goes through something like a solar flare in a familiarly attention-grabbing way.

He swings.

“OOOH, AND LADYBIRD TOO!!!”

From the entire other side of Gigalopolis Zone, one of the former dogs in a mailman’s outfit jumps above the city and activates what I have to assume is a Legendary Skill.

From the furthest up and back in that direction you could go and still technically be ‘inside’ the arena, a man spreads his arms.

Then it rains.

Airplanes.

It rains airplanes.

All kinds of them. There’s Cargo planes, passenger planes, private jets, actual jets, and everything in between.

“AND HERE WE HAVE OUTSIDE’S LEGENDARY FINISHER!!!”

The crowd ooo’s and aaah’s, and especially ooo’s when three different models of passenger planes and a military bomber crash into, and subsequently collapse, the two tallest towers.

“YIKES, I DON’T KNOW IF THEY THOUGHT OF THAT WHEN THIS ROUND’S LAYOUT WAS DECIDED!!!”

As for the aircraft that actually reach the ground, one gets punched through with a much more heavily armored train than the one I saw before.

Another’s wing gets clipped off by a skyscraper.

Another gets cut in half by the prismatic fire swordsman. No, wait. Not a swordsman. A samurai. He has a katana and everything. I never noticed because it still hasn’t stopped shining like he’s in the middle of a finishing move that never actually finishes.

The world speeds up.

What?

Oh. I’m hyperventilating.

I hold my breath. It’s only then, thanks to my equalibrium’s reliable consistency during paused time, that I notice just how hard my heart is midway through pounding.

I try to calm myself.

It kind of works. At least I eventually feel like I can breathe normally enough to watch the samurai do just what I wish I could do, right where I wish I could do it.

As soon as I finish waiting to exhale, the plane that just lost a wing finishes crashing right on top of the woman who never quite recovered from taking an explosive tennis ball to the face.

“LUMBERJILL DOWN!!!”

The entire audience cheers.

Especially the Adventurer’s Guild members.

Now why…

A blood tornado comes to life right underneath the plane summoner.

But moments later, he’s not the only one caught in it.

In addition to the former dog himself, another man, along with about twenty actual dogs, gets sucked up in the torrent.

“MISTER PATTERSON!!!”

Between the tornado and the wreckage, the formerly pristine city is a scene of pure chaos.

But Zephyr isn’t bothered by that. Having dodged and shot through several planes before they went down, she flies up alongside the tornado. With her apparently infinite-ammo sniper, she alternately shoots a dog, and propels herself around the localized apocalyptic disaster to line up her next target.

OH NO, HER ENHANCED PEEPERS ARE LETTING HER PEPPER THE PUPPER’S PUPPERS LIKE JALAPEÑO POPPERS-AAAH!!!”

A moment of silence.

“SORRY FOLKS!!! BIT MY TONGUE PRETTY BAD THERE…” Another few moments later, he seems to catch up with the action. “OUTSIDE AND MISTER PATTERSON ARE FINISHED!!! IT’S A BLOODY PUPPY MASACRE IN THE CITY RUINS THIS ROUND!!!”

Only two former dogs are left.

One small man sits in some kind of minigun-mounted hover-chair on top of a building in the middle of the city.

From atop another across the street, a huge werewolf jumps to land straight on one of the Adventurer’s Guild members who just got crashed into by a plane.

When the discharge of debris and dust clears from where the huge bearlike biped landed, he’s holding the man in glowing armor like a wooden plank. His eyes seem to flash as the Good Boy breaks the guy over his knee. And then he does it again. And again, each time more vicious and desperate than the last.

The not-quite-physical armor cracks. Then shatters. Then regenerates.

The relentless beating doesn’t seem to have much staying power before the chair-mounted Good Boy points all his guns at the magically armored man far below and unloads everything.

Said man takes some damage. That much is clear.

But then a meteor comes down on both dogs.

And a bombing run someone called in.

And a self-bending laser.

And an ethereal slash.

And a train.

And several sniper rounds.

“-AN EXPLOSIVE FINISH FOR FLUFFERS AND HAWKING SENDS THE GOOD BOYS OUT OF THIS YEAR’S TOURNAMENT, AND THE CHAMPS TO THE FINALS, IN STYLE!!!”

I’m stunned at the power on display. I don’t know how else to put it.

Could I do stuff like… That? I mean I can deal some crazy close-up damage. Even designed my whole build around it. But I’m noticing a distinct tendency towards ranged combat that I never quite saw from attacks by Monsters in the dungeons of Outset or Interior.

I’m not entirely sure I could take any of The Adventurer’s Guild’s tournament team in a straight fight. Maybe that armor guy? If I shattered his shield with one sword, I could probably hit his chewy interior with my other one before the crunchy bit regenerated. But, like, I don’t even have the tools to reach Sniper Lady. Zephyr would obliterate me in any fight where we weren’t trapped together in a three-foot cube. And where would I even get one of those?

I sneak a look over at Darreck. But should I… Well, I mean I could. But I was gonna wait. At least there’s no harm in shopping…

For the first time in months, I open my skill list and immediately register the fruit of all my restraint. Five entire unspent Skill Points. It brings a tear to my eye.

And then I have to go and fantasize about all the stuff I could do if I was ready to commit to anything right now.

But when I eventually do, I’ve gotta go for some kind of projectile deflection. And if I’m gonna have enough Skill Points by Level 16, I really do need to start working towards-

[ COMMON CORE PASSIVE: UNSEGMENTED SPINE — CONFIRM PURCHASE? ]

Not now, god damn it!

I dismiss the prompt, once more relieved that spending limited resources, at least, is gated by a confirmation window.

Seeming to have other things on his mind, Darreck belatedly winces. “Oof. Bad news for Lumberjill.”

“What? They won.” Which reminds me… “Oh yeah, why did her own guild cheer when she died?”

“Double oof… How much do you know about The Adventurer’s guild’s contribution points system.”

“That it has one?”

“Triple oof. Okay, so the top eight unascended guild members, at least in terms of lifetime contribution points, are automatically slated for the tournament team. That doesn’t mean you’re kicked off if you fall behind. Once you’re in, you’re in. Your eligibility only gets reevaluated when you die in a match.”

“Well damn…”

“Yeah…”

“So she’s, like, out forever?”

Darreck shrugs. “Probably not. Even if being on the Tournament Team doesn’t earn you much in the way of points in and of itself, Lumberjill had the requisite amount not too long ago. I imagine we’ll see her again in a few years once her totals eclipse those of someone else who died in a match.”

Yellow rolls her eyes. “Assuming she doesn’t retire already.”

“Yeah, I was thinking that. Hell of a time to be booted out.”

Green looks inquisitively over. “Oh? Is it their turn to win next year then?”

“Year after that. Frost Kingdom next year. Then the guilds get a turn.”

I can’t take it anymore. “Turn? How can they have a turn? It’s a tournament.”

Everyone looks at each other.

Eventually, Yellow breaks the silence. “Wanna bet on the next round?”

“Like… In three weeks?”

“No, no. The next fight. Today. Fire Nation versus Archive.”

“Alright, I’ll take The Fire Nation. How much you wanna bet?”

Piss looks suddenly herselfed. “No you won’t. I’m proving a point over here. If you don’t bet on the guild, you’re basically just admitting I’m right.”

“I admit nothing. Everyone got up and left as soon as the ‘reigning champions’ won. And that title doesn’t even make sense if there wasn’t some kind of rigged horseshit going on here. Just because I don’t know what it is, doesn’t mean I’m willing to get fleeced about it.”

“Talk about horseshit… I hate your stupid pause button…”

“That’s what’s so great about it.”

As the stands continue to empty, the Gigalopolis Zone seems to experience a localized time reversal.

From what Civetta said about time manipulation being completely off the table in the normal course of things, I don’t think that’s what’s happening.

Nonetheless, the blood disappears from where the tornado splattered everything in sight. Craters and grooves in the street fill back in. Rubble from fallen buildings crumble to dust even as those very buildings are regrown just as fast and effortlessly as when they formed in the first place. Before long, the entire city is just as pristine as when it first formed.

“ALRIGHT Y’ALL, IT’S THE FIRE NATION VERSUS THE ARCHIVE. IF YOU’RE STILL HERE, I’LL ASSUME YOU KNOW THE DEAL, SO LET’S GET THIS OVER WITH!!!”

Green folds her arms. “If they were actually fighting, The Archive would wipe the floor with them.”

Yellow looks askance at her. “How do you figure?”

“Easy. They’ve got more purists.”

I get a distinct flashback of my killer before groaning in resignation. “And what the fuck is a purist.”

Green flinches at the sound of my voice. Almost hesitantly, she flashes me a cheshire grin.

Darreck sighs through the ensuing silence, resigning himself to prevent yet another, otherwise inevitable pissing contest between myself and the lemon-lime twins. “So, when a pop culture creator dies a hero and all that, Heaven gets a massive influx of new Skills and Items and Equipment and things associated with whatever they made. You know, since they’re the ones who came up with those concepts, their knowledge overrides whatever Heaven already ‘knew’.”

He shakes his head. “But I’m getting off track. Being a Purist means that your Subclass and Trade are the same. That’s not something you can do with a Respec. It’s only possible during initial CLASS and CRAFT selection, and only for ones that you personally changed with the knowledge you brought in. That’s why Purists are so valued. It means that not only do they possess a unique affinity to their chosen powerset, but also a normally impossible Skill synergy since all their potential is derived from the same source.

I shmrug. “So then I’m a Purist?”

Darreck blinks. “No. No, I was referring to the royal ‘you’.”

I twitch before immediately remembering the hair color of the guy I’m talking to. “What? No, I mean… I’ve got Anime for both of those. I could swear I told you that…”

“You… Did not.”

Everyone stares at me like I’m crazier than their gaze usually implies.

Even Blue.

I chuckle unconvincingly. “Oh. So it’s a big deal or something?”

Once he gets over his surprise, Darreck looks thoughtful. “Maybe..? You’ve got swords and armor, right? You’re pretty well balanced in that choice, but… You have a Skill that does more damage if you yell out attack names, right?”

“More or less.”

“So what if you had a Communication CRAFT with the same Trade as your Subclass? I’m willing to bet there are voice amplification toggles and passives that could make that damage truly monstrous.”

[ 3 ]

“THREE!!!”

After a lot of soul-searching, I can only come up with one reply. “…Fuck.”

[ 2 ]

“TWO!!!”

[ 1 ]

“ONE!!!”

[ 0 ]

“FFFIIIGHT!!!” The announcer is alone this time.

On that mark, the street underneath the entire fire team flash-boils to an almost liquid concrete slush before erupting in, appropriately enough, fire. Most of it is red. Some is orange, yellow, and even green. The main guy in the center explodes upwards in a white flame that somehow includes all the distinct colors of the rainbow. Oh… It’s prismatic again. It looks different from what was on the samurai dude’s sword. But I guess that probably has more to do with the interactions between all the other Movement Blessings in play.

Over a mile down that same main boulevard, seven of The Archive team members don’t do anything.

One is even lying in bed.

Only the middle guy steps a bit away from the construction site in a distinctly business-like manner.

He clears his throat.

The fact that I can hear him makes me instantly jealous of the voice amplification Skill he must have.

Lifting one foot, he shoots up to the size of a titan. Like an ancient Greek one. The colossal kind.

Only then does he gingerly put his foot down the next block over while casually slapping apart a skyscraper that would otherwise make the space above the street a bit too narrow for his liking.

As he scowls around at the crowd, his eyes land on me.

Only then do I realize I can’t target him. I can see him clearly, but… he’s too far away. Actually, I think I might have to prioritize some Core Skills into ones that boost targeting range. Do those exist?

I check.

They do. Or at least one does. I think one of my five Skill Points will have to go to that. Have I just been lucky that nothing’s used ranged attacks on me?

Like, I can deflect a thrown weapon. But can I do it with an arrow?

Fuck! Why didn’t I ever ask Mich to shoot at me? Not like that was a problem before!

I mean I kind of just assumed it wouldn’t work…

Oh right… I thought he was James. And I was trying to git gud with his advice, but without his help.

Blegh…

The moment I start breathing again, the bearded giant’s scowl resumes deepening as his gaze moves right past me, and over the rest of the crowd. Or more specifically, the lack thereof.

Just as gingerly as with his foot, he gradually bends his neck back into place.

Only then does the giant bearded man’s voice out-perform even this supermassive stadium’s sound system at its loudest. “WE SURRENDER!!!”

His scowl remains even after the match is called.

I can only gape at the giant that I still can’t target. “The fuck is this now?”

I try to ignore Piss and Vinegar as we all leave.

Wait, vinegar isn’t green… Whatever.