Just as Charlotte’s power began to fade, the reinforcements arrived. Once more, the pillar holding up the impending doom flared with power. Images linked arms and pressed their hands against the weight above them. Behind the Knight of the Tide, the waters of the Alpha Cosmos surged and smashed back Pine’s dark subconscious.
They held up the sky. They defied inevitability.
Randidly offered Laplace a Cheshire grin. His Vessel thrummed. “Looks like its just you and me.”
He didn’t wait for the Eternity to answer; Randidly suspected this ancient monster had more counter-attacks than just the steadily worsening pressure Randidly experienced by fighting against more and more of its interior time. So he opened up his Vessel Point screen. Because not only did he need the people of the Alpha Cosmos to act in order to buy him some time…
…but their movements also provided quite a few other benefits, in the form of Skill Level Ups. With more VPs, his own potential would continue to climb.
Congratulations! Your Skill Echoes of a Living Myth (M) has grown to Level 1404!
Congratulations! Your Skill Wake of Miracles (T) has grown to Level 1410!
Congratulations! Your Skill Heralds of the Ghosthound’s Legend (M) has grown to Level 1515!
Congratulations! Your Skill Charisma of the Arch-Heretic (T) has grown to Level 1251!
Congratulations! Your Skill What the Ghosthound Sows, He Will Soon Reap (GD)(U) has grown to Level 1721!
Randidly considered his available Creeds; each represented a slight variation on somewhat similar empowerments. He pressed his lips together. Any answer was fine for now, but he needed to consider the consequences for the Alpha Cosmos of his choice. Both for the stability and for a little extra energy given to the people helping to restrain the weight of the dead, Randidly poured 2000 VPs each into Duty and Harmony.
Then he gritted his teeth and leaned forward. He grasped for the vulnerable core of the Eternity, ignoring the agony in his shaking arms. He shifted his weight. He took another step, forcing back the defensive significance of Laplace. His body creaked and groaned, but he flooded his veins with the sparkling waves of translucent significance his Nether Core produced. His footing remained stable.
Temporal flows slammed against him, but he did not falter.
Congratulations! Your Skill Randildy Ghosthound, Executive of Nether Reborn (GD)(U) has grown to Level 2079!
Do you think you can stop me like this? Randidly stared into the bloody gashes in Laplace’s eyes, their two forms leaning together. Trembling seemed to jump from one to the other, until both bodies buzzed. Randidly Ghosthound’s Grand Fate was a ravenous animal, lashing out and crashing through impediments. With athletic displays, it forged its way forward.
The Eternity housed a steadily worsening avalanche. It threw more and more at the Grand Fate in a desperate attempt to demolish its momentum.
Laplace’s long tongue undulated to the side, then sharpened to a razor point and drilled at Randidly’s chest. He removed a hand from Acri and caught the attack before it could land. The impact disintegrated the last few bits of solid ground beneath the two’s feet, leaving them floating in a churning globe of force.
The hand driving Acri and his image/Grand Fate deeper into Laplace’s body didn’t waver in the slightest. The Grand Fate continued to lope forward, leaping from one portion of the avalanche of time to another, staying abreast of the collapse.
Randidly’s smile widened. He manifested the regal World Tree behind his body, breaking all the chaotic energies mixing in the environment.
Congratulations! Your Skill The First Tree Suffers Only Fealty (P) has grown to Level 1733!
When Yggdrasil pressed down against all the wild kinetic forces, they meekly stilled and showed their submission. That opening was all that Randidly needed; he swirled the powers together into a storm. The storm tightened into a spiral that slammed into Randidly’s back, just as he leaned forward. He exploded, driving Acri just a little bit deeper. The Grand Fate bound up the last third of the distance to its target, glittering amongst the folds of time.
Congratulations! Your Skill Truth Within the Primordial Flux (GD) has grown to Level 1641!
Congratulations! Your Skill Deviation’s Inevitable Machinations (GD) has grown to Level 2001!
A second Skill reached two thousand… and I’m just getting started… Randidly’s eyes flashed. He leaned just a bit more forward. He shoved his way deeper into the temporal pressures of Laplace’s interior and ignored the small tears in his muscles and the grinding noise from his joints.
All his focus narrowed to the churning working in the depths of Laplace, from whence so much of the fabric of time was forever frozen and immortalized.
Yet the last stretch proved to be the most difficult.
Even for his overwhelming physicality, the restrictions began to add up. His movements were sluggish and the environment seemed at the cusp of freezing around him every instant if he didn’t force his way just a little bit deeper. The Grand Fate had to struggle and tear open a path in order to continue. The Nether flowed more quickly through Randidly’s veins, coating the inside of his muscles for a little bit of extra structural integrity. He refused to cease moving.
He swam through molten amber. Every part of his body hurt. His grip tightened on Acri. He drove his weapon deeper and deeper, using the tip of the spear to nudge open the dense waves of calcified time. Suspended in the depths of Laplace, Randidly suppressed the urge to laugh. At this point, buddy, you are less of a spear and more of a key…
Keep moving. Keep advancing. Only then…
Only by pushing forward…!
His muscles cried out for a break as the dense waves of time and stifling Nether continued to constrict his movements. Randidly pressed his Grand Fate deeper, digging into the small opening created by Acri’s tip. The weapon trilled with joy, given the opportunity to pierce so deep. But Randidly felt his momentum slowing, with his target still with a last gulf to cross. His emerald eyes narrowed.
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Songstress… set the mood.
Randidly’y entire face was briefly lost in a spreading event horizon. And from those inhospitable depths arose an aria of pure longing. For every moment that Randidly and every other individual in the Alpha Cosmos had felt strange, unusual, too-much, abandoned, isolated, and miserable… the Songstress of Absence loosed thunderous notes. She sang with her whole being. She wished to exist, she wished to be accepted, she wished she wasn’t a monster.
The universe flinched before that raw vulnerability. For a brief moment, that gilded song at the restrictions around them, allowing Randidly to advance marginally further.
Yggdrasil, prepare the stage.
An infinite number of roots converged on Randidly’s position. All the trees in the Nexus ceded their authority and donated their vast root systems. Randidly became a knot at the middle of a massive convergence of roots. They anchored themselves in the core of his being and then spun out in a helix, following the small passage created by Acri. The deft points of the roots found their way forward and then rapidly thickened. Thousands of roots followed the guiding actions of Yggdrasil, layering themselves into thick walls that prevented any interference. Laplace’s interior Nether screamed in protest.
Yet the World Tree blazed with light and darkness, genesis and exodus. Dawn and dusk filtered through its thick canopy. It could support an entire universe. It could also open up a single corridor.
It could provide the foundation for a rebirth of universal proportions.
And Tiamat. Let’s advance toward the finale, shall we?
Tiamat, Dread Chimera and Grey Fear growled, containing all of Randidly’s darkness. All of the Alpha Cosmos’s fears. It was a monster honed from a thousand desperate, life-or-death struggles. The humanoid form stood in that gleaming corridor of roots, its knuckles raw and its eyes bloodshot. With a sniff, it knew how close it had come to its goal. It leaned forward and exploded into motion, already salivating. It spread out grey wings and glided toward the destination, gaining speed as the Eternity felt genuine dread.
The corridor seemed to swell as those wings and the doom they promised became almost inevitable. He closed in on Laplace’s Core, only an arm’s length away.
Randidly’s three images crashed against a final barrier. Randidly’s organs curled in on themselves from the rebound. Acri’s tip skittered across its surface, unable to find purchase despite the significant image power behind him.
And as his momentum stalled out, the temporal folds swam around him in determined circles. His Grand Fate furiously swelled and began healing the flows of time, but just as quickly more twisted currents arrived. Randidly heard the blood pounding in his ears. His body leaned closer to Laplace, but his consciousness had sunk deeply into the Eternity. Right in front of him, beyond that core barrier, lay Laplace’s animus. It glittered and pulsed, almost taunting him with its proximity. In its pulsing folds, he saw so many fascinating patterns.
Randidly barred his teeth and drew power together for one more attempt.
“You cannot yet take the last step,” Laplace said in a low, triumphant tone. “Just like all others, the door to godhood is barred to you.”
“I do not need to be a god to end you,” Randidly growled back. Kinetic force swirled into his agonized muscles. He felt hundreds of small ruptures in his arms and legs but didn’t have the spare attention for them. He was so close.
Laplace’s laugh rippled out through even his calcified time. “Perhaps eventually. But now, here, before your people are obliterated by the weight of your expectations? You will fail.”
Randidly’s mind raced for a second, searching for an answer as he readjusted his stance. He bent his knees, fingers tightening even further on Acri; his entire being narrowed to methods to produce explosive power to crack open this shell. Yet just as his panic began to congeal in his chest, he smoothed it away. His eyes were clear.
“If you haven’t felt it, it’s difficult to comprehend the power of an entire universe. They are… not that feeble.” Randidly said, just as much to himself as to Laplace. He felt his Vessel stir in response. He felt a psychological connection click into place. “They don’t always need me to protect them from every threat.”
His heart tightened as he felt the Alpha Cosmos roaring out their defiance. They were a smaller universe, one born in Randidly’s body and developed only over decades. Yet at their height, they pulsed with enough power to hold back the darkness of the Nexus.
In answer to their efforts, Randidly felt his Creeds resonating in his body. They were the new Soul of the Alpha Cosmos, the disposition that would shape its development. He felt the steely weight of Duty in his bones. He felt the fire of Vengeance in his stomach. He felt the cool tingling sensation of harmony as the individuals combined their images. He felt Tolerance, enduring the crushing weight of another universe’s festering subconscious.
Randidly pivoted, preparing for another Acri thrust. His three images stirred, gathering up their remnant powers from opening the path to create a battering ram and break down this last door-
The Alchemist stilled. He drew Randidly’s attention to the precise word usage that Laplce had just used. Just like all others, the door to godhood is barred to you.
Randidly’s emerald pupils dilated. He purposefully let his mind turn over the details of his current situation. His perspective began to shift. It’s all about shapes and roles. Anything can be a doorway. The way the people of the outer multiverse talk about the Pinnacle is reaching a threshold and either becoming the door, to create a new universe, or stepping through it, for a single moment to ascend to the height of power.
Congratulations! Your Skill Alpha Cosmos Births a Shallah (S) has grown to Level 1516!
He did not follow through with his thrust. Time constricted around him, but Randidly ignored it. Flicking his wrist, he signaled to Acri to slither up his arm and to its usual resting place at his waist. The plant weapon hummed in confusion but obeyed. Randidly stretched out his left hand and pressed his palm up against that last barrier.
He released a breath. I am blind to Truth. Truth is the resonance that would guide me to the point where I could make that decision… but technically I am not barred from the Pinnacle. I will just pass it by without sensing its proximity.
Congratulations! Your Skill Alpha Cosmos Births a Shallah (S) has grown to Level 1539!
But isn’t the Pinnacle also just a shape? Randidly’s gaze sharpened. The trembling in his body worsened as his stillness allowed the physical erosion to intensify. Even the Vessel of Randidly Ghosthound began to buckle and fail against the core defenses of Laplace. Yet his only response was to spend the VPs he had been able to gather with recent Skill Levels, 2000 to Vengeance and 2000 to Tolerance.
His flesh relaxed by a small degree, allowing him to endure just a little more. Randidly leaned forward. The fire in his belly was banked, filling him with heat and conviction. Randidly flexed his splayed-out fingers. Isn’t it enough… that I know at the moment I’m standing upon a powerful threshold? All I need to do now-
Randidly Ghosthound drew out his Alchemist’s Passport, the evolved version of his first Fate. He flicked the Fate once, reverting it back to its original form: the Philosopher’s Key. He thrust his right hand forward, driving this ‘weapon’ into the threshold and twisting.
Congratulations! Your Skill Alpha Cosmos Births a Shallah (S) has grown to Level 1600!
His senses were numbed by the pressure, but Randidly lingered in the strain, even as his Vessel wore down. He searched, struggling to keep his hand steady as he sensed the small little snags in existence. Sweat dripped down his brow and evaporated underneath the dangerous kinetic forces.
With a sigh, the key slid into a lock that felt perfectly mundane to Randidly. But he knew he was on the right track when the fundamental fabric of space and time around him stilled. The corner of his mouth twisted upward. He turned the key.
The door cracked open in a starburst of significance and brilliant energy.