~~~Stanley~~~
The freed humans sprinted into the street, and Stanley made his own break for freedom...
MOVE
He didn't even make it across the street.
Stanley felt it coming, his premonition screaming a far too short warning. Because it all happened in the same instant. Hundreds, or thousands, of hooks stabbed into his soul...
Debuff Resisted: [Soul Cage]
Debuff Resisted: [Soul Cage]
Debuff Resisted: [Soul Cage]
...
Debuff Partially Resisted: [Soul Cage]
Debuff Partially Resisted: [Soul Cage]
Debuff Partially Resisted: [Soul Cage]
...
Debuff: [Soul Cage]
There was no time in between the attacks, no time to react or respond. One moment he was flying free, and the next, he'd already been attacked more times than he could count.
He slammed to a stop in midair, held in place by a web of soul magic, hopelessly and helplessly tangled in the center. No!
I AM FREE
Stanley raged and threw every bit of his power against the magic holding him.
Debuff Removed: [Soul Cage]
It worked! The entangling threads loosened and slipped away from his soul. Yes! Go...
Debuff Resisted: [Soul Cage]
Debuff Resisted: [Soul Cage]
Debuff Resisted: [Soul Cage]
...
Debuff Partially Resisted: [Soul Cage]
Debuff Partially Resisted: [Soul Cage]
Debuff Partially Resisted: [Soul Cage]
...
Debuff: [Soul Cage]
Like a tsunami of death, the web crashed back around him. This time, it took fewer attempts to break through his resistance. Not that it mattered when it all happened so fast...
Caffeine was growling and standing up in his lap, and Stanley used the sight of him to fuel his rage. The thought of anything hurting the little pug was plenty enraging. After everything they'd been through to get here... After all the pain and suffering Caffeine had endured for him in this hell... It was more than enough for a healthy rage.
I. AM. FREE!
It almost worked.
Debuff Removed: [Soul Cage]
He got free, but the skeleton appeared at the same time. Out of nowhere, it was suddenly in front of him and swinging for his face with a glowing skeletal hand.
Caffeine grew to fill Stanley's vision in an instant. Because... of course he did. Because of course he took the hit. Because of course he paid the price for Stanley's weakness.
CUT
His will shattered against and through a glowing force field surrounding the skeleton.
CUT
He carved a smooth line through half of its skull.
CUT
He removed its head from the spine.
BREAK
He shattered the skull into dust.
SHATTER
He shattered the upper body.
D...
His world went white with pain.
...
When Stanley opened his eyes again, he was hanging in the air between skyscrapers with his arms and legs stretched out and restrained. It wasn't only his soul this time; now he had even more magic wrapping his body into immobility.
Caffeine was nearby, fighting against the skeleton while trying to free Stanley from his chains.
Because they were chains. Dozens of glowing magic chains stretched from each of his limbs and around his neck, tethering him to a massive circle of light in the sky above and its mirror on the ground below. A circle that spanned an entire city block...
Caffeine used the chains as springboards while he bounded away from pursuing magic. At least when he wasn't tearing them apart with his teeth.
Just like before, the pug was eating the magic, and Stanley joined in.
FREE
Lightning burned through his body and mind, frying synapses and rattling his body to the breaking point, even as less than half the chains fell away.
FREE
More lightning burned. More chains fell.
It didn't matter. For every chain he broke free of, two more materialized... and they all tightened further around his flesh. Stanley didn't let that stop him, even when the chains felt like live wires against his flesh.
His brain was frying and his vision was narrowing as he resorted to cutting the chains one by one.
More lightning raged through him... and he cut them faster. In twos and threes. Even as his vision started graying out from the strangling, electrocuting chains...
Stanley saw without a doubt that he was losing, and he clawed at that glowing crack in his soul desperately. Give me the power! He only needed a few seconds. One second. Just enough to wipe this fucking monster from existence! Please!
The power refused to come to him, no matter how hard he strained. No matter how much he raged and begged. It hovered just out of his reach.
Then it no longer mattered when Caffeine got caught.
A bubble snapped closed around the pug, a spinning, size-shifting bubble that held Caffeine trapped and helpless in the air.
Stanley immediately redirected his power against the bubble, only to get a skeletal hand glowing with green light across his face. There were some crunching sounds to accompany the sparkling lights in his head... and everything went away for a bit.
"At last," a raspy voice breathed in the ensuing silence. "You are quite the spirited duo, and I must thank you for obliging me by sitting still for so long. Though I had not expected you did so to rank up... A bold strategy. But ultimately futile."
Stanley opened his eyes as the skeleton walked slowly around him, striding through the air to stand on nothing in front of him. Behind it, Caffeine was alternately sprinting in random directions while ballooning through a variety of different sizes, ranging from multi-story building height to fitting in the palm of your hand. All of it in silence, and all of it failing to break the bubble.
The skeleton followed his gaze and smiled. Well, technically, it was a skull and so already smiling, but something in its voice gave away the amusement. "Yes, the beast lord is a fantastic specimen. How you ever managed to bind it to yourself is a mystery... unless you would care to shed light on the matter?"
CUT
His power carved a line through one side of its skull and straight through that psycho black pit that was its eye!
It only sighed as the damage vanished. "I suppose that was on me. I shouldn't have expected more from one of the savage races."
Three of its hands moved then. The fourth remained still, pointing toward Caffeine with a glowing string of magic connecting to the sphere around the pug. So that was what Stanley hit next.
CUT
Rather than regrowing a new limb, this time the severed arm stayed unmoving in the air while it regrew and reconnected. The magic didn't even waver...
"This will hurt," the skeleton said, and then slammed one hand into Stanley's chest. Deep into his chest.
It did hurt.
Quite a lot.
Debuff: [Soul Intrusion]
Along with the pain and notification, Stanley's vision tunneled into darkness until he abruptly found himself back in the void and looking upon the fucked-up mess that was his soul.
The skeleton was in here with him... which couldn't be a good sign.
It looked just like it did outside as it stood still and stared at his soul in shock. It actually sounded horrified when it whispered, "What have you done to your soul?"
Fuck you! Stanley screamed at it but found himself even more limited in here than he was outside. Even the chains had followed, and his voice was nothing more than an angry, useless thought.
The skeleton ignored him and floated inside the misshapen orb that was his soul. That was definitely not ideal.
It was only after it vanished inside that Stanley saw Lee peeking around the orb. Lee, run! Only... this was their soul. There was nowhere else to run. Lee, help!
"I'm working on it," Lee whispered, and ducked back out of sight.
The sight of his brother—albeit only a blob of consciousness that he knew was his twin—plus the sound of his voice gave Stanley renewed hope. Fragile hope, but hope nonetheless.
He found that he could still move somewhat in this place despite the chains and followed the monster into his soul, where he found it staring around the less horrible shelter at the center of their being.
"I see," it finally said, while looking down at the little pug standing on the glowing crack and growling at the intruding monster. "So that is why you didn't attempt to use the source against me... Perhaps you're not a total fool."
Good boy! Stanley thought at Caffeine. And fuck you, you fucking piece of shit! he thought at the monster. As for what it was talking about... he didn't know. He had totally tried to use the source against this fuckface! It was right there, just out of reach behind that glowing crack.
"Such a crude thing you have done here. Yet... this should have been impossible. It remains impossible. So I suppose some credit is due... Well done, human." It sounded proud of him.
Fuck you and fuck your fucking face! Get the fuck out of my soul!
"As I said, crude." Now it sounded disappointed in him. As if Stanley gave a flying fuck what it thought!
"But thanks to your efforts, I believe I will be able to improve upon your creation. I will simply need to remove the beast from your control..." It said that while staring down at the growling Caffeine, who still hadn't moved from where he stood atop the crack in their soul.
The words sent a chill through Stanley and cooled his rage. Slightly. Why are you doing this? Why even come after me?
It started weaving a new spell. Slowly. "You will likely not survive the extraction, but I am not above educating the lesser races when the opportunity presents. Of course, you must know why I am here? The system has surely informed you that your acquisition of a source was a mistake. Such power is not meant to reside in the clutches of monsters."
"Now, had you joined us, as was offered, this would have been a very different conversation. Alas, it is too late for that now. The high lords themselves dispatched me to come here and claim this source for the eternal march."
What makes you any different from me? Stanley railed at it. You guys have killed more people than any of us. How are we the monsters here!?
"We do not feed directly upon the souls of other monsters. We do not corrupt ourselves in such a way." That was some absolute bullshit coming from these corruption dealers... It also sounded like a belief. The kind of crazy you can't argue with.
This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.
So Stanley changed the subject, hoping for a clue. What did you mean about me not using the source against you? You're strong, but not strong enough to survive that. Why would you even attack me if you knew about it?
It eyed him, and Stanley finally realized that he was sensing its soul. Maybe because it was literally inside him, or for some other reason. Either way, it was no longer hidden. It was also looking down on him—the condescending prick!
"There is much you do not know. An F-grade wielding a source is a threat, yes. But your limits were deduced and defined well before I was ever dispatched to retrieve it. The risk you posed to myself was deemed minimal. Even as an E-grade."
"What are you doing to me?" Stanley demanded in frustration. He couldn't do anything in here; he couldn't even attack the bastard. All he could feel of himself or the outside world was from his domain. He couldn't feel his body, but his domain could.
It was weird. Like it was no longer his own flesh...
"My orders were to retrieve the source, or at least to contain it, until we establish the eternal march upon this world." It didn't look at him as it spoke, and it kept weaving a nasty-looking spell with three of its hands the entire time. "I suspect yourself and the beast will make the process of containment a difficult proposal."
God damn right, we will! The bastard was still hovering right in front of his body in the real world, well within his domain. It had to be... since it had one hand buried inside his chest.
"So I have decided to expedite the process by removing your connection to the beast."
No, no, no! Stanley struggled futilely against his restraints, both in his soul and in the real world. If he...
The skeleton raised one hand, now wreathed in raging streams of awful green light. "Right... here..." It swung down with that terrible blade of light.
Caffeine entered his domain back in the real world. His massive form loomed into view at the same time that the little version of him inside their soul grew to match and took a step.
The glowing crack fluctuated, splitting wider the instant his paws moved, flaring brighter than the sun as Caffeine clamped his jaws shut over the top half of the skeleton. Both inside their soul and in the real world.
Its spell lashed out sideways from the original target as the monster screamed, and Stanley only got to enjoy the sound for the briefest of instants.
Because the source roaring out of the crack filled his mind with the power he needed. It illuminated the world, casting everything into stark relief. It shone a light over and through the fabric of reality.
In the light of that power, Stanley saw the skeleton and the countless threads that ran from it, stretching across the city in an unbreakable web of power that would keep this monster alive no matter what he did.
He saw the chains stretching up from the massive magic circle and trapping him here... He also saw its spell lashing out inside his soul.
There was a choice over what to do with the source. A single instant to aim the power as it swelled inside him.
Stop the spell, or kill the origin of it. The spell was bad news; he knew that much. But he also doubted it would kill him... at least, not immediately.
There were also the chains. He could destroy the circle and free himself... only would that really matter? The monster was faster than him. A whole grade higher. Running wasn't an option anymore. He had to fight.
Stanley was pissed off. He was angry that this monster hunted him down. That it ran him to ground and then waited for him to pop back out. That it talked down to him. Looked down on him. That it thought itself better...
So he went for the throat. Stanley hit the skeleton, ready to burn it to ash, ready to burn down all those little threads that were poised to bring the monster back.
His attack never reached its target.
Instead, it slammed into a barrier. A shield that only appeared the moment he attacked. One powered by source...
It wasn’t quite the same as what Stanley threw at it. It was weak. A source shield that couldn't stand against his own source. But it slowed his attack as he burned through the shield. It stopped him from killing the monster in that instant. An instant too long...
The skeleton's unleashed spell struck his soul.
Caffeine screamed along with Stanley from where he stood once more atop the fluctuating crack in their soul. A crack that flickered and danced like a squirming snake as sparks zipped out like lightning bolts... Caffeine's shadow caught all of them even as he howled in outraged agony through clenched teeth that refused to release the monster caught between them.
Stanley barely saw any of that. All of it was happening far away. Far, far away from the pain that was his new reality.
He'd thought he knew what real pain was. He had thought he could deal with any new form of agony, but he'd never felt anything like this.
The burns and dismemberments. The knife in his heart. All those soul attacks he'd endured... all the unpleasant aches and clawing spells... none of them held a candle to this white-hot blade of magic as it carved a bloody hole through his soul. As it ripped a jagged wound through his very being. Tore right through every bit of what made him... him.
Outside, Caffeine howled along with Stanley. The pug howled with screaming outrage while the skeleton's bones reformed and healed as if nothing had happened. While it flicked more magic at Caffeine and trapped his body within another bubble. While it stood undaunted with a single hand still buried in Stanley's chest.
Then the noise of Caffeine's howl shifted. The tone dropped. The anger sounded through.
The balance of power shifted.
Out in the real world, the bubble shattered from around Caffeine, and he turned into a streak of gray as he started biting the skeleton's head off. Just like he had with the zombie...
Stanley saw that happening while simultaneously watching the pug inside his soul wrestle with the skeleton that had invaded the sanctum of their being.
It wasn't enjoying the experience, going by the screams and insults it hurled at the pug from within Caffeine's jaws. But it also didn't relent as gleaming white teeth dug deeper and deeper holes in its form, and its one free hand was already starting to glow with the light of that same terrible magic.
Lee appeared out of nowhere while Caffeine fought, and he ignored the battle to approach the horrifying new hole in their soul that was even now spewing out a continuous stream of... something.
Glowing symbols flew from his brother as he stood before the wound. Some symbols landed beside the hole and gleamed brighter, while others fizzled out on contact.
Stanley didn't know what his brother was doing, but he knew they had to do something. There were no notifications in here, and he could only imagine what they were saying. Whatever it was, he knew it wasn't anything good. He could feel something leaking out... could feel something being lost... something terribly important.
He moved closer, desperately trying to think of a way to help, and his still chained and bound form passed into the path of his draining soul... blood? There wasn't any specific color in the spraying light. Only an iridescence that defied description... but whatever it was, it didn't like the magic chains wrapped around his form.
Sparks flew from the chains as, one by one, they shattered into motes of dull light that couldn't compare to what spilled from their soul.
Stanley hovered in that light for a long second as every one of his binding chains broke. He felt the energy as it flowed around and through him. He felt the power of their soul as it leaked uselessly away into nothing. It was akin to what his Soul Sight skill had used... but... completely different.
It was... pure. It was him. No, it was... them. But more than that, it was power. Power unlike anything he'd used... but so very familiar. A power he knew. A power that was more a part of him than anything else he'd ever felt... It was a power he could wield.
At a price. A terrible price.
He felt Lee watching him as he weighed the horror of what he was about to do. He felt Lee's understanding align with his own. He felt the grim acceptance and resolve as Lee growled, "Do it."
Feeling the determination of his twin gave Stanley strength. Feeling the absolute conviction Lee held. Feeling the faith his brother had in him. It gave Stanley the strength to reach into the hole in themselves and gather up that leaking soul energy. To reach inside the wound for more.
He wrapped his power around it and it around his power. An intertwined combination that was greater than the sum of its parts.
Caffeine was losing the fight when Stanley turned back to the invader. More chains had sprung up in here. Countless chains. They wrapped around and bound the pug even as he relentlessly devoured them, one after the other. But slower than they appeared.
The skeleton wasn't uninjured. It was missing a chunk of itself... leaking a light similar to what shone from their own soul. A much uglier light.
Stanley didn't know what was happening outside his body other than what was directly within his domain. Which just so happened to include the skeleton that also existed in here... with one of its hands still embedded in his chest.
Caffeine was still out there, and he blurred repeatedly through Stanley’s domain as he ripped the skeleton’s head away on each pass.
So Stanley cast his unchained mind at the undead, inside and out. At both of them. At what were technically two sides of the same creature. Its body and soul. He drove his will against the monster. A will wrapped in his soul.
CUT
The skeleton's bones splintered and shattered into broken shards... before reforming once again. Instantly. Perfectly.
But the ghostly undead inside his soul fared much worse when it split in half. Partially. Two of its soul arms boiled away into that similar but fouler iridescence. Only, they didn't heal. There was no instant restoration for its soul...
And it screamed. It screamed with such a wonderful and horrible sound of pure agony. A beautiful sound!
You never should have come in here!
Stanley screamed, too. He screamed along with Lee and Caffeine as the wound in their soul split wider. As more of themselves gushed and bled from the open wound. He screamed inside his soul and in the real world.
The magic trapping his mind inside his soul had broken in the attack, and now he saw both locations simultaneously.
His real body was still bound in magic chains, but they were cracking and shattering under the iridescent glow shining from both his and Caffeine's flesh.
He saw Caffeine. The pug was little more than a glowing blur as he took the skeleton apart, one life at a time. One head at a time. The slow way. The not nearly fast enough way...
It didn't care that its head was missing almost non-stop. It didn't even hesitate while it screamed with that delightful sound. It drew up more magic instantly. A massive storm of roiling magic that Stanley didn't need premonition to tell him was a threat. Magic that caught Caffeine and stopped his blurring attack cold. Magic that dug and lashed into the pug...
CUT
Stanley didn't hesitate to pull more energy from his soul. Though he stopped screaming when the wound ripped even wider. Not that he wanted to stop... he just didn't have the breath for it. He couldn't breathe. Couldn't think. Couldn't... anything...
"Fools." The skeleton's voice brought him back. Just barely. Just enough that he saw the strange sight happening in the real world around him.
They were on the ground, and Caffeine had stopped his mad dash. Now he stood... or crouched in a massive crater. His legs were bent as if holding up an immense weight, and each of his laborious footsteps landed with the power of a meteor as he struggled closer.
Only now, he no longer fought alone.
Other humans lurked around them. Strangers and friends alike were fighting against not only the skeleton but also the army of dead surrounding it. Fire lit up the world, flames licking over humans and zombies alike but barely scorching the skeleton with a hand still in his chest. Other skills and magic flew, with even less effect...
Stanley watched zombies die by the hundreds. Watched the magic growing stronger in the skeleton's hands. Magic that would wipe them from the face of the earth. Magic that they couldn't stop. Stanley knew that. He could hear their souls.
Not only them, he could hear so many souls—thousands of them. Souls from across the entire city, and some nearby that he hadn't expected. Stanley could hear them all in a deafening cacophony of fear, hope, terror, pain, love... and despair.
He heard and watched all of it in a haze of pain. Not even pain. Not even agony. He was dying. They were dying. He hadn't done enough. He wasn't strong enough.
Inside their soul, Lee still moved. Glowing symbols flowed around him in a raging whirlwind of power. He fought. For survival. For Stanley. For all of them.
Stanley could feel the souls behind Lee. He could feel their attention on his twin. They feared for him. Cared for him. Loved him. Lee loved them back, and it was that feeling that drove him through the pain.
It still wasn't enough. Stanley tried. He tried so hard to pull himself together... to gather what power he could... to fight back. It wasn't enough. The skeleton's spell reached a crescendo...
A flaming bird flew into the skeleton's face and exploded. It came on so fast that Stanley only knew the red streak was a bird because it was inside his domain. So he also saw it explode into nothing more than a raging red-gold fireball. A fire beyond any fire he knew. He wasn't sure it could even be called fire...
The explosion disintegrated the skeleton into ashes. Or maybe it was the violent failure of its building spell. It still regenerated, because of course it did, but either way, it bought Stanley a second.
It also did more than that, because it finally blasted him free of the skeleton and did so without burning him to ashes... somehow. The skeleton's hand left no hole in his chest when it was gone... but it was gone! From his chest and soul.
Stanley stood. In the real world and in his soul. Incoherent screams and sounds of violence surrounded him in the streets of Boston, but it was silent again within their soul.
Lee still worked furiously, his magic taking shape over the terrible wound. A web. Or stitching. Was he going to seal the wound? Could he do that?
Caffeine stood still atop the glowing source crack, his gaze locked on the new, and now much larger, wound. His tail was drooping lower...
Outside, the skeleton conjured a dome of green light, and silence descended like a bomb going off. It didn't fly and instead stalked towards Stanley over the unrecognizable remains of a city street. "You have spirit, human. Or whatever the two of you are... But it is over. Destroying your own soul only makes my task here easier."
It was lying. Not with its words. Those were all true. But its confidence was a lie. It saw its death looming. It felt fear...
Stanley saw Caffeine unleash a silent bark at the dome. Cracks spread over it, but the magic held. Caffeine shrank following the action... and Stanley knew they were reaching the end. Their own end, or the skeletons. Or both.
He carved pieces from it as it stalked closer, with his mind rather than his soul, but every injury healed as fast as it appeared.
Caffeine barked and spread more cracks through the magic dome while shrinking even smaller.
Stanley drew on his rage as he watched Lee work and their killer approach. It was all he had left. No one else was coming to save him. He could feel Nate's soul in the distance... beside Zeke's, and surrounded by undead. They were overrun. Game over. Zeke would die. Nate would die. Everyone would die.
Everyone. Every... thing.
Stanley smiled then. A bitter, hateful smile. A bloodthirsty smile. An enraged smile. "If I'm going down," he whispered, and the skeleton hesitated. "You're coming with me."
Lee was waiting when Stanley reached into the bleeding hole that was their soul. He understood the plan and shared Stanley's rage, but not his fatalism. He still had hope. "End this, Stan. I will hold our soul together."
Stanley let him have the hope. He had no room for it in his heart. Only rage. Enough rage to see this through. Enough rage to see the undead's end. All the rage I'll ever need.
"I won't let us die," Lee said, and Stanley barely heard him.
Instead, he reached out to the monster as it charged him. As it gathered more magic. As it promised to end him. As it ran to its death. I can't kill your body... So I will kill your soul.
It was the only solution. He couldn't kill this monster enough times to end it. Not fast enough. But he could destroy its soul. So that was what he did.
With all the rage of his lost hope. With all the rage of his lost family. With all the rage of his failures, the weight of them. The crushing, excruciating knowledge that he'd damned his brother by being too weak.
Stanley poured all that rage against the monster before him—against its soul. He pitted his own soul against the thing hunting him.
You are... undone
Stanley saw the light in its eyes dim. He felt its disbelief, fear, and sweet, sweet despair. He heard its soul screaming in delicious agony... and then the disgusting light went out of its eyes.
Invader Defeated. Contributions earned. Defeat the remaining invaders to claim your rewards.
He heard the notification telling him the monster was dead, but it was unnecessary. He knew it was dead. He had made it DEAD!
Debuff Upgraded: [Critical Soul Wound] = [Deadly Soul Wound]
But victory had come at a price. Now Stanley would die. Lee would die. They'd won... and lost.
Only... it wasn't over just yet... and there were still more monsters to kill. Even as his own life—his own soul—bled away. Through the lens of his rage, Stanley saw that golden soul in the distance...
Zeke had helped him. Not a lot. Not enough. But he had helped. He had soothed some of the hurts. Maybe he could soothe Caffeine when Stanley was gone? That was enough of a reason to help. Enough reason to kill one more monster before he died.
Not that any of that truly mattered. Stanley only wanted more death. He didn't need an excuse. Every monster in this place should die. Would die.
He reached out for the zombie miles away... it felt familiar... and afraid. Stanley liked that, as his power stretched further and further. Closer and closer. Eat shit and...
It vanished with a burst of magic.
What? No... Stanley floundered at the loss of his target. His rage flickered amid the pain and confusion... Then, before he could search for it, before he could find and kill it, before he could kill anything else, there was a flash of blinding light from his soul.
The light flashed along with a pulse of fresh pain. A pain that pushed away the light. Pain that dragged him down... down into the darkness.
Peaceful, soothing darkness.
It was over. I'm sorry... Lee, Caff, I...
A notification chimed through his head, but Stanley didn't see it before the darkness took everything away.