Master of the Loop

Chapter 61

  Altar of Sacrifice

The world became still for a moment, as though the whole of the battlefield witnessed what just happened. At least, in Sylas’ eyes, it seemed so. The time slowed down to a crawl as his mind began to reject his action. But he held it. He wrapped his arms around it and pushed it down.

“Y-y-you…” Dyn choked on his blood for a moment as his eyes rolled back and his body went limp. Sylas pulled back the blade and let the body fall sideways, into the reddened snow. It was only now that Valen came to, realizing what happened—or at least a part of what happened. Glancing at the scar-faced youth lying dead in front of him, and then at Sylas, he was mute. Sylas… saved his life. It was unmistakable.

Just as he was about to yell in gratitude at the man, Sylas turned to the side and keeled over, heaving but not vomiting at least. Valen jumped, fearful Sylas might have gotten stabbed as well, quickly hurrying over and holding the man gently.

“Are you alright?! Did… did he stab you!?! Dammit! I knew I should have asked the Master to come, I knew we’d need him! What do I do?! What do I do?!! I need to—”

"You need to calm the fuck down is what you need to do," Sylas said, taking a deep breath and swallowing yet another heave that was about to leap out of him. "I'm fine. Just a bit of recoil. Prophets aren't meant to cradle mortal affairs. Alas, I couldn't just watch you die." He quickly made up an excuse, but from the look on Valen’s face… it worked a bit too well.

“You… you…” the Prince was practically crying, suddenly wrapping his arms around Sylas and hugging him tightly. “I owe you the debt of life. Twice now. I… I know even a lifetime is not enough to repay it, but I will try. Whatever it is that you want, that you need, even if it is my head—you only need to ask.” This would be quite romantic if I swung for the bats and not the bal—no, wait, both of those are kind of sus. If I swung for the bats and not for the, uh… boobs. Right. Let’s just go with boobs.

"For starters," Sylas said. "Can you get off me? There's still a battle to command, in case you forgot." But, just as Sylas said that he noticed something strange—or, rather, a distinct lack of something.

Battle sounds were nowhere to be heard—there were no shouts, no cries of agony, no cacophony of metallic sounds clashing with each other… nothing. Both of them faced forward and saw the lead archer jogging back toward them, a wide grin on his face.

“Your Highness! Your Highness!” he shouted. “They’ve surrendered!”

“… they’ve… what?” both Valen and Sylas exclaimed in confusion.

“They all suddenly knelt on the ground and begged us to spare them!” the man reported. “They’re using the excuse that they’ve been mind-controlled. Hah! Do they take us for fools?” while the archer went on a bit of a tangent, Sylas and Valen glanced down at the still corpse at their feet before looking at each other.

“Could it be…?”

“Perhaps…? Ah, this world…” Sylas added with a sigh.

“What should we do, Your Highness?”

“Accept their surrender,” Valen shrugged. “We’ll camp for the night. Take the weapons from them and be mindful, but there's no need to be brutal. Able-bodied men are one thing our castle lacks."

“Very well, Your Highness!” the man quickly jogged away, likely to relay the orders.

“Mind-control? Is… is such a thing even possible?” Valen asked, looking at the corpse. Then again, the scarred man did turn into a phantom of shadows and cover the massive distance before Valen could even blink properly.

"We'll know more once we ask them," Sylas said. "In the meantime, I… I need to get super drunk. Fuckin' hell." Sylas took a deep breath, calming himself down forcibly. He tried to utilize what the phantom figure in his dream taught him about controlling his own heart. It wasn't easy, but at the very least he wasn't having an anxiety attack and periodically blacking out this time around. He'd killed, once again. And though he was quite shaken… it would be a lie to claim that he wasn't a tiny bit proud too.

After all, even if it was a lucky kill—since, unquestionably, he stood no chance against Dyn in real combat—it was a kill that even someone of Dyn’s caliber was unable to see coming and block. Just as he was about to step into the encampment, he paused. The reason was simple: a window appeared in front of him. A window that he both wanted and didn’t want to see.

New Save Point, ‘Pup’s Blood’, has been discovered.

Would you like to overwrite your previous save?

YES/NO

Sylas stared at the words 'YES' and 'NO' intently. He didn't optimize the current loop as much as he could have—he largely spent it mulling about, occasionally training, and spending the last few days in the talisman-making business. By all accounts, he should just take 'No', play the current one out for a bit longer, and then reset, optimize it further. Additionally, if he accepted, he'd have to carry the burden of Dyn’s death. Permanently.

And yet… nobody died during the attack. Well, calling it an ‘attack’ was a bit of a love tap, but nonetheless. Nobody died. And Dyn’s death truly was lucky. Sylas had absolutely no confidence in repeating the feat. In fact, he suspected that if he went again, he’d likely be too conscious of it to react in time. If he plopped Derrek next to the Prince as protection, it was unlikely that Dyn would just mindlessly rush in, and the battle between the two could cause even more deaths.

He looked up and saw the relieved and refreshed faces of all those who’ve come here—all with full knowledge that they may never return. If he reset the loop… just how many of them would die? How long would it take him to repeat today’s success? Five loops? Ten? Fifty? A hundred? Would he spend the next hundred years just replaying one month over and over again just for that minute chance of the perfect ending?

New Save Point, ‘Pup’s Blood’, has been initialized.

Sylas swallowed the bitter brutality and raced forward, catching up to Valen. Derrek and Tenner were already waiting for them in front of the central 'building' of sorts—at least it had a relatively non-leaky roof, Sylas mused—the place where Dyn slept.

“Are you alright, Your Highness?” Derrek asked, his expression slightly twisted. He was uncertain, Sylas realized. He must have recognized the voice as well as the shadow, but couldn’t be certain just yet. “What was… what happened? Who was that?”

“… I don’t know,” Valen shrugged, glancing at Sylas. “But he saved my life. Before that man could stab me, Sylas… Sylas killed him. I’ve already ordered someone to carry the body here. I’ve never seen magic utilized quite like that before in my life. I’ll have the Master look at him and see if he can spot any oddities.”

“Why don’t you and Tenner see if there’s anything interesting in the building,” Sylas suggested suddenly. “While Captain Derrek and I roam the perimeter?”

“Why would you—”

“It’s a good idea, no?” Sylas pressured.

“Y-yes, let’s do that,” Valen wouldn’t even say ‘No’ if Sylas ordered him to strip right here and now, so he quickly accepted, taking Tenner and walking inside. Derrek, on the other, looked strangely at Sylas, a good deal of reservation in his eyes.

“Let’s walk,” Sylas said. “And talk about your friend.”

“… you… so, it was him?” Derrek asked, a trace of shock and sorrow in his voice.

“What was left of him, anyway,” Sylas replied. “Could he have done it? Mind-controlled everyone here?”

“Him? No,” Derrek replied decisively. “At least not unless he was given an artifact to help him. How did you kill him? Even I struggled for quite a while to kill him. You… in one hit… truly, who are you?”

"Just luck is all," Sylas replied honestly as the two left the encampment, finding some privacy. "I know you don't trust much in my prophetic abilities—"

“Much?” Derrek interrupted, a mocking smile emerging on his handsome face.

“Much,” Sylas repeated. “But at least trust the fact that I want what’s best for the Prince as well as this Kingdom. Dyn… Dyn was a flawed man, but one whose weaknesses got exploited by the lot who don’t care. Today it’s him, tomorrow… it’s potentially someone else. I want to work with you, directly, when it comes to exterminating the Cult of the Damned.”

"…" Derrek didn't seem surprised that Sylas was aware. In fact, even Sylas himself wasn't quite certain just how much Derrek knew at this point in the loop since quite a few memories have… melded together, so to say, by now.

“I can initially offer you where Dyn was communing with one of the big—or, at least, bigger figures in the cult,” Sylas said. “They were using a mirror of some kind.”

“Ah, the Altar of Sacrifice,” Derrek sighed. “Yes, we’ve found the Altars a few times after we raided some of the cult’s hideouts.”

“And I can offer you a Shard of Ascindium.”

“A Shard of—” Derrek’s countenance quickly shifted, but Sylas interrupted him.

“If—and only if… you are honest with me,” Sylas said. “I know that the Shard contains subspace. Some legends claim that the ancient peoples or whatever kept their treasures inside, but no treasure has ever been discovered in one of them. I also know that, some way or another, Dyn could have caused an explosion of a massive scale using the Shard—I… I just don’t know how. So, I want the truth—everything you know about the Shard. No lies, no half-truths. If you do try… trust me. I will know.”

“…” Derrek paused for a moment, looking directly at Sylas’ eyes. The man in front of him… was strange. All along, Derrek had no doubt in his mind that the man was merely a charlatan, someone exploiting young and naïve Prince for the benefit. But, clearly, that wasn’t the case. “Will I regret it?” he asked.

“Yes,” Sylas replied. “But only because you’ll grow to eventually not just tolerate me, but also love me. And it all starts here.”

“Haah,” Derrek sighed, shaking his head, though still letting out a faint smile. “Very well. But, in exchange, I ask that you also be honest with me and tell me how you’ve managed to kill Dyn. I can tell that, even though you do know magic, it’s beyond basic, incapable of harming a dog, let alone a man. And though I can tell that you have a body of a decent swordsman, Dyn was… he was a Bloodstone Knight. Forget a decent swordsman, fifty master swordsmen would struggle to tire him out. So, do we have a deal?”

“We do,” Sylas nodded happily. “You start, though. I don’t trust people with handsome faces.”

“… did you just call yourself ugly?”

“… I did, didn’t I? Fuck.”