Zeroth Moment: My Cheat Skill Is Stupid, So I'll Just Ignore It

Topher's mouth worked, but no sound was coming out. How does he know who I am? What's going on? Finally, he managed to wrangle the various synapses controlling his face, which promptly settled into its habitual grimace. "Yeah. How did you --"

"We will speak shortly. Do not move." The elf snapped his fingers, and a globe of light appeared above his head, which then drifted to float ominously over Topher's own. Topher winced up at it, but before he could ask what the hell was going on, the mage had disappeared in a burst of golden light. Short-range teleport, like the one that mage tutor guy used, Topher recalled abruptly. "He'll be back," he commented to Zanasha, mostly out of a desire to not look like an idiot.

The half-orc nodded, then wobbled slightly; Topher reached out to steady her, but wasn't strong enough to prevent her from sitting down heavily. "It is only the battle fatigue," she murmured in reassurance. "It will pass." Her gaze drifted behind them to the rear of the hill, where Hana had fallen. "Is Hana-chan...?"

Topher turned and shuffled to the edge of the hill, the light globe following him with only moderate menace; he looked down and saw the Japanese woman's form crouched at the bottom of the hill, with both hands clutched to her head. "Hey! Hana!" he shouted down to her; she twitched and turned to look back at him, an expression of terror on her face. Then a gasp of surprise escaped her, and she uttered something he couldn't hear before twisting and starting back up the hill, her face pale with worry.

As Topher watched, Hana first stumbled, then ran, then began to bound up the hill like a gazelle; he watched, astonished, as she covered ground in moments that would have taken him long minutes to traverse. Not Rank F Dexterity, either, the cool observant part of his mind noted. Then, abruptly, she was next to him, not even panting or gasping for breath; "Zee... is she...?" the young woman managed, clearly more fearful than fatigued.

Wordlessly, Topher half-turned and pointed behind himself to where Zanasha stood, still reeling from the rapid sequence of events; with a cry, Hana threw herself into the half-orc's arms. Murmuring soothing words, Zanasha managed to fumble her sword back into its scabbard and steady the young woman; Topher, watching awkwardly, couldn't help but notice the disparity in their sizes once more. She's almost twice as big, he marveled. After a long moment, Hana extricated herself with an apology; as she did so, Topher glimpsed a glint of metal from her hand, and noticed that the Japanese girl had been clutching the nine-pointed star of her Gatekeepers badge. That's weird. Did she have it in her hand from before all this happened? Topher's face twisted in confusion. Maybe she had it ready to show that Waymaster guy before he got turned into chunky salsa.

Feeling out of place, Topher sidled up next to the two of them. In the distance, he could see flashes of golden light taking place in the town before them, and frowned. "What's all that about?"

"I am not sure, Friend Topher," Zanasha returned, "but I believe the elf mage is repairing some of the damage."

Topher squinted, and could see that she was right; several roads which the demon had smashed had been replaced, as had other critical structures such as an aqueduct and several bridges. However, Topher saw that Kelfir wasn't repairing all the casualties of the demon's rampage -- the destroyed buildings and other areas had simply been cleared away, with large stacks of building materials apparently now standing ready for new construction. Topher blinked. "Holy shit. That's why all the buildings look the same. They just rebuild them with magic!"

"I... I think it's the other way, Bailey-san." Hana seemed to be slowly steadying herself. "Spells to summon materials in bulk, and then craftsmen reassemble them at scale. They look the same because all the builders are working from the same patterns."

"Hey, yeah, that's right." Belatedly, Topher remembered Oguro summoning bricks and mortar, but still having to reassemble his wall with Mage Hand; Kelfir was obviously significantly more capable than the D-Ranker mage had been, but even his powers apparently had limits. He only has so much MP, Topher intuited. But once he's done all he intends to do --

Then, almost as soon as he thought it, it happened; there was another burst of golden light, and Kelfir appeared in their midst, looking even more haggard and weary than he had before. "Ceaseless," he murmured dazedly. "It is ceaseless..."

Hana, shocked by the elf's sudden appearance, squawked and scrambled backwards; Zanasha stepped protectively in front of her, just as she had for Topher earlier, but this time Kelfir ignored her. Instead, his sorrowful golden eyes fixed on Topher with a force that felt almost physical, and his mouth twisted in an ugly expression of distaste. "Now then."

Stepping forwards with a swiftness that belied his earlier frailty, Kelfir grabbed Topher's wrist and ground out a harsh word; Topher's skin-tight Mage Shield shattered around him like glass, fraying into wisps of ashlike light that melted into the afternoon air. "Hey!" protested Topher, but before he could make a more in-depth retort, the glowing golden orb that had been hovering over him abruptly descended and swooped down to alight on his collarbone.

The instant it touched him, Topher's mind went berserk.

It was as though he suddenly had x-ray vision; he could see into and through the orb, intuiting the runic circle which, when rotated, produced its form. It was a Kuul-Uul harmonic midpoint, projected through planes produced by Zu and Mij, and it had a simple purpose: to burn the seal it projected into the body and spirit of its target creature. Topher's Stylus spat akasha, and a lash of the glowing gossamer essence slapped against the orb and ripped it free of his skin before it could brand him. Kelfir's expression, which had already been scornful, turned murderous, and his own bound akasha flowed out of and around him, excising Topher's strands with scalpel-like precision; but when Kelfir's akasha touched his own, Topher's mind fractured further.

He could see everything happening around him refracted infinitely, like a hall of mirrors; this space here was the present, and before and behind him he could see himself and Kelfir locked in an infinite struggle that bifurcated and expanded into infinite futures as each possible outcome of their contest wrote itself across the future and into the past. Hana and Zanasha stood frozen in shock; he didn't know if they were actually being held in stasis, or if time had stopped, or if they were just freaking out. Fuck this, he thought grimly, and reached out to lock his own hand on Kelfir's robe; in doing so, he sunk his fingers deep into the other mage's bound akasha and pulled.

It was like falling sideways, except in a direction that was at right angles to all other directions; reality shattered like a stained-glass window as Topher and Kelfir fell out of realspace and into the akashic realm. Everything was golden and glowing; space was spherical, was cubical, was hexagonal all at once. They seemed to be inside a golden room, with white-hot strands of some weblike substance that wrapped and entangled everything; the room was vast and yet cramped, warm and yet cold, clear and yet obscured. Topher ignored all of this and focused on punching the elf in the face.

To his shock, he succeeded; Kelfir's head rocked backwards, and a small spray of blood shot from one nostril. Astonished, he staggered back, and Topher yanked on his robe and pulled him forward again. "What's the big idea, motherfucker?!" he screamed into the elf's face. "I don't want to hurt you!"

"Perhaps... not..." the mage managed, spitting blood to one side. Then he looked back into Topher's eyes, and Topher recoiled at the hate he saw there. "But I want to hurt you." Gesturing, Kelfir did something complex and subtle to the space they were in, and Topher found himself pulled away from the elf by a force like gravity; perspective shifted, and he found that he was lying on his back with his hands bound to his sides, as Kelfir towered above him imperiously. "My son... my remaining son," the elf spat, "spoke to me of you. He told me many things -- some clearly muddled, others obviously wishful thinking." Kelfir leaned down, his tormented and fatigued face inches from Topher's. "But the primary fact I gleaned was that you are responsible for Lulein's death."

Lulein. Cailu's true name. Topher's dung beetle soul twisted guiltily inside him. "I didn't kill him," he croaked, despite the strangling binding encircling his throat. "Shit, I tried to... ghk! ...save him."

"Tried?!" shrieked Kelfir. "You tried! Of course you tried, you misbegotten abomination." He placed his heel on the side of Topher's face and bore down, grinding his boot into Topher's face; tears streamed down his cheeks as he bared his clenched teeth. "But I do not hold you responsible. How could I?" his voice shook with grief and rage. "I am responsible. But I can stop you from doing any more damage."

The elf's foot turned, releasing Topher's face; as he gasped for breath, Kelfir reached down and plunged his fist into Topher's stomach, then seized the front of his robe and hauled him up by it as Topher gagged and coughed for breath. Placing his palm on Topher's upper chest, the mage began to chant; and Topher felt the brand begin to form in his flesh, a brand that he knew would circumscribe and fetter him to Kelfir's will. "You will never hurt anyone again," the mage hissed.

Topher choked. He spat blood, gasped for air.

Then, suddenly, he was shunted aside; trapped and imprisoned within his own flesh. For a dazed moment, he thought it was the brand, overriding his own will; but then his mouth smiled against his will, and his hands curled into claws as they snapped into place around Kelfir's wrists. His mouth opened, and that voice emerged once more; the poisonous, bile-soaked voice that had issued forth from him in Wanbourne. "Yeah, well... you're not the first to try."

With a vicious jerk, Topher's arms pulled down and back on Kelfir's wrists; as the elf stumbled forward, Topher's head rocketed down and met the mage's nose with a sickening crunch. Kelfir's gurgling scream followed the blood which fountained forth, but Topher's body was moving on its own; the space around them was twisting and darkening, turning black and bloody. Now it was Kelfir who was on his back, as gravity shifted and rotated to place Topher's body atop his, iron-hard hands closing on the elf's throat.

In a daze, Topher realized that nothing that was happening here was what it seemed; he and Kelfir were doing battle not with their bodies, but with their Statuses. The elf's Rank C Intelligence had mastered Topher's Rank D Intelligence in the early phases of the battle, granting him greater control over the space and, correspondingly, Topher's essence; but now the thing within Topher had upset the battlefield with sufficient violence to shift the scope of the contest, and Topher's Rank D Constitution was overpowering the elf's own Rank F Constitution. He could feel Kelfir's vitality like a humming emerald thread, fragile between his fingers; elegant and eldritch. Breakable.

Topher struggled, willing his hands to unclench from around Kelfir's larynx, but they refused to obey him. Please! he beseeched inside his own mind, desperate. I don't want to kill him!

He tried to bind us. To shackle us, came an answering roar from within Topher's own mind. Confused, Topher nonetheless bulled forward. He's just scared! Look at him!

Lots of murderers were probably scared too, observed the distant part of his mind drily; Topher snarled mentally at it to shut up. The guy's obviously exhausted, half out of his mind with grief and sleep deprivation! We can't just kill him because we're scared too!

Won't be caged again, the thought came. He could feel it, coming from somewhere alien and yet familiar, literally boiling with rage and hatred.

In desperation, Topher inverted his perceptions; abruptly, he was outside his own body, looking inwards. The thought how the fuck did I do that drifted through his consciousness, but he had no time for astonishment; he could already see Kelfir's eyes beginning to roll back in his skull. Instead, he reached inwards from the outside, gently asserting control of himself from an unexpected direction; the killing urge within him howled and fought, but Topher had the initiative and prised the coils of his own will back from it before it could react to the new parameters of the conflict. He wanted to release the elf, but he didn't dare; free, Kelfir would surely destroy him in retaliation. He needed a better solution.

It ends with us! howled the broken thing inside him.

No, Topher responded as an epiphany flooded through him. It starts with us.

Gently, he began to relax his hands' grip on the elf's throat even as his mind tightened its grasp on the akashic space around them; before Kelfir's mind could reassert control, he grasped the principle with which the mage had sought to brand him and rotated it around Jhu. Then, as quickly as he dared, he let go of Kelfir's throat with his left hand, grabbed the elf's right wrist with it, then wrenched Kelfir's right palm onto the elf's own chest.

The space exploded.

In an instant, Topher and Kelfir reemerged into the physical and temporal world; Topher was clutching his own throat and gasping, while Kelfir was staring, horrified, at the smoking brand which had been seared into his upper chest. "You filth," he spat. "I will --"

Then, abruptly, the elf's voice choked off, and his eyes widened. "What have you...?"

"I didn't... do shit," Topher coughed. Painfully, he straightened up and crossed his arms, glaring at Kelfir. "That's you, you supercilious fuck. That's your will controlling you."

The elf staggered back, staring at his own hands; he seemed to be choking on some violent, conflicted emotion. "You... you... I...?"

He looked up at Topher, and his eyes were haunted and agonized; Topher shuddered, despite himself. Then, Kelfir's eyes wandered in opposite directions, and he swayed; against his better judgment, Topher cursed and swept forward, just barely catching the elf as he fainted. "Fucking elves," he groused as he lay the mage down on the grass as gently as he dared, then sagged back and flopped to the ground in exhaustion.

Around him, Zanasha and Hana abruptly became animated once more. Hana's hands leapt to her mouth, and she sank to her knees, trembling, while Zanasha darted over and half-drew her sword from her sheath. "Friend Topher?" she asked, in a calm tone that Topher knew concealed the verge of panic. "Have you slain...?"

"He'll be fine," Topher sighed. He held his own hands up before his face, blanching at the sight of them; they were bloodstained and corded with violence, and it was like staring at someone else's hands. "Not sure I can say the same."

The three of them sat there, too shocked to move, for a few seconds; then, with a groan, Topher forced himself to sit up. "Do you have any water?" he asked Zanasha tiredly. "I'd Create some, but I'm still out of MP."

"I... I have some." Shakily, Hana stumbled over to him, then produced a small canteen and passed it over with trembling hands. "What are..." she began, but then she pressed her lips together tightly and shook her head, backing away. "What will you do?"

"Try to wake this poor bastard up," Topher sighed. Painfully, he crawled over to Kelfir's supine form, and trickled a little water into the mage's mouth. "Wake up, dickhead," he murmured. "You've still got one son's life to finish ruining."

The elf's eyes snapped open, fixing on Topher with rage; but then pain and despair surged up in them, and the elf's body heaved and rolled away. He managed to make it onto his right side before vomiting, and then spent several moments coughing and gagging; Topher watched with grim approval, but did nothing.

Then, finally, the elf struggled onto his knees, looking away from Topher, and began to sob. Hana, looking shocked, started towards him, but Topher held up a warning hand and shook his head. "Leave him alone," he warned, then turned his gaze back to the elf. "He's... kinda going through a lot."

"What did you do," breathed Hana in astonished horror.

"Nothing," Topher sighed. "He did it to himself." Wrapping his arms around his knees, he resisted the urge to rock back and forth and wail. "He did it all to himself."