Chương 87: Chapter 86 - Reasoning

Atzi made her way further into the slums, to the broken sewer entrance. She clambered inside and made her way to where she knew the Pangaeans' hideout was. When she arrived, Atzi looked up at the metal door. She took a deep breath, and then started pounding aggressively on it.

"Cory!" After a moment, Cory's voice came muffled from the other side.

"Wha- Atzi?!"

"This plan is completely insane!" Atzi shouted.

"Why do you want to do it?!"

"What are you-""Do you know how many people? It's... a hundred just to summon the thing! Then it kills thousands! For nothing! It does nothing, Cory! The city dies in six days and the stupid demon doesn't change a thing!" There was a pause. Then Cory said, "Atzi, back up from the door. I'm coming out and I'm armed. I will hurt you if you're near the door." Atzi stepped back. She noticed she was clenching her claws, and tried to relax. She didn't succeed.

Cory came out wielding a dagger, then shut the door behind her. She pointed the weapon at Atzi.

"What do you know?"

"Cory... the plan can't work. Sostra can't handle an invasion right now anyway. It's not gonna destroy Hasen, the plan is stupid!" Atzi sighed.

"I'm going to tell you something and this time, this time, you'll believe me. I can't die. Every time I do, I just wake up. Today. Again." Cory raised an eyebrow.

"You know where I was last time? Pangaea. Now you have to believe me. Now I know something you can't make up an excuse for and explain away. I've been there. I saw the bodies of Hasen soldiers strung up by vines, rotting away. I saw a lady with a horse for legs, the centaur, I saw the cat lady that handles the little dirt mound you sleep in, I saw the prophet of the Forest, with her big moth wings and plants on her, I saw it all!" Silence fell between them as Cory seemed to be taking in what Atzi had said.

Then she narrowed her eyes and asked, "Are you some kind of demon pretending to be Atzi?" Atzi made a frustrated noise.

"A demon? Come on! Believe me for once, Cory! You and me and Oak and Alana and Daisy and... I forget what the lizard girl was called, but we all went there, on a boat pulled by shark people."

"... You can't know the things you know normally, but that doesn't mean you're a, what, immortal time being?"

"And a demon makes more sense? How would a demon know all this stuff? Why would a demon pick me? I'm a prophet, Cory. Of the Saintess. Except the stupid Forest goddess freaked out when she saw her! And all the Pangaeans killed me!" Cory slightly raised her dagger.

"If you're telling the truth, then I should kill you, too." Atzi clawed at her own hair.

"... Cory. Cory, I... I am not letting you summon that archdemon. Ever again. You can't, by the way. You never accomplished it until I helped you, and you... you… If you kill me here and now, I'm going to walk over to the head of counter-intelligence and tell him everything. I can get a meeting with him really easily. I know the trick. If I return Terra's book to her, he'll find me to ask how I got it." She paused to catch her breath.

"And I'll say - it was being used to summon a big demon and kill loads of people. And say this location. But I'll make sure to tell him they brainwashed you into helping them, I'm not... I'm not evil." Her tail thudded against the ground.

"But I can break this entire plan, every single time, really, really easily." Cory's eyes darted around, but she didn't lower the dagger.

"What is it that you want?"

"Go back to Pangaea. Just go. The Hasen part works, I don't know how to stop that bit. If you kill me.... even if time didn't reset, it wouldn't matter. Because the city is doomed and only I know how to stop that. There's no Sostra left to war with Hasen in six days."

"And if I choose to stay here?"

"V never gives you the book. We stole it together, a couple times. You... pushed me off a wall." Cory shook her head.

"The book was only ever a superior version of the plan. If you're telling the truth you should know what the regular plan is."

"Oh, you summon a bunch of little demons in," Atzi tried to remember, "three days' time, at night. Doesn't really go anywhere."

"And why do you care?"

"Because... because..." Atzi found the words hard to say, the inside of her mouth suddenly dry. Maybe she'll kill me the second I say it and I can undo it that way.

"I... like you… and you're better than something like this..."

"Atzi, I'm not stupid." Cory rolled her eyes.

"I know you like me. I've known since we met." Atzi gawped.

"I-it was obvious?"

"Extremely. That you thought it wasn't is..." Cory's expression twisted unknowably.

"Interesting." Atzi looked down, embarrassed.

"S-so... you knew, but… you already have-" Cory interrupted her.

"So, what? You're concerned for me, and that's why you want me to leave?"

"Yes. It fails anyway, so why do it?"

"Why not help us?"

"No!" Atzi suddenly screamed.

"I'm not killing people! I don't... I don't do that!"

"What, you keep repeating time and you haven't killed anyone?" Cory had a look of disbelief.

"No, I…" Atzi shook.

"I killed someone by accident, once. In a fight. He came at me and I... stabbed him harder than I thought and he just... went down." Cory sneered.

"Oh, I get it. You helped me before. But you couldn't handle what it took to do something meaningful."

"Meaningful?" Atzi opened both her claws, splayed to the side, as if asking what Cory was on about.

"I just told you it goes nowhere! It went nowhere then! It was completely pointless and I knew it!" Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"Well, you're the person with future information." Cory shrugged a single shoulder.

"Tell me how to make it less pointless."

"There's basically no way that the plan works." Atzi shook her head.

"Hasen is stronger than you guys seem to think it is, Sostra can't actually destroy it. And it's not how Sostra does things, anyway. They'd force a surrender or make them join the empire or something instead, not wipe them out." Although she knew what the Forest had said, she decided to ask anyway, "Has anyone in Pangaea even tried talking to Hasen?"

"Has anyone- Atzi, this is a blood war going back hundreds of years. People are dying as we sit here and do nothing." Cory slammed a first against the metal door behind her.

"You're so worried about the people here, but what about the people there, huh? Are their lives worth less?" Atzi raised her claws.

"N-no, I didn't say that! How many though, thousands? Is Hasen actually invading and killing everyone?"

"Hasen is doing everything in their power to clear out the forests and build more of their horrendous nation. In those hundreds of years, millions have died."

"M-millions?! There.... I didn't see that many people there, I thought there weren't that many..."

"Every animal is a child of the Forest, and with every day she touches them they grow more intelligent. So every animal slain is a life lost."

"W-wait, that monkey was going to turn into a monkey person?"

"I don't know which monkeys you are talking about, but yes."

"Why is Hasen attacking, for more space to build on?"

"They can't stop their expansion, just like Sostra's empire. Just because Pangaea is at war with Hasen and not the empire doesn't make Sostra any better. How many people do you think Sostra will kill to keep growing?"

"... I don't know. Cthargictha... they didn't even do anything, Malus just wants their gem stockpiles."

"See? Don't be on the wrong side, Atzi." Atzi screamed, "I'm not on any side! I just wanted to rob a stupid bank and retire happy and rich! I didn't want to get eaten and torn apart and drowned and stabbed and-" She stopped to hyperventilate for a few moments.

"I can't... I can't change any of this, Cory." She sniffled a little.

"E-every time I fix anything it just... it just breaks again and there's so many things and I'm stupid and useless and I c-can't change any of it. I just die in stupid stupid ways," she whined.

"I don't want Pangaea to get killed, I don't want that! I don't want everyone in Sostra dying either! I dunno about Hasen, but there's probably a load of people there like us that didn't do anything but be born there. They're not the problem, why do they all need to die?"

"They are the problem Atzi. They feed the nation, little workers generating the tools needed for death. Even if they're innocent, they're not." She raised her chin in seeming pride.

"See past your squeamishness and self-hatred. It's okay to kill people if it means saving those who are in the right." Atzi pointed a claw at herself.

"Why me? Why does it have to be me? I'm nobody! I'm not strong and smart like you are. I'm not cool, I can't make people do what I want, I can't figure out plans like V, I can't blow people up like Terra, why couldn't someone else have been picked instead of me?" Cory stomped.

"Atzi, if you're going to give up, then give up. Why push it off? Just give up. Lay in the dirt and die over and over." It hurt, hearing that. Even though it was how Atzi felt, it hurt hearing it said like that. Cory continued, "But if you don't want that to be your life, just dying again and again, then do something. Help me! Help us!"

"I…" Atzi's arms dangled at her side.

"There has to be a better plan than this… How did... how did the war start?"

"What do you mean?"

"The blood war. Hundreds of years. There must have been a time before it, how did it start?"

"I don't know, exactly. That would be a question for the goddess or her prophet, or someone who's listened to them a lot. I just know that Hasen was a colony of Mediolanum that went independent when they discovered how to make steel, and they love clearing out forests to keep building and building. Killing us in the process." Atzi scratched her scales.

"I think... I think I need to talk to the Forest again. Cory. Can you get me to Pangaea?"

"Sure. Get me the book and I'll get you to Pangaea."

"Cory. We're not going that way. It doesn't work. I told you, Sostra dies in six days."

"What if I promised not to summon the demon in Sostra? If you're right about Hasen, I should summon it there." For some reason, that didn't sound quite as bad to Atzi. She didn't know anyone there, after all.

"I'm not... I'm not sacrificing people. I'm not luring them in."

"Others can do that."

"Cory..." Atzi looked at her intently. She is completely insane. Nothing I say can reason with her. And the worst part was - if she said 'Atzi, will you go out with me?', Atzi would jump into her arms like a puppy.

"What?" Cory asked.

"Do you promise you can get me to Pangaea? That the plan ends, here? That you'll... trust me, that I want to help them too? And... I can try other plans. We can experiment. We can find something that works. Maybe even a way that doesn't kill everyone..." Cory shrugged.

"As long as it works. But if you're going to give up on a plan just because it involves killing people, that's wrong. There are morally justified killings, and at minimum they include Hasen. I'd argue for Sostra too, but you seem a little sore on it - I can show you I'm right, in time."

"There's people I like in Sostra..." Cory laughed.

"Who?"

"There's... there's a priestess at the temple that's always nice to me. And my innkeeper, and Fence is actually pretty alright, I realised. And there's a daughter of the Serpent that's fun, and… I guess I've met a bunch of people since this started."

"So tell them to fight against Sostra too." Atzi snapped two clawed fingers together.

"Oh. Right, I need to go meet the Serpent. I think I can stop Sostra being destroyed if I talk to her and explain things right. She's always helpful." Cory frowned.

"I wouldn't trust her, if I was you." Atzi remembered when she had mentioned the Serpent's eating habits to Cory before.

"Wait, why did you get mad before when I said the Serpent eats people? If you don't like Sostra anyway, doesn't that mean you don't follow her anymore?"

"Hm?"

"I said the Serpent ate me and you got mad at me. It was... a bunch of lives ago."

"I wasn't there so I don't know, but if I did that I was probably just putting on an act because I didn't trust it wouldn't get around to her. And then she'd have eaten me, too."

"Oh." Atzi kicked a clawed foot idly.

"... The Serpent really did eat me. It turns out she does that."

"See? Terrible place." Atzi decided to not continue talking about how she liked the Serpent.

"But yes, if you get me the book, I will get you to Pan and not summon the demon here in Sostra. Getting me the book would at least give me confidence this isn't, somehow, an act."

"Okay." Atzi nodded.

"How are you gonna explain it to Oak? Just so I know what the game is."

"That's the harder part."

"I could say I'm with counterintelligence. Or, was, and I'm betraying them. I did that ruse once, it worked pretty well."

"I can't get you to Pan with Oak's knowledge. Not unless you can prove to him the plan is unnecessary. So I still have to stay here and summon smaller demons. I'll just hide the book."

"How can I prove something that hasn't happened yet?"

"Yep, probably can't. So that's why I'm going to steal his whistle for you. You get me the book, I get you the whistle."

"... Won't they kill me on sight in the jungle?"

"That's up to you to figure out." Atzi groaned.

"That's the most I can do."

"Okay. I'll get you the book. Meet me... I'm staying at the One Eye Open inn." Atzi gave Cory the directions.

"Meet me there tonight and I'll have it."

"Got it. And I'm bringing Alana. At the very least she has to know. So don't try any tricks."

"I know how strong she is, I'm not doing anything."

"Then we have a deal. Book for whistle, and I won't summon the big demon in Sostra." Cory smiled.