Chương 81: 80-Closing the Circle

Billy exploded into a thousand points of light as soon as they passed through the entrance to the Black Tower. Jenna panicked.

"Oh, my God, did he…"

"Stay calm, Jenna," Bob told her.

"That was a normal respawn. If he had been exiled, the tentacles would have manifested." Sure enough, Billy reappeared ten seconds later, looking none the worse.

"It seems you need an active Oath to remain a Mystic Storyteller—once you complete it, you lose the form," he explained to Bob and Jenna.

"The good news is that I get back the full achievement point cost of the form, 50 AP per level, not the reduced rate. Another way to get AP—a dangerous one." They stopped for a brief rest. The passageway leading to the exit sloped gently downward. They had become unable to hear the sounds of the battle outside as soon as they had gone deep enough to lose sight of the exit—it was only a few yards away, but it could have been a world apart.

Bob knew that following the path would unerringly take them to the lake that contained the Keeper and offered a path to any point in the continuum. Exchange, in that irritating way of his, so reminiscent of Dawn and Governance, had given them the minimum amount of information necessary to complete their task. Jenna asked for a time-out.

"Okay, guys, let's sit down for a minute—I finally understand Exchange's plan. I know what he intends us to do. That poem with the Widow was the final clue."

"I still think it would have been much easier if he had just plain told us, instead of all that you will know when it's time crap," answered Billy.

"In this particular case, I think I understand his line of reasoning. If he had told us, the Keeper would have found out and adjusted. Now it is too late for him to do anything about it."

"How will the Keeper react when it sees us inside the dungeon? Won't it attack us?" asked Billy.

"It is bound by its own nature," answered Jenna.

"It can't do anything to us while inside the Tower. As for outside of it, if Exchange's calculations are correct, that thing must have exhausted itself by now." She then explained the rest of the plan. Bob whistled.

"Do you think Exchange planned it all in advance—the Widow being chosen and using that specific poem?"

"He has 200 points in Intelligence, Bob. Who knows what his limits are?"

"Do you really think I can do this, Jenna?" Billy asked.

"There is only one way to find out," she said as she enhanced his visualization powers, allowing him to divine the effect of new Essence Gestalts without having to respawn as a Headshaker. Billy spent twenty long minutes trying new combinations. He finally sighed and opened his eyes.

"There is both good and bad news," he told them.

"The good news is that I can indeed acquire the power we need by mixing the correct Akashic Forms," he explained, an expression of doubt on his face.

"Go on," said Jenna.

"The bad news is that Mystic Storyteller is a necessary component of the mix."

"Jesus, Billy, another oath? Again? Just three minutes after completing the last one?"

"It is worse than that, Jenna. The full restrictions of Mystic Storyteller apply to any of the forms it is part of—I must also restart at level one. I am sorry, but it is the only way to do it."

"I thought Essence Gestalts could not advance in level once they were manifested," Jenna mused.

"As I said, Mystic Storyteller trumps all that," Billy answered.

"You start at level 1, and you can level for five points per rank, even in Essence Gestalt form."

"And all it costs you is the very real possibility of going to hell," said Jenna.

"So affordable."

"Okay, things are not as bad as they look," Jenna fumed, as if trying to convince herself.

"The Keeper has exhausted all the available paradox energy with that last pull. That means we only have to corpse-camp a few beasts so that Billy gets his Gestalt form at a level high enough to unlock the power he needs. Then we go home." Neither Bob nor Billy said anything. They all knew it would not be that simple.

"Okay, go for it," Jenna said to Billy. Billy closed his eyes and discorporated. He chose the needed Gestalt. Apocalypse Ender: Two parts of Mystic Storyteller, one part of Assassin Timespider, one part of Blind Swordsman, shake gently—very, very gently- and pray it does not explode. Serve with a sprig of rosemary. Cost 5 points. Requires an Oath.

"I swear I will rid humanity of the Icosahedron forever," Billy swore. When he came back, he was no longer a person. His body was still mostly humanoid, but his limbs were too long and gaunt to pass as human. He had powerful spider mandibles instead of a jaw, and several eyes dotted what would have been his forehead. His skin was covered with coarse, matted hair.

The greatest change was to his senses, though—this thing had all the temporal senses of a Timespider, enhanced with the sensitivity of a Blind Swordsman and the possibility sight of the Mystic Storyteller. Reality became a kaleidoscope.

"Are you feeling okay, Billy?" he heard her girlfriend say. He looked at her, but she was no longer Jenna. No longer only Jenna. She was the Widow. She was Multiple Jenna. She was Legacy. She was all their possible combinations and none of them at the same time. And this was only at level 1. What would reality look like for this beast when its mind was upgraded? There was only one way to know.

"As well as I will ever be. Let's go," Billy answered in a metallic, resonant voice. They went down the pathway. The Keeper's lake was waiting for them down below. Billy could feel the powerful presence looming at its depths. The same presence that had scoured all the space-time continuum, seeking assassins it could use against the Losers.

"Don't look at it, Billy. Let's get this done," he heard his girlfriend say.

"It is the third entry from the right. I have memorized all the steps from there. Come on, let's go!"

"Wait a second, Jenna," Billy told her.

"The Tower is…different. There are many, many more paths than before. The Keeper has done something to time—there are not only Then, Now, and Will Be. The last one is gone—it has split into Could Be and Could Have Been."

"This thing has changed the fundamental structure of the cosmos just to stop us?" asked a bewildered Bob.

"The question is, did Exchange take this into account when he made his calculations?" Billy said.

"Let's hope that he is much, much smarter than that thing at the bottom of the lake," Jenna answered curtly. They approached the chosen exit. Just when they were about to enter it, he heard a voice inside his mind. The voice of a young girl.

"Billy. Bob. Jenna." Billy turned round, and he beheld the gargantuan majesty of the insectoid-dragon known as the Keeper, rising from the lake.

"You know I must stop you three. It is in my nature. I can't fight it any more than an apple can fight gravity when it falls from the tree." There was something strange about the beast. Finally, Billy realized what it was. It was unique. He saw no possible permutation of it. Alone among all creation, the Keeper was not a possibility. The Keeper was.

"You bluff, Keeper," Jenna answered the dragon, wholly unafraid.

"You have exhausted yourself with that last trick you pulled. You have no cards left to play."

"You are right, Jenna. I only have one thought left." The Losers ran from the lake, sprinting towards their destination. ◇"Of course, one thought from the Keeper can shape universes," the dragon mumbled. And it released its thought. It followed the Losers at first, tracking their steps along the same paths. After five such turns, it took a detour. It passed through unknown pathways inaccessible even through the Black Tower—pathways open only to the Keeper's thoughts.

The thought elegantly dodged a paradox, dived under a conundrum, and slid down a contradiction, reaching a point in time it could not theoretically reach: months before the creation of the Black Tower. It lodged itself inside a specific mind, that of Professor Arimel, who was experimenting for the first time with what would later be called dungeons. It made a tiny alteration to his brain patterns, causing a small, undetectable change and giving all the Essentials in Erela a new tag: hidden, unknown, and dangerous.

Paradox: Essentials created in dungeons with this tag are extremely sensitive to Dissonance and react violently to it. ◇ The Losers reached the end of the tunnel. A nightmare waited for them—the remains of a once-proud city, now destroyed. Erela had once been more technologically advanced than Earth, a dream come true thanks to the wonder of Eidotics. Now it was a huge graveyard, filled with maddened Essentials hunting the last remnants of humanity.

They watched the horror from the inside of the tunnel, not daring to break the silence.

"This is Dawn's homeland, isn't it?" Bob finally said.

"You are seeing it just a few minutes after she entered the Black Tower, never to return to this Aeon. The worst part is over. Let's do some corpse-camping so that Billy can develop his powers, and let's wrap this whole thing up," said Jenna. They exited the tunnel and were greeted by a symphony of screams: the howling of all Essentials in Erela, roaring in unison with rage. Billy saw huge swarms of flying Essentials take to the sky, looking for the source of the offending Dissonance.

They looked like a massive black cloud heading towards their position. The only thing that kept them from being instantly overwhelmed was their struggle to pinpoint the Icosahedron's exact location.

"Billy, do you remember what I told you about taking some time off for corpse-camping?" whispered Jenna, awed by the spectacle of all the Essentials on the planet charging towards their location. The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

"Yes," Billy whispered back.

"We may have to take a rain check on it." ◇ Bob felt Jenna's hand fall on his shoulder, enhancing his mind and imprinting the coordinates of their destination in his memory.

"It is the tall, yellow building at the end of the big street. Our goal is the seventh floor," he heard her say.

"I can't teleport to the exact location if I don't know what it looks like—I will teleport us to ground level, and then we will have to make our way up," Bob answered as he pushed his mind against space, feeling the threads that held reality together come loose. A rift appeared in mid-air. Bob felt a vague surprise as the three jumped through it: rifts usually revealed what lay on the other side, but this one opened into a featureless gray mist.

However, the Essentials were drawing near, and beggars can't be choosers. He screamed as he found himself three hundred feet above ground. A gigantic man-eating flower the size of a football stadium lay beneath them, its jaws wide open, waiting for them to fall into its mouth. Bob instinctively transformed into manta form in mid-air.

"Charlie, get Jenna and Billy; this is a trap," he nervously ordered the driver in his mental limousine.

"Do not worry, Bob, they have it under control," Charlie answered. Bob looked through the car windows and saw Jenna and Billy mounted on the Celestial Stag: she had summoned her warhorn and called for her mount in mid-air. She made a hand sign to Bob: Follow me. Bob flew after the stag. He saw the huge cloud of flying Essentials approaching their position like a hurricane of locusts—less than two minutes away. The stag flew gracefully through a huge window at the southernmost end of the nearest building.

Bob dove after them. They were in what seemed to be an executive office, with luxurious, modern furniture and a spectacular view of Erela through the now-destroyed window. Jenna and Billy dismounted as Bob shifted back into human form.

"What the hell happened there? What was that thing?" asked Bob.

"It was a Core," Billy answered.

"It had some space-distortion magic; that is why your spell transported us to a point just above its open jaws—it is the way it hunts."

"If we teleport again, we will just appear in the same spot," said Jenna.

"Not being able to use spatial magic is going to complicate things greatly. We are going to have to reach our goal the hard way."

"I am afraid to ask what the hard way is," said Bob.

"We are at the southernmost skyscraper on this avenue. I chose it because all the buildings touch each other, with no space between them. We are going to crash through the walls between them until we reach our goal. That is seven buildings across and three stories up," explained Jenna.

"Uhm, Jenna, I think we have more serious problems," said Spider-Billy, in that deep, metallic voice of his. Bob instantly knew what he meant: the clouds of flying Essentials were creeping closer. Their numbers were so vast that the Losers would inevitably be swamped, even if the Essentials could not pinpoint their exact location.

"Your turn now," Jenna said kindly to the Celestial Stag. The beast dove through the window and galloped through the sky, heading back in the direction they had just come. The flying Essentials saw a lone figure escaping from them: that was all the signal they needed. They flew after the Stag as a single creature.

"It will drive them away from us as far as the boundary of the Dissonance Sphere," Jenna explained.

"Once they cross its boundary, they will realize the Stag is not the one emitting Dissonance, and they will head back here—he will have bought us six minutes."

"Six minutes may not be enough, Jenna," Billy said, his not-quite-human hand pointing at the non-flying Essentials entering the buildings along the avenue. A horde of nightmare creatures, with their hate for the Dissonant strangers as the sole unifying feature, was frantically looking for them.

"And I need more AP," Billy went on. He projected his screen. Glimpse into the Past (Timecraft 1): Jump into the past for one second, to a point up to one minute earlier. May cause Dissonance. Cooldown: one month.

"I've got to upgrade this power," Billy explained.

"Quite a lot, as a matter of fact."

"How many character levels do you need, Billy?" Bob asked.

"At least 90."

"Ouch."

"Jesus, we do not have that much time," an exasperated Jenna said.

"Corpse-camping is just not going to cut it in these conditions."

"No, it is not," Billy agreed. The Red Machete suddenly materialized in his right hand. ◇ Billy spent one AP and suddenly felt the machete's weight in his hand. His aunt's name was engraved on it, and the metal had a reddish tint, as if glowing from within.

"Let's go; it's one hundred feet north to the next wall," his girlfriend shouted as she led the way. She had planned the next steps in detail, using all her tactical prowess. Jenna opened the door, followed by Bob and Billy.

"You take the rear, Billy; you are only level 1. Bob and I will deal with the foes before they come too near."

"I need to help kill some of them, Jenna. It is the only way I will gain levels." Billy just realized that his voice came from his thorax, not from his throat. A spider thing, probably.

"We weaken them; you finish," Bob said, one Palooga ball already in his hand. Billy could hear an enormous ruckus coming from the floor below them—Essentials were already pouring into the building and climbing their way up, looking for enemies. Billy saw Jenna somehow change, becoming more real, as if she were being overstuffed with her own identity. She ran towards the far wall at full speed. Then she ran through it—she had increased her momentum.

They had crossed the first wall without encountering foes, but that was not going to last. Jenna fell to her knees after crashing through the wall. She glanced up, only to see a demonic creature the size of two men glaring at her. It had three maws, one in its abdomen, another in its thorax, and the third one where its mouth should be. It opened all three, impossibly wide. Bob's Palooga ball flew into the mouth in its abdomen, the largest of them.

Eruna's Inertia (Palooga 4): Much like Eruna, the largest of the Amazons, this ball gathers enormous inertia when it charges. It transmits that inertia to the target without harming it. The ball did not go through the monster—it returned to Bob's mindspace as soon as it touched the beast, but not before charging the monster with the ball's own momentum. The Essential was thrown back like a rag in a gale, crashing into another of its kind that was behind it. Both fell into a heap on the floor.

Jenna offered Bob her hand; he took it and used her power and his Flamethrower perk to burn both to a crisp. As the beasts screamed horribly, Billy fell upon them and finished them with his machete. He felt something crawl up the machete blade towards his hand. A surge of power coursed through him. You have gained four levels. You gain +1 to each Stat. You have gained the Shapeshifting Competency Glimpse into the Past (Timecraft 2): Jump into the past for one second, to a point up to one minute earlier.

May cause Dissonance. Cooldown: one week. A long, long way to go still. He had to make the most of the rest of the fight. They ran down the corridor.

"One hundred feet south. Then the east corridor. South again. Fifty feet," Jenna shouted. The ruckus of the monsters was growing louder—they were only facing scouts so far, but the main horde was making its way up to their floor. They turned east and suddenly ran into four goblin-like creatures armed with tridents. Bob and Jenna crossed weapons with them, leaving them wounded enough for Billy to easily finish them.

He felt another surge of power, but not as strong as the first one, and he gained two more levels—these were weaker opponents, and the rewards were smaller. Then they reached the second wall. Jenna went through it again—the corridor behind it was filled with rotting zombies. Bob prepared his magic, but Jenna stopped him.

"No, let Billy do it; he needs the points." Billy felt her Spirit touch him, enhancing his physical prowess. He felt like he could take the world. He jumped among the zombies, using wide swipes to clear the corridor. Whenever the machete swung, limbs flew, and the enemy fell, not to rise again." Is she giving me even more power? Where does she get it from?" Billy thought as he felt his coordination and strength improving even more. Then he realized it was not Jenna—it was the weapon.

It was continuously feeding him levels as he slew his foes. These puny foes. He laughed as he danced the glorious dance of battle. He missed Jenna's worried look as she glanced at him. Glimpse into the Past (Timecraft 4): Jump into the past for one second, to a point up to one week earlier. May cause Dissonance. Cooldown: one day. His girlfriend shouted more nonsensical directions—he decided to humor her and followed them. It did not really matter; there were Essentials everywhere they went.

You have gained one mutation —the system spat at him after he plunged his machete through the open jaws of a steel-encased monstrosity, right into its brain. Billy's skin took on a metallic sheen, like natural armor. Sweet. The machete not only gave him levels, but also stole some of the powers of the enemies he slew. As he gained stats and levels, he started using the Apocalypse Ender powers in new ways. He flickered down the corridor, jumping to the points in the timeline where he could kill his foes more easily.

Essential warriors fell in droves as he blinked out of existence at the right instant and came back just in time to feed the Red Machete. He rewrote reality, making blows that would have hit him strike his enemies. He shapeshifted his body, making weapons grow out of it and strike his enemies. His power grew by leaps and bounds as he fed the Machete once again. You have gained one mutation —he tore apart some amoeba-like creature with his own hands. Its blood ignited in contact with air, severely burning his hands.

He did not mind. He felt his blood gaining the same properties. It would burn anyone alive who touched it. Jenna no longer went through walls—he did. He had lost count of how many times he had already done it. With a howl of fury, the flying Essentials finally caught up with them, entering the last building through many windows at once. Billy cut his right hand with the machete and sprayed his blood all around him, laughing as he turned his winged enemies into bonfires.

Jenna and Bob crouched down, trying not to get caught in the conflagration. Who cared? He was having fun. Glimpse into the Past (Timecraft 7): Jump into the past for three seconds, to a point up to one month earlier. May cause Dissonance. Cool down: One day. He did not care. Feeding the blade—that was the only thing that mattered. ◇ Jenna was not worried; she was utterly terrified. Billy had become a killing machine, and he had been ignoring any attempt to communicate with him for the past ten minutes.

At first, she and Bob had tried to protect Billy while he was weakened. Now they struggled to keep up with him. He went through mobs and walls like a bullet through paper. He had grown two feet, his skin had turned into metallic armor, and whenever he got wounded, his blood acted like liquid napalm.

"Billy, stop it. We are already here. It is that door. Stop it, goddamnit!" She put her hand on Billy's shoulder. He backhanded her savagely, throwing her to the ground.

"Not Billy, you stupid bitch. William!" he shouted in that deep, resonant voice of his.

"It is too late, Jenna," Bob said.

"We have lost him."

"It is not too late, Bob. I am not giving up on him," Jenna muttered. She reached inside herself, diving into the Chant. She knew she could get three extra freebie points for an instant by focusing on the right Coda; it had once allowed her to heal Elias in Babylon. She recited the Coda of Balarion and Telana, once mistress and pupil, then friends, then lovers, who had decided to die together fighting an unbeatable foe: One will, one soul, one life.

Spirit +6 Empathy +6 Union +6 Jenna and Billy ceased to exist, and for one single second, they became one being, not only on the mental, emotional, and physical levels, but also on the metaphysical level. Jenna felt an endless rage invading her, threatening to consume her soul along with that of Billy. It only lasted a second, but sometimes a second is enough. Jenna's fingers brushed the leaf talisman hanging from her neck, a powerful item Billy had given her after saving her life.

A talisman powered by a Tribulation that could dispel debuffs. The talisman released its magic, and the rage abated for a second. Billy briefly came to his senses. What was he doing? He looked at the machete in his right hand as if he were holding a living snake. He unclenched his fist and let it fall to the ground. The machete exploded into points of blue light. Glimpse into the Past (Timecraft 10): Jump into the past for 10 seconds, to a point up to one year earlier. May cause Dissonance. One-day cooldown.

They were inside a ransacked room. Jenna and Bob were desperately holding the door, trying to stop the marauding horde of Essentials outside from coming in. He knew this room. Dawn had described it to them in detail when Exchange briefed them for their mission. It was the room where a young professor had lived, so many Aeons ago, with her fiancé, who would one day become the being known as Necessity. Billy realized he had almost wrecked the whole plan, dooming the Universe.

He felt tears falling down his inhuman face. They ignited on contact with air. Damn it, even the tears are flame. He activated the power and traveled many months into the past. The whole room changed around him. The Losers were gone. In their place, a young professor gaped at him in horror—Dawn. He spoke to her in English, a language Dawn did not know, but his magical ring conveyed his meaning.

"I am sorry," Billy said in his metallic but gentle voice.

"I am so, so sorry, but I must give you this," he said as he placed the Icosahedron on Dawn's desk. Then he was whisked back to the present. He discorporated as soon as he reentered the present, returning in his true form—the conditions of the Oath had been met. He was no longer the Apocalypse Ender; he was again Billy. He was back with Bob and Jenna. The room was again in disarray, but the Essentials could no longer be heard. He then noticed something new: none of them was emitting Dissonance anymore.

They had won. The effects of the Keeper's chicanery had also been blown away on the winds of causality: Essentials no longer reacted to Dissonance. He fell to his knees and began to cry. Jenna hugged him, caressing his cheek.

"Ssh. It is over now."