Chương 57: Genocide has consequences, but who cares

"Are we there yet?" Mary's whining just did not end. Stuart was half-convinced that she just did it for fun. Like a donkey from Shrek, simply finding new and inventive ways to entertain herself by making others suffer.

"You literally know that we're not," Jack grumbled nearby as they walked.

"The observatory is there." He pointed.

"On that hill. You are here. Not on that hill. Surely, you can conclude that we're not 'there' yet."

"But what if we actually are?" Mary whispered conspiratorially.

"What even is a hill? How do we know where a hill truly ends? We see only the high part of the hill, but at its base… maybe the whole world is just an extension of that hill. How could we even tell? We could already be there, and you wouldn't know it."

"I'm confident that we would actually know it if we were there," Stacy interjected.

"Since Stuart would've told us."

"Which is why it's important to ask!" Mary declared triumphantly.

"I regret to inform you that we're not, in fact, there." Stuart decided to join in on the conversation, if only to pass the time. Truly, he was glad for Mary's presence with them. He could always count on her to make the world around them more lovely. It was something that they sorely needed. A particularly brittle chunk of the false-ground crumbled under his foot as they started to ascend. The air grew thinner as they moved further from the false-buildings.

Technically, they were still in Los Angeles, but even inside the city some places were just 'thicker' than others, and safer, if one didn't count the monsters, of course. Here, the only 'safe' place was the Griffith Observatory itself, and they were still some distance away from it. He shivered from the cold. It wasn't really a temperature, just the way he experienced what they called the 'low-density' zones. Hannah was outright trembling, he noted.

She had the least 'experience points' of them all when they got here, and was the first to experience what happened once one had reached the 'threshhold'. Luckily, they managed to help her. But nothing could help her deal with the memories but time and patience. Mary was beside the girl almost in an instant.

"Don't worry," she muttered gently.

"I've got you. You exist." The spell wasn't aimed at Stuart, yet he still enjoyed the sudden burst of warmth just from being nearby. Of all of them, Mary was the best with that particular magic. No one else could get the resonance quite that right.

"Thanks," Hannah mumbled quietly while hugging herself.

"We're almost there, hon," Mary said kindly.

"Are we, Stuart?"

"Maybe twenty minutes," he replied.

"We're close." The rest of the ascent passed in silence. Sometimes it was too easy to let it fill the space, despite Mary's work. The observatory was an impressive building. They all relaxed a little bit as the air grew thicker and more comfortable to exist in. The monster stood its vigil at the top of the dome. How and why did it climb there, Stuart had no idea. Sometimes the creatures picked just the weirdest places to hang out, and if there was a pattern, he couldn't figure it out yet.

"We're not gonna fight that thing, are we?" Jack asked warily, his eyes never leaving the dark statue. They knew that they were safe at this distance, but it was hard to relax when an error might mean death to all of them.

"We're not prepared."

"I don't think so, no," Stuart shook his hand.

"The place is somewhere behind the observatory."

"Thank God," Stacy muttered, barely managing to hide her fear. Stuart didn't judge.

"I hate fighting those things." Fighting would be the wrong word for it. Despite the overwhelming strength that the Arms of High Authority possessed, they were quite dumb and thus could be tricked. Their most effective strategy so far was a long piece of string and days of casting Durability and Sharpness on it in turns. It even worked, bisecting the creature in half as it ran through it. But when it didn't work… Their little band of six wasn't so little, once.

Safe to say, they didn't fight unless it was truly necessary. No amount of power was worth the lives of their friends. Though, looking at Hannah, they might need to kill another one soon. Just not today. They reached the edge of a cliff behind the observatory. The view from it was stunning, allowing them to see most of the city below.

The sight wasn't as impressive as the real thing, but the eerie similarness of architecture, and tens of thousands of people flying in the paper-white sky compensated for the fakeness of it all.

"Is this the place?" Mary asked quietly, looking at the city.

"Mhm," Stuart nodded.

"Is the time right?" Evan asked, breaking his silence for the first time that day. Stuart was glad to hear from him. It meant that this day might be one of Evan's good days.

"Just a few minutes left, if I'm feeling it right," Stuart replied, finding a comfy rock for himself to sit on. Everyone found themselves a place as they waited.

"Any idea what it is?" Jack asked, breaking the silence.

"Fuck if I know."

"We're probably supposed to see something?" Hannah guessed.

"Or maybe someone will see us? The view is great, so it has to be deliberate."

"Or a magical portal is going to suddenly appear right here and bring us home," Mary said. Everyone gave her a look. She shrugged.

"What? Would've been nice. Nothing wrong with wanting a nice thing." The idle chatter slowly died down as time passed. Tension filled the air. After all, they didn't know exactly why they were here, near the observatory. Stuart's skill was both the weakest and the strongest of the group. A Proper Time and Place wasn't named as poetically as some of the others, and the name didn't vaguely hint at any kind of horribly personal secret despite how personal skill names and descriptions usually were.

He liked it like that, simple and straightforward, and tried not to think too much about what it told about him as a person. The skill gave him knowledge of where and when he should be. That was it. He didn't know what he would encounter, or if he needed to prepare beforehand, just the time and place where he would've wanted to be. Or, maybe it wasn't about his wants, but the skill's? Stuart didn't know what decided if the place was good or not, but so far the skill was only helpful.

It allowed him to find other people, and to find safe places, and it allowed them to find the monster that was stuck in some sort of cracky portal when Hannah needed help. Not to brag, but they all would've been dead ten times over if not for his skill, despite it being… not as flashy as some of the others. The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

It was concerning that the skill brought them near one of the monsters, and the slight chance of whatever was going to happen involving the murderous creature nearby didn't fill anyone with confidence.

"It's time," he whispered, feeling the skill clicking like a puzzle piece. He was where he was supposed to be, at the time when he needed to. Everyone got alert, looking around, trying to find something, though they didn't know what. Jack and Stacy watched the Arm. Hannah shifted nervously, just waiting for something to happen. Evan did seemingly nothing, but a slight tension in his jaw betrayed his awareness. Stuart and Mary watched the city below.

"Nothing's happening," Hannah whispered.

"Are we supposed to do something?"

"There!" Mary almost shouted, but the presence of a monster nearby forced her to be quiet. The result of it was akin to a loud whisper. She was pointing somewhere in the city. Stuart followed her gaze, but saw nothing but an empty street.

"I don't see–""No. There," Evan pointed some way to the left of where Mary did.

"Something moved." Stuart couldn't see it.

"Oh, I see it," Stacy said quietly.

"It's– Wait, no. It's– What the hell. It's fast. Holy– Watch the Arms. Just pick one and watch them." He focused on one of the monsters near an intersection, deciding to trust his friends. He almost missed it. A slow blink would've been enough to miss it. One moment, the monster stood ominously near the entrance of an old store. Suddenly, a red blur appeared nearby. In just a second, the creature fell apart in two pieces, bisected horizontally.

"What the fuck," he muttered, trying to follow the movements. With every breath he took it switched streets, frequently disappearing behind the buildings. The only reliable way to follow the movements was... He looked at the nearest Arm to where the blur was. Three breaths later it was dead. He switched his sight to another one. This time he blinked at the wrong moment, missing how it died." Hasten Perception," Evan muttered under his breath. It was a costly spell, though not as costly as the all-purpose Haste.

The tricky part was resonating with two concepts at the same time and then making them resonate with each other. When it came to tricky spells such as this, Evan was the best of them.

"It's a person," he said. His eyes followed the movements with fierce intensity, not blinking even once.

"A man, I think? With a backpack. Too far to see the details."

"Talk about winning the skill lottery," Jack muttered.

"So we were supposed to see them," Mary said quietly.

"Which is weird. Why didn't your skill put us somewhere where we would actually, you know… meet them?"

"I think it did," Stuart murmured.

"We're near the Arm, aren't we? And this person–""Oh shit," Hannah said in alarm.

"They're coming towards us." The short conversation was enough for that person to kill a good dozen of the monsters, and they were indeed slowly moving towards the group one kill at a time, if slowly could be the right word. The road that they'd used to get up the hill was being traversed with the speed that boggled the mind.

"Should we prepare for a fight?" Evan whispered.

"Don't joke like that," Hannah replied.

"I do wonder though why your skill picked this exact place. We could've met them in the city."

"Something about this Arm, maybe?" Jack guessed.

"It's–""Man, I really hate it when those things climb up somewhere high like that," a new voice interrupted him.

"How the fuck am I supposed to aggro it?" They all tensed. A boy was standing near Mary, looking up at the dome of the observatory. She yelped, jumping away and pointing her staff at him. Silence stretched as no one moved, afraid of provoking the guy. Dangerous. Stuart didn't dare to breathe. He was fucking dangerous. It was one thing to understand logically that this person killed the Arms like bugs, or see how fast they were from a distance. But being nearby…

Stuart couldn't stop thinking of the presence that they carried. Hairs stood up on the back of Stuart's neck as he desperately tried to start thinking again. The fear response was unnatural. It was just… the same thing they felt when too close to the Arms. Overwhelming metaphysical power. Something beyond importance. Objective superiority. Just standing near the guy felt like having a razor sharp blade pressed against his neck. Sharp was the feeling that he got from him.

Usually people didn't carry such a distinctive meaning about them. The Arms did, the magical places did, and this boy… he felt less like a person and more like a blade. Stuart gulped, trying to see beyond what his magical senses were telling him.

"Are you, like, some sort of magician or something?" the boy said casually, looking at the staff that was pointed at him without a care in the world. In his gaze there was boredom, but beyond it there was madness. A challenge. A promise to murder them all the moment they did a wrong thing. Stuart wasn't sure how much of it was him projecting his own fear, and how much of it was genuine insight.

"I should probably warn ya, I kinda counter mages, I think? If you're thinking fireball, just don't bother. You need some quick casting. Maybe something with auto-aiming? AoE? Did you guys figure out how to silent-cast?" Mary dropped her staff, finally realizing that she was threatening the guy. Stuart allowed himself a small exhale of relief as the wood clacked against the ground. The hum of Jack's skill got quieter, like a finger that was moved away from the trigger.

"I– I'm not…" Mary muttered as she took a few steps back before her mind overcame the fight or flight response and Stuart saw fire in her eyes. Oh no.

"It's not fair! You startled me! And you're scary! Who does that?! Apologize this instant or I'll… I'll be mad at you!" Oh no Mary please don't pick an argument with personified murder." I startled you?!" the boy replied… defensively?" You startled me! It's wrong to… to point sticks at people!" He shouted while pointing a broken katana at her. Katana? What the– "How could I know what kind of eldritch horrors you could conjure from it?!"

"It's just a stick!"

"It's clearly magical! And it looks cool!"

"Thank you! I worked hard to make it that way! But it doesn't actually do anything!" Stuart started to feel a bit lost.

"And you all look like cultists or something!" the boy ranted, waving his sword.

"Like, the strongest group I've ever met, and you reek of magic like my history teacher reeked of perfume! Especially that guy!" He pointed at Jack.

"Me?" Jack pointed at himself confusedly.

"Yes! Why the fuck are you… pointy and shit! Who does that?! Stop pointing… your pointy thing! And the other guy is wearing a fucking robe!"

"Pointy?" Jack murmured quietly to himself.

"We're not cultists!" Mary interjected.

"We're roleplayers!"

"Oh, that's nerd shit."" Nerd shit?!" Oh dear. Now Mary was angry.

"Have you seen yourself?! That's a fucking katana in your hand! And the shirt is clearly merch! I've never seen a nerdier guy in my life! And why the fuck do you carry a corpse?!"

"Can we maybe calm down a little bit?" Hannah asked quietly, breaking through the effect of the weird… fear aura that the guy had.

"I think we got off on the wrong foot."

"Why did it want us to meet here though?" Evan asked quietly, deep in thought.

"Still makes no sense." A wave of magic passed through them all at that moment, silencing everyone. Stuart turned his head towards the city. Above it, not that far away from their hideout, above even the people in the sky, a tear appeared. Through it crawled out a monster. It was huge, the size of a building. Like a spider with three legs, it fell down on the ground. Instead of a body, all it had was a giant eye.

The creature used its long legs to stretch high akin to a tower, its gaze rapidly shifting between every dead Arm on the ground. It was looking for something. Even from here, Stuart could feel it. The Eye of High Authority.

"Probably so that thing didn't find us instantly," Jack replied stoically.

"Nice save, Stuart."

"Bet it's looking for me," the boy said, gently putting the corpse down on the ground with a surprising amount of care.

"I'm gonna go have a civil conversation with it. You guys are not evil, right? Look after the girl for a bit, okay? Don't be mean to her. She'll tell me if you were." He disappeared.