Chương 133: Dead Gods

The dust glowed faintly, as if spending its last strength to give shape to Mippo's words. Tiny golden particles trembled in the air, flaring brighter then almost fading, as though the very magic sustaining this display was growing tired from the long telling. The lamp between them cast uneven, flickering glints across the walls, and somewhere deep in the building a floorboard creaked again, as if the house itself were shifting in its sleep, settling in before the next part of the story. — Anarchs.

They stand at the very top of the ranking system. Or rather, it would be more accurate to say they exist outside of it entirely. These are monsters that — I won't shy away from the word — have become gods. Mippo's voice came out quieter than usual, almost reverent, and a chill ran down Lloyd's spine at the sound of it. He listened warily, unable to tear his eyes from the patterns of dust slowly weaving themselves into vague, elusive shapes, which scattered apart the instant he tried to look at them more closely.

He'd heard of this rank before — in passing, in scraps of other people's conversations somewhere at a market or in a tavern — but each time, the information had been catastrophically scarce, as if the very subject were under some unspoken ban. For the highest, final rank in the entire system, that seemed, at the very least, strange. As if the rank both existed and didn't exist at the same time — something people were afraid to speak of aloud, worried that a mere mention might draw unwanted attention.

— So where are they now? — Lloyd asked, and his own voice sounded too quiet to him in the oppressive silence of the room, almost swallowed by the thick shadows creeping over the walls. Mippo spread his hands and gave a slight shrug, making the little bell in the folds of his robe let out a short, almost apologetic ring, instantly absorbed by the stillness. — No idea. We know about them from petroglyphs and pictographs left by ancient races and civilizations that fell victim to Oblivion many millions of years ago.

Most likely, the last of the Anarchs died long before our current world ever came to be. Lloyd let out a breath of relief, feeling some of the tightness leave his chest, as though an invisible weight had slipped off his shoulders — but Mippo immediately added, giving him no chance to relax, his voice taking on a cold, serious edge once more: — At least, that's what I hope.

Otherwise, a single one of those "gods" would be enough to destroy the entire world, and none of us would even have time to understand what was happening. The dust glowed faintly again, this time forming the outlines of ancient cities from some long-forgotten civilization — leaning towers, wide stone plazas, columns webbed with cracks — before rapidly shifting into the likeness of brittle, edge-scorched parchments covered in illegible symbols, as though written in a language time itself had forgotten.

The images surfaced and dissolved one after another, as if the dust itself were turning the pages of some invisible book, too ancient even for Oblivion's memory, and with every new page the air in the room seemed to grow just a little heavier. Lloyd found himself turning toward the window. Beyond the cloudy, cobweb-cracked glass, thousands of islands drifted in slow orbit around a massive tornado — all that remained of the once-magnificent kingdom of Lethea.

Fragments of land floated through the darkness, snagged together by scraps of bridges and collapsed walls, here and there a gleam of what had once been golden domes still catching the light, and the sight of it alone was unsettling, as though the whole scene carried within it the echo of some long-past catastrophe.

"I wonder if that kingdom existed back when monsters like these still walked the world." The thought slipped into his mind unnoticed, as if it had crawled in on its own from the darkness beyond the window, and it sent a shiver crawling across his skin, his fingers curling into fists without his meaning them to. Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

"Or maybe its downfall was exactly that — the aftermath of some Anarch's power." Fortunately — or not — Lloyd was never going to find out the answer. The members of that rank had, by all accounts, died out long before even the dinosaurs came into being, and any guesses would remain just that: guesses, buried along with the last of those creatures somewhere at the bottom of a long-forgotten age.

Mippo watched Lloyd in silence for a while, taking in his bewildered, troubled expression, as if weighing whether it was worth saying anything more, the green sparks in his eyes dimming for just a moment. He seemed ready to rise and leave, to let Lloyd sit alone with his unsettled thoughts, but then, recalling something, he spoke again, and an unusually serious, almost fatherly note crept into his voice. — I can see you've still got plenty of doubts and questions left.

But let me tell you one more thing before I go. Lloyd nodded silently, all ears, feeling his heart pick up its pace again in anticipation of some new unsettling revelation. — As you've probably noticed, the monster ranking system only has seven ranks. A bead of sweat slid slowly down Lloyd's temple, leaving a damp trail, and he nodded again, not quite grasping where Mippo was going with this, though a vague, uneasy feeling was already building inside him. — Players, on the other hand, have eleven ranks.

And yet the strongest Player currently alive holds only the ninth rank. Lloyd nodded a third time, but he still wasn't following, and it showed plainly in his slightly furrowed brow. Noticing his confusion, Mippo narrowed his eyes a little and continued, choosing his words carefully, as though trying to explain something both simple and impossibly complex at once: — Which means the gap between monster ranks and Player ranks is enormous. Picture this: you might be able to take down a Reaper without much effort.

But a monster of that very same rank might not give you a single chance at victory. The spread of strength within one and the same monster rank is monstrously wide, and that gap only grows wider with every rank up — as if the chasm between the weakest and the strongest just keeps stretching further. Lloyd swallowed hard, feeling his mouth go suddenly dry, his palms turning faintly cold. — That's exactly why you need to learn to read an enemy's phantasm as quickly as possible, before the fight even starts.

Otherwise you're going to have a very hard time of it, Lloyd. Sometimes the only chance you have of surviving is realizing in time that you shouldn't start the fight at all. Mippo chuckled softly, and for the first time all evening, there was something in that laugh that resembled genuine sympathy rather than his usual mockery. — As you've probably figured out by now, the entire System of Ex and all its ranks are built on randomness.

What more is there to say — even dungeons only have three ranks, though you'd think it would make more sense to tie them to the ranks of monsters or Players. But it seems whoever built all this didn't much care for our kind of logic. He let out a heavy sigh, and in that sigh Lloyd thought he heard years upon years of weariness, as if Mippo had said all this many times before, to more than one Player before him. — But I'm out of time to tell you about dungeons now.

Mippo rose from the floor with a smoothness surprising for someone with his hunched posture, and reaching out a hand, cupped his palm over the lamp. The dust, long since stripped of its golden shimmer, settled quietly onto the floor in a thin, almost invisible layer, as if it had never been there at all — not a single glimmering speck, not a hint that only moments ago it had been sketching cities, parchments, and monsters into the air, things Lloyd doubted he would ever be able to forget now.

Watching him go, Lloyd managed to force out only a single word, hoarse and quiet: — Thank you. Mippo nodded silently, without turning around, as though he understood perfectly well, without needing words, everything currently churning through Lloyd's mind. Turning, he moved toward the darkness pooling by the door, each step accompanied by the soft, steady chime of his bell, gradually dissolving into the silence of the corridor. — Sweet dreams.

The next instant, the green light of his eyes went out, as though someone had snuffed an invisible candle in a single motion, and the whole room dissolved into darkness along with it.

Somewhere in the dark, the door creaked softly, and such a complete, heavy silence settled over everything that for a moment Lloyd could have sworn none of it had happened at all — not Mippo, not the dust, not their long conversation — as though he had simply imagined it all in that hazy space between waking and sleep, amid the creak of floorboards and the smell of old wood.