Contender

—Memoirs of a Master-Tier Warmage384

Contender

“Shiv! Shiv! What is this shit?” Jessica came storming through the crowd, gliding between people using her diminutive size. Most of the former slaves and civilians were wise enough to part when a Legend approached, but some were far too slow, and she simply slid through them like a dagger slipping between the gaps in armor. In her hand was a flyer, one that had been distributed all across the Gate, and upon its page was an illustration detailing Shiv leaping up into the air, trying to smite Roland Arrow from the sky before the latter shot him down.

The header held a cursive chain painted in magical filigree:

The ridiculousness of the depiction made Shiv snort. For one, his head wasn’t that small in proportion to his body. The way he was drawn made his face look like a small skin tag sticking out from a mess of tumorous lumps, while an endless tide of nightmarish flies spilled out from his ass. Meanwhile, Roland looked like a divine hero of beauty and grace bearing a furious bow made to fell the meanest of monsters.

“Felling artists. Anyway, Jessica, you want a potsticker?” Shiv gestured to the small mountain of potstickers stacked at the center of the Surface District.

The central square was almost entirely occupied by his foodstuff, and the taste of heated pork and baked dough wafted in crushing waves that drowned every tongue and throat. The locals, only just recovered from their ordeal at the hands of the mana leeches, were practically scrambling over each other, climbing off the pyramid-like steps to seize a potsticker for themselves. On average, it took two Initiate-Tiers to carry the burden of a single potsticker, for they ran three meters long and constituted three hundred kilograms in terms of mass—not to mention having far higher caloric density than most non-monstrous organics would ever need.

Shiv guessed.

Jessica jumped up and slammed her poster straight into Shiv’s face. Her thrust was hard enough to paste the skull of an Adept, but Shiv didn’t even blink. Jessica was about to start complaining again, but then she did a double-take, and her jaw fell open at the edifice of fried dough-dollops nearby. “I… Holy shit, those are some big godsdamned potstickers.”

“I made them for dragons,” Shiv said, grinning against the rough paper. “Can probably feed a goblin or a goblin-sized human for years.”

She scowled. “Fuck yo—Ugh, what is that smell?”

“Philosophy. A lot of it is my Nihilism.”

“Philosophy? Shiv, what the felling fuck are you talking about?”

“Oh, my new Pyromancy Evolution draws mana from kindling philosophy.”

the Nihilist proclaimed.

Jessica’s befuddlement grew three times that second. “Did your fire just speak to me? Wait, was that who was talking earlier? The gray shit that bounced off my armor?” And then the worst part of Shiv’s declaration smashed into the back of Jessica’s skull like a boomerang. “Wait, new Pyromancy? You did another evolution?”

“Philosophy. Pyromancy. Cooking.” Shiv held up three fingers and casually shoved them against Jessica’s forehead to taunt her. “Heroic-Tier. But functionally Unique. Cause no one else's as special as—”

She exploded in size, dwarfing Shiv in an instant as she seized and began to throttle him. “You little fucking shit.”

“N-n-not my fault,” Shiv stuttered, grinning and limp as she tried to rattle the life out of him, “that I'm so much b-better than you.”

“Rusty! Sheathe this ass!” Jessica’s order caused Shiv’s smile to crack and his body to tense in more ways than one. Muscles he normally couldn’t control in his ass woke and squeezed his rectal path until not even a molecule could pass through.

Rusty rumbled, displeased with his wielder’s behavior.

“A triple Heroic Skill Fusion in a fucking week! You wanna know how long it took me to become a Hero in a Skill? Decades! Felling decades!” The now three-meter-tall Jessica was seething at Shiv, while the latter enjoyed so much smugness it should have evolved its own skill.

“You should really try a potsticker,” Shiv said. “You can be pissed at me, and also enjoy the food at the same time. It’s a win-win. Or don’t, and make yourself easy to manipulate.”

He could practically see the flames of frustration behind her eyes. “Excuse me? Easy to manipulate?”

“Yeah, if I didn’t say that, you would have gone hungry out of spite because that’s your nature: someone tells you something, and you do whatever you want. Aside from Veronica, but you know—”

Jessica punted Shiv between the legs so hard a concussive blast swept out and flung dozens of residents and guards off their feet. As their bodies toppled over each other, Shiv's form went flying skybound, and even then, he remained indifferent, though there was a slight bruise forming on the underside of his fifth limb. Even so, he kept his Shapeless Tides in restraint, for he was building up as much as he could in anticipation of the coming duel. His Physicality was an appreciating asset—one he couldn't spend frivolously right now because he needed to preserve everything he had to give Roland a new asshole.

As he crashed back down, Shiv bounced once, gave Jessica a nonchalant nod, and returned to seeing the public served. While one body was committed to seeing the denizens of the gate fed, the others were hard at work and in anticipation of the duel to come.

Back in the capital, Marcus Unblood was studying harder than ever before, with his main focus given to Chronomancy. Shiv had to give his Legion of Self routine breaks to not lose hours to cognitive exhaustion, but for now, he still possessed ample energy, and the mind fog remained a distant threat. Spread open before him upon the pages of his tomes were spell shapes and mechanics bound to the principles of Magical Alacrity. As his reading revealed, every time he used an anchor, he was exercising a portion of magical alacrity, effectively pinning a section of his own temporal mana onto the world. What he needed to do then was expand his Chronomancy to encompass another spell or action he was performing in a moment, and then accelerate that forward until it was swept into its Chronomancy, held in place, and primed to be used at any point in the future.

However, storing spells and actions within his Chronomancy placed variable strain on his mana. Capturing a series of punches and slashes was simple; all he needed to do was imprint a temporal anchor of himself on the world and then draw that anchor back into himself. He could do that over and over again until his Harbinger was on the verge of cracking. But placing a spell derived from another mana type inflicted another level of strain altogether.

the advised.

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Shiv was about to agree when a huge hand seized his Surface District body from behind and started shaking him again. “Jessica, come on—oh, how do you like it?”

She still looked three shades of pissed, but she was gobbling one of his potstickers. “It’s… Yeah, it’s good, but the whole philosophy-cooking is… is…” The redness left her face, and she smacked her lips together. “Huh. It’s pretty good. Is that what nihilism tastes like? Almost… sweet and bitter?”

“Mixed in with a bunch of other perspectives at the same time,” Shiv said. “So think of it as a unique sauce derivable only at a specific place, from a specific group of people. If I used another group of people to kindle my flames as a critical focus, then it would probably taste different.”

“Shit, kid, that’s actually… That’s got some kick. Reminds me of my first liquor.” Jessica shook her head. “Not just in the intensity, but the feeling of… of…”

“Acquired taste?”

“Yeah, that. It’s really an acquired taste. It felt like I was swallowing shit for a moment at the start, but later it really stuck to me. You know something, you should advertise that—I think this’ll get you shit-tons of customers if you ever manage to get your monster-kitchen up in the air outdoors.”

Shiv looked over the crowds—some of whom were actively staggering back to their feet and giving the Deathless and the Giantsbane a wide berth. Despite him coming to feed them, there was still a heavy feeling of nervousness when he was nearby—and he understood. Tier-Dread was a very real thing: the kind of primal, instinctive terror you would feel when you had to coexist beside someone so much more powerful than you in practically every way. A single sloppy swing from a Legend could see the entire district rendered rubble, and there was nothing anyone present could do about it.

But though the feeling would never fully go away, it could be alleviated. Shiv had no problem with people fearing him. On some level, he even enjoyed it. But he wanted more than their understandable terror, because there were multitudes to them and there were multitudes to him. Even if they remained wary of his strength and volatility, they could still appreciate his service as a chef and judge him by his character.

“It will,” he reassured her. And himself. “Real soon. I think I’m going to start inside the Gate first. Have all the residents and mercs come aboard for the opening night before heading out and seeing what we can do for all our new guests.”

And there were plenty of new guests flooding into Gate Piety with every minute. Uva, the Arachnae Order, and the remains of the Blackedge guard were being taxed to the limit trying to process everyone. Apparently, the surface gateway was completely surrounded by encampments and pocket dimensions housing Pathbearers from all across Integrated Earth.

Roland Arrow’s reputation carried a great deal of gravity, and it seemed few could resist its pull, be they enemy or ally.

The bridge leading to the surface gateway had been expanded into a customs tower—something Gate Theborn once had as well. All the newcomers were directed to wait and declare themselves in detail before they were allowed to mingle amongst the existing population.

At the same time, Can Hu and the Geomancers were literally dragging entire residential clusters up from the soil. Domiciles and housing were desperately needed, and even with all the experience the Penitent possessed, they would be hard-pressed to satisfy the logistical demands that came with a population spike of this size. And these were just basic worries. Aside from shelter, sustenance, and protection, people often needed things to occupy their interests and time.

Such was why most places had practice arenas, racetracks, debate forums, theaters, and more. With so many different Pathbearers bound to so many different Paths, there were countless skills they all needed to hone, and with the proper facilities and resources, they would find the gate lacking as well.

But that gave Shiv a hit of inspiration.

“Look, you should have talked to me about this,” Jessica said, causing Shiv’s attention to snap back to his surface district body again.

“About what? Sparring with Roland?” He rubbed his nose. “Yeah, don’t take this the wrong way, Jessica, but our grudges are separate. I know you still might want to put Roland down, but—”

“It’s not that,” Jessica said, shaking Shiv with a single hand and frowning at him. He arched an unimpressed eyebrow as his Gardener of Doubt and his Harbinger both signaled how much shit she was spewing. “It’s not that. Look, I’d love for you to drag Roland through the dirt and give him the ass-beating of a lifetime, but you’re rushing into this. You should tell him the fight’s off—or get an extension or something. A month, at least. To prepare and build yourself up.”

“A month?” Shiv chuckled. “Are you worried he’s going to hurt me? Because I’m not. I got deaths to spare.”

“No, it’s just…” She clenched her spare hand as a look of motherly agitation came over her. “Fuck’s sake, I don’t want to see you humiliated.”

He paused. “Huh?”

“Dying’s one thing, but humiliation is another. I don’t want to watch Roland Arrow beat your ass so bad that he breaks something inside you.” Jessica paused, and she shot a quick look around, worried someone might be listening in. “Look, can we do this talk in private? Because I’m pretty sure Roland is listening to everything we say.” To emphasize her words, she cast a wary look toward the Perch in the distance.

“Telepathy?” Shiv asked.

“No. Inside Rusty. It’s the safest place we got right now.”

Shiv shrugged. “Alright. But I’m going to do this: It’s been a long time coming, and a little violence between us will probably be good. Let us both get some of that nasty shit we’ve been holding inside out.”

“Yeah, in my experience, the nasty shit coming out just means you get it all over everyone else instead of getting rid of it,” Jessica replied. “But what do I know? I just got a bunch of kids who I can barely talk to and a series of bars I can’t go back to. Rusty!”

Her Legendary blade shot up into the air like a static missile and then exploded in size to become like a ten-story tower. A series of worried shouts sounded from the various diplomats and former slaves that made up the surface district’s population, and Shiv winced. Their voices were cut off in an instant as Rusty splashed down over him, and they found themselves hovering over a vast opalescent platform that stretched far beyond the visible horizon. To Shiv’s surprise, he saw chains connected to the skies above, and massive blades, spears, shields, and more bound in that messy nest of alloyed knots.

“How many of these dimensions do you have?” Shiv asked, regarding the vast and resplendent arsenal looming directly above. “Because this place is pretty—”

Shiv grunted as she spiked him into the ground. He slammed dead-on against the platform—but it didn’t break. Instead, all the kinetic energy contained within his collision was inverted, causing him to bounce right back. Again, Jessica swatted him down with the palm of her hand. Then, like a yo-yo, Shiv went back up.

“Come on, Jessica—” His voice was interrupted as he crashed skull-first against her index finger. She started dribbling him like a godsdamned ball. “Fucking—Jessica, quit it! I’m trying to save up my Shapeless Tides for Roland. I don’t have time to mess around with—actually, wait, hit me harder. I can use some more Pillar levels.”

With a final launching toss, she dashed him against the platform. The air sparked, ignited, and then ionized. Plasma blossomed and embraced Shiv, licking at his flesh and washing over him in a tide of heat and devastation. A ligament in his shoulder tore, and his blasé expression broke—Jessica was genuinely trying to hurt him now.

He rebounded into the chains in an explosive instant, but what they struck was his mana first—for the chains were tessellating like lengths of fluid bricks.

, Shiv realized.

An explosion of light and force washed over him from behind. Shiv tilted his head to the side as he barely managed to dodge Jessica’s spinning roundhouse that painted an arc of flame in the air as the wheels beneath her feet spun.

Continuity Error 233 > 234

Rolling in mid-air to face her, Shiv scowled but kept his hands low. “Hey, it was funny a minute before, but now this shit is getting annoying. I’m not fighting you, Jessica. You wait your turn after Roland if you want to kick my ass. I’m doing everything to keep these tides in circulation.” He held out his arms and showed her all the striped vectors stacked against each other, swimming over his body. “They’re for him, not you.”

She replied with a hoarse, bitter laugh. “And you think you’re ever going to get close enough to Roland to use them?”

“I won’t need to. Grudge-Tethered will let me take a swing at him the first time he takes a shot at me from far off,” Shiv said. “He’s not going to be able to avoid a brawl even if he wants.”

Jessica shook her head slowly. “Roland’s going to be able to decide whatever he wants, whenever he wants to. How many skills do you have? Are they over a hundred?”

He briefly brought up his skill status and counted. “No. But—”

“Roland told you how his Unique Skill worked yet?”

Shiv paused. “That level-shuffling one? Yeah. Well, more like he told Adam first—”

“He has more than just Respec. More than all those special arrows. He killed you once before, right? While you were scouting Lost Angeles?”

“Yeah,” Shiv answered. Then, the subtext in her words struck. “He has an arrow based off my Vitae.”

“Probably. But that’s not even the worst of it. Besides the three Uniques, the Inquisition suspects that he’s got a whole arsenal of Legendary weapons hidden away—and a bunch of different armors he can swap between depending on who he is fighting. He can choose which skills he wants to evolve and fuse, and you don’t have any skills that can pin him down. He knows general Magical Theory better than a lot of Mages, can choose which lore he wants to go Heroic in, even for Magical Skills he’s not really trained in, and that’s not to mention the really weird shit he can start doing by mixing Pyromancy and Writing. You ready to burn every time you read and understand a word he paints in mid-air?”

“Can he really do that, or are you just trying to psyche me out?” Shiv squinted.

The Giantsbane sighed. “You know what it takes to beat the shit out of a Master-Tier as a Low Adept?”

“Skill? A plan? A lot of luck?”

“A miracle,” Jessica said. “A miracle for most. There’s no fight when someone is faster than you by a magnitude. There’s no fight when none of your attacks really shake them. None. But Roland broke a Master before he even left the academy. He embarrassed so many people that there were no duels issued to him by his final year—fucking House Heads were just trying to arrange his assassination instead. Even before he went Unique and decided to hide just how powerful he was, he was his own miracle. The first time I met him, I watched him butcher a Heroic-Tier Stormlord while he was just a Low Master.”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it: Roland Arrow’s a genius Pathbearer,” Shiv said. The Harbinger helped convert his jealousy and annoyance to something useful, but the feelings were still there. “But I’m not going to let how good he is turn me away from facing him. I’ve fought plenty of favored and geniuses. I’m not afraid of humiliation either. I’ve been hated my entire life. Losing’s not that bad if you learn, build, and don’t stay broken.” Shiv folded his arms. “If this goes bad for me, it goes bad. I want to know how good he is for myself, and I want to understand so I might be able to match and beat him—whatever it takes.”

The agitation within Jessica dulled, and her shoulders grew limp. More than anything, she seemed tired—emotionally tired. Genuinely worried.

Shiv snarled. “Fucking Veronica. Look at what she’s making you do.”

Jessica froze. “And what is—”

“You’re not bullshitting me, so I won’t bullshit you: I’m glad you’re here and for everything you’ve done, but Veronica’s scheme to have you close to us and use whatever friendly pseudo master-student thing might be here is obvious. But she doesn’t care that it’s bothering you more than it’s influencing me.”

His words struck like a blade across the throat. Jessica was silent and calm on the surface, but he could see she was gushing blood where it counted. “I don’t hate you for caring. And I’m sorry I was so rough to you before. I don’t know what it’s like. Even after losing Georges. I don’t know what it’s like to be you. I wish you had an Adam or an Uva or someone who bothered to do right by you when you needed them. I wish you had a Jessica yourself.”

An enkindled shadow hissed out from Jessica’s cracked core, but the shade that formed wasn’t of her, but a man shaped from stone—a man who was crumbling, reaching out from her, but never able to truly touch her anymore.

These Words of Truth and Adoration 87 > 89

Harbinger of Tripartite Ruin 326 > 329

“Go away, System,” Shiv spat as the notifications appeared. “Don’t give me this shit now. I’m not trying to manipulate her. I’m not .”

“Levels?” Jessica said, trying to hide it.

“Yeah,” Shiv sighed. “Harbinger’s taking effect on you. Pre-Legendary. It’s just—”

“I know you don’t really mean it. Veronica would have never told me.” Jessica nodded and lowered her eyes. “I know.”

For a moment, neither had anything to say.

“I was going to come looking for you earlier,” Shiv said honestly. “I want your help—whatever you can give in this short time. You and Valor and Uva and anyone. And at the end of this day, I’m still going to tell him that we need to have it out. Because he needs it.” And a lance of pain went through Shiv. “And I need it too. I might be a different person now, but I still remember biting into rats, Jessica. I still remember what it felt like to be hated, the way the stones cut me, and how the cold winds made the sting worse. The Omenborn isn’t done hating the Town Lord. And he isn’t finished hating the Lowes. So. I think we need this. Time is not going to fix this wound. It might get me more prepared, but… The fight itself happening now is worth more than any victory. Because of Adam. Because we need to be better, if only for him.”

Instead of using any kind of scheme or logic this time, Shiv bled. He bled emotionally, in front of the wounded Jessica—because there wasn’t a need for a lie. He just had to be honest, and it felt like the right thing to do.

Slowly, something inside her dislodged, and she sighed. “But you would like to win.”

“I would felling love to win. I would love to kick the shit out of him.” Shiv clenched his teeth. “Can you help me?”

Jessica closed her eyes and almost reluctantly nodded. “Yeah. I don’t think this is going to fucking go well, but let’s see if I can make a bigger miracle out of you than the Starhawk made with Roland.”

“It’s not just you,” Shiv said. “Valor—”

“Ah, you remembered me again.”

“FUCK!” Shiv squeaked, spinning around. “You scared a squirt of piss out of me, Valor!”

Valor—who'd been right behind him for an uncertain period of time—nodded—and used the nod to dodge a reflexive slash Jessica sent toward him via an invisible blade. “Yes,” Valor intoned. “Surprise, deception, and stealth are essential weapons in war. And they might be the only true edges you can deploy against Roland Arrow. Remind me, Shiv: What Stealth Skill do you have? And what level is it at?”

Jessica barely held herself back from skewering Valor, but the old lich paid her no heed as the green flames behind his magic-formed eyes narrowed.

“Uh, Master-Tier. The Creeping Void. It’s at 175.”

A sound of pure disgust escaped Valor. “Absolutely horrid. Unspeakable. Disgrace. This won’t do. This won’t do at all. It must be corrected with utmost haste.” Then, a smirk came over his expression. “And I think I have an idea how to incentivize this growth, improve your other skills upon failure, and potentially see another objective fulfilled. And since you have multiple bodies, you can undergo direct combat training at the same time. How opportune…”

Shiv suddenly felt a lance of searing pain travel up his asshole. “Valor. What… what is this idea?”

“Hm. Shiv. Use your Severed Shadow and go seek out Uva, Legend Hymn, Candles, Tulveg, and everyone who can render aid. After that, find Enchanter Merrielmel and have him set up his Slipgate in the Tutorial bunker. Remember how one must level, Shiv.”

“Strain and… and novelty?”

“Yes. And constant, extreme, borderline torturous struggle.”

“Oh,” Jessica breathed. “I think I like the sound of this.”

the Harbinger whimpered.

“Valor,” Shiv began, trying to apologize.

“For now: endure.”

“What?”

“Endure!” Valor repeated. “Pillar only! Toughness training!”

Then Jessica smashed her heel down on Shiv’s head before he could blink. Once more, he blasted straight down—this time sporting a full concussion rather than a meager bruise. And once more, he bounced off the platform and rose high into the air—where both Valor and Jessica hovered with malice and blades in wait.