The Apocalypse is a Side Quest: Book Three, page 29
“Changes? What do you mean?”
“You’re still absorbing all that divinity. My gift. It has yet to fully establish itself. It won’t finish for quite a bit of time. You’ll have to continue to develop your abilities in the meantime.”
“And Lily being attached is going to complicate things?”
Thalassa sighed. “I don’t know that for certain. It’s a risky move. This is already a dangerous procedure; adding in unknown complications will only make things more difficult to diagnose. If something goes wrong, it’ll be very hard to determine whether it was me, or her, or you.”
“It’s too late now.”
Nathan looked over at Lily, who’d been silent and simply observing. Her? Divine? It sounded absurd, but Nathan had seen a lot of absurd things as of late. Nathan supposed that was just part and parcel of the apocalypse.
Nathan scratched his head. “So if I’m getting infused with divinity, does that make you like, my mother?”
Thalassa didn’t so much as blink. “Do you want me to be?”
“… No?”
“Then no, it doesn’t. It means exactly what you want it to mean. Human genetics are very different than what I’ve done to you. You’ve become linked to me in a way that’s far closer than mere blood. But it is not the same familial relationship that you have with your sister, for example. It’s best not to apply your preconceived notions to it.”
That didn’t really clear up much, but thanks for the explanation.
“So what do we do now?” Nathan said. “What about… her—?”
“Don’t.”
Nathan shut his mind instantly.
“You’ve obtained a method of getting to the Golden Realm, yes? That’s the only safe place to think about or speak of those things. Not even here can I protect you from… certain powers.” Thalassa’s hair seemed to light up. “You need to learn how to integrate properties of that realm into your abilities. It’ll be a key weapon against her.”
The temperature dropped. The sky seemed to turn a little dimmer.
Thalassa frowned.
“Let’s stop this line of conversation. We risk drawing undue attention.”
Nathan thought back to his newfound abilities. “Any tips for dealing with these new powers? What should I be doing?”
“Advice?” Thalassa shut her eyes. “You’ll notice that when I was fighting your plant, there were no special properties to the water I was manipulating. There was no magical connection, either. Rather, I was simply asking them to do what needed to be done, and it responded to me. No, I was the water. This is the ideal. You don’t want a skill corrupting your connection with your domain. And it is a domain. Water has become—or is becoming—a fundamental part of who you are. These abstractions—shields, healing, attacks—all they do is act as tools in order to help you as training wheels, essentially. But at some point, if you want to achieve your full potential, you have to take off these training wheels. You need to comprehend the element at its core.”
“How do I do that?”
“Integration, as I said. You need to find a common thread across all your abilities, and, hopefully, obtain the water manipulation skill. This is still abstraction; manipulation is not what you should be aiming for. But it’ll take you a step closer to achieving true mastery.”
“I understand.” Nathan thought about whether he had any other questions to ask. “Are there any others you gave this gift to who made it this far?”
“One. Exactly one.”
“Has this person managed to fully absorb your divinity?”
“No. But his path was different than yours. He relies on the System. His strength is in his variety, not in his focus.”
“Relies?”
Thalassa smirked. “I believe it’s about time for you to wake up. I’ll be waiting for you.”
Nathan felt the world start to drift away, stretch, and melt. A voice echoed in his eardrums.
“Nathan,” the voice said. “Nathan, wake up. We need you.”
Nathan blearily blinked his eyes, revealing the inside of the presidential house’s meeting room. Chad was shaking him awake.
Nathan yawned.
“What is it?” he asked
“The top ten are here. They want to talk about getting to the arena.”
Nathan grimaced. He’d been wondering when that would happen.
“Let’s head out.”
“I think it’s abundantly clear that we need to gather information and figure out the exact format of how this will all work,” Nathan said.
They were on the archipelago where there’d been a near-total war situation. Nathan looked around at the rest of the top humans. All of them looked somewhat tired but ready to go and excited. Grigor had a funny gleam in his eyes as he listened to the conversation. Arika’s smile seemed a bit wider than usual, and even Dr. Ada looked ready to go.
Battle maniacs. All of them.
“I have room on my boat—”
Dr. Ada scoffed. “Are you joking? Surely you realize that we’ve figured out our own methods of transportation.”
“What exactly are you using?”
“For now, please.” Dr. Ada placed her fingers in her mouth, forming a whistle. She blew. A second later, a loud flap of wings echoed in across the islands. A motley crew of skeleton birds rapidly approached the islands. Nathan stiffened and got ready to grab his fishing rod. But then Dr. Ada held out her hand.
“Wait.”
They slowed and then landed gracefully right beside the group. Dr. Ada stepped over and rubbed one of the skeleton birds while speaking.
“We managed to domesticate them. It was a simple matter.”
Nathan blinked. They were fast.
“A—all right then, let’s go.”
Chapter Thirty-Nine
The arena wasn’t really that far; they’d already been able to see it in the distance, after all. It took five minutes, if that. Before they left, they also grabbed Bree from the town. She’d already spoken to Dr. Ada, who vouched for her with the rest of the group.
When they arrived, Nathan couldn’t help but be amazed at its sheer size and scope. It might’ve been the size of two or three football stadiums put together. An enormous, grand construction. It was built in the Roman Coliseum style, with arches and brick-and-mortar, but it had been scaled up to an absolutely ridiculous level.
I wonder if this was built recently, ripped off from Roman architecture—or if it already existed, and this is just some strange coincidence?
Nathan suspected he wouldn’t be getting an answer anytime soon.
“Fascinating, isn’t it? The way so many of the circles seem to mimic constructions created by us?”
Nathan looked over at Dr. Ada, who was brushing her hand against one of the bricks.
Nathan shrugged. “It is kind of strange. I remember that city from earlier. That was pretty interesting.”
“I’m of the opinion that these circles are handcrafted for us. Or perhaps generated is the correct term. I’m doubtful that much care was put into it, given the inaccuracies.”
“Inaccuracies?”
“This is the wrong type of stone. And the shape of the arches isn’t true to what the actual Roman style was. This was taken from pop culture. Strange—presumably they could’ve used the actual Coliseum as a model.”
Arika, who’d been in her own conversation with her younger sister, perked up and looked back over at Dr. Ada. “It’s laziness. When I do an illusion that relies on something drawn from the subject’s mind, it comes out the same way as this. Not true to reality.”
“That begs the question, though,” Dr. Ada said. “Why was Earth prioritized? Why weren’t the structures of the elves and the orcs? Surely we would’ve seen some variety.”
“Maybe they’re deeper down in the next couple circles?” Nathan asked.
“Maybe,” Dr. Ada said.
Chad turned his face to a window that had popped up to his right. “Hold on, let me set something up. I bet I can get some information.”
Grigor glared at Chad. “Must you do that?”
Nathan looked over at Grigor. “Just watch. It’s actually more useful than you might think.”
“It’s me, your boy Chad. I’m here with the strongest humans in the apocalypse—we’re checking out this weird arena thing.”
After a minute of talking, Chad glanced back over and said, “So, everybody else is saying that they don’t have an arena anywhere near them. The only one saying otherwise is my one orc fan, who says that the orcs have an arena all to themselves. They’re also currently trying to figure out how to get in. The problem is they just started fighting each other outside of the arena doorway—”
“Arena door?” Grigor said.
Chad nodded and pointed at the wall in front of him. “Look at the edges. This whole thing is a door.”
Nathan stepped closer and inspected the edges. His eyes widened at the thin stone-engraved mark stretching across from top to bottom in the clear shape of the door.
“Well, how do we get it open?” Arika said.
At that, Tamsin stepped forward, her backpack bouncing behind her. Nathan watched her with interest. How is it that someone so young has managed to reach the top ten? She must’ve had some sort of ability in order to make up for her relative lack of maturity—although, granted, Nathan was assuming there.
Nathan’s eyes widened again as a full-on terminal appeared in front of her, made entirely of blue system boxes. She typed in a few commands, and lines of code flashed behind the screen faster than Nathan could make out. After a few seconds, Tamsin shut them off and looked over at Nathan. “I’m getting something about a necessary… sacrifice? I’m not sure what it means, but that’s what it’s referring to here.”
“What is that ability?” Grigor said.
“It’s a special class that gives me access to some of the back end of the system. Not too much, since that would be outright cheating, I can see into all sorts of interesting things—”
Arika’s mana flared, and suddenly a white piece of tape with the words filtered appeared over Tamsin’s mouth. She turned and stared at Arika, who simply glared back.
Grigor actually cracked a smile at that, then turned his attention back to the door.
Nathan took a few steps closer and touched his hand to the door. As soon as he did so, a blue glow lit up one of the top bricks, directly in the center of the door.
As soon as the glow lit up, it increased in luminosity, almost blinding Nathan. Then, it dropped, and the entire frame shook. The doors moved of their own accord, stone scraping against stone. They opened, revealing the interior of the arena.
A system window popped up in front of Nathan.
[Warning!]
You are about to embark on a boss gauntlet. Once you enter, you will be tied to the arena. Every 24 hours, you will be teleported back to face the next boss monster. External help may be added, but they, too, will be bound to the arena. Are you absolutely certain you wish to enter?
Nathan looked at his fellow humans to see that they all had similar messages in front of them.
“Well, that’s not concerning in the slightest,” Nathan muttered.
“It basically matches up with what the main quest said at the start,” Arika said. “I’m not too surprised.”
“I propose that we stock up on resources first,” Dr. Ada said. “Although I’m curious as to how dangerous this will be, I suspect rushing into this would be a poor idea.”
As she said that, Nathan heard another set of wing flaps. He blinked and turned around.
A squadron of elf warriors led by Fliel was flying directly toward the arena.
Nathan shook his head frantically and waved at them to stop. Fliel didn’t seem to care. Instead, his men formed into a single line, pointed perfectly straight at the arena door.
“Those absolute idiots,” Arika hissed. “What the hell are they doing?”
“We can’t stop them, get out of the way!” Grigor shouted.
Everybody moved out of the way of the doors. A moment later, the elves flew past them and directly into the arena.
As soon as they crossed the border, Nathan suddenly noticed a strange red glow appearing at the edge of his vision. A window appeared in front of him.
[Activating teleportation. Boss battle triggered.]
The door slammed shut.
Nathan felt his world shift as he was suddenly teleported from the outside of the arena to the inside. His eyes blinked open, and now they were on the inside of the arena. Fliel and his group hovered a few feet off the ground, looking around in confusion.
The doors rumbled to a close behind them, locking them in. Nathan resisted the urge to scream.
“What are you doing in here?!” Fliel shouted. “Did you run after me?”
Nathan growled. “If you bothered to take things slowly and read the freaking system prompt, you would know what’s happening.”
Fliel scoffed and looked around. “I got there was supposed to be some kind of boss monster.”
Nathan felt his heart drop. He reached into his inventory and pulled out both his harpoon and his fishing rod. Around him, his various allies pulled out their weapons.
After a few seconds, a rumbling came from underneath the earth. Something started to rise out of the sand, a golem with piercing red eyes, a brick body, and an angry stare. It looked over at Bree immediately.
Bree pounded her fists together. “You want to play?”
The golem smashed its hands into the ground, and an earthquake rippled forward from its impact, lots of stone flying upward in a pattern directly toward Bree.
Rather than run away, Bree smashed her own fist into the ground, and the earth responded in kind. The two attack patterns slammed into each other—but the golem’s won out and slammed directly forward. Bree cast and jumped to the side, barely avoiding getting slung upward in the air like a ragdoll.
“It’s better at it than me,” Bree muttered. “This could be a problem.”
Chapter Forty
The monster unleashed another wave of stone in a ripple-like pattern, radiating outward. Nathan leaped into the air, dodging the attack, and hurled his harpoon with all his strength. The harpoon shot forward and struck the golem’s exterior, but it merely bounced off, leaving only a small chip in the stone.
“Oh, that’s not good,” Nathan muttered.
Dr. Ada sprinted forward, summoning a cluster of icicles behind her. With a gesture, she sent them hurtling toward the golem with explosive speed, crashing into it and forcing it to stagger back. The golem’s eyes flashed, and the ground around it seemed to shimmer like water.
No—Nathan could sense water, and this wasn’t it. He furrowed his eyebrows. It was an illusion.
It fell into the water.
Nathan looked around—Arika was staring at the golem.
The golem began to convulse, as if trying to swim out of the mirage. Nathan couldn’t help but admire Arika’s quick thinking and skill.
Then a shout pierced the air, making Nathan wince.
“Charge!”
Fliel and his soldiers dove downward, their curved scimitars aimed at the golem. The creature roared. It swatted Fliel out of the air with ease and sent him crashing into a wall. It seized another elven soldier and crushed them instantly. A third elf slammed uselessly into the golem’s side.
“Such competence in the elven military,” Nathan said dryly. “I can see how they reached the Ninth Circle.”
The golem rolled out of Arika’s illusory “water” and slammed its fists into the ground. A massive rock dislodged and hurtled toward Nathan. He swung his fishing rod downward. The hook glowed as it sank into the rock, shattering it into fragments. Grigor appeared out of nowhere, raising his massive shield to block another incoming boulder.
Nathan glanced at Arika. She stood off to the side, unharmed. Was she even there? Nathan was beginning to understand why she might be considered the fourth-highest Delver.
Tamsin, meanwhile, fumbled with her system windows, her fingers shaking as she typed commands that seemed to do nothing. She muttered under her breath, her face pale.
Arika’s head snapped toward her sister.
Tamsin shrank back. She pulled up her system windows and typed out something. Her face fell. “It’s entering a new phase! It’s targeting Bree specifically!”
Bree growled. “If this thing thinks it can take me out, it’s got no idea who it’s messing with.”
“You don’t get it,” Tamsin shouted. “Its abilities are designed to counter yours. You can’t fight it head-on!”
Bree clicked her tongue but stepped back.
The golem slammed its fist into the ground again. This time, the earth split open, swallowing it whole.
Bree’s eyes widened. “That’s my move! This is copyright infringement!”
Tamsin, still hovering over her system menu, typed rapidly but shook her head. “I can’t track it. It’s like it vanished.”
Grigor grunted. “Boss monsters. Always the exception.”
The group scanned their surroundings. Nathan tried to sense vibrations in the ground but felt nothing.
Nathan caught a faint sound in the air. Arika’s head snapped toward the noise, and she unleashed a wave of mana. The ground shifted in response, and the golem burst out, exposed. Chad charged forward, his blue-flaming longsword blazing as he struck the golem’s body with relentless force. Mara stood back, seemingly inactive.
Nathan sprinted forward, leaped, and drove his harpoon point-blank into the golem’s chest. The stone splintered, and for a fleeting moment, Nathan glimpsed a red glow at its core. Before he could react, the golem’s fist seized him, tearing him from his harpoon and hurling him against a brick wall. The impact forced the air from his lungs. Groaning, he staggered to his feet.
