The Apocalypse is a Side Quest: Book Three, page 32
“She’s one of the top ten. Humanity needs people like her—people like you—if we want to reach the bottom.”
“You’re thinking that far ahead?”
“You aren’t?”
Arika paused and shook her head. “Honestly, no. We’ve always been so busy with just trying to survive, just making it from day to day. The idea of actually reaching the bottom—I have to admit, there’s a part of me that kind of forgot.”
“It’s an easy thing to forget. But… it’s my honest hope. Part of why I hate how we’re fighting each other. We need to get to the bottom.”
“Is this a proposition?”
“It could be. If you’re open to it.”
“An alliance with the number one?” Arika placed a finger to her chin. “I have to admit, the idea’s tempting.”
“You’ve seen how capable all of us are. Imagine that kind of force united against any boss monsters going forward.”
“It’s a tempting offer. I’ll have to think about it.”
“That’s all I ask.”
Arika gave a lazy salute, turned around, and walked off. Nathan was about to do the same when he realized something.
“You recognized him, didn’t you?”
“Who?”
“Leviathan.”
Arika froze.
“H-how?” she said.
“It was the funniest look in your eyes. I wouldn’t have noticed if not for—well, it doesn’t matter.”
Arika glanced off to the side. “He’s not here.”
“He isn’t.”
“He saved us. Kind of.”
“Kind of?”
“Let me set the scene: There’s Tamsin, about to be attacked. Then Leviathan swoops in and creates a fire wall?”
A wall of fire? In addition to his air control?
“That sounds kind of him.”
“But what you didn’t know is that Leviathan had been under the effect of an illusion spell that I’d made. It was a slight thing—I’d manipulated the distance so that Tamsin would appear to be closer to the monster. In theory, this would’ve meant that the boss monster would stop before hitting Tamsin.”
“So what does this have to do with Leviathan?”
“From his perspective, it would’ve been that Tamsin was in front of the fire wall he made.”
Nathan’s body froze. “Wait, so he would’ve trapped her with the boss monster?”
“I’m not sure what he was thinking—perhaps he was trying to prevent further casualties, or he judged that Tamsin was already doomed. Nonetheless…”
“So it was just pure luck that the fire wall happened to help her?”
“It’s possible he saw through my illusion. We can’t discount that. But he seemed to show no remorse or hesitation at putting my sister in the path of the monster’s attack. I don’t know—really, I don’t think I even saw his eyes move toward her. He didn’t even recognize us today—I’m not sure it registered who we are.” Arika shook her head. “It all just rubs me the wrong way. There’s something off about that man.”
After that, Arika glanced back toward the arena entrance. “Tamsin is waiting for me. I’m going to be having a long talk with her about how to properly defend herself. We’re going to try to figure out some way of countering that damn attack, since it’ll probably be coming again.”
“I’ll be doing the same. We need a solution, since the abilities are constantly stacking.”
And that’s not terrifying at all, by the way.
As Arika walked off, Nathan’s thoughts turned toward the second-ranked.
Leviathan. Just who are you, really? What are you really after?
Nathan found himself back on the boat with Chad, Mara, and Bree. Nathan had left his soulbound town portal open on some island. Nathan could’ve closed it, but if the council had decided to put up fortifications for some reason, or maybe figured out some were mining the surrounding islands, Nathan figured it would be good not to cut off access by opening the soulbound town portal right here. He pulled back and pushed on the oars rhythmically. In the background, the chatter of the others seemed to fade away.
Nathan peeked over to the left and right at the random islands speckling the sky. It really was an amazing thing, the fact that they were just floating. He had to give the System credit; he would’ve never seen anything like this back on Earth. The apocalypse may have been traumatizing and absolutely terrifying, but the views were pretty damn good. Nathan suddenly stopped his rowing.
What was that?
Could’ve sworn he felt… something familiar? No, someone.
They hadn’t been to this section of the islands before; they were taking a detour. What was going on?
There, out of the corner of his eye, Nathan spotted someone fishing. There was a large lake on one of the islands, and this person was just… fishing.
Nathan tried to think of anyone he’d met who fished. Nobody was really coming to mind. You’d have to be an idiot to put your points in fishing.
Nathan would know.
“Hey, are you noticing that?” Nathan asked. “That person, there on the island.”
Chad perked up and looked over in the direction Nathan was staring. He squinted his eyes. “Hey, we should go see if they need anything. Maybe they’re trapped.”
Nathan turned the boat over in the direction of the person.
As he got closer, he could make out more and more of the person’s figure. They seemed slender—roughly female? They were wearing a thick cloak that was skewing their features, though. Yet, as Nathan got closer, he couldn’t escape this incredible feeling that it was someone he knew.
Nathan set the boat down right behind the person in the hood. Behind him, he could hear weapons being drawn.
“Wait. Not a hostile.”
The person in the hood didn’t so much as move.
The figure stood up and turned around. Nathan gasped.
Chapter Forty-Four
“Sarah, what are you doing here?”
The woman wiggled the fishing rod in her hands.
“Well, right now I’m trying to catch some fish. It did look a lot easier in all your videos.”
“Wait, is that his sister?” Bree shouted.
Chad coughed. “I think we should probably… give them some privacy?”
Nathan heard them shuffle off toward the side—not that there was much of a side, given that they were on an island. Still, it was appreciated.
Sarah patted the ground at her side and tilted her head. “Come on, sit down.”
Nathan walked over and sat down. His heart was pounding in his chest. He knew that he’d see Sarah again—at least he’d hoped so. But he hadn’t expected it to be quite so soon.
“I’m terrible at this,” Sarah said, waving the fishing rod around, the string leaving ripples in the water. “Really bad. I don’t think I’ve caught a single thing.”
Nathan tried to think of what to say. Finally, he decided to just respond directly. “Why do you do it?”
“It’s relaxing. Gives me time to think.”
“You do that often? Think?”
“I know it’s a foreign idea to you, Nathan. But yes, I think.”
Nathan’s mouth felt drier than the Second Circle.
“So,” Nathan said, “you’ve just been stuck here on this island?”
“Can’t fly. Er, I do have the teleportation scrolls. But I have a limited number of them. Best not to waste them. I’ve been trying to work on domesticating some of those skeleton birds, but no luck.”
“Your magic doesn’t help you?”
“With flying? No. Unfortunately not.”
Nathan tried to think of other things to talk about, but all he could think of were the questions that he knew she wouldn’t answer. Will you come back? Why are you hiding out here?
Finally, Nathan managed to come up with something.
“Your abilities—” Nathan blurted out. “You’re really strong.”
“Nothing compared to you.” Sarah paused. “I’ve seen what you’re capable of. Who would’ve thought that all it would take is an apocalypse to bring out the potential of my baby brother?”
Nathan couldn’t help but smile at that. “I was kind of a loser back on Earth, wasn’t I?”
“I can’t remember the last time you managed to keep a job for more than three months. I still recall when you told us that you were dropping out of college. Mom nearly had a hernia.”
Nathan scratched the back of his neck. “I honestly can’t remember.”
“I do. She was screaming at us for hours, talking about where she went wrong, how her genius son could’ve suddenly decided to throw away his future.”
“I guess it all seems really small now in comparison.”
“You think they’re still alive?”
Nathan glanced over at her. “You mean Mom and Dad?”
“Yeah.”
Nathan shrugged and looked back at the water. “They probably have some powers. It seems like magic is genetic to some degree. You’re strong. You even have the same element as me.”
“Yes, I’m not as crazy as you, but I have a nice smattering of spells that help save my bacon in times of emergency.”
The conversation turned quiet at that.
“You did a good thing, by the way,” she suddenly said.
“What are you talking about—”
“On the last circle. What you did to Gabriel. He was a different person, but that person had long since died. You did what you had to do. I don’t blame you.”
A girl suddenly piped up from the background. “Actually, it was me that pulled the trigger—”
The sound of Chad smacking Mara over the back of the head seemed to echo like a loud bell.
Nathan slapped his palms into his face.
“On the plus side, the organization seems to have fallen apart—” Sarah adjusted the grip of her fishing rod. “Whatever, there’s nothing left of the organization. A handful of loyalists, but the Harrowed Hand is essentially no more. It was the right thing to do.”
It sounded as if she was just as much trying to convince herself as she was trying to convince Nathan. He remained silent.
Finally, he couldn’t stop himself from asking the question.
“So… has your opinion changed about… the thing?”
“What thing?”
“You know what I’m talking about.”
Sarah didn’t so much as twitch. She was silent for a few moments. Finally, her lips moved.
“Not yet. Just… just not yet.”
“But why? Is this some kind of self-flagellation? Do you blame me? Mara?”
“A little bit. A little bit of all of them, really. My thoughts are a mess. I can’t… I don’t sleep. I don’t eat. I don’t drink. It’s hard to gain much motivation to do anything nowadays.”
“We can help you. There’s got to be someone who knows how to help with things like this. Someone who’s going through something similar.”
Sarah let out a long sigh. “Nathan, you have a healing power, right?”
“Yeah, I do.”
“How does it work?”
“Typically, I have to pump the person full of energy.”
“Is it you doing the healing, or the person?”
Nathan was about to respond with ‘himself’ when he paused. No, that wasn’t quite true. Normally, all he was doing was just injecting them with energy and super-charging the healing process. Even last time with Tamsin, he hadn’t generated new cells. It was debatable if he was even “healing.” He was just untwisting something that had gotten stuck.
“It’s more the other person.”
“You can’t help someone who can’t help themselves,” Sarah said. “I’m just not there yet. I’m sorry, Nathan.”
Nathan was about to respond when he bit his lip and stayed silent.
There was a part of him that wanted to start shouting, to get angry—but at the same time, he felt so worn out and exhausted that he was unable to do so.
“If you ever change your mind, the invitation’s always open,” Nathan said. “I’m sure you can find my soulbound town, but let me give you the directions.”
“You don’t have to do that—”
It was too late. Nathan had already grabbed a piece of paper—made by the lovely people of his soulbound town—and wrote down a rough idea of where to go using the sun and northwest, east, south as a reference. Nathan handed the paper over to Sarah, and she hesitantly took it out of his hand.
“Thank you.”
“No problem. I’ll see you soon, Sarah—”
A pop-up dinged to Nathan’s right. When he saw who it was, he blinked hard.
When Nathan, Chad, Bree, and Mara finally returned to the town, the first thing Nathan noticed was the gleaming metal.
It seemed that Fliel and his troops had arrived. Earlier that day, Fliel had contacted Nathan through the system, requesting a meeting to discuss urgent matters. Nathan had agreed, eager to address the growing tensions between humans and elves.
Nathan approached the gate and saw them standing stiffly in the middle of the road, with mushrooms, Delvers, and werewolves alike staring in confusion. The gates opened, and he walked through, approaching Fliel. The elf sneered down at him. “Nathan Lee.”
Nathan extended his hand for a handshake. Fliel gripped it and squeezed as tightly as he could. Nathan barely felt it. After a few seconds, Fliel’s hand began to tremble. His grip had turned white, and his face was reddening from effort. Nathan gently squeezed back, and then he heard something crunch. Fliel jolted and nearly fell over from the pain before managing to catch himself. He took a few deep breaths and glanced at his troops.
“I believe the… journey must have tired me out more than I thought,” Fliel said.
One or two of the troops awkwardly nodded.
“How about we take this inside my meeting hall?” Nathan asked.
“You requested to speak to me?” Nathan said.
The door shut behind him with a soft thud. Fliel’s dismissive sneer vanished, replaced by a calculating glint in his eyes. He took the seat at the right side of the table, gesturing for Nathan to sit opposite. Nathan complied.
“First of all,” Fliel said, “let’s drop the pretense. I didn’t call you here to discuss trade routes or peace treaties. I know what you’ve been looking for, Nathan.”
Nathan’s brow furrowed. “What are you talking about?”
Fliel leaned forward, his gaze piercing. “Don’t play coy. I know it was you—or someone in your employ—sneaking into Emi’s town in disguise. Asking questions about how we bypassed the final circle.”
“You catch on fast.”
“It’s not just that, though.” He paused. “The scent of a dead System clings to you, Nathan. Not many could carry that mark. And anyone capable of killing a System… well, they’d know about her. The Mother. The final boss.”
Nathan’s blood ran cold. The room seemed to shrink, the air growing heavy.
“If you know that much, then you know why I’m searching. We need to talk about this somewhere safe.”
Fliel nodded. “You have a portal to—?”
“Yes.” Nathan reached into his inventory and pulled out gallons of spirit water, the shimmering liquid catching the light. With a flick of his wrist, he poured it onto the ground, where it pooled into a glowing, pulsating ball. The air hummed with energy as the ball expanded, its surface rippling like liquid gold. A portal to the Golden Realm tore open in the center of the room.
Fliel’s eyes widened, his composure slipping. “Is that—”
“The Golden Realm,” Nathan said, stepping toward the portal. “The only place we can discuss her without her eyes on us.”
Nathan fell backward into the portal, plunging into an infinite, white, cloudy void. A second later, a slight displacement of air announced Fliel’s arrival above him. The elf flailed, his arms waving frantically as he realized he was falling. “What have you done?!” he shouted.
Nathan put his hands behind his head. “Relax. It’s no big deal.”
“On the contrary, I think I’m about to fall to my death!”
“There’s no bottom, except for the ones you imagine in your mind.”
“What does that even mean?!”
“One must imagine a bottom for there to be a bottom.”
“You’re still just saying words!”
Nathan rolled his eyes. The payback was fun, but he probably needed to be helpful.
“Just flood your body with mana.”
Fliel, still flailing, began falling through the portal. Nathan watched as the elven man scrambled up and down, left and right, frantically attempting to stop himself.
“Like I said, just flood your body with mana. It’ll slow you down,” Nathan said.
Fliel did as he instructed. Nathan watched as blue mana stretched over the man’s body. He started to slow to a gentle halt, and Nathan joined him. They both landed on the ground, created by their use of mana.
“Pretty neat, right?” Nathan said.
Fliel breathed hard. He looked up and glared at Nathan.
“Neat… is not a word I would use, but I suppose.”
Nathan and Fliel stared at each other for a few seconds before Nathan broke the silence. “So… have you been here before?” Nathan asked.
“No. I’ve not been to the Golden Realm. Although… it’s something I’ve longed to see.” Fliel frowned. “I will admit that I’m a little disappointed. This is the key to passing the Mother System?”
“You’re trying to defeat her, too?”
“No, not defeat. You can’t defeat the Mother System any more than you can defeat gravity. You can avoid it for a little while, but you can’t permanently disable it. It’s a force of nature at this point.”
“Then how did the early elves manage to bypass the Mother System?”
“That’s the word. Bypass. There was no defeating the Mother System, and they didn’t even attempt it. What they did was find a loophole, a way to dodge the Ninth Circle. Of course, we couldn’t avoid the System forever.” Fliel ground his teeth together. “I think that when we escaped, the Mother System came back for us.”
