A week.
A week...
"A week... What exactly do I do for the week?" I asked Eleanor as we both did exercises in her room.
The child in question shrugged as she continued doing her own part.
While I was in a small conflict.
It's just that... I don't know what to do. Like, this is quite literally the first break I've had in a long time. Well, not long, how much time had passed since I had this new life? Uh... a week? Yeah, around a week. And it has been an eventful one, so now that I can sit back and relax... I feel bored.
Of course, I prefer this boredom to whatever feelings I had before and during the battle I prepared myself for, but still...
Alright, I can do some other stuff! Like... checking my assimilations! Yeah...
[Assimilation Process:]
-Dante Zogratis - 28%
-Oliver Grayson - 23%
[Progress Bar: 34%]
Oh! Roland is done already? I don't feel much difference... Whatever, let's throw Ragna in.
-Ragna - 17%
Hum... Ragna should give me his silver aura, but I don't feel half-sword or anything like that.
I feel the aura he has, but it's complicated to control it.
What were his instructions... Move the arms using only aura?
Since it's in all of my body, I just need to move the aura in my arms up.
My arms tremble a bit, but they flex and move by themselves.
It's a weird feeling, my arms move but they don't feel like they're moving, maybe because I don't feel the muscles flexing.
I can think of some uses. Like using it to do the remaining exercises, I won't since they're easy, but it's an example.
Finishing the exercises, we took a shower and ate breakfast.
"Hey, Eleanor, serious talk, what exactly do we do now?" I asked the only other person in this room.
"..." She looked at me with an eyebrow raised and pointed to the window.
"Yeah... I guess we could go outside." I took her hand and we took a walk through the village.
People looked at us and they whispered, nothing bad, but we were certainly eye-catching.
Everyone recognized me from killing the eye, while Eleanor had pink hair and some crazy armor.
The village was nice, it's exactly how I expected it to be, a little rural and small, without too many landmarks.
There are various stores around us, none of which are really important, but I entered one with Eleanor.
"Good afternoon, can I get two chocolate cakes?" It was a small bakery in the middle of some houses, the owner was a middle-aged man.
"Sure." He gave the food in two small plastic bags.
Then I tried to pay him.
"Don't worry about the pay, it's on the house." People actually say ¨It's on the house¨? Wait, no, what did he say?
"Uh?" My astonishment must have been greater in my face, since he let out a little laugh before answering.
"You killed the eye, yeah?" He asked.
"Yeah, why?"
"Well, that's enough. You helped us, I'd be an asshole to make you pay for a simple cake." The owner said, maybe ignoring how big my eyes got.
"Ah... Thanks." I couldn't have been more surprised by this random act of solidarity.
"Don't worry about it, we should be thanking you." I left after that, simply because I didn't know what else to say.
Was he looking at me weird? Did he laugh again? Was he smiling? Satisfied? I couldn't know, I wouldn't be able to know now that I turned and escaped from the situation.
My legs suddenly felt a bit weak, the cake didn't look as appetizing as it did earlier.
...
I floated mindlessly through the village, Oliver's assimilation was enough to let me float easily, but not enough to let me outright fly. Eleanor looked a bit concerned as she walked to my side, but I wasn't in the right mindset to soothe her worries.
The sun... looked as it did every day.
But this time it was covered by the clouds, as if it couldn't be bothered to shine upon me.
So I just kept walking.
I went out of the village, the houses became less and less, replaced by trees and open clear fields.
Animals came out to greet me, monsters came out to bother, I ignored them all and climbed a tree, where I spent some time protected by the leaves.
Eleanor sat in another branch, and apparently fell asleep.
I wasn't able to, I was too focused on... not thinking.
Huh... Am I sad?
There shouldn't be any reason for me to be sad.
I have power, I have money, I have freedom, I have someone at my side.
I have everything that I could want.
But there's a feeling inside me.
Something in my stomach, wriggling and moving and making me want to vomit.
It makes me want to--"Hey!"
Huh?
I turn to Eleanor, who seems unbothered by the sudden sound.
Oh, just perfect, I'm having hallucinations.
"Dude, here!" My schizophrenia ghost directed my attention below the tree.
Holding a torch, I saw Eve.
Ms. Main character.
"...Are you my hallucination?" I asked, a bit surprised.
"What are you talking about? Just come down." She told me.
Ok, she's real.
"Uh, no? Why? No, wait. Why are you even here?" I answered the unamused woman.
"Because I was alerted of someone going out of the village really late with a child, so I went to investigate if something bad was happening." She told me while waving the torch around.
"It's not really late, it's like 5 pm." I rebutted.
"It's 8 pm." She said.
Is it? Wow, it explains all the darkness... but that makes me ask where the part 3 hours went.
"Whatever, you know what's going on now, so you can rest." I told her as I made myself comfortable in the tree.
"Yeah, I will as soon as you get down and stop endangering yourself in the dark." She moved one hand to her hip, while she stared at me, ready to burn down the tree if that made me go down.
"You saw me kill the eye, I can deal with anything in this night, y'know?" I said, reluctant to go down my spot.
"I know and I also know that the forest will lack a tree, or several, if you don't get down from it." She said it with horrible words, but I understood.
"Haah..." I had no big reason to be in a tree either way, so I threw Eleanor over my shoulder and fell to the ground.
"Alright, let's go back, I need to sleep for the big celebration." Eve said as I followed her back to the village.
"What celebration?" I asked.
"It's the lantern night, in celebration for the death of the eye. You weren't going to be there?" She asked me as we exited the forest.
"No, I didn't know there was going to be a celebration." How would I?
"Huh? Then why were you out in the dark?"
"What did you think I was doing?"
"I thought you were waiting to release your lantern in the middle of the forest."
"Do you see a lantern with me?"
"Shut up, what were you doing?"
"I was a bit overwhelmed with thoughts, so I was having a moment with me, myself, and I..." My spider-sense acts up, hit incoming...
Eleanor suddenly wakes up and slaps me in the forehead with her backhand.
"...And with my favorite leech, of course." Another slap.
"...Ok, how do you feel now?" She asks me a bit nervously, maybe she didn't want to deal with a depressed person now.
"I'm fine."
"..."
"...I am fine."
Eleanor scoffs in my shoulder, and I slap her forehead.
"That's what everyone says." She says as we walk through the village.
"Not everyone can kill an eye monster."
"Yeah, but everyone's been 18 or 19 or whatever age you are."
"...I'm 16." I looked at her very seriously.
"Yeah, sure."
"Dude." I stood still, looking at her from behind.
"Yeah?" She turned to look back at me.
"I'm 16."
"...Seriously?" The astonishment was palpable in her voice.
"Why is that so hard to believe?"
"You don't look 16."
After my assimilations, it would be weird if I did.
"Whatever... By the way, where are we going?" I asked.
We were just walking through the village, some people waved at Eve as we walked.
"To my house." She said.
"Why are you taking me to your house?"
"To help you." She said looking straight ahead.
"Help me?"
"Yeah, you said you had a bad moment, so let's talk it out."
"...No."
"It's not like you know someone else to tell your problems to." She tried to convince me.
"Not that, you don't want to help me... you... Oh, I get it. You need to observe me, did Andrew put you up for this?" I deduced with the information I had.
She said Andrew was paranoid about me, she got nervous when I talked about myself, and she's been awfully chatty.
"Uh... Yeah, something like that. Don't worry though, I'm an expert in hearing people." Eve made no effort in hiding her motives but also reinforced the worries I didn't have.
"...You know what? I don't even care, it's not like I have anything to lose or he's confronting me directly, and you're right, I don't have anyone to talk about this." I concede.
Of course, if he had stalked me, tried to leash me with connections, or asked me to comply with everything he said, then I would have thrown him to the moon.
There's a limit to my patience, after all.
"Alright then, make yourself comfortable." We entered her house.
It was a fairly large one, made primarily of stone and wood.
"How do you even afford this place?" I started with the small chat.
"Well, my job plays a good part in paying." She answered as she threw herself on the couch.
I left Eleanor in another one, and sat in the third couch left.
"What do you work as?" I asked.
"I protect the village from monsters and anything that could harm it."
"Oh yeah, I think Andrew said something about protector..."
...
"What did you guys make with the remnants of the Eye?"
"Some went to the tinkerer, some went for the kingdom. Fjell wanted to do experiments on it. Oh, the blacksmith wanted to use it as well, but the rest was sold, I think."
...
"How do people pass the time here?"
"They have jobs... They also have hobbies, duties, studies, and many other things. Although most end up at the bar when the clock hits midnight."
...
"Did you really come from another world?"
"Yeah." I answered. "It's dangerous though, so I need to become stronger and get better and more useful things."
"Sounds tough."
...
"What's with the child?"
"I got her because her parent was a worm." I would have said insect, but calling him worm is more accurate, figuratively and literally.
"You can take care of her?"
"It's not like she's not high maintenance, she's smart and knows what to do, even if a little mischievous."
"Oh, well, just remember to ask for help if you need it."
"Sure."
...
"Hey, so I've heard about some kind of kingdom?"
"Oh yeah... It's a pretty peaceful place, and they were going to do something about the eye, but then you came."
"Cool, I guess."
...
It was deep in the night by the time we finished talking, Eleanor had already fallen asleep some time ago.
At the end, we didn't talk about anything really meaningful, I asked her some questions, she asked me some back... It helped me clear my thoughts.
After eating dinner, Eve went back to her room while I slept on the sofa. I would have gone back to the inn, but it didn't change a lot since I could fall asleep here comfortably, and Eleanor could've woken up if I picked her up.
That night, even if I had started to assimilate Ragna, was the first one in which I didn't have any nightmares.
...
...
...
*Pat*
"Eh?" I felt something weird in my cheek.
*Pat* *Pat*
"What's-" I opened my eyes to see Eleanor staring into my soul.
The sun fell directly in the living room, illuminating the whole place.
"Huh? Elle?" I straightened myself in the couch.
Through our always convenient mental connection, she told me of the current situation.
I stood up, went to the kitchen and saw a small piece of paper to the side of a sandwich.
"In case you're hungry." Was written in it.
Before I gather my thoughts, I heard a knock at the door.
"The weirdo who came to our room the first day." Eleanor ¨said¨, so I'm assuming it's the guide.
Opening the door, I come face to face with Andrew.
He doesn't look threatening, actually, he looks like a background character in a medieval setting, with a dull blue shirt and brown pants.
"Good morning. What a beautiful day it is, right?" He asked as if our relationship was close enough to say these little remarks.
Or maybe he's saying them because it isn't.
"I suppose... What brings you here?" I asked.
"I just wanted to confirm one thing..." He said, while lowering his face, hiding his expression. "You know, don't you?"
I know? What kind of-Ah.
"Yeah... What do you think about this?" I asked.
"..." He stood silent, avoiding my gaze and with his hands behind his back.
Andrew was talking about the Wall of Flesh summoning ritual.
Throwing a voodoo doll of the guide in the lava of the underworld.
But not any guide, the chosen one, the one whose soul is linked with the world's guardian himself.
In other words, him.
"..." He didn't say anything, so I didn't either. Just when I was going to close the door and go back to sleep, he raised his head quickly, moving the wind around him.
I looked into his eyes and they showed... relief?
"Thanks. Thank you for this." He said, not an ounce of falsehood could be heard in his voice. He was truly grateful for my actions.
I was surprised to say the least, enough to even trample myself in words.
"W- Won't you die if I kill it?" I asked, disbelief in my voice.
"I will, but my death will play a part in the schemes of the world, so I'm satisfied." He said, smile on his face.
'Satisfied?'
"Satisfied?" I voiced my thoughts.
"Yes. It's the purpose of my life, and once I'm gone, the rest will follow smoothly." He said, still looking into my eyes.
Fulfillment was in his eyes, as if he truly believed that once he died everything would fall into place.
He seemed at peace.
"Why... do you seem so serene, so calm." Once again, I voiced my thoughts with disbelief in my voice.
I couldn't believe it, someone giving up on their life like that.
Maybe it was common for him... but it felt wrong. If that's the most appropriate choice of words.
"Because I am, I really am." He said wearing a smile, instead of the smile he showed me the day we met, his smile showed his emotions fully. "Listen, I... am but a small thing."
"Eh?"
"From the day my soul was paired with the guardian's, I knew that someday it would be used by someone to go forward, by someone whose purpose in this world was bigger than mine. I would be a stepstool towards the bigger purpose, towards the big thing." He said full of righteousness, as if he had the words inside him for a long time and just now could get them out.
"For a long time I wondered... Why me? Why was I made so unique that I needed to be sacrificed? But soon enough I learned a lesson and I got to a simple conclusion... Nothing did." He continued with his speech.
"Nothing differentiated me from the other guides, I was just another one in the multitude, another one could have been chosen... And both the me and the one who could've been would have been the same." His voice was firm, completely sure of his words.
"And that's fine." He suddenly raised his head and looked up to the roof of the door, but I knew he was looking past that.
"The lesson that I learned... Is that I'm fine with that, I'm fine with not being special, not everything and everybody has to be special. Sometimes it's fine to be another cog in the system, another drop of water in the rain, another person forgotten by history. Sometimes it's fine to feel accomplished by the simple things. And I feel accomplished because of the life I've had." He said, a subtle smile always in his face.
"I feel happy because I've lived my life, I feel accomplished, I feel satisfied, and I feel... like the world itself is agreeing with me. As if it was a closing, a conclusion, as if this was the end of my story and the moral lesson is engraved upon me." He looked to his hands, I couldn't quite catch the feeling in his eyes, but he was feeling powerful.
"I feel at peace." He looked at me.
"Thank you." And he made sure I would never forget this conversation.
...
...
...
After he left, I did my usual morning routine. Not that it was morning, it was already a bit late, seeing as how even Eleanor woke up before me.
Before going to hell, we went walking around and I bought a cellphone. Yeah, it was sold casually, so I didn't have to go around buying and earning the components.
Normally, I would think about all the things this entails.
But my head wasn't fully in the game that day. I was kinda going through the motions. So, without using my super speed, I decided to go clear my head... And I'm taking that reference out of the list.
Seriously though, I wanted to think about the conversation I had with Andrew.
First, I'm not feeling bad because he has to die. I mean, I've literally had 2 conversations with the guy, the first one where he collected my data and this second one where he told me the story of his life. Plus it would be rather hypocritical of me to feel bad. I'm the one whose actions will cause his death, in a way.
Second, I'm feeling complicated, because of his point of view.
He's sure that he has completed his purpose, so he's fine with dying. Furthermore, he's fine with not being given credit for his death.
I don't like that.
Both the part where he's fine with dying, and the part where he doesn't want any credit for it.
I don't like it, but there isn't anything I could do about it.
Still... It makes me uncomfortable, from my perspective, he's giving up on life. Well, it's more like he's accepting his death, which if I think about it in that way, it makes more sense to me.
But I don't know, maybe it's because I've never given up in my life in that way, in any way.
Even after having my whole sense of reality changed, I've never just thought ¨Okay, here's where I finish¨ and died.
So seeing him so easygoing, for a lack of better words, about his death makes me contemplate my thoughts.
I know that I have no right of telling him to change his mindset, and that it's dumb to mortify myself because of his way of seeing life, and that I'm not wrong in thinking it's a shame that he accepts his death without a fight, but I'm not right because the opposite of that would be fighting for a way to evade his death, and that wouldn't be good for my objectives, especially with the time limit the travel ticket has. Furthermore...
Haah... I'm talking too much.
It's not like I'm going to do anything about it either way, because at the end of the day his sacrifice will serve to push my goals forward, and if I did something, he's going to find a way to kill himself with his voodoo doll. Yes, he would do that, because he knows that I want to kill the Moon Lord, probably because Calista told him, and the wall stands in my way.
It's something already set, his death will happen.
Now that I think about it, is this why she asked me to wait for a week? It wouldn't be weird if they knew each other, and she said she knew someone that could get her information on the queen.
Whatever, I don't care that much about her connections.
"Argh, it's just weird." Again, I don't like him, so I don't feel bad about his death in that way. It's more of a bother, I dislike that he accepts his death without a fight.
If I were in his situation... Yeah, I would fight.
Like, I would understand that my death will help the world get rid of something bigger than me, but I would still fight. I would use every single thing I have on my disposal to survive, even if it was for just one more day.
But well, that's my mindset, and he has his. Even if his way of thinking is the complete opposite of mine, it's not like I'm going to act to change it, restrict it, or something, I'm not a fascist.
Even if I could be.
Difference of Ideas happens every time, it's not a big deal, even if his sucks.
"Let's just do our jobs." I focus my mind in the ambient around me.
I'm in hell.
Literally, like, Eleanor's worm is killing some demons and hell bats.
The hellvator wasn't hard to make, I just went out of the city to the nearest evil biome and dug a hole inside one of the already existing caves. That way no one will accidentally stumble into it, and if something came up, then they'll just be another monster in this part of the world.
The place looked like a typical hellscape, it looked like a cavern of some kind, one that had a lot of stalactites and lava in it.
We can't forget the occasional ruined house either.
In them, I found some shadow chests, and in those chests I found different loot.
Potions, mainly. But I also found some weapons, coins, bullets, and most importantly, a dark lance to the side of a treasure magnet.
It's weak, I mean, everything is at this stage, especially when compared to my body, but I didn't want the lance because of its damage, I wanted it because of its special capabilities.
You see, this weapon is one of the very few that inflict a certain debuff when attacking. Shadowflame prevents regeneration and does damage at the same time.
So, going close an unsuspecting demon, I tested it by piercing the lance through his stomach, making him struggle in agony, removing the weapon, it was easy to see the scorch marks that appeared around the wound.
Not only that, but the slowly spreading fire that refused to allow that wound to heal, if it could.
This little test shows that debuffs are good, and may be one of my weaknesses, as I'm not sure my regeneration is good enough to counter that.
My viltrumite part should be able to resist, and eventually extinguish the fire, but the damage would already be done.
Still, generalizing a little, internal damage should be the only thing that could harm me.
Which bosses inflict debuffs? Plantera, Wall of Flesh, Duke Fishron, and I wouldn't be surprised if the Lunatic Cultist, this is real life after all, he's going to prepare as much as he can.
Talking about real life...
Nop, I don't feel it.
I'm talking about the Superboy Prime problem, or well, any ¨transmigrator into a fictional world¨ problem.
All of the people around me feel pretty real, all of them with their own personalities and characteristics, all of them with their own lives, and all of that.
It feels as real as my old reality felt. Is that weird? Maybe... I don't really care a lot about that.
And, talking about my old reality...
Could I go back eventually? Not like I want to, but could I?
I don't think it should be impossible, but it could be hard.
Maybe I lived in a reality similar to the Earth-33 of DC, where all superheroes, aliens, gods, etc, were comic books, as the reality was surrounded by the fictive membrane.
Maybe the reality I lived in isn't real, or real concerning this world. Aresha, the mirror woman I met before being thrown here, said something similar. Something about ¨This place can't be explained by anything.¨
I should've paid more attention. Maybe it's something like ¨You can't even begin to explain this place with your measel brain.¨
I once read that small brains can't comprehend what a bigger brain thinks. Like how an ant can't comprehend what a human thinks because it lacks the necessary brain power.
So, according to this theory, my previous reality is so high level that this lower level reality can't even begin to approach it?
That sounds weird...
There's also the chance that I was living in a fictional world, but just as an extra. Not even a background extra, but a real nonexistent extra.
Imagine you're in a low-level anime like Wotakoi, but not in Japan or near the main plot, you're just an average American in your 9-5 far away from anything related to the main cast.
You watch anime, you read manga, and you go on with your normal life, not knowing that your world is fictional, and no one was there to see your life.
What if I'm a fictional character? Isekai'd people are incredibly common, especially in Japan.
It wouldn't be weird either... God of War is a popular place, and since it's a high-level world, literally anything could come out of gacha and it wouldn't be weird. I've said before that being in a low level anime with this gacha would be overkill...
Am I real?
Hmm...
"Oh, Author above, please give me something really strong or really cool in the next gacha. Something that's both preferable, someone like Doom Slayer, or a Persona character. Oh! What about a God Killer? Like Asura"
...No answer.
"Well, I hope that the author is older than 10- Wait, scratch that, please let him be 8 years old so he could change this story to an easy wish-fulfillment fantasy."
Again, no answer.
"Whatever. It's a dumb question to be asking anyways, I know that my author dearest will give me zero character development."
(A/N: Lol.)
Being a bit more serious, the ¨Am I real?¨ question is too dumb to be asked anyways. Even people from my past reality asked themselves that question, and they should be more real than me!
Wait, am I a ¨Real¨ guy thrown into a fictional world? Or, now that I'm in a fictional world it became ¨Real¨?
"Argh, let's just go do something else." It's not fun to think about these things, it feels ominous.
Having done everything I wanted in the underworld, I went to my hellevator and tried to further develop my limited levitation into a full-fledged flight skill. It kinda worked.
...
After leaving the underworld, I spent my time doing some little things.
I walked around the city, I chatted with Eve, sometimes I went to check up on the Mechanic and the Dryad.
The Dryad seemed happy to see me, the mechanic seemed a little awkward around me, but maybe that's to be expected with the speech that I gave her.
Ugh, I still cringe a little, hopefully I won't get a Naruto card anytime soon.
In one of the chats with Eve, she took me to help people around the community.
It wasn't anything big, just helping at the soup kitchen. But it helped me take my mind out of the dumb thoughts.
Anyways, I also visited the blacksmith, I'm almost sure that there wasn't one in the game, but it makes sense since the MC shouldn't be realistically able to do everything now.
Through his help and the goblin tinkerer's, we were able to make two special swords, the Blade of Grass, the Volcano, and the Light's Bane. All weapons needed for the Night's Edge.
The next step wasn't too hard, I just went to the corruption and threw the four swords needed for the recipe, after a moment, they fused into one.
I didn't think about it too much, just accepted it and moved on.
The sword is a bit strong... I would say it's around my level, but since I'm barely a fifth of Oliver's, my physically strongest character, it's not really all that.
It left a trail with every swing, said trail sends an attack forward that dissipated after a moment.
Weapon crafting wasn't the only thing I did in the week. I also explored the world to see how different it was from what I knew.
I found a kingdom, but I didn't bother myself with it.
I went to the desert and found a pyramid with a flying carpet inside.
In the tundra, I grabbed some boreal wood as they were very good looking.
High in the sky I came across some Flying Islands, actually this place is full of interesting things beyond the loot, more on that later.
I found a sword shrine, don't ask how, and got the enchanted sword from there.
Well, that was the efficient part of me talking. I also spent some time in the mountains.
More specifically, in the mountains of the tundra. It's kinda weird that every biome here has such a distinct geography, like, even the jungle has a decently tall mountain where not a single snowflake falls, that doesn't make sense at all.
I probably shouldn't be concerned about the geography of a world that has a will, though.
Anyways, I spent days in the snow, I just lay there and let the cold hug me.
It's nice, I felt like I was in a movie.
"The masculine urge to slowly bleed out here. Hehe" It was the perfect point for the meme.
Eleanor couldn't be bothered with my little comments, and just enjoyed the cold.
So did I.
Uncharacteristic for this temperature, it made me feel better.
"What did Makima say... When you're cold you're depressed, apparently she was wrong since I'm feeling pretty comfortable." At that moment I felt as if everything was completely fine, enough to let a mindless comment such as that out of my mouth.
My issues and worries seemed to slowly escape me as the cold consumed my body.
To be honest, I've always preferred the cold to the heat.
...
I spent the next week with days like that.
My actions consisted of helping out people, chatting with the ones I knew, spending time in the cold, and doing other minor things that sound repetitive to say.
I didn't meet with Andrew.
Not that week, and I was never going to be able to do so again.
The doll in my hands seemed awfully light compared to the weight of my thoughts, the lava looked eager to swallow it, even if it meant summoning a horrible monster.
No demon was in the vicinity, making me feel slightly lonely.
I stood in one of the many ruined houses, and before I could let my thoughts wander around, I threw the doll into the lava.
Once again, before any thoughts could form, I felt an incredible sensation of disgust and the air shift as I looked in front of me to see a singular mouth poke out of the air.
It felt unreal, as if the mouth simply came to existence in the middle of the air.
In the span of a moment, the mouth expanded uncontrollably to all sides. Forming a skyscraper-sized wall that created a pair of enormous eyes.
Needless to say, it was disgusting to see it happening, even for just a moment.
My senses went into overload at the moment, alerting me of the imminent danger and triggering my fight or flight response.
Of course, I chose to fight.
But I'm not dumb, I didn't just rush into the fight, I need a plan, one that I should've thought of before throwing the doll to the lava.
Well, it's pure flesh, I could make distance and build up speed to just pierce through it.
The myriad of lasers it sent me proved useless as I dodged all of them.
It was slow, that was the only thing I had over it.
The flesh wriggled for a bit before numerous appendages protruded from its body, these appendages are connected to the main body by thin, red, fleshy chains.
At the end of the chain, small mouths resembling the much larger one in the middle appeared.
Very creeped out, I retreated a bit, carefully judging the appropriate distance to not make it throw its tongue to me.
"Alright, let's just go for the usual." Reaching into my inventory, I took out a weirdly looking crimson sword and increased its size massively.
With a single large swing, most of the mouths were cut in half. The few that didn't separate from their chains flew to me.
Giving a little spin to my massive sword, I reduced its size and slashed at the little flying mouths.
The wall let out an intense roar that rumbled across the underworld and fastened its pace.
I aimed my sword towards one of the massive eyes, but the effect was rather minor and the lasers almost reached me, almost.
No point doing this, only my body is strong enough to destroy it, but I'm not fully sure if touching the flesh would be a good idea.
Hmm... I should've brought an armo-Hm?
"Rogue Sun." My hand slipped into my inventory again and took the sun stone while depositing the scissor swords.
Surrounding my body, the armor made me feel more secure, even if I had said that the armor was weak and easily replaceable.
In the security of my armor; I flew straight into one of his eyes with one hand ready to pummel
The eye visibly shook as my punch made contact with it.
Its flesh wriggled under the strain and started to contaminate my armor, climbing it through the hand.
I pulled my hand quickly and flew back before it could go further and the flesh died shortly after losing its connection with the main body.
But the spot I had punched slowly regenerated until it became an eye again, with its regeneration, the lasers began again.
'Alright, I got everything necessary to kill it.' I wasn't bothered by this in the slightest, this chain of events let me discover something.
It got smaller.
Even if just by a singular centimeter, the eye got smaller. I can't say anything about the other eye or the rest of the flesh around me, but I can say that I made significant damage here.
The gears turned in my head and a plan was made.
'What plan?' Do you ask?
"Obviously, I just have to hit it till' it dies!" Yep, it boiled down to that.
It's immune to fire and probably every other thing I can use, so hitting it until it uses all of its flesh to regenerate is going to be my best shot.
I flew into the same eye I had almost destroyed, the Wall of Flesh didn't simply take my attack, and summoned various mouths around itself.
Many came at me flying while others stayed attached to the monster, all of them couldn't make a dent in the armor, so I grew confident.
The fight was boring, apart from the occasional laser I had to dodge and the flying mouths that couldn't do anything to me, I only had to back off when the flesh trying to take over my body got too close for comfort.
Still, I couldn't let my guard down, just earlier I said my body wanted to flee, there has to be a reason why.
But slowly, I lost reasons to keep it up, and the fight became a repetition of the same actions.
Destroy the eye as fast as I could, retreat, dodge any attacks sent at me, and repeat.
The Wall isn't completely mindless, but it can't adapt, or do any strategies.
If its actions fail, it just repeats them with more strength. I can't blame him for that, as it would work with everything in this world.
But I'm not from this world.
Slowly but surely, the wall's size began to diminish, its hundreds of meters began to transform into tens as the eyes got increasingly smaller.
Once I did enough damage to the eye I was aiming at, it stopped regenerating and I focused on the other one.
Nothing that could be said about the fight hadn't been said yet, it all became really boring at some point, the only real reason why I couldn't do this any faster was because I had no way of actually destroying it in one go, I'd need some sort of incredibly big attack that could wipe it in one go.
Maybe if I had more assimilation with Dante.
The fight began to slow down as the once imposing wall was reduced to a 2 meter panel with a mouth in the middle.
Floating in the middle of the underworld, I looked at it and punched it as hard as I could.
Destroying it, from the mouth, a whirlwind of light and darkness came out and escaped to all the confines of the world, changing it irreversibly. Save for one little part of light that materialized itself in my hand.
As they died down, I saw what I had in my hand and a smile appeared in my face.
...
Returning to the surface, the first thing I did was go straight to the Dryad.
Well, first thing after throwing myself into a river and washing the dead flesh and other stains, which source was unknown to me.
"I suppose you felt that." I opened the door to her house and found her in deep thoughts with a silent mechanic at her side.
She didn't answer, and I focused on the only other person here. "Is there something wrong with her, Terra?" I learnt her name in the past week.
"I think she's talking with the world right now. She does it sometimes." Terra said, acting as if this was a normal occurrence.
Apparently I was interrupting their daily tea session, now that I think about it, almost every time I came here they were doing so...
Suddenly she stood up, looked at four different directions for ten seconds and stared at me deeply.
In those directions were the Jungle, the Corruption, the Crimson, and an unknown place that I assumed was the Hallow.
"You did it." Calista slowly turned her head and looked at me, I couldn't decipher any extra information as she covered her face with both of her hands.
She looked like a weeping angel.
"Yes." The air around us grew dense, Terra felt it and ran away, not in a ¨I don't care¨ gesture, but more of a ¨I'll give the two of you some space.¨
"...What about Andrew?" Her voice came out even heavier than the atmosphere, my face fell with realization.
But I can't back off, I did this, so I need to face some consequences. "Dead." I answered without any hesitation.
"..." Her face lowered and her hands trembled, I saw a single water drop coming down her cheek, immediately, I felt a pang of guilt hit me.
Of course, I already had thought deeply about that enough, but I can't help but feel that it was my fault. Maybe I'm being too harsh with myself...
*Smack*
A loud hit interrupted my thoughts. I brought my hand to my face in instinct, but the hit wasn't directed against me.
Calista's face had a slight red mark, and if it wasn't for the weird looks Terra was giving her, I would have thought I was imagining things.
"We have work to do." She looked at me straight in the eye with her eyes wide open, while ignoring the single tear falling down her eye.
She stood firm and straight, her hands were balled into fists and she was biting her lower lip while she slowly averted her eyes and looked up.
"Ok, let's start with..."
Calista must've thought about this for a long time, as this was a very, very good plan.
My plan was based on killing the most that I could in the new biomes, and checking the jungle for life fruits or something.
But she had an actual proper plan.
Which started with doing something about the Hallow.
...
Eleanor straightened herself, the sudden mirage of energy vanished as fast as it had appeared, but she couldn't go back to sleep just yet.
"Whoa, you got up early." Eve said from her kitchen, where she was frying something on the pan.
Lately, she's been crashing in her house whenever she didn't feel like throwing herself in the snow or walking around under the sunlight.
Her master also comes often to talk about stuff she can't understand, or be bothered for.
While others might call her childish, she simply thinks it's the most comfortable way of living.
Enough about that though, what intrigued her is the reason why she woke her up so abruptly, the energy that propagated so quickly and remained there in miniscule quantities, just enough to not notice unless you were making a real effort, but enough to influence the environment.
It was unusual for a change to happen like this, especially so suddenly.
She couldn't be the only one to sense this change, maybe the Dryad could, her master definitely would be able to...
"Hey, is it me or the air feels weird? Is it the gas?" Eve said, looking around the kitchen like the shift could be seen physically.
"Yeah, there's something... shining? No, wait, it's getting darker... Meh, it probably was a fairy." Apparently, it could. She didn't dwell on it too much, as she mistook it for a phenomenon she was acquainted with.
Intriguing... But she had other matters to attend to.
What to eat for breakfast? Eggs or bacon...
Perhaps both...?
Hmm, maybe.
...
Eve saw the child float to the kitchen on a worm, grab some eggs and bread, and eat them slowly with her eyes closed, sometimes she fed parts of her food to her worm, but that was rather common now.
'Although, that may be a loose use of the word.' What was normal now? Too many things had happened recently, enough to doubt every use of the term.
Well, while there have been too many changes recently, nothing is completely out of expectations, so that may be an exaggeration.
Anyhow, it's not something for a small town protector like herself to bother with. She'll just have to notify Andrew of any weird changes.
"Any plans for today? No, wait, you're just gonna sleep all day." She talked with the child, who seemed completely unbothered by the assumption and just nodded slowly.
"Ok, then it just means you're free to help me with something." Eve's mood was easy to deduce by her words; lively, energetic, productive. While Eleanor's was only perceivable by her face.
"Bitch, can you not do this so early in the morning?" Eleanor's face screamed.
"I can't hear your disagreement, so I'll just take that as a yes." Facing the complete opposite way from Eleanor, Eve nodded to herself.
Eleanor could only wish it was something easy and quick.
They both finished their breakfast before quickly going out, the image of someone with a flying child had already become commonplace in the town. Leaving Eleanor outside a small shop, she quickly bought some things.
"Alright, let's go- Oh wait! Is that Terra's shop?" Through the corner of her eye she sees an open shop that was previously closed for a long time.
"I haven't talked to her in ages... Let's go, Elle." She grabs the child by the arm and they enter the shop.
The scene is similar to when your mother encounters her old friend, who she hasn't spoken to in ten years, and the friend, for some reason, feels the need to update her in such an adequate location of Walmart's parking lot. Because, yes, Veronica, it's IS imperative for me and my mother to know why your second, third, or whatever number of husbands divorced you and left you with the children. Again.
While that sentiment was weird to put in words, the face that Eleanor is currently making perfectly describes it.
"Oh my god, Eve, how are you?" Terra's face brightened up when she saw her friend and a familiar child walk in through the door to her shop.
Said shop looked like a very standard mechanic shop, except that instead of cars it had various pieces of confusing machinery. Like various, plates, levers, a treasure chest? Well, it's golden but it has a large top, like you're supposed to stand up in it.
It's not the only weird thing here either, there's a moving platform with a shiny gold square in the center of a dark geometric design, but it's very small and it's constantly moving in and out of the box in the center of the platform, as if it's supposed to remain inside the box.
And let's not talk about what would be a perfectly common item if you found it anywhere else; the fishing pole.
"I'm good, actually, the question would make more sense if I made it to you. I haven't seen you in ages." Eve responded and Terra let out a sigh.
"Well, it all started when I was out one day, I had gone to purchase some things to finish some mechanisms..." The red-haired mechanic started her story, much to the dismay of the only child in here.
...
"So out of nowhere, I see this child." Head pat incoming, unavoidable. "And the guy we're talking with a magical worm killing the same ones who threw me into all of that mess. God, I just... I don't know how to say this." Terra sighed with frustration.
Her water bottle hit the table as she placed it down with more force than usual, neither Eve nor Eleanor batted an eye and she continued.
"It's nice, now I can just go back to doing the things I like and I don't have to fear for my life constantly, but..." She was sabotaging herself with words.
"It happened too soon?" Eve suggested.
"Yes! Exactly, I- I think I had, y'know, accepted it, accepted the fact that I was going to be there. I treated it like it was common sense, and then he came and disrupted it, and now I just want to get over all that, but he said something about scars and pain, so then my goal changed, and now I want to heal or something, but I don't know how and I'm scared that time is going to pass and nothing will change and it will just stay in the back of my mind and I- I just thought to-" Terra's speech patterns and voice were crumbling down as she spoke, her breathing becoming more ragged and ragged.
"Thought to do something else, but you don't know what and you're here mortifying yourself because you're not doing anything but let the time pass?" Eve interrupted her friend's trauma dump, afraid she might just collapse in her spot.
"...Well, yeah, something like that." Terra took a sip of her water bottle and nodded meekly, a little embarrassed by how her friend was able to identify her problem so quickly.
"Hmm. I can't say I understand your problems... I really can't say anything about your situation, my go-to advice is usually to go out and do something that will tire you enough." Eve says with a hand on her jaw.
"It's fine, just getting it out of my mind is good enough help." Terra said good heartedly.
"Well, I do know something we could do..." Eve's brain concocts a plan.
"Hm?"
...
Behind Eve's house, in a decently sized patch of dirt, three women and one worm moved around, kneeling and scratching the dirt every so often.
"How did you even get this idea?" Terra complained while stretching her back.
"I don't remember, I just woke up one day and I decided to do something else, I took a walk and I saw the plant store." Eve uses a plow to level the terrain, while keeping the earth as unperturbed as she can.
"..." Eleanor's verbal skills are put to the test, as she commands her worm to bring a sack full of seeds and vegetables, carrots mostly.
"You're planting carrots? Aren't there specifics to doing this?" Terra used a ruler to measure the soil.
"First, don't use a ruler; second, yes, there are. I asked some of the farmers about the specifics and they were happy to see someone eager to learn." Eve took the ruler from Terra's hand and gave her a measuring tape.
"I see... Do you like plants, Eve?" Terra tried to start another conversation while fidgeting with the tape.
"Hm? Ah, well, not really, but I enjoy doing something to move my body, it's rather fulfilling." Eve said while receiving the vegetables bag from Eleanor's worm.
"Then why plants?" Terra used the tape to measure the distance between the carrot seeds, 30 cm between them.
"Oh, it's just that the farmer guys don't have too much contact with the larger community of people, so I wanted to get close to them and I did, they introduced me to the plants business, and I happened to enjoy it." Eleanor's worm gave Eve a calendar and she marked the day they planted the seeds.
"Well, if you like it..." Terra stood up and sat down outside the dirt patch, to the child's side.
A comfortable silence made its way into the conversation, Eleanor didn't participate in it, but even she felt cozy in the environment.
"Alright, it's almost done." Eve stood up and patted her thighs, brushing off the dirt on them.
"Let me just... Oh, thanks." She received some pipes with holes in the middle of them and placed them around the garden.
"What are those?" Terra asked from the leisure of her chair.
"Remember some time ago I bought some tubes from you? I used them to make this watering system." Eve connected the pipes to the same faucet by an adaptor
"Really?" Terra's voice came out with a tinge of disbelief, not on purpose.
"Yeah, it was a bit hard but with Ada's help and some instructions from the farmer guys I got a DIY copy." She turned the faucet and tested the system.
"Alright, we're good to go." Eve sat down next to her friend and served herself a glass of water.
"So, when will this thing be ready for harvest?" Terra asked.
"3 to 4 months." Eve answered flatly
"3 to-?! So, like... months? As in, ¨30-days¨ months?" Terra asked, again.
"Yeah, and after that I'll have to rotate it with some tomatoes or legumes." Eve said while resting on her seat, as if it was normal, which it actually is.
Not to the mechanic to her side, though.
"That's insane! Does every vegetable-" "Tomatoes aren't vegetables." "...Does every vegetable have to go through this process?!" Terra looked to her friend, lounging casually.
"Yeh." Flat answer again.
"...Huh." Terra looked a bit out of her element, just a bit.
"Yeah, makes you think." Eve giggled for a moment.
"It does." Terra finally sat back down, and they both enjoyed the sun for a long time.
No one spoke, it seemed like the perfect moment to just relax and not think about anything.
Someone didn't think the same.
"By the way, what about the child?" Terra asked, earning the looks from the other women.
"What about her?" Eve asked, while Eleanor's face spoke for herself.
"Y'know... doesn't she have school or something?" Terra tried to explain.
"Nah, she isn't from here, and neither is Arian" Eve explained.
"Do they come from the kingdom?" Terra looked a little surprised by that.
"Nop, Eleanor and Arian are weird, but they aren't that extreme." Eve explained.
"Oh well..." Terra accepted that answer.
"..."
"...
"..."
One of those three was Eleanor's.
"Speak." Eve got bothered by the uncomfortable silence.
"What?" Terra didn't meet Eve's eyes.
"You seem to want to say something, but aren't finding the words." Eve has a good understanding of her friend.
"Just... What's up about him?" Terra is not very good with words.
"...Arian, a guy who came to the town to kill the monsters, Andrew supports him to an extent, I think he's met with the dryad. What else... He takes care of Eleanor... He's two years younger than you... He's also curious about machinery, I think, he mentioned it a few times when I talked to him." Eve tried to recall every piece of information from her brain.
"Machinery?"
"Yeah, he's really invested in it, Eleanor, show her the thing" Eve gestured to the child.
From god-knows-where she took the scouter Arian had previously given her.
"Oh... This is... Wait, it's actually..." Terra slowly reacts to the scouter.
"This is actually pretty good!" She sounds happy.
"I know right? Even I thought it was a big deal. You should probably ask him about it"
"Yeah, I will do that."
Eve didn't pay attention to Terra's expression, if she had, then she would have laughed before teasing her friend.
Eleanor watched her expression with a completely neutral expression on her face.
'Something is going on...' Eleanor thought.
'It seems fun, though, so I'll leave it like that' Eleanor stopped thinking and went back to sleeping lazily, not knowing of the consequences of her actions.
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A/N: Hey there.
While writing the WoF fight, I realized that it really was a boring fight, because it's in itself a very simple boss, because I couldn't describe it in a fancier way, and because overdoing the fancy would make the Moon-Lord fight either lackluster or over the top.
I would have written something about the cultist preparing the machines or something, but I didn't really feel it would fit, foreshadowing someone everyone knows and a threat that everyone knows.
Btw, I'm going to upload the next chapters all in batch to end this arc. If they go as I planned, then they will cover from here to post-moon lord. Pre-HM was 24-25 thousand words so I should have HM in 35 thousand. Maybe.