He wasn’t entirely sure why Elle and Vil had suddenly decided to attack the assassins. Maybe there was some logic behind it, and maybe Vil had just crashed out as Elle had guessed earlier. Either way, this was the situation they were in right now, and he needed to respond accordingly.

  The chair tipped over along with Celia once he pulled her backwards. Thankfully, Lana’s attention had been fully grabbed by Vil until that point, so she did not notice Celia escaping. And even if she did, she clearly decided that it was more important to fight the knight right now. So, grabbing Celia and pushing the chair away, Arthur scrambled out of the pile of boxes that were thrown on top of them and managed to get out into a relatively open space.

  “Holy…what is wrong with you all?”

  “What do you mean?” Arthur helped her stand up, and she looked back at the chaos that the entire area had devolved into.

  “Either rescue me, or challenge them to a fight. Who does both things at the exact same time?!”

  “I have the same exact same question, actually. But I assure you, we do not have the time for that right now. Come on. I need to get you to Dee.”

  “You’re leaving them alone?”

  Arthur grabbed her hand to pull her along with him, but she quickly let go and decided to look at the ongoing fights. Right as she did, a short boom filled the room. Johnny kicked through the rock structure that Elle had formed under his feet and burst out of his temporary confinement. As Lana pushed against Vil, he held his ground just like last time. Back on full health and stamina, he probably had a lot more of a fight in him right now. To protect the others from Johnny’s attacks, Elle jumped straight into the middle of the fight and kicked the assassin in the stomach.

  “Yeah, I think they got it. You’re the one in most danger here.”

  “I can get out myself.” She argued, refusing to look at him, “Are you sure you want to come with me, and not help them out?”

  Arthur looked at the two and groaned. There was no doubt that they needed help. But that did not mean he could give them any. He wasn’t as good as them. Not even close. No matter how hard he tried, he would only either get in their way or be able to help just the bare minimum. He had one skill, which was useful in very rare circumstances, and would not always be there.

  Still. He still had to use it…

  Elle’s attacks barely did any damage to Johnny. Instead, the guy just tanked them with all his body mass and strength, and grabbed Elle by the throat. Right as he did, a knife came flying out of the other side of the fight and lodged itself into the hand that had locked Elle. Whimpering, Johnny pulled the knife out, but the variant dropped to the floor, stole the knife out of his hands, and jumped backwards.

  Johnny grumbled and hit the shelf behind him out of anger. A bunch of dust spread around the room. Arthur knew there was not much else to be done here. His choice was made. He grabbed Celia by her wrist and pulled her forward. As she let go of the shelf she had been watching through, the vibrations spread. In the space right between Johnny and Elle, a cardboard box fell to the ground and rocked the entire floor with its weight. Out of the torn package peeked a steel dumbbell.

  The assassin shrugged it off and continued walking. It had missed him by a lot. The gap between him and his prey was huge, after all. Huge…

  As he ran, Arthur closed his eyes and pointed his hand at the dumbbell. Johnny kept walking. Whether he still had Arthur and Celia in his mind was questionable, but it was for the best. One. Two. Three.

  Skill Activation

  Object Reversal

  The dumbbell went back to the top of the shelf. One step, two step, three…Johnny got closer and closer as Elle readied his knife and got into a fighting position. Then, right as the assassin was under it, the timing worked out. The package fell from the top of the shelf once more and hit Johnny square in the head. He crumbled, kneeling on the floor as a clear streak of blood started to make its way down his head.

  Elle looked at their general direction, gave a nod, and attacked the weakened enemy.

  “See? I helped. Can’t do anything for another two minutes. Come on!”

  Celia kept looking at the enemy as they moved forward.

  They hopped through the cardboard boxes and squeezed through fallen storage shelves as Celia finally came back to the present moment. The sounds of grunts, steel blades clashing, and packages falling over all started to die out in the background as the two of them got closer to the exit.

  “Are you gonna leave, Arthur?”

  “Huh?”

  He stopped, and her hand naturally slipped out of his. Lana attacked upwards in the background. At least that is what Arthur guessed the boxes flying all over the basement ceiling were. Then, he looked back down at her and gulped. Why was she asking this all of a sudden?

  “If I don’t, then they’ll just…keep coming.”

  “I know. Yeah, I know. Plus, you need to find the person who is behind all of this. It’s just that it’s a bit difficult to think. Things become…”

  “What?”

  Celia shook her head, grabbed his hand once more, and took the lead this time. Moving through the boxes, she ran all the way to the stairs leading to the exit and panted. Letting go of his hand, she gave Arthur a quick nod.

  “You can go. I’ll get out of here.”

  “Sure, yeah. Take care. But also, what did you mean? Just now.”

  “Huh? Oh, just…I’m sorry. Things have been weird. I had a lot of time to think about things when I was kidnapped there, and I realized that they’re weird. That’s it. Multiverses become more of a fantasy when you do not have a dragon in front of you all the time, you know.”

  “Yeah, of course. Yeah.”

  She uncomfortably shifted where she was, “Also…I can’t really believe it was real, so there’s that. But the idea that you’ll just be gone by tomorrow morning is certainly something. I haven’t…”

  This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

  “What?”

  “I haven’t had anyone I know die, you know.”

  “Oh. Well, I’m not gonna die, I can assure you of that.”

  Skill Activation

  Enlargement

  A massive leg rose in the air and swirled down. Arthur moved up, grabbed Celia, and shoved her into the stairwell as it rolled around the room and destroyed the entire set of shelves and boxes. Behind them, as the destroyed metal, wood, and cardboard settled, Arthur found himself unnaturally close to Celia. Quietly, he pulled away and took a step back – out into the basement.

  “I didn’t mean you were gonna die, of course.”

  They both took a quick look at the shelves, which were completely gone. Right in the middle of the warehouse, the four combatants who were still going at it with no scratches on any of them jumped and hopped around without pause.

  Celia cleared her throat, “I just meant to say that I’ve known you for so long, and tomorrow, you just won’t be there. And I haven’t really had that before, so I’m just feeling a bit weird, that’s it.”

  “Yeah, but I don’t…think…this is the best time to be saying all that.”

  Lana hopped back and aimed her sword at the floor.

  Skill Activation

  Atomic Resonance

  As a burst of air in the shape of a sword slash rushed towards Vil, he jumped up and backwards – causing the ground below him to burst into pieces. As the broken tiles flew up into the air, Vil used his sword to redirect some of them towards the descending Lana. Without any hesitation, she struck them with her katana too. Then, both of them went back to trading blows at close quarters.

  “I know. I know.” She took long breaths, as if trying to suppress something that she wanted to say, “I just think that I’m being overreactive to this, and I really don’t want to give you any wrong ideas, so I am just trying to consider how to best word this. That’s it, really. Just give me a second.”

  “I can…talk to you about this later. Really.”

  He kept switching between looking back and then back at her. His body and mind hesitated to agree with the other. He really needed to go back and help them. 120 seconds were up. His skill had reset, and he was only just delaying their support. But at the same time, he wanted to hear her out. He wanted to know what she was going to say.

  “Yeah, but…”

  A loud scream from behind them stopped her from saying anything further. It was Elle.

  “He took my fucking refresh potion!”

  And a couple of seconds after that, right as Arthur was processing the statement –

  Skill Activation

  Enlargement

  This time, a fist. It went backwards as Johnny aimed it at his target, running forward. Elle hesitated and jumped to the side, barely grazing Vil as he thrust his sword towards Lana, and she did a quick backflip to avoid it. But Johnny did not change his position or the direction of the fist. That was when Arthur realized what was going on. Celia kept staring, but he quickly grabbed her once more and started running.

  The fist came closer and closer, growing in size by the inch as they made their way out of its damage radius, barely able to run among the garbage pile of cardboard that stopped them from moving straight. Celia screamed, almost slipping on one of the town packages, but Arthur grabbed her by the shoulder and threw her forward. Immediately after, as the fist finally closed in and hit the wall behind them, he dived forward and covered her with his body.

  Small brick pieces hit his back, but he ignored them. The darkness of the fist enveloped their entire bodies for some time, and then the light shone suddenly as the effect of the skill wore off. Arthur could feel his pulse rate heightening. His health had dropped to 87, all the way from 92, just because of that scare. He made sure Celia was alright and then picked her up again.

  In the middle of the basement, which was the only place where the ground was clean, Johnny looked at the two of them and flexed his arms. Was this his way of showing how angry he was? It had become apparent that neither of them was capable of speech, but he still did not understand why. Was it a condition? A self-inflicted choice? Why would they be like that?

  For now, he ignored the question, just like before, and started moving once more. All of the destruction had caused the stairwell to be blocked by more debris. There was no escape from the basement anymore. He needed to leave Celia in a relatively safe space and get back to the fight. Elle had successfully drawn Johnny’s attention back to himself once more, and Vil was still fighting Lana in his own space. Those two felt like they had been in a deadlock for far too long.

  “Can you stay in this corner? Just run away if an attack comes your way.”

  “Got it!”

  Both of them ran to one of the corners of the room, and she stayed there, still catching her breath after what had just happened.

  “Anything else to say?” Arthur asked as he took a quick step backwards.

  She shook her head, smiling and gesturing for him to go on.

  He sighed and turned once more, running through the piles of cardboard towards the main fight. There was no understanding someone you loved. He knew that well. But it still hurt. He wanted to know what she was thinking. He wanted to know why she had been so agitated just a moment ago. He wanted to know why, all of a sudden, she was fine with him going off to fight and help them. But he could not find out. He could never find out.

  Lana hit Vil with an attack, and he protected his neck. She pushed her sword inwards, trying to draw even the smallest amount of blood. But as long as there was a smile on the knight’s face, Arthur knew that there was no reason to worry. Elle seemed to be struggling a bit with Johnny, though, since he did not have a proper weapon. That gave him enough information to decide where he needed to go.

  The female assassin’s attack failed. As her sword moved, Arthur put his hand forward and counted.

  Skill Activation

  Object Reversal

  The katana clattered to the ground. Arthur stumbled through the cardboard boxes, into the clear area, and quickly fell to the ground to catch it. Lana grunted and tried to stop him from taking it, but Vil kicked her away and followed her deeper into a different corner of the little arena they had created. Arthur grabbed the sword and stood up, looking at Johnny and Elle.

  “Welcome back, I guess!” Elle screamed as he threw a punch at the assassin’s face, doing zero damage, “I have my skill. Aim for the neck!”

  Arthur kept running forward. He still wasn’t sure how a katana was even supposed to be used, but he had a little bit of experience now. Things made sense, and the weight was familiar. It felt a bit rude to keep stealing it from Lana over and over again, but she had another one at her waist anyway. She was probably already using it to continue her fight with Vil.

  Elle took a deep breath and jumped backwards. As the hulking Johnny made his way towards him, he closed his eyes and aimed at the pile of junk all around them. The assassin started to slowly increase his speed, but it was not enough. Arthur finally made it to the man and bent down. In a crouch, he sliced through Johnny’s ankle and kept moving forward. It didn’t do much damage, but it attracted his attention for some time.

  So, right as Arthur turned back around and gained enough friction to cancel his crouched slide, enough time had passed for Elle to be able to unleash his powers.

  Skill Activation

  Sin

  The many wooden shelf boards that lay in the pile came together and rushed towards Johnny at once. On the way, they changed shape and blended into weird amalgamations of each other. Shrinking, expanding, growing denser and lighter as need be, and making their way straight for the enemy’s limbs. Together, they finally converged as wooden chains. Four in total – one on each of his ankles and wrists. Tied down to the floor as if they were built into the warehouse, they stopped Johnny in his tracks.

  Arthur could see the rest of the path for himself. Despite being ‘chains’, the wood pieces were quite straight and wide. It helped with keeping such a massive enemy down, but it also helped with movement. He jumped on top of one of the pieces, leading up the man’s arms, and hopped on. The height it gave him put Johnny’s head right around his stomach, but that was still good. He would not have been able to reach all the way there without any help.

  Sword aimed, he ran up to the edge of the wooden chain and jumped at an angle that made it easier on him. It wasn’t perfect, but it was something. Listening to what Elle had told him, he sliced through the assassin’s neck and fell back down to the floor. The sword clattered beside him as he lost his grip due to the tough attack. But along with that fell quite a bit of blood that covered him and the floor.

  Johnny was alive, as his increasingly panicked arms proved with their movement, but once Arthur looked up, he couldn’t help but smile. There was quite a gash on his neck. They had done substantial damage.