World-Tree's End

by E A Hooper

  >Jim: Fantastic work. Quinn and I are regrouping right now. I’ll add her to the team.

  >Vincent: Yes, we’re finally getting the group back together!

  >Quinn: Don’t get too excited, Vince. This isn’t over yet. Ezra has some kind of flag thing that he can use as a spawn point.

  >Jim: I got one of those from the dragon kite. Are you saying he has it planted somewhere on this world?

  >Quinn: That’s right. I think he was moving between the Challenge Worlds while turning all the bosses into puppets. Xan and I managed to kill three of his puppets with hit-and-run tactics before he got us. He should respawn somewhere around here in two weeks. Are we going to do something about that or just leave him here?

  >Vincent: I’d like to wait for him to respawn. I want to invite him to our team.

  >Devon: Really? After all this trouble?

  >Vincent: He’s one of the strongest players in this game. We could use his help against the Elder Gods.

  >Quinn: Yeah, those things are no joke. Are we just going to camp in the forest and wait for him? That would give us a couple weeks to catch up. I really want to know where the hell you’ve been, Vince.

  >Vincent: Let’s regroup, and I’ll tell you all about it. It’s a long story.

  Chapter 20

  The next two weeks passed by faster than Vincent had expected. He spent most of the time reconnecting with his three friends and sharing stories. It took a while for Vincent to tell them everything that had happened to him since Isaac’s War, and it was a struggle to explain his situation with Rosaria being a copy of Monika. Quinn and Xan fell silent for that part of the story, and he guessed they still felt guilty about giving her the daiglass shard.

  After Vincent finished his story, Xan and Quinn told him everything that had happened to the guild from their point of view. They glossed over certain subjects, like their arguments with Jim, and Vincent could tell there was still tension between the three. The two women barely spoke to Jim during those two weeks, and he tended to run off on his own to look for Ezra’s flag.

  They’d hoped to make things easier by finding Ezra’s spawn point, but the man had hidden it well, and they still hadn’t managed to track it down by the end of the second week. Vincent had thought it’d be underground somewhere, but Quinn explained that Ezra had made one of the bosses relocate it while they were puppets. She had tried to see through the eyes of the boss, but only caught glimpses of orange.

  When the timer they’d marked for Ezra’s death reached zero, Xan rooted herself to the ground with world magic before casting a tracing spell she’d developed and upgraded over the years. White lines ran across the petal, connecting each of the nearby players, then one extra line pointed east.

  “He’s that way,” Xan said.

  The group hurried away, following Xan’s tracking spell like a compass. As they reached the drop-off near the edge of a petal, a white deer galloped into their view and slowly approached. Its eyes flashed with white light, and then text appeared on Vincent’s HUD.

  1v1 Me (Contract Quest) – Ezra the Tempered is offering to join your guild if you defeat him in a one-on-one fight. This contract will initiate a Life Pact Duel. If you are defeated, then your teammates will perish. | Quest Condition: Since this contract initiates a Life Pact Duel, your teammates will have to agree as well. Do you accept? (Yes/No)

  “We’re not agreeing to this, right?” Devon said, staring at everyone. His teammates smirked at him one by one. “Seriously?”

  “Vince won’t pass up the challenge,” Xan said. “There’s no point in trying to argue with him.”

  Vincent smiled at his friends. “Even after a century apart, you guys know me so well.”

  Vincent accepted the contract, then turned to Devon, knowing he was the only one hesitating.

  “Should we at least set Checkpoint Crystals?” Devon asked.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Xan said. “If he loses, we’ll respawn back at Edgelight and just ignore Ezra entirely.”

  Devon nodded, and then everyone accepted the contract.

  All available party members have agreed to Ezra’s Life Pact Duel. Challenger, the fight will begin when you step onto the battlefield.

  The deer vanished, leaving a white line at the petal’s edge. When Vincent approached, he saw a large ring of world magic surrounding the valley beyond the drop-off. Ezra stood at the center, waiting with a shimmering sword in his hands.

  Vincent dropped off the ledge, and a wall of world magic immediately rose behind him. The enemy remained still as he approached, looking as though he was waiting for Vincent to take a fighting position. Ezra wore mithril armor, but his sword caught Vincent’s eye. The handle and blade were made of the same, clear metal that seemed to capture the color of a fragmented rainbow inside of it.

  The strange sword held his attention for a moment, but then his eyes went to the mechanism sticking out of the gray-haired man’s neck. He’d taken a Fast Injector and attached it to a clockwork mechanism that shot a potion into his bloodstream every second. However, the potion inside seemed to refill almost instantly, even though it didn’t seem like Ezra was using his inventory.

  “Go ahead and Scan me,” Ezra called out with his raspy voice. “I got a good look at your abilities while I had control of you. I want you to know what you’re up against too.”

  Vincent Scanned Ezra, his world magic shield, the potion in the Fast Injector, and then the sword.

  Player: Ezra the Tempered

  Class: Fighter

  Subclass: Cleric

  Real Age: 54

  Highest World: Orange Challenge World

  Vitality: Lv 502

  Spirit: Lv 511

  Resolve*: Lv 554

  Perception: Lv 509

  Agility: Lv 505

  Strength*: Lv 561

  Divine Body (Requires Holy Shield) – Mana Usage: Very High | Magic Rating: 1-999 | Replaces the user’s Mana Shield. | The user charges every cell in their body with world magic. Whenever damaged tissue is healed, it must be recharged with additional world magic. To recharge this shield, the user must make skin-to-earth contact while paying the mana cost.

  Endless Elixir (Soulbound) – A standard bottle of elixir that refills as soon as you drink it.

  Daisteel Sword (Soulbound) – Material Rating: 1000 | An indestructible blade. Legend says it was created by something greater than the Elder Gods, and only one exists on the entire World-Tree.

  “Wow,” Vincent uttered.

  “Impressive, no?” Ezra said with a crooked-tooth grin.

  Vincent nodded in agreement. “I can’t believe someone is that close to my levels. I suppose you’ve been grinding Challenge Bosses for a long, long time. Then there’s that elixir your injector is pumping through you—and don’t even get me started on that sword.”

  “I got the Endless Elixir and the Daisteel Sword by trading with an NPC named Archie,” Ezra explained, holding up his blade to show it off. “Together, they cost me a hundred thirty Unique Tokens, but it was damn worth it.”

  “So it’s actually indestructible?” Vincent asked.

  “Toss that Voidfire of yours,” Ezra said. “I’ll show you.”

  Vincent complied, throwing a Voidfire at the gray-haired man. Ezra swung his blade down the middle, splitting the black flames before they reached him. The two halves continued onward and exploded behind him, but his blade remained unscathed.

  “Even void attacks don’t scratch it!” Vincent said in shock. “That’s incredible.”

  “It makes quick work of angels too,” Ezra said. “Not even your Density Shield will save you from its edge.”

  Vincent nodded, thinking to himself. “That’s true, but with my Zero Field I have a lot more mobility than you. Unless you have a flying spell.”

  “No, I never came up with anything like your friend’s wings,” Ezra said. “I’ll be sure to work toward that next. It would round my build out very nicely.”

  “Hey!” Quin
n shouted from the upper petal. “Are you two going to fight, or you just measuring dicks over there?”

  “Yeah, are we fighting or not?” Vincent asked, taking a stance.

  “I see this more like a job interview,” Ezra replied. “But yes, to an extent, this is something of a dick-measuring-contest. I’ll show you my ultimate attack, and if you survive, you can show me yours.”

  Ezra raised his Daisteel Sword, and an intense light shone off it so brightly that Vincent could barely look at it. He could feel a wave of pressure, almost like Rosaria’s presence, wash over him. Even Quinn had to brace herself from getting knocked away despite standing on the other side of the world magic wall.

  Vincent squinted his eyes to Scan the light.

  Celestial End (Requires Greater World Breaker | Requires Holy Atomica) – Mana Usage: Very High+ | The user draws in world magic from the atmosphere, then directs it into the ground. Once it strikes a world vein, it unleashes the power of the World-Tree to the surface.

  Vincent watched the light disappear from the blade, then cracks appeared, spreading across the entire valley and only stopping at the wall of world magic that circled their fighting area. The air grew heavy with pressure, and sparkling light appeared from the fissures. Vincent unequipped Silpher’s Coat, steeled himself, and then a white flash engulfed his entire field of view.

  Intense energies gnawed at his flesh as he struggled, and the pounding waves of world magic knocked him into the air. Like the brilliant explosions Xan had made in the battle against Isaac many years ago, the blast seemed to reach for the sky like a god’s ethereal blade. When the attack finally ended, Vincent plummeted into a crater that stretched across the entire valley.

  The old man climbed to his feet, and his gaze fell on Ezra, who was unharmed and standing on the only section of the petal that had survived the attack. The man smirked, but he didn’t seem too surprised that his target had survived.

  “Alright, my turn,” Vincent said, not bothering to heal. “This is an experimental attack that I’m working on. Once it’s finished, I’m going to break the skybox and end this game.”

  Ezra grinned, almost ear to ear. “This better not disappoint.”

  Vincent reequipped Silpher’s Coat. He gathered all the mana from it, forming a Greater Mana Bomb. The adrenaline rushing through him helped him compress the spell more and more. Negative energy surged and danced around his body, which hadn’t happened the last few times he’d attempted the spell.

  “Where’s your respawn flag?” Vincent asked, barely containing the power in his hands.

  “Hidden between the overlapping petals behind you,” Ezra responded, his eyes open wide with curiosity. “I almost thought I’d blow it away with my attack.”

  “And if I destroy it, where will you spawn?” Vincent asked, his arms shaking with power.

  “Edgelight.”

  “Good. I’ll see you there.”

  Vincent poured the power of Greater Voidfire into the Greater Mana Bomb. The two spells seemed to co-exist in the same place for the briefest of moments, and then they collapsed in on each other like a black hole. They exploded outward a thousandth of a second later, enveloping the entire valley and beyond in absolute darkness.

  You’ve died. Respawning at Edgelight…

  Vincent blinked, watching the city materialize around him. His first thought was to check the spell upgrade, but to his disappointment it was still stuck at one percent.

  Really? I thought I’d made some progress that time. Then again, even if I made improvement, it might not have been enough to count for even one percent of growth. If that’s the case, this spell might be tougher to finish than I thought.

  >Quinn: Holy crap, so that was the attack you were talking about? I didn’t see how far it extended before I died. My Alcubierre Shield couldn’t even keep me alive for a split-second!

  >Alexandria: What about Ezra? Should we guard the Jump Gate in case he tries to get away again?

  >Vincent: I have a feeling that won’t be a problem. Let’s all meet up at the gate, though.

  Vincent sent out a few messages as he walked back to the Jump Gate. The guild had been on edge the last two weeks, questioning if their team had been captured or not. Once Vincent finished reassuring the various lieutenants, he checked the top fifteen on the Local Power Rankings—which showed everyone’s top stat—now that the entire guild was located on the same world.

  Local Power Rankings:

  #1: Old Man Vincent – 626

  #2: Pale Alexandria – 463

  #3: Ice Knight Zhang – 455

  #4: Quinn the Breaker - 432

  #5: Worldly Ryker - 430

  #6: Fynn the Wolf Lord - 428

  #7: Dragonspear Jeanie - 420

  #8: River Will Drown You - 416

  #9: Athena the Fair - 411

  #10: Crow-Foot Jim – 403

  #11: Devon in Shining Armor - 400

  #12: Spellslingin’ Antonio - 399

  #13: Bombadier Quinton - 395

  #14: Grinning Gwendolyn - 390

  #15: Big Keanu - 382

  Things have changed a lot in a hundred years, Vincent noted. Quinn caught back up to our top players. River and Athena moved up the list, but Antonio and Quinton fell behind just a bit. I guess we should use our top eleven players, plus Ezra, to make a full team of twelve to fight the Gods.

  Vincent sent out messages to any top members that weren’t already on his team. He asked them to meet him at the Jump Gate, and one by one they appeared. Jim and Jeanie arrived first, walking arm in arm.

  “Look at the two of you!” Vincent said, smiling at his old friend. “I had trouble picturing you two as a couple, but now I totally see it. Congrats, Jeanie, you got a good one! Just don’t marry him too quickly. That hasn’t gone so well with him in the past.”

  “Don’t worry, we agreed to no in-game marriage,” Jeanie replied. “We’ll see how we feel about each other once we’re back in the real world.”

  Quinn and Xan arrived next, although Zhang followed close behind. The Ice Knight approached slowly with a look of shame on his face.

  “I’ve had time to talk things over with the rest of the guild,” Zhang said. “And I wanted to apologize again for everything.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Vincent said, waving his hand to quiet the Ice Knight. “That’s not why I asked you here. Let’s just wait for the others.”

  Zhang nodded, but he continued to hang his head low.

  Fynn showed up a few seconds later, looking tense. “Listen, about what happened—” he started to say.

  “No, no. Stop,” Vincent interrupted. “I already told Zhang that I didn’t bring you here to talk about that. Just wait for the others.”

  Fynn raised an eyebrow, then quietly leaned against a wall. When River and Athena showed up a few seconds later, the Wolf Lord hushed River before she could start an argument. “He says we’re not here to talk about that.”

  “Then why are we here?” River asked.

  Fynn shrugged in response. “Who knows. Let’s wait and see.”

  Worldly Ryker showed up shortly thereafter. He glanced at the group, noticing that everyone was silent, and then he joined Fynn by the wall.

  After another minute, Devon slowly approached and looked at Vincent. “Uh, when you said for everyone to meet up at the gate, I wasn’t sure if that meant me too.”

  “Yes, you too,” Vincent said. “You actually beat Antonio by one level for our twelfth spot.”

  “Twelfth spot?” Devon asked.

  “Obviously, he’s putting together a team to take on the Elder Gods,” Fynn said.

  “Hell yeah!” Jeanie said, pumping her fist. “I’ve been waiting for this moment a long time.”

  “And you guys aren’t still mad?” River asked, glancing at her grandfather.

  “I’m definitely irritated with most of you,” Jim said, glancing at the group. “However, none of our previous arguments matter. We need to put all that behind us an
d beat this game.”

  “That’s what Xan and I were saying years ago,” Quinn grumbled.

  The group began mumbling and arguing, but Vincent used Zero Field to make them all face him. “Everyone—everyone, stop it!” he commanded. “Just stop. Seriously. None of that matters. The moment we beat this game and you take off your headsets, all these petty arguments will feel distant and pointless. The only thing we need to be worry about anymore is defeating the Elder Gods, reaching Xenith, and breaking the skybox. Got it?”

  A few people nodded their heads in agreement, although the rest glanced at one another with uncertain expressions. However, Devon seemed to ignore what Vincent was saying as he counted over the number of people there.

  “Hang on, there’s only eleven here,” Devon noted. “You aren’t still counting on Ezra, are you?”

  A rasping laugh called from the top of the nearby wall. “I suppose I should make my introductions,” he said, hopping down and landing near Zhang.

  “Ezra!” Zhang said, looking bewildered. “You’re really… you mean after all this time—”

  “Yes, old friend,” Ezra interrupted, reaching out his hand. “I’m back.”

  Zhang hesitated a moment, but then hesitantly accepted his handshake. “Did you hear about Amelia and Noah?”

  Ezra motioned to Xan. “She told me what happened to them when I was using her as a puppet. It’s a shame they aren’t staying to see the end of the game, but good on them for choosing a difficult path and sticking to it.”

  “Yeah, about that puppet stuff,” Quinn said. “We ought to have a real talk about that.”

  The gray-haired man smiled back in response. “Didn’t you listen to your fearless leader? Nothing matters besides beating this game. I saw the messages they sent to you about the timer being a lie. If we don’t reach the top, then who knows how long we’ll be trapped here? Now, that doesn’t sound so bad to me—I quite enjoy living on the World-Tree—but I also don’t want to let this game go unbeaten.”