Janus and Oblivion

by Noam Oswin

  [You are now in the True Path]

  A sniper.

  They were shot down with pin-point accuracy. Headshots brutal enough to explode their skulls on impact. I didn’t hear the sound of any gunshots ringing out. I did not hear the telltale crack of an object breaking the sound barrier. Not even a high-grade suppressor could completely and utterly eliminate sound from a fired long range rifle.

  “Zlosta, what was the world like before you were sealed?”

  “Why?”

  “It’s important. Humans, humanity – krvavi – what were they like? Their settlements, their manner of living, kingdoms – anything.”

  She frowned at me. “There weren’t any Kingdoms, just a few groups of Krvavi scattered around Alamir in small settlements, hiding and running away from masakh. They were outnumbered, and often times one or two heroes would rise from the Church of the Prince – but the heroes often died because their numbers weren’t enough.”

  “Did they have wheels?” I asked. “Carts and wheels that could transport goods?”

  “Yes.”

  “Bakeries and bread?”

  “That too. I don’t see why you’re asking –”

  “Iron. Did they have iron and steel?”

  “Yes! What does this have to do with anything?”

  Shit. Shit.

  This wasn’t a fucking medieval fantasy world.

  “You’ve been sealed for several thousand years. Enough that you don’t even recognize the current dating system. Zlosta – the world out there is going to be nothing, nothing like what you remember.”

  Bring a man from 1903 and place him in the year 2023, and he would be out of place and lost at the insanity of the world before him. He’d be scandalized at the concept of mini-skirts, and bikinis would appear to him as blatantly unthinkable. A smartphone and computer would appear to be sorcery, and a Virtual Reality Headset would make him believe men had become gods.

  That was roughly a hundred years of difference, give or take.

  But a thousand? Two thousand? Three? Four? Ten? Twenty? Fifty?

  Shit. Shit. Shit.

  “What is the reason for your hesitation, champion?” Ilikbolg asked. “Let us tear down this wall and do as the Mother has instructed!”

  They did not get it. None of them got it. This was suicide. Assuming Alamir was medieval several thousand years ago, then we were screwed. On earth, the difference between the medieval era of man and the atomic era was hundreds of years. Hundreds, not thousands. At the very least, we were going up against people who had invented their own brand of nuclear weapons, and at worst, we were facing people so technologically advanced that they’d discovered Faster-Than-Light travel.

  Shit.

  “Janus?”

  [You have split Paths]

  [You are now in Path A]

  “We will die if we break past that wall.” I said without preamble. “All of us will die, stupid, pointless, vain deaths.”

  I turned to Zlosta. “All of us, except you.”

  Ilikbolg scoffed. “I didn’t believe you’d be a coward.”

  “It has nothing to do with cowardice –”

  “Enough blustering!” Ilikbolg said. “We have waited for this moment for thousands of years, and if you are too scared to do what needs to be done, the proud Giblon tribe will take over from here!”

  Ilikbolg rose his staff into the air. “FOR THE MOTHER!”

  His people chanted along with him. The monsters rushed forward along with him, charging ahead while Zlosta shot me a look of bitter disappointment. Part of me wanted to care. Part of me realized I didn’t.

  “Janus –”

  “Go.” I said. “You’ll understand.”

  Zlosta charged forward along with them. [Path A] played out with them calling me a coward and leaving me behind, being jostled and pushed aside. In [Path B] I led the charge along with them, rushing forward against the large walls.

  In that world, we stopped when a section of the wall opened. Slid upwards like a mechanical shaft. [Path B], the world where I charged along with them, where I led the charge, had me staring straight at men and women, in sharp, crisp military uniforms. Uniforms the color of muddy water, camouflage, and all of them were holding devices in their hands that looked like high-tech rifles.

  In [Path B] the men and women took aim. In [Path B] the men and women, who, at the sight of the charging horde, did not back down, did not flee, and did not look perturbed, twitched their fingers.

  That was all it took.

  [You are now in the True Path]

  [You have gained the skill {Holy Damage Resistance} from enduring damage from Sacrosanct Weaponry]

  [Skill {Holy Damage Resistance} has gained a Level.]

  [Skill {Holy Damage Resistance} has gained a Level.]

  [Skill {Holy Damage Resistance} has gained a Level.]

  The world where I was called a coward became the one and only true world. I gleamed a little from my demise, and the first thing that came to mind, was to question the nature of the weapons.

  Sacrosanct Weaponry.

  Guns that fired literal beams of holy light. Guns that fired holy light. Holy Laser Rifles. Fuck.

  [You have split Paths]

  [You are now in Path A]

  I ran towards the battle, towards the sight of the goblins and the Minotaurs being gunned down like a player in an open world shooter who decided to go on a massacre. Left and right, skulls and body-parts exploded, harpies fell from the sky like dead birds dropping in a thunderstorm. Dullahan collapsed off their horses as the creatures lost their own heads to match their riders. The goblins with their arrows and spears could barely fire or throw before rain after rain of silent gunfire in the form of bright light blasted them to bloody chunks.

  [Sixth Sense – Danger Detected]

  I couldn’t dodge and resorted to using goblins and wolves as body shields. The men and women in uniform massacring us barely had to aim. They were shooting light. One didn’t dodge light. They pulled the trigger and whatever that was in the line of sight of their barrel exploded.

  The only reason I was making the suicidal decision of charging into this massacre instead of away, was because I was Janus. Was because I could look back and forth, because in [Path B] I was running in the opposite direction, and any information I got in [Path A] would be invaluable.

  Less than five minutes after the firing began, it ended. I laid low on the ground, covered in the naked bloody corpses of lamia and harpies. I could spot Ilikbolg’s corpse not far away from me, as for all his bravado, holy bullets of light did not discriminate. I guess he would never mount that woman and provide his ancestors with pride.

  The only person left standing, as I’d predicted, was Zlosta.

  She roared, charging at the men and women in uniforms, shooting balls of fire at them –

  A translucent shield stopped the fire cold. It appeared almost like a hologram, flickering and pixelating, and no matter what Zlosta threw in the direction of the shield, fire, gusts of wind, large spikes of earth, nothing broke through.

  Instead, they continued to pepper her with gunfire.

  I watched her head blow clean off her shoulders, and regenerate back in seconds. Her stomach and legs were evaporated into nothingness, and they regrew, bone and flesh knitting back sickeningly. She was screaming. She could feel the pain of the assaults, but she could not die.

  She could not die.

  She would feel the pain of a thousand deaths and not die.

  There’s no reason to help her – there’s no reason to help her –

  She wanted to end the world. She wanted people to suffer. She would not look twice if someone was raped or tortured, as she believed it would make it better when she killed them.

  I have no reason to want to save her.

  Zlosta cried as she dropped to the ground. The barrage of light bullets did not stop. They peppered her with gunfire until she was stripped of flesh and nothing but chocolate-colored skeleton. She
regenerated, and they continued firing. They just kept firing.

  She screamed, and they kept firing.

  “FUCK!”

  I didn’t know why I was doing this. I didn’t know what spurred me on to shift from my hiding place amidst corpses and use my powers like an idiotic white knight saving a damsel in distress. I was no Knight, and Zlosta was no damsel. It was probably Stockholm syndrome. Yes, stupid, bloody Stockholm syndrome.

  “[GOLEM CREATION!]”

  Adolf 2.0 came to life, rising from the earth, the exact same size and shape as the previous Adolf, with only one significant difference. Rather than being the man of reinforced concrete and asphalt plating, he was the man of reinforced concrete with glass coating.

  The Glass Golem charged with heavy footsteps, and as I anticipated, the soldiers began firing on him. Elementary school physics came into effect and confirmed that even holy light obeyed the laws, blasts of light struck Glass Adolf repetitively and bounced off harmlessly. He shielded Zlosta from the barrage of light, covering her naked green-skinned form and picking her into his arms. Once his task was done, I ordered him to return as quickly as he could. We would need to make a hurried escape if we wanted to get out of range and ensure that we weren’t followed.

  [Sixth Sense – IMMINENT DANGER DETECTED!]

  “A Stalker Skeleton, creating a non-sentient Golem, to rescue a Night-Witch?”

  I froze.

  A man hovered in the air above me. No, not a man. A boy. A fair-skinned boy of about thirteen or fourteen, with golden locks of hair tied into a soft bun, and he was eating from a bag of chips. Eating. Like the rest, he was dressed in military attire, but unlike the rest, his military attire was pure black filled with so many medals that I could not even begin to count them all.

  How did he find me? How did he get behind me?

  “Sounds like a fairy tale for nightmares.” The boy slowly bit down on a single chip. It wasn’t a potato chip, and the crunching, chewing sound was distressing. “I don’t like it when Nightmares have fairy tales.”

  He thrust his hand at me and I was barely able to make out the words written above his head.

  Hoplite Hierophantasia

  [High Eminent of War]

  [Commander General of the Alhamisian Adventurer Army]

  [Undisputed Master of Gravity]

  Human Champion

  Lv. ?

  With one hand extended, he uttered two words that became my definition of fear.

  “[Black Hole].”

  Chapter 22

  Revelation

  My body was still shaking.

  [You are now in the True Path]

  [You have gained the skill {Lesser Gravity Resistance} from enduring significant damage from gravitational forces]

  I was alone. Alone, in the second path where I’d ran away, in the path where I did not bother to stay and witness the massacre. In the path where I’d fled – this was my reality, my unchangeable, unfixable reality.

  I was alone, deep within the forest with nothing but the silence of my own thoughts and the uneven shaking of my bony hands. Without realizing it, I found myself laughing.

  Black holes. I laughed, harder. Black holes. Black-fucking-holes. What kind of world has people that can create black-fucking-holes?

  Goblins and magic and Minotaurs I could allow, but this? This? I didn’t know how he’d manage to create it such that the entire world was not destroyed from its existence, and I would never find out.

  That reality did not exist to anyone but me. As far as the world was concerned, I’d ran away from the battlefield. No one rescued Zlosta, and she was either still being assaulted by gunfire, or that boy – Hoplite – had ordered them to capture her.

  Zlosta was captured – which meant I was finally free of her. Free to do whatever it was I wanted without worry.

  Free.

  I should feel happy.

  Zlosta couldn’t die, and normally, that would be a good thing. But it wasn’t. No matter how much she was tortured or punished or experimented on... she couldn’t die.

  I understood now, how it was possible that humans could survive in a world like this. The humans were as dangerous, if not hundreds of times more dangerous than the monsters. Walking on water and raising the dead was probably normal occurrence in this world if it followed fantasy themes of magic.

  If this world was anything like mine, but with magic and several thousand years of advancement thrown into the mix...

  “Shit.”

  It’s been fifteen days.

  I’ve been reincarnated for all of fifteen days and it felt much, much longer.

  “Shit.”

  What was I supposed to do now? Where did I go from here? Rescuing Zlosta was out of the question. I didn’t see any reason why I should do it, other than the bit of lingering attachment I had from her being the first person in this world I ever talked to. From the brief moment of laughter we shared and that one hug. Was that enough to risk my life to try and save her?

  Zlosta named me. Zlosta named me Janus.

  If Zlosta didn’t name me, I wouldn’t be alive right now.

  But if I never freed her – she would never have named me.

  Do I really owe her anything?

  I freed her, she named me, a favor for a favor. It was done. It was time to move on. Time to find another path, find something else, someone else. It sucked that she was captured, but I warned her.

  I told her and she didn’t listen to me. I told her everyone would die except you, and she charged headlong into battle anyway. There was only so much I could do. Risking my neck to save someone who may not even appreciate it, who may not even let me leave her side after I’d done it –

  I wasn’t going to do that.

  For the first time in this second chance at life, I was free to do whatever it was I wanted. What I wanted most right now was to find another way out of the Final Sanctuary. To find another way out, and to learn as much as I could about Alamir, about the humans with weaponized holy light and advanced technology.

  I wanted to taste Alamir’s cuisine. Listen to its music. Learn its cultures. See its arts. Read its literature. Comprehend its science.

  The world would not end if Zlosta Janje was not at my side. And thus, I left.

  I ran in the opposite direction of the wall, I ran, moving and hopping deep through the silent woodlands of the final sanctuary, moving in the opposite direction, because there had to be a different way to get out. A place like this couldn’t have only one exit and entrance.

  [You have split Paths]

  I tried north and south first. Running in two opposite directions in two different paths. Running without getting tired or feeling the need to stop and eat. Running until the sun set and the moon rose and the sun rose and the moon vanished.

  The road far south ended with a tremendous waterfall. The waterfall spanned the lengths of several football fields, the sound of gushing water like the ocean’s roar deafened me. I could not see anything beyond the waterfall and did not know if there was even anything at the bottom of the falls.

  The road far north ended with snow-peaked mountains and frosty frigid weather. It was cold enough that trees lacked any leaves, and I could see frost covering the grounds. I didn’t know what lay beyond the mountains, nor did I know what lay beneath the waterfall.

  I ascending the mountain with [Greater Rabbit’s Leap]. I descended the waterfall with [Water Striding].

  I knew that at the end of the day, I could only commit to one of these choices. I would end up choosing the adventure beyond the mountains, or the adventure at the bottom of a massive waterfall. For now, I was content in the knowledge that I was seeing different parts of Alamir, and I knew, regardless of which I chose eventually, I would have found myself an adventure, found myself something special.

  And it would make all the difference.

  END OF BOOK 1

  PREVIEW OF BOOK 2

  Janus and Alhamis

  A LITRPG Saga
>
  Book Two of the Nightmares of Alamir

  Noam Oswin

  COPYRIGHT AND DISCLAIMER

  This publication is protected under the United States copyright act of 1976 and all other applicable international, federal, state and local laws, and all rights are reserved, including resale rights: you are not allowed to give or sell this book to anyone else. Except as permitted under the United States Copyright act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in may be reproduced or transmitted in any form whatsoever, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any informational storage or retrieval system without express written, dated and signed permission from the author.

  Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  All characters in this work are a product of the mind and is a figment of the author’s imagination and therefore fictional, and make no reference to real people or situations and events, any resemblance to actual events, whether past or present, persons, living or dead is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2019 Noam Oswin

  All rights reserved.

  PREVIEW OF BOOK TWO

  “We wanna here the scary story, Niha!”

  “Yeah! The one – the one about the Prince!”

  “The Prince’s story isn’t scary!”

  “Is too!”

  “Is not!”

  “Is too!”

  “Is not!”

  Two sharp raps on their heads was all it took to silence them.

  “Ouch!”

  “Owie!”

  The twins were easily the most annoying of the bunch. Still, she could not admit that they had a certain likeability about them. Not that she’d ever admit it.

  “Come on,” she clapped her hands. “Into bed you rascals.”

  “What about the story?”

  “Yeah, what about the story?”

  “I’ve got COMMA exams tomorrow morning –”

  “Please Niha?”

  “Yeah, pretty please?”