Chapter 134: Prophesied Doom

Caddock heaved the arm-width rope over his shoulder, timing his tugs with those of other prisoners as they transported the star towards the cart designed to haul it out of the frozen wastes and down to Basalt.

Robbing the mostly empty frozen wastes of what little warmth they had in order to arm the Church of Granesh against the oncoming flood.

Caddock could see why it was necessary, he just wished it wasn’t.

He and the other prisoners had the technique down to an artform, but it was still gruelling work…for the others, who were largely below level fifteen. Not Caddock. The frozen winds and hard labor were more like a slightly chill morning and a bit of brisk exercise.

It was hardly a punishment for him at all. More like a brief vacation and some calisthenics.

Even with the Blessed Steel chains on his arms and legs, he wasn’t really bothered. He had long since detached himself from his situation and focused on the real problem. Caddock was mostly absentmindedly planning how to kill William Oh. He didn’t have time to goof around in a prison camp. The boy was gaining power at an exponential rate.

I do not leave missions unfinished.

The little proto-lord is too squirrely. His detection range is huge, his movement speed, reaction time and toughness are all on Lord levels, but his primary strength is the Ability that allows him to both hot-swap outlandishly boosted Relics with powerful soft-sets, and confiscate other’s Relics mid-fight.

Invisibly. From a distance.

The boy is practically engineered to be a nightmare to fight as a Climber.

I would need a way to gain power that didn’t rely on Relics. Or Relics that couldn’t be removed. Preferably both.

As for the power without the need for a Relic…a Lordship would do that. As far as he knew, Lords derived a portion of their power from their Vassals.

Paladins of the Church of Granesh swore an oath not to seek Lordship, so as to prevent the formation of a power structure external to the church’s hierarchy.

I would need at least a dozen Vassals, and a small town’s worth of civilians. People willing to accept me as their Lord. It would be hard to acquire that many people from the church legitimately, since they also have their oaths not to become vassals.

So where would I get that many people on short notice?

As he was musing, Caddock accidentally stepped on the heel of the prisoner in front of him.

“I-I’m sorry sir,” The prisoner stammered, picking up his pace and nearly slamming into the prisoner in front of him, who looked back with a snarl before he noticed Caddock, his expression going slack.

“S-sir,” the second prisoner nodded, before facing forward and minding his own business.

“No worries, gentlemen. It was my fault.” Caddock said, scanning his surroundings. No less than three hundred prisoners huddled inside their fur-lined coats, trembling with cold and effort as they struggled to move the outlandishly heavy stars.

Malnurished, exhausted, all but bereft of hope in the darkness of the frozen wastes.

All of them cast him furtive glances at Caddock when they thought he wasn’t watching, awestruck at the presence of a High Paladin in their midst. Could he represent their salvation, or was he just a curiosity?

Where indeed? Caddock thought, slipping his shoulder out from under the rope as he stepped outside the line of prisoners.

“How long do you have on your sentence, Albert?” Caddock asked the man in front of him as he watched the foreman notice Caddock and begin trotting towards him, hefting his enchanted whip with a murderous expression.

“Umm, fifteen years, sir?” Albert said, glancing behind him, his eyes widening as he saw what was happening.

“And what did you do?” Caddock asked.

“I wrote some questions in the margins of the bible!” Albert squealed, hunkering down, along with the rest of the prisoners as the foreman wound up a whipping, safely outside the range their chains would allow them to move.

Defiling a bible. That’s a pretty serious offense that I typically wouldn’t be able to forgive, but at least he’s not violent.

Finishing missions makes for strange bedfellows, I suppose. I’ll give him time off for good behavior working as my Vassal.

CRACK!

the whip’s cracker came to a dead halt as Caddock caught it in midair.

He yanked the whip and the foreman stumbled forward far enough that Caddock was able to lunge forward and catch the man’s wrist.

“Now son, you can give me the keys to my chains, or you can experience being beaten to death by your own arm. The choice is yours.”

“PRISONER ESCAPING!” the foreman shouted.

Well, you made your choice, Caddock thought, exerting a bit of force.

RIIIP.

**William Oh**

“What the Abyss is this!?” Will demanded as they arrived back at the Caravan, prying open Mason’s shirt to reveal the slowly healing cracks in his form. “Explain.”

“The dimensional Oyster I added to my shields allows me to absorb a tiny fraction of their energy when they break, creating a permanent extradimensional space between my outer layer of dead skin and the living tissue beneath it.” Mason replied, his cheeks turning pearlescent red.

“So your internal organs are getting further and further away from your skin,” Will mused.

“Yeah, it - STOP THAT!” Mason slapped Will’s hand away from his holes and glaring at him until Will took a step back.

“It’s only about a hair’s breadth of extra space every time the shield breaks, but it stacks up nicely, especially after Loth pioneered breaking it in rapid succession. I must’ve broken my shields a hundred thousand times while you two were gone.”

“Can you still feel anything?” Will asked, pinching Mason’s wrist.

“Yes, I can still feel things, stop it. Can I have my Relics back now or what?”

“Sure,” Will said, dropping the Relics back into Mason’s hands.

“So if your organs have at least twenty feet of clearance above the ‘ground’ inside you, can we store some…”

Mason’s expression made Will’s question wither before he even finished it.

“…Nevermind.”

“You’re damn right nevermind,” Mason grumbled, tugging his shirt closed as he trundled off. “Store things inside you, see how you like it.”

“Arkesh, you old ponce, I haven’t seen you in days!” Reese’s voice came from across the camp, directing Will’s attention to where the emaciated sailor and the wizened old snake were talking. The conversation was fascinating.

“…Who are you again?” Arkesh asked, frowning at the emaciated sailor.

“It’s me, Reese, you know, the guy you ate who spent several years going through your digestive tract. Came out your ass like this, Blah!” Reese widened his eyes and splayed his fingers.

“Oh! Yeah, I remember you. Sorry about that, I was trying to kill you.

“And I wish you had!” Reese replied without an ounce of sarcasm.

 “I haven’t seen you since this was the Fifth Floor. Where were you in the last Coil?” Arkesh asked.

“Trapped in a lightless, soundless coffin that randomly hurts you for at least a couple hours! You know those black coffins on the Sixth-floor that the techno-priests used to fuel their immortality. I got caught in one and turned into a healing battery for generations of assholes! How have you been?”

“…Reconsidering what It means to suffer, I suppose.” Arkesh replied. “Maybe I’m not as tormented as I thought I was…Relatively speaking. You’ll at least be glad to know the techno-priests are gone.”

“Is the whole floor wiped clean?” Reese asked.

“There’s nothing alive there anymore, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“Hell yeah, fuck those guys! Freakin’ technopriests, why I ought’a…” Reese shook his fists as Will approached.

“Excuse me,” Will said, approaching the two old men. Arkesh’s eyes widened minutely and he glanced between Will and Reese before his expression came back under control. Will noticed it, and stored that tidbit for further examination.

“You know what Reese is talking about when he says a Coil?” Will asked, pointing at Reese. “I can’t get any good details from him, because he’s completely Cracked.”

“Is it that time again?” Arkesh mused, rubbing his chin before looking back up at Will.

“Yes, the Tower is always growing. Every thousand years, give or take, it adds a Floor. The more long-lived among us call that a Coil. When The Tower adds a Floor, the floodgates of Miasma temporarily open up, sending harmful magic and powerful monsters down to the lowest Floors and even out beyond the tower. Some societies remember and prepare themselves, weathering the catastrophic disruption, allowing them to maintain civilizations that spans multiple Floors, but a thousand years is plenty of time for humans to dismiss the ‘ancient past’ and sooner or later corruption brings their civilization down. Usually the following apocalypse is of such magnitude that humans are reduced to starving bands, losing technology and history, spending vital generations rebuilding society rather than preparing for the next Coil.”

“And how well prepared are we for the end of the Coil?” Will asked.

“I’ve never visited outside The Tower this Coil. It’s wildly uncomfortable and I never had a good reason. How big is the defensive wall around The Tower?”

“What wall?” Will asked.

Arkesh sucked in a breath through his teeth.

“How robust is your highway system? Can goods and personnel be moved quickly in an emergency?”

“We’ve got cobblestone roads between the major cities of the Ring,” Will said proudly.

“What’s your highest Floor Lord?”

“As far as I know? The Rotwitch on the 13th Floor.” Will replied.

“William Oh,” Arkesh said, putting a hand on Will’s shoulder. “I don’t know how to put this nicely, so I’ll just say it. Everyone and everything you know and love is going to die when this Coil ends.”

Will’s skin broke out in a cold sweat.

“Well, when is the Coil going to end?” Will asked. Maybe he could do something. At least protect the orphanage.

Arkesh looked Will up and down. “How old-“

“Ahem.” Reese cleared his throat, giving Arkesh a meaningful glance.

“You were about to ask how old I was.” Will said, glancing between the two of them. “Why would my age have anything to do with it?”

Will glanced over at Reese, who was looking away, fiddling with his ragged clothes.

“When we first met, you said I was the guy. The once-in-a-thousand-years legend. The one with the best shot of making it to the top. You asked if they taught me that in school.”

“…Shit.” Reese said.

“…Is there something about me that causes the Coil to end?” Will asked.

“Not causes…more like heralds it.” Arkesh said. “There’s been a great hero at the end of every Coil who nearly makes it to the top before dying. It’s like…the world’s last dying gasp. Happens every time.”

 I didn’t realize it was you, but you fit the timing and the pattern. This hero starts his Climb quite young, becomes a legend in his own time, and dies somewhere around twenty years old.”

“Man, it never goes well when he knows this stuff.” Reese said, uncrossing his arms to point at Will. “Look, he’s doing the math right now.”

Each Floor takes longer and longer to clear, so I would die somewhere in the late forties, maybe even the fiftieth…each floor taking longer than a month…and that’s not including time spent going up and down for resupplies.

“What’s on the fiftieth floor?” Will asked, turning his gaze back to Reese.

Arkesh glanced at Reese, who shook his head.

“I’m afraid I don’t know. I’m not that old. You would have to find an original molt like your father to tell you.”

Will stored that information for later and turned his gaze on Reese, who obviously knew what was on the fiftieth Floor.

“Look, I was tortured for generations and didn’t crack. There isn’t a chance in hell you can get me to tell you what’s there. It doesn’t end well when you know. Let’s just say it’s where the thing I’ve been looking for is.” Reese crossed his arms again.

Will processed that. There was prophesied death waiting above him, a society-ending apocalypse of monsters and Miasma beneath…Will was confident that they’d grown powerful enough to weather the storm of a Coil if they wanted to.

Will could go back outside The Tower and he would probably survive, and even help society rebuild, since he was going to live at least two hundred years, given his Resistance.

It was tempting…but it felt like a trap.

This ‘legendary hero’ ‘chosen one’ stuff sounds like a con-artist’s ruse designed to make me feel special before he takes my money. A distraction from something while I get hustled.

Will ran through his Memory Key just to be sure they weren’t dicking with his mind, then turned his attention to Reese.

“We’re gonna talk about this more later,” Will said, pointing at the immortal. “In the meantime, I’m going to keep Climbing. I’ve got things I want to do with my life and cowering outside the Tower isn’t one of them.”

Reese heaved a sigh of relief.

Will turned back to Arkesh. “Did you say my father was an original molt?”

“Yes, a direct shedding of Ouroboros himself, formed in a battle between the gods on what is now the eighty-seventh Floor. One of the pioneers of breeding with humans, actually. He advocated for creating a new species to cooperate with the humans.”

Arkesh lowered his voice, leaning close to Will. “You know, I’ve heard that original molts have an echo of our god’s memories. Perhaps Ouroboros gave him his mission to woo human women personally…”

“Or maybe he’s just a freak?” Reese said with a shrug.

“…I’m gonna go sit down and think about this.” Will said, turning and walking to his tent as Reese and Arkesh glanced at each other.

He’d put most of it together already of course, but hearing it all from the snake’s mouth was overwhelming.

And there’s more to it than I thought, Will thought, slumping down onto his cot, staring at the plain canvas of his tent.

Will felt like a tiny cog in some universe-sized clock that kept spinning him around without his permission.

And still, it felt like he hadn’t gotten the full story. There was something more. Something hidden that his subconscious was desperately trying to highlight, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it yet.

Speaking of my finger…

Will pulled out his Ring of Snaring and slid it over his left-hand ring-finger.

Nothing.

There was no subtle sense of his stats going up and taking a look at his status confirmed it: His left hand Slot simply wasn’t working.

Not to mention…

Will grabbed his left hand with his right and gently squeezed, stopping when it felt like his bones were going to break.

For comparison, Will squeezed his foot. It felt like nothing special.

It’s still weak. Why is it still weak?

His left hand looked perfectly healthy. Will could control it without issue.

It just…seemed to not benefit from his stats at all.

It was as if his hand had regrown, but The System hadn’t grown to fill the space.

Then why would it even regrow at all? Will thought with a frown.

“Are you alright?” Loth asked, peeking into his tent.

“Some immortals just told me I’m probably going to die sometime in the next four years, that the country is doomed, and that my dad is some kind of demigod,” Will said. “All that could be outlandish lies to manipulate me. I won’t really know until I talk to my Dad again, but what really bothers me, is my hand isn’t coming back like it should. Other than that, I’m doing alright.”

“You want Anna to cheer you up?” Loth offered.

Will chuckled, idly bullying his left hand with his right.

“No, Anna is for nice things.” Will said, motioning for Loth to come in. “I need someone I can talk to about death and cold-blooded murder.”

“Will a map to a powerful Raid Boss make you feel better?” Loth asked, producing a roll of vellum as she sat down on the cot beside him.

“It just might.”