Amazon Apocalypse 6: Chapter 60

As I feared, a battle was about to erupt on the bridge. I'd hoped to get a few more words out before Seraphyne saw Jade, but I hadn't realized it was possible to use the ship's teleportation system within the ship like that.

I tried to repeat her feat but failed, so I resorted to using Shadowrealm Stride. Even at that speed, I barely arrived in time to avert disaster.

Both of them had drawn swords and were pointing them at one another.
"There you both are! I see the two of you have met already." I waved my hands, urging both of them to lower their weapons. "Jade, this is the help I promised. And Seraphyne? You're going to need Jade's help to not get eaten by that thing behind us."

The two A-Grade women glared at one another. I wished I were taller so I could block their view of each other. I thought about pulling up a chair to stand on, but if I didn't stay between them, things might come to blows a moment later. Maybe this was a bad idea.

"Who is this woman and where did she come from?" Jade demanded.
"Why is a cultivator on my bridge?" Seraphyne demanded.

Both of them turned to me, and suddenly I felt the combined pressure of two A-Grade glares.
I did my best to stay cool and flipped through the controls until the display showed the mature Void Leviathan rapidly approaching us from behind.

"Less talking, more fighting! That thing is seconds away from biting off the rear end of the ship. Just remember we're all on the same side." I gestured toward the angry Void Leviathan on the screen.

The two of them glared at one another for a moment. Thankfully, the Void Leviathan did most of the convincing, and I didn't need to search for the words that would keep them from fighting.
"I'll deal with you later," Seraphyne said, then vanished.

"Carter, you have some explaining to do when this is over," Jade said, then she vanished too.

On the main screen, two powerful figures appeared, both prepared for battle from the moment they teleported in.

I held my breath for a moment, and to their credit the two of them took one glance at the Void Leviathan and knew it was the bigger threat. Both moved to engage it at the same time.

If they communicated at all, I didn't see any signs of it. Despite being silent, the two of them flanked the Void Leviathan from either side and attacked at once, forcing it to split its attention.

Since I'd already seen plenty of Jade's attacks, I paid more attention to Seraphyne. She was faster to strike, since her powers were more akin to the discrete System abilities I was used to instead of the flowing, artful, self-directed applications of power cultivators used.

Seraphyne executed a rapid series of elaborate mana manipulations, which resulted in a golden laser beam shooting out of her wand. It didn't do much damage to the Void Leviathan, but she raked it across the creature's side to get its attention while Jade did something similar on the other side.

She followed by rapidly casting a defensive barrier around herself, much like Mage Armor, then surrounded her sword with similar energy. I was a bit disappointed at first, since none of these abilities seemed all that different from what I could do. But she must have cast her real heavy-hitting spells sometime between the more obvious stuff.

White threads spooled from her sleeves, unwinding to wrap around the Void Leviathan. Meanwhile, the elaborate hood of her dress twisted and reassembled itself into a spherical machine, which detached from her body into a drone of sorts.

The drone twisted in on itself, then expanded as it seemingly drew mass from nowhere. A barrel far too large for the little drone appeared in the middle of a field of white energy and began opening fire on the Void Leviathan with a steady rhythm.

The Void Leviathan didn't sit still and ignore the attacks. Before, when it was just Jade, she had hardly done much more than draw its interest. But being hit by the full might of two A-Grades was enough to force out more than a dismissive roar from the Void Leviathan.

Suddenly, Jade cried out in pain, and my eyes were drawn to her as a huge bite mark appeared on one of her arms. I didn't know what had happened until the Void Leviathan snapped at her. I'd seen that kind of spellcraft before. Probabilistic attack abilities dealt damage based on the potential to leave wounds. Whether or not the attacks actually struck wasn't relevant.

I'd seen such spells before, and I would have accepted a fellow spellcaster wielding such abilities, but this was just a monster. And the attack had been dished out so casually, like it was nothing more than an instinctual reflex

Jade moved to withdraw. Seraphyne waved a hand at her, and golden light shot toward Jade. At first, I feared it was an attack, but after an instant of consideration, Jade didn't move to avoid it. Instead, she held out her wounded arm. The golden light washed over the wound, and when it was gone Jade looked like she hadn't taken any damage at all.

Was Seraphyne a healer, then?

Whatever ability she'd just used on Jade seemed specialized for healing. That theory was further bolstered when Seraphyne summoned a corona of golden light around herself, around her drone, and then finally around Jade. When that aura surrounded Jade, she started moving faster and seemed a bit more fearless about engaging the Void Leviathan's swinging tentacles.

The Void Leviathan showed off several more powerful abilities. It had some control of entropy, like it was eating the very order of the universe. The hull of the ship began rusting at an alarming rate, and every surface started collecting dust.

Next to me, Hyacinth stared at her hands in growing horror as wrinkles began appearing on them, like she was aging a hundred years with each passing second. I glanced at my own hands, but they thankfully seemed unaffected, either due to my much longer lifespan or my higher level.

Seraphyne countered the effect a moment later. The dust gathering on the consoles lifted back into the air, and the wrinkles on the backs of Hyacinth's hands shrank to nothing. My sense of time felt off, like the past few seconds were being rewound and pushed forward simultaneously.This was truly a battle of epic proportions, and if there were an inhabited world nearby, that burst of strange magic would have wiped out a good chunk of the population.

I opened Sanctum's mystic realm, grabbed Mimiko and Hyacinth, and shoved them through before slamming the portal closed. The backlash from this battle was too dangerous for them. The same would be true for whatever followed if I wasn't able to convince the two of them to stand down.

When I checked the viewscreen again, Jade was glowing an even brighter shade of gold. She had several powerful buffs on her that pushed her to a whole new level of power. Before, she'd only been able to wield those giant sword slashes of hers once every few seconds, but now she had it fully active, to the point that she looked like she was wielding a sword the size of a celestial body.

The Void Leviathan was fighting for real now. Its mane of tendrils lashed out, each throwing lances of dark shadow. Jade faced them head-on. Seraphyne twirled her fingers in a circular pattern, and the white threads she'd released at the start of the battle wound tighter around the Void Leviathan.

A pulse of sinister light shone from the Void Leviathan's eyes, and I felt like someone was trying to suck my soul out my nostrils. It was a profoundly uncomfortable feeling, but like many of the Void Leviathan's other powers, it was quickly countered by Seraphyne.

At some point she'd even commanded the ship to aid her, and the Oraculum was contributing to the fight with blasts from its mining cannon, lasers, and even the occasional missile, which I hadn't known the ship had.

I could have kept watching, since it would be smart to learn more about Seraphyne's abilities. And it would have been the opportunity of a lifetime to see Jade fight at full power again. But I had something more important coming up. Now that I was fairly sure they could win, I had to stop the two of them from killing one another when this fight was over.

I grabbed Ted's book, 'Interpreting the Fairer Sex.'

"Come on, Ted. You better have something for me here..." I muttered. My breath was as heavy as if I were fighting in the battle out there, though my battle had yet to begin.

I flipped to several chapters' worth of text dedicated to managing female rivalries within your harem and read as fast as my eyes could scan.

I flipped through pages describing what to do if one woman ate another's food and if one had strong distaste for another's family before finally getting to the section that dealt with convincing mortal enemies not to fight and instead just relax and stop acting crazy.

Unfortunately, most of the techniques required being more powerful than the women in question. It made sense, considering much of this guide was probably written after Ted reached high A-Grade and got bored with no way to continue leveling within the System.

The most helpful passage described a lengthy and elaborate gaslighting technique that could slowly defuse enmity between powerful mortal enemies, but it was the sort of thing that would take months of work, if not years. I needed something that would work immediately.

The only strategy that would work was one that featured both shared praise and a bit of gaslighting on the side. I didn't consider myself a manipulative person, so I felt a bit bad about coming in with a plan like this, but when the alternative was watching them kill one another there was little else I could do.

I mentally ran through several variations of the conversation a few times and finished just as the battle ended. I missed the ending of the fight, but the ship had been rocking through space like a rowboat in a hurricane, so that final bout must really have been something to see.

To my surprise, the two of them were staring at the biggest monster core I'd ever seen. It was huge, about the size of my body. The rest of the Void Leviathan was gone, but the core remained and wasn't transforming into a planet. Perhaps the Void Leviathan had a way to escape with its flesh but not its core.

Regardless, there was an obvious problem. There was only one S-Grade monster core, but there were two A-Grade women who'd fought for it. Dividing the spoils like this could start a fight even under the best circumstances. These were not the best circumstances. I needed to act fast.

I used the ship to teleport out to the core. While the two women were staring at one another, I grabbed it, pointed to the ship, and teleported back. The two women kept staring at one another even after I'd left, and for a moment I realized I'd just swooped in and stolen the prize from a pair of A-Grades. I was in a ship and they weren't, so if this were any other pair of A-Grades, getting away would have been as simple as slapping that warp button and taking off.

It would probably be the safer thing to do in this situation. But doing that would result in one of these two killing the other, and only I could avert that fate. So once aboard, I steered the ship over and teleported both of them aboard before launching into my plan.

"Well done, both of you! A well-fought battle. And I'm incredibly impressed the two of you were able to overcome your differences and work together as allies. Well done!" I clapped softly while they both turned to me. The effect would have been better if I'd kept Mimiko and Hyacinth here for an audience and to help me clap, but I didn't want either of them to get caught in the crossfire if things went wrong.

"Uh... alcohol! Yes, a celebratory toast to a job well done!" I furiously searched my many bags of holding for any sort of alcohol. For once, all my bad experiences with Amazonian liquor worked against me, because I hardly kept anything one might consider alcohol on me. It didn't help that alcohol strong enough to affect A-Grades was strong enough to kill just about anybody else.

After flipping through my supplies, I eventually found what I was pretty sure was some potent cultivator alcohol. I'd been using it to clean my sword after battles, since the alcohol in it was potent enough to wash away just about anything, including taste buds. But according to Ted's book, all gaslighting techniques received a huge boost to effectiveness if you got the women drunk first. And right now I really needed to convince this pair they could get along.

"A toast to your victory! And don't worry about the core. I'll buy it off the two of you so you can split it evenly. I have a decent number of goodies I'm sure you'll both find interesting."

I shoved a wine glass full of the strange cultivator brew into each of their hands, then gave myself a cup of my own.

"Cheers to a job well done!" I held up my own glass, which I'd discreetly filled with water instead of whatever was in that bottle. I needed my wits about me for this.

The two women stared at the glasses I'd put in their hands, then stared at one another. Wordlessly, both women dropped their glasses, which shattered on the floor. Then they both drew their swords.

My elaborate gaslighting plan fell to pieces along with my glassware, and I rushed forward to get between the two of them once again.

"Carter, get back. This woman is dangerous," Jade said as she eyed Seraphyne.

"Carter, was it? It is clear to me that I owe you my life. Get behind me and I will protect you from this cultivator. She is likely nurturing you as part of some foul experiment and will refine your soul for some primitive witch's brew," Seraphyne said.

"Will not! Carter is... well..." Jade went silent, suddenly at a loss for words.

"See how poorly she lies? I will not allow someone who performed as much meritorious service for me as you have to suffer the fate she has in mind for you. You will come home with me. If there is anything left of my family's dynasty, I will see that you are rewarded beyond your wildest dreams. And if my kin are gone, you can assist me in starting a new dynasty before receiving your just rewards." Seraphyne held out one hand to me, urging me to her side. She wore a kind but insistent smile that made me want to agree before even thinking things over.

Meanwhile, Jade grew angrier at Seraphyne's words.

"Shameless woman! You've only just met Carter and now you're planning on starting a dynasty with him?" Jade conjured mana and pulled it through her body.

"I plan to reward him fairly for his work. A foreign concept to your kind, no doubt," Seraphyne said, curling her nose in distaste.

"No wonder your empire collapsed. You people are always so certain you've discovered everything worth knowing, and that all the cosmos' knowledge is already in your heads. There is no room left for the mysteries of the universe in your eyes," Jade sneered back.

Things had gone from bad to worse, and the two of them were moments from coming to blows. I stepped between them again, though when I felt their respective presences bearing down on me, I realized what a dangerous position this was to be in.

"Ladies... ladies! Let's put those swords away and talk things over. You worked so well together out there. There’s no need to fight now. Come on..." I placed a hand on the tips of each of their swords, slowly pushing them down.

Jade took my hint and reluctantly sheathed her sword. An instant later Seraphyne did the same.

"All right, we won't fight today," Jade grumbled.

"I owe you my life. It would be a poor show of gratitude to go against your wishes now," Seraphyne muttered.

Both women seemed unhappy with the arrangement, but at least they put away their weapons.

"We'll be leaving now. If we ever meet again, don't expect to get away so easily." Jade grabbed my wrist and made to leave with me, but to both our surprise I didn't budge.

I looked over to my other arm, which was held firmly in Seraphyne's grasp.

"You may leave. You may even take the core with you. But I am keeping my savior with me."

<Note>

It turns out, it was never dividing the core that Carter needed to worry about. He needed to worry about dividing himself!

Too bad he doesn't have Darren's mutlibody technique from Paladin of the Sigil.

Also, Carter learned something valuable today. Gaslighting requires a lot of prep work, and preferably recruiting a few others to the cause to support your false narrative.