Eternium ~ 48!

Just gonna say it, this is an epic chapter. 

Barry stepped onto the third floor, and I watched him cautiously. Only a tiny tendril of my influence remained in the area, ready to be retracted at the first sign of the gaseous green fog that came out of him. The High-Elf looked around and began speaking to himself, “So much effort has gone into getting everyone to this point, and yet here I stand, alone. Everyone else is either dead, dying, or deserted. But what about me?”

The man seemed to be rambling, going on about various faction disputes he had been in, lamenting his time in the guild. “But now I have a new trick! Ah, Xenocide, how did I not see this aspect of my power before now?”

The conversation was just getting interesting, but the green fog was rolling out once more. I pulled back, and felt a huge swath of my power vanish once more. Ouch. <Dani, Grace, it's time to go!>

“Are you sure, Cal? Shouldn’t we just go through the portal down here and stay with you in the physical world?” Dani was fretting, and I knew where her nerves stemmed from. 

<But this way you will be in the physi-Cal world!> I chuckled at her exasperation. <This is why I tested things with Mu, Dregs, and Xan. A Core absorbs you, but going through the portal will let you be with me. Do you really want to be trapped in an Inscribed tungsten ball, surrounded by feces, for however long it takes for the world to settle? Even then, I’ll need to rebuild my dungeon around myself! The boredom, Dani. Think of the boredom!>

“If you’re sure about this…” She was still hesitating, so I sent along all my feelings in a stream of consciousness, then linked with her as they raced to the surface. 

Barry had just entered the room with Manny, and seemed to be having fun letting the Manticore try to kill him. Stinger? Broken against Barry’s skin. Teeth? Ineffective. Body slam? Manny stopped like he had flown into the side of Mountaindale. Eventually Barry seemed to grow sick of the game and slapped the Manticore into a paste that covered the rear wall. Then the green fog rolled out once more, and my view vanished with a painful lurch. Ugh. 

Good, Dani was getting close to the surface, now I could drop through the portal below me and-

*Boom*. 

<What in the abyss?> I looked at what was happening in the dungeon, and it seemed that Barry had taken a page out of Xenocide’s book and decided to go through the floor instead of across it! What was happening? This made no sense! Barry came out from the ceiling of the Elemental Pit, dropping down the center of it and only taking note of the increased gravity as a method of falling faster. What did he hope to accomplish? I snuck a look at Dani and Grace, they were almost to the portal! Only a few more seconds!

Barry landed on my spider-Boss, using it to break his fall and then blatantly ignoring it. He walked over to the first of the challenge areas and smashed through the wall. Then the second… third… fourth… Dani and Grace vanished through the portal above me just ahead of some fleeing Goblins, and I released the catch to drop into the emergency escape portal just below me. Cya in a few eons, planet!

In the second and a half that I was in the air, Barry appeared above me and caught my falling Core. He was moving so far above Mage speed that it appeared to be instantaneous teleportation. I was in absolute shock, my carefully planned escape had just failed, and I was being held in the palm of the second-most-dangerous man in the world. My contingency plan…! I didn’t have enough time to use it! Barry lifted me up and stared into the colors of me. He was still moving surreally swift, and I could just barely understand the words he was speaking.

“Three hundred seventy-four thousand, four hundred and seventy-three people have gone through the portal. I’m so glad we were able to save so many.” Barry’s smile was dark and filled with malicious intent. “After all, what sort of reward would my time with Xenocide have been if there were only a mere handful of delicious souls; or such varied Mana types weren’t included?”

“Well, little Core with pure Mana.” Barry’s lips were twitching, he was smiling so hard. “Thank you for being the filter that I use to siphon all the power of the multiple races into myself. And… goodbye to all of my faithful followers. Your sacrifice will not be in vain.”

The S-ranker let a cloud of green gas pour out of his mouth, surround the Core in his hand, and began to squeeze. I could only force myself to get a single sentence out, and I directed it at Dani. <Get out! Barry->

Then the pressure became too much, and my Core began to crumble. I watched from multiple facets as Barry squeezed harder and harder. Just as it became too much, I saw The Master appear beside Barry and beginning to swing at him. Too slow.

*Crack* Just like that, my Core shattered, and I died.

The Master’s voice shook the ground, but at this point I was past caring. “I knew it, you twisted-”  

My Soul and all the energy I had accrued began to float away from my demolished body, but was stopped by the cloud of green that surrounded me. I could feel the energy trying to eat away at me, I could feel the end trying to come, but instead of either of those outcomes… I collapsed inward, into my Soul Space. The fear vanished, the green energy no longer surrounded me, and then I was suddenly elsewhere. I was suddenly suppressed, a small part of something much greater.

I started to scream, clutching at my chest and head so hard that blood began to pour from wherever my grip had landed. 

“Ow, ow!” I shouted downward at where I knew Barry stood. “Barry, you traitorous snake!”

“Dale, what’s the matter?” Minya was already on edge from the screaming, it was attracting attention from the creatures. 

“I’m fine, it's… Barry just shattered Cal’s… my Core and tried to absorb everyone that had gone through the portal already.” I whimpered and tried to deal with what was happening to me right now. “I feel like I’m on fire. Who… am I?”

“Cal is… dead?” Minya gasped, her eyes flickering to the still-stable portal.  “What… Dale, what’s happening to you?”

I groaned and fell back to the ground as my body worked to contain and control the power roiling through it. “I’m fully me again. I was always only a half of a soul, if even that. I’m gaining new insight on myself right now, in the worst way I can imagine. Me, as Cal, was able to keep my mind separate when we rejoined. I, as Dale, couldn't do that. Can’t do it. I am once more a single being and mind.”

Spitting blood onto the ground and convulsing a few times forced me to stop speaking, but when I could manage it again I continued. “Minya, when I died and went into Cal’s Core, I could remain separate and distinct. A human cannot maintain that separation. I’m an A-ranked Mage, a dungeon, a human, and a B-ranked Mage right now. The power discrepancy, the irregular flow, is tearing me apart. I have… an hour at best until I explode or burn out. My body is not built for this! I’m not ready for this!”

“What can I do, Dale?” Minya desperately fretted. She placed her hands on my body to help me up, but yelped and pulled back as her skin began to blister.

“I need you to come with me to my Core room.” I laughed as blood flecked out of my lips. “So strange to say. I have another Core there that I was using as a mimicry of me, built to be an absolute perfect match. It was a decoy, set higher in the area where I resided. It was supposed to be part of my defenses, but I don't think I could fool Barry. Well, obviously not.”

Minya shrieked as I clutched at my head and the blood vessels in my eyes began to rupture. “We… we need to hurry. Brains are an imperfect storage device. I need to preserve as much as possible.”

“Let’s go, Dale!” Minya started running to the dungeon, and I did what I could to keep up. She smacked flyers away from me, and soon we were at the entrance to the dungeon. I had never appreciated it like this before. Now, with both the eye of an outsider as well as the creator, I could really and truly appreciate the beauty of this place like never before.

“Just gotta get to the bottom…” I coughed a spray of blood, and I simply hoped that I could make it to the Core room in time. The actual travel wouldn’t be an issue, but there were currently two powerful people slamming each other around. “Ready to go, Minya?”

“Always, Dale.” Minya gave me a thumbs-up and smiled.

“Great!” I passed a command to the wall beside me, and it slid upward just high enough to let me duck in. I was all of me, and I had all the power, knowledge, and experience of both my selves. “Get to the portal, Minya. There’s no way for you to help me against S-rankers.”

Minya squacked indignantly, catching the stone as it sank and trying to force it upward. I shook my head and took a few steps. “Thank you, Minya. This time with you was… just get to the portal, and I’ll see you again soon, okay?”

“Dale! Dale!” Minya shouted as I forced the stone to the ground. I crawled a few more feet and let myself slide into an air tunnel. This one connected to the large one, and that would bring me straight down to the Mages Recluse. 

My face was grim as I reached free-fall. I really… really hoped that the information Eternium had given me would prove itself. There was only one way to know for sure. I created a blast of air with my Mana, and sped down into the deepest depths of my old self.