The mad immortal a litrp.., p.28
The Mad Immortal: A LitRPG Adventure, page 28
“What about the girl?”
Bastion stepped away from Nate to hover above where Ellie lay. Nate wanted to scream at him to stay away from her. All he managed was a choked groan.
“In much the same state,” Bastion said, appraising Ellie, “though her burns are not nearly so bad. Still, now that we have drained away the last of her vera, I do not expect any problems.”
“And you’re certain your weave will hold?”
“Yes, yes, my dear guildmaster. I designed Amplify Pain for protracted concentration, especially with an Extended infusion and my high Resolve. They will conquer the effect eventually, but in their current states, I wager it will take them at least a day or two: plenty of time to complete our mission.”
A third voice joined the others. “Is this really necessary?”
Wes! If he was here, maybe they still had a chance. He’d been in pretty good shape when they left the Molten Vale, even if sustaining the Freezing Mist had taxed his reserve.
Then Nate remembered what he’d heard before passing out. But that couldn’t be right. He must’ve misunderstood.
Wes’ next words were a punch to the gut. “This wasn’t part of the deal. You said you would let them go if I gave you the compass.”
The odds of running into the guild here were practically nil. Not unless Commander Grisham had someone feeding her information so she could track their progress.
No! Wes would never betray me like that! His friend had to be under some kind of mental domination that was messing with his mind like what that Dawnstar soulbinder had done to Nate. It was the only explanation.
The commander sighed. “And so we shall; however, I said nothing about the condition we would leave them in.”
“You have the compass!” Wes protested. “There’s no reason to—”
“There is every reason! Lest you forget, this traitor broke every oath he swore to us. I lost seven members to his stunt in the Vermilion Glade. Seven.”
“At least, give them the mercy of a quick reclamation,” Wes pleaded, his voice cracking.
Through his haze of pain, Nate tried to think. Wes didn’t sound like he was being compelled, though Nate wasn’t certain he’d be able to recognize it even if he was. There had to be something he was missing. Wes will get us out of this mess; I know it.
“I’m afraid it’s not that simple,” Commander Grisham said. “If we kill them, they’ll resurrect back at Tabula Rasa and likely start blabbing our current location to anyone who will listen. This is the only way to be sure we’ll have a chance at the bounty ourselves.”
The thought had crossed Nate’s mind. If he couldn’t claim the bounty, he sure as nil didn’t want the likes of Bastion or Commander Grisham to get it.
Wes was silent for a long moment. “I just wish things had turned out differently,” he finally whispered, almost too quietly for Nate to hear.
Nate was surprised by the compassion he heard in the guildmaster’s voice when she responded. “We all make our choices, Wes. You know what they did was wrong; otherwise, you never would’ve agreed to help us.
“Because of your assistance, I’m willing to consider your debt to the guild repaid…so long as you give me no other reasons to doubt your loyalty. But after everything Nate and Ellie have done, a couple painful days lying here in penance is a far better fate than they deserve.”
Tell her to go to Null, Wes! Tell her you’ve changed your mind! Yet, Wes seemed to accept her words, the conversation dying away.
With nothing else to distract him, Nate sank back into the overwhelming pain as it threatened to consume all conscious thought.
For once, he welcomed the sensation. He didn’t want to have to think about what had just happened.
“I’m sorry,” Wes whispered.
Nate opened his eyes a crack, blinking back tears to see Wes leaning over him. His face was pale and drawn.
“I…” Wes trailed off, looking like he wanted to say more but couldn’t find the words. Then, he turned and fled.
Nate wasn’t sure how long he lay there. It was impossible to keep track of time when everything was swallowed up in endless torment.
Bastion had walked away with one last parting smirk, and Nate had seen or heard no one else since. He assumed the Riftwalkers had continued on, following the compass to its nearby source.
In one of his rare moments of lucidity, the irony of his current plight occurred to him. Here he was, a superpowered human trapped in agony because his body was literally too strong to succumb to what should’ve been mortal wounds. Even with no vera in his reserve, his body just kept chugging along, dragging his mind with it.
The sector remained a mystery to him. The climate seemed nice enough, certainly better than the blistering heat of the Molten Vale. He’d hoped that some verabeast might wander over and kill them, but no such luck.
He checked constantly to see if Ellie was still beside him. Each time, he prayed for her sake that she would have dissipated and respawned free of Bastion’s weave.
She kept her eyes firmly closed, and Nate couldn’t tell whether she was even conscious. He tried to slip into unconsciousness himself, but couldn’t manage it through the pain.
Eventually, he fell into a dreamlike state. Random images flashed through his head in a confused jumble. He thought about what he would do to Commander Grisham and Bastion and Dale and Sandra and all the rest of the guild when he caught up with them. He’d show them what a verist could really accomplish when they put their mind to it.
He thought about Wes. No matter how he tried to deny it, the truth was obvious: Wes had betrayed them. That revelation stung more deeply than any of his current wounds.
He’d trusted Wes absolutely, had had his back for years. Sure, they’d had their ups and downs recently. Nate hadn’t always been the perfect friend. But this? At first, he was angry, imagining all the ways he might punish Wes or exact his revenge.
Gradually, though, his anger morphed into a deep hollowness. Scenes from the Precursor Trials and their other past adventures played out before his eyes. He felt like some part of him had been ripped away forever, never to be reclaimed.
Nate thought of his parents and old friends he’d left behind on Earth. Though he hadn’t seen them in almost three years, he suddenly felt a keen sense of loss at their absence. He wondered what they were doing now while he was here in the Nexus.
And he thought of Ellie. He pictured her smiling face and her inquisitive stare. The way the flecks of crystal from her aura would catch the light and refract it back as if she were enveloped by thousands of tiny glowing stars. What was it she had said to him in the Dreamlands? You don’t earn happiness; you decide to let it in.
An infinite amount of time later, approaching footsteps drew Nate out of his fugue state. It seemed like days should have passed, but he knew it had most likely been only hours. Maybe even less. The footsteps came to a halt beside him, and a familiar bearded face leaned in over his.
“You look like nil,” Vince said.
Nate could only manage a groan. What in the Null is he doing here?
Vince chuckled. “Yeah, yeah, tell me all about it. Hmm, let’s see…”
He took a few steps back out of Nate’s line of sight. For a panicked moment, Nate thought the verist was just going to leave them here. The last thing he wanted was to be alone with the pain again.
To his relief, Vince spoke again from nearby. “I can’t tell what they have affecting you. I’d thought it might be some kind of spatial magic to hold you in place, but this looks like soul stuff to me. Nasty bit of work, too, judging by your expressions.”
Vince shuffled around, and Nate thought he might be pacing as he muttered to himself. “No way to remove the effect…vera isn’t helping, probably because your reserve’s dry…doesn’t seem to be wearing off, no idea of its duration…Alright.”
A few seconds later, Vince reappeared above Nate, his face grim but resolute. “So, here’s the deal. I don’t think I can break whatever debuff they put on you. That leaves us with two options.
“Option A: we wait and see if it wears off on its own. Maybe if we give it enough time, it’ll weaken enough for you to resist even without your vera.
“Option B: I kill you and send you to the Ward. That should at least clear the weave, though I reckon it’ll be unpleasant in its own right.”
Remembering Bastion’s prediction of how long the effect would last, the decision was an easy one. Nate tried to give his answer, but only a growl escaped his throat.
Vince rolled his eyes. “How about this: blink once for patience, twice for reclamation.”
Nate blinked twice, a heaviness settling in his chest. If they respawned back at Tabula Rasa, they’d be more than a week behind the guild. Any hope they had of securing the bounty would effectively be dashed.
But he didn’t see how they could beat the guild there now, anyway. Besides, anything sounded better than another second trapped in this prison of pain.
Vince smiled humorlessly. “Alright. Sorry about this.”
Vince hefted something in both hands. As he brought it down, Nate realized it was Ellie’s Channeling Rod. Vince’s first blow glanced off Nate’s skull, adding an extra burst of agony to the sea already overwhelming him.
Even without his aegis, he was hardier than any normal human. The second blow collided with a sickening thunk. He felt his head split open, and the world faded away, replaced by a blissful emptiness.
Just like that, he died.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Nate came to gasping for breath. Naked and cold, he lay in a small stone cubicle. A curtain covered the doorway, and a stone bench behind him offered a place to sit.
As he struggled to reorient himself, a man in a crisp uniform pushed through the curtain and kneeled beside him. From the pure gold of his eyes and the gilded scales running down his hands, Nate marked him as one of the healers who worked in the Ward, aiding reclaimed verists.
“Hello, Mr. Carter,” the healer said kindly. “I know this experience can be disorienting. You have just died and been returned to life by the verifont in Tabula Rasa.”
Nate nodded, not quite feeling up to speech yet. Being resurrected had always reminded him of a particularly terrible hangover: his body ached, and his head pounded.
The Immortals referred to the sensation as soul sickness. The strain of reclamation would sap a bit of his strength until he’d had a day or two to recover. Still, it was a step up from Bastion’s Amplify Pain weave.
The attendant asked Nate a standard series of questions, checking to make sure he knew what was happening and had no persistent ailments. Then, he vanished back through the curtain, reappearing a minute later with some water, a tray of crackers, and a set of simple clean robes.
Nate slipped on the robes and grabbed the tray. After forcing down some of the tasteless crackers and a few sips of water, he felt a bit better. His headache had lessened to a dull throb in the back of his neck.
The attendant bowed. “If you need anything, please don’t hesitate to track one of us down. We are here to serve at the Headmistress’ behest.”
After the attendant left, Nate slumped back against the bench. Even the effort to rise seemed too great. They had struck a bargain with a seer to forge a magical compass, fought past frogs and clones and giant lava monsters. They’d even escaped from their own guild when they’d been outnumbered and outmatched. Yet, in the end, none of it had mattered. In the end, they had lost.
If his guide had been disappointed in him before, how must it feel now? Nate had harbored some hope that his guide would finally grant its blessing once he’d proven himself against the Lord Protector. Now, that would never happen. Commander Grisham would claim the two hundred thousand drops and burn it all to cover the guild’s debts.
And Wes… Maybe if Nate hadn’t been so obsessed with the Null-cursed bounty, he’d have paid more attention to their fracturing friendship. Maybe he could’ve salvaged something before it was too late.
Instead, he’d been left with no bounty, no guild, no friends… He’d made an even bigger mess of this life than he had his first on Earth.
He hunched over, curling his arms around his legs and pulling them to his chest. Rocking there, his vision blurred as tears streamed down his cheeks. He heard the rustle of the curtain and didn’t bother to look up.
So what if the attendant saw him like this? The healer would just assume it was a result of the soul sickness. And maybe it was, at least in part. Soul sickness mimicked depression in a lot of ways.
Someone sat heavily on the bench beside him.
“Well, that sucked,” Ellie said.
Nate sniffled, wiping at his eyes and trying to pretend like he hadn’t just been bawling. He looked up and saw Ellie smiling tiredly at him. She wore the same white robe he did.
Vince must’ve killed her right after finishing him. When two or more verists died close to one another, they usually respawned together, as well. Her alcove had likely been nearby.
Ellie laid a hand on his shoulder. “It’s alright to mourn. Anyone would need time to process what just happened.”
“My best friend betrayed us; that’s what happened,” Nate said dully.
Ellie nodded. “Yes, he did. And I know it hurts. But I can understand why he did it.”
“Why?” His anger flared anew, and he embraced it. Better rage than despair.
He stood, looming over Ellie. “What do you mean, you understand? Because I sure as Null don’t! We trusted him, and he stabbed us in the back. He and Bastion probably got a big kick out of it, too.”
“Did Wes look like he was enjoying it?” Ellie asked quietly.
Nate thought about Wes’ regret-choked goodbye, about how he had pleaded with the commander, and his anger wavered. Yet, when it had come down to it, Wes had still abandoned Nate and Ellie to their fate.
“He can choke on his empty words for all I care. I hope the Lord Protector kills him.”
Ellie sighed, leaning back against the wall. The flecks of crystal from her aura sparkled beautifully against the stone. “I know you don’t really mean that.”
“Of course I do! I’ve had his back since we got here, done everything I could to help him, and this is how he repays me?”
“You speak of your friendship as if it were a transaction you made: your help in exchange for his loyalty. But that’s not how friendships work.”
“What would you know about friends?” he snapped. “You’ve spent the entirety of your time in the Nexus cooped up here alone in the city.”
He turned his back on her, pacing across the cubicle until he stood beside the curtain leading to the hall. He balled his hands into fists and pressed them against the stone. A half-formed weave for Fire Bolt flared on the left, one for Ice Blade crackling on the right.
After a lengthy pause, Ellie whispered, “You’re my friend, Nate. Wes was my friend, too.”
His anger faded back to an aching emptiness, and he sagged against the wall. It was like his insides had been coated in ice and gone entirely numb.
Ellie continued, her words soft but insistent. “That’s how I know Wes made the only decision he thought he could. You forced him to choose between his loyalty to the guild and his loyalty to you. He chose them. I don’t like it. I wish he hadn’t. But I can see why he did.”
She was right. Like everything else, Wes’ betrayal was his fault. He’d taken their friendship for granted until it was too late. Wes, Ellie, my guide; I failed them all.
Nate trudged back across the room, slumping into the seat beside her. He kept his eyes downcast, too ashamed to look at her. The full weight of what had happened threatened to overwhelm him.
“I guess that’s it, then, huh?” he finally said. “All that work, just to have the bounty snatched from us at the very end.”
She placed a hand on his shoulder. “It’s not all bad,” she said with forced cheer. “Sure, we just got bludgeoned to death after being betrayed by our trusted ally. But hey, at least this means we don’t have to worry about the return trip.”
He couldn’t even manage a pity chuckle. “What a waste,” he sighed. “No guild, no items, no bounty… And Commander Grisham is spiteful enough to make sure no other guild will have us, at least none that matter. So much for proving ourselves to the Patriarch.”
So much for being a hero.
Ellie’s arm wrapped around his shoulders, and he let himself be pulled into a one-armed embrace. Another time and place, he might’ve found comfort in her touch. Now, he just stared morosely at the polished floor.
“We’ll get through this,” she said. “We survived killer spider toads, our own alternate selves, a giant magma monster… Null, we literally just survived death itself. There will always be more opportunities, other ways to grow. So we didn’t get to the destination we wanted; at least, we still had the journey, right?”
Nate shook his head weakly. “What’s the point? Without the bounty, all that hard work was meaningless.”
He felt Ellie release him. Before he could react, she slapped him across the cheek with all the strength she could muster. Reclamation didn’t restore any vera, so both of them were running on empty. The blow still stung.
“What the Null was that for?” he demanded, raising a hand to his cheek.
“A waste of time?” Ellie growled. “Every moment here is a gift, both the good and the bad. So what if your friend betrayed you? So what if you lost out on the bounty? There will always be things outside of your control.”
She rose, taking a step away from the bench and then spinning back to point at him. “What you can control is how you let it affect you and what you decide to do about it. Sit here and wallow in self-pity if that’s what you want. Personally, I’m going to use my remaining drops to restock as best I can. Then I’m going to retrace our steps until either I die or someone claims the bounty.”
Nate stared at Ellie, mouth agape. He heard the thump of footsteps just beyond the curtain to their room—probably an attendant ready to step in if the confrontation escalated further.
