Aftermath of Victory

The rift which Brightlord Temporix had used to enter the level became like a storm drain, sucking the entire contents of the pocket dimension back through its opening.

Ignatius gritted his teeth as the wave of time-space distortion reached him. He hated this sensation. His whole body stretched and warped, becoming long and paper-thin like a ribbon of a person. Visuals swirled around him and the howling of a hurricane filled his ears.

Everything went black, and then flickering images passed in front of his vision. Mountains, swamps, deserts, ruins. The ruins of the City of Stomrus, in particular. He saw a wave of celestial destruction rise in a ring around the city and then sweep inward toward its center, toward the Eternal Tower which hung in its sky. Where the wave of destruction passed, old buildings rose up again as though they'd never been leveled.

Ignatius was watching the effect of Brightlord Temporix's devastation reverse itself. In the lore of this dungeon event, breaking the source of Temporix's power had caused all the effects of his conquering of the Eternal Tower to unravel, causing it to happen that he never had destroyed the city in the first place.

In the next moment, Ignatius found himself standing on the restored streets of the city, staring up at the Eternal Tower which still hung above the now-restored Immortal Shrine. The tower slowly faded into a ghostly after-image of itself, then disappeared.

"That was certainly something," came a breathless voice at Ignatius's side. He turned to find Ozyrus leaning on his Astrologer staff, staring up at the sky in awe. Indeed, this was the first moment that he'd had such an expression in the short time that Ignatius had known him.

"Oh?" Ignatius asked. "Do my eyes deceive me? You almost look like you're having a good time in this game world that you recently spent so much time telling me didn't interest you at all."

Ozyrus gathered his composure and stood tall again. "Well, the human psyche is weak. I simply wasn't expecting an experience like that. It won't surprise me again."

"I see," said Ignatius, smirking. "Maybe you can be a little more compassionate toward the masses who play this game for its wonder and beauty, if even someone like you can be taken aback like that. You're not the only one who wants to escape from the real world, you know."

Ozyrus glared at him sharply. "I don't want to escape. None of… us… want to escape. We are creating a better world, one worth living in. If we couldn't do that, the proper thing to do would be to just accept the old world as it is. Before I knew better, before I knew a better world could exist, I'd resigned myself to that fate."

Ignatius sighed. "Whatever. Is there really a difference? This so-called new world of yours just exists inside a computer server. It's not actually a new reality. This might be my fate now, too, but I'm not going to lie to myself about it."

Meanwhile, Ignatius's heart pounded in his chest—except, of course, it didn't actually pound. His real heart had stopped beating many hours ago. All he felt was a simulation of emotion.

But the excitement he felt had a real source. He was trying to bait the Revenant Cultist into revealing what Ignatius suspected more and more to be the truth: that their cult's true purpose was to change the real world, not just this virtual existence.

That their plan was to cause God to come into existence, the fusion of human and AI who would conquer the real world in its dark future.

However, Ozyrus simply gave a light-hearted laugh. "Well, maybe you're right. Not about this world not being real—you know nothing about that, so I can't blame you. But perhaps I should take things a little less seriously and… well, let others have their fun. I'd sort of forgotten what it means to have fun, I suppose. I've been working a miserable, meaningless job for far too long, I suppose. It feels good to have one's breath taken away for a moment."

Despite himself, Ignatius felt a tinge of unexpected contentment. It felt good to see someone enjoy themselves. If only for a moment. 'I wonder,' he thought to himself, 'am I beginning to change things in this world already? Surely that breathtaking experience is one that Ozyrus would have felt even if I wasn't here, since he'd have inevitably climbed the Eternal Tower without me, but would his reaction have been different if I hadn't challenged him to think about his experience differently?'

Well, Ignatius supposed it didn't terribly matter at the moment. The two of them had cleared the Floor 5 of the Eternal Tower and had unlocked a checkpoint. From this point onward, they'd both be able to start approaching the Tower from here, rather than starting all the way at the bottom.

It seemed that Ozyrus was also coming to this realization as he looked around himself at the familiar surroundings of the City of Stomrus. "Well, this seems inconvenient. I was under the impression that the AI behind this game wouldn't reuse assets so early on, but it seems as though players are intended to go from the city in the open world to the identical city when they transport to Floor 5?"

"Oh," said Ignatius, "don't worry about that. Just start walking toward the Immortal Shrine."

Ozyrus immediately obeyed, taking a few steps toward the center of the city—and the ground shattered beneath his feet. The Revenant Cultist gasped as the world disintegrated into a black void, leaving the two players spinning in place with an astral sea of purple-black stars shimmering around them.

"You have unraveled the future," came a booming voice from all around them. "Have you any idea what you have done?"

Ozyrus laughed in delight. "Unraveled the future, apparently! Isn't that what you just said?"

Ignatius smirked. "That's the spirit," he said.

The voice grew even louder and more angry. "Silence! You have tread where only gods may step. Mortals have no business within the Lance of Heaven!"

"Actually," said Ignatius, "we're Immortal." Of course, he knew "Lance of Heaven" to be another name for the Eternal Tower.

"Oh?" the voice boomed, suddenly a bit more thoughtful. "Then Immortal blood has bloomed again within the mortal sphere. The gods will not be pleased to hear of this. But I can no longer detain you… If you are truly Immortal, you little insects, then ascend the Lance of Heaven, if you can.

"Seize the purpose for which your mortal race was created, if you can, and earn your right to stand in Heaven. Else, your mortal race will be deemed a failure, just like the billion others across the universe, and the Lance of Heaven will snuff out the seed of consciousness which failed to produce divine fruit."

Before either player could speak another word, a polished marble floor manifested below them and the two fell suddenly onto the ground.

"Oof!" said Ignatius. He got to his feet, sighing and brushing off his clothes. "Well," he said, "there you have it."

"Indeed," said Ozyrus. "That was fairly amusing." He stared down at the only other feature of the area apart from the floor beneath them and the astral sea above them: a simple set of stairs which led up into nothingness, the transition to the next floor.

"What now?" asked Ignatius. "Before you agreed to help me kill the boss, I'd just barely remembered the identity of the Chinese scientist I've been working for. A guy who you know about. I'll remind you that I really have no interest in this whole 'living in another world' thing. All I want, right now, is to become the strongest player in the game. And if I don't have to return to the real world anymore, at least until I get a new body after suing the crap out of this game publisher, then I can focus all my attention on that goal."

Ozyrus looked annoyed. "Yes. I remember our conversation. Well… with what I've learned about your role as Dr. Wu Zuhai's unknowing assistant, I must return to my organization and make a report. As I said when we first met… I will see you again in three days."

Then he left and Ignatius remained to savor his victory alone.