12 Miles Below

“Contact. Southwest tower.” One of the Winterscar knights called out from their sniping nest.

Tallest tower they could find, best sight across the entire skyscraper bridge ruin. Had a full view over me, while I waited at the center.

It took Avalis just about a quarter hour to reach me. He made his return to the battlefield a spectacle this time. I heard rumbling in the distance as the prelude, and like the snipers had called, they showed up.

Crawling all across the outsides, claws finding easy purchase on cracks, vines and rough concrete. Screamers, enough to cover the walls as they moved. At the base of the bridge, walking my way with steady cold fury, was Avalis.

“Figured you’d get here faster.” I said, standing up from my lotus position. “Did picking up the kids really take you that long?”

The Feather stopped in his tracks, turning an eye behind him at the mass of machines crawling off the walls and onto the bridge. “I suppose the number I came with was too much to hide. And here I was thinking I was being subtle.”

“Oh, I've got a master eye. Couldn’t sneak an airspeeder around me.”

Avalis brushed off bits of dirt and leaves stuck in the groves of his armor. “I’ve noticed.”

Glass was fracturing all across the bridge, as more of his army emerged in full from the ground. White claws ripping apart the vines and metal in the way, scorch marks across the white ceramic armor as they’d crawled through the sections still filled with dying out fire.

The other side of the bridge wasn’t spared either, Screamers flooding over the black containment cube, crawling out of the broken concrete.

Comms pinged from the two Winterscar knights on overwatch. “M'lord, you need to evacuate at once! This is far too many to handle, we won’t be able to eliminate them all.”

“Stay on target.” I said. “They’re after me, not you. Right, Avalis?”

“This discussion is pointless. I have a traitor to destroy.” He answered, a small haze of heat beginning to form above his head, right by that halo Feathers all had. His other hand drew out the longsword. “I don’t know what you’re planning, but if you think I’ll let you escape, you’re far off the mark. When I fight her, I’ll make sure she’s alone.”

“Guess that means he’s sending some of his army to fight you two.” I reported to the knights. “Can you hold them off?”

“We’re more worried for you, the ones coming are hardly anything compared to the swarm on the bridge.”

I stretched my legs, cracking my neck to the side. “I can always jump off.” I said, patting the hook and rope at my side. “Wrath would probably never let me live it down though.”

Journey’s shields were at a hundred and I felt about as refreshed as I could get. A break had done me good. I unhooked the undersider rifle from the holster, clicked the safety off and gave an experimental aim, making sure I could use the weapon properly in the armguard hand.

Relic armor made it easy to hold, Journey’s HUD showing a targeting reticle where it calculated my aim would land. The white sword flared to life in my main hand, and I took a stance.

Avalis didn’t take chances, clearly aware I must have something up my sleeves. Staring down an entire army and deciding I’d fight it? Not something a sane human should be doing. He slashed his hand to the side, giving an unworded command to his forces. The Screamers howled, and then charged forward from both sides, leaping out with claws extended.

He remained behind, watching. Calculating where I’d try to escape. Chain ready to cut through any lifeline I’d toss out. Staying safe behind his army.

Well, if he wasn’t coming to me, I’d need to get to him. So I started a dead sprint. Directly at the wall of screamers baying for my blood.

His eyes widened with surprise, then narrowed with suspicion. Even knowing something was wrong with a suicidal human charging into a full army of machines backed by a Feather, he couldn’t figure out what was coming next.

In my armguard, held tightly in my fist, was a small mite-made cube of metal. And inside was a fractal like no other.

I asked for a weapon that could kill a god. The mites gave me a weapon that could turn me into one.

Within the small digital computer inside the cube, a four dimensional fractal was calculated and generated. The millisecond it was rendered, it began moving. Constantly shifting, following an invisible curve, a hidden set of chaotic logic.

And then, even in the digital world of numbers, the fractal began to glow as a soul tendril sank into it. Occult pulsed around me, whipping the air, the cube glowing blue, light leaking through my fingers. Sparks of lighting crawled around my armor, striking out and licking the ground under me as I raced forward, as if the universe itself was holding its breath, waiting.

I tapped into the fractal of Urs.

I could see it burning bright in the soul sight, almost a gravity point, drawing power into a vortex with my closed fist as the centerpoint. The concept it held. One that was familiar to me.

The world fragmented in my mind. Dissolved into an infinite amount of parallel versions. Each with a Keith of its own, and each Keith had just triggered some variation of that fractal. The same exact fractal, existing simultaneously within that small infinity of linked worlds.

I hadn’t exactly known what the tiny computer could do. But the mites hadn't given me some kind of nebulous weapon that could only theoretically kill a god if used right. They had to factor me into that equation. If I could use the weapon, it wasn't a weapon that fit the description. The little bastards hadn't given me any kind of instruction manual on it.

But I had a strong guess already based on the name.

>Single use, cross-dimentional four-dimensional inscription.(Modification by user: URS.)

Single-use, the mites had listed. Within the first moment my awareness expanded into infinity, I understood why. The fractal connecting all of us was unstable, constantly moving. The mites had calculated a self-correcting formula that would keep the fractal a match with what the true pattern should look like. But soon enough, the formula would deviate, the mites unable to create a computer perfect enough to replicate a true one-to-one version of this fractal indefinitly. I had until the mathematics crunching through the cube made the first mistake.

Then I’d be stuck with a useless cube rendering the wrong fractal.

I don’t know how Urs factored in all this, and the forge wasn’t in the business of answering questions. I either had a request for it to make, and the correct payment, or it wanted nothing to do with me.

Fussy thing. And the demands were ridiculous. Wrath and Father got an easy exchange. But me? No, the moment I want to start killing gods, it suddenly turns into a demon offering power in exchange for everything I own. Even Cathida thought it was a little much.

But it was that, or die.

And from the moment I tapped into the fractal, for however long it could last me, I was immortal. Power coursed through the cube, causing it to rattle in my hand as dimensions wove and spun through the gate. Occult radiated off in a wave, strong enough even the machines ahead stumbled in their charge, the force manifesting as a physical pulse by sheer side effect.

The infinite variations of me blinked. Got reacquainted with the feeling. Then we got to work.

A small part of the greater whole immediately gave their life up. In their dimension, that Keith leaped into the wall of machines, hacking and slashing away alone. Rifle opening fire until it clicked empty, discarded. Knightbreaker round brought out and fired, ripping apart multiple Screamers that had the unfortunate fate to stay in the way.

They fought, armguard and blade working in tandem. Each one eventually was pulled off their feet, held down and stabbed through by dozens of claws racking across Journey. Others survived long enough to be caught by Avalis himself, the chain scything through his own forces, striking and wrapping around until it cut through Journey’s shield and then that Keith vanished from the greater whole.

And in each one of those doomed dead-end dimensions, the fractal of mirrors remained lit bright, deep inside the armor until the very last breath. One image was sent out - but not within that dimension.

For every one hundred Keiths, we picked one dimension as the true path forward. Like before, it felt as if I had trimmed nails or peeled off dead skin. The whole survived, even while a hundred fold versions of me didn't.

But the result couldn't be argued with. The moment I tapped into the fractal of Urs, a hundred wraiths stepped out of my armor, and leaped forward against the wall of Screamers.

Each had a single dedicated Keith commanding it, for however long that Keith stayed alive before his dimension’s Avalis cut his life short, or Screamers ripped him apart. Making each mirror image fighting at my side right now functionally free of cognitive load.

Avalis didn’t even try to fight back against odds like that. He went intangible, leaping back as tide of wraiths chased after, swinging swords, fire and armguards all at once. The rest of the screamers before me didn’t have the same options. The only choice his army had, was to grind against my own, and hope their might was stronger.

They were ripped apart instead.

I dove headfirst into the melee myself, charging forward, images of me fighting everything around, clearing a path forward with perfect teamwork. Occult flooded the bridge, shining bright enough to be seen for miles, washing forward from the cube in my hand.

Among the infinite, ever changing future, a massive amount of Keiths instantly winked out of sight. I realized why a moment later, when the parts of me that lived were the lucky ones that happened to evade a drake laser, leaving melted glass pooling down a perfectly cut hole. So, running in a straight line wasn't a good move.

Above, rifle shots came out, as the Winterscars began opening fire, catching the exposed drakes.

Avalis snarled just ahead of me, watching as his army was utterly overwhelmed against the wave of wraiths. “This isn’t happening.” He hissed. “This is an illusion. A viral attack against my perceptions. You’ve compromised my head somehow.”

“Then stop running and fight me.” I shouted back, getting closer and closer. "I'm not real right?"

More of me died away, caught by the drakes. A smaller infinity survived and became the new true route forward. I dodged and evaded every shot the drakes fired out, timelines pruned away as new roots became the true path again and again. Long enough for the Winterscar knights to spot and kill the last drake from where it hid.

Just in time, Journey’s HUD showed their combat feeds. Screamers burst through the doorways leading to their rooftop nest. The two knights promptly let go of rifles, and drew black Winterscar blades, stalking forward to handle the incoming force.

I didn’t have much time. On two fronts. Any moment, the quantum cube could hit an error and lose the correct pattern, forever split off. The sheer amount of power flooding through it had to be melting parts of it, section by section. Concepts of heat and destruction were starting to appear in my sight.

But this cube wasn’t made by fickle mites. This was something they made while serious. It was every bit of their combined techniques, as perfected as they could have made it. Redundancies clicked through, again and again as more of the cube weathered the strain and remained intact.

The second front was the machine army. They were adapting. The infinite versions of me stuck in a dead-end dimension fought them off, but we were losing faster and faster across the dimensions.

The Screamers realized sumbling against each other wasn’t working, and began to tighten up formation. A few managed to dodge my strikes, and followup attacks would knock me off my footing. From there, it was over for that Keith. Others charged at me with improvised weapons, ripped from the ground. It worked for a few. With an entire army of machines surrounding me, all it took was one mistake and that Keith would die.

I made it work. There was an infinite amount of me, all working together, all unified as one mind. I was adapting as well, each second I died a few thousand times and remembered every death. That kind of parallel training was turning me into a battlefield veteran, new tricks learned by blind luck, anything that let me survive just a little bit longer. It was a bloodbath for a massive part of the greater me.

But in the few true timelines where I poured everything into… in those the machines were being utterly eradicated.

The army of ghosts ebbed and flowed, dozens of images winking out each second as their controlling Keith was dogpiled and killed in his own dimension. More images surged from my chest as new branches of me emerged from the current one.

It never ended. I could not be stopped.

I lunged out at him, white blade seeking his throat with a traditional opener.

There was genuine fear in his eyes as he fought against a knight radiating occult, a few dozen images appearing from him each second. He still rose up, convinced this had to be some kind of illusion, and struck out with his chain, the mace going directly for my heart.

By all accounts, none of us could have possibly blocked a quick strike like that. But some of us had, by sheer chance. And from that root, we continued.

The battle between us pitted omnipresence against sheer unyielding physical power. Occult sparks from our blades and chains striking one another flashed out in the air, looking more like streaks of bright light, as they were sucked forward for the few milliseconds of existence. Sucked directly to the cube in my hand, curving through time and space.

He killed me a few thousand times. But in the true timeline, I always managed a lucky dodge or struck back at just the worst angle for him to hold off. There was an infinity of me, all working together to make slightly different moves. One Keith would inevitably do the best and become the next main root.

I fought the machine Feather, blade to blade.

His gaze changed from one of doubt and fury to outright fear. The fight was breaking through every prediction he could make, the occult around me strong enough even his own fractals felt the strain of its gravity. He hadn't made a single mistake. In all the infinite timelines, no Keith had been able to land a hit on him.

It was only a matter of time until he finally flinched. And he knew it.

Next Chapter - Return

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