113. 13th Freak of Freaks (I)

Working alongside YoAnna opened Jay’s Multiverse view more. There was the pleasure of devoting himself as best he could to see YoAnna’s dream– and what was becoming more and more his dream– come to fruition. It was a frustrating process in the backend, and Jay had a poor talent for it. So he would let Kleo assist YoAnna while Jay made his rounds with the Champions and Pantheon members at the front. But in the moments where Jay could assist YoAnna, or simply shadow her, Jay’s understanding of great universal forces, large and small, widened under YoAnna’s tutelage and through the assistance of his Vice-Chair Title.

One such subject that had been a major discussion between Jay and YoAnna was the weight of Titles and their heavily influential concepts. This was an important topic for YoAnna because of her nature as [Godling] of Challenge and Change. Her mere existence curved reality around her just like a heavy body with large amounts of mass and energy curved space-time. Incredibly, Jay’s studies in physics and gravity made the concepts of divinity more digestible. One could not be a god without having a heavier effect on reality and magic compared to mortals. This also meant that everything had an effect on reality and magic for merely existing, just less in a degree compared to something of YoAnna’s nature.

It brought to mind the ludicrous nature of their school. YoAnna’s heavy touch upon the institute through donations and by merely pretending to be a student had bent most if not all of the students and faculty there toward her machinations. Personalities became a bit more extreme. Nicknames stood out more because they were like Titles. They meant you’d accomplished a notable feat, no matter the consequence. Having a nickname gave you weight. That weight affected others, for good or bad. YoAnna had orchestrated this for experimentation and practice while studying as quickly as possible in preparation to become System Guide. She was already Pantheon Leader by then. She was starting to work with world governments in secret by the time she was eight years old.

She had a lot of responsibility. She also had an impressionable young mind. Central High was made by that kiddish part of her that wanted to orchestrate an entertaining high school experience and gather her chosen. There were other reasons for designing Central High, but the practice of using her divinity to nudge the high school experience up a few notches had been her attempt at studying the weight of notoriety at a vastly smaller scale. Because these nicknames, in a sense, were like Titles, which were the most defining, reality-warping powers you could gain from the System. But unlike Titles, their nicknames were still of a mortal Systemless structure, and could fluidly or violently change. YoAnna had set for Jay to be Rooftop Hero after his stunt. YoAnna hadn’t anticipated bullies to challenge that. In the end, they’d won the challenge and changed Jay’s name to Rooftop Weirdo with a negative connotation.

During these talks between Chair and Vice-Chair, YoAnna had apologized to Jay multiple times over the ordeal, and over many of her poor, childish choices that had affected mortals. But Jay saw things differently. Maybe it was his crush on YoAnna making him softer on her. Or maybe it was due to YoAnna’s consistent, worklike, and critical nature, especially when regarding herself, that made Jay facilitate a role where he could help prop her up. Or maybe Jay was just weird. But from Jay’s understanding, he could understand why YoAnna experimented on Central High to understand the effects of divinity, notoriety, and the warping of reality. In Jay’s opinion, it was better that she experimented and played with her powers somehow rather than harbor them and wait for a pivotal event for when those powers were needed and she was less confident of what she could achieve. Was it screwed up that she experimented on her own school peers in between all the busy work she had?

Yeah.

But Jay made sure YoAnna would keep the school open and do her best to protect the students and faculty there. Not to an extreme length, but enough for the school to keep functioning. Central High benefited greatly even if the school was a playground for a budding creature of divinity. And while the principal there was an asshole, he was devoted to the success of the school and the students who were afforded the opportunity to enjoy something a touch too fantastic to seem real. It shouldn’t get taken away from them now that YoAnna and her Champions had moved on to bigger and greater concerns. As the price for being YoAnna’s test subjects and childish ideas of high school grandeur, Central High would continue to receive funding and just a weensy touch of YoAnna’s blessing so it didn’t lose that spark of magic. Just enough to keep the fun, but not enough to intensify YoAnna’s nature of challenge and change.

Because YoAnna had indeed learned a lot from her Central High experiments about her own concepts. These lessons were discussed deeply and passed on to Jay as Pantheon Commander. And some of these lessons were best reserved rather than expressed to everyone, because the weight of this knowledge could affect reality and bend the course of potential events, cutting one likely future outcome, and switching tracks to another less likely outcome YoAnna hadn’t put too much stock in. Rather than talk about it, Jay decided to take YoAnna’s studies and lessons a step further and apply it in the Junkside War. If YoAnna’s theories remained sound, then the matter in which Jay organized the Pantheon and their affiliates to attack would expose those most likely to challenge the Champions and change the course of their fates by hungering to gain a huge jump in levels for killing one of YoAnna’s Champions. This would make it easier to separate innocent Unregulated from murderhobos.

At the same time, those who feared the oncoming brutality brought forth by Team Holy Divinity, Team Booty Warlords, and Team FAAHI But Smarter, and still wanted to murder for levels would seek challenge elsewhere. They could get into fights against Joy 45’s joint-op army in the south quarter. They could also get into fights against Jay’s joint-op army in the east quarter. And a few would.

But a majority would get pulled toward the most massive and highly energetic bodies of challenge and change existing in their sphere. They would get drawn toward Jay and YoAnna. The latter especially, since YoAnna delivered a public apology to Junkers and marked herself as a seemingly easy target. What powerful person would make a public apology like that?

The murderhobos would want to prey on that. They wouldn’t even know that they were under the influence of the Commander and Leader. The concepts of challenge and change weren’t reserved to YoAnna’s Pantheon. She had observed in Central High that other students would attempt to challenge and change a student’s nickname if it had such notoriety to elicit strong responses from others. They would try to take it for themselves.

This was part of why the Allens, formerly the Divine, were so tough and mean. They’d been attacked constantly by those who wanted their position and close proximity near YoAnna. And their nicknames made the Allens extra prominent. Jay had no idea they had more on their plate than just defending YoAnna from creepers until this revelation.

The Allens had been fighting high school wars since the moment they’d taken their spot close to YoAnna. Casey especially. She had to keep all the rich, preppy kids, and athletic phenoms in line, and those kids were the most egregiously competitive in the high school hierarchy.

Other examples could be found in the top nerds. Lilith had her own minor cases of bullying by those who couldn’t accept her position as First Nerd. But Lilith was a vicious girl who would pay those bullies back. She would protect Mike from bullying without Mike even knowing he was a big target. People had feared Lilith too much to make an attempt at her or Mike.

Hailey had to combat everyone that wanted her position as a Divine sitting next to YoAnna and as Third Nerd. She was also the Event Planner, a very prominent position in Central High. Hailey didn’t seem like such a big deal because she’d always facilitated roles where she placed herself in the backend of things. But Jay now suspected Hailey was a multifaceted genius and incredibly tough girl to hold multiple nicknames in Central High.

It might be extreme to consider all of these factors involved when YoAnna nudged reality with her divinity inside a high school setting of her design and try to apply that to a brutal, shifty, unpredictable war of death between the pantheon and the Unregulated murderhobos. But as Jay kept dodging and engaging in light skirmishes, wasting time to see how many gangsters would arrive at his fight, despite the reality that these people could go anywhere else, could try to hide themselves and survive, could try to breech the military blockade, or fucking fly away if they had the power of such, they instead gathered where Jay fought. It was incremental at first, but over the course of a few hours, Jay had hundreds of gangsters falling into the weight of Jay’s Title of Challenge and Change and the presence of a divine creature that embodied those concepts.

These theories and experiments that YoAnna had expressed to Jay were also things that touched on morality. If these men and women threw caution to the wind and came seeking challenge and change for their own glories, would it be nefarious of the pantheon to take advantage of such and murder them all for the pantheon’s own gain? YoAnna asked Jay to consider this question among others since Omen Bearer of the Apocalypse was now out of the window and YoAnna wanted to challenge Jay on his ability to stay the course despite how horrific things might get once the true slaughtering started.

There was a moment of hesitance for Jay. He didn’t fear the damage he could do to those who were pulled by the weight of his Titles or the nature of YoAnna and would most likely use violence or assault to gain for themselves. He feared the fact that he didn’t fear the damage he would do.

He was supposed to be a hero of comedy. Could he still be such if he preyed on these men and women who could still have some redeemable qualities to them?

Jay had no idea.

But as he skidded to a stop in front of the Flaming Mother, his body covered in countless wounds, his armor torn to pieces, and all he saw were a teeming collection north of three hundred Systemized Unregulated Challengers, Jay sighed with relief. It was easier to put the theory to the faces this way. These people may not be all villains. Maybe they were all caught up in the excitement of having powers and felt an opportunity to use it against Jay. But they were challengers nonetheless. They would kill Jay for the opportunity to change their fates. They were hungry. Jay was also hungry.

It was a dog eat dog Multiverse, apparently. And Jay had a seat unlike anybody on Earth could imagine. He had a seat at the biggest and grandest table beyond this measly planet. A seat where if Jay could grow strong enough, he could give his mom an entire planet to rule as queen. Or hell, why not a galaxy?

Jay would like to give his mom a galaxy. He would kill for such. Thus, he knew he wouldn’t be afraid of himself for not fearing the slaughter.

At this point, Doug was standing smugly among his massive reinforcements. The Roach King ensured everyone here was aware that they could die if they ran away. The three hundred Systemized gangsters didn’t seem to care. No matter if a majority of them were Rank 1s, they had a sheer difference in numbers that one Rank 2 Pantheon Commander shouldn’t hope to overcome. And all they’d seen of Jay was his sword play, really, and a couple of gravity tricks that had killed off Thugmaster, Wind Cutter, and some others. Billy was still alive somewhere out there. Jay would get to him eventually if Billy hadn’t ran and got disintegrated by YoAnna’s divine decree.

Even with those small victories, Jay still suffered greatly.

Doug had broken the Rapier of Scathing Damnation and stabbed the bladed end into Jay’s gut. That took a huge chunk of health, forcing Jay to retreat multiple times while sipping on basic health potions. The constant attacks pouring down from magic projectiles and fields wouldn’t let Jay settle one bit. But Jay kept patient. He kept retreating, skirmishing, retreating, skirmishing, burning through potion stock steadily as he grew immune to those, and repeated the outmaneuvers. They had a lull in the action when a beaming spear rose from the Junkyard and thrust up into space and rained down magic lights all over the place. Jay smiled, knowing that was Mike’s work.

Jay didn’t smile when the ground rumbled. Then a sewage pipe a hundred feet away blew out green-yellow flakes that giggled when dancing on a gust of wind. All around Junkside, more and more of these giggling green-yellow flakes danced around in the air, joining the magic lights as some of those flakes got whisked away with the wind currents. All the action stopped while everyone looked up at the strange and magical display above their heads. Jay used this opportunity to down his last potion, barely getting much healing from it. It brought him a little over halfway in Health. Kleo was still singing, but she didn’t dance anymore. She had been singing and dodging any attempts to strike her with every skirmish. Sometimes she had to slip inside of Jay, and then come out when the coast was clear. A lot of the gangsters mocked the gravity duo for Kleo’s seemingly useless presence. Kleo kept her annoyance tucked inside as she sang.

Jay looked back to YoAnna and saw the worry on her face.

“This is not good.” She watched a giggling green-yellow flake pass her shoulder. “Very not good.”

“I believe our Champions made an error in judgment,” Jay said. “But I can’t blame them. Whatever they wanted to bomb, it must’ve been worth the bombing.”

“This is not their fault,” YoAnna said. “I’ve locked myself to this event, Jay. I can’t contain this now. This is a great event of challenge and change, too. A result of our Champions’ decisions. I might’ve been able to bar the spread if I didn’t impose myself upon you and Jhara’s causality, but I have imposed myself. And this error of mine will hurt the world.”

“This error saved my mom,” Jay said.

“I shouldn’t have come down here for revenge,” Jhara said hauntingly. “The error is mine.”

Jay shivered.

YoAnna tensed.

Reality shifted around Jhara, and a new Title came to existence regardless of Jay or YoAnna’s wishes.

Jhara gained the [Mother of Apocalyptic Doom] Title.

YoAnna looked sick, but she held onto Mom’s broken body anyway. At the very least, Fuzzy had used [Seelie Magic] to create braces for Mom’s body. She did so while refreshing [Mana Relief] and [Invigorate] on Jay.

“Are we going to be okay?” Fuzzy trembled with fear.

Neither Jay nor YoAnna could answer right away. Jay could tell YoAnna was deeply disturbed. When things went off the rails despite her detailed visions of likely outcomes, YoAnna had a tendency to take it hard. She could freeze up. Or she could enter a minor collapse of belief. For a deity borne with great and powerful concepts, she was sensitive. And hard on herself.

“Hey,” Jay said. “I’ll find a way through this.”

“How can you be so brave in the face of this?” YoAnna waved at the laughing flakes.

“I have to be.” Jay turned and faced Doug’s army as they centered their attention back on him. “I have impossible goals to achieve.”

“What the hell did you do, Jay?” Doug asked from the middle of his gangster army. “You know what. I guess it doesn’t matter. You’re dead anyway.”

“Kleo, it’s time,” Jay said. “Mary’s yours while I use the 13th Freak of Freaks.”

Kleo stopped singing. “Finally.”

Jay flipped the blue radiant kukri into the air. Kleo caught it with [Sling Assist]. The blade glowed merrily as it swung around Kleo’s orbit.

“At long last, we get to work together, Mary,” Kleo said.

Mary’s spirit flared like a blue fire, excited and thrilled to be paired with Kleo.

Jay stepped forward, leaving Kleo and Mary to do as they pleased. They would pick and choose their battles based on their master.

Jay cricked his neck and rolled his shoulders, flexing some of the new muscles that were growing from his constant training, especially during the times when he limited his Attributes and made himself struggle. His upper body was more muscular than ever before.

Jay unlocked the Title 13th Freak of Freaks.

[13th Freak of Freaks: Infant]: There are many Freaks in the Multiverse. There have been 12 of such who have exceeded the parameters set for a tolerable Freak throughout the time that the System has existed. Because of the nature of these Freaks of Freaks, and the unfathomable damage they’ve wrought, the System Admins will not allow a 13th Freak of Freaks to arrive even if such must be acknowledged for their potential to be the 13th.

There is a boon in this Title that’s yours to utilize at any given moment, especially in climactic events. You can use this Title after allowing your Chance Status to drop all the way to x1. Then you may choose up to 4 Attributes that will be extremely boosted depending on the collective Chance of your enemies that’s higher than your Chance. These Attribute boosts may fluctuate up or down as your enemies increase or decrease in number. End this power to fully regain your Chance Status plus a small boost dependent on the number of enemies you’ve faced while having x1 Chance.

Once the climactic event ends with your victory or preferably your death, your spirit will be taken by a System-approved wraith above your rank. And you will die. You can avoid this by not using this power. By not using this power, you and the Multiverse will never fully realize the horrific nature of the 13th Freak of Freaks. This is a good thing. So, the System Admins recommended not to use this power. But if you do, please have your affairs in order for when the System-approved wraith comes for you and your soul.

Jay’s Chance dropped all the way to x1, and the world seemed bent against him. As if he was doomed and fated to die here. He had too little Chance, and the narrative gave the gangster army all the weight they would need plus more to defeat him. But Jay had four Attributes he could choose while against the gangsters and the narrative.

Jay chose Resilience, Poise, Intellect, and Discovery.

Jay clenched his jaw as he felt the changes, but he kept moving toward the gangster army calmly. As if nothing changed about him. All they could see was his short and shirtless body, his empty hands, and his bare feet from losing his boots. His leggings were ragged things now, but they still felt good on him. Like wearing Capoeira pants.

“What the hell do you think this is, Jay?” Doug laughed. “A stupid anime? I got three hundred men with magic powers. And they’re all out for your blood! You’re dead, you little loser!”

“You should’ve brought more men,” Jay said.