Chapter 149—Consequences

As he wasn’t dying and his opponent only had a partial shield, none of his wounds were healed as the magic removed him from the arena.

Between one moment and another, he reappeared in the common area, still facing Baptiste like he had been when the duel had started. His positioning flipped from sprawled on the ground to standing. In other circumstances, the shift would have been agonising, but there was no pain because he had used a spell to block it. Nevertheless, he wobbled. His entire right side was unable to provide any structural support. Both his right leg and arm were noticeably misshapen to the degree that Tom knew that some neutral human observers would have instinctively considered him to be a monster. 

Behind him, Briana screamed in raw horror.

Internally, Tom smiled. He could imagine her looking at the unnatural bends in his leg and reacting on an instinctive level.

Despite all of his years of body control, he leant too far to the left, and he felt his balance vanish. With his right leg as damaged as it was, he couldn’t use it to stabilise himself. He remained calm and before he toppled, his spear appeared tucked under his arm with the butt of it pressed firmly on the ground to provide extra stability.

He breathed in deeply as he arrested the fall. That had almost been exceedingly undignified. Not to mention costly from a future healing perspective. An uncontrolled fall, given the number of broken bones he already possessed would cause lots of additional issues. 

The degree of his incapacitation didn’t help as the pitch Briana was screaming at increased.

Balanced and no longer at risk of toppling, he did a small hop to start the process of turning to face them. He had a joke to deliver.

“You should…” he started to say but before he could finish the sentence, his throat closed up and a bout of coughing forced him to double up.

He winced at the violent, involuntary body jerks. He was glad he didn’t have Touch Heal running, but could imagine the damage he was doing to a body filled with unanchored bone fragments. It was better than falling, but only just. That first violent choking cough just by itself was going to require an extra half an hour of healing to fix.

Something wasn’t right. His instincts screamed at him. He had suffered significant injuries when he had collided with the ground, but there hadn’t been any throat or lung damage.

Why was he coughing? He thought alarmed. It didn’t make any sense. 

“Fucking hell,” Corrine exclaimed with a noticeable amount of horror and fear expressed in the two words. A feeling of dread ran through Tom. She wasn’t eight years old and Tom’s injuries while gruesome shouldn’t have had an impact.

And her swearing… that had contained too much raw emotion.

He suppressed the coughs as best he could and attempted to turn more quickly. An idea suddenly occurred to him. 

All he could think of was, What the fuck. How was that joke controversial?

Fear slammed through him.

His coughing fit, Briana, and Corrine all the different pieces were fitting together to create a picture that he didn’t want to experience.

This was wrong.

Social Silence for the first time he could remember had activated while he was with friends. Usually, it let him do whatever he wanted in front of people that he had a personal relationship with.

But today, right now… it hadn’t.

It had blocked an innocent joke. Why?

Oh fuck, he thought as various possibilities flashed through his mind. Oh shit.

A handful of seconds had passed with most of the delay caused by his coughing fit and during that period Briana had only grown more hysterical.

Finally, he looked at her and his worst fears were realised.

She wasn’t looking at him instead she was looking down and to her right.

It felt like time slowed down for him more than it did during the duels when his traits kicked in.

He followed the direction of her gaze.

Dread gripped his heart. The terror that assaulted him was very real. She was eight, but it was an Existentia eight. You could say that the orphanage had tempered her, that she was partially vaccinated against the brutality of the world. Whatever this was had shaken her, despite all that hardening she was acting her age.

Her screams were primal. The terror of a monster coming at her that she couldn’t fight in her wildest dreams or seeing the consequences of someone else having fought such a creature.

His physical senses caught up with his brain.

Red blood drenched the tiled floor.

Then he saw the body. The first glimpse was of light pink sausage like entrails that had been casually knotted like a child would a daisy chain. Then the rest of it came into view. A pulsing heart with veins still attached, pale skin, a gaping chest cavity, Kang’s lifeless eyes.

Tom’s mouth fell open.

The heart still beat. It was disturbing. But while he lived Tom could see how weak that beat had been. It was an organ on the point of imminent failure.

His eyes travelled up further a symbol carved on his friend’s forehead.

“The Trident,” Corrine whispered. Her eyes he noted clinically were starting to water. She, being both closer and uninjured had moved faster than Tom could and she was already leaning down over Kang with her hand holding a glowing potion.

Reality flexed.

Mr Cricket was suddenly there, looming over both of them.

His arms, dozens of them, were active. They were a blur. Three of the hands snatched the potion off her and the other arms, most ending with just a single finger and thumb with a couple showing more complexity and one even mimicking a human’s hand were reorganising Kang’s organs and placing them back into the chest cavity.

“Fuck! Fuck.” Corrine repeated as she stumbled away from the body with two of Mr Cricket’s arms guiding her.

“Kang!” Briana yelled.

The bright liquid of the potion dripped over the open wound while Tom just stared in shock. Organs began wiggling and settling deeper into the body. Eight arms closed the flaps of skin that the trident had surgically cut open and then folded out.

“No, Kang, no!” Briana repeated.

Tom felt sick inside.

This was the price of his failure.

He remembered all those hours he had spent trying to get the disks done. Hours begging for Mr Cricket to relent and let the roll out go earlier. His willingness to offer anything but it had fallen on deaf ears. Without a tangible reason, the open competitor refused to budge, and the GEAs had blocked him from mentioning the real reasons. 

This was what he had been trying to avoid.

A weird sound erupted from his throat. Half mourning, half denial and a hundred percent emotion.

Mr Cricket was looking at him, pitying him, and then time ground to a halt as that regard became hostile.

A chill went down his spine.

“Sorry Tom,” Mr Cricket said with words that no one else could hear as he exploited Tom’s trait for all it was worth. The words sung with compassion he didn’t think the alien was capable of. “I see what you feared now and I couldn’t before, and that’s ridiculous. A GEAs clearly blocked you and manipulated me just as badly. Maybe even worse, because they must have gotten into my very brain and influenced it. Why would I insist on a reason when it was obvious. The humans who died always did it at around the six to nine-month point. They did this. This was them. This was not me or us. It was them.” he finished harshly. There was a long pause. “Take what I’ve taught and make this thing suffer.”

I will, he wanted to proclaim, but of course he couldn’t, why his perception was sped up his physical body wasn’t.

“But rest assured we’ll be rolling out your disks before the next duel. You don’t need to worry about her.”

The words didn’t comfort him. His eyes flicked toward where Briana was. They didn’t move but magically the light bent to let him focus on her face clearly. She would have to win a fight before she could buy one.

“I’ll talk to one of the priestesses about her as well,” Mr Cricket promised. “I’m hopeful an allowance can be made.”

Time reverted to normal.

Mr Cricket’s arms gathered back into his central mass as they did when not in use. Power intensified around the alien being and then seeped into Kang.

Silence deadened and even Briana’s noise was briefly subdued.

“He will live. His soul is still intact.” Mr Cricket proclaimed.

There were relieved sighs all round.

“But it’s unlikely he’ll fight again.”

“What the fuck did you just say?” Corrine blustered, momentarily forgetting the usual deference she gave to open competitors.

“The truth hatchling. I gave you the truth. His soul is not destroyed, but it is damaged and scarred. I don’t know how much it’ll heal itself but it’s possible, probably even likely that he’ll be unable to level after this.”

Her eyes flashed. “What can we do to help?”

“There are soul treasures that could do the trick.”

“We’ll fucking get him one.”

“Not so fast hatchling. No civilisation would use it on someone as crippled as Kang. Such a treasure given to someone healthy would certainly make them a genius or given to someone like you, Corrine, would create a power capable of transforming a local cluster of nations.”

Corrine looked like she wanted to argue, but she bit her tongue and instead bowed her head.

Mr cricket didn’t move, but suddenly he had more presence and everyone focused on him. “This is the risk we all face.” he proclaimed. “If we go into a duel without shielding, we may die. If we elect to push for safety, then we never get enough coins to transform our people. What we do is dangerous, but Tom, with the help of myself and other open competitors has a solution. From tomorrow we’ll be selling Danger Sense disks that can protect you from this result. I must insist that if you can afford it that you use them.”

Tom found himself inexplicably not hating the strange open competitor. The private communication from earlier resonated inside him. It had sounded so truthful and while the open competitor could easily lie to someone as weak as himself he didn’t think it was the case. The GEAs being responsible made too much sense.

If the GODs had set up the test years ago, then he had never had a chance to save him but… two weeks. That was the difference between Kang living and dying. It was galling. Not that it was his fault, but he cursed himself for not being more industrious a year and a half ago. He had been creating these disks for over two years in preparation, finding two weeks would only have taken him working five percent harder on one of those first years. 

Time ground to a halt. He shivered slightly under the impact of such a powerful opponent viewing him as something to eat.

“Get out of your head hatchling. My lack of action speaks to higher powers. You’re not responsible.. You’ve worked harder than anyone I’ve ever seen. It’s not like you can see the future.”

Once more, the accuracy of those words ricochetted within him. At least the first bit but not the last. That felt wrong.

He bowed his head.

“It’s not your fault.” Mr Cricket repeated.

He was right. GODs versus mortals could have only one outcome, and he was mortal. How tantalising close he had gotten to saving Kang was probably them playing games. He had a title that was proof that they personally had it out for him. Them tweaking things to cause him pain… it was not as outlandish a claim as it should have been. 

He looked at Kang and the wounds had vanished.

The other signs of the injuries had not.

Blood was everywhere and his friend wasn’t moving.

“Kang.” Briana knelt and clutched his hand. “Kang, can you hear? Please say something. Don’t just lie there.”

Tom watched with his heart breaking.

Healing struck him.

“Fuck Tom what fucking happened to you?”

He glanced up at Corrine. ‘You should have seen the other guy.’ He thought about saying it, but there was no point now. “I won.” He shrugged and flinched as it made his arm deform as some bones slipped to gather near his wrists.

“Fuck. Do you need me to get another restoring potion.”

“No, no. There’s no need. I can fix this.”

“How are you so calm?”

“I’m not fucking calm. Kang’s…” he gestured helplessly as his own tears started to form. “I’m wrecked.”

“He has used magic to turn off pain,” Mr Cricket stated. “Plus, physical pain is nothing compared to what I put him through daily.”

Corrine, now with multiple tear streaks down her face glared at the alien. “With all due respect, can we have privacy.”

The fact she had not sworn at him was testimony to the fury she had to be feeling.

Tom felt himself being teleported, and he found himself sitting mostly upright in some high tech magical bed that was supporting all of his injured spots like they were resting on clouds.

Kang was laid out on a bed with Corrine, Baptiste, and Briana flanking him. A piece of parchment was on the boy’s chest.

“What’s that?” Briana asked.

Corrine snatched it and read it. Her lips went hard. “It’s from Mr Cricket.” The letter vanished. “It’s not important.”

“It is so,” Briana snapped. “What did it say?”

Corrine hesitated, glanced at him, and more healing flowed from her. He appreciated it even if the timing was brought forward as a delaying tactic. The spell she hit him with was under powered but he knew she was emptying her mana pool each time she did it.

Rather than letting the spell do its thing he used Touch Heal to direct her unstructured healing toward the areas she could heal without causing problems. Basically, he forced the energy away from where the bone hadn’t been set to injured skin, muscle and organs.

“What did it say?” Briana repeated.

“It was a summary of Kang’s condition.” She trailed off.

“And?”

Corrine sighed. “It’s not good. Fifty percent chance of surviving with his personality intact. Thirty percent chance of suffering brain damage and twenty that he never wakes.”

Inside, Tom shrunk down even further. That was a significantly worse prognosis than Mr Cricket had declared to the wider audience.

“What does that mean?”

“There’s only a one in two chance that he wakes up and is still Kang.” Corrine told her bluntly.

Confusion crossed the young girl’s face. “It that good?”

Tom shook his head as she had been looking at him when she had asked. “No. It’s terrible.”

“And even if he wakes up as Kang,” Corrine continued into the silence. “There’s no way he becomes an adventurer.”

“What do you mean?”

Corrine wiped the tears away. “His soul’s screwed.”

“But at least he might still be him,” Tom said quietly. Or he might never wake up or be mentally disabled. He thought, but didn’t voice the opinion. “He was so happy to have gotten in. It wasn’t supposed to happen like this.”

Corrine smiled bravely. “It’s the risk we all face every time we go into battle.”

“But I have a trick that lets fate protect us.” Briana proclaimed.

Neither he nor Corrine said a thing. If they did, there were too many chances their words would be distorted, and they’d say something completely opposite to what they wanted to.

“I fucking hate the…” Corrine cursed and stopped talking abruptly before she finished the sentence and committed blasphemy. “I hate that this happened.”

“And whatever circumstances conspired to allow it.” Tom clarified.

“Amen.” Corrine said simply.

“Amen,” he said, mirroring her words.

Briana was looking at them like saying amen was crazy and he guessed it was.

“DEUS, if you can fix him,” Tom whispered, and he knew he had no levers or special connection to implore her to do extra. There was nothing he could promise that would matter. “If you can I’d like that.”

AG. I want to be known as someone who doesn't do plot armour. Life can be brutal and unfair and I want my novels to reflect that. As the end of the chapter had made clear there'll be no magical saving of Kang. And while I haven't finalised my plan for him, (I'll do so when I flesh out Book 5's direction this weekend) there will no HWFWM or DOTF crap where dead people are brought back to life having experienced a unique opportunity that made them stronger. What Mr Cricket left in the note is what will happen.

Speaking of overall direction you've probably notcied that I'm about fifteen chapters behind where I want to be given Toms age. I really should have been doing this stuff at about chapter 135ish. Unfortunately there were too many interesting details to include. I'm still keeping everything to 7 books and book 4 will be finished within 3 weeks (technically it should be 4 chapters but I probably won't be able to keep it to that) and will end with Tom's full status sheet as he turns 10.