CC. | Ch. 200: 'The Horror at Bellvine...' (Patreon)

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Chapter Two Hundred: 'The Horror at Bellvine...'

...89 years ago...

The reports had been curious, to say the least. Livestock going missing. Strange lights in the night sky. Rumors of "inhuman creatures" skulking around the city.

But none of that was why Parson Miles had bothered to come investigate the quiet Stecatti town of Bellvine in person.

No, the only reason he was here was because of a report about an "unidentified black goo."

His peers in the Vanguard hadn't thought much of it, of course. A black goo? It was probably just a bit of spilled oil or some such thing, they'd said. Why was he even pointing it out? Everyone knew that worms from the Undercrust couldn't survive on the surface.

They all just assumed that that was what he and Overra had been worried about. Worms. Of course.

But Parson hadn't forgotten that encounter he'd had in Calthos, nearly forty years ago now. He was not the same man that he was then, but he still remembered it as clearly as if it were only yesterday. A strange man, appearing in a dust storm, identifying himself as "Ettol," and then disappearing amid a disturbing fountain of black and slimy vomit.

Parson had tried his damnedest to find out more about who that person was or what had happened there, but all he'd managed to discover was that "Ettol" was the name of an Ancient Melmoorian trickster deity. And that wasn't much to go on.

So after deliberating on it a bit further, he and Overra decided to keep this investigation off the Vanguardian record books--for the time being, at least.

Instead, they decided to rely on their other friends for help. "Ettol" had inquired about them, after all, so perhaps they were the missing pieces that Parson had never wanted to use. With so many years gone by and nothing to show for it, his questions had never done anything but burn in the back of his mind.

And now, for the first time since they were bratty little war orphans in Melmoore, all three of them were going to be in the same place again. Parson, Damian, and Germal.

He entered the old diner in the heart of town and only began to realize how hungry he was when the smell of freshly baking bread and pasta hit his nostrils. The welcoming staff greeted him, but Parson could already see where he was going to sit and politely refused their assistance.

The two men sitting at the far end of the room noticed him immediately, as did both of their reapers. With Overra following close behind, he walked right over to them. They had been playing cards while they waited, apparently.

Parson had last seen Germal only a few short years ago, but he hardly recognized him. That wasn't so surprising, though. Each time they'd met, Germal had always seemed like a different person. Some things never changed, Parson supposed. At least he wasn't trying to get them to call him by different names, anymore.

Damian, on the other hand, was the opposite in almost every respect. It had been decades since Parson had been able to meet him face-to-face like this, yet looking at him now, Parson could recognize him instantly. That strong chin and those thick, angular eyebrows were simply too distinct; and that perpetual scowl on his face might as well have been a signature.

"Gentlemen." Parson tried to keep a perfectly stern face, as his mentor would, but it proved too difficult. Just seeing the both of them there, together, was more than enough to pull a smile out of him.

Germal flashed a grin in return. Were his teeth always so white? And that big, fluffy hat he was wearing--it was appropriate for the cold weather, sure, but Parson knew it was probably meant to conceal that horn on his head that always looked a little bit larger every time they met up.

Damian, however, scarcely even looked up from his cards. "Germal's cheating."

"And how, exactly, am I cheating?" said Germal. "You're dealing, aren't you? And it's your deck of cards, isn't it?"

Damian just grumbled at him.

Parson pulled up a chair. "Poker?"

"You want in?" said Damian.

"Sure, as long we can get some food, too." Parson waved the waitress over, and they placed their orders.

At the end of his very first hand, Parson found himself staring at a straight flush. He managed to get both of the other men to raise their bets twice that round before taking their money.

"You're cheating, too," said Damian.

Parson and Germal shared a laugh.

The reapers weren't talking much, likely because their reunion wasn't quite as momentous. Overra, Feromas, and Nerovoy had been in more regular contact with one another over the years. Those three were often the means through which the servants communicated with one another--and that was mostly due to their concerns over security. Letters and telegrams could be lost or intercepted, and the reapers still didn't fully trust telephones, despite the technology existing for over fifty years already.

Parson wanted to enjoy the company of his old friends a bit more before letting the conversation turn more serious, but as he was eating, he began to notice something.

"Germal," he said, eyeing the man more carefully this time. "Are you feeling alright?"

Germal returned another smile, as innocuous as the last, but he seemed even paler than usual and beads of sweat had been gathering at the edges of his face for a while now. "Heh. Yeah. I'm fine. Why do you ask?"

Overra answered for Parson. 'You look a bit ill.'

"Oh, it's just the nature of mutation," said Germal. "Nothing to worry about."

"You're sure?" said Parson. "I thought you had stopped struggling with your power decades ago."

"For the most part, yes. But it still acts up from time to time--often whenever I visit new places."

That response only made Parson more curious. "Why would a new location have an impact on your power?"

Germal's smile slackened somewhat. "That is a tough question. Even after all these years, I'm still not sure I fully understand it, myself. But I have always... resonated with the land, so to speak."

Damian cocked an eyebrow. "What does that mean?"

Germal set his cards down. "Well, in the beginning, it meant that I was utterly miserable all the time. Much of that was because I simply could not control my mutations and had all but destroyed my own body, but even after getting a much better handle on my ability, I discovered that there was more to it than mere physical pain. There was something psychological beneath it. Spiritual, even."

Parson and Damian exchanged glances as they continued to listen.

"The land breathes," said Germal. "Wherever you go, you'll find something distinct. Even in places still untouched by humans. But there are some places where... I am not sure how to explain it, exactly, but... there are some places where I feel such a strong resonance that it affects me physically."

"Hmm." Parson set his cards down, too, and leaned forward to place his elbows on the table. "And you have no idea what causes this 'uncommonly strong resonance' of yours?"

"I didn't say that," said Germal. "I believe I have some notion of what might be behind it."

"Well, don't keep us waiting in suspense," said Damian.

"Ancient monuments, of a particular sort," said Germal. "Statues or monoliths that, for whatever reason, have a power to them--a power which has seeped into the land over time, altering its breath. Its resonance."

Parson had always known that Germal's power was odd, but hearing all this now was still fairly surprising to him, and he wasn't sure what to think.

"You tellin' me you're some kinda ultra-tree-hugger?" said Damian.

Germal snorted a laugh. "Of a sort, perhaps."

Parson was too preoccupied with his thoughts to be amused by the other men's conversation. Germal's power resonated with the land and monuments of ancient power, eh? Thinking back to his encounter with Ettol, Overra had mentioned something about Ettol using a long-forgotten name for the region at the time.

And taken in combination with everything else Ettol had said, it seemed clear to Parson now that Germal must have been the one that the mysterious man had been searching for.

But what did that mean in regard to their present circumstances? In regard to this town? This whole area?

Parson was beginning to get a bad feeling.

But why, exactly?

Perhaps because he had only meant to come here in order to investigate. In the back of his mind, he'd hoped to encounter the mysterious Ettol another time and hopefully discover some answers to his long-lingering questions, but he still had a vague instinct in the pit of his stomach that was telling him that he shouldn't give Ettol what he wanted, that he shouldn't allow his friends here to meet him.

That could've just been paranoia, though. As a servant, he was getting old. That was becoming an increasingly greater concern.

And yet... something about Germal's explanation just now was really starting to bother him. If Germal's power was linked with the very land itself, then... wasn't that an unprecedented risk factor? Parson had never even heard of a servant ability working like that before.

...What if they had made a mistake? Could the mere act of coming here have been foolish? Sure, it had been forty years, but... what if this was a trap?

Looking at Germal's face now, though the man may have been laughing at the moment, the sweat droplets on his face only seemed to be multiplying. And that paleness...

Parson stood up from the table, drawing looks from both men and all three reapers.

"Something wrong?" said Damian.

"I think we should leave," said Parson.

"Hmm?" Damian sat back in his chair. "We just got here."

"I know," said Parson. "But Germal's condition concerns me. And if it's because of the location, then let's quit this place for the time being and gather more intel, first."

His old friends seemed uncertain, but they also began gathering themselves up to leave.

That was, until, Germal froze in place, wide-eyed and stuck like a statue.

Parson and Damian both stopped and stared at him, then looked to the man's reaper, Nerovoy.

'Germal,' the reaper tried, to no avail.

Parson touched Germal's shoulder and shook him. "Hey."

Still no response. And the sweat on the man's face was stronger than ever.

"Damian." Parson's voice held the urgency of a command under it, and Damian seemed to understand.

Together, they scrambled to pull Germal out of his seat and carry him out of the restaurant. People were gawking at the scene they were making, but Parson was beyond the point of caring about that now.

"The hell's wrong with him?" said Damian.

'I don't know,' said Nerovoy. 'I've never seen him react like this.'

Once they were outside, they started toward Damian's vehicle. Parson had brought a horse, still preferring them to automobiles, but he wasn't about to argue when the vehicle was closer and roomier.

Before they could reach it, however, Gemal spasmed violently and slipped out of both their grips. The man caught himself on the ground with all four limbs and just remained that way, his head swiveling around like an animal looking for something.

"What the--?! Hey!" Damian was about to walk up to him when Parson held out a hand in front of him.

"Careful," said Parson. "Be mindful of the reapers' safety, before everything else."

And indeed, the three of them were crowding around Damian and Parson now.

'I am sensing something VERY strange,' said Feromas.

"No shit," said Damian.

'I sense it as well,' said Overra.

'Same here,' said Nerovoy. 'It's--it's quiet. Subtle. As if it's been here the whole time but I'm only now realizing it. And it's... it's...'

'Everywhere,' finished Overra.

Parson hardly needed them to tell him that something was wrong here. He could sense it himself--physically, even. The air was different. Heavier. Thicker. And this sound. Like that of rushing water, perhaps.

Dark splotches began to appear on the ground, pools of black, as if the remains of a dark rain that had never come. They were small at first but spread quickly, staining the earth.

And from the nearest one, arrived something almost inexplicable to Parson's eyes.

A dark rainbow. Swirling and visibly confusing. But it seemed to have a shape. Like an arm reaching up out of the ground. It gripped the solid ground outside of the dark splotch and pulled itself up, retrieving more of its shape, revealing a larger, more beastly figure--yet still fully covered in the rainbow.

Everyone backed away from it, even Germal who was growling like an animal now.

But much to their surprise, as soon as the beastly rainbow form finished clawing its way out of its murky pit, it collapsed onto the ground.

Was it breathing?

It seemed to be. And quite heavily, too. As if it were exhausted.

Germal, meanwhile, was still on all fours and growling.

Parson was so baffled that he didn't even know where to begin asking questions or who might even possess answers.

Then the rainbow moved, but the figure it was attached to did not. Its dark swirls slid down the beastly form like oozing paint, and the monster beneath it was revealed more clearly.

A giant wolf? Silver gray fur. It merely lay there, not moving, aside from its barrel-sized chest as it was panting.

Inexplicably, Germal started barking at it. Or was he barking at the rainbow ooze? Parson had no idea.

The ooze was still moving, though. Even after dripping off the dog completely, Parson could see it pulsing and twitching erratically on its own.

Germal was backing away from the scene, even as he continued barking. Parson was inclined to follow his lead on this one.

Without warning, the rainbow slime jolted straight toward Germal.

Damian, however, intervened. From too far away, he threw a punch with his right fist, and an invisible impact bridged the distance and blasted a massive chunk of the slime before it could touch Germal.

'Why is it going after him?' said Nerovoy.

The question went unanswered as a separate chunk of the slime leapt toward Germal from another angle.

Parson was the one to stop it this time, with a soaring blade of wind that he'd sacrificed the skin of his left forearm to create.

The different bits of ooze all bristled with seeming frustration for a moment, then started moving towards one another again, perhaps trying to recompile.

'Kill it,' said Feromas with commanding force, grabbing Damian's shoulder. 'Do whatever you have to do.'

Parson felt Overra grab his as well, and the regenerative vigor flowed through his body.

Perhaps sensing the danger, however, the ooze burrowed suddenly underground, causing cracks and tremors beneath their feet with increasing force.

Parson saw the cracks grow suddenly in the direction of the restaurant they had just left, and scarcely a moment passed before the foundation of the entire building shifted. A few shrieks rang out from the people still inside.

"Stay with Germal!" shouted Damian. And without waiting for a response, he bounded into the building.

More shouts and even more violent tremors erupted, and the building shifted again, this time shattering all of its windows and causing the walls to buckle.

Parson placed himself in front of Germal, who for whatever reason had finally stopped barking.

Then Damian came crashing back out of the building through a wall. A young woman was in his arms, one of the waitresses, Parson recognized. Damian managed to land on his back instead of her.

And abruptly, the tremors stopped. Complete quiet arrived, save only for the panicked and terrified breaths of the woman in Damian's care.

Parson waited. A part of him wanted to just attack the ruined building with every blade of wind that he could create, but the thought of hitting the civilians inside stopped him.

But then those same civilians began to appear from the rubble, crawling out from under the collapsed roof or climbing atop it or emerging from behind a half-destroyed wall.

And they were not as they should be.

Even if he didn't pay attention to their abnormal movements or their too-still faces, Parson could sense something inherently wrong with their souls.

They were missing.

Whatever these creatures were, they were not the people who had been in that building a few minutes ago.

The reapers could tell something was wrong with them, too, and tried to warn their servants, but Parson was too focused on what these soulless husks were doing to listen.

The husks all lunged toward them in unison.

Parson and Damian smacked them all down without much difficulty, but they refrained from using deadly force. Whatever was happening here, these were still, seemingly, innocent people. Even if their souls were missing, perhaps they could be recovered in some way.

That was what Parson's Vanguardian instincts were telling him, and he was glad to see that Damian was apparently thinking something similar.

When the tremors returned, however, so did the rainbow ooze from beneath the cracks in the ground. And when it began to slather itself all over the soulless husks, everything that Parson had just been thinking went out the window.

The husks changed. Their bodies contorted impossibly. Grotesquely. And they grew. As big as gorillas. New limbs sprouted from their backs or even their necks. Their heads twisted and twitched, some splitting a part and becoming two or even three.

The rainbow's swirling colors seemed to melt away into nothingness, but in their wake, their work was apparent. New faces were there on the husks, but not on their heads. On their bulging stomachs. On their extra-jointed legs. Or their torn-open arms.

For a few horrible moments, Parson could only stare, eyes wide with disbelief. This couldn't be real. It was impossible.

And yet, it was also somehow... familiar.

He had glimpsed similar forms before with his waking eyes. Forty years ago. In the infinite infinities of Chaos itself.

They had been only fleeting images at best, but he was recalling them clearly now.

Madness.

He remembered, too, being underwhelmed. He remembered thinking that such impossible things couldn't touch reality, couldn't affect it any way.

Ha.

He'd been a fool.

The distorted husks all began moving at once, completely unlike their previously human selves. They leapt or crawled or scuttled to and fro--but it was clear enough that they were all coming for the trio again.

Parson and Damian did not hold back this time.

The nearest one exploded into meaty chunks as Damian pointed at it with a fist, and the one next to it was shredded to pieces by a flurry of wind blades. A dozen more were still coming as the two men stood back to back with only Germal between them on the ground.

Parson, for his half of the enemies, sacrificed most of his left arm in order to summon a small tornado. He didn't want to make it too large, else it would disrupt whatever Damian was doing. And the abominable husks all had an obvious heft to them, so the tornado didn't have enough power in it to send them flying--but it did have enough to slow them down.

He could see them struggling to summon various counterattacks of their own--flames from one of their many mouths or bolts of crackling blue energy or even bubbling green acid.

He didn't intend to give them the opportunity to use any of that.

'Rozum,' he thought.

And Overra obliged.

The pan-rozum merge provided him with more than enough control to manipulate the tornado that he'd previously created. He was therefore able to dive headlong into it without having to worry about the winds slowing him down like the husks.

He blitzed cleanly through the roaring maelstrom as quickly as one might blink, and in rapid succession, he crushed each of the disfigured abominations into the ground with a bone-breaking blow straight to their skulls.

Within seconds, his work was done, and he and Overra separated again so as not to let pan-rozum keep draining their collective stamina.

It looked like Damian was just about finished as well, though his work was far messier.

Germal, meanwhile, was still on the ground and shaking his head.

Parson was just waiting for the rainbow ooze to reappear so that he could obliterate it with his most powerful attack. The Instant Air Burst. It would require sacrificing almost all of the flesh in his body, but pan-forma could fix that in no time, and Overra was still attached to his back, ready to activate it.

What happened next, however, completely disrupted his plans.

Overra gasped with sudden panic and activated pan-forma without asking. 'The Mad Demon!'

'Wh--?!'

That was all the warning the reaper managed to give him before the ground beneath everyone's feet erupted with the force of a volcano.

Parson was sent tumbling through the air, completely confused and disoriented. He thought he saw the rainbow again in all the mayhem. It wasn't until he transfigured oxygen all over his body that he managed to catch himself in midair and reassess the situation.

And indeed, it was true.

From his position in the sky, looking down on the smoldering crater where the restaurant and surrounding property used to be, Parson saw the man standing there amidst the smoke--the man whose face he had only ever seen in wanted posters among the Vanguard.

The Mad Demon himself. Morgunov.

The rainbow ooze was wrapped around his arm, thrashing wildly as if to escape his clutches, while Morgunov just seemed to be calmly inspecting it and smiling.

Parson tried to think. The Mad Demon was here--quite possibly the most dangerous person on the planet. What was the best way to handle this development? Did Morgunov know who he was? That he was Vanguard? Would it be better to just flee?

Damian just ignored all of those concerns and called out to him. "Morgunov! What the hell are you doing here?!" Somehow, he sounded more like he was talking to a child than to his superior officer. "Don't tell me you were following me again!"

"Okay, I won't tell you!" said Morgunov, not bothering to remove his gaze from the slime.

Germal seemed to be regaining his senses, Parson noticed.

Parson was reluctant to get any closer to the Mad Demon, so he decided to to move toward Germal instead.

"You can't keep doing this," Damian said, having walked right up to him. "I told you. I need my space."

"Aw, don't be like that," said Morgunov. "I was just concerned for your well-being, my boy."

"Yes, well, as you can see, I'm perfectly fine."

"Hmm, I'm not so sure you are. You wouldn't have allowed me to follow you if you were in top form." With his free hand, Morgunov touched Damian's forehead. "You're not coming down with something, are you?"

Damian batted him away. "Stop that. You're being ridiculous."

"Silly boy. Just because you're a servant doesn't mean you're immune to sickness."

"Um. Yes, it does."

Morgunov just stared at him for a second. "Oh, yeah, I guess you're right. But hey, you should still be careful. What if someone engineered a new disease that specifically targets servants, huh? Where will you and all of your certitude be then, huh?"

Damian's expression was flat. "And who would do such a thing? Other than you?"

"What, I don't count?" said Morgunov. "I could betray you at any time, you know. Why, perhaps I'll use this technicolor puke here to achieve some nefarious end. You can never be too careful, Damian. Why aren't you wearing the mittens I made for you? They'll help keep the germs at bay, you know. Especially in this cold."

Damian ignored the question and asked his own. "You say you were worried about me, but I was hardly in any danger. Why did you really decide to show yourself?"

Morgunov's smile became briefly manic in that infamous way. "I was planning to just observe from afar, but when this little guy appeared, my curiosity was piqued." The rainbow slime was slapping him in the face with enough force to create ground-shaking impacts, but it didn't seem to be bothering him in the slightest. "I'll admit, I was worried that you and your friends here were going to destroy it without even bothering to analyze it first! Which would've been so heartless of you! I mean, just look at how cute it is!"

The ooze manifested a sudden mouth and hissed at him.

"Ehehe. What should I call you? Binky? Slime-o? Stretchy McJeffy?"

Parson was helping Germal to his feet, finally, but he was still wary of moving any closer to Morgunov. Maybe it didn't matter at this point, but frankly, he was at a loss for what to do now.

Damian and Feromas seemed to be having a silent conversation, but it was again Damian who decided to speak up. "That thing was trying to kill us."

"You don't know that," said Morgunov. "Maybe Slime-o just wanted some attention."

It latched onto his face.

Morgunov grabbed it with his other hand and squeezed it like a balloon before yanking it off again. "Some face-hugging attention. But isn't that what we all want, at the end of the day? I don't see what's so wrong about it."

"It kept attacking us," said Damian. "And I'm certain it was trying to touch my friend over there."

And Morgunov's gaze finally turned to Parson and Germal. "Mmhmm. And just who are these friends of yours, by the way?" Somehow, the man's smile only ever seemed to widen. "Introduce me, why don't you?"

Did he really not know? Parson had to wonder. He certainly didn't know the Mad Demon like Damian did, but it didn't seem unlikely that the man might decide to play dumb on any number of different subjects.

Apparently, Damian had been thinking the same thing. "Don't act like you don't already know. I'm sure you know exactly who they are."

"Hmm." Morgunov turned slowly toward Damian and, with an abrupt flatness, said, "Perhaps I just wanted to know if you would try to lie to me again."

At that, Damian seemed to lose most of his fervor, and Parson could feel a physical difference in the environment. The upturned earth all around them shifted beneath the extra weight in the air. Even the slime on Morgunov's arm settled down.

Without moving his head, Morgunov's silver-gray eyes shifted to Germal. "You. You are one of the Monster's men, are you not?"

"I am." Germal looked perfectly calm, at least.

Morgunov spared a glance for Parson as well but chose not to address him and returned to Germal. A morsel of his earlier cheer found his face again. "What does Slime-o want with you?"

"I have no idea," said Germal.

"Hazard a guess, then," said Morgunov.

Germal opened his mouth but apparently didn't know what to say. He looked to Nerovoy for help, then to Parson.

Parson wished he hadn't done that, because it made Morgunov look in his direction, too.

"Do you know something?" said the Mad Demon.

Parson clenched his jaw, trying to think.

The silence only seemed to amuse Morgunov. "Come now, General Miles. Your hesitation does a disservice to the Vanguard's reputation."

Parson struggled not to scowl.

"What would your Lawman think if he was here? I imagine he would be embarrassed by his pupil, hmm?" The Mad Demon smiled wide again. "Or do you think he, too, would be afraid?"

'Parson,' came Overra's private voice.

He didn't need her to say anything more. He knew what she was warning him against. No matter how much he cared for Lamont as his mentor, he wasn't about to let this bastard goad him into reacting stupidly.

At the same time, however, Parson didn't know how he was supposed to avoid Morgunov's questions. He very much did NOT think it was a good idea to share his encounter with Ettol. There was no telling what the Mad Demon would do if he knew that Germal was supposedly "a key unto Chaos," as Ettol had claimed.

"Not very cooperative, eh?" said Morgunov. "Well, I can't say I'm surprised. I suppose I could just force you to tell me, but..." His gaze returned to the slime. "How about you, Slime-o? Do you know anything useful?"

It shivered visibly.

"Don't be scared. Share with me all your secrets, and you'll see just how kind I can be." He held the slime up to his head, right by his ear. "Here. I'll make it easy for you."

Still, it just sat there, shivering.

"Go on. I know you're tempted. Show me what a Primordial is really capable of, why don't you?"

The slime stopped suddenly, then bristled one more time. It launched itself against Mogunov's head and started struggling there.

Parson squinted as he watched, unsure what was happening until he noticed that the slime was slowly shrinking.

It was disappearing.

Into the Mad Demon's ear.

Into his head.

Morgunov looked far from concerned, however. His eyes were alight with as much excitement as Parson had ever seen. "Oh, wow! I see! Yes! So that's what you were hiding! Ooh, and I feel quite ill as well! I could yack at any moment! Amazing!"

Parson found the scene so repulsive that he thought he might vomit at any moment, as well.

But it was all he could do to watch and wait, for whatever happened next--for whatever Morgunov decided to do.

The Mad Demon's head twitched grotesquely as he eyed his own hands.

Then, the rainbow gradually began to appear again, as if melting out of his skin. But it didn't quite look like ooze or slime any more. It was more like just a coating around Morgunov's body.

Or a shadow, perhaps. One of many colors.

"Ehehe!" Morgunov raised his hands towards the sky, and his laughter only seemed to heighten with each passing moment. "Well, well, well! Isn't this just the greatest gift that a man of science could have ever asked for?! What have I done to deserve this?! Oh, magnificent God of All That Is Not! Have my sacrifices truly pleased you this much?! Rarely have I ever known humility in my life, yet even I can't help feeling unworthy of such love! Ehehe!"

Parson wished he were anywhere but here, right now. The man's laugh carried through the air, as if being amplified by the field density of his soul, and Parson could've sworn that the night sky was becoming even darker than it already was. The more he watched and the more he listened, the more he realized how terrifyingly accurate the moniker of "the Mad Demon" truly was.

"This wealth of knowledge is nigh unbearable!" cackled Morgunov. "Ignorant world! You leave me no choice! I must share it with you!" He turned suddenly, and his gaze snapped to Germal. "O, Heart's Trinket! I see your Path! Allow me to help you achieve Fulfillment!"

And in a flash of dark brown, Morgunov blinked out of existence, only to reappear with both hands already wrapped around Germal's head.

"What are you--?!" The words died in Germal's throat and were replaced by a bloodcurdling scream.

"Yes! YES! See and understand, young one!"

Damian and Parson were both moving. Their friend's agony was proof enough that there could be no peaceful resolution to this situation, and it now seemed an insane notion to Parson that he ever humored the idea that there could be.

Whether they lived or died here--it mattered not. They could not stand idly by and watch.

Parson loosed a surge of wind blades, but they broke harmlessly upon a sudden wall of red. And when the red vanished, Morgunov and Germal and Nerovoy were all gone, having blinked a dozen meters to their right.

Damian reacted first and attacked with an invisible impact. The red shade rose to Morgunov's defense again, but this time it buckled under the force of the blow.

Parson and Overra resorted to pan-forma once more and concentrated on increasing their speed. Multiple small jets of transfigured oxygen appeared on his back and behind each limb. He'd had considerable practice with this technique in the past and could now control it effortlessly even while being propelled along at speeds high enough to tear a normal body to shreds.

Parson launched another flurry of wind blades in advance as he dove straight toward Morgunov. They didn't do much, but they were just padding while he prepped a pressurized drill in place of his entire right hand. As soon as he was close enough, he would--

Morgunov caught him by the throat.

Parson found himself completely immobilized, though he couldn't tell precisely how. A swirl of colors flashed across his vision and when he looked at the drill that should have replaced his right hand, he instead found the limb replaced with something transparent.

Glass? He had a glass arm now?

He didn't get the opportunity to process what had happened before Damian barreled into the group, jostling Parson free of Morgunov's grasp but not Germal.

"Release him!" yelled Damian with two voices.

"Ehehe! Calm down, dear boy! Your turn will come!"

"I said release him, Demon!"

Parson was on the ground, struggling to regain himself. Even with pan-forma making his regeneration almost instantaneous, the glass was getting in the way of his flesh regrowing properly--and even more of his body had been replaced by it than he'd first realized. Only his head, chest, and left arm were still flesh and blood. He had to break the glass to free himself.

By the time Parson was back on his feet, Damian was caught in Morgunov's shadowy grip as well. Most of Damian's body was glass, and Morgunov was holding his face with one hand and Germal's face with the other.

"Become as you were meant to be! See truth unlike you have ever known!"

Both of his old friends were screaming in agony, and so were their reapers.

Parson's most reliably powerful attack would require sacrificing most of his body, but the collateral damage might very well destroy the very people he was trying to save in the process. He had to do something else--and what came to mind in that moment was far riskier.

'Rozum,' he told Overra.

She melted out of his body for the briefest moment to deactivate pan-forma before returning to it and reactivating pan-rozum.

He wasted no time. His body divided in two, creating a second Parson.

But he doubted that would be enough. This was the Mad Demon they were dealing with. And they weren't likely to get another chance.

Parson demanded more. Difficulty be damned.

A third Parson. A fourth. A fifth. And finally, a sixth.

Six of himself. Six warriors of oxygen, manifested with pan-rozum.

It was so much information at once, overwhelming his mind even with Overra's help. But that hardly mattered now. He didn't need to know it all. He only needed to know his goal.

All six moved together. Three attacked the Mad Demon in unison directly. One grabbed Germal. One grabbed Damian. And the last stayed back, readying his most powerful attack--the same attack that he'd elected not to use with pan-forma a moment ago.

The Instant Air Burst.

As soon as the others were clear, the sixth clone would sacrifice its entire body to use it.

But Morgunov did not make it that simple, of course.

The Mad Demon teleported again, and half of the Parsons accompanied him--the two trying to free Damian and Germal, along with one other who was clinging to Morgunov's back and trying to drill into it. The remaining three Parsons gave chase.

Morgunov jumped several more times before apparently realizing that the three clones clinging to him were not going to be thrown off. In another shadowy flash, the clone trying to free Damian was turned entirely to glass, but the one trying to free Germal actually succeeded.

"So many new powers!" said Morgunov, teleporting again. "So much to play with! It's almost too much! Even for me!

With Parson and Overra's consciousness now divided between five bodies, it was relatively easy to track the Mad Demon's erratic movements.

It was not so easy to do anything about the multicolored swamp that kept expanding outward all around him. Two of the clones became quickly stuck, waist deep, and had to separate themselves at their torsos and retreat to the air with hovering tornadoes of oxygen. The clone on Morgunov's back had been swallowed almost immediately.

Germal and Nerovoy were both out cold, and one of the Parsons had to pick them up and carry them so that they didn't get swallowed by the swamp.

The four remaining clones all spread out, each finding a point of high ground to squat on--chimney, a pine tree, a tall boulder, and a rooftop. Parson and Overra's collective consciousness tried to reevaluate the situation as a sudden lull in the chaos arrived.

Damian and Feromas were still in Morgunov's grasp, but they were no longer screaming. Perhaps they had fallen unconscious like Germal and Nerovoy. What in the world had the Mad Demon done to all of them?

"Little Vanguardian!" came the Demon's echoing call. He was high up in the air as well, propped up by a tower of rainbow shadows. "Would you like to know the secrets of this world, too?! I am generous, but I am not sure I wish to share them with you, little Vanguardian! Perhaps if you show me that you are deserving, I might change my mind!"

Parson didn't plan to take him up on that offer, but he was having trouble coming up with what to do, instead. Madly, he could sense Overra's thoughts humoring the idea. Perhaps whatever Morgunov had done to the others wasn't actually that bad. Perhaps Morgunov really was trying to help them in some strange way.

Those arguments only served to make Parson angry.

"Alas!" shouted Morgunov. "It seems our time together is at an end!"

Parson didn't know what he was talking about.

Then the rainbow shadows swirled one more time and vanished. Blinking? Teleporting?

When Morgunov had teleported every time previously, there had been the briefest flash of brown, but Parson hadn't seen that this time. And none of the Parsons could see where Morgunov had jumped to, either.

"Improve thyself!" came Morgunov's voice again, seemingly disembodied. "I will be taking my silly boy back with me, but I hope you and I will meet again, one day! Little Vanguardian! Ehehe! Until then, farewell!"

And Parson waited. And kept waiting.

Nothing happened.

He didn't understand. Why had he just left like that? Had the Demon sensed someone else approaching in the distance? And if so, who? Parson wasn't sensing anyone, even after all this time waiting.

But at length, he knew that if he remained in pan-rozum much longer, he would begin to lose himself. Parson and Overra chose the clone nearest Germal as the location of their split, and the other three Parsons all disappeared into whiffs of dematerializing oxygen.

The fatigue hit him immediately and strongly, but he knew there was much work still to be done. And he was worried that something else might--

"Just kidding." Morgunov's whispering voice was right in his ear this time.

Without even a moment to think, Parson tried to wrench himself away from the voice, but it was too late. The Mad Demon's hand found his neck, and the swirling rainbow shadow turned him around to face Morgunov.

"I apologize for lying like that. Lying is such a base form of trickery--I know. But hey! If it works, it works, eh?! Ehehe!"

Parson tried to speak, but the Mad Demon's hold on his throat was too strong. How did he have such strength? The man didn't have two voices. He didn't appear to be in a hyper-state. And his reaper, Bool, was nowhere to be seen.

Overra, however, could still talk despite her shadowy bindings. 'Explain yourself, Demon. What have you done to them, exactly? And why?'

"Hee-hee, so good of you to ask! Your curiosity speaks well of your worthiness! But that alone is not enough, I am afraid!"

'Then what must we do to prove ourselves?'

"A good question, hmm! Perhaps if--" Morgunov cut himself off as his eyes locked with Parson's. He clicked his tongue before smiling in that horrible way again. "No. You have already born witness, haven't you? To Chaos?"

He might've answered if his throat wasn't being crushed. For all this madman's ramblings, Parson felt as if he might actually know what Morgunov was talking about this time.

The Mad Demon laughed. "Would you like to see it again?!" Wide-eyed, he forced Parson to nod his head, treating him like a puppet. "Oh?! Such courage! What's that, you say?! You aren't frightened at all?!" He made Parson shake his head. "My, my! Are you, perhaps, suggesting that you would like to do more than merely see it again?!"

Parson's mind was racing as Morgunov forced him to nod another time. He could of course transfigure his entire body at once, excepting only his brain. That was the one thing that a transfiguration user could not manipulate directly, and leaving Morgunov with his brain certainly wouldn't improve his circumstances--or Overra's, which was the real problem here. Even if he exploded his entire body and destroyed his brain in the blast radius, how would that help her? It could very well kill her.

Agh, and this fatigue. He could hardly think straight. What could be done? Were there truly no options?

"I admire your enthusiasm!" Morgunov was saying. "But witnessing Chaos is quite different from experiencing it, you know!" He giggled and propped up Damian and Germal's limp bodies. "Why, just ask them! When they wake up, of course!"

Parson tried to keep struggling against the shadow, but even that much effort was proving difficult for him. The energy just seemed to be draining out of him. Was his body being turned to glass again? He couldn't tell. Maybe it was just pan-rozum's aftereffects.

Whatever it was, he was losing hope by the second.

But Overra, bless her, was still trying.

'What is this Chaos you keep referring to?' she asked, sounding genuinely curious and quite calm somehow. Hell, maybe she really was both of those things, but Parson highly doubted it.

Reapers were like that, weren't they? Always desperately trying to talk their way out of a situation--and always trying not to sound desperate when doing so. Parson had learned that long ago.

"To attempt to explain Chaos would be doing it a profound disservice," said Morgunov. "All that is not, all that may yet be--even all that should not be. Can you even begin to imagine that? I do not think--"

Morgunov's expression froze, and his mind abruptly seemed to be elsewhere.

Was he sensing something unexpected? Parson's own senses were too foggy to tell.

The Mad Demon turned around just in time to see a pair of open jaws, mere inches from his face. They had been halted by the rainbow shadow, apparently, and when they snapped shut, Parson recognized the silver fur of the giant wolf from earlier.

"Ah," said Morgunov, though he sounded considerably less jovial now. "The Beast of Ardora. Still, you persist. But of course you do, hmm? The Prime Hunt must continue, mustn't it?"

The beast's growl had enough force behind it to make the surrounding shadows tremble.

"Do you even remember anything?" said Morgunov. "Or are you now a creature of instinct alone?"

The growl grew into a snarl, and this time, the shadows shuddered so strongly that the wolf was able to thrash itself free again.

"Uh-oh!" said Morgunov, too late but still smiling.

The beast's jaws found the man's shoulder and bit through it.

The attached arm had been holding Parson, and with it severed, he dropped to the rooftop below and rolled haphazardly down its wooden shingles, taking several with him. He tried to catch himself on the ledge, but the shingle that he grabbed just ripped free, and he went flying off.

He hit the already-broken ground with a thud and groaned as he tried to get his bearings back. The sense of urgency in the back of his mind spurred him on, despite his entire body protesting, and when he looked up, he saw Overra there. The wolf had freed her, too?

She melted into his body without a word, and he felt the hyper-state once more.

Not pan-rozum. They'd already stretched themselves to the limit with that one. But pan-forma was still doable.

Parson launched himself up into the air with legs of pure wind and reassessed the situation.

He was not prepared for what he saw next.

The wolf had grown to twice, or perhaps even thrice, its previous size. And its fur was even blacker than the night surrounding it. And moving. Almost like a shadow of its own.

The rainbow shadow raged even more wildly around Morgunov than it had before, but the beast was not being deterred. Parson could hardly believe his eyes, but it looked like the beast might've actually been pushing the Mad Demon back. Its hulking teeth and claws were tearing through the rainbow shade like so much paper. And... eating it?

Parson couldn't let himself remain awestruck, though. He may not have known the first thing about that monstrous dog over there, but he knew that he had to give it every bit of assistance possible.

Catching up with them proved rather difficult with how fast they were both moving, and as he got closer, Parson began to notice greater and greater changes in the environment. The air was thicker, making it harder to breathe, and it felt like there was an electric charge gathering around him, too.

And his vision.

The ability to see souls was decidedly not helpful here. Wisps of souls--or at least, soul-like energy--could be found all around him, like fragmentary embers escaping a fire.

At first, he was horrified, thinking they were all souls belonging to the hapless citizens of Bellvine--hundreds, if not thousands of people being killed.

But that couldn't be it, he realized. The battle between the Morgunov and Beast was certainly razing the land all around them and leveling buildings like they were sand castles, but they simply weren't covering enough ground to have killed so many people in so short a time.

Which begged the question.

Where was all this soul power in the environment coming from?

Parson had only ever seen this phenomenon twice before--and both times, it had been when two emperors clashed.

He didn't get the opportunity to dwell on it, however.

Morgunov vanished underground, and a moment later, a chunk of landmass as big as a city block was cast into the air. Parson had to stop and throw himself out of its path, but even while it was still in midair, he caught sight of the wolf running horizontally across its uneven body as easily as water flowing over a rocky riverbed.

Parson decided to follow the wolf's lead. It seemed like it still had a perfect bead on Morgunov's location, regardless of all the obstacles and debris in the way.

Attacking the Mad Demon head on was obviously a bad idea, but if he could provide covering fire for the wolf from a distance, then perhaps that would be enough.

Parson loosed a barrage of wind blades from his hands as he soared around Morgunov. The Mad Demon's arm had not grown back after being ripped off by the dog earlier, but it didn't seem to have slowed him down at all. Parson kept up the pressure while the dog torpedoed closer.

Just before impact, however, Morgunov decided to simply take Parson's attack and spun around to catch the wolf by its open and salivating jaws. The Beast tried to bite down, but the man's horde of shadows had a hold on it as well, so even with one hand, he was able to check the Beast's advance.

The wolf wasn't exactly stopping, though. His massive bulk still pushed Morgunov backward, digging into the earth when the emperor's legs didn't budge and carving out a visible path of destruction through Bellvine.

Parson hadn't expected his wind blades to do much, but the fact that Morgunov just ignored what little damage they had done was a problem. He needed to go stronger.

He readied the Instant Air Burst again as he tried to move in closer. Maybe this time, he'd actually get the chance to use it.

He could hear the Beast roaring again, and he could see the emperor's shade wavering as well, but at the end of the exchange, it was the wolf who went flying backward from a one-handed punch from Morgunov.

And even among the increasing number of shrieks from innocent bystanders, Parson heard that familiar cackle one more time.

"Ah, this is so wonderful! I haven't had a fight this messy in ages!"

Parson thought he saw his opening while Morgunov was busy prattling on. He narrowed the distance a bit more and then launched--

Something blindsided him and clobbered through a line of trees.

"No, no, little Vanguardian! You'll have to be sneakier than that!"

The Instant Air Burst was dropped from his thoughts again, and he tried to pick himself up off the ground.

"Wouldn't it be better if we had more playmates?" said Morgunov. "We shouldn't keep all the fun to ourselves!"

At that, Parson expected to see Morgunov start turning the innocent bystanders into disfigured monsters, like the slime had done before, but that was not what happened.

Instead, entirely new monsters were starting to appear.

They came from the ground--or more precisely, from the black pools that the Mad Demon seemed to be summoning.

To Parson's disbelieving eyes, they were entirely inhuman. Impossible creatures. And not very alike in shape, either. Some were bloated, some were gangly. Some had far too many eyes, some had none at all. Some had several arms, some were just blobs. They didn't even all have heads.

The only shared feature among them seemed to be their sickly pale and gray skin, but even that had a degree of variation with spots, stripes, blemishes, spare hair, and probably more that Parson couldn't even see.

He was without words.

Was he really going to have to fight all these things? What were they?

However, as he was preparing himself for wherever this new nightmare was going to take him, the circumstances changed yet again.

Before any of the pale monsters climbed fully out of their black portals--or whatever the hell those were--they all stopped, frozen.

As did the Mad Demon, Parson noticed.

After a moment, the monsters all began to slink back down into the blackness below.

Morgunov clutched his head with his one hand. "No!" He dropped to his knees, trembling. "Listen to me!"

By now, Parson's utter confusion had amplified a dozen times over.

But he wasn't about to waste an opening.

He readied the Instant Air Burst once more, trying to hurry while the Mad Demon just sat there, having of some sort of existentially psychotic breakdown.

And perhaps the fourth time was the charm, because to Parson's own amazement, the attack actually, finally connected.

Ninety percent of his body was sacrificed to heighten the attacks explosive power, but pan-forma's improved regenerative effects could take care of that problem in a matter of seconds.

When the dust cleared, a crater stood where Morgunov had been. He looked around for any trace of the man. And after a few more seconds of not finding it, Parson began to wonder.

Could it really be? Was the Mad Demon gone?

Parson hardly allowed himself to breathe. He wasn't sensing anything. Just more terrified people fleeing. And the dog approaching.

And the slime.

It was there in front of him--or what was left of it was, at least. Its movements were sluggish now. Tired, perhaps. Parson had to wonder if slime could even feel exhaustion.

He took a deep breath, finally, and let his legs buckle while he considered what to do. He wanted to run and leave all this madness behind. He wanted to go grab his two unconscious friends and never look back.

And a rather large part of him was still waiting for Morgunov to pop up again out of nowhere.

But that didn't happen.

The Beast reappeared first, ambling nearer at a leisurely pace. Its hulking body had shrunk back to its comparatively smaller form, and its black fur had reverted to silver again.

Oddly enough, the dog's calm movements helped to confirm for him that Morgunov really was gone.

Not for good, of course, but Parson wasn't about to complain. It would've been downright incredible if he had been able to capture the Mad Demon's head at the end of that fight, but the more he thought back on how it had all gone down, the more certain he was that he had made the right call. If he'd tried to hold back even a little bit in order to prevent the Instant Air Burst from obliterating Morgunov's head, then there was a decent chance that the bastard might have lived it well enough to keep fighting.

Then again, maybe that was just his lack of experience talking. Lamont probably would have been able to capture him in that situation. Morgunov had all but offered himself up.

Parson sighed.

Overra melted out of his body, ending the pan-forma merge, and yet another wave of fatigue washed over Parson. The reaper must've been feeling it, too, but she wasn't showing it.

'Hello,' she said to the giant wolf. 'Thank you for your help. I suspect my servant and I would be dead now, if not for you.'

That was an understatement, Parson thought. All of Bellvine probably would've been annihilated, though perhaps the Demon would've taken his time with that.

The Beast made no response. It only walked over to the pile of leftover rainbow sludge and gobbled it up.

Parson frowned. He would've like to have captured that stuff for study later.

The wolf licked its chops, threw them both a look, then lowered its butt and sat down. If not for its size, Parson might've mistook it for a regular old dog now.

'...Do you have a name? Mine is Overra, and this is Parson Miles. We are with the Vanguard.'

Still, the wolf said nothing.

Overra tried talking to it a few more times, but to no avail, and Parson was beginning to think the whole thing was a fool's errand. After a while, he decided to interrupt her.

'Overra,' he said, eyes still on the wolf.

'What?' she said in the echo of privacy.

'Are you sure that thing can even understand what you're saying?'

'I suppose not. You think I should try different languages?'

He rubbed his sore neck as he stretched it. 'Go ahead, but that wasn't what I was getting at.'

'What do you mean?'

'I mean, is that thing even a servant?'

She hesitated. 'Of course it is. Why wouldn't it be?'

Parson didn't have an explanation for her. Just a feeling that he couldn't quite articulate.

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