Chapter 131: The Confrontation
The plan was simple. The Dragon Paiiniak wanted to keep the peace between Xhag’duul and us. So all we had to do was go along with that. A simple “Yes, clearly you are wiser than us. Please help us accomplish peace,” and Paiiniak went along with it.
And what did it do to help? Well, it refused to do much, but it could do what Dragons normally did: sit around and do fuckall. It perched up high above us, as visible as it could be, to signal to Xhag’duul where we were. Something so obvious, he would have to come to us, right?
Obviously, I was taking advantage of the Dragon’s kindness a bit there. But I was also taking advantage of its ego and utter lack of perspective. It seemed like it was so completely out of touch with reality that not only could it not understand the idea that maybe peace wasn’t possible here, but it also didn’t realize that Xhag’duul would probably want to stay away from a massive Dragon, not go near it.
That was the main thing we were banking on, at least. The gamble was that, if Xhag’duul saw the Dragon, he would avoid it. But it was the best chance we had. If he had some way to know our general location—knowing that we left the road, where we left the road, and in what direction we left the road would all require that—then the Dragon would be our last hope. If he didn’t have any of that basic information, he wouldn’t have had any way to see the Dragon anyway, so it wasn’t like we were taking some huge risk, either. Effectively, if Xhag'duul was close enough to us to see the Dragon and have our location signaled to him, he'd be close enough to find us anyway.
So in that situation, we wouldn't be able to hide. Therefore, scaring him off was our best bet. Otherwise, he’d easily zero in on us. It also served to ward off any other predators.
So, with Paiiniak getting attention for our “peace meeting,” we set off and continued forward to the Barinruth Empire. We had to be close by now, I practically begged whatever gods were watching. I didn’t expect the Dragon to buy us an infinite amount of time, but if we could just get a bit more, maybe we could get there. We, of course, explained to Paiiniak that we were just running in an attempt to find Xhag’duul ourselves, too, and to just stick above us if we ever moved too far away.
As we swiftly moved through the forest, we tried our best to keep an eye out for any threats and cover up the tracks we left behind. I kept track of the time, too. When we’d died in the last timeline, it had been around noon. Then I reset time and went back a few hours, but by this point, enough time had passed that it was a bit past noon now. That meant the Demon had probably gotten to where we’d been before. If he had any way to track us, he’d be close on our tail by now.
Stressful minute after stressful minute passed as we traveled through the rocky mountains as quickly as possible while also being as stealthy as possible. Every now and then, Paiiniak would swoop through the air to keep itself above us, which I was thankful for because of the protection, but it also startled me beyond belief every time because of the noise. Despite my heightened nerves, though, we didn’t have any hostile encounters. Maybe our strategy with the Dragon was actually working. At the very least, it seemed to be deterring the nearby Drakes; every time it moved, I could see a couple more of the smaller-scaled beasts fly off from their resting points, away from its intimidating presence.
Who knew how long it’d take until that Demon saw through our ruse, though.
Another minute passed. And another, and another. Every hill we climbed, every corner we turned, I hoped more than anything we’d see a sign of civilization. And every time we didn’t see it, I lost yet more hope. If we couldn’t reach them in this timeline, while we were not only moving as quickly as we could, but also buying extra time with this Dragon, how could we ever hope to survive the Demon in the next? I had exactly one more try after this. If we found out it was impossible to reach now, what could we even attempt next time? No, this was effectively our last shot. We had to succeed now.
I climbed through a gap between two boulders, squeezing through the wall and tumbling out the other side. And once I was through, I looked around at my surroundings, trying to figure out where to go next. But when I glanced ahead, I saw something that almost made me cry with joy.
Civilization.
Not anything huge—no city, or even village. But it was a small outpost, probably around a thousand paces away. From my perspective, it was a tiny dot in the landscape, but I could see some figures moving around on it. Were they guards? It made sense that the Barinruth Empire, whose borders were nestled up close to Kingdom’s Edge, would need to keep guard outposts near the mountain range that housed Drakes and Dragons nearby. And if they did employ these guards, they’d obviously have to be seriously high-Leveled in order to repel such monsters.
In short, it was our salvation. So close! It wouldn’t take more than a few minutes to get there.
I looked back and hurriedly helped Erani and Ainash through the gap between the boulders, too, silently messaging Ainash and asking her to pass the word along to Erani. “Guard outpost! A thousand paces or so ahead, right where those paths cross!”
I watched as both of their expressions lit up in joy and relief and they gazed upon the same sight of salvation that I’d seen. There was the slight issue of the Dragon above us and how it’d probably follow us right up to the guards employed precisely to repel such a monster, but that problem was much preferred to the Demon chasing us. We just needed to get help from them, and our lives would be saved.
Taking care not to trip and fall, I quickly began making my way down the steep slope of the mountain range, beginning what seemed to be our last journey alone in this gods-forsaken valley. But just as I took my first steps, I heard movement from above. Glancing upward, I saw the Dragon, Paiiniak, shift its head to look over behind us. What was it looking at? It squinted its eyes, like it was trying to confirm what it saw, and then…
“Ah!” it exclaimed in a thunderous boom of a voice. “A Demon! You must be here for the peace treaty.”
Blood drained from my face. I couldn’t even yell up at Paiiniak to shut up, because to do so would give my position away regardless. I mentally screamed at Ainash to please ask the Dragon to shut its mouth—make up some sort of lie, quick, to get it to feign aggression and scare it away, or act like it was some peace treaty involving people other than us, or something. But as I did so, I heard a muffled voice come up from behind us, shouting up at the Dragon. I couldn’t make it out, but I recognized the tone.
“Yes, yes, with those two Human fellows and the Nymph,” Paiiniak responded to the voice’s question. “They’re right down here, below me! I do hope you can hash out your differences.”
With that, I simply made the decision to sprint away as quickly as I could, Erani seeming to arrive at the same conclusion as I did and running alongside me, pulling Ainash along by the arm. We were so close—so gods-damned close—to safety. If we could just make it a bit further, we’d get there.
I activated Expedite on all of us time after time after time, pushing every one of us to our limits with the Spell in order to squeeze out as many paces of distance as we could until the Demon inevitably saw us and approached.
And, as if on cue, I heard a smashing sound and looked back to see the two boulders we’d squeezed through blasted apart, shards of stone exploding across the mountainside to reveal a familiar Demon, sadistic grin on his face. He glanced back and forth until he locked eyes on me, and his smile grew wider.
“Take care not to hurt each other!” Paiiniak shouted from above, watching us both with a self-satisfied smile. Fucking idiot! I’d even asked it not to call out to the Demon if it saw him. Why couldn’t it just listen to what I said?!
“Sure, sure,” the Demon—Xhag’duul—called back up to it. “We’re just going to have a little spar. Prove who’s stronger, just for fun. Thanks again for pointing him out to me. Huge help.”
I looked back at our destination. We’d barely made any progress. It was still probably nine hundred paces away, at least. With how much faster this thing was than us, there was no possibility we’d even make it to the halfway point before he slaughtered us all.
So I made a split-second decision.
I stopped in my tracks and turned to face my opponent.
“Arlan!” Erani turned to me, trying to tug me along.
“Go!” I said. “Get help, now! I have Dark Plate and Expedite, I can probably hold him off for a bit of extra time.”
“I’ll leave Ainash to help you—”
“No!” I said, remembering the grisly sight of her head being crushed between the monster’s fingers. I didn’t care if I could reset things, I couldn’t watch it happen again. “Take her along. Protect her. Just get help, and come back for me.”
Ainash, no doubt feeling the emotion I felt in that moment, looked at me with teary eyes.
Threshold reached.
Your Bond with Level 30 Draconiad has deepened.
Due to your Bond being deepened, it has undergone the following changes:
Stat Increase: From 8 to 10
XP Gain: From 4% to 5%
Heat Resistance: From 21.9% to 26.6%
I suppressed a laugh at the notification. What a consolation prize. Maybe the two extra Stats would help me with the Demon that could one-shot me?
Erani took a fraction of a second to get one last look at me, and then turned and ran, tugging Ainash with her and continuing down the hill and toward the outpost.
“How sweet,” I heard a voice directly behind me.
I jumped and turned to face Xhag’duul, who was standing with his face right up to mine. I felt the breath from a sigh escaping his mouth and leaned back, putting maybe a single pace of distance between us. He’d really crossed all that distance in the time I’d just exchanged a few words with Erani.
“At least, I’d say it was sweet, if it wasn’t completely idiotic,” the Demon continued. “You think you can hold me off? For that long?”
I took a few steps back, trying to control my breathing. Just keep him occupied. I knew from experience that he liked to talk. Maybe he’d lose track of time if I kept him going.
“I mean, you’ve fought me before, right? Well, I assume that’s what this was all about,” he gestured all around himself. “You’ve died to me once before, and now that you know you can’t beat me, you’re trying to run? It’s pathetic. But at least I get to know for sure that you’re weak enough to know, yourself, that you can’t do anything to kill me. Boosts my confidence a little. Tell me, how many times have you died to me so far? It’s been my little theory so far that you only get one reset per day, but maybe it works more like Temporus and you get a couple?”
I just looked at him as he peered through the gaps in my helmet, saying nothing.
Then he shrugged. “Fine. If you don’t want to have a little conversation, we don’t have to. Let’s just get this over—”
“Once,” I spat out, desperate to keep him from initiating combat. “I’ve died to you once.”
“Just the one time, huh?” he nodded. “Makes sense. You fight and die, so your next plan is to just run. You got any more lives in that little Class of yours? Or is this your last? Will this version of me get the pleasure of keeping the memories of your death?”
Mind racing, I began to form a plan in my head. Something that may be able to put him on the backfoot. If my goal was just to keep him talking, keep him occupied, maybe this could work. And… I thought to myself, going over all of the different possibilities. Yes, yes, I could even spin this around. I could get him on my side with this. If I played my cards right here, I wouldn’t just stall the threat, I’d neutralize it completely! With what little knowledge I had of this guy, he may have given me just enough to pull this off.
“I’ve got more resets,” I said.
“Oh? How many?”
I straightened my back, trying to show as much false confidence as I could. “One hundred.”
Xhag'duul's face went slack.
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