The Referee

Johan’s very existence was sin. Every breath he took went against the laws of nature, and for a long time this did not offend me for I too stood above those laws. Those from above always watched the struggles of men of lower planes with something of a disdainful admiration, impressed by the tenacity of those humans who struggled to grasp their tenuous goals—and sometimes offered them the chance to ascend. Not to the highest of planes, but to a higher plane. Few humans were granted such honor, and even fewer lost it.

This was the first time I had witnessed an existence that defied those concepts. A creature who hadn’t been invited to climb up the staircase toward a higher plane, but rather ascended out of his own free will. Someone who stepped onto the domains of the Gods uninvited and felled one of them with his blade.

Johan, the Godslayer, was an anomaly.

And he had absorbed the God Sphere now.

Something is wrong, Carr thought. I have to back away now.

Carr didn’t have the ability to sense magic or anything of the sort. It was a baser, more animalistic instinct that warned him. Something deep within his existence dating back to the first humans that warned him, that screamed at him: Stay and die. It didn’t make any sense. The four swordsmen had all pierced Johan with their blades and he should have been at the brink of death now. Yet the sense of overwhelming fear he felt willed him to move. The man didn’t simply retreat, he leaped backward without ever turning his back to the creature before him.

At a safe distance, his first thought was that he had somehow survived. His second thought was that his sword arm was shaking now. It’s not just me, Carr realized, everyone else backed away too.

The four swordsmen all surrounded Johan now, having all moved so that their backs were toward the exit while the Godslayer stood with his back to the fire. Johan’s open wounds had healed and aside from the blood on his clothes it was as if the man had never been wounded at all. It felt more than mere magical healing, it was as if the very nature of his injuries had been denied.

“Is everyone alright?” Carr cried out. “Come on now, don’t go giving up on me!”

The other three all felt a sudden oddness in the air that Carr did not. Fedal attributed the change to his own nerves, with a vague spot spared for the unicorn and his meeting with Martim the Sinner. Max felt unnerved by the change, but he blamed it on his injury—he had lost an arm, and the pain was unbearable. Merely standing took all of his mental stack at the moment. Only Valle really gave the sensation any consideration.

It’s like the air changed its smell, Valle thought. The way my clothes feel against my skin isn’t the same anymore. The sensation of wind against my skin feels different. The blood dripping from my wounds feels cold instead of hot now. It wasn’t a big change. Someone else might have ignored it completely. Yet Valle had noticed it, and his instincts warned him that something deep within him, within his very world had changed permanently. My sword feels different.

“This is wrong,” Valle muttered. “We have Carr and we injured Johan a moment ago—let’s escape right now. Time to regroup and plan how to approach the war.”

“We have him cornered,” Carr answered back, but his voice was almost a whisper as well. Neither man dared to look away from Johan. “This is our best chance at taking him down.”

“No,” Valle said. “Right now, we don’t have all the information. Something…something is different. We should—”

Planning with your friends is a most difficult thing. Even a simple lunch meeting may take multiple confirmations, too much effort, and entirely too many misunderstandings about basic concepts thought to be severely implied before such a meeting can happen. Thus, in the middle of that chaos, when severe pain and blood loss were added to that mix, it was hardly surprising that Max of Relampago did not hear Valle of Cresna and dashed forward, using his Swordsmanship to power his moves.

*DON’T—*was all the King in Cresna managed to think before the man was past him.

Max of Relampago was not recklessly expecting victory. More than any of the others, he was a pessimist. This is not to say he was lacking in confidence, but rather that he assumed the worst case scenario and attempted to find a way where he would come out ahead even then. This was no different. He could not place the source of his feeling, but he felt it in his heart regardless and meant to act through it.

I don’t know how much my balance has been affected by losing that arm, Max considered. It was a strangely rational thought for the situation, as though time had slowed down. I won’t get inside his range. I’m going to blow him up with Swordsmanship. It won’t do anything against him, but his reaction is going to tell us something. Is he going to just tank the hit? Is he going to parry it still?

With his full might, Max’s Swordsmanship flowed to his sword and his lunge ended just before Johan’s range, reaching the ground in front of him and hoping the ensuing explosion would provoke a reaction, if not damage. Show me your hand, Johan!

Johan did not move at the explosion—but he did bring up his sword to deflect some of the damage. His HP remained entirely unaffected by it, and he did not give chase as Max stumbled backwards for safety. Not concerned about it, but he moved his sword anyway. So it’s not like he can’t feel pain or can’t be damaged. Think…think...what does that tell us about—

Max’s thoughts were cut short by his own legs failing him, causing him to stumble backwards. He would have hit the floor if not for Fedal’s sudden dive and catching him with both hands. “Are you okay, Max?” Fedal asked. Then, glancing at where his arm would be, Fedal shook his head and said, “Just—just rest now!”

“No way!” Max shouted. “That bastard tried to turn Gilder into—”

Something else caught his attention.

He finally realized where his feeling had come from.

“W—what?” Max managed. “That…that doesn’t make any sense!”

[Max of Relampago]

[Swordsmanship]: 375→325

“My…my stats have gone down,” Max whispered. “I…I can’t increase them anymore.”

Fedal took a moment to respond, as if processing it. “That—that can’t be right. You’re injured, that must be—”

“That,” said a new voice, “is unfortunately not the issue.”

People knew him by many different names. To me he was Charles, yet to others he was the Old Gambler or the Devil. To Francisco, he was, above all, his old friend—who had admittedly tried to kill him. Yet now he had, through sheer speed or clever usage of Rules, grasped Francisco’s nearly lifeless body and moved to the stands, away from the battlefield. “Don’t die on me,” Charles said firmly. “Not now.”

“I thought you hated me,” Francisco whispered back weakly. “Isn’t this what you wanted?”

“I thought so too,” Charles replied. “Just—just hang on.”

He gently laid his friend down in the stands and regarded the swordsmen on the piste gravely. It was an expression of many emotions, among them guilt and sorrow. There was also a sort of solemn air of responsibility about him, a resigned shame that did not keep him—no, it empowered him—from holding his head high as he addressed the swordsmen. “This treachery comes from me most of all,” he said, in a low tone. “And though I have since abandoned that plan…it was my research that led here.”

“What—what are you talking about?” Carr demanded. “You always appear saying a bunch of cryptic shit and then fuck off like you were never there. Be clear for once! What’s going on?”

Here Johan smiled. “Go ahead, Devil. Enlighten them.”

My own curiosity was piqued here, and my eyes met Charles’ for a moment. I need to know more. Not just for the sake of fairness, but for my own sake too. Charles, what is going on?

“When a world’s Architect loses his Godhood,” Charles said, “his Rules lose their power. It is not as though they are entirely gone—not yet. Imagine a fire that runs out of wood to burn. The flames will not die at once, but they are not long for this world. Applied Rules will remain valid—but only to a degree.”

“What does that mean?” Carr cried out. “What the hell did Johan do?”

Johan let out a low, eerie laugh at that. The sound reminded Carr somewhat of the laughter he would hear between bouts, back when the two of them would practice together, a long time ago. But compared to it, this was a lower laugh, a darker noise. “You don’t understand it yet, do you? Then let me clarify—as we are all aware, some noblemen were opposed to my nomination as the Emperor. Even force would not be enough to make them ally themselves with me, and any bent knees would come with promises to undermine my reign and inconvenience my day. It would simply not do to have men after me like that, with a show of malignant compliance inconvenience tax collectors and such. Naturally, I had to do something.”

I have not felt this in years, I considered. At some point, a sudden feeling had crept on me that I could neither place nor shake off. It was familiar, eerily so. A feeling of the world before Francisco.

“The Devil and I worked hard to research Francisco’s past Rules. Do you know what his first Rule was?”

A sudden sound off in the distance sent a chill down my spine. This man, I realized, in horror, he—he didn’t. But he had. All for the sake of his perfect daily life.

“His first Rule,” Johan said, slowly, “was to banish monsters from this world.”

Dark times, those. Maddening beasts of eight legs, larger than any animal, and capable of surviving even decapitation. Some had scales like lizards, but were so large as to fill a room from top to bottom. They had horns and tusks; claws and tails. Many had wings, and all carried a terrible, insatiable hunger. An uncomfortable fear of them was one of my few reminders of my life before. In order to deal with these creatures, Francisco had used his Rule to wipe them from existence.

They had not been killed outright. They had merely…disappeared. He could not kill those creatures, so he banished them. Even Architects had certain limitations in how they could approach life. I did not know if this applied to Johan, who had stolen the sphere rather than having been awarded it.

“Francisco’s Godhood has ended,” Johan said with a smile. “This means his banishment will slowly but surely erode as well. At first it will only be a couple of those creatures. But by year’s end, their numbers will have grown to an unmanageable amount—and humanity will have but one person to turn to.”

“You think people are going to bend their knee to you because of that?” Carr cried out. He was the first to react, the first to both accept the madness and to speak against it. “Fucking hell, Johan, I knew you were an egomaniac but this is too goddamn much. What, you think people can’t fend for themselves? That they will turn to you for protection? This is a world where people can use goddamn explosions with their swords, they can fight off monsters by themselves if—”

Valle stepped up. “That’s just it, Carr…we can’t.” He looked at his sword. “Not anymore. Not for long.” He frowned, suddenly concerned. His hand went over his heart, touching the chain he wore around his neck—there was a necklace of some sort hidden beneath his clothes. He hid it there to not go against the tournament’s dress code, I realized. “You saw what happened to Max. Our stats…they are dying.”

“What?” Carr shouted. Then, slowly, realization dawned on him and he felt his stomach sink. He had wanted nothing more than for stats to die—he loathed their very existence. Yet their sudden disappearance posed too many immediate issues for him to brush aside. “You mean—Johan! The hell have you done?”

“I thought you of all people would appreciate this,” the Godslayer replied, his grin widening. “People still have their stats, for now. But every time they use them, their numbers will go down. Permanently. Levelling Spheres will no longer be produced as a result of duels. Eventually, everyone’s Swordsmanship will go down to zero—or at least too weak to face the monsters sieging their cities. With Francisco’s term ended, I am afraid I cannot continue to grant Swordsmanship in his stead. It is sincerely outside my considerable powers. Thus, soon, not a single person will be capable of wielding Swordsmanship, since each use of it will lower your stats. Everyone, of course, except for me.”

Johan’s eyes paused on Fedal. “You see, though the Rule of Swordsmanship will die out, some of Francisco’s other creations will not. Some, due to my interference, some due to the…unnatural way he went about creating them.”

He knows too much, I realized, horrified. Not even Charles should have known such details about the system. How had Johan found out about it? At that realization, I willed myself into his mind to find out more—this could not be allowed to continue. It was my job to ensure that fairness remained supreme, and I had wavered too much already. It was time to find out what had happened and report it to the higher ups. Yet, my search yielded only a dark room.

Ah. It’s my pleasure to welcome you to my mind, Johan thought. Nonetheless, as you hopefully understand, there are thoughts I do not wish to share. I am not a servant of your lords and no one has permission to enter my mind—not anymore. Therefore, do not take this personally—but you WILL leave my mind right now. At that moment I felt a sharp pain and nearly lost my balance.

Johan pushed me out of his mind, I realized in horror. How…how did he do that?

“Where was I? Oh, yes—Fedal’s ability. You see, now that I have obtained it, I have no reason to worry about maintaining the Rule of Swordsmanship. As of now, I cannot create new Rules—the process appears rather arcane to me, you understand, and I imagine it will take a measure of time until I understand it. This much I was prepared for: my research had warned me as much.”

Where did you research this? I thought desperately. How did you know? Humans were not meant to know about this!

“Though I cannot create new Rules yet, I can simply choose to refuse to fuel them. I can deprive the flame of the branches surrounding it, allow it to naturally die out. And while I refuse to fuel the Rule that allows Swordsmanship and other Stats to exist…well! I will maintain Heroic Rising’s existence. This means that while the rest of the world loses its ability to wield magic Swordsmanship, I alone will maintain it. Do you understand what this means?”

“You—you insane lunatic,” Carr replied. I…I wanted to end Swordsmanship. Stats. Everything. But I didn’t want to end everything at once like this, these people will collapse without it. You have to find a way to make things right. Maybe implement a magic system that doesn’t focus on their birthright so much. Not…not this. This isn’t what I wanted. He had to say something now, to scream his feelings at Johan…but he didn’t know where to start. “Johan, those people—”

Carr started to speak without knowing where he was going, but stopped when he felt Valle’s firm grasp on his shoulder. The King in Cresna stepped forward with murder in his eyes. “Do you understand what you have done? It’s not just the monsters. The economy, society itself—people rely on Skills to live! What are they going to do when shoemakers cannot produce shoes from little material anymore? How will they eat when their farming Skills die out and they cannot reap from infertile soil? Where will they live when builders cannot create houses with just material anymore? Forget the monsters—by the time they show up, hundreds of people—”

“Hundreds of thousands,” Johan replied calmly. “Those under my rule will benefit from my Rule! Do you understand, Fiend? Those who serve me will live behind the walls I will personally defend. Until I attain mastery of my Rules and can find a way to restructure society, they will ration out their use of Skills the best they can and survive under my watch. Thus, the rebellious nobles I spoke of earlier—why, they have no choice but to follow me. The same applies to you, of course, mighty ‘king’ of Cresna. Do you understand now?”

The implications hung heavy.

War would become both more costly and far more unpredictable, there was hardly any surviving information on how to fight a war without magic stats in this world. Valle would have to improvise, while Johan could draw on whatever he remembered from Earth, however much that was. Moreover, wasting their remaining Swordsmanship in war would leave them vulnerable to monsters—were they to show up.

“Answer me now, oh Mighty King of Cresna!” Johan cried out, his voice regal but his face mocking. He gestured at the flying Eye above, still broadcasting this message. “Do you bend the knee or does this foolish king mean to wage war against his God?”

“I—” Valle opened his mouth and stopped. For the first time, he hesitated. He didn’t know what to do. If we bow down here, Cresna will never be independent. No, more than that…Johan cannot be allowed to rule over anyone. But how can I lead my people in a war against a nearly unbeatable opponent. Back when his stats were the only issue, I was confident we could win. But now, I…what can I do? He didn’t know what to do, but he knew he was being broadcasted to the whole Terra Inglesa. He could not waver. Johan…that manipulative bastard is only broadcasting this to the Terra Inglesa. He doesn’t want the rest of the world to know it in these terms. There will be rumors, but information travels slow and he can control his delivery…he meant to end things like this from the start. Too much time had passed in silence already; Valle knew he had to speak. “My decision as the King in Cresna is—”

Valle started to speak without knowing where he was going, but stopped when he felt Carr’s firm grasp on his shoulder. The Swordsman of Zero stepped forward with a maniacal satisfaction in his eyes. “Johan, you stupid bastard, I don’t think you realize what you have done. You just told me how to beat your stupid fucking number.”