Bathed under the light of the Logos, my mind's eye opens. Everything is all so clear now. The path of victory has always been within my reach. I savor the transcendent sensation of relief swirling about in my head. Its as if a rusty floodgate had finally be pried open, releasing a pent up tidal wave of stagnant water. A twisted knot of tension that I had never known existed evaporates in this single instant as tears of sheer pleasure pour down my cheeks.

Its so easy to live with never ending pain, especially if its all you have ever known.

And once you taste freedom from this pain, you become all the more aware of the discomfort that you are still suffering from.

As my body drinks the light of the Logos, I nevertheless sense multiple blockages deep within me blithely ignoring the influence of the Word of God. I focus and try to forcibly unlock these sealed portions of my mind, but the knots stubbornly spurn all such efforts. Its like the most annoying itch that you can imagine. You know its there somewhere on your back but you can't reach it, no matter the contortions your body goes through. And ignoring the problem just makes the sensation even more irritating.

"What a bother." I grumble, turning my attention back to the mob of bandits closing in on me. Dealing with metaphorical psychic itches can wait. As always, first things first.

The bandits come at me as a single swarm, eager to finish the battle. I'm injured and fatigued after all. The wolf pack is done harassing the lion and has moved in for the kill. With the dregs of magical power I still possess, I would only be able to take a few more blows before the Rhino Skin enchantment collapses like a pile of soggy noodles. The fight, but every reasonable standard, is over.

Thank goodness that reason flew right of the window a long time ago. Along with the bell tower. And the church. Not to mention common sense.

I glare at an empty spot of the church behind the mob and spread my feet out, leaning forward slightly. Taking a deep breath, I begin narrowing my gaze to the point where the only thing I can see is that single patch of the church's floor. No need to harness my magical power or perform any fancy incantations. I'm not casting a spell after all.

I'm just quickstepping.

My right leg twitches, a minute almost imperceptible movement. The penultimate step needed to execute this technique. Its simple, trivially simple. Something inconsistent with everything I had been taught at the Academy. I exhale -

- And my entire body is engulfed in a blur and sent sliding across the floor, right into the mass of bandits charging toward me. I feel nothing as countless blades pierce my body and the next thing I realize is that my entire form is phasing through the mob, as if I'm made of nothing more substantial than air.

My heart catches in my throat as the momentum carries me over a gap in the floor, but my feet sail over the gap without any trouble. Its almost as if there's an invisible anchor pulling me toward my destination. The moment I reach that empty spot I had been focusing on, there's a hard jerk as my body comes to a stop abruptly, nearly causing my neck to whiplash. I barely manage to brace in time as the blur occluding my body fades, signaling the completion of the quickstep technique.

I have accomplished something that defies every tenet of materialism. Without using a single scrap of magic. Its a feat that should be impossible. But my mind drifts back to the confrontation with Mandor and what he told me. Dialectics. That there is no universal truth in this world. Have I inadvertently experienced the Order of Impartial Justice's great secret for myself?

My hand loops around the waist of a nearby bandit with his back to me, closing in on the pistol kept snugly in its holster. Before the bandit realizes that I had quickstepped behind the mob, I draw the pistol and jam it hard against the bandit's head. The pistol bellows in anger at the urging of my trigger finger, violently reducing my enemy's head into meaty red chunks. That certainly gets the mob's attention, but while the bandits are still turning around, I'm already in motion.

I twirl the pistol, catching it by the barrel and lashing out at another bandit, slamming the pistol's grip right into his jaw. Teeth fly and my target is left wobbling on his feet glassy eyed. A hard kick, empowered by my rapidly diminishing magic, sends the bandit crashing backward into the roiling mass of the mob and sending a good number of his comrades toppling out into the void through an unfortunately placed hole in the floating church's floor. I hold my breath, waiting for another wave of sky bandits to appear.

And nothing happens. The number of bandits have stopped replenishing ever since the Logos became active. I have no idea why, but its not like I'm in the position to complain right now. As the bandits begin to rearrange themselves make a go of rushing me again, I simply perform another quickstep, this time blurring to the opposite end of the church. Before the mob realizes it, I've already helped myself to a discarded sword and eviscerated several bandits through their backs.

This power, skill, whatever the quickstep is, it makes a mockery of traditional tactics and drills. I have complete freedom of movement, even if it should be impossible. Quickstepping even provides a kind of invincibility, nothing seems to be able to harm me as long as the technique is in effect. And the best, or worst, part depending on how you look at it, is that quickstepping does not require magic. I will never tire using this skill. Neither do I feel any real discomfort. There's zero cost attached to quickstepping, unlike the conventional magical enhancements I deploy.

"I was so screwed." I muse to myself, blurring around the mob again, "The Stabber could have ended me anytime he wanted."

Its true. I had no chance at all against the Stabber when we squared off in Deshawn City. The moment I had gotten an advantage over him, the Stabber simply used quickstep to turn the tables on me. And the he could have done this as many times as he wanted. Fighting him was a death sentence that I barely managed to escape.

My stolen sword carves red ruin across the sad remnants of the mob, the once deadly battle rendered a cakewalk thanks to my unlocked knowledge. But that begs another question. How did I possess the knowledge to perform quicksteps in the first place? Its not a technique that I was taught. In fact, I get the impression that I've always known how to execute quicksteps, right from the day I was born. I was simply barred from using that knowledge.

No idea how I know this with such certainty though. Its the same way that I just know that the technique is referred to as quickstepping despite never hearing the term before. Another nonsensical mystery to the towering pile of nonsense confronting me already. Still, there's no harm in doing some due diligence while I have the chance. Especially since the opportunity might never arise ever again. I look up to where the Logos is hovering, smack dab where the church's ceiling should be. Focusing on the Logos's position, I will myself to quickstep toward it. But I don't feel the invisible anchor dropping at my new target destination. The technique simply refuses to activate.

So that's quickstep's limitation. I can only move from one surface to another. Good to know.

A hard knee smash to the torso causes one of the remaining bandits to double over, seized with pain. Grappling my opponent by his shoulders, I force the addled bandit to his knees before he has a chance to recover. Since I can't use quickstep, I'm just going to have to improvise.

"Give a pal a helping hand huh?" I snark at the bandit, stomping hard on one of the man's shoulders.

Before the bandit's shoulder gives way, my leg pushes upward, sending me vaulting through the air toward where the Logos is hovering. The mob turns its dumbfounded gaze, tracking my movement as I soar over them like a bird. The stolen sword clatters to the ground as my arm stretches outward as far as it can go, closing in on the Logos. There's a suspended moment as my fingers brush against the Word of God, causing an electric tremor to rush up my spine and my jaws to involuntarily clench. An overwhelming wave of revulsion threatens to drown me as my entire body shrieks out a single message.

The Logos is not meant to be taken away from here.

"Shit!" I shout in alarm as my instincts go haywire. The only thing I can think about now is how to get as far away as possible from the Logos. My magic fires up against my will and my hand is brought down in a vicious slap on the Logos, the same way one would drive away a particularly obnoxious bee. There's a burning pain as my palm strikes against the Word of God and to my horror, the Logos is batted free from where its been hovering.

Right into the mob gathering underneath me.

The Logos strikes the mob with cataclysmic force, sundering several of the bandits with the impact. A shock wave spreads across the entire structure of the church as the stone crumbles away, leaving empty air in its place. The Logos continues to plunge downward unabated, piercing the cloud carpet, out of my sight.

"Damn." I curse, "Don't think that was supposed to happen."

The bandits cry out in dismay as the clouds beneath us churn, opening up a vortex that begins hungrily devouring the shattered remnants of the church. Men are already being steadily sucked into the vortex as they thrash about impotently to save themselves. I feel the vortex's insatiable pull as well as it tears me from the deteriorating skeleton of the church. I'm soon part of the conga line of bandits serving as a buffet for the vortex. As I madly spin about, I distantly note that the bell tower is being pulled toward the vortex as well, with Ramon nearly wetting himself in terror. The only safe haven in the skies is the demon king's fortress, standing inviolate behind its protective sphere.

A slab of masonry crashes into my side, sending me hurtling straight into the heart of the vortex. All around me are the cries of unadulterated fear and despair. There's no way out of this situation. Not for me or the bandits.

The one way left available for us is through the vortex. We have to descend to earth, the same way that Enn, the first human, did in the legends.

We have to make the legend our own.