《How Zantheus Fell into the Sky》25. How Can I Go Further?
Advertisement
At the same time as Tromo and Ethall had been having this philosophical discussion, somewhere below, Zantheus had started to hallucinate.
He was back on Awmeer, not in the heights, but on the lower slopes, running through the early training exercises as a boy again, learning to climb with rocks tied to his arms and legs. There was Rhemeus’s face looking down on him, goading him on:
“Come on Zantheus, if you can’t handle this little ridge how will you ever hope to conquer the whole mountain?”
He gritted his teeth, scrunched his eyes up, and tried harder, expending every ounce of his willpower on forcing his body up the training run. If he just tried that bit more, if he just put in that bit more effort, he would make it to the top.
Discipline and hard work, that was all it required.
Only...only that wasn’t working any more. All the will power he had amassed, all the strength he had built up was useless to him now. Each time he tried to wrestle free of the plant’s grip with his own strength it would only draw him straight back into it.
He was having to violently unlearn everything he had been taught in the Order. Getting free from the plant took something other than willpower –it took a strange power of...stopping that wasn’t really a power at all. Just when Zantheus thought he had learned its trick, certain that this time he would get to the top and be free of the plant, a vine would constrict particularly tightly around him and he would jolt back into his old way of behaving and into the leafy depths once more.
This happened.
He gave up. It was impossible to escape. Instead of moving again, he lay where he was, in the clutches of the plant. He heard Rhemeus say in his mind “You’ve got to try harder, Zantheus, you’ve got to push yourself.”
Advertisement
“No, no...” he murmured. “I cannot. I cannot do it. My strength is useless to me here...”
Now he saw Anthē’s face. He saw how it had looked when he was nearly out. “You can do it, Zantheus, you’re nearly there!” But not even this picture could get him moving again. Down here in the plant, it twisted and contorted and mocked him.
“You can do it, Zantheus, you’re nearly there!” rang out the words again, now tainted with sarcastic malice.
“No, I cannot!”
“Try harder!”
“I cannot do it!”
“Try harder!”
“No! That does not work. That does not work!” He realised he was crying. He could not remember the last time he had cried.
“You’re right, that doesn’t work.” This was a new voice. Though it spoke in a whisper, it was musical and gentle. “You can’t get free for yourself, or for anyone else.”
“How can I go further?” he asked the voice.
“Here, take my hand,” said the voice.
Advertisement
Apocalypse King: Progression System LitRPG
Hail, Apocalypse King! A LitRPG where the MC fights the System Apocalypse Invaders with military training, dark magic, and a Humanity, Fuck Yeah attitude! Hounded by trauma from combat and his childhood upbringing, Sergeant DeSean Solomon left the U.S. Marines and attends college alone. While at a house party, the world as DeSean knows it ends. All of humanity receives a System notification. Do you wish to be saved from the taint of chaos? A countdown starts. Time is of the essence. To say yes will transform you into a monstrous zealot controlled by a genocidal eldritch invader. To say no is to be marked for the slaughter and forced into a high-stakes and vicious survival game. Even with the introduction of system progression stats, magical powers, and contracts with otherworldly creatures, all signs point toward the earth and its people getting subjugated. Or suffering a worse fate. Unless DeSean has a say in it. When the end of the world comes knocking, it's not a hero or someone with a special bloodline that rises to the occasion. It's a slightly demented Marine Veteran who storms the breach, summoning demons, evoking dark magic, and using all of his military skills and System Skills to bring down the enemy. Posts Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Please click below and enjoy!
8 272Reborn as a Magic Firefly, Help?
A rural farmer's boy is unknowingly reincarnated into a world of magic and monsters as just a wee little larva, not even considered a monster at all. But through grit and a passion for surviving, he will eventually evolve into something truly powerful and maybe, just maybe, find a way home. If that means defeating powerful foes and becoming a powerful monster himself, maybe, just maybe, that's what he needs to do. Popcorn easy-going typical "reincarnated as a monster" fic. Expect evolution trees, rare evolutions, small twists, a generally unaccepted main character who just wants to meet a human, the works. In this story, the main character is reincarnated as a larva, but his evolution will lead him down a path to become a will 'o wisp firefly hybrid, since that is what the fellows over on light novel amino requested, and it sounded cool. I'm just writing this to keep my fingers moving, so it won't have too much effort in it, but if you like stories like the beginning of the (good) reincarnated-as-a-dragon light novel, I'm sure you'll like this one. Popcorn isekai fic. The cover, drawn by yours truly, will reflect the current evolution of the main character. Also, he'll be pretty weak-to-strong, since, well, maggots are kind-of-really weak.
8 86The Swords of the Guardians
Jack is finishing his last quest for the company when a mysterious old man brings him on a journey into the depths of a sorcery and deadmen ridden dungeon. The only way out is forward and it is sure to reveal more than one secret of the world. Tillon wants to rise through the ranks of the Swords of the Guardians, but his luck... well, it's terrible to say the least. Yet everything changes as he ends up in the middle of a political mess where backstabbers and cultists are the least of his worries. The world crashes and webs of deceit unfold around the mercenaries of the Swords of the Guardians. Will they manage to save the world and themselves? Or will they make everything worse? [Uploading at least twice a week]
8 277Wading Through The Dark
There are things in the dark that we do not wish to acknowledge, truths that we wish will go unsaid. But when the moon is out and the veil of night covers the horizon, these things have a habit of seeping out. Do you dare go wading through the darkness to find whatever twisted nightmare lies in wait beneath the fog, or do you wish to sleep tonight?
8 186Gloom and Doom: Short Stories
Pick a story. Any story. You'll come back out. Just maybe not the same. And possibly in a few more pieces. A collection of standalone short stories. Some will be funny. Some will be disturbing. Most are both. All will be completely ridiculous. Take a look at the story guide first for... well, a guide to the stories.
8 168Uploaded Fairy: The Family Of Lost Purgatory Girls
Author Note: Before you read, this isn't your typical Isekei. The MC spends half their time being completely curb stomped. So please don't whine if the MC isn't Op. Nadine is an slacking student, who has recently broken up with her girlfriend. Initially she wanted to continue building her robotic dog. But the next morning, her mother dies in a mysterious accident. Taken to a boarding school to live the rest of her teen years, torn between dating her old sweet heart and establishing a new life, she knows the life she wants to lead is not here.But when she runs away from the boarding school on the floating city, the only way to hold her hand to keep her from falling is her old lover. Stuck in a world where teens build robot dogs to fight to the death, she comes to understand that not everyone lives like aristocrats. They hold onto the false promise of a better life.Compounding the stench of death and cockroaches, the corporate state forked the source code from an old war time simulator. This simulator reworked into tailored experience in a fantasy world, specific to the desire of individual gamers. When Nadine finds her sexual desires to much to handle, she is about to give up gaming.A dream-scanner, whose been watching her play all this time, has given her one last chance: she has the opprotunity to fix that apocalypse she's created that ruined the lives of the game world fairies. Who has her own mixed loyalties. And she keeps telling Nadine, "It's not really a game."
8 169