An Ascended? Whoever he was, he was going to have to wait. Nico turned towards the in-coming mushroom and dashed forward.

Something landed on his shoulder. Nico got one good look at the glossy leather shoes before he fell back to the ground as Atomic launch off him straight towards the incoming mushroom.

He plucked it out of the air. He balled up as he flipped and extended both his feet forward, striking the monster’s face and neck. One hand snapped downward, catching the croc by its mouth. He flicked in the mushroom into the croc’s mouth with a finger. His other hand winded up for a swing.

His fist plunged into it, sending the croc’s head a good foot into the earth, and exploded. Its lower back went up and swung like a pole, sending Atomic sprawling through the air. He struck the ground, rolled, and jumped to his feet in a fit of gore, mud, and dirt.

Nico stared blankly at Atomic. Only when Atomic began walking towards him did Nico get to his feet. “Now, as much as I love a good surprise,” he said, following Nico as he stepped back. He held his hands behind and leaned forward, taking long, exaggerated steps. “Who the fuck are you.”

“I—”

“Don’t care, actually,” he said, putting his hand forward. “Give me the Augmenter before I get really pissed.”

“All yours,” Nico lifted the Locust towards Atomic, his palm hanging limply down. He didn’t think Atomic was the Nightmare. The Nightmare slaughtered thousands of people, it wouldn’t react the way Atomic did to Nico being a kid.

Which means I can’t let him have it. Nico had 4 Energy to work with. He didn’t pre-charge it because of the small hope that they could avoid a fight that would end up killing them both. Atomic might have been Rank V, but that wasn’t strong enough to fight the swarm of monsters just a short distance away from them.

And that was going to be Nico’s only way to escape.

Atomic shook his head. “It’s just not going to work.”

Probably not, Nico would have said, but that was not prudent. Instead he stepped back into someone. He looked up and she looked down to him. Their eyes would have met if she had any.

Two brown leather straps crisscrossed over them, covering her entire face save for her black lips. She had a few strands of white alongside long dark hair that fell past her hands. Her black dress covered her from neck to her dress shoes.

There were neither letters nor Life to make sense of her. Every step she took forward Nico took back, with his strength running out on the fourth. He would have crumbled to the ground had her hand not wrapped around him, keeping him upright as she bent down to press her ear over his chest.

Her hair was the first pleasant thing Nico had felt in a while. It was soft and smooth, as if he was touching silk. It brushed the bottom of his chin, making him giggle despite the situation. She pulled him back and looked—or at least faced him with what seemed like a smile. It was just a rigid tug at her lips.

“What’s your name?” Her voice was hushed, almost a whisper, and barely audible through the rumbling behind them.

“Nil. You?”

“Riguel.”

Nico heard a banging behind him. When he turned he saw Atomic smashing his face against the tree.

“I misspoke,” she said, bowing slightly. “Riguel is my real name. My handle is--”

“Well don’t tell him that either!” Atomic yelled.

“Why?”

Nico answered that one. “Beats the point of having a handle.”

“I see,” she said, nodding.

Atomic’s voice grew dangerously loud. “No. No, you absolutely do not see.”

“I understand.”

“I doubt that even less,” he hissed.

“She’s trying her best man,” Nico said, successfully swallowing his laughter, but he couldn’t hold back a smile.

“Yes, I really am, and I think that’s what really matters,” she said, in a sincere tone of voice. “Now can I have a moment to think?”

“What the fuck do you need to think about?” Atomic said, tossing his hands up in the air. “We take that thing. World saved. We go home.”

“We’re not going to kill a child,” Riguel said offhandedly. It came out more like a question than an answer.

“So you’re going to let the Nightmare do it?” Atomic said, chuckling desperately. He rested his back against a tree and sank down to the ground. “That might kill a lot more children than just one, and all their bloody cute heads will be on you.”

“Might,” Riguel said, turning back to Nico. There was an odd, lifeless look about her. It brought the question of why she faced him in the first place. She lowered her voice when she spoke to him. She rested one stiff arm on his right shoulder in which he assumed was supposed to be a comforting gesture. “Are you okay?”

“Uh,” Nico said, staring back at her. She talked and treated him like a child. He supposed that, just for this time, he’ll go with it. “A little bit spooked and confused, but I’m doing alright.”

She nodded. “I’ve been spooked and confused since I was a kid, too, but it does get easier. Can you tell me what happened?”

“I cannot,” Nico said.

“Are you a Ranker, Nil?”

“I would be a terrible Ranker if I was,” Nico said. “I’m Rank I.”

“I see,” Riguel said. “Then, do you have a valuable skill, or any reason for having been given the Locust?

“Kind of,” he said. “I have a Healing skill, but I’m a Transmuter-Enhancer, so I can only heal myself.”

“You’re the Undying,” Riguel said.

“In the flesh,” he said. “Seen me before?”

“Not funny,” Atomic said.

“You just made that joke,” Nico said, turning his head towards him.

“Which is why it’s not funny. Get it?”

“Nope,” Nico said, turning back towards Riguel. Seconds passed and she didn’t respond. She didn’t move an inch, not even a sway. She was perfectly still. Perfectly. She seemed like a statue. “Uhm, what are you doing?”

“I’m thinking,” she said. “Please wait.”

“Well tick tock babe,” Atomic said, his face suddenly stretching to a smile that was as wide as a fairy’s mouth. “This brat’s fuck-up made an Elite.”

Past the branches, the cesspool of monsters tearing and blowing each other apart were reduced to a small bunch. The ground was torn asunder under them, having more craters and uprooted trees than flat ground.

There was a single three-star Elite named Hunter Abomination killing everything in sight.

Its body was the same as the fairies, it had the head of a Bog Rider, and the wings that were a combination of both.

The bulging veins tracing its wings pulsed as a thick yellow liquid ran through them. There were no quadrants for it to fire beams from. It was replaced by a more organized line of mushrooms on the back and front. It zipped around, each mushroom exploding causing it to maneuver with absurd agility. It turned in sharp angles rather than curves. The mushrooms on the center propelled it forward or back, while the ones on the sides allowed it to turn.

This was the first reason why what Nico did was bad. Monsters evolve once they’ve eaten enough creatures, but if a monster eats enough of just one specie in particular, then it could evolve into a new specie combining different skills and traits never seen before. Sometimes it was self-crippled by a horrible combination of skills, but sometimes it was several times more dangerous than its normal evolution. Left alone, it could change the ecosystem.

Like that one. Just following it with his eyes was difficult. The sky was filled with beams as the fairies attempted to take it down. The Bog Rider’s had even less luck. It killed everything mindlessly, including the other 3-star Ranger Faries. With its speed, it controlled the sky.

It did get hit a few times, there were a few bruises in its wings and flesh, but that barely slowed it. It swooped down, taking whole fairies with its mouth before tearing them up in the sky. From their flesh, the disfigurement on its body healed.

With most of the monsters gone, it landed on the ground and began consuming everything.

“I got it!” Riguel said, thumping her fist against her palm. “Nil, since you made a dangerous thing that will hurt many people, you need to kill it. We will let you go if you do.”

“Oh real funny,” Atomic said, laughing. His laughter cut halfway through. “Why the fuck would we do that?”

“We have to give him a chance,” Riguel said.

“No we don’t.”

“I would love to,” Nico said, frowning. “But you see, I don’t have any wings.” He didn’t get the reaction he thought he would get from Riguel. She simply paused, and then answered with such little confidence that it made Nico feel bad.

“You do not need wings to hunt it.”

“I get that, I mean it’s not impossible, but it’s a 3-star and I’m Rank—”

“I understand how difficult it is, but you need to understand that you need to take responsibility for your actions.”

“And you’ll kill me if I don’t?”

Riguel nodded. “This is the best I can do for you.”

Fuck. This was just about the worst-case scenario. Fighting a 3-star Elite wasn’t realistic by any stretch of the imagination. They just wanted him to die so the Locust would be separated. The Sky Rider did seem to have Rubber Flesh, though, and Nico did have a highly effective skill against it. The main reason it was able to hunt everything was because it could heal, something that didn’t matter if it fought only a single target like Nico. “Maybe.”

“Maybe?” Riguel said, incredulous. Her mouth hung open as she looked at him—he could hear her confusion. “Do you think we wouldn—”

“I understand,” Nico said. “Non-existence. Eternal sleep. But one, I’ll only able to hunt that if I can Siphon a few monsters, and Harvest myself a solution so I can actually have enough firepower to kill it. If the rolls don’t work, I can’t work. Two, if you really wanted to give me a chance, then you would have at least given me pants first.”

“Pants? Why do you want pants? Are you cold?”

Nico looked down. Oh yeah. He nodded. “Yeah, I’m super cold. Would like an extra layer of clothes of everything.”

“Atomic, can you get Nil some clothes?”

“Riguel,” Atomic said, slowly. “He’s teasing you. He doesn’t care about pants. It’s literately boiling blood out here.”

Riguel turned towards Nico. “Is that…is that true?”

“Of course not. Pants are a human right.”

“But…but I…I don’t understand,” Riguel said, holding the side of her head. She seemed to be in physical pain. “It’s…it’s fine I suppose.”

“So can you answer a few questions,” Nico said. “Because, if we’re being honest here, I still have no clue what is going on. Actually, I’m more confused now, so I think you need to—you know—take responsibility for your actions and…tell me…” His voice faded. He probably should think before being rude to people that can kill him.

Strangely enough, Riguel just smiled at him.

“If you did, we would have probably killed you,” Atomic said. “But no. You look too pitiful for that.”

“I thought you said that joke wasn’t funny anymore,” Nico said.

“To me,” Atomic said. “She wouldn’t think your pitiful even if she could see, which would be mistake.”

“You’re so angry,” Nico said.

“It’s because you’re still breathing.”

“Would it help if I held my breath?”

“Three days ago,” Riguel began, stopping whatever Atomic was about to say next. “An unidentified individual, or group of individuals, began traveling from the West gate at a 46-degree angle. They moved only during the night, passing monsters and people. Any attempt of either engaging or talk—”

“Monsters talk?” Nico blurted. He covered his mouth. “Sorry.”

“You have nothing to apologize for,” she said. “Anyone that engaged them has been cut down before they were able to get a description. They haven’t been spotted yet, so people began calling it a Nightmare, in due part in reference to the Nightmare of the 4th City, and in due part to it possibly being the original Nightmare of the 4th City, though the question of why it is leaving corpses stand.” She pointed towards the city, with arms still as a statue. Her nails were white. In the sun, they looked like marble. “They were going in that direction.” She rotated her arm until it pointed at Nico. “They are still heading in that direction.”

“Uh…” Nico had so many questions he didn’t even know where to start. “So they…it just ran through hundreds of monsters? In a straight line? Wouldn’t that attract attention?”

“Yes.”

“So…how did the Nightmare get through?”

“We do not know. “

“And aren’t there Houses in those Zones? With Night Hunters? The Nightmare got past them too?”

“It did.”

“…you do know how crazy that sounds, right?”

“It’s why I am confused,” Riguel said, smiling. “It gets easier, but it’s never easy.”

“What does it want with me?”

“I do not know,” Riguel.

“But it can’t be good,” Atomic said. “Which—”

“Is why you should kill it, but you’re too scared of fighting it, so you’re settling for me,” Nico said. “We get it.”

“Obviously she doesn’t,” Atomic said.

“I do have a guess,” Riguel said.

“Wait what?” Atomic said. “You do? Since when? Why haven’t you told me?”

“I would of, if you would stop talking,” Riguel said.

Even with the mask on, Nico could tell Atomic opened his mouth to speak, but thought better of it.

“If the Augmenter was made within a city illegally,” Riguel began, “then tossing it out and then bringing it back in is the way to have it registered in the Syndicate, allowing it to be used in the 42nd Games. Though I do not know how this was done—I was under the impression that the cities walls were tall.”

Okay, so I was put into a cannon and fired. Because of how dangerous they were, only certified Rankers were allowed to make Augmenters. They could return to the walls and say they looted it off a monster.

Augmenters were tough things. Even if the owner gets gobbled up, digested, and pooped out, the Augmenter will last a good number of centuries inside a monster’s guts. It was pretty much what was going to happen if Nico fought the Sky Rider unprepared.

Huh. So he really was just a delivery box. “And who are you guys?”

“I am Riguel,” she said. “He is L—”

“Atomic,” Atomic said quickly. “I am Atomic.”

“What do you two do?” Nico asked. “Why are you here? And how did you get here—if the Nightmare is going in a straight line, which is really strange because then everyone knows its course, why are you the only ones here? Can’t you set—”

“The Nightmare travels only during the night, but it does travel faster than even Ascended. The Syndicate best squads are chasing it as we speak, but Atomic and I possess a faster method of transportation.”

“Huh. So you didn’t lie about being confused, did you?”

“I did not,” Riguel said. “Very strange things are happening.”

“So say I kill that thing. What happens then? You’ll let me go?”

“We will,” Riguel said. “I promise.”

“No we won’t,” Atomic said. “Whatever the Nightmare’s plan is, we’re going to stop it.”

“It hasn’t killed anyone,” Riguel said. “We have no right to harm people that have done no harm.”

“It’s cutting people in halves,” Atomic said. “How is that not doing harm?”

“Self-defense,” Riguel said. “It cuts, but it doesn’t harm the brain nor steal anything but health potions. The ones that died, died because monsters ate them.”

“Big difference. It’s still rampaging through the areas, causing death.”

“It has to rush, otherwise Nil might die before it reached him. Her reason is better than their reason.”

“One life doesn’t take precedent over the life of others,” he said, glancing at Nico. “The least of which is a life of a murderer—or am I misremembering?”

“Atomic,” Riguel said, sighing. “Can we discuss this while Nil attempts to hunt the beast?”

“Sure,” Atomic said, folding his arms. “But I’m not budging.”

“Thank you, Atomic,” Riguel said, walking past Nico. She sat beside Atomic with her legs folded underneath her. “I do hope you survive, Nil.”

An audience, he thought. One side wants me dead, the other wants me to win. Now he only needed them to cheer and he’ll feel back at home.