Die. Respawn. Repeat.
Chapter 255: Book 4: Life and Death

14 seconds left before the Ritual stage is complete.

It's a testament to the sheer power imbued into the skill that all sorts of plant and fungal life erupt through the stone beneath our feet even before it's fully activated. Vibrant Firmament coalesces around my counterpart's fist, everything around him bending and flickering with the power of a manifested Concept.

In him, I catch a glimpse of the power I might wield if I were to unravel the entirety of my core into a skill. I wouldn't survive the process, of course. Not even with the power of the loops. It would erase any hint of a soul that might be carried back through time. And in exchange...

Power.

Contained within the other Ethan's fist is Life, uncontained and uncontrolled. It's the birth and evolution of the very first self-replicating molecules in the primordial soup that started it all. It's the energy contained in the lightning that transformed those first inorganic molecules into amino acids, the cascading probability that turned those into the earliest polymers, and the infinitesimal chance that led to the formation of the first cellular machines that invigorated the ocean with everything it needed for life.

And it's the millions of years that came after. Neverending propagation, evolution, optimization; sheer, unbridled probability; the birth of life and everything that comes with it. My use of this skill back in the Empty City was already an expression of unbelievable power, but this?

I can't even see the other Ethan anymore. The effect of the skill is contained within my barriers, for now, and that means that everything within its tiny sphere of influence is growing and replicating uncontrollably; that alone would undoubtedly have killed him if not for the healing effect of the skill.

He steps forward, and Life follows, obedient and corralled.

The first three Force Constructs shatter without even a flicker of hesitation. The next three manage to last a fraction of a second longer, though even then it's only barely enough to push the timer down.

12 seconds left. No more Force Constructs. I can feel my counterpart dying, not because of any particular damage done to him but because his makeshift soul can no longer hold itself together. Instead, he falls apart into his constituent matter, the vines of countless Root Acolytes joining the pile of raw biomass that moves forward like a tidal wave.

His death, unfortunately, doesn't end the skill. It's already in motion, rushing forward toward the Seed. The only thing in its way is my final barrier and my last line of defense: the only other Submerged skill in my repertoire.

The Great Filter.

To call it a barrier would be to do it a disservice. Like Primordial Foray, it's the encapsulation of a Concept; unlike it, it holds a different aspect of that Concept within it. The Great Filter represents the near-insurmountable barriers that all life must cross to move on to the next stage. From primordial soup to the very first cell, from simple to complex, to the first multicellular organism and beyond.

And when the force of Primordial Foray strikes it, it holds.

The skills strain against each other, a silent battle of Concept and Firmament. The seconds tick by, one after the other. Primordial Foray begins to weaken.

So does the Great Filter.

9 seconds left. Cracks appear in the shimmering divide created by the skill. If I had to guess, Primordial Foray is about a third as strong as it originally was, but the Filter is more than halfway depleted. I try to pour more Firmament into the skill, but I've drained my core almost as far as it will go; the little I have left isn't enough to make a difference.

Ahkelios was right. This was the trap that was planned for me—the oversaturation of Firmament in the final seconds of the Ritual stage. The worst part is that I'm not sure how much saturation this will create. All I know is that if this is going to hit, I need to weaken it as much as possible.

6 seconds left.

The Filter breaks. My injuries close in an instant as the blow rushes past me and toward the Seed. I grasp for options. I don't have the Firmament to use Eternal Moment on something like this—not with the amount of power it contains. It would drain nearly all my remaining power just to hold it for a second.

I need options. The Seed is too close to saturation, and this thing is too strong for me to risk letting it hit. I don't want to hit saturation at all, preferably, but if we're going to hit it I don't want to risk an overload strong enough to hit all ongoing Trials. Even if there was something I could do to mitigate it, the death toll that degree of failure would exact...

The thing is, we've discussed this exact scenario in the Grove. I had the spark of an idea about this before: the Ritual blowback Ahkelios described would necessarily have to open a connection between a number of different Trials. There's a chance I could use a controlled blowback to figure out how to connect the Trials together, or to identify how the dungeons keep the Trials connected.

It's not something I wanted to test, really. Too much risk involved, and no guarantee that I can suppress the consequences. But if it's going to happen anyway, we need to weaken this as much as possible.

Another Great Filter is out of the question. I don't have the Firmament for it. The level of power I would need to put into Force Constructs would be almost as bad. Ahkelios and Gheraa are coming to help, but there's too much power left to bleed away with just the two of them.

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

I glance at the humans.

They're sitting near the Seed, their eyes closed. Meditating, I think. The sight of it almost gives me pause, but then I realize what they're actually doing.

Pushing for a phase shift. Now? They won't finish it in time—

—not unless I give them an Eternal Moment to do it in.

They aren't moving. There's nothing I'm explicitly trying to stop, which means the skill would cost a lot less Firmament than it normally would. All I need to do for them is stretch the time between one moment and the next and give them the time they need to complete their shift.

So I do. I feel my Firmament burn its way into time, creating the tiniest fracture in eternity.

Eternal Moment.

And because I'm not going to have the time to explain everything that's going on to them, I connect with that fracture in time with a second skill.

Temporal Link.

All that thinking takes only a fraction of a second, thanks to the effects of Quicken Mind and the continual boost in my processing speed from my Astral pool. With Temporal Link active, I can feel the change in time as the skill begins to take effect—everything seems to slow to a crawl, even more than it already has. For a moment, it looks like the world is frozen around me.

That's... a lot stronger than I was expecting this skill to be. With the amount of Firmament I had left, I was expecting it to run at half effectiveness, if that. Instead, it's nearly as strong as it would have been had I used it at full strength.

And then I realize why.

This usage of Eternal Moment aligns with my Truth. The other humans here are trying to push themselves to grow and change specifically so they can make a difference, and my Truth is all about Change. It's been fundamentally imbued into my Firmament ever since I completed my third phase shift.

There's something there, I think. A power buried in that alignment of Firmament, Truth, and Concept. I reach for it, almost manage to grasp it—

—but it slips away, and I let it go. There'll be time enough to investigate whatever that was later. For now, I need to make sure Adeya and the others understand exactly what's at stake, the potential catastrophe that could result if a fully-powered Primordial Foray were to strike that Seed.

The link I've established helps. It's not the same as a direct conversation, of course; Temporal Link hasn't connected me directly to their phase shifts, only to the Eternal Moment I've placed them in. But I can speak into that moment and tell them everything about what's happening.

About the potential severity of the blowback. About the necessity of pushing this back, making the incoming Foray as weak as possible.

And when the Eternal Moment passes, all three of them shine with new power.

5 seconds left. The Primordial Foray has crossed more than half of the way toward the Seed, leaving behind a trail of plant and fungal growth that cracks the stone beneath. It would be a beautiful sight if it weren't for what it represented—the plants I see growing are the only source of real color I've seen for a while, outside the flowers on the Root Acolytes.

Reds, oranges, and yellows bloom across the floor like a traveling sunset. Adeya steps forward, and her friends stand at her side, each channeling a core piece of their power into her. Together, they throw up a barrier.

It's like nothing I've ever seen.

The barrier is blood and sound, crystal and wind, star and stone. It holds for a second, then two, then three, stopping the tidal wave of flowers in its tracks. I can feel the strength of the Foray weakening as it struggles against this new barrier—whatever it is, that joint attempt was almost as powerful as the Great Filter.

And it still isn't strong enough.

The barrier shatters. Adeya staggers, looking exhausted. Primordial Foray is weaker, but not nearly weak enough to avoid saturation. How many Trials will the blowback hit at its current strength? Half?

Too many.

Ahkelios shoves his way forward, blade glowing with a fierce blue-white Firmament; his expression is closed and determined, and he slashes through the center of the attack with enough force to slice the stone all the way to the walls of the chamber. Gheraa steps up shortly afterward, throwing up two massive shields of light to try to deflect them away from the Seed even as Ahkelios's blow splits and weakens it.

One second left. We just need it to take longer than a second. Gheraa's deflection has bought us time and helped to weaken the remnants of the skill even further. I can only hope it's enough.

It's not. Three notifications hit at almost the exact same time.

[Firmament saturation: 103%]

[Stage 3: Water the Seed complete!]

[Warning: A stage prerequisite has been failed. Ritual blowback has begun.]

I'm already working desperately to restore my Firmament, gathering everything I can with Firmament Control and feeding it to my core in the hopes that it'll replenish my stores enough to deal with what's about to come. There's a certain irony in the fact that the Ritual blowback helps with this—the Seed's absorption of Firmament has left the chamber relatively dry, but the blowback?

The Interface has been waiting for this.

Firmament gathers as if from nowhere, pouring in from the unseen construct of the Interface in a dizzying whirlwind of pure energy. The wisps and dregs I manage to steal for myself are packed dense with enough power that they actually take time for me to convert and integrate, small as they are; that golden construct in my soul can only do so much, even now.

It all gathers into a single point above the Seed.

Adeya, Taylor, and Dhruv exchange worried glances. The scirix mutter anxiously amongst themselves. Ahkelios stares up at the gathering Firmament, something pained in his eyes. I can almost see the memories he's trying to avoid dredging themselves up in his mind.

Gheraa, on the other hand? He just looks away, fists clenched, like he's blaming himself for this. I almost want to go to him, but no. I need to keep with what we've discussed.

If this is happening, then I need to learn everything I can about how it happens. I keep my attention fixed on the gathering storm, and in the background, start trying to nudge my core into spinning once more.

I'll need all the Firmament I can gather for what's coming.

The storm ahead is starting to stabilize. There's a startling familiarity to it. First, a central pillar of Firmament forms, stretching almost as high as the chamber ceiling. Tendrils of power stretch out from that pillar, shifting strangely in my sight.

Phasing. But stronger than anything I've been able to accomplish with Phaseslip. Strong enough that it bends space around it, using the enormous density of Firmament around us to reach out and connect with—

The realization clicks.

This thing is a makeshift Intermediary.

But unlike the real thing, this one is built to kill. I can feel the lethal Firmament building up within it even now, ready to be injected into every Trial it's connected to.

All forty-two of them.