Book 6: Chapter 12 - The Future (RAW)

We have isolated forty-two serotypes, yet none remain stable beyond twelve hours. The virion’s ribon arrays realign rapidly as if guided by a Gestalt consciousness, rewriting host Lifescript one nucleotide at a time. Its resulting mutations are legion. Genomic markers point unerringly to Xenodraconis-invader mitochondria. Containment is impossible. Evolution has found a conductor, and the tempo now accelerates beyond our reach.

- Dr. Sylvie Templar [Confidential Memo].

“Why don’t you come down and let us settle this like men?” I called up to the man who looked like he fancied himself a god.

His answering grin cut across his face, a crescent moon of raw arrogance. “Why not? I’ll amuse myself for a moment. I would know the name of the brave fool who delights in facing me. Tell me, do you truly believe you’re the equal of my usual foes?”

I started to draw my magic to me even as I answered. “I am the death of gods, Apex. I am Gilgamesh of Uruk.”

Sage’s Sight flooded my senses, a storm of overlapping futures that shimmered like shards of broken stained-glass. In one splinter of possibility, I heard Solarin’s voice crackle, Move left, and before the sound had even reached the comm in my ear, I was already pirouetting, twin swords singing free of their sheaths.

You have gained 1 Dexterity.

You have gained 1 Luck.

A split-second later, Apex struck the sand where I had stood, faster than any lightning. The desert floor erupted—stone and sand fountaining skyward with the impact.

He rose, unhurried, rolling broad shoulders that belonged to a Greek statue carved of marble. I saw golden motes bleed from his presence: raw Mana so dense I was sure that even mortal eyes could track each ember as it drifted, hissed, and died.

I stole the heartbeat he granted me, Overboost surging through Sage’s Sight until the world fractured into a thousand kaleidoscopic threads—each one a way to die. I gripped Cutting Leaf and Song before me, listening to the blades’ hungry hymn as I prepared to do what needed to be done.

“Gil,” Solarin whispered over the comm, her words warping beneath static, “we’re going deeper into the forest. Be—”

“—careful,” I finished for her, letting the echo hang between us. “He’s faster than Velocity Rush. I’ll try to help as much as I can.”

I shook my head, a pointless motion. “Protect the girl.” 

Apex’s eyes narrowed; gods dislike being ignored. 

“Yes,” he rumbled, voice a deep and perfect, pleasant baritone, “you might be of some entertainment.”

Then he was gone. Not merely vanished, my heightened arcane vision mapped the vortex his departure carved through the air. More threads of possibilities appeared before me.

I chose the most survivable future, shattering half a dozen paths to do it.

You have gained 1 Wisdom.

You have gained 1 Intelligence.

You have learned Improved Dodge (lvl.5)

I bent my knees, pivoted left, and slid into The Mantis Waits, as my treacherous master Fen would have called the form. Caselel’s blade, Cutting Leaf, high, Song low, their points tracing lethal arcs in the air as I attempted a counter to a blow that I was sure was coming. Yet even prophecy is sometimes too slow; a naked fist met my blades, and for a moment, there was resistance, before Apex broke through my guard. The strike continued, impacting against my trunk and sending me flying over the dunes with the power of the First Spell.

You have gained 1 Luck.

You have gained 1 Strength.

You have gained 1 Dexterity.

You have gained 2 Constitution.

My Health did not just drop—it plummeted, a brutal loss of six hundred and forty-five points. I could not withstand many more hits like that—miracles, regeneration, or magic notwithstanding. Yet there was a silver lining: every exchange of blows with Apex’s overwhelming power tempered my body. Tempered my will. The recent gains in my attributes were testament to such.

I murmured Heal, emerald light knitting rent flesh even as a colder truth settled in my chest like lead: this was a battle where I could not hold back. For the first time in a very long time, I stood hopelessly outclassed—death itself before me in a cape. Strangely, the revelation unshackled me. Acceptance washed over like cool rain, lifting burdens I had carried too long. Perhaps I would soon be at peace.

That clarity marshaled me into action. At my command, Greater Drain, its form sculpted by the chorus of voices within, erupted from my palm. Enhanced by Overboost, it stretched forth as a ravenous tentacle of midnight, a living thing of umbra. When it latched onto its prey, unrestrained joy flared in my heart.

Rather than following up on his attack, he merely regarded me with cool indifference—his hubris so absolute that he chose to toy with me, oblivious, or uncaring, to the fact that my spell was already siphoning his very strength.

I took this time, this gift, to rally myself.

Amid the countless futures that blossomed and died behind my eyes, I glimpsed my own corpse more often than not; yet in every branching vision flickered a single, stubborn ember of hope. Apex’s overwhelming might was also his fatal flaw: he possessed neither training nor discipline, relying solely on his raw, unrefined natural power. After all, what need has a god for skill when might has ever sufficed?

But the reprieve did not last long. Apex surged toward me, flying across the sands. But I was already diving low, dodging his winding haymaker before the idea had even crystallized in his mind. In one shimmering possibility, I had witnessed Solarin cry out a warning; that phantom echo granted me the heartbeat I required to summon a counterstroke. I wove Holy Strike through my bladesong, and gold hummed at my sword’s edge of silver.

My sword kissed Apex’s chest. Sparks skittered, the Godmetal cutting into the fabric of his suit, but there was no blood. It was like cutting at a mountain. Still, Apex’s brows rose in grudging acceptance; the Meta had expected no resistance at all.

“Interesting toy,” he rumbled, voice reverberating like war drums. “Where did you find an alloy that even notices me?”

What an odd turn of phrase, I mused, feeling the power within me brim over—my cup finally running full. I shaped the ancient syllables that would unlock the path of the Asura. I am invincible… I am unbreakable… I am power without equal… 

“Under an older heaven,” I answered, slipping inside his reach. His left jab blurred past, a blow meant to topple titans, but it found only empty air. “Not in any chronicle, unwritten on any map, and forgotten by all memory.” 

The words felt correct, as if they were lines that had been rehearsed many times before. I shook my head.

Apex fancied himself a god. I had always imagined myself the one who slew them. To my mantra, I added words of my own. “My skill has no equal, I am godslayer.”

The Path of the Asura opened within me, each pulse of my heart a thunderclap of crimson light. One step. Veins blazed, muscles thickened, and the world slowed—not merely with the cool lucidity of a boosted Sage’s Sight, but with a molten certainty that I was the fulcrum around which fate itself would now pivot.

Apex’s answering laugh rolled across the dunes. “That expression… the burst in your aura… yes, fight me.” He launched forward, fists tracing near invisible lines as the air screamed in resistance.

I met him halfway. Godmetal shrieked as Cutting Leaf parried his leading hook; Song followed in a rippling thrust that skimmed his flank hard enough to shed sparks. A rumble of amusement escaped him—and then he slammed his forehead against my helm, a meteor-strike at point-blank. I realized, against all reason, that my Adamantine plate was holding even as stars detonated behind my eyelids. Forced to my knees, I almost fell into the void of unconsciousness, but the Path demanded I still walk upon it. So, I did.

Step. 

I rose, aiming a blow at his ribs; he countered, floating behind me, and striking me with a brutal hammer-blow to the back of my neck that would have decapitated a lesser man.

You have gained 1 Strength.

You have gained 2 Luck.

You have gained 2 Constitution.

Again, my Health dropped.

He stepped away, amusement in his eyes. “Incredible, you are still alive. Fantastic. They say you are just a normal man… how is this even possible?”

Whilst he blathered, I cast Holy Aura, the spell coming easily to me now that I was a few steps on the Path. I glowed with radiance. Step. Heal again, this time boosted by Holy Aura, sang most loudly, restoring my essence. Despite Greater Drain working, pumping me full of essence, I was sure that I would run out of Mana if this exchange continued at this pace.

On the comm, distant voices cried out—Solarin, Casia, maybe even the little Variant child—yet they seemed to reach me through water, far away and irrelevant to the red trance in my veins.

Apex threw a cross that was far too direct, too confident. I slipped inside the arc and slashed at his wrist with my sword Song. Empowered by Holy Strike, the blade shrieked against his skin, and this time, I felt it bite. 

You have learned Holy Strike (lvl.3)

You have gained 1 Strength.

You have gained 1 Dexterity.

You have gained 1 Wisdom.

But even as I completed the motion, expecting to finally see some damage, I saw only a thin line of gold-white light sear across his flesh... and then vanish, healed before my eyes.

Apex could heal himself, too.

If mortal eyes could follow this battle, it would have seemed absurd, like something out of a fever dream. A man clad in heavy armor of black and gold, brandishing twin blades, locked in combat with a caped figure who floated effortlessly above the ground.

And in that moment, clarity struck. I finally understood what I was up against: an undefeatable boss—the kind of enemy games threw at you not to win, but to make a point. A narrative device meant to humble the hero, to expose his weakness, to set the stage for growth and training through sheer humiliation.

But sometimes, just sometimes, those scripted defeats could be overcome. And when they were, the rewards were always impressive.

“Equal?” he mocked, flexing the unmarred hand. “You are interesting, Gilgamesh, but you are not power without equal.”

“For someone who styles himself divine,” I spat, whirling Cutting Leaf overhead into a descending cleave filled with my righteous fury, “you whine and blather awfully like mortal.”

He blocked with his forearm, my blade clanging sharply on impact—but I might as well have struck bedrock. Apex planted his feet, drew back a fist. I saw the attack coming, saw the future it would carve—but so fast was he that I was powerless to stop it.

The blow landed dead center. My armor held, steadfast as ever, but the sheer force of the strike launched me a hundred paces through the air. I hit the ground hard, skidding through sand, gouging deep furrows in my wake.

You have gained 1 Strength.

You have gained 1 Constitution.

You have gained Improved Pain nullification (lvl.2)

Yes, it made sense. It all made sense. On the Path, there was no pain. Step.

He was truly playing with me, of that I was sure, and I did not know how much longer I could walk along the Path. No… that thought was wrong. It felt wrong. Doubt had no place here. Not on the Path.

Storm-forged steel—that was the color of his eyes, and they watched me with cool amusement. “An impressive suit you wear,” he mused. “I wonder who forged it? Voss? Ingram? Lazar? And that radiance... I’m curious—what kind of power fuels it?”

I pushed myself to my feet, every movement laced with effort, and answered evenly, “A skilled but humble smith of Al-Lazar. And this…” I let the radiance around me intensify, “...this is the light of the Goddess.”

Apex might have been the focus of my fury, the embodiment of everything I opposed… but credit where it was due: the cur was surprisingly sporting.

He laughed, the sound echoing across the dunes. “You speak like a madman. I have flown to every corner of this world and never heard of such places.”

“Ignorance, it seems, has no cure,” I retorted, sliding one sword back into its sheath. Where two blades failed, perhaps one might triumph.

Apex’s eyes narrowed. “You’re facing only a sliver of my power, Gilgamesh. Test my patience, and this game ends.”

I threw my head back and laughed. “A game, is it? Then let’s us continue this play! I dare you to keep using only that fraction—unless, of course, you are afraid.”

It was a slim, desperate wager—one aimed squarely at his pride.

Feeling my gall rise, I felt only disgusted with myself for sinking this low. It was almost begging. Not even the gods had humbled me so.