Chapter 231: Choosing the Horrible Option (Patreon)

"No, what you have thought is indeed true, Master. There is only one way to escape this scenario, and that is through the spirit plane. Once the trial concludes and the leviathan is crowned victor, the participants will be given the option to exit via portals similar to Phase One. But those will only lead you all back to your doom. Even if by some… cosmic interference you managed to emerge in one piece, someone very powerful outside has caught wind of your presence, Master. They will not rest until you are well and truly dead and six feet under."

"Hah, let me guess, said powerful being is the leader of those elves." Alice had mentioned that Gweneth couldn't speak outright to them because all of Varkaigrad was being watched by someone formidable. She had heavily hinted it was the Elven Queen.

"Yes, Master. The outside world is no less perilous. And there is only one kind of person who can make a diviner of even my caliber nervous, and whom I make equally nervous in return: another diviner of the same rank of power. She and I are cut from the same cloth, merely born and bound to different circumstances. Though perhaps 'diviner' is not quite the right term. We are more aptly called deductors."

She paused, gathering her thoughts. "Deductors work on cues set within their world and require an intimate understanding of said world. It may not appear impressive on paper, but once they grow intimate with their domain, they can literally see a landslide coming by the shift of a single rock— or shift the rock themselves to cause a landslide. It is almost as if they are gods of their region. Just as I was, in this small world set up for you, Master. I knew everything— everyone's fate, every subtle shift in their threads, their beginnings and their ends. I could weave it all without directly interfering; just shift a few pebbles here and there and watch it all turn into what I wished it to be. That is how deductors operate."

Well, I had always known the Elven Queen might be terrifying, but to think even this proud leviathan would admit to being similar to her in some fashion—and that they both made each other nervous… I had a deepening sense of dread about her now. And from what I had gathered, the leviathan was a stage above Gold itself— platinum core, as they called it. So was the Elven Queen the same? From the looks of it, that was probably true.

But I had another question.

"Then what's stopping someone like that outside from simply… knowing what you're up to? You said someone like her was enough to unsettle you and vice versa. But what about her? She must think there is another way for me to escape. And if she knows… you… are here…" I paused as the full implication clicked into place. "She doesn't know you— or someone of your caliber— is here, does she?"

Even with her head bowed, I could feel the smug energy radiating from her being. "That is indeed true, Master. She has no idea how long I have been manipulating the very theme of the Colosseum itself. A deductor works based on cues—but what if those cues are being fed by another deductor, unknowingly to them? It creates a blind spot in their predictions.

"For however long the Colosseum's trials have existed, they were meant to be manifestations of historical scenarios in the form of simulations, designed to test participants and reward them. It was always just that: a simulation. Nothing you did here, worked on here, or even took from here mattered, for it was nothing more than an elaborately crafted illusion.

"But this time, it is the real thing. The gates to the true world within the Colosseum. A phenomenon that has only opened twice before now. First, to instigate it all into motion millennia ago, when the Colosseum's existence first became known to everyone. And once now, when the true heir entered the trial.

"As for your question, Master, do you understand now?"

However terrifying it was to consider how long this had been going on, the picture was becoming clearer by the moment. "Yes— at least I think so. My initial theory was correct, it seems. I knew something was off about this 'simulation' from the very start. First, it never resembled any historical event I knew of, which was supposedly the theme of every other trial. And second, the part that might throw everyone off from me, the permanence of progression here."

The lights went off in my head. "When it was a simulation, they said that no matter what power you gained within the trial, whether from an artefact, something you achieved yourself, it was all part of the simulation. Your true body was secured elsewhere by the Colosseum while your consciousness took root in a host within the simulation. So it was all for naught except the final rewards offered by the Colosseum, which you only gained after it all finished. Given that this time it is not a simulation, and I literally have my dragon body within the trial… that implies my real body is here. What I gained during my stay is permanent this time. And that includes the power to use divinity, and a more direct affinity for solar fire."

I glanced at my doppelganger, who seemed to be enjoying watching me connect the dots. "Divinity is the very first thing I need to even survive contact with the Spirit Plane, something I could never obtain from the trial as an outsider. The same goes for the all-powerful Elven deductor! They have no reason to think I can escape via the Spirit Plane, because that would be suicide for me. The only way they see is for me to claim the prize by going out and dooming myself."

"Such marvelous deduction, Master!" The heavenly leviathan's voice brimmed with genuine pride. "A few parts might be off, but that is indeed more or less the truth. Only supplemented by the fact that no diviner or deductor can send their senses into this tumultuous plane itself to find cues and deduce their way through, even such senses are prone to spiritual degradation. That helped, but the only true way to fool one deductor is via another."

The scope of it all left me breathless. It felt like I was a piece on a board where two behemoths played chess with real lives. But it did feel good to know one was on my side. I looked down at her, still singing my praises like a mother watching a baby take its first steps, being endlessly proud. I banished that image from my mind.

So… nobody outside, no matter how powerful, knew I still had a way to escape intact. But that brought me back to the issue that had been gnawing at me. I looked at the heavenly leviathan, and at my doppelganger standing beside me. Neither had commented on the fate of literally millions within Varkaigrad, those who would be caught in this mess. Either they'd die first when the ley lines exploded, or be consumed by the fairy ring afterward.

And not just them, since I knew this trial was real and not a simulation, what of the people inside the trial when it all shattered? I had divinity to protect me, but what about them? The answer was there: the Spirit Plane would erase them. If they somehow took the portals out, the fairy ring would kill them.

While it was all set up to fool this all-powerful, godlike figure playing with people's fates outside, what was so different from the being plotting it from the inside? It was simple. They had everyone else marked as acceptable sacrifices.

I looked down at my own hands. Acceptable sacrifices, huh? Would I— despite all my will to be a different kind of dragon than my predecessors— fall into the same fallacy? One where everyone around me was just a necessary, unknowing pawn to be discarded without remorse, just to save my own scaly hide? Was that who I truly wished to be?

The answer came without significant thought. And it was a straight, resolute no.

"How do I save everyone else?" I said without blinking, staring straight at the leviathan below me.

That was the question that caused a tense moment of silence among us. "Before you said something along the lines of 'you don't, Master.' Beware that that was NOT my question."

Something shifted in the air. The usual embarrassment and stammer vanished from her voice as her gaze lifted, just a bit. She still did not face me directly, but it was enough to see her irises, which had shrunk to pinpoints, and her almost frozen pale face. She looked almost terrifying now.

"I was not going to answer that, Master. I was made to answer whatever you ask of me with no deceit. There is just no saving 'everyone else.' If you wish to talk about the outside world, even if you were to send your servants back to the waking world to warn others, they would be noticed by the watchful eye of the deductor and eliminated before they even thought what hit them. The only way to escape would be to craft a powerful anti-divination charm and flee as soon as possible. If that happened en masse, the deductor would notice. Even on a small scale, speaking of the fact will be noticed, it needs to be as natural as possible. So, no, there is no way to save the people outside. Except a few who'd leave without asking a single question, without even being told."

I was aware of this… somehow. And I could feel my heart wrenching bit by bit as her explanation went on. I was truly powerless, wasn't I? Incarnation of this big, bad, all-powerful dragon and still incapable of saving lives when it came down to it. Just a leaf falling in autumn, blown wherever the wind wills, watching the rest of them kindling on fire, still selfishly blissful that I wasn't part of that flame.

My doppelganger wore an incredulous expression at my question, but for all things good, she had kept her mouth shut this time. For good reason.

But I had noticed the leviathan had only mentioned that I couldn't save everyone in the waking world. She had bitten her lips, as if to keep herself from speaking about the people within the trial. So I obviously forced her open her mouth.

"What about the people within the trial? That includes 'everyone else' too, as far as I'm aware."

"There is a way to save almost everyone within the trial… but— while you did not ask me this question— I would say please don't do it, Master. The only way to preserve everyone else here is to aid them in resisting the disintegration effect of the Spirit Plane on their physical existence, something that can only be done with divinity right now. And the only creature with potent divinity here is you, Master. But by doing so, if it succeeds, you would be thinning the divinity around yourself to preserve everyone else. The pressure of the Spirit Plane will be far more dreadful that way. Where earlier you might feel like you were taking a leisurely stroll, by thinning your divinity to protect them, you would actually feel the dreadful effect taking hold. Every day, you would feel yourself shattering bit by bit, and the existential pain would be worse than anything you have ever imagined. And even my sight does not pierce the boundaries of that plane. How long you would remain there before finding a fortunate portal back to the waking world… is uncertain."

She was shaking by the time she finished, and perhaps I could feel the reason.

I had a dilemma to work through, huh. Either I walked out of here on my own and strolled through the Spirit Plane while letting everyone else dissolve like a live chicken dropped in potent acid— or I brought everyone else with me, saving them from this fate, while enduring some kind of inexplicable, unimaginable pain for an unknowable amount of time before I even got out.

Huh… seemed like the dilemma was no dilemma after all.

But I could see the leviathan spiraling as I finished that thought.

“Please don't take that path, Master. You have no idea… how can you possibly endure that with how you are right now? The pain, the slow unraveling of your very being, for an eternity you cannot measure. I cannot allow that. I cannot… What if there was another way? What if… what if there was no one left to save? Then Master would have no reason to thin her divinity. No reason to suffer. Yes. That's it. If I simply ensured there were no survivors within the trial, if they all dissolved before Master even had the chance to decide— "

A terrifying, gigantic black claw suddenly appeared behind the leviathan.

The leviathan paused before her spiral even finished, "Why do I feel like my existence will be prematurely erased if I finished that thought?"