No, I'm Telling You, It Got Copied. (4)
As divinity erupted from every direction at once, I hurriedly set foot into the forest.
As far as I knew, nothing truly catastrophic was supposed to happen in the Forest of Hallucinations.
Granted, the illusions could exert physical force, but at their core, even if one caught you, all it meant was a brief flash of pain before you blacked out.
Sure, there was always the chance of someone cracking their head on a rock or a tree trunk, but nothing like that was liable to happen to an entire crowd all at once.
So my plan was simple: check the situation through the students' mana stones first. Even a quick glance should be enough to tell me what was going on.
I pulled out my mana stone. It blinked its blue light several times, then brightened into a screen.
"Wha...?"
The screen was shaking uncontrollably. Terrified voices spilled through it, and the frantic pounding of running footsteps made it impossible to tell what was actually happening.
The one thing they all had in common was that every single student kept screaming my name.
Maybe because they knew I could watch through the mana stones, they kept spitting out pleas for me to save them.
I flipped between the feeds, and every single screen showed the same kind of scene.
So seriously — what the hell is going on here?
I studied the shaky footage as best I could, but I didn't see any wounds or anything resembling injuries on the students' bodies.
What on earth could a person be facing that would wring screams of terror like that out of them?
Still, the fact that it was all caused by illusions put me somewhat at ease. It didn't seem like some villain I didn't know about had stormed in, or some mechanism I'd never accounted for had popped up out of nowhere.
Just as I was about to move, however—
a voice suddenly rang out inside my head.
"...Brother, get out of the forest."
"Ah, fuck! You scared me. No, sorry—"
"Never mind that. Get out of the forest now. Before the illusions appear."
Oh.
Damn it.
Only then did Niger's warning — get out before the illusions appear — actually sink in.
I had no idea what kind of horrors my rich imagination might conjure up, and yet I'd gone and forgotten all about them and waltzed straight into the forest like an idiot.
Whether it was my imagination or Niger's, the results were guaranteed to be nothing but absolute nightmares.
Thinking that, I turned around. I hadn't come deep into the forest, so a fast sprint would get me out in under a minute. With an Enhance spell on top, I could make it in thirty seconds, easily.
Or so I thought.
"...You are too late."
The moment Niger's voice said too late, the world around me began to bleed red.
Blood dripped — drip, drip — soaking into the dirt floor. A headless corpse dangling from a tree swayed gently, waving its hand at me.
And then came the sound.
In front of me. Behind me. From both sides. Blood-soaked figures were closing in on foot, mouths split grotesquely wide into mad, rictus grins.
In the pool of blood gathering beneath my feet, I could see my own reflection, standing alone amid that tableau of horror.
Ah.
Should I even call this a mercy?
At least no nukes dropped and no tanks rolled out, so I supposed I could count myself lucky in a way — but that didn't change the fact that I was about to throw up, and that was the real problem.
"Urgh... Niger, sir...?"
"...."
Just how fertile is this man's imagination, that he repainted the entire landscape of the forest around me?
The sky, bright only moments ago, had darkened and sunk low. It was unmistakably midday, yet a pale moonlight was seeping through the canopy of leaves. Along with the sodden, blood-drenched scenery, a fishy reek swept across my nose.
So I desperately called for Niger, hoping he would fix this insane spectacle. These weren't even illusions I had created in the first place, so I figured he owed me at least this much.
"Niger, sir, could you come out here and take care of this, please...?"
"They are mere illusions. You are perfectly capable of dealing with them yourself."
But Niger refused my request.
I hadn't expected him to turn down a plea like please kill me instead, so I found myself stammering without meaning to.
"N-no, that's not the point. Even if they are illusions, I've — I've never been in a situation like this before...?"
"...."
Answer me. Answer me right now.
I'm about to throw up, so hurry up and say something.
"Huurk — if you don't fix this, I'm seriously going to shit my pants. Ugh... I'm going to dump a magnificent load right where every student can see it, then puke and pass out, I swear...!"
"...You will be fine. Simply do as I say, and quickly. We must deal with this before anyone else witnesses it."
Wow. What an absolute bastard.
I'm begging this hard and he's still making me do it myself.
Life, honestly.
I wanted to spit out another I don't want to, but Niger spoke first.
"First, cast the sacred spells on your body. Strength, speed — and steady your mind as well."
I squeezed my eyes shut. Drawing a long breath, I pressed my trembling hands against my body and let the divinity flow.
Enhance Strength
Swiftness
Calm
I chanted the incantations one after another. Divinity poured into my body, and little by little my mind began to settle. Strength welled up in my limbs, and my steps turned light as feathers.
It still felt wrong. The revulsion still crawled under my skin.
But I followed his instructions as naturally as if I weren't myself.
"Next — the mace."
I acted on what I heard. Pressing hard on the rosario, I transformed it into the mace, gripped it in my right hand, and raised it with a practiced motion.
"You may swing the mace lightly. With the enhancement spells active, even a casual swing will be more than enough."
I didn't answer him. I only nodded.
The blood-drenched illusions were beginning to rush at me, and I closed my eyes. The reek of blood washed over me in a wave.
"Now open your eyes. Start with the head of the illusion charging in from your right."
I opened my eyes.
The mace felt surprisingly light. I raised it and swung sideways toward my right. The illusions only ever took the shape of people smaller than me, so I leveled the arc at shoulder height and cleaved across.
CRUNCH—
A vivid sensation traveled up the mace and into my hands. The head of the blood-soaked illusion burst open, brains spilling free.
"No time to hesitate. Shove past the illusion in front of you and knock it down to open up space."
I did exactly as he said. Driving my shoulder forward, I slammed into the illusion charging head-on. The mace swept aside the dagger in its hand in the same motion, and I drove the spike down into the skull of the illusion I'd bowled over.
After all, if I hadn't done it, Niger's voice would have walked me straight into it anyway.
"Several more are massed behind you. Turn your body back and swing the mace."
I spun at his word. My eyes — not mine, someone else's — burned a cold, lethal blue. Blood smeared across my face trickled down my cheek.
SPLAT, SPLAT—
The sight of the illusions bursting open one after another made my breath catch in my throat. Nausea surged up.
"Fall far back, then channel divinity into the mace and drive it into the ground."
I leaped backward, putting distance between myself and the horde. Channelling divinity into the blood-stained, crimson-dark mace, I plunged it straight into the earth.
"The circuit — Modified Circuit 2, the one I taught you in lecture."
I drew the circuit. I'd assumed I hadn't memorized it properly, but my hands connected the pattern with an unsettling calm. I took the finished circuit and twisted it, warped it. The divinity blazed, and the gathering light was brilliant.
Chain Explosion
Chain Explosion. Of course. A spell worthy of a serial killer to the very end.
The light flooded out.
KWAAAAAAAM—
With a colossal detonation, the forest around me was swallowed by radiance. The shadows of the trees were scoured away, even the bloodstains crumbling to nothing, and the reek of gore gave way to the fresh scent of grass.
The hallucinations were fading.
The blood and corpses that had littered the ground lost their shapes, and the stains clinging to my clothes and face slowly wiped themselves away as well. Since none of that blood was mine, it seemed to vanish along with the illusions.
"Haah..."
"Well done. No more hallucinations will occur for some time. Finish your task quickly and get out."
"..."
With that, Niger fell silent, like a man whose work was done.
Flabbergasted that he'd manhandled me so abruptly, I called his name over and over — but no answer ever came.
Ugh. Crazy bastard. Seriously.
So, seizing the window before the illusions could reappear, I set out to save the students. Elia would have already reached wherever they were by now, so I too pounded the earth in a hurry.
I twisted my body frantically toward the screams, and as I neared the heart of the forest, something started to feel off.
How should I put this.
How do I explain that for a moment, I failed to process the sight of a devoutly dressed priest — smiling — strolling along behind the fleeing students?
I couldn't believe it.
Me.
Niger... got copied?
No. What the actual fuck.
Really.
Don't screw with me.
What the hell did I ever do to you bastards, that you'd turn every last one of them into copies of me and throw this fucking pool party from hell?