Chapter 128: Book 2 Chapter 35 - Flower Power

“What did you say?” Anton asked.

His eyes swirled about, looking for anything out of place.

Jack grinned.

“I know you have a problem with me. Is it really because of the gas station? I’ve seen the way you look at me and Zoe, I think I know what your problem is. Let’s settle this, man to man.”

“I’ve done nothing.”

“Sure you haven’t, just watched me like a cat watches a hamster.”

Anton’s eyes roamed high above the two men in the lush garden. He scanned the golden polyp and the courthouse and the icy town beyond.

He saw nothing out of the norm. How subtle was Jack’s trick?

“You said you wanted to kill me,” Anton said slowly, refusing to let this man — this irritating man — bait him. “Is it a joke, or are you threatening me? Either way, I should break your legs.”

Jack looked Anton up and down, as though surprised they weren’t fighting already.

“Sure, I went looking for some way to kill you inside the polyp. I found nothing, but I figured it was the right move since you so clearly want to stab me in the back.”

“What makes you think I won’t stab you in the front?”

“You know, I had you wrong,” Jack said as he raised his hands in surrender. “The polyp told me you accepted the [Noblesse Oblige] quest. If you’ll do something like that, you won’t stab me in the back.”

Anton shook his head.

“What? I could stab you right now, front or back. I accepted that quest for the rewards. Who cares about these people?”

Jack took a half-step back, his fingers twitching, almost fists, as his eyes glanced at Anton’s gun.

“Does that mean you’re going to kill me now?”

Anton thought about it.

He could nip this in the bud, but should he?

Jack was testing him. Pushing him. He must have some trick up his sleeve, otherwise, he wouldn’t try to take Anton’s place.

Was this paranoia?

His mind spun, but he had spent too long thinking anyway. He pulled out his gun.

“You’ve had this coming for a while, Jack.”

A few petals smoldered into the air.

“You going to shoot me?” Jack asked.

Anton set the gun down and placed the axe beside it. He walked toward Jack with a serene smile on his face. It was finally time to kill the bastard who dropped Bella.

Felt good.

Jack’s petals flooded the space between them as he realized what was happening. They moved in thick, burning ribbons that obscured even Anton’s vision. But Jack’s surprise punch was sloppy — wide — and Anton sidestepped as more attacks came. He wove Jack through the burning rivers of petals. Though he had energy to spare, he could feel himself pushing to the limits. Days of fighting had worn him down, but he would not give an inch.

Even as the flames billowed, and Jack launched himself faster than any human had a right to be, Anton evaded. The pattern was so obvious.

He saw his chance as Jack overextended on a punch. He stepped past Jack’s fist and stomped through his shin. Anton felt the cracks through the soles of his boots. Less than expected. Jack groaned and Anton headbutted. His nose crunched against Jack’s nose and he stepped away as a wild punch filled the space where he had stood.

Jack fell back. The petals swirled around him, spun away, and he was gone. Anton’s eyes flashed through the garden searching for him.

“You can’t hide from me!”

But Jack knew it was possible. His sniper friend hid from Anton. His sniper friend even killed Anton.

A rock sailed out of a mass of petals. Anton didn’t even have to move. Now he knew where Jack was.

He charged with cold precision. More rocks flew out from the burning clouds, but he weaved through them. At last, the petals exploded toward him. He closed his eyes, and let the silver guide him against the torrent.

Some petals singed through his clothes and skin with livid kisses. He grabbed a hold of Jack and threw him to the ground.

He reached down and grabbed a fistful of Jack’s hair. He slammed his face until blood gurgled.

Anton let out a sigh and stood. A gentle rain fell as the garden’s flames died under the polyp's gaze. After a moment, Jack’s bent knee clicked into place.

“That hurt,” Jack said as he stood. He wiped away the blood on his face. “But you don’t know how high my Vitality is, do you?”

“What’s it matter? With my Insight, you can’t land a hit.”

“We’ll see who tires out first.”

Jack’s hands glowed. Flowers of bright, folded flame expanded out from his fists. Raindrops hissed into steam.

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Anton’s scan picked up the technique.

[Molotov Orchid]

Jack threw the technique as another flower bloomed in his hand. The burning orchids shot out the size of a cabbage, but they unfolded through the air, hissing, sputtering, ballooning into weeping petals of dark fire.

Anton dove aside. Heat rippled across his back. Anton grimaced but dove forward under the next flying explosion.

Jack must have developed this technique with the polyp's help. Such a shame he perverted the flower into something so crude.

He got close enough to land some punches. Jack didn’t even dodge, merely stumbled back and launched another flower.

Anton fell back.

In the weeks since he gained his body path, Anton had pondered the essence of a flower. It was not in the bloom, no matter how bright. That was a side effect. The true worth of a flower was that it grew and demanded growth. The plant only reached for the sky to make the flower visible. And the flower only existed to spread the plant.

It was the reason the roots sucked nutrients from the ground.

It was the reason the plant sucked nutrients from the ground.

Jack was wrong, and Anton intended to correct him.

The polyp — observing them both — helped.

Time slowed around Anton. Flames stopped dancing, as though holding their breath. He had a fraction of a second to think about what was happening when the lightning struck him in the chest.

The fat snake of power wriggled and ripped into his flesh. He screamed, but there was no time to move his jaw, to breathe, so he screamed inside his mind as he took that gifted power and shaped it to his use.

Time unstuck, and he smiled with bliss as he wove through the orchids. The polyp never stopped watching them.

At last, there were no more burning flowers, and the gentle rain choked out the last smoldering fires in the ashes. Jack heaved for air.

Anton walked toward him.

“One should never run out of Skein.”

Jack’s Vitality would renew his Skein soon, but Anton wouldn’t let that happen.

The new growths of nerves and organs inside his wrists still tingled with technique-forming lighting. With the last of the lightning, he linked them to his heart and to his Skein. Moving forward in rhythm to his pulse he slammed his open palm into Jack’s shoulder.

[Dandelion Through the Pavement]

Skein rippled out from his hand and into Jack’s flesh. It squirmed against the other man’s Willpower, found cracks, took root, and sucked out nutrients.

Jack squealed as the technique bloomed.

His shoulder blew apart as a flower of air rushed out from beneath his skin. Flesh ripped out and exposed cracked bone. Jack collapsed, screaming an ugly, inhuman sound.

Anton blinked, shocked at the technique that came out of him

[Skein 100/177]

It was a novel experience to have a technique that drained Skein so quickly. That shot had cost 20 Skein. Even with his Dexterity working to make it more efficient.

He was close to worn out as he grabbed Jack by his collar and lifted him.

“Did you push Bella?”

Jack slurred as he stared at Anton through a haze of pain. His blood flowed into the dirt.

“What?”

“Did you drop her?”

Eyes wide, Jack shook his head.

“No…”

Anton stared. Every instinct told him Jack was being honest. He waited for that distrustful voice in the back of his head, but it didn’t come.

Time to end this.

He cupped his hands around Jack’s neck.

[Dandelion Through the Pavement]

He stepped back as twin flowers bloomed. Ghostly shapes outlined by fine arterial spray, before Jack’s head rolled onto the ground in the garden’s ashes. Anton stepped back, breathing evenly, and stared at the gore.

He felt a small sense of satisfaction at his progress with his technique, but the death itself was regrettable. The polyp’s warm gaze fell upon him, and Anton sighed.

“I know, I know, but don’t worry. I’ll clean this up as though it never happened.”

[Fools Rush In]

Flames rushed out, and Anton grimaced. They swept over and he bit down on his lip until it bled. He fell beside Jack’s burning corpse. The sky bubbled and slagged as his eyes melted.

Zoe really undersold the horror of burning to death.

###

The flames grew ever higher, and in the distance, shockingly clear against the roaring fire, Sister Salt screamed as she lived through the end once more.

###

Anton blinked as he stood once more in the bright garden. Jack stared at him, fists clenched, ready to go. Anton reached out to the polyp and forged his technique. The pain was long and surreal, but it was easier the second time around.

He even improved the efficiency.

Time unstuck. Maybe it was bad for his health to play with time so much.

“You want to pal around?” he asked.

He flipped away from Jack and landed atop a garden wall.

He balanced easily, but his heart pounded harder than it should have. A bead of sweat ran down his neck.

The quest blinked away in the back of his head.

Ah, so his theory had been true.

That was why he felt slightly heavier during that fight.

Quests acted as parasites. This quest fed off of his energy until he completed it, and so his abilities were limited. It was as though he were walking around covered in weights.

In one way, this was a punishment for embracing power and the growth of power.

Resistance dragged at his eyes. Slowed them, blinkered them. They were still faster and keener than when he exited the dungeon but…

In another way, this was training.

Once he completed the quest, he would be so used to the new level that he would be stronger.

He just had to survive the quest… Another bead of sweat ran down his neck. Last time, that hadn’t been so easy.

Jack watched Anton with a frown, as though unsure of what was happening. That’s right, Anton thought, he thought we were about to fight.

“I’ve been too hard on you,” Anton said. “We had a bad first impression.”

Jack frowned.

“Yeah,” he said at last. “Sorry for saying I wanted to kill you.”

“Sorry for being a dick.”

“Me too.”

They stood in silence for a moment as Jack tried to puzzle out Anton’s perfectly content smile.

“I got a quest to follow you around as a deputy,” he said. “So, what’s the next move?

“What if I don’t want you following me around?”

“Then stop me.”

Jack’s hand opened, and an orchid of blackened flame bloomed. It hovered, raging, rotating, beside his hand, like a mad falcon waiting for release.

[Molotov Orchid]

Anton waited, but Jack snapped his fingers, and the flame vanished.

“I don’t need you,” Jack said with exasperation.

He walked away through the garden until he stood behind the polyp. His boot stomped down. A reverberation shook dirt as he hit something metal. Anton watched from overhead as Jack unearthed a large metal door hidden in the ground.

“Hey,” Anton said. “How did you know that was there?”

“It’s part of my quest.”

Anton frowned and reached for his quest.

[Goal: you must expand the safe zone]

[Current radius from polyp: 10 ft]

[E Rank Reward delivered: 100 ft]

[For further quest information, see the list held by your deputy]

“My deputy,” Anton said flatly.

“Told you.”

Jack’s grin was so smug Anton considered killing him again but decided not to waste the time loop.