After portaling to Jupiter, a few minutes of flight remaining between him and the planet, Sam felt the communication array snap into place, linking him to Jeffrey.
“Sam? -he-e are y-u?” The connection was patchy due to the distance,barely functioning.
“Jeffrey?” Sam asked. “What’s up? I can’t really hear you. Should I teleport back?”
“Yes,” Jeffrey said, before a burst of static came across the line. Sam cut the connection and opened another portal, glancing back at Jupiter one more time. Jacob would have to deal with it by himself.
Sam portaled into the plaza outside the city hall, noting that as always, some significant refurbishment had gone down in the city. More skyscrapers loomed on the horizon, and the ones closer to the center of the city were far larger than before. Larger even than any skyscrapers that had existed on Earth. Some of them were easily over a mile tall and so wide that they looked like mountains.
Sam spotted Jeffrey pacing around a few hundred feet away by the city hall’s entrance, deep in conversation with Eduardo. Sam teleported over to them, appearing right next to Jeffrey.
“What’s going on?” Sam asked. “Why did you contact me? Is something wrong?”
Jeffrey nodded. “It looks like Tantalos got to work. An emissary of the Selvans is waiting for you. It came out of a hole in the sky a few minutes ago. All it would say is that it wants to talk to you.”
Sam frowned. “Why would Tantalos send an emissary? Doesn’t he want us to destroy them?”
“Well-” Jeffrey began.
“Oh, I think I get it,” Sam interrupted, before flashing his friend an apologetic glance. “He’s doing this to make it harder for me to fight them.”
“How would that work?” Jeffrey replied.
Eduardo nodded. “I understand. By setting up this whole narrative of a fair fight, with the Selvans having nothing against us, Sam’s Dao will be inhibited. It’s based on vengeance, but if there is nothing to avenge, Sam won’t be able to do much with it.”
“Exactly,” Sam answered. “And unless we just want it to stay there, I’m going to need to talk to it. Great.”
“You should try to annoy it,” Jeffrey suggested. “Make it reveal its true intentions. It seemed pretty uptight. Maybe you can jab at it a bit?”
Sam shrugged. “It’s worth a try. We’re going to have to fight them anyway, so what’s the harm?”
He headed through the archway, a few people turning to look his way as he passed. Eduardo and Jeffrey followed him in.
Sam’s feet clicked on the marble floor, and when he looked down he realized that some additions had been made. An ornate network of metal filaments depicted the history of the faction, starting with the end of the tournament. A few images of Sam fighting Jacob preceded it.
“Who makes these things?” Sam asked, a bit amused. “All the buildings lately are so ostentatious.”
“There is no inherent problem with that,” Eduardo said. “As long as it is done tastefully. The architect tried to sneak in statues of all the captains at the ends of hallways. I had to stop him.”
Sam chuckled at the thought of seeing statues of himself at every turn. It was just as well that hadn’t come to pass. While he didn’t mind attention anymore, there was still a line.
The Selvan waited in a side room, awkwardly hunched over. The alien was too large to stand up straight, its arachnid body almost folded in on itself. It wasn’t especially powerful, only an F Ranker, but its presence was still disconcerting.
Sam pushed back a wave of revulsion, instead opting to greet the emissary. “I’m Sam Atlas. I was told you wanted to see me?”
“Sam Atlas,” it said in a raspy voice.
“Yes, that’s my name,” Sam replied, a bit confused. “Why did you come here? What do you want from my faction?”
“The ancestor sent me to inform you that the Selvans will wait until you attack first. We are not a warlike people.” Despite the statement, the monster’s face twisted slightly as it said it.
“Right…” Sam said. “Well, if that’s it, you can go. I don’t want to have to look at you anymore. You disgust me.”
“What did you just say?” the Selvan spat, its forced demeanor of calm slipping away in an instant. “Human filth! You do not know your own place.”
“Told you,” Jeffrey muttered, too low for anyone other than Sam to hear it.
“My place,” Sam said softly. “What is my place, exactly?”
The alien envoy scoffed, ignoring all of the warning signs. “Your place is being ground beneath my feet, writhing in pain as my hatchlings feast upon your body for the sustenance they need to grow strong! It is as fertilizer for crops and as the flour from which bread is baked.”
Sam kept his face level. “That’s quite a strange place for me to be in, given the gulf in power between us. How would you back up any of those threats? Are you hiding secret reserves of strength far beyond my own?”
The Selvan bared its feet, rows of sharp, spiderlike fangs arranged within a humanoid mouth. Sam felt a shudder run down the length of his body at the sight. “With the will of the ancestor behind us, anything is possible. The Selvans are the peak of existence. Every other species is beneath them.”
Eduardo chuckled. “I cannot imagine what sort of idiotic being would send someone like you as an ambassador. Is your vaunted ancestor a few threads short of a web?”
If Sam’s earlier exchange had raised the Selvan’s hackles, this one infuriated it. The creature reared up on its back legs, a viscous fluid beginning to drip from its mouth. Where it landed, greenish smoke rose up, eating away at the stone. Sam and the others simply regarded the Selvan coldly, the gas washing over them harmlessly. There was nothing the alien could do to harm the faction elites, let alone Sam himself.
Still, the original purpose of the taunts had been achieved. An act of violence, if not against a person, then against the faction to which Sam belonged. Now he had sufficient motivation to use his Dao to its fullest. With the Selvan fully admitting that it wanted to use Sam as food, Sam had gotten a good picture of how the species as a whole operated. If this slavering maniac was their idea of an ambassador, then the rest were likely monstrous in comparison.
“Get out,” Sam barked. “You’ve overstayed your welcome. One more wrong move and I will end you, here and now. The only reason I am even willing to let you go is to transmit a message back to your friends. I was willing to work something out between us, but now that I’ve seen how the Selvans think of me and my faction, that peace seems unattainable.”
“Peace?” the alien envoy spat. “I did not come here to ask for peace. I came here to discover the sort of man who would incur the personal wrath of the ancestor himself. Your faction’s secrets are now mine. I know the layout of your city, your planet’s defences, every little detail we need for an invasion.”
“Really?” Sam asked incredulously. “So you admit you came here as a spy?”
For the first time in the conversation, the Selvan paused to think about what it had said. “I am no spy. A Selvan would never stoop to such a low. Against cattle, there is no crime. All is justified.”
“I’ve heard enough,” Sam replied. “Sadly, you won’t be returning to your people. They can figure out what happened to you on their own.”
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Instead of speaking, the Selvan threw itself at Sam, blades emerging from the ends of its eight legs. Needless to say, it looked like it was in slow motion compared to Sam. He turned on his heel, moving so quickly that the far weaker alien couldn’t even see him. His captains, already anticipating what was to come, widened their stances for battle. They, unlike the Selvan, were quick enough to catch Sam’s movements.
“Deal with it, please,” Sam ordered Jeffrey and Eduardo. “I don’t particularly want to do pest control after spending days in the World Dungeons.”
“On it,” Jeffrey said. He pointed his index finger at the Selvan like a gun, before miming pulling the trigger. There was a dull splat as the alien collapsed in on itself, a bullet of energy passing through so quickly that it turned the Selvan inside out.
Sam didn’t look back. He had more work to do.
***
Over the course of Uranus’ World Dungeon, Jacob had grown rapidly. Not exactly in terms of strength, but rather how he applied it. With Ouranos himself holding sway over the entire world, Jacob had been forced to deal with threats he had little experience with. All sorts of traps, magical arrays and ambushes had stretched him to his limit. Most of the damage he had taken in the dungeon had been from sources like that, rather than in open combat. To be honest, most of the monsters were pretty lacking in strength. The facsimile Titans and various figures from Greek mythology were far weaker than he was, and their defeats only served to fuel his strength more and more.
Eventually, after days of struggle, Jacob reached his destination. A single mountain had emerged from the star speckled darkness of the World Dungeon, stretching up to meet the heavens. On it was a gargantuan throne of obsidian, covered in sparkling gemstones. Each of the stones corresponded to a star in the sky, tracing out the heavens above.
On it sat who could only be Ouranos himself, a mile tall humanoid with dark blue skin. He wore a crown of dark iron, seven diamonds affixed to spikes that protruded from the top. He had no weapons, and wore only a loose robe that billowed in the wind.
“So you finally arrived, butcher of my family,” Ouranos rumbled from on high. “I do not know what you expect to find here, but what I do know is what you will find. Death.”
“Yes,” Jacob admitted, “but not my own.”
He took a single step forward, yet the world quaked and trembled beneath it. A pillar of carmine radiance lanced up into the night sky. When it vanished, Jacob was already gone, his fist swinging at Ouranos’ face.
His fist landed, but rather than wound Ouranos, it passed through the titan’s flesh like it was made of air.
“I am the king of the sky, foolish mortal. All of its strengths are mine.”
Jacob drew back his other fist, this time gathering his Dao within it. When his punch landed again, he successfully connected with his foe. Ouranos rocked backwards, his cheek rippling like a lake in a hurricane, before a geyser of bluish blood exploded out from his mouth and nose.
“Your boasts are as empty as the air you say you rule over,” Jacob taunted. “Fight me like a man. A mere god is not enough for me.”
Ouranos rose from his throne, growling low in his throat. “Very well. I shall take great pleasure in this.”
The titan’s hand flashed out, briefly transforming into a bolt of electricity, as if drawing upon the power of elemental lightning. Ouranos moved so fast that Jacob was caught unawares, and scooped him up in his massive hand.
The titan began to squeeze, his previously permeable flesh now as hard as diamond. Jacob laughed from within Ouranos’ grip, and with a shocking display of strength, forced the titan’s fingers apart. Jacob roared, a wave of physical force nearly bending Ouranos’ fingers backwards. He exploded out from the titan’s hand, streaking upwards like a rocket. His fist crashed into Ouranos’ chin, surrounded by a blazing corona of pure Dao energy. For a moment a titanic fist formed around Jacob’s own, nearly a thousand feet wide. It lifted Ouranos off his feet, turning the bottom half of his face into a pulped mess. Teeth flew everywhere and azure blood plummeted downwards like rain.
Torrents of Dao energy sloughed off of Jacob as he absorbed all of Ouranos’ surprise and fear, empowering his own Dao to new heights. Jacob hung in the air for a moment, looking more like a ray of sunlight than an actual person. Then, with another primal roar, he punched. The air split before him, a rampaging dragon of crimson lightning shooting out from his fist. It howled as it went, barreling across the skies towards the faltering titan.
Ouranos got his bearings a moment later, stepping on the air itself to right himself. He held out his palms and a shimmering shield of midnight black shot through with the twinkling of stars formed before him. Jacob’s attack crashed into it a split second later, shaking the shield. Ouranos took a step back, but the shield ultimately held.
He returned fire, a spear of darkness forming in his left hand. Ouranos stabbed towards Jacob, a tunnel of hypersonic wind trapping Jacob in place. A wave of Authority rippled out from Ouranos, preventing Jacob from even teleporting away.
Instead of running, Jacob stood his ground, trusting in his own strength. He had been working on a new technique for a while, and it seemed like the right time to test it out in battle. Sending all of his available Dao energy to his right hand, Jacob conceptualized the entire battle in his mind, drawing every ounce of egotistical pleasure out of it that he could. Every wound he had scored on Ouranos contributed to his Dao, the red fire surrounding his right hand glowing brighter and brighter.
Without saying a word, Jacob punched. Such was the power of the skill that no name could ever capture its true nature. That choice alone empowered it even further, drawing upon all of the mental gymnastics that Jacob had to resort to in order to use his Dao to the fullest.
A thin beam of utter destruction left Jacob’s fist, heading towards Ouranous. The titan’s spear seemed impossibly large in comparison, thousands of times larger than Jacob’s own attack. Only, when they met, Jacob’s beam punched straight through, striking the titan directly in the center of his chest. A resounding boom rang out as Ouranos’ chest caved in, a detonation ripping apart the titan’s flesh.
Jacob had no Dao energy left to defend himself, so the remnants of Ouranos’ original strike slammed into him too, driving him down into the ground. His flesh was flayed into ribbons by blades of high pressure air, but in terms of damage, he had dealt far more than he ended up taking.
Ouranos lay slumped against the mountain, one hand grasping at his throne to pull himself back up. His chest was a ruin of blood and torn flesh, but it was already beginning to pull itself back together as Jacob watched.
“How’s that for a foolish mortal?” Jacob called out as he rose to his feet. He ignored the pain of his injuries, as they healed over quickly enough that they hardly mattered in the grand scheme of the battle.
“You have impressive strength for one of your kind,” Ouranos admitted. “But you have not seen even a fraction of my true strength. This is not my true body. The whole realm is.”
Before Jacob could react to this proclamation, a hand reached out from the ground and grabbed him. A jolt of electricity ran through it, burning his skin nearly to the bone.
The sky whirled, stars blurring as they whipped around. A whirlpool of darkness and light dominated the heavens as Ouranos ascended into the sky. His body came apart at the seams, transforming into pure energy. It rushed up into the sky and joined with the whirlpool of power gathering above.
Ouranos’ face appeared in the center of the sky, gazing down at Jacob with a glare on its face that stretched for thousands of miles. “It ends here.” Ouranos smiled thinly, the world seeming to pause as he drew in breath to speak. “Skyfall!”
The heavens crumbled, falling from on high towards Jacob. Thousands of stars revealed themselves to be titanic orbs of flame and plasma the size of cities, hurtling downwards. While they weren’t real stars, the danger was still too much to be ignored.
Jacob leaped up into the sky, manifesting his Dao around himself in the form of a suit of armor. His Authority swept out, shielding him from the onslaught. One of the fiery orbs struck the edges of his Authority, threatening to break through. Jacob summoned layer after layer of metal, the molten liquid spilling down the sides of his Authority as it was burned away by the false star.
Seeing that this wasn’t going to work, Jacob took matters into his own hands. A bolt of lightning snapped out from his palms and impacted the center of the sphere of flame, causing it to rupture. With a resounding boom, the fireball detonated, a wave of heat spreading out in all directions.
Jacob flew up through the center of the conflagration, eyes set on Ouranos. The fact that the titan’s face still remained meant that while he professed to be the incarnation of the realm itself, he still had a central mind and source of power. After all, even a D Ranker was incapable of spreading their power across a dimensional space this large.
Jacob could sense the core of Ouranos’ being, contained within the brightest star in the sky. While hundreds of them had plummeted to the ground, most of them still remained, forming the outline of the titan’s face.
The titan narrowed his eyes, and just as Jacob prepared to fire off a bolt of energy, his instincts told him to dodge as beams of bluish energy fired from Ouranos’ eyes.
The ground ruptured as the beams struck, patches of reality falling away into the void. As that happened, Ouranos’ face grew clearer and more distinct, as if by destroying parts of his realm, he was strengthening what remained.
Jacob paid no heed, focusing on ending the battle. Now that he knew where Ouranos kept his mind, he had a surefire way to win. All he needed to do was reach his target.
The further he went, the worse the assault became. The air itself became hostile, reaching into his mouth and nose, trying to rip apart his head from the inside. Jacob forced it out with his Dao, but still took heavy damage in the process. Lightning forked down from the grimacing visage high above, burning flesh as it landed.
“You should have made yourself smaller,” Jacob grunted through gritted teeth. “All this did was make you a bigger target.”
The closer he got, the closer he came to victory. Jacob knew this, and by the end, so did Ouranos. The titan simply couldn’t do anything to permanently put Jacob down. His ego had led him to spread his power too thinly, and there was no way to defend.
Jacob finally reached Ouranos’ core, nearly dead from the effort and wounds he had suffered. He shattered it with a single blow, ending the dungeon once and for all.
