There were a lot of things that were going through Ryan’s mind as the outline of the teleportation zone appeared around him. He sure as hell didn’t like the ideal that One-Eyed Rick embodied. If there was a prime example of a Settler generation bastard, Rick embodied it entirely.

  Though it was impossible to deny. The bastard did have style.

  Mana crackled around Rick’s eye socket. Blue sparks crackling outwards, a bright light in the dark gray haze.

  “”

  “I don’t have time for this right now. I think I left my stove on and I don’t want my house to burn down. Sorry, you’re just going to have to wait a little longer.”

  “You think I’m going to just let you teleport safely?”

  “”

  A massive orb that consisted of complicated interlocking parts formed above Rick’s hand. It was made in multiple parts so that a stray antimagic skill wouldn’t be able to destroy it. It was also pretty damn archaic. Nobody really used something like this anymore.

  It descended down on Ryan, threatening to crush him if he didn’t move out of the way.

  Ryan considered Rax’s spear for a second but decided against it. He dropped the golem and spear and formed a blade of aura in his right hand. Holding a knife in his left.

  [Aura Slash]

  It wasn’t a particularly strong wave, but if Ryan was right, it didn’t really need to be either. The red wave smashed into the interlocking structure of the orb and collapsed the structure. The interlocking parts broke apart, the parts that hadn’t been crushed were still falling down towards him. Then the knife slammed into the exposed mana.

  [Volatile Antimagic Throw]

  The explosion smashed apart the rest of the structure, exploding it into bits, making Rick blink in surprise.

  The elf looked thoughtful. “Is this the standard of strong fourth realms these days? Interesting.”

  “[Mana Structures] is a bad skill for combat, Rick. It was probably versatile back in your day, but it’s pretty damn inefficient for combat.”

  Rick considered Ryan’s words. “You’re not wrong, I always did feel like I was lacking firepower compared to how far ahead I was. However, that was not the reason I picked that skill in the first place.”

  The elf raised his hand once again. This time the mana structures weren’t taking a singular orb shape but floating in the air and separate. Four, five–then all of of the [Mana structures] broke apart. Rick staggered, his good eye spinning in his head.

  Ryan laughed. “What’s wrong old man? Having trouble getting it up in a leveled zone? Or maybe it’s just been too long. You know what they say, use it or lose it.”

  It was clear that the Witch Tyrant hadn’t resurrected the Fallen Rick until now. It was also clear that One-Eyed Rick didn’t know how to handle a leveled zone. Not only was One-Eyed Rick’s magical efficiency significantly worse than Gamielle’s, but Rick felt far, far weaker than Pinkie and the dragonslayers she’d fought.

  With all of that put together, Ryan felt he was actually quite a bit stronger than Rick in a leveled zone.

  The elf brought his hand up to his face. He started reconstructing smaller magical structures in his hand. Spinning blue shapes that reminded Ryan of three dimensional tetris pieces were spinning rapidly. Rick got up to six structures this time before it shattered in his hands. The seventh piece forming for a very brief amount of time.

  “ The bottleneck here isn’t my magical ability, but my mental capacity. Of course not just my mana is restricted, but so is my mental ability.” The mad [Arcane Seeker] hummed, focusing on his mana structures. “I could adapt the structure or maybe it just means I have focused too much on the magical aspect and neglected my mental efficiency.”

  Rick was now completely engrossed in trying to figure out a way out of the problem of working in a leveled zone. This time he got to nine structures before they broke apart. The rapid improvement sent a chill down Ryan’s spine.

  He grabbed at a knife, picking up the spear as well. Ryan didn’t know if a Fallen summoned by the Witch Tyrant could die, but he sure as hell wanted to find out Rick kept improving his efficiency.

  Unfortunately the mad elf hadn’t been so engrossed in his task that he’d missed Ryan’s hostility.

  “Hm? Shoo.” Rick waved him off with a hand. “Come back when you’re ready.”

  One-Eyed Rick turned around and walked behind the fifth Trial entrance and a little bit down the hill. Away from Ryan’s capability to fire at him while sticking to his teleport.

  –

  When Ryan woke back up on the couch of the apartment he’d rented, he was just staring up at the ceiling. Ryan was vaguely aware of a large green orc sitting at the dining table, watching the TV. It was still playing highlights of the tournament, the unwanted not having reached anywhere near Gravenmarch yet.

  Clara was hovering over Milock’s laptop as his friend kept typing away.

  Ryan let out a sigh.

  The sound drew everyone’s attention. Milock bolted up from his laptop and Clara practically jumped over the table.

  “Ryan!”

  He got up. For some reason he had been thinking that he’d be a little too exhausted to deal with his friends.

  He’d been wrong.

  This was exactly what he needed.

  Ryan hugged Clara and signalled for Milock to come over.

  “Come on Milo. Too good to give your friend a hug? Come on Barry, you too.”

  Milo shook his head and sat back down at his laptop. Barry just snorted. Clara was just staring at his face, intently.

  “What? You guys draw dicks on my face again?”

  “You got scratch marks on your face. Uh, it’s faded but it looks like it was pretty bad.”

  Milock popped his head over his laptop to take a better look at him. Ryan just touched his own face and felt that the wounds were slightly bumpy. He looked to the window and saw his face in the reflection. It definitely looked like a tiger had clawed his face.

  “Ah, I should have used some of the mid potions instead. Oh well, it’ll disappear when I hit the fifth realm anyway.”

  “How are you going to do that?” Milock asked. “They have adventurers on rotation. Maxing out the Fifth Trial capacity. Don’t think you’ll get a chance for a while. Probably not long after the Realm expansion.”

  “There’s another trial entrance deep in the Abyss. I’ve already found it, and well. It’s a long story. How about an after-action report?”

  Ryan looked at Barry as he said it. The orc raised an eyebrow, curious as to why Ryan seemed so keen on an after action report.

  This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

  “A little late but might as well.”

  –

  So, Ryan started from the beginning. With the time chamber and One-eyed Rick’s skill orb.

  Barry scratched his tusk. “Huh. I didn't think he was that much of a monster when I met him. I thought some of the other Settlers were stronger than he was.”

  “So wait, you agree with the rest of the Settlers? People in your generation could actually go toe to toe with the Tyrants?”

  It was hard to imagine for most people nowadays, but older generations always did say that there were monsters in the Settler generation that could go toe to toe against the Tyrants. While Ryan knew it was true with One-Eyed Rick, he didn’t know how true it was with the others.

  Barry scratched a tusk. “The rest of the world thinks the Witch Tyrant played a complex game where the seven pioneers appeared weaker than they actually were. I say she was playing defense, keeping their strengths hidden until they were strong enough to roll over everyone. I’ve seen it, back then there were always people that could challenge them. Though, I didn’t think someone ever existed that was stronger than the Passive Tyrant. Hmm, a solo [Mage]. Especially back then. I should have figured that one out.”

  Ryan explained further about his choices and why he did so. There were no comments about lost opportunities, Barry and Milock had complete faith in him that Ryan made the right assessment… It was almost disappointing in a sense.

  Then Ryan started talking about Pinkie and her fight with the dragonslayers. He stopped when he started talking about the dragonslayers that had fought Pinkie.

  Suddenly the haze of exhaustion that had been lifting was bearing down on him in full. Ryan leaned his head back on the chair.

  “Oh god. I completely forgot about Gilbert. I got him killed. Fuck.”

  The mood on the table instantly shifted. Their judgmental stares didn’t hurt as much as Ryan expected.

  Clara seemed uncertain. “You… forgot?”

  “So much has happened since then. You guys don’t even know about the almost genocide with the Unwanted yet.”

  He tried to make a joke. It was half-hearted and didn’t land at all.

  Clara came in to chastise him. “Ryan, read the room, that’s not funny. It’s been four days, what the hell do you mean an almost genocide?”

  Milock shifted a little. “You’re not talking about how Pinkie almost killed everyone in the city are you?”

  “Nope, an entire species of people down at the Abyss. A whole clusterfuck–”

  Barry interrupted the conversation. “Let’s get back on track. We were talking about your tournament plan and how it went wrong.”

  The group did know about the plan and the promises Pinkie had made. Ryan had told them about it and they had accepted that he was going to do it.

  “I got fucked.” Ryan said simply. “Pinkie lied to me and used that stage to further her own Legend. She was ready to kill everyone, the city and the other dragonslayers. It’s my fault Gilbert died.”

  Barry crossed his arms. Ryan expected a ‘told you so’ but it didn’t come. The veteran was a bit more cold than that.

  “Where do you think you went wrong?”

  “I trusted my gut too much? I didn’t realize Pinkie was a psychopath until it was too late.”

  Clara frowned, clearly not reconciling what Ryan was saying to what she remembered. “Wasn’t the first thing she did was pose as an airline attendant and put a knife to your neck?”

  “Yeah but she reminded me of Gamielle. Cold to her enemies, but warm to her allies. I thought…” Ryan blinked as he trailed off. He was trying to remember how the Ryan of back then saw her. “I thought she would keep her word because she seemed so prideful of how strong she was. Pinkie played me and I didn’t see it coming at all… I should have seen it coming.”

  Barry broke the silence. “We’ll put a lid on that and come back to it later.”

  “What? Not going to say ‘”

  “No. Not yet. Continue your report.”

  So, Ryan continued. They talked about the hex, how the Witch Tyrant taunted him while he was stuck on Cerul, staring down into oblivion. Her intentions with the soul hex being made clear afterwards.

  As usual, Clara was completely concerned for his well-being. “So, it wasn’t designed to kill. But to force you down a different path?”

  “The Witch said that even she didn’t know what the result of the curse would be. She was taking a gamble on my life and hoping that I’d overcome it somehow.”

  Barry just shook his head while Clara stared hard at the table. The silence was deafening, the exhaustion coming back in full.

  For the first time in the discussion, Milock chimed in. “So, it was a good thing right? Sounds like she would have hexed you with it anyway. With this, you got to set the stage, and then destroyed it. It was like you said when you first told us your plan. She’s always going to plot around you, better to give yourself the strongest advantage you can manage.”

  For some reason Milock, who always took Ryan’s side no matter what, had somehow hit the nail on the head, but Barry agreed with Milo.

  “You took the trap head on while holding onto a trump card. Your plan, considering who you were up against. Worked out.”

  It was weird that Barry of all people wasn’t poking holes and calling him reckless in an after-action report. Ryan just shook his head. “I didn’t even know if [Resource Overdrive] could do half the things it could do. Besides, I don’t know if this result is better.”

  Clara looked concerned for his sanity. “And you getting soul-hexed by a tortured hero is a better result?”

  Ryan felt like he was being put on the defensive about the wrong things. “I don’t know. Did you guys see what happened, with Pinkie punching her in the face and her eyes coming together?”

  “Uh, yeah? The whole world did, saw her get punched by Pinkie and everything. That wasn’t scripted right?”

  “No. That was a legitimate hit, and I think it’s bad. The Witch Tyrant is… different now. Unpredictable.”

  “Ryan, listen to yourself, you’re saying the Witch Tyrant is predictable.” Clara paused, “I mean, I guess you did expect the trap from her, and that she was always planning on doing something… huh.”

  Barry was more direct, trusting in Ryan’s instincts. “How is she different?”

  “Less like a machine pretending to be the Witch Tyrant. I don’t know, it’s like how [Mages] sort of become muted when they use mindsplit skills. She’s brought all her mental threads back together, and uh. She seems more alive, and well, I don’t know how to explain it more than that.”

  Barry shook his head. “We’ll move on from that topic. Why don’t you tell us about that almost genocide. Explain to us what happened that’s got you like this.”

  Barry was talking about Ryan’s demeanor. Ryan assumed Barry was talking about the scratches on his face.

  Ryan relayed what had happened with the Leafstalkers. Receiving appropriate responses from Clara and Milock. Sympathy but with shaking heads. Clara wishing that Ryan wasn’t in this position in the first place, Milock called him an idiot but said that he’d support Ryan, no matter what he did.

  Once again, he didn’t know how much he needed to hear that from both of them.

  It was Barry that surprised him with a callous answer. The orc believed Ryan should have let Tar’el die. Saying that the risk was stupid and that Ryan would be a terrible adventurer to rely on.

  Though even Barry was half-hearted in his chastisement. Ending his tirade with a “I do get it though.”

  Ryan continued with the rest of the story. How he overcame the traps, met with an Unwanted named Xxshareshvil and they dived into the depths and into their city. He told the rest of the adventure as they became more and more silent. Horrified by the fact that the monsters the world called skin shamblers were a people.

  “And Zedart saved the day. I should have realized sooner that the Rax I was fighting was a construct. There was so much more I could have done too. I probably could have ordered Tar’el to–”

  Ryan was interrupted by Clara and Barry sharing a look, Clara nudged Barry and the orc rolled his eyes and shook his head.

  “What? How are you two silently communicating already.”

  “We just vibe like that.”

  Clara reached out to bump fists with Barry. The orc completely ignored it. Clara then punched him in the arm and tilted her head towards Ryan.

  Barry sighed. Frustrated that someone like Clara was matching his vibe. The old orc elaborated. “Fuck-ups happen. You’re skipping important details and that’s not like you.”

  “I, that was what happened. I don’t think I skipped anything.”

  Barry sighed. “You just said: ‘and I showed Tar’el that the Unwanted elves are a people and he helped send messages to the Eternal Delvers while I was being watched.’ That doesn’t explain shit. You somehow managed to turn a fanatic Leafstalker that tried to martyr himself? In three days?”

  Ryan scratched his head. “Uh, it was in one day? Maybe less? I kinda just talked their ears off until they both got annoyed with me. I mean, I’ve argued with plenty of Leaflegends on the realmnet. Tar’el just reminded me of most of them. They’re all good people, just with a little too much enthusiasm. Tar’el just needed to be shown there was something better to throw all his pent up angst at.”

  Clara shook her head in disbelief and turned to Barry and spread out her hands in a ‘what do we do?’ expression.

  Barry sighed, once again annoyed that he was the one being forced to point it out. “You’re abbreviating and skipping details. Meanwhile, you’ve just been laser focused on your mistakes. After-action reports aren’t just about what you could have done differently.” The orc did shake his head a little. “I guess we haven’t been pointing out your successes because you were always bragging about them.”

  Barry paused, letting him digest the old orc’s words. Then he leaned in closer, intent. For the first time, Ryan actively wanted Barry’s wisdom. Perhaps this was what he had been looking for the entire time.

  “You know, Ryan, the way I see it? You got a fanatic suicidal elf to help out what had to be the worst monster in his eyes. You escaped a complete shitshow of a Sector that was designed to break you down in the worst way. You’re just… a little too raw from other people paying for things you could only know in hindsight.”

  “I still think there were things–”

  “Get some rest. If you can’t sleep, then instead of thinking about what went wrong, think about what went right. Consider that your after-action assignment for today.”

  –

  Ryan was once again, staring at the ceiling. They hadn’t even gotten to the One-Eyed Rick part before he was forcefully dismissed. As always, Barry wasn’t completely wrong. Ryan had abbreviated his report and focused on what he'd missed parts.

  The more he thought about it, the more he realized he hadn’t explained things properly. He had barely described the flesh titan, barely talked about the fight and everything else. That wasn't like him at all. That fight with the flesh titan had been everything he'd dreamed of as a kid.

  Ryan was still awake thirty minutes later as the others chatted in the living room. His fourth realm ears could hear it all.

  Clara was poking at the veteran orc to get him to talk more. “He’s just so different today.”

  “It happens often enough. Something happens that they couldn’t have accounted for. They lose a little too much and it gets them stuck in their heads. It can be fatal in the long run.”

  “Barry! Clara! I know you both know I can hear you!”

  “Good, then why don’t you list five things you did well down in the Cataclysm Abyss.”

  “Fuck you too, Barry. Good night.”