Origin ARS 4 (16 page)

Ero did not care. In fact, she had not even heard the man. She was currently lost inside of herself. She could only feel her sadness and the pain of her loss. She could no longer even hear the battle theme playing in the background. Of course, given the quality of the lyrics that might have been an actual blessing.

The one she loved, the one she had pledged to guard for the whole of her life had died. She had failed him. She had hope that he would respawn, but that was cold comfort compared to the fact that she had let him die due to her own weakness.

If only she had been stronger! That was what she kept thinking. If only her tiny little body could use her powers more efficiently. If only.

Several minutes passed, and Ero began to weaken. Soon, her power would die away altogether. She would fade into nothing. She had used too much of her energy the other day in blissful eroticism by forcing herself to remain in an enlarged state. She would be unable to do anything for days.

In many ways, using her true power was equal to taking on the risk of a potential death sentence. Even during the best of times it was likely that she would die with only the hope of her deep connection with Scott to provide her the opportunity of restoration. She could not truly die, not as long as her Scott’s soul existed, and they shared a strong bond. Though, she might end up existing in a death-like state similar to a coma for lengthy periods of time.

As she continued to weaken, her desire to become stronger rose to greater heights. If only she could use more power. Even this was not truly her utmost ability. She was not high enough in level to use the next tier of her power, but she was close enough that she could taste it.

She hated that she could not finish these mean old bandits off! They’d killed her friends. They wanted to sell her for parts! Why wasn’t she stronger now? There had to be a way to become stronger, now!

Her desire led to understanding as she felt a strange tugging sensation within her. She sensed that pull and realized that it was her connection to Scott. His body was dead, but his soul lingered still, as he was not like the mortals of this world. He was a champion, like these bandana-clad meanies, he would revive at some point.

She could feel him within her. It was a sense of strength, of humor, and of warmth. In her darkest time he had come to her and become a light that turned back the darkness, had cast out the loneliness that had plagued her and nearly claimed her soul. Now he was trying to do the same once again, even in death.

Her Scott was with her! She did not want to fail him! The bandits had to die!

Ero was not sure what to do at first, but then she realized something else. Her current method would of attack not work, but there was a way. It would be perfect for trap making rats like these people. Nothing that entered this area could leave until the event ended. That was perfect. She could use that!

She felt her strength beginning to fail for a moment, but then that soothing warmth, that essence of her bond with Scott helped her find the power to continue. Ero knew what she had to do and she began to do it in earnest.

The song in the background shifted to one that was more dangerous. Horns played, and the sound of violins began to echo through the air in an elegant rage.

Drums; violent, deep, and aggressive began to thunder in the background as Ero focused all of her remaining energy on one final gambit. She slammed her palms together and used her magical senses to seek out the water that she needed to use in order to make it happen. Unfortunately for the bandits, they had set up shop next to the largest body of water on the planet.

The ground trembled. Lightning flared all around her, and distinct rumbling sound could be heard. The wall of wind continued to whirl, but the rain stopped.

~
The power of your love, my heart you did save
… ~

Bandana man came out from hiding to see what was going on, and he looked up toward the brightly lit sky. His eyes narrowed in confusion when a dark shadow was cast across the area. The mine grew darker by the second even as the violins, horns, and drums raged louder than ever.

The bandana-clad man blinked then pointed at something he could scarcely believe. What he saw could not possibly be happening, not in a place like this.

~
And when darkness came calling, my love crashed down. Like a
-~

“Tidal Wave!” screamed the bandit hysterically while he waved his finger around wildly at the source of his oncoming death. His eyes widened in a hilarious manner and he shook his head back and forth slowly, unable to believe what he was now seeing.

A massive wall of water crashed down with tremendous force. Bright red damage numbers flared up from all over the place as bandits were hit for hundreds, in some cases thousands, of points of damage in rapid-fire succession. Those that managed to somehow barely survive the onslaught knew the horror of hemorrhaging health and mana. The tidal wave that temporary fairy overlord Ero had unleashed counted as one of her storm of emotion water attacks. Their health dropped rapidly with no way to hide from the watery doom that had befallen them. Much like the hopeless situation that Scott and Rhea had suffered, they now suffered the fate of those caught in an inescapable death trap.

Ero remained coherent just long enough to see a message screen flash into existence that congratulated her party for killing off the bandits menacing the area. A brief smile flittered across her lips before she closed her eyes and her body dissolved into motes of light. Four sweetly whispered words echoed in the area as her light dispersed. “Like a tidal wave….” Soon, all that was left was silence.

Chapter 11: Home Sweet Home

His eyes slowly opened but his vision was clouded. His sense of hearing was dull and confused. He did not recognize sounds properly at first. It took a moment to get his bearings due to the strangeness of his senses, but when he did his eyes widened. He knew exactly where he was. Scott was home. Rather, he was back at his house on Earth.

“What…?” he asked intelligently. His speech was slightly slurred, and he had a bad case of cotton mouth. It was like he had spent all night on a drunken bender and he was currently within the throes of a headache free hangover.

It could be a truly daunting experience the first time; that was what Rhea had once said to Scott. However, she had spoken as an immortal goddess capable of surviving almost anything. She knew intrinsically that she only existed in part on the world of ARS. No matter what happened to her body on ARS she had a true existence that was elsewhere. Scott, was not used to such a divergence in cognitive awareness and corporeal separation. It played havoc on his mental state.

Was what he had experienced real? Was it all merely a dream? He had awoken on the floor, so it was possible that he had underwent some sort of near-death experience after hitting his head. Though, that latter possibility was the least likely.

“How did I get back here?” he asked softly. He wipe his face with his hand. In the process of doing that he saw something truly strange. He gripped his surprisingly long hair and pulled a lock of it forward. It was still blue, as blue and shining as the purest lightning that he had ever seen.

Scott rose to his feet and staggered over to his bathroom. His hair had been decidedly brown before he had gone to ARS. If his hair was really blue then he had not been dreaming.

The moment he looked into his bathroom mirror, his eyes widened once more. He had never really looked at himself much before. The man staring back at him from the mirror was almost disturbingly handsome in a thematically anime sort of manner.

“Damn, son…” Scott shook his head and watched his luxuriously fabulous hair wave back and forth. He looked like he had just stepped out of a poster for an eighties era glam metal band.

He checked out his body for a moment and noticed the sleekly tanned and toned goodness. “How have I not really noticed this before?”

In fact, he now noticed many things that he had merely accepted as reality prior to his first death. Outside of his almost absurd level of masculine beauty, he noticed the lack of background music. He no longer felt like every thought and feeling that he had was the most important thing in the world. Hell, he felt like ignoring them altogether.

It could be said that for the first time in months Scott was truly himself. Without the mind and spirit altering effects of the world of ARS, he could think clearly and logically.

Memories of the actions and choices that he had made in the last few months came rushing to the forefront of his mind. “What the hell have I been doing?”

Scott shook his head again. He had made so many decisions based solely on emotion that it was amazing that he had not died dozens of times already! That was ridiculous. He knew better than that. A proper soldier did not just rush in like an asshole, he scouted the area properly! He does reconnaissance.

After taking a moment to berate himself mentally for his overly emotional idiocy he realized the worst offender in his most recent grouping of offenses. The current plans for corpse rat were riddled with stupid and overly emotional decisions that had made little sense in the grand scheme of things. Holding grudges against a group of unimportant idiots was stupid when the world itself was at stake. Yes, they had captured Scott and Rhea. They had perpetrated terrible things against them, but why the fuck was he still wasting his time on them when he should be focusing on building his power-base?

“It’s a four-to-one ratio, right? So, less than twenty years of ARS time remains till the lords of destruction event starts.” Scott continued to berate himself for wasting precious time for a moment. The most important thing right now was to finish the important business on the current server in preparation for transition to the true battle field.

Now that he could think clearly, it was obvious that there were many things that he could have been doing to better the situation. It was like nothing he had done throughout his entire time on ARS had made any sort of sense. He would have berated himself further, but to his surprise he heard someone knock at the door.

He went to see who it was, but stopped to stare after he opened the door. On the other side was a girl who had blue hair that was equally as bright and out of place in this world as his own. She also had jade green eyes that were so beautiful that they practically sparkled in the light. She was fairly tall and had a certain sweet sensuality about her that he could not possibly mistake.

“Rhea?” asked Scott, surprised by the sudden arrival of this vision of loveliness. He had not considered the possibility of having her also be on this world.

The visitor laughed warmly then shook her head. “Why no, sir. My name is Aria, Aria Ardent. I’m your new neighbor. I’m a young and impressionable girl who has recently moved to town. I know nothing of the area and wish to make friends.” She tilted her head to the side then smiled brightly, “Can we have sex now?”

Scott squinted at her then threw back his head and laughed. OK, so maybe there was one thing that he’d done on ARS that made sense.

“What’s with the name change?” asked Scott lightly.

Aria grinned at him. “Different world, different name. Besides, it’s the name that I wanted to choose for this form before.”

She took out a pair of glasses and put them on. Aria placed her hand to her cheek. Her thumb cradled her jaw lightly while her index finger rested against her cheek. “Don’t you recognize the poor little fat girl who you helped long ago?”

Scott eyed her critically for a moment. It was odd to see her without elf ears, but he would hesitate to call her fat. If anything she looked like a curvy fitness model who had been blessed with way too much charisma. “Whoever said a good deed was its own reward was wrong.”

“Hmm?” asked Aria.

“There aren’t enough good deeds in the world to make having you in my life a fair reward.” said Scott lightly.

“Why, Mr. Neighbor, how bold of you!” said Aria with a giggle.

Scott reached out and pulled his human-form girlfriend to him. He kissed her warmly on the lips and they stayed that way for quite some time.

“You’re a bit curvier as a human.” Remarked Scott playfully.

Aria poked him. “I used to be a cute little fat girl, remember?”

“Yes, you were so fat that I was afraid that the moon would be pulled out of the sky and start to orbit you.” replied Scott before reaching down to lightly grasp her delightful booty in both hands.

“Thanks!” exclaimed Aria brightly before she kissed him again. He was so sweet sometimes.

They finished being all ridiculous and romantic a few minutes later. Scott invited his body-swapping love interest into his abode.

“Sorry, the lights are out. I haven’t paid the bills in a few months.” said Scott.

“That’s fine, it’s cozy like this. Though, there is another option.” said Aria.

“Oh?” asked Scott.

Aria grinned at him then raised up her hand in an imperious and dramatic manner. “Let there be light!”

Almost instantly electric lights and various appliances awoke all over the house. Scott stared at the light bulb over head for a moment then cursed because he had nearly blinded himself in the process.