Markets and Multiverses

The massive spider loomed above the street before me, like some sort of bone and flesh abomination, and I glanced back at the ongoing fight between my friends and the flesh giants.

We had yet to kill off three of the flesh giants, and most of the skeletal warriors and archers had been downed. We were still a minute away from cleaning up the first wave of enemies, but the second wave of enemies had already arrived. We had no more time.

Could we run away?

I looked at the massive spider that seemed to zip forward, and my heart clenched.

We wouldn’t be outrunning this thing anytime soon.

I growled at the creature. Even with full essence, I probably couldn’t extinguish this thing. Its life force was too high for me to manage a kill without reaching advanced grade or higher for my attunement. The only relief was that its life force was still much weaker than the tree root’s life force. It probably wouldn’t whip out new abilities one after another during the fight.

I glanced at my three friends again, and confirmed that they were winning the fight against the flesh giants. I gritted my teeth, and sprinted towards the bone and tendon spider.

I was going to keep this thing busy until my friends could help me kill it. I doubted I could down this thing, but I could at least hold it off.

I just needed to survive while poking it in the limbs several times.

The bone spider sprinted towards me like a train made of bones and hate. Its speed was nearly too much for me to track, even with my higher perception - there seemed to be some sort of blur to its motions that made it harder for me to see it.

At least its limbs didn’t look anywhere near as strong as those of the flesh giant.

It seemed fast, but weak.

The blur around its limbs that made it hard to track suddenly became stronger, and I withdrew backwards.

Before I could process what was happening, I saw the spider’s limb inside of my dress, its massive limbs and face only a meter away from my own.

If it had been able to cut through my dress, I would have died before I even realized what was happening. 

But my dress could block it.

I felt a mad grin tug at my lips, even though the creature was hard to see and hard to track with my eyes.

I could teleport, and my dress could keep me safe. I could do this..

The spider dragged its limb out of my dress and then leapt towards me, trying to rip my head off with its razor sharp, bony mandibles.

Sine there was no way my muscles could keep up with the thing’s speed, I teleported a few meters to the left, and then tried to stab one of its bony limbs with my umbrella.

The spider immediately pulled its legs out of the way, neatly dodging my attack, and then spat a glob of green acid at me.

I teleported on top of the creature, again. Before I could try to stab it, the creature bucked, sending me sailing into the air as I tried to orient myself.

While I was still in midair, I suddenly realized the spider was sailing towards me. The damn thing could jump!

I teleported away, narrowly avoiding getting torn into ribbons, and ended up on the street behind the spider.

I cursed.

The biggest problem with fighting this thing was  that my reactions just weren’t fast enough. I couldn’t land a hit. I could barely keep up with its actions, even with my teleportation. And whatever was making its limbs hard to see, it was a massive pain in the neck.

The bone spider landed on the street, pseudo-concrete and buildings collapsing under the sheer weight of the spider’s body. I grimaced, and teleported closer again.

If I kept teleporting around, I would run out of absorption essence sooner or later. I was already down to about half of my absorption pool. I needed to at least slow this thing down. If I could just destroy a leg or two, I would have no problem holding it off until the others finished up their fight.

My physical abilities clearly weren’t enough. So I pointed my umbrella at one of the spider’s limbs, and unleashed a lightning bolt at one of its legs, chewing through half of my remaining absorption essence. At the same time, I prepared to alter the trajectory of the lightning in midair using the umbrella - I didn’t doubt for a second that this thing could dodge a magic lightning bolt.

For a moment, the spider looked like it was about to slide past my attack, and I saw its limbs start to blur and blend into their surroundings. I prepared to move the lightning bolt, and prayed that I would hit my target - and then, I felt the tarot deck I had equipped start to burn, almost as if I had a heater connected to my item slot, instead of a deck of cards. Instinctively, I knew what had just happened.

The Chariot card had come into effect.

Suddenly, the overwhelmingly fast spider slowed down, as if someone had hit the ‘slow motion’ button on the entire fight. The spider looked like it was wading through molasses now. Its blurry limbs suddenly became easily visible again.

I felt my tarot deck burn again, and instinctively knew the Strength card had just activated.

Right before my lightning bolt struck.

My lightning bolt ripped into the creature’s bones, turning one of the legs into a splintered mess of bones and sinew. My lightning bolt cut all the way through the first leg and ripped into a second leg, although it didn’t completely annihilate the limb. 

I finally had time to observe what the strength card had done. The creature seemed weaker. Its bones were softer than before - Strength seemed to have reduced the spider’s defenses and made its body weaker.

I blinked.

I had originally thought that the Tarot deck had a ridiculously long cooldown… but right now, it was also proving just how potent its curses were. The creature that probably outclassed me by at least three grades in Agility now looked like a drunken snail.

The Tarot deck might have a five year cooldown between uses, but it was clearly strong enough to be useful despite that drawback.

I teleported onto the top of the spider again, and this time, it didn’t have the speed or strength it needed to throw me off of it. I quickly took my umbrella, and stabbed into the now soft bones of its injured leg, and managed to shear it off after a few stabs. I felt the urge to cackle.

I hadn’t given my tarot deck anywhere near enough credit.

A few moments later, I felt another feeling of heat radiate out from the tarot deck that was attached to my soul.

The Chariot would be ending soon.

I quickly took the opportunity to stab one of its legs one last time, chipping the softened bones a bit, and then teleported away.

The spider reeled in surprise as it found two of its legs had been destroyed nearly instantly, at least from its perspective.

It shrieked in rage, and then started to slide to the left. I had taken off the two front legs on its left side, and the creature seemed to be struggling to keep its balance now.

Just as I was feeling satisfied with myself, a fireball ripped through the air and disappeared into my dress, drawing my attention to the left.

The last two spellcasters and flesh giants in the area had reinforced the enemy while I was distracted. There were only a few skeletal minions with them - their squad seemed to be smaller than the last three, thankfully.

I glanced back at my friends. They had felled two of the flesh giants, and were a couple seconds away from killing the last one. Their fight had basically ended.

I gritted my teeth, and turned back towards the now six-legged bone spider.

We could do this.

“Enemy reinforcements here! Help me!” I yelled as I started dropping the few skeletal archers and warriors.

I felt that we could handle this, but there was no freaking way I could handle the spider, two spellcasters, and two flesh giants at the same time. My essence reserves wouldn’t last that long, and my reflexes weren’t good enough to keep me alive against the spider and two spellcasters, either.

From the corner of my eye, I saw the last flesh giant from the last wave drop dead as Sallia decapitated it with a bone wave. The moment it collapsed, Sallia started charging to my side.

“What’s going on with the spider? It slowed down a lot partway through your fight,” asked Sallia, and I let out a sigh of relief.

Sallia had noticed the Spider’s crippling slowness. Even though my three friends had been caught up in their own fight, Sallia had been watching to make sure she could step in if I got into a situation I couldn’t handle.

“It’s fast, but weak for its size. The Tarot deck’s curses hit it really hard. Chariot is spent, strength makes it weaker and squishier. Justice hasn't been activated yet,” I said.

“Got it. Leave the spider to me. You get the casters, but stay safe. You spent a lot of essence already!” said Sallia.

A moment later, Sallia sprinted towards the spider. The creature had finally adjusted to its missing legs, and let out another ear-breaking screech. Sallia immediately sent a wood and bone wave at its legs, which the creature nimbly dodged, and then Sallia was in its face a second later. The massive legs and overwhelming speed that I could barely deal with were far more manageable for her, and while the fight was nearly fast enough that I couldn’t track it, I could certainly see Sallia blocking the spider’s bladelike limbs with her sword as the two tangled in a blur of limbs, blades, and shards of wood and bone. 

Sallia looked like she was doing fine. I grinned, and teleported towards the spellcasters. The flesh giants immediately whirled around, breaking off their charge to try to protect the spellcasters - which gave Anise and Felix enough time to start spraying the spellcasters with magic missiles and metal fragments. One of the spellcasters got clipped in the head by a magic missile and nearly collapsed, while I stabbed the other with my umbrella.

I felt something from the side.

I whirled around, opening my umbrella to meet the spell of the other spellcaster…

At least, I tried to open my umbrella.

Unfortunately, my left arm was still paste.

A fireball crashed into my torso. Most of it was caught by my dress, but the rim of it spilled over my dress and crashed into my neck, causing me to gasp in pain as scorching heat and force ripped into my neck and collarbone. I felt burning heat in my throat… before my lungs and throat stopped working entirely.

I tried to suck in a deep breath, failed to, and started panicking, dropping my umbrella as I clawed at my burnt throat with my one good arm.

I saw Sallia’s eyes widen in the distance, and she immediately threw her sword like a javelin, tearing into the one remaining spellcaster’s head and killing it. Sallia took a bad hit from the spider, and her wandering swordsman’s robe fell apart like soggy paper, allowing the spider to drive its limb through her stomach and impale her, planting her into the ground.

I felt a wave of panic surge through me, driving away my thoughts of my own ruined neck as I prepared to throw everything at the spider.

I felt my tarot deck heat up again, and suddenly, a massive injury appeared in the middle of the spider’s stomach, as well. It didn’t heal Sallia or protect her, but it reflected the exact same damage the spider had done to her.

It was the Justice card. Apparently, it created some sort of reflected damage effect. The spider reeled in pain, its spearlike limb loosing as it thrashed and writhed in pain.

For just a moment, the spider was distracted, giving Sallia time to dematerialize her sword, rematerialize it in her hand, and chop off the leg pinning her to the ground. The spider shrieked again, before it backed up, stumbled, and spewed a splash of green liquid at Sallia - which she reflected with her sword’s ability, sending the splash of acid right back at the spider. It landed on the creature’s face. Anise and Felix slammed a few magic missiles and metal shards into the creature’s head, finally dropping it as Sallia coughed and retched blood onto the street and I tried to breathe through my ruined through.

I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t-

“Miria! It’s the Market! You’re fine!” yelled Felix.

I paused, looked at the dead skeletal mages near me, and tried to curse. The only sound that came out of my ruined throat was a warbling coughing sound, but I was ashamed to realize Felix was right.

I was panicking over nothing. Breathing didn’t matter here.

I eyed the two flesh giants, who seemed confused by the sudden turn of events. Both spellcasters that they were supposed to protect were dead, and the giant spider was also dead. Before they could react, I teleported away from the two flesh giants, returned my umbrella to my hand, and sent a lightning bolt into the face of one of the two remaining flesh giants, chewing through almost every last drop of absorption essence.

Sallia lifted herself up, pointed her sword at the flesh giant I had hit, and cut it down with a wave of wood and bone, before Felix finished off the last flesh giant using the horribly beaten up executioner’s axe he had started out the battle with.

I looked at my friends, and then myself, trying to assess what had happened.

Sallia’s injury was bad, and might have been worrying - if we weren’t in the Market. I was pretty sure she had lost a few parts of her intestine, but in the Market, most of our organs didn’t actually seem that necessary apart from our brain. My injuries were also bad, but since I didn’t need to breathe they weren’t that big of a deal. I would get a new throat when we reincarnated anyway.

Anise and Felix were uninjured. The only remaining enemy was the final bone spider, which was still guarding the pool of reincarnation in the distance. 

I felt a grin start to form on my burnt lips.

It was too late for it to reinforce its friends, and there were no other threats nearby. We could just wait for my alteration essence to recover and then I could extinguish the final spider with no threat to us.

We still had to finish off the final bone spider, but it shouldn’t be a threat to us. We had won.

 

 

acaswell

So, update.

My thumb still hurts.

It has been about a month now.

It still hurts.

I will probably go to the doctor this weekend or early next week to see what they have to say, since some of the other injuries from a month ago have largely healed, but my thumbs still quite hurts. Depending on what the doctor says, I may need to not write much next week, or even start my vacation earlier if the doctor says I need to. We’ll see what they have to say. Fingers crossed that it’s easy to fix, but I’m letting you guys know in case things slow down earlier than expected. I’ll keep you updated.

I don't know if this WILL disrupt my writing schedule, but it might. My thumbs are great. I use my thumbs to hit the spacebar key while I'm writing, and that is a pretty darn important key. I also use my thumbs for daily life. Opening ziploc bags has never been harder since I've needed to keep pressure off of my thumbs. Cutting potatoes is also surprisingly difficult, since cutting potatoes apparently puts a fair amount of pressure on some joints connected to my thumbs somehow, or something. Either way, cutting potatoes hurts now.

So yeah. Depending on what happens, chapters may be cancelled or delayed as my health requires, until my thumbs are healed up and I can function more effectively again.

Thanks and sorry,

-Acaswell

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