“This is…”
[No, it’s not. I just made it resemble that time.]
Zane was standing in a flavian amphitheater and he saw a copy of himself from before he was defeated by Jack.
It just managed to beat a hiveling by going under it and grinding its way to victory.
“Seriously!? You want me to fight Jack, AGAIN!? Come on system, give me a break!”
‘Jack?’ Zane thought before looking at himself. His form was the same.
[He doesn’t know it’s you; he’s seeing you as jack right now.]
‘You really have fully regained your true personality, huh.’
[What do you mean?]
‘I mean how else would you be so twisted that you made the final floor all about making me kill myself? If I had my emotions and managed to reach here while retaining my sanity, I’m sure this place would break me.’
[Guess it’s a good thing I locked them then.]
‘I guess it was.’
Zane sighed “Let’ get this over with.” He immediately charged towards the other zane and struck down with his sword.
“Nope!” The doppelganger swerved to the left and aimed an attack on zane’s feet.
*Clank!*
But it was easily blocked.
“Oh, come on! This definitely isn’t fai-what the!?”
Zane covered his eyes as a heavy light engulfed the boss. When it finally faded away, he found that his opponent got an upgrade.
He stood flabbergasted before he yelled “F****** finally, some good equipment! Why the sudden compassion though? Reasons, what reasons?”
‘What are you doing, Theta?’ Zane asked Theta as he watched the doppelganger supposedly arguing with her aloud.
[It won’t be much of a test if it’s not at least a little harder, right? Now here’s when the real boss battle starts]
After she said that, the doppelganger’s eyes turned dim for a moment and when life returned to them, he showed a vicious smile.
“Now I get it!” He exclaimed before he suddenly charged towards zane at an incredible pace and unleashed a flurry of attacks.
*Clank*
*Clank*
*Clank*
“CLANK!”
Immediately after Zane blocked the last strike, he got kicked and sent flying into one of the walls of the amphitheater.
*SLAM*
[-999]
“Cough!” Zane coughed blood as he fell on the floor.
“This got to be the easiest fight I had! That means there’s definitely a trap, right?”
“Don’t count your eggs before they hatch, buddy.”
Zane emptied ten fire bombs from his inventory and threw them all over the place, engulfing the area in flames, and when the doppelganger tried to jump away, Zane immediately stood up and slammed his now red glowing blade into the ground causing a fiery snake-like wave to charge towards the boss and fling him away when he tried to block it.
“Where did you learn to do that!?”
“Well, I made sure to learn a few tricks before coming to say hi.”
“You did, huh? Let’s see if I gained any new skills as well.”
When he saw his opponent’s blade glowing purple, he released a rapid series of fireballs which were quickly approaching their target. But then the fake smiled.
“Soul Gear Jörmungandr!”
Suddenly a fierce roar erupted from the fake Zane’s blade and a wave of purple energy blasted from his body.
It extinguished all forms of magic surrounding its user, from the fireballs to the magically enhanced flames from the bombs. It even almost caused the amphitheater to glitch.
The nastiest thing of all when Zane fell to his feet…
“AAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!” He screamed in horror as his emotions returned.
[Oh, s***! I didn’t know it could do that! Why can’t I block them!?]
“Hey! Are you alr-what the f***!?” The doppelganger panicked as what was supposed to be Jack turned into a version of himself. It was even more shocked when he curled on the ground and started rocking uncontrollably.
“F*** you! F*** you! F*** you!” Zane kept muttering as tears fell from his eyes.
[Hey, how some respect and go fi-]
“Shut the f*** up, you filthy whore!”
“Who are you talking to!? What’s the f*** going on, system!?”
[…Go finish the fight, Zane…]
She told him in a cold voice laced with killing intent.
“For what!? So I can be your f****** player and kill every other guy stuck in limbo so you can go back to being a stupid admin!? F*** that! F*** limbo! AND F*** YOU! I won’t fight so you can get a f****** promotion!”
“Promotion? Admin? Seriously, what’s going on right now?”
[…]
Silence engulfed the colosseum as the doppelganger stood still with an expression conveying both confusion and pity while Zane let go of his sword and was clutching his head.
While Zane was lost in his thoughts, the doppelganger lowered his stance and cautiously approached but looked like he had no intention to fight
Suddenly a red screen only visible to Zane appeared right in front of his face, and on it was Theta..
[…You think you have a choice?]
“No… stop…”
“Don’t worry, I’m not gonna harm you.”
[After coming this far, you think I’ll just let you go?]
“Leave me alone…”
“Buddy, relax a little.”
[So you won’t fight, huh?]
“I won’t!”
“Geez! I won’t do anything!”.
[If you don’t want to fight, then I’ll just make you. While we were chatting I’ve fixed a few bugs :)]
“AH! AHHHHHHH!!!” Just as the doppelganger approached, Zane roared.
All his emotions were driven back except for a single one. Rage.
“What the!? Jörmun-”
He pounced on the doppelganger and just as it was about to unleash another attack, he grabbed the sword and forced it out of its hands.
“Hey, that’s mine-! Ahh!” The fake Zane screamed in pain as it was kicked to the ground.
It then rolled to avoid getting stabbed by its own weapon and managed to grab Zane’s sword off the ground.
“Guess this is round two… You know that we don’t have to do this, right!?”
“Raaaaaghhhhhh!”
*Clank*
*Clank*
*Clank!*
This time the roles were reversed as the boss kept blocking Zane’s attack.
They were heavy and filled with fury. Every slash was capable of cutting him in half, armour or otherwise. As the poor blade kept receiving attack after attack from its former master, cracks started appearing on it and they kept expanding until…
*Crack!!!*
It shattered.
He tried pulling Zane’s old weapons so he could have a chance of fighting back, but they all broke after a single strike. He tried every trick up his sleeve, but they all failed.
Everything failed against the enraged Zane and Jörmungandr.
The defenceless boss kept backing away slowly until his back was to the wall.
“You don’t have to do this. It doesn’t have to end like this… You don’t have to be a pawn in its games!”
The boss begged but his cries fell on deaf ears.
“Jörmungandr!” Zane screamed as he stabbed the purple glowing blade into his other self, piercing its armour as if it was nothing.
“Akh… Ah…” He cried as his skin turned ashen and black veins spread throughout his body. He was injected with the poison that is said to be the origin of all things… Eitr…
He looked at Zane with his now black eyes “ple… plea… se… don’t be her slave… Zane…”
And with that, he died. His body didn’t disappear but remained on the floor as the crowd chanted Zane’s name.
“Zane!”
“Zane!”
“Zane!”
“Zane!”
[Congratulations, Zane! I knew you could do it! You won and gained a special reward; your very own soul gear!]
“Wha…” Zane muttered as he regained his sanity. He then looked at his fallen foe and then at his bloodied hands.
“What have I done…?”
