Chapter 33: Chapter 24: Collapse

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Getting ready for the upcoming song, involved wearing a disguise that, for the singer, was time consuming and a bit painful…

“Heat from fire, fire from heat. Heat from fire, fire from heat…” it was also more nerve wreaking that a normal performance, and for some reason, doing voice training exercises, to make sure their voice sounded feminine, calmed the singer…

‘Why…?’ for some reason that… ‘Calm down… it’s part of the act… just an act…’ they didn’t fully committed to figure out…

“Sounds good! Now lean forwards a bit more…” Carmen, the band’s keyboardist, was struggling slightly with the finishing touches of the corset, but with the mechanism of the wings below it, extending down while partially hidden in the backside of the skirt, she couldn’t use as much strength as she wanted, due to the delicate state of the ‘Alpha Wings’ as it’s creator named them

“Ow…” making them a literal pain to wear

“The wings were your idea…” she reminded the singer…

“But the mechanism is Oscar’s-!” something clicked in place, freezing both of them in place, but as it didn’t fell apart again, they breathed out… slowly… “Ow… couldn’t we have gone for the cute wings…?”

‘I know what she is going to say… and as a guy I shouldn’t do cute things anyways… but…’

“I wanted you to be the cutest girl in the scenario… but our band’s aesthetic isn't cute…” the singer shivered questioning why she had to said it like that “Done! Now the mask”

The mask, that only let the singer’s mouth and lower jaw visible, had a subtle solar motif, that they deemed fitting for the, hope filled, later part of the song. It had to be attached to the wig, and due to the mechanism, it made a face reveal at the end of the song, impossible to do without help…

‘Why do I like that…?’ but the singer liked the idea of staying like that… ever since the keyboardist started with the idea, of having the singer dress as a woman for their last performance ‘How I’m ok with this…?’ the singer just got more and more… ‘Is as if… is as if…’

“There! Finally!” Carmen’s words stopped her friend from attempting to reach the answer to that question, as they stretched as much as the thing disguise allowed, before it disassembled and revealed how the singer was supposed to look like…

‘The real me… what? Real me? Where did that came from-?’

“What a cute girl!” Carmen once more stopped the singer from their latest attempt of reaching an answer

“I’m a-!” but perhaps sensing her mistake, and what her friend was about to say, she stopped the singer by placing a finger on their lips

Carmen touched their foreheads together and meet their gaze, confusing the singer immensely, due to the keyboardist claims of only liking girls, and how… intimate… the gesture felt…

“Right now… and until you stop singing. You. Are. A. Girl.” she didn’t let the eyes of the singer look away from hers “A girl that is going to sing her heart out, and is going to make all of them fall in love with her…”

Her words had an intensity…

‘Sometimes I wish, that… that was true…’ that made the singer remember the wish, that was repeating in their mind, everyday

“Look at yourself” she guided the singer towards the mirror

“We should… be…” and even if they were a bit short on time…

The singer froze…

‘Damn… there is a… girl… in the mirror…’

And slowly smiled at the reflection…

‘Carmen was right… the light make up I have, makes what you can see of my face, look pretty… the corset, while a bit too large, does help to make me look like a girl… my bandaged arms and the skirt are meant to look like that due to the “Story” in the song…’

They took a step closer to the mirror, Carmen smiling at the silence, feeling that it was a good thing

‘Damn… Carmen was right… shaving was a great idea…’ the singer had doubted, and had been trying to ignore, the thigh high socks at first, mostly because the skirt meant that the public couldn’t see them… ‘I can feel them as I move… I love it… I… I like how I look…’

That thought floored the singer…

‘Have I ever said that about… me… before…? And why I’m getting… happy… now? Shouldn’t that happen after the song…?’

…

/////

What looked like an enormous suit of armor was waiting in Mordauntless domain, and the Trickster De was hit by a lightning bolt coming from one of their eyes, the moment the instance of the god appeared there, after coming back from stopping the boar from killing Miriam

The pain was transferred equally, to every other instance of the goddess, and she could feel everything being constricted… narrowed… chained…

The other gods were unable to help… because that was the punishment that the Guardian deemed fit…

And even Mordauntless, while angry at the suffering caused to his sibling, he still was happy by the outcome… because De wasn't destroyed by breaking the rules

Of the five eyes that could be seen from the gaps on the helmet, only one was static, but none of the independent moving eyes, or the static one, looked at the seven gods in front of the Guardian, for more than a fraction of a second

And things remained like that for hours, until De started to laugh, because even in pain, she was the first to notice that Miriam was going to survive the attack of a Ruler… the other gods didn’t laughed, but they did felt some amount of relief, at the luck of the, by then berserk, girl…

Once the punishment was complete, but De was still suffering in the ground of the domain, one of the eyes looked at each of the gods, for three milliseconds each, and the Guardian spoke

“That, was the punishment for breaking the rules so outlandishly… what were you thinking while sending a whole instance, directly to the surface of a fucking planet…?”

They got no answer as De still fought against the limitations placed in her… but was unable to do anything against them…

“I shall lift the restrictions placed in you eventually…” the Guardian stopped for a moment, letting the gods nod before continuing “But… I might make it permanent, or worse…” they pointed to the representation of the nameless world behind them “If I don’t get a proper explanation to: why you are letting that Calamity grow…? Or, why that soul hasn't been given a body yet…?”

/////

The door to the dressing room opened suddenly-

“Girls!”

““AH!”” and the two inside were surprised by the guitarist, almost making the whole mechanism to trigger ahead of time, again…

“Hurry! We don’t have time!”

Carmen almost screamed at him, but the singer moved towards him first

“It’s ok we are done” saying that, even if part of them oddly wanted to keep looking at the mirror…

“Then lets go! Go! Go! Go!” the three of them rushed as quickly as the wings dragging on the ground let them

But as they took their places in the scenario…

‘Girls…? Why did he…? I do wish I was born as one… but…’ the singer while smiling took a deep breath, and stopped thinking about anything other than the song, before starting walking forwards… ‘For now… just for now…’ with surprisingly steady steps

/////

“You could have done this-” the Guardian snapped their fingers, and Mordauntless was struck in the face with enough power to destroy a dwarf planet, but the god reacted as if it was just a slap “And if the soul of the crow, was as weakened as you said… that would have cracked the soul enough, for them to cross the mist…”

The eyeless god turned his head to look at the Guardian directly

“Would you have done that…?” and challenged them

“We don’t have the same restrictions as gods do…”

Mordauntless smiled at the nonanswer he got, but the Guardian moved on

“You said that the snake saw you as a jester…?”

De started to lift herself from the ground, changing with every word she attempted to said, growing wolf ears and a tail at first, then a chitinous armor that only covered her arms and legs, then a coat of wool that only left uncovered her face, then she became a baby girl, before turning into the statue of an old woman

“I believe…” she gave up after fighting for hours and accepted that, no mater how beautiful, or how horrendous she tried to to transform. Now she only could turn into a humanoid woman or similar… it was a massive restriction that hurt her core essence of a trickster… “Believe that… she…”

“Unlike you, I can tell who and what her soul was before…” they focused in Miriam for a millisecond “I’ll check, just in case there was interference from an outsider…”

Having heard that, De laid against the floor again, and tried to rest…

“Luyg Lues…” the Guardian continued “Why are you here?”

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“I recently became involved with Miriam, thanks to the System…” the goddess clad in vegetation answered “I thought that since she forgot about Carmen, I wouldn’t be involved in this topic until the crow was born but…” the green skinned deity smiled “She seems to be unpredictable…”

“Then I don’t have anything else to ask to the gods of Yvni” one of the eyes glanced at Aufiea, but they didn’t said anything to the goddess clad in leather armor “Emerald, Onyx and Ruby…”

The three mourning goddess looked at the Guardian, unlike the other instances they always needed to be sitting or have some kind of support, due to the fact that, like the current De, they reflected the state of the main body of the deities. Emerald lost the right half of her body, Onyx had no legs and her whole torso looked dry, fragile and burnt, and Ruby, the youngest of the three, looked ancient and was missing an arm and a leg…

“Why there isn't a new Primal Soul in your world?” the answer came from Mordauntless

“Because I plan on becoming it”

And faster that any of the gods could react, the armor moved forwards and perforated his chest with an arm

/////

While the singer hated the place they were using for their last performance of highschool…

‘Time sing my heart out!’ the euphoria the questioning teenager was feeling, had grown stronger by the time it took to reach the mike, and was drowning everything else… ‘Oh, big boobs guy…’ not even seeing in the third row, right in front of… her…? The person that rejected Carmen not that long ago, dampened… her…? Mood…

The singer dragged the mike awkwardly, with the wires on… her? Arm, mostly due to how sensitive to failure the whole mechanism was…

And started to sing what Carmen had written… the song that herself? Had finished… because… the singer felt that the song was incomplete, it resonated with… her… but it needed a bit more from… herself… to be the final thing… she needed to-

BANG!

“Ah…!” but…

As they reached the last part of the song, the singer felt their life being cut short

‘NO!!!’

Falling backwards

‘No!’

Hitting the ground, while their body moved slightly, due to the damaged mechanism losing tension

‘Let me finish!’

Feeling despair

‘Let me… finish…’ the last thing the singer saw, was a crying Carmen kneeling on top of one of the wings, trying to get access to the wound ‘My… song…’

And somehow seeing mist getting close…

/////

“If I heard you say something like that joke again…” the pain that the god felt was immense- “I will kill you…” but brief

The Guardian pulled out their arm from the god, the wound sealing instantly and leaving Mordauntless standing, but unsteady. Having done that, the Guardian moved back to the spot where they were standing previously

“You becoming the new Primal Soul of this planet, has a greater chance for disaster, than the three of them killing themselves to create one” once on their previous spot the Guardian turned to look at the gods again “Not to mention, that you are the only god capable of dealing with souls that get stuck in two worlds…”

The Guardian pointed at the eye that no matter how they moved, was staring at the same point in space

“And I’m not keeping another world under my sight, due to the stupidity of another god…”

Ruby was the first one to react after what happened, and addressed Mordauntless

“That is the first time you mention that…” she wasn't judging him

“I wanted to solve the issue… that makes me a poor choice, first…” he didn’t looked at anyone

Aufiea stopped glaring at him, and turned to the Guardian with a sigh

“We have a plan that should help with the current problems with the planet” a dot of light appeared in her hand and she sent it towards the Guardian, that grabbed it once it got closer

“It’s shit” was the instant judgment they gave “This plan only has a twenty-five percent chance of working”

“It’s a better number, that us killing ourselves” Onyx smiled at the Guardian

As an answer the Guardian turned towards the representation of the world and pointed to Miriam’s location. None of the gods saw what they did, but as the Guardian turned to look at them again, they all felt dread…

“Then seeing how desperate things are, I see the need to act. If Miriam finish growing into a Calamity, or if she dies, then her body will explode with the same power of a nuclear weapon of the same mass”

De roared in anger as she struggled to rise from the floor, her body being covered in her combat armor as her mace formed from the lava that came out of her mouth

“If her soul gets stuck again, then I’ll deal with it, but seeing how your plan requires her to survive, then I shall make a new Primal Soul…” they pointed at Emerald, Onyx, Ruby and Aufiea “Using the four of you as materials”

Mordauntless roared and his armor, nearly identical to his sister’s, covered him, but he could only give a single step towards the Guardian, before they pointed at him, making him stop

“As a mortal, I killed stronger gods than you… don’t test my patience, now…” they pointed down “Sit”

Both Mordauntless and De landed against the floor of the domain, causing deep cracks to appear. That was all the Guardian did, so as Mordauntless tried to stand and charge

“I accept” Aufiea physically stopped him by moving in front of him, while addressing the Guardian

The Triad nodded too, as Lulu helped De to reach a seat

“You don’t have a choice in this” the Guardian told her

“Even so… she has faith in us… so I’ll repay that, with trust…” she answered

“How amusing…”

/////

Slowly, the awareness of the singer was coming back…

‘I can’t move… my body…’ that, and constant pressure everywhere were the first things they processed ‘Can’t open my eyes…? I’m… not in a bed…’ the darkness surrounding them, together with the posture they seemed to be stuck, came afterwards

Trying to move their neck was possible, and gave them the feedback, of being surrounded by something, instead of being pressed

‘I’m in… a bag…?’ their body wasn't answering like they were used to-

Caw

‘Ah!’ and the sudden sound right on top, together with a sudden light appearing outside of the thing around them, surprised them into struggling-

Crack

‘Ah!!!’ and they felt their head getting stuck, further scaring them ‘What is going-?!’

Caw

‘What-? Ah!’ the sound repeating and the thing around them moving for a moment, made them realize something… ‘That… was a bird… either a raven or a crow… it sounds close, literally on top of me… and this thing just moved…’

Making use of all the strength that their body allowed, they tried to move their head again-

Crack

Chirp!

‘Ah!’ finishing breaking the shell around them, what little they could see was blurry, but they managed to notice a black thing moving the pieces of the shell away ‘What?!’ leaving them with a weird, if accurate, thought… ‘I got turned into a bird?!’