Rituals, Regrets, and Really Dumb People

Chapter 8: Abominations, Realizations, and Baby Aliens, Part 2

I hesitated to reach out and grab it. I looked up at her, staring. "But the Rules? Interference?"

"The Rules only go so far," She remarked. "I cannot break them all, but if I sit by idly, then we all fail, we all fall. The game has changed, the laws have been broken by your kith long ago. I just wished we had more time. I thought we would have. Alas, they play dirty, so we will play even dirtier. More dirty. No, dirtier, yes."

I reached up and took the smooth, leather bound grimoire in my hands, my fingers clutching to the golden ornamentation and gild. "Isn't the chosen hero thing overplayed?" I asked.

"Yes, but me and He are sticklers for tradition. Also, it won't be you alone who does it. You'll play a role, as everyone else will too."

I see. "What can I use against him from this book?" I asked, opening the grimoire wide and looking inside. Ancient, divine knowledge began to flood my eyes, secrets humanity would not know, should not know, divine truths and painful lies exposed. It was a lot to take in, forcing me to swallow from the weight of it all laying down on my back. "My god..."

"Beautiful, isn't it?"

"So that is what happened to Timmy Moffa?"

She gave a nod. "Real shame that he's buried in the—well, this isn't the place and time for that." She looked around, time slowly catching up to us, the pawns slightly moving, adjusting, the speed of the normal world ready to break through. "Find the Command of Locking."

"Command of Locking?" I flipped through the book, quickly trying to find such a spell.

"Something about Locking. Denying. Uh-uh, Sealing. Yes, Sealing! The Command of Sealing."

"Sealing!? What does it do!?"

"It seals his powers. Now hurry."

"Why are you two over there?" I heard. It was Vileon. Time has caught back up with us. "What are you doing!?"

"Well, Shiitake mushrooms," I exclaimed. "Baby woke up."

And he did, and he attacked me. I dashed out to my right as the abomination smashed his tentacles down on the platform and steps. He about got me.

"Stay still little monkey-man," he yelled at me, whipping the ground all around. I slithered away like a worm, crawling the ground and trying to find a hidey hole. "Let me help end your suffering."

"No," I said as I wiggled around the pillars and around the steps. "Jason," I called out, "give me a helping hand."

Jason did. I needed a temporary distraction so I could find this spell. I peeked back out from a pillar to find Jason running in, tackling the floaty fetus monster and trying to wrangle it around. Damn, that monster-baby was pretty strong, he was giving Jason a tough time. Seems like I didn't have long to find this spell.

I sat down in the pool of pea soup vomit and shoved the book open, palming the pages to look around. Why didn't these old books have a table of contents? Hundreds—if not into the thousands—of pages with various spells, universal truths, and reality-breaking calculations and not one damn table of contents. I swear, if He gets better—

"Better hurry," Jason yelled out as he wrestled with the giant fetus monster. He would lose his grip before too long. "He's looking for you."

"Stop it," Vileon said to his grappler. "You were not invited to play."

Okay then. Again, I began searching the divine tome for this spell. Conjuring angels and demons, turning people into toadstools and how to turn them back, the appropriate amount of chocolate for the best Germanian chocolate cake you'd ever taste. No, none of this was right. More, more, time was of the essence.