After
Sixth Ring, Valor
Mori, you will not endanger the group because you want to play the hero. Stand down. That's an order.
My sister is down there.
Shiori needed her. Nothing else mattered. Mori fell from the heights, bracing for impact. Her protective bubble fractured and evaporated. She hit the ground hard, a tremor traveling up her legs. Mori's vision fuzzed from the pain that rippled through her body, her health bar declining to half.
Stay awake. Stay awake.
Gripping her rifle, she ran toward the party fighting the minotaurs. Adrenaline pounded through her veins. She counted three players left against five bulls.
At their forefront, Shiori dodged and wove through the monsters like a dancer. Hair aflame, she held her fists up and cracked the monsters' across the face with the spikes on her knuckles, the concussive force downing them for a few moments before they recovered.
A moment of deja vu hit Mori. Even though the players dealt damage to the monsters, the red health bars refilled at a steady rate. "Potato!" she screamed through comms. "Tell me you know how to beat these things!"
"You have to one-shot them!" Perera cried out in response before someone muffled her voice.
Ren took over the line. "Mori, don't do this. You can't fight them all."
Another scream rent the air, like a tear in the fabric of reality.
"Haruna!" Shiori yelled, anguish twisting her voice and sending a stab of pain in Mori's heart.
Mori dropped to one knee, dangerously close to the fight, but she couldn't trust to her fluctuating accuracy. She singled out a minotaur furthest from the players and fired. Her bullet chipped a horn. Breathe, Mori. A little lower and to the left.
The second her accuracy spiked, Mori re-centered on the bull's forehead and pulled the trigger. Her shot still strayed to the side, but took the bull in the eye instead. Bellowing loud enough that the earth quaked, the beast exploded into red fragments. The poleax it had been carrying dropped to the ground.
As one, the remaining monsters turned to look at Mori, scarlet eyes gleaming in the dusk.
The surviving members of the other party scrambled away when the minotaurs brandished their weapons and roared. The monsters charged as a unit, hooves striking the dirt and steam blowing from flared nostrils.
Trapped between the bulls and the cliffs, Mori didn't dare try to make a run for it at the risk of leading the monsters back to her party. If this is where she died at least Shiori would be safe.
Mori stood and put her cheek to her rifle stock, tears trickling down her face and onto her rifle. All this time, she'd hoped that bravery lurked inside her, that her low strength stat was a fluke. But facing these monsters alone, Mori knew fear to be more than her match. She cried because she remembered that she would die in every world.
Even with her finger on the trigger, she couldn't bring herself to shoot because she knew she'd miss.
It didn't take long for the first beast to reach her. Barely able to see through the tears, Mori raised her weapon to block the downward swing of its hammer. Her rifle crumpled under the blow, the force of it knocking her to the ground.
But as her gun vanished in a grey shimmer of sparks, a figure materialized to stand over her and deflect the following attack.
Cynthia.
"Get up!" her leader yelled over comms. Light collected at the tip of her sword before bursting to blind the monsters. "We're both making it out of here alive so I can kill you later!"
Mori regained her footing, drawing her knife out.
"Alright everyone, let's light it up!" Niko whooped from behind. Green flames and purple smoke raced past her feet to reach the monsters.
Tsuna darted in wielding dual daggers to slice through hamstrings, Yuta close behind with a whip to tangle up feet.
"Mori!" Perera called. She jogged across the valley with the giant poleax cradled in her arms.
Mori glanced down at the little knife in her hand and ran to meet her.
"Listen, listen." Perera panted for breath. "I think I figured out the puzzle. If you damage the monsters with their own weapons, they can't heal."
Sending her knife back to storage, Mori took the poleax. "Only one way to find out."
"Sodder Shield!" Perera called out.
The shimmer of a renewed bubble spread over Mori's head and down the sides as she ran at the monsters' backs. With the combined efforts of her party, they'd managed to beat down the health of one minotaur, but three still fought.
Cynthia staggered, taking the brunt of the attacks.
Teeth gritted, Mori leaped and sliced a bull across the muscles of its upper leg. The beast threw its head back, bellowing in pain. The rise of its health bar stagnated. Mori retreated before the other two enemies could crush her.
A stench like burning steak filled the air.
Catching sight of the curved sword of the slain minotaur, Mori tapped into party comms. "Potato, can you freeze all three monsters and Tsuna? See the sword at the feet of the one with the hammer? Grab it while they're iced."
"Roger that."
"Got it, Mentos."
Mere seconds after making the call, Mori looked around for Cynthia and found Ren dragging her off the battlefield. Amid the chaos, she registered the other party approaching them.
"Mori, we need heal!" Ren shouted.
Already sprinting to reach them, Mori dropped the poleax and slid to a stop on her knees. Stripped of her silver armor, Cynthia looked more human, even with her blue lips as she gasped for air.
"Her health keeps falling and I don't know why," Ren whispered, wringing her hands.
Summoning her healing rain, Mori glanced at Cynthia's health bar and found it dropping below the one star mark. "I'll do what I can, Ren. You'd better help the others. If you use the monster weapons, it stops them from healing..."
Mori trailed off and directed the pattering droplets over the wound in Cynthia's stomach. She held her breath, watching the white of their leader's health bar.
It flashed and diminished another increment.
Ren's face paled. She snatched up the poleax and ran toward their party, her voice clear over comms. "Don't let them damage you! Their weapons have health decay—if your shields break, go to Potato for your replacement or fall back!"
Mori cupped her hand to her mouth, biting down on her tongue.
This was all her fault. Cynthia had saved her life and now she was dying for it.
The woman's bright blue eyes focused on her, sweat shining on her brow. "It's alright," she murmured.
"No! No, it's not alright." Mori sobbed. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." She gripped handfuls of grass in her hands, nails digging into the dirt.
Cynthia's health dropped again, like a clock ticking down.
"Mori," she whispered, "Take care of them. And if you see Ronin again, can you please...tell him...I'm going to say hi to Tofu."
The cloud of rain expanded over their heads, watering the earth until moonflowers bloomed around Cynthia. "Yeah." Mori choked. "Yeah, I'll tell him for you."
She didn't know if Cynthia heard her. The woman's eyes glazed over as if frost overlayed the blue seas of her irises. Her lips parted in a torturous scream, her spine arching off the ground.
Chills rolling over her, Mori reached out to hold Cynthia's hand, but she'd already shattered into golden particles.
Mori stared at the floating specks, at the empty outline in the grass with moonflowers around it swaying in the gentle breeze.
"Please." The voice sounded so far away. "Please, she insisted I carry her to you."
Mori stirred from her stupor and looked up, her heart stopping in her chest.
The player lowered Shiori onto the ground, rain falling on the both of them.
"Hey, Nee-chan," Shiori whispered, the flames in her hair fizzling out so she looked exactly as Mori had always known her. Her kid sister—an adrenaline junkie, a rebel, a girl all too fond of getting in a good fight.
Except for the bleeding gash in her cheek that Mori knew she couldn't fix, the wound that would drain Shiori's life away.
"Not you. Not you too," Mori cried out, gathering Shiori into her arms, as if she could hold her together and keep it all from falling apart. She hugged Shiori, just the same as when she'd been five-years-old and her father had placed her newborn baby sister in her eager hands. Tears fell from her eyes to spatter Shiori's face, but her little sister smiled up at her as if she were the sun and not a raincloud.
"I was afraid I'd never see you again," Shiori said softly. "But whenever it got dark" —she clasped Mori's hand in hers, night falling like a blanket around them— "I imagined you beside me, telling me that you were here." The final roar of a dying monster echoed and faded from hearing.
"I'm here. I'm here," Mori sobbed. "Don't you know, Shiori-chan? I would have come for you in every world." She squeezed Shiori's hand, her voice cracking. "Wherever you go, I'm going to follow you."
Shiori's eyes watered. "Nee-chan, you can't come where I'm going. Promise me you'll live. Promise me you'll fight. You'll win and go home and be happy. Please," Shiori whispered, her skin growing cold and ashen. "Please."
"No!" Mori shook her head violently. "Not without you. I won't be happy if you aren't there with me."
Shiori cupped Mori's face with her other hand, swiping a tear away with her finger. "Don't cry forever." She laughed. "I hate making you cry."
Mori could feel Shiori's hand trembling, the strength leaving her body. "Don't leave me," she pleaded. "Shiori, I'm so scared."
After glancing at something to the side, Shiori gripped Mori's hand tighter. "Say goodnight, Nee-chan." Her eyelids fluttered closer to shut.
No, I can't say that. I can't say goodnight. "I love you," Mori said, silently begging Shiori to open her eyes again.
Her sister dissolved into light. The pieces of her drifted in the air, borne aloft by an invisible hand.
"No...No. No." Mori's heart cracked open inside her, as one by one, the glowing flecks died out.
Too late, she remembered the object sitting in her inventory. The ring. She'd been saving it, planning to rescue Shiori with it.
She summoned the item, the pale blue gemstones shining against the silver metal.
Mori screamed.
Pain ripped a hole through her chest, grief spilling out over the edges. This wasn't real. This couldn't be happening.
Mori screamed Shiori's name in an incoherent sob.
Through her weeping, Ren's murmurs reached her. Her friend tried to take her hand, but almost made her drop the ring. Mori curled in on herself and they left her alone.
But maybe...maybe Shiori still lived in the real world. Maybe she hadn't really died at all.
With that thought, Mori placed two of her fingers on the ring. A moonflower bobbed by her head, reminding her of the promise to Cynthia. But she needed to know.
Positioning the ring so that she'd covered all four gems, Mori pressed down. A sharp twinge impaled the pads of her fingers, like a nail being driven through the flesh.
As she screamed—her throat raw—once again Mori thought she heard a soft giggling beside her.
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Chapter Word Count: 1863
Total Word Count: 25617