Chapter 151 – Strangeness

Chapter 151 – Strangeness

John kept an eye on his Mana Protection. Once it reached maximum capacity, they would enter the battlefield again. Standard safety procedures, and all of that.

“I want more of these,” Sylph whined, eating what John had told her to be the last gummy bear. He felt like this day was the opening of Pandora’s cookie jar for a future sweet addiction for Sylph.

“What’s so great about this stuff anyway?” Salamander asked. She had tried a gummy bear herself, but hadn’t found it particularly to her liking. From the slime lady at John’s side (actually more on John’s side, she was feeling lazy/affectionate and had attached herself to him for the time being) came support for that question.

“They are sweet and sugary and woah!” Sylph said, “Gnome, you explain!”

The earth spirit, hand in the bowl, was startled as everyone’s attention shifted to her. “I, uhm, they are, like, tasty?” she stammered.

“Gnome doesn’t count, she is heavy,” Salamander waved it off.

“Wha- NO I AM NOT!” the stone elemental shouted in response.

“Yes, yes, you are, you are made from rock,” her burning sister stated drily.

“I am unsure how Gnome being of heavy material relates to her liking gummy bears,” Aclysia chimed in.

“It is a joke about her being fat,” John explained, “which you are not, Gnome, so no cause for concern. Salamander is just out to tease you.”

“Partypooper,” the blaze elemental complained, “could have annoyed her for at least another five minutes.”

John’s Mana Protection hit maximum charge. “There is no time for that. Everybody remembers the strategy?” Affirmations all around. “Then let’s go.” John reached for the doorknob.

The entrance flew open, almost hitting John’s face. Surprised, he stumbled backwards. Undine on his side made a disgruntled sound, complaining about the shaking.Nêww chapters will be fully updated at (n)ov(e)l/bin(.)com

Outside the door was a seizure inducing cacophony of colours and images. In the door itself stood a remarkably unmemorable man. He could have been literally anybody else, the kind of person one didn’t even notice while walking through the streets.

“Whoops, not at all where I wanted to come out, oh and hi John, I am in a hurry so we’ll talk again next time,” the man said and quickly closed the door. John didn’t even have the chance to use Observe.

“What was that?” he wanted to know from Hermes.

“Probably somebody who met another version of you,” The god of messages shrugged, “I told you that door is enchanted to invite people from wherever, not the first time it brought in some dimension traveller who got tangled up in the spell.”

“Hold the phone, dimension traveller? As in, there is more than one?” Obviously, that was a common theory, particularly when it came to the kind of fantasy realm he found himself in. Guessing and knowing were, particularly when it came to finding out there were parallel versions of him, incredibly different.

“Yup, have fun with that bit of trivia,” Hermes answered, “not like it will help you with anything, dimension travelling is a skill so exceedingly rare I doubt that you will get any use of it. I interact with a lot of them because of what I do and even I see only a couple a year.”

‘Okay, so that’s the existence of parallel dimensions and other versions of me confirmed,’ John thought. ‘Wonder how they are doing?’ Looking at his own luck in life, he was sure that the answer was ‘not so hot’. Then again, who knew how far the divergences could go? Some ‘hims’ would probably be so changed by circumstances that they had nothing in common.

John noticed something running out of the burning building. A human wearing black clothes that hid the whole body from view. A scarf and glasses that also made his face unrecognizable. The green glow behind made it pretty clear that this was not a human however.



“Why does he have to look like a member of Antifa?” John sighed. “Political commentary? Really, Gaia? Also he drops NO money but his legendary drop is the Communist Manifesto! How am I supposed to take this seriously?”

The answer to that question came flying in the shape of a Molotov cocktail. “I got this, see, see?” Sylph chirped and sent the projectile flying back in a gust of wind.

An explosion big enough to still damage John’s shield by 160 points exploded in the Citychaos Elemental’s face. John did not expect that to actually hurt it but as the cloud of ash and dust slowly cleared, the revealed boss did look like he was at the very least bothered by the attack.

“Good job, Sylph,” John complimented, very happy to not have been the centre of that explosion, “You keep reflecting that.”

“Aye, Johnnie, can do that, caaaaaan dooo, can I? Yes, I can!”

“Shut up, Sylph,” Salamander said, engaging the enemy.

Aclysia did the same, so did Gnome and they were facing an absolute...

Weakling of a boss.

“I don’t get it,” John scratched his head. The scene before him was absurd. The entirety of the gathered combatants were kicking the daylights out of the boss, like it was just a mundane guy. He almost expected to be surprised by the black bloc turning around the corner. However, it was just that one guy. One guy with no abilities outside of throwing an easily countered Molotov cocktail. The defeat followed swiftly.

‘So, the core floor boss of this one is super easy and the other one I haven’t even faced, weird,’ John shrugged it off and left the barrier as soon as the timer for the next Wave showed. Once back in the main barrier he pulled out Mono, despite Magoi being present as always.

“Sorry, I need whatever power can be offered to me, right now,” John defended himself from the judgemental stare.

Magoi, after a short delay, just let out a long sigh, “I have no idea how strong this Thana thing you are about to face is, so maybe you do? Let me warn you however that your new golem will be very interesting to whoever runs a mana factory. Even more than you are,” he told John.

“How come?” John wanted to know.

“Because it is hard to keep a human of your power sedated. A golem with that kind of power core, however, can be exploited. You call her an Artificial Spirit but that really is nothing but a golem with will. Not to mention that she is living material, so they can feed her whatever they need to get mana out of her,” Magoi explained. “They would consider her a way to transform enchanted items into raw mana and basic materials. Inevitably, she would break from that sort of exploitation.”

“Well, she is bound to me, so it should work out fine,” John said with conviction.

“Don’t let arrogance be your undoing, John.” With these words the disappointed Fateweaver left.

“Should you maybe not have revealed me?” Mono asked in an apologetic tone.

“No, he would have found out anyway eventually. I try to be honest,” John answered with a smile, “Now come, we have stuff to feed you and then we need to resume grinding.”