The group spent the next twenty hours constantly moving. There were two patterns to the operations. Either they found four survivors, universally those that were in the barrier specific gestalt unification machine, or they found none. In the latter cases, John only bothered to search two of the barriers. Once to gather information and a second time to verify. In both cases he found the dungeon completely empty, save for the phantom stalking around.

The explanation of why some places were ‘saved’ in time doubtlessly had to do with the quality of their mind-connection fluid. As John had learned, it did contain Sands of Time, and if the power of the grains was depleted to a certain point, the time it would take the phantom to manifest in response to the Lorylim meddling was longer than it took the Lorylim to corrupt everyone inside the barrier.

John guessed that this still threw a wrench into the Lorylim’s plans. Given the overlapping reports he got, it seemed that the Lorylim had managed to take hold of the final consciousness nexus of the East Gestalt guild. From there, they sent a corrupted alchemist to each of the lowest institutions to tamper with the mind-connection fluid. If all went according to plan, the entire structure would be mentally corrupted bottom-up. That whole process would likely have been subtle at first and only been detected when it was far too late.

However, the Sands of Times had acted as a sort-of mental insulation between the corrupted and the higher echelons, also leading to the perception that sand was the main problem. Then, between two and five days after their meddling, the Sands of Time manifested into that odd slime creature. The first few times, the Lorylim had tried to fight this (John had no evidence pointing at something else involved), but lost. In every case where the Lorylim could, they would have cut their losses, forced corruption directly on the people they could and moved the fresh meat who-knew where.

The good news of this: John’s hope that the two catastrophes would cancel each other was, somewhat, accurate. The head of the East Gestalt guild was most likely corrupt. John didn’t have hard confirmation for this, but every sign pointed towards it. The lower ranks had become Lorylim fodder in one sense or another. Everything between that would have gotten away with only minor mental disturbance, thanks to the entire system collapsing before the corruption could spread up.

The bad news was that the raw bulk of the population was taken. By John’s estimation, there were 6 degrees of separation between the top and the lowest ranks. Given the basic math he had to do (4 to the power of 5 and then times 5 for the final step) that meant that there were about 5120 dead people. An estimate but, given the strict organization of the system, unlikely to be too far from the truth.

If just 10% of them had been successfully evacuated as fresh meatbags for the Lorylim, they were now 500 bodies richer. That was far removed from the entirety of the roughly 6484 people, but it was still worrying. Infestations had the potential to spread rapidly, given the right circumstances.

Of these 6484 people, John saved 64 and about 1300 (the theoretical membership of the middle ranks) were largely untouched by the ongoings. In that middle-management, he found who had contacted Fusion in the first place. They were confused about the situation at large, having been unaware of the Lorylim while their own repositories of Sands of Times had started to act up. The chain reaction was still on-going.

‘The end of that might just become the real crisis,’ John thought, while the prismatic light of entering an Illusion Barrier danced around his car. He pulled up to a cubical building with four rectangular towers. Everything had perfect angles and even the windows were symmetrically aligned and square. The East Gestalt was obsessed with the form of things. “Alright, let’s get you patched up,” John told the people in the car, the latest batch he had saved.

He still felt a fair bit of animosity towards their way of life. The way they reacted to all the death didn’t help. To say they were indifferent would have been inaccurate. It just didn’t seem as if they were grieving for someone but rather something. Being intertwined on a remembrance level seemed to actually reduce the amount of investment they had in another person. They weren’t people who knew each other, they were additional experiences of themselves. It was their lifestyle being threatened, more than anything else, that coerced an emotional response from the people.

Regardless of all that disdain he felt for the way things were run, John believed he should do his best to save human life. He could berate them more after they had gotten nourishment and sleep. Thankfully, he didn’t have to oversee these things himself anymore.

At the glass door of the building, they were greeted by a group of four that each picked out one of the four that John had brought. Himself, he was greeted by Beatrice. “Report: the building continues to operate without issue. All Sands of Time stocks and other alchemical substances were moved out of this barrier.”

“Fantastic, so this is our safe haven.” The Gamer moved into the building.

“Are we finally fucking done running around?” Eliza asked as they moved inside. “I swear to cocksucking that I had enough of creepy, silent, odourless, screaming goo monsters. Undine is enough when it comes to dealing with wobbling slime shit.”

“It’s inconvenient, yes, but it’s of little risk to us and it saves lives.” John led the group through the open entrance area. Just like the underground corridors, everything had that clean hospital feeling to it. When it came to having synchronized experiences even off the machine, the Gamer imagined that cleaning together was one of the more popular ones.

“Honestly, these fuckers deserve what they brought on themselves,” Eliza growled and snapped her teeth at someone passing by. Wisely, they tumbled back. “Really great job at presenting themselves as a nice fucking meal to the alien giggle creatures. I guess even retards with the mental capacity of soggy bread can mould.”

To pacify his pretty little psycho, John grabbed her, tugged her under his arm and carried her like a piece of luggage. “Give them some respect. Idiots or not, a life is worth something,” he reprimanded her.

Eliza didn’t care about getting carried nor about what he told her. “How about you try spanking that respect into me?”

“I think I would never get done with that.”

“That’s the idea, you fucking genius.”

John stepped into a room where Metra waited for him. It was one of the sleeping facilities, with four beds rowed up together and a single window with four panels on the opposite side of the wall. The entrance area was narrowed somewhat by the walls boxing in the bathroom unit attached to this room. Another feature that reminded John of hospitals.

The four beds had been shoved together into a more harem friendly unit. Eliza flew about two metres towards it and came to a halt after bouncing once. “Cheap fucks use thin mattresses,” she complained. “So, are we done for today or not?”

“…Yes,” John responded hesitantly. On one hand, it pulled him to get out there again and do as much as he could. On the other, he was no more than ONE powerful individual. If he tried to clean every bit of this up himself, he wouldn’t stop driving between destinations before the end of the month and, by then, everyone still around would have died of thirst.

Not acting himself right now may cause the death of some, but if he didn’t coordinate things with the resources he had available as a leader, a greater toll would be paid. He moved towards the laptop that Beatrice had set up for him on a simple white table and sat down on the stool before it. The laptop booted up and he quickly checked through his messages.

“So, where do we go from here?” Metra wanted to know.

“The centre,” John responded without hesitation. “Then West Gestalt. If it’s true what I heard about their organization, we’ll have to deal with a lot more difficulties on their end.”

“Why?” Metra asked.

“The Lorylim followed the strategy to corrupt the fundament of the structure and let it spread upwards. That’s a lot easier if the basic building block of the pyramid is one person,” John explained. “I also don’t know if they have the same accidental protection through the time phantom. It might be that the corruption over there was completed.” He shrugged. “It might also be that they weren’t hit at all. In that case, I will move to annex them immediately.”

“Getting a lot more aggressive, are we, my king?” the First of Wrath asked.

“Only a fucking moron would let several thousand potential eldritch hosts sit around doing fuck all except looking fat and tasty,” Eliza chimed in.

“I wouldn’t have put it quite like that, but that’s about my thoughts, yes,” John said and fished out his phone to make a couple of calls. The first one was obvious.

“Waddup, tiger?” his girlfriend asked. “Wondered when ya would call.”

John put on as energetic a voice as he could. “Well, I did as quickly as I could, but you know how things are. I was pretty occupied.”

“Ya sound tired,” Rave pointed out, immediately seeing through his façade. “Ya doing alright?”

The Gamer sighed, wanting to avoid worrying his girlfriend. “I’m in need of some sleep and eating. Only had water and a cheap gas station hotdog the past 26 hours.”

“Those are edible?” Rave wanted to know. “I always thought they came as decoration and for the cheap greasy smell.”

John laughed and leaned on the table. “Well, I can confirm they don’t kill you,” he said and took a slow breath. Now that he had stopped moving about, it slowly settled how tired he was. ‘Perhaps there is a subconscious reason beyond what I need to do personally and what I need to do as a leader that made me stop for the day,’ he thought and suppressed a yawn. ‘I need sleep, sex and a proper breakfast.’ “I’ll rest in a minute,” he promised. “I just need to prepare myself for tomorrow. How did parliament go?”

“They agreed to the East Gestalt deployment, but want to talk again over the West Gestalt deal,” the Lightbearer informed him. “I tried to push them, but the Speaker put her foot down and said she didn’t want to add that to the program on such short notice.”

“That’s what I get for dropping it in a text like an hour beforehand,” the Gamer sighed and massaged the bridge of his nose. From his perspective, this loss of time was incredibly foolish. Every hour could be another life lost unnecessarily. From the perspective of the politicians back home, it was a disregard of proper procedure. Even John’s fame and reputation allowed him only so much leeway before people reminded him what powers the system endowed them with.

“Aclysia and I’ll take care of it, don’t ya worry,” Rave assured him. “Nia is on her way. Ya get the battle strategy?”

“I did,” John confirmed. The generals had decided to split into three forces. One, led by Chemilia, was to join John at his current position as quickly as possible and expand this spot to a proper base of operations. The second, led by Nia, would scout out the coordinates they had been sent and conduct the experiments John hadn’t been able to. Once they knew how powerful a soldier had to be to wrestle control of the barrier from the Sands of Time monster, segment three, led by Ted, would spring into action and start the widespread liberation efforts. They would have to look out for Lorylim remains, the average soldier could get infected by a few spores while John could shrug off even direct contact to a limited degree.

“They got moving like two hours ago, so you’ll probably have to wait another ten before things really get into motion,” Rave told him. “Get some rest, tiger. I’ll call ya tomorrow when we got the rest of the law stuff done, alright?”

“Alright,” John confirmed. “Love you.”

“Love ya more,” she said, underlined with a kissing sound, and then hung up.

John took a quick glance at the bed and considered just laying down. The next call, he didn’t look forward to whatsoever. Nevertheless, he needed confirmation for a hunch. He punched a number into his phone and let it ring. When, finally, he heard the sound of the speaker clicking, he said immediately, “Horned Rat, I need your advice on something.”

“Speak, speak,” the deep voice of the god was accompanied by tiny squeaks and fell immediately into a serious tone. “What do you wish to know?”

It was nice to know that Richard could react in a proper fashion if John used the proper tone from the start. “Do you know what is happening in the East Gestalt right now?”

“I have heard of troubles, but nothing concrete has reached me yet,” the Horned Rat responded. “It is difficult to insert spies into an organization that synchronizes the mind, even for me. I expected to learn the details through the reports of your soldiers, reaching me one way or another.”

That honesty was something that irked John slightly. It was also expected, so he didn’t chase it further. “The Lorylim struck.”

“Expected, given the Gestalt organization,” the Horned Rat remarked in a calm tone.

“You seem unfazed by this.”

“I have my reasons to view the Lorylim with more respect and less fear than others.” It was an answer John decided to save close to his heart. That the Horned Rat knew more about this so-called first foe than he did was obvious. How much more and what exactly was something the Gamer would have paid quite a bit to know. “A couple thousand more or less bodies for the Lorylim are of no consequence to my schemes. You wouldn’t call me for secrets I haven’t given in the past.”

“Indeed. Did you know the Gestalt guilds used the Sands of Time in their alchemical concoction?”

“Yes, and that it seems to occur naturally in Natural Barriers in the area. Why do you ask?”

“It is manifesting into a will of its own – into an entity that seems lost between emotions, is powerful enough to kill Lorylim but doesn’t seem to care to kill people,” John finally got to the point and was met with an atypical silence. Only the grinding of bone against bone informed him that the Horned Rat was still there. The sound of splintering stone and a tail lashing the ground. “Horned Rat, you know the origin of our current framework of magic, right? Tell me the conclusion you draw. I need someone to tell me that what I think is happening is impossible.”

“…No… no, if the Lorylim have…” the Horned Rat sounded strained, thought out loud and stopped himself before letting slip something he didn’t want John to know. “It is possible… Yes, yes… the prophecy I spoke on your birthday, it dawns on me now. ‘One brother has always been alone – he will rise as ivy and spring and bone.’ Yes, the signs align…” Another pause. “Do you have confirmation?”

“Not yet,” John responded. “I will let you know when I do. We might have to tighten our allegiance if the worst comes to pass.”

“I am pleased by your wisdom, John Newman.” The Horned Rat sounded strained and John heard squeaks in the background, high-pitched voices muttering among themselves as they started to move. “Preparations will be made. Do not tell Romulus.”

“As long as it is to my benefit. Until then.” John ended the call and put the phone on the table.

“The fuck was all of that about?” Eliza wanted to know.

“Making plans for the worst-case scenario,” John turned towards her. “There is only one known entity still inside the Sands of Time, Eliza, and if this phantom shouts the syllables of Romulus and Gaia’s name for any reason, then that leaves only one conclusion.”

Remus.