I Think, Therefore I Am

  “I think,” it muttered slowly, a branch emerging from under the ground as the Savior stared at its own appendage in fascination, slowly coming to its senses. “I… Think,” it exclaimed, this time its voice becoming louder and more powerful, “I feel. I sense.” It looked around slowly, its beastly eyes having the night vision to naturally observe its surroundings even in complete darkness. There were a multitude of monsters all around it staring from a fair distance away, from small puny ones coming from average citizens to those that exuded the energy rivalling those of the top thousand heroes in the Association. The Savior understood nothing beyond that it was a monster and that yet it could think and feel - things it knew from when it had been alive were supposedly impossible. And yet it clearly wasn’t impossible, seeing as it was there, and it felt and it thought. Its eyes trailed across the underground fortress that the monsters had carved for it while it wasn’t even conscious yet, until its eyes lingered on the twelve that were gathered directly in front of it by its roots. “Who are you?” it asked those gathered, expecting no response. They were monsters after all; unthinking bundles of dead energy given form. One of the monsters slowly stood up, a humanoid looking creature with masses of tentacles for arms and the head of a shrimp, “We are alive, thanks to you, our Savior,” it said, the sheer reverence coming out of the creature’s voice making up for its lack of facial expressions. The Savior blinked, taken aback by the shrimp creature speaking to it, “You speak??” it wondered in awe, its eyes scanning the being up and down and recognising through some ethereal manner that the creature that had stood to speak was unimaginably powerful - more powerful than anything the Savior had ever seen in its previous life. “I speak,” the shrimp monster continued, doing a deep bow as its voice began to crack, as if crying, “Because you allow me to speak, my Savior. Thank you.”

  The Savior didn’t know what to say. She was simply stunned. She? Am I… a woman? Do monsters even have such concepts? Should I? Still, I have a vague sense that I am a woman. I must have been one in life, then. The Savior wondered and then concluded, catching herself off guard. Why was she so readily accepting that she was a monster? Why was she so readily accepting that these creatures gathered before her were monsters? Why wasn’t she more baffled when the shrimp creature spoke to her? “You… think. You feel,” she spoke slowly, a branch slowly reaching out to the shrimp and gently touching its head. The humanoid monster froze, its eyes glistening, before falling to its knees, its voice so shaky that it could barely respond in between its raspy breaths, almost like it was sobbing, “I think because of you, my Savior. I feel because of you, my Savior. Before you, I was but a creature of the ocean, occasionally sinking boats out of pure animalistic instinct. I sought nought but to destroy and pilfer and consume. And yet one day I woke up and I… I thought. I felt. I remembered.” The shrimp creature pressed its tentacle masses for arms together and its temple against the floor, prostrating before the Savior. The other monsters quickly followed suit, each and every single one of them speaking in tandem as they got into their prostrating position, “Our Savior.” And that's when the Savior understood, her eyes slowly closing, cutting off her vision and submerging herself in darkness for a moment. I don’t know why. I don’t know how. But it's clear to me that my very existence has somehow turned these monsters sentient. I don’t understand much beyond this, but I feel - I KNOW that this is what I am. Their Savior.

  Her eyes slowly opened again, a smile slowly appearing on her face as her eyes lingered on the creatures gathered by her roots one by one, committing each and every one of them to memory. Her eyes then slowly rose past them, staring around at the underground structure she was currently planted in. The ones who had been surrounding her were a mere thirteen, yet the eyes leering down at her from atop the various segmented sections of the stadium-like underground construct numbered in the hundreds if not thousands. “So many…” the Savior asked out loud, her eyes returning down to the group gathered around her, her Apostles, “How? In my time, there were only a few monsters active at any time.” My time… How long ago was my time? How many years have passed since I died, until the energy from my power could gather into the form I inhabit? Is it even the same century? This time a large monster in the shape of a cinder block slowly rose on its two pudgy feet, a singular slitted eye in the dead center of its body, “My Savior… Your presence has given thousands of monstrous essences the push they needed to finally achieve a form. Some of these are millenia old, and some died merely yesterday. They all owe their existence to you,” it finished by giving a deep bow, nearly toppling over thanks to its rigid stone-like body. This one is immensely powerful, too. The Savior noted, her eyes lingering on this being for a moment longer before her branches pulled away, slowly wrapping them around herself.

  She thought in silence, every being in the underground remaining perfectly still as she immersed herself in thought. It might have taken seconds. It might have taken minutes. It might have been hours. Days. None of those gathered knew for sure, since every passing moment was sheer torture for every single one of them. They all understood, as did the Savior, that her next words would determine the fate of thousands upon thousands at best, and perhaps even billions at worst. And yet not a single one of them wanted to make that choice themselves, the responsibility of it all befalling on the Savior. Had any one of them spoken against the imminent decision, the Savior would have chosen differently. She knew it, too, and silently begged for anyone but her to make the choice. But in the end, this is what she said; “Then we will live.” And then a week went by.

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  Immortalis took a deep breath, his entire body absolutely drenched in sweat while his eyelids twitched, his bloodshot eyes on the verge of tears. “AGAIN!!” he exclaimed with a furious roar, the virtual reality simulation sprawling before him once more as the room seemingly transformed into a ruined city reminiscent of the great wars from over a century ago. He took a deep breath and charged directly into the battle with narrowed glowing eyes, completely ignoring cover and any sort of tactics. Virtual enemy soldiers began to shoot at him from various different places, most of their shots missing but quite a few landing. The suit John was wearing ensured that every bullet’s impact would feel real, sending electrical pulses through his body that would cause his nerves to scream in agony. His eyes became even more bloodshot as the hero gasped in pain, the scarlet glow of his eyes intensifying as he only paused for a split moment, roaring as he forced himself to keep running straight towards the enemy’s hail of bullets. Five seconds!! Just five seconds!! He yowled to himself internally as he rushed forward. He had had a realization during one of his training bouts; the amount of pain he could possibly feel was finite. It didn’t matter if he was on the very edge of passing out; if he could only last for five seconds, then his pain would reset. In the case of the current wall of bullets bombarding him, it meant that his pain could only accumulate until the five seconds passed, after which it would start again. In other words… The amount of pain I can feel because of being shot at, as long as it remains at a constant rate, has a hard maximum!! He once more growled in effort, his jaw gritting so hard that his teeth were beginning to crack. And despite this, just as he reached the first enemy soldier, the five seconds were over.

  “I DID IT!!!” he exclaimed in fury, any sort of accomplishment he would have felt vanishing, replaced by a tide of anger. He slammed his fist against the face of one of his virtual enemies, punching so hard that the skin of his knuckles peeled away, exposing his bone. The soldiers’ entire body slammed against the concrete floor so hard that his body literally bounced off it, dead in an instant. This simulation is way too realistic. Seven thought with a grimace as he stared down at the bloodied remains of the fake soldier. He grit his teeth and wiped the virtual blood on his clothes, impressed with how his hand felt genuinely wet with blood as if his skin tight bodysuit was simply not there. This tech is insane. Imagine when they find a way to mass produce Maquineers’ little pet projects without needing her to be there in person, hah. His thought process was interrupted when he felt a barrage of bullets pummel his side once more, causing him to wince as his head turned quickly to spot another soldier. He took a deep breath, steadying himself even as he was currently being barraged by intense pain flaring all through his body, taking a step towards his new enemy, only for John to suddenly feel something touch his shoulder unexpectedly. Immortalis’ eyes widened as he turned around with a high kick, aiming for where the head would be on an average height human. Instead, though, he felt his shin be split in half as it came into contact with a drawn blade, causing him to stagger and shortly thereafter fall to the ground while the bottom third of his leg flew off into the other side of the room. “Calm down, John. I’m not a simulation,” harrumphed the familiar voice of Crusader, his pearly white eyes staring down Immortalis’ own bloodshot crimson ones.

  “AGH!! FUCK!!” Seven yowled, groaning as he quickly reached up to his head and turned off the simulation while the virtual soldier kept shooting him incessantly, only making his suffering worse. Ten watched on silently as his comrade turned off the simulation and shortly after threw the headset away like it was a frisbee, letting it skid across the floor while groaning in pain. John then turned to look up at his fellow Celestial with narrowed eyes. “What the hell was that for, bastard?!” he growled to Ten, an undignified frown sprawled across his face. Ibrahim returned John’s cold venom with a raised eyebrow and a half-smirk, causing the young Celestial to feel like he was being mocked. “I’m surprised you’re training, Immortalis,” began the ferromancer, five of his swords hovering around him, one of them the culprit for Seven cutting off his own leg. John’s lower eyelid twitched, crossing his arms as he looked away with a ‘tsk’, his cheeks turning ever so slightly pinkish in shame while his body fixed itself - suit and all included. “What do you care??” the immortal asked rhetorically, pursing his lips, the glow in his eyes dying down. Dammit. He thought in frustration, the overbearing figure of his lower ranking yet older coworker staring at him over his shoulder. I was really hoping I’d get to keep this a secret… Fine!! Fine, so be it!! I’ll just have to rebuild my reputation from scratch. No big deal, I can do it. I’m IMMORTAL! I have time. I have infinite time!! “I won’t tell anyone, if you’re worried about that,” Ibrahim added, crossing his arms as he tentatively extended a hand towards John, “I don’t care about your obsession with high society anyway. I wouldn’t even know who to tell in order to hurt you, if that means anything to you.” Immortalis turned to look at him, making eye-contact briefly before swatting away Crusaders’ hand and getting up by himself.

  Ibrahim grimaced at his hand getting slapped away, clearly somewhat annoyed that Immortalis had responded in such a way to his gesture of goodwill. Fine then, John. He thought bitterly. We don’t have to be friends. “But,” Ibrahim suddenly continued, snapping Immortalis’ attention back to him, Crusaders’ pearl white eyes beginning to light up ever so slightly, “To be frank, John, you suck at fighting. Your kick wouldn’t have even hit my head, I had to block around my waist.” Seven grit his teeth and responded to his coworkers’ snarky remark with an intense glare from his crimson eyes. He was about to respond to Ten’s comment with as much venom as his frustrated and stressed self could muster, but then he sighed and simply looked away, his gaze dropping in defeat. “Fuck off, Ibrahim,” Immortalis responded dejectedly, slowly walking towards the headset he had thrown away in frustration, his hands in his pockets. But before he could lean down to grab it, a sword suddenly descended from the sky and impaled itself right in front of him, missing his face by a couple of millimeters, splitting the headset in half. Immortalis grit his teeth even harder, his fists clenching as he turned to look at Crusader, enraged, “What?! Is mocking me not enough, huh?! You wanna rub it in?! I’ll show you why I’m ranked above you, Ibrahim, if that’s what you want!!” Ten’s eyes narrowed as he flicked his fingers, his four other swords suddenly flying towards his coworker with murderous intent. John tsk’d and jumped out of the way of the swords, his crimson eyes now fully lit up. The moment his feet hit the ground, he immediately began to sprint towards Ibrahim, his fists raised. Crusader’s pearl white eyes were also glowing, his palms pressed together, the swords beginning to spin rapidly while turning mid-air.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  Immortalis reached Crusader, throwing a punch out which Ibrahim dodged by jumping backwards, a sword suddenly coming in from the side as it spun like a saw blade. Immortalis narrowed his eyes, taking a step forward while punching with his other hand, fighting his instincts screaming at him to get out of the way of the incoming blade. Tens’ eyes widened slightly as Sevens’ punch hit him right on the chestplate. He’s strong! Crusader thought in surprise, his feet being lifted off the ground as he skidded along the floor for a moment before regaining his footing, a stinging feeling spreading all over his body from his chest. Meanwhile, Immortalis’ dead body fell to the floor unceremoniously since Ibrahim’s blade had just cleaved his head in half. I was only aiming to cut his arm after he tried to punch me. He purposefully allowed himself to be hit in the head in order to land a blow on me. That is… good. Excellent, even. I’m glad I checked up on John after Empress told me about this odd behavior of his. The edges of Tens’ mouth began to curve upwards as his fellow Celestial rose from the ground once more, and the two of them locked eyes.

  “I underestimated you, John, I will admit that much,” Crusader stated, his five blades returning to him, still spinning like saw blades in an arc over his head, “But you’re still too far from your true potential for me to be content.” Immortalis scoffed, putting his hands in his pockets while tilting his head to stare Ibrahim down, his frown diminishing slightly, “I know that, you idiot. Why else would I be training?! You were briefed, weren’t you? I got my ass robbed blind and didn’t even manage to kill the bastard responsible,” he spat venomously, turning away as he once more reached for the broken VR headset on the floor. Crusader tsk’d and suddenly the headset caved in on itself right as John was about to grab it, imploding into a small uniform ball of metal. “The VR is fine, but it’s not good,” Ibrahim began, the ball floating up into the air with a flick of his hand. Seven’s eyes twitched in anger, turning to look at his fellow Celestial with increasingly grit teeth, his fists clenching. Ten pointed a finger at Immortalis, the ball of what used to be the headset elongating with cracking sounds until it assumed the shape of a knife, “You need someone to train with. Someone real, someone dangerous. Guns will be the least of your worries on the battlefield - there’s no way someone of your caliber would be used to deal with fodder.” Immortalis unclenched his fists, his eyes remaining steady and unblinking as he stared at Crusader, considering his words.

  Ibrahim stared back, his arms crossing as the newly made knife flew towards him, replacing the sixth sword he had given Maquineer and beginning to spin as well. John pondered on it for a few more seconds before he finally answered, “I already tried to train with other heroes that fight up close and personal, but it didn’t work. My power… it won’t let me get stronger. Muscles grow when you damage them through workouts, so that your body can rebuild them stronger than before. I can’t do that, because any damage I do to my own muscles vanishes in five seconds,” he hissed, looking down at his hands for a moment as he closed one of them into a fist, “So unless you can impress me in some way, we’re done here.” Ibrahim nodded along, a small smile beginning to perch itself on his lips, “I see,” he added nonchalantly, his eyes remaining glued to Immortalis, “However, there’s something that’s bothering me. That punch you hit me with earlier… It was far too strong a hit for someone who has supposedly normal human strength,” Ibrahim pointed out in an accusatory tone, causing the latter to merely grunt in disdain, not bothering to look up at the senior hero, “If I had to guess, you had to brute force your body into ignoring its instincts in order to hit me with so much strength it dislocated your joints. Am I right?” Immortalis glanced up from his fist in genuine surprise, Ibrahim leaning backwards as his spinning blades began to fly around him erratically before he continued, “Next time… hit me so hard that it breaks your bones,” he hissed, his voice sounding truly threatening and aggressive for the first time since their encounter started. John blinked a couple of times, his eyes narrowing as he turned towards Crusader slowly, a malicious grin starting to form on his face, “Oh?? I take back what I said! Maybe spending time with you won’t be a complete waste of time after all~” he then took a decisive step forward, his eyes glinting with crimson light as a fist suddenly flew towards his fellow Celestial. Ten jumped backwards, narrowly avoiding the hit as two of the blades stopped spinning, flattening and wrapping around his forearms until they had formed into thick gauntlets, his expression solidifying into a victorious grin.

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  “You’re quite a glutton, huh?” I mentioned with a wave of my hand, raising an eyebrow as Jessica gorged herself on the sixth donut of the 12 pack. It’s not that I was worried she’d eat my sum, no. The donuts, like all other foods, tasted like cardboard to me anyway. I was merely slightly impressed by her ability to consume that much that fast. Love Love looked up at me with huge dilated pupils, looking more like a lost kitten than a human, her voice coming out as muffled thanks to her mouth being full, “O-Oh, shorry…” she mumbled slowly. I shook my head, lowering my hand back down to the table as I gave her an amused yet somewhat warm smile, “Nah, don’t worry. They’re yours anyway.” Still, I was expecting her to ask for something more… lavish. I pondered, looking out my window and at the peaceful countryside. I have the funds for it after all. But nope; all she wanted in exchange for her little exploit with Maquineer was just some sweets and desserts. Jessica grinned excitedly, going right back to devouring the baked goods, muffledly saying something between the bites she was giving the food, “What… What now??” she asked nervously, looking up at me with her cheeks bulging like she was a hamster. I looked back at her, my amused expression washing away in exchange for one of tedium, sighing, “We have about fifteen minutes until all hell breaks loose, so I guess we have some time to chat. You read up on everything I told you to, right?” I asked her curiously, raising an eyebrow and waving around a crumb of donut. Jessica nodded, her gaze drooping while she pursed her lips slightly, twiddling her thumbs nervously. How does he do it? She wondered softly. I feel like I would go crazy if I knew everything bad that would happen and yet couldn’t tell anyone… This future that Kevin is chasing, I really do hope it’s worth it…

  She answered, her voice sounding robotic and practiced, like she had already said the same thing over and over into a mirror, “On the nature of monsters, synopsis. Monsters don’t appear naturally in the wild. They aren’t animals, but rather are the result of humans having the energy from their powers released to the outside world upon death. Once enough of this essence gathers, it then coalesces and manipulates mass around itself to form a body. About 1% of deaths actually cause a monster to form - not counting cripples as they literally cannot create a monster upon death. The more powerful the dead human, the more powerful the potential monster that can form upon their death is, but there is no correlation between the strength of a human and the likeliness that a monster forms upon their death,” she finished, looking up at me with wide and hopeful eyes. I smirked and ruffled her hair, reaching into the donut box and giving one of the donuts a tentative bite before setting it back down in disappointment. “Good!!” I told her with a thumbs up, “I’m surprised by your diligence, to be frank. This little experiment is going way better than I was expecting!”

  Love Love blinked a couple of times upon hearing those words, her eyes narrowing as her meek expression quickly changed into a more serious one, “Better… than you had expected??” she breathed out, her pink eyes lighting up with realization, “Than you expected?! This- this is the first time I’m here, isn’t it!!! You haven’t done this before!!! None of this- No wonder!!” she quickly figured it out, her eyes widening like a cat’s as she violently stood up from where she was sitting, knocking her chair over. My own eyes widened slightly, for the first time in a very, very long time actually feeling a knot in my throat at the realization that I had made a mistake. How strange, how very strange. It’s as if my actions had consequences again!! Haha! “Ah, fuck, you weren’t supposed to know that. Whoopsie!! I’ll see ya ten seconds ago, Jessica,” I muttered with an overly exaggerated sigh and some fake playfulness, leaning back with half closed eyes and winding the clock right as she began lunging towards me in a panic. Her mouth was open, her right arm outstretched towards me, her eyes wide and glowing, her pupils dilated, “NO!! KEVIN- W-WAIT-!!!” and then that reality ceased to be.

  This time I measured my words better, smirking and ruffling her hair once more, “Good!!” I repeated, but followed up with something different this time, “Very nice. Oh but you missed one part,” I mentioned in a sing-song tone. Jessica slowly and tentatively grabbed the last donut in the box - the one I had bit into - her eyes darting over to me with a raised eyebrow. I grinned, placing my hands behind my head while leaning back on the chair, motioning over to the TV in the corner of the rather empty cafe, “Monsters are mindless beasts who will enter a savage bloodthirsty rampage upon detecting a human. Otherwise, they will passively roam around with no real direction or objective,” I finished, my tone extremely mocking and unserious, grinning broadly. Jessica followed my nod, her eyes resting on the TV currently showing a soapy romance movie. I counted down the seconds in my head, and snapped my fingers right as she was about to look away from the TV and turn to me questioningly. The screen suddenly sputtered, the screen being overtaken by static for a moment before slowly clearing and revealing a mechanical aberration of creature with a head made up of a mishmash of wires and household appliances standing in a lavish and well-organised news station.

  Jessica’s eyes widened as she quickly understood what was happening, her eyes darting to my pleasantly smiling face and then over to the other people in the cafe who were now all attentively looking at the sudden change albeit clearly very confused. “Greetings, humanity,” the monster spoke, its voice sounding like the rasping of metal against metal rather than an actual voice, his tone steady yet with clear undertones of doubt and sadness, “This is the first and only time this message will be sent, so listen attentively and heed well. I am Mecha, one of the 13 apostles of the Savior, and the following words I speak in her name and her authority, and therefore it is the voice of all monsterkind. Humanity will come under siege in exactly one week from now,” it spoke in its garbled mechanical whirring for a voice, slowly lifting a rather humanoid hand made up of various mechanical components which was currently displaying a clock winding down from 6:23:59:59, “For we are declaring war. This outcome is unchangeable, as dictated by the Savior, so do not try negotiations, for they will be futile. During this week we will allow humanity to evacuate the areas that shall become the frontlines, this being; Greenland, Iceland, northern Canada, northern Russia, and the northern zones of the Scandinavian countries. This week’s truce will only be allowed to exist as long as no monster is hunted down, else we will forgo our utmost generous benevolence and begin the war immediately. Good luck, and may the victor claim the spoils,” it finished speaking, doing a revering bow as the TV returned to showing nonsense static - the last image before fading away being the clock striking 6:24:59:40.

  The TV then returned to the soapy romance movie and resumed like nothing had happened. There was silence, an overwhelming quiet that enveloped all of humanity for a few moments. Had that message been for real? There was no way it could be true, right? A monster, speaking?? It was inconceivable. It had to be a prank. A hacker powered person must have caused this strange message to appear on screens worldwide as either a joke or an attempt to sow chaos. That must be it, surely. Thought billions of humans in that very moment. Jessica slowly turned to look at me, her eyes fully narrowed and her expression one of serious determination, her eyes glowing furiously with pink energy. I smirked back at her, my irises still as dark and lifeless as ever while I slowly pulled out my phone, setting it down on the table before snickering, “What a polite fella, that monster, eh?” And then my phone rang.