MINOR WOUND

Your health has been decreased by 5%

A bolt grazed Dallion as he tried to block its path. That was a good thing: wounds such as these would be healed by Lux in a matter of seconds, and more importantly, the bolt failed to hit its intended target.

The fight between Euryale and Gloria had intensified quite a bit, to the point that Dallion was forced to use all his available skills—combat splitting included—to prevent them from killing each other. That also meant taking most of their damage on himself. Even so, the wounds he was getting were starting to become more and more serious. Soon there would come a point at which even Lux wouldn’t be able to help him. What’s more, his actions had also started having an effect on the echoes as well.

“Why do you keep protecting her?” Gloria asked. “She’s just a replacement. You only got to know her because I wasn’t there. I’m here now. Or do you wish I wasn’t?”

“No, it’s not like that,” Dallion said. Part of him was already annoyed with himself about resorting to such responses. It wasn’t that he didn’t know how to respond, it was the only way he could without risking harming them.

“You fell in love with someone you’ve only been with for a month? Face it, it was always supposed to be a one-night stand. Just look at her. Do you think she cares about you?”

“Just what a girl would say,” Eury said, then split into three instances. Each of them went past Dallion and attacked Gloria directly.

Dallion reacted without hesitation, creating three instances of his own and having them block each of Eury’s attacks. The gorgon was only using melee combat, but that was more than enough to cause considerable difficulties. There was no doubt that, left to her own devices, she would easily rip Gloria to shreds. Not that the bladebows made things much better for Dallion.

Nox, get ready, Dallion thought, as he slashed at the claws of Eury’s gauntlet. The attack was only partially successful, with three of the claws falling off.

“If he wasn’t protecting you you’d be already gone,” Eury said. “Not that you’re worth it. Seriously, Dal, why do you keep protecting a useless doll? She’s just using you. You know that you’ll never get lucky with her. If she was serious about you, she’d have done something about it. She’s just stringing you along.”

“Not as much as he’s stringing me,” Gloria countered. “If he was really into you, he’d have no problems telling me about it.”

A pair of bolts split the air, passing by Dallion on their way to Eury. For some reason, the gorgon didn’t split to safety, taking a hit in the shoulder. This was the first time she had received damage in battle, but she was already at fifty percent health because of it.

Moments later, two more bolts were on their way. It was Dallion’s turn to react again, but this time he decided on a new approach. Moving between the bolts and Eury as before, he made sure to complete a full guard sequence to slow down time. It didn’t end there, though. Dallion continued with his guard skill, completing sequence after sequence until time stopped completely.

Interesting decision, Nil said. You remember that the moment you do anything, time will resume, right?

Dallion didn’t reply. He knew it perfectly well. The reason for the pause was to give him some time to think in peace without having to protect Euryale and Gloria from each other. He still had to be careful, though. Thoughts still had the ability to harm, even with time stopped completely.

What’s the point of the challenge? Dallion wondered.

Up till now, it was always defeating his opponents one way or another. This one felt different, though. Dallion had been given way too many advantages. If he wanted, he could defeat either of them just by talking, but was that the point? Every fiber of his body screamed no.

What was he supposed to do? Make a choice? That sounded logical, but it also felt to be the easy way out. Dallion didn’t want to lose anyone.

When he was a child back on Earth, he wanted all his friends to get along well with one another. Often that involved mediating between them, lying if needed, in order to try to get them to warm up to one another. So far that had never worked out, resulting in both of them walking out on him. Some did it quickly, others remained lingering on for years, before moving to other friends. It had been the same with romantic relations.

As Dallion matured, he had come to the realization that it was impossible to have his friends always like one another. Instead, he was content with them liking him and not fighting in front of him. That made things simpler and more bearable. That was the reason he had started running away. It was a sort of defense mechanism, although Dallion thought he had grown enough to handle such situations. Clearly, that wasn’t the case. Thinking about it, it should have been obvious on the first day when Gloria returned. The fact that he felt some deep discomfort, even fear at the thought of having her and Euryale at the same place at the same time, should have made it obvious. However, Dallion had been too stubborn to admit it, using work and other developments as an excuse. Well, now he had no choice, if he was going to breathe through his next barrier, he’d have to find a way through this. The problem was that he had no idea how.

So far, everyone had insisted that he had to make a choice. Maybe that’s the correct thing to do. Maybe it was what was expected from him, but they weren’t him. As the dryad had said, Dallion was an empath, and that made the world a whole different place for him.

Still feeling greedy? Gen asked.

I thought you’d know, Dallion replied.

Even echoes have limitations. I have your thoughts, but not your stats. Do you think you can pull it off?

I’ve no idea. Dallion sighed. If this is a puzzle, I can’t see the answer. If I let them fight, they’ll eventually kill each other. If I step in on one side, the other will get hurt. If I let them kill me… is that the solution?

I don’t know. Sounds like running away, just in a more creative fashion.

What’s left then? I can’t reason with them, I’ve tried.

Reasoning, as it turned out, also caused damage.

Why don’t you offer a draw? The echo asked. It worked with other enemies.

They aren’t my enemies. Besides, it only works some of the time.

It worked on me.

The notion gave Dallion pause. That was true. When fighting the echo of his grandfather, there was no reason for him to spare it. Instead, he had transformed it into his first full-time echo. If that was possible then, why wouldn’t it be possible now as well? There was one difference, though—there were three sides in this conflict, all of which had to come to an agreement for a draw to work.

Nil, how many awakened stop at this stage? Dallion asked.

It’s difficult to say. Approximately ninety percent don’t reach the requirements for passing the third gate. I have no idea how many give up at your level. Not that it matters. There are different flaws for different people.

That was what being a double digit awakened was all about: eliminating one’s flaws in order to continue further on. It was supposed to be challenging to the extreme both on a physical and mental level. However, there was a way forward. All Dallion had to do was find it.

Something that Veil said came to mind. Back when Dallion had defeated Aspion’s limiting echo, he had shared this with the Luors. Veil had responded that the echo wasn’t an issue since he had “beaten him up” to do what he wanted. At the time, Dallion hadn’t given it much thought. However, there was one glaring problem: echoes only had enough health to exist. There shouldn’t have been a way for Veil to have beaten up the echo, since one punch would have been enough to destroy it. And still, the blond wasn’t the sort of person who would lie about something of the sort. That meant that there was a way to subdue someone without dealing damage.

I want to defeat them without harming them, Dallion thought.

A new set of markers appeared. While still red, these were different from the standard attack markers. They displayed holds and direction arrows. In a way, they had shared a lot of characteristics with the athletic markers. More than likely, this was another combination.

There’s no guarantee that will work, Gen said.

I know, but at least there’s a chance.

Returning to normal, Dallion went back into the fight, focusing on Gloria. While counterintuitive, he preferred not to have to deal with ranged weapons later on. The main thing was to still not attack, just use Gloria’s own momentum against her in a purely defensive fashion.

“You’re taking her side?” Gloria asked in shock. Surprisingly there was no red rectangle this time.

“I’m taking my own side,” Dallion said. “And that means using whatever strength I have to keep you two from hurting yourselves.”

“You mean each other,” Eury corrected.

Continuing his action, Dallion managed to grab hold of one of Gloria’s bladebows. Alas for him, the weapon disappeared before he could get a good grip on it. This meant she could still summon it at will. Even so, his action was mostly successful.

Not expecting to have to defend herself, Gloria made a sloppy attempt to pull away by making a high acrobatic leap. However, she no longer was the only one capable of that skill. Leaping up alongside her, Dallion grabbed her other hand, forcing her to unsummon the second weapon as well.

“You know I like you,” he said. “But you also know I love Eury.”

“No, you don’t,” she replied, the features of her face distorting as a sense of betrayal rang throughout her body. “You just think so.”

“Maybe you’re right, but that’s for me to find out. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you right away, but I was scared I might lose you.”

“And you were right too. Choosing that thing is the same as killing me, so you might as well just do it.” The betrayal slowly started shifting to regret. “If that’s your choice.”

“It’s not my choice.”

No attacks followed while the two fell back to the ground. Neither Gloria nor Eury even made an attempt.

“You want us to remain friends?” Gloria’s laugh was full of bitterness and mockery.

“I want us to remain as we were, and I think so do you,” Dallion continued. “The real you, not the echo my mind’s created of you. Until I awakened, you barely knew I existed. That’s something we can’t change, but after that we did well together. I just don’t think either of us thinks we’re meant to be together.”

There was a long moment of silence. Dallion knew that Euryale was also there, standing a few steps away, but he didn’t turn to look towards her. Not yet. If she were to take advantage of the situation and attack, then he’d respond best he could. Until then, all his focus was on Gloria.

“You had a crush on me, didn’t you?” Gloria ventured a smile.

“I’m not sure. Maybe. You were nice to me, so I thought I did…”

“And I was the only girl your age who was awakened.”

As much as he didn’t want to admit it, that much was true. Had Dallion remained in Dherma, maybe something would have happened, though it didn’t sound like it would have worked out either way. Choosing due to lack of options was no choice at all.

“Are you sure she’s worth it?” Gloria asked. “What if she drops you when you tell her about me?”

“I’m hoping that won’t happen. But if it does, I’ll figure it out somehow…”

At the end of the day, that’s what life was for. Dallion was just done refusing to accept reality. As his parents used to say after Dallion went through some major disappointment as a child “life goes on” the important thing was to know what to do with it. He was still going to do everything in his power, to keep Gloria as a friend, but he had his life and she had hers.

MAJOR HEAL

GLORIA’s health has been increased by 50%