With a chuckle, Eik took a deep breath and felt the stench of rotting wood fill his nostrils like thick, death gravy.

  “Would it be all right if I asked for a different room the next time I come visit? I’m getting a little tired of this quarter star hotel accommodation, to be honest. You could at the very least have the decency to put some dry sheets on before the guest checks in, don’t you think?” he said out loud, snorting a laugh as he stood up, completely ignoring the brittle, wooden coffin containing him.

  Last time he had come by way of the trait called A Greeting. The coffin had been spit out right at the foot of that big ass mountain which had drawn him in so powerfully back when he had first come to the Profound Toxic realm.

  Now he was back in the puddle-like pool in a stinky swamp. Home sweet home?

  “Do I have to come all the way back to that hole in the ground to see you, or what-at-at?” he called into the air.

  When no answer was forthcoming, he sighed. “All right, fine.” Movement Boost empowered his muscles and sent him hundreds of meters into the air with a single leap, the wind buffeting his hair.

  As the landscape stretched out before his eyes, he got another impression of the true scale of the Profound Toxic realm.

  The first time he had come here, his assumption had been along the lines of a small-ish bubble of alternate, dream-like reality. Like a snow globe with its world contained in an isolated pocket.

  Sprawling forest covering unbelievably large swathes of land, towering mountain piercing the clouds like blades through bellies, and winding, rushing rivers cutting through it all like cracks in a sheet of ice once again proved just how mistaken he had been back then. The Profound Toxic realm was as much a world as any other.

  And, in any case, what Monarch would make any other claim about his own land? This was indeed home sweet home. The sensation in his stomach as he regarded the massive realm left little doubt about that. By his family’s side was his true home but the sight of this place filled him with an unmistakable sense of belonging.

  Except for the fact that there was still an inexplicable yet not nearly as powerful draw to the mountain with the stone basin on its peak, Eik really couldn’t tell what was so different about that particular mountain compared to the countless others on the horizon. As a matter of fact, it was a fair bit smaller than many of the others.

  Well, not that it really mattered. Sightseeing and exploration were not the reasons he had come today. Detonating cubes of toxin under his feet, he dove headfirst toward the far side of the mountain, aiming to narrowly miss the peak and land as close to the foot as he could.

  As he was passing above the peak, something shot up at unfathomable speed and cracked into his hip with a force that sent him spinning wildly. Knocked off course, he slammed into and straight through a rocky protrusion halfway down the side of the mountain, fragmented rocks following him as he tumbled down toward the ground.

  “Freakin’…!” Eik grunted as he stood up and patted dust and soil from his clothes. “We both know that could only have been you-ou-ou! All the other inhabitants here would never attack me-ee-ee! I’m not an idiot-iot-iot!” he shouted to the empty echo, feeling very much like an idiot.

  Lobbed with perfect accuracy, a chunk of crystalline Profound Toxin sailed down from the peak. Seeing it coming this time, Eik caught the projectile in one hand and hurled it back up in one smooth motion.

  “So that’s how you want to play it?” he scoffed and crouched down into a crude imitation of a sprinter’s starting position. “Fine by me!”

  He vanished as if erased in a frame change by the world’s editor, the void of air left behind by his launch zooming in with a sharp crack. Once, he had spent hours ascending the mountain like a good, little boy. There had been something spiritual in the act and it had made sense at the time to take his time getting to the top.

  Fuck that. He cleared it in six massive leaps, touching down on boulders along the way with the lightness of a feather before rocketing further up. Clearing the peak with a hundred meters to spare, Eik looked down and realized that a person stood in the center, close to the stone basin.

  “Who the hell are y—” he began as he landed but the words caught in his throat when he got a better look. It was an exact facsimile of him.

  It struck something in his mind that wasn’t supposed to ever be touched. It was nothing like seeing yourself on film or in pictures, nor was it like the times he had made the Living Manifestations turn into him. Video and picture lacked the placement in the real world and the Profound Toxic beasts had trouble with human features and mannerisms. They were all flawed in one way or the other.

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  Even twins were not actually the same person and would have grown up with the experience even if they were. At least he assumed as much.

  No, this was… It was wrong. Or rather, it was unsettling and creepy and felt more like an out-of-body experience than anything else, but wrong didn’t actually describe the feeling well. As a matter of fact, one of the most unsettling aspects of the whole thing was how right it actually felt.

  More so than a copy of himself, it was more like staring at the second genuine half of his being.

  “Profound Toxin?” he asked with a raised eyebrow.

  “What do you… think?”

  “All right, all right there, buddy. There’s really no need for the shitty attitude.”

  Ignoring that, his face speaking with his voice moved on. “You did… it.”

  “You don’t say. Feeling you go crazy and ripping at my spirit to fight the thing told me as much,” he said with a roll of his eyes.

  “There is… really no need for the… shitty attitude,” it said, perfectly imitation both the timbre, pace, and articulation of his voice. It was eerie but natural.

  He snorted a laugh. “Okay, I suppose I deserved that. But I even beat it pretty damned handily too, if I do say so myself. With as much potion as I had in my system during that fight I was punching way above my weight.”

  “I… agree.”

  “All right, dude,” Eik deadpanned. “Anyway, what’s up? You said to come and see you for a second. Although I can pretty much guess what it’s about, all things considered.”

  “You must take up… the mantle of the… Supreme Divinity of Toxin,” Profound Toxin declared, words still halting despite the perfect imitation of Eik’s voice.

  “I mean, where do I sign, bro?” Eik said with open enthusiasm.

  “Not… yet.”

  “What?”

  Eik looked at Eik with the kind of expression that only Eik could fully comprehend the meaning of. “There is still one thing left… before I can relinquish the reigns of this world… to you.”

  “The reigns of this world?” Eik asked, incomprehension pulling his brow into a deep furrow. “What about my X-rank? What about becoming the Supreme Divinity of Toxin? I need it for a thing later, so what the hell happened to that?” he exclaimed.

  Clearly fed up with Eik’s stupidity, his flawless twin shot him a look under heavy brows. “This world…” it stated, pride suddenly filling its voice. “is Toxin. All you see is Toxin. All you smell is Toxin. All you hear is Toxin. All you feel is Toxin. All you are in this world is… Toxin,” it said, managing a surprisingly long and fluid string of words.

  “So… what? What do I have to do?”

  “If I… hand over dominion over Toxin to you… you must first prove that you deserve it.”

  Eik groaned. “I killed that thing! You said that that was all I had to prove to you! What more can I show you?” he complained. With the kind of escalation they had witnessed today—servants of the Lord of the Moon appearing in the middle of Gimleh like common raider—there really was no time to spare in the acquisition of power.

  Not just Eik, but even the most pessimistic predictions of the hostile Worldbreaker’s offensive timeline had put such clear and forward acts of antagonism relatively far in the future. And, of course, the Oracle of the cult of Moon Shall Swallow had made no mention of an incoming attack.

  Whether that was due to ignorance or malice, Eik could not say, but it would certainly not endear her to the Alliance leadership whose disposition toward her could already only be described as tentatively tolerant at best. And Eik would be lying if he wasn’t beginning to doubt her integrity himself.

  He had been a defender of her honesty in betraying the ancient mission of the cult but now he wasn’t so sure. But on the other hand, if the Lord of the Moon was so powerful, it wasn’t exactly far-fetched to believe him capable of blocking her prophetic sight either.

  “It is not… me to whom you must prove your worth… this time.”

  “Stop with the cryptic shit, please! Do you see anybody else here besides you and me?”

  Eik’s copy pivoted smoothly on one heel and gestured across the sprawling landscape with a sweep of his arm. “You must prove it… to Toxin itself. How could it… submit to you without knowing to whom it is submitting?” Profound Toxin asked as if it was supposed to make any sense at all.

  “Uuh, I was kind of under the impression that this world was you, or at the very least an extension of you.”

  “Incorrect.”

  “And what is correct, then?”

  “Toxin is not an… extension of me. I am an extension of it. I am Profound Toxin, the… avatar of Toxin.”

  Eik considered that for a moment. “So kind of like how I am the avatar of a world of great flavors?”

  “… No,” Profound Toxin deadpanned but stuck out its hand, as if only now remembering how good Eik’s cooking was. He dutifully handed over four scones and a milk slice.

  “What’s the test, then?”

  Instead of answering, Profound Toxin simply turned and gazed out across the vast world as it munched on the first scone. After a few seconds, Eik was about to ask what the hell was going on when something began to rumble in his ears—deep and grinding. With every moment it grew more intense.

  Whatever it was resonated with his entire being like a perfect frequency.

  Then, before his eyes, the perpetually thick cloud cover parted. And a moment later, surreally, the largest beast he had ever seen descended from above, its flat, serpentine head rivaling the mountain he was standing on in size.

  Briefly, it deigned to look at him but then its head whipped to the side before it shot off into the distance, its titanic body carried soundlessly through the air by unseen forces.

  “Midg?rdsormen…” he breathed in his native tongue, his blood running cold in his veins. J?rmungandr.

  Despite its size, the speed at which it flowed above the landscape could not be compared to even his own, potion-fuelled rush. He couldn’t even imagine Chop able to keep up. And yet more and more of its vast, snake-like body just kept coming down from above the clouds.

  Faster than should have been possible, Eik felt a cosmic pressure bear down upon him from behind.

  What met him when he turned around was a pair of glittering blue eyes, taking up his entire field of vision and blazing with the power and vitality of an entire world.

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