Everything was black again, but at least this time, it was a familiar black, a void filled with delicate flickering and floating candles. And standing over the Missing was a familiar disgruntled face.
“What did you do?”
Litvir and Retvik didn’t have an answer. Arkay though immediately apologised.
“I’m sorry. I acted on instinct. I just needed to protect everyone from a vast Corruption and that was the only way I could think of to do it.”
Deathven inspected some more. Arkay was being very submissive. Normally he was quiet fiery, or at least rather antisocial and very cold towards Deathven.
“Deathbringer, I asked what happened. I want to know. Reports say that a large Corrupted mass approached the hotel you were staying at and a second Corrupted mass surrounded the hotel briefly, but the larger mass left and the smaller mass evaporated. I don’t have any details about what happened. You were there, you can tell me the details.”
Arkay stared at the floor, twiddling his thumbs. “You’ll be angry at me. I’m angry at me.”
“I am not angry. I want information before I make any judgements…” Deathven glanced at Retvik and Litvir. “And it seems your companions also don’t know what happened.”
“You did somewhat teleport us away before we could ask Arkay ourselves!” Retvik grunted.
“I did, yes. Because I was concerned that I had lost both a friendly Deathven-affiliated hotel filled with innocent beings and one of my Hidden Trios to a deadly sub-strain of the Unending Ancient One. But I am not angry. I am concerned.”
“To be fair, we are too…” Litvir muttered.
Arkay struggled a little bit, trying to gather his thoughts, before sighing and just explaining everything.
“I sensed that the Corruption was coming and that it was huge. So huge that Retvik’s fire powers would have done nothing. But worse, it was coming after me, because it knew that I helped kill the Unending Ancient One. So I turned myself into Arkidetelos, into my own unique strain, because I know the Started End just automatically consumes Unending Ancient One strains if they come into contact with it. It was a literally moon-sized mass of super dense Corruption, I didn’t know what else to do. I couldn’t just nuke it because there were too many innocents nearby and they would have been harmed. But Ateleophagon was willing to talk and listen and I convinced him to leave on his own.”
Deathven looked Arkay up and down. “You… turned into Corruption?”
“Yeah. The Started End though is… weird but it only eats other Corruptions.”
“You can turn into your own unique strain of Corruption that feeds on other Corruptions?”
Arkay nodded. “Yeah. I… I hate it. It terrifies me. It terrifies me when I turn into anything apart from my normal Decayon self. Being a Life Goddess was horrible, I hated it. But because I was originally programmed to protect someone, and I gave my original mortal life to protect a family of strangers, I feel I HAVE to protect everyone, and sometimes that means I do things almost on instinct. I instinctively turned into Arkidetelos so I could protect all the innocents at the hotel, and, I don’t know how, I somehow convinced Ateleophagon to leave on his own. Because I told him that Epanophovon broke his promise to me and my sisters and wasn’t the “honourable Corruption” that Ateleophagon believed he was.”
“But you have turned back to normal now though, yes?” Deathven asked.
“Yeah. I’m Arkay again. As soon as I turn back into… anything but Arkidetelos, all my sub-strain particles seem to automatically implode and melt away.”
“Is your… unique strain the same as that of Unender?”
Arkay thought for a moment, then shook his head. “No. I don’t know what Elkay’s strain is…”
“Elkay’s strain does the same thing though,” Retvik quickly butted in. “It only consumes other Corruption and is weirdly inert and does not react with anything else. But also, just like Arkay, when Elkay turned back to normal, there were no traces of the Corruption left to study. It is all very self-contained.”
“I see, I see…” Deathven trailed off, then thought to himself for a bit. “Well… I can’t be angry at you. What you did was very strange and confusing and potentially dangerous, but you did the right thing and you saved the day. Even if you scared the hell out of all the people in the hotel. And you scared me.”
“Oh, so now you are showing concern about us?” Litvir snapped. “Because up until now, you seemed to not care at all.”
Deathven nodded. “I was wrong to hold hatred against you. You Missing have proved yourselves to be both loyal and honourable. But at the same time, you do have to understand that you are INSANELY powerful. Terrifyingly powerful. I am glad that you are on my side, and I should not have pushed you away in the first place… Either way, I am going to send you three back home now. Well, I am going to send you to the nearest mall to the Thantir’s base so you can do some shopping, then you can go home. Alright?”
Retvik and Litvir both shrugged. Arkay was still feeling off, and Deathven could sense that.
“Deathbringer, I am not angry at you.”
“Feels like you are.”
“I genuinely am not angry at you. You did the right thing. You did the right thing in a very weird way, but you did the right thing nonetheless. And you saved many, many lives.”
“I couldn’t save Prodota’s life. Or Zizari’s life.”
“Ah… you were… asleep for that conversation, but their lives are not on your hands. Souldrainer explained that mess to me, and that was all on the Gymne. Deathbringer, you are a good person.”
“I am?”
“Yes. But you are also clearly homesick. So go home. Be with your friends and family. Relax a little and go back to your preferred duties as the Guardian of the Thantir. I will call you back when I need you. Alright?”
Arkay nodded weakly. Deathven smiled, then snapped his fingers. In an instant, the Missing were gone, returned back to familiar territories.