Script Quest; Althea
The instructions were simple enough, even a newbie gamer could follow them.
[Defeat the Boggart]
Me, personally? I'd never heard of these Bugg- I mean "Boggarts." Ever before. But standing behind Althea and looking at one, I felt about ready to piss myself. I felt ready to piss myself, I didn't actually piss myself so relax. That said, the thing was made from nightmares that's for sure.
The Boggart wasn't just big; it was disproportionate in a way that made my brain itch. It stood roughly eight feet tall, hunched over like its spine couldn't support the weight of its own malice. Its skin was a sickly, mottled grey—like a corpse left out in the cold rain—stretched entirely too tight over roping, unnatural muscle.
From its skull jutted two twisted, asymmetrical horns. They were jagged and splintered, resembling ancient, rotting wood more than actual bone. But the face… man, the face was the absolute worst part. It didn't have lips. Instead, it possessed a gaping, cavernous maw lined with row upon row of translucent, needle-like teeth. They were entirely too long to actually fit in its mouth, overlapping each other like a haphazardly constructed bear trap. Thick, viscous drool dripped from its chin, sizzling faintly where it hit the stone floor beneath us.
Its arms were abnormally long, dragging along the ground and ending in hands that were less like appendages and more like meat hooks. Each hand featured four elongated digits capped with ferocious, obsidian claws that were curved perfectly for rending and tearing.
And then there was the way it looked at me. It had two empty, milky voids for eyes, yet they somehow still managed to project an overwhelming, ravenous hunger.
As I peeked out from behind Althea's shoulder, its nostrils flared, taking in my scent. It let out a low, guttural chittering sound. It wasn't just an angry monster waiting for an aggro pull; it was starving. The way its jaw snapped at the empty air… it was looking for meat. Human meat. My meat.
It stared at me the way I stare at a freezing cold energy drink when I'm dead on my feet, only with significantly more murder involved.
"Adjutant," Althea's voice cut through my rising panic, calm and dangerously steady. She drew her sword, the steel singing a sharp note that echoed in the dark chamber. "Stay behind me."
"Don't need to tell me twice!" I screeched, running towards what I thought was the exit.
In terms of exit, there was no exit. I was trapped between a nightmare, a "knightmare" and an Interface that seemed disinterested in my survival. My heart started racing in a panic when a gust of wind hit me square on my face. It was Althea who leapt into action against the Boggart.
The gust of wind wasn't just a byproduct of her movement; it was a deliberate launchpad. Althea exploded forward, closing the distance between us and the nightmare in a fraction of a second.
The Boggart let out a deafening screech, throwing its right arm in a wild, sweeping arc like a fleshy wrecking ball. Althea didn't even flinch. She dropped into a slide, the gale-force winds wrapping around her legs as she ducked neatly under the obsidian claws. From my useless vantage point pressed against the cold stone wall, it looked like she was perfectly timing her dodges, abusing invincibility frames that only she knew about.
Before the monster could recover its balance, Althea lunged. She drove her blade upward, aiming right for the Boggart's exposed ribcage.
CLANG!
A jarring, metallic shriek echoed through the chamber. Her sword—which the Interface had so helpfully classified as a "Dull Sword"—connected with the creature's mottled grey skin and practically bounced off, leaving nothing but a pathetic trail of sparks. It had the agility of a dump truck, but the armor plating of a tank. She simply didn't have the DPS to stagger it.
The Boggart snapped its horrifying jaw, lunging face-first to take a bite out of her shoulder. Althea pivoted on her heel, a vortex of air pulling her just out of reach, and brought her blade up in a horizontal guard. The monster's claws crashed down onto the flat of her sword.
She parried the strike, but the sheer kinetic force of the blow was absurd. A shockwave rippled outward, rattling my teeth and sending a cloud of dust into the air. Althea gritted her teeth, her boots grinding fiercely against the stone floor as the Boggart's sheer weight overwhelmed her footing.
With a guttural roar, the creature shoved its massive frame forward. The physical disparity was just too much for a Level 1 Aeon. The wind swirling around Althea shattered, and she was launched backward, skidding across the floor until she slammed to a halt right in front of me, her chest heaving as she kept her sword raised.
"Althea!" I yelled, my voice cracking slightly.
Before she could answer, the familiar, annoying hum of the Interface buzzed in my left ear. A glowing blue window materialized right in front of my face, entirely blocking my view of the ravenous meat-grinder charging our way.
[WARNING: TARGET HP EXCEEDS CURRENT DAMAGE THRESHOLD]
[AEON: ALTHEA – ENERGY MAXIMIZED]
[UNLOCK ULTIMATE SKILL?]
[YES / NO]
A classic boss-fight progression! The basic attacks aren't cutting it, so the System is forcing you to learn the big mechanics.
"Yes!" I roared.
"Understood." Althea barked back, launching herself at the monster.
The moment my finger collided with the [YES] icon, the air in the chamber didn't just move—it died. A vacuum-like silence swallowed the Boggart's roar as Althea's dull blade began to glow with a terrifying, pressurized white light.
"Adjutant, brace yourself!" she commanded.
She didn't just run this time; she became a blur of kinetic energy. The Boggart, sensing the shift in the atmosphere, went into a blind frenzy. It lashed out with both meat-hook arms, its obsidian claws carving deep, jagged rifts into the stone floor as it tried to squash the golden-haired threat.
Althea moved like she was dancing on a hurricane. She spiraled through the air, her feet barely touching the ground. A claw the size of my torso whistled millimeters past her ear, but she didn't even blink. She stepped into the monster's reach, weaving through a flurry of snapping teeth and lashing limbs that would have turned me into a human jigsaw puzzle in seconds.
She reached the creature's center mass, and the "Dull Sword" was no longer just a piece of metal. It was the eye of a storm.
"Arial Gale!"
She drove the blade into the center of that mottled, grey chest. For a heartbeat, there was resistance. Then, the pressurized wind she had gathered at the tip ignited. A spiral of violent, screaming air erupted from the point of contact, spinning with such high-frequency vibration that it didn't just cut—it erased.
The Boggart's milky eyes widened as the gale tunneled through its armor-plated hide. Its ribcage shattered like glass, and a pillar of white wind blew clean through its torso, erupting out of its back in a spray of dark, ethereal ichor. The force of the blast sent a shockwave that slammed me back against the door, the pressure popping my ears.
The creature didn't even have time to scream. The wind consumed its core, and its massive, nightmare-fuel body disintegrated into a cloud of black pixels and grey dust.
Silence returned to the room, heavier than before. Althea stood in the center of the crater, her sword lowered, the white light fading back into the grey of the dull steel.
[SCRIPT QUEST COMPLETE]
[TARGET ELIMINATED]
[XP ACQUIRED: 1500]
[REWARD: REFINED WHETSTONE (UNCOMMON)]
I stayed slumped against the wall, my heart trying to beat its way out of my throat. "So… that was the Ultimate?"
Althea turned back to me, her expression as calm as if she'd just finished a light morning jog, though her chest was still heaving slightly. "It was a fraction of my potential, Adjutant. But for a Level 1… it was sufficient."
I looked at the "Refined Whetstone" icon floating in my inventory. One monster down, an entire history of the world to fix.
"For a level one huh," I muttered. "Tell me something, you said you're loyal to me, right?"
"That's right."
"Why?"
"Pardon?"
"I'm asking you why you're loyal to me?" I repeated. "No, nevermind. More than anything, I'm still completely clueless as to how I ended up in this situation in the first place."
"Adjutant…" she sighed.
Althea is an Aeon, not an Angel. She's strong enough to take down a Boggart, which I assumed would be equal to a 3rd class Demon in the real world. Speaking of, this "Pantheon" is either a dream I'm having while fondling a half naked woman's teat. Or it's a actual separate dimension different from the world I know. A world that recognizes me as it's Administrator and the Aeons as my…"soldiers"? And going by the countless frames outside all those doors, I can summon more Aeons. I might just be in way over my head in this.