It was nightmarish—living in this life with that man. T’balt wished he’d never seen him and that he’d never woken up to these stupid Redeemer powers.

  That he’d never been exposed to that monster. Monan.

  It was just one man bringing him so much pain and making him so desperate that he had just broken up with the only person he thought ever cared for him. It was all for some vendetta against T’balt because he was simply bored.

  He felt helpless. Powerless against him. And now he knew how easily it was for people to turn their backs on him. He wanted to scream out in anger, but his drunkenness turned him back to the video game. To the name on the screen. “UnNRVed.”

  He typed angrily into the text box. “You have a stupid name. You’re bad at this game. It must be why your parents don’t love you.” He pressed the send button, hating himself for doing it.

  It would likely be some kid who didn’t know any better and would run to tell their parents. What did he care? The world was ending in a few moments anyway.

  He folded himself on the couch, hand still aching from the glass, groaning in his own self-pity. But then the chime rang from his monitor. “Who cares? Get good or uninstall noob :P”

  T’balt furiously typed back. “If I’m a noob, what does that say about you?”

  “That I’m better.”

  “You’re only better at wasting valuable space in your mom's crusty ass basement.”

  There was a pause as the three dots appeared while typing in the chat box.

  “I don’t have a mom…” T’balt looked at the screen. Then a message smeared across the screen.

  “Service disconnected.”

  Then came the rumble. T’balt stood still, groaning to himself. He watched everything crack and shake and rolled his eyes. It wasn’t long after that that the Deer King decided to intrude.

  T’balt wasn’t ready to go. He wanted to keep playing video games and drinking his beer. He didn’t want to go back to the church. He wanted to stay in his home and nothing else.

  The Crimson Deer King forced him hard against a wall, nearly bursting him through it as it tried to take his head off with that flaming sword.

  “Not today, crimson deer bitch.” T’balt was sloppy due to the alcohol and his overall lack of empathy for pain at the moment. But he was able to take it out at the knees before delivering the final bullets to the back of its head. He tossed away the gun before sitting on the couch of his now ruined house.

  He tried to play the game, but the power was cut. There was nothing going into the house. The demon must’ve shattered all the lines when they burst through the front door, trying to kill him.

  T’balt looked at the destruction in his grandparents' home and couldn’t help but feel like he deserved all this in some way. So he just sat there a while, wading in it. But the hellcats showed up later, and T’balt was forced to fight them, remembering this was something he and Chosa had done together once.

  He didn’t pick up the flame sword loot, electing only to fight them with his bare hands and his gun. They nearly chomped his head off, but he’d conserved on the ammo in the fight with the Deer King. So ten hellcats weren’t too bad to deal with.

  He walked out of the fight with bite marks on his legs, cuts on his arms, and blood dripping down his forehead. However, he didn’t want the gauntlet loot either. He wanted to rest in his bed a little longer. And so he did, sleeping off everything. He didn’t care if another beast came to free him of his mortal shell.

  It didn’t matter. It would only give him more time in the peaceful world. Another 12 hours of nothing. Not nothing… he’d see Chosa again. And he didn’t know if he could stand that yet.

  “Acelin!” he called out. He’d forgotten to go get him. He got in his car and rushed over to the bridge.

  But it was branching into the evening, the light had faded into the fatal yellow-red before the coming night. The demons swarmed his car, but T’balt drove straight through them until it eventually crashed, flipping over on its head. Without any loot, there wasn’t much else he could do.

  It forced him to equip the gauntlet loot just to be able to fight the bug creatures. T’balt killed them all without too much effort. But it didn’t give him his time back.

  When he ran to the bridge, it was covered in bodies and cars. There were burns on the sides of buildings from where the angel had been, and chunks missing from the bridge where the bugs had attacked. Acelin was nowhere to be found.

  He remembered his promise. “No matter what, I’ll never leave you behind.” He sighed. Acelin wouldn’t know. The kid would have no clue who T’balt was, but that didn’t matter. T’balt remembered, and not knowing where the kid was eating him up. Acelin was alone in this dark, ravaged world.

  The angel appeared in the sky, as if it were patrolling the grounds. With its four wings, stone face, and mountainous frame, it floated, scanning the ground. T’balt barely dodged its view by leaping into a totalled car. With that thing roaming, he wasn’t going to be able to search for Acelin, not that it was guaranteed that the kid was around or even alive.

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  He had to make himself forget about Chosa. It just made everything harder. It made him not want to leave that car. If he didn’t, other people would die. That was enough to keep him moving at least. Not very fast, but at least he was moving.

  He arrived at the church a day late. Without his car, he had to walk most of the way until he found a bicycle to steal. Still, he took his time, not having the strength to rush and dealing with several demons along the way.

  The church seemed to have already established its system by then. T’balt sat still on his cot for the rest of that day, not bothering to interact with Ellie or Arthur. In his mind, they still hated him. Even if it was a new iteration, he still looked at them as they were when he left them.

  He couldn’t help that. His brain reacted in a pure fear response just by being around them and knowing their true characters. Because he had firm proof that who one was in one iteration wasn’t changed in the next.

  “Sir,” one of the church women asked, “If you’re not doing anything, we could use some help in the kitchens.”

  “Leave me alone.” He turned away, pulling the sheet over his head.

  He went out loot hunting on his own. No one in the church had seen or even heard the word loot. And it was clear that they were starting to struggle without it. The infirmary was being overfilled, and there wasn’t an endless supply of water and cooking fires for everyone to use. The place started to smell like death.

  So he came back from the woods with a sack of loot, about half the size as usual. “Here. This will help you heal the others,” he said, holding loot out in front of Ellie.

  “The same as before, just give it to her and show her how to use it. They’ll think you’re a prophet, and they’ll try to put you back in that terrible room,” he thought.

  “No. I can’t,” Ellie said.

  “It's fine. Look, I’ll show you.”

  “Get your hands off me.” She snatched herself away from him, leaving him confused. She looked at him like he was suddenly holding roadkill in his hand. “Don’t touch me with that!”

  “What's the matter?”

  “The abbot says those things are instruments of the devil. They’re the reason the world is the way it is now. You get that thing out of here! Get it far away!”

  “But I don’t understand… You took it last time.”

  “I’ve never touched those things before in my life.”

  “Why can’t you just do what you’re supposed to do!” He raised his voice, drawing stares. It was creating a scene. He scoffed and walked away.

  It was Kilgrove. He must’ve had his little revelation early in this iteration. Now he had the entire church believing that loot was some divine evil. “That crazy old man. He’s going to get everyone killed.” It was their only defense. Without the loot, how were they going to fend off Monan or those bandits?

  Everyone started looking at him like some sort of hostile entity. Squinting eyes, whispers behind his back. He felt like they were plotting to kill him or something. They didn’t even know him yet.

  “He’s a freak.”

  “A demon.”

  “He must’ve killed one and eaten them.”

  “That’s why he has their mark on his neck.”

  He unconsciously covered the back of his neck with his hand as he walked. But one of the believers roadblocked him and shoved him against a wall.

  “We don’t want you here, you freak,” he said.

  Another called at him. “You’ve forsaken your god given body and turned to sin. You’re not a human anymore.”

  “What are you talking about?” T’balt responded. They started pointing knives and broomsticks at him like he was a rabid dog.

  The fragility of the masses.

  He felt cornered, still seething from his rage. And the black smoke swelled. They all jumped back as the gauntlets formed around his arms.

  That seemed to quiet them, making them far too afraid to attack him or say anything else. But they looked at him as one would an enemy intruding in their homes. He had to watch his back, or someone would stick a knife in it.

  He didn’t have much choice but to go see the abbot and try to get a handle on this before it got crazier than it already was. Surely he’d still have some sense in him. But that wasn’t the case.

  “Arthur. We need to talk,” he said, intruding into the abbot's quarters.

  “I’m sorry. And you are?”

  T’balt groaned, frustrated. “T’balt Ferrier. You don’t know me yet, but you will. I’ve come to protect this church.”

  “Mhmm…” The man hesitated.

  T’balt tried to find the right words. “But everyone downstairs is anti-loot. They won’t accept the powers, and people are dying downstairs because of it. You have to convince them to take it so they can heal the wounded and defend themselves.”

  “Loot? You mean those magic coins?”

  “Whatever you want to call them. We need them.”

  “Am I to understand that you’ve taken one of them, boy?”

  “That’s not the point, Arthur. The point is that your people need help, and they need me to help them. So just tell them that the loot is okay, so they stop freaking out at me.”

  “I won’t do that,” the abbot said.

  “Listen. You won’t survive without loot. You have no idea what's coming for you.”

  “I have a pretty good idea… A young man with no respect barging into the house of the lord, making demands he cannot understand.” He was out of his seat, staring daggers into T’balt’s dark eyes.

  “I know what I’m talking about. I’m not just some guy. I’m…”

  “What? Our prophet?” He laughed. “No prophet would preach about the graces of those satanic coins. A snake preaching the apple’s temptations. You have sullied yourself and thus become an instrument of the devil. We, here, are under the protection of God.”

  “That’s not enough. Trust me. Those demons. Those people out there. They will kill all of you.”

  “Perhaps. But we at least will die human.”

  “Listen here, you crazy old man.” T’balt’s smoke was on him, his anger causing the gauntlets to unconsciously form, fire in his eyes. But before anything, a group of believers had tackled him to the ground. They pinned his arms behind his back, restricting his movements.

  T’balt struggled, yelling, “You don’t know what you’re doing! Listen to me! Arthur! In two weeks, an attack is coming! Monan will kill us all!” But Arthur paid him no more mind, and in the next few moments, T’balt was carried to the front door and tossed to the street.

  No one spared him a second glance. Not even Ellie, who turned, wishing good riddance to the strange man who had turned his back on God. T’balt balled himself up, unsure of the path forward. Maybe there was none. Maybe it just all ended right here.

  Everyone then. Everyone was gone. This was the iteration he was destined to be alone. Chosa was right about him. He was always meant to be alone.