Return of the Runebound Professor-Chapter 676: Sticks and Stones

Garina killed Noah.

It wasn’t immediate. He put up another good minute of a fight, drawing on every scrap of magic he could pull from Unstable Pandemonium to try and hold her assault off. But Garina would not be stopped. Holding her back was like trying to restrain the ocean itself.

Noah wasn’t even entirely sure how his newly discovered ability to stop Garina’s attacks worked. He wasn’t sure exactly what it was the Chaos magic was doing that let it completely stop her punches — and Garina wasn’t exactly letting him stop and think about it.

All things considered, he put up a pretty good fight. There was only so much a Rank 5 could do against a Rank 7. That was doubly true when said Rank 7 was one of the Apostles. Even though Garina wasn’t using her magic and clearly holding back, he managed to keep her at bay all the way up until his magic ran out.

He wasn’t quite about to start tossing Sunder and the Fragment of Renewal’s power around in a training exercise. There were some things that didn’t need to be shared, and Noah wasn’t in a spot where he felt he needed to practice using those particular Master Runes yet.

Noah was halfway through trying to call on Combustion to suffocate Garina when she punched him so hard in the face that his head literally tore off his shoulders.

And that was that.

He was dead.

Noah’s soul tore free from his body in an instant, giving him a front row seat to watch his own head sail into the sky like a home run ball. His body swayed and pitched forward, landing on the ground with a thud.

“Damn it!” Noah exclaimed. “I have a class to teach after this, you wackjob!”

Garina didn’t hear him. She just looked down at his corpse. Then her lip curled. She shook the blood coating her knuckles off before crouching and wiping her hand off on the grass beside her. Not once did her eyes leave Noah’s body.

She was clearly waiting for him to revive — and so was his gourd. A strand of power coiled around Noah’s neck and pulled him toward it. He briefly considered indulging a petty part of himself and resisting the call, just to inconvenience Garina a little more.

That, unfortunately, wouldn’t have done anything other than worsened the soul damage he took from the revival. Noah suppressed a slew of curses. This was seriously messing with his day’s plans.

I’m not a huge fan of revealing how Sunder works to Garina, but I guess I really don’t have much of a choice… and I’ve made more progress with Unstable Pandemonium than I have in quite some time.

Not that I’ll tell her that.

Noah let the call take him. Black smoke poured out of the gourd as there was a sharp yank at his neck. Noah was pulled down into it —

His eyes snapped open. He shot upright, his hand already shooting out to the body that he already knew laid beside him. Noah hooked a hand into the travel bag at his waist and plucked one of his spare outfits from it, pulling it on without a word.

“Fascinating,” Garina said.

“Unless your name is Moxie, you don’t get to say that whilst I’m half naked,” Noah said as he tugged his jacket on. He rose to his feet, pushing the pounding headache in his skull back like it was an unwanted platter of party snacks.

“You aren’t immortal. You just don’t stay dead,” Garina said, ignoring his words entirely. She crossed her arms in front of her chest. “And you’ve clearly done this enough times that the process doesn’t even phase you. There’s no limit to it?”

“It hasn’t been enjoyable enough for me to want to find one,” Noah said. He brushed himself off before leveling a glare at Garina. “Did you really have to kill me? I’ll also have you know you’ve gone and ruined my plans for the day. I had a lesson with my students coming up.”

Garina tilted her head to the side. Her dark eyes bore into Noah’s skull like blades. “Ruined? I — ah. I see it, now. How curious.”

“See what?”

“Your domain. It’s gone,” Garina said. “As is your magical signature. Now that’s fascinating indeed. When you die, your soul becomes unbound from the body it inhabits, but entering a new one doesn’t immediately re-establish the bond. You don’t have access to your magic, do you?”

Shit. She figured that out quick.

“I—”

“Now, here’s the question,” Garina said, her eyes twinkling like dying stars. “Is that a weakness? Or a defensive mechanism?”

Before Noah had a chance to ask what she was talking about, Garina flicked her hand. A black line carved through the air, moving so fast that Noah only spotted it after it had passed through him.

His body peeled apart like an unripe banana.

Noah’s soul was launched out of its housing for the second time within a minute. The remains of his corpse splattered to the ground, ruining a perfectly good set of clothes with a deluge of viscera and blood.

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“God damn it!” Noah yelled. “Seriously? What is your problem? Couldn’t you have at least done that while I was naked? I don’t have that many spares on me, you know!”

The gourd called.

He answered.

Noah bolted upright once more, glaring before life had even returned to his eyes. His hand was halfway to his bag by the time he’d sat up. He wordlessly scooped another outfit from within it and pulled the clothes on.

“The hell is your problem?” Noah asked. “That was just rude.”

“It was fascinating,” Garina corrected. “And it seems it was the latter.”

“The latter?”

“A defensive mechanism.” Garina tapped her foot on the ground. “When you come back, your soul’s binding to the new body is weak. Honestly, that isn’t surprising. Forming a whole new body from raw magic and then stuffing yourself into it should come with even more drawbacks than what I see, not less. You’re getting off easy. The process prevents you from using magic, but when you die… it also keeps the damage your soul takes minimal. Basically, you’ve got a grace period for soul damage immediately after you get yourself killed the first time. Incredible. In all my years, I’ve never seen something like this.”

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Huh. I never thought about it… but that must be why I was able to survive so long in the Scorched Acres. If I take less soul damage when dying shortly after a previous death, then that’s pretty convenient to know. Not particularly useful at the moment… but I’m sure it could be important in the right circumstance.

“I’m glad you find me an interesting experiment, but you’ve still gone and ruined my class. I can’t properly protect everyone from their patterns while they’re practicing without access to my domain.”

“Do you care about nothing beyond your students?”

“I care about Moxie. Lee. Brayden. The other teachers. That’s about it, though. You’ve also gone and made sure I can’t practice anymore either. Honestly, you could have stopped right before I died. I really need to figure out how to fully control my Chaos rune.”

Garina stared at him. “The one you made?”

“Correct,” Noah said. “I wasn’t lying about that.”

She studied him for a few more moments before blowing a stray hair away from her face and shaking her head. “Do you realize how ludicrous that seems? Do you even know what Chaos is?”

“Nope,” Noah said. “But I strongly suspect you’re about to enlighten me.”

Garina smiled. “No. I’m not.”

“Huh?”

“If you’re telling the truth… then the absolute last thing in the world I would ever do is tell you what that rune is. After all, you punched me. Me.”

“Man, I should take lessons on holding a grudge from you. We were sparring! And you killed me! Twice!”

“You misunderstand me, Vermil,” Garina said, stepping closer to Noah as a predatory grin crossed her lips. “I’m not angry at you. I suppose — and don’t ever expect me to repeat these words — I owe you a small apology.”

Noah blinked. “What?”

“Strength,” Garina said, “is the most important thing in this world. It is the only way to earn the respect of others. And though strength is shown through action, words are the judge of respect.”

“I’m not entirely sure I’m following. I mean — I get what you’re saying, but not why you’re saying it. What does this have to do with killing me?”

Garina clicked her tongue in distaste. “I am not apologizing for killing you, Noah. That was fun. I am apologizing for insulting you. I wanted to goad you into pushing your abilities farther, but I implied some things I did not believe.”

Noah stared at her in surprise. Of everything Garina could have said, he hadn’t been expecting this. “Uh… thanks? I’ll be real with you, I don’t really give a shit about what you were saying. I’m more pissed I can’t watch over my students during their training today.”

The Apostle sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. “In the last several hundred years, there have been only two people weaker than me that I have found myself gaining any measure of respect for. You are one of them. I find little pleasure in calling the abilities of someone weaker than me pathetic, especially when they are anything but.”

“I see,” Noah said. “Well, no hard feelings. I kind of tune out battle shit-talk. But why won’t you tell me anything about Chaos, then?”

“Because it would be a disservice. If you’ve actually managed to create a Chaos rune entirely on your own… the limits of your own imagination will take you much farther than any rules will. Take the ability you just demonstrated, for example. Do you have any idea what you were doing?”

“Err… I think I was solidifying magic into something physical. I haven’t had much of a chance to think about it.”

Garina snorted. “You used chaos magic to play a musical note that warped reality and made the air impermeable. And that was all subconscious. If I told you what I believed the limits of your magic were, you’d subconsciously believe them to be true. It is far better for you to determine the limits yourself — but do not fear. I will help. You will need to determine them if you want to stand a fly’s chance against the Apostles.”

Noah pondered her words for a moment. Then a small smile tugged at his lips. “I think I see what you’re saying. Thank you. Just… maybe don’t kill me right before my class next time? I have students counting on me.”

“I have time today. I will make up for what you find yourself unable to do.”

“Really?” Noah’s eyes lit up. “Thank you!”

Garina snorted. “Why was that the only thanks you gave me that felt truly heartfelt? You are a fascinating creature. One day, you will tell more of your origin. I wish to know how you came into being.”

He just gave her a shameless grin. “We’ll see. So, should we head back?”

Garina blinked. “Head back? No. Of course not. Your class isn’t for several hours as per your own words. You have time to continue practicing.”

“I think a piece of info may have slipped through the cracks,” Noah said, rubbing the back of his neck. “I can’t use my magic right now, Garina. There’s no way for me to access my runes. I can’t practice anymore.”

Garina looked at Noah like he’d just sat down on a cake she’d been looking forward to eating all day. “Are you an idiot?”

“…potentially?”

“Do you really think every one of your opponents will simply stop fighting once you have died? When you come back helpless as a babe, will they sit down and pick at their nose until you are ready to fight again?”

Noah cleared his throat. “I mean, that would be great. I’ve managed to avoid—”

“Idiot,” Garina said. “You do not train only for scenarios you can control. You train for the ones you cannot.”

“But what the hell can I do when I don’t have my magic?” Noah asked.

Garina cracked her neck. Then she smiled in a way that only a wolf looking at its prey could. A trill of warning ran down Noah’s spine.

“You fight,” Garina replied as she lowered into a fighting stance. “You’d be surprised how far physical combat can take you, Noah. Besides, you’ve already proven you like throwing punches. Let’s see how many more you can land.”

Ah, fuck me.