Overpowered Wizard-Chapter 315: B3: C105: Not A Quitter

“I failed to protect you,” Para said, with surprising emotion.

Zarian hesitated as they looked eye-to-eye, seeing himself and the woman Para had become with this new body of hers. It was like seeing a long-lost twin, but with dark reddish skin and scales. Both of their tails, one reptilian and one feline, waved behind them slowly as they kept looking eye-to-eye.

Para looked away first and faced the cliff end. Down far below, the Hunter Gorer Super Dungeon remained hidden under thick blankets of steam amid mountainous claws.

“Maybe we should go for easier prey,” Para suggested softly.

“No.” Zarian shook his head. “We can’t run away from this. Once the twenty-four hours are up, we’re going back in there to run it again.”

“Z-”

“Leo,” he corrected.

Para huffed, irritated. “Leo, it is more important that you survive and grow as needed. There is no need for you to risk your life here.”

“There is a point to me risking my life, Medusa. You’ve heard me. I told everyone who’ll listen to my insane ass that I want to become stronger and greater. Hell, if I can’t be stronger, let me become greater.”

“You are already great,” Para snapped.

Zarian shook his head. “No, not in the way that counts. I’m not great enough. And to become greater is taking a path laden with deadly challenges, so it shouldn’t be a shock to us when we find something that’s actually hard. That’s how it’s supposed to be with hard challenges. They don’t roll over easily. Or they wouldn’t be hard.”

“I would prefer if we handled this with the other Floridians.”

Zarian shook his head. “They aren’t here. They’re on their own solo adventures, risking it all. But you’re here with me, and I think that’s enough once we lock in and tackle this appropriately.”

Para turned her irradiated green eyes to his missing right side, the flesh and bone still healing. She hissed angrily before stepping closer and pointing her palms over his gaping wound. Zarian sensed a series of runic magic activate, her hands pulsating with healing arrays that were dissimilar to how Gilbert healed.

Healing arrays from sorcery needed more accuracy, more science, like cramming to be an actual doctor unlike how Gilbert and most healers used healing magic based mostly on faith and Wonder.

Both Zarian and Para had to go through grueling bio magic courses under Ruvaria to learn this aspect of sorcery, and Para was honestly better at it than Zarian – she was more intimate with biology.

With Para’s help, Zarian’s right side healed faster. They focused on that for a while as they overlooked the cliff. His lungs, ribs, flesh, muscles, and more returned after being encouraged to recover and grow. Vital health kept Zarian from bleeding out, protecting his life energy, as more flesh and bone returned with the help of accurate healing arrays.

Eventually, Zarian’s arm regrew, muscles and tendons rapidly appearing and weaving as bone sprouted down the side. After a few hours of consistent work, Zarian’s healing finished with his nails regrowing at the end of his fingers. By that point, the stamina half of vitality was depleted, and Zarian couldn’t help but collapse backward.

Para was there, gently catching him and laying him back. She stayed knelt behind him, propping him up as he reclined backward and rested against her.

She was being more responsive to his needs than usual, even with the separation between their bodies. Zarian felt bad about that, but he was a little too weary to stop her from supporting him.

“You haven’t slept in two weeks,” Para declared.

Zarian grunted. “Yeah, I can use some sleep. Maybe I should go as far as taking two days off. One to rest and eat. The second to experiment.”

Zarian sighed. “I need to focus on growing my Devourer of Secrets and Stories from legendary to mythical. The information blocks are getting annoying when we’re up against so many unknowns. I also need to simplify my offensive sorcery.”

Zarian had too many magic options with sorcery. So much so, it could be paralyzing going through a list of them even with free evil +13 and all of his mental enhancements. He figured refining his sorcery to creating a strong and reliable offensive technique would free up his mental processing.

The other option was to lean toward one favored-style of sorcery and change it up as needed when he had the time to. That way, he had an automatic response that he could change after the first check failed outright.

Zarian already knew which specific element he would prioritize with his sorcery, but he would need to do some testing before he finalized his choice. He also needed to confirm what Para could specifically do with all her changes.

Zarian looked back at Para with his devourer trait.

<Unable to Identify Unknown Quality.>

The same notification popped up.

Para tilted her head, having felt Zarian’s devourer trait. There was something on her mind. Zarian waited for her to pick up the conversation again.

“I think I want to stop you,” she said. “It would be horrible for you to die, not because I would lose my existence, but because I would hate for you to lose everything you’ve built with this loop. If what Ariana says is true, then the Funnest wouldn’t be able to reverse everything again. Maybe Ariana will even go as far as stopping the Funnest and breaking the loops forever. That would also be terrible. I don’t want you to lose everything and be stuck as nothing but all-consuming darkness. I believe that goes against what you truly desire and is a horrible end to your dreams and existence.”

Para breathed deeply, her hands clenching him a little tighter. Her claws dug into his flesh, leaving marks without drawing blood.

“So … I will fight you to save you if I have to,” Para added.

“You know I can turn off your skill if you get in my way,” Zarian replied, wriggling a little in her grasp, testing her grip.

Her grip was unbreakable. Still, he pushed and pulled to see if she would draw blood, but she kept adjusting her grip to avoid that outcome.

“I know you can. But I don’t think you will,” Para challenged, handling him adeptly.

“How do you know that?”

“It would be a terrible oversight on my part if I didn’t know my host by this point.”

The tension between them was mountainous, weighty. The constant wriggling and testing against Para’s grip added to the tension. Then, after a long stretch of quiet warring, Zarian relented. He went back to recline against Para as she continued to prop him up while keeping a firm grip on him.

Zarian let out a big whoop. “Yeah, I can’t see myself turning you off. So I guess if you decide to curb stomp me into the dirt before I can respond, that’ll be that. Seems silly, doesn’t it? But I guess that’s some sort of weird pride I have. I would rather be hurt by a friend than to betray a friend…”

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“Or you can accept that we should pick an easier super dungeon and grind more safely,” Para urged softly. “You are too important for these sorts of risks. And we have plenty more ahead of us to test ourselves against.”

She was right.

Zarian knew she was right.

And that pissed him off.

Zarian glowered over the cliff’s edge, silently fuming to himself. He felt … weak. He felt … like a bitch.

Yes, he was too important to take stupid risks. Yes, he had responsibilities that couldn’t go on without him. He had the best friends he could ever ask for. He had a growing empire, the freedom alignment, his crazy toxic love for a Chosen One named Naomi, magic lessons with Ruvaria, and his budding relationship with his arranged wife.

He had a lot going on.

So, risking his life out of ego and pride was the height of arrogance. He might as well call out to his sister and ask her how he should give her everything she wanted on a silver plate. Because going down this road would most likely end up with him dead and everything wasted.

Yet…

Yet…

Zarian couldn’t quit on the Hunter Gorer Super Dungeon.

Something inside of him refused.

“Medusa,” Zarian grunted.

“Can we do away with the aliases and the Darkrun Debuff?” she urged, pushing for more.

Zarian repeated himself. “Medusa.”

Para huffed. “Yes, Leo?”

“In two to three days, I’m going back into that super dungeon. You can fight me if you want. You’ll probably be able to overpower me if I don’t cast fast enough. But you’ll have to break my limbs and give me a concussion to stop me. You’ll have to destroy me, which makes me ask this: are you really okay with doing that to me?”

“You are being cruel.”

“I know I am, but that’s how serious this is. I have immense power. I have responsibilities that are bigger than this mortal form of mine. But I have a ticking time bomb of a sister who is stronger than me as I am now, greater than me in many ways, more talented than me in all ways, and is already at the peak of her power at the universal tier, with only her sleeping habits holding her back.”

Zarian rolled his head back, his face against Para’s, his eye glaring out the corner to meet hers. “Ariana’s evil as sin. She remembers everything. I honestly think she plays dumb to keep our guard down, holding back loops of knowledge that would crush everyone. We are literally banking our entire existence on how slow she is in waking up fully, which can end at any moment. How the fuck am I supposed to keep the same patient course when my own bloody family will try to perma-kill everyone once she’s up and ready?”

Para didn’t respond.

Zarian continued. “This is what we’re up against. Yes, I know I can take the safest and more surefire path to Level 500 and God Land. I know I can probably make my way onto the Throne of the Adventurer King and sit as the true head of Infinita after enough time and strategic effort. And maybe Ariana wouldn’t wake up by then. But I bet you both of my balls that it still wouldn’t be enough against her.”

“You’re already able to unlock up to Seven Percent Darkness. With enough time, you’ll be able to master all of Overwhelming Darkness. Wouldn’t that be enough to defeat her?” Para asked in a low voice.

Zarian unlocked a bit of his darkness and made the nearest shadows darken. He noticed how his darkness responded with less freedom and less willingness to serve him.

On a Super World, his magic wasn’t as grand and all-consuming compared to being on a Lesser World. It was safe to assume as he climbed upward, wielding his darkness would get harder.

“There is a chance that Overwhelming Darkness will not be as strong as it would be if it was free completely. I remember how I grew as I ate worlds and consumed the Star System from the inside out too fast for it to respond appropriately. But if I’m able to keep it contained and controlled in this more mortal body, it won’t be the same all-expanding, multiverse-threatening power it has been in past loops. And that leaves Ariana with too much room to trump me because we don’t really know how much she has up her sleeves.”

“I see.” Para shifted down to a seat next to him, her arm behind his back. “You want to maximize your growth with as much pressure as possible because we don’t know Ariana’s limits. The best we can assume is that her limits are far beyond us and the gods and other Ultra Gods when she’s awake. However, I still think your Overwhelming Darkness is more powerful.”

“But what’s power without the skill to use it against someone who’ll be the most skillful out of all of us?” Zarian asked.

Para scrunched her nose and frowned. “Ugh, fine, we’ll go back. We’ll rerun it. But you must rest and eat fully until I’m satisfied with your full recovery. Then we must do testing and practice. Especially me.”

Para raised her free arm and extended a curved bone blade that vibrated at a high frequency from her forearm. Apparently, some of the unique aspects of the kaiju had passed down to this newer body, a gift that kept on giving.

“Your heart … it’s still a nuclear reactor,” Zarian said, pointing to the middle of her chest. “Even though I can’t fully identify you, I can tell your nuclear heart is more powerful than the last version. Every part of you is a higher quality than mythical. A quality that’s so powerful, it must be highly restricted from anyone below Champion.”

“I can sense that I’m not as powerful as I should be.” Para looked down, her sharp teeth biting the edge of her bottom lip. “But without those locks you’ve placed on the berserk rage inside of me, I would’ve killed you.”

“That, too, we’ll have to test. Gotta see how many locks we can remove while you remain in control of yourself.”

“We’ll work on that later. It’s time we find a place for you to rest.” Para wouldn’t brook no as an answer.

Like an overly concerned sister, she fussed at him until he got to his feet and followed her to a cave that was out of the burdensome steam. There weren’t too many claws poking out from the cavern walls, but the heat remained sweltering, and the airflow was nonexistent.

Zarian placed wards for pushing out the steam. He used arrays for filtering air, temperature control, and making the cave more comfortable and cool for him.

Para pulled out high-quality camping supplies from her pocket dimension and set them up for Zarian, which included a large and comfy bed. Then she took out some boxed meals that were as warm and fresh as the time Foodie had cooked them.

Zarian ate his fill, every bite of Foodie’s food filling him with pleasure. Then he crashed belly first into his comfy bed.

The moment he touched down, his body seemed to melt and become weak. He couldn’t even bother covering himself with a blanket. Para did it for him.

He really was weary after all they’d done in the past two weeks. Normally he could go a long time without rest, but that depended on how active he was, and he and Para had pushed themselves to the extremes for a long enough time.

Para set herself near his bed with a bean bag chair. She propped her feet up on a foot rest and looked over him with her irradiated green eyes.

“How does it feel to have a body that matches you more than any prior?” Zarian murmured, half asleep.

“Unreal, really. I didn’t expect this to happen this way. It feels too soon.”

“Yeah, well, we put too much time and effort into making our kaiju. I didn’t like how one dumb monster tore it up that easily.” Zarian yawned. “So, I figured why not take the risk of using polymorph and seeing if I can deal with the berserk part. Voila.”

“I’m convinced.”

“Convinced?”

“I was so worried about what you would lose if you died I forgot to factor how creative and relentless you can be while under pressure. You are a messy host, but I wouldn’t have the pleasure of a body that’s more reliably mine if it wasn’t for you being you. So, if you want to throw yourself into a dungeon made to kill you, then I will do all I can to prevent your death.”

“Atta girl. Keep talking like that … and maybe … you’ll become … a Darkrun.”

Zarian fell asleep, and Para held her watch over him, not needing to sleep.

“I wonder how the others are doing,” Para murmured, expecting no answer. To her surprise, she felt a slight imprint that came from an unknown source.

Suddenly, she knew things just like how she knew about the killing intent of the boar monsters even though they couldn’t be sensed by most means. She knew things just like how she knew where to find the cave without actually perceiving it through the thick steam and its sense-jamming properties.

Para was confused. Was this the POV Shift? This was not a power she should be able to tap into without Zarian, and the POV Shift and Lion Prince skill wasn’t so reliable right now while under the Darkrun Debuff.

She wasn’t a Darkrun. She was sure of that. She was a skill with unusual self-awareness and personhood, but a skill nonetheless, all represented by a series of System-provided runes attached to Zarian’s soul.

“Whatever it is … it’s more like an instinct than a shift,” Para said.

Even after some intense self-searching, Para couldn’t figure out what the omniscient instinct could be. Still, she found it illuminating.

Because her instincts were telling her that Zarian alone wasn’t going through trials and tribulations. The people he cared about were going through their own challenges, too.

Unfortunately, she couldn’t confirm what that meant exactly. All she could do was hope that their friends would come out alright as she held watch over her host.

Hours later, a monster tripped the silent alarms from the perimeter wards. Something wanted to break into the cave despite the wards that pulsated with a warning.

Para left Zarian’s side.

And returned in less than ten seconds.

Her movements would’ve conjured multiple sonic booms and disturbed the cave heavily, let alone Zarian’s peacefully restful form, but she instinctively dampened the force with her body’s in-built rune magic and eldritch nature.

The death of a powerful monster went without notice – and so did its sudden disappearance after being consumed wholly. Para had left no scraps or specks of blood, satisfying her instinct to eat.

Her nuclear heart kept her fueled plenty well.

But the lust for blood, meat, and life remained.

After all, no matter how much she grew, now matter how much she changed, she was still a predator who chose not to consume her first and greatest prey – Zarian. Her hunger was large because she kept turning toward other targets instead of her true target.

Even with this insanely powerful body, the draw to eat Zarian remained a strong one. Some part of her even wondered … if she ate Zarian, would she become a full person? And would Overwhelming Darkness be hers?

These were trifling questions. Horrid in all ways. But Para entertained them because they were a part of her. She had to face them so she could remember the origins of her existence and carefully patch any holes in her personhood that her monstrous side wanted to tear down.

She’d done this multiple times. To where she found comfort with the act of wrestling between her parasitic nature and her human nature, between the hunger to eat her host, and the love she felt for him that she knew was real and wonderful and hers.

No matter what.

No matter how hungry she’d felt.

Para’s love remained bigger than her stomach. Her care for Zarian stopped her from turning on him.

He knew, too. She was sure he knew of her darkest desires, even if he acted like it was no big deal. Maybe he truly didn’t care and put it out of mind. He trusted her so much that he’d allowed her to watch him sleep while he was his most vulnerable.

They’d done this for a few years, hadn’t they?

She would rather die than to betray his trust.

In that same vein, she would love to seek and destroy his enemies, especially the ones who successfully harmed him.

The boar monsters especially. They’d hurt her host. They’d nearly killed him. They’d nearly ruined all of his efforts in their home universe. And they’d done that while it was Para’s job to protect Zarian.

Para swore to make the entire super dungeon pay, nursing the limited rage that rattled all twenty sealing locks inside of her. The locks held firm … for now.

With a quiet huff, Para turned her attention back to her instincts.

She sensed … Bianca, her favorite Floridian friend.

She sensed … Reiki, the Dungeon Boss. Another adoring follower of Zarian.

She even sensed Ruvaria, who cherished Zarian greatly.

And … strangely … she sensed Lucy Shadowfell Darkrun. How could that be possible?

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