Overpowered Wizard

While Zarian played a madman’s game of attrition warfare with a Divine World Boss, Gilbert walked into a heavy metal elevator chute. The soles of his boots thudded across a thick platform that was going to plunge deep under Ride-or-Die Village.

Hannah was there with him. She brought along three wagons filled with equipment and three softball size golems that were orbiting around her body.

Other than Gilbert’s armor and foldable shield and abilities, that was about it.

“Be safe, Gilbert, and My Lady Hannah,” Rhea Hemlock said from outside of the elevator chute.

Gilbert tipped his cowboy hat at the Hemlock, who was their main admin errand girl. Gilbert preferred the first name basis with the woman, though the relationship between Rhea and her direct boss was more strict and hierarchical.

Hannah hummed. “You know what to do.”

Rhea smiled and nodded gracefully. “Yes, my lady. Your will is my command.”

The chute doors closed. Purple lights illuminated the space. The elevator platform descended while making a metallic hum and some windy sounds. It was a chilly ride, too.

Gilbert let out a big sigh. It wasn’t his idea to go down there to where a destined son and a powerful false idol were duking it out. It was Hannah’s idea. Gilbert would rather work with Bianca and the guild members, who were staying top side.

Just prior, he was quelling unrest on the surface. Striders and paladins had broken out into random fights with each other because of historical issues.

Apparently, the summoning of angel-like creatures usually led to the outright eradication of great swaths of people. Paladins seemed to lack a certain amount of concern about that, so Gilbert understood why the striders were raising a fuss.

Granted, Gilbert was in his element when dealing with rowdy crowds and public disorder because of his past work as a cop in the old universe. With his abilities, he was the perfect person for calming widespread anger and securing people’s safety.

Too bad he wasn’t doing that. He was going straight to the source of trouble instead.

Gilbert knew angels could come in many shapes and sizes. He also knew that devils and demons could masquerade as angels and trick people into thinking their words were the almighty law.

The rise in horror. The rise in violence. The rise in lunacy.

All of that was because of a World Boss known as Metatron, the Welcoming Voice of Good, which could be a genuine threat to the nearest civilizations, especially their village. That all sounded pretty damn ungodly to Gilbert, so he wouldn’t blame Zarian for putting down a false angel.

He knew Zarian would be a pain in the ass about it later, but that was alright. Gilbert had some jokes prepared for the destined son, since his actions had started riots in his own village.

They left the safety of the Central Library Artillery Tower.

Empress Ruvaria remained in the best section in the city, the top of the tower, where she could look down on everything. The magical intelligence, Magi, kept the old elf company while coordinating with guild members like a police dispatcher. Rhea would assist with everything that needed a personal touch, no matter the emergency.

While that all happened above, the elevator ride down felt like a one-way trip to hell.

Maybe Gilbert deserved it. Or maybe it was another test from the Big G.

Gilbert had faced a lot of tests lately because of his crazy friends and their outlandish objectives.

One thing that kept Gilbert from panicking was knowing how damn great Hannah had become as the Runic Engineer. She’d crafted and enchanted everything!

The gravity enchantments placed into the elevator were done personally by her just like ninety-nine percent of everything else in the village.

How?

Gilbert had heard Hannah explain how, but he remained mostly clueless.

Hannah could work miracles at speeds that Gilbert couldn’t comprehend. But that came at a steep price that Gilbert sometimes found troubling.

While the craft and enchantments were stellar, the further down they went, the more they could feel the impacts of the divine fight between Zarian and Metatron. The entire elevator chute rattled as they drew closer to the cavernous chambers below.

Gilbert felt his heart pounding harder and harder the further they went.

He glanced over at Hannah.

Regardless of her being the oldest, she looked more dynamic and filled out, leaving behind her past appearance as a mousy little woman. The time spent training and eating quality magic food had done its work on her as well as everyone else.

It would’ve been better eating Foodie’s meals, but Gilbert was certainly putting on more muscle than before the portal incident. His arms seemed too big and epic to be real.

He was happy about the positive growth for them all, especially with how they settled down these past five months and raised up a village for the growing younglings. But the ice cold expression Hannah wore every day was troubling.

Gilbert hadn’t seen Hannah smile in over five months. Not since the day they’d built a home for Stony the Wall Crusher Master. Hannah was happy and warm back then, like any Alabamian who kept up with their southern hospitality.

Then the Darkrun Apocalypse had changed everything.

Yeah, they shared the mind spiders, and they could all get a decent feel of each other without having to get into each other’s heads completely, but Hannah had picked up a habit of hiding her emotions from the mind spiders as well.

She wasn’t as perfect as Naomi, but Hannah was scarily deft at acting like a machine. All she did these days was magic engineering and side quests, leaving little room for anything else.

Now Gilbert was trying to figure out something stupid to say that would trigger Hannah and make her act a little more human. He’d already played out the whole ‘elf retard’ thing.

What would Hannah think if he pointed out how the empress gave him the creeps? The empress wouldn’t obliterate him with a point of a finger if he called her an ‘old creeper,’ would she?

Hannah beat him to the punch. “I wish I could magically dissect with something similar to the Identify trait. We could learn directly from the anatomy of these fascinating creatures we face.”

Gilbert raised an eyebrow. “Yeah?”

“It just occurred to me that someone with the right traits and skills could learn much about divine beings from the corpse of an Arch Cherub, if Para could spare some remains.”

“Well, I like your confidence in thinking this will be another win for us.”

“It’s not about winning or losing. Zarian won’t let himself lose. If he did, I would be…” Hannah trailed off.

She clenched her fist and took a deep breath.

Her ice cold expression remained. “We must consider what happens afterward when the Arch Cherub is defeated. Hence why I wish we had someone who could dissect and learn from the cadaver. That would probably require a particular healer class, I imagine. Such a class could be useful against the corrupted creatures from Shadowfell and future divine enemies.”

Gilbert shifted from side to side with both thumbs hooked onto his belt. “Well, excuse me for not being the nerdy healer guy. I’m more of the healer who’ll ask Jesus to take the wheel and pray that nothing gets fixed the wrong way.”

“Well, it’s probably best that you rely more on faith and Wonder as our healer, Gilbert. You remain yourself and unbothered. You’re better at that than me,” Hannah said.

They were getting close to their destination. Gilbert figures it was now or never to dig into Hannah a little more. He should’ve done this earlier, but something deep down told him now was the best opportunity.

“Hannah, what’s wrong?”

“I’m not good enough.”

What? What did she mean she wasn’t good enough?

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Gilbert was shocked, taken aback.

Why would she say that?

Was she not aware of all that she’d created? She’d done great constructive work in months when it should’ve taken years!

Gilbert just couldn’t see why she would be so hard on herself, at least not easily. After further thought, Gilbert concluded there was only one reasonable explanation.

She was comparing herself to Zarian, wasn’t she?

That was ridiculous!

Zarian was a fallen angel, a destined son of greater angels and demons beyond Infinita. There was no way any of them could compare to that!

“Hannah, we’re just people,” Gilbert said.

The elevator slowed to a stop. It struck the bottom with a heavy thunk, but Gilbert barely felt the rattle.

He felt the impacts of the fight shaking the cavernous chambers. He heard the cascading roar of tumbling rock and widespread destruction.

He felt stuck, as if he could sense the ceiling collapse that was going to happen at any moment and trap him and Hannah. If it didn’t kill them.

He kept his eyes on Hannah while the chute doors were still opening.

“Naomi had it right from the start,” Hannah said. “We can’t just be people if we want to keep up with the darling son of ultra gods. We have to do more. Be more. Or we will be too puny and insignificant for Zarian and his little sister. And especially for the elders of their family. Hence why I say I’m not good enough. I must be better than this.”

There was no more time to talk this out, which was crap. They’d avoided these hard conversations with each other for months.

But just like always, there was something major to do to keep them from hashing things out fully.

For now, Gilbert let Hannah off the hook as she marched out of the elevator chute, her mini golem balls revolving around her rapidly. He followed her and the self-driven carts. He felt tempted to take a drink as he faced a sharp rise of pressure, chaos, and lunacy.

There was a flask on his person filled with high-quality alcohol that would activate his Intoxicated Brawler trait. He held back because he needed to focus on strictly supporting without getting into the thick of the fight.

Gilbert looked around as he followed Hannah and the carts. He heard horrific and monstrous screams, roars, and shouts that made him think they were really at the gates of hell, or what folks of this universe called Hidden Hell.

The cavern floor was filled with cracks, fissures, and craters. The rumbling impact and cascades of cavern-wide destruction shook up everything.

Every step tested his Agility, which tempted Gilbert to summon Slip down here. The Sleipnir was up top, acting as a gallant mount for Princess Bianca while she quelled the unrest.

Thankfully, Gilbert wasn’t down here with nobody who was lame. Despite her self-esteem issues, Hannah moved like nothing could stop her.

It was easy to see why.

Vast heaps of cavernous material turned into large vortexes of tiny grit, no matter if it was giant slabs of fallen rock, hill-sized piles of rubble, or entire walls of collapsed sediment.

Nothing escaped Hannah’s Cube Maker Magic +2. Once she set her mind on something, she turned it all to dust and absorbed the materials directly into her body.

It was like she had a great fiendish hunger similar to Para, but for inanimate objects instead of flesh.

She was fancy with it, too, clearing out obstacles while snatching up whatever material caught her attention, even to the point of cannibalizing her own cube creations, the fallen parts and the whole ones.

From the dust they were born to the dust they returned, fueling Hannah’s relentless drive.

All of that was already impressive to Gilbert. But Hannah was such an overachiever she couldn’t stop herself from multitasking.

She turned some of that new material around into a perfectly stable highway under their feet.

All within a blink of an eye.

If Gilbert wasn’t already a big believer in the one God, he would’ve thought Hannah was already a walking Alabamian Goddess.

She went a step further and laid enchantments at the same time, damn near instantly. So now the newborn road canceled the harsh tremors and quakes while making their steps longer and faster, like walking forward with a speedy conveyor.

Of course, that still wasn’t enough for Hannah.

She turned around, walked backwards, and deployed her little golem balls. They helped her construct a new cannon from the parts she’d brought on the carts while introducing new materials she converted from the cavern.

Gilbert watched as the golem balls used some tricky gravity magic to make all of Hannah’s stuff float. The slim and stylish smart gauntlets she wore on her hands glowed with bluish runic power as she directed every piece where it needed to go along with arrays of magic runes.

Then Hannah went another step further, because as she emptied the carts of major parts for her new cannon, the carts transformed into a rolling platform for Hannah to place her cannon on.

From what Gilbert could see, Hannah was definitely the most efficient among the Floridians.

Not everything was hands free for Hannah, however. Sometimes, she needed a fine-tune and direct touch for more complex enchantments.

Gilbert could help there by administering the right amount of Adrenaline Jolt +2 to make Hannah sharper and faster without it being excessive.

It was unfortunate, but the Level 0 skills were having a hard time keeping up with their overall growth. They were still helpful, but less so compared to before, or Hannah would’ve been fine with her Level 0 Adrenaline Jolt.

Only Zarian could make the Level 0 skills scale up perfectly for him.

Regardless of those complications, Gilbert was also here to ensure Hannah made it back fine. She was a tough and powerful woman, but she was nowhere near as tough as Gilbert, Zarian, and the other two crazy women.

Things seemed to be going alright for now. Their enchanted highway went over a giant crater and through an immense hole in a wall that was a divider between one chamber and another in these underground caverns.

Gilbert saw the distant ruins of things Hannah had made for her artificial dungeon. Most of her stuff had fallen to destruction because of the fight between a fallen angel and a false angel.

Gilbert heard his first intelligible word from the divine fight. This one came from the false angel.

“Surrender!” Metatron demanded.

Gilbert hadn’t laid eyes upon the World Boss yet, but he still felt the heavy compulsion to surrender. He didn’t, of course, because he had free for real +1 and his Unyielding Mentality, a rare quality trait he had upgraded from the old hopeful version.

He could’ve gone for something else, but Gilbert liked to ensure his faith and his mind were his own regardless of the spider living in there.

Being in the freedom alignment helped with that, but it wasn’t unbeatable. Hence why Gilbert turned to Hannah, focused, and administered his Adrenaline Jolt +2 again, specifically for her mind.

That snapped her free of Metatron’s mind control.

Gilbert was glad to help, but the expression on Hannah’s face was the scariest he’d seen from her yet.

Her expression went beyond cold.

On her face was a fury that promised vengeance of a highly intelligent degree. Perhaps to the point of craziness.

Everybody knew Hannah would’ve been monstrous if she’d joined the evil side, free or otherwise. Gilbert could see that quite easily as Hannah dashed past him, with her unfinished cannon chasing after her.

She crafted and enchanted the highway faster. She packed more cubes into her cannon, making it bulkier, greater, bigger. She packed on more enchantments, layers and layers of the stuff.

Then they finally reached the cavern section that was holding the fight.

Gilbert staggered to a stop.

Metatron would’ve been an impressive and awe-inspiring sight even as a false angel if it weren’t covered in so many hideous, bloody wounds. It also had two different flames, one of black magic and one of more eerie origins, covering its brutalized form, burning it alive.

It had six battered wings that were made of tarnished gold and covered in white blood, although Gilbert could see it must’ve had more before the others were ripped off. It had many bleeding mouths, broken teeth, and ripped tongues, some looking blown apart while others were covered in acidic smoke.

Metatron looked way past dead. Yet, the monstrous World Boss remained in the air, shooting beams and making buzzing passes to slice at its main foe with its remaining wings.

Then there was Zarian, or what was left of Zarian. He was not much of a man anymore.

He reminded Gilbert of that comic book villain with the living flesh suit, the red version of Spider-man’s usual nemesis.

After some thought, Gilbert realized Zarian looked like a more nightmarish and wormy version of Carnage, with tentacles covered in red, gray, and black magic that whipped at the cherub’s torn-up body.

This was all Gilbert could observe during pauses after a big exchange of blows followed by the cherub asking for them to surrender and Zarian howling like something that crawled out of the deepest pits. Then the two erupted into a furious exchange of wild attacks again, almost like two eldritch cats going at it, before having another pause and taunting session.

Hannah interjected herself with a rapidly built wall that shielded her and Gilbert from the massive cannon. Then, with a growl of cold fury, Hannah fired the biggest magic cannon she’d ever deployed.

It felt like that to Gilbert as the cannon itself exploded entirely and knocked the wall over like a grown man kicking through a sand castle.

The Knighted Healer moved his body where he was needed instantly. He planted himself between near absolute death and the Runic Engineer.

Gilbert roared as he soaked the hits and wrapped up Hannah with his arms and his Healing Force +2. He felt his armor endure all it could before the enchantments hit critical failure.

Then his spine snapped.

The flesh along his back became brutalized.

Numerous organs turned into jelly.

Something, probably a piece of the cannon, inserted itself into the back of his head.

He blacked out.

Then Gilbert woke up.

Hannah was wide-eyed and pale faced while still in his arms. He heard something fall and hit the ground behind his head. He heard crunchy, squishy noises from the back of his head as it returned to being whole.

He felt his organs return to normal, and so did his bones and his flesh. He unentangled himself from around Hannah and hacked up some bloody chunks of loose gore and fragments of bone that had gotten into his lungs.

“Gilbert, I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry,” Hannah apologized, still shocked while on the ground.

The rubble from the blown up cannon surrounded them. There was a vast crater where Hannah’s mega cannon once stood.

“Did you hit it?” Gilbert asked, turning to see if his Extra Life sacrifice was worth anything. “Well, I’ll be damned. You hit it, Hannah.”

The Arch Cherub was wailing like a dying animal while an enormous chunk from the top of its body was missing. Hannah had blown away a fifth of the monster and took a few more of its wings.

Now it was flapping around erratically while closer to being on the verge of death than before.

Gilbert wondered what Zarian was up to, because it was hard to pin him down. Access to Zarian’s mind spider was either on the fritz or getting blocked.

When he heard Hannah gasping, Gilbert turned to see a naked Zarian crouched over one of Hannah’s little golems that was still working.

The golem switched on aura charging mode. Zarian was all over it like it offered warmth from the cold.

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