Skill Hunter -Kill Monsters, Acquire Skills, Ascend to the Highest Rank!

The nobles whirled, instantly unleashing attacks at Ike. Although their faces remained impassive, now no more than flat masks unable to show emotion, their attacks were all unique, the techniques the bodies they inhabited had learned during life bursting out from them. Ike grimaced. That meant they were dead, minced up and squeezed into these pitiful puppet forms. Nothing could save them anymore, except for the sweet release of death.

Good thing he was handing that out today.

Ike activated the Hungry Sword and met the nobles' charge with a blow of his own. The sword ate up their hits without effort, tanking the blows easily. He continued the swipe and threw them back. Spider thread yanked their shoulders, pinning them to the ground. Ike hammered down at their backs, destroying the core that kept the black goo flowing… at least in the generic puppets. These, however, kept fighting. They twisted their heads, shoulders, and hips around on the floor and attacked from the ground, totally unbothered.

Mag darted down from the sky and carried one off, and two were whisked away by spiderthread to fates unknown, if one didn't know Wisp very well. Ike hammered his sword at the remaining three, smashing their heads one after another. Without heads, they flopped around uselessly on the ground, unable to see or hear any longer.

"Impressive," Brightbriar stated, mildly impressed but not emotional beyond that.

"I'm so happy," Ike snarked. He advanced toward Brightbriar.

Rosamund jumped out, throwing her hands out in front of her father. "Why are you attacking him? Don't! Stop!"

Ike narrowed his eyes at her. "Step aside, puppet."

"Puppet? Father would never!" Rosamund snarled.

Sighing, Ike reached into his storage ring and removed one of the artifacts deep within, one of the items he'd long been pretending he'd forgotten about. He handed Rosamund her own head. "Convinced yet?"

Rosamund stared. Her hands shook, and she backed away, shaking her head. "It's… not…"

The head blinked blearily in her grip, barely aware after so long separated from its primary source of black goo. It met Rosamund's eyes and smiled.

Rosamund screamed and threw it away. "No!"

"Yes." Ike put a hand on her shoulder, then hesitated. Rather than just pushing her aside, he pulled in, absorbing her.

Rosamund yelped, but put up little resistance. After the shock of the head, it seemed there was little left in her. With her last scrap of sanity, she turned to Brightbriar. "Father, please—help…"

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Brightbriar watched on, curious, but no more. He glanced at Rosamund at her plea, then turned his gaze back to Ike, more interested to see how he absorbed her.

Rosamund's expression went blank with despair. A single tear rolled down her cheek, and then she was gone.

"Is this all your love amounts to?" Ike asked, as the blank puppet in its ornate dress hit the floor.

"Not at all. You have no idea the depths of my love. The extent to which I would go, to bring back the only one that ever mattered to me, that ever cared for me. My world."

Ike shook his head. "That isn't love at all."

"Would you know, you parentless, loveless thing?" Brightbriar asked, giving him a pitying look.

"I'd know better than you, ya fuckin' bloodless psychopathic maniac," Ike responded without a second's hesitation. Love wasn't just something parents or lovers gave. There was love between friends as well, a deep comradery that ran thicker than blood. Between him and Brightbriar, who killed his beloved children for being 'imperfect,' Ike, with his imperfect, savage friends, knew far, far more about 'love.'

Brightbriar didn't respond, except to smile blandly. "Don't fear, child. I'll ensure you feel loved once you reassume your true form."

Ike raised his brows. He'd thought it for a while now, but it was getting very obvious that Brightbriar wasn't entirely living in the same reality as everyone else. His mind went back to the fog spirit, and her ominous words. "By some accounts, he got off the lightest of all. By others…"

Was this part of his punishment, or is this his state of mind, after spending so long chasing after the greater being? He knew Brightbriar could act rational under the right conditions, but he definitely wasn't acting completely with it right now. Maybe it was something that ebbed and flowed. Or maybe, in the face of his long-lived obsession, he could no longer be rational at all, regardless of his typical mental state.

There was still so much he didn't know. What had he been? What had Brightbriar been to him? What was Brightbriar's punishment, and for that matter, what had put them in the place to be punished? What had replaced them? 'The current System' was one answer, but the System didn't seem like a thing capable of punishing others. It didn't seem sentient enough. Then, was it the person who had put the System in place? Was there such a person?

So many questions, and so little time.

The other nobles fled, racing away from the conflict. A few strode forward, drawing their weapons, but stood at a distance, watching the fight to see which way it was going to go before intervening. A few stood frozen, locked in shock. From the far end of the hall, opposite the double doors where most of the nobles fled through—at least, the ones that weren't stylish enough to leap through the windows instead—a pair of yet more lavish golden double doors flew open. A man stepped through, a man who was undeniably the king, with a wide-breasted set of robes, a broad stance, and a large, glittering crown on his head, set with priceless jewels. He glared across the room. "Who dares interrupt my banquet?"

Brightbriar looked over and smiled. He held his hand out to the king. "Won't you punish this prodigal son of mine?"

Oh, shit, Ike thought, as a possibility no one had brought up suddenly sprang to mind. What if the king stopped causing trouble about Brightbriar bringing puppets to the ball… because the king was a puppet himself?

The king's expression went blank. He reached for his sword.

"Don't like that," Ike said.

Wisp hopped onto his free shoulder. "We king-killing?"

Ike spun his sword and stepped forward, as the king did the same. "Looks like it."

"Hell yeah."