||WARNING: CODE VIOLATION; SKILL SHARING||

“Huh-”

I grabbed my chest.

“Augh- ack… ga-…”

A pounding feeling rose up in my body.

“Huh… Cyn-“

I fell to the ground.

“AHHH- ke- AH…”

“E-esther… get… away-“

My body started creating these red slime spikes that emerged from my back and sides, along with some sort of red lightning coursing around my body.

||EMERGENCY: SKILL SHARING WAS NOT PERMITTED. PUNISHMENT BEING ENACTED.||

||EMERGENCY: VARIANT ‘04’ BEING FORCEFULLY RELEASED… PREPARING SEMBLANCE: GENOCIDE.||

“C-Cyn… hey- what’s wrong…?”

||FORM SHIFT||

||EXPANSION||

I expanded my hand and grabbed Esther. I tried extending my arm as far as possible, trying to make the distance between me and her larger.

“Hey!”

My arm started glitching out and it released Esther, it went flying back to its original state… I was only able to get her out around a hundred feet.

||EMERGENCY: ERROR-||

||EMERGENCY: ERROR-||

||EMERGENCY: ERROR-||

||EMERGENCY: ERROR-||

||EMERGENCY: CONSCIOUSNESS SWAP FORCEFULLY OCCURING.||

The green on my coat began to glitch out, green and red sparks intertwining with each other. My eyes grew darker along with the slime wrapping around them creating that pure red again. The yellow number in my eye began twitching.

The ‘01’ in my eye, starting to shift… ‘02’… ‘03’… it accelerated jumping between hundreds of numbers. Glitches occurring inside of it, I could feel my mind slipping.

My body’s killing intent was rising. The green on my coat fully switched, exploding into a dark red… and the yellow number finally landed on ‘04’.

“Cyn—!” Esther yelled out to me.

My consciousness faded and my body went limp for a few seconds.

When it woke up again. It wasn’t me…

For the most part.

⊰───────•✦•───────⊱⊰───────•✦•───────⊱⊰───────•✦•───────⊱

“Ah-”

My head kind of hurts…

“Where the fuck am I?”

I sat up and grabbed my head.

“Our subconscious.” Said a familiar voice.

The area I was in was a light black void… there was almost nothing inside of it. I looked up and saw these massive white rings circling me… they had these small colored orbs inside of them. I turned around and saw a couch of sorts, laying on top of it.

Was Six.

His clothing changed though. He had loose fitting black clothes disguised with some sort of leather decor, it was hard to tell whether his outfit was purposeful or if he was just being lazy. He had dark brown gloves and brown shoes. He had a black skin-tight shirt on and his baggy sweater sleeves rolled up slightly. He turned toward me and looked into my eyes.

“Six…? What are you doing here?”

“I just told you. It’s our subconscious.”

“Wait- then why am I here?”

He tapped his head lightly signaling something to me.

His eyes were dead like usual and he had a stack of manga at his side.

I tried to think… Why was I here?

The last thing I remember was walking with Esther… then that-

Everything clicked.

My conscience was forcefully swapped out from me giving Esther the [Semi-Chant] skill…

“Wait Six… if we are both here-”

“Then who’s out there?” Six said finishing my sentence.

“Huh- yeah…”

“That’s Genocide.”

“Genocide…? Doesn’t that have to do with mass murder?”

“Yeah- usually. Genocide also goes by Four. You got punished by the system for… what was it? Skill sharing? So the system is trying to kill everything in the area.”

Six flipped to another page of his manga.

“Shit… shit shit! I was with Esther-”

“Ah- that sucks.” Six said in a monotonous tone.

Not that his tone changed much for anything though…

“Damn it! How can I get back?”

“To that body? You can’t.” Six said bluntly.

Think me… think! Esther’s life is at stake here. How can I get out…

“Hey Six, can we see anything outside?”

…

“Yeah.”

Six double tapped the side of the couch making an old TV form out of the ground, it looked like it was from the 80s. When I looked at it, it was a third person view around the current variant. Which was Four. He was slowly getting off the ground. He looked nearly identical to me except his teeth were now jagged like a sharks, the lime green on his coat swapped to a darkened red, his eyes were purely dark red along with the streak in his hair going a shade of dark red, his coat’s collar was straightened upward, his jeans were now a blackish-gray, a yellow-gold ‘04’ beamed in his left eye, and the last noticeable change from him standing there was some silver chained decor on his coat.

“That’s… Four?”

“Yeah.”

I looked toward Six, he didn’t seem interested in the screen at all since he was still engrossed in his manga.

“How do you know all of this? What am I missing that’s so important?”

Six looked back toward me.

“We are variants. Variants of each other. Which means we are different versions of you. Think of something similar to a multiversal effect. Each of us had similar worlds in a sense, and at the end of all of them we slowly got sent here. The main thing is that us variants know each other since we’ve been locked here for so long. Though it’s been a bit since all of us last met up, and that fucking system is the source problem of all of this.”

I was trying to process everything Six said.

“So the main thing I’m getting, is that system is a bitch and we all want it gone for fucking with us…?”

Six’s eyes started shining a black color.

“Yeah.”

Six then went back to his manga… I guess he wasn’t interested in the conversation anymore.

When I looked back toward the screen Four had begun moving forward. When I looked a little closer I saw Esther running toward him.

“No-!”

Six jolted.

“Hey One. Quiet down.”

“Esther stop! That’s not me… well, I mean it is-”

I knew she couldn’t hear me but…

How do I get out of here?

⊰───────•✦•───────⊱⊰───────•✦•───────⊱⊰───────•✦•───────⊱

“Cyn!”

Why did he suddenly do that?

Huh-

Doesn’t he look a little different than before? Why is his coat black and red now…?

“Cyn!”

He’s walking toward me, so I guess he’s fine-

…

Something doesn’t feel right.

Esther stopped in her tracks. 

She reached behind her back and took out her staff, it started unfolding as it flipped and transformed into your traditional medieval magic staff. The wood was a dark brown color and the crystal in the center was a deep purple that radiated mana.

Esther readied her guard.

The person she was dealing with… wasn’t Cyn.

The figure walked closer.

One foot in front of the other…

“Hmm~ hm hmm~ hm…”

He was humming some sort of song.

“What a lovely song~! Y’know what it reminds me of…?”

What’s he talking about?

“The… oh so great~ joys of... Genocide!”

A giant dark red scythe started forming in his right hand, it was similar to my sword. It landed down on his shoulder, his body slouching a little from what appeared to be the weight of the weapon. 

The blade looked sharp… 

Can I win this fight? Do I have to fight? Is he still Cyn?

From one glance Esther could tell.

Everything she hoped for was completely shattered. She jumped back quickly… 

A giant slice in the ground appeared, the man was now standing in front of her. The scythe was swung down to his left side.

She had barely gotten out of the way in time.

“Who are you? Where’s Cyn?”

“Hm~? Me? How very rude~… however, I shall tell you. I am Four; The embodiment of Genocide!”

“...”

Esther just stared at him blankly like he was insane.

“What? Is there something on my face…?”

He felt around… he looked extremely confused and had lowered his guard.

Esther took that moment to make some distance and started preparing a fireball.

“Is there something? I can’t tell… damn it I wish I had a mirror!”

Four was enraged at the fact that he didn’t have a mirror nor could he check his face.

“Fireball!”

A giant purple fireball came flying toward Four, he was hit dead on making a large purple cloud erupt into the sky.

⊰───────•✦•───────⊱⊰───────•✦•───────⊱⊰───────•✦•───────⊱

“Did she get him?”

Six looked at the screen.

“Probably not. We don’t go down that easily.”

The smoke cleared and Four was on one knee, the right half of his face was blown off and he was missing an arm. His body began to regenerate quickly, fixing all the damaged parts.

“Ooooh~ that was quite powerful! Did One teach you that?”

He put his hand up to his forehead to block the sun and leaned forward slightly.

“Tch… this sun is annoying.”

Four hastily made a pair of black sunglasses and put them on.

His sharp white teeth matching them perfectly.

“Alllll~righttt!”

…

“Well to answer about what happened to One- no I guess you're calling him Cyn. He was banished to our subconscious temporarily because he broke the system’s code. Tch- that fucking system… So I~ am taking his place for the time being and wiping everything out in this area~!”

“What-?”

“Sounds fun… right~?”

Four picked his scythe up again and started walking toward Esther… he was slowly approaching her. One foot in front of the other.

Esther tightened the grip on her staff as she put it out in front of her. She pointed the tip of it at Four as she got ready for another spell. She started off by using [Binding]. Four was wrapped up in a darkened purple mana. He struggled a little trying to use brute force to break them, the binds were made of mana so he would have to attack with equal power to get out.

“This is neat~... but not enough.”

His eyes looked slightly bored and dead. Mana coated Four’s arms as he shattered the binds.

“Is that all you-...”

Four paused.

“Um… when did you-”

Esther had spells circling her as she readied herself once more.

“Tempest. Fireball. Lightning Chain. Air Cutter. Magic Missile. Icicle Drill.”

The spells split into two separate sides combining to make them even more deadly. [Tempest], [Fireball] and [Lightning Chain] combined into this electrically charged fire with tornado-like winds that quickly approached Four. On the other side [Air Cutter], [Magic Missile] and [Icicle Drill] combined. [Air Cutter] spliced the icicles into shards along with accelerating them, while [Magic Missile] made them mana infused as well as extremely controllable.

Four was bombarded by magic; his body burned, fried, and shredded. He fell to his knees for a few moments.

Esther was staring at him in anticipation.

⊰───────•✦•───────⊱⊰───────•✦•───────⊱⊰───────•✦•───────⊱

“Are you sure he is still fine Six? I mean that was…”

“Yeah, but Four recovers quickly from most things. Magic being one of them.” Four stood back up his body hastily recovering as he cracked his neck.

“Maaaan~ that felt good! I didn’t expect that at all. However, It's my turn now.”

Four jumped forward… right in front of Esther. He started swinging his scythe down, before Esther disappeared with a faint whisper.

“Huh- wait. What? Where’d she go?”

Four looked around frantically before looking up.

She was flying and already had more spells lined up. 

“Explosion.”

Esther swung her staff down. The spells bolted toward the ground chasing after Four. He raced around laughing as the land around him exploded. 

“Wow~! These spells are impressive! Hahaha! I’m loving this~” Four cut one of the spells in half with his scythe and jumped toward Esther.

⊰───────•✦•───────⊱⊰───────•✦•───────⊱⊰───────•✦•───────⊱

“I have to get out of here… but how… how… how…”

Wait-

“Hey Six. I can swap my consciousness into any part of my body right?”

Six looked up for a second.

“Well. Yeah, but your main body is under Four’s control.”

“Perfect~”

Six tilted his head and looked toward me slightly confused. I placed my hands together and started visualizing a new body. 

||FORM SHIFT||

A body made from the many parts of me throughout the world I explored so far. Esther’s room… the false gold coin stash… the carnival I set up, all of the fake coins I created. I started combining them all hastily into a usable body.

I smiled widely.

“Just wait… a little longer~ Four-”

||MIND’S EYE||

My consciousness warped out of the void-like realm and into this new body. My vision went a bright white before fading back into reality. My body was pretty unstable since it was still forming. I was at the carnival’s site since it had the most storage of my slime. There were people beneath me witnessing the entire thing, I guess they saw it and were trying to understand how it worked. My body continued forming as I hastened the process. Pulling everything in.

||FLIGHT||

I then flew toward Esther as fast as I could, trying to make it in time.