213 The Botanist
213 The Botanist
It had been exactly two months and three weeks since I fell into this world.
I’d counted the days out of habit at first, then out of necessity. Over roughly the past seven weeks, I had done little else but study Urbanite from its infrastructure, its rituals, its people, and more importantly, the way belief was harvested and recycled like fuel. I abused every material available to me, stripped buildings down to bones, melted scrap into something usable, and built portals crude enough to pass unnoticed but precise enough to reach home.
Each one burned itself out after a single use.
That was fine.
I destroyed them, buried the remains, erased every trace, and rebuilt them again elsewhere. Over and over. The process was tedious, but effective. The portals only needed to work once, and they always did.
Perry’s cash helped more than he probably realized. Points bought silence. Silence bought time. Time bought labor from players, NPCs, and the occasional disposable specialist who didn’t ask questions. All of this was possible by using ‘possession’ on either an NPC or a player, while spending the points under those guise. It was quite an effective method to hide and focus on my business.
However, the letter that Perry left me was the real prize.
It was filled with twelve pages that explained everything.
Urbanite wasn’t ruled by a single madman, nor by a shadow puppeteer pulling strings from behind a curtain. It was ruled by two bosses, locked in a mutually parasitic equilibrium. A reality warper who fed on belief, and a psychic administrator who structured that belief into something industrial.
An equal relationship.
That alone would have been interesting. What fascinated me more was the rest of it was the revelation that Urbanite was, at its core, a city-sized brainwashing chain supported by enslaved cognition. Players, NPCs, executives, even the city itself, all locked into a feedback loop of misfortune and dependency.
It was incredible, really… The Monarchy could pick a thing or two from them.
I stood in front of them now, walking a slow circle around the two figures at the center of the room. The System Administrator was rigid, her clipboard held too tightly. Gameboy tried to hide his worry, but his fingers were twitching like they itched to snap.
“I’ll let you live,” I said calmly, my voice echoing faintly in the ruined hall, “if Gameboy surrenders his life to me.”
The words landed heavy.
The System Administrator’s breath caught. Gameboy laughed.
“You’re a fool,” he said, grinning wide. “You think we’d sing along to your tune just because you walked in here with some fireworks?”
I stopped behind him.
“You’d better dance to it,” I replied, “if you want your life to have any meaning at all.”
I stepped away and faced them both, spreading my hands slightlyas I continued on an explanation. “You’re outclassed, completely! In resources. In leverage. In position. Fighting me now would be the single worst decision you could make in your long, boring lives.”
Gameboy’s smile thinned.
“I’m being merciful,” I continued. “Your existence helped me reach my goals faster. Coming here and allowing me to bring my people, for example. Stirring the board. Drawing attention. For that alone, I’m willing to hear you out.”
I tilted my head.
“Tell me why Cordelia wants you dead.”
Gameboy’s eyes flicked to the Administrator. His fingers twitched.
He was about to snap.
“Don’t,” the System Administrator said sharply.
He froze.
Her voice was tight, strained. “If you do, he’ll follow through.”
Gameboy snarled under his breath but lowered his hand.
I watched them in silence, thinking of Perry’s letter, the dossiers, and the claims of Urbanite’s hidden city. Of the risks I’d already taken to connect this world back to mine, it would have taken an enormous moron to lose here.
“You know for a city built on secrecy, you left one hell of a footprint.”
Both of them stiffened.
“I know about the Undercity,” I continued. “The place beneath Urbanite, hidden from prying eyes. I’m very curious about it. Can you tell me more about this hidden city of yours?”
I had no idea what the Undercity actually looked like.
What I did know was that it had always been the final destination of the Foresthome capes. Their mission had never truly been about Urbanite itself. It was about extraction. A single cape buried somewhere below the city. An informant. A spy. Someone Foresthome claimed was theirs.
At least, that was the story.
However, there was more to Perry’s letter, hinting at the possibility of being misled. Huston had pushed too hard. ‘Retrieve the target at all cost.’ It probably unnerved Perry, prompting him to accelerate whatever plans he had and withdrawing from this mission.
Gameboy stared at me, jaw tight, and eyes burning. He looked like a cornered animal that finally understood the size of the trap.
Urbanite was his power source. The city, the players, and the belief economy… all of it! And I had taken it hostage.
He inhaled slowly, then exhaled through his nose.
“Fine,” he said at last. “I admit it. You win.”
The words tasted poisonous coming from him.
“I’ll take you down there.”
I nodded once, then glanced over my shoulder.
“Shadow,” I said.
My shadow peeled itself off the floor.
Jacob rose from it as if climbing out of liquid darkness. His skin was pitch-black, swallowing light rather than reflecting it, and his eyes were indistinct. It was there, but never quite visible. A dark cowl hung over reinforced body armor, every line of him still and ready.
“Detain the psychic,” I ordered. “Keep watch. If she so much as twitches wrong, end her.”
System Administrator stiffened, but didn’t resist. Jacob stepped behind her, the shadow beneath her feet deepening, clinging.
The Godslayers arrived in this world with the intent to conquer it. I brought everyone except Amelia, George, and Guesswork. Bringing them would’ve been excessive, and they were already busy stabilizing the outside situation. This wasn’t brute conquest. This was excavation.
There was Brute Keegan, Abner, and Dragoness Diane.
Spoiler remained on her post, exactly where she needed to be. The nuke sat with her, inert but very real, while Hover watched from above, layered in stealth, quietly shooting down any observer orbs the Box dared to send drifting too close.
Across the city, the other pocket nukes were guarded just as carefully. Abner’s placements had been meticulous. Keegan’s patience was thin, but his discipline held. Diane didn’t even need to be told what to do.
Gameboy swallowed and turned to the System Administrator.
“Hold the players back,” he said sharply. “Make sure not to provoke them, while I’m gone.”
She hesitated, then nodded.
The city, for once, went still.
I stepped closer to Gameboy, my voice low.
“Lead the way,” I said.
Gameboy raised his finger. “I’m opening the pathway,” he said lightly, as if announcing a magic trick.
“Don’t do any stupid trick,” I warned. “Not unless you want to die very creatively.”
He snapped his fingers.
Reality folded inward with a dry, hollow sound, like paper crushed in a fist. A vertical tear opened in the air, light bleeding out of it in layered bands. I pressed my earpiece immediately.
“Status,” I said.
Abner’s voice came first, steady. “Readings are stable. No cascade. Portal structure looks… intentional. I’ve interrogated him as much as my powers allow. You should be safe.”
A beat later, Spoiler chimed in. “Confirmed. No immediate kill-lines branching from this choice. Don’t kill him. Seriously. No matter what.”
I exhaled slowly. Two-way confirmation from precogs meant I wasn’t walking blind into a guillotine.
“Understood,” I said. “He lives. For now.”
Gameboy stepped through the portal without looking back. I followed.
The transition wasn’t violent. There was neither pressure nor tearing sensation. Just a brief and nauseating inversion, like my senses had been shuffled and then put back slightly wrong.
When my vision settled, I frowned.
It was too bright.
We were standing in the middle of a park. Trimmed grass. Stone walkways. Trees arranged with deliberate symmetry. Beyond them sprawled a city. It was clean, expansive, and alive in a good way. Towers rose in elegant lines, lights glowing warmly from their windows. People moved through the streets laughing, talking, carrying bags that looked expensive even at a glance.
Children ran past us, chasing one another.
One of them passed straight through my leg.
I stiffened.
Gameboy smirked. “Didn’t expect that, did you?”
I turned slowly, taking it in. The sounds were real. The warmth of the air was real. The light cast shadows where it should. And yet—
A couple stood beside me, chatting softly. I threw a punch.
My fist passed through them like smoke.
They didn’t react.
“What is this?” I asked.
Gameboy clicked his tongue. “You really must be going deaf. I already told you.”
He spread his arms wide, almost reverent.
“This is Urbanite.”
I stared at him.
“No,” I said flatly. “Urbanite is above us. This… is different…”
His grin faded. The glitch obscuring his face flickered harder, as if struggling to keep itself together. “This is what Urbanite is supposed to be.”
He looked around us, and for the first time since I’d met him, his tone wasn’t playful. It was solemn. Almost fragile.
“My masterpiece,” he continued. “The utopia I always wanted to build.”
A child bumped into me again, giggling, and kept running.
“They’re not real,” I said.
“They are,” Gameboy replied. “Just not here.”
I turned back to him. “NPCs?”
He shook his head. “Souls.”
That got my attention.
“Do you believe in souls, Eclipse?” he asked.
I didn’t answer.
He didn’t wait.
“I used to believe in God,” he said. “Preached, even. Small church. Nothing fancy. Just people who wanted answers. People who were hurting.”
He laughed quietly, without humor.
“And I watched them pray. Beg. Starve. Die. Watched corruption rot everything it touched, while the ones who needed help the most were ignored.”
He looked up at the artificial sky.
“That’s when I realized God wasn’t real. Or if He was, He didn’t matter.”
His head turned toward me.
“The only real things are people,” he said. “Their souls. Their desires. Their greed. Their fear. Their belief.”
“I’m not here for your sermon,” I said. “Or your backstory.”
He blinked, then laughed, the playful tone snapping back into place like a mask.
“Ouch,” he said. “That hurts. You know, I was a cult leader once. Thought you’d appreciate the nostalgia.”
I didn’t.
His laughter died abruptly.
He stepped closer, the glitch in his face warping harder.
“Tell me something,” he said, voice low. “What do you even want here, Eclipse?”
“I want to meet the botanist,” I said.
Gameboy stared at me as if I had spoken a foreign language. His brows drew together, the glitch over his face stabilizing just long enough for confusion to register. Then his lips twitched. A breath escaped him. And then he laughed.
It started as a low, incredulous chuckle, the kind that tried and failed to stay contained. A second later, it broke loose.
“Ha—ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha—!”
He bent forward, clutching his stomach, laughter echoing across the immaculate park. A few passersby glanced our way, then lost interest, their attention sliding off us like water.
“You ignoramus,” Gameboy said between laughs, wiping imaginary tears from his glitched eyes. “You must want to hurt this world that badly, huh?”
I didn’t move. “Explain.”
“Oh, you will,” he said, straightening. “Much better if you see it yourself.”
He snapped his fingers.
A car materialized beside us, sleek and black, humming softly as if it had always been there. He walked around to the driver’s side and got in. I slid into the passenger seat without comment.
As the car began to move, I tried to study the world outside the window. Streets curved in ways that made sense only after I stopped trying to map them. Buildings repeated motifs from Urbanite but refined, perfected, as if the city above were a rough draft and this was the final copy. Everything felt… layered. Like I was looking at meaning stacked atop meaning.
“I wouldn’t bother,” Gameboy said, eyes on the road. “Even Administrator and I gave up trying to understand this place.”
“So what is it?” I asked.
He shrugged. “Afterlife. Psychic underside. A reflection. A landfill for souls that don’t fit anywhere else. Pick your poison.”
The air behind us rippled.
I turned just as someone settled into the back seat without opening a door.
She was a goth girl, pale skin, black lipstick, heavy eyeliner, striped stockings. She lounged sideways, boots on the upholstery, staring out the window with bored disinterest.
Gameboy glanced at the rearview mirror. “Oh. You’re awake.”
“Unfortunately,” she said. Then she looked at me. “Who’s the weirdo?”
“Don’t mind him, Eclipse. This is Malware,” Gameboy said cheerfully. “Mal for short.”
I frowned. “One of your women?”
“Yuck,” Mal said instantly. “Dad, your friend’s gross.”
I looked at Gameboy.
“She’s my daughter,” he said, as if that explained everything. “Made her with Administrator. For fun.”
I stopped trying to reconcile things. Some puzzles were better left unsolved.
Mal leaned forward. “What are we doing down here? Three sectors just glitched.”
Three.
My jaw tightened. “Define glitched.”
“Malfunctioned,” she said. “Collapsed. Went dark. Big boom energy.”
So the damage carried over. The pocket nukes weren’t just threatening Urbanite. They were shaking its shadow.
Gameboy whistled. “See? If you find any humanity in your heart, please don’t destroy Urbanite.”
The car slowed and stopped in front of a familiar structure.
Urbanite Mental Asylum.
It looked pristine here, white stone unmarred by time. The doors opened at Gameboy’s gesture. He led the way inside, Mal trailing behind us, humming tunelessly. The halls were too quiet. Doors stood open on either side, revealing empty rooms with beds neatly made, restraints unused, and walls unmarked.
“How many patients do you have here?” I asked. “The place looks desolate…”
“One,” Mal said.
We stopped before a single reinforced door at the end of the corridor.
Gameboy gestured lazily. “After you.”
I opened it.
The room was stark. White walls. White floor. White light.
At its center sat a man bound in a straitjacket, secured to a chair bolted into the floor. His hair was white, long and unkempt. A blindfold covered his eyes. His mouth was sewn shut with thick, black thread.
“This,” Gameboy said behind me, voice suddenly devoid of humor, “is the Botanist.”
I turned slowly.
“A prolific serial killer in his old world,” he continued. “King F. Huston, the one you know as the Divine Forest King.”
I stared back at the bound figure as my blood ran cold.
“That’s impossible,” I said. “Huston is—”
“Above,” Gameboy finished. “Yeah, I know…”
He tapped the doorframe lightly.
“This is his soul.”
I looked at him.
“I trapped it here,” Gameboy went on, “with Administrator’s help. Cost us a lot of lives. Worth every one. What do you think? Not just anyone can trap god, don’t you think?”