I paused. They seemed to be serious. That really changed my track of thought. The first matter to be resolved was: Did I want to deal with them? The answer to that was no… and yes. The Narrators were foundationally terrible and evil people. This whole meeting was an elaborate dance to make me feel important, and included. The information I was giving was both a distraction from the manipulation. All of this was to literally come to the table and negotiate. That is one of the most sinister things about coercion is the absence of immediate violence can almost look like an earnest effort to talk. They were the source of every problem they implied we could solve together. Ultimately this could just be a bad faith effort to claim I was being unreasonable when they refused to hold to their end of the agreement.

On the other hand, what if I could leverage this into something good? It was a faint, and probably foolish hope. That said, I still had the opportunity. Did that mean I had an obligation to try?

Yep… dammit. That was way less cathartic than telling this lot to go fuck themselves.

That led to the second major concern. These narrators were obviously trying to manipulate me. Being aware you are being fucked with does make you more resistant, but not immune. I needed to figure out a means to minimize their fuckery.

I needed to treat this like everything else: understand the situation, come up with a plan, and then act.

Expend Free Action? Yes/No

Note: You must select the total number of seconds spent before activating.

Error: This skill cannot be used in a Time Stop of this Scope.

"Doug, why are you trying to stop time?" Denise asked.

The stressed Narrator scoffed, "Because he is stupid."

"Real talk, guy. If I am stupid and I messed up all of your plans and forced you into a gross and frankly sad narrative ass pull, what does that make you?" I wasn't just choosing verbal violence. Fuck this guy in particular. I was also trying to see if Narrators were fratricious everywhere.

"He has you there, Lee," the guy who gave the Australia update laughed.

"Eat my ass Lachlan," Lee snapped he turned back to me,"and listen hear you big, dumb, ugly, hairy-"

"Get to the insult, you're not even using good adjectives," I cut in.

Lee stood up. He was gonna fight me.

"Sit down Lee," Wilson warned.

"Yeah, Lee, sit down," I agreed. I was laying it on a little thick, but nothing ventured, you know?

That pushed him over the edge. He stormed up to me and glared. He had to glare up at me as I stayed sitting in my chair. Like I said before I am huge, or everyone else is little. Lee spat in my face and then tried to clock me. I caught his arm. He was not as strong as Lindsey.

No one intervened. I let go of his arm and wiped off my face before smearing the spite on the table top. "Don't do that again."

Lee did it again. His punch wasn't any faster this time. I think he started with his best shot.

I caught his arm. I would have caught his fist, but my hand was too big and catching his arm was a better lever if it came down to that. "Stop it." I stood.

"I am going to kick your ass," Lee shouted, before he tried to kick me.

I extended my arm and his kick went wide. I glanced over to Smith and found him watching placidly as he took a sip of his drink. I focused on Lee, "Last chance or I will retaliate."

"Fuck you, you uppity ow! Ow, ow ow!" Lee started with his free hand he clawed at my arm. He lost his train of thought when I used my thumb to leverage his entire hand. Lee may be a narrator, and inhuman, but his was anatomically close enough. So when I hyperextended his hand back he started howling.

"Quit fighting me," I said, holding him at arms length. I raised my arm keeping him on his tip-toes. It made it harder for her to try and kick me.

"Lee! This is like being mauled by a bear. He is not afraid of you. Go limp and protect your head!" Denise spoke up. She also slid him chair away until she was out of arms reach.

"Or you could offer up a twink," Wilson added. Several others laughed at that.

No one stopped this. One of their own being brutalized in their hall of power. That didn't matter to any of them. It wasn't hurting them in particular. I was not dealing with a collective group. I was dealing with individual, sociopathic, backbiting, Narrators.

That realization was like climbing out from under a mountain. Now to figure out who I could leverage against who. Lee was a lost cause. That bridge was truly burnt.

"Just chuck him and be done," Lachlan called. He slapped his hand on the table twice.

"I'll let you go if you say you're sorry," I told Lee.

He spat in my face again. Good aim honestly.

"Okay, I am just doing what Lachlan said," I turned at the hip and flung Lee toward the double door. He sailed through the air and slammed into them. He sort of slapped against the doors. For a brief instant he was flat against the door, but then the latch broke and the door swung open. Lee tumbled down the hallway on the stone floor before ending up in an awkward heap.

"If he does that again, I am going to do something permanent to him," I declared. None of the Narrators challenged that.

Wilson called to Lee, "Get up Lee. You almost had him."

Lee did get up and staggered back into the room.

"Sit down, now," Smith commanded.

Lee glared at me, but did what he was told. I was probably going to need to stay the hell out of Asia in the future.

Smith set his drink down, "So Doug what do you want?"

"Let's start with what you want and why?" I insisted.

"We need you to undo your pact with Toad," Smith said. He turned to Marge, "Could you please explain?"

I could see Marge was clearly jonesing for something. She sighed, "What you just handed to the Goblins is going to destabilize the entirety of the system on literally every continent."

That didn't quite track, "If my pact is so bad for the system, then why did the system let me do it?"

Marge gazed at me like I was stupid, "Because you're a Titan Spawn. You're Titanic Scale. The system is biased toward giving you a very long leash."

Stolen novel; please report.

"So it's not the system, it is you guys who are upset that I made a bunch of instant divine scale goblins," I said.

"What?" Marge asked.

"The pact," I said suddenly, a lot less certain. "I gave Toad Improved Pact, and he was elevated to Divine Scale. He then sent out the same perk. The System automatically resolved it."

Marge was quiet for a long moment, "Are you saying you not only gave a goblin mental Resistance you also raised them up to Divine Scale."

"Someone didn't read the memo," Another Narrator joked.

Marge without looking away from me picked up her glass and chucked it at the Narrator who spoke. The glass struck them right in the face. It didn't shatter till it hit the ground. She kept staring at me. She wanted an answer.

"Yeah, I did," I told her.

"Don't worry about the Divine Scale thing," Wilson said.

Aw shit, I turned to look at him, "Why aren't you worried about that?"

Wilson grinned at me, "That is easy to resolve, once the pact is over they can just all die from Scale decay." When I was quiet for a long moment Wilson said, "And now he is at the table ready to negotiate."

"Thank you, Wilson," Smith said.

"Why do you not want a goblin to have Mental Resistance?" I asked.

"Because with Mental Resistance they will be able to use Goblin Mode without any negative consequences." Marge said.

"Why is that a problem?" I asked.

"I don't think it is a good idea to tell you," Marge said.

"Why?" I asked. I can see why five year olds do this. It is so easy and kinda fun.

"Tell him the truth," Smith said. I almost believed that wasn't a staged interaction to make him look like he was on my side.

Marge took a drink of water from her neighbor's glass, before answering, "Goblins are pretty smart in general. Then the little bastard start drawing info from Goblin Mode. Everything any goblin knew, ever, is stored in it. Goblins will pull snippets here and there. It helps them come up with all those clever little ideas they use to survive out in the Wastes. Things like which mushrooms are edible or poisonous, how to tune an engine, making bombs. Messing with Goblin Mode too much is how they get weird. Too much data, it fries the brain. Giving one of those psychopaths Mental Resistance and it is going to be about ten minutes before they try and pull everything."

"...so?" I asked.

"They will succeed," Marge said much louder than she had been speaking, "Basically that will cause an immediate singularity type event. It would be like giving someone the entire knowledge of the internet from the world that was. Ten minutes after that they would be using exploits to crack the foundation of the system."

"That sounds useful," I said.

"That's how we get canceled," Mr. Smith said. "That's how everyone you know dies."

I nodded, "So, you won't accept my demand of no interference from you people going forward."

Smith gazed at me for a moment, "That is off the table. Besides you are missing the fact that our intervention prevents needless mass death events. Grace tell him about your stabilizing North America."

Grace turned and spoke in her near emotionless way, "Both the Technacoast and the Fantasy Coast have significant presences near the musical valley, what you would know as the Shenandoah Valley. Orders from both the Technacoast Authority, and The Storm King were issued. Both wanted their forces to seize a dungeon and clear it. This would have resulted in both parties meeting in the dungeon and clashing. That would have spilled over into a full out resumption of hostilities. Three gods from the Fantasy Coast would invade the Technacoast. This would trigger a retaliatory missile strike from the Technacoast. All said and done casualties would exceed one million people before the end of the month. I stopped that by interfering with the Technacoast communication."

"Like you didn't arrange for the tensions to begin with," I dismissed.

"We didn't," Grace explained. "You're elder spawn, Zach, built a kingdom around himself in the south along the Gulf of Mexico. The core tenants he built into the society was his own supremacy and enrichment. Inevitably others chaffed under his control. They were given the choice: fall in line or fuck off. A small portion of the population fled north and built the Technicoast. In order to survive they adopted a strong central authority to distribute military might and resources. Surprising no one, a would-be tyrant seized control of the entire society. The Fantasy Coast and Technacoast have been at intermittent war ever since. We have been working to stop the violence because frankly, a war between them is redundant with Europe already providing war stories."

I hated that. I hated that it didn't sound like a lie.

I sighed, "Fine. I want to be consulted before anything else is changed in my story going forward. No exceptions."

"Done," Smith said, smiling that I was negotiating.

"I also want to know what you have planned at the tower," I demanded.

"You and your forces, clashing with an army of demons. I believe you have already been told your forces will win." Smith said. He picked up his drink and after finishing it held it up for his assistant to take.

That wasn't a lot of information. I wanted to know more details, but I was still convinced that was a trap. They could feed me information that would pull my focus. I couldn't find a solid means of leveraging further information into driving division between them so I pivoted. "I want to level."

"That we can't allow," Grace said, "not until after the tower."

"Well…" Smith said, taking a fresh drink, "What would be the harm."

"He could trivialize the entire fight," Grace said. "Another perk, and an edge. It would be obvious he would win. It would be boring."

"A small price compared to what we are trying to stop," Smith set his drink down. "Then it is agreed. Alright Doug, the retcon will be us back off the Mental Resistance. Instead your pact will include Improved Pact, and Titanic Regeneration. Agreed?"

"Wait! No!" I said. "Everyone with the pact will die when the pact ends."

Smith shook his head, "Toad did declare to the audience that he had made pacts. I am afraid our hands are tied there."

"There are ways to save them," Wilson said, his grin widening.

"How?" I demanded.

"I can tell you, but if I do, you have to level the way I tell you to," Wilson leaned back in his chair and put his feet on the table.

"No," I shook my head.

"Fine then. Just so you know. By the time you actually get things stopped with your pact wombo combo, thirty eight hundred goblins will be affected, and they die once the pact finishes." Wilson pulled out his phone, "Divine Pacts can't be altered like yours so the original timeline will hold. They will all be dead by the end of the week. Most won't get to see their families again after going through hell for you." He considered. "Denise, make a note about needing to frame it as a tragedy. Heroic sacrifice maybe." He turned back to me, "You are pretty good with Spine. You have a thing for Goblin kids. Do you think you could raise nine thousand?"

"Tell me what you want," I told him. My voice was very calm. It surprised me. Inside I was so angry. It took everything I had to keep thinking before talking or acting.

"I want you to take the Edge, Autonomous Shadows." Wilson said, gesturing broadly with one hand.

"What does it do," I asked.

"Well, you will need to take the Perk that lets you Generate a Shadow. You have seen those. All your older siblings got them. You were gonna take that anyways. The Edge lets you generate five shadows at once. One you control and four more that are autonomous. I guess you could call it, one shadow and four shadow spawn," Wilson explained.

I stared at him, "You want me to clone myself?"

Wilson nodded, "The only problem with you kid is there isn't enough of you to love. You should eat more. Figure out how food works. And they wouldn't be carbon copies. They would just have your memories up to the moment you selected the perk."

That sounded a lot like how the Titan made spawn like me. Why the hell would Wilson want that… "They wouldn't have Mental Resistance would they?" Wilson had read my mind in the past and couldn't now that I had Mental Resistance. A clone through and he could basically learn my secrets through a back door. Things like how I was the one destabilizing the system.

Wilson paused. He hadn't expected me to figure it out. A millisecond of annoyance flashed in his eyes, "Not unless they selected it as their starting trait, they would be ten levels behind you and Heroic Scale." He was back to his fake smile, "That's not the only reason though. No spawn has taken it yet. The Audience wants to see what it does."

Everything about this felt gross. More people with my mind? I was me. Others made by this fucked up system would cheapen that. Also it was what Wilson wanted me to do, so it had to have some no doubt barb strings attached. "You aren't going to do something fucking stupid like have them turn against me after there… born."

"No, that is hack writing. They will have your memories, and their own body, and free will. If you don't like it, just kill 'em and don't let them respawn."

"Respawn?" I asked.

"Shadows are a projection of the Titan Spawn. "So long as you are alive they can respawn an hour after they die." Denise told me.

"If I take it they have to start with Mental Resistance at the start." I said.

"Sure, but I get to pick everything else about them," Wilson said.

"This is getting very close to saying fuck you," I told him.

"We can just let all those goblins die," Wilson said. He looked back at his phone.

… Motherfucker. Wait, I had one last chance around this!

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