The Protagonist System

326 Pain Is In The Mind Part Two

The awkward moment ended and John stepped back from me, his face still sad. “You went through that and now you're Naruto and living a similar life.” He said and then smiled. “How long did you wait to accelerate your growth with magic? Or did you use technology?”

“I used a combination of powers, including chronomancy.” I said and told him it was only a recent development, because once I left the walls of Konoha, I was no longer restricted to staying in my younger body to keep up the ruse that I was a kid.

“That's a useful power.” John said and looked constipated. “That I apparently can't copy.”

I chuckled at that. “That's also because of a certain combination of powers. Have you heard about My Hero Academia?”

John's eyes widened. “You're kidding!” He exclaimed and then squinted his eyes. After a moment, he laughed. “Both! You have both One for All and All for One!”

“I do. At the time it was quite versatile. After I went to Worm and encountered the entities...” I started to explain and he held a hand up to stop me.

“I've been there and even encountered Scion's avatar. After some experimentation, I launched a spread of quantum torpedos into his real body in another dimension.” John interrupted me. He must have seen confusion on my face, because he chuckled. “I just realized neither of us have encountered the same versions of the worlds we've been to.”

I opened my mouth to respond, then thought about what he said. “You can choose where to go as well?”

John sighed. “It's a recent development. After I was in High School DxD for about a million years, I used a heavily modified King Piece to fix myself and my powers. It mostly restored me to what I was supposed to be, only there are still a couple of pieces missing. I regained an important one on the last world before I was kicked off of it.”

“Can I ask what that was?” I asked.

“Aura and Semblance. When I gained them, they mostly fixed my healing powers.” John answered.

“Mostly?” I asked and frowned. “Why wouldn't you be able to heal yourself and fix... oh.”

John chuckled. “You just answered your own question.”

“Yeah, and I'm wondering what are the last few things you need to get fixed.” I said.

“You didn't check already?” John asked, surprised.

“No, I respect people's personal space most of the time.” I responded. “If the damage isn't obvious, I have to remind myself I can check people's health.”

John nodded. “I get it. The more powers you have, you become spoiled for choice.”

I shrugged. I usually only used the powers I needed at the time, mostly because I did not want to fall into the same endless pit of arrogance that Scion did, with all the powers and no real need for most of them. The old adage of power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely, definitely applied to me and I suspect it applied to John, too.

“Do you want me to give you a check-up and see what's what?” I asked and held a hand out to him.

John stepped forward and accepted the hand and held it, as if to shake it, and didn't do anything else. “Go ahead and confirm that you can't do anything.” He said with a slight tone of defeat in his voice. “I've been under Panacea's unlocked power and she did all she could, since I was a baseline human at the time and it's my powers that have been altered, not me.”

I took in his words with a grain of salt, because the worst patient a doctor could ever have was himself. He was way too close to the problem to see it for what it was and I was sure it was either a blind spot in his own head or someone screwed him over.

I used both detection spells and Panacea's full power to check him. As he said, he was physically fine. Metaphysically, it was a whole other story. I could feel the King Piece nestled in his chest and couldn't detect any trace of devil DNA, which didn't make sense. I also detected the programming and how a lot of it didn't make sense, unless you knew both magic and computers.

I then touched him with both One for All and All for One, just to see if they would tell me about his powers. My mind kind of stuttered as I saw the mangle of abilities that had been returned to some kind of order, thanks to the King Piece. He must have worked on it for years to get it to that point. I could also see how his travel power had been nerfed and then mostly restored.

“You're still having trouble travelling?” I asked.

“Not really. I picked the last place without trouble. It was when I was shunted out and into this world that I felt it get knocked slightly out of whack again.” John answered.

I nodded and toggled off the random aspect of the travel power, then altered it with my entity shard power. Editing a power was easy when you knew how they worked, and I had a bunch of different travel powers that combined into a final version.

“You also have a kind of familiar bond?” I asked when I found something mystically bound to his soul.

“Oh! That's Ost. She's a soul I saved in the Shield Hero universe when she was willing to die to save her world.” John explained. “I had Dr. Fate fix the locked state of the Shield when I was in a version of the DC Universe where the sidekicks had their own team. She's been asleep for a long time and will only wake when I'm in an appropriate world.”

“Shield hero?” I asked, confused.

John looked surprised for a moment, then he launched into an explanation about the thing, how it was kept in its own pocket universe, and how a very powerful being was folding different worlds together to harvest the energy destroying them all would grant.

“Then, what happened to the guy who was supposed to be the shield hero?” I asked.

“I have no idea.” John said and jerked slightly when I received a popup.

You have detected an anomaly attached to a powerful soul, similar to a sacred gear and a tailed beast. Do you wish to sell the entity to the system for 20,000 Karma Points?

NO! I mentally gasped, because John felt my system poking Ost. The popup disappeared and another took its place.

Do you wish to spend 50,000 Karma Points to unlock the perpetual sleeping state of the bound entity? Afterwards, an application of the forbidden Eight Trigrams Seal will allow the binding to be moved from the sacred gear device to the host directly and will bypass any other restrictions.

I can't heal him? Or overhaul him? I asked.

You do not have the required Karma Points to restore a cosmic level entity to his former state.

Cosmic level? Holy crap! I thought, because I had just over two million Karma Points and that wasn't enough. Jesus H. Christ! Who was this guy?

John saw the shock on my face. “What is it?”

“I... I don't know... if I should say.” I said, hesitantly. With how his powers had been so screwed up, I was sure someone, or many someones, had messed him up on purpose. Why would someone do that, though?

John sighed and looked sad. “You can't help me.”

“I didn't say that.” I said and concentrated on my system and the different options I had. What about just fixing his powers? He only has a hole or two and is almost done fixing himself. Can I fill those holes with a similar power?

The main popup didn't appear and Fate's little blue box did. You still don't have enough points to fix him, because it would change the fate of countless worlds. Some for the better and some for the worse.

I had to think about that. If I fix his power, it might give him an idea how to get revenge on the ones that did it to him?

His power would let him find the others of similar powers, which he has been blocked from for a very specific reason. Fate answered and didn't say what it was.

Oh. I thought and understood. I get it. As soon as he can freely find who he's looking for, not only will he detect them, they will detect him right back and he loses his anonymity. That will cause a lot of trouble for a lot of people.

That is a severe understatement. Fate's popup stated. Whole branches of different multiverses will be wiped out if they start fighting again, even if he doesn't realize why they are fighting him.

I took a deep breath and let it out after that bit of information. I couldn't let that happen, not if Fate herself knew that trillions of lives would be lost if John had all of his powers back, not that I could do that anyway.

What can I actually do for him? I asked.

Fate's popup showed three blinking dots for several seconds. If you are sure you want to spend the rest of your points, and give up the choice of your next jump, then I'll fudge the numbers and you can give him access to his soul bound mate and alter his detection power to focus on a specific individual and not his whole race like its supposed to be.

I needed a moment to think about that and spoke out loud. “John, is there anyone specific you have been desperate to find for a long time?”

John stiffened and stared into my eyes, as if trying to read my mind. When I didn't react after a few seconds, he took a breath. “I don't know how you know about that; but, yes I do. Her name is Gloria Colorado and she's the lost love of my many lifetimes. I've been trying to not search for her, just so I might stumble across her again sometime in the future.”

“And she's like you?” I asked and he raised his eyebrows. “A traveller that moves around, usually not by choice.”

John huffed. “Yes, I had to teach her how I used my powers and she learned to move in a similar manner. I've learned to focus recently and can more or less choose where I go, with exceptions.”

I nodded and closed my eyes. I didn't regret having to spend all my Karma Points if it was to ensure that the man... being... potential cosmic entity... in front of me, didn't accidentally or intentionally destroyed multiple universes.

This will also block him from being detected? I asked and Fate's popup showed a thumbs up symbol. Okay, do it.

It was almost anticlimactic as a popup with my Karma Point total ticked down with the sound of a machine gun and drained away all of my built up points. I didn't feel any different, or even felt a drain on my magic or abilities as Fate used my powers to alter John's powers.

John seemed to freeze when he felt his arm shift and a large bracelet morphed out of his skin. The large glowing green gem looked ominous for a second before the glow faded and the gem became dark.

“Ohhhh.” A sexy female voice said and John gasped as a voluptuous woman faded into view beside him. She was fully manifested and solid, which she proved when she reached out to pull John's surprisingly stretchy costume off of his chest and showed him the intricate inked seal that was there.

John looked up from the seal to my face and gasped again as he felt his newly altered power slot back into the 'empty' spot where it had been. His eyes were wide as it activated and he shivered as he felt out and out and very far away. His eyes went back to normal and he smiled when he found her.

“Thank you.” John said and didn't tell his bound mate to stop caressing his muscular chest. “I don't know how you did that, only that you've given me the two things I've been trying to get back for... well, nearly forever.”

I wasn't going to play if off as unimportant, because we both knew it wasn't. Him because of who he was now able to find who he wanted and me because I had just saved countless people in multiple universes. I didn't get any Karma Points for it, though.

Fate's popup showed the word 'giggle'. You can't game the system like that. There's no such thing as free points. You spent all of that to ensure their survival and can't be rewarded for the same act.

That's fair. I thought and tried to let John's hand go.

“No, let me do something first.” John said and apparated us to a small island in the middle of the ocean. Instead of letting my hand go, he knelt and touched the dirt and activated his power.

Since I was still touching him, I felt his immensely vast oceans of mana flow through him and a trickle came through and the entire island changed from a normal one to one that held a large and quite familiar prison. Azkaban Prison from Harry Potter.

“Holy crap!” I exclaimed, then I felt another touch of mana and a thousand and thirty-three people appeared inside the prison.

“These are the people I cleaned up while I was here.” John said and then another touch of mana made me gasp as I felt ownership of the island transfer to me. “The Akatsuki, Obito, Madara, Black Zetsu, a bunch of White Zetsu, the Jinchuriki that tried to fight me, most of the shinobi from the Hidden Cloud Village, and a bunch of missing-nin in the Bingo Book.”

I blinked my eyes at him and he laughed.

“I'm not saying here if I can finally go and find my long lost love.” John said and let my hand go to put his arm around Ost, whom cooed as she cuddled into him. “It's been far too long since I've seen her.”

“A day won't make a difference, will it?” I asked him, because we both knew he could appear at any point in the timeline he wanted, as long as he had a clear destination in mind.

“It will to me.” John said and Ost nodded. “Dear, can you return to your slumber? I don't want to take a chance you might be lost if I travel without you safely contained.”

“You don't have to worry about that. She's bound to your soul and not the device.” I said and waved at the large bracelet on his wrist. “It still works like it did before; but, Ost's soul is inside the seal and not the sacred gear. You'll never leave her behind or have to force her to sleep when you travel.”

John looked down at his wrist and willed it away, as if to prove me right. It disappeared and Ost didn't. He smiled when he looked at her happy face and he leaned in to kiss her. Ost moaned indecently and then slowly faded away.

“I don't feel tired at all.” Ost said. “It's really roomy in here, too.”

“It's a mostly mental construct with some energy manipulation mixed in, so have fun making it how you want in there.” I told them.

“An orgy-sized bed!” Ost said and there was some squeaking noises.

“That better be the bed springs.” John warned with a chuckle.

“Yes, it's... mmm... the bed springs.” Ost blatantly lied as she softly moaned.

John shook his head and the sound cut off. “I'll need to watch out for that.”

“Yeah, good luck with it. She has as much control in there as you do.” I said with a grin.

John groaned and then laughed. “All right, I'm out of here.” He said and reached out to shake my hand again. “I can't thank you enough, Naruto.”

I shook my head. “Don't thank me. I couldn't restore what you had before...” I stopped talking before I gave away what I had discovered about who and what he was.

“What you did was more than enough, my friend. More than enough.” John said and let my hand go as he started to glow. “I'm coming for you, Gloria!”

Ost let out a sexy giggle and I laughed with her at the unintentional pun. John rolled his eyes at me and then he was gone. I couldn't feel or detect him anywhere, so I went inside the prison. I had been there hundreds of times with Andromeda Tonks to visit Sirius and knew where to go. Through the administration section, past the low security, and up the stairs.

I was sure John would have put the more powerful people at the top level and I found Pain, Obito, and Madara in the high security cells where Sirius Black, Bellatrix Lestrange, and Rudolphus Lesrange stayed. The next six cells had the Raikage of the Hidden Cloud Village, his brother Killer Bee, and four other Jinchuriki in them.

I didn't waste any time and sold the tailed beasts to the system, earning back a small portion of what I had spent, and then had the dementors suck out the souls of everyone there. I didn't want the responsibility of taking care of over a thousand prisoners and they had to die to claim the remaining bounties, anyway.

I had no clue who the white skinned and horned people where and didn't ask. If John, a borderline cosmic powered being, put them into prison, then he had a good reason to and I wasn't going to question his decision. They died after their souls were sucked out and that was that.