My Scumbag System-Chapter 396: Victory Tastes Like Broken Ribs

Silence stretched between us.

Then, without another word, the old man raised his hand. Golden light pooled in his palm. He gestured toward Cel, and the light flowed across the chamber floor, gentle as water, climbing across her skin.

The translucent quality faded. Color returned to her cheeks. Her breathing deepened, steadied.

The freezing sickness reversed itself.

"There," the Arborist said. "I have honored your request. Now you must honor mine."

I didn’t like the sound of that.

"What request?"

"Kill me." He spread his arms wide, exposing his chest. "The Great Root has rejected me. The Garden has turned against its Keeper. My form fails. My purpose ends. Grant me the mercy of final death rather than slow rot."

I stared at him. At the knife in my hand.

Nel had been silent since we entered this place. Apollo had vanished. The System sat broken in the corner of my vision.

But I didn’t need divine guidance to recognize a trap when I saw one.

"What happens if I kill you?" I asked. "What happens to the Garden? To everyone you’ve preserved?"

The old man’s smile turned sad.

"The Garden collapses. The Black Gate closes. All the preserved souls trapped within my collection return to their native dimensions, scattered across time and space." He paused. "Including you and your companion. You will wake in your world as though from a dream, with only fragments of memory remaining."

"And if I don’t kill you?"

"Then I linger. The Garden remains. And eventually, someone stronger than you will arrive and finish what you began." He gestured at the chamber around us. "This place exists outside normal time. What feels like hours here becomes mere minutes in your world. You could stay. Learn from me. Master the preservation arts. Become the next Keeper when my form finally fails completely."

There it was. The real offer.

Not imprisonment in a collection, but apprenticeship. A chance to inherit an ancient cosmic power.

The worst part? A piece of me actually considered it.

Imagine controlling every plant across multiple dimensions. Being able to preserve moments forever. Having access to knowledge accumulated across ten thousand cycles.

The empire I could build with that power would make everything I’d accomplished so far look like child’s play.

But.

I looked at Cel. At the girl who’d chosen to stay with me despite knowing I was using her. Who’d trusted me enough to cross a nightmare river and fight impossible battles.

Cel had already spent her entire life being someone’s tool. Her sister’s political asset. The VHC’s symbol. A breeding prospect for elite Hunter families.

If I stayed here, if I accepted the Arborist’s offer, I’d be doing the same thing. Preserving her perfectly in this moment. Beautiful and powerful and completely frozen.

No growth. No choice. No future.

Just eternal preservation.

I raised the knife.

The Arborist’s eyes tracked the movement. "You choose poorly. Power such as mine appears once in a cosmic age."

"Yeah, well." I stepped forward, closing the distance. "I’ve got a dinner reservation next week. And I really hate being late."

I drove the blade into his chest.

The knife sank deep. The old man gasped, his eyes widening. Golden sap flowed around the wound, but this time it didn’t heal. The First Tree’s weapon did its job, severing the connection between the Arborist and the Great Root.

He looked down at the knife. Up at me.

"Thank you," he whispered. "I have been so tired. For so long."

Then he dissolved. Not violently. Gently. Like snow melting in spring.

His form collapsed into golden particles that spread across the chamber floor. The massive tree behind him began shrinking, its trunk returning to normal proportions. The heart stopped pulsing.

And the Garden itself began to sing.

Not a sound I heard with my ears. This was something felt in my bones, my blood, the core of whatever made me human. Every plant the Arborist had collected sang together. Joy. Relief. Freedom.

The silver light from the knife spread across every surface. The chamber walls cracked and peeled away, revealing actual sky beyond. Not the artificial darkness with its twin moons, but a real dawn, pink and gold and beautiful.

The Black Gate was opening. Collapsing. Returning us home.

I stumbled over to Cel and dropped beside her. Her eyes fluttered open, periwinkle irises focusing on my face.

"Did we win?"

"Yeah." I laughed, the sound more exhausted than triumphant. "We won. You can stop being a hero now."

She smiled. Then punched me in the shoulder.

"Ow! What the hell?"

"That’s for almost dying."

"It’s not like I was trying to—"

Cel didn’t let me finish the sentence.

Her hand fisted in my shirt, yanked me forward, and her lips crashed against mine.

The kiss was nothing like the calculated ones I’d shared with the others. No strategy. No technique. Just raw, desperate relief that we were both still breathing.

Her tongue pushed past my teeth, demanding rather than asking. I responded without thinking, one hand tangling in her silver-white hair while the other found her waist.

Bad idea. Terrible idea.

My burned arms screamed in protest at the movement. My ribs gave an ominous creak that suggested they were about three seconds from giving out entirely.

Didn’t stop me.

Cel tasted like frost and something sweeter underneath. The Nectar flooded between us, humming through the connection our lips created. Her entire body shuddered against mine.

"Fuck," she gasped into my mouth, her nails digging into my shoulders through the tattered remains of my shirt. "What is that? Why does it—"

I kissed her harder, swallowing whatever question she’d been about to ask. Her response was immediate and overwhelming, a soft sound vibrating in her throat as she pressed closer.

Too close.

My ribs reminded me they existed by sending a fresh wave of white-hot agony racing across my chest. I broke the kiss with a sharp hiss, my vision tunneling.

Cel pulled back immediately, her eyes wide. The white streaks in her hair glowed faintly in the golden dawn light now filtering through the collapsing chamber.

"Your ribs." She touched my chest, feather-light, clinical despite the flush still burning across her cheeks.

"I forgot. I’m sorry, I just—"

"Don’t apologize for kissing me. That’s a terrible precedent to set."