Inga’s mouth dropped open. She blushed, a gentle purple color creeping into her pale cheeks. “Well, I was the Grand Archivist, yes. The beauty contest wasn’t... I mean, I inherited my feathers and my beak. My wings... well, I worked on those, but I enjoyed the exercise.” She swallowed, blinked, and her antennae drooped. “I’m sorry, but what was the question again?”
Shadowcroft chuckled, as did the classroom, except for members of the First Cohort.
Logan wasn’t sure what kind of world Inga had come from, but she must’ve been some kind of bird creature. They all had new bodies, after all.
Shadowcroft smiled at the moth woman. “I suppose my question was rhetorical, my dear. But yes, here, murder can be ethical. We are here to stop dungeoneers from destroying the universe one Celestial Node at a time. We murder for the greater good, since wouldn’t it be better to kill a few villainous people than let all life die? For life is precious, wouldn’t you agree?”
“The trolley problem,” Logan found himself saying.
Shadowcroft snapped his wooden fingers. “Yes, on your world, moral philosophy professors have pondered this issue before. If you are driving an out-of-control trolley, should you throw a lever to kill one person or refuse to do nothing at all and kill five?”
“How drunk am I?” Marko asked, eyebrows scrunching as though he were seriously considering an answer.
The headmaster waved a finger at him. “Sober as a judge, Mr. Laskarelis. And the answer, of course, is that you throw the switch and doom the one. As plain as the wooden nose on my face. You see, my friends, we here at the Shadowcroft Academy have a very utilitarian view of our work. Yes, in a perfect universe, we would convince the dungeoneers that what they are doing is inherently wrong. We have even tried that a time or two. Why, back in the 60s—that would be the 600s of the Age of Harmony, mind you—I even advocated for a nonviolent solution. Give peace a chance, and all that. Fruitless.” He shook his head, mossy beard swinging. “These raiders will not stop, will not be deterred. They do it for money. They do it for power. And, in the end, they are searching for immortality.”
He shrugged and spread his hands as though to say, and here we are.
Logan nodded. “I can see that. The more powerful they become with stolen Apothos, they higher they climb in their classes. An Immortal Crown dungeoneer would be immortal. Are there any dungeoneers who’ve become immortal?”
Shadowcroft lifted a finger to speak. He then closed his eyes. “That is a difficult question and better suited for Professor Nekhbet’s course on the Tree of Souls.” The headmaster inhaled. “Yes, a long story, and a sad one. Suffice it to say, Mr. Murray, some raiders are driven to plunder by their fear of death. That which we cling to can kill us in the end. You are an example of the opposite.”
Logan felt a shiver on his neck. “Me?”
The headmaster nodded. “Yes, you come from Uroth.”
Chadrigoth’s desk near the back smoldered from his flames. The Abyss Lord laughed. “Uroth? That place is a myth. No world could be so weak. It would fall from the Tree a blackened cinder.”
“Yeah, Chad,” Jimi Magmarty agreed, his voice the sound of churning cement. “You tell ’em.”
Shadowcroft motioned to Logan. “Not only does he come from Uroth, but his reaping was unexpected and a bit extreme. He leapt at the chance to fight raiders and save dungeons, and his performance during the Threshing impressed us all.”
“Even Professor Rockheart?” Logan asked.
“Impressed most of us,” the headmaster conceded, bowing his head a fraction of an inch.
“Here’s what I don’t get,” Logan said. “Do the dungeoneers know they are destroying the Tree of Souls?”
“That is the central question,” Inga agreed. “I have part of the answer.”
Shadowcroft gestured for her to continue.
The moth woman blushed, glanced around, and then drew her wings in close. She touched her hair, as if to make sure she still had it. What had she said about feathers? She talked in an awkward, slightly choked voice. “The lesser raiders are either clueless or are in terrible denial. They tell themselves they’ve never seen a world die, so people are probably overreacting. Or they convince themselves that some worlds should be destroyed because they’re weak. Like Uroth. Who would want to live in such a weak, pathetic place in the first place?”
“Easy there,” Logan said with a sharp smile. “That’s my hometown. It’s not much, but we do have Netflix and nachos.”
“I apologize,” Inga said, still nervous and quaking a bit. Again, her hand went to her hair. “Or, the raiders say that the universe is so vast that it can’t die. Some dungeoneers think that destroying Celestial Nodes actually helps the Tree of Souls grow. Like pruning a grapevine—you clip off some branches to help it grow. That’s not correct. The Tree doesn’t work like that.”
The headmaster nodded. “Very good, Inga. You are, of course, correct. You see, my friends, everyone is born with an instinctive knowledge of the Tree of Souls. We know we are connected. However, the Iron Trunk, Azure Branch, Jade Leaf dungeoneers all convince themselves that the Celestial Nodes, the places where the Tree meets worlds, aren’t real. They think dungeon cores are evil monsters, deserving of destruction.
“This changes, however, when raiders move from being Jade Leaf cultivators to S-Class cultivators. Heartwood, Crown, and Immortal Crown raiders know exactly what they are doing. To advance from Jade Leaf to Heartwood is no easy feat, mind you. It requires both a massive amount of energy and a divine connection to the tree. What we call a Revelation. They know all right, and they don’t care. They simply don’t care.” Shadowcroft got choked up, eyes watering at the mere thought of it all.
Chadrigoth’s aura of flame exploded. “Those villains think that if they become Immortal Crown cultivators, they can create their own realities, and who cares about anyone else? We need to stop them, all of them. Even the fools.” He growled, fiery claws digging into the desktop.
“We do need to stop them,” Shadowcroft agreed softly. “As I’ve said, the raiders, even someone as weak as a Deep Root dungeoneer, instinctively know that what they are doing is wrong. Still they do it. We have no choice but to stop them. If we lose too many Celestial Nodes, the Tree of Souls will wither and die. If the Tree dies, then all of reality will die with it. How many will lose their lives? Countless souls will be lost. Countless animals. Countless people. All of reality will be gone like tears in rain.”
“The ethics of murder,” Logan muttered to himself. This made the trolley problem seem so small in comparison. What was a few thousand dungeoneers when compared to the impossible number of all possible lives strewn across the multiverse?
Still, it was hard. He’d fought in an active combat zone, even killed. He’d pulled the trigger because it had been him or the man behind the wheel of the car-borne IED barreling toward his convoy. He’d done what needed doing, but it had haunted him.
This, though, was war on another level. When Logan created his dungeon to protect a Celestial Node, he wouldn’t be killing pixels... he’d be cutting down real people. Still, there was also a sure knowledge that this was a war that needed fighting. There were no politics involved here, no uncertainty. They were defending the universe itself from annihilation, and he would gladly pull the trigger again when the time came. No hesitation and not a moment of doubt.