Still, I could sense his unkind, fiery gaze focused upon me.
The air thickened around us, forming an impenetrable barrier. No one could come to my rescue now.
The fragments of his new hybrid identity seemed to have never properly alloyed together. His outline rippled with occasional surges of interference.
“I knew you wouldn’t abandon that filthy troll thing,” his hoarse laughter was laced with hatred — a sound which betrayed an undertone of fear.
“I don’t have the time to besiege your castle,” he continued. “Without you, it’ll fall within days. So let’s finish this thing here and now.”
“Very well. Let’s do it. Why did you have to make it so complicated? Couldn’t you just challenge me? Or you knew you couldn’t win without better odds?”
“All means are good if they lead to victory. You easily fell for my trap.”
“Are you sure I fell for it? How about I walked into it consciously?”
He didn’t like that idea at all. His confidence seemed to have taken a serious blow: the seed of self-doubt which had fallen on fertile ground. I’d managed to upset his mental equilibrium.
He attacked.
This was a lethal combo of a lunging blow followed by a circular slicing hit.
The microchipped blade struck sparks off my shield. I dodged the lunge, then somersaulted backwards as Dietrich’s sword whooshed through thin air.
My counterattack failed. Exiting the combo, Dietrich attacked me with clots of dark energy which I chose to just block seeing as my shield could absorb magic so well.
“You think you could do this without cheating?” I wheezed.
“All I did I tweaked the program code a little,” his armor plates rose and fell in unison with his hastened breathing. “There’ll be no respawn for you this time, Alex. You can forget it.”
“I know. Same goes for you too.”
He laughed. In his opinion, with my magic abilities blocked I was only a warrior prone to physical exhaustion.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said, then went for me again.
He showered me with blows, forcing me to spend my physical energy blocking them. His own strength and stamina were literally off the scale.
Finally, I caught him off-guard and gave him a brief illustration of my point. The Sword of a Neuro sliced through Dietrich’s bracer, extracting a faint bluish cloud of neurograms from the shallow wound.
That wouldn’t kill him but it’d teach him a lesson.
Dietrich recoiled, covering himself with his massive shield and giving me a chance to restore. His shock and disbelief were genuine. Even though the surrounding darkness had already healed his wound, he now knew that there was no escape for him. He could still activate the portal and flee, promising himself never to get anywhere near Rion again.
Now he’d have to give all Neuros a wide berth. We had a weapon capable of destabilizing and ripping apart his hybrid identity!
Charges of lightning clung to his sword, elongating it. He lowered it in a wide sweeping motion, hitting the nearby trees, lopping off several branches and showering the ground with trembling leaves.
The blow grazed me, stripping me of 15% life. Even my shield hadn’t helped much. It now sported a deep fire-swept scar which had dropped my gear’s durability 30%.
By now, Dietrich had gone completely berserk. There was no stopping him. His lightning sword drew another semicircle through the air, followed by a series of blows which forced me to constantly somersault from one spot to another.
I was so happy for my Cargonite Golem and our sparring practice! It had proved truly priceless.
“I like your agility-” Dietrich cut himself short, sensing danger. He swung round, blocked my blow, then launched into a response combo, throwing in a fire attack for good measure.
A wall of flames reared up before me. Dietrich’s sword came down on me as he performed a leaping blow, pointing his weapon diagonally down.
My shield split in two. My left arm turned numb.
Immediately, a flash of green light erased the pain, momentarily blinding Dietrich, as the Charm of Nature that Enea had given me crumbled to dust, absorbing all incoming damage.
An uneasy balance hung in the air. Both of us gasped, trying to restore. An impregnable thick wall of ashes encircled the scene of combat. The earth underfoot was blackened by fire. Tree branches smoldered. The humming of magic dampers reverberated through the air.
Noticing my life bar filling all the way back to 100%, Dietrich cussed unintelligibly. He put his shield back into his inventory and exchanged his weapon for a double sword: two long massive blades attached to both ends of a thick wooden haft.
A fetid haze of poison enveloped the blades. I could make out the Founders’ symbols on the microchipped steel.
Dietrich clenched his teeth and came after me.
The tree next to me shuddered, sliced vertically in two. Whiffs of the poison spiraled through the air.
Dietrich stood in disbelief. I couldn’t have microported out of his sword’s path, surely? Procuring the magic dampers was supposed to have secured his advantage.
He was right. One thing he hadn’t considered was that I still had my Neuro combat abilities. My maxed-out Reflex Optimization had allowed me to dodge his lethal attack.
I performed a series of response blows, leaving deep dents in Dietrich’s armor. Some of his fresh wounds started to seep neurogram haze.
Losing parts of his identity, Dietrich microported out of reach of my coup de grace and swung round.
A thick gray mist formed around him, building three warriors out of the ashes. They were armed with Spears of Gloom.
Four on one? This ratio left me no chance. There was no way I could successfully use Exorcism now. All I had left available was Centurion.
I activated it, summoning Helmud the Knight.
A flash of light sliced through the darkness. Helmud the Knight raised his shield, parrying the darkness’ attacks. A golden aura surrounded his outline.
Two more enemy warriors stepped out of the cloud of gloom. There were five of them now!
I hurled a Disintegration Potion at the curtain of darkness which now concealed the First Reaper. I switched the grip on my sword, grabbing it with both hands and boring through my enemies in a long spiraling pirouette. That was something White had taught me.
Two of the warriors crumbled into a flurry of ash flakes, immediately replaced by even more menacing figures.
Acid hissed. It sounded like my Disintegration Potion had hit its target!
Helmud was fighting with a recklessness born of desperation. He realized the situation perfectly well. He knew he’d been summoned back from oblivion for a couple of minutes at most. So he gave it his all.
If only he were more prudent! I’d leveled up a lot since our last meeting — and the duration of this summoning had grown accordingly too.
Ignoring all incoming damage, Helmud hacked his way through the enemy ranks. Then he entered the swirling gray cloud.
The darkness fell apart, separating into layers of mist. Just as his brief existence expired, Helmud sliced through Dietrich’s shield. With his gauntleted hand he ripped an amulet off Dietrich’s neck — an exact copy of my own Charm of the Sovereign.
Beams of light shredded the darkness, scorching it and critting the dark warriors.
With a bitter heart I realized what had just happened. I’d never be able to summon Helmud again. He’d just sacrificed himself in order to release a little transcendental energy into this world.
The safe cocoon of Dietrich’s passive shields and protection auras burned out almost instantly. His oxidized armor darkened. His runes faded.
The magic dampers reverberated, emitting an intense low humming noise. The impervious wall of gray haze around the scene solidified, its swirls freezing in blocks of gray stone. No one could penetrate it now until the fate of this world was decided.
Dietrich resembled an anci
ent tank wreck.
The dents in his armor oozed with the bluish haze of neurograms escaping his wounds.
He attacked me again, furiously but illogically, using an erratic choice of physical and magic abilities.
Could these be his death throes?
I struggled to parry his blows. I had to survive this final attack without letting him crit me.
The Shield of Reason icon began to flash as Dietrich desperately tried to use fire, lightning and darkness all at once to destroy me.
He’d almost succeeded. Even though his name tag didn’t show his level, the sheer power of his attacks spoke for itself.
Then his movements slowed down. The neurogram discharges became more intense. Had he run out of steam?
Oh no, he hadn’t. He’d simply changed weapons. A poleaxe wrapped in a shroud of darkness appeared in his hands.
My sword was damaged, I could see that. Thin discharges of blue light crackled between the ancient microchipped symbols.
I couldn’t use it to block his blows anymore. I’d just have to dodge them. Still, by now my stamina was almost at zero, its green bar barely glowing, as some of the debuffs had affected me after all.
Suddenly, a fine web of cracks covered the magic damper rocks. The gentle new shoots of mountain vines peeked out of them: amazing plants capable of penetrating rock. So those were the seeds Enea had used!
Dietrich attacked me with renewed vigor. The powerful swings of his monstrous poleaxe left me no chance of dodging them. And I only had one ability left, the one I’d received just recently.
You’ve activated Steel Mist!
My split cargonite shield — which by now was utterly useless — disappeared in a silent flash. A faint cloud of tiny metallic particles enveloped me. They responded to the threat like living beings, accumulating in the area of the approaching blow.
With a metallic clang, the blade of Dietrich’s poleaxe shattered, leaving only the wooden shaft in his hands.
He staggered. His strength wasn’t infinite, either. I’d survived his attacks; the magic dampers had been destroyed while his own hybrid identity was rapidly disintegrating.
The unquenchable hatred in his glare burned a hole in me.
“You’ll never win!” he gasped. “Ever! You can’t!”
I invested all my remaining strength into a final lunge, burying my sword deep into his chest.
Neurograms gushed out of the wound.
The First Reaper dropped his broken poleaxe. Mechanically he grabbed at my sword’s blade trying to pull it out of the wound but couldn’t.
“You can’t win,” he croaked. “I’ll have the last word. You’ll die slowly... while watching the love of your life...”
His avatar rippled with surges of interference and began to crumble to ashes.
A flurry of strange-looking codes flashed before my eyes, followed by absolute darkness.
Chapter Nine
In Limbo
A DULL LIGHT assaulted my eyes.
I struggled to breathe. The air was cold and smelled of medication.
A pump heaved rhythmically next to my bed’s headrest. My throat was rasping. My stomach was in stiches. Gradually, the pain began to subside.
Was this the real world?!
I was shuddering uncontrollably. The contract I’d signed with Infosystems had no provision for logging out.
Did that mean that Dietrich, in the last moments of his existence, had somehow managed to send my identity back into my mangled physical body which I’d been forced to give up after the car crash?
So what? Big deal, I could always log back in again. What had he been trying to achieve?
I struggled to make out my surroundings through the layer of brown dust covering the capsule’s transparent lid. I could barely move. My normal physical perception hadn’t come back to me quite yet. Virtually all of my nerve endings echoed with pain.
An alarm beeped. My mind cleared. System messages flashed through the inside of the capsule’s lid,
Metabolic correction completed
Please wait while we’re uploading new plugins to your neural interface
Your avatar has been temporarily disabled
Warning! Your neural implant is about to be restarted. This can cause temporary perception failures.
The messages disappeared. The stench of medications was gone. I could breathe freely now. The air was fresh and cold.
Success! Your neural implant has been restarted.
Please don’t try to get up or open the in-mode capsule. Environment scanning in progress.
Environment scanner report:
Radiation levels: lethal
Air toxicity levels: lethal
Please wait while we’re searching for the nearest evacuation module
Ignoring the system warnings, the capsule’s pneumatic drives hissed. The lid rose and slid backwards, letting the outside air in.
Mechanically I held my breath. Too late.
All the sensors began beeping. My mind blurred.
* * *
When I came round, I felt weak and unwell. New messages from the reinitialized neural implant appeared on the inside of my eyelids,
Your body’s cybernetic components are being reactivated. Please don’t try to stand up.
The servodrives squeaked.
My right arm and both my legs moved against my will.
I’d never bothered to wonder about all the consequences of that fateful car crash on my physical body. Once I’d signed the waiver agreeing to have the trial version of the implant installed, my life had been confined to virtual reality. I’d never taken Borisov’s promises too seriously. At the time, all his assurances that my physical body would receive cutting-edge medical treatment, including all the latest breakthroughs in both servomechanics and neural cybernetics, had sounded pretty fantastical. In any case, I hadn’t believed any of them.
Testing completed
System report:
Your body’s organic content: 40%
Condition: Poor
Your body’s cybernetic content: 60%
Condition: Fully operational
Motor skills synchronization in process...
Data exchange test in process...
Reflex check in process...
Congratulations! All your virtual reflexes and skills have been saved. You can now use them in the real world.
Warning! The micro nuclear batteries feeding your cybernetic prosthetics are running low. Please replace the batteries.
Current charge available: 12.5% of the batteries’ full capacity.
The squeaking of the servodrives faded to a faint rubbing.
Overcoming instinctive (and perfectly natural) fear, I opened my eyes.
Dozens of wires and tubes disengaged themselves from my body and hung in thick bundles, then got sucked out of my field of sight.
My vision filled with the icons of my game interface which hovered in front of my eyes, overlapping reality.
The interface was slightly different this time. Everything pertaining to magic was now gone, replaced by new foldable windows reporting the data from my cyber prosthetics.
I was a cyborg.
The thought didn’t even hurt that much. For a brief second, it grated on my heart, then disappeared.
I glanced over the interface, swiping the windows open with my eye movements.
Infrared Vision
Environment Scanner
Life Form Detector
Energy Matrix Detector
Optical Multiplier
That much was pretty clear. Basically, they’d activated some additional sensory perceptions. I could use them, that’s for sure.
* * *
My first attempt to climb out of the capsule wasn’t very successful. Despite the recent synchronization, my cyber prosthetics responded much faster than my weak radiation-damaged muscles. Confused and disoriented, I lost my balance and struggled to control my awkward, jerky movements.
Afte
r several failed attempts, I finally climbed over the low side of the capsule and dropped to the floor.
Dietrich’s cold impassive words still hovered in my mind.
You’ll die slowly... while watching the love of your life-
I grabbed at a curved steel pipe running along the wall and pulled myself to my feet. I needed to take a look around.
The room must have suffered a lot in some technogenic catastrophe. The thick ceiling had caved in, a large gaping hole in it offering a peek of a gloomy sky.
Everything around me was covered in a thick layer of concrete dust. None of the computer terminals worked. Everywhere I looked, I saw signs of spontaneous combustion.
I took a tentative step. It seemed all right. I was adapting to my new state rather quickly. The cyber prosthetics automatically adjusted themselves to my reaction times and muscle tone.
The capsule next to mine was Enea’s.
I touched it, brushing off the thin layer of brownish dust, and stared at her face.
My throat tensed. My heart began to race.
I had to get a grip.
This must have been Dietrich’s plan from the start. He knew the exact location of our in-modes. So he’d set me up for this outcome regardless of whichever one of us won our duel.
He wanted me to die in the deserted bunker from the lethal dose of toxins and radiation while watching Enea in her safely pressurized capsule.
Bastard!
Well, he’d outsmarted himself this time, hadn’t he?
Borisov had kept his word. The Corporation had had my mangled body completely healed and restored. Sixty percent of it was now cyborgized but that didn’t make it any easier.
The Reapers (The Neuro 3) Page 27