Login Re:Coded: A LitRPG Novel (Incipere Online Book 2)

by R J Triveri

  “She was clicking on that screen last I saw her,” Nyx said as she joined the search.

  “That doesn’t mean she came with us,” Mac pointed out as he surveyed the land, or what he could see.

  As the four looked around for their party leader, a more pressing matter pushed itself to the surface:

  Boss Challenge has begun!

  Tactics Rules Engaged.

  Objective: Reach the other side of the floor and trigger the victory button before the guardian eliminates the entire group.

  “That… doesn’t seem good,” Allen said as he leaned on his staff casually. “So, we just have to make it to the other side and press a button? Why does that sound too easy?”

  “Because anything that sounds easy in a dungeon is a trap,” Mac replied before looking over at a rather worried-looking Dante.

  “Maybe that’s where River is?” Dante offered as he stepped forward and accidentally used his face to discover that his progress had been restricted by an invisible wall.

  Error: Tactics Rules are in effect. A bridge or raft is required to cross a body of water.

  “I’m starting to agree with why River hates this place,” he said, pushing his hand against the invisible barrier. All around them, the stream of a pebble river raged that hadn’t been there just a moment ago. “Now what do we do?”

  ***

  Back in the tactical chamber, Reflection stared at the symbols and images representing the two groups out on the tactic floor.

  “It’s your move,” Reflection said, rather pleased with herself after having drawn the river around River’s friends as her first move.

  Looking through all of her options, River felt overwhelmed with the knowledge at hand. She couldn’t fight. Of course, she couldn’t fight. She was good at that, but she couldn’t let them down. Reviewing the rules, she did what she could, her best.

  Opening the RTS inventory, she found a simple bridge and pressed it. The bridge glowed softly and began to overlay the land on the table as she guided it to where it belonged.

  ***

  “Umm, guys?” Dante began as he pointed out over the landscape. “Please tell me you see that.”

  “Would that be the bridge floating in the air?” Nyx asked as it floated, defying all known rules of physics, above their river.

  “Glad I’m not going crazy.”

  “I’ve seen stranger,” Allen commented as he watched the object float impossibly easy in the low sky above the river in front of them. A moment later, the image slammed into the ground with the solid thud of a meteor and materialized into a bridge built from the same material as the rest of the dungeon floor. “Still not the strangest thing I’ve seen today.”

  “Agreed,” Dante said and tapped a foot against the stonework. “It seems solid though, and I’m not getting the error message.”

  “Then let’s move,” Mac ordered. “The sooner we get to the other side, the sooner these shenanigans will be over.”

  “Shenanigans?” Nyx asked as she followed orders.

  “What? I like the word.”

  Dante shook his thoughts and worry away and looked to the space beyond the bridge. “Well, we’ve got a long way to go. It looks to be at least a mile and...” The ground shook with his words as something beyond their vision moved… loudly… “Something’s waiting for us.”

  And the world changed again.

  ***

  A large image appeared at the far side of the map as River’s group crossed the bridge into the main area of the RTS map. It was quickly populated by Reflection to be full of rolling hills and a few lakes. The creature, though monster would have been better with how jagged and tall it seemed to be, took five steps and stopped. Even here away from the map, River could feel the world shake as whatever it was crashed into the ground again and again.

  “What the Hell is that?”

  “I’m not one to remind someone of something they’ve forgotten.” Reflection never seemed to stop smiling since she had come into existence and waved a finger at her counterpart. “You have your representatives, and I have mine. That’s all you need to know, now that yours and mine have moved, I believe it’s my turn again.” Opening a screen like River had, Reflection selected a building and placed it just beyond the next horizon from Dante’s group. It only took her a moment to confirm the move and look back at her source. “Your turn.”

  “Wait, didn’t you already move?”

  Reflection nodded. “As the region boss, I get to also alter the environment when new groups enter it without using up my turn.”

  River groaned as her screen reappeared. First, no combat and now the boss gets extra turns? To make matters worse, River and Reflection seemed to have different inventories. She hadn’t seen the house in hers, so there was no telling what it could have been. Maybe her group could just avoid it? They did have Dante after all, and he wasn’t a slouch. She didn’t have much more time to think as Reflection rapped her fingers against the glass.

  “Could you stop that?” she asked, more out of annoyance than anything else.

  “Does it bother you?”

  Before she could stop herself, River answered honestly. “Yeah.”

  “Then no.” If River’s fist could reach across the table, she would have decked the copy just for the snide tone she carried. “Though I suggest you move a bit quicker. They’re coming up on the cabin.”

  Noticing the group moving towards the house from the sky, River frantically began searching for anything that might help the group. Landing on the bottom page, it was her turn to smile as she dragged an object from the window to the game board next to the house’s entrance. “Beat that.”

  ***

  A moment after the group began to trek towards the sound, the group could only watch in horror as another object fell from the sky. Their dismay only grew as a smaller meteor fell in the same region a bit later.

  “What the hell is wrong with this place?” Dante reiterated as they reached the crest of the hill.

  As the group looked down into the valley of the hills, a house and a rather large pile of crates marked with the word explosives stamped into the side of each one sat waiting for them to decide what to do about it.

  “I think we should avoid that,” Nyx offered as the group stared at the odd sight for a few moments. “It looks a little on the deadly side.”

  “Did your abilities tell you that?” Dante asked with a hint of sarcasm and a grin.

  She cocked an eyebrow at him and shook her head. “Common sense, Dante. Would you really go near a place that looked ready to blow?”

  “I think we can all agree to no for that,” Mac answered for him as they began to back off from their original plan and continued forward. An empty, ominous silence continued to enshroud them while they pushed forward towards the next ridge. Only the echo of footfall on stone sounded their presence as they switched into party chat to avoid giving themselves away.

  ***

  In the tactics room, things had started to become more interesting for the pair.

  “Clever,” Reflection said with the first hint of something other than happiness River had heard since their first meeting. Staring down her reflective source, the glass-hewn woman’s facade broke for only a moment. A quiver of anger against her smile was enough to tell River all she needed to know.

  But, she wasn’t about to give up her tilt. River simply grinned at the compliment. A dark, sinister tone entered her voice as she brought her screen up and waited for the dungeon master’s next move. “I’m nothing if not clever and subtle.” Whether she was just a Wild One or nothing more than a bad copy, River didn’t care anymore. She had access to one of the few things she really knew how to use in a tactical situation, twenty large crates of dynamite. “Now, make your move, so I can blow it up.”

  Reflection only nodded and tapped her screen, readying her next move. “As you wish.”

  Chapter: Thirty-Three: Reflection's Fault

  The Dungeon of Gla
ss - Level Three

  The current time is 2:15pm. The dungeon will end at 4:00pm.

  Your party has one hour and forty-five minutes left until ejection.

  SIFS chat disabled. Streaming still in progress.

  There were no words for the level of nerves the group had gained in their time traveling through the now literal miles of the tactics floor. No monsters made themselves known, and every time something spawned, a new pile of explosives formed next to it like clockwork. On a few particularly unlucky spawning events, a large explosion had quickly followed the compilation leaving a few of them worse for wear. If it hadn’t been for Allen’s quick thinking and spells, they might not have made it to the point they had as they neared the end of the rolling hills.

  No matter how close the call was, the near-death experiences didn’t seem to satisfy whoever was out to get them. Again and again, shelters, oases, even a small warren of rabbits were soon accompanied by one of the deadliest assortment of explosives the group had ever seen outside of cartoons. After the last blast, a crater as deep as they were tall smoldered for a few moments before anyone dared to move again. With one rogue spark in the right place, even Dante was beginning to doubt that the dungeon’s walls would hold.

  “Can we take a break?” Nyx asked as she looked around and confirmed that nothing new had spawned around them. “We’ve been walking for hours.”

  The last earthquake seemed closer than Dante wanted to admit, but he was enjoying leadership. “I don’t think it’s a good idea. The ground keeps shaking, and we still can’t see what’s causing it. I’d rather get out of here before we meet it or the whole place comes down on us.”

  Allen studied him carefully and shook his head. “As much as I hate to admit it, we need a rest. I’ve got some food, and it’d be good to get our strength up.” He hesitated for a moment. “But you’re the second-in-command, if you think we should keep moving, I’ll take that word as law.”

  An explosion from over the rise behind them frazzled Dante’s nerves further before he had a chance to speak. The rough shake of his bones was settled slightly as Sedai nuzzled his cheek from his shoulder. Taking a moment more to think as the adrenaline’s high ebbed, he finally spoke as he looked at Nyx’s hopeful face. “I think we need to keep moving.”

  A moment of silence followed. Nyx’s face fell as she seemed ready to argue that decision, and Allen seemed slightly disheartened as his normally sour smile scowled slightly. Mac was the only one that had any instance of understanding and made a point to approach their leader’s side.

  “It shouldn’t be much longer,” Mac pointed out, but with a shake of his head, he put his hand on Dante’s shoulder. “We’ll get ourselves out of here soon. Then our fearless leader here can treat us to something.”

  If that wasn’t enough, Allen nodded, put some weight onto his spear, and looked ahead before spouting the good news. “I think I can see the wall.”

  That perked Nyx up as she got back to her feet. “Alright!”

  “Stick together,” Dante ordered as Sedai jumped back to the floor. He looked carefully over the horizon and sighed. It couldn’t be this easy. “Whatever is going on is still out there. It will pick us off if we go off on our own, and we still haven’t seen the boss. No one is going to die under my watch.”

  ***

  Reflection grinned as she watched from her station, but there was only malice in that fractal facade. The dungeon boss had turned on the audio from the parties and listened to Dante’s words. “I think we need to re-evaluate his potential.” River’s screen was nearly empty as Reflection drew a river behind the group as her next move. “Your turn.”

  “I know,” she answered as she scrolled through the screen.

  River had gotten much more comfortable with the tactical screen and its concepts, but her options were still limited. In a short time, she learned that major events froze time for the floor while minor ones still allowed the groups to move easily. The latest move only made sense in one way. Reflection had cut off their escape route. Looking down at the map confirmed this as the boss’s symbol was gaining on the group and for some reason the end wall was close behind it. At least that was one question off her plate. However, why Reflection kept extending the field in front of the group while the wall kept time with the… thing was still her top question as she queried up another item.

  “Shit.”

  Her weapons were gone. There were no explosives left in her inventory to deter the group, but there was something she thought might be useful. Well, useful if they’d trust it enough thanks to what she’d been doing. As she selected the idea, she only tapped the screen for a moment before letting it go.

  ***

  A few feet away, a treasure chest crashed into the stony earth. Like steam rising from a hot street after a summer rain, pulverized stone wafted into the air as the chest settled into its small crater. When the group watched for a pile of explosives that never came, the curious nature of one member rose to the brim.

  “Well, it’s a treasure chest. Are we going to check it or just ignore whatever loot might be inside?” Nyx asked as she eyed the chest with eyes that nearly dripped emerald.

  Another moment passed as the group eyed it as if it could strike out at them at any moment. Still, no explosives appeared to ruin her excitement.

  “Well, it doesn’t seem like anything’s going to explode, so let’s make this quick,” Dante finally decided and held out his hand to it. “Detect.”

  Skill cost extracted - Familiar skill: Rebuff triggered! Dante Rior: 98% Integrity Remaining

  Scan Complete!

  100% Successful.

  Treasure Chest

  Variant: Crystal Chest

  Modifiers: None

  It’s a chest with treasure. Open it up to find out what’s waiting inside.

  No traps appeared, no mobs were hidden, nothing pinged as his directed skill showed him nothing that they couldn’t already see. “It’s safe.”

  Knowing she’d have to give it up later didn’t abate her excitement at opening a new chest. Touching the box opened its inventory and showed only a small trifecta of items: an orb of blue crystal inscribed with blue runes, a pouch of some kind, and a book wearing a blue ribbon. However, her words betrayed her as the items vanished into Dante’s inventory per the party settings. “Aww.”

  On the other end, Dante was more than happy to look at the new tools.

  Items Acquired!

  1x Sapphire Lapis Focus

  14x Shimmerdust

  1x Skill Book (Unidentified)

  “Swing and a miss,” she finished and watched as Dante materialized the items one by one to examine more closely.

  Sapphire Lapis Focus

  Level 2 Magical Focus (Class Neutral)

  Basic Damage Rank 1 - Low

  Attack Speed - Slow - Blunt Damage

  Rare Variant Attributes:

  Shatterproof: This weapon cannot be broken by normal means. Reflective Force is exempt from this ability.

  Focus V: Mitigates the integrity cost of spells and abilities by 20%.

  14x Shimmerdust

  Common Crafting Material / Throwable Weapon

  Shimmerdust is the result of the forced crushing of any crystal of glass-based crafting material. Dangerous to inhale, shimmerdust is unique in the fact that it has two uses as a thrown weapon or as a base to construct better glass components.

  1x Skill Book (Unidentified)

  Level 4 Tome of Knowledge

  Class Skill - Unknown

  Skill books are rare tomes of knowledge that impart the knowledge of passive and active skills. This information is locked by the identification seal until it has been identified by the proper class.

  Giving each item Dante materialized a once-over, Nyx questioned the usefulness of the focus. “Upgrade?”

  He materialized it again and held it up to compare to the Graystone Focus he normally used. It was half the size of the crystalline sphere rested in his hand,
but it seemed so much more fragile. The blue runes ran with the aforementioned lapis and shimmered with the light of enchantment as he tipped it back and forth to examine every surface. A greedy smile crossed his face as the dull stone focus vanished back into his inventory for the time being. “It’s not legendary or anything, but foci are hard enough to find. It’s got a huge spell-cost reduction too, so it’s going to make things interesting.”

  Nyx gave him a quizzical stare. “So… yes?”

  “Situationally, yes.” He nodded to himself as it vanished back into his inventory and turned his attention back to her. “I’ll keep the others for now, and we’ll distribute the rest when we’re out of here.”

  There were no objections from the rest of the group, but then again, there wasn’t time for it.

  An earth-shattering boom followed quickly by a second rocked the four. It was closer now. With the earth shaking and the boom almost deafening, it had to be close. The land was only a little hilly though, so if it had been anywhere, they should have been able to see it.

  “What the hell is doing that?” Allen asked as his nerves showed. “Nothing that big should be able to hide if it makes that much noise.”

  Mac looked at him carefully and sighed. “Don’t tempt fate, Allen.”

  But his words were too little, too late.

  ***

  Reflection grinned as those words echoed into the hidden tactics room. “I love when they set me up like that.” The ground flattened slowly, leaving nothing to view by the end of the wall and a distortion in the air. “By the way, this will be your last move now that they’re engaging the boss.” Her Cheshire, broken mirror of a smile returned for just a moment before she spoke again. “Better make it count.”

  River looked at the field again. It had zoomed in and the four were only steps away from the distortion. Why could they hear it and not see it? She wondered to herself as she flipped through her screens again. One chance, I need to make this count. Screen after screen provided no help to her. Suddenly, a thought occurred to her, and she nearly reflected the smile in her counterpart as she looked at the new building their treasure chest had gifted her. On the surface, it wasn’t anything special, but it was now the largest thing in her inventory. Seeing it, a dangerous idea crossed her mind, and she selected the large building to add to the field. A sinister smile crossed her face as the manic idea bloomed into fruition. She never said the space had to be unoccupied.