But that all occurred to me on the move. Without a second to lose, I ducked past the champion, an invisible shadow slipping between the repairmen coming up, and headed below. The monster’s hulk once again filled the space above me, but it was too late. I was in. Below, a long, spiral staircase wound its way down, though there was nobody else hurrying up to the roof. I pulled my knees up to make sure I didn’t accidentally knock off any stray pebbles, held my arms out wide, and eased my way down, once again thrilled by how advanced Ulbaron was. That particularly hit home once I made it down a few turns and looked back up. The dim lighting and dusty air showed me a slender red beam next to one of the stairs — if I’d been walking, I would have tripped it. Turning and heading back up, I studied the trap. It was your standard laser alarm. The fact that it was embedded in the wall meant it had been part of the original construction, and it was turned on. That told me quite a bit. For example, there was a creature somewhere controlling however many lasers there were — I was going to have to be careful, even looking around for cameras. I could only assume there were a few of them, with somebody off monitoring the feeds. Just as I’d assumed, Earth tech worked fine inside the protective field.
I came across three more lasers on my way down. Two were next to steps; one was chest-high. It was a good thing I’d found the first one, as I was able to look around and find them before I got close. Having flown through without tripping any of the alarms, I found myself in the church’s main sanctuary. The string of monsters carrying electronics disappeared behind the altar and headed down another level. There were imprisoned people there, too. Tightly arranged in rows, the motionless mannequins were standing by a wall and paying no attention to the proceedings. And the monsters completely ignored their master’s dolls, not even glancing over at them as unavailable chunks of meat. Just in case, I checked my willpower. It was up to level 70, and the fact that I couldn’t hear any hypnotic voices in my head meant it was working fine.
Once again, I activated device control only to get nothing. The system message told me there were no devices within 45 meters. Of course, someone might just be hiding them. I tried not to think about another option — my level 90 wasn’t enough to get through the creature’s protection. Although…
Device control +10 (100).
You can’t boost skills past 100 until you have 100 set levels.
What the… Who made this damn game? I wanted to find them and tear them to pieces. Sure, I’d known I would come up against another barrier the game would throw up at some point, but I didn’t expect it to have anything to do with levels. Didn’t they say something about how all the restrictions are removed after level 100? But no… There was a new level 100 restriction, only that time it had to do with fixed level. What else will there be? I could only assume I’d eventually run smack up against yet another wall I never could have even imagined at the beginning. The game was anything but balanced.
Emotions are all well and good, but ten minutes later, I wasn’t feeling anything. My game items were gone, and I needed to keep moving. Looking around, I crept between the frozen people. Nobody’s going to stab me in the back, right? But no, none of them responded to my presence, though my head suddenly started hurting again. There was a flash up by the cupola, a burnt smell hit my nostrils, and a dull thump told me something had just hit the ground. Someone had fallen off the roof. A second later, three mannequins perked up and grabbed fire extinguishers on their way up to the roof. There had apparently been some kind of electrical short.
The monsters hauling equipment around started looking up nervously. There wasn’t much smoke, though there was enough for the even line to scatter. And no matter how loudly the champions standing by the door yelled in their foreign language, they couldn’t restore order. The superior monsters had no desire to be burned alive.
It was a great opportunity for me, and I quickly utilized it. Slipping along the wall past the altar, I found myself facing yet another ladder. Only that one definitely wasn’t original — judging by the edges and the pile of earth by the far wall, the opening had been made fairly recently.
Jumping to miss a monster coming up, I headed down. My calculations had told me the monsters appeared every twenty seconds, which meant I needed to find cover in that time. When the next changed appeared, I was huddled in a special niche in the wall. The scratches and dried spit told me it was for waiting in while monsters hauled equipment down. But in that moment, it was for me. The monster headed up without stopping, and I moved downward, counting off the next twenty seconds in my head.
I had to hide in niches three more times. Finally, with an even area opening up beneath me, I activated Zelda and crept out into the big cave hidden by its invisibility. There was no light, but Raptor took care of that, showing me a black-and-white model of the area. Getting to the wall and wedging myself in between two boulders, I looked around.
The cave had been made by shrews — the uneven walls made that much clear. And they’d done a good bit of work, as Raptor told me the cave was big enough to fit an entire soccer field in. Right in the middle, there was an enormous pile of equipment ten little, toothless creatures were pulling parts from. I’d seen monsters like that back when they were helping a larva. Is there something at that level here, too? If there was, I was in trouble, as I didn’t think I could take it on without explosives.
A chomping sound broke out. Looking over, I saw a creature biting down on the remains of some electronics. And they were indeed remains, as the toothless assistants pulled everything valuable out, tossed it away, and, with the help of ten hypnotized humans, cleared everything in the area into the gaping maw. I hadn’t even noticed it, assuming it was part of the wall. But as soon as it started chewing, Raptor decided to introduce us:
Disposal. Larva-level creature.
The parts deemed suitable for future use were dropped into a cart. When it was full, the mannequins pulled it away to the far wall, where there was something like a lift pulling it farther down.
A fat power cable ran right behind me. I noticed a low-frequency hum coming from it — the voltage sounded like it was through the roof. Following it with my eyes, I saw that it led upward, feeding the cross on the roof, and I very nearly cut through it. No, too suspicious here. The other end wound its way along the wall before disappearing down into the lift opening. Yet more champions checked every cart carefully, another blocking the way to the boss.
Time was becoming a factor. Waiting for a moment when the monsters hauling equipment had their backs to each other, I flew over to the other side of the cave and started moving cautiously along the wall. The disposal was near where I’d started, and I had no desire to see how well Ulbaron would stand up to its teeth. And with everyone busy, nobody paid any attention to the shadow flitting past. The fact that there wasn’t any lighting told me the monsters could see perfectly well in the dark. They were also moving easily and with purpose, even the hypnotized people moving their carts around objects like they knew what they were doing.
When I got to the lift, I stopped. The champions were standing too close to each other for me to get past. As each cart was rolled over, another one stepped up and held a device up to it before signaling for it to be transported down. The guards stepped aside, and the cart was pushed onto the platform. A minute later, the platform was back with a newly emptied cart. Neither the parts nor the hypnotized human were anywhere to be seen.
Wait, a device?! I couldn’t really make out the different parts in the dark myself, and I couldn’t risk heading over to see what the device was. Regardless, it was apparently something from our world — nothing else worked down there.
Standing there for a good half hour, I tried to catch a moment where I could jump past the monsters. No such luck. My only options were jumping out and fighting my way down or… Hm… The next cart came back up, and one of the champions shoved it to the side. A human mannequin stepped over to push it off toward the mountain of electronic devices. Bingo!
&n
bsp; I had to wait two more turns to figure out where the carts were ending up. But as soon as the next set of parts was sent below, I pressed myself against the wall and crept over to the spot. The lift came back, and the cart very nearly smacked directly into me. One of the humans separated from the rest. As soon as he got close, I leaped to my feet, giving him a blow to the back of the head that was just heavy enough to knock him unconscious. I sure hope that thing isn’t controlling them all remotely. But no, it was apparently a predesigned schematic, so I was able to ease the body to the ground, grab the cart, and head over to the loading point. The hardest part was jerking around without overturning my load.
The toothless helpers filled the cart with cables and microchips, ripping them out of TVs, phones, and tape recorders. I never would have thought aliens would have the slightest interest in our technology. But when the last part was dropped into the cart, the creature turned away, figuring it was full enough. Staggering and twitching, I headed for the lift. A champion stepped forward. Everything inside me tightened — it was holding a scanner. A game scanner, one that even my device control hadn’t picked up, and it was working fine inside the protective field. All Raptor could do was recognize the thing visually and give me the tersest of messages:
Sk-X scanner.
Level ten… How?! Where?! Where did the monsters get something like that?
I did my best to keep my breathing even as the champion ran the device over the cart, but sweat still streamed down my back regardless of Ulbaron’s cooling system. Finally, the screen blinked green, and the monster stepped to the side. The guards followed suit. As my heart pounded, I pushed the cart forward, the amount of adrenaline in my blood apparently approaching critical mass.
The platform jerked and headed downward. There was no roof, which let Raptor calculate how deep the shaft went — forty-two meters. Including the first ladder, the beast I was on my way to visit was a good hundred meters underground.
The lift shuddered to a halt, revealing a new cave. That one didn’t have any guards. In fact, there was nothing there but a pile of parts. Playing my role to the end, I pushed the cart over, dumped out its contents, and took a step backwards to let Raptor finish building a three-dimensional model of the area.
And that’s when everything started to happen.
A tentacle I hadn’t noticed tossed the cart away. The latter landed on the lift, heading immediately upward, while a second tentacle wrapped itself around me. Squeezing hard, it did its best to turn me into a freshly squeezed lemon. Only Ulbaron saved me as Raptor found the source of my problems and highlighted the pile of parts. The tentacles were reaching out from it.
Everything inside me wanted to slice through my assailant using Fang, but I bade my time. There was nothing I could do until I saw my opponent. In the meantime, the tentacle redoubled its attack to the point that my armor started to creak, and I even pulled out Fang just in case, though it all stopped suddenly. Just as quickly as it had appeared, the tentacle ducked back into the pile, dropping me onto the ground. The thought flashed through my mind that I was supposed to be cut in two with no way to move, so I let myself flop down motionlessly. Both eyes were fixed on Raptor.
The next beast appeared a minute later.
It was a spider, or at least, something that looked like one. Crawling out of a corner, it clung to every nook and cranny in the ceiling that it could find, coming at me upside down. There was a head, a body, and eight long, multi-jointed legs, two of which I thought were equipped with grasping devices. Something like hands. Raptor told me nothing about its level, name, and equipment. All it could do was show a black-and-white projection edging sideways toward me.
Suddenly, I started hearing things.
You’re weak. It’s time to relax. You’re weak. It’s time to relax.
Against my will, my arms started feeling heavy and difficult to move. The spider hung directly above me, peering down with what looked like some kind of interest.
You’re tired. You want to sleep. You’re tired. You want to sleep.
The thing was so good that my eyes started closing, and there was nothing I could do. Just as I was losing consciousness, I spotted the power supply cable stretching out to the wall from the spider’s body. Wait, what? So that thing is feeding the cross on the cupola? It’s what’s controlling Dread and the soldiers? And it wants me dead?
A flash of rage returned my consciousness, if only my consciousness. I still couldn’t move my body. But that wasn’t important — I’d already worked around that in the game. Ulbaron’s drives worked beautifully with mental commands. With the spider hanging directly above me, I kicked all the drives on my back into full gear. It was quite the takeoff. In fact, it was such a fast takeoff that I pinned the terrifying spider to the ceiling. Legs broke with a crunch, and the voice disappeared from my head, though I still couldn’t think straight. Knowing that I had neither the opportunity nor the energy to hold off a new attack, I had to make my next move. The next drives to fire were on my right arm. One of the bent it at the elbow, while the other hurled it at the pinned spider. The third command — also mental — made my ritual danger spring into my palm. It thirsted for blood.
Surprisingly, I wasn’t able to punch a hole through the spider’s body on the first try. Fang felt like it was stuck in something tough and viscous, though it kept pushing ahead of Ulbaron’s drives. But I had no idea what happened next. There was no me left to think about that — I was already asleep.
I only found out how the battle ended an hour later. Lying in complete darkness, I wasn’t able to move. And it wasn’t because the monster was controlling me. No, Ulbaron was almost out of energy. All it had left was the backup there to let the player out, as it had spent the entire time I was asleep pinning the spider to the ceiling and thrusting Fang into its body. Looking up, I saw that it had been a success. The necrotic knife and even the rest of my arm were buried in the thing’s hulk.
There were no longer any voices in my head. The store was working beautifully, and I quickly bought enough energy blocks to supply all my equipment. Just in case, I replaced everything. There was no sense repeating the same mistake. A couple seconds later, I’d completed the job and activated all of Ulbaron’s functions, at which point I was finally able to pull my arm out of the monster’s body. It was a revolting moment. There were no guts remaining, just the empty shell. Throwing it to the side, I stood up. The only other creatures in the cave were a few people lying unconscious, all with carts. A few tentacles crept out of the main pile to twitch aimlessly as though disconnected from their brain.
Finally, Raptor realized I’d regained consciousness. It started vibrating to grab my attention.
You destroyed 3R32-221, equipment that came to Earth with the release team.
Title: Hero changed to Liquidator.
***
You’re the first player in the past 52 seasons to earn the title of Liquidator.
Level +150 (268).
150 free attribute points received.
***
The game owner named you Public Enemy No. 1 and applied the Outcast penalty to you.
The game owner paid the creator a penalty for applying the Outcast penalty to a natural release player.
Monster levels reduced by 1 (current level: 3).
Note! Outcast cannot be applied to personified noa.
***
You took the first picture of a dead release team member. 6000000 coins received.
The spider’s body flickered and disappeared, leaving a small chest in its place. It was the same old wooden, iron-encased type of thing the pirates used to go with. And as I pulled it open, the breath caught in my throat, a smile spreading across my face. Are part of my problems finally over with?
Seven noa stones were shimmering in front of me. Where can I find another couple?
Chapter 11
FANG SPLIT the twitching tentacle in half. There was no more sense hiding, so I turned on a flashlight to check the thing o
ut. It wasn’t a living creature, per se. Instead, it was part of a robot made out of materials at hand on Earth. Nothing about it had anything to do with the game.
Incidentally, the strange field had disappeared with the death of the robot, the game once again coming into its own. Everything on me was back at my disposal. Unsure of what to expect up above, I went ahead and called Gardine. Father Dread and the soldiers were all back to normal the way I’d assumed they would be, and they were busy looking around in wonder and amazement. None of them had any memory of what had happened since the moment they’d been hypnotized. For the troops, that was when they found the clergyman; for the latter, it was when the flying saucer had descended on the forest. Giving them the go-ahead to release the prisoners, as they no longer represented a threat, I hung up and stared at the opposite wall.
A flying saucer?
Sure, I’d seen with my own two eyes the spot where some enormous piece of equipment had turned the giant trees into firewood. I hadn’t wanted to believe it, but the robot spider had come out from cover on its own, which meant it had someone helping it. Maybe even multiple someones. There was also its super-duper ship capable of wiping out whole sections of forest. So, where was its cover?
Pearl of the South (World of the Changed Book #2): LitRPG Series Page 14