by Ivan Shaman
“Hi, guys!” He waved to them. “What’s happened? Why are you so gloomy?”
“Why are we so gloomy?” Jack grunted. “Lex, this is your disciple, please explain it to him before I kill him.”
“What should be explained? What’s the matter?” Demon asked, not understanding. Lex covered his eyes with his hand and muttered something.
“You’re a fucking psycho,” Kris said, staring at him with wide-open frightened eyes. “You should be killed…”
“Why? It’s just a game...” he started, but Jane approached him and, looking into his eyes, she slapped his face. His head buzzed. The pain was more than real, and the slap knocked him to the floor.
“Demon, this isn’t a game! Do you see what you've done?” He obediently looked around. The bodies, which had been piled against the wall of the hangar, were now scattered around the morgue like rag dolls. “We’re here. We’re real. And you too!”
He couldn’t endure it anymore. The fragile barrier of indifference collapsed, and Demon realized that he had just desecrated and thrown around nearly a thousand bodies. The stupor exploded in wild hysterics, and tears flowed from his eyes. The Light, why? Why did it bring him back to this horrible world?! Why did it doom him to existence in this nightmare world?
Jack put him against the wall and squatted down next to him.
“Now you seem to understand how we all felt when we came back,” the Goliath said quietly. “Well, at least it’s clear you’re not as monstrous as the Emperor. It’s good.”
“Leave him alone,” Kris scowled. “We have nothing to do here. Let’s not waste time on him.”
Chapter 8. Eco-house
“Please, stop. Help me,” Demon muttered, trying to get up.
“There’s nothing we can do,” Kris growled, heading toward the door.
“The bodies need to be piled,” the Cannibal answered, struggling to stand up and holding on to the metal wall of the hangar to keep himself from falling. “Help me to pile them properly.”
“We’ll help,” Jane said calmly. “Yes, men?” She looked at Lex, who hesitantly nodded.
“We’ll help. Why not,” Jack rumbled. “Come on, Luminary.”
The four of them piled the bodies neatly against the wall. But, no matter how hard they tried, they had to stack them. Demon walked unsteadily along the rows of thousands of dead bodies. He was full of terror. How could he have pumped out nanomachines from all of them? Even if they were already dead. The rest pumped up exactly the same way, only using the bodies of their enemies, not their brethren. He was sick.
“That’s good,” Lex remarked when they were leaving the hangar.
“What’s good?” The Cannibal mumbled. He could hardly walk.
“It’s good that you feel bad. After what you did, it’s a perfectly normal reaction.” He patted Demon on the shoulder. “You’ll be fine.”
“How do you live with that?” He asked, looking into the Luminary’s eyes. “Because to level-up, you have to kill living people.”
“Well, that’s a different matter. People are our enemies. It’s easier,” Lex said, hesitating. “Although I know what you mean. You have to understand, it’s either us or them.”
“But it’s wrong. We must find another way. We must make contact.”
“Do you really think they want to contact us?” Jane enquired with a heavy note of bitterness in her voice. “Even after what you saw in the hangar? Do you think that parents will ever be able to forgive us for their dead children? Do you think we will ever forgive ourselves for that?”
Demon shook his head. Now he understood why people were so frantically trying to destroy them. Wars sometimes began with a much smaller cause – a murder of a prince or a count, a student strike, or the overthrowing of a corrupt president. But they were culpable in the deaths of thousands of children. It wouldn’t surprise him to find out that people also blamed them for the terror act.
“Where are you going?” Jack asked Lex.
“To the northern TPS. We must get it under control and make sure it won’t be recaptured as the southern one has been.”
“Don’t they have their own Luminary?” Kris, who had joined them, wondered aloud.
“Yes, they do. Marcus, as far as I remember. But he’s alone there, and nearby, a military base of people has appeared,” the Luminary spat through his teeth. “They have already tried to recapture it. We must nip it in the bud before it’s too late.”
“You want to attack a military base?”
“No, we just need to strengthen our defenses and make sure that each new outing is more dangerous for them than the previous one.” Lex smiled at his thoughts. “The task isn’t difficult, but it could prove to be very important.”
“It’s great. So, my disciple and I will go with you,” the Goliath said, putting his arm around Lex’s shoulders. Demon noticed how the Luminary’s knees buckled under the hug. “We’ll fight the southern TPS back when the Masters repair the plant and the wind turbines.”
“Can they really be restored?” Demon was surprised.
“Yeah, of course, but we need to change out some wires.” The Goliath looked at him with displeasure. “Our masters can easily do it.”
“You should see what Dwalin can do with devices and equipment!” Lex smiled. “He’s a real Grandmaster. He can build a tank out of nothing.”
“We’ll go with you,” Jack repeated. “Kris’ll have some training, and I’ll warm up before the southern TPS. Would you mind?”
“No, of course, not. That is if you aren’t afraid of Demon.” Lex turned around. “Hey, Demon, do you mind? You won’t eat them at night will you?” He asked mockingly, but the Cannibal saw a mixture of disbelief and fear in his eyes.
“Of course, I won’t,” he muttered in response, carefully watching the interlocutors. “When are we going?”
“Tomorrow morning. We’ll eat and sleep first. Where are you going to sleep?”
“I don’t know,” Demon whispered. He had no hope that Jane would shelter him after today’s excursion to the morgue. “I’ll find something.”
“You’ll go to my place,” Jane said confidently. “Tomorrow, I’m going with you.”
“What are you doing, Jane?” Kris looked at the girl carefully. “Why do you have to be such a pain in the ass?”
“While we were piling the corpses, I remembered how Reverend Alexander ran my grandmother’s funeral,” Jane answered calmly. “She’s the first relative I’ve remembered in two months.”
“Yeah, it’s important,” the Goliath agreed. “You can’t miss the chance. I approve of your decision.”
“Okay, I don’t mind,” Lex confirmed. “Take care of my disciple.”
“I won’t promise, but I’ll try.” Jane nodded. “Although it’s unlikely that he’ll want anything today.”
“Yeah, I think you’re right.” Looking back at Demon, the Luminary smiled. “By the way, today is a celebration of the triple anniversary!”
“What are you talking about?” The Cannibal asked. “Is it someone’s birthday?”
“It’s yours, dummy. Look at your stats.”
He opened the character panel and fell into a stupor. Of course, he’d tried very hard while he had been in a trance, and then they’d piled up almost a thousand people, but the result was still shocking.
Demon, Cannibal, level 30
Strength:
70
Dexterity:
45
Intelligence:
70
Perception:
62
Stamina:
45
Available stat points:
420
Available skills:
25
Available talent points:
28
Available skills: Experienced (recommended skill), Training, Melee, Shooter, Master, Hard skull, Quiet step, Strongman, Connection.
“Wow,” he mumbled.
“Wow,” Kris echoed him, “You’ve
leveled-up twenty-three levels in five hours, without even killing anyone. I wish I were as lucky as you.”
“Take the skill ‘Cannibal’ and go to the morgue,” Demon snapped, looking indecisively at the talents, stats, and skills that had just become available.
“No, thank you. Eat corpses yourself. I prefer live people.”
“Do you think it’s really better?” Jane muttered quietly. “Alex, think carefully what you’ll do with this fortune.”
“The situation is unusual,” Lex remarked, “but not surprising. Most importantly, it’s clear what to do next. Pump all your stats until they reach 150 and then take ‘Immortality”. Then you can just play it by ear.”
“Why don’t you have ‘Immortality’ then?” Jack asked. “That’s strange. You have no talent higher than level 20.”
“It’s simple. Have you seen Caesar’s title?”
“‘Blazing’. It’s difficult to ignore it.”
“Well, he got it upon reaching the seventy-fifth level, but it’s available from the sixty-fifth. I’ll take it as soon as reach it. It’ll increase my control range to two thousand yards.” Lex grinned. “He put everything he had into ‘Intelligence’. But I took some training instead of the skills on the twentieth level. So, I’m very strong.”
“Well, not stronger than me,” the Goliath chuckled, crushing the iron pillar in one motion.
“No, of course, not, but you know who’ll win our fight?” The Luminary smiled back.
“The Emperor,” Demon said calmly, but this name immediately extinguished all smiles. “Explain what he is? I saw his titles with great difficult – even after he showed them to me. And his gun! I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“Really?” Jack asked. Bending his right arm at the elbow, he clenched his fist sharply, and a meter-long blade popped out of it. “This is the so-called ‘Punch’. You have it too, according to your skills. And this...” he tapped his chest and a dull metallic sound came, “is horn armor of the tenth level.”
“It’s not the same. He has a gun. It shoots!”
“I’m not completely sure,” Lex replied, hesitating, “but it seems to be a bonus when you get the ‘Artillerist’. However, the only one I saw with such a gun, constantly complained about the huge reload and its low accuracy.”
“It was said the range was up to fifteen thousand yards, and it had the maximum armor-piercing capabilities. It fired shots every ten seconds.”
“How were you able to see the characteristics of his weapon?” Jack asked. “You can’t see stats and Specialization yet.”
Demon shrugged. “He showed it to me.”
“Fifteen thousand yards,” Lex muttered. “There are two options: either he’s decided to kill us all so that we can’t take him under our control, or he’s intended to clean up the military port alone. I hope it’s the second option.”
“He must have a problem with accuracy, anyway,” Jack insisted. “Have you ever seen a built-in weapon which is both accurate and long-range?”
“Nope,” the Luminary responded, “but that’s no reason to relax. We need to notify all the seniors. Kris, go to Padre, he is at the farthest western checkpoint. You, Jack, go to Caesar, and I will go to the south. Let’s meet up again tomorrow morning.”
“What should I do?” The Cannibal asked in confusion.
“Choose some proper skills and stats?” Lex smiled. “So you’re not at a loss, pump up your ‘Intelligence’ and ‘Perception’ to one hundred and fifty each, and then you’ll understand a lot more. At least you’ll be able to read about talents. Jane, keep an eye on him, he’s rather inexperienced.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll look after him.” Jane waved to the rapidly receding Luminary. “Let’s go home?”
“Yes, to relax and level-up.” Demon nodded.
They went up to the tenth floor, and he immediately added eighty points to his ‘Intelligence’ and eighty-eight points to his ‘Perception’. The world immediately changed – now it played with new colors, and it bloomed with new smells and sounds. However, it wasn’t a pleasant experience for Demon. He could smell mold and rust; he could hear water running through the pipes and the piles creaking in the wind. Everything around him looked gloomy. There were holes in the bedspread and clear traces of mice and insects.
The perception subsided a little bit later. Descriptions of items stopped emerging at first sight. Now it was possible to look around a little more calmly. Only when he held his gaze did the descriptions appear. He looked at Jane.
Jane, Immortal, level 28, like, level of needs – average
Strength:
150
Dexterity:
140
Intelligence:
100
Perception:
100
Stamina:
200
Basic skills: Immortality, Second Heart, Integrity, Primal Self
Battle skills: Jerk, Strongman, Instant Healing
“Wow,” he said. “Cool. Now I see your skills and stats.”
“Not only them,” Jane smiled, “I bet you also see the ‘Like’ status.”
“Do you see mine?” He asked, looking again. She likes me…
“Yes, only it’s my usual status, not meant for you personally.”
“What does ‘level of needs’ mean?”
“Oh, it’s the need for food, sleep, and satisfaction of my natural needs.” Jane was embarrassed. “Everything that the body needs, not the brain.”
“Do I have such statuses?” He enquired in surprise, and then he opened his character panel. “Oh, here they are.”
Needs
Food:
45%
Water:
23%
Sleep:
75%
Sex:
30%
“Well,” he muttered in confusion. “Does that mean that everyone who has ‘Perception’ of a hundred and above knows when I want to sleep?”
“Not only that,” she replied, blushing even more. “That’s why there are brothels. Everyone’s needs accumulate in different ways. The women and men whose needs grow more rapidly come here.”
“What about food and water? There is no industry and production; warehouses aren’t endless. It’s winter.”
“We have a kind of communism now: to each according to his needs, from each according to his abilities. People could slack off and lie, but we can’t do it. You want to lead, become a Luminary. To his song, the work is performed hundreds of times more effectively. We have freedom of choice. The Mind hasn’t given us useless skills.”
“Will you help me deal with what I have?” He asked hopefully.
“Sorry, no. The best way is actually to sit and figure it out by yourself.”
After these words, she left, and Demon opened his character panel.
What do I want to be?
Chapter 9. Choice
The number of skills available to him now was off the scale. He’d received 23 ordinary and 5 bonus stat points. He wasn’t even sure at first whether he needed so many. However, after reading the skill descriptions, everything fell into place. Each new level cost one point more. Therefore, the ‘Regeneration’ of the first level cost one skill point, and of the fifth level – five points. However, the difference was significant. The description indicated that the effectiveness of each level wasn’t doubled, but rather it increased exponentially.
Demon, Cannibal, level 30
Strength:
70
Dexterity:
45
Intelligence:
150
Perception:
150
Stamina:
45
Available stat points:
252
Available skills:
25
Available talent points:
28
Available skills: Experienced (recommended skill), Training, Melee, Shooter, Master, Hard skull, Quiet step, Strongman, Control.
&n
bsp; There were also many that required pumping stats and other skills. It was obvious that to get one of the leading skills he needed to spend at least twenty ordinary ones.
‘Immortality’ is a system of organs and mechanisms used to survive a direct hit from a firearm to the heart or head. Requirements: ‘Regeneration 3’, ‘Second Heart’, ‘Hard Skull 3’, and ‘Horn Armor 3’. Total is 6+1+6+6. They were 6s because he’d need to get levels 1 and 2 before taking level 3.
‘Invisibility’ is an ability to become invisible and inaudible to an enemy. Requirements: ‘Quiet step 3’, ‘Chameleon’, ‘Silent run 3’, and ‘Ninja 3’. It’s 6+1+6+6, so it would be 19 again.
The ‘Artillerist’ is a built-in rail gun, firing supersonic projectiles. It requires: ‘Shooter 3’, ‘Marksman’, ‘Sniper 3’, and ‘Commando 3’, so, once more, it would be 19.
The ‘Goliath’ is a growth and strengthening of the muscle tissue, bones and tendons to obtain suppressive physical strength. Requirements: ‘Melee 3’, ‘Strongman 3’, and ‘Strong back 3’. It also required the ‘Punch’, but he already had that.
The ‘Lord’ is a self-healing combat drone of fire support; shoots high-speed projectiles. Requirements: ‘Control 4’, and ‘Connection 4’. 10+9 was 19… again.
Wait, why nineteen? He looked through the taken skills and was surprised to find the ‘Connection’ first level he’d picked up. He’d forgotten all about it.
He checked the lists of inaccessible skills, and among them were ‘Luminary’, ‘Immortal’, ‘Ghost’ and ‘Absorber’, which could only be gotten at the fortieth level. At the hundredth level, there were ‘Super ruler’, ‘Terminator’, and ‘Archangel’. Each of them required pumping its own relevant skills. Having done some brief mental calculations, Demon suddenly understood that it was possible to pump up both the ‘Luminary’ and ‘Eternal’ only at the eightieth level. If he was to add in the ‘Absorber’ and ‘Artillerist’ options too, it was only possible at level 120.