The map of the Universe was replaced by four windows, each containing a piece of information about a particular class. The windows were aligned horizontally on the holographic screen. Above them was a single word CLASSES.
I examined the first window.
Damage
Class Description: Damage warriors deal the most damage to the enemy. Their abilities and skills allow them to constantly deal high amounts of damage.
Abilities: Battle Drone (Active Ability), Double Time (Passive Ability), Rage (Ultimate Ability)
Below it was a line of text and two buttons.
(Do you want to open the Damage Abilities tab: Yes/No)
I tapped the Yes button, and a new window with additional information popped up below.
Green Rune (Active Ability) — Battle drone
Description: Deploys an aerial drone that attacks enemies. If destroyed, it can be redeployed after cooldown.
Ammo: 300 rounds
Duration: 60 seconds
Cooldown: 60 seconds
Blue Rune (Passive Ability) — Double Time
Description: You move faster for a few seconds when enemy projectiles barely miss you.
Duration: 1 second
Red Rune (Ultimate Ability) — Rage
Description: When the Ultimate Ability is active, you become stronger, you move with increased speed, and your wounds heals much faster.
Duration: 10 seconds
Cooldown: 10 minutes
(Do you want to open the Damage Skills tab: Yes/No)
I pressed the Yes button. However, nothing happened. When I pushed it one more time and nothing happened again, I asked, “Echo, why the heck the Damage Skill tab won’t open?”
“You first need to pick a class before you can check out its skills,” Echo said.
“I see.”
I shifted my gaze to the second window.
Flanker
Class Description: Flank warriors are exceptionally good at both damage and mobility. They excel at sudden attacks, quick disappearances, and chasing enemies.
Abilities: Blink (Active Ability), Sixth Sense (Passive Ability), Teleport (Ultimate Ability)
(Do you want to open the Flanker Abilities tab: Yes/No)
I pressed the Yes button.
Green Rune (Active Ability) — Blink
Description: Teleport forward a short distance.
Maximum distance: 15 meters
Cooldown: 60 seconds
Blue Rune (Passive Ability) — Sixth Sense
Description: The spectral Voice warns you when there is danger within the effective range when you are not aware of it.
Effective range: 25 meters around
Cooldown: 6 seconds
Red Rune (Ultimate Ability) — Teleport
Description: Allows you to create a teleportation tunnel that you and your allies can use. When the Ultimate Ability is active, you move with increased speed. Moreover, you become half-invisible but leave a trace of light behind that lasts for a few seconds. Moreover, when you activate the Ultimate Ability to create a teleportation tunnel, you enter the void space, which means that you cannot attack and cannot be attacked.
Maximum length: 50 meters
Duration: 30 seconds
Cooldown: 10 minutes
(Do you want to open the Flanker Skills tab: Yes/No)
Since I could not check out the Flanker class’s skills, I shifted my attention to the next class.
Front Line
Class Description: Front Line warriors excel at taking control of objectives and protecting their teammates. A Front Line warrior can cast an energy shield to protect himself/herself as well as their teammates against enemies. Moreover, a Front Line warrior can wear a powered exoskeleton (also known as power armor, power suit, or exosuit). To be able to operate a powered exoskeleton, a warrior’s nanotrites have to be configured in a special way. Only a Front Line warrior’s nanotrites can be configured in such a way.
Abilities: Barrier (Active Ability), Kinetic Shield (Passive Ability), Dome of Protection (Ultimate Ability)
(Do you want to open the Front Line Abilities tab: Yes/No)
I pressed the Yes button.
Green Rune (Active Ability) — Barrier
Description: Casts an energy shield that absorbs all incoming fire while allowing you and your teammates to shoot through it. The shield always remains in front of you when you pivot and move.
Size: 2 meters in width, 2 meters in height
Duration: 10 seconds
Cooldown: 60 seconds
Blue Rune (Passive Ability) — Kinetic Shield
Description: The kinetic shield protects you from enemy projectiles. Yet it is not unbreakable. It can take only so much damage. When destroyed, the kinetic shield automatically redeploys after some time.
Cooldown: 180 seconds
Red Rune (Ultimate Ability) — Dome of Protection
Description: Projects a stationary dome shield that stops all incoming (but not outgoing) projectiles. The shield allows you and your teammates to move through it while preventing those outside from getting inside.
Radius: 3 meters
Duration: 10 seconds
Cooldown: 10 minutes
(Do you want to open the Front Line Skills tab: Yes/No)
I then checked out the last class.
Support
Class Description: Support warriors have a wide range of both defensive and offensive skills at their disposal. Their abilities and skills allow them to heal their teammates and deal damage to their enemies.
Abilities: Healing (Active Ability), Regeneration (Passive Ability), Ghost Walk (Ultimate Ability)
(Do you want to open the Support Abilities tab: Yes/No)
I pressed the Yes button.
Green Rune (Active Ability) — Healing
Description: Heals your teammates over time. To do so you need to hold out one of your hands toward the teammate you want to heal.
Duration: 3 seconds
Cooldown: 60 seconds
Blue Rune (Passive Ability) — Regeneration
Description: Your wounds heal over time when you are not taking damage.
Red Rune (Ultimate Ability) — Ghost Walk
Description: The Ultimate Ability allows you to step into another plane of reality for a limited amount of time. You become half-invisible and enemies cannot attack you. While Ghost Walk is active, your movement speed increases, and all your healing abilities and skills heal faster and work longer.
Duration: 5 seconds
Cooldown: 10 minutes
(Do you want to open the Support Skills tab: Yes/No)
What I did not see was a button that allowed me to choose a class. So I asked, “Echo, what do I do to pick a class? Do I need to just say it?”
“You cannot currently pick a class, warrior,” Echo stated.
“Really?” I said. “And why is that?”
“You are going to work in a team of four,” Echo said. “So you need to wait for the other three warriors to join. Once the team is full, you will be able to pick a class.”
“How long before they join?” I asked.
“I do not know. You need to activate the search process first.”
“How to do so?”
“Just say it.”
“Okay,” I said. “Turn on the search process for the other three warriors.”
A second later, Echo said, “The search process is active.”
A new window popped up on the holographic screen below the four windows of class’ descriptions. There was a message on it that said, “Looking for warriors. Approximate time: 29 minutes.”
“You should’ve told me about turning on the search process a bit earlier,” I muttered.
Echo did not bother to reply.
I shifted my gaze to the four windows with classes’ descriptions. So I had four classes to choose from. Since I had noth
ing to do, I read the descriptions and examined the abilities one more time.
The classes were pretty standard. The Damage was, obviously, a damage dealer, the Front Line a tank, and the Support a healer. The Flanker was a bit of mystery to me. I figured a Flank warrior was something like a rogue from World of Warcraft who preferred to attack from shadows instead of making direct attacks. I had never been a fan of such classes.
After giving the matter some thought, I decided that I would probably pick the Damage. The Front Line was a tank, and I had never enjoyed playing as a tank. The same held true with the Support. I figured a healer needed to stay back so he or she could constantly check on their teammates to timely use their abilities to heal them. Such a game style was not for me. I wanted to be in the middle of the action instead.
So the Damage was my kind of class. To me, the Damage seemed to be the most fun class to play as.
“Tell me something, Echo,” I said.
“Sure,” the AI replied. “What do you want to know, warrior?”
“So I’m going to do some jobs for The Weaponized,” I said. “For every successfully finished mission, I’m going to get experience points, which I can spend to learn new skills.”
“That’s correct, warrior,” Echo said.
“My question is why do I need this system?” I asked. “Why can’t I unlock everything at once?”
Getting experience points and unlocking new abilities and skills was perfectly fine for a role-playing video game. In fact, it was one of the main reasons why people loved role-playing games. But was there a reason for implementing such a system in real life? I was sure it was real life.
“There are two main reasons for this,” Echo replied. “First, if you were to unlock all skills at once, you would be overwhelmed by a wide range of various options available to you. In battle, every second counts. When in a dangerous situation, it would do you no good if you were to waste time trying to decide which skill to use in this particular situation. Unlocking new skills gradually, on the other hand, will help you in learning how your abilities and skills work. This way, you will be able to come up with the best tactic possible.”
What Echo had just told me made sense.
“Okay,” I said. “What’s the second reason then?”
“The second reason is that your body has to get used to the nanotrites coursing through your veins,” Echo explained. “As you already know, the nanotrites deal with dark energy. And dark energy is a very powerful force and should be treated extremely carefully. When you level up, what actually happens is that the nanotrites get ungraded. They become stronger, which allows you to create more powerful spells—so to speak—with dark energy. Upgrading nanotrites gradually gives your body time to adjust to them. If you were to have your nanotrites upgraded to the max at once, it would inflict great damage to your body once you tried to use dark energy to cast a powerful spell. It would result in your death.”
Okay, I thought. So the first reason seemed reasonable to me. As to the second one, I was not so sure. If it was actually a video game, then it could be completely made up. Leveling up and learning new skills in a role-playing game was there just for the sake of the very process.
However, if it was real life, then Echo might not have been lying. I had no reason not to believe Echo that dark energy was dangerous stuff.
There was some strange sound like a bell ringing that seemed to have come from everywhere and nowhere at the same time, just like Echo’s voice.
“What was that?” I asked.
“One of the three warriors has just been found,” Echo said.
I glanced at the holographic screen hovering above the Control Panel. The message was now saying, “1 out of 3 warriors found. Searching for the rest. Approximate time: 24 minutes.”
“Where is he?” I asked as I looked around.
As soon as I asked the question, the bell sound ringed once again.
“He’s just been teleported here,” Echo said.
I saw that the lid of the teleportation chamber that sat on the same side of the room as mine had become transparent. I crossed the room toward the pod and stopped next to it. Now that the lid was transparent, I could see inside the pod. There was a young man in his early twenties lying in the teleportation chamber. His eyes were closed. He seemed to be asleep.
“Do I need to open it and woke him up?” I asked.
“You cannot open it,” Echo said. “Teleportation chambers can only be opened from inside.”
“Okay. How long before he wakes up? Should I wake him up?”
“He should come around in a beat,” Echo said. “And it is better if he wakes up on his own. But even if you tried to wake him up, you would not be able to do so. While a user is inside a teleportation pod, it is soundproof. However, once he is awake, he will be able to hear you.”
“Why is he asleep anyway?” I asked.
“This is one of the side effects of being teleported through a teleportation chamber,” Echo said.
I wanted to ask him what were the other side effects, but at this moment the guy inside the teleportation chamber stirred, and then his eyelids fluttered open.
He glanced around with the look of confusion on his face. He then looked up and saw me staring down at him.
“Hey,” I said. “Can you hear me?”
“Yeah,” he replied. “Who are you?”
“Don’t be afraid,” I said. “I’m not your enemy.”
“I’m not afraid,” the guy replied. True to his word, he did not look scared at all. He looked around his teleportation chamber, then asked, “Where am I? Why did you put me in this thing?”
“I didn’t put you in there,” I said. “And it’s easy to get out of there.”
The guy looked at me, then put his hands against the inside of the lid and tried to push. It didn’t budge.
“It won’t open,” he said.
“There should be a button on your right,” I said.
The guy turned his head to examine the right-hand wall of his chamber.
“You’re right,” he said. “There it is.”
He pressed the button, and a holographic display popped up. From where I stood, I could not see what was written on the screen.
The guy took a moment to examine a piece of information shown on the display screen. He then reached his hand to it and made a movement as if trying to scroll down. Yet as soon as his fingers touched the screen, the piece of information must have disappeared to be replaced by the two buttons controlling the lid.
He touched one of them. The lid parted, and the two halves slid into the walls of the teleportation chamber.
The guy sat up and then climbed out.
He was very long, probably half a head higher than me, and sturdily built. He was not as ripped as young Arnold Schwarzenegger had been, yet the guy was clearly very strong, his biceps and triceps evident. He had long raven-black hair that was pulled back in a tight ponytail. His eyes were black and intense. The guy was handsome. I was more than sure that girls tended to fall in love with him at first glance. He was dressed in a black tank top and gray sweatpants.
I watched him turn his head this way, then that. He seemed to be more interested in his surroundings than in me. He was looking around, examining the room he had found himself in.
I held out my hand to him and said, “I’m David, by the way.”
The guy finally turned his head to look at me. He shook my hand and then jerked his thumb over his shoulder and said, “That thing gave me a name. Nate. Guess that’s me.”
“Yeah, it figures,” I said. “Nice to meet you, Nate.”
He swept his arm around the room and asked, “What is this place, anyway? Where are we, David?”
“We are on a space station,” I said.
“Makes sense,” Nate said as he looked in the direction of the big window. He looked at the starts and the sun for a second, then said, “To be honest, I’m not even s
ure how I’m supposed to react to it.” He turned his head to look at me. “I mean, I don’t remember anything before waking up in this place. I don’t know who I am, what I am, what I do for a living, where I live, and all that jazz.”
He spoke with the British accent, so he was probably from the United Kingdom. However, there was no way to tell for sure yet. Since at the moment, he did not have any memories of his life, there was no way to tell if he had been teleported to this space station from the year 2020. Sure, I had lived in 2020, but it did not necessarily mean that Nate had gotten here from the same year. He might have gotten here from another time frame. I did not know how I had gotten here. It might have had something to do with my Macro Envision headset, but again, there was no way to tell for sure yet. So, for all I knew, Nate hailed from an altogether different planet, not from Earth.
So I needed to wait for him to get his memories back before asking him any questions.
“Why can’t I remember anything?” Nate asked.
“It’s one of the negative side effects of the teleportation travel,” Echo said.
Nate looked around, searching for the source of the voice.
“Who said that?” He asked, his brow furrowed.
“It’s an AI of this space station,” I said. “His name is Echo.”
“That’s correct,” Echo said. “I am very pleased to meet you. I am here to help you in any way I can. You can ask me anything.”
“Okay,” Nate said. “Am I going to have my memories back?”
“Yes, you are,” Echo said.
“When?”
“You are suffering a brief memory loss that usually lasts up to five minutes,” Echo said. “As it is three minutes and thirty-five seconds since your awakening, you should have your memories back in one minute and twenty-five seconds, tops.”
“Sounds promising,” Nate said as he continued to look around as if still trying to figure out where the voice was coming from. He spotted the round table in the middle of the room and asked, “What is that?”
The Weaponized: The Complete LitRPG Series Page 3