World Unbound

by Tao Wong

  And I have him exactly where I want him.

  As the Kudaya pins my arm with one hand, the other rising to crush my face, I focus. Portals take a few precious moments to appear, the time required depending on the distance. And the interference at the other end. In this case, the other end of the Portal isn’t far. Just a hundred fifty feet or so. Directly above me. And the first one is directly below me.

  We fall through the Portal and appear above where we were, above the arena and its exclusion from the quantum lock surrounding Tobago. Pain erupts through my body as molecules which were meant to align after teleportation get shifted ever so slightly, the System helping to fix the damage after having enforced the initial damage in the first place. We fall, picking up speed, and I fend off one more punch before Blink Stepping away from the damn Kudaya, just a couple of feet away so that I can nudge him back into the center of the Portal.

  “Give up?” I shout.

  “Never!”

  Asgauver falls, twisting in the air, and hits the open Portal and reappears high above the arena to take damage again. And drops downward as gravity takes effect, falling through the Portal again to reappear above, his speed ever increasing. As for me, I stand to the side of the open Portal and focus, keeping an eye on the stubborn hippo’s health, occasionally using my spells to bounce him back into the center.

  Once again, the silence through the stadium tells me I might have stunned the crowd. This time, when the noise comes back, it’s more muted, less boisterous. I might win, but I obviously didn’t win the “right” way.

  “I told you you needed more movement Skills,” Quityan is saying to Asgauver.

  The giant hippo is less boisterous now, arms crossed, his lips twisted upward in what I would call a snarl while the jaws move, masticating food. Once the Kudaya had finally been deemed too damaged to continue, I closed the Portals. Since then, the Kudaya has yet to say a damn word to me.

  “You might have overdone it,” Lana says, elbowing me in the ribs. “You could have given up after putting on a good show.”

  “Bugger him if he can’t take losing,” Ali says, playing with a string of glittering little spheres on a vine before he pops one into his mouth. “He shouldn’t have mocked boy-o.”

  “He’ll get over it,” I say semi-confidently.

  Whether he likes it or not, the System seems to agree that the win was mine, dumping a ton of experience onto me. It’s one of the facets of an arena which makes it popular. Everyone watching within the arena makes a minor experience donation. It’s generally pretty low per person, but with so many attendees, the amount stored and distributed is significant. As the headline act, the two of us receive a large chunk of the experience siphoned off during the day. As the winner, I get an even larger portion, enough so that I skip two Levels, putting me at Level 18. I’d assign my attributes and Skills, but it’d be considered rude to do so right now. No rush really.

  Mikito nods, then grins slightly. “John could always beat him into it anyway.”

  I cough as Quityan shoots us a look, obviously having heard Mikito. But she has a point. This is the Fist after all. In fact, I probably should have just wagered their vote on the fight, but truth be told, I hadn’t been that confident I’d win. If he had a Flight or other movement spell he could have used in mid-air, he would have been fine.

  Lana rolls her eyes but stops when she sees another well-wisher come up. As usual, they greet Mikito first then me, congratulating us on our arena battles. Once again, I feel the undercurrent of disrespect, a dislike for my methods. By the time he’s gone—after extending another invitation to Mikito for a fight at a later date—Quityan is next to us.

  “My apologies. Asgauver does not like losing. He’ll be better after he’s healed. His Skill takes a lot from him, no matter what he says,” Quityan says, looking back at the large hippo with a tenderness in his eyes that I didn’t expect.

  I blink, thinking back to the casual touches, the body language… huh. Well, how would it work? After a moment, I wish I could scrub my brain.

  “At a later date. If you’re willing?”

  “Pardon?” I say, shaking my head. I rewind his words in my brain and catch up. “Oh. Yes, definitely. We do need your votes.”

  “And you’ll have them. For a few small considerations.” There’s a slight pause before Quityan adds, “We seek little from your world, but individuals are interesting. Your strength, your experience in the Forbidden Zone…”

  I nod slightly, mentally wincing. Right. I know now where this is going. They’ll want details, explanations of monsters and my experiences. Might even want me to go on a trip with them to a zone, just to power-Level themselves once again. I can see it in his eyes, in the way he speaks.

  “Of course. Tomorrow then?” I say.

  “Tomorrow,” Quityan says. “If you’d like, I can have you shown to your rooms. You must be tired.”

  Murmured agreements ring out. Lana begs out too, indicating a desire to take her pets for a run. Her words elicits another delay as others offer to show her to a nearby dungeon. In the midst of the hubbub, Mikito and I extract ourselves, glad to leave the fight-crazy Fists alone.

  “So how’d you do?” I ask. “On your wagers.”

  “About forty thousand Credits down,” Mikito says happily. “Be better if I had bet on you winning like I thought you would.”

  “You bet on me losing?” I groused.

  “Well, I didn’t want to jinx you,” Mikito replies, eyes twinkling.

  Silence extends between us before we break out in laughter, the attendant showing us the way to our temporary accommodations staring at us as if we’re crazy. The look the attendant gives us only drives us to laugh harder.

  Chapter 14

  “When you said you wanted to spend some time together, I was thinking a nice gastropub. Or maybe a yoga session,” Aiden, the skinny-jeans-wearing, goateed, manbun Mage, mutters. His hand twists and a lamppost bends and catches the flying monkey creature in mid-air, crushing it. At the same time, his other hand swings a wand, carving runes of light in the air, which float away to stack up in front of him.

  “This is a lot more fun,” I say, impaling another downed monkey.

  Hitting open settlements and dungeons have become a thing in the last couple of weeks, between conversations with panicked humans and snooty Galactics. I’ve stepped back somewhat from negotiating with settlement owners while I wait for more information, letting Lana and Katherine take the lead. Part of the reason we’re out as often though is because many of the completed deals have included helping out with dungeon population control, monster swarms, and sweeping areas to develop new land. So going out and killing monsters has actually helped strengthen our negotiation power as we show we’re not all talk. I do get moments of déjà vu though, when I Portal in another attack team to another strange city before traveling to the next damn location to do the same again. At least this time I’ve got access to much faster transportation.

  All this fighting has provided a nice boost to my experience bar, gaining me another Level. In many ways, my Leveling speed is a bit ridiculous, but I did just spend four years fighting over-Leveled monsters on an on-going basis, so the resulting banked experience is significant. At some point, the banked experience will run out, but for now, I won’t be complaining.

  “Your definition of fun needs work,” Lana calls, shotgun in hand. She hasn’t shot it yet, mostly because the Aura of the Red Queen which surrounds her is sufficient to keep the monsters away. That, and her pets do a bang-up job of taking down anything that even remotely threatens her. Her griffin is particularly frightening, though right now, the griffin’s fighting a pair of flying snake-like creatures.

  “Come on, this is a walk in the park,” I say.

  “I have a Fireball,” Aiden says, holding up his hand.

  “I do not understand,” Capstan growls between taking shots at the flying monkeys. They mostly bounce off the temporary force shields the Yerrick have
erected around our Portal site, only a few managing to make their way through the gaps the Yerrick have positioned.

  Every second, more Adventurers are streaming in from Vancouver, parties gathering and receiving their marching orders from Capstan’s people while Carlos hands out small bags filled with his latest creations.

  “We’re in El Chaten, which is located in Los Glaciares National Park. John was punning with the idiom,” Aiden says, his left hand still not stopping. “Nearly…”

  “What are you casting?” Lana says, cocking her head to the side.

  “A localized teleportation spell which is anchored here and linked to my life signs with a secondary healing and regeneration component,” Aiden says as he jabs the wand forward.

  The last rune floats into the air, coalescing into a giant ball of spinning light before it splits into two parts. The smaller portion strikes Aiden in his chest, the larger sinking into the ground, where it disperses and embeds itself, leaving runic marks that slowly fade away.

  “Whoa…” I say, looking at Aiden with admiration. “We can do that?”

  “I can,” Aiden says, shaking his head. “It’s a ritual spell which takes about a week to cast. What you saw was just the engagement process.”

  I blink, scratching the spell off the list of things I needed for regular dungeon runs. Still impressive though.

  “Mikito not here?” Aiden asks.

  “No. She’s running another dungeon.”

  “With the champions?”

  “No. Americans,” Lana adds unhappily. “Howard says the borders are secure. Nothing major in the next few blocks, though he smelled something disturbing on the other side of town. Howard’s insisting someone else do the killing as he doesn’t want to bite it.”

  Her words gets a chuckle from Capstan before he barks a few orders. A party of Yerrick run up and are soon sent off to meet with the reluctant pony-sized puppy, Ali helpfully supplying everyone with coordinates. The Spirit is standing next to the Portal, tagging all the newcomers and sharing updated information maps. It still amazes me how smart Lana’s pets have gotten. It’s rather frightening the Level of power she can wield. Each of her animals is nearly the same strength as an equivalent Leveled individual, making Lana a walking party by herself. It makes her Class over-powered in some ways, but also a bit lopsided. It’d take a single semi-skilled assassin to take her out.

  While everyone else is busy, I’m just holding the Portal open, so I take a moment to look around. The earth and our surroundings are all dusty brown, dry in the Argentinian summer. The mountains which ring the tiny town have the lightest of remnants of snow, a stark contrast to the unceasing whiteness of the Yukon this time of year. Most of the—few—buildings around us are broken down, missing windows and occasional walls, weird pitted holes and half-dissolved bricks opening up the interiors. Even the asphalt is damaged, torn up and melted, giving further clues as to the cause of destruction. Monsters. Lots of monsters.

  While the town itself hasn’t become a dungeon, it’s a Level 80-plus zone out at the borders with obviously higher Level zones as you move further in. The town once thrived post-apocalypse but made the crucial mistake of not consistently clearing the surrounding alphas and dungeons, leading to a monster swarm which promptly killed everyone. Since then, no one’s taken the town, leaving it unclaimed. It probably didn’t help that there’s literally nothing connected to it for hundreds of kilometers. Of course, the lack of access is partly why it’s the perfect settlement for us to claim back.

  “You sure about this, Capstan?” I say again, frowning at the big minotaur.

  He chuckles, clapping me on the shoulder. “Whitehorse cannot hold all three clans which have arrived. With support from you and Lord Roxley, we should be able to develop this Village quickly. And I understand the Spear will be leading the champions to clear a few dungeons next week. We will be fine.”

  “Fine,” I say. A moment later, I get the all-clear from our last entrant into our game of whack a monster. I drop the Portal, glancing at my slowly regenerating Mana, and tap Aiden on the shoulder. “You’re with us.”

  “Dungeon clearing?”

  “Yup. There’s a Level 90 dungeon which needs clearing,” I say and point in the right direction.

  Aiden grumbles, more out of habit than actual objection it seems, as he follows along. Capstan and Nelia fall in with us after Capstan finishes speaking with the other Fist—a shorter female minotaur who wields a whip and Gatling gun. Lana refuses to come, busy running her puppies and coordinating with the new settlement owner.

  Our tiny party makes it about a hundred meters away from town before Ingrid makes her appearance next to us, letting the others know of her presence.

  “Ms. Starling,” Aiden exclaims. “I did not expect you here. Lana said you weren’t coming.”

  Ingrid sniffs. “Lana’s stuck-up and judgmental. I figured I’d hitch a ride quietly. It’s been ages since I’ve done a proper dungeon delve.”

  “You’re welcome to come along,” I say with a chuckle, my invitation echoed by the Yerrick.

  With Ingrid settled, we pick up the pace, headed for the dungeon. Should be a breeze, with the group as it stands.

  One of the things any Adventurer learns about dungeons is that they don’t hold to the normal laws of physics. Given enough Mana, dungeons have a tendency to warp the space around them, like a heavy meal ball on cheesecloth, stretching it under its weight and density. The dungeon we enter is a simple cave from the outside, but inside, it transforms to something truly immense, large enough to rival the Mammoth Cave system perhaps. As we delve, the initial few rooms are filled with poisoned fungi, warped insects, and mutated bats. Easy kills. Pedestrian even. Afterwards, things get disgusting.

  “Acid slimes,” I announce, swiping the dripping mucous-like substance from my Soul Shield.

  The corpse of the slime slowly dissolves, its Mana core destroyed.

  “Flammable oil slimes here,” Aiden says, floating as he sprays his own opponents with a burst of freezing cold from his arm. Beneath him, the slimes twist and stretch in an attempt to reach the mage.

  “Acid,” Nelia calls, her hands shifting as roots explode upward from the ground, piercing the slimes and draining them of their fluids, leaving crystalline remnants and Mana stones.

  “More fire slimes,” Capstan growls. The large Yerrick looks to be the most perturbed, his usual loadout less than useful against these gelatinous opponents. Even so, he brute-forces his attacks, slamming his axe on a slime and using the concussive force of his attack to blast the slime’s body apart.

  “Gah. I feel like I’m in a bad Japanese porn video.” I shake my head and cast a Blade Strike to rip apart a trio of slimes who drop from the ceiling right above me. Positioned as I am in front of everyone, I’m being swarmed, the slimes preferring to go for quantity over quality. As my Soul Shield keeps ticking down no matter how damn many of these things I kill is a good sign it’d work if we gave them enough time.

  “Think you’re repeating yourself there,” Ingrid says with a chuckle before fading out of sight to reposition.

  “Repeat?” Capstan swings his axe and sends out a burning energy strike from the head of it.

  “Girlie means there ain’t no good Japanese porn. Repeating bad and Japanese, see?” Ali explains happily.

  “That’s not what I meant!”

  “Aiden,” I call to the mage, ignoring the byplay.

  The Mage rolls his eyes but turns toward me, casting Polar Zone centered around my body. I watch as he does so, my Mana Sight wide open as I study the way the spell twists and shapes Mana in front of me, altering the temperature in my surroundings. Aiden abbreviates some of what would be the normal casting method, short-cutting sections and replacing it with knots in other areas, the final spell-form different from that which I purchased. Different and so much more powerful.

  The temperature drops by dozens of degrees in a second, the spell sweeping over all of us. Acid slimes fr
eeze from their edges inward, their struggles shattering their gelatinous bodies and exposing unfrozen parts to the cold, speeding up their demise. Within tens of seconds, the monsters are dead and Aiden cuts the spell. Not a moment too soon—my own Soul Shield has fallen, exposing me to the full effects of the Spell. Not that I can’t take the damage.

  “Damn…” Ali says, eyeing the numerous, fallen Mana stones “Someone’s been working out.”

  “Thanks, Aiden,” I say, grinning at the Mage. It was the right decision, conning the man into coming along. His wide-scale area effect Spells will be useful against the wide variety of slimes that have been reported in this dungeon.

  Once Nelia drops a drone to do the pickup of the Mana stones, we head in deeper to hunt down the remainder of the monsters. And of course, the dungeon boss.

  “That’s not a slime,” I say, staring at the dungeon boss.

  “Well, it technically is,” Aiden mutters, his eyes narrowing. “Those crystals that make up its body are slime cores. We’re going to need to shatter or separate each of those cores. I’d also assume that a large enough portion broken from the main body would still be functional.”

  “So. Weird,” I mutter.

  Crystalline Slime Hive (Dungeon Boss Level 94)

  HP: 18318/18318

  MP: 7337/7868

  Conditions: Hivemind, Ablative Armor, Dispersed Core

  “Har. Better than a titan slime,” Yerrick says with a snort, hefting his axe. “My sire fought one of those before on Regis III. Burnt off all his fur, ate his hand and one horn before he blasted it apart.”

  I shudder at the description, my mind considering what a slime thirty or forty feet tall would be like. The maintenance bill of dealing with one of those things must be ridiculous. Especially if it ate you.

  “So, recommendations?” I ask while the party splits apart.

  Nelia stays close to Aiden, her hands weaving as she piles together new roots and earthen walls to protect the pair of them while Capstan and I flank the creature. I’m assuming Ingrid’s somewhere around, waiting for her chance to do some real damage.