Defiance of the Fall: A LitRPG Adventure

by TheFirstDefier

  As Zac looked down on the weapon, he was surprised to see that the mink’s blood wasn’t dripping off the weapon, but rather got absorbed. He already knew from before that Spirit Tools needed to absorb various materials to evolve, but he didn’t expect one of them to be blood. Unfortunately, the axe didn’t come with an instruction manual of what it wanted, and Zac could only try various things.

  He already knew that it didn’t want Nexus Crystals, which was sort of a relief. After some hesitation, he broke off an incisor from the animal and pushed it toward the teeth on the axe, but nothing happened. It looked like he wouldn’t have to go around ripping teeth out of his foes like some demented dentist to feed the Spirit Tool.

  Next, Zac started looking around the area for anything that looked valuable since Ogras said that strong beasts sometimes built their nests close to some natural treasures, as living in its vicinity would help the beast grow faster. Since the beast was clearly stronger compared to other monsters in the area, there should be something of value here.

  As he looked around, he was once again astounded by the amount of Cosmic Energy his body naturally absorbed now. It almost felt like a torrent entered his body to restore his missing energy. He would have to ask around later about whether that was due to reaching E-rank Race, or if it was due to something else.

  Even after looking for an hour, he couldn’t find any treasure, and he could only return with a frown. It appeared that his high Luck couldn’t help him out in every scenario. Zac was soon back at where he’d left the deer-human and found him still fretfully walking about, seemingly unable to decide whether he should follow or go back. As he saw Zac approach, he sighed in relief and approached.

  “My friend! It is good that you are okay. Luckily, it seems the beast was awa–” he said, but his words got stuck in his throat as Zac took the carcass of the beast out of his pouch and let it fall down on the ground with a deep thud. Next, he took out the decapitated head and placed it to the side of the body.

  “This should be the mink you were talking about,” Zac simply said.

  The Ishiate hunter blankly stared at the carcass lying in front of him.

  “You can take the head as evidence if you wish. Can you help me skin it?” The fur of the monster was extremely soft and luxurious, and it’d be a waste to leave it. But with his self-taught skills, he was afraid he’d ruin it. Normally, he’d want to take the meat as well, as the stronger the beast was, the more delicious its meat would often be. However, it seemed that this monster had eaten quite a few humans and beastmen, so it felt pretty disgusting to eat its meat by now.

  “Ah? Yes, certainly!” the hunter said and quickly got to work after grabbing a skinning knife from a pouch on his back. “May I ask… Is that a Cosmos Sack you’re using?” he tentatively asked as he glanced at Zac.

  “Yes, why?” Zac asked. Selas shouldn’t have actually seen the pouch, as it was fastened to his girdle beneath his cloak, but there obviously weren’t many ways that one could make a huge corpse appear from nowhere.

  “Do you have any more? Winterleaf Village would love to buy one. We’d offer a competitive price.”

  “I only have one with me at the moment. But I’ll see what I can do next time I pass by,” Zac answered, not wanting to commit. He did have a couple of them lying around at his camp since looting them from the demons, and there were quite a few of them waiting up on the mountaintops. But he wasn’t sure whether selling them was a good idea or not.

  “What about the entrance token to the event?” Zac asked. He’d already received the map immediately after killing the beast, but there were still rewards to reap.

  Selas once again reached into the sack on his back and took out a smaller pouch. He opened it, and inside were two tokens. They appeared to be made out of stone and were almost as large as a palm. Zac immediately saw that these things were something made by the System, as the telltale fractals completely covered them.

  Zac fiddled with his token a bit before he imbued it with Cosmic Energy, and a stream of energy entered his mind. He could quickly discern that this was the real deal, and the only thing needed to enter this so-called treasure hunt was this badge. As long as it was in your possession when the event started, you would be teleported there. There was no ownership or restrictions at all, making the item a hot potato.

  He wasn’t worried for himself, as he felt that there were very few people who were able to snatch something out of his hands. But his eyes turned to Selas, who tensed up from the glare. But soon he resumed working his knife on the carcass.

  “Please keep it a secret you got it from me. Very few people know it’s in my possession, and it needs to stay that way for the safety of Winterleaf Village.”

  Zac simply nodded and said no more. Soon the beast was skinned, and Selas held up the large pelt.

  “It’s done, but it needs to be properly treated,” the hunter said.

  “Could you help me with that too? I need to visit the human settlement before I head back to my hometown. I will be back to your village in a few days.”

  “Of course. Their town is that way,” Selas answered and pointed east. “I would say be careful, but I feel that it is not you who’s in danger,” he added as he glanced at the large head next to him.

  Zac wryly smiled and turned to leave.

  “Oh, and, Zac? Thank you,” he heard from behind, and only answered with a wave. There were obviously multiple meanings to those two words.

  As Zac walked, he sighed slightly and shook his head. The hunter was clearly afraid that Zac would kill him to take the second token as well. And Zac knew that many might have done just that. Zac didn’t even consider it, as he had no real use for another token. Even if he quickly found his sister, it wasn’t something that he would want her to possess.

  Just owning it meant having a bullseye on one’s back. And even if you survived and went there, the competition would likely be extreme. The most powerful and ruthless people gathered at one spot, competing for great treasures? It would likely make the battle at the monkey mountain seem like a day at the spa.

  He wasn’t too keen on going himself and certainly wouldn’t send someone he loved there. Of course, he also knew that going there might be the best opportunity to get a real sense of the situation in the world and get some power-ups. If people from all over the world gathered, someone might even be from his hometown.

  Becoming the strongest or whatever wasn’t really his goal, and he’d simply fought to survive so far. He hoped that his visit to the human settlement would give him some answers to what was going on. If not, he would try again next month. He only had a few days to spare, after all, and needed to get back to Port Atwood sooner or later.

  As he walked, he took in a fresh breath of air. It finally felt like he had some control over his actions after months battling. He constantly found himself pushed into one situation after another, putting him in a constant reactive state. But now he had full freedom, at least for a few days. The fact that he would have to get back soon ruined the mood a bit for him, but at least for now, he relished the feeling of just adventuring.

  He took out a crystal from his pouch as he walked and imbued it with some energy. A window opened up with a rough map inside. It was black and white and didn’t contain a lot of detail, but it did cover a large area and marked the towns. He saw Winterleaf Village the closest, and he currently was heading toward Fort Roger.

  Both of the towns had crystals next to the name, and after some confusion, he realized it meant that they probably possessed Nexus Nodes or Lesser Nexus Nodes. Lesser Nexus Nodes gave access to the class system, but needed quests to unlock the town management systems.

  Apparently, there were differences between the nodes with access to buildings as well, where he got a throng of options, whereas most of the towns only got the bare essentials. Nexus Nodes were extremely common, though, from what Alyn told him, which made sense, as people needed to get their classes somehow. Alyn didn’t explain how t
hey appeared, as they generally had been around for thousands upon thousands of years on their home planet.

  That Winterleaf Village possessed a proper Nexus Node with a Town Shop was clear to Zac, but he doubted that anyone in the surrounding towns knew that. At least not for now. From his impression of the small village, he felt that they weren’t careful enough. They really lucked out that Zac, and not someone else, had walked through that portal.

  Zac hadn’t inspected anyone out of politeness, but he never felt any sense of danger from any one of them, meaning that they shouldn’t have been too strong. Of course, they were strong enough to both get a Nexus Node and gather enough money for a Teleportation Array, so they were no slouches either.

  They were even open about possessing the entrance tokens before they even knew him, which seemed crazy to Zac. He had a feeling that unless they wised up, they’d end up in dire straits. Possessing too many valuables was a crime in troubled times, after all. If it were the old him, Zac wouldn’t have felt anything was wrong, but Ogras had started to rub off on him.

  Zac kept walking and, out of habit, started using [Axe Mastery]. It felt like the trajectories were slightly changed to accommodate his new weapon, making Zac once again marvel over the skill. It was also the first time he properly used the skill since it reached Late mastery, and as he expected, it better incorporated his Dao Seeds into the mix.

  What surprised him was that it actually even incorporated the Dao of Trees. Until now, that Dao Seed had remained unused in battle, but the guidance system showed him its usage. Every now and then, it told him to imbue his free hand with it as he used it for grabs or blocks. Zac wasn’t sure what the exact use was, perhaps except that it improved the resilience of his arm, enabling him almost to use it as a shield. However, he still felt that a low mastery seed was too weak for that kind of usage at the moment.

  Zac kept moving throughout the day and the next, unceasingly using his skill. It was almost addicting to be able to once again use Nexus Crystals to restore his missing energy, especially now that it apparently only took a fifth of the time to absorb the energy contained in an F-grade Crystal.

  The hunter said that the town was four days away, but with Zac’s huge attributes and speed, it went far quicker. Finally, he reached his destination, Fort Roger. And as he looked upon the ramshackle town with its weak fortifications, he felt that the description of Selas didn’t do the town justice.

  It was much worse.

  98

  Fort Roger

  It would be more appropriate to call the wall that ran around the small town a large fence. It consisted of trees with their ends sharpened, and was between three and five meters tall, as the length of the poles weren’t uniform. There even were some holes in the wall due to uneven placement, giving enough room for a person to sneak through.

  The town was located right on the edge of the forest, with large trees giving way to expansive fields. The fields might actually have been farmland before, as they were flat, and Zac thought he spotted a tractor. But the fields were in complete disrepair, overgrown with weeds and unmanned.

  With the new energy in the atmosphere, anything would grow faster compared to before, and Zac felt it was very telling about the town that they didn’t utilize such a prime source of food. They would only have to clean up the fields and throw some seeds in there, and they would have grain in no time. But he saw no one even try it.

  There was a path leading to an actual gate that Zac stepped out on as he walked the last distance. He didn’t plan on sneaking into the town and didn’t want to alarm them. He also slowed down his speed to normal walking from his attribute-empowered movement.

  As he closed in on the wall, he saw there were two corpses hanging from the wall, one on each side of the gate. It was a man and a woman, both in their thirties or forties. It was hard to tell since they had obviously been tortured before they were killed. Attached to their feet were plaques that simply said “TRAITOR.”

  Zac was starting to hesitate whether to actually enter this place, but he knew there weren’t many alternatives. There was another town on the Automatic Map, but it would take at least another two days to get there. With his return to the portal, he would barely make it in time for the next wave, and that was barring any unexpected incidents on the way. After making sure his odd clothing wasn’t visible through his worn cloak, he started walking. As he approached the gates, two guards perked up and warily glared at him.

  “Stop! Why are you here?” one of them gruffly asked.

  “I’m traveling to find my hometown,” Zac simply answered. There should be lots of people like him who weren’t at home when the world got integrated, forcing them to travel to find their way back home.

  “Pfft, another idiot looking to be eaten by the beasts,” the guard said, and the other one snickered in derision.

  “Five Nexus Crystals to enter. If you don’t have it, you can fuck right off.”

  Zac was a bit surprised they used Nexus Crystals rather than Nexus Coins as a currency. Then again, Nexus Coins were only usable in System-affiliated stores, whereas Nexus Crystals were not only used for currency, they could also make you stronger.

  Zac pretended to look troubled, but reached inside his cape and pretended to grope around while he took out five crystals from his Cosmos Sack. He handed them over to the guard, who quickly put them in a backpack.

  “Is there somewhere to get a drink?” Zac asked.

  The guards were a bit more amenable now that they’d gotten paid, and Zac didn’t care whether the entrance fee was real or not.

  “There’s a bar down the main road, the Royal Oak,” the guard answered with a wave.

  Zac nodded and headed into the town. He only took a few steps before he stopped, as a wall of stench slammed into him. It wasn’t to the level of the imp camps in the tunnels, but it was bad. The town was obviously human, likely from America or the UK, as the worn signs were in English.

  But four months into the apocalypse, the whole town looked ready to collapse under the weight of its own filth. Piles of dirt were thrown into the alleys, and disgusting streams of mystery liquid ran along the pavement. He even saw a corpse lying in an alley, halfway buried under the filth. Zac was infinitely happy that he had decided to put his shoes on, as he’d almost puked at the prospect of stepping on the ground here.

  Clearly there was no such thing as sanitation in Fort Roger. People just threw garbage wherever. There were a few people on the streets, and they looked worn and malnourished. Zac decided to use [Eye of Discernment] on a few of the stragglers and was shocked to see that many were below level 5. There even were a few that still puttered around at level 1. He wasn’t sure exactly how much experience was needed to gain levels in the beginning, as he’d essentially started at level 16, but he couldn’t imagine it was a lot.

  These people were likely mortals just like him. But different from Zac, they had simply stayed within this disgusting town since the integration, afraid to venture out. Zac couldn’t imagine that these people would have a happy ending in a world of cultivators and local tyrants. The rule of law was gone, replaced by the creed “might makes right.”

  He didn’t know why, but he actually felt some disdain for these hapless people. He knew that it would be weird to expect people to rush out into the forests to risk their lives fighting animals. But for people to just give up, like these people clearly had, felt like a joke.

  They could work together to kill some weaker beasts and slowly but gradually gain the power that would allow them to feed and protect themselves. They would also get Nexus Coins for the kills, which could be turned into Nexus Crystals at any System-run shop. They could even just do some work for Nexus Coins and use that to purchase crystals.

  Zac resisted the urge to grab these people and shake some sense into them and instead kept going. He was planning on heading straight for the bar, but something caught his eye. It was a large electronics store, now used by a few people to loiter around
. There was no electricity, so none of the TVs were turned on, but Zac simply ignored the people and headed into the warehouse in the back.

  He found the box containing one of the larger flat-screens and simply threw it into his pouch after making sure no one was in sight. Next, he took a video player and boxes and boxes of movies. It was mainly for Alea, who liked watching movies just like Ogras. But Zac was interested in whether they could actually make some money from these things like Ogras hinted, so he took some technology with him back home.

  Finally, most of his pouch was stocked up with electronics and movies, and he headed on toward the bar. He wasn’t looking for a drink, but simply to sit down and ask some questions. Soon he arrived at the Royal Oak and saw it was an old Irish pub. It actually looked like it was in decent shape, with a clean storefront and no garbage piling up around the structure. Clearly, there was a proprietor who still had some sense of pride.

  He walked inside and saw that the interior was just as he expected. The only difference between this and all other classical pubs he had visited through the years was that, instead of normal lights, there were candles burning on the tables. Zac already expected it, but it looked like there was no electricity in the town.

  He had guessed that things like power, internet, and water supply would be essentially gone with the integration, as the randomization of the world would ruin the network of tubes and cables that had been built over the years. Perhaps there would be some lucky areas that were right next to a water power plant or a farm of windmills or solar panels that might be okay, but most would likely have to do without electricity.

  The bar was largely empty apart from a few tables. Everyone kept to themselves, and the conversations were kept at a low volume.

  “A new face, I see,” Zac heard and turned toward a portly middle-aged man who likely was the proprietor.