Life in the North: An Apocalyptic LitRPG

Life in the North: An Apocalyptic LitRPG (The System Apocalypse Book 1) Tao Wong

Life in the North

An Apocalyptic LitRPG

Book 1 of the System Apocalypse

by

Tao Wong

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Copyright 2017 Tao Wong

Copyright 2017 Sarah Anderson Cover Designer

Chapter 1

Greetings citizen. As a peaceful and organised immersion into the Galactic Council has been declined (extensively and painfully we might add), your world has been declared a Dungeon World. Thank you. We were getting bored with the 12 that we had previously.

Please note that the process of developing a Dungeon World can be difficult for current inhabitants. We recommend leaving the planet till the process is completed in 373 days, 2 hours, 14 minutes and 12 seconds.

For those of you unable or unwilling to leave, do note that new Dungeons and wandering monsters will spawn intermittently throughout the integration process. All new Dungeons and zones will receive recommended minimum levels, however, during the transition period expect there to be significant volatility in the levels and types of monsters in each Dungeon and zone.

As a new Dungeon World, your planet has been designated a free-immigration location. Undeveloped worlds in the Galactic Council may take advantage of this new immigration policy. Please try not to greet all new visitors the same way as you did our Emissary, you humans could do with some friends.

As part of the transition, all sentient subjects will have access to new classes and skills as well as the traditional user interface adopted by the Galactic Council in 119 GC.

Thank you for your co-operation and good luck! We look forward to meeting you soon.

Time to System initiation: 59 minutes 23 seconds

I groan, freeing my hand enough to swipe at the blue box in front of my face as I crank my eyes open. Weird dream. It’s not as if I had drank that much either, just a few shots of whiskey before I went to bed. Almost as soon as the box disappears, another appears, obscuring the small 2-person tent that I’m sleeping in.

Congratulations! You have been spawned in the Kluane National Park (level 110+) zone.

You have received 7,500 XP (Delayed)

As per Dungeon World Development Schedule 124.3.2.1, inhabitants assigned to a region with a recommended level 25 or more above the inhabitants current level will receive one Small perk.

As per Dungeon World Development Schedule 124.3.2.2, inhabitants assigned to a region with a recommended level 50 or more above the inhabitants current level will receive one Medium perk.

As per Dungeon World Development Schedule 124.3.2.3, inhabitants assigned to a region with a recommended level 75 or more above the inhabitants current level will receive one Large perk.

As per Dungeon World Development Schedule 124.3.2.4, inhabitants assigned to a region with a recommended level 100 or more above the inhabitants current level will receive one Greater perk

What the hell? I jerk forwards and almost fall immediately fall backwards, the sleeping bag tangling me up. I scramble out, pulling my 5’ 8” frame into a sitting position as I swipe black hair out of my eyes to stare at the taunting blue message. Alright, I’m awake and this is not a dream.

This can’t be happening, I mean, sure it’s happening, but it can’t be. It must be a dream, things like this didn’t happen in real life. However, considering the rather realistic aches and pains that encompass my body from yesterday’s hike, it’s really not a dream. Still, this can’t be happening.

When I reach out, attempting to touch the screen itself and for a moment, nothing happens until I move my hand when the screen seems to ‘stick’ to it, swinging with my hand. It’s almost like a window in a touchscreen which makes no sense, since this is the real world and there’s no tablet. Now that I’m concentrating, I can even feel how the screen has a slight tactile sensation to it, like touching plastic wrap stretched too tight except with the added tingle of static electricity. I stare at my hand and the window and then flick it away watching the window shrink. This makes no sense.

Just yesterday I had hiked up the King’s Throne Peak with all my gear to overlook the lake. Early April in the Yukon means that the peak itself was still covered with snow but I’d packed for that, though the final couple of kilometers had been tougher than I had expected. Still, being out and about at least cleared my mind of the dismal state of my life after moving to Whitehorse. No job, barely enough money to pay next month’s rent and having just broken up with my girlfriend, leaving on a Tuesday on my junker of a car was just what the doctor ordered. As bad as my life had been, I’m pretty sure I wasn’t even close to breaking down, at least not enough to see things.

I shut my eyes, forcing them to stay shut for a count of three before I open them again. The blue box stays, taunting me with its reality. I can feel my breathing shorten, my thoughts splitting in a thousand different directions as I try to make sense of what’s happening.

Stop.

I force my eyes close again and old training, old habits come into play. I bottle up the feelings of panic that encroach on my mind, force my scattered thoughts to stop swirling and compartmentalise my feelings. This is not the time or place for all this. I shove it all into a box and close the lid, pushing my emotions down until all there is a comforting, familiar, numbness.

A therapist once said my emotional detachment is a learned self-defense mechanism, one that was useful during my youth but somewhat unnecessary now that I’m an adult with more control over my surroundings. My girlfriend, my ex-girlfriend, just called me an emotionless dick. I’ve been taught better coping mechanisms but when push comes to shove, I go with what works. If there’s an environment which I can’t control, I’m going to call floating blue boxes in the real world one of them.

Calmer now, I open my eyes and re-read the information. First rule – what is, is. No more arguing or screaming or worrying about why or how or if I’m insane. What is, is. So. I have perks. And there’s a system providing the perks and assigning levels. There’s also going to be dungeons and monsters. I’m in a frigging MMO without a damn manual it looks like, which means that at least some of my misspent youth is going to be useful. I wonder what my dad would say. I push the familiar flash of anger down at the thought of him, focusing instead on my current problems.

My first requirement is information. Or better yet, a guide. I’m working on instinct here, going by what feels right rather than what I think is right since the thinking part of me is busy putting its fingers in its ears and going ‘na-na-na-na-na’.

“Status?” I query and a new screen blooms.

Status Screen

Name

John Lee

Class

None

Race

Human (Male)

Level

0

Titles

None

Health

100

Stamina

100

Mana

100

Status

Twisted ankle (-5% movement speed)

Tendinitis (-10% Manual Agility)

Attributes

Strength

11

Agility

10

Constitution

11

Perception

14

Intelligence

16

Willpower

18

Charisma

8

Luck

7

Skills

None

Class Skills

None

Spells

None

Unassigned Attributes:

1 Small, 1 Medium, 1 Large, 1 Greater Perk

Would you like to assign these attributes? (Y/N)

The second window pop’s up almost immediately on top of the first. I want more time to look over my Status but the information seems mostly self-explanatory and it’s better to get this over with. It’s not as if I have a lot of time. Almost as soon as I think that, the Y depresses and a giant list of Perks flashes up.

Oh, I do not have time for this. I definitely don’t have time to get stuck in character creation. Being stuck in a zone that is way out of my level when the System initializes is a one-way ticket to chowville. The giant list of perks before me is way too much to even begin sorting through, especially with names that don’t necessarily make sense. What the hell does Adaptive Colouring actually mean? Right, this system seems to work via thought, reacting to what I think so, perhaps I can sort by perk type – narrow it down to small perks for a guide or companion of some form?

Almost as soon as I think of it, the system flashes out and only the word Companion appears. I nod slightly to myself and further details appear, providing two options.

AISpirit

I select AI but a new notice flashes up

AI Selection unavailable. Minimum requirements of:

Mark IV Processing Unit not met

I grunt. Yeah, no shit. I don’t have a computer on me. Or... in me? No cyberpunk world for me. Not yet at least, though how cool would that be with a computer for a brain and metallic arms that don’t hurt from being on the computer too much. Not the time for this, so I pick Spirit next and I acknowledge the query.

System Companion Spirit gained

Congratulations! World Fourth. As the fourth individual to gain a Companion Spirit, your companion is now (Linked). Linked Companions will grow and develop with you.

As I dismiss the notifications, I can see a light begin to glow to my right. I twist around, wondering who or what my new companion is going to be.

“Run, hide or fight. Ain’t hard to make a choice boy-o.”

Look, I’m no pervert. I didn’t need a cute, beautiful fairy as my System Companion Spirit. Sure, a part of me hoped for it, I’m a red-blooded male who wouldn’t mind staring at something pretty. Still, practically speaking, I would have settled for a Genderless automaton that was efficient and answered my questions with a minimum of lip. Instead, I get… him.

I stare at my new Companion and sigh mentally. Barely a foot tall, he’s built like a linebacker with a full, curly brown beard. Brown hair, brown eyes and olive skin in a body-hugging orange jumpsuit that’s tight in all the wrong places completes the ensemble. Ali my new companion has been here for all of 10 minutes giving me the lowdown and I’m already partly regretting my choice.

Partly, because for all of his berating, he’s actually quite useful.

“Run,” I finally decide, pulling apart the chocolate bar and taking another bite. No use fighting, nothing in the store that could scratch a level 110 monster is going to be usable by me according to Ali and while there’s no guarantee one of them will spawn immediately, even the lower level monsters that will make up its dinner would be too tough for me.

Hiding just delays things, so I have to get the hell out of the park which really, shouldn’t be that hard. It took me half-a-day of hard hiking to get up this far in the mountain from the parking lot and the parking lot is just inside the new zone. At a good pace, I should be down in a few hours which if I understand things properly means there aren’t that many monsters. Once I’m out, it seems Whitehorse has a safe zone which means I can hunker down and figure out what the hell is going on.

“About damn time,” grouses Ali. A wave of his hands and a series of new windows appear in front of me. Shortly after appearing he demanded full access to my System which has allowed him to manipulate the information I can see and receive. It’s going a lot faster this way since he just pushes the information to me, letting me read through things while he does the deeper search. The new blue windows - System messages according to him - are his picks for medium and large perks respectively.

Prodigy: Subterfuge

You’re a natural born spy. Intrepid would hire you immediately.

Effect: All Subterfuge skills are gained 100% quicker. +50% Skill Level increase for all Subterfuge skills.

“Why this?” I frown, poking at the Subterfuge side. I’m not exactly the spying kind, more direct in most of my interactions. I’ve never really felt the need to lie too much and I certainly don’t see myself creeping around breaking into buildings.

“Stealth skills. It gives a direct bonus to all of them which means you’ll gain them faster. A small perk would allow us to directly affect the base Stealth skill but at this level, we’ve got to go up to its main category.” Ali replies and continues, “If you manage to survive, it’ll probably be useful in the future anyway.”

Quantum Stealth Manipulator (QSM)

The QSM allows it’s bearer to phase-shift, placing himself adjacent to the current dimension

Effect: While active, user is rendered invisible and undetectable to normal and magical means as long as the QSM is active. Solid objects may be passed through but will drain charge at a higher rate. Charge lasts 5 minutes under normal conditions.

“The QSM – how do I recharge it?”

“It uses a Type III Crystal Manipulator. The Crystal draws upon ambient and line specific…” Ali stares at my face for a moment before waving his hand. “It recharges automatically. It’ll be fully charged in a day under normal conditions.”

“No level requirements on these?”

“None.”

I picked Ali because he knows the System better than I do, so I can either accept what he’s saying or I can do it myself. Put that way, there’s really not much of a choice. It’s what we talked about, though that Perk Subterfuge isn’t really going to be that useful for me. On the other hand, any bonuses to staying out of sight would be great and the QSM would let me run away if I was found out. Which just left my Greater Perk.

Advanced Class: Erethran Honor Guard

The Erethran Honor Guard are Elite Members of the Erethran Armed Forces.

Class Abilities: +2 Per Level in Strength. + 4 Per Level in Constitution and Agility. +3 Per Level in Intelligence and Willpower. Additional 3 Free Attributes per Level.

+90% Mental Resistance. +40% Elemental Resistance

May designate a Personal Weapon. Personal Weapon is Soulbound and upgradeable.

Honor Guard members may have up to 4 Hard Point Links before Essence Penalties apply.

Warning! Minimum Attribute Requirements for the Erethran Honor Guard Class not met. Class Skills Locked till minimum requirements met.

Advanced Class: Dragon Knight

Groomed before birth, Dragon Knights are the Elite Warriors of the Kingdom of Xylargh.

Class Abilities: +3 Per Level in Strength and Dexterity. + 4 Per Level in Constitution. +3 Per Level Intelligence and Willpower. + 1 in Charisma. Additional 2 Free Attributes per Level.

+80% Mental Resistance. +50% Elemental Resistance

Gain One Greater and One Lesser Elemental Affinity

Warning! Minimum Attribute Requirements for the Dragon Slayer Class not met. Class Skills Locked till minimum requirements met.

“That’s it?”

“No, you could get this too.”

Class: Demi-God

You sexy looking human, you’ll be a demi-god. Smart, strong, handsome. What more could you want?

Class Abilities: +100 to all Attributes

All Greater Affinities Gained

Super Sexiness Trait

“That’s not a thing.”

“It really ain’t,” smirking, Ali waves and the last screen dismisses. “You wanted a class that helps you survive? That means mental resistances. Otherwise, you’ll be pissing those pretty little Pac-Man boxers the moment you see a Level 50 monster. You wanted an end-game? The Honor Guard are some mean motherfuckers. They combine magic and tech making them one of the most versatile groups around, and their Master class advancements are truly scary. The Dragon Knights fight Dragons. One on one and they sometimes even win. Oh, and neither, and I quote ‘makes me into a monster’.

“If these are Advanced Classes, what other classes are there?” I prod at Ali, still hesitating. This seems like a big choice.

“Basic, Advance, Master, Grandmaster, Heroic, Legendary,” lists Ali and he shrugs. “I could get you a Master class with your perk, but you’d be locked out of your class skills forever. You’d also take forever to level because of the higher minimum experience level gains. Instead, I’ve got you a rare Advanced Class - it’ll give you a better base stat gain per level and you won’t have to wait forever to gain access to your class skills. Getting a basic Class, even a rarer Basic class would be a waste of the Greater Perk. So what’s it going to be?”

As cool as punching a dragon in the face would be, I know which way I’m going the moment he called it up. I mentally select the Guard and light fills me. At first, it just forces me to squint but it begins to dig in, pushing into my body and mind, sending electric, hot claws into my cells. The pain is worse than anything I’ve felt and I’ve broken bones, shattered ribs and even managed to electrocute myself before. I know I’m screaming but the pain keeps coming, swarming over me and tearing at my mind, my control. Luckily, darkness claims me before my mind shatters.

Chapter 2

“You could have told me that was going to happen!” I shout at Ali who is hovering over my right shoulder as I rush the packing of my tent and gear.

“How was I supposed to know you’d bitch out and faint like a Goblin on his first date?” Ali smirks, contentedly floating alongside me and watching my back.

“You, I could, aaarrgggh!!!” I want to scream but I have to keep it contained as I keep packing. I have to push away that emotion and the fear that grips my guts, wanting to take over my control and force me to do nothing. We’ve lost over 2 hours already to my Class change and the System is up and running. The fact was that the System was now in place and had saturated the Park with mana, so much that spontaneous mutations were already cropping up all over the area according to Ali. I needed to get out of here, preferably quietly and fast. On top of it all, the smoke trail down the mountain where the parking lot was located just said a lot of bad things about what happened to my car. All in all, screaming was the least helpful reaction I could have at this point in time. Well, outside of sitting around like a blithering idiot. “You could help you know.”

“I am,” Ali sighs and waves his hand outwards. “I’m watching your back.”

I’d argue but at this point, the bag is packed and it’s time to go. I rip open another of my chocolate bars, chewing down on it as I slide the bag on and cinch up.

I spend a moment to look around the clearing again, a part of me registering the gorgeous view. Kathleen Lake sits in its glacial glory, waters rippling and throwing up waves as the wind howls around the snow-capped mountains that surround it. Pristine wilderness that could have been put on a postcard now shouts danger to me, forests hiding who knows what new monsters. I take a moment to check there isn’t anything else that I can do in my campsite and find nothing. The alpine underbrush around here is sparse, the trees small and stunted from having only a short summer to grow in, so I decide to bushwhack my way down the mountain rather than use the trail. Better to go slow and quietly than head down a trail straight into the waiting arms of whatever creature that decides to stake it out in this new world.

30 minutes in, I get a notification that I’ve received a skill called “Stealth”. I can’t say I’m surprised, sneaking was part of the plan Ali and I had come up with. Between my medium perk and being seriously under-leveled in a high mana environment, the System is automatically generating additional bonuses to learning rates to help balance the risk/reward ratio. The moment the notification happens, I can a slight tingle go through my body and I feel the knowledge shift the way I move, think and just analyse the surroundings.

The first sign of trouble that I encounter is the chittering. It’s way too loud. I spot it next, a black shadow the size of a Doberman moving along the ground on six legs with antennae. Ants should not be that big. I freeze, then begin to back up slowly. Thank the gods it hasn’t seen me.

“Oy, you big black beauty. Over here! Tasty morsel for your Queen. Yoo hooo!” a manically grinning Ali shouts above me, waving his arms to get attention.

“What the fuck!” I don’t have time to do anything beyond begin berating him since the ant, drawn to the little bugger’s antics, turns to me and after a brief moment’s hesitation charges directly at me. I bring my walking stick up and lunge forwards, hoping to spear it.

Yeah, not a fencer. Also, not a sword. The point skitters off harmlessly and the ant is on me, bowling me over and attempting to behead me with its mandibles.

I heave, bucking around before managing to throw it off me. Thank god my backpack helps a little with that, the entire angle all kinds of wrong for lying flat. I even manage to get the ant to flip over underneath me when I throw it off. On top of the ant, I splay my body outwards to help hold it in place before laying the walking pole across its neck, holding it in place with one arm while I desperately hunt for my survival knife. It takes a moment to find on my belt and then it’s just a few minutes of desperate stabbing before the creature stills.

I’m dirty, smelly and covered in ant guts. I don’t give a shit about all of that as I stand up, absolutely furious. “What in the hundred hells was that?”

“Training.” Ali shrugs unconcerned, “You needed to level up. That was a Level 1 Ant. No way you’d be able to find easier prey. Now you grabbing your loot?”

“You, you, you…” I splutter to a stop, turning to the ant instead and kicking it a few times to take out the accumulated frustration and fear. Adrenaline spent, I slump down beside the ant’s body before I finally register what he said. “Loot?”

“Place your hand on the body and either think or say Loot.”

I comply and blink at the pop-up that appears. I reach out, grabbing the loot that is displayed before grimacing. A hunk of ant meat.

“Put in your inventory stupid.”

I’ve given up even questioning the insane things that are happening by now, forcing myself to just accept. When I think inventory, a grid 5 by 5 appears. Putting my hand into a grid has the meat appear in it, filling a space. I wonder if its stackable?

“Nice,” I start reaching to undo my bag when I get called up short.

“Don’t bother, only System generated items can go into the inventory,” Ali comments as he continues to spin around me.

“Ugh. What a damn scam,” I grumble, keeping my bag on as I stare at the rest of the ant body. I guess this new world doesn’t have a dissolving corpse gimmick.

Level Up!

You have reached Level 2 as an Erethran Honor Guard. Stat Points automatically distributed. You have 3 Free Attributes to distribute. Class skills locked.

Strange that the notification pops up only now. Then I pause, glancing to Ali who gives me a thumbs up. Ah, he’s suppressing them till it makes sense to view them. I had been rather disappointed when I first woke up that the saved experience I had earlier hadn’t leveled me up, even to Level 2 but Ali did explain that Advanced Classes had higher experience requirements. One look at my free stat points and I dump them all into Luck. Yeah, I know there might be smarter things to do with the points, things like maximising my Agility or perhaps my Strength to become all powerful.

Anyone who thinks that though hasn’t lived my life. If my Luck stat really is that low, it’d explain a hell of a lot of things about my past. I wouldn’t even be in the Yukon if my apartment hadn’t burnt down a week after I lost my job as a programmer which led to me coming up here with my then girlfriend. What a shitshow that had become with her too, once we got up here. The damn insurance company wouldn’t even accept my claims, which left me with nothing to my name beyond some meager savings. Rather than going home in shame to my father, I picked up and moved to a new Territory. I’d rather die than see my father like this. Now that I’ve got a chance to redirect some bad Karma or fate, I’m taking it.

“You know, it ain’t that kind of lucky right boy-o?”

I am a bigger man than him. I am a bigger man than him. I am a bigger man than him. I give him the finger and head down, both of us getting serious again.

The rest of the day sees me climbing down cautiously, scooting around the rather ubiquitous giant creatures when I can and occasionally slaying them when I can’t. The slaying wasn’t my decision but after some hurried negotiation, Ali and I came to an agreement. He’d let me know of any low-level monsters we came across and I’d attack and kill them if I could do it safely. In return, he’d not force my hand – so long as I was actually making a good will effort. If I was in the army, I’d call him a drill sergeant. Since I’m not, I just call him an asshole.

Things only got really scary once, when I walk under what I thought were a pair of trees and realised it was the legs of what I can only describe as a giant ogre. Thankfully, his first swipe missed and once I had him thinking I was running downhill, I activated the QSM and ran back uphill past him. I spent the next half-hour watching him rampage downhill, knocking down trees and smashing other monsters that got in his way. I’d never been more scared in my life, especially since the ogre’s diet seemed to consist of anything fleshy.

On the other hand, I had him to thank for my highest level kill so far – a trapped fox whose spine had been shattered by a fallen tree. The loot just consisted of more organ parts and its fur, but I’m not complaining about free experience and loot.

I’d like to say I spent the rest of the day struggling down the hill, heroically pushing past exhaustion and the fear, but by 3, I was done. Being in a constant adrenaline high, hiding and backing off constantly had worn me down and I knew if I kept this up, I’d make a mistake. I wasn’t making good time at all, barely having covered half the ground I needed to. When I found a small depression that was relatively well hidden I just gave up, pulling out my cellphone and try to boot it up. It doesn’t, just staying dead and I look at Ali.

“Don’t bother. Electronics are always the first to go once ambient mana reaches this point. If it’s not shielded or made to work with mana, it all shorts out,” Ali explains.

“Fuck. All electronics?” I prod and he nods. Damn, that probably means most new vehicles are dead along with the Internet, cellphones and most modern conveniences. I rub my temple, putting the cellphone away and curl up, deciding to rest for a few minutes. I must have slept because the next thing I knew, it was 7pm.

“Why us?” I queried Ali as I made dinner from my camping supplies.

“Unique snowflakes you humans. Perfectly unique with boundless potential,” Ali who has been keeping watch outside answers without looking back to me.

“Enough sarcasm. Really, why us? Why now?”

“Sorry to say, there ain’t no good reason. The ambient mana flow finally reached a point where you could be added to the System.”

“Alright, let’s back off a second. What’s mana? I keep seeing it on my Status screen and you keep mentioning it but it explains nothing.”

“I got a thousand explanations and none for you boy-o. Nanites that enter and control your body using quantum strings and ultra-dimensional energy. Or you could call it the ambient force of the universe, the singular force that makes up all the elements. It could be dark matter made flesh or magic. It’s all the same, just people prattling on without a clue,” Ali shrugs. “It’s what surrounds us, what makes the System work.”

“Okay, then what’s the System?”

“The blue boxes. The experience points. The loot. The Shop which lets you buy anything from anywhere or from the Shopkeepers who rent the place. It’s the way we upgrade our world and ourselves. It’s what constrains me to working with you and for you. It’s everything. The System’s your world, your universe now,” exclaims Ali fatalistically.

“I thought the Galactic Council created it, I mean, their announcement…” I waved my hand to where the blue boxes were.

“The GC make something? About the only thing those bureaucrats could make is a pile of shit. And that’s only because they’d been told where to sit. Those idiots only have the loosest control over the System and the galaxy’s happier that way. Just leave it, kid, the System just is.”

“Come on, you’re not a little curious about what the System is? It rules our lives and…”

“Enough. Just stop already,” Ali spins around, floating up to my face and glaring at me.

“I just want to know damn it!”

Congratulations! Quest Granted. The System

Find out what the System is.

Rewards: Knowledge is power. Or something.

The moment the quest appears, Ali lets out a groan and just floats away. I read it over and then dismiss it before I speak again. “What’s your problem?”

“Nothing. Nothing at all,” Ali just sits in the sky, floating with his legs crossed and refusing to face me.

“Ali.”

“I hate that Quest. It’s the fucking turd-bucket of the galaxy. Everyone gets it, and everyone thinks they’ll be the first one to solve it. And then you end up spending the next 80 years of my life sitting in a fucking library, debating with other fucking researchers over a Kricklik written article first published 2,000 years ago! And then, well, fuck…” as he speaks his voice gets louder and louder.

“I got it, I got it. You have issues. Can we please not bring the forest down on us?” I gesture with my palms down, trying to shush him.

Calming down slightly, Ali growls. “I ain’t got issues. You need tissues.”

Ummm…. Okay, moving along. Quests eh, I guess if the system continues to work the same way, then the Quest tab is under…

Quests

Unique

Get out of Kluane National Park alive

Party

None

System

Unravel the secrets of the System

“When did I get that quest?” I mutter to myself, staring at the first quest listed.

“Oh, I accepted that one for you while you were playing electric eel.”

“You can accept quests for me!” I stare at Ali, “How much control did I actually give you?”

“Not enough lucky boy,” Ali smirks before he shrugs. “I’m your Companion. Can’t do anything to hurt you and you were getting out of here anyway. Didn’t matter if I accepted it or not.”

“Fine, just let me know, will you? I don’t like surprises like that,” I close out the tab then stare at him a bit more. “What exactly is a companion?”

“About frigging time. I’m a System Companion – Spirit Type to be exact. As a System assigned companion, I get access to your interface and certain aspects of the System that general users don’t. We’re linked so once you man up, I’ll get more abilities too. At Level 2, I got access to information about the monsters that are in the System around us. Later on, I’ll be able to provide you more details and at even higher levels, I’ll be able to share my Elemental Affinity and even gain a body.”

I nod in thanks to Ali and then fall silent, pondering what he said. Seems like having him as a Linked Companion was more powerful than I thought. Still, there was so much to learn. “There a Help file?”

A hand waves and in a moment, a giant blue box of text drops in front of me. I grunt and lean further back into the cave to begin reading. Hours later, I have a better understanding of the basics. The base attributes were pretty self-explanatory, though interestingly enough Stamina dictated not only my base Health but how fast I healed. Each point basically healed the same amount per minute. Intelligence dictated how large a mana pool I had while Willpower refreshed that pool on a per minute basis based on its statistical value. Of course, I didn’t really know how useful that was right now since I didn’t have anything that used Mana, but it’s still good information.

Interestingly enough, Health wasn’t just how physically healthy I was. It was actually a numerical value for how much damage the mana embedded in my body would actually absorb, defraying damage done to me. It wouldn’t stop instant death if I had a pick shoved through my brain, but it would actually reduce the force of the pick as it impacted me if I had a large enough Health pool. Of course, that used up some of the embedded mana, reducing my ‘Health’ at a more drastic rate. Such a strange thing, especially since this embedded mana was completely different from the mana that I could use for spells. As I fight off another yawn, I turn to poking at more information about the things I saw on the Status screen.

Class skills were special skills, abilities that relied on Mana to produce their effects. They generally broke the law of physics, the amount dependent upon the skill itself. Some of the common examples make me think of action movies and anime - the ability to generate fire from my hands or get an armor-plated body seemed just cool.

Spells, on the other hand, were just that, magical spells that used Mana to cast. The distinction between what was considered a skill and what a spell seemed a bit arbitrary to me, but perhaps it would clarify when I actually get either one of them.

And Perks, well, perks were things you gained for completing special quests or just being in the wrong place at the wrong time it seemed. Small or large advantages over your everyday non-perked person.

Now we had numbers, points to say who we are, what we are, what we’re good or bad at supposedly. Would it have mattered when I was younger, to be able to point to a screen to say ‘I’m not who you think I am’, or would it have been the same? If my life had been governed before by this System, would I have tried to raise my Charisma or perhaps trained more to be stronger? Would I have failed less because I would have focused on things that I was good at already? Or would it not have mattered?

I sigh, rubbing at my eyes. There’s so much left to read, so much left to learn about this strange new world. I want to read more but I can’t fight off the exhaustion any longer, my eyes drifting shut.

Chapter 3

Congratulations. You survived an entire day! You humans really are an excellent bunch. Only 60% of you died yesterday. We are impressed. Have a cookie. And some experience. Remember, monster spawning will increase over the next week.

“60%” I shut my eyes as my mind attempt to grasp the meaning of that number. 60% - over 4 billion dead. 60% - 6 in 10 people I’ve ever met are dead. 6 in 10… that means, my family is dead since I’m alive. That last thought makes my breath catch, a yawning chasm of pain opening up. I’ve been avoiding thinking of them, of what this System means for the world but with this announcement, grief and rage and regret building. That chasm of pain and mixed emotions widens for a moment before it gets bunched away and put aside, compartmentalized. I don’t have time to deal with this now, I have things to do, my own life to keep alive.

“You know, crying is considered real manly in Kraska cultures. Of course, they’re sort of like your earth crocodiles,” Ali floats above me, watching me deal with my thoughts before he waves the notification away. “Let’s go boy-o.”

“Give me a moment,“ I mutter.

“You aren’t really going to cry are you?” Ali asks, spinning completely upside down in boredom.

“No, no I’m not,” I state that confidently. I can feel the grief if I focus but it, like most of my other emotions are muted, like a heavy blanket thrown over a speaker. It’s there, just hard to access. Enough for me to function, at least mostly. I can tell though, even now, the grief is mixing with that rolling sea of anger that I live in.

Anger…

“Ali, find me something to kill,” I state dispassionately as I stand up and heft my bag. “Find me a lot of things to kill.”

Ali for once doesn’t give me lip, just doing as I requested.

“It’s dead,” Ali speaks placatingly to me as I give the Ground Squirrel one last stab. I might have gone a bit overboard there – the animal is pretty much in pieces. Thank the gods the Loot function doesn’t take into account the body of the creature, giving my prize without the rather nasty stab wounds.

“Ali, how do I get a better weapon?” I stare at my knife and the creature. Thank the gods I indulged my inner child when I picked it up and got a Bowie. Truthfully, it was way too much of a knife for camping but I had been on a Rambo kick when I bought it. Now, it’s my one and only weapon. Well, that and a can of bear spray.

“System Shop. That’ll be in a System generated safe haven, which currently is only in Whitehorse itself. You’ll need to sell your Loot to get it though, unless you get some System Credits which only sentients carry,” Ali continues to explain. “Still need to work out your feelings?”

“Let’s get out of here,” I shake head my head, the rage finally settled. I’m not sure what it says about me, that I took out my feelings on these creatures, but for now, I’m just going to ignore dwelling on that. It’s mid-morning already and I’ve only managed to make a couple of kills so far. Hunting is getting more and more dangerous as even Earth creatures mutate at an increasing rate, out-leveling me and my pitiful knife.

“Alright boy-o, same deal as yesterday,” Ali waves his hand down the path and I follow his directions.

Knife held out before me, I jump and swing downwards, the QSM deactivating at the last second as I plunge the knife into the Snowshoe Hare’s head. I hope I hit something important since the hare is now the size of a horse but much broader. It rears its head and only a hastily grabbed piece of fur keeps me on it as I repeatedly plunge the blade into the back of its head and neck.

A minute later, sufficient damage is done for the hare to fall over dead. A few moments ago, it finally managed to get me off its back by slamming itself into a nearby pine tree, breaking my shoulder and loosening my grip. As I lie on the ground, whimpering in pain I can’t help but wonder why Ali was so insistent I fight the Hare. I give mouth to my thoughts while I heal, pulling myself to sit at the base of the tree and pull another chocolate bar out of my pack. Thank god I always over-packed on the chocolate.

“Hare? I thought it was a Rabbit,” Ali frowns, floating above the creature. “Damn. And here I wanted to say ‘Nothing’s up, Rabbit.’ “

“Down!”

I drop to the ground and am smashed to the side as the creature hits my backpack. I roll, coming up and face-to-face with a rabid ball of fluff with way too many teeth. I stab the walking stick in its maw, the creature biting down on the metal pole automatically. I keep shoving, pinning the creature to the ground as it begins to choke.

“Move!”

I jump, releasing the pole as another of the fluff monsters attacks me from the side, too focused as I am on killing the first. I lash out with my knife, cutting at the scratchy fur as I stumble backwards, desperately waving my weapon at it.

“To your right,” Ali calls out and I look right, backhanding the third Tribble monster. The blow catches it and sends it spinning away, tumbling down the hill. The second monster takes my brief distraction as a sign to bite my leg and I scream in pain, stabbing down with my knife again and again till it releases me.

I push off, hobbling to where the first fluff monster continues to gag and cough and I kill it by stomping on the creature, repeatedly doing so till it stops moving.

“Behind you again,” Ali calls out, bored now.

I spin, getting my arm up in time to let it chew on my forearm rather than my face and then proceed to stab it to death.

“Well, that’s one way of killing monsters. Maybe try not to let them snack on you as much when fighting next time,” Ali points out helpfully and I snarl at him, looting the balls of fluff. Really, fluff? That’s my loot? Fluff? Then again, what was I expecting from balls of fluff. I dump it in my inventory, grimacing and get moving to the stream I recall being around here, limping my way to it.

I wash my clothing as best as I can in the stream, Ali keeping watch above me. I work fast, getting rid of as much blood as I can without dampening my clothing too much. Wool or not, wet is wet and early April in Kluane means temperatures are only around 6 Celsius in the shade. As I clean myself, I ask Ali something that’s been troubling me. “Ali, how come the monsters never attack you?”

“They can’t see me,” Ali answers.

I frown, “But that first time…”

“I can become visible with effort, but I can’t sustain it long, not yet at least,” Ali pauses, turning to the East before he speaks. “Time to go pretty boy. Company’s coming.”

I get up hastily, shaking the water off my hands as I take off at a low jog South West, doing my best to keep as quiet as possible.

The sun has nearly set when I finally arrive at the car-park. What should have been a half-day hike has turned into a two day ordeal. I’m not surprised to see the burnt remnants of my vehicle, though the hissed word ‘Salamander’ gives me an idea of what could have caused the problem. Or would if I knew what a Salamander was.

“Giant lizard with a Greater Affinity to Fire magic. Breathes fire actually, some think it’s a lesser variant of a Dragon,” Ali explains. “Good news and bad news too.”

“Explain,” I murmur softly, eyeing the clearing for monsters.

“Bad news – it’s headed to your Haines Junction,” Ali motions to the rather obvious tracks. When I don’t bite at his silence, he sighs and explains the good news, “Its presence is likely to drive away most of the monsters from its path. Makes it safer to follow after. If it doesn’t double back.”

Great. Just great. I’m going to be following a giant, fire breathing lizard on its way to the closest source of civilization that I know of and hope it doesn’t notice me. At least it ain’t called Godzilla.

I’m not much of a gamer, but my ex was and I’d picked up enough of the lingo to know the term ‘kill stealing’. I would almost feel guilty, ending the life of these Lightning Elk and gaining some minuscule amount of experience from it, but considering they are either mangled or suffering from significant burns, I’ll call it a humanitarian act. Beyond those acts of mercy, I resolutely ignore the roasted, half-eaten corpses that make up the majority of the herd and the Salamander’s most recent meal.

Level Up!

You have reached Level 3 as an Erethran Honor Guard. Stat Points automatically distributed. You have 3 Free Attributes to distribute. Class Skills Locked

The locked skill draws a grimace from me but considering the ridiculous Stat increases, I can live with it. Since I have a brief moment, I pull up my Status Screen to review it.

Status Screen

Name

John Lee

Class

Erethran Honor Guard

Race

Human (Male)

Level

3

Titles

None

Health

190

Stamina

190

Mana

220

Status

Normal

Attributes

Strength

15 (50)

Agility

18 (70)

Constitution

19 (75)

Perception

12

Intelligence

22 (60)

Willpower

24 (60)

Charisma

8 (16)

Luck

10

Skills

Stealth

6

Wilderness Survival

3

Unarmed Combat

2

Knife Proficiency

5

Athletics

3

Observe

4

Cooking

1

Sense Danger

2

Class Skills

None (2 Locked)

Spells

None

Perks

Spirit Companion

Level 3

Prodigy (Subterfuge)

N/A

Unassigned Attributes:

Would you like to assign these attributes?

3 Stat Points

(Y/N)

“Whoa! Where did all those skills come from?” Seeing my Status Screen for the first time in days makes an eyebrow go up.

“You’ve been gaining them all along, I’ve just been hiding the notifications for now,” Ali shrugs, doing an aerial handstand as he waits for me.

“What! Why?” I growl at the little man, eyes narrowing.

“It’d be a distraction. It’s not as if you’d have done anything differently, would you? The skill gains from the System get added straight to your muscle memory and mind, so it’s not as if you haven’t been gaining from it as it stands. The rest is just numbers,” Ali sniffs. “Numbers mean jack shit if you aren’t doing anything. Best not to obsess.”

What he says reminds me of a conversation I had with a school counselor once. IQ means nothing if you don’t study he would always say. Hearing Ali mention something so similar, I can’t help but glare at him, “Next time, give me a summary every night will you? I’d at least like to know what’s happening.”

Ali sighs, acting all put upon as I get moving, adjusting the screen so that’s it’s mostly transparent as I get walking. I continue studying it, trusting in the little man to keep me informed. As annoying as he is, he’s a good lookout.

“Ali, the maths doesn’t make sense.”

“You got a few points from all that running and hiding you’ve been doing. And once you got a class, your Stats back paid into your Hit Points,” Ali states as if it’s the simplest thing in the world. To him perhaps, but it’d have been nice to know that could happen. The Help Guide he’d provided had given some understanding of things, but there obviously was still a lot that I didn’t understand. “Don’t expect any more though, you’ve leveled up to a point that unless you became a professional athlete, you’re better off spending your time leveling.”

I nod at his words and then try to decide on what to do with my free points but realise I have no clue, all of the minimums are so far away they might as well be on the moon. At a quick calculation, I’d need at least 18 Levels to get just my Strength up to my class level if I didn’t put any points into it. Instead, I leave the points unallocated for now. Maybe I’ll figure out what exactly I need later.

“Ali, question about messages. They seem to change in tone, from businesslike to well, kinda dickish.”

“Ah, well the base System messages are what you see mostly, the businesslike ones you mention. However, the GC has control of the messages too, so occasionally they take a hand especially if it’s something that interests one of their observers,” Ali explains.

“Observers?” I grunt, eyeing him and then the surroundings.

“Yeah, but you’d have to do something really big to get their notice. Don’t worry about it, not as if you can do anything,” Ali points out and I nod. I still find myself hunching my shoulders in a bit - Big Brother is watching.

A couple of hours later, I pause and pull out my compass. A quick reckoning of the path ahead and I look to Ali who nods confirmation to what I’ve guessed. The Salamander has changed course, moving away from the Junction.

Scarily enough, the Salamander is going to be one of the least powerful regular monsters that will inhabit the park from now on, using the overgrown and leveled up native fauna for its food source. Thankfully, the Salamander is dumb, a creature of pure instinct that roams the park and its surroundings.

Readjusting my backpack, I pick up the pace. Hopefully, there’s a car or some other vehicle I can borrow that’ll get me to Whitehorse. At the very least, there will be survivors who I can join.

Chapter 4

Crossing out the Park nets me a simple message and a reward. Nowhere close to getting enough for another Level Up but every little bit counts.

Quest Complete!

You have survived Kluane National Park and even managed to keep all your limbs!

5,000 XP Awarded

As I near Haines Junction, I try to recall what little I know of it. Town population of around 800, so there should have been at least a few hundred survivors left, if the numbers hold true. The smoke that I see rising from the center of the one road town has me worried though, so I take my time, diverting into a few local houses that make up the approach to the few buildings that make up the town center. I find a car and even keys but nothing works, the cars too new. Damn System.

I luck out when I do so, coming across food and clothing that I can use along with a real weapon at last – an abandoned .56 caliber rifle and a box of bullets. The rifle itself is trigger locked but thankfully, the trigger lock key is easy to find hanging on a nail right across the case. Thank the gods for human laziness.

Signs of struggle are everywhere including a few over-turned cars, pools of blood and smashed windows. Disturbingly, I find no bodies, though perhaps the survivors have collected them all for burial. At least, I hope that’s the case, though with the way many of the animals I’ve met have expanded their diets, I don’t hold much hope.

Armed with the new weapon, I venture closer to the town center. Never know what could be awaiting me, though I’m praying that Frosty’s is still standing. I could definitely make do with their milkshake, burger and fries.

Beyond one derogatory comment about the peashooter I picked up, Ali has been uncharacteristically quiet. A somewhat unfair observation perhaps – when it’s time to be serious, the Spirit is actually rather professional, if a bit much of a know it all.

The first sign of trouble is the overgrown mis-shappen head that I spot as I creep closer. Looking like a cross between a Neathredal and Big Foot, the 14-foot tall creature seems to be happily munching on its dinner. Things get even worse when I realise that that’s the kid as the mother, unclothed and very female strides over and drags her kid back to the center of the town. Ali frowns, staring at them and then a glowing green bar floats above their heads along with a short descriptor

Ogre Youth (Level 12)

Ogre Matron (Level 21)

I breathe deeply, quelling my pounding heart before I creep forwards further. Something about the meal the kid was holding nags me. I have to know, and when I do get close enough to see, I suddenly wish I didn’t. I’ve found the villagers, or what’s left of them. Surrounding a cookfire, there’s a good baker’s dozen of the adult Ogres, mostly in the Level 20 ranges, lounging after a truly epic feast. Playing in the bone pile is a pair of children, sword-fighting with the thigh bones of the former residents of Haines. The only consolation I have is that it looks like the villagers managed to kill a couple of the Ogres by the bodies that are laid aside with care.

I come to my senses when I realise my hands are aching, clutching the rifle so hard all the blood has gone from my fingers. Crawling back into hiding, I force myself to breathe deeply and take control of my emotions. Every time I begin to do so, I recall the small bones that I saw, the half-eaten face and I recall another child, crying and wondering why no one ever came to help. I draw a deep shuddering breath, my hands shaking and unshed tears in my eyes.

“There’s nothing we can do John. It’s time to go,” Ali murmurs consolingly.

“I’m going to kill them. Kill them all,” I hiss as rage burns within me, overflowing from its confines and wrapping me in its familiar embrace.

“Not a chance. Even that kid could take you down with a single hit. Give it up, we’ll come back another time,” Ali insists.

“I. Don’t. Care.” I snarl, standing up and moving as the anger consumes me. I’m not sure where, but I can’t keep still any longer.

“You can’t do this. As a group, they’d be a challenge for monsters five times their strength!”

Suddenly, I can feel the anger cool, turning ice cold as a mad plan forms.

The plan has three parts. Each part insanely dangerous. To complete the first part, I dump 2 points into Agility and another into Constitution to raise my Stamina. I’m going to need to be fast and fit for this.

Most monsters keep away from Haines Junction, the presence of the Ogres sufficient deterrent. The ones that don’t are quickly dispatched and added to the fire, their bodies butchered just like the humans. That works to my advantage as I get my plans ready. It takes a couple of days to pull what I need together, days that I barely sleep or eat in as I work at a feverish pace. Twice, I’m almost found out. I spend nearly two hours the first time, hiding beneath a truck waiting for the Ogre pair to move on. The second time, I have to use the QSM and duck pass the converging group to hide. I can tell they are beginning to suspect something, their actions getting more and more agitated as the days go by but they can’t find me even if they start huddling closer together and patrolling more.

Preparations finally complete in the Junction itself, I hide my supplies and take only the bare minimum that I need. The gun, two magazines full of bullets and enough food and water for a few days.

When I finally find my objective, I can’t help but feel my face split into a humorless grin. I can feel the tightness in my chest, the speeding up heartbeat and the dump of adrenaline as I sign my likely death warrant. It’s all secondary though, secondary to the rage that fills my being. I’ve had enough, of hiding and sneaking and fearing for my life. Enough of this System that has driven friends and family to death, to wipe out 60% of humanity’s population.

If I was going to die, at least I’ll do it trying to strike back. The last thought is punctuated by the crack of my rifle, the shot spinning hundreds of yards to smash into the unsuspecting Salamander. I work the bolt, firing again to lock its attention on me. When it turns and begins to lumber towards me, I take off.

I lure the creature to Haines Junction for hours, running as fast as I can and when it finally begins to catch up, using the QSM to disappear. I husband the use of the QSM, bolting as far as possible and hiding, sneaking away to give myself more distance before I attract its attention again by firing at it. It could go faster but I need the QSM to last me so I often take breaks when the Salamander roots around, searching for me. After a while, I expand the range I shoot from, firing from over half a kilometre away and mostly missing even if it is the size of a barn. Hurting it really isn’t the point anyway.

Only twice do I nearly die. Once is near the start, when a sudden surge in speed has it almost catch me. Only a last minute barrel roll gets me out of the way in time, leaving me with only a small wound before I activate the QSM and run like hell to a hiding spot. The second time, the Salamander launches a series of fire balls into the sky, landing them all around me. Fun fact about being in another dimension – I might be able to ignore most physical structures but energy – specifically heat energy crosses over. By the time I get away from the fire, I feel half-cooked and my flashing health bar in the corner of my vision matches. After that, I keep further away from the creature and only give it brief glimpses of me when I need to pull it closer.

By the time I reach the Junction, I’m nearly out of bullets. The Ogres are lined up, watching the incoming enraged monster. I breathe a sigh of relief when I see them, part 2 of the plan required that the Ogres be willing to fight. When they catch sight of me, they roar and one tries to step forward, only to be chivied back into line by the others. I grin, stopping a good hundred yards from them and waving cheekily at them before turning back to the incoming monster.

“Ali watch them,” I growl out, slipping the rifle from my shoulder one last time and lining up a shot on the Salamander. This time around, I need to hurt it enough to draw it all the way which means I need to make the shot. I draw a few deep breaths, trying to get my thundering heart to calm and my breathing to slow. Already past the boundary of its ‘natural’ region, the Salamander will need a little more encouragement.

The first shot misses and I snarl, wishing I had spent more time at the range. I always said I would, but somehow never did. Too busy procrastinating. The second shot hits and the explosion is everything I wish it to be. The abandoned propane tank lights up behind the Salamander, too far away to do any real damage but scaring it slightly. Already annoyed with me, the creature charges forwards, smart enough to put the sounds of the gunshot and the annoyances it’s been facing for the last few hours together.

Bullets out, I toss the rifle to the side and hope I can retrieve it later. Rather than run immediately, I watch the Salamander charge me, waiting. Emboldened by the fact that I’ve finally stopped running, the Salamander picks up speed and when it is a bare hundred yards away I turn and sprint for the Ogres.

The Ogres are pissed, but without ranged weapons of their own, there’s little they can do to stop as I bring their end right to them. Just before I reach them, I trigger the QSM and let the club that’s swung at me pass through my body as I duck through their lines. A last, spiteful move makes me release the QSM long enough to plunge my knife into a creature’s back and then I take off, leaving the monsters to do their thing. As much as they’d like to chase after me, staying together to fight the Salamander is more important.

A safe distance away, I watch the battle unfold from hiding. It’s vicious and not nearly as one-sided as I would have expected. The Ogres hold their own against the Salamander at first, their oversized leader triggering some form of ability that wreathes its club in green as it smashes down on the Salamander. The blow does real damage which the other Ogres are quick to take advantage of, pummelling the dazed Salamander. At first, I almost think the Salamander might die without doing any damage.

That is until its entire body starts glowing red and it releases a cloud of red steam all around it. The Salamander seems to boil its own blood and releases it, scalding the surrounding attackers and driving them back. After that, the Salamander bites down on a female Ogre, ripping her arm from her body. The rest of the battle just gets bloody and nasty but half-way through, I realise something is wrong. It takes me a moment to realise what though.

“The kids aren’t here!” I snarl out towards Ali who is watching the fight with amusement, somehow having conjured up a bag of popcorn. He stops eating long enough to point before going back to ignoring me.

I follow his directions, sneaking from one building to another to find the children being guarded by the Ogre Youth. My eyes narrow, considering what to do, before I return to the main event. I smile grimly, the battle nearly over by the time I’m done, the badly injured Salamander roasting the last Ogre with its breath.

How do you like being cooked? A part of me is worried about the hateful glee that I’m exhibiting, but it’s a very small part. Once the Salamander is done finishing off the last of the main Ogres, I make sure it finishes the job, leading it by taunting it further to the children.

Part 2 complete, I smile humorlessly as the Salamander munches down on the Ogre Youth before I hurry away. I could end it here, revenge taken for the residents of the Junction. However, the rage is not quenched, my anger still needing a final outlet. The Salamander was a monster and it needed to die.

Part 3 was very simple in theory. In fact, I had made a big bet that it’d be the Salamander that was still alive at the end of the battle since I had built my little toy with it in mind. I’d hidden the weapon close on-hand and was grateful the Ogres weren’t familiar with human technology or too inquisitive as I find it untouched. Grabbing the shopping cart by its handles I wheel the contraption around to see the Salamander.

I cross my fingers, hoping this works and then shove, sending the entire cart hurtling towards the monster. It doesn’t understand what’s happening, but it does understand me running away which sends it chasing after me again, obviously wanting to finish me off at last.

Surprisingly, the first bump when it hits the Salamander head-on doesn’t set the entire thing off. The second, when its hind foot lands on the cart does. The cart is packed in layers. The innermost layer, what took serious effort, contains a bottle of home-brewed nitroglycerin. The bottle is sealed tight, packed with cotton around it to ensure that casual bumping doesn’t set it off. Around that, I packed half-filled gasoline cans interspersed with hair spray. Lastly, on the outside, I had a thin layer of nails, screws and nuts. This was my improvised bomb and what took the majority of my time to put together.

When it goes off, the improvised shrapnel does most of the damage as expected. The Salamander might be resistant to high heat and perhaps even partly resistant to the concussive force of the explosions, but there isn’t much it can do about the shrapnel that rips up from its foot and into its body.

Of course, I mostly figure that part out later. When the explosion happens, all I remember is sharp pain and the concussive force of the explosion throwing me forwards before blackness takes me.

When I wake up, I find Ali hovering over me with a worried look on his face. It disappears the moment I open my eyes, the unimpressed grump pulling back to his usual station. A slight twitch of his hand is all I see before my vision is filled with blue.

Congratulations!

You have been instrumental in the destruction of the Ogre Village (Newbie). Even down to the children. Who is the monster now?

+13,000 XP

Congratulations!

You have helped kill a Salamander (Level 108). You really shouldn’t play with bombs, next time they might go off at the wrong time.

+27,000 XP (XP apportioned according to damage done)

“Uhhh… Ali. Did the System just warn me off?” I eye the blue screen worriedly. Did Big Brother actually pay attention to what I did? Could they influence things if I tried something similar? Then again, I wasn’t exactly planning on doing this again. Half-remembered Youtube videos and chemistry classes were not the way to build bombs.

“Seems like it doesn’t it?” Ali replies as I dismiss that notification to keep going through the field of blue.

Title Gained

For killing a monster over a 100 levels higher than you, you have been awarded the title ‘Monster’s Bane’. All damage dealt to monsters of a higher level than you +15%

Congratulations!

For achieving your first title, you receive a bonus +5,000 XP.

Level Up! * 4

You have reached Level 7 as an Erethran Honor Guard. Stat Points automatically distributed. You have 15 Free Attributes to distribute.

Class Skills Locked.

My vision finally clear of the field of blue, I peruse my Status bars and other notifications slowly. Health is still below half and the little additional status icons tell me I’m concussed and exhausted. No shit. Still, no rest for the wicked and I push myself onto my feet, after which I proceed to vomit.

“That’s just nasty,” Ali sniffs and waits for me to mostly finish before continuing, “Now move it buttercup. Carrion creatures are coming soon and you need to finish looting.”

I grimace but get moving slowly, doing my best to not lose my breakfast again. Or is it lunch now? Dinner? Gods, I really don’t know and my head hurts way too much for me to care. Still, no complaints– I’m alive which is not what I was expecting. In fact, I’m pretty sure I wasn’t actually thinking straight these last few days. Who the hell lures a mini-dragon into a deathmatch with a group of Ogres that just wiped out a village by themselves and builds a bomb by hand?

The Salamander gets me a Salamander Fire Sac, its skin and more meat. Surprisingly, when I open my inventory to put the items away I realise that its increased in size again.

“Ali… am I seeing things?” I frown, staring at the new 6 by 6 grid.

“Nope, inventory space increases every 5 levels,” Ali explains and eyes it. “Lucky for you.”

I can’t help but agree since otherwise I’d have to toss some of this away. While items of the same type stacked, unique items needed their own slot and the different kinds of meat were all considered unique. Either way, lucky me. I grab the loot from the Salamander and dump it in my inventory, moving on. The children Ogres get me some Ogre skins while the adults are a disappointment at first, giving me an assortment of crude weapons, oversized armour, Ogre hide and 5,000 Credits in total. The credits go straight into my inventory as a notification, which helps since I’ve started leaving older loot like the Ant meat aside. When I finally get to the Ogre Chief, I carefully bend down to grab the club it dropped and almost drop it again when the notification pops up.

Enchanted Oversized Club of Smashing

Base Damage: 38

Enchantment: Ignores 20% of Target Armour

Damn. My knife only did a base damage of 4 to start. Of course, as the guide explained, damage after base was based off the targets armor and where and how you hit. Better kinds of armor absorb more damage, though armor has a tendency to get damaged as it absorbed more and more punishment. In addition, melee weapons had additional damage modifiers that included your strength, which in the Ogre’s case was probably significant.

I can barely carry the damn oversized club and the fact that I can even heft it at all breaks all kinds of physic rules, which is why I just leave it on the ground as I reach out to loot the Chieftain next. He gets me another Ogre hide, 7,000 credits and a golden key. When my hand closes around the key to put it in inventory, I get another blue screen.

Key to the City

Would you like to take control of Haines Junction? (Y/N)

“What the hell?” I shout to Ali and immediately regret it, my head spinning. Ali zooms over to join me, staring at my screen and being silent while I recover. For a moment, as my head spins, I wonder if he’s gotten bigger. Then I get distracted again by his talking.

“Mary’s sweet spot,” Ali breathes, pointing to the key. “That’s why those Ogre’s weren’t running. They bought the city.”

“Explanation damn it,” I reply.

“Ugh… okay. Yeah. Your cities aren’t real cities, not at least according to the System. You want to own it, you need to buy the rights to the city. That’s what the Ogre’s did. They must have pooled their resources, bought the rights from the System and a portal here. Must have cost them a fortune even to get a dump like this,” Ali explains quickly, spinning in an agitated circle. I guess that made the Ogres pioneers. Dead, roasted and eaten cannibalistic pioneers.

“Whatever,” Angrily, I decline the system’s offer. Damn System, thinking what we built isn’t real. Ali’s exclamation of surprise at my actions is cut short by another prompt.

Control over city declined.

No other sentient found in domain.

Would you like to resell the rights to Haines Junction? (Y/N)

I giggle slightly, as I point at Ali, “Not sentient!”

“Dance on a stick. I don’t count because I’m linked to you boy-o,” Ali retorts even as the key disappears from my hand.

Rights to Haines Junction sold for 10% of cost. 200,000 System Credits credited to account.

As a one-time offer, would you like to spend your System Credits now? (Y/N)

This time, I don’t get to choose as Ali does it for me.

Chapter 5

One moment I’m standing amongst the burnt, savaged remnants of the Ogre clan aching in pain and fighting off waves of dizziness and silliness. The next I’m fully healthy in a high-tech retail store that has a thing for yellow. I raise my eyebrow at the colour choice, having thought it’d be all blue but yellow it is, from the walls to the waiting chairs to the counter top where a yellow lizardman waits.

“You’re big!” I shout as I see Ali. Unlike his normal foot tall experience, this Ali is a towering 7 feet. Thankfully, he’s still clad in his usual orange jumpsuit which I have to admit, sets off his mocha coloured skin very well.

“This is my real size,” Ali grouses and points to me. “You just can’t contain my awesomeness.”

“Awesomeness?” My eyes widen at his choice of words.

“I get bored. Your world has a lot of interesting entertainment forms,” Ali says dismissively as he strides over to the waiting lizard. “Malik! You old scoundrel. Have I got a deal for you!”

I stare at the lizardman and my companion as he begins to pull my stuff from my inventory, already getting into an argument over pricing. Better him than me but what the hell should I do? For that matter, why the hell was I healthy?

“Perhaps the Master would like to peruse our wares?” comes a soft voice at my elbow, making me spin around and throw a strike at it. I catch a glimpse of the speaker, a bipedal fox before it slips under my blow with careless ease.

“Sorry! I’m really sorry. I just, you know, apocalypse!” I apologize profusely.

“Not at all Master, completely normal. It’s this servant’s fault for startling you,” the young fox’s grin widens as he gestures to a doorway I didn’t see before. “The wares Master?”

“Yeah, I guess I could…” I follow its lead. I am rich after all, or at least, I think I am. “By the way, I was injured beforehand but now I’m feeling fine.”

“Ah, part of the transfer process. Galactic Council policy dictates that all purchases be done by individuals in their full health. You will be returned in the same form as you were before though,” the Fox explains easily as he leads me to a doorway. The room that we enter is in cool yellow, so large that I can’t see the end of it. Inside, the room is dominated by a floating spaceship reminiscent of the one that Superman came to Earth in from the classic movie. In front of it is a single screen, floating

Mark VIII Regulus (200,000 Credits)

Single passenger spaceship originally capable of achieving hyperspace travel. Comes equipped with the 3rd Generation Link Laser and 2 Ares Launcher Bays. More…

Would you like to purchase this? (Y/N)

My hand unconsciously twitches and moves upward. A ship to get the hell out of here and leave as the System suggested. An escape from the blood and insanity that is my life now, a way to be free of the fear. It’s everything that I could want. A slight shift in stance draws my eye to the Fox and my eyes narrow. There’s something about the way he’s holding himself, something in his eye.

Son of a bitch. They’re playing me. Once again, anger rushes through me and I have to work hard on relaxing, on tamping my emotions down. I roll my neck and resolutely hit no. The fox says nothing which is lucky for it, and after a brief moment, a giant list of products appear. A tight smile appears on my face before I speak, glancing to the Fox, “Be a good boy. Get me a chair and some coffee and any chocolate you have on-hand. I’m going to be a while.”

The Fox slinks off and I start browsing. Time to make this more manageable.

“Remove all items costing over 200,000 credits.” The list shrinks for a moment before repopulating. I grunt, not surprised. Let’s see, what next…

“List only Human specialty items,” This time, the list almost completely disappears except for 3. I guess we’re too new for a bunch of specialty products.

Human Genome Treatments

Genome treatments are individually tailored for each client. Each treatment’s goal is to fix and optimise the client’s base genetic code, removing errors due to aging and radiation. Optional improvements to the treatment include the removal of less than optimal genetic code and the addition of best practise genes.

Base Cost: 10,000 Credits

Removal of Genes: 2,500 Credits

Insertion of Genes: 2,500 Credits

“This won’t make me sexless or something strange will it?” I question the returned fox, somewhat puzzled at the words ‘optimal’. After all, an alien race’s definition of optimal might include making us hermaphrodites or adding back our tail.

“No. The genome treatment is specifically catered to humanity including your race’s societal hangups,” the Fox replies, back to its cool professionalism. I grunt and grab the window, swinging it to the side to leave open. Definitely getting that.

The Basics of Mana Manipulation for Humans

Using System Patented technology, the knowledge of basic mana manipulation will be downloaded directly into your mind. Mana manipulation is a requirement for basic magic skills.

Cost: 5,000 Credits.

Interesting. Playing on a hunch, I pull out a comparison.

The Basics of Mana Manipulation

Using System Patented technology, the knowledge of basic mana manipulation will be downloaded directly into your mental storage unit. Mana manipulation is a requirement for basic magic skills.

Cost: 1,000 Credits.

“Care to explain?” I turn to the fox who looks perfectly relaxed at this information. He points to the cheaper option first.

“This is the System created option that is purchasable by any being that is part of the System. However, as it is developed for use for the entire System’s inhabitants, it does not guarantee assimilation of the knowledge and in extreme cases may cause harm. In all but the most edge cases, only the most basic information is imparted.

“The second option has been specifically tailored by one of our Craftsmen to ensure that full assimilation of the knowledge will occur. We stand by the product 100% and this product has been particularly successful in your world. Certain gifted individuals have been able to glean a higher base level of skill from purchasing this product.”

“What’s the chance for the average human to get the skill from this?” I point to the System skill.

“32%”

“And me?”

“98%”

“That’s what I figured,” I grunt and swipe the System skill window over to join the Genome Treatment. 7 Levels in, my Intelligence is way above base human. Never mind the fact that I was never considered dumb. I turn back to the shopping windows, eyeing the last specialty item.

Thrasher’s Guide to Surviving the Apocalypse on Earth

This guide imparts basic information about the System, the current apocalypse and future plans. Included are explanations of common skills, magic, technology, Safe Points, the Shop and more.

Cost: 50 Credits

I eye that one dubiously before creating a second section for ‘Maybe’s’. I have a feeling Ali has more information than a 50 Credit Guide, but it never hurts to ask. Next up, my class “List information purchasable about the Erethran Honor Guard.”

A giant list detailing the Honor Guard’s training, history, customs, battle tactics, gear, current organisational structure and more appears, most of it in the 20-50 credit range and I grab them all. Interestingly enough, there’s even information about Secret and Hidden Missions available for sale, though those I avoid. The Guard is going to be pissed off enough with me as it stands I assume, I really don’t need them to get uppity just because I bought some insider knowledge from the System.

Next up, Basic Skills. I eye the wide range of skills for a second then narrow them down to combat skills for now. The usual series of Unarmed, Bladed, Blunt, Polearms, Archery, Rifles, Pistols and more are there. I could learn to drive a tank if I wanted! A part of me giggles at the idea, though I quickly dismiss it. For one thing, I don’t even think there’s a single tank in the entirety of the Yukon even before the apocalypse. Now, it’d just be a hunk of metal.

No, better to focus on things I do need. I grab the skills for unarmed combat, adding it to the ‘To Buy’ pile and then add the rifles and pistols along with bladed weaponry to the maybe pile. I’ll have to figure out the kinds of weapons I’m buying before I get to that.

I pull up the Class Skills selection and wince. Even the cheapest Class Skill starts at the tens of thousands of dollars and they don’t particularly look that good. I definitely need to balance my desire for a cool skill with the fact that I need weapons, transportation and skills. Still, I highlight a few and swing them into the To-Buy column.

I grin, finishing up the coffee and then waving the empty cup at the Fox, pulling open the chocolate bars. Oh, right - a quick search reveals a whole series of chocolate bar options and I indulge, picking up a stack of Swiss chocolate. Right, next! A weapon would be great, but I need to remember that I need to allocate money for armor and a mode of transportation. It’s only another 160 kilometres or so to Whitehorse but on foot, that would be an easy couple of weeks. That’s if I don’t account for the various monsters that are likely hanging around.

Best find out how much transportation costs first then. The resulting list makes me wince. Even a basic bike is a few thousand Credits and a compact is over ten thousand credits with fueling requirements for gasoline. Anything more advanced and the prices start jumping higher, though a glance at the details shows why. Many of the more advanced vehicles power themselves directly off collected mana. Armor is likely going to get expensive too. In fact, it’d probably be more expensive than any weapon I buy if humanity’s own history is anything to go by.

I snarl in annoyance, staring at the vehicles. There’s got to be a way to do this…

“Where the hell are you? You better not have bought anything!” Ali slams the door open, looking around desperately for me, obviously finally remembering he wasn’t here alone. He rushes over and points a finger at me, snarling; “I look away for one second!”

I snort, feet up in the air and staring at the windows I’ve got arrayed before me before I close them all before he can see them, instead pulling out another.

“Oh shut it. I already got someone better,” I point to the window and he spins, staring at the accusing window.

Sixth Generation Lambda Class AI Companion

Resulting from the combination of a Delta and Epsilon class AI, this Sixth Generation Lamba Class Companion is still in its infancy but with its base code can be expected to process significant levels of data and manage the operation of up to 3 Rank D machines or 1 Rank C machine.

Rank: C

Requires: Minimum Rank D Hardware for Installation

Furiously reading, Ali’s eyes widen and he sputters for a second, “You, you, you replaced me with a hunk of code!” He’s shouting at the end, his face completely red. “You ungrateful meatball, you undeserving maggot eating swine-licking sheep-loving…”

He sputters to a stop as I am bent over, giggling at him. I try at first to stop, but when his ranting comes to a stop, I fall from the chair and just whoop it up. Every time I think I have a handle on my emotions, I catch a sight of Ali’s long-suffering face and I collapse again. Even the Fox is slightly amused from the way its tail waves around.

I don’t know how long it takes me to get control of my emotions but it’s a while. When I do, I point a finger at Ali, “Some Companion you are. These hucksters nearly got me.”

Ali’s eyes narrow and I sigh, calling forth the spaceship. Ali looks at it, the window flickering as he reads more details and grunts. “Yeah, that’s a piece of shit. 3 generations out of date, no missiles included, no armor and they’ve ripped out the original space drive for a hunk of crap that might or might not get you into hyperspace and you certainly need to refuel after every jump. They didn’t even frigging fuel it.”

The Fox just stands there, a smile that wouldn’t melt ice cream on its face as we speak. These guys have no shame. Which is why I’m going to be happy to let Ali do the haggling later on and let him take them to the cleaners.

“Alright, enough fun and games. How’d you do?” I gesture back the way he came from.

“I will get you back,” Ali mutters before answering me, “Pretty good. The Salamander Sac’s the first to come from Earth, so you got a premium so it sold for $23,187 Credits. The Ogre Hides mostly went cheaply except the kids. Those are premium, softer you know…”

He shuts up as I hold my hand, not really needing a detailed list of his exploits. He grumbles for a moment about ungrateful children before answering, “38,632 Credits for all of it.”

“That gives us 250,632 Credits yes? And correct me if I’m wrong, but we can buy and apply these in any order we need yes?”

“Yeah…”

“Good. Here’s what I’m thinking,” I gesture back to the newly pulled up windows, getting ready to argue with the Spirit.

“You can stop anytime pretty boy,” Ali grouses as I continue to stare at my reflection. I just flash him a grin, touch the helmet again and make it retreat into a simple metal collar around my neck. The one piece jumpsuit that I wear is all in black and leaves nothing to the imagination, but that’s okay since it is also armor.

Pretty boy is an actual truth for once. The Genome Treatment seems to have, amongst other things, made me actually good looking. My chin has strengthened, my features become slightly more symmetrical and elongated, blending my Chinese origins with other races. I look closer to Keanu Reeves than myself in some ways. Some things I’ve kept such as my black hair and eyes but additional minor changes have occurred all across my body including an extra four inches of height and a significant amount of muscles. Lines that had started cropping up in the last few years, small enough only I’d notice have wiped away another decade, making me look to be in my early 20’s again. The facial changes were particularly unnerving but thankfully, I seem to have sub-consciously adjusted to all the changes relatively well. I guess the mental resistance training that came with my Class is helping me - either that or the System is just altering my mind to let me get on with my life.

Surprisingly, beyond the surface changes, I don’t feel a significant change in the performance of my body. When questioned, Ali explained it as a side effect of my level and class – I’ve long ago exceeded peak human genetics so the genome treatment could only provide minor additional adjustments. Something about creating denser muscle fibres, a higher level of red blood cells, increased grey matter and more, most of which I tuned out.

Mostly, what I’ve focused on are the mental changes. As part of the genome treatment, it seemed that a chemical flush was required which has left me feeling more stable, emotions a bit more under control. There’s still residual anger and guilt for surviving, but for now, I’m functional again without the rather severe neurological chemical imbalance I had. Of course, seeing how my mental resistances was handling the outward physical changes with aplomb, I wonder exactly how close I would have been to a breakdown without the class. For a former office worker, I’d done a hell of a lot of running, hiding and killing over the last week.

It doesn’t really matter, I am still here and what if’s could go on forever. It is what it is. Still, I curiously pull up my Status Screen to see the changes.

Status Screen

Name

John Lee

Class

Erethran Honor Guard

Race

Human (Male)

Level

7

Titles

Monster’s Bane

Health

390

Stamina

390

Mana

360

Status

Normal

Attributes

Strength

27 (50)

Agility

38 (70)

Constitution

39 (75)

Perception

14

Intelligence

36 (60)

Willpower

36 (60)

Charisma

14

Luck

10

Skills

Stealth

6

Wilderness Survival

3

Unarmed Combat

2

Knife Proficiency

5

Athletics

5

Observe

5

Cooking

1

Sense Danger

4

Jury-rigging

2

Explosives

1

Class Skills

None (4 Locked)

Spells

None

Perks

Spirit Companion

Level 3

Prodigy (Subterfuge)

N/A

Unassigned Attributes:

12 Stat Points

Would you like to assign these attributes? (Y/N)

“Didn’t your mother tell you not to rub it so much,” Ali grouses and I come back to the present and pull my hand down from rubbing my head. There’s not even a scar, but if I focus, I can feel the installed neural link in my mind become active. I could almost swear I can feel it sitting in my brain, but that I know is purely psychosomatic. Once again, I call up the detail window of the link.

Tier IV Neural Link

Neural link may support up to 5 connections.

Current connections: Omnitron III Class II Personal Assault Vehicle

Software Installed: Rich’lki Firewall Class IV, Omnitron III Class IV Controller

Dismissing the window, I walk over to my Personal Assault Vehicle, stroking the handlebars. The PAV looks like a road bike on steroids in this configuration, pure black with sleek lined armor plates. That’s not the only thing though, with a thought the PAV can break apart and attach itself to me, acting as power armor. That’s right – I have bike mecha. It almost makes up for all the stupid, crazy shit that I’ve gone through. Almost.

I can’t help but call up the details of the mecha again, just to gloat a little.

Omnitron III Class II Personal Assault Vehicle (Sabre)

Core: Class II Omnitron Mana Engine

CPU: Class D Xylik Core CPU

Armor Rating: Tier IV

Hard Points: 4 (1 Used for Quantum Space Manipulator Integrator)

Soft Points: 3 (1 Used for Neural Link)

Requires: Neural Link for Advanced Configuration

Battery Capacity: 120/120

Attribute Bonuses: +20 Strength, +7 Agility, +10 Perception

Ali had even been helpful – working with me to tweak my initial choice of the Ares version of this product to the Omnitron. The Omnitron was more heavily armed and armored normally but suffered from a smaller mana engine. Instead, at Ali’s suggestion we had sacrificed the installed weaponry and the better armor for an upgraded mana engine. The result was a bare bones product that had no bells and whistles but could be upgraded significantly and that has a significant recharge rate.

To keep cost down, we also went with ablative armoring. The way armor worked in this new world, you could either choose super-tough armor that would shatter if it ever was breached or ablative armor that crumpled and reduced but was useable even after getting damaged. Of course, Tier IV armor was still extremely strong by pre-Earth standards. In fact, most of the monsters I’ve fought directly wouldn’t even leave a scratch on it. I’m obviously not counting the Salamander since I never really fought it - just ran away a lot.

The only upgrade we had purchased for the bike was the integrator to the QSM which by itself had cost a quarter again the price of Sabre. Yeah, I named it. Sue me. I would say I was surprised at how expensive the upgrade was, but considering how ridiculously useful the QSM had turned out to be, I was willing to pay for it.

Of course, that left us with much-reduced funds for my personal weapon. In the end, we had settled on 2 different weapons. The first was attached via a handy holster to Sabre with some minor modifications. It looked for the most part like a regular semi-automatic hunting rifle with a faux wooden stock, just with a slightly bulkier than normal stock. Of course, it wasn’t:

Ferlix Type II Beam Rifle (Modified)

Base Damage: 38

Battery Capacity: 21/21

Recharge rate: 1 per hour per GMU (currently 12)

I had to bug Ali to get an explanation of the recharge rate, which he finally did explain in detail, way too much detail in fact. He even pulled up graphs and charts with maps of both the solar system and galaxy. Truth be told, I tuned out after the first 5 minutes. It all boiled down to this – the Galactic Council had instituted a series of measurements based off the ‘base’ mana available in the ambient surroundings in the capital. This was a single Galactic Mana Unit or GMU. All mana engines were rated based on their ability to absorb and charge a mana battery based off a single GMU. However, in Dungeon worlds and zones with higher levels, the recharge rates would increase as there was just more GMUs. Mana batteries could be recharged directly but it was a specialised skillset since an improperly charged mana battery would explode.

My close range weapon had resulted in a lively debate. Ali had wanted me to purchase a pistol – that man was a gun nut – while I wanted a sword. He had only relented when I pointed out that I needed a weapon that didn’t run out of charges in the middle of a fight, otherwise I’d be completely hosed. He’s still sulking over losing that argument.

I’d started with a simple hand-and-a-half for my sword and watched it change the moment I made it my personal weapon. Initially, it had a light pattern where the fuller was on the blade, a green inlay on its hilt and a flared guard. It was simple but pretty for a weapon, but choosing it as my personal weapon stripped it of its ornamentation. Now, the sword was sleeker, all traces of ornamentation gone. The only beauty it had now was in its stark simplicity of purpose – this was a weapon meant to kill and kill well.

Tier II Sword (Soulbound Personal Weapon of an Erethran Honor Guard)

Base Damage: 48

Durability: N/A (Personal Weapon)

Special Abilities: None

The sword had grown even sharper and while it could still break, I had only to dismiss it and call it back for it to reappear in its original state.

Preparations complete, all the basic knowledge absorbed, there was but the skills left to do. I finally step away and nod to the Fox, ready for him to begin. As soon as I nodded, I felt the shift. This was even more marked than the previous purchase of knowledge like the world had stopped and then restarted with a lurch. Windows bloom soon after.

Unarmed Combat Skill Gained (Level 6)

Blade Mastery Skill Gained (Level 6)

PAV Combat Skill Gained (Level 4)

Energy Rifles Skill Gained (Level 3)

Meditation Skill Gained (Level 5)

Mana Manipulation Skill Gained (Level 1)

Minor Healing Spell Gained

Even as I finish dismissing the windows, another notice appears.

The System Quest Update

The journey to understanding the origins of the System and Mana has many beginnings, but all roads lead to the understanding of Mana. You have taken your first step in understanding the System.

Requirement: Learn Mana Manipulation

Reward: 500 XP

“Huh,” I grin, dismissing the quest update. My business done, my funds drained, I find myself back in the real world.

The smell of burnt flesh and spilt guts return along with the pain. No longer under the System’s care, all the damage I had received comes back with interest. Knowing it was coming does little to stop me from dropping to my knees in pain, head swimming. It’s only with great focus am I able to cast my Minor Healing Spell, fixing the damage as I recast it again and again. Ali stays silent through this, waiting for me to become mostly functional before he speaks, “Alright, let’s get this show on the road!”

“No.” I shake my head, shrugging my shoulders as I walk over to my bike. I sit on it, triggering the change in my mind and feeling the armour crawl and attach itself to me.

“Oooh, we going to farm some carrion?”

“Not exactly,” I walk towards the town center while looking for potential threats.

“Stop that! We’re not playing 20 questions here. What the hell are you up to boy-o?” Ali grouses, flying after me.

“Being human.”

I shoot the last oversized coyote that crawled out to see if it could get dinner and loot it before turning back to the pyre I had made. I probably should have done something about the other monster corpses, but I didn’t give a damn about them. The citizens of the town though, they deserved something better. Even in power armor, the chopping and hauling had taken me hours especially as I had to stop every once in a while and kill a few wandering monsters.

I don’t have words for when I’m done, even though I’ve tried to find the words these past few hours. In the end, all I have is this, “I’m sorry.”

As I turn away, calling Sabre back to its bike form, I hear from behind me a rough voice.

God lay dead in heaven;

Angels sang the hymn of the end;

Purple winds went moaning,

Their wings drip-dripping

With blood

That fell upon the earth.

It, groaning thing,

Turned black and sank.

Then from the far caverns

Of dead sins

Came monsters, livid with desire.

They fought,

Wrangled over the world,

A morsel.

But of all sadness this was sad —

A woman’s arms tried to shield

The head of a sleeping man

From the jaws of the final beast. ((“God Lay Dead in Heaven,” Stephen Crane))

I twist around, staring up at Ali who shrugs. “It seemed appropriate”

Yeah, it did.

Hidden Quest Completed!

You have laid to rest the bodies of the fallen and avenged their death against all odds. The System might be callous, but you are not.

Reward: 5,000 XP, Title Gained: Redeemer of the Dead. Reputation change with certain factions.

“And fuck you too System,” I whisper and gesture the notification away. It’s time to go home.

Chapter 6

“Ali, I’m not wrong, right? You’re bigger?” Gunning the engine, I shoot down the road, weaving around newly created potholes and debris. Looks like monsters don’t have any civic pride, the way they destroy common roadways.

“More than big enough or so the lady’s say,” Ali smirks.

“You’re a Spirit. You don’t even have a gender,” I growl back, leaning into the curve as we shoot past a startled Moose. Holy shit, that thing was the size of a bus!

“Now that’s heteronormative thinking. It’s thinking like that that has kept half of your population down for the entirety of your history,” starts Ali.

“I hate you,” I grouse, tuning out Ali. I had a serious question about his abilities, but every single time!!!

I’m purposely tuning him out so when he screams “Down”, it takes me a moment to realise he’s serious and react. It almost costs me my life as I duck down, sending the entire vehicle into a spin. Missing me by inches a dragon pulls up from its dive, screeching its anger as batlike wings and purple scales glisten in the sunlight. I feel the pressure, the aura of fear that surrounds it as closes on me, trying to lock my muscles together and make me prey.

My resistances kick-in even as I focus on getting control of my bike. Realising it’s a lost cause, I trigger the change, the entire bike coming apart beneath me as I take a death-grip on the handlebars. It’s a good thing that the overalls I’m wearing have light armor plates stitched in or else I’d have some terrible road rash.

The transformation takes seconds, armor plates sliding to protect my arms and legs, liquid metal filling in gaps at the joints while the bike’s wheels attach to the back with the exhaust, creating a bulky backpack section. My actual hiking backpack and its contents get strewn all over the road during the change. As I slide along the ground, I dig in my bottom foot and come up to a crouched position in a display of agility, co-ordination and strength no normal human could ever exhibit.

When I do manage to slow down and look up, I get a chance to actually see the information Ali has pulled for me.

Shadow Drake (Level 74)

HP: 14,780 / 14,780

Christ on a pogo stick! There’s no way I’m winning this fight. A mental command triggers the QSM and I bolt for it, heading into the surrounding forest to hide.

Ali comes back to my hiding spot hours later after the sun has finally set and risen again, pointing upwards. “We’re clear. It’s gone.”

I breathe a sigh of relief, my hands trembling slightly from the accumulated adrenaline finally subsiding. I rest my head on my arms, forcing myself to breathe slower, pushing the fear back down after a moment. That Drake had been tenacious, unwilling to leave even after it lost track of me. If I hadn’t the QSM to lose it initially, I would have been Drake chow. I was lucky, so damn lucky…

Once I have control of myself again, I take a quick glance at the inbuilt compass in my helmet and I take off towards Whitehorse through the forest, figuring I’ll eventually meet up with the road. Best to give it a few more hours before I risk the road again.

Ali seems unusually quiet for a few minutes as I sneak through the forest, just floating beside me and not even humming an annoying tune. “I am bigger. Told you, as you grow stronger, so do I and I’ll eventually be able to manifest a real body.”

“You said at Level 2 you gained the ability to sense the System monster’s around us. How did the Drake get so damn close?” I gripe at him.

“Shadow Drake. Stealth abilities affect my ability to sense them through the System since the System dictates the skills themselves,” Ali explains and I make a mental note to start paying more attention myself. It seems like I can’t just rely on him.

“What’d you get for the other levels?”

“More access to the system. It’s why the information I’ve been displaying has been getting more and more accurate. I’ve also extended the range of my spot function and I can manifest longer too.” Ali explains, “If you hit level 10 my affinity will be something you can gain, if you spend some time practicing it.”

I nod, happy. Finally, some real information.

After a few hours of walking off the road, I get back on it and head in at speed. Most of the rest of the journey to Whitehorse goes by relatively peacefully and fast, the closer I get to the city the lower the level of monsters go. In fact, the latest monster that I deal with is a giant brown bear whose level sits at a measly 35. At Ali’s insistence, I kill it and loot it. Poor thing stood no chance as I just sniped it to death from a distance. I don’t get a level and I feel somewhat bad about leaving the rest of the meat to rot, but I just don’t have the ability to carry the non-System generated body. Something to think about for the future – getting some form of inter-dimensional storage.

When I get within a kilometer of the Takhini cutoff, a bare 20 minutes away by bike to Whitehorse, Ali starts jabbering. “Pedal to the metal boy-o, unless you want to re-run of the Junction.”

I snarl, gunning the bike. Sabre roars, the mana battery ticking down as I pull more power than the engine can recharge. Not the time to worry about it. I can’t see the problem till I take the last corner, easing off the throttle enough to let me ascertain the situation.

Troll (Level 32)

HP: 1673/1842

The Troll is the aggressor here, all 13 feet of gangly, warty green skin facing off directly against a diminutive Japanese woman who wields a polearm-like weapon. Even as I pull to a stop behind them, she slips a strike, spins the blade to slice open the Troll’s arm and then reverses the cut immediately to slash open its throat. As she makes the last strike, a white glow seems to envelop the blade itself, making the second cut pass through the Troll’s body much easier. She has the Troll outclassed in sheer speed and skill, but it doesn’t seem to matter as the Troll is already regenerating the damage, old and new wounds closing. Unlike the Troll, the woman isn’t regenerating damage and blood drips from the scalp wound she has already received.

Mikito Sato (Level 27)

HP: 282/420

As interesting as the fight is, the giant Huskies that dart in and out to annoy and distract the Troll are more so. Those creatures are nearly the size of a small pony each, varying in colouring and size by only a small amount. Controlling their actions with barked orders are a pair of redheaded humans, their owners I’d presume.

Richard Pearson (Level 24)

HP: 210 / 210

Lana Pearson (Level 24)

HP: 230/230

Further behind are a crowd of non-combatants, children and more. I don’t pay attention to them as I struggle to get the rifle out of its holster. I curse myself for not practising drawing the weapon when I had the time, fumbling the motion and costing precious seconds. Mikito misses a dodge, blood from her wound blinding her for a crucial second and it is all the Troll needs to smash her down. The killing blow is delayed for a precious second at the cost of a Husky’s body, thrown at its raised arm and then my rifle is free.

I aim high, figuring a missed shot will stay missed that way and pull the trigger. The first shot catches it on the shoulder, burning and then cauterising the flesh as the beam weapon punches a hole through it. The Troll hunches down, making a smaller target as it then sprints towards me on all fours.

Rather than run, I line up a proper shot, this one smashes the left collarbone and keeps going, right through its body to dig into the earth behind it. The Troll crashes to the ground, momentum keeping it rolling to me. When it recovers, it launches itself in a straight lunge which I meet with a boot to its face. Unfortunately, I forgot about that bitch physics which still has some control over our lives.

Instead of throwing the Troll back, I’m the one who goes flying backwards and into the ground. I take the fall and roll, a part of me marvelling at the fact that I can even do this kind of crazy acrobatics, the other, larger and smarter part snapping another shot off at the Troll.

This one completely misses, but it does make the Troll pause long enough to let me stand up. Again, I make a mistake, forgetting how long the creature’s arms are and it smashes the rifle aside, nearly taking my head with it except for a quick reflexive jerk backwards. My arms throb, but none of its claws get through the armor. Seeing me disarmed, it launches itself forward with little care.

Too bad an Erethran Honor Guard (stolen class and all) is never truly unarmed. I pivot and drop, letting instinct guide me as my sword appears in my hands and I let the Troll disembowel itself. I’m already stepping out from its shadow, a downward slice severing tendons in the back of the knee before my hands join together at the hilt for a hard block that disarms the Troll. Literally.

The Troll’s strike with its remaining arm is dodged and then help arrives, the Huskies bearing down on the wounded creature. I take the time to help lop off its other arm while the Huskies and Mikito keep it busy before I retrieve my rifle to end the fight and start blasting away at it. I grin behind my helmet, watching it fry and die.

Troll (Level 37) Slain

+3700 XP

“Whoa! That was amazing,” Richard walks up and claps me on the shoulder. Danger over, I pull my helmet off and nod back to him, reeling internally at how easy that was. I mean, sure I screwed up a bit, but that thing was significantly stronger than me in terms of Levels. Yet, I have a feeling with just a little more experience I could have kicked its ass all by my lonesome.

“Richard! Hilda needs some help,” Lana calls out, bent over the injured husky. As I look over, my eyes lock on the buxom redhead whose green blouse is slightly parted, leaning over the dog and my breath catches for a moment. Good lord, she’s gorgeous. Pulling my gaze away, I look at the dog on the ground, spotting its low health . Hmmm…

“Let me try something…” I walk over, calling forth the memory of the spell that I’ve gained and place hands on the creature, ignoring its labored breathing. I chant Minor Healing in my mind, my hand glowing from the mana that infuses it before spilling out onto the husky to begin the recovery process. I have to wait for a minute each time before I can recast the spell, but I eventually prop her health above the two-third mark. In between waiting, I loot the Troll gaining some Troll Blood and hide, being the slayer and the only one able to do so. I also check out the non-combatants who number just under 8, a split of 6 adults and 2 kids. With nothing better to do after all that, I review my spell again.

Minor Healing

Effect: Heals 20 Health per casting. Target must be in contact during healing. Cooldown 60 seconds.

Cost: 20 Mana

"Thank you!" Lana clutches the newly recovered dog, pushing her head into its fur as the dog returns the favor with long licks.

“How did you learn that? And how come your bike is still working?” Richard is eyeing me with pure lust and jealousy after the first healing. I look back up, noting the family resemblance, the light smile that twists their lips, the striking features that they both have. Richard is pretty damn good looking too, though it’s an ephemeral charisma that draws the eye to him when he speaks. He’s clad in a plaid shirt and jeans with a light summer jacket on his body, a shotgun held casually on his arm.

“Bought it in the Shop,” I casually mention. Best not to mention Sabres a mecha for now, a working bike these days is wonder enough.

“The Shop?” Lana butts in while Mikito stays silent, watching over the group. I look over and nod to the other fighter in this group and she just stares at me. Right then, not the friendliest one that one.

“Place where you can sell the Loot drops. There’s one in Whitehorse,” I pause, then hold up a hand to forestall more questions. “Let’s get moving, we can talk when we’re safe. Then I’ll answer your questions.”

The trio nod grimly, being reminded of the problems of standing around in the wild. I gesture over the children and one of the mum’s to get on the bike, remotely starting it and setting it to move along at a slow pace next to us.

Now that I’ve got them moving in the right direction I put my helmet back on and speak into it, obscuring my voice, “Ali, keep an eye out. Let me know if there’s any danger will you?”

“Not introducing me? Ashamed of me are you?” Ali grumbles, floating next to me.

“Just cautious. They seem nice enough people, but those dogs are huge,” I eye the hounds who trot beside us, even the one that got smashed around by the Troll. Seems like those things heal faster than we do which is saying something. I guess I wasted a bunch of my mana for nothing.

“Beast companions. Bet you a hundred Credits those two have a Beast Tamer Class,” Ali points to the Pearsons. I open my mouth to ask more when Richard drops back to speak to me and I pop my visor open to stay polite.

“Thanks again. I’m Richard, that’s my sister Lana and the lady over there’s Mikito,” Richard gestures in turn to the combatants before proceeding to point at the other non-combatants who stay in the center of our little group and naming them. Truth be told, I forget their names as fast as he says it, I’ve always been horrible with names and with Ali around, I don’t even have to try.

“John,” I offer my hand for a quick shake before I begin probing for their story. It seems he needs to talk since it doesn’t take long to get the details of what happened to them. When the System turned on, both Richard and Lana had been offered classes as Beast Tamers as their recommended small perk. They’d ignored the option at first, but after dealing with their first monster (a giant Squirrel it seems), they’d accepted. That had caused their mushing team to transform into the current pack that ranges around us and gave them a linked connection to their pets.

Mikito had been with her husband at the Takhini Hot Springs, hoping to get pregnant under the Northern Lights but things ended in tragedy. Neither of the Pearsons have been able to get the story of her Naginata out of her as yet, but whatever it was, it wasn’t pretty as the woman seemed to throw herself at the monsters they’d encountered at the drop of a hat. The rest of the non-combatants they’d picked up, neighbours and others independently moving to Whitehorse in hopes of safety.

“How come they don’t have classes?” I point to the group in the center, letting my head swivel around for new threats.

“They do. Karl’s a Farmer, Jorge is an Industrialist and so on, they’re just not fighters,” Richard shrugs and then mutters. “Neither am I really but you know…”

“Yeah, I do.” We both fall silent then, finishing the walk in our own thoughts. Being drawn into a fight or die situation has not been easy, not for any of us. I stare forwards as we walk, my mind turning to Whitehorse. We can rest when we get in, the safe zone a place where we can find some peace. Maybe put down our weapons, stop killing. Find some sanity in this crazy new world.

When we finally catch sight of Two Mile Hill in Whitehorse, the entire group lets out a little cheer. Walking through the industrial park and suburbs had been depressing, even if we hadn’t ventured from the highway to check out the abandoned buildings. Closer to the town, the zone level had dropped all the way to the mid-20s, so it was pretty safe as far as an apocalypse goes. No more flying drakes at least. However, the signs of struggle and death were all around us as we traveled and once again I was reminded that not everyone received or took a combat class - or had a chance to take one.

The cheers die off as we note another party coming down Two Mile Hill from the community center on bicycles. To our right, the massive white and blue building that made up the community centre sat, seeming to cast an oppressive gloom around it. The Canada Games Centre is something we are going to have to keep an eye on as from what Ali could tell, the mana flows were pooling quite deeply which would result in more monsters being drawn in. In time, if it isn’t cleared out, it’ll turn into a proper monster lair and after that, a full Dungeon. Thankfully, that’s a problem for another time and another person.

I drop the visor in the helmet to pull up basic magnification to start collecting information of the other group. The group consists of a pair of what look like extras from the Lord of the Rings Elves, a dragonman wannabe, a mini-Giant in full plate and what have to be a pair of casters by their long flowing robes. That’s right, the entire group looks like a LARP party on steroids, though with Level’s from low to mid 30’s which makes them a serious threat.

“Ali, what’s up with their levels?” I mutter into my helmet.

“Mmm… Whitehorse probably saw a lot more spawning in the initial period. You’re all getting bonus experience at the start, so if they’ve been working together and killing the monsters around here, leveling is pretty easy. Though, I’ll admit - it’s still pretty high,” Ali intones, eyeing the group as well.

I groan after a moment as I get a better look at the casters, the pair of them having the least amount of changes from their pre-Apocalypse visages. No acne makes the pair of teenagers look significantly better but it’s definitely them. I pull my helmet off completely to run a hand through my hair, shoulders hunching slightly. Lana, buxom Lana whose company is definitely more interesting than her brother Richard’s shoots me a worried look from my side.

“I kind of know them,” I start throwing a prayer to whatever gods there are who might be listening.

There probably is, and his name is Murphy because the bicycle-riding group swerves our way and I get a chance to read all their System names including the female Elf.

Luthien Celbrindal (Level 32)

HP: 420/420

“Fuck me sideways. I swear, I should have put more points into Luck,” I roll my neck, attempting to get rid of the tension that’s suddenly built up. Mikito hefts her naginata, getting ready for battle and I realise even the dogs are rumbling. “Not that kind of trouble people. I think. It’s personal.”

Lana gestures and Richard and the rest of the group come to a stop, obviously waiting for me to explain, “That’s my ex incoming. Bad breakup and all. I left the city to get away from her…”

“You’re scared of a girl?” Ali chortles at the same time Lana speaks. “You ran from relationship issues into the apocalypse?”

“No, I just don’t want to deal with the she-bitch,” I protest, waving them to be silent. Lana looks puzzled for a moment before gesturing for Richard to keep moving. That annoying redhead is trying to hide a grin, something that Ali doesn’t even bother with as he’s rolling in the air laughing his ass off.

“Halt! Who goes there,” the Giant calls out as we near.

“A bad role-player,” I say beneath my breath, letting Richard take the lead in the discussion as I attempt to fade into the background. Introductions are quickly made with Richard relaying a short version of their trip.

While Richard does the speaking, I eyeball the group and their weaponry. The swords, bows and maces are well used and while the group might seem friendly, they’re all keeping hands near their weapons. They seem to have stuck to the fantasy motif, which doesn’t surprise me at all – her role-playing group were all about D&D.

“How’d you get the bike working?” his Status bar says Tim and it takes me a moment to place him. Right! He was a mechanic before all this shit happened. Now he’s a half-dragon, half-man mixture seven feet tall carrying a battleaxe clad in chainmail. I guess some interests don’t go away.

“Well?” He pushes and I realise everyone is waiting for me to answer, even the Pearsons and Mikito.

“I bought it from the Shop.,” I say, leaning against the vehicle and oh so casually having my hand near the stock of my rifle. Not that I expect to have to shoot anybody but Tim’s just a little too happy to see a working bike.

“There’s a Shop out there?” Luthien the she-bitch butts in. I have to admit, the Elf look works for her - tall, thin and blonde is what she was before, but the additional pointy ears and tight leather pants and armor certainly accentuates everything. Looking good was never her problem though, lying, cheating, manipulating, that was another matter.

“No. I got access due to some… special circumstances,” I pause, trying to figure out the best way to get around this. “It was in Haines Junction…”

“You were there? Did you see a man named Perry?” The other elf speaks up, pushing forwards in the group surrounding me now.

“No. The town, it’s gone,” I look down, not really wanting to be the one to pass on this news. “Ogres took it over, killed them all. The Ogres were killed by a Salamander and when I looted them, I got a chance to use the Shop. That’s where I got the bike and my weapons,” that should do it. Just enough truth without going into detail about my part of it.

I watch the Elf, Jeff, crumple at the news and turn away. The others give him some space but Luthien and the last mage, Kevin just stare at me. In the end, it’s Kevin who speaks, “Is that you John?”

“Yes,” I answer him and as he opens his mouth to speak, I wave him away. “Glad to see you all alive,” I mouth, my brain turning on automatic as the roiling pit of anger and disgust thrums through me. I shake my head and swing my feet over the bike and get ready to leave.

“John…” Luthien says.

I ignore her, kicking the bike into gear and pulling away from the group, forcing one of the teenagers to jump aside or get run over. Yeah, I'm running away. I still can’t be in the same place with her, not right now. I grit my teeth, pushing aside the emotions again as I head down Two Mile Hill into downtown Whitehorse. I guess my peaceful return to normalcy just got shot out the window.

“So, John… figure I should let you know this now,” Ali speaks to me. Wait, into me! “Yeah, we’ve got a mental connection so you can stop talking into the air like a crazy person.”

How do I do this…?

“If that constipated look on your face is anything to go by, you’re trying it right? You got to think at me first, then I’ll hear it. It’s not mind reading,” Ali says.

“Like this asshole?”

“Perfect! Of course, no one can hear me so I won’t do the ‘duh I’m stupid stare’ like you,” Ali adds.

“Asshole,” I mutter into my helmet.

Once I’m down the hill, I take 4th Street, passing the burnt-out shell of the McDonald’s and more abandoned commercial buildings on both sides of me. In a minute, I have to slowdown to a crawl as the number of people increases significantly and none of them are obeying traffic laws anymore. Not too surprising, since the number of working vehicles can be counted on one finger. Though, it looks like bicycles have made a giant comeback, with riders swerving in and around pedestrians with little care. I guess when your health regenerates within minutes, even bruises and broken bones become less important. The humans all move jerkily, flickers of anger or fear crossing faces when a movement is too fast or something catches them unaware. Shoulders are hunched, others have eyes wide and staring and these are the good ones - the ones willing to come out from hiding.

It takes me a moment to realise what is nagging me about everyone – there’s not a single pair of spectacles to be seen. Like my own on-going ailments, it looks like the increased regeneration rate from the System removes minor issues like that. More interestingly, I spot two pairs of high-level individuals with rifles patrolling the streets, each a pair black-skinned, silver-haired Elves in a tunic uniform ensemble of more black and silver. Shacking up with Luthien, I know immediately these guys aren’t your typical Elves - they’re Dark Elves, the evil version of the Elves. At least in bad fantasy lore. Surprisingly, their presence doesn’t seem to generate much interest from the humans around, most who seem to be scurrying back and forth on their own errands.

At École Elementary School, it’s my turn to be shocked as I spot a working truck amongst on the street, engine running as people hurry around it and into the sea of tents on the school grounds. The sound of the diesel engine cranking over is loud as a group of First Nation hunters unload a Moose from the back. Like most of our native flora, this one seems to have tripled in size at least from the sheer quantity of meat that they are pulling off and handing down into the school.

I pull my bike over near them and one of the First Nations elder who is directing the unloading looks to me with caution, a hand unconsciously tightening on the rifle butt. He’s old school with a permanent squint from being outdoors all the time and lines across his tanned face. Dressed in a rawhide vest, plaid shirt and jeans, he could be out for a Sunday afternoon stroll in Whitehorse if not for the blood that covers his clothing. I’m sure I’ve seen him around town before at one of the many public functions but for the life of me, where and when eludes me. I raise my hand in greeting and I can see him look towards my bike in consideration.

“You hunt that yourself?” I let the surprise and admiration creep into my voice. Even a glance at their Status Bars shows me their average level is in the single digits.

“Yup. Took half our bullets too but we still have some,” The warning is clear, though I just chuckle and raise both my hands clear of my own rifle.

“Don’t want no trouble. Just a little information as I just got in. People gathering in the school?” I gesture to École and get a nod in confirmation.

“So, what’s that?” I point towards the biggest change in the city, the towering 8 storey, shining metal building that dominates the town and is probably smack centre in Main St. Whitehorse was a picturesque town, one made of short rectangular buildings, wide roads and occasional gestures to its pioneer past. There was even an ordinance that kept buildings beneath 30 feet, so the Blade Runner escapee of a building was not normal.

A spit is my initial answer before the elder continues, “Building appeared 3 days after the monsters. Some asshole who says he owns the town now lives there.”

“That’s where the Shop is boy-o. Someone purchased the rights to town, give me a second and I’ll see what I can dig up,” Ali says, going back to staring into space.

Realising I’ve still got my helmet on, I pull it off and set it on the handlebars. “Mind if I ask a few more questions?”

The elder sighs and after getting me to add myself to the chain, proceeds to answer. Lifting and tossing the meat is cheap for the information that I want. Surprisingly, the moment my foot crosses the line into the school, I get a new window, one that I’ve never seen before.

You Have Entered a Safe Zone (École School)

Mana flows in this area are stabilised. No monster spawning will happen.

This Safe Space includes:

A School (+10% Skill Progression)

I soon learn that the guards are the town owner’s and they have been dealing with most of the spawning monsters, patrolling the main thoroughfares. Both École and FH Collins were safe zones and where nearly everyone was crashing these days since it was the only way to guarantee a monster didn’t just spawn in the middle of the night under your bed. Space was a premium though and hygiene levels had dropped since both electricity and water wasn’t working anymore which explained the rather rank smell of unwashed bodies. Then again, I was not complaining - I hadn’t washed in days either.

The meat was for the general stew pot as the regular truck delivery had never made it and a ton of food had spoiled when the electricity died. It was only some quick thinking that had the stores barricaded, with food being served in the cafeteria. The hunters were doing their best to supplement, but with nearly five thousand mouths to feed, they weren’t keeping up and everyone was on short rations now.

While I'm speaking the others catch up and the non-combatants and kids are quickly ushered in by a welcoming committee of delighted looking residents. In the background, I can hear questions being asked about where they came from and of any confirmed deaths. I guess knowing one way or the other is better than not. Richard and the other fighters are dragged away by my ex and her group, a quick glare by me keeping them away for now at least.

Unloaded, the men hop up onto the truck looking grim. The only other working truck they’d found had never come back from a recent trip so they need to get hunting immediately. However, hunting monsters bigger and tougher than you are with our basic hunting rifles could not be easy.

“Jim,” I call to the elder and he turns back to me from speaking with his group about their next hunting grounds, obviously irritated by my interruptions. Hopefully, this will help, “Ran into a bear along the ride-in. I had to kill it and leave the meat. It’s about 45 minutes drive from here on the way to Haines Junction. Might be a bit rotten, it’s been a few hours but…”

“Where?” His eyes narrow, already considering it. Free meat that doesn’t require them to fight is too good to pass up.

“I’ll show you,” I head back to the bike and then stop as a pair of guards appear in front of me, their faces impassive. “Hi there.”

“Lord Roxley would like to have a word,” the taller of the two Dark Elves speaks, hand casually resting on his sword hilt.

“Really now,” I can feel my lips widen and my balance shift before Ali practically shouts into my ear. “Don’t be an idiot! If he wants to, he can ban you from the Shop!”

That would be bad. “I guess I’m coming with you.”

Jim glares at the guards but says nothing, nodding to me to show he understands my predicament. On a whim, I grab the rifle from the holster and hand it to the man. “Shoots just like the real thing, except no recoil. You’ve got 21 shots in there. Try not to break it will you? I expect it back.”

Jim grunts, checking the rifle out as his friends look on in surprise.

“So Ali, you got the locator beacon on that turned on right?”

“Definitely. Still stupid, but these hicks won’t be able to figure out how to turn it off,” Ali smirks.

“Let’s go see your boss then,” I flash the pair a wide grin that doesn’t reach my eyes as I get onto the bike and wave them to lead me. This should prove interesting at the very least.

Chapter 7

On closer inspection, the building that the Shop is housed in is sheathed in some form of reflective silvery material. Spreading upwards in a rectangular block, it dominates the cityscape, jarring in its alienness. As we approach, the door slides open and we enter the foyer which is all black marble and more silver highlights. The moment we do, a System message appears.

You Have Entered a Safe Zone (City Centre)

Mana flows in this area are stabilised. No monster spawning will happen.

This Safe Space includes:

Village of Whitehorse City Centre

The Shop

“Village?” Yeah, the city’s small but that’s a bit of a demotion. I guess the System is only counting System recognised housing.

“Getting a map now John, I’ll overlay with your human maps in a bit so you can see things properly when you put on the helmet,” Ali speaks, eyeing the building we walk in. “Of course, if you got those cyber-eyes, I could just shoot it through to you but you just got whiny about wanting to keep your meat eyes.”

So not the right time. I sigh and rub my temples, wondering for the thousandth time whether there was something in the Shop that’d let me neuter Spirits. Or at least gag them.

We enter the elevators and shoot up to the top floor, the motion completely imperceptible. Heck, the only reason I know we’re on the top floor is due to the 360-degree view that the transparent walls afford me.

“Lord Graxin Roxley, Baron of the Seven Seas, Hunter of Drakyl, Master of the Sword and the Black Flame, Corinthian of the Second Order and acclaimed Dancing Master of the 196th Ball,” the guard announces as we step from the elevator. At my side, Ali translates in his usual helpful manner “Dark Elf, Baron, killed over a hundred demons, blade master and special fire mage, likes to cuddle with men aggressively and is a pretty, pretty dancer.”

The guard, unaware continues his introductions. “My lord, the Adventurer John Lee, Monster Bane and Redeemer of the Dead.”

Interesting. So my Titles actually mean something it seems. While I’m being announced, I take the time to watch Lord Roxley. The man (elf?) is tall, a good 6’ 6” of lithe grace and purple hair that reaches his back. Pointy ears, black skin and purple eyes dominate an angular face atop a military cut swing jacket that’s all in black with hints of purple. Resting easy on his right hip is a sword and across from it on his left a pistol. He exudes easy confidence and charm and a part of me wants to go up and grab his trim butt and see how kissable he really is.

Mental Influence Resisted

The flashing note brings my lustful thoughts to a halt and Ali floats next to me, nodding at my glance, “Yup. He’s putting out a low-level bubble of charisma. Looks like a mixture of pheromones, good genes and subtle body mimicking behavior.” He pauses and then continues, “Still, feel free to jump his bones. I’ll watch and tape it.”

“How come his Status Bar is just a bunch of question marks after his name?” I ignore Ali’s assertions, though a part of me still wouldn’t mind. It’s not as if I haven’t dabbled before but maybe another day.

“Can’t access his information. Something’s blocking me,” Ali says.

“Welcome to the Village of Whitehorse Adventurer,” Lord Roxley says.

“Thank you,” I stand around, trying to figure out what the hell is going on. Why me? The way we were announced tells me something formal is going on here, but what beats me like a white guy the day before the welfare check arrives.

“I must say, I had not expected one so… inexperienced, for one so titled,” Roxley smiles and this one is not at all friendly.

“Yeah. I got… lucky,” okay, downplay might be the better bet here perhaps. Or at the least, close to the vest.

“There is no Luck with the System,” Roxley states and the way he says it, it seems like it’s a quote. He gestures to a pair of lounging chairs and I walk over to join him, waiting for him to sit before doing so myself. Some courtesies I know, though who knows if they use the same forms.

“I will not keep you long. I’m sure you wish to use my Shop and see what has transpired in your city. Still, I would feel it remiss if I did not speak with you beforehand, to ensure that certain matters are clear,” Roxley leans forward, meeting my eyes and waiting for a nod before continuing, “I am the System registered owner of this Village. I have every intention of growing it to it’s fullest and adding this region to my Clan’s holdings.

“To ensure that, I’ve already hired many of your compatriots in the village. I understand you even met up with some of them and were instrumental in bringing some survivors back. For that, you have my thanks”

Quest Completed: The Safety of Many

Reward: 2,000 Credits per Each Survivor (22,000 Credits Received); 500XP per Survivor (5,500XP Received)

Type: Repeatable

Level Up!

You have reached Level 8 as an Erethran Honor Guard. Stat Points automatically distributed. You have 18 Free Attributes to distribute.

“Ah, congratulations!” Roxley smiles slightly as he watches me even as I will away the windows. He then stands and walks away to a sideboard, getting us a couple of drinks. “In my culture, each Level is celebrated.”

“Ali, how the hell does he know what’s going on?”

“At a guess boy-o? He’s got a System Companion too. From his eye, I’d say it’s an AI. Or you know, he could be reading you like a crystal,” Ali shrugs. “I’ve stopped a dozen probes into our information on the System already, and I only managed to stop them from reading us completely. He definitely has your basic stats at least. Well, hello there… Got to go. Try not to get killed.”

With those last words, Ali is gone. What the hell?

“To Strength!” Handing me the glass of dark blue liquid, Roxley toasts. I echo his cheer, sipping on the drink tentatively first. It’s sweet and smooth, almost like drinking a good mead. On that thought, I pull the drink away from my lips as memories of waking up on a beach, pantsless intrude. Good times with Luthien… I push those thoughts away too. Not now.

“I, will of course, reward you similarly for any others you may find and for other relevant information,” Roxley says.

“Ummm…” I pause, considering and then fill him in on Haines Junction giving him the abbreviated version I gave the others. His eyes narrow a bit but he doesn’t interrupt me, just thanking me for the information.

“Well Adventurer Lee, this has been enlightening. I expect I shall be seeing more of you, one so titled after such a short period is certain to do much,” Roxley says, offering me his hand. I take it, feeling a shiver pass through my body on contact which I push away. When he lets go of my hand, he inclines his head to the door and I take the dismissal, following the guards out. They deposit me a few floors down into the Shop.

Interestingly, when I arrive and place my hand on the crystal that will transport me to the Shop, I get a System window asking me to choose which one. I also have a default option and after a brief consideration, I decide to go with it. Ali seems to know them and I do too, a bit. Who knows - the others Shops might be even worst.

The Shop itself hasn’t changed much in the time that I’ve gone, which isn’t surprising. The two within greet me with cool professionalism until they realise that Ali isn’t here. Then the professionalism thaws a little bit, probably in anticipation of fleecing me.

Too bad I don’t have much for them to buy or sell. I push them a bit on the last few pieces of Ogre loot I hadn’t been able to contain in my inventory the first time around and the few pieces of extra loot I’ve picked up then but don’t bother haggling too much. Better to let them have a good deal now to build up some goodwill for when I bring Ali and more loot back in the future.

That done, I take a deep breath. I’ve been putting this off for a bit, making excuses for why I couldn’t do it in Haines Junction, promising that I’d do it once I was in Whitehorse. Now, faced with the ability to check on the Status of my family, I find myself hesitating. Believing they are dead and knowing are two different things. I bite my lip and then finally pay the cheap, cheap price to the System for information on my family.

I close my eyes, hands clenched before me as I hold back the tears by sheer force of will. I force myself to look up and breathe, force control over my body and by that, my emotions. I knew the answer before I paid, I knew this was the likely result. I knew it, but the pain still chokes me up for a moment. I cycle my breath for what seems like hours but is probably just a few minutes before I stuff the grief away again. Another time - I’ll deal with it another time.

I came down here for another reason though, one that came to mind when I stepped into the school. I pull up information on these Safe Zones, browsing for information. A quick perusal and a few questions get me the answers that I need. Any building purchased from the System is considered a safe zone, the System automatically stabilising the flow of mana in that location. Locations within a city are generally more expensive as the City Owner taxes all prices but in return, if 80% of all land that lay within a city’s boundary was part of the System, the entire city would be considered a Safe Zone.

Once again, I can’t help but feel the entire System is a scam. It seems engineered to force people into using it – destroying sensitive electronics with mana, creating safe zones only when a building is purchased, even the inventory items. If Steve Jobs was still alive, he probably would be jerking off to the System Help Guide.

I pull up the listings for the schools and then the other buildings that have been bought in short order. Not many at all, most owned by Roxley himself, with the only exceptions an armoury, an alchemist and another house. The house is registered as owned by Nicodemus of the Raven’s Circle, which puzzles me for a second before I recall the Giant. Ah right, Nicodemus / Nick, he was the accountant and GM wasn’t he? That must be where the ‘Raven’s Circle’´ was headquartering themselves.

Out of curiosity, I make another query of the System and grimace. Of course, it’d work that way. Unless a fee was paid to register a designated heir, all buildings owned by an individual upon death would revert to the System. Yeah, keeping Roxley alive was in our best for now - he literally kept the monsters at bay by being alive.

I make a note to mention this to someone at some point before finally pulling up my own residence.

89 Alsek Rd.

Current Ownership: None

Current Occupant: John Lee, Adventurer

Cost: 20,000 Credits (50% discount for previous occupancy status)

Current Assigned Purpose: None

I’d rented a 1 bedroom suite beneath a house, but it looks like the System has decided I live in the entire location. I eye the Credits that I have left and I bite my lips for a moment. Easy come, easy go.

Congratulations!

You have purchased 89 Alsek Rd. You now own the building and may assign a purpose and upgrade the building. Upgrades may be purchased at the residence itself or at the Shop. Please note that all buildings have a minimum maintenance cost and if not met, will be returned to the System Pool.

22,000 Credits Deducted

Even after the Apocalypse, there are taxes.

Coming out of the City Centre, I come across a group of teenagers trying to bikejack Sabre. Something a little cruel rises up in me and I just stand there, grinning as one hunts for the keys and ignition, another attempts to pry up the seat with a crowbar while the last fiddles with where the engine is, trying to discern how to get it started. The crowbar slips, putting its edge into his friend’s shoulder but not even leaving a scratch on the bike.

Next to me, the pair of guards who escorted me down move to do something about this but I wave them down. They look at me incredulously at first but soon find as much cruel amusement as I do in the children’s futile efforts. In fact, we start betting on how long it’ll take before the group give up. They take 5 and 8 minutes, I take 10.

Teenage stupidity and stubbornness win me 50 credits each after the ten-minute mark passes. By this point, the kid with the crowbar is whaling on the seat in an attempt to get the bike to do something, anything. Tier IV Armor might not be much to the System, but in old Earth standards, I might as well be driving a tank.

Having made an easy 100 credits, I send the command to Sabre to turn on. The kids jump and finally spot us and I give them a slight wave before touching the band around my neck to call forth the helmet. As the helmet folds up around my face, they jump back and then as one, scatter.

Kids.

Strange. What started out as a cruel prank has actually lightened my spirits, at least a little. Feeling happier than I have been in a while, I wave goodbye to the guards and head home.

As I cross the bridge that separates downtown Whitehorse from the Riverdale subdivision, I note that the river seems to have risen higher. I wonder how the dam is doing but now is not the time. Instead, I gun it, passing F.H. Collins on the right where another tent city has sprung up on its grounds, covering every single piece of protected land in canvas and humans. The greenery on the left has me keeping a close eye out and I’m not the only one as the series of guards posted at the school attest. I hit the roundabout and more guards stand outside the Super A, making my lips twist in distaste.

Passing empty ranch houses on my left and right as I cross through the suburb, the entire place feels like a ghost town with not a single person present. Broken doors, shattered windows and blood marks tell a desperate, bloody story. Cars are abandoned in driveways everywhere, previously snow-covered lawns brown and grey with lack of care.

I pull Sabre to a stop in front of my house as I come to the end of the street at the T-junction, staring at my house with its double garage doors beneath the open-air deck, the double-storey white residence connected directly to the garage itself. Wind ruffles my hair, bringing the smell of pine from the trees that cling to the clay-cliff face behind the house. The main entrance doorway is broken into, the double-doors off their hinges, the usual white coat of paint marred by a single dark red streak at the door. The bushes that make up our fence look to be doing fine, adapted as they are to a Northern spring. I glance to the right, noting the stand-alone workshop has its door rolled open, the contents stolen with only a few scattered items left. To the side, I see the fence that blocks off the garden that abuts the hill in the back is at least still in good condition.

The moment I turn onto the driveway and pass the lot threshold, I get a System message.

Welcome to 89 Alsek Rd.

Current Ownership: John Lee, Adventurer

Current Occupants: None

Current Assigned Purpose: None

Structural Integrity: 94% (More…)

Would you like to assign a purpose?

Interesting, purpose? I mentally select yes, curious to see what it speaks of. The list of purposes come up, most of them greyed out but the top two – Residence and Safe House. A quick verification shows the first gives a bonus to resting and offers more upgradeable options in terms of add-on facilities, the second a reduced cost for security upgrades for the entire lot. My hand hovers for a moment, trying to decide between the two. The safe house option would allow me to build walls, cameras and other security measures fast but the residence with add-on facilities could really make use of the workshop.

Really though, I should ask Randy first before I make any further decisions. I dismiss the pop-up and draw my sword, heading in through the broken door. Best to see if there are any unpleasant surprises awaiting me inside.

There are, just none alive. The large pool of blood and the blood splatters around the room tell the tale of Randy’s likely fate. The body is gone, hopefully taken care of by one of the citizens, but I really wouldn’t bet on it. The tang of rotten, clotted blood fills the house, mitigated by the open doorway but I sigh, making a note that this will need to be cleaned soon.

I make my way to the garage and open the doors, rolling the bike in securely before making way to my own suite beneath the stairs. The door here is broken too, but nothing seems taken. Then again, it’s not as if I had a lot to take. A couch and my laptop dominate the small living room while in my bedroom, my King-sized indulgence lies unmade. Everything looks exactly the way I left it, and for a moment, I have this surreal feeling that everything I’ve experienced was just a bad dream.

I lean against the doorjamb, mind spinning as I finally realise I’m home. I’m safe - mostly. Monsters can’t spawn in here and Ali would warn me of anything that spawned close by. A tightness in my chest that I’ve carried for days releases slightly, just a little bit and I find myself smiling.

I run a hand through my hair, feeling the stickiness from not having a proper wash and shake the feelings off. First things first, grab a change of clothing and then it’d be time to check out the rain barrels at the back for a quick wash. I grab a shirt and pair of jeans and then pause, laughing to myself.

“Leave you alone for 5 minutes and you go completely nuts eh?” Ali snorts, floating next to me as he surveys my old home.

“Ali! You son-of-a-bitch! Where did you go?” I grouse, throwing the useless clothing aside. Adding a bunch of inches in height was great, except for the fact that none of my old clothing would fit me. I head upstairs for Randy’s closet, after all, he isn’t going to need it anymore and he was always a big man.

“Got an invite from a shiny pair of bits. Rox-boy had an AI Companion who invited me over to chat,” Ali chuckles, shaking his head. “Figured you could handle yourself for a few minutes. Decent buy on this place, but you got fleeced at the Shop.”

I grunt, picking through and finding some clothes that I figure will work. I head to the back, beginning to strip before I raise an eyebrow at the Spirit who shakes his head negatively. Good, no monsters.

“Talk,” I grunt and begin the process of bathing in the garden. It’s not great, but it’s certainly better than nothing and while I couldn’t necessarily smell myself after days of stewing in my own stink, I’m sure others could. Not to mention that the simple act of being clean is bliss in itself.

“Hmmm… where to start. First, don’t fuck with the elf. He’d eat you, me, your friends, the entire city and then wonder when the main course would start. He’s got at least an Advanced-class in the high levels, or, and I’d lay good money on this, a Master class. Very little chance he’s got a Grandmaster class otherwise he wouldn’t be hanging out in a dump like this. Second, he’s in a rush. I don’t think X-124 knew I picked that up, but again, we’re outclassed here. Third, he’s the reason why the Raven’s Circle is so high-level. He’s been giving out Quests like candy in an attempt to get as many survivors in town as possible,” Ali says.

I finish dunking myself in the water and pause long enough to ask “Why?”

“Mmmm, City prerequisites. Once we get the buildings bought up, he’d be able to upgrade to a Town which gives us a series of new building options. There’s a minimum citizen requirement for that though, and of course, you guys are his tax base.”

I grunt at that and then nod. Makes sense. I pull up the house’s menu and flick it to him as I get dressed, sliding the high-tech jumpsuit on first before more normal clothing. Thank the gods the jumpsuit had an auto-clean feature on itself, otherwise, I’d refuse to wear it again. “Recommendations?”

“You’re asking? Shit, did he drug you?” Ali teases as he spins it around and points to the Residence option. “No choice. If you intend to stay, this is it.”

I nod, happy that we concur and make the selection. Sorry Randy, guess I’m taking over your place. If you are alive, I’ll apologise in person. That done, I also make a quick payment on a rush basis to bring the integrity of the location back to 100% which fixes all the doors. It’s amusing watching the System take care of it as the doors shimmer and then reappear, fixed and brand new. Much more convenient than doing it myself.

“Where to now boy-o?” Ali asks.

“Got to get my rifle back,” I make sure the doors are locked before I roll the bike out, the sun still shining with its cheerful brightness. I grimace, pulling up a clock and realise it’s nearly time for dinner. Damn midnight sun.

“Jim!” I wave to the Elder, having parked the bike around the corner from the school on 5th street. Not as many people roaming by and while it’s out of sight for me, Ali can sense it and I can easily call it to me through the Neuro Link. The helmet I stow in its band form around my neck, finally giving up on acting like it’s a normal helmet.

“Ah, John,” he comes over to shake my hand before he unslings the rifle from his shoulder and hands it back to me a tad reluctantly. “That is a powerful weapon.”

“Yup and…” I shut up, my brain kicking in before I finish the sentence if you get me a pouch of tobacco and your daughter it’s yours. Not appropriate.

“And…?” Jim says.

“Uh… there’s a basic version of one like it for around 500 Credits in the Shop. If you skip getting the upgrades, it’s pretty decent,” I reply, quickly backpedalling.

At the mention of the System, Jim scowls, “The rifle came in handy. We had to fight off this 3 legged, furred creature that was eating the bear. Couldn’t save all the bear meat, but it more than made up for it.”

“Good! What’d you get for the loot?” I grin at him, curious.

“…” Jim pauses, speaking slowly. “Loot?”

“Shit. No one told you about that?” I wince, wondering how much they must have missed.

“Not as if you knew either noob,” Ali points out helpfully.

“Put your hand on your next kill, or whoever does the kill, and think Loot. The System will let you grab some items that can be sold for Credits in the Shop,” I explain and then add. “You can still use the meat that’s left, it just gives you a small portion of the creature. That’s how I skinned the bear.”

Every time I mention the System, Jim scowls. I can understand not liking the world we are in or the damn scam that it is, but the way he acts, it’s pure spite. It’s not as if the System cares if we loot a body or not, “Try it the next time. You’ll need to get new weapons soon, unless you want to try killing things with spears when you run out of bullets.”

Jim’s grimace is enough to let me know I’ve gotten through to him. I nod a goodbye to him saying, “Alright, I guess I should try some of this food…”

He nods, gesturing me into the building itself and I head over, surveying the grounds for more familiar faces. In the school, only a small walkway is available as people sit, squat and rest, marking out where they will be sleeping tonight. A few questions has me directed to the cafeteria, most watching me with wary or curious eyes.

The serving tables are set-up in the cafeteria itself, people streaming in and out as they get food before most of them leave for less crowded environs, the close-packed quantities of unwashed humanity a bit much on the senses. Everything is dirty, dishevelled and demoralised; many just sitting down without a goal. No electricity means no easy entertainment or ability to use a million, billion electronic distractions that we have come to rely on, and until more buildings are purchased, safe zones are at a premium.

I stand in line and wait my turn, eyeing the portions doled out. The stew is mostly water with some slivers of meat and vegetables in it. Considering I lost my backpack and all my rations to a dragon and someone had already raided my house, I don’t have a lot of other options at this time. I’ll have to look into purchasing some food from the Shop the next time, but for tonight, this works.

A part of me wants to be among humanity, unwashed and demoralised as they are. The press of humanity, the closeness of people is something that I hadn’t realised I missed until I met up with Richard and his crew. It’s not easy for most, shifting from a peaceful lifestyle to dealing with the System and its monsters and I can see more than one person being comforted as they suddenly break down crying or just stop, staring into space. I’m mostly a stranger here, having only arrived a few months ago so I have no true ties to the community, not like many here who have lost friends, family and co-workers in days. Whitehorse has always been a small town, so everyone has lost someone.

I grab the bannock, flashing the server a smile and getting a blush back before I go looking for butter, not finding any. Stew and bannock it is then and I head for the doors, hoping for some fresh air. I catch more than one glance, a few looks filled with hope which is quickly dashed. Outside, I find an empty spot and continue people watching as I mull over the future.

What happens to us now? Traditionally, the First Nations hunted for their for meat but with such a large group, that probably won’t help in the long run, not to mention that many of the hunting grounds are at least an hour away. We’re lucky this is in mid-April, giving us the option of getting more plants into the ground, but there is no way for us to actually plant all the food the town will need. No more food from the south means the winter will be brutal, not unless we can find another source of supplies. That means we need the System and all the ability to buy and sell in the Shop - which means not pissing off Lord Roxley.

It’s not a nice conclusion especially since it seems like he’s just another vulture, dropping onto the still twitching corpse of Earth but it is what it is. I wonder how many of these others are seeing that, thinking that far ahead? For that matter, why am I? I’ve never been much for this kind of thinking before.

“Ali, those increases in Intelligence. Are those things making me plan and think further?”

“Yeah, sort of,” Ali shrugs, turning away from trying to look down a nearby lady’s blouse. “It’s a bit hard to pinpoint the changes, but sort of. When you increase your level or your base stats, there are two effects. The first is, of course, your increase in your Mana pool which the System adjusts for you. The second is a change in your brain, allowing you to process and understand data better and then eventually process that data into information, to put things together into concrete ideas and plans, especially in unexpected ways. That’s the physical side, the thing that makes you, you.”

“So, what, I’m smarter than Einstein now?”

“Ein… who? Look, you weren’t a complete Goblin before. But you’ve also mostly been fighting and running so your increases have mostly been focused in that area. You’re faster and smarter at fighting, not at solving world peace. However, there’s also side benefits like your ability to plan and think about things, at comprehending information.”

I grunt, mopping up the last of the food. That’s frightening, that the System - that Mana is changing me so directly. It’s also just as scary thinking what someone who specialises or puts all their points into Intelligence would be like. What else is the System changing without me knowing? The more I learn about the System, the less I like it.

As I stand, I realise that the group of children playing in the corner are doing so with some mini-ponies masquerading as dogs. On a whim, I walk over, depositing the bowl in a nearby tray. Lana gives me a hug when she spots me, Mikito offering me a slight nod. Richard seems to be missing, but that’s okay as I view the two ladies in turn, both of them having obviously found a washbasin somewhere to clean up the worst of the dirt and blood. Mikito looks at first glance to be doing fine, stoic and calm, but little signs show she’s on the edge. Fingers trembling ever so slightly, a twist in the mouth when no one is looking.

Lana looks to be doing better, more subdued by the generally gloomy atmosphere here but certainly not as broken. She has also changed into new clothing and the top she’s found is just a little too small, ensuring that more than one man has enjoyed looking at her generous assets. I have to work hard on not staring myself, reminding myself that I’m not a teenager anymore. No matter what my damn hormones are saying.

“How are you guys doing?” I gesture around before we return to watching the pair of dogs give rides to the kids. Parents watch on, some disinterestedly, some with deep concern but none make a move to stop it. I watch for a moment then I pull some chocolate from my stash, waving over some of the smaller ones and handing out the chocolate. It looks like they could do with the calories and after the initial rush, the children return to playing with the kids. In the meantime, the girls stay silent.

“We found a place to stay but it’s… umm… crowded,” Lana answers once we are alone again and Mikito nods firmly. “Richard’s taken the dogs to Collin’s, we’re hoping there’s more space there. Where are you staying?

“In my house,” I say.

“That’s not safe!” Lana hisses, turning to me. “I know you’ve been out in the woods yourself, but it really isn’t safe. You never know when a monster could spawn.”

“Oh,” realising my mistake, I quickly explain. “I bought it from the System so it is a Safe Zone. Still, won’t stop them from breaking in, but I’ll have enough warning especially since the doors and windows are fixed.”

“Mmmm….”

“Is that where you bathed?” Mikito speaks up from her seat.

“In a way. Randy, ummm, the former owner, he had rain barrels that were still filled up in the back,” I explain.

Mikito smiles and shares a look with Lana before they each take hold of one of my arms, gripping them firmly. “John…”

And that’s how I ended up with three new guests and a half-dozen mini-pony dogs. At least the dogs make a great alarm system.

Chapter 8

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

The world centers on my breathing and then nothing, a complete absence of thought fading in and out at times. I still have a long way to go, even with the purchased skill but as my alarm goes off, I realise I’ve been at it for half-an-hour now. Much better than what I could have done before the purchase.

It’s strange that such a simple thing helps me feel so much better, more balanced and calm. A part of me still wants to poke and prod at the System, about the why’s and wherefores, but it’s easy to push aside now, to focus on what is. Those questions can be answered in due time, but for now, there are things to do. Like breakfast.

“I love you,” I come down after a rain barrel bath, rifle clutched in one hand to grab the cup of offered coffee. “If that’s bacon, I’m marrying you.”

Lana laughs, shaking her head and pokes me with the spatula as she stands in the kitchen cooking up breakfast using my spare camping stove in a plain black borrowed shirt. The house looks cleaner, more put together with blood stains gone and furniture put aright. It must be my guests since after being forced to invite them home, I spent the rest of the night hidden away in my room going over the various upgrade options of my new residence. Spending so much time alone recently and being a natural introvert meant the rush of humanity drained all my social batteries.

“It’s the end of the world, not my taste,” Lana retorts and points to a seat. “Sit and eat.”

I comply happily, digging in before I have to ask, “Where did this come from?”

“Richard. He visited the Shop this morning while you were asleep and traded in our loot for some groceries. We gave most of what we got to the others, but we kept some essentials,” Lana answers me.

“Where are they?” I look around and note that both Mikito and Richard aren’t around.

“Hunting. Richard got an invite to join in and Mikito insisted on going. They took the dogs with them and joined up with a few others to work the area around Long Lake. Seems like you can put together parties in Town and share experience that way,” she explains. “I’m going to see what I can do to help at the schools. What’s your plans?”

“Nothing,” I smile slightly, shrugging. “I was thinking of taking it a bit easy, maybe spend a little time looking over the rest of the house and resting.”

Lana purses her lips, looking at me for a moment but does not comment further. After a moment she finishes the last of her coffee before she heads off to the room the girls shared to get dressed. Dressed for sure, since when she walks around the counter, I realise she’s not wearing pants. My jaw must have dropped because she grins back at me mischievously and explains in a purr that she doesn’t have anything to wear.

Ali just wolf-whistles and helpfully points out that she probably is coming on to me and proceeds to provide me graphic, graphic advise on what to do. I tune him out again, and when Lana does come back out wearing the same worn jeans as the day before, I almost wonder if what she said was the full truth. Either way, not the problem this moment. She waves goodbye to me, heading out and I sit back, staring around me.

The next half-hour has me puttering around the house, cleaning up the dishes and the stovetop, sorting out the remaining mess upstairs and my suite and then the workshop. When I find myself trying to turn on the water to water the plants that I realise I’m just trying to find work to do, something to get my mind off that gnawing pit of grief that is still bottled up in my body. I walk over to my bookcase, staring at my old friends and realise that’s not going to work either.

Fuck.

I close my eyes, leaning on the bookcase and realising that make-work isn’t going to cut it. I either have to deal with my emotions, all the things that I’ve been putting off or… Or I need to be out there, fighting. That’s when I don’t think. Out there, with the monsters, I can’t afford to do it.

I grim humorlessly, staring at my hand. Stupid. Such a stupid idea. But there might be more survivors who need help, more people trying to get back to town. Maybe I could do a little good too.

First step is to swing by the old hospital near the school and then take the road down to check out the scattered homes on this side of the river. There’s not a lot of people who live past the hospital, but with the increased number of monsters down this way, anyone who did live here might have been trapped. Anyway, it won’t take me longer than a half-hour. Other than a single, unwary crab-like monster that I kill, Ali and I find no sign of surviving humans and I don’t feel the need to go hunting here. The quest and the potential lives I might save are more important, at least for now.

After that, I leave Riverdale itself, the goal to make it to Porter Creek and the other suburbs to do a final check. There are more people out during the day, even the threat of on-going sudden death can’t beat pure boredom. In Rotary and Shipyards Park on the river, I note people working the fields over, breaking up the earth to begin planting. I’d barely glanced at Rotary Park on the way to Riverdale last night, figuring the churned earth just another apocalyptic change.

Once I leave downtown, it’s a faster ride to the suburbs. I don’t even bother slowing down to shoot at the monsters I see on my way there, but a part of me knows my haste is wasted. If there are survivors, they could have made their way in from these nearby suburbs on foot easily enough or someone like the circle would have escorted them in. Still, I’ll feel better making sure.

Surprisingly, I come across a few holdouts; families and individuals who refuse to leave their residences from sheer pride or stupidity. By the sounds of it, I’m not the only one who has tried to convince the holdouts to move, so I leave them to it, just making notes of where they are. I’ll leave it for someone else to deal with these idiots. Unfortunately, by the time I finish my circuit, other than a few simple kills, I’ve not found a single survivor to bring back and I’ve wasted half the day already.

It's strange, driving through abandoned houses and spotting the occasional dead and rotting body, the smell carrying through the wind. I know I should feel something for them. Pity. Sympathy. Grief. Something. I don’t though, just this hollow emptiness where the feelings should be. Pushing aside my own emotions over my own loss has left me with this emptiness, this coldness. Why should I cry for someone I didn’t know when I haven’t for those that I do? I can’t change the fact that they are dead, can’t make them come back alive. Dead is dead and there’s no point wasting any further thought on them. It’s cold and heartless, but it’s reality. What is, is.

The only good news I have is that you can flash cook some monster meat with a burst from my rifle. Having forgotten to bring lunch, this was a happy solution, if not particularly tasty. Still, food is food and it means I can move on to phase 2 of the plan.

If everything that is easy to reach by bicycle is taken care of, then I just need to range wider. Until I’m able to find a more general solution to the transportation problem though, closer is better since I can only carry one other with me. That means that the Lorne Mountain Community and eventually Carcross are the way to go. Decision made, I swing back out to Klondike Highway and gun it.

The Klondike has never been very well kept and it’s not much better now. Already, I can see potholes and depressions occurring and I wonder how many years it’ll be before the entire highway is useless, permafrost and lack of maintenance returning the Yukon back to its pristine state. Idle thoughts as I scan the forests on either side, a part of me for the first time really seeing my surroundings again. It’s a beautiful place, but the human can only take wonder for so long before it makes it mundane. Now, having to watch out for monsters that Ali might miss, I see it all again.

Forests that go on for as long as the eye can see, lakes a beautiful glacier green, snow-capped mountains in the backdrop. It’s no wonder we had a constant flow of tourists, a veritable horde of Southerners descending each summer in search of the untouched beauty of nature, that pioneer charm that city life in the south has been stripped of.

It’s all a lie of course. Among the trees are the occasional residence, the lodges and bread-and-breakfasts that catered to the tourists. All nestled away in the forest as they attempted to convince their guests they were part of the wilderness, all the while providing the benefits of electricity, the Internet and running water. Now the lodges and B&B’s lie empty, their occupants either dead or fled. No one wants to return to the pioneer days really, even the First Nation communities demand their rights to modern conveniences like running water, working schools and electricity. It’s no wonder – the wilderness is dirty, smelly and deadly.

Morbid thoughts are pushed aside as Ali bids me to pull over.

“So, remember how you mentioned you wanted to work on some of your skills?” Ali enquires, sweet as can be.

“Yeah…” I reply warily.

“Good. Transform the bike and grab your sword. There’s a nest of ants about 800 meters in. Chop chop time,” Ali grins.

Even as I do as he says, I can’t help but ask, “Why the sword?”

“That’s your personal weapon. And you couldn’t stop talking about how cool the Guard was in your videos.” Ali says.

“Okay,” I nod firmly, not bothering to hide my path through the woods. We still haven’t left the low zones yet, so this should be a good test.

The Erethran Honor Guard are feared for their combat abilities for a number of reasons. To start with, unlike many other groups, they don’t specialise in Tech or Magic, mixing and matching to suit the individual preferences of the Guard members. Unfortunately, I have only a single spell right now and it’s not one that I will likely need to use. The other reason they are feared is due to their Class skill, their ability to enhance their Personal Weapons, transforming even the simplest weapon into something truly deadly. I can’t do that either. To be frank and Ali can be Sally, I wouldn’t even qualify to join them.

However, if I ever want to make full use of my class, I need to start training the way they train. One thing that was very clear from the downloaded footage is that they make use of their personal weapons in a very unique way due to the fact the weapons are Soulbound. It’s entirely different from any fighting technique used by humanity too, which is why all I can do now is experiment.

Of course, first I have to find the damn Ants. “Ali, are you sure its 800 meters?”

I don’t need an answer since the Ants give me one, springing their ambush as I walk blindly into it. The first rushes out from behind a bush, closely followed by another. All around me, I can hear Ants the size of bulldogs come boiling out.

I drop into a reverse lunge, letting the Ant skewer itself on my blade. Instead of taking the time to extract the blade, I let go and I shift to my back-stretched supporting leg, ramming an elbow into the ant behind me. I hear carapace shatter and spot another Ant jump towards my face, its black mandibles nearly on me. I raise my hand in a cut, calling the soulbound sword into my hand. My control is slow, my commands hesitant and the sword appears half-way through the creature in a weird explosion of light, destroying the sword itself and the Ant and pelting me in heat and broken metal. It’s bad enough that I get a small damage alert from Sabre itself as the explosion tears apart some of the armor.

Ooops. Thrown onto my back from the attack, another Ant clamps itself onto my leg and another one attempts to bite through the armor in my torso. The first actually hurts a bit, its mandibles exerting pressure enough that I decide to take care of it with a swift jerking motion of my leg. I ignore the second Ant, its attacks insufficient to penetrate the thicker armor around my torso.

Time to get back to practising. A single failure is no reason to quit. I flip myself back onto my feet, the Ant in my middle dislodged from its futile attempts and I recall the sword to plunge into its back. More and more Ants swarm me and I start moving, lashing out with punches and kicks in my mecha, calling and recalling the sword at intervals. It’s a bit of a curb stomp really. The Ants can barely do any damage to me individually and I never stay still long enough for them to pile on, the added speed and strength that Sabre provides me allowing me to over-power even then five Ant team that had me held down for a moment.

It takes a long time for me to kill them all off though and when I’m done, I must have ranged over a hundred meters, smashing, stabbing and killing. Ali watches, popcorn in hand with an occasional warning or an even rarer useful piece of advice. Once I’ve recovered, I begin the slow process of looting the bodies.

“Any progress?” I grumble, touching another body and flicking the loot into my inventory. There’s got to be an easier way of doing this.

“Of course not. You think it’s that easy to get a new skill? Or increase your current skill level?” Ali snorts, shaking his head. “It takes years for Mastery to occur and you’re on the steepest part of the slope. Gains will take forever. This? This was a warmup.”

I grunt and get back to looting the corpses, each Ant removed of its chitinous outer shell and a slab of meat. Occasionally, I get even some mandibles, though god knows what that’s for. The entire looting process takes longer than the fight and I wonder if it’s even worth bringing the bodies back. Ants, even giant ants, don’t really have a lot of meat on their bodies.

No, better to get the move on if I want to actually make it to Mount Lorne at the very least. The community is isolated enough that I might actually find a survivor or two.

It’s not even 5 minutes later when Ali announces, “We’re entering a higher level zone soon, figure average level in the low-to-mid 20’s.”

Even before I can acknowledge it, Ali continues; “We’ve got trouble. There are 8 Hakarta warriors in a building to the left at the t-intersection. “

“Hakarta?”

“Large, aggressive green-skinned individuals with tusks who come from a warrior culture. Often hire themselves out as shock troops. Closest analogue are Orcs,” Ali explains hurriedly to me.

“About time,” I grin slightly beneath my helmet. What kind of fantasy would world it be without Orcs? As I spot the two-storey log building that dominates the Carcross cut-off, I note a slight glint in the bottom window. Instinct makes me start leaning to the side and I feel the beam punch through my shoulder, my body spasming around the damage. I’m sliding off the bike into a controlled crash, the pain too sudden for my body to catch up with it.

As momentum keeps me rolling on the ground, another blast kicks up the asphalt. Pain radiates through me, my shoulder a complete mess with a hole burnt right through it. I manage to trigger the quantum state manipulator (the QSM) just before a third shot passes through where I would have been, pain tearing through me again from the energy that passes through the dimensions. I finally come to a stop about ten feet and another dimension from my bike. I’m invisible and in another dimension so the Hakarta aren’t shooting at me anymore as I just lie on the road, dealing with my injuries.

After a time, I manage to gain sufficient control to cast my only spell, patching my wound such that I’m able to stand. When I turn to look at the building, the Hakarta are coming out in a group of five, their movements with that polished training you see in movies. Ali’s right, they are extremely muscular, green and tusky. At a glance, they’d be perfect orcs – if orcs wore body armour and carried beam rifles.

“What the hell Ali! They have rifles. Why didn’t you warn me?” I snarl as I stagger over to where my bike is, pain from the shoulder wound slowly fading.

“I did! They’re Hakarta, of course they have rifles!” snaps Ali, affronted.

“Orcs don’t have rifles. They’re Orcs!” I snarl, casting one last heal on my shoulder. It’s not fully patched, but it’s workable for now.

“I said the closest analogue is Orcs. I didn’t say there were orcs, I said they were Hakarta!” Ali says.

“Fuck it. Later. I need you to distract them so I can drop out and trigger the change,” I point away from me, bending down to the bike. I’m so not leaving Sabre here for them.

“Now he wants me to get shot,” Ali flies off, grumbling all the while. “Yohooo! Big, green and dumb, think you can hit me?”

The Hakarta react with speed, the Hakarta tasked to deal with him aiming and firing in a single swift motion. I turn off the QSM and trigger the change immediately, yanking the armor on. Unfortunately, a simple distraction isn’t good enough and the Hakarta covering my bike opens fire. Luckily, this one is caught mostly on the armor that slides over me. It still makes me jerk in reaction, sending me sprawling and I have to trigger the QSM once more as I roll away, the armor sufficiently equipped to come with me thankfully.

“Move! They’ve got a quantum grenade,” Ali shouts urgently and I bolt for it. The grenade hits the ground where I was and explodes, picking me up and throwing me forwards. It feels like a hundred burning needles have shoved themselves throughout my body and damage reports from the mecha suit start streaming in. I crawl my way away to the treeline and push myself till I’m a good distance away before I allow myself to breathe.

Thankfully, the Hakarta aren’t pursuing at speed so I have time to catch my breath. Ali keeps an eye out for me as I recover and check over the damage reports. Thankfully, nothing is broken irretrievably but a number of systems have re-routed to secondary circuits to deal with the existing damage.

“Still doing a sweep, they’ve got a scanner. Looks to be only a Mark V though, so you’ve got about 5 minutes before they’re in range. Run or fight boy-o,” Ali calls out.

Run or fight. I’m injured, in pain and outnumbered. They’ve got training, experience and levels on me. Good sense says run.

“Let’s kill them,” I snarl, retrieving my rifle and checking it for damage. Stupid but if I wanted to be smart, I’d be home. Two can play this game.

Bad news for the Hakarta. Their scanner works great, but if I’m no longer using the QSM it has nothing to pick up on. Curled up and ready to ambush them with Ali providing real-time updates on their positions, I get ready to take my revenge.

“Coming around the tree in 5, 4, 3…” intones Ali.

The Hakarta step around and I take my shot. The first shot goes for the scanner itself, blasting the valuable equipment into so much junk. Of course, the Hakarta holding it has it up to his chest so he gets shot too, though it doesn’t look like a killing wound.

I roll back into cover under the tree and keep rolling, letting the gradient of the hill get me out of the way of the return fire. A quantum grenade arrives soon afterwards, but this one does no damage as I’m still phased into this reality and the ancillary explosive damage in this reality is insufficient to breach Sabre’s armor at this distance.

I trigger the QSM the moment it’s safe and leg it to a nearby tree, spinning around and waiting. The Hakarta are aggressive, coming around my original sniping position and getting ready to finish me. They are disciplined and smart, coming around fast with each member having their own field of fire. Me, I just shoot the green bastard who is facing me straight in the face. As the others begin to swing around to finish me, I fire again before rolling behind cover and triggering the QSM.

Two more times. That’s as many times as I can use the QSM, if I keep my time in the other state short. I make sure I do, booting it not away from them but directly to them. When I get close enough, I drop back into reality, my rifle pointed straight at the third Hakarta, a moment before I pull the trigger. The blast catches it in the side of the neck, blowing his head clean off but I don’t have time to watch. There are 2 more left from the initial party, one wounded, and I need to finish them. I drop the rifle, swinging my right hand in an overhand chop direct into the arms of another Hakarta who is turning to bring his weapon to bear. Too big for close range combat, he never gets it to me in time before I disarm him and then behead him with the sword I call into being.

The last Hakarta doesn’t bother with his rifle, instead tackling me. I lose grip of my sword as I fall. Thankfully the shock absorbers in Sabre remove most of the damage and I get an arm in the way of the plunging knife, redirecting its force sufficiently that it doesn’t skewer me, just leaves a deep cut in the top of my shoulder armor. I grip him close with my arm then and recall my blade with my free hand before pummeling him with my pommel. His helmet stands the first few blows well enough but eventually shatters. A few more strikes leaves the Hakarta lifeless above me, at which point I push the creature off.

5 down. I cast another Minor Healing to staunch the bleeding in my injured shoulder where I’ve re-opened the wound and then proceed to loot the bodies. Surprisingly, the first body I loot gives me access to all their weapons and armor. I guess fighting humanoids who actually buy their equipment from the System is extremely profitable. I can’t help but grin, grabbing everything possible and dumping it into my inventory. By the time I’m done looting the bodies, I’ve received 5 Beam Rifles (Type IV), 5 Tier V personal body armor (3 significantly damaged), personal arms for each Hakarta and 3 Plasma Grenades along with 432 Credits.

“Ali, scout the building will you?” I begin to make my way back, wondering if I could somehow lure at least a few others out.

“Sir, yes Sir!” mouths Ali but I ignore it. Got to let the Spirit get his shots in, otherwise, it’s impossible to work with him. Thankfully, he still does his job.

“3 left. They are set-up in the center room of the ground floor. Looks like the leader and a couple more grunts, guarding the entrances to the room,” Ali reports back in a few minutes. I’ve set-up a short distance away, watching the building from the tree line across the highway. I nod at his words, getting a little more detail about the layout before working out the new plan.

Letting Ali keep an eye on them, I walk boldly up to the door and open it. I spin out of the way just in case, but no bombs or shots go off. A quick peak shows me it’s still clear and I walk up to the next door, pulling and priming a grenade. Once at the door, I gently depress the door handle and then quickly toss the grenade in, hunkering around the corner even as the Hakarta open fire, tearing chunks out of the door and even catching me a glancing blow.

The explosion is significantly more powerful than I expected, tearing drywall apart like tissue and dumping me on my ass as more damage messages scroll through in the bottom left of my vision. I roll around, trying to get my rifle to bear and realise I might as well not bother, the lifeless and mangled bodies of the three telling its own tale. Battle over, Ali lets the important notifications creep into my view.

Level Up! * 2

You have reached Level 10 as an Erethran Honor Guard. Stat Points automatically distributed. You have 21 Free Attribute Points to distribute.

Twice in a single battle? I knew I was getting clobbered by running rather than fighting and the first ten levels were the easiest to gain, but still, twice? No wonder the others had gained levels so fast. Those free attribute points were really starting to creep up there. I’d have to make a decision soon since they weren’t doing me any good just sitting unallocated.

I spend a few minutes putting out fires to ensure the building doesn’t burn down, beginning to realise how lucky I am. After I loot the bodies, I then drag the bodies out of the house and stack them to the side. No reason to let them rot in the building after all. This time, looting the bodies gets me some scrap, a few personal weapons and their System credits. Note to self, plasma grenades should not be used unless I really need them. I make a final sweep of the building, finding some minor conveniences including what looks to be a mana-charged stove, food stores and high-tech sleeping bags. As I put them into my inventory, I can’t help but think that Lana would love the stove.

Other than the bodies, there’s a single glowing crystal In the remnants of the room I dragged the bodies from which I eye askance.

“Ali…?”

“Control crystal for the fort,” Ali explains.

“What fort?”

“The one you’re standing in of course,” Ali says.

“This is a restaurant and grocery store, not a fort!” though it looks like the Hakarta have cleared out most of the grocery items and started putting together a proper base of operations.

“System designated fort. Created at locations of importance outside of a city, generally a building that commands significant views or a strategic location. Considering we’re about 45 minutes out from Whitehorse on the only major highway in? I’d say both. Now, go on and touch the crystal,” Ali replies wearily.

Would you like to take Command of the Carcross Cutoff Fort?

(Y/N)

Congratulations! You are now Commander of the Carcross Cutoff Fort

Population: 1/1

Assigned Guards: 0/20

Structural Integrity: 68/100

Upgrades: None

First Fort Won!

Bonus +3000 Experience Awarded

“So what now?” I frown, staring at the upgrade option.

“Nothing, now we leave. Next sentient who comes in will take the place, but at least you’ll get a notification,” Ali says, sounding bored.

“But…” Just leaving this place right after I won it is frustrating, but he’s right. It’s not as if I’m going to guard it, I still have to get to Mount Lorne and Carcross. I grit my teeth and stomp out, assuaging my feelings by pulling out my new status sheet.

Status Screen

Name

John Lee

Class

Erethran Honor Guard

Race

Human (Male)

Level

10

Titles

None

Health

510

Stamina

510

Mana

450

Status

Normal

Attributes

Strength

33 (50)

Agility

50 (70)

Constitution

51 (75)

Perception

14

Intelligence

45 (60)

Willpower

45 (60)

Charisma

14

Luck

10

Skills

Stealth

6

Wilderness Survival

3

Unarmed Combat

6

Knife Proficiency

5

Athletics

5

Observe

5

Cooking

1

Sense Danger

4

Jury-rigging

2

Explosives

1

Blade Mastery

6

PAV Combatics

4

Energy Rifles

3

Meditation

5

Mana Manipulation

1

Class Skills

None (5 Locked)

Spells

Minor Healing

Perks

Spirit Companion

Level 3

Prodigy (Subterfuge)

N/A

Damn, that’s a big difference from when I started. I’m not even remotely within human normal anymore, with reaction times and strength that are off the charts. I don’t even feel the weight of my armor or seem to run out of stamina doing normal things. At this rate, there are only a few more levels before I finally unlock my class skills and after seeing Mikito use hers, I really can’t wait. On the other hand, it feels like I’m not utilising the changes in my body properly, my actions themselves jittery in the extreme. I wonder if it’s my low Perception – I’m not able to properly perceive what I need to do and what I’m doing, especially with the way my body is moving.

“Ali? Recommendations?” I enquire, waving to the Stat Screen as I get ready, the slight hitch and a barely audible grinding making me grimace as Sabre switches form. Damn, but I’m going to have to get this fixed.

“Perception. Maybe you’d get a hint or two next time before you get shot,” Ali answers immediately.

I grimace but have to agree. I dump half my points into it and then, on a whim, I put another 3 into Luck. It’s such a nebulous stat, but from what I understand, it affects minor things in the System in my favor. A shot that does more damage than it would normally, maybe more or better System assisted Loot drops. It should also reduce the likelihood that someone with high Luck bends the System to their favor. More Luck doesn’t seem to hurt anyway.

The moment I confirm it, the world shifts. It’s so startling I begin to lose control of Sabre and even as I realise that, I correct it. It happens faster than an eyeblink, perception, understanding and reaction. Oh my, this is going to be fun.

Chapter 9

“Ali, information dump time. How come the System designated the Cutoff as a fort if no one bought it before?” I enquire as I ride down the winding mountain road. On both sides is untouched, unclaimed wilderness as far as the eye can see. Only occasionally is there a road that swings out to a lone farm or suburb, but each time Ali just shakes his head slightly, indicating a lack of human life.

“The building was there and it was a strategic spot. Seems like the System decided it was worthy of being picked,” Ali shrugs, disinterested in the conversation.

I’m not as easy to put off “But why? I thought we had to buy locations.”

“Settlements certainly. However, forts aren’t the same – they are freestanding fortifications. You are limited to guard, security and observation upgrades, which generally limit what you can do drastically. Of course, you can always buy other upgrades like an armory and the like, but it’s always more expensive” Ali says.

“Didn’t look like much of a fort to me, just a normal building,” I point out.

“Sure, that’s because no one has upgraded it yet. Get some walls built or buy the upgrades and it’ll start looking like a real fort,” Ali replies.

“Wait, we can build walls? Won’t the System ignore them?” After all, it’s ignored most of our other buildings.

“Nope. You guys are all System-claimed now, so what you do from now on matters to the System,” says Ali.

No use getting angry over this, but I can’t help but feel it. The System this, the System that. It makes decisions and discards everything that we ever did before it came, remaking us and our world without care. I find myself grinding my teeth and force myself to breathe out as I push the anger aside. In control once more, I ask lightly, keeping my voice calm. Or at least I think it’s calm, “That mean those non-fighter classes we found, they could fix up the cars?”

Ali nods, “Sure, if they use System registered materials, no reason it wouldn’t work. You’d either have to salvage or work the materials from start or buy from the Shop, and if they wanted to Mana engines and batteries, they’d have to get their skills up.”

Good news. I lean into the next turn, falling silent for now as I scan for more trouble. Even driving at speed, I see more than I used to - my increased perceptions able to take notice of more. I spot our local, non-transformed wildlife – squirrels, ground squirrels, a fox, occasional birds. I spot a few transformed and new animals, but none that are a danger to me so I don’t stop. I came out to check for survivors after all, not kill monsters.

Mount Lorne is a bust, the various small residences and communities that cluster around the community centre empty. They leave another mystery though – unlike many of the houses in Riverdale, many show signs of an organised exit. Doors closed, windows shut, no damaged or broken buildings to be seen and no blood. It is almost as if they evacuated somewhere else, those that weren’t attacked immediately at least. Did they make it into Whitehorse already? A puzzle for sure, but not one that I can solve right now.

I look up the time and note it’s 7pm already, glad that my helmet and Sabre came with a clock. The longer spring hours in the North throw me for a curve, daylight lingering till 10pm these days. If you’d asked me, I wouldn’t have guessed it no more than 4 at most. A dangerous little trick the North likes to play, making inexperienced backpackers push themselves till late at night, unaware of how long they have exerted themselves.

It’s another twenty minutes to Carcross at speed, but I take it a little slower and get there in half-an-hour. As I begin to pass the world’s smallest desert on my left, Ali pops back into life, finishing up the game of cards he has been playing to talk to me. “Humans. Lots of humans. At least a few hundred.”

I grin at his words, relaxing. Thank the gods, not every small community was being wiped off the map. I slow down anyway since I figure whoever is there is going to be jumpy and I’m glad I do because I’m so not ready for what I see.

Just before I get to town proper, I run into a barrier made up of cars, trucks and stacked furniture that reaches all across the road and down to my right as far as I can see, probably all the way to the river. The town itself is built adjacent to the river, spreading out from near the bridge and along the West side of the highway. From what I can see, where they have run out of cars and furniture, they have dug a trench on one side and just piled the extra earth on the other, shoring the entire thing up with occasional felled trees. Quite a feat if they have it all the way down to the river since it’s at least a good kilometer away.

I slow down and creep up to the barrier, waiting to be challenged. I don’t have to wait long.

“Who’s there?” A voice shouts in the slightly slurred accent of one of the First Nations. Tagish probably considering we’re in Carcross.

“John Lee. I’m here from Whitehorse,” I shout back, touching my helmet to make it disappear. I hear a gasp behind the barrier even from this distance. I guess the disappearing helmet trick is still kinda new.

“You human?” the voice continues to question.

“Yes!” I grimace, shaking my head at the question. I can hear the arguments behind as someone else points out that’s a stupid question. A hurried discussion happens even as they send one of their own to get someone in charge.

“Who’s the Greatest Hockey Player ever?” This time, at least, the question makes sense.

“Gretzky of course.” I snort, shaking my head. “Look, I don’t mean any harm, I just came to see what I could do to help.”

“‘Right, sorry about that. Just come up slow now. We got guns,” my unseen conversation partner says. I comply readily enough, riding my bike closer and then am forced to wait till they pull the makeshift gate aside to ride in.

Inside the barrier, Carcross has not changed much. A single lonesome gas station connected to the motel and gift shop is a short distance away on the left while to the right, the Tagish First Nation’s office building, a church and a variety of other residences spread out to the river that the entire community nestles against. Surprisingly, everything looks pretty normal though there are guards standing around me and further, all of them looking around with that wary expression I’ve come to recognise of people under siege. The guards on closer inspection are low-leveled, all in the single digits and have a new appellation next to each of them – Warrior, Riflemen, Guard and more.

“Ali, what’s with the new information?”

“New information that I can display. Not super useful all the time, and I’m translating it best as I can from what the System gives me, but there you go,” Ali replies, gesturing to the Status bars.

“Evening. Sorry about the reception, but we’ve had to be careful,” an older brunette woman with a pixie haircut walks up to me and interrupts any further conversation with Ali. She’s dressed in a pair of jeans and plaid shirt and could be generously called hefty, though she moves her weight with grace and carries the giant hammer over her shoulder with ease. The Status bar over her head reads Melissa O’Keefe, Level 38 Protector. “I’m Melissa.”

“John,” I take the proffered hand and watch as a crowd begins to gather, coming from the gas station and the office building, consisting mostly of children and teenagers. “This place is… impressive.”