I immediately put ten into ESP. In theory, this should increase the Compass’s efficiency since it couldn’t be improved by increasing the skill’s level. In addition, by improving the ESP path, I consequently improved all skills tied to it. I added another ten points to Third Eye as it proved very useful during the mission. It helped me uncover Rosh and find the fragment. It was unique, and therefore its development was important.
Swaying on Rat’s back as he trotted toward the Valley, I thought for a long time about how to spend the remaining four points. In the end, I decided to put them into Parasite. Those abilities could come in handy even now.
Warlock
Level: 101
Faction: Gray
Specialization: Death Magic
❖ Rank: 2 [300/400]
❖ HP: 880/880
Evolution Points: ~15,000
Physical Characteristics
Size: 12
Perception: 9
Stamina: 10
Damage Resistance: 5
Mental Strength: 19
Speed: 6
Damage: ~250
Available Paths and Skills
Unallocated Points: 0
Genus (faction skill), level 3
Heir (unique), level 36
ESP (unique and personal skill), level 50
● Control (basic skill), level 22
● Mental Transmission (passive skill), level 14
● Evacuation (unique, class skill)
● Mental Defense (unique, class skill), level 20
● Mental Attack (unique, class skill), level 41
● Dark Manipulator (legendary skill), level 22
● Mental Mask (unique skill), level 25
● Magic Compass
[D. Mutation] (legendary path), level 19
● D. Peddler (basic skill), level 10
● D. Scout: level 10
● D. Armor: level 7
● Mutation Transmitter (sub-section of D. Mutation)
❖ Linguistics: level 9
❖ Third Eye: (legendary skill), level 27
[Parasite](personal path), level 49
● Laboratory (basic skill available to all parasites)
● D. Augmentation: level 45
● Connection: level 17
[Demon] (path of the Piper), level 30
● Rat-Catcher of Hamelin (legendary skill), level 30
***
During the trip, I had worked myself up quite a bit and was now imagining the worst: Amoeba’s mangled body hanging from the fir trees, bloodthirsty mobs devouring the biologist’s flesh... The screams of the waking nocturnal predators coming from the Lands only spurred my already rich imagination.
But when I arrived at the Valley, it turned out that Kay-Si and Amoeba were having a leisurely conversation, sitting on the stones of the Stonehenge.
Amoeba, who was slowly turning over a piece of meat roasting on the coals, turned at the sound of rustling.
“Loki! Good to see you. Kay-Si and I were just talking about how—”
“Christ, Amoeba! You could’ve warned us that you were going to stay here until the evening!”
Amoeba looked up at the setting sun in surprise.
“I didn’t even notice. Time sure flies when you’re having fun...”
“Must be at least six o’clock, then.” Kay-Si laughed.
“Still, it’s a good thing you came. We were talking about you. Here’s our plan...”
***
Early in the morning, half an hour before our expedition was to gather, when the first rays of sun had just licked the horizon, Amoeba set off in the direction of the Valley. In addition to the purely scientific interest to meet with a representative of an alien civilization, he had an idea that could be only realized with the help of this very representative.
Kay-Si met him rather warily, but when he saw that Amoeba belonged to the Gray faction, he hurried to remove the damask dagger, found somewhere, from the player’s throat.
“I don’t have a throat,” Amoeba said jokingly. “With that little knife of yours, you would’ve spent a good ten minutes chopping me up.”
“One hit to the heart would’ve been enough. Haha!” Kay-Si laughed, but there was still a wary note in his voice. “Let’s get to know each other: Kay-Si, Violet faction, once a shaman, now a demon.”
A shaman? Good, just what I need... The biologist thought, looking at the tall figure in a black robe.
However, most of their conversation didn’t touch on the plan at all, but about each other’s realities. Kay-Si turned out to be some kind of a scientist as well. On his home planet, he was engaged in mining “urenainin” from boulders in the “Grob Thunderer” Desert (Kay-Si tried to translate the name of the place literally). On the day of the disaster, Kay-Si and his team, wearing armored spacesuits and turning on the anti-gravity meter, ran through the second level of the desert, where they could find “urenainin-34,” a particularly valuable resource.
“The second level of the desert?” Amoeba asked, puzzled.
“Special locations with multiple ground levels. Like floating layers of rock... They were in the Game back then... But I haven’t found anything like it since, although I wandered around the Valley for a whole day... That’s where I found this dagger. It inflicts bleed on whoever it cuts.”
***
“See what I‘m getting at?” Amoeba asked.
“No,” I replied honestly.
“The Game’s changing!” he exclaimed, looking at me with delight. “It changes whenever a new race enters it!”
I didn’t understand a goddamn thing.
“How do I put this?” Amoeba wondered. “Ah! We’re extracting coal, yes? We, humans. Our predecessors could’ve had another resource, for example, that urenainin-34.”
“For the urenainin to form, it requires shoval corpses affected by the primary fragments of the First Satellite,” Kay-Si said.
“I took it solely as an example, my friend.”
I slowly began to put the pieces together. The Game created the most suitable conditions for whichever species was currently in it, but made sure that they still weren’t the same as that on their home planet. So, for us, the surrounding locations took the form of coniferous forests, strange mountains that stood in the middle of plains, giant complexes of underground caves... In general, the conditions were modified to allow new players to live in a world similar to their own.
But only similar.
Amoeba had come up with a way to improve Third Sight, but he wanted to hear the opinion of someone as experienced as Kay-Si. Through their conversation, they came up with the following plan: aside from smoking the drug, Kay-Si would use a skill of his that would “bind” the player’s consciousness to a certain game object with the help of a symbol.
“The ten-pointed star represents the Giant. The same kind of symbol, as I understand it, was used by the Piper... So...” Kay-Si said, tossing a piece of roasted meat into his mouth. “All we need to do is put it all together and send you, Loki, to say ‘hi’ to the Giant.”
“Me?!” I remembered with horror what had happened during my last attempt to use Elf’s invention: the red star burnt my eyes, and I heard dead people whispering in my ear...
“Who else?” Kay-Si asked, surprised. “I’ll be the shaman, and Amoeba will keep an eye on your condition.”
“Besides, Elf and I tinkered with the drug and improved it. It’ll put less pressure on your mind,” Amoeba added.
I once again felt like a lab rat. Last time, Amoeba and Elf decided to test their invention (without telling me), I almost died. And now, they wanted me to get high and track down the Giant.
Ah, why am I even thinking about this? Of course I’ll do it!
***
Kay-Si was in his element: after all, he was a shaman, and he now felt like fish in water. His eyes lit up with merriment and his lips stretched into a smile (which made him look even scarier), and his clawed fingers, peeking from under th
e wide sleeves of his robe, were already shaking in anticipation.
“I don’t feel comfortable,” Amoeba said via Mental Transmission, warily eyeing the demon.
“Oh, come on!” I chuckled, though doubt had crept into my mind. “He has spent several years in ‘the world of the dead,’ and has finally gotten his hands on magic again. I’m sure you’d be just as excited had someone forced you to drop your experiments for a couple of years.”
It was worth mentioning that Kay-Si refused to talk to us about the afterlife. Neither Amoeba nor I could get any information out of him about it. And that was probably the most interesting thing he could tell us. Amoeba just spread his arms and sighed, saying that perhaps he couldn’t tell us even if he wanted to. It was possible, but I found it strange that we could revive someone but they couldn’t tell us about where they had been.
Though, one thing was for sure — once you’ve died, you couldn’t return to the Game that you once knew. Not only did Kay-Si have to take on a different body, but everything he knew about the Game had changed while he was away. At least he got to keep his skillset.
But I couldn’t help wondering about what awaited us. Heaven? Hell? Valhalla? Nothing? Or did it differ from race to race? From person to person?
Meanwhile, Kay-Si finished setting up the site. He chose Stonehenge as it had the biggest concentration of magic of all the places in the Valley, drew a circle with his foot, and used his blood to draw the ten-pointed star.
“Good enough?” he asked, observing his handiwork, and adjusted one of the points.
“It’s perfect.”
“Then lie down.” He pointed at the center of the circle.
Amoeba held out the already lit cigarette (I really didn’t want to call it a joint even though, let’s face it, it was), and I took the first puff, expecting the acrid smoke to enter my lungs like the last time. But it didn’t. I didn’t know if it was a matter of habit or if it was the result of Elf’s and Amoeba’s work, but I felt only a slightly unpleasant taste. I immediately took another drag.
“Hey, hey, hey!” Kay-Si frowned. “Don’t pass out before you enter the circle.”
I obediently lay down on the snow-covered ground, put one hand behind my head, and with the other knocked the ash from my cigarette.
“Time to begin...” Kay-Si said and hit a giant rock. The stone made a sound like a drum. He repeated this but this time he hit even harder, making the ground shake along with the stone. The next beat outlined a rhythm reminiscent of those played on African drums.
The fourth puff started the process. My body was almost numb. All I could do was lie on the cold ground and stare at the blood-painted star while the drums continued playing.
Bam! Bam-bam... Bam! Bam-bam... Bam! Bam-bam...
Kay-Si began to dance in tune with the sounds that the stone was now making without his help. He then froze in what seemed to be the most uncomfortable pose I had ever seen and raised his hands to the sky, whispering unknown spells. At first, nothing happened. But then, as I struggled to take my eyes off the star, I saw a dot in the sky that gradually grew bigger...
And then I realized that something huge was crashing down toward the ground.
Toward me!
A tall totem landed next to me, sinking into the cracked soil by a good couple of inches, and threw me into the air like a rag doll. All attempts to land on my feet and run away screaming failed. My limbs simply refused to obey me.
“Kay-Si, you could’ve crushed him!” Amoeba exclaimed.
“Oh, come one! It’s far enough, besides—”
I didn’t hear the rest as I fell into a deep slumber.
***
A bright ten-pointed star, as if drawn in the air with blood, glowed brighter and brighter...
It was hard to look at. I reflexively turned away from the light source. To my surprise, unlike the last time, I managed to do so. Not only that, but I also managed to fly a bit away from it. It really seemed to be drawn on the darkness in the middle of infinite space I had found myself in. Lonely. Proud. Bright. The voices weren’t there this time. My mind was silent except for the occasional muffled rumble. It tittered on the edge of my hearing, so quiet that it could’ve been written off as the sound of blood rushing through my head. But that was the problem — in this state, I didn’t have a head. Or a body.
I listened. The sound seemed to come from the direction of the star. As I approached the symbol, which had already become quite bright, I noticed something in it. Like water when you put a paint brush in.
What if I touch it...?
The surface of the star was pliable and it crumpled when I tried to push it. Finally making up my mind, I flew straight into the center of the symbol.
I saw a red haze. And an endless field of golden sand.
***
I was blinded by the bright sun. The roar and clang of some huge machinery hit my ears, and in front of my eyes I saw black letters that made a chill run down my spine.
The Steel Giant
Sinking knee-deep in the sand, cutting through the dunes scorched by the sun’s bright rays, the huge mechanical monster strode across the desert heading toward the north.
Its face was like a mask with two slits for eyes — the only truly “living” part of the creature, covered with a thick glaze that glittered in the sun. The mask had numerous scratches but no visible cracks, damaged probably only by time itself. The Giant didn’t have a nose or a mouth. None that I could see anyway. There wasn’t a single emotion, not a single thought in its empty cold eyes. It was a death machine, a soulless mechanism designed to sow death and destruction.
Over its head, it wore what looked like a Maratha helmet, except that it was unadorned. On it was a small antenna made of reddish material, built into the Giant’s head near the right temple.
It had a thick neck, broad shoulders, and a strong body with defined muscles and joints. It was at least thirty feet tall. And just like its name implied, it was made entirely of metal. I wasn’t sure if it was steel but it was worn out, only a few places still retained its metallic luster. For all I knew, it could’ve been the same material that the key was made of.
Its gait was so smooth and natural that it could’ve easily been mistaken for a human from a distance. It didn’t suffer from rigid, stuttery movements like the robots I had seen. Every muscle, every joint, and every tendon were mobile. It was as if it was a humanoid magically transformed into a huge machine. I was certain that its insides were organic. That is, that it possessed the same organs we did. Or an alien equivalent of them. But then again, why would it need them? To process oil? Store stocks of gasoline or diesel? What fuel did it use anyway? Something had to power the roaring motor that moved it.
Its six-toed feet kicked clouds of fine dust into the air as it walked. With each step, its feet sank into the sand that sometimes reached up to its knees. But this didn’t hinder the Giant’s movements in the least. It didn’t seem to even notice the dust clouds.
In my previous “dream,” time didn’t seem to coincide with the time in the real world. The sun was just beginning to set here, while it was already late in the evening back in reality. The stars were about to appear in the sky, and the sharp edge of the moon was about to peer from behind the clouds... In reality, it was winter. There was cold, snow, and light frost. Here... Here there was sun, heat, and sand.
The desert must’ve been hundreds of miles away from our forests. Elf had said that the Game world was much smaller than Earth, which would mean that locations were much closer than it seemed. But still, the distance ought to be large.
When would this dream become a reality?
Perhaps the Giant had just entered the desert biome, having only recently exited the equatorial forests?
Perhaps it was even further away? Perhaps it was in the southern hemisphere. That’d explain the difference in the time of day. Or perhaps I was completely wrong and it’d be at our door as soon as tomorrow. As soon as it crossed the steppes, t
he forests, and saw the peak of the Black Mountain, it’d clench its huge metal fists and rush to make mincemeat out of us.
If we don’t hurry... We’re all dead.
I highly doubted that we could stop this thing. Even if I were to do what I had done when we fought the Burgundies, I had no idea what level this monstrosity was. For all I knew, it could be invulnerable.
The thing weighed at least fifteen tons. Add to that its metallic skin which was impenetrable to any weapons we currently possessed, and it wasn’t hard to see just how utterly fucked we were. We could, of course, make a desperate attempt to stop it by rushing at it armed with sabers and bows and shouting: “The Russians don’t give up!” And then it’d wave its hand and swath us all like the bugs we were. Now that I thought about it, the strategic retreat into the caves sounded very nice.
We had to find the remaining fragments.
The sooner, the better.
***
The antenna, emitting dozens of sparks, flashed bright red, reaching a melting point. The Giant shuddered, and its eyes for a moment showed something resembling emotion. I didn’t get a chance to figure out what exactly it had felt, but it looked like the Giant was... determined. Or angry. It was hard to tell. After that, its pupils, which had glanced to the side, returned to their original position, and the Giant’s gaze became calm and empty once more.
The antenna began to cool down just as abruptly. The Giant picked up its pace and, after a while, broke into a run.
What was that?! Did the System order something? Why is it running all of a sudden? Perhaps... Perhaps it has a mind of its own after all...
Reborn: Evolution: A LitRPG Series (Warlock Chronicles Book 3) Page 8
