Gestation
Page 12
It didn’t take going far before that happened. I can’t be far from the fortress if I’m taking that much more damage. I need to keep going, keep working on my resistance.
Another hour goes by, and I’ve found the right level of damage and crawled into a secluded spot but it turns out to be inhabited by a blend of mole and human. To be honest, I jumped when it popped out of the ground right in front of me. As part of the loot I get from him, there’s a shovel, and I give him his dues by digging him a grave.
∞ ∞ ∞
Damage taken: 4500 (ignored: 1592)
125/2000
Resistance to physical damage: +0.02%
Physical damage ignored up to 1677/second
Resistance to mental damage: +0.01%
Mental damage ignored up to 1071/second
That scared me. A little more, and I would have lost all the work I’ve put in over the past four months. There is one thing I’ve noticed, however: the worse your wounds, the faster your survivability improves. The same is true with resistance: the harder you get hit, the quicker it goes.
Off in the distance, there’s an enormous fortress with two towers. Above it, on a separate little island, is a crystal. Even my simple eyes can see the red waves emanating from it. Although, on my map it looks like I have a good 24 hours of running ahead of me before I get to the center of the circle, so there are either two rings of fortresses or there’s another one in the center.
I sit there for three days working on my resistance. The moles really get on my nerves, constantly popping right up under my legs. There’s a whole graveyard in here!
My perception reaches 140. There’s more detail in the world around me: from a way off, I can see the tiniest details on the dwarf trees, and even blades of grass. It’s time to head toward the fortress.
As soon as a patrol marches by, I set off after them. The demons are ridiculously talkative, and I learn lots of new words, the latest gossip, and even some useful information. I’m currently in the domain of Latimin, to whom the fortress belongs. The scouts belonged to Ovidius’ neighboring domain. Quick skirmishes are the norm, and help the demons level-up. The strongest ones are sent to serve in the lower circles of Hell. At the center of the ninth circle, there’s Fales’ fortress. That’s where I need to go.
I follow them for about a kilometer.
∞ ∞ ∞
Damage taken: 8500 (ignored: 6592)
225/2000
It takes me a week to get to the level I need to be to get closer to the fortress. Nobody sees me in the small cave I use for this purpose, though that’s mostly due to the prickly bush covering the entrance. Then, two gargoyles notice me and fly down. I drag them, stunned, into the cave. Outside, there’s a lake of lava, and the heat is monstrous.
Taking blood from the gargoyles, I draw pentagrams and drag the flying beasts on top of them. Healing and vampire spikes pin them to the ground. I just need to make sure that they stay on top of the pentagrams.
∞ ∞ ∞
Damage taken: 86300 (ignored: 63722)
12422/35000
Resistance to fire: +0.02%
Thermal damage ignored up to 63998/second
One weak healing restores 6060 health; nine streams gives me 54540. I take 22538 fire damage, leaving the other two streams to keep the gargoyles stunned.
I think back to the last conversation I had with the “psychologist”: after a long monologue about how I need to talk more with my peers, I found out that she can watch recordings of my gameplay. Eliza knows that I’m in some kind of terrible location where I’m constantly hurting myself. As she talks about deviances related to masochism, she makes a very serious face. I laugh for a long time, and her face only gets more serious. If she could only see what I’m doing with the gargoyles or my first experiments with necromancy, she’d say that I have a penchant for sadism. She hasn’t touched me for two months, Vaalsie isn’t punishing me, and I couldn’t be happier.
I purposely avoid using the demon appearance since I need my normal look to work with all my streams of consciousness. I’ll figure it out.
For the past week, I’ve been trying to find a replacement for the gargoyles. They’re too weak: at Level 144, they only have 17500 health. I’ve gotten up to 6.12% resistance to physical damage, ignoring up to 10752. With fire, the story is even better: 23.19% (up to 163792 damage ignored per second). I imagine the damage done by the aura near the fortress will reach 50000.
Suddenly, my solution appears: two squads and Harol himself.
“Ah, there you are! Are you going to come with us quietly or will we have to take you by force?”
They remind me of the kids back at the orphanage. It’s all about force. But I need victims, and I just logged into the game. I have plenty of time to work.
“Somebody’s been killing us recently, so tell us where your friends are. Tell us, and you’ll die quickly…”
The fight lasts five minutes. My enhanced strength, magic, and incredible speed mean that nobody can stand against me. Four of them stay constantly stunned, I heal myself, I attack with magic, and I send destruction spikes flying at them. Ultimately, three are left alive: two gargoyle commanders and Harol, who got his wings broken immediately. Just in case, I leave a wailer, too. The battle turned out to be a good way of testing my skills. Having survived, I go around collecting loot and burning bodies.
Then, I drag the four bodies away, brush away my tracks, kill a few beasts who noticed me, and brush away my tracks again. Four is too many, but, like Galboa always said, it isn’t work when you’re working for yourself.
The next two days are spent giving a show of pain—not mine, of course. I kill the wailer, using the gargoyles and Haron for my rituals.
∞ ∞ ∞
Damage taken: 193216 (ignored: 163792)
12422/82720
Resistance to fire: +0.02%
Thermal damage ignored up to 164851/second
This time, I leave only Harol stunned; the gargoyles are awake the whole time. They stoically endure the pain, the same way I do. Now, I’m taking 29457 damage and can heal 60600. I need a reserve just in case something happens. The demons turn out to be awfully talkative, and I learn quite a bit, also, beefing up my knowledge of the demon tongue, over the two days we spend together. Fifty hours later, I’m forced out of the game. The capsule, apparently, has a restriction on how much time you can spend in it, and I just have time to kill the trio and hide deeper in the cave before I log out.
After sleeping for eighteen hours, I wake up hungry. I decide to eat before jumping back into the game.
As soon as I arrive, I realize that I’m being hunted. Demons are flying everywhere, darkening the sky, and scouts are running to and fro. I meet one right at the entrance to the cave and simply toss his body into the lava.
I don’t know how much damage the aura of pain does, so I have to give the fortress a wide berth. But when I do ultimately get to the center, pretty close to the fortress, I have to slow down. I was right; the aura is especially painful here. Ten days are spent boosting my resistance as I gradually take one step closer after another. The aura does 70000 damage, 40% of which is mental, the rest physical. Hell is a terrible place if this is what just the auras are like. What about the local bosses?
Again, I hit the effective ceiling. I can no longer boost the amount of health I have; all I can do is work on the amount I can restore per second, a total of 60000. The fire teaches me that lesson very quickly.
I can’t find a good place next to the fortress to work on my resistance, so I have to get smart about it. The aura doesn’t destroy items. I pull on a full load of armor and all the jewelry I have, giving me enough stamina even with the penalty I get for not having the right level for it all. Regardless, I’m able to get to the pit.
Well, it’s more an enormous hole than a pit. All of Imir and the surrounding lands would have fit into it. I can barely see the other side. Did I really make it here? It’s hard to believe. No, I’m
better off climbing down slowly than jumping, but first…
“Attribute window!”
Name: Sagie
Level: 0
Experience: 0/100 (100 left until the next level)
Race: Human
Class: None selected
Basic attributes
Strength: 200
Agility: 200
Stamina: 200
Intellect: 200
Wisdom: 200
Available attribute points: 0
Additional attributes
Speed: 200
Athleticism: 200
Morale: 200
Survivability: 200
Derivative ratings
Physical damage: 100 (strength/2, but no less than 1)
Carrying capacity: 500 kg (strength*10/4)
Mana: 2000 (wisdom*10)
Health: 2000 (stamina*10)
Strength: 2000 (stamina*10)
Health restoration: 2000/minute (survivability*10)
Mana restoration: 2000/minute (morale*10)
Strength restoration: 2000/minute (athleticism*10)
Running speed: 76 km/h (1+speed/10)
Defense: 1
Resistance
Physical damage: 10.01% (damage ignored: up to 45077/second)
Poison: 1.27% (damage ignored: up to 211/second)
Mental damage: 8.69% (damage ignored: up to 26700/second)
Fire: 26.21% (damage ignored: up to 280515/second)
Skills
Cooking: 25
Trap setting and disarming: 19
Archery: 2
Swimming: 4
Breath-holding: 5
Stealth: 250
Life Magic: 250
Mind Magic: 250
Space Magic: 250
Earth Magic: 250
Water Magic: 250
Fire Magic: 250
Air Magic: 250
Light Magic: 250
Dark Magic: 250
Meditation: 250
Hand-to-hand combat: 92
Perception: 166
Necromancy: 250
Blood magic: 250
Ritual magic: 250
Professions
Herbalist: 2
Fisherman: 16
Tailor: 23
Blacksmith: 8
Carpenter: 16
Passive skills
Imp eye
Undecuple consciousness
Demon possession, complete
Gifts
Meeting deferred
The numbers are great, of course. I haven’t spent these five months suffering for nothing. How long is it going to take me to get through all eight circles? Or does the hole drop straight through to the bottom?
As I think, I crawl. It’s an odd feeling, letting yourself down into a bottomless opening. It’s almost like signing your own death warrant or cutting off your head. I have the wild idea of taking the leap, fortifying my body, and seeing if I would live. The swarm of ants meandering across my back tells me that it’s a terrible idea, and I’m inclined to agree with them, so I keep going. It gets really scary when the magic torches start disappearing. No, I didn’t let them go; they just melted away two meters below me. In fact, that scares me so badly that my fingers relax and I slip into the abyss.
The shock wears off quickly. As soon as I hit the ground, I have to dodge a strike; some kind of naked girl with a whip is chattering away in demonic tongue.
Come at me with a whip and you’ll die by the whip.
Demons, Dust Succubus, Level 177
Killing opponents who have no idea what battle tactics are is easy. It was harder with the gargoyles, though the good part here is that I know what she’s trying to say now.
“Time to punish the bad boy! Get on your knees so I can spank you.”
What did I do to her? Why beat me? Just to make sure, I take the whip away from her. It’s rare, so I don’t destroy it. I have room.
At first, I thought that I was still in the first circle, but I was wrong.
∞ ∞ ∞
Current location: Second Circle of Hell. Lust.
Rock wasteland
If I were an adult, the girl probably would have spanked me, and I would’ve been only too happy to die. But my attitude to girls is a little different: I want to kill them all.
Suddenly, it occurs to me that most demons don’t wear armor, and very few of them use weapons. I wonder why that is.
I take off at a run, notwithstanding the hurricane-force gale blowing in my face. Sometimes, my body is taken and thrown against the cliff, but that’s okay. My resistance to physical damage is plenty high enough.
The closer I get to the center, the harder the wind blows. Sometimes, it seems like there’s a blade cutting through my body, or somebody has lassoed me and tossed me against a rock. I definitely won’t be able to do any work here. Once again, I hit a stone, and I look around to see that there’s a ring of fortresses in front of me. Each is surrounded by an actual tornado. How am I going to get through between two of those? I remember the gargoyles. The sky is clear, though there are naked and half-naked women roaming around below it. They move slowly and gracefully. The strongest is at Level 202.
The wind whips around me; the clouds move slowly. Roads lead toward the fortresses, which patrols are protecting from the gale using force fields. Of course, I could get by them in stealth mode, but there’s no guarantee that they don’t have some kind of Harol who can sense all kinds of magic. I found out how I’d been located when I was torturing the gargoyles: Harol was a guard, and he could sense any changes in magic across a long distance.
The idea looks silly, but I want to try it. I start sewing myself wings. First, I break down all the cloth and leather items I have, and then I sew the resulting materials together. I got bone wings from the gargoyles, so I use them as a framework. Finally, I finish with a construction that weighs 75 kilograms.
Trimmed gargoyle wings
A despairing sinner decided to taste the joy of flight and die, broken on the cliffs. The heavier they are, the harder it is to fly. Using them damages them.
Effect: Let you fly
Requirement: 200 strength, 200 stamina, 200 agility
Durability: 801/1000
It’s two weeks of Hell just for me. Up I fly, down I crash, so many times that I lose count, but I finally learn how to fly. The hardest part is controlling my body in flight, as my center of gravity drops from my stomach to my hips. I can take off just by relaxing the lower half of my body and strengthening my arms and torso. To make sure that happens, I put on all the artifacts I have that boost stamina and agility.
The enormous wings work, each two meters long. I wave my arms rhythmically and take off, though I’m all the way at the edge of the circle next to the shroud to get as far away from the wind as I can. It’s calm out here.
After taking off, I fly toward the center. Yes, a flying pet wouldn’t be a bad idea. Really, I have to imagine that any bird seeing me right now would die of laughter. Even chicks falling out of the nest don’t look this bad.
I move fairly slowly. It’s a long way down, but I can see that the hurricane doesn’t go any higher than 100 meters. If I fall from up here, I’m dead. And so I just breathe easily and keep flying. The hurricanes and the fortresses are behind me, and I’m thinking about flying down to what looks like the placid ground when I notice something strange. There isn’t a single mountain in the area, just smooth ground covered in sand and rocks. There isn’t even the scrawniest plant. Peering closer, I notice that it isn’t the ground; it’s a wall of wind carrying dust and earth along with it. My improved perception saved the day. If it hadn’t been for this, I’d have flown down and died. At least, I may have survived, but I wouldn’t have been able to take off again.
About a hundred meters away from the next hole, the wind dies down. The flight takes me thirty-five hours.
I land and laugh for a long time. It was fun, scary, and…exciting.
∞ ∞ �
��
I can’t just stick my wings in my inventory, so I tie them to my back and start down.
Again, the exact same thing happens, only now I wait until the torches disappear, jump down, and immediately turn on stealth. I toss the wings away and head thirty meters in.
Nothing happens to start with, and then an enormous, three-headed dog runs up. It’s several meters tall at the withers, and even longer than that. I see powerful muscles writhing under its skin. One head turns toward the spot where I fell, and the dog starts sniffing. My stealth is still working, but I’m not going to be able to get away. I don’t have the ability to walk quietly, and the dog is very experienced; it picks up my scent right away.
Demons, Cerberus, Level 350
He’s an attacker, half his points in stamina, with about 100000 health absent skills. That thought flits through my mind one second, and I’ve taken on my demon appearance the next. I leap right onto its neck and grip the fur, using my magic to attack.
It takes me ten minutes to kill it. The only thing it can do is roll around on the ground, and I attack with everything I have. He turns out to have complete immunity to fire and stun. Dark arrows take off a little health, and I hang on tight as I cast them. Suddenly, however, he throws me off. My next blow, however, is equal to the strength of the eleven boulders I pick up and hurl at him. I was right: the dog has huge resistance to physical damage. On the other hand, my attack does about 50000 damage. The barrage of rocks crash against his chest and shatter; he falls backward and doesn’t move.
Phew, that was a huge risk. If the attack hadn’t worked, he would’ve killed me, although, he definitely doesn’t have the kind of resistance I have.
I get a leather mantle and a bunch of other junk from him. After taking it all, I keep moving.
The mini map shows me that I’m in the third circle of Hell. It’s raining, though - a torrential downpour. Sometimes, I hear thunder, other times there’s hail. No aura - just damage from the hail. The farther I go, the stronger the smell of decay gets. That’s so nasty! Then, I see them: enormous, fat people and other creatures. A dwarf steps on his beard and topples over, leaving him in a position where he can’t move. All he can do is mumble something.