Gestation

by John Gold

∞ ∞ ∞

  Damage taken: 12845 (ignored: 167)

  446226/461200

  Resistance to fire: +0.02%

  Thermal damage ignored up to 221/second

  In front of me, the melted sand has taken the shape of a cone. It hisses and crackles. It may not be more than fifteen meters long, but what an effect. If I took just 5% of the damage, the total was twenty times as much, or a quarter of a million. Shooting that at the sand dogs would have incinerated them and their loot. They only have 45000 health each.

  But I’m getting distracted. I need to prepare the area, especially now that my fireworks have scared off everything in the vicinity.

  It takes me two hours to collect my first experimental group made out of a hundred monsters. I should take a screenshot of me with a mountain of paralyzed bodies in the background. There are giant snakes, dogs, overgrown ants, and even something like sand fairies. Those last ones are what take the most time—they’re the only monsters who attack with magic, so I have to spend another six hours on them. But with my health boosted to half a million, it isn’t their lucky day.

  Once the altar is in place on the red-hot glass, I start tracing the ritual seal. I actually have more victims than I need, so I use the first set to make a ring out of twilight iron. They are, incidentally, the most expensive items at the auction, already with gems set in them. They may not be mithril, but there’s a reason I learned how to reinforce metal in Heron. Everything’s been planned for a while now. All eight of the blanks spend a week boiling in my blood, right in the middle of the ritual seal using mana depositories. That’s what the remainder of the malachite is used for.

  And now, it’s time to get to work on the most exciting part of my evening.

  Monster-eater

  Once upon a time, a famed killer lived in the world. His victims were all monsters in human skin: vampires, werewolves, witches, cannibals, and others. The killer himself came from a tribe where you eat your enemy to inherit their strength. Nobody could catch the killer, and the only trace he left was a ring. Nobody could understand if the killer was possessed and therefore eaten by his ring.

  Effect:

  Intellect +5

  Wisdom +5

  Morale +5

  Stamina +5

  Athleticism +5

  Requirement: Scalable item

  Durability: Indestructible, with damage to it taken out of the owner’s health

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  It’s a good thing I boiled it in my blood. I got five effects and it isn’t even mithril. That’s some mastery for you! My mithril bars couldn’t match it. Of course, it’s nothing compared to what I made in Hell, and I can only imagine that the structure of the world order has something to do with why the bonuses I’ve been getting from rings are so much lower. There is some logic there, needless to say. What would I do with a scalable item that gives me +300 intellect before I’ve even reached Level 1? What I made with the pirates may have been unique, but it wasn’t scalable. Unique items give you a bigger bonus for your level, but their value drops precipitously if they’re low-level. It’s just a shame that my victims weren’t a bit stronger and that there weren’t more than the hundred and fifty or so that I had. I had to use a different seal to make sure they all fit. Anyway, I clear the loot and load up my cart. Anybody could be out wandering the desert.

  Mornings are wonderful when you know that you’re going to be spending the day digging yourself an altar and collecting a bunch of monsters to use in your experiments. I have lots of things to do and the whole day ahead of me. I’m not in a hurry, either, and I can wait quite a while for another of those rings.

  I prepare from morning till night, and I have to skip my experiments. I’m out of spikes. In the evenings, I smear a paralyzing poison on them and pile them up on the ritual seal. All I have are simple iron spikes with pieces of malachite forged into them. The paralysis rune draws energy from them when I use it.

  With three hundred and thirty-two of the creatures gathered, it’s a shame they don’t all come in pairs. I’m not going to make it to the five hundred I was hoping for.

  Sun-eater ring

  The great wolf Fenrir was a terror of his time. Many monsters in the world suffered in the face of his strength, though Fenrir was punished for biting the hand of a god once. Since then, nobody has heard of him, and one of his toys is all that’s left.

  Effect:

  Stamina +5

  Athleticism +7

  Survivability +3

  Strength +7

  Intellect +3

  Requirement: Scalable item

  Durability: Indestructible, with damage to it taken out of the owner’s health

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  How strong do you have to be to bite the hand of a god?

  This time, I emphasize strength and stamina. The more my victims have of each, the more pronounced they are in the ring’s effects.

  I end up having to venture farther into the desert, boosting my resistance to fire and mental damage as I go. My cart starts to fill up. If it’s going to be like this the whole time, I’m going to have to sew new bags.

  One interesting thing about the desert is the variety of fauna. At the beginning of my trip, I just came across small monsters who occasionally formed groups. The deeper I’ve gone, the stronger they are. Now, in most cases, I get loners, though they’re incredibly powerful.

  In a week, I find a good stone area and Level-400 monsters who throw in some magic.

  Monster, Lamia, Level 402

  She’s half-woman, half-snake, and her attempt to come at me with a mental attack is met with a powerful defense. An hour later, I’ve collected my first dozen of her sisters. The pile of womanly bodies with snake tails looks beautiful, of course, but dragging them all around is tough. Just one of them weighs as much as ten men. Even in Hell, they weren’t this heavy.

  It’s evening. I’m up to my normal ritual on the stone area, and I have my pile of lamias to work with. Just another ceremony with eighty-five sacrifices.

  Red master ring

  The Red Master was a well-known ruler, though not many people know him by that name. There were no women in his harem; only slave girls. He collected them on his many travels, always charming his victims before carrying them out in his red stole.

  Effect:

  Speed +4

  Agility +2

  Survivability +2

  Morale +7

  Intellect +7

  Wisdom +3

  Requirement: Scalable item

  Durability: Indestructible, with damage to it taken out of the owner’s health

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  That’s interesting. It’s my first item to add speed. The additions to my intellect and wisdom make sense: lamias use charm to defeat their opponents.

  I decide to use nothing but lamias to make the rest of my five rings since they give me the best combination for magic damage. Plus that speed.

  Finally, I get what I’m looking for, so it’s time to make some things.

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  War is the destiny of men, at least, that’s what Leon thought. That day, he had been able to emerge victorious near Romada. Four clans had attacked the castle of the Golden Hand, and all they’d suffered was the loss of two of their own. Their assault had led them right into an ambush that also exploited the lowered guard Leon had been anticipating.

  That evening, Leon’s military alliance, with the support of Margul, was going to fight a pitched battle with the combined forces of the young gods. The battle of Romada, like the other six, were all diversions.

  The start of the battle was sudden and well planned. A group of mages teleported to the front lines and launched a suicidal attack, creating several incredibly powerful fire vortexes before succumbing to a hail of blows. Explosions rang out along the right flank. The second group of mages was using meteors to demolish the enemy formation. The enemy decided to take out as many as they could with one blow.

  “Raise the shields an
d prepare the archers. We’re going to create a field that will increase their range.”

  All this was yet another diversion. Leon sent his own group of mage killers around to the opponent’s rear. This was when the main battle supposed to begin, as soon as the signal was given. Leon and Margul were going to handle the gods.

  Margul soared over the field of battle in the form of a giant dragon. He was much larger than ordinary dragons, at least five times as big. His aura engulfed everyone fighting below. Leon couldn’t muster the strength to do the same, and the issue was Margul’s followers. They were in every corner of the world, living in almost every territory on the planet.

  The flow of belief energy—prana—depended on the number of followers each god had as well as how they were worshipped. The geography of where the true believers were located was important, too—the more there were in a region, the more powerfully the god could express his abilities there. Their supply of strength was in the astral and tied to the world via an altar in the main temple of their cult. The better the altar, the stronger the god could appear in the real world. There were all kinds of requirements for how to improve altars, all of which had to do with the believers and where they were located. Once those requirements were met, the god could select a path for development and move up into the large pantheon. Leon was at that point just a god in a small pantheon without that many followers.

  Thunder crashed on the enemy’s side, followed by a flash that illuminated the entire field.

  In the commotion, Leon was the only one who could see the scale of the disaster.

  The gods had combined their strength for a single, exceedingly powerful attack on Margul. The lightning that struck him distorted space, opening the path for all kinds of beasts to arrive from the astral. The dragon lord himself, his back scorched, tumbled to the ground, though he immediately tried to pull himself up. The entire army was hit with debuffs, losing both their hearing and vision.

  The enemy army, forty thousand strong, moved in, and the war began.

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  Margul got in touch with Bernard when they were getting ready to leave for another dungeon.

  “Bernard, you were right—they’re weak. Even all together, they couldn’t kill me. This avatar still has a good half its strength left.”

  “Don’t underestimate the wanderers. They may try to outwit you. Don’t be stupid.”

  “I hear you, brother. Okay, time for me to go.”

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  The dragon spread his wings again and flew off toward the enemy’s main group. The little attacks mages threw at him did nothing, and Margul was just one of five dragons in the war. The humans couldn’t beat them even with their numerical superiority.

  The dragons formed a wedge and swept a firestorm over the enemy army, evening up the sides. Margul himself created a blue sun right above the gods to ensure that they were weakened, but not killed. One of the dragons split off from the group with a message for Leon: they were leaving the alliances due to a serious wound suffered by their leader.

  “I’m not going to die at the hand of these weaklings,” Margul said furiously, creating a final spell that blinded everyone on both sides.

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  I was naïve to think that I could take out everyone and everything in this desert.

  There’s a hulk that I notice from a kilometer away, though it noticed me from two kilometers away and is dashing toward me. It’s a raid boss, and I happened across where it patrols. Damn mega dungeon! Where are my victims?

  Monster, Death Spinner, Level 301, raid boss

  Two minutes later, I have three victims lined up to combine our health. The raid boss’ retinue is first to get to me—eight tarantulas, each the size of an aerocar. The only difference is that they’re faster and could eat an aerocar in less than a minute.

  Monster, Small Death Tarantula, Level 310

  I wasn’t prepared for this, though I do have my shield ready. I’m not worried about poison damage; it’s physical attacks that are making me think twice. But they make their first mistake right at the beginning, charging in a group that’s easy to target with dragon breath. Four of them die outright. The rest keep coming, and I have to take them out with lightning and another dragon breath.

  I have another minute left before the raid boss gets to me, and there’s no time left to collect the loot after I heal myself. I need to face him down, and I have a good attack. The important part is surviving the recoil.

  “Dwarf hammer!”

  Dwarf hammer is a scary spell. Your opponent is squashed by a giant gravitational impulse. It’s like a mouse getting hit with a sledgehammer.

  The boss is a monster among monsters. He takes three hits delivered with all my power and keeps coming, the first two just driving his legs deeper into the sand, and the third finally breaking them and crumpling his chitin shell. Four legs still stick out of the sand, while the rest are buried deep inside. A million health and enormous resistance to physical damage is no joke.

  It’s just when I walk over to him that I realize how big the spider really is. He could have eaten Cerberus and matched up against the six-armed guard in the eighth circle of Hell. That thing is the size of a small shuttle! It’s a good thing my last hammer strike took him out, otherwise I wouldn’t be here to tell the tale. My mana is almost gone, and my health is in the red.

  Oo-ooh, wait a second! If things like that are what I get from this kind of monster, I’m more than happy to have them keep coming. Everything is epic and legendary, although I obviously can’t use any of it. But if I can identify and sell it, I’ll walk away with a pretty penny.

  It’s like the spider gobbled up a bunch of ancient heroes and then came around wondering who to give the loot to.

  I’m going to stay here for now. First, I need to make new clothes, and second, I need to eliminate the mental damage I’m taking.

  Mental damage is brutal. I haven’t fought other players, and they can blind me, stun me, paralyze me, take control of me, possess my body, and influence my mind. That’s the worst thing I can imagine. What could be tougher to deal with than your own body betraying you? Fire and physical damage is fine, and I’m working on poison. This desert is the only place in the world with the kind of aura I’m looking for. I’ll go to the very center if that’s what it takes to handle the issue.

  There are four kinds of armor in Project Chrysalis: cloth, leather, chainmail, and plate. Mages only use cloth armor. Thieves, assassins, and archers use both cloth and leather armor. Marauders and crossbowmen add chainmail to their selection, while warriors generally tend to use heavy plate armor. They do occasionally go with other types, though. They can wear a cloth outfit, put chainmail over it, and top that off with plate armor. All of the defense attributes add up, though only what you’re wearing on top gives you added effects. If I wear armor, I’ll get a penalty for using it without a skill. Wearing armor is a main class ability. Anyway, of the four types, I can only use cloth armor.

  I can make items for my neck, head, wrists, chest, ears, legs, feet, and hands, as well as a cloak or cape. Pauldrons only come in plate armor. I’ve never heard of implants though, which is why I asked the master healer at the Sural arena about it. It turns out that mages and warriors can both change their body to meet the needs of their specialty.

  Over the course of the day, I make a new altar and start to think about where I’m going to develop in the future. I don’t have any restrictions on using monsters to create items, so I can make whatever I want. I just have to make sure nobody notices me. There are almost fifty blanks for rings that I’m carrying with me to make different kinds of rings with. I already have a good selection of rings to use magic with, and I need to make more of them with a focus on strength and stamina. The rest will be unique and for personalized use in specific situations. For example, I can make one with strength and intellect maxed. Yeah, normal players can only dream about this kind of thing. Want to join me? Go ahead, get through He
ll, and you can have all the goodies you want. Payment? Simple—your soul, and that’s it. Well, you might also have problems with your health and a psychologist.

  I decide to figure out what I’m going to do about my clothes right away. There’s one set I can enchant, so I’m going to need to sew another set. I’ll have to find some shoes, too. I’m not a cobbler, so I can’t make them.

  For now, I need to create a mage’s amulet to wear around my neck. I work on that all day, looking for monsters with a magic bent. I’m a long way from the lamias and going back doesn’t make sense, so I have to use the eyes I come across.

  Monster, Wild Eye, Level 312

  I see the green wonder levitating a meter and a half above the earth. It’s a sphere with an enormous eye, a mouth that’s acid-green, and octopus-like tentacles. It has no stamina, so it prefers to use lightning, and its enormous jaw with three rows of sharp teeth snaps at my head when I get too close. It has immunity to Mind Magic and tries to break through my shield, but it can’t get away from a paralysis spike. One good throw, and my collection has a new body. Doctor! Time to operate.

  Next, two weeks of electrotherapy go by with health boosted to two million. The wild eye “heals” my weakness to electric damage. I’m able to train my defense against lightning cast by monsters at Level 400, though that still doesn’t solve the problem. I bring together a collection of “doctors” to see if I can find a drastic solution. Sadly, they all admit their incompetency, and I have to kill them.

  On the way, I make myself clothes that give me a magic bump. A spider shows up on the last day of therapy…and it isn’t alone.

  Disaster strikes when two raid bosses appear almost at once. Life hasn’t prepared me for this kind of thing! At least, I have a bunch of victims that boost my health all the way up to two million. Luck is on my side, and I use a meteor with double force.

  Monster, Death Spinner, Level 301, raid boss

  I do my best to bring down a boulder so big that the shock wave can be felt from half a kilometer away. The recoil takes off half a million health, but it’s a success. All that’s left is a crater twenty meters across with a bunch of bodies inside. How much damage must that have done if it took off half a million health even with my resistance? Ten million. Ah, I wish I had more mana!