World of the changed 3 Noa in the flesh

by Vasily Mahanenko

  Assured that victory was within my grasp, I made my next cut, only the block that should have dropped down in front of me actually toppled back away from me. Into empty space. A few seconds later, I heard it slam into something metal at the same time as something like a large platform flashed by the opening. And while I didn't have time to gauge how big it was, the fact that nobody had showed up to see what the hole was all about told me I could enlarge it. Fang flashed a few times, and I pulled the blocks in toward me before they could fall off into the abyss.

  It was a shaft, fairly wide, almost the same as what I’d seen under the noa concentration plants. The only difference was the metal pole at the center. Risking a look up, I saw that the pole was holding up an odd platform. The latter was full of holes, almost like a big colander, and very much unlike a lift. A little while later, something clicked. The holes were covered over, and the platform began dropping.

  In that moment, I realized how dangerous wind can be.

  The platform fit so snugglv against the walls that there was nowhere for the air to go except down. My hole qualified, too. For the first little while, I held up all right, though the lower the piston got, the higher the air pressure grew. It got to the point that I was even thrown against the stone. Good thing I didn't toss everything back out into the tunnel with the guard! I was pinned so tightly that I couldn’t pull so much as a hand away from the wall regardless of my superhuman strength.

  The platform rushed past, and that was the end of the pressure. As the air whistled back into the shaft, I took a deep breath. Somehow, the laws of physics wrere being violated. Air can’t be that pressurized. There’s

  no way! And the amount that was in the shaft...

  Peeking back out, I found that the platform had stopped just a few meters down. It was motionless. But a few moments later, there was another click, the holes opened up, and the piston headed back toward the surface for another gulp of air.

  There were several passages visible down below. If I was right, they were air intakes for the lower levels, which made sense — there was no way to get oxygen underground. And that meant there had to be some kind of creature down there that needed it...

  I definitely needed my spiral ladder. Only I changed my mind — it was going to head down, rather than up. Jumping out into the shaft with the piston-like platform was a terrible idea, as I didn’t want to think about what might happen if the air intakes were covered by some kind of material Fang couldn’t cut through. No, that’s not a risk worth taking.

  My horizontal movement gave way to a vertical attack, though I had to stop every minute to battle the flow of air. That really slowed things down. Not only that, but the rocks I tossed back into the tunnel were thrown down on top of me, defeating the entire purpose. I ended up having to drop them into my inventory before heaving them into the shaft. From what I could tell, there was enough room down there for a few extra building blocks.

  The descent took quite a while. It certainly felt like I should be level with the air intakes, though I had yet to break into any open spaces. Sure, the tunnels were going to be off to the side. But I was assuming there was going to be some kind of new level. I didn’t like being wrong, and it hit me that I needed to figure out my next move. There wasn’t any sense continuing down.

  With a deafening crunch of stone, gravel came pouring down on me from above to pull me away from my thoughts. I looked up and swallowed hard. The guard had apparently been able to finally hit the brakes, as it had stopped and cut a new tunnel down to where I was. Just above my head, an arm’s length away, its body was swirling past. Fang was already at the ready. Without waiting for the next domino to fall, I buried it in the guard. Valkyrie didn’t work, mines were useless, and sacrificial offering had proven ineffective, so I wasn’t getting my hopes up. On the other hand, I was concerned that my dagger would get yanked off by the creature. That left the bracing holding it against my arm — it had to come through for me.

  But things turned out very differently.

  The first surprise was that the knife slipped right into the steel body without encountering the least bit of resistance. The second was that I just wasn’t strong enough to actually do the cutting myself. And the third was that my dagger was dragged off after the creature, leaving the wall as the point where something was going to have to give. It was either Fang or my arm.

  A third option appeared, however — the monster’s body was what gave in.

  The bracing dug into my arm, cutting straight through to the bone, though it couldn’t go any further. My steel bones stood tall. Of course, I only found all that out later when I was jerked awake by the pain — oddly enough, even losing my legs hadn’t been that painful. But as soon as my bones started fighting back, I turned into a sniveling little girl looking for her mommy.

  Something snapped. It wasn’t my arm, and it wasn't even Fang. For a few moments, the monster continued moving forward, splitting its own body open across the blade of my dagger. The interminable body whirled past as Fang gutted it.

  And that was when I lost consciousness. When I work up, I spent a while staring at my damaged arm. It had already regenerated — muscles weren’t bone, and they regenerated quickly. The guard was nowhere to be seen, apparently having crawled off. Right then, my phone projected an icon on Ulbaron’s screen to tell me that I had unread messages, so I decided to pull them up. I wasn’t ready to get back to work just yet. Mentally tapping the button and beginning to read the text, it hit me how much I wanted to find the game creator and look it in the eye. A few solid shots to the jaw were also in order. But first, I wanted to see those eyes — they couldn’t be anything but utterly crazed.

  You destroyed the guard for the intermediary level of Li-Ho-Dun’s home.

  Level +1 (713).

  One level?! Just one level for a monster nothing worked on? Are you kidding me?!

  I stood up, peering into the tunnel it had created. The creature’s tail was visible not far off. It was shivering slightly, almost as if the thing was living out its last few moments, though the game status told me the machine was already gone. It was no longer a threat.

  Just then, the piston headed down. I wasn't ready, and I didn't have time to drop down onto my stomach. At least, I wanted to, only the edge of the hole I was looking out of caught me. The stream of air first held me and then picked me up and sent me flying off toward the guard’s tail.

  I ended up hugging it like a long-lost relative to make sure I didn't slip farther up the body. Once the platform whooshed past the hole, the air pressure evened out, though I was already in no hurry to leave my perch. The message I was looking at was far too tempting for that.

  You’re trying to hack the defenses of the guard for the intermediary level of Li-Ho-Dun’s home.

  Sum total of your skill levels: 760.

  Sum total ofUT-!252’s protection: 740.

  Probability of successful hack: 2.6%.

  By the time I’d hacked the remains, I’d also lived through five more whirlwinds. For whatever reason, the game fought to the end, unwilling to hand me control. But it didn't have much of a choice in the grand scheme of things.

  You connected to the guard for the intermediary level of

  Li-Ho-Dun’s home.

  Would you like to extract the core?

  There was no loot to speak of. My device control told me the hunk of metal wras one solid piece the store had no interest in, and I figured I had to have whatever the core w^as. At least I’ll have something to showfoi' my trouble.

  A small item reminiscent of a piece of pencil graphite appeared in my hand. It was slender, little, light, and black. Holding it carefully in both hands, and being careful not to squeeze it too hard, I suddenly dropped to the ground — the guard’s body had disappeared. Raptor, set to automatically take pictures, had done exactly that, leaving me six million coins richer. That’s as much as they give you for a release team member. Realizing that the next flow of air was about to hit me, I dove
back into my hole. And I w^as just in time. The piston dropped, and I was pinned to the ground. But that didn’t bother me, and I wasn’t even paying attention — my phone had finally figured out how to tell me wThat I was holding.

  Core. Description: Basic element of sustenance for non-living machines not made of the game’s nanoparticles. Energy charge:

  Unlimited by amount or time. Contains dragon’s blood (3%). For storage, use an isolation device, otherwise noa will begin to appear around the core. Absorption period: 10 days. Cost: unavailable.

  The wind died away, and I was able to check out the core once more. It was enveloped in the blue fog I’d seen down below the earth’s core — noa was eating away at it like some kind of acid. The surface was already covered in small bumps and cracks.

  “Give the core back, you idiot!” a heavy, unpleasant voice called suddenly, apparently coming from every stone around me. “There’s still time to save it!”

  Obviously, I wasn’t about to respond. The core refused to be dropped into my virtual storage, so I slipped it into a pocket and went back to cutting myself a way out. Another three or four meters later, if I still hadn’t come across anything, I was going to start digging horizontally. But the voice kept going.

  “You're going to get it for this! I’ll do everything I can to make sure you don’t make it out of this release alive. You’ll never be part of the game, Two! The general will renounce you. Give the core back!”

  A minute later, things took a turn for the worse.

  “You chose your fate. From now on, there's no place for you in World of the Changed!”

  The owner’s son named player LRO-443-2 Public Enemy No. 1 and gave it the outcast penalty.

  Player LRO-443-2 is a non-natural player, so the creator

  ignored the penalty.

  ***

  You set up a non-natural release player and earned it a

  penalty (outcast).

  Level +1 (714).

  ***

  Because of its current status, you are unable to use player

  LRO-443-2’s identity.

  “Mark Derwin?!” the area around me exploded. And right then, the stone under me gave in, and I tumbled into the hole that appeared. Ulbaron quickly kicked in and stopped my fall just before I hit the ground.

  Attention! This area is home to Li-Ho-Dun. If you don’t have the owner’s son’s medallion, quickly get it, otherwise the owner’s son cannot take responsibility for the possible consequences of its experiments.

  The players in your hexagon have been informed of your

  current location.

  A hunt was announced for Mark Derwin!

  ***

  New mission: Hunter or hunted? Description: Survive twenty-four hours beginning when the hunt was announced. If you are able to, you will earn a significant reward.

  Chapter to

  SO, THERE I WAS, a hunt declared, an entire horde of aliens thirsting for my blood, and the terrifying son of the owner somewhere on the same level as me, someone, I had to assume, who was also a dragon... But I was just staring at the bewitchingly dancing tongue of flames without any desire to keep going.

  The first of Li-Ho-Dun’s creations I came across was a fire elemental. And it wasn’t just a tiny bundle of sparks or some formless mass. No, it was a real-life Ragnaros. For me, someone who’d spent good chunks of time playing that particular game, it was incredible to see it right there in the flesh. Any gamers who had been with me in that moment would have understood. And not only that, but little creatures constantly dashed up to the thing I immediately began referring to as Ragnaros, leaving something smoking and scalding hot right next to it. The elemental itself was floating in a small lake of melted stone as it sent out little protrusions to suck in whatever the little spawn was leaving it. Taking a moment to see where the tiny riffraff was running off to, I noticed an ore deposit in one of the walls. The creatures w^ere mining it. After turning into little clumps of energy, they soaked into the wall before ripping out a small rock. Or a piece of ore. They then took their haul back over to the boss, subsequently returning for another load. Everyone was hard at work. Only

  I sat there watching, not moving a muscle to run or hide.

  When else was I going to get the chance to enjoy watching something that beautiful?

  You lost control over the storage’s level l.

  Wow, that was fast! Honestly, I’d been counting on the players taking at least an hour to get to where I was, but they’d arrived in less than ten minutes to start wresting my property away from me. It was hard to avoid losing control over empty space, of course, but it still rankled me.

  But there was one more reason why I was sitting there without doing anything. The cave I’d dropped into didn’t offer a way out. There were no tunnels, no doors, nothing. Presumably, I was going to have to deal with the elemental before moving on, but Valkyrie wasn’t much help there. Only the freeze rounds gave me 0.051% damage values wrhen I pointed them at Ragnaros. The rest were powerless.

  All I could really do was sit and wait. The first players were going to start showing up soon, and I was going to have enough on my hands fighting them then. It was time to relax and gather my strength for the coming storm.

  You lost control over the storage’s level 2.

  So, they figured out how to use the stairs. That left them two levels away — the third, and then the one with the guard. Valkyrie popped back up in my hand, and I aimed it at the hole. Guests were going to be showing up at any moment. After all, the better players didn't need to grab control of the levels; that was what the weak, useless fighters were there for. The best were going to be coming straight for me.

  There was a soft clap from the other side of the hole, and that served as the signal telling me to make sure I was well and truly hidden behind my little outcropping. Still, I had time to catch a glimpse of the wall of fire that filled the area. Thermal mines. And lots of them. Far too basic, kids. Far too basic. Just then, the piston headed down, and the fire my opponents had created was carried back the way it had come. Some of it made it past me, of course, but the lion’s share remained up on the intermediary level. And if it really was filled with fire, whoever was up there was in for a toasty time of it.

  Counter updated for players killed since the beginning of

  Hunter or hunted.

  Hunter or hunted: 0/32.

  If you successfully complete the mission, you will receive a reward for each player eliminated.

  Intermediary level destroyed.

  Pebbles rained down from the opening, and there was a deafening roar. A smile spread unbidden across my face. Thirty-two fried players wasn’t bad at all, especially given how they’d taken the level out along with themselves. From that point on, the only way to get to me was via the fourth level, and there weren’t many players who had access to it. I’d seen the list, after all. The general and Li-Ho-Dun are going to have to work that out, so hopefidly that’ll take some time. Instead of the entire hexagon, I was only going to have to deal with the thirty players who had access.

  “Run a scan!” Goosebumps popped up when I heard the lifeless voice, and I flicked on my invisibility just in case. It was Ragnaros who’d spoken up — it was apparently intelligent as well as beautiful and hot. The little tufts of fire flew over to the closest passageway without touching the ground. Circling, they headed back to their boss, who apparently decided it was going to handle the job itself. And while it didn’t have legs, it was perfectly capable of floating through the air. The rock underneath it melted into pools of lava as it passed.

  Raptor’s red signal w7as unexpected — the tablet was telling me that the element was going to pass by just a couple steps away. And my prospects weren’t bright, with the chances of survival dropping to just five percent as long as it stayed farther away. But the closer it got, the farther my chances dropped. When the percentage hit zero, Raptor’s screen blinked to make sure the message w7as really driven home, Ragnaros having mo
ved within ten meters. Its progress wTas inexorable if slow. Looking around wildly, I didn’t see anywhere to go — flying up into the air would have meant a trip past the elemental, while it was already headed toward the far end of the cave.

  It got so hot I had to duck deeper into the stone. My air conditioning system did its best to cope with the nearby tongues of fire, but it was a hopeless endeavor. All that saved me was my impenetrable skin. All the way up at level 21, it did solid work keeping the heat out, though it was almost impossible to breathe. Still, my skin kept me in the game long enough for Ragnaros to get to where I needed it.

  Two meters and ninety centimeters away.

  But I wasn't tracking it. All I could do was keep from moving in order to avoid stirring up the heated air while mentally pounding away at the sacrificial offering button. There was no recharge time, so I didn't have to worry about missing my opportunity. The only thing hanging in the balance was my life. If the elemental had the same kind of immunity as the guard on the intermediary level, the game was going to end right there for me.

  The heat just intensified. Raptor was the first casualty as it burned out and turned off. Next was Ulbaron — it gave up trying to keep the heat out, just turning off and expanding as far as it could to keep a cushion of air between it and my skin. And while I couldn’t see Ragnaros any longer, I could sense it with my personal scanner. Still, I mashed the button. My body stopped caring if it got any air or not, and my consciousness was fading when the elemental finally got within range.

  You sacrificed a living personification of fire belonging to the owner’s son using the absorber’s sacrificial offering quality.

  The game creator appreciated your sacrifice.

  All data regarding the sacrificed creature was removed

  from the game.

  Information was not sent regarding the killing of a nonexistent creature.

  You earned a hefty reward.

  ***

  Level +50 (764).

  You locked in 50 levels. Current level: 647.