by Pegaz
Sadly, even SSS ranked quests were only for mortals. He went and asked a staff member.
“Hello.” He approached the counter. “Do you have any quests that involve hunting immortal creatures?”
The man behind the counter looked up, slightly shocked. “You’re an immortal?”
John only nodded.
“Then you need to update your guild card to immortal rank,” the staff member adjusted his glasses in a huff. “They work the same as mortal ranks, but go from IH to IS.”
“Can you please update my guild card?”
The man shook his head. “Only the guild master can do that. All immortal-ranked quests are on the second floor too. It’s to stop anyone who’s not an immortal from taking on any of those quests. The death rate for them is 100%.”
“Oh, then can you inform the guild master that I need to see him?”
“Certainly.” The man shuffled in a fluster. “Please wait in the seating area.”
The wait was only a couple of minutes at most. Immortals get much better treatment from staff members it seems.
John checked the guild master’s strength.
???
Rank: 3
Level: 7
John stood up and shook hands with the man.
“Hello,” the guild master said in a deep voice. “Come to my office, and we’ll talk.”
John followed the guild master into his office and took a seat on the other side of the desk. He was offered a cup of tea. He never liked tea on Earth, but he found this tea delicious.
“So, what rank are you?” The man started writing down the details.
“Only Rank 2.” John was checking the man’s facial features as he said this, so he followed up, “Much weaker than yourself.”
The man stopped writing when he heard this and slowly looked up with a shocked face.
“Why is a Rank 3 late-stage immortal inside the guild doing paperwork?” John sipped on his tea.
After nearly a minute of silence, the man uttered, “How?”
“Secret,” John grinned like a Cheshire cat. “Just want you to know that I have many special skills, like measuring someone’s strength even when they’re trying to hide it. All I’m asking for is fair treatment, despite my weaker strength.”
John was not an expert at reading facial expressions, but the guild master had relaxed after initially hearing his rank. John had come to the conclusion that the master was only giving him good service because he thought that John was stronger.
“Well, I’m here to work,” the guild master replied slowly. “Hopefully, I will be promoted and get to work at the guild’s headquarters.”
John nodded. “You mean the planet that’s solely for the guild’s headquarters, right? I’ve only heard of it, but I’ve never been there. Is it a place that’s good for immortals?”
The man smiled. “I’ve been there once, and it truly is a heaven for immortals. They’ve come up with a technique to draw out more Life Power from the earth.”
John knitted his brows. “Won’t that just destroy the planet?”
“No idea.” The guild master shrugged. “If it does start to collapse, then I’m sure the guild has some measures in place to at least evacuate everyone.”
Even I would not care about the planet. I would take not only the Life Power but the lives of sinners as well if it would increase my strength and have no regrets about it either.
“Well, let us change the subject.” John swept away his dark thoughts. “Can you tell me how this works, please? I was only a mortal when I last did jobs for the guild.”
“It’s the same as how it works with mortals, really. The only difference are the ranks. You can only advance in guild rank when you advance in your cultivation rank. So, until you’ve reached Rank 3, you’ll be ranked IG. Quest rankings will tell you the rank of the monsters but not the levels. Early Stage 3’s might continue hunting IG-ranked quests until they’re mid-stage.”
John nodded at the information. “To be honest, I just want the information of the creatures that are Rank 2 and above on this planet. I didn’t know the guild has ranks for immortals too. In specific, I need to find Rank 2 or 3 creatures that are within a few days of travel. I’m a contestant in that tournament just over two months away, so…”
The man gave John his ID card back and showed him the immortal quest board. It was in a room next to the guild master’s office, and there was a man behind the only counter in this room too. John was now allowed to come in whenever he wanted.
John found a quest for the same crocodile beasts that he had been killing on the way here. However, Rank 3 was the weakest target on this quest. Since it was only a three-day travel away, he took it.
John ran for a few hours out of town. Once he made sure no one was following him, he took a deep breath.
Time to fly.
Chapter 24
Flight
Standing on a small hill surrounded by trees, John searched around. He eventually found leaves that had fallen on the ground and some tall grass. Collecting them, he put them all into a thick pile on that hill.
Even though he had the Pain Sense skill to numb him, he didn’t know if falling was considered to be third-party damage or not. Would the fall even do any damage to his body? Preparing for the worst, he made the best cushion he could manage in case of a crash landing.
Standing on top of the makeshift cushion, John looked down to his feet and started putting Life Power into them. He focused on the soles of his feet like what he did for running, but this time he tried pushing the Life Power downwards only.
To his delight and horror, John started to rise in the air. As he did, he lost balance and fell forwards. He forgot to stop the pushing force on his feet, which resulted in him going across the ground at a fast speed. He turned off the power as soon as his reflexes kicked in, but he’d still travelled for about ten feet.
A little shaken, he stood up and spat out a mouthful of dirt. Dirt was also in his hair and clothes, and he did his best to clean up. Luckily, he found no real damage, so he walked back to the cushioned landing.
He tried it again but focused on his balance. Soon, he was hovering about two feet in the air, smiling.
John looked at the system, seeing that he currently had 10,249,956 Life Power units. He watched the end digit turn to ‘4’ and started counting. When the end digit jumped to ‘2’, 50 seconds had passed. John assumed it was 2 units per 10 seconds. Level 4 of the Fuel Skill turned it to 50 seconds.
If he was right, Level 5 would be 2 per minute, which was twice the amount of his idle absorbing rate.
Next, he started flying further up, keeping an eye on the amount of Life Power he had. It was going down by 3 units every 50 seconds. Looking down, John realised he was at least a hundred feet up in the air. He’d gone too far up—a huge problem since he didn’t know how to get down yet.
He took a deep breath and reduced the number of units under his foot to 1 unit. He started to slowly descend.
So, that’s 1 unit for the descent, 2 for hovering, and 3 for rising. Not bad, but what about at faster speeds?
He put in 10 Life Power units pushing underneath his foot.
Whoosh!
With no hesitation, he surged 50 feet further into the air. His speed was then reduced when he placed only 2 units in his feet to hover. This all happened so fast that he experienced G-Force! Though the system deemed it as a third party force and John was immune to it, he still felt it.
Right now, I can only use Life Power from my feet., When I can use it through my back, chest, and shoulders, I might be able to use the momentum to push me forward.
John tried taking a step while hovering in the air, but when his back foot went at an angle, he started moving forward like he was ice skating. While moving forward, he started descending slowly.
So, the hover is only when both feet are perfectly downwards, and if either foot is angled any other direction, then I lose the hover and start descending whil
e moving in that direction.
John smiled and lunged forward, keeping his feet at a backwards angle. He flew forward, adjusting his feet and body angle. With this new angle, he flew straight, neither ascending or descending.
Then, he put 50 Life Power units into his feet.
BOOM!
He went faster than the speed of sound. His body jolted a little. John felt a scream trapped in his throat and a panic in his chest, but after a while, he was able to hold himself steady. While going at that speed, he lifted his head up and pushed his feet forward, pushed Life Power in his feet to counter the momentum, trying to slow down. Eventually, he came to a stop and started falling.
Managing to get his feet towards the ground, he steadily applied 5 Life Power units. With this force, he stopped falling. With a manoeuvre, he landed safely on the ground.
Checking the world map, he discovered he was roughly 2,600 feet away from where he started.
If we take away roughly 100 feet because I was gliding and couldn’t stop... it’s 2 Life Power units for 100 feet when flying! That’s a better result compared to running. Maybe, when I get Fuel to Level 5, it will be 100 feet to 1 unit… I think it’s best not to fly until I’ve done the stomach to shoulders part of the Life Stage. Of course, that’s only for travelling normally.
With the tests over, he started his journey to the crocodile nest indicated on his parchment from the guild.
Two days later, he was on top of a tree, sniping all the crocs he could lay his eyes on.
The strongest croc he found was Rank 3 Level 9. Using 45 Life Power to form his bullet, it was killed without resistance. He gained 90 Life Power units.
Sure enough, 10 units each level for Rank 3. I’m guessing Rank 4 Level 1 will be worth 100 units. Will Level 2 be 200 or 110 units per creature?
The location of the nest was a massive lake with reeds everywhere, like the Everglades back on Earth. The Rank 3 version of the crocs was slightly different in colour and size. They also had more scales around the body than the Rank 2 ones he killed on the way to the capital.
The smallest croc in the group was roughly 40 feet in length, with a mouth more than 10 feet when spread open.
He remembered that the crocs on Earth were very sensitive inside the mouth, that even if only a drop of water were to fall inside, it would cause the croc to clamp its jaw full of teeth down hard.
He started hovering roughly 70 feet above the water, floating to the middle of the lake. With Life Vision turned on, John found thousands of the creatures in the water. John wondered what they were eating to survive, with so many of them in one spot. Squinting, he saw a few fish swimming about with Life Vision, but that was about it.
The force of the bullet as it launched from John’s finger jolted his body through the air. Luckily, John had gotten used to performing a balancing act, so he soon stabilised in the air. The croc John had shot at, however, wasn’t so lucky.
Though it was roughly 15 to 20 feet underwater, the fast bullet was able to tear through the water that it hit its mark unhindered. The creature stood no chance. As John watched the bullet, he noticed it created a small whirlpool because of the spinning movement.
To complete this quest, he needed to kill ten Rank 3 crocs. It was time to get busy.
Just under two months passed, and John had already shot hundreds of them. He collected all of their corpses and stored them inside his Storage Space.
The crocs could do nothing to reach John, so they went deeper underwater to try and survive. However, the bullet was able to keep the penetrating power and spin for roughly 50 feet underwater. After that, it lost momentum, but for the most part, he was able to make do.
John had finished the Fuel skill after 17 days. He put all Idlers into Force’s Brakes. The first level was 2d 12h. The next levels were 5d, 10d, and 20d. He had just under 6d left for Brakes Level 4 to complete.
Name: John
Age: 23
Idlers: 0/135
Skill Points: 0
Life Pool: 11.7M
Sin: 0
Misc List:
Force - Idlers 135/135, Accelerate - 0/5, Brakes - 3/5, Time - 5d 21h 23m 42s
Force II - Idlers 0/135, Speed - 0/5, Control - 0/5
It was time to go back to the capital. There were only four or five days left until the start of the tournament.
And so, two days later John was back in the Adventurer Guild. John handed in six hundred twenty-eight Rank 3 crocodile corpses, perfectly intact with the only damage being a hole in their heads.
After collecting his reward, John had another £31.4 billion in his account. With the money John already had, he now had over £61 billion. The guild offered an exchange with Life Stones for cash, Grade 1 for £100,000 each. However, he didn’t need them just yet.
As per his routine, John went to the best hotel in the capital and booked the best room he could get. He told the guild where he was staying so they could fetch him at the start of the tournament.
With a smile on his lips, he soon fell asleep.
Chapter 25
Almost Salivating
Five days later, the guild staff came and fetched John. The arena here was just like the one in the small town but on a much bigger scale.
John was lead to what looked like a small dugout with seats. It was like what they had in baseball stadiums back in America on Earth where the “players” could see everything. There were two of these dugouts, and they were both opposite each other with the fighting ring in the middle. From his seat, John could see that the rows of seats above him were stacked almost vertically. His eye caught sight of the very top, about 600 feet in the air.
That’s got to be a place for the viewing of immortals. Mortals can’t see much from that height.
John checked out all the combatants’ strengths in the opposite dugout. The highest ranked person made his eyes widen. He almost wanted to snipe him then and there and forget about the tournament.
???
Rank: 3
Level: 6
Sin: 104,294
One bullet could get him over 100,000 Life Power units. John was almost salivating at the thought. In fact, he tried blurting excuses to the staff for permission to leave and secretly find a sniping spot in the stands, but they wouldn’t let him go. He sat down disappointed.
Most of the combatants who heard John started laughing. They all thought he got cold feet and was trying to squirm his way out of fighting. Of course, they immediately froze when John released a bit of his killing intent. His blood red eyes made John look like a demon. They all flinched out of instinct.
After that, if one were to look carefully, John was sitting alone in the centre of the dugout. No one was within 15 feet of him. The seats outside of this range were full, and a few even chose to stand rather than get too close.
John was assigned the number ‘100’ since he was the last person to qualify for this tournament. The original plan was to get at least 10,000 people to fight in the tournament, but most of the combatants had gone missing or were killed on the way to the capital. The tournament continued, but an investigation into these missing persons had already begun.
The first stage of the tournament was one-on-one again. The top 50 would then fight in five groups of ten, and the last man standing would go to the finals. Each of the top 5 people would have to fight the other four people at least once to find out the rankings of the top 5.
Since this was a low-levelled tournament, the prizes were as follows:
5th place - Rank 1 armour set.
4th place - Rank 2 armour set.
3rd place - Rank 3 armour set and £1 Billion.
2nd place - Rank 4 armour set, £10 Billion and 10 Grade 2 Life Stones.
1st Place - Rank 4 armour set, Rank 4 weapon of your choice, £50 billion, 100 Grade 2 Life Stones and a place at the king’s feast.
When John heard the prizes, he was disappointed. He didn’t need any of that stuff and neither did he want to get involved with the
nobles or royalties of any planet. He’d already started walking away when the guild staff announced a rule change.
The rule stating no Life Power attacks and the rule forbidding killing were both now gone.
Nobody saw it, but John had stopped moving. A hungry grin crept onto his face. After a moment, he slipped back into his poker face and sat back down.
The first fight was contestant number ‘1’ versus contestant number ‘100’. John stood up and entered the ring. The person he was fighting was the man with 100,000 plus units worth of Sin. John had to try to hold off from smiling.
Is this good luck or bad luck? I don’t have a guaranteed win... but if I pull it off, I gain a lot.
There were betting stalls all around the arena. They had the ranks of each person listed. The man’s odds were 5:3, and John’s were 1:15 since his opponent was Rank 3 and John was Rank 2. John wished he had a teammate whom he could give money to bet on himself.
Though John was trying to hide his smile at the thought of his possible prize, he was still nervous. He’s unable to snipe him from long range, and he had no idea if a Rank 3 could move faster than him.
That’s when an idea popped into his head.
After a matter of seconds, John and his opponent were in position. They stood on the edges of the ring, about 50 feet away from each other. There were four judges all around the ring this time. Even though killing the opponent was now allowed, there were other ways to win. A few enforcers were also seated in the stadium, prepared to leap into action if the rules were blatantly ignored.
The head referee climbed up to the stage and asked both John and the man if they were ready. When both nodded to his question, he raised his hand and shouted, “Start!”
John pushed 1 Life Power unit into the tip of his right hand’s fingers while he was flexing his hand. He also put 50 units into his feet and in a burst, he was next to his opponent almost instantaneously.
He landed on his left foot, beginning his assault with a sidekick. He pointed the sole of his foot away from the man and used the flight technique to propel his foot forward.
