What’s it doing this far from Tartila Mine? And why is it out at night? The experiments were daytime monsters, no? Valia was also speaking mentally, though there were no answers to her questions forthcoming. And it wasn’t even that Tailyn didn’t know the answers. Of course, he didn’t, but the reason he didn’t respond was that he was busy staring at a new message that had left him utterly unsure of what to do.
Mechanism detected.
Would you like to connect to Experiment 14?
If you are unsuccessful, the owner will be informed of your attempt.
Why was it a mechanism when the description clearly said it was a monster? Tailyn wasn’t sure. He also wasn’t sure whether he should risk an attempt to connect to a non-level creature with his laughable parameters. For the present, it was just walking around, but the pair wouldn’t have been able to escape from the underground hideout if a battle was joined. The monster would have just dug down and eaten them. And that time, Tailyn didn’t have a dead Sloan he could detonate in the thing’s mouth.
What’s with you? Valia asked, just about going back to speaking out loud when he explained. Don’t you even think about it. That’s too dangerous!
The experiment let out another roar before continuing on. The earthquake stopped, and Tailyn sighed in relief. With no monster around, there was no temptation to hack it. The pair spent the whole night tracking the creature’s movements — it only headed back to the lake right before daybreak. After everything quieted down, the boy risked rolling the boulder back. The snakes were gone, and he hoped against hope that they’d disappeared rather than being eaten by the experiment. The thought that a giant, which was what Fourteen undoubtedly was, could get into the basement scared him.
“Let’s go with your way,” Valia said. “But let’s just hurry. I don’t want to stay in this city a second longer than we have to.”
The sleepless night left the girl with dark circles under her eyes, and Tailyn once again had to heal her. Feeling so-so himself, he still wanted to rest, too — Valanil had told him his regeneration could buy him up to a week without sleep, though you then collapsed and were out of it completely for two whole days.
There were no more snakes to be seen, and the pair had gotten almost all the way to their destination by the end of the day. One more cave-in, and they were home free. They decided to put that off for the next day. With that said, there was nowhere to set up the tent, and neither one wanted to go back — one of the passageways was so narrow that Tailyn had barely gotten through. He’d been forced to take Vargot off and deal with a couple bruises his personal shield left when it dragged across his chest. The worst part was that there hadn’t been any way to widen the tunnel. The surrounding stone was reinforced with the ancients’ metal grids.
Valia dropped weakly onto the stone. The sleepless night and day spent clambering through narrow underground passages had her more worn out than Valanil’s workouts. After eating something to regain her strength, she was about to close her eyes when she heard voices talking. Unsure of what they were saying, she still reacted instantaneously.
Tailyn, freeze!
The boy did just that, his pick upraised, and that was when the voice got louder.
“Are you sure?” Tailyn thought he recognized the haughty tone. He’d heard it somewhere, though he could say for sure it wasn’t Berad. And since Raptor wasn’t coming up with any red dots, the people were talking by an opening, the echo of their voices carried through the tunnels.
“Yes, Commander! The yaks headed this way, straight for the lake. I want all the way around the city, and they didn’t leave, so the students have to be hiding under a protective dome somewhere around here.”
“Spears at the ready! Spread out and keep your eyes open,” the first voice said, and Tailyn finally realized where he’d heard it. There had been just one time in Culmart. After the lix attack, Baron Equire’s guards had dropped by, and they’d been commanded by a mustachioed man with the voice Tailyn had recognized. The detachment had apparently been sent after the kids. Forian had warned them something like that could happen, but the boy had had a hard time believing experienced fighters would be sent out into the gray steppe after a couple children.
“Commander, we need to check the hole!” The guards’ ranger turned out to be unpleasantly on the ball.
“Go for it. Do you need help?”
“I’ll be fine. Go check those rocks — if I were them, I would set up camp there. And... What was that?!”
“Weapons!” came the order as the familiar metallic roar broke out. Experiment 14 was venturing out of its den earlier than the day before, apparently having sensed prey. The earth shook as it made a beeline toward the silent children. Meanwhile, horses whinnied hysterically. People shouted. Someone shrieked like a pig being led to slaughter. The mustachioed commander barked order after order, though it didn’t sound like they were having an effect.
And that was when the hair on the back of Tailyn’s neck stood up. The next shout came from the ranger.
“Commander, tell my family I served well. For the emperor!”
Immediately following his words came an explosion that caved in part of the underground passageways.
“It worked! We can kill it!” shouted someone else. “Think good of me, brothers. Die, you vile beast! For the emperor!”
Another explosion.
“For the emperor!”
One more explosion.
“For — ”
The tunnel the kids had crawled through collapsed completely, cutting off the sound. Only the cracks in the ceiling and the rock dust falling to the ground told the pair what was going on above them. One after another, the guardsmen died, though each did damage to Fourteen before they did. The only question was how.
A red dot appeared on Raptor as Experiment 14 headed slowly back to the pool. No longer could Tailyn hear the thunderous footfalls and monstrous roars that had so scared him. That time, it was the retreat of a mortally wounded beast wobbling back and forth as it tried desperately to make it back to its lair.
A new dot appeared, and Tailyn finally saw the guard commander’s name: Darod Bifo, a level thirty-seven warrior. He was following the monster, himself wobbling just as much as it was. After reaching it, his dot disappeared, and the resulting explosion was so powerful the rocks filling the tunnel ahead of the children came falling out and just about crushed them. The ceiling continued cracking, Tailyn grabbed Valia by the arm, and the two dove into the suddenly open passageway.
You reached a storeroom of ancient books.
Level +1 (4).
Hacking +1 (5).
Tailyn assigned the free point he got almost without a glance. The room the children found themselves in was barely two meters wide and packed with shimmering books. Having preserved its treasure, the System was ready to find out which of the tomes needed to be transferred to the empire’s most important library, and which needed to be destroyed.
Behind the kids, there was a crash as the tunnel collapsed. The weight of the monster above them as well as Darod Bifo’s explosion had done their worst.
Tailyn checked Raptor to see that Fourteen hadn’t gone anywhere, and there weren’t any other red dots to be seen. Were the guards all dead? Yet again, the System’s tempting offer popped up, and the boy decided to pull the trigger. The wounded monster might not pay any attention to yet another foe, he reasoned.
Would you like to connect to Experiment 14?
The messages were different from the last time — something was new.
Status change. Current status: combat.
Your Hacking level: 20.
Probability of successful hack: 3%.
Time between attempts: 5 seconds.
Attempt 1… Unsuccessful.
“Tailyn, why?!” Valia yelled when she noticed the status change. Just then, the monster’s metallic roar cut right through the thick layer of earth. It had discovered new enemies, and it didn’t like what they were doing at all. T
he ground shook as Fourteen began trying to break through the earth and rock to get to the children.
Tailyn went cold inside as he realized how idiotic he’d been. But there was no going back. Focusing on Raptor and ignoring Valia berating him, he pulled ten of his prized supply of thirteen crystals out of his inventory. He’d dreamed of one day having enough to resurrect Ka-Do-Gir, but he wouldn’t be there to do it if he died himself.
Hacking +10 (15).
Probability of successful hack: 8%.
The walls vibrated with renewed vigor as Raptor showed one of the monster’s tentacles already halfway down. Swallowing hard, the boy resumed his attempts to hack the creature once his parameters had been updated. Rock shards rained down. The room turned out to be made out of the ancients’ reinforced stone, which was why it had held up so well, but even the ancient technology wasn’t going to be enough to keep the enraged monster out.
Attempt 16… Unsuccessful.
A wide crack spread across the ceiling. Soil dropped through, Valia screamed and covered her head with her hands, and something flashed across the opening, but there was no breaking Tailyn’s concentration. The boy had turned into a statue as he tried to hack the beast over and over again.
Attempt 17… Successful.
You connected to Experiment 14.
The space in front of Tailyn filled with new information, and he let out a yell, not sure what to press.
“Block Fourteen! Destroy it! Liquidate it!”
Sit and stay low destroyed Experiment 14, an ancient monster created by crazed engineers that was able to break out of its cage. You earned a substantial reward by freeing up significant System resources.
Level +3 (7).
***
You destroyed a non-level creature.
All your attributes and skills were increased by 5.
Level +1 (8).
***
You used free attribute points.
Monster Knowledge +2 (13).
Integration +2 (13).
***
Named item level +1 (6).
Your named items reached a threshold (next threshold: level 15), gained additional properties, and increased their attribute requirements from 5 to 20.
Note! You do not meet the requirements and cannot use your named items.
An oppressive silence fell. Valia pulled her hands away from her face and looked around. The ceiling had cracked, and an ugly piece of tentacle lined with claws had poked through. And while the books had fallen off the shelves, the System had taken care of its treasure, each of them sporting its own protective dome. Tailyn, meanwhile, was lying on the floor making no effort to stand.
Tailyn, are you okay? Why aren’t you saying anything? We won, didn’t we? the girl asked.
Help me out of my armor — I can’t move. Vargot isn’t listening to me, and it looks like I’m going to have some clothing problems.
Group renamed. New name: You were told to sit tight! What did you do this time?
Chapter 11
“ARE YOU SURE it’ll be okay?” Valia asked worriedly as she looked down Tailyn’s mangled Vargot. The girl had been forced to be careful as she cut Tailyn out of his armor, turning one end of Matilda into a sharp blade the inactive suit could do nothing about. She’d just had to make sure she didn’t cut Tailyn.
“Of course,” Tailyn replied with a heavy sigh. He’d known his named items would level-up sooner or later, though he’d assumed it would be after he himself got to level twenty. But he’d gotten unlucky. Tossing his suddenly useless items in his inventory, the boy shivered. It was cold and dark underground.
“Do you have anything to wear?” he asked hopefully.
Nothing, Valia replied mentally, her hermetic seal still switched on.
Tailyn pulled up his store only to close it irritably without buying anything. He couldn’t. Right then, nothing was threatening them, and he couldn’t stomach spending a pile of coins on something he would eventually just sell for a third of the purchase amount. His supply of coins was running low as it was.
“Give me a lift? I can’t reach, and Raptor doesn’t work anymore.” Tailyn pointed at the remains of the monster dangling from the ceiling.
“Of course, but... Why don’t we leave the group first?”
“Why?” Tailyn asked, taken aback.
“Because... Well, we have no idea what the loot will be. I have nothing but respect for our mentor and trainer, and I appreciate everything they’ve done for us, but I was taught to keep secrets from everyone who isn’t close to you. And that’s just you. The adults already got three levels and plus-five to all their attributes. But I’m not leaving the group by myself — only if we do it together.”
The girl’s suggestion made sense. Tailyn definitely didn’t want what they were about to get to show up in their logs, and while part of him would have been only too happy to fall in line behind Valia, that part was controlled closely by something the simple people called his conscience. Perhaps, if Tailyn had been an aristocrat, he would have gone along with the girl. Perhaps, their mentor or trainer would have left the group without thinking twice in their shoes. But that wasn’t him. Just the thought of it revolted him, and Tailyn didn’t even like the fact that his girl had suggested the idea.
“No, Valia, we’re not going to. Neither Forian nor Valanil have hurt us in any way. Actually, they’re the reason I became who I am, a student at the academy. If we’re going to talk about the people who are close to us, that includes them, I think.”
“Okay, fair enough, though that’s only so long as they don’t prove the contrary,” the girl replied insistently. “Tailyn, I grew up with relatives who would have slit each other’s throats to get ahead. And I very much hope you’re right about Forian and Valanil. Okay, turn around, and I’ll give you a lift.”
The worm of doubt gnawed uncomfortably at the boy, settling somewhere in his chest. While he wasn’t worried, his body felt like something was wrong and sent a message to his brain to get rid of the intruder. Shaking his head to clear it, the boy raised a hand and flew up toward the ceiling so fast he smacked his head against it. The miniature girl had lifted Tailyn so easily he might as well have been a dust bunny.
Oh, sorry, I don’t know my own strength, Tailyn heard her say in his head, though he didn’t have time to reply before reaching through the crack and touching the dead monster.
Your Marauder level: 45. Darod Bifo’s active protection level: 30. Verification complete.
Location maps updated (6).
Loot received:
230 coins.
28112 gold.
Complete set of imperial armor-III.
Booster-III amulet.
Strength-III ring.
Agility-III ring.
***
Device Control skill not detected. You cannot take Experiment 14 apart.
Loot received:
Core (2).
Named star (no owner).
“I need a new skill!” Tailyn said as soon as he was back on his own two feet. The guard’s armor immediately began to transform, turning into outdoor garb for mages. Really, that was an awfully convenient property the god’s items had — the ability to always match their owner. Unfortunately, the same wasn’t true of the rings. Strength and agility were universal attributes, so the jewelry didn’t modify. After the coins and gold distributed themselves automatically, Tailyn held the named star out to Valia.
“Here, this is for you. The next time you see a terminal, buy Vargot. It’s worth it, believe me.”
The girl wasn’t about to turn down his gift, quickly dropping it into her inventory. While she never would have admitted it to Tailyn, in the depths of her soul she was jealous he had three named items and the chance to get a fourth while she only had one. It was almost as though he was the one from the influential family.
Setting aside the rings and armor, Tailyn checked the loot he’d gotten from the monster. It looked something like pencil lead on the outsid
e, just as dark, slender, and fragile. A blue mist surrounded it. And the fact that the mist resembled what had enveloped the mages hanging over the pool of red acid was enough to trigger the boy’s perception.
Core. Description: basic element of sustenance for living machines. Energy charge: unlimited by time. Contains Dragon’s Blood (3%). For storage, use an isolation device, otherwise noa will begin to appear around the core. Core absorption period with no isolation device: 60 minutes.
Mission update: Ancient History. Description: you learned that the essence of the planet, something called noa, doesn’t just appear as crystals. It can also be a blue mist that appears around mages or items containing Dragon’s Blood. Find out what noa is and what it means for the planet.
Tears of Alron (The Alchemist Book #3): LitRPG Series Page 15
