Descend- Bursting Out: A litrpg adventure

by David Burke

  Well that changed now. The first step was powering up. So with blinding speed, Jay slammed his hand into the deck. As the punch descended on his target he braced his arm with a PSI construct glove. The boom that followed was prodigious. Jay knew he would soon have an audience but he didn’t care.

  Instead he boosted his strength, durability, speed, and regeneration to their max. Then he rained down a torrent of blows upon the decking. The metal was strong and it absorbed blow after blow. Nothing else he did mattered until he could overcome the power of his true enemies. This floor might only be the least of their defenses but if he couldn’t get through it he would never stand a chance against the enemy.

  Thanks to the training that he had received from Hanna he at least knew how to throw a punch without shattering his hand the first time. He steadily increased the speed and force he put behind each blow. A smile crept over his face as he saw the metal starting to bend. He had already felt multiple bones crack in his hands and arms but his regeneration and the healing energy he was now able to send into his body was sufficient for the task.

  The damage he saw in the decking stirred him on to try harder. He knew that he could use his PSI blade and cut through much faster but he was becoming too reliant on that. He needed to train the rest of his skills and that started with conditioning his body as much as possible. He had big plans for this but first he needed to prove that he could make his way through the decking.

  There it was, a split in the metal. He slipped a PSI construct down into the gap and braced himself with other constructs. Then he began pulling. His straining causing the muscles of his shoulders and arms to bulge so much that they ripped his sleeves. He paused briefly to fling his shirt off and then heard a cheer rise up around the top of the hole.

  He looked up and at least thirty girls were standing around and watching him work. Once upon a time he would have quailed at such attention but now he felt comfortable with himself. He liked looking at them so who was he to say that they couldn’t like looking at him.

  Immediately he went back to pulling, feeling motivated by the onlookers. He would give them something to cheer for. He applied his Kinetic Manipulation and put both mind and muscle to work, till the split increased. Strip by strip he tore up the deck. It seemed to be one whole piece instead of a series of plates put together. But that didn’t stop him.

  He just broke it apart till the skin was gone and he saw crystals and conduits that he had begun to associate with A’snkarnt technology. It was all woven through and around the frame of the decking and beneath was another later to the decking, presumably the ceiling of the deck beneath. This was good enough for now.

  Jay ordered the girls to clear a space and threw up the flooring onto one side of the ring. He telepathically reached out to Huong who he found to be at the tech building. “I’ve got some stuff you may want to salvage. But you’ve only got an hour to get to it and I need Sofia, please.” Then he sent the directions to where he was at.

  Seconds later, Huong was there and excited to get an opportunity to salvage more of the A’snkarnt materials. Jay knew she had to be excited because she didn’t even make a comment about his chest or arms. Not that her silence kept many of the other girls from commenting. But Jay had a mission now so he needed to focus. If he accomplished this then he would have earned his rewards later.

  “Are Felicia and Cadence here?” Jay called out.

  Sure enough two of the girls from the side stepped forward. Felicia was a dark-skinned beauty with a bubble butt that he loved. Cadence had that mousy librarian look down perfectly. Her hair was always a mess like she forgot to do it, but it still somehow managed to look like she was just too beautiful to have to bother with little things like that.

  “I want to pour a new floor here in about an hour. If I can bring through magma from the fifth floor do you think that your powers can be combined to make a solid floor out of that?”

  The two looked at each other and started jabbering about mineral composition and chemical reactions. Jay didn’t really need to know how they did it just if they could. The funny thing about these two was that they were once again an example of intent at work.

  Felicia had been a geology student and now possessed the power to manipulate and transmute earthen materials. While Cadence had been a post-grad student working on some type of doctorate in chemistry. Needless to say both were very smart; even if they still fawned over Jay, he never forgot for a moment that their brains were needed every bit as much as his brawn.

  Finally Cadence said, “Yeah, we should be able to. It is impossible to promise results without knowing the exact composition of the magma you bring over but, it should work. The biggest problem is going to be keeping it from hardening too quickly while we are still working on it.”

  “I can keep it liquid and heat it if that becomes an issue, but hopefully I can recruit some others to do it for me,” Jay replied.

  Then he called out, “Are Ellie and Clara here?”

  Again, this time from two different sides, the two girls stepped forward. Ellie called out, “I assume that you want me to try to create a telekinetic vessel to hold the magma.”

  When Jay nodded, Clara said, “So that probably means that you want me to keep it spinning so it doesn’t solidify until you are ready for it?”

  “Exactly right, girls. Can you do it?”

  Both nodded and Jay added, “If it starts to cool off too much Meikiyo should be able to heat it back up nicely, or if she is busy I might be able to also.”

  After that he sent word to Trina asking her to guard everyone while he and Ava went to the fifth floor. It would be a royal pain if he had to keep carrying the magma over one load at a time in a PSI construct, but if he could create a portal between the two floors then that would make this much simpler. More importantly though if they could practice stable transport between floors it might eventually lead to being able to move more freely about the ship.

  As an afterthought he asked for Faith to come with them. She was another mousy girl. Her parents apparently had been very religious but it didn’t stick with her. She just always wanted to be anywhere that people weren’t focused on her. When Jay talked to her about her history, she had been made to sing at churches all over the country. It didn’t sound very fun.

  Jay certainly didn’t have anything against religion or what people might believe. He just didn’t like the idea of it being turned into a show or some kind of giant production. He didn’t want to think that it would be forced on anyone either. Belief was something that you had to come to on your own.

  When Ava and Faith arrived, he looked at them and explained his plan. Faith said she would try but had never teleported more than just herself.

  “That is okay, you can just take me first and if that works, then we will come back and you can take Ava with us too, okay?” Jay asked her.

  Faith replied, “Whatever you want. I feel bad that I haven’t been able to contribute more.”

  “You shouldn’t, we all have our parts to play. I certainly am not a genius like Ava here, but each of us can still contribute. Truth be told you may play an important role in the future. I get you wanting to be quiet and all, but your power is actually very impressive.”

  Ava protested, “Master, I mean no disrespect, but she should test her power with me. You are too valuable.”

  “I see that Trina is rubbing off on you. Well, sorry but I am going with her. And for talking back, pet, you will have to be punished tonight. Please remind me this evening about what you need to be punished for.” Then Jay took Faith’s hand and said, “Take us to the fifth floor.”

  “Okay, but I’ve only been there once when we were coming through to here,” Faith replied.

  “That is fine. Surely you can remember the caldera where the doorway is?”

  “I can do that.” Then she closed her eyes and they were no longer there.

  Jay had read about teleporting in many books from pseudoscience to fantasy novels.
Almost always they talked about some sense of movement or disorientation. There was none of that. Sure it was a bit disconcerting to suddenly see new things, but Jay handled that pretty easily.

  “That was amazing. How do you do it? Is there a limit to how far you can travel?” he asked.

  “In my mind somehow space is just a concept and everywhere is the same. I just have to be able to visualize the place that I want to be and then I’m there. As far as a limit, not that I have found yet, but the further the distance the greater the amount of PSI. For example that took about two hundred PSI. I expect half of that was because of you and half for me,” Faith replied.

  “Great, that is good to know. And how much PSI do you have?” As Jay asked, he was mentally adding her to the list of girls that needed to be considered for a fusion. That power would be incredibly useful. Of course he still wouldn’t force her to it if she wasn’t willing to make a lifetime commitment. He might be able to get over the idea of only fusing with women he was in love with, but he wasn’t gonna fuse with some woman that was gonna end up with other guys.

  “I have over nine hundred thanks to your refining,” she answered proudly.

  Jay had forgotten what a difference there was between the fused wives and the non-fused girls. Well, and Faith was one who still had not passed the fifth threshold yet. He couldn’t fault her though, it was her personality. “Okay, can you take us back then we will let you rest and recharge for a bit?”

  She didn’t say a word but suddenly they were back on the sixth floor. Jay began filling in all of his wives telepathically about how useful this ability could be. He even included Trina to make her feel part of the team. He knew he needed to give trust in order to get it.

  Half an hour later, they had managed to get a stable connection between the two floors and Ava’s portal transported several tons of magma into a telekinetic sphere that Ellie made. She ended up needing Daphne to boost her power but the redhead was happy to do so.

  It took longer than he would have liked for Felicia and Cadence to be satisfied with the end result. They said that the magma had a great many impurities in it but ultimately as they poured the new floor they assured him that it would harden up to be much stronger than concrete back on Earth. Cadence even commented that if the Earth still existed they would have been able to make a fortune off of the patent for this material.

  While they worked, Jay and Sofia worked on cutting apart the decking. Her power to separate matter at a molecular level proved to be even more powerful than he remembered. In the past denser materials were harder for her, but now she made it through the armor as easy as a hot knife through butter. It actually made him feel a little silly for how hard it had been for him to rip up the floor.

  Once the floor was poured, Jay asked Zuri to pull the heat out and it cooled in record time. He was really beginning to see how much they could accomplish by pooling their numerous powers. Although he also worried a bit about how eager he was getting at the idea of acquiring some of the powers that various girls possessed.

  Out loud he said, “As long as I’m Peter and not Sylar, I guess it’s okay.”

  Behind him Amelia asked, “What?”

  “Oh, nothing, just a nerd thing,” Jay replied.

  “That isn’t true, I can feel your worry. Remember the fusion goes both ways. Since this morning you have been working non-stop. I have felt how excited you are. This is important to you, so it is important to me. Please tell me.” As she spoke, she walked up next to him and pressed her head against his chest.

  He paused trying to find the right words. “I’m excited because I feel like I have more clarity now.”

  “I got that much. You think it is time that we take the battle to them. I’m on board, especially if you are going to power up first. But your positive emotions are easier to read than your negative ones. So…” Amelia said softly.

  “As I interacted with some of the different girls, especially Faith and Sofia, I thought about how incredibly useful it would be if I could fuse with them and gain those powers. I relied earlier on yours, Meikiyo’s, and Huong’s powers. I have realized that I have been short-changing myself by falling back onto PSI constructs too much,” Jay said.

  “That doesn’t sound so bad. There has to be more to it than that,” Amelia prodded.

  “Yeah there is. I mean, is it bad of me to consider fusing solely to gain a power?” he asked.

  “I could candy coat it for you, but you know that isn’t me. It just means that Saint Jay of the Pure Motives is human too. And yes, you better fuse with as many other girls as it takes for you to be strong enough to free us. I’m not the only one who has noticed that each of the fusions produces a slightly larger increase in your power. I mean despite the fact that we keep improving, the gap between you and us is only growing larger. But, if I can share you in bed, then you can suck it up and fuse with whoever you have to in order to get this job done,” Amelia said.

  Jay laughed. “I can always count on you. Thanks.” Then he looked down into her eyes. “It is gonna take another hour before the floor is fully dried and they have the floor pieces mounted on the walls of the pit.”

  “And are you suggesting something, husband?” she asked while adopting a seductive voice.

  “Well never a bad time for a little afternoon delight.”

  “Oh you’re so bad, husband. Carry me away and ravish me,” Amelia said, grinning.

  “As you wish,” Jay said while picking her up and then super speeding to one of the empty houses. What followed most definitely didn’t happen at super speed even if it was passionate and energetic.

  Chapter 25- Pushing Harder

  It was only an hour before sunset by the time that the pit was ready. The inside walls were lined with the decking from the floor to a height of eight feet. The floor was the specially made hardened magma which was nearly as strong as steel. There were places set in the wall every few feet where the largest PSI crystals that Mia could make were placed.

  Each one of the crystals had been charged by Madison working with Daphne with her mass-increasing power. They were set up to create a field that effectively increased the effect of gravity on anything within the pit. The gravity on the sixth floor was about six times what it would have been on Earth, but even the weakest of them were strong enough now not to be bothered by that.

  The crystals however could create a field that would increase the mass of any object or person within the pit by forty times each. That was the most that Madison could muster in such a large area. Then at the top of the pit he had asked Madison, Daphne, Mia, and Meikiyo to meet him. Because of the others there, Jay chose to have the conversation telepathically with them. He didn’t want everyone knowing what he was going to do.

  “Okay, so you probably have some idea of what I’m going to attempt, but the gist of it is that I am going to try to exercise with as much extra weight as you can put on me. My skill gains in strength and even speed have largely stagnated and I would like to change that,” Jay said.

  “I get why you want me and even Daphne here but what about the others?” Madison asked.

  “Simple, Mia will borrow your skill for mass manipulation and Meikiyo will borrow Daphne’s power. As I understand it you can increase mass by about forty times in an area the size of this pit, but with Daphne your power will be ten times greater or more like four hundred times. If both of you work together, you should be able to increase the mass by eight hundred times. If you think it will help we can ask Harper to help your powers work in concert,” Jay explained.

  “No it is pretty simple, that shouldn’t be necessary. The powers will work as simple addition but what makes you think that I will help you commit suicide. Jay, I know you are strong but that is ridiculous. You will be turned into a pancake at eight hundred times greater mass and there are still the crystals down there that will increase it by another one hundred and sixty times,” Madison said.

  “My strength when multiplied to its max will be
about well over seventeen hundred times what it would have been back on Earth for a body this size. I won’t have any problem handling it,” Jay responded.

  “Maybe, but the mass will be multiplied by the extra gravity on this floor which we calculated to be six times Earth’s so the strain on your body will be nearly six thousand times what Earth’s gravity would be,” Mia said rather sharply.

  “Again that is why we will only do this for thirty minutes, but I need to push myself. We have plenty of healers now and even Huong will be just a few seconds’ run from here,” Jay said, making his case.

  Meikiyo sighed, “You know we can’t say no to him no matter if he is trying to prove Amelia right, so we might as well agree.”

  Daphne asked, “Prove Amelia right?”

  Simultaneously Mia and Meikiyo said, “That he is a bonehead.”

  “Thanks, and remember thirty minutes, no more no less. I will be erecting a barrier so that everyone isn’t staring at me, but don’t worry it will still allow your powers to affect the area.” Then with that Jay jumped down. He hoped that Meikiyo and Mia hadn’t detected his slight bit of deceit there. Blocking the emotions that he revealed through the fusion could be challenging.