Aces High (Reality Benders Book #6) LitRPG Series

by Michael Atamanov

  During our talk I also heard something from Major Kudryavtsev that had me greatly intrigued:

  “The Geckho have confirmed that there are more and more human factions on Earth all the time, and those factions are growing larger and more powerful. As it stands, there are already around thirty human players with Leng status. And soon we will also have our very own Kung — the most powerful of the high-profile players, someone who can unite the various factions of Earth under their leadership. There have been certain hints to suggest that this Kung will emerge in the new coalition — they have a special program for rapidly levelling Fame and Authority for faction leaders. And when that Kung appears, the Human-3 Faction is planning to work with them.”

  Oh, how my tongue was itching just then to tell everyone that the “great and terrible Kung” they were all waiting for was none other than the Gnat on their screen! I wanted to take off my Null Ring and gaze upon the faces of the curators, who had just a few minutes prior refused deeper integration with my Relict Faction, calling my plans “utopian” and “untenable,” and saying they’d chosen a different path for the Human-3 and Human-23 Factions. But I held back. I figured that was not the time to demonstrate my new status. I had to first take a deep dive into the politics of the game on earth and better grasp the situation on the virtual planet.

  The remote talks went on a bit longer, but what we discussed after that was smaller scale and less interesting. The particulars of redeploying the three hundred Second Legion fighters into the parallel world. The rallying point for the unified army of Earth. The construction of a training camp in the immediate vicinity of the Geckho spaceport. Whether they could use the shuttles my business partner and I were renting to deliver some shipments the H3 Faction had ordered to Earth. Accelerated Geckho language courses for humans. The intricate settings of the game menu for faction leaders. Other topics were only of interest to those directly involved.

  Finally, I considered our discussion over and ended the call, asking the former leader of the Human-25 Faction Valentina Koval to come to the Geckho spaceport — I had a large number of projects connected with her distant node on the big continent.

  “MY HUSBAND, YOU GAVE in to those people strikingly fast,” Princess Minn-O told me when we got back to the frigate and were alone in the captain’s berth. “And I know you too well to think they scared you into relenting. Or that you’d give up on your personal ambitions in favor of some semi-mythical Kung of Earth without having a plan b.”

  I walked up to the Princess, sitting on the bed and stroked her silvery hair tenderly, then gingerly placed a hand on her belly. Minn-O’s pregnancy was still not showing, but my high Perception already allowed me to sense the beating of the little heart in her womb.

  “Yeah, you’re right. It’s just that I already know who this Kung of Earth will be, and so I see no reason to argue or lock horns.”

  “And who will it be?” Minn-O raised her eyes to me in surprise, then figured it out. “You are that Kung, the one they’re waiting for! So that’s why you’ve hidden game info.”

  I shot her a cheery wink and temporarily removed my Null Ring to confirm my wife’s guess. Minn-O started smiling in satisfaction and squeezed herself up against me. It was an exceptionally appropriate time to discuss our further plans. Selecting my words with the utmost care, I expressed the idea that Minn-O would have to leave the starship crew and stay on the planet for the sake of our child’s health. I was expecting rebuttals and serious resistance, but she gave me neither.

  “Yes, that would be the right thing to do. I was looking for a good excuse to talk to you about that myself. Because recently I very nearly suffered serious complications or even lost the fetus. The only thing that saved me was the timely intervention of the ship Medic. I really do need to take better care of myself. Just to avoid gossip, I have to ask you to again make me your senior wife, because a wayedda must always be at her husband’s side during his journeys.”

  I promised to do that in the next couple of days, and make sure it was big news for the whole magocratic world. Now that I had confirmed that I could make direct contact with the real world from the game, as ruler of the First Directory, I no longer had to communicate with my subjects only through middlemen. The time had come to give a big speech. I wanted to tell them all how I saw the situation in the magocratic world and give my opinion on the precepts of old and the antimage uprising. I expected that speech to go off like a bomb, so I tried to think through every aspect, foresee all possible consequences and prepare with the utmost care.

  Minn-O closed her eyes and, smiling constantly at the thoughts in her head, drifted off to sleep. I looked at the time. Our new Chef-Assassin’s big celebratory meal was just half an hour away. Just the time to spend up Gnat’s unused statistic points and get an overall idea of his skills and what needed to be bolstered:

  Kung Gnat. Human. Relict Faction.

  Level-105 Listener

  Statistics:

  Strength

  14

  Agility

  18

  Intelligence

  33 + 7

  Perception

  29 + 2

  Constitution

  17

  Luck modifier

  +3

  Attention!!! You have eight unused stat points.

  Controlled drones

  3 of 3

  Parameters:

  Hitpoints

  2346 of 2346

  Endurance points

  1525 of 1713

  Magic points

  1180 of 2352

  Carrying capacity

  62 lbs.

  Fame

  106

  Authority

  102

  Skills:

  Electronics

  100 ATTENTION!!! You may choose your first specialization in this skill

  Scanning

  72

  Cartography

  89

  Astrolinguistics

  108 * First specialization taken

  Rifles

  66

  Mineralogy

  60

  Medium Armor

  100 * First specialization taken

  Eagle Eye

  99

  Sharpshooter

  53

  Targeting

  55

  Danger Sense

  98

  Psionic

  123 * First specialization taken

  Mental Fortitude

  120 * First specialization taken

  Machine Control

  114 * First specialization taken

  Mysticism

  68

  Telekinesis

  13

  Training

  27

  Disorientation

  9

  Attention!!! You have three unspent skill points.

  FIRST OF ALL, I SPENT up my skill points. This time I set my previous strategy aside and brought up Eagle Eye and Danger Sense to a hundred so I could handle all three skills’ perks at once. For Electronics I chose the specialization Error Vision, which allowed me to exclude obviously incorrect connectivity and action options when working with electronic systems. A useful specialization, which would be a significant help to my character when working with unfamiliar and complex computer systems. As for Eagle Eye, I also didn’t try to be too clever and chose the obviously useful perk “Increase Visual Distance by 20%.” But Danger Sense left me lagging like an old computer. It felt like I needed every option:

  Increase danger warning time from 2 to 3 seconds.

  Increase warning trigger probability.

  Act intuitively to avoid immediate threats to life.

  Ignore external factors and internal states that might prevent skill from triggering (sleep, illness, alcoholic or narcotic intoxication, hypnosis, etc.).

  Detect source of threat instantly.

  Weaken or even fully deactivate an opponent’s Danger Sense skill.

  After nearly ten minutes’ conte
mplation, I made my choice and landed on the last option. After all, I’d been impeded by an opponent’s Danger Sense skill before! The now long-ago firefight with Minn-O La-Fin on the Geckho ferry had proven that an adversary with high Danger Sense could leave me totally impotent and them nearly invulnerable.

  So then, done with the skill points. Time to get to the tastier morsel — the eight stat points just waiting to be spent! Strange as it may have been, there I didn’t hesitate one bit because I already had an approximate idea of what needed strengthening. Three points right into Perception! A lot of my character’s skills depended on that statistic: Cartography, Eagle Eye, Sharpshooter, Rifle, Scanning, and partially Electronics as well. That whole group of skills had been lagging noticeably behind in recent times when I had been orienting myself more around Intelligence. That needed to be fixed. So then, Perception went up from twenty-nine to... That’s right, thirty-three. I got one “bonus” point for every two invested into a statistic over 20.

  You might be asking why then did I not invest one more point into Perception to get another bonus? And that would be right of course, but I was hoping to add another point to Perception in the future as it was — any statistic could be improved by three points through extensive use, and I had only brought up my Perception by two so far. And so it would be best to wait and get that precious bonus point when the statistic went up on its own. The free point, meanwhile, could find a better application.

  So then, Gnat’s Perception was up to thirty-three and, with the IR-Visor on, my effective Perception was way up at thirty-five! I immediately started to perceive the surrounding world differently — my vision became more contrasting and distinct. I could smell the appetizing aromas from the galley clearly, hear Minn-O’s even breathing in her sleep and even make out an altercation between Kisly and Eduard through three partitions. As you might have guessed, my two crew members were arguing over the NPC Dryad Nefertiti and, though they had raised their voices, they were still at an acceptable volume.

  As for the remaining five characteristic points, I invested four right into Intelligence, bringing that highly important figure up from thirty-three to thirty-nine (yes, I got a whole two bonus points). With my rings on, my effective Intelligence was now at a sky-high forty-six!!! Oh-ho, I do not envy the enemies who dare to challenge me in Psionics now! I had nearly a one-hundred-percent chance of disorienting someone due to my Intelligence advantage — I was almost certainly ten points above any given player. Even my wife’s sinister old grandpa, Coruler of Humanity Leng Thumor-Anhu La-Fin would have been no match for me after this. From now on, only the most outstanding players in the game like the Relict Hierarchs, or Miyelonian Fleet Commander Kung Keetsie-Myau, or the Great Priestess Leng Amiru U-Mayaoo could go toe to toe with me in a mental duel.

  Along with my Intelligence, my mana went up by almost five hundred points at once! Trust me, that’s a lot. More than a lot even. That was an additional several attempts to take control of complex machines (by the way, the success chance for those operations would be sharply increasing as well!). Or an extra minute of grueling psionic battle against several adversaries at once. Oh, Valeri-Urla, you were very lucky to have challenged me two days ago instead of today. Today I’d be able to crumple your psionic defenses without even breaking a sweat.

  As for the last statistic point, I put it into Constitution, bringing it up to eighteen. That gave me a bit more Endurance, Hitpoints and just made the high G forces of spaceflight easier to bear.

  Chapter Twenty-Three. Instructor of the Army of Earth

  THE CELEBRATORY MEAL was an unqualified success. It must be said that, before we feasted, I was of course wondering where products native to Earth might be found on a Trillian resort moon, so I was mentally prepared for “approximations.” And so I didn’t ask the Chef why my bowl of “borsht” (as Amati-Kuis called the dish she served me) contained a piercingly blue stew the consistency of thick oatmeal and had some little three-eyed thing swimming around in it and assiduously pushing its way through bunches of bright orange seaweed. All the other crew members ate and in fact heaped praise on the food, so I didn’t inform the team that the food before them on the table was actually exotic space grub, instead insisting we were eating “traditional Earth cuisine.” What mattered most was that it was edible and even tasty.

  Another peculiarity of the dishes the professional Chef prepared were their positive game bonuses — some gave accelerated regeneration, others temporary boosts to maximum Hitpoints or Endurance Points, while others still gave various minor but highly pleasing positive effects. I’d have to take note of that and make use it. For example, additional hitpoints and accelerated regeneration would come in handy before important battles.

  The festive atmosphere was added to by Vasily Filippov when he came back into the game. Our Bard played the guitar and sang songs in Geckho about space, love and military campaigns. At a certain point he was joined by Grim Reaper as well — the German Sniper possessed a fantastic baritone and, I suspect, could have become a professional singer if he had chosen that for his earthly profession.

  Taking advantage of the fact that my whole crew was on the frigate, I ordered the mobile Relict laboratory to make a random jump without the starship but stay inside the Solar System and hide, then not respond to anyone else and wait only for my command. The only one who noticed the disappearance of the laboratory in any way or understood my order was Gerd Urgeh Pu-Pu Urgeh the Technician:

  “What, captain, don’t trust me?” the Relict inquired mentally. “Blocked remote control functions, moved the station to an unknown location...”

  “You’re not the one I’m worried about. It’s just that too many in the galaxy thirst for that laboratory and would commit any crime in the book to get their hands on it. We’ll both feel more secure this way, believe me.”

  A little while later, seizing a convenient opportunity, I took the Relict aside from the celebratory and noisy crowd.

  “You looked very pensive when you came back. Would you mind telling me what you saw in the real world?”

  The Technician looked at me with both of his huge soccer-ball sized eyes, spent a bit of time in silence then made up his mind:

  “I was at the refuge. I reviewed its data on the dozens of tongs I missed while in stasis. I saw the war. It was the most terrible war one could ever imagine. I saw the worlds inhabited by intelligent races die out one after the next. I saw whole planets annihilated. I saw trillions of members of my race perish. I saw the Pyramid irretrievably lose strata of invaluable data that took centuries to accumulate. I saw the world as I knew it crumble.”

  Psionic skill increased to level one hundred twenty-four!

  The sense of limitless sorrow and despair emanating from the Technician just then was so great that my eyes faded just because I accidentally caught a hint of his emotions. I also saw ghastly scenes of underwater megalopolises going up in annihilating flames and felt outbursts of fear from their billions of intelligent creatures being transformed into nothingness. All that brought unbearable pain. I quickly stopped reading his thoughts and wiped the cold sweat from my brow. Once I’d somewhat caught my breath, I asked:

  “Urgeh Pu, were there any survivors other than you?”

  “Hundreds of thousands of virt pods stand empty. Endless rows of empty, open pods. I spent a few ummi strolling past the high towers of empty pods and just couldn’t look away from the ghastly spectacle of a demolished civilization. My civilization. But then I found a stem that contained operating virt pods. I counted four hundred twenty-three. I don’t know where their occupants are now, but they are alive and could potentially awaken at some point.”

  Well, well! Very intriguing! I promised the Technician to expend as much effort as it took to get to the bottom of that and awaken his dormant compatriots. And I immediately asked Urgeh Pu how that ancient war had concluded.

  “Captain, I do not know. The logs stop after the Syam Tro VII Refuge changed location to a random p
oint in the Universe four hundred times in a row to evade detection by the flotillas of the Precursor punitive expeditions. And finally, when the artificial planetoid got them off its trail, power was cut to all instruments and communication with the outside world was stifled.”

  Artificial planetoid? So, did that make the Refuge a large artificial satellite or a small planet? And by the way... I opened the proposal from the unknown monitoring program to join my faction, which I still had yet to answer. Yes, precisely! The message had come from none other than the Syam Tro VII Refuge. I asked the Technician to comment. The Relict wasn’t the least bit surprised.

  “I activated the refuge’s monitoring program. I powered up several systems. Many of the refuge’s rooms are flooded, so I turned on the pumps. I activated the hydroponic farms, though I am not certain the seeds will still be viable after all these tongs. But I did see lots of invar in the water. At the very least I could hunt them for nourishment. And well, of course, I shared lots of information with the refuge’s artificial intelligence, telling it of my reawakening in the modern world. That is my duty now — to replenish the Pyramid with data. And by the looks of things, the monitoring program concluded that you are a promising potential ally and it should work with you.”