by Tao Wong
“Hopscotch,” I send to Ali.
Too many Sect members are boiling out of downtown now, some flying across the water, others screaming across the bridge and up Main St. No way for me to cross, and I’ve got less than half of my health points left. Still more than most of the Basic Sect members, but each time I stop to kill, they target me and chip away at my regeneration. And scarily enough, I’ve only seen one of their big guns.
“On it. Stay alive!” Ali sends to me.
I nod, taking a second to duck behind a house that nearly instantly gets obliterated by a pair of spells and what looks like a mortar shell. The explosion kicks wind and debris around me, hammering my Soul Shield as it drains down again.
Twisting in the air, I call forth Sabre and start the transformation process. I haven’t done it before because I didn’t have enough space and cover, the transformation process being the most vulnerable time. Even as I think that, another spell hits me, wind blades combined with a freezing spell cutting into the mecha and my shield.
We land, Sabre already blinking yellow as readouts tell of damaged circuits caught during the change. Immediately, I layer the mecha’s shield on top of the Soul Shield and take off running, picking up speed.
A laser beam fires, this one coming from the Wall Center, and cuts through both shields before losing its effectiveness against Sabre’s armor. A single shot did over a thousand points of damage! At a guess, that’d be the Sect Enforcer in play. I shudder and start dodging, glad that whatever Skill and weapon he’s using, it must take some time to charge.
“Ali…”
“Almost there, boy-o,” Ali sends.
Walls erupt ahead of me. I grin behind my helmet, jumping upward and hitting the jets to get me higher. That’s when tentacles come bursting out of the wall, reaching for my body. Even as one grabs my torso and another my head, I reach through Ali’s senses and trigger Blink Step. Surprisingly, I see my Mana drop even further than normal.
A microsecond to recover my footing, another to grab and smash my fist into the Sect member. This time, it’s a gilled purple creature, its eyes widening comically as my blow catches it. Surprisingly, the Sect member folds over, bones crunching under my attack. I don’t stop, can’t stop, as I spin around it and plunge my sword through its back. A quick twist, a strangled scream, and I’m off. Experience flows again and another notification flickers in the corner of my vision.
“That was too easy!” I send to Ali.
“Non-combatant Sect member,” Ali sends to me as he flies away.
A part of me winces—a small part, since I’m too busy running away. We’re behind the main converging line now, the group turning to follow us. Ahead of us, even more Sect members are hurrying forward. I pick a group to fight, watching my health creep up as my regeneration kicks in and pulls ribs back into place. Just over nine hundred hit points, but only three hundred Mana. This is going well. For getting caught in an ambush.
“Aaaarrrgghhhhhhhhhhh!” Ali’s mental scream catches me by surprise.
I look back and see the Spirit twist in the air, clutching his head. A second later, he disappears in a burst of light, banished. Through our connection, I can feel the burning pain from the psychic attack he was under.
Swearing quietly, I trigger the Temporal Shift module and a Mana potion from within Sabre. It floods my body, giving me a few hundred more Mana to play with. That’s enough of a leeway for me to Blink Step to a nearby power pole. A second to orient myself, then I trigger it again. And then once more, crossing nearly a kilometer and a half in seconds. No time to rest, so I port straight to an abandoned alleyway and transform Sabre so that I can take advantage of the greater speed and mobility the bike provides.
Without Ali, I can’t skip away as far as I want to. Can’t even sneak out, not with everyone looking for me. The only advantage I have is that I’m in Burnaby now, outside of Vancouver itself, which means the main sensors they’ve installed are probably reduced in effectiveness and I broke out of their initial encirclement. Speed is my only advantage right now.
This might have been a bad idea.
Once my breathing calms down, I assess options as I eye my much-reduced minimap. Without Ali’s greater sensing ability, it’s shrunk to only what my Greater Detection Skill can provide. Less detail, lower range. It’s still better than what most others have, I know, many having to rely on technology or enhanced senses. Still, without Ali, I feel half-blind.
A small blinking notification in the corner of my eyes attracts my attention, pulling me from my worries as I gun down side streets. A moment’s thought is all I need, the notification making me grin. Finally!
Level Up!
You have reached Level 40 as an Erethran Honor Guard. Stat Points automatically distributed. You have 9 Free Attributes and 3 Class Skill Points to distribute.
Tier III Class Skills Unlocked
Now we’re talking. I slam the first free Class Skill point into Portal, my long-range teleportation ability. It flashes, the details coming up within seconds. I crouch down further behind my bike, watching attacks splash harmlessly against Sabre’s recovered shield as I zoom past another group of attackers.
Portal (Level 1)
Effect: Creates a 2-meter by 2-meter tall portal that can connect to a previously traveled location by user. May be used by others. Maximum distance range of portals is 100 kilometers.
Cost: 250 Mana + 100 Mana per minute
Damn. I’m slightly disappointed with the range. Nowhere near as far as I wanted it to go. After all, once you’re bending the laws of space and time, why should distance matter? I push the thought aside, knowing that bitching about distance isn’t the point right now. Still, I take a turn down a side street and onto a main thoroughfare, catching the next group of Sect members by surprise.
The sonic pulser gives me enough time to use my blade as an impromptu spear as I lean dangerously away from the bike. I leave my sword speared in the Sect member’s chest where his heart should be. If its physiology is human-like. The fireball I launch afterward finishes the job, a blip in the corner of my eyes telling me I probably got experience for that kill. No time or desire to check it.
I leave the other two points unused for now. While I have plans for them, those plans rely on me surviving the next few hours. Tapping into those points for a sudden power boost might be all that I need to make it out of here.
By reflex, I turn my head, scanning around me. Something high above, a flicker of light, catches my attention. Looking up, I see not one but a half-dozen drones spreading out along my lines of retreat. With a crunch, a flicker, Sabre’s shield goes down again. Something pink and fluttery, meaty and garishly blue flies past me as I turn forward again and pay attention to where I’m going. No experience notification this time, so I probably didn’t kill whoever—whatever—I just ran over with my bike. I mentally shift the power drain by the shield recharger higher, drawing more from the Mana battery and overheating the poor shield.
A bare couple hundred Mana left in my personal pool. Barely enough for a pair of Blink Steps, then I’m in Mana withdrawal and nearly useless. The few Sect members who get close get shot at, more to keep their heads down than in hopes of hurting them. But their attacks hurt, chipping away at Sabre’s shield. After that, its armor and my health. I’m reminded once again that Skills don’t matter if you don’t have the Mana to back them up.
I keep swerving, hoping to give whoever’s out there a harder time of shooting me. Instinct makes me change direction earlier than usual. A second later, the ground where I’d have been evaporates, asphalt gone and the sewer system exposed as the Sect Enforcer fires again. Even the near-miss is enough to melt my nanite armor and scorch my bare flesh, sweat evaporating in an explosion of steam.
Damn it! I can’t risk it any longer. A second later, I trigger another Mana potion, the second one within an hour. My Mana goes up immediately and I open the Portal, driving straight into its sinister void seconds before the potion fee
dback hits, sending me screaming into darkness.
Chapter 17
“Well, that was stupid,” Ali says, floating beside me in the inky blackness of the lake.
We’re back at the same lake bottom, the location of my Portal, surrounded by fish and the damaged portions of my mecha. Thankfully, the Portal could be set to be one-way, which meant no one had any clue I was at the bottom of a lake. And I know that because if they knew I was here, I’d probably have eaten another laser beam of death. As it stood, after porting in, I’d pretty much fainted from the potion backlash, the lack of Mana, and the damage done to me. I’d barely managed to trigger the mecha’s transformation to encase me in the suit and keep me alive under the water.
“Damian didn’t tell me about the laser beam of death,” I grumble to Ali. Sabre’s down to a barebones output of Mana, just the Temporal Shift module, life support, and the nanite factory. By the time I awoke, I’d fully healed and even the Mana headache had mostly subsided.
“He probably didn’t use it,” Ali says. “Remember, they were trying to keep the humans alive. Can’t get good prison labor out of corpses.”
“That reminds me. Necromancy…?” I ask.
“Works. You can get zombies and skeletons and the like, but it’s no more effective than any other summoner. The undead aren’t particularly smart, so an undead workforce isn’t useful outside of the most rudimentary tasks.”
“Good to know.” I sigh, taking the time to allocate the last two Skill points I have. Once I’m done, I pull out my new status, curious to see where I am.
Status Screen
Name
John Lee
Class
Erethran Honor Guard
Race
Human (Male)
Level
40
Titles
Monster’s Bane, Redeemer of the Dead
Health
1850
Stamina
1850
Mana
1400
Mana Regeneration
102 / minute
Attributes
Strength
100
Agility
175
Constitution
185
Perception
61
Intelligence
142
Willpower
142
Charisma
16
Luck
32
Class Skills
Mana Imbue
2
Blade Strike
2
Thousand Steps
1
Altered Space
2
Two are One
1
The Body’s Resolve
3
Greater Detection
1
A Thousand Blades
1
Soul Shield
2
Blink Step
2
Portal
3
Instantaneous Inventory*
1
Cleave*
2
Frenzy*
1
Elemental Strike*
1 (Ice)
Shrunken Footsteps*
1
Tech Link*
2
Combat Spells
Improved Minor Healing (II)
Greater Regeneration
Greater Healing
Mana Drip
Improved Mana Dart (IV)
Enhanced Lightning Strike
Fireball
Polar Zone
Freezing Blade
“You nearly died out there, boy-o,” Ali says softly.
I have to agree with the Spirit. While I had meant to take the risk, and planned for it, I hadn’t expected it to be quite that risky. If it hadn’t been for the Body’s Resolve and my ridiculously high health, along with judicious use of Soul Shield, I would have died quite a few times. Thankfully, I can take a lot of damage, and Blink Step means it’s really hard to pin me down in a fight. Even the Erethran Honor Guard’s resistances help in small doses, mostly from side effects of damage, like fire and cold resistances.
That’s why I had to be the one to do this. Mikito is tough and fast and frankly, fast becoming deadlier than I am in a straight-out fight. Her weapon can dish out more damage than mine, has better reach, and she’s both more skilled and Skilled for straight-on duels. Lana would have died fast because she’s just too squishy, and Ingrid… well, okay, Ingrid probably wouldn’t have been caught even if they knew where she was.
“So how long are we staying here?” Ali asks, waving his hand around the water.
“Not sure. Debating if they’d spend more funds to locate me. If they don’t, this is a great place to hide. If they do, I need to be on the move,” I say, reaching up to rub my chin and finding my helmet in the way. I frown, itching to eat something but not having the option to do so. Well, outside of the damn food paste the nanites can produce. But we don’t consider that food.
“Recommend you portal out of here anyway,” Ali says.
I sigh. This time around, with more points stuck into Portal—all my remaining ones, in fact—my range had significantly increased. Even so, wielding Mana in any form hurts right now. Even summoning Ali had been painful, but I felt safer with his presence.
Still, the damn Spirit has a point. A few minutes later, I’m stretching and savoring the experience of being free of both Sabre and my armor while standing in Kamloops’s City Center. Painful as it might be, a Cleanse spell a second later makes me feel so much better, though I promise myself a hot shower too. But first…
“Guys. I’m back,” I say over the radio, sending a notice to the group.
Lana and Sam answer immediately, and I make promises to see them soon. Food first though, as my stomach’s rumbling again.
“Ingrid’s left a few messages,” Ali says, waving at the city center orb.
I grunt, walk over to place my hand on it, and pull up the messages.
In Seattle safe. City is weird—multiple Shops situated throughout the city with each Shop creating its own “city,” unlike in Whitehorse. The Sect has control of most of the minor towns north of Seattle and about a quarter of the Shops in northern Seattle itself. :( They have lost major ground recently as the humans have been pushing back hard. Will update later when I know more.
I frown, reading the message quickly. Good to know she managed to make it down safely, even if the message itself was weeks old by now.
No messages for me? You suck. :P
Met some friendly—too friendly in some cases—humans. Quite a few groups of survivors down here, each of them competing and centering their bases around the Shops. Some are going all Mad Max while others are trying to be nice. Nicer groups include a bunch of geeks who nearly all Classed as Mages of some sort centered around Microsoft’s headquarters and another group of hipster coffee makers who make the best coffee ever. We got to get some of this going—their coffee tastes like heaven and bumps up Mana regeneration without affecting other potions. I’m writing this right now on it. So good.
You were right. The humans down here are really keeping the Sect on their toes. They’re fighting back and stubborn and the Sect has to keep most of their troops down here. I’ve spotted quite a few scouts watching the Sect. Any time they shift forces one way or the other, someone attacks the weakened group. If they didn’t have so many Advanced Classers, they’d be wiped out already.
There are other groups that Liam—the coffee brewer boss—promises to introduce me to. He’s real nice and says he’s interested but figures everyone is too tightly wound to actually help. Best we can hope for is a bit more of a push. But I’ll see what I can do. Might have to kill a few Sect members to prove things.
PS: Forgot. Almost everyone who leads a group has an Advanced Class, though no one’s above Level 15. Highest is a 13 so far, but I think they’ve been funneling kills to him because eve
ryone else on his group is in the 30s. Mage group is nearly ready to break into their Advanced Class—give them a few months and their elites will be there. They’re scarily good but very cautious.
Interesting. It seems like at least one group has learned how to cheat the System’s experience a bit. Or I might be over-thinking things. There could be a dozen different reasons for why the leader has much higher experience points. Still, something I’d love to look into later…
Still no messages? What, do I smell bad? Making a girl feel a little abandoned here.
Remember how I pointed out I wasn’t real good at this talk nice to people thing and you should send Lana? Well, don’t say I didn’t warn you. I might have had to kill a few Americans. In my defense, they were racist, sexist, misogynistic, torturing pigs. Also, they were trying to kill some new friends of mine and had good loot. So yeah, keep an eye out for the Sons of Odin when you come down.
I’ll keep talking to people here, but I don’t think we’re going to get that much help. They’re a bit too fractured. If they weren’t, they’d probably have kicked the Sect’s ass by themselves anyway. I’ll keep trying though. It’s been fun.
I rub my face as I read the last message. Just what we needed. Another group of enemies. Then again, considering their name, I could guess the kind of idiots they are anyway. Any group that decides the Vikings are people they want to emulate will never be high on my friend list. Seriously, study some history, people.
I consider what to write before I jot down a quick message thanking Ingrid for her help and letting her know that my part of the plan had some progress. After that, sending out a few more letters, simple messages to old friends, makes sense.
