Respawn: The Last Crossing (Respawn LitRPG series Book 6)

by Arthur Stone

  This was the first time Cheater had heard of this Trinity. Beetle informed him that, yes, in Rainbow they sometimes talked about the Trinity. People planning to go east yearned to learn everything they could about it.

  March knew of it, of course. He must have. However, the leader did not consider it necessary to share this knowledge with his party.

  He was March, after all.

  The man of mysteries.

  Players in the eastern part of the region had been unable to fully explore this area, but they had discovered the Trinity—and learned a thing or two about it.

  They had sacrificed hundreds of lives to do so.

  Perhaps thousands.

  The available knowledge was woefully incomplete. Some held that the Trinity was not a Trinity at all, but a Quaternity, or a Quinternity. Eyewitnesses never saw more than three individuals, but that did not hold substance for these conspiracy theorists. Perhaps there were more. No one could really be sure.

  There was no mystical meaning to the name itself.

  The Trinity was three ghouls. Ordinary infecteds.

  Except that the word “ordinary” would only here be uttered by a slobbering idiot.

  Infecteds started their lives as level zero walkers and progressed towards elite. But this line of development, in theory, had no end. Ghouls could level up endlessly, if they were provided food and nothing cut them down along the way.

  Level 62 to level 100 infecteds were elites. Anything over level 100 was classified as a dire elite. He had seen a book which proposed that anything over level 200 be called an ultradire elite. But it also regretfully mentioned one important subtlety.

  Players had limits on their Perception, and on abilities related to it. The higher an opponent’s level, the harder it was to ascertain information about it at a glance. This was especially true at medium and long range.

  But sometimes it was even true at point blank range. Monsters over level 200 would only generally have their levels revealed when they died, in the System victory log. It was unlikely that there was any player on the Continent mighty enough to read the stats of such a beast while it was alive.

  There was another subtlety.

  This one much more important.

  Finishing off a ghoul over level 200 was damn near impossible. Besides the usual super-developed stats and armor, infecteds at that level had sets of effective abilities. The monsters could use them to defend, attack, disguise themselves, detect prey from a distance, and so on.

  Defeating such a beast was only possible with a well-trained party. Many veteran fighters equipped with the best weapons and ammunition. And, of course, abilities that were able to counter the ghouls’ own abilities.

  Every battle with an “ultradire” was the stuff of legend, and whole books of analysis were written about them. Cheater had encountered one such volume in Rainbow. Most of all, he remembered the scrupulously extended list of how the hunters who went after the beast perished. Nearly all of them were dead in under a minute.

  That was, in fact, how long the final battle stretched. The party lost a quarter of its members in the first few seconds. A further half—three-quarters in total—died before the end.

  After that first minute, the players successfully disabled the monster’s anti-ability defense and successfully fired a grenade which exploded right beneath the hood covering the sporesac. It had been protected from all sides, except for the very bottom. A fatal piece of shrapnel flew up, saving victory from the claws of defeat.

  Why hunt such a terrifying monster at all?

  For the same reasons as one hunted weaker monsters: experience and loot. And achievements, of course. Slaying such a mighty mauler yielded bonus perks.

  These were unpredictable. The System decided how to distribute them.

  Experience points, as usual, were based on each member’s contribution to the fight. If you dealt a lot of damage, you get a lot—if you did little, the reward is disappointing.

  The trophies pulled from the monster’s sporesac were fantastic. Quite inferior to what could be obtained from an Unnamed One, but still fantastic. The Unnamed were not infecteds, after all, and yielded loot which ghouls could not. But while the “ultradire” elite was able to offer everything lower levels of infecteds had, it also offered something unique.

  Of course, the number of “ordinary” trophies found was staggering.

  A level 101 elite could give you over a pound of webbing, 170 spores, 70-some peas of various colors, 20 grains, about 10 nuts, stars, and smooth amber threads, and three knotted amber threads.

  Plus, of course, pearls. At least three pearls, of a mix of colors.

  They also had a 50% chance of giving you one white pearl. The higher the elite’s level, the higher this chance. And the higher the quantity of the other kinds of pearls.

  Rumors traveled of dozens of black, red, and green pearls extracted from an ultradire—in addition to five whites. Players loved to exaggerate, of course, but such tales always came from somewhere.

  Cheater had checked these numbers several times, from various sources. After March’s payment to the Janitor, he became very interested in the topic. Before that, he had not delved much into detail. White pearls had seemed like a legend.

  Afterward, he dove in.

  The Trinity was three such ultradire elites. Their levels could not be accurately ascertained, but if Beetle’s assurances were anything to go by, they had long since passed level 200. Their size and many abilities indicated that.

  Of course players could not help but be tempted by such powerful game. The most they had managed to do prior to this was inflict serious injury on one single member of the Trinity. They had lured it into a clever trap. The other two were unharmed, however, and the vengeance they dealt for the damage done to their fellow monster was cruel and swift.

  Wounds were pointless, anyway—the beasts could regenerate at speeds that players could only reach with regeneration cores. By the time another hunt could be assembled, all three were back to full health.

  The best the poor fellows had ever managed to do was count the monsters as they died.

  But they barely ever left the First Steppe. All of the approaches teemed with other infecteds, and getting past them was not an easy task. No serious vehicles or weapons could ascend the steppe. They would have to build an immense ramp—and the commotion would bring every ghoul in the region coming to call. Fighting three such powerful elites with what you could carry on your back was virtually hopeless.

  March had chosen the worst crossing path not just for these regions but perhaps for the whole Continent. No one had ever crossed the border which ran across the First Steppe. The second level of the steppe, which began further, was the region Kitty was located in. Elite hunters came from the other region, too—and inevitably respawned there. The trio controlled their whole territory, and no one could get through. No complete map of their land even existed.

  No publicly known map, at least.

  He could guess why March was intentionally entering their land. He had plans.

  After Beetle’s explanations, those plans were easy to perceive.

  March wanted to do what no one had done before: destroy the trio of monsters and seize the incredible treasures within.

  Cheater had no idea how the man planned to do it. But he had no doubt that their boss had invented something no hunter had thought of before. The insane sapper was probably a part of the plan.

  Encountering a powerful bounty hunting group was likely not one. As Cheater walked through the tunnel, he continually tried to send March a chat message, while he was listening to the tales of the Trinity. Beetle had many details to share, including some he had heard first-hand. He had even spoken with members of that mysterious organization of players whose purpose was to collect information about the Continent. They had people in nearly every region, and all information obtained was forwarded north to their main office, which they called the Institute.

  Those Insti
tute members had shared a bold suggestion with Beetle. After observing the area for several months, they suspected that the Trinity was somehow involved in the fact that hordes of infecteds regularly migrated away from the area. The three themselves did not leave the First Steppe, but all of the invasions had their inception in the trio’s territory.

  Cheater thought this kind of information was unlikely to come in useful, but he committed every word of it to memory anyway. Perhaps the theory would have some practical implication down the road.

  “Once, close to this location, the whole Trinity was seen surrounded by hundreds of other creatures,” Beetle continued, “acting together, as one flock. It’s still unclear how the Trinity knows so quickly that a hunting party is coming for it. Perhaps the smaller ghouls somehow inform them. It is very difficult to pass through this area unseen. If we went up to the surface now, we would be noticed many times over with each and every step we took. There are no forests and no high rises in this section. Mostly fields and dried-up ponds.

  The chat with March suddenly came alive. His latest attempt to send a random letter was successful.

  In order to avoid explaining everything to everyone separately, he used the party chat.

  Cheater:

  Don’t climb up the Steppe. Keep away from the leaning building. Ambush!

  Janitor:

  What kind of ambush? And who?

  Cheater:

  People Beetle knows want to kill you. He’s here now. Ran on foot to catch and warn us.

  March:

  That sounds fishy. He could have just sent you a chat message.

  Cheater:

  Chat wasn’t going through. We were far into the borderlands already. Black and gray clusters. Are you close to the building?

  March:

  We’re already climbing. Everything’s quiet. No ghouls to be seen.

  Cheater:

  Dammit, take cover! They’re nearby. About ten of them, and they’ve done this before.

  Clown:

  Why are they after us?

  Cheater:

  Long story. Hide!

  The icon belonging to Gangrene—or Gang, as was his real name—went out, and Maple’s icon started blinking fast.

  Cheater:

  Hide now!

  March:

  Calm down. We did as soon as you wrote us. Not everyone took cover in time. Where are they shooting from? Crafty team, I don’t see anyone.

  Cheater:

  Hold on. I’m almost there.

  All party functions worked now, not just the chat. That included the ability to track each member’s location. Cheater called up the map and saw that he was about 700 yards, as the crow flies, from his comrades. The tunnel, however, did not run right towards them—it took a sharp turn towards the black cluster they had emerged from.

  He hurried to ask the tankman, “Are those hatches far?”

  Beetle was also looking at the map and did not answer immediately. “Quarter mile to the exit.”

  “Tell me more. They have started at shooting my party already. Gang is dead, and Maple is seriously injured. Wait—she’s already gone. She’ll respawn unless they revive her. All they have left is Goblin. Bling, I mean.”

  “We’ll take the hatch that breaks out into the square,” Beetle said. “I think that’s the best move. They say the place has a lot of thick hedges, so they won’t be able to see us without a sensor. Of course, they definitely have a sensor, so it is a risky move.”

  “I have a disguise ability,” Cheater admitted, without mentioning his disguising item. “I’ve only rarely used it, so I don’t know all of its capabilities. But it seems from the description that it helps against sensors. As long as we keep some distance. Where do you think they’ve set up?”

  “I’ve never been here before. I’ve got this map, and I once saw a physical model of this area. Yes, some weirdo sculpted it. We have a museum of sorts at the stable, filled with his stuff. It’s good for teaching the area to newbies. Those preparing to go on their first hunt, I mean. If that model is accurate, well, I would have positioned myself in the tallest building. It’s about three hundred yards from the leaner, and from the upper floors, you can see everything across the way. Walking up the inside of the leaning skyscraper is unlikely. It’s badly deformed, with plenty of cracks and piles of rubble. Too dangerous. I myself can’t see how the thing hasn’t fallen apart by now. So our people walk up on the outside. It’s tough going, but the slope is climbable. Since your party isn’t dead yet, I’m guessing your friends jumped into the windows, but they’re unlikely to find a different way out. Some might manage to get inside and make their way down, but that won’t help much—that building is all alone. Nothing else nearby. You can’t exactly run out of the bottom of it unnoticed. This assumes they’re being watched from up high, of course.”

  “Are there any tall buildings nearby that can get eyes on the ambush?” Cheater asked.

  Beetle shook his head, “No, nothing nearby.”

  “How about far away, then? Half a mile? Mile?”

  “We’d have to go back and up through a different hatch. But it’s a dangerous move, since the exit has no cover. This is a dangerous area of the world. That skyscraper isn’t just the only way up—it’s the only place devoid of ghouls. Almost as though the Trinity keeps it clear just to lure people like you. If you take a shot from anywhere, the ghouls will be on you. We cannot make noise.”

  “The ambush party is making noise,” Cheater remarked.

  “I doubt it. They knew where they were headed. Silenced weapons will be the bulk of their arms. Or, they have a muffler with them.”

  “A muffler? How is that different from a silencer?”

  “I mean a player with an ability. I knew such a guy once. He could throw up a sphere of silence. You could beat on a drum set inside and no one outside would hear.”

  Cheater nodded. “Yeah, I’ve heard of those.”

  “So they could shoot without worry,” Beetle continued. “A bullet doesn’t make too much noise in flight, and the hits wouldn’t be heard from far away. How about your group try negotiating? I know a couple of the nicknames in the other group.”

  Cheater shook his head. “Once the shooting starts, there’s no talking. You know that.”

  Fatso’s icon blinked out.

  This was serious. The attackers had killed someone who did not have a bounty out on them. And they had done so while the party was in cover.

  Cheater had no idea what was going on there. But he figured he had to act fast.

  Should he go back and ascend the skyscraper to get the drop on the enemy? Would he even see them all? His rangefinder was no longer working after his trip through the black cluster, and at such distances, he needed to know the precise distance. Using the map for that purpose would be tough, as none of the enemy’s markers could be seen on it.

  So that was no option. He needed something else.

  “Beetle, tell me more about this tall building the ambush group is in.”

  “They might not be there.”

  “They are. March just said so. He finally spotted them. They’re in an unfinished high rise, next to a big shopping mall. Is that it?”

  “Yes.”

  “So tell me about it. Everything you can.”

  Chapter 26

  Life Nine. The Unfinished Skyscraper

  The bounty hunters definitely had a sensor. That was clear regardless of what Beetle was saying or not. He was a good sensor. An exceptionally good sensor. Not only did he pinpoint the location of his enemies with high accuracy, he also shot at them himself—or directed his accomplices to do so, when necessary. They had one or two large-caliber rifles, firing round after round. Walls were not guaranteed to save anyone from such rounds, so Cheater’s companions had carefully retreated deeper into the building. As Beetle had predicted, things were bad inside. They could not find a safe escape route through the twisted and cracked floors and beams. All they could do was wait for the
situation to change.

  The suppressing fire had stopped, but the party was caught in a trap, with poor prospects of escaping. They even began to seriously discuss a risky plan. For instance, they could make some noise and bring the infecteds running over. Perhaps then the enemy would have to hide and they would get a chance to slip out.

  It was a mediocre plan, even if you discounted the presence of the Trinity. Beetle had said that it was rare to see the three beasts down below.

  But in this case, they might make an exception.

  Cheater’s suggestion was not so glamorous itself, but it was not entirely hopeless. Dealing with a party of ten on his own was at least possible. He had emerged victorious from several very difficult situations throughout his life here.