Date: 2022-04-21 04:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Fantasy
Description: The Challenge continues, and there is no end in sight to the bloodletting. It doesn’t matter whether you are a “Brahmin” or a disenfranchised piece of meat, a popular top dog or the lowliest loser. You still don’t know squat, and if anything, the questions just keep piling up. Yet, the new tier is also different, at least for some. You can go hard, or go easy, but the harder the going, the higher the loot. If you are lucky, you may even get a respite from feeding on your own kind. Instead, you’ll be eating right. But don’t rejoice finding yourself all alone on a deserted shore. Nature is the w

Arthur Stone

Eating Right

Text Copyright © 2021 Arthur Stone

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the author.

Contents:

Arthur Stone

Eating Right

Dubious Criticisms of the Legends of Xai

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Many thanks to my readers!

“Sorry to interrupt your honeymoon, but...”

Something Pornobunny supposedly said barging onto the scene. It happened just two seconds before the tragic demise of the last two male participants at his starting location.

It is really hard to believe he actually did say that. To be sure, the above quote could offer a solid corroboration of what we know about this notorious participant’s inner world; however, certain stylistic elements here do raise a few eyebrows, contradicting some well- established facts.

In all fairness, Pornobunny never said any such thing. And it was not just that all of his opponents perished in the following few seconds.

In fact, it was even worse.

Much, much worse...

Dubious Criticisms of the Legends of Xai

Chapter 1

The Space of Xai. Launchpad 165-62-11-C-8

The Other Side of the Star

One feels one’s chin resting against something hard—something totally smooth, cool, and pleasant. It is nothing like the hard rock of some stony desert wrapped up in that fluid fog. Nor is there any pain, none at all, even though everyone knows that once you discharge your bracelet, and then pop a sizeable pill for good measure, the remaining vestiges of pain will still be lingering in the background somewhere.

So you raise your head from that snow-white horizontal surface. And you stare at yet another such chalky plane—only this one is vertical.

And not so white, come to think of it.

It had been fouled up by letters—big, fat, black buggers, some of them numbers, standing at parade rest in a dozen or so lines.

Tier One completed.

Congratulations!

AFTER-ACTION SUMMARY FOR YOUR INFORMATION (this section is available to all Team 2 participants)

Team casualties on the tier: 24.2% of the original strength; 24.2% of the team’s strength on the tier (Tier 1).

Casualties high.

Total civilizational points for tier: 3.0

Civilizational points earned by your team: 0.5

Performance low.

Total destruction points for tear: 6

Destruction points earned by your team: 1

Performance low.

Minimum number of points for team bonus activation: 1.0

Total civilizational points earned: 0.5

Civilizational points irreversibly used: 0.0

Civilizational points reversibly used: 0.0

Civilizational points available to be used: 0.5

Points cannot be distributed.

AFTER-ACTION SUMMARY FOR YOUR INFORMATION (this section is only available to Team 2 participants who have shown outstanding performance)

Your current stats make you a leadership candidate.

All-time minimum number of points required for leadership system activation: 1.0

All-time total points earned: 0.5

Leadership not available at this point.

Black, fat letters and a snow-white wall... Sinner already saw both once.

Eons ago.

Which was two weeks prior.

It was a pleasant feeling to realize you had been right all along in your assumptions, and so had others. Indeed, none of the participants knew for sure what happened the moment one left the tier. It appeared you went straight back to the Launchpad, or at least that seemed to be the case with those who died and then came back successfully courtesy of resurrection altars. Furthermore, they were coming back like new, without a scratch. Only their possessions seemed to be lost.

Naturally, Sinner cared a lot about his property, but it was still a minor consideration when compared with his desire to survive and complete the tier. Alas, his was a difficult case, so even the resurrection altar working properly did not guarantee anything. The puppet masters, kind and considerate folks that they were, would just drop him off naked on the coast again—and good luck to you, buddy. There, the border is that way, and you still have a day or two left. Be a good boy. Give it another try. Gee, thanks! Of course, Lord and his minions would stand a much higher chance of pulling such second coming off. They could just call their posse, and those would come rushing down to pick the boss up. They had the wheels, and they knew the roads. There would still be plenty of time. Besides, there were hardly any people remaining away from the border, so the risk of getting ambushed would be negligible.

Sinner did not have any motorized help, and crossing the entire tier on foot in a day—border to border, with all of its multiple pitfalls—would be science fiction. Unless he got himself a teleportation stone. But that was a rare thing indeed. Even their small fragments were hardly ever dropped, and he would need a hundred of those.

Be it as it may, pain, paralysis, and momentary darkness were things of the past, it seemed. Sinner was now lying on the Cube’s glowing floor, feeling as if he had done nothing in the previous few days but ate and slept. He was in top shape, to say the least. His body was full of energy, and the itch to jump up and get himself busy doing something was almost unbearable.

But doing what, exactly? Well, he’d take anything, he thought for a moment. Anything would be better than sitting still. Like, perhaps, even running around a little, jumping at the small Cube’s walls, screaming, like he was deranged.

One thing was clear though: feeling that way was not exactly natural for someone who had recently caught two bullets. Except his wounds were now gone. His cargo vest and body armor were beat- up and bloodstained, but his body was fine, with nary a scar in sight. He could use a shower though, in all fairness.

And perhaps “wash” his clothes and accessories using repair tokens.

Carefully, Sinner looked around.

“Hey! What’s the story with showers around here? I mean, a man needs to wash up, at least sometimes.”

The wall Sinner was looking at sprang another growth of fat, black symbols.

The Launchpad offers multiple options for the key word “wash up”. They include a bowl of cold or hot water, a shower stall, a bathtub of any size desired, a pool, Russian or Turkish steam baths, scrubbing with sand, whether fine or coarse, body wiping with wet or dry towelettes, and body licking (parts thereof within reach).

There are other options as well.

Would you like to see the entire list?

Mulling the matter over, Sinner reasoned some of the choices shown might well prove to be too much of the good thing. Body licking in particular gave rise to an entire host of unwelcome mental constructs.

He decided to make it simple.

“How do I get a bath or something similar?”

Formulate a request. Provide details as needed. For example, say “I want a Jacuzzi, anti-dandruff shampoo, baby soap, a hard loofah sponge for my back and some bath salts.” Then answer the clarifying questions when asked.

A person who is full of energy can do a great job asking questions.

Sinner was, and did.

And why not, he figured, if no one was rushing him—not like before they dropped him on Tier One. Besides, this time around they seemed to be way more accommodating and ready to go into detail.

Fifteen minutes later, the Cube expanded to multiples of its original size. There were now several doors along the walls too. Each of them, respectively, opened into a full bathroom, a decently equipped kitchen with a pair of fridges, stuffed to the gills with all kinds of foods imaginable, a bedroom, and a sizeable pool.

There was even an exercise room. Or rather, “room” wasn’t quite the word for it. What lay behind that wide door was, in fact, an entire gym, complete with a high-end treadmill, a shooting range, fencing dummies and punching bags, all kinds of exercise machines and what not.

But Sinner did not stop there. He only ran out of ideas once he created a large home theater. For the audience of one, of course.

To be sure, he could still think of a few other things, but his natural modesty got the better of him.

Or, perhaps, his good sense.

Why on earth did he need an IMAX theater? Or a golf course? What was the point in having all those luxuries anyway when he would never even get a chance of using them even once, in all likelihood?

That was just plain out silly. But under the circumstances, he figured, he should cut himself some slack for the duration and enjoy some much needed R&R.

Although he’d better start thinking of more serious things soon. Indeed, he had not the foggiest idea of what was going to happen next. Although wait, let’s rephrase that: he knew it for a fact he was moving on to the next tier. But how was it all going to happen? The devil, as always, was in the details.

In theory, his mind should have cleared itself of all that strong chemical gunk by now—except that his recent splurging on luxuries suggested otherwise. Or perhaps it was the side effects of the abrupt switch from a near death experience to the land of plenty.

It was now time to stop bombarding the Cube with trivial questions and ask about the really important thing.

“How much time do I have left? When is the new launch?”

Your familiar concept of time does not apply well to your current situation. You can launch into Tier Two right away. Or you can stay here for a biological equivalent of seventeen days.

“Are you saying I can stay here for another seventeen days?”

Biological equivalent.

“All right, I got it. But not quite. I see you guys have no food shortages here. I could be ordering caviar by the bucketful. So let’s say I start eating right and maybe gain ten pounds over this time. And then what? Are you still going to drop me into Tier Two—extra weight and all?”

You will land on the tier in exactly the same condition you are in when leaving the Launchpad.

“So it appears I could spend two and a half weeks here pumping iron and practicing marksmanship, and the progress will stay with me. Is that so?”

The wall popped up the same message as before, word for word.

Sinner threw a sideways glance at the door leading to his personal gym. Perhaps it was not such a bad idea to have requested that, of all other things.

“Could I talk to some other participants?” he asked his next question. “Or maybe call someone, or chat?”

The current stage of the Challenge and your status do not provide for any such opportunity. But you can familiarize yourself with what is happening to other participants in an expanded format. You could also leave personal comments on other participants’ pages—unless they choose to close the discussion. If the page owners opt to stay on the Launchpad for an extended period of time, they will be able to see your comments once the feeds are synched. But keep it in mind that your comments are not private. Any other participant visiting the page will be able to see them. Additionally, please be advised that your status does not make you eligible for free messaging. Every word you write will cost you 25 points.

Now he had to figure out what that was all about. And get on it right away. Suddenly, doing laundry and mending clothes were relegated to a much lower priority.

The easiest thing to find in that bloated monster of a participant directory happened to be his own persona. There was no need to search through names or anything. All he had to do was punch in his Launchpad number—and voila, there his information was, available to anyone.

Sinner almost cursed under his breath when he checked it out. The picture displayed on the wall triggered a deluge of conflicting feelings. One couldn’t be expected to get all warm and fuzzy at the sight of one’s own bare back a moment or two after the drop on the tier. The camera caught Sinner when he was just emerging from the water, still almost waist deep in the surf.

The “almost” part left his naked butt flagrantly exposed. Not only that, but the cameraman must have been a great private parts aficionado, seeing how the entire composition seemed to be focused on Sinner’s tight butt cheeks as the central element of the oeuvre.

“Twelve seconds after launch,” read the line under the picture. Comments were posted below. And there were quite a few of them, too.

Cynic Six:

“Out of the sea foam, buns of steel hit home... Indeed, we get the Aphrodite we deserve.”

Captain Poland:

“How could that even be? Wasn’t he trailing the Bunny until the very last moment—one body at a time? Does anyone know how this nudist even managed to come ahead in the end? What kind of a monster is he anyway?”

Suicide Catfish:

“What a naked dumbass! How did he even rise in the ratings? Sitting on his butt?”

Joanna IV:

“Cute little vegan butt!”

Smart and Handsome Me:

“My own page is a hundred times cuter.”

Homophobe II:

“Passives take selfies now?”

Acrobat:

“The visitor numbers here are a misleading rip-off! I thought this was a place to get free points, but what it is, is a SHITHOLE!

Fiver:

You frigging asshole! You think we forgot about you? Yeah, right! Don’t you worry, we’ll get your sorry butt in Tier Two! Better drop dead now!”

Naughty Fluffer:

“Man, I am in love! Wanna have some fun?”

Smart and Handsome Me:

“Plenty of fun on my page.”

Alisher III:

“Are you kidding me? That shaved ass a star now?”

Waffle SS:

“Sinner, find me in Tier Two. Us white Aryan dudes need to stick together.”

Smart and Handsome Me:

“Dudes on my own page are a hundred times whiter and more Aryan.”

Waffle SS:

“Die, you shit!”

Caramel Alice:

“Great-looking butt! I’d do it with him!”

Smart and Handsome Me:

“Butts on my own page are a hundred times more doable!”

Atomic Dude:

“Why don’t you just beg us for those likes, you dolt?”

Genghis Khan:

“Is there a video of them doing it?”

And on, and on it went. Hundreds upon hundreds of comments that followed could be easily skipped since they contained no useful information whatsoever, fixating instead on the topic of Sinner’s exposed buns. There were even messages from an old nemesis or two, but those were of no particular interest either since all they offered was curses and threats. Comments from friends, on the other hand, were very reserved and ambiguous—apparently for fear of revealing anything of importance in public.

At the very bottom of the comments section, there was finally a message from his trusted companion.

Lynxie:

“Stay popular. All the best.”

Sinner had no illusions about his popularity: it was undeservedly high. Unhealthily so. It was in fact through the roof. But it was not like he was surprised. Even he was interested to learn about top participants when he was planning his terror act in the Pit. Here, at the Launchpad, all the stats were available in full and presented in a much more graphical manner than when viewing them on the phone.

Staring at the blank wall, he gave the order.

“Show me five top killers.”

Overall, or by type?

“What do you mean, by type?”

Killing on your own, face to face (fair fight one on one, or one against many). Killing from an ambush (catching the opponent unawares). Killing of one or several opponents by a group. Killing on your own, but with indirect help from someone else (such as finishing off an opponent wounded in a fight with other participants). Premeditated murder or accidental killing. Killing remotely with a shooting weapon. There are other types as well.

Would you like to see the entire list of killing categories?

“Show me the overall numbers. The total of who killed how many. Never mind the details.”

A new, much more laconic display popped up.

Sinner: 177 killed

Pornobunny: 54 killed

Cutter: 47 killed

Freckle: 44 killed

Ladyboy: 42 killed

Damn!

One hundred and seventy-seven?! How could that be? Why so many? To be sure, Sinner did not consider himself one of those turn the other cheek types. He was up to his elbows in blood—up to his shoulders, in fact. But that many? The number was larger than what he expected to see—by a factor of ten.

That could well be the body count of a successful sniper of the World War II era. And not even that, perhaps, because none of those had amassed their respective track records within such a short period of time. The number was more befitting a mass murderer in a concentration camp of the same vintage, where hundreds died in gas chambers at the same time, at the throw of a lever.

This was surreal. This was wrong. Even when compared to the rest of the contenders, he looked like a monster. His score was not just higher than theirs—it was several times over.

It took him some time to find Lord down the list. The man did not even make top ten.

Sinner also noticed that the most noteworthy participants did not have any suffixes after their names. As he had learned speaking to others on the tier, there was no prohibition against recurring names. That was how, initially, there could be several people among the participants going by the same name. But a few days into the exercise, suffixes appeared. The chance of acquiring one was the higher the further down the ratings list one was.

The numerical value of such a suffix also provided an indication as to what kind of a performer one was. The lower the number, the higher up in the ratings the name holder was.

Either way, Sinner was the top honcho where killing was concerned. Presumably, there were other Sinners roaming the tier, each with a number after their respective names.

But that really was immaterial. What he needed to understand now was how he could have possibly amassed such a monster killing score.

Somehow, Sinner did not feel like asking the wall about it, strange as that might seem. Perhaps it was his very tongue refusing to voice such requests.

But that was all right, he knew where he could find the answer. He’d need his phone. The explanation would be in the most recent messages.

And what a long list that was! To his surprise, Sinner learned he had been credited as the main perpetrator of the explosion at the bleachers, even though he never touched the bombs or any of their components. Nor did he take any part in setting the charges, although, in all fairness, he did in fact offer his help back at the time. Tark refused it, categorically. His reasoning was that a prominent feed participant, such as Sinner, would have had all eyes set on him, while the business at hand required utmost discretion. Not to mention that some of the work had to be done outside the safe zone.

And that was the most important and difficult task. Tark’s people barely managed to pull it all off within the laughably short stretch of time available, and without being caught. Through all that time, Sinner had never even lifted a finger, staying in plain sight—to the caste participants’ utter annoyance. In the end, all he had to do was push a button.

It was nothing, really.

Yet the puppet masters decided he had had a hand in that particular crime too, among many others. The crucial hand, no less, although, in all fairness, others also received a mention as the master villain’s accomplices.

Seeing how at least a few dozen died there, the event qualified as a serious bloodbath. Which made Sinner wonder about the unimpressive amount of karma and points he had been awarded for the deed. Apparently, a substantial portion of the loot went to those who made and set up the bombs.

Nor was Sinner surprised that the raging inferno on that mountain road had been credited to him too. There were many more victims there than at the Pit—a hundred or so, if his estimates were correct. The flames did in anyone who was merely wounded after the original blast, so the death toll was higher on that occasion, and the amount of points and karma he had been awarded was higher too. Perhaps, his participation share in the massacre was also deemed to be higher.

The math here would forever remain a mystery. Even though Sinner had killed relatively few directly, up close and personal, the puppet masters decided he should be crowned as their chief master slayer.

Yet, Pornobunny, for example, was way ahead of him in terms of individual killings. He dispatched almost all of his victims alone—with his own hands and no assistance from anyone. But the number of comments on his page was nowhere near as large as on Sinner’s. As it often happens, the public could not be bothered with minor details and designated their champion in this case based on the overall total.

Done with the killing stats, Sinner requested the second most popular rating.

“Show me the highest point scores,” he told the wall. “Make it the top five.”

Sinner: 25,061 points (24,999 earned on the tier, plus a bonus of 62 points)

Chao Chan: 17,123 points (17,122 earned on the tier, plus a bonus of 1 point)

Lee Zhou Eng: 14,733 points (14,727 earned on the tier, plus a bonus of 6 points)

Ruby Dragon: 14,398 points (14,390 earned on the tier, plus a bonus of 8 points)

Arata: 14,385 points (14,372 earned on the tier, plus a bonus of 13 points)

Sinner’s lead on that front was not as overwhelming but still impressive enough. Chao Chan, the number two on the list, was lagging behind by almost a third, and the others were further down still. The last three of the contenders were essentially equals. Which begged for an assumption that there may well have been quite a few other participants in the 14K range, give or take, just under the first five.

Chao Chan was indeed way ahead of all the others. In all likelihood, the reason the man only had one bonus point was that he had stayed on the tier until the very end—perhaps, crossing over as late as just a few seconds before the deluge.

Bonus points, on the other hands, were awarded for speed. In other words, the first participant to complete the tier received the maximum bonus, the last one getting a bare minimum.

Seeing how none of the participants in the top slots had much of a bonus awarded, the speed bonuses were likely quite puny. Most of the points were earned by killing each other, long and hard, by hunting, completing quests, and doing other such heroic deeds, which commanded substantial rewards.

Scrolling the high point list down, Sinner noticed that it contained an outsized number of Asian-sounding names and monikers. He remembered hearing that the Chinese, the Koreans, and other peoples from East and Southeast Asia were well known for doing well in online gaming. Those included such where one needed to upgrade and promote his or her avatar.

In this world, where stats ruled the day, they once again proved they were literally at the top of their game.

Yet, none of them went as high as Sinner did. Whatever their top honcho, Chao Chan, did to amass his impressive score, he was still lagging behind quite nicely. And mind you, the man must have likely stayed on the tier, scoring points, until the waves literally started rolling in. Had Sinner not been getting his loot at a double rate, the closest contender might well have come out ahead.

Sinner wondered what actually happened on the tier once the countdown to flooding reached zero. At first, he imagined a monster tsunami moving in from the sea, but then he figured the reality must have looked much less picturesque.

In any event, none of those who actually got to witness what had transpired would still be around to be able to tell others what they saw. The Challenge rules were tough, and those who came in late were simply eliminated. Not even a resurrection altar could help those poor souls since altars only worked on the current tier. They did not bump one up to the next one. Therefore, there was no one remaining who could answer his question.

But he did find other answers. For example, just as the consensus among the participants had it, points were not just abstract numbers; they were a currency of sorts, which could be used to acquire certain valuables.

And now he felt would be a good time to figure out the details.

But before he got down to it, Sinner finally left a message on someone else’s page that opened with a photo of a blonde girl, looking utterly lost as she stood on the wet sand, at the edge of the foaming surf.

“Make haste slowly, Lynxie. Remember the day we found that elephant in the phone store? And the conversation we had that night? About development?”

He would really hate to spell it all out in plain language, on what amounted to a public forum. Others could easily pick up the good idea and make it their own.

But Lynxie was a smart girl. She’d know what he meant. She had an excellent memory, so she’d be able to remember what they were talking about back then easily enough.

Namely, that stats were all nice and good, but building your body up in a natural way was nothing to frown upon. Of any number of people with the same physical strength value in the stats, he would be the strongest who had the most developed muscles. Lean, hard body mass would beat stick-like arms and legs hands down. Natural abilities, on the other hand, would get a boost from numerical upgrades. That was how it worked in this world anyway. If you were a zero from the get go, you’d stay a zero regardless of your efforts at multiplication.

Lynxie would know what he was driving at.

She’d have over two weeks ahead, and she could also request a gym.

To be sure, she wouldn’t beat any records within such a short time, but every little bit mattered. He—or she, rather—who neglected pennies would be sure to miss on her dollars.

Chapter 2

The Space of Xai. Launchpad 165-62-11-C-8

Utter Greed

Standard limit for level upgrades using bonus level signs: 1 level (on the current tier).

Your limit for level upgrades using bonus level signs: 1 level.

Standard limit for parameter and subparameter upgrades using bonus development symbols: 6 parameters and subparameters (on the current tier).

Your limit for parameter and subparameter upgrades using bonus development symbols: 36 parameters and subparameters.

Standard limit for condition degree upgrades using bonus development symbols: 3 degrees (on the current tier).

Your limit for condition degree upgrades using bonus development symbols: 11 degrees.

Standard limit for skill rank upgrades using bonus development symbols: 9 ranks (on the current tier).

Your limit for skill rank upgrades using bonus development symbols: 19 ranks.

Standard limit...

Sinner did not simply wash himself clean. He was now squeaky clean. And he ate, too—a lot actually, wondering at his enormous appetite.

Coming back to the Cube’s main space, he once again stared at the long breakdown of basic award allocations and limits. The standards were the bare minimums, he figured. The powers that be simply could not award less. Or so it seemed.

Sinner had a vested interest in the matter—those were all his awards. It appeared, what he was given had by far exceeded the standard minimum rates—all of them, except the first one.

The points, as it turned out, could be spent on quite a few useful things. Those included bonus level signs and development symbols—which, however, could not be taken outside the Cube; Challenge Coins and Ideal Challenge Coins—which could be taken outside; item rank upgrades, including changing their colors and improving their attack and defense attributes; phone and bracelet functionality upgrades— and on, and on the menu went.

One could pick and choose as desired, subject to staying within one’s personal limit established by the puppet masters. If, say, your limit was thirty-five skill ranks, you could get as many development symbols as you liked if you had enough points, but you still could not do more than thirty-five ranks. Extra symbols would simply not be credited, no matter how many of them you put into the container. Incidentally, containers here were free for the asking and available without limit in all sizes.

Nor could you take those symbols with you when leaving the Cube.

It was only now that Sinner finally understood the second part of the hint written for him by the snake on that stone with her own blood: “Aim at the dark spot in the back of the head. Don’t waste Universal Development Symbols on expensive skills.” It was way too expensive to upgrade higher class ranks using development symbols obtained on the tier. But why bother if you could do it while in the Cube?

One point could be exchanged for ten “non-removable” Universal Development Symbols. The number of points Sinner had translated into a quarter of a million symbols. That was a truly enormous amount, exceeding everything he had made over the two weeks on the tier by a factor of ten. Oh, OK, a tad less. He could stuff his mattress full of those donuts and sleep on his treasure if he so wished.

That is, of course, if he did not intend to spend them on stats, parameters, and skills.

Which Sinner knew he would have to do.

But he was not at all in a hurry. He looked, and comparison shopped, and did the arithmetic—and then did it over and over again. Time and time again, he took stock of everything he had brought with him, including the contents of two yet unopened containers—the ones dropped by Lord’s lieutenant. Tark somehow managed to stuff them into his backpack.

Those were legitimate loot.

Another four containers—a tier completion bonus—were waiting for Sinner at the Cube. Naturally, they were a top-dog-level bonus, way higher than the standard payout allowed the hoi polloi. Among other things, the containers included quite a few regular development symbols and a sizeable handful of Challenge coins.

Along with the coins he made on the tier and exchanged for points while here, the sum total Sinner had on hand came down to one hundred and sixty-one. Here, at the Cube, one could access a store selling such yummy things that quite a few folks would be happy to trade in their souls, along with their mothers, and assorted grannies and great grandmas to lay their hands on the goodies.

There were amazing artifacts with epic properties; reliable weapons with outsized attack attributes; armor with the highest defense; resurrection altars; teleportation stones strong enough to send one to virtually any point on the map; recapture symbols that could link items to one’s person, similarly to how Sinner had done it with his bow; all kinds of property activators, including ideal ones, which guaranteed the addition of one or two extra attributes to an item; rare skill books of high classes; legendary treatment pills that could make you whole again in an hour or two after any disease or injury imaginable—as long as you still had a mouth to swallow them with; the strongest repair tokens that would not only fully restore an item with zero durability left but also offer a chance of actually making it better. And on, and on the list went. There was, it seemed, no end to it at all. Those were all the best and most expensive items that made one itch to get them.

So why was Sinner not in a hurry to buy it all up?

The answer was simple: he was cheap. And he was also poor. A bow that made him salivate cost nine hundred and twenty-nine coins. That was double of what he had made. And that was not even the most expensive item at the store.

And mind you, Sinner was no regular schmoe. He was indisputably the top dog leading two of the most important ratings and God only knew how many secondary ones. He had killed a humongous monster on his own and materially contributed to the demise of another. Even when laughably weak at the initial stage, he still took care of legions of monkeys and a horrendous tiger that made short work even of much stronger participants.

Yet, the Ideal Coins he now had would not even be enough for a quarter of that bow, which was not even the very best, truth be told.

And he shouldn’t have even looked at the more expensive items. What shook him to the core was the ideal caste initiator. It was something required for changing one’s status from feed to dirt—the lowest of the low castes.

Until recently, Sinner believed what he read and thought that such a transition would “only” require ten million in karma. What made him doubt that assertion was Lord’s equivocal hints during their conversation at the safe zone. Based on some alleged higher knowledge he possessed, the man intimated that the matter was not so simple, and that such radical change could hardly be pulled off on one’s own. Supposedly, as a member of a higher caste, Lord was privy to information unavailable to others.

And indeed, the gang leader knew things others had no idea about. Buying an ideal caste initiator, for one, would set one back ten thousand Ideal Coins.

Ten thousand!

This was no laughing matter at all. Sinner even rubbed his eyes looking at the listing, to make sure he got the price correctly.

And then rubbed them again.

That was indeed an altogether unfathomable amount. Even if, by some miracle, he could accumulate ten million in karma quickly enough, what would he do about the coins? For that kind of money, he could get an entire suit of amulets, weapons and protection to bring himself up to an entirely different level of personal strength.

Oh, and the coins would be just one thing. The store also required karma. Not as much, but the sum total of everything would still be usurious.

It was highway robbery all around.

To summarize, the store was basically only good for window shopping. In the end, he would have to leave his Ideal Coins at the Cube, as the most secure storage room. Perhaps he’d find himself in a better financial position after completing the next tier and be able to afford something then.

Now he needed to stop dreaming about what was out of his reach and begin reassessing his stats, parameters and skills, finding the best possible way of allocating the bonus development symbols he had to his maximum benefit, leaving simpler development options for a later date. He’d handle those on the next tier, once new loot began rolling in.

There were also some additional secondary options available to him, some of which were not altogether insignificant—such as, for example, paying for shorter activation periods. And perhaps paying a little extra still to cut the sound and vibration intensity in half. To be sure, that would not protect him from aggressive caste members, but hunting timid game when your phone blared at full strength was not an altogether winning proposition.

Besides, who could tell what other vicious creatures could be attracted but that traitorous sound?

No, he could not buy that option once and for all. If he still wanted it, he would need to pay up again on the next tier. But it was worth it.

He would have to get it.

* * *

Seventeen days passed in a most unusual manner. Sinner ate healthy foods, took his time splashing in his crystal clear personal pool and scrubbed himself clean in the shower almost to the point of skin sores, as if not quite believing that the dirt and stink of the humid tropical tier were now a thing of the past.

But above all, he spent most of his waking hours in the gym, pumping iron, running, jumping and shooting a bow to utter exhaustion, using the breaks between sets to once again consider where and in what proportion to invest his available resources. In his down time, he read good, old hardcopy books. No, not fiction, but rather all kinds of training manuals and reference books. Some of them were so specialized that he had to request translations of titles that were not available in any of the languages he knew.

Thankfully, this time around the puppet masters proved to be very accommodating, granting all his requests quickly and without any objections. To be sure, some things were still off limits, and the bans could not be circumvented. All requests for information about the subsequent tiers were categorically denied, as were quite a few other things, such as Internet access. In other words, they were still not telling him everything, but at the very least, he was no longer in the state of information vacuum he found himself in prior to and during the first launch.

Using his bonus, the symbols he had saved, and the loot from six containers, including his completion prize, Sinner managed to bump himself up to Level Fifteen. He was well aware that the number was not crucial, and there was no need to push it, and that it might even be detrimental in some respects. Yet, he still remembered it was a key barrier, and unless it was overcome, he would not be able to upgrade his other stats further.

Sinner had a short-term goal, which dictated the way, in which he made use of the symbols and signs he had available. The goal was to become primarily a “death from a distance” kind of fighter. To be sure, he’d have to put something into his hand-to-hand combat skills as well, but attacking with a ranged weapon would still be his major emphasis. Sinner knew he would spend his time on the next tier exterminating game with extreme prejudice. He’d also try to stay away from other participants altogether if at all possible. He would hunt, and hunt, and then hunt some more. He’d work from afar, without taking any undue risks and avoiding injuries that could slow his progress down.

He would squeeze Tier Two for all it had to give. He would widen the gap between himself and the closest challengers even further and come ahead of the rest of the crowd by an order of magnitude.

That was the plan anyway.

Following that plan, Sinner used up his three chances to improve skill classes to upgrade his bow from enhanced all the way up to brilliant. Alas, that involved losing a substantial amount of symbols already invested in it, but there was just no way around it.

He then spent almost fifty-five thousand development symbols on his archery skill, bringing it up to rank ten. That was the point where he became eligible to select his first modifier. Sinner immediately eliminated higher accuracy from his mental list of competing options. Indeed, accuracy was important, but it would be easier to upgrade it using other means. Similarly, armor penetration held little appeal for him, too.

He went for a 24% increase in the arrow’s initial velocity—a modifier that would keep on giving, adding an additional percentage point to the total with every new rank, which would impact the distance the arrow went, its trajectory, and, indirectly, its ability to penetrate armor.

That little luxury cost him an additional thirty-two thousand universal development symbols. All modifications were expensive, and the higher the skill class, the more one had to pay for them.

So what would happen if the skill class was upgraded—say, by one point? What would the effects on the modification be? Well, nothing that could not be expected of this merciless Challenge. The modification would become unavailable and remain that way until the skill rank in the new class was brought back up to ten and the requisite price differential was paid. In his particular case, that would mean spending another thirty-two thousand.

The racket around here was a well-oiled machine indeed.

Sinner knew he would love to bring the skill rank to fifteen right away, but that would require another seventy-five thousand symbols. Alas, he could not afford that much, seeing how he had to worry about the rest of his parameters too. As it is, seeing how some time later, after completing the next tier, he would be raising the skill class again, he would lose a quarter of what he was investing now.

It made no sense to rush into taking such a penalty. Besides, no one would possibly be in position to spend as much as he did on his one chosen skill. Indeed, Chao Chan and other such single-minded characters who had been exterminating wildlife nonstop, propping themselves up with stimulants, depriving themselves of sleep, eating on the go, and perhaps even doing their business into adult diapers to save time, could have amassed larger fortunes. But if they spent what Sinner did right now, they’d have no reserves left for everything else. And a well-developed single skill, in the absence of all other supports, really didn’t change all that much.

What supports would he, Sinner, need to give his archery skill? As a minimum, he identified four of them: agility, its subparameter accuracy, defeat armor as a subparameter of strength, and physical attack. Seeing how at their current levels those stats needed way fewer symbols for continuous development than a brilliant-level skill and that, in the aggregate, they would provide a similar benefit, he would be making the right decision, it seemed.

Upgrading agility from eleven to fifteen cost just under five thousand symbols. Accuracy and defeat armor from four to fifteen cost eleven thousand, and physical attack to the same level, another seven and a half thousand.

He would have another four unused chances left for parameters and subparameters. Upon reflection, Sinner put them all into strength—which would bring it up to the available maximum of fifteen as well. One could argue that was not a crucial quality for archery, but it was not like he could hope to solve all of the potential future issues from a distance. In any hand-to-hand encounter, however, having more strength could prove to be decisive. Besides, as his experience showed, lifting or carrying heavy loads was a common occurrence on the tier, so hopefully, he would be making things a little easier on himself now.

Sinner put the remaining five chances available for parameters into physical defense, bringing it up to just a point short of his currently allowed maximum. In fact, he had very little choice in the matter since his physical attack was already at its upper limit, and so far, he had seen little need for magical attack or defense.

Neither he nor anyone he talked to had encountered any evil magic here—not even once. To be sure, there had to be a reason those options were mentioned at all. It could well be that new threats would materialize without warning and catch him unawares, and yes, it would be good to be able to anticipate them and prepare accordingly ahead of time, but having no clue as to what he might, or might not be up against in the future, he simply could not afford to invest his limited resources in such an indiscriminate manner.

He’d be better off propping up his defenses against well known and clear dangers he was likely to face again. Any amount invested where it might potentially come useful could well prove to be sorely missing where he knew he would need it for sure.

Indeed, insurance was a great thing—if one could afford it. Sinner had no resources to spare. Everything he came by was immediately spent on things he absolutely needed to survive. That’s what living hand to mouth meant, he chuckled.

His skills accounted for most of the expense. And boy, were they expensive! In addition to archery, he upgraded his deflection skill from rare to epic and invested twenty-seven thousand symbols to bring it to second rank.

Squeezing the max out of the Cube’s willingness to provide information, he found out that raising the class of that particular skill did not only promote a reduction in body energy expenditures but also made the deflection itself more effective. Thus, a hit by a giant monitor lizard’s tail would fail to cause him major damage and also reduce the distance, the length of which he could be tossed. Besides, the skill’s higher ranks expanded the infinitesimally short duration of the protection effect, making those intervals ever longer and more meaningful. Upgraded high enough, the skill could give a full second or more of almost absolute protection, deflecting more multiple attacks occurring within that period of time.

What Sinner had at the moment was mere one hundred and ninety-eight one thousandths of a second. That was indeed ridiculously short, even with prior upgrades, but any additional effect extensions would have to be done in stages, little by little. And it was going to be insanely expensive either way, although well worth it in the long run.

The change in the skill’s second feature was more perceptible: hanging a single shield took forty-five units of body energy. Grumbling at the Cube’s usurious prices, Sinner bought five body energy sparks, and now the total he had available stood at two hundred and twenty-five units. That was barely enough to hang five deflection shields, which was allowed from the skill’s second rank up.

That was a valuable improvement indeed.

Another fifteen thousand bought him a glaives upgrade to rank fifteen, enhanced class. Yet another eight thousand went into the modification that would help him wield the weapon sixteen percent faster. Just as in the case of the bow, the modification was cumulative. From rank ten up, it added an additional percentage point per rank to the base amount, so the effective improvement came down to twenty-one percent rather than sixteen.

That was basically it. He added a little here and there to a number of other skills, too, just to bring them up a tad from the zero level. He was drastically short on symbols, and still needed plenty of them for other things.

In the end, a summary of his new stats looked as follows:

Level: 15

Body Energy: 200 (+25)

Spirit Energy: 50 (+2)

STATS

Strength: 15

Strength subparameters

Defeat Armor: 15

Agility: 15

Agility subparameters

Accuracy: 15

Stamina: 10

Stamina subparameters

Stability: 3

Perception: 5

Spirit: 0

PARAMETERS

Physical Defense: 14

Magical Defense: 0

Physical Attack: 15

Magical Attack: 0

ACTIVE SKILLS

Built-in Skills:

Unarmed Combat: 6 (built-in enhanced)

Cartography: 0

Basic Skills:

Spear: 2

Herbal Lore: 2

Simple Skills:

Clubs: 9

Random Items: 6

Traps: 5

Enhanced Skills:

Glaives: 15 (one modification: +(16+5)% to weapon wielding speed)

Knife: 2

Brilliant Skills:

Bow: 10 (one modification: +24% to initial arrow velocity)

Rare Skills:

Pistols: 1

Epic Sills:

Epic Reflection: 2

Epic Research: 2

Epic Geology: 2

CASTE:

None

ACCUMULATED KARMA:

147233

TOTAL POINTS RECEIVED:

25061

POINTS RECEIVED AT CURRENT TIER:

25061

Sinner followed a simple logic where his equipment items were concerned. He went for the maximum allowed upgrade of his bow alone. To be sure, he remembered the adage about not putting all of one’s eggs in the same basket, but what was the real risk of such a narrow specialization anyway? If the weapon was taken from him on the tier, chances were the rest of his possessions would be too. If he survived the ordeal, he would have to hunt and fight using whatever was available—until he made his exit again.

Since he decided to bet on shooting and dedicate his full-time efforts to hunting, he would simply have to upgrade the bow. Fortunately, he could keep doing it using the offerings from the local “lower-end store” where all they wanted at the moment were points, and the prices were reasonable.

So Sinner got everything he was allowed to get for his bow from the point store, upgrading its level and rank and enhancing the first artifact attribute to Level 4—the currently available maximum. He also added a second such attribute and upgraded it in a similar manner. The third and fourth attributes wouldn’t be so easy since they required Ideal Coins that Sinner decided to save for the future. Instead, he deleted old, already activated attributes, replacing them with much more serious new ones. And, naturally, increased the attack too, for good measure, after which the weapon’s appearance also changed substantially. The bow now had such a surreally aggressive look that Sinner himself felt uncomfortable staring at it.

That said, none of it was anywhere near the limit of what was possible.

New upgrades also had higher personal requirements, but Sinner was not worried about it.

He met those.

The full description of his upgraded weapon was now quite different from what it used to be.

Challenge item.

White.

Weapon. Type: physical. Class: non-firearms. Range: long. Category: bow.

Large object.

Level: 15.

Rank: rare item (can contain up to 8 attributes (and 3 extra slots have been added with the use of expanders)).

Artifact properties:

1. Artifact enhancement, Level Four. Substantially enhanced effectiveness against non-magical types of defense (especially when using armor piercing arrows).

2. Artifact enhancement, Level Four. Offers a chance at paralyzing the target even when doing trivial damage (25% probability when hitting the head or another primary brain repository; 5% probability when hitting extremities or their equivalents; 10% probability when hitting all other places).

Activated attributes: +5 Physical Attack; +5 Physical Attack; +5 Physical Attack; +5 Physical Attack; +6 Physical Attack; +6 Physical Attack; +6 Physical Attack; +6 Physical Attack; +5 Accuracy; +5 Accuracy; +6 Accuracy;

Link: linked automatically (extra bonus from the selected prize item). Owner: Sinner (participant 165-62-11-С-8).

Durability: 958/958.

Attack: higher

Defense: none.

Created by: The Challenge Ladder (selected prize item, with fundamental improvements).

Resources available upon destruction: 1–7 bars of excellent wood, 1–5 bars of exceptional wood, 1–5 pieces of excellent leather, 1–3 pieces of exceptional leather, 1–4 pieces of exceptional rope, 1–3 pieces of excellent rope, 1–7 pieces of excellent bone, 1–4 pieces of exceptional bone, 1–4 panels of excellent tusk, 1–2 panels of rare tusk, 1–5 exceptional claws, 1–6 exceptional sinews, 1–3 rare sinews, 1–2 tubes of excellent varnish, 1–3 tubes of excellent glue, 1–5 pieces of rare ore, 1–4 pieces of excellent ore, 1–15 regular crystals, 1–4 pieces of regular salt, 1–3 souls of a beast, 1–8 souls of a creature.

Attention! The amount of resources may grow as skills associated with gathering material resources are learned and developed. Without them you can only get a minimum amount (in case of successful destruction).

Brief description:

Good bow. Immeasurably better than basic. Good accuracy over medium distances. High rate of fire. Basic damage higher than average.

Attention! The following parameters are need to be able to use this bow: Level 15; Strength: 12; Agility:14.

Sinner also upgraded his guandao to Level 15 and brought its rank to enhanced. He used “hole punchers” he bought for points to open two additional slots and filled them, along with the four that did not require opening, with +5 x 3 physical attack and +6 x 3 physical attack.

Why not all sixes, one may ask? Well, because that’s how those activators worked. Other participants who used to be avid gamers in their past lives called it GKR—”Great Korean Random”. The strong attribute could add five or six points, but getting the maximum number was subject to pure luck and thus random. If you didn’t like what you got, you could always try to redo the setup and hope for better luck.

But that would cost you, and once again, the result was not guaranteed.

At first Sinner wanted to upgrade his protective equipment as well, but as days went by, he came to the conclusion that the bulletproof west he had found in the police cruiser was at the end of its useful life. He had seen much more interesting wares with traders in the safe zone, and those were all available for regular coins. Back then, Sinner simply did not have any money to spare, but now he figured he’d get another chance, and soon. He’d sell the old vest and get something light enough that would cover his entire abdomen and have strong armor plates on the chest and in other places where they wouldn’t constrain his movements.

He’d need to find a use for the loot he would be making hunting, right? To be sure, he could easily spend it all buying development symbols, but if he bought too much, and regularly, traders would start raising prices. He recalled how once, in the last trading zone he visited, he almost triggered a local shortage of that particular type of merchandise.

That was all right. Sinner knew he would still make his fortune. His new, upgraded bow would make that easy. At the range, using regular arrows, he could shoot right through sizeable cinderblocks and even metal roofing panels from fifty yards away.

The metal wasn’t exactly cheap junk either and did substantial damage to the arrows themselves—to the point that Sinner would have quickly run out of projectiles had the Cube not provided an unlimited quantity of such arrows and other study guides and training aids of every stripe imaginable.

To be sure, armor-piercing arrows were a much better choice and didn’t break as often. They went through quality metal sheets as if it were mere paper.

That was not surprising at all. Even the bow alone, disregarding Sinner’s much improved personal stats, might give one the jitters. Level 15, plus a total of extra 44 points to physical attack, which made the weapon much more effective against any non-magical defenses (including passive protection provided by armor or shields), and the bow’s enhanced attack made it no laughing matter. Certainly, top of the line it still wasn’t, but solid midrange was utterly respectable too. Safe zone traders had nothing to offer that would even come close.

The bow’s color was a bit off though. Improving the color for Ideal Coins would be extremely expensive, and besides, Sinner did not even have that kind of cash. Yet, it was still not the starter version. It was a four out of ten.

Had Sinner had a bow like that at the first launch, or acquired it shortly thereafter, he would have shown everyone a thing or two they did not expect coming. The maximum possible distance of the shooting range at the Cube was up to three hundred and thirty yards, and even at that distance, Sinner now managed to hit targets the size of a soccer ball once or twice out of ten.

From two hundred yards, he could make it five or six out of ten.

From a hundred yards, he rarely missed at all, and in most cases his armor-piercing arrows would go through those 1.5 mm thick metal roofing panels like knife through butter.

With that kind of a weapon, he could have easily picked off targets anywhere inside the safe zone where Xiao was based from well beyond its borders. And later on, in town, caste participants would have had to mostly stick around the center to avoid exposing themselves.

And even there they wouldn’t be completely safe since he would still be able to reach them with high-trajectory shots.

Sinner smiled. He was no longer an archer. He was a mortarman, hehe. Even if he could replicate on the tier half the performance he had shown in “ideal” conditions in training, the results would be plain out fantastic.

It was too bad the Cube provided no live targets for training, such as, perhaps, crocodiles or lizards. He wouldn’t care if they were mechanical or virtual—as long as they were not just flat metal silhouettes, moving steadily on a straight line, left to right.

Sinner ached to check his bow out in real action.

But he’d settle for anything that came close.

Chapter 3

The Space of Xai. Launchpad 165-62-11-C-8

Second Launch

This time around, the Cube did not skimp on either information or material goods. Moreover, their magnanimity went as far as providing a lot of things and facilities for free—as long as everything that was not related to the Challenge itself stayed behind once you launched.

But you could still take a few small things with you—what fit inside the smallest of the containers—if you had brought those items with you when exiting the tier.

Sinner brought his custom-made shotgun rounds, percussion caps, felt wads, buckshot, empty shells, powder and petards. He would leave most of it at the Cube, he decided. He was not going to shoot that shotgun much, he reasoned, so why haul around such heavy rare items?

But they were not the only things he was allowed to take with him. The Cube sold plenty of incidentals for token amounts of points, including clothes and different accessories. Hoping the next tier was not going to be staged in Antarctica or something, Sinner bought two pairs of light camo pants, a couple of similarly patterned t-shirts, a cargo vest with a myriad pockets, and a tactical backpack. Then he added a couple of bottles of water, MREs, some chocolate candy bars, matches, a lighter, solid fuel tablets, bandages, Band-Aids, etc. The list was quite extensive, yet it did not contain everything.

Thus, for example, the store did not sell arrows, and you could not take out those provided by the place for free for training purposes. But Sinner figured he’d take care of those even in the absence of any trading zone vendors. Back in Song Lang, he couldn’t find the recipe he needed, and not even Demon could locate it for him. It appeared ammunition shortages faced by firearm owners extended to those who used bows and crossbows as well. They had to pay for their projectiles, and besides, those were not easy to find.

And to add insult to injury, no recipes for making them were available either. None at all. No one even heard of those. However, here at the Cube, he found several on the list of store offerings. Sinner would be happy to buy all of them, but unfortunately, they were only being sold in exchange for Ideal Coins.

But he needed them. Who knew what kind of surprises were waiting for them on the next tier? Since he had already spent so much on upgrading his bow, the next logical step would be to make sure he had plenty of arrows.

He just couldn’t do without, period.

Cringing, he spent forty-four Ideal Coins on a lousy couple of recipes. The first was relatively inexpensive and allowed Sinner to create his own regular armor-piercing arrows—the kind that could be easily found with traders.

Now, equipped with a piece of basic or low-grade ore, two blocks of simple wood, a bunch of simple feathers and a spool of regular thread, he could create two dozen arrows. Naturally, if he could find a container to put it all in, since nothing could be created without those.

The second recipe was way more expensive and involved a different kind of production math. The same two dozen arrows would require two blocks of wood—one quality, and one excellent—a spool of excellent thread, a bunch of excellent feathers and two pieces of ore—one enriched, and one regular. Those were much more expensive and rare ingredients, but with his highly developed geology skill, Sinner would actually be able to find some of them easily enough. Besides, the small number of symbols he had put into his herbal lore skill would probably make it easier for him to find useful plants.

Among other things, he hoped this would finally help him learn the secret of where raw Challenge wood came from, so he’d not be limited to destroying other items acquired to source his wood. That would become his personal little secret. Some of the comments from other herbalists he saw on the recipe pages implied that they were able to find such materials easily enough and in large quantities.

Expensive arrows were going to be worth every penny he paid for the recipe. They advertised enhanced durability and, most importantly, extra twenty-six percent added to penetration. Unsurprisingly, the puppet masters withheld some important input data, so the actual enhancement number would still involve a certain amount of guesswork. For example, assuming a regular basic arrow, otherwise identical to the enhanced one, went four inches into a slab of frozen meat, the enhanced arrow would make it about five.

That would come in handy when dealing with massive beasts with tough hides. A bunch of such enhanced penetrators could make all the difference when hunting large game that Sinner knew he would not want to come close to wielding his guandao alone.

To be sure, those were still not top of the line arrows, for which other, more effective recipes were available at the store. But those cost so much Sinner once again felt he was a lowly pauper. So he had to rein in his appetite and hope the new tier would bring him more Ideal Coins.

* * *

Sinner spent his last day at the Cube resting. That meant he did not torture himself with never-ending exercise, like a professional athlete might, preparing for an important competition. He just did a bit of stretching in the morning, had a little warming-up with his guandao and fired a few arrows at the range. He knew he had to let his body recover before the launch.

Then he browsed some useful training manuals and had a quick look at the top listings, scanning new comments under the leaders’ photos. Out of curiosity, Sinner told himself, just pure stray curiosity. He already knew that hardly anyone ever left any comments on the pages of those who were at the tail end of the pack, so his message to Lynxie might well have remained unnoticed.

As to the others’ comments, most of them looked so asinine that one wondered how such retards even managed to complete Tier One. In all fairness, some could hardly be called people at all.

They were animals...

One of the champions, in the second place down from Sinner by the number of murders, had used up his message limit to the max to express himself at length under Sinner’s now notorious photo from the landing beach.

There were quite a few other comments under it now, as befitted the Challenge’s top dog, and Sinner skipped most of them. But he read that one.

Pornobunny:

“Are y’all dumb or what? You really think we are living through the end of the world? Yeah, right! The world ended way back, only you, dump pricks, never noticed.

Anyone thinking I am making this up? Well, don’t think! You are not any good at it.

Let me give you an idiot’s guide to it.

You could invent an AIDS or cancer cure, or set a thousand junkies straight—and no one would ever hear your name. But if you wiggle your ass the right way at the right place, in public, you are suddenly a big star!

If this is not hell, then what is?

And by the way, you! You, that skinny white ass in the picture! When you go to Tier Two, make sure you bring that naked ass of yours over. I need a butt to kick!”

Smart and Handsome Me:

“Plenty of kicked butts on my page.”

Pornobunny:

“Why don’t you begin saying good bye to your own right now?”

Sinner chuckled. What a nice way to say hello to your fellow champion—the one who sent more souls to their maker than you did!

But that was child’s play compared to what Pornobunny had on his own page. One of the photos there—a grisly strangulation scene shot from a fairly bad angle—provoked just about as much commentary as Sinner’s own popular masterpiece in the nude.

And the foul-mouthed bunny did not let any of it slide, barking back at individual posters and the entire community alike.

In his own idiosyncratic way, that is.

Pornobunny:

The photo sucks, but it’s a great moment. I almost see it all as a movie in my mind—the way that lousy worm begged me on his knees to spare his worthless life. He kissed my feet, literally. And then he died as he lived—like an animal... Oh, and I did that identical twin buddy of his too. And then I took out my thick black johnson and peed on their stinky dead bodies. Peed on them real good! So that grass would grow better over all that scum. Too bad y’all can’t see it in the picture. What a waste of a great scenic effect!

Can you folks believe it? The dumb pervs wanted to have a go at me! Me!!! Now, who had a go at whom, huh? Don’t thank me. Pleasure was all mine.

Oh, and folks... anyone here who writes anything nasty about me, rest assured I’ll find you. Sure as eggs is eggs. I will not sleep, and I will not eat, but I’ll find you. So you’d better not give me any of your crap here.”

Aryan V:

“How about you come find me, you damn ape? I’ll make you pleasure me on your knees again.”

Pornobunny:

“Oh, I’ll find you all right, you jerk-off. How you been? Still nursing that badly torn back door of yours? Make sure you do a good job of it. You’ll need it again. I mean, yeah, seeing how you are begging for it. It’s not like you are my type, to be sure, but I will still be happy to oblige. It is my duty to please that booty. Except I’ll do it my own way, of course. I’ll go hump that humpback of a mother of yours first, and then I’ll come for you. Just you wait.”

Chocolady II:

“Hey, Bun, remember me?”

Pornobunny:

“It’s Bunny, not Bun. Unless you are some feebleminded piece of ghetto trash, that is. And even then, don’t say that anyway. I am THE Pornobunny. With a capital P, capisce? Get it through you thick skull, all right? And no, baby, I do not remember you at all. Plenty of fat lips out there, how’s a man to remember? And your mugs are all the same kind of fat and ugly too, like y’all came out of the same factory.”

Golden Lion:

“You shit! You ugly mutt! Bottom of the barrel! Dregs! Toxic sludge! I’ll do anything and give anything to make sure they get you.”

Pornobunny:

“Hey, little cub! Whatcha got to give? Your well-used butt hole? That’s all you’ve got anyway. I’ve had it with you. It’s like you are in love with me or something. You seem to be all over me. Quit it already, it’s hopeless. Better find yourself some hairy hulk and bear him an ugly little urchin. Then drop it through your ass—like you yourself were dropped.”

Fancy Dude:

“I missed by a quarter of an inch. But I won’t miss next time. We all remember you well.”

Pornobunny:

Yo, what was that all about? I am not getting it. You mean to say you didn’t like it? You ingrates! Now, cut the crap and listen to me real careful. It’s not you who remember me, it’s me who remembers your sorry mugs. Once we are back on the tier, your butts are mine again. The usual way—the hard way. And you, specifically, you big hulk with a little pecker, I’ll have a special surprise for you. One day, you’ll turn around, and I’ll be there. Like, real close. Mark my words. And have no doubts. It’ll go down the way it always had. But you’ve been there. You know that.”

Prophet III:

“Something is telling me you are not going to die in your bed.”

Smart and Handsome Me:

“Plenty of prophecies on my page.”

Pornobunny:

“You still here?! Brave little you. Respect. Your butt will be the centerpiece of my trophy wall.”

And on, and on it went. Primitive foul language galore and similarly pathetic threats, liberally doused with racism, sexism and other types of intolerance. It appeared Pornobunny hated the young and the old, the healthy and the infirm, all races and ethnicities without exception, and all sexual orientations and genders—and everything in between. The general impression was the man deemed himself a unique creature from a far-away bright star, and that entire wave of expletives and condescension was but a perfectly normal way for a superior being to address his inferiors. For the man, none of the other participants in the conversation stacked up, and he was never shy to point that out, time and again. Which action, of course, provoked plenty of counteraction, and the comments section grew like a snowball rolling down the hill on a wet day.

The man was definitely not normal. A total psycho. No wonder he was the solid number two in the murders department. The surprising part was he didn’t make number one.

He apparently enjoyed killing.

But in all fairness, judging by what Pornobunny’s opponents were saying in the comments, they were not all that different. And some may well have been even worse. Madhouse material, all of them.

Not so much mammals as evolution’s blind alleys.

That night, Sinner did not sleep well. Even though he was sure he was a hefty cut above the rest and should not expect any particular difficulties, his soul was not at peace nonetheless. The damn Cube let out nothing whatsoever about what they could expect on the next tier. One could not even get a sense of the kind of weather they were to face on their new battlefield.

He dozed off only a couple of hours before the reveille. But he felt fresh and eager. Quickly donning his clothes and gear, Sinner stood by the wall for a moment, waiting for the already familiar text messages to begin running.

Attention! Countdown to second launch beginning.

A bet has been placed on you.

Current bet status: bonus selected. Under the terms of the bonus, your current status will yield you a much larger amount of loot for victories (x2 basic or x2 bonus), with a considerably higher chance of receiving extra loot, if the bonuses are meant for all Challenge participants or separate groups.

For this tier, you have three launch options:

1. Easy

2. Harder

3. Hard

By default, the harder option will apply. Choosing the easy option will cause you to forfeit the bonus. Choosing the hard option will bring your bonus up from x2 to x2.5.

Please choose your launch option. If you fail to do so within the time allowed, the second option will apply.

20 seconds

19 seconds

18 seconds...

No one told Sinner about that. There were no launch option discussions prior to the first start. They just dropped him into it, the way he was, without explaining anything. Except for waving a stinky pair of underpants in his face, pushing him to agree to anything at all, except for that sorry piece of dirty loincloth.

This time, it was all different. So what do we have here, Sinner asked himself. What was the harder option going to be about? Something like disembarking onto the far end of a rocky promontory with a pair of ever hungry gaki blocking your way and a gang of cutthroats drawing close? But even back then, he managed to survive, and now such a setup would be mere child’s play.

The hard option looked interesting, plus it promised a higher bonus multiplier. But what would it all mean at the moment of the launch? Four “gaki units”? Six? Ten? Or Lord’s entire gang assembled nearby?

No information was available, and no one was in a hurry to provide any. And all the while, time was running out.

At the last moment, almost intuitively, Sinner pressed the third line.

His was not the easy way.

What would come, would come.

Hard landing option selected. Bonus awarded: in your current status, you will be eligible for a much larger amount of loot for victories (x2.5 basic or x2.5 bonus), to be rounded back, with a considerably higher chance of receiving extra loot if the bonuses are meant for all Challenge participants or separate groups.

Attention! Remember that even though you are much stronger now, you remain a source of valuable loot for others. That danger to you is now even higher than at the start of the Challenge due to your increased worth. Higher-status Challenge participants may attack you for the valuable loot and to win bragging rights. Also remember that Tier Two will be more difficult than Tier One. It will require more of all the Challenge participants. Your new adversaries will often be stronger and more numerous. Tier Two may become insurmountable for those who have neglected personal development in Tier One.

The launch into Tier Two is now being initiated.

Landing location: Skeleton Coast

Second launch advice: Beware not only of usual opponents, but of the environment itself in all its manifestations. It may easily kill those who do not adapt.

The Challenge is about to resume.

Tier Two.

Launch!

And then, in a manner already familiar, Sinner’s world went dark.

Chapter 4

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Skeleton Coast

Out of the Sea Foam—Again

It took Sinner a great deal of effort to remain standing. Such a hard landing meant he should have fallen, so he was not quite sure himself why he didn’t.

This time around, the puppet masters dropped him smack in the middle of the surf washing over a sandy shore. And what a surf it was too, ocean-strong, well capable of rocking even a large boat to the max of its endurance. As luck would have it, Sinner found himself almost onshore, where the waves were already losing their vigor, pulling back to their native element.

He recalled one of the comments left on his page by someone called Cynic something—an Aphrodite emerging out of the sea foam. Something like that anyway.

And the commenter never even saw the real state of the events. Unlike on Tier One, there really was plenty of foam here. Like, in spades.

With great difficulty, fighting the surf that was pulling him back into the water, Sinner finally made it to higher ground. His boots, tall that they were, were now full of sand, but he kept pushing forward, without washing it off.

Pausing in the open to remove the sand wouldn’t be wise. It seemed like the entirely bare shore he was now standing on was stretching for miles in both directions, with nary a tree or a bush in sight. The long strip of sand, however, which made for a magnificent beach, was lined with patches of moribund grass here and there along the inland edge of it.

Anywhere he looked, a dry fog of airborne sand floated above the shoreline. A continuous chain of sand dunes, some of them dozens of yards high, clearly dominated the coastal landscape. In places, they almost reached the surf line, the largest waves eating into their bases, but most were a hundred paces or more away from the swells. That was where the spots of sickly, low-rise vegetation could be seen.

Sinner squeezed his farseeing amulet and threw a quick look around. Momentarily resting his eyes on a large dorsal fin loitering above the large swells, he darted towards a small cove nested between two sizeable dunes that reached down towards the surf line. It was not much of a shelter but still better than remaining in plain sight on the open beach.

Sinner threw another quick look around, squatted and reached into his backpack, producing a baseball cap he had bought while in the Cube. If one was to believe the description, it was a special piece of headgear that provided extra protection from heat stroke. The sun here was a real scorcher, and with no shade of any kind anywhere, the cap was exactly what the doctor ordered.

Even though the amulet extended his eagle vision for miles, Sinner could not see a single other participant. Which, of course, was fairly strange since according to various estimates, during the landing at least three participants should have been dropped on each mile-long stretch. Some speculations pushed that number up to ten or more. Or that distribution may have been skewed, or perhaps some participants had been dropped further away from the shore—up to a couple of hundred yards further. That could well be the reason why so far he had failed to notice any “neighbors”.

Except visibility here was perfect. Unless, that is, the competition was dropped on the other side of the dunes.

It really couldn’t be that they had dropped him all alone on such a vast stretch of coast—or could it? What did he do to deserve any such luxury anyway? Or did they give him a delayed launch, after the first wave of participants had already been disembarked? If that was the case, some of the early birds could now be secretly watching him from the tops of those dunes. He’d really need to pay close attention to that particular direction. Except, since nothing ever was easy, that meant looking up, against the white hot disc in the sky that hurt one’s eyes and burned one’s skin like there was no tomorrow.

It appeared they had once again dropped him onto a promontory of sorts, except not on the southern tip of it, but rather on the side somewhere. The sun simply couldn’t shine from the north.

Sinner suppressed an urge to climb a high dune. First things first, he reasoned. Now he needed to do something else.

He reached for his phone.

Tier Two of the Challenge Ladder

This tier is more difficult than the first one but much more lucrative for those who are serious about their personal development. This tier, substantially expanded in terms of both space and time, is teeming with aggressive and more docile opponents. Battling those, you could, if you so wish, reach the development heights that will help you survive and prosper in more difficult subsequent tiers.

Minimum recommended level for completion: 10

Level recommended for facilitated completion: 18

Level recommended for comfortable completion: 27

Recommendations account for a harmonious development of all the participant’s stats. However, these are just the averages, so even at Level 27 you will remain vulnerable in your encounters with the most dangerous of Tier Two denizens.

The Tier’s Special Features

Climate: subtropical, tropical, subequatorial, and equatorial zones (often intermixed, unpredictable, and aggravated with sizeable areas of high elevation).

The coastline is straight but heavily indented. The terrain has stretches of the savannah, deserts, semi-deserts, rainforests, hills, low-rise mountains, high mountains, lake systems and standalone lakes, small and large river valleys, and complex estuaries.

The populace has been partially deactivated. There are few towns or villages, and they are not evenly distributed throughout. Most of them are small and either altogether abandoned or having very few residents remaining.

Temperatures range from almost comfortable to very high.

Primary antagonists include colonizers and slave owners, aggressive settlers, the cult of the accursed, and a hodge-podge of accidental beasts.

Possible antagonists: accidental creatures, remaining populace, Challenge participants.

Standing advice for this tier: curb your unchecked enthusiasm for hunting. Predators are attracted by fresh blood. Maintain good hygiene. Treat all wounds ASAP. Concentrate on personal development any way you can. This tier is slightly more difficult but ideally suited for those who seek accelerated development. You will have plenty of time to enjoy the process. There will be no need to rush for the exit. You will have a chance to take a breather after the accelerated timeframe of the first tier. Take your time to develop.

Primary goal: reaching the exit from Tier 2 of the Challenge Ladder.

Secondary goal: comprehensive personal development. Building up a reputation.

Available hints: a substantially more difficult start in a vast location (this earns you the higher basic loot multiplier of x2.5 and one random hint which is not chosen by you personally and may be available at any moment; a bet had been placed on you before the Challenge started).

Your reward upon reaching your primary goal: full body restoration, points (the amount of which will be determined by the speed and efficacy of completing the tier), a container with valuable content (or several containers), access to Tier Three, access to personal Launchpad, Ideal Challenge Coins, and access to the premium shop as well as the exchange center.

No reward will be given for the secondary goal, unless you demonstrate an exceptional result.

Attention!

You can access the development menu using the bracelet’s options in any provisionally safe location. This is not a reward, but rather a special way of realizing your development potential, without which the successful completion of the Challenge will be next to impossible. Remember that we care about and root for you. We wish you the best of luck.

Additionally, all of the Challenge participants in Tier Two will have a chance to earn a special bonus (1.5 times any kind of loot). Take that chance of building up your wealth, since it may come in handy later on.

Attention!

Do not lose your device. Leaving the tier without it will cause you to forfeit all the points and karma earned while on the tier.

Having read the message, Sinner threw a sideways glance at his bracelet. The countdown had already started—only this time it was from forty-nine days rather than fifteen. The notice also mentioned the longer timeframe for completion, and the physical dimensions of the tier, if one believed the description, were substantially larger too. Perhaps, that was the reason why he could not see any other participants around: they were simply dropped at a substantial distance from each other since the longer coastline offered plenty of room.

The list of potential opponents was also larger than on Tier One, and just as cryptic. But one thing was clear: there would be plenty of killing.

This little game the puppet masters created was definitely not for those who were averse to violence.

Sinner reached into his backpack again and thanked himself for his attention to detail. He did not penny pinch and got plenty of water from the store—and now he was glad he did. Unfortunately, at the Launchpad, it cost so much some of the ritziest airports in large cities could blush. Luckily, he exited Tier One with such a balance of points that he could easily afford to buy it by the barrel there. Gee, Sinner thought, thank God for small favors.

Anyhow, it was not his habit to skimp on essentials.

He threw a sideways glance at his phone again. Too bad the basic communications options available to meat remained unchanged. Anything extra cost points. Besides, as one texted or called more, the rates would go up, dramatically. Not even Sinner, his position in the rankings notwithstanding, could afford to use his phone freely. Instead, he had opted for a fairly lousy plan, which was still better than the basic allowance. What he now had available was two short calls and six reasonably laconic messages a day.

Throwing another quick look around, he dialed Lynxie. In all fairness, she probably couldn’t afford to call him.

The girl picked up immediately, as if she was waiting for he call.

“Hey, Sinner! I got your message on my page. Sorry I didn’t respond. I figured I shouldn’t say much of anything in a public forum. But yeah, I realized it myself I should spend my time at the pad getting ready.”

“Hi, Lynxie! So did you pump any iron? How much do you bench press now? Fifty pounds? Seventy-five?”

“Pfft, how about one fifty? Where are you anyway?”

“Skeleton Coast.”

“Huh? Where’s that?”

“No idea.”

“Well, how does it look?”

“A little boring, actually. Like a sea coast on the edge of a desert. There’s nothing but sand dunes. No trees, just some occasional bunches of sickly grass. But I haven’t had much of a chance to look around yet. And where are you?”

“Some place called Labita.”

“Well, now it’s my turn to ask where’s that.”

“Dunno yet. I hid in the brush right away. That’s where I am sitting now, talking to you.”

“Oh, you have some brush?”

“Yup, and there’s trees too.”

“Now, that’s rich! Me, I wouldn’t even be able to hang myself here if I wanted to.”

“That was not funny, Sinner. What I see further ahead is some kind of hills with meadows and large trees with flat tops. Oh, and it’s hot, very much so. Sticky and humid. And tons of flies around. I got bit on the neck once, and it’s a bad one.”

“Hey, you’d better be careful with that, girl! You have any detoxifiers?”

“Yep, a few. Plus I bought a double charge for the bracelet. It cost tons of points too. Maybe I shouldn’t have.”

“No, you did the right thing. I bought some as well. You never know what you are going to be up against. But either way, you know you have to be careful, don’t you?”

“Sinner, do you have any idea how far you are from me? And which way to go?”

“How could I, Lynxie? My phone doesn’t even show the general direction to where you are. It’s a blank screen, essentially. Just a stretch of coast and a few dunes. That’s it. And I have no idea how to determine my latitude or longitude without instruments.”

“Yes, I understand.” The girl’s voice soured. “That was a silly question. Sorry.”

“Well, cheer up, girl. I am sure we’ll meet again. If not on this tier, then on the next. All right, I am running out of talk time. And one other thing... Send a message to Tark. He may well be closer to you. Or maybe his people. Although wait. Don’t. No need to waste your limit. I’ll write to him myself and tell him about you. All right, Lynxie, best of luck.”

“Same to you, Sin...”

The line went dead. Buggers, he cursed. The time was up, and they didn’t even kick in a single lousy second on top of it.”

Damn Scrooges!

And then the phone buzzed again. There was no sound—Sinner had turned it off on purpose.

Speak of the devil—the call was from someone he was just about to buzz himself.

He pressed the device to his ear.

“Hi there, Tark! How was your landing?”

“Oh, it was a beaut, actually. You know, I am no slumdog. I am high-caste and to the manor born, so I get VIP treatment.” Then the man’s voice got serious. “I am glad you’ve made it. Because you know, it didn’t look good. I was worried about you until I saw that picture of you online. You look good, especially from behind.” Tark chuckled, cheerfully.

“Yeah, yeah, laugh all you want—you and the rest of the world,” Sinner grumbled.

“Sorry, buddy, I just couldn’t help it. Where are you now?

“I have no idea. The place’s called Skeleton Coast.”

“What does it look like?”

“Well, how should I put it... Like the backyard behind a mummy vault, perhaps. Nothing but bare sand dunes. No trees, almost no grass, nothing living in sight. Not even seagulls. Although, wait. There’s one. Or maybe I am just seeing things. That’s my luck, I guess. But then again, I am not to the manor born. I am the underdog here. They banished me to the desert, and my civil rights have been violated, too, hehe.”

“I’ll ask around, maybe someone from the old crowd has been dropped somewhere near you,” Tark said.

“Better check on Lynxie. She’s in some place called Labita. She says she’s got hills, and high grass, and trees with flat tops. Oh, and flies, too. The biting kind. I have no idea where that might be.”

“I’ll check on you both,” Tark promised. “If I learn anything, I’ll send you a message right away. I’ll talk to you soon. Now I have tons of other calls to make.”

“Go ahead, you slave driver, make your calls. It’s probably an all-you-can-eat for you,” Sinner added a bit of clumsy theatrics to his voice.

“Begrudge not, you lowly meat,” Tark answered in a dramatic voice, before changing back to his normal self. “Good luck to you, buddy. We’ll get those meat hunters again. You’ll see.”

Sinner was about to say he had nothing against hunting as such, but the line clicked, and Tark was gone.

Sinner put his phone away, into his vest pocket, and looked around again. Just as before, he could see nothing and no one around. Just the surf and the sand. There were no more seagulls either, so perhaps the one he thought he saw earlier was but a figment of his imagination. It sure did look like that scraggly grass at the feet of the dunes was the only sign of life around here.

It was time to venture further inland and give some serious thought to moving to friendlier grounds.

Sinner did not like this coast. Not one single bit.

* * *

The dune proved to be not so high after all. Thirty yards, perhaps, forty tops. Still, climbing it took quite some time. The sand was too dry, and the sun too hot. On the way up, Sinner fought the urge to stop, pull out the water bottle from his backpack, and take a swig. But he had to be very careful with his water. Who knew when he’d be able to replenish? Both his life experience and his gut feeling suggested sources of water in this place would be few and far between.

Finally reaching the top, Sinner straightened himself and looked north. Surprise, surprise... Not.

There was nothing but sand dunes. And more sand dunes. All the way to the horizon.

It seemed his suspicions of water around here being scarce were right on.

Sinner pinched his farseeing amulet with two fingers, trying to squeeze a little more visual range and detail out of his natural eyesight. As before, using the amulet made him farsighted in more ways than one, blurring out the objects that were right there, in front of him. Luckily, the wind whine had died down and his ears caught the sound of the sand rustling.

Dropping the amulet, he swung his head sideways, and barely managed to suppress a blood curling yelp of horror as his heart sank—all the way to his boots.

Or perhaps lower still.

We all have our little vulnerabilities, and Sinner was no exception. He loathed large insects. He abhorred them. Even a harmless grasshopper landing on his arm could put him in a foul mood immediately and for quite some time. And it only got worse with anything more exotic. Especially if it was poisonous. Or a bloodsucker. Eew.

Watching a scorpion the size of a fully grown shepherd dog digging itself out of the sand slowly, not quite a few steps away, he knew his mood was not going to improve until the day he died.

But Sinner did not panic, his worst phobia or not. He rejected the urge to reach for his bow outright. There was no way to tell how effective his arrows would be against this nightmarish creature, and considering the distance between them, he was not going to get more than a couple of tries to find that out. The monster might well turn out to be quite agile too. If it rushed him, Sinner knew he’d better have some serious close quarters argument in his hands. Something deadly. Something suitable for both attack and defense.

Sinner reached for his belt where his space-curving bag hung loosely. Flipping the cover flap, his hand hurriedly went for his guandao. He congratulated himself on his smart thinking for having activated the retrieval menu and selected his favorite melee weapon way ahead. Back at the beach, that is. Just for the heck of it. Carrying the bag unlocked was not particularly comfortable, and there was a chance, at least in theory, that he might lose something, but in case of any emergency he’d have a weapon ready without having to waste precious seconds fumbling with his phone’s activation menu.

QED, Sinner now had a serious long weapon in his hands before the ugly bugger could even think of pulling something off. He’d stand his ground, yes. Anything more than that, however, was still a big if. His legs wobbly, Sinner knew he’d be loath to come closer to that horrible creature of his own accord. Like, go on the attack, guns blazing. Or guandao swinging, more like. Gosh, what a disgusting bug that was! In all fairness, creatures like that had no business existing in the modern atmosphere. They simply wouldn’t be able to breathe. That was why they had all died out in time immemorial.

Except this here ugly arachnid didn’t seem to be in any respiratory distress. And it moved fast enough for a relic too.

Damn those puppet masters! They were apparently unconstrained by any biological laws.

The beast was now almost completely out of the sand, and Sinner finally summoned enough willpower to make his move. He lunged forward, swinging his weapon.

The scorpion recoiled, but its tail was still stuck in the sand and apparently couldn’t be liberated quickly enough. With a nauseating rustle of its chitinous carapace, the insect jerked, trying to avoid the blade swinging down on it.

But the blow hit home, and hit hard. The metal sliced through the side of the beast’s head all the way down, burying itself in the sand below. The chittering went up a notch as the insect thrashed, scattering bits, pieces, and blobs of some nasty goo around. Apparently straining itself to the max, the scorpion finally freed up its tail and used it immediately to charge the opponent. Except the strike missed. Heck, it was not even in the right direction.

Sinner’s blow must have hit some vital organs, because the animal was apparently in distress. Very much so.

But no, Sinner was not going to offer the poor dear a Band-Aid. Instead, he hit it again, and again, severing a few of the front legs on the left, and then chopping the poisonous stinger right off. That thing, he figured, must have been loaded for bear, or more like for a herd of woolly mammoths, because venom gushed out of the wound in a veritable fountain.

The crippled insect tried to beat a hasty retreat, but his motor coordination must have suffered badly, not to mention the missing legs. Falling on its side, it thrashed for a moment, then striking the ground with its circumcised tail again, bringing up a cloud of fine sand.

In the heat of the battle, Sinner forgot all about his phobia. An adrenaline-fueled spring in his step, he walked around to face the opponent’s now exposed undercarriage, took careful aim and delivered the killing blow through where two large plates of chitin came together.

Once again, the blade on his pole sliced all the way through, burying itself in the sand.

The severed head rolled forward, away from the thrashing trunk, and then it was over.

Out of the corner of his eye, Sinner noticed a bright orange spot popping up against the dull yellow of the surrounding dunes. A container. That meant the battle was truly over, and the monster’s final convulsions were just that—the residual motor reflexes of a body already dead.

The corner of his other eye caught more sand movement a little to the side—some thirty steps away, down the slope. A pair of monster claws were hastily clearing a hole large enough for the body they were attached to. And then there was more movement to the left. Another scorpion.

What was this place, Klendathu? Was he now in Bug City, and the creatures were simply having their afternoon siesta down below? But why here, of all places? What was there to eat for these large, prehistoric animals in a barren sea of sand?

But apparently that wasn’t the question the puppet masters bothered asking themselves. They could easily clone as many monsters as they needed too, and all of those would somehow manage to keep kicking until the tier flooded.

Gorging themselves on an occasional loser here and there.

Now there was a suspicious movement in two other places.

Sinner stuck his guandao into the sand and pulled his bow off his shoulder. A hunting arrow at the ready, he waited for the scorpion to emerge almost in its entirety.

This was going to be a point blank shot, and besides, he was aiming for what looked like the most vulnerable spot. He didn’t miss, but, as luck would have it, the arrow ricocheted off, as if hitting a thick steel plate, and disappeared among the distant dunes somewhere.

How could that be? Didn’t his guandao go through the first scorpion’s shell like knife through butter? And with no perceptible resistance, either, as the blade was slicing through? He only winced in disgust as the carapace cracked and bits and pieces flew around. So in theory, an arrow should have pierced the bug’s armor just as easily as a stitching awl would go through pork fat.

Sinner pulled out an armor-piercing arrow and waited for the insect to completely dig itself out of the sand and rush up the hill. He needed to know how fast the creatures could move.

And fast they were indeed. He’d have to put any further research on hold.

Sinner let loose.

With a loud crack, the arrow hit home, going about a third of its length in. The scorpion stumbled and fell on its underside, its legs flailing, kicking up a cloud of sand. But it was no use. Whatever machinery the beast had inside was now hopelessly broken. Yet, no container materialized, so the bug could not yet be written off for good. Still, Sinner had no time to finish it off since there was yet another contender coming up, and a couple more further away who were now almost in the clear.

Jeez, how many of them were there? And in the middle of a desert, of all places! Were they having a mating period or something?

“Damn it,” Sinner cursed, not even realizing he was speaking out loud. “What is this place, you bastards?”

Anywhere he looked, the sand was now moving. Dozens of these horrible creatures, it seemed, were hastily making their way to the surface.

Did he even have enough arrows?

Seeing that a regular hunting stick didn’t penetrate, he might well come up short. And if he did, then what? Swing his guandao all the way down? That would work with single specimens, or perhaps even two at a time. But three would already be a tall order, and he’d likely get pinched by those monster claws or struck with a stinger. There was no doubt in his mind that monster scorpion venom would kill him in seconds.

Once all of his shields were triggered and deactivated, he wouldn’t even have time enough to reach for a detoxifier.

Or perhaps he could beat it back down, into the surf and try to hide there. In a quieter spot somewhere, where he could stand comfortably among the waves.

But what if those damn scorpions had no issues with salt water whatsoever?

Well, he figured, he knew what...

Chapter 5

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Skeleton Coast

A Rookery of Bones

Sinner did in fact run out of arrows, but strangely enough that did not affect the effectiveness of his tactics. Killer shots happened rarely, with one container materializing for every four or five arrows he spent, give or take. But those arrows, even where they did not kill, would also inflict serious injuries, essentially putting those clipped scorpions out of action. Some of them could still crawl, slowly and with apparent difficulties, while others couldn’t even do that.

Sinner ignored the injured ones. When one of the bugs drew close, he would simply move a dozen or so steps away and continue shooting its still unmolested brethren. His focus was on the new entrants that had just extricated themselves from the sand completely. They were fast; he wouldn’t even think of trying to outrun them. However, the bugs seemed to be just as small in the brain department as they were ugly and followed the same linear attack tactic, which made them easy targets. You just needed to let them come close and aim for the head—preferably for its snub-nosed frontal part. Miss that—and even an armor-piercing arrow would often ricochet.

In the end, Sinner completely exhausted his supply of arrows, but by that time there was no able-bodied opposition left. Everywhere he looked, wounded bugs were either thrashing in place, furiously, or crawling slowly at a snail’s pace.

It was now time to make use of his guandao. Unlike with the arrows, the chitin armor stood no chance against the high-quality steel blade. The cracking sound was nauseating, but aside from that, it was like chopping potato chips with a cleaver.

Once again, Sinner commended himself for having decided on a blade with a long wooden handle. Some of the scorpions were so large that reaching them even with the longest of swords would be impossible without dangerously exposing his precious self to their stingers or claws. The guandao was a game changer. There really was no risk.

Towards the end of the mop-up, Sinner felt mortally tired. The day was a real scorcher—think boiling cauldrons in hell for the worst of sinners, sans the water—and physical exertion was a sure way towards a heat stroke.

He had to stop to take a breather, using the occasion to think through his most recent actions. On the surface of it, it did not look like he had been doing anything wrong, chopping off the frontal part of the scorpion bodies. Though he was thinking of it as the insect’s head, Sinner knew it was actually the belly or something to that effect anyway. That was where the jaws and the animal’s largest and strongest chitin plate were. That was also where the claws were attached to the body. So it looked like he was actually chopping those large trunks almost in half that way, which required a mighty blow and took a considerable effort.

He decided to see if a simple puncture wound would do the job and immediately realized how much energy he had wasted with all that chopping earlier. Yes, it took two or three thrusts at times, but even then those took much less of him, and in the end the bug would still be just as dead. To be sure, that only worked with injured bugs that could not offer much resistance, but that was all there was left anyway.

In another few minutes, the battle was over. There didn’t seem to be any more contenders coming, and of the fallen ones, even those whose bodies were still twitching had a victory container next to them.

Sinner took the count: just under three full dozen. He wondered if some of the insects had gone into hiding since at first it seemed there were many more of them. Did they run away screaming? Unlikely, to say the least, and besides, he would have noticed.

But either way, the results were impressive enough, especially for someone who used to get almost panic-stricken at the mere sight of a large cockroach.

Sinner hastily emptied some of the containers into his backpack, attached some unopened ones to it on the outside, and grabbed the rest to carry them in his hands. He did not want to stay on that dune for another second if he could avoid it. He’d sort his loot out down below, he told himself, where there were no scorpions, it seemed.

He had to admit even the sight of dead monster bugs made him cringe.

Even if their bodies contained the choicest of expensive ingredients for making all kinds of things and potions, Sinner would not touch the carcasses with a ten-foot pole. One had to draw that line somewhere.

Let them rot.

He did not want to have anything to do with them.

Reaching the little depression from where he had called Lynxie and where he then spoke to Tark, he kept going. His hands felt like they were burning and he wouldn’t be able to wash them clean in a million years. But it got better once he scrubbed them with sand and rinsed them thoroughly in sea water. It was only then that Sinner finally picked up his phone.

You have killed an antagonist: a common beast.

Common beast: Armored Scorpion of the Desert. Caste: none. Level: 19.

Boosts: substantially enhanced protection against physical attacks from a distance; improved seismic sense; enhanced resilience to poisons; considerable scare factor.

45 points received.

+206 to Karma.

The Armored Scorpion of the Desert is now listed in your extended rating.

Come again? Level 19? The difference from Sinner’s own fifteen wasn’t all that great, but he was the crème de la crème of the ratings. Most other Challenge participants were hopelessly lagging behind and an encounter with such a mighty beast would be quite an ordeal for them. Getting ambushed by an entire troop of monster scorpions would mean certain death.

There was not even a hint in the tier description that one could face such a high risk of dying here after the first few steps.

Or was it his “hard” option in action? That was altogether possible. Although for him, Sinner knew, it wasn’t really much of a life or death situation. It wasn’t a walk in the park, but still, he had not a scratch on him. He managed to get out easy indeed, all things considered, Sinner told himself. With the kind of weapons and skills he had now, he could certainly handle even much more serious opposition.

But what if it wasn’t about his personal hard start? What if such strong adversaries were a common thing here? That would mean the grueling battle he had just fought would be a near hopeless exercise for others, with precious few chances of success.

Sinner suddenly felt like calling Lynxie again, but then he noticed a message from Tark on the screen, received a few minutes earlier. He must have been scrubbing his hands at the moment and missed the phone’s vibrations.

Tark to Sinner.

Lynxie is fine. She’s sitting tight, waiting for a girlfriend of hers. The other girl is on the way and close. They will soon be joined by a good guy I know. Once they are together, they’ll be fine, and then, hopefully, I’ll put them in touch with others from the old crowd. We are trying to come together, all of us. At the moment, the situation is unclear, but it looks like we are scattered all over the place. No one heard anything about your Skeleton Coast. No one knows what kind of place it is. But I’ll keep asking.

Sinner wanted to write back that Skeleton Coast was a place one went to when nature was calling but decided against wasting a message on a rant.

He still had nothing to say to the point. When he did, he would, he told himself.

He took a gulp out of his bottle, taking note, to his dismay, that there was much less water remaining in it now. In such heat, he really needed to be very careful with his water. He should have waited until the evening for his next swig. But how could one possibly do that when roasting alive?

He’d have to take frequent dips in the sea, perhaps. That wouldn’t be particularly expedient, but it would cool him off and slow dehydration down.

He took his camouflage throw-over out of his backpack. Naturally, the Brown Beige Green pattern wouldn’t offer much of a disguise against the light yellow sand, but he could definitely use some sun protection.

If he knew where he was going, he would have spent some points and got a heat reflective blanket. There was one on the store menu at the Launchpad, but back then, he laughed it off. As a disguise, that would only work against someone completely blind, if that.

Well, he shouldn’t have laughed. It would come quite handy now.

Sinner had a careful look at his victory messages. He was right all along: the opposition’s levels were frighteningly high. Nineteen, it seemed, was the lowest, and there were plenty of twenties, quite a few twenty-ones and twenty-twos and even one twenty-three.

He checked the overall Tier Two ratings. It wasn’t just curiosity alone. Getting a perspective could pour some light on whether it was him alone who hit the ground running from the first moments or it was a common occurrence.

He skipped the top murderer list, which wouldn’t tell him much. Checking the point ratings, he saw himself at the very top of the list. The nearest runners up were a couple of absolute unknowns whose names he did not recognize. Judging by those, one was an Asian, the other clearly a European. But they were both still lagging behind by almost a factor of ten, so the drastic difference could not be explained by Sinner’s higher bonus multiplier.

Therefore, he must have been the only one to have chanced upon rich hunting grounds from the get go and managed to take full advantage of it. In other words, what had just happened to him could not be construed as business as usual on Tier Two. Not yet anyway.

Sinner looked into some of the containers. The loot appropriately matched the strength of the game. Every bug earned him seven to eight dozen development symbols and over a dozen of level signs. Even though his overall loot multiplier was now down to one and a half from two, he could not yet tell much of a difference in terms of the absolute totals. The most likely reason for that was that each of the beasts he had vanquished had at least three upgrades, which always resulted in a higher amount of loot being awarded for the victory.

Plus he had his own hard start bonus. It all added up.

Now Sinner also knew the secret of why his arrows could hardly break through the beasts’ armor while his guandao crushed them like they were egg shells. All of the scorpions had the upgrade one could call an archer’s worst nightmare: additional protection against physical attack from a distance. No, Sinner checked himself, “nightmare” was too strong a word. The chitin carapace could and did get penetrated. It was more like a nuisance. Besides, the upgrade did the bugs no good in close encounters.

Overall, all that new information was not particularly valuable. Sinner had no desire whatsoever to go back up the dune for another round of hunting. The loot was indeed good if you stumbled upon a nest of those buggers, but that alone did not look like much of an incentive.

Sinner threw a sideways glance at the pile of arrows he had extracted back from the dead scorpions. There was the reason for the feeling his hands were never coming clean again.

The very thought that those arrows would have to be washed, too, made him nauseous.

He’d take another moment and get right down to it, Sinner told himself. And then get going west. Along the shore. Looking that way, far away in the distance, he could see outlines of rocks and boulders, not unlike giant fingers reaching up into the sky. Whether there was water there remained to be seen, but at least there would be shade.

* * *

Sinner was facing a rock. Lashed by the winds and scorched by the sun, it had long lost its natural color, blackening up instead, as if baked in an oven, for which reason it stood out against the background of wet sand even from far away. Regardless, it was still going strong, valiantly holding back the attacking sea waves. The rock’s smoothed out front face extended some seventy yards out into the water while the bulk in the back reached some thirty yards high, producing the overall impression of an invincible bastion guarding the shore.

The sideways view from the desert was not too shabby either. This was the first place so far in Sinner’s recent experience where sand had to make way for stone. It also looked like further west the coast became rocky, which was hopefully a good thing.

Sinner went up where sand met stone, almost on a discreet borderline. There was plenty of stone rubble of all sizes scattered around the place and bedrock outcroppings abounded. This was a much easier terrain to follow than sand dune slopes.

Having finally climbed the large stone tooth rising up above the desert, Sinner looked further westward. His earlier guess was correct. Only an occasional sand tongue here and there would reach the water edge going forward, and most of the beach was rock. Or rather, there was no beach as such, not even of a pebbly kind. It was just solid rock: a string of humongous stony pillows, tightly huddling together against the assault of violent waves. And upon those, there were hundreds, if not thousands of sea lions, or others such animals Sinner could not quite recall a name for.

And there were also scorpions. Unwittingly, Sinner ground his teeth: it seemed like there was an ugly bugger hiding under every sizeable boulder and every rock outcropping.

He squatted to minimize his own size as a target and gave the sea lion rookery a closer look. The animals seemed to be at piece, yet he could see quite a few gnawed skeletons interspersed among them. Some looked quite fresh, implying the animals had met their demise a considerable distance away from the water.

There were even more skulls, individual bones and fragments thereof. So many, in fact, that at times no rock could be seen under an almost continuous cover of off-white shards. It seemed thousands upon thousands of animals, year in and year out, would end their earthly journey here, and the elements would then take their toll on the lifeless bodies.

It appeared the scorpions, too, were lying in wait for any occasional mammal that foolishly strayed too far away from the sea. However, as hard as Sinner tried, he could not see a single bug venturing close to the surf. The sea lions couldn’t be too stupid either, so, one figured, they’d stay close to the water or bolt right back towards the surf line at the first sign of danger.

So how did the monster insects catch their prey then?

That was the question.

Sinner shrugged to himself. In all fairness, that was something for the sea lions and scorpions to worry about. What about his own problem though? It seemed he could forget about moving further west along the coast. Once he was down from his commanding height, in a mere fifty yards, he’d have to tiptoe over sizzling hot rocks, hoping the scorpions would not sense the vibrations. But each of those buggers, his victory messages said, had heightened seismic sense—which was what had alerted them to his movements up that sand dune in the first place. The closest bugs must have reacted first, and then, one by one, the entire neighborhood joined the party, digging themselves out of the sand ASAP.

But that wasn’t the worst of it yet. A bit further inland, the sand once again took hold, either covering the underlying coastal rocks or replacing them outright. No one could tell how many scorpions would be lying in wait there. If he could see what looked like dozens in front of him, in the sand, the count would probably be in the hundreds.

So why didn’t these bugs on the coast retreat back into the desert? Were they the hungriest or something?

The answer was right there, on the surface, just as the bugs themselves were. Shade. They were all craving shade. Apparently, even those nightmarish creatures hated the midday sun.

Sinner shuddered thinking of what might be transpiring in this place in the relative cool of the night.

No wonder the entire coastal strip was blanketed with a layer of bones.

He had to give it to the puppet masters. When creating the stage set, they missed no details. It was all as realistic as it could possibly be, regardless of what he had thought or said out loud in anger when he fought his battle at the top of the dune. Having populated this section of the desert with myriads of scorpions, they did not forget about their sustenance. Now he had no more questions about what it was that the buggers were eating.

That was quite a lively habitat here, between the sea and the sand, and the description did not lie when it said opportunities would be endless here. The sea lions could yield so much loot he would need a truck to haul it all away. And then, there would still be scorpions.

To be sure, they said Tier One also had some rich hunting grounds, yet Sinner could not remember seeing anything of the kind himself. The crocodiles at the reservoir, perhaps, but those reptiles had very tough hides and could prove to be more trouble than they were worth. The sea lions, on the other hand, could be easily slaughtered en masse using regular hunting arrows. They did not seem to have any protections at all. The real problem could start if they all began fleeing in panic, seeking salvation back in the sea. On the other hand, they could not stay in the water forever, and besides, the stony shore seemed to stretch for as far as the eye could see. If he scared this particular rookery off, there would be others down the line.

But having stumbled upon these fantastic hunting grounds gave Sinner little joy. What was he going to do anyway? Try sneaking through without disturbing the scorpions? Well, he was not so sure about his stealth abilities. And there was no doubt in his mind that sooner or later he would make a mistake and find himself surrounded by a cohort of bugs, venomous stingers at the ready.

Merely thinking about it put him on edge.

Damn that phobia!

And the nights would be even worse. Scorpions on Earth were usually active and out in force at night. These buggers here couldn’t be all that different. There was a reason they sought shade and hid under boulders like some kind of ugly crabs. They simply waited there for the sun to come down, so that they could have them a run at the rookery. Trying to sneak past them at night would be totally out of the question.

What if he turned back, went around the promontory and headed east? But the scraps of information they had given him before the action started left no doubts in his mind as to the most inconvenient truth.

No matter where he’d go, this was not a good place to be.

Sinner’s memory, both visual and verbal, tried to serve bits and pieces of a conversation from way back, but the entire picture still wouldn’t emerge in full.

There was an endless sheet of snow-white plastic. There were two chairs. And two men. Or rather, two creatures, one of which was him. Not quite yet the hapless, disenfranchised participant by the name of Sinner, but half the way there, in his new life.

So who was that stranger next to him then?

“I would like to be able to say that being on my side would make it easier for you, but, alas, that wouldn’t be true,” the man said back then. “Or rather, not quite true. But from what I have learned about you, being on my side might well be what you would want. So, if you join my side, your launch won’t be easy. You’ll find yourself in an unsafe place and in unfavorable conditions. And this will be the case time and time again. I’m talking about tactical vulnerability that could kill you instantly, at the very beginning of the Challenge, or at the beginning of every new tier. But you will have a strategic advantage that will help you move up and ahead with a lesser amount of effort. If you survive at the beginning, it’ll prove helpful to you in the future, and on each subsequent tier.”

Indeed, that seemed to be the case. In Tier One, Sinner was not offered any choice at all and found himself in a beautiful yet very inhospitable place. At the tip of a narrow, rocky promontory. He could not go back into the water patrolled by the Sea Guardians, and then ran into his first gaki while trying to find passage on land. And now he was almost sure that had he managed to avoid those, there would have been something else—something preventing him from leaving his place of disembarkation. So he had to sit tight in place—until his phone started broadcasting and Draco’s gang showed up on the scene.

This time around, the geography differed but the situation was quite similar. The Guardians would deny him access to the sea, and he had no hopes of being able to go far, proceeding over the stony strip along the surf-battered coast. Cracks and wet vertical rock walls would stand in the way. He would thus only be able to move across the sands further inland, and God only knew what that would look like at night. Furthermore, relatively safe passage would lie along the very outer edge of the rookery, where the sand met the rocks, because in the desert proper the scorpions would really make short work of him. No, he was not walking across those dunes again, thank you very much.

Once was enough.

He thought of heading east once again. Nah, logic suggested there would be more of the same there, seeing how he was meant by design to find himself in the most inhospitable places ever.

Looking around, Sinner rested his eyes on yet another “stone tooth” some fifty yards away. Badly eroded over the years, the butte now had an intricate shape of a slightly inclined finger some ten yards high and no more than three yards in diameter in its thickest part. At the top, there was a flat landing, good for standing or even lying down. It wasn’t quite a soccer field, though it would still offer enough room to bed down with comfort.

Sinner threw another glance at the closest scorpions lying in wait.

And what if..?

Chapter 6

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Skeleton Coast

The Most Disgusting Massacre Ever

The butte did not just have a weird shape. The surface texture was no picnic either. As if corroded by a strong acid, it was all rough and bumpy, with deep cavities (vugs, Sinner’s memory obliged, serving up a term he once knew) and such, yet the rock itself was hard and solid—not a limestone of any kind. There were plenty of spots to grab at or set a foot in. That was what made the entire undertaking feasible. Having sprinted across the open space that separated him from the foot of the butte, Sinner climbed to the top easily enough. The secret was not to look down or sideways.

Reaching the top was paramount. He did not need any distractions or sudden bouts of acrophobia.

Falling all the way down would be a real bummer.

Only when taking a breather on top of the butte did Sinner look around, studying the approaches to it from all sides. Just as he expected, the scorpions that were biding their time in the shade did not ignore his sprint. What he failed to anticipate was that not only the bugs sitting closest would show interest, but that a veritable avalanche of agitated arachnids would come down from all around—maybe from as far away as fifty or even a hundred yards out.

Some surprise it was alright.

On the other hand, that might not be such a bad thing at all.

If the bugs could feel their prey from so far away, this might well save him a sprint or two. Picking his next stop carefully, and far enough away, he could then find himself in a good position to exterminate the maximum number of bugs around it before moving on to his next battle station. There were plenty of buttes and ledges here, so it wouldn’t be all that difficult to find good, defensible positions.

He hastily dropped his backpack, put his bow and arrows on it and then paused for a moment. The weapon would be ready for him when he needed it.

The last thing Sinner wanted was to square things off with the scorpions using his guandao. Staying as far away as possible from them, physically, would be a good thing for his mental health. Except that would be wishful thinking, of course. He did not originally have all that many arrows to begin with, and some of them broke during the first fight. And he could not make any new arrows since there didn’t seem to be any resources available around here. His geology skill was telling him there may well be an ore vein somewhere nearby, but what kind of ore it was remained a mystery.

But the main issue was wood, of course. And besides, not just any kind of wood would fit the bill. He needed a very special variety suitable for the purposes of the Challenge.

Again, just as Sinner expected, the scorpions proved to be very adept at climbing up vertical surfaces, although—thank God for small favors!—it took them longer than it would their smaller brethren on Earth. Apparently, it was a matter of their much more substantial weight. Still, not even most experienced rock climbers would be able to catch up with them.

The bugs were not climbing, they walked, the tips of their legs making good use of the uneven stone surface.

Sinner identified the most enthusiastic of the bunch and then waited until it almost made its way onto the flat landing at the top before chopping through one of the claws along with the entire frontal part of the body with a mighty swing. Shifting to the side, he immediately stabbed the next bug.

And on it went. The scorpions were all on the heavy side and not particularly agile when climbing. They made good speed but were still not fast enough for Sinner to be unable to control all of the approaches to his small landing.

He chopped and stabbed, chopped and stabbed. Ordinarily, he did not even try to inflict a mortal blow, which would just be a waste of effort. A serious injury was enough for the animal to fall down onto the sharp rocks below. Many would then just remain where they fell, their legs twitching, and then a container would materialize. Others found enough strength to try to repeat the ascent. But they were slower, and it was easier still to dispatch the injured ones once they came back up.

Sinner made a mental note to find a higher butte next time. Considering the scorpions’ not insubstantial weight, they would accelerate further when falling and hit the rocks below harder, so there would most likely be no need for any additional mop-up.

He began checking out the outlying rocks in search of his next position. Luckily, there was plenty of choice, with elaborate rock formations extending on and on along the shore, as far as the eye could see. It was as if the puppet masters had placed their monster collection of stone “icicles” along the coastal strip specifically for that purpose—all the more so since there were none in the desert further inland or out at sea.

Even though the scorpions attacked in force—a much larger force than Sinner expected—he had no problem handling them all. Ten minutes later, he descend, measuring his every step, and dispatched those who were still alive but could barely move.

Then he picked up the containers, quickly sorting the loot out. Everything, except the level signs and development symbols, went into the same pile. There was a combat axe among the items, which he deconstructed, adding the resulting resources to his other trophies.

Sinner used a simple trick Demon had taught him to minimize the volume of level signs and development symbols without reducing their number or value. Indeed, who but the traders would face such a problem regularly, facing the limits on the number of challenge items they could carry? Whoever it was who said necessity is the mother of invention.

It worked like this. Let’s assume you have a hundred level signs with a face value of one each. Ordinarily, that meant you had to haul around a hundred small items, which, with an initial limit of one hundred and fifty, was quite a serious number. Add to this bits and pieces of other stuff accumulated along the way, and you are suddenly facing the risk of things beginning to fall out. What would you do then?

To be sure, you could put them all into a container and invest in your own progress. The trick was writing on the container that only one point was to go towards development—and voila! Once the container disintegrated, you had your “change”—a little horseshoe with a face value of 99.

And it would only count as one small item.

That’s what Sinner did. Luckily, there was no shortage of small containers, and he could not take them all with him—not even using the “nesting doll” method.

Done sorting his loot, he sat down in the shade under a rock and allowed himself a couple of swallows of water. Hunting here was like hunting in hell. Heat exhaustion was not only real—it was a major factor. To make matters worse, the earlier wind had died down, taking its cooling effect with it.

His phone buzzed, and he reached for it.

Tark to Sinner.

Lynxie has rendezvoused with my guys. They are doing fine. I keep asking around about your Skeleton Coast. None of my guys are there, but one of them can see what looks like the edge of a desert further east. Not sure about sand dunes though. If he reports seeing any there, I’ll let you know. And there’s also some mountains to the northwest of him. There’s one with a double top, and you can see it very well. He says it’s like a crab claw. If you can see it too, then we’ll have a general idea of where you are. Let me know if you do.

Sinner sent a message back, asking if anyone had seen any scorpions the size of a small calf. Tark responded immediately. Had any of his people come across any such thing, they would have told him about it right away. He also said everyone was busy exterminating all kinds of antelopes, zebras and even giraffes. There were quite a few of them in places. Some reported seeing large cats, but so far no one had had any close encounters with those.

Sinner wondered about his luck again: some were accumulating loot hunting peaceful herbivores, while his own opponents were such that he wouldn’t wish them upon his worst enemy.

He checked the point ratings and frowned. Tireless Asians were moving up, drastically reducing the earlier gap—regardless, mind you, of the little fact that he, Sinner, had just dispatched fourteen scorpions.

What were they doing out there? Whacking zebras by the herd?

Anything was possible, which meant he had better get moving, rather than chill out in the shade. If he was not altogether unlucky, he would reach those wonderful lands sooner or later and get so many containers on the way that the competition would simply turn green with envy.

* * *

The cycle repeated itself again and again. Sinner would dart from one conveniently located butte to another, climb to the top and begin killing scorpions that were never too far behind. None of the bugs ever had a chance to use their claws or stingers. Attacking from the bottom up, they were a pitiful sight, and definitely no match against Sinner’s blade on a pole. Sending yet another batch packing, Sinner would hastily collect his trophies, minimize the volumes to the extent possible—and then a new round of same would start.

But he did have a few harrowing moments. The culprits in all of them were smaller scorpions that were much darker—almost black—in color. Whether it was on account of their lower weight or for some other reason, they moved much faster than their larger brethren. They literally sprinted up those vertical buttes with apparent ease.

Sinner did not like that, not one single bit.

Luckily, there were not too many of those fast movers there. Having learned his lesson during his first encounter with this more dangerous subspecies, Sinner kept his eyes open for them at all times and gave them first priority.

Man can adapt to almost anything. A few hours later, Sinner’s only complaints were being thirsty and tired. He now had to ration his water out in drops since there was no sources of resupply in sight. The heat, however, sucked the moisture—and energy—out of him faster than ever before.

He still did not think the huge scorpions were pretty, but they no longer put him on the verge of fainting. In fact, Sinner almost made his peace with them. Well, sort of. In any case, he did not have any more nausea spells when facing the buggers.

Give it another day, he told himself. Or two. He’d grow to like them.

But perhaps not too much.

The sun was leaning down, but the heat only abated somewhat. By that time Sinner had already opened his second, and last bottle of water, realizing, he was not going to make it through another day like this. Swinging the heavy guandao in the heat was not a particularly forgiving task. His body required tons of food and water to replenish.

He didn’t have much of an appetite, to be sure, so the real big issue was water.

To his surprise, even using his amulet, he could not see anything new to the west. The elaborately carved rocks and stone pillows seemed to be stretching out for miles and miles ahead, all the way to the horizon. And that was it. Move on, move on, folks, nothing to see here.

What he could see, in fact—just before the sunset burned itself out—was a string of mountains in the north. Or rather, he noticed them earlier, during the day, but at that time he could not quite tell if they were real or a fleeting mirage over the desert.

How far away were they? Fifteen miles? Thirty? Forty? Sinner did not know. He suspected the mountain range was not just there as a part of the stage set the puppet masters thought some sensitive souls might find alluring; it might well be the border between different zones. There was a chance terrain would be different on the other side—with plenty of water and no overgrown arachnids.

But that remained to be seen. The puppet masters’ logic here was as obscure as ever. On the one hand, they tried to make it all as real as possible, but on the other... monster scorpions? Does that sound real to you, comrade? In theory, such creatures could have existed on Earth millions of years ago, when the composition of the atmosphere was different and other conditions favored large arthropods. In the subsequent eras, their size progressively went down.

But here, all of a sudden, they had no problem breathing, even though the air felt like, well, regular air.

Now, wasn’t that weird?

Sinner knew that if he didn’t find water tomorrow, he’d have to drink from the sea. That was not good, but it was not like he had a better choice. It was definitely better than drinking his own urine. Besides, he could try to beat the adverse effects down using detoxifier pills. He had three of those, plus his bracelet would offer some body purification too. However, whether it would all help was purely a matter of speculation at the moment. The pills would likely reverse the poisoning. Quenching his thirst would be a different matter altogether. So he’d just waste the effort and valuable drugs.

It was bound to get cooler at night. It would then take less of him—and less of the moisture remaining in his body—to fight the bugs. If he could still keep going, that is. Boy, was he tired!

He needed rest.

Sinner recalled that on Earth scorpions were at their most active at night. He was also well aware of how many of them were lying in wait under rocks around him.

The last thing he wanted was to face a hundred of those nightmarish creatures in complete darkness.

Sinner untied the rolled sleeping mat he had attached to the side of his backpack and spread it out on a pile of dry seaweed he had fetched from the rookery, scaring off a bunch of sea lions in the process. Done with that, he positioned a number of large “signal stones” along the perimeter of his makeshift bed. If he rolled at night, Sinner figured, he’d bump into those first and wake up. And if he didn’t, hopefully, they would still prevent further rolling and the impending fall.

The operative word, of course, was “hopefully,” but sleeping on top of the highest rock in the neighborhood had its dangers. One could not only suffer broken bones. One might well find oneself going through a brand new launch again.

If the Resurrection Altar worked, that it.

* * *

Sinner woke up in the middle of the night. No, his body was not pushing against his sharp safety rocks.

It was the sound—the familiar rustling and intermittent knock-knocks.

Scorpions!

But how could it be? He had selected the highest butte in the area. Before mopping up the approaches to it, he took care of the more outlying sections first, leaving at least a couple of dozen dead bugs behind. It was all clear around his nightly abode, so nothing should have attracted any more bugs from elsewhere. He also rubbed the soles of his boots on wet seaweed, so that the smell of iodine would eliminate any scent of the human body.

And yet, the damn bugs had somehow sensed him. Judging by the sound, there were at least two of them climbing up.

It really wouldn’t be a good idea to just roll to the other side and go back to sleep. Scorpions didn’t climb to such heights for fun. There was something here that had attracted them. The problem was not going away all by itself.

He’d have to do something.

Up in the sky, among the loose spread of unfamiliar constellations, the crescent of the Moon was approaching its zenith. Back in Tier One, some of the stars looked familiar, but here it was totally uncharted territory. Except alien astronomy was not at issue now. He simply needed some ambient light. Of which, unfortunately, there was precious little.

Pressing his body against the stone surface, his guandao at the ready and head on a swivel, Sinner was all eyes, ready to catch the moment when the first of the scorpions raised its ugly head over the edge of the platform. The secret would be to see the bug before the bug saw him.

A huge claw shot upwards, blocking the Moon. It must have been the largest one he had seen so far, or perhaps it was his sudden fear that had such big eyes. Leaving the search for the answer for a later moment in time, Sinner slashed at the ugly extremity, almost severing it, and then, reaching forward, followed up with a blind thrust at where the beast’s body should have been.

Something cracked and gave way, and he knew his jab went home. The next moment, there was no more resistance at the end of the pole as the bug must have tumbled down.

The second scorpion, upon sensing (or perhaps even hearing) human motion up top, redoubled the effort and almost succeeded in climbing onto the landing. That was where Sinner’s mighty blow caught up with it, sending the bug straight down, the way of the first assailant.

Done with the pair, Sinner cocked his ear. After two large, juicy crashes down below (big buggers, too, eh?), the sound of chitin plates breaking clearly audible in the silence of the night, it was all quiet again.

But then... huh? There was more rustling, and then the revolting knock-knocks followed. And grew louder and more frequent. Coming from all around.

Damn! He was being surrounded by scorpions! And it looked like still more of them were converging on his butte.

Dealing even with a pair of them at night wasn’t exactly child’s play. Sinner didn’t mind the cool, but having some light on would definitely be welcome.

He shook his head and slapped himself on the right side of it lightly. Maybe it was just his sudden bout of panic playing tricks on him. Perhaps it was nothing more than a pair of stragglers having chanced upon his high-rise camp during their nightly wanderings. But no, there was no mistake. The sounds were now loud and clear, and there were more of them too. In a moment or two, the entire landing would be overrun by those record-sized bruisers looking for a midnight snack. If the bugs rushed him from all sides at the same time, fending them off with his lone blade would be a fool’s errand.

He wouldn’t last long. It would only take one massive claw or one agile stinger.

The rest of the flock would easily overrun the wounded human, flooding his body with a hundred times the amount of venom his modest body mass commanded.

Then a light bulb went off in Sinner’s mind. Wasting no more time, he reached into his backpack, commending himself for his quick thinking. Among other incidentals he had acquired at the Cube, there were some chemical light sticks. At just a few points per box, they were cheap as dirt by the Launchpad’s standards. He remembered contemplating the purchase back at the time. Why would he need glow sticks when he had a flashlight in his phone? Then Sinner recalled that one time on Tier One when the shiny little things proved their worth during the quest Xiao had given him. All right then, he told himself, naturally, there might be plenty of uses for them down the road again.

He bought an entire box—and boy, was he now glad he did!

Cracking one stick after another, Sinner began throwing them down, in a loose circle around his butte. They were not all that luminescent, but hopefully, he’d be able to discern the silhouettes of the scorpions climbing onto the landing against the solid wall of shimmering light, however meager. It wouldn’t be the best set-up ever, but it was still better than nothing.

The little fireflies descending from the skies piqued the scorpions’ interest right away. But it waned just as easily once they checked them out. Instead, they picked up pace climbing Sinner’s rock.

Sinner’s ears told him there were more bugs down there now than the sum total of what he had seen during the entire day. There was no point saving his arrows now, so Sinner made a few shots, aiming for smaller bugs. He could not tell their color in the dark, so he figured those that moved the fastest would be the particularly dangerous kind he had encountered earlier.

Then it was his guandao’s turn.

The butte he was on was about as high as a five-story tenement, which would delay the beginning of the all-out assault by another few minutes. The top was also too large for Sinner alone to defend the perimeter effectively. In hindsight, that was definitely an oversight on his part. He should have selected more unpretentious grounds for his last stand.

Sinner stepped up towards the edge and lunged, throwing one of the fast buggers down.

“The opening shot,” he had a moment to think, and then he was smack in the thick of it.

He chopped and stabbed, chopped and stabbed. Stabbing and jabbing was easier, especially when working from the top down, but not always possible. With the bugs pressing the attack up on all fronts around him simultaneously, at times, it might seem to an outside observer there was a windmill up there, turning like crazy. Except, of course, a windmill Sinner wasn’t, and swinging his guandao non-stop was quickly taking its toll, draining the last of his strength.

But with up to three bugs entering the landing at the same time, he did not have much of a choice.

There was a moment when he found himself facing four. He handled them all just fine, but while he was at it, yet another fast one emerged from behind, and it was truly a miracle Sinner avoided getting stung. The sneaky bugger soon followed the rest of them on their way down.

Minutes became hours, and Sinner was still at it—stabbing and chopping, stabbing and chopping. The stimulant pill he took, and then another, had long become a distant memory. They were not much help to begin with, and he didn’t have another one anyway. All he had left was the injection from his bracelet, but he was saving that for his “broken arrow” moment.

It was not that the injection was strong enough to give you wings and fire breathing capacity, but it could surely mess with your head in unforeseeable ways. He might begin hallucinating, Sinner thought, or getting strange ideas, some of which could be stupid or outright suicidal. The last thing he needed was to start making mistakes. Even one could well lead to his bones becoming part of the sprawling graveyard around him.

He definitely did not care about making himself dinner for the ugly arachnids.

Fat chance, buggers...

Dispatching yet another pair of scorpions, Sinner jumped off to the opposite edge of the platform. There had to be another one there by now, he figured.

What he found instead was a surprise.

Naturally, not a pleasant one.

An angular silhouette flashed against the surreally pale glow of the sticks. In a suicidal pirouette, one of the more dangerous fast buggers jumped, pushing against a rocky protrusion, stretching its claws out in the process. Had Sinner been wielding a sword or a similarly short blade, he might have been able to parry the lunge, if not thrust or push the scorpion off the ledge. But he wasn’t, and for once, his long guandao happened to be not up to the occasion. He was now a crucial split second short.

All he could do now was jump back or sideways, and he almost managed to pull it off.

But not quite. This must have been a smarter bug, and its stinger lashed to the side—rather than upward and forward, over the head, which would be the bugs’ standard tactic. That was an unexpected change from the order of battle so far. Apparently, such a move wasn’t quite comfortable for the scorpion and it lost its balance and tumbled over the edge of the platform, going back down with no assistance from Sinner. But not before the stinger hit home.

The blow to Sinner’s outer thigh was so hard that he went down on one knee involuntarily, unable to stifle a yelp of pain. His entire leg from the waste down instantly paralyzed with what felt like liquid fire in his veins, Sinner blinked, because the night suddenly grew pitch black, all sources of light, meager as they were, now distant history. For a moment, he thought he had gone blind.

Yet his mind remained crystal clear. Guided by tactile memory, Sinner’s hand reached into the right pocket in his cargo vest and found a detoxifier.

It only took him a second or two to stuff the pill into his mouth and swallow it. But in a battle like this, a second might well be a century. A number of scorpions, having reached the edge of the platform unopposed, rushed him from different directions. As his vision cleared, Sinner realized he did not have time enough to push them all back.

In desperation, he swung the guandao in a circular motion, as if it were a scythe, and never mind the proper technique, putting all his remaining strength into the move. Two of the bugs, slashed horizontally, went back over the edge right away. Dropping the weapon, Sinner drew his stump of a shotgun from its holster on his injured thigh and discharged a load of buckshot at two more assailants climbing the opposite edge of the platform.

Dropping the firearm, he went back to swinging and slashing, screaming in pain and anger.

He truly hated himself at that moment.

Idiot! What a damn, hopeless moron! How could he not notice that all of his deflective shields were discharged and down! All along, he was facing mortal danger as good as naked—and remained blissfully unaware of it.

Indeed, one should make other, more sensible uses of one’s head, rather than just shove food into it. He had had other, less fateful brushes with the scorpions’ combat appendages earlier, and those were absorbed by his shields, which went down one after the other, leaving him more and more exposed. And how many did he put back on?

One! Just one lousy little shielding in all that time!

How was that for automatic defensive thinking?

Apparently, his skills still had a ways to go.

If he survived the night, that is.

His body energy now replenished, Sinner put on the entire complement of shields and continued fighting the bugs off.

Getting hit again now wouldn’t be much of a big deal.

Sinner promised himself that if he stood fast and pushed the new wave of the attackers off, and then the next one that must have now been approaching the edge of the platform, he’d take a painkiller pill. Those were even rarer than detoxifier pills, but the moment called for one, desperately. He was about to lose consciousness, and if he did, that would be the end of the battle, period.

No one would let him stay down for ten seconds before awarding the bugs a knockout. This was by far not a fair fight in the ring.

It seemed the scorpions somehow sensed that the man on top of the butte was on his last legs. To an outside observer, it might now look like the rock’s walls were covered with a gyrating, continuous layer of chitin as dozens of freshly arriving insects joined the fray, rushing upward with no concern for safety, pushing and shoving, knocking slowpokes down and then tumbling themselves on occasion. Quite a few must have tried to race upward over others’ heads because, as Sinner could see, sending one of the bugs down often caused a cascading avalanche with a half dozen other bugs following suit.

The light sticks were also beginning to dim. Or rather, they were still glowing fine, but with a pile of dead bodies at the foot of the rock growing, some became buried completely, while others, though still radiating from under mutilated carcasses and debris, looked dimmer and far less effective. The exact body count down below after hours of non-stop action up on the platform was anyone’s guess now.

The wound on Sinner’s thigh did not only hurt like hell but was bleeding badly as well, sapping the last of his strength. Luckily, a momentary lull in the onslaught—no more than a few seconds, if that—gave him a chance to reach for a painkiller or a healing pill. He grabbed both.

There were hardly any of them remaining.

The attack resumed in earnest. The butte Sinner was fighting on had visibly grown in diameter, the uninterrupted layer of chitin on its walls now three or four specimens thick. Bottlenecks caused perceptible swells, which would often be followed by massive slides, with multiple bugs falling down, unable to hold on to the undulating mass of their brethren underneath. Aiming the weapon now became superfluous since every random jab, poke or slash invariably hit home. But that didn’t help much as two new bugs rose up where one fell. The battle was clearly entering the endgame. Sinner could hardly stand straight anymore and knew it would be mere minutes until he couldn’t.

He was on the verge of being overrun.

Yet he still kept fighting.

Suddenly, his waning consciousness caught a slight change in the surrounding scenery. Sinner looked east and knew immediately what it was. The sky above the sea, still invisible in the darkness, began to turn grey. Based on his daytime observations, they had to be close enough to the equator, so the pre-dawn twilight wouldn’t last long.

The sunrise was coming. Once it did, hopefully, scorpions, as mostly nocturnal creatures, would lose their unbridled enthusiasm. Plus there would be plenty of natural light to replace the dying glow sticks, most of which had been hopelessly buried under piles of stricken bugs anyway.

He just needed to hold for a tiny little bit longer.

As if to prove this to himself, Sinner gave a desperate, angry battle cry to squeeze a bit more strength and confidence out of his bone-tired body. Staggering, he took a swing and chopped yet another advancing scorpion in half, and then used his foot to push one of the last large chunks of rock remaining on the platform into an intertwined, undulating mass of scorpions emerging over the edge on their way up. The twitching mass disintegrated, as if hit by a cannonball, individual bugs tumbling down one after another in a spectacular cascade.

Dragging his injured leg, Sinner limped towards the edge again, preparing for another swing—and froze.

What he saw made no sense at all.

There were no more targets to hit. In the dying glow of the light sticks and the strengthening luminescence of the approaching sunrise, Sinner could clearly see the wave of attacking scorpions hastily rolling back. In what looked like a sudden bout of panic, the bugs were retreating hurriedly, jumping and crawling over each other, this time on the way down and out. The foot of the butte, now a veritable stampede for the exists, presented the most spectacular sight, as injured scorpions down below were being crushed by their unmolested brethren, sagging deeper into the rapidly compacting pile of dead chitin.

Disbelieving his eyes, Sinner walked along the entire perimeter. The picture remained the same all around.

The bugs were hastily fleeing.

Sinner looked to the east. The sky there was now brighter still but not quite ready yet to explode with sunshine.

Anyone in Sinner’s shoes would rejoice happily at the sight of the enemy retreating just when all hope seemed to be lost—except Sinner himself, of course. Oh, no, he was too paranoid for that, always expecting some kind of funny business.

No, it wasn’t the approaching sunrise that scared the bugs off.

That had to be something more monumental. After all, they were almost there. There were hundreds upon hundreds of them, and they held all the aces. In another minute, they would have rolled over him by dint of their sheer mass. And there was precious little he would have been able to do about it. In fact, Sinner was not quite sure why he even remained standing—still standing, that is.

And they gave it all up in a jiffy. Why?

A glowing stick down below blinked one last time and went out, and then another one. A third got blocked altogether by yet another dark, immobile carcass. Able-bodied scorpions that only a few moments before were crushing each other at the bottom of Sinner’s rock were now all gone. Only the dead and the badly injured were left behind, spread around in a thick layer, some twitching impotently, their legs and tails still wiggling somewhat, yet no longer of any practical use to their owners.

And stepping right over that cracking mass of chopped up or crashed bugs, something truly humongous was getting closer.

Something really, really horrible.

In the dying glow of yet another stick, Sinner got a momentary glimpse of a claw. Except that wasn’t the right word, perhaps. More like a claw on steroids, or a claw squared, or Cubed even. Yes, it was that big. Butterflies in Sinner’s stomach fluttered en masse. The largest of his nightly visitors so far, which unpleasantly surprised him with its sheer girth, seemed like small fry when compared to this particular scorpion king. Sinner’s entomophobia, seemingly gone for good after the long battle, came back with a vengeance.

No, this just couldn’t be! No such giant things could have possibly existed on Earth even hundreds of millions of years ago when size really mattered.

That simply made no sense. That was just him, Sinner, seeing things through the eyes of his fear. The bug was but a figment of his badly swollen imagination, at best.

And then, as the monster reached the bottom of the butte and began climbing slowly, Sinner could finally see it in its entirety. Alas, there was no mistake. If anything, he had underestimated the size.

The creature was larger than a fully grown, seasoned bull. With claws that could easily snap a man or a sea lion in two, the venom in the bug’s stinger was probably superfluous altogether.

Sinner threw the last of his cannonball stones down.

It bounced off the bug’s armor with a loud bang, which was just about the only effect.

Sinner grabbed his bow. The more damage he could inflict on the monster while it was on the way up, he figured, the less he would have to strain himself when it came down to swinging his guandao.

He sent his first arrow down.

It ricocheted.

He sent another.

Another ricochet.

Damn! Armor-piercing arrows were bouncing off like they were toothpicks. And the monster never even noticed. As large as it was, the bug was not particularly agile and moved slowly. Yet its confidence seemed rock solid. Apparently, it had no doubt it would get the human just fine.

Sinner had no such doubts either. Almost none, that is. Due to his returning fear of bugs, now a thousand times stronger than before, he was just about certain this was not going to end well.

But one still put one foot in front of the other, no matter what. Sinner froze on the edge of the platform, guandao at the ready. He figured the beast’s claws were so long that his strike from a distance advantage would now be all gone. He’d have to fight the scorpion on an equal footing.

The outcome of such a “fair” fight would be quite apparent, Sinner thought. He had lost before the fight even started. Avoiding such a quandary was the entire point of trying to shoot the bug down on its way up, from a maximum distance. But what had worked against regular scorpions, including the larger specimens, failed spectacularly this time around. This really had to be a very special bug.

Sinner waited for the monster to close the distance to the minimum. In a moment, the bug would be just about ready to grab the injured man with its claws. It was now or never.

Complex situations sometimes call for fairly simple solutions. Swinging the guandao above his head once, Sinner brought the weapon down in a straight vertical blow, like he might when driving a crowbar into an asphalted surface.

And drive it he did—into the bug’s head.

The scorpion tried to bring its claws up to parry the blow, but being as heavy as it was, it moved slowly and found it difficult to hold on to the vertical rockface.

The tip of Sinner’s guandao went straight into the bug’s maw, getting buried deep in the monster’s throat. Having squatted as he struck, to maximize the force of the impact, Sinner now tried to straighten up again, but the weapon got stuck in the wound and wouldn’t budge. In the next split second, the scorpion jerked, once again trying to bring its claws to bear. All Sinner could do was let go of the shaft and jump away from the edge.

But chasing the human away cost the insect dearly. Badly wounded, it exerted itself too much and began losing balance, while desperately trying to grab at the edge of the platform. But to no avail: loose rock it was trying to hold on to gave way, and the insect went down hard, hitting the ground with a loud thump. Apparently feeling the tremor, the panicked sea lions at the shore gave a loud round of barking.

If Sinner’s luck held, this might well be the end of it. The scorpion weighed at least a ton, and falling down onto sharp rocks from the height of several stories was bound to inflict some serious damage.

In the tottering light of the early morning, Sinner could see the monster’s legs and claws moving steadily. Then, rolling haphazardly onto its belly, the beast took a few seconds to right itself and then began heading back towards the rock surface, ready to resume the climb. One could see the bug was badly wounded, but it still had quite a lot of fight left in it. For the moment, it was just progressing upward—slowly but with great dedication. Sinner realized it was not the victory he had hoped for. It was anything but.

And what was he going to use to meet his adversary again? The bow? Pfft, it was but a peashooter under the circumstances. And his guandao, stuck in the front of the monster’s head, was still there, sticking out like the bowsprit of a tall ship. Which did not seem to bother the bug at all.

There were no more large chunks of rock left, but a few smaller pieces were still scattered around. For lack of anything better, Sinner tried to use those. They banged loudly, hitting the bug’s armor, as if announcing to the world the futility of this desperate gesture. The bug seemed oblivious to that small caliber fire one way or the other.

Watching the monster approach, Sinner assessed his chances of pulling the weapon out of its body successfully. They were not very high. Doing so would take time, and in the meanwhile, the humongous claws would reach him before he could grab the wooden handle. Based on what he saw so far, the bug moved quickly enough for that. He could put trust in his deflection shields—but would those last long enough?

And if they would, would the guandao be of much use? It was stuck deep inside the beast’s body, yes, but with no apparent effect on the creature. It seemed falling off the top of the butte had inflicted much more damage on it.

Once again, steeling himself, Sinner stepped up to the edge of the platform, waiting for the scorpion to approach—and then squatted sharply, at the same time stretching his arm out. The next moment, he tapped the thick carapace lightly. Luckily, none of his shields triggered. So far, his luck held.

“Research it!” he commanded as his fingers reached the hard surface.

And almost choked as his epic skill illuminated the details of the bug’s innards, as if it was a map of some kind. To be sure, the nasty display would kill even a much less squeamish person’s appetite for days.

But he saw what he needed to see all right, and never mind the filth and the gore.

The scorpion’s head was indeed one of its weaker spots. But the real Achilles’ foot, the vulnerable node that, if stricken, would kill the beast instantly, was in the midst of soft tissue underlying the thick chitin shell. The blade of his guandao, though sitting deep enough inside, missed the crucial spot by a hand’s width, veering off sideways, along the inner surface of the carapace.

In all fairness though, Sinner could not even be certain that hitting the soft spot would in fact kill the bug quickly enough. But he figured repeatedly striking the vulnerable zone multiple times, rather than just once, would make final victory much more likely.

That was what he was betting on anyway. Yes, it was a big risk, and on the surface of it, it seemed like total folly. But all his other options were worse still. Much worse.

Besides, there was no time left to think of anything better. The beast was already emerging onto the platform.

Pretending to be scared out of his wits, Sinner took a step back. Or rather, he did not even have to pretend much. It came out quite natural anyway. Who knew, perhaps the creature could read emotions. Let it think then that the prey is totally demoralized and will not be able to mount any serious resistance.

It appeared that even though Sinner’s guandao missed the vital nerve center, it did do some damage to the beast’s left eye. Moving forward, the bug leaned sideways a little, partially turning to the left. Quite possibly, it could now only see well out of its good eye.

But enough was enough. Sinner was done backing off. In the next split second, he rushed the bug. The platform, large as it was, was still fairly small, and half of if had already been occupied by the scorpion. Sinner squeezed the max out of what little territory he had left. He zigged leftward, and then zagged to the right, successfully missing the striking claw and positioning himself on the bug’s left, where it could not see very well. The insect’s other claw held on to the rocky surface, helping propel its massive body forward, so it could not be used for another strike quickly enough.

Pushing off the ground hard, Sinner sent himself flying in a powerful jump, at the same time drawing his knees up to avoid hitting the handle of his guandao stuck in the bug’s maw. The maneuver worked, and he landed successfully atop the broad chitin plate that protected the monster’s entire front.

Loath to waste even a second, he immediately rammed the blade of his Bowie knife under it, through a seam on the edge, at the same time leveraging his entire body mass to pull the chitin plate back, detaching it from the underlying tissue.

His body shuddered from an electric zap—one of his shields had been triggered. The protective field held, but it still couldn’t absorb the force of the blow in its entirety. Sinner felt himself getting pressed into the bug’s carapace so hard that his mouth could taste the horrible goo now gushing from under the armor plate. As his research scan had shown, the seam between chitin plates, into which he had plunged his knife, was also a vulnerable area, but he would need a much longer blade—or much more time—to inflict any serious damage.

He had neither.

Sinner tensed, twisting the knife sideways in the wound, at the same time holding the edge of the plate back, preventing the gap from closing. The scorpion must have finally realized what was happening, as it brought its stinger to bear again and also tried grabbing Sinner’s legs hanging on both sides of the guandao’s wooden handle. Another one of Sinner’s shields went with a sharp buzz, but it saved his legs. The beast, grabbing the wooden pole instead during the commotion, did not seem to realize its claw was off the mark and let the guandao’s handle have it instead. It was now racking it back and forth, causing itself unspeakable agony in the process.

While it did that, Sinner, having lost count of how many zaps he had felt and how many shields were still remaining, yet desperately hopeful there would be enough of them left, drew his shotgun and stuck it all the way into the hole carved by his knife between the two armor plates. His hand pushed and pushed through the soft flesh, bringing the barrel closer to the ruby-red core pulsing with what seemed like the bug’s very life. If his aim was true, the scorpion would inevitably suffer a quick death.

The chitin plates creaked and rustled, rubbing against each other as the bug raised its tail for another strike.

But the barrel of Sinner’s gun was now just inches away from the beast’s “heart”.

And then Sinner’s trigger finger contracted, pulling back.

Chapter 7

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Skeleton Coast

A Kingdom for a Drink

You have killed an antagonist: an elite beast.

Elite beast: Horrific Scorpion of the Skeleton Coast. Caste: none. Level: 39. Boosts: enhanced stamina; advanced chitin armor; improved night vision; heat vision; sharp response to distant sources of light; enhanced sense of smell; substantially enhanced protection against physical attacks from a distance; improved seismic sense; enhanced resilience to poisons; considerable scare factor; superior running ability on any horizontal or near horizontal surfaces; extreme venom toxicity.

117 points received.

+846 to Karma.

The Horrific Scorpion of the Skeleton Coast is now listed in your extended rating.

As Sinner was reading and rereading his victory message, he couldn’t stop shaking his head. What seemed like a heroic deed at the time turned out to be a fairly mundane matter. The final opponent he had taken for a rare monster turned out to be a regular common beast, or at least fairly close to it.

There was nothing below a common beast, right? Those were the most basic and numerous creatures around. The next level up was uncommon beasts. The name was misleading since those were still quite numerous, although they counted under a higher category. The tiger Sinner vanquished at the very beginning of Tier One was one of such uncommon creatures. Back then, him and everyone else had precious little to boast about in the stats department, for which reason that victory of his made such a splash. The puppet masters broadcast the news publicly.

That was the first time Sinner gained some fame.

Now, the elephant from the busted cell phone store was an elite beast. On the other hand, the snake Sinner managed to kill in the mountains on Tier One was in the “rare” category. That was the top fourth category, one step above “elite”. It warranted much more loot and unexpected, nice performance bonuses. But a giant scorpion visiting just before sunrise warranted nothing of the kind—if, that is, the beast was of a level close to your own. Big deal, it was just an opponent a couple of categories above common.

But wait—if the beast had a level more than double your own, that would be a rare feat indeed and worth a special mention.

Sinner checked his phone again. There it was, finally—a message like other similar ones he had gotten on multiple prior occasions.

Attention! This is a special message.

You have set a record among all the participants of your status on the current tier. Your victory far exceeds any previous victory by any Challenge participant of your status on the current tier (collectively as well as individually).

Your prize: 340 points, 4,650 to karma, and a container.

This is an absolute record covering all the tiers completed by this particular group of participants.

Your prize: 1,210 points, 12,090 to karma. You can upgrade the rank of one skill no higher than rare (a rare opportunity).

You can upgrade the class of one skill no higher than brilliant (a rare opportunity).

Attention! This option will only be accessible for the next 24 hours. If not used by then, it will automatically get canceled. This upgrade can only be used for a skill, for which you have not yet begun developing the next rank (zero investment of development symbols at the current rank).

Attention! You can only upgrade the ranks of skills that you have already learned as of this moment.

Attention! To all the Challenge participants. A record has been set. Record holder: Sinner. Level: 15. Caste: none (feed (meat)).

Individual victory. The highest victory record among meat on the current tier. Individual victory over a foe with special abilities (Level 39 antagonist (elite beast).

This is an absolute record covering all the tiers completed by this particular group of participants.

Attention! This is a special message.

You have broken a record among all the Challenge participants. Your victory far exceeds any previous individual victory by any Challenge participant on the current tier.

Your prize: 580 points, 8,250 to Karma, and a container.

This is an absolute record covering all the tiers completed by this particular group of participants.

Your prize: 2,060 points, 20,260 to Karma. You can upgrade the class of one skill no higher than rare (a rare opportunity).

Attention! This option will only be accessible for the next 24 hours. If not used by then, it will automatically get canceled. This upgrade can only be used for a skill, for which you have not yet begun developing the next rank (zero investment of development symbols at the current rank).

Attention! You can only upgrade the ranks of skills that you have already learned as of this moment.

You can also upgrade defense or attack of any item by one rank (not applicable to shooting weapons or battle whips).

Attention! To all the Challenge participants. A record has been set. Record holder: Sinner. Level: 15. Caste: none (feed (meat)).

Individual victory. The most effective winner among all the Challenge participants on the current level. Individual victory over a foe with special abilities (Level 39 antagonist (elite beast).

Attention! This is a special message.

You are the ninety-eighth participant to have defeated an elite beast, the eleventh of those who have done it individually, and the second participant to have done it twice.

Your prize: 1,070 points, 9,880 to Karma and a choice of a container with a large number of level signs or universal development symbols. Attention! This option will only be accessible for the next 24 hours. If not used by then, it will automatically get canceled.

Come to think of it, it was not really such an out of this world record. As far as Sinner knew, there had been a few victories over Level 34 creatures in Tier One. Thirty-nine was not all that much further ahead. Still, the puppet masters decided the accomplishment was worth special recognition. They may have been a bit skimpy with the rewards this time, but one could never be sure.

No one knew how the prizes were calculated and awarded to begin with. So far, he, Sinner, had not been able to discern any particular logic there.

He skipped reviewing his victory feed for the rest of the scorpions in detail. Judging by how slowly the scrollbar moved on the screen, it would go on for miles. One thing he did learn was that nighttime scorpions varied a lot, some of them being substantially stronger than the ones he encountered during the day. The numbers were indeed endless since it seemed hundreds of scorpions that met Sinner’s guandao and fell down succumbed to their injuries later.

Indeed, piles of their remains down below spread out as if someone had rolled out a large grisly carpet around the place.

Oh, and they were just that, scattered remains, rather than relatively intact corpses. It appeared all of the hoi polloi of the bug society that had scattered when their king showed up on the scene came back later, once it was gone. Except this time around, they did not try climbing Sinner’s butte again but rather held an after-action party, devouring their fallen co-tribalists.

But once again, there were a lot of them, and they were all hungry. From the top of his rock, Sinner watched them having their innocent fun until the last of the scavengers crawled away, dragging their bloated bellies along with substantial difficulty. Most of them sought shade or dug themselves into the sand, wary of yet another upcoming scorcher.

Indeed, the sun that had just risen above the horizon was already getting the knack of it, inundating the entire coast with its murderous rays.

And Sinner was now thirstier than ever.

He looked down again, at the freshly cleaned boneyard liberally dotted with bright orange spots. There was not a single live scorpion remaining there.

Casting a glance at the nearby sea, then at his remaining water, Sinner realized he would need to start experimenting.

Right now.

* * *

The experiment headed south from the very beginning. He did not even have to waste a detoxifier on it since his body rejected seawater after the first gulp, his stomach sending it right back up.

His innards seemed adamant about it: dying of dehydration would still be preferable to drinking THAT.

So all he really managed to achieve was scaring off the poor sea lions again.

Speaking of that...

Sinner gave the apparently well-fed animals at a not so long a distance rom him an evil look. What if he shot a couple and drained their blood? Would it do him for water?

At the mere suggestion of still more experiments, Sinner’s stomach acted up again.

Incredulously, Sinner shook his head. His options were really simple: either lie down and die or his body would need to shut up and drink what he gave it.

He went back to his rock and sat down in the shade, no longer bothered by the remains of the scorpions piled up around. At least the events of the previous night taught him to take a simpler, less squeamish view of such inconvenient facts of life.

He picked up his phone and finally checked the message he remembered receiving as, doubled over, he was violently regurgitating half a pint of seawater mixed with bile.

Tark to Sinner.

Man, did you make it your life’s goal to drive those Chinese runners up nuts? Ain’t you something, buddy?! I mean, duh, congratulations are in order, and all that, but maybe you should at least take some rest at night before you go cuckoo yourself. I keep asking around about your Skeleton Coast. My guys decided against going to check that desert out. They say it’s hard going. How are you doing out there? Have you found out anything? If you haven’t, there’s no need to respond. Just check the ratings. You’ve shot up like a rocket. Me, I really want to find that Skeleton Coast now. I don’t know why you don’t like it there. The loot must be out of this world.”

Sinner was no longer wondering why no one knew anything about his particular area. It was clear the place was particularly nasty. But hey, didn’t he choose to go hard from the very beginning?

That he was now beginning to have some regrets didn’t change anything one single bit.

What was it Tark said? Finding a ray of sunshine even in the dark of the night was easy if someone told you where to look.

He pulled up the point ratings for the tier on the screen of his phone. He was leading the top five.

Sinner: 29,267 points

Chao Chan: 4,089 points

John Smith: 3,882 points

Ruby Dragon: 3,501 points

Ayumi: 3,489 points

His thirst was utterly unbearable, and he wasn’t quite thinking straight, being dead tired and coming off a massive amount of stimulants taken over a short period of time. Still, he couldn’t miss a number of meaningful and fairly surprising things.

It appeared he had made more points over the previous day and night than in the entire Tier One. And that was considering that rate wise, he was only getting three quarters of what they were giving him earlier.

Or perhaps it was more than three quarters, after all. The formula was more complicated since he was earning a personal bonus on this tier for the higher difficulty level.

But the numbers were still quite shocking.

One night and the entire tier were not even in the same ballpark. And he didn’t even have to go far.

How many scorpions did he get credit for? Sure thing, he could pull up the victory feed again, which recorded everything, or look at the ratings that showed the totals, but he decided not to bother.

What mattered was that there were a lot of them. Like, A LOT! Five hundred, or perhaps even more. And since most of them had all kinds of upgrades and a much higher level than he, Sinner, the rewards were appropriately high. Factor in the special bonuses for the records set, and voila. The total amount spoke for itself.

The second important point was that Chao Chan was still in the running, at number two, although this time his performance was but a small fraction of Sinner’s. Big difference! The result was still respectable though. Four thousand points a day was something most others could only dream about.

There was also that John Smith fella—an apparent newcomer who was nowhere to be seen in Tier One, not even in the Top Twenty. The guy must have simply chanced upon some rich hunting grounds with abundant easy game.

Sinner reached for his water bottle and took a minuscule swallow. As his thinking cleared a bit, out of curiosity, he checked the murder ratings.

Pornobunny: 8

Yuppy: 4

Cutter: 3

Takeshi V: 3

Ladyboy: 2

Naturally, Sinner himself was altogether absent from that count. For obvious reasons, too; he couldn’t kill anyone now even if he wanted to.

Sinner chuckled. How about that Pornobunny, huh? From the get go, the man was apparently trying to make up for missing the number one spot in Tier One. Judging by the numbers, this time he might well make it.

And no, Sinner was not going to be jealous.

He reached into his backpack, apparently searching for a small miracle. Like, say, a small water desalination plant.

But everyone knew of course that there were no miracles.

Come to think of it, he did have a plastic rain poncho that could be jury rigged to collect condensation. It might work, in theory, but the output of such a primitive set-up would be questionable at best. Plus he’d have to sit in one place waiting for enough water to materialize.

In a nutshell, going back to the shore, digging a hole in the sand and covering it with a sheet of plastic was not going to be a particularly promising idea. He’d keep it as his Plan B, Sinner told himself, to fall back on in the event he was all out of water and death from dehydration was imminent. But for now, while he still had some strength left, he needed to look for a better solution.

He picked up his bottle and gave it a sober look.

Only half-full, and his other bottle was already empty. Anyway one looked at it, the end of the line was drawing near.

So what was he to do? Push further west? Keep moving from one butte to another, fighting off the attacking scorpions? At least here, in his current spot, he had already decimated their population quite a bit and the bugs still remaining satiated themselves with the bodies of their fallen compadres, at least for a while. Hopefully, there would be no attackers crawling out tonight, wave after wave, to be then followed at dawn by yet another unimaginable monster double the size of the first one.

No, going west would be a nonstarter. There was nothing there for him. As he looked that way earlier with the help of his amulet, from the top of the highest rock around, all he could see was more of the same: the rocky coast with standalone high-rise buttes, stretching for miles ahead. Just the rocks, the sea lions, and the vicious scorpions. That’s all there was.

Going north would also be problematic. Sinner had no idea how far away the distant mountains were but he could well guesstimate the number of scorpions that would be waiting for him at every turn. Oh, and did anyone mention that lousy bottle of water that was only half full even if assessed optimistically?

Unless he was ready to just go and drown himself in the sea, the only remaining option was moving east.

The Orient, baby. Yee-haw!

But first he would have to sort out an entire mound of containers. The largest of them could probably be threaded together through the carrying handles and even serve to house subsequent loot, especially those with the warped space feature. Most of them, however, would have to be opened, emptied out, and left behind.

This, too, was fairly mundane work, which took quite some time. But at least it was satisfying.

* * *

The way back to the beach proved to be hard going. The day before, darting from one butte to another, Sinner had dispatched most of the scorpions lying in ambush there. He hoped he wouldn’t have to do it again today.

But that was wishful thinking, of course.

There were far fewer of them, to be sure, and in most cases Sinner did not even need to climb any rocks to fight the buggers off, resolving the matter swiftly in passing with his bow or guandao.

But even that took time, and a lot of it. At some point, he even thought he’d be better off wading away along the surf line. The scorpions usually broke off the chase once the sea lions they were pursuing went into the water, so perhaps, Sinner reasoned, they’d leave him alone too. Yeah, right. The next thing he knew, he had to take on three of them at the same time, smack in the middle of the foaming waves.

Whatever their reasons, the bugs seemed to be prepared to follow a human much further into the water than when chasing sea lions.

Plus it was fairly difficult here to go much further in than knee-deep. The rocky bottom of the coastal cliffs that extended into the water tended to drop off abruptly not quite a yard away. With all the extra weight on him, Sinner thought, he’d sink like—well, duh!—like a rock before he could say Jack Robinson.

And there would be the guardians waiting to welcome him to the blue depths. They’d be really happy to see him.

The way east seemed to lie overland after all, as much as he hated the idea. So on Sinner went, slowly, fighting his way through and consuming the last of his water, gulp after tiny gulp.

* * *

It was way past noon when the rocks ended and Sinner finally reached the beach. Pushing back the burning desire to just drop where he stood and stretch himself on the sand, he dragged his tired bones further eastward. From what he could see, a few miles further out, the coastline made a blind turn.

What lay behind the bend was anyone’s guess since a number of closely sitting high dunes were blocking the view. If his luck held, there would be a blooming oasis flowing with fresh water on that other side.

If a miracle did happen, that is.

If it didn’t, he’d have no other choice but to proceed with that pitiful Plan B involving the plastic poncho. Or try digging a hole further away from the sea hoping that ground water there wouldn’t be as disgusting.

And while he was sitting here, on the coast, squeezing water out of sand just to ensure survival, the competition would continue amassing loot and pushing themselves further up. And then they would complete the tier and cross over, and the current stage set would go under.

And all the while, he’d still be stuck on this godawful, desolate beach no one even heard about.

He really had a bright future to look forward to, Sinner chuckled sadly.

The promontory was fairly long, and it was quite a ways to go before he would reach the magic bend. Sinner walked slowly, his head down, the tracker in his head automatically counting steps: three hundred fifty-six, three hundred fifty-seven, three hundred fifty-eight... If nothing else, that helped take his mind off his fatigue, thirst, the burning sensation in his eyes and throat, and the frequent spasms in his gut. Some of it may have been the aftereffects of venom poisoning, plus he really shouldn’t have tried drinking sea water, but for the most part, it was just him being dead tired and dehydrated. In all fairness, Sinner thought, if he died right here and now, he probably wouldn’t have any regrets later.

With the count reaching another five hundred—tada! Another five C-notes!—Sinner looked up. The picture was blurry and he blinked to clear it up. Nothing changed.

He stepped into the water, squatted, and scooped a handful from the incoming wave to wash up his face. Another handful went onto the top of his head. This was a quick and dirty way to prevent a heat stroke, and it worked, too, except by now his entire upper body covered with a palpable layer of salt residue was itching all over.

But the trick worked, and his vision was now back to 20/20. Sinner took another look north-north-east just to put all the checkmarks in their proper places, and not really expecting to see anything.

And froze.

He straightened up and had another look.

There could be no mistake. Even without his amulet, he could tell there was something there. Something new. No, it wasn’t an oasis, but still not something one would expect to come across in the desert. Now, would there be any water there?

That was indeed the question.

Chapter 8

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Skeleton Coast

Civilization Revisited

One could tell right away the setting for the Challenge Ladder’s initial tier was a well lived-in place. The coastal area where they had dropped Sinner had plenty of discarded plastic and other trash, and fairly modern buildings could be seen in the distance. From the very beginning, he was convinced that the unknown abductors had released him somewhere on Earth—in Southeast Asia, perhaps, or some place warm anyway.

Here, on the other hand, no signs of civilization could be found anywhere. Neither the sandy beach, nor the rocks before it had any signs of anything technogenic—no empty bottles, no fishing net floats, nothing.

It shouldn’t have been like that. Even the most remote islands where hardly anyone set foot, ever, would have plenty of trash brought in by the sea. There was no such thing as pristine on Earth anymore. People, ocean currents, and winds made sure of that. Not even the hard to reach parts of the frozen wastelands on the poles were an exception. The Antarctic did better than most other locations, but untainted it wasn’t either.

Once on Tier Two, Sinner didn’t really give it much thought. So there was no trash. All right. Or rather, it was even a little sad since one man’s trash, as everyone knew, could turn out to be a treasure trove for others.

Turning around the bend, he was now witnessing signs of civilization—for the first time. To be sure, what he saw was not anything screamingly modern, but it wasn’t some primitive stone cleavers or arrowheads either.

What he saw beached onshore was a ship. Sinner knew little about modern seafaring, and that went double for seafaring of old. All he could tell was the ship looked like a sailboat from the Middle Ages. A frigate?

A sloop?

No, sloops were supposed to only have one mast. This one had three.

A barque then? Or a galleon? Probably the latter, Sinner thought. Barques would be more modern than the truly ancient design he was now looking at.

But he couldn’t be sure. He’d be able to tell a yacht from a destroyer, but that was as far as his knowledge went.

Whatever that thing was called, the important part was that there was a sailboat half a mile away from Sinner—the kind of boat they had not built on Earth for at least two or three hundred years.

And besides, the boat was still operational, or rather, could be made operational, it seemed, seeing how it was now onshore, and apparently for a reason.

It was definitely not a wreck. The anchor was pulled out on purpose and grounded securely at the foot of the closest sand dune. Not only that, but the crew seemed to have used a winch and a bunch of roller logs carefully stacked alongside, all of them cleared of the bark and well polished, to pull their vessel out of the water and onto the beach.

Only the stern was still in the shallows, the incoming surf foaming all around it.

On the other hand, the ship seemed well traveled and badly damaged to boot. All the three masts were broken in midspan and would require serious repairs to make the vessel seaworthy again. The highest of the three stubs had some sails jury rigged to it, which was probably how the crew had managed to bring the vessel to shore after it was damaged on the high seas.

And there was something else, too. No matter how hard Sinner looked, squeezing his amulet chain, he could not see any sailors, dead or alive. Not that the ship looked long abandoned, but there wasn’t anyone around.

Now, what kind of a ship would it be without a crew?

Sinner stayed in place for an hour or so, watching, yet there was nothing happening. Nothing suspicious anyway.

Still, he suspected a trap of some kind. But what could he do? Approaching the ship inconspicuously, so as to stay out of sight of anyone lying in ambush just wouldn’t be possible. Nor did trying to bypass it over the scorpion-infested dunes in the back strike him as a particularly brilliant idea. Go back? Now, that was not even funny. There was no way back—not with several miles of sand stretching behind, followed by many more miles of coastal rocks that would surely be his undoing once the night fell.

What lay ahead, on the other hand, was very tempting. There surely had to be water among the ship’s stores.

But even if there wasn’t, he’d still have to push forward. Going back was the worst of his options.

* * *

The closer Sinner got, the more details revealed themselves. It appeared the crew had not only brought the ship’s anchor onshore but dug quite a few holes as well. There was also plenty of stuff scattered around, and some of the items looked vaguely familiar. But it took coming closer still for Sinner to finally realize what he was looking at.

Those were not just holes. They were graves. There were four of them, distinctly separate, and they were not individual. With the crude crosses on top knocked down and plenty of rags and human remains scattered around, it appeared the graves had been raided, the unknown perpetrators having dug the dead bodies out, ripped their clothes off and gnawed rotting flesh off the bones. Goodness gracious!

Sinner ventured a guess that the original grave diggers and the subsequent brazen exhumers must have been totally different individuals, and he soon found corroboration for that, such as chitin carapace fragments, apparently smashed with some hard implement. Or by a much larger claw.

So it appeared people that were still alive buried their dead comrades, and then scorpions came and feasted on those. And then chased human flesh down with that of one of their own. That he hadn’t seen a single scorpion over the past few hours did not mean a thing. Looking further east, Sinner could tell the rocky terrain resumed about half a mile out. If there were sea lions there as well, they’d provide an ample source of food for a healthy bug population.

Scorpions on Earth did not need to eat every day. They could stuff themselves solid once and then stay under a rock for a month digesting the haul. If the local bugs were from the same mold, every mile of the coast could support hundreds, if not thousands of them. His experience from the night before firmly attested to that.

It also suggested that the arachnids became active in the dark and were quite capable of traveling from far enough away, converging on any single spot in force. That they were not here now did not mean they would not be coming at night.

Having given the beach another cursory look, Sinner focused on the ship. Getting on board was not going to be difficult. The crew had conveniently left a ladder of rope and wooden planks hanging from up top, its bottom part firmly grounded in the sand for better stability. They must have had plenty of timber aboard judging by how much of it was used to outfit the ladder.

On the downside, as Sinner was climbing up, all that wood was creaking like there was no tomorrow, so he had to assume anyone still on board—if there was anyone there, that is—would be warned of his impending arrival.

So there was really no point wasting time, trying to remain unannounced.

After a few steps up, Sinner abandoned any attempts at stealth and got his bow ready instead. There was plenty of room on the main deck for a bow shot, but none were required. Everything—winches, rope coils, broken-off mast tips, and what not—were neatly stowed away. There were a few ancient cannons sticking out the gun ports on the side.

But there were no people.

Sinner contemplated going down to the lower deck. The space there would be much more constricted, so his bow would be useless, his guandao following closely behind. His Bowie knife would be his only weapon. Well, that and his fists. Sinner’s paranoid imagination conveniently painted a picture of a boarding team hiding under the planks of the upper deck, their swords and cutlasses gleaming meekly in the poor ambient light, their blunderbusses and pistols at the ready.

Sinner’s own arsenal was just not designed to go against all those goodies. It was simply not intended for fighting in close quarters.

Upon reflection, he decided to leave the lower deck inspection for later. For the time being, there was an easier target: a door to the superstructure on the stern.

And what a door it was, too! Massive, with rich gilded carvings all around and a polished bronze handle, it had to be leading to the captain’s quarters, no less. Or at least the officers’ mess room. Definitely not anything for use by the rank and file.

For a second, Sinner considered using his Research skill to see if there was anyone hiding on the other side, and decided against it. The skill still wasn’t good enough to scan the entire ship, and doing it piecemeal made little sense. He figured he’d better save the energy, just in case the situation deteriorated.

He put his bow away and grabbed the guandao. Holding the weapon at the ready, Sinner pushed the handle down with its tip, and then deftly hooked the shining bronze and pulled the door back.

It didn’t yield at first, but then something on the inside gave way sharply, and the door flew open—with a double bang and in clouds of gun smoke escaping. Someone inside must have let go with an ancient double-barreled muzzle loader.

Before Sinner could commend himself for being such a suspicious old bugger, there was a volley of savage yells from behind, followed by the sound of running feet. The stairs leading from the hold down below had apparently been commandeered by some very aggressive folks that were anxious to get up onto the deck.

Squeezed between that rapidly approaching posse and the shooter or shooters still hiding in the mess room, Sinner did not have much time to strategize.

Acting on autopilot, he crouched and lunged for the door. But contrary to his expectations, there were no more shoots. There was a tall, broad-shouldered man in the room dressed in some kind of a richly ornate Medieval waistcoat. He had a well-groomed face with sharp features and a neat triangular beard going all the way down to his chest. One could tell the man was no commoner by the very way he comported himself—which was corroborated by his attire, consisting of many separate items, many of which Sinner wouldn’t be able to name even if his name depended on it.

What he could tell was that this properly outfitted gentleman was engaged in something he really shouldn’t have been: ramming a new load into the barrel of a flintlock pistol with a cleaning rod.

Without straightening himself, Sinner thrust his guandao on the diagonal, from the bottom up, catching the man in the lower abdomen, and at the same time twisting the blade as it hit home. Aiming higher wouldn’t be advisable, he figured, since a noble, such as this naval officer, might well have a short cuirass under his clothes. But this way, the blade went in as if into butter and must have wreaked havoc with the poor sob’s innards.

Indeed, the shooter went down like a sack of potatoes and lost consciousness right away.

Immediately, Sinner turned around—and quite on time, too. There was yet another guy with a Don Quixote beard emerging from the manhole below him, except this one, in all fairness, was not much of a dandy. All he had on was broad, screamingly red pants and a sleeveless leather vest with no shirt underneath. On his feet, he had some kind of moccasins, rather than fancy tall boots the officer wore. This sea devil was suntanned in the extreme—to the point that Sinner would probably find it difficult to notice the man at night even in broad moonlight.

In his left hand, Mr. Red Pants had an incredibly massive harquebus with a thick barrel that, upon emerging from down under, he immediately began setting on some kind of a forked pole. The man’s apparently malicious intent made Sinner worried, so he abandoned his now immobile quarry in the mess room and darted towards the manhole on deck.

Without further ado, he hit the harquebusier with his guandao, as if with a battle axe, and the man went out cold, his head now not unlike a ripe watermelon cracked in two from the top down.

But there were already three replacements behind him, all of them with long firearms, which they immediately dropped without firing, two of them drawing short cutlasses and the third a small hatchet.

Sinner gave them a vicious grin and charged, his guandao engaging all three at the same time. The men must have thought he was the devil himself because they jumped back straight away to save themselves from the opening stage of such a relentless attack.

Except the guandao was longer, and Sinner was faster. The next moment, one of the sailors fell, his chest slashed open. The second made the mistake of trying to attack while Sinner’s weapon was seemingly stuck in his hapless comrade’s body.

Except, of course, things are seldom the way they appear, and the guandao could go out just as easily as it went in. Egressing, Sinner slashed the brave seaman on the thigh and then finished him off with a lunge at his neck as the man began leaning sideways, his injured leg no longer providing any meaningful support.

The third man retreated so far that for a split second Sinner wondered if perhaps the fella thought they were actually in a running race. Ready to oblige, Sinner prepared to give chase, but at that moment a firearm went off behind his back with a loud bang and he felt the electric buzz of one of his deflective shields responding. To add insult to injury, the bullet caught him as he was just about to sprint, his body almost airborne at the moment.

It took Sinner a tremendous amount of effort to right himself, but right himself he did.

The fleeing sailor, apparently deciding a man with a bullet in his back would be easy prey suddenly reacquired his courage and charged with a savage yell, swinging his cutlass. Sinner almost enjoyed the sudden grimace of sheer amazement on the man’s face as his guandao slid in between the opponent’s ribs, collapsing his lungs and nipping his scream of pain in the bud.

Turning on a dime, Sinner faced another bearded noble, not unlike the first one in both his attire and facial features, his hand hectically working a pistol, which was still smoking.

Sinner had time to wonder why, instead of dropping the now useless gun and drawing the thin, long blade from the sheath on his thigh, the man went about reloading the pistol. But judging by how fast he moved, he was much better at it than the first shooter, so Sinner would probably have to take that for an answer.

In any event, the man was still dangerous.

Sinner noticed the second officer’s clothes were very much in disarray: buttons undone, his bare chest apparently unprotected by a cuirass or mesh, the wide leather belt unfastened.

Sinner suppressed the desire to reach for his shotgun. Instead, he swung and threw his guandao as if it were a spear. The weapon caught the man smack in the center mass, apparently knocking the breath out of him, because he immediately fell on his back and moved no longer, the guandao sticking upward as if it aspired to becoming a mast.

For a moment, silence descended, but of course, Sinner had never been much of a trusting soul, so he rushed forward, grabbing the shaft of his weapon, cutting its seafaring aspirations short.

Before he could pull the blade out, the dying man, blood foaming on his lips, tried to speak.

“Ateu...” he uttered.

And then a container popped up by his head. Sinner looked forward and saw another one, by the body of the first noble shooter.

There was still not a sound, and not a motion around.

It was either that Sinner had won outright, or the remaining sailors were in no particular hurry to engage the unknown devil who had just made brutal, efficiently short work of the rest of their fellow crew members.

But that was all right. If they were there, Sinner would find them. He’d have to search the ship anyway.

He had gotten here driven by thirst. Now quenching that thirst would take precedence.

Chapter 9

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Skeleton Coast

Wise Decisions and Horrible Nightmares

As it turned out, the ship had no water. Like, none at all. Just about the only sign that they used to have it was an empty barrel with a wet bottom. It was as if they had just finished the last of it—or even poured it all out to make sure Sinner did not get any.

Arrrrrgh!

In the mess hall, he found a bunch of bottles and a carafe. An empty carafe, to his chagrin. The bottles were no help either since all of them contained either wine or some kind of low quality rum.

Sinner wasn’t much of a drinker, and besides, consuming alcohol would sooner cause more dehydration than help quench his thirst.

But Sinner did not despair. There was no need to. He now knew how to solve his water problem in a different way. Like, solve it for good.

He had a way now to manufacture his water. Lots of it. As much as he wanted. For as long as the firewood lasted.

Firewood, one might ask?

Yes, firewood.

While searching the ship, Sinner kept his eyes open for all kinds of things—not just water or hiding sailors. His mind was constantly churning, trying to figure out if what his eyes were seeing could be put to any legitimate use.

During his first trip back to the shore, he brought a large pot from the kitchen and some of the dishware. He then went back for a load of firewood—the same wood, he now realized, that was used for making the crude crosses on the graves.

Soon enough, a fire was burning under the pot, heating seawater in it. Under the pot’s lid, turned upside down, there was a bowl resting atop the carafe from the mess room, which happened to fit the purpose perfectly, size wise.

The cover was weighed down by a mound of wet sand, which Sinner watered now and then to keep it moist. Boiling water produced plenty of steam, which condensed on the cooler metal of the lid, with liquid water then traveling towards the lid’s center under the influence of gravity and dropping into the bowl.

It was a primitive enough system—the kind used in simple hooch stills at home. And the hotter the fire burned, the larger the output of this jury-rigged desalination plant was.

Although in theory the contraption would produce distilled water, in reality, the end product, while no longer salty, tasted very much of the sea.

But Sinner did not mind. The bigger problem was that he had to drink his water still warm, cooling the bowls off hastily in the sand pits he dug along the surf line.

The ship had plenty of firewood. Plus the ship itself was but a mound of burnable timber that could last him a year or more. The sea, too, could not be expected to run out of water. By Sinner’s conservative estimates, he would be able to produce two to three buckets of iodine-smelling distillate over any 12-hour period. Even in the hot climate of the current tier, that would be enough for at least a few people.

But Sinner did not have anyone else with him. He was by his lonely self. Now he’d be able to take a fresh water bath, if he so wished.

But as anyone would surmise, man shall not live on water alone. Having searched the ship some more, Sinner discovered several barrels with salted fish and pork. Both stank so much that Sinner’s eyes swelled with tears immediately. He couldn’t even imagine how anyone could stomach even a little bit of that filth. As a purely theoretical exercise, he wondered whether it was the product that had gone bad or he, Sinner, was himself a hopelessly spoiled product of modern civilization.

But there was also flour, hardtack, and some stone-like cheese that seemed to be OK. In the mess room, he found some candied fruit, cocoa powder and a hunk of very appealing smoked bacon. After a thoroughly satisfying large meal, Sinner continued inspecting his newly acquired booty.

His gut feeling was telling him there were still plenty of marvels to be discovered on board.

His phone identified the cumbersome long guns as flintlock muskets. Their bore was so large that in the modern world, they would surely count as artillery. They were heavy, too—twenty pounds, at least. Plus reloading those would be a bitch, what with the powder in primitive paper-rapped cartridges, and a load of buckshot or a slug with its separator wad, which needed to be dropped into the barrel separately through the muzzle and rammed down with a rod. Oh, and yes, some of that powder would have to go on the lock’s shelf, too. Gee, thanks.

Be it as it may, Sinner couldn’t help experimenting a little. The best reloading time he showed was just a tad under a minute and a half, but with proper training, this could still be improved.

But he had to admit the results were impressive. Although the heavy lead balls failed to go through the ship’s outer hull made of monstrously thick planks, they still left impressive jagged dents comparable to other mechanical damage that was probably inflicted by colliding with rocks or reefs.

Shooting a scorpion from fifty paces, unless, perhaps, it was the master arachnid from the night before, would definitely put the bugger out of commission once and for all. Assuming, of course, you could hit the bastard where it mattered.

That was good news, of course—but carry the big musket around? Sinner did not think so. And it was not even that he had no skill for rifles. One of the dead sailors dropped him a long gun book that he could learn in no time. But why bother, really? The unwieldy hand cannon weighed just about as much as a heavy machine gun—all for a single shot a minute with a short enough range and dubious accuracy. No, that did not sound like a winning proposition at all.

But it still wouldn’t do leaving such goodies behind. The muskets, cutlasses, axes and harpoons he had collected from different parts of the ship were all Challenge items and could thus be deconstructed to produce ample resources. Including those he could use to make more arrows.

Additionally, while inspecting the hold, Sinner found a case of empty metal cylinders and balls filled with gunpowder. Those primitive ancient grenades required an actual burning fuse fitted through a hole, but that would still be workable. The grenades were not Challenge items, but they could still be used by anyone with an open random items skill.

Sinner had that.

But, as could be expected, he made his most delicious discovery in the mess room—and no, that was not the candied fruit. There was a higher reason, it seemed, that the two officers were sitting pretty in those comfortable quarters.

It became apparent once Sinner opened a container labeled “Prize”. The orange box was actually hidden in a large oak chest that must have served as the ship’s safe. Sinner tried to pick the padlock with a nail and a thick stitching awl, but to no avail. His next try included a heavy hammer, a crowbar and a lot of brute force, which succeeded.

In addition to the container, the chest produced the ship’s treasury—a bag of Challenge Coins, of which Sinner counted almost five hundred pieces. It was fairly strange to see that kind of legal tender on a ship crewed by a bunch of non-playing extras among whom there were no participants. Gold doubloons or piasters would be much more natural under the circumstances. But Sinner was no longer getting surprised by anything in this scaringly real new world, which was not really all that real at times.

The container was quite large since it was not of the space-warping variety. Inside, Sinner found a Level 9 broadsword of a simple rank with weak attack. Sinner did have a swords skill, so he figured he might as well keep the piece in his belt bag for the time being, rather than deconstruct it into resources. He could always do that later if need be. Perhaps the weapon might come in handy if he needed to fight in close quarters, and it was not adding much weight or taking extra room in the storage bag anyway. Besides, it was by no means a plain vanilla poker, and had to be worth more than its weight in resources if sold.

The artillery skill book left Sinner unimpressed—dragging a shipboard cannon along would be a little extreme.

But a few Ideal Challenge Coins, level signs and development symbols, all of them in large denominations, were quite welcome, and so were three disintegrators, a large repair token, a small hole puncher and a white pearl. According to the description, the latter could be used in a number of manufacturing recipes.

But the most interesting items were not in the container, but rather in the chest itself. And it wasn’t treasure as such, but rather an album full of pencil sketches. Fairly inept, too, they depicted a few scorpions and sea lions, some sharks and an unknown animal not unlike a hippo, but with flippers instead of legs and a small head atop a long neck.

What was of a particular interest though was a tired old sheet of loose paper Sinner found between the pages. It had a map of some kind on it.

Once Sinner looked at it, his phone buzzed, receiving a message.

You have found half a treasure map. Captain Joaquin Caštru sent out a team headed by officer Marcellus Mota to find the treasure but kept this half of the map.

To get the complete map, find Marcellus Mota. This half of the map shows the beginning of the route the team followed.

If you find the complete map, it will show in full among the maps on your phone. It will also show the specific spot where the treasure is buried and provide other useful information.

This was the first time Sinner came across something like that. He did hear some rumors in Tier One, but they were inconclusive at best.

And now, what do you know, he had himself a Captain Flint-style map. Or half a map, rather.

He had a closer look at the nondescript sheet. It showed a rough outline of a ship with a cross nearby—apparently, the cemetery desecrated by the scorpions. A string of small arrows headed eastward from the location and then made a sharp turn and disappeared upon reaching a somewhat wavy line crossing the entire map from north to south. It could well be a stream or riverbed, except Sinner could not see any such thing looking from the ship’s deck. Large sand dunes were blocking the view.

This was definitely worth checking out.

The map was interesting. Promising, at least. Finding a treasure would be fine, but there were other reasons as well to try and get the complete map. The rest of the goodies he got didn’t seem particularly valuable, but it was not like he could call mopping up the ship a great challenge. The opposition was somewhat awkward, and so were their actions, as if the entire episode was borrowed from a low-budget straight-to-video thriller, in which the script called for anything and everything living to just drop dead at the first sight of the main hero. None of the sailors was a serious fighter. Such characters were only dangerous when there were a lot of them. For someone with a number of deflective shields protecting him, they were easy prey.

So why would the puppet masters give him an outsize reward for winning such a mundane skirmish?

Come to think of it, it was all fairly logical.

Now, following that Marcellus Mota guy into the desert may well be worth something better. But the really important reason was that having that complete map might well show him a way out and away from this inhospitable coast.

Finally done with his search, Sinner got down to something that could not be put off any longer.

The loot. It was time to sort out his loot. To be sure, he must have lost quite a bit of it on the way, so the things he dropped could now be traced to find the mother lode—if there was anyone around, that is, to take on such a task. But at least he was smart enough not to bother opening the most valuable of the containers—the ones dropped by the scorpion king and awarded later as special prizes. So far, all of them counted as single items, regardless of how much stuff they held. They were also pretty hard to lose, if his past experience was any indication. They were too visible and unwieldy for that.

Sinner sighed, putting on his bookkeeping hat. The main prizes and other containers held a lot of useful things, but they were all fairly mundane and unexciting. Except for one item. Neither a weapon, nor armor, it still had value in spades.

In fact, for Sinner, that thing was outright precious.

He immediately touched the item with his phone and froze. Wow!

He read the description—and then did it again. And again.

Challenge item.

Grey.

Accessories. Type: physical. Class: cargo carrier. Type: special backpack.

Level: 5.

Rank: enhanced item (can contain up to 4 attributes (and 2 more available with the use of expanders)).

Activated attributes: 0 (4 slots available).

Link: none.

Durability: 209/209.

Attack: none.

Defense: enhanced.

Large object.

Created by: The Challenge Ladder.

Resources available upon destruction: 1–4 pieces of quality leather, 1–4 pieces of excellent leather, 1–4 pieces of enhanced ore, 1–2 pieces of magic ore, 1–2 pieces of quality composite material, 1–12 pieces of excellent cloth, 1–6 pieces of excellent rope, 1–9 spools of excellent thread, 1–3 panels of excellent plastic, 1–5 regular crystals, 0–1 rare crystals, 1–4 pieces of simple salt, 1–2 pieces of magic salt.

Attention! The amount of resources may grow as skills associated with gathering material resources are learned and developed. Without them you can only get a minimum amount (in case of successful destruction).

Special properties:

Space warping: 60 liters in the volume of 20 liters originally. Volume may increase as the item’s level is upgraded (+0.6 liter for each new level at this color (grey)).

Weight reduction: items in the backpack lose 55% of their weight in transit (this only applies to items placed in the two compartments and outer pockets, with zippers and flaps closed. Items in the net pockets or those tied up or otherwise attached outside not eligible). Further level upgrades may reduce item weight up to 71% at this level of defense (enhanced). Upgrading defense may slightly reduce stored item weights further.

Brief description:

A fairly good quality backpack with enhanced carry comfort. Provides a reasonable degree of protection to the carrier’s back; however, it does not qualify as a full-blown piece of armor. Provides a decent increase to the limit of items that could be carried: 250 small objects (or 50 medium-sized ones; or 10 large ones; or 5 enormous ones) and 8 containers. This limit increase will not change with level or other parameter upgrades.

It was indeed a quality item, and Sinner’s memory conveniently reminded him of the humongous loads he and Lynxie were carrying in the closing days of Tier One. Similar backpacks could be bought at the Launchpad, but only for Ideal Coins.

A lot of them.

But that was by far not all. The rest of the loot in the prize containers made Sinner chuckle, and even raise his brows in a decidedly positive way, and went a long way towards softening his hard demeanor and warming up his embittered heart.

There were almost twenty-nine thousand development symbols in one container and just over twenty thousand in the other one. Other noteworthy items included a teleportation stone and a fairly decent hole puncher. The remainder was small fry commonly awarded for smaller victories as well.

All of that was indeed quite unexpected. Overall, it was one heck of a haul. Sinner had never even seen development symbols in such large denominations: hundreds were generally rare, and here he was getting thousands. The grand total across all of the containers, large and small, came down to over fifty-four thousand development symbols.

It was much less than what he had gotten at the Launchpad but way more than his entire haul from Tier One.

Plus he now had over nine thousand “horseshoes”—level signs. If he used them all, he could bump himself up to Level 24.

But did he really need that now? With that kind of an upgrade, he’d overtake all daytime scorpions and most nighttime ones as well, or at least close the gap dramatically. This would have an immediate adverse effect on the amount of loot awarded for victories over these arachnids.

Would taking that step be worth it?

A matter as serious as that required plenty of thought and alternative calculations.

In the end, Sinner decided to upgrade his skills first. That definitely wouldn’t hurt. All the more so since he had bonuses still pending that could not wait for more than a day. And most of that time had already passed. All of a sudden, Sinner’s original emphasis on his bow didn’t seem so hot anymore.

As battles with the scorpions showed, neglecting his guandao wouldn’t be advisable. That’s what decided the outcome back then—and never mind those bouncing arrows.

His glaives skill was stuck in the enhanced class at the moment. But he could bring it up to the same level as his bow, i.e. brilliant. The bonuses he received would allow for that. One of them expressly disqualified shooting skills and battle whips, but that didn’t apply to the guandao. It would work.

That was where Sinner got greedy. All of his bonuses were subject to limitations. However, he could still apply them to bring his bow one level up and then use his recent loot to compensate for the loss of the weapon’s rank at the new level. In the end, that would give him a seriously improved weapon.

All right, he decided, he’d do one class up for the glaives, and one for the bow. And he could then bring the bow up to rank fifteen, provided he put all his loot into it. Indeed, that would cost an arm and a leg. Even at the Launchpad, he did not have enough to pay for such an improvement.

Except now he did.

Besides, he had made the strategic decision to concentrate on his shooter earlier, so there was no point in revisiting that even in view of his recent difficulties dealing with well-protected opponents. Besides, to hear Tark put it, Sinner was a special case here, as always, and in all other locations across the tier game could be easily put down with arrows.

Now, those would be the places he needed to be heading for. Besides, his proposed upgrades to the bow could well prove to be enough to penetrate scorpion armor. Even now, his arrows maimed the lower-end bugs pretty badly. Except, of course, he’d have to limit his appetites to rank ten, rather than fifteen, or there wouldn’t be much left for anything else.

So he bumped his glaives from the enhanced class to superior and his bow from brilliant to rare. With the glaives, Sinner settled for a reduction from rank fifteen to ten, and even that much required an additional payment of four and a half thousand. Keeping the first modification took another eight thousand.

All of a sudden, his humongous pile of development symbols didn’t look all that large anymore. Shucks, before long, he would need millions.

His brilliant rank ten bow became rare, and keeping it at the same rank took almost sixty-nine thousand, plus another thirty two for retaining the first modification.

Once Sinner was done upgrading the two weapons, the amount of over one hundred thousand symbols he started with was reduced to just fifteen hundred.

But at least he no longer needed to worry about what to invest the loot in.

He still had one bonus left—the one for upgrading the rank of one skill no higher in class than rare.

Sinner had only one rare skill remaining—pistols, which sat at zero. Bringing it to rank one would cost four thousand symbols. His rank ten bow was now a class below—at rare. Upgrading it to rank eleven would cost twenty-two thousand.

Naturally, he went for the lower class. That was a no brainer. An extra rank would not give him much, but if he wanted to push for a higher class, he could count on substantial savings. Going one rank up would involve the loss of a quarter of the original investment of twenty-two thousand. The rest would be carried forward.

In the end, his upgraded skills looked as follows:

Excellent Skills

Glaives: 10 (one modification: +20% to weapon wielding speed)

Rare Skills

Bow: 10 (one modification: +28% to initial arrow velocity)

The remaining fifteen hundred symbols were burning a hole through his pocket, and Sinner invested them in physical defense. That was exactly what was required to bring it to the maximum at the current level, fifteen.

The attack and defense improvement bonus required no thinking at all. By default, it could not be applied to a shooting weapon. Putting that much into his knife made no sense at all; perhaps some time later, if he had money to burn and nothing better to use it for.

Instead, he raised his glaives’ attack—from weak to regular. Now he’d have something to offer fairly well protected higher level scorpions.

Upgrading skills took a much lesser physical toll on the body, yet it still felt like a ton of bricks on his shoulders pushing him down. Sinner suddenly felt sleepy.

But first, he would take another large drink.

* * *

Similarly to the day before, Sinner woke in the middle of the night. And just like the night before, he could hear that unpleasant rustling somewhere close.

Man, those scorpions never gave up! Judging by the sound, there were not many of them, but that could change in an instant.

Where did they even come from? In all that time, Sinner never saw a single one around.

He recalled the desecrated graves. Well, maybe they came visiting. Or perhaps the buggers had as much affinity with wet sand as they did with the rocks, or got curious, or simply caught the scent of a human. What difference did it make anyway?

Sinner froze, hoping they would not notice him and go away. But if they did, well, he was prepared. The door to the aft mess room seemed like the weakest spot on the entire ship, and Sinner did what he could to improve his defenses—like, hanging plenty of seaweed around to mask his smell, and propping the door from the inside with sections of the huge steel harpoons he had collected. It looked like the ship was an occasional whaler—which was the only explanation Sinner could find to them having such specific weapons on board.

In addition, he found an entire small bag of allspice among other things in the officers’ mess and spread it liberally all around. He loaded all the muskets and pistols with slugs and laid them out on the huge table in the middle of the room, augmenting them with the crew’s blades for which he had the skill open. The case of grenades went into a corner—just in case.

With the time passing, the noise increased. It appeared there were more and more scorpions coming, but for the time being they showed no interest in the doors and windows, so he had little reason for concern.

However, something really big showed up at dawn. Sinner did not so much hear as sense that beast. One needed no special seismic skill to feel the entire ship shuddering. Plus you could tell it was no wave, although it was not unlike a huge swell catching the vessel broadside.

But is was no wave. What showed up late to the party was a specimen, compared to which the scorpion king of the night before could hardly qualify as the imaginary boogeyman under the bed small kids believed in.

Unlike the first big bug, which was the size of a grown bull, this one would have to be more like an elephant. Much more, in all fairness. As the monster was promenading itself on the upper deck, the thick planks were squeaking dolefully; something broke, there was a jingling of metal, and then a sail ripped somewhere. In addition to that, there was a fair amount of crunching and chirping.

Sinner had no idea what the beast looked like and no desire to find out. The only thing he could think of was when the bugger might want to leave—and hopefully, never come back.

It just didn’t belong on a ship. There was nothing for it here anyway since Sinner had dumped all the dead bodies overboard and then dragged them out into the water where the tide would pick them up and carry them away. He also washed the blood off the boards and poured vinegar on the wet spots to kill any remaining smell. So what was there for the big boy? Let him go back ashore and have him a sea lion or something.

* * *

The unseen monster kept him awake until well past sunrise. The bugger apparently didn’t have brains enough to figure out the superstructure on the stern had a human inside. So it kept wreaking havoc outside. The deck planking appeared to have cracked in places under the hefty weight.

It was only now that Sinner realized the deep dents and scratches on the outside of the hull were not the result of foul weather at sea or getting stuck on reefs. Some of the older marks were almost identical to the fresher ones that were not even there the day before.

It appeared, this was not the monster’s first visit here.

So what kind of a beast was it?

There were plenty of tracks on the sand, the worst and the most impressive of them being an entire wide road beaten and pressed into the wet sand left bare by the retreating tide. It led westward—the very direction Sinner had come from. That was where the scorpions—no less than a few dozen of them—had hauled from as well. Seeing how there were none on the spot the night before, Sinner suspected the buggers had quite a sense of smell about them, not unlike the Tier One crocodiles that were prepared to follow the prey’s scent for miles, come hell or high water—or even precipitous rocks.

A similar, but smaller road led to the east, although the density of tracks on it was lighter. It was more like a bunch of individual tracks, some larger and some smaller—rather than one common four-lane thoroughfare.

Yet there was one particular track among them, so wide and well beaten-in, that Sinner did not quite get at first what it was. Surely, that had to be a tank of some kind—not a living creature.

Freezing on the edge of the humongous trench, Sinner picked up his phone. Judging by the vibration frequency, it had to be a message from one of the few people he knew who knew his number.

But Sinner was wrong. It was no one he had met personally.

It was the puppet masters saying hello.

You have attracted the attention of a rare monster in this location. It knows your are here somewhere and will do everything in its power to make sure you do not leave its territory. During the day, the monster’s entourage is watching you to relay your whereabouts to the warden once the sun goes down. The monster is fairly fast, so your chances of making it far enough away from the place during the day are slim. The best course of action would be assembling a team of strong friendly fighters and taking a stand. If you win, your prizes will be commensurate, and this will become a much safer location. Besides, you won’t need to worry about anyone giving chase if you decide to leave the place.

Gee, thanks, Sinner chuckled sadly. Sure thing, he’d spread the word around, gather his troops and begin preparing for the great battle. Didn’t he have the experience from taking part in a group hunt once? We could do it again, as the Russians liked saying.

The puppet masters, those moral degenerates, were simply making fun of him. It was not like he had ever received a message like that before.

He read it again. Rare had to refer to the beast’s rank. Regular, or common would be the weakest, then came uncommon, then elite—and only then, rare. So far, Sinner had not encountered anything else—and he was glad he hadn’t.

Regular scorpions were no big deal, and they accounted for upward of ninety percent of the entire population. Uncommon ones, just as the name implied, were not as frequent, yet you did not have to carry a lamp during the day to find them. As to the elite, Sinner met one during his first night on the new tier. Now, there was a rare beast coming. To be sure, there was one already on his record—the monster serpent in the gorge on Tier One that led through the mountain range blocking the way north. But the only reason Sinner could vanquish that monster was an unusual, unexpected hint he had received and used to his maximum advantage.

Soon after that, he met his first location warden as part of Rat Catcher’s group.

And now he’d be facing another one, all alone. Based on indirect indications, this beast could well be the location warden.

But the worst thing was that the monster would reportedly not leave Sinner alone, nor let him leave.

He looked at the tank-like track, recalled the lizard and the serpent, and tried to imagine a chitin-clad monster of the same dimensions. The picture did not come out pretty.

What if he could spend some time fixing the ship and then take to sea, to try and reach the border of Tier Three once this tier was flooded?

No, that didn’t make much sense either. No one really knew how such flooding occurred. It may have well been but a figure of speech. Otherwise, the sea would be full of floating debris left over from when the previous tier was flooded. Including tons of ever-present plastic, of which Tier One had quite a bit.

So, apparently, the process was not as straightforward as the puppet masters claimed it to be. Which meant being aboard a ship on the high seas wouldn’t help him much.

No, Sinner realized, he was not going to sail anywhere.

Nor would he stay here.

Which meant that if the unknown monster was so keen on not letting him go, it would not be Sinner’s problem. It would be the monster’s.

Chapter 10

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Skeleton Coast

So Whose Problems Were They?

A day passed, and then a second, a third and a fourth. On day five, Sinner was still working hard. Somewhere out there, other Challenge participants, acting alone or in groups, were earning their containers by hunting local game and each other. Some tender souls, trying to avoid the incessant bloodletting, rushed to cross the tier as soon as they could to collect higher bonuses for a speedy completion and bump their stats up that way. Certain particularly crafty minds looked for—and found—safe zones, where they began buying low and selling high, thus taking a slow yet relatively risk-free route towards personal development.

All in all, everyone was going about what, by the puppet masters’ design, they were supposed to be going about.

And only Sinner was working his butt off.

Like a true beast of burden.

Most of his waking hours, dawn to dusk, he had been hauling all kinds of goodies to a dominant rock half a mile to the east of the ship. Some things could be stuffed into his new backpack while others he piled on a makeshift sled, assuming the role of horse afterwards. At the final destination, he resorted to wooden rollers and pulleys using the ship’s ample supply of timber and rope of all lengths and diameters.

But getting the stuff there was only half the task. For hours on end, Sinner had been swinging a heavy hammer, chiseling into hard rock, or digging deep pits at the bottom of his mighty butte.

And then he hauled some more stuff.

Nights brought a bit of respite since the most dangerous of the scorpions woke up at night and he simply had to stop.

The main monster came visiting too—sometimes before dawn, and sometimes right after sunset. It would climb aboard again and saunter around, testing the creaking deck planks, messing up the rigging, and ripping the remaining sails and netting to shreds. At some point, it pulled out the ship’s main wheel and then almost broke through the roof over the officers’ mess room, after which glorious deed, Sinner had to move to the hold.

To be sure, the space down below was fairly damp and claustrophobic, but Sinner knew he’d be safer there. On occasion, he could even sleep through most of the night, paying the rummaging monster up on the deck little heed. Heck, he was almost comfortable in the little lair he had built for himself among redwood logs, and barrels of tar, and bales of raw cotton.

It was also there, in a locked wooden cage, that barrels of strong rum were kept. But apparently, neither the heavy padlock, nor the hardwood two by two’s of the cage could keep true aficionados away from the good stuff. Quite a few of the barrels had been opened and partaken from.

The crew’s affinity to hard liquor may well have been the decisive factor that precipitated the fate that befell the ship. Or at least something like that may have easily happened on Earth.

Over the five days, estimating conservatively, Sinner must have gone back and forth, between the ship and the butte, some two hundred times, give or take. On some of those days, taking advantage of the calm seas, he even used a makeshift raft made of boards and logs from the hold as his delivery vehicle of choice.

Towards the end of day five, watching the sun getting ready to dip below the horizon, he decided he had done enough.

If he hadn’t, then there would be no point delaying the inevitable. Nothing else he could think of would help much.

Suddenly, his phone gave a long, nasty buzz. His eyes still following the red-orange disk of the sun, Sinner reached for the gadget.

“Hey, bud!”

“Hi there, Tark!

“Listen, we’ve been thinking here. What if you raised your level?”

“And what would be the point?”

“Well, you’d get more immunity from the Guardians of the Sea. You could then swim around those stretches where you can’t bypass the scorpions by land.”

“That only works once a day,” Sinner said.

“So? You’d be guaranteed safe passage once a day. Didn’t you say you could easily do a mile and a half or two overland out there? You could add an extra few hundred yards to that swimming. If it takes you, say, twenty days to get out of there, it will all add up.”

“No, Tark, that won’t work. I told you earlier, I am roasting here. I’ll have to haul an entire barrel of water with me, and I am not even sure it will be enough. How am I going to swim with that? Oh, and remember what the puppet masters told me? There’s this real big bugger coming for me every night. I have no idea why it can’t find me down in the hold, but I sure as hell can’t hide from it on top of some rock. So I can’t even go far from the ship. If I can’t come back by sundown, I am toast. There’s just not enough daylight hours for me to be able to go far enough. It’s a setup. Someone’s making sure I can’t make it out of this place. They want it this way.”

“No, Sin, that’s not how it works. There’s always a way out.”

“Of course there is! I am about to go look for it, in fifteen minutes or so.”

“What do you have in mind?

It’s a long story, and long-distance rates here suck. How about we talk again tomorrow? Or better yet, when I see you?”

“Oh! That would be good. All right, I’ll let you be. Go find your exit. But don’t you dare cheat. You promised to come see me, and I’ll take nothing less.”

“Done deal, man. I’ll do my best.”

As the line went dead, Sinner chuckled. His best may not be enough, and he knew it.

In any event, he wouldn’t be betting the house on that happy reunion just yet.

One tiny mistake—and all his careful preparations would go down the drain.

Which wouldn’t just mean time and effort wasted. That would be it. Finito. Auf Wiedersehen, mein lieber Mann. The Skeleton Coast would add yet another skeleton to its roster.

To chase the momentary gloom away, Sinner checked the ratings again.

Chao Chan: 33,017 points

Ruby Dragon: 31,996 points

Lee Zhou Eng: 31,182

Ayumi: 30,759 points

Takeda: 30,707 points

It was really easy to tell who was spending his days doing honest work that did not require swinging a weapon.

And in the meantime, the rest of the crowd was definitely not about to join the ASPCA. His 30K+ points notwithstanding, Sinner was now out of the Top Five. Chao Chan, with over ten percent more points than Sinner, was now solidly installed as the number one guy, and besides, he had bumped himself up to a higher level too. However, unlike in Tier One, the competition was now truly breathing down the campion’s neck.

Apparently, Tier One had taught quite a few quite a lot. They were all seriously at it, day after day, making good use of whatever knowledge they acquired, hunting rich grounds, taking little rest. Sinner, on the other hand, after mopping up the area around his first butte, didn’t do much wet work, except for dispatching an occasional daytime scorpion here or there. When compared to the current Top Five, he was essentially beating around the bush, living off the glory of his first night there to avoid coming through as a complete nonentity.

In all fairness, this desolate coast here had more development potential than anything Sinner had seen anywhere in Tier One. The loot and points to be had here were truly limitless. But it would take a strong, dedicated group to prosper.

A loner like himself would be eaten alive, and soon. So far, he had just been lucky. It was just a matter of time. What he really needed to do was get out of there.

* * *

The scorpions rushed him immediately after sundown, before the quick onset tropical dusk could even morph into the dark of the night proper. The abhorrent chirping and chitin rustling was coming in from all directions—except from the sea. In the smoky glow of a few tar barrels he had set on fire right before the sunset, Sinner had himself a pretty good view of the bugs moving in down below. Lighting, of all other things, was not going to be a problem.

The fires would last him for at least a few hours, and if the deed wasn’t done during that time, there’d be no need for any more lights.

Eschewing any attempts at originality, the bugs followed their usual tactic of climbing the butte from all sides at once. At first, Sinner did nothing to slow them down. He did not even bother shooting his bow even though, after a few production runs using resources from deconstructing some of the trophies obtained from the first battle and found onboard, he had enough arrows for the second siege of Troy.

There was no need to tire his hands out. The battle would be decided by his guandao alone. Or so he thought at first.

However, upon seeing a few agile little buggers running ahead of the pack, Sinner changed his mind and picked up the bow, after all. Flimsy as their armor may be, their stingers were still plenty dangerous. Besides, one could always argue in favor of thinning out the mass of attackers before the attack truly began.

Promptly, his arrows went to work.

The butte, on which Sinner fought his first battle was high and way too wide at the top. This one was higher and wider still. Had he had a choice, he would have selected something of more modest proportions, but his options were as limited as the assortment of goodies available from a government-run rural food store in communist Russia.

Defending such a large area alone seemed like a fool’s errand at first. He’d be fighting scorpions approaching from one direction, and in the meantime, even the slowest of their brethren would have enough time to climb onto the platform from the opposite side. And once they were fully emerged onto the platform, it would become a totally different game.

The bugs also seemed to ascend faster, which was probably on account of the rock being of a softer kind than sheer gneiss, with plenty of cracks and fissures to provide extra purchase when climbing.

As a matter of fact, that was the very reason Sinner had selected this butte since he figured it would be much easier to carve and bore into. That would make his preparations for battle easier too, saving at least a couple of days.

The scorpions ascended en masse unimpeded. However, that changed as they drew close to the edge of the platform. What they ran into on three sides was wooden framing of sorts, propped up by supporting beams and clamps Sinner had attached to the vertical surface. What his efforts produced was a semblance of balcony frames, from which he hung overboard netting, like some kind of a fence dangling down.

Now the bugs, ascending from three sides, had encountered that makeshift fence. Agile as they were, the scorpions still couldn’t fly and found negotiating the ropey barrier exceedingly difficult. As the first wave came to a halt just under the lower cutoff of the nets, those following in their stead from below caught up with the attacking vanguard and tried getting through, pushing and shoving, and finding themselves tangled up in the nets and creating even more of a roadblock.

On the fourth side, there were no such obstacles, but there was Sinner, swinging his guandao like there was no tomorrow.

Sinner knew this was going to be a much longer night than his first, and he was now a true showcase for the economy of motion. A lunge, a stab, and a step back, with an occasional reserved slash to finish the job—that was all it was taking him now to send an average bug down. But there were substantially more bugs attacking now, drawn in from at least a few miles around by the promise of an easy meal. Ah, promises, promises...

Anyway, he’d have his work cut out for him until the sun rose.

For two hours or so, it was going on pretty much as expected. Sinner would man the unprotected side, occasionally darting sideways or to the rear to push back some particularly eager bug who had somehow managed to climb up over the bottleneck at the nets. The body count grew, with relatively little effort on Sinner’s part.

But just as the first time, as the night grew darker, there were more and more scorpions joining the fray. In the last rays of dim light thrown off by the burnt-out tar barrels, Sinner could see an endless carpet of moving bugs down below. He had prepared a stash of torches up top, made of the cotton from the ship’s hold, dipped in the tar of the same provenance, and he would occasionally light one and throw it down, into the crawling mass of the insects. They didn’t like it one single bit and tried to scurry away immediately, but the slower ones may have even suffered serious burns. But either way, there was nowhere for them to go as there was virtually no room remaining by the foot of the rock.

In another couple of hours, the scorpions finally faltered. Straining his eyes, Sinner looked out into the shimmering shadows in the distance where something humongous was moving. In another few seconds, he could tell the smaller bugs out there began hastily beating retreat. Then the climbers slowed down too, and then reversed course.

Sinner threw a couple of lit torches in the direction of the suspicious movement, trying to get a better look. And sneered in disappointment: the big kahuna he had expected seemed to be very much like the master bug that showed up towards the end of his first engagement. The two could well be twin brothers.

It was nowhere like what he had imagined thinking of the nightmarish creature that was visiting the ship. No, it wasn’t the capo of all local capi, or perhaps no capo at all. This was an elite bug, at best, which, of course, was a much bigger deal than the regular foot soldiers, and even their sergeants—uncommon beasts—which Sinner’s guandao handled easily enough. But the entire point of his painstaking preparations was in engaging—and ridding himself of—that unspeakable ghoul that had little by little been breaking the ship into a mound of timber.

Be it as it may, Sinner would have to deal with this oversized runner up, lest it wreak havoc up on the platform. Besides, the bugger was scaring off the smaller scorpions, of which Sinner expected to harvest more—way more, in fact. But the whole point was he could not afford to waste his major calibers on this unwelcome impostor, because if he did, what would he have left to welcome the real life and soul of the party when it showed up? And show up it would, Sinner was pretty sure of that. So what was he to do? As the huge scorpion was taking the shortest route towards Sinner’s butte, Sinner took careful aim and threw a lit torch, landing it smack on the creature’s back.

Softened tar took to chitin like a duck to water, but it was way too runny to keep the torch in one place for long. It was unlikely the bug would suffer serious burns.

Still, in a couple of seconds, the scorpion clearly wised up to the fact it now had a wee bit of a problem. It squirmed, trying to reach the torch with its claws, which sent it spinning in place. And then jumping sideways, as a grenade went off under its belly.

To be sure, much of a grenade it wasn’t. Black powder was no match for TNT or RDX, or whatever it was they were using in anti-tank mines those days. Heck, he would even settle for a plain old anti-personnel splitter. But wishful thinking wouldn’t carry the day, or night, rather, so he had to compensate for the lack of quality with sheer quantity, lobbing the explosive canisters from the case he had found on board, one after another.

They did not seem to be inflicting much damage, and some wouldn’t even go off, but the scared bug kept dancing with a grace one could never expect of a bull in a china shop.

Then another huge shadow advanced from the dark. Another big scorpion! And then yet another! Without further ado, the two newcomers rushed their not-quite-dynamited colleague, at the same time taking swipes at each other. They must have all been one happy family.

Sinner chuckled, watching the fight unfurl. He would surely enjoy a break while the bugs were making life easier for him. Indeed, whoever emerged victorious would also emerge quite weakened and easier to put down, which would be a welcome development.

The bugs gave it their all. Chitin creaked and cracked, severed extremities went airborne, and nauseating goo was gushing out of horrible wounds not unlike from holes in a bullet-ridden tanker truck. All Sinner had left to do was applaud and cheer.

Soon enough, the first loser candidate became apparent. The bug had evidently suffered way more damage than the other two.

But before the semi-finalists could finish it off, something larger came on the scene—and appearing larger still in the flickering light of the tar barrels and torches.

Sinner did not need a better look. He knew what it was. Yessss!!!

The tsar of all boogeymen, the mysterious master connoisseur of beached ships, the ultimate nemesis that for reasons unknown had its eye on Sinner personally and finally graced them with their presence.

To say that the creature was humongous wouldn’t even begin to describe it. Sinner’s inner convictions and all the laws of physics he was aware of said no, yet his eyes were saying yes.

He grabbed his bow. Before getting to the main course, perhaps he would still have a chance to dispense with one of the three appetizers, not to have to deal with them all at the same time. Whatever their reasons, the lesser creatures did not deploy their stingers against each other, only using their claws to break through the opposition’s chitin armor or snip off their legs. Sinner took aim. With luck, he’d be able to hit one of the gaping holes on the losing bug’s carapace, reaching a vulnerable spot inside.

And then the elite bugs surprised him again. Putting their differences aside for the time being, they all fell in line and attacked the presumed incumbent.

Never before had chitin crackled so loudly—not in Sinner’s experience anyway. But he was no longer watching the show. Pulling on a rope he had put in for just that purpose, Sinner slid a section of the netting to the side. The next step was rolling towards the edge of the platform his own version of Little Boy: a powder keg wrapped in multiple layers of saltpeter-soaked, tar-smudged cotton held together with strips of sailcloth. The ground under the rock was mostly sand, and Sinner hoped his flammable oeuvre wouldn’t disintegrate on impact.

He lit the fuse. The nifty little flicker went to work eagerly, getting closer and closer to the main charge. Finally, with a strained grunt, Sinner pushed the barrel off the platform. Falling through the gap he had opened in the netting, the keg landed smack in the middle of the grounds contested by the four bugs. Preoccupied with grabbing each other’s legs, claws and tails, the scorpions paid it no heed.

Big mistake.

As the fuse burned all the way down to the base, the keg blew up in a major flash of fire and smoke. The blast must have been seen and heard from miles and miles away—provided, that is, there was someone out there to hear or see.

But Sinner had yet another ace up his sleeve. The blast was indeed beautiful, and there was so much smoke he suddenly found it difficult to breathe up on his platform. Yet, Sinner had his doubts as to how effective the bomb had been.

His phone vibrated for a second, which was not what a wholesale victory could in all fairness be expected to produce.

Just to be on the safe side, he sent another bomb down, immediately jumping right back to avoid the upward-channeled shock wave and mushroom cloud. Only when the smoke cleared did Sinner look down.

But there wasn’t really much to see. Piles of tar-smudged firewood and whole small logs he had strategically positioned around the butte caught fire as expected, and it looked like the blaze was only getting started. In fact, Sinner intended this to be his last line of defense if he was about to get overrun, so one could say the fire was set prematurely. Still, the plan worked, it seemed.

Yet, there could never be such a thing as too much of a good thing, could there? Sinner got his next projectile ready, this one an incendiary: a similarly attired barrel, only this time, instead of gunpowder, it was filled with rum and wads of cotton he had pushed inside through the opening on the protruding side. Down the bomb went.

To be sure, the blaze below needed no additional incentive, but it was picking up slowly enough, and in the meantime, Sinner needed more light. He simply had to see what had happened to the big bugs.

This time he used a fairly flimsy and worn out old barrel, with the upper hoop removed, intending the projectile to disintegrate on impact. It did, as expected, splashing its highly flammable contents all around. The nearly 200 proof alcohol ignited immediately with a loud whoosh, instantaneously basking the area in a pale glow. There was not as much smoke this time around, and it cleared quickly. Sinner could finally have a good look at the fruits of his labor.

The three of the smaller scorpions had been blown to pieces—or rather, became mounds of slimy goo. The birthday boy, however, was still showing signs of life, clumsily trying to turn over and onto its belly again. Most of its legs had been blown off, and one of the claws apparently broken or dislocated, seeing how it was sticking upwards at an unnatural angle and not moving. The creature was badly maimed, but nowhere near done for yet.

What was worse, it was quickly regaining its senses.

With a mighty swing, Sinner hurled a harpoon down. The heavy, hollow lily iron on a wooden shaft counted as a spear, and Sinner had a skill for it. It also took a strong, steady hand to throw that thing—all 20+ pounds of it.

Sinner had that too.

Another harpoon followed the first one on the way down, and then yet another. As the fire below grew, Sinner could see the smaller bugs on the periphery of the action starting to crawl back. Apparently, the hoi polloi of the scorpion society realized their gods had been vanquished and rediscovered their courage.

The fourth harpoon finally hit the upturned bug where a human’s solar plexus would approximately be located. According to Sinner’s Research skill, that was where elite arachnids had one of their vital nerve nodes. The beast jerked mightily and froze. Apparently, rare scorpions were not structurally different from any of those under them. It was just the case of size matters.

Sinner decided to hold on to the rest of his projectiles, wait for a while, and see what happened. Lo and behold, the prostrated bug convulsed once more—and then Sinner’s phone came to life, receiving a lengthy message.

Unable to resist the urge, Sinner reached into his cargo west. He would just take a quick peek, he told himself. If that was indeed the rare location warden, the haul would be epic. Perhaps as much as the giant serpent had earned him, or maybe even more. Indeed, back then he had a helping hint, while now the victory would be his and his alone. They would not even penalize him for making use of a trap since he had a skill for it and was thus totally eligible.

The train of his thought broke as the fire on the side of the butte intensified, sending clouds of black smoke (all that tar!) up to his platform. Momentarily, Sinner’s eyes welled with tears and he had to wipe them away with the back side of his arm.

A his vision cleared, he looked down again. The flames were reaching around the side of the rock where yet unengaged piles of tar-smudged wood were waiting their turn.

The smaller scorpions, totally brazen now, emerged from the shadows and flung themselves at the plentiful carrion with as much enthusiasm as they had shown for climbing Sinner’s rock earlier. They now ignored the human altogether. Who knows, had their larger brethren failed to show up, they might still be pressing their attack up the rock with complete abandon. But now, with so much food around, there was really no longer a reason for them to bother.

But hey, they seemed to be busy, and that was all Sinner needed. He picked up his bow and went to work. There was no point being selective. Sinner was just sending one arrow after another into the closest tangled lump of crawling creatures, expecting to get two or three at a time. That would net him a couple of hundred bugs an hour, which was not so bad at all. When his hands got tired, he went for the grenades.

Lobbing those was easier, and it was more efficient too, seeing how those wounded by fragments would probably be trampled upon by the others. They were smaller bugs, and thus much more vulnerable to shrapnel and any extra weight on their carapaces. From what he could see, particularly successful explosions in the thick of it must have been taking out up to a dozen regular scorpions.

At that rate, by the morning hours, he would easily be up a hundred thousand development symbols or more.

And then, of course, there were points.

Sinner imagined a flood of congratulatory calls and messages he would be receiving tomorrow. Indeed, he who laughed last laughed best.

But once again, his stay on cloud nine proved fairly short-lived as a loud commotion down below brought him back to earth. A huge gang of scorpions were viciously fighting over the severed tail of one of the giants thrown off by the explosions towards a narrow passage right under the rock that Sinner left free of any incendiary traps. Back when he was setting the stage, he figured he’d be better off having the bugs pass through the opening single file when everything went up in flames, rather than try to jump or ram through the fiery barrier, spreading every which way. If the battle was not over by then, he’d need to limit any potential avenues of ingress to try and take care of the entire shebang wholesale.

He rolled yet another one of his barrel bombs towards the edge of the platform—and cursed out loud. Damn! It appeared the big boy show was not quite over yet. Little of what he had seen so far—and in all fairness, he thought he had seen it all at that point—prepared him for the next act of the play.

He was now looking at a giant centipede the length of half a city block. The fighting scorpions made an immediate panicked run for it, confirming to Sinner that he was not seeing double.

Even if the new boy in town was not the actual location warden, it surely had to be the largest of its kind. A creature like that simply couldn’t be any larger. Sinner recalled his first ever location warden, the one he hunted with Rat Catcher’s gang, and shuddered at the memory of the damage the beast had done.

The centipede looked twice as large and three times as dangerous. And boy, was it ugly!

Ignoring the carrion, twisting its long body with apparent ease, the centipede crawled among fading tar barrels, went around the raging fire and emerged on the other side of the rock where the flames had not reached yet. And immediately began climbing it.

The situation, it seemed, was much worse than Sinner expected. Unlike the scorpions, the centipede did not have to pause while climbing to find purchase. Though not as agile as the smaller arachnids, perhaps, it had an exceedingly long body, most of which remained on the ground, providing much needed support. As a result, the creature moved with amazing speed, pushing its head higher and higher.

With that kind of equipment, Sinner figured, his new vis-à-vis would be up top in no time at all.

Sinner picked up and lit a grenade, waiting for the fuse to burn down almost in its entirety. No, he harbored no hope that the puny, underpowered little banger would do much damage, but perhaps the long dude would get startled, and with luck maybe even fall down. He threw the grenade.

Indeed, as it blew up in the air, just above the ground, the upper part of the centipede’s body recoiled, bending at an unnatural angle, like a snake about to go on the attack. But then everything went back to the new normal, and the beast simply ignored Sinner’s next grenade. And then another one. The fragments were bouncing harmlessly off the monster insect’s armor, whether it was chitin, like with the scorpions, or something else. Nor did the bugger seem to be bothered by loud bangs anymore.

Sinner used the momentary commotion to drop a couple of his rum barrels onto the nets below the edge of the platform. A bunch of grenades tied together went the same way, their long fuses already burning.

Sinner grabbed a heavy hammer and knocked the props supporting the frame out from under it, one after another. The entire assembly went crashing down. The centipede had nowhere to go, and not only that, but, reflectively, it also tried to attack the falling structure that resembled a low soccer goal with some large, smoking balls caught in it.

In the next split second, its crooked mandibles grabbed the netting.

A grenade popped, and then another, and nothing else happened.

The rum barrels held and failed to ignite.

Thinking on his feet, Sinner quickly donned a pair of crude gloves and turned another one of his barrels over on the side, its uncorked bung hole facing outwards. Another moment—and the stream of alcohol ignited.

Caught in a torrent of flaming liquid, the centipede jerked and twitched, at the same time producing a squeal-like sound, which was as disgusting as the creature looked. It was now tossing its head back and forth, trying to free itself of the jumble of rope and broken wood.

Without pausing, Sinner went for a giant cauldron under which he had been stoking a small fire for over an hour now to keep the pot’s contents warm.

The pot was truly humongous, but Sinner had the puppet masters’ chemicals working for him now: earlier, he had taken a Large Strength Stimulant he had found in one of the containers under the rock, on which he fought his first battle with the scorpions. The description for the potion—the somewhat bitter contents of a small vial—promised a brief x5 strength increase.

This would now come in quite handy. Originally, Sinner planned on dragging the pot to the edge and turning it over to pour its contents out onto the climbing creature’s head.

However, it now became clear he would not have enough time for that as the centipede was about to finally shake off the jumbled netting and resume its climb unimpeded. The stream of burning rum did not seem to have discouraged it much, nor did it do any visible damage. If things went further the way they were going, the centipede’s head would reach the edge of the platform in twenty seconds or so.

Grunting, Sinner picked up the pot, his hands feeling the heat even through the thick fabric of his gloves, and rushed to the edge. As he turned the pot over, two buckets of hot tar, liquefied to the consistency of water, poured out onto the centipede’s head and upper body.

And then, with a welcome loud whoosh, a mighty serious pillar of solid flames shot up from below. Hallelujah! The rum barrels had finally ignited!

And if you asked Sinner, this couldn’t have come soon enough.

Caught in the bluish flames of burning rum, the tar was in no particular rush to continue on its way down. Not unlike napalm, it stuck to the surface it landed on, burning its way through the centipede’s armored upper layer down to the vulnerable soft tissues underneath.

The centipede shrieked worse than before, revealing a truly impressive vocal talent. Who could have thought? Sinner had always believed the only sound bugs made was that of cracking under the sole of one’s shoes.

Regardless, the centipede’s head and a few sections behind it were ablaze, and the fire was spreading further down the body. It looked like in another moment or two, the huge insect would drop dead or at least turn around and flee.

Instead, whatever thinking algorithms were moving the bug, it probably realized there was no way back. It had to rush forward, and damn the torpedoes, and nail the brazen two-legged morsel of tough meat before it came up with another painful indignity.

Rather than back off, ignoring a new flaming stream of rum from yet another barrel, the animal resumed its upward march with increased vigor. And it was just as fast, even though its entire upper body was now truly living its life like a candle in the wind. But it was not, of course, that the bugger was such a great fan of Elton John. Its armor must have been so tough that it could somehow withstand the devastating effects of burning tar, at least for a while—something that would be totally unheard of in the case of any creature on Earth.

Grabbing a harpoon, Sinner sent it down, aiming for the centipede’s head. The weapon bounced harmlessly off the slanted surface, and another one that followed did too.

A tank, the damn thing was a veritable tank, a thought flashed in Sinner’s mind. Under the circumstances, his guandao would probably fail to penetrate if it came to that, which left his shotgun, which had a measly single load of buckshot in it, and what would he do when that was expended, shoot arrows at the up-armored monster?

Sinner took a torch to his last remaining powder keg. The next moment, his foot pushed the bomb off the edge of the platform.

That was it. The moment of truth.

In hindsight, he should have brought more powder up here, using his primitive winch, and yes, there was still plenty of it on board, but what was he expected to do, spend the rest of his life hauling stuff over and hoisting it to this godforsaken rocky outcrop? In all fairness, he simply had no idea what he was going to be up against or he would have worked harder and longer, and fetched more of everything, including some of the muskets, too, and maybe dipped his blades and arrowheads in scorpion venom, and anyway, where, in what particular book could he have read about these alien monsters attacking in threes, to be followed by a nightmarish armored sausage with legs, and how...

Clack! Having bounced a couple of times off the rock wall, the barrel, on the final leg of its downward trajectory, hit the centipede right in the head, connecting with its target a few yards higher than where it was just a moment before. And when it did, whether deliberately or not, the animal parried this new flaming ball, sending it sideways with a mighty kick of its indestructible skull. Deflected, the keg went further down, landing on a rocky outcropping some distance below, breaking into pieces and going off. To be sure, there was plenty of fire and smoke, but the blast came out nothing like what Sinner expected, and did anyone even mention it was way off course?

With no more barrel bombs left, Sinner was fresh out of options now. Except one.

* * *

Standing in the middle of his platform, Sinner was holding two thick burning fuses in his both hands, watching two ugly horns (or were they antennae?) rise over the edge. One was severely damaged—burnt or blown off, perhaps—while the other still looked like new. Then the upper portion of the head appeared, complete with a pair of horrible extremities, good for walking or holding hapless victims down as the monster’s mandibles went about turning them into food for the beast’s belly.

There was still plenty of tar on the centipede’s outer armor and in the segment joints, some of it still smoldering. That did not seem to bother the animal much as it was taking its time to climb.

This high up, it must have been hard enough to fight gravity to propel such a long body skyward. Extreme caution was thus required since in the event of falling back down the animal, what with its huge mass and inertia, would suffer mightily—unlike regular small centipedes on Earth that could drop from the ceiling, pick themselves up and hit the ground running again with no ill effects.

But that was then, and this was now, as someone said somewhere. This was no Earth, and no small centipede on the ceiling.

Sinner watched yet another pair of legs push off the edge of the platform, helping hoist the rest of the body onto it. At the same time, the animal’s head twisted, the nearly blind little eyes giving Sinner a mean look as the one and a half horns probed outward, almost reaching the nasty, delectable human.

Watching the ugly crawler intently, Sinner let his hands fall by his sides.

The burning fuses in them touched the vents on the two six pounder cannons he had spent so much time and effort dragging here from the ship and then hoisting to the top of the butte. The flash of the first shot lit up everything for a split second—before the entire world drowned in a cloud of smoke.

The gun lurched, the recoil pushing it towards the opposite edge—far enough for the piece to tilt backward and careen to the ground.

Sinner could not really hear the second blast as he was already deaf from the first one.

He also remained oblivious to the sound of the centipede’s armor disintegrating under the impact of the plain iron balls.

Chapter 11

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Skeleton Coast

The Morning After and More Grinding Toil

Sinner welcomed the morning the way he thought he would: dead tired, all out of arrows, and all alone on the platform, now largely devoid of everything he had almost broken his back bringing up, including both cannons that fired the winning shots. He could see those pieces of ancient artillery down below, their wooden carriages, along with all that tarred timber around the butte, now but a few handfuls of weakly glowing embers. But of course, the fire could do nothing about the barrels themselves—as it couldn’t about hundreds upon hundreds of containers scattered around.

Sinner would now have to take care of all of those before darkness descended again, making his way around smoldering debris, piles of which had still more containers in them.

Indeed, he had his work cut out for him, and it was not just sorting out the containers. He also had to make more arrows to replace those expended dispatching smaller scorpions and collect whatever could still be salvaged or retrieved from dead bug bodies. He was truly not looking forward to that part of the job, no, sir.

Unable to help himself, Sinner crossed to the other end of the platform and looked at the centipede, now lit by the first rays of the rising sun. No, it didn’t look prettier in daylight.

More like the opposite.

It also appeared that the giant centipede had taken quite some time to die. Sinner never used his Research skill on the beast, so he was really none the wiser as to which of its parts were most vulnerable. The head, it now seemed, was not that much of a big deal since, with its top blown, the animal was essentially paralyzed, but not killed. Sinner continued with his forensic analysis. Once the centipede fell and hit the tar-smudged logs down below, it seemed to have stayed there for a while, twitching convulsively. In the meantime, the fire was picking up, essentially roasting the long insect on hot coals. When the centipede finally regained some of its faculties, it was already too late since half of its body was getting close to well done.

That must have been what did it in. But in all fairness, based on the tracks, smudges and scuff marks on the ground, the beast did find the strength to extricate itself from the fire and spent its last moments rolling and twisting in a cooler spot on the side. But its contorted twitching was getting weaker and weaker, and then died down altogether. And so, finally, did the horrific animal.

Sinner’s phone began vibrating, the frequency indicating it was an incoming voice call.

“Best wishes to our man in the high castle!” he quipped, his voice barely audible.

“Right back atcha, buddy,” Tark laughed. “Although I can’t imagine what I could possibly wish to someone who has everything. You got yourself another bundle, eh? What could I even say? I wouldn’t even know what to call it. You know, what you pulled off again. So I’ll just shut up. Congrats, man. This now seems to be your signature style. Go for the big boys, and never mind that small fry. All those little momma’s boys from Top Five will die of envy today. It’s a good thing you have no people out there, on that coast of yours, or you’d be top murderer again, too, hehe. I mean the broadcast ticker just wouldn’t shut up all night long. So, what was it you were fighting there?”

“Ahem, bugs...”

“Scorpions again? Sinner, you da man, and all due respect, and all that, but let me tell ya. You are no biologist. Scorpions are not bugs. They are their own thing. A great legend such as yourself really needs to watch what he is saying. You know, for the benefit of the adoring crowds.”

“Tark, all due respect, too, but why don’t you go off yourself?”

The man burst out laughing. “All right, all right, I am getting your drift. Just take it easy, man. Rest awhile. I’ll let you be. If I get any news about that coast of yours, or scorpions in the desert, I’ll send you a text right away. I’ll keep asking. Talk to you soon.”

Next, Sinner checked his messages. There were four of them: from Lynxie, Power, Demon—and Hue. Now, that was a surprise all right! The girls, although using different language of different brevity, offered their congratulations and best wishes in much the same manner. Demon, while doing the same, seemed to be dying to know how much loot Sinner had got and of what kind after the epic night that had been broadcast publicly—in real time and almost in its entirety.

Sinner sent brief “thank you’s” to everyone—except Demon. Instead, the trader received a selfie Sinner had taken against the background of multiple containers (including the biggest one he had ever received, the size of a small refrigerator), piled up next to the giant centipede’s forked tail.

Demon responded immediately—in a volley of oohs and aahs, and other, much saltier language—suggesting they meet right away.

Sinner was perfectly amenable. They just needed to figure out the how part.

He took a brief look at his victory notification list but gave up soon. Reading the entire thing would take him a full day, at least. Playing with the settings, and, for once, thanking the puppet masters for providing filtering options, Sinner pulled up a concise report on his victories from the elite level up and the loot awarded for them.

He had been credited with three elite beasts equivalent to the one he dispatched on his first night. The largest of the scorpions—the nightly visitor that had kept him up aboard the ship—was classified as a rare beast. It was not the location warden Sinner thought it would be based on the earlier message received from the puppet masters. But it was still a straight victory: mano a mano, no help or hints involved. Naturally, the reward reflected that.

The centipede was the location warden. It must have been drawn by the fire once the battle with the giants started in earnest.

That would be his second location warden, Sinner thought, the first one having been the lizard he hunted with Rat Catcher’s group. But back then, it was a group undertaking.

This one here was a personal victory, and it earned him six regular containers and two special prizes. All of them were positioned neatly, in a tight circle around that huge refrigerator-sized container he mentally christened Big Fella. But in all fairness, they were all large enough.

You have killed an antagonist: location warden.

Location warden: Giant Centipede of the Bone Desert. Caste: none. Level: 52. Boosts: enhanced physical defense, enhanced attack, terror aura, disease touch, poison touch, higher speed, better stamina, better armor, long memory, resilience to mental magic, resilience to poisons, improved eyesight, improved sense of smell, improved resilience to fire, accelerated regeneration, medium skill suite.

984 points received.

+8,481 to Karma.

The Giant Centipede of the Bone Desert is now listed in your extended rating.

Attention! This is a special message.

You have set a record among all the participants of your status. Your victory far exceeds any previous victory by any Challenge participant of your status (collectively as well as individually).

Your prize: 2,090 points, +28,640 to karma, and a container.

You can upgrade the rank of 1 item.

Attention! This option will only be accessible for the next 24 hours. If not used by then, it will automatically get canceled.

Attention! You can only upgrade the ranks of items that you have with you at the moment, since a higher item rank requires contact between the telephone and the item in question.

Attention! To all the Challenge participants. A record has been set. Record holder: Sinner. Level: 15. Caste: none (feed (meat)).

Individual victory. The highest victory record among meat. Individual victory (Level 52, antagonist (location warden), with special abilities).

Own record broken (achievement replicated).

Attention! This is a special message.

You have set a record among all the Challenge participants. Your victory far exceeds any previous individual victory of this kind by any Challenge participant.

Your prize: 5,470 points, +62,410 to karma.

You can upgrade the rank of one skill by two grades or two skills by one grade (rare opportunity).

You can upgrade the class of one skill (rare opportunity).

You can upgrade any parameters or subparameters by three grades. This could be split between different parameters or subparameters (rare opportunity).

Attention! This option will only be accessible for the next 24 hours. If not used by then, it will automatically get canceled. This upgrade can only be used for a skill, for which you have not yet begun developing the next rank (zero investment of development symbols at the current rank).

Attention! You can only upgrade the ranks of items that you have already learned as of this moment.

Attention! To all the Challenge participants. A record has been set. Record holder: Sinner. Level: 15. Caste: none (feed (meat)).

Individual victory. The highest victory record among all the Challenge participants. Individual victory (Level 52, antagonist (location warden), with special abilities).

Own record broken (achievement replicated).

Attention! This is a special message.

You are the fourth participant to have vanquished a location warden and the first to have done that singlehandedly.

Your prize: 4,910 points, +49,650 to Karma.

You can upgrade the class of one skill (rare opportunity).

You can upgrade the rank of one skill (rare opportunity).

You can upgrade defense and attack for three items (or one item by three grades, or split the upgrade between two items).

Attention! This option will only be accessible for the next 24 hours. If not used by then, it will automatically get canceled.

Attention! You can only upgrade the rank of a skill and defense and attack of only those skills and items that you have as of this moment.

The physical and emotional strain of the past night made digesting all those numbers difficult. But even if he missed something, Sinner was sure the battle was his best achievement so far. The loot awarded, too, had never been so high.

And he never even looked inside all those containers yet.

And there were also additional bonuses for defeating elite and rare beasts, which also involved opportunities for skill and item upgrades. And he barely had 24 hours to avail himself of those.

But first, he needed to sort out the containers, and then, perhaps, get a little shuteye.

But before he did any of that, Sinner took a peek at the points ratings.

Sinner: 107,438 points

Chao Chan: 33,654 points

Ruby Dragon: 32,206 points

Lee Zhou Eng: 31,711 points

Ayumi: 30,759 points

Ayumi may have been sleeping at the wheel, Sinner chuckled. Or perhaps the guy (or was it a girl? Go figure these days!) just hit a rough hunting patch.

Of all the others, Sinner felt a tad sorry for Chao Chan. Here was someone who seemed as regular as clockwork, moving up consistently, little by little. No fits and starts for this guy, thank you very much. And then there comes Sinner, who once again takes a huge leap overnight and leaves the guy’s aspirations in the dust, nullifying an entire week’s worth of honest work.

Once again, Sinner threw a quick look at all those containers—before shifting his gaze back to the ratings screen. And then did it again.

He winced and pressed the Call button.

“Good morning, Sinner,” a familiar voice answered almost immediately. “How are you holding up out there?”

“I am alright, Lynxie. You?”

“I couldn’t hold a candle to you, but otherwise I am fine. Congrats again. You are not wounded, are you? You know, I am worried about you.”

“No, no, I am in one piece. Physically, that is.”

“How do you mean?”

“A little smoke inhalation, and a light concussion, perhaps. But otherwise, not a scratch. My mental health is a different matter though. But never mind, this is not something that happened overnight.”

“Now you are talking in riddles. What’s wrong?”

“I wish I knew myself. But something is off. With me. Or with everyone. You know, I started checking those goddamned ratings every day. Like, all of a sudden, I am interested in where I stand in the pecking order. Shucks, I am not just checking. I am rooting for myself. You see what’s happening?”

“But that’s normal, isn’t it? Wouldn’t anyone want to know? If you ask me, there’s nothing out of line there.”

“No, Lynxie, this is hardly normal. This is the wrong thing to take an interest in. This means I’ve accepted the rules of the game. That’s what the puppet masters want. I have no idea what the final design is, but it sure is clear as day they are trying their damnedest to make us all fall in. And they seem to be getting their way just fine...”

Chapter 12

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Skeleton Coast

Numbers and More Numbers (aka One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich)

Sinner was right about all those containers: sorting them out took a while. He lost track of them almost immediately, restarted the count and then lost track again. In the end, he couldn’t tell for sure what the total was. Stimulants were great, but they were not omnipotent, and besides, taking too many was rife with its own perils. His tired brain must have gone to mush because he just couldn’t concentrate on the monotony of the task at hand.

It could be a thousand altogether, or maybe as high as fifteen hundred. He could not even hit the ballpark right. He tried to take a running total of level signs and development symbols—and failed again. All of the scorpions had been of the enhanced kind, to some extent or other, and besides, they were almost all nocturnal ones, and thus worth more. It also made the amount of loot dropped by each of them fairly unpredictable.

No two fairly advanced scorpions with different sets of skills and boosts were alike. Sometimes, they could be radically different.

The only thing Sinner did know was that there was a whole hell of a lot of containers, and it took him the entire day to process them all. He was drained to begin with, and besides it was hot and miserable as hell—what with the sun going full blast and the smoldering remnants of logs and tar, and the stench of burnt chitin, and a myriad of flies that showed up to feast on the carcasses.

Towards the end of the day, Sinner barely made it back to his lair in the ship’s hold and zonked out. But he barely allowed himself a couple of hours of sleep because by morning, all of those skill and upgrade offers would have been ancient history. He had it happen once after catching that bullet during the assault on Lord’s camp, and he simply couldn’t afford to have it happen again. So, upon waking up, against his better judgment, he took another short-term stimulant pill and got down to it. Thankfully, with the loot from all those newly acquired containers, he now had no shortage of meds.

With his mind wandering, Sinner reasoned, he just couldn’t take the risk of miscalculating the sum total of development symbols he now had available. So, he’d get a wee bit of help from the chemicals again. No big deal. Once he sorted the symbols out, he could then make the decision on how to apply the bonuses. He’d have to be careful though, Sinner told himself. Every upgrade to his skills meant a pinprick from his bracelet and more chemicals in his blood.

And that meant yet another bout of weakness and distorted thinking. Although the stimulant was supposed to help with that, wasn’t it?

In any event, he’d start with upgrading things first, Sinner decided. That did not require any injections or made one feel sick. It would not take long either. Although his guandao proved instrumental once again, Sinner decided he was putting everything into his bow. That included one of the few items from the prize containers he had never had before. Two of them, actually, which he had seen offered for sale at the Cube in exchange for Ideal Coins or such an obscene number of points that even someone like Sinner would have trouble affording those things.

The prized items, which both enhanced artifact properties of the weapon they were applied to, were a Medium Property Multiplier and a Visual Appearance Modifier. The former, as its name suggested, increased the value of the property selected by a factor of one point six. That went straight to Sinner’s bow.

Figuring out what to do with the latter took longer. Sinner took his phone to the unusual trophy to read the description and, upon some reflection, could not think of a better use for it than to modify his shotgun. As a result, the weapon acquired another barrel and some extra durability—without losing any of its already existing properties. There was just one drawback—extra weight—but it would still be manageable.

It was killing two birds with one stone, actually: upgrading a weapon that saved his life during the first night on the new tier and getting rid of a valuable, yet very narrowly targeted trophy he would otherwise not have much use for. The second part of that equation was actually no small matter: modifiers were medium—rather than small—items, which took quite some room. To be sure, Sinner now had a higher carrying capacity and item limits, and then there was his new weight-reducing backpack too, but it still looked like he was going to have a hell of a lot of loot to carry.

Any help dwindling the pile down was welcome.

And then there was yet another item that needed to be upgraded as much as possible. In a strange quirk, the puppet masters dropped him another magic backpack. A much better one.

Sinner was actually quite happy with the first one—but that feeling only lasted until he checked the specs on the new rig.

Challenge item.

Blue.

Accessories. Type: physical. Class: cargo carrier. Item: special turtle-shaped backpack with artifact properties.

Level: 12.

Rank: good item (can contain up to 5 attributes (and 2 more available with the use of expanders)).

Artifact properties: protecting the contents and the carrier (warming up the carrier’s body a little when it’s cold and cooling it off when it’s becoming overheated; maintaining the temperature of items placed inside; preserving foodstuffs by protecting them from rot and fungi. Remains waterproof for a long time in the rain or even when fully submerged. Offers a certain degree of fire resistance).

Activated attributes: 0 (5 slots available).

Link: none.

Durability: 209/209.

Attack: none.

Defense: substantially improved.

Large object.

Created by: The Challenge Ladder.

Resources available upon destruction: 1–6 pieces of quality leather; 1–5 pieces of excellent leather; 1–2 pieces of exceptional leather; 1–5 pieces of enhanced ore, 1–2 pieces of regular ore; 1–4 pieces of magic ore; 1–4 pieces of quality composite material; 1–16 pieces of excellent cloth; 1–3 pieces of exceptional cloth; 1–8 pieces of excellent rope; 1–3 pieces of exceptional rope; 1–12 spools of excellent thread; 1–4 panels of excellent plastic; 1–8 regular crystals; 0–2 rare crystals; 0–1 quality rock crystals; 1–6 pieces of simple salt; 1–3 pieces of magic salt; 0–1 soul of a participant, 0–2 creature souls, and 0–6 souls of a beast.

Attention! The amount of resources may grow as skills associated with gathering material resources are learned and developed. Without them you can only get a minimum amount (in case of successful destruction).

Special properties:

Space warping: 80 liters in the volume of 20 liters originally (40 liters in each compartment). Volume may increase as the item’s level is upgraded (+0.8 liter for each new level at this color (blue)).

Weight reduction: items in the backpack lose 62% of their weight in transit (this only applies to items placed in the two compartments and outer pockets, with zippers and flaps closed. Items in the net pockets or those tied up or otherwise attached outside not eligible). Further level upgrades may reduce item weight up to 84%, provided that the level of defense remains the same (enhanced). Upgrading defense may slightly reduce stored item weights further.

Brief description:

A fairly decent backpack. Offers additional comfort due to balanced weight distribution and a well thought-out complement of buckles and straps. Provides a reasonable degree of protection to the carrier’s back on account of its turtle-like shape; however, it does not qualify as a full-blown piece of armor. Space warping properties allow for items up to 5 yards long to be put inside (as long as the item stays under the volume limit of the compartment it is placed in). Substantially expands the maximum limit of items that could be carried: 500 small objects (or 100 medium-sized ones; or 20 large ones; or 10 enormous ones) and 15 containers. This limit increase will not change with level or other parameter upgrades.

Attention! The following parameters are needed to be able to use this backpack: Level 14; Strength: 12; Agility: 11.

Sinner finally had his first blue item. In the roster of colors, blue held the fifth position from the bottom—one step above Sinner’s earlier darling, white.

Color was considered an item’s most important property, and it was the hardest to upgrade. Sinner checked conversion prices while at the Launchpad and decided not to proceed. They didn’t take points for that. Ideal Coins only, and a lot of them.

So, yeah, the new backpack was more than welcome. If need be, he could even stick his guandao into it, or a bunch of spears. Plus it had a very unusual semicircular shape, reliably covering his entire back, from the shoulders down to the northern provinces of his butt, without constricting movement. Where Sinner was concerned, no extra protection for his rear could be superfluous.

Sinner thought of how best to fill the backpack’s artifact slots. Stamina, perhaps, using the cheapest activators possible. In addition to a weight reduction, this would give him such a boost during long walks that he’d be able to keep going for hours, Energizer Bunny-like, even on a scorching hot afternoon in the desert.

With five buckets of water stashed away on his back.

And if he added to that yet another one of his trophies—a light jacket with similar thermal qualities—and wore it together with the cargo vest and pants he had bought at the Launchpad, Sinner would have a total item carry limit that would truly be worth writing home about. Which meant the loot remaining after he was done upgrading could be successfully carried along until he reached any traders he could sell it too.

It would be a win-win all around.

Getting down to his bow, Sinner realized he would now have to raise his level too as the minimum requirements for using the weapon were going up. That must have been by design so that weak participants wouldn’t be able to use the best of items.

But his level would have to go up anyway. And it wasn’t just about the bow. Sinner simply had to move forward. The going was getting harder, so he needed to quickly spend his loot and progress accordingly, rather than lose sleep sitting, like some kind of a modern-day Scrooge, over an unspent pile of expensive trophies.

Sinner counted off the required amount of level signs and put them into a container. His bracelet flashed, delivering the pinprick, after which his vision blurred momentarily, smudging out all things near and turning the far away objects into nothing more than a few vague spots of watered-down color. He took a drink of water to wash away the metallic taste in his mouth.

It didn’t really help since his desalinated water tasted much the same and only added a few notes of iodine.

Done with the level upgrade injection, Sinner decided to just sit awhile rather than proceed immediately to boosting his other stats. He needed his head clear to finish the work with his bow.

It did not take long anyway.

As he took the phone to his newly bumped-up weapon, the screen spit out a new set of parameters.

Challenge item.

White.

Weapon. Type: physical. Class: non-firearm. Range: long. Category: bow.

Large object.

Level: 18.

Rank: great item (can contain up to 9 attributes (and 4 extra slots have been added with the use of expanders)).

Artifact properties:

1. Artifact enhancement, Level Four. Substantially enhanced effectiveness against non-magical defenses (especially when using armor-piercing arrows).

2. Artifact enhancement: Level Four. Offers a chance at paralyzing the target briefly even when doing trivial damage (25% probability when hitting the head or another primary brain repository; 5% probability when hitting extremities or their equivalents; 10% probability when hitting all other places).

Activated attributes: +5 Physical Attack; +5 Physical Attack; +5 Physical Attack; +5 Physical Attack; +6 Physical Attack; +6 Physical Attack; +6 Physical Attack; +6 Physical Attack; +5 Accuracy; +5 Accuracy; +6 Accuracy; +4 Accuracy; +3 Accuracy.

Link: linked automatically (extra bonus for the selected prize item). Owner: Sinner (participant 165-62-11-С-8).

Durability: 1559/1559.

Attack: Highest.

Defense: none.

Created by: The Challenge Ladder (selected prize item, with fundamental improvements).

Attention! The following parameters are need to be able to use this bow: Level 18; Strength: 15; Agility: 17.

Upgrading weapon ranks was easier than everything else. It could be done for points at the Launchpad, or using some fairly common loot that even regular game often dropped. That went double—if not a much higher multiple—for victories over serious adversaries.

In the end, Sinner stopped just two ranks short of the maximum—ideal—beyond which point the bow could no longer be upgraded. The last of the properties he activated on the weapon were not of the best and strongest kind, but that could be addressed later, using points, the next time he was at the Launchpad. As it was, he had more points now than he had made over the entire first tier.

Regardless, at the moment, his bow might well be the best such weapon on Tier Two.

Even assuming that higher castes received loot for certain victories at a higher rate, he, Sinner, was still the absolute champion in terms of the totals, so no one else would have been in a position to make the same kind of investment in a single weapon.

The way he saw it, his new bow would now be able to send arrows right through any scorpion under the level of elite. All other creatures would be easier still. Based on what Tark and Lynxie were telling him, most game on the rest of the tier was broadly similar to that prevalent in Africa, and that game was for the most part jumpy herbivores. They were not exactly easy to come close to for a spear or sword strike.

Hunting such game required a powerful rifle, and one of those could truly work miracles in Africa. His bow would be the next best thing.

Now all he had left to do was reach those blessed grounds.

His skills were next.

Sinner upgraded his archery to the rare class, which alone cost two thirds of the symbols he made to keep the tenth rank at that level. Talk about mental anguish: he wanted to go further, but at the next, epic, level the cost would be so astronomic that all of his loot made last night wouldn’t be enough to swing it.

But worse still, he was now short of the necessary amount of symbols to uprank his glaives because if he did, he would lose the modification bonus at rank ten and come up short and unable to keep it.

It was the same story all over again: no matter how much he made, he was always a penny short.

As a consolation prize, he improved his reflection skill from epic to legendary instead and applied all his bonuses to it, raising its rank to four. Sinner had no second thoughts about it. This was a skill that had saved his bacon many times in the past and probably would again. He had thus bought himself complete immunity for all of twenty-four one hundredths of a second. Eighty-five percent of any impact not involving blunt trauma would now be mitigated too. It would now be so much more difficult to knock Sinner off his feet or stomp him into the ground. The skill’s cooldown period went down to two seconds, and activation time to one second.

Raising the rank to five would allow Sinner to hang six shields at the same time rather than five, but once again—wasn’t that the story of his life or something?—he came up short.

The remaining pittance went into various stats and parameters of lesser significance, and in the end he spent it all, down to the last lousy symbol. Sinner picked up his phone to have a bird’s eye view of what his shopping spree had bought him.

Level: 18

Body Energy: 230 (+88)

Spirit Energy: 90 (+56)

STATS

Strength: 15

Strength subparameters:

Defeat Armor: 15

Agility: 18

Agility subparameters:

Accuracy: 17

Stamina: 12

Stamina subparameters:

Stability: 4

Perception: 5

Spirit: 0

PARAMETERS

Physical Defense: 18

Magical Defense: 0

Physical Attack: 18

Magical Attack: 0

ACTIVE SKILLS

Built-in Skills:

Unarmed Combat: 6 (built-in enhanced)

Cartography: 0

Basic Skills:

Spear: 2

Herbal Lore: 2

Simple Skills:

Artillery: 7

Clubs: 9

Random Items: 6

Traps: 5

Enhanced Skills:

Knife: 2

Excellent Skills:

Glaives: 10 (one modification: +20% to weapon wielding speed)

Rare Skills:

Bow: 10 (one modification: +36% to initial arrow velocity)

Pistols: 0

Epic Skills:

Epic Research: 2

Epic Geology: 2

Legendary Skills:

Legendary Reflection: 4

CASTE:

None

ACCUMULATED KARMA:

701,654

POINTS RECEIVED AT CURRENT TIER:

107,438

Unfortunately, Sinner was unable to bring it all up to Level 18—the maximum possible at the moment. The higher he went, the more stratospheric upgrade costs became.

Plus most of his loot had gone straight into his bow, because otherwise he would have had plenty for all of his parameters, subparameters, and the rest of that entire shebang. Sinner shook his head sadly: he had spent over one hundred and thirty thousand symbols on his bow. Jesus H. Christ!!! To be sure, the amount was outright usurious, but it wasn’t like he was willing to give up the modification as he upgraded the weapon. The higher the skill class, the better it paid back. When he opened that modification for the first time, he could tell the difference with his first shot, with no corrections or adjustments required. His arrows just flew faster, period. All by themselves.

How this boost made its peace with ballistics, and whether it did at all was a totally different question, but Sinner did not even bother asking it.

He took yes for an answer.

However, with costs being what they were, pushing the bow higher still would be downright impossible. He would either have to wait for his next sojourn at the Launchpad before the third tier and buy everything wholesale, up to the limits allowed, or hope for a chance at another glorious deed right here, to be followed by symbols in the dozens of thousands and other substantial loot from containers.

One thing was clear though: this tier had been streamlined for intensive development. Even the fact that they dropped him in some godforsaken secret location no one knew anything about corroborated that premise—seeing how he managed to turn it around to his own benefit.

In fact, here he pursued his development with a vigor other participants, in less productive locations, could only dream about. From what Tark told him, chasing antelopes around was a totally different kind of hunting, and it paid pennies on the dollar compared to what he was getting here. Indeed, he did not even have to whistle to keep the beasties coming. After dark, they came of their own accord, and willingly. And they came by the thousand. To be sure, the antelopes were not going to eat one alive—nor would they yield a thousand juicy containers overnight.

And that was before one even counted in the special prizes.

Those prizes, as well as the loot dropped by the centipede and the rare scorpion gave Sinner a plethora of expensive items.

There was a humongous shield of metal and black plastic that went straight into his new backpack. The specs on it were through the roof, but Sinner doubted he could easily find an individual prepared to pay what the piece was worth. Ergo, he would have to sell the shield to a trader somewhere at half price or disassemble it into resources if he needed the storage space for something still more valuable and just as unwieldy.

There was also a metal helmet with a fancy T-shaped slit in the visor, but Sinner immediately nixed the idea of keeping it for his own use. It felt like wearing a metal bucket over his head, and he could hardly see anything through the slits. But perhaps some connoisseur of solid protection would see value in it.

There was a spear, too, and Sinner liked it just fine, except why would he need it if he already had his guandao? All of those items would have to be stored until the right moment presented itself and they could be unloaded on some wealthy, generally sane participants. Besides, upgrading such items from zero to something comparable to Sinner’s current equipment would cost a fortune, and not all the stats could be bumped up using regular loot anyway. So, yeah, he would part with all those things eagerly if the right man—or woman—came along, and at an attractive discount too, which would still be better than selling them for a pittance to the puppet masters’ captive traders with their usurious prices.

Sinner considered the new crossbow for a second. It looked good, with the stats to match. He also liked the idea of having the piece in half-size. The very sight of the weapon made Sinner think of Lynxie.

That would be an ideal shooter for the girl’s gentle constitution. And she had had the skill for it since way back. Sinner put the piece into his bag too. Never mind them chocolates. Advanced weapons made for best presents to significant others.

Sinner tried the heavy set of mail armor on—and didn’t like it. Not one single bit. The difference between that and a modern bulletproof vest was striking. Heavy metal constricted movement and would probably hamper his speed too. It might well offer better protection, but still, Sinner knew this wasn’t something he’d ever use.

A lighter, more manageable set, perhaps—sometime in the future, when he bumped his Strength sky-high, but maybe not even then. Either way, for the time being, those were all items for sale.

In the end, out of the entire push cart-worth of different items, he only selected four for his personal use. Naturally, they were all fairly expensive. Multiple tchotchkes, such as various rings and bracelets that could be mixed and matched freely within one’s personal artifact limits, would be for sale too. In fact, those would be easiest to sell.

The first article was not something Sinner ever expected to see: it was a pair of yellowish green camouflage pants. Such regular looking overalls—fairly faded, too, as if they had been washed often—could well be part of a battle dress uniform in any number of European armies back on Earth. They looked cheap and expendable—until Sinner took his phone to them.

Challenge item.

Blue.

Pants. Type: physical defense. Class: protective clothing. Item: Protective Agility Pants.

Large object.

Level: 11.

Rank: good item (can contain up to 5 attributes (and 2 more available with the use of expanders)).

Artifact properties: boost to owner’s Agility (by a factor of .17).

Activated attributes: none (5 slots available).

Link: none.

Durability: 413/413.

Attack: none.

Defense: enhanced.

Created by: The Challenge Ladder.

That would be his second blue item after the new back, Sinner thought. The color alone piqued his interest immediately, and the more he looked into it, the more said interest grew.

To hear the puppet masters put it, the pants offered better protection than his bulletproof vest—all on account of their enhanced defense. The detailed description even claimed that when hit by a bullet or another projectile, the fabric around the point of impact would compress in a special way, spreading the slug’s kinetic energy over a larger area and thus helping mitigate any potential damage. The hit wouldn’t become any more pleasant, but perhaps the magic breeches would help him avoid outright penetrations, broken bones or even bad bruises.

As an extra bonus, the pants could be dropped into any spare container to have their outer color or thermal qualities changed as desired, based on the weather conditions. They would keep him warm in the cold and help cool the lower part of his body in the desert.

Overall, Sinner agreed with himself, that was an outstanding item of clothing, definitely worthy of a famous champion’s wardrobe.

Shucks, he wouldn’t mind a shirt from the same label either, but that was where his luck ran out, at least for the time being. Perhaps, if he could ever afford the Launchpad store’s extortionate pricing, he’d buy one for his birthday, Sinner promised himself.

Having put the pants on, Sinner took a few steps around the ship’s hold to get used to the feel of the new garment, and then tried a running jump. His head immediately bumped into the deck planks above, the body getting deflected, flipped head over heels and sent straight back down to the nether region. Amazingly, acting on sheer instinct, Sinner somehow managed to return to the upright position, having thus done a full somersault, and landed on his feet. And he made no noise while at it, despite having his heavy boots on.

Wow! To be sure, the landing was not perfect, the body still persevering in its old ways, reluctant to immediately accept the unexpected boost from the puppet masters, but with training and frequent use, the add-on would be welcome and much appreciated.

The other three items Sinner decided to keep were not as impressive: a nondescript ring that reduced the risk of serious bruises, dislocations and fractures and quickly stemmed bleeding; a belt with a massive buckle that served as a bug repellent and discouraged snakes and other reptiles, and a flexible collar made of some unknown material.

The belt was also said to help discourage and disorient particularly eager opponents during hand-to-hand combat. But the bug repellent property was particularly welcome, seeing how there were myriads of gnats around, attracted by piles of rotting seaweed on the shore. Their bites were painless, but soon enough, they began itching like hell, and by the time the nasty effect wore out Sinner had plenty of new bites. Those damn little things really drove him nuts, and there didn’t seem to be any respite in sight. Now, hopefully, he’d have at least some.

The collar Sinner was not so sure about at first since it was just not his style wearing anything around his neck. But putting the strange neckband on gave him no discernible discomfort. On the contrary, Sinner felt good and content immediately—as if after an hour-long massage, or, perhaps, an energizing jog, followed by a hot shower and a cup of good Colombian coffee. His head cleared and he felt a perceptible energy boost.

But that was not all. According to the description, wearing the collar all the time or with only minimal breaks helped one get by on much less sleep—up to two times less, ideally—although the instructions kept mum on how to reach that ideal. Furthermore, the user’s manual claimed that the effect was not achieved through any chemicals injected into the bloodstream and would not conflict with any medications from bracelets or pills.

All the three items had decent ranks and quite a number of slots to be filled. Since Sinner ran out of expensive activators, he stuffed them with weak and medium boosts that added to Agility, Strength, and Stamina.

There was also yet another Resurrection Altar and two teleportation stones, none of which Sinner had an immediate need for at the moment. Using disintegrators, he turned a lot of cheaper items into resources, to make more arrows and reduce the number of large items he would have to haul with him. Even seeing that his carrying capacity was increased greatly, Sinner still could not afford to just stuff all the loot dropped after the last night’s massacre into his backpacks and be on his merry way.

So he spent a whole bunch of small items on some equipment upgrades that, in all fairness, he could do without—just to reduce the physical amount of loot he’d have to drag on his way out of this place. Hopefully, such upgraded equipment would command a higher price once he finally reached civilization. For a moment, Sinner thought about making a loot cache right here, by the ship, but decided against it.

Who knew what the future would bring? Even having a teleportation stone, there was no guarantee he’d be able to come back to collect his trophies.

One of his main containers also yielded four flash drives, one of which had a large-scale map on it. However, upon close inspection, Sinner realized the areas on the map were mere partials—sections of the adjoining desert and fragments of the coast. There was no good reason to get all pumped up about any of those places, let alone waste a teleportation stone to get there.

The second drive contained an illustrated encyclopedia of sorts that described some two dozen species of the tier’s fauna depicted in their respective natural habitats. Each entry provided a picture, a brief description of the animal, and information about their food preferences, habitats, vulnerabilities and the potential danger they presented.

The third drive had a single QR code on it. Once Sinner checked it with his phone, the message on the screen congratulated him on having just learned the local ngvi-bao-bo vernacular.

There was no indication anywhere as to what he might need that esteemed lingo for. Nor could he notice any changes in himself now that he was a freshly minted native speaker of babo... guin... Sinner chuckled and gave up trying.

The fourth drive displayed a mark on the map claimed to be the location of a local trader by the name of Mbungu. The gentleman was apparently paying two Ideal Coins each for excellent quality chitin panels, and he could take as may as seventy-five of them right away. However, the area around the mark was a complete whited out blank, so teleporting to anywhere within a reasonable distance of it would also be impossible. Teleportation required precise location details, which the map somehow failed to include. Reading on, Sinner learned that giant scorpions, centipedes, and sand catchers, whatever those were, could only be encountered on the Skeleton Coast.

Sinner had not yet had a chance to deal with the latter and hoped he wouldn’t.

Still, a hundred and fifty Ideal Coins was a fairly decent amount—about as much as he had waiting for him on account at the Launchpad. That was all Sinner had in the way of savings, left over from Tier One. Plus another two hundred and twenty-four here, on hand—the total tally for the two battles with the scorpions, collected from all of the containers and special prizes. But, strictly speaking, those did not count yet since he could not spend any of them at the moment. Besides, there was always a chance he’d get killed or robbed before he finally could.

So how would he deliver those chitin panels to Mr. Mbungu? They were medium objects, equivalent to five small ones. Even without that chitin, Sinner was very much close to his carrying capacity, so taking much of anything else on would be a problem. All he could do, he thought, was harvest the plates and make a secret stash right here, for hope of being able to come back and collect it at some later point in time.

God knew he did not want to bury any treasure. He had to. And while he was at it, Sinner decided, he would also leave some of the small, less valuable stuff behind. His experience suggested that overloading was not exactly conducive to successfully moving around. And besides, there could well be more stuff to be had on the way. One always needed to keep one’s powder dry and have a bit extra storage space reserved, for good measure.

Overall, Sinner found the information useful, but it still did not help him with the big question. He would still need to find his way out of this place under his own power. His teleportation stones would have to wait for another day.

Chapter 13

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: South Meeba

Hunting the Treasure Hunters

Sinner left early in the morning, foregoing the opportunity to give the scorpions another thrashing or two.

To be sure, making tons of loot overnight was lucrative business, but how many such nights could he expect himself to last? One could not be winning forever. Besides, what would be the point of getting even more loot if he was already at capacity and couldn’t carry any more of it away with him?

And—last but not least—it was not all just about the loot alone. Time went by, and he was still sitting exactly where they dropped him off. Who knew what the road north would bring? He’d really need to get moving and reconnoiter the way out well in advance. Once he knew what the story was, he could probably take his time and consider other possible options.

Such as, say, go all the way to the border, but not quite, just to try it on for size, and then unsheathe his teleportation stone and—whoosh!—fly back to the kingdom of huge scorpions and stay until the very last possible moment to harvest as much loot as he could. And then use another stone to return to the border. Thanks to the rich prize containers, Sinner now had a nice little stash of those instantaneous “plane tickets” to use as he saw fit.

He had put most of them together using fragments, which were a frequent occurrence even in the containers dropped by regular scorpions.

On his way out and into the desert, Sinner followed a dry riverbed connecting to the coast a bit further east, between the ship and another stretch of rocky terrain.

According to a mark on the map he found searching the mess room, that was the starting point of officer Marcellus Mota’s expedition. If he managed to catch up with them, Sinner thought, there’d always be a chance of him learning the location of the treasure that, in all likelihood, the ship had been after.

And since he was heading that way anyway, why not combine two good things into one? Even if it turned out to be a banal chest of gold, that would still be welcome. Gold was used here as a valuable resource in all kinds of recipes, and traders accepted gold too. Furthermore, gold coins and regular jewelry were not Challenge items, so they were not subject to weight limits.

But of course, mere gold would be the worst case scenario. Under the circumstances, launching a serious expedition to such a dangerous place for gold alone would make little sense. Besides, Sinner seemed to be the only Challenge participant in an extremely dangerous location, and he got his treasure map, or at least a part thereof, after an all-out battle with numerically superior opponents. There had to be something more valuable involved than just gold. Diamonds, perhaps? Sinner vaguely recalled that back on Earth, South Africa also had some kind of a place called the Skeleton Coast, with the Namib Desert on one end and the Atlantic Ocean on the other. The region had a bad reputation, but one could get hold of some diamonds there.

Back in Tier One, Sinner heard a story about some lucky girl who had chanced upon a jewelry store that was not yet burglarized. She had to fight for her prize, as it usually happens with most things of value, and in the end, there was precious little jewelry there. However, just one ring with a large diamond brought the lady over ten thousand regular coins and a few ideal ones. Which was quite telling, seeing how traders, who might on occasion be a little lax with regular coins, absolutely loathed parting with ideal ones.

Perhaps he’d be lucky enough to come across something similar in that treasure trove, Sinner told himself.

He took great care to prepare for crossing the desert. His new protective pants were set for the maximum cooling effect. On his back, he had his new fancy turtle-shaped backpack, and the one the giant scorpion dropped on the first night on top of that. Between the two of those, he had about ten gallons of water in large flasks of unknown provenance he had found aboard the ship. Naturally, he wouldn’t be able to carry as much without weight and dimension reductions offered by the backpacks. Add to that half a dozen various bottles, a narrow-necked jug corked with a makeshift plug and a mini cask, and the water supply picture would be complete.

By Sinner’s conservative estimates, barring the unforeseen, he’d have enough water for a week of very, very hard going. He’d give himself full four days, Sinner decided. If, by the end of that period, nothing appeared to be changing, he’d come back to the ship, replenish his water supply and try to reach greener (literally so!) pastures moving through the scorpion territory along the coast.

There was yet another feasible option: take full seven days walking north, and then, if there was still nothing there, use a teleportation stone to come back to the ship. But that would really have to be a Plan B of the last resort. It was not so much the matter of wasting a teleportation stone, or rather not only that. He just didn’t trust the puppet masters that much. Before going deeper still into the desert, he had better make absolutely sure he had enough time and supplies to get back to the ship under his own power if it ever came to that.

An hour into it, Sinner realized, to his surprise and delight, that he would not have to fight his way through—not all that much anyway. It seemed the scorpions only congregated en mass at the very beginning: over the first mile and a half, he dispatched fourteen of them. However, walking the next couple of miles, he only saw two—both of them at a considerable distance.

In all likelihood, the puppet masters must have been guided by common sense here: large enough predators simply wouldn’t be able to find sustenance in a barren desert such as this one. Now, having five hundred of them per square mile, for dozens of miles on end, would really make the project science fiction—minus the science. The monster arthropods seemed to be at the very top of the local food chain, so they tended to congregate around the sea lion rookeries.

There were none in the desert, so the scorpions had to stay close to the seashore. In other words, if he did have to take the coastal route out after all, there’d be no need to fight his way through it: all he’d have to do would be go but a few miles into the desert and then continue on a parallel course with the shore. And if he kept to the lower areas at the foot of the dunes, that would be easier still since the scorpions, whatever their reasons, seemed to like higher grounds better.

But that would be a concern for the future. For the time being, Sinner was following the dry riverbed, which tended to disappear under shifting dunes every once in a while but was easy enough to find again on the other side of the encroaching mound of sand.

Some of the buried sections were up to half a mile long, but the main bed would always resurface in the end. The channel, which had apparently been carved by an ample flow of water during some other, more bountiful times, was dry as a bone, but at least it was a nearly perfect navigational tool—a straight arrow connecting north and south. At least for the time being, Sinner told himself. It was nowhere near over yet.

* * *

Three hours down the road, Sinner made a brief pause to take stock of his progress. Over that time, his “you are here” mark on the map shifted by almost six miles as the crow flew. It was probably not all that much different from the actual mileage since through that time he had been moving almost directly northward.

Which translated into not quite two miles an hour. Not much. Fairly laughable, actually, but hey, he was having plenty of sand to traverse in those places where the riverbed was buried, and the channel itself wasn’t quite a highway even on its most agreeable stretches. Add to that the temperatures in the low nineties and a heavy load on his back—and voila. The going was hard, really hard, and although his newly acquired “feel good” collar helped a little, this was still nowhere near a walk in the park. And yes, it could get worse. It always could.

As he was getting further away from the coast, there was ever more sand, it seemed, and it was drier and crumblier too. And he was getting progressively more tired. Sinner knew there was no way he’d be able to maintain the same tempo, slow that it was, until sundown. It would be good if he managed to do twenty miles overall that day. Twenty-five would be an outstanding result. Thirty...

Well, he was not going to do thirty, he was sure of that.

In Tier One, moving at such speeds would take one all the way to the northern frontier in just two or three days. This place here was reportedly much larger, and they allowed forty-nine days—rather than fifteen—for it. You do the math, buddy, Sinner told the nasty little critic up in his frontal lobe. By that token, the total border to border distance here would be three times as long—on the order of a hundred and fifty miles, or more.

If this was in fact an accurate estimate, Sinner thought, he might have enough water on him to go straight through, even if the terrain was a desert all the way down. Provided, of course, that he took small enough gulps and swallows, and not very often. But what about those mountains in the distance then? Were they a mirage, or were they real?

In less arid areas where it was not so hot, his water could last longer, much longer, especially if he only moved mornings and nights, taking cover in the shade to rest during the hottest parts of the day. But that would be pushing it.

God only knew what kind of surprises one might encounter here in the dark.

Still, even if he miscalculated, Sinner thought, he’d have to keep going, barring a true emergency.

He didn’t really have much choice.

* * *

Sinner stopped for the night right before the disk of the sun on his left dove into its sandy burrow. He could probably push it for another mile or two, but the place was just too good to pass it by. The shallow, stony canyon cut a wide swath through the dunes to its east and west, with the rock face on the eastern side rising as high as a five-story tenement at some point. A dozen yards up from the ground, the rock had a sizeable opening, which, upon inspection, turned out to lead to a semblance of a cavern, large enough for a grown man to stretch out comfortably.

Sinner liked the place just fine. Hard as his makeshift bed for the night would be, it was better to sleep here than in the open, exposed to anyone or anything that might crawl out of the dark. If nothing else, the position was defensible, with any potential attackers having just one avenue of ingress.

Sinner had a quick bite thinking that the uninspiring provisions from the ship’s galley would present yet another danger to his water supply, seeing how all those foodstuffs were dry and excessively salty.

But again, it was still better than nothing.

He’d make his water last, one way or another, Sinner told himself—for the entire hundred and fifty miles if need be. Somehow that number, accurate or not, got stuck in his mind and flat out refused to leave. But that was all right. He had made things work before, and he’d do it again. He was Sinner. He was the champion.

* * *

Sleeping undisturbed until dawn proved to be as much of an unachievable dream as ever. Or rather, at first Sinner thought he was having a nightmare because the sounds from the outside were very familiar. The rustling of chitin plates that only intensified when scorpions were climbing vertical surfaces wasn’t something one forgot easily.

Turning on his back, Sinner failed to see stars in the sky and immediately knew he was in an enclosed space.

The remnants of sleep were gone in a jiffy. No, it was no bad dream. It had to be scorpions.

Jumping in his improvised bed, Sinner felt for the musket he had brought with him from the ship. It was the shortest of the entire bunch, and that’s what sold him on it. The piece was there, and ready for action. Good. With his left hand, Sinner reached for his trusted guandao and then froze, watching the access hole. He had no more light sticks left, but the moon was out that night, and there were plenty of shiny stars up in the clear skies. He could definitely see the outline of something.

Something moving his way. An amorphous blob of darkness at first, the silhouette kept growing larger and more angular. Sinner knew what it was. A sensitive soul with no interest in or familiarity with finer points of entomology might well have a heart attack at the sight of something like that. But Sinner, although not yet completely free of his old bug phobia, was not a sensitive soul.

And he did come across an arachnid or two in the past—all of which materially contributed to the sheer lethality of his blows.

A momentary crackle of breaking chitin later, the first of the scorpions went down, to where it had come from.

Sinner was on! Again!

Except it was really all over before it started. Three more scorpions tried their luck and shared he fate of the first one. They were regular bugs. Nothing special.

And that was it. To be sure, injured bugs down below, having met Sinner’s guandao and lived to tell about it, were still fussing around. But they were not going to be able to climb back up, so there was no need to worry about them anymore.

Now, why were there so few of them?

And where did they come from anyway? Sinner had not seen any of them for hours and came to believe the giant bugs didn’t venture that far from the ocean.

But then, some fifteen minutes later, there was yet another rustling sound outside. Soon enough, a new entrant, which had apparently had no experience in the matter yet, joined its more knowledgeable brethren at the foot of the rock to discuss fine points of Sinner’s jabbing technique.

Up in his cave, Sinner beat down the urge to check his phone to see if there was any new information in his victory messages.

But no, even a momentary flash of the screen in the dark could knock his night vision out for long minutes, and if another arachnid showed up during that time, Sinner would have nothing else left to do but illuminate the new threat with the phone’s flashlight. And he did not even want to think of what and from how far away could see the sudden flash and develop an interest.

He did not need any more guests, Sinner figured. He’d wait for daylight.

* * *

All in all, by the time the sun rose, Sinner dispatched a total of nine scorpions. Although the first four were of the more agile and dangerous nightly variety, the remainder were regular, average-sized bugs, which got Sinner thinking. At the crack of dawn, once sufficient lighting became available, he checked his phone.

By that time, four of the nine scorpions no longer showed any signs of life, and he had received a separate notification for each of them.

The first one read as follows:

You have killed an antagonist: a common beast.

Common beast: Agile Scorpion of the Desert. Caste: none. Level: 20.

Boosts: substantially enhanced protection against physical attacks from a distance; improved seismic sense; enhanced resilience to poisons; tracking ability; considerable scare factor.

49 points received.

+217 to Karma.

The Agile Scorpion of the Desert is now listed in your extended rating.

The other three notifications differed from the first in some minor details, but all of them had one thing in common: tracking ability.

Reading the brief descriptions, Sinner could not tell if that was a boost or a separate skill in its own right. Either way, it was not something he had any memories of having come across before, so he read the notifications again, this time with more scrutiny. One thing was clear though: the ability had not been listed in the descriptions of so many different scorpions at the same time before.

Sinner recalled the crocodiles on Tier One, which were guided by their long memory as they pursued him and his companions across the reservoir and up the gorge. It could well be that one or a few of the reptiles also had a similar tracking skill, and the rest were just following.

Therefore, he could safely assume that his first nightly visitors, out of the sand and on the prowl, simply chanced upon his footprints and tracked him all the way up for miles. The less gifted variety simply followed.

Or perhaps he was just overthinking that entire experience. There was simply not enough information available.

Sinner got up—or down, rather—and went about getting it.

* * *

Once at the foot of his rock, Sinner used his guandao to quickly finish off the crippled scorpions that were still alive.

As additional notifications were coming in, he read them all carefully. Indeed, each of the freshly demised scorpions had the same “tracking ability”.

It was time to look into the tracks themselves.

Scorpions tracks, that is.

The night had been quiet, and now Sinner could clearly see the extended parallel lines of discrete marks left by scorpion legs on the sand covering parts of the riverbed. He took the trouble of going back almost for a half mile and scaling a dune just to make sure that yes, the bugs had in fact come from the coast, following him north on a straight line. Even without his amulet, Sinner could see multiple individual tracks overlapping each other, almost creating a single continuous groove in the sand.

So it appeared less than a dozen of bugs had followed him as he moved away from the shore. Big deal! Compared to the countless hordes from earlier, this was a mere pittance. This was good news. Sinner wondered if he may have inflicted some extinction level damage on the bug population in that particular section of the shore. If that was the case, then, perhaps, once the tracks were blown over during the day, no more scorpions would be following.

But that would be making way too many assumptions, each of which could prove to be dead wrong. Which meant what exactly? There were not that many defensible positions in the desert, especially if the bugs caught him in the open.

Come to think of it, the grotto where he had just spent the night was just about the only such defensible place he had come across since leaving the coast. And even the smallest of the bugs could easily kill him when he was asleep.

So what was a man to do under the circumstances? Keep pushing north and keep his fingers crossed that he would bump into another convenient shelter or that no more poisonous vermin would show up again in the dark of the night?

Sinner walked around the area a little and even climbed up a couple of dunes trying to figure out what lay ahead. But all he could see was more dunes further north, quite a few of them just as high as before.

Indeed, he did not see much of anything else.

That did not bode well for his immediate prospects. Even the highest of those dunes would be a lousy place to fight off an army of giant bugs.

So, upon reflection, Sinner headed back to his cavern. He’d stay put for another night, he decided.

As much as he hated losing a day, he simply had to know what, if anything, the scorpions were going to do come nightfall. If they did come again, he’d be ready, willing, and able.

And then he’d make his final decision.

* * *

The day went down the drain all right. With nothing productive to do, Sinner simply went for limiting motion—any kind of motion—to save his water.

But he didn’t begrudge himself that involuntary period of “doing absolutely nothing” as much as the fact that it had all been for nothing. He had spent the entire night barely snoozing and keeping one eye open, but no more scorpions showed up. It was either that they couldn’t pick up the old trail again, or there were simply no more pathfinder bugs remaining in the area.

Yeah, yeah, Sinner told the critic again. He was out of another day.

But at least now he knew, almost for a fact, that no one else was coming for him from the coast. That was valuable information. Negative results were results too!

He still had plenty of time, Sinner told himself. A day more or less didn’t make much of a difference. In fact, he should have rejoiced that none of the really big bugs had been following. He wouldn’t have been able to do much about an elite scorpion up in that cave even though he did have a few portable aces up his sleeve, including an IED.

Still, black powder wasn’t TNT, and it was a small bomb too, in all fairness. It would not do much, unless he somehow managed to make the big bug swallow it.

All that was speculation at best anyway.

What he needed to do now was put his backpacks back on and try to make for the time lost.

Chapter 14

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Central Meeba

Arrows and Bullets

By noon, Sinner learned two things.

First: he had given himself way too much credit. Covering twenty miles under the scorching sun may well have been possible when following a stony riverbed, which was largely free of the sand. However, the further north Sinner went, the more sand there was—of the kind that one’s foot sank ankle-deep into.

His second finding was that he’d die of exhaustion and depressing boredom in this featureless desert before he was dead of thirst.

There was nothing alive in that place. Nothing lived there. He had not even seen any dried up grass stalks for quite some time now, or perhaps a small beetle or fly. It was as if he were on Mars, which they had somehow equipped with an atmosphere.

Sinner almost felt nostalgic for the fairly barren coast, which, in comparison with his current surroundings, almost seemed to be an oasis. And then there was that thoroughly depressing feeling of being in a totally lifeless place, which no living being, large or small, cared to call home.

In the absence of any visual stimulation for logical inferences, his imagination conveniently served up all kinds of gratuitous otherworldly horrors, prompting Sinner to strain his direct and peripheral vision, searching for things that were not really there. The effect was borderline hallucinatory and outright dangerous for one’s mental health.

And did he even mention the unbearable heat yet? Under that never-ending thermal stress, all the little bits of help he was getting from his fancy backpacks, his collar, and his other expensive equipment, were essentially for naught.

Sinner could tell his mental capacity suffered greatly too. He was just putting one foot in front of the other in a totally mechanical manner while his mind and soul drew a complete blank, for the most part.

That was bad. That was totally unacceptable, because the world he was in was not really dead, and the disposition could turn on a dime at any moment. Sinner needed to be prepared for that. Whether it was going to be more scorpions or something else that he hadn’t even experienced yet, he had to stay sharp. He did not need any surprises of any kind, especially those he would be totally unprepared for.

He needed to stay Sinner.

* * *

It was way past noon when Sinner finally met trouble.

As Murphy’s Law would have it, it happened during one of those periods when he was borderline comatose, barely dragging his feet and struggling to maintain the somewhat hunched position that made the weight on his back somewhat bearable. His eyes were down though and barely capable of reacting to anything but the most basic of impediments that could have an immediate adverse effect on sustained horizontal movement. The rest of his mental faculties took a vacation, with a mere skeleton crew standing watch up on the bridge to ensure the barebones continuous operations of the locomotor system.

In all fairness, Sinner was but a walking vegetable.

And then, with nary a warning, two things happened: his nose caught a strange smell, and his ears heard the click of a flintlock, followed by the roar of a musket shot somewhere up and ahead of him.

Later on, Sinner could never figure out how on earth he had managed to react in the split second that separated the powder on the shelf igniting from the slug leaving the .75 bore barrel. By all accounts, waking up from the vegetative state he was in should have taken longer, yet his body still threw itself sideways without waiting for any specific instructions from the engine order telegraph.

Instead of hitting him smack in the chest, the heavy bullet skirted the edge of the second, less capable backpack on top of Sinner’s master turtle. But even that was enough to throw him off kilter. He did manage to keep his balance, Sinner realized on some subconscious level, but his forward momentum came to a full stop.

The enemy, whoever they were, got much luckier with their second shot, perhaps because this was a load of buckshot, rather than a solid slug. In all fairness though, their triple aught buck was just about the size of a regular .38 bullet, and a few of those beauties hit Sinner in the center mass, discharging one of the five shields he maintained on himself at all times.

But by that time, Sinner already figured out where the shots had come from and darted forward, seeking cover under the precipitous rock face on his right. The riverbed here was more like a massive trench with walls some three yards high. The soil was a reddish clay of sorts, intermixed with water-worn rock that offered plenty of furrows and other depressions to squeeze himself into, hang another shield and take a breather to figure out what kind of a hornet’s nest he had stirred up this time.

Sticking his guandao out, Sinner used the wide polished blade as a mirror. Five seconds later, he had a clear enough picture of what had just transpired.

A hundred yards further ahead, the dry channel was once again being squeezed by overbearing mounds of sand on both sides, one of which was dominated by a fairly high dune. On top of which two men were seemingly busy, reloading. They both looked vaguely familiar.

No, Sinner did not know them personally, but their attire and weapons must have come from the same Post Exchange the recently demised officers on board the ship had been shopping at. Their faces, similarly dry, taut and swarthy, seemed to be from the same mold as well.

How they had found themselves here, in the middle of the desert and dozens of miles away from the sea, was a question for another time. For now, Sinner knew, he needed to neutralize the threat. He decided not to bother with his own musket.

It was way too far, and he put no trust in the unfamiliar, primitive weapon.

Sinner pulled the piece off his shoulder, putting it on the ground, next to his backpacks.

He wouldn’t be able to move fast enough with a load like that on his shoulders. Hopefully, no one would materialize out of thin air to steal them.

The engagement, it seemed, was barely getting started. He could attack the two musketeers head on, Sinner thought, using good old blunt force and speed. His five shields would be more than enough to deflect two bullets, and he would then reach the pair before they could reload and fire again. And God help those buggers then.

But that wasn’t the best he could do, and it wasn’t particularly smart. Sinner put the guandao down next to the musket. After all, what was the purpose of spending so lavishly on his bow if he was not going to use it? Why would he want to play target?

Watching the shooters, Sinner could tell they had just pants and short sleeve shirts on. No armor of any kind. He’d use regular arrows then, he decided, the ones with wide heads.

Hugging the clay of the canyon wall, Sinner moved a dozen paces closer to the enemy’s position and then took a hurried step sideways, towards the center, at the same time raising his bow.

The two shooters, alert and ready, were still there, apparently targeting the spot where they saw Sinner last. To their credit, they reacted without delay, the barrels of their muskets immediately becoming two huge black muzzles looking Sinner straight in the face. At point-blank range, there was no need to compensate for bullet drop, so whatever the pair had loaded in those muskets would go straight to the target, guaranteed.

But Sinner was faster. His arrow went flying before the enemy’s lead even left the barrels. In all fairness though, the response did not lag far behind: both guns boomed in a cloud of smoke, lit from behind by a pair of bright flashes.

Sinner’s arrow found its target, but so did the bullets, one of them hitting him smack in the head. Once again, his deflection skill saved the day, sparing Sinner any injury, but the blunt force of the impact was so strong that he lost his balance and went down. Yet he was still all in it and upon hitting the ground immediately rolled to the side, to the safety of his protruding rock face.

Once there, Sinner could not deny himself the pleasure of spending a few seconds listening to the desperate screams of the man hit by his arrow. It meant there was now only one adversary left standing. Good.

However, the following moment Sinner’s high mood went south abruptly as there were suddenly many more shouts and yells, all from different sources, and not so much of pain as of white-hot fury and steely resolve—all those nice things preceding the dispensation of revenge. Oh, how sweet it is to be loved by you, the little critic in Sinner’s head sang.

It looked like he finally caught up with the ship’s treasure hunting expedition, Sinner reasoned, and—surprise, surprise!—they were not too happy to see him. That would add about a dozen resolute old salts to the opposing force, and they were coming down from somewhere behind the original pair’s shooting position. And they would be highly likely to have muskets too—many more of them than he had deflection shields.

Sinner did not like the math on this one, and besides, his own position sucked. If those sea dogs turned out to be smart enough to flank him and cut his only avenue of retreat from behind, or post shooters up top, on both sides of the canyon, he’d be bottled up in the narrow, hi-walled trench with nowhere to go but against the volleys of murderous lead. He simply had to get out of that damned riverbed.

And it was not that the slopes were particularly high; however, they were steep, and the soil was all dry, crumbly clay mixed with sand that tended to give way the moment you thought you found a foothold. Cursing himself and the world around him, Sinner darted back down the canyon, the way he had come from.

It was a damn shame to be leaving his backpacks and his guandao behind, but he simply had no time to go collect them. And even if he did, combat maneuvering with that much weight on his shoulders suddenly looked much less attractive.

Another shot rang out behind, the bullet hitting him in the back. This time, Sinner did not even bother looking around: just like he thought they would, the sailors must have reached high ground on the side of the canyon and ready to let him have it.

They were fast all right. This way he’d be out of shields before he could even say a quick Hail Mary.

Sinner counted to ten slowly—which, he figured, would be enough time for a skilled musketeer to reload—and broke into a zigzagging run. It worked: the next shot missed. The bullet went way to the left, hitting the ground about twenty paces ahead of him.

Sinner wondered if his vigorous meandering alone could account for such a bad miss. Perhaps not—and then his head finally kicked into gear, fortified by a healthy adrenaline shot, and Sinner recalled his own extensive experiments with this world’s firearms back at the ship. Hitting a barrel from seventy paces was problematic even when shooting the best and the longest of the muskets they had—and hey, the barrel was standing still.

Putting a mere fifty yards between himself and the shooter would increase his chances immensely, especially if changing course every couple of seconds or so.

Almost immediately, Sinner knew what he needed to do.

Yes, that would be a dangerous plan—but wasn’t “risk” his middle name?

* * *

The bow is an ancient weapon. No one could ever determine even an approximate timeframe for when it was first invented. The oldest examples ever unearthed by archeologists dated tens of thousands of years back and did not look particularly impressive. Or rather, it was not so much the bows as such, Sinner corrected himself, but arrowheads that must have been attached to the shafts using some kind of collagen glue. That was what the scientists carbon dated.

Be it as it may, that proved to be sufficient time for humanity to learn all the ins and outs of their “shooting sticks” and figure out the best ways to use them. An experienced archer of the later eras could reliably hit a human-sized target from a hundred or so yards away. But record shots at the times when the bow was a mainstay military weapon had been made and reached their targets from distances double, or even triple as long.

At his custom-designed shooting range back at the Launchpad, Sinner himself could hit a soccer ball from three hundred and thirty yards once or twice out of ten.

At a hundred yards, he’d easily hit the damn thing every time.

Earlier, even at the best of times in his past life, he would have been lucky to get one hit out of fifty tries—but that was way before his very survival depended on it. In Tier One, when he got his first bow, he quickly learned to reliably hit monkeys at thirty or forty paces, but that was as far as it went. At longer distances, both his accuracy and arrow lethality dropped like a rock. Quite a few of his hits inflicted no serious injury, and the prey would get away easily.

And then he started putting some serious loot into it. Ergo, the boosts bought from the puppet masters worked, and worked very well. Sinner was none the wiser as to how exactly it was all happening, but his natural talents and skills developed through years of semi-serious training had indeed been multiplied manifold. Plus Sinner was lucky in that he had been well familiar with the bow before finding himself at the Cube.

Thinking back, his archery skills, in particular, made a stratospheric jump once he selected and opened accuracy as a subparameter and began investing regularly in related items, little by little.

And his current bow even had an additional artifact property now, which also made one hell of a difference.

All in all, there would hardly be anyone back on Earth at the moment who could outshoot him and his bow. They were indeed one lethal combo—indispensable parts of one whole designed and trained to deal death with pinpoint accuracy from a distance, one arrow at a time.

Sinner got the guy who had shot him in the back from a hundred and thirty yards—smack in the chest, when the bugger rose above the edge of the canyon, anxious to send another slug down.

The next two arrows dispensed with another couple. They were just running along the edge, not even trying to minimize their respective target profiles. They thought they were just too far away. Ha! A couple of seconds later, they knew better, but it was too late.

After that, no one shot back. In all fairness, from that distance, their muskets were all but useless, even when loaded with buckshot.

Perhaps, they knew that too, and that was the real reason they didn’t want to waste any more of their powder, but Sinner flattered himself a little, telling himself that he may have had something to do with it as well. Whatever their reasons, the rest of the crew—seven in all, headed by an officer—bunched together at the top of the very dune from where the first two had ambushed him before proceeding further. Apparently, they realized working in pairs might be detrimental to their health and well-being. All of them had simple outfits of cloth and leather on, except for the officer, who, unlike the ones before him, sported a metal cuirass and a helmet with fancy featherwork on top. The man wielded a long sword in one hand and a pistol in the other and gave Sinner an evil look, as if trying to burn right through him from the distance of three hundred yards.

But Sinner was not scared, and nowhere near ready to run any further.

Why would he? He was now totally in his element. At that point, he was almost certain that they were the treasure hunting posse, and that they wouldn’t share their map with him willingly.

It was unlikely the crew would be traveling light. Whatever their idiosyncrasies, the puppet masters had proven time and again that they were not altogether alien to common sense. The expedition had to carry water with them, and come to think of it, Sinner had come across a few empty barrels that must have had the life-giving liquid in them. The sailors had to have more of it nearby, too, and perhaps some other supplies as well. And Sinner could definitely use both.

So he’d have to kill them all for it. No biggie, he wasn’t born yesterday. Not that he was so anxious to get extra loot, but leaving any of them alive wouldn’t be advisable—he needed no additional hassle from the bunch, especially at night when he’d rather be sleeping than waiting for the survivors to come at him again. He wanted their water, and the map too, because without it his prospects around this place were not all that promising. And he was dangerously low on water after wasting an entire day at the cavern.

If he was to go all the way through to the border, it now appeared he’d need to resupply, at least once. Or maybe more.

Thankfully, the desert here appeared fairly conducive to committing mayhem with a powerful bow. Aside from that high dune in the north, from where the original couple had ambushed him, the rest of it was fairly flat. That played right into Sinner’s hands.

He now had irrefutable proof that the insane amount of development symbols he had invested in his bow was not for naught. Because what would he do otherwise—charge the heavy musket-wielding party across the sands with his guandao? Nah, he had a better way.

Having allowed the enemy to close the distance to about a hundred and fifty yards, Sinner sent the first arrow down. A scream that followed immediately was full of pain and surprise in equal measure: the attackers were certain they were perfectly safe so far away from their prey. Besides, they were now moving almost directly against the sun and could not see their deadly objective very well.

Sinner managed to fell another man, hitting him in the face, before the rest realized they had to take cover, or at least pick up the pace. All-as-one, they tried to charge him running, but good luck doing that in the sand.

Sinner’s bow was not a machine gun, but the considerable distance and his target’s slow advance made up for the slow rate of fire.

He got his seventh man when the pour sod was still some seventy yards away, bringing his musket up to his shoulder, without the benefit of a supporting rod.

There was now just the officer remaining, bogged down in the sand but still pretending to run. Sinner had left him for last.

His bow at the ready, he stood straight.

“Freeze, or you are next!”

Taking the man prisoner and questioning him about the second half of the map seemed like a prudent move. He was also curious as to whether these imitation humans could actually talk.

If they did, he might as well learn a few other things.

But the valiant land captain still wouldn’t stop. Was the man stupidly brave—or was it a language issue? All that had been coming from the mouths of Sinner’s attackers so far was yelling and shouting, but even that did not sound familiar.

To be sure, according to his phone, Sinner would now be conversant in the local vernacular, but for the moment that was purely theoretical and he had no idea of how to make use of his newly acquired linguistic prowess.

Or was there a catch somewhere?

In the meantime, the officer showed no signs of quitting. Without further ado, he brought his hand with the pistol up and fired blindly, not even trying to take aim. That was a desperate gesture, and hopeless too, since not even long muskets could be relied upon when shooting from such a distance, let alone a primitive sidearm.

The bullet flew harmlessly by. Making a savage face, the officer threw it away and reached into his sash, from which a handle of another one was sticking out.

Oh, what a waste, Sinner shook his head—and let loose.

Maybe some folks just didn’t like talking...

Chapter 15

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Bitter Oasis

Part Two

The battle, as it turned out, did not end with the officer. Unhurriedly, Sinner headed towards the dune where he could see a couple of wounded men still showing signs of life. One was bleeding profusely from his right thigh, the other had an arrow through his shoulder. Neither injury seemed fatal. Coming closer, Sinner wondered what to do with the two. They looked like regular people. Simply finishing them off wasn’t the same thing as mopping up scorpions. He wasn’t a savage, and he wasn’t blood-thirsty.

Fortunately for Sinner, the moral conundrum quickly resolved itself. Having waited for him to approach to about a hundred yards, both sailors suddenly stopped pretending to be on their last legs and made good use of said lower extremities—jumping into a kneeling position and firing in unison.

One of the lead pellets hit Sinner in the shoulder, triggering a shield. But that was as far as it went. Two more arrows ended the battle—decisively in Sinner’s favor.

However, how could he be sure a hundred more cutthroats were not on their way?

Sinner took a walk along the edge of the gorge to make sure there was no one else hiding there. He decided not to go down to pick up his backpacks and his guandao for the time being. He was perfectly happy with his bow’s performance, so that was what he was going to keep using while reconnoitering his immediate environs.

Sinner climbed to the top of the dune next to have a better look around.

What he saw on the other end of that sand mound left him speechless: water.

A whole lot of water.

A lake with a surface area of at least a few dozen acres surrounded by the sands. The crystal clear water seemed turquoise in color, with the lightly hued bottom perfectly visible from up high. The lake couldn’t be all that deep, especially around the edges.

He could also see a narrow strip of wilted grass along the shore—not so much green as greyish yellow. Beyond that, it was sand again, and more sand. The only exception was a stretch of the shore on the lake’s opposite end that had a round spot of stony ground a hundred yards in diameter or so. The place had some brush on it and even what looked like a few low, contorted trees.

That was where his humanoid enemies had set camp: a couple of large canvas tents and a stretched canopy. The stone-lined fire pit in the middle was still smoking. It may well have been that smell of smoke that brought Sinner out of his stupor a split second before the first shot.

As Sinner was watching the camp, his peripheral vision caught a flicker of movement—something dark and slow in the deepest part of the lake, towards the center. It could not possibly be just a log propelled by the current. But it was really hard to tell since now the bright sun was working against him.

Sinner reached for his far-seeing amulet and squinted. And gave a surprised whistle.

Indeed, wonders never ceased in this place. Who could have thought there’d be Sea Guardians in the middle of the desert?

And what were the puppet masters thinking putting them there—in a closed body of water with no rivers or streams flowing in or out? There was just that dry riverbed, the one he’d been following all along, connecting to the southern end of the lake. But no one would be swimming down that particular route to escape from the place for sure.

So why would they even need any Sea Guardians there?

But of course, Sinner knew a rhetorical question when he saw one. All of that was way above his pay grade and outside of his immediate area of interest. His concern was his own survival, and no gratuitous speculation was going to help with that. End of story, private, he told himself. Not up for discussion. Dismissed.

He threw a quick glance at his backpacks left behind and noticed nothing untoward. They could stay there a while longer, Sinner decided, while he checked out the camp. If there was anyone still left alive around, they would surely be there, lying in ambush.

There was simply nowhere else to hide—unless, that is, one was willing to dig himself into the sand, scorpion-like.

He found no one alive at the camp, but there was a dead body—all neat and pretty under the canopy, arms folded, hands on top of the chest, coins on unseeing eyes. The deceased showed no apparent signs of violence, so chances were the man had died of natural causes. His pointy beard and clothes also indicated an officer.

Cringing, Sinner took his phone to the cadaver—and immediately received a brief message.

Random creature: Slave-Owning Seafarer (officer Marcellus Mota).

Status: expedition leader.

Mode: deactivated.

Well, well, well... Sinner sure did know the man, at least by reputation.

To refresh his memory severely impeded by the scorching sun, he scrolled the messages back.

There! There it was.

You have found half a treasure map. Captain Joaquin Caštru sent out a team headed by officer Marcellus Mota to find the treasure but kept this half of the map.

To get the complete map, find Marcellus Mota. This half of the map shows the beginning of the route the team followed.

If you find the complete map, it will show in full among the maps on your phone. It will also show the specific spot where the treasure is buried and provide other useful information.

All right, so he had found Marcellus Mota. Now what? Where was that second half of the map?

Sinner searched the body and found nothing.

Oh, well... He set about exploring the camp, this time not so much looking for any remaining sailors but rather assessing the loot. On the way down to the camp, he had already tried the water from the lake, only to discover it was just about as salty as in the sea and thus not potable. Now, the water in the barrel he found behind one of the tents was perfectly fine. Too warm, even hot, on account of brutal local sun, but thoroughly drinkable.

A large sack sitting next to the barrel yielded the same kind of petrified cheese, hardtack, and dried fruit and vegetables. The supplies were no delicacies, but they were serviceable.

Catching a whiff of unpleasant odor, Sinner checked the nearby brush and found another dead body. That one was much worse for the wear: bluish purple in color, horribly bloated, with skin bursting in places. But once again, there were no signs of any wounds or weapon marks inflicted in anger. What killed the sailor would be anyone’s guess. Perhaps it was venom—courtesy of a scorpion or some other poisonous creature. On the way down to the camp, Sinner had already noticed some previously unseen tracks, not unlike from a snake crawling. Perhaps the poor guy was just unlucky enough to have come across a wrong kind of reptile.

Or maybe it was simply Sinner’s mind searching for a rational explanation while the puppet masters had simply put the dead body there as a stage prop—just for the heck of it.

Sinner remembered the bodies of the other sailors he had killed and sighed. None of those had any maps on them—or at least he couldn’t find any when he examined them. Nor were there any in the containers dropped by the brave seamen. Those only had regular kinds of loot—symbols and such. The damn thing had to be in the camp somewhere. He had to search the camp thoroughly.

Sinner mentally divided the area into quadrants and went about searching each of them separately, inch by square inch.

Low and behold, the secret cache was located right under the water barrel he had checked out earlier, and it was not particularly well hidden either.

The dark-colored container labeled “Prize” was almost sticking out from under a few chunks of turf. He should have been able to see it right there and then, the first time he set his eyes on that spot, Sinner rebuked himself. Perhaps, he needed a vacation. At which thought his lips curled into a smile of their own accord.

Anyhow, the container produced a few somewhat more interesting things, one of them in particular.

It was a book.

A very unusual one.

Challenge item.

Brilliant Brief Charge book (Brilliant skill).

Medium object.

Brief description:

Teaches the Brief Charge skill. This is an active skill. This Brilliant class skill requires 50 units of spirit energy (at rank zero) for a single use (-10 units at the next class up; +10 units at one class below). Every 20 ranks will reduce the amount of energy required by one unit (but it will never go down to zero completely). At rank zero, this Brilliant class skill allows you to dart 10 yards (+2 yards at the next class up; -2 yards at one class below) instantaneously in any direction. Every rank added will increase the maximum distance by one yard.

This Brilliant skill may be used up to five times a day (+1 time at the next class up; -1 time at one class below). Every 10 ranks added allow for one more daily use. The use count renews at 00 hours 00 minutes 00 seconds standard tier time (may be displayed on your phone if option selected in the Settings).

Action.

Will transport you instantly to the point indicated.

Obstacles between yourself and the desired point are allowed, but said point must be visible or have been visible no more than 5 seconds previously (for the Brilliant class; +1 second at the next class up; -1 second at one class below). If the skill is modified, parameters and limits may change.

If there is an obstacle at your desired destination point, you will be placed at a different random point in the immediate vicinity thereof. If the obstacle is landable, you may be placed right on top of it, provided that the obstacle is no higher than 15% of your skill’s maximum active distance (+3% at the next class up; -3% at one class below).

You can combine Brief Charge with other skills using the Settings, such as preprogram activation of different other types of acceleration (if you have them) immediately after using the Charge. This may prove to be beneficial during a rapid retreat.

Attention! This skill cannot be copied into a new Skill Book to be passed on to another Challenge participant.

Now, that was an unusual skill all right—a mini-teleportation of sorts. Too bad it was so short. But it could still be immensely useful. Plus it could offer a valuable synergy when used jointly with other skills.

This was definitely a skill worth not only learning formally but figuring out in intricate detail for maximum efficiency of use.

That said, it was still not what he had come here for. Where was the treasure? Perhaps it really was a big deal and worth pursuing—what with all the hardships he had suffered on the way up to that point in time. And in view of the not so fair a fight that could have easily gone against him.

One way or another, this was becoming quite a quest—way more difficult anyway than the fight against the gaki queen ordered by trader Xiao in Tier One. Quests were in fact a big deal and commanded hefty rewards. This one was turning to be a quest of all quests, so the reward would presumably be commensurate.

Something really, really valuable.

Now all he had to do was find that second half of the damn map.

Where the hell was it?

* * *

Having finished searching the last quadrant, dead tired, Sinner sat on the water barrel, watching the surrounding bleak terrain with something resembling hopelessness. Sand and stone, stone and sand. The puppet masters really knew how to keep a man properly entertained. Sinner wondered why there was so little vegetation around—except, perhaps, on the distant northern end of the lake. And even there, it wasn’t much. Not enough for even something as small as a rabbit to hide, for sure.

But perhaps just the right amount to bury a map? Like, in the sand, at the foot of a dune, or under a rock somewhere? Or the puppet masters may well have kicked it up a notch and put the map at the bottom of the lake. Why not? They loved making things interesting.

Like, go ahead, give it a shot, bud! And don’t forget to say hi to the Guardian. Or, wait—why not put it inside the Guardian altogether? Make the beast swallow the map and parade around in circles right under the surface, for everyone who had eyes to see? That would sure give the damn thing a good reason for being there.

Oh, well... Sinner pulled out his phone and called Tark.

The man picked up right away.

“Yo, Sin! How you doing out there? Anything interesting yet?”

“I am not sure. It looks like I found Marcellus Mota. I am actually sitting by his dead body now.”

“Did you kill him?”

“No, no, it wasn’t me. It may have been the sailors’ doing.”

“His own men, huh? But why?”

“I have no idea. Mutiny, perhaps? After all, it was him who brought them into this godforsaken desert. I can tell you, it was definitely no animal. He’s been all chopped up and slashed, and shot in the face to boot. He’s got a huge hole for an eye. All filled up with sand. His mouth too.”

“Why the sand? And where did they even get it?”

“It’s a desert, Tark. There’s nothing but sand here.”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it, Sin. I am not stupid. But why in the mouth?”

“How would I know? Maybe it’s the way they do things around here. Fill the mouth with sand. Or maybe someone just had his brain scrambled in the heat and went nuts. You should have seen the way these guys acted. They tried to shoot me, but they did it in a completely asinine manner. They cornered me at first, but then I took them all out, one by one. The entire bunch of them. And it was easy work, too. Who knows, maybe they are really not all there. It is so hot here that my own brain is about to go to mush...”

“So what was in the treasure?”

“Nothing. There is no treasure.”

“Whoa, whoa. What do you mean, no treasure? This aint’ no joke, Sinner. It just can’t be. I’ve heard about such quests before, and folks always found something major.”

“Well, I didn’t say I got nothing out of it at all. I found a prize container under a water barrel. There was a pretty good book in it and a bunch of other small stuff. But none of it amounts to a treasure. And besides, the hole the container was in looked fairly fresh. And the second half of the map is nowhere near in sight.”

“Well, that Marcellus character should have it,” Tark insisted.

“That’s what I thought, too. And I looked everywhere. No map. They could have hidden it anywhere. There’s tons of stones and sand here. And a salt lake. Big one too. With a Guardian in it.”

“A Guardian? In a lake? Now, that’s funny. But don’t you worry, I don’t think the map is underwater. That would be way too much, even for a quest.”

“So maybe there’s no map at all, Tark? Perhaps all of it is just one big misunderstanding. Or a joke. Puppet masters like jokes. Or someone has found it already.”

“Nah, it can’t be. Didn’t you tell me there’s no one there but you? Take another look. Check the guy’s butt crack if need be. Or the contents of his stomach. Or dig right under. Get moving. Waste no time.”

“No, it’s not that. I have already looked everywhere. And I’ve been thinking about it. There’s gotta be some kind of logic to it. Or a hint, perhaps?”

“Maybe you need to take a look inside that Guardian,” Tark laughed.

“I thought about that, too. The Guardian is the only attraction around here. Think about it: why did they even put it there?”

“Hey! Take it easy, buddy! Relax! That was a joke, all right? Those Guardians are immortal. It says so everywhere, in all detailed tier descriptions. No one is going to put any maps inside one. Not even the puppet masters. There’s limits to everything, you know.”

“Logically, I understand that, too. And then... Didn’t I say it’s hot as hell here? Your mind begins rambling.”

“Well, I don’t know then. Just remember, you don’t have all the time in the world. Don’t linger there. Get moving. Screw their treasure. You must be low on water, and you still need to make it to more hospitable places. That’s your major objective, and not some mythical chest of gold.”

“There’s an entire big barrel of water at the camp,” Sinner said. It looks like they dragged it here on a sled. Along with a small bronze cannon. I could now spare a day or two.”

“Well, don’t linger there anyway. While you are chilling there, the competition is catching up. When was the last time you checked the ratings?”

“Oh?”

“ You have no idea what’s going on down here. Business is booming. If you act as a group, and the place is right, you could harvest those symbols and signs by the ton. Literally. That’s exactly what some are doing. So get going, Sinner. We can’t wait to see you again.”

Sinner stuck the phone back into his pocket and took a large swallow of water. There was no need to save it anymore. For the time being, the barrel had solved that particular issue.

Once again, Sinner looked at the officer’s body. He had already searched everywhere, disregarding any and all presumptions of human decency and respect for rank.

What was it Tark said? Stomach contents? Eew!

But he wouldn’t put anything past those puppet masters.

Taking another gulp, Sinner sighed, got off the barrel and headed back towards the dead captain’s body.

* * *

Thankfully, he did not need to cut it open. The map was in the man’s mouth. Someone must have crumpled it and stuffed it deep into his throat, then topping the cavity off with sand. Once cemented together, the revolting blob of silica, blood and saliva plugged the poor sod’s mouth real good and took a while to extract. To give credit where it was due, Sinner had to admit the ingenious cache was as secure as it was disgusting.

He had his first suspicions stirring even before putting the two halves of the map together, but once he did, and his phone started buzzing, he knew right away the news was going to be bad.

To be sure, the map now showed on the screen in its entirety, with a clear mark on it indicating the treasure’s exact location. Sinner zoomed in for a more detailed look at the place. The news wasn’t just bad. It was worse.

Sinner squinted, blinked and looked at the map again. No, there was no mistake. He was not seeing double. The mark was exactly in the same spot it had been before.

Sinner sighed and scratched the back of his head.

“No, Tark,” he mumbled under his nose. “That’s where you got it wrong. There is no such thing as way too much for these folks.”

Chapter 16

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Bitter Oasis

Rules? Really?

Feed were the most disenfranchised category of the Challenge participants, shortchanged on all fronts and accounts. And the higher amounts of standard loot and probabilities of receiving something more special were their only form of compensation for being the ultimate underdogs.

Limitations applied to everything, including access to information. Even the lowest castes were free to search the master database in a virtually unrestricted manner. Feed, however, always drew a uniform blank. Literally.

However, there’s almost always a life hack available, and there was one here as well. Getting hold of a caste participant’s phone, a piece of meat could download all the database sections, or pages, the phone owner had ever searched or visited. In theory, access to the entire database could be gained this way, except the phone owner would have had to meticulously visit all those pages before the fact, spending dozens and dozens of hours. Apparently, connection speeds and download rates were slow for a reason. That was actually one of the projects Tark and his team had been running, to provide easy access to information for the meat, but Sinner had no idea how much progress they made so far. Besides, there was no such thing as remote access and he was still to reconnect with his buddies in person.

Sinner learned quite a lot in Tier One, having gained access to multiple articles and database sections, including the benefits enjoyed by higher caste participants. All that information was still in his phone, and finding it was a matter of seconds.

Level 1 gives you 10 seconds of immunity from the Guardians of the Sea, Level 2—20 seconds, Level 3—30 seconds, and so on. While you have immunity, the Sea Guardians will not be able to get closer to you than ten feet (remember, the Guardians cannot be harmed; do not waste your time trying to hurt them while you have immunity). Immunity is activated immediately, once a Guardian tries to attack you. Immunity may get activated once daily.

The treasure location mark on the map was almost at the very center of the salt lake, in its deepest part.

And a small lake it wasn’t.

The treasure couldn’t be in a worse place even if it was in fact in the Guardian’s belly. Or rather, it would make little difference since either way, the treasure would be protected by a lethal creature that could not be killed.

Talk about adding insult to injury!

But there was really no such thing as impossible situations, was there?

If he couldn’t tackle the problem head on, perhaps he could find a way around it? Level Eighteen offered exactly three minutes of immunity that could be tapped once a day. So...

Sinner looked at the phone again, assessing the distance—and that was when his mood really soured. One hundred and twenty-six yards.

Sinner moaned.

As someone with a kin interest in sports, he knew that the global one hundred meter swimming record among men was just a tad short of a minute. Sure thing, he, Sinner, was a great swimmer, but nowhere near as fast as those top tier champions. Plus the record was set in a pool—which this body of water wasn’t. Realistically, he could cover the first hundred meters in under a minute and a half, plus another third of that for the additional twenty-six.

All in all, just swimming there and back would take over three minutes.

And then there would be diving. Oh, and swimming back with that container of unknown weight would definitely take longer.

Nah, the entire affair just didn’t compute at that level. But what if he raised it? He’d need to be Level 24 to get full four minutes of immunity, which would be the absolute bare minimum of time needed. Being anywhere near comfortable required Level 30 and five minutes, assuming he found the container on the bottom on his first dive.

If the damn thing was not going to sink back. But then again, if it did, he could still tie up a line to it right there and then, and drag it ashore later. If the line did not tangle up... Shucks, there was nothing but if’s and provided that’s in this entire affair!

Sinner had plenty of level signs. Since he mostly invested in his parameters, stats and skills, which took development symbols, level signs were mainly just sitting there, awaiting their time. He’d have enough of them to bump himself up to Level Thirty.

However, that would mean he’d be getting way less loot from his scorpions or any other game he may have to hunt later. Such penalty against higher levels applied universally to all Challenge participants, including meat. Additionally, he would lose the semblance of “balance” between his current level and his stats sitting at the current maximum of eighteen or following closely behind.

Basically, he would be swapping his extra hunting bonuses for a treasure of unknown value and provenance. Would the bet be worth it?

There was yet another option though. He could try coming back here with his friends, once they finally reconnected, and try recovering the treasure then, while the others were distracting the Guardian. The monster could not be in two places at once, so it would focus on the diversion at the other end. Hopefully, that would help Sinner do the job with his currently available three minutes of immunity.

But there were just too many unknowns in that plan. This particular Guardian might just happen to be different from the ones at sea and give them a nasty surprise, throwing that entire diversion plan off.

Besides, if he still managed to pull it off by himself, the puppet masters may deem the achievement worthy of additional bonuses. They seemed to like individual feats much better and didn’t skimp on rewards. During his battle with the giant snake, they even counted that measly hint against him, making a special mention of it in the victory notice.

And who knew what that treasure contained anyway? A fat development symbol worth 150K or more? Or something even more outrageous—something that would make finishing the tier a breeze?

Be it as it may, Sinner knew he really wanted to pull this thing off now and on his own—and be done with it.

So he’d need to think about it some more.

* * *

ACTIVE SKILLS

...

...

...

Brilliant Skills:

Brief Charge-2

Bringing the new skill up to second rank took three thousand symbols. In Tier One, that would have been a fairly respectable amount, but here, after a couple of bitter (and lucrative) battles on the coast it did not look like such a big deal. Still, Sinner had to spend all the loot he got for the vanquished sailors, everything he found in their camp, and some of his own meager leftovers remaining after his last major upgrade.

Now his maximum jump distance would be twelve, rather than ten, yards. It wasn’t much, but Sinner figured even seven would do for what he had in mind. But again, this was a totally new thing for him, and untried yet, so having a little extra available wouldn’t be so bad.

Bringing a single skill up a couple of ranks from zero didn’t take much of a toll on the body. He hardly felt any weakness at all.

The next stage was much harder.

Sinner needed a proper opponent. Strangely, that presented a problem, seeing how he and the Guardian were the last two living beings around, and the latter, strange as it was, did not qualify for the job.

Sinner went back to where he had seen snake tracks earlier. They were now all covered with sand, and he began running in circles, getting further and further away from the dry riverbed.

Where was a giant scorpion when you actually needed one? Nah, he thought to himself. They were too far from the coast. Which was just as well.

Two hours later, right before sundown, Sinner found his snake. He gave the medium-sized reptile a loud yahoo, as if it were his long lost brother or something, and apparently scared the creature silly. In any case, at first it simply tried to get away from the crazy human, but then, sensing it was probably not going to happen, turned around and took a menacing combat stance.

Sinner was truly delighted. This was not some harmless water snake. This was a real venomous deal—a cottonmouth or a viper. Excellent!

It was just what the doctor ordered. Now, all he needed to do was get the reptile really angry. Then he could begin testing.

* * *

Sinner returned to the camp in the dark, using his phone’s flashlight—thank puppet masters for small favors!—to avoid breaking his legs in the stony dry channel. He was apprehensive about using it earlier, but here, in the middle of this lifeless desert, it seemed like there was nothing to be afraid of.

That said, once the night fell, the place proved to be not so lifeless after all. The oasis was apparently more popular than the scorched earth he had left behind. There were in fact snakes here—he had seen six, scaring them all away, before reaching the camp. Plus there were some kinds of rodents that probably served as food for the snakes. Neither seemed to be great fans of sunlight.

Bagging yet another well-fed snake on the way, Sinner treated himself to a luxury supper, roasting both of them in the coals. There was already a considerable stash of sticks and branches near the fire pit. Man, those sailors had thought of everything!

If they were not afraid of maintaining a campfire during the night, he probably had no reasons for concern either. Besides, the lake and the camp on its shores were located in a circular depression, so the light wouldn’t travel beyond the nearest dunes.

Not too many folks would get excited about eating haphazardly roasted snake meat, but Sinner liked it just fine. Not picky about his food at the best of times, having spent days on a diet of moldy hardtack and questionable low-grade cheese, he now felt like a true gourmet.

His feeling of profound contentment derived from consuming fresh meat, however exotic, was enhanced further by another test he ran while enjoying the late meal. It took a number of tries before succeeding, but in the end succeed it did, and it was all that mattered. Now Sinner knew the exact steps he needed to take, and in what order. As his preparations progressed, he was getting more and more certain his plan just might work. But there were still quite a few things he had to do first.

Tomorrow would be the day for manual labor, Sinner told himself before turning in for the night.

* * *

It seemed Officer Marcellus Mota had been looking for his treasure with a real flourish. The posse of sailors he led carried all the supplies and such, some of them on an intricately designed sled. Of the stuff they brought with them, they had only discarded their empty water barrels, which Sinner noticed as he followed the expedition up the dry riverbed. The rest was right there, at the camp, all safe and sound.

On the one hand, the crew may have mutinied because the water in the lake turned out to be unpotable. But on the other... Something did not compute. Why didn’t he find more empty barrels around? By Sinner’s estimates, it looked like the expedition had spent quite a few days at camp.

So were they dying of dehydration? That would definitely explain the desiccated corpse.

Or perhaps things were much simpler than they seemed, and this was merely an oversight on the puppet masters’ part?

Be it as it may, the sailors had succeeded in delivering quite a few things to their camp, such as the tents, the canopy, and the heavy water barrel, which was still almost full. Oh, and last but not least, a couple of fairly large grenade cases, plenty of power and bullets, a small bronze cannon on pretty ingenious iron skids, complete with its own ordnance, a bunch of muskets and pistols and a plethora of other weapons, such as pikes, halberds, and even a few fairly large harpoons.

The night before, Sinner tried all that arsenal against the Guardian.

The thing, whatever it really was, paid no heed whatsoever to musket bullets. Not even when they hit. A few dozen shots later, Sinner decided that was a complete waste of time.

The cannon showed a bit more potential, but there was still a long way to go. It was much harder to aim, and hitting the dorsal fin specifically proved almost impossible.

Sinner also learned that the toy-like cannonballs failed to do any damage, although, unlike with the bullets, the beast acknowledged the hits. It would jerk and dive, only to resurface again in a moment and resume its patrol rounds over where the treasure had to be.

However, there were three types of ordnance available for the cannon: solid metal balls, cloth bags of steel shot and some kind of pre-modern day sabot rounds, not unlike short steel harpoons.

Now, the one time one of those hit close, the Guardian got really nervous. It dived and stayed in the deep for over a minute. When it resurfaced again, Sinner could see to his amazement that his cannoneering had actually scored: the creature’s smooth, dark skin had a small bruise on it. It was small—the size of a fingernail, perhaps—and he wouldn’t have been able to see it without his farseeing amulet. But the mark was definitely there.

Perhaps the Guardians were not that invulnerable after all. At the very least, the laws of this world allowed for scratching them. Naturally, there could be yet another, inner, layer of skin underneath, which offered much more serious protection; however, the mere fact of the harpoon leaving a mark suggested the plan shaping up in Sinner’s mind was not as crazy as Tark claimed it was in a response to the message Sinner had sent him earlier.

At the very least, that he managed to inflict at least some damage on the Guardian provoked some serious thought.

After all, he who said A must say B next, and walk the walk, and talk the talk, and all that kind of stuff.

Because, come to think of it, what was a skin abrasion? It was a wound, however small. So, as a matter of principle, if you could inflict a small wound, why not cause a more serious injury? All of a sudden, the puppet masters’ claims about the Guardians did not sound all that convincing anymore—not after his own recent experience. Their skin was vulnerable. And that was now an established fact.

Logically, the skin should have been the strongest and most resilient part of their bodies. By that token, everything beneath it would likely be more at risk.

Today, Sinner was not going to do any target practice, although he would have some use for a gun. Not the cannon, and not a musket—a pistol. The one that proved the most reliable during his tests and only misfired once or twice. The rest of them were much less serviceable.

To be sure, Sinner was well aware that he wouldn’t be able to succeed with a pistol where a cannon barely managed to make a scratch.

For that reason, he wouldn’t even bother loading a bullet.

He would be shooting blanks. It was all part of a greater idea, which, Sinner figured, might or might not succeed.

But in any event, he did not have a death wish.

What he did have was a plan.

A solid, original plan.

* * *

The Guardian never failed to respond when Sinner came close. He did not even have to enter the water. The Guardian would come greet him from the other end of the lake even when he simply walked along the shore.

Today was no different. Sinner took a moment before getting his feet wet. This time, he was hauling equipment with him—a mongrel cross between a raft and a boy. Setting it afloat would take a minute or two. The square panel he had made of interwoven crooked tree branches and flimsy bunches of rushes did not look like a serious affair. But it did have a convincing argument—a couple of small powder kegs installed in the middle. The entire construction was indeed as unwieldy as it was ugly, so Sinner had his work cut out for him launching the floating bomb.

With the craft finally in the water, Sinner grabbed a makeshift rope he had tied to it and headed towards the center of the lake. He now had to tow his man-of-war to a sufficient depth.

But if wouldn’t be far. Waist-deep would do the job. Sinner stopped and began twisting and turning in place, the way he had practiced for hours on land in preparation. Now he’d just give it one last trial run in the most realistic environment.

His hands were moving fast, and with great coordination. There was no need for more practice.

He was ready.

The Guardian of the Sea was quite a large creature, and it attacked early. Sinner’s feet were still planted firmly on the bottom when the humongous black and white hulk rushed him, the breaker in front of it tall and rumbling.

However, the beast hit the brakes in earnest almost immediately, producing quite a water surge. Immunity—the victim had immunity, although not for long. Disregarding the waves, Sinner turned left and waded along the shore, pulling the raft behind him. The shallows were going to give way to a much larger depth some fifty paces away, creating a sizeable swimming hole barely a few yards from the shore. That was where the Guardian had been comfortably coming close to within an arm’s length every time Sinner approached the surf line.

In all fairness, it would make more sense to launch his raft right there, too, except the shore profile rose in that place, creating a small drop some two feet above the water line. It wasn’t too much, but just dropping the raft down even from that insignificant height wouldn’t be a particularly smart idea. The rickety contraption might fall apart on impact, or the powder kegs could get wet.

That was a risk Sinner did not want to take. He needed them dry as a bone.

Moving along, he was carefully watching the distance to shore. There was no point taking any chances here since the bottom was grading down as he moved along, and would soon be deep enough for his purposes even this close to shore. Seven yards, Sinner told himself. He needed to stay within seven yards of the surf line at all times. Anything beyond that would mean giving a head start to the Guardian. A huge head start.

And this was no time to be charitable.

The Guardian did not seem in a hurry to charge, albeit it was staying close. Without knowing what the thing had inside and what algorithms it followed, Sinner assumed it would rush him once his immunity was all gone.

Which would be exactly how he wanted it this time.

It was all part of the plan.

Sinner’s bracelet had a stopwatch function in it, and he had set it to one hundred and eighty seconds before getting into the water and hit the “Go” button as soon as the Guardian rushed him for the first time. Now he was checking the countdown regularly to see how much time he had until his immunity was all gone. Naturally, it was going to be an approximation, but a second or two were not going to make much of a difference one way or another.

Checking the time again, Sinner sighed with relief. The unwieldy raft notwithstanding, he would reach his selected spot with half or more of his immunity time still remaining. There was no reason to rush it. He’d be better off conserving his strength for the final stage, which would have to go off without a hitch to produce the desired effect.

His feet were no longer feeling the bottom, but Sinner remained vertical, bobbing up and down. The water was crystal clear, but it was still hard to tell what the depth was. And it was so salty that every time he submerged, his eyes burned like hell. Where was a pair of goggles when one needed them? Either way, it seemed like the bottom was at least two to three yards down below now. That should have been deep enough for the Guardian who first tried to attack when Sinner was still wading through the shallows.

Further on, the shore line made an almost ninety degree turn. That distinct landmark, along with the line of four stakes he had installed on the beach earlier, gave Sinner a pretty good idea of his exact location. By all accounts, the explosive raft was now exactly seven yards away from the shore and the crumpled piece of sailcloth he had left by the surf line.

That was it. He was at his ground zero—except it was all water.

All he had to do now was wait a while.

The Guardian was keeping track of time too, it seemed, because when the stopwatch showed some twenty seconds of immunity remaining, the beast got visibly agitated. Sinner took his eyes off the dial and reached for his harpoon. It had a straight shaft some two yards long, with a bunch of grenades tied up to the barbed metal head and wrapped in a piece of sailcloth for camouflage. In the center of that explosive package, there was a sawed-off shotgun stuck into the bundle, barrel in. A thin line Sinner had tied to the trigger was now in his other hand and ready for action.

That was a critical detail indeed, so he had used the good quality cord from his own supplies for it, rather than an improvised tow rope fashioned from the cut strips of tent canvas.

Kicking with his legs, Sinner positioned the raft between himself and the Guardian, and threw a quick glance at the promontory that became visible on the other side of the bend. At the end of it, he could clearly see his stretch of white sailcloth. His special skill, which he was not yet quite familiar with, required exact positioning. But he had done a practice run before, so hopefully, everything would work as intended.

He would not have any time for a second try anyway. Besides, the skill could only be used twice a day and took too much spirit energy. For all the practical purposes, this was going to be a one shot deal, even though, technically, he would still have another chance to scrape enough energy and jump one more time. But Sinner did not even want to think about that. It would be the absolute worst case scenario.

And then, just like that, the time was up. The subsequent events were a complete blur—the kind of a setup when so much is happening at once that the brain is unable to process it all in a sentient manner, concentrating instead on firing away subconscious electrical impulses to muscles that executed the moves. And on the whole, the fierce battle took no time at all, even though a lot of things happened within that limited window measured in split seconds.

Sinner had already had a chance to observe a Guardian in its attack mode once before. As a matter of fact, it happened in the first minutes of his new life as chow for others, when the puppet masters dropped him off in the coastal shallows on Tier One. He clearly remembered that rookie caste guy with zero or near zero immunity going into the water off the rocks and the flicker of a humongous body rising up from the depths to claim its catch. The expression on the poor sod’s face in the last moment of his life was that of sheer terror. The other snapshot Sinner’s memory preserved from that occasion was the monster jaws. It was as if the folks that made the namesake movie on Earth back in the seventies really had something there. The monster maw seemed humongous even with the jaws closed, and when they opened, the picture became outright grotesque. Back then, everyone in the audience knew it was a prop, or an optical trick of some kind. Well, here it wasn’t.

In all fairness, the absurd creature could make good use of its mandibles even in the shallows, except it wouldn’t be able to get there comfortably, which was precisely the case here. That would require at least three yards of vertical freedom. Even here, in the pit right next to the shore, that shark from hell (if that’s what it really was) glided towards Sinner in what amounted to a mere bucket of water, with its dorsal fin clearly sticking out along the way. Half a dozen yards away from its target, the Guardian stuck out its maw, too, the jaws unclenching, and Sinner could confirm for anyone who still had any doubts that they were indeed disproportionately humongous. And awfully real.

Sinner was ready for it though. He knew from the get go that the entire engagement would hardly last a moment and allow for no second takes. That was why he had spent so much time training on shore first, having gone into the trouble of constructing a similarly sized prop, using wooden stakes and old sailcloth. Time consuming and strenuous as the exercise might have been, he knew it would probably save his life when he had to face the real thing. That is, of course, if he was lucky enough. Additionally, a snake he caught for the purpose proved itself a valuable study aid, realistically imitating the lunges and feints of the much larger threat Sinner was now facing. Plus there was something to be said for training with “live ordnance,” which produced a welcome adrenaline rush.

Still, all the training and preparations notwithstanding, Sinner’s throwing hand almost betrayed him at the crucial moment. The Guardian bore some responsibility for it too, having failed to open its jaws as widely as expected. Or perhaps it was saving the move for the moment immediately preceding the grab. There was no way to tell. Originally, Sinner even thought of letting that oversized management flunky swallow him hollow to be able to wreak proper havoc from within, like he did it when hunting the monster lizard with Rat Catcher’s crew. Except this particular foe was a total unknown, and putting himself between its teeth deliberately he’d be taking a risk the severity of which he could not even calculate properly. It might well be that his protective skills would simply fail to work.

They were not foolproof even when facing regular opponents on the tier. No, Sinner decided, he did not have a death wish, and he’d loathe to spend his hard-earned loot on exorbitant shrink fees later.

Be it as it may, his harpoon had no problem finding its way inside the beast even through its partially opened jaws; however, the explosive package on its end did make the glancing acquaintance of several rows of giant teeth. The ordnance avoided getting stuck in between them outright, although it barely made it through and got a little chewed up in the process. Sinner had to work double, leveraging the weight of his entire body to push the naughty bundle all the way into the Guardian’s throat. Luckily, Sharky helped too, pressing the attack forward, at the same time skewering itself on Sinner’s disingenuous weapon.

A split second before their bodies collided, Sinner jerked his head backwards as far as it went, at the same time pulling the trigger cord on the shotgun that was now deep inside the Guardian’s maw. The barrel of a similar makeshift detonator was stuck into one of the powder kegs on the raft, the line leading to it tied around Sinner’s head. There was a good reason engineers everywhere embraced redundancy: the chance of both guns misfiring would be negligible.

What happened next was not entirely clear. The world swirled in a vortex of water and air, hitting his eardrums with a monster shockwave, produced by either the exploding powder or the crushing pressure of some serious depths, wherever such depths may have come from in this fairly unimpressive body of water. Sinner felt some enormous force crushing his ribcage, and then dragging him somewhere.

But the moment was fleeting, at best. A second, perhaps. The weight squeezing him lifted. However, his legs wouldn’t get with the program just yet, and instead of standing up, Sinner squatted involuntarily. That was when he realized he was no longer in the water, but rather on land—on the very stretch of canvas he had laid out on shore, targeting his new jumping skill on it.

Sinner threw a quick glance at the lake where, some ten yards away, the Guardian was thrashing noisily in the shallows. The humongous hulk was now visible in its entirety, lying on its side, tail flailing and beating the water into a cloud of foaming spray. Sinner could not quite see the beast’s head clearly through all that jittery motion, so it was hard to tell how much of an injury it had sustained. But it did look strange.

In all likelihood, this time around the creature would not be getting away with a bruise.

Suddenly, the giant hulk froze, shuddered, and strained itself in a major paroxysm, as if trying to bend double.

What kind of trouble did he get himself in this time? His legs still wobbly, Sinner got up and began hurriedly throwing protective shields over himself, not bothering to keep track of them. Some of the earlier shields he had put on must have definitely been triggered and gone already, but he could only feel it now. But he could not possibly spend any more energy than he had in store, so his skill would simply tell him when he ran out of it.

His phone, sitting on a nearby rock, suddenly came to life. Even though the device was in its usual vibrate only mode, it began beeping loudly, using a ringtone Sinner had never heard before. The screeching beeps were frequent and ear-piercing. They did not spell relief. Something similar happened to Sinner in his past life once when he dropped his new smartphone into the toilet bowl accidentally, and upon being extracted from it the gadget paid him back with a bout of nerve-racking emergency alert.

What was going on?

One of his eyes still on the Guardian, Sinner took a step, crouched, and reached for the phone.

And then the world disappeared.

Chapter 17

Space Unknown. Team Unknown. Tier Unknown. Location Unknown.

Mr. Featureless

Once again, his legs grew weak, but at least this time Sinner did not have to crouch.

Because he was already seated.

On a chair—as snow white as everything else around. It felt as if he was inside a bubble of pristine light plastic.

In front of him, there was a similar chair, on which a familiar man sat.

If he was a man, that is.

Was he?

And who was he anyway? Or what? What would you call someone you could not quite see even when that someone was no more than a couple of paces from you? And, mind you, it wouldn’t be an eyes issue. Your eyesight would be fine; it’s just that your brain would refuse to process the optical signals. What you’d have as a result would be a paradox of sorts: something perfectly discernible, yet altogether featureless. And weird, to say the least. In fact, in Sinner’s case, it was not unlike what he experienced when dealing with the giant scorpions, only now the straight out feeling of disgust was augmented with something else—something he could not quite put his finger on.

Come to think of it, he had seen the man once before, or perhaps it was someone different, but the two looked exactly the same. At the very beginning, before he even found himself at the Launchpad—that’s when that was. He was sitting right here, on this chair, facing this very nameless person with no features. And at the same time, he was somehow still fighting the unresponsive steering wheel in his car, realizing it was to no avail, and he wasn’t going home that night.

For him, that was the end of the road.

So how come he was back in this place again? Wasn’t everything just peachy not quite a few moments ago? Before his car went flying, having failed to make a blind turn on a coastal scenic route through the mountains and launched itself off, towards the distant surf and jagged rocks down below? Or was it the Guardian’s doing? Except that bugger was now dead or would be soon, and besides, even if it was somehow immortal indeed, it still couldn’t hurt him, Sinner, on land. Or did someone sneak up on him from behind while he was admiring the fruits of his labors and checking the phone? But who? There was no one left alive at that pitiful excuse for an oasis, and even if there was, Sinner had plenty of shields on him, and those could not all be triggered at once.

“Oh, but they could. At least in theory,” said the featureless man without opening his mouth. If he even had one he could open, that is.

“The skill system may well have some talents that could neutralize your deflection, at least to some extent,” Mr. Featureless continued. “It wouldn’t be likely at this stage, but you still cannot disregard such an eventuality altogether.

“Why am I here?” Sinner asked, surprised at his own loquaciousness.

During his first visit to this place, he was a clumsy puppet, mute and immobile. Now he could at least say something.

Instinctively, he raised his hand. Yep, he could move, too.

“Your quest,” the featureless man deigned him with an answer.

“The treasure map. You have to retrieve the treasure. But you cannot attack the Guardian. That’s unacceptable.”

Sinner almost smiled back at the man. A dialogue was a thing of beauty. Having one was so much better than just sitting impotently, like some dumb idol, while the other party was free to run at the mouth.

Especially when said party began with accusing you of all the sins in the Bible.

Now that they were actually talking, perhaps he could try and ferret out some useful information directly, bypassing what the puppet masters had put into the database.

Getting some would be priceless.

“If you are trying to pin some kind of a violation on me, there wasn’t any,” Sinner said. “There was nothing in the messages I received about not attacking the Guardian. And besides, what violation? What are we even talking about? You do what you have to do out there.”

His featureless interlocutor responded immediately.

“Information you received from other members mentioned the Guardians of the Sea extensively. It was noted in it more than once that you can’t harm the Guardian. However, you have carefully planned an attack against it and then carried it out. Why did you do that?”

“Well, you just answered your question yourself. It wasn’t an accident. I did in fact intend to kill the Guardian. What other choice did I have? It stood between me and the treasure.”

“You could still retrieve the treasure without murdering the Guardian. You had every opportunity.”

“Nope,” Sinner shook his head. “I thought it all through. I could only pull it off with a serious boost to my level. And that would go against my interests for the time being. So I simply had to kill it.”

“You could not harm the Guardian. You knew that too.”

“But I did, didn’t I? So it appears it was in fact possible.”

“No!” the man without a face insisted. “With the kind of capabilities participants have at the current level, they cannot inflict fatal damage even on low-level Guardians of the Sea.”

Once again, Sinner shook his head.

“But it looks like I did. And please note, it was your oversight. Don’t blame me for that. There was no express prohibition against attacking the Guardian. But even if you spelled it out in all caps that it is strictly forbidden, I still wouldn’t give a damn. Like I don’t give a damn about you. All of you. Do I have to explain why?”

The unseen face smiled, or perhaps it only seemed that way. One could never know with an unfathomable creature like that.

“You cannot harm the Guardian, period. You plan couldn’t have worked.”

“Oh, man,” Sinner sighed. “Here we go again! Look at me, will you? If I am right here, in front of you, it has all worked just fine, hasn’t it? If I remember it correctly, the Guardian was not feeling all that well when I... ahem... urgently vacated the place.”

“You do remember it correctly. Those are indeed valid memories.”

“Of course, they are,” Sinner grinned. “Very pleasant ones, too!”

“But you still cannot harm the Guardian!” The man went full circle and kept going. “The current tier has simplified low-level Guardians. They are fully adequate for the purpose. Participants simply have no weapons or tools at their disposal to deal fatal damage to them. What actually happened was an unpredictable confluence of events that had a near-zero probability of occurrence. Your plan couldn’t have harmed the Guardian even if you used modern explosives that could be found in Tier One. Your deflection skills is nowhere near unique. The Guardians have similar protections as well. And they also have what you might call biological armor. It does not only shield their skin and subcutaneous tissues, but internal organs as well. You could not have possibly damaged them.”

“I now know I couldn’t have. Except I did.” It was now Sinner’s turn to sneer. “That’s you own oversight. I have noticed it before that you left a few stones unturned. That goes double for the Guardian. And let me say it again: this is your problem, not mine. Do not pin it on me.”

“Yes, ours indeed,” the man suddenly agreed. “Except that was indeed an impossible confluence of events. Unbeknownst to you, your plan has gone awry. The cloth that you wrapped your strike package in caught on the Guardian’s teeth and got seriously deformed. As a result, the barrels of the weapon shifted along the harpoon’s shaft and pointed somewhere else entirely. If you didn’t jerk your head as hard as you did, it wouldn’t have fired at all, most likely. But it did. The shotgun shells had slugs in them, and those did hit the powder. By then the keg’s interior was broken and flooded, but the powder inside still remained largely dry and detonated. There was an explosion, accompanied by evaporation of a substantial amount of water. However, there were two barrels, and two slugs, one of which fired slightly ahead of the other. The first bullet triggered the shield—what you could call the first line of defense. The second one went through but changed its intended trajectory. It triggered the second defensive shield and stopped. But the gas flow behind it caught up with it and gave it another impulse. The bullet went through the discharged second shield, changing its trajectory again—and hit a spot that you could not have possibly anticipated. A blind spot that could not have been reasonably hit from the outside. It was a perfect storm of sorts. None of the separate actions alone could have critically hurt the Guardian. But together, they somehow did. That was totally unforeseen.”

“That sounds like a typical engineering problem to me,” Sinner said. “I could have easily designed that entire sequence. Actually, I originally intended to touch the Guardian and scan it with my Research skill. I would have spotted that vulnerability.”

“This makes no sense. You cannot harm the Guardian. You couldn’t have possibly anticipated that chain of events or planned for it. Not with your current capabilities.”

“But in the end of the day, it all worked,” Sinner smiled again. “So it was a good plan after all.”

“Yes, it was a rational plan, and the risk was negligible,” the man agreed. “You have somehow achieved a combination of skills that is very unlikely for the current level. You have somehow augmented your Reflection with Brief Charge. You have engaged automatic firing of the Charge immediately after the discharge of three deflection shields, which could not be done manually. That gave you less than a second of complete immunity from the Guard. Your shields discharged one after another, protecting you momentarily from harmful impacts. That’s how you survived the explosions and the Guardian’s teeth, which only managed to grab and hold you until the skills fired. You got disoriented, but that alone did not do you any harm. And the target position you selected for the jump was far enough for the Guardian to be unable to reach you within the time available. That was how, after the Brief Charge triggered automatically, you found yourself at the spot you were eyeing on land before the Guardian went on the attack. Again, such a sequence could not have been anticipated beforehand. You need to realize that the probability of someone trying to get between the Guardian’s jaws on purpose is tending to zero.”

“That may be so,” Sinner nodded. “But what of it? The fact remains that I have managed to pull it all off. I understand this may be quite a problem for you. I don’t recall anyone talking about having been invited for a palaver with the management in this snow white place. Which means I am a special case.”

“Guardians of the Sea cannot be harmed under current conditions,” Mr. Featureless droned on. But suddenly, there were new notes in his voice. “It cannot be killed—but it somehow has been. This is an eventuality that has not been provided for. But it came to be. Which makes it a new possibility. A new victory. A major one. Albeit unexpected. The party vanquished is not listed in the currently approved classification. No rewards or bonuses have been established for such a scenario. This is a true contingency.”

For reasons unknown, Sinner stopped worrying about anything at that point. He was as sure of himself as ever, although he knew it all too well his life could be snuffed out at any moment.

For a second, he wondered if the puppet masters were aware of the “no man, no problem” approach. But even if they were, seeing that they didn’t just send him the way of the dodo right there and then, they must have had a reason for bringing him up for consultations. Consultations my butt, Sinner smiled to himself.

So what was that reason? He surmised he had simply put his interlocutor into an untenable position.

He made him vulnerable somehow—which was good. Vulnerabilities existed to be exploited.

“Let me say it again: this is your snafu,” Sinner said. “So do something. Do something quick. Provide for it. I am reasonable. I’ll simply take an extra prize for the inconvenience. Or some answers. Your know, I do have a few questions. Since you messed up here, make it up to me somehow.”

“No answers,” the man snapped, his tone implying this was not up for discussion. “No answers allowed. Everyone makes mistakes. Always. Here, look.”

The world disappeared again.

For a moment, Sinner was not quite sure where he was. And then he cackled. He was seeing himself—from the outside.

He was in a room with a low ceiling lined with multiple shelves, concealed with curtains, which were now drawn back. He was frozen in the middle of it, watching a dead body at his feet. A bit further away, Lynxie was leaning over an open cardboard box.

There were some cans in it, a beat-up bulletproof vest, and some dirty clothes. Wait! Wasn’t that the basement of that first store where they were selling cheap bows? That place on Tier One? Further on to the left, there was the door behind which the dead tiger lay. And this here, under his feet, was the animal’s dead owner.

The advanced strangler.

Sinner knew that was no out-of-body experience. It was just a hologram. A 3D movie—with him in it. Yet, somehow, most of his sensory signals seemed to be shut off at the moment. Nor could he move, except for turning his head, which may well have had a VR set on it. The rest of his body was frozen solid.

He heard the same featureless voice, except it didn’t come through his ears—which he did not have. The receptors were more like in the very center of his head.

“Here’s a mistake. Your mistake. Your oversight.”

The world faded again, and Sinner found himself in a different place. Familiar too. Except it took him some looking around to realize he had visited there before. The picture showed some strange orange-red dogs tearing the flesh of a monster serpent where its skin had apparently been removed first.

This time, Sinner did not see himself in the frame. In all likelihood, the shot was taken after he, loaded with loot, resumed his march to the north. Once he left, the scavengers he chased off after taking care of the crocodiles, must have come back.

And again, there was that silent voice in his head.

“Another serious mistake. Your mistake. Your oversight.”

The world blinked, disappearing, and came back right away. Naturally, it was another familiar place—the smoking ruins of a store, with Sinner and Lynxie in the foreground. Unlike in the first episode, they were both much better dressed and equipped, but just as dirty, wet and tired. To the best of his recollection, they were searching the battlefield after the engagement with the elephant and the explosion that blew away the gaki.

What the featureless man was showing him were unforgettable moments indeed.

But why was he doing it? Why was he showing him old pictures?

“And here’s yet another mistake. Just one of the three mistakes you made in similar circumstances. They are not coincidental. They form a trend. They show you make mistakes all the time.”

“And what might those mistakes be?” Sinner said, surprised at how easily and spontaneously words were coming out of him.

“Oh, I could tell you.” There were suddenly some distinct, although quite labored seductive notes in the man’s voice, unless it was Sinner’s own mind playing tricks on him.

“Do you want me to tell you? It will count as a hint. You are entitled to one hint per tier. Be my guest, take it. So, should I?”

Sinner did not even need to think about it. Whatever the man had to say, wasting a hint, which might well save him from certain death, as the case had been with the serpent, on an explanation of some alleged mistakes that were apparently not fatal would be a fairly lousy idea.

Such information could in fact be valuable, but no more valuable than his life.

“Once you put it this way, I’d rather you didn’t. I might still need that hint. But let me tell you, you guys make mistakes too, left and right. But it’s not like I am shouting about those on every street corner, you know.”

“Name one. Just one. An example is required.”

“Water. Those sailors I killed in the camp. As they moved along, they had been discarding empty water barrels. One could use their number to estimate how long their voyage took. Seeing how the scorpions probably left them alone, they must have arrived in the oasis way before me. And that’s assuming they left the ship the same day I found it, rather than earlier. Now, the lake water is not potable, and yet, they still had one barrel left, and it was full. So what is it, they drank nothing for days? That’s not possible. Under regular circumstances, they would have died in such a case. That’s your mistake, and it makes the entire setup look labored and unnatural. And I know you don’t like when this happens.”

“There’s no mistake there,” Mr. Features ‘R Not Us said in a categorical tone.

“Yes, there is,” Sinner insisted. “Those sailors by the lake, they have put up quite a show chasing me. I wouldn’t say they were about to drop dead of dehydration. And this is the kind of place where a day without water’s really cramping your style. Just don’t tell me it isn’t so. I checked. On myself. And I am no weakling, so in the end I would have blown all those guys away one way or another. Yet, somehow, even though they couldn’t hold a candle to me, they seemed to be very lively and doing just fine without water. You see what I am driving at?”

“No, I don’t. There’s no mistake here,” the company man insisted.

“Well, maybe it’s me then,” Sinner shrugged. “Silly me.”

“You are a good bet,” the voice said, and turned the world off again.

Or rather, brought the white ward back—chairs, walls, the indiscernible face and all.

“This is a contingency,” said the man. “And it needs to be corrected. Two options have been proposed. First: you go back to where you left off and receive a prize. This was a significant victory, and the prize will be too. The victory will also be broadcast to all the Team Two members in the regular manner. The Guardian of the Sea will be declared vulnerable. In Tier Two only. This will be fixed in Tier Three. Second option: you agree to an unusual prize and go back to where you started. This is a significant victory, and the prize will be too, but we won’t broadcast the event to Team Two participants, and the Guardians will remain invulnerable. With the second option, you can only claim your reward upon completing Tier Two. You will not be able to take possession of any valuable items or information before that. Otherwise, it could be construed as an extra bonus, which would be unacceptable. We have to choose one of the two options now. Or, rather, you will choose, and I will put it through as the official solution to this problem. So, what’s your choice?”

“Wait a second! How could I possibly choose without knowing what the choice is? I need to know what the prizes will be.”

“If I tell you, this information may not be changed later on. If I don’t, the final prize still remains open somewhat. So, you still want those details?”

“I am not sure I am following you, but I definitely do not want a cat in the bag. Could you elaborate some on those options? At least a little bit?”

“First option: a wide choice of prize items. I can’t tell you which and how many. That’s against the rules of the reward mechanism. Second option: you will be given a chance to learn a new item that will be made available to you at the Launchpad, once you complete Tier Two. And you will be getting that item there free of charge. This would be the maximum allowed interference with the reward menu acceptable in this unusual situation. The adjustment will be made immediately, but still, you will only receive the item itself after completing Tier Two. If you die on the tier and are resurrected successfully, you will not receive the item. You have to complete the tier on the first try.”

“Well, that much is clear. But I still don’t know what the item will be.”

“It will suite your style of going through the tiers and prove to be particularly useful in your case.”

“What, I can’t even try that thing on first?” Sinner said, his voice deliberately plaintive.

“Yes, you can see it, and hear about it, and touch it too. But only in the most general of ways. That’s it. That’s the absolute best we could do for you here. So, do you still want to see or hear?”

“I do. And, ahem... Touch, you said? Let me touch it too then.”

The next moment, he had an item in his lap that his eyes and tactile sensors recognized as a guandao. The weight seemed to be about right too. That was not the unexpected part.

The real surprise was that it was not the same guandao. It looked more expensive, although not on account of any rich ornamentation. It just felt like it had been upgraded, no costs spared, well beyond his current weapon. But he wouldn’t be able to tell how he could possibly know all that at first sight.”

“All right, touch. Look. Choose,” said the benevolent puppet master.

Cautiously, Sinner got up and swung the weapon. The balance was perfect, even if not that different from his usual piece. He could take it straight to battle, without allowing for a long familiarization period.

And now...

“Go ahead, try attacking me,” the man nodded without waiting for Sinner to finish the phrase. “You can’t harm me anyway.”

“That’s what you guys said about the Guardian,” Sinner cackled, feeling the itch in his fingers grow stronger.

“I have no vulnerabilities,” the man retorted. “By the laws of physics you are familiar with, I am not even here. That is, if we could even speak of me actually existing in a language you could understand. Even us talking here is not direct. It involves a multifaceted technical process of reconciling the notions that are not available at your intellectual level with those that are. What you think is a weapon isn’t one either. You could think of it as a hologram with expanded functionality. Well, again, it isn’t, but that’s as much of an analogy as I could offer you.”

“I don’t see all that much difference from my own guandao,” Sinner said, reluctantly pushing away a mental image of the white chair chopped in half—along with the person sitting on it.

“Look behind you. There’s a list of features. At least the most important ones.”

Turning around, Sinner saw a perfectly white square floating in the air behind his chair with no visible supports. Its surface was densely covered with black text and numbers. The picture was similar to what he had seen dozens of times on the screen of his own phone, only here that display was stretched out horizontally and much larger.

The description was simplified though, with the component section missing.

Challenge item.

Green.

Weapon. Type: physical. Class: melee weapon. Range: hand-to-hand combat. Type: double mono-transformer (glaive and sword).

Large object.

Level: 15.

Rank: great item (can contain up to 9 attributes (and 4 more available with the use of expanders)).

Artifact properties:

1. Increased armor penetration.

2. Increased resilience to any attempts at damage or destruction.

3. Inflicting additional pain on opponents capable of feeling pain.

Activated attributes: 0 (9 slots available).

Link: none.

Durability: 498/498.

Attack: Outstanding.

Defense: none.

Created by: The Challenge Ladder.

Brief description:

A special double transformer weapon. May instantly assume one of the forms desired. The weapon has the same parameter set in each of its forms (mono-transformer).

Forms available: guandao, sword.

An expensive color transformer. Immeasurably better than basic. An effective weapon for jabbing and cutting at close and longer distances (for different forms). Making cuts with the guandao form would be a little more difficult, but with a sufficient skill level, they could still be inflicted in an efficient enough manner. Overall, jabs and cuts made with this weapon will not be particularly grave, yet longer thrusts and wider swings could still help inflict serious damage even on advanced adversaries. In the guandao form, stabbing wounds would be wide, and narrower but potentially much deeper, in the sword form. They could result in a quick death due to blood loss, even where no vital organs have been affected.

Attention! The following parameters are needed to be able to use the double transformer: Strength: 14; Agility: 15; Stamina: 9; glaives: a minimum of second rank (enhanced class at the minimum); swords: a minimum of second rank (enhanced class at the minimum).

“Transformer weapons are hard to come by at the current tier,” the featureless man said as Sinner finished reading. At the moment, no one knows what they are or how to handle them. But I will tell you. That’ll make it easier for you than reading the full description. Hold the weapon tightly with one hand. You also have to position it in such a way that it would cause you no injury if it suddenly changes its length. Once you meet those requirements, wish for a transformation.”

“What to you mean, wish?” Sinner asked.

“Just do what I tell you. You’ll see.”

His hand outstretched as far as it’d go Sinner brought the guandao blade up and commanded it to become a sword. Or, rather, not so much commanded as imagined it, without even saying any words in his mind. It was just some unexplainable mental flickering.

His hand jerked, responding to the sudden change in the weight and balance of the object it held. Vibrating sharply, the guandao was rapidly shrinking, and its blade was transforming as well. Sinner’s hand almost lost its grip on the handle of the stylish sword that suddenly replaced the much larger weapon. The new blade was slightly curved, one-sided, long, and thin. If his eyes served him right, Sinner thought, it was also very sharp. The cutting edge was dangerously thin—to the point where one could shave with it. On the surface of it, it seemed this was the kind of blade that might be easily damaged by contact with any hard surfaces, yet somehow Sinner knew that the sword could easily slice through a metal pipe, and it would be the pipe that would suffer.

“The sword is better suited for confined spaces, and the guandao is at its best in the open,” the featureless man sad, stating the obvious. So go ahead, make your choice: either get this transformer after you complete the tier, or you will be publicly credited with the victory over the Guardian of the Sea and take whatever prize the system decides to give you. It may be a better one, or it may not. This is an uncertain area with plenty of room for leeway.

Pensively, Sinner was still playing with form changing.

“So how much does this thing cost?”

“The final price will be determined after the tier is flooded. The average price of this item comes down to eight thousand four hundred and thirty two Ideal Challenge Coins. Naturally, there may be some fluctuations, with the highest price ever registered being about eleven thousand and a half. That’s your ballpark estimate.

Sinner almost dropped the weapon. Eight thousand and change was some fifty times more than his entire earnings in Tier One. Even considering his great performance in this tier so far, he’d hardly be able to save even a quarter of this amount—and that’s assuming he went back to the coast and spent the rest of his time there harvesting scorpions until the very last moment.

As a matter of fact, it was the first time he held a Green item in his hands. Or even saw one. Not even the most affluent of traders had anything of the kind to offer.

There were only two more colors above Green in the color table: Red and Orange. Higher colors were an extremely valuable attribute since they gave the highest boosts to attack and defense parameters. And they were the hardest to upgrade. A high achiever that he was, Sinner could hardly ever afford any such “colorful” upgrades.

Besides, the transformation feature should have also been worth a pretty penny. Even the higher Strength, Agility and Stamina thresholds indicated that, and it was also the first time he came across a minimum skill requirement. To be sure, there were other weapons that couldn’t be used under certain minimum skill rankings, but this was assumed more than spelled out in black and white.

Either way, at the moment, Sinner could only play with the piece in the training mode. He had plenty of achievements, but they did not cover everything. He did have a sword skill, but it had remained dormant since Tier One. And activating it wouldn’t be a small matter at all. Apparently, the intended purpose of the skill floor was to close the loophole that might exist when the weapon holder would transform the weapon to the form he did not meet the requirements for. But even if he activated the skill, there would still be the issue of class.

But so what? He still had a long way to go, and perhaps a better skill book would come along. Or he’d simply get one at the Launchpad where anything could be bought for points or Ideal Coins.

It was indeed a very expensive weapon. And very useful. There was no doubt about that. For once, hauling that huge regular guandao around was a major pain, and it was of little use in close quarters. But this piece was two in one. He could carry it as a sword, much smaller in size, and transform the weapon into the other form when needed. He would not even need his phone for that.

That would be really simple, and much easier than fumbling with the bag.

Yet his suddenly awoken greed still desired more details.

“Say, could you at least give me the ballpark of what I might net on the second option, if you announce the victory?”

“No can do. No interference is allowed. What you’ve been offered is the maximum reward possible.”

“All right, I get it. I am leaning towards the transformer then. But could you at least give me a hint as to whether that would be a wise choice?”

“I can’t. That’s unacceptable. That’s the absolute maximum, and the very idea of that implies a limit. You would also undertake not to reveal your victory over the Guardian to any other participants, unless you absolutely have to.”

“My friend Tark knows I was going into that lake. And he’s aware there’s a Guardian there.”

“We know that. Your friend is not privy to your plan’s details. Just don’t tell him, or anybody else, about what happened. Don’t tell them about the Guardian’s demise. And by the way, this has a force of a binding contract.”

“What if I do tell?” Sinner asked.

“You will be in breach of the contract.”

“And how is this going to affect me?”

“You’ll be labeled as someone who is not a man of his word.”

“Well, yeah, I get that. But what’s the penalty here?”

“The status of someone who is not a man of his word. So, what’s your choice?”

“Man, you guys are making it so hard... All right, transformer it is. Now what?”

And the world disappeared.

Chapter 18

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Bitter Oasis

Other Things Not Accounted For

Sinner was not in the least surprised to find himself back on the familiar shore, his feet firmly planted on the crumpled piece of sailcloth. It was time he got used to the puppet masters’ unceremonious manners.

At least they put him back carefully where they picked him up, without knocking him off his feet. Gee, thanks! They could have just dropped him ten yards above the ground and let him deal with it as he saw fit.

Anyhow, that was quite a palaver, Sinner thought. It was almost an impossible task to squeeze any information out of such stranger interlocutors no matter how many words were actually said. But the bottom line here was whether he actually learned something.

And that still required some serious thought. He’d have to go back and revisit every word and sentence uttered. And check on a few things as well.

Be it as it may, his phone was no longer ringing, and there was no body of the “immortal” Guardian bobbing on the surface. Nor was the beast visible anywhere deeper, and it would really be a fool’s errand trying to hide such a huge hulk in a small, clear body of water such as this one.

They must have cleaned up all the results of his unauthorized victory, most likely. It certainly looked that way.

Anyway, the Guardian was a case open and shut; however, the contract mentioned nothing about the treasure. He really needed to check on that before anything else.

However, had Sinner been a tremulous trusting soul, he would have never made it out of Tier One alive. Here, too, if they mopped up what remained of the Guardian, why wouldn’t they do the same thing about its conqueror? That they put him back on that lake shore didn’t mean squat. Sinner could see how Mr. Featureless and the rest of that gang might somehow be subject to all kinds of limits and restrictions, which would require that inconvenient participants be done away with only using pretty mundane methods and strictly on location, at the current tier.

So, to be on the safe side, he went into the trouble of climbing atop the same high dune and carefully scanned the surrounding area and the environs of the lake. Only upon making sure no one was sneaking up on him and no new Guardian was lying in ambush on the bottom, did Sinner start heading back to the lake.

Once there, he first engaged his Research skill to scan the battleground. The next step was diving to retrieve a large piece of his shotgun’s furniture, which was all that remained of the gun after the blast. Sinner then went back to the camp and restored the weapon using repair tokens.

His next foray into the water was much more serious. Constantly checking his phone, Sinner paddled towards the treasure mark on the map. Despite his previous thorough checking, the butterflies in his stomach were having a field day, yet nothing untoward happened. It must have been a dead lake anyway. Aside from the Guardian—an obvious plant—and some scant greenish residue on the rocks on shore, there was hardly any sign of life in the water.

One could only wonder what the Guardian had been feeding on there.

Or perhaps it didn’t even need to eat. It was a special enough creature, so it wouldn’t surprise Sinner in the least if it didn’t. Special indeed, he thought. At least enough so to make the puppet masters get their knickers in a twist when he whacked one. Even though, in all fairness, when compared to his battle with the giant centipede, the engagement with the Guardian was no more than a minor skirmish. It was not even worth being called a proper fight since, according to the no-face guy, the main action hardly took a second.

Anyhow, it didn’t really matter how things worked in that lake. For all he cared, the Guardians could feed on air—as long as there was no fully functional replacement lurking somewhere in the deep, waiting for its prey to get close.

The water at the site of the mark was fairly deep—seven yards or so—but that wasn’t much of a problem since Sinner was a fairly proficient diver.

However, that water was so salty and dense that it really pushed his body back up to the surface, at the same time eating at his eyes worse than some bona fide acids. Even in regular sea water, it was hard to see things clearly without swimming goggles; here, Sinner was essentially navigating blind, relying on his sense of touch alone.

He had to dive again and again, each time fighting the buoyant force that, by some impossible twist, seemed to get stronger with every new try, blatantly defying the laws of physics. Sinner would feel the bottom hurriedly with his hands for a few seconds, and then—pop!—up he went. There was just sand, sand, and more sand. Once he seemed to grab at something unusual but had to let the thing go since there was hardly any air remaining in his lungs and he had to resurface. As unfortunate as that was, he now finally knew on what side of the mark he had to continue his exploration.

A couple of more dives, and he found something else that was distinctly different from the ever present sand. By the shape of it, it could well be an arched suitcase handle. A cheap suitcase it may have been but simply trying to pull it up yielded Sinner nothing.

He thus had to resort to digging, scooping sand with his bare hands.

But he couldn’t stay underwater long, and once he went back, it was hard to find the pit again.

And on and on it went, until, thoroughly exhausted, Sinner finally managed to liberate a small but heavy chest from the sand and muck on the bottom and bring it to the surface.

Swimming back with a bulky load was quite an undertaking too, but at least the salt water was now working for, rather than against him, propping his body up like a cork. Things went even better once he discarded his makeshift dive belt of sailcloth and stones.

Reaching the shore, Sinner immediately headed back to the camp, putting his trophy under the stretched canopy. But first, he drank an entire liter of water, which still failed to quench his thirst.

The metal chest had an old padlock on it, which, however, seemed to be fairly corroded by salt water and yielded easily to a couple of strong hits with a rock and the butt of Sinner’s knife. Opening the lid, on the other hand, took some doing since the two edges were fused together by the utterly aggressive environment, as if they had been welded shut.

That was some bad chemical soup they filled that lake with, Sinner thought to himself. Given another few years, it might well dissolve the chest and what was in it altogether.

What was in fact in it was a container—no surprises there!—and a small ivory box full of sparkling crystals of different sizes. Forgetting the heat and his utter exhaustion, Sinner grabbed his phone to finally find out what it was that took him such a monumental effort to recover.

That was indeed the moment of truth.

He barely had time enough for a brief check when the phone rang.

“Hey, Tark!”

“Hey yourself! How you doin’ out there, buddy? Long time no hear. I tried calling you earlier.”

“You did? Sorry, I must have left my phone behind.”

“No kidding? That’s the best way of losing it. You need to take better care of that thing.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Stuff happened.”

“What kind of stuff? Out with it! What are you up to? Have you left the oasis yet?”

“Not yet. You know, I finally found that damn treasure.”

“Wow! Just how did you pull that off?”

“Oh, it’s a long story,” Sinner said, noncommittally, abiding by the terms of the contract. “And what’s up with you?”

“Never mind me,” Tark barked. “Give me the details. Spill it out!”

“Oh, so you don’t want to know what’s in the treasure?” Sinner asked, deflecting the conversation from the sensitive topic of “how”.

“Oh, come on! I am itching to know!”

“I am going through it as we speak.”

“And? Out, out with it!”

“There’s a container and an ivory box, it seems. And the box has diamonds in it. Or so I think.”

“Diamonds?! A lot of them? What kind?”

“Fourteen pieces. The smallest is the size of a thumbnail, the largest more like a small walnut.”

“I’ll be damned,” Tark exclaimed.

“What, they are that expensive?” Sinner asked, pretending he did not know.

He actually did—back from Tier One. Diamonds were worth a fortune. Here, too. But air time cost a fortune too, so he knew they needed to keep this short.

“You kidding me, right? You mean you don’t know anything about gems?”

“What’s there to know? Diamonds are diamonds, right?”

“Man, ain’t you a lost cause! Put your phone to the smallest rock and then the largest. Then let the price range sink in. Haven’t you looked at those numbers yet?”

“Well, this thing tired me out quite a bit. I haven’t had a chance to take a proper look yet.”

“So take one now!”

“The smallest shows as three and the largest as twenty-four,” he reported in a few seconds. “Are those good numbers?”

“There are thirty-six grades in all,” Tark said. “A grade thirty-six can be thousands of times more expensive than grade one. That’s what it says in the description anyway. But that’s just a general idea, and individual stones may have different values. Regular traders could easily give you a hundred coins for a grade three the size of a hazelnut. Don’t ask me about the twenty-fours. I never saw any of those—nor met anyone who did. But that’s definitely some serious moolah, so congrats, you’ve got yourself a mother lode. Oh, and keep it in mind that diamonds are not Challenge items. Just like gold and silver, they have their own intrinsic value. You can even take them with you to the Launchpad, even though they are regular items. Some nifty exception they’ve made, huh? And what’s in the container?”

“Almost five hundred level signs, a few stimulants, an entire teleportation stone and twenty artifact enhancers. Just don’t ask me what those are, I have never seen them before. And there’s a couple of prize tablets. They look the same. It says on them that they can increase a skill class that’s no higher than enhanced.”

“Tablets are good, but yours are not particularly valuable,” Tark said. “I’ve seen better ones. Now, the artifact enhancers are a different story. I am sure you know you could buy them at the Launchpad.”

“Oh, yeah, I remember now,” Sinner frowned. “Sorry, bud, I’ve had quite a day here. My memory is all hazy. I think I saw them at the Cube, and then there were a couple back on the coast. But I needed a total of five for the second artificer level.”

“Oh, so your memory is coming back now,” Tark chuckled. “You must have had it pretty hard out there, because these are not the kind of things you forget easily.”

“Well, yeah, only robots never forget. And I am definitely not one. I am telling you, I’ve had so much on my plate lately...”

“That’s all right, buddy. But you need to keep a cool head there.”

“I know, I know. I am trying.”

“You need ten tablets to bring the artificer level from two to three,” Tark continued. “There’s a total of twelve levels, but the higher numbers cost an arm and a leg, and tablets are a rare find. Me, I’ve never come across them on the tier. I only saw them at the Launchpad, offered for sale for beaucoup bucks. And there’s all kinds of restrictions on them there, like you can’t take them to the tier, and you cannot max out on them, even if you do have that kind of cash. Or rather, you can, but it has to be Ideal Coins. So see for yourself what you could improve with them. Or just hold on to them and sell them later. Although I have no idea how much you could clear for them around here. It would definitely be better to find some moneybags who have cash to spare and sell them to those. It makes no sense unloading such rare goodies on the traders. They won’t give you a good price. Anyway, was that it? I kind of hoped they’d be a little more generous with a quest like that. What you’ve told me about doesn’t seem like a big deal.”

Sinner’s face spread into a tired smile.

“Oh, yeah, I forgot.”

“Huh? What is it?”

“There’s almost four hundred and fifty coins there. A tad less. Ideal Coins, that is.”

“I’ll be damned,” Tark whistled.

“I know. I am speechless myself.”

“Oh, that’s something alright! Four frigging hundred, eh?”

“Uh-huh. I don’t think I cleared a third of that over the entire Tier One, and now here we go, this whole mother lode in one fell swoop.”

“Congratulations, Sinner! You da man! And you’ve earned it. Every penny of it. So what now? Are you gonna get going?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Sinner nodded. “There’s no point staying here any longer. I’ll spend another night at the camp in comfort and then get started at dawn. Now, how are you doing?”

“Uh, I’m alright. I finally reconnected with Lynxie. She says hi.”

“Send her my loooove,” Sinner smiled.

“Why don’t you give it to her yourself? I mean, really, it’s time you came and joined us.”

“I am working on it. But you never answered my question. What’s your own status? You healthy?”

“Yeah, yeah, it’s all good. We’ve been hunting these grass eaters here into extinction. We bumped into some caste folks once, too, but it all went fine. They were regular guys. Decent. We went our own way, and they went theirs. Peacefully. But it was a tense moment, of course. You know how these things are.”

“I do.”

“I’ll get going then, Sin. You know, not even us, high castes in ivory towers, get unlimited calls.

“Yeah, you take care, Tark!”

“You too, buddy.”

Clicking off, Sinner threw another assessing glance at the loot spread on the stretch of canvass in front of him. His eyes then shifted to the water barrel. What was it the no-face man said about the obvious lack of water shortage at the camp?

That there was something Sinner hadn’t considered, and those sailors wouldn’t have been dying of thirst, and there was no mistake?

Something funny was going on there indeed. By every indication, the sailors must have spent quite some time by the lake. If they hadn’t, they could have made it there and back to the ship much faster, even if dragging a heavy load with them.

There had to be a different reason, other than the guy simply refusing to admit they had in fact made a mistake.

But what was it then?

* * *

Sinner took some time searching the camp and its immediate environs thoroughly—and then doing it again. Paying the outlying areas only cursory attention, he concentrated on what was close. Either way, he did not expect any major finds.

But he was wrong. The cache was located in the most unlikely of all places—on the beach. To be sure, hiding something on a wide strip of sand with no distinct landmarks, and only a few inches above the water level, was not a particularly bright idea. You could easily lose what you hid.

Unless, of cause, you were burying a major stockpile, which this definitely was.

The sailors had dug a large square pit in the sand right near the water edge, where the sand was still wet and held the shape well.

There was even a thin layer of underground water on the bottom. Having reinforced the walls with a few branches and sticks, they deposited twelve barrels there, three in a row, and then placed a frame of poles and sticks on top, covering it with sailcloth weighed down with stones along the edges.

Then they piled sand on top of the hoard, leveling the mound up to blend with the surrounding terrain. They did a good job of it too, seeing how Sinner would have easily missed the small rise had he not decided to disregard small stuff and mostly focus on larger forms.

Five of the barrels were empty. Sinner wondered why the sailors even bothered to put them back into the pit, but perhaps they had their reasons. It didn’t really matter. Seven barrels were full of water, which, although not quite cool, was by no means hot. And that was on an open beach devoid of any vegetation and with not a hint of shade anywhere. The sand itself was burning hot—to the point you couldn’t walk on it barefoot.

But none of it was surprising. The sailors must have had pure physics in mind. They simply built themselves a natural fridge. Water on the bottom of the pit evaporated through the porous cover, assisted by the breeze, however hot, and thus produced a cooling effect inside. Naturally, the primitive system couldn’t freeze anything, but any temperature drop below the baseline mattered in this deserted furnace.

One could, say, cool a bottle of beer quite a bit in a similar manner—by wrapping it in a wet kitchen towel, putting it in an open truck bed and hitting the highway. Naturally, the effect was much weaker here, although still sufficient for keeping the water in the barrels well under the boiling point.

In all fairness though, Sinner didn’t much need water at the moment. The barrel he found at the camp was quite sufficient for replenishing his stores to the max.

But the find still gave him much more leeway on the way up north. His point of no return would be much further up on the map now. He could even take a detour to the east or west if he felt like it. Or take side trips for a day or two, coming back to the base camp after that.

Except what business did he have venturing east of west? Perhaps, none, but he’d never know if he didn’t check.

One never knew.

* * *

The dune was a couple of miles to the northwest of the camp and rose substantially over the other ones around. Even the commanding height selected by the sailors waiting in ambush was at least some fifteen or twenty yards lower by the looks of it.

Towards the end of his hard journey to the top of the dune, Sinner became fully aware that his earlier progress estimate was quite a bit off. As he drew closer, the fine sand near the summit really slowed him down and he barely managed to get to his destination before dark.

The sun was almost down when he finally reached the top and began scanning his surroundings with the help of his farseeing amulet. Once again, he thought it was high time he invested a symbol or two in the little artifact to bring its capabilities up. The amulet might not seem like a crucial piece of equipment at a cursory glance, but first impressions were always misleading. It was indeed a very valuable thing to have, and Sinner used it all the time. He had been thinking of selling the piece and getting something better instead, but so far that had proved to be just good intentions—and everyone knew what the story was with those.

And right now, what his amulet could give him was patently not enough. Sunlight at that time of day was propagating in parallel to the ground, and the shadows cast by dunes could be seen lining up until the horizon. Any little bump rising ever so slightly above the ground level cast a fairly long shadow too. Because of that, the desert had an unusual eerie look, with the mountains in the north coming through as a humongous dark wall of some castle, lorded over by a dark magician. In the dusk, it seemed, the mountains remained as much of a mystery as at daytime, although they may have gotten a little closer. Even though Sinner now had a somewhat better look at that enigmatic range, it was still not enough to be able to tell anything about it or at lest venture a guess about how far away the massif was.

All he could tell was that he still had a long way to go. Quite a bit further than the distance he had already covered. To complicate matters, he needed to take his bearings very carefully now, Sinner thought, since the dry riverbed that took him almost on a straight line from the coast to the oasis seemed to stop there. He would no longer have a convenient, hard to miss route further north.

So how was he going to chart his course through this nondescript realm of intricate long shadows, covering the desert in a camouflage pattern that seemed to be exactly the same anywhere he looked?

However, it was the peculiar vestiges of daylight that helped Sinner notice something he missed when the sun was still going full blast. Far away in the north, and a bit to the east, the shadow pattern had a semblance of a chess board. In all likelihood, there had to be a few parallel ranges of low-lying rocks there, although he could not quite see the area in much detail. It was still too far for his amulet to resolve it clearly, and besides, the color pattern that way was indistinguishable from that in the rest of the desert. However, there could be no doubt there were multiple small rises in the terrain in that area.

Their distinct, regular shapes immediately suggested the phenomenon was man-made—something along the lines of a settlement of sorts, with straight streets and similar structures lining them, which would have been altogether identical if not for their different size. In that pre-sunset hour, even one-story huts could cast shadows dozens of yards long. Looking elsewhere, Sinner could see plenty of reddish sunlight, yet only that area to the northeast had the peculiar “black camo” pattern.

A village, he thought. Or a small township. That had to be it. It was hard to believe though that someone could actually live in this desert. But even if the place was abandoned, he could still find water there, because there must have been water at some point where people used to live, right?

To be sure, at the moment, Sinner had plenty of it, but how much would he have left by the time he had gone that far? From his vantage point, Sinner could not even guess the distance remaining, and even assuming he managed to reach the mountains, there was no guarantee he’d find lush and prosperous country there.

So, even though the assumed village was not exactly on his way up, a little detour, if it gave him a chance of extending his traveling range, probably made sense.

However, he might well find the place had no water at all.

Which wouldn’t be the end of the world either since he now had a Plan B—courtesy of the sailors.

It was time for him to go back to the camp and get started with the preparations, but Sinner was in no hurry to come down from the top of the dune, still staring at the intricate shadow pattern—and thinking.

Water aside, there could be stuff at that place. Really valuable stuff. Abandoned towns were just the right kind of places to stow away treasure.

But that would also mean there might as well be someone there guarding the stash.

Was it even worth the risk? Perhaps he’d be better off leaving the place alone and just going his own way?

But no, that wasn’t a good enough reason. There was risk everywhere around this place, and at least in a village he would stand a high chance of finding something of value, while in the high desert, there was nothing at all.

He sure could use a flash drive marking out a route north. If detailed enough, it could even provide coordinates for teleportation. Wouldn’t that be sweet?

And then he wouldn’t even have to walk anymore. Indeed, dreams were sweet.

Chapter 19

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Northern Meeba

The “Settlement”

His progress walking slowed down substantially. At first, Sinner could not even figure out how the sailors managed to handle their sled. And he even had a “light” version of it since all he needed to haul was three water barrels. A few hundred yards down the road, he realized that the way the sled felt, it was not much better than simply carrying stuff on his shoulders.

He stopped and thought a while. As he lengthened the harness straps, letting the contraption dangle much further behind him, the going got so much easier that, upon reflection, Sinner put his backpack on it too, and then also some heavier stuff from his cargo vest.

And he could easily load it up even further, with no additional hardship. As primitive as the method was, it proved to be a real boon since the puppet masters had not thought of putting any limits on how many items could be carried in such a manner. It was a true life hack, if he ever saw one, and an apparent exploitable vulnerability in the system.

But the real cherry on the cake was that he could now spread his wings, even though he technically did not have any. Yes, it was slower going, but it was easier, too, and well worth it. Having that much extra water, Sinner knew he could continue going for at least seven days without having to worry about running out of it in the middle for the sizzling-hot desert.

But even if he couldn’t reach the mountains within a week, that would still not be the end of it. He could then go back to the camp, pick up another three of four barrels and give it another try. He wouldn’t be able to cover more than seventy or eighty miles from the salt lake anyway, and it would only cost him two teleportation stones to go get more water at the camp and come back. It would be a small price to pay for the try.

An extra seven days of going would give him a much higher chance of reaching those mountains in the distance.

And if that was still not enough, perhaps it was all some kind of a weird mirage.

But when all else failed, he could always teleport back to the ship where he wouldn’t have any issues with water. He would then be able to take a break for a day or two and decide what to do next.

So, in all fairness, for the time being, his only true enemies were the heat and the sand that slowed him down and found its way into every nook and cranny. The desert here was altogether dead, the last vestiges of life of any kind having manifested themselves at the oasis. On the one hand, it was not so bad since there didn’t seem to be anyone around to attack him; on the other, it was a fairly harrowing experience. Sinner wanted to believe there would be water at the “settlement”. However, in that case, the closer he got to it, the livelier it would have to be getting.

Except it wasn’t.

Sinner wiped the nonexistent sweat off his brow. Another thousand steps, and he’d take a break. Five minutes, perhaps, sitting in the shadow under a piece of canvas stretched over a couple of poles. Have some water—and then keep going again.

To make yet another stop in another three thousand paces.

Wearily, Sinner looked ahead. His eyes had been playing tricks on him before. Now, too, it seemed like there was a dark grey something moving up ahead in the distance, barely noticeable. He could definitely see the outline of something. Sinner knew that once he blinked, the thing would probably go away or get lost among the nondescript landscape. It could well be a bird flying far out there, at the outer limits of his visual capacity. It had indeed happened before. It could be a hallucination or his overheated brain was simply playing tricks on him.

His thermal clothes helped a little but not to the point of offering wholesale protection from the extremely high temperatures.

But wait! There was in fact a light spot out there, standing out against the grey background, surrounded by a bunch of similar, albeit smaller spots. They couldn’t be boulders or rocks, which were almost indistinguishable from the color of sand, even where there wasn’t all that much of it.

Sinner picked up the pace.

Where did he even find the strength?

* * *

Among a bunch of smaller rocks and bones, there was a skull. That must have been what attracted Sinner’s attention, and for a good reason. Something as large as that would be hard to miss indeed.

And no, it didn’t belong to some kind of an unknown monster. One didn’t need a PhD in biology to identify the former owner of the remains. A pair of tusks spoke volumes. The rest of the more subtle identifiers were essentially superfluous.

It was all clear as day.

Too bad there were no dunes here, Sinner thought, because he wouldn’t mind climbing higher for a better look.

From the ground, he could not see any signs of grass anywhere around. So what was that elephant even doing there? Judging by the size of the skull, it must have been a fully grown specimen, and those required hundreds of pounds of green vegetation daily.

Which were conspicuously absent from the area. And anything as strange as that was rife with danger.

Could it be that the big animal had simply wandered into the desert by accident and lost its way? But that would mean the elephant had come from a place that was too distant for Sinner to see even with the help of his amulet. Why would a smart giant such as that want to go into a scorching hot wasteland where there was neither food, nor water?

Once again, something did not compute.

On the other hand, it could well be another snafu on the part of the puppet masters—except didn’t he think the same about the water supply at the camp?

Unfortunately, here, outside of the featureless man’s “white plastic chamber,” there was no one to discuss curious biological riddles with, and there were no other brains available for picking. That said, Sinner recalled that back on Earth there was allegedly a small population of desert elephants in Africa. Those animals were said to be able to travel long distances with no food or water under the most inhospitable of conditions.

Perhaps, what he was looking at now were the remains of one of such oddball deviants. Or the thing may have had a compelling reason to go into such inhospitable lands—exhaustion of more familiar pastures, population explosion or simply an adventurous nature. From what Sinner remembered, back on Earth, elephants were well-known for their propensity to wander off. Their very way of life presumed moving between various feeding grounds. Sinner’s memory even served up snippets of stories he read about entire elephant cemeteries where generation upon generation of aging or sick giants would go when they felt their days were numbered.

To be sure, that was more of a myth than anything else, and it was back on Earth, too, but who could tell where the puppet masters were getting their background information when they were building those tiers? If they simply surfed the net for it, feeding on unverified claims or outright erroneous misinformation that abounded online, there was little wonder some of their creations in this world came through quite a bit off.

However, what he was now looking at was by far not a mass graveyard. It was but a single set of remains.

An enigma all right, if he ever saw one.

Sinner went back to his sled, congratulating himself on having had the foresight to leave it behind when he went to check the strange light spots out. Yes, he would lose some time going back and forth, but that was small price to pay for not having to chart the course for his “barge” among the dense array of rubble and large boulders.

Anyhow, that was by no means time wasted. He learned something new about this place, and one day that knowledge might prove useful.

Half way back, he stopped to take a breather and realized how tired he was. His brain was fried too, refusing to notice or comprehend the simplest of things.

Such as, for example, the fact that back in Tier One, elephant tusks were considered to be valuable loot that could be deconstructed into resources.

Traders would pay top dollar for those.

To be sure, Sinner was rich, but not rich enough to forego extra income. Plus his sled still had plenty of room for extra stuff. And he had quite a few empty containers that he was still hauling around just in case.

Those simply begged to be gotten rid of for a good cause. And the cause in this particular case seemed to be plenty good.

It would be a win-win. And Sinner liked those just fine.

* * *

The “settlement” turned out to be no settlement at all.

Having turned the corner on yet another dune (did dunes even have corners?), Sinner saw an even, flat clearing dotted with hundreds of sand mounds. They were all almost ideal cones of some three to six yards high. It must have been their nearly identical nature and positioning in geometrically regular groups that played that trick on him when he was watching the nightly shadows from up top. Back then, he thought the things were man-made.

He wouldn’t insist on that now, but that still left open the question of what those cones were and how they had come to be. In the previous few days, Sinner had been spared strong winds, but for the most part, there was still some breeze. And even the slightest of air movements shifted the fine sand. That was the mechanism that created dunes and other specific terrain features—which, ordinarily, did not seem to have anything to do with any cones placed on a geometrically correct grid.

So, if it wasn’t atmospheric turbulence, what was it? What he could tell for sure was that most of the cones were fairly fresh. They could have been just put together, and the winds had not yet had a chance to smooth out their sharp outlines.

Except there were no builders in sight. Heck, there were no signs of any life at all.

Although, wait… What was that white thing out there?

Sinner grabbed his amulet and zoomed in. Indeed, there was something near a group of cones that he already saw earlier. And not quite an hour before. A massive bone. A large fragment of an elephant’s thigh. And there was another one, too, a bit further away. And then, a hundred yards out or so, there was a tusk.

Sinner was no great desert aficionado, but he had little doubt no such terrain features could be found back on Earth. The cones were just too regular, and no researcher worth his or her salt would have passed them by or failed to report them in one of their little limited circulation magazines no one in the larger world ever read or even heard of. But a sensationalist journo or two would have surely picked the news up and served it up to the general public: here, look at this nice little curio! And by the way, we found it first!

Which, of course, wasn’t the case here. This was something totally alien, and perhaps dangerous. His intuition screamed, telling him to turn around and give the place a wide berth.

But a detour would take a lot of time and effort since the terrain around the clearing was nothing but tall dunes. As his recent experience proved beyond any doubt whatsoever, pulling a sled across those was definitely not his favorite pastime. In such areas, the heavily loaded contraption slowed him down substantially, sometimes to a mere crawl, and required double the effort even for that.

And he was already tired as hell, and doubly so on account of the horrible heat.

Eew, that!

For some reason or other, the easiest south to north route in his current location lay in between the “dune walls,” across that strange clearing with the mounds. Come to think of it, it was a veritable ribbon of flat terrain, a couple of hundred yards to three quarters of a mile wide. To be sure, it was still covered with sand, but flat sand, which was light years ahead of the alternative on his left and right. Of course, Sinner would have preferred a rocky riverbed instead, but he wasn’t picky. He’d have to make do with what was available.

He’d absolutely loathe to have to abandon what under the circumstances could easily count as a major highway. And damn those mounds in the fake “settlement”.

Sinner spotted a group of what seemed to be the lowest and oldest cones on the very edge of the formation and headed that way. He figured that if he was going to follow that route all the way through, he might as well scan and research those strange objects. And he’d start on the periphery where, hopefully, the force that had created the cones would have been at its weakest.

And besides, he was not going to get all that close to the strange things. Using his amulet, Sinner could literally see every grain of sand from the distance of three dozen paces. If he saw anything untoward, he told himself, he’d turn around right away and take that hateful detour, extra time and effort notwithstanding.

However, the desert had its own take on the matter. Sinner barely had a dozen yards left to cover when, unexpectedly, his foot went deep into the sand. His focus was on what lay ahead, to the detriment of what was so much closer—namely, the suddenly changing nature of the ground under his feet.

He took a step—and froze.

Something was definitely wrong.

Big time.

The sand was suddenly all vibrating, and also spreading out, as if trying to form a pit.

Reflexively, Sinner jerked his sunk foot up, trying to extract it at the same time it was sinking. But at that point, the sand under him gave way altogether, refusing to hold the weight of Sinner’s body, and collapsed over a larger enough area, producing a cloud of fine quartz particles.

What just a moment before seemed to be a nondescript flat surface suddenly became a major sinkhole. It was also conical—a mirror image of the strange mounds, only pointed downward. The slopes of the concavity were the same kind of porous, flowing sand, so trying to gain purchase on those would be hopeless. Sinner would have been sucked all the way in had it not been for his sled, which still remained on solid ground. The pit that suddenly revealed itself resembled a classic hidden trap, except what was on the bottom of it was not so much sharp stakes as something that resembled a dark brown head of cabbage, it’s top featuring a distinct cross cut into the surface, not unlike a huge chestnut ready for roasting.

And Sinner was now hanging above the thing on his harness straps. The strange round object was about a yard and a half in diameter and didn’t quite come through as a plant.

Sinner’s memory conveniently served up images of giant scorpions and monster centipedes. The thing below did in fact seem kind of chitinous.

But Sinner was not quite dwelling on the exact classification of the phenomenon. Whatever the scorpion cabbage below was, scientifically speaking, it had to be mortally dangerous, seeing how this entire set up looked more and more like a trap.

And in all likelihood, the creature was directly responsible for it.

Sinner made the harness straps of the sailcloth he had found at the camp, and they came out long and sturdy. He just couldn’t have imagined he’d be hanging on them over a mysterious predator at the bottom of a sizeable sinkhole. And now, no matter how hard he tried, he could not untangle himself from them or at least get a better grip. He was very much like a puppet trying to control its own movements and badly failing at it. That his hands trying to grab at the thick, wax-coated fabric kept sliding, unable to get a firm grasp, only made the situation worse. Momentarily, Sinner wondered how long he’d be able to wiggle that way before the sled, which wasn’t anchored, would shift towards the edge of the pit, putting him closer to the bottom or smack on top of the menacing cabbage way past its prime.

He suddenly felt an immense hatred for cabbages. And scorpions. And sandy sinkholes for good measure.

As he tried to relieve the pressure from the straps, Sinner’s feet treaded the quicksand on the walls of the pit, sending tons of it down.

Finally, he wiggled into the right position, grabbed at the sailcloth ribbon above a large knot and began wrapping it around his fist, little by little, to create enough leverage. The important thing now was to take it slow, trying to arrest the continuous slide down and then start making his way up—one step at a time.

There was suddenly some clatter below, and Sinner twisted and threw a quick glance down.

Which he immediately regretted.

Under the circumstances, he didn’t really need to know that the cabbage began opening up alongside the cross cut. In fact, it was no longer a cabbage, but more like some ugly bud preparing to become a flower. The tentacle-like “pistil and stamens” were already visible, each of them topped with huge crooked talons. Those seemed like perfect weapons for grabbing at the plant’s victim and bringing it closer, to be properly digested inside this huge blossom from hell.

No, Sinner told himself, he shouldn’t have looked. He should have done better to preserve his peace of mind under such strenuous circumstances.

As it happened though, he wiggled and twisted with increased vigor, his other hand finally managing to get a better grip of the strap. However, the sled didn’t take kindly to all that extra jerking and pulling and finally shifted, getting a yard or two closer to the edge of the pit—something Sinner was afraid of all along.

And despite all his efforts, Sinner slid further down towards the opening floral maw—by about that much, too.

Something below clacked again—this time, dangerously close to his feet. And then did it again and again. The unfathomable creature at the bottom was rapidly waking up.

But he wouldn’t look again, Sinner told himself.

He cherished his sanity.

The downward flow of sand from the pit walls continued, providing no support for his feet whatsoever. And if he simply tried pulling himself up, using only his arms, with the rest of the body dangling, the sled might yield, unable to bear the heavy burden any longer. Sinner was not overweight, but he was tall enough and had substantial body mass. All that muscle, he thought. Buns of steel! So instead of an easy way out, he’d have to do it the hard way, his feet still treading sand on the pit wall, triggering veritable avalanches with his every step. And his hands would still need to do most of the work.

But he was getting there, his eyes finally looking over the edge.

Another little pull, and he’d be over it.

That was when the canvas loop he had wound over his left wrist slid off, the loss of purchase almost sending him back down. But he weathered that, too. Abandoning any attempts at catching the deviant strap again, Sinner grabbed his knife, pushed hard with his sliding feet and lunged up and forward, in the process turning the blade sideways and plunging it into the sand as hard and as deep as he could.

There, he now had a reliable pivot point again. If he did everything right, moving slowly and avoiding sharp jerks, even the loose local loams would hold the knife tight.

Behind him, there was a sudden whistling sound and something slammed into his right leg so hard that Sinner cried out in fear and pain, only managing to hold on to the hilt of his knife by some miracle.

And that wasn’t the end of it. It appeared that flower from hell had rammed the talon on the end of one of its tentacles smack into the thick of his gastrocnemius, as if it were some kind of a monster harpoon. The hard implement was now vibrating perceptibly inside Sinner’s flesh, the creature apparently getting ready to yank its prey off the pit slope and give it a proper welcome down below, inside the gaping maw. And in the meantime, more and more tentacles were reaching out from the midst of it, eager to secure their evening meal right and proper.

Sinner could now no longer continue his slow crawl upward—nor could he stay put, waiting for more talons, or claws, or whatever those things were, to latch onto his flesh.

He threw a quick glance back, which was enough for him to immediately abandon the idea of shooting the mother ship down below with his shotgun or just taking the plunge and engaging the monster mano a mano. He’d need a bazooka here, not his measly peashooter.

There’d be no point fighting the thing either. He just needed to get out somehow—out and away, as far from this place as humanly possible.

His left leg, which so far had been still kicking a sandstorm on the slope would be the only weapon available. Sinner pulled it back and kicked the tentacle hard with the heel of his boot, and then again and again, at the same time praying the knife, which was now the only thing that prevented him from falling down, would hold and stay in the ground for the duration.

Every one of his kicks was hitting home, but the talon was just twisting and turning in the wound, making it ever larger.

The pain was incredible, blood gushing down and into his boot, but Sinner knew there was nothing else he could do. Steady and slow, persevere and win—or whatever the right slogan was here that his racing brain, focused on the main effort, was holding back.

He just had to keep going, pounding that alien rubber hose attached to his leg, and never mind the chunk of his muscle that was now history. That wasn’t the end of the world. Giving up and finding himself inside the diabolical cabbage would be. He simply had to break free.

Whatever it took.

Something else slammed into his leg, and Sinner screamed at the top of his lungs like he hadn’t ever before, and then it also felt like the knife was beginning to shift, and even the skies darkened, professing the end of the world—his, Sinner’s, world anyway—and then his mangled extremity was suddenly free, just dangling there like a broken, limp rag doll abandoned by its indifferent master.

Instinctively, Sinner made a desperate lunge upward, his hand fused to the knife’s handle—his last-ditch pivot point. There had to be God in the local version of heaven, because he was now half-out, his chest firmly planted on the horizontal plane outside. Then the menacing whistle from behind hit his ears again, this time much closer, but the evil underground flowering crucifer (Lucifer?) must have missed its chance, because there were no more harpoon hits, and Sinner’s lower back cursed back at the whistler with a vengeance, popping, and cracking, and creaking, and then his legs were suddenly up top and out of the pit, having performed an unimaginable salto mortale, which, by some incomprehensible confluence of all things large and small, failed to prove fatal. Sinner never knew he could do acrobatics like that when essentially suspended in thin air, but desperate times called for desperate measures.

Rolling away from the edge, Sinner caught a glimpse of his wounded extremity and knew right away retribution and all other things would just have to wait. His entire leg below the knee was one bloody mess, as if stripped raw. It had to be dealt with immediately.

That damn subterranean vegetable!

And what was he even thinking himself? Where were his protective shields?

For reasons unknown, they all triggered—all at once. Perhaps he had put them on too sensitive a setting, so they all discharged at once, mistaking his feet hitting the walls of the pit and the mass of sand pouring down for an attack. Whatever happened, the monster got him on the first try.

But what about his most recent skill? Why didn’t he jump sideways and out of the pit as soon as his head rose above the edge of it? Sinner had to admit he still had a long way to go to condition his brain to automatically resort to the additional capabilities the puppet masters had afforded him. That was a clear case of subconscious traditionalism that caused him to try and resolve the problem using the familiar methods life on Earth had prepared him for. Grit and grind, yes, and ordinarily there wasn’t anything wrong with that. Except now the approach almost cost him his life.

And even then, the “almost” part was still not a done deal. He had a serious injury and was losing blood fast. Something had to be done about it, or in a few minutes it would be lights out.

Back on Earth, the situation would have called for a tourniquet, but here things were indeed different. Sinner reached into his vest pocket where he kept all kinds of treatment meds and painkillers. He quickly popped two pills. Together, they would stem the bleeding too, and with fewer side effects than the standard concoction in the bracelet.

One of the beast’s tentacles, or rather the very tip of it with the talon, reached over the edge of the pit, burrowing in the sand and searching for its escaping victim blindly not quite a foot away from him.

Sinner reached for his shotgun but then thought better of it.

There was no need to waste valuable ammunition. Boy, did he have a surprise for the bugger!

He rose and headed for the sled, dragging his leg badly. There was hardly any more pain, but the extremity felt stiff and alien. But he’d have a better look at it later.

Now, it was payback time.

Reaching his mother lode, Sinner grabbed one of the primitive grenades he had picked at the sailors’ camp and then went back to the pit, grinning. He felt as if even his limp had suddenly gotten better.

His crippled leg wanted revenge too, it seemed.

Giving the tentacle, which was still searching hectically, a wide berth, Sinner approached the pit from the opposite side and threw a cautious look inside.

The cabbage head was now completely gone, replaced with some two dozen segmented tentacles of different length and thickness, all of them reaching upwards, towards the prey they must have already considered their own. Said appendages were rooted in a bumpy, chitinous mass that was covered almost in its entirety with a growth of smaller tentacles, which, unlike their larger equivalents, only had a single section and looked like outsized worms. And yes, they were all longingly pointed upwards. Come to think of it, the larger feelers were not unlike legs on a giant crab turned upside down while the little ones seemed like the eye stalks on a snail. Except there was an awful lot of those. And they all adorned a humongous maw in the middle, which, in all fairness, was not at all unlike a human mouth, only blown grotesquely way out of proportion. Sinner immediately thought of all those dedicated female victims of plastic surgeries and Botox lip flips back on his home planet.

And to add insult to injury, that humongous pair of fat, smacking kissers was also painted a screamingly bright, in-your-face hue of scarlet.

Sinner’s leg seized altogether. He took a knee, reached for his lighter and lit the fuse. “Bon appétit, you bitch,” he said and threw the grenade down the pit. The humongous lips smacked gratefully, accepting the offering.

Chapter 20

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Northern Meeba

The Easiest Hunt Ever

He wouldn’t pinpoint the subdued pop down below for what it was if he didn’t know. Even the gun smoke wafted up through the thick layer of sand in a totally lackluster manner, most of the fumes staying underground, inside the ravaged trunk of unknown size.

The kissy lips never refused what he gave them and never tried spitting the deadly gifts out.

It was now his second day ravaging the population of underground cabbage wannabees, yet Sinner was still unable to tell how large his new victim truly was by the size of its tentacles.

His victory messages were not exactly clear about it, and he couldn’t afford wasting energy, scanning them with his Research skill.

You have killed an antagonist: an elite beast.

Elite beast: the Sand Catcher of Meeba. Caste: none. Level: 28. Boosts: enhanced strength, the highest degree of protection when inactive, enhanced mimicry, improved sense of smell, deep anabiosis, substantially enhanced protection against physical attacks from a distance, improved seismic sense, enhanced resilience to poisons, enhanced protection from fire, master-level sand castle building skills.

12 points received.

+697 to Karma.

The Sand Catcher of Meeba is listed in your extended rating.

Sinner grinned. How about it—another elite beast! Most of them here were uncommon beasts—like that first tiger of his, which put him on the local society’s map in Tier One. But roughly one out of seven was a much juicier catch.

The monster scorpion that almost got him on his first night on the new tier was also an elite bugger. Only it was of a higher level, which was why the amount of loot for it was nothing like this time around.

These guys here had weaker parameters but they were by no means easy prey. Their vulnerabilities were buried deep inside the sand mass and getting to them was nowhere near straightforward. The tentacles, as Sinner found out, were very well protected, and the main body hidden underground apparently was too. Even the description on his phone said there was no point trying to poison the catchers, burn them or shoot arrows at them.

And besides, how would you even shoot something hiding six feet under while staying alive and dangerous?

But all of that was irrelevant for someone who had a large enough stash of fragmentation grenades. Even if they were primitive and not particularly powerful. The hungry lips were always open and willing, and whatever protections the things enjoyed on the outside did not cover their entrails.

Sinner’s sled also came handy, or rather one of its parts—a long pole.

Using it as a probe, Sinner slowly walked around the area, feeling for any hidden hollows underneath. Just as the description suggested, the catchers were great masters of disguise, but they could only deceive the eyes. Poking the surface with the pole, Sinner immediately knew if the spot was kosher or not.

And sometimes he afforded himself the luxury of using his Research skill. In some cases, a single use revealed two or three nearby traps right away. But his energy supply was not endless and took a long time to replenish, so Sinner had to use it sparingly.

On two occasions, he chanced upon rare beasts. However, dealing with those only required extra caution on account of their high parameters, and the name itself, because otherwise, they were in no way different from the rest of the tribe. Each of them died just as quickly, having dined on a single grenade.

Had Sinner had more powder and metal containers, he could have easily decimated the entire population of catchers in that dune-lined flat area. He estimated there had to be at least a few hundred such vicious cabbages in that unique place. And the real cherry on the top was that not a single one of them (at least among those he had sent to their maker) was an ordinary beast. They were all uncommon or higher, with quite a few different boosts.

Naturally, the loot they dropped reflected that fact as well. And they were incredibly easy to kill, too. Even a child could handle them, if equipped properly.

Just about the only aggravation was that after each explosion, Sinner had to go down into the pit to collect his trophies, and then make it back up, fighting the flowing sands. Even using the straps tied to his well-anchored sled, it was hard, time-consuming work, at least initially, before his leg healed completely.

But at least the containers were always dropped on top of the beast, or among the wilted tentacles, so he didn’t have to dig for them.

Hey, maybe the puppet masters were beginning to grow a rudimentary conscience.

Still, Sinner’s supply of grenades was not endless, and rather than engage in carpet bombing, he was simply clearing a route for himself, moving north within the confines of that narrow band between the dunes. Come to think of it, he was merely passing through, and the monsters that stood in his way were just an annoying hindrance. But quite a profitable one, too, Sinner admitted. Fair was fair.

And it wasn’t just the containers. Both the pits and their surrounding areas often contained elephant bones and tusks that could be deconstructed into resources, all the more so since he now had more containers than he knew what to do with. He couldn’t take them all with him anyway. As it was, his sled now had a pile of different goodies on it, way in excess of any regular carry limits. If he had to abandon his “transport,” Sinner thought, he’d have to leave most of that loot behind as well. Which would be very unfortunate.

Although still very likely. The mountains ahead looked serious enough. They were definitely not suitable grounds for dragging a sled behind.

For the time being, Sinner simply refused to think about how he might go around that looming overloading issue and continued pulling the entire mother lode forward while he still could. And when he couldn’t, Sinner told himself, he’d think of something. A loophole in the rules, perhaps, or some such. And anyway, wasn’t necessity the mother of invention?

One of the rare beasts dropped him a flash drive with a partial map. This time, the amount of detail on it was amazing, so the map could definitely be used for teleportation.

Except did he really want to go that way?

The area depicted was some forty-five miles to the northwest—perhaps right in those mountains Sinner was heading towards. But it was still hard to tell.

On the one hand, “northwest” had an important “north” element in it, and moving that much closer to the coveted tier border in one fell swoop looked like quite a boon.

However, the way Sinner saw it, there were two obvious reasons for concern.

First, the map fragment was clearly marked as a Mountain Murker Lair. Sinner had no idea what those were but he was ready to bet they were not going to be warm and fuzzy.

Second, what the map showed was indeed a pitiful snippet—an elliptical area ten yards long and six yards across in it its widest part. And when he zoomed in to the max, he could clearly see some suspicious debris that looked very much like large bones. Sinner had plenty of those right here, no travel required, thank you very much. He also doubted the elephants in that distant location, or whatever they were, had died peacefully.

Something over there was just as fond of its tuskers as the cabbage heads in his current whereabouts.

Heck, he even had the name for that something: Mountain Murkers. Those things might well have bribed the puppet masters to have the flash drives with the coordinates of their lair included among other loot. Or they could call it a cross-selling arrangement.

Sinner chuckled. If he took them up on that offer, he was bound to find himself in the company of God only knew how many previously unseen critters. And all he knew about them was they liked hunting large game.

Gee, what a great deal indeed! For the murkers, that is. Not for him. With zero room for maneuver and no knowledge of the terrain, he’d be toast.

So, on the balance of things, Sinner decided he’d pass. The instant lift to what looked like a mortally dangerous place just wasn’t worth it.

He wasn’t a madman. He’d hurry slowly.

Yet he would keep that option in the back of his mind in case an opportunity presented itself to go visit the place without any additional risk. Elephant eaters had to be valuable. Which the catchers had proven beyond all doubt. All other things being equal, he’d like a shot at hunting those murkers as well.

Speaking of elephants, it looked like they had been wandering into the desert in droves. Perhaps there were times, or seasons, when they had a compelling reason to do that. It wasn’t for nothing that the catchers had built an entire field of traps in the only location where the animals could cross the dunes unimpeded.

Suddenly, his phone began vibrating, and it wasn’t another activation. That had come and gone earlier.

Tark, it had to be Tark calling again.

Sinner looked at the screen. It was.

“Come again?” the man asked after the initial exchange of greetings. “You are somewhat alive? The hell does that mean?”

“Well, I had me a bit of a thrashing.”

“How bad?”

“Nothing I can’t live with. There’s these curious critters I’ve come across here. They are warm and cuddly, basically. Except one almost tore my leg off. I am still taking it easy. Slowly, you know. And it’s not like you could race in this place anyway. But I have pills. I’ll be fine tomorrow. What’s up with you?”

“Oh, it’s been a monkey zoo since morning,” Tark sighed.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, it started when we went to help our guys. They had a bit of a run-in with the caste crowd. No one died, but some were wounded. Well, the caste folks fled but promised to come back and bring reinforcements. There was tons of noise and screaming from afar, so we went over to help. And then we figured, oh, well, why wait. Let’s go finish this business. So we gave chase. You get the picture. Anyway, we tracked them, but we should have really left it alone. Those schmucks that ran away from us, they bumped into some locals. Like, real savages, if you want to know. Total psychos. We found three. Three bodies, that is. They were not just killed... They... well, you don’t want to know.”

“Why do you think it was the natives, rather than some other gang, like you guys?”

“You could tell by the footprints,” Tark said. We have this tracker fella with us. Really knows his business. He said there was at least fifty people there. All of them barefoot. So imagine these four dozen yahoos, running around, no shoes or anything, and damn all that sharp stuff. And they are cutting everyone into pieces, whoever they come across.”

“I don’t see any sharp stuff where I am at,” Sinner said.

“Yeah, I know. I also know the sand in the desert is, like, burning hot. Are you walking barefoot there too?”

“All right, Tark, all right, I get it. Just get the hell out of there. The last thing you want is stepping on someone’s toes. And fifty wild ones sounds like plenty of trouble to me.”

“It’s not like we wanted to. We never even heard of anything like it. I mean, yeah, I know there’s some kind of locals. But a major force like this? That’s a first. Shucks, we really need you over here, Sin. And maybe ten others like you, for good measure. We are like on a minefield here, and we have no idea where we are going. It looks like it’s just about as bad as in Tier One. I mean, going north, that is. Well, not quite, but you can’t just trek anywhere. You need to know. And you need fighters. Like, real tough guys.”

“Well, I’d be happy to help, but you know my disposition.”

“So why don’t you get out of there already? It’s been two weeks, and you are still in that desert shithole no one even heard about. But hey, maybe you like it out there. It’s not even funny anymore.”

Putting the phone away, Sinner took a long, hard look north. Once again, something dark blinked up ahead. Was he seeing double, or was it a bird out there, cruising?

This time he did not even bother using his amulet. The desert had always been playing tricks with his eyes. And those apparitions never lasted for more than a second or two. Brutal heat, dust and chronic fatigue were far from a winning combination. And stimulants only made it worse.

At the moment, Sinner could not even see those distant mountains—if they had ever been there to begin with.

He could probably climb yet another dune to check once again, but time was of the essence. Either way, that would be superfluous. Mountains or not, he knew which way to go.

North. He needed to head north.

* * *

In the morning, Sinner was back on his way before sunrise. Thanks to his “feel good” collar, he could get by on little sleep, and besides, the desert was much cooler at night, which made for easier going. He had crossed the entire “settlement” the night before, and there didn’t seem to be any more sand mounds up ahead. Which meant there were no more traps. But even if there were, the flashlight in his phone produced a large enough cone of light to warn him of anything that might lie at least a few yards ahead.

Even though the heat was still at half strength, it was hard going. The strain of the day before, when he did not only have to clear the way from the monsters but also climbed in and out of God only knew how many of their pits to collect the containers, was finally catching up with him. Plus the sled was so much heavier now on account of all those processed elephant bones. They were just about as large and heavy as the tusks, but worth much less. Sinner wondered if it even made sense to haul all that stuff along. If the route north did not improve, and if he didn’t run into an amenable merchant soon, perhaps he’d be better off simply dumping that extra load.

Yeah, perhaps he would.

In the meantime, the road was actually getting worse, one mile after another. After the first couple of hours (easy going, that, in hindsight, and in a relative cool), his progress essentially slowed to a crawl. Flat terrain was now over, and he was back to zigzagging among those godawful, ever-present dunes. They were not too tall, yet still high enough to warrant going around, wasting the time and effort he could ill afford.

In another hour and a half, Sinner realized he was not going to last until nightfall. There was not a whiff of a breeze among the dunes, and he felt like he was in some humongous oven, traversing a hot plate that on top of it all was all potholed and bumpy, so the damn sled would lurch and get stuck every minute or so.

Just about the only good thing about that snowless toboggan was that it threw off some shade when he stopped to catch his breath.

But was that even worth it? Once again, Sinner wondered if he should just abandon the piece, loot and all. And then teleport back to pick it up at some later point in time.

Tempting. It was so damn tempting.

But then what? What if he ran into yet another rich hunting ground around the bend? Where would he put all that new loot? How many caches was he prepared to leave on the way? No, Sinner decided, he had worked way too hard for his loot. He’d only leave it behind when he was all spent or the road became plain out impassable.

And he was not quite there yet.

But he would take a break soon, he promised himself, and maybe check on the ratings, too, to take his mind off his current debilitating grind.

Obligingly, the phone produced the stats when requested.

Sinner: 113,624 points

Chao Chan: 76,888 points

John Smith: 69,338 points

Arata: 68,106 points

Lee Zhou Eng: 66,812 points

Ahem. Interesting. The good news was no one had managed to catch up with him yet. And the contenders were still lagging behind badly enough. But that was just about the only bright spot.

Since the time of his great battle on the coast, Sinner had hardly made any progress. Which, come to think of it, was not all that surprising. They awarded him precious few points for the sailors dispatched and the treasure found. The catchers netted him much more, but again, it all paled in comparison with his glorious deeds of almost two weeks before.

Damn! If only he had enough of those grenades...

After his last major jump, Sinner had more than three times as many points as the nearest runner up, Chao Chan. Almost three and a half, actually. Now they were talking mere percentage points rather than factors.

And that percentage difference wasn’t all that great.

Sinner had no idea where Chao Chan had been getting his loot for development from, but it appeared the man’s hunting grounds were not too shabby either. He was receiving way more points than Tark or Lynxie. Incomparably more, that is. And the rest of that crowd was following closely behind.

Indeed, while Sinner was wandering in his wastelands, the challengers seemed to be busy-busy-busy, and the gap was getting smaller and smaller.

If it continued like that, soon enough he wouldn’t even make the top five. It happened once, shortly after Tier One launched, and it could definitely happen again.

The same fate must have also befallen the participant named Arata, whoever he or she was, who dropped out of the top spots earlier but had now rejoined the leaders again, taking the fourth place. Nothing, it seemed, was set in stone, here or elsewhere.

The top murderer rating had also changed substantially since the last time he checked.

Cutter: 29 murders

Freckle: 18 murders

Takeshi: 17 murders

Ladyboy: 15 murders

Baldy B: 15 murders

Sinner had never even been in that picture in the new tier. Which was understandable, seeing how there was simply no one around to murder. For that particular metric, only participants counted, and stranglers, sailors and those mythical savages Tark had told him about didn’t.

Strangely enough, though, Pornobunny, who held the solid No. 2 place in Tier One and became the leader on the new tier from the get go was now nowhere to be seen. The man did not even make Top 20. The current runners up, on the other hand, were moving in a tight pack—except, perhaps, the new challenger, Baldy B, who had jumped out of nowhere to catch up with Ladyboy, an almost permanent fixture among the top butchers. Sinner wondered why the puppet masters still put Ladybody above that new entrant even though their body count was the same. Seniority, perhaps?

The pack leader, Cutter, was way ahead of the rest of that crowd, albeit still not by orders of magnitude. Sinner recalled that the man was a prolific killer even in Tier One, and then hit the ground running when Tier Two launched. And now he was the top dog.

Unlike Sinner, whose extended sun tanning session in the desert would soon remove him from the stats picture altogether. Well, he told himself philosophically, at least, he didn’t crave the title of the top murderer, now or ever.

What he really needed was find a trader. The stash of goodies he was hauling would alone underwrite his next major jump across all the parameters. And then he could proceed with the original plan of hunting game with his bow.

He’d stay number one. Oh, yes, sir, he would. All he needed to do was leave this awful desert behind.

Thinking of his parameters suddenly reminded Sinner that he had quite a few development symbols accumulated after his fun with the catchers the day before. He didn’t think about it then, in the heat of the moment, while making his way through the tentacled cabbage-infested territory.

But now it was a different story. He might as well spend the stash.

However, one sour look towards the scorching sun told Sinner it might not be such a great idea to subject his body to any additional strain, however fleeting. He’d leave it alone until the evening.

For the time being though, he’d walk some more. Slowly. And then, perhaps, make that fateful decision to dump some of his less valuable loot.

Such as the bones, as much as it hurt him to admit. And perhaps even the tusks.

They may have been expensive, but his good health and well-being were worth more.

* * *

At first Sinner decided he was going to make a thousand steps and then revisit the issue of dumping some of his cargo. But then, there was suddenly a dune range blocking his way that offered no convenient passage, and he decided he was not going to do anything until he climbed to the top of it and crossed to the other side.

That way a thousand paces became two thousand. And then two and a half.

And then, another hundred or so steps later, he found himself on a mountain pass. Except, of course, they were not mountains. They were sand dunes. To the right and left of him, there were other dune tops, and what he was leaving behind was the lengthy ascent with his sled that was now about to break and turn downhill.

But the most interesting part lay right in front of him.

His eyes fixed on all points north, Sinner reached for the water bottle on his belt and unscrewed the cap. He took four small swallows, washing off the taste of despair in his mouth, and gargling a little, and wetting his dry, chapped lips.

And then, talking to no one in particular, tired and fairly disheartened, he smiled.

“Oh, all right. Something new at last.”

Chapter 21

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Location: Northern Meeba, Salty Foothills

The Importance of Looking Up

Now he was not just walking. He was almost flying since the surface was almost ideal. It was flat and even, with no bumps, rises or ice ridges, such as on a frozen lake or river. Now, that was a curious thought, Sinner chuckled. Where would ice ridges come from in the flaming desert inferno? Anyhow, what he meant was that the descent down the other side was really, really regular and pleasant.

What he saw from the top of the dune looked like a complex, intertwined system of shallow lakes that extended left and right, in a never-ending ribbon, along a mountain range. Their shores appeared abnormal—too white for the circumstances. Snow-white, in fact. The lack of any greenery when there was so much water around also seemed strange. But that was not what drew Sinner’s attention. His focus was primarily on what lay some ten miles further ahead: mountains.

Finally, in all its splendor, the coveted range he had been trying to reach for so long was now right in front of him.

Goodness gracious, he was almost there.

But for the time being, Sinner put the victory lap on hold since, at a first glance, they seemed like strange mountains indeed. And as he kept looking, the news became worse still.

Those were not luscious, climbable peaks. Steep, yes. Picturesque, yes. But still not particularly high. It was perhaps for that very reason that they remained obscured from sight by the dune ridge until the very last moment. However, none of that meant they would be easy to cross. The tops formed a number of parallel ridges, extending east to west—or the other way around, if one liked thinking about them that particular way. And every subsequent ridge further in looked higher than the one before it. In fact, what Sinner was looking at resembled a number of monster jigsaw blades bunched together in a haphazard fashion and facing upwards. In fact, just about the only thing missing would be a giant rubber band or two to hold the entire pack together.

There were no foothills to speak of, and the entire range seemed kind of chopped off from the south along its entire length. Anywhere Sinner looked, there was an almost vertical rock wall going hundreds of yards up. To be sure, there were some extended sediment slide areas at the bottom, but they were fairly low-lying and insufficient to reach any flat sections up above.

Besides, in all fairness, there were no flat sections to speak of. Despite their relatively unimpressive height, those seemed to be fairly unforgiving mountains that could hardly be traversed without special equipment and solid rock climbing skills.

The almost vertical southernmost ridge could easily be at least fifteen hundred feet high and exhibited no convenient avenues of ingress. And it appeared there were at least two or three more ridges behind it, all of them taller and more forbidding still.

To be sure, the Himalayas they were not, but trying to negotiate the range would be a task to behold. And not just for travelers. The rock wall seemed to present quite an impediment for the air masses from the coast as well. Bumping into those peaks, the soggy clouds lost most of their moisture, which became frequent rains, the water pouring down the southern slopes and feeding that strange chain of lakes with white shores.

One way or another, Sinner knew he could forget about dragging his sled across those mountains. There were no signs of any traders around either, or anyone else, for that matter, so it did look like he’d have to leave a lot of his cargo behind.

It was bad news, but it was still as expected.

What was even worse was that so far he had no idea how to negotiate that mountain range even if traveling light. There were indeed a few sections he could see that looked more promising than others, but he would not be able to tell anything for sure without a closer look. The mountains were still too far out for his farseeing amulet to be of any use.

And he couldn’t just leave his sled right there and then. Always at the mercy of the winds, the dunes were constantly shifting, and chances were high they’d suck his treasure trove in within days. Sinner was not quite ready for that. He still cherished the thought of coming back at a later point in time and reclaiming his hard-earned loot.

Besides, now that he had a number of teleportation stones available, he was curious to experience what that process looked and felt like.

So where would he hide his treasure? Down below? The lakes looked fairly suspicious, and at the very least he needed to find out what it was that was wrong with them. And once he did, he’d make up his mind as to whether to hide his stash on the shore somewhere or drag it all the way to the foot of some mountain.

In all fairness, Sinner had to admit, once he gave it some thought, certain things about that lake system became fairly clear even without using his amulet or coming much closer. Knowing a bit of physical geography went a long way in all kinds of situations.

The lakes that were the closest to his observation point up top had no water in them. It had evaporated completely, leaving behind a thick layer of salt, which glistened in the sunlight, creating the illusion of a water surface. As he came closer, Sinner began noticing occasional stalks of some strange reddish plants that he couldn’t quite see from high up on the dune. And it seemed the growth was becoming more lush further north—if that’s what the deep burgundy streaks and splotches that he was now seeing up ahead were.

Indeed, his assumption proved to be correct. The unusual shoots became thicker and taller, some of them now getting knee-high. They also seemed to become meatier as they grew larger—something along the lines of underdeveloped cacti with no prickles. In places, the plants had clearly been trampled upon or munched at. Uh-oh!

Any creatures that lived in this salty world and fed on such suspicious flora were bound to be strange indeed. And strange usually meant unfamiliar dangers.

Sinner met those curious critters when he finally found water. Or rather brine, because with that kind of concentration of different salts in it, the viscous liquid could hardly qualify as plain old H2O. Not even the Dead Sea could be deemed as dead as the lakes Sinner was now exploring.

Anyhow, whatever one wanted to call the sticky solution in the first of the lakes that wasn’t completely dry, all of the four or five acres of it, there was precious little liquid there. And in those few inches of fluid saline mush, a bunch of creatures, not unlike awkwardly thrown together outsized crocodiles, were happily pickling themselves. Or rather, they looked more like humongous toads that tried to disguise themselves as bona fide reptiles.

Except for their considerable dimensions, the toadies did not look particularly aggressive or dangerous. But apparently, size did matter. The largest of the animals reached five yards or more and the diameter of hundred-year-old pine trees.

Suddenly, Sinner’s hands were itching to shoot one of them just to test the idea, but in the end, he restrained himself. Even if successful, the effort was not going to bring him anything other than some points, karma and a victory message to his phone. The wind had died down, so any container that might pop up would take a while to drift to the shore, and Sinner definitely did not cherish the idea of getting into that overheated brine to retrieve it himself. Who knew what kind of infernal stuff it might have dissolved in it?

Now that his injured leg was back to normal, Sinner was in no hurry whatsoever to put his lower extremities in danger again.

And killing anything without bothering to collect the loot just didn’t seem right. It would be like catch and release—the reprehensible kind of recreational fishing, whereas one would torture the fish just for the fun of it, with no intention of eating it or putting the trophy to any other legitimate use. Even considering that this was a different world, Sinner reasoned, where a lot of things that looked familiar were not in fact similarly dispositioned, gratuitous killing just didn’t sit right with him. That was just the kind of mindset he had, and there was precious little he could do about it.

Plus it would be a sheer waste of an arrow.

But the issue resolved itself a little further ahead, after he crossed yet another nearly dry lake that his sled seemed to love so much, sliding along as if under its own power. The narrow causeway that separated the lake from the next one up was solidly blocked by two of the local reptilian (or where they amphibian?) denizens. Grazing unhurriedly on the red shoots, their heads bobbing in and out of the thick natural hedgerow, they gave Sinner a curious look that left him none the wiser as to their potential intentions with respect to his person. The movements of their heads, too, came through as fairly mechanical, as if driven by some inanimate apparatus inside.

As those things went, they were both fairly small—six to eight feet long, one slightly larger than the other. Sinner had no idea how the remaining creature would react to the violent demise of his buddy. What if it really took offense and attacked? With that unfortunate scenario in mind, he selected the larger of the two as his target.

But he needn’t have worried. The “little one” split the very moment Sinner’s arrow pierced the head of its larger companion. And it never looked back.

The one Sinner shot dropped down in place, its paws and tail twitching spasmodically, as if suddenly zapped with high voltage. The arrow went through the skull easily, half of it emerging on the other side.

Pfft, Sinner thought. They were fake crocodiles indeed! The real ones from Tier One had their heads so up-armored that during the first encounter with them Sinner did not even try to use his bow. To be sure, back then the bow he had was nowhere near as good, and his archery skill left much to be desired too.

But either way, these guys here seemed to have eggshells for bone.

Sinner reached for his phone.

You have killed an antagonist: a common beast.

Common beast: Pink Lake Salamander. Caste: none. Level: 19. Boosts: enhanced resistance to aggressive chemical media (including the ability to drink water of the highest salinity), enhanced upward vision.

6 points received.

+305 to Karma.

The Pink Lake Salamander is listed in your extended rating.

Salamander? Really? From what Sinner remembered of his high school biology class, salamanders were amphibians, while this thing looked more like a reptile. It clearly had scales on top, and it looked like it may have recently lost its tail and was now growing a new one. So this was basically a lizard?

And where did it lose that tail then? Who was the culprit? It had been close to two hours since Sinner entered this lake country, and he was yet to see anything else moving but these salamanders. It just couldn’t be that they were eating each other. They were feeding on the red stalks, it seemed.

And besides, what was the deal with the upward vision? Now, the “chemical” boost was fairly clear-cut, what with the creatures’ most unusual habitat, but why did they need to look to the firmament?

As if on cue, Sinner raised his eyes skywards and, in a kind of a two-for-one deal, got his answers to both why it was so important to check the heavens often enough around those parts and what had happened to the deceased salamander’s tail.

From high up in the pale blue desert airspace, something huge and horrible was diving right on him. The flier, whatever it was, had a huge, long beak, open wide enough to display rows of sharp triangular teeth any shark would be happy to kill for. The attacker’s large, leathery wings seemed to be swept back to facilitate speed diving, and its bloody red eyes, both hungry and joyous at the same time, shone with unmistaken anticipation.

Well, the reason for the latter was obvious, Sinner thought to himself. The bugger knew it was not going to be hungry for much longer.

But under the circumstances, he cut his pondering short. He darted sideways to remove himself from the immediate target area of the diving predator, basically following the same tactic the second salamander must have employed before he even became aware of the predator up above.

The pink thing must have had quite some experience in the matter and knew that the hunter’s maneuverability in a steep dive such as this one was severely limited.

All you had to do to avoid being grabbed was jump sideways a little.

But for Sinner, it was too little, too late. In all fairness, he had neither acute AA vision nor the reflex of checking the skies every couple of seconds. And he was too late. And hadn’t jumped far enough. He was still well within the attacker’s target engagement envelope.

However, there was no point in sinking into despair. What he needed to do was try and evade the first attack at all costs.

Then, assuming the creature would only be pouncing him from the air, it would have to go around and try again. Sinner could then use that break to rush towards the lake and get deeper into the briny waters. As bad as they looked, somehow the salamanders survived in it. So he’d last a while too. Besides, he had noticed that when they sat in the water, the strange amphibians were fairly lax with their air defense measures. That meant they felt safe there. Whatever the reason for that was, the details did not matter at the moment. What did was that salvation lay within that awful toxic slurry.

To be sure, Sinner did not feel particularly anxious to get into the salty goo, but his choices at the moment were limited at best. He could stake his life on his bow and shotgun, but that would be extremely risky. The flying bandit was way too large, and Sinner had no idea what it could be capable off. But at the very least, he could still fire a shot for hope of scaring the bugger off with the loud report and gaining a few extra moments that way.

Without stopping, Sinner swung around and went into a controlled tumble, back first. The idea was to hit the ground sliding and stay with the move, his eyes firmly on the attacker all along.

His left hand still had the phone in it, but Sinner held on to it. For what he had in mind, his right hand would suffice alone.

He reached for the holster and felt the checkered surface of the pistol grip in his hand.

It would only take him an extra second to draw the weapon and pull both triggers, firing point blank. But as it happened, that was a second he did not have.

The toothy beak closed in on his wrist like a bear trap, pinning the hand with the shotgun down and kicking up a cloud of sand and salt particles as the sharp tip of the creature’s main assault weapon plunged deep into the ground.

Sinner twitched, annoyed and desperate, but it was no use. It was as if he was caught in a giant vise, with no hope of getting out. He felt being lifted off the ground and caught a glimpse of water below as the beast was quickly gaining altitude, seemingly unimpeded by the weight of its catch.

The beak was still holding him tight, his hand with the gun now pinned to the side of his body, and Sinner could feel his shields discharging in a quick succession, one after another. Once the last of them was gone, there’d be nothing standing between his flesh and those teeth. He’d be history.

Sinner knew he had but a second left to live.

Chapter 22

The Space of Xai. Tier 2. Team 2. Locations: Salty Foothills, Southern Wall, Plateau of Bones, Toothy Ridge, Northern Slopes, Hills of Horror

Location Kaleidoscope and Eating Right

Sinner was wrong about the length of his remaining lifespan. And about nothing but his magic skill protecting him from the creature’s teeth.

Yes, the continuous pressure from the tightly shut beak kept triggering a new shield automatically every twenty four hundredths of a second in a kind of a relay race to oblivion. Since he could not currently have more than five shields active, in total, they would slow his upcoming demise by a tad over a second.

But then he also had his enhanced body armor. And his body as such was a tough enough nut in its own right on account of its high Physical Defense and Stamina. Experience told him that the sum total of all those stats wouldn’t quite be sufficient to disregard the teeth of flying monsters altogether, but hopefully, he could still avoid terminal injury.

On the other side of the scale, there was his immediate adversary, a very unusual creature indeed. Something that, when attacking from the air, could easily snap the sturdy sailcloth straps attached to Sinner’s sled deserved unmitigated respect. Against such an enemy, his shotgun would work best if discharged straight into the damn thing’s throat. However, said worthy weapon was now in his right hand, which was pinned tight to his body around the elbow joint, lodged in between those monster teeth. With no room for maneuver repositioning and aiming the gun would require.

Conversely, Sinner’s other hand had not yet had the pleasure of meeting the creature’s long jaws. So, in the span of that second available, he reflexively did the first thing that came to his subconscious mind under the circumstances.

He grabbed his knife from the sheath on his belt. No, not to attack the beast back, because he simply had no time to inflict any serious damage. Sinner just turned it sideways, the tip outwards, so the beak and the teeth would meet the sharp blade directly once his shields were gone.

And once he was out of them, there was not going to be anymore where those came from, at least not quickly enough to matter since the cooldown for the skill was two seconds, and yet another second was needed to trigger.

So, three altogether.

He didn’t quite have even half of that.

And so, finally, the long toothy jaws of the monster tightened shut all the way.

The pain was unbearable, and Sinner screamed.

This is it, buddy, a thought flashed in his mind. Your goose is soooo cooked! But the next moment he somehow realized the beast’s teeth were not quite crushing him and most of his body was still pretty much intact. It was his unfortunate right arm stuck close to the base of the beak that took the brunt of the assault. A few of the teeth penetrated deep enough, inflicting painful flesh wounds, and the elbow joint, caught smack in that merciless trap, was a sensitive area too. Still it didn’t quite feel like any of his bones were broken.

Gee, thanks.

As luck would have it, only the tips of the teeth were sharp. With sharp edges, Sinner would have definitely had to say good bye to his right hand.

And on the left, the blade of his knife held steady, preventing the jaws from crushing his body. On top of it all, he was lucky again in that the beast was apparently not used to chewing in flight; the jaws remained immobile through the duration, just holding the prey tight.

But that alone was bad enough, to be sure. His chest was compressed to the point that the remaining lung volume was barely enough to allow for shallow breathing. And it was anyone’s guess how long he could survive on so little oxygen. Every once in a while Sinner felt like he was about to black out and only managed not to by a sheer act of will.

There was no doubt in his mind that every new bout of oncoming darkness could well be his last.

That was quite a predicament indeed that he got himself into.

On top of it all, things were aggravated by the fact that Sinner had a sturdy all-around metal helmet on his head, which obstructed his vision even under the best of circumstances. It was one of the trophies he had got when crossing the sand catcher territory. The piece was unwieldy but offered plenty of protection. But the real reason Sinner bothered was that the helmet had an invaluable temperature control property, keeping his head cool even in the suffocating heat of the desert. Presumably, according to the description, it would have the opposite effect in the cold, but that still remained to be seen.

Either way, it was a nice thing to have when traveling through extremely hot climes.

Once his deflective shields were gone, the metal headgear deformed substantially, squeezing Sinner’s head tight, but again, the knife’s blade, acting as a mine prop of sorts, prevented further damage. However, the eye slit that did not allow for much of a field of view even in its original condition was now badly deformed and almost closed shut. And there was precious little Sinner could do about it, trapped that he was. He could only look down now. By some strange confluence of events, when the beast grabbed him, his body somehow got flipped, the back now turned upward, even though Sinner was facing the attacker head on when the beak pinned him down. Looking between the teeth, he could only catch occasional glimpses of the terrain below, which, considering the high speed of their flight and plenty of vibration, made the overall picture not unlike a kaleidoscope of indeterminate bits and pieces.

At first, there were snippets of whitish land interspersed with the glimmer of water, and then Sinner saw mountains. The flying bandit must have gained quite some altitude, leaving the sheer drop-off of the southern edge down below.

And then there were rocks and more rocks. Even back when Sinner was observing the area from the top of that last dune, he could not see any greenery. There still wasn’t any. Just hostile dead rocks.

He’d be dead too, and soon, Sinner reminded himself, if he just kept looking down, trying to make head or tail of the inhospitable landscape below.

Using his eyes was all nice and good, but at the moment, he needed to engage his brain first, all the more so since whatever reflexive action he could take had already been taken. His grey matter, although compressed and suffering from the lack of oxygen, was still unaffected, right? Like some kind of a sorting machine, Sinner’s mind was now hectically going through all the options available, trying to find something that didn’t seem outright ridiculous or hopeless.

All right, so what do we have? A huge flying monster. Although in all fairness, it is having us, but never mind, that is nowhere near productive. So, a flying monster then. What do we know about it, except that it’s large and scary?

Pterodactyl? Pterosaur? Something prehistoric for sure. Sinner was no paleontologist, so the issue of proper classification would have to be put aside, at least for the time being.

And besides, what did it matter?

The creature had some kind of hind limbs that, unlike many birds of preys, it never tried to use for offensive purposes. Just the long jaws, or the beak, of whatever it really was because regular bird mandibles were not supposed to have teeth in them. And some teeth those were indeed—the real deal, and not just some jagged bone edges.

How did you fight that? Back on Earth, humanity never had any experience in that department since all those pteros went extinct tens of millions of years before the first ape even picked up a stick. To be sure, some cryptobiologists were claiming they had survived and were now thriving in some hard to reach areas in Africa, but no one with half a brain could possibly believe those charlatans. Be it as it may, perhaps the puppet masters were feeding on that kind of pseudoscientific tabloid fare when they were designing Tier Two.

Or they may have relied on some ancient petroglyphs, augmenting the dearth of hard facts with plenty of fantasy.

None of those, even if available, would help Sinner much anyway. He’d have to use his own brain and memory trying to match the snippets of old knowledge with what he had seen, or thought he had seen, here.

Which wasn’t much, in all fairness. One couldn’t make out much from the (dis)advantage point of being inside a prehistoric monster’s beak. Gosh, it was one weird beak to be sure, and it looked terrifying and grotesque at the same time.

The teeth alone could make a large crocodile turn green with envy. At the same time, there was not even a remote semblance of lips around the contour, which was why Sinner thought of the huge implement as a beak—such that an exotic bird might have. And the upper and lower halves of it had limited horizontal mobility. It looked like all those jaws could do was grab and hold. Perhaps that was why the beast never tried to chew on him. It simply couldn’t.

All of which meant that at the moment Sinner was relatively safe. For as long as he remained pinched tight by that huge biological vise, he did not have much to worry about. Now, all of that could change in a jiffy if the beast decided to let go of him.

So what could he do? He lost his shotgun the moment his wrist found itself between the monster’s teeth. It was now back there somewhere, on a salt-encrusted shore, next to the sled that had plenty of treasure in it, as well as his guandao and other such useful things.

So what did he have left?

His primary weapon was the bow, but it would be altogether unwieldy in such close quarters. Besides, the piece would still need to be retrieved from the space-warping bag on Sinner’s belt. Which would require punching buttons on his phone—something that was no big deal under normal circumstances yet might prove thoroughly problematic now.

In fact, it was a true miracle that he still held the device in his left hand, all the more so since that was the very hand he had used to retrieve his knife.

And then there was the knife itself—a large, wide blade. But as good as it was, the weapon was already serving a crucial purpose, holding the monster’s jaws at bay, preventing them from closing all the way and crushing Sinner’s body in the process. And even if he could somehow liberate the blade from its currently stationary position, what would be the point in that? The monster’s teeth would then come together, tearing him apart and crushing his body to death.

And not even the puppet masters’ wonder drugs would be able to help him stem the bleeding since those would still need to be extracted from a pocket in his cargo vest.

Nah, using that blade was a nonstarter.

But there was yet another knife. Or rather, a multitool with two blades—one short, the other shorter still. It was now sitting in yet another one of those multiple pockets. Sinner had bought it at the Launchpad, along with the light sticks and other small, cheap accessories. Its value as a weapon would be questionable, to say the least, and he wouldn’t be able to retrieve it easily either. Basically, the only part of his body that he still had a relatively free command of was his left arm, and it wasn’t thin enough to make its way to the other side of his body through the clenched jaws to get to the stuff on the other side of the cargo vest.

Which was too bad, of course, since this was where he had a grenade and one of the flintlock pistols from the camp.

If he could somehow manage to light the fuse or pull the trigger, Sinner thought, he could hope the newly hung shields would spare him the damage from falling down onto the rocks from such a forbidding height, once the beast’s jaws unclenched.

But using those primitive weapons could still be an option if he played his cards right, because hey, didn’t he have a fancy new skill—Brief Charge?

He could take advantage of that any moment to free himself from the monster’s jaws. To find himself some ten yards away in an instant. The beak would be unable to hold him back since the charge was essentially a mini-teleportation event, and thus unstoppable. All he had to do was keep the destination point clearly in sight.

So why wasn’t he using it already? Oh, but don’t you see? That’s because, first, he’d need to free himself from that squashed helmet that now prevented him from seeing much of anything. And yes, he was already pulling his head in that deformed, elongated steel pot out of the beak, little by little, a fraction of an inch at a time.

But breaking free would only be half the job and not particularly useful. If he charged away that very moment, the beast would immediately realize it had lost its prey and react at once, using the strength of its monster wings. After all, Sinner would still be right there, only a few yards away, and still easy enough to catch again before he could even hit the rocks down below.

Sinner recalled reading about how, presumably, pterodactyls and such could not really fly all that high, and that, in essence, they were only gliding down from rocks and trees, unable to take off from flat ground. Except was he going to bet someone had told this particular bugger about it?

Maybe not, because it seemed the thing could fly with the best of them all right. It would catch up with him in no time.

Which would only mean one thing: a dogfight.

With the monster enjoying complete air superiority. Even with all its vulnerabilities, the creature would still be a ways stronger than him in any aerial battle.

Having used his Research skill on this renegade ptero, Sinner now knew all there was to know about its pitiful build and design. The deformed skull pot was no impediment for his scanning ability, and the skill obligingly highlighted the monster’s vulnerable areas.

Or rather, the entire damn thing was one big vulnerable zone.

Its bones were slender and porous, and its skin paper thing. It could easily be punctured even with a sharp twig. In fact, it was the first time ever Sinner was dealing with such a poorly protected creature.

It appeared the monster had all of its eggs put in the same basket—speed and attack—leaving nothing whatsoever for defense. It could hardly endure a protracted engagement. Come to think of it now, even its jaws were greatly simplified. Everything about the beast was streamlined for the most primitive hunting tactic: dive from up high, grab something weak and haul it away quickly.

Sinner sneered thinking of what he was going to do to the bastard once they reached terra firma. Except therein lay his problem. How would he put his feet back on the ground? Seeing how they were flying so high, it would take him a while to fall all the way down, and in the meantime the creature was going to be able to grab him again, or a number of times if it came to that. And he couldn’t use his Brief Charge more than once since the skill was a true energy guzzler.

He’d have to wait for the right moment or think of something else.

But what?

Anyhow, to the extent he could tell through his deformed visor, they were flying north, to where he had seen those flying dots up in the sky earlier. Apparently, they were no optical tricks played on him by the desert even though he could never quite catch any details, not even using his trusted amulet. And besides, the distant dots would disappear just about as quickly as they popped up.

So, in all likelihood, Sinner must have been seeing those predators flying above the lakes, looking for prey. One thing he could tell for sure: they were not coming from the desert, but rather from the mountains. It would make sense if they had their nests somewhere up among the peaks and only came down to hunt smaller salamanders. Or adult ones. It really wouldn’t make any difference, especially if there were larger, stronger specimen among the predators.

Be it as it may, the glimpses Sinner managed to get through his dysfunctional visor were those of the rocks, not the desert, which meant they were flying north. Which was exactly where he needed to go.

So, essentially, he was getting a free ride. Great!

He made another move, and his helmet screeched, metal scraping against the teeth, and moved an entire inch of so.

That was good news.

But that was where it ended too. Whatever really happened, the damn pot was now stuck solid and wouldn’t budge.

The pathetic visor slit closed completely, too, leaving him in complete darkness. If nothing changed, Sinner thought, the next thing he’d see would be the little pteros in the beast’s nest pecking on his head, once they broke through the metal. If even that.

So any action he intended to take would now have to be taken blindly. With full awareness that, once he jumped, he would have to spend some time freeing himself from the helmet.

Luckily, according to the skill description, blind charges were allowed even in complete darkness, if need be, as long as one’s face was turned in the direction one wanted to go. Provided there were no serious physical barriers to any such movement. That was a little ambiguous indeed, but Sinner assumed a few feet this way or that wouldn’t make much of a difference, seeing how he would still be in the air.

The phone in Sinner’s hand suddenly began vibrating and he startled, almost dropping the device. It was still a long time until his next activation—or was it? Keeping track of time under such circumstances was no small matter.

The beast must have felt the buzz, too, because for the first time since the initial attack the humongous jaws moved. Spasmodically, the upper and lower mandibles unclenched somewhat and then closed again, as if getting a better grip on their catch.

Sinner screamed again as multiple sharp teeth re-embedded themselves in his flesh, and the psychological impact was even worse once he instinctively imagined that entire process, as if looking from the outside in.

And then his head was suddenly free of his helmet, the sudden burst of blinding bright light giving him yet another startle. Talk about mixed blessings and silver linings!

As Sinner’s eyes followed the steel pot on its way down, he had himself yet another scare. Apparently, his air carrier really liked flying high, because the tops of even the most serious mountains were what looked like hundreds of yards below them. And then the phone burped again, and there was suddenly a familiar female voice inside his ears.

“Hello! Sinner! Are you all right? Say something!”

Lynxie! That was Lynxie calling, for crying out loud!

Unless he was having a hallucination of some kind, produced by the shock of being suddenly able to see again—and finding himself a mile up in the sky. Yet the more likely explanation would be that as his body jerked in between the monster jaws, his left hand with the phone twitched too, accidentally hitting the green button and accepting the call.

He couldn’t put the phone to his ear, but even from a distance the sound was coming in clearly enough.

“Hey, Lynxie,” he said, trying to sound casual. “Great to hear you, girl. My bad, I was a little busy here.”

“Sorry,” Lynxie said her favorite word. “I’ll call again later then, all right?”

“Later when?” Sinner chuckled, his eyes still anxiously trying to make sense of the terrain down below. “You only get one call a day.”

“Well, I’ll call tomorrow then. I just wanted to say hi. See how you are doing. I figured you’d need a call more than I do. You are all alone out there. Sorry.”

“Oh, you and your sorry’s! I am... er... I am all right, by and large. Still kicking. What else could a man wish for?”

“Well... that’s good... And we went to that village, to see some traders. That was where we bumped into the casties. Tark must have told you.”

“He did. I could use a trader, too.”

“Yeah, I know... Listen... I wish you were here already. ASAP. You’ve been alone there for so long. And that’s just not good. Heck, that’s terrible!”

“I am on my way, Lynxie. I mean, literally. You wouldn’t believe how quickly I am moving north right now. Like I were a rocket. You couldn’t catch up with me on horseback!”

“Pants on fire!”

Sinner could almost see the girl smiling on the other end of the line.

“You are hauling that sled! And two backpacks of loot. Rocket my tush! Seriously, Sinner, we are worried silly about you. What’s that noise in the background? I can barely hear you. Is it the wind?”

“Er... yeah... just a little. But I am beginning to see some green down below,” Sinner rushed to change the topic. “That’s gotta be good, right?”

“Down below? What, you on a mountain or something? How did you even get there?”

“Er... you know...” He was not going to tell her the truth here, gosh, no. “It looks like I am almost on the other side of those mountains. Just a little bit longer. And if there’s green, there’s gotta be water, too. A am no longer a Robinson.”

He was quickly becoming quite a diplomat, Sinner thought to himself, smiling. Or a social worker. “Naturally, my days of eating right are over, but don’t you worry about me. I’ll be fine. Now, you, you be very careful down there, in that village, all right?”

“We always are,” Lynxie said. “Now, what was that about eating right?”

“Oh, the same as always. We are feed, right? Everybody wants a piece of us. But we are the kind of food that will eat them right back. They’ll choke on us. But you see, there was no one in that desert. No eaters. No humans to kill. All I ate, so to speak, was the beasties. Go ahead, check the murder ratings. My slate is still clean. You know what I am saying?”

“Yes, yes, I do,” Lynxie said. “But you are beating around the bush, Sinner. There’s something you are not telling me. Those sounds in the background are all wrong. This is no wind. Now, quit jerking me around. What is it? Please? I am running out of call minutes. If you don’t tell me, I won’t sleep through the night imagining things.”

Jeez, what a smart girl! But he was not really going to tell her he was an air passenger held against his will in a huge beak of a monster ptero-something that was hauling him to God only knew where. Oh, and guess what, sweetheart, they are no vegans down there.

No, he’d spare her the mental anguish. Sinner swallowed the sudden lump in his throat.

“It’s all right, Lynxie. I’ll be fine. Don’t you worry, I’ll find you soon.”

“But what it is that...”

The phone went dead. The extra minutes she had bought at the Launchpad must have run out.

Which was not necessarily a bad thing under the circumstances since Sinner had no idea whatsoever what to tell Lynxie or how to get her off his back. Because she was not the kind of girl to burst into tears and go home. And they had a connection, no doubt about that. He couldn’t just bamboozle her easily. She’d know.

But she could definitely do without the sordid details. She had plenty of her own problems to deal with out there.

And besides, Lynxie couldn’t help him in any manner whatsoever. So why put her through yet another wringer?

In the meantime, the beast was beginning to show signs of distress of some kind. And it didn’t seem it was its prey suddenly starting to make all those sounds that bothered it. The ptero was now zigzagging left and right, at the same time getting higher and higher.

His imagination still playing tricks on him, painting a nest the size of a basketball court on top of the highest mountain, and, naturally, with mounds of bones in it, Sinner twisted his neck this way and that, trying to catch a glimpse of what lay ahead.

But he couldn’t. He didn’t have a giraffe’s neck. That said, he did notice something.

Another flying bugger. The thing was a few hundred yards below them, and looking down Sinner could not quite tell if it was of the same species, or, perhaps, something different. The new guy on the block seemed to be maneuvering just as actively, its wings flapping like there was no tomorrow. Was it chasing them?

But why? As that old philosophical principle suggested, the simplest and most obvious answer would probably be correct, too: it wanted the other fella’s prey. It wanted him, Sinner.

Except, naturally, the thing that got him first did not want to share. It changed course to north and stepped on it. But they were no longer getting perceptibly higher. Perhaps the flyer was tired, or the burden it carried suddenly grew heavier, or perhaps the increasingly more rarified air made it difficult. The pursuer, on the other hand, appeared to be fresh and eager. And, one could surmise, awfully hungry, which prompted it to make haste. If nothing changed, Sinner figured, it was the matter of ten or fifteen minutes, or perhaps even less, before the challenger caught up with them.

But Sinner’s own monster, it seemed, was well aware of the fact, because it was still trying to get higher. The land down below was quickly becoming but blurry splotches of muddy ochres and umbers. Plus constant vibration didn’t quite promote effective observation, so, just as before, Sinner was not quite sure if there was anything green in those mountains yet or what he thought he saw earlier was nothing but wishful thinking.

In the meantime, their pursuer had closed the distance to no more than fifty yards. Now that he came face to face, so to speak, with the potential enemy, Sinner liked what he saw even less.

Big bruiser. Mean. Relentless.

There was no point trying to hang additional shields. The first monster’s beak was still squeezing him tightly, with some of the wounds still oozing blood and his muscles altogether numb and sore. The Reflection skill would treat that kind of an effect as the primary danger and discharge all those shields right away. Yes, he could actually set the trigger sensitivity, but to do that he needed to fumble with the settings on the phone. And the phone, still in his left hand, was distant enough and out of his immediate field of view. Going through the motions blindly, and with only one hand available, was just not going to be good enough.

Once again, Sinner wished he had bought that voice control functionality for his phone at the Launchpad. Now, as on many prior occasions, it would really come in handy. Sinner was put off by the part of the description that warned about potential voice recognition problems that might be likely. And, of course, the module cost an arm and a leg.

But perhaps he should have bought it anyway.

If it came to the two monsters clashing, he would have to Brief Charge away and hope to cover a sufficient enough distance while they were busy with each other, so that neither of them would be able to catch up with him before he crash landed.

Falling from such a wuthering height would be a complicated and dangerous thing in its own right, but he’d manage somehow, Sinner told himself. He had a couple of thoughts on the matter.

The monster treated Sinner as helpless prey and could not care less about his comfort, it seemed. Letting the adversary close the distance between them to a bare minimum, it took evasive action with a series of unabashed aerobatic maneuvers that immediately made Sinner sick to his stomach.

Even if he had an inner ear of steel, Sinner thought, that kind of pirouetting would still make him regret he had ever been born.

But apparently the technique worked since every time the attacker charged, its beak would clack loudly, getting nothing but thin air, with the intended target at least a couple of feet away. After all, these were some kind of flying dinosaurs rather than fully fledged agile birds, and they couldn’t fine-tune their angle of attack as quickly. Evading yet another charge, the original monster would open the distance, and the pursuer followed again, and round and round they went in a never ending aerial dogfight.

In the end, Sinner hardly had anything left in his stomach to serve up when the next call came, and the bitter taste of bile in his mouth became overpowering. But he didn’t much care. He was utterly spent and resigned to his fate, whatever that might shape out to be. Unrestrained roller-coasting does that to you.

Later on, he would never be able to tell how long the torture had lasted. Which wasn’t surprising seeing how he shouldn’t have even stayed conscious. Either way, he saw almost nothing and processed even less, being literally at his wit’s end. But at some point, much to his surprise, Sinner realized the rock ‘n’ roll session was over, and what he was seeing below was not the distant ground but rather a continuous layer of thick fog.

And not just below. The fog was all around them. Most likely, they were inside a cloud. Atmospheric effects over deserts were not particularly common, but not unheard of. Besides, they had been moving north all that time, and were now over the mountains where the weather patterns had to be different.

The pursuer was nowhere near in sight. Nor could Sinner hear the nasty screeching sound the flying dodo was making every time it missed its target.

It could be they had finally lost it, or so one hoped.

Sinner’s own fossil must have been thinking along the same lines because it was now gliding down, its wings spread out and immobile. In a minute or two, they’d be back to a more comfortable height where the air was thicker, and where the creature could resume its interrupted horizontal flight to wherever it was going.

Except Sinner had no intention of tagging along. Now would be a good time to part ways.

He would hardly have a better moment.

CHARGE!

Sinner’s body left the confines of the monster’s beak, only to reappear immediately a few yards to the side. He was free—except from gravity.

Obeying the latter, his body tumbled about on the way to the ground. Sinner immediately lost track of where was up and where was down, saying goodbye to his original plan of assuming the prone horizontal position to help slow down the velocity of his free fall.

Besides, the skill did nothing about inertia, and now, as Sinner was getting closer to the ground, the impulse of the monster’s original flight was still propelling him forward.

The clouds that to anyone watching from below could come through as solid and impenetrable were anything but. They were in fact a form of a thin fog, in which Sinner’s falling body could easily be seen from at least a hundred yards afar.

And to add insult to injury, all that continuous somersaulting was squeezing the last drops of bile out of his wretched stomach. But at least his eyes still worked, scanning the skies in all direction for the sight of any possible opposition, while his left hand hurriedly fumbled with the phone. His right hand was down altogether. Whether it had suffered serious damage from the monster’s teeth or was simply numb on account of poor blood circulation for so long remained to be seen.

Either way, now that Sinner desperately needed it to open his bag and retrieve a certain something, it was solidly out of commission.

And what a something it was indeed! One of his most prized, although unwieldy, trophies.

The fog was finally gone, and Sinner suddenly saw the ground below. His heart fluttered momentarily. Yes! Half a mile down below, there was a green carpet, dotted in places by rocks, bodies of water and reddish patches.

The place was alive. It was no longer a desert.

Hallelujah! He made it!

It didn’t matter how.

What mattered was that he did.

But there was a fly in that ointment. A big one, actually. The size of a flying monster deprived of its prey that was now circling around some fifty yards away. Its neck twisted, its eyes pointed upwards, it was actually waiting for Sinner to clear the clouds on his way down.

Damn! How could it even be there so fast?

Well, wings, duh, Sinner’s inner voice quipped.

The monster noticed him but couldn’t attack right away given its somewhat unconducive position. However, it immediately began turning and getting ready to charge. Sinner now had but a few seconds to prepare himself for battle.

And that wouldn’t be enough to retrieve what he needed from his special bag.

Damn!

Sinner reached into his cargo vest and realized there was not even enough time to stow his phone away properly. He just couldn’t be fumbling with any of those buttons or Velcro strips now.

Especially one-handed.

In the end, he couldn’t think of anything better than sticking it into the pocket of his pants, swelling and flailing in the onrushing airflow that they were. Done with that, he reached for his vest again and found the pistol. He had placed it there, fastened on top with a couple of Velcro strips, exactly for that kind of an eventuality. It made for a good addition to his shotgun to quickly respond to anything untoward he might come across in the desert.

The heavy pistol felt good in his hand but whether it would fire remained to be seen. The piece had a bullet in it and powder on the shelf. There was, however, no guarantee the onrush of air was not going to blow that powder away before it could properly ignite and trigger the main charge in the barrel. The flint stone alone was not going to do that job.

But the only proof of the pudding was in the eating.

With mere seconds remaining until the impact, all Sinner could do was raise his hand with the pistol towards the oncoming predator and wait for his moment.

The monster’s beak opened wide a fraction of a second before the two bodies collided, and then closed shut immediately, squeezing its catch.

But Sinner had a full complement of deflection shields on again, which, cumulatively, would offer him an entire second of protection. Well, almost. His knife, however, was gone, and there was nothing else he could use to prevent the beast’s mandibles from crushing him once the shields were gone.

So it was now or never. Sinner braced himself and pulled the trigger. Hard.

A flash in the dark told him the powder on that shelf was just fine. The flintlock worked as advertised, and the pistol bucked in his hand, disgorging its deadly load.

And then—CHARGE!—Sinner jumped.

He was free again, but his one-shot pistol was now only good as a paperweight, and he had no more energy left for another Charge. There was a bit of body energy left, but he was hurriedly using it up to hang as many shields as he could.

At the same time, his head on a swivel, he was constantly searching the skies for any signs of the monster.

Oh, there it was—some fifty yards away. And something was clearly askew with its flying technique now. Or rather, there wasn’t much of any left at all since the beast seemed to be simply tumbling down in an uncontrolled manner, like Sinner was. The creature was apparently trying to spread and engage its wings, but unsuccessfully, as they got beaten back down, to their original position alongside the trunk. Moreover, the flyer’s entire body was twitching spasmodically, as if zapped with electricity again and again.

His own situation being as dire as it was, Sinner still found the strength and the heart to grin.

Done! The bugger was flying its last!

Sinner was still gloating when some inexplicable inner sense told him the most recent shield hanging attempt had just failed. With the ground rapidly approaching, he did not have a full complement. He had enough energy for all the five shields he could carry simultaneously, but apparently some of it was spent, inexplicably, fighting off the attacker.

Would what he had left be enough to survive?

He could try using his remaining moments to reach into his vest for a teleportation stone, except what would be the point? The jump would require a container and take two and a half minutes to activate. And all that time, he would have to abstain from attacking anyone and remain still.

The former part would be easy—but standing still for a hundred and fifty seconds? He would not even have half that much before his body hit the ground. After all, the beast hadn’t quite taken him to the stratosphere.

He could not even tell at that point how many shields had in fact posted successfully. His skill was not yet at that intimate integration level that required no external measurement instruments. Sometimes he could sense the finer details, and sometimes he couldn’t.

But in any event, he had to expect a hard landing. Very hard landing indeed. All he could hope for was that the shields he did manage to hang would prove to be sufficient and save him again, like they did on many previous occasions.

With just a few seconds remaining, Sinner wondered what his terminal velocity was? A hundred miles per hour? Two hundred?

And then, rolling onto his stomach once again, Sinner spent his last waking moments watching a rapidly approaching lush treetop. Just before the impact, the final picture came into sharp focus, with every glossy tropical leaf, and every little cracked cone that must have contained the ripe seeds inside becoming perfectly visible, and then...

... and then the inevitable came: CARRUMPF! And everything went black.

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