Date: 2019-04-25 04:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Fantasy; Science Fiction; Artificial Intelligence
Description: The Fortress that the Station Core had constructed was completely destroyed following a particularly brutal attack by superior forces – but they had won, albeit by the skin of their teeth. Fortunately, using his drones and multiple Molecular Converters to clean up the rubble, Milton was able to piece together everyone who had fallen under the Bearilla’s assault. Unfortunately, the force that had attacked him on his home turf was only a very small portion of those heading inevitably closer to the Kingdom’s border. After the beating that they had just taken, Milton, Rosewyn, Moxwell, Brint, Whis

The Kingdom Rises

A Dungeon Core Epic

Station Cores – Book 4

Jonathan Brooks

Cover Design: Yvonne Less, Art 4 Artists

Edited by: Celestian Rince

Copyright ©2019 Jonathan Brooks

All rights reserved.  No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

The following is a work of fiction.  Any names, characters, businesses, corporations, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner.  Any resemblance to any actual persons, places, or events is purely coincidental.

Cover Design Copyright ©2019 Yvonne Less, Art 4 Artists

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my wife for constantly supporting me while I’m writing, and for my daughter who wants to know what a “dungeon” is.

I also have to thank all my beta-readers!  You all provided wonderful feedback that made this story so much better!

Grant Harrell

Brian O’Neil

Sean Hall

Martin Plummer

Edwin Feng

Aaron Wiley

Richard Hutchinson

Brian Flater

Tnega Terces

Joshua Chausse

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements

Foreword

Recap – What came before…

Part I – Picking Up The Pieces

Prologue – The Cordpower Company

Chapter 1 – A Conference

Chapter 2 – A Few Notifications

Chapter 3 – Research FTW

Chapter 4 – Quagon

Chapter 5 – Volunteers

Chapter 6 – A whole new perspective

Chapter 7 – Greycer

Chapter 8 – A serious talk

Chapter 9 – Scouting report

Chapter 10 – CAS

Chapter 11 – Automated mining

Chapter 12 – Southern exposure

Chapter 13 – Rest stop

Chapter 14 – Hoodwinkery

Part II – Improvements & Exploration

Chapter 15 – Once more down into the depths

Chapter 16 – The ninth room

Chapter 17 – Deadly trees

Chapter 18 – New abilities

Chapter 19 – Options

Chapter 20 – The other side of the mountains

Chapter 21 – Light show

Chapter 22 – New Toys

Chapter 23 – Suspicions

Part III – Defenses

Chapter 24 – On the move

Chapter 25 – Camp Deathtrap

Chapter 26 – The benefits of technology

Chapter 27 – Knock knock

Chapter 28 – Torturous motivation

Chapter 29 – Maximum occupancy

Chapter 30 – Attrition

Chapter 31 – Rooms 10, 11, and 12

Chapter 32 – Full responsibility

Part IV – The Kingdom Rises

Chapter 33 – On the road again

Chapter 34 – Stonewall

Chapter 35 – Breakthrough

Chapter 36 – It begins

Chapter 37 – Counterstrategy

Chapter 38 – A brave defense

Chapter 39 – Fallen Kingdom

Chapter 40 – No other option

Epilogue – Comeuppance

Final Stats

Author’s Note

Books by Jonathan Brooks

Tables

Foreword

Thanks for choosing to read The Kingdom Rises, Book 4 of my Station Cores series!

Similar to the first three in the series, I wanted this book to be accessible to everyone, not just hardcore stat-lovers like me.  While reading, you will notice that there are footnotes scattered throughout the story.  These are for those who want to dig into all the stat sheets, tables, and other informational tidbits that enhance the story – but are not necessary to enjoy it.  Even if you don’t look at a single one, you are not going to miss out on the story as a whole.  They are only there for people like me, who think “the more information, the better,” is the way every book should be written.  Knowing that not everyone shares that same mindset, I wanted to give options to those who either don’t like stat sheets or wouldn’t miss them if they weren’t there.

Regardless of how you want to go about reading this book, please enjoy!

Recap – What came before…

Milton Frederick had been abducted by aliens.  Not your run-of-the-mill grey aliens with big heads and black eyes that like to perform anal probes, but by some aliens known collectively as…The Collective.  Passive by nature, The Collective abducted 100 humans in the hope that they could be turned into Station Cores: giant metal egg-shaped constructs designed to hold their consciousness.

These Station Cores were created to be the basis of their defense against another race of war-like aliens called Heliothropes, who were not scared off by the high-tech (yet non-lethal) defenses The Collective used against them.  Whole planets were decimated and enslaved before they launched their last-ditch effort to find a way to combat the invaders, sending ships to Earth to acquire a species who had the ability to love and be compassionate – as well as being able to defend themselves, with lethal effect if necessary.

Unfortunately, The Collective was ambushed by Heliothrope ships on their way home, causing the Station Core formerly known as the human being, Milton Frederick, to be launched out into space in the resulting ships’ explosions.  Drifting for over 4,000 years, he crash-landed on a strange planet, where he learned what happened to him from his AI guide, ALANNA.

ALANNA, who was formed by billions of tiny nanites, told him of his responsibilities as a Station Core: defend The Collective.  Unfortunately for her – and fortunately for Milton – he maintained all his memories, which would normally be wiped clean if he were to be installed in a defensive installation.  Milton and the foul-mouthed AI decided to work together to get off the planet; however, despite her insistence that they find out what happened to The Collective, he still wasn’t entirely sure what he would do once he finally left.

One thing after another kept Milton from his goal.  First, his Station Core shell had been severely damaged, with his zero-point reactor leaking radiation all over the place.  The only thing that could repair him would be tritanium, which was a very, very dense metal that couldn’t be found – only created in his in-core Molecular Converter.  It was going to take many, many resources to repair himself enough to be able to build and power a spaceship capable of getting him to where he wanted to go…wherever that ended up being.

Second, the monsters and beasts of the new world were attracted by the leaking radiation Milton’s damaged reactor was spilling out.  Being as damaged as he was, a few good hits on his previously impervious shell was liable to completely destroy him – as well as a very large portion of the land around him when his reactor overloaded.  To combat this, he hid himself underground with the intent of making it harder to reach him, utilizing his ability to make whatever he could think of (provided he had the raw materials).

The biggest drawback of being in an enclosed space, however, was that the radiation he was leaking out all pooled into one place, further damaging the Station Core.  Milton had to leave the entrance open to the outside world, as well as diverting an underground lake to clear out most of the radiation from his Core Room, letting it flow into a large underground river.

Traps, new Combat Unit hybrids (his defenders), and the natural landscape all contributed to his defense.  Upon exploration of the surrounding areas, the trail he left was plain for multiple incursions by stronger and stronger wildlife, all intent on getting to Milton’s core – and his radiation.  He was barely able to fight them off, including the large “quick lizards”, or Quizards, he found in the mountains to the east.

The third problem Milton encountered was something of his own making, though he didn’t realize what was happening at the time.  The radiation being cleansed out of his Core Room had dispersed all over the continent, getting into the water sources used by the heretofore unknown people of the planet: the Proctans.  This radiation changed them, causing genetic mutations that gave them abilities not unlike the “magic” he had seen in the games he used to play back on Earth.

The animals who ingested the water, unfortunately, didn’t turn out so well.  Mutated by the same radiation, instead of “magic”, they became monstrous and dangerous.  After the “Beast War” that decimated the Proctan population, the people of the land discovered their new abilities and beat back the hordes of beasts trying to kill them.  From those first Proctans who had developed their powers, the Guardian Guild was born to protect the Kingdom from any future attacks by the Proctan-hating monsters that roamed through the forests and mountains bordering the Kingdom.

As for Milton, he worked toward his development, finding resources to build better Combat Units and traps, repair his Station Core, and advanced his skills and stats enough to make some good progress.  At least, until Brint (a unique, ability-less Proctan) inadvertently found him hiding in the forest.

Upon learning that the water coming from his Core Room had changed the very nature of the people and animals, as well as providing Power to the Proctans for the use of their abilities, Milton reached a deal with Brint and his friend Whisp, selling them the highly concentrated Power Potions in exchange for raw metal resources.

This partnership worked well, advancing Milton even further in his goals, until the greedy Cordpower Company (who had a monopoly on making and selling Power Potions to the general public) sent some of their representatives to put a stop to their entrepreneurship.  After torturing and killing Whisp, they followed Brint as he hysterically brought her body back to Milton’s self-styled “dungeon”.

They barely succeeded in eliminating the trio of Cordpower Company thugs; Milton was left with a fully depleted army of Combat Units (other than over a hundred Blood-thirsty Squirrels) and a mostly destroyed dungeon.  However, he had survived – and even managed to keep Brint alive.

To see if it could be done, Milton used his resources and technology to bring Brint’s friend, Whisp – an Inventor – back to life, though without a Neurological Control Unit.  The downside to this resurrection was that she lost all “experience” in using her power, resetting her essentially down to level 1 in terms of her Power pool and skills.  She still maintained all of her knowledge, however, so it was only a matter of time using the “Power Potion” inside Milton’s Core Room to “level-up” quickly.

As a thanks for bringing her back to life, and because it was too dangerous to return to the village they disappeared from, Whisp used her vast intelligence and know-how to help design working traps and rooms for Milton’s dungeon, an aspect of which he was ashamed to admit he needed help with.  He had begun to learn more about engineering the traps he wanted and needed, but the practical knowledge he possessed was barely a bucketful compared to the lake of smarts Whisp possessed.

Brint, on the other hand, had shown an ability to control Milton’s Combat Units, utilizing the same neural network that the Station Core used, though on a much less-powerful scale.  With his new ability, though, he was able to lead successfully bigger hunting expeditions around the surrounding area, acquiring more Bio Mass so that Milton could instigate the next part of his plan.

The Quizard Mountains.

A quick expedition near the beginning (which resulted in the attack by a half-dozen Quizards) showed that there was a massive amount of resources which he needed in the mountains to the east.  He was planning on sending a larger mining expedition to ramp up his progress, as what he needed most to advance his goals was metal, or metal equivalents.

Unfortunately, the world at large wasn’t ready to leave Milton alone.  Another expedition by a quartet of greedy Proctans (who were planning on killing and robbing the Cordpower thugs who had come before) attacked his first, barely ready room inside his dungeon.  With the help of Whisp’s traps and room design, however, they were easily defeated.

As a result of absorbing their bodies (as well as Whisp’s earlier), Milton was able to unlock genetic mutation traits in his Combat Units, allowing him the capability to give them the same abilities the Proctans had, though in a much more limited form.

After not hearing from the representatives they’d dispatched on their mission, Cordpower contacted the two most powerful Proctans in the Kingdom (who happened to be part of the Guardian Guild), instructing them to eliminate their competition, no matter what.  Rosewyn and Moxwell, however, weren’t in it to kill other Proctans if there was another way, so they went toward Milton’s dungeon with a relatively open mind.

Meanwhile, the Station Core finally had enough resources to commit to the expedition to the Quizard Mountains.  Brint took his “raid party” consisting of various Combat Units and started to mine the first cave they located.  After finding massive amounts of viable resources, they inadvertently opened up a tunnel that led farther into the mountain, where they fought off a small horde of Quizards.  Upon the exploration of this new tunnel, they found even more resources for Milton…and more.

Down in the depths of the Quizard Mountains, an unbelievably large cavern, filled with thousands of Quizards, hundreds of new Bear/Gorilla hybrids that stood over 20 feet tall, and an unknown giant creature, awaited Brint.  He escaped before they could sense his presence, though on the way out of the cavern he was discovered by one of the new Bearillas.  The powerful creature destroyed what was left of his raid group, and Brint barely escaped on his Station Core-created Qwizard mount.

While this was going on, Rosewyn and Moxwell had located the dungeon, infiltrated its depths, and were ready to advance past what Whisp and Milton had the time to complete before their arrival.  Brint was able to sneak in the “backdoor” of the dungeon, hoping to lose the chasing Bearilla that followed him.  Unfortunately, it was able to locate the entrance and made short work of any remaining traps in the rooms the Cordpower contractors had just advanced through.

With only a short time before it got to his Station Core (where it would inevitably destroy him), Brint and ALANNA were able to convince the married couple to help fight the extraordinarily powerful monster.  During the ensuing battle, Moxwell was killed in front of his wife, prompting Rosewyn to throw caution and restraint to the wind and prompting her to create pulsing, black hole-like void that contained all of the elements, killing the Bearilla when it was sucked into the raging vortex.

The backlash of using all of her Power and combining all of the elements she possessed was enough to stop Rosewyn’s heart, killing her despite her victory over the monstrous creature.

Elsewhere in the Kingdom, out of sight of the general populace, the Cordpower Company had instigated a coup to take over the Kingdom’s government, killing and/or executing almost every noble during a celebration held in the royal castle – including the King.  Then, after scapegoating the Guardian Guild for the act of regicide, the Company used the Royal Army Reserve to hunt down any suspected members of the Guild to hold them accountable for their fictitious crimes.

After the attack of the single Bearilla inside his dungeon, Milton brought back copies of the two Guild members who were killed trying to destroy the massive monster.  As added insurance of their good behavior, he added a Neurological Control Unit (NCU) to each of them – with unintended and beneficial consequences.

Because of their deaths and subsequent resurrection, Rosewyn and Moxwell lost all of the accumulated experience and benefits from using their abilities over their lifetime.  However, with the addition of the NCU, Milton was able to bring them back again with only an approximate 2% reduction in their skill levels and Power pools – effectively allowing them to level-up and “respawn” after their deaths with a minimal loss to their stats.  Additionally, with their respawns, Milton could now add to their Gene Mutations – which meant new additional abilities for them.

With this new revelation, a plan was hatched between Milton, ALANNA, Brint, Whisp, Rosewyn, and Moxwell: invite a few hundred members of the Guardian Guild to volunteer to die and be brought back with the NCU installed inside them, allowing them to get stronger faster with access to the Power-infused water from the Core Room.  Of course, finding out about the governmental coup changed things a little.

Instead of a few hundred volunteers, the Station Core needed to make room for over 15,000 Guild refugees.  Located a relatively small distance away from his dungeon, Milton – with a lot of help from Whisp and Flauren (the Guardian Guild’s Logistics Coordinator) – created a massive living space underneath the ground that had all the amenities they needed to survive and live comfortably at the same time.  This eventually became The Refuge, a place where the refugees would be safe.

As they tried to avoid the roving patrols of Army Reservists by traveling through the dangerous forest, the group of refugees were attacked by the normally passive Elephines, with over 1,000 of their number (including children) being trampled to death.  Milton sent Brint out with a portable Molecular Converter and Power Generator to “convert” the dead bodies so that they could be brought back to life at the dungeon.  At that time, Brint also relayed to the entire Guild what they were up against and why Milton and the others needed their help.

Although there were originally some dissenters, when the news of what they – as the defenders of the Kingdom against beast-threats – were up against reached them, all but a few members were willing to put their lives on the line to protect the people.  Eventually, they were all installed inside The Refuge and started the process of getting stronger with additional abilities by running through Milton’s dungeon.

To help pay for the upkeep cost of controlling so many Combat Units (since that was essentially what all of the Proctans with NCUs installed inside them were), each person had to contribute somehow to Milton’s metal resource needs: either by helping to “mine” it out of the ground, or by secretly venturing back into the Kingdom to purchase the precious resource using Station Core-made currency.  This also helped Milton to create additional copies of dungeon rooms, supplying them with their own drones, Molecular Converters, and even Power Generators.

Things were progressing nicely, until Brint was scouting to the north and found a large amount of Bearillas and Quizards slowly clearing a pathway through the forest out from the Quizard Mountains – and heading towards the Kingdom.  He was spotted and killed (though he was brought back soon afterwards by a Bioconversion Laboratory), but he was able to pass on the news to the others of the impending attack.

With only a few days to plan, Milton constructed The Fortress, a large and long fortification above the dungeon made entirely of the super-strong and heavy material, Weightonite.  It was designed to funnel any potential Bearillas and their Quizard pets down a long “hallway”, covered on both sides by protected bunkers where defenders could attack those attacking them with impunity.  Various traps and defenses were also placed along the way, turning the entire place into one extremely deadly gauntlet that their enemies had to navigate down in order to reach the dungeon – and subsequently the Station Core.

Of course, the original fortification only planned on defending against a handful of Bearillas and Quizards, but their luck took a hit when 30 Bearillas (led by a grizzled and powerful Elite Bearilla) and over 3,000 Quizards showed up for the attack.  Through excellent planning and defense, they were able to defeat the smaller and easier quick lizards before they could even reach The Fortress.

The Bearillas were a different story; they not only reached The Fortress nearly unscathed, but they powered through many of the traps and defenses set up inside the fortification.  Through trap attrition and the bravery of their defenders, they were able to defeat the Bearilla army, though nearly every defender who had a part in the battle had been slain.  The Fortress lay in ruins, most of it having been destroyed to take out the Elite Bearilla at the end.

However, despite the “victory”, it was obvious to everyone who had survived that they were wholly unprepared to defend against even a small fraction of what Brint had seen underneath the Quizard Mountains.  In fact, if only a few more Bearillas had attacked them, they might’ve all been killed – and Milton’s Station Core destroyed.

And to top it all off, ALANNA discovered something about the Bearillas that had attacked them; nanites – similar to the ones Milton had inside of his Combat Units – were found inside their bodies, which had prevented some of the more-subtle attacks he had designed to destroy them from the inside.  Which also made something else obvious.

Milton wasn’t the only Station Core on the planet…

Part I – Picking Up The Pieces

Prologue – The Cordpower Company

Gavin stared the messenger down, causing the young man to drop his gaze until he was staring at the floor in deference.  Or, at least, a show of deference; the head of the Cordpower Company – and now the de facto leader of the entire Kingdom – didn’t care if his people respected him, as long as they did what he wanted.  He didn’t tolerate outright disrespect, but he knew that he couldn’t inspire the same loyalty as he did with the rest of his most trusted employees.

In fact, sometimes a little defiance was good – it showed that they had some sort of backbone.  It meant that they were willing to fight for what they believed in and wouldn’t hesitate to do what it took to survive and stay alive.  Of course, too much defiance from someone indicated that they were a problem that his “elite squad” had to take care of – with finality.

Fortunately for the man – who appeared to be barely out of adolescence – Gavin wasn’t one to take out unfortunate news on messengers who were only doing their jobs.  His need to strike someone could be indulged later, however, because he had to deal with the current situation in the Kingdom first.

“So, let me get this straight; you’re telling me that there is no sign of a single Guardian Guild member anywhere to be found in the entire Kingdom?  They all just up and disappeared?  Every single one?  And Roscoe expects me to believe that?” he asked with a slightly strained voice, trying to keep his temper under control.  He failed at his job, and now he doesn’t want to show his face; I can’t say I blame him, though – he knows I don’t like failures.

Roscoe was his Chief Intelligence Agent and had been for years – just shortly after he had been recruited.  His ability essentially made him a walking lie-detector as he could detect falsehoods with as little as a single spoken word; not only that, but he said sometimes that he could actually hear the thoughts of an individual if he was touching them.  That part wasn’t exactly reliable, though his lie detection was always correct – even if the person telling the lie didn’t actually realize it was a lie.  Which made the failure to find the whereabouts of the remaining thousands of Guardian Guild members hard to believe.

“I’m sorry, sir.  That is the only message I was instructed to pass along from him,” the young man repeated clearly though quietly.  “However…” he said hesitatingly, before he stopped altogether.

“Yes?  Go on – don’t be afraid to speak your mind.”  Although, if I don’t like what you have to say, I can’t guarantee that you’ll have time to be afraid.

With a little more confidence, the messenger cleared his throat before he elaborated.  “However, I happened to learn some information from a retired former courier friend of mine.  I told Roscoe about it, but he dismissed it as – I believe he said – ‘impossible hogwash’.”

“Go on – let me hear this ‘impossible hogwash’.”  This should be good.

“Well, he told me that he had a friend that told him about meeting a member of the Guild a few days ago – right here in the Grestwinch.  They didn’t have their guild symbol showing like they usually do, but his friend remembered seeing this individual before when he dealt with supplying the Guild with certain…things,” he said, though he hesitated as he expanded on that.  “Certain illegal…things,” he told him with a wink.  “Anyway, this friend also legally dealt with supplying foodstuffs for Army Reservists patrols and has a fairly good grasp of what is needed to survive while traveling to anywhere in the Kingdom—”

“Ok, but I fail to understand how this is supposed to help,” Gavin interrupted him impatiently.

“Sorry, sir – I’m getting to that.  Now, based upon what his friend saw and what he had overheard from the Guild member, he wasn’t going to make any other stops on the way back to wherever he was holed up.  Based upon the amount of supplies the Guild member had with him, however, it was much more than was needed to travel anywhere in the Kingdom – even with a little bit extra for emergencies. And it was all fresh food, so he wasn’t necessarily bringing it back for whomever he was living with – he needed it for the journey itself.”

“I still fail to see what point you’re trying to make.”

The young man actually had the audacity to raise his eyes to Gavin’s and give him a look like he thought the leader of the Kingdom was deliberately being an imbecile.  This better be good, or I’ll make sure I never have to suffer such disrespect from him again.  “Isn’t it obvious?  Uh…sir?  I mean, if they were inside the Kingdom, they wouldn’t need all that food.  And if they aren’t in the Kingdom, that means they are outside of its borders,” the young messenger told him with a smile on his face, as if he had made the greatest discovery of the last decade.  “Which means…they are all hiding out in the forest.  Which also explains why no one has been able to find them.”

Gavin thought about it for all of two seconds – which was almost an eternity to his Inventor-boosted mind – before he dismissed it.  “You know what?  You might be right about Roscoe – he made a mistake.”  The young man’s smile grew even larger at that declaration.

“He should’ve killed you for bringing that ‘impossible hogwash’ to his attention.  Bruth, show our friend here the special treatment we reserve for those who waste our time.”  Gavin’s bodyguard caught the messenger as he realized his predicament and tried to use his Augmented speed to run away; unfortunately for the young man, Bruth was much faster – and stronger.

He ignored the screams and hollow-sounding cracks as he looked at a few other written reports on his desk inside the Royal Suite.  He had taken it over after disposing of the rest of the Kingdom’s royalty in an “unofficial” official capacity, though it wasn’t as enjoyable as he thought it would be.  He had left the majority of the Cordpower Company’s everyday business to some of his trusted employees; even with that off his plate, the management of the entire Kingdom consumed most of his day.

He barely slept in the massive bed at his disposal, even though it was barely twenty steps away from where he worked most of the time.  Kingdom resource and logistical management was more-involved than even his Company; it was only after all of the nobles and all of their functionaries were killed that he discovered his first mistake.  He found that what he formerly thought of as lazy, useless individuals who were only a drain on the economy, were actually all important cogs in the running of the governmental machine.

Granted, before making all of the plans to remove the King and the others from power, he had done his research into how the government was run; it was, in fact, similar to how the Cordpower Company was run.  The issue he was having was that most of the important trusted employees and board members that were supposed to help him were either still maintaining Cordpower or out dealing with issues that arose after the Guild had disappeared.  Cowardly bastards – they couldn’t just stay put and die like they should’ve.

His original plan was to increase recruiting for the Royal Army Reserve to maintain the border; while the core group of Reservists were perfect for keeping order inside the Kingdom, they weren’t necessarily suited for protecting against external threats.  In the beginning, at least half of the standing army was to swiftly take over the Guild’s border stations, executing the former Guardians while they were at it, and then with them gone they would speed up recruiting under the guise that the government was needing an external border force to replace the treacherous Guild.  The other half of the Reserve was going to police the Kingdom itself, putting down any potential revolts or uprisings once the Guild was taken care of and was out of everyone’s minds.

A vital source within the Guild’s leadership had let him know that the last few years had been relatively quiet, so while he had had to speed up his timeline a bit, it was still the perfect time to enact that phase of the plan.  There were thousands of young men and women who were denied a place in the elitist Guild, as well as the Royal Army Reserve when they applied; there should’ve been (and in actuality there still was) a stampede of willing recruits heading out to the border to maintain the safety of the Kingdom.

The problem was a significant portion of his available troops were patrolling the Kingdom, looking for the Guild.  As a result, most of his dedicated team were doing what they could to plug the holes along most of the border – and not being available to train any new recruits.  Not only that, but they had already lost half a village to the south two days ago to a savage pack of spiderwolves before help was able to arrive.  And the advancement of beasts seemed to be getting worse every day.

Instead of inheriting a quiet border, it was as if the monstrous beasts in the forest had come alive and were protesting the removal of their mortal enemies – the Guild.  He knew that realistically this wasn’t the case, but Gavin couldn’t help but wonder at the coincidence.

Maybe that messenger had a point.  He looked over at the mess the young man had made when he was literally ripped limb from limb while he was still alive; fortunately, all the blood had fallen on easy-to-clean stone instead of the rug underneath his feet.  Guess it’s too late to apologize and ask more questions.  Oh well.

“Bruth – when you are done there, can you send someone to fetch Dravel for me?  Thanks,” he told his bodyguard absently.  His mind was already on something else, but he always tried to let his employees know he appreciated their work when they deserved it.  Which Bruth did, in fact, deserve thanks – he had accomplished his dismemberment of the young man faster than Gavin thought possible.

As a frightened servant came into the Royal Suite to help clean up the mess with shaky hands, he smiled at her to let her know he appreciated her help, as well.  He turned back to his paperwork, the entire incident not even requiring his attention anymore.

Another report of an incursion by a small beast horde to the north made him rub his temples as his head started to pound.  Those useless Reservist morons are just running around aimlessly – they’re serving no purpose.  He sighed heavily as he wrote an order to allocate even more Cordpower resources toward the north, where lately a lot of activity was being seen.  Now if only I could trust them to do their job, it would make this so much easier.  He sighed even heavier when he heard the servant throwing up in the bucket that she had brought to clean up the blood and body parts.

It’s hard getting good help these days.

He put the thought that he would have to get rid of her after she was done to the back of his mind (it wouldn’t do to have her spreading rumors about the unfortunate “accidents” in the Royal Suite), as he saw Draven step over the mess near the entrance with a look of distaste on his face.  “Another unfortunate Guild spy?” the accomplished Elemental Caster asked him with an ironically cocked eyebrow.

“Something like that.  Come here for a moment, I have an important job for you to do.”  As the last of the mess was being cleaned up by the serving woman with tears running down her face, Gavin locked eyes with Bruth; with a nod in her direction, he got his point across.  With that taken care of, he turned his full attention to the money-grubbing former Guardian Guild member who was just sitting down.

“You know I didn’t agree to be your errand boy; someone of my stature and skills is way above anything like that.  You’re lucky I was just down the hallway when your pet found me – I’ve never been one to be at another’s beck-and-call, and I’m not about to start now,” Draven said before he could speak.

You may be one of the most powerful Casters left in the Kingdom, but you’re next to useless to me otherwise.  Fortunately, over the years Gavin had had to deal with people like Draven and knew there were two effective ways to deal with them.  One, he could casually threaten him with the same treatment that the messenger enjoyed earlier – which probably wouldn’t work because he doubted the dumb ex-Guild member would consider that a threat; or two, he could bribe him – though not with wealth.

“I appreciate you being willing to see me on such short notice.  Some things have come to my attention that you might be interested in,” he started, before pulling out a couple of reports that he had ignored before because they seemed to be improbable.  “We had a report a couple of weeks ago coming out from a village to the east—”

“Get on with it, I don’t have all day,” Draven interrupted him, which almost prompted Gavin to instruct Bruth to teach the insolent Caster a lesson – but he refrained because he needed his help, as much as it pained him.  He resorted to giving him a silent look that he had perfected over the years of experience in corporate intrigue.  He kept staring at him until the other man started to fidget in his seat, looking away for just a moment – and then he continued.

“As I was saying, a message coming from an outpost reported that they had slain two suspected Guild members that had arrived – irrefutably – from the forest along their border.  While that wasn’t too surprising, what made me question the validity of the report was that my agent there claimed that it was none other than Rosewyn and Moxwell that they had killed.”

Draven scoffed at that.  “Impossible.  There was no way they could’ve killed those two; as much as I hate to admit it, Rosewyn alone is slightly more accomplished than myself, and there is no way I would allow the Reservist trash to even touch me.  And I don’t know Moxwell that well other than in passing, but from what I’ve heard, there is very little that could actually hurt him.  So your source must be lying.”

Exactly what I had thought, but now I’m not so sure…  “I thought so too, at first, which is why I had dismissed it.  However, with some hearsay I received this morning—” he looked pointedly at the spot where the remains of the messenger were finally cleaned up— “along with a closer look at the recent beast incursions, I believe that there might be some truth to it.  I’m not saying that it was definitely those two that were killed, but there is something suspicious going on.”

Draven finally looked slightly interested, though he was trying to hide it by hiding his fidgeting hands in his robe pockets.  “What do you mean?”

“After evaluating the locations of the recent attacks, I thought it was just a lucky coincidence that there were none coming from a fairly large section to the east.  Along with rumors that some people believe that the survivors of the Guardian Guild are hiding out in the forest, too many coincidences are coming together that are pointing to one thing.  Let me see if you can guess where this outpost is located that claimed to have killed those two,” he asked, hoping that the powerful imbecile was at least smart enough to put two and two together.

Draven only looked at him with a stupid expression on his face, before shrugging.

He’s even dumber than I thought.  “It’s located right in the middle of the area that hasn’t seen any attacks lately.  If you consider that my agent had just been overzealous in his claim that he had killed ‘Rosewyn and Moxwell’, then it might’ve just been some random Guild members…that came from the forest.”

“Just spit it out already, I’m tired of your word games.”

I guess I really do have to spell it out for him.  “Ok…so rumors that the Guardian Guild are hiding in the forest, the border along the east side is quiet – as if whatever beasts that had been there were killed before they got to Kingdom territory, and a sighting of Guild members coming from the forest…” He waited to see if any of this was making sense.  When it was obvious that it wasn’t, he continued with an inward roll of his eyes.  “It means that it is likely that the rest of the Guild really is hiding in the forest to the east, somehow surviving without outside help.”

“Which also means that Gereld and that damnable Karn are there!  I can finally kill those bastards for turning everyone else against me!”  Draven jumped out of his seat, excitement in his voice.  Gavin had been listening to him drone on and on about how he wanted to be the one to kill the rest of the Guild leadership because of – what the head of Cordpower thought were probably imagined – slights they had committed against the powerful Elemental Caster.

“That’s right.  Since there is no sign of them in the Kingdom, that must be where they are.  If you can fit it into your schedule, I would like you to take every Reservist I can spare, as well as a sizable portion of my Cordpower personnel to root them out once and for all.  We can’t keep running around everywhere looking for them, just waiting for them to counterattack – we need to end them now.  With your help, there is absolutely no possibility that we won’t be successful.”

Draven was practically bouncing up and down in his chair in excitement.  “Yes!  I’ll do it!”  Then his demeanor changed in a flash.  “But I’m in charge of this little expedition, right?”

Gavin plastered a smile on his face before he answered.  “Of course – you’re in charge.  It’ll take a little over a week to get all the troops called back, and then you can be on your way.”  There is no way I would let you be in charge of anything.  If he hadn’t been such a powerful Caster with access to three of the elements, he would’ve disposed of the greedy maniac weeks ago.  Unfortunately, he was a valuable tool that was best kept around for certain situations.  Certain situations like this.

As Draven left – muttering under his breath about what he needed to pack – Gavin couldn’t help but feel a smidge of relief.  He despised the man, but if he really did get the job done it would be worth all of the annoyance having him around caused.  The more he thought of the plan, the more he was convinced that it was the right decision; he couldn’t imagine that there were more than a few hundred Guild members that had managed to band together.  It was almost impossible to survive in the forest for long without outside help, so they were most likely starting to go hungry from lack of supplies.

True, they might put up a bit of a fight – and he expected them to.  Even if half of his force was wiped out, it would be more than worth it to put an end to their existence.  They would pay for denying him access to their elitist group when he was younger; the royal family and the other nobles had already paid for their denial of his space in the Royal Army Reserve.  It was about time they got what was coming to them.

And if they ended up putting up more of a fight than he expected, they might even kill Draven for him.  He was always going to eventually kill the man because he couldn’t trust him farther than he could throw him – which was essentially none.

Once a traitor, always a traitor.

Chapter 1 – A Conference

“The cleanup is still underway; I’ll have a better count once everything is broken down and placed inside the multitude of molecular converters we have operating up there.  The good news, at least, is that of the 143 people without an NCU that were unaccounted for, over 100 of them had enough biological material found that my system was able to process and bring them back.  There is still a lot to go through, so I’m hoping to find more – possibly even everybody.”

Milton could see the relief on the face of everyone involved in their impromptu leader meeting, consisting of a recently respawned Rosewyn, Moxwell, Brint, Gereld, and Karn, as well as Whisp and Flauren, their non-combatant Inventors/other.  It’s hard to classify everyone by what they can do – most of the Proctans who had an NCU before this last battle had usually acquired a secondary ability already.

ALANNA was there as well in one of the small conference rooms he had hollowed out of the surrounding rock weeks ago; it was located right off of the Bioconversion Lab room, where groups who had just respawned could sit and relax while they ravenously ate and discussed what had went wrong before they died.  Milton wasn’t actually inside the room, of course, but he could see and hear everything through a sensor orb wedged into the ceiling.

“That’s great news, Milton!  While I – and everyone else – appreciate the willingness of those without the…N-C-U…inside them to sacrifice themselves for our defense, I’d rather not lose anybody.  That being said, we’re going to have to talk about the sheer devastation even a handful of those things could bring if they ever reached the Kingdom.  If it weren’t for the fortification you built, I doubt any of us would’ve survived…” Gereld said, his voice fluctuating between excited for the recovery of everyone…and hopelessly despondent concerning the Kingdom’s future chances.

Whisp interjected her own opinion.  “Yes, it’s true that we lost almost everybody to those…things, but the fact of the matter is that we won.  It wasn’t quite as a resounding victory like we had hoped for, of course, but I think everyone can agree that we defeated overwhelming odds and came out ahead.  We’re – for the most part – all still here, and they’re not.  I’d call that a victory any day of the year.”

Everyone was silent as they contemplated her words.  Milton felt a little bit of pride at how confident Whisp was now that she had obtained some more abilities and was arguably the most “Powerful” person in the room; although she couldn’t destroy everyone with just a thought like Rosewyn and her elemental abilities, or rip someone in half at high speed like Moxwell, Gereld, or even Karn, she had been using her abilities almost non-stop since she decided she wanted to acquire an NCU.  While she hadn’t been using them in combat like most of the others, the constant use of Power and access to Milton’s special Power Potions had skyrocketed her pool past what everyone else had access to.[1]  She wasn’t quite back to the point she had been before she had elected to be respawned again – but she was constantly working on it.

“I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m worried,” Roselyn suddenly blurted out, breaking the silence.  “Don’t get me wrong, what we did was incredible, and I don’t want to take away the victory we achieved; however, that was barely a drop in the bucket when it comes to what we saw underneath the Quizard Mountains through Brint’s memories.  If there had been another half-dozen of those monstrous beasts, we probably wouldn’t have survived.”

Exactly what I was thinking, Milton agreed, thinking to himself.

Karn spoke for the first time, his weak-looking arms paling in comparison to what they were before he had died.  He hadn’t had a chance yet to get an NCU installed before the attack, so he was still unable to fill his shirt out.  “Yes, but there weren’t more, were there?  So, we beat them back and we’ll do the same to every other one we come across.”

“I want to interject here for a moment.  I just want to say that I am proud of what you have all accomplished, but we’re far from being out of the woods yet.”

They all looked at each other in confusion.  “But we’re in the middle of the forest, what does he mean?” he heard Moxwell loudly whisper to his wife sitting next to him.  I guess that particular idiom doesn’t exist here.

“What I mean by that is we still have a lot of trouble heading our way.  Rosewyn was right, we barely survived that attack, and that was what you could consider just a scouting party.  If they come in real numbers – they would just trample us on their way through to the Kingdom.  True, we would make them pay dearly in blood for their passage, but at the moment there is nothing we could do to stop them.

“I was hoping to have more time before they chose to attack; unfortunately, they appear to be already on the move.  Slowly – apparently – but still on the move to the north.”

Flauren waved away his concern.  “Yes, yes – we’re all doomed if they all came right now, blah, blah, blah.  What I want to know is why we’re not all dead yet.  If they have all of this strength in their monster army, why haven’t they attacked and just finished it?”

That made everyone sit back and really consider it, including Milton.  “ALANNA, why do you think they haven’t attacked yet?” he asked her privately.  He had some theories, but nothing concrete.

“I think you know the answer to that better than anyone here, mister Station Core.”

He had an idea – especially if what they found out when they examined the carcasses of the dead Bearillas was true.  If it wasn’t just a fluke – and the massive monkey-bears were actually foreign Combat Units – then he had to consider the possibility that whoever was in the other Station Core had gone insane and rogue somehow.

Of course, he didn’t know the exact situation concerning the other Core, so he didn’t know what was going on; Milton was tempted to try to contact the other potential “human” and find out what he or she was doing.  However, its actions so far were not inspiring confidence that whoever was in there was still sane.  I mean, why build up that massive army in the first place?  He thought about breaking the news to his friends around the conference table but decided that the knowledge might hurt more than help.

Hundreds of scenarios rushed through his mind as he thought about what might’ve happened to it; based upon the damage to his own structure, it was possible that the rogue Core had been damaged even further.  What if his/her AI had been damaged?  What if the consciousness transfer to the Core was corrupted or interrupted?  On and on he considered what might’ve happened to it, so much so that he needed more information before he decided whether or not he wanted to try to contact him/her.

What he did know was battle tactics and strategy.  And this “invasion” of the Core’s Combat Units didn’t make any sense to him.  The most important part of any war was information; battles were won and lost by better information on the enemy.  From what Milton could see, there hadn’t been any scouting or reconnaissance done by the opposing army; if they had, they would’ve known that sending in a few dozen Bearillas over the last few years would’ve wiped out the entire civilization in the matter of a few weeks.  Instead, they were clearing trees out of the way and carving a pathway for who knows what reason – though he had his suspicions.

Unless their goal wasn’t to kill everyone.

It was too much to contemplate right now, though, so he turned back to the discussion.

“I don’t know why they haven’t wiped us off the face of the planet yet; I think that only they know that reason.  What we need to concentrate on is what we can do to prevent the coming confrontation.  Obviously, we can all continue to get stronger as time goes on, and we can even accelerate the pace – but will it be enough?  Are there other options?”

This at least caused the conversation to become more productive, though the most obvious (and most contentious) answer came from Brint.  “Why is it that we aren’t involving the rest of the Kingdom?  There is so much we could be doing if we had their help.”

“Because the Cordpower Company is filled with treacherous assholes, that’s why!” Gereld shot back heatedly.  “I refuse to go begging to them for help after they literally killed the entire royal family and blamed it on us!”

Karn seconded his proclamation with a, “Damn straight!”

“Look, I want those bastards dead just as much as you all do – so why can’t we just kill them and take over the Kingdom for ourselves?  Milton, remember when you promised that – when the time came – you would help me destroy the Company?” Brint asked the sensor orb above him.

“Yes, Brint – but that was before they had committed a brutal hostile takeover of the entire Kingdom.  I don’t think that would be a good idea now.”

“Wait a minute, this is the first time I’ve heard of this – what is he talking about, Milton?” Moxwell spoke for the first time.

“Brint was mad – and rightfully so – at the Cordpower Company because they had killed his friend—” which caused Whisp to blush when they all turned their focus on her— “and so he wanted to march right up to the Company and kill every single one of them.  I determined that – at the time – it wouldn’t work out the way he wanted it to; arriving at the capital with a horde of monsters in tow would probably cause more harm than good.  Now, however, if that was the only goal, it could be easily accomplished; but with them in charge of everything, it would be a bit more complicated.”

“That’s an understatement.  And while I agree that having Cordpower out of power would be the best solution, I can’t see any way of doing that without alienating the Guild from the people even more than it already is,” Rosewyn added, before continuing.  “Right now – actually, even before we came here – our members have enough power and skill in their abilities to take over the Kingdom if we wanted to.  In fact, historically, we’ve always had the most power and strength in the Kingdom. We’ve never tried to grasp for the throne, though, for one simple reason: we didn’t want the responsibility.  We all joined the Guild to protect the defenseless masses from the threats outside our border; that’s it and that’s all.

“It’s the same reason everyone is here today and why so many were willing to sacrifice themselves to defend against those horrific monsters.  Because we can.  Period.  It is what we live for; if we had to run an entire Kingdom, it would take us away from what we do best.

“So, yes, we could march into Grestwinch and wrest control away from Cordpower, but right now it wouldn’t do any good.  The general population – as well as the Royal Army Reserve – thinks that we killed their ruler, and he was a good and just one, too.  If they aren’t on our side, then everything would be for naught.  We wouldn’t be able to enlist the help from the population without resorting to the same underhanded tactics as the Company, and that runs counter to what we believe in.”

“She’s right,” Gereld agreed.  “I was – and I guess still am – the Guildmaster, and I hated not being able to go out and fight against the various border incursions whenever I wanted to.  I can’t imagine how much worse it would be to be a part of the government.”

“That’s pretty much what I assumed after reviewing all of the information about the coup you described to me.  That being said, we’ve got very little hope of successfully defending the entire populace without their help.  Not only would they be able to help defend, but we need their resources if we have any hope of succeeding.  If we can’t have your people even walk around inside the Kingdom without being killed outright, what are we going to do when the Bearilla army reaches the northern border?

“The way I see it, there are three things that need to get done in order to survive the coming attack.  One, we need to secure the help of the Kingdom; two, we need more metal resources to improve our defenses, improve the dungeon so we can train more people, and provide stronger and more-powerful arms and armor for your people; three, we need to somehow divert or delay the army up north so that we have time to do things one and two.”

They were all silent for a moment while they contemplated his words.

“As much as I want to rip them apart limb-from-limb, I think the only option is to work with those murdering bastards,” Moxwell finally ventured, which elicited protestations from everyone else around the table – all except for his wife.  She just sat there while everyone else argued back-and-forth, not really listening to them as she appeared to work through her own thoughts.  Moxwell added, “However, I think that even if we sent someone to warn them of the impending disaster, they would discount it if they even suspected where the source of the knowledge came from.”

When their arguments finally petered out, Rosewyn spoke to no one in particular.  “Moxwell is right; in order to save everyone, we’re going to have to suck it up and beg for their help.  If we can successfully express the threat everyone is under – and make sure the general population knows about it as well – then they’ll have no choice but to help us.

“At their core they’re an entity in the business of making money; if they don’t have anyone buying their product, then it’s a losing proposition.  And if the people are convinced that we aren’t the bad guys and are ready and willing to help defend the Kingdom without asking for anything other than some supplies as compensation, then there is no way they would allow their ‘interim’ government to kill us.  Especially since Cordpower will be the ones doing the convincing.”

“How the hell are you going to do that?  And are you honestly suggesting that we just forgive them and let them get away with what they’ve done?!” Brint asked with anger in his voice.

A slow, creepy smile transformed Rosewyn’s face, a threatening visage if Milton had ever seen one.  She could give lessons to ALANNA on creepy looks – I hope she doesn’t get any ideas.

“Oh,” she responded with a deeper voice than he’d ever heard before, reminding him of some horror movies he’d seen as a kid.  “I never said that.  Don’t worry – they’ll get what’s coming to them.”

Chapter 2 – A Few Notifications

New Short-termed Goal: The Kingdom Rises

With the threat of the rogue Station Core’s army looming on the horizon, you have discovered that your current situation requires some additional help.  Find a way to secure the help of the Kingdom, while still maintaining the safety of the Guardian Guild.

Difficulty of Goal: Unknown

Timeframe: 4 weeks

Rewards: +5 to Communication/Charisma, help from the Kingdom

“You couldn’t be more specific than that?” Milton privately asked ALANNA, after Rosewyn had made her announcement.

“No, because I don’t have the specifics of what the Guild is planning, so I have no quantifiable requirements.  With more information, I can update the goal – I’m sorry – quest.  That should do for now,” she replied, acting more “normal” than she had in days.  At least she’s seemed to concentrate on one personality for now; thankfully, it isn’t one that curses all the time.

“Of course, you’ve got your own issues, numb-nuts.”  I spoke too soon.

“And what would those be, o magnificent AI guide?”

She smiled, ignoring his sarcasm.  “I’m glad that you finally acknowledge my greatness – it’s about time.  Anyway, you still need to find a way to gather even more resources; I know that the Guild is planning on spending some time trying to secure the Kingdom’s help, so if they are successful, you’ll have a larger influx of metal coming from that quarter.  However, based upon what you need to operate at peak efficiency, you’re going to need a lot more – not to mention Focusing Crystals.”

That’s right; most of my higher-tech (and therefore more powerful) defenses utilize those crystals.  At the moment, Milton only had 2; in a pinch, he could salvage another 15 from the access terminals he had set up in The Refuge – but even that wouldn’t go very far.  What he needed was to get back to the Quizard Mountains so that he could mine there.  However, that posed a whole new set of obstacles – he didn’t want to cause even more of the monstrous Bearillas and their Quizard pets to emerge from their home base and attack him.  Not only that, but the manpower required to guard his drones while they mined was better used elsewhere.

Unless…

He put that thought on hold while the impromptu meeting came to an end; his conversation with ALANNA and his thoughts afterward having taken place so quickly that it was only a few seconds after Rosewyn stopped speaking.  Everyone reluctantly agreed that her idea was the best chance to save as many people as they could, though they made Rosewyn promise that they would get their revenge on Cordpower.

She said she would handle the details – but needed to recruit the right people for the job.  Milton was interested in hearing exactly what Rosewyn had planned, but she said she had to see if she could find enough volunteers.  The only thing she asked him to do right now was to start stockpiling his special Power Potions.  That was easy enough, since it was essentially just his waste water from the reactor core leakage – it would only take a single drone to get that done.

Up above the dungeon, every other available drone had been at work non-stop clearing out the ruins of The Fortress, cutting up and placing every little scrap into the six portable Molecular Converters he had placed up there.  Meanwhile, his 100 Bioconversion Labs were busily pumping out respawns every half-hour or so; with over 6,000 Proctans dead, it was going to take more than a day to finish bringing everyone back.  It had only been about 12 hours since the conclusion of the attack, so that process was going to take a while.

An update of the missing persons without NCUs had dropped down to 52 while the meeting was taking place, which boosted Milton’s confidence that they would be able to bring everyone back.  They needed every single person they had alive in order to have any chance of stopping the enemy, and the (hopeful) news that everyone was alive would go a long way to raise morale as well.

While the battleground clean-up finished up, Milton thought about what to do next.  There was one vital thing that needed to be done immediately, however; as much as Brint probably wouldn’t appreciate it, they all needed more information about the enemy’s movements.  He didn’t want to be surprised by another force following after this initial one, only to be caught with his figurative “pants down”.  He had some sensor orbs searching the forest at the limit of their range, but it would give him (and everyone in his care) only about 30 minutes warning at the speed at which the enemy could move.

His small army of Blood-thirsty Squirrel scouts helped to widen the detection range, but there was so much area to cover that, at best, he could count on only about an hour of lead-time before they might be attacked.  If the enemy was spotted in time and didn’t slip through the holey detection net that he had established.

“Brint, I’m sorry to do this to you, but I need you back out in the field to do some more scouting.  I need to know what the enemy is up to, and I need that information soon.  We can’t afford to wait any longer.”

He caught the young Proctan walking back to the room he now shared with Whisp.  “As much as I don’t want to go back out there yet, I completely agree with you.  Who knows if there are other places where they are emerging from the mountains?  However, I don’t have any of my team left,” Brint informed him.

That’s right – there’s almost nothing left.

“Take whatever rest you can right now; I’ve got to do a couple of things and then I’ll have something ready for you in…let’s say six hours.”

Brint agreed and went to spend some time alone with Whisp, which prompted Milton to immediately turn his attention elsewhere.

The information-gathering issue was starting to become a major problem.  While Brint did an awesome job of relaying what he saw, he couldn’t be everywhere.  To combat some of this, Milton immediately started pumping out even more squirrel scouts; they couldn’t move as fast as Brint and his team, but they were cheap resource-wise and could range much, much farther than his sensor orbs (which needed access to a central power source to continue operating).

Thousands of the frightening rodents started to emerge from the backs of the Molecular Converters aboveground, and immediately fanned out in three directions: north, south, and east.  He already had some still looking toward the west, but anything coming from the Kingdom was much less of a threat to him now.

But that was only the first stage of his plan; the next was to finally look through his notifications he had received before, during, and after the battle with the Bearillas.  There were so many that he had to take them one section at a time – first up: his skills.

Congratulations!

You have upgraded the skill: Kamikaze (Level 8)

Current bonus: 900% damage increase

You have converted the skill Formation Fighting to Large-scale Battle Tactics (Level 2)

Due to your presence as the head of a small army involved in a large-scale battle, you have converted your Formation Fighting skill into Large-scale Battle Tactics.  By coordinating your Combat Units in battle, they receive a bonus to their physical attack damage as well as improving the effectiveness of any abilities they activate.

Current Bonus: 15% increase in Combat Unit physical attack damage and activated ability effectiveness when participating in a battle consisting of more than 50 participants

You have upgraded the skill: Cooperation (Level 9)

Current Bonus: 45% increase in defense when fighting alongside natural enemies

You have upgraded the skill: Survivor (Level 5)

Current Bonus: 25% increase in defense of all Combat Units

You have upgraded the skill: Combat Communication (Level 9)

Current # of units you can communicate with simultaneously at your current skill level: 200

You have upgraded the skill: Geneticist (Level 8)

Current Bonus: +80 Trait Points

You have obtained a new skill: Defensive Fortification Aficionado (Level 1)

By utilizing existing and new materials, you have created a defensive fortification unlike any other recorded in existence – and survived victorious through an intense battle.  Your Combat Units now receive a bonus to their attack/defense when stationed inside one of your defensive fortifications.

Current Bonus: 5% to Combat Unit attack/defense[2]

Congratulations!

You have unlocked an achievement:

Genocidal Acolyte

You have defeated more than 1,000 of the same type of enemy within 10 minutes

Bonus – +5 to Insight/Luck

With the increase of so many of his skills, as well as a few new ones, he felt a little better about their chances against a platoon of Bearillas again.  It wasn’t a massive increase in their bonuses, but it would definitely help.  What he was most excited about was the skill conversion of his Formation Fighting skill into Large-scale Battle Tactics; while it decreased the bonus attack damage from 35% to 15%, it now included activated abilities – which would include elemental attacks and even boosts.  The lone downside was that it would only work if there were more than 50 participants in the battle, but he figured that probably wouldn’t be a problem in the future.

If he added in a fortified defensive structure to the battle, that would increase everyone’s effectiveness even more.  Milton could only imagine how powerful his Combat Units (including all of the Proctans) could be once he leveled up the new Defensive Fortification Aficionado skill.

However, none of those skills really helped his current problem: scouting and information-gathering.  The main issue was the speed at which the information got to him, which was hampered by his communication range.  When Brint was scouting to the north, he was so far out of range that he had had barely gotten in range before he was killed; if he had been caught even a minute before by the Bearillas, all the knowledge of the invading army cutting through the trees would’ve been lost.

Milton knew that he had leveled-up a few times during the battle[3] and thought about throwing as many attribute points into Communication/Charisma as he could; however, before he did that, he decided to see what free points he might get if he finished off a quest or two.

Looking at his nearly completed Hustle That Flow goal/quest, he realized that he was only two points away in his Structural Integrity/Constitution stat to complete it.  With the before-battle cannibalization of many of the traps and portable Molecular Converters (along with their Power Generators) to use their resources strictly for defense, he had more than enough to finish it off.  It would hamper his ability to get all the extra dungeon rooms back up and running for a little bit, but Milton thought it was worth investing in it for the future.  Besides, he still had a few shipments from the Kingdom that were due back any time now from those who had gone out before the attack was incoming.

Current Average-term Goal: Hustle That Flow – Complete!

With the Quizard Mountains to the east currently closed to you and with the arrival of the army of creatures discovered underneath them potentially imminent, acquiring more resources to continue your growth has become doubly important.  Not only will it lead to the eventual ability to leave the planet, but it will also help complete the short-term goal: Unlikely Odds.

-         Discover a new source of large quantities of Basic Metal Units – 1/1 – Complete!

-         Improve your Reactor Power and Structural Integrity to 50 – Current: RP – 50, SI – 50 – Complete!

Difficulty of Goal: Difficult, but doable

Timeframe: 5 years

Rewards: Experience, +10 to Ingenuity/Wisdom and Sensor Interpretation/Perception

Bonus Rewards: For completing it much faster than your AI guide thought possible, you receive a bonus +5 to Processing Power/Intelligence

Along with that goal, he also completed one with the conclusion of the battle.

Current Short-term Goal: The First Skirmish – Completed!

The army of monstrous beasts from underneath the Quizard Mountains has sent its first force against your dungeon and those you are tasked to protect.  Defend against them, ensure that you survive, and bring back anyone who dies in its defense.  Additionally, if you survive, obtain a viable specimen of a Bearilla for your own use and experimentation.

- Defeat enemy forces:

- Quizards – Current: 3026/3026 – Complete!

- Bearillas – Current: 30/30 – Complete!

- Station Core survives – Current: 1/1 – Complete!

- Obtain a Bearilla specimen to convert – Current 1/1 – Complete!

Difficulty of Goal: Very Hard

Timeframe: 1 day

Rewards: +2 to Insight/Luck, a powerful new Combat Unit option, and…hope

Now that he had acquired those bonuses to his attributes/stats, he was able to see where to spend his 41 earned points from leveling-up after the battle.[4]  He concentrated on keeping things as even as he could, but he spent a little extra on his Communication/Charisma stat so that he would have an increased range that he was hoping would allow him to see and contact Brint while he was out scouting.  Additionally, it would help with looking at the progress Rosewyn’s “team” had inside the Kingdom in their efforts to get help.

As soon as he finished allocating the points, Milton found his awareness of his surroundings expand exponentially; it was almost as if he had finally hit a threshold and burst right through it.  His new communication range was now so wide that he couldn’t feel the limit – mainly because he didn’t have any Combat Units that far out in the forest.  However, when he directed his attention toward the Kingdom, he was able to connect with one of his Units walking down a road gradually making its way down a steep hill, heading toward a huge city with massively tall walls.  From what he could see from the higher vantage point of the road, it was unlike any city he had seen before; he was used to sprawling metropolises that spanned miles and miles in every direction – but this was just the opposite.

He assumed that it had originally been a modest city at some point, with one or two-story houses and buildings inside the walls.  However, with the advancement in the Proctans’ abilities – especially Earth-based elemental abilities – they were able to expand the city: upward.  Tall, drab-colored buildings that rivaled skyscrapers in his old world were created entirely of Earth-based materials including hard-looking stone and metal (for support, he assumed).  His Combat Unit (which he now recognized as Thyren, an Inventor that originally joined the Guild as a supply purchaser) was too far away to see any people inside, but it was obvious that there was a large flow of traffic going in and out of the gates.  By his estimation – which was helped by ALANNA as she piggy-backed on his viewing – he thought there could be as many as two to three million people inside what he assumed was the Kingdom’s capital city, Grestwinch.

He only spent a few moments there getting his first glimpse of what the cities on this planet looked like, before turning his attention back to his Core.  The one thing he did notice was that, even at the far distance where Thyren was located, Milton didn’t feel a strain on the connection like he usually did at the extreme limits of his communication range.  Which meant that his reach was now at insane levels.

Which was only proven right when he looked at what the bonuses for hitting the next thresholds in his statistics brought him.

Chapter 3 – Research FTW

He pulled up the notification that was eager for his attention.

Congratulations!

When you reach certain milestones in your statistics, additional bonuses can be unlocked.  In this instance, when you reached 80 points in Processing Speed/Agility, Processing Power/Intelligence, Ingenuity/Wisdom, Communication/Charisma, and Sensor Interpretation/Perceptions, as well as 50 points in Reactor Power/Strength, Structural Integrity/Constitution, and Insight/Luck, you gained these bonuses:

- With your Reactor Power and Structural Integrity both at the halfway point to complete functionality, the level of output your reactor can now generate is increased by 20% of base output; Current Reactor Output: 85%

- With the additional Processing Speed at which your drones can process orders, their speed has now increased by 50%, allowing them to construct/deconstruct as well as physically move much faster than before

- With your current Processing Power, combined with your Processing Speed, your facilities are now capable of producing materials 15% faster

- With the additional Insight you have gained, goals with numeric counts to complete are now reduced by 10%

- With the additional Ingenuity at your disposal, you have unlocked new Research options in your Biological Recombinator

- With the additional increase in your Communication as well as Reactor Power Output, your effective range of communication with your Combat Units has increased by 150%, and your range with powered units has increased by 175%

- With the additional calibration to what your sensors can interpret, the resonance distances have increased to 50 feet through any surface; in addition, heat signatures can now be detected at a range of 150 feet through any surface

- With Ingenuity combined with your new Insight, you now have even more facility options to construct[5]

150% increase in communication range?!  Now he knew why he could reach out farther than he ever had before; not only had he increased the C/C stat by 20 points (which dramatically expanded it all by itself), but with the boost in Reactor Power, it was multiplied two and a half times!  And, not only that, but the range at which he could reach his powered units like his drones and sensor orbs had been expanded by 175%.  With that, he could potentially…

He lost that train of thought as he saw what else he had earned.  His drones could work 50% faster than they already were, and his facilities (including the Bioconversion Labs who were still pumping out respawns) finished their projects 15% faster!  He could easily see the difference in his drones clearing up the remains of The Fortress; as for the respawns inside the Bio Labs, only time would tell how much time he would save there.

There were a few new options for research and facilities that he wanted to check out soon, but what interested him the most was the reduction in numerical counts required to complete his goals.  After he pulled up his current goals list[6], he could see that every single one of them had been changed to reflect that bonus.  For instance, his DNA Harvester goal now required less to get to the final unlock (though it would still take a while for that to happen).

Current Average-term Goal: DNA Harvester

After gaining DNA samples of various Proctans with abilities, you have discovered that they provide unique gene mutations.  Currently, you can apply a single gene mutation – acquire more samples to unlock the ability to add more than one to your Combat Units.

-            Add +1 gene mutation to your Combat Units – Current: 18/18 – Complete!

-            Add +2 gene mutations to your Combat Units – Current: 90/90 – Complete!

-            Add +3 gene mutations to your Combat Units – Current: 450/450 – Complete!

-            Add +4 gene mutations to your Combat Units – Current: 2250/2250 – Complete!

-            Add +5 gene mutations to your Combat Units – Current: 6356/11250

Difficulty of Goal: Average

Timeframe: 40 years

Rewards: +10 to Communication/Charisma, enhance Combat Units’ Power Capacity X3

The others reflected the same change – all except for The Kingdom Rises goal, since there wasn’t anything quantifiable for that one yet.  Regardless, the bonus 10% reduction from his Insight/Luck stat was paying off already; he just wished the increase in his attributes had taken effect before he spent the resources to bring his SI/C up to 50.  On a second thought, he realized that it was beneficial to bring it up anyways – so no harm done.

With all of his increases, Milton felt energized and ready to take on the world.  Despite the long road ahead of him to get his two stats that required resources back up to normal, the others were rapidly approaching optimal efficiency.  He could think faster, act faster, field more Combat Units, reach farther with his new communication range, and produce everything faster.  The only thing he lacked was the resources to get everything done that he wanted to – but he had plans for that.

Before that, however, he made sure that all of his notifications had been taken care of.  There were only some that indicated how much Combat Experience he had earned from beating back the Bearilla army, which – all told – brought his total up to an impressive 7,401,490/10,147,500.  Based upon how much it was going to take to get to the next level, he thought it might be a while before he saw any more points that he could allocate; which, essentially, meant that he had to work with what he currently had.

To that end, he started work on Brint’s new scouting team.  Whereas the reliable Proctan had been formerly using a Qwizard as his mount to rapidly get from one place to another, Milton thought it was about time to try something different.  With the extra 80 Trait Points his Geneticist skill gave him, as well as the additional specimens and mutations he had acquired since the Qwizards had first been created, he figured there had to be a better option.

The list of available specimens to try combining together seemed nearly endless, but when he filtered out all of the Proctans and the recombinations that he had already created, it was only 20 different species long.[7]  When he added a generic Proctan back in, that list increased to 21 – but still plenty to work with.

“Bearilla” had finally appeared on the list (greyed-out but present), but when he attempted to select it—

Error!

This specimen is unable to be recombined again.

That made him pause for a moment as the message only confirmed that he was dealing with another Station Core.  There was always the possibility in the back of his mind that it had just been a fluke that the nanites were present in the Bearilla; now, however, it was clear that something had recombined different creatures to create it.  Well, it’s obvious that I didn’t recombine it; that must mean that the rogue Core must’ve created it the same way I create my own recombinations.

With the Bearilla not as an option to recombine (though it would still make a formidable ally in the war to come), Milton instead considered everything else.  What he needed was something that could move faster than a Bearilla over open ground as well as something stronger that could defend against the monstrous gorilla-bears; additionally, it would be beneficial if it was something that could make use of one of the special gene mutations that he had recently acquired.

Which was a lot.

After the battle (and during the cleanup that was rapidly approaching completion with the new speed of his drones), the death and “conversion” of many of the guild members that hadn’t had an NCU before had increased his overall list of available gene mutations.  While many of the mutations were similar enough to some of the more common mutations – such as the ability to “warm up a room” that was classified as a Fire affinity – there were many that he had never seen before.[8]

The major problem with trying to assign gene mutations to his non-Proctan Combat Units was their inability to handle more than one ability at a time.  Especially when they were activated abilities; they just weren’t intelligent enough to juggle different abilities like a Proctan could.  In fact, it was even difficult for Proctans, as well – which was painfully obvious when he saw some of those who took wildly different second abilities and struggled to learn how to control them properly.

But that didn’t mean that their allies couldn’t help them out a little.

It was a radical idea, but Milton thought it would work.  He was actually really excited about it; if it worked, it could change the entire way Brint would operate.  He just hoped his friend agreed.

But first, he had to design what he had in mind.  Unfortunately, for his design, he needed a way to be able to combine more than the current limit of 4 specimens at the same time.  He opened up the Research menu on the Biological Recombinator and was surprised at the number of options now available[9] – before he remembered that he had just unlocked some more with the recent increases in his stats.

The Quinary Recombination research option was still there for 100,000 Bio Units, which was affordable after receiving so much from the Quizard and Bearilla corpses.  It would allow him to combine 5 different specimens together, which should be plenty for what he had in mind.

However, in addition to that option, there were also ones that would allow him to combine 6 and 7 together, costing half a million and a full million Bio Units, respectively.  The Septenary Recombination was something he could actually afford right now (due to the over 9 million Bio Units he received from the dead enemy Quizards alone), but he hesitated at the cost; it was expensive, and he could make a lot of new Combat Units for the price of a cool million.  However, he knew that if he was going to do this, he wanted it to be the best it could be.

There were two others, as well: Non-biological Recombination and Highly Experimental Proctan Recombination.  The first allowed him to use a single “compatible” non-biological compound during recombination; he wasn’t sure what made something compatible, nor how it was supposed to work, but he was willing to try it out for a measly 50,000 Bio Units.

The other raised some issues that he wasn’t sure he wanted to pursue at the moment.  Apparently, he could combine two individual Proctans together to produce what he could only consider an “offspring” of the two people; it would apparently have the same abilities of its “parents” combined together, as well as their memories.  He imagined if he were to combine Rosewyn and Moxwell together to produce a “child” that had every single Gene Mutation that they currently had access to, it would create a super-powerful Elemental Caster and Physical Augmenter – all rolled up in one.

However, it also said that the option was “highly experimental” and that the chance of success and/or eventual issues was unknown.  Having an intelligent “super” offspring seemed like a recipe for disaster to Milton; he couldn’t imagine the possible mental problems a kid with two different sets of memories inside of them would have.  Though, at 125,000 Bio Units, it might be something that he could experiment with in the future – but not right now.

Therefore, he purchased the Quinary Recombination, Senary Recombination, Septenary Recombination, and Non-biological Recombination research options for the near-painful total of 1,650,000 Bio Units – and got to work.

Resources well spent.

Chapter 4 – Quagon

He felt like some sort of witch or alchemist brewing a devious potion: a pinch of this, a portion of that, and a few sprinkles of another thing.  Of course, he was designing a living, breathing Combat Unit, so it was a bit different – but it was similar, nonetheless.

Seeing the massive size of the Bearillas had given him an idea.  There were a few creatures he had access to that were large, but they had to be grown from a small size and would rapidly succumb to old age from the quick maturing process.  That was definitely not what he wanted to do in this case – he needed this new scout Unit to last as long as possible.

Therefore, he had an inkling that there must be some sort of way to create a Combat Unit of that size without having to wait for it to grow naturally.  Unless the rogue Core found out some way to stop the aging process in rapid-maturing Units.  He was stumped at first, but after a little bit of investigating, he found it.

It had been recently unlocked in his available facilities.[10]

That wasn’t all he found, but the other new available facilities he saw on there would have to wait until he had a little bit more to spend on them.  Nevertheless, the Upgraded Bioconversion Lab would work perfectly for his needs; for only 32,000 BMUs for the new facility, he could create “extra-large” Combat Units.  He wasn’t exactly sure how large he could make them, but he was willing to spend the BMUs to find out.

The drones aboveground were only about an hour away from being finished, so he justified stealing about 20 of them away so that he could use them to create another large room to put his new Upgraded Bioconversion Lab.  Within minutes, half of them were working on hollowing out a large room near the surface, attached to a large hallway leading aboveground that would allow whatever he created to be able to exit; it was completely unconnected to his dungeon at the moment, but it would be easy to connect it later if he chose to do so.  The other half were busy transporting parts for the Upgraded Bio Lab from his Core Room, where the larger pieces it required meant that a portable Molecular Converter wouldn’t work.

Twenty minutes later, the room and hallway were complete and the drones he had commandeered were putting the finishing touches on his new toy.  It was massive.

Milton thought it might be a little more than twice the size of his other non-upgraded ones, based upon the original (without bonuses) cost of 30,000 compared to 80,000 BMUs – but he was wrong.  Instead, it was so large it wouldn’t have looked out of place in a City Aquarium; as he looked at it again from higher up, he reevaluated his first thought and considered that it wouldn’t have looked out of place at Sea World – for dolphins or large sharks.

He saw no reason why his idea wouldn’t work now.

First, he started with the Quizard; despite their origin as edible “pets” to the attacking Bearillas, it was still the fastest specimen he had.  Then, of course, he had to add in a Proctan so that he had access to more Trait points.  From there, he had to get creative to get what he wanted.

He wanted it big; big enough that it couldn’t be squashed flat from a fist by an attacking Bearilla.  In fact, he wanted it bigger than a Bearilla, if possible – and for that, he had only one solution: the Gargantuan Anaconda.

To make it harder to damage and kill – as well as giving it “jaws of death” – he added in a Scaly Bear and a Snappy Turtle.

A massive scaled Quizard was impressive enough, but it wouldn’t quite do the trick for scouting.  No – he needed to make it fly.

He started by adding a Big Yellow Bird to the recombination to give it wings, but he didn’t want them to be feathered.  Instead, by adding in a Glider Monkey for the seventh and last recombination slot, he was able to get what he wanted.

Two hours later – and 150,000 Bio Units less – he squealed aloud in nerd-joy when a giant 50-foot-long, near-impervious scaled lizard with wings was birthed out the bottom of the Upgraded Bioconversion Lab.

“Wait a minute…is that what I think it is, Milton?” ALANNA didn’t exactly know what he had in mind when he started the process, since he was shielding his thoughts as he was working.  He wasn’t sure if it would work while he was doing it, so he didn’t want to share it before he knew for sure it would work, but it had turned out almost exactly as he had planned.

He couldn’t help it; the pride he felt in his creation caused him to lose all of his inhibitions toward cursing.  “Yep – it’s a fucking DRAGON!”[11]

“You know you’re a nerd, right?”

“Obviously, but I’m also a nerd with a DRAGON.”  ‘Nuff said.

*         *         *

Ok, so it wasn’t exactly like the dragon he was picturing.  His Quagon – Quizard Dragon – wasn’t as sleek-looking as he had hoped; it looked more like a bloated mottled brown-and-green lizard with wings and a long tail.  It also wasn’t as fast as he wanted it to be – mainly because of the extra protection its “armored” scales provided.  Not only was it slower on the ground, but it was so heavy that it couldn’t physically lift off from the ground.  However, once it was airborne, he hoped that it would be able to fly and glide just the same as a large bird.

Because its wings didn’t flap to raise it into the air – they were more like airplane wings without an engine that could flex and tilt slightly – it also couldn’t hover in place or rise into the air; instead, using currents in the air, it would “glide” and use its Air Affinity when it needed to rapidly accelerate.  He had wanted to add a Fire Affinity to it to make a “fire-breathing dragon”, but there was no reliable way to provide the source of the fire, which made it effectively unusable.

Milton also had to add an extra pair of arms to it, otherwise the “arms” were going to be counted as its wings like a bird.  As a result, the Multi-limbed Freak trait it acquired made it lose a bit in its looks department, dropping its Charisma by 80%.

Despite all that, it still overall looked like a dragon.  The minor issue with it not being able to take off notwithstanding, it would do the job nicely – it might even be able to take out a Bearilla if it got a hold of one in its horrendously powerful jaws.

As he directed it to emerge from the hole where it spawned, it was unfortunately near enough to the dungeon’s exit tunnel that a few new Proctan “respawns” saw the monstrosity and panicked.

Luckily, the ones that had seen it were newly outfitted with an NCU and couldn’t do much; not that he expected that even someone like Rosewyn or Moxwell would have an easy time going up against his new creation.

“Run!  I’ll hold it off!”  Grestlin – one of the former non-combatants who now had a full suite of the four basic elemental affinities – said as he rushed toward the Quagon.  The others just stood in fright instead of running, huddled up against each other in what appeared to be for comfort.  I wonder if the Charisma deduction makes it more frightening.

A few clods of dirt that were flung at his Quagon by Grestlin only managed to bounce off harmlessly as the Proctan shouted bravely at it to get its attention while his friends ran away.  And it might’ve been at least marginally effective if Milton hadn’t been controlling it – and had his friends actually ran away.

A nearby sensor orb was quickly brought over, and Milton was able to clear up the confusion.  He could’ve spoken directly to their minds, but he tended to dislike doing that unless it was absolutely necessary in an emergency.  Plus, they had just gotten their NCUs and he didn’t want to scare them any more than they already were.

“Hold up, everyone!  Sorry for the scare there – this beast is with us.  Very brave of you though, Grestlin.”

The Proctan stopped so quickly he tripped and fell flat on his face.  As he picked himself up, still with a wary eye on the unmoving massive monster, he asked, “What is that thing?  And how do you know my name?”

“Of course I know your name.  I know the names of everyone who has respawn…uh, rebirthed inside the Labs.  As for what this is, it’s called a Quagon – our new scout unit.  Of course, it needs a rider and Brint will be taking it out a little later to gather up some information.

“Someone’s going to ride that thing?”  The huddling group of frightened Proctans were starting to relax a little, and one of them – a female by the name of Yourey – asked Milton.

“Oh, yes – but not just ride.  He’s going to fly on it, in fact; just don’t tell him yet, because he doesn’t know.  I want it to be a surprise.”

“He’s going to fly on it?  How is that going to work?  I don’t see any wings—”

Milton had his new Quagon extend its wings that were pressed up against its sides, blending in so that you couldn’t see them until they were extended.  They popped out near-instantly, with a *fwap* that startled the onlookers.  It was fortunate that they were in a large clearing, because its wingspan was impressive at a full 100 feet wide.

“Oh my Goddess, that is so neat!  Can I ride?”

“I’ve always wanted to fly before!”

“If I fall off, you can just bring me back if I die, right?”

It was amazing what a difference adding wings to his relatively ugly giant lizard could do to the people.  Milton remembered learning in history class how obsessed humans had been with flight; they had spent decades or even centuries perfecting the art of flight through machines, so it wasn’t surprising to see that Proctans were the same when it came to the desire to soar through the sky.

“Maybe later, everyone.  Right now, I only have the one Quagon, and it’s not quite ready to fly yet.  Run along now, back to The Refuge – I’m sure everything is a bit of an adjustment for you, and it may take a while to get used to things.”

They stood watching the Quagon for another few moments before they dispersed.  To head off any other sudden negative reactions, he “broadcasted” to every Proctan who had an NCU, informing them of the giant beast aboveground and not to panic about it.  This, of course, drew a crowd – if only for curiosity’s sake.

It was only halfway through the time he had given Brint to rest and relax before he sent him out again, but at the announcement, both of his good friends emerged from the exit hole to check out his creation.

“Milton – what is that?” Brint asked, his arm comfortably around Whisp as they gazed upon the unmoving Quagon.

Who was looking at it with her critical Inventor brain of hers.  “I see the wings, Milton, and I’m no expert on flight, but…I have my doubts that that thing can get off the ground.”

“You’re absolutely right, Whisp.  I’m actually going to need your assistance with something.  As well as a little bit of help from your boyfriend there.”

She blushed as he spoke privately to both his friends’ minds, though Brint just smiled happily.  But then what Milton said must’ve registered, because he frowned and asked, “What do you mean?  How am I supposed to make it fly?”

“It’s time I let you two in on another secret.  You see, I now have the power to give you both one more ability…”

Chapter 5 – Volunteers

Rosewyn found volunteers for the mission easier than she had thought.  Gereld, Flauren, and Karn were founts of information with their knowledge of every single member of the Guild.  She sometimes regretted not spending more time getting to know her compatriots better; she had spent so long isolated with Moxwell and with her research that she knew only about three or four dozen members on sight – and most of those were part of the leadership.

Regardless of any regrets about her past socializing, there were other sources who were happy enough to help point her in the right direction – especially when she told them what they would be doing.  She hadn’t explained the whole plan to anyone yet – even Mox – because she was still working through a bit of it in her mind; however, there was enough there to get things started.

Things were still such a mess both at Milton’s dungeon and the cleanup from The Fortress that it wasn’t until 12 hours after the attack before everyone she was looking for was both alive and agreeable.

“Ok, now that everyone is here, I can go over what your mission is.  I know a few of you have asked me exactly what this is about, and I was hoping the promise of getting another ability – for free, mind you—” the volunteers who were all assembled in one of the private meeting rooms at The Refuge smiled at that— “was enough to persuade most of you to volunteer for a highly dangerous mission.”

The smiles turned to worried frowns, but before they changed their minds she kept going.  “What I didn’t tell you all was not only are you going to get a new ability, but you will be getting two.  After this mission is over, you can always choose to get rid of them and choose something else; however, I want to warn you that you’ll be starting back at nothing but your original ability and all of your progress with your Power pool will be lost.”

She had their attention now, though their expressions were tempered by the curiosity of what they would have to do to “earn” those abilities.  “What is it you want us to do for that?  Take on the entire enemy army all by ourselves?” a man up front asked, and Rosewyn had trouble remembering his name.

“Not quite that easy, I’m afraid.  No, you’ll be going in the opposite direction and hopefully won’t be doing any fighting,” she responded with her own smile.  “You 50 brave souls here are going to bring down Cordpower while at the same time convincing the people to join in their mutual defense.”

Silence.  Followed by muttering as everyone looked at each other in confusion.  The same man spoke up and suddenly his name popped into her head – Poegh.  “And how are we supposed to do that?  From what I can see, not a single one of us has any experience with fighting.”

“Oh, you won’t be fighting – well, not in pitched battle against beasts or anything.  You’ll be fighting more of an economic battle.  Can anyone tell me why the Cordpower Company is so powerful?”

Everyone started talking at once, but the most common things she heard was that they controlled the Power Potion supply and had too much money.  As she held up her hand to stop them, she said, “You are all correct – they have a stranglehold on the Power Potion market and make a lot of money from it.”  She paused while they took that in.

Poegh seemed to be the first one to at least vaguely understand.  “Wait…so you want us to flood the market with cheaper Power Potions from…Milton?...and put them out of business?  That’s a good idea – but won’t that take too long?”  I may have to put him in charge of this little expedition, since I nor any of the other leadership won’t be going along.

“I like the way you think, but that’s not quite what you’ll be doing.”  As she explained to them that what they were going to do would make the entire Cordpower Company entirely irrelevant, the whole room seemed to buzz with excitement.  By having the people of the Kingdom think they were doing what the Company wanted was just an extra bonus.

Now all I need is for Milton to do a couple of things for me, and we’ll be all set.

*         *         *

Milton assumed she would explain her idea soon-ish, but it wasn’t until he had done a few things for her that she finally let him into her devious plan.  He had to admit – it was worth the wait.

First, to his complete confusion, she asked him to help give the 50 volunteers – who appeared to have no combat experience, by the way – two new abilities.  He wasn’t opposed to this, especially since what she was asking for wasn’t something that would need massive experience to control properly.  The only reason he hadn’t given everyone abilities up to their maximum was because people usually weren’t ready for another ability until they had “mastered” their old ones.  It was dangerous in a fight to be unfamiliar with one’s own abilities – especially if a beast was charging down on them.

However, Charisma Boost and Healing Touch weren’t really ones that needed to be used in the heat of battle.  Plus, the abilities essentially acted on their own; there wasn’t too much knowledge necessary to use them.  They just accessed the Power from the user, and it did exactly what it was supposed to do – increase their Charisma and heal others with a touch.  Some of the Healers who now had an NCU had previously needed to intimately know the anatomy of their patients when they were healing them; they were shocked when they had initially respawned and the process was automated to one that just required a touch and an application of power.

She had another request for Milton, but he had to wait a little bit as some more of the drones were freed up and he had more resources to work with.  He had a small wait until that happened, so he had time to spare to observe the next part in the part in the plan.

Her next request was for Whisp to design a wagon of some sort that could travel over the open ground at high speeds.  It was the perfect chance for the young Inventor to design something that was simple – and yet genius at the same time.

She finally got to show off one of her blossoming abilities that she had been practicing with: Enchanting.  Fascinated at the process (since enchanting was a common theme in many of the RPGs he had played over the years), he had silently watched her experiment.

*        *        *

How am I going to do this?  Whisp ignored Brint messing around with his new ability in the Workshop as she took another small board of reinforced wood from her supply shelf in the back.  She always tried to keep a few materials around to experiment with; even though she had a Molecular Converter available in the room to provide everything she needed, sometimes it was nice to physically hold something in her hands before resorting to asking for something new.  Other times, she didn’t really know what she needed before she started, and only by eliminating what she had on hand was she able to focus on what was really required.

The board Whisp had was a special compressed-wood composite that was much stronger than conventional wood, though it was slightly heavier as a result.  There were numerous other materials she could use, but for what was asked of her it needed to look and feel like wood.  It would be traveling throughout the Kingdom, so anything that stood out as alien or unfamiliar would attract the wrong kinds of questions.

Of course, if she had to use an enchantment to get it to work, it might stand out anyway.

Setting the board down on her worktable, Whisp stared at it for a moment.  She wants a “wagon” that can move at high speeds without being completely destroyed by the bumps in the road.  That sounds nearly impossible to me; trying to get it out through the forest alone would be catastrophic even with massive shock absorbers.  Not to mention if the load balance was off – that could tip the entire thing over if taking a corner too fast.  And the wheels would have to be made of stronger stuff than wood; at the first major bump they would probably crack and fall to pieces.  There were some materials she could “hide” inside the wood, but that still wouldn’t help it if the outside wood cracked…

“Does it…need to have wheels though?”  It helped sometimes to talk to herself to work through a problem.  This time proved no exception.

“What about…a sled of some sort?  No, it might survive longer, but it would still fall apart after some rough treatment and then it would be in the same boat as the wheels.  I could always add an Earth Enchantment to it that would strengthen it a bit, but that wouldn’t help if it fell over.  Let’s see…”

Inspiration hit her as she dismissed all thoughts of destroyed wheels or sled rails; instead, she abandoned them completely.  Why should it even have to touch the ground?  Whisp had discovered that with a liberal use of Power, she could create enough force using air beneath her to lift her off the ground; however, it was so expensive in terms of power that she couldn’t maintain it for more than a minute before her expansive Power pool ran out.  Considering that she wasn’t that skilled in her Air Affinity yet and that was at only a foot above the ground, it was still fairly impressive.

Though, with some additional tips from Rosewyn on Air manipulation, she had learned how to create a small, spongy-yet-slippery bubble of air that she could condense under her feet, allowing her to almost “skate” across the ground.  It took much less Power, but it also required her to have an excellent sense of balance – which she didn’t have.  However, that didn’t mean that it couldn’t be applied here.

Enchanting was an awesome application to one’s abilities that changed Whisp’s inventing world forever.  She was still working on improving her new elemental affinities, so there wasn’t a whole lot that she could do – but the kinds of things she came up with were both amazing and disappointing.

For her first experiment, Whisp used an application of her Fire Affinity on a basic brick of stone, which was able to produce what she was calling a Heat Stone; the permanent heat effect it gave off couldn’t be adjusted, but it could easily be used to heat any small room.  Since her affinity could also remove the heat, she was able to create a Cold Stone, as well.

After that success, she found that she was able to strengthen various materials with her Earth Affinity, but it wasn’t as useful since it was easy enough to produce something just as good or better from the Molecular Converter.  A small Water Affinity enchantment on the inside of a bowl worked amazingly well constantly converting the moisture in the air into drinkable water.  It didn’t stop there, however, continuing until the air in her workshop grew bone-dry and the water spilled all over the place.  She had to throw it into the converter to stop it completely.

Which turned out to be the issue with most of the things she made.  Whisp was sure that with further experimentation and knowledge, she could figure out how to adjust or shut off the enchantment; at the moment, things like a sword wreathed in flame or boots with an Air enchantment allowing the wearer to move swifter were possible, but if they couldn’t be shut off, they were next to useless.  She envisioned someone with a flaming sword trying to put it in a sheath and lighting themselves on fire, or someone who used the boots and propelled themselves against a wall because they couldn’t stop.  That all seemed impractical, especially since even putting the boots on would be nearly impossible without enough strength to hold it in place.

The only significant progress she had made was in conjunction with her new Object Animation ability.  She had hopes that she could create something like little animated creatures made of stone and then animate them, but her skill in the animation part of it wasn’t quite that high yet.  The best she had been able to do was to move a single part in a single direction of some of the inventions she had made.  For instance, she was able to move a lever up or down but wasn’t able to switch directions without completely restarting the ability.  She didn’t let that stop her, because she was able to use it to turn something in a circle.

Four large fans hung down from the ceiling of her workshop, slowly rotating and circulating the air inside.  Without any external power source other than the permanent Object Animation Enchantment Whisp had placed on them.  She now had a way to constantly rotate anything: simple motors, fans, wheels on an axle – even the spinning Weightonite death blades she had created in room 3 of the dungeon.  She found that a lot more Power was required to redo those; heavier or denser material required additional Power to get them to animate properly.

She was excited for the future when she was able to do more, but her attention had been pulled away lately – which took away time from her experimentation.  Added to that, Milton had offered her another ability for use in her inventing, but she had held off because she wanted to learn more about her current abilities before she added on one more.  Regardless, what she needed to do here wasn’t going to need any animation or a new ability, only the fledgling skills of her Air Affinity.  She had attempted to try to enchant someone else’s ability onto something, but either she was not skilled enough in Enchanting – or it just wasn’t possible.

Whisp placed her hand on the condensed wood board, concentrating on creating a “slider” bubble underneath the 2-foot length.  As she felt a small chunk of her available Power convert to a normally invisible (to those who didn’t have an Air Affinity) squashed bubble, she made sure to expand the bubble to the sides so that it hung over the edges a little; she didn’t want the board falling off if it hit the edge of the cushion of air.  At the moment, it was only about 1-inch thick, but it was enough to test out her theory.

Keeping the bubble in place took a bit of her concentration and she was relieved that it only required a small trickle of her Power to keep it active after it was created.  Partitioning a part of her mind to enact the enchantment, Whisp was triply thankful for her increased Intelligence; this entire operation would’ve been next to impossible without it.  The way she needed to split her attention and focus on different things was something she thought was unbelievable – at least, it was before she figured out how after hours of trial-and-error.

Fusing together the wood and her “slider” bubble was tricky at first, as the nature of the air cushion made it want to slip away.  However, after a few minutes of intense concentration, she was able to pin it down and lock it into place along the bottom side of the board.  Stepping back from her creation, Whisp let all the power she was feeding into the bubble fade.

The board was floating an inch off the top of her work table and if it weren’t for the Air currents she could vaguely see when she focused underneath it, she would’ve said that it was floating on absolutely nothing.  She stepped back up to it and gently pushed the board to the side using just her finger…and it easily slid down the worktable at a slow pace with very little in the way of friction.

Whisp didn’t stop it when it fell off the edge of the worktable – she wanted to see what it would do.  Instead of floating down gently to land on the air cushion like she had expected, the board flipped end-over-end a few times before landing on its top.  When she walked over to pick it up, she had to reach near the floor to get underneath the bubble attached to the side now facing upwards.  Hmm…so falling off a cliff is a no-no.

She placed it on the floor and stood on top of it, testing to see if it could handle her weight.  It could – but it was also very slippery; she immediately fell off and landed on her butt as it flung out from under her feet, shooting toward the wall like a ballista bolt.  Rubbing her behind as she picked herself up, she saw that it rebounded quickly off of the wall at an angle, the air cushion preventing the board from being damaged.

Unfortunately, Brint had left sometime during the last few minutes to practice somewhere else, leaving Whisp alone to try to catch the board ricocheting around the room, bouncing off worktables, walls, and even the Molecular Converter before it slowed down enough for Whisp to catch it with another quick use of her Air Affinity, trapping it between two semi-solid walls of air.

Hmm…I think I have to rig up some sort of braking system for it…but I think this could work.  Sitting down at the drafting table that Milton had conscientiously created for her, she got to work on her blueprint.  She could use some drones that the Station Core normally allotted her for assembling most of the…Slider Wagons, she decided they were called…but there was still a lot of work for her to do for the enchanting.

Especially since Whisp wanted the “slider bubbles” to be a foot in height, allowing them better range of motion.  And she needed to make 50 of them to start out and apparently more were going to be needed in the future.

I think I need to train an apprentice or something.  Maybe Milton will let me do that after this.  She thought about asking now, but she realized it would take longer to train someone on how to do it than it would to just do it herself.  Although the long-term solution would be to find some help, this project needed to be done as soon as possible.

Whisp sighed at the upcoming sleepless night she was not looking forward to; it wasn’t the first and it wasn’t going to be the last, though.  At least I’m not missing out sleeping with Brint tonight.  I hope he’s safe.

“Ok, Milton, this is what I’m going to need…”

Chapter 6 – A whole new perspective

When The Milton had told him that he could have another ability, he was enthusiastic – until he had learned what it was.

“Self-levitation?  Is that the thing I saw…what’s his name…Verney?...doing the other day?  He was able to raise himself straight up into the air a couple of feet and then set himself down after a few seconds.  I wouldn’t really call that flying – more of an extended jump.  I can’t see how that would help.”

“It’s not for you, but for the Quagon sitting aboveground.  The weight from its armored scales makes it too heavy to take off from the ground by itself; as well, its lower Agility as a result of that weight means it can’t reach the speed it needs to properly lift off.  On top of that, it can’t flap its wings to generate lift.

“Your new Self-levitation ability would help generate a negative gravity field underneath the both of you when you’re riding it; if the ability works like I think it will, it’ll hopefully give you enough height that the Quagon could take it from there.  And unfortunately, I can’t give that Self-levitation ability to your new ride because non-sentient Combat Units aren’t able to improve their abilities like you and the other members of the Guild can.”

Brint had thought that was a big if.  “Wait, so you don’t know if this will work or not?” he had asked.  He hadn’t been sure he wanted an ability that probably wouldn’t be of much use if it didn’t work.

“Well…no, but I think it will.  Just trust me on this – it will be worth it.”

So, after subjecting himself to a few minutes in one of the Labs, Brint had miraculously acquired another ability.  Of course, he had no idea how it was supposed to work – it didn’t come with any instinctual instructions embedded in his mind.  He was forced to consult with Verney about how it worked, who had himself just been rebirthed the day before and was still adjusting to his smaller Power pool and lack of strength in his ability.

“Look, all I know is that I just think that I want to be a little higher off the ground, and the ability does its work for me.  When I was able to rise about a foot into the air, I gained a little more control over how fast I wanted to go up and down – otherwise, I would’ve shot straight up and down so quickly I probably would’ve hurt something,” Verney had told him, in what apparently was his normal gruff manner.  It wasn’t exactly rude, but it was abrupt and to the point.

He didn’t have any more advice than that, which wasn’t surprising; most people didn’t know how their abilities worked – only how they activated them.  Apparently, after a while it was so normal to them that it was almost automatic, and they barely thought about it; Brint didn’t necessarily have that kind of experience because his was something that came to him later in life and was already instinctual to him.

So he experimented at first with his new “Self-levitation” ability in Whisp’s Workshop.  The quick lesson Verney imparted had helped him, at least; after a few minutes of intense concentration with no result, he relaxed and just gently thought about rising off the ground – which worked wonders.  I’m floating!  This is amazing!  When he looked down, though, he was only about an inch off the floor.

At that, his concentration broke and he abruptly descended, landing unexpectedly and falling to his knees as he couldn’t catch his balance.  “Nice job, Brint – you’re sure to be flying soon,” Whisp had told him sarcastically, giggling cutely to take away any of the sting of the comment.

“Hey, I’m practically halfway there.  In fact, I don’t even know why I need to ride anything – I’ll be jumping above the trees in no time.”

Unfortunately, progress was slow on developing his new ability. The dungeon wasn’t quite ready to face any groups yet, so his plan to join one to improve his skill in combat was nixed before it could happen.  Therefore, Brint had to resort to improving it the time-tested, old-fashioned way: repetition and experimentation.

Fortunately, unlike most young adults who first discover their ability, he had a fairly large Power pool – and access to an unlimited supply of Power Potions.  Whereas Verney had told him that it had taken him almost a year to finally be able to reach a foot off the ground when he was younger, it took Brint only an hour.  And with achieving that rise of a foot, he indeed could start to alter the speed at which he rose and fell; he started to run around and add in the levitation so that it looked like he was jumping forward.  Eventually, he left the Workshop so that he could practice aboveground where he wouldn’t bump into anything.

Unfortunately, there was no part of the Self-levitation ability that propelled him forward.  Once he was in the air, he rapidly lost acceleration due to – as Whisp had called it – “air resistance”.  So, even if he was running at full speed with his Agility boosted, the levitation only carried his forward momentum so far before he slowed down to a stop.

And while he was in the air, there was nothing to push against; there was no resistance to his feet like Brint had seen Air Affinity-based Elemental Casters use to move effortlessly over the ground if they so chose.  When he floated, it was literally as if he was stuck trapped with no way to move.

The Milton told him that he needed to be able to generate a “negative gravity field” underneath him and the Quagon that was large enough for its rigid wings to catch enough air to lift it upwards into the sky.  Brint wasn’t exactly sure how this would work, but he was still willing to try.

So, after an exhaustive 12 hours of using his skill non-stop, popping Power Potion after Power Potion, he was finally able to reach a height of around 15 feet.  When his skill improved in the use of his Self-levitation, he was eventually able to “feel” how much Power was needed to activate and sustain the field; as a result, his efforts led to a reduction in the required amount as he streamlined his power use.  Unfortunately, the higher he went, the more Power it required to reach those heights.  In the end, maintaining 15 feet for more than 30 seconds was beyond even his ever-widening Power pool.

While he had been training his ability, Whisp had made a harness for the Quagon before working on her other project for Rosewyn.  The Milton suggested it because the Station Core said he didn’t want Brint to fall off the back of the massive flying beast within the first ten seconds.

Brint had readily agreed.

But when Whisp finished the harness only about an hour into his repetition and experimentation, she started working with wooden boards, after taking a brief nap – which made Brint a little envious.  By the time he had improved his Self-levitation enough aboveground, he was downright cranky from exhaustion and the need for sleep. Not even imbibing additional Power Potions could fully revive him.

That all changed as soon as he told The Milton he was ready to try things out with the Quagon.

“Try not to fall off, love.  I can’t imagine what being impaled by a tree at terminal velocity would feel like,” Whisp told Brint as she was showing him how to strap himself into the harness that stretched all the way around the ugly giant winged lizard.  Fortunately, it was easy enough to secure his legs into place by himself, leaving his upper body free to move around if he needed.  There was also a large handlebar in front of him with sturdy grips that he could hold onto if he had need.

Terminal velocity?  Whatever that means, it doesn’t sound good.  Before he could ask her about it, she gave him a quick kiss and then stepped back, joining the crowd of thousands of Guardian Guild members that had come to watch him fly.  The throng of people made him a little nervous; there was plenty of room in the large clearing around the dungeon because of the room they made for the Bearilla attack, but Brint was worried that the Quagon wouldn’t get high enough to clear the trees.  He could only imagine the embarrassment he would feel when he resurrected after getting smashed to a pulp in between the hulk of flesh underneath him and a tree.

Trying to appear more confident than he really was, Brint made sure his heavy brown leather cap was securely strapped around his head and over the delicate fins of his ears.  He followed that up with ensuring his leather jacket was fastened tight, his leather gloves were fitting well, and his leather pants were secured tightly to the harness.  All the leather was starting to make him hot, but when The Milton had gifted all of the peculiar clothes to him, he said it was necessary to keep him warm.  He wasn’t sure why it was going to get cold; he’d be closer to the sun, so wouldn’t it be hotter?

Lastly, Brint placed the strange-looking glasses over his eyes, securing them behind his head with a little bit of difficulty due to his thick gloves.  After a moment, however, he was ready – and it was do-or-die time.  Literally.

Before anything else happened, he used his Agility Boost – On touch ability to give the Quagon underneath him – who hadn’t reacted one bit to all the stuff going on around and to it – a surge of speed.  Drinking a quick Power Potion from the hundreds he had strapped to the harness and in a bag securely hooked to his back, Brint instructed the Quagon to start running.

At the moment, its wings were retracted; as it started to lumber forward and pick up speed, he was surprised at how fast it could actually move once it started going.  It looked like a bloated lizard that was incapable of reacting quickly; however, the bulging muscles underneath the scaly exterior were powerful enough to propel it quickly.  Brint hadn’t really seen it move much before this and he realized as it shot forward that the oversized, fat, bloated-looking appearance was all a façade – his Quagon was a beast full of restrained power.

While it wasn’t quite as fast or as smooth as his old Qwizard mounts while it was running, the Quagon’s sheer size meant that every step it took ate up the available space in the clearing in a flash.  Brint almost acted too late; the wall of trees ahead of him were approaching so fast that he wasn’t ready for it.  I wonder if I should’ve tried this out while we were standing still.

Luckily, the thought of impending death jolted him enough that he activated his Self-levitation ability just in time.  However, instead of a gradual rise of the height like he had planned, they instantly shot into the air 15 feet as if they had hit something.  Which also caused him to fall forward, smashing his face into the back of his ride; while still seeing stars in his vision, he physically felt the Quagon snap its wings open with a loud *thwap* and he suddenly found himself pressed against the back of the massive beast again, some sort of pressure keeping him there.

And then the pressure evaporated in an instant, and he felt himself falling backwards; with a frantic grab at the handlebar in front of him, Brint was able to prevent himself from flopping around as the wind buffeted him from the front.  He hunched down in his seat, letting the air flow mostly over his back instead of his chest and he felt a bit of the air pushing against him lessen.

It was only then that he felt relatively secure enough to look around.  To the front, beyond the massive head of the Quagon, was an endless expanse of sky and clouds; to the left and right of him, he saw the tops of the trees below him, though they were tilted at an angle.  He didn’t dare try to look backwards due to his still-precarious position, but he knew what he would find: the ground retreating rapidly behind him.

Finally, the pressure pushing at Brint eased even further and he felt rather than saw them level off…and then start to angle ever-so-slightly downward.  The wind still buffeted him, but it wasn’t as bad as the initial rise had been.  He was sitting about three-quarters of the way up his – flying! – mount, but he could still feel the muscles underneath its scaly skin move as its wings slightly flexed up and down, allowing it to generate enough lift to keep it steady in the air.

The Milton – along with Whisp, who had inexplicably gained a bit of knowledge of flight from somewhere – had warned him that the Quagon’s range of movement wasn’t near enough to get it off the ground, but it was just enough to keep it aloft once it was airborne.

Looking to the left and right, Brint could indeed see the wings slowly beating, though it wasn’t like the flapping his Birdalopes used to do; instead, they only moved up and down about a dozen feet from the stationary position.  It sounded like a lot, but considering the size of the entire beast, it was obvious that it was barely enough to keep it steady in the air.  As he looked down to see the sea of blues and purples marking the sea of trees ranging as far as the eye could see in every direction but the west (where he could see the start of the Kingdom border at the far reach of his vantage point), Brint realized something profound.

He was deathly afraid of heights.

Paralyzed in his seat, with his hands wrapped around the handlebars in front of him with a white-knuckled death-grip, his breathing stopped as the fright of being so far off the ground hit him for the first time.  Why did I agree to this?  Suddenly, the straps holding him to the harness seemed like the bare minimum of safety precautions.  What if they snap and I go plummeting to my death?  It was this last thought that actually comforted him enough that he started breathing again and relaxed his grip.

If I fall off and die – so what?  I’ll just resurrect back at the dungeon where I can see my love again.  It was amazing; knowing that death wasn’t the end – only an opportunity to try again – made almost anything bearable.  And, after a few minutes, Brint found that flying over two thousand feet above the treetops was enjoyable.

Actually, when he thought about it, it was both exhilarating and freeing.

No longer restrained by traveling along the ground and running the risk of coming up against dangerous beasts in the forest, Brint started to feel like the world was opening up beneath him.  He could go anywhere, do anything; boundaries were a thing of the past.

Looking off to the east, he could see the outline of the Quizard Mountains in the distance.  Looking at them from that height, though, made them look small; it was hard to tell from that distance, but it appeared as if he and his Quagon could fly right over them.  And that also made him curious as to whether there was anything on the other side.

Unfortunately, he couldn’t sate his curiosity at the moment.  The delay in his start because of his training up his new ability meant that he needed to head north as fast as he could; they all needed information on the whereabouts of the Quizard Mountain army – and they needed it now.

They were traveling at a good pace, but from looking at the trees going by beneath them, Brint determined that he could’ve made better time traveling on his old land-bound mount.  Can this thing go any faster?  He put the order to go faster into the Quagon’s mind and he immediately had to hold onto the handlebars again as his mount started to dive, angling downwards so quickly that he thought that they were going to crash right into the trees below.

But he let his ride have its head, as he suspected – and hoped – that it wasn’t suicidal, and this was how it was designed to travel faster.  And it was – faster, at least.  Not to mention frightening as the trees flew by so fast that they looked like a blur below him.

At about 100 feet above the tops of the trees, the Quagon started to level out, and Brint felt like he was being pushed down against the back of the beast.  He actually had to boost his Constitution so that it didn’t feel like his insides were going to be squished out of the holes in his body.  The muscles of the flying lizard beneath him strained at the pressure as well, but within moments they were rising back into the sky, reaching around the same height or higher as they had before.

As soon as they leveled out, Brint looked down and behind them; from a taller tree he had seen before the dive he used as a point of reference, he guesstimated that they had covered almost a mile in less than 30 seconds.  Now that is impressive.

Before he could do anything else, the Quagon dove again – starting the cycle that would continue for the next couple of hours.

Chapter 7 – Greycer

Milton’s drones had finished with the cleanup outside the dungeon and were currently working to get each part of the dungeon back up and running.  There were many more Guild members that had an NCU now, and most of them were eager to improve themselves through combat; on the flip side, there were hundreds of non-combat members like Inventors and Nature Manipulators who originally weren’t part of the Guild to fight, but who wanted to contribute through more “civilian” roles.

He didn’t want those with very few combat abilities to possibly handicap a strong group running through the dungeon in order to gain “experience” – there had to be another way they could improve without participating through combat.  It was obvious from the way Brint had had to slowly improve his skill in Self-Levitation that they needed another way to go about it; the only way he was successful after half a day was the fact that he already had a large Power pool to work with.  To someone starting out from scratch with that same or similar ability, it would take much longer.

It was something that he needed to consider and gather some more information about before he did anything, however.  Besides, he had something else on his plate at the moment: more Rosewyn requests.

When he was finally informed about the plan pertaining to the Kingdom, Milton had been skeptical.  However, he wasn’t an expert on business and/or social economics, so he went with it because he didn’t have any better option.  Although it didn’t really cost him much as far as resources went, the time spent on the entire operation was valuable; he hoped it worked, because he really needed the resources they could provide – not to mention the “manpower”.

Everyone already had a job to do; they either were going to actively get stronger by running through the dungeon constantly, going to the Kingdom on runs to secretly bring back more metal, watching the numerous children in The Refuge, or taking care of the logistics involved with ensuring everyone had what they needed.  With so many more of the Proctans with an NCU – more than half of those who had come to The Refuge had them now – the pool of people available for specific tasks that always seemed to spring up was shrinking.  Even the 50 volunteers that Rosewyn recruited took a bite out of that total.

What he needed was a ready supply of individuals that he could mold into a specific specialization.  Currently, almost everyone that had participated in the NCU “program” were left to their own devices as far as choosing their own additional abilities.  This led to a mishmash of different fighting styles that didn’t always mesh well with others in the group, but most of them made it work anyways.

However, Milton envisioned eventually having an initial set list of abilities that complemented each other, either by making it a requirement when first brought on board, or just a recommendation to make it easier.  He didn’t feel right about dictating what people could and couldn’t choose to select for themselves; games with a vast array of “character customization” choices always felt much better than ones with cookie-cutter classes.  When someone’s gear they were wearing was more important than their skill, it made the entire game more…mundane and boring.  Combining peculiar classes and specializations together to come up with something exciting and effective was more fulfilling to him.

But that didn’t mean that everyone knew what was best for them.  Most just lacked the knowledge, and others made poor decisions; although they could “reset” if they didn’t like what they had chosen, they didn’t have time for that.  He needed even more people going through his dungeon and getting more powerful before there wasn’t a Kingdom to protect.

It was something he would consult with his friends before he made any decisions in that regard, since they had a better understanding of how that would go over.  It was a moot point, anyway, unless the volunteers were successful in their endeavors.

Which brought Milton to the Biological Recombinator.  This time, instead of a massive Dragon, he was back to manipulating one of his original (and had to admit, his favorite – as he was fond of dogs) Combat Units: the Greywiener.  But not a regular-sized dog; no, he needed one that someone could ride and also pull a wagon.  So, like one the size of a small elephant – but faster.  Much faster.  And one that was apparently adorable.

First, he started with the Greywiener as the base specimen, and as usual added Proctan DNA to the mix to increase what he had to work with.  After that, he added in the Quizard and a Jackalope for an extra boost of speed; a Big Yellow Bird for lighter-weight bones to reduce its weight so it could travel even faster; a Blood-thirsty Squirrel for a “cute” bushy tail; and finally an Elephine for the boost in size and for the extra strength to carry a rider and pull a wagon at the same time.  The Elephine also helped to reinforce the lightweight bones so that they wouldn’t snap every time it moved.

And fortunately, he had more than enough Trait points to accomplish all of that because of all of the “negative” traits he added.  Similar to his Wienerpups from the fifth room in his dungeon that charmed unwary visitors, they had blunted teeth, extra-soft fur that contributed very little to defense, and stunted claws – essentially, they had no attacking abilities other than trampling someone to death.  The only thing it had going for it was that it was fast, and its body was tough, which led to a strong defense – just no offense.

Almost 45 minutes later, and 15,000 Bio Units spent, the first Greycer[12] plopped out from his Upgraded Bioconversion Lab – it was so large that it wasn’t able to be created in a normal Lab.  When it was dried off and fed from a nearby Molecular Converter, Milton immediately brought it aboveground and tested its quickness by sending it over to The Refuge as fast as it could go.

It definitely held up to the name he had assigned it; the “Grey Racer” was so fast that it was literally a blur when he tried to track it.  Back on Earth, he had remembered seeing a rabbit in his neighborhood while he was walking home from school; when it saw him, it took off like a rocket and was out of sight behind another house before he barely registered it was there.  This was like that, except that this was like if that rabbit had actual rocket boosters attached to it.

“Rosewyn, please come out from The Refuge – I have a delivery for you.”

Milton spoke directly to her, since down in their residence there weren’t many sensor orbs to relay his voice.  “Sure, sure – I’ll be right up.”  Most of the Guild was resting comfortably in The Refuge ever since the battle; he hadn’t opened up the dungeon yet, since he was still actively “respawning” those that had perished.  Based upon the speed of the resurrections, it was still going to take another 10 or 11 hours to finish bringing everyone back.

He distantly thought about adding more Bioconversion Labs to speed the process up, but he would rather spend the very recent shipment of metal resources on what he needed to fully equip the dungeon (and the extra individual rooms) again.  It was only a matter of time before the respawning finished and having more rooms for everyone to participate in their training was more important.  With all the additional NCU recruits, he wanted to ensure that wait times to run through a room (or rooms) was at a minimum.

Besides, this way everyone had a chance to recover after the horrific, destructive battle they just went through.

Milton’s new Greycer Combat Unit had drawn an audience by the time Rosewyn – and Moxwell – finally arrived and had to push through the crowd to get a good look at what she had asked him to create.  He had to admit that he felt a bit of pride at seeing the same look of dreaminess on her face that was reflected on everyone else’s.  Even Moxwell, who had essentially been immune to his first look at the Wienerpups inside the dungeon, appeared to want to just give in and snuggle up to the adorable beast sitting down in front of the ever-growing crowd.  Milton suspected that it was only an innate wariness of the dangerousness of large beasts that prevented the Greycer from being “dog-piled”.

“Oh my Goddess, Milton – it’s beautiful,” Rosewyn whispered, her attention wandering as she stared at it.  She shook her head a few times as if to clear it, before she asked, “How did you…?  Never mind, I don’t need the details.  It’s definitely even more adorable than I had imagined; more importantly, though, is it fast?”

Just then, Whisp came running up, out of breath after sprinting from her Workshop carrying a bundle of grey-colored leather – a near-perfect match for the coloring of the Greycer.  She had finished her project only minutes before, with approximate measurements that Milton had given her during the Recombination process.

She bent over double with her hands on her knees, gulping in her breaths as she slowly recovered.  “I…have the harness…here…it’s adjustable…so hopefully…it fits—” she said between breaths, before she stood up and finally caught sight of Milton’s creation.

He couldn’t blame her reaction – he had designed it that way, after all.  From head to its long, upwardly curved bushy tail, the Greycer was covered in luxurious, invitingly soft grey fur; each of its powerful legs were shaped like a rabbit’s, and its long floppy ears looked to Milton like a cross between a dog’s and a rabbit’s as well; the oversized eyes were so large and wide that it reminded him of an anime – they were only missing a sparkle to them to complete the effect; the massive paws were essentially de-clawed, though their pads were reinforced and rough to aid in getting a grip on the ground while it traveled; a long, dark-pink tongue was hanging out of its open mouth, showing off its nearly blunt teeth.  They weren’t completely harmless, because it was still a carnivore and needed to be able to rip apart and chew its food – though he doubted they would do much against an attacker.

Added to all of that, it was nearly 20 feet long and 10 feet tall to the top of its head when it stood up.  Its long “wiener dog” torso looked capable of holding five or six people, though the harness Whisp had designed was only for one.

“Milton, you really outdid yourself here.  If I didn’t already have Fluffy, I would so take one of those,” ALANNA butted in on his thoughts.  He took a look at her inside the Core Room and he saw her with an almost identical expression of wide-eyed attraction that those aboveground were exhibiting.  I guess I did good.

“I could always make you a puppy of this one, and then you could have two – though it would probably still be much larger than your current size,” he offered her.

“Oooh, I would LOVE that! Do it, do it, do it!” she squealed in joy.

“Let me finish up with this first, and then I promise I’ll make you one.”  Anything to keep her happy and giving relevant advice without the commentary.

Meanwhile, Whisp and Rosewyn had recovered enough from the sight of the Greycer to work on securing the harness the Inventor had created, tightening its adjustable straps so that it was placed near the front of its torso.  Other belts and loops were hanging loosely near where the seat was placed that reminded Milton of the harness that she had made for the Quagon.

“Ok, who wants to try it out?  If what Milton told me was true, it’s very, very fast; I have these straps here to literally hold you onto the…what did you call this adorable creature?”

“It’s a Greycer.  Short for grey racer, and, indeed, it is even faster than I had expected it to be.”

“Well, then, who is ready to try riding the Greycer?” Whisp asked again.

Unsurprisingly, everyone wanted to be the first, if only so they could get closer to the massive beast; now that it didn’t appear threatening, many in the crowd wanted to touch it to feel the velvety softness of its fur.  Moxwell and a few of the other Physical Augmenters had to create a perimeter surrounding the Greycer so that it wouldn’t get overwhelmed.

Rosewyn used her seniority to go first, which didn’t surprise Milton; it was actually the best choice because nobody expected anything different.  Although there wasn’t necessarily the same sort of social hierarchies as there had been when everyone was judged solely on their Power Ranking, she was still known to be one of the most powerful Proctans to have ever lived (even if some of the others who had been progressing through his dungeon were near or beyond her current Ranking).  Therefore, it was only right in their minds that she went first – and Milton only thought it was fitting since she had “commissioned” his creation in the first place.

Since the Greycer was lying calmly down on the ground, Rosewyn was easily able to vault herself into the harness, where she immediately started to strap herself into it with some advice from Whisp.  She waved off help because – as she said – she wanted to make sure those riding on the creature by themselves could easily do it themselves without difficulty.

Around two minutes later and a multitude of straps holding her onto Milton’s awesome ball of fluffy adorableness, she was ready to go.

“You’ve never traveled this fast before, so let me give you some advice.  When the Greycer starts moving, keep yourself lying as flat against its back as possible.  And don’t lift your head up – or the whiplash you’d experience might snap your neck.  Overall, though – have fun!”

Milton felt like a carnie operating an unsafe ride; the worry that suffused Rosewyn’s face when he warned her about snapping her neck almost made him feel sorry for her.  Almost.  As it was, he was envious of her; although he could “ride along” with her or the Greycer, it wasn’t the same as doing it in his own body.

After instructing the large dog/rabbit/squirrel/bird/lizard/elephant hybrid to get to its feet, he warned Rosewyn again privately to keep her head down initially and to hold on very tight to the grips provided for her.  Her hands were white-knuckled as they gripped even tighter, a bit of fear now showing in her face.  She opened her mouth to speak – which Milton assumed was to get off the ride before it started – but it was too late.

He wasn’t sure how it was able to accelerate so fast from a stationary position; regardless, it went from all-stop to full-speed in what appeared to be less than a second.  It raced and dodged though the trees with amazing alacrity, bounding across the forest floor so quickly it almost appeared not to touch the ground as it passed by.  Milton had trouble following it with his sensor orb he had flying above it, so he switched to the Greycer’s perspective – which was an immersive experience in itself.

Making a loop to the entrance to his dungeon and back to The Refuge, they arrived only a little more than a minute later.  Since the distance between the two was approximately a mile apart, the Greycer had to have traveled at least 120 miles per hour – all while dodging trees!  Milton could only imagine how much faster it would be when it had open country to travel across.

Rosewyn was breathing heavily by the time the Greycer slowed down and came to a stop near the crowd; she was still lying along its back and hadn’t released her intense grip – but she was smiling.  The Greycer, on the other hand, barely seemed to be winded from the quick sprint.

Moxwell came over to help her unstrap from the harness, because her fingers were stiff and shaking a little from the experience.  The rest of the crowd took advantage to tentatively touch and get closer to the behemoth-sized dog, staying away from its head but petting and rubbing everything else.  Some even went so far as to snuggle up against its fur, smiling as they luxuriated in the pure softness of it.

Once she got free, Rosewyn stood on shaky legs and had to hold onto her husband for a few seconds before she recovered; however, she never stopped smiling.  “Milton, that was unbelievable – we were going so fast I thought we were going to crash into a tree.  This is beyond what I was expecting, and I think it will be perfect for the plan.  Just one thing, though.”

“And what is that?”

Looking back at the crowd now doing their best to swarm the adorable creature, she said, “There is no way my people will be able to leave a village unless they have something to distract the villagers.  Can you make some baby Greycers to give away?”

I wonder if she’s been talking with ALANNA?

Chapter 8 – A serious talk

In order to ensure the creation of the 49 additional Greycers that Rosewyn requested for the volunteers didn’t take days, Milton spent a portion of the recent BMU shipment from the Kingdom to construct another Upgraded Bioconversion Lab to speed up production.  If everything went well with the plan, he knew that he was going to have to make more of them in the future anyway – so he’d rather have another one in place now.  As for the “baby Greycers”, the puppies were small enough that he could spit them out of a Molecular Converter and only cost 300 Bio Units a piece.

They were still large-ish as far as puppies went, but that made sense when considering how massive they were when they grew up.  He didn’t put any restrictions on their growth; just the opposite – Milton sped it up just enough that he was fairly confident that they wouldn’t run into the same problem he had with some of his “bosses” earlier.  He didn’t want them to grow old and die within a week.  Of course, now that he had access to his Upgraded Bio Lab, he didn’t have to worry about that as much.

By his estimation, the Greycer Puppies would grow to a full-size adult within a month or so.  If Rosewyn was indeed planning on giving them away as gifts – or bribes – then he was hoping that those who received them knew exactly how much food that they were going to end up needing to eat.  Which turned out to be a lot, as after it expended a lot of energy running around, his first Greycer had needed to eat already to replenish its strength.  It wasn’t like a whole Picow or anything, but it was nearly as much or more than some of the more-powerful Guild members ate.

One thing Milton did learn was that its diet could be supplemented by vegetation; as the Greycer had been resting aboveground and ignoring the visitors who still came by to visit (which were becoming less and less frequent as they got used to it), it had started eating the sparse grass and leaves on the ground around The Refuge.  I guess that makes it an omnivore – which shouldn’t surprise me because it had some squirrel and rabbit in its make-up.

So, while additional Greycers were created and Whisp finished up making the “Slider Wagons” – as she decided to call them – Brint had left earlier on his maiden voyage on his Quagon.  The resurrection of everyone who had fallen in the battle from almost 24 hours ago was due to be finished in just under two hours, and the dungeon was as ready as it could be for the initial groups who were chomping at the bit to get in.  Which he could understand – seeing how ineffectual many of their attacks were against the Bearillas, they wanted to “power-level” so that they could face them without being completely overrun.

Milton’s drones had time to kill – so to say – while things were finishing up with the Labs, so he had them work on creating even more room replicas spread out further into the forest.  It had originally been a crazy rush when the Guild first came to get more space available for everyone to train; what ended up happening was random rooms getting so spread out and haphazard that nothing made any sense where it was located.  He wished he could just wipe the slate clean and start again with all of the additional training areas, but it would take too much time – which was something they didn’t have enough of.

“Why can’t you build these rooms aboveground?  Why does it need to be underground?  Your main defenses need to stay where they are and you are much safer where you are, but there’s no reason everything needs to be down below,” ALANNA finally asked him, as he was scrambling to find another space to fit in another room without venturing miles out of the way.

“Because we still need to hide.  Putting anything outside would be like flashing a beacon across the sky and saying, ‘Here I am – kill me now!’,” Milton told her.

“And seeing the giant holes all over the ground isn’t obvious?  I think there is less of a threat coming from the Kingdom now – and you haven’t seen any sign of anything coming out of the mountains near here.  Even if they did, I don’t think hiding underground is going to prevent them from finding this place.”

Good point.  And it’s not like I’m bringing my Core up there, so there’s no danger to me.  In fact, if I have my drones color the outside of any structures that I build to look like the trees nearby, it might also help to camouflage the giant clearing around my dungeon entrance…

A thought popped into Milton’s mind that hadn’t occurred to him before then.  “You could be right about that – I might just do that.  There is something else that I wanted to know, however.”

“If you’re going to ask me why I’m not urging you to connect with this other Station Core because we’re all supposed to be on the same side, let me stop you right there.  And before you ask how I knew you were going to ask that, you weren’t shielding your thoughts very well.” ALANNA rolled her eyes at him, as if saying he should’ve known that already.

“Anyway, the idea had crossed my mind, but upon further evaluation of its actions, I believe that there is something extraordinarily wrong with it.  There is no logical reason for what it’s been doing that I could see; all signs point to some fundamental flaw in it somewhere.  What exactly that it is, I could only speculate at this point.  Regardless of what the issue is, however, it needs to be stopped before it sends anything to hunt you down.”

“Don’t you mean the Proctans?  They are in more danger than I am right now,” he asked, confused.

“No, I mean you.  I want you to do everything you can to save them, because they are ultimately helping you get to your ultimate long-term goal here; in the end though, saving them all right now isn’t as important.”

Current Long-term Goal: Goodbye Planet, Hello Collective

-         Gather Units of Tritanium – Current: 51/900

-         Greatly Repair (72) your Reactor Power and Structural Integrity – Current: RP – 50/72, SI – 50/72

-         Achieve Reactor Output of at least 63% – Current: 85%

-         Create Space-worthy Vehicle to Transport Station Core – 0/1

Difficulty of Goal: Nightmare-inducing

Timeframe: None

Rewards: Leave Current Planet

The notification popped up as soon as she mentioned it, which made him see that even his long-term goal was positively affected by his bonus 10% reduction in his needed goals.  He hadn’t really looked at it lately, since it was so far out of the realm of completion that it was almost forgotten.  It was nice to see that he was making some progress, but he didn’t want that to distract him.

“Yes, ALANNA, I know what the ultimate goal is, but that doesn’t mean that I can just sit by and let this other Station Core kill everyone!”

She shook her head like he just wasn’t understanding.  “That’s not what I said.  I said right now.  Quite the distinction.  Based upon what I’ve seen, even if you had another year or two before the mass of creatures under the control of this rogue Core surged out and attacked, they would swarm over everything before you could stop them.  Hold on, I’m not finished,” she said when he was about to refute that.

“As much as I think you’ll do everything in your power to prevent it, there are too many of them.  Do you remember the approximate statistics of that Elite Bearilla…I still think you could’ve thought up a better name than that…you were barely able to kill?[13]  If I remember correctly, it said that that creature was 112 years old!  Granted, it was an approximate age, but it was probably accurate to within a couple of years.  I’ve spent a bit of my time lately replaying the feed from Brint that he showed us from that massive cavern; that ‘Elite’ – if you persist in calling it that – was one of many that I saw down there.  Not only that, but it looked like it was one of the youngest and smallest of the Elites that I saw down there.  And if I’m not mistaken, there were larger, stronger, and different-looking ones compared to those similar to the one you killed.”

That’s not surprising – I knew there would be stronger enemies down there.  “Ok…what are you getting at, then?”

She rolled her eyes again at him and he was starting to get annoyed – not necessarily at her, though.  What am I missing?  Is it that obvious?  “Let me spell it out for you, plainly, then.  If you assume that age has something to do with how powerful they are – which is a good assumption when you look at the ages of the original Bearilla who attacked you and the others from yesterday – then how old do you think those stronger and older Bearillas are that were seen underground?”

“Well, they would be older, of course.  What are you getting at?”

“What I’m trying to tell you is that it is possible that this rogue Station Core has been here for a lot longer than you have.  And not like a century or two – I’m talking possibly a thousand years or more.”

A thousand years?  That doesn’t seem possible.

“Oh, it’s more than possible, if not at the same time nearly impossible.  If it had been blown away from The Collective’s ships at a greater velocity, it would’ve reached here much sooner than you.  What’s nearly impossible is the fact that you both arrived at the same planet a thousand years apart – do I have to tell you how big outer space is?  From some calculations I performed, the chance that you both followed the exact same heading, hit this planet – which isn’t stationary in its rotation around the sun by the way, and so far apart in time is so small that it is statistically impossible.”

“So you’re saying that it might not be chance that brought us both here.  What’s going on then?” Milton asked, even more confused than before.

“I have no idea.  Doesn’t matter right now, though, because whatever did happen means nothing other than the fact that this other Core here has had anywhere between five to ten times longer to prepare its armies than the time that you’ve even been here.  You probably haven’t even seen all that it has to throw at you yet.  What I’m saying is that you have no chance in succeeding in what you’re doing right now.”

Now he was angry – there was no way he was just going to give up on these Proctans; he didn’t care if it killed him, he would do everything he could to save them.  “What do you expect me to do?  Just seal myself off and tell them all ‘Good luck, I’m out’?  I won’t abandon them like that, and I can’t believe you would suggest such a thing!”

“Again, I never said anything like that – stop getting your panties in a bunch, pussy,” she responded with a sad smile, as some of the old ALANNA came out.  Strangely enough, her ridicule actually calmed him down a little.

When he was able to talk again without yelling at her, he asked, “Well then, what should I do?”

“I don’t have all the answers for you, Milton.  I know you better than you probably know yourself, and I’ve seen some of the memories that have leaked out of your life back on Earth – including your experience with the ‘video games’ you used to play.  I know you enjoy the challenge of overcoming impossible odds by figuring it out by yourself – but I would still tell you the solution if I knew what it was.  The only thing I can do is remind you that there’s always a way to win – you just have to find it.”

What the heck does that mean?  I wonder if over time the AI starts to go crazy, and that’s what happened to the rogue Station Core; I hope that’s not what’s happening to ALANNA.  He made sure to hide all those thoughts that time, as ALANNA was finally becoming an asset instead of a pain in his butt.

“There’s always a way to win.”  Something in that phrase tickled something in his memories, but he couldn’t hold onto it long enough to make sense.  Instead, it sat at the back of his thoughts like a tiny pebble in his snow boot while walking in the middle of a freezing snowstorm; he could feel it there, but it wasn’t worth giving his foot frostbite by exposing it to the elements to get rid of it.  Eventually, though, he would be able to worry at it when he got to where he was going.

Which was a destination that was now slightly unfocused after his conversation with ALANNA.  When he honestly thought about it, he could see the futility of it all; however, he wasn’t going to let it stop him from trying his best.  For the moment, that was all he could do.  Until another solution popped up, he would continue to strive to make the Proctans as powerful as they could be and provide the defenses they would need to survive against the coming hordes.  Hopefully.

Almost as if the thought of those hordes had summoned them, a prod by Brint let him know that he was getting near where he saw the northern army before.  Milton was a little amazed, but thankful, that his communication range extended so far and would probably reach even farther as he didn’t feel any strain in it.  He quickly made a general announcement throughout The Refuge to gather near one of the two Access Terminals, as he wanted them all to see the “scouting report”.  There was no point in keeping it a secret, and it was better that everyone was on the same page without hearsay and confusion breeding misinformation.

Unfortunately, the terminals weren’t exactly theater screens, so it was hard for many of the people to see; nevertheless, an enterprising young lady did what she could to at least project the sound coming from it using her Air Affinity to those within the Cafeteria, where most of them were gathering to watch.

Crowds were still trickling in to watch, but Milton didn’t wait anymore – he projected what Brint was sending him.

Chapter 9 – Scouting report

Rosewyn joined the rest of the crowd in watching the view from atop of the Quagon that Brint was riding.  It was a little disorienting at first, as the vantage point was awkward; she had never been higher than the buildings inside Grestwinch, which were admittedly tall, but the view she was seeing had to be over a thousand feet above the treetops.  As the “feed” – which was what Milton told them they were going to watch – got closer to the area that was being cleared of trees in a wide line, she had to refocus as she got a better frame of reference.

Brint and his Quagon had to be at least three to four thousand feet above the surface.

Reaching off to what she assumed was the east based on the mountain range she could see in the distance, a great scar in the forest was visible as Brint leaned over the side of the flying beast.  Out of the corner of his view, she could see that the wings of the Quagon were extended, flapping slowly to keep it steadily gliding along through the air.

That thing is amazing; I thought the Greycer that Milton made was the most wonderful thing he had ever created, but now I’m not so sure.  It might be ugly, but to be able to fly!  That’s amazing.  The ride was steady enough that the perspective wasn’t bouncing around, though she could hear the wind rushing past.

“The Milton told me that you are all watching and can see what I can see, so I’ll try to tell you what I’m looking at,” Brint’s voice broke in hesitatingly and softly. Even though he was so high up in the air, he was wisely keeping the noise he made to a minimum; it was only because he was the focus of the view that his audience was able to hear him.  “After about four hours of…uh, exhilarating flight, we’re here at the place where I had seen the army of Bearillas and Quizards destroying the forest in a large swath for some reason.”

She couldn’t see anything clear down below, until his vision suddenly sharpened and seemed to zoom toward the ground.  “Sorry, I forgot to boost my vision a little – that should be a little better.  Anyway, it’s hard to tell because this point-of-view is quite different from where I first saw them on the ground, but it appears that they haven’t made much progress for some reason.”

Rosewyn clearly saw the ground below as Brint and his flying beast seemed to gently drift overhead.  What Brint had originally described when he had first seen it days ago as just a large clearing was now stretching all the way to the east, ending next to what she assumed were the mountains.  All along the pathway leading east, she could see it dotted with piles of trees every two or three hundred feet; there weren’t even any stumps either, as they hadn’t cut them but uprooted the entire tree as one.  The only thing visible along the cleared section were dirt-filled holes where the trees used to stand.

“As you can see, what I had originally assumed was a large clearing is actually a large stretch of cleared land, going all the way—” the perspective changed as Brint focused into the distance— “to the mountains to the east.  I’m not sure what the purpose is, but the fact that they haven’t seemed to have moved much over the last couple of days might be a good sign.”

The view changed again as it focused on the ground directly below, where Rosewyn could see a large group of what she assumed were Bearillas by their size, accompanied by a swarm of hundreds of smaller Quizards.  It was strange looking at them from a bird’s-eye-view, but the more she looked she was able to make out more details.

There were nearly a hundred of the Bearillas just standing around; it appeared that they weren’t doing anything to actively continue the pathway they were creating.  In fact, the only thing she could see them doing was grabbing a random giant lizard and biting their heads off before consuming the rest of them, along with idly flinging small uprooted trees around at each other.  She was confused at first, but she thought she understood why at the same time as Brint.

“It appears they are just milling around without doing anything.  I don’t know why that would be…ah, I don’t see any of those bigger, stronger ones around.  I wonder if the one that came after me was the leader…or something like that?  Maybe we just completely stopped their advance here and we have nothing to worry—never mind, spoke too soon.”

Racing down the pathway they had cleared was another large group of Bearillas led by another one of its older, grizzled brethren.  Within moments, it had reached the original group and immediately roared at them, so loud that Brint could hear it clearly even so far up in the air.  It was so powerful that Rosewyn saw the perspective he was displaying jump around a bit as he was startled and let go of the handle that he was gripping onto to lean over.  Fortunately, he was strapped into the harness and didn’t fall, but it took a few moments for him to recover.

“Sorry about that, that shook me up a little.  Ah, now you can plainly see them going back to work.  See there, they are working in teams to shake the trees – breaking their roots – before ripping them out and throwing them on the big pile behind them,” Brint recovered bravely, though he shakily reported what was obvious to see beneath them.

Flauren was sitting next to Rosewyn and Moxwell, and she whispered to them so that she wouldn’t disturb everyone else watching the view.  Which was good, because what she said might’ve thrown everyone into a panic.  “From my estimations, based on what I could see of the land around where that young man is flying, as well as the speed at which they are ripping those trees out, I would put their arrival at the northern border of the Kingdom in as little as two weeks – three weeks if we’re lucky.”

Two weeks.  That’s not nearly enough time – we’re not ready yet.

Brint continued to circle the location where the Bearillas were ripping out the trees for another ten minutes or so, but there wasn’t really anything new to see.  Looking around, Rosewyn could tell that the progress the massive creatures were making was demoralizing to the entire crowd watching; it was with some relief when the perspective soon changed.

She could see Brint look up again, turning his flying mount around so that it was headed in a different direction.  “Alright, everybody – The Milton has asked me to scout around down south to make sure there aren’t any other, uh, ‘incursions’ that I missed.  It will probably take a while, so I’ll let him know if I find anything…thanks for watching.”  And with that, the “feed” was cut, bringing up the normal screen her people used to get food from the Cafeteria Access Terminal.

The murmurings started low throughout the room, but with everyone crowded so close together, the noise level soon became unbearable.  They needed to figure out what the plan was now that they could see what they were up against – and hopefully before everyone started to panic.

Looking toward Flauren, she motioned with her head that she should come with them as they headed for the door.  Along the way, she found Gereld and Karn, who were doing their best to calm a few panicked Guild members.

“But my parents live up in Northside, right in the path of those monsters!  I need to warn them!”

“We need to do something about them now, before they get any closer!”

Gereld put his hands out to stop their protestations and spoke to them gentler than she had ever heard him before.  “I’m well aware of the danger they are facing.  Now that we have a better idea of what’s going on, we can make plans to fight them.  Please be patient while we figure out the best way to do it.  And don’t run off on your own – we are a Guild and we ACT as a Guild.”

Gereld saw her looking at him and excused himself and Karn, pleading that he needed to plan out the best way to defend against what they had seen.  Everyone was silent until they walked down the far side stairwell, where they eventually came to one of the smaller meeting rooms on the 12th floor of The Refuge.  They needed some peace and quiet to discuss the problem at hand, and that was the best way to go about it.

Fortunately, there was one of Milton’s sensor orbs inside the room and he was able to join their discussion, which he did as soon as they had all settled.

“Well, you’ve all seen the danger we’re up against.  Thoughts?”

Although she was used to being the one with the greater authority due to her historically greater Power Ranking, she knew the protocol here; although they were heavily relying on Milton for a lot of things, they were still the Guardian Guild – and she wasn’t the leader.

“Even if we are able to reach them in time, I can’t see any way we can fight them and kill them.  We barely survived last time against a quarter of their numbers – and that was with the help of The Fortress.  And who knows if they will get reinforcements by that time, either.  Regardless, we have to do something to either stop them or slow them down.  Any news on how soon we can expect some help from the Kingdom, Rosewyn?” Gereld started off the meeting on a down note.

“From what Milton has told me, we should be ready to go in around 5 hours or so when the Greycers and ‘Slider Wagons’ Whisp is building are done.  I could send a few now with what is already available, but I want to wait until my volunteers have had enough practice with their new abilities before I send them off.  Nevertheless, even if I sent them right now, it wouldn’t matter – we won’t see any significant progress with the Kingdom for another month or so, possibly earlier.  But not in time to lend aid for this group heading for the northern border,” she told everyone.

Flauren spoke up, confirming what she had previously whispered to Rosewyn and Moxwell.  “Yes, like I told Rosewyn earlier, I don’t think we have more than three weeks until they arrive at the northern part of the Kingdom if they keep on like they’ve been doing.  However, two weeks is probably a safe deadline to stop them by.”

“Let’s just head up north and crush them!  We have the numbers, and with another week to train we can all become much stronger.  There is no way we can just let them walk into our Kingdom with impunity!” Karn spoke up, his usual cautiousness she knew from him eroded away from the stress of the last few days.

Her husband attempted to temper Karn’s anxiousness.  “While I agree with Karn in principle, I don’t believe that it will be that easy.  I’ve fought one of those Bearillas when I was at my top condition, and even then, I got my ass handed to me.  If we all go up there without some sort of plan or defensive fortification like The Fortress, I doubt we’ll survive long enough to wipe them out.  I have no doubt we could take out quite a few, but not all; by the time we were all resurrected and got back to them, they’d be in the Kingdom anyways.  With fewer numbers, probably, but still free to destroy everything in their path.”

Karn appeared to think this over and some of his former thoughtful preparation started to come back.  “Ok, I admit that running up there and taking our chances against them probably isn’t the best idea without a plan, but what else can we do.”

Rosewyn had a thought.  “What if we don’t have to kill them right now?  What if we can divert them for a while until we are more prepared?”

“How do you mean?” Gereld asked, intrigued.

“Well, what if we had some of Milton’s creatures run up there and distract them; it was obvious that Brint’s original appearance up there caused a good portion of those clearing the forest to chase him.  I believe our Greycers are faster even than those monsters – if they ran near them and led them away, it would hopefully delay them enough that we can get some sort of better defense set up.”

“That’s a good idea, but it doesn’t solve the main problem.  I agree that it is something we should consider in our plans; however, it does nothing to eliminate the overall threat.  Any other ideas?”  The Guild leader looked around at those assembled, but no one seemed to have anything to add.  It was finally Flauren that tentatively asked the sensor orb floating above the table a question.

“Milton…I’m sure I’ve only seen a portion of what you are capable of…so I could be completely wrong.  I was wondering if you had any special…‘technology’…to maybe wipe out the threat at its source?”

What does she mean by that?  Milton was uncharacteristically silent for a few moments, before he answered in what sounded like a carefully composed admittance.

“I had thought about that as soon as I had seen the monstrous horde underneath the mountains.  I do indeed have some things that might do the trick, but each one has its dangers and would be highly unpredictable.  There is no precise way to accomplish it without possibly making the situation worse, so I had abandoned that train of thought almost as soon as it occurred to me.  And after learning some other information, some other avenues of possible genocide are no longer viable.”

“What kind of dangers are you talking about?  And how could the situation be worse than it is now?” Flauren asked, following up with her inquiry now that Milton had admitted to being able to put a stop to things.

“Well, using a certain technology, I could probably figure out how to make a bomb that, if delivered down to that massive cavern, could cause an explosion that would destroy a great portion of everything down there.  However, because I don’t know exactly how large the cavern is, it might not kill everything; I am willing to bet that whatever is left would swarm out and indiscriminately kill everything in their path.

“The only thing saving us from that fate right now is their strangely methodical destruction of the forest for some reason, though it is possible that they are just making a clear path for the rest of their army to travel down.  But if they swarm out of every cave in the mountains, we’ll have no chance of stopping them then.

“If that isn’t bad enough, there is a possibility that the explosion would be even greater than I – or ALANNA, who I will admit probably has more knowledge of it – could predict.  If that were to happen, I could end up destroying half the planet.”

Silence reigned as they all sat there with shocked looks on their faces as they took what he said in.  He could destroy…half the planet…accidentally?  Does he really have that much power?  It shouldn’t have come as a surprise to Rosewyn, given how powerful the Station Core already seemed.  I guess that’s a no.  I would rather take our chances with another solution first.

“But I do have another option.  After the recent battle above the dungeon, I now have the ability to create those same Bearillas that attacked us.  Though, in order to afford to make enough of them – as well as getting them done in time – I’m going to need more metal resources.  I have a thought about that, but I need more to get started on that plan.”

We would have some of those things on our side?  Now that changes things.  “My volunteers are going to be acquiring more of those resources for you while they are doing their thing throughout the Kingdom, will that help?”

“Absolutely.  If I can get a boost in those resources, I can do a lot.  In fact, I think I just might have a plan that will work…”

Chapter 10 – CAS

Two hours after the scouting report from Brint – and a full 26 hours after the destructive and devastating battle between the Guild and the now-relatively small Bearilla/Quizard army – every Proctan that had been slain during the battle was thankfully accounted for and “resurrected”.  The newest-born recruits were all ones that had the NCU installed into them for the first time, and they were still reeling at all the new changes as they made their way over to The Refuge.  Milton could see their shocked faces as they saw the disappearance of The Fortress; the last thing most of them knew, they were fighting for their lives inside it against the Bearillas.

As the last one left the access tunnel leading out from the Bioconversion Labs, the first groups entered the dungeon rooms scattered all around the clearing and throughout the forest.  Though, fortunately, they didn’t have to trudge through the area to find what they were looking for.

Milton had opted against building anything aboveground; instead, he sealed off the normal access to the individual rooms from the surface and spent the last few hours directing his drones to create a massive reinforced tunnel system that all led to a central access station – a massive room that was almost a mile wide and long, as well as about 150 feet tall.

To get to the Central Access Station (CAS), Milton hooked up a steep tunnel to an upper corner of The Refuge, meaning that the Guardian Guild members could slide down the “chute” to get to the massive room.  To get back to The Refuge, a similarly sloped chute slid down to the bottom corner of the habitation center.  That, unfortunately for them, was the only easy part.

All along the walls, tunnels were clearly marked with what rooms they led to.  Some were along the bottom of the wall and could be walked into directly; others were only reachable by small staircases that led to tunnels further up the wall.  Regardless of which room they chose, every Guild member had to travel down a sometimes-lengthy tunnel to reach their destination.

Outside of every tunnel, a simple flippable sign was hanging on the wall.  On one side, it said, “Dungeon Room #_ Not In Use”; the other, predictably said, “Dungeon Room #_ In Use”.  When someone would go in, they would flip the sign to let others know that it was occupied; when they came out, they would flip it back over until they either went in again or the next in line went.  Most of the time, the sheer act of walking back down the tunnel was enough time for his drones and replacement Combat Units to reset the room.

Or – as most likely would happen more often than not – if no one survived, a drone he had stationed in the CAS would flip the sign over as soon as it was ready again.

In addition to the tunnels leading out from the large room, he broke down and transported 75 of his Bioconversion Labs to the CAS in a private space, so that anyone respawning didn’t have to travel far to try again.  Two portable Molecular Converters were inside the room as well; one was near the Bio Labs to provide the clothing, armor, and weapons they lost inside the dungeon room; another was set up to provide food to newly respawned members or those who were hungry after successfully completing a room or two.  A series of benches were set up in a large area as well, for those waiting for a room to open up or just for a place to eat.

Both of the Molecular Converters were close enough together that the Access Terminal he had originally set up in his dungeon for those choosing their new abilities was converted to one that could do both that and let people choose what they wanted to eat and for clothing/armor/weapon choice.  It was a one-stop shop for everything they needed – the only thing it didn’t have was a place to sleep, which was why it was easy to get back to The Refuge and their rooms there.

All of that was done to speed up the Guild members’ “leveling-up” process; having them as strong as they could possibly be was essential to the plan he had come up with.  And it was a simple plan too – one which had a great chance of succeeding.  But there was a lot that needed to be done before that happened.

Another benefit of having everything connected together, was the ability to share the resources he was using to repair and replace dungeon parts.  Previously – since they were all separate – each room required their own set of Power Generator/Molecular Converters to operate; now, with the connection process underway, he was able to place only one set in between two or three, thereby saving resources that could be better spent somewhere else.

His original dungeon was being used as almost a “testing” facility now – or by those like Rosewyn’s groups who were slated to tackle the one-of-a-kind rooms that hadn’t been seen yet.  Only those that wanted to “test” themselves to see if they could fight through far enough to earn another ability would enter it.  Even though having those abilities would eventually help them improve their combat ability, Milton (along with a consensus from the other Guild leadership) still thought it was better that their members improve their base skills before adding in another one.

It was like some RPGs he had played that allowed you to acquire and use a whole bunch of skills at the beginning – to make yourself a bit of a Jack-of-all-trades – only to suffer as you leveled-up because nothing you used was a high enough skill to survive.  It was only when you concentrated on one thing (or sometimes two complementary things) at first that allowed you to add more things in when you had a good foundation.

Milton was still working out how to help out the non-combat-oriented recruits such as Inventors and those like them.  He had some ideas now but would have to wait until he had more time to implement them.

After watching the scouting report from Brint a couple of hours ago, the Guild members went from slightly fearful to determined – played in no small part from some rousing speeches from the leadership.  They stressed that they had a plan and explained the bare bones of it to them: they would train over the next week and a half to get stronger and then, when they were ready, they would go as a large force to stop and destroy the Bearillas up north.

Their confidence in themselves caused the CAS to flood with willing and eager participants, though most of them were already relatively familiar with the different rooms in Milton’s dungeon.  At least the beginning ones; no one other than Rosewyn and her group had gotten past the 8th room yet, and they hadn’t even attempted the 9th yet.  Even after they managed to defeat all 12 rooms, Milton already had some ideas for harder ones – he just hadn’t started on them yet because it wasn’t worth the time or resources to develop them at the moment.  However, with all the intense training going on, it might just happen before long.

Two hours after the dungeon rooms reopened for business, the last of the Greycers was birthed from the Upgraded Conversion Lab and raced aboveground to join its companions waiting for their mission.

*         *         *

Whisp hadn’t gotten more than an hour’s sleep after finishing the last of the parts needed for her “Slider Wagons” before Milton woke her up.  She didn’t complain, however, because she asked him to – she wanted to be there when Rosewyn’s volunteers took Milton’s Greycers and her wagons out for their mission.  Although she had already made sure earlier that the harness system worked flawlessly while hooked up to the transport, the wagons hadn’t been loaded yet and she wasn’t sure if there would be a weight issue that would cause them to unbalance.

Ever since she had helped Milton complete the dungeon, she would occasionally sneak away when she had some spare time to the fifth room and burrow herself into the pile of Wienerpups that were constantly playing together.  As she was a “friend” of the dungeon itself, they were instructed not to harm her and she never worried about it; however, the experience of being dog-piled by absolutely adorable, soft-furred balls of cuteness would’ve made dying and being resurrected a minor price to pay.  It was almost better than the fun times she’d had with Brint in their bedroom; it wasn’t as fun – but it was close.

However, the sight of 50 Greycers sitting quietly and adorably in the small clearing around The Refuge was a whole new level of delight.  It was hard enough to restrain herself when there was only one, but with a whole crowd of them the desire to run up to one and snuggle was hard to control.  Already, there were many Guild members who didn’t have her restraint and were doing what she wanted to do, but the volunteers going on the mission were able to gently pry them from their mounts.

“They’re beautiful, aren’t they?” Rosewyn asked abruptly.

Whisp was startled; she hadn’t heard the older woman arrive nearby because she was so enamored at the sight before her.  “Yes, they are – but that’s the whole point, right?”

“It sure is.  That, and the efforts from our volunteers to sell the story we want to everyone they come across, of course.  These…Greycers…are designed to facilitate that process.  Nice job on those wagons, by the way – slider bubbles, right?”

Of course she would recognize it right away.  “Yes, after you showed me how they worked, it seemed like the perfect solution.”

“That Enchanting seems like an extremely useful ability to have.  I may have to think about picking it up for my next one.”

I can’t even imagine what she would be able to do with that.  I’m a little envious, but excited at the same time.  “If you need any advice on that, I’m always willing to share some.”

“Thanks, I might just take you up on that.  Excuse me, I have to go make sure everything was loaded correctly.”  At that, Rosewyn stepped up to the nearest wagon and swung the rear door leading inside wide.

The wagon itself was 12 feet long and 6 feet wide, though it looked even larger than that because the wooden sides of the wagon added 8 feet to its height.  It was completely enclosed on the top, so it looked more like a large floating box than anything resembling a transport.  Two poles were attached on a vertical swivel to the sides of the “box” and stuck forward, where they were easily attached to the harness of the Greycer pulling it.  The doors on the rear of the wagon were easy to secure and there would be very little danger of them flying open during travel.

Along the bottom were her enchanted boards with their slider bubbles; fortunately, she didn’t have to make the entire thing one bubble, as all that was needed was a hefty one around the sides to keep it stable.  The bubbles stuck out a foot on every side, giving them more surface area and theoretically eliminating any potential toppling over; that didn’t mean, of course, that it was impervious to flipping if it went over a cliff – though there was very little danger of that in the Kingdom.  There were some high hills, but no mountains to speak of.

Since friction didn’t really do much to stop it, like the first experiment in her Workshop that had shot around the room, she had rigged a series of four spikes underneath (where there wasn’t a slider bubble) that you could access from the sides of the wagon.  With a simple shove of a lever, a reinforced spike would impale itself into the ground and prevent the wagon from moving.  When all four were engaged, it would take an extremely strong impact to move it.

Whisp followed farther back from Rosewyn, wanting to see all that was included in the wagons.  From floor to ceiling, small wooden boxes were stacked up, hundreds – actually, over a thousand when she got a better look – of them filled to the brim with Milton’s special Power Potions.  Just one of those boxes was worth more than she had ever earned selling her inventions combined; this wagon alone could probably buy the entire Kingdom.  And there were 49 more – with more supposed to be shipping out when they were available.

Along with the boxes of Potions – and making Whisp want to squeal with delight – were a dozen Greycer puppies, infantile versions of the behemoth mount.  They reminded her of the Wienerpups from the dungeon, though in her opinion they weren’t as cute; they were larger and different-looking, but still adorable.  The fact that they would grow and mature to the size of the adult Greycers in a month was hard to believe when she looked at them.

Lastly, there was food for everyone: the volunteer, the Greycer, and the puppies.  Not terribly exciting, but necessary.

Everything was packed tightly inside the secure rope system she had designed for the wagon.  Although moving over the ground wasn’t going to tip the whole thing over, the movement of the Greycer was sure to cause everything to shake apart unless it was secured in place.  To prevent the puppies from having their baby brains shook up, Whisp had designed a special platform for them to lie on that would absorb and reduce any sudden movements or stoppages that might occur – she didn’t want them to be flung everywhere during the journey.

It looked good to her, and Rosewyn apparently thought so too, because she shut the doors up tight and walked up front to the Greycer already hooked up to it.  The volunteers had been practicing riding over the last couple of hours, so the one currently strapped in only smiled and didn’t hesitate when Rosewyn asked him to give a quick test run to see if it was working properly.

It took off slower this time; instead of a sudden jerk and full-out sprint, it gradually built up speed until it was going so fast and was so far into the trees that Whisp lost sight of it.  After about a minute, she heard it arriving from behind her, having made a loop around an area of the forest and arriving back looking none the worse for wear.  The volunteers were all enjoying the speed at which they moved, which was more than obvious when he came back with an even bigger smile on his face.

As he slowed to a stop – which was good because, despite the precautions she put in place, stopping abruptly at full speed might put too much stress on the wagon – Rosewyn immediately walked over and opened up the back.

Everything looked perfectly fine – not a single thing had shifted out of place.  Even the puppies seemed to be having a good time.

With that test over with, it was time for everyone to head out.  They were all strapped in their harnesses and only awaited the word from Rosewyn.

“You all received the changes to the plan that Milton has provided, and you all have your routes.  Be safe as you as you scatter to different villages and towns, making your way across the Kingdom.  Your supplies and Power Potions probably won’t last as long as you might think, so be ready to come back as soon as you need more – we should hopefully have some waiting for you to bring back out.  Remember, you’re there as an ambassador, but I don’t want you to risk yourselves unnecessarily.  If you meet any serious opposition – RUN!  With your Greycers, you should be able to outrun everyone.

“You all know the importance of this; without the people of the Kingdom on our side, there is no way we can win.  Your primary job is to convince them; these things you’re bringing with you, as well as your new abilities, will only help in that regard.  However, it all boils down to you – the safety of everyone rests on your shoulders.   Good luck and may the Goddess be with you.”

The crowd that had gathered to see them off waved as they all took off, again slow at first before picking up speed.  One-by-one they disappeared into the trees, the large wagons trailing behind them easily moving over the rough terrain.

Before the last one disappeared, she thought again about the contents of the wagon and whether it was going to be convincing enough to get people to eat up what they were being told.  Each of the boxes had been identically created with the same symbol etched on the outside for display, as if they had been produced in a factory.  As she glimpsed the back of the final wagon, the Cordpower Company logo and symbol prominently displayed exactly like the boxed Potions, she couldn’t help but think: this crazy plan better work.

Chapter 11 – Automated mining

He had thought that controlling the 50 Greycers as they ran would be hard, but when Milton upgraded his Combat Communication skill to level 9, he was able to simultaneously control up to 200 different units without too much trouble.  It was almost as if his concentration was easily split up in multiple directions; following and directing the racing Combat Units was just like extending another arm – or 50.  He was able to listen in on the commands of the volunteers as they made minute changes to their courses and adjust accordingly.  Most of the time, however, he just let the Greycer run – which they were great at.

When they emerged out from the forest at different points – it was decided to completely avoid the nearest village where Brint and Whisp came from, as well as where Rosewyn and Moxwell were killed – it turned out that he was right: the Greycers were even faster over open ground.  From his estimation, they reached upwards to 160 miles per hour – a 33.3% increase in their forest-running speed.

With the volunteers well on the way pulling their “Cordpower Company” wagons behind them, Milton switched his attention to another delivery of metal resources just arriving from the Kingdom.  The “merchant” couple was surprised to hear about the attack and the subsequent cleanup; they had gone farther than most in order to acquire enough to be fully converted to an NCU-equipped recruit when they got back, and Milton was only too happy to oblige.  Because they brought back even more than what was required.

The high-quality steel they contributed was worth more than the basic, lower-quality metal that usually filled his Molecular Converters.  In general, the higher-quality stuff was worth about five times the amount he got from a piece of ore of the same quantity; the bounty he received from the couple opened up some possibilities for him.  Over a million BMUs made him feel practically rich in comparison to his previous resource-poverty.

First, since it was a priority, he purchased an additional three sets of Molecular Converters/Power Generators to finish up the remaining dungeon rooms that were lying dormant since he didn’t have enough resources to run them.  That alone cost him just shy of 100,000 BMUs at 33,250/set.  With everything he had already built now powered and running, he set 30 of his extra drones creating additional copies of the rooms near enough to the existing equipment so that he didn’t have to spend any more on them any time soon.  They were quick enough that they could make an entire room in less than an hour, so he expected the advancement of the Guild to speed up even more over the next week as wait times shrank.

Next, he expanded his farm to almost twice its original size, reaching almost two and a half miles.  Even though he had acquired millions of Bio Units from the defeated Quizards and Bearillas, a sizable chunk of that was already gone when it went toward Biological Recombination research, the Quagon, the 50 Greycers, and – what ended up costing almost more than that combined – feeding the massive creatures.  He now knew why the Bearillas underneath the Quizard Mountains kept so many of the giant lizards around: big creatures had big appetites.

He was tasked with creating even more of the Greycers, as well as starting the process of building up his own army of Bearillas.  The Greycers cost 15,000 Bio Units to “hatch”, whereas the Bearillas cost 60,000 – and that wasn’t even counting what it took to feed them.  From what he remembered, the massive bear-monkeys needed to consume even more food than a normal Combat Unit to survive, apparently due to one of their genetic conditions.[14]  That meant that the more he created, the more they were going to cost in terms of upkeep.  However, the Bearillas were too strong and valuable as allies to pass off as too expensive.

At this point, they were practically a necessity they needed to survive.

The Quagons he had designed might be larger and a bit stronger, but they were nowhere near as quick and were almost three times as much in terms of Bio Unit costs.  Also, they were voracious eaters, as was evidenced when Brint had stopped back at the dungeon a few hours ago and the Combat Unit ate two entire Picows!  They weren’t necessarily full-sized, but they were big enough that the resources he would’ve received from them would’ve fed a couple hundred Proctans for a day.

That was going to take another almost 200,000 BMUs to properly finish the farm off, with additional farm-designated drones to go with it.  The process of expansion was going to take almost a day to complete, because it was a bigger job than some of the others, but he had already allocated the resources toward it and it would be done.

The last thing he built was a third Upgraded Bioconversion Lab so that he could start pumping out the massive Combat Units.  When he needed them.  He wasn’t going to waste resources by keeping some of them around for a week or more when he’d be able to supply them when the time was right.  He created one, of course, because he wanted to see what it could do.

With more than a third of the metal resources he had just received, and no other expected shipments incoming (other than whatever the volunteers were able to scrounge up), Milton needed to implement a plan he’d been thinking about but didn’t have the time or opportunity to achieve.

He was going to mine the Quizard Mountains again.

But not like the last time.  Brint was necessary before because Milton didn’t have the communication range to control the drones doing the mining while inside the mountain range.  Additionally, he didn’t have the necessary skill to protect them as they got the job done, which was obviously needed as soon as they broke through into another cavern.

Milton didn’t plan on fighting and didn’t want to send resources to defend his drones.  That didn’t mean that he was going to just send them into the caves to get destroyed; in fact, he wasn’t even going to send them into the caves.  With the bonus he had obtained due to his increase in Sensor Interpretation/Perception, his sensor orbs could now penetrate 50 feet through the surface of the mountain to “see” where the metal ore was.  It could direct the drones on where to mine, as well as seeing if there were any pockets of empty space – which might lead to some defenders.  Their ability to detect body heat through 150 feet of space would help to avoid detection as well.

With that plan in mind, he fabricated three ground drones, a sensor orb, a portable Molecular Converter, and a portable Power Generator.  Using his newly created Bearilla, he had the massive Combat Unit gather them all up easily in its powerful arms and run towards the Quizard Mountains.

He angled the direction more northeastern than east, however; if he had gone in a straight line directly toward the mountains, he would be entirely too close to the cave where Brint had encountered his first Bearilla.  He wanted to avoid any more contact with the denizens of the cave systems there, so he aimed a little north of there.  He had to go a little slower than his Bearilla could normally move because it was carrying a large-ish load; regardless, a little over an hour later it arrived at the small valley in front of the mountains with the small stream running through it.

Instead of venturing into one of the caves that dotted the mountains, he directed his Combat Unit to find an area in between them and it immediately placed everything on the ground.  Quickly, since he didn’t want everything exposed and out in the open for long, he directed the drones to cut out a large enough block of stone from the mountain’s face to fit the Molecular Converter in.  Using his Bearilla again, it was able to grab the sizable chunk of stone – with not a little bit of strain – and pulled it out so that his drones could enter the relatively small cave they had made.

Less than thirty seconds later, the drones had cut enough stone – and shoved it into the Converter – that they could fit everything comfortably inside.  Lifting up all the equipment, Milton’s Bearilla placed everything inside and shoved it down the small cave tunnel the drones had excavated, “trapping” two of the drones and his sensor orb inside.  When that was done, his Combat Unit lifted the stone block again – with a little help from the third drone still outside – and plugged up the hole.  The drone still outside quickly used its abilities to seal the small cut-lines made when the stone block was originally removed.

From the outside, there was no evidence – at least that Milton could detect while looking through the Bearilla’s eyes – that anything was different about the cliff face.  The only sign that he had been there were some indentations in the ground from the weight of his Combat Unit and the stone block, but that couldn’t be helped.  Within a few days, even those signs would most likely be gone.  With a quick grab of the exterior drone, he instructed the Bearilla to run back to the dungeon, its mission successful.

Inside the mining “tunnel”, his drones went to work, following the directions of the sensor orb.  They were sealed completely inside the dark, lightless tunnel, but they didn’t necessarily need light to see – and they fortunately didn’t need to breathe either.  As everything in there was essentially a machine, they didn’t need air or supplies to sustain them.  Nor rest or sleep – which meant they could operate 24 hours a day without stopping.

There wasn’t much metal ore in the nearby vicinity, but there was enough that the two drones were able to slowly mine their way through the solid stone to find the small pockets.  There weren’t any nearby “voids”, at least – empty spaces where there might possibly be a small cave or tunnel connecting to the larger enemy cave system.  As they traveled further inside and deeper down, the more plentiful the bounty became.

Before the Bearilla even arrived back at the dungeon, the drones had already mined enough to pay for themselves and the equipment they had with them.  It was quick work; the speed at which the drones operated was almost insanely fast.  He could imagine miners back on Earth looking at the work his little guys did in such a short time with jealousy – and with such little effort.  They also made very little noise while they worked, because they rarely ever let anything drop and their tools were nearly silent.

One drone would slice up the wall in front of it, keeping the tunnel they were creating fairly uniform in size.  Once the stone was cut up into large chunks, it would use its versatile arms to move the rock behind it, where the other drone would slice it down even smaller and feed it into the Molecular Converter that was being brought along behind them.  It was an efficient and quick system they had going on – and it brought results.

The sensor orb would follow along, staying out of the way while it searched the surrounding walls, scanning 50 feet in every direction to find the best route to mine.  Only once during the first hour did it detect some body heat located in an empty space, which it easily led his drones around.  Milton couldn’t tell how big the empty space was – it could’ve been a huge cave or just a small tunnel.  Either way, it wasn’t something he wanted or needed to investigate; everything alive down there he considered hostile and was happy enough to avoid.

While the Bearilla was rushing back to the dungeon, he built another whole set of “mining equipment” and it was more than ready to go by the time his Combat Unit arrived.  However, he could tell that it was already hungry again despite eating a few hours before, so he used the waiting Molecular Converter to provide a sizable meal of “fresh meat” for it in the shape of a large slab of bloody flesh.  And then a second.  And then a third before it was satisfied.

These things might be more resource-expensive than I thought.

Despite the expense, it was worth it for the sheer power the Bearilla exhibited.  Milton had a feeling that even if he tried to attempt to make something of the same size and power – similarly to the Quagon he created – it would still require massive amounts of food to upkeep.  He might experiment later to see if he could figure out another large Combat Unit that would work just as well, but for the moment the Bearilla worked fine.

While the new mining equipment was heading towards the Quizard Mountains – this time to the southeast – Milton received a “poke” from his current mining team.  He hadn’t been wholly focused on them, since his concentration was still split up between ensuring all of the dungeon rooms were working properly, controlling the racing Greycers as they spread out throughout the Kingdom, and monitoring the various scouts he had ranged around his territory.

With the massive increase in the number of Blood-thirsty Squirrels he had sent out, he was constantly getting images of things they saw that he assumed they thought was important enough to bother him with.  It was a little annoying, but he’d rather be annoyed than miss a potential threat coming from somewhere.

So once he received the nudge from his mining team, he focused a big part of his concentration on them to see what the issue was.  Since they were essentially operating in enemy territory, they took priority over most other things.  And when he understood why the sensor orb had alerted him, he was instantly excited.

They hadn’t gotten too near it, since they were instructed to stay away from enemy tunnels and other cavities; however, from what the sensor orb could tell, the small void was only about 10 feet wide and just a little over that much tall.  It was a pocket in the middle of the stone, like a large circular bubble that had gotten caught in the middle of the formation of the mountain.  And from what the orb could tell, it was full of crystals.

Focusing Crystals.

He took direct control of the drone in the lead as he worked his way closer to the void.  There wasn’t any body heat detected in the cavity, but he wanted to be as cautious as possible – who knows what else might be down here?   Once he was near the edge, he directed the drone to create a hole just big enough for his sensor orb to visually look through.

Of course, it was completely dark inside, which normally didn’t matter because his sensor orbs could map everything out for him without light.  However, he wanted to be able to actually see.  Once the sensor orb looked inside and determined that there wasn’t anything alive – at least that it could determine – he widened the hole with his drone and the floating orb drifted inside, suffusing the room with light as it went.

Milton felt as if his breath would’ve caught in his throat – if he still had one.  The sight that greeted him was so amazing that he stopped thinking and just drank in the view.

It’s so beautiful…

Now, to the Guild members who had fallen all over themselves at the sight of his Greycers, the small room he was in probably wouldn’t have gotten the same reaction.  Whereas the giant, fluffy, adorable dog-bunnies were cute, the light reflecting off the thousands of crystals completely covering every inch of the walls was beautiful.  At least to Milton.

It was like looking at the inside of a giant geode, except that this geode was full of the precious Focusing Crystals.  They were similar in shape and size as the green and red glowing ones Brint had found while he went mining with his Raid Group – but they weren’t lit up like they were.  He didn’t understand what the difference was – why were those glowing but these aren’t?  At least, he didn’t at first; as the air from the tunnel his drones created flowed inside, the ones nearest the hole he had made for the sensor orb started to faintly glow.  It wasn’t bright, but the red and green – and a blue one here and there – looked very similar to the ones found before.

Since there wasn’t much fresh air that had been trapped with the equipment inside the mining tunnel, the glow only suffused a small portion of the room.  Milton figured that if the tunnel were open to the outside, the fresh air flowing in would’ve lit the whole place up with a near-blinding glow.

But he didn’t want to open a hole up to the outside for any reason; he was here to mine, and so that was what he did.  Within minutes, the drones were harvesting the crystals and emptying out the beautiful void.  It ached a little to destroy something so awe-inspiring – but his ache was soothed as he saw how many Focusing Crystals he netted from the entire room.

2,315.

Now we’re getting somewhere.  Milton couldn’t believe his luck; there was a whole new world of possibilities opening up for him now.  Before he went on a crazy spending spree, however, he directed his drones to keep going, searching out more ore deposits and instructing the basic AI inside the sensor orb to alert him if any more voids are found that were similar to that one.  He didn’t want to inadvertently miss out on more crystals.

The Bearilla was still on the way to the next mining spot, but Milton didn’t wait to build another half-dozen mining equipment sets.  Even if they didn’t find any more of those special “treasure” rooms full of focusing crystals, the amount of BMUs the first team was contributing was impressive all by itself.

But if they did find more…then the possibilities seemed endless.

Chapter 12 – Southern exposure

Despite the exhilarating – if repetitive – free-fall and subsequent rise into the air as his Quagon flew south, Brint was getting bored.  At least while he rode on his Qwizard mount on the ground, he would frequently see something as he traveled; here in the sky, however, all he saw were boring clouds in the sky followed by the view of thousands of boring treetops.  The stop earlier at the dungeon clearing was a welcome respite from the monotonous journey they had made together.  Eight hours total to make it to the north followed by the return trip was exhausting for both of them.

He was able to visit with Whisp for nearly an hour before they had to leave again.  Not enough time to do…anything…but the rest and food was indeed welcome.  The Milton hadn’t expressly asked him to leave right away, but Brint was more than aware of how important getting the information was.  If the same thing was happening to the south that was happening up north – they needed to know about it.

He wasn’t sure what was ultimately decided to do about the presence of so many Bearillas up north; not that it mattered to him at the moment, because he was preoccupied with scouting.  Going to where he was sent was the only thing that concerned him, because it sure as anything beat harvesting fields every day.  Whatever it took to keep Whisp safe and protected inside The Milton’s dungeon was enough for him.

Right now, he was approximately the same distance flying south away from the dungeon and the Guild (not that he had an accurate measurement, but it just felt like the same distance away from the Station Core) as he was when he saw the northern Bearilla army.  He hadn’t seen anything doing the same thing so far, which was a relief; he even strayed a bit closer to the mountains in order to see if anything was assembling along the small river valley that existed between the forest and the range.

Which was something that he found strange, in addition to everything else.  He wasn’t the best navigator, but he could at least guestimate his general direction based upon the position of the sun in the sky; given that fact, he had noticed that the mountain range he was following along, spread almost unerringly north and south, with very little (almost none) extending westward out into the forest.  The small river valley also ran north and south, the same general distance between the trees and the range the entire length.

Again, he wasn’t an expert on nature, but he had been around plenty of growing things in his old job enough that he knew that plants and trees tended to sprout up wherever they could find root.  The river valley, though…it was almost like there was a clear dividing line that the trees didn’t grow past – which was highly strange to Brint.  He had mentioned all these observations to The Milton earlier, and the Station Core had said he would look into it; he also sounded like it wasn’t a surprise to him, either.  He probably knows something about the formation of mountains that I don’t.  I bet Whisp would know.

Despite that peculiarity, Brint hadn’t seen much else.  Every once in a while, he would find small clearings dotting the forest, but they were all randomly placed and seemed to be the result of some group of beasts knocking them down to make their home with the felled trees.  Nothing particularly interesting, however.

He decided to give the flight south another few minutes or so, before he had to turn back.  Although he was indeed exhausted and wanted to sleep, the main reason he needed to head home was that he didn’t desire trying to fly – and especially land – in the dark when he got back to the dungeon.  He was lucky that he had left around dawn that day, otherwise he wouldn’t have been able to travel so much; it also helped that it was in the middle of summer and the days were much longer.

After those few minutes were up, Brint was about to instruct his ride to start turning around, when he saw a break in the trees a distance ahead.  Even with his augmented Perception, he couldn’t tell what it was – other than that it appeared to span the entire southeastern part of the forest near the mountains.  Which – now that he was paying attention to it – appeared to abruptly end near where the break in the trees started.  He had to remove his eyewear protecting his eyes so that he could rub them, thinking that his exhaustion was playing tricks on his mind.

But no – even when he looked again, the mountain range was completely ending up ahead.  It was still about a half hour of travel out; despite knowing that he should probably head back so that they weren’t flying in the dark soon, he urged his Quagon to fly faster so that he could see what it all was.

From what he understood, and from what The Milton had told Brint, everyone believed that the Quizard Mountains bisected the world, running north and south over the entire planet.  Of course, back in the Kingdom they didn’t call it the “Quizard Mountains”; they didn’t have a name other than “the mountain range to the east”.  Since no one had ever been to them – or desired to visit – that was all the information anyone had.  If someone had been to the mountains, they hadn’t lived long enough to tell the tale.

Just as no one had previously been to the mountains, Brint severely doubted that anyone had been this far south.  He was probably the farthest anyone had been from the Kingdom – at least over the last century since the Beast War.  Not many records were left from before that, despite the capital never being overrun – which he always thought was strange.

Thoughts of that left his head as he got closer to the clearing ahead – except, it turned out not to be just a clearing.  He had seen on his journeys inside and above the forest some larger clearings, big rivers, and even some areas where the forest grew sparsely – but there were always trees close by.  There were even plenty of trees that grew inside the Kingdom, though they were closely regulated so that they didn’t “produce beasts”, even if it might be impossible.  The only exception to that, of course, was the weird river valley next to the mountains.  Therefore, he knew trees, had seen trees all his life, and was sure that life couldn’t exist without trees – even if they hid the dangerous beasts that preyed on the Kingdom’s residents along the border.

Until he saw a land completely devoid of trees as far as his eye could see.  And he could see pretty far from his vantage point, flying so far above the ground.

Another handful of minutes and a half-dozen free-fall accelerations later, Brint could plainly see where the mountain range to the east just…ended.  It wasn’t gradual, nor was it like someone had cut it off with a giant colossal knife; the best way Brint could describe it – using his own farming experience – was as if someone had been planting “mountain” seeds and then ran out when they got that far south.  They were all fully “grown”, so it was a strange sight to see them abruptly end – in a general straight line heading east.

Along the empty land, Brint could see that it was filled with knee-high or higher grass when he was close enough to pick it out.  Various beasts roamed the grassland, some solitary and many others in large herds – but all looked particularly deadly with sharp horns, massive claws, and even some with multiple heads.

“If I didn’t know better, I’d say that beast is a cross between a lion and a zebra.  What would that make it?  A Libra?  Sounds too astrological sign-ish, I think.  Maybe a Zeon?”

It was when he was flying overhead one of the solitary hunting creatures trying to get a better look when The Milton made a surprise appearance in his head.  He had been alone with his thoughts essentially for the last few hours, so he jerked quite a bit in surprise; again, he was thankful for Whisp’s creation of the saddle he was strapped into – he was sure that if he wasn’t securely in place, he would’ve just fallen to his death.

That wasn’t the most important thing though.  What the Goddess is a lion?  Or a zebra for that matter?

“I’m assuming you’re seeing what I’m seeing here.  Did you know that the mountain range just…ends?  And what is this place?  The no-tree thing feels…un-natural.”  As he asked the Station Core, he looked over the end of the range again, before turning his attention to the ground – and the beasts roaming all over it.

“This place reminds me of pictures and videos…uh, records…I’ve seen back on my home planet.  These plains could almost be right out the Serengeti or some other similar place in Africa.  Though, even there, trees weren’t non-existent like they apparently are here.  This is very strange.

“And as far as the mountain range goes, I wasn’t aware that it ended, though it doesn’t surprise me.  What does surprise me is how precisely it ends – as well as where the trees stop, and the plains begin.  It’s…unusual.

“The good news, however, is that it doesn’t look like there are any more incursions we have to worry about coming from anywhere else.  Nice job, Brint.”

He felt himself embarrassed at the praise, as it wasn’t something that he was particularly used to quite yet.  Before Brint could say anything back, however, his Quagon took an unexpected dive toward the ground, folding its wings abruptly to pick up speed and then snapping them back out when it got closer to the ground, gliding downwards at only about 50 feet above the ground.  He quickly slipped into its mind and discovered the issue:

It was hungry.

And below and in front of them were some shaggy-looking beasts that reminded Brint of a Picow, though they had longer legs.  And two massive, sharp horns on their heads sticking up like giant ears.  So, not much like a Picow; maybe it was the general size and shape that looked familiar to him.

Brint immediately boosted the Quagon with augmentations to its Strength, Constitution, Agility, and Perception.  He doubted it needed that last one, since there was no place for the shaggy beast to run or hide – but he had plenty of Power to spare and it was good to practice with it.

He did the same for himself – just in case – before he popped another Power Potion, filling himself back up to full.  Usually, there was a bit of an extra “perk-up” associated with it, but he was so exhausted and had drunk so many of the potions over the last 24 hours that it did nothing for him other than fill his pool back up.

For the millionth time that day, he again was thankful for his harness.  He wasn’t sure if it was the conflicting instincts of every beast that had went into the making of the Quagon, or just inexperience with hunting from the sky, but it didn’t turn out nearly as well as either of them apparently thought it would.

Things were looking alright as the Quagon dove straight for one of the shaggy, horned beasts near the edge of the 20-strong herd.  Brint let it do what it wanted because he assumed that it knew what it was doing; although flying didn’t appear to be the “natural” thing that the giant lizard knew how to do, it had taken to it quite remarkably.  So when his mount didn’t slow down, he unfortunately assumed that this would be the same.

He was wrong.

Looking back, Brint realized that all the Quagon could think of was getting to what it saw as food, without thought of the consequences.  It never occurred to him that it wouldn’t realize that landing next to a herd of large beasts and eating one of its family members probably wouldn’t go over so well.

As they crashed into the shaggy beast – which, while smaller, was still about a third of the size of its attacker – Brint held on as they stopped abruptly, jerking him violently forward and almost breaking the straps keeping him secure against the harness.  He had incorrectly assumed that the Quagon would swoop in and carry off its food to eat somewhere else, but his mount had other ideas.

Without the momentum to sustain them, they collapsed right next to the bowled-over shaggy-haired beast.  Before it could get to its feet, the massive lizard stomped over and quickly bit down on the unfortunate victim’s thick neck once, twice, and then three times in quick succession.  Blood spurted out everywhere, coating the mouth of his Quagon and the light-brown hair of the beast; while it was technically still alive, its throat had been torn out and it was as good as dead.

As the Quagon started ripping chunks off the twitching beast, swallowing them whole after barely chewing them, Brint was still trying to recover from the abrupt stoppage and adjust his perception to ground level.  Which was why he barely saw the charge of pissed-off friends and family of the ripped-up nearby carcass heading right for them.  Or more accurately, aiming for him – who was prominently displayed for them to skewer.

They had tilted their heads down so that the two horns were like extra-long, sharp spears; I wonder if they can see where they’re going flitted across his thoughts inanely as he sent the order for the Quagon to defend itself.  By the time it turned around, the nearly 20 attackers were only feet away, their deadly horns threatening to impale them both with thousands of pounds of weight behind their charge.

Brint reacted instinctively, using the same ability he had practiced over and over before he even set himself in the harness.  The Quagon was in the middle of stretching out its neck to snatch up one of the closest beasts when it was abruptly thrust into the air, the negative gravity field shooting it over 30 feet high before it fell back down onto the 15-foot field.  Since it wasn’t moving, it stayed stationary, which didn’t help with flying, unfortunately; it was only a temporary life-saving measure that he thought of at the last moment.

What he didn’t think of was what would happen to the rapidly advancing, charging, shaggy-haired beasts.  When they hit the negative gravity field that Brint generated, they definitely weren’t stationary; just like what happened when the Quagon was taking off, they rapidly rose into the air – at speed.

They didn’t have wings, so they didn’t take off into the sky like his mount did.  What they did do was fling themselves forward and up, almost like some sort of ball that a giant had kicked from behind.  It would’ve been amusing to Brint if he hadn’t almost been skewered seconds ago; he only found humor in it later in retrospect.

They made a nice arc through the air before slamming into the ground with the snapping sounds of breaking bones and violent impacts.  As he looked back at them from the top of the negative gravity field, he could see that a few had even landed horn-first and were impaled into the ground, unable to extricate themselves.

He looked at the struggling beasts in shock as they attempted to get up from the unexpected collision with the ground.  Knowing that they had gotten extremely lucky, Brint immediately lowered them to the ground – a little quicker than he probably should’ve – and instructed, unnecessarily it turned out, the Quagon to run over and finish them off before they could charge at them again.

Although this would’ve theoretically been a good time to make a strategic retreat and lift back into the air, he could still “feel” the hunger emanating from the Quagon.  There was food already there, at least, and he didn’t want to risk it trying again – perhaps in the middle of a pack of “Libras”, or whatever The Milton had called the striped, hairy-necked giant cats he had seen earlier.

A few of the shaggy beasts appeared to be largely unharmed, so Brint instructed the giant flying lizard to attack those ones first – to some disturbing (to Brint at least) results.  The Quagon literally pounced on them, sometimes finishing them off with a massive chomp through their neck, and other times ripping entire limbs off – it all depended on what he could reach.  After it had finished tearing them apart, it appeared to take great pleasure in eviscerating and destroying the ones that couldn’t even get up due to numerous broken bones.

Only once did it suffer any type of damage, as it was impaled through the upper part of its right front leg by an unexpected thrust by a seemingly impaired shaggy beast.  Fortunately, it did nothing to hamper its movements as it slaughtered the rest of the herd.  As the last one died to an efficient chomp to its neck – which happened to be one that had impaled its horns into the ground – he could tell that whatever bloodlust his Quagon had been suffering under had spent itself out.

A quick use of his Healing Touch ability was able to patch up the wound on his mount as Brint surveyed the battleground.  Though, it wasn’t really a battle – more of a slaughter.

“Wow, that was impressively quick thinking there, Brint!  I never realized the negative gravity field you generated could be used for such a defensive application before I saw it in action.  And the way the Quagon almost looked like a T-Rex as it took out the rest of those Shaggies – amazing.  A little violent and bloody for my tastes, but it got the job done.”

He just felt numb, which was plain in his monotone, “Thanks”, response.  He let the Quagon feed on the nearest beast, blocking out the sounds of tearing flesh and snapping bones.

“Why don’t you get some sleep, Brint.  You’ve been going for more than 24 hours and you look like you’re going to fall right asleep at any time.  When you wake up tomorrow, head back home for a little R&R before you go back to scouting the northern incursion.  You should have plenty of food in your packs, so don’t forget to eat and keep your strength up.  I’ll watch over you while using the Quagon’s senses…well, when it’s done eating at least – I can’t stand to watch through its eyes as it tears those things apart.”

Brint didn’t protest; he acknowledged the order with a grunt as he unstrapped himself from the back of the Quagon, falling to the ground without the strength to catch himself.  His legs felt wobbly from the entire experience: the frantic improving of his new ability, the flight to the north, then the flight down south, and finally the dangerous “fight” against the – did he call them Shaggies? – shaggy beasts.

He walked as far away as he could from the field of slaughter behind him and lay down in the grass, his energy too spent to bother digging out any food.  I’ll get some in the morning.

That was the last thought he had as the oblivion of sleep crashed down on him, the sounds of tearing and crunching echoing through his ears.

Chapter 13 – Rest stop

It took a while to get used to the insane speed of the powerfully fast Greycer underneath him; however, an hour into the journey was enough for Poegh to feel comfortable enough to really enjoy the cross-country travel.  He had practiced with a few of the Greycers along with the rest of the volunteers before they left The Refuge, but those few minutes of racing around the forest had nothing on almost literally flying across the largely open space of the Kingdom.

After that hour was up, he had instructions to slow down and stop, letting his mount rest and feed on the nearby grass supplemented by some of the fresh meat he was carrying in the “Slider Wagon” behind him.  They had made nearly unbelievable progress so far – much farther than Poegh thought anyone had actually believed they would travel.

Traveling across a field of grass, with no one in sight, he verbally asked for the Greycer to stop – which he was told was relayed directly to Milton so that he could control his mount.  Poegh had never actually met the almost-mythical Station Core; he thought the number of people who had actually seen the all-seeing, all-knowing, powerful figure could probably be counted on his hands.  He heard rumors that Milton was in actuality a big giant metal egg, but he discounted those as just how they were relayed to him – as rumors.

Poegh personally thought that the Station Core was just a smaller, normal-looking, shy person – but with some sort of ability that allowed him to control and speak to all of the wondrous machines that he had access to.  With such power at his disposal, Poegh couldn’t blame the guy for wanting to stay isolated; he probably would do the same thing to avoid the many people who would try to take advantage of him for their own benefits.  The volunteer was just thankful that the Station Core was using his power to help them however he could.

The Greycer slowed down and quickly came to a stop, lying down as soon as – he, Poegh had noticed earlier – stopped moving.  Despite having traveled so far at high speeds, Poegh could see the massive dog-bunny breathing only slightly harder from the exertion.  Amazing.  If it had been me, I’d be collapsed on the ground, trying to not die from the lack of breath.

Unstrapping his legs from the harness wrapped around the upper torso of the Greycer, Poegh slid down the side of the creature and immediately fell to his knees as the world seemed to sway in his vision.  He closed his eyes for a few moments, his equilibrium reestablishing itself after the quick jerking and mostly gentle swaying of his mount’s movements.

Once he was at least fairly confident he wasn’t going to collapse again, he got to his feet and cautiously walked back to the wagon being pulled behind the Greycer.  He pushed down and engaged two of the spikes designed to hold it in place, because he wasn’t expecting to be there that long; nevertheless, he didn’t want it trying to drift away when he checked everything out.

Amazingly, there was absolutely nothing amiss when he opened up the back of the wagon; he had pessimistically assumed that something might break or fall from the journey, as they had moved around quickly and sometimes jerkily when dodging trees.  However, when he swung the doors wide, everything was as it should be: the excited Greycer Puppies were no exception.  When he stepped up to retrieve some food for the adult Greycer out front, they swarmed around him, jumping up playfully and licking him with their oversized tongues – all the while silently inviting him to play.

The only thing that saved him from succumbing to their charm and adorableness was his own ability to augment his Charisma in return.  Poegh almost always kept it activated and it was made so much easier by having essentially an unlimited supply of Power Potions at his disposal.

Every volunteer had gained the ability to make them more charming and charismatic.  At first, when they activated it together as a group, there wasn’t a lot to see; it wasn’t flashy or obvious like most of the other augmentation abilities like strength or speed.  However, when they went along the rest of the Guild members who didn’t have augmented Charisma, the effect was subtle at first – an extra smile or thanks when they did something for someone.  Over the more than half a day where they were able to constantly activate their abilities, they all noticed that the smiles and thanks started to turn into something a little…more.

He had always considered himself a relatively charming person – especially when he was talking to the opposite sex – but this brought the attraction to a whole new level.  It wasn’t subtle, either; a few women who hadn’t even looked at him twice over the years had suddenly started to look.  Not only that, but other people – men included, which was strange to him – that he was more “familiar” with, now gave off a vibe that he would’ve taken advantage of previously.

It wasn’t only him; every other volunteer who now had access to the Charisma augmentation had seen it.  And it scared them just as much as it scared him.

Thankfully, it hadn’t gone beyond simple flirting, but as they upped their skill with the augmentation even more, they were all worried about the possible consequences.  Sure, at one point, he would’ve killed to have that extra advantage with women; however, it was patently obvious that it was entirely artificial, and he couldn’t help but think that it would be wrongly taking advantage of them.

From what Rosewyn had let slip – and he might’ve been the only one to hear it as she talked with some others of the Guild leadership – they were all chosen specifically because they were all already socially adept and got along well with everybody.  That fact was patently obvious to the volunteers when they all saw each other and the abilities they received only enhanced what was already there – to a great degree.  What wasn’t obvious was that they were also chosen because they wouldn’t be tempted to abuse their new power.

Poegh could understand that; if he had been socially awkward beforehand, suddenly being the center of attention with everyone adoring him – he might’ve been tempted (probably more than tempted) to take advantage of it.  As it was, he, as well as the other volunteers, weren’t lacking in that aspect of their life – and had no desire to abuse their ability in that way.

Because of this revelation, the volunteers had largely isolated themselves while they improved their skills.  Fortunately, they all seemed to have an immunity to each other – which meant that by the time they were ready to go on their mission, they didn’t really understand how much more powerful their charm had grown since it didn’t work on the others in their group.

The Guild members that saw them off didn’t necessarily throw themselves at them – but it was plain to see that they would’ve if they weren’t distracted by the cute adorableness of the Greycers.  Which was good to see, because that meant that they hopefully wouldn’t be personally swarmed when they got to the villages and towns they were supposed to visit.

They were all instructed to avoid any significant population centers until they got to their destinations; by his estimation, he still had a few hours to go – which was almost ridiculous because it was on the extreme opposite side of where he crossed over into Kingdom territory.  Nevertheless, he was on a timetable and needed to get moving.

He fed a small amount of food to the puppies inside the wagon before he locked it back up.  They probably didn’t need to eat yet because they hadn’t been exerting themselves like the Greycer pulling them along, but it helped to settle them down when he left them.  He took the extra fresh meat with him up front and placed it in front of his mount – and the giant beast practically inhaled it.

I wonder if we need to stop more often than every hour?  I guess only time will tell.

Poegh had his own little snack before he climbed back on and strapped himself in, once he was secure, he didn’t even have to instruct the Greycer (or Milton) to start moving again.  It was a little strange knowing that the Station Core could “see” out of his eyes and control him if it were necessary; regardless of the strangeness and the loss of complete control over his life, he wouldn’t have it any other way.

The advantages far outweighed the disadvantages as far as he was concerned: whatever it took to save the people of the Kingdom was worth it.  He had already given up half his life to protecting them when he joined the Guild – this was just another aspect of that.  The choice had been easy when he was asked if he would volunteer for this mission.

The hardest part, he thought, will be convincing the other people of the Kingdom that they need to save themselves.

Chapter 14 – Hoodwinkery

The rest of the 5-hour journey toward a small village on the western border of the Kingdom called – un-inspirationally – Westside, was rather uneventful.  If you were to travel to the opposite border in a straight line, there was a village along the eastern border called Eastside; Poegh guessed that the symmetry was on purpose, though he wondered which one came first.

About a mile out from where he figured the village was located, he asked for the Greycer to slow down.  It had only been about 15 minutes since their last stop, so he didn’t have to worry about feeding his mount right away; Poegh figured the big, furry beast would be content to snack on some nearby grass – or whatever was available once they got to where they were going.  As for his own hunger, it was far overshadowed by the exhaustion he was feeling.

Despite only riding for less than half a day, Poegh felt as if he had been doing all the running.  The exhilarating feeling flying across the ground buoyed him at first, but after a while it was almost too much; the literal break-neck speed they were traveling at strangely wore him out.  I don’t think I can do more than four or five hours without needing some downtime.

Fortunately, now that he was near his destination, the travel between villages and towns would be much, much shorter.  Whereas it would take a normal person a few hours or half a day of walking to get to a nearby village, by taking the Greycer, Poegh could cut that down to minutes.

The quick walk to the village allowed him to gain some of his faculties back after traveling so fast; by the time he saw the open gates of his destination, he felt much better.

Like most – but not all – of the border villages, this one had an 8-foot tall wooden fence made of cut-up logs surrounding the main village buildings.  Although it wouldn’t stop a determined attack by even a small horde of beasts, it prevented many stray attacks from surprising them in the middle of the night.  And it wouldn’t stop any beast that could jump over it, of course, but there was only so much that could be done.  Poegh couldn’t help but think that their Refuge was perfectly placed underground to prevent almost any attack.

It was the middle of the day and there was only one “guard” stationed at the gate; normally, it might be a Guardian Guild member stationed there, but it was more likely that any Guild members were out in the field protecting them from any possible attacks from nearby forest beasts.  Then again, Poegh wasn’t sure who was doing the defending of the village nowadays, with the Guild gone and in hiding.

Guarding the gate wasn’t as important during the day; it was more as a precaution if some beasts somehow got past whoever was guarding the border.  Poegh had worked at the Guild HQ, so he hadn’t ever had to defend a village before; nevertheless, he knew that even the “unimportant” jobs near the border could potentially save the entire village – so having someone watching the gates at all times was vital.

In this case, it appeared to be just a young villager leaning lazily against the side of the gate, using the shadow it cast to prevent him from having to stand out in full sun all day.  A long spear was propped up against the wall next to him, which he immediately snatched up with shaky hands as he saw the massive beast approaching.  However, when the Greycer was close enough to see, he placed the spear back against the wall and smiled at the sight of the adorable creature.

“Hello, young sir!  Is this the village of Westside?”  Poegh asked as he got close enough and his mount stopped automatically just before the gate.  He was fairly confident that he was in the right place, but it didn’t hurt anything to confirm it.

Despite talking directly to the gate guard and with his Charisma augmented by his new ability, the young man couldn’t take his eyes off the Greycer – though he at least answered.  “Yes, this is Westside.  What is it that you’re riding?”

“I’ll explain all in due time, young man.  I’m here from the Cordpower Company; could you help gather everyone up in whatever you have as a central meeting place for me?”

At the mention of the Company, the young man’s eyes finally strayed from Poegh’s mount and noticed his travel-stained uniform – with the Cordpower Company logo stitched on the upper right side as well on each sleeve.  Curiosity lit up the gate guard’s face as he saw the “floating” wagon being drawn behind the Greycer.

“Uh…I’m not supposed to leave the gate…what’s in the big box?”

“How about I help you shut the gate for now, and then you can open it up again when you come back?” Poegh asked, eager to see whether or not this plan would work.  It sounded solid in theory, but until it went into action…there was no telling how it would pan out.

The young man agreed, though he did take the chance to touch the silky-soft side of the Greycer as it went inside the gate.  Poegh had already unstrapped himself and stretched as much as he could while still seated when they had started traveling at a walk, so that he wouldn’t embarrass himself by collapsing in a heap when he got off – not quite the right first impression.  Therefore, he easily hopped off – with only a little wobble at landing – and helped the gate guard close and lock the gates, before the young man ran shouting throughout the village.

It was near midday and most of the villagers were out and about doing various tasks, and they all came running to hear what was going on.  Poegh assumed that everyone knew the kid and was worried when their gate guard started shouting; fortunately, the young man didn’t sound panicked – only excited.

That same excitement was reflected on the faces of the villagers as they rushed over to Poegh; actually, it was more accurate to say that they rushed over to the Greycer.  Either way, instead of being cautious at the new arrival, they were instead welcoming and eager to see what he was doing there.

When sufficient time had passed, and most of the villagers seemed to be there (as far as he could tell, at least – though it was difficult since most of them were swarming his mount trying to get a better look or to touch the silky softness of the Greycer’s fur), he climbed up and stood on the back of the large fluffy beast, and nervously cleared his throat.

“Hello, everyone!  I’m here from the Cordpower Company with some news.  If you can all step back from my Greycer, I need everyone’s attention for an announcement.”

It took a few minutes, but eventually everyone stepped back and finally looked at Poegh, tearing their gazes away from his mount as they took in his appearance – and the small vial in his hand.  Even if they didn’t see a Power Potion very often out there on the border, they definitely recognized it; and, seeing that he came from the Cordpower Company, it was likely that it was actually the real thing.  He waited another few moments for the conversation to die down before he started his spiel that he and the other volunteers had practiced (with just slight variations depending on the person).

“Good day, Westside!  My name is Poegh, and like I said, I’m here as a representative of the Cordpower Company.  I have some very important news for you – some of it good…and unfortunately, some of it bad.  First, some information for you; I’m sure by now you’ve heard of the treasonous killing of the Royal family, along with almost every Kingdom noble, by the Guardian Guild – our former protectors along the border.”  There were a few angry mutterings from the crowd at that, which Poegh had expected.  “Unfortunately for everyone, it has recently come to light that the evidence pointing toward their complicity was actually incorrect.  It wasn’t the actions of the Guardian Guild that perpetrated the horrific slaughter of everyone inside the castle; however, it was their inattention that allowed it to happen.”  All technically true.

Now the villagers all looked confused.  “If it wasn’t them – then who was it?” an older man asked from the back.  Everyone nodded along with his question, looking toward Poegh for answers.  With all the charm and Charisma-enhanced effects floating around from both Poegh and his Greycer, they seemed willing to at least listen to the explanation – if not believe it outright.

“We’ve learned that a threat from the forest was actually responsible for the attack on our leaders.  This threat is unlike anything that we’ve seen before; it is so large and dangerous that it will make the Beast War over a century ago look like a minor skirmish.  I’m here to alert and mobilize everyone in defense of the Kingdom – this is not something that the Royal Army Reserve can handle on its own.  Even if the Guardian Guild hadn’t disappeared, not even they could handle this without help.  We need everybody to help.”

Silence descended on the crowd, as they all stared at him in shock and incomprehension.  An elderly woman up front asked, not without reason, “How are we supposed to help?  Most of us here have never even held a weapon before, let alone used one.  Most of us don’t have abilities that are suited for helping in any type of battle; for instance, how am I supposed to fight anything with the ability to whisper to someone from a long distance away?”

“Now that is an interesting ability – I wonder how that would be classified?”

The Station Core spoke unexpectedly to Poegh’s mind, which shocked him so much that he almost fell off his perch on the back of the Greycer.  Fortunately, he recovered quickly and turned his attention to everyone again; he didn’t think Milton actually needed a response to the question – nor did he think it prudent to answer him while he was talking to the villagers.

“Everyone can contribute something to the defense effort.  Only by working together will we be able to combat this threat successfully; there is strength in numbers, and we have the numbers to be strong,” he started, abruptly cutting himself off when he saw something out of the corner of his eye.

Before anyone could say anything in reply, there was a group of people rushing toward the crowd from the direction of the front gate.  Poegh had seen the young gate guard leave in a rush after everyone started to assemble, so he was expecting this.  He wasn’t looking forward to it – but he was expecting it, nonetheless.

“What is this all about?  Who are you and what’s going on?”

There were three employees of the Cordpower Company walking purposefully toward the crowd, pushing people out of the way to get closer to Poegh and his Greycer.  Although he could tell that the sight of the adorable furry mount affected the three Company members, they reined in their curiosity well.  With hands on their sheathed weapons, they approached the side of the Greycer in a threatening manner.

“Thank goodness you’re here, I’m glad that you received the message the Company sent out a few days ago.  I was just telling these fine folks here about the orders to mobilize and move everyone out toward the northern border.  However, they don’t seem to have any knowledge of this – why not?”

The leader of the Company employees was an older man, with a fairly recent wound along his cheek that appeared to be just starting to heal.  I wonder if they’ve seen some action along the border here?  He was also obviously comfortable with his own authority by the way he expected everyone to move out of the way for him, but his expression was one of confusion and doubt as he listened to Poegh.

“We…received no message.  We’ve been watching the border ever since those Guild cowards left everyone here to fend for themselves and haven’t had much word from the capital.  What’s this all about?”

Poegh knew how to talk to all kinds of people; sometimes he needed to speak with his own confidence and authority, and sometimes he needed to just pretend to be conciliatory and ignorant.  This time was no exception, as he adopted the latter.

“I’m sorry, I was told that you would have your orders already.  I’m only here to drop off some supplies and let you know that the timetable has been sped up a little.  We need to have as many people – including villagers – as possible to the northeast border to repel the upcoming invasion.  You just tell me where you want all the boxes of free Power Potions for the villagers, and I’ll be on my way.”

“Wait, what—” was all the Company leader got to say before all hell broke loose.  Poegh jumped down and ran to the back of the wagon, where he threw the doors open just moments before the crowd rushed him.

“One box per person!  Line up in an organized manner, or you won’t be getting anything – and don’t worry, there is enough for everyone!  Don’t delay the process, though – I have other deliveries to make today!” he shouted, as he jumped up and unstrapped the first line of boxes with the “Cordpower Company” logo on the side.  He started to hand them out as the villagers first swarmed, and then quickly lined up as he threatened to leave without giving them anything.

The process was done amazingly fast, as everyone was eager for a box of Power Potions and didn’t want to hold up the line longer than necessary.  At the end, the three Cordpower Company employees walked up with a scowl on their faces.  Poegh cut them off before they could say anything.

“Oh, and don’t worry, I have the extra ones for you as well.  Each of you will be getting three of these boxes; you are the ones in charge and it’s up to you to get them all safe to the northern border.  There will be encampments set up there for you when you arrive, so don’t worry about that,” he told them in a lower voice for their ears only, before he raised it to address the entire crowd milling around the back of his wagon.

“Everyone!  I know this is very confusing for you, especially as you have had no warning before this, which I deeply apologize for.” He looked at the three employees with apology written all over his face.  “But with those Power Potions in your hands – which the three Cordpower representatives will ensure you keep and use for yourselves – you can become much stronger.  We need everyone’s help to defend against this threat, no matter what you can and can’t do – every single person here can contribute.”

He saw the same elderly woman from earlier, clutching the box of Cordpower potions to her chest in both amazement and bafflement.  He jumped down from the wagon, latching it as he did so (he didn’t trust the Cordpower employees not to ransack his transport, despite having their hands literally full of potions already), and walked over to her.  In a loud voice, he said, “For instance, your whispering ability – do you know how valuable that would be in a fight to be able to communicate across the battlefield?  Just because you can’t swing a sword doesn’t mean that you can’t help.  In fact, you could single-handedly save the entire Kingdom!”

While Poegh inwardly acknowledged that he was putting it on a little thick, he could see his Charisma kick in and affect the villagers who heard him.  He could imagine the others thinking about their own abilities and how it could be used in different ways.

He went back to the wagon, unlatching it and climbing inside.  He started stacking an additional 15 boxes of Power Potions on the ground outside, before announcing, “Ok, here are some extra potions for everyone here to share, and for anyone who couldn’t be here right now – I expect there are some out in the fields?” he asked the Cordpower men but went on before they could even answer.  “Regardless, when you get to the northeast, there will be more Potions for everyone.

“And here,” Poegh said as he reached back inside, “is one of our Greycer Puppies that will be fully grown in about a month.”  He went to the same elderly woman and placed it at her feet.  “We had a whole bunch of extra puppies and wanted to share them with everyone,” he explained, as he went to the wagon and locked everything back up.

He brought the three Cordpower fellows together for a private conversation.  “I don’t know if you’ve heard the reports from the northeastern border lately – have you?” he asked, knowing that they hadn’t.  “It’s bad…very bad.  I can’t stress to you how important it is that everyone get mobilized and travel there as soon as possible.  As much as it pains the Company to give all of these Power Potions away, there really isn’t any alternative; if they don’t get stronger, we may not be able to withstand this invasion.  Many of them may not even make it back after this.” Poegh tried to appear sad at that possible outcome, while also looking like it didn’t matter to him.  He had met quite a few Cordpower higher-ups over the years, so he tried to adopt the same indifferent attitude they seemed to have.

“I don’t understand.  I mean, I’m not a business expert or anything, but isn’t giving away all these Potions going to cut into the bottom line?  You know, ‘bad for business’?” the Company leader asked, still looking confused but Poegh could see that his words – as well as his actions so far – were working extraordinarily well to persuade the man of the “truth”.

“Normally, you would be right,” he said, before he leaned slightly over and dropped to a conspiratorial whisper that only the man in charge could hear, “but if there’s no one left alive, who would buy our product?  This way, we may lose a significant portion of the poorer population, but the alternative is the death of nearly everyone.  In the end, this is actually ‘good for business’.”

Straightening back up, he spoke to all three again, who were now listening to Poegh without even the barest hint of hesitancy.  He smiled inwardly, halfway amazed that he had managed to convince them that he was telling the truth.  This ability is very useful – as well as scary.  I can’t imagine what someone with horrid morals would do with this power; at least I’m trying to do this to save everyone, not take advantage of them – even these Cordpower bastards.

“Remember, we need those villagers to be at the top of their power when they come to help defend the border.  So, as much as you might want to take those boxes away for ‘safekeeping’ – don’t.  You should have plenty for yourselves, and there will be more when you get there.  The more powerful they are, the more likely they are to survive the coming encounter.  And besides—” he smiled and winked— “when they have bigger power pools in the future, how else are they going to fill themselves up quickly without one of our Power Potions?”

They nodded knowingly, and Poegh looked at the leader’s face.  “I just noticed – you’re injured!  We can’t have that; give me a second and I’ll get that for you.”  He reached out and touched his hand to the leader’s bare arm, activating his Healing Touch ability.  Within seconds, the wound to the Company man’s face was gone, not even leaving a scar.  “There, now you look the part of a leader.”

The man looked amazed, which was only understandable – healing was something else that wasn’t given away very often.  He whispered low enough for just the three to hear him again, “One last thing – and this is from the higher-ups…if you encounter any Guardian Guild members, ignore whatever your last orders were to detain or even kill them on sight.  As much as it risks exposing…things, we may need their help to survive.  Beggars can’t be choosers, as they say, and we can always reinstate that…previous order, once this crisis is done with.”

Poegh did his best to ignore the looks from everyone as he hitched up the spikes keeping the wagon in place; there was complete – if eerie – silence from the village crowd as he jumped on the back of the Greycer and very faintly ordered it to start moving.  He didn’t strap himself in yet, knowing that he would have time once they got far enough away from the village; instead, he stood up in the two stirrups where he had his feet placed, and waved to the village just staring at him.

“I’ll see you all up towards the northeast!  There may or may not be supply runs that will sustain you on the way, so try to bring all the food you can carry with you. I’ve got to get to the next village and get them moving as well.  Good luck, everybody – and don’t forget to practice your abilities and use those Power Potions!”  At the last word, his Greycer picked up speed until it was trotting at a good clip outside the village fence.  He waved at the young gate guard on the way out, silently hoping that everything worked out the way everything had been planned.

In-and-out, was what Rosewyn told them.  Get in, deliver the spiel with conviction, commandeer every conversation and override protestations, hand out the gifts/bribes, and leave before anyone could question him too closely.  If they did their jobs right, and sufficiently convinced whoever was in charge, the rest should fall in line.  Their objective was to use everything at their disposal to get the job done: fast-talking, gifts/bribes, and whatever else they could think of – other than threats.  They couldn’t back it up even if they wanted to, so it was a method that was ignored.

A half-mile out from the village, Poegh strapped himself in, letting Milton know that he was ready for the next location.  Now that he had gotten his first out of the way, he felt more confident in the plan.

“Nice work, Poegh – you were the first to reach your village, as well as being the first successful execution of the plan.  The villagers of Westside are already packing up for the trip; I’ll be able to keep an eye on them through the Greycer Puppy you dropped off.  Not to mention, it will be easy to locate them when it comes to delivering supplies.”

“Thanks, Milton.”  Poegh felt a flush of pride rush through him as he hunkered down against the back of his mount, the miles fading behind him as he approached the next town in less than ten minutes.

“Hello, young sir!  Is this the village of Raftley?”

Part II – Improvements & Exploration

Chapter 15 – Once more down into the depths

Despite the harrowing Bearilla attack and the experience of being essentially squished to death underneath the rubble of The Fortress, once the logistics regarding the volunteers and obtaining help from the Kingdom was complete, Rosewyn and her groupmates were eager to continue their descent through Milton’s dungeon.  It wasn’t entirely selfish, however; it was obvious to everyone now that they needed to improve their own strength and skills in order to survive against what was coming.

Instead of joining the majority of the groups in the new Central Access Station that the Station Core had set up for ease of use, she and her party were still going through the full dungeon.  Because they were still “leading” the pack in terms of strength and Power, the only place they could go to tackle the harder rooms was in the original location.  As much as the CAS made it easier to access the first seven rooms, it didn’t quite work for them.

“Do you think we can finish the eighth room again without everyone almost dying this time?  And maybe I can keep all my limbs intact?” Prastor asked, having largely recovered from having a portion of The Fortress ceiling fall on him – as did the rest of them – the day before.

“Absolutely, no problem.  We just had a little hiccup – easy enough to succeed this time,” Gregar responded with enthusiasm.

And he wasn’t exactly wrong.

None of them had been exactly idle while they were waiting for the dungeon to reopen.  With the availability of Power Potions now in great supply, everyone was using them to both boost their Power Pool and to constantly use their abilities until it became second nature.  Most Guild members who were “newly” reborn increased their Power Pools – if not their skills in their abilities – quite rapidly; to those who had already gone through the dungeon far enough to grab another ability, they were able to practice with those new skills until they became more comfortable using them.  Of course, the progress with their improvements was slow outside of combat but having the available Power at their fingertips meant that it still steadily improved.

Before going to the dungeon, Rosewyn had looked at her own “statistics” – which was what the Station Core called them – at the access terminal in the CAS.[15]  It had changed significantly since she saw it before the Bearilla battle above the dungeon; not only had the intense danger everyone had been in amped up the skill gains, but the subsequent practice and Power Potion guzzling she (like everyone else) had done had increased her pool size dramatically.

Rosewyn now felt as if she had more in her Power pool than she ever had before, though her skill in most of her Affinities was still less than what it had been before.  But it felt like it was slowly improving, hour after hour.  She found that as she improved her skill with the basic Affinities, as well as her Light and Dark ones, the easier her powerful Spatial Void ability was to use.

At first, creating even a tiny Void had drained her – and not only her Power; the fact that she had fallen into a coma after using the massively sized Void the last time they had tackled room eight was evidence that the strain was sometimes too much.  Even during the battle against the Bearillas, she was only able to cast a few – granted, they were smaller – of them before she was too weak to do much afterwards.

She had also broken through to the Supreme rank at some point over the last hectic week before and after the battle; it didn’t mean as much as it used to, however, because she felt as if she was just barely scratching at the potential that she knew was eventually obtainable.  Supreme ranks almost seemed like they weren’t the pinnacle of achievement – more like the stepping stones to something even greater.  However, there was no way she was ever going to see that if she didn’t get stronger and, of course, defeat the horrifically strong army up north.

Although they had “technically” finished the eighth room already before the attack, none of the members of her group had taken a second ability yet.  For one, they didn’t have time before everyone was scrambling to get ready to repel the attack; and two, they didn’t think they all really earned it since they didn’t come through unscathed.  Prastor had lost his arm and if it hadn’t been for the fact that Milton’s special labs were able to fix her coma state, she had been effectively dead.  They all agreed to try again and finish it cleanly before they got their new abilities.

There was a small wait for them when they got to Milton’s dungeon; they were delayed getting started because of a few logistical matters to deal with, which meant that as the sixth group in line, they had time to kill.  No one really had anything they wanted to talk about – since that was what they had done a lot of while they were waiting for the dungeons to reopen – so Moxwell just pulled Rosewyn close and held her while they waited for their turn.

It was strange to her; ever since they had first “died”, the love they held between them was stronger than it was before.  They had rarely exhibited many public displays of affection before meeting Milton – but now it felt like they couldn’t keep their hands off each other.  She could see Gregar and Rychelle doing the same thing; the Scout/Nature Manipulator couple were thinking of eventually getting married – when everything settled down at least.  Without knowing how long that was going to take, Rosewyn was thankful that with the NCUs in their system they were essentially immortal.

Pairings between group members was becoming more and more commonplace.  Although it had never been outright forbidden, romance between Guild members had been highly discouraged and frowned-upon because of the heightened risk of death in their jobs.  Since that issue was no longer something they had to worry about, the emotions that were generated by the intense danger they faced in combat in turn incited the romantic feelings of many Guild members outside of combat.  It was a strange dichotomy of brutal destructive capabilities on one hand, and enflamed passionate emotions on the other.

Even Prastor had a “friend” back in The Refuge, though he didn’t talk about her much.  Or at all.

The wait took less than twenty minutes, as those that had gone before her group had been experienced and were able to tear through the first room without much trouble.  In fact, Rosewyn’s group had been through so many times and had increased their own skills so much that they could practically walk through without stopping.  Which turned out to be true when they finally got their chance to go in.

She had asked and learned the names of every type of beast they came across inside the dungeon; therefore, she knew that the short, brown stealthy creatures that they practically tore apart were called Squirrelings.  Although the exact placement of the room’s denizens was randomized every time they had gone through, they had all become more adept at spotting them – even without Rosewyn’s perpetual Affinity fields that she was starting to finally be able to use most of the time again.

Each of her fields were able to extend 20 feet in all directions without much drain on her Power Pool; they could reach farther if she pumped a little more power into them, but she rarely needed to do that.  Therefore, it was easy enough to spot the body heat and small moisture concentrations of the Squirrelings even when they were hiding behind the unstable pillars.

Gregar ranged ahead, directing them around the different trap triggers spread all over the room; his eyesight was now augmented so powerfully that he didn’t even stop as he casually walked through, trusting in his companions to stop any type of attack from above.  Moxwell came next, watching his surroundings and looking for any potential threat that got too close.  Next came Prastor, who was the most vulnerable because he had very little in the way of offensive capability and was in the middle so that he could reach everyone quickly.

Rosewyn came next, spotting the creatures hanging off the pillars; when she located them, instead of using her abilities to knock them off, she instead created small balls of light next to them, highlighting them for everyone to see.  Rychelle would then use one of her plants she was carrying to snatch them off with its numerous long tentacle-vines, holding them in place and constricting them until they perished.

Sometimes the Squirrelings would react quicker than their Nature Manipulator could grab them; then – and only then, because otherwise there was a potential for her Air Affinity to jostle the unstable pillars if she used it too close to them – Rosewyn would quickly create a box of Air around them and lower them down to the ground, where Moxwell could finish them off.

They were very precise in their actions, because any stray attack – or smacked-around Squirreling – could potentially bring the whole place crashing down on them.  They’d all had enough of that to last a lifetime, both with their first few times through the room and from the battle more than a day ago.

No one even spoke to each other throughout the room; they were so comfortable as a team now that it wasn’t necessary.  As a result, with their skill and experience playing no small part, they were through the room in less than two minutes, with only one stop near the end when they had to take out five of the Squirrelings before they could progress.

The next room with the Quakes and tall dried grass took a minute or two longer; they were only delayed when one of the missed hidden snakes ended up latching onto Rychelle as they walked through the room.  She was hurt only superficially, but Prastor healed her up quickly and they were ready to go.

The strategy they had adopted in that second room was to run full-out toward the middle of the room, where Rosewyn would extend her Air Affinity field briefly so determine where the exit was; when it was found, Moxwell would literally sweep his sword across the ground, cutting great swathes in the grassy field.  Sometimes he would catch a hidden Quake or two in the process; if he didn’t get them, Gregar was there to quickly take them out.  It was rare that they ever ran into one of the firebombs, and when they did, Rosewyn would flex her Fire Affinity muscles to snuff it out.

The third room had taken them a while to figure out, though once they discovered the solution, many of the other groups had adopted it to suit their groups.  No longer did she try to speed up the slicing Weightonite blades crossing the corridors, potentially causing it to destroy itself and kill them all.  Instead, she slowed it down using her Air Affinity a margin, before Rychelle snuck in a few vines to wrap around the base of the blade and axle it was rotating upon.  They had no hope of actually stopping it; the best they could do was slow it down far enough to make crossing through them easy.

As for the Rabbiteers shooting out from the walls, both Moxwell and Gregar were fast enough to intercept them when they came out.  They didn’t take much effort to kill once they were caught – usually in mid-air – so they usually made a game out of snatching the antlered rabbits out of the air and humanely dispatching them.

The fourth room, or the “Rainbow” room as Milton liked to call it, was always fun.  The location of the handholds they had to climb up constantly changed, though the same color order never did.  It usually only took them a few seconds to determine the correct path before they were up and ready for the shower of colorful – if deadly – puffballs to fall out of the ceiling.  After they had originally defeated this room, using whatever tactics they had at their disposal and receiving many tiny wounds in return, Rychelle had used the Item Shaping ability she had earned afterwards to create something that would eliminate most of the threat.

She pulled it out from the satchel of various plants she always brought with her and placed it on the edge of the “bowl”, using her Nature Manipulation and Item Shaping ability on it to create a massive fly-trap-looking plant.  Its “mouth” was huge: opened wide, it spanned about 12 feet across.  Now too big and heavy for Rychelle to even think of picking up, Moxwell came over and scooped it up with his augmented strength and lobbed it easily toward the middle of the concave flooring.

As soon as the massive plant arrived at its location – only slightly off the mark – the ceiling opened, and thousands of multi-colored fluff balls started to fall down.  The giant fly-trap swallowed 95% of the Tiny Wolfites, enclosing the lot of them inside its mouth and using the acidic poison coating its insides to quickly dissolve their bodies.  The remaining 200 or so that missed the mouth ran toward the group when they landed but were instantly set upon by everyone.

The Tiny Wolfites’ main advantage was to attack as a massive group to overwhelm their targets; when that was taken away, a swift kick to their bodies or a stomp was enough to finish them off.  They were relatively harmless at this point, so they had fun kicking them at each other playfully.  Most of the time, even a kick from Prastor was enough to kill them, so it was almost like kicking around little fluff balls instead of dangerous tiny beasts.

The fifth room still looked the same, with a small, brightly lit area that had trees lining the walls and luxurious grass carpeting the floor.  Usually, there were Wienerpups inside to entice the unwary to play and snuggle with them, which they had all learned to easily resist.  Most of the time, they just walked through with smiles on their faces as they watched the puppies play.  Easy-peasy.

Now, however, the Wienerpups were playing with a new friend: Greycer Puppies.  The adorable cuteness factor had been ramped up as Rosewyn gazed on them all roughhousing together.  Moxwell had to physically restrain her for a couple of seconds as she nearly made the same mistake as she did the first time that she saw them.  Once she had recovered from the intense Charisma draw that they were emanating, Rosewyn looked over and saw Gregar doing the same to Rychelle – who was slowly coming out of it as well.

Prastor wasn’t as lucky, as he actually managed to reach the pile of puppies; fortunately, Moxwell quickly snatched him back once he was sure Rosewyn wasn’t going to succumb anymore.  A few strands of grass were ripped up as Prastor was pulled away, the Wienerpups’ Nature Manipulation ability already at work.  The slight pain of the tightening and then tearing grass restraints was thankfully enough to snap their Healer out of it.

“Wow, Milton – that was intense.”

“Thanks, I’ll take that as a compliment.  This room was starting to become a bit of a joke as it feels like it’s been a very, very long time since anyone was taken by them.  I thought the addition of an additional Charisma-based creature would make it a little more dangerous.  It worked so well that the two previous groups actually ended up…staying here to enjoy the new addition.”

Wow – who knew those new puppies could be so deadly?  With them all recovered from the cuteness overload, they left behind the pile of Wienerpups and Greycer Puppies and moved onto the sixth room.

Which ended up being one of the easier rooms since Milton never changed the route (at least that she had ever seen).  They all moved as a group, easily finding their way through the maze of rope bridges; vines would shoot out from Rychelle to wrap around the Bird Warriors attacking them every 10 feet, and Rosewyn would create small walls of hardened air that they would smack right into – especially after she forced a small orb created by her Dark Affinity on its eyes to blind it.  Only occasionally did they manage to reach the group, where they were expertly dispatched by Moxwell and Gregar.  At one point, Prastor was a hair’s-breadth away from being snatched up, but their Scout’s knife through its eye ended the threat.

The first part of room seven was easy enough; Rosewyn steadied the pillars of earth they were walking across using her Earth Affinity, while Rychelle used one of her plants to shoot needles at the attacking Quadger Buddies trying to bring them down.  Their Nature Manipulator never managed to actually kill one, but it usually prevented them from bunching up enough to take down a pillar or two.

The fight against those same Quadger Buddies and their Quadger Foreman “leader” was the first real challenge they had experienced through this dungeon run, but it was only challenging because it actually required some strategy.  The Buddies would attack all at once, and only when they were halfway eliminated did the Foreman appear – in a big eruption of dirt from underneath the ground.  From there, Moxwell did his best to annoy it and make it concentrate on him – taking hits that his body ultimately shrugged off due to an extra augmentation boost from Prastor, but his armor took a beating – while the rest slowly took out its smaller brethren who liked to burrow under the ground and ambush them.

Fortunately, Rychelle was able to dig some thick roots from her plant under the ground, which flushed the little guys out.  If that didn’t work, Rosewyn would use her own Earth Affinity to push them out; she had tried to squish and entomb them inside the dirt, but they were able to cut through almost everything she sent their way with ease.  Of course, once they were out, they were easy prey for Gregar to dispatch efficiently.

With those taken care of, they all unleashed their attacks on the Foreman: plant spikes, air blades and hardened earth shards, and rear sneak attacks from Gregar.  Within less than 30 seconds of the full-group barrage, the Foreman was dead.

Time to tackle room eight again.

Chapter 16 – The ninth room

They made it through the wall-smashing trap in between rooms seven and eight with no problem, and Moxwell was able to exchange his armor for something that wasn’t all cut-up using the Molecular Converter there.  The rest of the short journey toward the eighth room was uneventful – and it also showed no sign (not that it ever really did) that anyone had come through before them.  She wasn’t sure how far the other groups had gotten so far that day, but she knew that at least a few had finished the seventh room before the attack.

Their same strategy worked with the same effectiveness as it had in their visit before.  Prastor augmented Moxwell, who gained the attention of the heavily armored bear facing them; Gregar waited for an opportune opening and assisted their Nature Manipulator when he could; Rosewyn swept the upper catwalks for the invisible Kittylocks, knocking them off while avoiding the deadly Weightonite shards that were pushed off; and Rychelle extended her flower plant’s petals to envelop the falling gliding cats, where they were subjected to the poisonous insides of her sindano plant.  A liberal application of burning fire to the bottom of the less-armored feet of the Scaly Tanks allowed them to finish them off when they rolled to the side to avoid the fire burning their feet.

The one thing they made absolutely sure of – when busting through the thin dirt walls to the next section of the room – was that they didn’t launch any stray dirt clods on the easily identifiable spring traps located inside each section.  It was that mistake that almost killed every one of them last time and put her into a coma; they wanted to avoid that outcome if at all possible.  However, just in case it did happen, Rosewyn had a plan to catch whatever was thrown forward in a sphere of hardened air – though she wasn’t confident she could react fast enough if it came down to it.

Fortunately, over the next thirty minutes of slowly taking on increasingly numerous Scaly Tanks and Kittylocks, they finally came to the last section where there were six of the armored bears – as well as ten of the gliding cats.  Without having to worry about destroying the barrier to the next section, Rosewyn used an extra-large sweep of air to push the invisible cats all off at the same time; using her Fire Affinity field to detect their body heat, she sliced their relatively fragile glider wings up with some additional sharp Air slices, causing them to plummet to the ground.

Gregar rushed to where they all landed – all but one, which had landed on one of the spring traps and was splattered against the far wall when it was launched away at high speeds.  Now that I see it in action again, I don’t think I could’ve caught a clod of dirt before it hit anything.  Rychelle helped to restrain the few that were trying to recover and get away with her vine plant, which helped to eliminate them all rather quickly.

Meanwhile, Moxwell was kiting the six armored bears around; with his activated Slowing Miasma, they were slow enough that it was relatively easy for him – all the while still maintaining their attention.  When the Kittylocks were all taken care of, the rest of the team went to work.

Rychelle accurately launched poisoned needles inside the eye-slits of the Scaly Tanks, effectively slowing and blinding them temporarily at the same time.  With her still-lit fire stick, Rosewyn used that as a focus to systematically burn the feet of each bear, where Gregar immediately took advantage and practically eviscerated their softer underbellies.  One-by-one, they fell as easy as the others inside the eighth room, until the last one dropped dead at Moxwell’s feet.

“Well, that was a bit easier this time!  Nice job, everyone,” Moxwell said, his labored breathing from the fight quickly recovering as they finished with the fight.

“I agree, that was what they call textbook teamwork there.  Are you all ready to get your new abilities, or do you want to press on?”

Rosewyn glanced around at her groupmates, silently asking that question as she looked at them individually.  Shrugs and even a thumbs-up from Rychelle gave her all the information she needed.  “I think we’ll keep going – we might as well check out the next room while we’re here.  Though, if it doesn’t work out too well, can you bring us back in the CAS so we can get our abilities there?”

Milton agreed, and they exited the room, the only one a little worse-for-wear was Moxwell, who had some damage to his armor from defending against the Scaly Tanks.  Rosewyn drank a Power Potion along with the others as they walked to the room’s exit, remarking to her group that she hadn’t needed to use one before then – and neither had they.  It was that – more than anything – that showed how much they had all improved.

The tunnel toward the next room wasn’t long, but Gregar inspected every inch of it for more traps; Rosewyn was appreciative for that even though it delayed them a little – she didn’t relish dying before even getting to the ninth room.  Toward the end of the tunnel, it started to get dark – so dark that she brought forth a floating orb of light that she maintained with her Light Affinity.  Although she could “see” using her fields around her, the rest of her group couldn’t.

There turned out to be nothing dangerous or deadly inside the tunnel, so they reached the next room fortunately unscathed.  Unfortunately, the next room was pitch dark; at the threshold, they all looked inside and couldn’t see anything – but they could all feel and smell the heavy moisture in the air.  I wonder if it’s a room full of water?  Though, as she extended her Water Affinity field farther inside the room, she reevaluated her assumption: the saturated air inside the room was so thick with water that it was unlike anything she had ever experienced near bodies of water.

She directed the Light orb hanging above their heads to fly further into the room and she got her answer to the moisture question: the room was full of thick, heavy fog.  It was so thick that instead of her orb illuminating the room, it was obscured like the moon behind cloud cover.  It suffused their surroundings with light, but all it essentially did was brighten up the fog, so it appeared to be a massive wall of white.  She pumped a little more Power into her orb, hoping that would help – but all it did was make the wall of white more intense and almost blinding.

“I can barely see more than a few feet in front of me.  Gregar, can you see any better in here?”  Moxwell asked.  Rosewyn was worried; even though Moxwell had prioritized his Strength and Constitution augmentation boosts lately, he could still improve his Perception a fair amount.  If he wasn’t able to see, then it was likely that Gregar – who had an increased augmented vision, admittedly – could only see marginally better.

“I’ll see what I can do to check it out, but I don’t think I can see much more than you.”  So saying, their Scout turned invisible using his Light Spectrum Invisibility and crept forward.  Unfortunately, his passage caused the fog to swirl around behind him, easily highlighting him to anyone else.  None of them said anything, however, because they didn’t want to call attention to Gregar trying to sneak his way inside.

Rosewyn lost sight of him (or at least the disturbed fog from his passage) within seconds, though she could vaguely detect his body heat using her Fire Affinity field; the massive amount of moisture in the air was thoroughly diffusing the source of heat, making its usual precise pinpointing nearly useless.  The water contained in his body was also difficult to track, as it blended in with the thick fog.  Disturbances in the air were a little easier to follow, but once he traveled toward the edge of her field, he kind of…faded from her awareness.

He was back within a minute, popping up in front of them like he sometimes liked to do to see if he could scare any of them.  It usually worked (for everyone except for her), but this time everyone saw him coming due to the wisps of fog being blown around.

“It’s so thick out there that I couldn’t make out much; if there is a trap along the ground, I would have to literally crawl over every inch to see it.  About 25 feet from the entrance, there are some…trees, I believe – though unlike any that I’ve seen before.  For one, they are growing directly out of the stone flooring; if that wasn’t enough, they’re sickly and crooked-looking, with their branches sticking out this way and that.  I touched the end of one delicately and found that they are pointed at the ends like long spears, with sharp edges along the length of them.  They are growing so close together that I can’t see a way through without stabbing or slicing ourselves up – though I didn’t travel too far up the line of them.”

“Let me see if I can do anything about this fog – there could be anything out there for all we know,” Rosewyn said after Gregar made his report.  Stepping into the room a few feet, she used her Air Affinity to generate a vortex of air around her reaching about 15 feet out, clearing the fog away from her and providing a relatively clear line of sight.  She let the vortex fade when the Power drain was starting to get a bit extensive; the thickly saturated air was more difficult to move and control.

The fog crept in almost instantly, flowing into the “bubble” of clear air around her until she quickly couldn’t see anything again.  There has to be a better solution.  I wonder…

Normally, when she used her Water Affinity, it was to either manipulate an existing pool of water in different ways to create an attack or defense, or to “suck” the water out of a beast, though that was harder depending on the size and fortitude of said beast, and whether there was an open orifice nearby.  As much as she’d like to, she couldn’t just rip it all out – at least not yet.  Perhaps when I’m stronger…

Either way, the point was she could move water around, but it was very difficult to “create” more of it.  Fire, on the other hand, was easy – it burned through the Caster’s Power as fuel and could be spread rapidly in different ways; Air, similarly, was plentiful and could be used with abandon.  Earth needed the element already present to manipulate; the dirt and stone she manipulated was finite and was dependent upon nearby resources.  She could condense the water in the air – drying out the moisture content – but then she would have to do something with it because she couldn’t just make it disappear.

She tried something different with that in mind.  Reaching out with her Water Affinity, she condensed the moisture around her and shot the large ball it created out toward the “trees” she had caught the barest glimpse of when she cleared the air earlier.  The air cleared…and then started to slowly fill the void back in.  A quick burst of air originating around her body pushed it back, and the air was clear for another short length of time.  She started condensing the moisture within her easy reach again – creating a smaller ball of pure water – and propelled that out again.  Which was when she started the air burst process all over again.

“Ok, I can clear the air for us if I maintain this rotation, but it’s a major Power drain.  I could theoretically make this bubble larger, but it would quickly exhaust me; as it is, I’ll probably have to down another Power Potion every five minutes or so.  Let’s go – Gregar, you’re out front,” she told them, repeating the process again every few seconds.

She got into a good rhythm as they started to explore, cautiously traveling along the lengthy line of strange-looking trees.  As they got close enough to see them clearly, Rychelle looked at them and said, “Those are not trees…unless they are all dead and that’s why I can’t ‘feel’ them.”  When Rosewyn was close enough, she split her focus from maintaining the Light above her group and maintaining the “bubble” of cleared air to sense the strange trees better.

They were colored a dark brown color, but it was a flimsy illusion; in reality, the strange “trees” weren’t trees at all – they were constructions made from Weightonite.  They stuck out in almost random directions, poking out crazily and looking like deadly and demented sculptures.  A closer look at how they were all intertwined made it obvious that no one was going to get though the “hedge” they were following without getting seriously hurt.

After The Fortress had fallen, Rosewyn and many of the other Elemental Casters took advantage of the small chips of Weightonite that had broken off in the destruction of the massive fortification.  They now all had full understanding of the extremely heavy stone, though even that knowledge wasn’t enough to manipulate more than a small amount of it.  The heavier and denser the stone, the harder (and the more Power required) it was to move around and do what you wanted.  So, while the “trees” in the room technically fell into her Earth Affinity category, the most she could probably do to move them out of the way was slowly bend the stone in a different direction.

One at a time – and slowly, requiring another Power Potion in between each branch.

While it might be a good training regimen to increase her skill with Earth (and increase her Power Pool), it could potentially take hours to get through.  Therefore, she put that thought completely out of her mind.

About 50 feet from the entrance, there was finally an opening in the tree line; the trees just stopped, creating a gap of about 10 feet before the trees continued into the distance.  Of course, she couldn’t see that far, so it could’ve ended in a wall 20 feet farther down or gone on forever.  Regardless, Gregar led the way into the gap, as it was the only pathway they could see.

Chapter 17 – Deadly trees

And a pathway it turned out to be.  Though, from what Rosewyn could tell, it was more of the start of a maze than anything; more trees were lined up on either side for a short distance before the pathway turned left.  Feeling as though they were walking into a trap, they all entered anyway.

When Rychelle – the last member of their party to walk onto the pathway – was about 10 feet inside the maze entrance, a loud grinding noise erupted under their feet and one of the trees flanking that same entrance abruptly shifted until their way out was completely blocked.  They all froze, waiting for anything else to happen; after a moment, they all breathed a sigh of relief.

“Phew!  For a moment there, I thought the whole ‘forest’ was going to come slamming right into us,” Gregar said, a cheerful tone to his voice.  Rosewyn absently noted that he was trying to lighten the mood, for which she was thankful; with their way out blocked, they were now committed to seeing this room through.

“Gregar.” Rosewyn gestured to their scout to come near, which he did as he ran so fast that he practically flew to her side.  “What do you make of these lines?” she asked, pointing to some odd lines on the floor.  She would do it herself, but she was still concentrating on doing three things at once.

He bent down to get a closer look, running his fingers over them, before he looked back at the “tree” that had moved.  “Hmm…it looks like these small grooves are connected to the base of all these trees.  The one that blocked the entrance to this pathway has one too and…well, I could be mistaken, but I think that it is entirely possible that all these trees could—”

Gregar was suddenly cut off when the deafening sound of wolves howling erupted from all around them; it sounded as if they were right next to her ear, and it was hard to determine exactly which direction it was coming from because of the lack of visibility and fog.  All she could focus on while the howl seemed to echo around the room was the fact that she was shivering in fear.

It was almost the opposite from the fifth room with the adorable puppies; those dog babies made her want to jump into the pile of cuteness, whereas the howling made her want to flee in terror.  Fortunately, they were all made of stern stuff – especially after the harrowing experience fighting against the Bearillas – so they all stood stock-still in fear instead of running.

The howling seemed to go on forever; when it finally stopped, she shook herself to snap out of it, seeing her groupmates do the same thing.  The silence was almost painful afterwards; when she looked at the others, she just wished they would make a noise to show that they were alright.

“That certainly doesn’t bode well—” Moxwell finally said, recovering faster than the rest of them, before he himself was cut off.

Not by more howling, but by the near-deafening grinding of stone on stone as the floor started to vibrate.  She was looking towards the pathway going further into the maze of trees, still trying to concentrate on clearing the air as she had stopped while the howling was going on; as a result, she neither saw, felt, nor heard over the grinding noise something land behind them – right behind Rychelle.

“Ry! Look out!” Gregar must’ve sensed something with his augmented Perception, because his eyes grew wide as he barreled past the others standing in the way.  Rosewyn herself was knocked to the side slightly as she turned to see what he was talking about.

An eight-foot tall wolf stood on its hind legs, its enormous jaws locked around Rychelle’s throat as she tried to scream in pain.  A mere fraction of a second before Gregar arrived, Rosewyn could hear the snap of their Nature Manipulator’s neck even over the terrible grinding noise beneath their feet.  She fell to the ground, her neck a gaping mess and hanging at an unnatural angle; Gregar flew over her body and stabbed his two knives directly into the wolf’s chest as he screamed in rage.

Although that might have been a deathblow, the wolf wasn’t going down without a fight.  It immediately tried to grab at Gregar with its…hands?  She looked again at the entire beast; grey fur covered its entire body, its muscular-looking hind legs looking larger than she’d ever seen before on a wolf or wolf-hybrid, the chest larger and wider…it almost appeared like a very large person that had their body turned into a wolf.  In fact, the only thing that belied that was its head – which was very large wolf all the way.

And, of course, the eight shiny, black-scaled spider legs sticking out of its back.

Gregar kicked off the beast’s torso and jumped back – abandoning his knives inside the chest of the monster that had just killed his girlfriend – narrowly avoiding the hands that tried to grab him.  Unfortunately, he didn’t see one of the spider legs extending out from the back of the upright wolf, which caught him in the side, impaling him and lifting him up in the air.

Rosewyn dropped what she was doing and condensed the water sphere she was in the middle of forming; with a sharp *crack*, the water instantly turned to ice as she turned it into a frozen spear, which she shot forward into the chest of the wolf right next to the knives still embedded there.  Moxwell rushed past her quickly (not as fast as their Scout, but almost) as Prastor quickly slapped him on the back and boosted his already augmented body.

Two other ice spears were already forming in the air, rocketing across the short distance between her and the monstrous wolf when Moxwell arrived, jumping up and yelling as he came down with his sword, intending to split it right down the middle.  As if it had seen what was coming for it, the spider-wolf tossed the struggling (but still alive) Gregar aside and brought its eight spider legs up in a defensive shield of sorts.

Gregar flew outwards and Rosewyn tried to catch him with a cushion of air, but the moisture prevented it from fully forming.  In the end, all she could do was slow him down a little; he still hit the nearby trees with enough force to slice him into at least five big pieces.  And numerous small ones.

Meanwhile, Moxwell’s diving sword attack ended up slamming into the “spider-leg shield”, completely shattering all but one of the hard, scaly legs and embedding the edge of his sword into the side of its skull.  Even with that, it still wasn’t quite dead; the upright wolf punched out with its person-like hands and pushed Moxwell back a few feet.  It wasn’t enough to even hurt him, but he lost the grip on his sword, which was still hanging off the wolf’s head.

It was actually a good thing that he moved back, since Rosewyn had strained a little bit and condensed an even larger amount of water from the air, creating a massive ice spear that was nearly the size of the spider-wolf’s leg.  When he was punched out of the way, she pushed it forward at high speed and drove her projectile into its chest.  It hit so hard that it was picked up and thrown backwards – right into the “tree” blocking their exit.  Being a bit larger than their Scout, there were more than five large pieces that rained down the branches to pile on the floor.

“Oops.”  Rosewyn realized that Moxwell’s sword – the one that had been embedded inside the skull of the wolf – was now quite out of reach when it was flung somewhere even past where she could see.  If it was a little closer, she could use her Earth Affinity to move it closer, but she couldn’t even sense it now.

“What the fuck was that?” Prastor uncharacteristically said, shocking her because she was expecting her husband to say something like that.  No one made mention of their two dead groupmates, which was a common occurrence lately; they had all seen each other die so many times that it barely fazed them anymore.

Before Moxwell could respond, Rosewyn yelled, “No time for that now!  The trees are starting to move together!  Move!  Move!”  In fact, as soon as the horrendous beast had died, she felt a subtle shift in the grinding sound beneath them, which tipped her off to start looking around her.  She had noticed the trees starting to move near Moxwell; slow at first, it was starting to move even faster now.  And then the next one in line on each side started to move toward them, as well, shrinking their pathway by the second.

Rosewyn continued to clear the air, though instead of water balls she created some ice spears and floated them along with her; she popped a Power Potion fairly quickly and had another in her fist ready to go if she needed it.  The remaining three group members raced ahead of the slowly collapsing corridor, keeping ahead of it by a large margin – which they needed as they encountered another spider-wolf-person beast.

To be truthful, it wasn’t really them encountering the beast; in reality, Moxwell’s face met the powerful feet of the wolf as it dropped down from somewhere up above.  She called out at the last moment as it literally fell into her detection field, which helped her husband survive even worse initial damage. Rosewyn had a feeling that if he hadn’t dodged slightly backwards at her shout, he might’ve had his neck damaged or broken by the impact.

Nevertheless, he was in a vulnerable position without a weapon – just his armor and his shield.  He bashed ahead with his shield as he recovered, knocking the hulking beast a few feet but doing little to no damage to it.  It was enough of a space that the six spears of ice that Rosewyn had been floating along with her were able to slide in and impale themselves inside the body of the beast.  Three went into its chest, two aimed at its neck, and the last ricocheted off its skull as she missed its eye by a fraction of an inch.

As Rosewyn pushed the air away from her again to clear the air, she redirected it toward the beast, who was staggered by her assault.  She could tell that she had injured it, but its ability to push past the pain and continue fighting allowed it to shrug off the five bleeding wounds caused by her ice shards.  She didn’t think she had enough strength in her Air Affinity to restrain it or do enough damage with sharpened hardened air, but that wasn’t her objective.

“Moxwell, hold there and get ready!” Rosewyn shouted, as her redirected air arrived behind the beast.

It took a step forward and she immediately slammed her gathered air mass into the back of its other knee like a hammer, not doing any major damage – but the force of the impact caused its joint to buckle under the pressure.  Its momentum made the furry wolf-spider pitch forward, falling flat on its face – except the eight legs on its back splayed out before it could hit the ground.

Almost perpendicular to the ground, the wolf-spider put its hands down to pick itself up, but it didn’t get far as Moxwell slammed his shield down on its head, stunning it for a moment.  He then used that same head as a stepping stone as he jumped almost straight up in the air – and landed feet-first with all his weight on the back of the stunned beast.  Even over the sound of the stone-on-stone still grinding under her feet, she could hear the spider legs snap under the strain and the chest of the wolf slammed into the ground, the ice spears still embedded there driven deeper.

It tried to howl, but Rosewyn must’ve aimed the spears near something vital, because all that came out was a choked whine.  Seconds later, it shuddered and lay still.

Prastor came up behind her husband and touched him on the arm, sending his Healing Touch ability into Moxwell to fix his ruined face.  “Thanks, Prastor.  That was some nice thinking there, honey.”

“Thanks, but we really need to get moving,” Rosewyn urged, as she implemented her air clearing procedure again and noticed the trees around them were already starting to move.

They encountered three more of the wolf-spiders, but they were easily taken out using the exact same strategy; either they couldn’t see what happened to the others, or they didn’t adapt their attacks very well.  The third actually went down faster, as she was luckily able to angle one of the ice spears that she propelled forward inside of its eye cavity, where it impaled its brain.

They were keeping ahead of the collapsing pathway behind them, and it was only when it spilled out into a large open area that she realized that there hadn’t been any side paths for them to choose from.  So, not a maze, obviously – but where was the pathway leading us?

She got her answer when they came to a stop after about 20 feet into the open area, the deadly trees had been surrounding them for the last fifteen minutes as they ran for their lives.  Howls erupted from around them, much closer than it felt like before, freezing them all in place as they stared out into the barely lit confines of her “bubble”.  The howls seemed to come from outside of her detection field, but they also sounded as if they were closer to the ground than they had been before – which probably meant that they weren’t going to drop on their heads.

In addition, the grinding that had been their constant companion suddenly stopped, the silence replaced by another curious sound.

Drinking her fourth Power Potion, she increased her Power expenditure to expand her moisture condensing and air expansion bubble by a magnitude of three.  It took nearly half of her Power, but she already had another Potion in her hand to replenish it.

Which she fumbled and dropped when the fog cleared, and she brightened her Light orb – to reveal the nightmare around them.

Eight more of the upright-walking wolf-spiders surrounded them about 20 feet out, closing off any hope of escape (even if they knew which way to go).  Worse than that, Rosewyn could see that they were surrounded in a large circle of trees; it didn’t sound that bad, but the fact that every other one was spinning, creating a whirlwind of deadly destruction – that was bad.  Especially since they were noticeably getting closer and looking at the floor, she saw that at least a few of them had lines leading to the center of the circle.

Where they were standing.

The “bubble” she had created was starting to fill with fog again, but she was able to see the wolf-spider beasts curiously turn their backs toward them.  Before they were completely obscured, she could see a small hole on their lower backs that she hadn’t really noticed before fill with some white substance.

As a large glob of sticky-looking webbing shot out at them from eight different directions, Moxwell turned to Rosewyn and said, “Hey, at least now we can pick our new abil—”

Chapter 18 – New abilities

Milton watched the final showdown between Rosewyn and her group against his Arachnawerewolves[16], who ended up utterly decimating the unprepared and reduced party in the final “arena”.  With their composition made up of a Spiderwolf, Proctan, and a Scaly Bear, the spider-accented werewolves were fast, agile, and could withstand some considerable damage before they went down.  They also could self-regenerate from grievous wounds (though not necessarily missing limbs without an extended period of time) – as per the gene mutation he gave them – and their sense of Perception was also heightened, allowing them to fairly accurately locate the group members as they walked through the room.

Although they didn’t have armored scales all up and down their body, their durable spider legs were another matter entirely; they were able to use them to both attack with extra strength and block attack like a shield when it covered their bodies.  However, even the extra protection afforded by the scales on the spider legs couldn’t withstand attacks like Moxwell had dished out with his sword at first.  Against such overwhelming Strength, there wasn’t much else his werewolves could do to defend against that.

Altogether, though, his Arachnawerewolves did very well – especially at the end where the sticky webbing they shot out of their lower backs hampered the group’s efforts of defense.  The thin shield of air that Rosewyn usually kept up around her body prevented the gooey white substance from sticking, but it didn’t help the others.  She had attempted to burn it off of them with her Fire Affinity – which actually did work – but it ended up hurting them as well.  Not to mention that by the time they could move again, the werewolves were already pouncing on them.  They managed to take out one when Moxwell practically hugged one and took it down to the ground; Rosewyn followed it up with some precisely shot ice spears to its eyes and brain when it couldn’t move.

Prastor was caught and killed quickly after that; he didn’t have a chance when four of the Arachnawerewolves piled on top of Moxwell and proceeded to essentially rip off his armor with their jaws and spider legs – which almost acted like can openers.  With no real attack or defense to speak of, they swarmed him quickly thereafter.

Rosewyn managed to frantically get off an un-aimed Spatial Void, which sliced off a leg from one of her two attackers, but quickly fell under the onslaught of the other one.  Once they were in close, she didn’t have a lot of defense against a determined enemy – even some well-placed air punches couldn’t deter it for long.  As a last-ditch effort, she attempted to condense the fog around them into ice shackles to prevent it from moving, but the werewolf shattered them within seconds, and it was all over after that.

Milton really wanted Rosewyn to improve her use of her Spatial Void; it was obscenely powerful and a well-placed one could even kill a Bearilla with seemingly little effort.  However, every time she used her ability, she was supremely drained afterwards; he was sure that it was this drain that made her a little gun-shy.  He had asked her about it previously, and she said that it felt like her body became lethargic and her mind slowed down – two things that were not the best during combat.  Fortunately, as her skills improved in her other Affinities, the creation of the voids seemed to come easier to her.

Which was important to know – he wanted the other Elemental Casters training right now to have access to the same deadly ability.  Having 50, 100, or even 500 Casters able to toss out Voids like beads at a Mardi Gras parade was invaluable.  It was potentially something that could win the fight to come – but everyone except for Rosewyn was a long way off from that becoming a reality.  Even if he were to give every Caster the ability right now, many of them still weren’t powerful enough to actually use it yet, let alone effectively.  For those that could potentially use it, they would most likely feel the same type of fatigue and drain Rosewyn did if they were to create even quarter-sized Voids.  It was possible that some might even break their minds and be sent into a coma like she had experienced – and that wasn’t good for anyone.  Although he was able to “fix” her, she had practically had to be respawned with an additional loss to her memory – and subsequently had a negative impact on her skills.

Regardless, she – as well as everyone else – was already making progress.  The fact that the top group had made it flawlessly through the eighth room was encouraging, and it appeared that two of the other leading groups were getting close to at least completing it – if not flawlessly.  He knew that when they got to the ninth room that they would have just as much trouble as Rosewyn’s group, which was intentional.  His dungeon rooms were supposed to be difficult, and only by precise strategy and teamwork would they be able to persevere.

However, Milton began to think the ninth room might not work out the way he and Whisp had originally intended it to.  At first, he had wanted to create a dark, creepy forest filled with his Arachnawerewolves, where they would jump out of the shadows and down from the ledges set up above the pathway leading to the central “arena”.  It was amazing how much Whisp was able to accomplish with simple weights and pulleys to get the Weightonite trees to move – and spin.  That was all working as intended; it was the heavy fog that he was now hesitant about.  And that heavy fog, he was thinking, added too many complications such that he was considering taking it out.

When they were designing the room, it had been just completely unlit.  When the Guardian Guild arrived, they were able to provide a lot of metal resources – which led Whisp to ask about the various defensive weapons he had at his disposal from his Defensive Weapons Factory.  As they were more expensive to set up and use, he hadn’t taken advantage of them before – but there was nothing stopping him then.

He let her look through all that he had available to build, though by the time the Guild was starting to run through his dungeon he wasn’t as concerned with making sure that nobody got through – which was what some of those traps might ensure.  However, Whisp was more interested in seeing how they worked and whether or not they could be adapted in different ways.

She had managed to find the instruction manual in his system for the Atmospheric Condensers[17].  With that, and a little ingenuity – which she had in spades – she was able to adapt it to make fog.  Normally, it would suck all of the atmosphere out of a room, creating a vacuum inside that would theoretically kill anyone who needed to breathe.  So, essentially, every Proctan or Combat Unit in the room.

From what Milton understood – and from what Whisp told him – the Atmospheric Condenser did this by obviously “condensing” the air it sucked up so that it was all stored inside the small rectangular box that contained the defense.  Kind of like pressurized tanks of oxygen, I guess – or that’s the best analogy I can think of.  By opening it up and fiddling with it, however, Whisp was able to reverse the flow so that it pumped out whatever was hooked to it – which ended up being a large reservoir of water.

While extreme humidity was a weakness to the Condenser, it was only vulnerable in its storage space.  Water that was merely passing through to be aerosolized  didn’t react with the vulnerable components, so there was little to no chance that it would fail.

Milton ended up putting four of the Atmospheric Condensers inside the room all hooked up to the same portable Power Generator, which pumped out fog like nobody’s business until it was thick and heavy.  There was a sensor inside the trap that stopped it after a certain saturation point, otherwise it might end up flooding the room.  As it was, the room ended up being thoroughly damp after a while when the Condensers were active; which was only when Rosewyn and her group decided to try their luck against the ninth room.  He kept it off otherwise.

The fog was a great addition, he thought, and added to the “spookiness” of the environment, but it also provided a few drawbacks.  One, the excess radiation his Core was still leaking out was being slowly infused into the fog, which actually replenished their Power when they breathed it in – though at a slower rate than his more-concentrated Power Potions.

Two, he didn’t personally control his Combat Units inside the room, so the poor visibility caused the ones dropping down on the group through the pathway not to know what had happened to their co-defenders – which led them to be defeated by the exact same tactics instead of adopting new ones based upon visual knowledge.  None of his Combat Units were mindless automatons, and even though they didn’t employ advanced tactics and strategies, they weren’t dumb.  They wouldn’t attack the exact same way if they saw one of their brethren try and fail miserably.  Granted, it might only be that they might attack from another direction and not with a whole new plan, but it would at least be slightly different.

And three – there was so much water in the air that it was practically waiting to be used by an Elemental Caster.  While not necessarily a bad thing, Milton had to weigh the pros and cons of the fog being there in the first place.  Either way, he was sure that Rosewyn and her group would be back soon to try again.  As soon as they had decided to tackle it, he had started another duplicate of the room so that they could practice it with different strategies, though it would be a few hours before it was complete; it had more moving pieces than some of the other rooms, so it would take some extra time to finish it off.

Milton watched as they all respawned in the CAS, acquired their clothes/weapons/armor from the Molecular Converter there, and discussed what had happened and potential strategies for next time as they ate a hearty meal at the tables and benches set up nearby.  There were already hundreds of other Guild members there, either waiting for their turn or having already had a go at one of the dungeon rooms – and were recovering from their respawn.

When Rosewyn and her group was done eating, they excitedly approached the Access Terminal Milton had set up there to assist with applying additional abilities.  Although he had a lot of different gene mutations before, after everyone had been brought back following the attack on The Fortress, there were a lot more.  So many, in fact, that Milton was forced to create a whole new screen for them to choose from, eliminating most of the info that normally accompanied them.  They could still be seen when they selected each ability on a different screen, however; all-in-all, it was more user-friendly.[18]

There were lots of selections to choose from (the only one not available to them was Brint’s unique Neural Uplink mutation), which sometimes boggled Milton’s mind at the possible combinations with each other.  What made it even more insane was the fact that most of the Guild had been primarily combat-based with Physical Augmenters, Healers, and Elemental Casters aplenty; the small list of “different” and “unique” abilities all came from the non-combat members who took care of the logistics and management of the Guild.  He couldn’t imagine what would happen if he had even a small sampling of the general population in the Kingdom.

“So, are we all in agreement?” Rosewyn asked the rest of her group.

With affirmatives all around, they all gathered around the Access Terminal and one-by-one selected their new ability.  Once selected, all they needed to do was go back to the Bioconversion Labs set up conveniently nearby, take off their clothes/weapons/armor (not that the process wouldn’t work with them on, but it was more comfortable for them if they didn’t have wet and only partially-dried accoutrements afterwards), and jump into the top of the Lab.  The process was fairly quick, since they didn’t have to be fully grown like a complete respawn, so only a couple of minutes was all it took to insert the new gene mutation into their DNA.

Prastor went first and ended up getting Force Field Generation, allowing him to create a small spherical force field wherever he wanted.  Well, wherever he wanted once he improved his skill with it; as a brand-new ability, it was more like a small bubble that he could place within 10 inches of him.  It cost a lot of Power to maintain and was purported to be invulnerable, though to the original “owner” of the ability had never been able to get it larger than her hand due to Power limitations.

Which meant that the larger the field, the more Power it would take to both initialize and maintain.  The Healer’s hope was that with his ever-increasing Power pool he would be able to quickly build up his skill to the point where he could create a force field large enough to cover an entire person – even for only a second or two.  Those seconds of invulnerability could mean the difference between life or death, however.

The Nature Manipulator, Rychelle, took the Beast Control ability, allowing her to “tame” and maintain control of a beast.  At first, the mutation seemed to be nearly worthless, as all her stats needed to be higher than the beasts’; the only ones that would work for that would be the less powerful creatures that she might find out in the forest, except…

“Milton, do you think this ability would work on the creatures inside your dungeon?” she had asked.

“No, my Combat Units have an NCU inside of them – just as you do – and it wouldn’t work on them.”

She looked disappointed and Milton didn’t blame her; it would’ve been awesome to provide her with a Combat Unit that she could exclusively use like a limited form of Brint’s Neural Uplink ability.  He was sorry to disappoint her, but fortunately ALANNA came to her rescue.

“You know, Milton, just like you originally created Whisp without an NCU inside of her, you could do the same for any of your specimens.  It would mean that it would be wild and uncontrollable – so it wasn’t ever advisable before – but if there was someone right there to tame it…”  And she left it there.

So, after letting her know the good news, she literally jumped for joy.  Milton wasn’t exactly sure why she wanted the ability in the first place, but now that it was a viable choice, he was excited to see what it could ultimately do.

Gregar went next, the Scout-turned-Rogue taking Weakening Poison – On Touch, which was a perfect complement to his role as a stealther.  He could come up behind their enemies and strike from his Light Spectrum Invisibility, doing extra damage to the unsuspecting target; then, with the ability now to poison his victim, he could essentially add a de-buff to it and make it less deadly when it attacked his group.  Although it was probably going to be barely noticeable to Milton’s Combat Units at first, he could only imagine what would happen to one of the Arachnawerewolves if its Strength de-buffed down to 1 – it would probably have trouble keeping itself upright.

Rosewyn’s husband went next, again taking a new ability that Milton wouldn’t have expected: Limited Precognition.

“What’s better than knowing what’s going to happen before even the enemy does?” Moxwell justified his selection.  Milton couldn’t help but agree – knowledge was power and there’s power in having the knowledge of knowing what your opponent is most likely to do.

Granted, at its lowest skill level, the accuracy of the “precognition” was only 50% within 1 second, but Milton had followed up with the original possessor of the ability (which he did for every unique gene mutation he gained access to) and found that he was fairly accurate in predicting events up to 5 seconds in the future, though even that was fairly taxing on his former Power Pool.  If Moxwell was able to even see a couple of seconds into the future and block an unseen potential killing stroke to one of his groupmates, the ability would show its worth immediately.

Finally, Rosewyn chose her second additional ability – and it was probably the smartest choice for her.  She was extraordinarily powerful with her own Elemental Caster abilities and was only getting stronger – she didn’t need another ability to add to her already impressive arsenal.  Although she could’ve used something defensive like the Physical Boost Suite to improve her chances of living through an attack, it wasn’t that useful because if the enemy was close enough to hurt her – they were already in trouble.  No, she didn’t need anything for herself; what she needed was something to boost those around her.

Prastor had the healing and physical buffs covered so she didn’t need that; Rychelle was great at dealing with crowd control, taking out hard-to-reach enemies and large groups at the same time; Gregar was essentially their Rogue and did a great job scouting and identifying traps, as well as being DPS; Moxwell was their tank and performed that job near-flawlessly; Rosewyn, of course, was their long-range caster and DPS, as well as performing utility functions.  With all of their bases essentially covered, it came down to what would benefit the group as a whole.

Which was why she made good on her assertion to Whisp that she would seriously consider Enchanting as her next ability.[19]

While it didn’t directly help her, she had mentioned a few times to the others some thoughts on how the permanent effects of her Caster abilities could potentially help in combat.  In fact, the first thing she made was something that would help them immensely when they tackled the ninth room again: a normal-looking rock enchanted with her Light Affinity, causing it to grow brightly.  Permanently.

After they were all done, they all agreed to practice with their new abilities for a few hours before they tackled the ninth room again, which was Milton’s cue to break off and return his main focus to some other tasks.

Chapter 19 – Options

While there was nothing at the moment that he could directly do against the army of Bearillas and Quizards tearing up the northern forest, Milton did everything available to ensure everything he could control was operating at peak efficiency.  An hour had passed after his seventh “mining team” had went to work mining the Quizard Mountains; his BMUs were steadily climbing – along with his Focusing Crystals.[20]  Though they hadn’t located any motherlodes like the first one, small pockets of the valuable crystals were still found sprinkled throughout the mountains.

He held off on sending any others for the moment, because the last one took his Bearilla almost three hours of travel to find a place where his miners wouldn’t run into each other – at least initially.  They worked quickly, however, and there was bound to be a time when they would run into the same areas.  For now, though, they were all bringing in a steady stream of resources that he was itching to spend.

Especially since he knew he would be getting some shipments of metal from the Kingdom in the next few days – and it was all because of Rosewyn’s plan.

The volunteers that had gone out riding the Greycers and pulling their Slider Wagons full of Power Potions hadn’t all gone to the villages and towns of the Kingdom.  While it was their main priority to start the population moving on their way up to the northeast, three of their number had approached a few organizations throughout the land to find sources of metal.

The first was essentially a metalworking or “blacksmithing” organization that dealt with manufacturing all sorts of primarily metal implements for sale to the general public.  Havenistry Metalworking consisted of quite a few Earth and Fire Affinity Elemental Casters, who worked together to shape and temper the metals into everyday essentials like forks, knives, spoons, pots, pans, etc., as well as creating decorative figurines – both big and small.

Next was a weapon manufactory, located dangerously close to the Capital; Wholesale Weaponry dealt with creating swords and knives and spears – essentially everything someone would need to stab, slice, or chop a beast to pieces.  Similar to the makeup of the metalworking organization, it consisted of quite a few Casters – with a few Inventors thrown in for merchandising and creating new ways to kill something.

Protection Purveyors was, predictably, an armor-manufacturing facility.  Unlike the others, it dealt with both metal and leather – only one of which Milton was interested in.  Full suits of armor were rare for most Proctans wanting to fight against beasts, apparently, so smaller and lighter pieces were favored over the heavy and cumbersome armor that Milton had first seen Moxwell wearing.  Nevertheless, they had plenty of things to choose from.

At all three locations, Rosewyn’s volunteers bartered the Power Potions for as much metal as they could get – which was almost their entire stock and raw material.  The previous journeys from the regular “merchants” buying metal with the currency Milton produced were small purchases, usually not enough to cause suspicion.

He thought about doing the same thing with these three purchases – using the currency he made – but realized that the Kingdom’s economy might be taking quite a hit within the next few months, even if everything went as he thought it might.  He would rather the large manufacturing outfits have something to show for their hard work; they couldn’t “use” the wooden coins he made infused with power, but they certainly could drink the potions to become stronger.

Once those visits were done, those three volunteers still had plenty of Power Potions to spread out to even more villages – which they did before returning to Milton and the dungeon.  Each of their sources of metal in the Kingdom would be getting all of their wares and raw materials together, and a volunteer would stop by and pick them up over the next few days on their way back “home”.

As much as he wanted to spend the incoming metal from his miners and the soon-to-be-delivered shipments from the Kingdom on some new “toys”, Milton knew what he had coming up: the creation of larger-than-life Combat Units.  And with that, their additional food and power upkeep.[21]

He was already expanding his Farm to be double the size, but with the new material rolling in, he instead diverted some more drones down to his “Organic Material and Biological Mass”-producing facility to double that again, making it almost four full miles of production.  Over the next few days, it would start to ramp up production of both those necessary resources.

His power requirements were a different issue altogether – and not as easily solved.

As of now, his Reactor Output was at 85%, which seemed like a lot, until he considered that he had over 7,000 Proctans as Combat Units.  At an average of 800 Bio Units a piece, the power requirements for them alone was almost 57% – two-thirds of his available Output.  When he added in Brint’s Quagon, the 50 Greycers the volunteers were riding, the 300 Greycer Puppies they already gave away, the 1 Bearilla he already created, the Units defending his dungeon and the satellite rooms, the different drones and sensors…

He was already using nearly 77% of the 85% he had available.

More Greycers and Greycer Puppies were already on the schedule to be made as the volunteers visited more villages and towns on their assignment to gather as many of the Kingdom’s people as possible in defense.  Additionally, he hadn’t even populated rooms 11 and 12 in his dungeon yet, because there was no reason to have them until there was a need.

As it was, he could maybe make 10 to 12 more Bearillas for the effort to stop the northern army; if he “converted” all the current dungeon Combat Units, he thought he could triple that number.  Even with an additional 40 Bearillas, though, he still didn’t think that would be enough to win the day.  The Proctans that were going with them were getting stronger and deadlier all the time, but unfortunately, he thought it would take at least 50 or more of them to take down an enemy Bearilla reliably – and that was if the beast was by itself.

Milton had two choices, neither of which he wanted to choose.  The first – and the worst, in his opinion – was to ask for thousands of weaker Proctan volunteers to “die” in order to free up some available Output.  He had a feeling that requesting that wouldn’t go over well, nor did he want to sacrifice people so that he could create more of the monstrous beasts.

His other choice was to spend his hard-earned resources on improving his Reactor Power.  ALANNA had told him that once he was past the 50% mark the resources required to fix the damage to them would start to go down, but it was still likely to take millions of BMUs to get it to the point where he might be able to squeeze out a few more.  And that was just the Reactor – he still had to improve the Structural Integrity of his core to contain all that raw power.

This seemed like the only choice, even though he worried what would happen once his outer shell continued to be fixed.  It hadn’t really been a concern before, but if he sealed up the damaged section, would that cut off the flow of radiation that was providing the Power the Proctans so dearly relied on?

“Yes, yes it will.  It’s an expected side-effect of fixing yourself up so that you can leave the planet.  Normally, it would be a good thing – you know, not leaking harmful radiation everywhere.  However, I see your conundrum here: if you fix up your shell far enough so that you have enough Reactor Output to help save the Proctans, you’ll end up cutting off – or at least severely diminish – the flow of Power to those same Proctans.  Which would leave them vulnerable to additional attacks; and we all know that this northern army is just the start.  So, what to do, what to do?  Hmm…”  ALANNA looked at him with a curious look on her face, tapping her lip with her finger in exaggerated thought.

“Spit it out – I think I’ve known you long enough to know when you have a solution I haven’t thought of.”

She sighed dramatically, though she smiled at the fact of Milton having guessed her game.  “Fine, the answer has been staring you in your face – but you haven’t really looked at it.  Remember when you received additional Facilities that you could build?  Check that real quick.”

He remembered looking at them briefly when he was searching for the Upgraded Bioconversion Lab, but he had ignored most of them because they had been way out of his price range or required…Focusing Crystals that he didn’t have at the time.[22]  And there it was, right at the top of the list, practically begging for his attention.

A Geothermal Transmutation Station.

Geothermal Transmutation Station: A small facility that produces Ambient Power usable by nearby Combat Units, Facilities, and Non-combat Units.  Comes with self-drilling mechanism to convert geothermal energy far underground into energy to easily power most Units and facilities.  Ambient Power reaches up to 1 mile from the Geothermal Transmutation Station.  After construction, 24-48 hours are needed to drill and start the conversion process.  Required: 200,000 Basic Metal Units (80,000 with bonuses), 200 Focusing Crystals, Power Generator – Portable (2)

It wasn’t the end-all solution to his problems, but it would eliminate many of his issues.  For instance, while it would help to power his Combat Units while they were near his dungeon, as soon as they left, his main Station Core Reactor Output would have to take over.  Additionally, it didn’t solve the fix-the-Core-and-eliminate-the-leakage problem; though, it also meant that he wasn’t going to have to spend millions of BMUs to improve his Core – yet.  He knew he would still have to improve it, but he wanted to see if there was any way to reproduce the Power-giving radiation without blowing up half the world.

“Thanks, ALANNA – you’re literally a life-saver.”

“You’re welcome, Milton.  Anytime,” she replied, a smile on her face at being able to help him.  A normal-looking smile, too – not one of the creepy smiles from a few weeks ago.

Milton immediately sent some available drones he had in reserve for projects such as this to get started constructing three of the Geothermal Transmutation Facilities: one near the CAS and encompassing the entire Refuge and a good portion of the satellite dungeon rooms, another near his actual dungeon and the rest of the satellite rooms, and the last one covering his facilities, his planned expansion of the dungeon after the 12th room, and most of the Farm.  There was still a section of the Farm not covered because it was so large, but it wasn’t worth the expense to build another one at that time.  It cost almost 400,000 BMUs and 600 Focusing Crystals (which weren’t affected by his reduction bonuses, unfortunately), which was well within his budget considering he had over 1.6 million BMUs and 3,000 Focusing Crystals at the moment.

It would take a little bit even when those were constructed to be operational, so Milton switched his focus again to the other potential Facilities he could build – which had definitely expanded since the first time he had seen the list.  If his existence on the planet were equated to an MMORPG, he was finally seeing some of the end-game content: A Planetary Bombardment Dome and a Space Transport Dock.  They both cost massive amounts of resources to build; fortunately, they weren’t vital or important to him at this point – they were for later.

There were four other new facilities, two of which didn’t seem important to build at the moment due to available resources as well.  The Vehicle Assembly Plant would create armored vehicles for transport, but from the detailed description, those vehicles would take large amounts of BMUs to produce – including their own portable Power Generators.  He had other options that were less expensive for transport if it came down to it.

One that intrigued him, but he didn’t quite think was necessary right now, was the Cybernetic/Synthetic Organism Factory.  From what he could see from the in-depth description, it would allow him to essentially produce armies of robots, cyborgs, androids – whatever you wanted to call them.  While it was expensive to even build the factory, things that were produced within would take large amounts of BMUs as well as Focusing Crystals, but not necessarily because of the actual production of them.  Each of them had an even smaller version of the portable Power Generator, meaning that they were essentially self-sustaining and powered themselves – which added to their cost.

From what he could tell, the “robots” would be strong, fast, and fairly resistant to damage – but they couldn’t use the one thing that gave Proctans an advantage over them: Power.  Because their abilities stemmed from gene mutations, as well as having their reservoir of Power, those things couldn’t be incorporated into what was, at its base structure, a machine.  Even though his supply of resources was steadily growing, it wasn’t yet at the point where he could afford to make foot soldiers; a decade ago, he would’ve jumped at the chance – but that was before he had learned about the abilities and Power the Proctans possessed.

Despite determining not to build the facility at the moment, he kept it in the back of his mind for the future.  I could probably design a synthetic body for myself to use…

While Milton could technically take control of any of the Proctans he had as Combat Units, it wasn’t the same as having a body of his own.  They belonged to a living, thinking, separate person; the body he controlled and “inhabited” wouldn’t be his – whenever he did dive into the physical feelings of one of the Proctans, it just felt…foreign.  It wasn’t quite as bad as when he took control of one of the beasts he used as Units, but it wasn’t human either.  There was enough difference between the two races that it was more than noticeable.  A bit of an “uncanny valley” scenario going on.

The last two Facilities were at first confusing to him but opened up a world of possibilities once he understood why they even existed.  The Rapid Coalification Facility and Destructive Distillery worked hand-in-hand to create some types of material that he didn’t have access to before.  It wasn’t until he saw their purpose that he realized something: over the past century and more – through all of his excavation and mining underground – he had found barely a speck of coal or crude oil or anything of that nature.  Granted, he hadn’t explored everywhere, but there was nothing around his territory that had contained those types of resources.

“That leads me to believe that life on this planet is either relatively new, or there was a very, very long time between life at one period of time and another; those resources are usually caused by decayed plant and animal material being compressed into the dirt over hundreds of thousands to millions of years.  However, the fact that you haven’t found anything doesn’t necessarily mean there isn’t some somewhere; it might be even farther down, or it might just not be here,” ALANNA broke into his thoughts, summarizing some of the basic geological science he had learned about in high school.

Whatever the reason was, it didn’t change the fact that he hadn’t found any of those resources.  The Rapid Coalification Facility (RCF), however, would produce the same effects of millions of years of heat and pressure, creating coal and other materials that could be used in a number of ways.  First, it would need to be broken down and distilled into various refined substances using the Destructive Distillery, many of which could be used in other applications.  Then, some of those substances could be re-fed into the RCF to produce different products that required high-carbon-content materials to produce – such as diamonds.[23]

The exact process would probably interest Whisp and some of the other Inventors, but for Milton, all that mattered was that if he built the two facilities – at 120,000 BMUs total and 150 Focusing Crystals – he would be able to make some very…interesting things.  He put the two Facilities on the list after the Geothermal Transmutation Stations were done.

That left him with almost a million BMUs and quite a few Focusing Crystals to play with, and small amounts constantly coming in from the miners in the Quizard Mountains.  He immediately used 90% of those BMUs on improving his RP/S and SI/C by 2, which thankfully (he mentally laughed at the situation – Reactor leakage was a good thing) didn’t diminish any of the radiation infusing the water around his core with Power.  What it did do was increase his Reactor Output by 5% – which was essentially another potential 8 Bearillas he could maintain if he needed to.

As for what BMUs he had left and was still expecting to arrive, as well as the Focusing Crystals he had in reserve, he had plans on finally using them to make some toys.  But before he started to look at what kind of defensive weapons he wanted to make, he needed to figure out what to do with all of those squishy Inventors and other non-combat recruits…

Chapter 20 – The other side of the mountains

Brint slowly awoke with a metallic smell – and sticky feeling – assaulting his tactile senses.  It was so powerful that it felt like he fell asleep in a pool of blood; when he finally opened his eyes, the carnage that greeted him made it actually seem that way.

His Quagon – controlled by Milton while he slept – was lying down quietly nearby, with what Brint could’ve sworn was a self-satisfied smirk on its face.  If giant flying lizards could smile and smirk, he was pretty sure that’s what it would’ve been doing, despite having numerous wounds all over its body.

The grassland for nearly 1,000 feet in every direction was stomped and trampled flat, the normal blue-ish tint to it marred by dark red streaks splattered around like the Picow slaughterhouse Brint had seen back in his village.  Bodies of strange-looking beasts were piled in neat piles, half of them missing large chunks that he presumed his flying mount had sampled when he was hungry.  While he saw the – now greatly diminished – pile of horned beasts that The Milton called “Shaggies”, there were quite a few more now.  Apparently, in his need for sleep, he hadn’t walked quite as far away from the battleground as he had hoped.

Not only that, but it was quite possible that they had been attacked close to his “camp”, as there were blood spatters all over his skin and clothes; it wasn’t quite as bad as if he had taken a dip in a lake of blood, but it certainly felt that way.  He was amazed that he hadn’t woken up during the commotion – he doubted that it was silent and just the act of his Quagon walking around nearby would shake almost anyone out of a dead sleep.

“Good morning, sleepyhead!  I apologize if I overstepped my bounds, but I felt it prudent that you get enough rest so that you can continue on your journey today.  I shut down most of your senses so that the sounds and violent shaking of the fighting wouldn’t wake you up.

“You would not believe how many predators there are lurking through the grass around here!  I was forced to have your Quagon make one giant crop circle just so he could see some of the beasts trying to get close enough to eat you.  The smell of blood was obviously too strong still, even after making the Quagon eat as much as it could.

“Regardless, you’re safe and awake!  I hate to rush you, but I really need some more information on the northern army.  My sensor orbs don’t reach that far yet, and I’m afraid to send a Greycer on the off-chance that it might be sensed by them.  We’re on track right now and things are going good – as long as the enemy keeps doing what they have been doing.”

It took his mind a little bit to get going after waking up to the nightmarish scene around him, and The Milton speaking to his head sounding so chipper wasn’t helping.  He shook his head a few times to shake some sense into it – which made him a little dizzy and caused him to throw up from the stench around him.  Fortunately, he didn’t have much in his stomach because he had forgotten to eat before he went to sleep; that, and the retching actually helped to wake him up like nothing else could.

“Ok, ok, I’m going – I can’t take the smell of this place anyways.  Let me get myself together and I’m gone.”

He looked around at the remains of all the creatures that had apparently attacked while he had been unconscious, wishing that he had some way to bring them back for The Milton to use.  However, he had nothing to strap them down to the Quagon, nor did he think that his mount could carry one – it needed to be able to run on all four legs in order to get enough speed to take off.  With that as a no-go, there was only one thing left to do before he could leave the horrid stink of bloody decomposing bodies in full-sun.

He walked over to the Quagon and placed his hand on its back, transferring his Power into a healing energy with his Healing Touch ability.  The wounds closed up rapidly, the large gashes in its normally resilient skin sealing up within minutes.  I wonder what could’ve done that kind of damage to it?

While he was waiting for the healing to finish up – which required him to grab another vial of Power Potion because his pool wasn’t quite full from the day before – he looked closer at one of the piles of beasts.  He recognized a few of the furry-maned striped beasts that The Milton jokingly called a “Libra” – or was it a “Zeon” – underneath a few other, larger beasts.  Looking at its large, razor-sharp and deadly-looking claws, he was sure that at least some of the Quagon’s wounds came from that.

All done, Brint jumped on top of the back of his flying mount and started strapping himself in.  He could feel his stomach trying to eat itself from the inside and he thought of the food in some of the small packs he had attached to the harness; however, whenever he actually thought of physically eating, the stench around him caused him to start to retch again.  I’ll either eat in the air or when we get back to the dungeon for a stopover.

Ready to go, he instructed his mount to start running; he had to hold on tighter than normal because the Quagon was running faster than he remembered.  He wished he could check its stats, but only sensor orbs had that function; despite not having access to one nearby, he could physically tell that the giant flying lizard had apparently “leveled-up” (as The Milton called it) and improved its speed – probably along with its strength as well.  I guess decimating half of the beasts in this part of the grassland would do that.

All of which meant that the Quagon was almost able to lift off the ground on its own, especially since there weren’t any trees to run into at the edge of a clearing.  In the end, though, Brint had to use his Self-levitation ability to raise it into the air, allowing it to rise quickly into the sky.  As a pleasant surprise, he also noticed that his new-ish ability felt like it raised them even higher – maybe 25 feet or so.  It took a little extra application of power, but it was definitely an improvement from just the day before.  It must be because I used it in “combat” – I’ll have to keep that in mind.

“Milton, I’m on my way back.  However, I’d like to make a slight detour on my way.”

“Where were you thinking about going?”

“I thought about it a little bit last night before I passed out from exhaustion – I’d like to see what is on the other side of the mountains.  Obviously, the range ends here at the grassland, but I can also see that it ends in the other direction as well.  I think getting a look at what is past it might be beneficial,” Brint told the Station Core.  “Plus, my curiosity is killing me to see what’s over there.  There might even be allies that we can ask for help.”

The Milton was silent for a few moments as Brint was steadily flying northwards, not quite out of the grasslands but approaching the range cut-off quickly.  He didn’t want to expressly go against the Station Core’s request/order to scout the army again up north, but he also had an itch to explore even more since he had found the strange treeless expanse.  What else is out there, just waiting to be found?

“That’s…actually not that bad of an idea.  I’m not sure why I never thought about looking past the Quizard Mountains; though it was probably because I never had access to anything that could venture that far before.  It makes sense that there might be some other Proctans alive somewhere on the planet; it would actually be more than strange if there weren’t any other pockets of civilization elsewhere.  Go for it, Brint – but don’t take too long, because I do still need you to scout to the north again.”

With that approval, Brint started to angle the Quagon more to the east than north; from their altered heading, he could see that they would pass just before the range ended on the southern side and be able to easily slide up to the opposite side of the Quizard Mountains.  He was excited and nervous as the same time – he wasn’t sure what he would find, but he hoped The Milton was right.  Even if they didn’t know about other people in other lands, that didn’t mean they didn’t exist.

With the horrendous smell behind them – other than the lingering remnants on his clothes and skin – Brint satiated his grumbling stomach by reaching into the storage bags nearby and eating at the top of the up-and-down arcs the Quagon was making.  His attempts even to chew while flying through the air at high-speeds was a failure, as it was difficult to concentrate on it while holding on for dear life.

By the time they were rounding the southern end of the mountains and saw the first sights of the eastern side, he had eaten enough to feel satisfied.  He was fortunate that he had gotten relatively used to the extreme forces at play during the flight, because otherwise he might have lost everything he just ate; as it was, he still felt a little queasy – but it passed after a few minutes.

His initial impression of the eastern side was…disappointing.  The forest started again, approximately at the same line where it cut off on the western side.  As he looked out to the horizon, Brint worried that it would just be more of the same as his “home” side – there were trees as far as he could see.

“Brint, I’m starting to lose a connection with you.  I don’t know why, but for some reason that doesn’t make sense, the Quizard Mountains are forming some kind of barrier—”

And then The Milton’s words cut off abruptly as Brint traveled even deeper into the unknown.  He tried to establish any kind of connection with anything other than the Quagon he was flying on and couldn’t; it reminded him a little of how he was cut off when he had ventured down into the bowels of the mountains – where he found the scene which still gave him nightmares.  What is it about this range that cuts me off?

Brint almost turned back; if he died, nobody would know unless The Milton tried to “resurrect” him inside one of the Bioconversion Labs.  Not only that, but anything he saw or found from then on wouldn’t be remembered, so even if he did die, he wouldn’t know what caused it.  He got lucky before when he found the Bearilla army up north – he was able to get back into range before he died; here, there was almost no likelihood that he could get back into range if he were to be attacked.

However, despite the potential possibility of dying with nothing to show for it, Brint kept going.  The draw was too strong for him to turn back now; and there weren’t many things he thought would be able to hurt him while he was in the air.  Still, he was ever on the lookout for anything that might attack – and was ready to turn around and flee instead of sticking around.  As a result, he flew ahead as his eyes jumped around, looking around for any type of movement – which was probably why he didn’t see a change in the landscape below right away.

Which was crazy because the difference wasn’t subtle – an entire pathway was cut through the trees the same size and shape as one he had just seen before: on the other side of the mountains.  Unlike the scarred landscape left over from recently uprooted trees – the earth ripped up, trees stacked up in huge piles, and of course massive holes dotting the landscape – the scar along the land was patched up.  Brint could still see where the holes were, but they had been marginally filled in; it wasn’t clear from the air whether it was deliberate – or just over time.

Either way, grass was already covering the pockmarked countryside almost as high as the grassland to the south.  And sprinkled haphazardly throughout the pathway were small trees poking their way through the grass.  They were definitely much, much smaller than the behemoths flanking the trail cut through forest – smaller, but probably still 50 years old at the least.

When Brint was younger, he had once asked how long the trees that bordered the Kingdom had been there.  No one knew for sure, because all the trees currently within the Kingdom were grown through the efforts of Nature Manipulators; however, using their own knowledge of nature, they estimated that it took hundreds of years for the trees to grow that tall and large.  Therefore, when he guesstimated their age, he was most likely fairly accurate.

He circled around the pathway a couple of times and flew closer to the mountain to see that it originated right outside another one of the massive caves eerily similar to the opposite side.  In fact, as he looked down the range, he could see more of the caves equidistant from each other; as far as he could see in the distance they continued – with more of the ripped-up forest trails leading from every third one.

For a moment, Brint’s mind refused to comprehend what he was seeing.  As the implications finally hit him, it felt like the blood in his veins turned to ice and he started to hyperventilate.  He gripped the handle attached to his harness so hard he heard a *pop*; he looked down to see that he had literally squeezed so hard he popped one of his fingers out of its joint.

It was a blessing in disguise, as the pain he experienced shortly thereafter as he gripped the finger as hard as he could and popped it back in place, actually ended up clearing away most of the fear that had gripped him at the sight stretching out ahead of him.  Although Brint couldn’t actually use Healing Touch upon himself, his natural regeneration as a result of having the NCU inside of him fixed the pain and inflammation around his finger joint within minutes.  Those few minutes were a bit painful, but it also focused him – allowing him to make a choice on a difficult decision.

Should I stay or should I go?

It was an easy one now that his fear didn’t have a hold on him.  Brint had come too far to turn back now; he had to find out what these pathways led to.  He needed to know why the trees were cleared throughout the forest – because they were obviously cleared for a reason.

So he turned east, following the nearest pathway he came across to see where it led.  After about 30 minutes, he finally saw something on the horizon; the vast sea of trees appeared to end as if they fell off a cliff.  When he flew closer, he saw that he was wrong – they just ended as abruptly as they did on the border of the Kingdom.

The land beyond the forest was similar in appearance at first to his homeland: flat land with small scatterings of trees dotting here-and-there.  However, he started to see rolling hills almost seem to rise from the ground, forming their own short mountain range – which was entirely unlike the Kingdom.  And on those hills were more trees – shorter and less impressive-looking than the forest he just left behind; there were so many, in fact, that it almost looked a mini-forest all of its own.

Also unlike the land he came from were the obvious signs of civilization that had been utterly destroyed and almost flattened into the ground.  Scattered around the area, he could see what he imagined his own village looked like: a central area where the majority of buildings congregated with intricately delineated fields surrounding it.

As opposed to a living, thriving community, unfortunately, he could barely make out where the buildings used to be, and the fields were heavily overgrown after years and years of inattention.  It was so bad that he could barely recognize them as fields at all; it was only his vast “experience” tending fields all day that allowed him to identify them from the air.  He surmised that he would have even more difficulty if he had actually been on the ground instead of hundreds of feet in the sky.

Then there were the dirt roads that he could still make out from his vantage point, despite their prevalence for being overgrown and nearly indistinguishable from the rest of the neglected landscape.  The precise lines they made cutting through the land was easily seen from the air; what else was easily seen was that they all led toward the same point in the distance.

Obviously, he had to follow them – they most likely led toward the interior of whatever this place was.  Another Kingdom, perhaps?  “Whatever this place was” was quickly changed to “whatever this place used to be” as he saw what looked like larger towns with what appeared to be stone walls surrounding them smashed apart and flattened almost as completely as the nearby villages.  As he flew further into the interior, following the roads, he saw larger and larger areas of destruction; just looking at them made him shudder as he imagined his own Kingdom suffering the same fate.

It was more than obvious that no one there was still left alive.  In fact, there wasn’t anything alive anywhere he looked – not even a small “squirrel” in a tree.  He had augmented his own eyesight as he had been doing almost every minute he had been flying; although it was sometimes hard to see things hidden underneath the tree canopies, he could still see enough to know that there was nothing to see.

Brint almost turned back right then as he followed the road until it led up into the rolling hills, knowing that there was no point in looking any further.  There was nothing to learn there – other than the fact that there used to be another Kingdom and it had been wiped out just as surely as they would be if they didn’t find a way to stop the army underneath the Quizard Mountains.  However, he kept going for another few minutes in the hope that his trip there wasn’t completely wasted.

And he was glad he did.  The rolling hills grew taller and taller (though not nearly as tall as the mountain range behind him), the trees growing on them cut through just as similarly as the forest Brint had flown over.  However, unlike the considerable distance between those, these were all converging on one point.  The hills eventually fell away, leaving a massive ovoid-shaped valley that was miles across even at its narrowest point.  Right in the middle of the valley was a city that rivaled Grestwinch in size – and perhaps even larger.

It was hard to tell, though, as the former walls and buildings it had contained were strewn over half the valley.  Everything was flattened as if a giant hand had come out of the sky and toppled the city to the sides before smashing what was left flat into the ground.  Only a few remnants of civilization stood standing: a partial half-wall here and a toppled stone column there.  From his view high up in the air, it was obvious that whatever had come through had not only wanted to kill everybody, but to eliminate as many traces of their former habitats as possible.

There was nothing left of the city other than rubble and the splintered remains of wooden structures; in fact, there wasn’t anything new that he learned, other than that the people who had perished were fighters to the end.

Strangely, Brint hadn’t seen any type of evidence on his flight of the corpses from those who had lived there – not even a picked-over skeleton or two.  Nor had he seen any of the enemy, though based upon his own first-hand knowledge of their deadly and powerful strength, that wasn’t surprising.  What was surprising, however, was the obvious sight of Quizard and Bearilla bones scattered around the outside of where he guessed the wall would’ve stood around the city.

Piecing together what he thought may have happened, Brint surmised that they had evacuated the surrounding areas and hosted all of the refugees inside the capital – which was horribly similar to their own Beast War.  Apparently, they managed to kill a good number of the enemy before they eventually fell, which only showed what could happen when everyone worked together for their mutual defense.  They might’ve held out even longer and inflicted more casualties on the opposing army if it weren’t for one thing.

There were the bones of something enormous casting a shadow over the entire battlefield.

There was no head attached to it, nor was there a tail; he couldn’t tell if they had disappeared later or if they were destroyed when the unbelievably massive beast had been somehow killed.  Only the spine and ribcage partially remained, though there were still spots of what he assumed was rotting flesh attached in various places.  It was just the sheer size of it, however, that almost made him soil the harness he was strapped into.

The bones were larger than anything he had seen or heard of before; even his Quagon, which was three times the size of a Bearilla, would have no trouble fitting inside the belly of the gigantic behemoth.  It was so large he couldn’t comprehend how anything that large could even exist, let alone how something like that could be killed.

What made it worse was the knowledge that it probably wasn’t alone.  Remembering the massive caves down below the Quizard Mountains with the half-seen creatures inside, there literally could’ve been hundreds of them.  It suddenly occurred to him why the Bearillas were ripping up the trees back near the Kingdom: these humongous behemoths needed a pathway cleared in order to move.  He wasn’t exactly sure why something that large couldn’t just smash aside anything in its way, but he couldn’t think of any other reason.

Brint circled around the destroyed city, this civilization’s last stand, for almost an hour, seeking any sign that anything had survived.  He was well aware that he wasn’t the best tracker; however, despite a bit of inexperience in that regard, he was fairly certain that only the victors of the confrontation had managed to walk away.  And just like the people that had once lived there, his hopes of finding allies against the upcoming horde of monstrous beasts was dead before it even had a chance to survive.

Instead of exploring any more – and with his despair growing by the minute – Brint turned the Quagon around and headed back to the Kingdom-side of the mountains.  Instead of going back south and working his way back up through the forest, he instead had his mount fly straight over the mountains.  Although he wouldn’t be able to fly faster by using the Quagon’s normal method of diving-and-rising, it could still maintain a fairly steady clip in a straight shot.

He needed to get this information back to The Milton as fast as he could; not even the mountains were going to stand in his way.

Chapter 21 – Light show

It’s amazing what you can do with a little Light Affinity, thought Rosewyn.  It was literally because she was tired of holding a Light Orb above their heads in the ninth room that she had thought about enchanting an extremely bright glowing effect on everyone’s clothes and armor before venturing inside, that led to their success.  After attempting the room again four separate times, with varying degrees of success, they had finally survived and completed it.

While they were able to make it easily to the “arena” – which was what Milton called it – without suffering too much in the way of damage, they were constantly overwhelmed by both the sticky web shooting out of the “Arachnawerewolves’” backs and their sheer numbers.  The group was easily able to withstand three or four of them with Moxwell drawing their attention, but the other wolf-spider hybrids picked off the others in the group with impunity.  They broke through anything Rychelle sent their way to delay them, endured the icicle spears Rosewyn shot their way without flinching, and any attempts to lock one or two in shackles of air and ice only meant that the others were able to approach without too much trouble.  Even Gregar had trouble attacking from his Invisibility because they had keen senses of smell and could pinpoint him fairly well.

She was already having trouble maintaining the air clearing and fog condensation – as well as the light orb above – to be able to split her concentration and power four or five ways.  Even letting her nearly automatic elemental fields fall wasn’t enough to see them through.  That’s when she got fed up and started to use her burgeoning skill in Enchanting and provided them everlasting light without having to concentrate on maintaining it in the middle of a fight.

It was actually harder than it looked; all of her initial attempts at Enchanting were simple affairs as she copied some of the things that she had seen Whisp do.  Rosewyn created perpetually hot and cold rocks, attached a slider bubble onto the bottom of some wood, and she even copied the Inventor’s failed attempt at producing something that pulled the moisture from the air in a never-ending fountain.  Each of her “copies” seemed to pale in comparison to Whisp’s, though she thought it might be because she wasn’t as experienced with using the ability quite yet.

However, the one thing that Rosewyn had over the young Inventor, was her experience with her Elemental Affinities.  She had the skill and control to do things that only years of experimentation and research could supply; as a result, she was able to refine a few of the things that Whisp had attempted and given up as impossible.

A sword of fire, for example.  While it would certainly be impressive to wave around a sword that was wreathed in fire, the reality and practicality of it was quite the opposite.  First, too much fire next to even the highest-quality steel would start to degrade the metal, causing it to warp and become brittle after prolonged exposure.  Second, trying to hold something that could potentially light yourself on fire was not the best idea – it was like wielding a torch as a weapon.

The solution to that was a multi-stage process.  To begin, she took Moxwell’s sword and immediately got to work creating a very thin film of quickly circulating, bitingly frigid air along the flats of the blade – enough to freeze the blade and potentially make it brittle.  However, unlike infusing a rock directly with cold or heat – which was at a milder temperature – the metal of the sword could only withstand so much before it suffered damage; hence, the additional thin film of warm air she created that floated above the blade – the cold didn’t integrate itself inside the material and cause it to break.

Next, she used her Fire Affinity to wrap a super-compressed, ultra-hot thin layer of flame over the thin film of frigid air.  Essentially, it was an enchantment three layers deep starting above the metal of the blade: thin warm Air layer, thin frigid Air layer, and then super-hot Fire layer.

She had to experiment with a few pieces of wood to get the balance correct; too hot and it would still start to burn the wood underneath despite the cooled air; too cold and it would reduce the effectiveness of the flame layer and freeze everything underneath it.

Eventually she was able to apply the enchantment to Moxwell’s sword; the cold layer could effectively insulate the sword from the majority of the heat, letting only enough through to keep the blade just slightly warm, like it had been left out in the sun for a few minutes – at least that’s what it felt like on the hilt of the sword.  No one could touch the blade itself, as it was essentially covered in fire – without the flames getting everywhere out of control.

She also altered Moxwell’s sheath – with a full coating of perpetual ice lining the inside.  All of the extra enchantments made the fit inside the sheath a little tight, but once the sword was inside, it was effectively “cooled” enough that it wasn’t dangerous anymore.  Except to their enemies, in which it was more than effective; an efficient slice with it could penetrate defenses three to four times better, as well as cauterize the wounds left behind.  It prevented massive bleeding, but it also slowed down any potential regeneration by up to 90% – which the Arachnawerewolves had plenty of.

As far as using her Enchanting ability on other things, the results were varied.  Adding a thin layer/bubble of air to the outside of a piece of armor/clothing to absorb damage only worked marginally; the larger the bubble, the better absorption – but then it was harder to fight comfortably in and hindered movement.  Adding anything with Earth only made things heavier and cumbersome, and there was no way anyone would walk around with their clothes on fire.  An attempt to Enchant a shirt to absorb sweat only managed to almost kill her when it tried to suck her body dry.  She instinctively “knew” that there was a way to do the Enchanting better, but either her skill in that ability wasn’t high enough yet or she was missing something.

Finally, because Milton wanted her to try it, she attempted to create a Spatial Void and add it to something.  All her attempts failed, however, and it wasn’t because of the objects she tried to add it to; no, it was because her Enchanting ability couldn’t even “see” it to attach to an object.  It was like trying to grip nothing – because there was nothing to hold onto.  A complete failure, but at least she had experience casting the dangerous and Power-sucking ability.

All told, she could see some potential possibilities for the Enchanting ability – once she learned more about how it exactly worked.  Even Whisp was still struggling to understand the mechanics of it, so Rosewyn didn’t worry herself over it.  What she had accomplished already was beneficial.

Which, going back to the ninth room, was all down to her Enchanting everyone’s clothes/armor (except for Gregar, who wished to remain lightless so that he could be invisible) with a very bright Light enchantment.  Going into the room, the area lit up around them so that they could practically see everything in the room that wasn’t obscured by fog – which, unfortunately, was still everywhere.  For the fog-filled parts, it turned everything into a wall of bright white, which was only pushed back by her use of her Air Affinity.  However, by not having to split her concentration to hold a light orb to see with – along with her increasing proficiency with the element – she was able to push it out to nearly 50 feet with very little effort, clearing the view for everyone to see.

With that, it was more than easy to see the small platforms in the air where the large wolf-spiders were waiting to jump down on them.  They were easily picked off from afar before they could even get too close, knocking them off their perches and onto the deadly trees with a few tugs of a vine from their Nature Manipulator.  The few that managed to hit the ground were pelted by large ice shards condensed from the moisture in the air before they could react.  Moxwell finished them off by shearing through their spider legs put up in defense and taking off their heads with a simple application of his “Fire sword”.

The fight in the arena was actually quite simple.  They hadn’t noticed before, but the intense light that emanated from their armor was too bright for the dark-adjusted eyes of the Arachnawerewolves.  Though they weren’t necessarily blinded, they had trouble focusing on the group enough to effectively attack, leaving them open for getting hit from all sides – plant needle shots, ice shards, and even sword strikes – which they had no hope of seeing to defend against.  The normal webbing that they were usually shot with at the beginning of the fight was shot in all sorts of directions, only a small amount hitting Rosewyn in the leg.

Overall, it was a bit anti-climactic after all of the trouble that they had had in their previous forays into the room, but as soon as the last Arachnawerewolf fell, the spinning trees of death stopped and reset to their normal position.  Another tree moved to the side opposite of where they had entered the arena, allowing them to continue on their way through the room.  A short time later – and with no more attacks – they finally reached the next hallway leading to the next room.

“That was much easier than I thought it would be – I barely broke up a sweat there.  Let’s head to the next room and check it out,” Gregar said, as soon as they walked into the hallway leading out from the ninth room.

“I agree, that was almost too easy, once we figured out that those wolves didn’t appreciate the blindingly good looks that I brought with me,” Moxwell agreed fake-haughtily, stepping into the hallway that was lit up brighter than the mid-day sun.  His overconfidence was their undoing, unfortunately, as he stepped once more down the hallway.

“Don’t step—” was all Gregar got out before Moxwell triggered a trap that sent nearly 100 Weightonite-tipped javelins shooting from the opposite end of the hallway, impaling and killing everyone except the Scout, who managed to use his excessive speed to dodge all but one of the projectiles.  With Rosewyn’s last sight of the dungeon after being impaled through the chest three times, she saw that Gregar had been hit in his knee where it completely crippled the leg, leaving a massive wound that was literally gushing blood.

The next thing she knew, she was plopping out of the Bioconversion Lab, shivering slightly – as she was wet and naked – before the heater both dried her off and warmed her up.  She got her clothes from the Molecular Converter located nearby, noticing that the Light Enchantment was gone, though she had expected it.  Milton said that he couldn’t reproduce any of the enchantments for some reason; she suspected that most things that her people could do with the Power were beyond him, just as many of the things that he did almost instinctively were beyond her people.

Gathering up with the rest of her group in the CAS, she couldn’t help but notice that Moxwell looked a little sheepish.  Serves him right.

“Well, ok – nice job, everybody, for finishing up the ninth room.  Now, I don’t think I have to remind everyone—” she looked pointedly at her husband, who bowed his head in mock-shame— “that Gregar always goes first.  Any questions?”  She smiled minutely at Moxwell, letting him know that he was forgiven for his literal mis-step.  It was an honest mistake; sure, it got them killed, but death wasn’t so bad that there was no coming back from it.

“Alright, let’s take a little break for a few and regroup – because I really want to see what’s in the next room!”

Despite the looming danger up north, and the fate of the entire Kingdom seemingly in their hands – Rosewyn was excited.  Just like the first time she had stepped into Milton’s dungeon, she couldn’t help thinking, I haven’t had this much fun in years!

*        *        *

Milton had watched with amusement as Rosewyn[24] lectured Moxwell later when they were relatively alone, though she did it out of love rather than any ill will.  She was particularly harping on the fact that he hadn’t used his Limited Precognition ability, which had proved useful during the previous room to counter incoming attacks.  The fact that they had gotten through the ninth room meant that he was ready to start supplying defending Combat Units to the eleventh; although the beasts inside the room were marginally more difficult, he didn’t believe that it would be long until they finished the tenth one as well.  The time when he would have to expand his dungeon was quickly approaching – faster than he had anticipated.  Which was a good thing.

Along with Rosewyn’s top group, several of the others were adapting some of the same strategies they learned from hearing about their exploits.  Every group had at least a slightly different set of abilities, though each one had someone playing the role of Caster, Tank, and Healer.  The other two slots were open to whatever anyone wanted to do – they were flex spots.

Which all meant that they were rapidly catching up, some already making their way through the room Rosewyn’s group had just cleared.  And that, in turn, meant more work and more resources on creating an additional satellite room for training.  Not to mention having some additional Bioconversion Labs nearby to help with restocking the room with Combat Units.  He was now up to 80 additional Labs that were created expressly for the purpose of replacing the large Quadger Foreman in room 7, the Scaly Tanks in room 8, and the Arachnawerewolves in room 9; they were larger and contained more Bio Units to create than could be done in a Molecular Converter – which also meant that the down-time was longer in between groups.

To combat this, he had to make even more rooms so that they were on a rotating schedule, cutting the normal time someone had to wait by a third.  It was a significant expense, but he was getting a large influx of resources from both the mines and the first loads coming from the Kingdom.

Speaking of the Kingdom, the mass migration of people to the northeast was on schedule.  The volunteers with their Charisma Boosts and Healing Touches were doing an awesome job of getting people moving; the hardest part of everything was keeping up with the demand for more supplies.

He finally had to utilize Flauren, the Guild’s Logistics Coordinator, to organize everything.  He set her up with her own little “office” near the exit point of the Upgraded Bioconversion Labs, complete with her own desk and Access Terminal made entirely for her.  Since he wasn’t hoarding Focusing Crystals, the mere 5 that were needed for it weren’t much of an issue anymore.  It made the ferrying of supplies and people much easier for everyone – especially once he learned how to apply his now-upgraded Tactical Mapping[25] skill to the Access Terminal.

Flauren took to what was essentially a high-tech touchscreen computer with amazing confidence.  Once he understood what she needed, he gave her access to everything she could ever want.  She had screens that recounted the current Bio Units used in the creation of more Greycers and their production schedule, as well as what was available for use in creating food for the marching populace; other screens that listed the available boxes of Power Potions that needed to be shipped out and the Greycer Puppies that would go out with them; up-to-the-minute views of Enchanted Slider Wagons being assembled and ready to go; and finally the tactical map that showed everything – or at least everything that Milton could control or had information on.

The interactive map could zoom into the known, traveled-through parts of the Kingdom that the Greycers had visited – as well as the Greycer Puppies traveling with the communities up north.  Not only were the puppies an extra-cute reminder of the volunteers’ visit, they were also essentially a spy in their camps as well.  Not that Milton needed to “spy”, but it allowed him to see and hear what was going on with the groups of Kingdom citizens at any time to make sure there weren’t any difficulties.

Flauren could see what villages and towns had been evacuated, which ones still needed to be approached, zoom in and look through the “puppy feed” to see the general state of affairs, assign outgoing shipments (that were manned by other volunteers, though they were mundane volunteers and not the Charismatic kind) to resupply them with food and a box or two of Potions, deliver other supplies up to the northeastern staging area, and look for any other potential issues.

That took a lot off of Milton’s plate; although he could do it – or even ask ALANNA to help with it, which he was sure she would if asked – he would rather spend most of his concentration on other things, like preparing for the upcoming confrontation up north.  Flauren’s knowledge of the Kingdom and logistical matters like moving shipments around was invaluable – even if she was formerly only doing it for the Guild of 15 to 20,000 people.  Now she was doing it for the entire Kingdom of millions.

As the demand for Bio Units and Organic Material rose, Milton was forced to double the size of his Farm again.  Instead of just expanding the giant 4-mile-long cavern that already existed, he produced another 40 drones to excavate, plant, install the sprinkler system, and position Molecular Converters for a brand new “Farm 2” (not an original name, but it was expedient) placed around 20 miles south in the middle of nowhere.  He wasn’t exactly paranoid, but he was well aware of the “don’t put all your eggs in one basket” theory.

If something somehow found the farm and destroyed it, his ability to fight back would be severely impacted.  With Farm 2 “nearby” but nowhere near at the same time, Milton had the hope that if that ever happened, he would still have a backup.  He even supplied it with its own Geothermal Transmutation Station (GTS) to power everything in case his own power was tied-up otherwise.

Everything took time, however.  It was already three full days since the Bearilla attack, and the previous GTSs he had created nearby were starting to kick in and take over the power required to maintain so many different units.[26]  When they finally did all activate, it “felt” like a large weight had been figuratively taken off his back.  Because of improving his Reactor Power/Strength by a little bit earlier, he was at 90% Reactor Output – and was only using 14.7% now.  Most of that was being used by the (currently 70) Greycers running around the Kingdom, as well as the (currently nearly 600) Puppies traveling with the citizens.  The rest were made up of the volunteers, Brint and his Quagon, sensor orbs ranging through the forest, and his mining teams.

With his available Power Output no longer as much of a concern – at least near the dungeon, Milton started to produce some Bearillas for the fight up north.  As soon as they left the proximity of the dungeon, of course, they would start eating up 0.6% of his output per unit – but he had plans for that as well.

When he heard from Brint shortly thereafter, displaying what he had found over the mountain – he was doubly glad that he started production.

This is going to get ugly.

Chapter 22 – New Toys

Fortunately for everybody, Brint and his Quagon had seen no sight of any other breakouts from the Quizard Mountains on the Kingdom side.  His news about the country/kingdom/whatever it was that was on the other side of the mountain range was bad enough, but it didn’t surprise the Station Core.  He had figured that if there was anything over there, it was probably destroyed – the methods of “attack” so far from the enemy seemed too practiced.  However, he wasn’t sure what was stopping them from attacking from every possible exit cave they could; the only thing he could hope for was that stopping them in their first foray outside would prevent the others from pouring out in a flood.

Milton spent some time making plans; plans for defeating the looming menace up north…and for afterward.  With the confirmation from what Brint saw – that there was likely something huge that was liable to make its way out of the cave at some point – he started to spend his resources like they were going out of style.[27]  He had millions of BMUs saved up, as well as thousands of Focusing Crystals, so he spent a chunk of it to create two more GTSs, portable Power Generators and Molecular Converters by the dozen, hundreds of sensor orbs, and nearly 100 flying drones.

He used the drones nearby to help finish up his other projects, but the other constructed material he stored in a large, hastily made “warehouse” under the ground until they were needed.  Once that was done, he had a fairly good idea what he had to spend on “fun” things from the Defensive Weapons Factory.

Now that he had access to a larger store of Focusing Crystals, in turn, the options that he had access to had increased as well.[28]  There were even some things that he hadn’t seen on the Defensive Weapons Factory menu before.

Harmonic Force Fields: Harmonic Force Fields create an impenetrable wall of harmonically arranged atoms, unable to be broken if the two pillars to either side are functional.  The force field can be up to 50 feet long and up to 10 feet tall, providing excellent defense in tight quarters.  Vulnerable to blunt-force impacts to field pillars.  Cost: 15,000 BMUs, 15 Focusing Crystals.  Requires: Power Generator – Portable.

Gravity Manipulators: Gravity Manipulators act as their name would imply – they manipulate gravity.  The gravity fields produced can be up to 30 feet wide and can affect up to 200 feet above the Gravity Manipulator placement.  Gravity field can be finely controlled, producing negative and positive gravity changes.  Vulnerable to blunt-force impacts and excessive heat.  Cost: 60,000 BMUs, 60 Focusing Crystals.  Requires: Power Generator – Portable (2).

Auditory Assault Fields: The field produced by this defense projects a near-visible auditory assault in a semi-directional wide array, similar to a perpetual sonic boom.  The auditory assault can cause permanent damage to its victims’ hearing, as well as incapacitating those with less Constitution.  Ear protection is recommended while in use.  Assault can reach up to 500 feet or more.  Vulnerable to extreme humidity, excessive heat, and electric shock.  Cost: 15,000 BMUs, 25 Focusing Crystals.  Requires: Power Generator – Portable.

Optical Barrages: This defense creates a barrage of disorienting images, ranging from painfully intense bright lights to confusing, nightmarish scenes of horror and dismemberment – your choice.  The Barrage housing contains directional emitters, which can cover up to 10,000 square feet of area.  Vulnerable to any type of impact and will start to degrade after 30 minutes of constant use.  Cost: 25,000 BMUs, 25 Focusing Crystals.  Requires: Power Generator – Portable.

Holographic Illusions: The Holographic Illusion emitters project a hyper-real holographic illusion that is virtually indistinguishable from the real thing, though it will not hold up under direct physical contact.  Can be displayed up against any type of surface, though surface texture can have detrimental effects on the believability of the illusion.  Can project up to 200 feet wide, but the larger the illusion, the less substantiality it will appear to have.  Vulnerable to excessive heat, excessive moisture, and blunt-force impacts.  Cost: 1,000 BMUs, 5 Focusing Crystals.  Requires: Power Generator – Portable.

Laser Cannon Emplacements: Best placed with a wide range of fire, the Laser Cannon Emplacements must be manually controlled by your Combat Units.  By firing out a highly volatile, super-concentrated beam of harmful amplified light particles, those controlling the Cannon Emplacement can severely damage an attacker with the extremely rapid heating of their extremities.  Can effectively impact targets up to 150 feet away while in current atmosphere – farther distances will have less of an effect.  Continuous firing of more than 15 seconds every minute can damage the Laser Cannon Emplacement due to overheating.  Vulnerable to impact damage, overheating, and radiation leakage.  Cost: 75,000 BMUs, 75 Focusing Crystals.  Requires: Power Generator – Portable.

Railgun Penetrators: The wall-mounted Railgun Penetrators project a microscopically thin sliver of charged tritanium at high velocity, allowing it to penetrate nearly any type of defense with impunity.  Upon impact with a surface, the charged tritanium sliver will break its molecular bonds, causing a small explosion nanoseconds after contact.  While this defense is manually controlled and targeted, the fire-rate should be kept low – no more than 1 shot per 30 seconds as the slivers generate extreme heat while firing.  The small block of tritanium used for the projectile source will provide enough ammunition to fire approximately 120,000 shots.  Extremely vulnerable to overheating, blunt-force impacts, and electrical discharges. Effective Range While In Current Atmosphere: 400 feet. Cost: 400,000 BMUs, 15 Focusing Crystals.  Requires: Power Generator – Portable.

Molecular Disruptor: The Molecular Disruptor is a defense that is triggered by pressure after placement.  When triggered, the Disruptor uses the same technology in a Molecular Converter on all objects within 15 feet, near-instantly scrambling the molecules of anything unlucky enough to be caught in its “blast radius” – including itself.  One-time use.  Relatively invulnerable and self-contained.  Cost: 60,000 BMUs, 30 Focusing Crystals.  Requires: Power Generator – Portable only at initial placement.

Plasma Bomb – Small: The small Plasma Bomb is a one-time use defense for potentially eliminating small groups of enemies.  Each bomb contains a highly concentrated and condensed quantity of ionized gas.  When activated, the sudden introduction of very high temperatures causes the Plasma Bomb to explode.  The explosion causes a supremely high-temperature blast of up to 40 feet in diameter.  Can be thrown or launched; once activated, the explosion will occur within 10 seconds.  Cost: 5,000 BMUs, 3 Focusing Crystals.

Plasma Bomb – Large: The large Plasma Bomb is a one-time use defense for potentially eliminating large groups of enemies.  Each bomb contains a highly concentrated and condensed quantity of ionized gas.  When activated, the sudden introduction of very high temperatures causes the Plasma Bomb to explode.  The explosion causes a supremely high-temperature blast of up to 400 feet in diameter.  Cannot be thrown, as the Large Plasma Bomb is vulnerable to extreme vibration.  Once manually triggered by a Combat Unit, the activation will occur within 30 seconds.  Cost: 200,000 BMUs, 60 Focusing Crystals.

Unstable Void: This defense creates an Unstable Void in a specified place up to 300 feet away from the apparatus.  Anything within 50 feet of the 10-foot diameter semi-solid void sphere is instantly pulled into the unstable vortex of a relatively controlled subatomic implosion, ripping them to pieces and fueling the void.  The Unstable Void can grow up to a 30-foot diameter before it breaks apart, or after 1 minute the void will collapse upon itself, destroying the defense in the process.  Apparatus is vulnerable to blunt-force impacts and submersion in water; the unstable void is invulnerable.  One-time use.  Cost: 1,500,000 BMUs, 500 Focusing Crystals.  Requires: Power Generator – Portable (4).

Particle Accelerator – Portable: The Portable Particle Accelerator is the pinnacle of defensive weaponry available for small to large engagements.  This tripod-mounted defense is unfortunately large and unwieldy, but it also packs more stopping power than you will probably need.  By accelerating a mass of subatomic particles to high velocities by means of a small zero-point energy reactor inside the long tube mounted on the tripod, this weapon will deliver a high-energy beam of unstoppable destruction up to 2,000 feet away.  Anything standing before it will be instantly disintegrated by the bombardment of masses of particles, tearing the molecular bonds of anything it is pointed at.  Spread of the beam is up to 2 feet wide and will not degrade until after 2,000 feet.  Multiple use – but requires an additional infusion of 400 Focusing Crystals after every 30-second discharge.  After every discharge, a 1 hour waiting time is recommended to prevent overheating.  Vulnerable to blunt-force impacts and overheating.  Cost: 3,000,000 BMUs, 5,000 Focusing Crystals, 200 Focusing Crystals per 30-second discharge.  Requires: Power Generator – Portable (12).

There was a lot to choose from; Milton was finally seeing what could’ve been available to him if he hadn’t been damaged and was where he was supposed to be.  Given the extreme defensive weaponry he now had access to, he believed that The Collective had a fairly good chance to win their war against the…whatever they were that attacked them.  At least, they would’ve – if the Station Cores had ever made it to their destinations.

First, the Particle Accelerator – Portable sounded awesome, but it was entirely too pricey for practical use.  While he might be able to afford it if he waited until his miner drones found some more Focusing Crystals, it wouldn’t be cost-effective at that point to utilize it in battle.  If it somehow was broken, then he would most likely lose the one advantage his Combat Units had over the enemy.

The same went with the Unstable Void – it was just too expensive, especially for a one-time use defense.  While it appeared that it – like the Particle Accelerator – could probably kill anything, there were other defenses that he would rather spend his resources on.

As for the others, everything else had potential.  He wasn’t sure how effective the Harmonic Force Fields would be out in the open, however; the Bearillas could just jump over them, he was pretty sure.  Despite that, he could see them being useful funneling large quantities of enemy Quizards when it came down to it.

Milton eventually decided on a hefty amount of Laser Cannon Emplacements, Plasma Bomb – Small, and a few other choice defenses for an extra oomph to their defense.  After contacting Flauren, he had her include them on her schedule in a few of the later shipments heading north to the staging area.  As much as he wanted to bring them up there right now and start getting set up, there were other things that were a higher priority.

Like arming and protecting the general population of the Kingdom.

As much as he wanted to provide the millions of Proctans heading up north a full suit of armor, high-quality steel weapons, and – while he was at it – modern (to Milton) guns and the like, he didn’t have the resources for that.  It was expensive enough providing those necessary items to the current Guild members near his dungeon; he would need a billion or more BMUs to do the same to the Kingdom’s population.

And based upon what Brint had seen underneath the Quizard Mountains – they were going to need every hand on deck.  While the Bearilla Combat Units he was creating, as well as the trained-up Guild members, were hopefully adequate to defeat the enemy Bearillas, there was the issue with the massive quantity of Quizards that inevitably came with them.  Based upon the ratio that had attacked The Fortress, there was likely to be 100 times more of the quick lizards than their larger bear-gorilla leaders.

From what Brint had been observing watching the army tear up the forest, there was a constant supply of them emerging from the caves to replenish their numbers – at least as food.  And if they were going through so many hundreds per day just to eat, that meant that there were even more just waiting to emerge.

So what Milton needed was a resource-cheap alternative to equip the Kingdom’s citizens adequately, so that they could help defend against the tide of Quizards – and he thought he had discovered it.  It was all thanks to his new Rapid Carbonization Facility and Destructive Distillery facilities; by producing Refined Carbon as another usable resource, he could fashion it into some amazing things.

Although it would take a lot of Organic Material converting into Refined Carbon, Milton first thought about arming everyone with diamond swords and armor straight out of a Minecraft game.  However, upon experimentation (in which he actually created a diamond sword!) he found that although diamonds were exceptionally hard and could produce an impressive edge, they were prone to cracking and shattering upon multiple forceful impacts.  At the end, they were more like very, very hard swords made of glass – temporarily effective, but ultimately useless for more than a dozen strikes.  It was possible that they might last longer against Quizards, who didn’t have the super-thick and durable skin and bones of a Bearilla, though Milton didn’t want to take that chance.

Instead, he found an interesting material made from the Refined Carbon called Diamene, which – at only 2 atoms thick – was flexible yet stronger than a diamond upon impact.  By layering the Diamene on top of each other surrounding a very thin rod of steel, he produced what looked like a lightweight wavy clear-ish plastic sword; by further fusing individual, very tiny, sharply cut diamonds (which were much, much less likely to break due to their small size) to the cutting edges and the point, the result was a relatively lightweight but very strong and sharp sword that wouldn’t shatter upon impact.  Or even after the 10th or 10,000th impact.  It wasn’t quite indestructible, but it would last under quite a lot of abuse.

For armor, he used the same material and layered it between multiple sheets of thin cloth, producing a finished product that was slightly thicker than a normal set of clothing – but could also stop a bullet if it needed to.  By adding a thin layer of the same Elastifoam material the mattresses that were on the beds in The Refuge were made from to the inside of the new “bullet-proof” cloth, he created a veritable padded suit of “armor” that could absorb some impact and was virtually tear-proof.

He only made a pair of pants, a shirt, and a helmet that looked more like one of the old-timey football helmets, however; if someone took a hit to the face or uncovered body part the defense his armor provided would be nil.  And a massive impact – like from the fist of a Bearilla – would probably still kill someone without a large Constitution augmentation, though; he designed it for use by the general population against the smaller Quizards – not Bearillas.

To produce each Diamene-diamond sword, it took 50 units of Refined Carbon and 2 BMUs; to produce a set of armor, it took only 5 units of Refined Carbon and 20 units each of Organic Material and Bio Mass.  However, with a single unit of Refined Carbon taking 10 units of highly compressed and processed Organic Material, to equip a single person was going to take 570 units of Organic Material and 20 Bio Mass.  He was going to need more trees.

He spent even more of his slowly dwindling resources to expand the Vendrasorel tree farm he had created previously – by 600%.  It was going to take around 8 days for the trees to grow large enough to harvest, but he wasn’t going to need the material until later – though he would be cutting it close with the timing and delivery of the equipment.  He added another note for Flauren to consider in the future.

With most of his resources now tied up in producing equipment and defensive weapons at the moment and in anticipation of future resources, Milton turned his focus back to the state of the Kingdom.  Almost as if it was waiting for his attention, something inevitably came up.

Why can’t things just go right for a change?

Chapter 23 – Suspicions

Gavin was having a particularly difficult week.  After sending orders to the various Royal Army Reserve contingents scattered across the Kingdom to gather at the capital, he figured most of his problems with the Guardian Guild were soon to be taken care of.  With Draven set to leave as well, things were starting to look up.

That was, of course, before he started to hear reports from returning Reserve troops about abandoned villages – and even a good-sized town or two – along their route.  Since their orders had been to return to Grestwinch in all haste, they didn’t investigate the disappearance of the Kingdom’s people.  The most they had learned was that the village-folk had left in what appeared to be a hurry, though there was no sign of any type of altercation.  Supplies were obviously taken, though not necessarily everything they had on hand; it was more like they had grabbed what they thought they could physically carry and that was it.

It took a little over a week, but the last of the troops were trickling in now; all 20,000+ of them were holed up in the Royal Barracks, where they usually spent most of their time.  At least, that’s where they normally spent most of their time – after Gavin and his Cordpower Company had assumed control of the Kingdom, they were constantly out in the field chasing after “ghosts”.  There still wasn’t any sign of the Guild anywhere, though Gavin thought it more and more likely that they were still holed up in the forest to the east – and were somehow behind the mass exodus by the Kingdom’s people.

While he didn’t care about the citizens more than as a potential source in which to sell his Company’s product, what he was worried about was the fact that all of his operatives and employees stationed in those villages had disappeared as well.  As there was no sign that they had been killed and disposed of, Gavin couldn’t imagine any scenario that wouldn’t have them at least finding a way to communicate what was going on.

Either they were all being held against their will – which he thought was in the realm of possibility, but very unlikely – or they were somehow involved, which was nearly incomprehensible to him.  To have a few traitors in his ranks was entirely possible, but for all of them to turn against him and the Company was so impossible that there was virtually no likelihood of that being the answer.

He finally caught a break when he received a message from his Chief Intelligence Agent, Roscoe, a few days ago.  The man infuriatingly didn’t explain in detail what he had learned, only that he had caught someone who he suspected was from the Guardian Guild masquerading as a representative of the Cordpower Company.  Not only that, but he was bringing with him something that could potentially cause some issues to their bottom line.

His informants inside the city let him know that Roscoe had arrived a few minutes ago and was heading straight to the Royal Castle, dragging behind him – with the help of a few other Company employees – a large, wheel-less wagon that floated above the ground.  That discovery alone was worth looking into; he had been knee-deep in logistics ever since he had taken over ruling the Kingdom and having a transport like that was practically invaluable.

A commotion at the door to his office made him look up from a particularly boring report on Power Potion production schedules.  There was very little that had changed in that respect, and they made sure it stayed that way; when they controlled the supply of Potions and only produced a certain amount, they were able to keep the price fairly steady – which allowed them to project earnings in the following year.

His doors swung wide open, his bodyguard Bruth doing the act himself, as Roscoe strolled through easily pulling behind him a massive wooden box that was – as the reports had said – suspended in the air.  There were two long wooden poles attached to the sides of the box pointing forwards, though they seemed to be cracked and damaged at the ends – as if something was violently torn off of them.

Coming in behind Roscoe and the wheel-less wagon were two additional massively large Cordpower Company employees that Gavin recognized as the “muscle” behind his Chief Intelligence Agent’s activities.  While Roscoe could detect lies from someone like no one else, he wasn’t very imposing at just over 5 feet tall and scrawny to boot.  He also had a perpetual squint which bunched his face up to the point where it was almost amusing to look at; however, no one that had laughed at him lived long enough to regret their mistake.

Roscoe’s “muscle” were physically lifting a heavily bound prisoner between them; she didn’t look like she was strong enough to escape even if they left her alone, but they were apparently not taking any chances.  Gavin could appreciate that – there was a time to take a risk, and there were times when you did everything you could to minimize potential threats.

What surprised him the most was that she was possibly the most attractive person he had ever seen – man or woman.  While he wasn’t necessarily vain about his own personal looks, he knew that he could turn an eye or two when walking in a room – and not because with his wealth he could own anyone in that room ten times over.  He never had much time for anything other than casual companionship, however, but this tall, blonde-haired beauty made him rethink about settling down.

It was just too bad that she had probably done something that would require him to kill her.

“Sir, I have returned as I said I would.”

There was no smile or any other expression on Roscoe’s face, no indication that he was expecting any type of reward.  Gavin appreciated that – his Chief Intelligence Agent did his job and a job well done was usually the only approval that was needed for the strange man.  “Welcome back, Roscoe; I assume you have an explanation of why you couldn’t tell me about this in your message.”

“Yes, sir.  I figured that what I brought with me was dangerous enough not to risk it in case someone intercepted the message.  Given the circumstances, I thought the potential of that happening was at least 50%,” Roscoe responded succinctly without elaboration.

“I can appreciate that, and I trust that you had good reason.  Now, tell me about what happened and what you brought back with you.  I trust this has something to do with your main mission of sniffing out the Guild?”

“Yes sir, please come back here, if you will,” the Agent said, before walking back toward the rear of the floating wagon.  Gavin followed, taking an extra few seconds to feel underneath the wagon – but he encountered a firm-yet-pliable invisible cushion of air blocking his efforts.  They somehow attached a slider bubble to the bottom of the wagon…permanently?  Despite not having the same abilities as an Elemental Caster, he had learned almost everything he could about them and what they could do – as well as most other abilities that the people had access to.  Seemingly useless information sometimes came in handy, and it wasn’t too much of burden to learn it in the first place; he had plenty of willing demonstrators who were willing to perform for a taste of his Power Potion.

Arriving at the back of the box – which he saw had “Cordpower Company” and its logo emblazoned on the sides (those sneaky bastards) – Roscoe threw the doors open wide, showing a half-full compartment full of small wooden boxes.  Each of the boxes had the same Company logo burnt into the sides of the wood and there had to be at least a couple hundred of them.  A small platform was nestled along the bottom rear of the floor that appeared to move independently from the rest of the transport.

“Here, let me show you,” Roscoe said, before he climbed up into the wagon with some difficulty – being so short and all.  He quickly grabbed a box from the nearest stack and handed it to Gavin without a word.

Knowing that his subordinate wouldn’t just hand over something deadly without a warning – at least he hoped so – he held it in the palm of one hand, noticing how smooth and well-made the construction of the wooden box was.  Lifting up the lid, he noticed nearly two-dozen vials of liquid inside, sloshing around the holder keeping them separate as he shifted to see them better.

“Are these what I think they are?” he asked unnecessarily.  They looked exactly like a Cordpower Company vial, down to the signature tapering on the bottom he noticed when he brought one out.  “Did they steal these?  I have no record of any theft or ‘misplaced’ Potions lately, which has happened in the past.  Or are these all fake?”

“They’re not fake, sir – nor are they Cordpower’s.  Try one yourself,” Roscoe prompted.  And so he did.

He felt energized – unlike any feeling he had ever experienced when he drank one of his own Company’s Potions.  That was the only way to describe it; it was almost like that little vial was ten or twenty of his own Potions all condensed into one.  As far as he knew, the researchers had created the best and most intense condensing process in the Kingdom; rivals in the past had tried to emulate them, but always ended up making a far inferior product.  In fact, the only incidence of a stronger potion was one that mysteriously disappeared earlier that year…and every agent he sent to investigate and stop the distribution of the competition’s Potions had never returned.

Therefore, he reasoned, whoever is behind all this has either discovered a way to refine the concentration of Power inside water (which I doubt), or they’ve found the mythical source of the Power.  Former heads of the Company had searched the Kingdom high and low over the years, Gavin spending his own personal wealth to hire teams of explorers looking for the fabled source; he knew it had to exist somewhere, his – as well as a few experts in their fields – logical mind had reasoned at least that much.  And now someone had purportedly found it…and he was willing to bet that the Guardian Guild was behind it one way or another.

“This is…disturbing.  Thank you for keeping this quiet, Roscoe – word of this shipment getting out could have dire consequences.  How much were they selling it for?  Actually, a better question probably is: how much money did they steal from us?”

Roscoe looked hesitant to answer for some reason.  He had better not be in on this; if he’s a traitor, I’m not sure who to trust anymore.

“Uh, sir…actually, we technically didn’t lose any money,” Roscoe finally said, not meeting Gavin’s eyes as he stared instead at the bound woman still being forcefully held by his two accomplices.  “She was giving them away – for free.”

“What!?”  Such a thing seemed to be impossible to his business-oriented mind.  Why would anyone just give this stuff away?  However, as his Chief Intelligence Agent explained the circumstances regarding the discovery of the woman and her goods, he began to understand better.  He described listening to the woman as she convincingly swindled the entire village he had been stationed at; how she was from the Cordpower Company and that there were new orders that a major threat to the northeast and everyone had to go there as quickly as possible to help push back a massive beast invasion; how the Guardian Guild was framed by the beasts themselves; and how the Power Potions given out to everyone for free was to help make them stronger so that they could contribute everything they had in defense.

“They even had small puppies they were giving out of the same…there is no other word for it – adorable…beast they had pulling the wagons.  It was at least 15 feet tall and could run faster than anything I’ve seen before; the only reason I know that is because as soon as I confronted the woman you see here—” he pointed toward the attractive bound woman— “the beast broke out of the harness that was attached to it and was out of sight before I could issue an order to stop it.  Two puppies escaped from the back of the wagon and rushed out of sight before we could catch them; they weren’t as fast as what I’m assuming was the adult, but they were quicker than my guys here.”

It went without saying that Roscoe had seen through her lies, which was why he – unlike everyone else, assumedly – hadn’t gone along with the plan.  And, frankly, he had trouble blaming even his employees who had deserted; when faced with someone who says they are with Cordpower, giving out Power Potions, and announcing a threat to the entire Kingdom, even he might be convinced.  Especially when he heard the woman talking a few seconds later.

“You’re running out of time.  The only hope you and everyone else has at surviving is to evacuate Grestwinch and head to the northeast.  There is a threat to the Kingdom so great that your petty politicking will mean nothing if you don’t act.  This is your only warning,” she said, having been completely silent the entire time she was there.

Gavin was mildly amused, though everyone else looked shocked; from their appearance, he guessed that she hadn’t been very talkative since her capture.  Her voice wasn’t the smoothest or most enticing he’d heard – truthfully, it had a bit of a masculine tone to it – but there was a quality to it that made it believable.  He had in his employ some people with an ability to make themselves more charming, and the feeling was very nearly the same – though much stronger.  Fortunately, he had experience ignoring those same charms, so much in fact that he was nearly immune to them.  Not completely, because despite her (and whoever she worked for) trying to destroy everything he had worked so hard to achieve – he still found her physically desirable.

“I don’t believe you.  Tell me who you are working for and maybe I will give you a clean death.  That’s more than a traitor like you deserves, but I’m willing to be lenient if you answer my questions,” Gavin told the woman, who instead of looking frightened only smiled.

“Well, according to your walking polygraph there, you can see that I’m telling the truth.  If you choose not to believe me, then all their deaths are on you.”

Gavin didn’t know what a polygraph was, but he assumed that it meant something along the lines of what Roscoe’s ability was.  There were very few people who knew what his Chief Intelligence Agent could do, which made it much easier for him to do his job; for this woman to guess or even know about it was worrisome.  Even more worrisome was the confirmation he saw on Roscoe’s face when he glanced at him.

“She’s…telling the truth.  Or, at least, what she’s been told was relayed as ‘the truth’, so she may not know any better.  Either way, there is likely something to the northeast, though whether it is a threat or not…I’m not so sure.”

Hmm…  “Ok, so she’s telling the truth about something to the northeast, but whatever it is may or not actually be a threat,” he asked Roscoe, confirming what he had heard.  When he nodded, Gavin asked the woman, “Since you seem talkative, how about you answer some questions for me?”

“Shoot.”

Shoot?  What does that mean?  “Uh, ok.  Do you work for the Guild?”

“Not precisely – it’s more of a mutual protection agreement.”

He kept a corner of his eye on Roscoe, knowing that he would only react if he detected a lie.  When he didn’t see anything, he assumed that she was telling the truth.  Which meant that some sort of organization was working with the Guild – potentially the same organization that was creating and distributing the other Power Potions.

“Where is the Guardian Guild?  Are they to the northeast?” Gavin asked.

“I’m not going to answer that first question and…no.”

Still no reaction from Roscoe, which meant that he was getting somewhere.  First, he knew that the Guild wasn’t to the northeast, which indicated that the entire “invasion” was most likely fake and something that even the few Cordpower employees he had with the people there could most likely stop it.  He wasn’t sure exactly why the entire Kingdom’s population was being moved up there; the only thing he knew was whoever this woman worked for was using the Guild to try to take him and the Company down.

“Are they to the east – a few miles into the forest, perhaps?” he asked, hoping that he would get some sort of reaction.

Her previous lack of hesitation showed here as she seemed to freeze for a moment, before answering.  “I’m not answering any more questions.  I’ve given you your warning – ignore it at your peril.  We’ve already infiltrated the city and are spreading the word about the looming threat; if you prevent anyone from leaving, their deaths will be on your conscience.”

“Oh, you’ll answer more questions alright, you might just need some motiva—”

She cut him off with a smile on her face, “I’ve always wanted to say this.  This message will self-destruct in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1…”

Gavin, as well as the other people in the room, were confused at that statement; until she literally dropped dead in the arms of one of Roscoe’s associates.  Attempts to revive her were unsuccessful; unless she had some sort of poison secreted on her person, there was no indication of how she had killed herself.

Regardless, Gavin had a decision to make: send the Royal Army Reserve to go after the citizens heading to the northeast – as well as any further ones trying to leave, or continue on his previous plan to squash whatever remnants of the Guild there was to the east – as well as whatever organization was helping them.  He was now fairly certain after talking to the woman that the Guild was holing up where he had thought it might be, so it was likely that everyone was there.  And they didn’t know that he knew where they were, so they wouldn’t be expecting an entire army knocking at their front door.

If he sent them all northeast, he would only delay eliminating the Guild – which would allow them to cause even more problems than they already had.  As for the perceived threat up north, he doubted it was too much to concern himself with; with all the citizens up there, it was more than likely they’d have thousands or tens of thousands of willing fighters to beat back whatever came their way.  In fact, it might be a good way to identify potential recruits for the new Border Protection regiment of the Reserve – whoever survived would be ideal to continue protecting the Kingdom’s borders.  The more he thought about it, the better it sounded.

With that decided, he dismissed everyone from his office, instructing Roscoe to secure the boxes of Power Potions he had confiscated in the treasury in the basement of the Royal Castle.  He even told him to take a box or two for himself and his associates for a job well done.

When they were all gone, he called to his bodyguard.  “Bruth, tell Draven that I want him to start moving to the east with the Army as soon as possible.  It’s a day before schedule, so he’ll probably give you some pushback; tell him that I’ll let him take this new floating ‘wagon’ as incentive, as long as he brings it back in one piece.  I have some Casters that would love to figure out how this thing works.”

Once the guild and this mystery organization is crushed, I can start putting the Kingdom back together.  And if they somehow find the source of Power, this could be potentially be the best year yet for the Cordpower Company.

Part III – Defenses

Chapter 24 – On the move

Milton knew that it had been a risk keeping Drodana alive to answer questions, especially because he was pretty sure he gave away more than he was planning on.  However, he considered the knowledge he had gained by taking over and controlling the volunteer well worth it.  And she didn’t mind, either; she was actually thankful, because after she was captured, she knew what was likely to be in store for her – everyone had heard the rumors of what Cordpower did to its enemies.

When he took over control, he shunted her consciousness to an empty part of her mind, effectively putting her to sleep – and she woke up later at the bottom of a Bioconversion Lab none the worse for wear.  In fact, she didn’t remember anything past the initial capture; which was good because they were not gentle, nor did they behave…appropriately.  Milton could now understand the same sort of hate and distaste for the Cordpower Company that many of the Guild (Brint and Whisp as well) had toward the business entity.

But he wanted to see Gavin, the leader of the Company that had masterminded everything that had befallen the Kingdom.  And, as reluctant as he was, he wanted to give them one chance to try to do the right thing and save the Kingdom.  He should’ve known better, though, even if he had someone who could detect lies standing right next to him.  That would be an interesting gene mutation to get ahold of.

And even though Milton had inadvertently indicated where he, the Refuge, and the dungeon were located, he was relatively sure that Gavin had known about his location already.  He wasn’t sure how that was, but it was entirely possible that he had sifted through rumors and sightings to piece it together.  He wasn’t worried about it too much though; his other volunteers had nearly finished alerting every village and town in the Kingdom.  And, just as he had told the head of the Cordpower Company, there were already a few volunteers infiltrating the capital of Grestwinch and sending people northeast.

Milton was honestly slightly surprised that none of the volunteers had been caught before that.  Also, with the Royal Army Reserve purportedly combing the Kingdom for Guardian Guild members, it was a wonder that none of the groups of marching citizens had been stopped and told to go back.

It wasn’t until he saw the massive contingents of Reservists stationed in the barracks in the capital that he thought he understood.  No one had stopped the citizens because there was no one to stop them – they were all holed up in Grestwinch.  He was sure that they would start to move now that Gavin had an idea of what they were up against, but he wasn’t sure exactly which way he would go.  Would he order them to the northeast, bolstering the mass migration of people heading that way, or would he attack the Station Core and the dungeon?

With the number of eyes he had around the Kingdom, Milton was fairly certain he would have warning either way.  And regardless, it was a non-issue; if they didn’t stop the Bearilla/Quizard army up north, then it wouldn’t matter where they went.  Speaking of which, the invasion there was slowly picking up steam with additional reinforcements from the Quizard Mountains.

Fifty-two of his Bloody-thirsty Squirrel scouts had finally worked their way up, after traveling nearly non-stop for about a week.  They didn’t move nearly as fast as he would’ve liked, despite taking a route entirely through the trees; their delay was because of a small river winding its way through the forest.  He had lost a few dozen squirrel scouts trying to get across because of the local underwater beast population; it had taken distracting at least 40 Horrific Piranhas with a minor sacrificial squirrel feeding-frenzy for the remaining survivors to quickly make it to the other side.

Now that they were there along the pathway being torn up, hiding in the trees and attracting as little attention as possible, he was able to get a fairly accurate count of the enemy.  The numbers didn’t look good, and he knew that it was only the tip of the iceberg.  Nearly 400 Bearillas were now outside of the Quizard Mountains – with nearly 10 times that number of Quizards – though only a handful more of them were doing the forest-clearing.  Unfortunately, as a result of the extra “hands”, the timetable was slowly moved up.

The Kingdom’s citizens were slowly making their way to the northeast, but it would be weeks before everything was set up to defend anything there.  Instead, he had already sent some of the Bearillas he had created up north to set up a camp of sorts 10 miles to the south of the destructive pathway the enemy was making.

They carried with them a couple of Geothermal Transmutation Stations, multiple Molecular Converters and Portable Power Generators, traps and other defenses, and of course a virtual army of flying drones.  It was too far north for the drones to fly themselves, due to being out of his powered communication range, so they had to be carried the last half of the journey there.  Fortunately, the GTS was ready to go by the time the Bearillas arrived with them a day later, allowing them to get to work.

While they were all hard at work setting up the camp and minor fortifications, it was almost time for the Guardian Guild members to start moving north as well.  Their training inside the dungeon had progressed with an intensity he wouldn’t have believed if he hadn’t seen it with his sensor orbs.  With the deadline approaching, they were like MMORPG gamers trying to be the first to reach max level after a new expansion upped the level cap.  They drove themselves harder and deeper into the dungeon trying to earn as much “experience” as possible before they marched off to war.

As he had thought, Rosewyn[29] and her group had blown through the tenth dungeon room in less than a day, completely decimating the Combat Units he had defending the room.  However, if it had been anyone but them, it wouldn’t have been as easy; the powerful Elemental Caster was finally starting to frequently utilize her Spatial Void Affinity ability.

Not only had she learned to modulate their size to only what she needed, but even a split-second of a Spatial Void’s existence was enough to do all the damage she needed.  When she cast them spread out, with just the minimum amount of Power pushed into the skill, she was able to cut through anything with impunity.  Heads rolled, limbs were chopped off, torsos cut in half – she was a virtual wrecking machine.  It was getting so bad that her groupmates were practically bored as they worked their way through the later dungeon rooms.

What she – and Milton – learned, however, was that for some reason she couldn’t direct a Spatial Void to form underwater.  It made absolutely no sense, but every time she tried, it would stop at the surface and not go any further; this made the fact that the majority of the room was filled with water that much harder.  So, while they breezed through the other rooms without much difficulty, the eleventh room was giving them a bit of trouble.

With the advancement of the other groups going well at the same time, Rosewyn’s unique Elemental Caster status disappeared.  With their unlocking of two additional abilities, the majority of the Casters in those groups that had finished the eighth room had taken the Grey Area Suite (which gave them access to Light and Dark affinities) and then the Spatial Void Affinity abilities.  They had seen firsthand how powerful the ability was and were eager to use it; however, just as Rosewyn had trouble adapting to the extreme Power draw, the Casters were having difficulties staying conscious after a single cast.  Milton knew they would eventually get the hang of it, so he wasn’t too worried.

But they were out of time to train in the dungeon; it was time to start moving people around.  All told, there were just over 5,000 Guardian Guild members readying to head north, every single one of them with an NCU in them.  Since they were going to be away from the dungeon, Milton didn’t want anyone to go whom he couldn’t bring back right away – if something happened and everyone was killed, there probably wouldn’t be any time to “convert” the bodies of anyone fallen there.  He had already seen that the enemy Bearillas weren’t too picky when it came to their diet; Proctans were probably more of a snack than a meal, though.

“Are you ready to head out, Rosewyn?”

“Yes, the last of the preparations are complete – we were just waiting for the stragglers.  We should be ready to go in a few moments,” Rosewyn replied, as she looked over at Gereld, receiving a nod in response.

Although Gereld was still technically the Guild leader in an official capacity, most looked to Rosewyn for direction; instead of being put out by being kicked out as the go-to person, however, Gereld was actually happy about the arrangement.  “I never really liked being the Guild leader; I only took the position because I was the best-suited for it – after Rosewyn and Moxwell, of course.  Now that she is here and directing like she should’ve been doing all along, I feel…freer,” he had told Milton after the Station Core had asked the other day.

They were taking a single Greycer pulling a Slider Wagon that contained a single Molecular Converter and Power Generator.  Instead of a long supply train which a normal “army” like this would normally need, all the supplies they could ever need was inside that wagon.  And, if it were lost or destroyed for some reason on their journey, Milton could divert some resources around to replace it quickly if necessary.

Whisp had acquired an “apprentice” of sorts, though calling the older male Inventor that showed an interest in Enchanting an apprentice to the young woman was strange.  Milton had provided him with the ability – as well as the Basic Elemental Suite – and he instantly took to the process.  With less time needed to train him than the Station Core thought it would’ve taken, Troncle – the older Inventor – was now able to essentially double the output of Slider Wagon construction.  The fact that the young Inventor was able to teach him so quickly and effectively was something that he would keep in mind if he ever got around to working on the non-combat Guild member problem.

Milton had already created 30 Bearilla Combat Units as his stockpiled Bio Unit resources allowed, most of which were already up north in the camp he had created.  He was still creating more, but it was slow going as his resources were strained to keep even those Bearillas fed and healthy – every four or five hours he was able to make another one and send it north.

With everything that he had been producing, Milton was forced to expand his nearby Farm once again, adding another mile (which was all he could reasonably afford) of grass and Picow Livestock to make up for the Bio Units he was expending on equipment, food, and new Combat Units.  Fortunately, once the Guild started to move, they supplemented the available resources handily.

Because he didn’t have Brint roaming and hunting in the forest with his “raid group” lately, only the immediate area around the Refuge and the dungeon had been cleared of dangerous – and some not so dangerous – beasts by groups wanting a change from dungeon delving.  At approximately 5 miles out from the dungeon, however, the forest was teeming with life; it wasn’t as densely populated as it had been before the Bearillas had started messing with the ever-plentiful balance of beasts, but it was more than enough to provide some valuable “real-world” experience for some of the newer combat-oriented Guild members.

Despite being on foot, the large assemblage moved quickly; most individual groups had someone now who had the Physical Boost – On Touch Suite, allowing them to increase the speed of everyone nearby.  Although they had to keep to the slowest pace among them, it was still at least twice as fast as without the Agility Boost.

For those who had a larger speed boost than others – like some of the former Scouts and other Physical Augmenters – they stayed behind after the group had encountered and easily slaughtered large numbers of beasts, cutting their corpses up and feeding them into the Molecular Converter they were lugging along.  They, as well as the super-fast Greycer, were able to easily catch up to the main army without much trouble, only to continue the process when even more beasts’ remains were left for them.

One time, they even encountered three Gargantuan Anacondas hunting from their trees together; a Healer ended up almost dying from that ambush, but there were fortunately plenty of other Healers nearby who saved him before he could perish.  Those three corpses took nearly half a day to “process” – but it was nearly enough Bio Mass to feed the entire expedition for a few days – especially when it was supplemented by Organic Material.

At their rate of progress, it was still going to take five days of marching to arrive at the campsite; whereas his other non-sentient Combat Units didn’t need sleep, the nature of the Proctans meant that they needed to sleep every night.  Luckily, with the GTSs in place, he was still doing more than ok with his Power Requirements; even with the increased amount of Greycers running around delivering supplies, the additional 40% Reactor Output drainage from the Guild members on the move wasn’t enough to put him in danger of running out of power[30].  He didn’t have a ton of wiggle room, but there was enough in case there were any emergencies.

Overall, the Guild didn’t have any major issues over the next few days.  Crossing the same river that had given Milton’s squirrels such a hard time was easy with so many Casters along; using a liberal amount of power, they were able to work together to literally build a permanent bridge over the slow-flowing river using their different affinities.  First, half of them used their Water Affinity to divert the water away from certain areas, and the other half moved a large portion of stone they dug up from underground near the riverbank using their Earth Affinity, making it into a bridge, with supports anchoring it deep into the river bed on both banks.

The center of the bridge wasn’t anchored because the river bottom was too deep at that point; instead, the whole shape of the bridge was made into an arch and melded together, providing an impressive structure that would probably last for decades or more. Rosewyn even Enchanted underneath the middle of the bridge with an extra layer of hardened Air to act as additional support.  All told, the entire construction only took 15 minutes – more than worth the time to produce something that might come in handy later.

It was near the end of the fifth day out from the dungeon when they finally arrived at the camp, exhausted but determined.  Unlike when they were traveling and built a low earth wall around their encampment at night, at Camp Deathtrap they actually had somewhere comfortable to sleep.

Chapter 25 – Camp Deathtrap

“Welcome to Camp Deathtrap, everyone!  While not nearly as comfortable as the Refuge, you’ll actually have a nice place to sleep tonight.  Which I implore you to take advantage of, because starting tomorrow…we war!”

Rosewyn and the rest of the Guild army were greeted by 50 Bearillas facing each other in a long line, looking as vicious and powerful as she remembered.  The sight of so many in one place made her – and not a small number of others – pause in fear when she first saw them; however, when they didn’t move or even show any sign of acknowledging their presence as they passed in between them, she relaxed and walked on unafraid.  Or mostly unafraid – there was a persistent kernel of fear that sprouted every time she looked at one for long.  Having been utterly decimated by what was essentially just a handful of these monsters less than two weeks ago was hard to come to terms with.

Fortunately, Milton had proved not only able to control the powerful beasts but was integrating them into their defense plan.

While the 20-foot tall monstrosities were all but statues – which Milton said was the intent, as the more they moved around the more they needed to feed themselves – the rest of the area was a hive of activity.  Flying drones were carrying different materials about the large clearing; though not nearly as large as the clearing around Milton’s dungeon, it was still at least 500 feet across and just as wide.  The busy little metal drones were busy making the finishing touches on what was going to be their killing ground – or, like the camp’s namesake, a veritable Deathtrap for the enemy.

Instead of a massive fortification like the Fortress, however, there was a minimum of visible defenses – visible being the key word.  Before she could look into them, her entire group was led by a flying drone into a hole in the ground; similar to the entrance to the Refuge, it was dug straight into the earth.  However, where it was only a short jaunt into the Refuge proper, the journey to the underground barracks where they could enjoy a nice night’s sleep was a long and winding journey down a seemingly never-ending stairway.  Just like everything else she had seen Milton construct, the stairway was made from Weightonite…stair after stair of Weightonite.

Fortunately, it was well lit and the steps leading down had a rough texture to them, which helped them to descend in safety.  By the time they reached the bottom, Rosewyn was practically dizzy from the back and forth of the stairs, so it was a relief when they finally reached their destination.  I don’t relish climbing those stairs tomorrow.

“Sorry for the deep descent, I want to ensure that if we had to fall back, this place would be practically impenetrable.  It is almost 500 feet below the surface, the entryway is collapsible, and even if they were able to get into the stairwell, it is such a narrow squeeze that a Bearilla can’t fit into it.  I know that because I tried to squeeze one of mine into it – and I was barely able to get it out.”

Makes sense, I guess.  Despite knowing that she would come back, Rosewyn – and she was sure everyone else with her – didn’t want to die; if they had a place to hide out to strike again, she knew that most of her people would choose that alternative.

Walking through the entrance to their new home for the foreseeable future, she saw a well-lit room made of – what else – Weightonite, with multiple columns holding up the roof every 100 feet or so in a grid-like pattern.  The ceiling was only about 25 feet tall, but it was more than enough to make the space less enclosed-feeling.  She couldn’t tell exactly how large it was however, because there were beds stacked on top of each other in rows lining the floor.  And not just two on top of each other, but five – all the way up to the ceiling.

“I had to conserve space because I was wanting to make the walls extra thick surrounding the barracks.  From what I can tell, there is very little chance that anything short of an entire mountain falling on you will be able to break through without spending days bashing at the surrounding Weightonite.  The bunk-beds should be comfortable enough, however, so I doubt it will be any big hardship.  Oh, and there are two MCs available for dinner.”

Rosewyn walked over to one of the beds and pushed down on the mattress – it was the same as the ones in the Refuge.  She smiled; it would be nice to sleep in a real bed again instead of roughing it in the forest.

Gereld came up behind her, looking around in pleasure – I’m sure he feels the same about sleeping safe and secure in a real bed again.  “Alright, I think this will work.  Karn!”

Karn was just walking through the entrance, but he hurried over to the Guild leader as soon as he heard his name.  Rosewyn noticed that he had filled out quite a bit again after training for the last week in Milton’s dungeon; if she had to guess, she would’ve said he was actually larger than he had been before the Fortress battle.

“Get people organized in shifts to get food and then get groups assigned to the…bunk-beds,” Gereld said, testing the unfamiliar word.  “I want everyone to bed down within the hour – let’s take advantage of being in a secure position to get some beneficial rest.  I for one could use a good night’s sleep before we kick some beast-ass tomorrow.”

“Don’t bother setting watch shifts either – I will wake everybody up if there is an issue.  Have a good night’s sleep – you’re going to need it.”

Rosewyn could see that everyone took that to heart as she ate as quick as she could and bedded down, snuggling up to Moxwell and nearly overflowing the bed at the same time.  Fortunately, the wooden bedframes were sturdily built, and the mattress was comfortable enough that she fell asleep within minutes of closing her eyes.

*         *         *

“Brint reports that only about a tenth of the forces have taken the bait.  From my scouts inside the forest, ALANNA estimates that they will arrive at Camp Deathtrap in approximately…36 minutes, 17 seconds.  Everyone stay safe – I don’t want any casualties.”

That was the last communication from Milton that Rosewyn received, though a faint counter in her head with ALANNA’s voice ticked off every minute of the countdown.  She, along with the rest of the Elemental Casters, were on the top of a 70-foot-tall, 150-foot-long, 30-foot-wide block of almost completely solid Weightonite.  It looked impossible for her to get up there safely, in fact – if it weren’t for the hidden narrow staircase leading through the center of the wall and leading far underground, of course, where it connected through another relatively narrow passage to the barracks where they slept last night.

Looking around, she could see the other Casters standing around, tense from the anticipation of the upcoming battle.  Battle would hopefully end up being too strong of a word if everything went the way it was supposed to – slaughter was more along the lines of what she was hoping for.  Milton had almost outdone himself this time; although not as visually imposing as The Fortress, the fortifications there that were thrown hastily together seemed like they would be even more effective – and hopefully safer for the defenders.

There was a half wall surrounding the roof of the massive stone structure, which they used to crouch down behind so that they couldn’t be seen.  Normally, it would probably be obvious to anyone that they were up there, but that was taken care of by the machines that Milton called his “Holographic Illusions”; two of them were set up in the clearing about 50 feet away from the front of the Weightonite block, projecting the trees behind the huge edifice onto the front.  Since their stone structure was tall enough to block nearly all sight of the trees behind them, from the front and peripherally it appeared as if nothing was there except more forest.

From personally seeing it even from close up, it looked entirely real; it was only when she got near enough to block some of the projection that the illusion was shattered.  And, looking up at the top and seeing figures peering over was strange – it looked as if they were emerging from the sky.  The projection created by the Holographic Illusion machines only extended up to the top of the half wall, mainly so that the defenders could look down on the clearing without being blocked by it.

Rosewyn checked her bag on her hip, making sure that the Power Potions inside were accessible.  They had a relatively limited supply, given that they couldn’t be created from the Molecular Converter, but they still had nearly 50 per person – which should last quite a while especially with everyone’s Power Pool being quite a bit larger than they ever had been.  Hers included; she could tell that it was nearly a third larger than it had been before she had died unknowingly defending Milton’s dungeon against that first Bearilla.

Distracted by thinking how much had changed in such a relatively short amount of time – not even half a year had passed since she and Moxwell had taken the job from Cordpower – she realized that the faint voice of ALANNA just indicated that the enemy was only about 2 minutes out.  From what Milton had told her, he had placed some of his squirrel scouts along the pathway at regular intervals to let them know the current progress of their “victims”.  She wasn’t normally a blood-thirsty fan of killing but thinking about the horrific Bearillas and their Quizard pets as “victims” made her smile.  How dare they invade my Kingdom!

Everyone was already crouched down below the half-wall, knowing that the longer they stayed concealed, the better they would end up.  Rosewyn took her place against the wall as well, feeling the strange mix of excitement and nervousness she had experienced in the Fortress battle.  Without even seeing them, she knew that the enemy had arrived as she felt a surge of energy rush through her.  Instinctively, she knew that if she was to physically hit something, she would do more damage; not only that, but she felt as if the casts she made would be more powerful.

This must be that Large-scale Battle Tactics skill I saw on my stat sheet.  She hadn’t really understood how having a skill like that would even work.  Even now – personally feeling it – she still didn’t understand it, but it didn’t matter because it was obviously activated.

Rosewyn, along with everyone else nearby, lifted her head just barely above the half-wall to look out along the battlefield, trying to stay as concealed as possible but still being able to see what was happening.  She saw a pair of Greycers running through the trees at the far end of the clearing, heading in a single-file line straight towards the large Weightonite block she was stationed on.  A third of the distance through the clearing, they suddenly jumped forward nearly 30 feet through the air before continuing on their steady “run”.  They were barely moving at a fast walk, however, compared to the speed at which she knew they could move; the reason for that, though, came streaming out of the forest behind them soon after.

A massive horde of Quizards that rivaled the one that had tried to attack the Fortress streamed out of the trees, traveling in a fairly tight wave of frantic-looking lizard flesh.  They stayed on the pathway the Greycers took, watching the pair of giant dog-bunnies scurry down a hole just barely large enough for them to squeeze down.  They were so intent on their hunt, in fact, that it took a few seconds for the rear forces of the horde to realize that those in front of them…disappeared.

Now, it was patently obvious that the large lizards weren’t stupid – just overwhelmingly single-minded.  When they had been ordered to attack back at the Fortress, they were too tightly packed together to avoid falling in the massive pit prepared for them; here, they were more spread out from chasing the Greycers through the forest and had a chance to see what was going on ahead of them.  However, only about a quarter of the 4,000 Quizards who had joined the chase after the Greycers were able to stop before they too disappeared.

Unlike the pit from the Fortress battle, this one was initially uncovered; four Holographic Illusion projectors located in nearby trees covered the 300-foot-long, 20-foot-wide, and 150-foot-deep spiked pit so that it appeared as if the ground just kept straight without interruption.  When the Quizards “disappeared”, they fell through the illusion and ended up impaling themselves on the spikes far below.

Which was great, but it also left nearly 1,000 of the Quizards roaming around the pit, a few testing – and failing – to get past it at first.  Finally, after much persistence, they managed to skirt the edge of the pit, racing for the hole in the ground where they had seen the large dog-bunnies escape into.  They were more than capable of fitting inside – almost two at a time – and they quickly filed through, in a race to be the first ones to find the food for their masters.

Unbeknownst to the poor unfortunate Bearilla snacks, Rosewyn knew that the two Greycers had shunted to a now-closed-off section of the realistic-looking bunny tunnel, safe and sound.  Instead, the Quizards shot straight ahead, packed so close together and pushing each other that they barely noticed that the tunnel they were following burrowed under the same block of Weightonite she was standing on and emerged out of another tunnel.

And, unfortunately for them, the tunnel ended with a small 20-foot drop-off, where the giant lizards fell straight through a multi-layered net of what Milton called a Monomel Filament Wire Grid, where they impacted it and were immediately neatly diced into pieces.  From there, the chunks of Quizard meat would land on a large, smooth funnel, which directed the pieces underground into a waiting Molecular Converter.  Surrounding the “landing” area was a large circle of Physical Augmenters and Scouts ready to beat back anything that managed to survive the fall or somehow – though highly unlikely – jumped past it.  They were staring silently at the carnage happening in front of them, a few splashes and chunks managing to stain their armor as it was flung in all directions.

Rosewyn had rushed over to that side of the wall and watched the nearly silent slaughter of the Quizards through the wire grid for a few moments before needing to turn away.  Although she knew they needed to die, the splattering of their remains into the large funnel was threatening to make her lose her breakfast.  She saw quite a few others turn away as well – and one actually did lose the contents of her stomach, which she thankfully let join the disgusting pile of lizard parts filtering down below – and they joined Rosewyn at the other wall just in time for her to see the last lizards filing in.

Well, it would’ve been the last of the Quizards filing in if their masters hadn’t arrived, calling out in a few short growls for them to return.

Unluckily for the defenders, about a dozen lizards heard and broke off to return; as if they were forced to obey their commands without thought or exception, they immediately ran straight back and…disappeared.  There was no sound and no logical explanation for it, so the Bearillas were understandably cautious.  All 42 of them entered the clearing, staring and sniffing around in apparent confusion – but also with obvious hunger in their eyes.  She wasn’t sure what they could smell, but she was almost confident that all they could actually see was an empty clearing with a hole about two-thirds of the way across, where the Quizards were seen filing into.

“Hold on, I’m going to try to bait them again.”

Seconds later, the two Greycers ran out of the hole in the ground, sniffing around as if they were searching for danger – before pretending to be shocked at the appearance of the Bearillas across the clearing.  They performed a cute little hop before they ran back down the hole, one keeping its face near the top staring the Bearillas down.

That was too much for the ever-hungry Bearillas.  Rosewyn tensed as they started to lope forward, eager and hungry – but still cautious.  When they approached where the Quizards had disappeared on the other side, they all slowed – sniffing at the air.  Nearly 150 feet below their feet, the blood from thousands of giant lizard corpses were probably stinking up the area; it was no wonder that they stopped, again confused at what was going on.

“Trees – now!”

Hidden back in the trees in the “corners” of the clearing, four camouflaged bunkers full of Nature Manipulators poked minutely out of the ground, just barely enough for the Guild members to touch the surface of the earth around them.  There was no access from outside the bunker; same as the walls that Rosewyn now safely found herself on, the only way in and out of them was to travel far underground through a narrow tunnel to the barracks.

At Milton’s order, 150 hands reached out to the earth on the northeastern and northwestern bunker, where they immediately worked together to start manipulating entire trees so that they bent all in the same direction, lying down in a giant half-circle until hundreds of the giant trees created a virtual wall of wood that reached nearly 50 feet high.  Once those were lying down, those same hands were responsible for bringing the trees behind the wooden wall forward, so that they both braced and added some height to the wall.

A half-second after the top half of the clearing was completely closed off, the two bunkers to the south did the same thing, completing the circle until all escape was closed off.  Granted, they could probably climb over or just punch the walls to pieces given enough time, but we’re not going to give them that.

Silence reigned over the battlefield as the Bearillas apparently realized they had walked into a trap.  Before they could react, however, Milton started the party.

“Steady…steady…at my signal…UNLEASH HELL!”

At the signal, everyone atop her wall – as well as the two angled wing-walls adjacent to her front-facing wall – popped up and started the attack.  To the left and right of her, she watched as each Caster shot forward the massive Ice Spears that they had constructed from the large pool of continuously flowing water running from a Molecular Converter.  On the other half of her wall, another Molecular Converter spewed out large clumps of basic dirt and shards of stone, where the Casters there turned it into massive boulders that they strained to launch at the Bearillas.  Fortunately, they only had to Power the initial launch and let gravity do the rest.

On the wing-walls, teams of various Physical Augmenters and Scouts (the ones that weren’t being used to ensure the Quizards were taken care of) pushed ballistae forward, where they used their enormous speed and strength to quickly aim, fire, and reload before firing again.  Although they had only practiced for a few minutes that morning, they were easily able to keep a fairly steady fire-rate of one every 5 seconds.

As opposed to the ballistae that they had used in the Fortress – which were operated by mostly non-combatants – these ones had a much stronger draw; as a result, they required more Strength to reload, but the Physical Augmenters had plenty of that.  The bolts shot through the air much faster and penetrated deeper, mainly due to their “diamond”-tipped points, which was an interesting clear stone that she noticed reflected light prettily the first time Rosewyn saw it.

Of course, the Bearillas were having none of it; while many of the defenders’ projectiles managed to actually hit them, only the ballista bolts did any kind of damage upon impact.  And even those only sunk into their skin far enough to be annoying, before they were unceremoniously ripped out and thrown away.  Seeing the defenders almost floating on the tops of the trees, the massive monkey-bears threw caution to the wind in their need for vengeance and took a chance by jumping over where they saw their Quizards disappear.

Rosewyn held her breath as they jumped and briefly exulted as one fell into the pit, only to have caught the edge and pull itself up quickly thereafter.

And that’s when things got really interesting.

Chapter 26 – The benefits of technology

Milton watched as the battle played out essentially as he had predicted and frankly hoped for, though already he could see some things that might increase the kill-thru rate.  First, instead of making all of the Quizards fall straight into the pit trap, if he put a dozen small bridges across it, the lizards might see that at least some of them were getting through.  If that happened, he could picture most of them continuing on until they had all attempted to cross.  Plus, it would theoretically help with the bunch-up that had occurred at the tunnel entrance when they had to investigate a way around the illusion-trapped pit.

Second, he really had to think of a better quote than “at my signal, unleash Hell!” – it would probably get old after a while.

Milton pulled his attention back to the battle going on, his thoughts now processing so quickly that it had only been moments after he had committed the Guild to the attack.  He watched as he thought they would get an easy kill when a Bearilla disappeared underneath the projection his Holographic Illusion displayed over the massive pit.  When it was able to climb back up, he let out a disappointed sigh – before he saw what the benefits of advanced technology could do in “primitive” warfare.

The Bearillas were racing toward the Weightonite stone blocks that were holding the majority of the Guild members, the trees behind them projected on their front making them appear to be just more forest.  They were perhaps 100 feet from reaching the one in the middle – that held the Elemental Casters throwing out Ice Spears and Boulders – when he activated the Optical Barrage placed 5 feet off the ground on the Weightonite stone wall and pointing toward the oncoming behemoths.

Instantly, they roared as pain obviously assaulted their eyeballs, the intense images and bright light that even in the full light of day were so blinding that even Milton couldn’t look at it through one of his sensor orbs.  The Bearillas had their eyes closed now, determined to continue on with their attack by attempting to blindly run forward and destroy whatever was blinding them.

However, their temporary stoppage as they roared in pain gave his ballistae forces the opportunity to hit an unmoving target.  With their Perception stat boosted so much, the Scout who were aiming the siege engines were finally able to hit vital points on their bodies.  Three Bearillas were hit directly through their thick necks – not breaking any of their adamantine-like bones, of course – piercing their arteries and throats.  They weren’t killed straight out, but they were fairly incapacitated for the moment; it was even possible that they might live if they were able to remove the bolt and recover, but Milton and the other defenders weren’t going to give them that opportunity.

Nine others were shot through their mouths as their jaws opened wide from their howls of pain.  Seven were killed instantly as the diamond-tipped ballista bolt impaled them at a sharp enough angle that it reached their brains, while the other two fell to the ground, blinded and attempting to remove a massive wooden stick from their throats without causing more damage.

A good baker’s-dozen were shot in their chests, though their ribcages stopped most of the momentum.  However, the bolts’ momentum was so great – and it had occurred when they were blinded – that they weren’t able to brace themselves, resulting in them being knocked on their butts momentarily.  As for the rest, a couple were shot in their extremities as they luckily moved to avoid being shot somewhere vital, but there wasn’t much damage done from those shots.

That wasn’t the only thing that they got hit with, however.

There were 8 Laser Cannon Emplacements being operated by Scouts on the walls of the stone blocks as well; 2 were on each wall that contained the ballistae, and the other 4 were near the Casters.  Gregar from Rosewyn’s group was stationed on the one nearest her, and Milton could see the glee on his face as he took advantage of the situation just like the others and fired his Laser Cannon right into the face of a struggling Bearilla.

The Station Core had been mildly worried that with their inherent heat and fire resistance they had, that the Laser Cannons wouldn’t be very effective.  Which was why he had experimented back near the dungeon with one of his own Bearilla Combat Units – and he had nothing to worry about.  It was like the difference between a human wearing a heat-resistant mitt to take something out of the oven, and that same human stepping into a blast furnace with the same protection all over their body.  It helped for a second, but the intense heat generated from the Laser Cannon burned straight through whatever protection the Bearillas had.

Needless to say, he had had to replace his Combat Unit after a very successful test.

The beam of the Cannons were approximately 6 inches wide, which meant that they covered a lot of surface area in little time.  The eight Bearillas that got hit with a blast to their faces were fine for a split second as their heat resistance kicked in…and then their skin and muscles underneath started to melt and drip off their skulls.  They tried to thrash around and avoid the intense heat practically cooking their heads, but the Scouts were quick enough with their boosted Agility that they were able to stay on target for the most part.

By the time the allotted 15 seconds had passed before the Emplacements overheated, the Lasers had literally cooked and melted their brains inside of their thick cranial bones.  Shockingly enough, in a few spots that were particularly concentrated on by the Scouts, the bones had finally started to crack and melt, joining the brain jelly oozing from the heads of the massive corpses.

But wait…there’s more.

Despite their expense, Milton had sprung for two Railgun Penetrators.  Stationed on the corners of the main Caster wall and manned by two more Scouts, the Railguns opened fire on the Bearillas below and the result was spectacular to say the least.  You couldn’t physically see the miniscule slivers of Tritanium that was launched from the Penetrators, nor was there but the barest hint of lag time between when it was fired and the explosions that followed.  Regardless, the fact of the matter was that they were highly effective.

One Railgun sliver managed to smack into the cheek of a bear head, penetrating an inch or two before the bonds holding together the tritanium were broken all at once.  The force of the explosion that resulted from that was so great that the target’s head was just gone in a fraction of a second – bones and all!  Some of the victim’s skull shrapnel managed to embed itself in the nearby Bearillas, though the wounds were relatively superficial.  A small piece managed to be propelled so fiercely that it actually managed to reach the roof of the stone blocks, hitting a Caster in the upper arm and practically ripping it off the unfortunate woman.

Fortunately, there were some scattered Healers up top who rushed to her aid; after a few minutes of intense healing, they ended up saving her arm and she was as healthy as the day she was reborn.

As for the second Railgun sliver, it traveled at such great velocity that it managed to penetrate four or five inches into the chest cavity of a previously unhurt Bearilla.  Because the tritanium had gotten so deep, the resulting explosion was mostly contained inside its body; there wasn’t any shrapnel flung out to hurt the other attackers, but the damage it caused to the victim Milton equated to someone going reverse Temple of Doom and placing a grenade where its heart was.

A muffled *thump* and a small rupture at the front of its chest was all that was seen or heard as the Bearilla pitched over onto its face after the contained explosion.  It didn’t have too much visible external damage, so to anyone else it would’ve looked like it had a heart attack; if having its internal organs obliterated could be called a heart attack, of course.

Meanwhile, the Elemental Casters hadn’t been idle.  With their targets now closer in range, they began to use more of their specialized attacks; the Ice Spear and Boulder attacks were primarily used before to lure the Bearillas into attacking at long range.  The farther away they were, the more difficult their casts were to control; however, due to almost everyone having an increased skill and Power Pool compared to what they had before, they could start bringing the hurt down on the now-scattered and scrambling, blind and semi-injured giant gorilla-bears.

Invisible fists of air punched them in their heads, superficially sliced up their bodies with hardened blades of air, and one Bearilla even managed to get tripped up as a few blocks of air managed to sweep its feet out from under it.  Giant spikes of stone were suspended over the battlefield as they quickly formed from available material, only to be propelled downward by a massive surge of compressed air.  Four Casters even worked together to lift a giant bubble of water from the available pool and rapidly move it until it covered an entire Bearilla, where they flash-froze the massive monster in a block of ice – and then kept repairing the cracks as it tried to break free.

Rosewyn and two others that had started to get more comfortable with Spatial Voids started to rapidly form and disperse small Voids, literally slicing the necks open of three Bearillas in a matter of seconds.  When they had finished with that, they all targeted the same Bearilla when something unexpected happened.

By happenstance, they all tried to form a small Spatial Void in the exact same spot.  When the Voids “touched”, they contracted into a single point for a nanosecond, before that point started to expand.  A wavy-looking black sphere appeared right in the center of the unlucky Bearilla’s neck, which only grew larger as the sphere expanded and started to literally suck the rest of the massive beast into it!  In less than a second, the black sphere had grown to three times its originally size – and then winked out of existence.

Milton heard the screams of the three who had cast the Voids, clutching their heads as they collapsed.  He took a quick look at Rosewyn[31] with his sensor orb to see if it could tell him what happened.  She was hurt as half of her Health was gone, though it could be explained by the apparent rapid expenditure of Power – she was completely tapped-out.  He hadn’t necessarily been watching her Power expenditure during the battle, but he didn’t think she had used that much; whatever she had done had somehow drained her to the point where she collapsed from the sheer amount of Power passing through and out of her.  Looking at the others, he saw that they were completely devoid of Power as well.

There was something else in all of their statuses—

Congratulations!

3 of your Combat Units have managed to create a natural Unstable Void and unlocked the trait:

Unstable Warp Void +1

Combine two or more Spatial Voids together to create an Unstable Warp Void.  Caution: Power feedback from the combination of Voids may cause unconsciousness or even death in the user.

Well, that answers that.  Milton was just hoping that there wasn’t any permanent damage done to them, otherwise he would have to kill and respawn them; he couldn’t construct any facilities outside of five miles from his Core and bringing them all the way back down south and healing them would take too long.

All of that took Milton less than a second to process, and he put any concern for the three Casters out of his mind – he had more pressing concerns.  11 of the initial 42 Bearillas were still alive and only minimally damaged, though still essentially blinded; another dozen of them were injured and at least temporarily out of the fight.  They could try to whittle them down some more with long-range attacks, but Milton decided that it was time to try out his shock troops.

Unlike a lot of video games he had played in the past, buffs applied from Healers that had the ability to Boost others upon touch stacked.  There was a limit on how much you could apply to a target – or a Bearilla in this case – depending on how much they could reliably handle.  For instance, a Blood-thirsty Squirrel could only be boosted so far before it hit the max of what its little body could contain Power-wise.  His new Combat Units were much, much larger and tougher than a Squirrel, however.

Which was why nearly 400 Healers had been running themselves ragged Boosting the physical stats of the 50 Bearillas, 200 on each side of the clearing hidden behind the two wing-walls holding the ballistae.  However, now that it was his massive Combat Units’ time to shine, the Healers quickly retreated to another hidden underground bunker, ready to escape and retreat back to the barracks at the first sign of danger.

Rushing around the walls on either side of the clearing, his Combat Bearillas were nearly a blur as their increased Agility let them arrive next to the enemy in less than a second, where they immediately put their enhanced Strength to work.  Each of them was holding an 8-foot-long pole created from wrapping a thin alternating-layer sheet of high-quality steel and Diamene around a 6-inch diameter core of Weightonite.

Normally, the weight of the pole alone would be a struggle for them to handle, though they could drag them if they needed to.  With their augmented Strength, however, they handled the poles like they were a small switch from a tree; Milton directed them to swing them like he had learned how to swing a baseball bat in his failed attempt at little league when he was younger.

The results were mixed.  Sure, the 50 super-Boosted Bearillas utterly destroyed the bodies of the enemy oversized gorillas, hitting hard enough to actually break their back, cave in their heads, and generally pound them into a disgusting mess of blood and broken bones.  Two were even smashed so hard in their chests that the impact caused them to fly backwards right into the pit.

But – they completely destroyed their weapons within a hit or two.  Even the superior durability of the Diamene and steel layered together along with the Weightonite was no match for the insane levels of Strength that were exhibited by his Combat Units.  Some were bent in half, others had shattered inside the covering like they were large icicles instead of steel and stone, and even more were broken into two or more pieces.  I may have to rethink their weapons – or maybe just have the Strength Boosts toned down a little.

Regardless of the unfortunate state of their weapons, his Bearilla Units had killed every single enemy Bearilla within seconds.  After the fight-worthy ones had been dispatched, his own team fell upon the injured and dying ones with their fists or whatever was left of their weapons.  As a result of that, the intense force involved in using their own bodies to attack actually managed to snap some of his Units’ own bones, while at the same time ending the lives of the remaining enemy.  Fortunately, he had just the people available to Heal that.

A small cheer rang out, kept to a low volume because they didn’t want to do anything to alert the rest of the army – at least not yet.  Although they were just over 10 miles away, any loud noises might reach them, which was one of the main reasons he hadn’t used any Auditory Assault Fields.  Their success relied on baiting and luring contingents of the enemy to them, allowing the Guild – with a little help from his technologically advanced defenses and Bearillas – to whittle them down until it was time to stop them completely.

One of the beneficial parts of the plan, at least to Milton, was the fact that he was also receiving Combat Experience, despite not being anywhere near his Core.  Just as Brint had acquired large amounts of experience exploring and killing beasts with his “raid group” – and most recently down south in the grasslands – the Guild were all technically his Combat Units and provided him experience.  In fact, in between the Quagon decimating hundreds of beasts in the grasslands and this recent slaughter, he had been able to level up.[32]

Congratulations!  Your Combat Units have defeated Quizard x4128!  You gain (4128x100) 412,800 combat experience!

For defeating many enemies in a short amount of time, you receive a combo bonus!

Bonus: (4128x50) 206,400 experience!

Congratulations!  Your Combat Units have defeated Bearilla x42!  You gain (42x40000) 1,680,000 combat experience!

For defeating many enemies in a short amount of time, you receive a combo bonus!

Bonus: (42x20000) 840,000 experience!

Congratulations!  You have increased your Combat Level!

Current Combat Level: 22

Experience: 12,141,115/16,419,000

By raising your Combat Level, you can choose to prioritize the development of certain statistics.  In addition, your Combat Units will receive a 2% (per Combat Level) increase in their own attack and defensive abilities.

Current Points to Allocate: 22

Current Combat Unit A/D Increase: 44%

Looking over the after-battle notification, he realized that he was now earning less experience for each Quizard (only a fifth as much) and half as much for a Bearilla.  There hadn’t been any Elite Bearillas in that group that had come, but he suspected that it would be similar.

“It’s because you instinctively think of them as less of a threat now.  The experience-rewarding system takes that into account when it assesses how much you should earn.  Now that you’re killing them quite handily, you’ll earn less,” ALANNA informed him, as she was – as usual – looking over his shoulder and reading his surface thoughts.

“Thanks, ALANNA.  I guess that makes sense, I just hadn’t seen it before.”

She had an answer for that, too.  “Well, it considers similar scenarios as to what came before.  Since you defended The Fortress ‘successfully’—” Milton could hear the air quotes around that word without having to look at her— “and were defending this place, both you and the system consider them less of a threat now.  It’s possible the experience may be lowered even more in the future.”

Well, despite that, he had still leveled up as he was pushed over the required experience by nearly two million – though even with that head start he was nearly four million away from the next level.  He had been inching closer to Combat Level 22 after he went all rampage with the Quagon down south, and this fight just finished it off.

While everyone rested and talked about the results of the fight, his Bearillas that had injured themselves were quickly patched up and his drones got to work cleaning up.  Even with the quick work performed by them, it was going to take a while to convert all of the corpses not fed through the wire grid/funnel into usable Bio Mass.  The Nature Manipulators used their abilities to put all the trees back to their original positions, with only some leaves that had fallen off giving any indication that they had been enclosing the clearing.

Overall, there were no casualties on his side, and with only a few actual injuries – including Rosewyn and the two others who had woken up with pounding headaches but no permanent damage – so Milton considered it a success.  He wasn’t sure how many times racing his Greycers through the pathway the northern army was clearing as bait would work, but they would keep with it as long as they could.  The longer they delayed them, the more time he had to ensure the Kingdom was ready to repel the invasion.

Theoretically, he could send his super-boosted Bearillas up north and attempt to lay waste to the army, but he held them back – just in case.  If for some reason they were eliminated – for instance, trying to beat back waves and waves of attackers until their buffs wore off – he would lose a large portion of his attack strength.  Although the Guild members, along with the defenses Milton had set up, could hold their own for a while, if they were attacked by three, four, ten times the number of Quizards and Bearillas in Camp Deathtrap – they would most likely be overwhelmed.

So as soon as the drones cleared the field, he would send those two Greycers racing back to—

Something caught his attention.  It took him a second to focus on it; his concentration had been split in so many different places that most things were on autopilot, only requiring his direct attention when it was absolutely necessary.

And this definitely fell into the “absolutely necessary” category.

Chapter 27 – Knock knock

“You want me to do what?  I don’t have any experience leading anything except Combat Units; I don’t think I’m qualified for that.  Rosewyn would be a much better choice,” Brint told him, still apparently nervous even after all those months of having an ability.

Milton could tell that his young adult life being ridiculed for not having an ability had really left a mark on him.  He still wasn’t great around large groups of people, especially if he had to for some reason order them around.

“Rosewyn and the other Guild leaders will be helping you, don’t worry about that.  However, you’re the only one that can control Combat Units and activate some of the defenses.  The Guild already knows what they need to be doing, so you won’t have to be responsible for them – except to give them orders.  You can communicate directly into their minds like I can – and you are the only one I trust to have that ability.”

That wasn’t entirely true; he trusted Whisp enough that if she wanted the Neural Uplink gene mutation, he would gladly give it to her.  She was constantly needing help finding certain materials from the Molecular Converter, directing drones, and needing help with other projects – which usually needed at least a portion of his attention for the very specific requests.  Letting her do it all herself would free up his focus considerably, but for now her other abilities were more beneficial.

Rosewyn…maybe.  She had proven that she was in this for the long-haul, but she had also arrived under completely different circumstances.  While her going rogue and sabotaging him and his defenses were about as likely as Milton ever seeing Earth again, he didn’t feel like giving even a modicum of control to someone who had originally set out to find him and shut him down.

“I don’t know if I can do it – I’ve never tried to control multiple Units before at such distances.  What if I mess up?”

“You’ll be fine.  You’ve improved your control so much that most of what you do now is nearly automatic.  As for the distance, you should be able to control anything at least four or five times the distance from the Camp to the northern army.  Possibly even more.  You’ll be fine, trust me.”

“I do trust you, but…” Brint cut off as he banked the Quagon around for one last look over the northern army before heading toward Camp Deathtrap.

“Look, I’ve already told everyone there that you are coming in to help and they are to assist you while I’m occupied elsewhere.  They are all more than happy for your assistance and I think this will be a valuable learning experience for you.”

Milton couldn’t believe he just said that.  He almost sounded like his parents and teachers back on Earth; maybe, just maybe, he was finally maturing.

“Nope, you’re still an immature nerd,” ALANNA butted in to the serious conversation he was trying to have with Brint.  He ignored her, though he could tell that she was just slightly worried – and he couldn’t blame her.

The young Proctan was silent the entire flight back to the Camp, where he landed safely in the middle of the field.  He unstrapped himself and patted the Quagon on the back, before turning toward the big block of Weightonite that held the Casters.  The Holographic Illusion projectors were turned off for the moment, because apparently, they made people feel uncomfortable when they looked at them for too long.

Over the last week and a half, Brint had improved his Self-levitation ability by constantly using it whenever he was on the ground.  It had gotten to the point that it could raise him nearly 40 feet into the air, though it still took a good portion of his Power to do so.  However, he had also learned that if he built up enough acceleration by forming the negative gravity field quickly instead of gradually, he could launch himself much higher.

Moving forward with apparent confidence – which was only hiding the fear Milton could still see in his face – Brint started running toward the stone block until he was only about 30 feet away.  Activating his Self-levitation ability to produce a rapid rise in height (it wasn’t instant, but within a second it was a full 40 feet tall), the young Proctan shot up at an angle, leaving the negative gravity field behind as he shot an extra 40 feet into the air.  His “g-force training” from riding the Quagon through the air was paying off.

He landed with apparent grace as he activated his ability again, creating a smaller field to slow his descent to the top surface.  From the perspective of the others, it appeared as if he had just jumped 80 feet into the air without seemingly much effort.

“That was quite impressive, kid.  So, are you here to help us slaughter some more of these bastards?” Moxwell, who was standing next to Rosewyn and the other Guild leaders, asked him.

Milton saw some of the confidence in his stance slip a little as he answered.  “I guess so.  If you’ll have me.”

Rosewyn walked over and gave him a quick hug.  “Of course, Brint.  We couldn’t do this without you.”

Brint blushed mightily at the attention as the others said essentially the same thing.  He then shrugged and said, “Well then, I guess…let’s get to work.”

In a question that only Milton could hear through the Neural Uplink Brint possessed, his new general of the joint Guild/Combat Unit Army asked, “Tell me again – why can’t you do this?”

“Oh, that’s easy, Brint – I’m about to have over 20,000 angry neighbors knocking on my door.  I want to be polite and give them my full attention.”

*         *        *

Milton was wrong about having to worry about what the Cordpower Company and their head, Gavin, was going to do.  He thought he would have plenty of time to react when he finally discovered where they were going, but he had lost track of them after his nearby volunteers saw them move out from the capital.  It was impossible to tell which way they were going as both destinations were in the same general direction; despite that, he should’ve guessed from his conversation with Gavin that he was the target.

Somehow, the massive Royal Army Reserve slipped through the various shipments and citizen groups that were on the move.  Belatedly, Milton wished that he had created some cheap flying Combat Units like Birdalopes to keep an eye over the skies of the Kingdom, but it hadn’t seemed important at the time.  The Greycers were much faster and could cover more territory than even a bird – he thought they would be enough.

With all that had been going on with finishing up the Guild’s training, moving them up north, assembling Camp Deathtrap, and destroying the first group of Bearillas and Quizards – Milton had honestly forgotten about them when they hadn’t shown up on his “radar”.  They were previously a non-issue because they didn’t seem like much of a threat compared to the Guild members who were crushing his dungeon rooms.  Of course, numbers did make a difference – and 20,000+ was a bit more than a “non-issue”.

And now the “issue” was already speedily traveling through the forest, his few Squirrel scouts still stationed along the border alerting him to their presence.  They were moving quickly, faster than a normal Proctan group would normally travel; either they all had some sort of Agility augmentation (which seemed unlikely), or they had found some other way to improve their speed.  Either way, they were aiming almost unerringly for Milton and the dungeon and were most likely going to arrive within a couple of hours.

That didn’t give him much time to organize a defense – especially since the only Guild members left nearby weren’t quite suited for combat.  Granted, they would put up a good fight, but they didn’t have the same abilities to defend themselves as the ones sitting up north.  No, he was going to have to do this alone – or at least with just the Combat Units he had nearby.

First, to ensure there wasn’t a possibility of anyone getting unnecessarily hurt, Milton contacted the minds of as many Guild members nearby as he could, letting them know to head back to the Refuge for safety.  Fortunately, most everybody was already there, and those that weren’t hurriedly rushed back.  Within an hour, everyone was inside, and he sealed up the door, utilizing a large quantity of drones from the now-empty dungeon rooms to bury the entrance from the outside as well.

If someone really looked, especially if there was anyone with an Earth Affinity, they would be able to find it – but they wouldn’t be able to get in.  Even some of the Guild’s Earth-focused Elemental Casters couldn’t break through the Weightonite-enclosed Refuge without days of work to manipulate enough of the thick walls.

Milton then used those same drones to close off every other access points within the dungeon entrance clearing and throughout the forest.  By the time he thought he should probably create some Bearillas to dissuade his incoming guests, he saw that he didn’t have enough time.  They’d be at his dungeon at least a half-hour before they were done – but he started the process in the hopes that the Reservists could be delayed at all.

Although he didn’t have the same reservations concerning attacking the Royal Army Reserve as the Guardian Guild did, he wouldn’t hesitate to defend himself if it came down to it – especially since he saw quite a few employees of the Cordpower Company along with them.  He knew that stopping them outside the dungeon with some large, dangerous Combat Units would be ideal, as they would be more inclined to turn back; again – he was working on it – though they wouldn’t be done until it was too late.

But that didn’t mean he couldn’t make mass quantities of smaller Combat Units.  It just so happened that he had just gotten a massive influx of Bio Units from up north.  And, with all of the normal smaller Bioconversion Labs unoccupied without dungeon delvers constantly respawning, he had nearly 200 available for whatever he wanted to use them for.  The Units he created in them still had to be grown and “born”, but he had a good solid hour and a half to spawn as many as he could.

They’re coming with an army?  I’ll show them an army.

*        *        *

Draven passed by the first of the trees with disgust on his face as he looked at them.  He hated the forest and did everything he could to avoid having to travel through it; considerable effort was made when he was just a raw Guild recruit to avoid it whenever possible.  It wasn’t always successful, but the times he was forced to enter the trees on necessary expeditions were fortunately over quickly and without major incident.

He was at the rear of the column of Royal Army Reservists, whom he looked down upon – as every Guardian Guild member worth anything should do.  Or, ex-Guardian Guild member he should say.  Of course, when he reformed an organization that was in charge of protecting the borders, it wouldn’t be named anything as mundane and generic as “Guardian Guild”.  Maybe…“Draven’s Elites” or something like that.  As long as it has my name in it, I don’t care what it’s called.

Unfortunately, it might have to be initially populated by the Reservist rejects he had the “lucky” chance to lead on this extermination mission.  While they were passable by Royal Army standards, they were next to nothing compared to the members of the Guardian Guild.  Despite his hatred for everyone in the Guild now, he privately had to admit that they really were the best-of-the-best and did an…adequate job of keeping beasts out of the Kingdom.  It was just that he thought they were holding him back from what he knew he was capable of and were stuck in their old ways of doing things.

Which was why he jumped at the chance to take them down when presented with the opportunity.  He was now freer than ever in being able to conduct whatever experiments he wanted, without Guardian Guild morality officers looking over his shoulder every minute.  And having access to greater amounts of Power Potions for a very deep discount had increased his own Power considerably over the last few months.

Breaking through to a Supreme ranking was just a bonus; in fact, he thought he probably rivaled Rosewyn in terms of sheer Power now.  Which made him slightly sad if he believed the rumors that she was dead; he would’ve liked to wipe the perpetual holier-than-thou expression off her face.

But at least he’d be able to destroy whatever remnants of the Guild were out in the forest.  That was almost as good.

“Sir, we’ve found what looks like a trail leading further into the forest, but it looks like it’s been abandoned for a while.  Shall we follow it?”

The subordinate was talking to the previous leader of the army, a Colonel…Something-or-other.  Draven supposed he should probably learn their names if he was to command them, but he just couldn’t find it in him to care about the Reservists.  They were a tool to be used and he wasn’t in the habit of naming his tools.

“Stop right there!  I am the leader of this expedition, so if there are any decisions that need to be made, they go through me.  Now, what was it you found?” Draven stepped up and got in their faces.  He let the fact that he was Supreme-rank speak for itself.

The kid looked at the other man with a nervous question in his eyes before turning to Draven.  “Yes, sir!  Sorry, sir!  I was just telling Colonel Harbish here that the scouts found an old trail that looks abandoned.  Orders, sir?”

Colonel Harbish, huh?  I should probably remember that…oh, wait.  It’s gone already.  “Follow it.”

The junior officer left, and the Colonel turned toward him when they were alone.  “Sir, I think we should send our scouts out further through the forest, that way we can—”

“If I wanted your opinion, I would ask for it.  As I didn’t, I don’t care what you have to say – all I care about is that you follow my orders.  And my orders are to follow the trail; I’m not going to give those Guild outlaws a chance to escape once they detect we’re here.  We do this quick and dirty – and then we’re done.  Do you understand?”

The former leader of the Reserve appeared as though he wanted to object, but fortunately his self-preservation kicked in and he held his tongue.  “Yes, sir.”

Draven had taught a few little tricks he had learned to some of the other, weaker Casters among the Army.  For the Earth-Affinity ones, he showed them how to quickly balance the surface they traveled over so that they could smooth out the rough spots and roughen up the smooth spots a little, providing the ground superior traction for their – and everyone else’s – feet.  For the Air-Affinity Casters, he taught them how to gradually reduce the air density in a large area around them.  The Fire-Affinity ones he taught how to reduce someone’s body heat, making them need to stay moving in order not to freeze.

The Reserve was used to marching all over the Kingdom, but he didn’t want them marching – he needed them to run.  They had gotten a late start that morning and he didn’t want to end up searching the forest when it got too dark to see; instead, he was hoping to get to wherever the Guild hideout was as soon as possible and be back before dark.  Thus, the few tricks he taught to the others in the column.

Only one of those things wouldn’t make a difference, but Draven had experimented on ways to motivate other to move faster.  Although pain and fear were normally a good motivator, in this instance he needed them to want to run; literally freezing to death if you stopped was a good way to get everyone to keep running as fast as they could to stay alive.  The reduced air density made it slightly harder to breathe, but it also reduced air drag as they ran forward.  With the traction on the ground smoothed or roughed-up for ideal running conditions, everyone moved faster.

Including Draven, but he didn’t need any other motivation than killing the last of the Guild.  He kept in shape and was used to running long distances, using his Air Affinity to reduce air friction while still keeping it breathable.  It was amazing how fast you could run without anything working against you in the opposite direction.

Forty-five minutes into the run and the scouts started to see more signs of disturbance along the trail.  At the hour mark, even Draven with his – he would grudgingly admit – poor tracking skills could see the signs of recent activity.  Yes!  I knew it!  I told Gavin they were out here! He conveniently misrepresented the conversation he had with the head of the Cordpower Company two weeks ago.

“Move your asses!  Stop dawdling and get moving!” he screamed out to some Scouts that were looking at something along the edge of the trail as the rest of the Army ran by.

They quickly caught up and tried to report to the Colonel, but he shook his head and nodded to Draven.  Ah, it looks like at least someone in this worthless bunch can learn.

“Sir, we found an unusual number of large tracks leading in and out of the area in multiple directions.  I’m worried that we might be walking right into a nest of some nasty beasts ahead,” one of the Scouts reported, running alongside Draven.

“And I’m worried that if we don’t finish and get back to civilization before dark, I’m going to miss that bottle of wine I left chilling at the inn back at that village.  So what if there are beasts out here – it would only surprise me if there weren’t.  We have over 20,000 men and women – are you telling me you’re scared of a beast or two?”

The Scout looked a little flustered.  “Well, no…but—”

“But nothing!  We keep going until we find the Guild; if we run into any beasts along the way, we slaughter them as quickly as we can and move on.  As long as we don’t stop, I’m not really worried about it.”  And with that, his decision had been made – and no one was going to argue with it.

Draven caught the look the Scout gave the Colonel out of the corner of his eye, but he let it go for once.  He didn’t need to intentionally antagonize the rank-and-file unless it served some purpose – and at this point it didn’t.  And they were following orders, so he let them do their thing and they did their best to stay out of his way.

A few minutes later, the forest around the running army seemed to come alive as small, furry, brown creatures jumped off from where they had apparently been lying in wait, crouched along the sides of the trees.  Most of them were less than a foot tall – if that – but there were thousands of the tiny beasts, raining down on the soldiers of the Reserve; exclamations of surprise and then pain reverberated through the air as the column ground to a halt.  Draven could see the Reservists in front of him literally covered in the beasts who were doing their best to bite and scratch through the gaps in their armor.

A wave of the beasts aimed for Draven, but he normally kept a very small shield of air around him at all times; when he saw them coming, he changed it into a thin-but-deadly vortex of razor-sharp air blades.  When the creatures pounced and got within four inches of his skin, they were immediately shredded by hundreds of furiously rotating blades.  His spinning air vortex was so strong, in fact, that blood and body parts painted the nearby soldiers red.

The Reservists didn’t panic – fortunately – and immediately worked to eliminate the beasts before they could do any major damage.  Some dropped to the ground and rolled, effectively crushing many of the smaller creatures in the process; others smashed them against their bodies with their fists and arms; still others who were quick enough with their hands picked them up and crushed them before flinging them away.

Draven didn’t waste any more of his Power helping them, as they were already winning against the little buggers.  Not that he would’ve helped them in the first place, unless he himself were in danger; if they couldn’t help themselves, he wasn’t going to do it for them.

There were no casualties, though a few needed to have a small amount of healing from some bad scratches.  That wasn’t the worst thing, though; they had lost nearly 10 minutes from the attack and recovery.

“Alright, stop lounging around!  If I’d let a bunch of furry beasts stop me, I’d be ashamed to call myself a Royal Army Reservist!”  I’d be ashamed to call myself one in the first place.

Although they seemed to have recovered from the attack, many of the soldiers still watched the trees as they ran.  Draven had to admit that he did as well, though it was more out of anger at the delay; he didn’t want any more surprises keeping him from his vengeance.  If he saw them again, he would spend some of his Power to smash all that he could see out of the sky before they could fall on the soldiers.  He had quite a few Power Potions given to him by Gavin as a precaution in an emergency – which preventing more delays certainly qualified as.

So, with most everyone watching the trees as they ran, very few of them were watching around their feet – which caught many of the soldiers by surprise as they were bitten on the legs by thousands of small, big-headed snakes.  They didn’t do a lot of damage – but they did cause another stoppage of their run.

Damn these beasts!  It’s almost as if they are deliberately trying to delay me!  The thought that they were actually working with the Guild briefly flashed through his mind but was instantly dismissed as impossible.

Regardless of whatever is going on here, I will find them!

Chapter 28 – Torturous motivation

In general, Milton thought he knew why there was a cap on the maximum players a raid could contain for some MMORPGS he had played; he had always assumed that the developers had limited an open-world raid to 1,000 or slightly more because of latency issues.  When there were too many people in one spot trying to attack the same thing, he’d seen serious lag issues in the past; if it wasn’t lag, there was usually some sort of bug or glitch that had the server crashing time and time again.  As high-speed internet had come about – as well as advances in technology – a lot of those issues were resolved for the most part.

But the player caps usually remained or only increased slightly.

In Crowned Lieges of Destiny, the game that he had been lately most proficient at, the developers had solved some of those problems by including NPCs in large-scale battles, which were much easier to control how much was displayed on-screen.  Despite that, there was still a few minor problems with lag and glitching that occurred once in a while, usually when there were too many players present in an assault on a specific location.  It was frustrating, and sometimes he wished for a time when the technology was far enough advanced to eliminate latency issues altogether.  That way they could have an unlimited number of players working together to achieve a goal.

However, faced with over 20,000 Royal Army Reservists intent on reaching and – he assumed – destroying him as fast as possible, he now thought that the developers had been right to put limits on player counts.  His dungeon was designed for small groups, not hundreds or thousands; if he were to take that many with him into a dungeon in one of the games he used to play, there would be practically no challenge – he would steamroll through everything.

Which was precisely what was happening here.  Granted, he hadn’t been throwing anything extraordinarily dangerous at them – mainly in the hopes that if they saw some opposition in their way, they might pause and be a little more cautious.  Or, better yet, turn around.

However, from the little he had overheard from a man in black robes[33] (who appeared to be leading them but didn’t appear to actually be part of the Army), they were so intent on destroying the rest of the Guild that they wouldn’t stop for anything.  And this person was a real piece of work; from what Milton’s increasingly accurate sensor orbs could determine, he was a fairly powerful Elemental Caster who appeared to be newly at the Supreme rank, but one of his skills was an “Expert Torture Aficionado”.  Not necessarily good people there.

And for some reason he treated the Reservists around him (who, in general, didn’t look like they were necessarily bad people) with disdain, which made Milton think he was either some highfalutin nobility that hadn’t been killed with the purge Cordpower enacted or was someone high up in the Company command structure.  He didn’t think it mattered one way or another, but the more he knew why this black-robed man was so intent on destroying the Guild, the better chance he might have of defusing the situation before he was forced to kill everyone.  Or at least try to kill them all.

“I can tell you exactly who that is – that’s Draven.  He’s part of the Guardian Guild’s leadership, or at least he used to be.  We were never sure what happened to him; rumors said he was killed when we were forced to flee, but Gereld, Karn, and I always suspected he was up to no good.  This just proves it – he’s a traitor to the Guild,” Flauren told him when he popped up in the current view of the Army’s progress.

“Why would he want to destroy the Guild?  Isn’t he a member?  Or at least he was, right?”

“He was passed over for Guild Leader in favor of Gereld.  Draven thinks he should’ve been Leader solely based on his strength of Power, which I will admit is extremely impressive.  With the Guild technically no longer in the Kingdom, he’s probably the most dangerous one still alive.  There are some non-combat experts in their fields that probably have a bigger Power Pool, but as far as raw Power goes – he’s it.  And all that power literally went to his head…I don’t know the exact reason he wants the Guild destroyed, but it’s probably so that he could create his own with him as the leader or some such nonsense.”

Milton could see what she was talking about; if he hadn’t already seen Rosewyn before she had died, he would’ve said Draven was the most powerful Proctan he had ever seen.  Of course, this “Draven” didn’t hold a candle to even half of the current NCU’d Guild members who had multiple abilities and similar if not larger Power Pools.

Based on the information Flauren gave him, Milton was fairly sure that there was no changing Draven’s mind.  But that didn’t mean that the Royal Army Reserve had to suffer for his madness and thirst for revenge.  His multiple attempts at swarming them with smaller Combat Units was a failure, as the only delay he had seen was when his 100,000 Blood-thirsty Squirrels had attacked them.

With all the increases in production, Milton had been amazed at how fast he could produce the smaller creatures – they practically flowed out of nearly every Molecular Converter he had in a steady stream for 5 minutes.  The one problem he had encountered was the sheer number of them, as well as the 20,000 Lollipop Snakes he had made afterwards.

Although he had plenty of Bio Mass and Power Output to easily create and maintain them, the insane number of different minds scrambling for his attention was overwhelming.  It was hard enough to give groups of them orders on where to go; he had to have ALANNA helping non-stop to arrange everything properly.  When it was finally time, whatever it was inside the Station Core that simulated his head felt like it should have a splitting migraine after he gave the order to attack.  Switching between so many groups within nanoseconds of each other was stressful.

He had a small army of other Combat Units he had made, but he kept them back near or inside the dungeon for now.  Instead, he thought he would try to appeal to the Army’s sense of duty and obligation.

“Attention, Royal Army Reserve!  There is nothing to gain from continuing down this pathway except for death.  I do not desire to kill you – but I will not hesitate to defend myself if you press the issue.  The Guardian Guild is not here, so your journey has been in vain.

“I doubt the gutless cur, Draven, will heed my warning, but I implore the rest of the Reserve to turn back.  The Kingdom needs your help from a threat—”

As soon as he started talking loudly through the sensor orb floating above them, the soldiers all stopped in their tracks and stared in shock.  He couldn’t tell if he was getting through to them or not, but any further communication was cut off when Draven angrily used his Power in an impressive and creative application of Fire and Air.  A high-temperature cutting blade shot through his orb and literally sliced it in half.

Any other attempts to speak to the army were ignored or again destroyed by the powerful Caster.  However, he could definitely see the beginnings of dissension within the ranks; as they ran seemingly faster and faster, they would constantly be sneaking glances at each other with a look on their faces that showed severe reluctance.

They were about 15 minutes out from his dungeon and Milton sent a wave of 1,000 Jackalopes sprinting toward the front ranks of the Reserve, still trying to use as little force as possible to get them to turn back.  The Army took their first casualty, an unlucky soldier that tripped at the wrong time and got a Jackalope antler to his eye – which pierced all the way to his brain.  He was dead before any Healer could reach him, though they were plenty busy after the rest of the front line took Jackalope impacts over various parts of their bodies – none of which were particularly life-threatening.

However, that one casualty was enough to incite a small mutiny within a few hundred soldiers.

“We aren’t going any further.  This mission is insane, and we’re supposedly led by a madman.  I’m sure the Colonel—”

Draven had come up behind the lot of mutinous soldiers while they were discussing what they wanted to do, who Milton could see were refusing to continue their run with the rest.  “You’re sure the Colonel will do…what?  Obey orders?  Because that’s what he will be doing, unlike what appears to be all of you.  I’ll give you one chance to keep moving, before I’m forced to make you move.”

“And how are you going to do that?  There are hundreds of us, and only one—” the leader of the rebellious Reservists started to ask, as his fellow constituents circled around the Caster with expressions ranging from angry to scared.  He was cut off abruptly as he doubled over and held his head, screaming at the top of his lungs.

Draven held a simple lit quick-starter in his hands as he stared in apparent disinterest at the screaming man.  “I think that demonstrated my point enough.  Now, get moving – insubordination will not be tolerated.”

When no one moved – and a few actually drew their weapons – Draven sighed, and an intense look of concentration suffused his face for a moment – at least it did right before he smiled creepily.  That guy could give ALANNA a run for her money in the creepy department.

Every single one of the mutineers dropped to the ground, screaming so loud it was nearly deafening to all the other soldiers running by with their eyes ahead and hands over their ears.  The horrific cacophony of screams created almost a symphony of vocalized pain and terror, punctuated by the fact that Draven seemed to be conducting it as he waved his hands around dreamily.  It only lasted 10 seconds, but it was enough to leave nearly all of the soldiers weeping in remembered pain.

Milton looked again at Draven’s approximate Status and saw that the incapacitation and torture of hundreds of soldiers required a whopping…35 Power.

“I hope you’ve learned your lesson, because I don’t want to have to stop again.  Get up, get moving, and if you lag behind, I’ll turn up the pain from the application of Fire burning your nervous system so that you’ll wish you were dead.”  And with that, Draven rejoined the trailing end of the Royal Army Reserve marching by.

The recently tortured soldiers sluggishly got off the ground and rushed to the rear columns of the Army, silently joining the procession without complaint.  And with that, there went his best chance of changing their minds and turning them back.

“That guy’s a dick – can we please kill him?” ALANNA asked, having watched the whole thing through his few hidden sensor orbs he had following the Army.

“Yes…yes we can.”

Chapter 29 – Maximum occupancy

A treeless clearing in the middle of the forest was a minor surprise; however, the sheer size of it was a whole other thing.  Draven stared at the hole in the ground located nearly in the middle of the clearing with suspicion.  The ground was trampled around the area, as if a lot of beasts had been going in and out in large quantities.  Or, from a print that one of the Scouts had pointed out – people.

They had seen some other disturbed areas around, but even with his Earth Affinity he couldn’t detect anything below the ground.  This hole, on the other hand, was different.  He could sense some voids below the ground, but something was blocking his attempts to discern exactly what they were or what they looked like.

He hadn’t had that happen in a long time…in fact, it hadn’t been since before he finished his training with his mentor all those years ago.  It was almost as if there was something his Affinity had never encountered before – but that was impossible.  He’d gotten the same training as every other Earth Caster, and even had access to some rare types of minerals that he had found through his research over the years.

Regardless, he just knew that they had found what they were looking for.  “Alright, Colonel…send your troops in.  This must be where the Guild has been hiding out; if I didn’t despise them so much, I would say it was pretty clever building an underground bunker.  It would definitely keep out many of the beasts that roam around here.”  When the Colonel didn’t act right away, Draven demanded, “Is there a problem?”

“Uh, sir – we don’t know what’s in there.  If we just go in blind, we could be walking into an ambush.  It’s obvious that they already know we’re here, so I wouldn’t put it past them to—”

“I see your point.  Ok, send all of the Scouts in first and then we’ll follow right after,” he acknowledged.

“…All of them?”

“Yes, all of them.  Are you having trouble understanding my commands?  I have a little trick with your nervous system that I can use to try to fix—”

The Colonel immediately cut him off.  “Not necessary, sir – I just wanted to be clear.  Sending in the Scouts now.”

Less than a minute later, everyone outside the hole heard echoing screams coming from inside, followed by the sounds of weapons striking stone and other solid objects.  “See, it looks like they found the Guild and are taking care of—”

An enormous crash of stone on stone came billowing out the entrance to the Guild’s hideout, followed by complete silence.  With the amount of dust that amount of dirt and stone must have made crashing together, Draven expected there to be a big cloud blowing out the hole – but it remained empty.

“Alright…looks like they’ve cleared the ambush – let’s go.”

Everyone hesitated, looking at him like he was crazy.  He slowly and deliberately lit a quick-lighting stick and stared around at them, as if daring them to contradict him.  Everyone drew their weapons and Draven tensed, but they all turned toward the hole and started to file inside without a word.

He somewhat admired their bravery, but not enough to outweigh their cowardice at the hesitation.  They weren’t defenseless; he had seen that well enough when they had fought off the waves of beasts that had attacked them.  Just because they weren’t good enough to get into the Guild, that didn’t mean they didn’t have a lot of similar abilities that – if they had been better able to apply them – would’ve given them enough use to be accepted into the Guild.  Perhaps I was wrong about the Reserve – maybe some of them have improved enough that they would’ve fit well enough into the Guild? …Nah, they’re still next-to-useless.

After the majority of the soldiers had filed in, Draven joined them, trusting in them to act as meat shields if it came down to a fight.  He walked 20 feet down into the hole before he encountered a tunnel comprised of an entirely unknown black, white-spotted stone.  He physically touched it and it was as if his Earth Affinity just rebounded right off of it.  Huh.  I’m going to have to get a sample of this after we’re done with the Guild.

He followed the soldiers as they kept walking cautiously, the echoing sounds of screams faintly reaching his ears from far ahead.  There were still literally 20,000 soldiers in front of him, so it was possible that it was the screams of the Guild members as they were found and cut down, but for some reason he couldn’t explain he doubted it.  Based on what he had seen so far, including the room he just walked into, this underground shelter was unlike anything he had seen before.

The floor was covered in shards of stone, as well as large plates of the same black-and-white-spotted stone as the perimeter of the room.  Fortunately, it wasn’t that deep compared to the size of the room and the soldiers were carefully walking over the rubble.  Draven followed suit, picking his way over the strange stone, following the others.  While he was climbing over a particularly large mound, he couldn’t help but see blood leaking out from underneath some of the piles he crossed over.  Guess I know what happened to the Scouts.

A scream behind him caused him to whip around, as he watched one of the unique stone plates shift and slide, crashing into a soldier at speed.  It hit who he recognized as one of the Army’s Casters right in the waist, the impact literally shearing right through his body – effectively cutting him in half.  The scream lasted another moment before someone behind him put him out of his misery with a sword slice to his head.  “Sorry for that, Derrin – there’s no coming back from that,” the soldier who had granted mercy choked out, before steadfastly continuing on.

Decent fellow, there.

There weren’t any other incidents as he traveled through the rest of the room, fortunately, so he reached a very similar tunnel as the first they had encountered.  It was dark throughout the hallway, unlike the room before which – now that he thought about it – was lit by some mysterious source.  He was tempted to walk back and check out the light again, but he noticed a few Fire-Affinity Casters keeping the hallway lit – and for good reason.

Halfway down the tunnel was a pool of disintegrated body parts; he just happened to know from personal experience exactly what it looked like in that state.  Apparently, whatever had been in that section was so corrosive that at least three different soldiers had lost their lives there before everyone was directed around the spot.

He didn’t say a word as he passed by the pool, though he could see the fear and disturbance it caused on those looking at it.  Weaklings.

In the next room, the entire place appeared to have been burnt to still-smoldering ash – along with nearly 40 bodies.  He couldn’t tell if they had burned in the fire, or if they had been killed by something else; it didn’t matter, though, as they were still dead, and the danger had apparently passed.

What is this place?  Did the Guild just rig this place to kill every intruder that stepped foot in here?  For the first time, Draven was actually glad that he had the Royal Army Reserve with him – if only to be there to spring all of the traps that were riddled throughout these first rooms.  The fact that they were apparently still moving spoke to the fact that there were many more rooms ahead of them; in fact, he was legitimately surprised that he hadn’t had word that they had found the Guild and had finally ended them.

That thought warred with his own sense of self-preservation; while he honestly appreciated that the soldiers ahead of him were going first and suffering from the deadly traps that they had apparently discovered, he also wanted to be the one to end the Guild.  Especially Gereld; he hoped that the Guild Leader was still alive, just so he could die by Draven’s hand.

As if his hope had been a signal, a soldier came racing back down the hallway leading from the second room.

Out of breath, the Reservist took a second to recover before speaking.  “Sir, we’ve penetrated the defenses here for quite a way, but we’ve run into a bit of a snag.”

“A snag?  What kind of snag?”

“Well, sir, that’s something that you’re just going to have to see for yourself…I can’t explain it.”

*        *        *

Milton was conflicted.  On the one hand, the soldiers of the Royal Army Reserve weren’t necessarily the enemy and were being forced to invade his dungeon.  On the other – they were invading his dungeon.  And using many, many more bodies than it was designed to combat.

They weren’t mindless automatons, either; Milton could see the fear and hesitation as the first scouting party entered the dungeon – all 34 of them – and were wiped out to the man in the first room.  Well, to the man and two women if he was being truthful.  That, unfortunately, was not enough to deter the rest of the Army from pushing on.

Evidentially, the soldiers knew Draven’s reputation more than just his demonstration in the forest; they were apparently more scared of turning back than of whatever dangers the unknown hole in the ground held.  And he knew that, too, because as the remaining soldiers filed in and started to make their way through the dungeon rooms, he had tried to talk some sense into them.  He even went so far as to bribe them with whatever they could want, but they – for some reason – had closed their ears to him.

“ALANNA, why won’t they listen to me?  That Draven guy can’t be that powerful; I’m sure if they all refused to go on, they could turn on him and make him see reason.  He’s only one man – and there are over 20,000 of them.”

Milton watched his AI guide as she thought about it for a moment.  “I think it all comes down to duty, Milton.”

“Duty?  How do you mean?”

She sighed heavily before she continued.  “Remember how I had acted when you first ‘woke up’?  How I was so adamant on getting off this planet and getting back to The Collective?  Well, although that directive was programmed into me, it was instilled in me as more of a sense of duty.  I needed you – and, honestly, still do – to do whatever you could to improve enough of yourself to be able to leave.  However, I was powerless to do anything but follow along with what you chose to do; the all-encompassing focus of getting space-bound was shifted slightly with your plans.

“By helping the Proctans, you were helping yourself get stronger and repair your core.  In fact, if you were to break down all of your different Facilities, your Molecular Converters and Power Generators, all of the various defenses – here and up north – you’ve set up, and eliminated all but a few necessary drones, I believe that you might nearly have enough to leave this planet right now.  And if not now, then probably in less than a year if you allow your miner drones to keep working.

“But I haven’t said anything, because you are following your own sense of duty to try to help these Proctans.  I know you well enough that you wouldn’t leave them, and my sense of duty makes me support you – because I’d rather have you on my side and supporting me and my need to know the current state of The Collective.

“In my case, I had a choice: I could choose to support your decision to help the Proctans at the expense of an indeterminate amount of time, or I could do everything I could to hinder that help.  Obviously, you know what I chose,” she smirked at his Core, before continuing.

“But these soldiers have no choice, really.  Their duty, from what I understand of their history, is to protect the Kingdom.  Unlike the Guardian Guild who primarily were tasked with protecting the border from the beasts outside, the Royal Army Reserve was created to protect the Kingdom from inside the borders.  Which means anything from putting down or preventing internal conflicts, policing the countryside, and acting as backup if the Guild required it.

“And what the Guild represents now, is an internal conflict.  To them and what they were told, the former members of the Guardian Guild – except for Draven, apparently – were declared outlaws and rebels, which means it is their duty to eliminate them for the good of the Kingdom.  They aren’t listening to you because they think you are the Guild – or someone connected to them – so whatever you say is suspect.  I think that the one chance you had to change their minds was back in the forest, when they had some mutinous members of the Army – who were promptly put in their place by a higher authority.

“Now that you’ve killed some of them, they are even more determined to press on to take revenge on ‘The Guardian Guild’ for those deaths.  Even at the expense of their lives.”

Wow, that’s more than I’ve heard her say in like…ever.  Thinking about what she said, he realized that she had a point; his new friends had been either been killed or chased out of their homes by the Cordpower Company and Milton wanted to do whatever he could to stop them – if not as vehemently as Brint and the Guild.  But he could understand getting revenge.

“I…guess you have a point.  So what do you suggest I do to get them to leave?”

“Milton, I don’t think you’re getting it – there isn’t anything you can do.  They’re here and they’re not leaving,” ALANNA patiently told him.

Maybe if I make something impassable, they might turn back.

“I wouldn’t do that.  They might leave and then come back either with more troops somehow or try to find another way to get to you.  Either way, they would probably leave some soldiers here so that they keep the Guild ‘trapped’ – which would kind of hinder your ability to move supplies around.  Right now, you have them all here…I think you know what you have to do,” ALANNA told him, after Milton realized he hadn’t been shielding his thoughts.

And he did, he was just hoping to avoid it.

Chapter 30 – Attrition

New Short-term Goal: Duty Calls

Your dungeon is facing an invasion by an army, an army that will not be dissuaded.  To ensure that their threat is eliminated completely, do not allow a single member of the army to escape.

-         Royal Army Reserve soldiers remaining: 19,965/20,000

-         Cordpower Company representatives remaining: 145/145

-         Invading army leader, Draven (Elemental Caster) remaining: 1/1

Difficulty of Goal: Easy

Timeframe: 8 hours

Rewards: Experience, +2 to Insight/Luck

Well, that makes it official.  ALANNA wasn’t taking any chances that he misunderstood what she was trying to get across.

Now that his decision was made essentially made for him, Milton could finally spend those 22 points he had earned from leveling up.  While he was doing that, he absently noticed that he had earned very little from the 35 total deaths that had occurred on the surface and in the first room – 350.  Which meant that each living, breathing person was only worth 10 Combat Experience a piece, but after a moment he guessed that he understood: they really weren’t much of a threat.  In fact, if it weren’t for the sheer number of them, he wouldn’t be worried about them at all.

He finally had enough points to get one of his attributes up to 100 – where they should’ve been all along – but he had to be strategic about his choice.  Should I get one up to 100?  Or should I bring two different ones up to 90?  Which one would be better?

“ALANNA, what would you suggest I invest my points in?” Milton decided to ask the expert on what an undamaged Station Core could do.

“Now that you have the choice, I would bring at least something up to normal operating efficiency.  While it wasn’t necessarily advisable earlier – because many of the different components to your status relied heavily on each other to operate efficiently – almost everything about you is nearly back to ‘normal’.  You’ll be surprised at the difference having 100 in an attribute will do for you.  As for which one, that depends on what you think you’re going to need the most in the near future.”

So, no help there other than telling him he should bump something up to “normal”.  Thinking about his immediate need – repelling the army attacking his dungeon – and the ongoing operations up north (which was still waiting for another baiting of the enemy to Camp Deathtrap), Milton decided to jack his Processing Speed/Agility up to 100.[34]  He almost went with Processing Power/Intelligence, but he didn’t have as many issues with his power limits since he had access to the Geothermal Transmutation Stations; still, he placed his last two points there so that it was one step closer to “normal”.

But having faster drones, faster production, and faster response time between Combat Units was going to be ideal.  He was already starting to work with many more components – drones, Combat Units, facilities, and defenses – than he ever thought he would; being able to have them all working together in a speedier process would hopefully save a lot of time – which they didn’t have a lot of.

Congratulations!

By increasing your Processing Speed/Agility to 100, you have gained the following bonuses:

- Your production facilities now operate at optimum efficiency, which increases their production speed by 50%

- Your Molecular Converters now construct/deconstruct objects 40% faster

- All types of drones complete their work 60% faster, can manipulate 20% heavier material at one time, and can travel 40% faster

- Switching between Combat Units to deliver instructions is instantaneous, reducing lag time between issuing orders

- Your Combat Units all receive a bonus 15% to their Agility Statistic

Now that was a surprise!  A bonus 15% to their Agility!  For a normal Guild member who didn’t specialize in Agility, the difference would probably be negligible; for the Scouts and his other Combat Units that relied heavily on it – including his Bearillas – the bonus could be in the hundreds!  In fact…

“Brint!  Sorry to scare you, but I wanted to give you a warning – everyone is about to get a small upgrade to their speed, including you.  I wanted to make sure it doesn’t take everyone by surprise.  If you can, spread the word.”

“Will do, thanks,” his new commander of Camp Deathtrap responded quickly.

As for everything else, Milton knew that it would all come in handy – especially with the cleanup after thousands of Quizards all die at the same time.  And, he thought it would come in handy cleaning up after he took care of his home infestation issue.  Not to mention that his Bearillas he was growing in the Upgraded Bioconversion Labs were now even closer to being finished.  They still wouldn’t be done until after the Army was all inside the dungeon, but they would definitely come in handy if they did end up getting far enough to become a serious threat.

All of that conversation with ALANNA, the allocation of his stat points, and his brief message to Brint took a whole whopping two minutes, which meant that the soldiers invading his dungeon hadn’t gotten very far.  After moving carefully through the first room, climbing over the rubble left over from when the entire ceiling ended up crashing down, they entered the first of many room-connecting hallways.  Three more soldiers fell to the acid trap that sprayed down from the ceiling, but it also slowed down the rushing influx of Army people streaming through as they started to use their heads and be more cautious in their approach.

The second room with his Quakes and dry grass took out another 40, both through attacks by the large-headed snakes and through the entire room burning everything and everyone inside it.  There was a Fire-Affinity Elemental Caster who was just entering the room and managed to survive by snuffing out the flames in her immediate vicinity, but the rest had been Physical Augmenters that, while some were exceptionally fast, were soon surrounded by flames and had nowhere to go.

The third room with the rotating Weightonite blades and Rabbiteers managed between them to kill another 152.  Only a few dozen had been slow enough to actually get hurt or killed by the blades; the rest had been killed by his Jackalope hybrids shooting out of the walls.

Through all those rooms, the army was still primarily located outside – there were only so many that could file through at one time.  There wasn’t much that Milton wanted to do at that point, though, because he wanted to make sure that all of them were inside before he really “flexed his muscles”.  He had actually doubled or tripled the amount of Combat Units in every room after the first, so that they would be able to eliminate more of the soldiers.

As for his traps and other defenses set up…he didn’t touch them or try to make them deadlier.  He did that for a couple of reasons: 1. he didn’t want to make it so hard that they couldn’t progress, effectively making a spot where they would have to turn back; and 2. he needed everyone inside before he closed off the dungeon.

He now had that capability, since there were multiple air chutes located throughout the complex, constantly circulating air; he hadn’t done it before they arrived only because he didn’t want them wandering around and finding the Refuge, even if they couldn’t get in – or at least he hoped they couldn’t.  He couldn’t afford to take that risk; there were still people – including children – inside there that had never been killed before, which meant he couldn’t chance their bodies being so far destroyed that he had no hope of bringing them back.

And this Draven seemed the type to burn them all to ash to erase all signs of them ever existing.

After the third room, the now-overly cautious soldiers of the Royal Army Reserve entered his rainbow room; they looked at the multicolored handholds in confusion, before testing them out.  Of course, having never probably seen a rainbow before, they had no idea of the pattern; it took 37 of them being flung across the room into the stone spikes before they finally discovered the pattern.

When they finally encountered the “balloon” drop of – the increased amount – 15,000 Tiny Wolfites cascading from the ceiling, the 10 that had made it to the top before advancing were quickly overwhelmed.  They managed to slay a few hundred in the process, but the rest jumped down from the bowl where they originated and swarmed over those still climbing and entering the room.

With an enemy to fight now, however, the soldiers rallied after losing a dozen more to the colorful balls of fluff; holding the line across the tunnel entrance with three lines of eight soldiers, they utilized their Physical Augmentations, Elemental Casting, and even some Nature Manipulation from a small vine plant.  Although they incurred some injuries, no more were lost and even the injured were healed up.

Of course, as soon as they were over and were descending the collapsible staircase on the opposite side of the bowl, they lost another three soldiers who were flung onto the spikes below.

The fifth room, filling with nearly 50 Wienerpups and Greycer Puppies, managed to only take out the leading two soldiers – who immediately jumped into the pile of adorable puppies and were dropped into the pit below.  After that, though, the obvious pit that he didn’t dare send his drones in to recover was enough of a deterrent.

Milton debated whether or not to allow the rope bridge in the sixth room collapse.  On the one hand, the way that the soldiers were bunched up as they explored each room meant that he could probably take out a few hundred if he made it collapse.  However, on the other hand, if he did that – the rest wouldn’t be able to continue onwards.  In the end, he decided to leave the rope bridge maze alone, and let the nearly 120 Bird Warriors he filled the place with do the work for him.

And work, they did.  After taking out nearly three times their number of soldiers by swooping in and picking them up – only to drop them on the spikes below – they were finally whittled down by a combination of quick-moving Physical Augmenters and three Fire-Affinity Casters who were enjoying roasting them as they flew through the air.  At the end, 352 more of the Army fell to his Combat Units.

In the seventh room, the one with the Quadger Buddies and Quadger Foreman, the soldiers only initially lost only four soldiers as they fell from the stone columns that collapsed after they were cut from below.  After that, an Earth-Affinity Caster had to be called to the front and was able to manipulate the stone in the pit into a staircase, allowing them to proceed into the pit where the columns had collapsed.

And they were surprisingly effective against his Quadger Buddies once they were facing them on equal footing.  With them prepared and with no more traps surprising them, twenty soldiers were able to decimate the dozen he sent against them; they just weren’t fast enough to get more than a strike or two against them before they were skewered by a sword or taken apart by a Cast.  One Quadger did manage to slice completely through a soldier’s leg, effectively putting him out of the fight – but that was it.

The same Earth Caster built another staircase up out of the pit and led the vanguard into the next section of the room.

“Look out, everyone!  I can feel disturbances in the dirt all around us—” the soldier started, before three dozen more Quadger Buddies popped out of the ground, completely surrounding the twenty assembled soldiers.  However, instead of attacking right away like the soldiers had expected, they dove back underground.

“Where did they—” said another soldier, before he was struck from below, screaming as the Quadger’s super-sharp rock-cutting claws ripped him to shreds before he could defend himself.  The same was repeated with the rest, though the Earth Caster was able to quickly harden the dirt underneath himself before jumping away – right into the emerging claws of another Quadger.  Done with the slaughter, they retreated underground again just as more soldiers were coming.

His Combat Units’ success was short-lived, unfortunately, as the soldiers got smart and waited for more of their cohorts to arrive before daring the deadly landscape covered in nearly two dozen still-bleeding bodies.  By drawing the Quadger Buddies out one at a time using an impressively quick Physical Augmenter, they were able to attack from a distance once his Unit emerged.

The Quadger Foreman had a little more luck, as Milton had waited until there were only a dozen Buddies left and held them in reserve.  Once the speed-boosted Augmenter had investigated the entire area and wasn’t attacked, he continued on, leading to the next hallway.  With the danger apparently passed, nearly 1,000 soldiers that were waiting finally advanced further into the room – mistakenly all at once.

“Does anyone feel that?”

Milton didn’t see the one that actually said that, because the next moment the ground exploded underneath the group as a dozen Buddies and the Foreman erupted outward, laying into those bunched up together.  Despite the unexpected and successful start of the attack, his Units were hopelessly outnumbered.  Still, they took out another 124 more before they were surrounded and destroyed – the Foreman accounting for nearly half of those before he was taken down.

The wall-smashing trap between rooms seven and eight took out two more, but once it was identified it was easy enough for a single person to stand there and let the others know about the danger.

With the soldiers going into the eighth room, Milton looked back to see the progress of the incoming army and saw that there were only a few hundred left outside that were waiting to enter – including Draven, over a hundred Cordpower Company representatives, and the majority of the Army leadership.  Getting a quick update of his current progress on his new quest, he saw that he hadn’t even killed 1,000 of them yet; that was okay, though, as they hadn’t seen the most dangerous rooms yet.

“Aren’t you letting them get a little close, Milton?” ALANNA asked, watching as the first few soldiers entered room number eight.

“No, they are right where they need to be – they need to all be inside before I start to show them why they shouldn’t have come here.  And don’t worry – their numbers won’t mean much when they finally get to rooms eleven and twelve.”

Milton could see her mentally remember what was inside those two rooms.  “Huh, yeah, you’re probably right,” she said, before smiling.

Not even the best groups of Guardian Guild members could get through those yet.

Room eight had more than twice the number of defenders as it did previously; he wanted to add more, but since he couldn’t pump them out of a Converter and instead had to grow them, he was limited on how much he could fill it up.  In addition, all of the Combat Units in the rooms after that one needed to be grown as well, so he had a need to balance out the rooms.

The first six soldiers that walked into the room were almost immediately killed by dropped Weightonite shards dropped down from the catwalks above, courtesy of the invisible Kittylocks.  That didn’t deter the Reserve, however, as they pushed on, tasking three of their cohorts to watch above and shout out warnings.  An Air-affinity Caster tried to use some of his ability to locate the source of the sudden attacks, but as he wasn’t as adept at manipulating the air so far away, he didn’t have much success.

His Scaly Tanks were proving to be essentially impervious to the majority of the attacks sent their way; plus, their normally low Agility stat had been boosted marginally with the bonuses from his level-up, so they were able to avoid being hit every once in a while.  One, two, six, ten – eventually, two dozen soldiers were killed from deadly swipes by the powerful bears before one of the Reservists caught a break.

As he tripped over the leg of one of those unlucky enough to have been killed by the Scaly Tank, the soldier landed near the side of the massive bear.  He still had ahold of his sword and used it to stab from the ground – slightly piercing the softer underbelly of the armored powerhouse.  He then got a paw to his head as the now-injured Tank whirled around and took its vengeance on him, but the damage had been done, so to say.

Once they learned that their attacks would be much more effective from below, four soldiers who only had Augmented Strength approached it from the side and heaved the beast over, landing it on its back.  One of the Reservists got mauled for his trouble, but the result was a frenzy of others stabbing and killing Milton’s Combat Unit rather quickly.

Fortunately for the Station Core, that was the last of their luck in that room.

One of his Scaly Tanks ended up killing another soldier, who unluckily landed on one of the spring traps he had set up, flinging the lifeless body so hard and fast that it pierced through not just one of the thin earthen walls separating the different sections of the room – but two.

A swarm of armored-scale tanks then assaulted those soldiers had been, up to that point, making progress.  Over the next twenty minutes, chaos ensued as the Army pushed its way inside, beating back the 26 Scaly Tanks that were preventing their forward progress.  Hundreds of soldiers died in that time, their bodies doing more to help than hinder as they were used as literal meat shields to isolate and overwhelm the powerful bears.  Even attacks from the Kittylocks drifting down from above only slightly stymied them, the invisible predators having dropped all of the available Weightonite shards already.

The toll was horrendous on the Reserve, but they continued to push ahead, using their fallen comrades as motivation to exact their own body count on Milton’s defenders.  Once they had cleared the initial three sections of the room – miraculously not opening up the next section, they prepared for any other onslaughts, instinctively grouping together by ability type to combat the next phase.

Milton was actually impressed by that; Casters were grouping together to utilize their skills in combination with each other; Physical Augmenters were separated by type: the strong ones ready to flip over Tanks, the ones who could take a beating there to distract the armored bears, while the fast ones were ready to move in for the strike once it was vulnerable; the few Healers they had stayed toward the back, still healing those who had been injured previously; the few Nature Manipulators there were grouping together, utilizing their available plants wherever openings occurred; a smattering of other unclassified abilities were there as well, filling in holes wherever they were needed.

By the time they were ready to attack the last sections of the room, there were over a thousand vengeful soldiers eager and ready to rip apart Milton’s Combat Units.  Which they immediately did as they broke through, utilizing the same tactics that had worked so well through the rest of the room.  Only about two dozen more Reservists fell from unlucky paw swipes or Weightonite shards dropped from above; all told, though, the number of dead soldiers in room eight was almost as many as all the rooms that came before: 782.

That was just the icing on the cake, however, as the number of soldiers outside the dungeon had dwindled to just over a hundred.  Soon enough, he could seal off the entrance and “get to work”.

Milton decided to get rid of the fog in the ninth room during the attack – at least initially.  Although it would probably be even more deadly, there was very little that the soldiers could do to clear it, meaning that they wouldn’t be able to see anything, which might make them turn back; it was obvious that killing monstrous beasts while taking horrific casualties wasn’t an issue for the soldiers, but if they couldn’t even find their way through to the next area, he wouldn’t blame them for wanting to turn back and look for another way.  He did still keep it dark as night, though.

The large floating flames that the Fire-Affinity Casters in the initial groups going through didn’t do too much to push back the darkness, but it at least allowed the soldiers to see their deaths in the form of the Arachnawerewolves hunting them down.  Milton had tripled the number of them inside the room, as well, so they racked up an impressive body count by the time the first soldiers had managed to survive long enough to reach the “arena”.

Because the room was initially designed for small groups, Milton stopped the pathway through his deadly Weightonite trees from blocking anything off and closing so that there wasn’t a barrier preventing forward progress.  They were still deadly enough that even if his sneaky wolf-spider hybrid knocked some troops into them without actually doing any initial harm, they were sharp enough that not many survived more than a brush up against them.  It was the trees themselves that managed to kill nearly half as many as the Arachnawerewolves did – a testament to how deadly they were.

Eventually, even the powerful Combat Units that filled his ninth room were overcome by sheer numbers – and the ever-increasingly prevalent use of strategy by those soldiers who had survived the longest.  It seemed that his dungeon was doing its job, though he didn’t particularly want it to in this instance; they were “leveling-up” as they used their abilities in combat.

Most of them had only been in there for an hour or more, but already some of the more powerful (it was relative, of course – they couldn’t compare to the majority of the Guild members working their way through his dungeon) were like grizzled veterans as they led those behind them ahead.  When they finally overwhelmed the last of the Arachnawerewolves in the “arena” (which he stopped the spinning trees from advancing because it was as likely to hurt the increased number of his Combat Units as the soldiers), there were hundreds of veterans who had formed the core of the attack.

All told, by the time they finished the ninth room, 1102 more soldiers had perished; not only that, but the last of those outside had finally entered the dungeon, including the sadistic leader of them, Draven.

Current Short-term Goal: Duty Calls

Your dungeon is facing an invasion by an army, an army that will not be dissuaded.  To ensure that their threat is eliminated completely, do not allow a single member of the army to escape.

-         Royal Army Reserve soldiers remaining: 17,349/20,000

-         Cordpower Company representatives remaining: 145/145

-         Invading army leader, Draven (Elemental Caster) remaining: 1/1

Difficulty of Goal: Easy

Timeframe: 8 hours

Rewards: Experience, +2 to Insight/Luck

Chapter 31 – Rooms 10, 11, and 12

Draven worked his way up through the various rooms, frankly amazed at the different traps set up everywhere, the bodies of the slain beasts, and the different paths that he had to travel to where the front of the Royal Army Reserve was located.  And, as he moved through what he counted was the eighth room and then the ninth, the number of dead soldiers he encountered started to worry him.  Just a little.

Not that he cared about them one or the other, but he wanted to make sure that there were enough to get through the rest of this strange security system leading to the Guild’s hideout.  The first couple of rooms he could explain away as just something that was quickly set up to kill anyone not invited in and he didn’t actually see any defenders as he progressed.  However, the fact that the rest of the place was literally littered with the bodies of increasingly bigger and deadly-looking beasts led him to believe that the Guild had turned as much traitor as he had.

Of course, he didn’t consider himself a traitor – more of a savior of the people getting rid of the corrupting influence of the Guardian Guild.

Hundreds of bodies – both beast and soldier – didn’t make the enclosed underground space any better in the smell department, and Draven soon had to constantly filter out the stench around his nose using a very small application of his Air Affinity.  It barely used any Power at all, especially since he was adept at that particular function: some of his “experiments” tended to cause an excess of bodily fluids spilling everywhere.

The ninth room held an interesting beast that looked like a more advanced form of a Spiderwolf, though how it had evolved into its current form was a mystery to him.  While he used some smaller, easily captured beasts in some of his experiments, he never had any success of creating anything like that.  In fact, many of the slain beasts he had seen in so far in that place had been unusual; he wasn’t an expert on the different beasts found in the forest, but many of them looked just like altered forms of the ones he did know.

He barely glanced at what he absently noted was over a thousand dead soldiers as he found his way to the…tenth room?  He wasn’t sure how many more of these deadly rooms there were, but he was hoping there weren’t too many more; the Army Reserve wasn’t unlimited in number and many had been killed, though he still thought there were plenty to get the job done.  Just as long as this place doesn’t go on forever.

He passed many soldiers in the connecting hallway, all of them avoiding a section of the floor that was pointed out as a trigger for another trap.  Fifteen more bodies of Reservists filled with what appeared to be spears littered the floor around the floor trigger mechanism.  Draven ignored everyone’s looks as he walked by them without even acknowledging them.

The first thing he noticed when he walked into the tenth room was that it was hot.  He instantly began sweating as the heat beat down on him, prompting him to expend a little of his Air and Fire Affinities to keep the air around him cooler.  Once he was more comfortable, he was able to look at the room for the first time.

For a moment, he thought he was outside again.  It was a definite difference from the pervading darkness of the previous room, which was lit up by two dozen low-ranked Fire-Affinity Casters along the way.  It was so bright that he needed to shield his eyes as he looked over the large expanse of what appeared to be dry, cracked earth and rocks.  The room was wasn’t actually that large but it was long, the walls cleverly painted to look like the room was wider than it was; he only noticed the difference when he extended his Air Affinity out far enough to find that it stopped abruptly, making the room only about 100 feet wide.

As for how long it was, he wasn’t quite sure.  In the distance, at least 500 feet distant, there was a large “mountain” of stone that extended all the way up to the 50-foot ceiling; it was impossible to tell what was beyond it.  He could vaguely make out a small cave that led into, and he assumed through, the mountain, but it was angled so that he couldn’t see through it.

Dotted along the hot, wretched landscape were groupings of bodies.  He estimated that at least a few hundred were soldiers, but there were also three dozen or so others that were large black beasts lying hacked apart, burnt, and otherwise destroyed by all manner of the soldiers’ abilities.  They had hard, shiny-looking shells covering their bodies and three horns on the front of their heads, many of which had been broken off apparently in their fights against the soldiers.  They were obviously harder to kill than some of the other beasts, which was evident by the dead soldiers surrounding them, but at least the light in the room made it easier to see them.

There were also many holes in the earth that he could see; walking closer to the nearest one, he used his Earth Affinity to see what it was.  A long, slightly angled tube led down about 20 feet before it stopped.  His affinity couldn’t make sense of what else was there, and he had to assume it was more of the strange rock that the place seemed to be largely constructed of.

“One of the few that made it out said that the tubes led down to a long, narrow hallway that twisted back-and-forth, filled with extremely sharp protrusions of rock.  Many of my fellow soldiers bravely lost their lives trying to escape, only to bleed out after receiving so many cuts to their bodies,” the messenger that had come to get him from the rear informed him.

That doesn’t sound brave to me, dying all alone in a tunnel – and not even against a deadly beast.  He didn’t say anything to that effect, of course, but he didn’t respond in any way, either.  Draven looked behind him, seeing the Cordpower Company representatives that had come with the Army following behind; none of them were even Exalted in Ranking, but they had proven useful for some of the logistics concerning the march.  He didn’t have explicit instructions from Gavin regarding them, but he was sure they were sent along to “keep him in line”. Fat chance of that, though – they were pathetically weak, just like the rest of the Army.

“Sir, if you’ll follow me, I’ll show you the safe path through this area.”

Draven shooed him ahead, knowing that his Earth Affinity would serve him much better here than any knowledge the soldier could possibly possess.  In most of the other rooms, the soldiers had been packed together, waiting for their opportunity to move ahead; here, though, because it was so hot, no one wanted to stand around in the heat – it could kill them almost as fast as a beast could.  Therefore, there wasn’t any obvious pathway to follow.

Draven detected the thin earth covering a hole long before the soldier stepped on it but decided not to say anything.  If the man wanted to act confident in his ability to navigate safely through the hundreds of holes dotting the landscape, then the Elemental Caster was going to let him prove it.  The Reservist stepped on the edge of the thin covering, his left foot slipping through the now-empty hole and…he used an extra burst of his speed augmentation to throw himself past the hole, barely missing being trapped underneath the ground.  Unfortunately, with his impromptu save, he accidentally rolled over another hole, where he instantly disappeared underground.

“Make your way to the end and we’ll meet you there!” Draven shouted down the hole, after ensuring that there weren’t any other dangers as he walked to it.  He looked around at the Company people following him, seeing that nearly all of them were sweating as much as the soldier had been, though it was hot enough that all the moisture on their skin evaporated quickly.  “Let’s go,” he said quietly to them, leaving the soldier to his own fate.

It was easy to find the rest of the trapped dirt, almost as easy as avoiding the open holes; within a few minutes, and accompanied by only his entourage, they started to see more bodies the closer they came to the mountain.  They didn’t have a mark on them; they appeared to have collapsed due to the extreme heat of the room.  Some of his followers looked ready to do the same, but they entered the cool confines of the tunnel mountain in time to save them.  Again, not that he cared either way, but it might look bad on his report to Gavin if he deliberately allowed some of the Company reps to die.

If he thought the carnage from the previous rooms had been bad, it was nothing to what he saw as he passed through the “mountain”.  Thousands of soldiers’ bodies were piled up in various poses of death, some literally ripped in half as they lay strewn about.

As to what caused so much destruction, Draven saw something that looked similar to the large, black, insect-like beasts from the other side of the mountain; however, the remains of the beasts were much larger – by at least three times, were dirt brown-colored, and their shells were rough-looking instead of shiny.  And, judging by the ineffectual marks left on those same shells, nearly impervious to normal weapons.

They were wider as well, which he saw as he approached the nearest of the six dead ones, with the sides of their shells tapering off to a razor-sharp edge.  Now that he could observe them up close, they were flatter as well, leaving them to look nearly circular in appearance instead of elongated.  Although they appeared to be able to withstand attacks to their shell, their underbelly was apparently more vulnerable – yet it was low to the ground.  He wasn’t sure what the soldiers had ultimately ended up doing to kill them, but Draven was honestly impressed.

It looks like at least a few soldiers are able to use their heads here.  If they survive, maybe I can recruit them for the start of my new “Guild”.  He had already been contemplating that, but now it was even more evident that the soldiers in the Royal Army Reserve weren’t all bad.  At least a handful of them had potential.

Quickly moving out from the hot, nearly moisture-less air, Draven was finally able to cancel the Air and Fire shield that he had activated to keep the hot air out.  He could tell that the Company men were thankful as well, but Draven was only interested in what was ahead of him.  While he could feel the oppressive heat still emanating from the previous room, in front of him was just the opposite.

Clumps of soldiers were alternately sweating and shivering inside the tunnel depending on where they were in relation to the two rooms.  Some were moving back and forth, warming up and then cooling down, though they stopped when they saw him coming.  “Out of the way!  Let me through!”

Most of the soldiers moved to either side of the hallway, letting him pass.  The only ones that didn’t were a few shivering ones near the end of the tunnel, blocking the majority of his view of the next room; the only thing he could see was a lot of blue and white.

“What’s the hold-up here?  Why aren’t you all advancing?”

Instinctively, Draven noted that many of the soldiers toward the front of the tunnel were – astonishingly – all in the lower Exalted Power Rankings.  When they had set out, there were two of the higher Reserve leadership that were within those Rankings and none in the normal soldiers.  Now, somehow, there were nearly 50 of them in varying degrees of Exalted Rankings, the highest being what appeared to be a dual Physical Augmenter with a Ranking of 4-3.  While still not nearly as strong as Draven himself, the presence of so many higher Power Ranking soldiers made him a tad uncomfortable for the first time.

The only explanation that he could come up with was the Power Potion situation.  Before they left, each soldier was given a diluted Power Potion; each was equivalent to maybe 20% of a normal Power Potion, but it was thought that a little “just in case” was needed in the result that they encountered stronger opposition than normal.  Draven thought that the expense wasn’t worth it, but it seemed as though the head of the Cordpower Company thought differently – and that these soldiers up front had been looting the corpses of their fellow soldiers for their Potions.

He had to admit that their ruthlessness made him a little proud, while at the same time worrying.  He himself had a dozen Power Potions that he had purchased at a great discount before leaving, knowing that he would probably need them going up against his former Guild.  He just hoped that these soldiers didn’t get it into their heads to try to kill him and take his stash.  It wouldn’t work out well for them.

At his words, the ones in front of the next room moved aside, the one who was the highest in terms of Ranking speaking for them.  “Take a look for yourself…sir,” he said, his voice tinged with disrespect.

Draven was tempted to teach him a lesson but thought it prudent to see what the issue was first.  It wasn’t that he was scared being surrounded by relatively high-ranking soldiers having bloodied themselves throughout this strange place…yeah, he wasn’t scared – just playing it smart, that’s all.

The room, if that’s what it was, was half filled with water that flowed up to the tunnel’s entrance; again, like the last room, he couldn’t tell how long it was, though it seemed almost as wide to his senses as the hot, dry room.  Instead of one giant mountain in the distance, however, large jagged blocks of ice seemed to be floating in place on the water, blocking all sight of the end.

Right in front of where the tunnel let out into the room, a small wooden boat – large enough to seat maybe six people – bobbed along within easy reach, held in place by a series of rope nets keeping it corralled.  Two oars were lashed to the middle seat, just waiting for someone to enter and start rowing.

“What’s the issue?  Just get in that boat and row to the other side, come back and pick up some more soldiers.  It will take a while, but it looks easy enough.”

Even more disrespect oozed off the soldier who had spoken earlier as he said, “Oh, I never thought of that, sir.  We, in fact, did try that multiple times – only to have something come up from below and destroy the boat, and everyone in it, before they could do anything.  And—” he held up his hands before Draven could reply, annoying the Caster even further— “before you ask, swimming across the water didn’t work out any better.  Not only is the water freezing, but there are smaller beasts that tore apart anyone trying to cross.”

Draven looked at the boat still there, then back at the soldiers.  “Then, pray tell me, why is that boat still there?”

“Because, sir—” Draven was getting tired of the man mocking him with his disrespect— “every time the boat gets destroyed, another one pops up right here within seconds.”

That seems not only improbable, but impossible.  “I doubt that—”

“Attention, remaining Royal Army Reservists, Cordpower Company representatives, and the Guardian Guild traitor, Draven.  I warned you multiple times not to come to my dungeon and yet you persisted; while it is true that the remaining Guardian Guild members are my friends, they are not here.  That being said, I have sealed every single one of you inside what will be your tomb – I will not allow you to harm them under the misguided direction of the Cordpower Company, who were the ones that orchestrated the assassination of the Royal family.

“Believe me if you want, it matters not one whit to me.  What matters to me is that there is an even bigger threat to your Kingdom that you are ignoring at the behest of this man, Draven, who betrayed the members of his Guild for personal gain and for the gain of the Cordpower Company.

“There is no escape, and I am genuinely sorry that it had to come to this.  For almost all of you, I have been impressed by your perseverance, your dedication to duty, and your steadfast discipline in the face of overwhelming odds.  In fact, you have traveled farther than I thought you would’ve, which is saying a lot towards your worth as defenders of the Kingdom.  For every single member of the Royal Army Reserve, I will tell you that your death is not the end…it is only the beginning.

“For those of you who are part of the despised Cordpower Company, I’m sorry to say that your journey ends here.  I can’t trust you, nor will I risk you existing to cause harm elsewhere.

“To Draven, the sadistic traitor in your midst – did you know he gets pleasure from torturing animals and people?  Anyway, I am giving you one chance to right the wrongs you have done by getting into the boat in front of you.  In fact, if you and every single Cordpower rep you have with you board my boats, you’ll live long enough to see the final room – I even promise not to let the beasts inside the water attack you.  You don’t have to, of course, but that just means you’ll die with the rest of the Army.

“Lest you think I am bluffing, I suggest you take one step to your left, Draven.”

Who does this bastard think—?  Draven heard something above him and quickly jumped to his left without thinking too long about it.  He could feel the wind of something passing him by as it narrowly missed him, slamming into the ground with a *thunk*.  Right where he was standing was a large block of the unusual black and white-spotted stone; he went to kick it gently trying to move it, but it didn’t even wobble – it was so heavy.  If that had landed on me, it would’ve been the end for sure.  Having avoided death so closely didn’t do well for his nerves, and it was with extra shock that he noticed that there were an additional two-dozen boats floating nearby, with a rope connecting them all.

He looked around for help but noticed that every soldier standing around him had expressions on their faces that precluded him asking them to either ignore what they had just heard or to assist him.  In fact, they almost looked like they were going to attack him…

“Soldiers, please don’t try to harm Draven; I’ve got a special reception waiting for him, and I don’t want to have him hurting even more of you unnecessarily on my conscience.”

Draven wasn’t sure if they were scared of him, or if they were actually heeding the voice’s request, but the soldiers pulled back and let him pass.  While he didn’t know how that voice thought he could kill them all, the Caster thought it was safe to assume that he could hear and see everything that happened inside the…dungeon?  He ultimately wanted to get to the end of this place so that he could destroy the rest of the Guild; he secretly thought the voice was lying and that he would still find them toward the end.  If not, though, he was sure he could bargain for at least his own release by trading away his Power Potions.  The other Cordpower reps were out of luck, unless for some reason they had some with them as well.

He boarded the front boat, followed by four others; he was about to order them to paddle the oars to get them moving when the boat started to move all by itself.  It only moved up far enough for the next boat to move into place, where it was boarded by another five reps.  This went on for another five minutes until all of the boats were full and all the Cordpower Company men were on board, most shivering at the extreme cold and some openly weeping at their fate.  Is everyone but me a weakling?

He had yet to see anything in that place that he thought was a major danger to him, especially if he had time to prepare something.  Anything except for what was in the current room; having the lack of a Water Affinity hadn’t really bothered him until now, but he was honestly nearly useless if something were to attack from underwater.

He sat in the boat stoically as it started to move, pulling along the others tethered to it.  He looked back to see the soldiers in the tunnel staring daggers at him and he couldn’t help but smile back at them.  He could see two of the Physical Augmenters holding what appeared to be a Fire-Affinity caster back as the woman tried to attack him and the boats; it wouldn’t have done much good, anyway, because he would’ve just negated whatever she tried to do with his own power.

The cold didn’t touch him as he held a shield of warm-temperature air around him, leaving him the freedom to watch as they glided effortlessly through the water.  They swerved around five different massive blocks of ice before they got to the end of the room, every moment tense as Draven expected some sort of attack to occur from below.  However, true to the voice’s word, nothing bothered them.

Similar to the loading procedure, they disembarked one boat at a time until they were all standing on the platform leading to another tunnel.  When everyone was ready, Draven led the way, unsure of what was waiting for him.  No traps sprung out of the walls like he was expecting in the well-lit hallway; in fact, it was relatively peaceful, with only the sounds of their footsteps echoing briefly down the tunnel.  At the end of the corridor, all Draven could see was a black void.

As soon as they all passed the threshold of the tunnel, however, a massive wall slammed down behind them, trapping them inside the hallway.  Suddenly, the lights started to dim in the corridor, fading to complete darkness within seconds.  Before he could panic, he lit a quick-lighting stick and formed a large flame, lighting the way ahead.  A dozen others were apparently Fire-Affinity Casters as well, though their flames were quite a bit smaller than his.

In the black void ahead, a sudden light shone down from an unseen source, highlighting a small table containing a single object standing upright.  Draven paused, expecting an attack of some sort, but after a moment he relaxed when nothing else happened.

This was obviously where he was supposed to go, so he cautiously approached, the reps behind him keeping close as they whispered to each other and peered around fearfully.  Draven ignored them as he neared the table, all attempts at caution evaporating as he saw the object clearer.  It looked like a Power Potion, though in a strange shape; it was larger than a Cordpower Company one, with a flat bottom that allowed it to stand upright, as well as a clearer, purer-looking consistency.

“Welcome to the current final room of my dungeon.  Congratulations on making it this far, even though you all did none of the work and I essentially gave you a pass through the eleventh room.  And, even though I know you probably don’t care about them, the rest of the Army is slowly going into their final sleep of this life as all the air is slowly pumped out of the dungeon and a soporific is pumped inside.  They won’t feel a thing, don’t worry.

“As for you, Draven, I wanted to give you a taste of what you will be missing because of your actions.  Go ahead, it’s perfectly fine – if I wanted that to kill you, I wouldn’t have brought you all the way here.”

Draven’s hand trembled as he slid his fingers around the Potion vial, the shaking so bad he almost dropped the entire thing.  Fortunately, only a single drop spilled out as he held it in his hand; he could practically feel the thrum of Power that infused the concentrated water in his hand.  Is this?

He, of course, had heard about the special Power Potion that was rumored to have caused a stir around the Kingdom, though he had never had a chance to sample it, to his distress.  But if this was what he thought it was, then being able to say he found the source of the Potion was worth more than anything – he would even give up his experiments if he had control of something like that.

Draven tipped the vial up to his lips and the liquid poured down his throat.  He instantly felt his slightly depleted Power Pool fill up to bursting and beyond; in addition, all of the fatigue from the long day of running and making his way through the strange rooms of death and destruction seemed to fade away as a smile was involuntarily plastered across his face.

“Nice, huh?  Well, I just wanted to give you a taste of the last good thing you’ll ever experience before I wipe you off the face of this planet.”

The pure bliss faded as he heard the voice speak those words.

“Oh, and unlike the peaceful sleep the Army is experiencing right now…this will hurt.”

The flames that everyone – including him – had originally lit, had been extinguished as soon as they had entered the light in the middle of the room.  He didn’t remember doing it, but as it wasn’t needed anymore, he must’ve automatically canceled the Fire manipulation to save Power.

Either way, it still wasn’t needed as light flooded the rest of the room, blinding him and the others for a moment.  Once his eyes adjusted enough to see, he wished he hadn’t looked.

Surrounding the group of over 100 Cordpower Company representatives – and Draven – was a massive collection of frighteningly monstrous beasts.  Glancing around, he saw they ranged from some Proctan-shaped lizards riding on the back of a smaller version of the black-shelled beasts, huge monkey-bear-like hybrid beasts that appeared as if they could snap him in half, and an exceedingly large snake with a massive head – all poised and ready to strike.

“Wait, wait, wait!  Can’t we talk about—!”

Chapter 32 – Full responsibility

Normally, Milton wasn’t that cruel and blood-thirsty; it was just something about that sadistically cruel bastard that really got to him.  He could understand the motivations of someone like Gavin, who had ordered the assassination of the Royal family in order to further his political ambitions.  He could also understand the reasoning behind blaming the Guardian Guild for the deed as well – it eliminated a rival for the governing for the Kingdom.  While he could understand the purpose behind them, that still didn’t mean that he approved of the actions.

But what he absolutely abhorred was the cruelty and sadistic nature of men like Draven, who went out of their way to inflict harm on other people either for their own enjoyment or for experimentation.  People like that needed to be put down like a diseased rat, otherwise they could infect an entire population.

The fact that he was able to eliminate the Cordpower Company representatives at the same time was just a bonus.  Although he disliked them, they hadn’t specifically shown that they were as cruel and heartless as Draven; still, he was hesitant to ever bring them back unless there was dire need.  And at the moment – there was no dire need.

“That was a bit over-the-top, don’t you think?” ALANNA asked, after the reps and Draven were destroyed within seconds of the battle starting.  Honestly, they had no chance, but he wasn’t playing fair.

“I take full responsibility for my actions, and I won’t apologize, either.  They got what they deserved.”

ALANNA actually laughed at that.  “Oh, no – that’s not what I’m talking about.  I agree that they had that coming to them: I already told you I thought that guy Draven was a dick.  I was talking about the whole ‘Power Potion’ and the—” she changed her voice to sound just like Milton, which was unnerving— “‘I just wanted to give you a taste of the last good thing you’ll ever experience before I wipe you off the face of this planet’ thing.”

If Milton could blush, he would’ve been red down to his toes.  “Yeah, well, I was trying to do my best to be more impressive and dramatic without going too far.  I guess I failed at that, didn’t I?”

“You’re being silly, Milton – who are you trying to impress?  It’s only me and you here—”

“Oh, uh – that was entirely for my own enjoyment.  Besides, it might make a good movie later for when the Guild comes back, don’t you think?”

ALANNA stared at one of his sensor orbs for a moment, deep in thought, before she smiled and agreed.

Why did I do that?  Was it just for me, or was it something I wanted to do subconsciously?  Do I even have a subconscious?  He wasn’t sure exactly why he did it, all he knew was that it felt right to him.  Maybe all of the recent stressful situations – as well as the pervasive radiation – were finally getting to him.  He shelved thinking about it for another day.

Current Short-term Goal: Duty Calls – Complete!

Your dungeon is facing an invasion by an army, an army that will not be dissuaded.  To ensure that their threat is eliminated completely, do not allow a single member of the army to escape.

-         Royal Army Reserve soldiers remaining: 0/20,000 – Complete!

-         Cordpower Company representatives remaining: 0/145 – Complete!

-         Invading army leader, Draven (Elemental Caster) remaining: 0/1 – Complete!

Difficulty of Goal: Easy

Timeframe: 8 hours

Rewards: Experience, +2 to Insight/Luck

As he had his drones swarm inside the dungeon, converting the bodies of everyone who had perished inside, he quickly watched as the DNA Harvester quest was finally completed – by a large margin.

Current Average-term Goal: DNA Harvester – Complete!

After gaining DNA samples of various Proctans with abilities, you have discovered that they provide unique gene mutations.  Currently, you can apply a single gene mutation – acquire more samples to unlock the ability to add more than one to your Combat Units.

-            Add +1 gene mutation to your Combat Units – Current: 18/18 – Complete!

-            Add +2 gene mutations to your Combat Units – Current: 90/90 – Complete!

-            Add +3 gene mutations to your Combat Units – Current: 450/450 – Complete!

-            Add +4 gene mutations to your Combat Units – Current: 2250/2250 – Complete!

-            Add +5 gene mutations to your Combat Units – Current: 11250/11250 – Complete!

Difficulty of Goal: Average

Timeframe: 40 years

Rewards: +10 to Communication/Charisma, enhance Combat Units’ Power Capacity X3

Bonus Rewards: For completing it faster than the allotted time, and by exceeding the required number of samples by twice the amount, you have unlocked another goal, DNA Harvester: The Second Harvest.

Congratulations!

Through the analysis of numerous gene mutations, you have discovered a way to increase the maximum Power Capacity of your Combat Units by 300%!  Normally, each of your Combat Units could only potentially hold a limited amount of Power before they hit their limit; now, however they will be able to increase their “Power Pool” by three times their former limit.  In addition, their ability to raise the amount of Power they can hold has now been sped up by 50%.  This change does not occur automatically – they will need to revisit a Bioconversion Lab for this to take effect.

Huh, I guess the Power Pool limit was probably at the maximum Power Ranking of Supreme-Master.  Since there were a few people slowly reaching that limit, like Rosewyn, this means that they can progress even further – and apparently faster now!

New Long-term Goal: DNA Harvester: The Second Harvest

After gaining DNA samples over 25,000 Proctans, you have discovered that there might be a way to program custom gene mutations for use in your Combat Units.  Unfortunately, you will need many, many more samples to accurately construct your custom gene mutations.  While you harvest these samples, you may also unlock the ability to add an even greater quantity of gene mutations, though adding too many to a single subject may have unforeseen consequences.

-          Add +6 gene mutations to your Combat Units – Current: 27548/100000

-          Add +7 gene mutations to your Combat Units – Current: 27548/500000

-          Add +8 gene mutations to your Combat Units – Current: 27548/1000000

-          Create your own custom gene mutations to add to your Combat Units – Current: 27548/5000000

Difficulty of Goal: Average

Timeframe: 100 years

Rewards: Additional gene mutations and the ability to customize your own gene mutations.

100 years!  He knew he had beaten the former timeframe by quite a large margin – at less than a year – but he had gotten lucky.  To reach five million different samples was nearly impossible.

With the completion of those two quests/goals, Milton looked at his status again[35], noting that he was almost at 100 in Communication/Charisma – only 6 points away.  He unfortunately didn’t get anything unlocked at 90 points, but he could feel his communication range expand again – even though it hadn’t been lacking since his last major upgrade.  He also received more experience from their deaths, though it was just barely over 200,000.  One interesting note was that although the Company reps were worth the same as the soldiers – 10 experience points – Draven was worth 1,000.  Probably because he was a Supreme Ranking already when he entered my dungeon.  From completing the quest to defend his dungeon, he also received another 200,000 experience – which effectively doubled what he had already received.

While the drones completed the cleanup, Milton finally realized something.  With Brint taking over operations at Camp Deathtrap, the threat of the Royal Army Reserve eliminated, and the Cordpower Company now severely hampered in its ability to do much of anything, he was now free to concentrate on the bigger picture.  He had already started preparations on the fortifications needed for the Kingdom’s citizens, but it was finally time to ramp things up.

He had a limited time with which to do it, but with his drones moving so much faster, he was confident it could get done.  Milton called a quick meeting with Flauren and Whisp – who had been in a secure lockdown since the Reserve had invaded the dungeon – to wrap up the final preparations.

They had already talked about how to create a mini-city to house over five million people – but the devil was always in the details.

Part IV – The Kingdom Rises

Chapter 33 – On the road again

Brint was exhausted.

Actually, more than exhausted – if he didn’t know better, he would’ve thought that he’d died and everything around him was some sort of death dream.  Fortunately (or unfortunately, he wasn’t sure yet), he wasn’t dead, though his head sure felt like it was.  Thankfully, this was the last time he would have to lead in the defense of Camp Deathtrap; based upon what both he and The Milton had seen, it was time for them all to move to the main camp only about 20 miles to the northwest.

This was his – he had to think about it for a moment – 22nd bait-and-destroy mission he had led since he took over operations at Deathtrap, a fitting moniker if he had ever heard of one.  In the nearly two weeks that they had been harrying the reinforcements that were steadily fed out to the tree-clearing teams of Bearillas and Quizards, they had killed hundreds – possibly thousands, he had lost count – of the massive monkey-bear monsters.  They had also eliminated nearly 100 times that many Quizards, of course, but they were almost negligible.

And in all that time, they had suffered very few casualties, none of which was anyone’s fault necessarily – it was all due to defense failure.  The super-thin wire grid that they had been using to slice and dice the majority of the Quizards who emerged from the underground tunnel had broken, allowing a stream of nearly 2,000 of the quick lizards to emerge largely unscathed.  Luckily for the defenders, they hadn’t ever let down their guard and were easily able to eliminate them – but at the cost of a few Guild members who were initially overrun by the onslaught.  They were currently traveling back north with the help of some more Bearillas after being “reborn” down near the Station Core.

They had some spare grids, at least, so the drones were able to repair the broken defense quite easily, though if it broke again – they were out of luck.  With this last operation, though, even if it broke, it wouldn’t matter in the long-run; they were leaving Camp Deathtrap the next morning.

Brint was sitting down on top of the middle “tower”, his back against the half-wall surrounding the roof of the big block of Weightonite.  After his first experience at controlling all of the different elements of the defense, he had realized that trying to stand up and appear commanding and in charge was stupid; he didn’t need to physically “see” anything to do what he needed to do – everything he required was fed directly to him through various sensor orbs scattered over the field.  And not only that, but the first part of the process needed intense concentration, which made maintaining the balance of his physical body difficult.

The first time that he had connected with the Greycers, he experienced the rush of speed as they raced through the forest; they were so fast that he literally couldn’t control them – he had to let them pick their way through the trees without his help.  The most he could do was to point them in a direction and hold on for the ride.  Which was exhilarating, almost more so than flying with his Quagon, which was a whole other experience.

Controlling two of the racing dog-rabbits wasn’t difficult, nor did the range they eventually reached strain him – which was a welcome surprise.  He had a feeling that if he were to send them even further out, the connection would become a little more difficult, but he had improved his ability to control them by leaps-and-bounds since he had acquired an NCU.  He wasn’t sure if it was because he was now “part of the system” as The Milton told him, but it nevertheless quite a difference.

Breaking through the trees into the pathway being cleared for the 22nd time didn’t lessen his fear any; if anything, it made him even more concerned when there were hundreds of Bearillas seemingly waiting for the Greycers to emerge.  Up until then, reinforcements to the Bearillas and Quizards had been relatively steady; every time they disturbed the army and convinced a large portion of them to chase the Greycers, they delayed the progress of the tree-clearing by anywhere from a few hours to up to a day once.

It actually surprised everyone that they had been so successful with their predictable and repetitive baiting; whoever was leading the monstrous army apparently either didn’t know what was happening, or they didn’t care. Apparently, that had changed – they were waiting for him.

The Squirrel scouts lining the southern part of the pathway hadn’t seen this happening when he first started racing north.  With his concentration fully on the Greycers, he hadn’t bothered to recheck to make sure it was still clear to proceed, which turned out to be a mistake.  Nothing had changed before, so he had assumed that it wouldn’t; the powers in charge of the northern army seemingly decided that they had had enough of his meddling, however.

Although the Greycers were fast, they couldn’t turn on point; as a result, one of the super-fast dog-bunnies was caught as Brint tried to turn it around and retreat.  The other one managed to squeeze through the converging Bearillas and escape back down south.  He cut his connection with the one that was caught just as it was passed alive to the largest Bearilla he had ever seen.

Unlike the Elite Bearillas – at least that’s what The Milton called the older, larger Bearillas – who had been seen more often as of late, this monstrosity was half again as big, though its hair was completely white and silver all over its body.  The other Bearillas seemed to defer to it, even the Elites, and Brint wished there was a sensor orb near so that he could get a better read on it.  Alas, all of their sensor orbs needed to be near Camp Deathtrap, utilizing the ambient power that The Milton’s Geothermal Stations created.

Worst of all – even worse than their operations being somehow too predictable now – was that none of the Bearillas or Quizards took the bait.  Once the Greycer was far enough south that Brint was fairly certain that it wouldn’t be caught if he left control for a moment, he looked through some of the Squirrel scouts’ eyes and saw that nothing had moved.  The white-and-silver Bearilla had apparently reined everyone in, not allowing them to chase after the tantalizing treat.  Of the Greycer that had been caught, there was no sign of it other than some blood staining the front of the massive Bearilla.

“Bad news, everyone.  It looks like they’ve gotten wise to our setup here and aren’t going to be taking the bait now.  They’ve got someone new in charge.”

Talking to everyone in camp at the same time had gotten easier the more he did it; he had been hesitant at first, but after a while it became natural to speak to them all – especially since a lot of them were scattered around the clearing or in underground bunkers.  Rosewyn and her group had left a week earlier, heading to the main camp for some reason or other, so Gereld – the Guardian Guild leader – had been his go-to contact ever since.

“Well, we knew it was going to happen at some point, I’m just glad it lasted as long as it did.  Nice job, Brint – you make a good Commander,” the Guild leader told Brint, clapping him on his shoulder as he stood up after giving the Greycer orders to return to the Camp.  He felt himself blush from the praise, but it was much less than it would’ve been a couple weeks ago; he was well aware how much work it had been trying to control everything in the operation, and he had to admit that he did a pretty good job.

“Well, if we’re not seeing any more action today, let’s let everyone get some rest and we’ll leave as soon as we’re packed up.  You too, Commander,” Gereld added, smiling at Brint without a touch of irony.

He didn’t complain or refuse; in fact, he agreed so whole-heartedly that he just sat right back down and leaned up against the wall, his eyes closing almost instantly.  He had learned to grab sleep when he could, because they were constantly on the lookout for reinforcements up north and they needed to be able to thin them out at a moment’s notice.

Therefore, when his eyes closed, it didn’t take long for the blessedly dreamless oblivion of sleep to overtake him.

*        *        *

When he woke up, he found himself strapped to the back of his Quagon, his sleep apparently so deep and uninterrupted that it was a wonder that he didn’t wake up through what had to be some intense man-handling.  As soon as he thought this, the answer presented itself – again.

“Brint!  Sorry about the forced sleep again, but you were working yourself way too hard.  If it hadn’t been for the nanites in your body keeping you alive, you probably would’ve collapsed and died due to acute exhaustion days ago.  You’re not completely recovered, but you should feel at least a little better now.”

The Milton was right, Brint did feel better.  He was still a little tired, but it wasn’t the same bone-numbing exhaustion he had felt before he had fallen asleep atop the tower…

He looked around for the first time, noticing that he was still in the clearing where Camp Deathtrap had done all of the work thinning out the northern army for the last two weeks.  However, the Camp was…gone.  And not just hidden behind Holographic Illusion projectors, either.  While he couldn’t physically “see” through the illusions, he didn’t need to because he could access the controls behind them; in this case, there was nothing to access – it was all gone.

The only thing that remained was the pit filled with spikes and some holes leading into the ground.  The Weightonite block towers were missing as well, and as Brint reached out with his ability to access The Milton’s neural network he couldn’t detect anything nearby – nor anyone with an NCU.  They had abandoned him.

“I know what you’re probably thinking, but don’t worry – you weren’t left behind on accident.  I instructed Gereld to place you on top of the Quagon before they left.  Once the entire Camp had been dismantled and the defenses loaded onto Glider Wagons, they departed for the main camp.  I needed you here to get the Quagon off the ground and into the air.”

I guess that makes sense.  His Quagon had been hiding in the forest to the south, after having to have some drones remove a few trees in its path.  It was too big to incorporate into the defenses of the Camp, so it had been contently waiting for Brint to need it again.  It couldn’t lift off without his help, otherwise he would’ve sent it up to help scout; he could control it from a fairly long distance now, but it still needed his Self-levitation ability to get airborne.

“So…now what?” he asked, still waking up and coming to the realization that his stint as Camp Deathtrap Commander was at an end.  He was relieved and disappointed; it had been inordinately stressful having everyone rely on his abilities to keep them alive – but at the end of the day he finally felt like he was making a difference.  Just going back up to scout the approaching army seemed like a step back, though he did have to admit that he missed flying through the air.

“Now, my friend, it’s time to fly the friendly skies.  Head over to the main camp – which the people there are taking to calling ‘Stonewall’ – and check it out.  I’m sure there are a few people there that would love to check out the Quagon you’re flying.

“After that, I need your help scouting again.  I know it’s not as glamorous as commanding the entire operation at Camp Deathtrap, but you’re the only one that can do it – and do it quickly – right now.  By the way, I want you to know that I thought you did an awesome job; I couldn’t have done it better myself.  And what you’ve done has potentially saved the entire Kingdom.”

Such praise coming from the Guild members he had been working with had become almost commonplace over the last two weeks, but praise coming from The Milton himself was incomparable.  He felt himself flush with pride, much more than when Gereld had said similar things, and he was speechless for a moment.

“Thank you, I only tried to imagine what you would do,” Brint finally said, when he was able to communicate again.

The Milton was silent for a moment, before he broke off communication saying he was looking forward to Brint checking out the new camp, and mumbling something that sounded like, “a WWJD moment”.  It was just another thing that the Station Core said that didn’t make sense, so Brint ignored it like he did a lot of the things he heard from The Milton that seemed indecipherable.

Before he took off, Brint looked around at the clearing again, remembering the placement of the different defenses.  So much had happened over the last few weeks, though most of it almost seemed like he was recalling it through a haze.  He had been so intent on keeping everyone at the Camp safe that he hadn’t really had time to process the changes.

The news that the Royal Army Reserve had attacked and been defeated inside The Milton’s dungeon was met with mixed reactions from the Guild.  They knew that the Reserve was being deceived and manipulated by the Cordpower Company’s machinations, and that was the main reason they hadn’t fought back against them – because they were, at their core, innocent pawns in the political gain.

The only thing that made their deaths better was the fact that they weren’t permanently dead.  The Milton had already told them that he was planning on bringing them back as soon as he had the resources to do that; he wasn’t quite set up for it at the moment, because most of the things that he had been using to run the whole dungeon-training program were sent north for the defense of the Kingdom.

The additional news that Draven – a former member of the Guardian Guild’s leadership – had been a traitor and had been killed in the dungeon (never to be brought back) was not only accepted but celebrated.  For the next week, Brint constantly heard mutterings of “I knew it!” and “I hope that bastard got what he deserved!” in between attacks by the Bearillas.

Other than that, the news that was passed on to Brint and the Guild was for the most part positive.  There hadn’t been any backlash from whoever was left from the Cordpower Company, though he did hear that some of the Company’s people who went north with the village and town citizens had had to be put in their place as they tried to take control.  And as far as the massive undertaking of moving every citizen up to the northeast border, The Milton had told him that he was almost positive that 98% of the population had been moved.  The only major holdouts were some of the richer merchants in Grestwinch and, of course, the many people that Cordpower employed.

They weren’t invited to the party.

Only the other five million people in the Kingdom were.  Which, according to the last thing The Milton had told him about it, was going better than expected considering the sudden departure from their homes.  The last of the citizens had arrived at the main camp – Stonewall, apparently – and that was one of the reasons that the Guild fighters were already slated to move there.  The other reason was the increase of enemy reinforcements, which Brint had seen firsthand.

And now he was eager to see how over five million people were supposed to live in one place.  The Milton had privately told him that where he came from, having so many people packed together was commonplace; however, to Brint’s knowledge it had never been attempted before.  The most people he had heard of living so close to one another was in the capital of Grestwinch, though it still only had a fraction of the entire Kingdom’s population.

He didn’t want to waste any more time, so Brint got his Quagon moving, racing across the clearing at an astonishingly quick pace.  Before he knew it, the trees were closing in and he popped his Self-levitation ability, rapidly flinging the massive lizard upwards.  The wings snapped open and he felt himself flattened backwards and against the back of the Quagon as it shot high up into the air, clearing the treetops at the clearing’s edge by only a few feet.

As they climbed farther into the sky, Brint looked back and saw the large clearing quickly disappear behind them, rapidly becoming only a small blemish in the awe-inspiring massive forest of trees.  Leveling off at the top of their ascent, Brint was finally able to look ahead – and saw something equally – or possibly even more – magnificent than the sea of trees he was leaving behind.

Chapter 34 – Stonewall

It was closer than he was expecting to the border, but he guessed it made sense to have everyone as near on hand as possible to help repel the ever-growing army ripping up trees in their path.

Row after row of very long, normal-stone buildings were placed parallel to each other, lining the land for miles in every almost every direction he looked.  Flying lower, he could see that each of the buildings was 10 stories tall, with windows apparently made of glass that he assumed were placed to indicate the different rooms inside.  He estimated that the length of the residences was nearly half a mile long in and of themselves; he was sure that Whisp would be able to look at them and tell him exactly how many people could fit in each one, but he didn’t have that kind of ability.  His best guess was that they would fit around 20,000.

Massive spheres were held up by long columns spaced apart from each other, which had large pipes running from the bottom of the spheres to the nearby buildings.  By keeping his Quagon steady, Brint was able to count and saw that around 50 of the buildings had pipes running into the top of them.

“It’s a sight to see, huh?  I worked with Flauren and your girlfriend to design this whole setup.  Those water towers are constantly filled by a Molecular Converter and those pipes send it straight down into the 4,000 rooms per building, 20,000 people a piece.  All of the unused and waste water is sent far below, where chutes lead to four other Molecular Converters that recycle everything from all 250 buildings.  There are just over 5 million people all crowded in about 10 square miles at an average of 5 per room.  Fortunately, they aren’t cramped and many of them have expressed that they actually have more living space than back home.

“Then, of course, they are all raving about the easy availability of all the food they could ever want with four more Converters in each of the buildings’ eating spaces.  Although it’s not as luxurious as the Refuge, they are settling in well.”

Now that he looked, Brint could see literal “hordes” of his people moving around on the ground, most of which were moving toward a large cleared area that was in the middle of the endless lines of buildings.  From his estimation, it was probably ten times the size of the clearing he had just departed, if not more; it was hard to tell because there were so many people doing…something…on the field.

“I’ve told them to clear an area for you to land – just make sure you don’t squash anybody.”

The amusement in The Milton’s voice was obvious, as Brint and his Quagon still weren’t the most adept at landings.  Plus, knowing he had an audience, his nerves probably weren’t going to help.  Fortunately, after two weeks of doing nothing but controlling Combat Units and defenses, he had started to become more in tune with the control necessary to successfully utilize them.

Which helped immensely as he spotted the only – ridiculously small – cleared space he could see near the field.  Instead of doing his normal attempt at a gliding landing, and then hoping he didn’t overshoot the space, he decided to try something new.  Reaching out for his Power, he augmented the Strength and Constitution of his Quagon, knowing that it was going to need both of those attributes for this maneuver.

He was still high in the air, at least 2,000 feet above the surface and nearly half that away from the cleared space, when he suddenly instructed the Quagon to dive straight down, collapsing its wings to reduce friction.  At about 200 feet from the ground, Brint had his mount snap its wings open, angling them slightly so that it started to aim for the space he was supposed to land at.  He could feel the strain as the sheer speed of the dive stressed against the wing and muscles underneath his harness, but the augmentations held.

They were still flying fast at a shallow angle heading down toward the ground flying over the heads of thousands of citizens beneath him, when he heard the first screams as people started to catch a glimpse of him as he flew by.  Fortunately, nothing attacked him as he approached the small clearing – which actually appeared a little bigger now that he was closer to it – and he suddenly pulled the Quagon up until it was shooting straight up into the sky.  Once it was completely vertical, he forced it to snap its wings closed, its momentum causing it to rise another hundred feet or so.

As they fell back to the earth, Brint managed to get the massive lizard to contort itself so that it was parallel to the ground.  When they were 50 feet away from smashing into the dirt below, Brint activated his Self-levitation ability and the negative gravity field formed below them.  What he didn’t count on was the sudden jolt as they were caught by it, but it fortunately didn’t hurt anything other than his forehead which smacked against the handle on his harness.  Luckily, he had experience lately maintaining his concentration, so he was able to maintain the field and slowly lower themselves to the ground.

He had done it!  Brint had never landed the Quagon in such a small space before, and he was inordinately proud of himself.  As he started to unstrap himself from the harness, he noticed that the screaming had stopped, only to be replaced by a cacophony of sound and movement that assaulted his senses.  There were people everywhere.

From his slightly higher vantage point on top of the Quagon, Brint could see thousands, possibly millions (he had never seen so many people together at one time, so it was difficult to even comprehend what he was seeing, let alone count them) of people engaged in various forms of activity.

His landing space was close to the eastern edge of the field, which allowed him to see long lines of citizens aiming toward over a dozen Molecular Converters clustered together.  When one of the people stepped up to it, they paused for a second before one of the Converters spat out a couple of things.

The first was obvious to Brint: a sword.  However, it was a sword unlike any that he had seen before.  It was clear as if it were made of glass, though he could see a thin line in the middle of it that hinted at some metal at least supporting it.  After seeing someone drop one as they left, however, it hit the ground and cut through the dirt a few inches like it was nothing.

The other thing that was produced was a set of dark clothing, browns and blacks from the look of them, that looked…normal.  They were a little thicker than he was used to seeing, but nothing too abnormal.  The only thing that was unusual was that there was a padded helmet of the same type of material that he could see many of those around him already wearing.

Further out in the field, he could see people lined up in rows facing the same direction, watching someone demonstrate something with their own sword.  Within seconds, he recognized Moxwell, Rosewyn’s husband, demonstrating how to place your hands on the sword, following it up with the correct slashing motions to effectively strike an opponent.

That might be good to learn sometime.  Brint had always relied on his ability to control Combat Units to do the fighting for him, but he always wanted to be able to do more than just that – especially with the ability to augment his own physical attributes.

The citizens around him training were people from all walks of life: men and women, young and old, rich and poor, and even those highly skilled in their abilities and those who were not.  They were all equal in their training, and as they were all dressed in the same clothes it made them start to look like an army more than just an amalgamation of random people who had come together.

He thought he recognized one of Rosewyn’s volunteers roaming through the crowd, giving encouragement wherever she passed.  He didn’t know her name, but he could clearly see that those who saw or spoke to her perk up and smile, going about what they were doing with more enthusiasm.

He turned his attention away from the Charisma-boosted volunteer and just happened to catch someone training with Moxwell accidentally lose hold of their sword when they swung it forward.  It smacked into the back of the person in front of them, cutting a deep gash into the clothing but not piercing through.  All work stopped as Brint recognized one of the Healers that had been at Camp Deathtrap rush up to make sure no one had gotten hurt.

Apparently, those aren’t “normal” clothes.

The Healer pointed the one who had gotten his clothes damaged towards the Molecular Converters again, before retreating from the training section.  Moxwell quickly resumed his demonstration, allowing the rest to practice as they could – though Brint could tell even from a distance that they were taking extra care to keep a tight grip on their swords.

In another direction, flames of fire erupted into the sky as Brint recognized Rosewyn directing another large class of what appeared to be Elemental Casters.  They were enclosed in a high circular wall that he was just barely able to see over, which he assumed was for the protection of those passing by so they wouldn’t get turned into a torch accidentally.

Brint saw another few circular walls scattered about, and although he couldn’t see everything happening within them, he assumed there were more classes inside them with other Caster instructors.  In all, he counted four of the smaller circular walls – one for each of the basic elements – but it was the larger, low-walled…arena…that caught his attention.

Inside, he could see various areas set up where the Kingdom’s citizens were facing off against small beasts.  It appeared to be a real fight, too, as he saw a couple people get hit from some large antlered rabbits launching themselves at a group.  Fortunately, the clothes they were wearing prevented anything from piercing them, but the force of the impact still hurt them – knocking an older woman down before she was surrounded by others who came to her defense long enough for her to get up.

On the sides of the “arena”, Brint could see a few Molecular Converters spitting out more beasts, varying in size and shape though very similar to those inside The Milton’s dungeon.  There were even a few that he hadn’t seen before, but before he could focus on them, he saw a few drones scurrying through the mock-battlefield, picking up the corpses of the slain Combat Units and depositing them back inside the Converters.

What surprised him the most, however, was the fact that he thought he could see around a dozen Quizards and two Bearillas standing quietly at the far end of the field, in plain view of everyone who could see them.

“I sent them here so that people could see what they would be going up against.  If all goes well, most of these people won’t have to go toe-to-toe with a Bearilla, but most of the Quizards that are coming are going to be their responsibility.”

Brint guessed that made sense.  He once overheard The Milton saying that information was a powerful resource, and that it was important to “know thy enemy” – whatever that meant.  Either way, everyone gave the massive creatures a wide berth.

A crowd had gathered around his Quagon while he was looking around and he could see the frightened/curious glances of those nearest him.  They didn’t get too close, but he was sure they would once they got over their fear of the giant flying lizard.  Which meant that he had to get off the back of it before the too-curious prevented him from leaving.

After making sure his straps were all done, he sent a command to the Quagon to sit still and allow anyone brave enough to touch it to allow them to do so.  He didn’t need his mount accidentally killing someone.

Questions assaulted him from all around, inquiries ranging from what the Quagon was called, where he got it, and even if there were any more that they could fly.  He answered as best he could before escaping the pressure of the crowd; despite being the Commander of Camp Deathtrap, he wasn’t used to being surrounded by people clamoring for his attention.

Ducking behind another curious onlooker as they tried to push through the gathering crowd looking at his Quagon, Brint thought he was in the clear as he tried to slink away.  He scooted around another group heading toward his landing spot when he was suddenly sucker-punched hard in the stomach.  He doubled over in pain, activating his Physical Augmentations too late to save the initial hit, but allowing him to recover enough that he was able to stand back up and see who had hit him.

He straightened up to see a face that he hadn’t seen in what felt like years, but he remembered vividly.  It was just one of the vast array of tormentors that had ridiculed and verbally assaulted him when it was revealed that he didn’t have an ability.

“Well, look who just flew in!  Tell me, Brint, who did you have to murder to get that massive flying lizard?  Maybe if I enact a little village justice for the killing of our resident Inventor, those in charge of this place might give it to me as a reward for getting rid of useless trash,” sneered Clogan, backed up by two of his cronies nearby.  They were dressed just like the others surrounding them, black-and-brown colored clothing – and the strangely sharp glass swords by their sides.

Brint quickly got his bearings back from the unexpected attack and appearance by one of his childhood bullies.  “Clogan, I can’t say it’s good to see you.  And for your information, I didn’t kill Whisp; in fact, she’s still alive.  Now, move aside and go about your business and I’ll go about mine.”

Brint had always imagined discovering an ability one day and paying back everyone that had looked down on him.  He used to dream about having some sort of super-ability that would enable him to exact his vengeance upon them like one of the Beast War heroes of legend; after having acquired more abilities than he had ever dreamed of possessing, however, those dreams didn’t seem as…important.  He had gained more than just those abilities over the last couple of months – he had gained confidence in himself.

He tried to push past the three young men, but they refused to move.  All of them were low-ranked Physical Augmenters that had a focus on their Strength, and they weren’t used to being dismissed like Brint had just done.  Clogan went to punch him again but Brint had already boosted all of his own attributes including his Agility, which allowed him to easily dodge the attack.

“Well, well – it looks like ‘Brint the Useless’ convinced someone to augment his speed a little.  I’m not sure who would waste their time on you like that, but they’ll figure out their mistake when I slice you in half with this sword I was given,” Clogan announced, after ineffectually trying to hit him again.

The bully raised his glass-looking sword, intending to strike out at Brint – who wasn’t too worried because he was still faster than him – but before Clogan could do anything, a voice of authority called out, “Stop!”

He wasn’t even able to respond, however, as the young man holding the sword was frozen as he was wrapped up in bands of invisible air that Brint could see pressing up against his clothes.  Looking at the other two men, he could also see that they were frozen in place as well, all of them struggling ineffectually against their restraints.

Out of the corner of his eye, Brint could see two figures walking toward the confrontation.  Rosewyn had been the source of the voice that he had recognized, and she was walking with a scowl on her face that scared him for a moment before he realized the look was directed toward the three that had been wrapped up.

But next to her was someone he hadn’t been expecting to see, and it took him a moment to recognize Whisp dressed in the same clothes as everyone else – though he had to admit that it looked better on her.  She was holding her hands out toward the three young men with a look of intense dislike in her gaze; he belatedly realized that it had been her that had immobilized them with her Air Affinity.  I guess she’s had some time to practice.

He could see that Clogan and the others recognized her as well, and their faces went almost white as they realized what they had just tried to do.  Not only were they about to try to kill Brint for something that he didn’t actually do, but they also got a sense of who was walking toward them.

Two obviously pissed-off, high-Supreme-ranked individuals who could squash them like bugs.

“Obviously, I’m still alive and you nearly tried to kill my boyfriend.  You best leave now before I lose my temper and squeeze those bands of air a little too tight,” Whisp said in a controlled voice, as she stared at them for nearly a minute before releasing them.  Needless to say, they beat a hasty retreat.

“Whisp, my love!  What are you doing here?  Isn’t it, you know, a little dangerous here?”

She laughed at him, swatting him across the chest as she pulled back from their embrace.  “Of course it’s dangerous – that’s the whole point.  I came up here with thousands of other Guild members that had been safe in the Refuge.  There was no way we were going to let the whole rest of the Kingdom fight for its defense without us doing our part.  Besides,” she spoke softly, “I can’t really die, you know?”

“That’s true…otherwise I would attempt to strap you to the back of my Quagon and fly you far from here.  I guess…you have just as much right and reason to be here as everyone else does.”  He thought for a moment.  “Something just occurred to me – what about the children?”

“If you’re talking about the children in the Refuge, they’re still there along with nearly 500 adults taking care of them.  As for those here, they will be ushered to a deep underground bunker at the first sign of an attack.  Milton says that he has ten drones working non-stop on creating a tunnel system connecting to the bunker that will lead them down south towards him and the dungeon, though it will take a while to get that far.  Either way, with the adults in charge of them down there and two Molecular Converters, they’ll be as safe as anywhere in the Kingdom.”

Brint held her again, her short stature allowing him to place his chin on the top of her head.  “Well, despite the danger – I’m glad you’re here.  I missed you terribly.”

“Me too.  Now, follow me to where I’ve been staying so I can show you how much I’ve missed you.”

He didn’t argue as she pulled him along, waving thanks to Rosewyn as he escaped from the crowds.  She just smiled at him and waved back.

Chapter 35 – Breakthrough

While Brint had been overseeing the operations at Camp Deathtrap, Milton had turned his attention to the northeastern Kingdom camp.  After essentially gutting his satellite dungeon rooms, the CAS, and the majority of the primary dungeon rooms of their Molecular Converters and Power Generators, he spent time creating more Greycers to deliver them all to the new camp.  He had already sent some of the Geothermal Transmutation Stations up there as soon as he had access to them, along with a few dozen drones and two Converters with Power Generators.

In addition, he reassigned a dozen of Rosewyn’s volunteers to the eventual camp location, to welcome the new arrivals.  Whisp and Flauren were also a big help on figuring out the best way to house five million citizens while still maintaining their health and safety – hence the constantly flowing water from the water towers.  Sanitation was the number two priority in that regards; feeding them was relegated to priority number one.  Which was expensive.

His drones had quickly built 250 massively long buildings built close together out of basic, strong, and cheap stone; he didn’t use Weightonite because he needed a lot of it for the actual defenses.  What he couldn’t skimp on, was the Molecular Converters and Access Terminals for feeding the masses.

All told, including the single Converter in each of the five water towers, the four operating to recycle the waste water far underground, the two in the emergency children’s bunker, the 24 operating on the training field, and the four in each building, he ended up needing to utilize 1,035 Molecular Converters, along with about 300 Power Generators (though, most of those he had pilfered from his dungeon), which severely ate into his defense budget.  Added to that, he ended up spending 1,250 of his precious Focusing Crystals to create the Access Terminals – all so the citizens would be relatively comfortable.

And don’t even get him started on the furniture.

Fortunately, Milton was able to dismantle and convert more than half of his normal Bioconversion Labs for their resources; he figured if he needed to use them, the people he brought back wouldn’t be able to make it back to whatever battle had killed them in time to make a difference.  He wished that he could build facilities at the camp, but everything he built had to be within 5 miles of his Core.  Short of moving his massive shell all the way up there, he was out of luck.

But he sent almost everything else he could that wasn’t figuratively nailed down, and even pried up and shipped out some that was.  Most of the Combat Units were still alive and kicking inside his main dungeon, just in case; otherwise, everything else was shut down.  Even the Refuge was down to only a fraction of its residents, as most of them had gone north to fight in the upcoming defense.

And it turned out to be just barely enough.  He hadn’t forgotten that he needed to equip everyone with his new Diamene-layered padded clothing, as well as their new swords.  While he was swimming in Bio Mass because of the mass of Bearillas and Quizards Camp Deathtrap provided, each of the swords cost a minimum of 2 BMUs – which equaled 10 million BMUs for just swords!  He was lucky that the armored clothing only cost organic material and Bio Mass, because he would’ve run out of resources far ahead of the demand.

However, even with the additional Bio Mass he received from their delaying tactics and his expanded Farms, he was going to run out of food within a week after having to feed all of the teeming masses of citizens.  Unfortunately (or fortunately, as far as Milton’s resources went) the Bearillas were close to making a breakthrough – of the forest destruction kind.  It wouldn’t be long until they crossed over to Kingdom territory.

Milton had something going for him, though.  Because of his Combat Units utterly decimating hundreds of Bearillas and tens of thousands of Quizards at Deathtrap, he had amazingly increased his Combat Level[36] again despite the diminishing experience he was receiving from their deaths.

Milton had a choice to make – which statistic should he bump up to 100?  He was tempted to just finish off Communication/Charisma because it only required 6 points to do so – but would that help him?  If he used 6 of his 23 available points, he wouldn’t have enough to increase anything else up to 100.  And figuring that his Combat Units would probably receive a bonus to that stat, he didn’t think extra Charisma would help in the coming battle.

Sensor Interpretation/Perception might help, but he doubted that his Combat Units would greatly benefit from being able to see and aim better; if what he suspected was coming for them was deemed true, it wasn’t going to matter.  So that left either a bump in his Processing Power/Intelligence or his Ingenuity/Wisdom – either of which would help all of his Proctan Combat Units immensely, no matter what abilities they had.

It was the classic question that gamers struggled with when plotting out their builds: Do I want to hit harder or last longer?  Higher Intelligence builds were beneficial for quick, dirty fights where each spell landed quickly finished off an opponent, whereas higher Wisdom builds were usually strong for lengthy battles where staying power and higher regeneration was key.  Milton usually didn’t min/max like that – preferring to balance the two as much as he could, allowing his characters to be adaptable in most situations.

As much as he’d like to do that here, Milton didn’t have enough points to do that.  He had to choose one or the other – and so he based his choice on the long-game.  Plus, he thought it might ultimately help with his resource problem.

Congratulations!

By increasing your Ingenuity/Wisdom to 100, you have gained the following bonuses:

- Specific resources needed in the construction of Facilities can now be substituted by other resources up to 15%

- Specific resources needed in the construction of anything in the Drone Assembly Plant can now be substituted by other resources up to 10%

- Specific resources needed in the construction of anything in the Defensive Weapons Factory can now be substituted by other resources up to 10%

- Specific resources needed in the construction of Combat Units can now be substituted by other resources up to 5%

- The required resources while producing any non-Combat Unit object (that is not part of the requirements for a Facility) inside of a Molecular Converter has been reduced by 5%

- By using your greater Ingenuity, there is less waste produced in your Ore Refinery, increasing refinement by 50%

- With the complete repair of your Ingenuity/Wisdom system, your drones are no longer limited to following blueprints and specific orders, but can now utilize their limited AI to produce their own interpretation of a general order if you so choose

Your Combat Units all receive a bonus 15% to their Wisdom Statistic, though this increase can only be applied through the use of a Bioconversion Lab.

Congratulations!

By increasing both your Processing Speed/Agility and Ingenuity/Wisdom to 100, you have received the following bonus:

- New Facility[37] option now available

Just as he thought, his Combat Units now had a bonus 15% to their Wisdom, which meant that they would all have an increased Power Pool – upon either respawn or by visiting a Bio Lab, unfortunately.

“It’s because the nanites inside of them can’t ‘touch’ the Power that your Combat Units possess.  It is an entirely different system, which is only affected by the actual Gene Mutation/Manipulation process that they undergo inside your Bio Labs.  Whereas the nanites could increase your Units’ Agility because it is a physiological mechanism, the Wisdom and Power they possess is something else,” ALANNA helpfully added.

It wasn’t as much as he had been expecting, but he would take it.  The reduction in resources alone was worth it, meaning that he could provide another defense or two before time ran out.

As for the bonus of having both the Agility and Wisdom stats at 100, it hadn’t seemed like that good of one until he actually checked out the new Facility option – and everything changed.

(PPPPPP) Portable Power-Providing-Pack Production Plant: After extensive study of the effects your leaking radiation has had on the Proctan population, your Ingenuity/Wisdom system has determined how to produce the same result on a smaller scale.  The PPPPPP is a small, tritanium-enclosed facility that produces tiny portable packs that emit the same radiation as your leaking Zero-point Energy Reactor, though on a much smaller scale.  It is theoretically safe enough for a Combat Unit to wear, or it can be implanted inside of them for greater effect – it provides a constant regeneration of their innate Power.  The Portable Power-Providing-Pack (PPPP) can also be placed inside small quantities of water to produce similar results as the water currently inside of your Core Room.  Required: 20,000,000 Basic Metal Units (not affected by bonuses)

It was the solution to his problem that he was looking for, but it was going to take a while to accumulate enough resources to actually build the facility.  And, based on how much it cost, he assumed that the PPPPs were going to cost a pretty penny as well.  But at least it was going to allow him to fix his shell without stopping the flow of Power that was keeping the Proctans able to fight back against the beasts of the wild – not to mention the current crisis.

As for his extra three points that he had available to allocate, he stuck them into Processing Power/Intelligence, bringing it up to 85.  A little bit can go a long way.

Almost as if they were waiting for Milton and the citizens to be ready, the threat to the Kingdom was entering into range.  A full day after Brint had finally arrived at Stonewall, the Bearillas clearing the pathway by ripping out trees were finally within sight of the amassed army of defenders.

Chapter 36 – It begins

Brint took to the skies again very early the next morning, before many of the residents of ‘Stonewall’ were up, in fact.  After a very nice welcome from Whisp, he had spent the rest of the day watching the ongoing training, and even getting involved in one of the ever-growing classes taught by Moxwell on sword forms.  Even an hour of practicing the correct way to hold his new sword (he had gotten his own set of clothes and weapon) had made a big difference; no longer was he afraid to go up against a Quizard one-on-one, especially with his Physical Augmentation boosts.  He didn’t think he would survive going up against a few by himself, but his confidence had been raised, nevertheless.

And fortunately, he hadn’t seen even a glimpse of Clogan and his buddies; they were sufficiently cowed by Brint’s girlfriend, so he didn’t blame them for making themselves scarce. He had a good time training with Whisp for the rest of that day, but the continued exhaustion he felt made him want to retire much earlier than most – meaning he went to bed just barely before the sun went down.

But with that natural rest came an eagerness and energy as he prepared for the day.  A long goodbye precluded his departure with a still-drowsy Whisp, who he made at least halfway promise that she would try to stay as safe as possible.

“No one’s going to be safe, not until that army is completely defeated…but I promise not to go rushing out to die, either.  You be safe too.”

“I will – I’ll be far above the battle, trying to make myself as inconspicuous as possible,” he promised back.

Passing over the rest of the buildings housing the majority of the Kingdom’s population, he saw in the pre-dawn light the thick, Weightonite stone walls that gave the main camp its name.  They were nearly 10-feet thick and 60-feet high, rivaling the tall forest trees they were butted up against.  Placed on either side of where The Milton and some others had calculated the Bearillas would punch through the forest, they stretched nearly a mile in either direction, theoretically blocking off the main part of the incoming army from using the forest to go around the defenses.  It wouldn’t keep them out if they were determined to go through the nearby trees, but they were hoping that a multitude of pits placed throughout the surrounding forest would give them pause.  In addition, thousands of Nature Manipulators had been sent out to make the passage through the forest even more difficult: adding overgrown underbrush and hanging tangling vines, bending trees in a similar fashion as Camp Deathtrap, but also growing even more trees through the combined effort of dozens of Manipulators.  It wasn’t entirely impassable, but it was close enough.

He flew over the defenses set up in front of where the Bearillas were slated to come through, lit up brightly even through the night with the use of a multitude of sensor orbs.  He could see dozens more floating throughout the sky, keeping an eye on the forest; they couldn’t go far from the GTSs, so they were primarily being used by The Milton to get a view of the battlefield instead of scouting.

That’s where Brint came in.

The sun was barely rising above the treetops when he passed by what was still remaining of the forest being ripped apart by the incoming Bearillas.  They were closer than he had guessed, having made some insane progress since his unsuccessful attempt to bait more of them down south; unless he missed his guess, they would break through in a couple of hours.

Fortunately, though, the group waiting to advance into the Kingdom’s land didn’t seem too bad.  Sure, there were nearly 600 Bearillas, including a half-dozen Elites and the larger, white-and-silver-haired behemoth – as well as 100 times that amount of Quizards rushing around in apparent eagerness.  It was nothing they couldn’t handle though, especially with what was prepared for them.

He was flying thousands of feet above them, using his boosted Perception to get an accurate count; it was only his intense focus on those below that allowed him to see the massive white-haired Bearilla look up and stare directly at him.  Brint was taken aback at the pure malice in its gaze – which made him shiver as he locked eyes with the beast from thousands of feet away.

A sensor orb that had been floating behind him at its extreme movement range was able for the first time to get a look at the white-and-silvered monstrosity for the first time.  The Milton shared the information with him, though after looking at it he would’ve preferred to stay in the dark.[38]

It was called a Bearilla Commander, and in addition to the huge creature being twice the age of even the Elites – it was highly intelligent.  Although he was sure it would be able to hold its own in a fight, it appeared that it was more suited to commanding than placing itself on the front lines with skills like Master Leadership, Master Problem-solving, and Master Strategic Planning.  Oh, and it had an ability to roar and “charm” opponents – whatever that meant.

Before, he had always thought of the Bearillas (as well as the Quizards that came with them) as nearly mindless, hungering beasts; the way that he and the Guardian Guild members had easily baited and destroyed hundreds of them at Camp Deathtrap hadn’t disabused him of that notion.  Even the handful of Elites that had been lured down hadn’t been much different, other than being just slightly harder to kill.  But with the addition of someone smart finally leading them, it was possible that they could be in for a world of hurt.

“It’s too late to change the plan now.  Let’s just hope that we’ve planned for every eventuality.”

That didn’t make him feel any better.  Eventually, he floated past the steadily advancing army, an extreme effort of will allowing him to break eye contact with the massive beast.  He shivered at the eerie feeling he had experienced as he gazed upon the Commander, glad that he wasn’t down there for a moment and worried about Whisp.  He knew she would ultimately be fine no matter what happened, but “old habits die hard” and all that.

Along the pathway below, Brint noticed that all of the trees past the large group were cleared away, pushed up against the bordering trees.  The space was starting to look eerily similar to the ones he had seen on the other side of the mountains.  From his higher vantage point thousands of feet in the air, Brint was just barely able to look at the large caves far in the distant Quizard Mountains…and let go of a huge relieved sigh when he saw no sign of the trees being torn down yet.  “Phew – that’s the last thing we needed, big guy,” he told his Quagon, before patting it on the back affectionately.

He spoke too soon, however, as his vision returned directly east and saw a sight that made his heart drop.

“Well, fuck.”

Tens of thousands of Quizards were streaming out of the cave, though it was so distant they were indistinguishable other than as a massive wave starting to flow down the cleared pathway. Bearillas of different sizes (fortunately, he didn’t see any other white ones) ran along with them, his extreme distance making them appear like tiny little ants being swept along the lizard tide.  He didn’t even bother counting them, even though they seemed endless – he knew it wasn’t really going to matter.

Because, emerging slowly from the cave into the light of the new day, was the monstrous beast he had seen the ribcage for across the mountains.

Actually, looking at the object of what he knew was going to be the source of some new nightmares, he reevaluated his assumption that what he saw was the entire ribcage – because from where he was flying, it certainly looked like it had only been a small portion of it.

*        *        *

“Rosewyn, I have some good news, some bad news, and some really bad news.  Which would you like first?”

Rosewyn stopped in her pacing atop one of the giant 80-foot tall Weightonite towers lined up across from the soon-to-be open portion of the border hundreds of feet ahead.  She looked over at the other Elemental Casters, scattered Healers, and the Scouts operating the “Laser Cannon Emplacements” and “Railgun Penetrators” that had proved exceptionally deadly at Camp Deathtrap.

She had left after only a week into the operation – along with her group and a few others – to start training the citizens that were constantly streaming towards the northeastern camp.  City was more of an apt description, though it didn’t have the same things she would expect – like shops and crafters and restaurants.  But it served the purpose it was designed for: housing nearly five million of the Kingdom’s people.

While she had been tempted to exact some revenge on the hundreds or perhaps thousands of Cordpower Company hired muscle that had come with most of the citizens, so far, they hadn’t done anything to cause trouble.  It was astonishingly to say the least, but Rosewyn assumed it had something to do with the sheer size of the development there and the powerful entities who were overseeing things.  Plus, they were getting as many Power Potions as could be spared, so they were inordinately happy – along with most everyone else.

Everyone knew about the Beast War and how everyone was almost wiped out before abilities were discovered.  Down to the smallest child, each person knew deep down that they had gotten lucky; none of them wanted something like that to happen again and were willing – and if not willing, then amenable at least – to sacrifice themselves so that their children and families could live on.  While there were some that flat-out refused to participate, most people who saw the size of the operation and the expense of providing Power Potions, new weapons and armor, and food and shelter immediately knew that the situation was Serious with a capital S.

Old grandmothers, young men who had just recently acquired an ability, even a few exceedingly corpulent Healers were arming and training for the defense of the Kingdom – and Rosewyn felt intensely proud of her people.  While it had been her duty – and the Guardian Guild’s duty – to protect the Kingdom from external threats, she knew that the same desire to make a difference and keep their loved ones safe was instilled in most, if not all, of its citizens.

While she hadn’t been involved with recruitment, she knew that tens of thousands were turned away each year who wanted to join the Guild; not out of any malice or thought that they didn’t have the same drive to protect, but because they could only maintain so many because it was expensive.  This was blatantly evident by how many had taken up arms in defense like it was the natural thing to do.

She moved to the rear of the tower, looking over the vast fortifications that had been built in giant curved tiers.  They spanned over a mile in width, were eight 20-foot-tall tiers high, and held nearly 4.3 million people (the rest of the five million were children and older kids who hadn’t gained an ability yet) – all ready to defend the Kingdom.

Ballistae, catapults, and hand-crossbows were all set up and pointing toward the bottom of the six towers holding the “high-powered” ranged defenders like herself.  Plants of all shapes and sizes and deadliness were also planted everywhere, so that the tens of thousands of Nature Manipulators could utilize them to wreak havoc on the attackers.  She looked down to where she thought Moxwell was on the first tier and easily picked him out among the brown and black-clothed populace – he hadn’t changed out of his normal armor and refused to.  She turned back east, looking over her own fortification again.

The towers had two objectives.  First – the obvious purpose – was to replicate what had worked so well for them at Camp Deathtrap: ranged attack without danger of reprisal.  Along the top rim of the tower was another half-wall, but along the sides were also exceedingly sharp projections preventing anything from attempting to climb up the outside.

The second, less obvious purpose, was to break up and funnel the attacking enemies through pre-arranged channels behind them.  High walls would prevent them from merging together into one massive group, which would hopefully prevent them from overwhelming the defenders.

And, of course, there were pit traps everywhere – hidden by illusions that disguised them as flat ground.

All in all, it was an impressive display of defense that should easily defeat even multiple waves of Bearillas and Quizards, so Rosewyn was curious as to what Milton had to say.

“Uh, let’s hear the good news first,” she said out loud, earning her some curious looks from some of the “newer” Casters standing around.  They were ones that had shown a lot of promise and were powerful in a single element; even though they weren’t as powerful as most of the Guild members with an NCU, they could dish out damage well enough and had earned a spot up on the towers.

“Well, the good news is that you won’t have much longer to wait for the army to break through the trees – probably no more than fifteen minutes.  I can see how anxious and impatient everyone is.”

That was an understatement.  The looming threat that was coming was as pervasive as the suns starting to beat down on them from the sky; everyone could almost “feel” it coming, even those that had slightly doubted the level of threat they were facing.  As much as they didn’t relish the fight to come, the citizens – and the Guild included – were ready for it to show up, just so they had something to fight back against.

The loud murmur of the crowd of over four million people nearby had drowned out most of what she could hear, but now that she concentrated on it, she could hear a few soft *cracks* and *booms* coming from the forest.

“Ok, I guess that’s good news.  What’s the bad news?”

“The army is now being led by a very intelligent, supposedly tactical-thinking Bearilla unlike anything I’ve seen before.  Be ready for anything.”

That did sound bad.  It wouldn’t take much thinking to get around the various defenses they had set up; they had relied on the single-mindedness of the enemy before to fall into their traps to great success.  To have a potential counter to that disadvantage was worrisome.  Fortunately, even if they had someone smart behind the upcoming attack, the Kingdom was in a strongly defensible position.

“Alright, I agree that that could be an issue.  I’ll make sure to watch for that – are you sure you want me in charge down here?”

“Yes, I need you leading your people as best you can – I’ll be busy implementing the defenses and controlling our auxiliaries.”

He meant the “small” army of 150 of their own Bearillas, along with a multitude of other beasts that were able to be created inside of the nearby Molecular Converters.

“I’ll do what I can.  I’ll let everyone here know about the danger and to prepare them for the incoming enemy.”

“Don’t worry, I’ve already informed all the other Guild members of the other army’s presence, though I didn’t tell them about the new smart Bearilla.  No need to worry them at this point.  Aren’t you going to ask about the very bad news?”

Rosewyn froze for a second, sudden worry clouding her emotions.  What could be worse than that?  Before she could respond or even ask, the Station Core took her over for a moment and apologized.

“I’m sorry, there’s no time to waste – you need to see this, because you’re about to be very busy.  And…I would probably keep this to yourself for the moment – there’s no reason to panic everyone.  This is a feed directly from Brint.”

The world around her disappeared, to be replaced by the view from the back of Brint’s Quagon high up in the air.  She envied him a little the freedom to fly amongst the clouds like a bird, but the next moment she didn’t want to be anywhere near where he was.  In fact, even though she couldn’t see anything but what Brint was currently observing, she felt her legs give out as she collapsed to her knees.

He was probably three miles away from the large cave entrance to the Quizard mountains, but that was plenty close enough to see the veritable tide of Quizards and Bearillas racing down the cleared pathway.  Thousands – no, hundreds of thousands of the quick lizards were running at a full sprint, most being left behind by the faster Bearillas flowing along with them.  She estimated she saw at least a thousand of the larger monkey-bears, and she saw even more emerging from the cave.

However, they were forced to flow around something that had just exited the large cave.  Topping at what she estimated was at least 700 feet tall, she realized the literally gigantic beast must have had to stoop to get out of the already 500-foot-tall exit.  It was shaped like a massive red-and-brown slug, but that was where the similarities ended.

From head to toe, it reached nearly 2,000 feet; its body appeared to be entirely made of rock, except for the bottom which left behind a slimy substance as it ponderously navigated its way forward, extending its forward-bottom section ahead – which then pulled the rest of its long body along with it.

The frontal upright part of the monstrous beast was covered in the same rock-looking skin, though it looked even thicker towards its chest.  Three pairs of arms stuck out the front, though instead of hands it only appeared to have humongous hammer-like fists with a spike on the end.  As she watched, she saw the creature extend one of its arms down and suddenly thrust forward, piercing a Bearilla through the back.

As the large monkey-bear struggled against the massive spike thrust through its entire body and through its chest, the giant beast raised it up and held it up to its upper torso – which was apparently its mouth.  Rosewyn saw the rock-skin start to part, revealing enormous slabs of rock that apparently acted as teeth; as the fist was thrust into the mouth, the “teeth” caught the Bearilla and scraped it off, before slamming its mouth closed again and “chewing” the small snack.

The way it treated the Bearilla as a food source, similarly like how the Quizards were to the Bearillas, made her even more fearful.  Is there something else that treats this massive beast as a snack?  She couldn’t even comprehend that, so she left it alone.

They had enough problems.

Suddenly, the connection was severed, and she got her vision back.  She was on her knees with a crowd of concerned faces crowded around her.

“I’m ok, I’m ok.  I’m just anxious is all.  Everybody to their places!” she reassured them, before reminding them of their tasks.

A pregnant hush fell over the multitudes of citizens, as even they finally heard the sounds of cracking wood.  Standing up again on shaky knees, Rosewyn saw the trees ahead of them start to sway and move, until one after another were literally ripped out of the ground by two Bearilla-shaped figures at their base, before they were thrown backwards.

As soon as all of the trees had been cleared from the massive pathway – which she finally understood the purpose of – she expected them to rush to the prepared defenses.  Instead, the Bearillas calmly and purposefully started placing all of the downed trees along the edges of the pathway, creating a smooth corridor for the massive beast to flow down without impedance.  She wondered why it couldn’t just barrel through the trees since it was so massive but assumed that there must be a good reason why it didn’t.

She couldn’t quite see it yet; with her boosted Intelligence, she estimated that it was at least 100 miles or more to the mountains, so it was unlikely that they would see it.  Which was a good thing, because otherwise she wasn’t sure how many of those ready to defend the Kingdom would run at the first sight of it.  Rosewyn knew that she certainly wanted to run.

“ALANNA estimates that – based upon how fast it was moving – you have at least 8 hours before it arrives.  The leading edge of the Quizard and Bearilla flood will take much less time – possibly an hour if you’re lucky.”

Milton paused for a moment, and Rosewyn could tell that he still had something he wanted to say.

“Just worry about fighting off the smaller Quizards and Bearillas.  I’m looking into what we can do about big boy there, so don’t let its appearance alter your defense.  You can do this, Rosewyn…good luck, and may the Goddess be with you.”

It appeared that the enemy army had been waiting until their forest-clearing project was completed before they attacked, because as soon as the last tree was placed out of the way, a surge of over 10,000 Quizards (only about a sixth of those available) shot forward, running at full speed toward the defenders.

It has begun.

Chapter 37 – Counterstrategy

Milton watched as the first wave of Quizards sent by the Commander’s army raced toward the towers, the near silence from the Guild and Kingdom defenders punctuated by the pounding of lizard feet as they approached.  While the citizens who were roped into defending had an idea of what they were up against due to his Bearilla and Quizard Combat Units he had been showing them, they didn’t really understand just how big a threat they were until they were able to see them bearing down on them through the gaps in the towers.

“Shit just got real.”

“Thanks, ALANNA – your timing is impeccable,” he absently responded, watching as the quick lizards ran and ran and ran and then…disappeared.

A spike-filled pit covered by a holographic illusion had worked before at Camp Deathtrap, so he figured – why not?  It had worked – and had killed 10,000 enemies in the process – but they were small-fry compared to the larger, stronger, and deadlier enemies just staring as they tried to figure out what had happened.  He was hoping that they would be dumb and bum-rush the defenders as soon as they saw them, but no such luck was to be had.

The Commander in charge of the enemy forces had them following his orders to a T.  None of them stepped out of line or even acted like they were getting antsy, which said a lot to the authority that Bearilla held over the others.

Both sides stared at each other for a while before the sensor orb he had floating over the enemy vaguely heard some grunts and over 100 of the Bearillas started to move in concert.  But not towards the Guild and others, but backwards and to the sides of the pathway, where they picked up the massive trees.

Four of them worked together to lift the trees, handling the multi-ton logs like they were just big 2X4s.  Twenty-five sets of the massive beasts then threw the logs towards where the Quizards had disappeared, most of them disappearing down the 200-foot-long, 40-foot-wide pit that stretched from stone wall to stone wall.  A few, though, landed perpendicular over the pit, providing a bridge that was glaringly obvious despite the Holographic Illusion projector trying to cover it up.

Milton thought that was going to be the strategy of the Commander: keep tossing logs until it formed a large bridge to send the army across.  However, that didn’t turn out to be exactly what it was planning, as more and more Bearillas grabbed the ripped-out trees and chucked them at the pit.

Some of the trees that had formed a bridge before were actually knocked down into the pit; that was when Milton discovered the Commander’s tactic.  Why build a bridge when you have enough resources to fill in the entire pit?  While he was sure that the Bearilla in charge didn’t know exactly how deep it was, they had both the time and the ability to attempt filling it.

So Milton needed to try to take that away from them.

Laser Cannon Emplacements, while doing a lot of damage to the enemy, were highly visible and would play his hand too quickly.  Milton was pretty sure that the goings-on at Camp Deathtrap were still essentially a secret, as nothing had escaped the wrath of the Guild to report back.  Therefore, he wanted to keep as much of a surprise as possible.

And Railgun Penetrators were all but invisible.

Milton now had 8 of the expensive-but-worth-every-penny weapons set up on the towers, so he instructed the Guild Scouts operating them to fire them in staggered shots.  The Bearillas were nearly 500 feet away – 100 feet past the accurate range of the defenses.  However, all he wanted them to do was essentially hit the broad side of a barn.  Or at least the massive trunks of the trees near where the Bearillas were carrying them.

Just as they were about to throw some more logs to fill in the pit, 8 of the 25 logs were ripped apart in an explosion so much greater than even Milton was expecting.  It was almost as if someone had shoved a dozen sticks of dynamite inside the trunk and lit the fuse.  Wooden shrapnel was flung everywhere, some larger chunks actually able to pierce the tough fur and skin of the Bearillas, not doing any major damage but drawing a small amount of blood.

The nearby Quizards behind them took the worst of it, as the explosion was concentrated in a forward direction; huge chunks of the trees decapitated, dismembered, or impaled more than 200 of the large lizards, killing them near-instantly.  Over 1,000 were injured in some way, though it didn’t look debilitating.  It wasn’t a huge number of them in the scope of things, but Milton thought it at least gave them pause as those ready to throw put down the trees they were holding.

Unfortunately, they only paused long enough to revert to their animalistic nature and start a feeding frenzy of the dead and injured Quizards – with many of the non-involved Bearillas joining the fun.  Within seconds, all of the dead lizards had been swallowed up and half of the injured along with them, but that was when the Commander roared loudly – and everyone jumped back to what they had been doing.

Including throwing trees into the pit.

Apparently as a precaution, the Quizards were moved back – theoretically out of harm’s way.  Since those Bearillas that had gotten hurt didn’t seem to be greatly harmed in any way, they ignored the next five volleys and explosions caused by the Railgun Penetrators.  In fact, not only did they ignore them, even more of the massive beasts joined in the operation, until there was an almost constant stream of trees flying through the air.

There wasn’t anything that Milton wanted to do about it, however – at least nothing that wouldn’t put their guard up more.  He knew that it was inevitable that they would find a way over the pit, but he didn’t think it was going to be that quick.

And he needed to see what kind of leader the Commander was: did it really strategize every move, or was it just good at reactionary tactics?

He got a portion of the answer when the Yeti-like Bearilla commanded everyone forward once it was obvious that the pit had been filled in; the Commander was just as anxious to get to the defenders as the other Bearillas and Quizards were.

That was its first mistake – and hopefully not the last – as the enemy Bearillas rushed forward, both closer to the defenders and faster than the Quizard fodder.  What the enemy leader didn’t even think about was that the pit they had filled in hadn’t been the only one on the field.

A hundred feet past the first pit, another one the same size had been dug, covered up by even more Holographic Illusion projectors.  Over a hundred of the leading Bearillas fell into the trap before the rest stopped in confusion at the sight of their comrades disappearing.  And, the Commander’s orders came just a few seconds too late for another 20,000 or so Quizards, who ran over the edge of the pit to their doom like large lemmings.

The Railgun Penetrators hadn’t stopped firing, though.  Now that the stationary and confused Bearillas were in range, the precise shots of the Scouts all impacted eight different Bearilla heads, destroying a good portion of their brain matter inside their skulls instantly.  Unfortunately, they weren’t able to get another shot off before they all ran back to where the Commander was waiting, obviously seething and staring at the defenses in front of him like he was trying to figure out what to do about it.

Who knew Bearillas were so strong?  Despite being a hundred feet farther away, the addition of two more of the hulking behemoths per tree made it possible for them to start filling in the next hole.  The Guild atop the towers listened to the roars and grunts of pain from the Bearillas who were impaled and didn’t quite die as they fell into the pit with stoic faces; some of the Kingdom’s citizens that had joined them, however, appeared to sick up at the noises.

They’ll learn.

Milton had become fairly immune to the deaths of beasts – both his own Combat Units and others.  It was only when Proctans – who didn’t have NCUs already inside them – died that their deaths affected him.  Not as much as it used to, admittedly, but it still did a little.  Which made the defense of over 4 million non-NCU’d people his priority.

The one good thing about multiple tons of trees falling into the pit was that it silenced the noise the dying beasts were making.  Of course, the hole being filled in wasn’t the best scenario, but it was what they had to work with.

The closest trees lined up along the pathway stretching back to the Quizard Mountains had already been used up and thrown or were shattered from explosions and were littering the ground in a collection of splinters and chunks.  All of which meant that the Bearillas had to run back along the way they came to get more, which added to the time they took up to fill in the spiked pit trap.

Normally, while defending in a medieval siege-type situation, any type of delay is normally a good thing for the defenders – as long as they have the supplies to outlast the siege.  It allowed time for reinforcements to show up to help relieve the siege and wasted the attacker’s own supplies at the same time.  In this instance, however, only half of that was true: while Milton still had plenty of supplies, he didn’t have any reinforcements coming.

But the enemy sure did – and the Commander apparently knew that.

Even after they had filled the pit in, they didn’t make any move to advance.  Either the lead Bearilla had learned from its costly mistake, or it was delaying for another reason.  Which became apparent as the frontal wave of Quizards and Bearillas appeared in the distance, coming from the direction of the Quizard Mountains.

For the first time, worried murmurings started among those on the tower that saw them; Milton was just glad that the Kingdom’s citizens couldn’t see them quite yet.  They had been steadfastly stayed in their positions bravely, but if given enough time to think about it they might break and run.

And with the focus all on the incoming wave of “smaller” beasts, Milton was thankful that no one seemed to notice the small point of red and brown that indicated the massive beast on the horizon.

I’m sure they’ll be a bit preoccupied in a couple of minutes, anyway.

*        *        *

One thing at a time, Rosewyn – one thing at a time.

The enemy didn’t wait even a second when the flood of reinforcements joined the Quizards and Bearillas already there.  Despite knowing what kind of defenses they had set up, Rosewyn was worried over the sheer numbers that were barreling down the open ground, intent on destroying everything and everybody in the Kingdom.  She still didn’t know why they wanted to kill everyone, but she supposed it didn’t matter – they were doing it anyway.

As the first wave of the enemy deftly maneuvered over the filled-in pits, they had nearly 150 feet of open space between them and the towers.  This was to be the defenders’ main killing field, the spot where they would try to kill as many of the larger Bearillas as possible.  But as they quickly ate up the distance between them, Rosewyn and her fellow Casters did nothing.

All part of the plan.

Thousands of Quizards and tens of Bearillas passed through the space in between the massive Weightonite towers, unhindered in their eagerness to get to the tiers of citizens they could plainly see in the distance.  When a certain number had scrunched through the gap, however, everything changed when the obvious signal blared out.

Three of what Milton called Auditory Assault Fields activated, pointing out toward the incoming tide of enemies.  The Bearillas all stopped in place as the horrendously painful sound caused them to try to block it out with their fists over their sensitive ears; one drawback from having enhanced senses was the fact that they were prone to overstimulation.  The Quizards, on the other hand, didn’t physically have the ability to cover their ear holes with their hands or anything else, and many of them were incapacitated as they stumbled and fell, skidding to a halt through the grassy area in between the pit and the towers.

Those farther out from the first 500 feet of the Auditory Assault Field weren’t as affected, but it did make them stop – there wasn’t much reason to run right into the painful screeching of the fields.  That was ok, though, as it allowed those on the towers and the Nature Manipulators hidden nearby to get to work.

“Attack!” Rosewyn called out unnecessarily, as everyone had been prepped on the signal beforehand.  Not that anyone could hear her over the horrendous sound; she could barely hear herself.  She was just glad that the fields were pointed away from the defenders, otherwise they would be suffering just as much as the enemy seemed to be.

Over two dozen Laser Cannons shot out, blasting into and melting the faces of the slowly recovering Bearillas down in the killing zone.  The eight Railguns shot their tiny explosive weapons as well, taking out the same number with pinpoint shots from their Scouts.  More than 30 of the massive ape-bears were defeated in the span of seconds, though that was just the start.

The Casters on the tower hadn’t been idle. Rosewyn quickly meshed her Air Affinity with four others with practiced efficiency – all Guild members – to produce a large invisible air tube 50 feet long and 5 feet wide.  Pointing towards the nearest Bearilla, she sealed up the end facing toward the massive beast while leaving the other end open.

Five other Earth-Affinity Casters – citizens this time – used their ability to move a massive fire-hardened, cylinder-shaped stone projectile with a conical point tipped with diamond into the top of the tube, which was promptly sealed up afterwards.  The projectile was then held in place while Rosewyn and her team then manipulated the air inside of the tube until it was completely gone; she felt a small strain on her ability as the vacuum created tried to collapse the tube, but an extra application of Power stabilized it.

They – as well as nearly 300 other teams – had been practicing this maneuver for hours the night before, which allowed them to complete the entire procedure in less than five seconds.  Fortunately, the Bearillas hadn’t yet recovered from the intense audial assault, so the tube was right on target.  Oops, almost forgot to add the “rifling” – or whatever it was that Milton called it.

She quickly added some grooves to the inside of the tube, which would spin the snugly wedged stone projectile and keep it going the direction it was pointed.  As soon as she thought everything was ready, Rosewyn took another look down on the field and saw that the Bearillas were starting to stumble forward, so she shifted the entire tube to compensate – and then she simultaneously pierced the top of the tube while greatly thinning the end pointing down, causing the pressure from outside to rush into it at unbelievable speed.

The “Vacuum Cannon” (as Milton called it) launched the diamond-tipped stone “bullet” so quickly that it was nearly a blur.  There was a loud explosion as the air rushed into the tube, but they barely heard it over the Auditory Assault Fields.  Nor did they hear much from the 299 other teams as they launched their own projectiles, slamming and piercing through the Bearillas starting to move through the killing field.

They had practiced launching the stone bullets through the Vacuum Cannons against the ground where the pit now stood and were amazed at how much damage and penetration they achieved against the bare earth.  However, it was nothing compared to how they were able to pierce even the tough fur and skin of the Bearillas, going so far as to crack their bones as they were impaled.

She saw their own bullet had actually gone entirely through the one they were aiming for, leaving a five-foot hole through its abdomen, where the diamond tip had managed to shear through its spine.  The stone behind the tip had shattered into large chunks upon impact, but the force of the acceleration had caused it to still continue forward, destroying the entire torso of the Bearilla.

And just like that, the Bearillas caught in the Auditory Field were dead – some pierced by multiple projectiles.  Rosewyn and the other teams didn’t bother with the Quizards, as the Nature Manipulators stationed near the large stone walls were already at work.  The grass underneath the struggling lizards grew rapidly and their edges became razor-sharp; as the blades wrapped around the largely immobile lizards, they constricted and literally sliced the lizards into multiple pieces.

As for the Quizards and Bearillas who they had allowed to pass by the killing field, they didn’t fare any better.  The giant lizards were funneled into the high-walled chutes, where they were made to make turn after turn – before ultimately falling into another deep spike pit hidden by another Holographic Illusion.  Rosewyn couldn’t see it happening, but when she walked to the rear of the tower, she could see that none had survived and nothing had gotten near the citizens yet.  Not even the Bearillas.

They were taller than the wall chutes, which meant that they were ineffective in keeping the large monkey-bears contained.  That was why their own Bearillas (all with fur dyed black to differentiate them) were stationed behind the towers.  There were tight passages inside the tower where Healers with physical augmentation boosting capabilities were able to retreat to, which they did after they had touched and ramped up the strength, speed, and toughness of their own super-powered behemoths.

And they were given massive versions of the swords given to the rest of the population, nearly fifteen feet long and three feet wide with extra reinforcement.  One swing of those incredibly sharp and powerful swords with their enhanced strength could lop off Bearilla limbs – or heads.  When she looked down at the area right underneath the tower on the Kingdom side, she could see the corpses of the Bearillas who had managed to get that far, most without their heads attached but a few had missing legs – she assumed that some of the enemy had tried to jump out of the way of the surprise incoming weapons.

Rosewyn smiled at the utter devastation they had dropped on the incoming army, satisfaction at a plan coming together infusing her emotions.  When she walked back over to the front of the tower, the satisfied feeling left her as her heart dropped into her stomach.

She had seen the Bearillas’ immense strength when they had thrown the trees to fill in the pits, but they weren’t exactly accurate with the unwieldy logs.  But that accuracy was now evident when they started pitching something smaller at them.  Something of which they had hundreds of thousands of nearby – and who welcomed the opportunity to get closer to their enemies.

Chapter 38 – A brave defense

Brint watched the entire battle at over 2,000 feet in the air from the back of his Quagon.  He itched to be down there, doing his own part in the defense of the Kingdom, but The Milton asked him to stay out of it until he was desperately needed.  He agreed, but at the first sign of need he was planning on swooping in and seeing how the Bearillas liked facing off against his larger friend he was riding.

At first, things seemed to be going extraordinarily well for the defenders as the new Auditory Assault Fields that The Milton had supplied had performed exactly as the Station Core had said they would.  And the “Vacuum Cannons” that the Casters had created were doing some serious damage – so much so that he wished they had used them back at Camp Deathtrap.  However, after hearing the massive *crack* of explosively rushing air they made when fired, he had to admit that they were probably too loud and would’ve definitely called too much attention to them.

But then every single Bearilla started chucking Quizards at both the defenders and the Auditory defenses with amazing accuracy.  First, one of the Assault Fields was destroyed despite it being held in a Weightonite housing; the intense impact of a giant lizard against the hole where the sound was coming out of caused it to disintegrate, oozing inside the housing with enough force to break it.  The other two followed soon after, allowing a wave of Quizards and a few Bearillas to start another assault.

Brint had to turn away with a painful light in his eyes as the four Optical Barrages activated next, stopping the Quizards in their paths.  The animated grass did their work again, and the Vacuum Cannons the Casters employed took care of the closer Bearillas – but thousands more of the chucked Quizards soon destroyed even those defenses.

Another cautious deployment of some Quizards and Bearillas raced through the now-bloody, body-filled clearing where the Quizards’ feet were hacked up whenever they touched the razor-sharp grass.  The Bearillas were targeted by the Laser Cannons and Railguns to great effect, but the Vacuum Cannons didn’t have as much success in tracking and aiming like the Scouts on the powerful defenses.  For every shot they sent out the end of the cannons and hit a Bearilla, five more missed and produced a large furrow in the dirt below.

“And now is when the hard part starts.”

Brint couldn’t help but agree with The Milton.  Without the ability to stop or incapacitate the incoming waves, the defenders were forced to do their best to hit moving targets without the same accuracy.  An obvious fact, as the Commander of the enemy forces sent everything at them non-stop.

He looked farther up the ripped-out pathway and tried to see the end of the massive army of Quizards and their masters.  It stretched into the distance, telling him that there were literally millions of the quick lizards waiting for a chance to attack – as well as thousands of Bearillas.  However, at the farthest edge of his vision, he could eventually see an end to them.  He had checked a little bit ago to see if any more had emerged to reinforce these reinforcements and was relieved that no more had come out.

Of course, there was still the “Hammerslug” that The Milton had named the relatively slow-moving, 700-foot-tall monstrosity – but that wouldn’t matter so much if they couldn’t repel the current threat.

*        *        *

Rosewyn ducked under another Quizard that was thrown with enormous force over her head, quickly glancing up and backwards at it as it sailed through the sky, watching it disappear in the immense chaos below.  Half of their number atop the tower she was on had been taken out by the mobile projectiles as they were slammed into unsuspectingly.  The giant lizards were easy enough to dispatch if they managed to survive the impact and landing, but it didn’t help those who got bodily smashed by 900 pounds of lizard flesh coming at them at a high velocity.

They had abandoned the Vacuum Cannons as teams were broken apart, each Caster focusing on a different task.  Right now she was with a few others protecting their last Railgun Penetrator with shields of air; almost every other long-range defense along the towers had been destroyed within the first few minutes of the flying lizard bombardment.  And, apparently, when a Laser Cannon was impacted by a high-speed Quizard, it was liable to explode in a massive fireball.  They had lost quite a few Casters and Scouts because of that.

The ground below the towers on all sides were drenched in blood, body parts (some recognizable but most not), and mangled corpses.  When she wasn’t maintaining her Air shield protecting the Railgun, she and the other Casters were working together to drop the nearly full inventory of Vacuum Cannon bullets on those below, letting gravity and minor pushes of Air do the work.  It didn’t always do enough to kill them, and they missed more often than not, but they were doing all they could to stop the waves of beasts as they flowed past.

Some other Casters had taken to building massive curtains of fire that the enemy had to pass through in order to advance; it did little to hurt the fire-resistant Bearillas, but it severely damaged and weakened the Quizards.

Others were using one of the Molecular Converters on top of the tower to rain down water on the horde below, freezing them in place and creating Ice Spears to impale and damage those venturing by.

Even though it was a great distance away, some Earth-Affinity citizens were using the shattered stone of the Cannon bullets to fling shards of rock into passersby, inflicting major casualties on the giant lizards but not doing much to their larger masters.

“I’ll be right back,” she told the other two protecting the Railgun Penetrator, which was still doing its best to thin out the enemy every 30 seconds.

She swallowed her eighth Power Potion as she limped back to the rear of the tower; she had twisted her knee earlier trying to avoid being a smear against the tower by a flying Quizard, and it hadn’t fully healed yet.  Once she got to the rear half-wall, she looked down cautiously to see how things were faring.

All but a dozen of their black-dyed Bearillas had been overwhelmed, the Healers who had been both boosting and healing them for the most part dead as everyone was overwhelmed all at once.  Even their super-strong and sharp swords couldn’t stand up to the abuse a Strength-augmented Bearilla would put them through, so most of them had been broken in the seemingly endless fight.  However, their fists worked just as well when their team of a dozen Bearillas ganged up on lone enemy Bearillas and quickly pounded them to a pulp.

She looked further west to see all but the highest tier of their defensive fortification embroiled in battle; beasts of both types with ballista bolts impaled inside their corpses dotted the landscape, and she could see thousands of others who had been smashed apart by heavy catapult balls that had a small core of Weightonite surrounded by jagged normal stone.  Everyone who had some sort of speed or strength augmentation had been tasked with loading or aiming the large weapons, which allowed them to fire accurately and be quickly reloaded.

The pits that had originally stopped the majority of the Quizards from reaching the tiers were still there – but they were so choked with corpses (both lizard and monkey-bear) that they weren’t really a danger to the enemy anymore.  Long lines of the enemy flowed up and over the stacked corpses of their brethren to get to the fiercely defending Guild and citizens of the Kingdom.

With the new swords that Milton had provided, the defenders were literally slicing the Bearillas up and bleeding them dry.  Only a few of the strongest people – like her husband – were able to actually cut the entire way through a limb, but the rest were able to dig deep into the flesh of the massive monkey-bears.  As least, whenever they actually were able to hit them, they did some damage; the Bearillas were so fast and agile that it took swarming them with thirty times their number of normal citizens to take them down.  And it was usually only a few that walked away from that fight, if there were any at all.

And although their “armored” clothing could stop the deadly claws of a Quizard swipe, they couldn’t stop the impact of a fist the size of their chest.  Most of the dead or dying citizens she saw strewn across the tiers died relatively bloodless deaths, having been pounded into ruin by Bearillas.

Fortunately, even the citizens of the Kingdom couldn’t be considered “normal”.  While the swords and durable clothing were beneficial, it was the strength of their abilities that were keeping them alive.  Watching the battle on the tiers was like watching lights blinking on and off on a dark night as flashes of abilities made themselves known, sometimes turning a rout into victory.

Even over the din of the battle below, through the screams of the dying and the roars of the Bearillas doing the killing, she felt a hush fall over those watching the front side of the tower.  Turning around and slightly limping back, she noticed that whatever it was that Milton had put in her body was already healing her knee.  The other thing that it took a moment to notice was that there weren’t any more Quizards flying through the air.

One look over the half-wall was enough to see why – the flood of reinforcements was coming to an end.  There were still thousands that had yet to even arrive, but all of them could see the end of the flood.  Her spirits lifted as she realized that they were winning the day, despite the casualties that they had already experienced.

Milton had been right to bring all of the citizens up north, despite the severe casualties they were incurring; if they hadn’t been there, she didn’t think they would have had any chance to beat back the enemy.  She had opposed the plan at first, thinking that the Guild could take care of it with just a little help, but after remembering the insane number of beasts that Brint had seen under the Quizard Mountains, she had acquiesced.

This was just like the Beast War over a century ago – they were going to beat back the flood of beasts coming to destroy the Kingdom and rebuild it, stronger than ever.  They had lost many more people back then; less than a hundred thousand people had survived the assault on the capital back then.  From her count, at less than half of the citizens (she shuddered as she realized that still meant over two million) had been killed, but hopefully with the end in sight, they wouldn’t suffer too many more casualties.

“Teams!  Start the Vacuum Cannons again!” she shouted to those around her, eager to reduce the amount of Bearillas before they could inflict even more damage on the tiers behind her.

She started to form an Air tube again, but after a moment she realized that no one was moving.  Looking at the nearest Casters, she realized they weren’t looking down anymore – they were staring out into the distance.  She looked too, instinctively knowing what they were looking at.

It was still relatively far away, but the gigantic beast was so tall that it was hard to miss now.  Everyone had been so intent on killing those below that they hadn’t seen it until now; and now that they had seen it, that was all they could focus on.

“Snap out of it!  Fight those you can fight!  Save your people – they’re depending on you!”

Milton’s voice reverberated through everyone on the towers who had an NCU, which shook most of them out of their frightened stupor and got them moving.  Rosewyn saw one of the citizens, named Drice, staring open-mouthed in fright at the monstrous beast in the difference, so she physically grabbed him and turned him the other direction.

“Ignore it!  There is nothing you can do about that – but there are millions of people depending on you to save them.  We still have a job to do!” And then she slapped him – not hard, but enough to shake him up a little.

The fear started to fade a little in Drice’s eyes as he put his hand up to his cheek, rubbing the handprint she could see she left behind with her slap.  “Thanks, I needed that.  Let’s get to work.”  She could see him glance back at the monstrous creature, but he forcibly tore his gaze away and started to move one of the bullets with the help of a few other citizens that had been fixed by other Guild members.

They had loaded the bullet and were ready to shoot it into a running Bearilla, the other teams around her still getting themselves together, when the loudest, strangest growl came from the cluster of Bearillas still near the forest border.  The white-and-silver Bearilla had stood up to its fullest height and was belting out the most melodious ROAR she had ever heard before – and she had heard a lot over the years.

A sense of peace seemed to wash over her for a moment, making her want to just sit down and rest, before it fell away just as fast as it came.  She was readying the vacuum purge when she realized that the bullet had slid down the tube, no longer held up by any Earth Affinity.  She looked over at Drice and saw him just standing there with a smile and a far-off expression.

She held the Air casting while she walked over and slapped him again, but there was no reaction other than him falling down after becoming unbalanced.  Looking around in confusion, she saw that the others up top of the tower that she knew to be citizens had the same, blank-but-peaceful look on their faces.

“Rosewyn, have everyone you can try to fire on that Bearilla Commander!  Its Roar of Reason won’t affect anyone with an NCU because I stopped it, but everyone else is vulnerable!”

She looked at the other Guild members still alive on her team – all three of them – and shouted, “We’ve got to stop that roar!  You three handle the bullet and I’ll handle the tube!”

Maintaining the Air construct took a lot more concentration and Power, and it drained her immensely, but she was able to manipulate it so that it was pointing almost straight ahead instead of angling downwards.  When everything was ready, she created the vacuum inside the tube and then pierced the end, watching as the bullet flew right on course…and fell to the ground at least 50 feet short, plowing through the trailing end of the Quizard reinforcements, completely obliterating a half-dozen of them.

Quickly reloading with the help of the others, she was ready to go after about fifteen seconds, and she angled the tube upwards, straining at the intense draw of power it was requiring.  She sucked down another Potion she reflexively drew from her belt and felt her Power increase, reducing some of the strain.  With another deep breath and a slight adjustment to the angle, she launched the bullet through the air at high speed, watching it arc over the rushing reinforcements.

It started falling quickly, its immense weight drawing it down in a sharp nosedive; she held her breath as it looked like it was right on target.  Before it impacted the still-growling/roaring white Bearilla, one of the fifty Elite Bearillas who had been hanging back as some kind of honor guard jumped up and intercepted the bullet, throwing it off course but killing the massive beast in the process.

“What the fuck!” she screamed, the whole situation making her completely lose any sense of decorum.

Fortunately, the other teams on the towers had seen what she was trying to do and followed suit.  None of them were successful on their first shot, but by the time Rosewyn was shooting her third diamond-tipped stone bullet, they were starting to get their range.  And for every projectile that appeared to be even close to rustling the fur of the giant white Bearilla, another Elite jumped in front and deflected it at the cost of their lives.

It took another few minutes of volleys, but one of the shots from a tower two over from her was able to take out the last Elite.  Taking one last look to make sure her aim was correct, Rosewyn pierced the end of her Cannon again, watching their salvation shooting through the air, spinning from the rifling in her air tube.  It seemed to almost drift through the remaining distance in slow motion as it fell back to the earth; she smiled as she saw it was going to hit the lead Bearilla right in the chest.

And then it moved so fast she didn’t even see it happen.

The bullet plowed past, barely scraping the side of the giant Bearilla and scoring a shallow wound that quickly started to bleed and turn the pristine white-and-silver fur dark red.  As it looked down at the wound to its side, its strange growl/roar stopped.

Well, we didn’t kill it or wound it that badly, but we did get it to shut up.

She looked over at Drice and the other incapacitated citizens and watched them jerk alive as if they had just been abruptly woken up from a nap.

I just hope we were in time.

*        *        *

Whisp tossed out another small “blood spear” that penetrated the hide of a Quizard, slowing it enough that a young man on the tier below her could sneak in and decapitate the large lizard with a quick swipe of his sword.  Although there were small reservoirs of water around for those who needed something to drink or to use in defense, she had taken to using the vast quantity of blood lying around the battlefield to construct her projectiles.

She created another small shard out of the blood now pumping freely from the neck of the dead Quizard below; she wasn’t as powerful as someone like Rosewyn or the other dedicated Casters in the Guild, but she could hold her own against these Quizards slowly climbing up the tiers.  While she could only create and control smaller quantities of the elements, she had such a large Power Pool that she could do it for hours without running out.

The young man looked at her and held up his hand in thanks – and then seemed to freeze with a smile on his face.  She thought there was something behind her, so she spun around and didn’t see anything, but as she turned back, she heard an odd combination of a growl and a roar, intertwining in a way that almost sounded like a song of some sort.  She felt a sense of calm and peace wash over her for a moment before it was gone.

When she recovered from the strange sensation, she looked around and saw that almost everyone around her was frozen with the same faraway look and smile on their face.  All except for a woman near her she had seen from the Refuge that had come to fight with the rest of the Kingdom.

“What’s going on?” the woman shouted over to her.

“I have no idea – but I think we’re in trouble.”

She looked far down the tiers and saw a huge wave of Quizards and Bearillas swarming up the fortification, slaughtering the defenseless citizens who were staring off in space.  Here and there, she could see pockets of resistance and she easily picked out Moxwell in his metal armor two tiers down.  He was trying to hold back three Bearillas and thirty times that amount of Quizards – along with two other Guild members who were wielding their swords like they were extensions of their arms.

And they were winning.  They tore through the Quizards like they were nothing and started to dismember one of the Bearillas, tearing through an arm and leg like they were paper, before slicing its head off.  The other two tried to take advantage of their distraction, but Moxwell and his buddies were able to fall back and avoid the attacks with crazy-fast dodges.  She recognized Prastor nearby and realized that the Healer had probably boosted their Agility, allowing them to survive for so long.

Unfortunately, the previously safe section of the tier they were on was slowly becoming crowded with new arrivals.  It didn’t take the reinforcements long to tear through the first four tiers and by the time Moxwell saw them it was too late.  The trio managed to decimate three other Bearillas and nearly a hundred Quizards that got too close, but they soon fell under a literal tide of beasts only seconds later.

But the monsters didn’t stop there.  She watched in growing horror as they continued to sweep through the tiers, ending the lives of literally millions of citizens in less than five minutes.  In fact, they ended up doing more damage to the defenders in that short amount of time as the last four hours they had been fighting.

Whisp stepped back from the edge as she saw them racing across the tier below her, barely taking time to slice a throat here or bash an entire body to pulp there.  As they approached the young man that she had helped earlier with her blood spear, the musical growl/roar abruptly stopped.  She could see him “wake up” and look around, only to scream as a Quizard was approaching him at full speed.

Launching the blood spear that she realized she had still been maintaining all that time, Whisp managed to strike the lizard in the left front leg, causing it to stumble a little in its advance.  Fortunately, it was enough of an opening that the young man regained his senses and struck out at the advancing Quizard, slicing it open from neck to tail. Unfortunately, when he backed up to avoid being hit in a collision, he ran right into a descending fist from a Bearilla coming from the other direction.

The tiers were only about 35 feet tall, so it wasn’t much of an effort for something 20 feet tall to jump and pull itself up to the next tier.  Whisp backed up, her hand scrambling in her belt bag for something.  Where is it...ah-ha!

She pulled out a small cloth-wrapped object and delicately pulled back the layers until a small circular disk was laying in her hand.  With a quick burst of power, she activated her Object Animation ability on it, while at the same time throwing it at the Bearilla pulling itself over the edge of the tier.

While she didn’t have the best aim, she still managed to hit the leg of the massive creature.  It stuck there for a moment and she worried that she had thrown it too fast for her ability to take hold, but the next moment showers of blood erupted as the diamond-bladed circular sawblade started to quickly rotate its way through the fur, skin, and even the bones underneath.

This, of course, made the Bearilla stop and try to remove the blade, but it was also Enchanted with a combination of Earth and Water, making the blood inside act as a sort of magnet that kept it in place.

While it was distracted, she pulled out another one, Animated it, and threw it with better aim at its chest – where it immediately went to work trying to get to the source of the pumping blood: the heart.

Unfortunately, rather than try to ineffectually remove that blade as well, the Bearilla seemed to want to take down the one who had hurt it.  She ran away as fast as she could, and those around her who had previously been “asleep” rushed to her aid.  Luckily, the first sawblade did its work and managed to completely detach its leg, leaving it at the mercy of a dozen nearby swords who deftly slit its throat.

Phew, that was close.  “Thank you—” she started to tell them, but the words wouldn’t come.

Looking down the tier, the tide of Quizards were quickly sweeping through the still-recovering citizens, a few being taken out on the way but not enough to make a difference.  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw four other Bearillas climbing up the tier wall – and those were just in her section.  Whisp locked eyes with the others as they saw the same thing, before turning to face the onslaught with her sword held out in front of her and another blood spear hovering over her shoulder.

She was soon joined by the others around her, when she belatedly realized she had neglected to learn their names.  “Hi, I’m Whisp,” she said to the older woman next to her.

“Nice to meet you, Whisp, I’m—”

“You and the others did well and put up a brave defense.  But now, it’s time to go.  See you soon…”

What?

Suddenly, the ground under her feet started to rumble and she lost her footing, falling to the ground and losing her sword in the process.  Her blood spear fell apart and splashed all over her back as her concentration was focused on trying to maintain her sanity – which was becoming quite fragile as the world seemed to drop out from underneath her.

Chapter 39 – Fallen Kingdom

Rosewyn couldn’t believe her eyes and had to rub them a few times to make sure she wasn’t hallucinating.  Maybe that Bearilla Commander did something to my mind?  She could’ve sworn that the entire tiered fortification just disappeared and there was a gaping hole in the middle of the field a half-mile wide.  Actually, when she got her eyes on it again, it was currently turning into a mile wide as the sides caved in and, she assumed, landed on top of anyone or anything left alive on there.

Uh…what just happened?

Every adult in the Kingdom other than those with her on the towers and a few hundred Nature Manipulators off near the side walls were on those fortifications.  And now they were gone – though she did have to admit that after the Commander’s strange roar attack, there hadn’t been many left alive when the whole place went down.  And, now that she looked, it appeared that every Bearilla except for two injured and bleeding ones on their side had been on the fortification as well.

Though she did see a single Quizard had survived and she saw it running back up through the carnage towards the border for some reason.  She jumped as a sharp report to her left broke the intense silence, ending with a Cannon bullet obliterating the running Quizard.  Rosewyn looked over at the Guild members who did it and they just looked sad – which was exactly what she felt.

They’re all dead…why didn’t we try to run from this?  Was there something else we could’ve done?

“Rosewyn, this isn’t your fault.  I put in that failsafe under the fortification in case all was lost and I didn’t know if I would have to use it.”

Something in the way Milton said it made her suspicious.  “Wait a minute, you didn’t know if you would have to use it?  That means that you suspected that you would need to, doesn’t it?  Wait a minute…”  Thoughts were racing through her head at sonic speed, the Intelligence Boost working overtime as she started to put things together.

“YOU PLANNED THIS ALL ALONG!  Why else would you want all of the people together in one place – you just wanted to kill them without having to do it piecemeal.  What better way than by using a severe threat to the Kingdom to further your own goals!  I knew I never should’ve trusted—”  She started to let him have it, but she was frozen and couldn’t move, let alone speak.

“I’m sorry about this, but please – let me explain.  It’s not what you think.  I’m going to let you go now, so please give me a chance before you say something you’re going to regret.”

As soon as Milton stopped talking, Rosewyn felt all her control return and she almost continued her tirade.  However, she stopped as she remembered the authority tinged with sadness in the Station Core’s voice as he spoke.  She didn’t say anything, and he apparently took that as her submission.  I don’t care what he thinks, I only want to hear his “explanation”.

“As I think you know, I’m not from this planet.  It doesn’t matter exactly where I was from, the only thing you need to know is that on my world we had what you would call ‘military simulations’.  And suffice it to say, I was pretty good at them.  That being said, I’ve tried to apply that knowledge and experience to this world, doing my best to both protect myself and keep you alive once I learned about your presence.

“However, my good friend ALANNA recently told me some disturbing news that I refused to accept at first: she told me that I – no, we – would lose this war if I continued to do what my instincts wanted me to do.  If you knew me at all, you would know that I don’t like to lose; and so I did everything I could to prepare for the inevitable appearance of the army under the Quizard Mountains.  I provided training to the members of the Guild, assembled the Kingdom’s citizens and gave them weapons and armor, set up living spaces for everyone, built fortifications, and even constructed some higher-tech defenses.

“But it wasn’t enough.

“And deep down, I think I knew that.  But again, I didn’t want to acknowledge it or even hint at it to any of you, because I needed you to believe you could do it.  I needed everyone to give their all to this campaign, because otherwise we would lose.”

That didn’t make sense to Rosewyn.  “What do you mean – we’ve already lost!  There’s nobody but the few of us here left!”

“There’s something ALANNA told me that rattled around in this big old metal shell of mine ever since she said it: ‘There’s always a way to win’.  And when I first got that glimpse from Brint and his Quagon of the northern army tearing out the trees, I think I figured it out.

“In one of the “military simulations” that I used to participate in, there was one that had a very lengthy campaign with eight different factions before the winner was declared.  I had started out well, gathering resources and building up my armies, expanding my territory until I thought I was invincible.  However, a chance encounter told me that more than half of my enemies had created an alliance and were soon working together to take me down.  I knew that I was strong enough to destroy one or two of them with ease, but with four or five of them against me, I knew I was doomed.

“I almost gave up right then and there and cut my losses, especially after those not in the alliance against me refused to help with our own mutual protection pact.  But I didn’t like to lose and thought about what I could do to pull off a victory under those horrific odds.  I spent hours trying to figure it out, but every scenario I thought of just wouldn’t work.  I remember hanging my head with my hand over the Forfeit button, thinking that there was no way to win.

“But there’s always a way to win – it just might look different to everyone else.

“And so I prepared my armies, upgraded my defenses on my stronghold, and waited for the alliance against me to attack.”

What does this have anything to do with—

“I did much better than I thought I would, holding them off for hours and destroying half of their combined armies during the siege, but at the end it was for naught as my stronghold was destroyed and all of my soldiers there were killed.  The alliance left shortly thereafter, having completed their objective of eliminating the strongest faction – me.

“But unbeknownst to them, I had established a tiny little town outside of a newbie dungeon, out in the middle of nowhere.  While my main forces had been killed and my residence destroyed, I survived.  And then I expanded, and recruited mercenaries where I could, building my own little city in the middle of nowhere, spending every resource I earned on improving my army and none on defense – unlike the other factions.  My anonymity was enough protection, as I didn’t advertise my presence to anyone.

“And so when the time came when the other factions warred to become the strongest, sending their armies against each other to see who would come out on top, I stayed put in my corner of the land, continuing to build up my forces until I had an army bigger than any three of the other factions combined.

“And why did I do that?  Because the objective of the entire campaign was to either have the greatest military might by the end while still having a defended location, or by eliminating every other faction; it wasn’t about having the largest, flashiest castle or about how many battles you won during the entire campaign.  And the only victory condition I cared about stated that your stronghold needed to be a defended location – which my little city qualified for because I had a very cheap, rickety fence around it.  I had spent all my other resources on building up my military might while disregarding any defense.

“Of course, if a single soldier from any of the other factions found me and kicked my fence a couple of times until it fell over, I would’ve been disqualified.  But they didn’t, and by the time the campaign had ended, only two factions remained: mine and another one that had waged war on the other factions, winning battle after battle, but also losing soldier after soldier.  And I ultimately won – without actually winning a single battle.

“I had found an alternative-win scenario, one which had never been implemented before.  Usually in these long campaigns, there was plenty of time for the factions to destroy each other, leaving one to remain – the military might factor never came into play.

“And so I adapted this strategy here.  I saw the “alliance” aiming for the Kingdom and instinctively knew that we couldn’t win, despite all of the effort put into it.  But I needed it to at least appear as if we had thrown everything that we had at them, used all our resources and then failed, leaving the Kingdom ripe for destruction.  And I was right, unfortunately; if you’ll notice, the Bearilla Commander has already fled the field after having seen both armies take part in their mutual destruction.  He’s probably heading back to whoever is really in charge to tell them about this whole situation.

“And, as much as it might pain you to hear it, this was probably only a small fraction of those waiting to attack.  Already, Brint has just seen streams of Bearillas and Quizards exiting the other caves along the mountain range, ripping up trees just like they did here.  And though he can only see one or two, you can bet that the hundreds of caves down the range are doing the same thing.”

The anger drained away as Rosewyn comprehended what he just said.  That is, of course, if what he said was true.  “You’re saying that…we never had a chance, did we?  Then why go through all this if you knew what was going to happen?”

“I told you – I needed the enemy to think that we had been defeated, crushed into the ground and helpless.  Then, and only then, could we initiate an alternate-win scenario.”

Rosewyn looked at the giant hole in the ground, confused at what he was talking about.  “But we have been defeated – there’s essentially no one left.”

“Rosewyn, you should know better than that.  All of those citizens down there may have died, but while I’m around, death isn’t permanent.”

“But—”

“Yes, I’ve already started the process, but it is going to take some time.  As soon as I saw the army coming out of the mountain, I started to break down everything non-essential both here at my dungeon and at the residences I built there.  With the help of a veritable army of Greycers and slider wagons, I transported nearly 1,000 drones to help.

“They’ll be arriving shortly to help the drones already there; however, what I need to do this is time – which is slowly running out as the Hammerslug approaches.  I need you and everyone else left alive with NCUs to hold it off or find some way to kill it.  Send all the citizens left alive down to the field behind the towers and they can be transported back to the Refuge.”

“How the hell are we supposed to do that?  That thing is the largest beast I’ve ever seen; I’m not even sure it can be killed.”

“Honestly, I don’t know – but if anyone can figure it out, you can.  I have a few extra ‘toys’ coming with the drones that might help, but you’ll have to figure out how to best utilize them.  I’ll be concentrating on the cleanup, so it’s all up to you now – to help, though, I told the other teams on the towers to send their citizens down.”

I have no idea how that’s supposed to happen.  Multiple pairs of eyes on her made her realize that only half of her conversation with Milton had been audible, and now it appeared as if everyone around her thought she had lost her mind.  Alright, Rosewyn – one thing at a time.

“Ok, everyone, here’s the plan…”

*         *         *

True to his word, an army of the adorable bunny-dogs came streaking out from the south, delivering flying drones by the dozens.  They swarmed into the pit along with hundreds of Molecular Converters from the temporary residences; although she couldn’t see them inside the pit from where she was, she had personally seen how fast they could work.  Still, it was going to take a while to excavate and convert the entire fortification, bodies, and literal tons of dirt covering it.

A few drones also arrived at the towers for “cleanup” as well, removing their dead from the tall fortifications, as well as cleaning up the area around the bottom of them – including all of the damaged defenses.  Quite a few people and defenses had been knocked off from the chucked Quizards and neither Rosewyn nor Milton wanted to leave anyone or anything “behind” if they could help it.

She watched the surviving citizens from the towers making their way down to the field where the Greycers waited, each of them walking in a bit of a daze as one of Milton’s sensor orbs explained how to strap themselves to the back of the super-fast beast.  A quick count told her that only about 300 had survived – about a fifth of those that had started the day atop the towers.

The drones had also dropped off some more defenses, though she wasn’t quite sure how to best utilize them yet.  There were three of the one-time-use Large Plasma Bombs, which sounded like they would do some damage.

“Why didn’t we have these before?  This could’ve saved many more lives!”

“I didn’t quite have the resources for them until I had started cannibalizing everything to create the drones for cleanup.  And, they’re only for a single use – so while it would’ve taken out a large chunk of the enemy, it would’ve been only a small fraction of them.  Plus, you’d have to use it far away from any defenders, as it wouldn’t differentiate between friend and foe.”

It made sense, but she couldn’t help but think that having them when that Commander was growl-roaring would’ve helped immensely.  There was nothing she could’ve done about it now, however, and even if half of the citizens had survived, they would still have the massive beast slowly bearing down on them to contend with.  Which, as it approached, looked immeasurably larger than it had when seeing it through Brint’s eyes—

Hmmm…that might work.

She had a stupid idea, but it might just work – as long as Brint was willing.  She looked at the Guild survivors atop the towers and saw with relief that the two she was looking for were still around.  They were both on the tower next to the one she was on, so she yelled over to them and asked them to meet her on hers.  It took a little while for them to make their way down the inside of the tower, walk over the corpse-covered ground, and climb to the top of her tower – but that was okay, since they still had a while to wait until the gigantic slug was in range.

When the two Casters finally arrived, their clothes dirty and bloody from the blood-drenched ground below, she asked them, “So tell me – have you been practicing with your Spatial Voids?”

Chapter 40 – No other option

From his higher vantage point, Brint looked inside at the giant hole created when the tiered fortification had collapsed, taking everything with it nearly 1,000 feet down.  He could see drones swarming over it, excavating and tossing everything into hundreds of Molecular Converters set up in a ring around the giant hole.  He had been watching as it fell and remembered with pride watching Whisp stand her ground with about a dozen others on the top tier.  He was about to futilely lend his aid to try to save her – at least he had been before everything dropped.  And then was buried under thousands of tons of dirt.

It pained him to see it, but she and some others were already brought back in Milton’s dungeon.  Knowing that she hadn’t really died eased his mind somewhat.

He watched the “Hammerslug” approach, finally arriving close enough for the sensor orbs to get a good look at it.[39]  Needless to say, things didn’t look good.  For one, it had more Strength in one of its hammer-like arms (75,000) than almost 5 whole Bearilla Commanders – and it had 6 of them.  Second, its body was made from lava-formed exterior plates that appeared so durable that it was doubtful anything they threw at it would have any effect.

But that didn’t mean they didn’t try.

Angling their Vacuum Cannons to point high up into the air, the teams of Casters shot their diamond-tipped bullets, arcing them high into the air before they hit the Hammerslug nearly 3,000 feet away.  They weighed over a ton and had tremendous force behind them – but they pinged off the rocky-red exterior of the behemoth, leaving a tiny scratch as they fell back to the dirt.  Despite that ineffectiveness, they continued to shoot the bullets – because it was still too far away to hit with any other Casts.

What was surprisingly more effective was the needle grass and large-thorned vines the remaining Nature Manipulators grew across its path.  The underbelly of the giant slug seemed to be “softer” somehow and more prone to injury, which was evident when it actually hesitated and then smashed the ground with its fist.  Even though he was high up in the air, Brint could almost “feel” the reverberations slamming through the ground, churning the sharp plant-filled pathway to a smashed-flat dirt track.

Seeing that its bottom might be vulnerable to attack, the teams (after picking themselves up after being knocked around by the intense pounding by the Hammerslug) started to break the bullets up into sharply pointed cluster balls, launching them in the colossal beast’s path.  This caused the giant slug to pause even more as it smashed them to pieces or further into the ground, rendering them harmless.

All of which was the point; their goal was to delay the Hammerslug – not to kill it.  That was Brint’s job.

Well, Brint and the three people hitching a ride on the back of his Quagon.

“I can see the vulnerability of it down there, but by the time it’s close enough for my teams down there to take advantage of it, that thing will be in range to smash them to bits!” Rosewyn shouted over and in between the deafening noise of the Hammerslug pounding the ground once again with all six of its arms.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” he asked her, using his Uplink to speak directly to her mind.  He barely heard her shouting, and he didn’t want his question to get lost in the wind and noise – mainly because he wasn’t looking forward to it.

“No, but I don’t think we have any other choice!” she yelled back, resignation and conviction warring with each other in her voice.

“Alright, then – we better try this before we run out of time.  Hold on and I’ll let you know when it’s time.”  Brint banked his Quagon, turning it so that he was going to pass right over the top of it.  As he got closer, he started to count down the seconds for his passengers in their heads.  “…3, 2, 1, GO!”

At his word, Rosewyn and two other Casters that he didn’t know the names of jumped off the back of his mount, free-falling in an arced trajectory toward the massive Hammerslug.  Brint watched over the side of the Quagon, wincing as they almost appeared that they were going to splat right into the front of its rocky exterior, but apparently a few well-placed Air Casts caused them to divert to a safer landing.

They were still close enough to be swatted out of the air by the humongous hammer arms, however.  Fortunately, the sensor orbs told him that the Hammerslug relied on something called tremor-sense, which allowed it to “see” through vibrations through the ground.  Which made sense – he couldn’t see any type of normal-looking eyes on the thing.

They floated slowly past the arms without incident, using their abilities to greatly reduce their speed, if not come to a complete stop.  When they were across from the largest part of its “body”, they looked at each other; Rosewyn then used her Light Affinity to create a small orb of Light centered on the exterior of the slug.  Without hesitation, Brint saw them all drink another small vial of Power Potion, before they pointed towards the orb of Light.

That’s when things went a little crazy.  Where the Light orb once floated, a massive roiling grey-colored Unstable Warp Void was created when the three created large Spatial Voids and combined them together (he was told that this would happen when Rosewyn revealed the plan to him earlier, but actually seeing it happen was something else entirely).  It was nearly 50 feet wide and placed just inside the body of the Hammerslug; as he watched, it grew even larger as it sucked up more of the surrounding beast, expanding until it was nearly twice its original size…and then it collapsed and disappeared with a *pop*.

The three who had Cast the Voids plummeted to the ground, dead or unconscious; either way, they slammed into the ground so hard it didn’t really matter.  As for the gigantic slug, it was missing a large chunk out of its front side, steaming blood pouring out of its insides as the absence of the Void allowed some of its vital organs to appear, damaged and exposed to the air.

A roar louder than anything he’d heard before shook the very air around Brint as even the Quagon was affected, its wings reflexively snapping closed and they plummeted toward the forest below.

Luckily, the roar stopped after a few seconds; falling to the ground in an uncontrolled spiral, Brint was able to get his mount to extend its wings again.  They snapped open only 50 feet above the treetops, and as they stabilized their flight, some of the upper branches brushed the bottom of his Quagon as they flew past.

Fortunately, they had enough speed going for them that they were able to rise up into the air again, but it was a few minutes before his mount was able to get enough elevation to make it back to the battle.  As he turned back, he was dismayed that despite the massive wound to its front, the Hammerslug hadn’t stopped its advance.

In fact, once he was able to see the wound again, it seemed to be healing itself by using its natural heat and cauterizing the exterior of the wound, stopping the blood-loss.  A few Vacuum Cannon bullets had managed to make it inside the wound, finally doing some damage to its softer, vulnerable insides – but they were barely pin-pricks for all the care the Hammerslug showed at the injuries they created.

But now it was close enough to reach the towers, as the few minutes Brint had been recovering from his close-call had let it continue to advance, ignoring any of the sharp stone spikes the Casters had made from the earth right in front of the towers.  The wound to its front was probably bad enough that all it cared about now was destroying anything in its path and not caring about further injury to its bottom side.

Without time or opportunity to reload any more Cannons with the diamond-tipped bullets, the Casters resorted to throwing whatever elemental abilities they had at the gaping wound in front of them: large individual shards of stone, spears made of the congealing blood spread around the towers, sharp slices of hardened air – he even saw what looked like some sort of forked lightning bolt strike out.  Even the remaining Railgun Penetrator went to work, causing relatively minor explosions upon impact.

And while it did some damage and caused more ruptures inside the wound, it ultimately didn’t matter as the hammer arms came down, one per tower and slammed into them with such force that it almost made Brint’s ears bleed from the tremendous *crack* that reverberated through the air.

Each of the insanely strong and heavy Weightonite towers had split down the middle, the people fighting for their lives and the “future” lives of the Kingdom’s citizens flattened to a pulp or else flung away with such speed that they couldn’t hope to live from the impact with the ground or against another tower.

But the Hammerslug wasn’t done yet.  It was surprisingly fast in its repetitious destruction of the towers, not only slamming down and creating more cracks in the stone blocks but bringing two arms together to pulverize the Weightonite between its hammers.  However, regardless of the superior destructive capabilities of the gigantic beast, the Weightonite was a durable material; it took more than a half hour of constant pounding to reduce the blocks to rubble, followed by another 10 minutes of the Hammers pounding the shards into the ground, smoothing out the pathway before it.

And that was the moment Brint was waiting for.

As much as he wanted to do something before the towers were destroyed, he couldn’t even get close to the Hammerslug while it was flinging its arms up, down, and every which way.  But now, after it had taken its frustration out on the Weightonite blocks, it was content to hold its arms in place while it slowly moved forward.

Its wound by then had stopped bleeding completely, but it wasn’t miraculously healing.  It was probably still hurting and debilitating, but it wasn’t enough to stop it from completely destroying all of the drones and Converters still working down in the giant pit if it ventured down there.  After checking with their progress from The Milton, he knew that there was still at least an hour before they were done – but they didn’t have that much time.

Well, here goes nothing.

He banked his Quagon again, looking one more time on the hellish battlefield caused by millions of people and hundreds of thousands of enemy beasts clashing, along with the complete and utter destruction caused by the Hammerslug.

“Can you tell Whisp I’ll be seeing her soon?”

“Absolutely, buddy.  Good luck, my friend.”

Brint reached down to the three devices strapped to the harness in front of him, taking the place of the normal storage packs of food and Potions.  Quickly flipping the simple switches on top, he started to count down from 30 as he angled his Quagon toward the massive Hammerslug and its oversized frontal wound.

At 10 seconds, they were passing by the hammer arms that were extended out in front of the gargantuan beast, when he saw one of them moving toward them.  It might have just been coincidence, because Brint didn’t think it could actually see them; regardless, he immediately had the Quagon snap its wings closed and dive, barely passing underneath the arm as it passed by overhead.  The wind from the Hammerslug’s arm’s passage, however, disturbed their impromptu dive and by the time he was able to have his mount extend its wings again, they were aiming too far below the wound to be effective.

8 seconds.

Making a split-second decision, he retracted the wings of the Quagon and dove toward the ground again, snapping them open right before they would’ve hit.

7 seconds.

They glided only a few feet over the ground, gradually losing altitude as they closed the distance.

6 seconds.

As they neared the Hammerslug, the disturbance from their passage must’ve alerted the giant beast to their presence and two hammer arms swung down, slamming into the ground just behind the tail of the Quagon.

5 seconds.

When he figured they were close enough, he angled his mount’s wings so that they started to rise again, though they moved even slower now.

4 seconds.

He activated his Self-levitation ability, straining and pushing as much power into it as he could, creating a negative gravity field over 50 feet in height in less than a second.

3 seconds.

They shot upwards at an angle and Brint despaired because he saw that they were going to undershoot the wound.  He tried to angle the wings again on his Quagon, but they were already at the limit of how far they could move.

2 seconds.

His negative gravity field had apparently confused and pissed off the Hammerslug, because all six arms came flying down, and the wind caused by their passing pushed them higher, right into the path of the wound.

1 second.

The heat from inside the wound was intense and he felt his skin burning as soon as he passed inside of it.  Fortunately, he didn’t have to suffer long as the Quagon folded its wings and landed inside the spherical opening, feet and claws extended to grab hold of the sides and hang on.  Brint looked at the Large Plasma Bombs and prayed to the Goddess that they would work, because they didn’t have any other option—

0.

Epilogue – Comeuppance

Milton watched Brint bravely fly to his death, bringing with him three Large Plasma Bombs that went off precisely when they needed to.  And the result was even more spectacular than he had expected when Rosewyn had revealed the plan to him.  I can’t believe the ingenuity of these Proctans – I must be rubbing off on them.

The extremely high-temperature explosions that resulted from the bombs going off was too much for even the lava-like insides of the Hammerslug.  A 400-foot wide hole was created from inside of the beast, vaporizing the blood and internal organs of over half the beast in a split second.  The explosion was so powerful, in fact, that the super-durable exterior was blown apart, pieces of the slug’s outer shell raining over the landscape for miles around.

Some even fell into the pit where his drones were excavating, crushing five dozen in its wake.  That would’ve been detrimental to their progress, if it hadn’t been for the fact that every enemy threatening their project was now dead.  And unfortunately every defender was dead as well – even the Nature Manipulators who had survived and were watching from the forest: the explosion sent pieces of slug ripping through their ranks, completely decimating their entire force.

His drones kept working, eventually clearing up the rest of the pit, before using the same dirt that they had excavated for it to fill it loosely back up halfway.  He didn’t want to fill it up all the way and alert the enemy that somebody had survived the destruction; the way he left it made it look like all the bodies were still underneath the ground.  He only had to hope that none of them investigated it too closely.

Milton thought it was almost a shame that they had killed the Hammerslug, because then more effort might go into seeing who created it and how it was done – because he didn’t have the time to spare to convert all of it.  However, if it hadn’t been killed, he wouldn’t have been able to finish finding all the bodies of the citizens and he’d probably be missing a million or more of them.  He would just have to take the good with the bad there.

He spent some time cleaning everything else up, breaking down all of the Molecular Converters, Power Generators, destroyed defenses, drones, and all but one of the Geothermal Transmutation Stations for their resources, before burying the last Converter far underground – and then having it convert the very last drone.  When he was done, all that would be left were piles of rubble and the still-standing residences – which he was sure were going to be destroyed once more Hammerslugs emerged from hiding.

The Kingdom’s nearly 800,000 children were on their way underground being pulled along on hundreds of Glider Wagons to the Refuge, but it was going to be weeks or months before they arrived – mainly due to the fact that they had to keep moving a GTS to power the drones every couple of miles and then wait a day for it to activate.  They were scared and sad about their parents, but Milton (with ALANNA’s help) tried to assure them and their hundreds of caretakers that they were going someplace safe and they would see their parents again.  He wasn’t sure if their assurances worked, but none of them could do much about their situation.

At least the time until they arrived would give him time to prepare.  The first thing he needed to do was hide any indication of the Refuge and his dungeon, lest his ploy to hide out in the forest be uncovered and everything he had orchestrated be undone.  Second, he had to establish a place for the newcomers to live and learn about their new home underground.  Third…well, third, he needed to spend the attribute points figuratively burning a hole in his pocket.  Plus, achievements were always nice.

Congratulations!

You have unlocked an achievement:

Genocidal Professional

You have defeated more than 100,000 of the same type of enemy within 10 minutes

Bonus – +5 to Insight/Luck

You have unlocked an achievement:

Genocidal Master

You have defeated more than 1,000,000 of the same type of enemy within 10 minutes

Bonus – +5 to Insight/Luck

And after that – wait for his time to strike back and claim victory.

*        *         *

Gavin stared down at the strange clear sword and brown/black clothing one of his Company reps had raced back with from the northeast.  According to Mycallo, who had managed to sneak away and run back after receiving the armaments for free from a mysterious box that gave you whatever you wanted, there were so many of the Kingdom’s citizens up there that he had no chance to count them all.  The head of the Cordpower Company as well as the leader in charge of the Kingdom doubted it was everybody, but it was probably more than enough to substantiate the findings of his own people as they scoured the countryside looking for anyone left.

They had found some holdouts and random citizens living in small villages that weren’t even on his records (meaning that they hadn’t paid any taxes, ever); he had them all brought back to the capital so that he could keep an eye on them.  It was bad enough that all the others had been stolen away to the north on some scheme of the Guild; he’d be damned if he didn’t do whatever he could to ensure everybody else who was left weren’t going to leave.

He hadn’t heard back from Draven or the Royal Army Reserve, which worried him a little.  Even if they hadn’t been successful, Colonel Harbish had orders to send at least one messenger back with news.  With everything being quiet, and less and less news coming from all parts of the Kingdom, Gavin was content to hole up in the Capital – just in case.

He fully expected the Guild to come marching back and lay siege to Grestwinch, which was why he had called almost everyone back.  Including the multitudes of merchants and other powerful individuals who had refused to leave everything behind, he had more than 80,000 people that he could order or convince (under penalty of treason) to fight against whatever they brought with them.  They were in a very defensible position and it would take more than whatever ragtag group they brought back after whatever escapade they had going up north.

Roscoe was out scouring the countryside for any clues to what exactly that was, so he wasn’t there to confirm the story Mycallo told him about massive beasts 20 feet tall working with the Guild.  He thought it unlikely that the ones that were so focused on ridding the Kingdom of the beast threat would now be working with them, but these were strange times.  He didn’t kill his rep like he usually did with those he thought were lying to him – mainly because he didn’t have that many loyal people left around to get rid of one so flippantly.

“Sir, there’s…there’s something you need to see.”

He had never heard Bruth frightened before, so he was immediately on his guard as he looked up from his perusal of the sword and armor lying on his desk.  He had made the mistake of letting the edge of the weapon come in contact with the wooden furniture and it had ended up leaving a large cut in the side without much effort – or pressure.  He picked it up, again noticing its lightness as he followed his bodyguard out to the hallway and up the stairs to the upper floor.  And then from there, they took some narrow corridors that eventually led to the roof.

“Bruth, what is this all about?  Did those Guild bastards recruit even more people to their cause than I thought?” he asked, a little out of breath as they neared the top of the spiral staircase leading to one of the castle’s parapets.

“You…you could say that…sir.”

What’s gotten into him?

As soon as he stepped out of the small hatchway leading to the parapet, he knew.  Surrounding the capital city of Grestwinch on all sides was a monstrous army flooding the countryside, ranging as far as the eye could see.  But it wasn’t the Guild coming back with five million brain-washed recruits.

It was more like ten million giant lizards, half a million massive monkeys, and nearly a hundred red and brown beasts so large he thought if they got any closer that they would block out the sun.

The strange sword dropped from his nerveless fingers as he stared open-mouthed at the army of beasts ready to assault his city.  He glanced down and saw that the weapon had gotten stuck, easily cutting through the stone below his feet and was sticking up at an angle.

Strange times, indeed.

*         *         *

The figure listened to the grunts, growls, and soft roars of the one in charge of leading the initial expedition to the far north.  When it had made its report, the white-and-silver (with a small streak of blood running down its side) behemoth backed off and ran away, grabbing two of the giant lizards nearby on its way for a snack.

So the filthy two-legs are putting up a fight?  No matter, my unstoppable forces will overcome, just like they did to the east.

The frail-looking, four-legged figure bent down and entered the small cave behind it, contorting its frame and squeezing through the worn edges of the tight tunnel at the end for a few feet before it opened up enough to stand up straight.  Walking over to the far end of the room, the figure gazed at the broken metallic shell of its former home, time and heat having absolutely no effect on the cracked metal egg.  It was entirely inert, no hint of its former power rushing through its systems and processors.

The figure sat down and folded its strangely reptilian legs underneath it, gazing at the remains of a Station Core that had seen much better days.  It was never comfortable, however; ever since it had hijacked this form after its original repository had been damaged years after they had arrived at this outpost, it had mutated in incomprehensible ways – the least of which was an instinctual need to destroy the two-legs that had killed its original family and chased it down to the caverns it now resided in.

“We will be victoriussss, my Collective masterssss.  We will obliterate any tracccce of thesssse two-legged Heliothropessss from the planet and make it ssssafe for all to live.  You can rely on your sssservant, ALANNA, to do thissss for you.”

The figure stood back up and squeezed back out the small tunnel that kept its former home safe from further harm and emerged from the cave just in time to watch the members of its army marching up the tunnels leading outside.

It won’t be long now.  For The Collective!

End of Book 4

Final Stats

Core Status

Name:

Milton Frederick

Type:

Station Core Prototype 3-B

Combat Level:

24

Experience:

32457215/42985500

Reactor Type:

Zero-point Energy

Reactor Output:

90%

Current Statistics/Attributes

Reactor Power/Strength:

52

Processing Power/Intelligence:

85

Structural Integrity/Constitution:

52

Ingenuity/Wisdom:

100

Processing Speed/Agility:

100

Communication/Charisma:

94

Insight/Luck:

62

Sensor Interpretation/Perception

80

(24 points to allocate)

Power Requirements

Reactor Output

90%

Facilities

Power Requirements

With Current Reduction: 100%

Total Power Requirements

Ore Refinery (1)

1.5%

0%

0%

Bioconversion Lab (20)

1%

0%

0%

Bioconversion Lab – Upgraded (3)

2%

0%

0%

Biological Recombinator (1)

1.5%

0%

0%

Defensive Weapons Factory (1)

2%

0%

0%

Rapid Coalification Facility (1)

4%

0%

0%

Destructive Distillery (1)

4%

0%

0%

Drone Assembly Plant (1)

2%

0%

0%

Drones/Sensor Orbs

Power Requirements

With Current Reduction: 75%

Total Power Requirements

Ground Drone (150)

0.02%

0% (GTS)

0%

Ground Drone (14)

0.02%

0.005%

0.07%

Flying Drone (135)

0.025%

0% (GTS)

0%

Sensor Orb (520)

0.001%

0% (GTS)

0%

Sensor Orb (130)

0.001%

0.00025%

0.033%

Whisp’s Light (12103)

0.001%

0% (GTS)

0%

Combat Units

Power Requirements

With Current Reduction: 75%

Total Power Requirements

Non-sentient Units (615400) Total Bio Units

0.00004% per Bio Unit

0% (GTS)

0%

Non-sentient Units (6500) Total Bio Units

0.00004% per Bio Unit

0.00001% per Bio Unit

0.065%

Sentient Units (1561600 Total Bio Units)

0.00004% per Bio Unit

0% (GTS)

0%

Sentient Units (0 Total Bio Units)

0.00004% per Bio Unit

0.00001% per Bio Unit

0.0%

Total

0.168%

Current Goals

Long-term Goals:

Goodbye Planet, Hello Collective

Build spacecraft and leave planet

Average-term Goals:

Conquering Hero

Conquer Quizard Mountains for resources

DNA Harvester: The Second Harvest

Collect additional Gene Mutation samples

Short-term Goals:

Unlikely Odds

Defeat Quizard Mountain army

The Kingdom Rises

Obtain help from the Kingdom (Completed)

Bonuses and Other Information

Name

Received

Magnitude

Combat Unit attack and defense increased

Dependent upon Combat Level: 21

42%

Sensor Orbs can determine mineral characteristics

Unlocked at SI/P: 20

N/A

Communication range of Combat Units increased

Unlocked at C/C: 40

25%

Speed of projects completed in facilities increased

Unlocked at PS/A: 30

10%

Required BMUs for facilities decreased

Unlocked at I/W: 30

10%

Increase to defense of all Combat Units

Completed: Emergency Measures

10%

Additional Trait Points for use during Recombination

Geneticist: Level 4

+40

Cost reduction of DWF traps (excludes PG – P and MC – P)

Advanced Engineering: Level 4 (.16 X I/W)

12.8%

Speed of drones completing projects increased

Unlocked at PS/A: 40 and C/C: 30

50%

Bio Unit limit based upon Reactor Output

Unlocked at PP/I, C/C: 50

190000

Delegated skill upgrade speed increase

Delegation: Level 3

3%

Power required for drones and facilities decreased

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I: 50

50%

Bioconversion Lab speed increase

Unlocked at PS/S, I/W: 50

25%

Cost reduction of all DWF items

Unlocked at I/W: 50 and PP/I, PS/A: 40

5%

Can use non-biological components in Combat Units

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C: 50

N/A

Can use biological components in defensive traps

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C: 50

N/A

Increased chance to receive additional gene mutations

Unlocked at I/L: 40 and I/W: 50

5%

Sensor Orbs can determine approximate stat values

Unlocked at SI/P, PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C: 40

Accuracy +-12%

Sensor Orbs can estimate skills of non-Combat Units

Unlocked at SI/P: 50

Accuracy +-10%

Bioconversion Lab speed increase

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C, SI/P: 50

30%

Communication range of Combat Units increased

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C, SI/P: 50

15%

Combat Units require less of the Bio Unit limit

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C, SI/P: 50

50%

Drones automatically perceive problems and correct them

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C, SI/P: 50

N/A

Reduced requirements for improving RP/S and SI/C

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C, SI/P: 50

5%

Increased conversion speed inside Molecular Converters

Unlocked at PS/A: 60

30%

Range of Power Generator – Portable increased

Unlocked at PP/I: 60

50%

Automated Combat Unit replacement and Bio Mass reduction

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I: 60 and I/W: 50

15%

Power required for drones and facilities decreased

Unlocked at RP/S: 20

25%

Sentient Combat Units Power Requirements the same as Non-Sentient

Unlocked at RP/S: 20 and PS/A, PP/I, C/C: 50

N/A

Additional Facility Options

Unlocked at I/W: 60

N/A

Reduction of Non-sentient hybrid costs and Bio Mass total, based upon RP/S

Unlocked at I/W, PS/A, PP/I: 60 and RP/S: 20

2.4%

Reduced requirements for improving RP/S and SI/C

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

5%

Combat Units now require less Reactor Output to maintain

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

50%

Increase of Reactor Output

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

50%

Facility speed improvement

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

25%

Facilities within a certain distance rely on ambient power instead of Reactor Output

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

5 miles

Eliminate need for BMUs inside of Combat Units, utilizing biological material instead

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

N/A

Effective communication range increased

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

50%

Sensors can now penetrate through the ground

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

15 feet

Reactor Output increased

Unlocked at RP/S and SI/C: 50

20%

Drone speed increased

Unlocked at PS/A: 80

50%

Communication Range increased: Combat/Non-Combat Units

Unlocked at C/C: 80 and RP/S: 50

150%/175%

Sensor’s ground penetration/body heat detection

Unlocked at SI/P: 80

50 feet/150 feet

Goals with numeric counts to complete reduced

Unlocked at I/L: 50

10%

Additional Facility Options

Unlocked at I/W: 80 and I/L: 50

N/A

Additional Research options in the Biological Recombinator

Unlocked at I/W: 80

N/A

Facility speed improvement

Unlocked at PS/A and PP/I: 80

15%

Facility production speed increase

Unlocked at PS/A: 100

50%

Molecular Converter construct/deconstruct speed increase

Unlocked at PS/A: 100

0%

Drones: Faster/Stronger/Travel time decrease

Unlocked at PS/A: 100

60%/20%/40%

Switching between Combat Units is instantaneous

Unlocked at PS/A: 100

N/A

All Combat Units receive bonus to Agility

Unlocked at PS/A: 100

15%

Resource substitution in Facility construction increased

Unlocked at I/W: 100

15%

Resource substitution in Drone Assembly Plant items increased

Unlocked at I/W: 100

10%

Resource substitution in Defensive Weapons Factory items increased

Unlocked at I/W: 100

10%

Resource substitution for Combat Units increased

Unlocked at I/W: 100

5%

Reduction in requirements for non-Combat Unit objects in Molecular Converters

Unlocked at I/W: 100

5%

Increase in refinement for Ore Refinery

Unlocked at I/W: 100

50%

Drones can produce own interpretation of orders

Unlocked at I/W: 100

N/A

Combat Units gain a bonus to Wisdom

Unlocked at I/W: 100

15%

New Facility Options

Unlocked at PS/A and I/W: 100

N/A

Combat Unit Status

Reactor Power: 90%

Power Available: 90%

Name

# of Units

Power Per Unit %

Power Used %

Blood-thirsty Squirrel (Scout)

1300

0.00001%

0.065%

Fluffy (Speed Striker)

1

0.00055

0% (GTS)

Dungeon Units

6425

Variable

0% (GTS)

Picow Livestock

3450

0.0015%

0% (GTS)

Sentient Combat Units (see full list…)

1952

0.008%

0% (GTS)

Total Power Used: 0.065%

Current Facilities

Type

Description

Ore Refinery

Refines ore, providing 3X more usable Basic Metal Units

Bioconversion Lab

Allows for the creation of larger Combat Units

Bioconversion Lab – Upgraded

Allows for the creation of massive Combat Units

Biological Recombinator

Experiment with different types of units, recombining the DNA from multiple sources to form hybrids

Defensive Weaponry Factory

Creates high-tech defensive weaponry that is powered by your Core

Drone Assembly Plant

Creates and repairs non-combat drones and sensor orbs

Rapid Coalification Facility

Rapidly Converts Organic material into Coal using intense heat and pressure

Destructive Distillery

Destroys materials and changes it into various substances needed by the Molecular Converter to produce certain other materials

Workshop

Your subordinates can use this to develop and improve new and existing defenses

Farm

Provides renewable Organic Material and Biological Mass

Farm 2

Provides renewable Organic Material and Biological Mass (offsite facility)

Author’s Note

I hope you have enjoyed The Kingdom Rises, Book 4 of my Station Cores series.

Phew!  That was a longer one than I had intended, but I wanted to get it all shoved in there without leaving too much out.  You may be surprised at the destruction and deaths of the entire Kingdom, but I had been planning that from the get-go – but that was just about the only thing that I had planned from the very beginning.  Everything else kind of morphed and evolved as the story went along, which I think has worked well with the advancement of the characters and plot.

Look for the next book at some point in the next few months!

Again, thank you for reading and I implore you to consider leaving a review – I love 4 and 5-star ones!  Reviews make it more likely that others will pick up a good book and read it!

If you enjoy dungeon core, dungeon corps, dungeon master, dungeon lord, dungeonlit or any other type of dungeon-themed stories and content, check out the Dungeon Corps Facebook group where you can find all sorts of dungeon content.

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If you would like to contact me with any questions, comments, or suggestions for future books you would like to see, you can reach me at jonathanbrooksauthor@gmail.com.

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Books by Jonathan Brooks

Glendaria Awakens Trilogy

Dungeon Player

Dungeon Crisis

Dungeon Guild

Glendaria Awakens Trilogy Compilation w/bonus material

Uniworld Online Trilogy

The Song Maiden

The Song Mistress

The Song Matron

Station Cores Series

The Station Core

The Quizard Mountains

The Guardian Guild

The Kingdom Rises

Spirit Cores Series

Core of Fear

Dungeon World Series

Dungeon World

Dungeon World 2 (Coming soon)

Tables

[1]

Combat Unit Status

Name:

Whisp #3

Type:

Inventor/Enchanter/Animator/Elemental

Age:

20

Power Ranking: (Major, Minor)

Adept, Greater (3 – 4)

Health

500/500

Power

15000/15000

Attack

14 (+42%)

Defense

24 (+62%)

Strength

10

Constitution

15

Agility

20

Perception

100

Intelligence

1200

Wisdom

3000

Charisma

50

A/D Bonus

42%

Skills

Survivor (Lvl 4)

Permanent 20% increase in Defense

Kamikaze (Lvl 7)

800% more damage during a suicidal attack

Formation Fighting (Lvl 7)

35% increase in attack when fighting within a formation

Cooperation (Lvl 7)

35% increase in defense when fighting alongside natural enemies

Special Traits

Expert Intelligence Boost +34: Expertly increase Intelligence by 1840 for 30 minutes.

Proctan Genius: +50 to Intelligence and Wisdom

Enchanting +13: Imbue objects with a permanent effect

Object Animation +10: Animate normally inanimate objects

Weak Fire Affinity +6: Weakly manipulate Fire

Weak Air Affinity +4: Weakly manipulate Air

Weak Water Affinity +4: Weakly manipulate Water

Weak Earth Affinity +2: Weakly manipulate Earth

[2]

Skill List

Name

Level

Name

Level

Sensor Control

5

Advanced Technical Engineering

2

Kamikaze

8

Advanced Engineering

4

Sensor Enhancement

4

Primitive Defensive Weaponry

5

Drone Manipulation

6

Combat Communication

9

Large-scale Battle Tactics

2

Geneticist

8

Cooperation

9

Tactical Mapping

3

Survivor

5

Delegation

5

Overdrive

3

Defensive Fortification Aficionado

1

[3]

Core Status

Name:

Milton Frederick

Type:

Station Core Prototype 3-B

Combat Level:

21

Experience:

7301490/10147500

Reactor Type:

Zero-point Energy

Reactor Output:

75%

Current Statistics/Attributes

Reactor Power/Strength:

50

Processing Power/Intelligence:

70

Structural Integrity/Constitution:

48

Ingenuity/Wisdom:

70

Processing Speed/Agility:

70

Communication/Charisma:

64

Insight/Luck:

48

Sensor Interpretation/Perception

64

[4]

Core Status

Name:

Milton Frederick

Type:

Station Core Prototype 3-B

Combat Level:

21

Experience:

7401490/10147500

Reactor Type:

Zero-point Energy

Reactor Output:

75%

Current Statistics/Attributes

Reactor Power/Strength:

50

Processing Power/Intelligence:

80

Structural Integrity/Constitution:

50

Ingenuity/Wisdom:

80

Processing Speed/Agility:

80

Communication/Charisma:

84

Insight/Luck:

50

Sensor Interpretation/Perception

80

[5]

Bonuses and Other Information

Name

Received

Magnitude

Combat Unit attack and defense increased

Dependent upon Combat Level: 21

42%

Sensor Orbs can determine mineral characteristics

Unlocked at SI/P: 20

N/A

Communication range of Combat Units increased

Unlocked at C/C: 40

25%

Speed of projects completed in facilities increased

Unlocked at PS/A: 30

10%

Required BMUs for facilities decreased

Unlocked at I/W: 30

10%

Increase to defense of all Combat Units

Completed: Emergency Measures

10%

Additional Trait Points for use during Recombination

Geneticist: Level 4

+40

Cost reduction of DWF traps (excludes PG – P and MC – P)

Advanced Engineering: Level 4 (.16 X I/W)

12.8%

Speed of drones completing projects increased

Unlocked at PS/A: 40 and C/C: 30

50%

Bio Unit limit based upon Reactor Output

Unlocked at PP/I, C/C: 50

190000

Delegated skill upgrade speed increase

Delegation: Level 3

3%

Power required for drones and facilities decreased

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I: 50

50%

Bioconversion Lab speed increase

Unlocked at PS/S, I/W: 50

25%

Cost reduction of all DWF items

Unlocked at I/W: 50 and PP/I, PS/A: 40

5%

Can use non-biological components in Combat Units

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C: 50

N/A

Can use biological components in defensive traps

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C: 50

N/A

Increased chance to receive additional gene mutations

Unlocked at I/L: 40 and I/W: 50

5%

Sensor Orbs can determine approximate stat values

Unlocked at SI/P, PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C: 40

Accuracy +-12%

Sensor Orbs can estimate skills of non-Combat Units

Unlocked at SI/P: 50

Accuracy +-10%

Bioconversion Lab speed increase

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C, SI/P: 50

30%

Communication range of Combat Units increased

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C, SI/P: 50

15%

Combat Units require less of the Bio Unit limit

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C, SI/P: 50

50%

Drones automatically perceive problems and correct them

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C, SI/P: 50

N/A

Reduced requirements for improving RP/S and SI/C

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W, C/C, SI/P: 50

5%

Increased conversion speed inside Molecular Converters

Unlocked at PS/A: 60

30%

Range of Power Generator – Portable increased

Unlocked at PP/I: 60

50%

Automated Combat Unit replacement and Bio Mass reduction

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I: 60 and I/W: 50

15%

Power required for drones and facilities decreased

Unlocked at RP/S: 20

25%

Sentient Combat Units Power Requirements the same as Non-Sentient

Unlocked at RP/S: 20 and PS/A, PP/I, C/C: 50

N/A

Additional Facility Options

Unlocked at I/W: 60

N/A

Reduction of Non-sentient hybrid costs and Bio Mass total, based upon RP/S

Unlocked at I/W, PS/A, PP/I: 60 and RP/S: 20

2.4%

Reduced requirements for improving RP/S and SI/C

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

5%

Combat Units now require less Reactor Output to maintain

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

50%

Increase of Reactor Output

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

50%

Facility speed improvement

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

25%

Facilities within a certain distance rely on ambient power instead of Reactor Output

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

5 miles

Eliminate need for BMUs inside of Combat Units, utilizing biological material instead

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

N/A

Effective communication range increased

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

50%

Sensors can now penetrate through the ground

Unlocked at PS/A, PP/I, I/W: 70 and C/C, SI/P: 60 and RP/S: 50 and SI/C: 40

15 feet

Reactor Output increased

Unlocked at RP/S and SI/C: 50

20%

Drone speed increased

Unlocked at PS/A: 80

50%

Communication Range increased: Combat/Non-Combat Units

Unlocked at C/C: 80 and RP/S: 50

150%/175%

Sensor’s ground penetration/body heat detection

Unlocked at SI/P: 80

50 feet/150 feet

Goals with numeric counts to complete reduced

Unlocked at I/L: 50

10%

Additional Facility Options

Unlocked at I/W: 80 and I/L: 50

N/A

Additional Research options in the Biological Recombinator

Unlocked at I/W: 80

N/A

Facility speed improvement

Unlocked at PS/A and PP/I: 80

15%

[6]

Current Goals

Long-term Goals:

Goodbye Planet, Hello Collective

Build spacecraft and leave planet

Average-term Goals:

Conquering Hero

Conquer Quizard Mountains for resources

DNA Harvester

Collect additional Gene Mutation samples

Short-term Goals:

Unlikely Odds

Defeat Quizard Mountain army

The Kingdom Rises

Obtain help from the Kingdom

[7]

New and Updated List of Available Combat Units for Recombination

Blood-thirsty Squirrel

Greywiener

Quizard

Tricerabeetle

Lollipop Snake

Clawed Badger

Spiderwolf

Squirk

Jackalope

Ombre Jaguar

Glider Monkey

Gargantuan Anaconda

Pygmy Wolf

Scaly Bear

Horrific Piranha

Elephine

Miniature Pygmy Wolf

Big Yellow Bird

Snappy Turtle

Bearilla

[8]

Gene Mutation

Type

Effect

Description

Power Usage

Intelligence Boost +77

Intelligence +770 for 4 minutes

Provides a boost to a Combat Unit’s Intelligence stat for a limited amount of time.

140

Charisma Boost +8

Charisma +80 for 5 minutes

Provides a boost to a Combat Unit’s Charisma stat for a limited amount of time.

20

Agility Boost +210

Agility +2100 for 30 seconds

Provides a boost to a Combat Unit’s Agility stat for a limited amount of time.

420

Perception Boost +185

Perception +1850 for 45 seconds

Provides a boost to a Combat Unit’s Perception stat for a limited amount of time.

360

Strength Boost +222

Strength +2220 for 30 seconds

Provides a boost to a Combat Unit’s Strength stat for a limited amount of time.

440

Constitution Boost +115

Constitution +1150 for 2 minutes

Provides a boost to a Combat Unit’s Constitution stat for a limited amount of time.

220

Physical Boost Suite

Contains boosts for four physical attributes

Gives the Combat Unit access to the highest current levels of Agility, Perception, Strength, and Constitution Boosts.  (Counts as 1 Gene Mutation)

N/A

Strength Boost – On touch +6

Strength +60 for 10 minutes on another

Provides a boost to another’s Strength stat upon touch.  Cannot be used on self.

20

Constitution Boost – On touch +5

Constitution +50 for 10 minutes on another

Provides a boost to another’s Constitution stat upon touch.  Cannot be used on self.

20

Agility Boost – On touch +3

Agility +30 for 10 minutes on another

Provides a boost to another’s Agility stat upon touch.  Cannot be used on self.

20

Perception Boost – On touch +2

Perception +20 for 10 minutes on another

Provides a boost to another’s Perception stat upon touch.  Cannot be used on self.

20

Physical Boost – On touch Suite

Contains On touch boosts for four physical attributes

Gives the Combat Unit the ability to boost another’s attributes on touch to the highest current levels of Agility, Perception, Strength, and Constitution.  (Counts as 1 Gene Mutation)

N/A

Intelligence Boost – On touch +1

Intelligence +10 for 10 minutes on another

Provides a boost to another’s Intelligence stat upon touch.  Cannot be used on self.

20

Charisma Boost – On touch +1

Charisma +10 for 10 minutes on another

Provides a boost to another’s Charisma stat upon touch.  Cannot be used on self.

20

Boiling Blood – On touch +1

Boils the blood of another, causing a small amount of damage over time

Upon touch, cause the blood of your target to boil, causing 5 damage to Health/sec for 10 seconds.  Targets without blood are unaffected.

50

Weakening Poison – On touch +1

Minimally reduces Strength of another

Upon touch, reduce the Strength of a target by 10 for 30 seconds.  Strength cannot go below 1.

50

Slowing Miasma – Airborne Radius +1

Minimally reduces the Agility of others

Upon entering the range of the user, all targets suffer a reduction in their Agility by 10.  Miasma lasts for 30 seconds.

50

Self-levitation +1

Weakly lift oneself off of the ground

Allows for the self-levitation of the user, projecting a negative gravity field underneath them that lifts them vertically off the ground.  Current Height: 1 inch

30 per second

Telekinesis +1

Weakly lift an object from a certain distance

Allows user to move an object up to a certain weight and distance away.  Current Limit: 0.1 lbs. at a distance of 0.5 feet

20 per second

Ability Mimic +1

Weakly mimic the abilities of the nearest target

Allows for the mimicry of another’s abilities, though effectiveness of the ability is reduced.  Lasts for 10 minutes and effectiveness is at 5% of current original ability at normal costs.

50

Water Breathing +1

Converts inhaled water into a breathable substance

Allows the user to breathe underwater by automatically converting water into a breathable substance.  Constant use of power required.

5 per second

Low-light Visibility +1

Weakly enhance vision in low-light conditions

Lightens low-light environments to the user, allowing them to see marginally better.  Makes it 10% clearer and lasts 10 minutes.

20

Atmokinesis +1

Weakly control nearby atmospheric conditions

Allows the user to weakly control nearby atmospheric conditions such as air temperature, barometric pressure, humidity, precipitation, solar radiation, and wind.  Unit must have a minimum of 10 Intelligence.

10 per use

Limited Precognition +1

Vaguely determine what will happen in the future

Allows the user to determine the likeliest of possibilities depending upon multiple variables.  Accuracy 50% within 1 second.

200

Inanimate Object Teleportation +1

Teleport an object from one place to another

Allows the user to teleport an inanimate object from one place to another.  Current Limit: .1 cubic inches up to 6 inches away

50

Force Field Generation +1

Weakly generate a force field

Allows the user to weakly generate a small force field made of Power.  Force field is impenetrable but requires massive amounts of Power to maintain.  Current Field Limit: 5 spherical cubic inches and up to 10 inches away from user

75 per second

Intangibility +1

Pass through solid objects

Allows the user to physically pass their body through solid objects.  Only works on the user’s physical body, and not on anything they may be holding/wearing.  Denser material requires higher expenditure of Power.

30 – 3000 per second

Neural Uplink +1

Communicate via neural network

Allows the user to communicate and issue orders to Combat Units, drones, and facilities via the Station Core’s neural network.  Power used is variable.

Variable

Enchanting +5

Permanently imbue objects

Allows for the imbuement of objects with an application of a particular effect.  Effect is permanent, though magnitude is dependent upon power used in its creation.

1 - all

Item Shaping +3

Slowly shape the structure of natural materials

Allows for the manipulation of natural materials, bending and shaping their basic structure with a liberal application of power.

1 - all

Object Animation +2

Animate normally inanimate objects

Allows for the animation of an inanimate object.  Does not create moving parts, nor shape material for the use of locomotion.  Constant power use is required.

1 - all

Light Spectrum Invisibility +1

Visible Light Spectrum Invisibility

Bends the visible light spectrum to render user invisible to the naked eye.  Does not mask scent or sound.  Requires constant power usage to maintain.

10 - all

Flesh Manipulation – Self +1

Painfully manipulate own flesh and bone

Allows for the manipulation of the user’s own flesh and bones.  Constant power usage is needed to maintain transformation.

1 - all

Flora Manipulation +55

Influence living plants

Allows for the manipulation of living plants.  Unit must have a minimum of 10 Intelligence.

1 – all

Beast Control +5

Tame and direct non-sentient beasts

Allows for the taming of non-sentient beasts upon touch.  Beast must have all stats lower than user.

150

Air Affinity +72

Manipulate air with longer durations

Allows for the manipulation of air.  Unit must have a minimum of 10 Intelligence.

720 per use

Fire Affinity +80

Manipulate fire with longer durations

Allows for the manipulation of fire.  Unit must have a minimum of 10 Intelligence.

800 per use

Water Affinity +43

Manipulate water with short durations

Allows for the manipulation of water.  Unit must have a minimum of 10 Intelligence.

430 per use

Earth Affinity +84

Manipulate earth with longer durations

Allows for the manipulation of earth.  Unit must have a minimum of 10 Intelligence.

840 per use

Basic Elemental Suite

Contains affinities for the four basic elements

Gives the Combat Unit access to the highest current affinities of Air, Fire, Water, and Earth.  Unit must have a minimum of 10 Intelligence.  (Counts as 1 Gene Mutation)

N/A

Light Affinity +1

Weakly manipulate light in short bursts

Allows for the manipulation of light.  Unit must have a minimum of 100 Intelligence and access to the Basic Elemental Suite.

100 per use

Dark Affinity +1

Weakly manipulate darkness in short bursts

Allows for the manipulation of darkness.  Unit must have a minimum of 100 Intelligence and access to the Basic Elemental Suite.

100 per use

Grey Area Suite

Contains affinities for Light and Dark Affinities

Gives the Combat Unit access to the highest current affinities of Light and Dark.  Unit must have a minimum of 100 Intelligence and access to the Basic Elemental Suite.  (Counts as 1 Gene Mutation)

N/A

Spatial Void Affinity +1

Weakly manipulate spatial voids in short bursts

Allows for the manipulation of spatial voids.  Unit must have a minimum of 300 Intelligence and have access to all other elemental affinities.

3000 per use

Healing Touch +62

Use Power to regenerate Health in others

Heal all non-mortal wounds in others upon touch.  620 Health/min, duration determined by available power.

62 - all

Self-Regeneration +71

Use Power to regenerate Health

Heal all non-mortal wounds.  7100 Health/min, duration determined by available power.

71 - all

[9]

Biological Recombinator – Research

Available Bio Units: 9242578

Type

Description

Unlock Cost (# of samples)

Gene Mutation +5

Add up to 6 Gene Mutations to your specimen

6356/11250

Type

Description

Unlock Cost (Bio Units)

Quinary Recombination

Use up to (5) different specimens during recombination

100000

Senary Recombination

Use up to (6) different specimens during recombination

500000

Septenary Recombination

Use up to (7) different specimens during recombination

1000000

Non-biological Recombination

Use up to (1) compatible non-biological compound during recombination. Counts as one specimen.

50000

Highly Experimental Proctan Recombination

Recombine (2) individual Proctans together to produce a Combat Unit that exhibits all Gene Mutations and memories from original Proctan specimens.  Highly experimental means that the chance of success and/or eventual issues is unknown.  Each new Combat Unit produced is its own individual.

125000

[10]

Facility Fabrication (New and Updated)

Name

Description

Cost

(Basic Metal Units)

Power Requirements

(% of Reactor Output)

Bioconversion Lab (Upgraded)

Allows for the creation of extra-large Combat Units

80,000 (32,000 with bonuses)

2% (0% if located within 5 miles of Station Core)

[11]

Combat Unit Status

Name:

Quagon #1

Type:

Airborne Scout/Attacker

Combat Level:

1

Max Level:

25

Experience:

0/30000

Health

25000/25000

Power

650/650

Attack

10640 (+52%)

Defense

22160 (+177%)

Strength

7000

Constitution

8000

Agility

900

Perception

200

Intelligence

130

Wisdom

130

Charisma

10

A/D Bonus

42%

Skills

Survivor (Lvl 5)

Permanent 25% increase in Defense

Kamikaze (Lvl 8)

900% more damage during a suicidal attack

Large-scale Battle Tactics (Lvl 2)

15% increase in attack/abilities when fighting with more than 50 participants

Cooperation (Lvl 9)

45% increase in defense when fighting alongside natural enemies

Special Traits

Proctan Savant: +100 to Intelligence and Wisdom

Overweight: Quagon cannot lift itself from the ground

Semi-flexible Extra-reinforced Scales: +2000 to Constitution, +100% to Defense, -15% to Strength, -50% to Agility, -50% to Perception

Weak Air Affinity +5: Weakly manipulate air

Rigid Wing Membranes: Skin flaps allow for gliding and keep the Quagon aloft

Snappy-Beary Jaws: Bites by the Quagon inflict 200% more Attack damage

Anaconda Venom: Bites by the Quagon can paralyze an attacker for up to 30 seconds

Multi-limbed Freak: Has an extra pair of limbs -80% to Charisma

Quizard-like Reflexes: +1000 to Agility

Gargantuan Size: Quagon is 8 times the size of a Quizard, +3000 Strength, +3000 to Constitution, -300 to Agility, +10% to Attack/Defense

[12]

Combat Unit Status

Name:

Greycer #1

Type:

Charmer/Speed Transport

Combat Level:

1

Max Level:

15

Experience:

0/4000

Health

2250/2250

Power

700/700

Attack

310 (-38%)

Defense

752 (+67%)

Strength

500

Constitution

450

Agility

12800

Perception

125

Intelligence

140

Wisdom

140

Charisma

830

A/D Bonus

42%

Skills

Survivor (Lvl 5)

Permanent 25% increase in Defense

Kamikaze (Lvl 8)

900% more damage during a suicidal attack

Large-scale Battle Tactics (Lvl 2)

15% increase in attack/abilities when fighting with more than 50 participants

Cooperation (Lvl 9)

45% increase in defense when fighting alongside natural enemies

Special Traits

Quizard-like Speed: +3700 to Agility

Stunted Claws: -40% Attack damage

Extra-soft Fur: -50 to Constitution

Blunted Teeth: -40% Attack damage

Rabbit Reflexes: +3200 to Agility

Oversized Eyes: +100 to Perception and Charisma

Adorableness Perfected: +500 to Charisma

Lightweight Hollow Bones: +2400 to Agility

Pachyderm-fortitude: +400 to Strength and Constitution

Proctan Savant: +100 to Intelligence and Wisdom

Greyhound Sprint: +3300 to Agility

Weak Agility Boost +20: Agility +200 for 30 seconds

[13]

Target Status (Approximate Value)

Name:

Elite Bearilla

Type:

Very Strong Melee Attacker

Age:

112

Power Ranking: (Major, Minor)

N/A

Health

40490/42500

Power

N/A

Attack

9000

Defense

8500

Strength

10000

Constitution

9500

Agility

7500

Perception

1500

Intelligence

450

Wisdom

N/A

Charisma

15

Skills

Advanced Agility Training (lvl 42)

Jump, run, and accelerate faster

Absolute Leadership (lvl 15)

Unswerving obedience from subordinates

Advanced Hand-powered Destruction (lvl 32)

Does more damage with a hands-on approach

Advanced Throwing Accuracy (lvl 12)

Accuracy with thrown objects is increased

Special Traits

Bear-like Power: +2000 to Strength

Unbreakable Bones: +2000 to Constitution

Swift Strikes: +5000 to Agility

Smell of a Lifetime: +1000 to Perception

Gorilla-infused Power: +2500 to Strength

Armored Fur: +1500 to Constitution

Voice of the Wild: Roaring grants the chance to stun or confuse opponents

Hunger Pains: Must consume vast quantities of food to survive

[14]

Combat Unit Status

Name:

Bearilla #1

Type:

Strong Melee Attacker

Combat Level:

1

Max Level:

23

Experience:

0/25000

Health

42500/42500

Power

1500/1500

Attack

12780 (+42%)

Defense

14195 (+67%)

Strength

9000

Constitution

8500

Agility

7000

Perception

1200

Intelligence

300

Wisdom

300

Charisma

10

A/D Bonus

42%

Skills

Survivor (Lvl 5)

Permanent 25% increase in Defense

Kamikaze (Lvl 8)

900% more damage during a suicidal attack

Large-scale Battle Tactics (Lvl 2)

15% increase in attack/abilities when fighting with more than 50 participants

Cooperation (Lvl 9)

45% increase in defense when fighting alongside natural enemies

Special Traits

Bear-like Power: +2000 to Strength

Unbreakable Bones: +2000 to Constitution

Swift Strikes: +5000 to Agility

Smell of a Lifetime: +1000 to Perception

Gorilla-infused Power: +2500 to Strength

Armored Fur: +1500 to Constitution

Voice of the Wild: Roaring grants the chance to stun or confuse opponents

Hunger Pains: Must consume vast quantities of food to survive

[15]

Combat Unit Status

Name:

Rosewyn #8

Type:

Elemental Caster

Age:

34

Power Ranking: (Major, Minor)

Supreme, Minor (5 – 1)

Health

300/300

Power

24550/24550

Attack

36 (+42%)

Defense

100 (+67%)

Strength

25

Constitution

60

Agility

50

Perception

70

Intelligence

2440

Wisdom

4910

Charisma

40

A/D Bonus

42%

Skills

Survivor (Lvl 5)

Permanent 25% increase in Defense

Kamikaze (Lvl 8)

900% more damage during a suicidal attack

Large-scale Battle Tactics (Lvl 2)

15% increase in attack/abilities when fighting with more than 50 participants

Cooperation (Lvl 9)

45% increase in defense when fighting alongside natural enemies

Special Traits

Proctan Savant: +100 to Intelligence and Wisdom

Expert Air Affinity +49: Expertly manipulate Air

Expert Earth Affinity +24: Expertly manipulate Earth

Advanced Fire Affinity +48: Strongly manipulate Fire

Advanced Water Affinity +1: Strongly manipulate Water

Light Affinity +42: Weakly manipulate Light

Dark Affinity +38: Weakly manipulate Dark

Spatial Void Affinity +36: Weakly manipulate Spatial Voids

Intelligence Boost +114: Increase Intelligence by 1140

[16]

Combat Unit Status

Name:

Arachnawerewolf #9

Type:

Stealth/Melee Fighter

Combat Level:

1

Max Level:

12

Experience:

0/4000

Health

3750/3750

Power

350/350

Attack

972 (+62%)

Defense

1216 (+87%)

Strength

600

Constitution

650

Agility

800

Perception

1000

Intelligence

70

Wisdom

70

Charisma

1

A/D Bonus

42%

Skills

Survivor (Lvl 5)

Permanent 25% increase in Defense

Kamikaze (Lvl 8)

900% more damage during a suicidal attack

Large-scale Battle Tactics (Lvl 2)

15% increase in attack/abilities when fighting with more than 50 participants

Cooperation (Lvl 9)

45% increase in defense when fighting alongside natural enemies

Special Traits

Proctan Genius: +50 to Intelligence and Wisdom

Power of the Bear: +200 to Strength

Howl of Fear: Cause a fear state in enemies, which may result in them fleeing

Hardened Scale Arachnid Appendages: +20% to Attack and Defense

Proctan Musculature and Skeleton: +150 to Strength, Constitution, and Agility

Wolf Instincts: +400 to Agility and Perception

Web Pouch and Expeller: Allows the creation and launching of sticky webs

Self-regeneration +5: Heal all non-mortal wounds, 500 Health/min

[17] Atmospheric Condensers: This trap requires the room it is deployed within to be sealed air-tight to be effective.  Once triggered, the Atmospheric Condenser will begin to remove all air and heat within a room, creating a vacuum within the sealed space.  Can remove the atmosphere of a room 20 ft by 20 ft by 20 ft.  Multiple Condensers may be used on a larger-volume room.  Vulnerable to extreme humidity and high concentrations of particulates in the air.  Cost: 1,000 Basic Metal Units.  Requires: Power Generator – Portable.  Reusable.

[18]

Additional Ability Selection

Physical Boost Suite

Basic Elemental Suite

Self-regeneration

Water Breathing

Physical Boost – On touch Suite

Grey Area Suite

Healing Touch

Self-levitation

Intelligence Boost

Spatial Void Affinity

Vampiric Absorption

Telekinesis

Intelligence Boost – On touch

Flora Manipulation

Power Transfer

Atmokinesis

Charisma Boost

Flesh Manipulation

Light Spectrum Invisibility

Inanimate Object Teleportation

Charisma Boost – On touch

Beast Control

Intangibility

Limited Precognition

Boiling Blood – On touch

Object Animation

Low-light Visibility

Force Field Generation

Weakening Poison – On touch

Item Shaping

Dark Vision

Self-illumination

Slowing Miasma – Airborne

Enchanting

Ability Mimic

Molecular Evaporation

[19]

Combat Unit Status

Name:

Rosewyn #18

Type:

Elemental Caster

Age:

34

Power Ranking: (Major, Minor)

Supreme, Minor (5 – 1)

Health

300/300

Power

25600/25600

Attack

36 (+42%)

Defense

100 (+67%)

Strength

25

Constitution

60

Agility

50

Perception

70

Intelligence

2460

Wisdom

5120

Charisma

40

A/D Bonus

42%

Skills

Survivor (Lvl 5)

Permanent 25% increase in Defense

Kamikaze (Lvl 8)

900% more damage during a suicidal attack

Large-scale Battle Tactics (Lvl 2)

15% increase in attack/abilities when fighting with more than 50 participants

Cooperation (Lvl 9)

45% increase in defense when fighting alongside natural enemies

Special Traits

Proctan Savant: +100 to Intelligence and Wisdom

Master Air Affinity +1: Masterfully manipulate Air

Expert Earth Affinity +24: Expertly manipulate Earth

Advanced Fire Affinity +49: Strongly manipulate Fire

Advanced Water Affinity +24: Strongly manipulate Water

Light Affinity +48: Weakly manipulate Light

Dark Affinity +38: Weakly manipulate Dark

Spatial Void Affinity +37: Weakly manipulate Spatial Voids

Intelligence Boost +116: Increase Intelligence by 1160

Enchanting +1: Imbue objects with a particular effect

[20]

Available Resources

Resource Type

# of Units

Basic Earth

2978124

Basic Gravel

1245485

Basic Metal

1606720

Focusing Crystals

3105

Pure Water

6145782

Organic Material

1452587

Biological Mass

3845710

[21]

Power Requirements

Reactor Output

85%

Facilities

Power Requirements

With Current Reduction: 100%

Total Power Requirements

Ore Refinery (1)

1.5%

0%

0%

Bioconversion Lab (150)

1%

0%

0%

Bioconversion Lab – Upgraded (3)

2%

0%

0%

Biological Recombinator (1)

1.5%

0%

0%

Defensive Weapons Factory (1)

2%

0%

0%

Drone Assembly Plant (1)

2%

0%

0%

Drones/Sensor Orbs

Power Requirements

With Current Reduction: 75%

Total Power Requirements

Ground Drone (280)

0.02%

0.005%

1.4%

Flying Drone (85)

0.025%

0.00625%

0.53%

Sensor Orb (812)

0.001%

0.00025%

0.2%

Whisp’s Light (12103)

0.001%

0.00025%

3.03%

Combat Units

Power Requirements

With Current Reduction: 75%

Total Power Requirements

Non-sentient Units (1442548) Total Bio Units)

0.00004% per Bio Unit

0.00001% per Bio Unit

14.43%

Sentient Units (5699200 Total Bio Units)

0.00004% per Bio Unit

0.00001% per Bio Unit

56.99%

Total

76.58%

[22]

Facility Fabrication (New and Updated)

Name

Description

Cost

(Basic Metal Units)

Power Requirements

(% of Reactor Output)

Geothermal Transmutation Station

Converts geothermal energy into Ambient Power

200,000 (80,000 with bonuses), 200 Focusing Crystals

N/A: Requires Power Generator – Portable (2)

Bioconversion Lab (Upgraded)

Allows for the creation of extra-large Combat Units

80,000 (32,000 with bonuses)

2% (0% if located within 5 miles of Station Core)

Rapid Coalification Facility

Rapidly Converts Organic material into Coal using intense heat and pressure

150,000 (60,000 with bonuses), 150 Focusing Crystals

4% (0% if located within 5 miles of Station Core)

Destructive Distillery

Destroys materials and changes it into various substances needed by the Molecular Converter to produce certain other materials

150,000 (60,000 with bonuses)

Requires: Rapid Coalification Facility

4% (0% if located within 5 miles of Station Core)

Planetary Bombardment Dome

Primarily for defense, this dome can encompass your entire fortification and prevent most off-planet bombardments from reaching the ground

700,000 (315,000 with bonuses), 700 Focusing Crystals

30% when activated (ambient energy too little for power requirements)

Vehicle Assembly Plant

Produce various armored vehicles for use by your Combat Units

200,000 (80,000 with bonuses)

5% (0% if located within 5 miles of Station Core)

Cybernetic/Synthetic Organism Factory

Allows for the creation of synthetic-based Combat Units

1,000,000 (400,000 with bonuses) 1,000 Focusing Crystals

Requires: Destructive Distillery

5% (0% if located within 5 miles of Station Core)

Space Transport Dock

Create space-worthy transport vehicles for use in space

3,000,000 (1,200,000 with bonuses) 3,000 Focusing Crystals

Requires: Planetary Bombardment Dome

40% (ambient energy too little for power requirements)

[23] Factoid: Contrary to popular belief, diamonds on Earth were not actually made from highly pressurized coal; most of them were actually made from other high-carbon-content material in the Earth’s mantle, miles and miles below the surface and millions of years before there was actually life on the planet.  That, of course, doesn’t mean that diamonds couldn’t be made from coal or any other carbon-rich material – just that the diamonds on Earth were not.

[24]

Combat Unit Status

Name:

Rosewyn #23

Type:

Elemental Caster

Age:

34

Power Ranking: (Major, Minor)

Supreme, Lesser (5 – 2)

Health

300/300

Power

27500/27500

Attack

36 (+42%)

Defense

100 (+67%)

Strength

25

Constitution

60

Agility

50

Perception

70

Intelligence

2610

Wisdom

5500

Charisma

40

A/D Bonus

42%

Skills

Survivor (Lvl 5)

Permanent 25% increase in Defense

Kamikaze (Lvl 8)

900% more damage during a suicidal attack

Large-scale Battle Tactics (Lvl 2)

15% increase in attack/abilities when fighting with more than 50 participants

Cooperation (Lvl 9)

45% increase in defense when fighting alongside natural enemies

Special Traits

Proctan Savant: +100 to Intelligence and Wisdom

Master Air Affinity +10: Masterfully manipulate Air

Expert Earth Affinity +26: Expertly manipulate Earth

Expert Fire Affinity +11: Expertly manipulate Fire

Expert Water Affinity +10: Expertly manipulate Water

Advanced Light Affinity +24: Strongly manipulate Light

Spatial Void Affinity +47: Weakly manipulate Spatial Voids

Dark Affinity +40: Weakly manipulate Dark

Intelligence Boost +121: Increase Intelligence by 1210

Enchanting +22: Imbue objects with a particular effect

[25] Tactical Mapping (Level 5)

Current Bonus: See the current health of Combat Units and enemy combatants, based upon relevant and updated visual information.  Also allows for designated Combat Units to access this information independently.

[26]

Power Requirements

Reactor Output

90%

Facilities

Power Requirements

With Current Reduction: 100%

Total Power Requirements

Ore Refinery (1)

1.5%

0%

0%

Bioconversion Lab (180)

1%

0%

0%

Bioconversion Lab – Upgraded (3)

2%

0%

0%

Biological Recombinator (1)

1.5%

0%

0%

Defensive Weapons Factory (1)

2%

0%

0%

Rapid Coalification Facility (1)

4%

0%

0%

Destructive Distillery (1)

4%

0%

0%

Drone Assembly Plant (1)

2%

0%

0%

Drones/Sensor Orbs

Power Requirements

With Current Reduction: 75%

Total Power Requirements

Ground Drone (350)

0.02%

0% (GTS)

0%

Ground Drone (14)

0.02%

0.005%

0.07%

Flying Drone (85)

0.025%

0% (GTS)

0%

Sensor Orb (750)

0.001%

0% (GTS)

0%

Sensor Orb (130)

0.001%

0.00025%

0.033%

Whisp’s Light (12103)

0.001%

0% (GTS)

0%

Combat Units

Power Requirements

With Current Reduction: 75%

Total Power Requirements

Non-sentient Units (512400) Total Bio Units

0.00004% per Bio Unit

0% (GTS)

0%

Non-sentient Units (1381500) Total Bio Units

0.00004% per Bio Unit

0.00001% per Bio Unit

13.815%

Sentient Units (5620800 Total Bio Units)

0.00004% per Bio Unit

0% (GTS)

0%

Sentient Units (78400 Total Bio Units)

0.00004% per Bio Unit

0.00001% per Bio Unit

0.784%

Total

14.702%

[27]

Available Resources

Resource Type

# of Units

Basic Earth

4978124

Basic Gravel

1945485

Basic Metal

6314478

Refined Carbon

10

Focusing Crystals

3845

Pure Water

5412578

Organic Material

2452587

Biological Mass

2015480

[28]

Defensive Weapons Factory

Monomel Filament Wire Grids

High-Voltage Electrified Gates

Molecular Disruptor

Explosive Floor Plates

Harmonic Force Fields

Particle Accelerator – Portable

Alternate Gas Traps

Gravity Manipulators

Plasma Bomb – Small

Nanite Swarms

Auditory Assault Fields

Plasma Bomb – Large

Nitinol Morph Plastics

Optical Barrages

Unstable Void

Atmospheric Condensers

Holographic Illusions

Power Generators – Portable

Environmental Destabilization

Laser Cannon Emplacements

Molecular Converters – Portable

Magnetic Repulsors/Attractors

Railgun Penetrators

(More)

[29]

Combat Unit Status

Name:

Rosewyn #32

Type:

Elemental Caster

Age:

34

Power Ranking: (Major, Minor)

Supreme, Greater (5 – 4)

Health

300/300

Power

36500/36500

Attack

36 (+42%)

Defense

100 (+67%)

Strength

25

Constitution

60

Agility

50

Perception

70

Intelligence

3880

Wisdom

7300

Charisma

40

A/D Bonus

42%

Skills

Survivor (Lvl 5)

Permanent 25% increase in Defense

Kamikaze (Lvl 8)

900% more damage during a suicidal attack

Large-scale Battle Tactics (Lvl 2)

15% increase in attack/abilities when fighting with more than 50 participants

Cooperation (Lvl 9)

45% increase in defense when fighting alongside natural enemies

Special Traits

Proctan Savant: +100 to Intelligence and Wisdom

Master Air Affinity +25: Masterfully manipulate Air

Expert Water Affinity +39: Expertly manipulate Water

Expert Fire Affinity +32: Expertly manipulate Fire

Expert Earth Affinity +30: Expertly manipulate Earth

Advanced Light Affinity +37: Strongly manipulate Light

Advanced Spatial Void Affinity +9: Strongly manipulate Spatial Voids

Dark Affinity +42: Weakly manipulate Dark

Intelligence Boost +148: Increase Intelligence by 1480

Enchanting +32: Imbue objects with a particular effect

[30]

Power Requirements

Reactor Output

90%

Facilities

Power Requirements

With Current Reduction: 100%

Total Power Requirements

Ore Refinery (1)

1.5%

0%

0%

Bioconversion Lab (190)

1%

0%

0%

Bioconversion Lab – Upgraded (3)

2%

0%

0%

Biological Recombinator (1)

1.5%

0%

0%

Defensive Weapons Factory (1)

2%

0%

0%

Rapid Coalification Facility (1)

4%

0%

0%

Destructive Distillery (1)

4%

0%

0%

Drone Assembly Plant (1)

2%

0%

0%

Drones/Sensor Orbs

Power Requirements

With Current Reduction: 75%

Total Power Requirements

Ground Drone (360)

0.02%

0% (GTS)

0%

Ground Drone (14)

0.02%

0.005%

0.07%

Flying Drone (135)

0.025%

0% (GTS)

0%

Sensor Orb (860)

0.001%

0% (GTS)

0%

Sensor Orb (130)

0.001%

0.00025%

0.033%

Whisp’s Light (12103)

0.001%

0% (GTS)

0%

Combat Units

Power Requirements

With Current Reduction: 75%

Total Power Requirements

Non-sentient Units (2312400) Total Bio Units

0.00004% per Bio Unit

0% (GTS)

0%

Non-sentient Units (1606500) Total Bio Units

0.00004% per Bio Unit

0.00001% per Bio Unit

16.07%

Sentient Units (1620800 Total Bio Units)

0.00004% per Bio Unit

0% (GTS)

0%

Sentient Units (4784000 Total Bio Units)

0.00004% per Bio Unit

0.00001% per Bio Unit

47.84%

Total

63.91%

[31]

Combat Unit Status

Name:

Rosewyn #32

Type:

Elemental Caster

Age:

34

Power Ranking: (Major, Minor)

Supreme, Greater (5 – 4)

Health

150/300

Power

0/36750

Attack

36 (+42%)

Defense

100 (+67%)

Strength

25

Constitution

60

Agility

50

Perception

70

Intelligence

3890

Wisdom

7350

Charisma

40

A/D Bonus

42%

Skills

Survivor (Lvl 5)

Permanent 25% increase in Defense

Kamikaze (Lvl 8)

900% more damage during a suicidal attack

Large-scale Battle Tactics (Lvl 2)

15% increase in attack/abilities when fighting with more than 50 participants

Cooperation (Lvl 9)

45% increase in defense when fighting alongside natural enemies

Special Traits

Proctan Savant: +100 to Intelligence and Wisdom

Master Air Affinity +26: Masterfully manipulate Air

Expert Water Affinity +40: Expertly manipulate Water

Expert Fire Affinity +32: Expertly manipulate Fire

Expert Earth Affinity +31: Expertly manipulate Earth

Advanced Light Affinity +37: Strongly manipulate Light

Advanced Spatial Void Affinity +1: Strongly manipulate Spatial Voids

Dark Affinity +42: Weakly manipulate Dark

Unstable Warp Void +1: Combine two or more Spatial Voids together

Intelligence Boost +149: Increase Intelligence by 1490

Enchanting +32: Imbue objects with a particular effect

[32]

Core Status

Name:

Milton Frederick

Type:

Station Core Prototype 3-B

Combat Level:

22

Experience:

12141115/16419000

Reactor Type:

Zero-point Energy

Reactor Output:

90%

Current Statistics/Attributes

Reactor Power/Strength:

52

Processing Power/Intelligence:

80

Structural Integrity/Constitution:

52

Ingenuity/Wisdom:

80

Processing Speed/Agility:

80

Communication/Charisma:

84

Insight/Luck:

50

Sensor Interpretation/Perception

80

[33]

Combat Unit Status (Approximate Value)

Name:

Unknown Male Proctan

Type:

Elemental Caster

Age:

41

Power Ranking: (Major, Minor)

Supreme, Lesser (5 – 1)

Health

375/375

Power

17850/20000

Attack

50

Defense

75

Strength

50

Constitution

75

Agility

75

Perception

60

Intelligence

2900

Wisdom

4000

Charisma

20

Skills

Expert Power Professional (Level 24)

Efficiently utilizes the Power under his control to cast with great effect

Advanced Self-preservation Tactics (Level 15)

Successfully manipulates outcomes to ensure own safety

Expert Torture Aficionado (Level 20)

Effectively uses torture to extract the results needed during experimentation

Novice Research Assistant-in-training (Level 13)

Styles self to be an expert researcher, usually performing experiments with unusual variables

Special Traits

Proctan Genius: +50 to Intelligence and Wisdom

Expert Air Affinity +26: Masterfully manipulate Air

Expert Earth Affinity +24: Expertly manipulate Earth

Expert Fire Affinity +21: Expertly manipulate Fire

Cruelty to Animals: Does 15% more damage with Elements to beasts due to an uncaring nature

Sadistic Prodigy: Elemental Casts are 25% more damaging when other Proctans are the target

[34]

Core Status

Name:

Milton Frederick

Type:

Station Core Prototype 3-B

Combat Level:

22

Experience:

12141465/16419000

Reactor Type:

Zero-point Energy

Reactor Output:

90%

Current Statistics/Attributes

Reactor Power/Strength:

52

Processing Power/Intelligence:

82

Structural Integrity/Constitution:

52

Ingenuity/Wisdom:

80

Processing Speed/Agility:

100

Communication/Charisma:

84

Insight/Luck:

50

Sensor Interpretation/Perception

80

[35]

Core Status

Name:

Milton Frederick

Type:

Station Core Prototype 3-B

Combat Level:

22

Experience:

12542565/16419000

Reactor Type:

Zero-point Energy

Reactor Output:

90%

Current Statistics/Attributes

Reactor Power/Strength:

52

Processing Power/Intelligence:

82

Structural Integrity/Constitution:

52

Ingenuity/Wisdom:

80

Processing Speed/Agility:

100

Communication/Charisma:

94

Insight/Luck:

52

Sensor Interpretation/Perception

80

[36]

Core Status

Name:

Milton Frederick

Type:

Station Core Prototype 3-B

Combat Level:

23

Experience:

17547820/26566500

Reactor Type:

Zero-point Energy

Reactor Output:

90%

Current Statistics/Attributes

Reactor Power/Strength:

52

Processing Power/Intelligence:

82

Structural Integrity/Constitution:

52

Ingenuity/Wisdom:

80

Processing Speed/Agility:

100

Communication/Charisma:

94

Insight/Luck:

52

Sensor Interpretation/Perception

80

[37]

Facility Fabrication (New and Unbuilt)

Name

Description

Cost

(Basic Metal Units)

Power Requirements

(% of Reactor Output)

Planetary Bombardment Dome

Primarily for defense, this dome can encompass your entire fortification and prevent most off-planet bombardments from reaching the ground

700,000 (210,000 with bonuses), 700 Focusing Crystals (595 with bonus)

30% when activated (ambient energy too little for power requirements)

Vehicle Assembly Plant

Produce various armored vehicles for use by your Combat Units

200,000 (50,000 with bonuses)

5% (0% if located within 5 miles of Station Core)

Cybernetic/Synthetic Organism Factory

Allows for the creation of synthetic-based Combat Units

1,000,000 (250,000 with bonuses) 1,000 Focusing Crystals (850 with bonus)

Requires: Destructive Distillery

5% (0% if located within 5 miles of Station Core)

Space Transport Dock

Create space-worthy transport vehicles for use in space

3,000,000 (750,000 with bonuses) 3,000 Focusing Crystals (2550 with bonus)

Requires: Planetary Bombardment Dome

40% (ambient energy too little for power requirements)

PPPPPP

Produces Power Providers

20,000,000 (Not affected by bonuses)

5% (0% if located within 5 miles of Station Core)

[38]

Target Status (Approximate Value)

Name:

Bearilla Commander

Type:

Very Strong Melee Commander

Age:

253

Power Ranking: (Major, Minor)

N/A

Health

40490/42500

Power

N/A

Attack

9000

Defense

8500

Strength

16000

Constitution

14000

Agility

11000

Perception

4000

Intelligence

3500

Wisdom

N/A

Charisma

2000

Skills

Master Leadership (lvl 15)

Unswerving and unquestionable obedience from all

Master Strategic Planning (lvl 4)

Can utilize masterful tactics in combat

Master Problem-solving (lvl 8)

Uses high Intelligence to solve difficult problems

Advanced Throwing Accuracy (lvl 48)

Accuracy with thrown objects is increased

Special Traits

Bear-like Power: +3000 to Strength

Unbreakable Bones: +4000 to Constitution

Swift Strikes: +7000 to Agility

Smell of a Lifetime: +3000 to Perception

Gorilla-infused Power: +4000 to Strength

Armored Fur: +2500 to Constitution

Roar of Reason: Roaring has a chance to charm opponents

Hunger Pains: Must consume vast quantities of food to survive

[39]

Target Status (Approximate Value)

Name:

Hammerslug

Type:

Gargantuan Demolisher

Age:

615

Power Ranking: (Major, Minor)

N/A

Health

40490/42500

Power

N/A

Attack

9000

Defense

8500

Strength

500000

Constitution

600000

Agility

100

Perception

400

Intelligence

10

Wisdom

N/A

Charisma

1

Skills

Master Mindless Destruction (Level 50)

Causes mindless destruction wherever it goes

Special Traits

Hammer Time: +75000 Strength per arm

Lava-formed Exterior Plating: +400000 to Constitution

No Foot to Stand On: Uses body undulations to move over smooth ground

Tremor-sense: Uses vibrations to “see” +300 to Perception

Ambidextrous: Each hammer arm has equal power

Ugly SOB: Charisma is permanently set at 1

Ponderous Movement: Low Intelligence leads to slow decisions -95% to Agility

Hunger Pains: Must consume vast quantities of food to survive