- Ten thousand Void Coins
- Elemental Orb of Fire
- Upgrade Orb - Weapon
The next thing was arguably more important; the rank up. He had several options to choose from for a new skill.
Congratulations - You have reached the rank of C. You will be given a selection of abilities to choose from. Select one:
Conviction: Allows the user to momentarily ignore an injury for up to 15 seconds. User’s body will act as if the injury is not present and will physically move as normal.
- Mana Cost: 50
Warning: User’s body will immediately upon skill ending be subject to all injuries present.
Warning: Body parts will not reattach upon use of ability, only temporary attachment of the individual part back to the original body will allow for use for time duration of ability.
Elemental Command: User can summon elemental mana in a variety of forms to use in attacking or defending.
- Mana Cost: 10
Warning: Elemental magic is completely random upon casting and is line of sight for all forms.
Void Sense: Any Void aligned creature may be examined to give insight into their weaknesses. The creature that is scanned is immediately drawn to attack the user.
- Mana Cost: 15
Warning: This ability automatically draws aggression from whatever is scanned.
Warning: The user must record weaknesses on their own. Only secondary activation of ability will allow user to see weaknesses again.
Hmmm. That first ability is ridiculous. I can basically tank damage for 15 seconds regardless of what happens, and then it all hits after the timer runs out. Ouch. Dangerous for sure. Going to skip that one. Second one is really cool. I can be a wizard or sorcerer! But its random, which could be a bummer. Definitely a good one though.
The third one is interesting too. It’s like an Analyze ability or something out of a video game. But I guess that’s par for the course now. I already fight on the frontline of our little group, so I don’t think drawing aggro is probably a big deal.
Cade selected Void Sense, hoping it would help them fight the stronger monsters they would come up against. He pulled out the Upgrade Orb and selected it, pulling up a list of options.
SELECT WEAPON TO UPGRADE
- Gladius
- Heater Shield
- Ka Bar Knife
Selection of item is final and will provide a random upgrade to your designated weapon.
So… He could upgrade any weapon he had on him. The Ka Bar was unimportant, at this point more a memento of their friend Bridget, so he counted that one out. His sword was already pretty enhanced through Chain Flare, but his shield was basic. He shrugged and selected the shield; the orb flashed brightly with blue light and floated in front of him. He pulled his shield out and it floated upwards towards the orb. They touched and a bright light forced him to shade his eyes.
His shield had mostly kept its shape, but the upper edges had become more pronounced, sharp edges on either side mimicking somewhat the hand guard of a longsword or other blade. It had expanded in size however, giving him a larger surface to guard with. As it descended back towards him, he hooked his arm into it and moved his arm around. It was probably a quarter as light as it had been before, but it for some reason felt stronger. The name had changed: Orichalchum Protector.
“Pretty cool shield upgrade.” He turned and saw Brandon and King looking his way. Brandon was holding a new dagger. A straight blade, but was serrated along the back half of it, it had a deadly look to it - black, but shiny at the same time.
“Thanks. Orichalchum Protector is what it’s called. Whatcha got there?” Cade nodded his direction.
“I’m not kidding you… It’s called the Scionic Stabber. Does more damage to stronger enemies.” Brandon sarcastically said its name, but was definitely happy with its purpose.
“Hahaha that’s dumb, but sounds like a cool thing to have in a fight like that last one. King, what about you… anything new? Frida?” Cade called back, inviting their newest companion into the discussion.
King responded first, “Yeah actually. New Shield. It has almost no weight to it. I can swing it faster and move better with it overall, but taking and dealing hits makes it feel like it weighs a lot more for attackers. I also got a really cool new ability. But we can do that later. What about you Frida?” King looked over at Frida, grinning happily.
“New hammer. The faster I can swing it, the harder the hit is. Sounds like normal, but apparently it is multiplicative, so it scales hard with how fast I can swing it. My new ability will synergize nicely with it. I am content.” Frida smiled back at them. Cade assumed at this point that if she were done talking, that was all she had to say.
“I did get a bunch of coins, the new shield upgrade, an ability with my rank, higher Mana Generation, and some kind of elemental orb thing.” Cade pulled it from his inventory and displayed it for the group.”
“I got something like that too.” Brandon said.
“Same here.” King agreed. Both of them pulled out their orbs. Frida had also brought hers out, and when she did, the four orbs shot together and started orbiting around each other above them.
Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
ELEMENTAL ORBS COLLECTED: 4/4
- Join Orbs together?
- Yes
- No
The prompt appeared in front of all of them, apparently requiring each of them to agree in order for it to join them together.
“Anyone against joining them together? No clue what it’ll do, but what the hell.” Cade asked the group, selecting the yes option. They all agreed and selected yes as well. The orbs started to spin faster and faster, a whirring noise accompanying the dizzyingly fast orbs. They got closer and closer together until they joined into a single orb that shone brightly for a second before becoming a muted swirling colored singular orb.
“It looks like the Aurora Borealis.” Frida commented, awe in her voice. Cade had to agree, the light green swirling within it looked a lot like the Northern Lights that he had seen pictures of. The orb was the same size as the components it had been made of, but it had a different feel to it.
“Elemental Upgrade Orb - Tetra Shot. What does that mean?” King read the name of it to them after grabbing it out of the air.
“An Upgrade Orb is what I used on my shield. Does it give you any options, King?” Cade asked.
“It gives me the option to use it, but doesn’t tell me what it does. See if the prompt is the same for you?” He handed the orb over to Cade, who examined it.
“Yep, same for me. Maybe we can just hold onto it for now and see if a use comes later?” Cade waited for their decision, agreement coming quickly, before stowing it in his inventory. “Alright, so who wants to show off first?”
“Ohhhhh me. I’m up. This thing sounds awesome.” King ran a few feet from them and pulled his new shield out. It was dark blue now, the edges somehow looking deadlier than they had. An ornate pattern was embossed on the front of it, and it looked as though King was carrying around something that weighed a few pounds, not a massive shield.
“It’s called Sentinel’s Reach.” They all watched as he set his shield in front of him, his body tightening up and then flexing suddenly. A projection of blue energy the shape of his shield shot forward in front of him, hitting the wall of the cave 30 or so feet away, shattering the rock face.
“Holy shit man, that was amazing!” Cade couldn’t keep his voice down as King stowed his shield and whooped in excitement. Even Brandon whistled his acknowledgement. Frida remained silent but her face gave away her low key excitement as well.
“I have a ranged attack, as a shield guy. Let’s go!” King was hyped - Cade could understand why. That ability would not only serve him well, but also added a new dynamic to their squad.
“Okay okay, who’s next?” King was almost bouncing with energy and excitement as he looked around at them.
“I’m up.” Brandon walked over to them, waving King back towards the main group. He closed his eyes and a pulse of energy spread out from his feet. It traveled along the ground and then up the walls of the cave, and seemed to bounce back off of the rocks and obstructions nearby to travel back towards him.
“Soooo… What did that do?” King asked what we were all thinking.
“It’s a sonar ability. Assassin's Sense. I can send out a pulse of sensing energy around myself, and it tells me what is around. Size, shape and distance. Just have to make sure there isn’t anything stronger than us around, because they probably will detect it, according to the skill at least.” Brandon smiled, happy at his new scouting ability.
“That’s pretty handy. We can see if anyone is trying to sneak up on us. Nice. Frida? You want to go next, or me?” Cade looked at her. She responded with a wave of her hand in his direction.
“I got something called Void Sense. I can’t really show you what it does, because its directed towards “Void aligned enemies,” but it basically lets me scan an enemy and tell what their weakness is.” Cade was happy with it, but knew it was nothing flashy. He shrugged and relaxed, arms behind him holding him up. “Frida, take it away. I’m sure whatever you got is waaaay cooler.” She crackled out a laugh and stood up, walking over towards where King had shown his off.
“It is called Magnetic Control.” She took out her new hammer, a somehow even larger version of her last one, this one slightly more ornate than the last. The face was bigger, and the point opposite it looked even more deadly. “I can attach a node to anything metal, like my weapon, and I can control it remotely.” She touched her finger to the hammer and a light transferred into it. She held it out in front of her and let go. It floated in mid air in front of her, then shot off towards the wall King had cracked. Her hammer impacted hard and then with a flick of her wrist, it pulled itself out of the wall and back towards her.
“Damn… So you can just move it around at will? That is wild. Can you cast your Meteor Blast to it beforehand?” Cade’s brain started coming up with a million and one ways to utilize it, as he was sure Frida had already done. “Wait… you said your new hammer gets stronger the faster it is swung right? Can you spin it faster and increase the force that way?”
“I was thinking the same thing. We will need to test it out, but yes… I would think I should be able to still use those abilities with the magnetism.” She stowed her hammer and walked back over. She was halfway back to them when Cade realized she had stopped moving.
Fuck. It’s happening again. Cade remembered the first time this had happened. The Freeze.
[ Hello Humans. I hope you’ve been having a good time in your new world. ] The One’s voice rang out through his head. This time though, he wasn’t terrified. He was entirely angry though. This thing was still so powerful that he was unable to resist its ability to stop everyone from moving.
[ Just an update, there aren’t many of you left. To be exact, 100,654,513 remain. For those of you that can hear this, good job staying alive. You’re probably going to die soon, but nonetheless, well done. ] Cade had to settle his mind at this news. So many more people had been killed. How long has it been? Not longer than a month, he knew that.
[ It has been 30 of your Earth days. This marks a turning point for your planet. I have two announcements. The first; In another 30 days, I will be hosting a tournament for the top 5% of humanity’s strongest. Won’t that be fun? You will receive invites to the tournament if you are within the top few, but if not, you will all have the option to watch it. Wait… did I say option? No, I meant you will be forced to watch. Frozen… if you will. The second announcement is that the world and the new beautiful and exotic creatures that inhabit it will become a lot harder. Yes, I will be stepping up the difficulty of our little game. I hope you’ve all been training and getting stronger, because if not… Well, you won’t last long. See you in a month. ]
Cade unfroze, his anger seething as he ground his teeth together, his hands in fists.
“MOTHERFUCKER.” King yelled out. Cade heard Frida make a frustrated noise and flinched as she pulled her hammer out and struck the ground underneath her with enough force to shatter the stone.
“God dammit… 100 million left alive. Out of 9 billion.” Cade couldn’t help but focus on the numbers he had given them. He felt Brandon come up behind him, a hand on his arm to comfort him. The only issue was that Brandon was also frustrated, made clear by the iron grip he used on Cade’s arm. He didn’t care though, the pain was somewhat sobering and brought him out of his dark thoughts.
“Nothing has changed. We are still going to kill that son of a bitch.” Cade said out loud to the group.
“King. Let’s use that ability of yours to get the fuck out of here. Can you take us back to Portland? Or maybe somewhere further south?” Cade knew his voice was harsh, but he was tired and frustrated, knowing his friends would understand.
“How about Chico, in California? My parents had a house there. I think it’ll work.” King asked, activating his ability to summon a Node.
“Yeah. Fine. Let’s go.” Cade responded curtly.
King flexed his mana and a portal appeared in front of them. He pulled his shield out and walked through. The portal showed a living room off of a kitchen, there was no light shining through. They all followed King through as the portal closed behind them.