How long are you going to keep fighting these orcs? Caspa asked mentally.
I don’t know, aren’t you having fun? Pandora sent back.
Well, yes, but there are so many of them, Caspa said.
Yes, there are, Pandora sent back as she sent her orbs after another four kobolds that had tried to rush up the road and take advantage of a group of humans that were holding the line defensive line.
Pandora had made it to London about 10 a.m. and noticed that the flood of demi-humans coming out of the portal at Stonehenge had made it to the outskirts of London. Luckily, as the city had grown, it had been built up along a consecrated circular defense theme. Each new outer area had been enclosed by a wall. Each was about 40 feet high and right now was preventing the demi-humans from flooding into the city. She knew from Mistress Carpenter that a lot of people had been pushing to tear down the walls, but she had no doubt they were thankful that they still stood. London had turned into a huge castle and refuge which the people were rushing to defend.
As Pandora had flown over, she had heard gunfire from different areas of the city which probably meant that people were still fighting the spawned monsters, but the people of London seemed to be adapting to the situation quickly because she’d also seen the telltale signs of spells being cast. It seemed that at least some of the people of London had taken advantage of the class system and chosen mage classes. That’s not what drew her to step in and help. What had drawn her attention was that she’d seen the demi-humans rolling a battering ram toward the huge doors that had been closed.
Luckily there were no giant types in the group rolling the battering ram. The largest being orcs. Pandora pulled up, flipped, and dove toward the battering ram. A few bullets struck her from the human side of the wall until someone yelled, “Cease Fire!” as they realized the dragon was coming down from their side of the wall and moving toward the battering ram. Pandora ignored the humans as she released all 21 orbs and ordered them to attack the ram as she breathed on it and the demi-humans.
Pandora pulled up as she looked back and took in her handiwork as the orbs crashed into the battering ram which had no one standing near it anymore, her breath weapon having displaced them into the Shadow Plane. Others were already rushing toward the battering ram but it didn’t matter, the orbs had destroyed it and the cart it had been rolled on. She wondered briefly how her breath weapon knew to take the people and not the battering ram but then put it out of her mind as she flew low over the road again and landed on the west side of the wall where her breath weapon had cleared the demi-humans. As she faced the new demi-humans racing toward her, she released her breath weapon again. With the road clear for a moment she looked around as another bullet struck her hide from an old man up on the wall.
“Harold! Cut that shit!” A man from directly over the entrance to the city that the highway went through said.
Pandora was covered in shadows as she swapped to her Human Form and shadow stepped up onto the wall beside the leader as she left 20 of her orbs to defend the road. The chaos orb remained with her.
“Whoa, what?” the leader said as Pandora appeared.
“Harold, if you shoot me again, I’m going to think that you don’t like me?” Pandora said as she gave him her biggest smile.
Pandora only had half her attention on the defenders of the wall as the orcs continued to rush toward the tunnel under the walkway she stood on. Pandora picked the biggest orc which was wielding a large two-handed axe and sent the orbs on the highway after it. A moment later the orc exploded as if a shotgun blast had hit it.
A bit of an overkill, Caspa commented.
Yeah, it was. Also, good job on keeping me healed up, Pandora sent back.
You do the combat, I’ll worry about upkeep, healing, and allocating attributes as you level, Caspa sent back.
Sounds good!
Pandora refocused her attention on the horde of demi-humans rushing toward the wall and separated the 20 orbs into two groups of 10 while she kept the chaos orb for defense. Two orcs died almost as spectacularly as the first as they exploded so she separated the orbs into four groups of five. This time the four orcs she targeted died, but just barely. As she suspected there had been a caster in the mix that stepped out and targeted her.
A red orb screamed toward her as the leader on top of the wall yelled, “INCOMING!”
A moment later everyone looked around confused as a glowing red orb hovered in front of Pandora where the streak of fire had been coming from. One of the functions of Pandora’s orbs was that they could absorb any spell of their type and hold it until she recast it. Her Chaos Orb could hold any spell as chaos was made up of everything. The orb had absorbed a fireball and Pandora recast it back at the Orcish Shaman with a push of her will. The look of surprise on the Shaman’s face as the Chaos Orb absorbed the fireball and then recast the spell right back at the orc shaman was priceless. So was the fact that the fireball killed the shaman and ten other nearby orcs. Additionally, even more orcs, kobolds, and goblins were thrown in all directions. Pandora sent her other orbs to finish off any of the demi-humans that had been harmed.
In that first minute, she’d landed on the bridge, removed almost 30 orcs from the battle by putting them into the Shadow Plane, and killed 25 orcs and a few other demi-humans while the people looked on in awe. Now, over 10 hours later she’d been killing orcs, kobolds, and goblins as fast as they could rush forward. Pandora hadn’t stayed in one place either as she made her way up and down the wall helping out where she could. Her actions helped keep the enemy forces from building up in any one place
One particularly nasty spell caster had shot a putrescent green beam at her that the Chaos Orb had absorbed but when she’d recast it at the caster it had missed and hit an orc the caster had dived behind. The orc had rotted into nothing. Having none of that, Pandora had redirected all 20 orbs to attack and kill that mage. The orbs had formed a mini tornado as they spun around the mage and battered at its defenses. A moment later the mage had disappeared as it either teleported or sidestepped through a dimension to leave the area and reappeared over a mile away on top of a building. Pandora’s high perception allowed her to notice the sudden appearance of the mage.
“What was that?” The closest person to her asked as they looked at the place the mage had been.
“That is a dead mage,” Pandora said as she recalled the orbs to her and stepped into the shadow plane. She switched to her Dragon Form and launched into the air as she flew over the demi-humans she’d trapped in the Shadow Plane, though it looked like the denizens of the Shadow Plane had already started taking care of them. Pandora ignored them and headed toward the spot where she’d seen the mage appear. As she came in for a landing she noticed the mage standing on the top of the building looking at a crystal ball, Think she’s looking for me? Pandora sent to Caspa.
Of course.
Looks like the mage is still inside a shield of some kind. I wonder if what we did to the Araknis Queen will work here.
Pandora swapped forms and landed on the roof.
Might want to watch the form-swapping. You do have 800 mana and 280 chaos. Granted I can convert Chaos to mana pretty quickly and you regenerate 12 mana every combat turn but you’re using 100 mana each time you swap forms, Caspa sent to her mentally.
Okay, how often can I switch forms without using up our resources? Pandora asked.
Currently, you are regenerating 2 Chaos per second so, 20 per combat turn. You can convert those 20 points at a 1 for 2 ratio; Chaos to Hit Points, Stamina, Mana, or Psychic Energy. The ratio goes up as you level the skill so that the conversion rate will get better. The other direction still sucks though. You have to spend 9 Mana to get 1 point of Chaos back. So, it’ll take about 30 seconds to replace the mana by converting chaos into it. As long as you don’t switch more than twice per minute, I should be able to keep up pretty easily, Caspa sent.
Okay, I’ll take care of this mage and hang around this building for the next minute while I let the orbs have some fun, Pandora sent.
Pandora moved to a point right next to the mage in the Shadow Plane, with only the dimensional barrier separating them. She adjusted her position until she was below him and placed her hand flush with the shadow of the mage’s foot where it touched the ground. With a push of her will, 20 orbs leaped out of her hand, through the barrier between dimensions, and entered the Material Plane. They did not have enough force to enter the mage immediately and instead pushed his foot up and began orbiting the mage at less than an inch while they attacked the mage each combat round from within his barrier. Pandora watched as the mage’s body began to succumb to the attacks. 30 seconds after the attack started the mage’s corpse dropped to the ground as Pandora stepped out of the shadows, touched the corpse to store it in her personal storage, and looked around. After that, Pandora went back to work.
***
Clive Haskins, had been watching the dragon, or was she a woman? Regardless, he’d been watching her for the last 10 hours as she’d run up and down along the wall. Jumping in and helping where she could. Something a woman, even a dragon woman, should not be doing. Sure, some of the women were running supplies and meals up the defenders but that was their role, their place. This woman thought that she was better than all of them. Well, she did have some otherworldly power but that didn’t matter. The next time she stopped by him he had a surprise for her. A surprise that would make sure that all the women who had seen what she could do would know that men did the fighting, not women.
Besides, she was killing the monsters more quickly than any of the men could. If killing monsters allowed men to get stronger, they couldn’t have a girl stealing all of their experience. Hopefully, the sniper would recover some of that experience when he killed her. Victoria per Fortitudinem, or Victory through Strength was not an idle motto of the empire and the strength of a sniper round through the forehead of anyone had proved time again that bullets had all the strength.
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***
Pandora finished with the mage and the group that had been around him before she stepped through a shadow into the Shadow Plane. It was a lot easier to travel between points when all the shadow denizens stayed away than try to push through the throng of demi-humans. She made her way back to the walkway over the M3 highway. She took in the situation on the wall and then stepped out of the shadow of the leader she’d seen before. She’d been fighting all day and still needed to find the SYSTEM Shop node so that she could try to get back some of the skills she’d had before the SYSTEM had reset.
That’s when something tickled her senses and she intuitively reached out to absorb an incoming attack she barely perceived before it struck the back of her head. What was even more surprising was that her attempt worked.
You have unlocked the Skill Kinetic Absorption.
Kinetic Absorption - As long as you are aware of the attack you may spend 1 point of Chaos to absorb all of the kinetic energy out of the attack. NOTE: This skill will not absorb any portion of a magical attack though all kinetic aspects of any attack can be.
Immediately absorbs all kinetic energy into equal amounts of hit points, stamina, mana, and Psychic energy. An object's kinetic energy is absorbed. At Common Level 1, Conversion is negligible. For every four skill levels, each object absorbed provides 1 point to each attribute pool; hit points, stamina, mana, and psychic energy. Attribute pools cannot be increased above maximum levels.
Common Level 4: +1 to each attribute pool
Common level 8: +2 to each attribute pool
Scarce level 2: +3 to each attribute pool
Scarce Level 6: +4 to each attribute pool
Etc…
The sniper round stopped against the back of her head and started to drop to the walkway as Pandora stepped into a shadow and vanished.
Pandora, are you going to go after the sniper? Caspa asked.
No, Pandora answered.
Why not? Caspa asked.
Because it won’t make a difference and the people of London need all hands on deck. When the time is right I’ll let the others handle taking over London. Right now, they have monster swarms and a portal to an as-yet-undisclosed location that is pouring out a seemingly endless army. We need to finish what we came down here to do and maybe bring Thor back here to help take out the hordes of monsters.
Still, I can’t believe these men would attack someone who is helping them like you were, Caspa sent.
Look around. Any other women that are out here are either running up supplies or messages back and forth along the line. We’re not going to change the male-female dynamic in a couple of hours, Pandora sent thoughtfully, Changing the minds of roughly 200 or so men is not the same as changing the minds of millions.
I guess. I know your mother's memories are recommending that you end them all, Caspa sent.
True, but there are multiple ways to respond to those recommendations. I’m choosing not to help them any longer. I helped them and I gained a lot from helping them but if they don’t want the help, I’m not going to force them. Besides, it's time we headed back, Pandora sent.
You're right, let's go, Caspa agreed.
Pandora jumped into the air and shifted to her Dragon Form as she headed east. If these assholes were going to try to kill her they could fight their own battles. If they lost, the world would be better off without them. If they won, they would “talk” later.
Pandora continued toward central London. She thought, Closest SYSTEM Shop and a navigational arrow appeared in her vision again. It had automatically shut down when she went into combat. She followed the outline of the M3 highway in the Shadow Plane until she came to a small square park which the arrow in her vision was pointing toward. As she looked through the various shadows into the Material Plane she saw that it was called St. James’s Square. The SYSTEM Shop node was at its center right next to the Equestrian statue of William III
Pandora switched back to her Human Form and stepped through the shadow of someone who was walking up to the node. Before they could react, Pandora reached out, touched the orb, and accepted the prompt to enter. As she appeared a mechanical voice said,
“Welcome to the SYSTEM Shop. All services offered are automated. You may speak or if you would prefer to use tactile input please pick up one of the tablets on the counter. Only items that you purchase may leave the SYSTEM Shop with you.”
Pandora walked over to the counter and picked up one of the tablets as she said, “I would like to see all possible purchases that will allow me to protect the city of Scarborough up to the north as well as provide access to a SYSTEM Shop.”
A moment later a holographic screen appeared that listed her finances, which she’d accumulated over the last 10 hours plus the six million she’d earned when she killed the Araknis Queen. Pandora read the recommendations.
- SYSTEM Shop node: 1 Million beings living within a city or town, Free OR 1 million credits.
- Village Node, Automatically upgrades based on Population: 10,000 Credits
- Safe Zone must be assigned to a Village, Town, or City Node: 1 Million Credits per mile radius.
Pandora looked over her funds. She had 239,940 Copper coins, all of which had been earned today. She also had the 6,010,000 Credits. She could easily afford a Village Node, a 4-mile radius Safe Zone, and a SYSTEM Shop node for 5,010,000 credits. That would leave her with one million credits and a lot of copper. Pandora made the purchase and then converted all but 1,000 copper to credits. She lost 5% to the conversion fee which left her with 1,000 copper and 1,002,270 Credits.
Next, she purchased a couple of basic skills that she would just level normally for 1,000 Credits each; Analyze, Identify, Meditate, Regenerate, Running, Flying, Exotic Weapon: Orbs and a spell called Shadow Teleport that would allow her to instantly step into a shadow and exit another shadow up to 10 + 1 foot per Perception Attribute Bonus and Spell Level for 10 mana. It wasn’t very powerful but it would allow her to skip the step of traveling through the Shadow Plane so that she could move and attack in the same combat turn. After all purchases she still had 1,000 Copper coins and 994,270 credits.
Pandora closed the tablet and asked, “How do I install the Village Node.”
A neutral male voice responded from the air around her, “Go to the location you wish to set up your village. Be sure to pick a defensible location. Open your Status Screen to the Civilization Tab that has just been added. A prompt will ask you if you would like to establish a village. Do the same to add the Safe Zone to the village and the same again to place the SYSTEM Shop Node.”
“Thank you,” Pandora said.
“You are quite welcome,” The neutral male voice said, “Will there be anything else?”
“No, thank you again,” Pandora said as she turned and went back to the node at the shop entrance and exited the shop.
A man with a look of surprise on his face asked, “Who are you?”
Pandora ignored the man as she stepped through his shadow in the Shadow Plane, activated the Dragon Form, and headed North. Once she was an hour north of the city she re-entered the Material Plane and flew back toward Scarborough. It looked like the flood of demi-humans hadn’t made it this far north or east yet.
Pandora was pleasantly surprised as her Flying skill increased periodically while she made her way north. After Three hours her skill level had increased to Scarce rarity level 3 or it had increased by 13 total levels, depending on how you looked at it. That first hour and a half had seen the upgrades come along quickly while the last three levels had taken a good bit longer each time. With her level and attribute increase and her skill increase her flying speed had gone from 75 miles per hour to 89 miles per hour.
Also, as she came in on the estate she noticed that the crabs that had been coming in from the shore had been dealt with and the area around the estate looked to be clear. Pandora banked and came in for a landing in the courtyard as she swapped into her Human Form and stepped out of the billowing shadows the change made.
One of the guards at the inner door called out, “Pandora, your grandmother thought you’d land here, everyone is inside discussing what to do.”
“Where is the airship that was here earlier, I didn’t see it as I flew in,” Pandora asked.
“Thor is inside, Ma’am.”
Pandora walked toward the door, which the guard opened, and said, “Thank you,” as she stepped inside.
She stepped into a hallway and stepped across it to a set of large double doors. She pushed on the doors which opened easily and stepped in to see everyone relaxing while her Grandfather spoke.
“If this society is descendant from the Romans and women are treated as sex objects at the worst or livestock breeders at the best, changing the population's mindset during an apocalypse is not something that we will be able to do. The only type of government that would work in that case is a tyrannical setup, which I do not want to be part of.”
“Agreed,” most of the others said while Pandora’s eyes were drawn to Desirae.
“Why would a Tyrannical government be so bad?” Desirae asked.
“Because, in the simplest terms, In a Tyranny, there is only one person to blame when everything goes wrong,” Pandora’s Grandfather said. “Which means, once things go wrong, everyone will be coming after you.”
“We are making this area a Tyranny right?” Pandora asked.
“Of course,” her grandmother said.
“Also, I was told Thor was in here?”
“Up here,” a drone said as it dropped the camouflage it had going while it floated near the ceiling and tipped its wings slightly.
“Neat, and you can still become the plane if we need it?”
“Like you, I have a personal storage area. My excess mass is stored there, and I can access it as necessary. In fact, one of the skills I already possess increased my storage from a 10-foot cube to a 100-foot cube.”
“Nice,” Pandora said as she turned to look at everyone before she asked, “So my mission was successful, where are we putting the village node?” Pandora asked.
After a quick discussion, the Village Node was placed in the underground base top level, which was the 3rd basement level under the building. It was the most fortified position and easily protected. The System Shop node was placed in the communal area of the Underground base near the canteen in a little room off to the side so people could use it at their leisure and if needed any items purchased for cooking could be moved to the kitchen easily. Finally, she attached the Safe Zone to the Village and immediately the Village node upgraded from a village to a town when the population of her village, which had only included the estate, grew to include everyone within the 4-mile radius around the estate.
Pandora walked back to the city node and assigned Grandma, Grandpa, Abi, and Amanada Administrator access. Amanda and Abi because they’d helped run everything for his dad and Grandma and Grandpa, well because they were Grandma and Grandpa.
“Okay everyone, I’ve been fighting or flying for almost 17 hours straight at this point. I’m going to go to my room and lie down for a bit. You now have access to the City node, can make changes and set tax rates, and handle all of the minutia of running the city. Me, I’m going to go lie down for a bit.”
“You do that dear, some of us already had our naps. We’ll see to everything, “Cindy Bennard, her grandmother said.
Pandora made her way to her room, locked the door, and used her skill Mold Chaos to furnish her room before she lay down on her new bed and closed her eyes. She’d gotten sidetracked in London, and she’d been letting Caspa handle her notifications and leveling for the most part. She was about to ask Caspa about her level and current attributes and realized that Caspa had been uncommonly quiet for a bit. As she concentrated on her link to Caspa she realized that it felt like Caspa was sleeping. She didn’t know how she knew that, but she could feel through their bond that Caspa was sleeping. She had so much she wanted to ask her and talk about and then she yawned. She realized that she was also tired. Pandora closed her eyes and allowed herself to drift off to sleep.
