It had become a routine, of sorts. Sitting on Joshua’s couch, eating breakfast, watching the news, preparing for the day… and watching the end of the world slowly unfold.
Sure enough, someone else had the ‘Zombie Apocalypse’ idea, in South America this time. They were having a bit more of an issue containing it than Mexico had; not from any lack of competence, but because apparently a 100-ft. Jaguar, level 28, was a challenge to kill even for the Chosen; and the worst part?
The video showed seventeen Chosen, all between level 25 and 27, struggling to kill the behemoth… and mere moments after it was finally slain, before it could be looted… it rose as part of the Undead horde.
The revitalized creature put out a curse aura that afflicted any non-Undead nearby… and the chosen had been forced to withdraw. The helicopter that was taking a video of the whole thing crashed when the beast got too close.
This was the first time Grey could remember the Chosen being unable to kill a monster… and it was likely not because of how tough the beast was… but because until then, the beast itself had been fighting the Undead as well. And when it was suddenly working with them… every attacker was being overwhelmed by accursed undead.
A long list of Chosen; dozens of them, including a pair of familiar faces; had agreed to join together to put an end to the beast… Grey’s calm shattered when he saw her helmeted face again. Nightfire’s voice etched in his mind. It was only for seconds…
But he could hear it. “Myself and Golden Boy will be stepping in as well. Thankfully our region has been getting more and more quiet as time goes by; I anticipate that unless something changes most of our action will be in South America going forward.”
She was listed as level 27. She’d gained seven levels since she’d left him for dead. He’d reached level 10…. But what good did that do? It got harder and harder to level as you got higher… she must be constantly leaping and teleporting around, spending hours every day mass-destroying monsters.
He shook his head… and checked to see whether the kiosk would open for him.
After the silver spire appeared in his living room, he nodded…. And rather than jumping to the purchase menu… switched to ‘sell’.
This was… surprisingly functional.
He could sacrifice an item… earning back 25% of its credit value instantly. Or place an item up for sale… earning 75% of whatever value he chose.
He sorted through a few of his items quickly, to get a good idea of how much he could get if need be.
He stared at it for a few seconds. Parting with Right Hand of Death or its partner would instantly get him enough credits to get the mutagen he wanted, even if he just sacrificed them rather than putting them up for sale.
He almost sold Left Hand of Death right there, remembering his inability to hit two targets at once while fighting the Minoans; but shook his head.
The most interesting things to tell… the Multi-Rifle seemed to be the most expensive Rare-grade rifle the system could just create on its own. You could simply trade 2500 credits for one and the system would make you one on the spot. And while the return-to-owner feature was nice…. The unlimited ammo, and the ability to launch vials of fire, acid, or venom were far more useful for his purposes.
He set all of the Ant Chitin, Cold Dead Hands, all but one of the Settlement kits, and all of the light armor for sale at the listed price; he still had the one Medium armor bodysuit. He’d get it customized a bit so it didn’t look like an Invader item, and wear it. Maybe see if a leatherworker could plate it with Fire-Ant Chitin to make it fireproof.
He then swapped over, checking the items for sale. The list was constantly changing and updating; a new item appearing, then vanishing.. And it appeared to fill three categories.
Items that were roughly equivalent to a system-made item, only priced just slightly cheaper to attract a buyer. Items that were just flat-out superior, and priced significantly more…. And items that were inferior in some fashion, and thus more significantly cheaper.
He checked to see if there were any cheaper versions of the Extradimensional Shard mutagen… and found some immediately.
Grey stared at the descriptions for a few seconds, and gave a short nod. That Village shard. Who cared if it was always running, or he couldn’t shape it into some exquisite mansion? Unusually large? That just meant he could stuff even more undead in it.
It would be some time before he had enough…
He blinked
He stared for a few seconds… and nodded. That was… fast.
He immediately purchased the Village shard mutagen off of the kiosk. He was running low on time…. Only four minutes left.
He started up three searches at once; asking for lists of magazines he could fill with liquids and use with the Multi-Rifle… Mutagens that would stop someone from teleporting… and Fire Resistance mutagens.
The vials came up immediately; he could purchase ‘Common’ ceramic vials designed to fire through the Multi-Rifle for 15 per credit; and immediately bought 36 units worth, dropping his remaining credits to 2200, and only three minutes.
The listings for his searches popped up even as he finished that purchase.
Shit. As he reviewed the data…. The time ran out… and the Kiosk vanished. Still. He’d learned plenty. The ‘Fire Immunity’ had appeared and disappeared multiple times even as he read it, and when it was there, it had sold for millions of credits.
He should get the ‘Minor’ or ‘Moderate’ fire resistance power… and empower all of his undead with it before dumping them into the village.
More importantly; he was already an Assassin, partially. If he could get past level 20, he’d actually get exactly the ability he needed. Which… made sense.
He thought for a moment. He’d never explored the possible upgrades for Curse, or Assassin’s Strike. One of those might have something to limit the victim’s mobility; Dimension Lock might be an upgrade for something else, even.
He’d have to check into that. But for now….
The kiosk had directly transferred both a tiny glowing purple vial…. And 36 cases of ceramic jars, in simple plastic boxes… directly to his storage. He popped one box out…. Exactly as ordered. Three ‘Magazines’ of five jars, designed to feed into the bottom of the Multi-rifle.
Each jar… a ceramic bottle, with a ceramic screw-on lid, and a pointed tip. Undoubtedly 67mm in diameter, exactly what the rifle needed.
He studied the magazines; really simple plastic sleeves; for a moment. He could easily take those acid bladders and empty one out into a few of these; and do the same with his venom. The ceramic bottle itself would do some damage to the victim…. And then the contents would make it so much worse.
Cold had been a good gun. But the Multi-Rifle was just so much better for his purposes. And the credits let him get…..
The glowing purple vial popped into existence in his hand. It was tiny… had a screw-on metal cap…. And…. when he drank it down, it tasted…. Absolutely horrible.
He grimaced.
Grey nodded. Perfect.
He could even feel the space, as if he could just reach out and step into it at any moment. After a few seconds of focus… he did just that.
One moment, he was standing in his apartment; it was early morning in El Paso. The next…
He was in a very different, larger, more open house. A simple, wooden structure, with oversized furniture… and gaps in the wall where electronic fixtures had once been, and even blank openings where there had once been glass windows.
Outside…. It was noon. A beautiful summer day, bright and warm…. And the small house was in the middle of a small village, of other wooden structures. Most of them were primarily roof; roughly triangular structures.
He could see a simple gravel road outside,,, and when he stepped out of the gap that had once been a door, he got a better view of his new property… it seemed there were open fields of some sort of green-brown plant completely surrounding the village… and then a ring of trees perhaps a few hundred meters away.
So…. trees grew here, that they used to build houses. They grew crops. Probably raised animals, if Minoans ate meat. And… all told, someone had shaped it into a secure, albeit boring, farming village.
As he studied the village, nodding quietly to himself, he noticed something odd, at the center of the town… a simple stone arch, a few meters tall…. With a series of runes carved into it… and another, on the other side of the street. The only paved portion of the town’s roads was between the two arches. He studied the first one, triggering ‘Examine’.
The more he saw, the more questions he had. Were the Minoans a refugee people overall? Or perhaps large groups of them formed clusters of Shards like this to evade their government? Why colonize a new world instead of making one of these? The equipment the Minoans had brought with them, between all the armor and weapons, would’ve been most of the price of a shard like that.
It didn’t matter. Whatever the reason…. This was perfect.
It might have been able to house a modest population of Minoans. But it could fit thousands of Undead in here. And if he figured out which plants were best for the purpose, he might even be able to use some of them to keep the air in his smaller cargo container from going stale.
But…. that was something to worry about later. For now, he had some corpses which were already resistant to fire, and needed no augmentation. He wouldn’t be worried about controlling them; just dumping them out to attack Nightfire and then going into Stealth; so he could just give them every boost he could, drop them in the village, and let them go… moving on to the next one.
He had the minimum assets he would need for the plan; next, he just needed a way to keep Nightfire from fleeing the trap.
He pondered his options… as he typed in the GPS of the fire-ant nest where they’d buried all the corpses. The military would help him overcome the level disadvantage. They wouldn’t get him all the way there…. But if he played his cards right, they wouldn’t need to.
