The roar echoed throughout the building. Adam’s mournful cry was heard by everyone present. Even had they not seen the floating system message, they would still have known that Jessica, at least the monster that had taken her place, was no more.
Sitting within the conference room, Adam felt a wave of melancholy settle over him like a heavy blanket. What was he supposed to do now? He was a murderer. He had just killed his girlfriend. A large part of him knew that Jessica was already dead and that monster that replaced her needed to be stopped but… Adam still felt responsible for her death.
A hand gently touched his massive shoulder causing Adam to come back to the present. He turned his large head and saw Professor Johnson standing beside him, covered in partially healed wounds. Otto stood behind the professor with a look of sadness on his face.
“Otto told me who that was. Who she was…” his hand squeezed Adam's shoulder as he shook his head, “I can see that you are hurting but... I just wanted to say thank you. Had you not been there, she would have gotten away from me.” The professor looked him in the eyes and a sense of comradery bloomed within Adam’s chest.
He lowered his head and nudged Professor Johnson's arm before standing back up. Adam gestured towards the door with an oversized paw, ushering the two of them out towards the others, and moved to where a large table lay rotting against a stack of chairs. Using his large body he dragged the table and chairs towards the doorway, placing them in front of it to stop others from entering too easily. Adam wanted to remove the body but it wasn’t a priority and he didn’t want the others to see her destroyed corpse.
Before he fully sealed off the room, he stepped around the corner to where Otto had silently set his clothes and initiated his transformation back into his human form. Luckily, the process was far less painful then it had been before and, he remembered with embarrassment, he wasn’t getting naked in front of the others this time. He wasn’t sure if it was possible but he really wanted to find clothes that would transform with him. Or maybe some light clothes that were easy to put on and take off.
To hide from thinking about the embarrassment of stripping in front of others, Adam decided that this moment of solitude would be as good a time as any to check the system messages he had received. He concentrated on the messages he had dismissed before and three small screens appeared in his vision.
You have defeated a newborn Pestilent Wendigo (Level 2)!
~Experience Earned based on participation~
The first screen was to be expected. Based on the information he had inferred while in the Integration Stasis, Adam assumed that in order to gain levels, you would need to gain experience, similarly to how video game leveling worked. The fact that many of Earth's video games seemed to function similarly to the system was interesting in its own right, but he could ponder those thoughts more later.
As he moved on to the second notification, Adam felt a bit of anxiety build. If she was only Level 2, how powerful are other creatures going to be?
FIRST DAY INTEGRATION CLUE
Compatibility with Pestilent Wendigo is 0%
Warning
INTEGRATION CLUES are clues meant to provide hints for the Newly Integrated Beings of the world. They will be provided by the System for one full day [24 hours] upon Reintegration following Integration Stasis.
Compatibility?
Adam was confused by this one. While the first notification made sense, based on his own conjecture, this one felt random. The System was giving clues? The clue didn’t feel helpful at all, as it only brought up more questions.
The third notification brought on mixed feelings.
You have Leveled up!
~Check your Multiversal Status for details~
Free Point = 1
Improvement was good. He had to tell himself that as he opened up his status. Even if it was just a further reminder of what he did, the increase in his level was a positive thing.
While there weren't any major changes, his stats had gone up. Just like he had the first time, he placed his free point into Arcana. Mana was clearly an important aspect of this new world and his score was abysmal. While leveling didn't increase his arcana at all, he felt like it was a good idea to allot his free points into it for now, especially because the rest of his physical stats had improved so much already.
Name
Adam Abrams
Species
Human
Level
2
Pursuit
Path of the Beast
Class
N/A
Physique (Stage)
Beast Chimera (Assembled Beast Skeleton) [Fixed]
Affinity
?
Strength
11
Dexterity
6
Vitality
13
Arcana
6
Pursuit Specialty Stat: Instinct
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
10
Class Specialty Stat
N/A
Passive Skills
Flight
Active Skills
Bestial Transformation
Titles
Forerunner of Earth, Beast Frame
At this point, three of his stats were in the double digits. Was that a lot? Adam had no idea. All he knew was that he felt much stronger than he had been before.
With nothing else available to prolong his return, Adam sighed and stepped out into the hall once more, pushing the stacked debris fully into place, closing off the destroyed conference room.
Upon rejoining the others, Adam saw that Emi had woken up. Sylvia had used her torn and bloody jacket and a broken chair to splint her broken arm. Emi was clearly still in pain but having the arm isolated and held tight in a sling would help exponentially.
The small Japanese woman was animatedly talking to Henry while Sylvia was attempting to clean out the slashes across his shoulders. Something about the sword and how she had used it earlier. Emi was an interesting character because she seemed to subvert a lot of the stereotypes associated with Japanese people. She was loud and boisterous with her friends and was unapologetically interested in machines. Henry had often made jokes that Emi was more of a “Miyazaki Woman” than anything else, due to her muscular body and mechanical interests. She would fit right into one of the legendary creators films, in a set of coveralls with soot and grime swiped across her face.
Upon noticing his arrival, Emi fell silent as they all turned to face him. Eyes full of understanding and pity stared at him as the silence hung over them all. No one knew what to say.
Adam, not wanting to dwell on what happened, turned to the others, “So… is everyone okay?”
“I am by far the most injured one here,” Emi gestured to her arm, “but the real question, Adam, is are YOU okay?” She stood up from Where she was sitting beside Henry and Sylvia as she spoke and made her way towards him.
“Henry and I both got notifications saying we contributed to the defeat of a monster, while you, Otto and Professor Johnson were in the other room.” Emi ‘s voice cracked a little as she placed her uninjured hand against his arm. “Do you wanna talk about it?”
Adam sighed as his eyes began to water, “...Not…not just yet. We can talk about it when we are sure that we are safe.” He brushed the unshed tears from his eyes. He could cry later. He needed to keep moving forward while he still could. If he let himself fully relax and grieve, he would be down for the count and that was not helpful at the moment.
At this point, everyone had gotten to their feet and moved towards him. Despite his usual socially awkward tendencies, Henry was the one that changed the subject, much to Adam’s relief.
“So… you… what exactly are you now?” he asked. “Don’t get me wrong, I know you said you took the Path of the Beast but when you actually changed… you were… I honestly don’t even know what to say you were, dude. Awesome? Terrifying? Badass? Absofuckinlutely, but damn, I did not expect that.”
He grinned and turned to look at their newest tag-along, “Are you also a Path of the Beast, Professor Johnson?”
The older man had stayed on the outside of the group, leaning against the wall, so as not to intrude on the semi-emotional moment among the group of friends. With all eyes on him, he chuckled, “I'm not much of a professor at the moment, considering how the world has been flipped on its head so please, call me Michael” He smiled at the others and scratched the back of his head, “Yeah, I am also Path of the Beast. All of this game stuff is still confusing, so I just went with the option that I had the best compatibility with.”
Henry nodded, “That makes sense, I did the same thing. I was offered Academic, but I have always been a terrible student.”
“Oh, I know. I remember failing you.” Michael laughed.
The conversation brought some much needed levity to their current situation and helped the others relax.
Sylvia spoke up for the first time in a while, “So, what do we do now?”
“Maybe we should go to the police?” said Otto.
Emi shook her head, “I doubt they will be able to help. This isn’t exactly something they were trained to handle.”
“I’m not so sure,” Adam said, “This is all clearly out of their control but they will definitely have some crisis management stuff right? Not to mention the fact that they are some of the few people that I can think of that would actually have weapons training of some kind. I feel like guns might be helpful in this situation. Maybe it would be good to get some weapons?”
“Weapons are definitely a good idea, but do you think an officer is just going to hand their gun over to a civilian?” Michael asked. “Additionally, the police station is all the way across town and we don’t even know where that is anymore. I think that if we head towards the Security Office on campus we could at least get somethi—”
Henry cut him off, “Wait a sec, roll that back again. What do you mean we don’t know where it is anymore? Shouldn’t it be just across the bay? That's only a couple miles. We can just hop in Otto’s truck and be there in like 5 minutes.”
A strange look passed over Michael’s face, “First, we just fought a literal monster in the school, who knows what we could meet by traveling just a couple miles. Secondly, have none of you been outside yet?”
Everyone looked at the older man with questioning looks. “I am going to take that as a no.”
He turned, leading the others towards the exit, “I'm not sure what exactly happened but you all saw the image of the world breaking apart, right?” They nodded. “Well, when it was put back together, it looks like everything changed.” he pointedly looked between Otto and Henry and added, “While I am sure you’re a great driver Otto, I get the feeling Adam and I might be the only ones that could get there now.”
As the group listened to the professor's comments about the changed world, the group managed to fully exit the building, catching a glimpse of the changes he had referenced.
And boy, were there some big changes.
If someone walked out of the Student Center prior to the Integration, they would have seen a large open courtyard with concrete walkways threading through a small series of landscaped grassy knolls. A series of well manicured and strategically placed trees provided shade from the sun and protection from the ever present rain along the Oregon coast. Surrounding the courtyard were the Yaquina Center of the Arts on the left, where music and theater classes were held, the Administration building could be seen peeking out from behind it, with the Health and Science building taking up most of the view on the far side, blocking the view of the most inland portion of Yaquina Bay just down the hill. An extended parking lot was to the right of the exit, leading northward towards the forested hills and the highway beyond.
Now, it looked as if the world had been completely changed. The carefully curated grassy knolls were massively overgrown and now were dotted with boulders and large, rocky outcroppings. Some of the trees had fallen, while others seemed to have undergone explosive growth. The Arts building's front wall, which had previously been a wall of windows, was now just a framework with some residual broken glass stuck in the frames. Other parts of the building were severely damaged by more new rock formations. These were just the initial changes but they were by far the least of them.
As the group moved a little farther out, Otto stopped and stared forward, towards the Health and Science building. While most of them couldn’t see past the new rocky features, his new size allowed for him to just barely see past it all. They all heard his quiet voice as he said, “Where did that come from?”
Adam quickly moved to the outcropping and climbed over it, noticing his new athleticism with a hint of pride, before he fully saw the biggest change to their school.
It looked as if the courtyard had been split down the middle and expanded as the Health and Science building was about 100 meters further away than it had been previously, but he quickly understood what Otto was referring to.
Half of the building had been sheared away from its previous location as a massive ridge rose in its place. With his new elevated position, Adam was able to see even more than Otto. His jaw dropped as he turned to the others, “You all need to see this.”
Over the next minute, the small group of friends made their way up the rocky outcropping and took in the new sight.
The area that was once the Oregon coast was no more. In its place was what could only be described as a small mountain range. The area around the college looked like it was the northernmost mountain within this new range that extended in a southern direction. Buildings and old portions of roads could be seen broken apart as the land had risen up, leaving ruins and debris behind. Rusted vehicles could be seen in various stages of disrepair all around them.
From their new elevation, they could see far into the Pacific but much to their dismay, the ocean was no more. Beyond the edge of the mountains to the west was a series of rolling hills that extended down into what looked more like the plains of middle America.
Sylvia gasped and cried, “Look!”
The others turned and looked north towards where she was pointing and saw what she was looking at: the remains of the city of Newport.
Yaquina Bay seemed to have been elevated alongside the rest of the surrounding land and turned into a large body of water that could only be defined as a lake of some kind. The northern shore of the lake was overgrown by trees but hints of the city could be made out. A crumbled building on the edge of a cliff, reflections off of car windshields shining through the trees, things like that. However, where the bay had originally opened into the ocean, it now extended towards the entrance to a gargantuan canyon that split the land.
“That looks bigger than the Grand Canyon.” Michael whispered in awe.
The canyon extended northwest out across the new hills and grasslands for miles. Adam and Michael glanced at one another and exchanged a knowing look. They could sense danger from the canyon even from this distance.
As the group stared at the new world around them, Michael nudged Henry’s side with his elbow, “You still think it's a quick trip to the police station?”