It took me six days to hit my level cap, level 9. It seemed shorter, but with all the training I was doing, it was a busy time. The first ‘sessions‘ were fraught with more excitement than I liked, but after I got the hang of it, I became farmer Luke.

As the percentage on the stone kept increasing, more Tier 3 creatures spawned. I didn’t know if Llyod knew that or if it was generally known, but it was pretty evident after a while. Luckily, I became more competent, too. I spent my downtime digging pits, sharpening stakes, and making the area around the Lair Stone a death trap. It did not account for much damage, but it funnelled the creatures into specific zones and put me in a position that gave me an advantage. It was handy that the furthest something could spawn was about fifteen meters from the stone, and they wouldn’t spawn over a pit or a filled area. I used that to my advantage.

My XP climbed, and I ignored any messages I got in my limited notification world. Part of me wanted to know the math or mechanics behind XP per level, but I figured it was not important at the moment as I was busy making my death trap and I was busy training.

I cleared the area and built spiked log walls twenty-five meters out. When I say wall, it was really just piles of logs. I had made some areas where I could face the cats one-on-one if I needed to get close. Again, these were just piles of logs. Then I piled more wood up for platforms outside the walled-off sections for me to snipe from and then continued on training.

I was feeling good. It was amazing. I had such a stockpile of Chaos Trophies and was amassing a pile of monster bits. If this went to plan, I would be rich. Or richer. I had no idea what half the loot was for or worth, but I liked the idea of cooking up weird food. I figured that monster steaks were no different to rat stew. I was a bit interested in cooking, but it was not something I could see myself getting too excited about.

Crafting was also a thing I discovered after I eventually identified some of the loot.

Minor Fickle Grimclaw claw.

A Chaos-infused claw harvested from a subspecies of Grimclaw. The species was named for these famously sharp claws. It can be used in weapon crafting and has some minor alchemical properties. Common Quality.

Minor Fickle Grimclaw pelt.

A Chaos-infused pelt was harvested from a subspecies of Grimclaw. This pelt offers minor protection from Chaos energy if incorporated into armour. Common Quality.

Minor Fickle Grimclaw steak.

A Chaos-infused steak butchered from a subspecies of Grimclaw. Grimclaw meat provides modest boosts for agility and wisdom. Common Quality.

I was going to have to investigate crafting. Maybe. I could not see myself sitting around making shit for other people to use.

My timing had become pretty good over the last few days. When a portal appeared, I had between 10 and 40 seconds while the portals seemed to power up. Then, when the Grimclaw came through, there was a second window in which they appeared to adjust to being in this environment. It lasted about 5 seconds, time to smash them with pistols or eye beams. If they didn't get finished off, they would fall into pits and spear themselves, slowing their movement, and then I could pick them off as I needed to. I used my long knife on helpless, wounded ones. It was pretty brutal.

Over the days, my traps got better, and my aim got better. It was also great because there seemed to be no communication between them, and they did not learn from previous waves. I had not seen another intelligent or what I was calling mini-boss one either. Maybe I didn’t give them a chance to get organised on this side of wherever they came from.

I also learned that you could charge energy packs with mana. It took time, but I only needed four or five a day packs a day, and I could feed my mana or energy into the packs while I trained, which would trickle charge them. If I got the order correct, I could rip through a wave quickly with planning. Tier 3 Grimclaw were smarter and took 2-3 hits to defeat.

I needed to talk to Tasar about the differences in mana and energy for skills and how Tiers worked, as I only had a basic understanding. I felt I was missing out on some more profound power from my skills by using them in the default manner. It was as if I could sense a hint of what I was supposed to do, but I could not grasp it. I was getting around 3000 - 4500 experience daily and earning 10-14 Tier 2 Chaos Trophies and 3-10 Tier 3 Chaos Trophies simultaneously, claws, pelts, and steaks. No credits, though. That was still concerning.

There were so many small notifications that I was not checking I figured I would review them at the end of my farming or when I headed back to Tasar.

LEVEL UP.

Congratulations, you have levelled up. You are now level 9. Another 7100 XP is required for level 10.

All stats are locked at 5 until the Incarceration Collar is removed when stats revert to the accumulated total.

You may continue to accumulate stats and experience. Note: Experience level is capped at level 9. You may gain further experience, but it will be banked until you resolve your fugitive nature. Future Negative Karmic Penalties are doubled.

Just as I dreamed of farming this for the rest of my time here, the Lair Stone went Rare. Tier 4.

That was my mistake; I was complacent, and I had begun to think I was invincible again. I had stopped paying attention to the percentage climb in my greed. I was just caught up in my training and killing.

The cycles got faster and faster when the same shockwave from the last power-up burst forth. The Lair Stone collapsed on itself, and a larger, even more sinister one appeared. I stupidly thought that if I could handle Tier 3 Grimclaw, I could take Tier 4 ones. Especially after all my traps and surprises. I sat on my sniping platform, waiting for the next wave.

I forgot Tasar's talk about the growth between Tier 3 and 4. Well, I didn’t forget, as much as I was not really paying that much attention, and I guess my high intelligence prodded me when the shit hit the fan. Note to self: pay attention to the crazy bastard; some information might be helpful.

HIDDEN QUEST RECEIVED: EVENT: Defeat the Chaos Incursion Tier 4.

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Difficulty: RARE/EPIC

Time Frame: 1 Day

The reward for success: credits, experience, renown, title, and items.

Defeat the waves from the Incursion and return Lair Stone to the nearest Outpost Store. Failure: Death, enslavement, outpost overrun by chaos beasts.

All Nearby Imperial Combatants have been notified.

My mistake. It was an incursion event. Great.

My first epic quest! Failure was not an option.

I waited. Portals started opening.

Minor Fickle Grimclaw (Chaos, Tier 2). Agility. Healthy.

I shot it.

Ten Grimclaw later, I swapped over the pistols. I had reduced the re-load time to under 5 seconds, and I could do it left-handed if everything were set up. I had about 220 shots if I could keep it up with all my power packs.

If one thing the last few days had taught me was the limits of my abilities, I knew I had about ten uses of Eyes of Fury in a row. If I spaced them, I could almost go forever, with nearly thirty seconds to charge if I didn’t use it in between. I could not exploit them with one eye to moderate the damage or time, which was a shame. When my headaches got too much, it took closer to forty-five seconds. At least I could alternate pistol shots and Eyes of Fury. This allowed me to recharge my mana or energy. One day, I will sit down and work it out, do some theory crafting, maybe put it all into an Excel spreadsheet, and do some math. Perhaps I could get a hurry up on that AI, which was supposed to have been integrated.

Maybe I’d do some math – as if! I didn’t like math at school, so I was not about to start enjoying it, not now or ever.

So, I took about five shots between each use of my laser eyes. Two hundred twenty shots and 20 eye blasts later, the portals kept opening. The only thing that saved me was the portal delay and the period of disorientation. It was almost like shooting fish in a barrel, which was fine until you ran out of ammo or charges. Eventually, I only had Eyes of Fury, and from the feel of my energy stores, I only had about 20 uses left. I should have bought more ammo and energy packs, but I was not expecting to be in this situation when I was on my shopping spree.

I had been in tense situations like this before, where I had wished for a melee weapon, so I had made sure the axe was close and the combat knife was strapped to my thigh. For nearly a week, chopping trees with the axe had made it a familiar tool to me. My next move was to work through my traps, where they could only come at me one-on-one. I was lucky they were only portalling in batches of 5-10.

It was very slow and messy work.

I fell into the routine, using the axe for 30 seconds to a minute as my mana recharged, then blasting. The axe became my shield, a stabbing, slashing, and chopping weapon. Leet Parkour saved me as I flipped, vaulted, and used various wall techniques to keep me safe.

Once again, I was exhausted, terrified, and feeling more alive at the same time. I was born to fight Chaos Beasts. The rewards and karma gains were irrelevant as they fell before me. This felt right, and it didn’t matter if I died here today. I had done my part in the greater hidden war against Chaos. I was doing something important. My one regret was that my friends would not understand the drive or need.

I felt like a warrior, protecting those at home. In my moment of bravery, I wished I had dared to ask Sarah out. We could go on a date somewhere. I vowed I would. I stopped daydreaming and slaughtered evil devil cats.

My fight was not all one-sided. I was still bitten, clawed and battered around. I noticed at some stage that half my leg was shredded. It was slowly regenerating, and I was relatively sparing in using my healing skills. I wanted to save energy and mana, which recharged my laser eyes. I downed a healing potion when I could. I really did hate the licorice flavour. The strawberry-flavoured red brew was weirdly named "Blue Chives, Max Health, Max Freshness." I was chugging them quite regularly.

I constantly acted, reacted, moved, and reacted during the fight. Time stretched and bent, and when your heart beats at what seems a million beats per minute, and you fear for your very existence, it becomes meaningless. Seconds or hours does not matter in the face of death.

These beasts would not sacrifice me on this stone this time. They were here as an incursion, to invade, to kill. I don’t know how long I fought. Time blurred as I was chopping at Grimclaws. At one stage, I startled myself as I was even fighting unarmed, punching as my axe got knocked away. I would use the occasional "Thunder Grip" to get me out of a tricky spot.

Thunder Grip seemed less draining than Eyes of Fury, but it was much more dangerous to use as a close-quarters attack. Maybe it just used energy or mana, not both. It was loud, and I could operate it one or two-handed.

I still had to work that one out. There had to be a difference in how skills channelled mana or energy. Whatever they used, I still had to ration its use, so I didn't bottom out. I really needed to read the documentation for them. I wondered if there were Energy and Mana potions. That would be super handy. The battle seemed to take an eternity and moments as I fought on. I had a grin and was laughing, slightly maniacal, as I battled a seemingly endless wave of Grimclaws.

Eventually, I dispatched the last Grimclaw, and an eerie silence descended on the battlefield. The entire area was a wreck, and the stone emitted a weird miasma that was visible now without my identification skills. I almost knew what was coming. If this were a game, the boss battle music would start. We would pause, and there would be a portrait of it, a cut scene where it would come out and stamp around, roar and then charge, with its epic name above it. I missed music. This battle needed an epic soundtrack.

I was astonished when something ate me whole.

A Rare Major Giant Grimclaw Serpent has swallowed you: (Chaos, Tier 4) Stealth, Invisible, Scent of Blood.

I didn’t see or hear anything.

Maybe a crunch, crunch as I was broken, bleeding and being swallowed and sucked down something's throat. How big was this sucker? I was being pulled and crushed into the belly of the beast by its undulating muscles. I was suffocating. My self-repairing clothes were being eaten away by acid, and my face and skin were dissolving. My eyes were the first to go despite my having them closed. Then, my fingers and hands. "OMG, Heal me, it hurts." numbed the pain only slightly. I could imagine my hair sloping off my head and my lips dripping as I jumbled around. Crap, Crap, Crap, double crap. I couldn’t concentrate; my ears were gone, and I had lost the axe as the bones of my fingers started to crack and fall off. "EYES OF FURY" nothing. I could not see. My eyes didn’t work. It was the Simpsons, Radioactive Man, "My Eyes, My Eyes…"

CRITICAL FAILURE. No External Ocular system detected.

CRITICAL FAILURE. No External Ocular system detected.

CRITICAL FAILURE. No External Ocular system detected.

"Thunder Grip", clapping my hands together, gripping at whatever I could. I may have heard a growl of pain, and the muscles doubled down on constricting me, but my hands shattered as the energy blasted through them, leaving me with stumps of bone and flesh. I was holding my breath and struggling not to swallow whatever bile and acid I was sloshing around. I could feel the darkness closing in on me as my thoughts slowed. It couldn’t be the end of things. I was going numb. The pain was gone, and I felt at peace. On the edge of my hearing, I heard the cursed collar.

BEEP.

Critical Tampering detected.

Pain Threshold increased. Maximum Non-lethal force applied.

"OMG, Heal me, it hurts."

BEEP.

External assistance was detected. The area of effect increased. The use of lethal force is authorised.

I was shoving healing potions into my ruined throat as I spammed, "OMG, Heal me, it hurts."

BEEP