Eddy's plan was simple yet dangerous. It relied on some System enforcement of Accord regulations and some honour and fear from our enemies. We were putting a lot of faith in 'The Accords' that none of us knew much about other than whispers of knowledge.
For now, enemies meant The Karass and the Murhog Slavers. It was weird. I had never had enemies or even people trying to attack and capture or kill me; now, I had two alien species out to get me.
Both were warrior cultures with different views on how they conducted themselves. Eddy gave me a crash course in honour and how it was different depending on your point of view.
After battling and fighting groups of slavers, and in some instances capturing prisoners and interrogating them – I was not up to torturing them, but some hard questioning – with fatal results – got some information that we could use. I surprised myself at how squeamish I was in dealing with prisoners. I am not sure if it was humanising them or what, but there was a difference between someone actively attacking and someone who was helpless. My brain knew the difference, but it was hard to justify how we treated them. Jeff, Trent and Eddy were quite barbaric compared to me.
Why am I the only one who seems to have a problem with how we treat prisoners?
Eddy: Your Tier and stats possibly give you some insulation from the manipulation of the System.
What? Do we get manipulated?
Eddy: Of course. Did you expect to become powerful without conflict and violence? If there was no manipulation or suppression of your natural instincts, then most sapient species become psychotic or develop other mental instability.
Crap. I can understand that, but how much interference is there?
Eddy: Traditionally, it is higher at first, then lowers as you level and gain power. That is possibly why you are less affected.
It didn’t help and didn’t make me feel better, but at least I had a bit more of an idea of why they were more inclined to deal with our enemies.
We learned that the Karass and the Murhog were in cahoots to loot the earth of its resources and cripple any chance of the human race being viable in the near future. It was elegant in its brutality and understandable in a sick way. This was not the first time there had been a secret and illegal collaboration. They had been taking over planets in the outer regions like this for generations while the Empire was declining and failing inwards. Doing it during an Integration event was a bonus.
Our plan, or Eddy's really, relied on me using my stats and skills with overwhelming force to take down the high-priority targets while Jeff and Trent took out the others. Noah was with me as a punching bag since he was periodically lucid, and while he wasn’t, he was an indestructible target that we could use as a shield or decoy. Being an embodiment of the system had its perks, and it was a pity that he had not been fully developed before Harold left for whatever he was doing. I am sure we could fix it if we sacrificed enough energy or favour, but I found it hard to want to help Noah in any incarnation.
Eddy hacked their comms, and we soon had the routes and rosters for their cleanup raiding parties. They were here to mop up after the city's destruction, catching the last dregs, or as one put it, survivors were more valuable targets. Most of the captured people—in the tens of thousands—had been taken to larger processing camps further south before they would be loaded into cargo ships and sold. We passed that information back to Brisbane and told them to pass it on to Luke and the First Cohort, and perhaps we could do a combined raid.
On the ground, it was simple: Noah would walk into a patrol, they would attack, and we would mop up. With my spells, skills, stats, and Eddy's ability to cast support spells, we could take most groups out fairly quickly and with little actual danger. I ensured that Jeff and Trent got a shot or two in, so when we finally got XP for this, they would at least get some. We hoped.
It was intense; I had been shot, stabbed, blown up, had acid, fireballs, lightning, and even a multi-ton rock smashed on me, and the most damage had come from the rock. My Tier and spells guaranteed my survival against Tier 1, 2 and 3 foes.
My clothing, however, was a mess.
Eddy: Tier 5 Clothing. You need Tier 5 clothing.
I know, well I do now. I didn’t think it would make a difference. I don't know if I could afford it and where I would get it.
Eddy: Things at the Tier 5 level usually take reduced damage from attacks from lower tiers. Remember, Tier increases are exponential.
I do now. I'll just keep borrowing them. One change of clothes per fight.
Eddy: I'd count on more. We need to get to a safe space with store access.
Didn’t we get remote access?
Eddy: Not yet. We don't have full access to Earth Inc.'s contract. We are allies, not partners.
I was amazed at how powerful my spells were becoming. I could take down one of their raider aircraft with my Dispel Magic(Priest) and Dispel Magic(Mage) combo spells. I cast the High Priest version, while Eddy could cast the Mage version.
The combo spells disrupted the aircraft's engines and energy generators, turning them into expensive bricks. They flew just like bricks as they fell. Physics still trumped some things.
Once they were down, a well-placed flame strike, fireball or cone of cold seemed to do the trick. Trent and Jeff would lob their ranged attacks at will while keeping me covered from surprises.
A wall of force also worked wonders. As any aircraft came in for a strafing run, they crumpled in an explosion of fire and wreckage as they hit an impregnable invisible wall.
I was having so much fun. I was practising all my spells as I could, and I loved casting polymorph, invisibility and misty step. Having Eddy help me dual cast made me very effective in most engagements. Misty Step with Invisibility got me out of tight spots, while Mage Armour and Shield and Shield of Faith on top of my Earthmight skill enabled me to stand in the middle of chaos with little fear.
Using Cultivation, my regeneration rate went through the roof, and I could keep it all going longer than I would otherwise.
Help Cultivation:
Cultivation is the ability to increase the regeneration rates of Health, Mana and Energy.
Active: (rate x 10 level/5 per day).
At higher levels, the higher the cultivator's base rates of regeneration become *(1 + level / 20)
It made my base regeneration passively almost double since Harold levelled me up, and my active regeneration was nearly 20 times as fast.
The only thing slowing me down was the concept of spell slots.
With my stats as high as they were, I was not using much mana or energy to cast spells.
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Stats: Physical: 829 Cerebral: 1492 Meta-Physical: 703
HP: 14000/14000 EP: 5000/5000 MP: 1600/1600
After several battles and having to regain slots, which seemed to be daily or close to it, I contacted Allen.
Hey Allen, Bug fix. Change spell slots to straight Mana, would you?
Allen: It's not that simple since Harold ascended.
What do you mean? Just rewrite the code and send it through as a patch.
Allen: We can only do it when Harold approves a patch or one of his designated System Administrators. Then, all the required energy will have to be gathered.
I can ask Harold how much energy. What do I need to do? There is lots of stuff here we could convert.
Allen: That's easy, high-level enemies, powerplants, chaos cores, nuclear reactors, that sort of stuff. A several thousand Tier 2 equivalent corpse.
Eddy: That would be 100 Tier 3, 10 Ish Tier 4 and a single Tier 5.
Well, can you write the patch? When it's done, I'll summon Harold, and we can work on an IOU or something till we pay the energy.
Allen: It's not quite that simple. We need to balance and playtest the new rules.
Shit Allen, it’s not a game. Spell slots nerf high-level casters. I need to be able to cast spells until I run out of mana. Get your godamn act together and get these sorted.
Allen: Don't get nasty. Look, I'll work on it. I've got a bug list as long as my … well, it's significant. We are getting so many classes and skills that it is impossible to keep up.
Give Venus the skill. She always said she was a better hacker.
Allen: Now you're just being petty. I'll work on it. I can't promise anything, but I do need an offsider. As much as I love her, she is so hard to work with. There are some of Eddy's vat mates we are going to revive who might be good candidates.
Eddy: Yes, some were very skilled, and there is a tiny window where they will have supreme local access to give skills and even hack System Admin access.
Allen: We are working on some synthetic hosts and things like Noah, although that is creeping too many people out, which is why you are dealing with him.
Fix the spells, and get me more spells. Oh, and any idea why we have to fucking walk to Sydney? These slaver bastards have aircraft; we get a warning every time we get in one. I can't even use Darkflight out of combat!
Allen: I think Harold is getting back at you for being a bit nasty and not appreciating his magnificence.
What the fuck?
Allen: You hurt his feelings, and he does, for some reason, look to you as his surrogate mother or something.
Shit your joking. That’s not funny.
Allen: nope. No joke. Luckily, he moved up.
IPC: Yes, Lucky he moved up.
Crap Harold? Is he listening to everything?
IPC: Only when his name is besmirched, and his reputation is tarnished by his chosen one, whom he elevated above all others.
Sorry. Shit got to go. Fix the goddamn spells, Allan, and get Venus the skill so she can help you out.
Well, it's not quite what I wanted, but if it were done, it would make me more effective in combat.
We were busy as we kept moving south. As we cleared Murhog Slavers, we rescued several other survivor groups. I was surprised at how well tough-acting Jeff responded to them and how he defused several difficult situations. I could only cast my teleport spell once a day, so we had to set up several basecamps to manage them safely. They were mostly grateful for the help, yet one or two refused our help and either ran off or were just annoying.
It was sad to see the effects of integration that started in an unorganised manner; some of the survivors were beginning to show signs of madness and were in desperate need of training and Nanite realignment. We found groups as small as a single family and one group of fifty hiding and trying to move out of the city into a more secluded area. We didn’t tell them that doing that would have fast-tracked them to become insane; keeping near higher energy zones was key at the moment.
My name, as well as their witnessing us demolish the Murhog, was enough to keep the scared and terrified survivors from reacting with hostility.
Lucky for them, IPC offered safety and peace, so when they were teleported back to Brisbane, there were very few issues, and they were relegated to the now standard training programs. I left it to Sue to deal with; she had come through for me or IPC.
Sue had set up a warehouse with a teleportation circle that I could lock onto to manage all the refugees and survivors. It was a pretty slick operation.
It slowed us down as we had to backtrack a fair bit, but Trent rotated his drones out and around, looking for signs of survivors and our enemy.
It was not a huge deal as we were waiting for a larger, more organized strike force to respond to our guerrilla tactics.
It didn’t take us long to clear an exclusion zone, and I sent Jeff back to get us some outpost stones so we could reclaim some of the area and start spreading IPC's area of influence. We could set up an outpost with minimal effort and resources. If several were within a few kilometres of each other that we held for a week, they could be merged into a more permanent settlement, extending the control and spread of IPC nanites.
With the help of Simon and Robert, the former chiefs of the army and police, they organised patrols of trained people – mainly former soldiers and police – to man the outposts. There were also quite a few volunteers from the survivors who were keen to get some payback for the destruction of their city. Once we had the procedure, we were able to offload some of the survivor management to others.
Jeff, Trent, Noah, Eddy, and I kept heading south, dropping outpost stones every ten or so kilometres, using them to resupply and rest as needed, and offering some security to any survivors nearby. As the de facto leader of IPC, it also gave me some insight into how large an area we were covering and how little that was in the scheme of reclaiming our planet.
I hated it. The walking, the killing and seeing the destruction. I felt it changing me and making me more bitter and prone to violence.
Eddy: It is a common reaction: increased violence and increased narcissism, amongst other things.
What do you mean?
Eddy: Your body has changed. You have moved from a biologically driven imperative to survive to a self-driven imperative.
So, the system changes us?
Eddy: Yes, you knew this already, but how could it not? Not only is your biology different, but your neural pathways are superior and use more of your energy matrix. Was there a saying that you only use a small part of your brain?
Yeah, 10% or something crappy like that.
Eddy: Now you are using more. So you could think that you are becoming more you.
But changed?
Eddy: More extreme, you are still you; there is just less standing in the way of you reacting for self-interest, especially as you gain power. A Tier 5 is essentially beyond most laws.
Shit, what does that mean for me?
Eddy: Unless you want to take over and be the ruler of this planet, you will have to leave at some stage. Your power will destabilise both the energy generation …
How?
Eddy: A Tier 5 being requires more energy to exist. You lower the ambient energy generation unless the planet or area has a source that can offset your energy draw. I was going to add that your presence will also increase the density of incursions and their difficulty.
Do you think that Harold knew?
Eddy: Most certainly. I suspect that is why he insisted we walk.
Shit. What about Luke, Sarah and the Empress?
Eddy: I am surprised that, given the number of high-powered beings on this planet so early in its integration and with such a low energy reserve, there have not been any major consequences.
Like?
Eddy: Unknown, destabilisation of Karma and Energy is a field of research that I am not specialised in. A large settlement can stabilise the Karmic and Energy levels and can support a high-level ruler. A well-managed settlement can support multiple higher-tiered beings. Earth does not have that, and there will be consequences. Being around others is a danger to them in the long run until they reach Tier 3 and Tier 4.
Is that what the Drakes are doing with the Resort?
Eddy: Yes, although that is localised and specialised. It is not a permanent solution. They cannot live there without consequences.
So we will have to leave Earth?
Eddy: At some stage, yes. Until the levels get high enough to support you.
Shit. But it did give me something to fight for – a future home. Shit.
It gave me something to think about as we travelled the rest of the 900 kilometres south to Sydney.