“I liked it better when you were depressed.”
Barry only widened his grin in response as he took another slow step, his foot sliding into the reddish brown sand. He walked with an unusual, measured gait, the movements slow and exaggerated. It looked something like a recording of a normal walk, playing at only sixty percent of the normal speed.
A hooded mantle in the same colors as the desert covered his body, which together with the effect of [Blur Image] made him blend into the environment. At least, that was what he assumed, given the fact that he was still walking here, instead of being digested in the stomach of that monstrous bird.
“That feels on brand, for you. You’re remarkably hateful, for an AI.”
In hindsight, it may have been a mistake to inform the AI that his free manipulation seemed to work better when his focus was elsewhere. Since then, Pokka had been relentlessly engaging him in conversation as he used free manipulation on [Halt Waves - Sphere] to keep it moving alongside him.
“False. I do not feel emotions. Something like hate doesn’t ever feature in my processing.”
“I suppose that would explain how oblivious you are when it comes to emotions.” Barry nodded.
It had taken hours for Pokka to finally stop questioning why Barry would have been smiling, when his exposure to danger had just gone up drastically. Even his vaunted Psych Module showed its limitations, incapable of formulating a working explanation.
Any person with basic empathy could easily provide several guesses, and they might all be correct, to some extent. He’d been smiling at the fresh air. At the beautiful sunset. At the greenery and mountains in the distance. At what felt like the first real step closer to finding his family. At finally getting out of that horrid, damp cave which had become so much like a prison.
“Anyway, you’ll get better results when treating me with respect. I’m going to move as fast as possible towards my family - nothing you say will change that - but if you still want me to follow some of your advice, then you’d better listen to that Psych Module before speaking.”
The distraction of conversation was undoubtedly helping his free manipulation skills, having progressed to the point where the sphere remained mostly intact as he guided its path. All day he’d been walking without missing a step, while also working to address a critical weakness of this Ability: the fact that it did not let sound travel into the sphere.
Slowly and carefully, he was testing how to amend the bubble so that it would stop any waves from traveling out, while still letting others in from the outside. So far, the only thing that worked was a rough work-around: to extend his tendrils outside of the bubble, so that he could sense the soundwaves there before they were negated.
It was easy enough to feel that there was something there, some form of soundwave, but interpreting them correctly was the hard part. The key was not in the size, but in the texture. So far, he’d learned to connect high pitched sounds to sharper textures, shaped like pyramids or stars. Lower notes were rounder, sometimes even feeling like a collection of bubbles, though more often it would be a ribbed texture, like a potato chip, only more irregular.
In order for him to actually be able to hear the sounds, his brain would have to learn to directly interpret the signals sent by the PE Node, which would take a longer time.
“This is a result of your… change in mood?” Pokka spoke the last word as if it might have been made up.
“It feels like a new start, somehow, to finally be moving towards my family. Or perhaps after a month of feeling like a shit, the well of negative emotions in me has just run dry,” He shrugged, “Either way, we’re moving full steam ahead.”
They continued like this for a while, until Barry came to a sudden halt, spotting a moving cloud of sand in the distance. His eyes widened as he checked himself and his Abilities, but everything was running as it should. Had he made a mistake at some point?
He let out a breath of relief as the Roid-Bull veered to the right instead of heading towards him. His stealth was still working successfully. It must have found some other prey to pursue.
“What do they even eat in this desert, to be able to move around at those speeds all the time? Makes no sense.” He murmured, eyes narrowed as he tracked the giant creature.
“I will not reveal any information about the creatures of this world.” Pokka replied.
“Yeah, I know, you’ve only told me like a dozen times,” Barry waved his comment away while muttering under his breath, “I’ll figure it out myself.”
As he watched, the bull came to a halt, taking some time to paw at the ground, turning around a few times, not finding whatever it may have been looking for. Then, it just stopped moving and stood there in silence.
It was right in his path. Considering whether to take a detour, he decided against it. Barring any mistakes with the movement of his sphere, the bull would not be able to locate him, regardless if he was right next to it or several miles away.
Barry proceeded warily, slowing down as he got closer to the beast, adjusting his course slightly to bend around it. With its limited senses, it did not appear to have any clue he was there.
Unable to curb his curiosity, he studied it closely as he shuffled by, exceedingly careful never to step outside the bounds of [Halt Wave - Sphere]. Once again he was awed by the sheer size of it, its massive torso covered in thick overlapping plates of rough skin, which smoothed out around the neck, the gray color brightening slightly. Merely standing so close to it, even while perfectly hidden, was enough to make him sweat.
The beast barely moved, to the point where he wasn’t sure that it was even still breathing. Would it just continue to sit there, unmoving, as long as it did not detect any vibrations that it wanted to chase down?
As he looked out at the empty desert around them, he wondered again how it survived. He’d been walking most of the day, without spotting a single plant, not even a dry patch of grass. The Roid-Bulls were the only animals he’d seen, if you could call this gargantuan monster an animal.
So where did it get its energy from? Rhinos would need to graze all day long to sustain their bodies, and this was at least three times as big.
The way it rested on the hot sand, basking in the sunlight, reminded him of the way cold-blooded creatures like lizards or snakes would heat their bodies. But that did not gain them any energy to use as fuel, that would require photosynthesis, which was reserved for plants.
But then, he thought of his PE Node, how its capacity was refilling faster now, out in the desert. Something to do with ‘excess ambient energy’, Pokka had said, which he had assumed was referring to sunlight, for what else did the cave lack compared to the surface? The Roid-Bull in the VR environment had used something like Momentum Abilities. Surely the infernal creatures wouldn’t have anything like a PE Node?
It was with a deep frown that he continued on his path, pondering unanswered questions and disturbing implications.
After a while, he noticed that his PE Capacity was getting close to thirty percent, which was dangerously low. It would become a severe handicap in case he ran into any of the monstrous animals that roamed freely out here. As the sun was already well past its zenith, he decided to call it a day.
The desert was entirely flat and monotone, without any dunes or even rocks to serve as landmarks, so this place was as good as any other to take a break. It made him deeply uncomfortable to sleep out in the open like this, but at least the Energy Shroud would keep him hidden. He just had to hope nothing wandered into its range by chance.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
The Energy Shroud was fixed firmly on the ground, carefully keeping it within the range of his Ability. It would take about five minutes to start working, so he got on with some other chores.
First, he had to rebalance his Stats. As he strode across the desert, he’d been adding one point to Speed every thirty minutes or so, which was about the fastest he could increase it without stumbling. Over the course of the day, it had increased quite a bit, and he’d have to make sure his other Stats would not move too far from the ratios Pokka had recommended. With some mental math, he realized only his Senses needed to be brought up, though he also added two more in Strength for the sake of symmetry.
Tier 6 (Next: 4000)
Stats
Strength: 16
Durability: 16
Speed: 47
Senses: 23
Intelligence: 10
PE Capacity: 1300 KJ
Abilities
[Halt Wave - Sphere]
[Cast Wave]
Direct Manipulation - Waves
[Blur Image]
[Camouflage]
Direct Manipulation - Light
[Reflect Momentum]
Unallocated Value: 4960
Value allocated to Stats: 1440
Value allocated to Abilities: 1100
Value spent on items: 1360
There was a moment of disorientation as the 10 point increase in Senses took effect. Visual details increased suddenly, the grains of sand around him becoming sharper as a faint smell of sun-burnt rock suddenly entered his nostrils. His eyes darted from left to right as his attention was involuntarily drawn to minute movements caused by the shifting sand. It helped that he was in a quiet place with limited stimuli, or the adjustment would be far more disconcerting.
He closed his eyes, considering how far to still bring his Speed, as the cost of the Stat increases was scaling quickly. A single point increase between 10 and 20 had cost only 10 Value, but it increased every time he passed ten points, now already costing 60 per point for his Speed. It might be more cost effective to raise the other Stats, Intelligence in particular, but still he hesitated to bring it past 10. It felt like a final frontier, to have his very brain altered to become superhuman. How might that affect his identity?
In any case, he firmly believed that Speed should remain the priority, as it would directly increase his survivability. No amount of Durability would withstand a frontal hit from a Roid-Bull, nor a soundblast from that gigantic birdlike creature. Evading the monsters was the only way to survive in this zone.
The memory of the bird sent shivers down his spine, and he instinctively scanned his surroundings, opening his eyes again to look up anxiously at an empty sky. There had been plenty of time to ponder that beast, which hadn’t helped to curb his fear of it. The blasts of sound, he had theorized, must be used not only to stun its prey, but also to soften it up. He couldn’t be sure about the frequencies or amounts of energy required for such a thing, but it had no beak, nor any teeth, so how else would it feed?
One realization did help, which was based on the fact that its eyes were located on its torso. They were placed close together, and he recalled from a documentary about eagles that eye placement directly related to depth perception. An eagle had eyes on either side of its head, which caught light from different angles, allowing it to perceive the relative location of things through some form of triangulation.
With two eyes in its torso, looking only down at the ground, this monster might have very detailed vision, but also limited depth perception. It was a small thing, based on some assumptions, but it allowed him some hope that with [Blur Image] and his cloak as camouflage he’d be able to survive. It was why he avoided any travel during the early hours of the morning or later in the evening; the angle of the sun would cast too large a shadow, which might be spotted by the predator.
Thinking of eagles and their excellent eyesight gave him sudden inspiration. He toggled on [Free Manipulation - Light] and focused on the space in front of him. So far, the manipulation of lightwaves had proven to be challenging, but perhaps something simple on a small scale would work.
Using his normal vision and hands instead of imaginary tendrils, he stretched his arms out in front of him, forming a square with his fingers. He focused, willing only the light in that small area to come together. Imagining the rays of light bending together, he tried to push a trickle of energy to that location, but nothing happened.
Cursing the PE Node for how difficult it was to talk to, he settled in to try a few different tactics. He tried forming a triangle, squinting, pushing more energy out, but still nothing changed.
After nearly an hour of various failed attempts, he let out a sigh and decided to change his approach. He closed his eyes and did some breathing exercises, bringing himself into a more meditative state. Once again he brought his hands out in front of him, but this time he kept his eyes closed as his mind stayed in that unfocused, wandering state.
He cupped his hands together to form an oval shape between them, and imagined the shape of a lentil, the image fleeting in and out of his mind.
The point of this shape was that the rays of light would refract as they came in on the one side, bunching together in the middle of it before again expanding and leaving on the other side. He imagined a vortex in the middle, sucking in the light, having it all bunch up before sending it out through the other side.
When he absently felt something leaving him, a trickle of essence being sucked away, he knew that it was energy flowing out into whatever he had created. Calmly opening his eyes while carefully maintaining that undirected feeling of operating on autopilot, he then looked at his hands.
They were still cupped to create an open oval, and through that opening he could see more desert, but brought closer. As he moved his hands, the effect of a convex lens remained, enlarging whatever he was pointing it at. The distant mountains were just a blur, but when he directed it at a piece of rock in front of him, the intended zoom function was clearly working.
He grinned as a wave of excitement washed over him, causing the effect to dissipate with his focus lost. It was the first time he’d managed to create a new effect, instead of just altering an existing Ability. How amazing would it be, after he tweaked and improved it, to simply gesture with his hands and be able to see things in the distance, like a wizard from the stories?
His experience had been dominated by negative emotions for so long that the warm, buzzing feelings of triumph and elation felt almost unfamiliar. He allowed himself to feel them fully, even letting out a happy giggle as he looked at his hands with wonder.
It lasted only for a short while, fading away too quickly, replaced by the familiar troubles as he looked out at the horizon. Bringing up his map, he grimaced at the limited progress, having crossed not even a fifth of the immense desert towards the next orange zone, which looked like a forest. The snow-capped mountains on the horizon looked a lot closer than they were, still a few zones distant.
Once again, he wondered what his family would be doing now. Struggling to find food, fighting off dangerous creatures, his father standing protectively out in front, keeping Jasmine and his mother behind his back? Stress and urgency came rushing back along with those recurring worries, sticking to the growing ball he always carried in his stomach, like a tumor that he just couldn’t get rid of.
There was no choice but to speed up, he thought. In fact, he should be running towards them right now, instead of sitting and resting, leaving more time for something to happen to them and-
He squeezed his eyes shut and took a deep breath, holding the panic at bay. This was not helpful, he told himself. Calm, clear decisions would be better. He needed rest to function properly. There was no room for error in this zone, and to rush to his death would help no one. Letting this constant stress eat away at him from the inside was a mistake.
Getting to his feet, he shook out his arms as if it would somehow help to drive the stress out, then started doing some stretches, aiming to distract himself. It occurred to him then, that there was another thing he’d resolved to try just a day or two ago - dancing.
It felt silly at first, difficult to get into the right mindset, to the point where he nearly gave up. Pokka floated in the air, watching with that inscrutable gaze, which made him feel even more awkward. But he forced himself to finish at least one run of a particular sequence of the famous Don Quixote show.
Stretching one arm above his head, the other bent and touching his side, his back leg extended just so, he began. The flow was lacking and he stumbled because of the sand, so made himself start over, this time first closing his eyes and imagining the music.
It had been a while since he last heard the trumpets and flutes in that particular melody, but still it came back to him, nodding his head to the rhythm.
Then, he was moving, stepping from side to side with his arms in an elegant extension, back straight and neck stiff as he turned. Soon, he was lost in the movements, mind clear and focused on the position of his body. He twirled, first with one stretched leg swinging around, then it was bent with his foot touching at the other knee, both arms slightly curved above his head. He swiftly transitioned into a leaping pirouette, landing and immediately doing it again, never losing his momentum, managing two full turns before landing.
Then, something occurred to him. He had increased Stats now, didn’t he?
Flexing his Speed and Strength, he moved through the motions in a blur, a cloud of sand being kicked up around him. Another round of pirouettes had him doing first six, then eight, then as many as fourteen turns before landing.
By the time he finished with a gracious flourish, he was panting, with a wild grin on his face. Barry nearly flinched back as Pokka appeared right in front of him, scrutinizing him closely. He could feel the interest in the old AI’s piercing gaze, perhaps even seeing something like a twinkle in his eye.
“What was that?”
“Just a bit of dancing, a form of ballet in this case. It’s an old hobby of mine. Helps to take my mind off things.”
“Why is it that when you hold a spear in your hands, you move like a reluctant circus bear, while you are otherwise able to move as fluently as you just did?”
Barry frowned, fighting the urge to ask where he’d learned that expression, knowing that it would lead nowhere good.
“It’s a rigid length of wood, which you have to hold with both hands, at least most of the time. It gets in the way,” He shrugged, then continued, “Besides, the movements are entirely different. Those fighting drills are stiff, forceful moves. It just doesn’t flow like a dance does.”
“It seems we’ve been trying to teach you from scratch, when there is actually an interesting foundation to build on. Most standard forms of fighting are indeed based on pragmatic, repetitive singular movements. But aren’t you lucky that your old mentor here has a well of cosmic wisdom to pull from.”
The old man flashed a rare grin as he held out his hands, a strange image starting to take shape.
“I have a few ideas.”