Duke smiled at the onlookers, noting that they seemed to be divided by race into three groups. One group was reptilian, reminding Duke of the pair of Dragonians he had left back on Teldin. The fact that he had not seen the pair involved in the fighting against the Exospace Hounds tickled the back of his mind, but he stayed focused, looking over the other two groups.
The second group consisted of an insectoid race. They resembled praying mantises with their triangular heads and large multi-faceted eyes at the upper corners. The rest of their bodies were slightly more humanoid save for the extra pair of arms that sprouted from their torsos which looked far weaker than the larger limbs sprouting from their shoulders. Duke surmised the smaller arms were for more delicate work, but he was just guessing.
The third group appeared human but were adorned in armor that was reminiscent of Syndicate shock troops with a close resemblance to mechs. They had their helmets open and were openly eyeing Duke. They were armed with magitech rifles of some kind whereas the other two groups were armed in a more traditional fantasy style with blades, bows, and similar items. Duke almost didn’t notice the transparent gems floating in the air, circling one of the dragonians.
Ignoring the other two groups, Duke walked up to the dragonians and offered them a salute as he had learned from Drakmalorie. Their surprised reaction was well-concealed but Duke’s XENOGLOSSIA still picked up on it. Much like it picked up on the subtle cues of irritation from the other two groups.
He greeted the dragonians, “Greatness upon your eggs. I am known as Duke. How might you be addressed?”
The wording was specific and designed to translate perfectly into their language. From their reaction, Duke had hit the mark. The largest of the dragonians stepped up to him and swung his left arm full-speed at Duke’s head, claws extended. Duke caught the arm with his own, forearms locking together. The smile that spread across the dragonian’s face told Duke that he had nailed it perfectly.
“Your eggs must be strong, friend Duke. You must come with us and discuss how it is that you know our ways so well. I am known as Molekethesius but you can call me Mole if it pleases your tongue.”
Duke followed Mole and his group, who surprisingly had not introduced themselves, down a few streets before they arrived at the expected bar. Duke noted that the streets were paved with something closely resembling concrete and the buildings all appeared to be made of concrete and glass. In all, it bizarrely reminded him of a city on Earth and was not what he expected in the least.
As they walked, Duke fired up his DUNGEON SENSE and SENSE MAGIC to get an idea of what was really around him. What he discovered was not a great surprise but did give him a few things to think about. There was an extensive tunnel network running under the city that went several kilometers deep. He could sense creatures of numerous types within the tunnels. He could also sense that the concrete jungle around him was more than concrete and glass. Magitech was heavily incorporated, running through all the buildings’ structures. He guessed it was for reinforcement, but it could have been for anything.
In time, they arrived at the bar and filtered in, easily finding a table that could accommodate the dragonains’ size. The interior of the bar looked exactly like what Duke had expected. It was very reminiscent of the bar where he had first met Gro’nok on Turin station. There was one feature that immediately grabbed his attention though. There was a holographic display screen hovering overhead in the middle of the bar that listed the top ten rankings. He didn’t recognize any of the names which was no surprise to Duke but he was determined to see his own name among them before this was all over.
Top one hundred? No, top five. Top ten at a minimum. I have a lot of catching up to do. Where do I even rank on this thing?
Duke’s musings were interrupted as Mole spoke, “So, you are interested in the rankings, are you Duke?”
“Aren’t you?”
“Not at this point. We have lost too many of our clutch to continue. We are just going to wait here in Sanctuary until it is over. We will remain in the top thousand by my estimate. That should be enough for our sponsor.”
“That’s a lot to unpack. Would you share more? Like how you are coming to that estimate?”
Mole tapped on the table three time in rapid succession. This brought up a version of the rankings board that they could interact with. He quickly scrolled the listing down to the 523rd place which listed Team Shatterscale. Duke came to the sudden realization that there were three leader boards. One for individuals, one for teams, and one overall.
“That is our clutch, Team Shatterscale. We have over six million points and that should be enough to keep us in the top thousand.”
Duke scrolled through the various lists, eventually finding himself listed at the bottom of the individual list in rank 22,614. Mole noticed his rank and gave Duke a quizzical look.
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“I’ve only just arrived and have a lot of catching up to do. Any tips you’d like to share before I head out and get started?”
“You have a hard road ahead of you, friend. Where are you looking to get placed?”
Duke considered answering honestly but decided to hold back, “I’m going to make it into the top thousand if I have enough time.”
“You will find that difficult without killing other Contestants. Most of the Challenges have been completed. The only ones left are the ones that even the front-runners have avoided. There are still hordes of creatures out there but, again, they are hordes of high-tier creatures which would make it impossible for an individual to take on. The one thing I will warn you about above all is to avoid the main gate. Team Darkness Prevails has control of the area outside that gate and kills anyone trying to enter or leave it.”
“I assume the other gates are similarly controlled?”
“Very much so. You can buy passage in and out of the city, but it is expensive.”
“That’s good to know. Thank you for sharing this information. It seems I have less time to catch up than I had anticipated and a harder road of it than I was led to believe.”
Duke stood from the table and offered a final salute before quickly heading out of the bar. A single shout of “Good luck!” followed him out the door.
Once outside, Duke ducked down an alley to take a moment to think. He was confident that he could take on anyone with enough time to prepare and form a strategy but simply stepping outside the city walls would not give him any time to prepare.
I’m going to have to kill Contestants. The Overmind had told me as much but now it is crystal clear. I have to leave Sanctuary and find someone to kill. It shouldn’t be too hard, right? I can just TELEPORT my way out and start hunting. If I can knock off someone in the upper ranks, that will catapult me up the ranks since I would get half their points but also might put a target on my own head. Nothing to do but to get started.
Duke recalled the terrain he witnessed on his descent into the city and picked a mountainous region a significant distance from Sanctuary as his first destination. With a thought, he TELEPORTED to the tallest mountain in the range and started scanning the area with his senses.
The first thing he picked up was that there were hundreds, if not thousands of creatures in the area. They ranged from rabbit-sized prey creatures to a few large bipedal creatures. He couldn’t tell how powerful any of them were without getting line-of-sight to IDENTIFY them, so he decided to do just that.
Making his way down from the snowy peak, he flew slowly and carefully, maintaining a level of vigilance that he was accustomed to only during combat missions. Lately, he had let his wariness fade, replaced by supreme confidence. In this setting, he had switched back to old habits that had saved him on mission after mission. The stakes were high and he didn’t have enough information about what he was up against. In the struggle between urgency and caution, caution was the victor today.
Duke approached one of the larger bipedal figures to see that it was a white-furred creature standing close to three meters tall. His IDENTIFY gave him a bit more detail about the creature.
*** You have encountered a Yargeth. This creature is native to the icy planet Epsilot. It is known for its physical attacks including the ability to hurl boulders of ice significant distances.
Tier: 4
Level: 145
Health: 891,335
Mana: 801,000
***
Duke smiled, figuring this would be an easy first kill. He bathed the creature in FLAME and watched as it thrashed about, flinging spears of ice in seemingly random directions. Once came close to him and he batted it out of the air with his forearm. Duke was surprised by the sting of the cold from the spear. It felt as cold as the vacuum of space. He immediately decided to be even more careful when fighting these things. He increased the Mana flow to his FLAME Ability and the creature quickly succumbed. Duke was bombarded with notifications. Normally, he would ignore them but this time, he decided that there might be something worth reading with the Contest.
*** You have slain a Tier 4, Level 145 Yargeth. You gain 43,400 experience plus 4,340 bonus experience from your Mark of Teldin and are now level 9. You have 224 Characteristic Points to spend. You have gained 545 Contest points. Your new rank is 21,241. ***
Duke smiled as seeing his rank jump so much from one kill. Time to rocket up the bottom of the ranks! Must be a bunch of Contestants who aren’t doing much of anything. Maybe they are afraid to leave the city.
Duke gathered the corpse up into his INVENTORY and set about to start his slaughter. Flames wreathed his fists as he flew around the mountains attacking every Yargeth he could find. When he was done with his rampage several hours later, he had killed nearly two hundred of the things. Most were in the Tier Three to Four range, but there was one Tier Five. When he was all done, he reviewed the results.
Duke was now level 65 and had over 1,400 Characteristic Points to spend. He had gained 72,363 Contest points, bringing him up to 92,561 Points and breaking into the top 1,000 at number 917. He shook his head at the results.
How the hell did I shoot up that far from just a few hours of work? That makes no sense. I need to check the leader boards and find out what’s going on.
The though was enough to bring the boards up in his interface which made him eminently happy that he didn’t have to go back to town to check. He immediately saw the disparity. The individual ranked below him had a little over ten thousand points. The one above him, however, had over ten million points. That was one enormous gap.
His exploration of the board was interrupted by another notification.
***Contest Messaging System Activated. You have received a direct message from Zarmouth.
Congratulations on breaking into the top 1,000. Enjoy your rewards when they come.
I don’t know who you are, but if you start moving in on my placement, I will remove you from the board.
***
Duke noted the name and saw that it was the person just above him at rank 916. I guess that is why I was able to move up this far. This asshole keeps killing anyone who get close to him. Guess it’s time to make him give me five million points…