CHAPTER 157
The noise was going off in his head and in the heads of everyone around them based on the expressions on everyone’s faces. The event wave was finished, and the results were there to be absorbed.
Tom quickly checked.
Congratulations!
The third challenge of the settlement event has been successfully completed.
For personal rewards, please check the loot rift located where the wyvern died.
Personal rewards are calculated based on GODs Allocated Contribution.
Your personal contribution has been assigned as 48%.
Total experience awarded is 6000 per participant plus tailored loot from the portal.
69 participants for a total experience reward of 414,000
Your proportion of experience is 198,720.
Tom took a long moment to absorb the flood of experience that he had been allocated. It was ten levels! If he went that way. He was unconvinced if he would, but the possibility was there if he wished to embrace it.
This result was almost opposite to what had happened with the longjoules. With them, he had killed more than the percentage allocation he had been given because Everlyn had set up the kills. With the wyvern, he doubted he had done anywhere near close to fifty percent of the damage. Sure, he had delivered the killing blow, but his meteorites had failed against the creature’s scales. They had bounced away. The only reason that the final one had penetrated the defence of the wyvern was the existing section of broken scales that had been created by others. The wound it had slipped through had been opened by the collective effort of everyone else. Excluding that final blow, his direct damage had been low.
He had cracked a couple of claws and then helped cripple the wing, and he guessed his golem had opened some of the initial wounds. Collectively, that might have reduced the creature’s fighting capacity by fifteen percent. That forty-eight percent was not calculated from his raw strikes, but rewarded his impact on the battlefield.
It had attacked him first, which had saved lives. Then Golly number two had been sacrificed to buy more time. His intervention with Everlyn had kept her in the fight and probably got him a permanent slice of her points. Then finally, him jumping on the monster’s back had it grounded long enough for him and others to break the wing.
That was why his percentage allocation was so high.
“Forty-eight percent.” He informed Everlyn when she looked his way.
“Beat me by twenty-two.” She answered without missing a beat. She gave him a big thumbs up.
Tom meanwhile calculated what that actually meant. Subtract twenty-two from… Everlyn had been awarded a contribution of twenty-six. He didn’t know why she hadn’t just said that.
Secretly, he felt proud. Between them, they had claimed just a little under three-quarters of the rewards. He also felt bad for Legen and the others, but there was no arguing with the GOD’s allocation.
The wyvern’s massive body vanished into sparkling motes of light and was replaced by a single loot portal. It was probably a good choice by the system because judging by the green mist in the fortifications; they weren’t going to be getting in there soon, so the previous location of the portal was denied to them.
“All that experience. What are you considering buying?”
Tom shrugged at her question. “Honestly, I don’t know yet. I’ll probably split my purchases between skills and levels. I need to get my attributes up, but the faster I get skills the sooner they can be useful.” Tom laughed ruefully. “Choices, choices and I have to have to think more deeply about the evolution potions because I want to ensure they are directed optimally.”
“No.” She interrupted him. “Don’t overthink it. I reckon we should aim to get parity with the area we’re in and only then worry about expanding sideways.”
“I wish I had a hundred Oracle questions like in the tutorial.” Tom joked. “It would make moments like this so much easier.”
“Yep, only having to be concerned with yourself was terrific.” Everlyn said while she looked toward where the people had died.
“Yeah, that was simpler. Apart from Pinkwing before the last month I’ve never had anyone or anything I know die.”
“Really.” She sighed and rubbed his arm. “That was so nice. You must have lived a charmed life… what?” She asked defensively. “On Earth, I lost a friend, an aunt, and two of my grandparents before I was twenty.”
“Sorry.”
“Don’t be. Those losses… they’re a lifetime ago now. I’ve long forgotten almost everything about them. I’m not purchasing any more skills, beyond the minimal archery ones. Instead, I’ll be buying levels to bump me up four ranks. I think I’ll need that against what we’re going to be fighting in the mountains.”
“Are you investing it all into fate?”
Everlyn’s nose wrinkled, disgruntled. “I forgot about the potion. But you’re right. My free points, yes. They’re all going to fate.”
“So not four ranks. Two?”
She sighed. “Yeah. But if I’m boosting myself so little, then you might need to carry some of the slack till the rest of us build our rank.”
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“I didn’t say I wouldn’t. I just want to think about things a bit more. Work out my skill strategy particularly with that bonus, I get to evolve them now. Do I go for ones I already know? Do I limit myself to only a few to maximise evolutions? Does that mean it’ll be best if I buy a single high tier skill and focus on it?”
She laughed. “First world problems. A paralysis of choice.”
“Plus, the loot I get.” He nodded toward the portal. “Might change my plans. We all know that there are some skills and items that necessitate the purchase of supporting abilities.”
Almost without realising it they had walked toward the portal. There was a line and one by one people were sticking their arms in to get their prizes. Everyone here had been part of the fight, so they would have got a percentage allocation based on contribution. Those who had scattered in other directions could well end up with nothing. “Do the people…” Tom nodded away from where they were standing. “Who did nothing but run and hide get any rewards?”
“There is a floor of half a percent for rewards. Seems to come out of a different pot to that of those who actually contribute.”
“Wait does that mean Michael.”
She smiled. “Yes. Michael got the base reward with the longjoules.”
Tom chuckled. He was definitely going to use that against him at some point.
Ahead of them, the line shifted forward. Rahmat walked away with a disappointed look on his face.
“We’re definitely leaving tomorrow?” Everlyn asked. It felt like everyone near them turned to look at them.
Tom froze for a moment before he realised she had turned off the sound cancellation to make a point. She wanted them all to know their plans.
“Yes.” He answered simply and likewise didn’t bother lowering his voice. “I’m getting itchy feet to implement the plan.”
“Your famous plan to save all of humanity, hey.” She playfully bumped his shoulder. Most of the people who turned to look had politely courteously diverted their eyes away, but Tom was not naïve. If their ears did the thing like some animals where they would swivel in the direction they were listening, every single person’s ears would have been pointing at him.
“It’s important.” Tom reiterated. “I don’t know how many questions I invested in the plan, but it was probably over two thousand.”
She whistled appreciatively. “That’s a heap?”
“Yes, there were loads of details to go through. A lot of dead-end approaches that I had to get past. The pathway the quest walks is tight.”
“Like being on the edge of a cliff?”
He glanced at her and smiled. “More like walking a rotten, crooked bridge over a precarious drop with both howling wind and swooping hawks to contend with.”
“Maybe I should withdraw my offer to come.” Everlyn teased.
“Luckily, all those questions will let me avoid most of the pitfalls, and it’s extremely lucrative.”
“So mysterious. Are you going to share more?”
They stepped forward at another pace as one of Legen’s cronies left holding an orange skill stone in his hand out for his mates to identify. Unlike Rahmat, he had a huge grin on his face.
“No. Unfortunately I asked if my chances of success were improved significantly if I hid the details from my allies.”
“The answer was yes?”
Tom nodded.
“Sounds likely! What you want me to blindly trust you?”
“Yes.”
“Just take your word that it’s the right thing to do.”
“I know it sounds bad. But further guaranteed that anyone helping me would, on average earn materially more…”
“Bah…” she interrupted. “You and your obsession with ranking points.”
Tom shrugged.
“Not just ranking points, I’m talking about millions of them.”
She smiled at him. Everlyn, of course, knew everything he was saying: the entire conversation was solely for the benefit of everyone else who were collectively pretending not to be listening in. Enough people had heard that the gossip mill would guarantee that the entire community knew they were leaving within an hour or two.
“Of course I’ll trust you. I’m in.”
The line moved again, and then the portal was in front of him. Tom had a choice to make. He still had a large amount of fate and given the size of the coming reward he wanted to tilt it as much as possible in his favour.
The question was which of three directions to bias the prize toward.
He could shape it to strengthen himself. Aim for pure power, a skill or spell that would boost his combat strength or an item that would serve a similar outcome. He did after all need a decent set of chest armour or a helmet.
Alternatively, he could steer the portal to generate something to help his plan. There were still rituals and their materials that he needed to purchase. Finally, he could double down on True Dreaming and aim to acquire something to stop the killers or potentially manage them once he’d identify who they were.
Everlyn had agreed at least tentatively to put them to use, and Tom did not like wasting resources.
How he could do that was a mystery.
Plus, there were substantial benefits to getting the idiots who purchased the cursed bloodline under his control.
That fate spike ability might seem weak for the type of fights they had been experiencing. But in longer battles, that was a skill that he wanted on his side. Even at the base level it would be significant if they had to whittle down a more powerful creature and that said nothing of any upgrades Fate Spike might receive. Tom had no doubt that random updates or directed ones would materially improve the power of that ability, and he hoped to get those fate spikes to benefit his team. With three or more killers, with each of them dumping their fate multiple times over during the fight… the outcome of that was tantalising since it could help to guarantee victory.
All three choices were good, but he focused on the killers. He wanted something to neuter or to control them.
Tom waited till he had an intricate and complete idea of his idea. His mind had settled on the concept of a contracting scroll or equivalent.
An item that would let him offer them an ultimatum to serve or die, and if they accepted, then he would get their aid for the duration of his quest and stop them from betraying him either during that period and forever after.
Was him forcing the issue evil…? Maybe, but ultimately, all humans were on the same side and Tom did not want to see their potential go to waste and he expected them to take the deal. Especially if he could include a get-out clause once his task was complete, a way to release them to their own designs afterwards.
His gut told him that phrased the right way they would accept.
Fate flooded out of him and he pushed his hand into the mysterious light and his fingers closed over a small rock.
He flailed with his fist that contained the rock within the portal.
Only empty space was present. There were no other goodies, just a single stone was the extent of his rewards. It was a definitely a spell or skill stone of some description.
He pulled it out and open his fingers to peek at it for a moment and get an identification off.
Skill Stone: Contract binding - Tier 5
This skill allows the holder to create a single contract every 16 days that can bind up to eight people. The user of the skill will have an innate sense of the complexity, duration, strength and penalty clauses that the contract can sustain. The terms of the contract can be mentally adjusted as many times as required until everyone is satisfied prior to completing the contract.
Tom closed the stone firmly in his hand to hide it and winced slightly. It was an excellent skill and worth somewhat in the vicinity of a quarter of a million experience.
He knew why he had got it, but it just felt so pointless. It was his second high tier Skill that couldn’t be used to hit anything with. On the plus side, it was exactly what he was after. A way to control the killers if he could convince them to join him.
With a sad sigh, Tom glanced around everyone’s attention was on Everlyn who was thrusting her hand into the loot portal. He attempted to keep the stone hidden as he raised it and put it on his forehead.
He had it and was going to use it.