CHAPTER 249 – THE SIXTH COMPETITOR
Tom found himself immediately in a new mind and body. Both the creatures’ physical senses and his impression of its thoughts warred in him for attention. He focused on the mind and was surprised that its brain patterns resembled those of humans. The best way to describe it was the positioning of the self. When interacting with both the healer and the robotic creator species, they had possessed an underlying fundamental purpose or nucleus that dominated everything else. Contrasting that the insects and the dragon had a sense of absolute superiority and a focus on what was greatest for them individually. This person lacked those intense, almost external drivers. It still possessed intent, goals and aims that it strived for, but that motivation was shaped by its own history and conscious decisions as opposed to being innate to the species.
It might have been a weird distinction for him to be making, but it felt right. This sixth race was like humans in that their worldview was free to be shaped by their environment and their own desires. That was at odds with the healers who had an imperative need to sacrifice for others. A desire that they could fight against like that small one had been doing, but from his experience that resistance would not last long.
While the brain structure, so to speak was familiar, the same could not be said for the senses. The species had vision, but relative to even an unaugmented human, it was terrible. Gray scale that had been adapted for seeing movement as opposed to the shape of the creature that was facing it. The eyesight wouldn’t provide sufficient information for Tom to be able to describe their looks accurately.
Instead of vision, they relied on sound and smell as their primary senses. With every breath, he smelt the scent of the nearby seven companions. The mind did not actively focus on that sensory input, but in its subconscious it was aware. It was as if he was shopping in a supermarket. He would see the dozens of people picking up their own goods but he wouldn’t notice them. They were just back ground points of interest, unless he wanted to see them and then he could examine each in turn.
Scent to this species served the same role and created a detailed environmental map.
It’s interpretation of sound contained almost as much detail. It was not echolocation because it did not generate its own noise, but the shift of feet on grass was triangulated to a specific location and the breathing was as equally revealing. The different sensors were fascinating and nauseating. It was the same effect that all the other sapients with alien sensors had caused.
The breadth of what was out there… It was extraordinary.
Tom focused on what he required.
He wanted evidence that could recruit the other humans. If he was going to extract anything useful, he needed to find it elsewhere. A physical description derived from their terrible vision would persuade no one and nor would him relating unique scents or painting with words the impressions from the soundscape be convincing. Instead, he had to rely on a sense of touch and memories to build up a picture of the physical body.
Tom focused on the creature’s form.
It was not as easy to do as Tom might have thought. When he was sitting sharpening a weapon, he was not aware of his feet, toes only his hands and arms that were doing the work. It was the same here, so it took a moment to get his head around what he was sensing. That was okay. He had time. The aliens were not talking amongst themselves. Instead, the mind he was in was focused on working a dint out of its metal helmet.
With a mixture of compiling the sense of touch and memories, he created a mental map of the body that he was in. Physical details, number of limbs, specialised parts, the internal power.
Within the safety of his own thoughts, he gnashed his teeth. Every new competitor race he found reaffirmed a simple truth. The other races they were competing against were better than humans. Possibly not in competition terms, but in sheer physicality they could bring to bear.
The knowledge could have crushed his psychic, but he had long since evolved beyond such a fragile mindset. If the mountain climb was higher than he thought, then he just needed to work harder. The gap to close with the other races seemed insurmountable, but it wasn’t. Tom was confident that hard yakka would bridge it and he wasn’t afraid of putting in the effort.
This last race was cat like and weighed around two times that of an adult human male. They possessed six limbs and used all of them when manoeuvring. Their spine was not designed for bipedal or quadrupedal movement, which meant they had six legs and no arms. Each of their legs ended in heavy claws, which were both terribly sharp and hoof like with the entire foot composing of three solid claws without structural bone.
Evolutionary its attack pattern would be based around rending with its legs and then finishing with its teeth. However, the head was fixed in position like in felines. There was no elongation and three hundred sixty plus degree of movement like a wyvern or dragon possessed.
There were no thumbs on its feet and the feature that allowed them to adapt and become sapient and create tools was its chest area. Mentally, Tom tried and failed to understand how many muscles were used by the spot, but there were maybe a hundred scales, most of them about the length of a human’s pinky finger that could move independently of each other so there were potential more muscles in that space that there were in the human body. The result was a stretch of skin the size of a couple of dinner plates that was capable of fine motor control. If Tom had to put a number on it, the space was equivalent to multiple sets of human hands through less convenient as the object being worked on had to be physically brought to the chest.
While he was jealous, he could see how in many ways the human set up was better.
The mind he was in was reshaping a metal helmet to remove a dent and after placing it in position it was able to spin it to access all sides. Everything was done by touch, which given the eyes limitations that was not at all surprising.
With the armour fixed, it turned its attention away from the detailed work to its surroundings.
Once more, the deficiencies of its vision struck him hard. Those eyes were terrible. Even objects five metres distant were indistinct and provided no useful information. It spun on the spot and Tom got to see five of the companions that smell and sound had already highlighted for him. The vision was almost like looking through a telescope. It was so restricted. Apart from confirming that one of the five was slightly smaller than the other four, like sound had already suggested, Tom was unable to improve his understanding of the creature’s body shape.
Their latest prey, at least a section of it was visible with it being only two metres away. There was a jumble of images that accomplished the sight. The special attacks, how it moved, the way to avoid the many legs. Tom took note of the pertinent details.
Then the body settled back on its haunches and one of the normal sized ones shifted forward and transferred a long wooden plate that held a piece of meat on the end to him. The transfer was chest to chest and afterwards those scales moved to rotate the food into position for the jaws to easily take bites of them.
“What do you think of the other competitors?” The one who had passed the meat asked.
“What do you mean?” The person who’s mind he was sharing asked neutrally. There was an undertone of genuine interest. He was unsure of where the question had come from and what the context was.
“I mean, do you think they’ll be normal? When we make contact, will they try to kill us?”
“Some will some won’t.” He answered with absolute conviction and a lack of curiosity. There was no point in his mind to ponder on events outside of his control. As for the pass time of speculating and trying to predict others… well, in this case they had no concrete information to base their guesses on. The other competition races were a complete mystery. Did some have eight or four legs or were they going to be six legged like normal people?
“Do you think some of them will be violent?”
“It feels like it is a certainty.”
“Are you basing that on the sound tapes WADOR provided us?”
He growled. “Yes. What else could it be?”
The other smelled abashed. “Then what do we do when we find them?”
“Hopefully, we don’t. I pray they are stupid and that they all rush straight to the centre to claim the reward and don’t realise the benefit of grinding.”
“Your scent tells me you don’t think that is likely.”
He snarled softly to acknowledge the accuracy of that statement, with the mind amused by the unusual amount of perception that Toowold was demonstrating.
“And so if we run into them?”
“We stay away.” He said immediately. “If they stalk us, we counter ambush and destroy them. If they leave us alone, we will give them that same courtesy.”
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“And if they approach us with deception in their heart?”
“Tinga’s skill will let us recognise that and we will treat them as if they are hunting us.”
“If they approach without…”
He purred in amusement unable to help himself. The pitch he did it at was the equivalent of a smile. “Then we return the favour and be courteous and endeavour not to give away our secrets. Which means Toowold you will be banned from talking to them.”
Toowold snarled in annoyance. “That’s unfair.”
“Is it?” he showed canines and then started to eat the offered meal. The bribe had been paid for the guidance which he had already given.
With those thoughts, the True Dream finished and Tom was satisfied with what he learnt. He felt like he had got a feel for the sixth species’ morals, or at least their leaders, and if they introduced themselves in the correct way, they could be convinced to become allies. Contact would however be some time away because he recognised those giant snakes with legs. They belonged to a zone on the opposite side to where he stood. That meant they would not link up with these particular aliens until the fourth, or maybe even the fifth layer at the earliest.
Tom fell asleep expecting another emergency dream, but none were triggered. Two hours later, he woke to the scent of fresh hot porridge. He breathed in. This is what it was like being around other people, moments like this that took him back to Earth before everything went to shit.
The smell of a cooked breakfast in the morning was something that had never occurred when he had been alone in the tutorial. He rolled up, expecting to see Keikain hard at work, but was instead surprised to find that it was Michael.
The healer waved at him. “Great timing. There’s more than enough for you Tom.” The food was served and he was handed a large portion.
Tom scooped up some of the porridge and blew on it before tasting it. The gruel was still too hot, but his blowing had done the trick and ensured it didn’t burn him. It was a simple sweetened broth that reminded him of when his mum had used to make it. “It’s great.”
“One of my comfort foods. I used to bring it out when my daughter and grandkids slept over. It was always a hit.” Michael looked wishful for a moment.
“When will we complete the quest?” Tom asked deliberately redirecting the conversation. Speaking of Earth was dangerous for all involved. They were like war victims suffering PTSD in that regard.
Michael shrugged in response. “I don’t know. We’ve been here a little over one and a half days, failure rate is not too bad.”
“That long? Doesn’t feel like it.”
“That’s because you’ve been sleeping the whole time.”
“What? No!” Tom protested indignantly. He waved the comment away. “Not what I meant. To me it feels longer. I’ve had three True Dreams completed the golem and done some fighting. Seems too much for less than two days.”
“Sorry, I shouldn’t tease you just after you woke up. It feels longer for us, too. As for when?” Michael looked up at the roof far above them. “These puzzles are fiendishly complicated and we’re about forty percent through. That next twenty will require more time because we’ve been completing the easy ones. It’ll probably be another day.”
“And if we went for a hundred percent.”
Michael shook his head. “I don’t know if we’re smart enough to do that. You might not be aware of the scoring system, but each ring is worth the same amount. Those two puzzle tiles in the centre are worth as much as two hundred and fifty-six in the outer ring.”
“So we can just complete… the what?… Thirty puzzles in the inner four rings and we hit fifty percent completion? We should do that.” He grinned.
The healer chuckled. “Oh, my god! You’re a genius. I can’t believe I didn’t think of that. With that strategy, we can be done in a couple of hours.”
“I’m guessing it’s not that simple.”
“I’ll let you answer that. You up for beating that fight on the second ring.”
Tom shook his hit vigorously. The third ring final battle had almost been too much for him and that was when he had a favourable match up. There was no way he could win a scaled-up version without the massive benefit his Spark control had given him against their lightning.
“And that’s the rub.” Michael explained. “There are puzzles on rings that we either can’t complete or at least won’t without making multiple attempts. You try ones that are too hard you fail. You attempt easy ones you’re wasting time. We’ve been doing things systematically and giving the right difficulties to the correct people. But there is only so much low hanging fruit and by that I mean puzzles we can finish with only a single failure… and those… I reckon they can take us up to a sixties completion rate, maybe…” he appeared doubtful. “Probably fifty five if we’re being honest.”
“That low?”
“Each ring is significantly more difficult. You’re a numbers man, so I’ll give you the data and you can make up your own mind. For the outermost ring, we’ll call it the eighth. We have an eighty percent success rate with our first attempt and almost a hundred on the second. By the time we reach the fifth ring, fourth from the outside, that first attempt completion rate has dropped in half and second attempts are only at seventy percent and that’s with targeting the right people at each challenge. After that, we’re in the inner half and the next… level four…“ Michael shook his head. “Only myself. And Keikain are attempting those and I reckon we’re failing one time out of three and unlike on the outer ring if we repeat they’re not guaranteed to be successful. The third ring, well you know what the combat felt like.”
Tom understood the problem now. They had managed to complete forty percent in one and a half days, but that had been achieved by finishing the puzzles in the outermost rings. Now everyone was doing harder problems than they could easily solve. The failure rate would therefore sky rocket. “But you’re confident that another day will get us to sixty? Even with the mounting complexity.”
“I honestly don’t know.” Michael gestured at the centre of the rings. “Completing the innermost puzzles is clearly the key to this. Keikain is currently attempting one of the ring one challenges. If he is successful, that is worth over six percent of the entire quest. Whether we can complete those inner puzzles in one, two, three or never will answer your question.”
Tom realised he had nothing to contribute to the strategy. “Beyond my paygrade,” he quipped. “Let me know how you go.”
“How about you? What are your plans?”
“Sleep.” He smiled cheekily at Michael.
“Lazy. You can’t sleep the whole time.”
“I won’t be. I think I need to give True Dreaming a rest for a little. More seriously, I’ll mix things up. Sometimes sleeping, other times fighting, and the rest of the time standing guard. I want to incorporate my Remote Earth Manipulation into my Sense Earth spell. Partially merge the two skills.”
“That sounds like years of hard work.”
Tom shrugged. “Maybe. I’ve got some ideas and if I use fate, then it should go faster.”
“I endorse that plan. You manage yourself and if I’m being honest, a couple of the others are getting to the end of their usefulness. You’re more useful finishing those inner combat challenges than standing guard.”
He finished eating and put the bowl aside.
“Go fight.” Michael ordered.
“What? Now? What about you? Surely I should keep watch while you do the puzzles.”
Michael shook his head. “I’m on a slight break. Keikain will complete his attempt soon and if he’s failed, we want to compare notes immediately.”
Tom winced when he heard the healer’s intentions. It sounded bad. “Are you sure that’s a good idea. Arbitrage? Anti-cheating? It sounds dangerous.”
“Tom, you weren’t the only one who went through the tutorial. We know all that shit. There are lines we won’t cross. Keikain won’t state specific solutions, answers or approaches. At best it will be about just different ways of thinking about problems. Most of these things have a trick, so if you go in, expecting your job to be effectively spot the difference. That’s a separate mindset versus looking for prime number sequences… or colours, or science. That’s what he will share, mindsets and no more. Nothing that should draw the ire of the controller of the trial. We’ve already done it on the fourth ring.”
“He failed a puzzle?”
“He has, but the example I was referring to was me stuffing it up not him.”
“That’s funny. He’s a failure. He acted like he was a messiah and was going to crush this.”
“Keikain has one of the sharpest minds I’ve seen. He’s a certified genius. It’s just they’re hard. Really hard.”
“I liked how you slipped a humble brag in there.”
“What are you blabbering about, Tom?”
“This guy is an absolute genius. Best mind I’ve ever met. Incidentally, on an unrelated note, I’m as good, or possibly better at this than him, but he’s definitely a genius.”
“Not the point I was trying to make.”
“Sure…”
“My point is his confidence was not misplaced. Our team is really lucky to have the two of us or else this zone would have taken four or five days instead of the two and half we are looking at. To be fair, you’re important too. You’re the only one who could do those battle challenges.”
“Whatever… I’m still going to tease him. But right now. It’s time to do some fighting. I want to be positioned to brag about my hundred percent completion rate and it’ll come off better if I’ve done more than a couple of challenges.”
“You do that Tom, but we’ll know the truth. We all saw how you looked after your last fight and that you’re two scared to challenge the second ring.”
Tom laughed and stuck his finger up at Michael as he kept walking deeper into the concentric circles. The challenge he targeted was supposed to contain comically large insects. They were sort of like an armoured dung beetle, but substantially faster and more bloodthirsty. Tom approached things in his normal, calm manner. He cautiously engaged with the first monster and went through a number of rounds of cat and mouse, not committing to any major attacks to ensure he could avoid the counter strikes. His fate built up and as time went by, he became more and more confident it didn’t have any hidden special abilities.
With his safety as good as assured, he took the fight actively up to the creature. His spear probed and prodded as he attempted to discover its weak spot. The face was near invulnerable and if he destroyed a leg, it barely slowed it. Then, five seconds later it was regenerated. Its underbelly was armoured and even his enhanced spear did nothing against. He targeted the joint where the legs emerged from the shell.
The spear plunged in deep. Only a quick twist kept him from losing it.
Tom retreated and watched the wound. Unlike the damage done to the legs, it did not regenerate immediately. He smiled and moved in to finish the fight. He injured each leg joint in turn. The dung beetle spun and there was an awful ripping sound. The shell along the side split open. He dodged sideways to force it to spin, and the wound ripped further. It was squealing in pain and he targeted the other side.
It kept turning to face him, but everyone of its movements compounded the damage. The decibels of its sucking sound increased with every shift and the wound that was being created was visible as the separation of the top of its shell from the bottom increased every time he forced it to move. The sucking sound become more pronounced and distressed. Tom darted to the side, and it was barely able to follow him. It took it three jerky movements to twist around when previously it had taken one.
He forced it to move once more. The tearing sound was louder, and it collapsed on the ground. It had effectively destroyed itself after his minor wounds had started the process. The body vanished and two more beetles tunnelled up from the sand. Now that he knew their weakness, it was easy to defeat them. Yes, by the end, their rank had increased to twenty and every third battle was against four of them, but practically speaking that first fight where he hadn’t known their weaknesses had been the most challenging.
When he emerged, Thor was standing guard.
He relieved the other man checked that no one was currently sleeping and then sat down where he could watch the zone doors and improve his magic. He had two spells to merge.
The nature of what he had to do echoed in his head. Manipulating Earth within his domain had to be enhanced to the point that it was equivalent to flexing a muscle. He had ideas, but only weeks of practice or fate expenditure could prove whether they were valid or not.
He was going to do the second.