In comparison to the room, they had found themselves in the exterior corridor was a marked difference, pristine white walls and ceiling with lines of strip lights running down. Various metal doors with labels Carissa were unable to make out were further down from their current position.
Matthias readied his sword and with an alert gaze gave Carissa one glance before he turned his attention to the sides of the corridor. The voice of the intercom speaker came on again and it caused him to flinch but he kept his grip on his sword and his attention focused on danger.
Carissa searched for the exact sound of the intercom, if there was a degree of sufficient of technology inside this place then it stood that they would have other security systems in place. Either shatter-proof glass to lock down areas or likely security cameras to track their movements.
If her and Matthias had both been identified as intruders then the usage of combat was more than likely but she wasn’t sure how well her bone tooth club and Matthias's sword would stand up to modern weaponry.
The situation was strange, even stranger given what Mike had explained to her and how she had received a message from an unknown god about cheating.
Even the shark faced huge man who was likely an avatar or a representative of the gods back in the Deep Temple has told her she would need surgery to meet his needs.
None of the Ocean Gods wanted technology and all were hostile in various degrees except one. And for all she knew that one was purposefully trying to direct her to dance like a puppet on strings for their own amusement.
‘Matthias, do you come from a world filled with technology or do you consider it witchcraft?’ asked Carissa.
The empty corridor unnerved in her in a way. As though any moment a dozen armed security staff would come rushing out and attack them.
Strange.
There was something there in the back of her mind but she couldn’t understand it.
Matthias had jumped when he had heard the intercom but hadn’t cursed it out as a tool of the spirits. So, it was more than likely he had an understanding of technology.
‘My world? No, we obey the laws of the Lady above all. She disdains the mechanical and the sciences for the most part but there are some who choose to dabble. Generally, we think them mad and leave them alone in isolation inside their remote towers. I’m not a luddite idiot Carissa, the Ocean Gods gave me a basic understanding of what this world once was. You think I jump at the sound of a spoken machine out of fear? No, I don’t quite recognise the words but I know a call to arms when I hear it. We are intruders in this dungeon, the monsters will soon be upon us.’ said Matthias.
Holding her own bone tooth club, Carissa switched it to her other hand. Cramp was beginning to set in from the weight and she’d yet to get used to holding it for long enough.
‘A valid point. Apologies for my assumption, my own world used technology to an advanced degree. I’m in turn not used to having to work with my hands with...basic tools like these. Not that I had to defend myself, I usually paid for private security or Liam arranged it on my behalf. Sort of a money and fame solve a lot of problems. But this thing? I’m finding it difficult to hold.’ said Carissa.
Matthias gave her the smallest of nods to acknowledge and then put a finger to his lips and pointed down one direction of the pristine white corridor.
‘When you are given a weapon, you need to adapt to using it. Make it your own, keep it with you, sleep next to it and learn the balance to make it part of your own body. Remember the Ocean Gods gave you such a weapon for a reason, there is magic in this place and it plays many roles. For now, we need to know more. This dungeon will have either enemy to fight or innocents to learn from. I heard movement from that direction, we should follow this route. Are we in agreement Carissa?’ said Matthias.
‘A useful lesson to learn but I have a faster option.’ said Carissa. ‘None of this makes sense but we opened the door through action so further action will deliver us results. System, give us our quest. Our mission. Activate combat testing scenario. Ocean Gateway turn on. Insane Water God answer my prayer,’ said Carissa.
[Player-Candidate Number 5428119402.
-An unknown Ocean God has answered your prayer with the following message.
Hello Carissa. We need to talk. I’m going to borrow your friend for a second. Keep calm.]
Threat.
Stall.
‘No. No we don’t need to talk. Matthias! Put your sword down and get back into that room. We’re going back inside but we need to leave the door open.’ said Carissa as she grabbed the arm of Matthias which wasn’t holding a sword and dragged him back.
She kept her own bone tooth club away to avoid scraping him by accident as she pulled him harder when he resisted her grip.
‘Matthias. Talk to me.’ said Carissa, her voice beginning to tremble.
She didn’t need an insane god of sufficient power to take over the body of the one person she was grouped with inside an unknown advanced facility which was already aware of her presence. Whatever code Zeta was it wasn’t something she wanted to deal with just yet.
‘Into the room. Get inside the room Matthias!’ started Carissa as she stopped her voice from raising into a shout.
The intercom for the facility rang out again as the sound carried itself across the corridors. There was still no sign of action or any form of movement which concerned Carissa but she had more immediate concerns to directly deal with.
Matthias’s body had begun to twitch although his hand kept a tight hold onto his sword but his arms dropped loosely to the side.
After rapidly opening her own spatial bag and stuffing the bone tooth weapon back inside Carissa locked her own arms under the armpits of Matthias and clasped her hands around his chest, his body began to sag as an alarm klaxon rang out on the corridor again.
This time the above strip ceiling lights shifted into a pale red colour dimming the entire environment. The open metal door was close to her reach as Carissa took on the body weight of Matthias who was rapidly approaching unconsciousness as his arms and legs twitched.
Pushing the door open enough she dragged Matthias into the bare, sterile metal room leaving it open. There had been no means of sealing it from the inside so the best she could do was move to the back of the room to give them a degree of security.
Carissa briefly considered propping or forcing the door open using her bone tooth weapon but either way it wasn’t going to make a big difference. This wasn’t designed to be a location which she could defend easily and the other metal doors down the corridor was too far away.
She knew that during her own time as a scientist when a lockdown was in place, security measures would usually automatically lock down all doors to protect and inhibit the spread in case of emergency.
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‘Matthias. Can you hear me? I need to you talk if you can hear the sound of my voice. Matthias!’ said Carissa as she raised her voice.
Given the klaxon alarms outside raising nobody was going to notice when she shouted. A pain began to rise behind her eyes but Carissa ignored it as a familiar pressure began to reach inside her body and squeeze.
The sensation was similar to when she had been inside the Drowned Temple facing the massive figure with the shark head who had sank into a deep pool of water on the floor. Chas had called it a measure of the divine, this experience was similar but different.
A missing part of her, her technological implants inside her body which allowed for regulation of water temperature on her skin and outside her body began to awaken.
Carissa’s own body shook for a moment as her genetic enhancement began to reactivate partially, smell, sights and sound became heightened senses and she could taste blood inside her mouth.
Struggling to talk she pulled Matthias to the back of the room and lay him down; his body twitching had appeared to have stopped but he remained unresponsive.
Keeping her distance from the sword in his hand she crouched down and ignoring her enhanced senses and her body demanding immediate sources of protein she put her head to his mouth to find he was still breathing although marginally shallowly.
She turned him onto his side and gripped his fingers trying to peel them away from the sword he held but Matthias had a death grip of them and his hand refused to move and even twitched away from her own.
‘A knight until the end then eh Matthias.’ said Carissa as she struggled to control her own breathing.
The situation was getting difficult, she had a supposed ally who was going to be inhabited or controlled by an insane ocean god, klaxon alarms outside ringing in a thankfully still empty corridor and a room in which she couldn’t even close the door.
Adding in her own pain at her alterations and technology being forcefully activated Carrisa forcefully dampened her own emotional state and took several rapid breaths to calm herself.
‘Damn your ocean god. I don’t need your assistance if this what prayer gets me.’ said Carissa.
The taste of blood in her mouth had ignited a hunger deep within that she had been suppressing.
Recalling the strength of the grey suit she raised a covered hand to her mouth and bit down hard. As she was focused on trying to control her own body Carissa failed to notice that Matthias’s eyes had shot open, blinking several times. His free hand opened and closed several times but the hand with the sword had failed to move.
‘…. ah...breathing. Flesh and bone. I had forgotten the pain that comes with a physical body. Right, I just need to limit the damage a little bit before his Mistress gets too angry at me. Lucky for her this one is young and tough, he’ll heal quick enough. How’s my timing? Oops, got a little carried away there. Sorry.’ came the voice from the unconscious body of Matthias.
Carissa had experienced enough now not to be overly surprised by the situation. The insane drowned world and game of the gods had thrown enough at her but she knew that voice, she recognised that voice.
‘I know you. The beach. The man on the beach with Rissa, the one who was bothering us. I remember you when I was fifteen. Why are you inside my memories? You. It was you who turned her into water, the storm...the waves...you drowned me. You drowned me. I don’t…. how are you inside my memories?’ started Carissa as waves of pain and shock ran through her body and mind.
‘Ah...the reactionary nature of my power. Hard to control at times and it’s been a very, very long time since I’ve had to reign it in. Not a single avatar in all this time, acolytes yes and... interesting. You’re bonded to it on a cellular level, genius level tech. The alterations are quite impressive but the wrong choice for this place, the connections alone will cause immediate rejections from the others. Stop moving around. I can’t fix it if you keep moving around. Or at least limit it again. The pain you’re feeling is quite real though, let’s make an adjustment for that.’ came the voice from the body of Matthias.
A flood of endorphins came into Carissa's brain blocking off the pain signals to her body. A sense of relief fell into her but her rational mind still tasted the blood in her mouth, as she bit down on her grey suit covered hand once again to relieve her emotional stress.
‘I’d examine it if I had the time but I don’t. I understand why Grumera hates you though. Beauty and brains. I’d wager you worked extremely hard for your results Carissa. Good genes, mad science and training are always a good mix. You know me, Carissa. I’ve been trying to assist you for a good long time but I’ve been noticed and paid attention to and I’m only a single god. I don’t have the sheer, raw power to take on the others when they decide to interfere but this level is my domain. Try to relax and you’re going to have a little shock to your system. Literally.’ said the voice.
As the endorphins continued to flow, Carrisa recognised that her body was in severe pain. Everything was too bright, too raw for her to fully process. Part of her had become entirely detached, the rational section of her mind knew that her body had in effect been hijacked and taken control of by an outside force.
Not direct physical control but the materials that made up her body, both flesh and technology were being altered without her control.
The scientist in her found it an interesting process, as she observed the grey suit on her body began to melt off and pool onto the floor revealing her bare flesh. Her shark tooth necklace had been revealed underneath and her face flushed with anger at her most cherished personal possession revealed openly. Her spatial bag remained untouched.
Carissa knew then that she would repay the favour in turn, she would affect direct change on the being that did this to her. She wouldn’t need to kill or do it out of malice but simply to let it experience what she was going through.
Humiliation returned in kind with a dose of extra pain.
‘For what it’s worth I’m sorry about this. I usually work with those who try and bring technology with them through the Ocean Gateway System or even those who’ve been altered on a genetic level. Your trainer Mike was one of the latter, a simple matter for his physical enhancements to be turned off until he earned them back again. But he was one the early players, so rules were a little bit loose back then. In your case Carissa, you’re more of a…. unique biological sample. Remember this feeling, the rest of the Ocean Gods will do worse if you let them. The demi-gods for one. Poor beings...and we’re nearing completion. Don’t those klaxons annoy you? I don’t know what I was thinking when I designed this zone.’ came the voice using Matthias's vocal cords.
The sound outside muted immediately, there was a thin vibration in the air which Carissa experienced on the surface of her now bare skin but her ears failed to pick up anything.
‘Ah, the door as well. We might as well add a few bonuses to this room as well, not as though it’s going to ruin your experience as a player candidate having an improved starting room. The door needs to be shut tight though. As long as you’re unable to take the resources from here I think we should be comfortable. I’m going to have to leave this body soon, despite his youth and strength, he can’t take much more of my embodied presence. Besides, I’m not having the Lady get angry at me. She ignored the invitation from the rest of them but she still has a soft spot in my heart for accepting the bare minimum of technology into her domain. I mean the idiots don’t produce anything overly useful but she’s not drowning them in her lake just because they have divergent interests and a brain.’ came the voice.
Her own nudity didn’t bother her, nor did the fact that her massive abdominal scar was exposed. The fact that this was done against her will. She had ended up being thrown around enough and played with and guided or pushed along strict paths. Anger began to grow deep within her, a fierce burning which overcame the rational part of her mind. The grey suit had pooled itself at her becoming a mess of liquid and solid.
Despite the presence that threatened to overwhelm her senses she planted one hand on the floor and began to push herself up with her bare back against the cold metal of the wall behind her. Forcing her legs to stand upright she took control of her raw throat and loosened her fingers first before she clenched her hand into a fist.
‘Shut up. You’re not going to make me fall into an unconscious state again so you can dig through my memories or try to indoctrinate me into how you and your fellow gods choose to...drown an entire planet for a game.’ said Carissa.
Her fingernails began to dig into the palm of her skin as she clenched her other hand tight and forced herself to stand away from the wall.
‘You took me. You push me. You hurt me and tell me, and I don’t need it. Power runs both ways. You will do two things at my order. Leave the body of Matthias and then tell me what you want from me. I hear you helped me. What do you want from me? I know the gods want another of their kind. You look for the harvest from the crops but you failed. But not you. You want something from me. I know it. You told me. Tell me now or leave,’ said Carissa.
The room became absolute silence. Carissa’s ears and senses almost turned off. She was unable to hear the sound of her own breathing and her rapid heartbeat as the red flashing light in the room dimmed to near darkness.
Matthias stretched out limbs and rose up as he hung in the air and rotated around to face her, a grin was on his face. It was hard to make out in the darkness of the room but his glowing eyes revealed it wasn’t him who was in control, another was using him as a puppet. The sword which he had been gripping for so long fell clattering down onto the metal floor, the being inhabiting his body ignored it.
‘Very well. I don’t care about their game. They made me build the operating system for it, no. Bits of it at least. We traded some of it from some freaks who managed to take over their sectional reality and became their own player gods. Someplace called Beneath Nightmare Dungeon. Parts of it were a gift from a Mining company called Overmind. I need to turn you into a goddess to return a few favours as well as fulfil a promise to being who likes noodles. But first pass this level. Or die trying. Joke. You won’t die easily. Not in my territory. Not in my place of power. Or maybe you will. Bye!’ said the being inhabiting Matthias's body.
He jerked again for a moment before like a puppet with his strings cut, he dropped to the ground without a sound. The dim room turned into absolute darkness and all Carissa could hear once again was the sound of her breathing and sharp intakes of breath from Matthias.