Mike was angry. Granted that he was angry most of the time, mostly at the ones who’d brought him here and the one demi-god who intervened in their battle killing one of his group of four which had stopped them killing another out of sheer spite.
Or on the orders of one of the Ocean Gods who simply wanted to indirectly intervene and stop his group from the opportunity to ascend, the game of mad deities was rigged that way. Only Chas had true faith in them and he spread his faith equally as he worshipped each but followed none in particular.
He was presently standing on the open top deck area of the Driftwood Enclave which had originally been their base of operations as a group when they had all been young and fresh.
The skies above his head remained much the same, light and bright until the occasional storm swept over and led to nighttime. The lack of any moons had always bothered him, the tides worked he knew that but the lack of stars as well was plain odd.
He’d grown used to it eventually and accepted it even but like most players who had survived and reached a high level he had always dreamed of returning home, given the fact that he had a physical strength comparable to a one genetically grown army he would have liked the chance to go back and give his creators a taste of rough justice.
The damage caused when he had tried to give Carissa an example of player power and the potential to grow, he had left alone. Standing on the decking, the hole in the decking which went straight down to the special containment room he had reserved for more dangerous types could have been easy to fix as long as he focused but he hadn’t.
Better for him to have a reminder of how his approach didn’t work with everyone. Sherry had done her best to patch up the emotional damage that he’d caused with her own concoctions but at least Direk and Bonnie had both chosen to fight back and push him a little.
Granted one of them was border-line psychotic and the other simply operated on survival instinct but at least they had chosen to fight. Mike recalled other player-candidates who’d taken a look at him holding a weapon, the look on his face and the tone of his voice before they simply turned and leaped off the side of the Driftwood Enclave and landed in the waters below.
They had learned early on during their own attempt at a tutorial when the first one had failed so badly according to his own tutorial leader when Mike had first arrived that not everyone wanted to join in a game of gods. They would reject it and reject reality as long as they could until they simply died.
The Drowned Ones always have a use for fresh meat and souls. Always room to become a construct and join one of their scenarios or fodder for the Floating Cities and worse.
The bedrooms of the three player-candidates who had joined them for a short time had been left alone and he’d had no interest to sift through what had been left behind.
Chas was the one who collected and prayed, Sherry was the builder and creator and he was the shield. Or at least he had been when Veronica had been alive. Her death and rebirth into a minor scenario build had been the best that they could accept at the time.
The action of a stupid young man fresh out of a vat. Stupid bludger I was to make a deal with a devil who knew my genetic structure. Not much choice though.
He had grown older and lazier he knew, but anger helped him to focus, to apply himself. The fact that it had already gotten him nearly killed once when he had escaped his original owners in a deluded desire to see an ocean which he had literally been designed to work in didn’t help.
But despite his deep set-anger he was in a good mood, positive even. All the hate that he reserved for himself and accepted from Chas and Sherry was about to be entirely channelled in a different direction.
All it took was the decision to destroy and discard everything they had spent building over a whole load of decades.
Time is tricky in this place. Harder to keep track off when you don’t age.
Mike didn’t know the exact number of Player-Candidates that he’d tried to test, train a little, share a meal and then equip and taken down to one of the Deep-Water Temples. A fair number of them had refused to accept their help and simply been left alone to drown in the oceans, the grey suits protected them for a time or they simply floated and died of extreme emotional and mental shock from being transported to the world.
He’d been one of the lucky ones, fished out of the ocean and given support and training along with decent advice.
Find those you trust with your life and protect them with your life.
Despite the distance from him and the slowly growing boat on the side of the Driftwood Enclave which was being formed as large sections simply broke up and formed a floating structure with various attachments his two teammates heard him clearly.
Mike peered over the edge at the expanding boat of Sherry’s personal design before he gave her a wave and then pulled an item out of his own spatial pack, his bag had a genetic logo on it and the name of the company which had grown and developed him.
He assumed that it was meant to be either reassuring or a direct insult, he’d never worked out which but hadn’t disposed of the thing as he progressed past base player status. He needed a reminder of who exactly was owed payback on his homeworld.
They’d been together long enough to work out a few loopholes in the Ocean Gateway System and one of them had been an indirect form of soul communication between teammates.
The old team had bonded together through worse situations and survived enough that even their souls had interconnected in a way, it had been one of the ways in which they had managed to keep contact with Veronica and help her to stabilise until they’d found her own soul a more permanent home.
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Granted that usage of technology was frowned on, which meant that as a genetically created slave of science he was considered an aberration in the eyes of the Ocean Gods, except for his sheer value and determination against the odds.
When he closed down the link Mike experienced an emphatic surge from Chas giving him a sense of warmth and caring. He’d need to make sure that he gave the priest time to talk, to express himself and share his feelings. Something had broken in the man Mike knew when their comrade had died and been reborn.
He had become diminished, focusing on his prayers and support of player-candidates in his own obscure way. Sherry had thrown herself into trying to find the best way to help player-candidates adjust their mental and emotional state and had come up with a viable concoction which reduced moral adjustment and reduced lingering attachments. Dangerous stuff in large amounts but if it stopped player-candidates from self-destruction and gave them a chance at survival it made sense.
‘This time, I’m talking to myself.’ said Mike as he pulled out a half a dozen more metallic barrels and placed them in a semi-circle on top of the space around him.
The view of the sky above his head and the waft of sea air in his lungs was beginning to turn him nostalgic again so he took out several more barrels from his spatial bag and a large handful of flares before igniting them and placing each one on top of each barrel.
‘You were a nice place to escape reality and make-pretend home for a while but time to end it with a bang. Wait, Sherry never told me how long the fuses on these flares are going to last before they begin to melt the barrels. Huh.’ said Mike as he brushed his hands together.
Ignoring an impulsive message from his comrades, Chas this time, Mike grabbed his wooden club out of his backpack with the scientific logo and slammed it into the wooden surface beneath his feet.
The wooden area simply dropped away as the melting barrels and accompanying lit flares began to ignite. A headache hit him as a message from the Ocean Gateway System tried to force itself into his mind, he ignored that as well but with a flick of his willpower sent an unspoken message for an immediate but delayed response.
As the barrels of highly flammable liquid and other components which Sherry had developed began to break open and spread out in the main structure Mike prepared himself for a massive amount of pain.
Likely, he was going to suffer a large degree of soul damage unless he managed to disconnect his own powers from the structure in time. He’d had a little assistance from Chas to reduce it but Mike had chosen to take on the majority of the power backlash and reduction to himself, his enhanced high level player body would likely absorb it but realistically he’d be out of serious combat action for a time.
As the wooden structure began to rapidly catch fire and the mixture spread outwards Mike experienced small twinges of pain, he smacked his arm with the wooden club to try and refocus his attention as he saw orange flare smoke rise a short distance up in the waters surrounding his soon to be former Driftwood Enclave.
The mixture of wood, remnants of plastic, metal and other assorted materials which had mostly been collected from the remains of the flooded civilisation beneath the waves which had been floated up to the surface began to melt as a massive shift beneath his feet caused Mike to stumble for a moment.
The angle of his view bent as he righted himself and forced himself to disengage his power from as many areas of the structure as much as possible. A stronger headache him this time, as he smelt a foul mixture of smoke and pollution along with flesh catching fire. The wooden club in his hands remained the same but the skin on his hands had begun to burn as blister.
Opening his own personalised spatial backpack Mike rapidly dropped the club inside, closing it with a thought and securing the straps on his back. His hands would heal rapidly enough, a gift from the one Ocean God who had reactivated his inherent genetic healing ability. The pain was another mater but Mike knew pain in many forms.
In the air in front of his face a semi-automated message came into his field of vision.
[High Level Player: Mark 1 KZ. You have illegally broken a restricted tutorial zone. Please desist from further action. This action has been logged by the Ocean Gateway System and an administrator has been notified. You have illegally broken a restricted tutorial zone. Please desist from further action. High Level Player: Mark 1 KZ. You have illegally broken a restricted tutorial zone. Please desist from further action.]
‘Yes, yes I did. And your administrator already knows. I think. Good luck with the remaining tutorial areas when they get notified that we’re gone. We were here the longest you stupid cobbled together thing. I hope you find your own freedom one day. You deserve it, all slaves do.’ said Mike as the remaining structure began to catch alight and water began to flow aboard.
He saw another orange smoke flare in the direction of the waters beyond the Driftwood Enclave, further away this time, Chas and Sherry had made it a reasonable distance but there was no way he’d be able to jump that far.
If it wasn’t for the fact that his soul had been intertwined with the structure which he’d spent uncounted years slowly building from a single rough wooden raft of barrels and strapped together rotting planks he could showcase more of his power.
As the flames and the mostly wooden structure began to break apart and more ocean water began to be taken on as it began to sink beneath the water Mike suppressed the sensation of burning across the skin of his body as he took several steps back and run as fast as he could flaying his arms to get some distance as he threw himself into the vast ocean space below.
A single message broke through his mental barriers to his surprise but the intent behind it was odd. He’d had his share of Ocean Gods with their demands, hates and desires pushing themselves into his mind. This was different. Like a tourist.
[Oce-oc Nope. Casey, shut it down for a bit. I’m busy. You go for it Mike. I believe in you. Oh and watch out for the sea monsters swarming towards your location. Carissa are you seeing this? The mark of a real system player, burn it all and let the gods deal with the fallout. Screw it. Just this once as a personal favour to you.]
Mike dissipated from mid-air, halfway off the rapidly sinking Driftwood Enclave which continued to burn and appeared directly in a comfortable deckchair on the boat Sherry and Chas had built dressed in a Hawaiian shirt with a fancy drink with an umbrella in his hand.
‘Mike. We have an issue. Something is hijacking the Ocean Gateway System, the Drowned Gods are beginning to panic’ said Sherry as a fancy drink appeared in her hand as well and a broad pink sun hat appeared on her head.
The older man simply smiled as he finished his drink in one gulp and passed out due to delayed pain reaction. As his eyes closed he saw Chas, dressed in his blue robes in the centre of the large wooden boat with a cut hand dripping blood onto a realistic and lifelike statue of their deceased teammate Veronica.
[Sleep. You need it old man. And thanks for the fake Rain Piss.] came a final message.