Contingency Journal (All That Shines Isn’t Gold)
My name is Jordan Fredericks, and this is my second journal entry.
If you haven’t read my preamble or first entry and you have no idea what’s going on, switch back to them and catch up.
This entry will cover the events after my Review.
----------------------------------------
The day after the trial was heavy. Emotionally speaking, you know? I, ah, I did at least come to terms with how things were and how they were going to be. Mostly.
I knew I was in a game world and that my sister Anna was gone. I think I even had a dream over the night where I remembered her giving me the stupid game and everything. The game I never played because… well I’m an idiot.
But while it was a lot to deal with, I think I actually handled it pretty well. I got up, dealt with the unmentionable actions of the morning, and got dressed to have breakfast. I even had a good time eating, as it wasn’t as bad as the damn cat buns two days prior.
We even had a touching moment where I ate Catella’s nattos (some weird bean thing). Things were nice, though I, of course, ended up crying (this time out of happiness) and Catella may have detonated a chair in worry. She tends to be… ah, we’ll say ‘jumpy.’
After that, Catella and I went for a walk. I found out that Constantine goes into the city during the day for work, and I think Mercia was trying not to smother me.
On the walk, I saw that the Freyhells have an expansive garden populated by koi-fish looking monsters. They’re actually the size of fucking sheep dogs, to be honest, and they love to jump from stream to stream. Scared the daylights out of me.
But during the walk, I got to talk to Catella more. I found out that she’s a Rank [D] bloodline, and it may have been Mercia’s fault. Something went wrong during the pregnancy, I guess? But the little girl never let that bother her. She was always just worried about her big sister more (me, now).
She’s a sweet kid. A little slow, but… I feel like I made a good choice sticking with this family. Also, her jumping ability is her only birthright talent, or whatever, and she can’t actually control it. She got a new amulet to stop her from destroying things a little later though. In the meantime, I had her show me how far she could jump, and the tiny missile reached two damn stories into the air! Thankfully her power lets her land just as easily.
Anyway, the day seemed to be going well enough that, for once, I wasn’t worried. I was ready to relax, so when Rahm came by during the afternoon wanting to take me on a quick errand I didn’t see a problem with it.
It turned out to be a big fucking problem.
----------------------------------------
So I’ll cut to the chase here.
Rahm fucking smuggled me into a place called the Celestial City. It’s a place in an alternate damn dimension. At first, I felt like I was dying up there. Turns out I literally should have died on the spot, but me being Forsaken now meant that the protections on the City failed to smite me. Lucky me.
He told me his plan was to help with my cultivation and pick up his apprentice. With a bit of effort, I’d be able to catch up to where I should’ve been if I hadn’t been in the body of a Brat with medical conditions. But on our ‘commute’ to his place, we had to make a stop at the ‘customs’ office called the Bureau of Journey’s End.
On our way, we were accosted by a giant fucking Tigeress that I thought killed Rahm, only to have him just walk it off because he’s an infinitely regenerating Immortal. It was some bullshit.
At the customs office, Rahm fought his way through the queue system. Literally. He battled an army of the dead (who come to the city to be processed for reincarnation) and then the guardians of the queue system (a hundred different badass gods). The war was as brutal as it was short.
Then the fucker begged the counter agent to get me a visitor’s pass. I’m not joking, Rahm pouted saying ‘pwease’ as the Elephant-God (Milear I think his name was) punched him.
I decided to go outside and wait. Twenty minutes later, he was done and we went on our way.
Of course, it’s then that he tells me that it’ll still take an hour just to reach his place (even with the transit system). On our journey, I saw a lot of homeless gods and asked him about it.
He said to understand why, I’d need to know the difference in how mortals gain power, versus Spirits. He started by showing me a Crown, this world’s unit of highest currency, which is a ‘Golden’ coin filled with a single point of mana.
I say ‘Golden’ like that because in truth it’s True Gold. A concept interwoven into an object. Stirlings (True Silver) and Shillings (True Bronze) are each a tenth of the next stage (so 10 Stirlings are a Crown, and 100 Shillings is a Crown), and this world uses them to power enchantments or recharge items. Processes energy and all that.
The thing is, for people, we gain Experience. A literal, tangible energy that fills our Patterns (the blueprint of our beings) that is used to then shape it to be stronger.
Spirits, however, can freely shape their Pattern but they can only fuel it by channeling an ideal or position they fill. The problem that creates in the Celestial City is that Gods gain energy by their employed positions, not through their effort. They’re essentially all salary workers who don’t want to do anything more than the absolute bare minimum!
There’s also so many damn Gods that they have to use a work share program and there still isn’t enough work to go around. Though, that’s partly because the ‘Council’ in charge of the city doesn’t like making new positions as it expands how much higher management positions there are, and they get competitive.
Anyway, that’s mostly just… lore I guess you’d call it. The important thing to me was really just learning about Experience and how Concepts can be made into tangible things in this world.
----------------------------------------
So, that commute.
All the way to Rahm’s house, he was basically a walking disaster. Killing Gods left and right, and traveling with him was like being escorted by a psychopathic GTA player. That’s not even the right game!
Anyway, after he destroyed a train and performed what I’m fairly certain was a form of domestic terrorism, we arrived in a subdivision. That’s when he gave me sunglasses and I thought he was just fucking with me.
He wasn’t. His home is in a cul-de-sac that has a ‘Cosmic Oasis’ hanging in the middle of it.
It was a giant fucking pulsar.
…
I didn’t handle it very well, okay? Anyway, we finally got to his place and I got to meet his apprentice. She’s a cat-girl named Kioko, and while at first she was rather upset (she laser beamed Rahm through the wall), I didn’t actually blame her.
You see, Rahm had apparently left her up in the Celestial City for the last five fucking years. He literally forgot she was there. And this is the man who was going to train me.
…
Anyway, we had some tea, and I lost my shit (I have Essence Sensitivity and kind of short circuit when I ingest it. I got better with this later, but for a brief time I’m pretty sure I could smell the universe).
After that, Rahm stepped away to ‘prepare’ for what’s to come (cultivation), and Kioko and I got a chance to chat. She’s… prickly, but we made do. We discussed some skill stuff, and eventually it was decided I needed to use up whatever leftover Experience I may have had because it would be wasted after the cultivation. I didn’t know the limits at the time, but the items Rahm decided to use would apparently help supply the energy needed (high level stuff).
The skill Kioko taught me was [Memory Obfuscating Stillness] and it’s annoyingly hard to use. I didn’t realize it at the time, but it’s basically a glorified wall-flower power. While it is a stealth ability, you can’t actually move or do anything while you’re hidden! You can only just stand there and pretend not to exist. I was told I could upgrade it later to be less awful.
----------------------------------------
So cultivation.
At this point, I’m still wasn’t sure what all the attributes in this game were, but when it came to the ‘Core’ there were five to know about. Potency, Control, Circuit, Spirit, and Bloodline. Bloodline is a special one that can’t change after birth (until you become an Immortal and ‘purify’ your spiritual roots or whatever), so it’s really only the first four I was going to be working on.
Getting ready took a while (I had to get dressed and go through a little cleansing ritual), and when I first entered the ritual chamber I kind of collapsed. Not due to Essence Sensitivity, but apparently one of the Brat’s powers let’s me sense the emotion behind what’s written. It’s frustrating as all hell, and in this case I saw just how… sad and bored Rahm was when I read the inscriptions. Like… suicidal levels, but being an Immortal he was stuck where he is (I find out more details on how stuck later).
After that I had to be blindfolded. I did get a chance to use some of the Brat’s ritual skills though. [Mandala Lore], [Mandala Analysis], and [Mandala Identifying Inspection]. Mostly, it just gave me a headache as the ritual we used was far beyond me. As Kioko told me, it was like using a ‘Colossal Warhammer to shape a pebble.’
While the… intricacies of the cultivation process were intense, I’m not going to recount them all here. Suffice it to say, however, during the process I had a few visions. The last aspects of the cultivation for each (except Circuit for reasons) had weird spiritual trials of some kind.
----------------------------------------
Suffice it to say, they were intense. Potency involved me running around a void while mirrors reflecting potential futures of myself formed around me. I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do, but it turned out I just needed to be aware of my own potential. While there was probably more to the trial, succeeding at that first task let Rahm take over the rest of it.
The second thing I saw was the trial of control, which had me… dreaming? It was weird, and I wasn’t thinking properly. It really was like a dream. But in the end, it was about noticing how I wasn’t in control of my life or the world around me, and accepting that if I wanted that to change then I needed to… well, take control.
If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.
It sounds stupid laid out like that, but it was a dream vision, okay!? It made more sense at the time.
The last vision, though, I don’t remember. While Circuit was mostly a pass for me (I just needed to have my meridians activated, which there were 5 yin and 5 yang to be done), Spirit’s vision saw me just blacking out. When I woke up, I didn’t remember what happened.
----------------------------------------
But I did wake up! I also (on pain of shin kicks) got old man Rahm to confirm I had only been out for a few hours. I felt pretty good physically, but that had been because one of the items used during the cultivation was a phoenix feather. Nice renewing properties and all that.
Still, the old man was worried, and on pressing him he admitted that because he did all the work he made my life harder later on. The Academy’s entry board would likely dock me points for this, and when I start cultivating to hit Level Two it’ll be harder. I wasn’t exactly pleased by this, but I had to do something to reach the level of cultivation needed for Level One before my time limit’s up, so kicking the can down the road we go!
After that Rahm left to go get drinks and I hung out with Kioko. She ate while I opted for a sustenance potion (I’d had enough Essence-Acid trips at that point, thanks). We talked more about things, but eventually I wanted to know more about the vision I blacked out on (which I think I may have failed but Rahm pulled me through anyway). She got evasive and refused to answer me though. Things also got… fuzzy? I’m not sure.
Anyway, she left to go to the bathroom and while I was alone I decided to tidy up a bit. You see, when Rahm was preparing earlier he dumped his ‘secret’ stash of cultivation items on the table. It annoyed me because I don’t like having valuables left out like that! It reminds me of how I got stuff stolen from me when I was a kid.
And… ugh, okay like a damn fool I ended up somehow putting on a ring. The thing was black with red letters on it literally talking about cursing shit, and of course it stuck to my hand.
Kioko came back when I screamed and tried to cut my damn finger off, but the ring stored her knife. It, ah, it was an Artifact Storage ring which was apparently not very good.
That didn’t stop it from storing the table, other items, the leftover food, and half the damn house.
We fled the house trying to get to Rahm, and the pulsar outside shined on us on our way. The ring literally tried to store the whole thing! It didn’t work, but it did leave the star permanently dimmed.
I found out that Teleportation Gates exist (Rahm apparently hates them, hence why we took a fucking train), but when we’re about to go through the Storage Ring overflows from the pulsar it ate and leaks.
The whole damn thing goes crazy and I get teleported to a random spot in the city where I am accosted by a Hobo-Badger and other desperate, mutant Gods who think I’m going to steal their job. Demonkin are closely related to Demons, which used to be Daemons and ran the city before history shit happened long, long ago.
I ran away and tried to hide in an alley where a guy was waiting for me. He offered me candy and… somehow I went to take it. It was beyond foolish of me, especially since I don’t even like candy!
And of course, he kidnapped me.
----------------------------------------
The Spider-God who abducted me took me to a warehouse where he told me that he planned on killing me. Or torturing me? I wasn't entirely sure.
Point was, he had beef with me as he’s apparently my Fateweaver; the Spirit in charge of orchestrating my Fate. And he’s got issues with me because of much work I’m causing him. I didn’t really get a chance to figure it out before he got tired of hearing me plead for me life and gagged me again while he prepared to torture me.
I just did my best to beg him with my eyes after that.
----------------------------------------
And begging him with my eyes worked! Does that sound suspiciously easy? Oh don’t worry, it gets so much fucking better.
So the bastard dragged me around to go to FIMI (I don’t even remember what it means anymore, but it's an acronym about fate and institutes or whatever) where the Loom of Fate is set. The Spirit is convinced that if I see how much work I’m causing him I’ll want to kill myself.
Once we reached his office, he got… plastered. I didn’t know why at the time, but he seemed carefree and lazy. I went with it because I’m stupid.
He pulled out a maintenance kit and gave me a pair of goggles and with it I could see through one of the walls that was actually a screen of some sort. In it I see the Loom and my own Fate pattern.
And the reason the Spider-God is pissed at me is because I apparently inherited a fate-line from the person whose heart is now in my chest. Er, not the Brat (if you recall the Brat had heart conditions and had surgery right after she fucked up her summoning ritual. The heart she got also cursed me with an unknown fate. Yay!).
The reason this is a problem is because Demetria Westhell (The girl the heart came from) was what was called an ‘Anomaly,’ which just meant she was a person that Fate couldn’t really control and who would tend to screw with Fate. Since I got her heart (and that Fate line) I was at risk of becoming an Anomaly so my Fateweaver had orders to kill me.
And by kill me, I mean he was trying to orchestrate a plot line to get me assassinated or some shit. He even showed me his latest work! Point is, his job was to kill me to stop me from becoming an Anomaly, and he thinks it’s a hassle, so he wants me to just kill myself to spare him work.
I… didn’t even know what to do, but while I was thinking about it the fucker offers to go grab some ‘tarp’ and make a nice space for me to commit suicide in. I didn’t even think about it when I said ‘sure’ and he fucking left!
I thought it was a big break. Once again, I’m stupid but that’s jumping ahead.
So I logged onto the Loom of Fate, basically trying to copy his steps, and start by trying to remove the line I got from the Westhell girl. It fails as it is literally tied to my heart (and trying to remove it gave me a mini-fucking heart attack), so… I get mad and just slam every line of Fate I could into it. The Spider-God had been pretty specific that too many lines was what caused an Anomaly, and low and behold, I became one.
I logged out and tried to cover up what I was doing as I left, and the guy is right outside the door. Perfect timing right?
Past that I ‘convince’ him I’m sick and would like to die with my family, so he gave me a magic carpet that takes me straight to Rahm. I arrive specifically at the point when he is having his big show down.
Perfect… timing, right?
His big show down is with a woman called Cassiel, who happened to be his estranged wife. Wonderful! I thought, more drama! Oh boy.
So apparently Rahm had been causing citywide chaos looking for me, and there were now riots everywhere. The woman quickly sussed out that Rahm used illegal goods to help me cultivate and said she was going to send us all to Asurias (a hell-like dimension in this world).
Well, that’s when Rahm declares he’ll go postal and start KILLING all the Gods present. And not like before, nope, turns out that was all just gentle fun stuff. He has a way to literally obliviate Gods, and because of that, they call him…
Rahmiel Godslayer.
His wife offers him a deal then. She’d let Kioko and me go if he turned himself in. He said he’d consider it and I got… emotional. I didn’t want to lose the man, not when I felt like I had connected to him so much over the last two days (obviously it’s hard to convey that in a short journal entry, but we went through stuff with that cultivation, okay?). He told me to be good and all that, and I thought it was goodbye.
So of course, that was when he told his wife to go fuck herself and that he’s ready to cause a world wide cataclysm. All the Gods flip their shit and run for their lives, and Cassiel’s left alone and then Rahm threatens to tear her a new one in a duel, and she basically declares that even if he’s bluffing she’s not willing to risk it.
She let us go, but promised to pursue reparations through traditional means. She warned Rahm that there would be serious consequences in the future for making a threat like this, but…
Then the bastard rubs it in. He doesn’t let it stand, he basically mocked and derided her like a real prick! She got furious and then to get back at him, she ended up Banishing me from the Celestial City (he’d been making a point how he’d bring me back for more power ups later). I had to leave (magically enforced), and he was all shocked that she could be so ‘petty.’ She laughed at him, Rahm looked sad, and we all went on our way.
Now, you may have noticed my tone got a little less fucking serious a bit ago. So after a brief history lesson so I can learn how the fuck Rahm was going to get away with destroying the god damn planet if he didn’t get his way (and also learning why the cultivation items were illegal to use on me), I then told them where the fuck I was when they were looking for me.
I’m even proud to tell them how I tricked the Spider-God. The truth though?
I was fucking played. The whole goddamn time.
See, Rahm knew that his wife would be on his ass when he showed up, and he knew he wouldn’t be able to hide the cultivation of my Core. SO, he decides to use the scrutiny to get all eyes on him, while he bribed my Fateweaver on the side to sneak me into the Loom to allow me (trick me is more like) into becoming an Anomaly. Now, no one can orchestrate my death from on high. Yay. And since all the guards were busy, no one was watching the place and the only one at blame was me.
Which, conveniently, I was just banished thus giving me the greatest penalty I could receive (pre-emptively).
I also found out that the ring I got was apparently an undocumented artifact that was both a little gift for me as well as a means to disable the pulsar outside Rahm’s home. It’s… a stupid story, but I’ll just say that Rahm apparently hates Homeowner Associations and by dimming the lights the property value just went up and now he can finally sell all his investments which will more than cover the costs of his bribes, reparations, and the cultivation material in one fell swoop.
…I don’t even know anymore. He seemed convinced he’d get out of whatever further trouble his threats posed too, but he wouldn’t talk more about that.
----------------------------------------
Going home, the first thing I expected was to be yelled at. I don’t know why, I guess I’m just used to being in trouble.
Instead when Mercia saw me, she broke down crying. She’d apparently been convinced I’d died, as Rahm hadn’t been clear on where we were going and why that was going to be okay.
However, in addition to mom-guilt, I also stunk. The Essence in the Celestial City doesn’t really mix well with us Demonkin, and it was all over me. As a result, we went to a hot spring to get cleaned up.
While there, I learned more about Kioko’s condition. I thought it was weird how young she looked (barely past 13) yet everyone treated her like an adult. Turned out, she was a victim of another country that treats all Beastkin as Monsters. They’d ‘tamed’ her with alchemy, keeping her in a juvenile state. Otherwise, she’d have grown into a proper Tigerborn which are kind of Amazonian.
I also got the wonderful ‘talk.’ Birds and bees and all that. While I know all the basics of how girls develop and all that, I did learn something useful with all that.
Since everyone in this world has magical cores inside them, childbirth is a bit more complicated. Proper ‘genesis’ Essence has to be built up and cultivated in both parents, and combined in the proper way. Any mistakes can cost the developing child potential bloodline ranks, or even cause negative conditions.
Long story short though: apparently the nobility (in order to maintain their higher bloodline rankings) practice abstinence to build up that baby-making Essence. It can take years too, but the main point here is the world’s basically being run by sexually repressed bastards.
After that, we have a nice dinner under the stars, and I start puking blood from an assassination attempt on my life.
Oh yeah, remember how that fucking Spider-God literally showed me it was going to happen? Yeah, I forgot about it.
----------------------------------------
As I was dying, my artifact ring activated. Essentially, the damn thing stored my core.
Mostly it did that because it wanted to eat me, and if I died it wouldn’t be able to. I know that because my new ring formed a manifested Spirit to talk to me.
The damn thing looked like a dark mirror of the Brat. Creepiest fucking shit ever.
After discussing the meaning of existence (and being briefly tortured), I managed to become the ring’s master, and had it bring out one of the potions it had nicked from Rahm’s stash of goods. I woke up just after as Mercia poured the potion down my throat. She tried to give me the whole thing, but I forced her to give half of it to Kioko (while the ring protected my Core, Kioko used some sort of life sharing technique to protect my body and was dying).
Back in the lands of the living, a woman in dark plate armor dragged the assassin back to us. Mercia questioned him, but he saw the illegal item used to save me. He’s convinced I’ll be killed by the Church when they find out that I brought it across realms, and Mercia seemed certain we wouldn’t be able to hide the fact.
From there, she proceeded to question the guy, got under his skin, and learned that he was a rebel. She used magic to disguise herself as his long lost wife and convinced him to drink the second poison vial he’d brought (and planned to drink later anyway).
I’m… skipping over a lot with that, to be honest, because it was hard to watch. What was important to me at the time, though, was that the reason he was a rebel is because apparently the High King of Nation I’ve found myself in doesn’t allow rebellion.
He had the entire city wiped from the map. It also turned out that my new father, Constantine, had been in the army at the time and had been the one to do the dirty work. Since the assassin couldn’t target the High King, he went after the officer responsible.
I… wasn’t sure how to handle this information at first.
Not only was this monster the ‘Majesty’ in charge of the academy I was trying to get into, but the man I’d been growing attached to as my new father was guilty of a serious war crime. Just following orders doesn’t absolve someone of guilt.
I decided that from this point on, I’d keep in mind the possibility of going rogue. Of running off into the hills and fighting the good fight if I had to. However, until that happened, my plan going forward is to enter the Academy not just to secure my own freedom, but to gain the power to try and do something about that monster in charge.
And on the way… I hope I can find a way to save my new family. They all have their problems, but I want to help them. I don’t want this world to turn all of us into damn villains.
----------------------------------------