NOCTURNE

BOOK 2 – EREBUS

BY

JD GLASSCOCK

LitRPG Post Apocalyptic Progression

JDGLASSCOCK@2024

All Rights Reserved

CHAPTER 1 – THE GAME BEGINS

Somewhere on Erebus – City Ruins

***

Welcome Citizen to Erebus, your new home and future. Be prepared. The First Monster Wave begins in three days. Face the Challenge, grow and flourish, or die and be a footnote to the hunger of those who are lifted. The Generosity of the Multi-Versal System is Eternal.

WARNING – Native flora and fauna of the three worlds have been transported to Erebus and enhanced. Adversity is a perpetual path to power.

The last bit made him think they needed to create a base and shelter quickly. He had a feeling the System was not going to wait three days to throw death at their feet.

He shook his head, cobwebs spinning across his mind. Everything was twisted and upside down.

Gideon tilted his eyes up. His gaze tried to take in everything, the jungle/forest city ruins, the wandering, disoriented Shador everywhere, anything but his own flesh, scales, whatever he’d seen.

He tilted his head and stared at what he knew was L’Sana but now it was a L’Sana that was a kind of half-cat, half-shade elf combo. She was still on hands and knees like he was, even more stunned, eyes closed and breathing heavy.

Ari was eyeballing his hands like he’d just been upgraded into something cool and gave him a wink and a claw thumbs up. Of course, she’d like the new scaled look. He needed to get some new bracers that included gloves in the design.

He gave her a half smile and felt a difference in even such a small act, telling him his face was not as it was. Ignore, focus. He was happy for the hood of his cloak and half-mask.

He had a shit ton of notifications flashing in his vision but they weren’t something he wanted to dive into at the moment. First things first. He stood slowly, his entire body, strange, unwieldy for a moment. He was taller, he could feel it, and heavier. There was a density to him, a solidity to it.

Several of the Shador near them turned, their black orbs zeroing in. They gave a heavy bow then Dori’s voice blasted out from somewhere nearby. All the Shador started moving towards the sound, off to the left, many picking up the young or helping the old.

Gideon, L’Sana, and Ari were on the top of an outcrop of rock that had a fifteen foot drop down into a gradual slope that descended towards the ruins or one could walk around the rock outcropping to either side hooking up to the slope.

All the Shador were a good fifty yards further down, spread across the descending ground. Large and small ruins of buildings dotted the landscape leading to the city and the sky was a dark perpetual gray, no sun, no moon, just dark gray slate with a few wispy clouds of stormy black breaking its ominous reality.

Dori was off to his left, standing next to her Grandmother, the rest of her small group of fighters surrounding them; the twins, Budko and his wife, and the other new addition, the big Shador in full demon plate with the giant two-handed sword.

Unra was conversing with Orin, Iona, and Orsin’s wife, who he hadn’t met yet, along with the two warriors they had left there at the end.

Unra’s eyes flashed towards them and her eyes glistened with tears after a moment. She stopped mid-sentence with Orin and started stumbling her way towards them. Dori and the rest clocked what she’d seen and all of them thundered after her. Dori had Budko and his wife stay to collect and organize all the Shador while Iona and the two advanced Shador did the same.

“Gideon.”

The low-key whisper jacked his head to a now recovering L’Sana who was standing, wobbly. Even with his new height, her new form still cleared him. She had to be about 6’7” now, a bit bulkier with muscle. It was a good thing for them both that their armor and leather underclothes resized themselves.

She was impressive, a taut spring of muscle. She smiled, a smile that now sported predator fangs. Ari hovered in the air above her looking like a proud Momma. Gideon dropped his half-mask and watched L’Sana’s eyes grow big. Her words were a tumble.

“Looks like I’m not the only one to be spun through the new racial blender.”

She stepped close just as the Shador led by Unra closed in, sliding around the outcropping climbing up the slope. They stopped a good ten feet away as the new and improved L’Sana slowly pulled his hood back, a few gasps slipping from the Shador. Ari piped in.

“Dang Giddy!!! You look amaaaaaazing!!!!! Your scales are beautiful!!!!!”

He didn’t quite know how to feel about it all. He needed more power, more strength for what he knew was coming, and he could feel it, coursing through every part of him. L’Sana’s violet eyes were still the same and the intensity of them a churning river that rushed out as a hammer to his chest.

Truly, besides the new fangs and some light wisps of fur along her neck and arms, and her pupils now being slit, like a cat’s, she looked the same.

Her fingers brushed his cheek, a butterfly touch. She leaned into the side of his head.

“We did what we needed to protect those we love Gideon. You are as beautiful to me as you ever were.”

She shifted her head to a sliver from lips, eyes, violet flames an inch from his own. The intensity within him spurred. Whatever he was now, combined with the passions of his Class [Umbral Savage], tripped a catalyst to igniting a hunger within him that was not his own or at least not a part of who he had been. He pushed his Will hard, grinding the emotion down.

His senses and [Combat Awareness] spiked as a look he was becoming very familiar with danced across her eyes and lips. A grin that said duck a second too late as a hand in light gray/blue fur landed upside his head.

He staggered back to the memorable sounds of snorts half-choking the Grave Scion’s throat followed by her low-toned voice croaking.

“People are waiting on you Gideon and Momma’s got some good things waiting in her Notifications, she just feels it. Go do you while your woman gets her loot on.”

The last words resonated something within him. ‘Your woman’. Not now, too much. He’d said he loved her when he was delirious with pain and shock. His emotions were wound tighter than a Nun’s legs. He shoveled it off into a box of moments, moments not yet ready to shift through.

His eyes wandered anywhere besides the swaying hips he knew were happening as she strolled off towards a large piece of rusted metal that could have possibly been a car at some point.

He noticed there were many of them in the vicinity as well as broken concrete that could have been roads. All of it looked as if they had been aged by a thousand years overnight. It screamed System fuckery.

His eyes widened as he clocked that many of the Shador circling Budko did not have weapons, armor, or anything else but the rags on their backs and several small bags. The bags no doubt held what meager supplies they’d been able to take. He turned and called after L’Sana who’d just sat her rear on the rusted metal looking as if she was a hot sec from digging into her notifications.

“L’Sana!!! Throw all the weapons and armor I know you got stashed before you deep dive! The Shador have nothing!”

She gave a grunted pained look his high Perception caught even from the thirty yards that separated them in crystal clarity. Whatever had changed in him, his Body and Perception among many things had been boosted heavily.

He hid a smile. That woman wanted to let go of loot like someone with a heavy sweet tooth wanted to hand out their lollipops. Then little Shira ran up out of nowhere and leapt onto her lap, one small pudgy hand reaching out to pet Ari, her other gripped tight on the knife, sheathed at her waist, L’Sana had given her.

He knew with the little girl in front of her it was a done deal, and as he turned back, that truth was cemented with the sounds of metal landing on metal as the Loot Mistress unloaded her ring. He could imagine her shifting between wanting to cry and growling expletives.

Unra had a fond look and smile thrown towards the spectacle then whispered something to Dori who motioned to the twins and the large giant in the infernal armor who had grins on their faces as they charged over to grab the weapons and armor. That left him Unra, Orin, his wife, and Dori to deal with.

Before he could say anything, Orin’s wife, now looking healthy and not a burnt hunk of meat, tulwar at her hip, stepped forward, grabbing his scaled hand and dropped to one knee. She bowed her head to his hand for a moment before shifting her eyes up.

“I wanted to thank you Lord Gideon for the life of my love and for my own and my people.”

He was about to argue but she held a hand up as she stood once more.

“Please, let me finish. I have already been told a lot about your journey by Priestess Unra and the others, including my Husband. If not for you and Lady L’Sana and little Ari, not only would my love be dead, but so would Iona and myself as well as Jori and Dignon”

She motioned to those back with the rest of the Shador. Before he could comment her voice cut back in.

“The System also told us all what you and the others sacrificed to bring us here, to this new wondrous world. As usual in a way that said it thought your decision weak but where it sees weak, we see strength and heart. Our cost was nothing in the face of yours. Some memories, mostly bad ones, were given easily for us to see our people finally given a chance, a place to fight for our freedom ruled by Leaders who value us, and who’ve sacrificed for us.

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Most wouldn’t have done what you have done. It means everything to us as a people and as a race. We now can see a future that consists of more than just slavery and death and that is something we can never pay back, something that holds a value beyond any words can express.”

She looked towards the others and motioned towards Dori, all of them slipping from smiles to hard, serious looks. Dori turned and her voice thundered across the slope. Gideon certainly saw her Grandmother in the barking.

“SHADOR!!!!!!!! SHOW LORD GIDEON AND LADY L’SANA WHAT THEIR SACRIFICE AND LOYALTY MEANS TO US!!!!! SHOW THEM THE HEART AND SPIRIT OF OUR PEOPLE!!!”

As her words rolled out he found it uncomfortable but then, everyone, even Budko and the others, carrying armor and weapons down to the main group, stopped. As one, they went to knees, even the little ones and the elderly, heads bent as if in prayer, their hand clasped, all facing him. His newly amplified Insight screamed the intense level of sincerity and truth to the action, the broken spirits long carved into their flesh finding new purpose and healing.

Unra, Dori, Orin, and his wife, followed suit. Unra’s eyes tilted up with a true glow of love and empathy, her words slipping from her lips.

“Lord Gideon and yes, I know, you do not like to be addressed as such or what I am about to say but say it I must.”

She took a deep breath and he held his tongue as she had earned that much. He felt a hand slide into his and then Ari crawling onto his shoulder and neck, which was new.

He turned to find L’Sana staring at him, a smile and those new predator fangs wide open, Shira on her opposite hip smiling and waving up at him. L’Sana’s predator teeth would take some getting used to as he assumed so would his face, even though he as of yet had to look in a mirror to see what the fuck he looked like now. He waved back at Shira who giggled and hid her face into L’Sana’s side. The small girl’s voice whispered to her hero.

“Giddy looks so cool Sana, like a dragon.”

His face must not look too bad if the hungry look in L’Sana’s eyes had any say and Ari was biased with the whole scales thing. He did his best to keep the smile off his face. Unra’s gravely voice dropped back in.

“You are our Lord and Savior whether you wish it or not. We had tomorrows only etched in death on our home world if we’d returned. We are not so lost in fantasy to have thought we would have been successful in the Tutorial or even if we had, that a City Stone would have changed anything. That was how desperate we were, that was how sick we were of watching women taken, raped, and killed, our children slaughtered by beasts or thrown in mines in endless toil. We were heartsick to watch it all while we were kept from gaining any Abilities, skills, or weapons that would have allowed us to protect them, to change anything.”

Gideon’s heart clenched as he could not only see the tears carving her cheeks but also the wrenching emotions in the shattered timbre of her voice. His eyes caught the others with the same, Dori, wiping eyes, Orin and his wife, hard looks that rode the edge of breaking. He could hear the sniffles from Ari on his shoulders and L’Sana leaned into him, her arm circling his waist. He didn’t need Insight to tell him the shattered lives the Shador had lived through at the hands of the Sanctum.

“We dedicate our lives to you as you are the path to our future. I have had another vision. this time. from the Lady of Secrets herself. We must grow strong, we must become powerful and support you, or even with your great skill and strength, we shall all fall. The Vision told of a sea of enemies all around us that would seek to drown us. We must be the Bastion, the Symbol for this World if it, and we, are to survive.”

His body had tensed as soon as the word ‘Vision’ left her lips. The damn Gods could fuck themselves. L’Sana knew him well enough to squeeze his arm, hard. He took a breath and let Unra finish. He also reminded himself there was still the slim possibility that Cybil, the Goddess in question may have not known what had transpired.

It still did nothing to free her of responsibility nor change in any way his view and disgust with the Gods, the Primordials, and their bastard creation, the System, and the untold murders it had committed. L’Sana’s Goddess was the only one so far he had any inclination towards based on L’Sana talking her up but even then, he was in wait-and-see mode, trust an abysmal beast when it came to any of these Divine.

Unra had stood and stepped closer, signaling everyone else to stand, all the Shador further away going back to gathering themselves and the weapons and armor being handed out.

“Gideon, I understand you not liking a lot of this but it is what we as a people, need from you and Lady L’Sana. My people need a focus, something to hold onto, make them feel not only safe in this new world but something to belong to, something to give them security and an identity from which to step forward. They are not one of the native species. This isn’t their world but for them, every last one, they are Gideon’s people, and that, that is more than enough.”

He took another breath but this time L’Sana’s low-timbered smoke rolled forth.

“Don’t worry Unra, it’s all good. Ari and I will bring Giddy around. And let me throw out there, I gots no problem at all with people calling me Lady L’Sana. It has a beautiful sound to it, almost as good as Loot Mistress.”

Her elbow smacked into his side as Ari giggled.

“Yeah Giddy and you got a Princess around you know. You need to be a Lord or some kind of nobility otherwise people will think I’m in charge or ask why I’m slumming it with plebes.”

Everyone around was attempting to stifle smiles. Ari was lucky her cute factor was high or she wouldn’t get away with half the shit that tumbled out of her mouth.

Accept and focus on what the next steps were. He understood the Shador needed a home, understood needing an identity to hold onto when shoveled into a strange new world but all of that fell far short in importance to safety. That was what needed to happen, now being a yesterday to need.

The rest could figure itself out. His voice had people take a step back as he shifted away from L’Sana, Ari with a quick flap sliding back to her usual roost. Serious Gideon was back on the hoof.

“We need shelter people, yesterday. The System’s mention of the flora and fauna has me on edge. We know it’s not going to wait to throw death at us. Unra, you finished your quest so you have the City Stone?”

She nodded her head.

“Yes, Gideon though you should be the one that uses it. We have all discussed this. The Stone resonates and grows based on the City Lord’s Affinity and power.”

She noticed his grimace and quickly interjected.

“I can run the City Gideon once you make me the Administrator so you will be free to do what you will but as we talked about before, you need to place it. This City being known as yours will both be boon and bane but more of the former than the latter. You know this as well as we do, the monsters and the animals are not the true danger. It is other Citizens and the Multi-Versal Factions that are the true threat.”

His body relaxed knowing what she said was fact regardless of whether he wanted the responsibility or not. He’d chosen this path when he’d brought the Shador with him. Unra kept speaking.

“Orin you should assign as Master Builder and Lady Virasa as the City Commander with Iona and Dori as her Sub-Commanders. The rest we can figure out as we progress. And Gideon, Orin and Virasa received something that will be a blessing. I will let Lady Virasa share that information.”

Good to know a name finally to Orin’s wife, Virasa, if he could remember it. He was good at many things, but keeping everyone’s names straight was not one of them.

The weight of having to deal with the running of a City was off his shoulders at least. He would completely throw that on Unra. He had too many plans cresting his spirit to grapple with that gravity. He would protect them as much as he was able but had zero interest in running anything. Speaking of Orin’s wife, her voice had more melodic edges, a bit higher toned than L’Sana’s.

“Lord Gideon. I say this with the heaviness it deserves. I shall be your blade when needed, your shield otherwise. Nothing shall breach our home unless my lifeless body is stepped over. This I swear under the Lady of Secrets, may its truth be iron. My husband and every other Shador here, are the same. I speak for them all.”

Gideon put a squash on it all before more bowing ensued.

“Listen, appreciate the words and the thoughts and heart behind them, and if I didn’t care we wouldn’t have sacrificed what we did. And just so you all know, we did so with zero regrets, well, L’Sana is still probably grumbling over the lost loot but she’d do it again if needed. The point here is, we don’t have time.

I’m getting that the Shador are big on ceremony and speeches but we got a clock tick-tocking to not a favorable outcome. We need to use the City Stone and get everyone behind walls. Over half your people couldn’t fight their way out of a cardboard box and that’s harsh but reality has never been kind and I’ve never been one to hide from its teeth. So for now, let’s skip all the bullshit and tell me what we need to do and what you have that’s gonna help.”

Unra smiled but Dori, Orin, and Virasa took a step back at his intensity then the soon-to-be Commander nodded her head.

“The City Stone works best when used on an already built structure, the more mass the better though there is a limit. What Orin and I received for not allowing the Troglodytes or Sanctum to get to the Orb was an Epic Upgrade Stone. The description says it can be used on many things while being vague on what those things are but we have a feeling it will be usable on the City Stone.”

Gideon’s eyes scanned the horizon, the ruins of the city before them massive though probably a good twenty miles from their current position. Whatever it used to be it was mind-boggling huge, as big as Dallas though the building shapes were wrong for it to be the major city near his home.

He had no clue where they’d been brought out or what the three worlds being merged into one had done as far as geography but it looked like a shit ton. The City before him had the architecture of one from Earth, a few tall skyscrapers, and a myriad of smaller buildings but they’d all been crushed together with the heart of a forest.

As far as he knew from descriptions from L’Sana of her world, they did have Cities but they were more huge walled fortresses with small villages building up around them, and their technology was more geared towards the middle ages. He hadn’t really delved into it too hard. He had zero clues as far as the Beastkin and their world went.

He noticed some of the Shador including Budko and his wife, another name he needed to figure out, all pointing towards the ruins. He followed their gaze and clocked what they were looking at. Some kind of birds circling over the outskirts, at least twenty or thirty of them. At the distance and them still registering that distinctively to his sight meant they were rather large, too large.

It proved his point for them as the rest near him turned and saw what he saw. L’Sana’s voice was a foot behind him.

“Shit, those things do not look like something we want to play with.”

Gideon’s eyes did a quick hawk on the area close enough for them to get to. Off to the right, about half a mile was a large warehouse structure, some kind of manufacturing plant at a guess. It was three stories and a large rectangular shape with tall cement walls surrounding it, broken in a few spots by large trees fallen over. It looked as if the System had thrown the building and its walls on top of a part of the forest.

The whole landscape was similar, huge ass trees that broke up the terrain until thickening in density where the City had been placed. No doubt it was what used to be the outskirts of the forest leading to the heart of it where the ruins now were. His voice hammered out as he lifted his arm, pointing to the warehouse.

“There, now! Get all the Shador heading towards that building. It will have to do.”

He turned his head to Ari sitting on L’Sana’s shoulder.

“Ari, fly ahead and check it out, make sure there’s nothing dangerous. If there is do not engage, send a chat message, and L’Sana and I will move ahead and clear it.”

She nodded and took off like an arrow towards the warehouse. Unra and the rest were already halfway down the slope with the Old Woman and the new Commander both shouting orders. Dori gathered her team and started the process of ushering the children and elderly in the direction they needed to go.

The notifications kept shuffling across his vision in some rave club dance. Not yet the time. L’Sana and he didn’t wait for the rest and picked up their pace in case Ari needed them. As they moved he could feel the increase in every Attribute he had. His new race, and that A+ it had mentioned was no joke and he had an almost unbearable urge to pour over the details. He bit down on it. The Shador needed protection before anything else.

There’s nothing here guys just empty as empty gets. There are a bunch of metal hunks of something with wheels on them that look all rusted. I think you called them cars. Bunch of rusted metal machines too.

They slowed their pace and L’Sana called Ari back. A small dart sped out of the car manufacturing plant and zipped to L’Sana’s shoulder within a few seconds. They stopped and waited for the rest of the Shador to catch up which took some second hands as the low-level elderly and kids were slow-rolling.

L’Sana put Shira down who toddled back to the rest, stumbling a couple times as her hand refused to come off the pommel of her small dagger sheathed at her waist. L’Sana had a soft look to her eyes as she watched the little one. He found something about it appealing. Another thing he didn’t want to dig into.

He shifted his eyes to the circling birds. As he watched, a few of them would swoop down at something within the buildings, then fly back up. L’Sana picked up his focus and turned her eyes, a worried gaze shifting.

“We need to check that out Gideon, it could be survivors. They might need help.”

His thoughts had been running in the same direction but with the caution that they could also be more assholes jumping wholeheartedly into the System incentives to kill everything they came across. Flashing images of children and mothers scurried across the harsh judgment and had him sighing.

“As soon as we have the City Stone up and we can get through all our notifications we’ll take a walk and do some scouting.”

Her hand squeezed his arm and she threw a peck to his cheek as the Shador finally arrived. Unra bowed and held out a small glowing stone of silver and slate, the City Stone. Virasa held out something different, a small black smooth stone. He held up his scaled hands and received both. Time to build a City.