“I’ll tell you everything, just please don’t hurt me!”

You have defeated Tobias Braston in a Tier 1 Social Contest! You have earned 250 XP

That had been ridiculously easy, as I’d expected. I’d never engaged a monster in social combat before, but at Threat 10, I hadn’t expected much resistance or reward. Two-fifty was chump change, but the “Tier One” was interesting. He must have really wanted not to tell us.

Not that it made much of a difference against my [Intimidate] skill. One credible threat was all it had taken. I glanced over at Travis. Like most of the other survivors, he’d been watching the interrogation, brief as it had been. Travis fancied himself as a troublemaker, the one who would lead the survivors against me when the simmering tension built up enough.

In reality, he and the rest of his friends were not any kind of threat. I looked at him to tell him that I knew about his plans and that I didn’t care.

I can reduce you to a blubbering beggar just as easily, the look said. He must have grasped at least some of the content, as he quickly looked away.

[Intimidate] wasn’t even my most powerful skill. It was just the quickest in this situation. I could have turned on [Charm] or [Persuade] and had them eating out of my hand, following me around like little ducklings. They were so weak, it would have been easy.

The resentment they felt, the discontent that I allowed to grow, was my gift to them. Feelings that were rightfully theirs, generated by their experience of the world. Real emotions, not whatever I thought was convenient for me in the moment.

It was a gift I couldn’t share with Toby. He had something I wanted.

“So,” I said. “Your corporation. NovaGen.”

The name had been all over the documentation that we’d gone through. Toby looked at me nervously but didn’t volunteer anything.

“NovaGen made the zombie virus, didn’t they?”

“Maybe?” Toby said.

I frowned. Just a slight crinkling of the brow.

“I swear I don’t know!” Toby yelled. “I wasn’t involved, I never saw anything, but yeah, reading between the lines, it sure looks like it.”

“So your little outfit was researching variant zombies?”

“Mutations in the virus,” Toby said. “We were set up after the virus was found in the wild. The higher-ups were concerned about mutations. They sent samples to us so we could track how it was evolving.”

“Uh-huh, and how did you analyse the mutations? Computer simulations, live cultures, that sort of thing.”

He could tell that I already knew the answer. Even if I hadn’t gone through the documentation, I would have known the answer. He didn’t want to say it, but he didn’t want me to call him on a lie even more.

“That, yeah, but there was… live testing on human subjects.”

“You little shit!” Travis sprung to his feet and launched himself at the researcher, who was still tied up and lying on the floor. There hadn’t seemed to be a reason to untie him yet.

“Travis!” I barked, and the man stopped short, his hands balled up into fists.

“You pulled people off the streets for testing?” he sneered. “You’re a monster!”

“You’re all monsters,” I said mildly. “Keep in mind, it’s unlikely that he’s actually done the things he remembers.”

Travis frowned. I could tell that he wanted to have a deep philosophical discussion on the subject. If someone remembered doing something that never happened—and others had memories that agreed—had he done that thing?

Or possibly he just wanted to kick Toby until the man died. Those looks were pretty similar on Travis. I had no time for it either way. Under the pressure of my gaze, Travis slunk back down to his seat.

“This headquarters of yours,” I said, returning to the subject. “Is that where your buddies were headed?”

Toby nodded. “Once the mail stopped, and our final specimens… matured, there wasn’t much for us to do. We got permission to put the base on standby and return. I stayed behind to look after the place.”

“And aside from getting turned into a zombie, you did a bang-up job,” I said wryly. “Where’s the headquarters?”

“It’s about two weeks on foot,” Toby said. “I don’t know where, exactly, but we got sent directions. Something about necessary security precautions.”

That sounded like bullshit, but it sounded like Axel's “this is a game” bullshit. I tabled it for later.

“Fine,” I said. “You’ll lead us there tomorrow. Do you anticipate any problems?”

“Aside from zombies?” Toby asked.

“We can handle zombies,” I said confidently. “Though, I should check… the virus that made those climber zombies was sent to you, right?”

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

“Yes. I don’t know where it came from, but they’ll have that information back at headquarters. That sample was from some time ago as well. I’m sure there have been other mutations since.”

“That’s not great news, but we’ll manage,” I told him. “Anything else?”

“Well… you know they’re not going to let you in, don’t you? Even with me as a hostage.”

“Why wouldn’t they?” I asked. “If they’ve got a sanctuary, they’re going to need more hands to keep it safe, or expand it.”

“Maybe,” Toby agreed. “One of the last messages, before the Internet went down, was that they were looking for more test subjects. So they’re probably short on people, but I don’t know if they have jobs for you that you’d like.”

“Whatever gets our foot in the door,” I said grimly. I wondered if that was what the survivors were for. Bait to get us past the door? I looked over the group speculatively.

“We’re going,” Travis stated flatly.

I raised an eyebrow. “Are you that eager to become a zombie?” I asked.

Travis spat on the floor. I mean, actually spat on the floor. Rachel and Marta looked scandalised, and I don’t imagine the look on my face was approving. Someone was going to have to clean that up.

“Hell with that,” he said. “You got your stupid game to win—we want to see Axel. If he really exists.”

I looked at Travis calmly. “Fine,” I said. “I’ve no plans to stand between you and your Creator. Just don’t get in our way, and try not to die. I’d feel bad if I had to watch.”

He turned away, muttering to himself. I ignored him and turned to Sarotheil, who had been watching the whole group with interest.

“You’re coming too, right?” I asked.

“This will bring us back to the portal, correct? It’s not the way I came, that was underground.”

“Yeah, if you knew the way that you’d come, we might try it, but as it is, this is our best bet.”

“Sorry about that. Yes, I’ll come.”

“All right.” I looked down at Toby. “I suppose we should untie you now.”

----------------------------------------

“You’ve been fooled. There ain’t no road out here.” Travis said loudly.

“Are you trying to attract a zombie?” I asked. “I ask out of curiosity.”

Travis’s face went red, but he continued at a lower volume. “I know this area,” he insisted. “You got a ditch out back behind Taylor’s place and the sewage farm, but no road.” The rest of the survivors nodded in agreement, but they wisely kept their mouths shut.

“This is the route we were given,” Toby said meekly. He was leading us between two warehouse-like workshops at the back of the town. Exactly how he’d been given this route was a bit suspicious since he didn’t have any street names that he could give us. I chalked it up to Axel again.

That didn’t mean I was following him blindly, though.

“Hang on,” I said. I grabbed him to make sure he stopped.

“What is it?” Travis asked. He got more irritated every time I took charge.

“Magic,” I said, looking at the seemingly innocuous alley ahead of us. “It looks harmless, but…”

I’d gotten more used to having the extra sensory data from [Sense Mana] in my face at all times. It was easier in a dungeon and even easier in this one. Axel mostly kept his magic hidden in the floor or ceiling where my skill couldn’t reach. He only left it out for me to see when he had to, when there was a specific magical effect right in front of me.

Exactly what it was, I couldn’t tell, but some of it looked familiar. I could maybe puzzle it out, but brute force was easier.

“[Dispel Image],” I cast the spell aloud so everyone knew what I was doing. Everyone who counted, at least. There was a murmur and gasps from the crowd at the results.

The alley ahead of us disappeared. In its place was an open road, roughly lined with trees and bushes on either side. The transition was jarring. The buildings on either side of us simply ended as if they’d been cut with a very sharp knife.

“Looks like we found the path,” I said. “The illusion must have been to cover the transition.”

“Is that the portal I came through?” Sarotheil asked.

“No, this is just a local one,” I said.

“Do we go through?” Kyle asked.

“Wait, I’m not done.” Peering closer at the portal, I could see that there was still some illusion magic. This magic was further in, but my spell had range.

“[Dispel Image]” I cast again. “Ouch,” I said. That had not made things better.

What had previously looked like an ordinary road, now looked like something painted by Escher. It was twisted while still staying straight, a contradiction that hurt my eyes.

The others were having just as hard a time looking at it, none more so than the survivors. Evan quickly turned and threw up against the alley wall.

“We’re not going to have to go through that, are we?” Felicia said. “If we are, I wish you’d kept the illusion up.”

“What is it?” Rachel asked in disbelief. She couldn’t look at it for long, but she couldn’t stop herself from coming back. I sensed some vomiting in her near future.

“That’s how you pack a two-week journey into a space that's not that wide,” I said. “You twist space so the road can fit.”

“I’m not sure how this saves us a two-week journey, though,” Borys said. “Except in the sense that I have no desire to take that journey now.”

“That’s a fair point,” I admitted. “But I’m not done with brute force.”

I studied the Escher swirl in front of us carefully, trying to look at the magic instead of the geometrical nightmare. Spatial Magic wasn’t a recognised skill, but Rhis could do it. I’d watched what he did.

This was far beyond what he could do, but I got the sense that complicated and difficult meant more fragile in this case.

“Borys,” I said slowly. “Can you fill this with your blizzard?”

“I… can,” he said. “How will that help?”

“For one, we’ll be able to see less of it,” I confessed. “But for another, I want to fill the space up with magic to put the structure under strain.”

Borys shrugged and complied. There was a strangled sound from Toby, who hadn’t seen any flashy magic yet. I appreciated that he tried to keep his voice down. I almost forgave him for the human testing that he hadn’t really done. Almost.

Borys’s blizzard started filling up the inside of the spatial effect. Without the sight from the inside to distract us, we could see that it had an outside. It was a tube or—more accurately—a twisted strand of spaghetti that led from here to another place.

I frowned. Could that be right? I quickly checked without [Sense Mana] and confirmed that the tube was only visible with the skill. Ordinary eyes couldn’t see the outside of the tube.

[Sense Mana] grants extra-dimensional sight confirmed, I guess.

“Is this helping?” Borys asked.

“Yeah, I think so,” I said and reached out into the magic. The temperature dropped instantly, and I was glad that I was wearing a glove. “Nice control.”

Borys shrugged, and I brought [Theurgy] to the fore. I didn’t use this skill often; it was too difficult to use. But it could do any kind of magic, badly. Since there was no such thing as Spatial Magic, it was what I had to use.

Fortunately, I didn’t need to do anything complicated. Just disrupt what Axel had done. I was relying on the fact that while dungeon magic was more sophisticated and complicated than anything a human could do, it was often—always, maybe—weaker.

Brute force for the win. With my hand in the effect, I didn’t have to worry about range. I just reached out and twisted.

There was a sound that I’d never heard before as space itself shattered in front of me. Borys’s storm exploded in all directions, even the ones that didn’t exist. Sensing the moment, he cancelled the effect.

When the blizzard cleared, we were looking at a tunnel ending in a door with a sign on it that said NovaGen Solutions. But I was looking at my new notification.

[Theurgy] Level 5 acquired through use

For gaining a skill level you have been awarded 1 XP