What could I do other than loot, kill, and rampage? It’s in my blood to act like a belligerent beast. Fighting my instincts would have been impossible at such an early age. The need to level a skill only stops when it reaches lvl100.
By that point, the actions are often ingrained. The human mind is very adaptive, and with new hardware, it is far more rugged. While I wasn’t dumb enough to get something like the Intelligence parameter, I still chose Dexterity.
Parameters aren’t limited to the physical body; they affect the mind as well. Someone with more Dexterity can handle horrible sights more easily. Where others would break, a high Dexterity user will bend. Humans are incredibly adaptive; this event tested that.
…
“Why are you doing this?” An undead demanded. She might have been considered cute if not for the bloodshot eyes and crazy teeth. However, I had a thing for flowing black hair and grey skin.
Teen titans gave many of my generation a type. Her big titties held back my flames for the moment.
Undead office workers shot across the room, ducking into cubicles and tossing files into paper shredders. They obviously had information they didn’t want other undead to see. Off in the back of the room, there was a bank vault connected to what I assumed was an elevator. None of that interested me. Framed on the wall was a photo of an undead standing in front of a hummer. The same hummer I had in my inventory.
I pointed at the man in the photo. “Where is he?” The undead turned her head slightly towards the vaulted elevator.
Ok, they had made me curious with the burning of files and all the looks they gave that elevator. What was down there? I needed to know. My target was already dead, and I still had half an hour before the teleport restarted. Fires covered the city, and buildings fell, lighting more the surrounding structures ablaze.
It tickled my Root Of Black Dragons to burn down a city and take things from these people. But, there was a certain amount of satisfaction that couldn’t be denied from this even. Knowing that I could return to my world after causing so much devastation filled me with a childish sense of joy.
“Lead the way, and I’ll spare you and the others for the length of this stage.” I chose my words very carefully. It was essential to do so. Being known as a liar wouldn’t be any fun.
The undead glared at me as the world burned around us. Finally, the female undead turned and walked towards the elevator. With a swipe of her card key, the elevator doors opened. I pushed her inside.
“Ladies first.” She stared at the undead moving through the office, scrambling to get rid of lots of evidence.
She pressed a button on the elevator door, and suddenly we were moving. We traveled down dozens of floors without stopping.
“Is this a ploy to trap me?” I asked.
The undead felt off to me. All of the undead felt a little odd. Of course, an off feeling by itself wasn’t a problem. But, unfortunately, I felt a sensation from her that made me think.
I sensed negative energy from her; it drained away life itself, even my own. A few details I hadn’t paid attention to made themselves known. I haven’t seen anything living in this city. Grass doesn’t even burst up between cracks in concrete. Birds don’t fly over the city, and there are no rats hidden in dumpsters. Even cockroaches couldn’t survive here. These creatures leached life from the world itself to sustain themselves. Eating flesh was only part of it; indeed, they needed living flesh to survive smoked or preserved probably wouldn’t cut it for them.
A smirk slowly spread across her face. “What’s wrong is the big bad breather scared of being underground?” I raised an eyebrow.
Was she really trying to take advantage of this situation? Her usefulness to me was shrinking by the second. If I posted my problem with my hummer, I’m sure someone on Reddit would help me hotwire it.
I spotted her nametag on her breast. “Caeda right, do you really think any of you stand a chance against me?” I asked with all the sincerity I could muster.
This was stage 2 of the first event. I doubted there was anything this world had in the early game that I couldn’t crush. Unless I had accidentally triggered a secret boss or a bonus stage?
“What does your company do again? I asked.
She smiled, showing off teeth built for stripping flesh from bone. That was the one thing that broke the goth chick template on her. It was very annoying.
“I am a proud member of Parasol Inc. We are the ones who started the revolution that freed the world from death. Through the genius of our research, we have further enhanced ourselves. Glory to Parasol,” She shouted as the elevator door binged and opened. I turned my gaze to the poorly lit hallway directing her to shuffle out.
“That’s interesting, so your company has enhanced the undead. Is that it? As undead, your numbers are finite even if you convert a few humans at the farms when needed. Their numbers are also an issue. This planet will eventually die from your presence alone. Once that happens, what will you eat?” I said.
“Of course, a terrorist would believe in that radical belief. Global death is just a myth. Sometimes plagues wipe out animal populations, fish die, and water turns brackish when it sits still; that is natural.” Caeda said.
“No, I can sense the effect your existence has on the world. Burning your little city down probably bought this world some time. Not much, but eh, I don’t really care one way or the other. How goes your attempts to get off of human meat?” I said, changing the subject.
“Your mad, but I’ll humor your last request. We’ve begun developing cancers that show quite a lot of promise.” Her face scrunched up. “Though their taste leaves much to be desired. We’re working on that before it goes public. When one of our local farms burned to the ground. Parasol received a fat government grant to deal with the problem.” She said.
Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.
I nodded and felt around; there were several vast negative presences but nothing I needed to worry about, which disappointed me.
“So what do these super zombies look like. Are they gross, or did your mad scientists go for something aesthetically pleasing?” I said.
Caeda’s face twitched. “Does it matter what your death looks like?”
“Ugly as sin got it. Well, I hope your research is backed up at another facility because when I finish with Parasol’s science project, I’m burning all of this down.” I said.
Ok, I was feeling cocky. Nothing around here seemed to be at my level. I felt like a baseball pro team about to play against a minor league game. Yes, it would be sad as hell, and I should feel bad about crushing their dreams utterly, but it was easy money. If blowing up a few hydrogen cars gave me many coins last time, burning a whole city down would be even better.
She took me to a towering steel blast shutter and pressed a few buttons. On the shutter, there was a massive runic array from my current world. That gave me a slight pause. How did runes from that world get here?
Alarms sounded, and the shutter rose. Necrotic energies blasted away from the door rotting the oxygen in the air. I could feel my disease immunity struggle against a wave of death. A burning desire to reduce everything to ash welled up inside of me. Feeling the death energy radiating from beyond the steel shutter told me everything I needed to know.
I was in over my head and needed to get out of there. The power beyond the gate could destroy me with a thought. If this wasn’t a boss, I’d swap tongues with the undead.
Lights leading to the shutter winked out one after the other as shadowy hands of death brushed past them. A deathly cold swept through, adding a layer of frost to the floor and my well-oiled beard. Even activating Cloak Of Flames barely melted the ice.
Whatever lay beyond the shutter door was powerful to the extreme. My bloodlust began to hike up from sensing such a powerful foe. At the same time, I knew fighting the creature would be my end. I raised my sword using the weapon’s own presence to combat the aura of death.
Nameless radiated its own dark aura pushing the forces of death aside. Still, the power on the other side of that shutter was serious. If I didn’t treat it as such, I would die. That feeling made me want to laugh and clap.
This event actually had some surprises to it, after all.
Still, I didn’t have much time. In less than five minutes, I’d teleport back.
“Do my eyes deceive me, or is that shutter 4ft thick? And that energy, it’s a bit more than a few super soldiers. Did you lie to me?” I smirked as the shadowy presence beyond the shutter shifted, or maybe it was a trick of the failing light. “Did you think I couldn’t handle a little necrotic energy?” I said.
Wave after wave of deathly energy blasted my body. Ice crept over my body as the deathly power threatened to rip my very life away.
I felt something warm drip into my beard. When I rubbed it away, I pulled back blood. The blood on my fingers blackened almost instantly. “This is interesting.”
The knife-eared zombie looked at me in a mix of hunger and anxiety.
Ding!
Raid Boss Detected!
Scanning Enemy…
The shutter fully opened, revealing a skeleton with an alien bone structure. Its skull was a mix of a fish and dragon pointed on top, nearly like a pyramid with a long snout. Someone had gone to the trouble of shining the creature to a mirror finish. A pair of black wings connected to the creature’s shoulders by wiggling worms pretending to be corded muscles. They looked a little like the Pepsi Cola I had discovered in Audi. A colony of those worms covered the creature, acting as a form of muscle. Plates of thicker bone covered the creature held on to the worms by a wiggling black ooze. Tiny red orbs sparkled within the ooze for brief moments before they sunk deeper within the inky substance.
At my approach, the creature shifted.
It was nearly equal to my height and felt truly dangerous. Accelerate allowed me to stretch my last five minutes here to a crawl. Here was a powerful enemy with skills at least equal to my own. By its size alone, there was a good chance we had similar physical Parameters. It might have been a bit presumptuous, but I thought I could still win.
Bloody tears fell from my nose and eyes.
Its aura was killing me slowly; I felt that clearly. There had to be a change if I wanted to fight such a creature, but only if I didn’t rely on skills. My bloodlust came from my skills, and if I added more before I was ready, I don’t know what I’d do. If I wasn’t relying on skills, then that left me with weapons and runes.
Nameless buffed my already high Strength with its cutting power and additional powers. Unfortunately, the demonic nature of the weapon might be the wrong typing for this. Death-type enemies typically had a shit ton of dark resistance, immunity, absorption, or worst of all, reflection. I didn’t want to be my own downfall. So, I needed a new weapon or at least defenses to counter this creature.
Ding!
Raid Boss Identified
Secret Raid Boss Found
Magog Rxel IX
Title: Murder God, Sin God Sloth, Bearer Of Immortal Rot
Class: Primordial Corpse Lord
Race: Omega Lich
Defensive Aura Durability: 100m/100m
MP: 2.5b/5b
Status: Hibernation
Strongest Skill: Tomb Of The Undying Regis lvl100, Type MAG, Rank SSS
The longer I sensed the creature, the more over my head I realized I was.
As I looked closer, I could see tiny splinters of metal at the creature’s feet. One of the worms slowly tossed another sliver out of the creature. That let me know a few things. Suddenly this world began to make more sense. I started to figure out what went on here, and I didn’t like it. This raid boss was much too powerful for me to handle. Maybe if I had an army of other users with Strength equal or greater than my own, winning by myself was impossible.
I turned and swung my fist down, turning the knife eared undead into a smear on the wall. That calmed me down a little. The undead woman hadn’t seen me move. I still had that going for me. Time had slowed to a crawl while I used Accelerate to get away from the boss room. Who would the hell fight something like Rxel unprepared?
When I reached the elevator, I looked back to see the creature hadn’t moved and relaxed a bit. It was beyond me for now. Fighting it with my current loadout would be impossible. I needed lots of dark and death-resistant equipment. A few light-based magic spells wouldn’t be a bad thing either.
I took out my phone and zoomed in on the raid boss. The focus wasn’t the best, and the lighting was shit. But, the flash turned on, and the picture wasn’t terrible. I posted it on the Raid Boss side and watched the upvotes and comments pile up.
The creature turned its head to me, and its empty eye sockets flashed with baleful fire. “Nope,” I said and began my retreat. A wave of deathly energy smashed into me. I coughed out a mouthful of blood and felt my thoughts go fuzzy.
After inventorying my phone, I cut open the top of the elevator and threw myself upwards. Just posting that picture of the raid boss had cost me two precious minutes.
I shot up through the elevator shaft pulling myself up at incredible speeds even as Accelerate taxed my stamina. My Cloak Of Flames activated, and I began my destruction of the labs above. Fortunately, my flames were quick to rip free onto several floors and burn through delicate experiments. Unfortunately, my destruction wasn’t completed when the light of teleportation took me away.
Below the darkness swallowed up my flame and put them out. The dark rose like a brackish pool threatening to overtake me. Before it hit me, I winked away from this world through teleportation.
Ding!
Targets Destroyed x1
Skyscrapers Destroyed x18
Businesses Destroyed x15
Vehicles Destroyed x129
Large Vehicles Destroyed x15
Vehicles Stolen x1
Zombies Slain x10,934
Parasol Company Property Damage x5.9b dollars
Encountering A Secret Raid Boss x1
Points Awarded: 750,000
Event Points 755,000
I was getting tired of the way my screen was overfilled with Bronze, Silver, and Gold. So I changed my settings to ease my reading with abbreviations. So bronze would be Brz, Silver would be AG, and Gold would be AU to simplify things.
Ding!
Rewards
For Earning 10,000 Points: Brz Skill Upgrade x3
For Earning 100,000 Points AG Skill Upgrade x1
For Earning 250,000 Points: AG Skill Upgrade x2
For Killing Zombies x100: 10,000G
For Killing Zombies x1000: 100,000G
For Killing Zombies x10k: 1,000,000G
For Destroying vehicles x100: AG skill Dice x5
For Destroying Large Vehicles x10: AG Parameter Dice x2
For Large Vehicles Stolen x 1: Brz Parameter Dice x1
For Destroying Skyscrapers x1: AG Skill Dice x2
For Destroying Skyscrapers x10: AG Skill Dice x5
For Destroying Businesses x1: Brz Skill Dice x2
For Destroying Businesses x10: Brz Skill Dice x5
For Destroying Parasol Property x5b dollars: AU Skill Upgrade Dice x5
For Assassinating A Target x1: AU Parameter Dice x1
For Encountering A Secret Raid Boss x1: AU Skill Dice x1
Event Time left 28d 16H
Event Points 755,000
Enter Shop to trade reward points for items to assist with the event.
I further enhanced my experience by shortening the Skill Upgrade Dice to only Upgrade Dice. Then I took the Dice out of Parameter Dice to further compress it.
Ding!
Items
Brz Skill Dice x7 AG Skill Dice x12 AU Skill Dice x1
Brz Upgrade x3 AG Upgrade x3 AU Upgrade x5
Brz Parameter x1 AG Parameter x2 AU Parameter x1
Alright, that was much more manageable than what I had before. So I changed it on my screen to save reading time.
Ding!
Root Of Black Dragons lvl8
Type: QI
Rank A+
Description – The essence of a black dragon lives within your qi, allowing the user to learn exclusive black dragon abilities and access dragon-only areas.
Acts to level – Black dragons are bringers of chaos and misery omens hated by all. Therefore, actions that cause rampant destruction will level up this skill.
1. Dragon’s Hoard – By collecting riches and meditating, the user’s cultivation rate increases by A x Y = the user’s new cultivation rate. A = number of abilities Y = 1000 1 ounce gold coins.
2. Roots Of Fire – All Fire-type Cultivation techniques can be learned at 4x speed. Fire-type spiritual entities feel a kinship towards the user.
3. Drake’s Breath – The user’s dragon fire has increased in power and is fueled by QI.
4. Nose For Gold – The user can smell out Gold more easily and gains a gut feeling when it's possible to get more from a deal.
Ding!
Root Of Black Dragons has reached lvl8
QI +18
QI 251