(Heaven's Key, Streets)

    With enough computation you can do anything.

    - Loading Blurb

[https://i.imgur.com/hFn5cIR.png]

I spent the day playing around with Dale, just passing time. I've already mastered the Mind Reader Eye, so there wasn't much for me to do except crank up the time and play on fast forward. By now I am fairly familiar with the group's habits, and I had no trouble beating them even without cheats. Those guys are scrubs.

I stepped out of the casino into the streets of the golden city. It reminded me of that day so many years ago. Much like that day the sunset came tinting the golden city in a tinge of crimson. And as I walked home towards the inn, the night soon enveloped the sky. There were no voices of the crowd anymore, and no chirps of birds or insects at this height. Only the quietness and the shadows. I slowly made my way, and as I turned a corner, I recognized it. My memory is very good so of course I'd remember, it was where I faced the white haired guy last time.

And beyond! I saw a figure come from the other side, wearing a gray trench coat. White upturned hair like an anime character. In truth, I knew the Enforcement Division could have sent any number of people other than this guy, but this was the person I've most been hoping to battle. Feeling immense gratitude, a grin crept on my face and I strode forward to meet him. I had no doubt or fear, I placed my faith in my training. And after this battle, I knew I would reach a height I couldn't have had previously.

I came to a stop a few feet from him, staring the taller man straight in the eyes. He was taller than me, but I would not yield to that impulse of imposition. I refuse to think of myself as inferior. He should be the one to fear me.

In a snap, his revolver came out. Without flinching I took the fired bullet and we were transported to the dueling realm.

(Heaven's Key, Celestial Realm, Duel with Gray)

[https://i.imgur.com/vL0HwAU.png]

A golden heavenly realm greeted me, and for a few moments, I thought I could see some angel feathers flying through the air. A golden space with some whitish nebulas. The realm of shadows that was bathed in light.

And across the table there was him, my most fearsome opponent up to date. Last time I succumbed to him, but this time I will win. I have no intention of running.

"The report says you have the powers of an Episteme, kid. Where have you come from?" He asked me.

"Not from below. I come from a place far beyond your imagination." I larped as a demon, grinning dramatically. That is the based thing to do here.

"Ahahahaha!" The guy actually laughed. Though I am not the kind of person to take it as an insult, I like it when my imaginary viewers are entertained. It is my principle to live my life as if it were an anime series. Beyond good and evil, there is entertainment.

"Shall we get on with it?"

"Sure. Do you want to look at the cards first or shall I?" He asked me.

"Cards? Why do we need to look at them at all?" I played stupid. Though I was also implying that I do not need to look at cards to win.

"Heh." His voice had an end, and not hesitating, he did the same sequence as last time. Picking out a revolver, he pointed it at me and fired.

With my very enhanced cognition, I could count the millimeters as the bullet traveled towards my chest.

Bang! It blasted a hole through me.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

He emptied the rest into me, rocking my body, and I started to feel faint. I sprawled onto the table in front of me. I felt my blood spurting out and my sensations became faint. Touch, smell, vision became distant. And the last thing I saw was a puddle of blood becoming larger until it covered the two face down cards in front of me. The vision blurred and stretched out into the distance far away. I could hear the guy saying something, but I could not make out the world.

> Initiating True Belief Modification. Come back to life. Will it!

The last time I died here. Two times I have died here. But by my will, and my desire, this time I will win. With the program empowering my imagination, I will myself to come back to life. I imagine myself being whole again. My imagination is very vivid and crisp, and in response to that the wounds and even the clothing mend themselves. My senses return and I push myself out of the puddle of my own blood that I am lying.

"Pwah!" I take a deep breath. "That nearly killed me. Do that again!"

I want to try figuring out how my previous adversary made the bullets disappear before hitting him.

"You can regenerate? Not bad kid. Let's see how long you can keep that up. How about these bullets?"

He manifested a special clip in his hands. I could see they were orange colored compared to the previous brown ones. He plugged them into the magazine, gave the roll a spin and then with a snap of his wrist, clicked it into pace. The bullets came flying out at a rapid clip. At my thought speed I had plenty of time to think about it.

Just willing the bullets away would work, instead I ignore the bullets outright and focus on the integrity of my being.

Ultimately, the fight between high level opponents is a battle of beliefs. Is my belief in the wholeness of my body stronger than the sensations of the bullets hitting me? How will the system resolve that? I will the same thing as when I regenerated myself, except in a manner that is persistent. And in doing so I make my body an impenetrable wall no outside force can breach.

When the first bullet strikes me, it detonates in a fiery explosion, but I feel nothing happening to my body. Rather, I imagine the bullets exploding and tearing me apart, but no actual pain enters my mind. I know based on my senses that my body is whole.

> I see some pain impulses, but I've made them imaginary.

I understand why I am imagining my body exploding into gruesome chunks now.

> Just get rid of that entirely.

I message the controller back, as my obsessive imagination is distracting me. There is the danger of me slipping and making it real. As soon as I do, my mental state normalizes.

This exchange lasts only a moment, and as soon as the explosion clears, it reveals to my opponent my pristine self.

"You also know the Body Integrity Technique." My opponent commented.

"Is that what it is called? I once tried the same trick you did, but it didn't do anything to the enforcer so I threw it away. Firing guns at your opponent is useless."

"Huh? How did you come to that conclusion?" He seemed to be genuinely surprised at this. I shrugged and then snap manifesting a revolver, the same one he used, I fired away directly at his face. The six bullets fly and are immediately dispersed on contact with him.

"As I said, useless." I toss the revolver away. "It didn't do anything to you."

I can see him gulp and then lick his lips.

"About 99% of the players break and die after 15 minutes of contant fire for me. I think had you kept at it, you could have won just doing this against the enforcer we sent against you previously."

"Huh, really?" It was my turn to be surprised. "Lame."

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"..." He was speechless.

"Anyway, do you have any better moves? If you are just going to fire bullets at me it is not going to work." I ask him.

My opponent sighs and snaps his fingers. A shotgun manifests, and then another. Rows and columns of them arrayed in a sphere around me.

I turn my head and look. Everywhere there are floating shotguns aiming their barrels at me.

"Fire!" On command, the shotguns discharge their deadly cargo from all sides. I expected pellets, but it was some kind of shrapnel instead.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

Ceaselessly and endlessly, the guns blazed!

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

I could see it all in slow motion, as it happened. The flames of fury were pointed at me.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

And I just stood there, doing nothing.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

I endured it for a minute, two minutes, three minutes...

Ah. At some point, it happened that the system folded Gray out, and as I watched, two chips were deposited into my stack.

Right now the barrage of gunfire while not dangerous was deafening and distracting. If I tried opening my mouth here, I'd swallow a ton of shrapnel as a result. So I did the only sensible thing and raised one of my hands in a stop gesture, hoping my opponent would relent a little so I could get a word in. After a while, he did. The relentless waves of useless shrapnel being spat at me stopped.

"You got auto-folded dude." I informed him.

"Hah hah hah..." He was out of breath and sweat was pouring down his face. "Ghhh! How are you still fine?!" My opponent peered at me intently, checking me all over. It seems he put in a lot of effort into this attack, but to me it was nothing more than a breeze.

"Is this supposed to be dangerous? It isn't that much different to firing a single gun at me. I just used the Body Integrity Technique as you called it."

"Phew, I see...Have you been focusing it on your entire body this whole time?" He asked me. I started to feel pity for him. It was like he was asking to have his heart broken.

"How else am I supposed to do it? If I focus it on just a part of my body, that would leave me vulnerable, right?" He made a disgusted face.

I leaned back in my seat. Both the table and the seats are indestructible so the barrage did not affect them. I tried it plenty of times, but it is not possible to tear the cards either. The barrage did scatter the chips and the button as well as the cards into the abyss. The system would still remember the state of the game, so I do the sensible thing here.

"Raise." I min-raise to 4. I had no idea what cards I had, but the guy might start blasting away again and I do not want to get autofolded after 5m have run out.

Seeing how out of breath he is though, I am guessing he won't be able to go on for too long.

"..."

Seeing that he was just catching his breath, I got the sense that it was time for me to make a move myself. I thought back to my previous fight where I used the knowledge of my opponent's cards as well as the deck to win, and decided against it. The way this fight proceeded completely messed up that kind of flow. There is no point in trying to play cards while the other guy is assaulting me physically. Rather...

'Bang! Bang! Bang!' The barrage flashed through my mind. What he did was pretty interesting. A plan came to me.

> Hey, pause here. Look for schematics of the weapons he used and give it to me. I am going to try replicating his attack.

I didn't sense anything happening, but I got a reply almost immediately.

> Done, here they are.

I looked at the attached documents that came with the message and found the information that I needed right away. The 3d model of the shotguns being used, their material composition, as well as the data for the ammo of various kinds.

> How long did it take you to find this information?

I asked him out of curiosity. If he had to go on the internet, it is likely that it could have taken him as much as half an hour or even a few hours of real world time. This would have been a big loss for us.

> I thought about going on the Internet, but then I remembered that Simulacrum had a library related scenario. So I logged into it and found the relevant documents in the database. The modern weaponry stuff is all there, but the nanotech schematics are all locked and require credits from accomplishing missions or blueprint exchange.

That sounded really interesting. I wonder if I could exchange the eyes that I've made for something else? Exchanging technology with real people was one thing, but trading with NPCs in exchange for programs and designs I could use in the real world would be a win-win! I wouldn't put it past Simulacrum to enable that kind of trading.

Come to think of it, instead of going to the Internet in the real world, there are plenty of scenarios which have functional civilizations at the modern day level. He could have used the Internet of any one of those. 'Branch of Reality' scenario for example would have sufficed.

For the moment, let me put away those thoughts aside and focus on the game.

I studied shotgun design for a while. With my enhanced cognition it is really an easy thing to completely internalize them. Not even a single second had elapsed since I instructed the controller to get me the data, but I was ready.

As the first step in casting the spell, I did what I had done in the previous battle. Visualizing myself as a cloud of cells covering the table, I manifested my personal domain. Then I imagined the loaded shotguns all around the table much like my opponent had done. As I put in effort, the images become vivid and crisp in my mind. Then I manifest them.

Right now, shotguns, all of the same modes are floating around the table, pointed in random directions.

"Huh?" My opponent opens his mouth and becomes slack jawed at the scene.

I will it and the guns swivel towards him and fly into position in a semi sphere, much like he had done.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

On mental command, the barrage starts.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

My opponent grits his teeth and grasps the armrests of his seat tightly.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

Flames blaze out the barrels, sending lethal sharpnel at high velocity towards his body. Every time it hits, the objects get dispersed by his personal domain.

But how long will that last I wonder?

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

Sweat pours down his face and he closes his eyes as if wishing the terrible reality away. His muscles are taut and tense. The veins on his forehead bulge as scrap rains upon him.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

"Ghhhhhhhhh!" Resisting the barrage was easy for me, but he is gritting his teeth tightly enough to crush iron. Only a minute has passed, but I can tell he is at his breaking point.

Ah! One of the shots goes through his chest. And in the next moment, his body is torn asunder.

His arms and legs get shorn off, his body gets perforated, his face gets torn apart by the blasts.

Quickly, I give the mental command to stop and look over the damage. Looking at the state my opponent is in, I can't help, but feel revulsion. Gore and bits of meat are strewn all across his side of the table, and he looks like a bloody, dismembered mannequin.

Right now I have the choice of continuing the attack, but the opponent is basically no match for me, and I want to see if he has any other interesting techniques. Will he come back to life, much like I have?

I look over his corpse, and after a few seconds, I see it coming back together again. First the face was mended, the holes and the skin becoming whole again, covering the skull that was visible underneath. Then the torso, finally his arms and legs became mended along with the clothing. I am guessing instead of how I would do it, he is focusing on each part at a time to make it easier. Scrub.

"Hah hah hah!" He gasps for breath, before setting his eyes on me. I smile amiably at him.

"No problem, take your time my friend. Catch your breath. I will wait." I play with the mouse.

"Hah hah hah..." He manifests a water bottle and takes a swig, draining it to the bottom. "Pwah."

He wipes his mouth with his sleeve.

"Are you ready now? If this is all you have, even a 1,000 of you at this table would not make any difference. Show me something new. This gun barrage thing was pretty cool." I encourage him mockingly.

"Well, I have one, but it is not as good as the Shotgun Barrage." He admitted.

"Really? I want to see it! Give it a try!" I coax him enthusiastically.

"Fine." I give him the time to focus, and in the air above him, two assault helicopters manifest. At the nose, they have a minigun, and to their sides there are two missile pods. Sick, this military tech is pretty rad. I can see why two helis would be worse than a few hundred flying shotguns though. He could have just manifested missile pods and the miniguns, but he did the whole package, and for that I respect him.

The pilotless craft opened fire upon me. High caliber bullets, much faster than the shotgun flak struck my body, and a moment later, the missile pods opened fire. The missiles swiveled like flies through the air, spreading apart from each other and then trailing smoke behind them, blasted my side of the area to smithereens.

Or at least that is what would have happened if the table, the chair and me weren't indestructible.

In the middle of an explosion I couldn't see past my eyes directly, but through my personal cloud I got the sense of the intensity of the blast. My opponent shielded his face as the blast of air from the explosion hit him, rocking him into the back of his seat.

> Here. The heli and its weapon schematics.

Thank you, controller me. Still buried in the explosion, I study the schematics and then without missing a beat, manifest two large missiles and have them strike the helis. A blast to hellfire erupts where they were, reducing them to pieces.

We both wait a couple of moments for the dust to clear. I come into view.

"My turn." On mental command, I expand my personal cloud to 100 times its previous radius. And then I manifest 100 assault helicopters in the air around me. The dark birds of iron float there soundlessly, their propellers static.

My opponent's heart just sinks at this and he becomes introspective, no longer looking at me. I can tell.

I've won.

I give the command and the missile salvo is released. An untold number of explosions rocks the table, as they detonate upon striking.

And when the dust clears a few moments later, there is nothing there in his seat.

Neither does he resurrect like last time.

My min raise still stands, and after less than 5 minutes, I get a chip sent my way.

Then we get our hands dealt again, and I raise to 4. After 5 minutes, he gets autofolded.

I raise, he gets autofolded. Like that, the sides switch.

I wonder how long I'll have to keep doing this? The blinds increase every 18 hands, so depending on the size of his stack, it will take quite a while until I drain it all like this. I wish the timeouts were every half a minute instead of 5.

Still, this is a pivotal match for me, so I'll see it through to completion. I persevere.

It takes me over 13.5 damn hours, but eventually I manage to get all of his 30k chips.

Realizing that I am finally done, I lean back in my seat and finally let a breath of relief out. I stare into the bright golden skies above, letting the light take me into the world outside…