CHAPTER 133: Beginning of Conflict

Davian’s shoulders sank and he put a palm on his forehead. There couldn’t have been a worse time for Tom to make an appearance.

Tom looked up smiling at the confused army men. “Time for you chumps to fall in line and work under the boss,” he said antagonistically. “After needing us to save your asses you think you can come in here and make demands? Instead, rejoice in the boss’s benevolence.”

Adam was barely aware of it all though. His river was running. Heat was flowing through him and only his skill [Body and Soul Shaping] kept that heat inside, preventing everyone around him from burning. His attention wasn’t on that either. Adam’s focus was inside.

The soul map was where Adam’s attention was. He looked at it and felt for the people within range. There were quite a few people with varying amounts of good intention towards him, loyalty mixed with friendliness. Then on the other side he felt about two dozen people antagonistic towards him, but that wasn’t at the level of violence or hate. It was more like people who had heard nasty rumors about someone and believed them.

Then the rest were all neutral, no feelings for or against him. Except for one. A single soul was radiating a murderous rage at Adam. The soul wasn’t any bigger than the others, but the feelings coming off him were akin to the elves after he had tricked and assaulted them. They wanted him dead in the worst way.

Those feelings came from General Carmichael.

Adam then opened his Rift menu and looked through the different search options. He searched for stealthers, then hostiles, and down the list of different infiltration options. No one within the territory seemed hostile towards the base. No red marks showed up. According to the Rift, there wasn’t a perceivable threat here.

That only left imperceptible threats.

Adam formed a connection. He reached for the violent hate and sent a tendril to it. Sliding into General Carmichael’s soul he moved to the memory area. Inside, the memories looked like glittery storms. They twisted and swirled, rebounding off each other and floating away.

“If you’re causing trouble here then you’ll need to go elsewhere,” Adam heard Lucas’s voice say from far away, muffled by the distance.

“You kids think you’ll be able to handle us?” said a crisp male voice on the higher side. “I’ll burn you to cinders!”

The search continued as Adam looked for any sign of manipulation. No matter how far he moved through the memories, each shaped like a small storm, he saw none of the tell-tale signs. There were no lines connecting memories, none of the storm-like memories looked twisted or altered. He flew through the space as frantically as possible, trying to find the evidence he needed. No damn invader would come into his base or try to take it from him!

“You think we’re scared of you?” demanded Brittney. “You were chased from place to place because you were too weak to hold somewhere.”

“Which aliens did you pay off to get this security?” another voice retorted.

“Better not let the boss hear you talk like that,” said Tom, his voice drifting and wavy. Adam could barely hear it as his attention was desperate to find a sign.

Past more storms, through memories, to the center of the space, weaving around small and large storms. Adam moved as quick as thought but saw nothing. Nothing!

“There’s nothing there!” Adam shouted in frustration, back in his body; eyes locked on General Carmichael.

Everyone stopped and looked at Adam. Familiar soldiers stepped away from him. The venom in his voice had caught people in mid-motion. Tom’s sword was halfway out. Lucas and Brittney had their hammers ready. A man with a tag of “Firemancer” had flames surrounding his hands while a dome radiating healing had formed around him and a group of people.

At Adam’s outburst they stopped.

“Uh, boss. What’s the matter?” asked Tom, unsure whether to get the sword out of its sheath or not.

“It’s not there!” Adam spat.

“What’s not there?” asked Lucas.

“I can’t find how they are controlling him!” snapped Adam as he pointed to the general.

“Controlling ME?!” shouted Carmichael.

“What do you mean, Adam?” asked Elouise.

“I mean, why would he come in here and demand control of the base if he wasn’t under their influence?” asked Adam, confused and frustrated. “The mind witch had to have gotten to him!”

“What are you talking about, boy?!” demanded the general. “I’m not in anyone’s control!”

“Excuse me, General Carmichael,” said Colonel Davian, stepping forward. Then he turned to Adam. “Adam, why do you think the general is being controlled?” he asked gently.

“Because this is a trap! It’s always a trap,” Adam shouted, the frustration getting to him as the heat pounded in his ears. “They herded them to us, allowed us to rescue them. Even the bosses that we fought, the ones attacking their group were weak for their levels. What else could this be but a trojan horse?”

“Adam, this is General Carmichael, one of the highest ranked in the US armed forces. He’s used to being in charge. This is just how he is. From a military perspective he’s in the right to take control of the base. That’s what rank is all about,” said Davian softly, cautious when putting his hand on Adam until he realized Adam wasn’t radiating his heat, then gripping him more firmly.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“But that isn’t right! This is our base! My base! Why would he think it’s ok to demand it from us? Didn’t he send troops to assassinate us?” Adam was breathing heavily, the pounding and heat making it hard for him to concentrate.

The uncertainty caused him confusion. He wanted to rescue people, and he knew not everyone would be happy with it, but this was too much.

“Assassinate you? You must be that general brat, playing army with your kiddie friends,” mocked Carmichael. “No one was told to kill you. We wanted you for questioning. In the grand scheme of things, you are a nobody.”

Adam waved a hand, and a large display appeared. It showed a scene of Adam on a stage with a gun pointed at his head, the perpetrator was dressed in army fatigues. Then the scene switched to soldiers aiming guns at the other people. Several more pictures from the incident on invasion day flashed through the rift window.

Carmichael frowned at the display. “Those are my men, but they were to arrest you. Arrest only. It’s embarrassing that they didn’t even get control of the base at that time.”

“Then how do you explain your survival?” asked Brittney, trying to support Adam.

“Watch your mouth, little girl! Don’t underestimate the US army,” shouted Jamari Gillum, the “Outrider” standing behind the Firemancer.

“Answer the question,” said Tom, using his skills [Seek the Truth] to try and influence the general.

Carmichael scrunched his forehead and then answered honestly, “We just used the information provided by General Gervin. I made sure to set things up a bit further away from the capital so we would have a detached force to provide reinforcements if the capital needed it.”

“The information my husband had came from their group,” informed Elouise.

“That hardly matters,” dismissed the general.

A new voice then spoke up. One that sounded almost amused, but forceful. It wasn’t looking to de-escalate this.

“We can’t leave the fate of our country in the hands of children who are barely off their mother’s teats. This base, the alien technology, will come into our possession.”

“Adam,” gasped Colonel Davian, looking at the man’s tag of “Siege Wall [24].” “That is Detachment Commander Rexus.”

Adam could feel the man’s strength. He could tell he had reached Tier 3. The intensity of his soul on Adam’s soul map was brighter than anyone he had fought so far, and the map allowed Adam to feel a second soul nearly as strong approaching.

That wouldn’t stop him though. Anyone trying to steal from them, threatening to destroy the peace they had fought for, was an enemy.

Lucas whispered, “how did he gain so many levels in one afternoon?”

Then Adam pulled on his heat. He forced the river to churn as power entered him. The air around him started to waver and shift.

“Anyone who tries to destroy or take what we have will be put down!” snarled Adam.

Soldiers familiar with Adam stepped back to get away from him. Elouise grabbed Davian and pulled him backwards. General Carmichael also backed up at the fury and intensity that Adam was displaying. Lucas, Tom, and Brittney prepared to fight.

“This city belongs to the US government, not you!” yelled Carmichael, though from a safer distance as the air around Adam radiated his heat.

Then Adam stepped forward.

Jack Fleming, Firemancer, retreated a few steps from the burning air Adam gave off. Cody Sloan, the air ripper, put up a barrier to keep the heat back. Tyler Zito, the domain healer, poured more energy into his dome as buffs were applied to his allies within.

Adam stepped forward again.

Tom’s sword was drawn. Brittney flashed as her vitality buffs were applied to her own allies. Lucas held his war hammer in one hand and a Scyrric short sword in the other.

One more step brought Adam closer to them.

Then Adam nearly collapsed. His hand came up and gripped his chest as a groan escaped his mouth. He tilted to the side, barely stopping a fall by stomping his foot while his eyes lost focus.

Another groan came from Adam as he dropped onto one knee, hissing in pain.

“Adam!” shouted Brittney as she rushed forward and held her shield between him and their opponents.

Elouise also rushed forward but couldn’t get close enough due to the heat. Then the heat simply stopped and cooler air flowed in. Adam was gripping himself in agony and his friends were beyond confused. Elouise started talking to him, her words unheard as it took everything Adam had to prevent falling all the way onto the ground.

Then Lucas was there, pulling Adam up. Laughter overwhelmed Adam’s groans as Commander Rexus stepped forward.

“The mighty general, huh? All style and no substance. Like an athlete faking an injury before a game he’s scared to play in.” Rexus made it clear he found the moment a comedy. “If you were too scared to actually fight then you should have backed down before. We’ll be taking the base now.”

“You can’t!” burst out Davian. Rexus glared at him.

“Don’t tell me what I can’t do!”

“No, I mean it isn’t possible. Adam isn’t just in charge. The base is bound to him. Even if he were to die, you can’t just take control,” blurted out Davian. “He has to transfer it.”

That brought Rexus to a stop and he frowned at the struggling Adam, arms crossed.

***

Adam didn’t know what happened. Sure, he had felt pain before. Blowing off limbs, skin and muscles combusting, shot in the throat, they all hurt but the heat and river had overcome the pain. When they flowed through his soul and empowered his body, pain became a foreign sensation, something on the outside. Thanks to that, he had pushed through sensations that would have overwhelmed anyone else.

The pain he was feeling now wasn’t physical. If it hadn’t overwhelmed his mind, then he might have realized it was pain in his soul.

Out of reflex, Adam reached for his only real skill, [Body and Soul Shaping]. He turned the spigot up, trying to draw more power into his body to cover up his senses. With that the pain intensified and he screamed before being able to lower the power flow, bringing him some relief even as he continued to struggle.

He lowered the power as much as he could and then tried to snuff out the heat all together. That was when he gained enough presence of mind to realize that it was the heat causing the pain.

The heat and river.

They had always stayed inside his body; other than the time he had released the energy outside to break open the Testudinate barrier. Releasing the energy that time had been disastrous, even if it had led to his [Kinetic Impact] pseudo-skill. He had never since tried to push the energy outside.

That was how he realized what was happening now. The heat was pounding against his soul’s boundary as the river tried to create a new path outside. To somewhere else. To someone else.

Adam used all his willpower to contain the river. He grabbed at the coolness that usually stayed in his head. He tried to shape it, tried to manipulate it to hold the heat inside.

The heat threw itself against the edge of his soul. The river struck it with a force that could kill him, rupturing his very essence. To turn who he was inside out.

Hands grabbed Adam’s body as he struggled, pulling him back towards the wall. Towards the safety of their base.

As the distance between Adam and the special forces increased, the pain decreased. By the time they reached the gate, soldiers hurrying out of the way to clear a path for them, he had enough control to put a hand on Lucas’s shoulder and turn back.

His eyes looked past the general, past the healing domain that his opponents had stood in, and even past Commander Rexus. Adam’s eyes were fixed on the man that had approached during their conflict. A large, shirtless man with bulging muscles and veins trying to pop out of them. A man with rapidly reddening skin and heat flowing off him. A man who held his chest and growled as his eyes rose and met Adam’s.

Only Rexus noticed the eye contact, looking back and forth between Adam’s and the man’s hateful glares. But Adam’s eyes didn’t lower or change. His anger had burned out for the moment due to the pain and weakening of the river. It was like Adam had been spun in a centrifuge and part of his soul had come out. His corrupted soul, forced on him with the arrival of the [System], had almost fallen apart due to that man.

Adam stared furiously one last time at the Tier 3 “Blood Berserker [8]” before he was pulled out of view.