Alex lay on the ground dying, in a cave based in the heart of an Arachnae colony as a strange girl held his last healing potion up in the dim light. She examined the small vails every curve and contour while peering at the liquid within, fascinated with whatever her completely bound eyes were capable of seeing.
"Hey," Alex called weakly, "I need that, hand it over, will you?" He stretched his arm toward her as she turned to face him at his words. She then knelt to study him instead of the potion. Quirking her head to the side in mild surprise as if she too had just noticed him moving and alive for the first time. The girl then eyed each of his wounds with grotesque curiosity and fascination.
She still held the potion tight.
Alex’s world lurched as the pain of his countless wounds briefly exploded through the numbness, causing him to cough up blood. "Hey. Excuse me. Hey. Hi. Hello.” He called, his voice growing louder with each attempt to grasp her attention. She didn’t respond.
“HEY YOU LITTLE SHI—" He stopped and forced himself to breathe deeply to calm down, coughing more blood in the process. No, anger won’t work here. I just need this idio- I just need this girl to give me the potion so I can not die to some weak spider babies. If she could see the potion, he reasoned, then she could see him despite the blindfold, most likely due to whatever class or skill she possessed.
He tried a different approach.
He pointed meaningfully at the potion, staring at where her eyes should be beneath the webbing and mustering as much intent as he could into his gaze before speaking.
"I need that." He spoke emphatically and outstretched his palm at the final word, splaying his fingers. Despite his attempts at reigning in his anger, his face still twisted into one filled with suppressed rage as he spoke the order.
The girl seemed to understand and dropped the potion into his hand, jerking up in surprise at his croaking but firm and demanding voice.
"S…Sorry," she muttered, speaking sheepishly in a strange disjointed accent. She seemed surprised at his pained expression and, if Alex wasn't mistaken, a little upset by it.
Not trusting his fingers, Alex held the vial pressed between his palms and downed the potion with haste, the girl completely forgotten. He felt his internal organs knitting back together, and his ravaged muscles reconnecting while other repairs took place, though not as fast as he'd like. At least my arms are working properly again, he thought as he used his healed arms to sit up, pink-red skin shining where the flesh had grown to fill in his numerous gouges. Alex glanced down briefly to see a spider's fang embedded in his flesh, a trickle of blood staining his pants. He pulled out the fang and looked around him to realize he had been lying in a pool of his own blood.
Shuddering, Alex rose to his feet He eyed his surroundings, wondering how he could've survived. The dim cave was filled with bodies- everywhere, among the rocks and around them. Many of the surrounding corpses were just bones and scarce meat, and strangely, a majority of them were empty cracked carapaces where the Spiderlings had cannibalized each other for some reason. Probably to gain levels, he thought. The babies must have eaten each other in some sort of twisted game of survival of the fittest. It was barbaric, but it would be effective. A free for all with the one spiderling from this cave gaining a multitude of levels from slaying the captured high-level humans and their kin. Alex bowed his head. So many human lives lost in such a way was a horrific tragedy, one that should be avoided at all costs, he thought solemnly. And as a result of such tragedies, each surviving spiderling would leave its cave at a higher level. Not to mention that if they operated like ants, they could perform this ad infinitum- sacrificing their members for the good of the colony; all to create high-level elites. He was starting to truly understand how much of a scourge this species was.
He would have certainly died if he didn't have the last healing potions or if a swarm of the Spiderlings returned. His high endurance stat had most likely made his skin and muscles too tough to be quickly and easily consumed. But judging by the damage wrought to his body before the potions healing, he would’ve died either way. Alex’s expression turned grim with the realization of how close he had come to a pretty gruesome death. The system reincarnating him again seemed downright impossible; the first message had said it was an 'inductee final recycle' because he died when the system first entered Earth. That implies everyone had just one, and most likely for those unlucky enough to die in the brief period of the system's initial introduction message. Not to mention the tutorial period was over, and any attempts at whatever twisted form of ‘safety’ the system employed had all but been removed. There would be no second chances. Or third chances, for that matter.
Deep down, he had known the moment he'd set foot in Pyra that the system would not give him a third chance. If he died in this world, or any other, that would be it. His fate would be sealed, and his journey would end, snuffed out like a candle.
Unless he somehow managed to mimic what Phoenix had achieved in his Dao vision; Rebirth.
Hah, the Dao’s pretty much endless. That would take forever. Alex had been raised in Buddhist teachings all his life, he was aware of the endless depths of Earth's understanding of the universe. It was not something that could be grasped with ease. And that was the mundane version. With all of the progress he had made in his Dao, within his mind's eye, whenever he connected with its truths, it felt like he was a spec trying to grasp a vast galaxy of information, information too complex to even understand. It was too much for him.
But it wasn’t without its merits. The little he’d managed to glean from the Dao had already allowed him to win battles.
If the spec of dust he'd managed to grasp had given him such power, then to grasp the entire star would give him control over complete aspects of reality itself, like Phoenix. But that seemed like an impossible feat, he still felt like an ant trying to control a mountain any time he tried, chipping away at it with small bites, only gaining microscopic shards of the mountain but making no real progress.
He would need more Dao visions to truly progress, he believed. The first one had given him access to Phoenix's perspective, and fleeting glimpses of Phoenix’s endless lifetimes of truths that had expanded Alex’s awareness. This quest offered an insight of its own for him to claim. [Reward: Feat generation, E grade equipment, Insight of the imperial] It had said. An imperial insight.
Alex would finish the quest no matter what.
His thoughts returning to the present, he attempted to completely remove the webbing that mummified his form before giving up. He’d cleared a good portion of it… but it was just everywhere. There was just too much of it. It was sticky as all hell, and each movement shifted it to another part of his body rather than completely removing it.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
He still had a skill to test out in preparation for what was to come; his escape. He glanced at the girl digging through the surrounding Arachnae corpses. And her escape too, although protecting her is not going to be easy. He had no idea what a class milestone skill was, but the name suggested it was pivotal in some way, and most likely powerful. Despite the implication, he'd chosen something that would allow him to escape the Arachnae colony. The quest had said he was in the ‘heart’ of the colony, and had heavily implied that escaping its heart was something nobody had done before.
Before the system.
Let’s see what my ‘executioner’ can do. Alex thought, as his eyes focused on his surroundings.
Alex’s eyes took in the carnage around him. He found a triangular shard of exoskeleton, sharp and jagged, and gripped it firmly. Standing up, he assumed a balanced stance, his makeshift weapon pointed forward, settling into an advanced stance of kendo. Focusing on a heap of exoskeleton remains to his left, he prepared to engage. He took two short steps forward, left and then right.
If his hunch about this skill worked was correct, then distance wouldn’t matter as much as it should. He could feel it, a new instinct.
Alex concentrated on a space some distance away, about 15 steps to the side where the pile of broken exoskeleton lay, and activated his new skill.
As he thought the words Sovereign Executioner, the air in front of him visibly distorted, resembling a blade parting the very fabric of space.
And in its wake a figure emerged, notably taller than Alex, stepping into the cave. The figure wore robes of deep maroon, the fabric rich and heavy, flowing down and covering its form. Along sections of the robe, gilded patterns were intricately woven, in a way that made them hard to look at directly, even when the robes were unmoving. An insignia was embellished on the robe that shared the same quality as the patterns, in that it was hard to make out, constantly blurring out of focus whenever Alex tried to discern its contents. Even looking at the insignia too sharply seemed to cause a strange discomfort.
The figure's hands, extending from the flowing sleeves, were covered in gauntlets and held a large, thick ceremonial blade. Where a face might be beneath the hood, only shadows were visible. In the shadows, traces of a jawline could be seen, eerily similar in shape to Alex's. The lips, visible within the darkness, were set in a grim expression, akin to Alex's own frown.
The figure, the Sovereign Executioner, stood some meters to the side of Alex, mirroring his movements perfectly, their stances identical.
“Whoa”, Alex breathed in surprise. So that’s what I’d look like with a few extra months in the gym and an NBA contract… He studied the lifeless features buried within the depths of its hood. Nah, I like ‘me’ better, it doesn’t have my winning smile. He smirked, and the figure he summoned smirked too, mirroring his every twitch and breath. Alex studied the skills sensations. It felt like he had an extra body, like a disembodied limb that followed his every subconscious command.
So it won't disappear until I make an attack, that's useful, Alex noted. His improved sense of his internal workings gave him the minute feeling of his mana constantly draining while the summoned construct of mana stood still. The sixth sense gained by Inner Focus allowed him to instinctively feel that he could keep this up for an hour at best, and then he would be completely depleted of mana. Quick strikes then, he thought, attempting to decipher the patterns and insignia on the skills robes before wincing in pain at the ache it induced in his eyes. And what's with that, anyway? He blinked and rubbed his eyes, and noted the construct mirroring him, its gauntleted hands soundlessly reaching into the depths of its hood to rub whatever lay beneath the darkness. Isn't that supposed to be MY insignia? Why does it hurt to look at it? Feels like staring into the sun, but it's burning my insides as well as my eyes, not that he had ever stared into the sun, but Alex imagined that would feel just as bad as trying to decipher whatever meaning lay being the constructs insignia. The slow ache behind his eyes quickly faded as he focused on its other features, but the pain had reminded him of the pain he'd felt when he'd chosen his class, but far less agonizing. He felt his mana dip by a fraction and decided to end the skill; he had only used about a second's worth of mana, but as much as being unprepared would be tantamount to suicide, so would wasting the energy he used to fuel his skills.
Alex lifted the shard above his head, his arms extended but relaxed, in a state of violent calm. His skill’s creation stood several places ahead of him, its movements identical to his own as it too raised its sword overhead.
Alex swung. And so did his construct in perfect sync. He brought the shard down in a swift diagonal strike- a ‘Men’ strike, aiming for an imaginary opponent's head. It was a strike he employed often when ambushed, where you would wait for the right moment- when an opponent's guard dropped or they lost focus, even for a second. It's that key chance where the ‘Men’ strike would hit the head, when they're not ready to defend.
Alex’s arms blurred as he struck the air, the juvenile shard cracking in his hands under the strain of his enhanced movements. The shard sliced through the air, landing with a thud in the cave wall. The constructs arm blurred similarly some meters ahead, and sliced the tip of a large shard of cracked chitin clean off- Alex would've preferred to target the entire heap, but he could not afford to make such a large sound in the cavernous cave system, what if it attracted the swarm?
The construct faded as if it had never been there, distorted reality settling to normalcy in an instant.
And the girl was stock still, watching Alex with pure shock. He could see her mouth slightly Ajar by the slit in the webbing covering her entire face. Why hasn’t she taken it off of her face yet? I know it’s tricky, but that’s got to be annoying.
Sighing, he gestured to his only companion.
"Hey, you good?" He stepped closer to her crouched form. She had been inspecting the corpse of an Arachnae about as large as she was before Alex’s display had distracted her. Now, she broke pieces off the large corpses carapace and studied the chitin as if in a trance. “Yes.” She spoke a single word, her voice croaked and unused.
“Don’t worry, we’ll get you outta here,” Alex said. “Do you know if your family’s safe? You’re parents? Were they taken too?” She looked at Alex with utter bewilderment at his words as if he’d said something strange. Something alien, even.
“Uh…” Alex continued. “You know… your mom? Dad? The people that take care of you, keep you safe?” More confusion. “The reason you're alive? They were there when you were born?” At Alex’s more detailed description, her bewilderment intensified. She rocked her head as if in a daze. Must be the venom, Alex realized, he had experienced a similar daze moments ago, but his stats had quickly evened it out. Exasperated Alex continued. “You share their appearance? Their DN- uh, I mean, you share their ‘essence’, or something like that. Their blood? Your family? They take care of you? Do you know where they are?” She brightened at his words and what looked like a genuine smile could be seen beneath her wrappings, but she did not respond. Alex’s concern for the girl began to become tingled with pity. He sighed. She clearly couldn’t remember a thing. "What's your name?" He asked, as another more poignant thought occurred to him.
"M-My name? I…" she seemed lost in thought as if grasping at memories just out of her reach. "I'm not sure…"
Poor kid. Come to think of it, how is she still alive? What's her level? He wondered.
He studied her further. There's definitely something strange there, he decided. He was curious as to why she was bandaged in such a manor, but not to the point of action. Tearing the bandages off a younger girl seemed like something he could not bring himself to do without good reason. What if she was hideously scarred? Or held fresh and open wounds? Removing them would risk infection and almost guarantee her death. No- he couldn't do it, he decided. There was a chance she had already witnessed the horror of her townsfolk being consumed, and Alex did not want to traumatise her further. Still, he would have to keep an eye on her. If she was skilled, then the path to escape could go a little smoother.
"What's your leve—" Alex's words were interrupted by the sounds of soft groaning from the corner of the cave. The sounds were pained and muffled as if buried.
Human sounds.