Eduardo took them to one of the skyscrapers, and they entered the lobby. There was a receptionist at the desk, and upon seeing Eduardo and Sam enter, she rang a small bell on her desk. An elevator behind her slid open, and she went back to her work.
Eduardo strode forward, and Sam followed. They entered the elevator, which was too small for the others to fit in, with Rax having grown so much. As the elevator ascended, Sam took in the decorations within it. Frowning, he turned to Eduardo.
“What the hell are these?” Sam said, pointing at a poster of his face with a bright star hovering over it. Beneath the face read the words ‘Sam Atlas, the Arbiter of Justice’.
“Oh, that. Okita thought it would be good for morale, and a way to distract from slowly increasing taxes. There’s one for all of the captains. It’s part of some game or something, not that I knew the exact details. I believe that if you win, you have a chance to get some special gear.”
“So like a lottery? A portion of the tax money goes back into the community?”
“Yes, that’s about the gist of it.”
The doors slid open a moment later, and Sam stepped out into a brightly lit room. Other than the bright lighting, the thing that immediately came to mind was how untidy it was. Pieces of metal and plastic were strewn haphazardly around the room, and in the center, barely visible, a man sat at a desk. He was fiddling with some contraption in front of him, and did not notice their entry. Sam coughed once, and he looked up, revealing himself to be Thomas.
“Sam? It’s been a while since I’ve seen you. Where were you?”
“Ah, you know, exploring the world and fighting monsters. The usual stuff. From what I’ve heard, you’ve been quite busy as well.”
“Yeah, you wouldn’t believe just how hard it is to build a space program from the ground up. I have to calculate everything here, seeing as nobody else in the city knows anything about what I’m trying to do. Unless you can help me calculate the tangential path of a ten ton rocket going at Mach 12?” Upon seeing Sam’s bemused face, Thomas shook his head. “No? Too bad then. What did you come here for anyway?”
“Well, it's been quite some time since I saw you, and when I heard that you were working on something of this magnitude, I wanted to check in.”
“Oh, I see. How long has it been since I saw you last? A few days?”
“Uh, It’s been over a week. Just how interesting is that stuff you’re working on?”
“Very,” Thomas said, with a glint in his eyes.
"Well, I’ll leave you to it. Seems like you’re busy,” Sam said, backing out of the room with Eduardo in tow.
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Waving goodbye, he stepped into the elevator. As soon as they were out of earshot from Thomas, Sam sighed.
“Is he really the only person here with any sort of advanced scientific expertise?” Sam asked.
“Surprisingly enough, yes. There might be some more oncoming as the rest of the people in stasis emerge, but for now he’s it. Still, the amount of work he has been doing is nothing short of a miracle. All of that stuff you saw out there was based on his ideas.”
“Well, that explains why I hadn’t seen him for so long. Well, at least he’s alright.”
The elevator doors slid open, revealing the other waiting outside.
"Well? What happened in there?” Claude asked.
“I checked in on Thomas. He’s doing God’s work in there. That man is something else,” Sam said, still slightly in awe.
He might have been far stronger than Thomas, but the other man was much more intelligent, despite having, as far as Sam could tell, a lower Intelligence score. The roles of stats were complicated, and as far as Sam could tell, they were purely relative. That explained why large monsters were so durable, despite being of the same level as him. They might have had the same number of points in Constitution or Resilience, but each of those points were worth more. On the flip side, Dexterity gave them less of a bonus, and so did the mental stats.
Thomas had already been incredibly smart before the System had come, and after it had arrived, he had likely entered a level of intelligence beyond anything any human had ever felt. In fact, that might have been literally true, as not only was the man high leveled, there was barely anyone else on the planet at that moment.
“Sam? Sam!” Eduardo said, noticing that Sam had begun to drift off.
“Huh?” He said, startled. “Sorry. I was thinking about something. It isn't important.”
“I was just explaining to Eduardo the success of our quest. Lao will be quite pleased with his new weapon,” Claude said, filling Sam in.
“Oh, I almost forgot about that,” Sam replied, pulling the staff off his back. “Seeing that airport distracted me.”
Eduardo drew in close, and held out his hands.
“Can I?” He asked. Sam nodded, letting him take it from him. The man narrowed his eyes, clearly analyzing the weapon.
“Damn, this is a good weapon. Doesn't look like much, but the power it holds is immense. I almost feel jealous of Lao that he’s getting this. However, switching to a new weapon would hamper me, even if it is incredible.” The hungry look on Eduardo’s face perturbed Sam slightly, and he coughed. “What? I have just as many sins as the rest of you. It is how we deal with them that counts,” Eduardo said, drawing his eyes away from the weapon.
He then set his eyes on Sam's armor, raising an eyebrow. Sam sighed, and nodded before the other man could say anything.
“Yes, I know my armor is in quite the state at the moment., I was just considering whether to get it fixed now, or wait until after I had delivered the staff to Lao.”
“You should get it fixed now. Lao can wait a bit, and it would be better for appearances for you to have shining and pristine armor,” Eduardo said.
“Appearances?” Sam replied. “What, you’re my PR man now or something?”
Sam laughed as he said this. The idea that the concept of public relations would still be relevant after the apocalypse was amusing to Sam. That had only been used to cover up the traces of oily politicians and corrupt companies in the old world, but he supposed that the basic principles were the same. If the people thought that he was a worthy leader, they were far more likely to follow him than if not. Sam was powerful enough to rule by force, but there was no need to do so with the adoration of his people. There was a large dose of fear in there as well, but Sam was confident that it was not a hostile one. Sadly, the people cared a lot more about the appearances of their leader than the actual leader themselves.