KRILK

The planet of Windrush was a very windy place and the ocean called the Sea of Sail was a fast moving place. Krilk got the job as integrator on Windrush and spaceshifted there. The currents were strong, but that meant that the waters were muddy. Which for an aquatic integrator was rather excellent: Krilk was able to move to and fro well without risk of being discovered. Currently, the integration was in the initial, slow phase. Krilk was able to ensure that the new repository had its relays and ensured that initial skills were set up well. He normally would be the founder as well, but in this case, the system declared that the natives were allowed to found their own repositories. This worked surprisingly badly. There was only one repository and it didn’t grow as fast as Krilk expected a repository to grow after a lot of the essential skills were assembled, which made very little sense to the integrator. It was only when Krilk used magic relays of the Other System to investigate the status that Krilk felt more at ease and yet deeply frustrated: These people had to do random tasks and were not able to train their skills on a consistent basis. And the way they were all dragged in so many directions when doing such useless tasks, forced to fulfil contradicting requirements, unable to improve their skills or to gain new ones. They did not even have the emotional connection to their work that facilitates the creation of a new skill. It was utterly frustrating, it first seemed like a mental derangement to engage in these tasks, but Krilk realised that the engagement in these tasks seemed to be required for survival. It made no sense to the integrator unless it was designed to prevent people from levelling their skills just to survive… The sheer fact that there had been level ups for the repository at all was amazing.

Then, Krilk realised that there was a major mess up. Different magic flooded the relays. Something must have attempted to force out Solidarity. Krilk started to check the integrity of the repository with concern and with shivering flippers. To Krilk’s confusion, there was no damage. There was no erosion. There were no signs of tampering with the system of Solidarity. Every checksum checked out, every test tested well. Krilk was busy checking what the everloving frick just happened. He didn’t get closer though. He didn’t understand the situation at all. For someone who had a lot of experience with the integration of foreign worlds, this didn’t happen normally. Eventually, he used the relays, iffy as they might be, to look at what was happening. That was when Krilk was shocked: People in the towns looked much more unstable, people trying to use spells that failed. Some crushed under weights they seemingly were able to carry beforehand. The weird magic constrained the Other System, not Solidarity. But why?

SHIVERS-IN-SUNLIGHT

“I heard what you said! I am not going to condone that!” Shivers snarled at Rush who had just suggested a bad act.

Rush looked shocked. He looked at the scorpion-of-Tsanh as if he had forgotten xir to be around. “It was a joke! I don’t know if you have humour, but it is something with which humans bond.”

Shivers looked at Rush and xir stinger moved back and forth in a sign of aggression, even though the human was too far away to actually sting. “I know jokes. They are supposed to be funny. Like: Scampers-and-Burrows was waking up late one day. Jumps-for-Joy asks Scampers why he slept so long. Scampers said: ‘You know how there is a hole near the latrines for cooking waste?’ Jumps confirmed knowing. Scampers responded: ‘I do now!’”

Rush looked confused but his mouth twitched a bit at the punchline. “Okay, I have a bad sense of humour.” He paused for a moment before continuing, “and I guess my frustration about the situation here has made me frustrated. I have been under a lot of pressure lately: My family is giving me hell for not getting to level 10 first on this planet. And this group is our rival, so I said things that I shouldn’t have, just to let off steam.”

Xe could not read this human, but was willing to believe that he lied as well as he breathed. “This is Tsanh, the planet of creatures of Tsanh. You are not like us, you cannot exist here unless you have massive supplies of things like water, leaves, fruit and food from your lands. I do not understand why you insist on being here and trying to clear the dungeons.”

The human looked onto the ground for a moment before speaking: “We try to get first clears in order to get stat advantages. We go to freshly integrated worlds to get a better chance at getting a rare class. Most people of our main worlds do not get such a chance. Most people just get 2 class options at most. Here, we got 3 or even 4 different ones. And because most people do not get such a chance, there had been an absolute run for these positions. Our parents had to pay so much for the chance to go here. In addition, there is a chance to use initialisation patches to get better stats. Or more focussed stats. That also makes it more likely to get a better class.”

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Shivers stared at him: “But why? Is it so that there is an interchange between the people and the wider world? But then, why this constant competition that fosters unfair dealings?”

Rush looked at xir ponderously: “Shivers-in-Sunlight, you are a massive idealist, you know that, right? You think that the world is basically fair and that the integration is an advantage for all sides. It is not. Unless you are part of the richest ones, this system can be biassed against you. And if you are part of the richest elite, you either follow the path that has been laid out to you, or, like Skips, you end up being a failure.”

Shivers looked shocked: “To your people, Skips is… a… failure?”

Rush nodded: “Movement skills like hers are impressive on an empty planet like Tsanh, but they are almost useless on a planet where moving machines like the ones we are in are common. So, she would be considered a failure there.”

JAARU ANIIK

The contraption, which Jaaru pedalled angrily and as fast as her body allowed her to, creaked and moaned as it dodged the assault of drones. Some were armed with nets, some fired harpoons at the group and some had tasers. Init was able to switch off the taser drones via her skills, but more approached. Jaaru again changed direction, adjusting her own direction slightly, steering away from the city.

“The fuck are you doing‽” shouted Jiiti, “We are not flying towards the city anymore!”

Jaaru nodded: “Obviously not! The drones are more manoeuvrable than our contraption so I don’t want to be around buildings where they can use that to sneak up on us.” She pedalled for a moment, trying to evade a drone that was much faster than the others. “Also, I don’t want to fly over the city to prevent any drones falling on people!”

In that moment, a notification appeared in front of her and suddenly it felt like everything changed:

New Skill: Handling of mechanical planes (Level 1)

She felt no longer as if she was operating a device through a clunky, miserable set of pedals, wheels and levers but instead like she only needed to concentrate on where she wanted to go and her body translated the movements. It seemed as well that there was a change, the movement of the contraption was not as clunky as before but it seemed faster and smoother. The faster drone was suddenly reduced to a nuisance, no longer an immense threat. At the same time, as Jaaru dodged the constant assault of the drones, Jiiti asked: “Is there anything I can do to help?”

Jaaru nodded: “Can you reach out for me and take any kinds of skills from the repository that help here?”

Jaaru felt the weight of the contraption shift and, as she glanced backwards, she saw Jiiti kneeling on the seat, then slowly moving her body forward, to the left side of Init. Init held on to Jiiti and cussed: “This thing needs seatbelts! Jaaru, reach out a hand, Jiiti, grab the interception skill as soon as possible!”

Jaaru reached a hand backwards, was grabbed and then released. The contraption rocked and then she heard loud cursing. Jiiti and Init both. Jaaru could not look what was going on there but she realised that the two were not able to fight off the drones, so she focussed on her speed and on dodging the various attacks on keeping the thing in the air. She felt tired and anxious, her breath sped up and her pedalling shifted from a speed that she could maintain well over a longer time to a sprint speed that made her legs hurt, her feet hurt, her knees hurt and her eyes fill with tears, both from the exhaustion as well as the wind that was now blowing into her face with an absolutely painful intensity. She now raced over the city as she just needed to get to the vicinity of the warehouse and she had to get there somehow. That part was short and mostly crossed ruined and abandoned buildings. She pedalled fearfully and slowly descended. As she did, she shouted: “Solidarity, I am being pursued for the governor that was supposed to enforce certain protections in the treaty of integration of Windrush! I would deeply appreciate it if you could put its restrictions into the relays akin to how you established yourself there. I know you did because I gained skills outside of your area of effect. This will weaken Unlimited Potential and allow you to take over!”

She felt a sense of calm run over her. Then the orb twitched and then disintegrated.