Chapter 16 – Kick the Hive

“So, you’re telling me that some old lady lured you out into the woods and invited you into her house to give you a special gift but didn’t want anyone else to be there?” Tobias said as he bit into a chunk of grilled back strap.

“Well, when you put it like that it does sound weird.” Matt said while rotating the skewers around the fire. He had thankfully remembered enough from his time with his adoptive father to be able to dress out the stag he shot. The fresh meat was amazing with a little salt and pepper rubbed in before letting it cook over the open flame. “I don’t think you should call Tori old. She didn’t seem vain but why risk it with a god that other gods are afraid of.”

“Aight, fair point. This prime business sounds interesting though. Did she say any more about how it’s going to affect your skills and leveling?” Tobias asked after conceding to not insulting a divine being that could probably destroy the planet they were sitting on.

“She said something about records and that this blessing will be more to my benefit than to hers. Also, that it’s a long play. She has been watching us since Hal dimed on us and apparently, she likes what she sees.” Matt pulled a skewer away from the flames to let the meat rest a little. He saw the look on Tobias’ face and had to cut him off. “Not that way jackass.”

“If only she lobbed a scimitar at you from a pond…” muttered Tobias.

“Nice reference on multiple levels but I will have to wait and see. There were some allusions to other things going on in the Higher Plain, but she couldn’t say much about it. Turns out the System has some restrictions on what info gods can hand out.”

After Matt returned and he had hung the deer up to bleed for a while, everyone had sat down to go over details of the exchange. Matt had noticed that he could sense the blessing Tobias carried now that he had one of his own. Tobias, for his part also could sense it and for the first time they tried to identify each other. The results were lackluster, showing the race and level information but nothing more. Van returned a much different result when Tobias tried to use identify on the mech.

Construct – Threat level: High

They wondered about it for a while before an idea struck Matt in the form of Tobias throwing the book about piloting at him. It was said in the book that some Identify skills could give additional detail about other constructs, most only returned a threat level in relation to the identifier. Tobias theorized that the threat level was also on the scale of constructs and not in relation to their own ability. A sound deduction since Van could easily shred them both in a fight.

Matt had plans about that scenario. Constructs should have the same vulnerability as their counterparts back on earth. Dense vegetation and urban environments were the downfall to all armor unless properly supported. He had yet to meet any other beings on this world to flesh out that idea, but it was floating around in the back of his mind.

Van butted into the conversation suddenly. “Matt, this blessing, it affects both of us.”

“What do you mean?” Matt asked, now very curious about this blessing.

“I mean that I now carry it. I just inspected myself and have an exact copy of what you do. I think this might be due to us being soul bonded after my awakening.“ Van finished, giving some insight into why this was the case.

Tobias gave him a shrug while Matt thought about the bond and its strange properties. The feedback of emotions he got from Van was always present to some capacity and this blessing just added to his questions about how things work. The amplifying nature of the bond was still a worry, but Tori must know what she’s doing and that it would be a package deal. He would have to table the question for now and circle back to it when he next spoke with his patron.

“Well, should we do some testing of your shield and my hood?” Matt asked, not making any progress at wondering about System nonsense and soul magic. “I also got a little tip on what to upgrade with one of my tokens.”

Testing the shield was interesting if predictable. They started at low power by throwing things at it. Small rocks completely disappeared when hitting the void barrier and larger ones passed through but with most of their mass completely eaten away. At high power, there wasn’t anything that they could find that would make it through, anything throwable that is. By being absolutely reckless, they tested Matt’s rifle using both normal shot and imbued projectiles.

Why was what they were doing reckless? Well, it was breaking a fundamental rule of gun safety by pointing a gun at something he didn’t want to destroy. Tobias held the shield up and as far away as he could while crouching behind a rock while Matt shot at the edge farthest from him. They found that the imbued rounds could pass through at lower power but with more mana used to maintain it, they lost mass. They used the backdrop of the cliff to estimate impact and the imbued rounds that made it through only had a quarter of their normal energy on impact.

“I would say that is a very successful test.” Tobias said with Matt agreeing.” Let’s not test it on your tomahawk since it might severely damage it.”

“Agreed, I think we have proved that it’s going to stop almost anything that isn’t coated in plasma. Should we try out my cloak or upgrade my helmet first?”

They decided to test the hood first since they didn’t know what the helmet would do when upgraded and didn’t want to contaminate the results. The hood had a major obscuration of Matt’s information when identified. It completely obscured his information and gave no return for species or level, only showing a dash in both categories. Going a step further, he climbed into the mech and had Tobias test it again. No change this time, the hood only working on his person.

The camouflage feature seemed to work very well. Tobias would completely lose track of Matt when he held still but even when moving, there was a significant reduction in visibility. Tobias described it as the scenery moving more than something moving within the scenery. If Matt moved quickly, at a jog or run, the effect was much more localized, and it became clearer that something was there. A sprint completely negated the effect, and it looked like a brown-green blob rushed through the trees.

The testing so far had been pretty successful and shown the absolute overpowered nature of the rewards they had gotten. Matt brought out the upgrade token he had gotten from the loot chest and then held it up to his helmet. Nothing happened until he touched the edge of the token to his helmet causing a System Prompt to open.

Use Personal Equipment Enhancement Token (Epic) on Pilot Helmet, Powered, Set (Rare)

Naturally Matt accepted the prompt, his helmet and token vanishing from his hand for a moment before returning in a warm golden glow. Outwardly, the helmet looked to have remained the same, no changes to the appearance. Matt used identify on it.

Pilot Helmet, Powered, Set (Epic) (Upgradeable)

This helmet is the final piece to the Pilots armor and allows user access to the full benefits of the armor set. The helmet consists of hardened plates over an impact absorbing under layer. Comes equipped with communications equipment and vision adaptation for daylight, night vision (infrared) and thermal sources. Includes rear view and tactical overlay. Provides threat detection field. Provides enhancement to both Trait and Affinity. Provides real time recording and transmission of activities. Helmet uses Neural interface to function. Enchantments: Self repair, Enhanced comfort, Threat Detection

Armor Effects: +10% to all mental stats. Resistant to piercing attacks, slashing attacks, blunt attacks, chemical attacks, extreme weather.

Matt was beyond happy with the upgrade, some might even say ecstatic over the additions or at least most of them. Recordings wouldn’t be a massive advantage but could help with larger operations if they ever made it to a city. He held it out to Tobias to inspect and relayed the changed to Van over their mental link.

“That is quite the improvement.” Tobias said. “The threat detection field interest me. Does it sense movement or something else?”

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There was only one way to find out and Matt shoved the helmet back on his head, the interface booting up almost instantly. Overlaid into his display was a ghostly 3D representation of his surroundings, barely at the edge of his vision as projected through his interface. He turned around in a circle and noted not only how it moved but also the shape of Tobias filled in as a blue color.

“It’s a 3D projection and it looks like it accounts for our F.o.F. tags already.” Matt told Tobias as he walked around the camp site. “You and Van are highlighted as blue while everything else is a grey color.”

“What happens when we move, and you stay still?” Tobias asked as he got up and started walking around.

Matt had to think how to describe it. “When you are moving, it’s not exactly a perfect representation of you, more of a vague human shape. Van, can you move a bit too?”

The mech started circling around at the edge of the camp and Matt could see that its shape also distorted until it stopped for a few seconds. Having figured out how it worked, at least in practice, Matt decided to test the range and moved off into the wood line.

The display showed a general view of his surroundings for 100 meters, but only large, solid objects returned good results. Matt called Tobias to move into his range and say the same humanoid shape resolve in at the edge with a blue tint. When Matt stood still, When Matt stood still, the terrain sharpened in focus and Tobias’ figure became clearer. With another half hour spent acclimating to the new HUD, Matt returned to the mech and climbed in.

Matt had his suspicions when he climbed into the mech, but it was confirmed when he connected with it. His new threat detection field expanded to cover 500 meters, amplified by the sensors built into the construct. He was hoping it would be subject to the full 10X amplification, but it seems that there was still something holding that ability back. Hopping back out, Matt went into the cave to see how that affected the detection field. It was as expected, areas with solid walls were completely opaque.

Matt and Tobias spent the rest of the day testing their equipment and working on other endeavors. Tobias broke out his new modeling tool and Matt tested the capabilities of his aura and Mana blast with the new, upgraded helmet. The mana blast ability was impressive when Matt used it on foot but became devastating when used in the mech. The focused attack went from cutting a shallow groove into the rock wall to ripping a meter’s deep fissure into it. One noticeable change in the power was almost detrimental, the mana blast now had a noticeable recoil depending on the strength and how focused the arc was.

The next morning saw the trio moving through the forest again, closing in on the waypoint marker that had been both guiding and taunting them for days. There was still the denser undergrowth in this section of the forest, but the trees were growing larger again. Matt could feel a much denser level of what he assumed to be nature or plant mana; he hadn’t decided what to call it yet. Either way, it was probably the cause of the vines that he could feel tugging at the feet of the mech.

To prevent any total snags, Matt had readied the mech’s tomahawk in case he needed to cut his way out of the vines. The multi ton mech hadn’t had any issues so far but that didn’t mean it wouldn’t eventually. One curious thing had popped up over the last hundred meters and was starting to concern him. His threat detection field had returned faint red contacts at the far edges of his detection range.

“Hey, I’m getting faint contacts at the edge of the field, it’s all at ground level and only there for the briefest moments.” Matt told Tobias since Van was already aware of the situation.

“Anything concrete or do you think it could be false positives? We are moving pretty quick and haven’t completely figured out how it works.” Tobias asked before trying to make rational sense of the phenomena.

Matt stopped and started to scan with the various cameras in the mech, flipping through them and trying to spot anything that might be the cause. “I don’t know. It’s almost like it is picking up on terrain.” Not seeing anything, Matt started to advance again but the mech foot was stopped short as it tried to lift off the ground. “Oh, shit.” He identified the mass of vines that were around the mechs feet.

Choker Vine Hive. Level 30

The vines began to writhe up the legs of the mech and tighten, attempting to pull him toward the center of their mass. Matt could now see the outline of the creature or in this case creatures. There were 5 of them, almost evenly spaced around him and larger vines were rushing from them through the undergrowth. Deploying his Tomahawk, he ignited the blade with plasma and began to sweep it across the vines that were now beginning to climb up the mech’s legs, attempting to crush the armored plates.

After a couple swings, Matt wasn’t making much progress, so he decided to try another tactic. He used mana blast in a wide arc toward 3 of the incoming vines. The wave of superheated energy swept outward, incinerating the tangle around his feet, and colliding with the larger vines as around 50 meters. While he couldn’t see the effect with his eyes, Matt saw all 3 flinch back from the heat. He switched his attention to the other 2 incoming tendrils just in time to have both slam into the waist of the mech, almost knocking it over.

“Brace.” Was all Matt said before concentrating a narrower cone toward the tendrils that had hit him. Pushing a lot more mana into this blast, he released the ability. As the 45-degree arc shot toward the 2 vines, he was blasted in the opposite direction, toward one of the now retreating vines he had burned.

Matt decided to take the fight to the plant monster and traced the path of the vine back toward a gaping hole in the ground. There were other large vines surrounding it, but he ignored them as he charged in readying another mana blast. This one was narrow, and he tried to concentrate it downward into the pit, using his willpower to influence the ability. It worked, a lance of plasma rocketed along the ground, burning through everything in its way as it raced into the core of this vine monster.

The vines all around went slack, wilting like blanched spinach as the pit began to burn. A hissing echoed from the core of the plant monster as smoke billowed out of the hole. Matt didn’t stay to watch, pivoting and moving to where the next one was. His trip there was slowed by more vines trying to intercept him almost as if it knew what was about to happen. All the attempts to stop him were defeated by swings of the tomahawk that sliced right through, leaving smoking edges from where it had touched.

The second plant monster went down much like the first, a hissing plume of smoke and fire. As he pivoted to the next target, Matt found the large vines already in route for him. Before a mana blast could be fired off, the first of the 3 hit him in the chest armor. Matt stumbled as the second and third took him in the legs, wrapping tight and crushing the armor plates.

“Crushing damage to lower leg armor. Mobility has been reduced.” Van said over the cockpit speaker, likely for Tobias’ benefit since Matt could feel the feedback over his link.

“Here’s a test I didn’t think I would need to do.” Matt said as he prepared another overpowered mana blast. He released the skill again and was blasted backward. He barely stayed on his feet as the 2 vines turned to ash for several meters down their length. The last vine that had been the first to hit him came in again like a lance, aiming for the waist of the mech again.

Matt swept the tomahawk down from right to left, slightly cutting but mostly deflecting the tendril with the haft of the weapon. He took the chance and swung again, this time cutting off a large portion with the imbued edge of the blade. Matt took the opening made by the retreating vine and chased after the other 2. Closing in on the relatively close cores of the monsters, he prepped another focused mana blast.

Twice in quick succession, Matt used the skill. Igniting the first, he quickly pivoted and closed on the second, a line plasma released as he closed within 50 meters. With only one remaining, he turned to find the severed tendril of the last choker vine hive shooting toward him again, the severed stump having already begun to regrow. Dodging the attack, Matt rushed past and closed in on its core, not stopping the run until he was nearly on top of it.

The tendril had begun to rapidly retract into the opening, attempting to coil around the foot pads of the mech but Matt was ready and sent another mana blast right down the opening of the pit. The vine flailed in its death throws, knocking the mech flat on its back.

“Fuck!” shouted Tobias, clearly having been rattled from the sudden impact with the ground. “Good thing helmets exist, because the pad on this seat didn’t do shit to absorb that.”

Matt righted the mech, a shockingly easy process compared to the ones back on earth that had complicated righting procedures. He was able to roll onto his shoulder and push up off the ground, the arms more than strong enough to lift its bulk. “Everyone good?” He asked.

“Blunt impact and crush damage. Nothing major but we should repair it before moving on.” Van said. Matt could see the damage display and noted that this was the most severe they had gotten to this point.

“Lower leg armor had been fragmented in some places.” Matt said, reading the list off. “Abdominal armor is deformed, impinging on hip joints and reducing torso rotation.”

“So how did that feel?” Tobias asked, having been told that Matt could feel what the mech felt.

“Felt like I went 3 rounds with a muay Thai fighter.” Matt could say that with confidence since one of his instructors in the army had been one. Regardless, he started pushing mana into the self-repair feature of the armor, hoping to restore it quickly. He identified the remains of the vine monster while he waited and before he reviewed his notifications.

Choker Vine Hive. Level 30

This creature is a plant creature that has formed a hive with others of its species. It is a trap monster, lying dormant until prey stumbles into its net of webs. The others in the hive weave the vines into a net and use the primary tendrils to pull apart any prey before retrieving the larger portions for consumption.

Matt did not fancy being literally pulled apart and consumed, probably being slowly digested over a thousand years. A shiver ran down his spine and he decided to check his notifications.

You have killed Choker Vine. Level 30

You have killed Choker Vine. Level 30

There were 5 notifications, all for the same monster at the same level but missing the “Hive” part of the name. Matt figured that the hive aspect multiplied the danger of the monster since one wasn’t much of a threat to him. He wondered briefly how large the hives could become, was there a maximum limit or could they spread to cover entire countries? It would be a problem for a later as there was a more pressing message.

Class: Pilot – Skirmisher is level 25

Class evolution available

Evolve now? Y/N

Skill Selection Options Available