In those early days, there had been so little coordination between the disparate groups of humans that the risk of assassins finding the humans had been low. It still occurred, but as the years passed, humanity had migrated into set areas where they could help each other as needed. That, and the beginning of established settlements, had ramped up the frequency of targeted strikes.
Then the massacre of the woolanda had begun. Forty kids had been executed. He read the chronological events in growing horror.
The moment he finished the section, Tom pushed the book aside and leapt to his feet. His mind was spinning at those words. The circumstances had been described, but it was the result that horrified him. To handle his emotions, he focused on actions and rearranged the spears to create a small tent. Even though the process was hampered by his uncoordinated body, it only took a couple of minutes to make. But that was with his adult mind driving the action. Tom was confident that anything that examined this room once he left would assume that he spent most of the two-hour session constructing it.
Yet, as he worked, his mind thought about what he had learned.
The assassin had been a native powerhouse with a rank of a hundred and ten. That, apparently was more than twice as much as any human in the camp. Combined with his class skills, fighting him was impossible, because what could you conceivably do against someone who was twice as strong, twice as fast, and twice as durable as you? They couldn’t fight something that powerful; besides, initially it didn’t reveal why it was there.
Then it killed the first child, and the five champions of the group had fought back. Five against one, they had thought they had a chance but the benefit of the higher-levelled skills and spells at the native’s disposal made all the difference. Skills grown for centuries were far more potent than ones worked on for only decades, and even if the humans had higher-tiered abilities, they couldn’t cross the attribute and experience gap.
The champions had been slaughtered. The native had then gathered up all the children and demanded the reincarnated person reveal themselves. It had promised to spare everyone else once the reincarnated ones were all killed.
There had been no volunteers. Then It started killing. It executed one child, re-cast the spell and then kept going. Another wave of parents had launched a counterattack when they saw their loved ones dying. This time more than forty adults participated, but the attribute gap between them and the native was even larger than what the champions had faced. They all died, and the assassin had ignored the survivors and returned to his task. It killed children one by one as it searched for what it was after.
In the end, over a third of the tribe and all but two children had been slaughtered. It was a mystery to the author as to why the reincarnated ones did not reveal themselves earlier.
Tom clenched his fists as he remembered that. Such cowardice, to refuse to volunteer - and it had achieved nothing! The tent was finished, and he looked back at the book.
How could someone reincarnated to a new life allow forty kids to die pointlessly once they knew resistance was futile? It made his blood boil. If Tom had been there, he would have volunteered after the five champions died, the moment it was obvious that there was no point in hiding. He would have ended things.
The book remained where he had left it, and, reluctantly Tom went over there to finish the history lesson. This was different than earth history and because of his experience it felt far more real. He could envisage himself in these situations, but there was no point putting his head in the sand and remaining unnecessarily ignorant.
He picked it up and continued his research.
A month later, the same alien had struck another group of nomads. The same process repeated, but the story had been spread on the auction house, and the adults in this group were weaker. They stood and watched and, once more, the reincarnated ones refused to reveal themselves. This time, only half of the children were slaughtered.
Two months after that, it located a much larger encampment. This settlement had almost a hundred fifty children. The adults were stronger and ready for it, but it came with ten of its companions. The newcomers had an average ranking of over ninety and it was clear that even if every adult sacrificed their lives, it would be pointless as they would all die.
They prepared to fight anyway.
Before they did, four children led by a twelve-year-old called Michael had walked up and surrendered.
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After they were killed, the assassins cast their spell and left.
Tears were running down Tom’s face. He couldn’t keep reading. He didn’t know if it was the Michael that he had been friends with. But if Michael had been there, that was exactly what he would have done.
Whoever it had been Tom sympathised. It was painful to imagine what must have been going through their heads. These were heroes who had been given another chance to make a difference, and for that Michael, after seven years of effort, while still being too young to have achieved anything of note, they had been forced to put their head on the chopping block. All because an unstoppable force, a native far beyond their power had come hunting.
“How were the other GODs allowed to get away with this?” he asked the air and wiped his cheeks. “How?” He shouted. There was, of course, no answer.
It was the same bullshit that had occurred with the resurrection of the dragon. He and the others had killed her fair and square, and then the game board had been flipped on them. He had always known that Existentia didn’t pretend to be fair, but that was too much.
An impossible-to-kill dragon being defeated by Clare’s brilliance, and then that getting stolen from them.
Impossible-to-defeat assassins butchering reincarnated kids with parents forced to give them up or be killed themselves.
What was next?
How would they cheat next?
His eyes dropped back to the book. He was sure this story had an ending. It probably wouldn’t be pretty, but the way children were centralised now meant that the problem that had hit Michael’s settlement had to have been dealt with.
Over the eight hours following the deaths of those four kids, human ranking points exploded. More points were gained in that brief period than humanity had compiled over the previous twenty years. When the tally stopped going up, humans’ total had increased by a hundred and ten percent.
Tom froze as he read that passage. Somehow, he knew to the core of his being that this was the GOD’s response to rule breaking. How did he know? He wasn’t sure, but he was certain, and it must have been related to his missing memories. It didn’t make any sense otherwise. Why would he know anything about GODs? From the memories he possessed, he had been very successful in many things, but ultimately he had just been a warrior, a pawn, and others had beaten the dragon. There were no interactions with GODs anywhere apart from witnessing the aftermath of Sven’s blasphemy.
It was a mystery that he couldn’t solve, so he lowered his eyes and kept reading.
Over a month passed until an explanation of the surge of ranking points was made available by one of DEUS’ priests. The woolanda, a known terror species, had been convicted of knowingly interfering with a competition species after receiving a formal warning. The account the priest gave did not make it clear whether it was DEUS directly or a champion of hers, but over that eight hours the woolanda as a species was eliminated. As compensation for the lost lives of their children, humans had been credited with ten percent of the ranking points associated with the elimination of a native sapient species.
The priest cautioned that the reincarnated ones were still not safe, but the other two species hunting them would ensure that they would no longer kill innocent children.
This forced restraint, combined with the new orphanage protocols and the town prayers, has greatly reduced the number of assassinations that have occurred.
In the thirty-five years since the extermination of the woolanda, it is believed that only five reincarnated children have been killed before reaching maturity. In all cases, their status as being reincarnated ones was widely known amongst the town population.
Tom put the book down and wiped the tears from his eyes. He did not know whether the reward humanity had got for the hundreds of dead children was worth it or not, but at least it was something.
An entire species destroyed for interfering with the competition.
Tom had known the GODS took it seriously, but that was heavy stuff.
Sitting on the ground, his thoughts roaring in his head, he shut his eyes and grimaced.
He could guess that, overall, this was great news and he should be celebrating it. However, he didn’t feel that way.
His safety had been purchased by the death of innocents. He wondered if the Michael mentioned in the chapter was the man he had known. Tom swallowed heavily and forced himself not to think too hard on it. Ultimately, he really didn’t want to know.
To distract himself, he glanced at the timer. It showed that there was less than fifteen minutes left before the doors would open. He was feeling fidgety, so, to calm himself, he pulled out his preferred spear and started training.
Now that he knew that doing so wouldn’t risk exposing him, he tried to go faster. It was still a struggle to force his body to move in the right ways, but he needed to build repetitions to get the Spear skill anyway, so he went through the effort. It wouldn’t become his focus until he developed some magic, but training now would help his efforts later.
As he fought, he once more used his new spell to heal the cut, trying to force it to extend its effects deeper. He could see that the attempt failed, and the bruise remained as dark as it had been earlier and when he poked the area, it hurt - more than a bruise of that size was supposed to.
With a sigh, he replaced the spear in the tent and went to the healing crystal in the corner. Its magic fixed the cut, bruise, sore muscles all of it. If someone or something checked the room after this, they would discover nothing. Instead, they would assume he had spent the time constructing a useless fort and building book towers… an action Little Ta had done many times before.
Tom nodded to himself. This was good. He eyed the shelves of reference books.
This was very, very good.
He was going to enjoy the forced isolation times.