The Being
The Being sat cross legged on a rock at the edge of a Verse not much unlike ours. The rock in question was one of the first rocks to coalesce in this Verse. As such it quickly approached the edge of this Verse, travelling at nearly the speed of light. It had long ago escaped the inevitable contraction that was currently beginning its ponderous retreat. The Laws of Physics being largely similar to The Beings origin Verse meant this rock had a good chance to pass through the Veil, that thin layer of reality that separated one Verse from another.
The Being was no stranger to traversing the Veil. He had been there when Mana was quantified and ordered by the System. He wasn’t arrogant enough to believe his Verse was the first to gain the blessings of the System, though he suspected it was one of the first thousand Verses to do so. The Being knew not how old it was, it perceived time differently than other sapient beings. It had long forgotten what its original form consisted of, travelling the Veil changed you to accommodate the Laws of the Verse you find yourself in. And it had travelled for a long, long time.
The Being reordered its thoughts with a deep breath that it released into the Void. It wasn’t sure how or why it did this, it just happened from time to time, though, being a God, the action was completely unnecessary. It also found it a bit amusing to wonder just what exactly The Being was breathing in. No subatomic particles existed this close the edge of the Veil. No specks of dust or matter save for those that occasionally drifted free from the rock whence he sat whenever he shifted. No gases or liquids existed out here. Only He and the rock existed, and the rock would have long since dissolved had it not been wrapped in his own aura.
He? I suppose that is accurate in this Verse. With that thought settled he quickly schooled himself and entered a meditative state. Peering across the Veil required a great amount of concentration, even for a being as powerful as he was. He braced himself as his mind spread across the varied scope of the Verses. Subconsciously his mind was searching for something. What that thing was he wasn’t sure. He just knew he would know it when he found it.
Though technically there was no medium in the void to transmit sound, a loud buzzing assaulted his ears and he clenched his teeth, pain being a rare thing, and wholly unexpected. When the buzzing noise died down to a manageable level he opened his mind’s eye to what his subconscious had honed in on.
What he found was a Verse that subtly reminded him of his origin Verse, the one he vaguely remembered being born in. As his view raced through this Verse, he noted how young it seemed. A large accretion disc churned at its edge, birthing new galaxies as it spread at the speed of light. And yet it seemed like long moments passed before he reached a resting point above an unassuming spiral galaxy. He studied the two large black holes near the Galaxy’s center then the insistent buzzing tugged his attention to look further into the Galaxy.
His vision spun through one of the outer spurs, diving through several stars of varying size, mass, and color before he stopped outside a rather generic system. Nine planets, five rocky, four Gaseous. Three of the Rocky planets sat in the star's habitable zones while only one held life on the surface. He sensed life on one of the watery moons of the system's largest gas giant, but the buzz focused on the blue-green marble its inhabitants referred to as Earth.
He paused a moment to taste the turbulent flows of Mana that bashed its way through the system in a way only one such as he could perceive. He was rather stunned at the purity of the Mana within this system and resolved to investigate further at another time. There were several sparks of power shining like beacons to the Beings acute senses. Two however demanded his attention, and they were both in roughly the same location.
He narrowed his view until it rested above a large, flat, and dry landscape of red rock that was sparsely dotted with scrub brush and scraggly trees. He saw where the wild and chaotic mana had started changing the landscape, raising specific land masses and increasing the flow of the local rivers. He suspected that within a year this dry landscape would be verdant plain. A large newly created settlement sat between two of the rivers, four tribes of former refugees supporting it.
His eye turned north of the city where he found the first Beacon that had disturbed his meditation. An average looking species of humanoid, female if the information was correct, commanded an eclectic party of adventurers against an overwhelming group of men riding large beasts. He watched the battle with an appraising eye that only a person who had fought an infinite number of battles over the past several eons were capable of. Young, still has a lot to learn, but she shows talent. Alyssa Nightraven, The First Challenger of Earth.
The Being considered her carefully then clicked his tongue in his mouth and his view rapidly shifted to reveal the brightest Beacon on this planet. He spat at what he saw, the particles drifting off into space around his real body and promptly annihilating themselves in the formless void.
Below him was a blasted and blackened landscape that reeked with the stench of death. He soon found his initial revulsion justified, within the confines of the ruined city below him it’s long dead inhabitants still stumbled about. The being glared at the loathsome creatures with unadulterated hatred, then the sound of battle drew his attention.
The Being watched as a large man and several others fought against what the Being considered to be the second worst type of creature to exist across the multiverse, Demons. He watched as the man fought fluidly through the pressing horde of damnable creatures. He swapped smoothly and fluidly through his weapons, both ranged and melee. The man’s axe skills were particularly interesting as they used the same patterns and forms his own father had taught him so many lifetimes ago.
Strange that a Beacon would call to me bearing the skills and abilities of my people, they are all dead. He muttered soundlessly into the void. He thought bitterly about how he was the last of his people to still draw breath, and further on how the System pillaged his people for their skills and abilities, inferring them on another.
He released another explosive breath to calm his emotional outburst and watched the man work. As he watched he felt that maybe it wasn’t such a bad thing the martial art of his people, even a small sampling, might live on in this man. Of course, it’s only prudent that I measure his worth myself. I suppose it’s time for me to return to an inhabited Verse and introduce myself to this... Karl Brunett, Merciless Reaper of the Foolish.
With that momentous decision made, The Being stood on his little rock in the Void and stretched. Then with a flick of his wrist, a tear in the fabric of reality between the Void and the outer atmosphere of Earth appeared. He pushed off his rock abruptly halting its momentum and leapt through the dimensional tear. The rock exploded behind him and was reduced to its individual atoms, which then ceased to exist altogether.
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The Being smiled as he accelerated through Earth’s atmosphere with a simple thought running through his mind. Who knows? This could be fun.
Karl Brunett
I stood over Courtney as she worked on returning Stephen and Carly to fighting condition. Carly’s eyes began to flutter and Courtney quickly pressed a hand to her shoulder and transferred healing energy that finally took hold and shocked the woman awake with a start. She rubbed the back of her head and grimaced, then looked up at me.
“Did we win?”
“Yeah, we got the bastard, Keeg and the hunters are checking the cages.” I responded and looked to Stephen who stared up at me with a bit of shame.
“Sorry boss, I thought I could get a big hit off.”
I chuckled at the young man as Courtney fussed about his wounds, “Well, you should probably work on your timing.”
He chuckled back and ducked his head, seeing that my two significantly wounded were recovering I marched over to where Keeg and the Hunters were currently opening cages and checking bodies. To the side were several people, both human and dark elf. Keeg was pulsing a slight healing aura to boost their natural regeneration as he tore doors off cages. Henry saw me coming and approached me to report their progress.
“We got a couple dozen people here, varying wounds. It’s bad, where we going to send them?” He waved his hand to the huddled mass of naked, abused and emaciated beings that were gradually gathering together. Every time Keeg removed a door the group would flinch and cast about furtive glances. They had been tortured and traumatized repeatedly over the last couple weeks, only their system enhanced healing kept them from perishing completely, though looking into some of those haunted eyes I suspected that some may have wished they didn’t survive.
I walked slowly over to the group, as soon as one saw me the others looked up in terror. Maybe adjusting my height wasn’t such a good thing after all? It could also be my passive aura, meh. Rather than say anything to the cowering group of people, I reached into my spatial inventory and produced two large boxes of MRE’s I had purchased before leaving Winslow. Then I produced a couple jugs of water and sat them all a short distance from them.
At first, they didn’t move, only stared. I took a few steps back towards Henry and finally a terrified dark elf woman mustered the courage to cautiously crawl forward, never removing her eyes from me, and snatched an MRE and a jug of water from the pile. As soon as she scooted back with her prize several others edged forward, grabbed more packages, and then the group was stumbling over each other to gain relief for their empty bellies.
“I’ll stay with them.” Albert said as he handed Henry the large .50 caliber sniper rifle and the few boxes of ammo he still held for it. “I’ll hold onto the commie gun” he said to me with a small smirk.
“You’re welcome.” I replied with an equal measure of sarcasm, then I let the smile I had been fighting form and went over to Keeg who was almost done checking cages.
“I’m about done here, these ones I think are gone.” He said without looking back at me.
I looked at the mutilated bodies in the cage for a long moment before speaking, “I’m sure you heard, but Albert is gonna post up with the survivors, stay here til we give the all clear. We need to move to the next store down the street as soon as Stephen’s ready to move.”
“Yeah, ok, I’ll join you in a moment.” Taking the hint that Keeg wanted a moment to himself I went back to the front of the torture room and checked on the others once again.
Keeg finished his preparations and returned to us with Henry in tow. We made our way back out of the building, keeping an eye out for stragglers, but finding none to assail us. Carly’s freezing aura returned and Stephen kept up, though he ambled forward with a slight limp. Eventually we found ourselves on the road that led to the Walmart on the left and the Home Depot further up, on the right. I never understood why you’d put two major chain stores so close to one another, but it didn’t matter anymore. The world had pretty much ended, and then was reborn in a strange way, and we currently had a task to complete.
We rounded a slight bend in the road and earned our first good look at the Walmart. Somewhere along the way the petrified maze of bodies gave way to a foreboding dark wood. Even though it was currently spring, the road we stood on was blanketed in fall leaves. A thick forest of evergreen bushes and leafy oaks and maples had sprung up to block the majority of the parking lot, leaving only a path wide enough to fit two cars. We walked up the misty path, all our senses turned outward for any sign of danger.
Considering that almost all Walmart’s had the same layout I was confident that this path was leading up to the Garden Center. As we walked the dark path, I suddenly noticed the multitude of tiny yellow eyes peering out at us from within the thick shrubbery. The slightest of movements drew my attention to a branch hanging over our heads where a large grey owl peered down at us imperiously. It tracked our movements as we progressed past it and soon other creatures made their presence known. It was all rather cliché to my mind, but nothing made any overtly hostile motion.
As I had previously suspected, we soon found ourself standing before the entrance to the Garden Center. Just as we were about to cross the threshold, a larger elk than I had ever seen strolled casually across our path. It looked at us curiously, then bounded off through the bushes, barely making a sound.
“Well, that was interesting.” Henry muttered as he watched the prize of a future hunt bound away into the oppressive darkness.
“What kind of demon turns it’s domain into storybook forest?” Courtney asked the question aloud that we were all probably wondering to ourselves.
Keeg looked about, a sharp look on his face and then closed his eyes to concentrate. After a few seconds he looked back at us, confusion coloring his face, “I only sense one very powerful supernatural being, but I don’t sense any malice.”
“Does the System make use of non-violent challenges?” I asked to no one in particular.
Keeg gave me a thoughtful look before responding, “There are many ways the System challenges us, though the truly cerebral challenges don’t come until it feels a population has been properly educated on just what is possible within its control.”
“So, you’re saying there’s a chance we don’t have to actually fight anything in here?”
Keeg smiled sourly, “A small chance. At the very least, your moral integrity may be challenged.”
“Well, good for me my moral integrity only applies to the things and people I care about.” I mumbled as I stepped past the gates towards the entrance of the store that was flanked by a pair of tiki torches, seemingly borrowed from the Garden Center’s stock. I made note that the area was also abundant with colorful flowers and bushes. The typical aluminum and glass sliding doors still stood in front of us and happily slid to the side as we approached.
We crossed the threshold of the entrance into a short dark hall lit by liberally placed candles and smelling of incense. Despite the fragrant, smokey sticks, another scent clung inside my nostrils as we attempted to look down the rather dark hall.
“Anyone else think it smells like...” Carly began and Courtney finished, “Sex!”
“Definitely smells like someone’s been fucking all day long and not bothered to clean up.” Stephen added with a slight blush.
“Smells like a Vietnamese whorehouse. The air is thick like one too, humid.” Henry added while cautiously leaning around a corner.
“Korean bars. The ones that charge too much for a Filipino chick to sit with you and sip pineapple juice.” I threw my own thoughts into the mix.
Keeg looked at all of us incredulously, “By Mork, I didn’t realize I travelled with a bunch of sexual deviants.”
We all laughed at the man, and the three youngest of our group blushed a bit at the dark elf’s accusation. Just as I was about to respond I sensed someone coming down the hall and brought my hand to the grip of the pistol on my hip. What turned the corner caused me to pause with the weapon half drawn.
“Ah, there you are! The Lady has been expecting you. Please, follow us.”
A woman and man rounded the corner to greet us, wearing nothing but a brown leather collar that radiated power. We all stared at the pair, speechless as the men in the party soaked up the view of the beautiful blonde woman who greeted us, and the women in turn eyed the well-hung dark-haired man that accompanied her. Well, that would start to explain the heavy scent of sex, wouldn’t it!?