[System Decay] Chapter 48: Into the Breach (Patreon)

The plan was simple, but simple didn’t mean easy. Technically, getting to space was simple: you just had to break past the escape velocity of Earth. That feat had taken humanity some ten thousand years to manage.

Then again, Will had already been to space, so maybe he was being a bit too hasty on that front.

Caiyeri: You truly are a moron. This plan is awful.

Will: Thanks. Do you have any better ideas?

Caiyeri: No. We’re doing this.

They continued their game of cat and mouse, with Caiyeri taking the brunt of attention with colorful bursts of magic and occasional critical-hit Manabursts. Even if the kaiju’s bone-whips could deflect the magical missiles, the magic still counted as dealing damage, which restored much-needed power to Will through Soul Link.

Skill: [Mark for Death]

- Spell (affliction).

- Cost: moderate mana.

- Cooldown: 1 hour.

Bronze

Target any creature you can see or sense and mark them for death. During the next hour, the effectiveness of attacks and afflictions against the creature are increased, and you can track the creature through your minimap and through walls. This skill’s cooldown resets if the targeted creature dies.

[Soul Link] (bronze) - A fraction of all damage dealt to the marked creature is converted to healing for you.

The aspects of the Hunger infused into his aura were also a massive boon, giving him passive mana regeneration by stealing the gestalt’s stamina, but the sheer amount of power the kaiju had meant that the bronze-rank aura alone was not going to be enough to slow it down to a point where it would be significant as anything more than a source of mana regen.

For the time being, all they could do was preserve their skills as well as they could to run away from the kaiju.

It was adapting to their stratagem, though. Rather than just trying to run them down, it stayed in place for a bit, then fired a rain of bone spears that could tear through Will’s bronze and silver rank shielding like they were wet cardboard. The spears were horribly sharp and plentiful enough that simply running wasn’t going to let them escape.

Will activated Time in a Bottle as they fell, finding the perfect angle to squeeze himself into so that when time sped up again, one spear deflected off his adaptive shield, breaking it with its gold-rank power and costing him even more mana, while the others nearest him did nothing more than graze his back.

Before the bones were even done raining down upon the field, the kaiju moved. Any time it passed over its own spears, it simply absorbed them back into its body. Meanwhile, Will and Caiyeri were stuck navigating the labyrinth of spears sharpened on all sides with gold-rank strength, where one wrong move meant death. Caiyeri had survived the initial barrage with good positioning and judicious usage of her Emergency Shield skill, which Will was growing to realize was rather overpowered. It could almost always tank a single hit, even if it shattered immediately after.

The problem laid in the fact that the barrage hadn’t been meant to kill them, just delay and trap.

Will thought fast—extremely so. Time in a Bottle was growing riskier to use as his mana dipped into critical levels, but it was necessary here.

He identified positions quickly, then acted, letting time speed back up. As he did, he instructed the remaining intact parts of the Hunger Phantasm to move up ahead.

Weapons Free let him teleport to any weapon within the radius. Will wasn’t sure how the skill quantified that, but the spears definitely counted. He blinked over to Caiyeri, grabbing ahold of her arm.

“Hold on,” he warned, commanding pieces of the phantasm to coagulate into a dagger.

As soon as the skill came off cooldown, Will teleported again, landing them perilously close between two more spears. Then again. Then one more time, and they were free.

And Will was out of mana, which came with a debilitating headache. Even the amount he was restoring from the hunger aura wasn’t enough to make up for his overuse.

“Damn it,” he grunted, grabbing a silver-rank mana potion and downing it in a single sip.

Even at the peak of bronze, the silver-rank potion was high enough above him that it restored the entirety of his mana and then some in one go. It was an order of magnitude more effective than a bronze-rank potion would have been, which was critical when he needed all his skills available at any time.

He wasn’t going to be able to use any potions for quite a few minutes after this, but that was a price he was willing to pay.

There were ten minutes left on the clock.

Will and Caiyeri had gelled together from the start, no matter how little it seemed their personalities melded together. Though they were often snippy with each other, when it came to combat, they understood each other nearly perfectly. Quick communication and snap decisions kept them alive on a path orthogonal to the settlement.

Will: Lev, how’s it going?

Lev: Evacuation’s almost done. We’re leaving a skeleton crew behind, including me, but moving valuables is hard when not everything fits in an inventory.

Will: OK. Trying to get this son of a bitch out of here. You’ll know if it works.

Lev: Godspeed, friend.

Now that they had something resembling a plan, time couldn’t tick quickly enough. Every second seemed to stretch out into eternity, let alone the minutes. Will and Caiyeri couldn’t fall into an easy rhythm, either. The kaiju kept on adapting to their tactics, and they had to burn heavy mana every time it abruptly changed tacks.

And yet, they persisted. Ten minutes became nine, then eight, then six, then three, then one.

Tick. Tock.

They were within a couple hundred feet of the settlement now. When the kaiju rained bone spears down upon them, parts of Survivor Hill’s walls were included in the radius, and the stone crumpled under the barrage, as if it had been made of styrofoam.

With thirty seconds to go, Will messaged Caiyeri.

Will: We’ve made it this far. This ends now.

Caiyeri: One way or another.

They enacted their plan.

For the first time since they’d spotted the gold-rank kaiju on the horizon, they went on the offensive.

It was, as Will had thought, simple. Just a variation on a plan they’d done before, albeit a stupid one.

Will: On my go.

They were getting too close to the settlement. Will thought to the skeleton crew that Lev had said they’d left behind. Had anyone been hit by the bone spears? Would they be alive to see another day if they delayed another thirty seconds?

It didn’t matter. The kaiju had them where it wanted them. They just needed to prove that its understanding of their ability to get out of impossible situations was sorely lacking.

Twenty seconds. It was preparing for another rain of bones, and this one was going to land on the settlement for sure. They were way too close.

“Now!”

Caiyeri drew the seven-shooter. She’d fired six shots in an earlier distraction, but she had one big play left.

[Instant Death selected.]

The bullet was a streak of light connecting the tip of the revolver and the largest orb in the kaiju’s eye-system.

Critical hit!

The orb burst with a shower of black and red gore, and the monster roared, a guttural sound that chilled Will to the bone.

That wasn’t anywhere near close enough to take it down, he knew, but it was the best distraction he’d get.

Will took a certain object out of his inventory and fired a stealth arrow high in the sky.

Preoccupied with pain and the elf woman who had dealt it, the kaiju ignored Will teleporting upwards into the quieted arrow, making use of its momentum to get into an upwards glide. One of its tails absent-mindedly flicked at him, but it was such an afterthought that he was able to avoid it easily.

Will didn’t dare get close enough to touch the thing’s skin, but he was so near the kaiju’s head that he could see his reflection in the dark, orb-like eyes.

[7] seconds remaining.

He restructured the phantasm, giving him a temporary sinking platform to glide down on, and reared back as if to throw a baseball.

[5] seconds remaining.

Rather than the opening pitch at free ticket night at a college ball game, though, Will threw something decidedly less aerodynamic.

You are no longer a champion of [Elys, the Lake].

[Sigil Skill] removed: [Clear Water].

The disc-shaped token spun like the oversized coin it was. Even if it wasn’t designed to be hurled overhand, Will’s bronze-rank Power rivaled those of the best pitchers to ever take the plate.

It sank cleanly into the destroyed socket that had once held an eyeball.

[3] seconds remaining.

Blue energy coursed through the kaiju. Its other seven eyes shifted, and though there were no eyeballs, Will felt the crushing pressure as they all focused on him.

[2] seconds remaining.

“See you in the games, bitch.”

[1] second remaining.

Will let the phantasm drop.

The Trial of the Champion begins now.

And then he was somewhere else.

#

Entrants from [Midwestern American Region 3] by Sigil

[Kadael, the Hunger]:

William Li-Brown

[Sadareth, the Elven Mother]:

Nymlera Brooksoul

Thalia Brooksoul

Caiyeri Zero

Rowan Zero

Lystri Zero

Wilhelm Zero

Lya Zero

[Elys, Lady of the Lake]:

Unnamed Devouring Gestalt

[None, entering via Champion’s Pass]:

Caiyeri Seven

Varix Altaea

Lily Teneli

Gavin Griffin

Kenneth McCarthy

“This region,” said Dread Executor Azathoth, tenth of his name. “It is one to watch out for. An insignificant one, at first glance, but no region this small should be outputting so many entrants.”

“So it is,” mused Dread Executor Ramiel, first of his name. “It will be an interesting cycle indeed.”

“You created the boy,” Azathoth said. “The corruption wielder. He is unnatural.”

“He may be precisely what we need,” Ramiel suggested. “I had no hand in his creation, however. The Administrator decided that he was to live where he should have perished. Who am I to judge what our Lord demands?”

“He will not survive much longer,” Azathoth observed. “Not if he wants to get past gold rank, that is.”

“I suspect,” Ramiel said with a smile, “that the humans of this cycle may surprise you. They have done so before.”

#

“Ah,” Will said. “Here we are again, eh? Can’t seem to get away from you. I better not be missing out on the rules to the trials. I’ll be pissed if you fuck me over this late into the game.”

“We are on the same side,” the Hunger said begrudgingly. Unlike the last few times, he’d taken a physical form of Will’s side, though he still didn’t have any defining traits. “My advancement is tied to yours, now.”

“Fantastic. I notice you didn’t tell me I’m not missing anything.”

“You are not. This is a space of slowed time. I spent a considerable amount of my power to be allowed this conversation. You should be honored.”

“Consider me honored,” Will said in a tone so obviously sarcastic it surprised even him. Wow, I didn’t realize I could sound that done with life. “What did you want to tell me? Or are you here for one last bout of torture?”

“Nothing of the sort,” the Hunger said. “Lu Jie. Natalie Blurr. Osiris Adebayo. The Fangs. Many more I could name. All of them have sponsors in addition to passes or sigils. They will be higher rank than you. They will have better items than you.”

“If you came just to tell me that my odds are awful, then sorry, bud, you wasted your power. I don’t care what the odds are as long as they’re not zero. And maybe even not then, though I’d definitely think twice.”

That wasn’t entirely the truth, but it sounded right, and Will was in no mood to please the god who’d done his level best to torture him into insanity.

“You are frustrated with me,” the Hunger said. “That is understandable. Yet I am not here to beleaguer you but to assist you.”

“Heard that one before. What’s the catch?”

“The catch,” the Hunger said, no small amount of frustration slipping into his voice, “is that you have caught me already.”

Will gave the god his best shit-eating grin. “Oh. Right.”

“And,” the god said, sighing a very mortal-sounding sigh, “that means that you will receive my direct attentions. While other gods can delegate their responsibilites to their champions and trust that they will succeed, you are the only one I possess.”

“I don’t think you possess me,” Will said. “Sort of the other way around.”

He was genuinely impressed. He hadn’t thought the Hunger would have modeled teeth in his avatar, and yet here he was, grinding them against each other.

Will was enjoying this a little too much, but what was the point of life without a little fun?

“Let us skip over the rest of the information as well,” the Hunger hissed. “If you fail, I fail. Therefore, I wish for you not to fail. In doing so, there is a small boost I am permitted to give you. Not one that will raise you above all your competitors, but one that will put you on even ground.”

“Oh, now this I want to hear,” Will said, completely genuine. He still made it sound like he was trolling, of course.

“You will not need to hear. Experience.”

Abruptly, the room the Hunger had conjured faded away, replaced by another, sterile facility with white walls.

Power surged through Will, burning through his skin like the Hunger’s pain had, and he cursed the god for saddling him with yet another issue—and then it settled, and he realized that for once, the god had been speaking the truth.

He grinned.

“Hello world,” said William Li-Brown, sigil-holder of the Hunger, Reaper, and now freshly number 9 on the global leaderboard. “Let’s see what you’ve got for me.”

[Kadael, the Hunger], has blessed your arrival.

All attributes raised to a minimum of Bronze 10.

Advancing to silver rank…

Welcome to the Trial of the Champion.