[System Decay] Chapter 13: Pursuit (Patreon)

By the end of their training, Will was feeling a lot better about his chances.

Name: William Li-Brown

Level: Unformed 12

Race: Human

Class: None

Titles: [First Blood]

Attributes:

[Power]: Unformed 14

[Speed]: Unformed 15

[Affinity]: Unformed 20 (Bronze 10)

[Soul]: Unformed 10

[Resistance]: Bronze 0

[Perception]: Unformed 10

Unused Points: 0

As it turned out, leveling up through training alone was unlikely, but training stats? That was definitely doable. Soul leveled up slower than the physical stats, but that owed itself largely to the fact that there weren’t good targets for him to train on. Anything too corruption-focused was likely to violate the integrity of the safe zone, plus it threatened to do irreparable damage to Caiyeri.

Spells were harder to train when your entire arsenal focused around extraordinarily nasty effects. Who knew?

On top of all of that, mana potions had longer cooldowns than health and stamina.

That said, Will was not at all dissatisfied with what he’d received. He examined his Soul attribute, wondering if he should’ve picked something different.

“Nah,” he told himself. “No point in second-guessing now.”

#

Earlier, he’d spoken with the voice in the head and the clone elf lady about their next steps to deal with the oncoming onslaught of the goblin clans, already numb to how insane that sentence would’ve sounded to him outside the context of D&D only a few days ago.

“This tablet looks incredible,” he’d said, “but of the attributes I’ve got, only Affinity has an element bound to it, and I’m not sure if I want to fill up on my corruption options just yet.”

Helper: Assuming you select [Corruption] as one of your primary or secondary elements for your class selection, you will gain 2-3 more slots.

“That’s assuming he survives that far,” Caiyeri said. “He has better odds than before, but that doesn’t mean they’re good.”

“Exactly,” Will agreed. “I have an elemental gem as a quest reward that I can bind. I know you said to save it for later, but I’m starting to think that if I don’t open up my options right now, I won’t be able to open them up at all.”

Helper: Do not. You will regret not saving your gem in the future.

“That won’t matter if I don’t end up having a future.”

Helper: You can ensure your survival without wasting a gem. Do not use it.

“You know I don’t have to listen to you, right? You might’ve helped a lot more, but this is just transparently stupid from you. I didn’t go from a predetermined life path to this just so I could listen to more people tell me what to do.”

“I’m with the human,” Caiyeri said.

Will opened his quest tab and accepted the reward.

Reward: You have earned 1 element gem.

Choose the type of your reward. You may choose from the basic elements, including the following:

[Fire], [Water], [Metal], [Electricity], [Earth], [Air], [Poison], [Light], [Darkness], [Life], and [Death].

Will took some time to poke through the options. They weren’t all clear about what exactly they did, but the names were relatively self-explanatory. There were a few areas of note, though they were largely not because of the parts detailing what the element did but the descriptive text before—which Will was pretty sure by now wasn’t just there for flavor.

Element: [Poison]

Poison is a coward’s tool. Be wary of those who carry this element. [Poison] element users seek to win the war after losing the battle. A favorite element of Dread Executors.

Element: [Darkness]

A signature element of many Dread Executors not for its use, but for its intimidation factor. Commonly evolves into the [Fear] element.

Element: [Death]

“Hate makes you stronger.” - Dread Executor Nicoli IV, cycle 171.

Commonly known as the element of hatred, the [Death] element is banned or restricted in the supermajority of system-bound principalities. Do not select this element unless you can accept being at odds with a society of Users.

“Dread Executors,” Will read. “You know anything about them?”

“I haven’t spent much time outside these caves,” Caiyeri said. “The information I was allowed to see about them is limited, but you can think of them as… demigods, of a sort?”

“For some reason, I don’t feel immediately keen on trusting a bunch of super powerful beings that go around calling themselves ‘Dread Executors.’”

He was, however, rather interested in using their powers. Judging from the fact that these were the “basic” elements, it was already clear that there were a lot more of them than he could see right now, but if they were good enough for demigods, they certainly were for him.

All of these elements looked great for binding to his Soul attribute, but Fire, Poison, and Death just seemed to fit the bill best. Nothing Will got was going to help his defensive capabilities against an army—and besides, he greatly preferred dealing damage to taking it.

Of those three, Poison and Death looked more attractive thanks to their affiliation with the Dread Executors, whoever they were. Will spent some time deliberating between the two of those, then recalled his own experience with poison.

It was a painful death, but it was slow—in essence, even as an attacking element, he had a suspicion that it was going to lean heavily on damage over time. While it would be good to stack that with corruption, Will was fairly certain that corruption did the job better.

Right now, what he wanted was something immediate. An element that could supplement his reliance on items.

He selected Death.

#

The Dread Executor approached the planet. For five years, the cycle had been allowed to continue unmolested. For five years, they had readied themselves for war.

Today, he would put their preparations to the test.

#

After he’d had the vision, Helper had experienced an apparent change of heart.

Helper: Congratulations on affixing your new element.

“You were way against it earlier. What changed?”

Helper: I noticed that you were quite often simply following my suggestions. Not only will you not always have me, you also need to be aware that system entities—and companions, for that measure—will often misguide you out of incompetence or malice.

“Not sure I needed that.”

Helper: You did.

#

Will shook himself back to the present. What was done was done. There was no point in second-guessing his decisions when he was going to have to put them into practice in a matter of minutes.

They’d trained his new skills as much as they could, but they were still unformed. Will could see a progress indicator on his skills; the Space ones were over two-thirds of the way to bronze by the time they had to rest, while his new Death-bound skills were slightly under half.

He’d formed another tablet out of his awakening shards; combined with Caiyeri’s gift, that meant two new skills. Training had familiarized with them to some extent, but there was only so much he could do while locked up in a safe zone.

The two of them had gotten in enough sleep to feel rested, which put them at just under ten minutes until the safe zone expired.

“Ready?” Caiyeri asked.

“No,” Will replied. “But I don’t think we have a choice. Let’s go.”

They’d done all the preparation they could. Will had nearly emptied his credits purchasing potions and items. He had two new weapons ready to be used, though they weren’t as promising as the seven-shot six-shooter.

Caiyeri, too, had purchased a couple of items, complaining about the cost. Apparently Will had been benefiting from a tutorial discount.

Cleansing her amulet proved to be simple. He just took it and applied more corruption to it until it hit capacity, at which point it ejected that corruption onto its user, resetting itself and poisoning the user with chaos. Will, of course, was immune.

“Couldn’t you just hit someone else with this?” he asked. “Force them to take the corruption?”

“It needs time to adjust to the soul,” Caiyeri replied. “The goblins know what these are for. Elves have tried in the past. It rarely ends up working out. Corruption is a terrible way to go.”

Somewhere between Caiyeri resurrecting the poisoned Will and him clearing the corruption from her, they’d formed a sort of uneasy trust that went beyond just “you don’t kill me and I won’t kill you.”

For some reason, it felt more genuine than a lot of platonic relationships he’d had and all of the romantic ones.

Before they left, Will used a few of his remaining basic credits to buy a few more barrels of oil, a lighter, and some rope. He didn’t want to rely on the gun’s randomness this time, nor did he want to accidentally knock himself out. Caiyeri could have theoretically rigged it, but her Rigged Dice skill was more valuable applied elsewhere.

The plan was simple. Detonate, run, kill, survive. Caiyeri knew of an elven outpost a floor below them that had a teleporter. Neither of them knew if Will was going to be able to use it, but Caiyeri knew for a fact that she should be able to group up with the elves there, who would be able to send her back to her… boss?

“There are transporters in the intact outposts,” Caiyeri explained. “The one nearby won’t have one because the goblins destroy anything they can’t loot, those wastes of oxygen. They’ll be able to send you to an exit on the third floor.”

He hadn’t paid much attention to their surroundings on the way in by virtue of trying to survive, so he took a look as the two of them rolled barrel after barrel of oil into the clearing beyond.

This area of the caves looked more spacious than the cramped tunnels he’d entered the cave system from. There was vegetation along with the ubiquitous eerie vents. If Will hadn’t known that he was in an expansive cave system, he could have mistaken this grove for a strangely dark tropical area.

At least, that was the impression he got of it before they blew it to high heaven.

The second impression he got of the place was that they could have used this on the set of Apocalypse Now. All of the vegetation was dead or dying—or at least, Will assumed it was dying by virtue of being on fire.

“Go, go, go!”

Will had wondered whether or not these goblins would be dumb enough to set up an ambush the same way the previous clan had.

At least some part of them had.

Level up!

[Soul] advanced to Unformed 11!

Will put the two points into Soul. Affinity was maxed out at unformed rank, so he couldn’t put any more points in it—besides, his magic stat was what he needed right now.

[Soul]

- Bound to [Death]: You regain mana and health after killing a sapient being. You advance this attribute faster when you use a spell to kill. Your magic will be amplified in certain mental states.

There had been a fair few goblins staking out the area, though their group hadn’t been nearly as concentrated or weak as the first clan Will had run into. About a dozen goblins lay prone, burning up in the still-unextinguished flames.

They weren’t all dead, he realized. Since they had better equipment and generally looked stronger, they had better armor and skills than the others.

Will went around to the ones who were still alive, activating his new skill on them for practice. Even though they were technically able to move, the explosions had done enough damage to render most of them crippled enough that he easily outpaced them. He had more than enough time to line up a hit with the axe of despair and decapitate them.

[Chieftain’s Axe of Despair] inflicted a level of [Altrein’s Despair]!

[Chieftain’s Axe of Despair] inflicted a level of [Bleed]!

Using the item more seemed to increase the rate at which it inflicted its conditions, as well as its ease of use in Will’s hands. Whether that was simply because he was growing used to it or because the item was actually progressing, he wasn’t entirely sure, but he didn’t particularly care. Even if it was placebo, he was definitely using it more effectively now.

One of the goblins was coherent enough to scrabble back and speak. Will was readying his axe to finish this one off too when he started blabbering.

“H-human, I have no quarrel with you! This is the Carrion Lord’s doing! I can—“

“Numbers, locations, and weaknesses,” Caiyeri said brusquely, striding past Will and stomping down on the goblin’s sizzling chest armor. She didn’t seem to care that he was still actively on fire. Her boots shimmered with a faint protective glow.

The goblin screamed hoarsely.

“That’s not an answer.”

“Do all elves interrogate people like this?” Will asked curiously. “I feel like I should be more worried about… whatever you’re doing here.”

His real question at the moment was whether this would work, and that concerned him more than the actual interrogation itself. Will’s reaction should have been more intense, right? This was… inhumane, to say the least, yet the adrenaline running through him was overpowering any white-knight morality he might’ve had.

He cleared his mind. If he started double-guessing and overthinking everything, he was going to die. Will refused to fall into the same endless death spiral that he had in university. He’d made his bed, and he was damn well going to lie in it.

“Protocol is just a fancy word for what works,” Caiyeri said. “This works.”

She pressed down harder on her boot, making the goblin’s cries increase in intensity.

“We’ve definitely alerted all of this guy’s friends,” Will said.

“Numbers. Locations. Weaknesses.” Caiyeri’s glare could have melted steel. Will was glad she wasn’t turning that on him. “Now.”

“I—I’ll talk!” the goblin screeched.

That grin of hers was never going to get less unsettling, was it?

“Good.”

#

The only surprising part of the interrogation came at the end of it. Once Caiyeri finished extracting the information she wanted, she conjured a pale purple dagger and slit his throat with it.

“That’s a war crime,” Will said, raising an eyebrow.

“Not where I come from.”

“I guess the Geneva Convention doesn’t really apply when everyone can get death magic.”

“Geneva?” Caiyeri shook her head, wiping her blade off on the goblin’s armor. It didn’t get any cleaner. “That aside, I have to say that picking death magic was ambitious, especially when you haven’t used it yet. You’re going to have to hide that from the other elves.”

“You’re alright with it?”

“My options are you or fighting an army alone. You could eat babies and I would be alright with it.”

“That doesn’t give me much confidence.”

“Look, I have no problems with it. We’ll go over how to cloak your elements later. For now, we should use anything we have to survive.”

That was good enough for the time being. “Alright. Where to next, then?”

“They’re spread out enough that they’re going to be closing in on us,” Caiyeri said. “They’re going to try to flush us out with explosives and fire and seal off our entrances. No matter which way we go from here, we’ll be walking into an ambush.”

“Will it really be an ambush if we know it’s coming?”

“No. No, it won’t.”

Maybe Will hadn’t recovered from hitting his head earlier, because when Caiyeri’s chilling, evil smile split her face, he found a grin splitting his cheeks too.