Amazon Apocalypse: Chapter 18 (Patreon)

Most of the places where bathtubs and VR headsets should have sat were empty. These slots represented the newly-formed tether between the humans of Earth and the System. Its arrival had replaced whatever had filled this dimension previously or at least intercepted our souls from heading there. Had the System placed our real afterlives out of reach forever?

That was a scary thought.

Another scary thought was the idea that someone in this Dimension could just hack at the System controls around here and disconnect someone in the world below. I asked Lyra as much, and surprisingly she said it had happened before. System blackouts were rare, but not the end of the world. Most people gained stats slowly enough that their souls completely absorbed them, so they wouldn’t even notice any changes until they tried to access their stat menu.

For the people of Earth, though, that would be a much bigger problem. So Lyra was here to make sure everything was running smoothly. As some tiny town in the middle of nowhere with a modest population, we weren’t a particularly important station for her, but she took her job seriously.

She was also pretty interested in Earth culture before the integration, and moves, in particular, were quite interesting to her. I had to talk to her for quite a while before her duties finally came up again and she had to go.

Lyra was pleasant conversation, but I was pretty sure she’d try to stop me if she knew what I was planning to do.

The last thing she did before leaving to see to her duties was point out where Ben was. This run-down old arcade was far bigger than it should have been, much like the buildings on Earth. It actually blended together with an office complex that looked suspiciously like the one I’d been working out of over the past few years.

Had there been an arcade near our work? I wasn’t sure. Lyra said the exact location in this dimension shifted and changed all the time, but something still felt familiar about my surroundings, twisted by the System as they were.

Where was Sakura in this mess? Or Bridget? Or Caleb? Maybe I could give them some sort of boost from the other side. They might never know the angel on their shoulders was me walking the halls of this strange otherworldly plane, but here I was.

But since I had no way of figuring that out, I would just have to help them the hard way. In other words, by finding my way back to them.

Eventually, I found Ben.

It was hard to tell it was him. He’d been a broad-shouldered man with a clean-cut suit and a sharp look in his eyes in life. That had been his defining feature. But he wasn’t really himself anymore, just as I wasn’t really myself either. The two of us were hollow spirits, more translucent than alive. In fact, the only person here who resembled a living being was the reaper, Lyra.

Presumably, that form came with power and time spent absorbing those stat points, but neither of us was at that level now.

“Ben?” I called to the hazy outline of a figure sitting in a pool. He looked more like a faceless blob roughly in the shape of a man than a person. His hands were more like mittens, and his arms and legs were just tubes of energy. He was even less distinct than I was.

But he recognized me. His voice came to me like a chilly whisper that gradually grew clearer, just like I thought a ghost might sound.

“Carter... you... died...”

“Yeah, I did.”

“I’m... sorry...”

“It’s not your fault, Ben. Craig and I would have come to blows, eventually. I guess the smart thing to do would have been to pack our things and run, but who could have guessed Craig could recruit so many goons?” I shook my head. The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry.

We sat in shared silence for a moment, remembering the lives we’d lost.

“Have you spoken with that reaper? Lyra?”

Ben nodded.

“She mentioned that some people have been coming back to life through certain tricks. This whole system dimension isn’t as well built as it’s supposed to be. There are vulnerabilities to exploit. Possibilities, potentials, and tricks.”

“You... want to go back...” Ben said.

I nodded. “More than anything.”

Ben’s chest heaved. He looked up to meet my eyes. “How... can I help?”

I smiled. “I was hoping you’d ask that question.”

***

I helped Ben fix up his body a little so he could walk around. From there, we found all the others who’d died at Craig’s hands. Some had already passed on, souls harvested by the System to be placed elsewhere. Maybe they’d be given another shot at life, or maybe they’d have to live a few lives in the bodies of monsters. Lyra’s brief explanation wasn’t enough to say for sure.

But enough remained behind for my plans to work. If I wanted to restore myself to life, I’d need all their help. I started by helping them form their bodies well enough to speak. Apparently, Ben and I had been the only ones interesting enough for Lyra to come by and check out our achievements. The others hadn’t seen her and were still nothing more than blobs of soul stuck to VR consoles.

I told them what she’d told me. We were dead, and this was Purgatory. If we were headed to a real afterlife before, the System had other plans for our souls. I wasn’t sure what those plans were yet, but apparently, there were ways to make the System give you more beneficial reincarnations than before. It all felt a bit techno-buddist up to that point, but that was where things diverged.

Getting a better reincarnation in your next life didn’t seem to have much to do with being a good person. It was more about getting high achievements. For those who couldn’t do that, they could work for the System for a while, like Lyra did to win its favor by maintaining the place. Though being able to do that would require being able to form a proper body. Most of those we gathered and spoke to planned to choose that option, including Ben.

“So... you want to... steal our bathwater?” A ghost of a young woman asked. I was pretty sure I’d seen her body lying in a pile back in the real world.

“Don’t put it like that!” I protested. “And it isn’t bathwater! Ben, back me up here!”

“It admittedly does look like bathwater,” Ben said unhelpfully. He was speaking much more normally now that he’d had a bit of practice and had worked on his body a bit more.

“Look, all I need is a couple of stat points from each of you guys. That should be enough for me to come back to life. From there, all I need to do is kill something, and I’ll level up and get a class. Then I’ll be back in action,” I explained.

“But you’ll... avenge us?” the ghost of the young woman asked. “Kill... Craig?”

“I promise.”

“Cut... off his dick... choke him to death with it...” the ghost of the young woman continued.

“Uh, maybe not that part.”

What followed was a great deal of arguing. How much was the stat point bathwater worth? Should they give it to me? In life, many of these people had regarded me as something of a hero for bringing back food in their time of need. My reputation was actually surprisingly good among everyone here, not that it did much for me with all of them dead.

With Ben’s help and the fact that I shared the trick of turning the knob before each tub for a little trickle of extra power, I eventually convinced everyone to give me a cupful of what they had. In exchange, I made a few promises.

“I swear I’ll avenge all of you,” I promised.

“And check in on Margaret.” Ben made me promise. “Tell her I’m dead but not gone. I’ll be looking for a way to help her out on the other side. Maybe even join her again if I find a good body to snatch. Though I hope she understands that I don’t want to be a giant rat just to reunite with her a little sooner. Maybe a fox monster, though. She was really into that one time I got this costume, and I--“

I held up my hands. “I think you can handle that decision on your own. Good luck, Ben.”

“And you, Carter.” Ben shook my hand, which was a little awkward with our malformed spirit appendages. But it also felt a lot closer than a handshake in our old bodies would have been.

“I’ll try to keep Crownhill a nice place to come back to for all of you when you're able to. That and killing Craig are the only two promises I’ll make, but I’ll try and look after your loved ones as best I can.”

We scavenged a few cups to collect the stat point water. Most of the people were too weak to carry theirs over to my tub, but Ben and I managed it. Even though everyone had only given me a cup full, my tub was nearly full by the time I was sinking back into it.

“We’re going to want to make ourselves scarce,” Ben said. “Back to your tubs, everyone. If that Reaper girl comes by again, I’ll distract her for you, Carter.”

"Thanks. I don't know if she could stop what I'm trying to do, but she'll probably try."

Ben shrugged. "I don't know. She seems like a softie at heart. Maybe she's made herself scarce on purpose."

“Once I’m alive again, I should be beyond her reach either way,” I replied. “Thank you, everyone. I won’t forget this favor, and I hope we all meet again!”

Ben and the others waved me goodbye as I placed the helmet back on my face. At first, I saw the same message I’d seen when I was killed.

You have died!

View your achievements?

But then that abruptly shifted a moment later.

Error. Recalculating...

Health points above zero. Life signs detected. Re-calibrating soul...

The first thing I felt was a wave of agony. The pain was extreme to where it rivaled the excruciating feeling of the integration. Only this pain was a physical sensation. My mind was fine, but my body existed in a state of pure agony.

But that pain was good. It meant that I had a body, which was more than I had before. Now that I’d spent some time in just my soul, I could feel it as a distinct thing instead of the formless mass it had been before. The feeling of the Purgatory Dimension was already trying to slip out of my grasp, and the explicit details of the place were fading.

Perhaps a physical mind simply couldn’t hold on to the memories formed in that place. Or maybe I just needed a higher Intelligence stat. But I didn’t want to forget my promises, so I used them like a mantra to fight off the pain.

Kill Craig. Avenge the fallen. Make this a better place for when they return...

I repeated those words to myself over and over, and the pain continued to build. I was stiff, cold, and unmoving, but eventually, control over my body returned to me.

And what a body it was. I’d forgotten just how hard I’d been hit during that fight with Craig. How long had it been since then?

I had several missed notifications.

Blessed of the System has awarded you one new stat point in each attribute!

Your Regeneration Proficiency has increased to 4!

You have gained 1 point in Strength!

You have gained 4 points in Agility!

You have gained 3 points in Perception

You have gained 4 points in Vitality

You have gained 1 point in Intelligence

You have gained 4 points in Willpower

You have gained 5 points in Charisma

You have gained 3 points in Luck

It looked like the gifts I’d gotten from the others in the Purgatory dimension had given me somewhere between one and five stats in every point. That was twenty-six stat points total! In other words, six and a half levels worth of stats, with the boost in stats from my Blessed of the System title!

My power had surged by a tremendous degree. I remembered how painful a few points in any one stat were. Maybe some of this pain came from those stats and would vanish shortly?

I could hope, but I had my doubts. The more I surveyed the damage to my body, the worse off I felt. Healing this was going to take a lot of work.

Besides the boost in stats, I actually had a new title.

Death Defier (Legendary)

You have foiled death and returned to the world of the living after breathing your last breath! Far harder than being healed from the brink, your soul has seen the other side and returned.

20% Bonus to Willpower, Intelligence, and Charisma. All soul attacks have reduced effectiveness against you, and you have a greater affinity for soul magic.

The new title sounded amazing. Flat percentage bonuses with no strings attached seemed too good to be true. The only thing that convinced me it wasn’t a trick was the fact that I had to literally die to get this title. Between that and the fact that the System considered it something worth being called Legendary, it had to be an impressive skill.

But what drew my eye was the title immediately following it.

Attribute Redistribution Protocol (Legendary)

You have hacked the System and convinced other users to willingly give you their stat points. Under the right circumstances, you may be able to convince them to do the same here in the mortal world.

Grants the ability to steal levels from willing targets whose souls you are able to connect with.

The title claimed I now could steal stat points. I turned to the corpses around me and tried to think about the ability. Nothing happened, not even a System notification telling me I failed to activate it. Perhaps a cold corpse didn’t meet the requirements I needed.

I would have kept exploring that new title if it hadn’t been for the third legendary title waiting for me. I’d started excited, but as I read, my heart became wrapped in a vice of ice. This last title was no boon. It was a curse.

Death Curse (Unique)

You are someone who should have died and yet cheated death. The System does not tolerate cheating easily. You have been branded with a Death Curse. Until it is removed, strife will follow you wherever you go.

Your luck has been reduced by 666 stat points. As a result, monsters will be more likely to attack locations where you reside, and random system events will place you at an inherent disadvantage.

Defeating monsters will grant you no experience points.

Lyra had warned me something like this might happen. Now, I was cursed and cursed badly. I would be hunted by monsters, and the System itself would try to tilt the odds against me. Being hunted by monsters might not be the worst thing if it meant I was constantly gaining levels. Except the Death Curse also removed my ability to gain experience points from the levels. I’d constantly have to fight monsters who I wouldn’t benefit from killing at all!

That was bad. Very bad, considering part of my plan to deal with Craig had been to kill something, gain a class, and then fight him on equal footing. But I’d been stumped before I even began. How was I supposed to get my next level if killing monsters wouldn’t give me experience points?

The only saving grace was the fact that it looked like the Death Curse could be cured eventually. But what would I do until then?

I would have to figure something out. That was the only answer I could come up with. So I tabled those dire thoughts for later and focused on dealing with my current situation.

My stats were all horribly low, but my health points were the lowest. I still had a bunch of bullets in me, and they were afflicting me with a minor poison. It wasn’t as bad as Toxic Bite, but at this rate, I would still eventually die to them.

Fortunately, I had been prepared for this. I had mana to spare, and I immediately activated Mind Over Flesh to convert those mana points into health points. I’d have to keep that running constantly for the next few minutes.

Once that was done, I started going through my to-do list for coming back from the dead.

Arms and legs? Check.

Head still attached? Check.

Health points slowly going up? Check.

Any sounds of activity? Yes, but distant.

Where am I? Somewhere hard, metallic, and cold. It smelled like a combination of trash and blood. I was probably with the rest of the bodies, but the stuff underneath me... wait a minute. I knew that smell.

If it hadn’t been completely agonizing to sigh, I would have done so. Craig and his goons had thrown me in the dumpster.

I was in an extremely awkward position. Whoever had dumped me in here hadn’t been too keen on laying us to rest properly, and I was bent over backward on myself with both legs and one armed pinned behind me. I wasn’t too flexible and even after all those points in Agility I was no gymnast. If the rest of me wasn’t in agonizing pain, the position really would have hurt.

I struggled to right myself, though doing so aggravated a lot of my wounds and took chunks out of my health point pool. I had to take things slow and carefully. Craig was certain I was dead, and I planned to keep things that way until I was ready to fulfill my promise. And this time, I wouldn’t confront him until my stats were better than his. That was a mistake I didn’t plan to ever make again. But I could afford to be patient. My friends would have shown up in Purgatory if they’d died, and they weren’t dead yet. The danger for them had already passed since Craig would have killed them already if he was going to kill them at all.

That meant time was on my side. All I had to do was bide my time here until I was fully healed, and then I could--

One of the corpses sitting on top of me groaned. And not in a way that indicated they were still alive.

Zombie - Level 4

Ah, crap. Well, as long as I killed the thing before it started moving enough to attack me, I’d be alright.

You are in the presence of Undead Miasma!

You have been afflicted with [Low-Grade Death Curse].

If your health points reach zero, you will transform into a zombie.

Oh, come on!

+++

<Note>

So, in my original outline, I had intended Carter to come back to life through sheer grit/determination and the will to see his friends again. While writing, though, I found I wanted to change it to the last two chapters where Carter goes to Purgatory and finds a way to return that makes sense and isn’t reliant on him being more determined than all the other people who didn’t want to die. The fear mainly was that winning based on determination is a bit of a weak premise, even if it is often very awesome.

I’m not 100% settled on it yet, but I’m going to roll with this version and see how things go.

You guys seem to be fond of Lyra, which is nice. To be honest, she probably won't play much of a role in the story until book 3, but the changes had me introduce her early. We'll see her again eventually, though! Unfortunately she won't be joining the harem yet, since I don't have room for a fourth quite yet (Myrina, Sakura, and Bridget will probably max out book 1.)

Anyway, here are Carter’s stats. Now that I’ve finally broken down and given Carter a title that increases percentages, I’m probably going to swap over to doing this stuff on excel. It’s just getting too complicated for me to track on paper. I have no idea how well that is going to copy and paste over to Patreon though. This might be the last stat page you guys see for a bit.

Carter Smith (Human, Level 9. Rank F)

Attribute   Total

Strength   12

Agility   10

Perception

13 Vitality   16

Intelligence   28

Willpower   11

Charisma   11

Luck   4

Proficiency:

Caster: 6

Neutral Mana: 5

Improvised Weapons: 4

Rifle: 3

Pistol: 1

Regeneration: 4

Titles:

Forerunner of Earth, Integration Survivor, Chivalrous Pervert, Mechanical Master

Temporary Titles:

Blessed of the System (4 of 18 boosts), Hero of Sakura Miyamoto,

Skills and Spells:

Mind over Flesh (Uncommon)

Mana Bolt (Common)

Power Jump (Common)

Iron Will (Common)

Fabulous Phallus (Common)