Tier 3+ - Accidental Champion - Chapter 89 - The System Is Not Your Friend, Xavier (Patreon)

Xavier stared, expectantly, at the bartender—caretaker, or whatever the hell Sam, AKA Samericalian, actually was—waiting for him to answer all of his questions. Or, at least some of them.

Sam pulled up a stool on the other side of the bar and slid up onto it. He plopped his elbows onto the bar and let out a sigh. “A sector is…” He waved his hand in a circle. “A very, very big area of space. Containing a huge number of interconnected planets.”

“Like a galaxy?” Xavier asked with a frown.

Sam pointed at him. “Exactly like a galaxy. Though some sectors technically span more than one galaxy, that’s very rare—travelling between sectors is…” He shrugged. “Prohibitively expensive, unless you’re a part of the zero, point, zero zero zero one percent.”

“That’s… a fair amount of zeroes.”

“Indeed it is.”

Xavier looked down at the Sector Travel Key, held in his left hand. “But this lets me travel withina sector? Again, while that sounds awesome, how does that help me?” His forehead creased. “Is this how the invaders were able to come to my world? Using keys like this?”

Sam shook his head. “They would have used other means.” He stared off toward the other Champions populating the tavern’s tables. “The other four worlds participating in this instance of the tower are all from the same sector as your own world.”

Xavier pursed his lips together. “While that makes sense… isn’t our world integrated differently? Because interlopers travelled there, instigating the System’s take over?” He tilted his head to the side. “Wouldn’t the system have integrated our planet long ago if it was already in the same sector?”

“Do you know how large this galaxy is, Xavier?”

Xavier, who’d read a fair number of sci-fi novels in his time, clicked his fingers. “About one hundred thousand light years!”

The bartender blinked, leaning back a little. He muttered, light years, then appeared to do some mental calculations. “Yes,” he said, somewhat begrudgingly. “About that large.” He paused. “But is that something you’re able to comprehend?”

Xavier lowered his head, looking into his whiskey glass, thinking about all the things possible in science fiction—wormholes, FTL drives—all the things humans of Earth had imagined that could make interstellar space travel into a “reality.” Because otherwise, travelling across the galaxy—even if you could get a ship to travel near the speed of light, which would kill a normal human unless they were somehow protected—would simply take far too long. At least, far too long for a normal human’s lifespan.

Finally, he sighed. “No. I suppose it’s not.”

“Parts of this galaxy have been integrated into the System for many thousands of years. But the System is still crawling through the stars, integrating one planet after another. We’re still… a relatively young sector, when using the metrics of the Greater Universe at large.”

Xavier nodded. He supposed he could understand that. It made him wonder about a million things. Like how, exactly, the System was able to… do all that it could, but that was no doubt a question someone such as him could never answer.

Figuring out how all this works will probably only serve to explode my brain. Whether it runs on magic, science, or some twisted amalgamation of the two, it’s my new reality now.

“All right, so, I’m guessing travelling around the sector is incredibly expensive?” Xavier still couldn’t help but remember that portal opening, the goblins coming through. Why spend so much coin on something like that?

“It is, and that key lets you do it for free. Which is why it’s so damned valuable.”

“And the fact it only works once per year doesn’t make it any lessvaluable?” Xavier was trying not to show his impatience. The man was actually talking to him, freely giving him information. He didn’t want to sound ungrateful—or cause this conversation to end abruptly.

Sam leant more heavily on the bar. “I can understand where you’re coming from. Barely any time has passed since your world was integrated, and you’ve been moving so damned fast through the floors. For you, there is a lotthat will happen in quite a short period of time. Like… the invasion of your world, for instance, and whether or not other forces are able to gain a foothold there, or whether you’ll be able to ally with other, stronger forces in the sector who can help protect Earth.”

Xavier perked up, sitting straight on his stool. “That… that’s something possible?”

“Indeed. Not easy, but possible. But certainly not something you’d be able to do at this stage—not without a very high cost…” Sam waved a hand. “What I mean to say is, you’re seeing things on a very small timeline because of what you’re going through. When in a crisis, a day can feel like a week, a month a year.”

Xavier thought on that. He supposed the man was true. He’d been through the Covid pandemic, and that had felt like it had gone on for far more years than it had. What he’d been experiencing lately? It was a crisis on a far, far larger scale, and every hour had counted. Though not many days had passed, it felt like this had been going on forever.

“So in the grand scheme, a year really isn’t very long,” he muttered.

“If you progress through the different Grades, it is not only your power that will grow. Your lifespan will grow as well, far more than you would have ever expected it to.” Sam gave a small smile. “Assuming you don’t go and get yourself killed, of course.”

Xavier’s eyes grew wide. He’d expected something like this, even thought of it as a foregone conclusion, but he hadn’t thought past each day, each floor. Past returning to Earth, not even knowing what he would find there. “How could I…” Xavier swallowed. “Will I become immortal?”

“Effectively. Assuming you live long enough to reach the higher grades… there could, potentially, be no end to how long you can live. But…” Sam looked down at the bar, his voice turning melancholy. “There are Denizens in the Greater Universe who have stalled their development. Whether they have lived for hundreds of years, thousands, and some—though none in our sector—even for millions, many of them hit a wall that stops them from going any further. And if they hit a wall in their development before reaching the very peak, one day, they will die. There are some old monsters out there who ruled entire sectors before their eventual demise.”

Xavier took a deep breath. He was… struggling to take all of this in. The scope of it all was a little overwhelming. He’d been having trouble contemplating a year passing, and here Sam was talking of centuries, millennia, longer…

Even so, he clutched his Sector Travel Key tight in his hand. He’d be lying if he said he didn’t want to see what his sector—his galaxy—had too offer, but he didn’t even know what the other worlds apart of his instance of the Tower of Champions were called, let alone anywhere else out there in the black.

“And travelling around the sector will help me?”

Sam bit his lower lip. “It will. There will be opportunities out there that simply aren’t available on your world, or even in the tower. There will be items and equipment that cannot be bought in the System Shop. There will be manuals on advancing through to the next Grade. And far, far more…

“But none of this will benefit you yet. You’re nowhere near ready to leave your little world. It would be far too dangerous for you to venture away from it, especially while you’re still in F Grade.” He frowned. “There’s a reason the System doesn’t usually give those out until the later floors. Stepping out into the Greater Universe…” He looked away. “Unless you have friends out there, it’s likely to get you killed.”

“Friends?” Xavier muttered. “And how, exactly, do I make friends?” He gestured up, trying to point to the universe. “I mean, how do I make friends out there?”

Xavier was still reeling from the fact that he might, one day, become immortal. Or at least live for hundreds—if not thousands—of years.

He’d often thought about what life might be like if he were immortal. In a normal human lifespan, there is only so much one person can do. Only so much they can accomplish. Xavier wanted to become a writer. And not just any writer.

He had dreams of mastering the craft. Of toiling at his passion for decades upon decades, until his prose and the characters and worlds he created were as vibrant and real as the ones in his favourite novels, and the stories he told drew people in, immersing them fully, forcing them to keep turning the page.

But to live for centuries? Millennia? How many things would he get to master? How many things would he get to experience?

That was, of course, assuming Denizens got any down time in the Greater Universe, which he found hard to imagine, considering all he’d been doing since Earth had been integrated…

Sam smiled. “There are things I can tell you, and there are things I can’t. But… the other worlds that are a part of your instance, there will come a time when you get to interact with them. They may not feel like people who you can make alliances with, especially considering—”

The bartender’s mouth kept moving, but no sound came out. After a second, he clutched his neck, as though it were sore. He opened his mouth, working his jaw in a circle.

“Sorry about that, I almost said something I wasn’t supposed to.” Sam’s gaze flicked to the ceiling. “I’m honestly surprised that hasn’t happened already. The System is allowing me to tell you far more than it usually would, considering you’ve only cleared four floors of the tower.”

Xavier lowered his head. They would be able to interact with the Champions from other, already integrated worlds? How would they be interacting with them?

Considering all the System had put him and the others through, Xavier got the idea that they wouldn’t simply be meeting in a nice quiet tavern, chatting over a drink.

He looked down at the key again. “If the System doesn’t give these out until the later floors, then why do I have one?” Xavier vividly remembered feeling like nothing more than a speck of dust under the gaze of that presence. The one he’d felt after clearing the fourth floor. Like he was an ant and what looked down at him was… a supernova.

Something an ant could never hope to even comprehend.

He’d felt strong. Powerful. He’d just ranked number 1 on the top 100 ladder for a floor.

But… he knew that his feeling of strength was deceptive. He was still but a child. As galling as it felt being told that it was too dangerous for him to use this key yet, he knew it to be true.

He felt overpowered, and maybe he was. For his level. But that didn’t mean he was powerful—it only meant he hadn’t yet seen what true power was.

“I don’t know how you have that key,” Sam said. “You… you shouldn’t have it.”

“Could the System be trying to tell me something? Trying to help me?”

Sam laughed. He put his head in his hands, and he laughed. “The System is not your friend, Xavier. Whatever help you might think it gives you…” He shook his head, sighed. “It just wants conflict.” He cocked his head to the side. “Why do you think you had to face one of your fellow Champions when you signed up to come to the tower? Because the System was helping you?” A bit of venom seeped into the man’s voice. Something Xavier hadn’t heard from him before, and he had to say he was quite surprised by it.

Xavier supposed the man was right. The System’s actions hadn’t exactly been benevolent. It forced people to fight. Forced him to fight.

He shut his eyes. Now was the time to decide how much he should or shouldn’t tell Sam. The man had been helpful—going so far as to almost tell him too much—but did that mean Xavier could trust him?

“Is it possible that… a Denizen…” Xavier’s forehead creased, trying to find the words. “If they were powerful enough… might influence what happens inside the Tower of Champions?”

Sam pushed off the bar and stood straight. “Why would you ask something like that?”

Here goes nothing…

“Because I think I’m being watched.” Xavier placed the Sector Travel Key on the bar with a small click. “And I think that’s why I got this key.”