The Gamer Chapter 1326 – The Country Gal Saving (Patreon)

American infrastructure was a blessing and a curse. There were roads everywhere, but why only a fraction of those roads were equipped with walkways was a very interesting question. Even more interesting was why some of them had attached paths that were only for bikes to use.

John was amused. He was frustrated. He was amustrated. Frustused – that one sounded wrong. It wasn’t every day he got to be annoyed with an object as mundane as a traffic light. Inside his head also bounced the question of whether he even needed to make haste. It could have been that he had to take the fastest route at all possible. It could also have been that he had to take the route that came most natural to him.

Gauging prophecies was like trying to grab a piece of eggshell that had dropped into the yolk.

John tried to unify the two aspects by looking at whatever shortest path he naturally could take. That did include jogging down the bicycle path. He was going faster than half of the people riding along it anyway. More importantly, this was America! If he wanted to sprint down the bicycle path, he had every damn right to!

Once he arrived in the pedestrian area of the city, he stopped and wheezed. With his current, mundane physique, two hours of running in twenty degrees weather did put a tax on him. He could do it, he was at peak performance for his weight class. Still, he was happy that this was the coldest day they had since getting there.

John only stopped to buy a bottle of water in one of the stores, then walked down the roads in the general direction of the city centre. As he tried to orient himself, he tapped the release button on his power inhibitor.

The effect was immediate. Gamer’s Body blew away the muscle fatigue. His body temperature was regulated by magical means, decreasing and then ending his sweating. One good breath and the oxygen pumped through him with incredible efficiency. Sense wise, nothing changed. Now, he had the necessary speed to react to what he had been able to perceive.

Attention lay primarily with his Barrier Sense. The second was his aura sight. He was looking for someone Abyssal or for someone about to enter that world. He had a couple of hours deciphering the meaning of the prophecy in whole. ‘Above the peak you would request’ sounded like John was about to get ludicrously lucky. When he had first considered the option for a Latebloomer, he had put that aside as too unreasonable. That was, however, exactly why that was above the peak he would request.

Whoever he found, she needed to be Abyssal. There was no joining his harem as a mundane, that would isolate her from the entire rest of his life. A Latebloomer was more likely in the current year than any other and they still made up less than 0,1% of the Abyss. Finding someone like that who also met John’s harem standards would have been immensely fortunate – on the same day he wanted to find a country girl no less. Even the power of prophecy should not have allowed such luck.

‘Well, when the game hands you a free win, you take it,’ John decided, jog-walking deeper into the city. He would have continued to run in general, but he had the feeling he would spend more time dodging people than pulling ahead.

A Latebloomer made sense due to the addition of the prophecy: ‘If you fail to find her, her parents waste away, alone.’ If this was a mundane to turn Abyssal, and if she was the only child in the household, then she was relied on for various things. Thus, her sudden disappearance would have her mundane parents suffer in grief and isolation. Abyssal parents were a bit more resistant to unexpected child loss, on the financial and emotional level.

‘I’m probably about to prevent a mana factory abduction – the irony of which is not lost on me,’ the Gamer thought. ‘History rhymes. I get found by a super sexy girl and rescued, now I will find and save a super sexy girl.’

At 150 metres range, his Barrier Sense was guaranteed to pick up whatever happened in the city. It was not large, only about 37’000 people lived there. If John was wrong about this being his target, the next city to check out would have been Tulsa. Was it crazy to even consider running even further? A bit. Lorelei’s visions being so accurate maintained most sanity. To those that knew what was going on, at least. If there was a social media story about ‘the man that ran from Braggs to Tulsa’, then they would all bet on a nice helping of meth.

‘Actually, the way I look, they might bet on cocaine,’ the Gamer reconsidered. ‘Not to blow my own horn too much, but I look too handsome and upper class for Meth, even if I am cosplaying a farmer.’ Even though he had changed shoes, the combination of square-pattern cotton shirt and work pants was still in keeping with the everyday work he currently did. Really, the shoes were entirely unfitting. Polished black looked odd next to cement stains.

John was in the middle of those considerations when his Barrier Sense picked something up. It stood out because it was the only thing that he had picked up so far. The Gamer had done the census in these areas himself in the time after he had struck a deal with the Order. He knew just how low the population numbers were. The entire member guild only had about 10’000 Abyssals in it – in an area that covered more than the mundane state of Oklahoma. A state that, for reference, had about 4 million inhabitants.

It was more appropriate to compare the number of Abyssals to the number of black bears in Oklahoma. That was about 2000, from what John had read. There were a mere five times as many Abyssals as black bears in an area about 1,5 to 2 times as large as the US state. The numbers really were exceedingly small.

Hence, any Illusion Barrier was an immediate clue that something was going on.

John sprinted down the road. 150 metres were not quickly bridged on mundane feet while getting through a crowd and navigating unfamiliar streets. The Gamer silently cussed when he ran into a chain link gate that warded off access through the back alley he wanted to cross. A couple of patrolling police officers dissuaded him from just climbing it. Instead, he had to run all the way around the building.

‘Video game powers are a hassle sometimes. If I was properly learned in Illusion Barriers, I could just create one large enough to layer on top and then force the melding. But no, I would need a Perk for that… bullshit.’ The Gamer would have thought that in a joking fashion, had it been a less tense situation.

The corner he finally arrived at was an unassuming part of the city. It was difficult to even call it the city centre. The only halfway notable structure nearby was a set of white-painted buildings and extensions that a sign called Crimson Steel Supply. In every direction, there were dozens of metres of heat-browned grass around.

John did not take any time to really take in the scenery. Raising his hand, he entered the Illusion Barrier. Immediately, he felt control of it switching to him. His high level in the Fateweaver Class let him sense that. His targets were probably clueless. To know what he knew, they would have had the kind of Fateweaver around that could have prevented John from entering for at least a little bit.

The commotion was easy to spot. Too easy, really. John arrived at the tail-end of an obvious kidnapping. Two rough looking men were wrangling a woman between them. There was no actual struggle. The woman was outmatched three times over. She was outnumbered, she was a mundane, and she was up against brawny men. Two absolutely identical brawny men. Both were two metres tall, built like boulders, bald, and wore tank tops. It was one of the many stereotypical looks of Abyssal villains John had gotten used to. The kind of person that thought they could muscle their way through life and, in the lawless society, had succeeded to some degree.

By nature, John was more interested in the female they were trying to abduct, but between them pinning her between them and stuffing her into some kind of bag, there was not much to see. Observe was therefore limited to those two. ‘Sibling Telepathy? Now that’s an interesting Innate Ability,’ the Gamer thought, reading through the details. ‘Level 41… yeah, this’ll be over quick.’

One of the men must have noticed the change in the environment. He did not turn his head quick enough to see John, before the Gamer teleported and then used the secondary teleport enabled by Skittersteps to get a few metres further and turn invisible. He repeated that one more time, then he was right behind one of the men.

“How about you let go of the lady?” the Gamer requested, putting a hand on the much taller man’s shoulder. He would have immediately ripped him back, had that not posed the risk of ripping whatever limb he was holding away with him. The differences in physical capacity here were so vastly different, he had to operate as if he was trying to keep an elephant from trampling a flower.

“Hee-eh?” the annoyed sound got stuck halfway in the ruffian’s throat. “John Newman?!” he croaked.

“WHAT?!” the second man screamed, raising his eyes from the woman. His arms stayed around her tanned wrists. That was about as much as John could see of her even this close.

“You heard your brother right,” John stated and peeked around the broad back. For no reason other than he could, he waved nonchalantly. “Do me the favour and drop her. It’ll be easier for all of us.”

John could see the communication flow between the brothers as vibrations in their magical connection. Both brothers had a second connection travelling outwards. A weaker one, yet regardless it existed. Following it made the Gamer turn his head halfway.

Then the man whose shoulder he was holding suddenly whirled around. A fist slammed into John’s face and the kidnapper screamed when his fist came to a violent stop. The silver, arcane light of Particle Skin receded as quickly as it had arrived. “Bad choice,” the Gamer stated drily and smacked the taller man’s face with the back of his hand.

Lacking the Stats to absorb the impact, the kidnapper was flung two metres from where he stood. Hitting the grass, his back disturbed the topsoil, until he came to a stop another metre later. “Don’t you move a muscle!” the second twin threatened.

His plan had been painstakingly obvious. Short of surrender, putting a hand on the woman’s face was his best option. One squeeze and it would crack like an egg. The man must have bet that he could make his threat a reality faster than John could move. The Gamer was not certain of that, but he wasn’t going to run the risk without exhausting other options first. Kicking the air, the woman tried her best to wind out of the grip. The other man groaned and shook his head, making a sluggish recovery.

“What, really, do you think will happen here?” John asked, one hand in his pockets. “You can’t leave without me letting you. We can stand here for hours.”

“Ye can’t do jack shit while we have her,” the man holding their victim threatened. “Let’s negotiate a nice deal where ye fook off and we- NAUGHTY LIL’ BI-“ The shout was followed by the woman visibly crunching down on one of the man’s fingers. The human jaw was quite the weapon. She fell short of chomping straight through, but even with their Stat difference she managed to penetrate skin.

John had not bet on that creating the opening he needed. Still, he reacted swiftly. Teleporting forwards, he blasted the man’s arm off with a point-blank Blast Ray. In a flash, he separated the detached, loose limb from the woman’s face. Before the spray of blood could touch her, the Gamer had pulled her several metres away.

“Sorry about that, I wanted to solve this more cleanly,” he apologized first.

The woman’s green eyes stared back at him, dark eyebrows raised. Their colour was mismatched with what of her frizzy, curly blonde hair stuck out underneath her blue trucker hat. Depicted on it was an olive branch crossed with a calumet peace pipe on a light brown, feather-adorned background. The word ‘Oklahoma’ fittingly was written underneath the state flag.

Fully unthreatened by the people around them, John backed off a little bit to get a better look at all of her. She had an incredibly attractive face. There were some traces of black machine oil that looked like she had only half-heartedly tried to wash them off. She looked like she tried to take good care of her tanned skin otherwise, but there were the occasional marks of impurities here and there. It did little to diminish her overall beauty. She had pleasingly symmetrical features, a nicely soft curve to her jaw, and a finely crafted nose. Her lips were of a brownish pink that stood out tremendously despite the lack of makeup.

Beauty wise, she was enough to turn heads. Figure wise, she would have made most men twist their spine to keep their field of vision on her. The US flag on her white shirt was pushed up tremendously by a pair of large breasts. Sweat from her struggle made the fabric stick closely to her, revealing a narrow midriff and the soft outline of muscles. She wore the same kind of worker’s pants as John did currently, but even they couldn’t hide the shapely nature of her long legs. An empty gun holster was attached to her hip. A magazine still stuck out of a pocket usually meant for screwdrivers.

The only thing visually displeasing about her was the blood staining her teeth. “When you don’ starin’, can ya start explainin’?!” Her drawl was heavily compromised by the haste with which she pressed out those words. She was remarkably calm, despite the situation. “Who’re these orn’ry pack of ruffians and how the blazin’ hells did ya just throw lightning at the guy?”

‘Oh my God, yesssss,’ John hissed in his thoughts, upon hearing her accent. That was everything he had wanted to go through his ears. The drawl, the intonation, the pronunciation, the way she tilted her head when she spoke, just a shortlist of what was uniquely intriguing about this.

‘Focus,’ Stirwin called him out, despite the distance.

‘Can I be American for five seconds? This is the kind of voice that boys storm beaches for,’ the Gamer complained to his pride watch. Even though that was his verbal response, physically he straightened up. “Explaining all of that would take a bit, let me take care of this first.”

The Gamer stared at one brother holding the detached arm to his twin’s shoulder and the other brother trying to exit the barrier. It was doubtful the wound could be closed that way. From their perspective, it was worth a shot.

Just like it was worth a shot to try and sneak up on John for that third brother. He must have lain in wait somewhere in the outskirts of the barrier. “Come on, you think basic invisibility works against me?” John asked. Effortlessly, he grabbed the hidden blade swinging for his neck. It came to an immediate stop.

The invisibility spell was disturbed, revealing to the country gal what John could already plainly see. The third brother was younger than the other two and not as built. In exchange, he still had a full head of brown hair. His own level was a ‘mere’ 21.

John twisted the weapon like a doorknob, forcing its wielder to let go. He inspected it for a moment, then tossed it away like the worthless piece of barely enchanted steel that it was. “Here is what will happen,” the Gamer told them. “You’ll wait a moment with me until Metra comes to pick you up.” If the kidnappers had been capable of getting any paler, they would have at the mention of the First of Wrath’s name. “If you do anything stupid before or during your transport, you’ll be executed on the spot.”

“Ain’t he bleeding out?” the country gal asked, pointing at the dismembered twin.

“Abyssals are made out of hardier stuff,” John told her and turned his attention to her. “Speaking of which, I guess this is where I tell you the basics of the world you have just been rudely introduced to.”

He squatted down in front of her.