Chapter 85: A Blob on a Surfboard (Patreon)

Logan had lofty expectations for Arsen’s trial. The man had built himself up with his talk of tutoring Asthea. He was older than the other guards, more experienced. Based on the scars scattered throughout his arms and hands, he must have been in battles. Either that, or a lot of fights.

He expected Arsen to ace his trial and lead his army to victory through innovative tactics that made Logan’s look pale in comparison.

And yet… that didn’t happen.

Arsen had picked the swamp just like Errol, but he’d lucked out with his army, choosing the same squishy blobs as Logan, only this time the System had assigned him the cheerful, glowing blobs rather than the evil army.

Asthea laughed when she saw them. “They’ll certainly be good at absorbing hits,” she said, her eyes twinkling.

“Those monsters must have swallowed ten roasts whole!” Errol said with a laugh.

“What are the fat things doing?” boomed Thorin.

Logan straightened and crossed his arms as a surge of protectiveness surged through him. His blob army was loyal to a fault, and he’d become fond of the squishy things. He’d much rather deal with blobs than centipedes who wanted to taste his blood. Besides, their physiology made them round and making fun of someone based on appearance had always gotten his blood running hot. “They’re following Arsen’s orders,” he snapped.

Thorin threw Logan a hooded glance. “What would you know of orders? Cheater,” he muttered. Then he sidled up to Errol and nudged him with an elbow. “What splinter got stuck in his paw?”

“Boys, we’re getting along, remember?” Asthea said, distracted, her gaze glued to Arsen.

Logan took a deep breath. Without being aware of it, he’d unintentionally blasted his aura at the others. Running a hand through his hair, he turned his back and tried to calm down. Adrenaline was still thrumming underneath his skin from his skill ring discovery and any minor thing could trigger an explosion.

What he needed was to kill something.

Logan snorted. Now he’d really lost it.

But no… he wanted to burst into his own trial, go to war and slaughter the hell out of some ‘good’ blobs.

He wanted a fight.

If the System had given him a skill that could control time, he’d be fast forwarding the clock.

He never thought he’d be that guy… killing things? It would have been unthinkable a week ago. But he’d learned that he was good at killing the hell out of shit, and sometimes, a man just needed to let go.

But he needed to wait for Arsen and Asthea to get through their trials first.

Logan gritted his teeth, chanted internally, patience, and then turned around and crossed his arms as he watched.

***

Ding!

[Calculating leaderboard score for user Arsen Silverdagger!]

[Calculating…]

[…]

[..]

[….]

[Score calculated!]

[Leadership: 2400/ Tactical Innovation: 3670/Strategy: 2500/Victory: 1.]

[Leaderboard updated!]

Trial Leaderboard

1.     Arsen Silverdagger - 8,571

2.     Errol Silverdagger – 7,501

3.     Thorin Silverdagger – 1,101

4.     …

5.     …

Logan held back a grin. He hated to think that he’d be someone who got pleasure from other people’s failure, but although Logan could respect Arsen for his loyalty to Asthea, that didn’t mean he had to like the man.

After all Arsen’s talk, he hadn’t even gotten close to the All-Time Leaderboard:                                                      

All-Time Leaderboard

1.     Agata Silverdagger – 9,812 Points

2.     Aleda Silverdagger – 9,810 Points

3.     Alfifa Silverdagger – 9,798 Points

4.     Arnfasta Silverdagger – 8,981 Points

5.     Erik Silverdagger – 8,972 Points

Plus, although the man had been less obnoxious since the dexterity trial, he’d acted so high and mighty and superior that it felt good to see him fail.

Logan felt a surge of excitement. He’d been committed to winning, but for the first time, he started to believe that it just might be possible. Logan could win this trial, win 25 extra levels, not to mention the levels he’d gain in the battle and any additional System rewards, and then get back to the real world.

Asthea’s wolf ears perked up in attention and her face glowed with pride. “Impressive,” she said with a soft smile.

Arsen shook his head, spraying water and mud. “This old man still knows a few tricks, hmm?” he said, preening.

“Those traps were smart,” said Errol. “What did you use as the paralyzing agent?”

“Noncalaznt venom. I was carrying around a bottle just in case.”

Logan gave them an incredulous look. As the enemy had waded through the swamp, Arsen had set off boomerang plank traps, the ends littered with nails and spikes dripping with orange gel. He could give him points for creativity, but a trap, planks, and the work he’d done with his own daggers? Logan didn’t see the ingenuity. And yet… the others were acting as if he’d excelled, and he was still in first place.

Were Logan’s expectations too high?

Arsen walked over to Asthea and straightened her fur cloak, adjusting it like a father dressing a daughter about to go out into the winter. “And now it’s the real test. After all the time we spent to prepare, all your study, all your practical applications, you’re finally going to war. Are you ready?”

Asthea sucked in a shaky breath. “I’ve been ready my whole life.”

Thorin and Errol growled, rumbles coming from deep within their chests. Wrapping a large arm around her shoulder, Thorin rustled Asthea’s hair affectionately and then stepped away. With a hum of encouragement, Errol slapped her on the back and pushed her towards the doorway.

“You’ll beat Agata!” said Thorin. “You’ll blow away her score!”

“You’ve got this!” said Errol.

Asthea clenched her fists, her mouth in a grim line of determination. “I’m prepared, I’m focused, I’ll push my body and army past its limits!”

Rushing for the doorway, her fur cloak flying behind her, she entered the battlefield arena and the room transformed.

***

Damn. Logan was Canadian; he was no stranger to the winter, but even he wouldn’t dare subzero weather in nothing but a pair of swim trunks. He remembered one winter when he’d rushed from the outdoor hot tub to dive into a snowbank on a dare, but that was when he was drunk.

He was starting to regret that he hadn’t drank any of that nonaonalic juice.

Shivering, he hunched his shoulders and then debated taking out his white shirt from his spatial collar, but the snow wasn’t falling to the point where the guards couldn’t see him. He didn’t know the capacity of a ‘garbage grade’ spatial storage device, but he didn’t want to risk it. Not when he was this close to finishing the trial without attempted murder.

That meant he’d have to make do with his armour. The sooner the better since his five o’clock shadow was already turning into an ice beard.

Removing a bucket of sand from his collar, Logan made quick work of moulding it to his body, assembling the full suit in less than a minute. It created an airtight barrier against the environment. It was still cold, but at least he wouldn’t freeze to death. Lastly, he took an extra second to reassemble his ice cleats, giving himself five spikes on each boot for a better grip.

Arsen and the other guards didn’t have the same problem. They were wearing heavy gear already, and their fine white body hair provided an extra cushion against the elements.

Logan looked around.

White snow, nothing but endless arctic hell. The snow was falling at a brisk, steady pace, and snowflakes clung to his arms and shoulders. The System had dropped them into a flat, narrow valley, pine trees surrounding them in a circle on the sides. The valley was as long as a football stadium, nothing but flat snow, an endless white blanket. Level ground. On the far side, about a mile away, he could make out the enemy. An enemy of lightening rock people.

As for Asthea…

She was badass.

Her fur cloak fluttered in the wind like a cape, her long silver hair flying behind her, her ears tilting from left to right as she strode up and down her gathered army. With her face covered in war paint, a crossbow that radiated the same aura as the chains slung over her shoulder, and her hands covered in those leather fingerless gloves… damn.

Logan wouldn’t like to meet her on the battlefield.

She had the same rock army as Thorin, but these ones seemed extra tall against her shorter stature. In a line, they leaned towards Asthea and paid rapt attention. A soldier the size of a silverback gorilla stood in front of the uniform rock army with four legs splayed like a giraffe as it leaned towards her. It tilted its face up at Asthea and smiled. “The commander returns!”

Pound, pound, pound, went the rock army’s legs, a thousand tons of rock shaking the earth and punching through the snow. “The commander returns!” they shouted.

Asthea’s ears twitched, tiny white tuffs of fur standing on end. “Brothers! Sisters! I’ve returned to lead you!” Striding down the line, snow falling around her, she scowled at her army, her expression determined. “Our battle is righteous! Our battle is just! I’ll lead you to paradise!”

Pound. Pound. Pound.

“I know you yearn for victory. I know you yearn to string up your enemies into rock necklaces and wear their rock guts as evidence of your prowess.”

Pound. Pound. Pound.

“Stick with me, brothers and sisters, and you’ll wear a thousand necklaces. You’ll tell your tale of victory to the universe!”

Pound. Pound. Pound.

“You have my love. You have my devotion. Do I have yours?”

Pound. Pound. Pound. This time the whole valley shook as they stamped the hell out of their arms, their legs—they might as well be bashing their heads into the ground for all the enthusiasm they threw at her.

Resting her hands on her hips, Asthea studied her army, her blue eyes shining with silver and glinting in the glare of the snow.

Damn. What had she done in the last 24 hours to make them this devoted? For the first time, a trickling of doubt started to eat into Logan’s confidence. His blobs had treated him with respect—with too much respect—but they hadn’t gone out of their way to hammer their bulbous heads into the dirt to show their support.

Asthea had the advantage here. The System gave out a score for leadership, and Logan suspected that the others had either excelled in this area or failed depending upon how well they’d managed to motivate their army. If Logan had any chance at beating Asthea’s score, he needed to work his own army into the same frenzy.

“The princess certainly picked a spot. A spot that’s making my balls freeze!” guffawed Errol.

Arsen hit him over the top of the head. “Shut up and watch.”

Asthea grabbed her crossbow, her fingers white knuckled. “Then, friends, let’s go to war!”

Pound. Pound. Pound.

Asthea turned with a swish of her cloak and then peered down at the rock with the giraffe limbs. “Rin, is everything prepared?”

The rock captain dipped its head, butt sticking straight up as its legs flailed. “All is as you commanded. The vanguard is ready; the reserve is in position.” The rock soldier’s legs twitched, slipping on the slick snow. “Do I have your leave?”

Asthea bit her lip, dark circles underneath her eyes making her look hollow. “Are you sure they’re ready to do this? You know what it’ll mean for them.”

“Blessed being, they’d grind their own bodies into rubble if it meant it would secure your victory. To take the choice away from them would devastate them. They’re ready, commander.”

Asthea gave a curt nod. “All right, tell them that they’re up.”

At first, Logan was confused, but then as fifteen massive rock soldiers with two chunky boulder legs and arms came pounding over, saluting as they passed, he couldn’t help but take in a shocked gasp. In the chest of each rock soldier was a hole, a hole the size of his biggest metal bucket. And inside each hole, was a pile of…

No, it couldn’t be.

Logan had never been around weapons before; in fact, before the encounter with the murderers in the cabin, he’d never even owned a gun. But even he knew what a bomb looked like.

Inside each of these soldiers’ chests were holes filled with bombs.

Was Asthea going to bomb her enemies?

That was her strategy?

But even as the fifteen soldiers began running down the valley towards the enemy, the lights on the bombs blinking as if counting down, Logan didn’t think it was that. She was too smart. Bombing her opponent wasn’t so much a tactic as it was a way to finish with a hell of a bang.

Next to him, Thorin shifted as he tried to get a better view. “Is that…?”

Arsen nodded. “Resourceful, hmm? I was wondering how she’d managed to blow through so much KarmaCoin. Now I have my answer.”

Logan narrowed his eyes. He didn’t like the sound of that. Asthea had mentioned that humanity would eventually get access to a System market, and if bombs were available for anyone to buy, that would be a hell of a way to massacre a group of people and obtain a massive XP boost.

As soon as the enemy rock army got sight of the fifteen soldiers streaming towards them, they let out a tremendous shout and lightening crackled through the sky. Pounding the ground, they launched into a slow walk, then a jog, and then a sprint. Over a hundred of the things at once, all pouring into the clearing and charging towards Asthea’s vanguard.

They’d been used as bait.

Asthea was sacrificing them.

“Rin, signal the reserve to hold.”

The rock captain flailed its legs and nodded its head at another soldier on the sidelines. The other soldier bashed his two boulder fists together in agreement and then grabbed a plank. At the end of the plank was a blue piece of fabric that he waved into the air.

A signal flag.

Squinting his eyes through the falling snow, Logan strained to see. Far away, on the sides of the valley, he could just make out additional rock soldiers, a group on both the left and right.

Huh.

There was something else at work here other than bombs.

As the enemy burst into the valley like a swarm, the fifteen soldiers didn’t bother trying to fight, they ran past, ignoring the lightening that whipped their bodies, their divot eyes full of determination. No two soldiers ran together—they were all spaced apart, covering a wide area.

Logan looked from the battlefield to Asthea. She was mumbling something underneath her breath, and at first, he didn’t know what, but then he realized she was counting.

Counting to detonation.

BOOM.

BOOM.

BOOM.

One after another, the bombs exploded. They tore their hosts to pieces, taking the enemy’s limbs with them, but that wasn’t their purpose.

Logan had forgotten that the System had given them three battlefield choices. The third one hadn’t been to fight in a frozen valley.

It had been to fight on a frozen lake.

The snow was so heavy that it had covered the surface of the ice. Hiding it. Everyone was standing on a frozen lake. Even Logan. It was all around them.

And Asthea had just made the terrain into a hazard. Already taking the weight of thousands of tons of rock, now, the holes in the ice weakened the surface, creating cracks that multiplied like cobwebs.

One after another, the lightening soldiers sank, sank so deep that the water covered them whole, their heavy bodies shooting to the bottom like anchors.

It acted as a multiplying effect.

Soldiers scrambled to get away from the broken holes created by the bombs, bunching together and creating a massive amount of weight, which broke yet more holes in the ice until they were standing on a slushie that sucked them down.

“Rin, it’s time,” said Asthea.

The rock captain flailed his legs and signaled to the flag bearer again who waved his flag at the reserve soldiers in a sharp motion.

They’d been kept back to mop up any soldiers that managed to escape the ice.

After that, it took a half an hour at best.

Asthea had won.

And half her army were still standing behind her, smug in their victory.

***

As Asthea materialized in the white room holding her large serpent egg with a huge smile, her dimples showing, eyes glowing with pleasure, the others exploded in excitement.

“All bow to our new clan leader,” said Thorin with a theatrical dip of his head.

“That’s what I’m talking about!” said Errol, pumping his fist.

“I’m proud of you, girl.” Arsen grinned. “Let’s see how you did!”

Asthea held the egg and looked to the ceiling. “System, I’ve captured the egg.”

Ding!

[Calculating leaderboard score for user Asthea Silverdagger!]

[Calculating…]

[…]

[..]

[….]

[Score calculated!]

[Leadership: 3050/ Tactical Innovation: 4050/Strategy: 2707/Victory: 1.]

[Leaderboard updated!]

Trial Leaderboard

1.     Asthea Silverdagger – 9,808

2.     Arsen Silverdagger – 8,571

3.     Errol Silverdagger – 7,501

4.     Thorin Silverdagger -1,101

5.     …

All-Time Leaderboard

1.     Agata Silverdagger – 9,812 Points

2.     Aleda Silverdagger – 9,810 Points

3.     Asthea Silverdagger – 9,808

4.     Alfifa Silverdagger – 9,798 Points

5.     Arnfasta Silverdagger – 8,981 Points

Logan expected that Asthea would receive a high score after that performance, but he hadn’t expected her to do that well. She’d managed to place in the All-Time Leaderboard, kicking the last male off the board entirely.

Now, it was nothing but clan leaders.

The Silverdagger Clan reigned supreme.

Shit. Logan might have his work cut out for him. He’d been feeling confident after Arsen’s performance, but Asthea had hit it out of the park. She’d managed to win by being smart, win without even half of her resources. However, she’d had a huge advantage.

Bombs.

Logan had never been one to begrudge someone for their win, but after the others had complained of him being a trickster and a cheater just for using the skills the System had given him, he couldn’t help but see the irony of Asthea winning due to a heavy-duty System purchase.

If the System took that into consideration, he might have a chance to beat her score if he won using only what was provided—the planks, hay, and tar.

And tactics.

Never forget the tactics.

But most importantly, Logan felt one overarching emotion. Relief. Relief because this was almost over. Get through this last battle and win or lose, Logan was going home. Back to Ernie, back to Lara and the kids. Back to humanity.

And best of all, he could use it as an opportunity to kill the hell out of some shit.

With a savage grin, Logan ignored the chatter of the guards who were still gushing over Asthea and rushed towards the doorway.

Ding!

[Transfer to battlefield arena in progress!]

>----Go to chapter 86.