Chapter 127—Small Steps

Momentarily, Tom was suspended in emptiness before he was deposited into the new arena. He did so with a splash as he landed amidst what could only be described as a flood. There were dark clouds in the sky but no rain, yet the entire landscape was covered with water that went up to his knees.

It was unpleasant, but he, of course didn’t care about that. His mind was already focused on searching for a terrain advantage. The whole arena surface was submerged with a weak current going from left to right, which is something he could have used if he was poison aspected but given he had no skills in that area that slight current wasn’t going to change a thing. Possibly ducking under the surface of the water might provide protection against Corrine’s fire attacks, but he doubted it. One, her flames were hot, and secondly it wasn’t quite deep enough. 

Cautiously, he moved his feet to check the invisible surface, which was covered by the muddy water. The ground was firm underfoot, and he wished he had his Sense Earth spell from his previous life. That would have allowed him to map the terrain and avoid any hidden potholes.  

The arena, while initially a positive for him, really wasn’t that favourable. There was no way to negate any of Corrine’s strengths.

The countdown had already started, and he wondered if there were any outlandish tactics which would allow him to win. Without the attribute advantage, he couldn’t see how this was ending favourably. He was going to be slaughtered.

He studied the water once more. Maybe, just maybe, he could use it as a vector to deliver a stunning strike. There was a chance she would be vulnerable to an attack conveyed like that, while more traditional missile-based strikes like Lightning Bolt would be blocked. It would be high risk to try, but in a straight out battle he had no chance anyway, so it was definitely worth attempting.

Three, Two, One.

The moment the restrictions stopping him from moving dissipated he activated his spells. Corrine, he realised to his annoyance was not focusing on him so there was no bonus increase in his attributes which could have helped him. This was the problem of fighting someone who knew your strengths. The catch up of attributes provided by his trait also increased his mana, but Bursts, which he wasn’t going to use in training only improved his regeneration rate. She had made it so that he was limited to his base mana and free spells. He wanted to curse her, but there was nothing he could do. All was fair in these fights.

Tom knew running was pointless until he cast so the spell so he bent his knees to be ready to leap in any direction while he focused magic. A ball of fire materialised in front of Corrine and once his two Lightning Javelins were prepared, he launched them at her with his next steps dependent on their success. He was prepared to follow up with both direct and indirect attacks via the water table if he pierced her shields.

The fire ball glowed in reaction to his attack and wisps of fire shot out and intercepted his own spells. It was like they had hit a solid, metal enhanced wall. Both of them exploded pointlessly in the air.

His heart sank. She had developed a point defence system that nullified his major avenue of attack. He didn’t even know what else to do. Possibly his only choice was too close to melee range because none of his other magic would be able to get through her shielding.

He froze just before charging.

Corrine was clutching her belly while laughing. “Your face. So precious. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone look so crushed.”

Tom straightened. “That’s a nice new spell.” he temporised to buy time while his mind searched for a solution to circumvent the new defence that was perfect for nullifying his javelin trick. The only option was to hit her directly with his spear and he wouldn’t survive getting that close. “A very good spell. It gives me no chance.” He acknowledged.

“True. But even without this.” She waved her hands, and the flames vanished. “You still don’t have a chance. And that’s even with a favourable arena.” She kicked hard and the spray went everywhere. Some droplets splattered onto his face where he stood over ten metres from her. “I asked for something that would favour you but this.” She shook her head. “Nope. It’s fucking terrible. Can I reset?”

He nodded, the world vanished, and emptiness surrounded him for only a moment and then he found himself in a ruined city. He glanced around curiously. The buildings were evenly split between shattered and fully intact. It looked like some titans had fought over the ruins and done significant damage while doing so. The ones stepped on were rubble, while the others were undamaged.

The broken city wasn’t the product of human design. The doors only came up to Tom’s chest and at his current age he was short. It would be a more exotic species, but the easiest way to think of this place was that it was sized for gnomes or halflings.

Corrine glanced around and pointed at the closest intact house. “Come on, we can sit on the roof and chat.”

“Really? You don’t intend to kill me a few times first? Squish me like a bug.”

She shook her head. “Of course not. I wanted to see your expression when you saw the active missile defence and that was worth it. Beyond that nope. I just want to chat.”

“Seriously, you’re choosing not to fight?”

“If you could give me a challenge, it would be different. And even if you’re an annoying shit sometimes I have no desire to murder you. Dueling you would be like kicking a puppy.”

“Thanks.” He kicked the ground. “At least I think it’s thanks. It’s good being called a puppy. Isn’t it?”

She chuckled, but didn’t answer the question. Instead, she put her hands flat on the roof; it was awkward for her because it was shoulder height but by going slightly onto her tiptoes she could manage it. Then, with a slight jump and pushing with her arms she lifted herself enough that with a quick pivot she was able to put her bum on the roof with her legs dangling down.

She then offered him a hand, which gratefully accepted. There was no way he would have been able to get up so elegantly without her aid. Scrambling up should have been possible, but his body was weak so he might not have made it. After all, the roof was well above his head’s height.

The roof was still in good condition. When it was constructed, earth magic had clearly been used because there were no signs of any joins or blocks of stone. It was like it had been carved from a single, massive boulder. At least that’s what someone on Earth would have assumed.

Tom knew better.

“This is nice.”

“Yeah, I like the breeze.”

“And the sun.” she agreed. “Listen, I want to thank you for telling me about the darkhole trial.”

“There’s no need.”

“I know, but I wanted to anyway. It was lucrative.”

“Did you get a title for being the first single person to beat it.?” He asked, knowing that because, the trial, could only be run once, that it was now safe to discuss associated titles.

She nodded happily. “Yep. It gave me your burst ability and a title to allow me to set up a chat with anyone. Only two minutes but it’ll help a lot when I’m out fighting real monsters.”

Tom whistled in appreciation. “That’s good. Better than what we got. It’s the same concept, but mine only applies to the four of us and only lasts a minute.”

“Four a day is superior to my once every twenty-four hours. But I guess it’s only powerful if you stay together.”

Tom nodded. “It’s useless if I strike out on my own.”

She looked at him curiously. “You’re not planning on that are you?”

He shrugged. “Will they be able to keep up? In eight years time, are they going to be adventures or crafters?”

“Kang will.” Corrine said finally. “He’s going to fight, and he’ll probably be able to keep up with you.”

Tom grunted in response. Kang might be great but Known Heretic and his precognition affinity were difference makers. It meant that even someone slightly more talented than him would be left behind.

“You can keep pace with him at least. It just means you’ll have to prioritise buying high tier teleports instead of class levels.”

“At some point, my advantages will be too much.”

“Who fucking cares? When you’re rank hundred, yes, you’re right everything will change, but that’s a long fucking way away.”

“Still, if it’s only Kang, the title is at best on par with yours.”

She shrugged. “The other two might go with you. With their titles and traits from the explosive growth rewards, they should be adventures.”

“They’re six.”

“Almost seven.”

“If you round up sure, but only barely. And six, seven or ten, doesn’t really matter. People change.”

“True.”

He studied her. There was a melancholy clinging to her. “Why do you look sad?”

She laughed bitterly. “I just beat the fucking darkhole trial, but I don’t feel a fucking thing. You’re lucky you went with people.”

“I am not,” he shot back. “You don’t know what it’s like trying to keep children alive.”

“Yeah, probably, but two months by yourself is hard. And I was already feeling fucking isolated before I even entered the stupid trial.. Pretending to be a teenager is exhausting. All Shelly can talk about is boys. Adrian one week, Tom the next.”

“I’m flattered.”

“I wouldn’t be your names popular, not you.”

He clutched his heart dramatically. “That’s harsh. It’s popular because of me. Plus, she’s interested in boys? Really? Isn’t thirteen too young?”

“She’s fourteen, and you’d think, but no, it’s fucking not.”

“So, do you have a boy you like?”

She looked at him in disgust. “Fuck Tom that’s gross.”

“A girl?”

“There’re fucking kids, Tom!”

He raised his hands defensively. “I know. I shouldn’t tease, and I understood what you meant. Being able to come here. Even with Kang, it’s a godsend. Hanging around little kids all day is beyond grating. To be honest, being able to come here and talk to you helps to keep me sane.. Now tell me about your trial.”

They stayed in the arena for almost an hour, and then Tom left because of his scheduled isolation room session. The training he could get done in those two hours was too important to miss. Very conscious of what the instructor had told him he threw himself into the hammer kata. He wanted to get his first skill in the discipline before his next testing session. Only his healing let his abused muscles keep up with demands of wielding the heavy weapon.

An hour later, he finished, and his eyes went to the stack of papers in the container on the door. It should have been updated, and he was interested in finding out whether the darkhole trial had any impact on competition points.  

1.                Dragons: Current Rank 1 with accumulated points of 361 million. Current monthly baseline appears to be 10 million.

2.                Insects: Current Rank 2 with accumulated points of 326 million. Current monthly baseline appears to be 6 million.

3.                Inventors: Current Rank 3 with accumulated points of 317 million. Current monthly baseline appears to be 13 million.

4.                Humans: Current Rank 4 with accumulated points of 301 million. Excluding one offs current monthly baseline appears to be less than half a million. Note: There was a one off jump of 30 million due to a first time completion of the darkhole trial. More information is below.

5.                Giants: Current Rank 5 with accumulated points of 289 million. Current monthly baseline appears to be 2 million. Note: Monthly baseline is difficult to predict, but they got more returns this month than expected.

6.                Wador: Current Rank 6 with accumulated points of 284 million. Current monthly baseline appears to be less than half a million.

7.                Chosen: Current Rank 7 with accumulated points of 44 million. Current monthly baseline appears to be less than a hundred thousand.

The results were not as rosy as they appeared. They were only in fourth place, which wasn’t good enough, and the species ahead of them were earning far more per month than they were. Even giants were out earning humans by one and a half million per month, which if that was sustained that was almost twenty million per year. The current eleven million gap would be closed within a year. 

The enormity of what they faced struck Tom once more. 

But for a moment he ignored that to concentrate on the note included against the humans. 

Note 1: Completion of the darkhole trial was only possible due to a unique combination of traits and abilities of the individuals who risked it. Leadership is aware of the requirements and is looking for others who have a chance of completing it. At this point, no subjects have been identified with even a 0.1% chance of a successful run. If your details are registered and you have a chance, you will be contacted.

Tom hoped everyone read that warning rather than assuming they were special and rushing off and trying to complete it.

If they were that foolish, they would die.

The rest of the update made him want to scream. The dragons and insects were clearly doing something to generate points and given their nature it was easy to work out what. Somewhere in Existentia they had started a war with another species.

The inventor’s rate of accumulation hadn’t slowed down and then the uptick in the giant’s points was worrisome. He shut his eyes and considered a different timeline. One where humans hadn’t used fate to advance and been more conservative. Their initial accumulation of ranking points would have been slower, but now instead of a hundred thousand humans there would have been five times that number and probably a greater multiple of powerhouses. With those sorts of resources, humans would be well placed to have matched the rate of improvement of the giants. Humans struggle could be linked to the fact that ninety percent of them had died. The others unfortunately hadn’t the fate abilities that had tricked them into overextending. Their population was probably similar to what they had started with only far, far stronger.

DEUS had put her bets on individuals like Tom rather than a collective effort. That was fine, and he wasn’t going to question her, but he wondered where the points were going to come from. Yes, he had completed the darkhole trial, which was a massive benefit, but even amongst other reincarnators he had more advantages on them. These one-off benefits were not sustainable. Humans needed a more consistent source of ranking points.

“Shit,” he cursed after re-reading the numbers. For humans to compete against what he was seeing, they were going to have to go big. Saving Baptiste’s people might be part of it, but Tom could feel deep down inside of him that it wasn’t going to be enough. “Maybe if we kill off some terror species.” He speculated out loud to himself and then frowned.

There was something funny about the numbers.

How many species could the dragons and insects kill or at least reduce to the point where atrophy would claim them? Were the inventors going to keep getting that many points for the rest of the competition? If they did and if dragons went after dozens of species like Tom suspected they were destined to do where would that leave humans. What would humans have to do to match that sort of output? Kill ten, twenty, fifty terror species or save an equal number of diminishing civilisations.

Tom sighed as the enormity of what he faced struck fully.

It was a problem for another day.

For now, he had more research to do.

His eyes turned to the bookshelf. He had been spending a lot of time considering what the {redacted] methods on his earned title could be referring too and it was time to see if he could find any clues. Given how the orphanage had been put together, Tom was certain that if other humans knew the answer, then there would be a book in here that would be a roadmap to improving that title.   

He flipped through multiple books, searching for a hint. A reference to something unusual that couldn’t be explained by the normal framework of traits, spells, skills and bloodlines. Everything that appeared bizarre, he read in detail. There were species he discovered that naturally developed magical abilities when exposed to environmental stimuli. He didn’t see how this could be linked to the retracted, but he read a couple of examples, anyway.

The Rockskins had earth like biology, but their skin was basically made of stone and was way too heavy to float or even swim. The fascinating adaptation they had was that if they spent a lot of time near water, they would develop the ability to breathe in it. Once they developed it, they were safe, but before then, if they fell into a river or were caught in a massive flood they would drown.

There were also examples of a dragon like lizard that likewise created a specific elemental magic suppression skill if they were targeted repeatedly with attacks from that school of magic. It was noted that their army had nearly full immunity to all elemental strikes as a result of them abusing this functionality in training. Tom didn’t blame them if humans had something like that. He would force everyone to line up to accumulate resistances without hesitation, whether they wanted to or not..

While the idea that species possessed the ability to spontaneously manifest skills when exposed to certain stimuli was fascinating, he didn’t, however, think that was what his title was referring to.

He kept reading.

The Speciesiary he was studying, a bestiary for sapient species had nothing that shed light on his questions, so he switched to what had to be a fiction. He only had time to read the first couple of chapters before he was due to leave. Rather than putting it back he sent it into his inventory. It was a fun story and the main character, which was an oversized rabbit as best he could tell had been fighting a number of wolf like creatures and Tom, while he knew Adonsky would survive he wanted to find out how. It was a struggle to put the novel down, but he managed it.

Tom, laughing quietly to himself retreated to the divine championship trial to read and was promptly intercepted by Vturalta. She was now in charge of his training because Throm’s time in the open bracket had come to an end.

While the book called for him, all he could do was to focus on building the ritual because she was a hard taskmaster and wouldn’t accept excuses.

Another month passed and day by day his wire frame continued to expand until finally he looked up at his teacher. “It’s done.”

“Is it really?” She asked.

Carefully, he examined everything he had been taught. For every section of the ritual that he studied, he could explain exactly what it did. They all linked up perfectly and there wasn’t a single missing connection. “Yes, it is.” he told her more certainly.

She splashed water gently, and Tom could tell she was pleased. “Well, in its current form it isn’t very useful is it.” She flicked her finger, and a disk flew towards him. He snatched it out of the air and it was no different from the ones in the armoury. “Good luck.”

He stared at her, but she said nothing more and he knew what he was expected to do. He started transposing the massive ritual into the small piece of wood. Within a minute, he made a mistake and glanced up. His Living Wood was flexible enough that if he chose to do so, he would be able to correct the issue, but he remembered how April had reacted in similar situations, and he was interested in whether Vturalta shared a similar philosophy to the trial administrator.

“No need for that look, Tom. By your pause, you know exactly what you’re supposed to be doing in this situation.”

He hesitated and wondered if he could keep going, but her gaze was steady, and almost oppressive. Nope, she wanted him to destroy it. “I need to restart it.” He answered with his tone slipping beyond slightly annoyed. He retrieved another disk from his inventory and set about duplicating the complicated ritual.

“Nope. Throw it.” She interrupted.

“What did I do?” he asked in confusion having failed to pick up a mistake. 

Vturalta waved a tentacle and two images appeared both covering the section of the ritual that he was working on.

“I don’t see the difference.” He threw his hands up in frustration.

She zoomed in and with the increased magnification he could see that the angle that should have been twenty-eight and a half degrees was more like thirty.

“Is that really an issue?” he asked in surprise.

“Once you’re an expert no. But for now, it’s an error that will compound as you work through the entire design. It’s much better to start again and get it right.”

“How? How can I stop something like that from happening? My senses literally aren’t good enough to tell if I’ve made a mistake.”

“Practice will improve accuracy.”

“But I couldn’t even see the error.”

“You would have eventually noticed via the downstream impacts. But that’s why I’m here. I can stop you early in the process and save time.”

“But why? Surely, you’ve got other things to be doing.”

She shrunk back into the water. Her body language indicated that she was concerned that the answer she was about to give could set him off. “Esedhuil has made it clear that this project is the most important use of my time.”

Tom hesitated. “And you’re listening to her because she’s a priestess.” He guessed.

“She is the voice of DEUS.” The armoured octopus answered without hesitation or a hint of mockery.

“Is she?”

Vturalta slowly undulated, which was the equivalent of a shrug. “As good as.”

“But you aren’t always here.”

“Yes. That is something I wanted to talk about. It’s important that you don’t do any practice unsupervised.”

He raised an eyebrow sceptically. “I can’t do any practice?”

“Yes. You’re building something like muscle memory for your Living Wood skill. If you let bad habits occur, your disks power will be permanently reduced. We really don’t want to risk that as it will cost lives.”

“But you’re only really here in the evenings. Waiting for you will cut down my training hours.”

“There’s four of us that Throm and I consider to be suitable as an overseer. We’ll try to make sure someone is always available to monitor you.” All of her tentacles stilled. “Tom, your body language is screaming at me. A bit of doubt is acceptable, but not to the point of paranoia. This is not coming from Esedhuil it is my call. Promise you won’t try this crafting unless one of us is supervising it.”

He hesitated.

“Tom. This is not a game. It’s important.

“Fine. I won’t practice without you.”

“Great, now,” she nodded at the latest wooden disk that he had produced from his inventory. “Let’s see it again. This time, make sure you get the angles perfect.