ALL NOVEL Chapter 8: Celestial Blade
There was something Hugo had learned while discussing the game with his Heads. In this place, all of the NPC’s, the game’s natives, were entirely ‘self-aware’.
This was one of the things made possible by Eve, an AGI. She could run the game’s NPC’s and make them no different from any other human. Every single one had a history, a life, and their own thoughts and feelings. In fact, she had generated this universe from start to present, letting it run along its course in order to give a backstory to even the smallest details. Not even specks of dust were randomly generated. They were there due to time, dust, and the shedding of dead skin cells.
And the significance of the Immortals, the players, wasn’t conveniently ignored by the natives. Just as the players were curious about this world’s peoples, the natives were curious about the players.
According to the lore, the Immortals were prophesied to come during the end times. They would mark the beginning of the end, and what they chose to do would determine the course of history, the rise and fall of civilizations and factions, for better or worse.
At first, the Immortals were hailed and even worshiped. They were seen as divine, even though they weren’t attached to any one deity. They were immortal, after all. They couldn’t die, and they were people who just randomly spawned into the world through the Holy Spawning Temples.
But over time, the initial reverence died down. The natives figured out that the Immortals were normal, if not eccentric, people. They started off weak, at least the majority did. And most importantly, they could be worked with.
And so the two parties studied each other, the natives gradually entering a symbiotic relationship with the Immortals as the two parties learned to take advantage of each other.
Deathless warriors were too powerful of a card to play for the natives. It was guaranteed that they would be able to reach great heights so long as they had the talent and dedication. Most other soldiers would die before then, but Immortals didn’t have to worry about that.
This meant they could do things unthinkable to the natives. They could throw their lives away constantly before simply reviving and doing it again.
Of course, the players had a system that incentivized survival. Die too many times, and you would be forced out of the game for a certain amount of time. But the natives had discovered those kinds of rules after enough observation, so the strategies involving their Immortal soldiers grew in complexity accordingly.
These strategies included rewards. The Immortals were driven heavily by incentives. Give them money and items, and they would give their life for you. There were some who would do things out of charity and curiosity, but money was still the standard. That, and opportunities. Most Immortals wanted to get stronger in some way, achieved fame and Glory. They couldn’t do that without opportunities.
But that didn’t apply to everyone.
In the end, this was a game, and the players knew that. They had come here to live different, better, or more interesting lives. They wanted their entertainment, and a battlefield wasn’t always the most interesting place.
Some people wanted to try new things, even something as simple as cooking. Others might want to become a chemist in the Technical Faction, mixing all kinds of elements together and designing biomachines and complex weaponry.
The natives tried to encourage the Immortals as much as possible to fight on the frontlines. They did this by offering combat related classes, making the process streamlined. And in a sense, because many wanted to become more powerful, the system itself did most of their job for them.
Still, when Hugo left the temple, he could see players as far as the eye could see, all of them looking like they held different professions.
Food vendors, smiths, enchanters, beast tamers, and more. There was plenty to do and the players were more than happy to try it all.
The exit from the Celestial spawning temple led Hugo out to an outdoor plaza. From there he could see a decently sized city with some average-height buildings made of stone brick. The detail that caught his eye though was the dark sky, which seemed to have no atmosphere. He could see the stars above, as if he were looking directly into the depths of space. There was no light scattering to speak of.
But there was still a sun in the sky, one that brightened the land around them. For the most part, everything like the stone that composed the streets and even some dirt was black or gray, but there was also some purple, a color that primarily came from the few plants like trees that dotted the streets.
“New Immortals! Over here!”
Suddenly, as Hugo descended the stairs, people were flagged down by a man in a cloak.
Some went up to him while others walked off with their own objectives. Hugo decided to linger and hear what he had to say.
“I’m the recruiter for the Celestial Armed Guard. You can think of it as the military. I would simply like to provide you all with information on where you can find the training grounds to acquire your first class. For those interested, take this pamphlet which contains the directions to the training grounds.”
“Hm, interesting.”
Hugo watched, most people taking a pamphlet and getting directions.
He wasn’t going to do that though. Instead, he sensed a sharp gaze, swiveling his head until he locked eyes with Moses in the crowds.
The two smiled, approaching and clasping hands.
“You’ve made it.”
“Indeed. I see you really are powerful.”
Hugo looked Moses up and down.
The man was already huge, but his presence made him feel even more like a monster.
He was currently in some casual wear covered by a long coat so as to not draw attention. But some of the features on his body made it obvious that he was in the Technical faction.
There were lines across his exposed skin, like circuits, and some body modifications like metal joints on his elbows, knees, and knuckles.
This was what the Technical faction was known for. With their magic, they could seamlessly integrate machine and body using blood as a conduit. Not only that, but they used relatively high tech weaponry, primarily things like firearms and the like.
Moses had no need to improve his body since he was already at the top of the superhuman heriarchy, just short of the Martial Ancestors. So he decided to join the Technicals and become something like a gunslinger. His class was a Special one.
All the Heads had special classes. How could they settle for anything less?
Moses nodded to Hugo.
“Celestial, huh? Well, it’ll no doubt suit you. Come, the others are waiting.”
“Where to?”
“We all have an estate we bought together inside of a neutral territory, a special place for storage and refuge. We keep it secret from all of our in game friends so it acts as a safe house. We also prepared it for the day you would come and bring us together.”
“I see. How smart. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. It’ll be a bit before I catch up, and even then, having assets behind enemy lines would be more valuable.”
“Hehe, how cunning.”
Moses grinned as they walked through the city.
This city wasn’t the capital or anything like that.
The Origin Plane, the place all players are brought to, is a massive continent on which all humans and humanoid races exist.
That was another thing. Humans weren’t the only races. In fact, the class you chose would not only determine your skillsets, but could also allow you to change your species.
Evolutions were required in order to allow the body to accommodate increased power. And humans, being the most versatile species, had the ability to evolve into other types.
But besides that, when all players were dropped into the Origin Plane, they were randomly distributed between some cities within the territory of the faction they chose. And each faction territory had a capitol city. Between the faction territories were also neutral territories where those of differing factions could intermingle. These neutral territories had been massively expanded due to the presence of players since most of them wanted to be in different factions, yet wanted to cooperate. So they were now considered mostly Immortal territory.
The place that Moses headed to was one such neutral city, known as the Oddbird’s Rest. It was one of the few neutral cities with a functioning teleporter, making it a major landmark.
The two didn’t talk much, simply walking to the city center nearby and utilizing a teleporter. It cost money, but Moses had plenty of that.
After that, they were teleported to Oddbird’s Rest.
The sights were one that even had Hugo impressed.
After emerging from the teleporter, Hugo was greeted with a single massive Spire that rose over 500 meters in the sky. This Spire was made of something that looked like obsidian bricks, making it shimmer under the sun.
And around that spire floating at its highest level were three Octahedral structures, like diamonds. They simply levitated there, no indication of propulsion. He also couldn’t guess their utility based on the outward look. They simply looked like massive obsidian diamonds, each one being around 100 meters from top to bottom.
Hugo nodded at the sight, concluding that magic must be incredibly versatile if they could pull of feats like this.
Surrounding the Spire were miles of populated infrastructure. Another thing Hugo noticed was the fact that the normal blue sky was back. It seemed Celestial territory had a special thing going on with their atmosphere.
From the teleporter, Moses called a carriage that took them down smooth stone streets, moving away from the city center and toward areas where the buildings weren’t so tall.
They maintained their silence while waiting. And soon enough, the carriage rolled to a halt.
“Let’s go. Everyone is inside.”
“Mm.”
He nodded, the two climbing out to see a 6 story structure before them.
It was rather inconspicuous, away from the busy main streets. There were only a few dozen people within view of the building’s entrance.
There weren’t any markings on the outside either, making it unassuming.
The two entered through the single door on the front, seeing an empty lobby.
“Keep this in mind for when you come here by yourself.”
Moses said that as he walked over to a corner of the lobby room.
Once he stood on a certain area and stamped his foot twice, a magic formation lit up underneath him, making his body disappear with a flash.
Hugo’s brows raised as he walked over and did the same thing.
*Woosh*
He felt a bit of disorientation before he appeared in a lush living room.
“Hugo!”
Stacia called out, drawing Hugo’s attention as he looked around.
All the Heads were there, each one dressed in their own gear which denoted their faction quite clearly.
George was dreaded in dark, slim armor while Aurelia had on a set of thick blue robes. Like Moses, Tanya had some subtle biomechanical upgrades around her body. As for Stacia and Alexander, as part of the Ethereals Faction, they had on what many would consider to be generic gear. Stacia was a knight with thicker armor, and Alexander was dressed in a rich suit.
Hugo waved, noticing that their faces, while similar, were also a bit different from their original faces. That helped them maintain enough of an identity for the other Heads to recognize while making them different enough not to be noticed by anyone else.
“How is everyone?”
“We’re good. How are you? Chose the Celestials?”
“I did.”
“Fitting.”
Stacia nodded expectantly.
At the same time, Tanya walked over and grabbed Hugo’s arm.
“I want to give you some information. Come.”
“Okay.”
Hugo smiled and followed her to a table nearby. The others rose from their couches and chairs as well, surrounding them.
Gathered around the table, Tanya took out two maps.
“This one is for you. Go ahead and claim ownership. You do that by grabbing it and accepting the prompt.”
“Sure.”
Hugo grabbed the 2x1 foot piece of parchment. It was high quality, being completely white with embroidered ends.
Once Hugo grabbed it, there was in fact a prompt.
<Would you like to claim this Map (Rare)?>
“Yes.”
<Map claimed.>
The system spoke, the map flashing and writing out the name Polus on its corner.
Everyone saw the name, George humming.
“Polus, huh? We’ll need to get used to referring to you by that name.”
“What kind of name is that? Some greek philosopher name like Plato?”
Stacia scrutnized curiously, Hugo nodding in confirmation.
“Yes, it is.”
“Oh.”
“Nevermind that. Players are capable of sharing map data. Only Rare maps with magical functions can transfer data directly, and we all have them, so here.”
Tanya moved her map over. It was identical, and she placed it on top of his own.
<[GameMechanic] would like to share her map data with you. Accept?>
“Yes.”
Hugo nodded, the two maps flashing.
<Map data transferred.>
Just like that, Tanya’s entire map was given to Hugo.
When he picked it up, he found that he could move it with his finger like a digital map. This allowed him to zoom in and out on different places. She also had an organized system in place, a variety of tabs for different places that he could view.
The map was incredibly functional, and thanks to the data collection efforts of the entire group, incredibly detailed. Hugo now had the full map layouts for every place they had experienced so far, including things like dungeons. There were also hundreds of labels across the map to point out landmarks or special stuffs.
A map like this would be priced incredibly high, and he had gotten it for free. This was already a significant headstart.
After that, he got another notification.
<Alert: GameMechanic has requested to be your friend.]
<Alert: Major has requested to be your friend.]
<Alert: Queen Bee has requested to be your friend.]
<Alert: Sophos has requested to be your friend.]
<Alert: FireFox has requested to be your friend.]
<Alert: SurferDude400 has requested to be your friend.]
Everyone’s friend request came in one after the other.
<Alert: Polus has accepted your friend request.>
Hugo accepted them all, smiling at the last one.
“You could’ve named yourself anything else.”
“Hm? What’s wrong with mine?”
George’s brows raised, causing Hugo to smirk.
“The very fact that you knew I was pointing you out speaks to its oddity.”
“Hey, its unique.”
“Indeed.”
He smiled, as did all the others.
George just waved them all off with a scoff.
That’s when Aurelia chimed in.
“By the way, Polus, during our time here we’ve been planning for your arrival. That includes finding you a Special Class. We have multiple in our possession, but since you chose to become a Celestial, that narrows the options down to 1. Frankly though, that’s the best one, and we probably got it by Eve’s design looking back on it. Anyway, that’ll be there here waiting for you. When you reach the first Realm, just come find us.”
“My, that’s quite the gift. But I wanted to work my way up naturally.”
“Don’t be so quick to discard this. Allow me to enlighten you to how things work among the topmost players.”
Aurelia walked around Hugo, wrapping one arm around him from behind and tip toeing until her mouth was beside his ear.
“All the clubs do this. Their best players will wait for weeks or months until they can either find or buy a Special class and give one to them. Under normal circumstances, Special classes are impossible to reliably come across. So please, just accept this. I’m sure Eve wouldn’t allow you to do it any other way either.”
“Hm.”
Hugo hummed as Aurelia hugged him from behind, thinking before letting out a breath of reluctance.
“Fine, I’ll accept it.”
“Thank you. Hmm, I can’t get enough of this smell.”
Aurelia took a deep breath, her nose practically pressed against this back as she took in his scent.
It seems Eve was accurate enough to mimic even the pheromones. How amazing and unnecessary, Hugo thought.
“Vixen…”
Tanya mumbled from the side, shooting Aurelia a subtle glare as Hugo focused on the map.
He looked around Dawn City, seeing labels for nearly all of the hunting grounds and information on each one. The map may as well be an encyclopedia with how many details there were.
After a few seconds, Moses came over and pushed Aurelia off Hugo, throwing an arm around his shoulder in replacement.
“You’ll need to get registered as Hunter. Also, have you opened your Profile yet?”
“No, I haven’t.”
“Do it now. Just think about doing so and it’ll happen.”
“Hm.”
Hugo looked off into space, and sure enough, the Profile appeared with but a thought.
It was a screen that appeared in his vision, though only to him. He could see various numbers and descriptors.
\\Profile//
|
Name: Polus |
Faction: Celestial |
|
Class: None |
Realm: 0 |
|
Vitality: 14 |
Strength: 10 |
|
Acuity: 13 |
Wisdom: 13 |
Skills: None
Hugo looked over the relatively simple screen.
Right after that, he got a notification.
<Alert: You have met the stat requirements to Ascend. To do so, you must first acquire a class.>
<Note: Different classes have different requirements for Ascension, and not all class acquisition opportunities are immediately obvious. Be scrutinizing, because classes cannot be discarded or changed easily.>
“Well, would you look at that?”
Hugo’s brows raised, catching Moses’ interest.
“What is it?”
“I’ve met the requirement for my first Ascension. I can get a class.”
“Mm, I knew you would be close, if not already there.”
“Tsk, superhumans…”
Alexander clicked his tongue.
By now, it was common knowledge that a player needed 50 cumulative stats in order to reach the first opportunity for Ascension. And to Ascend to the first Realm, you needed a class.
Well, the game mimicked reality, and the stats were no different until the magic of the world was introduced.
That meant that superhumans would, by default, have a massive head start as soon as they entered. Hugo was not the first to immediately be capable of grabbing a class, and he wouldn’t be the last.
It was safe to say that this saved superhumans a huge chunk of time since they didn’t need to train and grind for stat points. It was also of natural course that the ordinary players would think this unfair, but the Archive ignored any and all protests regarding that issue. And subsequently, they were supported massively by the superhuman population.
Every single superhuman, without exception, had fought and earned their way to the level of strength they wielded. It was a battle against all odds and a process that could kill anyone who tried, not to mention the terrifying agony that came with pushing the body to those limits.
So the very notion of denying those people advantages in a game that reflected reality was asinine. Besides, even from a profitable standpoint, denying them those advantages would have hurt the game far more than not.
For one, it would have destroyed all credibility they had. The Ascent was a game designed to be a direct reflection of reality with some magic mixed in. To deny the physical superiority of superhumans would go against everything they had been advertising.
And secondly, they wouldn’t have gotten the superhuman population to play the game if that was the case, specifically two of the Four Great Dojos. Those people investing in a Club to play the game was free advertising on a whole other level.
So by doing what they did, they only got more popular rather than less. And anybody who continued to protest against it wouldn’t be taken seriously.
In the end, Hugo was yet another beneficiary of that system. Before he killed a single beast, he was already able to take on a class.
Moses pat his shoulder.
“Then there’s no time to lose. Let’s get you that Class. Come with me.”
Moses led the way, walking into a different part of the building.
They all walked up a floor and into a normal bedroom, one of several within the building. Yet one secret entrance wasn’t enough, and Moses introduced Hugo to the second.
He walked over to the wardrobe, opening its two doors and seeing some hanging shirts.
He reached in, knocked twice on the backboard, and then closed the doors.
Once he reopened it, there was a portal going directly to the storage room.
They all climbed in, stepping out into an underground space full of storage units. This was the secret stash of the Hydra, an undoubtedly secure place that no thief would likely ever find their way into.
Weapon racks held a variety of blades, guns, and magic wands. Chests littered the walls and held all kinds of armors, materials, and tools.
And in the corner of the room was a small pedestal, on top of which was a wooden box.
“This is the Special Class for Celestials that George found.”
“It was rather vague in its descriptors, but given what I know, its no worse than the one I have. Go ahead and take it.”
“Hmm.”
Hugo walked up to the box, opening it and finding a crystal knife.
It was literally a knife made entirely of crystal, the hilt chipped dull, and the blade impossibly sharp despite its serrated edge.
Once Hugo picked it up, he was hit with some notifications.
<This item has been Judged by another player. Its stats are available for observation.>
Name: Celestial Blade
|
Grade: ??? |
Damage: Tier ??? |
[Judgement: This item serves an unknown purpose, found collecting dust within the coffers of the Mad Harlot at the end of a Hidden Dungeon. Its age is inestimable, its material unable to be determined. It’s history cannot be imagined, and the only thing known about it is that it cannot be damaged. However, there are engravings within the crystalline structure that provide a set of instructions.]
[He who plunges the blade into his heart shall know the 6th Star.]
The given instructions must be followed at the highest difficulty level to take effect.
This item cannot be Stored
Hugo read through the details curiously. However, when he read the given instructions, his interest faded into exasperation.
“Seriously? Plunge into my own heart? You mean I need to kill myself with this?”
He turned to George, who shrugged.
“That’s all I could get out of it.”
“And I need to do this at the highest difficulty, without pain inhibitors. Great.”
He sighed. His first day in the game and he was already committing suicide.
But he wasn’t too detered. The level of pain he had gone through was no worse than stabbing yourself through the heart.
This would be the first time he would be hurting himself in such a way, but at some point, it was all the same. Hugo had long been numb to it, as most superhumans were.
So he sighed, brought up the knife, and rammed it through his chest.
*Shick*
It slid right through, slipping between the ribs and piercing through his heart.
The strength of his body instantly started to fade as blood exploded from the wound. The only saving grace was that the knife was impossibly sharp, making the initial process easy.
The others watched, the girls and Alexander cringing. They knew what had to be done and knew this was a game, but its realism could blur the line into nonexistence.
Pain was the same no matter if it was virtual or real now. It could do just as much damage to the psyche. They didn’t like seeing Hugo have to do something like this.
Like that, he bled out on the floor of their storage room. Curiously, his blood was no longer just red blood anymore. After becoming a superhuman and undergoing Eve’s genetic reconstruction, it had turned purple.
There was some silence as they watched the knife sit in Hugo’s chest, waiting to see what would happen.
“...We should’ve put him in the bathtub.”
Moses mumbled, causing the others to roll their eyes.
Right after he said that though, Hugo’s blood fluctuated, flowing back into his body as the crystal knife melted into his chest.
The magical forces around him whirled like a hurricane for over a minute before everything settled down once more.
Given some more time, Hugo’s eyes fluttered, his body regaining strength and rising from the dead.
“...Am I alive?”
He looked around for a second, raising his hand for help.
Moses picked his body up, dusting him off before looking him over.
“You seem fine now.”
“I feel fine. Well, almost. Something changed.”
Hugo felt his chest, a hole now in the center of his shirt.
Just then, he got even more alerts from the system.