Unchosen Champion

The chores were done. Coop spent a single day working hard, using all of his non-combat strengths to their full extent, and his diligence had earned a few days of free time. The Underlayer Event was still six days away from starting. The period was too short of a gap to tackle any of the larger projects that needed doing, like exploring the Fallen Zone north of Neptune’s Bridge, but it was more than enough time for what he needed most.

Coop was officially going on spring break. The timing worked out perfectly. It was Day 119 of the assimilation, and if old calendars were still applicable, they would be in the second week of March. It was prime spring break time and he intended to make the most of it.

He could have made his way directly back home after leaving Bobby Jon and Dorothy behind. It wouldn’t have taken long before he reached the expansive Empress City territory with the improvements to his travel skill. From there he could have passed through the lively port and hopped on a ferry for the rest of the journey back to his island. He would have been home by the end of another day, and what could be better than spending his spring break on Ghost Reef’s picturesque beaches?

But he held back. Instead, he slowed down in order to more closely explore the limits of the Swamp Lord’s territory before he got too far from the Alligator Farm and Placid Lake Outpost. It wasn’t so much that he was looking for trouble, though it might have seemed that way. Rather, for the invaders, he was trouble.

On his way north, he had passed over the environment in a rush, letting the pressure of the past, present, and future add wind to his sails. If he wasn’t directly defending the Lighthouse from the factions that sought to conquer it, he still felt the need to be equally productive, especially since it was up to him to make sure that the domestic threats to Ghost Reef and the core shard of their faction were under control. He couldn’t rest while his companions took on the obligations that he intended to keep, so he committed to his delegated task with a full head of steam. Making sure their broader territory was secure was his indirect contribution. A few days earlier and it would have been the most direct contribution possible, but new threats had been added as a tradeoff for new allies.

It wasn’t until he stopped to explore the Infestation that he paid closer attention to what was actually happening in the untrodden lands of Central Florida. At that point he was already beyond the fringes of the Infestation and in the midst of the system-designated dungeon thanks to the island formed by the Placid Lake Outpost. He wouldn’t find any Primal Constructs where the alligators had already taken control.

The only leveled non-minions he encountered were the former residents of Bobby Jon’s alligator farm. Most of the wild animals he noticed in close proximity to the farm were unleveled, but he had been focused on seeking out the minions that threatened the Outpost rather than understanding the lay of the land.

The urgency of an uninhibited Hive and his enthusiasm to do his part had driven him to skip over any potential Slayer grinds in favor of aiding his Empress City allies. It was a formation that should be taken care of before it escalated further. Now, with the Infestation dealt with and roughly five days before he actually needed to get back home for the initiation of the Underlayer Event, he could satisfy his curiosity while pursuing his own progression. Instead of a beach vacation, he was angling for a road trip and traveling was always more fun when rushing wasn’t necessary.

The boardwalk was the most obvious development in the region, and had been the main feature he followed on his way up the state. He continued to use it as an anchor point to assess the area. It was continually defended by steady patrols of Empress City sentries, but it was merely a narrow line that zigged and zagged across the landscapes in a total area that spanned a few hundred square miles. The singular tract did little to reveal the full scope of the region.

Along the boardwalk, word of their alliance with the alligators was already spreading. It had only taken a day for Dorothy to start making her moves, further demonstrating the level of coordination that existed between the reptiles in this section of the Everglades. Frankly, they put the efficiency of Coop’s own networks to shame. Patrolling sentries nervously tiptoed around their newest comrades on the relatively narrow wooden path, heading south to relay the message that they had established new allies and could continue their northward expansion. The alligators were already fully on board, literally. They appeared to be utilizing the elevated path as a central bulwark to stage their units.

Non-minion alligators had no issue climbing onto the wooden slats to bathe in the morning sun, completely ignoring the apprehensive humans. On the other hand, it seemed like it would take some time before the Empress City residents grew more comfortable around the large reptiles. Coop supposed it was only fair that the guards were uneasy. They were frequently at a level disadvantage that approached the triple digits. As far as they could see, the alligators were monstrous, battle-scarred threats with question marks for levels and backed up by equally powerful minions. Coop would have hesitated to get too close if he was in their shoes as well. A healthy dose of caution was as important as ever when leaving the consistency provided by settlement territory.

Outside of the boardwalk, there were entire ecosystems stretching across hundreds of miles that were in flux. The Everglades were expansive, and the Swamp Lord’s territory was merely a small patch centered in a particularly underdeveloped rural area. Coop wanted to explore it all.

There were hints at the previous developments from before the Everglades took over if he looked close enough. A fallen highway sign poking beyond a stand of trees or a collapsed gas station canopy partially submerged in the gently flowing river of grass hinted at previous human civilization, but even before the assimilation, the region was dominated by upland hardwood forest, drainage canals, and sugarcane-based agriculture.

The evidence of past civilization, in this case a rural highway corridor, wasn’t particularly interesting to someone like Coop. His main fascination was with the wildlife. Like on Ghost Reef and in the rainforests of the Yucatan, most animals appeared to have remained Unchosen and hadn’t yet started the process of leveling. Birds in particular were better able to stay removed from the action, and the pristine white plumages of herons and ibises were obvious against the natural backdrops.

The few animals that had begun their progression were safeguarding pockets against the Primal Constructs and were clearly becoming powerhouses out of necessity until the Swamp Lord’s minions took over, spreading her territory and pushing the Primal Constructs back toward their spawn points.

Without incorporating Fog of War into his unscientific survey, Coop didn’t spot any major activity, but he detected the auras of several wild animals with Presence of Mind. He was still within the limits of what had been the Infestation and was now considered Lighthouse territory, but the Primal Constructs had been slowly suppressed by the gators even before becoming a part of his faction’s holdings.

Coop noticed the first independent creature before he had reached the edge of controlled territory. It was in the crown of a slash pine that was an extraordinary 300 feet tall while only being three or four feet in diameter, thanks to the effects of mana. A level 264 Florida Black Bear was snoozing comfortably in the tree as it leaned in the breeze. The bear hadn’t been a part of the Swamp Lord’s Infestation, but it hadn’t succumbed to the invaders either. There would be many examples of such individual resistance.

Coop was being watched by a kettle of level 90 Turkey Vultures, gliding on thermals high above even where he mistjumped. The large carrion feeders had become opportunistic hunters, gaining levels by becoming third-party combatants against Primal Constructs. They didn’t need to scavenge for food with the supplementary impacts of mana, but they didn’t abandon their watchful nature, spotting weakened monsters and curiously finishing them off to gain their first levels.

A family of Marsh Bunnies dozed in a fluffy pile at the entrance to their warren in an elevated mound of grass. A single pine tree provided scattered shade on the small island in the river that they had made home. Dozens of pine cones were scattered around their pile, propped up by short stalks of chewed grass.

The bunnies would have been the picture of cuteness except that they were very clearly hardened warriors with the scars and levels to prove it. None of them had avoided battle. Their smaller rounded ears had rips torn in the edges and chunks of fur were missing from where they had received what should have been mortal wounds to their diminutive bodies, but were instead slowly recovering with the help of mana.

Life had been harsh before the Swamp Lord had tamed the land around their burrow. Now, the marsh bunnies slept innocently in the sunshine, each exceeding level 150, forming a colony of battle-ready veterans that would make petting irresistible. Maybe it would be a mistake to try, but Coop wouldn’t have held back if he was within arms reach.

South of the bunny haven, a pit viper that was barely above level 250 finished a quick swim before weaving into the thick grasses that secured the wet shore. The Florida Cottonmouth was only a few inches beyond a foot long, but of all the animals Coop detected, it had the most intense aura. It was heading further south, toward the edge of the Swamp Lord’s territory, as if it was on the hunt.

Even further away from the boardwalk, to the west, in the center of a particularly wide section of slowly drifting water, a pair of North American River Otters floated on their backs, holding hands with their eyes squeezed shut. They were so still, Coop wondered if they were stuffed animals that had escaped into the wilderness, but their auras were clear beacons to Presence of Mind. Their levels came as an even bigger surprise, one at an easy level 305 and the other at 303.

The amount of combat these animals had experienced was hard to imagine, even for someone like Coop, who was constantly dreaming of the grind. He was even planning to turn his spring break vacation into a grindcation, but he was thoroughly overshadowed by some otters.

If he applied his own understanding, their progress bordered on the impossible. Forget about the two levels a day that made his progress absurd, they were pushing toward three, putting him to shame. He could only assume that Central Florida had barely avoided letting the Primal Constructs transform the area into a similar formation that had created the Fallen Zone to the north of Orlando. The Swamp Lord had prevented a lot more work for the Champion of Ghost Reef.

Coop guessed that the Primal Constructs naturally targeted places some distance from established territories, following the path of least resistance, so the space between settlements was where their minions thrived. The loss of any civilization shards made their overall strategy more feasible. The gap between Empress City and Neptune’s Bridge was expansive enough to be the perfect staging ground. The sooner they added mana pylons the better.

The more he thought about it, the more it seemed like he should be thinking about the assimilation in terms of spreading territories. The Underlayer Event would be a tactical way of penning settlements in, allowing the untamed lands to be conquered by the invaders. On a smaller scale, wasn’t that what the Primal Tracker invaders were trying to do in Peacock Park, spreading from their spawn points in the golf course to try and dominate more territory? Even the Ruin Excavators were moving from chamber to chamber until they spilled out into the basement of the fort. Now that Coop had more perspective, the general strategy of the Primal Constructs seemed obvious.

On a more sparsely populated planet, with a single organized species to concentrate on, it would be an effective way to rapidly claim vast domains. They would dominate the planet from the start. Especially because the Primal Constructs had a huge variety of minion-types, providing their forces as a whole with elevated levels of flexibility in dealing with diverse environments.

The isolated civilization shards could be picked off one by one after the land was claimed, left alone and surrounded by hostile monsters. The assimilation had them focused on fighting over shards, so while they were distracted, the planet itself would be taken from the indigenous species’ grasp. The first event, being a siege, even encouraged the survivors to concentrate on bolstering their positions rather than expanding.

The Primal Constructs hadn't accounted for such stubborn resistance outside of settlement territories. People and animals alike had refused to play along with the norms of the assimilation, with varying degrees of success. Wildlife were proving why they couldn’t be ignored, refusing to roll over and die at every stage. Add the many people who would refuse to be moved from where they lived previously, preferring to hunker down and wait out the storm, like those in the Yucatan Peninsula, and a clear resistance to the Primal Constructs’ specific strategy was accidentally formed. Even if the people who stayed put couldn’t defeat the invaders completely, they would still significantly slow the progress of the invasion.

Then there would also be people like Coop, who would turn their attention to untamed lands sooner rather than later, actively seeking unique challenges to fuel their progression for their own purposes. Coop might be hunting for Slayer titles and Field Bosses, but others would have their own motivations to venture beyond the limits of settlement territory. Forging connections between neighbors was natural for people on Earth, like what had kept Neon Park’s alliance together and led to them sending their own scouts across the country.

Coop was sure that similar stories were occurring all over the world, and the Primal Constructs would be having a harder time because of them. If it wasn’t for the settlement events, and more importantly, the Eradication Protocol, it felt like Earth was developing a real fighting chance against the assimilation itself. Humanity may have taken a large, potentially devastating blow when mana activated and they were caught by surprise, but the survivors were stabilizing.

Locally, the lay of the land was becoming more obvious, with a clear distinction between the area claimed by the Swamp Lord and the completely untamed lands that covered the rest of the state in between Neptune’s Bridge and Empress City. The Swamp Lord’s minions were making sure that no Primal Constructs were able to establish themselves in the swamps, and at the same time, making the area safe for other wild animals for the first time since the assimilation began. The Marsh Bunnies and Black Bears were taking their first breaks, thanks to the more organized army of alligators pressuring the invaders until they were forced away.

Before the Infestation moved in, the Everglades had been yet another battlefield. Earth was evidently covered in conflict. It was hard to visualize, since the invasion was coming from all directions without a clear frontline established until individual groups were able to clear their own territory. There was finally a line drawn in the sand when it came to the Everglades, thanks to the Swamp Lord. Coop had been deep in the alligator territory, but as he made his way south, he approached the no man’s land where Primal Constructs still resisted the push and fought with the local fauna.

The alligators were scattered throughout the region, concentrated on the wetlands, but they were unafraid of venturing across the dry strips of pine rockland or expansive grassy meadows. Coop spotted individual minions sliding up banks and trotting across territory before diving back into shallow waters with clumsy splashes. They were actively seeking sections of unclaimed territory, barely beyond the edges of what had been the Infestation and was now Lighthouse territory. They just made themselves comfortable, waiting for the territory to follow them as the population of alligators increased. They settled into muddy bottoms, mere inches beneath the surface, and went idle, camouflaged, patiently waiting.

Coop thought it was interesting that the alligators were all originating from the Swamp Lord’s base in Bobby Jon’s farm. At first, he had assumed that they were forming minions from the existing alligators across the habitats, and he had used the pre-mana numbers to make assumptions about their potential. However, as Coop evaluated further, he was constantly discovering regular non-minion alligators existing side-by-side with the minions. It seemed more like the Swamp Lord’s representatives had some way of being summoned, more like the phantoms in Ghost Reef than the creations of someone like the Zombie Lord. Bobby Jon’s base might be more important than he initially recognized, like it was a spawning pool for the minions.

The alligators had spread miles beyond the Placid Lake Outpost, even before the alliance had formed, in their effort to expand their hold. As Coop made his way south, he began to encounter individual alligators fighting against the local Primal Construct variants over unclaimed territory.

Coop couldn’t pass up the opportunity to grind, especially since he had an entire spring break to kill before the event started. It seemed like this was the perfect way to both stay out of trouble while also not actually wasting his own time. No one could fault him for standing by the side of their newest allies and helping them defeat Primal Construct enemies.

The Everglades weren’t exactly his preferred beachy environment, but there was more than enough natural beauty to be appreciated. What better way for someone like Coop to appreciate it than through a mucky grind?

He chuckled to himself, happy to have found a suitable excuse for his grindcation. A greedy grin had already planted itself onto his face.

Coop landed in the swamp, splashing in the mud, near the current front line of the Swamp Lord’s territory. He greeted an Ancient Vanguard Primal Construct variant with a vicious spear, thrown from hundreds of yards away, still smiling to himself.

The giant mechanical ant, closer to the size of a bull than a regular insect, was facing down an alligator minion that was baring its teeth. Then, the monster was gone, shattered by an ethereal weapon leaving the monster in pieces that disintegrated into mana smoke before the splashes of water landed in the pond.

The alligator minion froze in confusion, watching as mists thickened around the shaft of the weapon that had annihilated its enemy, embedded in the mud below the shallow water. Coop solidified from the mists and took a deep breath. He was filled with relief as long-ignored tension was finally being released. Nodding at the alligator minion like they were old friends, he yanked his spear out of the mud and turned away. Coop squinted into the distance, watching a dozen Ancient Vanguards struggling with the mud as they pulled themselves out of burrows due to the disturbance that he caused.

Coop channeled a Fog of War that would settle across this arbitrary portion of the wetlands and make it his own, taking over for the minion as if it was a shift change on a factory floor.

Once the fog coalesced, he could still see the shadows of the Vanguards on the other side of the channel of water, and if they relied on vision, they would be able to see him as well. It was a thin formation that extended his Presence of Mind more than it would obstruct the invaders’ senses. He didn’t want to cause problems for the other gators, even if it wouldn’t bother them while they were submerged.

He raised the spear over his head, aiming the point at the bright sky, and closed his eyes, imagining the warriors that would be his companions on this hunt. He called upon the Legacy of the Mists. If he was going to do this, he might as well go all out.