Arcen opened his eyes. He couldn’t see anything. It was dark as darkness could be, almost perfect black that engulfed everything around him. He was lying on his back, skin against a smooth surface. He’d been shot in the head only a moment ago.
Gold veins rippled through his eyes.
╭ ╰︶?? ORISRYN ?? ︶╯ ╮
╭────────────────────╮
YOU HAVE BEEN REVIVED
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
Revived? Where the fuck am I?
There was no answer, of course. Instead, the gold veins warped into a new shape, slightly changing the hum in his ears.
╭ ╰︶?? ERITHERIA ?? ︶╯ ╮
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ ATTRIBUTE INCREASED ╰︶
????
DEATH +1
[11]
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
Panicking, he pushed himself up. Something cracked under his hands, and everything creaked all around him. It was a metallic sound, an unpleasant screech. The ground itself moved with these sounds.
Suddenly, everything around him jolted, and the ground moved lower from beneath him. He had nothing to hold on to as he dropped, falling exactly back where he was.
He’d come back from death once. He’d been disoriented almost exactly like this. He wasn’t in afterlife. He was somewhere. He just had to figure out where.
Commander Wells, the asshole that shot him couldn’t have missed the shot. The gun had been five inches away from his wide, octopus forehead. There was no way it didn’t punch a hole through his cranium.
There was a probability of him dying slowly, hallucinating all of this in his final seconds. There was no oily girl to revive him this time around. He’d gone from being elated about having half a million in his bank account back to the same situation he was in earlier, having to confront his death yet again.
He thought about Kysa and Kylan all over again. This time, he felt it like a knife in his heart. He’d been a fool to imagine a better life. He’d celebrated too early, and he was paying the price for it. He shouldn’t have ever trusted anyone in this hell tower.
At least Kysa and Kylan would be getting my money.
He tried to calm himself. If he died right here, he’d still be leaving them with half a million.
It wouldn’t actually be as smooth as that. If he died for good and his body wasn’t found, he’d be a missing persons case for a number of years. His family would have to make it on their own for that many years until the automatic declaration of death to see a penny of his money.
Maybe I should transfer all of it right now.
He didn’t know how long he had left in this strange place. It felt stable enough to sit. Everything could go to hell the moment he tried anything else. He did the familiar eye gestures to bring up the Mind Matrix.
Nothing happened.
He tried again.
Nothing happened.
Why is it not working?!
He had been able to use it all this time. The laboratory worked entirely on the Mind Matrix systems. He’d used it even afterwards in the tent with Wells where he checked the bank account.
Does it need something to work inside towers?!
That had to be the explanation. He’d seen all sorts of equipment everywhere in both cases.
Transferring the money was out of the question. He had to get out of the tower to do it. He wondered if the camp still had whatever equipment that allowed Mind Matrix to work in the towers. There was no way the Asset Recovery didn’t pack it up into the truck.
Fucking hell. I have to not die somehow, then.
He sighed and stood up. Everything creaked around him. He had to try everything to stay alive. If he had to die, he had to die somewhere his body would be found fast by other people. Disappearing into a dark corner like this would ruin his family way worse than having a funeral and getting it over with.
Snapping out of his bleak thoughts, he started exploring everything with his hands. He still didn’t have a feel for the creaky place that he was in. Exploring the ground, his hands touched something soft. He traced the shape with his fingers.
Wait, is this a guy?!
He touched around frantically looking for the head. It had to be Torga. If the man was just as lucky as him, they could make it out of this together.
He found the head. He ran his hands all over the man’s face. His skin was cold. He felt no breath when he finally found the man’s nose. Torga was dead, crumpled on the floor at a weird angle, pinned under the weight of his own body.
It didn’t matter now.
He was dead.
Finding Torga like this, Arcen figured out where he was. He was in a creaking metal death box. The same SUV they were both in when Wells shot them. That made sense as he touched around more. He could feel all of the textures. The carpet, the leather, the plastic and… the glass.
The smooth surface he was sitting on was all glass. He rotated the SUV in his head to figure out what weird angle it had to be in for him to end up in this position. The vehicle was face first in a hole.
That asshole must’ve crashed it to get rid of us!
His situation was far worse than he thought.
He ran his fingers over the smooth surface. The shattered windshield was sagging under his weight. He couldn’t tell how far the ground would be if he dropped.
Light! I need fucking light!
He managed to wrestle himself onto a metal surface that felt firm enough to put his weight on. He reached up the roof looking for the switch, but he could only feel dents and ripped upholstery. The vehicle had been crushed like a crumpled tin can.
How the fuck did this even happen!
He strained further and further, looking for anything that gave off any amount of light. The metal creaked along the rock surface on all sides.
Suddenly, the vehicle moved. Sliding deeper into the hole.
“Aah!” he yelled, holding on for dear life as glass shattered, debris scattering all over him.
It got snagged on something about a meter down and came to an abrupt stop. He didn’t move for a long time, afraid it would happen again. He felt completely helpless.
At some point, he accidentally talked to the tower. He didn’t think it would help. He had no contracts like Norm or the oily girl.
The gold veins weaved him the only contract he had as soon as he thought about it.
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SUBCONTRACTS ╰︶
????
FABRICATE WEAKNESS
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╰︶ACTIVATE ︶╯
He dismissed it right away.
That’s not helping! Do I have anything else?!
The tower weaved something else as soon as he wondered about what else he had. He wasn’t used to interacting with thoughts this way. It felt like everything was on a hair trigger. Just reading one word could open something that he never had seen, needed or even thought about.
╭ ╰︶?? ERITHERIA ?? ︶╯ ╮
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ NAME ╰︶
????
ARCEN
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ TITLE ╰︶
????
EATER OF PEOPLE
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ CLASSIFICATION ╰︶
????
INITIATE
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ ATTRIBUTES ╰︶
????
LOVE [9]
??
HATE [9]
??
TRUTH [10]
??
DECEPTION [8]
??
ORDER [7]
??
CHAOS [10]
??
HOPE [5]
??
DESPAIR [11]
??
CREATION [6]
??
DESTRUCTION [11]
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
??
LIGHT [10]
??
DARKNESS [8]
??
LIFE [10]
??
DEATH [11]
??
FUTURE [16]
??
PAST [3]
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SKILLS ╰︶
????
WRECK [1]
??
REVEAL [1]
??
INTIMIDATE [1]
??
DETONATE [1]
??
RADIATE [1]
??
RESTORE [1]
??
DRAIN [1]
??
PREDICT [1]
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SUB CONTRACTS ╰︶
????
FABRICATE WEAKNESS [1]
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ TRAITS ╰︶
????
SWALLOW
??
SUFFERENCE
??
EMBODIMENT
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ QUESTS ╰︶
????
RETREIVE ITEM
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
?╭─ GOLD ─╮?
╰ 0 ╯
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
?╭─ AURA ─╮?
╰ 8,058,276 ╯
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
He read through it all trying not to panic. These attributes were familiar. They were exactly the ones that he’d seen before on his Helviter Employee Profile thing that oily girl showed him at the beginning. He couldn’t remember the exact numbers from back then, but that didn’t matter now.
The girl had told him that towers were the real system. It still didn’t make sense why a tower would be tracking the same list of things that Mind Matrix did for his day job.
Unless, it’s how it’s always been?
He had it backwards, because he hadn’t been in towers for eight years with this system. The way this tower system interfaced with his thoughts rather than eye gestures like the Mind Matrix made it more primal, or fundamental. This wasn’t the screen-less computing thing that Mind Matrix was built for.
Setting Attributes aside, he saw the word ‘Contracts’. There was only one contract there. That hadn’t changed. Above that, he had a whole list of ‘Skills’. He couldn’t remember seeing it anywhere before because Norm Lorraine didn’t rely on these gold veins, he was talking with the tower directly with his brain.
What’s the difference? Skills and contracts? Why two?
So far, he’d thought of contracts as the means to ‘do things’ inside towers with this energy resource called Aura. But it seemed there was a whole other category of things that he could do.
He could still remember some of the things that he saw during those memory sessions. One of the items on the list of skills rang a bell. Norm used this thing ‘Reveal’ multiple times.
He used it on the oily girl as well. She used ‘Conceal’ to counter Norm’s ‘Reveal’. There was something about tiers or ranks. He remembered how Norm was impressed with the oily girl’s Conceal. He called it a waste of Aura.
Skills must be things that everyone can do?
The fact that he had it was proof enough. He hadn’t earned, bought or been given any of these things. They were just there, like they’d always been there.
Going further down that list, he saw three things that immediately caught his eye as solutions for his current predicament. Wreck, Restore and Radiate.
wreck.
Thinking about the word brought it up in full detail.
╭ ╰︶?? MAOSETH ?? ︶╯ ╮
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SKILL ╰︶
????
WRECK
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ AUDITOR ╰︶
????
MAOSETH
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ DUALITY ╰︶
????
CHAOS
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ TARGETING ╰︶
????
OBJECT
??
MULTIPLE OBJECTS
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ DESCRIPTION ╰︶
????
WEAR OUT AND BREAK
MECHANICALLY
FUNCTIONAL TARGET
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ BASE COST ╰︶
????
300 AURA
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╰︶ACTIVATE ︶╯
Wreck didn’t seem the right one. He was already in a wreck. If this was any more wrecked, he would be at the bottom of the crevice.
Radiate, then.
╭ ╰︶?? APOLLYON ?? ︶╯ ╮
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SKILL ╰︶
????
RADIATE
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ RANK ╰︶
????
FIRST
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ AUDITOR ╰︶
????
APOLLYON
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ DUALITY ╰︶
????
LIGHT
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ TARGETING ╰︶
????
POINT
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ DESCRIPTION ╰︶
????
RADIATES LIGHT FROM
THE TARGET POINT
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ COST ╰︶
????
300 AURA
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╰︶ACTIVATE ︶╯
He had more than enough Aura to spare for experiments.
A small point of light appeared directly where he was looking at. It was as bright as a small torch, emitting a pale bluish white light. It was enough to see everything inside the vehicle.
Oh, no!
He saw the twisted corpse of Torga behind him. His eyes open in a permanent expression of shock.
How long was I dead for?!
Arcen had no way of answering this question. He’d completely lost track of time.
Something about Torga looked weird. The cause of death should have been a gunshot to the forehead. Wells only would’ve had to move his aim to the right by about one foot to kill Torga. The man had no such wound—or any wound.
There was no blood anywhere. Panicking, Arcen checked him again, this time checking the neck for a pulse. There was none. Torga was really dead, completely intact.
Did he have a stroke?
Arcen had seen death many times than he could count. Besides him being definitely dead, it didn’t look like anything was wrong. There were no cuts or bruises, no tears, saliva, or blood. He just looked frozen in time.
How the fuck did he die then?
Arcen had no way of answering this question either. His situation was too dire to keep thinking about it.
The light showed him just enough of the surrounding features to guess his position. The SUV had indeed crashed face first into a crevice. He and Torga had somehow fallen with the panel that separates the driver's compartment. He’d been standing on the shattered windshield.
Slowly, he grabbed the nearest seat. It creaked, and the headrest he was holding onto came off. He managed to jump just high enough to grab a better ledge. He wrestled himself up through the crumpled metal.
When he just found his footing, the SUV sank another two feet further into the crevice. Arcen clung onto anything he could grab as metal creaked all around him, scraping against the rock walls. The light went off just in time.
Radiate!
Suddenly, the golden veins returned, responding to his thought. It only showed him exactly what he wanted to see.
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SKILL ╰︶
????
RADIATE
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╰︶ACTIVATE ︶╯
He used it again.
The light wasn’t strong enough to see how deep this crevice was. This still had to be the ground floor of the tower. He had to get out to know for sure. Things weren’t that bad. He could still make it out. He took one last look at Torga. He couldn’t do anything about his corpse.
He placed his leg firmly on a fallen seat and pushed himself towards the rear windshield. It was his only way out. The vehicle sank a couple feet into the crevice as he moved. He managed to squeeze through the gap in the rear seats and roll into the back.
Can I open the trunk?
The door had been crushed on both sides. It was stuck, almost like it was welded shut.
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SKILL ╰︶
????
RADIATE
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╰︶ACTIVATE ︶╯
He checked the seams of the rear windshield. He could push it just wide enough to peel it off. He found a piece of metal that he could use as a knife, and he chipped away at the shattered center of the windshield to cut a hole open.
His mind drifted as he kept on doing this. Then he remembered something that he had seen before.
Wasn’t there Detonate or something?
The list appeared.
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SKILLS ╰︶
????
WRECK [1]
??
REVEAL [1]
??
INTIMIDATE [1]
??
DETONATE [1]
??
RADIATE [1]
??
RESTORE [1]
??
DRAIN [1]
??
PREDICT [1]
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
There’s Wreck and Detonate. What’s the difference?
Detonate sounded dangerous. Wreck sounded more focused and controlled.
Detonate.
╭ ╰︶?? BRAHMARA ?? ︶╯ ╮
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SKILL ╰︶
????
DETONATE
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ AUDITOR ╰︶
????
BRAHMARA
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ DUALITY ╰︶
????
DESTRUCTION
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ TARGETING ╰︶
????
OBJECT
??
ENTITY
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ DESCRIPTION ╰︶
????
EXPLODES TARGET BY
RAPIDLY EXPANDING
GAPS BETWEEN
MOLECULES
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ COST ╰︶
????
300 AURA
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╰︶ACTIVATE ︶╯
He went with wreck, keeping his eyes on the shattered glass to target the skill before activating.
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SKILL ╰︶
????
WRECK
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╰︶ACTIVATE ︶╯
The shattered glass fell apart all at once. The glue holding the windshield to its frame failed.
“Oh fuck!”
Shattered glass fell on him. There was nowhere to run. He covered his face with his forearms barely in time to save his eyes.
He shook shards of glass off his forearms and climbed out of the vehicle. The vehicle sank another two or three feet, crunching against the rocks around it.
Standing on the rear door, he used Radiate to look for footholds.
He climbed up the jagged rock wall to his left. It took way longer than it should’ve to climb to the top. He was too paranoid about slipping or the footholds collapsing under his weight. But it wasn’t as hard as he thought. The crevice had rock formations at various levels. He climbed up like following a ladder.
Once at the top, he rolled off the edge in relief, happy to feel the cold flat rock on his back.
Still alive, somehow, still alive!
He didn’t want to get his hopes up. That always ended in tears and screams. He had to focus and find his way out of this place as fast as possible.
Arcen walked around the chamber for what felt like hours. He saw critters of all shapes and sizes. Most of them were skittish, dashing into the trees and holes as he approached. He passed by two large creatures. A snail the size of a firetruck that couldn’t give less of a fuck about him and an absurdly flat, huge salamander that tried to eat him after he stepped on its forehead thinking it was a weirdly shaped rock.
He learned how to use Radiate really well. He placed the blue flames where they could light the widest area for him, around corners, through gaps in trees and all around. Radiate costs kept piling up, but he didn’t care about that.
He found a small stream of water and drank as much water as he could. He was hungry too, but that wasn’t as bad as the thirst.
He met another creature that roughly resembled a deer as he came up on a small clearing down the stream.
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SKILL ╰︶
????
RADIATE
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╰︶ACTIVATE ︶╯
The ‘deer’ had a bulbous flower head with petals for a face. It had petals like armor plates instead of fur. It raised its flower head off the floor as soon as the light appeared. It ran away into the trees.
He continued his walk down the stream, hoping to find the exit from this chamber or this tower. He’d barely know the way if he found the research station again, wherever it was.
He found a clearing with a nice patch of soft grass that felt like cotton to the touch. He lay down on it to rest for a moment. His legs were burning, and he only had water in his stomach.
He drifted in and out of sleep for a while.
Something woke him up.
A flower deer was right above him, brushing its petals over his skin.
Can I eat it if I kill it?
He gave up before even trying. This thing had hooves, and it was twice his size.
“Fuck off...” he mumbled, turning over. The flower deer dashed away.
He didn’t feel rested enough to continue walking. He woke up sometime later with the same feeling. Except this time, he felt petals on his tentacles.
“The fuck’s wrong with—”
He was staring directly into the bulbous head of the flower deer. It had a mouth the size of a large cooking pot. All its petals were curled open, touching the top of his head.
What the hell is this!
The petals clamped down on him from all sides, and he felt himself being vacuumed into the flower head.
He panicked and tried to do too many things at once. He slipped on the grass, he tried to use a skill, a contract or anything. He ended up confusing himself.
Finally, He screamed, but his screams were muffled by the pulsating inner walls of the flower deer’s mouth. It couldn’t swallow him down. It kept him crammed into its throat, half of his his body dangling out.
“Let go!” he yelled, trying to kick it, but the petals clamped down tighter. Just when he thought it couldn’t get any worse,
The flower deer started running.
