Weapons of Mass Destruction

After a round of sparring, Tess and I went to the top of the tower, to have a look at the city around us. Right away I noticed a few higher towers with a better position that I felt would offer a nicer view of the lake.

“Do you think Sophie will be mad that we damaged the training hall?” Tess asks, her hair waving in the gentle breeze as she takes a seat on the bare rooftop.

I follow her example and claim a seat next to her. “Who should we blame it on?”

“The twins would rat you out in a heartbeat if you tried to blame it on them. Lily and Min-Jae would seem to be the best options.”

“I agree, also, did you just call him Min-Jae?”

She smiles. “He asked me to call him by his first name, apparently that means we’re good friends. He almost asked Maya as well, but he seems kinda shy around her.”

“He told me to call him by his first name months ago.”

“This isn’t a competition, Nat.”

“Sure.” Even though the sun isn’t visible, because of that dust or whatever surrounding the moon, it feels a bit warmer up here, so I open up the blanket a bit so that Biscuit can enjoy it as well.

“Do you plan on bringing him with you while you’re serving as Sophie's bodyguard, or will you break down and finally allow us to touch him?” She asks, lifting her eyebrows in an amused and questioning manner.

“I know, the moment you guys get your hands on him, even to pet him, you won’t be able to resist trying to take him from me. That's something I can’t allow. Besides, it’s up to me to protect him while he’s like this.”

“You mean while he is in a food coma?”

“It’s not a food coma. He’s digesting the Champion-ranked monster´s body and… cultivating or something. You know expunging impurities from his body.”

“So, it’s a food coma?”

“Yes…” I admit with a sigh and carefully hand him over to her, and she accepts him just as carefully, remaining mindful of the blanket as she does.

I watch as she gently touches the top of his head and pets him with the slightest brush of her fingers before using her entire palm, seeming surprised by just how small his head has become, not to mention its softness. I can see it on her face, especially in the big smile dominating her expression.

Biscuit, the sleeping pup, is defenseless, so she takes the opportunity to poke at his round, soft belly, pulls on his paws, and then, seemingly to her own surprise, leans in and sniffs the top of his head, chuckling as she does.

“Emotional Support Corgi, or ESC, is that what you called him?” she asks, the broad smile never leaving her face.

“Sometimes it feels that way. Izzy told me months ago that Biscuit feels like he has no evil in him, that you could always feel at ease around him.”

“Only until the moment he decides to nom on a being approaching level 500.” Tess quips.

“It was terribly weakened and almost all of its powers were suppressed.” I retort in the doggo’s defense.

“But he ate it.” Tess continues, “A house-sized deer with bones capable of withstanding an acid that melted through Lily’s arm as if it were nothing. She told me all about it.”

“If you put it that way…” I demure, letting the sentence fade into the air as lay back on the roof, allowing myself to rest, just for a while. No training, no worrying. Just for these few minutes, I allow myself to relax while I listen to Tess giggle like a child, caught up in her admiration of Biscuit.

“What happened to the other guys?” I ask after a few minutes, recreating the evil cube and reactivating my Restrictive Training Emblem.

“Famir took over the group we were leading. He and Heryd and their groups stayed with us after Sophie split off with Izzy. For the entire six months. We grew that group pretty big with their help and killed a good number of powerful sleeping monsters.” She seems reminiscent for a while. “Is it weird that I thought even that was fun? Even with the other groups pushing and hunting us, the need to constantly fight off strange monsters, all while dealing with city leaders, collecting information, and exploring amazing places?”

“I’m not the right person to ask.”

"I guess you aren’t," She admits, pulling Biscuit closer and rubbing her cheek against him, her golden hair falling around his tiny head. Then she asks, quietly, almost whisper silent, “Do you remember your apology, back in the tournament, for what you did on Earth?”

“Yes.”

“It was all forgiven long ago.”

As I look at her, she lifts Biscuit up to her face, his hind legs hanging down alongside his tiny, fluffy tail. Biscuit covers most of her face, her eyes the only things visible over his head. The wrinkles in the corners of her eyes tell me she’s smiling.

“Ah... that’s good.”

“It is, isn’t it?” I can hear the smile in her voice, but by the time she puts Biscuit back in her lap and wraps the blanket around him, it is gone.

As her face takes on a more serious expression, she turns to me “I’ll guard the fort while you’re at that dinner with Sophie and speak with Maya so she can guard Sophie when you need to be out doing your own thing. I already asked Izzy to help and we got Sophie to push back her plans a bit, so we have more time for preparations. So for the next few weeks; this will be our base, and once we return from the Beyond expedition you have scheduled for us, we can finally push to leave the 6th floor. I just think it’s better to go to Beyond while we have a safe base here on the 6th rather than leaving others alone to deal with the start of the 7th.”

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

"Let’s see how things shake out. We still have a lot to gain here, so I wouldn’t complain—but things never go as planned. Hopefully, the other floors won’t take as long. I want to clear them all."

“Me too. Now, if you’ll allow me,” she says, carefully handing Biscuit back to me, “I have to go and get that smartphone from Izzy, I really hope it’s not broken yet. Then I’ll listen to some of Earth´s music on repeat until I fall unconscious.”

Sophie walks in front, joined by her second assistant. Mila’s bringing up the rear to handle our defenses, while Tess does the same. I follow closely behind in the new clothes I’ve been forced to wear.

For some reason, they even brought in a barber, who wound up giving me a simple haircut and a quick styling, that nevertheless manages to earn a few compliments. Izzy also snapped a picture, surprising me with the idea that there should be any storage left on the device.

Heading to dinner we don’t take anything as fancy as a carriage or ride some flying monster or whatever the people here are accustomed to using. Instead, we walk. There are plenty of sneaky touches reaching toward us. Attempts at mental manipulation, or leaving a mark on us, scans, and more. All of which is simply and swiftly thwarted by Sophie as she walks sharply, her posture confident and head held high. Her expression is very different too, colder, and more confident, if not just dangerous.

Whenever people reach towards us, she reaches back, causing exactly twice the damage they would have caused.

So far, she also defends me and her second assistant who is also a mind mage, even if they are weaker than herself, so I’m just enjoying the walk and the feel of my new clothes. I think they’re the most comfortable I’ve ever had in the tutorial. Except for that shirt I bought for 10 bucks seven years ago. Even though it’s bleached and has a few holes, I still used to wear it on Earth when I went to sleep. Last I knew I’d thrown it over my chair back on Earth.

I hope no one stole it.

(Now that you and Tess are here, I can push more, so I mean to do just that. It will result in more attempts on our minds. Will you be okay?) Sophie is the first to break the silence.

(Sure, go wild. It’ll be more fun that way.)

(I'm confident you’d be singing a different tune if you didn’t have that disgustingly powerful passive to protect your mind.)

(That’s true; you know how much I love mind manipulation. I would probably end up nuking this city from orbit otherwise.) I’m sure she remembers our… clash from the first floor just as well as I do.

(I think these powers are just as disgusting as you do,) she admits, her voice growing quiet, despite the privacy afforded by our communications uplink.

To her assistant’s surprise, Sophie slows her walk and points to her right. (There are 10 people in that small house there. A group of people who’ve been taken over by one of the weaker mind mages. I could erase his marks, his protection, and order them all to start killing each other with a thought.)

She starts walking again. (Just think about how simple it is, even here, where people have mana, levels, and stronger natural barriers. Imagine what I could do on Earth. By the time I get out of the tutorial, I should be capable of turning millions, tens of millions, into mere slaves.)

(Do you want to?)

Sophie laughs. (It’s damn crazy, that would be the first thing you’d ask. I don’t want to, but if it meant protecting Izzy? Protecting someone else from our group? I’d just like to think I’d at least hesitate.)

(Why would you? Isn’t your sister more important than a bunch of people you don’t even know?)

(I... do you realize the moral implications of that, Nat?)

(Yes, very clearly.)

(And you would... you would choose your sister over millions of people?)

(Yes.)

(...sometimes it’s really easy to forget how you are.)

(I’m not saying I’d do it with pleasure, obviously. My goal is to become powerful enough to avoid ever being forced to make that choice. But want to hear a secret?)

(Please tell me, Nat.)

(No matter what you do or how much you try to prepare, there will be fuck-ups.)

(So you think I should stop worrying?)

(Nope. Just do the best you can so that even if something does fuck up, you can say there was nothing more you could do.)

(I wish I could.) She waves her hand, and a group of guards parts around us, letting us pass unchallenged. Before she starts walking again, she faces me, fully serious, with the faintest of smiles on her face. (People like me don’t get happy endings, and there’s a good reason I was thrown here.)

Then she turns, her steps determined as she strides forth to face the very thing she hates.

The building towering in front of us is much taller than our tower. Likely the second tallest in the city. It’s pitch black, with a surface as smooth as a polished mirror.

White inscriptions coil their way across the surface of the entire tower creating an ornamental display, bathing the surroundings in a gentle light. The trees framing the pathway have their own set of matching round lights floating among the branches, moving gently like buoys resting on the waves.

As it turns out the dinner isn’t actually being hosted inside the tower; instead, they’ve set everything up outside, in a beautiful garden framed by an assortment of trees, coiling pathways, flowers, and pillars showcasing art and inscriptions. The air hums with a strange energy, thick and charged. Shadows flit between the trees, figures pass through dressed in cloaks and fine robes, each giving off a sense of purpose and mystery. Somewhere deeper in the garden, music plays softly, adding a haunting echo that blends almost seamlessly with the whispers of the crowd around us.

There are dozens of people milling about, and Sophie’s protection disappears from me as she leaves me to fend for myself.

As if they had been waiting for just that moment, dozens of careful touches brush against my mind, each one making my blood boil. And even though they don’t manage to do anything, just the sheer fact that they’re even trying makes me want to smash in their heads.

My mind, my freedom is very important to me, and that’s a sentiment that’s only grown stronger over the course of the tutorial as I’ve encountered the forces capable of taking that freedom away.

I make sure to remember each and every one of those signatures, especially the three that seem more powerful or sneakier than others, making more serious attempts at taking over.

After clearing my mind, I use [Focus] to strengthen my resistance and follow Sophie, aware of dozens more scrying touches reaching for her than for me. It’s almost as if each step closer to the center of the garden were sharpening their interest, and drawing them in like moths to a flame.