Lair by Carl Stubblefield (recommended reading TXT) 📕

“Of course.”

Gus mentally kicked himself. How much time could I have saved if—No. No use in getting upset about it now. “Put some stealth mapping drones into the queue.”

“They should be ready by the time you finish training.”

“That’ll do, pig,” Gus mocked.

“Insulting bacon? Just get to training before you pull down the wrath of The Beard on you.” Gus furrowed his brow in confusion. “Never mind. Just go!”

As Gus entered the training arena, he stopped and looked at the quiet room. He was a total noob when he first started here, and now was getting pretty confident with fighting. He still felt like it may not be enough, but tried to not go down that rabbit-hole and the self-doubt that lurked there. Gus stood on the scanner, and waited. And then he waited some more. Just as he was about to step off the scanner, a quest dropped:

Quest Granted: The Final Countdown

Quest Conditions:

1) Familiarize yourself with your new armor’s capabilities

Quest Rewards: 300 XP, 100 FP

Time Requirements: None

Do you want to accept this quest? (Y/N)

That was simple. Gus accepted and three pillow-Mantids assembled to battle him. Gus got in his usual stance to start fighting. The pillow-Mantids began attacking like they were berserkers. The fury of their attack had Gus retreating and misplacing his steps. He fended one or two off with his naginata, but one got in a swipe from the side. As the holographic claw scraped at his face, Gus saw the padded arm blade under the projection getting closer through his peripheral vision.

Gus braced for the impact, when a surge of heat occurred, accompanied with a slight tickle on his skin. The final impact, if it could be called that, was like getting hit with a paddle shaped balloon, noticeable but harmless. Gus saw a crackling silver sheen flare at the site of impact as his eyes panned down by his cheek. A tiny bit of his MP and stamina were used in the process but to avoid getting slapped like Charlie Murphy, definitely worth it. Gus retreated out of the arena, and began to ask questions.

Instead of simply answering, Gus’ vision suddenly went black. His point-of-view shifted, and he was seeing the world as if through an insect’s eye. Well, not exactly like an insect, but the effect reminded him of how their eyes worked. There were many tiny hexagonal areas that were stitched together to create a mosaic of the world around him.

The motion in there was a discrepancy; he could feel more Nth moving to this area. The resolution of the view sharply increased as more Nth got in position and gave more feedback on the attack.

Without knowing exactly how, Gus felt the Nth adopt a honeycomb arrangement of multiple layers around the projected site of impact. As the padded blade of the pillowbot began to make contact, the hybrid-Nth began converting the kinetic energy into other forms of energy, then dissipating the remainder as heat. Gus could understand as he shared this consciousness briefly that the full brunt of the attack was not only absorbed, but redirected as in Judo or Aikido, allowing a portion of the force to glance and pass over, causing the enemy to overshoot as this slip occurred and providing an exposed overextension. As quickly as it assembled, the honeycomb structure disassembled to reposition itself in a consistent lattice around his whole body.

Gus’ vision winked black again and then he was back to normal. The experience was more than just seeing what was being done, he understood how and why it was being done. Just like a dream though, aspects of the experience that made sense to him and that he knew on an intuitive level and didn’t question just seconds ago began to fade and leave his consciousness. He tried to grasp at them but gave up when they retreated.

Gus strode back into the arena and the fighting resumed. Gus took a couple more risks, but was able to get more critical strikes as he expanded his style past the defensive style he had acquired to avoid getting scratched or infected by the Dark Nth. Occasionally, he found that he had the tendency to retreat and overprotect himself when he could have ended the fight.

After a bit of sparring, he became freer with taking more chances when he was facing the last pillow-Mantid alone. Once they were all defeated, they would reset and he would start again. Before he realized it, a half hour had passed and he completed the quest. The arena went dark.

Gus found he was hungry again and grabbed a snack to go so he would be buffed for the longest time possible. At his request this one delivered a five-point bonus to intelligence. As he began to eat, he saw that it stacked with his previous buff. Gus knew he was going to have to rely heavily on abilities and the increase to his MP pool, even if temporary, could get him out of a clutch situation when fighting Methiochos. The effects only lasted two hours, so it was time to grab his drones and get going.

Gus sent the drones ahead of him to scout the cave, and began running down the path.

Chapter Forty-Four

Final Boss

Day 10 3:54 PM

0:07:16 remaining

Gus arrived at the cave entrance. The drones had done a good job and mapped the inside of the cave. He entered the first chamber. The sulfurous scent of rotten eggs was more obnoxious the deeper he progressed into the chamber. As the light faded, yellow lines and textures illuminated the walls and areas ahead. Gus’ display also enhanced what he could see, but everything had a green tint as the display shifted to night-vision mode.

Meaty undertones tainted the smell of the chamber as well, and Gus couldn’t tell if they were from some prey the zombies had eaten, or remnants of their own decomposition. He struggled to breathe in the cloying, sulfur-rich gases. After a half-coughing, half-gagging fit, the silver cracking