Limitless by John Gold (best e reader for android txt) 📕

face if I want. And my head is buzzing by the time when Claude pulls me back to my senses.

“How did you find me? I didn’t leave any traces.”

The nurse smiles and points at a mark on my collar.

“The same way we find everyone. Other clothes aren’t allowed, and ours are outfitted with GPS chips. They track your health, too, which is why I come get you when there’s an alert.”

Apparently, problems with my health activate a signal. That’s fine, so long as there aren’t any chips under my skin—they’re much harder to get rid of.

I was able to read several books on spaceship building, their technological quirks, and ways to cut costs. It turns out that automating production right where the resources are mined can cut costs by as much as half. For a ship as large as a frontier, you need a ton of metal. The other additives can be brought from elsewhere.

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Current location: House of Fear

 

It would be no exaggeration to call this location the birthplace of nightmares. The gloom is palpable, seeping into everything around me. Living terrors scare everyone using any means at their disposal. It’s horrible. You’re just standing there, not bothering anyone, when someone lays their hand on your shoulder. When you turn reflexively, you just about lose your head to the gaping jaws of some terrifying beast.

Off in the distance, there’s an odd, weakly glowing silhouette. It gets closer by the minute, and soon, I realize, the soul of a hungry demon is rushing at me.

No matter how much energy I pour into my magic lantern, I can’t pierce the gloom. It’s the same Gray Lands, just with enemies everywhere. Happily, I survive all of my encounters with them. They even manage to break into my sensory deprivation chambers twice, and that’s when I learn what it means to freeze in horror.

I lie in the water, the darkness around so thick that I can’t see my hand in front of my face. As I imagine that I’m in my room, safe and sound, I slowly get the feeling that someone has their long, cold fingers on my throat. The sensation grows with each passing second until I realize that someone is sitting on my chest.

My lantern fires up, illuminating the space for a couple meters around me, and I see the beast trying to strangle me. It’s a zombie with eyes intact but muscles rotting away.

Damage received: 737290 (ignored: 1000000)

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The beast is smacking away at a spot that just partially ignores damage. And it’s a good thing he isn’t hitting any lower, otherwise I’d be dead—the Adam’s apple has half the resistance as the rest of the throat.

A wind of death kills the zombie instantaneously. His body dissolves into dust, though his hands stay clutched at my throat.

That’s a lesson I’ll remember until the very last trial. Now, when I climb into a chamber, I always leave the light on and one eye open. LJ keeps watch while I focus on suppressing the fear.

The farther I go, the more terrifying the creatures around me become. The light cast by my lantern barely reaches out two meters, so I can’t move any faster than a walk. It starts to get light at the end of the trial. But even that bit of good news turns out to be false hope for two reasons: I see everything in black and white, and there’s something resembling humanity’s greatest nightmare looming up in front of me.

Monster, Reeves the Lord of Fear, Level 19950

 

I realize too late that the mountain is actually an enormous beast. The white eyes have no pupils, the teeth are triangular, and it’s a hundred meters tall. It lets out a battle whoop as soon as it notices me.

Damage received: 8600290 (ignored: 25000000)

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The howl rattles its way through every cell in my body. My heart drops, and our eyes meet. It’s sitting in an enormous hole, which means that only a third of its body rises up above the edge of the precipice on which I’m standing.

Fear throws me into a stupor when I see an enormous paw reaching toward me. I’m lifted off my feet and hurled toward its mouth.

“Leap!”

You’re not going to get me that easily! The giant teeth snap together right where my head was a second ago. And as soon as the creature turns to look at me, I hurl a light spear at its eye. It’s impossible to miss from this distance. The hit elicits a screech, stones fly all around me, and debuffs start listing off in the chat. One paw clutches the wounded eye; the other tries to pin me to the ground.

My second light spear hits the monster in the finger, doing no damage whatsoever. In fact, its health is starting to recover quickly. As its health bar fills, the area grows lighter, and I realize that is what’s generating the aura of fear that’s turning everything black and white.

Yet another howl deafens me, just making it worse. Looking down, I notice the exit by its feet, though I also realize that the futility of trying to kill me with just one paw has now dawned on the beast. It pulls its second paw away from the wounded eye. But it also hits me that the creature’s going to be hiding its powerful second strike behind a first, diversionary jab.

After the first attack, I leap onto its arm using my sword, and then spring right into the gaping mouth. If you’re afraid of doing something, that should be the first thing you do. I’m afraid of being killed and eaten, so I make a beeline for the safest place I can find—the creature’s mouth.

The fishy tongue doesn’t help the monster spit me out, though chewing me up is always an option. I wedge my sword into its larynx and do everything I can to pick up the kill. Light spears go flying down into the stomach, and then a dead star sears through the rest