Arcen’s Mind Matrix flickered, and his headgear disconnected. He was back in the lab again. He looked around, still reeling from the memories swirling inside his head. Dr. Bourbon stood there staring at him intently.
“How was it, Mr. Henwick?” He asked with a concerned look on his face.
“I thought a session was three hours?” Arcen slurred, looking around for a clock. He didn’t feel like three hours had passed. It was only a few memories.
“Ah, that was three hours.” The doctor pointed at a display on the machine with a timer.
There’s no way?!
“Is time slowing down when I’m in there? I’m not sure I saw three hours of the past.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that, Mr. Henwick. This data is higher bandwidth than usual, takes your brain longer to process.”
He extended a hand to help Arcen stand up from the chair. Refusing help, Arcen stood, confident in his ability to do so. He stumbled and fell sideways immediately.
The hell? What is this?
He felt like he wasn’t ‘Norm’ enough to live in this octopus body of his. He’d been embodying the dead man for the last three hours, and some of that had leaked into his reality. He accepted the doctor’s hand and stood. A faint headache emerged from the depths of his forehead.
“You might experience some small side effects. These will dissipate in about fifteen minutes. You can take a break outside. Please return in one hour.”
Arcen walked out of the lab, through the integrity check room, and back into the lobby area.
“How did it go, Mr. Henwick?” Torga asked curiously. Jenna stood behind him with a worried look on her face.
“I have a headache, and I fell on my face. It would’ve been nice if someone told me any of these beforehand.”
“Mr. Henwick, your superior was instructed to give you the full briefing document,” Torga said, narrowing his eyes.
“What briefing document? I didn’t—“
That bulb-headed asshole Karnic.
As he was thinking about it, Jenna came over and took the helmet off him.
“Sit down, Mr. Henwick. I can help you with the headache,” she whispered, pointing at a chair nearby.
“Huh? What do you mean? I just need some pills.”
“We must save them for later. You can’t take two after each session. The recommended dose is two pills every eight hours. We’d like to avoid them as much as we can,” Torga said dismissively.
“Then how am I going to-“
“I’ll give you a head massage, and we’ll see,” Jenna said, rolling her sleeves up to her elbows.
A head massage?!
Arcen’s tentacles curled at the thought. He couldn’t remember the last time he got any sort of massage. He didn’t like being touched at all.
Should I say no?
He looked at her just to make sure. A hot woman wanted to mold his head with her fingers for free. Usually, he had to pay for things like these. He felt that tickle in his throat again.
Well, I don’t wanna be a pussy about it.
This was a fine opportunity to steel himself and see where things could lead. He readied himself as he watched her pour oil onto her perfectly manicured hands. Seeing oil knocked a couple of points off his fake confidence. He remembered that oily brat. He wasn’t ready when Jenna’s hands touched his squishy head. He squirmed, gripping the armrests of the chair tightly.
Don’t freak out! Don’t freak out!
“Oh wow? I didn’t imagine you’d be this soft,” she said, digging her fingers in. This is why he didn’t like being touched. He was squishy and sensitive now.
Jenna went to town on his head and tentacles, molding his head with practiced precision. He expected her to tickle him and make things unpleasant. He was so ready to say, On second thoughts, no thanks, Ms. Jenna.
That didn’t happen. His eyes rolled back, and he forgot all about the headache. This woman knew what she was doing. She kept going like a machine with surprising strength.
Holy crap. Is she single? Sounded like she enjoys squeezing my head. You can do that anytime, baby!
Within half an hour, his headache was gone, and his head was thoroughly oiled and tenderized. He could feel her fingers digging into his head even after she stopped. He touched his forehead as if to see if he still had it up there.
“Thank you, Ms. Jenna. That was way better than I expected, to be completely honest.”
“Oh, I’m glad I could help you,” she said, flushed by his half-compliment. “I worked as a masseuse for two years.”
For the first time in his life, Arcen saw a glimpse of real Jenna leak through her perfect face. He liked what he saw. He let it tickle his throat without trying to suppress it this time.
The second session wasn’t ready for him when he went back into the lab. Dr. Bourbon was busy with his team discussing something. Arcen took the chance to inspect the strange egg.
Might be best to put the sticker on while no one’s watching.
He looked for cameras and saw none. This was a temporary setup quickly put together just for him. They hadn’t bothered to rig the place up with cameras yet. He quietly scraped the black sticker from the sleeve of his glove and tacked it on the egg where it perfectly blended in.
The second session started as soon as the scientists finished their meeting.
┌──════════──???──════════──┐
Start
└──════════──???──════════──┘
Arcen was Norm again, and this time, he was in a dark chamber with glowing cylindrical plants. He wasn’t on the ground floor anymore. He was in the twenty-third one. Norm kept that fact at the top of his mind. He was more cautious in the way that he walked, more aware and ready for trouble in general.
Venti was leading the group, and he used his long pole-arm-like weapon to whack thick vegetation out of their way. Bower was positioned at the back with a strange light source hovering above him as he walked.
Norm and the girl walked side by side in the middle, keeping their eyes trained on the darkness on either side. This was about the elevation where things started to happen in these towers. Arcen knew it from watching documentaries. No one has ever managed to record a tower beyond twenty or thirty floors. All complex electronics failed at some point after passing through those glimmering walls between chambers and floors.
“Ivy, how far away are we?” Venti asked, slamming his pole-arm against an oversized mushroom.
“Half a kilometer, maybe?” The girl said, keeping her focus on the surroundings.
“You made it this far all by yourself?” Norm found it hard to believe. He’d definitely seen kids climb towers much higher, but they were accompanied by adults. It was rare for a young child to have enough perseverance to do twenty floors on their own.
He was pretty good at judging someone’s strength from the way they carried themselves. This kid didn’t feel remotely powerful enough for the current floor, let alone the four hundreds that they were heading towards.
“I’m pretty good at towers, Mister.”
“Oh yeah? How old are you?”
“Thirteen, why? Am I too old for you?” She asked with a menacing grin on her face.
Norm had a different plan. He needed to analyze this overconfident brat.
Gold veins grew from the corners of his eyes as he ‘spoke’ with his thoughts. He spelled those whispers in the same way the tower hummed them into his bones.
He can just do that?!
This was nothing like learning French or Japanese, the two languages Arcen had tried to learn but gave up on as a teen. This was more like playing ritual music with the brain as an instrument.
The gold veins twirled and twisted into various shapes as he did. Norm navigated through a bunch of those ‘screens’ before Arcen could even see the contents. He knew exactly which options to pick as if by muscle memory.
The gold veins rolled away when he stopped whispering. His world has darkened to shades of blue and purple. Thicker golden roots grew from the corners of his eyes, and he placed the girl at the center of his vision. Her outline started to glow gold, and thin vapor trails spiraled into the surrounding air.
Norm knew she had a strong Aura from the outline. He had to see how much.
Arcen didn’t really know what that meant. He’d never seen this Aura or this energy outline in a documentary. Climbers talked about it like a currency, but that was as far as video and audio could cover the topic.
Gold veins weaved in Norm’s eyes.
╭ ╰︶?? HERMAYA ?? ︶╯ ╮
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SKILL ╰︶
????
REVEAL
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ RANK ╰︶
????
FIRST
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ COST ╰︶
????
300 AURA
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╰︶ACTIVATE ︶╯
Norm could always bring up the exact thing he wanted with a thought. This looked like pieces of a larger interface.
“Hey, that’s not nice. Big man like you shouldn’t stalk poor little girls like me,” the girl said without even looking at him.
╭ ╰︶?? ERITHERIA ?? ︶╯ ╮
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ ACTIVATION FAILURE ╰︶
If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ INFORMATION ╰︶
????
TARGET IS USING SKILL
[CONCEAL 7]
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
Norm laughed as the dark purple shades faded from his world. Her energy outline faded with it.
”Conceal Seventh? I didn’t see that coming. So you’ve climbed high enough to earn that?”
“Something like that.”
Norm frowned at the child with newfound respect.
“That’s not the kind of kid you’d want to play with, Norm,” Venti said, slashing a small tree in half. “Trust me, I tried too. She’s here because she earned it.”
“Made her waste some Aura to counter that, though.”
Arcen had heard about these ‘skills’ the tower climbers are ‘blessed’ with in the towers. Climbers spoke of their costs getting higher and higher depending on the tier, level, or the rank of a skill.
If the First cost three hundred, Seventh got to be expensive.
“Oh, don’t you worry, Mister Popular Man. I have more than enough for you,” the girl said, smirking at him over her shoulder.
“Cheeky little shit.”
┌──════════──???──════════──┐
Skip
└──════════──???──════════──┘
┌──═════════──???──═════════──┐
HELVITER INDUSTRIES
︾
──────────────────────────
?Contract Activation Successful?
──────────────────────────
Contract: Glimpses of the Past
Cost: $43,900
Remaining Daily Quota: $1,324,100
└──═════════──???──═════════──┘
┌──════════──???──════════──┐
Start
└──════════──???──════════──┘
Norm was in a dark tube that was less than half a meter in diameter. This was the shortcut that the kid had found. A capillary shaft that goes up the tower through the white sections of its thick rock wall. It was filled with a clear, gel-like substance. They had some method of breathing through this liquid. All of their eyes were glowing blue. They were using some sort of power or skill for it. He’d missed it because the memory started in the middle.
The gel pushed them onwards towards the top, carrying them with it like ants stuck in syrup.
The inner surface of the shaft was unpleasant. Every inch of the wall was covered with thick, tubular fibers. A million fingers exploring every nook and cranny of the person inside it.
What a fucking nightmare?
Arcen felt molested experiencing it secondhand. There was nothing on God’s green earth that could ever convince him to crawl through something like this.
┌──════════──???──════════──┐
Skip
└──════════──???──════════──┘
┌──═════════──???──═════════──┐
HELVITER INDUSTRIES
︾
──────────────────────────
?Contract Activation Successful?
──────────────────────────
Contract: Glimpses of the Past
Cost: $12,200
Remaining Daily Quota: $1,311,900
└──═════════──???──═════════──┘
┌──════════──???──════════──┐
Start
└──════════──???──════════──┘
They were out of the shaft, and everyone was dry except for the girl, who was always oily. It seemed like they had been out of the shaft for a bit, as they were making their way through a chamber. This floor was very different from the floor in the twenties below. There were no bioluminescent plants or any sounds of critters. It was engulfed in complete darkness.
“It’s a bit too quiet and empty for my taste. Something’s wrong here,” Norm said, looking around.
They were on high alert, facing three directions while keeping the girl at the center. They moved through a mess of bony, root-like structures. Bower’s point light wasn’t enough to cut through this darkness.
“This floor was quiet like this when I got here as well,” the girl said, waving her hand at the root structures. “Although I didn’t get this far. There were Norgahals here. Should still be around, I didn’t kill any.”
An image of a ghastly creature came up in Norm’s mind. It looked like a translucent horse mixed with an angler fish to Arcen.
“I’ve dealt with those before,” Norm said, clenching his fists. The red crystalline scales of his gauntlets reacted to his movements. He could kill a Norgahal without much trouble.
“Something’s in here,” Venti muttered, pointing his pole-arm at the darkness ahead. “We need more light. Use your contract, Norm.”
Norm spoke to the tower much faster than he did before. Arcen barely even heard it. Gold veins weaved faster in his eyes.
╭ ╰︶?? APOLLYON ?? ︶╯ ╮
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ CONTRACT ╰︶
????
GREATER DAYLIGHT
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ DUALITY ╰︶
????
LIGHT
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ TYPE ╰︶
????
MAIN
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ RANK ╰︶
????
FIRST
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ DESCRIPTION ╰︶
????
FLIP THE DARKNESS OF
A GIVEN SPACE FROM
THE DESIGNATED POINT
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ CONDITIONS ╰︶
????
ACTIVATED SPACE MUST
BE DARK
??
ACTIVATED SPACE MUST
BE CONTAINED
??
EFFECT LASTS FOR 7
MINUTES
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ COST ╰︶
????
51,432 AURA
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╰︶ACTIVATE ︶╯
This was unlike any contract that Arcen had ever used for work.
The light that erupted almost blinded everyone. The ‘contract’ did exactly what it described. It flipped the existing darkness to light, preserving the same intensity. It went from pitch black to a clear-sky sunny day that no one has seen since the Mayday.
That light revealed something that made everyone jolt, including Arcen. They were surrounded on all sides by thick, writhing gray roots. All the roots ended upright, their pointed ends towards the chamber ceiling.
Gray humans with red eyes stood at the tip of each root, their legs fused together, weaved into the fibers of the root. Thousands of red pairs of eyes blinked all around them. Norm felt the hair at the back of his neck stand on end.
He didn’t know what this was.
How the fuck doesn’t he know?!
Arcen felt his panic leak into his own brain. He’d thought Norm Lorraine knew everything. How was this man just as surprised as he, a civilian?
“What the fuck is this?” Bower asked, readying himself as he activated several skills or contracts in quick succession. A blue sheen enveloped him over his exoskeleton, and his eyes started glowing white through his mask.
Venti snapped his polearm in half into two diagonal shards. He was also activating several things, and his orange hair danced upwards like a candle flame. He held the shards firmly, getting into a defensive stance.
“This isn’t normal!” Norm yelled quickly, browsing through his own things before Arcen could read them. Arcen only saw the word ‘activate’ several times. His scaly gauntlets grew up his arms. His muscles popped and bulged a couple of sizes bigger inside his reinforced outfit that was built to handle the stretch.
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ ACTIVATION SUCCESS ╰︶
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ ACTIVATION SUCCESS ╰︶
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ ACTIVATION SUCCESS ╰︶
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ ACTIVATION SUCCESS ╰︶
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
Norm paused for a second before dismissing all the gold veins. His vision darkened to purple, and he used reveal on one of the gray figures.
╭ ╰︶?? HERMAYA ?? ︶╯ ╮
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SKILL ╰︶
????
REVEAL
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ RANK ╰︶
????
NINTH
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ COST ╰︶
????
24,300 AURA
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╰︶ACTIVATE ︶╯
The result came up almost immediately.
╭ ╰︶?? ERITHERIA ?? ︶╯ ╮
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ NAME ╰︶
????
MERONOLITH TAILMAN
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SPECIES ╰︶
????
MERONOLITH
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SENTIENCE ╰︶
????
25%
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ AURA ╰︶
????
17,748
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
“Oh fuck!” he exclaimed. “This is a hive!” He had never met this one before. He had met similar things in the towers that he summited over the years. Each tower was different, and the creatures had slightly different properties. He had never seen the word ‘Meronolith’ before. Norm estimated at least five thousand individuals in this hive, surrounding them in this huge chamber.
A gray man dashed towards Venti from above just as Norm finished his sentence. The root bent with the agility of a tentacle as the man ‘swam’ through the air towards them like thousands of finger puppets on very long fingers. The gray men adjacent to the first attacker followed him in quick succession.
Venti countered with his dual shards, dashed to the left in an orange blur, and pierced the first creature through the chest. He decapitated it with his other shard and dashed back into formation.
Norm grabbed the first one that came towards him by the neck and ripped its torso open with his scaly hands. He tore the man off the root and threw the limp corpse over his head.
Bower summoned a huge wall of fire and caught a group of nine in a single swipe of his hand.
They fought waves upon waves of rooted gray men. The girl had her own unique way of fighting. She spurt streams of oil from her fingers and ignited the splashes mid air with a snapping gesture that sent sparks like fireworks. The creatures couldn’t shake off the fires that she set, no matter what they did afterwards. It was like napalm, burning through whatever it touched until nothing was left. She was almost as effective as Bower when it came to combat.
Norm went on a rampage. He jumped off the formation, ripping every root he came across to shreds. He saved Venti and the kid a couple of times. It was all a blur for Arcen. He saw heads torn, chests caved in, limbs flying as Norm destroyed everything in his sight. He flickered through whispers and veins at insane speed. Arcen understood none of it.
After suffering considerable losses, the gray men retreated from them in a wide circle. The thick roots created a bowl around them like an arena. The dead roots that they killed decayed and fell apart like sand sculptures.
Norm noticed it first. A twisted figure stood at the center of the bowl. It looked like a statue, as gray as the creatures they fought. It was folded inwards, limbs turned wrong at the joints, bones bent where they shouldn’t.
A loud guttural screech came from it. The statue moved, unfurling itself as it slowly raised itself into an impossibly tall female humanoid. She stretched herself out like an origami made of flesh. The roots that held gray men at their ends were connected to the base of her spine. Each of those ghastly roots was part of her body, serving the same purpose as the tail of a rattlesnake. She had lured her prey.
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SKILL ╰︶
????
REVEAL
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╰︶ACTIVATE ︶╯
Norm wasn’t thrilled about ‘wasting’ his Aura on this one skill, but he desperately needed to know what this creature was.
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ ACTIVATION SUCCESS ╰︶
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ NAME ╰︶
????
MERONOLITH QUEEN
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SENTIENCE ╰︶
????
76%
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────╮
?╭─ AURA ─╮?
╰ 0 ╯
╰─────╮╭────╯
Zero Aura was suspicious. He’d expected to see the reason listed there. That was how the tower usually responded. This creature couldn’t have survived this high up with zero Aura. Something was definitely off, and Norm had a gut feeling.
“It’s hiding its Aura. That’s the one we need to kill. Get ready.” Norm prepared his scaly fists. All the gray men went limp, and their glowing red eyes went dark. The gray roots flashed red from their ends back to her. Her eyes opened, they glowed red, and glowing red liquid flowed out from her tear glands. Her face wrinkled up into something between sorrow and wrath.
Venti leaned forward, adjusting his stance for dashing.
No one expected what happened next. In a split second, her pale white face was upside down, directly facing Venti, only inches away from his face. The shockwave of her move blew past them as she stared into his eyes.
Norm used Reveal again as he dashed forward.
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ SKILL ╰︶
????
REVEAL
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╰︶ACTIVATE ︶╯
The Meronolith Queen opened her mouth, her teeth grew out like needles, and pierced Venti’s head. She sucked her teeth in, and his head went in her mouth, ripped clean off his body.
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ ACTIVATION SUCCESS ╰︶
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────────────╮
︶╯ NAME ╰︶
????
MERONOLITH QUEEN
╰─────────╮╭────────╯
╭────────────╮
?╭─ AURA ─╮?
╰ 99,069,336 ╯
╰─────╮╭────╯
“Holy fuck!” Norm screamed as his friend’s decapitated corpse collapsed on the floor, spurting a thick stream of blood.
“Get back, kid!” he yelled at the oily girl, yanking her off the ground and tossing her far away from them. “Run!”
┌──════════──???──════════──┐
Skip
└──════════──???──════════──┘
┌──═════════──???──═════════──┐
HELVITER INDUSTRIES
︾
──────────────────────────
?Contract Activation Successful?
──────────────────────────
Contract: Glimpses of the Past
Cost: $165,800
Remaining Daily Quota: $1,146,100
└──═════════──???──═════════──┘
