Chapter 82 – Connections

AG. Nice long chapter today but no promises for tomorrow. All three kids are claiming they are too sick to go to school. With different symptoms. 1) Vomitting (proven), 2) Coughing (proven and its pretty bad) and then 3) the youngest (8 years old), headache, sore throat, snotty nose (proven) and headache.

Corrine visibly gritted her teeth.

He grinned at her. She was killing him easily, but the GOD’s shield pulling him out a moment before death guaranteed it to be painless. He was not suffering.

She narrowed her eyes. “I’m not sure you’re getting it.”

“I know how weak I am.” He told her reasonably. “There is nothing to be proven.”

More words appeared in front of him. He was getting sick of the repetition.

Corrine Hayley Roberts has challenged you to a duel to the death under a full GOD’s shield.

Terrain: Temperate, Mid-day, Ruins. Mode: Private. Time: 2 hours max.

Accept or Decline.

The slight changes in the wording were interesting, and he didn’t want to piss off a potential long-term ally. But nor was he willing to keep putting up with this silently. She had just beaten him to death with her fists. “For goodness’ sakes, Corrine, give it a rest.”

“Accept it.” She insisted.

For a moment, he considered saying no. The open competitors would support him. He had the right to reject her request. The question was whether that was the right call. She was someone he wanted information from in the short term and potentially more tangible support in the future. She was going to be powerful with a capital P, while he was just starting out - it would be stupid to alienate her.

“One more, please. I promise this is the last time.”

With a sigh, he clicked the button, and, a moment later, he was in the latest environment that he was going to have to fight in.

As always, Corrine was twenty metres away, and the usual ten-second countdown was in progress. He took the time to look around. If it wasn’t for the fact that he knew what was coming, the surroundings would have been pleasant. The two were perched on a small hilltop, and ancient remains of giant structures were surrounding them. It took him a moment to realise that the buildings had been constructed of wood instead of stone. He could see what had once been the frame and the cladding for the walls. The timber was in various states of disrepair. Some of it had been worn away by exposure to weather; then, in other spots, there was little visible aging. It was like the wood had been eroded away like stone rather than having been subjected to rot, and it wasn’t like it was dry. There was visible moisture on the areas that hadn’t yet been exposed to the sun.

The timber was clearly magical or unique, because it apparently was not subject to the aging cycles he was used to seeing. The remnants of the building were broken and splintered by age; only what looked like a particularly robust lichen grew upon it and even it was only present sporadically. Nothing else had touched it. Off down the hill, there was an almost intact structure. It was a single room the size of a basketball court, with extra-large wooden beams, just like those in the collapsed buildings near him, providing support.

The countdown ended, and Corrine raised her hands to ask him to relax. “We’re not here to fight.”

“You mean we’re just here for you to kill me again. Because I’m too pathetic to give you a fight.”

Her face softened. “No, Tom. I’ve made my point. That should have shown you how fucking weak you are.”

“You’re twice my age, Corrine, of course you can beat me. Especially when your build hard-counters mine.”

“Stop,” she yelled. “No. Fucking. No. Don’t be a weak shit and fall back on excuses.”

“It’s not an excuse, it’s just the truth.”

“Yeah, maybe. I might be older, but the competition is not fair. I’m weak, you’re worse. Do you realise that, in terms of raw power, I’m not even in the top fucking quarter of the children in your bucket?”

“Yes, I realised it,” he snapped back at her. “You didn’t have to kill me to demonstrate it. What are you, a psycho?”

She looked a little hurt. “I was proving a point, and it didn’t actually hurt you. I know what an instant kill in training feels like, and I made sure you died quickly. I know it feels weird, but it’s harmless.”

“It was excessive and deranged.”

“It was necessary.”

“But why do it? You didn’t talk to me first. Or bother to ask what I thought. If you had, you would have understood that I agree with you. That I know I’m weak. I’ve learnt it when I fought a rank six.”

“A rank six? You fucking idiot. You did what? Without a GOD’s shield? Do you know how reckless that is?”

Tom glared at her until she stopped her rant.

She had the grace to look embarrassed.

“As I was saying, I fought a rank six in the second contest. Afterwards, I decided I couldn’t fight a six point five, so I sat out the final round.”

“Then how did you fucking qualify?” She stopped as her brain caught up with her words. Realisation blossomed on her face. Her anger vanished, replaced with pity, as she understood what must have happened. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know. Forgive me, please. Sometimes I might be a little too impulsive and express my opinions before I should.” She chuckled. “No filter.”

“I’m not stupidly reckless, Corrine. I know how important staying alive is. That’s the whole game - grow as fast as possible while not taking undue risk.”

“Still, teaching you how weak you were didn’t hurt.”

“I already knew. Plus, who leaps into consecutive death matches like that?”

“It’s because of Tan Ru and Sonamoni.” She almost cried out the words. “It’s because of them. They were good. They were fucking good. Sonamoni was better than me, and she died. You can’t do the same. I’ll make sure you won’t.”

“Corrine, I’m reincarnated. You know my background. I’m competent.”

“Fuck your background. If anything, it makes you more reckless - didn’t you die in the first year? And Sonamoni was ranked number one for months before she died. I watched for the whole first two years how quickly all of you at the top dropped off, as the risks you took became too much.”

Tom studied Corrine. The false bravo remained there. Her history from whatever disadvantaged suburb she had come from was unchanged. But while she was hard, most of what she was doing seemed to be driven by concern.

“I don’t know who Sonamoni is.”

“She was a short girl, and one as crazy as you.”

“I’m not crazy. I died because I was hunted.” The last, while technically true, was a lie. His arrogance and lack of preparation had been what had killed him, but it would be counterproductive to tell Corrine that now.

“You’re not getting it. It doesn’t fucking matter if you’re crazy or not. Whether you like it or not, Tom, I’m going to do my best to make sure you understand how the fucking place works and help you stay alive.”

“And is this part of that?” he raised his arms to indicate the arena.

“Yes.”

“How is your lecturing me worthwhile? Amkhael was in the process of inducting me, and he seemed a hell of a lot more professional than you.”

She looked slightly hurt at that accusation. “No. Amkhael’s a wanker, and Esedhuil is a bitch who has a stick so far up her arse I’m surprised it’s not coming out of her throat.”

Tom snorted in laughter before he could help himself. The mushroom priestess had definitely been uptight.

Corrine smiled, and, for the first time since she brought him here, he could see her relax slightly. “Tom, I’m being serious about teaching you and doing it properly. What Amkhael will give you is a lip service. I’ll do it better, because I don’t want to see anyone else die.”

He shrugged. “I’m not about to turn away help, but how does being here…” He stamped his foot for emphasis and glanced pointedly at the surroundings. “Why here? How does being here help?”

“Privacy, seats, and more pleasant surroundings.”

“No; I mean, back in the foyer we had access to the terminals. They had looked like they had some serious hard data for us to look at.”

“The information DEUS is collecting is great.” She agreed happily. “But that was the other reason I was extending the fights. I have a solution, but I needed time to download everything required for this session.” A screen appeared in her hands,. It looked suspiciously like one of the terminal screens from an isolation room. Specifically, the ones used in the status ritual check.

“And where did you get that?”

She smirked. “Where do you think? With the acids in the upper cupboards, it didn’t even require any strength. Ten minutes and it came off. Dim just laughed at me when I admitted it was me. I reckon he had already guessed. No harm, really. Everything in the orphanage is there for us to use.”

Tom could have said lots in that moment, but there was something more important troubling him. He pointed at the screen. “How does that work here?”

“Trading between individuals is heavily regulated. It has to be coins for objects, and the system gets involved and takes a large cut of the transaction, so I couldn’t give this to someone to just go and fix. However, the open section competitors are all hundreds of years old. There are no restrictions on knowledge. So, I brought this screen and various tools, and one of them helped me make the modifications. Listen, I would like to come over, but I don’t want this,” she waved the screen in her hands, “to get damaged, and I kind of want to get closer. And, um… I know you’re angry. And so, I guess, if you need to kill me, then… um… I guess I can…” she bit her lip. “I can put it away and let you get revenge, and we can come back. But, um, if you have to do that, can you try to make it quick?”

She appeared genuine. He sighed. He guessed it would be unfair to blindside her like he had planned. Especially as such an effort would likely damage the screen, which sounded valuable and hard to replace.

“That’s not necessary. I’ll behave.” He promised.

“Come on,” she nodded at a nearby heaped pile of wood and then went over to it. She wrinkled her nose at the messy-looking seat. No matter how they sat, it was not going to be very comfortable, and he suspected their bottoms were going to get wet. “This is not what I was hoping for when I selected ruins. I was hoping for some nice steps, or at the very least some comfortable sitting stones rather than this.”

She sat down anyway, then waved at him to sit beside her.

When he sat, he discovered the logs were far more comfortable than he had expected, with the lichen taking the hard edge off them.

Corrine didn’t immediately turn the screen on, but rather faced him with a serious look. “I know you probably have dreams of winning thousands of matches and getting some life-changing, incredible natural treasure, an item that I’m sure that your curated list has dangled in front of you. Mine’s a tier-nine inferno storm domain. Everyone’s got something.”

“Yes, I saw the list. I have a stretch goal as well, but right now I’m ready to wave the white flag. I’m never getting it.”

She exhaled sharply in relief. “Thank the goddess. Some people get irrational about it. While the discounts are good, I think they’ve probably been inserted by the other GODs as a trap. I’ve also abandoned mine. All the old hands tell pretty much the same story. You try to get whatever your item is - you end up dead. I’m glad you’ve seen the truth without needing an intervention.”

“And you’ve really given up on yours? Looking at your coins earned, I thought you would be almost there.”

Her face darkened. “That’s right. I saw that fucking meddling cunt Amkhael parading that list in front of you. He shouldn’t have done it. And, let me guess, you saw the number of coins earned and did the maths about how often they had to be winning without a GOD’s shield to reach that number. And now you probably fucking think you can do it. That meddling arsehole.”

“I calculated the percentage.” Tom admitted.

“Bloody cunts. They knew it was old data, so they shouldn’t have shown it. Tan Ru passed on a warning from the person before him and it’s also in the human-only notes in the archive. Long story cut short, the historical success rates of the past no longer apply. They did something to alter the brackets to counter humans.”

“And Tan Ru knew that exactly how?”

“A priest warned him. You shouldn’t try to duplicate what they did. It’s too dangerous.”

“But you are.” He accused her.

“I’m not. But I’ll give you full disclosure of what I’m doing later. For now, let’s look at this.” The screen in her hands was turned on. It was filled with a familiar list, with him right at the bottom. “I downloaded all the information on your bucket prior to starting this session. These are all DEUSs representatives, and, before we get into the detail, you need to realise that, on average, due to how we select the participants, our win ratio is only forty-five percent.”

Tom frowned at that. That didn’t seem like a huge discrepancy, but it was a noticeable one when theoretically it should have been a fifty-fifty.  

“But it gets worse. If the SANATORES and INNECTIS didn’t send competitors, then the percentage would have dropped to thirty-nine percent. We’re fucking weak,” she waved the screen to illustrate her point. “And that’s what I’m comparing you against. So, even if you could beat fifty percent of your cohort, when you’ll be challenged against the other competitors, it will be lower.”

Tom nodded. “I get that. This is all pretty basic stuff.”

“Am I right when I say you’re close range lightning and spear? I’m not sure your healing matters that much.”

“Yes, and I’ve also got something to speed up my perception, illusion piercing, protection against mind attacks, and a weak instant finishing move.”

She nodded. “So does that mean I’m safe to say you’ve got no offensive abilities beyond five metres?”

“More like three.”

“So, before going through individual records, am I safe in assuming that you agree that anyone good at range will beat you?”

“Unless they’re overconfident and get too close.” To illustrate his point, he carefully zapped her shoulder.

She squealed and rubbed the spot hard, but didn’t retaliate. “What was that for?”

“Just to show I can be dangerous if you get too close.”

“Bullshit. You just wanted to zap me.”

Tom didn’t deny it.

“I guess I deserved that, but your premise is wrong. People here don’t taunt. All of our system fights are self-recorded afterwards, so I can get hard facts on that assumption later. But, for now, just know that you’re wrong. There’s only ever one or two active ones who play with their food like that.”

Tom wrinkled his nose. “No way. They can’t be that disciplined.”

She nodded seriously. “As a rule, I’m afraid that’s the case. You have to remember that everyone here’s exceptional.” She paused and poked her tongue out. “Exceptional excluding you, that is. People aren’t dumb enough to take chances. So, back to my original question. Can we just assume any ranged attackers will kill you?”

Tom wanted to argue, but the simple fact was that unless he could land Spark against his opponent, they would beat him. Reluctantly, he nodded in agreement, and precise instructions rolled over the interface.

Mark individuals who predominantly kill at a range of greater than four metres.

The list updated, and over half the people had a tick against them.

Corrine nudged him. “How does that make you feel? All of those fuckers are killing you instantly.” 

It was an extensive list, but not one he could dispute.

“And I also assume you’ll die against anything immune to your lightning.”

“Not necessarily. My lightning has a sideways evolution that allows it to stun everything.”

“Even a stone elemental?” she asked in confusion.

“No, not that,” he admitted. “They have to be physically able to be stunned.”

“So, only people with flesh and blood?”

Once more, he found himself being forced to agree when he didn’t want to.

“So, if they’re biologically immune, I can mark them as your loss as well?”

Tom remembered the multi-coloured ball creature he had fought. Technically, it had been immune to lightning, but he had killed it. “I fought a four point five in the contenders’ challenge that was immune, but I still kill it. It’s not a guaranteed loss just because they’re immune.”

She looked at him like he was an idiot. “Come on, Tom, that’s delusional. You’re not fighting some defective person in a random colosseum event; we’re talking about fucking elites here. If your only offensive spell doesn’t work, you’re toast. Unless there’s something special about your spear work you’ve forgotten to mention, that is. Maybe an ability that can let you beat a fighter twice your rank? Do you have anything like that? Tom?”

She watched him like a hawk as he processed her words and couldn’t find a way to dispute them. She nodded, satisfied; then commands went across the screen once more.

Mark all individuals who are biologically immune to stun.

Another ten percent were ticked off.

Corrine nodded at the numbers. “This is not great news for you, Tom. Sixty percent of DEUS champions in your bucket hard counter you. They’ll get an automatic kill against you.”

“Which means there is forty percent I can beat.” He joked.

She burst into laughter. “Not so fast, terminator. It only means that a fight against forty percent of them doesn’t mean instant death. We need to work through specifics to actually estimate your chances against the others.”

She pressed the first unmarked name on the list, and detailed information on their build was displayed.

Tom whistled. “If this got out...”

She waved her hand dismissively. “It can’t. There are trial level geas, and additional ones for DEUS-mandated private information. We can’t spread this accidentally or deliberately, so you don’t have to worry about any of your secrets being exposed. Such as them discovering you’re the Tom.” She smiled as she made inverted commas for his name.

Tom focused in on the teasing, and he felt like cradling his head in his hands. “You didn’t... You didn’t research me, did you?”

She shrugged, neither confirming it nor denying. “Don’t look so worried. I’m not going to betray you. They won’t find out that Tom is back from me.”

“Tom is back? Protect me? That’s funny, but your efforts are futile. My enemies already know who I am.”

“What the fuck does that mean?” She was instantly focused on him. “What did you just say?”

“They know that the Tom, as you described him, has been reincarnated, and that I’m in this orphanage.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” She said quietly, with an edge of threat.

Tom hesitated and then realised he had divulged too much. “Oh… forget what I said. It wasn’t important.”

“No, Tom, what the fuck do you mean the enemies know about you? I can tell you weren’t joking, and you’re alive, so them knowing is an impossibility. Spill it.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“No, Tom. We’re on the same team. We’re the future; I have to know.”

“The enemy GODs may have been running a fate-based ritual to try to kill me.” He admitted, realising that trying to keep everything secret now would be counterproductive.

Her eyes narrowed. “They were?”

He nodded.

“I’m not calling you a liar, but how the hell would you notice something like that?”

“There was a powerful boss in the bat lair. It was too strong to have been summoned randomly. It didn’t have fate abilities, but there was some hostile fate countering my own. And…” He stopped abruptly. Mentioning that he was responsible for the attack on the orphanage might not be sensible, and hopefully the boss’ information would be sufficient.

“And…” she said dangerously.

“That’s it,” he lied poorly, and internally cursed his social skills. “It was obvious from the bat being there when it shouldn’t have.”

“Spill it, Tom.”

Stubbornly, he said nothing and looked away. To his surprise, she didn’t push. Instead, she got up and started pacing up and down. Then suddenly she pointed at him. “The new assassin types. The ones that tricked Dimitri; you think they were after you, don’t you?”

He froze.

“For you to believe that, Dimitri must too. If that’s the case,” she mused. “It would explain why they only attacked our town. The proper strategy would have been to hit all three orphanages simultaneously, as they had the numbers. Instead, they focused on us because…” she met his eyes suspiciously. “Exactly how was that attack related to the bat?”

“It happened four days after.”

She bit her lip thoughtfully, absorbing that fact. “Fuck me. The resources, the coordination… Fuck. That could only have happened under a GOD’s orders. MAKROS must hate you.”

“Dimitri consulted with Eden. He didn’t tell me the details, but yes, he concluded that I might be hated that much.” It made little to no sense, but the older man had been convinced by whatever Everlyn had said about him.

“And now you’re in the champions’ trial. Fuck me. He’s going to be gunning for you even harder. That’s funny, and also even more reason to be careful.”

Tom had not expected her to react like this. “Wait, don’t you care about those who have died?”

She stared at him, trying to process what he was saying, and then her mouth made a little ‘O’ of surprise. Before he could do anything, she was sitting down and engulfing him with both of her arms. She was too strong for him to do anything to physically stop it, but he didn’t wriggle and try to escape. The hug was kind of nice.

After a too short minute, she released him. “Care? Of course I care. Arnali, despite the way he chose to get more powerful, was a friend. But do I blame you? Fuck no. Your spooking them into targeting us saved lives.” When he didn’t respond, she gently nudged him. “Hey. Did you really think I’d blame you?”

“Maybe.”

She smiled sadly. “Blame the situation, yes. Blame you? Not one little bit. Fuck, until we’re twenty-five, we’re like gnats in the greater scheme of things. Nothing we can do can make a difference.”

“True.”

“Now, let’s do this.” She pointed down at the detailed information laid out in front of them. It had all of the native’s abilities listed. She was a kind of multiple weapon berserker. “Rank six, and she opens with a blade storm charge. Super fast, re-targetable mid fight. I don’t think you’ve got anything that can counter.”

“Yep. Guaranteed death.” Tom agreed.

She clicked a button, and the next profile came up.

“My lightning will work against him.”

“But can you hurt him fast enough?”

Tom read the armour ratings and base healing rates along with the native’s size. “Hurt him fast enough? Nope. I’m not even convinced I can hurt him.”

“So, dead?” she asked.

“Very much so.”

It wasn’t until the eighth person they checked that there was someone Tom might be able to beat.

“Fragile, susceptible to lightning, uses illusions to get close to destroy the opponent.”

“Yes, I hard-counter it.” It had a general combat rating of eight point seven, and, even with his ability stopping its illusions, Tom’s victory was not guaranteed, as physically it was still a rank four and knew how to use its body.

She laughed. “You don’t look very confident.”

“Well, with it having that many raw attributes, nothing is guaranteed.”

“I’ll give it to you anyway.”

They went to the next one and then worked down the list, getting through a full hundred. Most of the times, the outcome was obvious, but there were a few they needed to debate in detail.

As they ticked off the last one, Corrine turned to look at him seriously. “Do we need to go through more, or do you get my point?”

There had been six that he would have been able to kill. All but one had been susceptible only because of his resistance to mind attacks and illusions. In total, it was well less than ten percent that he had a chance against.

“I understand.”

“And remember, these are from DEUS, and we’re the weakest.”

“Fate should be able to direct it so that I only fight against those I have an advantage against...”

“NO!” she shouted. “No. Fuck no. That’s why both Tan Ru and Sonamoni fucking died. You can’t influence the assigned fights.”

Tom studied her puzzled. “Then how are you doing it?”

“I only use fate to influence whether I should use a GODs shield or not. I bought a random chance generator that creates ones or zeros. When I’m choosing my GOD shield depending on my gut feeling, I trigger it three to six times, but usually more like five. If I see a single zero, I enter with a full shield.”

He really didn’t feel like doing the mathematics, but the percentages of that method seemed too low for how many coins she had earned. “What are those percentages?”

Corrine smiled. “Are you admitting you’re not a genius? Is a little math too hard for you?”

“It’s been a while since I’ve done advanced mathematics at school.” He answered dryly.

“You mean they’re not teaching you stuff like this in your number classes?”

Tom burst out laughing. “We are currently learning to do addition using beans and then counting them.”

She chuckled in reaction to his expression of disgust.  “Three rolls are twelve and a half percent, and five rolls reduces that to three percent.”

“But that’s not consistent with your coin total.” He pointed out.

“Yes, that’s the advantage of fate. I get straight ones a quarter of the time I do the test instead of the eight percent it should be showing.”

Tom whistled, impressed with how she was getting around the buckets being pre-set by the GODs and therefore beyond the ability of fate to influence them by altering probabilities.

“And before I got started, I did the same analysis that you did. Your possible kill rate is five percent. Mine was about twenty.”

Tom shook his head. “No, we both know that is not true. My kill rate is less than five percent. In a real duel to the death, I’m probably losing against half of the people tagged as a win.”

“I ran the same exercise as you.” Corrine reminded him. “But you got worse results, so if you borrow my technique, something which I strongly recommend, you should change it up. Instead of three to five in a row, you should be doing six to nine to reflect your lower chances.”

“I get it.” He stretched out and realised that he had enjoyed the experience much more than he would have if Amkhael had been presenting, even if the start had been less than ideal. “This has been fun, but killing me so many times at the start was a little unhinged, don’t you think?”

“I knew it wouldn’t actually hurt you.” She muttered defensively.

“It was unhinged,” he repeated. “But thank you for taking the time to help me. Being able to be myself and talk to someone frankly is such a relief.”

“Yeah, I fucking loved it too.”