The Systemic Lands

Chapter 16: Day 25 (3) – Tears of Blood

It was late evening, and I began to walk back towards the city. I had managed to get 200 slime crystals despite the slightly later start. It gave me hope the next couple of days would net me much larger hauls.

As I approached the gate, I saw Carlos’s group walk up and face off against a group of eight that included Amber at the front along with her two minions. Someone was busy recruiting all day. I stayed behind a tree and listened in, before making a decision. Information was king.

I also made sure to take off my pack while listening, just in case. I didn’t want to be encumbered in the fight to come.

“You don’t know who you are messing with,” Carlos said.

“I think I do,” Amber replied.

“You really want to risk a fight. We aren’t paying taxes to your council. In fact, you have to pay taxes to me. This is our hunting ground,” Carlos said.

“We were here first,” Amber replied. I couldn’t ask for a better line and I knew who I preferred. I stepped out and people quickly looked over to me. If I had to choose between Carlos and Amber, Carlos won every time. I trusted relationships built on mutual interest far more than emotion.

In the end I had four choices. Join Amber, which wasn’t going to happen since I didn’t trust her. Join Carlos, which was what I preferred at the moment. Do nothing, which would probably lead to both sides wounding each other and just making the winning group weaker and resent me. The fourth option was to kill the survivors after a fight.

That was also a losing choice. I had hoped to get groups invested into getting crystals and upgrading the store for me. I hadn’t expected a confrontation so soon. This was a major reason why I distrusted people, situations could happen outside of my expectations and control.

It was time to step up. There was the fifth choice of mediating a peace, but that would just make both parties resent me as well and I didn’t have the strength to take on both groups. I couldn’t be the thing that united both groups.

“Telling lies now Amber. If anything, I am the first person to find this place and understand the risks,” I gave her my crazy grin as I stepped out from behind the pine tree.

“Ah, Michael. We could use your help. This…man wants us to go away. We need to pool our crystals to help everyone and unlock the store upgrade.” I nodded at that and looked at Carlos.

“Two hundred points.” That was only 50 crystals, but he was decisive. He understood what my presence here meant. I could work with a rational person.

“A bit low, but I will give a first-time discount. Back me up.” I began advancing on Amber.

“Five hundred points,” she countered.

“My word is my bond. I don’t lie and I don’t break my word once I give it. Also, you weren’t strong enough to save Ryan,” she appeared visibly stricken at that and I rushed in. Don’t puke. Act!

My swing blew through her guard and hit her in the shoulder. She let out a cry and stumbled back. I didn’t hear a bone break. Kevin came in swinging at me. I stepped back and the swing went wide. Joe came in from the other side with a wild swing and a shout.

I batted his attack aside with my club. Carlos’ men had already rushed forward and were facing off against the extras Amber had brought with her. I didn’t have time to watch as I batted aside a blow from Kevin. I noted Amber was fighting Carlos to my side.

Joe same in with an overhead swing. I stepped back and raised up my own club. He missed and was out of position. I swung down and hit his head. His skull shattered, brain, and blood splattered about. I winced as Kevin hit me in the side, but the blow didn’t break any ribs. It was a weak blow but still hurt as I staggered a couple of steps from the attack.

“Death!” I screamed and began swinging wildly at Kevin. He wasn’t able to maintain his guard and I hit him in the shoulder. He let out a cry and I hit two more times. He collapsed on the ground. I kicked him in the side, and he curled up.

“Don’t let them escape!” Carlos cried out. I had started a rout. These people weren’t used to death and the momentum was on our side.

I ran forward and hit a fleeing person in the back. They collapsed on the ground, and I kept running forward, managing to catch another person when they stumbled. I looked around and everyone else had been caught and the survivors were being killed.

“I curse you!” Amber said before her face was smashed in by Carlos. He led everyone in a yell of victory which I joined.

“Good work,” Carlos said and walked over to me. My side was sore, but it wasn’t as bad as the time Lucas had hit me thankfully.

We both looked at each other for a long moment, sizing each other up. My heart was beating wildly. The entire fight had lasted under a minute, but I didn’t dare be seen as weak. I gave off my crazy grin.

“No problem. I keep my word,” I said. Carlos gave me a nod and then looked at his men.

“Don’t worry, we will have crystals for you tomorrow.”

“Thank you.” I could have made a point about wanting them today, but there was no need to start a pointless argument. He clearly wanted to confirm his position with a little power play. I was okay with that. All told, 40 crystals were not that important, what was more important was there wouldn’t be trouble from him or his group going forward.

I could put up with being bossed around a bit. That was the role I had accepted for myself, since I was not in charge but a mercenary for hire. Also, the fact I had built up a reputation now as a crazy bastard not to be messed with was cemented. Carlos’ men would talk, and people would leave me alone.

He probably wanted to make a show of giving me crystals. It would have been what I would have done if I were in charge. I went over to Kevin’s and Joe’s bodies. I shook my head. I took a watch off of Kevin and checked their pockets. No lighter or anything else useful.

I then left after getting my pack and made my way back into the city. Carlos’ men gave me looks as I left, but none of them approached me. I found a building to spend the night after making sure I wasn’t followed. Going up to the second floor, I sat down.

I refused to be weak. I wasn’t going to die helpless and afraid. I clenched my hands. I wasn’t going to die. It was either them or me. If I didn’t side with Carlos, he would have been undermined and resented me. I had to kill them, I had to.

Focusing on my breathing, I was quiet, listening like I normally did. There was no one else that I could hear, but one never knew. Death was out there, and I didn’t want to die. Stupid idiots, should have just given in. Did they think they were heroes, or this was a game for real?

It made me want to scream at the unfairness and stupidity of it all, but there was nothing I could do. I had to make choices, many of them bad, and live with the consequences. I never had a body count before coming to this place, and now I was stacking them up like logs.

I wanted to leave this place, but I wasn’t going to hope for something unrealistic. Team up? That was asking for me to put my fate into other people’s hands. That was unacceptable. I was the master of my own destiny, not some idiot.

Back on Earth, I was okay giving up freedoms to the government. There was only so much a single person could do, no matter how capable. Which was also what helped protect people from idiots in politics, at least in the US by spreading power out to a lot of people. Here, it was a completely different story. Might made right.

There was no safety net, no police, nothing. It was a dog-eat-dog world right now, and I didn’t want to be the tiny poodle ripped apart by a bulldog.

The reason I kept thinking about the fight, was because it felt so pointless, and it was to a large extent. The only thing it did was confirm who was in charge, which would be Carlos and not Amber. I would rather deal with a villain and posturing, which was Carlos, than an idealist like Amber.

I could predict Carlos and reason with him. Amber, I could tell that once she got something in her head she wasn’t going to let go. That kind of leader would just invite trouble since compromise was not something that would come easily to them. I had no doubt that Carlos would be terrible, but I would rather be free in hell than a servant in heaven.

It was the past, the decision was made, and I couldn’t go back. I rubbed my face; I was going to get wrinkles with all the worrying I was doing. Time to do something more productive than brood.

I had four watches and began adjusting the time on each of them. I would start tracking both the day and the night as best as I could. That would give me a better idea of how the length of the night and day were changing. I hadn’t been that good with keeping track. The days were getting slightly shorter from what I could tell, but it wasn’t by much. A couple of seconds each day at most, but it was hard to be perfectly accurate just by eying the shadows and sun.

I fell into an uneasy sleep and woke up to a beep from the watch I was wearing, pre-dawn. I stretched and lifted my stinking sweater and shirt. There was a huge bruise on my ribs where Kevin managed to hit me. It was sore, but manageable.

I debated about returning for a restoration, but it wasn’t worth it. My body was a lean mean killing machine now. The 43 upgrades I had in Body were clearly making themselves known. I wished for a health bar or points of some kind, and I was sure it wouldn’t be the last time. I could only shake my head at how that would be too easy.

Leaving the building I spent the night in, I made my way for the gate. There was no one nearby. Not a surprise. I am sure Carlos would get people stationed out here soon enough to collect a slime tax or at the pillars themselves. Probably the pillars since that was easier to manage. I wondered if he would put it at a hard number or a percentage. My personal guess was half of what people collected, but I was prepared to be surprised.

The bodies from yesterday were all gone. That was creepy. No grave, nothing. Whatever smoothed over the things people left behind was quite good at what it did.

Anyone capable of teleportation could easily do matter processing. Heck, having one’s body upgraded in some way wasn’t simple by any means. This made it hard to tell if this really was a simulation or not. I couldn’t make up my mind and hadn’t come up with any kind of definitive test I could perform.

The store imparting information into one’s brain directly was another thing that was creepy. I swore if there was a clown biome or chainsaw biome, I was noping right out of there. Portal to home just past it, nope. This place already set me on edge enough, didn’t need more creepiness added to it.

I found my first slime of the day and quickly killed it. I tossed the crystal into my pack, the movement smooth from all the practice I had gotten farming slime crystals. The soreness on my ribs from yesterday’s fight was annoying but bearable.

I kept up my slime murder throughout the day until I heard people approaching. I killed the slime I was fighting, putting away the crystal and turned towards the people headed towards me. There were three people, none of them part of Carlos’ crew.

He was definitely setting up a tax and forcing the useless bums in plaza to farm crystals. “Oh, hey there,” one of the men said.

“Shut up idiot,” another man hissed at him.

“That’s… that’s guy they were talking about.” They all looked at me.

“Don’t bother me and we won’t have a problem,” was all I said before turning and jogging away.

I ran into one more group that day who quickly backed off. Once I got 200 slime crystals, I began making my way back to the city and to the plaza.

At the gate there were two men. One I recognized from Carlos’ group from before. I nodded at the man. “No tax?” I asked just to confirm.

“That’s Killer.” Looks like I had an edgy new nick name. “No tax for you.”

“What is the tax normally?” I asked.

“Half, rounded up.” I nodded at that, pleased I had been right in my guess, but a bit thrown off that Carlos had put his men out here instead of at the pillars

“Carlos still at the building we talked at yesterday?” I asked.

“He should be there, but we are keeping an eye on things here for now.”

“Good work.” I said and made my way into the city. No need to be rude to the guards. I headed for Carlos’ building. There was a guard out front.

“Boss, Killer is here for you.”

“Send him up.” Carlos called out from the second floor. I made my way up and entered the room Carlos was in. He was standing when I entered and smiled at me.

“My friend Michael, good that you are here.”

“Thank you, Carlos.” He smiled at me.

“Ah, here you go, 40 crystals, so 200 points.” He handed me a pack. I didn’t bother to count it. It wasn’t worth the hassle and the disrespect. If anything, he probably added one or two extra crystals, just to see what I would do. That was what I would do.

“Thank you. Any idea when you are upgrading the store?” I asked.

“In a day or so. Wanted to get a few upgrades first, any suggestions?” He asked. I considered my answer and gave him a look.

He was putting me in a tough position. If I didn’t answer, then that would strain things. If I lied, I would eventually be found out which was worse. I didn’t know that much he wouldn’t be able to easily figure out himself within a couple of days with tax revenue. My tax wasn’t crystals but knowledge.

“For a friend, not a problem. Body has the most obvious impact, increasing one’s strength and health. Mind might make someone think faster and Perception might make someone notice things easier. No idea on Spirt and Aura yet.” Carlos nodded at that. Basically, what someone could work out from the names without details. If he pressed, I would say I wasn’t sure which had the benefit of being true.

It was a calculated risk, but there was no reason to rock the boat here. It wasn’t like it would be that hard to figure out with a bit of testing. Trying to hoard knowledge like that at this point was using a fire extinguisher for a forest fire. The fire was already out there in the wild.

“If you do find out, I am curious.”

“Not a problem for a friend. How many upgrades do you have?” Carlos asked. Now that was a bit too direct.

“Enough to get the nickname Killer,” I replied, and he let out a chuckle.