13 Retreat
I could feel it in the distance. The creature was the stuff of nightmares. I'd looked but it hadn't looked back. If it had looked back, I'd be dead or worse. That thing was beyond me. The power I'd gained was nothing compared to what that creature would be in a short amount of time. It had been contained. Before it had been dormant. By opening the door, I gave it the opportunity to nourish itself. How far did its legions already stretch? How aware was it now?
If I did nothing they'd expand indefinitely. Would the Illithid empire even care? I knew the answer to that. If I was an outlier among darklings then Gwen was one among Mind Flayers. They wouldn't lift a finger. If anything, they'd enjoy the new real estate.
Kem held out her hand offering a strip of rat jerky to me. "You have to eat to. I heard ranking up was taxing on the body." Kem said.
I took the tiny scrap of meat between two clawed fingers. My nails were metallic silver and pointed. I felt a charge run between them like pylons. Raising the meat to my mouth, I sniffed it. My nose felt a bit pointier than normal, I opened my mouth and felt two rows of interlocking teeth click open, and I tossed the chunk of meat in my mouth. I tasted the meat and felt unsatisfied. The salty taste wasn't the problem, there was something missing. Something else smelled much better. I stared down at the gobling. She took a step back.
A soft aroma of terror and stress made my mouth water. The desire to drain the gobling dry and devour her flesh teased my senses. Was I eating allies now? No, not yet if I wanted to use them as food, I'd have eaten them already. So, I turned my attention to the other side of the room.
She let out a uncomfortable sigh. "For a moment there, I thought you were going to eat me." For a moment, I thought I would too.
Kor put his knife away under my watchful gaze and approached me. "We need to get across and get some food to Tol. Then we run." Kor said.
I looked to the two goblings who survived Gwen's massacre. "The zombies have grown smarter we're low on time. I don't know if I can carry three of you to safety." I said.
Kor glared and bared his tusks. "We won't leave Tol and I won't let you leave with your wings intact. I won't abide a Darkling to fly free while good goblings die." Was this where I killed them? Their deaths here wouldn't be useful.
I turned my gaze to the shooting blind in the creature's direction. "The creature's eye has opened; it might be too late to run at all." Green light from the monster lit the small guard house. It was a powerful statement by itself. The threat was easier to see than before. "They aren't dumb zombies anymore." The guard tower rocked.
Across the other tower began to shake. Below the green zombies were hard at work dismantling the guard tower's legs. They were faster than I'd ever thought they could be. Dozens of them moved like a well-oiled machine. A harmony existed between them impossible for normal humans. They were less bodies and more machines under the command of an AI.
The irony wasn't lost on me. It was the difference between a general AI and a system AI like me. My purpose was much simpler than a general AI. I helped my host. That meant, I helped myself. A general AI had vastly more freedom. They are often sculpted after human minds and possess the organic dominance instinct. I was a former human pushed in an AI role while this creature was a hivemind.
My new brain didn't need my AI processing power to run scenarios and predict outcomes and timetables. The goblings built these towers to be sabotage proof. There were redundancies on top of redundancies. No, even this strange hivemind couldn't dismantle them quickly. 15 minutes by my calculations until both towers fell. That was an agonizingly long amount of time.
"I'll take you one at a time to a safe place. If I'm careful in my flight path, I can use the guard towers to hide myself from the creature." I said. The guard house shook.
"Fine take Kem and hurry back. If you screw me, I'll survive to make you pay." Kor said. I nodded and snatched up the green gobling girl.
I ran leapt through the open archer blind and unfurled my wings. Aura flowed to my wings and I flapped feeling my wings catch the air. I glided to a familiar desk. After a tucking her away in the metal cover, I turned to get the other two.
Kem ran forward and hugged me. "Thank you. Please save them too." I turned and nodded. My wings unfurled and I leapt into the air. It was so easy to fly when I wasn't holding someone. I made it back to the guard house in record time and grabbed Kor.
The guard towers began to sag already. My calculations had been off. It seemed the zombies were getting better as they worked. I wasn't dumb enough to believe they couldn't see me. It was possible their eyes didn't work. There was no way I was that lucky.
I dropped Kor in the desk with Kem and leapt off the ground. Flying was so freeing. The air rushed against my face and the zone began to come on. I made it back to the original guard house.
Tol smashed me in the ribs with the flail. "I told you, if I'm going to die then I'm taking you with me." Tol said.
I gripped my side and dodged another swing. While it hurt like hell a starved gobling couldn't swing with much force. "Your friends are safe you idiot. They're waiting on us. Are you going to die for no reason?"
A crazed look appeared in the gobling's eyes. There was a vacancy in his eyes like a corpse. "You butchered them; I saw it."
I felt a breeze behind me and knew the shooter blind was open. In Tol's eyes, I saw the creature looking back at me. I picked up a chair and broke it over the gobling's face. He fell like a sack of used dildos but was alive. I picked up the flail and leapt out from the other archer's bling.
The eye had seen my back and the creature might know I knew not to look at it.
Kem emerged from cover when I returned. "Tol! What happened to him?" Kem asked.
Ping!
Quest Completed: Escape with the three Goblings
Rewarded: Increased Trust from Goblings, +3END
Endurance 10
Ping!
Quest: Regroup to Safehouse
Reward: +2 INT +2 PER
Quest: Quick Regroup Reach Safehouse in 15minutes
Reward: +3 AGL
Ping!
Quest: Thin Herd I Kill 10 Zombies 1 Special Zombie
Reward: +1INT
Ping!
Quest: Thin Herd II Kill 50 Zombies 5 Special zombies 1 Fusion Zombie
Reward: +5INT
Ping!
Quest: Thin Herd III Kill 100 Zombies 10 Special Zombies 2Fusion Zombies
Reward: +10INT
Ping!
Quest: Thin Herd IV Kill 500 Zombies 50 Special Zombies 10 Fusion Zombie 1 Blessed Zombie
Reward: +50INT
Ping!
Quest: Thin Herd I Kill 1000 to all Zombies 100 Special Zombies 20 Fusion Zombies 2 Blessed Zombies
Reward: +100INT
Ping!
Quest: Slay Blessed Ancestor
Reward: +100 INT + 100 PER
These quests weren't a good thing. On the bright side, when I attacked most of them will probably return. That was it as far as bright sides are concerned. This kind of quest was the equivalent of an event. I had limited time and if I won there were massive rewards. If I ignored it and flew around this obstacle something else might take care of it. Would another 200INT even matter against Dol? That guy was a genius who invented a rank up spell with hardly any resources.
We made a skid for Tol and Kem chose to pull it. Kor stood next to me the flail gripped tightly in his hands. "I don't like this; how do we know your safehouse isn't crawling with them?" Kor asked.
"I have it on good authority that spiderlings were made to deal with this kind of threat. My spiderling friend won't let us down. Come on and keep them off of your friends."
For the first few minutes we were left in silence. Only the sound of the skid passing over junk signaled our passage. I raise my hand signaling the others to stop. The toxic scent of the undead was thick just in front of us. "Black Lighting Javelin," I said and stabbed my weapon down. The ground vanished revealing a green creature in a hole.
I blinked once the twice as the creature melted from dark and gyrated form shock damage. Its head was a mass of hooked tentacles covered in saw like bones. A single yellow puss covered eye looked up at me from the creature's chest.
"Have you seen the yellow eye?" A voice whispered. Several presences appeared at the edge of my senses.
"Have you seen the yellow eye?" They asked. Like berserkers they charged. I directed my javelin towards one and it shot across skewering him.
I sent another javelin out skewering another, then I drew my knife. It flung its tentacles at me. Its hooked appendages nearly took hold of my face. I stabbed true and pierced the eye in its chest. Horrible puss oozed down my hand and the creature clawed at me with its atrophied stick like hands. I'd learned from the rat.
Under the arms held just the joints I wanted to cut. One after the other the arms fell limply to the monster's side. I grabbed a handful of tentacles. "Black Series Static Parade," powerful darkness shrouded my left hand before pouring into the creature. Its flesh began to rapidly decay before it lost control of its motor functions.
Ping!
Level Up
Jacob lvl1 Black Sol Imp
+30 HP and AP
+3 to all stats.
Just as the corpse fell and I felt my power grow, I heard barking.
