The Law of the Land Below

"Every week a blood-red moon rises up above Purgatory's night sky, every month a moon blue rises and once a year a green moon will rise...."

He leaned forward and lowered his voice to a conspiratory tone.

"... There are rumours about this, but supposedly a black moon will rise once a decade."

He went back to his original posture before continuing.

"Every time these moons rise above the sky, disaster strikes. You can either choose to stay behind and fight the ... creatures ... or you can take part in the trials."

"These trials will transport you to alternate dimensions and fragments of reality where you will need to clear the given mission to be able to return."

"and unlike the tutorial... death is permanent."

"The difficulty level of the trials and the strength of the creatures of the dark are both closely related to the colour of the moon."

"Completing the tutorials will you give you rewards beyond your imagination and they are your only ticket to levelling up and growing strong quickly."

"The rewards, of course, are equally proportional to the dangers you would need to face."

"To the weak, the rise of the moon is a sign of calamity, but to the strong, it's an opportunity to grow further."

[Quest 1: Please ask the senior members of your hamlet for advice! (1/3 Complete!)]

The chief paused for a moment to give everyone time to recover from the sudden notification.

Unlike before when Purgatory used blood to write on random surfaces, it had chosen to blare a robotic voice into the sinners' ears.

"The voice that you just heard is part of the Purgatory System that has now been bound to you."

"You can figure out how the system works on your own later."

"The next thing that I will tell you about is the quests."

His voice deepened in tone.

It was clear that this was a topic of even more importance than the trials.

"Unlike the trials in which participants are invited as groups, quests are something that the system personalizes for each and every one of us."

"The quests you receive might complement those of another, alternatively it might directly contradict that of another sinner."

The man raised his hands skywards as a zealous gleam started to sparkle within his eyes.

"Fret Not! Purgatory can see everything!"

His voice suddenly rose by a few octaves as he started to spew out what he truly thought must be gospel.

"Each and every one of us is a part of its grand design. The fact that I am here explaining how this world works to you is also because of another quest."

"The quests all work for your benefit, they will lead you towards the traits and cores suitable for you, and they will push you towards growing stronger and increasing the synchronization rates of the traits that you already have."

His grin grew twisted and deranged as all signs of being a kind grandpa left his figure.

"The quests are divine commandments meant to lead us all to become the best versions of ourselves."

He was like a crazy zealot lost in worshipping a false god.

Quests?

Divine Commandments?

What Bullshit!

Sebastian couldn't help but feel sick at the sound of it.

Why did everything sound so familiar?

Being forced through horrendous situations all for 'his own good'.

The twisted nature of Purgatory had once again bared its fangs.

If even for a second he might have thought that his place might not be as bad as the tutorial, that thought had just been thoroughly purged from his mind.

He was still just a pawn in someone's grand plan.

Nothing but a cog in the well-oiled machine called Purgatory.

It didn't even matter what he wanted.

It was Purgatory's vision that truly mattered.

He was sure that even if he actively avoided all quests, the quests of others would sooner or later push him onto the path that Purgatory had laid out for him.

And that thought...

...made Sebastian sick to the bones.

[Quest 1: Please ask the senior members of your hamlet for advice! (2/3 Complete!)]

The man lowered his hands and picked up his cane once again.

He tapped it on the ground and schooled his expression back into a neutral one.

"The last thing that I will tell you about is the ability system in use in this place."

"Purgatory gives everyone who comes into purgatory something called a 'Primary Core'. This is based on the murder weapon that you favoured the most during your life. In case you only killed once, it is the weapon that you used."

"Keep in mind that the primary core has been condensed using your soul. If someone else gets their hands on it and destroys it..."

The man made a throat-slicing gesture.

"... you get destroyed with it."

Seb looked down at the M1911 in his hand with profound horror in his eyes.

His soul had been... ripped apart from his body... and turned into a murder weapon!

It felt ... so wrong.

It was like a part of him had been forcibly changed forever without his consent.

The gun in his hand didn't give him the same sense of solace that it gave before.

It only reminded him of the horrors that Purgatory was capable of.

Yet... he couldn't loosen his grasp on it at all.

After all, he was literally holding his life within his hands.

"The Primary core and in fact all cores run on something called 'Raw Core Essence' or 'Reiki' for short."

"The Cores can naturally recover the Reiki consumed by them while using abilities"

"However in order to level up the core you need to increase the upper limit of Reiki by actively acquiring it from external sources."

"There are three ways to acquire Reiki."

"The first and most effective way is the reward given by Purgatory for completing Trials and Quests."

"The second and least effective way is to sense the reiki in your surroundings and actively send it to the core. Not to mention impractical, most people cannot even directly sense reiki until they reach level 30."

"The final way and the most commonly used way... is to KILL!"

"Plunder the Reiki from the cores of the enemies you slay and use it to directly level up your core!"

"Whenever you kill someone their primary core gets degraded to a secondary core."

"Every sinner can fuse with up to 2 secondary cores."

"Make sure you choose wisely though, you cannot undo a fusion with a secondary core."

The twisted grin came back onto the old man's face.

It was like the blooming of a rotten flower.

The man once again leaned forward and spoke with a conspiratory voice.

"Do you know what's the best part about killing others?"

His voice seemed to edge the listeners on.

Keeping them glued to it.

Awaiting his next words.

"They drop all of their TRAITS!"

The man laughed crazily after making his announcement.

He pranced around his cane as if he had just made the revelation of the century.

He soon paused when he realized that he didn't get the reaction that he thought he would.

His eyes squinted dangerously before widening in realization as he slammed a palm on his forehead.

"AH! Look at me! I have gotten so old that I completely forgot to tell you about what traits are!"

"You see kids... if Reiki is the fuel used for all supernatural abilities, your traits are the source of all supernatural power that you possess."

"Your cores are nothing but a fulcrum used to burn reiki and stimulate the power of your traits to execute 'skills' that you can use."

"The higher the rank of your trait, the greater the quantity and quality of your skills!"

He pointed his cane toward the newbies while smiling sinisterly.

"Remember Kids~ If you ever see someone using a trait that you think is useful... KILL THEM AND TAKE IT!!!"

*COUGH!* *COUGH!*

"AHEM!"

The man cleared his throat and slammed his cane twice onto the ground before continuing.

"Looks like I got distracted..."

"What's left now?"

"Yeah, so every time you level up, you will be given free stat points that you can assign at will. There are stats that belong to your body and stats that belong to the abilities of the core."

"Since your existence is linked with the primary core, its level is the same as the level of your existence."

"Other than Primary and Secondary Cores, we also have Tertiary Cores. Since they cannot level up at all and only give you a predetermined set of abilities we just call them artifacts."

"Unlike Secondary cores, you can fuse with and unequip these cores at will."

"Just remember not to equip more than 5 of them at the same time... stuff like that can cause your body to break down."

"..."

"Hmm... other than your primary trait, you can attach and remove traits to your cores at will. Primary cores can hold a maximum of 10 traits, Secondary Cores can hold up to 7 while tertiary cores... can hold up to 3."

[Quest 1: Please ask the senior members of your hamlet for advice! (3/3 Complete!)]

[Congratulations on completing your first quest!]

[You have received the following rewards:-]

[+5 Free Stat Points]

[+25 Reiki Units]

The old man also had a satisfied smile on his face as his personal quest was also just completed.

His expression was full of bliss as if he had indeed just completed a divine commandment.

"Now that the introduction has been done, please make your way to the guest shacks. Just follow me."

The man started walking and the other residents of the hamlet also cleared the way in order to let the newcomers in.

Sebastian looked at the people around him once again before quietly following behind the hamlet chief.

The Hamlet was pretty small, but that was to be expected, considering that it could only house a population of up to 50 people.

The hamlet was arranged like a huge cross, with a communal ground in the middle and entrances on all four sides.

Each of the four 'wings' had around 10 shacks with another 10 at the central square.

They were led through the square to the 'wing' directly opposite the one they had come from.

The man came to a stop in front of 5 shacks that were placed a little further apart from the others in the entire hamlet.

"Please make yourselves at home and enjoy your week of immunity before your first trial."

"Get to know your neighbours and don't break any of the rules!"

"Once again, welcome to your new home!"

The man left the 5 of them to their own devices heading back towards the central square.

After making sure that the village chief had truly left, Sebastian randomly picked one of the shacks and entered it without staying behind to communicate with the others who had come with him.

He had a lot on his mind...

He needed to be alone.