Kaiser

Involuntarily I let out a scream as I felt the pain of a thousand damned souls. It took me a moment to disengage Gallant's empathy, and only Gamer's Mind kept my mind from cracking under the strain.

Somehow the range of the empathy was much farther than just eighty feet. It was as though the entire town was a single organism fueled by the pain of those it preyed upon.

After turning the empathy off, I found it hard to remember just what I'd felt with it on; apparently the memory of those emotions would be enough to cause me long term problems and my power was protecting me from that.

What else was my power protecting me from? I'd always thought of Gamer's Mind as something that just suppressed my emotions. If it was making me forget, then my mind really wasn't my own.

After a moment, I realized that this was a rabbit's hole that was worthless to pursue. I could let myself get worked up over something that might not even be real, or I could continue moving forward.

I immediately felt better.

I blinked upwards. The last thing I needed was to be attacked by fake Hookwolf while I was still low on hit points. I couldn't see much, but my slightly enhanced hearing could detect the sounds of growls and screams in the distance.

My plan had been to use empathy to find Kaiser quickly. That plan was out the window. My next plan was to follow the monsters; presumably they would be after Kaiser and Cricket, and they would be escalating the same way they had been with me.

With any luck, I'd be able to farm new powers, and that might give me an edge against Lung.

A giant pterodactyl flew out of the fog at me. I easily dodged it, and a far strike was enough to destroy it. I didn't bother to try its blood; it was the same species as the one I had attacked before.

The air raid sirens went off, and I grinned. The better monsters tended to come out after the sirens went off. I had to wonder if I'd created the sirens through my own fear of the Endbringers.

All throughout my childhood, we'd had drills in school about getting to the Endbringer shelters. Businesses did the same thing. Everyone knew where the shelters were in their hometown.

Allowing myself to drop to twenty feet in the air, I began flying slowly through the streets. I needed to upgrade wind riding anyway. The fog was thick enough that I didn't have to worry about distance attacks.

I saw two familiar figures crucified on one of the metal fences. They were Asian, and somehow, they were still alive. It looked as though their bodies had been ripped apart from the waist down, and I could see part of both of their spines.

I floated down to where they could see me.

"It's really too bad you got me to promise not to kill you," I said. "You wouldn't be wall decorations at least."

They moaned, and I saw that their tongues had been ripped out.

I shrugged.

"Maybe you should have convinced your boss not to go after people I cared about."

I left them behind.

At two miles per hour, wind riding wasn't really any faster than walking. By floating ten feet in the air, I was less at risk from random monsters, but I would be able to see them soon enough to react.

After a moment, I could hear the sound of battle in the distance.

With all the fog, I didn't have the line of sight needed to blink very far; that was a problem. I resorted to running up the side of a building, and then running on rooftops and jumping from roof to roof.

I saw a church surrounded by walls of metal; apparently Kaiser had chosen to make his stand there; ironic considering that he didn't seem like a religious man.

The entire place was surrounded by monsters.

Three were at the forefront, sending flying metal weapons at the barriers with enough force that they created holes in the walls which were regenerated just as quickly.

One was an emaciated figure; his skin was an unnatural shade of white the color of bone. Bones erupted from his flesh to shatter against the metal walls. All around him, the other monsters were having bones growing from their flesh.

Was this supposed to be some sort of twisted version of Marquis? I'd heard that he'd murdered Kaiser's sister. Was he a figure of nightmares for Kaiser despite being in the Birdcage?

The second figure was a large figure; at seven feet tall it was almost out of the human norm in terms of size. It had one eye, while the other eye was a ruined mass with a worm with teeth emerging from it.

Its skin was rotting, and the flesh on the side of its face was gone, showing teeth.

Every time it waved, hundreds of metal blades impacted the wall with a force that was strong enough to leave dozens of holes.

The last figure was slimmer; she was sorter than I was, and she had half her skull missing. Tendrils grew from her skull, and I could see growths coming from her skull.

Surrounding them were dozens of dog monsters, nurses and skinless corpses.

The largest figure was the one I wanted. He was generating hundreds of blades all around him in what seemed like an area effect attack. I needed an attack like that.

I blinked down beside him, but the storm of blades hit me over and over.

-10 HP!

-10 HP!

-10 HP!

-10 HP!

-10 HP!

+5% PHYSICAL DAMAGE RESISTANCE!

66% PHYSICAL RESISTANCE

WITH ARMORED SHELL, DAMAGE RESISTANCE IS 99.1%

At my current level of resistance, the blades were doing two hundred points each, and the only reason I wasn't being hit by more was that I was quick even with my Armored Skin.

I touched the figure on the shoulder, and I felt it resisting being inventoried. The resistance didn't last long; just enough time for me to be hit three more times, and then he was gone.

Blinking as far as I could, given the thick fog, I found the nearest building and ran up the side of the building. I raced across the rooftops, ignoring the bodies grasping at me, and the way that they all looked like they'd survived an explosion.

There was no way I could have known about the Deadman's switch, and it had been in a relatively deserted part of town anyway.

Of course, there had probably been Bakuda's victims wandering around, and there might have been homeless people and law enforcement agents.

It was possible that I'd done massive damage to the pipes carrying water and sewage around town, as well as electrical and phone lines.

The more I thought about this, the more the land around me began to change.

I felt the pressure building up and I released the monster.

I'd regenerated all the damage he had done, and the moment he reappeared, I began dancing around hitting him with far strikes. It felt like I was moving through molasses, but the increase in my damage resistance was worth the trade.

The daggers bounced off my shell doing no damage at all, and it was only thirty seconds before I'd killed the thing.

NEW POWER CREATED:

BLADESTORM!

CREATE A CLOUD OF DAGGERS UP TO 25 FOOT IN RADIUS AROUND YOU PER LEVEL. YOU CAN EXCLUDE ANYONE YOU CAN SENSE WITHIN THE STORM FROM ITS AFFECTS, AND YOU CAN CHOOSE TO ATTACK ONLY A SINGLE TARGET.

50 HP/LEVEL/PERSON AFFECTED.

LEVEL ONE

If I'd had a power like this when I was fighting the gangs in the beginning, I'd have finished them off in a few days.

I returned to the church.

The daggers surrounded me in a cloud, and the dogs tried to get to me. I ignored them, and their teeth broke against my metal skin.

The female monster sent a storm of metal in my direction, and I practiced using my new power to parry hers.

The dogs were falling around me, and so were the other monsters. I ignored them, focusing on the two boss monsters remaining.

Killing the female monster was easy. I let my metal stab at her, while I used far strike.

BLADESTORM HAS LEVELED UP!

+4 LEVELS!

NOW 250 POINTS PER PERSON AFFECTED!

LEVEL 5

NEW CONDITION!

BONED!

-25 HIT POINTS PER 4 SECONDS.

IGNORES PHYSICAL RESISTANCE IN CREATURES WITH BONES.

I could see bones erupting from my skin. That was weird because I wasn't even sure I had bones.

This wasn't something I could survive for long. If this ignored physical resistance, then keeping Armored Shell wouldn't do me much good.

I dropped it, and blinked next to the monster. The world finally felt amazing again, everything around me moving in slow motion.

I touched him, and then I blinked away as quickly as I could. The boned condition continued.

REGENERATION HAS LEVELED UP!

8 HP PER FOUR SECONDS

NOW LEVEL 8

I pulled the last of my candy bars from inventory and ate it. I began eating everything I could, but I barely managed to keep up.

The only way to end this was to finish the thing generating it, even within my inventory.

I recreated it fifty feet in the air, and had it fall through my blade storm. I blasted it with my far strike even as it hit the ground.

It was a corpse, and I was still getting damaged.

REGENERATION HAS LEVELED UP TO LEVEL 9!

9 HP PER 4 SECONDS!

I had to stay alive until my regeneration matched the damage that was being done.

I sat on a rooftop and I ate frantically. I didn't get full like a normal person would, but I was running through food rapidly, and I was suddenly regretting the pizzas I'd given the people on the zombie world.

REGENERATION HAS REACHED LEVEL 12!

12 HP PER 4 SECONDS.

It had been almost five minutes, and my regeneration gains were slowing. However, once the five-minute mark hit, the growing bone spikes on my arms fell off, leaving unblemished skin.

CONDITION BONED HAS ENDED.

I let myself rest and recuperate for a couple of minutes. It was a lesson that I could not allow myself to forget; there were capes out there with powers that would sidestep my defenses, and there wasn't anything I could do about it.

RESISTANCE TO BONE BASED ATTACKS IS NOW 15%! STACKS WITH PHYSICAL RESISTANCE UNLESS PHYSICAL RESISTANCE IS SIDESTEPPED.

I flitted down to the remains of the monster. No power was too inconsequential to try to gain.

NEW POWER GAINED!

BONE GARDEN!

TURN ENEMIES INTO THE BOUQUET OF BONES YOU ALWAYS WANTED.

CAUSES 50 POINTS OF DAMAGE PER LEVEL IN A 100 FOOT PER LEVEL RADIUS TO ANY CREATURE WITH BONES. YOU MAY EXCLUDE INDIVIDUALS YOU CAN SENSE.

LEVEL1

Somehow, I wasn't sure how useful the bone resistance would be It didn't seem like the kind of thing that would come up very often. Of course, I hadn't really been expecting bone-based attacks in the first place, so what did I know.

At least Kaiser and Cricket were known qualities. However, having an effect that would bypass damage resistance would be incredibly useful.

I returned to the church, and I saw that there was a new crop of creatures that I had already met before standing outside the metal wall.

Sending my eye through, I blinked through the metal dome that covered the building. Inside there was the church that I'd seen in the distance during my previous expedition here, and there was a cemetery covered in Christian crosses. The building and cemetery were both on a hill.

I didn't recognize the symbol on the door, though.

I could hear the sound of chanting inside; above that, I could hear the sounds of Kaiser's voice.

"The darkness has ceased knocking at our door!" I heard him shout out. "It is proof that I am here to lead you all to salvation!"

What?

I sent my eye inside, hovering it close to the ceiling where it was less likely to be noticed.

There were a long row of candle lit pews leading to a circular area with a large painting of the symbol I'd seen on the door outside.

A giant painting of a woman being burned alive filled the wall on the opposite end. It didn't seem like the kind of thing that belonged in a church, especially as it rose two stories.

There was a second floor with a small balcony level and an organ.

Kaiser was standing on that balcony, preaching down to the dozen or so worshippers down below. I was sitting next to a window, and my enhanced hearing could hear his booming voice.

I moved my eye, and I froze as I saw what was directly below me. They'd set up a fire pit, and they were roasting Cricket on a spit; she still had the metal cage on her head.

Had Kaiser allowed her to be sacrificed to save his own skin, or had the cultists kidnapped her and he'd tracked her down and discovered it was too late?

"I will lead you out of this hell on earth!" he shouted, "And I will lead you to the promised land!"

"We will never be released until the devil child is dealt with!" a woman in robes shouted.

"Let me heal," he said, "And I will lead you against any foe! We will be triumphant if we work together!"

The oppressive aura that covered the outside didn't seem to exist inside the church? Was it a sanctuary of some sort?

Did Kaiser suspect that the effect was generated by one of the cultists? That might make him afraid to kill any of them, for fear of losing that sanctuary.

There were eight figures pressed up against the front door. They looked like salt outcroppings as much as anything, with jagged spikes pointing everywhere and little of the remaining body left behind.

I blinked behind Kaiser, and then touched him, inventorying him.

"I've got a feeling that the whole lot of you belong right where you are," I said, nodding toward the burned corpse with the metal cage on her head.

"She had to be cleansed of the filth that had infected her!" the woman shouted.

I blinked to stand in the middle of the group, and a moment later every one of them had a dozen daggers pointed directly at them, floating sedately in the air.

"I'd have just sent her on her way," I said. "You people are crazy."

Using my eyeball, I blinked straight up, past the ends of the dome, blinking short hops upward as quickly as I could within the limits of my line of sight given the fog.

Although I flew higher and higher, I never rose above the fog. I must have risen a thousand feet into the air before I had to release Kaiser.

"Miss Hebert," he said calmly as I held him up with one hand. I was using mage hand to make him lighter, otherwise I might not have been able to do it without my arm shaking. His armor was heavy.

He could create metal from surfaces; here in the air, he was at his very worst. I began rising at two miles an hour even as we talked.

"So, you know my name now," I said. "I suppose you regret killing my father."

"That wasn't supposed to happen," he said. "People were going to be suspicious of any new hires immediately after the old one disappeared under suspicious circumstances. It would have been much better to have suborned your father."

"And so, you sent a group of murderers and rapists to kill the best man I ever knew," I said.

"I'm afraid Hookwolf was responsible for selecting the crew. Had I known that you would be so…dogged, I would have chosen differently."

He was trying to talk his way out of this.

"There's less than a hundred of your organization left," I said. "Hookwolf is your only cape."

"Did you kill Purity?" he asked, his eyes widening.

"Her apartment is nice," I said. "High rise, good for flying. Not as good for a woman with a baby and a stepchild."

I hadn't killed Purity, of course.

She'd left the Empire, and had made a public declaration that she wanted to be a hero. My counter had gone down, so I'd keep a cautious eye on her.

My folder on her suggested that she hadn't been involved in the day to day running of the organization since six months into her pregnancy, long before Dad had been killed.

A monstrous spike shot from his breastplate and into my chest.

-100 HP!

+1% PHYSICAL RESISTANCE!

I hadn't reactivated Armored Shell, which was maybe a mistake. I was out of food.

Grabbing his breastplate, I inventoried it. I did the same to his helmet.

I didn't allow him to see that he'd injured me at all. Instead I let go of him.

Letting myself fall, I activated my Bone Garden power. He screamed in agony as bones erupted underneath his skin.

"Ironic, isn't it?" I said. "Killed by the power of Marquis, the man who killed your sister. Marquis wouldn't have killed my father. He wasn't an idiot."

He closed his eyes; bones were already growing around his face. Before he could react, I lashed out, punching him in the nose.

There was blood on my hands.

"I'm going to destroy everything your father created, every friend you have. If you hadn't attacked my father, you'd still be at the top of your game. Now…you're just dust and bones."

BLADESTORM HAS LEVELED UP!

+4 LEVELS!

450 POINTS PER PERSON!

225 FOOT RADIUS!

LEVEL 9

Finally!

I had what I needed to get the Protectorate off my back, and Bone garden and Bladestorm together might be enough to kill Lung, or at least Hookwolf.

The human sized flower of bones that had been Kaiser shattered on top of the metal dome covering the church. I blinked away moments before I would have hit the dome.

I spent a moment wondering how the cultists would get out, then I shrugged to myself/

It was none of my concern.