5.9

[Helena's POV]

Standing at the top floor of the Astral Clocktower, I looked over the moonlit city from being the clock. I had actually bought my enhancement, the Vampire Baron, with this mission in mind, knowing we would be spending our time within a world stuck in nighttime.

After all, the Vampire Baron was a powerful enhancement, as it granted me an extremely strong vitality that allowed me to recover from most injuries. I could regenerate a missing limb, for example. One would have to exhaust my Blood Energy to kill me, or destroy my heart where my Blood Energy gathered, or decapitate me, which would stop me from manipulating my Blood Energy to control myself.

This was only one aspect of the enhancement too as I now had a couple of small fangs which I could use to draw someone's blood and not only replenish my Blood Energy, but also absorb a small part of their strength. It was a very small part of their strength, but as my vampire rank increases with enhancements, that would increase too.

I could also turn my fingers into claws, either to attack or to climb walls, and I had an increased strength and speed. Overall, this was a very strong enhancement, and from a battle standpoint, it was even stronger than the C Rank Super Soldier, which was a rank above what I had gotten.

It did have what I considered a fair price however, for all its strength come with weaknesses. The most obvious one is the weakness to the sun. From my experience in the time I bought in The Boys, it doesn't go as far as destroying me from a single glare of the sun, but I estimated that if I stayed for more than a couple hours unprotected from the sun, I would turn into ash.

And even if I didn't stay for that long, if any part of my body was kissed by the sun, then my strength would deplete by 67%, leaving me with only a third of my strength.

Silver also could char my skin, and garlic is best left out of my diet.

Fortunately, I didn't have the ending hunger for blood, as drinking blood only allowed me to replenish my Blood Energy.

One aspect of my transformation was quite bi-dimensional however. Having been turned into an undead, I no longer needed sustenance. In other words, I didn't need to eat food or drink water. I did need to drink blood, but I could feel that I could probably go on for at least a decade without drinking blood before my Blood Energy ran out, if I didn't use it that is.

But while this was certainly an advantage on a strictly pragmatic point of view, it was more of a downside for me. I may not need to eat, but I could do it if I tried. The only problem is that food has turned tasteless.

The world in general had lost a lot of its flavors, actually, and that made me savor my relationships even more.

Did I regret taking that enhancement? Not really, since I have a goal in mind that should erase the disadvantages of the enhancements and enhance the strengths of it. Besides, even if that wasn't the case, more than my life was at stake in this game, and power could only help us.

However, as I said, this did make me hold even more importance to my relationships than before, and so having Mary and Alexander disappear did put me on edge.

Alexander and I didn't know each other very much, since he spent most of the mission in The Boys as a spy within the Seven, and even after that he was the only one to not buy time in The Boys, so we had only interacted for 10 days together.

But even then, Alexander had a special place in our group. Even for the older members of the Team, they had a different relationship with Alexander than with each other. Of course, for Sarah they were lovers, but even for the rest of the team, Alexander wasn't just a teammate, he was the leader always being ahead.

In The Boys, that translated into Alexander going off to fight Homelander, Soldier Boy, Butcher and Queen Maeve, arguably the strongest beings in the world, on his own, while leaving the rest of the team safely behind.

Even after the mission, while we all bought a lot of time in The Boys to train our enhancements, he was already a step ahead and bought time in Skyrim instead, to get magical artefacts. And although Sarah had technically come with him, he had spent much of his time alone, as he always did.

That's because he is one step ahead of everyone in this game.

The oldest member of the team, along with Alexander, Jonathan, coined down several stages for all players: Passiveness, Adaptation, Activeness and Expert.

Passiveness was the first stage any player went through, and that was usually for their first mission. They view the game under the lenses they viewed the world in. That didn't mean one would exactly act as they would in the real world, but rather that one would passively play the game, fighting against the game's odds to survive, hence the name.

Adaptation was when one started becoming more familiar with the rules of the game, and started either changing to play around them, or being changed by them. This either happened after the first mission or during the second, according to Jonathan. That's also when one chooses a path for themselves, an enhancement. That's where I believe Victor to be.

Activeness came next, and was pretty self explanatory. That's when one becomes a real veteran, and fully make use of the rules of the game. I personally am at this stage, along with Mary, because we didn't just blindly get an enhancement that more or less suited us. That was the Adaptation phase. Instead, we took them with clear goals for them. We both took an enhancement that would add something to the Team, and have clearly established paths to enhance our strengths and erase our weaknesses.

Expert was the final stage, and is basically another name for someone who opened the First Genetic Constraint, at least once. Having not opened it myself, I didn't know how it felt, but according to the other veterans, who did open it, it drastically changed one's view of the world, and of the game. It can only be opened in the face of a life and death situation, and drastically changes someone. Or so they say.

But somehow, that didn't apply to Alexander. I remember that assassin who claimed to have taught me Krav-Maga, he despised Alexander for being a normal person having reached power simply for having appeared earlier, not understanding the irony of it.

He thought of himself as someone special because he had some dealings with Prometheus, an organization Mary suspected to actually have the secret plan of training people for this game, but even I, who had spent my entire life in there, am in the end just another player.

Sure, I have some skills, but they can only get you so far. To really play this game, it is all about mentality. And he wasn't anyone special.

Alexander is, however.

At first, I myself was guilty of my pride, coming from my training. I thought the difference in power only came from our time of entry. But then, I learned from the rest of the team that on their first mission, Alexander and Jonathan actually had a veteran themselves, one they suspected to have at least opened the Second Genetic Constraint, and possibly with One for All from My Hero Academia.

Yet, despite being only a normal human with average strength and intelligence, he still managed to kill him and earn himself many Points.

According to Jonathan, that was because Alexander wasn't like the rest of us. He didn't think or act like… well, a normal human.

That's why there has always been a barrier between him and the rest of the team, and that's fine. Because we can't relate to him the same way we do with the others doesn't mean we can't care. That's why, despite our somewhat special relationship, I still care about him missing.

As for Mary… well, she was a sister in everything but blood. Nay, we are closer than most sisters in the world, we were always together. So yes, having those two missing has somewhat put me on edge, and the only way I see to find a solution is to finish this world fast.

Turning around to look at the woman playing dead on the chair, I asked, "How long are you going to play dead for?"