The Cost Of Power

The native humans were shocked, in the past whenever someone obtained a soul stone they would keep it for themselves and sell it for a large sum of money. Afterall these stones were valuable and could earn you thousands of salvation coins, the currency most used in the post-apocalyptic world.

Despite the chaos the growing threat of the zombies and beasts that had been progressively getting far worse over the last hundred years there were now strong alliances and fortress cities that could resist humanities annihilation.

Hundreds of these fortress cities exist worldwide, each with a minimum of a tier-7 expert who serves as the cities controller, and each fortress issuing currency in the form that's become collectively to be called salvation coins for without the coins you are without salvation.

Though not ever Mutant beast or zombie has a gem in it's body.

Which raises the value of a Tier-2 gem even further.

a tier two when sold in the city could be worth 10,000 Sal

That was enough money that the team could not hope to earn in an entire year of hunting.

Such a precious item was actually non-chalantly given to a subordinate by that man?

Everyone knows the best way to use a soul gem was to slowly absorb it to avoid wasting it. If one consumed it all at once as Alpha had the body's absorption rate would decrease was this man a fool or did they not care about a soul gem of this rank?

Jake meanwhile was unaware of what they were thinking he was too busy watching Alpha whose body trembled slightly after ingesting the gem, while the exposed skin on his face and neck broke out in a sweat.

The support system informed this was a normal reaction when an soul gem entered a body and released the energy contained within.

Most people would apparently explode if they tried eating it all at once, only he and his RA soldiers could do this as their absorption efficiency was apparently perfect so any released energy could be absorbed without letting any of it be free to rampage around inside of their bodies.

Suddenly there was a simple grunt and Alpha's eyes shot open wide. Meanwhile his aura or presence felt even stronger than before.

"Alpha greets the commander!" <Alpha >

Having come back to his senses Alpha saluted Jake.

Apparently this was something to signal the completion of a rank up according to the system support, a simple gesture to show that they were completely different than before.

"Not bad." <Jake >

Thanks to his RA system he could see each of his units status and after checking it over he concluded that Alpha was now many times stronger than the other Peak tier 1's since even if 5 of his soldiers attacked Alpha he'd easily win.

That was the difference and gap between tier 1 and 2.

Sarah and her companions off the the side couldn't believe their eyes however.

The person who'd consumed the gem whole had not experienced any side affected but actually broke through and became an entity of the 2nd tier.

Meanwhile within a few minutes the Mutant dog had be thourghoutly dismantled each useful part of it had been preserved while any waste was properly disposed of.

Bravo returned to inform the commander that their mission had been completed while the other soldier joined the others in moving the spoils into easy to manage piles.

Jake just nodded their was not question about the loyalty of the RA soldiers. When Bravo said the mission was completed it meant the hostile man from before had been dealt with... permanently such that not even a body could be found as evidence to their actions.

Sarah and her group stood there watching on in silence, thinking that their saviours would at least say something to them, but the group collected up a majority of the beasts spoils before starting to set off.

They killed the beast and were leaving just like that?

"Hey, wait a minute." <Sarah >

Jake paused his steps and turned half around to look back at Sarah.

"What's the matter we left you a cut for your efforts?" <Jake >

Her face became hot with rage. Here she was a beautiful woman in her prime one who'd gotten offers from top officials and men in the outpost and city to be their companion at night but this man was about to leave without saying a word. Where was she supposed to put her face she was so proud of.

"You saved us just now. Can you at least give us a chance to repay you? I... we are not so ungrateful as to not reward you for your actions." <Sarah >

"Okay." <Jake >

Sarah just about spat out blood. Why was this man so indifferent? Was he really a man at all to ignore her beauty and sex appeal?

Seeing Sarah's frustrated expression Jake knew that he couldn't continue to pretend. the Protag fate thing was pushing hard to make these two meet, and as much as he tried to play cat and mouse against it, it seemed the world would not let their meeting go at that.

"Okay, it's up to you." <Jake >

Her face lit up with a charming smile, leaving her remaining two teammates stunned. Was this really their boss? The woman who'd turned down 100 men, they had never seen her smile like this before.

"Uh-oh this person caught the attention of our boss"

The young man behind her said out just loud enough for Jake to hear from afar while offering up a pitying look.

In the ensuing discussions it was revealed they were from Outpost 7 located about an hour away from the city, which was a forward operating base for resource gathering and for common people to live since the fortress cities had limited space and priorities those who had broken through and become tier'd beings.

Having little other choice Jake and his men agreed to accompany Sarah and her team back to the outpost where they could reward them with drinks for their help.

They also could sell the beast parts for Salvation coin at least for the part they weren't planning to use themselves.

As they walked on the conversations eventually died out and Jake began once more conversing with his system support to learn more about his system.

learning he could get an overview by chanting Status aloud or in his head.

[ Name: Jake Cross ]

[ System Level 1 ]

[ Credits: 0 ]

[ Energy: 0 ]

[ Total Support Units: 0 ]

[ Total Army Units: 9 ]

However when he questioned about his system level all he was able to learn was that the System level would eventually rise, but could not find what the maximum level of his system was, or if when it increased he'd access the other games or just more within RA itself.

For example maybe he was limited to only building the Tier 1 buildings within the game such as the starter MCV barracks and ore refinery, while other buildings would be locked till he leveled up.

At least one this was learned to be good, and that is that his own personal strength was the same as his highest tiered unit so in this case he was also a Tier-2 transcendent just like Alpha however apparently thanks the the system support his own aura was being suppressed so that everyone around him would think he was only a regular human and not a superhuman.